Session 63
Secret invasion
Since it is late already, we retreat to the Red Peacock and discover that the Obscurati group is still around. However, the behavior of their leader, Flavio, has changed considerably and they also seem to have gained new followers. Flavio tells the group that he was with Gouverneur Cadagyr today, who was pleased to see the Obs. In his wisdom, he then gave the Obs the authority to work with him officially, Flavio adds. We both agree that this is really bad news, and decide to stay awhile and listen.
When the Obs continue to make up strange stories about Risur, we, back in our beran disguise, approach them at their table to chat a bit. After some small talk, we probe them a bit and question the logic behind such seemingly crazy actions as building a tower, only to have it fall at the Danorans. Surely Risur would know how to operate tanks or cannons, we suggest, and observant Danorans would surely notice if someone tried to manually build an oversized tower within their territory.
(Ah, that tower story again. Never gets old)
We also mention that Risur has never declared war on anyone, and that Ber always had a good relationship with Risur before the recent quarrels. After all, they “helped us get rid of the Dragon Tyrants”. Once we've got enough people thinking, something seems to change in Flavio and he declares that there's nothing more to see here and everyone can calm down again. Then he leaves the house.
Surprisingly, the other people do exactly the same. But as there is no clear sign of a forming hivemind, we come to the conclusion that the Gidim may have changed the young Obs man and endowed him with mental abilities. Of course, cooperation with the Governor is a thorn in our side, as in the worst case all of Ursalina could form an ideological Obscurati nucleus supported by the Gidim. So we decide to check out the governor's house, especially since Flavio seems to be heading in the same direction.
To make ourselves as unnoticeable as possible, we utilize a combination of Occulus Prism and invisibility to sneak up to the Cardagyr estate. As soon as we arrive there, we first notice that the garden of the house seems to be rather neglected. Which is very unusual for a man of Cadagyr's rank. Only the smell of flowers appears to be omnipresent around the area. We sneak in and notice that there seem to be hardly any servants in the house either, although there are some old proclamations on the governor's desk as we delve deeper. Looking around, we also find a more recent proclamation in which Cadagyr announces the official cooperation with the Obscurati and Flavio in particular.
Finally, we reach the room where the Governor receives official visitors and hear him talking to Flavio. The young Obs man tells him about recent problems in the Red Peacock and a Beran couple from Reo Pedresco who were not so easily lulled into complacency, whereupon Cadagyr, who is obviously behaving strangely and almost inhuman, instructs him to keep an eye on the conspicuous people. Flavio leaves the room with this unquestioned order, and we notice that there are other empty seats in the room, where other people seem to sit regularly.
Just as we finish this thought, six Gidim enter the room and take a seat next to the governor. Cadagyr doesn't seem to mind though, which confirms our suspicion that he'd most likely be either possessed or completely Gidim. We take a quick look at the six and see that they are different entities, but not the Sijhen we are looking for. They discuss the fact that Dieter has probably escaped from the police and gone into hiding for the time being, and that it would be better to catch the young man sooner rather than later. Cadagyr doesn't seem to object to these plans, so there is probably not much to nothing at all of the old man present.
We decide that we've seen enough for now and agree that we'd better enlist the help of an Executores for further action. Which brings us back to Dieter and his contact.
On the way back to the Red Peacock, we receive a sending from Harkover Lee that the three ringleaders of the Obs Symposium, Chancellor Dmitra, Cardinal Tito, and Minister Duffet, are still catatonic. The situation in Cherage is still tense, but starting to maybe tilt to our side, as according to a young first responder, the King of Risur and the Dawn Knight are probably responsible for preventing a catastrophe, and part of the city is grateful for the quick and unexpected rescue.
We reply to Lee that he should stay in close contact with Heid, Kulp, Brakken and other allies, as they could confirm these rumors themselves and spread the news in their networks. At the same time, even before a set of "official statements" could be made public, Risuri officials should publicly announce that the inhabitants of Cherage and the people of Danor are not Risur's enemy and that the source of the Hiveminds should be considered the real threat.
