The Timberlands: Session Two

Screecher Hunt, Continued.

An untamed frontier. Dark cults. Fickle fey gods. Ravenous fiends. Nothing black powder and sorcery won't fix... . Timberlands Campaign Diary

After taking a brief respite in the ruins where they encountered strigiarpies last session, the heroes forged ahead toward their goal. The unspoiled ziggurat sat atop a bluff up ahead, but first, they had to deal with another flock of the strigiarpies. The party's bard, Gwaedd distracted the nested monstrosities with a well-placed spell. While they were hypnotized the rogue and monk swiftly finished them off. However, the rogue, Psykes, had already scouted ahead and discovered a sleeping screecher nearby. The heroes tried hard not to wake the owl-like abomination, but their plan was foiled when one of the strigiarpies got off a scream.

The ranger, Wild, already had his bow ready, however. He sank shafts into the ghostly raptor. However, the beastie didn't fall so an illusion of a larger screecher was thrown up to frighten it off. The others rushed to the nest's edge and poured their own attacks either into this new 'threat' or the actual screecher. The ruse worked otherwise as intended and the screecher took flight, but not after puking up a pellet full of undead skeletons.

While the melee fighters dealt with the skeletons, the ranged focused heroes pursued the winged horror through the woods. The screecher's ability to become insubstantial while in flight stymied their hunt for a time, but in the end, Wild was able to shoot it down. The party set to harvesting the heart their employer wanted from the monstrosity, along with a few feathers that hadn't lost their nigh-spectral state. However, they also realized that the creature they slew had alerted a larger member of its species which perched atop the ziggurat they sought.

Depleted of resources, the heroes knew talking the massive terror would end in tragedy. So, despite misgivings, they rested until evening and then struck out for the ancient structure. That evening high-clouds of roiling cinder filled the sky above. Between the stretches of embers, shooting stars zipped across the sky.

Pyskes ascended the ziggurat first and then used her winged boots to try and scout the intimidating structure faster. That's when the screecher patriarch struck. After snatching the eladrin in its claws, it perched on one of the towering statues of the Grim Visage of Enuk'lun and the battle was joined. Orym the monk and Gwadd battled spat-out skeletons on the ziggurat steps while the satyr wizard Siegfried and Wild assailed the huge monstrosity with spells and arrows respectively. Psykes fey-stepped from the owl-things grip and after a pitched battle they were able to kill the monster. The heroes were able to gather a few more ghostly feathers, as well as save one of the patriarch's red eyes in which magic lingered.

Still, they had the interior of the ziggurats to plumb.

After descending the stairs and moving down a hall lousy with the grim visage of Enuk'lun they rounded a statue of the arrogant sorcerer-king into the antechamber. There they were immediately confronted by a wizard priest of Enuk'lun and his two mauls of Enuk'lun (a deathlock and two wraiths). Dispatching the undead proved easy enough and the party began to investigate the ancient halls.

While carefully avoiding traps, all contained in busts of the grim visage of Enuk'lun, the party found an internal well that also served as an oubliette where they freed a trapped ghost so it could go to its final rest; a barracks of sort for the temple's occupants, and a grander bedroom in which they discovered a secret niche behind a cabinet. The last room came after they were struck by the Condemnation of Enuk'lun, a thunder trap that crippled most of the party. Likewise, the trap on the hidden chest behind the cabinet was not detected and Orym suffered a Dictate of Enuk'lun, a geas compelling him to seek out the room of prophecy within the temple. Speaking of prophecies the chest contained some gems but mostly several divination spells distilled into poisonous potions. After all, knowledge of the future comes with a price. They also found a warning, "Og'urer awaits in the Tower Of Supplication. Never open its gates."