Townies & Taverns

When the world was young, the bountiful earth and the hungry sea fell in love with each other from a distance. The earth would make eyes at the sea, and the sea would bashfully wave. They agreed to meet face to face to consummate their love, and the waters rose up and flooded the land. When the great flood receded, the devastation was total. Great cities were erased. Entire civilizations were wiped out. When they saw what they had done in their carelessness, earth and sea agreed that, though their love may continue to burn, they must never see each other again.

But see each other they did. Quietly and discreetly, their passions held in check by the fear of losing control once more.

The Flooded Lands are the last place where earth and sea mingle. Endless bogs, wetlands, swamps, and marshes. Neither the children of the earth nor the children of the sea are entirely at home here. Rather, this is home to those born of the flood. Things made of mud and clay. Slimy, scaley things with and fur and gills.

Your goal here is to find the Pinky, Ardan’s champion, and recover the first artifact of the archmage.

Two paths lie ahead of you.

One is through the Swamp of Sorrows. It is the most direct route and will get you to the Pinky’s monastery the quickest. But it is also the most dangerous. For the swamp is full of Dreadlights, Bog Rot, and Oneirophants.

The more circuitous route is also the safer option. It will take you around the swamp, through the Trollfen, and over Turtle Mound. A longer journey, but one less fraught with danger.

WHAT DO YOU DO

The story thus far: you are on a mission to re-assemble the Staff of the Archmage and seal the Bloodmoon Gate to prevent the Demon Horde from sweeping across the Silver Yonder. The first piece of the staff is in the possession of the Pinky somewhere in the Flooded Lands.

~

There is a long footbridge of rotten, moldy, wooden planks that leads out across the fetid water. You follow it into the Swamp of Sorrows.

The swamp is putrid. Almost nauseatingly smelly. A thick carpet of orange algae undulates with the rippling of the water beneath it. Pockets of swamp gas escape the mud far below and belch noisily when they reach the surface. Clouds of insects float above the water, and nip at you as you pass by. Large swamp trees grow here, with gnarled, twisted roots. Moss and thick vines hang from the branches and block your view. Between the trees, in the distance, you can see sulphurous yellow dreadlights bobbing up and down, just waiting to lure an unwitting traveler out into the waters.

Just up ahead, a large portion of the bridge has collapsed. About as far across as a wide road. You look down and see five or eight emaciated, milky white bodies floating suspended in the water below you. Their eyes are closed and their skin is pulled taught across their bones. Their hair spreads out like a halo around their heads. These are Oneirophants, slumbering prisoners of the swamp. If you’re lucky, they won’t bother you. If you disturb their slumber though, they may try to pull you down into the swamp to join them.

WHAT DO YOU DO?

While Stux and Krunn were fussing around with the leggy one-armed boulder, you inadvertently attracted the attention of the swamp’s least desirable denizens.

Three oneirophants—the lanky, clammy, pale drowned creatures who sleep at the bottom of the swamp—have crawled up onto the pier. They slither around on their bellies grinning and grabbing at your ankles.

“Come swim with us!” says the one with no teeth.

“Yes, come sleep under water!” agrees the one with far too many teeth.

“Such sights you will see!”

“Yes, such wonders!”

The third oneirophant’s mouth is sewn shut so you have no idea whether or not it has an appropriate number of teeth. It is awkwardly fumbling around with the ankle of the humanoid boulder but seems incapable of getting a hold of it with its cold slippery hand. It looks frustrated and uncomfortable.

One of the bobbing dreadlights—alerted to your presence by the commotion—weaves its way over to the pier and shines brightly in your eyes so that you have to squint.

“hEy dO YoU YoU WaNt tO SeE A WeIrD TuRtLe?” says the dreadlight. “iT’S RiGhT OvEr hErE, fOlLoW Me. It’s rEaLlY WeIrD. yOu gOtTa sEe iT.”

WHAT DO YOU DO?

The oneirophant slithers around on its belly, grinning up at you with its sharp little pointy teeth and its large wet eyes.

“Come sleep and swim with us!” it hisses at you. “You can be like a shark! Sleeping and swimming with one eye open and—ACK!”

