Red Dead Annihilation: Campaign Thread

The ideas would have to come from someone else, because now Meili was standing frozen and as pale as Inete, realizing, what just happened. "I destroyed the soul. I released it and Death Plague took it... Whoever it was is lost to this world and all others forever." With shaking hands, she returned the boomerang to her belt and began whispering a prayer for the dead to Eldath.

Ran pauses at Meili's outburst. He frowns for a moment, the nature of what's been going on finally trickling a little more into his direct brain. Then he just nods and continues on the path.

"What's done is done," Ran says. "Besides, you may have done them a favour. They might have been a right bastard in life and all that was waiting them was eternal gloom and doom."

But once he gets few steps further down the path, he looks over at the bird and whispers to it.

"Best be keeping you in once piece though, eh?"

Mica does his best to comfort Meili “Being bound to that skull was not proper for it anyway.  You released it, it may be for the best.”

He looks over at Ran and the bird “It doesn’t want to lead and it looks like it doesn’t want you to go either.  What is up there that worries it so?  If the skull was not the work of the tribe, then I fear for their safety.  Let’s go have a look, but be ready.”  Mica pulls out one of his hand axes and joins Ran in moving down the trail, keeping a sharp watch for signs of trouble.  Perception:15.

.

Danica stares in shock at seeing the soul howl in agony before dissipating into nothingness. Or perhaps pulled somewhere else entirely... Stepping up behind Meili, the elf rests her left hand on her shoulder and states lowly, "Y'couldn't've known what would happen. I encouraged you to do it even." 
As Inete and Meili offer prayers to their gods, Danica pauses, staring at where the skull was before doing the same, right hand running fingers over the symbol to Selune that hung from the scarf around her hip. "Moonmaiden guide your spirit to peace." As unlikely as it was to happen...she could still pray.

Huffing in mild amusement at Ran's speculations, Danica replies, "We can only hope. Just try and keep your new friend quiet if you can. Not trying to sneak in or anything, but no need ta announce ourselves."

Danica will continue onwards with the rest of the group and trusting Mica to keep a good lookout, she keeps her eyes peeled for any unusualness regarding the flora or signs of fauna as they walk.   Nature: 23

Meili only nodded to the supporting words (even if the idea of the poor soul being better off destroyed made her another shade paler) and continued whispering the prayer. For a while, she could only follow others but eventually she calmed down or fully accepted the tragedy enough to join the watching duty, searching for the signs of anything unnatural along the path. (Survival: 23)

Walking down the path toward M'bala, Danica notices some unusual things in the surrounding jungle. The cycads and ferns are much denser hear.  Though the large trees are more spread out, these ground based plants grow thick, tall and dense.  At times they encroach along either side of the path, blocking sight and obscuring your surroundings.  Their long, featherlike leaves hang over the path, sticky with a sap-like fluid that makes them clutch and grab at the party's clothing and armor.  You've seen plants like this on your travels before but their explosive growth here seems extraordinary.  Also, the insect population here is noticeably abundant.  There are enormous dragonflies, cockroaches and millipedes that scurry and fly away as you approach.  Again, you've seen their like before, but the concentration of them here stands out as strange.

Meili, you spot something unsettling.  Those few trees that do come close to the path have weird wooden figures hanging from them.  They are bundles of twigs, tied with thin vines into shapes.  Most are animals... snakes, birds... something that resembles a dinosaur.  And there are humanoid shapes as well.  You can't shake the feeling that they are changing locations.  It's crazy... but that snake... wasn't it just on that other tree over there?

After less than 10 minutes, you emerge from the thick ferns into the ruins of M'bala.

You enter a silent, clear plain, perhaps a mile in diameter.  The outer region, into which you are now walking, is all overgrown farmfields.  Its not terribly different in layout from an average town back on the continent.  Further ahead you can see the remains of clusters of buildings.  Most of the structures were wood and thatch, and they’re now just crumbling compost heaps demolished by rain, wind, and time. A few stone foundations and overgrown ramps poke up through the debris, indicating this was more than just a simple village.  A three tiered basalt ziggurat sits at the far side of the complex.  There is no sign of human activity or occupation.  A settlement of this size could have held hundreds of souls... it now stands empty, being slowly reclaimed by the jungle.