(We've been working on a set of statements that are about to be published later when the time is right)
And just as we mention Heid, we also spontaneously receive a small box out of thin air, containing an old tile and a letter from the philosopher. The tile depicts an old picture of legendary warlords from the pre-demonic era, while in the letter Heid tells us of an almost hopeless siege of Bhad Ryzhavdut that he's facing right now: After the Chancellor's disappearance, Grandis Komanov and her extremists have seemingly managed to gain and gather many followers around her and now she is probably besieging the city, all the while trying to bring the five powerful warlords, the Vsadni, back to life. And after our heroic deeds in Cherage, Heid hopes that we can help him this time as well.
We suspect that this might be connected to the Voice of Rot's plans, and that Komanov's takeover of Drakr is just the first step in creating his own doomsday army. However, we can't just disappear from Ursalina at the moment due to urgent Gidim business, so we'll put it on the next agenda.
(seems like everyone who wants to own/change/rule/destroy the world suddenly crept out of hiding and entered the race of who's completing their own plans first. I've seen the “what if the PCs don't intervene until NOW” timelines,.but it'd be really interesting to know how it would end if the party got wiped out or did nothing. I guess the Gidim would take just over while Drakr and Crisillyir fall to ruin?)
On our way back, we also wonder what will become of Crisillyir, and whether the Hierarchs have truly joined the Obs as one, and whether they will remain loyal once they learn that Nicodemus is in fact the hated heretic Miller. On the other hand, we know very little about the current situation in the land, except that they seem to be summoning angels en masse.
Auryn is still debating whether to publish the deeds of High Cardinal Silvestri, as this might make a true, lasting peace with Elfaivar impossible. After all, it is now clear that Srasama's death was a cunningly planned murder and genocide.
“I can understand your dilemma. But if you need another perspective: Remember that Silvestri's actions were ultimately just a reversal of Miller and Kasvarina's plan to do the same to Crisillyir. They, too, wanted to kill a god and its followers”, Gabriel reminds her calmly.
“They had a rushed and reckless plan, yes. But I still see a difference between the two cases: It is one thing to kill 'war' and its adherents – most likely warmongers and faithful soldiers. But killing 'the embodiment of Eladrin women', especially after torturing Dala in front of her mother... no, that's just vile.”, Auryn returns sternly. “But I wonder... how much if all of this was just a perfidious plan of Ashima-Shimtu.”
“Possibly all of it. We must always be wary around this fork-tongued demoness. She cannot be trusted.”, Gabriel guesses, before suggesting that we'd not spent too many thoughts on that creature.
Another thing we still don't understand and discuss on our way is the role of Han Jierre, who hasn't been seen since the naval battle for Axis Island. The question is standing whether he will be completely loyal to Nicodemus, whether he will side with Danor, or whether he'd perhaps pursue his own plans.
We finally arrive at the Red Peacock just to witness a police raid in which Dieter Cadagyr and his fellows are arrested and taken away to the police headquarters. To prevent a riot, we follow the group of policemen. There they separate Dieter from the rest of the group to bring him in a direction leading to the arena. Dieter acts surprised that he is not being led to his father's estate as usual, before one of the policewomen knocks him unconscious from behind. We decide that this is the right time to intervene. Auryn uses one sleep spell to magically put half of the cops to sleep all the while Gabriel uses more mundane means to afflict the same state upon the other half. Then we wake Dieter up and bring him to a safe hideout.
The young man is suitably confused, so we briefly explain his father's situation to him. We add that we also urgently need Salome Nieves as a witness. Dieter promises that we can get in touch with her the next morning and that we should come to the Troughs.
We use the rest of the night to look around the abandoned cube of the Exekutores, now that we can truly move unseen due to the Prisms. To our astonishment, we find traces of fighting and the remains of the personal belongings of the missing Exekutores. From these clues, we assume that many of them must have died in battle...
