Urska

Did you know that Krevborna has bear people as a playable race? It's true. Below are the Savage Worlds stats I've cobbled together for them; I think I might have based them somewhat on the minotaurs from the Fantasy Companion.

Urska

Similar to humanoid polar bears in appearance, urska are generally solitary–though they sometimes rally under the banner of a strong leader who commands their stalwart loyalty. Such leadership roles are only ever assumed when a urska manages to best all challengers in deadly, ritualized combat. Urska often favor attitudes best characterized as stoic and militaristic. 

• Blunt: Taught that might makes right, urska struggle with diplomacy and tact. They have the Mean Hindrance.

• Claws: Urska claws cause Strength+d6 damage, adding +4 if the character runs at least 5” (10 yards) and hits with them.

• Cold Resistance: Urska receive a +4 bonus to resist cold effects. Damage from cold is also reduced by 4.

• Heat Weakness: Urksa suffer a –4 penalty to resist heat effects and take +4 damage from heat and fire. 

• Hulking: Urska are tall and broad, adding +1 to their Toughness. They are Size +1.

• Martial Code: Honor is very important to urska. They generally keep their word, don’t abuse or kill prisoners, and feel duty-bound to respect those who have bested them.

• Tough: Urska starting Vigor is d6, increasing the limit to d12+1.

• Uneducated: Urska society favors physical prowess over intellectual ability. Smarts rolls are made at −1.

• Unwieldy: Their muscular frames causes urska to subtract two when using equipment designed for smaller beings, and they cannot wear humanoid armor or clothing. Equipment, armor, food and clothing cost double the listed price. 

• Very Strong: Urska start with Strength d8, increasing their maximum Strength to d12+2.

Almost Dying on the Moon

The second, and final, Krevborna game taking place on the Shadow Moon.

Characters

Willard Corn, strange old man in search of his missing dog

Heck, revenant who punches things to death

Garazi, young witch with a bird familiar

Panthalassa, a necromancer out for vengeance against a death cult

Daytona, dhampir cowboy along for the ride

Events

When we last left our "heroes," Panthalassa ran in to grab a skull mask off a table in a mess hall just as a dragon swooped down from a hole in the ceiling; everyone else was gathered by the doorway. Panthalassa took a mauling from the dragon, but made it to the door with the mask. 

The group slammed the door shut. Willard and Daytona ran down the hall, but everyone else stood by the door arguing which way they should flee--which gave the dragon the opportunity to breath fire and nail the characters who weren't already in motion. The door was blown off its hinges and the hallway filled with fire.

That got the rest of them moving. 

Now that most of them were injured, they decided to hole up in the empty cells in the subterranean floor to rest and recuperate. The time passed without them being detected, but they did begin to recall strange snippets of the woman who sent them here in the first place. 

Panthalassa summoned a cat and used it to explore the fissures running through the broken walls in the complex. Through the cat, they located a cache of stowed-away food and a room where the remaining Fraternitie du Cadavre cultists huddled in darkness. The last mask they needed was with the cultists. 

The group was detected as they approached the cultists. The cultists ran deeper into the tunnels, but the characters followed them. They ran into a chamber where the living avatar of the Nightmother stood; her six hands each held a blade, her monstrous tongue lolled from her mouth. Her mere presence caused fear in the majority of the party; thus debilitated, they had a difficult time fighting the pagan goddess's avatar, but eventually they prevailed--mostly due to Willard's efforts.

Unfortunately, while they were battling the Nightmother, the spectral necromancer Valton Blakely oozed into the room in shadow form and joined the fray. He wore a twisted crown and bore a greatsword blazing with black fire. Luckily, they heard the barking of a dog--Willard's legendary three-legged dog burst from a tunnel and tore a chunk out of Valton. 

Valton proved to be an even more powerful foe than the Nightmother. Since many of the characters (including Panthalassa's summoned raptors) were all bunched together, he was able to hit them all with a big swing, Dark Souls-boss swing of his blackflame sword. Interestingly, they didn't scatter after the first time that happened--so they all took another full swing of massive damage from the necromancer's sword. 

It was a very near thing; even Heck, the party's strongest member, was in danger of meeting death again. They did, at last, kill Valton, but they were always on the brink of losing one or two of their own.

They slaughtered the remaining cultists without mercy and took the final mask as their prize. They then hid out in the room with the cached food to heal up again. Backtracking to the room where they had fought the vlaak Lord Doctors, they realized that they had never looted the bodies there. In that room, they found the key to the vlaak craft, which Yarsi helpfully knew how to operate. 

Once everyone was aboard and strapped in, Yarsi fired up the ship and brought them back to Hemlock Hollow. Willard bid the rest of the group farewell; his next destination was the stars where, with Yarsi and his dog at his side, we would seek more vlaak to kill. 

The rest of the group brought the skull masks back to the Usher house. Inside, they found the sorceress Cassie Mabcrowe and her friends Brigid and Anastasia waiting for them. Nightsong was there too; she was yelling at Cassie for using "her team" for this mission. Cassie explained that she had sealed away their memories to prevent their plan from falling into the wrong hands if it was discovered--which was only partially true, but no one pressed her on that. 

They did, however, insist on watching her perform the ritual that would put Madeline Usher back to "sleep." Wisely, they wanted to make sure Cassie was as good as her word. She was telling the truth--this time, at least. The world is now safe again from Madeline, the Curse of the Ushers.

But how does the party feel about being used by Cassie and, more importantly, what can they do about it? Perhaps that will be filed away, as the next item that appears to be on their agenda is to confront the witchfinders responsible for Heck's death.

Walking on the Moon

We've returned to finish the Shadow Moon adventure in my Krevborna campaign. 

Characters

Willard Corn, strange old man in search of his missing dog

Heck, revenant who punches things to death

Garazi, young witch with a bird familiar

Panthalassa, a necromancer out for vengeance against a death cult

Daytona, dhampir cowboy along for the ride

Khamaat, mysterious pyromaniac mummy 

Events

The session opened with the characters gathered at the mouth of a cave on the forbidden Shadow Moon. They had just traversed a portal in the dungeons below Geldingstone to arrive here. Now, as they gazed on the alien lunar landscape, they saw that the surface of the moon was so black it would have been indistinguishable from the sky were it not for the stars. 

In the distance, they could see a Vlaak fortress surrounded by a tall fortified wall. Between the fortress and the cave was a field of black boulders. They spotted a dragon flying above them in the sky. 

The group wisely decided to use the boulders as cover to zig-zag to the gate at the wall. The were successful at avoiding the dragon's attention. However, as they approached the wall they saw that there were six gibbets on poles erected before it; each gibbet held a Fraternitie du Cadavre cultist. Panthalassa cast her burrow spell so she and Heck could move beneath the ground and come up on the other side of the wall to remove the bar that kept the gate closed. 

The first chamber they entered was a Vlaak barracks. Twelve Vlaak soldiers and two officers were sat at tables playing an esoteric game involving polyhedral dice, books, and miscellaneous papers. Khamaat was able to incinerate a bunch of them before they could even rise from their table. The rest put up more of a fight and were able to deal out a few wounds to the party. 

Two of the soldiers ran into another room. Heck and Daytona followed and found that they had removed some strange metal rods from a glass case, presumably to activate the two skull-headed iron golems standing in the room. Daytona and Heck killed them before they were able to do whatever it was they were doing.

Back in the main melee, the party turned the tide. One soldier struggled to unentangle himself from Garazi's magical chains, and it turned out he'd rather die by his own hand than face the dreaded Willard Corn. He turned his psychic blade on himself and chose death over Corn.

Beyond the automaton room, they found a door of flowing shadow. Khamaat tried tapping it with one of the metal rods, but the rod immediately disintegrated. The murals in this room told an interesting story: they depicted Vlaak in ceremonial armor and neck ruffs presenting chained humans to a throned Vlaak queen. 

