Green Pass Campaign IV: Interlude

After magically sealing the underworld rift, the surface of the lake already no longer seems to boil and fume and the malign fog above the surface of the water seems to lessen.

Over the next few hours the clouds around you lift and dissipate, revealing skeletal trees that seem to sag as though wilted by age. Portions of the bark are falling away, leaving behind patches of swollen mushy pulp that looks more like raw meat than wood. Residual beads of red condensation drip from withered leaves. The forest is still deathly still, with no bird calls or insect noises. At least the quiet provides some comfort that camping here for the night will be uneventful. You recover your spells and sleep well, the curse of this place having grown less oppressive for the moment.

After about a few hours of waiting, the formerly indistinct boundary between day and night has become meaningful. The sky is grayed by dawn, but as the sun rises, the coloration is badly wrong. Looking diagonally across the lake you can see the loading docks on the east shore, about a quarter mile from Centerpost, where a few small river boats are moored. The shore itself is deserted, but above the mist-choked horizon, you can see a terrible sight.

Low to the ground, lower than the mountain peaks would be, there is a swirling vortex of cloud. The cloud is fed from below by two enormous geysers of churning colored fluid that seem to be forced upward under great pressure. One is orange fringed in black, like cooling magma. The other is green with pulsing veins of purple wrapping around it like climbing vines. Rather than falling back to earth, the geysers seem to be feeding their churning liquid into the cloud like the base of an upside-down waterfall.

This actually exists! (It's Saturn's polar cyclone.)

The cloud itself is a spiral that draws in both colors like a tornado about to form. At the cloud's center is a dark throbbing egg of something that glistens like wet rubber, spinning rapidly as it hovers in the air a quarter-mile above the ground. Tongues of colored lightning, orange and green, descend from the egg to strike the ground at the known location of Centerpost. A hot wind is blowing outward from the direction of the vortex that was not present the day before. Just in the last few minutes, it has notably risen in intensity. The leaves now tremble enough to shed their drops, and a thin rain of ferric-smelling blood is drizzling under the forest canopy.

There is a far-off wailing on the wind, nearly imperceptible at first but growing louder like a chorus being joined by many voices. The surface of the lake answers the wailing with the wisps of fresh fumes, and begins to sputter with bubbles again.

Green Pass Campaign IV, Session I: The Mist

Writ of Summons on the Authority of the First Office of the Chancery of the Sea-Kingdom of Durnovar, on this the 30th of September, the year 70 AUP, being to all lords temporal, mystical, and spiritual of the chartered lands of Elysium:

We greet you on behalf of King and Archbishop and beseech you to muster at once to the headwaters of the Isigflod, northeast of the Isigwold holdings, and perform the following services on behalf of crown and mitre:

* Confirm the freedom and safety of the garrison at Fort Bodeswell and the Abbey of Little Darply, north along the Isigwold, and aid them in whatever reasonable capacity they request;

* Scout the valley up the Tenterhook to the camp of Centerpost, recently rumored to have fallen to the dread Cult of Orcus, and report on the forces massed there;

* Continue to the gate at Footman's Notch and reclaim control of it from any opposition, so we can re-establish contact with our outposts in the Balewood beyond;

* Warning: Military reconnaissance of the last few months describes numerous creatures of a fiendish and otherworldly nature, including hellhounds and demon swine. Locate the origin of these creatures, and if possible, disrupt their further arrival.

Do not engage any large standing armies until we have mobilized a counter-force of our own. If espionage presents opportunities to eliminate their leadership discretely, however, do not hesitate to do so.

We request you file report by swift courier from Bodeswell to the provincial council at Straddleport upon conclusion of any components this mission.

Heavenspeed, good nobles!

October 24-28, Caudex Annales, 70 AUP

The survivors of the north group, having fled Footman's Notch before the rest of the party was torn apart by hellhounds (and not knowing the full details of their fate), finally returned to civilization in the Isigwold, seeking succor at the castle of Tallibrick Sheerclift. Couriers were dispatched to relay news of the events of the last three months, first west along the river road to Straddleport by horse and then by arcane clairaudience back to Durnovar. The office of the chancellor issued a writ of summons for all nobles settled in the region, landed and titled, to muster for a reconnaissance of the region in greater force, all communications from the Green Pass region having been lost.

A party of powerful heroes assembled at the Buckler Gap, discovering a mysterious wall of fog that completely obscured visibility into the valley. The fog was curiously dense, and left a gritty film on the skin as evidence of its unnatural impurity. Attempts to disbelieve it as an illusion were unsuccessful, although the gritty sensation seemed to be entirely psychological in nature.

The company's roster:

• April Dawnbow, woodland hunter (Kim)
• Spinal Pyrope, jello...mancer?! (Kyle)
• Criptus, skinscribe (Andrew)
• Smaug, chiefest and greatest of calamities (Zac)
• Avila Tressa, priestess (Stuart)
• Qaldor Nim, mage (Sherlock)
• Rhaegal
• Tallibrick Shearclift, gnomish ferret-haver (Reba)
• Darrin, dwarven craftlord (Jacob)
• Sir Pal of Din, I dunno, probably some kind of elven ranger (Juston)
• Thorin Odinson, dwarven sapper
• And a roughly equal number of henchmen

After creating a magically cleared bubble of fresh air using the swirling vortex form of a summoned djinn, the party advanced cautiously through the mist, following the road. The thin patches of forest at the mouth of the valley were devoid of natural life, and the trees and plants were repugnantly soft and spongy to the touch. A few miles into the valley the party found a fortified halfling village, barred to outsiders. They could report nothing about the origin of the mist, other than that it had spread outward from the general location of the military depot at Centerpost.

Various chaotic and extraplanar creatures had apparently displaced the native wildlife. First, the party encountered a group of flame salamanders, which fell quickly to powerful spells after being spotted glowing through the fog. The next night, the sleeping party was assaulted by basilisks, which reduced the perimeter of summoned guardian slimes around the camp to giant slabs of stone before the mages could awaken to hurl electricity at them in the mist-choked darkness.

Finally, the party was discovered by a squad of stone giants. The giants hurled great boulders at the party, their infravision apparently unaffected by the mist. Again the heroes swarmed and dispatched the giants.

Where the Bresigway River widened into a lake, the party broke off the path in order to investigate the water. It was warm and tinged red, with a metallic smell of rust identifiable as the taint of fresh blood. The mist steamed and fumed from the surface of the polluted water. Setting up camp on the lakeshore, the party successfully divined the origin of the fouled waters by magically scouting along the surface of the lake from the air. A rift had opened in the depths of the lake, spewing forth boiling blood from some infernal underworld. The heat of the water made it difficult to endure; lowering the water by ten feet with a powerful spell was more than sufficient to allow the evil to be dispelled with clerical prayers. As the gaping maw closed, the water cooled and the fuming subsided.

The party set up camp and waited for the mist to disperse.