The next morning we pick up Dieter and take him to the Troughs, where he heads to a garbage dump. There, we meet a frightened young Exekutores, who introduces herself as Salome Nieves. We tell her about Glaucia and the situation. In return, she tells us about her precarious situation: after arriving in the city. She remembers that she tried to gain a feeling for the situation in Ursalina and saw strange things that she couldn't really understand. After she sent the message to her mentor, the local police tried to arrest her in the Executores' Headquarter, which her sisters could obviously not allow. A battle ensued in which many Exekutores died. She barely escaped, but felt pursued by unseen beings all the time. She was only able to shake off her pursuers in this garbage dump, which led her to believe that these creatures could not see through the thick smoke or were maybe poisoned by it.
We use a see invisibility spell to show her that her suspicions are indeed correct and ask her to follow us to the Jaula arena so that we can have her as a credible witness. We explain that Glaucia sent us out of concern for her well-being, as she herself had just escaped an assassination attempt by the Obs, and suspected that her sisters in Ursalina might have fallen victim to an Obs coup. But alas, the situation appears to be more dire than that. So now we offer to stand by her side against the much more threatening Gidim.
Salome is a little apprehensive at first, but finally agrees to our suggestion. We ask Dieter to stay hidden and go to the Jaula together. Once there, we make ourselves invisible and ignore all distractions to directly search for the maze under the Jaula. After some searching, we come to a group of cells where, judging by the noises, there must be animals locked up. A closer look reveals a group of altered warbears that apparently have been given tentacles by the Gidim.
Auryn tries to magically talk to the bears, but he only gets impressions of pain. So we take try to dispel as many of the alteration effects that we can and heal them magically. This lifts the pain from the bears, but they are still kind of... off. Auryn hints on the possibility of letting them go, and taking revenge on those who harmed them, but since bears call her "nice meat", we don't let them out of their cages for the time being.
We continue to look around and find a chamber with more cells in the next room. But what we also see is a rather gruesome sight as the disemboweled bodies of minotaurs and orcs are hanging from the ceiling. When we point this out to Salome, she shudders.
“This is sickening... I... I don't know... I can hardly breathe...” she mutters, as she seems being on the verge of throwing up.
“I guess this is why those bears saw you as 'nice meat', my dear”, Gabriel points out as we realize that these people are to be used as food for the warbears.
We open the door to the next room and are suddenly confronted by a Gidim, who seems to be the one responsible for these crimes. As soon as she spots the creature, Auryn attacks the Gidim without warning and destroys it instantly. Since there is also one of the flying eye beasts in the room, Gabriel destroys it as well with one precise ethereal wave.
In the cells here we find two prisoners who are mentally at the end of their tether: They are the cucumber-selling goblin and our friendly seamstress Flida. As we don't have the time to care for their damaged psyche, we both put in the Absurdist Web for the time being.
“Sorry that I didn't leave this creature alive for interrogation... but after what it did to those people, I couldn't hold back...”, Auryn apologizes for her rash action against the Gidim butcher, but Gabriel just shakes his head.
“I understand. He deserved it. And I guess that Gidim wouldn't have talked much either.”
Since we can't find anything else under the Jaula, we decide to follow up on the other two clues we have left: House Cadagyr and the Bard School. As we leave the arena, however, we find that a group of Gidim is already waiting for us, ready to pounce on Salome.
(yeah, they can't see us. Oopsie.).
Gabriel immediately pounces at the creatures to distract them from Salome, while Auryn remembers that the Gidim had their sight blocked in polluted air, and summons a rain of ash. We then turn our attention to the Gidim's daemonic supporters, subduing them and finishing off the psychic oculus constructs afterward. Once the Flying Eyes are history, however, we notice that the Dragonfly Gidim seem uncoordinated and retreat, giving us an idea of how their attacks could be coordinated.
After making sure that Salome is okay, we agree to sneak to the bard school, as we already established that there are six Gidim in the Cadagyr estate and we don't know anything about this place yet.
