session recap, 9/5/2012

CAST
--------
Mongo the Fighter (4), his henchladies "Bunny" the Thief (1), Nancy "the Wrathful" the Fighter (1), and William the Sentinel (1), and his soil-bearers Malazar and Benarto
Razoe the Fantra Paladin (3) and his henchman Skwisgar the Elf(1)

Razoe finally caught up to Mongo at "The Wretched" in Tarryfield. The duo decided to round up their henchmen and head to the cat-infested mansion, with an eye towards cleaning it up and making a home base out of it.

The house was a wreck. The windows had been smashed out by vandals, and the thousands of cats had left cat crap and urine everywhere. Mongo had some insightful observations about the cats - why would they defecate where they lived?  It was quite peculiar behavior for cats.

Once they stepped inside, they heard some music from the left. They entered the mansion's music room, where a cello with broken strings and a twisted neck stood in a corner. A glowing yellow figure was somehow playing this broken cello - and faded away as Mongo and Razoe entered the room.

Spooked by the apparition, the players stepped over more cats and eventually made their way to the kitchen. This room was unlike any other in the house - its tiled floor was gleamed with cleanliness. The only sign of cats had ever been in the kitchen were five polished-looking cat skeletons laying on the floor.

Suspicious, Mongo picked up one of the cats rubbing against his legs and hurled it into the kitchen. The large oven door sprang open, and a slimy pink pseudopod quickly reached out and grabbed up the cat. It meowed pitifully as the pink blob began absorbing the feline even before it had withdrawn back into the oven.

Outraged that their potential home had a blob infestation, they began hurling screeching cats into the kitchen to lure the blob into the open. Once it made its way to the center of the room, Mongo had his two soil-bearers begin flinging cats over his shoulders, while he, Razoe, and their henchmen shot arrows into the blob.

The party was horrified when the blob split into four separate sections, which began heading towards the party. Some of the blob-portions were distracted by fresh cats being hurled at them, while the warriors focused on those oozing towards them. They hacked the blobs to pieces, organelles and slime oozing all over the floor - but not before one of the blob-portions flowed over Nancy. Her technologically fattened caboose was no protection against the flesh-hungry blob, which eagerly devoured her exposed face.

The remaining blob portions were slaughtered, but the fight had left Razoe and Mongo badly wounded from acid burns. Mongo lay himself down on the floor and had his soil-bearers cover his carroty skin with dirt. The nutrients in the soil healed him, and soon he was at full strength. Razoe had no such powers, so they decided to head back to "The Wretched" for a week of rest and recuperation.

The pair conferred, and decided that the dungeon would probably be a safer place to explore. They headed down the dirt track towards Denethix. Before the road reached Denethix, it passed through the town of Lugosi. A working-class town of brick buildings, with one major oddity - all the first-floor exterior walls were covered with mirrors. They interrogated a passer-by: "No, no, of course there are no vampires. Just a gimmick for tourism. No idea why the mirrors are really there, they've been around forever. Yes, there's a mausoleum up in the graveyard called the Tomb of the Vampire.  You know what's there? Bunch of beer bottles. Teenagers keep having parties up there.  Anyhow, we have our bimonthly Festival of Fangs - that's great!  We light up torches at night, and the reflections off all these mirrors are just incredible!  Well, hope to see you at one of the festivals!"

Suspicious of vampirism, the pair got out of town as quickly as possible, straight towards Denethix.

Once there, new henchmen were recruited.  At Leafy Green's Salad Bar, Razoe managed to hire an elf named Skwisgar

Skwisgar: "I was hoping to sign on with Slezgar's Excellent Elven Edventurers. It's so sad what happened. Did you know him?"
Mongo: "No. We know nothing about him."

And at the Tattered Heel, Mongo hired a sentinel.

Mongo: "Interested in a job?"
Sentinel: "A job? Protecting you? From danger? I have waited all my life for this moment. Yes. Yes, I will go. I must go. (turning to his wife) Leave me now. Away with you! Stop crying. That part of my life is over now."
Mongo: "What's your name?"
Sentinel: "My new life begins in this very moment. My old self is dead. You must name me anew!"
Mongo: "Ok... you're William."

The party headed back to the dungeon, skirting around Chelmsfordshire. While in the fields, they were accosted by two armed men. "Aha! Oh, wait. Nice armor you guys have there. Uh... bye!"  The pair of would-be bandits fled through the fields, and the party was too unimpressed to give chase.

Once in the dungeon, they found that the chasm between first and second levels had been bridged again. Two ropes were strung across, one at "foot" level and one at "waist" level, providing a relatively easy route. Mongo and Razoe decided to explore a bit of the second level, and crossed rather than descending.

The nearby rooms appeared to have been ransacked, so the party headed down to the third level using the stairs. They found themselves in a delightfully not-flooded room, with a triangular screen on the wall. As they approached the screen, it turned on, and they were greeted with an image from beyond the grave - Slezgar!  The elf said "Hey losers!  Guess what? You're too late. I've already looted everything. So just go home."  The screen then went black.

The frame of the screen had a little red button - Mongo used his extending 20' pole to press the button from a distance. The screen filled with the word "RECORDING", and once Razoe told him what it said, Mongo panicked, intending to smash the screen. Razoe stopped him, and instead recorded a new greeting, that involved Razoe's naked posterior.

Hijinx done, they followed a corridor northeast, coming to a black stone door with a winged skull carved on it, and the words "Herein lies the Bone Lord. In death he shall know no rest."  Peeking through the door, they saw 17 skeletons dressed in formal wear (tuxedos and black dresses), a well-furnished fancy room with long dining table, and a great stone sarcophagus. One of the skeletons began to make a gesture, and they slammed the door shut in abject fright. They headed the opposite direction, back to the image of Razoe's behind, and headed down a northwest corridor.

The room at the end of this corridor had a message written on its south wall in black paint: "SAFE PASSAGE. SO SAY I, NIMIRLAN". A black triangle was painted underneath the message.  Searching carefully, they found that the message had been painted upon a secret door.

Beyond the secret door, they found a secret supply cache. There were crates of odd food unlike anything they had ever seen - jerked cave-lizard and dried mushroom caps made up most of the food. There were also barrels of water, a half dozen swords, a jug of black paint and a satchel containing a paint brush and a jar of stinky ointment, a scroll with arcane writing, a crude partial map of the third level, and a small coffer containing 350 gp.

They then followed a second secret door out of this room, and found a set of stairs leading to a flooded corridor. The bottom stair was covered in fungus. They stepped through the fungus, and followed the watery corridor (flooded 2' deep) to a series of natural caves. There, they decided that they had enough exploration for the day, and returned to Tarryfield.

Gains: 350 gp, crude map, arcane scroll
Kills: Blob
Losses: Nancy the Wrathful