Berserkir - 05/04/2023 - A Kavel Perspective

Daring Heights - Town Hall

I am 7’4” tall. But, Carnan, my Firbolg druid friend, has some inches over me. It’s impressive. Firbolgs are very tall. Carnan is several hundreds of years old, and considered to be in his elderly years for a Firbolg. It appears he has kept himself in good shape, too. However, his posture is terrible. I heard many a creaking joint when he bent down to talk to Emily, the Halfling Council attendant who was there to see that an experienced adventuring party was put together for an urgent matter in the Feythorn Forest.

Carnan had Ulfr, his large wolf mount, with him. Carnan also has a walking treehouse that he lives in, which brought him to the city from Fort Ettin. It is clear, that with both a mount and a walking house, that Carnan does not do nearly enough walking and walking could address his poor posture. I’ll ask Kruger, my Iron-bro, in Fort Ettin to make some suggestions to Carnan.

Emily kindly asked Carnan and I if we would like refreshments while we waited for other experienced adventurers to arrive. Carnan asked for some tea. I, knowing who among my thicc-boi comrades was also available for the Council request, asked Emily if she could oblige with a slightly odd request and have an ale and a lamb shank ready.

When Ivan, my Human berserker friend, and fellow thicc-boi arrived, a smaller council member had the ale and lamb shank ready. Ivan was curious as to whether everyone was getting meat. I think my friend was trying to ascertain whether he would look forward to signing-up to more Council requests. The smaller council member looked to me to explain the situation, “Ivan,” I said, “it’s for you. I made sure you would have your pre-adventure essentials.” (I cringed a little inside at describing the ale and lamb shank as ‘essential’).

Ivan picked up his refreshments with delight. What followed was an awkward exchange where Ivan tipped the council member for the refreshments and then complimented her on her looks, given the revelation of her age. Initially Ivan’s question about her age seemed to be flirtation. But, it wasn’t. And nor did Emily receive the comment about her age as such. She was quite bewildered. I tried to change the conversation by asking Ivan how the lamb shank was. The conversation persisted for a minute longer.

All the awkwardness managed to hide how tactfully clever I had been in getting Ivan his pre-adventure ‘sustenance’ for him. Last time I was with him, he threw all caution to the wind and got shit-faced and stoned before combat. If not for the powerful druid who healed Ivan of his fully inebriated state, we would have been one thicc-boi down during our mission. You see, by getting Ivan his ‘requirements’ for him, I have controlled for his pre-adventure recklessness, by limiting the number of ales he’ll drink. This level of deception is necessary with my friend, because despite him being the strongest, baddest axe-master in the world, mentally; he is very sensitive to all of the following: criticism, being liked, approval, being perceived as anything but tough, being perceived as not understanding things, and generally he is just very sensitive. So, I try to manage my friend’s sore points in a way I think he would like. I also watered down his ale.


Adventurers Want A Break From Adventuring By Adventuring

When the Council wants the Dawnlands’ most experienced adventurers, it is usually for a matter that needs to be addressed decisively, which usually means killing something evil that’s threatening the peace. Ivan had expressed his displeasure about some recent past adventures. One of them, I was with him, and we had a frustrating time against a cursed witch, where we failed to achieve our mission. So, in many respects, I understood what he meant when he said he was looking forward to a straightforward ‘do a murder’ job.

My Human sister, Sorrel, the badass stealth assassin, who is now very devoted to Selune, also turned up. I asked her how she was getting on with the new sisters. To be clear, these are not just new sisters in the religious sense, although these sisters are also devoted to Selune. No, these are Sorrel’s ‘legal’ sisters, raised by the same mother - something Sorrel only recently learnt about. Sorrel responded to my question about how they were all getting on in a manner that suggested she too, like Ivan, wanted a break from what had been going on, and that break would involve killing something deserving of death.

Sorrel remarked that Ivan was the only one with meat and ale. Council attendant Emily spoke up to mention she had a note about the adventurer Ivan Erikson and how he habitually operates slightly inebriated as a preference. I am sometimes accused of being tactless. Council attendant Emily had just undone a good example of my tactfulness..

“Oh shit. Word gets around,” I said convincingly to divert a possible accusation that I was Emily’s source.

“Obviously the note was you Kavel,” Ivan responded. He was of course correct.