Fortunately, we can get there without drawing the attention of more Gidim. Once there, we quickly discover that a mental illusion of a construction site has been placed over the whole area. We have not much trouble breaking through it as soon as we understand the nature of the illusion. But still the whole place feels haunted, and we are constantly on the lookout for more Gidim. We climb past several barricades to gain access to the building, and the first thing we hear is strange, quickly changing music meant to appeal to various emotions.
Suspecting real music instead of yet another illusion coming from one of the rooms, we check there first and are shocked to find it coming from the half animated, headless body of a former minstrel whose limbs are being animated by some sort of neural network to play erratic music. Gabriel feels the urge to relieve the poor soul directly, but holds back so as not to draw the Gidim's attention.
After this gruesome discovery, we move on and pass through more rooms where different kinds of music try to influence our minds. In the south wing we find a portrait of a beautiful elven musician and Salome suddenly feels a murderous hatred for Gabriel, which she is fortunately able to suppress with bared teeth.
We calm her down and explain that this is far from easy for us as well, but also remind her that Glaucia personally asked for our help. So she'd better keep her wits together as Glaucia relies on her competence as an Executores. This seems to stabilize Salome's emotions to some extend, and we agree to keep a closer eye on her, as the school turns from dreaded to horrifying.
As she tries to shake off the ongoing psychic effects, Salome then has a moment of clarity and she narrows her eyes.
“Wait a minute... you are not really Berans, are you? Matron Glaucia would have never shared so many of our secrets with those who are Berans, but no sisters of her. And he is clearly no Executores.”, Salome says, pointing at Gabriel.
Gebriel raises his shoulders in defense, signaling that she has finally caught us. We ultimately reveal that we are Risuri, but that we can hardly openly identify ourselves as such due to the current surface tensions between our two nations.
“Let's see... a pair of Risuri who are trusted acquaintances of Glaucia Evora, who have inside knowledge of the Bruse's politics and are being asked to investigate. You are the same Risuri that helped when Bruse Shantus was assassinated! You must be the King and the Dawn Knight!", she concludes with a gasp.
“No reason to be surprised.”, Auryn adds with a grin and a wink.
We continue to look around and eventually reach the music hall, where a similarly gutted orchestra is playing atmospheric music. The group is coordinated by a fully composed conductor, whose ghost, however, haunts the audience. In the stands are the heads, hearts and lungs of the bards, who are also kept alive by the Gidim network. After pushing back the initial shock of this horrific sight, we then think about how and if we can somehow save these poor people. And then come to the conclusion that only Doctor von Recklinghausen could maybe do it. However, this will be difficult, as the Gidim will probably notice any interference with their network.
So, with a heavy heart, we decide to continue our search for clues. When we find no more traces of Gidim activity in the upper part of the school, we set our sights on the old archaeological shaft in the middle of the building. We investigate the (very deep) shaft via flight and find an electrically charged field at the end, which is clearly designed to be a trap. However, Gabriel uses Granny's abilities to disarm the field, allowing us to enter safely. On the next level, we find a kind of sphincter made of living metal that can be opened by interacting with thoughts, revealing another opening.
(This is where I got big red Tempest alarm bells ringing. And thinking of it now, biomancy and these creepy Gidim experiments are pretty much on the same scale of body horror)
We carefully fly into the opening and are amazed to discover a gigantic cavern containing some kind of giant bioluminescent squid near a similarly gigantic translucent tentacle. Suspecting that this creature is either a weapon of war or some kind of Gidim station or hub, we fly closer to get more details on the close-up. Unfortunately though, we are quickly discovered by a nearby guardian Gidim, which causes the giant squid to glow as bright as day. Also, a swarm of smaller Gidim heads directly towards us as the thought-creatures have switched to full-on defense mode.
We gradually get rid of the Gidim and make haste to barely get inside the squid from the rear opening before it ultimately lifts off and breaks through the cave ceiling.
(so yeah, a rather long recap this time. But the session was rather short, and I found no real place to cut it into two parts. but... it ends with a proper cliffhanger - or shall I rather say cliffshatterer?
