To Winterhaven and Gardmore Abbey

After briefly inspecting the "balance" card but unable to discern its purpose, the group decided to follow Kor's advice and seek out Valthrun the Prescient in Winterhaven.  The journey required a few days travel to the small village.  Along the way on the first evening the group was beset upon by a Hill Giant that Edhas was fortunate enough to have heard following them along a creek.  Rather than flee, they decided to attack the Giant while they had the tactical height advantage.  Unfortunately, the overwhelming strength of the Giant caught them off guard and they were quickly looking for a way out.  The fled down the creek and further along the path until they felt it was safe to rest again.

On the second day, they arrived in Winterhaven and were greeted at the gate by two guards who asked for their business in town.  Not wanting to alert anyone to their purpose, they said it was just casual.  The town was small with the necessary shops and taverns.  The tower of Valthrun was clear - the knocked and were greeted by a pleasant old man that claimed to have known Kor Yeznia from many years ago, Although he confessed to being unaware of his current whereabouts.  They showed him the card and were informed that it was likely a part of the Deck of Many Things - an artifact last known to have been assembled in the depths of Guardmore Abbey.  The Abbey fell many generations ago when a young Paladin of Bahamut drew from the deck to save the Abbey from seige but his drawing was unfortunate and the Deck was scattered throughout the Abbey and beyond.  The group did not share how they acquired the card and Valthrun did not ask.  They also asked about the Staff of Chaos and Valthrun seemed even eager to hear about their adventures.  The final piece of the staff is buried with Lord Evard, entombed beneath the outpost of Triton Keep in the Southwest corner of the Nentir Valley.  Valthrun suggested the group seek out the advice of the local ruler, Lord Paedrag. 

Although Valthrun kept asking for more information that he could help them with, the group was unwilling to share any further information they had acquired.

They visited the smithy briefly before moving onto Lord Paedrag's manor.  They were greeted here equally as openly.  After recounting the information about the Card and the Abbey, he informed them that perhaps their interests could overlap - the Abbey was long ago taken over by tribes of Orcs that represent a threat to the existence of Winterhaven.  Although he is interested in seeking alliances with other towns to get rid of them, he needs someone to scout the area and let him know any useful information about the layout of their camp or their numbers.  This would also get the group closer to the Abbey they are askign so much about. 

They accepted the offer and hit the road for the two day journey to the Gardmore Downs.  Under the cover of darkness, they approached the Abbey's large outerwalls but several hundred yards awy from the perimeter they were attacked by a large Blue Dragon.  Although they tried to reason with the creature, its carnal instincts took over and it attacked the party, nearly killing the whole group.  Only through the last ditch effort by Sir Loin did they destroy the Dragon. 

In the midst of both battles (Giant and Dragon) the "balance" card glowed a dark amber and allowed the group to use an ability they had not had before.  The power of this attack revealed just how potent the Deck is when fully assembled.  It is clear now that control over the Deck may play an important part in the growing plot around them.  If you have read through this whole summary - text me the word "balance" for a wondrous item of your choosing level 8 and below

The Curse is Lifted and a Card

Racing out the back of the Harwick house, the group hurried to the tree line and decided rather than follow the directions to the farmhouse of Darien, Wyndham wanted to look for the town hall/militia to see if his mentor, Kor Yeznia, was hiding there.  As they snuck towards the center of the village, the bone dust in the air grew thicker and the constant shuffling of the undead filled the mist beyond their vision.  The town hall building had two leveled buildings connected by a ten foot high breezeway.  The large barn doors on the closest part of the building seemed sealed from the inside although Edhas could hear noises from inside.

They slinked around the side of the building and noted no other ways into the barn part of the building.  A bulkhead behind the building was also locked.  Dora's Ghost Sound power led to a ghoul howling for backup in the other direction, but they quickly realized that hungry undead were now approaching their location.  Some quick thinking by Wyndham had the group clikmbing the side of the barn with his grappling hook and rope.  Once above, they observed an unfortunate woman who suddenly fled across the town center only to be ravaged and disembowled by a horde of hungry zombies.  Not wasting anytime, they crossed the roof of the breezeway to a blocked window in the main part of the building.

Unable to push the wood blocking the window, Thorm began hacking at it with his axe until he could reach through and begin moving things away from the window.  Suddenly a dagger flashed across the space cutting his arm open.  The inhabitants kept insisted they leave, that they lacked food and didn't have any more space for others, but clever bargaining by Thorm convinced them to relent.  Once inside, they learned that 15 "militia" men were holed up here with some older weapons.  One identified himself as Kira's sister and, after discovering they had left her in the Chapel, was determined to go rescue her.  Secret word is Retarded - text me the word and 5 potions of vitality to your cahracter sheet. They also learned that this group of men had killed and eaten the mayor, whose body was salted and hanged in one of the rooms.  They also had no knowledge of Kor Yeznia but confirmed that Darien's farmhouse was further south - where the bone dust was even thicker.