In an armory chamber, the group found suits of Vlaak armor, psychic blades, a diorama depicting miniature Vlaak figures fighting eldritch abominations, and a fissure in the wall leading to a narrow tunnel. They followed the fissure tunnel and ended up in what appeared to be a small cell with an observation window set into its iron door. Luckily, the cell was unlocked so they could enter the hallway beyond.

In the hallway, they saw that there were two more cells. One held a human-looking man who had something horrific crawling under his skin. The sign under the observation window to his cell read: "CORN HYBRID #8729, NON-VIABLE." The second cell contained a teenage girl who appeared to be a hybrid of Vlaak and human. The sign beneath her observation window read "CORN HYBRID #7639 !DANGEROUS DO NOT RELEASE!" She clearly recognized Willard and made a three-fingers-down gesture that he recognized as a way to symbolize his missing three-legged dog. 

Panthalassa picked the lock to the girl's cell, and she was very relieved to be released from captivity. They quickly discovered that the girl did not speak Krevbornski; she only knew the language of the Vlaak. Willard could read Vlaak, so they began to write messages to each other to communicate. The hybrid girl's name was Yarsi and there were two important things to know about her: she loves dogs and hates the Vlaak. She joined the party from there on out.

In another room the group caught five scarlet-robed Vlaak Lord Doctors in the act of experimenting on a live human subject with their alien surgical instruments. With the doctors were three hovering automatons bristling with hypodermic needles and bone saws. Yarsi immediately proved her worth by psychically bursting the head of a Lord Doctor. The rest of the enemies were dealt with handily. 

Once their foes were disposed of, Heck took the opportunity to eat one of the Vlaak's brains and the human's brain to gain some insight into what was going on within the fortress. The human was one of the Fraternitie cultists, but unlike his fellows, who were rotting in a cave somewhere, he had escaped the Vlaak's initial massacre. As for the Vlaak, when they returned to their fortress and found it overrun with human cultists, they began to systematically hunt them down. There were still a bunch hiding in the complex, somewhere. 

They also found one of the Usher masks on the person of a dead cultist floating in a tube of yellow liquid. One mask recovered; two to go.

As they explored further, they found a chamber down a spiral ramp that was open to the air. Below the skyward opening sat an alien craft that vaguely resembled a fish made of metal and glass. Yarsi explained that they would need a key to operate it. There was another fissure in this room, and from it issued the sound of a dog barking. Willard wanted to go in to find his dog, but the passage was too narrow to admit him. Garazi send her bird familiar into the crevice and it ended up in the chamber Heck had seen in his vision after eating the cultist's brain--the chamber was piled with bodies. Unfortunately, the familiar's exploration was cut short when she was slain by the burning sword of an immense, shadowy figure wearing a twisted crown.

The group then decided that walking around without disguises was dangerous, so they outfitted themselves in Vlaak armor. This proved helpful when they blundered into a Vlaak mess hall. Thinking on his feet, Willard pointed and yelled "Willard Corn," which tricked the Vlaak into running out of the room in search of the hated and feared Willard Corn. The soldiers left behind one of the skull masks on the long dining table. Panthalassa ran in to get it--and just then the dragon swooped down into the room from an aperture in the ceiling. 

We'll find out what happens next time!

Lycans

I've begun figuring out what a "lycan" (aka Werewolf Lite) should look like mechanically in my Savage Worlds Krevborna games. Here's what I've come up with for an ancestry that has the werewolf flavor without being as busted-for-normal-campaigns and inconvenient-to-play as the werewolf rules in the Horror Companion.

Lycans

Also known as “wolfbloods,” lycans are folk who have inherited the curse of lycanthropy in a minor, but persistent and incurable, form that sets them apart from other mortals. Lycans appear to be members of other ancestries, but their bodies possess obvious bestial traits, such as sharp teeth, yellow eyes, or hair as thick as a shaggy pelt. When angered, a lycan’s form becomes more animalistic and fierce. 

Lycans as Savage World Ancestry

Lycans can usually pass as normal humans unless they are under close scrutiny. As a limited free action, they can transform into a more bestial, wolfish state; while in this form, they gain access to their Bite and Claw ancestral abilities.

Accursed Ancestry: Lycans suffer a -1 penalty to all Spirit rolls.

Bestial Rage: The beast is always ready to spring forth and cause carnage. All lycans possess the Berserk Edge.

Bite: In their bestial forms, lycan fangs cause Str+d4 damage and may be used on grappled foes.

Bloodthirsty: Lycans never takes prisoners unless under the direct order of the person they consider the leader of their "pack." 

Claws: In their bestial forms, lycans have claws that cause Str+d6 damage and are AP 2. 

Easily Angered: Lycans subtract 2 when resisting Taunt attacks.

Heightened Sense of Smell: A keen sense of smell gives lycans +2 to Survival rolls made to track if the target has a scent and the trail is no more than a day old.

Hunted: Lycans must always be wary of monster hunters who might mistake them for full-blooded werewolves. 

Low Light Vision: Lycans ignore penalties for Dim or Dark illumination (but not Pitch Darkness).

Monstrous Weakness: Attacks made with silvered weapons deal +4 damage against Lycans.

Geldingstone

We had a one-session break in the superhero game we're playing, so I filled in with a return to Krevborna to advance the players nearer a goal one of them have set. I prepped just about the perfect amount of material for a single session, I gotta say.

Characters

Willard Corn, a man of mystery looking for his three-legged dog

Panthalassa, necromantic dinosaur summoner with a grudge

Garazi, precocious witch with a possibly dark destiny

Heck, revenant out for revenge against witchhunters

Daytona, dhampir gunslinger always along for the ride

Khamaat, ancient mummy revived for unknown purposes

Events

The characters all emerged from a mental haze within a forested grove--with no idea how they had gotten there. It was night, and moonlight shone down from a gap in the trees. Khamaat had a vague memory of an unknown bearded old man putting his hands on her and Willard's shoulders as they did research at the university library at Creedhall, but everything else was fuzzy.

Peeking out of a gap between trees, they saw a downward slope leading to a long rectangular building. In front of the main door were six figures wearing bronze breastplates and bearing longswords; they stood beside a gnarled old tree. From the skull masks they wore, they were likely members of the Fraternitie du Cadavre. 

Willard's attempt to approach the figures peacefully failed--they drew their swords and attacked! Additionally, the gnarled tree uprooted itself and joined in the fray. Their foes hit hard, but the party hit harder--although the armored guards were undead, they fell to the group's weapons and the animate tree was left little more than a burning stump. Panthalassa had summoned two raptors, and though they took down the tree, they were stuck to its sap-bleeding wounds as they also expired.

Now able to enter the building they saw that its name was etched in the stone above the doorway: GELDINGSTONE.

Garazi summoned Txori to scout the available windows so they an idea of what to expect in the rooms inside. In the library, among the theological works on the shelves, Panthalassa found one volume that just had a series of numbers on the spine as a "title." Removing it caused a section of the shelving to shift aside, revealing what appeared to be a small dungeon cell. The book was full of equations, but one--31-3=28-- was circled every few pages. It also matched a scrap of paper Panthalassa found in her pocket.

In the nearby office, they found a ledger with a list of boys' names and dates from long ago. Moving aside a painting revealed eyeholes that could be used to look into the next room unobserved. The room appeared to be a dormitory of monk-like cells.

When they entered the dormitory they discovered that hanging behind the desk was an iron rod and a number of switches. They also found a loose floorboard, under which was an old, folded-up piece of paper that read "Meet me by the tree tonight. Bring the book." in a childish scrawl. 

