Hello Again, part 2

Hello Again is a campaign story that started in 2014 involving a carousel of players and a roller coaster of arcs all taking place in the town of Kine. At this point, it's starting to look like a bottle episode but I promise it takes a left turn.

So here's where we left off:

Eckehard wakes from a dream in which millions of eyes surround and constantly watch him. The struggle to regain consciousness leaves him weary and confused. He is in the pitch dark surrounded by damp walls and bars, and there’s something more, the itch in the back of his mind, the ever-present craving, a yearning for living flesh grows ever-steadily until any and all sensations are consumed by one, hunger.

Camilla and Coco find themselves in a fog, riding in a wagon. When Camilla looks to her left, she recognizes the wagon driver. It is Mert. This snaps her back to reality, as if waking from a coma, she very bluntly proclaims, “I saw you die.”

More here: part 1

Ernst Fuchs

Eckehard wakes in a dank mud hole of a cell. Barely conscious, he is suddenly consumed with an overwhelming urge to feed. Unable to control himself, a sound of movement comes from the dark sending him lurching towards it. Groping in mad fury he finds the adjacent cell. Drawing close to the bars, he lunges through and grasps the frail frame of a woman then wrenches her to his mouth. In seconds he's devoured the arteries in her neck. Like an animal, he snarls but even satiated the hunger continues to gnaw at his thoughts. The act of draining blood now drives him to utter madness. Movement from deep in the dark drives him on. He begins throwing his weight at the bars. They are stuck deep in the mud and into stone but the bars give slightly with each strike. As his body hits the bars, he's vaguely aware of the rats watching him. They are sitting in a neat line on the other side of the bars like an audience. He's also vaguely aware that the sound of squishing footsteps are making their way to his cell. 

The sound of steps stops and a figure stops in front of his cell, while Eckehard continues bashing the bars. His mania hasn't let up, but it's strange, the rats are gone and he has no urge to wrench at the figure- just to escape and feed. The bars have moved two inches since he began throwing himself at them.

"Ahh, you are awake. You've been unconscious for some time." A tall, strange looking man stood in front of the cell. His voice is high pitched and sounded a bit like a whistle. "If you'll stop, I'll open up the cell."

Oddly his voice immediately snaps him out of his lust for blood and that's when it hits him, the person before him has an off smell, like formaldehyde.  

"Good. You were unconscious for some time even before I was called to help. I apologize for the accommodations. I realize it is no place for a person of your stature, but we are limited by what's available here... and the situation."

This conversation continues for some time. It turns out the person's name is Nylor and apparently, the Silvers had hired him to combat the Red Plague. He is strange though. When he raises an eery yellow lantern you realize you killed an emaciated Nala, wife of Brill the innkeeper. At the rising horror and regret you feel for your actions, Nylor simply tsk-tsks and continues on, explaining that you are in a makeshift underground lab that interconnects with the old tunnels beneath Kine. As Eckehard walks with him they pass some of Nylor's helpers. The strange creatures are only about three feet tall. You'd guess that he employs only midgets, except these shrouded creatures, have bright yellow eyes- or at least he thinks they do, he only caught a quick glimpse.  

Nylor explains that Jorg Silver had summoned him here to cure the plague in his son. After a while you realize that the son Nylor is speaking of is not Roderick (whom you met and is indeed infected with the plague), but a young boy. 

Pieces are falling into place. The players suspect that this is the boy in Brill's keeping and probably why Nala was in a cell next to you. But you don't have to guess for much longer. As Nylor talks about his son he once again leads you downwards. This time the chambers change, but not from mud to stone, instead stone to something else. The long narrow room seems to throb as if it were a digestive tract. There is a large mirror on the wall but it doesn't reflect anything.

Then you notice the boy. Facing away from the entrance is a slanted table and the boy. He has been dissected, body flayed open and a long glowing worm intertwined with what was left of his still working innards. At this point, Eckehard realizes Nylor has left the room. At that same moment, the throbbing room seems to coincide with a growing headache and nausea, also the worm untethers from the boy. Seconds later it lurches towards Eckehard who collapses. Then the worm is on him, burrowing. He barely grasps its end, while the rest is plunged under his skin, preventing it from disappearing inside him.