Krunn BONKS the talkative oneirophant right on its noggin. Its skull makes a squishy sound and flattens—ejecting a surprising amount of water—and slowly, slowly returns to its normal shape like a sponge. It looks up at Krunn, insulted and cross-eyed and kind of lopsided, and slinks away off the side of the pier and back into the swamp with a plop.

Meanwhile Glarg is glarging out super hard. As the oneirophant tries in vain to grab your ankle, you in turn wrap your giant rocky fist around its entire torso and lift it up. It hisses and slither wriggles in your grasp. You squeeze a little too tightly, and it pops out of your grasp like a slippery fish. You comically juggle it a few times, squeezing and shooting it from your fist. Until finally it flops onto the pier, and back into the water.

The remaining oneirophants make rude faces and wag their fingers at you, disgusted at your inhospitable behavior. And they too slither off the side of the pier.

Only the dreadlight remains, bobbing up and down in the air. It is a small orb of light about the size of your fist. It glows a sulphurous yellow a couple arm lengths away from the pier, hovering over the water.

It buzzes as it speaks in a slightly muffled, undulating voice, “tHeRe’s a tUrTlE OuT HeRe tHaT Is tOtAlLy wEiRd. It’s lIkE, yOu wOuLdN’T EvEn bElIeVe iT. yOu’vE GoT To cOmE SeE ThIs wEiRd tUrTlE, c’mOn.”

Meanwhile, your way forward is still blocked by the washed out bridge.

WHAT DO YOU DO

Glarg grabs at the dreadlight.

“WHoA ThErE BuDdY!” cries the dreadlight as it dances away, tantalizingly just out of your grasp, luring you closer and closer to the edge of the pier. “lEt’s nOt bE So gRaBbY OkAy bIg gUy? I CaN’T ShOw yOu tHiS WeIrD TuRtLe iF I’M AlL CaPtUrEd aNd sTuFf! aNd tHaT WoUlD Be sAd wOuLdN’T It? FoR ThErE To bE ThIs tOtAlLy wEiRd tUrTlE, aNd nObOdY GeTs tO SeE It?”

Krunn sees Glarg grasp repeatedly at the annoying, bobbing light. Finally, inevitably, they overextend themself and start to lose their balance, teetering on the edge of the pier.

And then–KerSPLASH!!–down they go.

Glarg floats like a stone in the water. Which is to say, not at all. A gleeful oneirophant burbles with delight as you sink past, “Yes! Haha, yessssss!”, and finally you come to rest in the mud at the bottom of the swamp.

The surface of the water is only five or six feet out of your reach.

You notice that you came to rest near a large, smooth, oblong, patterned stone. And as you watch, the stone opens along its seam and a large, striped turtle head pokes out and looks at you curiously. Then a second striped head emerges from the shell! The second head continues to regard you while the first one extends its neck and experimentally nibbles on your arm with a gentle bite.

WHAT DO YOU DO

recap:

the Bloodmoon Gate has started to open once again and harbingers of the Demon Horde have been seen in the Silver Yonder. Your mission is to recover the Five Artifacts and reassemble the Staff of the Archmage, the legendary weapon that can seal the demon gate forever. You are currently in the Swamp of Sorrows seeking the Pinky, guardian of the first artifact.

And now:

Stux the party warlock fishes Glarg out of the swamp.

Glarg picks up Cremini, the small agreeable mushroom creature whose rock content is currently unknown.

Krunn assesses the landscape for potential things to bonk.

The swamp water bubbles, froths, and churns. As though summoned by the Glarg’s words, a two-headed turtle of enormous girth breaches the surface.

Its shell is black and covered in spiraling geodesic patterns. Its heads are also black, and have colorful stripes that run from behind their eyes along the back of their heads and necks.

You think that if you play this right and pacify the turtle somehow with your unique skills and talents, that it might ferry you across the washed out bridge to the other side.

The dreadlight bobs up and down excitedly, “oH HeCk yEaH LoOk aT ThAt tUrTlE! oH MaN It iS So wEiRd hAhA! hAhA, wHeEeEe!”

WHAT DO YOU DO?

The party starts ROCKING OUT.

It is a total raver!

