Session 12: The Shroud Takes Rivalis
At a glance
- In-game date: Immediately after Vermoth’s ambush through the following day
- Starting location: Road south of Martira Bay
- Ending location: Rivalis City Hall
- Characters present: Ignatius, Rage, and Carver
Summary
The road south began with another desecration. Rage cut one ear from Vermoth and each of his two pale thralls, adding all three to the trophies at his neck. He hacked at the corpses while Carver directed Chip to burn away what remained. Crows watched from above as smoke rose over the roadside.
Ignatius took the reins with Carver beside him and Rage resting in the coach. They followed the red star south toward Castle Avernus, and Carver used healing magic to ease Rage’s wounds. Before long, the grasses began to stamp and rustle on every side. Rotten arms and heads pushed up from the earth until a mass of walking corpses blocked the road.
Rage answered with a rallying cry and a thunderous wave that knocked the lesser dead from their feet. One larger corpse wielded a severed arm as a club and spoke a supernatural command that forced Rage to drop his drums. It failed to strike him with the grisly weapon but tore a bite from his arm. Carver’s chromatic orb went wide; Chip’s blast struck the commanding corpse with crushing force.
Rage discovers that music can strike as hard as an axe. See the image record.
Ignatius chose speed over slaughter. He drove the horses directly through the dead. Rage threw himself aside, caught the coach as it passed, and clung to its flank while Carver climbed aboard. The undead gave chase. A beautifully dressed figure emerged among them, robes glinting with embroidery. The corpse hurled its severed-arm weapon and the stranger cast after the fleeing coach, but both fell short. Then the robed spellcaster became a bat and flew north toward Martira Bay.
The party chooses momentum over a battle of attrition. See the image record.
The party escaped into a well-kept forest road. Dusk gathered, and with it came the Mists. All three faced the approaching Shroud without yielding to fear. Rage smashed the coach’s hitch so they could move faster. The party saved its critical equipment in Carver’s Bag of Holding, abandoned the coach, and rode south on the two horses.
The Mists followed.
After a desperate gallop through pitch darkness, a mangled man stumbled from the south, screaming that wolves had attacked him. His wounds looked consistent with an animal assault. Rage stopped him with a hurled handaxe and threats while Carver stabilized him and raised a Silent Sanctum around the meeting. The stranger was a farmer driven from his land and knew of no nearby refuge.
Rage’s fear supplied its own answer. Convinced that wolf wounds might carry lycanthropy, he abruptly chopped off the farmer’s injured forearm. The others mastered their horror. The terrified man endured, and Rage lifted him onto a horse before the party continued south.
Fear supplies a brutal answer before evidence can. See the image record.
A wolf howled somewhere behind them. They passed a silent cart whose fire had recently burned itself out, then broke from the trees into the farmlands around Rivalis. Ahead, the town they remembered was vanishing. The Shroud had pushed over its boundaries and swallowed whole streets.
Mist engulfed the riders. Dark shapes grasped from within it. Ignatius charged toward a chittering sound and met a skeletal rider mounted upon a skeletal horse. He dipped one hand into his prepared pouches, empowered it with harmful compounds, and drove a flying elbow through the horse before smashing the rider’s skull against the ground.
A second horror emerged: a hulking skeleton with bone-like horns and a massive club. Carver wounded it with radiant force. Rage charged and buried his greataxe deep, but the creature’s return swing missed him. Ignatius stepped into its reach and hammered its midsection with a flurry of blows. Carver struck again, then unleashed Chip’s Force Ballista. The spectral blast obliterated the creature’s shoulder and dropped it into the mist.
The party fights shapes of bone within the engulfing Mists. See the image record.
Ignatius mounted, seized Carver by the scruff, and drove forward. The Mists thinned as they reached open farmland and crossed into Rivalis proper. Much of the town was already gone behind a shimmering white curtain: the Coachman’s Rest, Traveler’s End, and half the Crystal Gardens lay within the Shroud.
The road returns the party to a town being erased. See the image record.
The first visible light belonged to a halfling couple already dressed for bed. The party pounded at their door, frantically explained, and pushed into a house built for smaller folk. Rage paid four gold pieces for the intrusion while Carver repaired the ornaments broken in their entry. They survived the night under the halflings’ roof.
Morning did not restore the town. When Rage demanded breakfast for his payment, the couple shoved him outside and barred the door. The wounded farmer introduced himself as Buddy. He believed he could find his way home. Carver’s magical examination found no enchantment or supernatural affliction upon him, though the artificer sensed deep rot within the surrounding ground. Buddy left for his farm, missing an arm because Rage’s fear had arrived before any proof.
Refugees now crowded the ground beyond the Mists. The party headed toward the government center and met Garen Faulk leading armored defenders out of the Shroud. Garen no longer spoke of merely defending Rivalis: the town was doomed, and its people would eventually have to leave. He intended to remain and fight. Ignatius suggested that Castle Avernus might hold answers capable of helping Rivalis, and Garen allowed that it might.
One dwarven defender spoke of miner cousins in the mountains near the castle. Castle Avernus, he said, was breaking and repairing itself at the same time. Many figures in red robes had been entering it. Their allegiance was unknown.