In other rooms they found evidence of the Fraternitie du Cadavre's necromantic activities, such as bones laid out on work surfaces and a room with tables full of preserved meat. Heck smashed the skeletons to prevent future animation attempts. While the destruction occurred, Willard remembered the bearded man telling him that there were Vlaak in Geldingstone and that the Vlaak definitely remembered who he was--as it turns out, Willard Corn is something of a bogeyman to the Vlaak. 

Additionally, Garazi remembered being paid a visit by a woman who kept one of her hands conspicuously out of sight.

As the ventured further into Geldingstone, three Cadavre cultists exited a room with their hands up. They just wanted to leave in peace, but Panthalassa wasn't having it--she summoned raptors and set them upon the three men, wrecking an unholy slaughter in revenge for them cutting off her arm months ago.

In the chapel, the uncovered the origins of the name Geldingstone. They found an ornate chair, with a hole cut out of the seat, that was used for turning boys into castrati for the Church's choirs.

Before they were killed, the three surrendering cultists had told the group that the key to the door they wanted was being guarded by a skinless monstrosity in the basement, so that's where they headed next. Wounding the creature caused it to expel a red mist that flooded the room; those within the mist found their vitality sapped. The skinless man killed every minion Panthalassa sent against it; each time it killed one it peeled a strip of skin from its victim, consumed it, and healed its wounds. 

The group did eventually prevail, and they could see the key they needed within its corpse, but the mist still pervaded the room so they retreated for the moment. Heck eventually decided to draw upon his undead vigor and run in to grab the key, wrenching it from the corpse. 

The key unlocked a chamber with a vast stone archway--the center of it was pure black. When they passed through the archway, they found themselves in a strange place. The ground beneath their feet was black. Emerging from a cave, they saw a fortress in the distance and heard the beating of great wings overhead.

They were now on the fabled Shadow Moon.

The Bloody Machinations of Makeen

The Khorne-carved butte

The Friday night group had a gap in between games that needed filling, so I stepped in with a one-shot session. The initial premise was that they'd be playing young barbarians about to be exiled from their tribe. Little did they know that they'd find themselves in a scenario that was half the Doctor Who episode "Face of Evil" and half them being recruited by Warhammer 40k's Inquisition.

I love doing a one-shot with a twist or reveal to it, but to make that work I think you also have to deliver on the premise you presented at the outset too. I promised barbarians vs. dinosaur action, which they got, and then there was a "the fantasy stuff is actually sci fi" and "actually you're facing an AI wargame corrupted by the chaos god Khorne" layer over that.

The Characters

Aldric, an agile warrior

Bru, a brutal warrior

Chika Boom-Boom, a lorekeeper

Abendego, a hunter

Yrsa, a shaman's acolyte

The Premise

This is what the players knew going into the game:

You are youngbloods of the Rokatehm tribe, hunters and gatherers who eke out an existence in your tribal lands. Your people collect fruit from the jungle and kill the mighty thunder lizards who roam the Carnage Zone for their meat and skins. The Carnage Zone lies beyond a line of magical pillars that keep the thunder lizards from wandering into your tribe’s territory. 

The Rokatehm do not live in peace; your people suffer raids from the lizard-headed Eaters, who attempt to drag members of your tribe away to be devoured or enslaved. No one knows where the Eaters hail from–they cross the Carnage Zone to reach your village. Even your great god Makeen does not offer an explanation for the predatory Eaters.

Makeen speaks! Mostly to Gorvus Feld, your tribe’s head shaman, and only when he wears his sacred headdress. Only Gorvus Feld can hear the voice of Makeen–or so you had been led to believe.

One night, drunk on the fermented nectar of the katal-katal fruit, you youngbloods sneaked into the head shaman’s chamber ritual chamber and took turns placing the holy helmet upon your heads. Each of you has heard the voice of Makeen! Makeen has spoken to you!

You were caught during your act of transgression and dragged before the tribal council. No one cared when you claimed that Gorvus Feld had lied about Makeen’s willingness to speak to others. The chieftain sentenced you to exile–you now stand before the mystical pillars, the tribe’s warriors at your back ready to force you from your home and into–the Carnage Zone!

Events

Play began with the characters' gear being tossed beyond the shimmering protective barrier of the pillars. The character crossed into exile willingly, except for Yrsa who had to be thrown past the boundary by the tribe's warriors. The group began to pick their way into the Carnage Zone. Around them, the jungle was alive with the sounds of birds and buzzing insects; as they marched the heat sapped their strength and they were soaked in sweat.

Things went from bad to worse when a few members of the group detected the ground shaking in response to a massive thunder lizard bearing down on them and crashing through the trees. The group ran for it, with most of the party heading left and Aldric heading right in hopes that the monster would pursue the larger group. 

Everyone emerged from the jungle at the same time at the base of a butte. The butte had been carved to resemble some kind of helmet or ritual headdress of unknown origins. The maw of the helmet was actually an entrance to a cave within the butte. The characters rushed inside. From the safety of the cave, they could see that the thunder lizard that had chased them through the jungle was a T. Rex. Fortunately, the cave's mouth was too small for the thunder lizard to squeeze in, though its saliva-dripping jaws did snap and snarl at the entrance.

Inside the cave, Abendego tripped over a skeleton whose remaining clothes marked them as a previous exile from the Rokatehm tribe. Using bits of the skeleton and its rags, he was able to fashion a makeshift torch to explore the rest of the cavern. There was a slopping passage up and a strange, unnatural shaft. The shaft was "decorated" with small blue lights and "vines" of copper metal that were threaded with strands and clumps of throbbing meat. When cut, the meat bled.

With no way to ascent the shaft, the group ventured up the sloping path and wandered further into the interior of the butte. They found themselves in a chamber lined with large glass tubes (though they had no conception of what glass was) filled with murky liquid. They had a bit of a jump scare when they realized that fetal thunder lizards were floating inside the murky liquid. Atop each of the tubes were more of the copper vines and bits of pulsating meat. A metal door with no handle marked one exit from the chamber and a corridor stretching off to the side marked another. There was also a perfectly round hole in the floor of this chamber. Using his torch, Abendego could see a collection of human and thunder lizard bones done below, as well as rats scurrying to and fro.

Their exploration was halted when five of the tubes opened to disgorge fully formed (and hungry) velociraptors. The group attempted to flee down the unknown corridor, but it ended in another featureless metal door. Now they were penned in with no choice but to fight their way past the velociraptors. Axes and swords were swung, arrows were unleased, and Chika was nearly shredded by the teeth of a raptor. The group managed to slay the prehistoric beasts. Bru was particularly effective at carving a swath through the monsters.

Abendego was able to fashion a rope from the copper vines (cables, really) and descend into the bone pit, where he found a slim card that unlocked the doors in the area above. As they explored further, they found a shrine with a bronze statue with the same helm as was carved on the butte's face. Piled around the statue's feet were human skulls that were spattered with dried blood. When Aldric began smashing the skulls, it alerted the lizard-headed Eaters in the next room to their presence in the complex. The Eaters rushed in and again the party found themselves in a life and death struggle.

The Eaters were hardy foes, but once they were vanquished the group found themselves in possession of another card. This one unlocked the most horrifying chamber yet: a room filled with wheezing machinery, curtains of raw meat hung like skirt steak, and undulating organs of alien purpose. Within the room were more Eaters (one of whom was armed with a strange sword whose edge was lined with metal "teeth," yeah, it was a chainsword) and a number of dead-eyed beings who looked like Rokatehm exiles whose flesh had been combined with bits of metal and flashing lights. 

The voice of Makeen rang out as they stepped into the chamber: "Calculating winner, please stand by." The winner was announced, and it was Chika! Part of the unnerving black metal machinery opened, revealing a throne. Chika was told to sit herself upon the throne and receive her "prize," but she refused. Her refusal confused the Eaters in the room, as they could not imagine rejecting the chance to be transformed into a champion of "the Blood God." 