Ivan threw the remaining half of the lamb shank he was eating to Sorrel, “you can finish it, if you like.” Ivan had once again not managed to make a good impression on Council attendant Emily.

We were also joined by our comrade, the one I like to call, ‘Red’ on account of her reddish-pink hair. ‘Red’ doesn’t speak, so none of us have ever learnt her name. She doesn’t write either. She does give out pearls though. Red is a Fairy, and like the adventurer Archie met last week, Red can manifest psychic blades. I wondered if the pearls come from the same place as the blades?

We had a team.

We went to Portal Plaza to be teleported to the Feythorn where Councillor Aurelia Archselon was awaiting us.


Horrible Crime Scene in the Feythorn

Aurelia was there to greet us in what was a marked off area of the Feythorn with many Watch members, Council members and Daring Academy people taking notes.

Aurelia explained that something was terrorising the farmsteads around Daring Heights. Several people had been taken from their homes. A shape had been spotted stealing the victims. Eyewitness accounts seem to vary on the shape and size of the monstrosity. No headway had been made, until that is, investigators found what Aurelia had brought us here to see.

What we saw was a three to four feet deep pit, approximately ten feet wide, fairly circular. Inside were the remains of several of the victims. The bodies, however, were not presented in an intact manner. Nor were they necessarily cut up. It was horrifying. The heads were the most visible parts of the bodies, on top of everything. Everything else was as if the bodies were made of a dough-like flesh and the dough from all the bodies had been stretched and mixed in with each other, like a human, doughy, and web-like entanglement. This would not have been nice for a loved one to have seen. Aurelia mentioned they had been able to identify seven of the missing people from the heads we saw. I have sympathy for whoever did the identifying. There were also a cluster of red crystals sprouting from the middle of the pile of remains, glowing.

Sorrel used her divine powers, but could not determine that there was anything strictly evil - in the religious sense - at the heart of the dismemberment pile, but certainly an aberration of some sort. ‘Red’ in her non-vocal way of communicating suggested we could have stumbled on a nest or food. But, we could find nothing to corroborate that. Carnan’s druidic examination concluded that the crystals related to the blood of the victims. Aurelia pointed out tracks that led away from the pit. I helped Ivan explore them. Together we found the tracks of a six legged creature with long claws. Ivan noted that the creature got larger as it moved away from the pit.

We had a direction to follow, but before we set off, I decided to get the insight of Mr. Bear.


Commune With… Mr. Bear?

I thought about the tracks, what my comrades had discovered, and I asked myself what further insights I might be able to add if I just thought about our situation for a few minutes. In moments where I let my mind fixate on geographical problems, my friend Mr. Bear comes and helps me out.

But, Mr. Bear did not appear. Instead there was a very large bear-like man with a large warhammer and a teapot. Those items don’t normally go together. The bear-man put his hammer and teapot down and approached me, whilst transforming into the largest bear I’d ever seen.

“Daring Heights,” the large bear said, sniffing me, “it shits demi-gods.” The bear-man acknowledged how thicc I am.

Fortunately, this was a situation where everyone could see the bear-man. Normally, others can’t see Mr. Bear when I commune with him, but this bear was visible to everyone. This bear was Mesikammen the Bear King, and he lived in Neuyeya, which could be found in the very north of the Angelbark. Ivan, it turned out, had met him before. Mesikammen was here, because Mr. Bear was busy. Mesikammen helped us out, he confirmed we were looking for an aberration, constructed by someone. This someone created the aberration to make the red crystals made from blood, the blood makes the creature, and then the creature makes more crystals.

“You got any more of that mead?” Ivan asked Mesikammen. I was worried Mesikammen was about to undo my good work in controlling Ivan’s alcohol consumption pre-adventure. But then, Mesikammen said, “not worthy. You need to come back when you can offer a big challenge.” I didn’t know what that was about, but it meant Ivan wasn’t getting any mead before we fought an aberration, so that was good. Also, Ivan seemed motivated by Mesikammen’s words, like it would be a nice goal for him, which is also good.

Before we left to follow the tracks, little ‘Red’ gave Aurelia a pearl. How does she have so many pearls? Do Fairies make them?


Following an Aberration’s Tracks

We followed deep claw marks in the ground, slashed up, and pushed over trees. The closer we got, we saw humanoid entrails, skin, and body parts strewn out around the forest. There was a stench of death to follow, and a red mist began to appear as we walked forward. We all felt a little weaker walking through the mist. Something arcane in the air?