He overcomes the agony, manages to pull it from his arm, stumble through the hall and eventually up into the stone part of the structure. The worm doesn't follow. Eckehard is left with a deep fear of this place but also anger. He manages to make it outside and begins the search for his companions.

******

Camilla and Coco are in the wagon, riding towards Kine. When Camilla says to Mert, "I saw you die." She is met with a look of confusion, then horror. A moment later Mert runs off into the woods screaming. Out of the fog, Coco and Camilla continue on and realize there are two others with them, a tall man named Trafalgalard and a young woman named Alia. They also seem thoroughly confused. The familiar features of the town are revealed. It is still cold, nearly vacant, but Gaunt the guard is no longer at his post and now a strange tower overlooks the town. That's when they notice a familiar man on a tall horse riding from the tower, Eckehard.

Where were there other companions? Where was Jorg? Roderick? Brill? The town seemed sterile. No one was about, almost like it was a model of Kine rather than Kine itself. After sharing his experience with Nylor the companions make their way to the Church of the Green Lady, the last place they remember being before all this. The church inside is abandoned but the altar opens into the underground just as it did before. The answers they hoped, would be found inside.

Immediately, they notice that the underground is different. A mold seems to grow everywhere and there are cracks in the ground. The cracks are filled with a black metallic substance. It almost looks like an infection spreading throughout the underground. As they explore the tunnels it is not long before they encounter the first living being- if you can call it that. The creature walks on two legs but it has no face and arms. At first sight, it charges at them. After a scuffle the creature is dead but Coco, Eckehard, and Camilla are suddenly filled with a sense that the creature was someone they knew, an old companion in fact. They resolve not to harm any of the other strange creatures they encounter underground- and encounter they do. It was a resolution that is hard to keep. 

They find many strange creatures, each different from the other, all with impossible evolutions like no mouth or trailing intestines. They race through the underground until they finally come to its terminus, a circular room with a tall jet black crystal bursting from the center. It appears this is the origin of the cracks. Coco being the curious person she is touched the crystal and disappears. 

She finds herself in a room. She can see her companions distorted within the crystal as if they are mere reflections. At first, the room seems identical, except that when she walks rather than her moving, the room moves around her instead. On one end of the room, she finds tatters and blood, also a letter like the ones they had found before. It is the mere ravings of a man that'd been trapped in a place for too long except for one thing, it was signed Finn Silver. The long missing nephew. Has he been here the whole time? Behind the rags are loose bricks.

At this point, the others have touched the crystal as well. They are all in the room now, pulling at the loose bricks. As the bricks give way, that area of the wall collapses revealing a starry night. 

That's not quite right. Not a starry night. A blackness. A void. They see endless nothingness and a few pinpricks of light like stars, and before them is a sprawling structure like a mold of an ant colony, and below is a room with an identical break in its wall. After some discussion, the group rigs a rope bridge to the other room.

This room appears a lot like the circular room they just left before touching the crystal, but for three portals. Each portal is opaque but bears a distinct color.

So without going into incredible detail, this complex ended up being a micro-universe where Nylor kept subjects to study and experiment on. Our adventure took us into and out of peril in dramatic fashion. For those curious, the playthrough of the conclusion is here: A Fitting End.

******

For now, I'll stick with the story points so we can get to present day. Nylor, this alien's simulation of a man was indeed summoned by Jorg, but it was his undoing. The Silver's have a long history directly entwined with the Masters, the old rulers of the kingdoms of man and still very much powerful entities. Their relationship with them directly resulted in the Red Death and the rebirth of Erasmus Silver in each generation. Jorg wanted to break the cycle so he enlisted the help of an outsider. But the outsider's investigation ended the same way as it does for most experimental subjects. Nylor infected his lessers with disease and facsimiles, experimented, and recording the results.

The party put an end to this, but the tear in time and space that resulted afterward was enough to change something within Camilla, the porcelain robot-like character with no past. After acting very strangely she seemed to flee the party in abject confusion and being tireless, the others were hard pressed to follow.

Part 3: Camilla flees to the forest while her companions pursue. The others feel as if they are being watched. Eckehard is captured and forced to return to Kine.