The party passed Ooru among the displaced crowds and saw many people wearing the Eternal Order’s seven-pointed star. Rivalis City Hall had become a refuge. Inside, Ewing Watergleen had effectively relocated his inn into the government building.
Rage challenged the largest guard present to an arm-wrestling contest and lost, to the crowd’s delight. He transformed defeat into celebration by buying a round for everyone. Carver asked Ewing about Aldo. The innkeeper said the dwarf had increasingly been visiting a friend south of town, beyond the cheese farms. The party arranged lodging for the night, returned to the town where their journey had begun—and found it dying around them.
Key events
- Rage added the ears of Vermoth and both pale thralls to his trophy chain.
- Chip burned the ambushers’ remains while crows watched.
- The party escaped an undead roadblock and an unidentified robed spellcaster who transformed into a bat.
- They abandoned the coach to outrun the Shroud but retained both horses and all critical equipment.
- Rage amputated Buddy’s forearm out of fear that wolf wounds might spread lycanthropy.
- Ignatius destroyed a skeletal rider and its mount within the Mists.
- Chip’s Force Ballista killed a hulking horned skeleton.
- The party reached Rivalis and found much of the town swallowed by the Shroud.
- Garen Faulk declared Rivalis doomed but chose to remain and fight.
- A dwarven defender reported that Castle Avernus is simultaneously breaking and repairing itself and that unidentified red-robed figures have been entering it.
- Ewing relocated his innkeeping operation to City Hall and revealed that Aldo has been visiting a friend south of the cheese farms.
Decisions and consequences
- The party drove through the first undead blockade rather than fighting to the end.
- They escaped the horde and its robed controller or ally.
- The party abandoned the coach to outrun the Shroud.
- The coach was lost in the forest, but the horses and critical supplies were saved.
- Rage amputated Buddy’s injured forearm.
- Buddy survived and showed no magical sign of infection, leaving the necessity of the act unsupported.
- Garen chose to remain in Rivalis.
- The town’s defenders continue fighting despite his belief that evacuation will eventually be unavoidable.
People
- Buddy: Farmer wounded by wolves, treated by Carver, and subjected to Rage’s fear-driven amputation.
- Garen Faulk: Declared Rivalis doomed but refused to abandon its defense.
- Ewing Watergleen: Relocated the functions of the Coachman’s Rest into City Hall.
- Ooru: Seen among the displaced residents of Rivalis.
- Unidentified robed spellcaster: Appeared among the road’s undead, cast after the coach, became a bat, and flew toward Martira Bay.
- Unidentified dwarven defender: Reported news from miner cousins near Castle Avernus.
Places
- Rivalis: Now half-consumed by the Shroud and facing probable evacuation.
- Rivalis City Hall: Converted into a refugee shelter and temporary inn.
- Coachman’s Rest: Lost within the Shroud; Ewing has relocated.
- Traveler’s End: Subsumed by the Mists.
- Crystal Gardens: Approximately half swallowed by the Shroud.
- Castle Avernus: Visible beneath the red star and reportedly breaking and repairing itself.
Clues, lore, and notable items
- The robed spellcaster may connect the zombie roadblock to the attack by Vermoth, but this is only a party theory.
- Deep rot lies within the ground around Rivalis.
- The Shroud now persists over much of Rivalis even during daylight.
- Unidentified red-robed figures have been entering Castle Avernus.
- Aldo has been making repeated visits to a friend south of Rivalis beyond the cheese farms.
Story threads
- Advanced: The Shroud at Rivalis
- Advanced: Invitation to Castle Avernus
- Advanced: The Red Star Ritual
- Advanced: The Weight upon the Chain
- Opened: Aldo’s Southern Visits
- Opened: The Dead on the Southern Road
Rewards, losses, and character changes
- The party abandoned Black Lily’s coach but retained both horses.
- All critical gear, including the Bag of Holding, Boom Sticks, scrolls, and provisions, was saved.
- Rage added three severed ears to his trophy chain.
- Rage paid the halfling couple 4 gp and later bought a round for the refugees and defenders at City Hall.
Memorable moments
- Ignatius drove the coach through a wall of rising dead while Rage clung to its side.
- Rage amputated a frightened farmer’s forearm to protect him from a curse that had not been proven to exist.
- Ignatius shattered a skeletal horse with a flying Hand of Harm elbow.
- Chip’s Force Ballista tore the horned skeleton apart within the Shroud.
- Rage lost an arm-wrestling contest before a delighted refugee crowd and bought everyone drinks.
Open questions
- Who was the bat-transforming robed spellcaster, and were the two road attacks connected?
- What is causing the deep rot beneath Rivalis?
- Can Rivalis be saved, or must its residents abandon it?
- Who are the red-robed figures entering Castle Avernus?
- How can a castle break and repair itself simultaneously?
- Whom has Aldo been visiting south of the cheese farms?
- What further burden will Rage’s new trophies place upon his chain?
Next session
- Immediate situation: The party has lodging within the refugee-filled government center while the Shroud covers much of Rivalis.
- Likely goals: Investigate Aldo’s southern visits, learn more about Rivalis’s collapse, and continue toward Castle Avernus.