Carnan, supportive just like comrade Derthaad, casted the Aid spell on all of us, and I remember feeling at peak conditioning again - actually better. ‘Red’ turned herself invisible. Sorrel downed a Potion of Heroism, and Ivan turned his back to me before also downing a potion of some kind. Thinking back to several of our previous adventures; it’s now clear he’s been downing potions behind my back a lot! Why was he hiding this, you might ask? Let me return you to my earlier statement about his sensitivity and insecurity. At the time, I thought he was downing a Potion of Growth, like I sometimes do for leverage over huge creatures. I asked him why his Potion of Growth wasn’t taking effect, because he hadn’t changed height.

“You know what, Kavel? Fuck you!” was Ivan’s response.

As I received Ivan’s admonition, his veins enlarged, and his skin started to take on a shade of frostiness. Aha! I thought to myself, I know what he’s just consumed. So, we had a little discussion on whether he even needed the Potion of Frost Giant’s Strength, and even if he felt he did, why wasn’t he using a Stone Giant potion? Stone Giants are the best giants. After all, Goliaths - like me - descend from Stone Giants (probably) and Goliath’s are the strongest humanoid (definitely). There are no humanoids who claim to be descended from Frost Giants - why would there be? I suggested to Ivan that since those potions are expensive, he might be better off drinking a vial of my blood for emergency strength gains. Carnan didn’t feel it would have the desired effects. Maybe he’s right, but surely my blood is good for something? I’m likely to be the strongest humanoid in Kantas, and the top conditioned too. My blood surely has to have some potency?

While me and my fellow thicc-boi were having our discussion, I had grown to around 15’ tall. I was sure I didn’t drink one of my Potions of Growth. I counted them to be sure. No empties. Although we couldn’t see her, and she wouldn’t respond vocally, we were certain ‘Red’ casted the Enlarge spell on me. Very cheeky. Unfortunately, I eventually shrank back to 7’4” before we reached the source of the stench.


Aberration’s Lair

‘Red’. She was fierce. Very fierce. I recalled a time where she attacked and was then swallowed by a giant worm after facing it head on. She was a little reckless that time. Like then, she went charging across the large pond we came out to, heading toward the ruin where some red lights could be seen. Before she got across the pond, a gargantuan beast with six limbs, multiple nostrils, and bristles and slime all over its body emerged from the water and took a bite at something - we could not see ‘Red’, but the aberration appeared to be able to, as it’s bite into ‘Red’ caused a bloody mist to form around its mouth, which it inhaled.

Before we could react, the aberration took a swipe at ‘Red’ with its big front claws. A horrifying amount of blood was drawn. The aberration then sank into the pond, and with frightening speed for a creature so massive, threw itself onto the shore where the ruins were. The foul creature inhaled more of ‘Red’s’ blood through its many nostrils. ‘Red’, became visible to us as she casted the spell Fairy Fire on the beast. Unfortunately, the spell did not take. Now visible, we could see a chunk of ‘Red’s leg was missing. But, what must have been very painful did not stop her from teleporting from the pond to where the creature now stood. ‘Red’ was small, and the creature gargantuan. But ‘Red’ was anything but afraid.

“I hope you can all get there quick like me,” I said to my comrades before propelling myself up into the air with my powerful flight legs across the pond and onto the aberration’s back sixty feet away. I grabbed a fist full of slimy bristles with my right hand to keep purchase. This creature moved like a spider and had bristles like a boar. It was some kind of pieced together aberration, and just being on top of it felt like poison was being poured down my throat. “You are an ugly pig,” I said to it, before driving my left fist into the back of its neck twice. I stopped to ask ‘Red’ how she was. The gargantuan pig reached round with its claws and slashed me.

“Abomination of nature! You are a disgrace!” Carnan yelled, slamming his spear into the earth. The terrain around where the aberration stood changed as the undergrowth became unsteady, and the trees and rocks nearby began attacking the creature.

Ivan came over a bridge mounted on Ulfr. As Ivan dismounted and ran at the aberration, I saw the frothing frenzied berserker look on his face. As he got within range of attacking, he took two mighty swings with his great axe and drew two deep masterful long and deep cuts into the beast. The cuts were made all the more painful by fire surrounding the great axe brought about by Ivan’s fiery magical gauntlets. The aberration fought back and slashed Ivan with its poisonous claws. Ivan retaliated, but the poison had thrown off his aim.