Ernst Fuchs

Hello Again part 1

A couple years back we had one of those games where we just couldn’t keep a consistent group together.  A roulette of six different players, two at a time stepped in and out after two or three sessions. We nearly gave up, but the mystery our GM dreamed up was just too damn good, even the restarts were interesting. So finally after a whole year, we managed to nail down two players and make it through the story. Now, I didn’t run the first two parts of the game, so I can only tell you what happened from my perspective, and then pick up where our old characters left off, so here it goes:

Ernst Fuchs

Part 1

Eckehard the ‘half-aelf’ is sitting, legs crossed and resting on a stool when a burly man in maille struts into the lonely hostel. The only spattering of buildings on the forest road for miles, everyone in the common room is a traveler. Still, Eckehard stands out. His inhuman features always attract the attention of xenophobes and bullies in this part of the world. Mert, the armored brute that just entered took immediate notice- too bad for him. Mert got only one insult out of his mouth before realizing his mistake. Eckehard moved like a snake. His strikes were without mercy and vicious. In seconds Mert was dead. In the ensuing chaos a curiosity- er rather, a bizarre scene unfolded. A woman but not a woman, a moving porcelain doll the size of a woman with an expressionless face, as if it were a permanent plaster mold, entered the bar. Dumbfounded, Eckehard and the three tavern patrons that had stood up to help him (though unnecessary) somehow joined together and make their way to place called Kine on a wagon with a strange box just long enough to house the parties strange new porcelain friend.

Presented straight off with this mystery, it wasn’t long after that a new one unfolded. This woman (a PC) named Camilla had no memories (neither did the player). She was obviously not human and had all the emotions of a broom. That said, she could speak and reason, she took suggestions literally, and she carried on tirelessly. Joining us was an old magician, a poor knight, and a little woman named Coco. Coco carried nothing with her yet seemed to have whatever was needed whatever the situation (a small mystery to the other PCs).

Map of Kine. Any old town will work, but we used this one by Dyson: https://rpgcharacters.wordpress.com/2013/12/17/tuesday-map-the-thorp-at-appletree-pond/

Upon arriving, the PCs discovered the town had been struck with the plague, a disease the residents called the Red Death. The town was sparse and few people were ever about. An impressive castle loomed over the town, owned by one Lord Silver. Apparently, he had not been seen for many weeks. The only other remarkable feature in the town was a very old looking church at its center.

After a small confrontation with the lone town guard (who demanded the visitors leave their weapons with him, but settled on allowing Lord Eckehard, a noble, to keep their weapons), the PCs made their way to an inn. Once entered they met Brill, the Innkeeper, a well-to-do entrepreneur with a knowledge of local nobility and a collector. This is where the mystery begins. It’s discovered that Mert works for Brill and Brill works for Lord Silver. Camilla was destined for delivery to this very tavern. What’s more, there is a strange painting in Mert’s wagon. Upon close inspection, a note is found in the wagon and another within the painting. The first says

Mert, you are late. Time is growing short. I require my merchandise delivered to Kine immediately. Bring it to the usual location by mid-fall and I will consider forgiving your delay.

The second says

…I awoke in my sleep again but this time the cellar was filled with offerings. The way was clear and I entered the city of my Lady.

This peaks the PCs curiosity. Especially when they realize there is another painting in the tavern that was clearly painted by the same hand. When they get a chance the PCs remove the backing of that painting and find another note.

…so I knew she called for me and me alone. Why else would she let me into her city? I opened the door with their blood. Fed the rats in the walls. Soon the rats will be sated. The rats. May the rats eat your eyes. Eat my offerings…

Thoroughly creeped out the PCs retire to their rooms but not after noting that Brill and his wife Nala, a couple well into their middle years, are fostering a young son that they suspect is not related to them. They seem overly protective of him.

With the memory of the notes fresh in their minds, scratches and growls coming through the walls in the night were needless to say, unsettling. So much so that two of the party left that night. In the morning, when the three remaining members commiserated over their miserable nights spent awake, they were joined by two others that were also staying at Brill’s Tavern (new PCs). These newcomers seemed curious as well. So when the PCs made their way to the church at the center of town the others joined.