The group heard a sound like the shrieking of a great bird coming from atop the butte. Further conversation with the gobsmacked Eaters was rendered impossible by a woman coming down the stairs from the top of the butte who opened fire on the Eaters with a miraculous weapon. Her white hair was cut in a bob and she wore black armor the likes of which the group had never seen before. (Yes, Sister Talisa was an Adepta Sororitas.) Since she didn't know what to do with the group, she brought them up top where her leader, Inquisitor Mohandas Corrado was busy examining Makeen's "brain."

Mohandas Corrado was a dark-skinned man with a swoop of curly hair covering one eye. He explained that just about everything the group knew about their lives was a distortion of the truth. The Rokatehm tribe were the descendants of the Boom-Boom Rocket Team, a team of suborbital racers who competed across the sector until their ship got caught in a Warp Storm and deposited on the jungle planet. One of the Rocket Team members was a "naughty boy" who had a xenos artificial intelligence wargame system onboard the ship; when it passed through the Warp Storm it was infested with Khorne's demonic energies. That xenos device was, of course, Makeen (machine!) and had been breeding dinosaurs and creating Eaters to carry on the blood-soaked wargame in real time to feed blood and souls to the Chaos god Khorne!

Mohandas asked the group what they would do with Makeen, if they were in his position: would they destroy it or take it away for further study? They hemmed and hawed over this question, but ultimately indicated that they would study it further if that meant putting an end to similar incursions elsewhere. Mohandas agreed and, intrigued by the groups' ability to survive against the machinations of Chaos, offered to take them with him on his gunship so they could be trained as part of his Inquisitorial retinue. 

They agreed that leaving the planet was a capital idea, so they boarded Corrado's gunship and prepared themselves to encounter an entire galaxy beyond their wildest imaginings. 

The Death of Patchwork Jack

Before the holidays, we were able to reach a good stopping point for the current Savage Krevborna campaign. In this episode they found and defeated their quarry, the genius corpse golem known as Patchwork Jack, though this one could have gone either way depending on the dice. We'll see if or when we return to this in the new year, but if we don't I'm at least satisfied we got to a little moment of closure on it one way or another.

Characters

Panthalassa, a necromancer who summons primordial creatures

Daytona, a dhampir gunslinger fresh from Hell (again)

Garazi, a beautiful young witch with a bird familiar

Willard Corn, a man of mysterious circumstances

Heck, a revenant seeking vengeance on witch hunters

Khamaat, a newly awakened mummy

Events

When we last left the party, they were unlocking a large, metal-plated door with a key they had obtained in a lower level of the complex. Beyond the door was a cage elevator big enough to move equipment--or cadavers--from level to level. They noticed that the elevator shaft proceeded both up and down. They decided to first use the elevator to ascend the shaft. The ride terminated at the top of a low mountain peak, with an rocky overhang to shelter the elevator from the snowfall. From the deep wheel ruts tracing up the path through the snow to this area, they guessed that something had been transported into the complex via the elevator recently. 

The group then decided to try their luck descending into the shaft. The elevator moved down the shaft for a very long time, taking them much deeper into the complex than they had previously ventured. The short corridor leading from where the elevator came to rest joined an octagonal room decorated with statues of Vlaak surgeon-priests, each of which held sharp obsidian surgical implements of alien design. There was an iron-bound door behind head statue. Willard noticed that there were scratch marks leading to the easternmost door, so they approached and opened that one. 

The corridor leading from that room ended in a stone door carved with the face of a Vlaakish queen that was slightly ajar. Peering beyond it, they could see a large chamber with pillars carved into the likenesses of misshapen monsters supporting the vaulted ceiling. Inside, three of Patchwork Jack's corpse golems stood guard by an eldritch metal throne. These golems differed from the ones they had previously encountered in one respect: gas masks had been sewn in place where their faces should have been. 

Deciding that they wanted no part of that action for the moment, the group retreated back to the octagonal room to try the other doors. This was, in fact, a tactical mistake on their part that would leave them in bad shape for the confrontation to come because when Willard approached a door that did not have scratches in front of it--which were proof that the door they entered before was seeing regular use--he triggered the statues to wildly swing their obsidian blades, which wounded several members of the party quite badly. 

Their lesson learned, they returned to the octagonal room and opened fire on the corpse golems from the doorway. This may also have been a strategic error, as Daytona's gunshots simply caused the golems to seek cover behind the throne and the group quickly learned that the creatures were highly resistant to any long-range sorceries they might hurl their way. The only solution was to charge them and fight it out hand-to-hand. Which they did, and handily won.

(Well, technically they could have parlayed with the corpse golems because they belonged to a faction that wanted to be free of Patchwork Jack, but they didn't explore that angle; thus, violence.)

After a bit of further exploration, and tangling with a few more corpse golems, they discovered a chasm down which a waterfall cascaded into an underground lake below. There was a chain ladder fastened to the side of the chasm, going into the dark. As they climbed down the swaying chain ladder, Daytona received a vision about Garazi--but did not divulge its contents to the rest of the group. 

At the bottom of the chain ladder, the group found themselves on the far shore of the underground lake. There was an island at the center of the lake, and on that island was a small fortress over which electricity was arcing chaotically--an eerie repetition of Viktoria Frankenstein's island chateau at the center of Loch Riven. The shore had a small dock; the boats at the dock were strange, advanced technology, but Serafina was able to get one working so that they could head to the island.

Once docked on the island, Patchwork Jack and his compatriots--a man in an exoskeleton of steel and six corpse golems--emerged from the fortress to meet them. Checking his pocket watch, Patchwork Jack announced that he had expected their arrival ten minutes earlier--no matter, though, he was happy to send them to their graves NOW. 

The first round of this long battle did not go in the characters' favor. Panthalassa initially found herself unable to summon dinosaur aid. Heck found Patchwork Jack to be more than a match for his previously unassailable undead vigor--Patchwork Jack grabbed him by the face, threw him onto his back, and began pummeling him with steam-hammer fists. Worse, when Heck let himself slip into a berserk rage, Patchwork Jack followed suit with a murderous rage of his own! 

Beaten and bruised by the first exchange of blows, things appeared dire for the party when a demonic gate erupted from the ground, its portal filled with fire. However, this gate was help on the way, as their ally Nightsong emerged from it and immediately cast a spell that knit and cauterized their wounds, giving them the wherewithal to keep fighting and turn the tide. Panthalassa was finally able to summon her raptors, which tore into the corpse golems, and even a massive herbivore--though that was quickly put down by a blow from Patchwork Jack. Nightong threw down her Judas coin, exclaiming "Now you dance with me" to a corpse golem that was about to rend Khamaat in two--there was a flash of bright light and the smell of brimstone as Nightsong and the golem vanished to duke it out in Hell's arena. Serafina was able to sneak up on the man in the exoskeleton suit and assassinate him from behind. Heck was finally able to land some blows in return against Patchwork Jack, and Daytona was able to finish him off with a bullet to the head.

When they regrouped, Nightsong announced that she hadn't just come to aid them in their time of need--she had business with them as well. She told them that, in her capacity as Hell's Herald, she was entrusted with the duty of recruiting a team capable of pulling off a job that just might end the Hellwar before it spilled out onto the Mortal Realm in earnest. She had considered many options, but decided that this group of ragtag misfits might be the best candidates for the job. As such, she asked them to sign a black book and become satanic agents in return for a boon to be bestowed upon the completion of their task. 

Garazi was the first to sign the book, and she signed in blood. Everyone signed the book save for Willard and Khamaat, who are either suspicious of what is being offered or repulsed by the idea of getting a rich favor from a Dark Power.

In the end, the group decided to part ways for the time being. Panthalassa would accompany Serafina and Nightsong to retrieve Viktoria from her safe haven. After that, Pathalassa would set sail aboard the Dawnrazor with Thomasina to find Pendleton. Nightsong told Garazi that she should return to Hemlock Hollow and spend time with her family because "it might be some time before you are able to see them again." Ominous and cryptic. 