The aberration was moving to keep Ivan from circling away from its jaws. The movement did not seem to affect someone’s aim with a longbow, as four perfectly shot arrows formed a piercing square around my right hand, which was holding the bristles on the creature's neck. Sorrel’s aim was deadly! She was still standing on the other side of the pond. The aberration was in pain from the axe and arrow attacks. So, I was not expecting to hear a maniacal laugh as a result of this coming from the ruins where the red light shone.


The Aberration’s Creator!

I could see the man. The ruined walls were low, and the man himself must have been around eleven feet tall. He was no recognisable humanoid. My more magically inclined comrades later concluded the man had changed due to his magical machinations. He had grey skin, and crystal bone protrusions from around his body, and his eyes glowed red. I could see more clearly what was causing the red light around him - a big collection of the red crystals we saw back in the pit. This evil wizard decided to join the fight, casting Eldritch blasts at us all. The one that hit ‘Red’ fortunately only clipped her, she was bloody enough. The one that hit me, hit me right in the chest, but wth my physique and battle breathing, I barely felt it. But, the Eldritch blast was effective in one regard, it preoccupied my focus. The aberration tried to shake me off. I tried to tighten my grip, but I was too slow, it managed to throw me to the ground and onto my back. From my prone position, I saw the aberration bite Ivan, before slamming its claws into me opening up some slashing wounds. From both its attacks, the mist of red caused Ivan and my blood, inhaled by the aberration, closed some of its arrow and axe wounds.

‘Red’ with reckless bravery flew to the evil wizard, but in her haste she suffered a punishing claw attack to her back from the aberration. This did not stop her flight towards the wizard though, as she reached him and stabbed him with one of her psychic blades.

As I got back up I tried to grab the creature’s claws, but it evaded me. It did not, however, evade the punch I threw at him, or the sidekick I threw as it tried to close the distance I created after stepping back from my punch. The kick was magnificent. I was so impressed with it that my body healed up some of the claw wounds. The creature slashed me again soon after though.

Ivan had another axe and claw exchange with the creature as Carnan brought the wrath of the surrounding nature down on the aberration followed by a radiant Guiding Bolt. With a luminescent light now shining on the creature, it jumped out of Carnan’s entangling undergrowth to get nearer its master. As it did, a very large Guiding Bolt fired from across the large pond flew straight at the wizard, lighting him up more brightly than the red crystals that surrounded him and hurting him immensely.

Despite the sharpshooter aim of Sorrel’s Guiding Bolt, the wizard was able to grab ‘Red’ by the throat as she hovered in range of the very tall man, and shook her violently in his hand like rat killing dogs do to rats with their jaws. The wizard then threw ‘Red’ twenty feet over the ruins and next to the aberration, as if giving a morsel of food to his pet.

‘Red’ hit the ground, motionless. At the same time, the wizard hurled a ball of black energy at Ivan and I, causing ripples of necrotic energy to smash into our bodies causing sickening pain. Ivan and I, closest to ‘Red’ were off guard, as the aberration looked down at her prone, unmoving body, and lifted one of its front limbs up high above her body.


…

There was a thundering crunch.

The aberration’s claws crunched down on ‘Red’. Without any pause, it then slashed at Ivan twice. I believe a sense of shock had penetrated through Ivan’s rage, as the sound of ‘Red’s’ small body broke. I believe this, because I too felt it. Ivan was an easy target for those slashes and their poisoning effects.

It wasn’t until I heard Carnan yell at me to go for the wizard, did I move. I jumped over the aberration, and stole a glance at my small Fairy comrade’s body as I flew through the air towards the wizard. I did not have the strength to reach him with my jump. So, I threw my Javelin of Lighting at him, striking him in the shoulder. It hurt him. The lightning energy got him. But he laughed all the same.

“The light of Silvanus will dispel you!” Carnan said, as he thrust his spear one more time into the ground and a wave of energy hit the aberration as pieces of it burned up in a bright light. And then suddenly, the aberration had vanished.