The only small structure still maintained and intact is a lone hut about a thousand yards southwest of where you stand, at the edge of a boulder field. The hut is made from thatch and animal hides stretched over the rib cage of an immense reptile. Animal skulls, wind chimes, and totems of feathers and shells rattle in the breeze, and smoke drifts from hut.  As you draw nearer, you spot a creature shuffling slowly around the outside of the hut, hunched over in an animal-like posture. You realize it’s a human woman: impossibly old, crippled by arthritis, blinded by cataracts.  She is on her hands and knees, digging in a root garden which surrounds her hut.  For now she doesn't react and doesn't seem to have noticed you approaching.

 For a while, Meili blamed the feeling of uneasiness on the gate's horrifying event, but the longer the group walked along the path the worse that feeling become. Finally, Meili had to speak up. "Hew? Those figurines on the trees around - is this M'Bala's tradition? There is something unsettling about them. might go crazy but it feels like they are moving somehow. I am sure I saw that snake on a tree ten paces behind us."

She tried to say in the center of the path and be ready for anything, no matter how crazy that "anything" will be.

However, ruins, as worrisome and sad as they were, did not look like an immediate threat, nor did the old blind woman near the only surviving hut. Meili breathed a sigh of relief but before darting to the only survivor asked Hew one more question. "Do you know that old lady? Would not want to frighten her."

Hew shakes his head when Meili asks about the stick figures, and then again about the old woman.  "It wasn't like this.  This place has been destroyed.  And look there..." he says, pointing at more recent signs of calamity.  A few of the dilapidated buildings have been obliterated, debris scattered across the roadway as if from an explosion.  Nearby, others are charred and blackened from fire.  It's not fresh, but neither is it so old as the rest of the decay in the town, which looks more like natural neglect than actual destruction.  A near a large cistern well, the ground is churned up as if from huge claw marks.

For now the old woman continues to dig, pulling up and sorting some sort of tropical root vegetables that resemble long, gnarled yellow carrots.

Ran looks over at Meili and mentions not wanting to frighten her.

"This place is a ghost town and everything we've bumped into since we left the port has wanted to make us their entree," Ran begins. He pauses and watches the old woman for a moment. "When you go through the alleys back home and dodge cutthroats and evade all the slimes and molds and whatnot from the sewers and come across an old man sitting quietly, that's when you know you're in real trouble."

He gestures back the way they came.

"There's no one else who here. Those wee decorations might be hers," Ran adds. "No, how about we don't let her frighten us?"

Meili quickly glanced at Ran and opened her mouth as if going to argue... but then closed it and listen to the rest silently. If anything, Hew's words very much supported Ran's notion. "There is wisdom in your words," admitted she quietly. "But we need to know what happened here. I will try to talk to her - that cloak can protect me from evil influences ... for a while." Meili even smiled a little. "And you can drag me out if something happens easier than it would be for me to get you out."

She tightened the cloak around herself (activating Protection from Evil and Good) and walked to the woman and coughed lightly attracting her attention. "Hello." She waited for the woman to turn to her voice. "We are travellers who hoped to find shelter in the village here not expecting to find it in ruins. What had happened here?"

The old woman freezes when Meili speaks.  She looks practiced at this... with her dusty brown clothes and hunched over body, she blends in quite well when she isn't moving.  When no attack comes, she slowly turns her head toward Meili.  The ancient woman's face is painted with chalk or something similar... the imprint of a bluish hand across her face.  Milky eyes peer out... its sounds like she sniffs at the air.  Then a voice calls out in thickly accented common.