The church was an ancient temple to the Green Lady, a cult that exists only on the fringe of the Free Realm. Their stop at the church revealed only the symptoms of the Red Death and that Lord Silver was indeed missing. It didn’t seem they would get any answers there, so they moved on to Lord Silver’s castle.

Now at this point, why stay? Why not leave at the first mention of the plague? Here's why, unbeknownst to the rest of the party, Eckehard is not a half-aelf, not at all (in fact that’s impossible, no one is a half-aelf but it's an often used lie). His blood is tainted with the blood of Nobles, something that burns hot within his veins, like a rash, always itching, driving him mad. His one solace is a second obsession. He seeks the Lady in Black, one of the long dead Masters now worshiped as a god. His search for her led him to Kine and now the notes seem to confirm it. Coco is a mercenary and Camilla follows orders. They seem useful to him so he feigns lordly interest in the matters of the Silvers, all the while probing for a path to his prize, the Lady in Black.

The PCs gain entrance to Lord Silver’s castle and find a sick and horribly drunk Roderick Silver, son of Jorg, the missing lord. He coughs blood like all the other plague victims except he is mostly lucid and intensely angry. He is outraged at any mention of his father but is prone to ramblings whenever he is mentioned. He raves about his Uncle, a man named Erasmus and his fathers leaving to find him. In the main hall, there are paintings of his father and a rather severe-looking man, whom the party assumed is Erasmus. By Roderick’s third outburst Eckehard has had enough, he surprises everyone in the party with a spell, putting young Roderick asleep and giving them time to explore the castle.

The explorers sneak upstairs where they find the study and a great oak desk. On it, they find an unfinished letter.

Brill, I have word that one of my uncle’s paintings was sold years ago to a collector in the east. It is imperative that I reacquire it. Have your contacts

They also find a note in the pile of papers, written in frantic letters, in the same pen as before but as if written quickly and with an unsteady hand.

RATS I HEAR THEM IN THE ATTIC THEY NEED MORE MEAT STRIP THE FLESH

At this point the group begins worrying that Roderick will soon wake, so quickly they move to through the other rooms. Much of the upstairs seemed mundane if not strangely undisturbed except for a set of large doors. With some fiddling the party realizes it is closed by an iron bar on the opposite side. The doors are wide set but the crack between them is dark (despite the fact that there should be plenty of windows in this room). Coco makes a quick attempt to get through the door but the sudden shouts from below alert them that Roderick is now awake. The party quickly makes their way to a set of stairs. As they descend they realize it doesn’t lead to a back entrance. In fact, it leads to an underground labyrinth.

There was a lot to explore in the tunnels, murals of a shrouded woman, sometimes depicted with another very similar woman or spiders, ghost walls, booby-trapped steps… but we’re going to fast forward to an underground chamber with a lever. When pulled, the ceiling pulls away and a path into a spacious room is revealed. The adventurers quickly realized they must be in the church at the center of town. It’s not long before two wandering monks discover them. A young man named Brother Maynard is nice enough when he finds them considering they were four strangers snooping around the chapel at midnight through a tunnel entrance he never knew existed. He calls for the grandmaster, the forgetful but venerated head of the church, and pretty soon there is a small gathering of monks. The players do their best to talk their way out of the situation but they’re shown the door. On their way out they recognize one of the monks as they pass him in the cloisters- Jorg Silver, the missing lord of Kine. Eckehard calls to Lord Silver. Without warning Eckehard collapses. Jorg disappears. Fade to black.

**End Part 1**

Part 2: Eckehard wakes from a dream in which millions of eyes surround and constantly watch him. The struggle to regain consciousness leaves him weary and confused. He is in the pitch dark surrounded by damp walls and bars, and there’s something more, the itch in the back of his mind, the ever present craving, a yearning for living flesh grows ever-steadly until any and all sensations are consumed by one, hunger.

Camilla and Coco find themselves in a fog, riding in a wagon. When Camilla looks to her left, she recognizes the wagon driver. It is Mert. This snaps her back to reality, as if waking from a coma, she very bluntly proclaims, “I saw you die.”