And this part of the adventure is really not for the faint of heart, as it fully embraces alien horror levels. Which makes facing off with Sijhen again pretty satisfying)
Secret invasion
Since it is late already, we retreat to the Red Peacock and discover that the Obscurati group is still around. However, the behavior of their leader, Flavio, has changed considerably and they also seem to have gained new followers. Flavio tells the group that he was with Gouverneur Cadagyr today, who was pleased to see the Obs. In his wisdom, he then gave the Obs the authority to work with him officially, Flavio adds. We both agree that this is really bad news, and decide to stay awhile and listen.
When the Obs continue to make up strange stories about Risur, we, back in our beran disguise, approach them at their table to chat a bit. After some small talk, we probe them a bit and question the logic behind such seemingly crazy actions as building a tower, only to have it fall at the Danorans. Surely Risur would know how to operate tanks or cannons, we suggest, and observant Danorans would surely notice if someone tried to manually build an oversized tower within their territory.
(Ah, that tower story again. Never gets old)
We also mention that Risur has never declared war on anyone, and that Ber always had a good relationship with Risur before the recent quarrels. After all, they “helped us get rid of the Dragon Tyrants”. Once we've got enough people thinking, something seems to change in Flavio and he declares that there's nothing more to see here and everyone can calm down again. Then he leaves the house.
Surprisingly, the other people do exactly the same. But as there is no clear sign of a forming hivemind, we come to the conclusion that the Gidim may have changed the young Obs man and endowed him with mental abilities. Of course, cooperation with the Governor is a thorn in our side, as in the worst case all of Ursalina could form an ideological Obscurati nucleus supported by the Gidim. So we decide to check out the governor's house, especially since Flavio seems to be heading in the same direction.
To make ourselves as unnoticeable as possible, we utilize a combination of Occulus Prism and invisibility to sneak up to the Cardagyr estate. As soon as we arrive there, we first notice that the garden of the house seems to be rather neglected. Which is very unusual for a man of Cadagyr's rank. Only the smell of flowers appears to be omnipresent around the area. We sneak in and notice that there seem to be hardly any servants in the house either, although there are some old proclamations on the governor's desk as we delve deeper. Looking around, we also find a more recent proclamation in which Cadagyr announces the official cooperation with the Obscurati and Flavio in particular.
Finally, we reach the room where the Governor receives official visitors and hear him talking to Flavio. The young Obs man tells him about recent problems in the Red Peacock and a Beran couple from Reo Pedresco who were not so easily lulled into complacency, whereupon Cadagyr, who is obviously behaving strangely and almost inhuman, instructs him to keep an eye on the conspicuous people. Flavio leaves the room with this unquestioned order, and we notice that there are other empty seats in the room, where other people seem to sit regularly.
Just as we finish this thought, six Gidim enter the room and take a seat next to the governor. Cadagyr doesn't seem to mind though, which confirms our suspicion that he'd most likely be either possessed or completely Gidim. We take a quick look at the six and see that they are different entities, but not the Sijhen we are looking for. They discuss the fact that Dieter has probably escaped from the police and gone into hiding for the time being, and that it would be better to catch the young man sooner rather than later. Cadagyr doesn't seem to object to these plans, so there is probably not much to nothing at all of the old man present.
We decide that we've seen enough for now and agree that we'd better enlist the help of an Executores for further action. Which brings us back to Dieter and his contact.
On the way back to the Red Peacock, we receive a sending from Harkover Lee that the three ringleaders of the Obs Symposium, Chancellor Dmitra, Cardinal Tito, and Minister Duffet, are still catatonic. The situation in Cherage is still tense, but starting to maybe tilt to our side, as according to a young first responder, the King of Risur and the Dawn Knight are probably responsible for preventing a catastrophe, and part of the city is grateful for the quick and unexpected rescue.
We reply to Lee that he should stay in close contact with Heid, Kulp, Brakken and other allies, as they could confirm these rumors themselves and spread the news in their networks. At the same time, even before a set of "official statements" could be made public, Risuri officials should publicly announce that the inhabitants of Cherage and the people of Danor are not Risur's enemy and that the source of the Hiveminds should be considered the real threat.