She also suggested that Heck accompany her and perhaps take the opportunity to get to know Ivara Graymalk better. Daytona would return to Lachryma and to Catarina--and also send the Widow and Viktoria's creations home. Khamaat was charged with keeping a finial safe--it would be needed in the task ahead. Also ominous and cryptic. And as for Willard...well, we assume he will keep looking for this three-legged dog in the interim.

A History of Horrible Experiments

The hunt for Patchwork Jack continues! This session brought some horrific revelations about the site they had been lured into by their quarry and the mystery of Willard Corn has also deepened. 

Characters

Panthalassa, a necromancer who summons primordial creatures

Daytona, a dhampir gunslinger fresh from Hell (again)

Garazi, a beautiful young witch with a bird familiar

Willard Corn, a man of mysterious circumstances

Heck, a revenant seeking vengeance on witch hunters

Khamaat, a newly awakened mummy

Events

When we last left our heroes, they were descending a spiral staircase down into the depths where they could hear a strange metallic buzzing. The sound was coming from a swarm of bio-mechanical bats, which surrounded the group and made them fight for their lives on the staircase. Judicious use of fiery blasts and necrotic bolts knocked the mechanical bats--which had been spying on them on behalf of Patchwork Jack--out of the air. 

While exploring this new level of the complex, they discovered a corpse that Khamaat determined had been exsanguinated via medical means. Additionally, many areas on this level of the complex proved to either be flooded or to have a fast-rushing stream bisecting the caverns they were trudging through. 

Garazi summoned Txori and sent the bird to scout one of the larger caverns. The cave was lit by phosphorescent fungi and was filled with over twenty Vlaak sarcophagi that were leaned against the walls. Willard was able to read the runes carved onto the stone sarcophagi; the runes indicated that the dead were "Doctor-Priests" of some fashion. 

Garazi sent her familiar into another cave--this one stinking of feral animal. Txori was able to relay that the cavern was inhabited by two ratman, each of whom was bearing an eldritch firearm fitted with a glowing green stone, before she was blasted into nothingness. (Don't worry, she can be re-summoned in ten days, good as new.) As the group stormed into the cave, one of the ratmen released a giant rat to attack them. Panthalassa responded by summoning a raptor, which took down the giant rat as it attacked Willard. Once the ratmen were dispatched, the group was able to determine that the eldritch weapons were now useless because they were powered by the life forces of their wielders. 

Heck volunteered to wade into a chamber filled with massive fungi since he is immune to poison. He found two ancient Vlaak corpses that had been covered in a carpet of fungal matter. He was able to obtain strange medical instruments (which he gave to Khamaat) and an alien sword (that was given to Willard). Since Heck was now covered in potentially deadly spores, the group made way so he could give them a wide berth and clean himself off in one of the cavern streams before returning to the party.  

Disappointingly,  neither Panthalassa nor Serafina could pick the lock of a large, metal-plated door that had the name Dahom-Ka inscribed in runes above it. They would need to find a key to open that door. There was also much dithering in the sarcophagi room over whether they should open one of the three final resting places of the Lord Doctors within the chamber. Ultimately, they decided to leave things alone in that room. 

However, on one wall they did find a relief carving of...Willard Corn and a three-legged dog?! The words accompanying the depiction indicated that they are dangerous escaped "experiments." 

Once a staircase was located, they descended to the next level. This set of stairs spit them out near a waterfall created by the rushing streams above. In a nearby room, they found barrels filled with human body parts preserved in formaldehyde for further experimentation. The floor in the room beyond the chamber smelled of vinegar and looked strangely wet. When Heck threw a piece of leather into the room, a translucent pseudopod extended and caught it; the leather sizzled in its acidic grasp! The group was soon fighting an unnatural ooze. 

Once the ooze was dealt with, they discovered another room that had been clearly been used for either surgery or butchery--or a combination of both. There were cleavers and anesthesia masks next to a scarred operating table. Other interesting surgical item was recovered from a flooded room. Panthalassa used her cephalopod familiar Happy to scout the room. After determining that there was a Vlaak skeleton and a floating sack in the water, Khamaat--also immune to poison and disease--waded in to retrieve whatever was in the bag. The item was a broken mechanical glove meant to assist during surgery. 

They also encountered a strange mollusk that was posing as a stalagmite, but they decided to avoid that monster. However, they did explore a series of rooms with broken white tiles on the floor that seemed to be some sort of hospital ward. Panthalassa picked the lock on one of the rooms and they discovered that there was a key jammed into a crack in one of the walls. In fact, Daytona had had a vision of a crazed, wild-eyed man hiding the key in that crack back in the past when this site was an operating medical facility. 

The key was a fit for the lock on the door on the previous level that they could not open. Now they are ready to find out what lies beyond the door.

Into the Vivisectum

We have begun the arc of the current Krevborna campaign where the players decided they wanted to hunt down Patchwork Jack and finish him off once and for all. They joined forces with Serafina for this, but the majority of the players did not like her plan to take Patchwork Jack alive. That adventure would have been more of a Blades in the Dark style game of skullduggery. Instead, the majority voted for taking him out permanently, which means instead they are venturing into his lair on a mission of assassination.

Characters

Panthalassa, a necromancer who summons primordial creatures

Daytona, a dhampir gunslinger fresh from Hell (again)

Garazi, a beautiful young witch with a bird familiar

Willard Corn, a man of mysterious circumstances

Heck, a revenant seeking vengeance on witch hunters

Khamaat, a newly awakened mummy

Events  

The plan went well, until it didn't. As Serafina suspected, the touted attraction of the Frankenstein organ brought Patchwork Jack to the Skarnesti Circus. The trap was sprung, but that's when everything went wrong. Patchwork Jack escaped, trudging north through the wilds of the Vespermark.

Acting quickly, the party gathered their resources and pursued him across the wastes on horseback. The weather did them no favors; winter had now arrived in earnest, bringing with it lashing winds, relentless snow, and bitter cold.

When they lost Patchwork Jack's trail, he set fires or left signs so they would remain on his trail. At last, they came to where his trail led: a fissure in the base of a mountain. Beside the crevice leading into the mountain caves, the group found a lit bonfire and a stack of firewood yet to be consumed. We find a fire and stuff outside the cave. A number of items were placed around the wood--there proved to be full wineskins and cheese and sausage preserved in red wax. Willard determined that the food was both edible and untampered with. Along with the food, a letter had been left. It read:

To Those Who Seek My Death,

Your ruse drew me, but now you stand on the precipice of my gambit. If you continue on this path, you approach your own doom.

Doctor Jack Frankenstein

Garazi summoned her familiar to scout inside the cave. Through Txori's eyes, she could see that beyond the mountainside fissure, the tunnel went north before become a switchback that headed south. She saw that a large double door within was guarded by two corpse golems bearing greataxes--though these two golems appeared to be of a higher quality of workmanship than the one that Viktor Frankenstein had sent after them previously.  

There were a number of discarded wineskins strewn about on the ground, which gave Panthalassa an idea. She summoned a giant spider and strapped their full wineskins to it and sent it into the caves; the theory was that the corpse golems had a taste for vino, so it might be possible to lure them out of the caves so dispatch them in the open. Unfortunately, when the corpse golems saw the spider one of them took a bell from its belt and began ringing it. Both corpse golems then exited through the doors they had been guarding. 

The party missed a crucial detail as they made their way inside: there were arrow slits in the walls. They quickly discovered the existence of the arrow slits when crossbowmen began firing on them. Garazi and Kamaat were both injured. Now on the run, the group saw a shallow set of stairs running south; they took the stairs and found the sniper's nest of one of the corpse golem crossbowman. After dispatching the monstrosity, they traversed the snipers nest to emerge beyond the door and out of range of the archers. 

