Finding the Spark (Pathfinder 1E Quest)

26 of Arodus 4707 A.R. (Absalom Reckoning)

Blinded though she be, Mina manages to spin a web across the entrance to the tunnel still spewing the smoke that had started the ambush, trapping a pair of the fleeing foes. While the other two may have been nimble enough to dodge the spell, they are not so fortunate dealing with the four vengeful iruxi and one slurk charging after them. At least you think Warty is vengeful, it is hard to tell why else he would be so insistent on running down the foes. If there is a further ambush down the tunnel it had been placed too far away as they are all ran down and bludgeoned into submission.

Akorian, Mina, Gorok, and Cob gain 1,355 XP

"I can't see... I still can't see," Mina's voice rises into brief panic before she reels it back fortunately, you are not sure what you would have done otherwise. Healing after a battle you can handle, cleaning off the blood, not that hard, and you are getting to be a dab hand at looting, but none of you had suffered lasting harm until now.

"We can get to a curse-breaker in Cauldron..."

She shakes her head. "Pepper can help me see, don't worry about me."

"I don't think I'll be able to follow that advice," you try for a jest that wobbles like a rope bridge over a chasm. As it turns out, once the air is cleared and the enemy disarmed, you have a somewhat larger problem: What does one do with eight unconscious foes when you have only eight warriors with you, counting the halfling sorceress who definitely can't take as much of a beating as she gave to that thing?

It lies on the on the cold stone in a crumbled black heap so much smaller in death than it had been in life. Had you not shared that thought mayhap you would have managed to sleep more next shift.

"It's not dead, that... used to be an azata, an immortal servant of the stars, of Desna, ruined into unlife." A look of purest revulsion crosses Mina's face. "It will come back, again and again, unless we can find the box where its soul is hidden."

"Hidden close?" Gorok asks, already looking around as though expecting to find some gap between the stones of the tunnels to dive in through and finish the fight. Then again, maybe he just wants to get away from the sound of crying children. Click is being remarkably quiet, but the same could not be said for some of the older halfling young ones. Between the smoke getting in their eyes and throats, the sight of copious amounts of blood smeared on stone and draining into sand, they are about as far from the good cheer of the earlier journey as you could come.

"Oh no, from the stories I heard a lich's phylactery, that is the proper name for the seat of their tormented soul, could be anywhere, even on another plane of existence. Such tormented souls are very protective of their anchors, for all that their destruction would also end their curse."

All the while you are only half listening, most of your attention fixed on the Whisper Foot in front of you, the first to be shaken awake for interrogation. She tells a familiar story, dreams in the night, promises of wealth, of power, of satisfying the cravings of the body, mind and soul, if only they would heed the dark reaper. Their own band had been doing poorly indeed these past few seasons, a fever had run through their ranks killing most of the elders and all of the children. So of course where the remaining pair lead they followed, right into the arms of ruin as it happened.

A thought, a suspicion, grows brighter in your mind the more the prisoner speaks: "Mina, you said that your Desna had power over dreams, but not so Zura, but this monster was a thing of Desna and now of Zura. If it's the same thing that set those goblins against us..."

She nods in the direction of your voice

So you hold up the bag with the ring. "Maybe we've been holding on to its phy... phylactery," you force out the unfamiliar word. "All this time." The bag pulses silently under your fingers like a growing pustule.

Wisdom Rolls: Cob, Gorok, Akorian: 9, 8, 20 (Failure, Failure, Critical Success)

Do you explain your new realization to your employer?

[] Yes, she deserves to know the peril her people are in

[] No, she will likely insist on getting rid of the ring but the thing is your responsibility

OOC: Loot will come in the next update, it clashed with the tone of this one a little

26 of Arodus 4707 A.R. (Absalom Reckoning)

You have never seen someone look quite so intently at a waterskin before and, judging from Iolda's expression, almost as though she is considering the difficulty of drowning someone in a few inches of water. "We've been dragging around that thing's soul? And the baby, yes, someone is after him as well. Nobles, wizards? That is why you wanted to hand him over? Do you four go out of your way to collect trouble or do you just track it in like a fresh sower just in from the field?" The more she speaks the more animated the halfling sorceress is, sparks frizzing in her hair and stray gusts of wind pulling at your cloak.

Under the circumstances one might forgive poor Click from concluding that another attack was happening. There is a brief flash of light and the scent of brimstone and suddenly you are holding a fussy baby, much like how he had landed unharmed off the belly of the stirge, such that you could not answer Iolda even if you wanted to. "Shh... it's alright, we're all safe now, no one's arguing."

Blatant lies aside, you note that your revelation about the nature of the ring around your neck does not seem to have stopped Iolda from poking the body of the slain monster. The first reward of this seeking is a pair of bone spectacles with an odd oily film in place of glass, that she proclaims is a 'Tracker's Friend', though it is the second that is by far the oddest, a steel dagger with an odd greenish sheen that Mina is able to recognize as Bane against some manner of spirit not native to the natural world.

"I'm not sure which, maybe if I could see..."

Mina Knowledge (The Planes): 1d20+10 = 29 (Critical Success)

That is when you make the, in retrospect, very unwise decision to get closer to the thing with the baby still in hand. Fortunately, you manage to hang onto said baby when he decides to scream as loudly as his little lungs can manage, black faceted eyed wide and starring.

Gained Tracker's Friend
Description: Made of bone, though of what origin none can say, these spectacles have in place of glass a dark oily film that clings to the frame. Colors are muted in their sight, contours blurred, except the target, the thing most sought.
Ability: These Spectacles let their wearer detect minute details, gaining a +5 competence bonus on Perception checks. It also aids in tracking, adding a +5 competence bonus on Survival checks when tracking.

Gained Bane Dagger
Description: This plain steel dagger has seemingly nothing to recommend it beyond solid workmanlike construction, perfect for slitting throats, but it resonates destructively with some distant sphere.
Ability: +1 Enchantment Bane (???)

"Whatever kindred one of his parents belong to, is who this dagger was meant to cut," Mina says at least. "Though I am not sure why that would be. I mean, whoever they were they left the little tyke to the mercies of Inquisitor Vicio and his bugs."

"Maybe it was meant for the babe," Iolda says with a shudder of obvious disdain at the thought. "We know it can teleport itself. Mayhap it can teleport others out of peril as well."

"So we weren't unwise to take him on then?" you ask, more sharply than you had intended.

"Don't be driving oxen into the garden over this yet now, lad. I was angry at the situation, not at ye." The sorceress shakes her head. "Best we can do is keep on keeping on."

That turn of phrase apparently made sense to Mina, or at least since she nods in acceptance. In the end you come to an agreement that the Bellflower Network will put you in contact with skilled priest of Pharasma to help you get rid of the ring, though you cannot help but feel that it is at the cost of some of that ethereal goodwill you had been counting on in this 'Andoran'. Still, better than being ambushed by a lich, most things are after all.

Who gets the items above?

[] Spectacles: Write in

[] Dagger: Write in

OOC: Since you guys have no diplomacy to soften the blow it defaulted to this outcome. Still better than if you had kept things under wraps and it came out later that this is why you kept getting ambushed.