After a brief rest, they decided to all fan out simultaneously and the party would head towards Darien's.  Hopefully they could put a stop to whatever was causing this undead horde to linger here.

The large farm estate appeared deserted until Edhas entered the front foyer to find a female ghoul (likely Darien's sister) hunched over a wide assortment of papers while she mumbled to herself frantically shuffling through them.  Staring in disbelief at a talking ghoul, she was surrounded by other undead that stormed into the room. She stood her ground, going toe to toe with the female ghoul, while receiving back up from the rest of hte group.  After defeating them, they looked through the papers and noticed the writings on the papers were actually frantic scribbling of the words "Asmodeous Walks".

Determined to find Darien and hopefully Kor, they made their way through the farmhouse estate, taking what was valuable and finally approaching the back gardens.  In the back, a freshly rotting ghoul was frantically building some sort of topiary out of twigs and yard debris, mumbling all the while.  Recognizing him as Kor, Wyndham approached to try and reason with him but his undead nature took control and he attacked his former charge.  While Wyndham and Dora dealt with Kor, Thorm, Sir Loin and Edhas found themselves nearly overmatched by a large ghoul that could only be Darien himself and a series of ravenous undead minions.  Pushed to the brink of defeat, the party mourned the loss of Wyndham's mentor.

He carried a note sealed with wax addressed to Wyndham.  The note said that they should not return to their hometown of Stonehallow.  In fact, Wyndham fled after taking something of importance from an unnamed person.  That prize, he claimed, was now hidden in the temple of St. Lucius.  It instructed them to take the item to Winterhaven and seek out Valthrun the Prescient.  The group quickly cracked a code embedded in his writing: Danitus.  Wyndham's knowledge of Stonehallow allowed him to recall the name Danitus. Kaius Danitus a prominent political figure on the ruling council of Stonehallow. Kor also carried a hand-drawn map that appeared to be several locations :Stonehallow, Sarthel and Banethal and a large Capital M.  All of the locations had a drawn circle that connected them.  The word "iron" was written on the outside of the circle.

They returned to the temple, noting that affter Darien's destruction, the curse seemed lifted, the ghouls scattered and the bone dust gone from the air.  Inside the temple some hard digging uncovered an item wrapped in fabric and tied with rope.  Although the item emitted strong levels of arcane chaos magic, they opened it to discover a simple card with the word "balance" on it.

The Tomb of St. Lucian

After surveying the land around the Temple grounds, they decided a frontal assault would be the most effective.  Charging into the front gates the group was confronted with more ravenous ghouls that continually rained down on them.  After realizing the fight would last forever, they began backpedaling towards the front doors of the chapel.  While Wyndham unlocked the large wooden doors, the backed in.

After they adjusted their eyes to the dark interior of the chapel, the scene of carnage was horrifying.  Dozens of dead, some laying in the aisles, others seated in the pews.  Most looked as though they didn't put up a fight.  Papers littered the floor around the altar.  Thorm to the time to look through the papers to reveal the writings of Brother Brellac Monson.  It spoke ominously of a young farmer named, Darien, brought before him because he was suffering from prophetic nightmares.  The name Darien matched the name in the wizard's tower.  Apparantly, this young man is the source of this outbreak and directions to his house were available in Monson's journal.  The writings indicate that Monson dispatched an acolyte to the home of the farmer to help his sister Elisa care for him.  Another torn letter indicates that the group could hear the ghouls tear apart Monson perhaps.  Either way, no one remaining here was living.  Thorm and the others consecrated the temple by interring the bodies in the catacombs below.  After securing the area, they rested for the night.

The next morning, they decided to investigate the crypts below to find another way out.  Thorm located a tear away wall behind one of the catacomb cutouts.  Peeling away the earth, he shifted the wall out of the way to reveal a narrow crawl space.  Wyndham led the way down the tunnel followed by Sir Loin and Thorm, who first removed his armor to better fit.  He decided to drag the armor behind him. Kyra remained behind in the catacombs rather than crawl through the passage.  At the end of the crawlspace, Wyndham located an apparant dead end, until he reached into the dirt wall to feel a level.  After pulling the lever, the sliding wall behind them shut to seal off the passage and water began to fill the space from holes above them.  With moments to spare, they relifted the lever, opened the same wall and let the water out.  Shouting to Kyra to brace the door behind them, Wyndham pulled the lever again and realized there was no way to lift another lever he found.  Reasoning that the only way to lift the second lever may have been to let the chamber fill with water, they asked Kyra to remove the wedge.  With that the door slid shut again and water filled the crawlspace.  Once filled, Wyndham pulled the second lever, and the floor collapsed beneath them, plunging them down ten feet into a room filled with more water. 