The chamber they found themselves in was not a natural cave, but rather a square room decorated with carvings of Vlaak wearing strange headdresses and operating unfathomable arcane machinery. The room also featured a rope bridge that spanned a massive chasm; they could hear water crashing in the depths below. The two corpse golem guards had fled to the other end of the rope bridge. The group opened fire on the guards from the other side of the chasm and Heck thundered across to bridge to protect it from being chopped down by the guards' axes. 

Once the guards had been dealt with via violence, the group proceeded east. They kept uncovering caches of water barrels and preserved foods, which was odd given that they knew that Patchwork Jack did not require food or drink to survive. 

Further in the caves, the group found two Vespermark plains barbarians imprisoned in an alcove behind a gate made of wooden slats. The woman offered to trade a stoppered gourd filled with potent medicine for their freedom. Heck attempted to shift the gate, but when he failed Serafina pushed past him and simply picked the iron padlock keeping it closed. 

The group offered to let the barbarians travel with them, but they preferred to take their chances escaping back the way they came. Before they left, they explained how they came to be in this predicament: they had been ambushed by rat-like humanoids while hunting and were dragged into the caves. The ratmen were armed, they said, with strange guns that emitted eerie auras. The party now had some of idea of the unseen dangers that lurked in the complex.

In another larger chamber they found haphazard stacks of crates, barrels, and sacks. Inside were all manner of "raw materials" for Patchwork Jack's experiments: metal devices, bolts and screws, beakers and chemicals. It appeared that Patchwork Jack may be using the complex as a laboratory.

As they explored further, they found a stone statue of a Vlaak wearing a strange nautilus-like mask. When approached the mask opened up and a greenish gas spilled forth. Garazi was the only one affected; the gas made her feel light-headed and when it cleared she was left feeling exhausted. 

After crossing through a door near the statue, the found a room full of pelts and tanned hides; the room had an almost overpowering acidic smell. Inside, a large leather arm emerged from a pile of tanned skins and smashed into Khamaat. A massive figure, which appeared to be a man-like creature sewn together from leather, emerged from the pile. Alongside it were two massive frankenwolves whose bodies appeared to have been pieced together from many different wolves. This battle was tough, and the party took a few wounds here, but ultimately they were able to destroy Patchwork Jack's creations. Panthalassa's summoned velociraptor was particularly deadly against the frankenwolves.

Further violence occurred when the group figured out how to access the second sniper's nest. Khamaat's fire was quite effective against the corpse golems, and the group now knew that they were afraid of flame--which might come in handy latter in the complex. The party also ambushed a lone teenage necromancer cooking meat over a fire; he had one of the Usher's stolen masks at his side, so they deduced that he was a member of the Fraternitie du Cadavre. He was quickly killed and knocked into his own fire. They did manage to recover his grimoire, and it contained a ritual for binding a ghost to a human body--perhaps a vital clue as to why this Cadaverite was in the caverns in the first place.

After barricading themselves in a chamber and keeping watch, the group was able to rest and heal their wounds. They located stone spiral stairs descending into darkness--from which they could hear both the crashing of water and a strange metallic buzzing sound--and went down into the next level of the complex. We'll see what they find next time. 

Felvolio's Carnival

We returned to the current Krevborna game. This one...has clowns. Thankfully, Savage Worlds has stats for "Evil Clowns" in one of the companion books. The folks over at Savage Worlds HQ always got my back.

Characters

Panthalassa, a necromancer with a missing arm

Daytona, a dhampir gunslinger fresh from Hell (again)

Garazi, a beautiful young witch with a bird familiar

Willard Corn and King Beebo, a farmer and his monkey (?)

Heck, a revenant seeking vengeance on witch hunters

Khamaat, a newly awakened mummy

Events

Autumn had ended and winter brought the first snowfall to Hemlock Hollow. Adrian Vergara and Ivara Graymalk crunched through the snow to pay a visit to Garazi's family home. Adrian brought a picnic basket of food and drink for Garazi's family, but more importantly he brought his translations from the book of necromantic lore they had obtained while in pursuit of the Fraternitie du Cadavre. Adrian explained that the book noted that the Nightmother bestowed the ability to raise the dead indirectly upon her cultists; to access that power, the cultists needed to construct an avatar of the Nightmother that she could inhabit--the "goddess" herself could then resurrect the dead on their behalf. 

Meanwhile, Ivara visited Heck in the lower level of the house. She gave Heck the results of her mother scrying the location of the witchfinder Grigori Trask; Trask was inhabiting an old fortress north of Chancel. She also gave Heck a note from her mother for Panthalassa the revealed that her missing arm was somewhere...on the Ghost Moon?! Finally, she gave him a letter to be opened later; this letter was from Ivara herself and she intimated that Heck, in his living incarnation, may be her father!

While en route to the Skarnesti Circus, the group saw firsthand evidence that the War in Hell had spilled over onto Earth. First, they smelled smoke--which proved to be coming from a village that was aflame. The cause made itself apparent: a number of demons were running amok, the chief of which was a corpulent demon with a massive maw. The demons were chasing a woman, who would turn out to be Khamaat. 

The party moved to fight the demons, but most of the party found themselves unnerved by their infernal presence. During the battle, Daytona was swallowed whole by the corpulent demon and it was only through the efforts of the dinosaurs that Panthalassa summoned that he was freed from the demon's gut. They did notice, however, that the demons bore the mark of Legion.

When the group arrived at the Skarnesti Circus, they found it far less bustling than they expected. They were approached by Melusine, the circus's "snake dancer" and former lover of Daytona, who explained that Zoskia Skarnesti, the circus's ringmaster, and Felvolio, the circus's star clown, had both gone missing. She brought them into a tent where an argument about what to do about that was already in progress. 

Of course, the group got themselves involved in the mystery. They got the sense that the circus had some odd visitors. The local constable had told them to move on; a woman (who was described as looking similar to Serafina) tried to join the circus, but Zoskia had turned them away; a trio had been seen stalking around the fairgrounds, seemingly uninterested in the circus's attractions. 

After searching Zoskia's wagon, they uncovered several clues--which they did not follow up on. Instead, they split into two teams: Panthalassa and Daytona went into town to talk to the woman who had wanted to join the circus and the rest walked into the northern woods to find the three strangers who seemed out of place at the circus.

Daytona and Panthalassa discovered that the town was populated with members of the Yezhuli, a heretical sect of the Church of Holy Blood that practices bigamy. After talking to the constable, they obtained the location of the Maitland residence--the home of the woman who wanted to run away with the circus. The constable also showed them that his jail was currently empty--he had not arrested Zoskia and Felvolio surreptitiously. 

Meanwhile, in the woods, Heck was able to track the three strangers to their camp, though only two--an older priest with an eyepatch named Father Ambroys and a young nobleman with a rapier at his side called Jean de Cote--were apparent. The third, the nobleman's Polnezna half-sister Winter was recalled from her sniper's nest to join the group. They explained that they are all members of the Hounds of Velun, a secret society that believes a tsar should be returned to Krevborna's throne. 

However, they disagree with Valton Blakely's quest to resurrect a dead tsar to lead the country--they want to find a living descendent instead. As such, they were led by the priest's mystical visions to the Skarnesti Circus--they were milling around the fairgrounds in search of the party because they wanted to give them a map to an old abbey on an island that Blakely is using as the headquarters of the Fraternitie du Cadavre. 

Back in town, Panthalassa made her way to the Maitland house. She knocked at the door, and when the man of the house answered she told him that she was having "woman problems." He promptly sent her around to the back of the house where one of his wives was taking laundry down from the line. Panthalassa immediately saw the resemblance between this woman, Agniezka, and Serafina--there could be no doubt that they were sisters. Agniezka confided that her husband was abusive and that she wanted out of the marriage; Panthalassa told her that if she could manage to sneak away that night, she would help her get to safety.