Ernst Fuchs

A Fitting End

The story started without any freakish abominations but with time evolved. If you remember our last campaign session, ended with Eckehard being eviscerated, (Gryres). But before all that, we had to reboot the campaign. It started with Eckehard the dhampir, Camilla the creature, and ‘Coco-bean’ the Magpie. They hadn’t yet met two of our current party members, Alia the wizard and Trafalgalard the half blood until Eckehard woke in an underground cell and Camilla and Coco had found themselves in a daze outside the town of Kine, traveling with two residents they knew to be dead (in fact, Eckehard had killed them in the first part of the adventure).

This was the Lord Silver campaign. The Silvers were a prominent family with a history stretching back to the once Masters of the realm– and apparently, it was just beginning to catch up to them. The town was plagued with disease and the town’s inhabitants were unwilling to confide in us. We had never really gotten to the bottom of that story arc, but after a long break and the introduction of the two new players, the story restarted with a twist. Apparently, a mysterious man named Doctor Nylor had entered the story in our absence and became the center of a whole new mess of problems for the town– beginning with the Silvers, who had apparently disappeared. Fast forward a few sessions and we find ourselves in a place outside the Material Plane. This ‘complex’ seemed to consist of micro universes, connected by portals and made to look like the natural habitats of those creatures imprisoned within them. One of the first we came to, was home to a little girl named Elizabeth, who was not only from the Free Realm, but the Free Realm of hundreds of years ago. Next, we entered a room with a Gwyllion, who apparently had just given birth but had her child stripped from her. There was also a room with a sentient tree, one with a crow, and a room that entered into outer space (which nearly killed Eckehard). We had ended with Eckehard going off alone to the room with a crow. There he had found a portal covered in an opaque sheen (which later turned out to be a Gryre– that's what Eckehard gets for trying to punch his way through the portal).

After his near-death experience and being rescued by the party, Eckehard returned to the Gwyllion’s pool to heal when a gnome woman named Blondwine entered. The gnome had apparently been freely traveling the prison and excitedly shared her findings with us. She had also drawn a map. Not long after, a second Blondwine entered the room. She was an exact duplicate. This led to all sorts of confusion and a short trip to a location marked ‘Storage’ on the map.  From the ‘Storage’ area, Eckehard found and examined a suit of armor that seemed to fluctuate as he stared at it. Not only did it evoke nausea, it also appeared to change size. In fact, to a point that it fit him. Then with some hesitation, Eckehard donned the fluctuating armor as a replacement for his broken mail (from the encounter with the Gryre). In the meantime, Blondwine left to explore the unlabeled room with a milky white portal (that she wouldn’t shut up about). We, on the other hand, decide to go to the part of the map labeled Troll– after all, it was a creature many of us had only heard stories about.

When we enter said room, Doctor Nylor is standing with two minions under an apparatus simultaneously holding the troll down and examining it. Without skipping a beat, Eckehard (who has already experience a number of enerving experiences with Doctor Nylor) with outward calm (and inward fear) made his way to Doctor Nylor but didn't get far. The precocious Alia suddenly summoned a fireball that whizzed by Eckehard and consumed not only the equipment, but also freed the troll, revealing Doctor Nylor in all his glory as an abomination wreathed in flames. When the fire cleared, a horror with many bulging eyes and gnashing teeth appeared in the good doctor's place, covering the waking troll (and perhaps holding it down). Being the closest, Eckehard quickly mounted the abomination and slashed it open, splitting it down the middle before it suddenly broke into a dozen fleeing blobs. The party shot at each of them with fire and arrows to prevent the fractured Nylor from escaping, while the troll in one fluid motion snatched a blob, froze it, and crushed it in its massive hand. Then with utmost clarity of thought, the troll stood up and scooped Coco off the ground as she made her way to the portal and in an all-out sprint rushed towards Eckehard who was standing between an exit and 4 of the horrors that were fleeing towards it. Eckehard managed to destroy the first horror but was then quickly dragged through the portal by the remaining three blobs.

In this new room (marked griffin on the map; also a creature of myth) is a peculiar place where all who enter are overcome with the sensation of being unable to move anywhere other than diagonally. Trafalgalard, who enters shortly after Eckehard, immediately falls from the diagonal and suddenly causes the griffin to appear as a writhing snake beast. Alia and Trafalgalard then burst through the portal and take out the other horrors before turning on the remaining one grappled with Eckehard. The beast then seems to let out a sigh and the echoing voice of Nylor is heard from all around, “Kill me and the knowledge is lost,” to which Coco answers by shattering it with a spell, thereby killing the good doctor.

