Chapter Thirty-One |
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December 20, 2011 |
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We enter the Mourning Marsh on foot in our pursuit of the slitherin. Periodically, Korvinean, who is scouting ahead, will come back to the party and lead us around particularly dangerous areas or deeper puddles. After about two and half hours, we come to a large dry land mass which rises above the surrounding marshes. We stop and let our boots and feet dry out. Korvinean moves out to scout some more, and returns to tell us there’s a very deep stream ahead to one side, and further uplands to the other. He tells us there is no way to wade across the stream, and we could either go around or cut down a tree to span the gap. We decide to fell a tree, and Finn begins chopping. One of the women yells, “Run and wake the witches!” and one of the men bursts at full speed from the group. Briggette punches him as he passes her, and she hears his jaw snap as he falls down unconscious. She lays on hands just enough to heal the jaw and bring him back to consciousness, “Stay down! And get back over there!” He scampers back to his group, and she draws out Helga. “What is wrong with you people? You want to be here?” She stares incredulously at them as no one answers, and one of the women starts crying incessantly. “Where are you from?” Briggette asks them, and all of the women begin to wail. “They will kill all of their children,” one of the men tells her. “They are underground in the nest.” Briggette asks him where the enemy is located, and he hesitates before telling her that the witches are holding the children. She asks where to find them, and the man replies, “You don’t know who you’re fighting, do you?” “I don’t care who I’m fighting, I know that they’re not good—or else they wouldn’t be holding the children.” He replies that all of the rat men—at least two dozen of them—are witches. He does not fight because he considers it certain suicide for a losing cause. She asks him to help. “I will not fight you or try to stop you, but I will not help you.” Meanwhile, outside with the rest of us, Ulric yells to the village, “Is there no one else? I am Ulric von Zurwald! Show yourself and fight!” He stands in wait for an enemy, but none appear, so he makes his way to the room where Briggette is talking with the captives. “Look, I understand that you’re not going to fight because you’re a big giant coward, but if you could just give me some basic information to help me save your children—the children you hold ‘so dear’—I would…” Ulric interrupts her, “You know what, they won’t fight for their own children, fuck these people! Let’s go!” and stalks out of the room. I walk up and sap the idiot, and we leave. I disable the doors so they can’t leave to warn their captors that we are coming. As we plan what we’re going to do, Brianna, Finn and Boian come in from the other side of the village. They look as though they’ve seen better days and have withstood a difficult battle. Briggette heals several of us up a bit, and we discuss our plan. Tired of the talk, Ulric kicks down the door to the bunk house which supposedly houses several of the male rat men. “I am Ulric von Zurwald! Surrender or perish!” Three of the ten rat men sleeping in the room wake up, but the others remain snoozing. Ulric immediately eviscerates one of them, and the other two point at him and cast; magic missiles fly forth and strike Ulric. I tumble in behind Ulric and scream, “Die, you fucker!” as I attack the closest one sleeping, yet somehow, I miss him and only strike his nest. He wakes up, and I swing again, instantly killing him. Briggette moves into the room and attacks one of the ones who is awake, but he survives the blow. Boian moves in and stabs one of them straight through the head. The remaining rat men wake up and begin casting magic missiles at the first non rat men they see. Briggette, Ulric and Boian are all struck, but none of them appear to be seriously injured. One of the rat men charges Ulric and attempts to hit him with claws and teeth, but misses on each count. Briggette drops another, and Brianna and Finn set in on yet another. I move in to stab the one Ulric has been working on, and he drops. Another charges in to touch him with some other magic, but he ends it before it has the chance, and charges across the room to gut another. Brigette deftly removes the head of the last one, and we find a hatch which we assume leads to the underground nest. I check it and don’t find any traps, but it does appear to be locked. However, I don’t see a keyhole. I try to deactivate the lock, and though it takes a minute, I eventually get it open. Ulric pulls the hatch open and a flame bursts out onto him. He is singed, but not severely damaged; the magic holding the lock must have obscured the trap. Once we make our way down the ladder, we find a series of dirt hallways about three feet wide and six feet tall. We will only be able to walk single file, so we line up with Ulric in front, Briggette next, and me behind her. I am followed by Boian, then Brianna, Korvinean and Finn. As we begin to head out, I notice that Boian’s tattoo is glowing. I remember that the last time this happened, we had faced enemies who were not what they appeared to be, and since we were warned not to trust our eyes, I try to refocus to make sure that what I see is truly what I see. After concentrating, I find that my surroundings are the same. The hallways here are winding and irregular, not following any sort of logical pattern or direction. We come to a large open room with upholstered furniture and a well-built fireplace. There are also some low wicker chairs, abstract tapestries and woven mats with images of snakes. There are four rat men in the room eating something, and they pause and look up as we enter. Ulric immediately charges in and guts one of them, and the other three raise their hands and cast at him. Magic missiles fly forward and strike him. Briggette runs in and attacks another, slicing open his chest and killing him instantly. I run into the room, hop up onto the table, slide through some of the food there, but manage to stop myself and attack the one that Ulric is attacking, and I slice him open. Boian attempts the same thing, but doesn’t recover quite as well, and his swing misses the final rat man. Ulric steps up to him and slashes him open, ending our quick combat with style. As we continue down the hallway, a skeleton pops out of the wall directly in front of us. Ulric smashes it with his shield, and it disintegrates. Upon closer inspection, it appears that it wasn’t actually an animated skeleton, but instead is a skeleton on a strange sort of hanging conveyance that makes it swing its arm (with the sword) once it reaches the end. We remark on the oddity, but continue on our way, at each opportunity taking the right hand turn. We come to another room, and as we approach, we hear a commotion. I am able to make out the sounds of an intimate encounter. Ulric enters the room and sees another fireplace, as well as some chairs and bookshelves, along with some sleeping mats with pillows and blankets. On one of the palettes, there is a beautiful woman in the throes of passion with a man. I disbelieve and see that she is, in fact, a white-furred rat woman. In Cuthbertine, I inform the others, “This is an illusion. That woman is a white-furred rat woman.” Ulric begins to step into the room, and she looks up and screams, “SISTER!” I step in and fire, and Ulric charges her. He slashes her right between the breasts, and she drops. Briggette steps over to the man she was with and punches him in order to subdue him—we don’t know yet whether he is an enemy. Eight humans appear from behind some tapestries and bumrush Ulric and Briggette. Ulric attacks each with the flat of Law’s Claw as they reach him, but intentionally hits lightly so as to knock them out, but not kill them. Suddenly, I am pulled backward off my feet and up toward the ceiling, but I don’t see anything on me. I feel its substance, however, and struggle to escape its grasp. Boian stabs at the air and apparently hits, as I am dropped. I manage to tumble into the fall and avoid injuries. Brianna attacks in a flurry of strong blows and knocks two of them out cold. Another human is killed instantly from the ferocity of her strikes. The man on the palette gets up and tries to run out of the room, but Ulric punches him and renders him unconscious. Finn steps up to the final man and knocks him out. Ulric steps up to him, “You and I are going to have to have a talk later. Can you pierce illusion?” “I can see all of those who serve the serpent mother.” “The slitherin?” Ulric asks. “All of those who serve Mormo,” he replies. We move on down the next hallway to the right. |
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