Both the group emerging from the forest and the group exiting the town were surprised to hear a discordant calliope playing on the circus fairgrounds. As they approached, they could see that the Skarnesti Circus's familiar black-and-white striped tents had been replaced by green-and-white striped canvas. A new sign was hung above the ticket booth that read FELVOLIO'S CARNIVAL. The sign also included the image of a sinister, god-like clown surrounded by animated laughing mouths. 

Once they had bought tickets from the elderly clown at the ticket booth, he let them in after saying "All hail the God of Dark Laughter!" which really set the tone for what followed. They saw their deceased friend Rudolpho in a monkey suit dancing to the sound of the calliope; Garazi was knocked into a mud puddle at the pillow fight contest; the ring toss proved to be obscene--they were meant to toss rings onto the upturned codpieces of gyrating clowns. Worse yet, entering the "Tragic Kingdom" exhibit shrunk the party down to size and forced them to face off against a giant ant for survival!

Eventually, they heard the sound of heralding trumpets and an announcement that the show in the big top was about to commence. Once in their seats, they found the spotlight trained on them and they were invited to the stage--where they were forced to fight many clowns to the death. The odds tipped against them when a mechanical contraption pulled up and even more clowns spilled out. Felvolio, the master clown and secret cultist of the God of Dark Laughter, also joined in the fray but ultimately the fools were defeated.

Of course, once defeated, the big top began to creak and groan--it was about to topple to the ground. The group ran for it, but as soon as they cleared the tent they could see that Felvolio's Carnival had been replaced by the Skarnesti Circus once more. The Skarnesti carnies were still trapped in glass bubbles floating in the nearby pond, but they were quickly freed.

That night, Serafina and Viktoria arrived in separate carriages. Serafina explained that she wanted the group's help in taking down Patchwork Jack. There was a wrinkle here, though--Serafina wanted to take him alive. The group balked at this and Serafina was outvoted. They have put themselves on the path of death.

Meanwhile, Viktoria presented Panthalassa with two replacement arms that she had crafted: one a perfect replica of the arm she had lost, the other decorated with raised scars depicting a variety of ancient fossils. Panthalassa chose the latter, and the doctor prepared to operate...

Wombs and Teeth

This adventure was the completion of the previous week's scenario. This one had the potential to have a much more involved and tense combat encounter or two--but they avoided one by not picking that fight and the other ended absurdly early due to two extremely lucky rolls by King Beebo's player. That's something that just happens with systems with exploding dice; you can't be mad at it! Live by the exploding die, die by the...exploding die.

Characters

Aria, a paladin struggling with her true nature

Panthalassa, a necromancer with a missing arm

Daytona, a dhampir gunslinger fresh from Hell (again)

Garazi, a beautiful young witch with a bird familiar

Willard Corn and King Beebo, a farmer and his monkey (?)

Events

Daytona arrived back in Hemlock Hollow after his harrowing adventure in Hell. As he walked through the night market, he was hailed by the snow elf Eshrevaal, who was talking to a Graymalk witch he did not recognize. The witch was introduced as Ivara Graymalk, one of the daughters who was present for the rest of the party's dinner with her mother Helena. When Daytona asked where he could find his friends, Ivara offered to take him through the Forest of Loss to where they were. Daytona agreed, and they set off, with Ivara plucking a Halloween mask from a passerby and handing it to Daytona. The townsman balked at the theft at first, but when he realized who he was dealing with he apologized and scurried away.

The pair were quickly enveloped in thick gray mist within the Forest of Loss, but as they emerged from it they found that there were before a farmhouse from which Daytona's friends were now emerging--expect Heck was no longer with them. When Heck's absence was discovered, they ventured back inside the farmhouse and discovered that Kestra had snatched him from the cellar and was keeping him as "collateral" until they got her her womb back.

And so the group returned to the House of the Maiden to attempt to get Sadira to give up the womb. Sadira was not pleased that they had returned empty-handed without her teeth, which Kestra still had in her possession, so attempts to intimidate and persuade her into an exchange fell on deaf ears. Eventually, Sadira became enraged and her monstrous nature became apparent: massive spider legs burst from her sides and an arachnid head emerged from the other side of her head. She attacked the group by enwrapping Garazi in threads of sticky spidersilk. Daytona cut Garazi free, but it was King Beebo who settled the matter decidedly: he fired both of his pistols into Sadira, putting her down like a mad dog before the other prostitutes in the brothel could even think about joining the fray. 

The patrons of the House of the Maiden fled and the women of the brothel made themselves scarce, giving the group time to ransack the building in search of Kestra's womb. Daytona found a safe hidden in the wall behind a painting, and Panthalassa was able to crack it. There were gold bars and bags of coins inside the safe, as well as a large stained leather sack. Dumping the sack onto the floor revealed its contents to be an extremely large--and terrifyingly fresh--womb. Pondering its size, Ivara was able to determine that Kestra had been warped by anger and grief into a "gargantuan"--a monstrous, physical ghost of prodigious size. This probably explained why Kestra never left the dark of the cellar; she was too big and too solid to exit the lower floor.

With the womb stuffed back into the sack by the bravest of the adventurers, they returned to the farmhouse to give it back to Kestra. Aria really wanted to force Kestra into trading the womb for the teeth--on the presumption that Sadira would "come back"--but the rest of the party just wanted to be done with the vile task and get their reward. Garazi and Aria got into an argument about it--and Kestra didn't help matters by rattling the tin can she kept Sadira's teeth in to taunt her. Ultimately, Aria said something unkind about witches in Ivara's presence. Ivara used her diabolic magic to force Aria to her knees and whispered in her ear that she didn't want to hear that kind of talk.

The rest of the group decided to venture down the cellar steps and give Kestra the sack. Horrifyingly, they could hear her inserting the organs back into her body. She did, however, keep her end of the bargain--she sent a very dazed and bewildered Heck out of the darkness, a fistful of tickets to ride the last "iron beast of the Vlaak" clutched in his hand. 

She also made good on providing "one secret known only to the dead." The group asked her if there was a way to restore a revenant to life--and told them that that occult secret resided in a Grail Tomb within the corrupted bayou known as the Stain. 

As Ivara led the group back through the mists to the Forest of Loss, things came to head within the party and Aria stalked off on her own after arguing again with Garazi and threatening to kill to Ivara. The party is now hunkering down to figure out their next move, but a plan is in the works to lure their foe Patchwork Jack into an ambush to deal with him once and for all. But...there's a wrinkle or two there they don't anticipate so we'll see what happens when the campaign resumes.

The Ghosts of Gallhart

We're back to our Savage Krevborna campaign with a Halloween-themed session!

Characters

Aria, a paladin struggling with her true nature

Heck, an affable revenant looking for answers

Panthalassa, a necromancer with a missing arm

Garazi, up and coming witch with a bird familiar

Willard Corn and King Beebo, a farmer and his monkey (?)

Events

With the departure of Daytona, and the relative safety afforded by Hemlock Hollow, the party had a bit of downtime to rest, recuperate, and run various errands. Garazi went to Adrian Vergara's house to return his calling card case and ask for a favor. She was surprised that her knock on the door was answered by Ilyona, the girl who had been melded with a tree outside of Borza. Ilyona explained that Adrian had offered her a job as his maid; when Garazi took her aside and asked if Adrian was a good master, the girl appeared genuinely happy with her current employment.

Over tea, Garazi brought up the compendium of death gods and grave spirits that they had found and needed translated. Adrian felt confident he could make a workable translation; Garazi directed him to focus on the entry for the Nightmother and the entry about revenants. She also produced the sheet music for the Hymn of the Nightmother but, being an unmusical sort, Adrian could not make heads or tails of it. As he walked her to the door, Adrian promised to visit her family's farmstead when he had a translation in hand.

