Seeds of Doubt

October 27, 2011

Although Qynn helped the group wake up, they are still shaken about the dream.  It was too real.  The sights, sounds and feel of the demon seeds in them, growing, left most of them unable to move for a while.  Eventually, Pelenois gets up and goes to get something to drink.  There is nothing downstairs for it but the innkeeper wakes up at the sounds and goes to fetch some ale for Pelenois.  All but Elthieren come down and join him and the innkeeper says he can get more when Qynn feels something is wrong.  He sense evil is the only way to say it.  He gets up and goes to a room, listening for sounds on the other side.  And what he hears, chills him.  Bones cracking and popping and cries of pain. 

Qynn bursts into the room and see several demons, surrounded by blood and the remants of bodies.  It’s only later that the party figures out the demons must have burst out of the Zhentarim’s bodies.  However, there is no time to think about that now!  Qynn rushes in and attacks.  The others come to back him up and a fight is joined.  Pelenois calls upon his demonic heritage to become a fierce creature but he also moved deeper into the room, and soon found himself surrounded and beaten down.  However, his new form regenerates himself and he is able to keep rising and calling upon magic to hurt the demons. 

One of the demons keeps healing the other demons and causing pain to the party.  They concentrate on him as best they can but he also keeps teleporting around with his attacks, making it tough to pin him down.  Elthieren comes down and joins in the fight and helps take the leader down just as Paelias warns the group of more demons coming down from the upper floors!  However, Qynn calls upon the might of Torm, which helps defend them and also renew some of their powers.  The attack the newcomers with vigor as well as continuing to hold off the other demons.  Soon, the inn is quiet, with only the bodies of demons on the ground. 

The innkeeper comes forward and apologizes for running but he didn’t know what else to do.  However, now he is very gracious and arranges for food and drink from the tavern as well as saying they can stay as long as they like and won’t pay for it.  Qynn looks around and senses that there are some villagers that have been implanted with a seed.  Qynn says they need to stay for several days while he researchers a purifying spell for the town.  The others agree and do what they can to help. 

Elthieren, Pelenois and Paelias also examine the bodies of the fallen demons and try and figure out what happened.  It was all of the Zhentarim that had demons come from them.  However, they were acting quite affable beforehand, even talking about the group as heroes!  They weren’t trying to talk about Bane at all. 

Qynn is ready and they all help in the ritual.  Pelenois can’t help himself and says that they are doing a ritual to cleanse the city of demons that have infested the town and he starts a panic.  Qynn manages to calm them down and get them all listening to him, glaring at Pelenois the whole time.  It takes several hours but soon the radiance of Torm shines down on Port Llast and cleanses them all of the demon seed.  The town hails the group as the saviors of Port Llast and make a shrine to Torm, saying how he saved them from this scourge.  Qynn is quite happy about that. 

The group heard the Zhentarim had come from Neverwinter and decide to get back there as soon as possible.  They head out into the winter for travel.  While the roads are in fine condition, it’s slow going.  The first night, when they are camped in their tents, Paelias is on watch when something comes over the cliff wall, carrying a cave bear!  It is a large centipede like creature and it proceeds to eat the cave bear, swallowing it in two gulps.  Paelias wakes the others but none of them know what it is, except that it looks like a remorhaz.  But that is all they know.  However, eventually Paelias himself remembers that they generate a lot of heat and are often subdued by frost giants and used as pets.  The group stays quiet and the remorhaz comes closer and investigates the tents, knocking one down but then a noise is heard in the darkness, although what the noise is tough to say, and the remorhaz leaves. 

The group doesn’t get much sleep after that and soon heads out to Neverwinter later that morning.  They make it late in the night.  The guards give them some guff about being out in the cold but eventually let them into the city.  The group goes right to the temple of Torm to tell them what they have found.  The temple is quite worried about it but also quite impressed with the ritual Qynn devised to cleanse Port Llast.  Several of the high priests were still trying to figure out such a ritual for themselves!  The groups do find evidence that people in Neverwinter are also tainted with demon seeds and work with all of the other temples to begin a cleansing on the town. 

As Pelenois is helping to draw several of the runes around town, some kids taunt him.  It’s mostly in fun but a few keep going and going at it.  And eventually Pelenois snaps and says that the demon seeds will get them.  The kids laugh and run away but the noble lady who was nearby and heard it all, covers her mouth in shock and then hurries off.  Pelenois groans at this but keeps going until he hears rumors that several noble houses have left for fear of being infected with the demon seed.  Pelenois goes to the houses to try and calm them but they have packed up and left!  He tracks them down to several ships in the harbor that are getting ready to leave for Waterdeep!  Pelenois tries to get the harbormaster to stop them but they ignore his messenger.  He goes back and finishes painting the rest of the runes but is late in getting back to the temple. 

When Qynn asks, he tries to deflect it but eventually it comes out what has happened, and now several ships are preparing to depart to Waterdeep.  Paelias and Pelenois go back and row out to the ships.  At firs the captain won’t speak to them but Paelias manages to convince him that it’s important.  Once everything is explained, the captain uses their ranking with the town to say they have to stay or won’t be allowed back to trade and they can’t afford that.  Soon, all of the people are off the ships and in the town again as the group readies themselves for the ritual.

They do the ritual and it’s glorious!  Five temples working together to bring the healing light of the gods down on the city of Neverwinter!  Qynn thought what he did at Port Llast was impressive, and it was, but it was nothing compared to a hundred priests and acolytes working together.  The shining light of so many gods lights up Neverwinter as they all work to cleanse the demon seeds.  And when they finish, the priests all rejoice for they did it!  They can sense no more demon seeds in anyone!

However, Paelias feels a divine touch on himself and knows he can see things as they truly are.  All of the priests have been infected!  And now they are convinced that it worked when it didn’t.  He attempts to talk to them about it but soon realizes it won’t happen and stops trying.  Paelias can also sense that there are pockets of evil, it’s the best way to describe them, under the city.  The most powerful is under the cemetery but it’s not the only one.  They are spreading out and stopped the ritual from succeeding.  Or maybe the priests couldn’t do it with the demon seeds in them.  But, there is still danger for the whole town. 

1200 xp

GM Notes

• Hmm.  It’s not easy for me to convert the game terms to a narrative.  For example, when the group had some powers renewed, not sure how to phrase that without it sounding metagaming to me. 
• It was a lot of fun having Pelenois shoot off his mouth, either to try and scare the kids taunting him or to be a jerk and then have it cause some problems that were fixed.  That worked out well. 
• The group quickly realized that because they did not check out what happened at Bane’s Hold, that’s how this scourge is spreading.  I liked it because it came together well and now the group is doing what they can to contain it and cleanse the people before it gets worse.  I kept thinking about Peter Parker not stopping the thief that goes on to kill his uncle. 
• The demon fight was tough!  A few weren’t hit much but Pelenois went down four times and it was only his renegeration from the new form that he was able to stay in the fight.  He also had to use all of his potions and get some healing from Qynn.  But he kept coming back and doing damage!  The second group wasn’t as bad and was dealt with much faster. 

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