Blood Sacrifices

Session 2.5 & 3: Blood Sacrifices 

Cast of the Party

• +Rob Conley as Sethre, an apostate.
• +Chris C.  played Ectur, a harden soldier.  
• +Ken H  played Brytan Nargald, a stealthy scout.
• Thadius was an NPC run by me.  Their former military commander.
• Jia another NPC, she is an apostate.

Not all games start with the players in one area.  Or time for that matter.  Ectur and Brytan have been adventuring north for the past two weeks, they ended their last adventure at Udine among the Etruscan apostates.

Sethre awakens, sore and confused.  He's in the forest.  His feet and hands are bound.  From somewhere behind him is a green, pulsating glow.  He can hear people talking.  Chanting...chanting is never good.

He looks around him and sees two other Etruscan soldiers bound like him. Heavy boots crunching the fallen leaves from behind.  He fakes unconsciousness and stifles a gasp when he sees a Roman soldier walk up to one the soldiers, lift him by the hair and slit his throat before throwing him over his shoulder.

Sethre awakens the other soldier, Marce.  They work together to become free.  The heavy boots return and this time they ambush the Roman.  Sethre kills the soldier with an expertly place arcane bolt.  After loots the Roman, Sethre discovers the Roman is not a Roman but an Etruscan.

They move to the edge of the forest and see a rift in the veil.  A blood mage is chanting over a pedestal.  An unnatural rock arch formation where bodies are stacked and the blood is dripping down onto the pedestal.  Another 'Roman' soldier is shouting for his friend.

The players attack.  The ceremony needs the blood of nine men to complete.  Seven have died.  During the fight, Marce kills the Roman soldier on the archway, his blood joins the others.  Eight.  Sethre damages the blood mage to brink of death door.  The blood mage pulls out his dagger and sacrifices himself on the pedestal.  Nine.

The anchor ceremony is complete and the rift is stabilized.  Tendrils reach out from the rift and attack.  Sethre gets pulled into the veil, not knowing the fate of Marce.  Inside the veil he struggles to free himself.  He sees a room of men sitting eating, talking to the apostates.  He reaches out for them and silently shouts for help.

Inside the monastery of apostates, Ectur, Brytan, Thadius and Jai eat.  They are discussing their plans as the apostates have politely asked them to move on.  Thadius becomes sick, the apostates quickly see that he has been infected with the dark taint.  They rush him to the infirmary.  He's in the right place.

"Help."

They hear a whisper of a voice.  They don't see anything at first, but then green tendrils form out of the wall and grab at them.  A battle begins.  Ectur and Brytan manage to get Sethre out, but both of them are swallowed up in it.  After a few pressure rolls they escaped before the rift closed.

They took time to recount what occurred.  Thadius and Jai remained behind.  Anders went with them.  While a tranquil will not fight, he is a proven alchemist and if nothing else the party decided he could carry stuff.

They decided to return to where the rift was located.  Brytan used his tracking to find the location and the dead body and glow of the rift announced they had arrived.  They took in the scene and Sethre understood the pedestal was an anchor to stabilize the rift to allow it to remain open.  They attacked the pedestal and more tendrils reached out for them and they fought them back as they smashed the pedestal.  A large scaly hand reached out of the rift.  As they fought and frantically fought off tendril and destroying the pedestal a 15' tall bi-pedal creature with a head of a dragon stepped out.

End of the session.