"Eh?  What's that?  Travelers?  More travelers, come to vex me?  Come to pile more suffering at my door?"  Her voice creaks like an old floor, the breaths between her words sound choked with dust.  She sniffs again.  "You wield magic... so you are more of those Wizards, then?  If so, then you know well what happened to Mbala... I told you well and once before already.  Strife and treachery, betrayal and death.  Mbala and its people are gone, and only I linger here, too stubborn to die, to old and dry to be worthy of eating by the beasts of the land.  And then you Wizards come to torture me more?  Well, old Nanny will not be fooled again.  I have a friend now."  She clucks her tongue and a little flying monkey hops out from behind her hut and sits down beside her, looking at Meili.

It looks up at the old woman and squeaks at her.  

"What?  The devil are you talking about?  Not Wizards?  ... Seekers?  Well, what do they seek?  Why have they come here, to nowhere, to frighten an old woman?"  She is looking down at the monkey, but Meili you feel the question is directed at you.

This place was like a seesaw with its danger and peace mixed together and changing into each other at every turn! Meili relaxed a bit and smiled at the woman. "No wizards, even if some of us do know a bit of magic. We came to take a break on the way to the hidden city in the south, where the source of the Death Plague lies." (Meili pushed away the thought that this would be the place where Velan would interrupt her to keep the secret. It was not the time to think about those they lost.) "This is what we seek as we are, indeed, called Seekers." And added as reassuringly as she could. "We mean no harm to you or anyone else."

"But how come Nanny, your... helper knows the name of our group?"

“We are no wizards Nanny, and we mean you no harm”  Mica steps up close behind Meili, both to offer support and to get a closer look at the old woman. “Signs of fire and explosion.  Nanny, did the wizards do this to the village?  Why?”

The old woman slowly turns her head back and forth to look from Meili to Mica; Mica to Meili.  She reaches down to scratch the flying monkey.  

"What kind of helper would he be if he couldn't help an old woman?  A useless helper, then.  If he knows, it is because you said so yourselves, once or more, and the jungle was listening."

To Mica, she looks up, and then begins to lift herself to her feet.  It is almost painful to watch and listen to; her knobby knees creaking and popping with the strain.  Her posture is so poor, that even standing she is not much taller than when she was kneeling in the dirt.  She cranes her neck and looks again in Mica's direction.  "Explosions, yes.  But M'bala was dead long before the Wizards set the corpse on fire."

"My help, they sought.  A favor, they wanted.  In return, I asked that they drive off my tormentors.  In the cliff face south of the village, a tribe of terror-folk make their nest.  They plague me; stealing, beating me, circling my hut at night and keeping me awake with their wretched calls.  The equally wretched Wizards thought to have the fight here, in my front yard.  Fire and stone flew, men and monster screamed, and old Nanny had to hide.  When it was over, all was still and quiet.  The Wizards were gone... but still the terror folk come at night.  Foolish Wizards."

Ran comes closer to join Mica and Meili.

”What’s a terror-folk? If you don’t mind me asking.” Ran says. He then gives the old woman his best smile. “Any chance a woman has been through here after the wizards were? Looks like me only not so handsome.”

Meili instinctively rushed forward to help Nanny to her feet, side-glancing at the "helper". If the creature did not object to the action, Meili would help and then return to her spot.

Meili frowned, trying to remember something resembling the description of "terror-folk" from Mr. Volo's book, and added another question to Ran's. "So, those wizards scared the creatures away and left. Do those terror-folk return every night? Will we see them if we stay here?"

Danica watches, head on a swivel as the party approaches M'bala, seeing the destruction and the unassuming old woman. She nodded along with Ran, much of the same opinion regarding the old woman, but they still needed to talk with her, just be wary. 
Many things about her set the elf on edge, not least of all just how very old she seemed yet still...intimidating somehow. Even more so when she spoke more of what happened to the village and what came after. "The fact that she remained through all that means that she's not one to be trifled with." Danica murmurs quietly to the group. 