Meanwhile, Panthalassa and Aria visited the Ushers to return the two masks they had recovered from the cemetery. This time, they were met at the door by a stoop-backed old woman who seemed blind. As before, they were lead to a parlor--but this one was littered with poorly maintained taxidermy. Panthalassa asked again whether the Fraternitie du Cadavre could have any motive for stealing her arm in particular. This Usher had a theory: if the Fraternitie was intent on creating an avatar of the Nightmother capable of raising the long dead, they would need specific body parts for its construction. Specifically, the woman said that six different arms would be required: the arm of "Everyone's Child," the arm of "The Grandfather" the arm of "The Soldier Boy," the arm of "The Preacher Man," the arm of "The Spinster," and the arm of "The Wretched." Additionally, such a working would require the "heart of The Widow," the "teeth of the Concubine," and the womb of The Mother."

The old woman assumed that Panthalassa's arm was the arm of "Everyone's Child."

Panthalassa was concerned about the sustainability of the Usher's vigil over Madeline, especially since the Usher woman they were talking to kept coughing up things that squirmed in the handkerchief she expectorated into. Panthalassa attempted to link her mind with that of the "sleeping" Madeline Usher; she saw a vision through the other woman's eyes--walking the halls of an ancient school where the instruction was presided over by a devil.

On the night before Halloween, Heck and company had been invited to dinner by Helena Graymalk, the matriarch of the Graymalk clan of witches. They were shown in by Ivara Graymalk, one of Helena's many daughters. Unlike her sisters, Ivara dressed very primly, more like a school marm than a witch. Some members of the group noticed that Ivara seemed to be searching Heck's face for something.

Understanding that Heck's condition as a revenant meant he had significant gaps in his memory, Helena told him that he had once been a powerful warlock in his own right and had been the leader of a coven adept at converting pagans to the worship of the Devil. Heck had met his demise at the hands of Grigori Trask and his witchfinders; Helena suspected that a member of Heck's coven had betrayed him. When asked about revenants, Helena admitted that most revenants returned to the grave once their vengeance had been attained, but also dangled the intriguing notion that some revenants persisted in their second life if they found a reason to continue living. 

Additionally, Aria's questions about her status as a creature made of song were answered by Helena as best she could. She conjectured that Aria may want to seek the Needle of Golgotha in the mountains, a structure said to enable communication with the elder gods of the Outer Dark.

Beebo announced that he wanted to go to the Skarnesti Circus. What on Earth could a monkey want at the circus?

During the course of dinner, Helena commended the group on the services they had provided by springing Coraline for Kholograt and saving Lorelei and her sisters from death in Borza. As such, she felt that she owed the group several favors. One of those favors was cashed in immediately: the group asked Helena to scry to the locations of Grigori Trask and Panthalassa's missing arm. Helena asked them what their plans were for Halloween night. Since they seemed to be in search of answers, she offered them a possibility: they could venture into the Forest of Loss, a popular place for suicides where the boundary between the living and the dead was especially thin on Samhain, because many people had reported finding the answers they were in search of in that unhallowed stretch of woods. Helena told them that if they did venture into the Forest of Loss on Halloween they should be wearing masks so that the spirits of the dead would not recognize them as the still living.

Upon venturing into the Forest of Loss on Halloween night, the group was quickly surrounded by a fog that separated them from the other groups in the woods. When they emerged from the fog, the found themselves cresting a hill overlooking a small village lit by jack o' lanterns and carved gourds. The first building on the path leading into the village was an eatery serving soup and dumplings. From the way the dumplings fell through the faces of the two elderly people "eating" at a table outside--only to plop back into their bowls--the group correctly ascertained that they were now among ghosts. The proprietor of the shack, a woman named Danila, knew that she was deceased, though she cautioned that not everyone in village was aware that they were specters. 

She also informed them that the town was caught up in a conflict between two vengeful women--Kestra at the old farmhouse and Sadira of the House of the Maiden. There was a third woman, the Widow, but she had somehow escaped being trapped in the cursed village of Gallhart. According to Danila, all three women were brought to Gallhart by a sorcerer named Valton Blakely. Blakely intended to sacrifice the women and use their body parts to construct an avatar of the Nightmother to--all to resurrect one of Krevborna's tsars. This eerily reflected the supposed goal of the Fraternitie du Cadavre. 

The group decided to explore the Widow's house first. They found it dark, but the front door was unlocked. Inside, everything was neat and tidy. There was a family portrait above the fireplace showing a man with dark hair parted in the middle, a tall woman with blonde hair and a beatific smile, and a young boy whose looks favored his mother. In the attic, they found trunks of clothes belonging to the man and the son; presumably, both had died and their things had been put out of sight.

The Widow's cottage was near a pagan shrine, so the group decided to poke around in there as well. The shrine had been vandalized; the altar was purposefully smashed, the ceiling was staved through, and the place had clearly received no visitors for many years. 

The party's next stop was the House of the Maiden. The building smelled of incense and was lit by a number of paper lanterns glowing with a macabre green light. The door of the House of the Maiden was answered by a slim woman whose hair was held in place by lacquered hair sticks. There was a series of pigeonholes behind the desk in the entrance room; each pigeonhole held a single cloth doll. Nine of the dolls were turned to face the back of the cabinet--only three faced forward. From this detail, the group correctly guessed that the House of the Maiden was a brothel and that the dolls signified which girls were currently "occupied" and which were currently available.

Abetta, the House of the Maiden's procuress, showed the group into the common room. The most notable "fixture" of the room was a nude woman suspended from the ceiling by fine thin threads. A woman with straight black hair, wearing a gossamer robe decorated with chrysanthemums, was playing a balalaika. This woman was introduced as Sadira. Sadira reiterated the facts of her conflict with Kestra at the farmhouse; the crux of the matter was that Kestra had stolen her teeth, a fact she underlined by removing her dentures. She had no real reply when asked why she and Kestra did not join forces against Blakely, who seemed to be the real cause of their woes. Ultimately, the group agreed to venture into the farmhouse and steal back Sadira's teeth with the reward of "a secret only the dead know" hanging in the balance as their payment. 

Kestra's farmhouse was surrounded by a metal fence, the gate of which creaked as they opened it. Similarly, the porch's boards moaned as they traversed them. There was a pitcher, its glass surface dotted with condensation, on a small table by the door. Aria tasted it and confirmed that it contained sweet tea. Garazi sent her familiar into the house to scout around; the bird reported that there was a strange sliding metal door just off the living room. 

The group crept in; predictably, the metal door made an awful racket as Heck slid it open. Just then, one of the other doors in the house crashed open and two figures, one a man in stained overalls and a pumpkin obscuring his face and the other a woman in a babydoll dress wearing a goat head mask, came barreling toward them. The man bore a sledgehammer and the woman held a cleaver in one hand and a butcher's knife in the other. The battle that followed was fraught, especially when a third participant--this man clad in Napoleonic uniform and his face painted like a clown--entered through the front door and began firing a pistol and swinging a cutlass. A few members of the party were injured, but ultimately they were able to kill their foes--even after a botched spell from Panthalassa briefly reanimated one of their attackers!

They then searched the house. The room beyond the sliding metal door was an abattoir, complete with human torsos hanging from hooks. They found the personal affects of their three attackers, including four unlabeled glass vials full of unidentifiable liquids. The darkness in the cellar proved impenetrable by the light of their lantern, but they could see two large yellow eyes shining in the shadows. They had found Kestra.

Kestra admitted that she had Sadira's teeth in her possession, but was equally uninterested in the question of why they hadn't joined forces against Blakely. However, Kestra added that she hated Sadira because the woman had stolen her womb--which she wanted back. In fact, she made an offer of her own: if the group got her womb from Sadira, she would give them a secret known only to the dead and tickets to ride the last "iron beast of the Vlaak." 

We'll see how they resolve this next time.