(We've been working on a set of statements that are about to be published later when the time is right)
And just as we mention Heid, we also spontaneously receive a small box out of thin air, containing an old tile and a letter from the philosopher. The tile depicts an old picture of legendary warlords from the pre-demonic era, while in the letter Heid tells us of an almost hopeless siege of Bhad Ryzhavdut that he's facing right now: After the Chancellor's disappearance, Grandis Komanov and her extremists have seemingly managed to gain and gather many followers around her and now she is probably besieging the city, all the while trying to bring the five powerful warlords, the Vsadni, back to life. And after our heroic deeds in Cherage, Heid hopes that we can help him this time as well.
We suspect that this might be connected to the Voice of Rot's plans, and that Komanov's takeover of Drakr is just the first step in creating his own doomsday army. However, we can't just disappear from Ursalina at the moment due to urgent Gidim business, so we'll put it on the next agenda.
(seems like everyone who wants to own/change/rule/destroy the world suddenly crept out of hiding and entered the race of who's completing their own plans first. I've seen the “what if the PCs don't intervene until NOW” timelines,.but it'd be really interesting to know how it would end if the party got wiped out or did nothing. I guess the Gidim would take just over while Drakr and Crisillyir fall to ruin?)
On our way back, we also wonder what will become of Crisillyir, and whether the Hierarchs have truly joined the Obs as one, and whether they will remain loyal once they learn that Nicodemus is in fact the hated heretic Miller. On the other hand, we know very little about the current situation in the land, except that they seem to be summoning angels en masse.
Auryn is still debating whether to publish the deeds of High Cardinal Silvestri, as this might make a true, lasting peace with Elfaivar impossible. After all, it is now clear that Srasama's death was a cunningly planned murder and genocide.
“I can understand your dilemma. But if you need another perspective: Remember that Silvestri's actions were ultimately just a reversal of Miller and Kasvarina's plan to do the same to Crisillyir. They, too, wanted to kill a god and its followers”, Gabriel reminds her calmly.
“They had a rushed and reckless plan, yes. But I still see a difference between the two cases: It is one thing to kill 'war' and its adherents – most likely warmongers and faithful soldiers. But killing 'the embodiment of Eladrin women', especially after torturing Dala in front of her mother... no, that's just vile.”, Auryn returns sternly. “But I wonder... how much if all of this was just a perfidious plan of Ashima-Shimtu.”
“Possibly all of it. We must always be wary around this fork-tongued demoness. She cannot be trusted.”, Gabriel guesses, before suggesting that we'd not spent too many thoughts on that creature.
Another thing we still don't understand and discuss on our way is the role of Han Jierre, who hasn't been seen since the naval battle for Axis Island. The question is standing whether he will be completely loyal to Nicodemus, whether he will side with Danor, or whether he'd perhaps pursue his own plans.
We finally arrive at the Red Peacock just to witness a police raid in which Dieter Cadagyr and his fellows are arrested and taken away to the police headquarters. To prevent a riot, we follow the group of policemen. There they separate Dieter from the rest of the group to bring him in a direction leading to the arena. Dieter acts surprised that he is not being led to his father's estate as usual, before one of the policewomen knocks him unconscious from behind. We decide that this is the right time to intervene. Auryn uses one sleep spell to magically put half of the cops to sleep all the while Gabriel uses more mundane means to afflict the same state upon the other half. Then we wake Dieter up and bring him to a safe hideout.
The young man is suitably confused, so we briefly explain his father's situation to him. We add that we also urgently need Salome Nieves as a witness. Dieter promises that we can get in touch with her the next morning and that we should come to the Troughs.
We use the rest of the night to look around the abandoned cube of the Exekutores, now that we can truly move unseen due to the Prisms. To our astonishment, we find traces of fighting and the remains of the personal belongings of the missing Exekutores. From these clues, we assume that many of them must have died in battle...