Seeing a winged monkey was interesting but what it 'said' to the old woman made a chill run down her spine. Meili asking the question of how it knew what they called themselves before she could. The answer didn't make her feel any more at ease. But she tried to swallow down her trepidation and add to the list of questions they were throwing at Nanny, "We don't mean to be rude and intrude on your home and badger you needlessly. Simply looking for a friend. But can we ask why these folk keep terrorizing you? And if it's not too much to ask that you repeat yourselves to this new group...tell us the story of strife and betrayal that apparently led to M'bala's destruction?" Danica tries to keep her voice and body posture casual and easy going, feeling very much like a prey drinking at the same river as a predator for some reason. 

Mica listened to the woman’s story with interest “Did the wizards leave, Meili, or did they fall against these terror folk?”  Mica looks over at Hew “Have you heard of these terror folk, seen them before?” 

“I would like to know more about what happened here.  I will look around while you talk, if you don’t mind Nanny”  Mica moves to investigate the ruins for any clues about what happened during the battle, paying special attention to the claw marks next to the well and for any casualties.

Perception: 18.

Survival: 13.

.

When Meili rushes over, the old woman initially tenses as if fearing an attack.  Once it is clear Meili is trying to assist her, she relaxes and accepts the help.  The monkey nervously touches its index fingers together, unsure of what to do.  "How kind, child.  Nanny can manage on her own, but you are sweet to help."  She reaches out and caresses the magical cloak.  "My my.  A girl, distant from here in location... magic, distant from here in time.  What fates have brought you together and to my doorstep?"

Ran, while Meili assists the old woman, the bird prances nervously on your shoulder, and based on a weird, wet, warm feeling sliding under your chainmail and down your back, you think it might have defecated on you.  It leans in and bites your ear again, harder this time.  Then it let's go and says, quietly, "Wrank!  Let's goooooo!"  Then it sidesteps back to the edge of Ran's shoulder, trying to keep a low profile.

"Looks like you?  Young man, my eyes fail me... but your voice... could there be something familiar there?  Perhaps...".

As the questions fly, the old woman waves her hand.  "One at a time.  Bah.  Weeks of quiet, then explosions.  Weeks of quiet, then a quadrillion questions.  Let old Nanny get herself up to your speed, children."

"Have you not encountered the terror folk?  A blessedly peaceful trip, you must have had.  They are a scourge on the land, great lizard men with wings, and no sense of their proper place in the cosmos' pecking order.  Many of this town's people were dragged away and eaten, and I would tell you, the blame lies at the feet of those monstrosities."

Hew steps in to answer as Mica has also asked him.  "Yes.  They are also called ptera-folk.  A few individuals have spotted and observed us on our travels, but none have challenged a group so large as ours. (cough cough)  We must be cautious.  They are dangerous."  Hew leans against the remains of an old hut.

The old woman cocks her head to the side when Hew speaks.  "Eh?  Troubled you are, dwarf.  Sick.  Shivering.  Failing.  How long can you carry on, do you think?  Nanny can cure this, tis an easy thing.  I have all I need right here," she gestures back toward her hut.

"Never you mind, that, (cough) madame.  I've survived far worse."

"I don't doubt.  I don't doubt.  But will you survive this?  You've grown old and you feel your constitution betraying you.  What of your customers here?  Who shall guide them if you fall?  Who shall quench the flame?"  She smiles.  "Do not be stubborn.  Nanny will do this.  As the child wrapped in magic offered Nanny a hand up, Nanny shall offer the same to you.  No conditions; a kindness for a kindness."

Mica, your inspection confirms there are signs of magical combat here.  The courtyard around the cistern well looks to have been the epicenter of the battle.  You're not an expert on magic, but it doesn't take one to see that fire magic was used here... lots of it.  There are no bodies, not of wizard or of ptera-folk.  The battle was fought weeks ago and the weather has damaged the tracks, though you can make out the prints of humanoid sized creatures as well as prints of something larger.

The claw marks near the well are particularly hard to figure out.  They certainly look like claw marks, and have left a pattern in the ground as if from the swing of a large beast.  But the claw marks themselves are strange.  The left hand/paw seems to have 5 claws while the right only has 2.  All are very long, but they are of different lengths and sizes... some claws seem to have been sharp like huge bear claws, while at least one was blunt and thick, more like a club.  You've never seen anything remotely like this.