Krunn is drumming, Glarg is singing, Cremini is blowing bubbles. And Stux the Party Warlock is doing all kinds of cool party tricks. Making balloon animals. They even managed to produce a small xylophone from somewhere and are banging out a jaunty melody with a tiny mallet.

The giant, two-headed turtle freezes in place. Both heads regard you, wide-eyed and silent. And then they both start bobbing up and down in time to the music.

After the performance, the giant, obsidian turtle drifts over to the edge of the pier. You climb aboard, and continue to party hard and rock out as the creature happily ferries you safely across the swamp.

The dreadlight, still bobbing up and down in place, cries out, “oMg tHaT Is sO SiCk! HaHa wHaT A WeIrD TuRtLe! YoU GuYs aRe tOtAlLy cRaZy!”

You land on the other side and de-turtle, climbing out onto the slick grass and mud of the far shore. The turtle sinks back into the swamp with a small smile on each of its faces and settles down into the mud for a long nap.

You follow the path through the swamp and eventually come to a large-ish clearing. It is a small glade full of silvery blades of grass. It is full of eviscerated gilpins—small swamp gnomes that kind of resemble fish-like bunny rabbits; it is kind of unfair how cute they are—strewn about in piles and pieces. The center of the glade is completely clean and clear of the gore that fills the rest of the space. It is empty except for a circle of small toadstools, in the center of which sits a tiny black cat which looks up at you with huge round yellow eyes. It mewls pathetically and rolls on its back.

WHAT DO YOU DO

Cremini blows some tiny pink bubbles and plays some dope toadstool chiptune. The toadstools light up in a neon pastel pattern of bright pinks and yellows and blues and purples. You can’t help but think that the dreadlight would think this is tOtAlLy aWeSoMe.

Glarg puzzles over a few gilpin pieces and clumsily tries to assemble them. They end up with a cluster of two or three torsos and a few too many limbs jutting out at odd angles. Almost as an afterthought they thrust a head into its center. It is a furry, scaly, rabbity, fishy abomination. They set it down on the ground and make some coaxing, pleading sounds at it. It sounds like smooth river rocks rubbing against each other.

Krunn severely scolds and chastises the very bad kitty! In reply, it rolls onto its side and does a big streeeeeeetch, clawing at the ground and doing a cute meow-purr.

Krunn crosses into the toadstool circle and the small cat leaps to its feet, arches its back and hisses and spits at the sudden intrusion. It backs away but doesn’t leave the circle, and soon it is cornered, and Krunn gives it a solid BONK right on the head, leaving a small gash across the top of its head. It falls to the ground in a heap and doesn’t move.

The toadstools audibly exhale, and a pinkish cloud of spores engulf the cat. It yowls and jumps up and puffs up to an enormous size. Its eyes bulge. And its warping, twisting bones outgrow their fleshy enclosure, starting at the skull where Krunn split it. When its transformation is complete, a huge skeletal beast with a mane of black fur across its shoulders stands inside the mushroom circle. It roars, baring its long fangs, and swipes at Krunn with its sharp boney claws!

The spores waft throughout the glade. A few of them drift over and land on the flesh golem Glarg made of gilpin pieces. They seep into its skin and its eyes shoot open. It looks around in apparent confusion, gasps for air, and moans. It cautiously reaches out to Glarg with its tangle of limbs. “Ma… Ma?”

Crimini notices that—although they have stopped making music at this point—the toadstools continue to pulse weakly but rhythmically in a repeating pattern of colors.

WHAT DO YOU DO?

Krunn entices the skelebeast with a piece of yarn. It stops and cocks its head to the side. It flops onto its side, and bats at the end of string with one big skeletal paw. Its long tail swishes back and forth in a wide arc.

Glarg backs up with Jr in one arm and Cremini in the other. They notice a cylindrical item rattling around inside the beast’s rib cage. It is the size of a small torch, or some kind of baton, or maybe a large rolled up scroll. It seems to be made of some kind of a dull silvery metal.

Cremini blows a few tiny green bubbles. The toadstools bop out a little melody.

Jr, the gilpin flesh elemental, smiles happily and groans, and waves their arms around in time with the toadstool song.

WHAT DO YOU DO