Struggling to swim up, Wyndham grabbed Thorm who had clutched a large lever on the wall. After pulling this lever, a large drainhole opened in the floor and Sir Loin used the edges of the hole to avoid being pulled down!  The wall opened to reveal a dark burial chamber.  Four sarcophagi sat in the room, the focal point of which was a larger sarcophagus with a bas relief of a throne at the top of the room.  The entrance to the room contained an ancient script that told the story of St. Lucian.  It ended with an ominous warning to "beware the interred evil"  Four crates sat in each corner of the room.  They contained water, food, a cache of healing potions and gold.  Although they decided not to take the gold, they did take the healing, saying a silent prayer to St. Lucian.  They room also contained an ages old corpse.  After manipulating St. Lucian's sarcophagus, an arcane portal revealed itself in the floor but Wyndham suspected it led to the Abyssal Plane of Carceri, the prison plane.  Rather than head there, they located a sealed way out of the room and made their way back to the surface via a secret entrance by the river.

They used the current of the river to take them to the next bridge and recognized Nik Harwick's house and recalled his plea to check on his wife.  After pulling themselves up to land, they quickly made their way into the house.  Ransacked and apparantly empty, they almost left until Wyndham discovered a door that held a ladder to a basement.  Looking inside, Thorm was pulled down and thrown against the wall by a large brutish ghoul.  While Sir Loin and Thorm battled Nik's wife now turned ghoul, Wyndham held off waves of ghouls trying to make their way into the home.  After dropping the ghoul, Thorm grabbed the ghoul's wedding ring to offer to Nik if they should run into one another again.  They then slipped as quickly out the back window as possible. 

On the way to the Temple

After dealing with the wave of ghouls in the wizard's tower, the group decided to listen to the full message contained on the magical sphere.  Following a series of seemingly mundane ritual steps, a diary type message:

"Father Monsen brought a case to me today. It
seems a young man named Dorien, Darien, or something
like that, has been suffering from terrible nightmares that
Monsen believes might be prophetic. This is the same boy mentioned
by Kor Yeznia.  I don’t know why he
reached that conclusion, but the boy will be stopping by
tomorrow, so I suppose I’ll have a cha . . .
. . . clearly these nightmares are growing in
both their intensity and horror . . . screaming
meat . . . and of blood . . . don’t blame the boy for
falling apart. . . .My auguries detected some form of extraplanar emanations.
By the colors, I’d have to say it’s from the Chaos, most
likely the Abyss with that oily edging. Gods I hope Monsen
is wrong about these nightma . . ."

Not sure what connection Kor Yeznia, Wyndham's mentor, has to this boy or the problems breaking out in Hampsted, but the group decided they should make their next stop the Temple of St. Lucian on this side of the river.  In order to get closer to the building but stay out of sight, they climbed through a high small window into a building that turned out to be a bathhouse.  Hiding in the privy, a woman named Kyra revealed that she had shut herself in the bathroom when the horrors broke out.  As they were peering through the broken shutters in the front of the building to decide the best way to approach the temple, they could hear moaning and shuffling from inside one of the adjacent larger bath rooms. 

Deciding to investigate rather than be blindsided, the room contained two ravenous ghouls, which the group tried to quickly destroy as quietly as possible.  In the midst of the carnage, a large gelatinous cube surrounded the group forcing them further into the room.  Although pushed to their limits, the group was able to dispatch the threat and began to decide how to best approach the front courtyard of the temple.

The Wizard's Tower

After resting in the woods, the group headed back towards Hampstead, intending to locate the Wizard, Tiren's, tower. As soon as they reached the hilltop and looked down on the small town, it was obvious that whatever struck the town had made it nearly impossible to navigate without attracting the attention of ravenous undead.  They used a series of distractions and clever navigation through the streets and rooftops to avoid the everpresent ghouls.

After ziplining across a road to avoid detection, they rushed into the wizard's tower.  It was clear right away that the ghouls had attacked the tower early on and most of the lower level of the tower was in shambles.  Blood and ichor covered the walls along with burnt paper, debris and broken furniture.  They headed up the stairs to find more of the same but also a formerly active summoning or protection circle.  After trying to locate any sign of Tiren or Yeznia, the group found a unique magic recording device.  Fumbling with it, they activated a booming voice reciting steps to a mundane ritual.  Although they were able to shut the stone up, the damage had been done, and the howling of ghouls immediately followed.

Trying to get ready for the attack, the party began blasting at ghouls as they made their way to the tower and up the outer walls.  As the undead pushed their way up the stairwell and through the windows, the group (aside from Windham, who fled out the window and onto the rooftop) stood their ground and defended the tower.  Eventually, the destroyed the last ghoul and took a moment to search the tower for anything left.  With no sign of Yeznia and Tiren's death almost certain, they needed to move on to another location.  They next had to decide whether to go to the Temple of St. Lucian, locate the mayor or  Nik Harwick's place.