But then the light in the room immediately quashes and there’s pitch darkness except for the pulsating glow of the portals. The room then begins cracking and the griffin panicks, cracking the world further. Eckehard immediately bolts from the room (to many an outcry from the players– a lot of shade is thrown Eckehard's way), while Alia casts a light spell. The room is being torn apart and everyone begins moving to the portal, except the troll, who is crouched with both hands on the ground and chanting ‘It's only stone, it's only stone’ as his magic permeates the floor, seemingly holding it together. Eckehard meanwhile is bolting through the portals from the crow's room to the tree which is now lit and floating above the floor to the fiend child's abandoned room. All the rooms were as pitch and they were all beginning to crack. The portals were pulsating more infrequently and becoming increasing faint. Three rooms later Eckehard returns to the room he was looking for. Elizabeth, the fiend child and the now sickly Gwyllion are curled up in a dark and cold pool. He immediately sweeps her and the Gwyllion up and moves to the room he had entered from and then another. He knew he wouldn't make it back to the crow's room (where he believed there was an exit). Instead, he returns to the first room (next to the fiend's). The one they had first entered the complex from.

It was now cracked and separated from reality by a gap in literal space. He can see that there's no time. The room is now broken and the ledge which led back to the Material Plane is thirty feet from the underground temple on the other side- but there is no time to stop and think, Eckehard runs and leeps. Somehow, despite the incredible distance, Eckehard is drawn to the crack in the underground temple as if its gravity was pulling him towards it. The armor also seems to respond to his will and aids him in traversing the gap (later my GM said, "Thank god you put it on"). As we were floating in space the jolt from the movement frees Elizabeth from his arms. Eckehard then reached for her, making his check to grab her but in the process loses his grip on the Gwyllion who slips into the nothingness, wherein the darkness there are many eyes, revealing creatures blinking into and out of existence. Our GM finishes the scene with the Gwyllion’s expression turning to one of comfort, she then smiles, and a translucent beast appears from the black swallows her whole, then fades away.

When Eckehard hits the ledge on the other side he doesn't miss a stride. He puts as much distance from the shattering complex and infinite space to the familiar tunnels below the temple. Meanwhile, the rest of the party leaves the troll muttering his incantation and makes for the room where the gryr was destroyed. From there they entered a portal (Ah ha! Punching the portal wasn't such a bad idea now, was it) into a collapsing underground complex still pulsating with otherworldly energy. They made their way through the hall and up the spiral staircase before the ceiling collapses. They are saved by Alia’s spell, but her sanity was lost in the process as the creature with which her mind was tied (there was a story arc with the crow) was crushed in the rubble and the Havren mind that possessed it (the crow) fled to hers, overwriting it (or at least pushing her mind aside).

We left the campaign here with the party amidst the rubble near the town and Eckehard below the temple at its center. Not long after exiting the portaled realm, acolytes from the temple approached underground with Yorgey Silver at their head (he was dead in the first rendition of this story, providing further evidence of multiple realities) and with the final words of the night said, “So my son is truly dead.”


There was a lot of run-up, but it was a hell of a ride and I thought I’d share the climax. I've never been so sad about a nameless NPC (the troll) especially one we spent so little time with. His sacrifice was appreciated.

GM side note: The story behind Blondwine was that she was captured and was used as a lab assistant in Nylor's experiments to find the source of the Silver disease. She was eventually able to make use of some tools that allowed her to traverse the portals and escape. Unfortunately, she found her way to a broken area of Nylor’s Prison (where he had mistakenly captured a vampire, who in its despair killed itself and its blood shattered that section of the prison). This broken area became a vortex of energy and shattered reality. Essentially, it began spitting out innumerable copies of Blondwine. She would then traverse the cells, eventually finding her way to the milky white room (room 12, which we later discovered what was inside from a blood-soaked map left behind by one of the Blondwines) where her infinite copies all met their demise. Interestingly, her curiosity ended up feeding and growing an entire ecosystem of giant spiders.