Hook:
Following up on the floating object to the south of Sifren.
068 - 260309 - South-er and Bees
Date:
446 PC, Ashfall 10
Players:
Dev
Die-anna
Raven
Sorel
Loot:
item 1 [claimed by]
item 2 [claimed by]
After Actions:
Dev:
All attempts at finding a way to contact Sophia have proven unsuccessful. I’ve hit a dead end. Trying to bluff Rector-9 into letting me out of my contract early is starting to seem like a reasonable idea.
This morning, everyone was talking about these weird ghost bees that turned up. They’re big – around the size of a small dog – and they’re weird. They leave a trail of coldness wherever they go, and the can fly through solid objects with no difficulty whatsoever. But they don’t seem to take any notice of living beings. I watched Die-Anna enlist some others in an attempt to herd some of the ghost bees to her home to pollinate some of her fruit trees, and the bees ignored everyone.
By lunchtime, everyone seemed to be talking about a new fight club. Don’t know, don’t care.
Steve issued an order to leave the bees alone, and the Banner had plans to conduct some sort of ritual to get them out of Sifren. They’d uncovered some sort of writing about the bees – they supposedly feed off of ghost energy and are part of a cleanup process. It seemed odd that he wanted us out of the way – we usually get the risky assignments – but if they want to take point, they can have the honor and the glory.
Die-Anna, Raven, Sorrel and I went exploring south of the city to see if we could figure out what the floating object was that we saw from the Tower when we were exploring the third floor. The heat of the last days of summer just hung in the air, and the buzz of insects – normal ones – was everywhere. In the distance, we could still see the movement of the bees, who were leaving cold scars on the late summer landscape.
Sorrel took point as we traveled in search of whatever we saw from the Tower all those weeks ago. We had to backtrack a little, but we made progress through the grassy dells south of the city. Die-Anna adjusted her form so that her neck with nearly five feet long, allowing her to keep a better lookout. I wasn’t in the mood for company, so I broke off and traveled a few hundred feet off and ahead of the rest of the group.
I found a hare stone, with the words “cold breath rises, Hunger Deep.” I later heard that Die-Anna saw a wild rhinuffalo herd, with animals that were shedding their summer coats in preparation of the coming cold weather.
Eventually, we spotted something wooden moving in the wind. There didn’t appear to be any connection to the ground. As we got closer, we saw more of them. There were several houses, a well, and some cobblestones that were once part of a road, among other floating debris. The lowest objects were about 15 feet off the ground. The highest ones we could see were about 100 feet up.
I was sure this was more of the Rift’s bullshit, where reality just couldn’t hold up to whatever happened during the collapse. But what if it isn’t? I know of several ways to manipulate gravity…but none of them are easy to do, and the power and precision it would take to do at this scale and for this length of time is almost impossible for me to imagine.
As we approached, Raven realized we were crossing a mass grave. Among the many fallen bits of wood, she found one that was still visibly a grave marker. As we reached the edge of the debris field, we saw a floating board that rotated in the air. As it spun around, I could read that it said “Eyreving Post” [my handwriting is not clear – Kiersten, please correct if I have this wrong]
While Die-Anna, Raven and Sorel were talking about how they were going to jump up to explore, I spoke the word in Infernal that allowed me to teleport up into the debris. I watched Sorrel rabbit jump up with a boost from the others, and Raven and Die-Anna did a sick acrobatics move to get up into the debris cloud. Inspired, I vaulted up to the lowest intact house.
This is the remains of a trading village, and Die-Anna spotted the faded remains of several “Quarantine” posters hung on the surviving buildings. She theorized that this might have been a site of the same illness that has the Witchlight elders so concerned. The house we approached was modest, it would have belonged to a working family, most likely. The door had been nailed shut quite some time ago. Die-Anna spotted bones covered in dust through a window.
We masked up and forced our way in. They found remains of at least 14 individuals, a mix of humans, halflings and goliaths. She saw a list of names carved into the wall, but everything else of interest had likely been removed before the house was sealed up. I was more concerned with how the house was floating in the air, so I concentrated on that. I sensed a source of arcane energy emanating from the center of the cloud, but below us.
We saw more quarantine houses, which seemed to be in better structural shape than the rest of the ruins. Sorrel and I tried to find the energy source I’d noticed. I looked at the flow of energy and tried to trace it back to the source using all the magical theory that I’d learned. Sorrel appeared to be going with vibes, and irritatingly, it was working better for him than my methods were working for me.
Beneath us, the town square remained. For some reason, it had not taken to the air with the rest of the village. There were small sparks of magic floating between the structures. A wave of tiny sparks of light coalesced and moved towards.
Sorrel and I with intent. It appeared that another group was making its way towards Raven and Die-Anna. Sorrel created a force ballista and obliterated the enemy that was targeting us before it had a chance to do any real damage. As he did so, a pair of large constructs emerged from the corners of the square, unfolding their limbs in a disturbingly unnatural way.
One jumped up to the piece of debris where I was standing and grabbed me. I eventually slipped free, but I was badly hurt. Sorrel and I burnt ours, while Die-Anna pummeled theirs to death with an assist from Raven.
We found a circular chamber beneath the square. Inside, a magical device was drawing vast amounts of energy from a distance to keep the village aloft. As much as I’d like to keep this to ourselves and see what we could do with it, we’re going to have to report our discovery to Steve and let him pass the news up the chain of command.
Unresolved Threads:
Hare stone, with the words “cold breath rises, Hunger Deep.”
Magical device drawing vast amounts of energy to levitate the village