Children of the Corn

As the group stitched up their wounds and tended to the family's wounds, they began to ask them some questions.  They learned that the town of Hampstead was up the road but a week ago, the screaming started, followed by the fires and then the ghoul attacks.  Nik Harwick was on his way out of town to sell his ironwares at the nearest trading town when he was set upon by a neighbor, Wil Tracem.  He warded him off and the family brought him into the house and commenced boarding up the windows and doors.  They had been staying there living off the food stores for about a week but now the position was surely given away. Wyndham explained that the Band of Jenkins was on the way to Hampstead to look for Kor Yeznia, his mentor.  When asked, Byron suggested that perhaps he was visiting or staying with Tiren the wizard, whose tower is easy to find in town.  Alternatively, he may have gone to St. Lucian's Chapel or the mayor.  The Chapel is easy to locate but the Mayor may be more difficult to find, considering the events.

Looking out the windows, they could see movement in the corn fields but couldn't identify how many or what was out there.  Although anxious to make the crossing, Byron insisted they would need help in crossing the fields. 

Nik asked the group if they would be willing to locate his wife Beth, whom he was certain would be holed up in their attic.  The Harwick home is located next to the bridge over the River Lebe that cuts the town in two. 

They threw caution into the wind and used a bundle of bloody clothes to distract any ghouls as they raced into the cornfields towards the woods.  Although the distraction was effective, it didn't prevent the ghouls from swarming entirely.  After cutting their way through several ghouls, the party took some wounds and lost one of the family.  Nik, Byron and his wife and children survived.  Only the eldest, Ollan, fell to the undead.  The group reached the woods and outside the reach of the ghouls.  A well timed nature ritual protected the party and the family through the night and allowed them the chance to rest unmolested.

Bone Dust and a Farmhouse

Backing away from the Ghouls, the group used clever tactics to prevent the ravenous ghouls from feasting on any single hero.  After destroying the last of the ghouls, the group piled them together while searching through the remains.  Dora, while looking inside the tent, discovered a handful of gems, most of which she secretly pocketed, and a potion of healing.  After deciding to move forward, the group headed back onto the road and reached the edge of the forest by dusk. The

When the tree line opened up, the walking path became lined with chest high crops on either side instead of trees.  Further up the hill, the horizon was dominated by a two story farmhouse, boarded up from the inside.  After coming out of the trees, the whole area was covered with a dense white fog, which Wyndham and Dora identified as not actually fog but pulverized bone dust!  The entire air polluted with bone dust! To Thorm's surprise, he recalled training in the Temple of Moradin about Doresain, the Exarch of Orcus and King of the Ghouls whose White Kingdom was similarly filled with this bone dust.  Informing the rest of the group of the connection, they realized all may not be fine in the small town of Hampstead. Rather than strike ahead to the town, they decided to cut through the crops directly for the farmhouse to check it out.  Unwilling to try the front door, they entered a nearby crop storage building.  Although it appeared empty but for a small number of harvested crops, there was a chute about twenty feet up that appeared to connect to the main building.  Although the ladder was broken, Dora performed a Make Whole ritual and repaired the ladder, which the group used to climb to the chute and crawl through.  Hailing the whispering voices on the other side and identifying themselves as allies, they were ushered into the building.  While a middle aged man identified himself as Byron Westfield, his father Ollin and wife, Alissa and two daughters, Gwen and Salla, shouts from downstairs that the group was followed interrupted their conversation!  Byron explained that a younger man, Nik Harwick, was downstairs keeping watch. Password for a

The group rushed downstairs to see a twenty-something man holding back the door as forces rushed against it.  Although the windows were also boarded up in the furniture cluttered farmhouse, they could hear creatures scurrying all around the house.  While Leucis went to help force the door closed, the group spread out to watch the other entrances.  Ghouls crashed through the front door, but Dora dropped a illusory zone over the area outside of the door.  This area constantly knocked the ghouls prone, while she pelted them with Phantom Bolts and Riswynn supported her with blasts of Sacred Flame from his Holy Symbol. Seventh level item is Although they were successfully holding off ghouls from the front entrance, they were surprised to see them breaking through windows and screams from upstairs indicated some had climbed the farmhouse and broken through the upstairs windows.  Wyndham ran up the stairs and began striking the ghouls with lightening until he effectively destroyed this second wave of undead creatures.  Meanwhile, Leucis and Thorm held off the advances of more ghouls downstairs.  As it seemed the battle was ended, the group tended to their wounds and began to question the family about their situation and the fate of Hampstead. Metallica