The next morning we pick up Dieter and take him to the Troughs, where he heads to a garbage dump. There, we meet a frightened young Exekutores, who introduces herself as Salome Nieves. We tell her about Glaucia and the situation. In return, she tells us about her precarious situation: after arriving in the city. She remembers that she tried to gain a feeling for the situation in Ursalina and saw strange things that she couldn't really understand. After she sent the message to her mentor, the local police tried to arrest her in the Executores' Headquarter, which her sisters could obviously not allow. A battle ensued in which many Exekutores died. She barely escaped, but felt pursued by unseen beings all the time. She was only able to shake off her pursuers in this garbage dump, which led her to believe that these creatures could not see through the thick smoke or were maybe poisoned by it.
We use a see invisibility spell to show her that her suspicions are indeed correct and ask her to follow us to the Jaula arena so that we can have her as a credible witness. We explain that Glaucia sent us out of concern for her well-being, as she herself had just escaped an assassination attempt by the Obs, and suspected that her sisters in Ursalina might have fallen victim to an Obs coup. But alas, the situation appears to be more dire than that. So now we offer to stand by her side against the much more threatening Gidim.
Salome is a little apprehensive at first, but finally agrees to our suggestion. We ask Dieter to stay hidden and go to the Jaula together. Once there, we make ourselves invisible and ignore all distractions to directly search for the maze under the Jaula. After some searching, we come to a group of cells where, judging by the noises, there must be animals locked up. A closer look reveals a group of altered warbears that apparently have been given tentacles by the Gidim.
Auryn tries to magically talk to the bears, but he only gets impressions of pain. So we take try to dispel as many of the alteration effects that we can and heal them magically. This lifts the pain from the bears, but they are still kind of... off. Auryn hints on the possibility of letting them go, and taking revenge on those who harmed them, but since bears call her "nice meat", we don't let them out of their cages for the time being.
We continue to look around and find a chamber with more cells in the next room. But what we also see is a rather gruesome sight as the disemboweled bodies of minotaurs and orcs are hanging from the ceiling. When we point this out to Salome, she shudders.
“This is sickening... I... I don't know... I can hardly breathe...” she mutters, as she seems being on the verge of throwing up.
“I guess this is why those bears saw you as 'nice meat', my dear”, Gabriel points out as we realize that these people are to be used as food for the warbears.
We open the door to the next room and are suddenly confronted by a Gidim, who seems to be the one responsible for these crimes. As soon as she spots the creature, Auryn attacks the Gidim without warning and destroys it instantly. Since there is also one of the flying eye beasts in the room, Gabriel destroys it as well with one precise ethereal wave.
In the cells here we find two prisoners who are mentally at the end of their tether: They are the cucumber-selling goblin and our friendly seamstress Flida. As we don't have the time to care for their damaged psyche, we both put in the Absurdist Web for the time being.
“Sorry that I didn't leave this creature alive for interrogation... but after what it did to those people, I couldn't hold back...”, Auryn apologizes for her rash action against the Gidim butcher, but Gabriel just shakes his head.
“I understand. He deserved it. And I guess that Gidim wouldn't have talked much either.”
Since we can't find anything else under the Jaula, we decide to follow up on the other two clues we have left: House Cadagyr and the Bard School. As we leave the arena, however, we find that a group of Gidim is already waiting for us, ready to pounce on Salome.
(yeah, they can't see us. Oopsie.).
Gabriel immediately pounces at the creatures to distract them from Salome, while Auryn remembers that the Gidim had their sight blocked in polluted air, and summons a rain of ash. We then turn our attention to the Gidim's daemonic supporters, subduing them and finishing off the psychic oculus constructs afterward. Once the Flying Eyes are history, however, we notice that the Dragonfly Gidim seem uncoordinated and retreat, giving us an idea of how their attacks could be coordinated.
After making sure that Salome is okay, we agree to sneak to the bard school, as we already established that there are six Gidim in the Cadagyr estate and we don't know anything about this place yet.
Fortunately, we can get there without drawing the attention of more Gidim. Once there, we quickly discover that a mental illusion of a construction site has been placed over the whole area. We have not much trouble breaking through it as soon as we understand the nature of the illusion. But still the whole place feels haunted, and we are constantly on the lookout for more Gidim. We climb past several barricades to gain access to the building, and the first thing we hear is strange, quickly changing music meant to appeal to various emotions.
Suspecting real music instead of yet another illusion coming from one of the rooms, we check there first and are shocked to find it coming from the half animated, headless body of a former minstrel whose limbs are being animated by some sort of neural network to play erratic music. Gabriel feels the urge to relieve the poor soul directly, but holds back so as not to draw the Gidim's attention.
After this gruesome discovery, we move on and pass through more rooms where different kinds of music try to influence our minds. In the south wing we find a portrait of a beautiful elven musician and Salome suddenly feels a murderous hatred for Gabriel, which she is fortunately able to suppress with bared teeth.
We calm her down and explain that this is far from easy for us as well, but also remind her that Glaucia personally asked for our help. So she'd better keep her wits together as Glaucia relies on her competence as an Executores. This seems to stabilize Salome's emotions to some extend, and we agree to keep a closer eye on her, as the school turns from dreaded to horrifying.
As she tries to shake off the ongoing psychic effects, Salome then has a moment of clarity and she narrows her eyes.
“Wait a minute... you are not really Berans, are you? Matron Glaucia would have never shared so many of our secrets with those who are Berans, but no sisters of her. And he is clearly no Executores.”, Salome says, pointing at Gabriel.
Gebriel raises his shoulders in defense, signaling that she has finally caught us. We ultimately reveal that we are Risuri, but that we can hardly openly identify ourselves as such due to the current surface tensions between our two nations.
“Let's see... a pair of Risuri who are trusted acquaintances of Glaucia Evora, who have inside knowledge of the Bruse's politics and are being asked to investigate. You are the same Risuri that helped when Bruse Shantus was assassinated! You must be the King and the Dawn Knight!", she concludes with a gasp.
“No reason to be surprised.”, Auryn adds with a grin and a wink.
We continue to look around and eventually reach the music hall, where a similarly gutted orchestra is playing atmospheric music. The group is coordinated by a fully composed conductor, whose ghost, however, haunts the audience. In the stands are the heads, hearts and lungs of the bards, who are also kept alive by the Gidim network. After pushing back the initial shock of this horrific sight, we then think about how and if we can somehow save these poor people. And then come to the conclusion that only Doctor von Recklinghausen could maybe do it. However, this will be difficult, as the Gidim will probably notice any interference with their network.
So, with a heavy heart, we decide to continue our search for clues. When we find no more traces of Gidim activity in the upper part of the school, we set our sights on the old archaeological shaft in the middle of the building. We investigate the (very deep) shaft via flight and find an electrically charged field at the end, which is clearly designed to be a trap. However, Gabriel uses Granny's abilities to disarm the field, allowing us to enter safely. On the next level, we find a kind of sphincter made of living metal that can be opened by interacting with thoughts, revealing another opening.
(This is where I got big red Tempest alarm bells ringing. And thinking of it now, biomancy and these creepy Gidim experiments are pretty much on the same scale of body horror)
We carefully fly into the opening and are amazed to discover a gigantic cavern containing some kind of giant bioluminescent squid near a similarly gigantic translucent tentacle. Suspecting that this creature is either a weapon of war or some kind of Gidim station or hub, we fly closer to get more details on the close-up. Unfortunately though, we are quickly discovered by a nearby guardian Gidim, which causes the giant squid to glow as bright as day. Also, a swarm of smaller Gidim heads directly towards us as the thought-creatures have switched to full-on defense mode.
We gradually get rid of the Gidim and make haste to barely get inside the squid from the rear opening before it ultimately lifts off and breaks through the cave ceiling.
(so yeah, a rather long recap this time. But the session was rather short, and I found no real place to cut it into two parts. but... it ends with a proper cliffhanger - or shall I rather say cliffshatterer?
And this part of the adventure is really not for the faint of heart, as it fully embraces alien horror levels. Which makes facing off with Sijhen again pretty satisfying)