The evil wizard screamed in anger as he witnessed the disappearance of his creation. In frustration, the wizard tore out my javelin from its shoulder, and paused to look around for the source that dispelled its creation. Landing eyes on Carnan, the wizard opened his mouth wide to scream. However, the wizard was looking in the wrong direction to ready himself for his next threat, as three arrows came over the pond, across the ruins and sank themselves deep into his body landing in his chest, neck and open mouth. The final arrow had gone through his mouth and into his head, killing him dead. His large body collapsed to the ground. Crystal bone protrusions crashed into the red crystals on the ground, and the crystals shattered spaying Ivan, nearby in blood. Ivan’s body suffered more poisoned pain from the crystal shards. But, it didn’t hurt him as much as what came next…


Magic Can’t Solve Everything

We gathered around ‘Red’’s body. Sorrel had the magic to cast Revivify and Ivan - for reasons - had a supply of the magical component the spell requires, diamond dust.

It was Sorrel’s first time casting the spell outside of practice.

“You can do this, Sorrel!” I said encouragingly.

We waited as Sorrel performed the spell. Her eyes turned white. Healing energy flowed down from the light of the moon focused on ‘Red’s lifeless body, and ‘Red’’s wounds began to close.

We waited.

The moon’s light returned back to normal, and so did Sorrel’s eyes.

‘Red’’s body was healed, but there was no sign of breathing.

I was confused. “... Sorrel?”

“She didn’t want to come back,” Sorrel began to reply, “… she wanted to stay.”

Ivan’s great axe fell to the ground.

We looked up and saw tears flowing from his eyes. His lips quivered. His body shook, and he fell to his knees and said pleadingly, “why do people I like die? Why again? Why couldn’t I stop it?” From his knees, Ivan fell to his side and tucked his knees to his chest, and cried.

I took off my leather vest, it was large enough for what I had in mind. I covered our fallen comrade’s small body, and then knelt down beside my balled up comrade, and patted him on the shoulder until it was right to move.


Daring Heights - Archselon Avenue

Carnan had a spell that teleported us to his walking treehouse outside of the Castleside gate. From there we walked back to The Heights, to see Aurelia.

Aurelia offered to make arrangements for our fallen friend at the Adventurer's Rest. We did not know what our Fairy friend’s burial preferences were, so the Adventurer’s Rest seemed best. We were rewarded 500gp each. But, of course, one bag went unclaimed. It was suggested that we could donate it to Thia’s Refuge. I made a suggestion.

“Before donating our comrade’s share to the Refuge, can we first use a portion of it to buy a large pearl? I never really knew her that well. But, she seemed to like pearls, it seemed. I think a pearl to be embedded in her gravestone would be nice. And, I know of a cleric spell to speak to the dead. I do not mean to make a joke, but we could use the spell to ask little ‘Red’ what her burial preferences are. Of course, she didn’t talk at all when she was alive, so I have my concerns that the spell will even be useful. Would it work?”

The Speak With Dead spell was considered unnecessary, but everyone liked the idea of buying the largest pearl we could find with ‘Red’s share of the reward before donating the rest to Thia’s Refuge.


Over the Coming Days

Mendal had made a couple of nice metal housings for the gravestone I was carving. One of the metal pieces was circular and was just right to hold the large pearl we bought in the centre top of the gravestone. The other metal device was a flower chamber to sit inside the stone foundation in front of the gravestone, with coin sized holes for flower stems to sit in.

Sorrel told us that before ‘Red’ left her during the casting of Revivify, ‘Red’ had spoken one word to her. The word was ‘Rhyme’ and Rhyme was our little comrade’s name. Sorrel wanted me to carve the name into the gravestone. But, at the same time we also felt we needed to pay tribute to the fact that Rhyme did not seem to share her name with anyone while alive. The name had to be redacted, edited off of the gravestone. We had a challenge here. If I carved the name completely out, then there would be no point carving it in the first place. With Archie’s help, we managed to sketch out a way to carve Rhyme’s name into her gravestone, but redact it at the same time. The solution involved spacing out the individual letters of ‘Rhyme’. In particular the ‘M’ from the ‘Y’ and the ‘E’:

R H Y M E

We were able to come up with a way to carve parts of the letters out, and carve some new ones within and alongside the scratched out remains of ‘Rhyme’ to read the following:

R E D A C T E D

I added square brackets too, to frame the word:

[ R E D A C T E D ]

And I carved the square brackets in a way that resembled Rhyme’s Fairy wings.

When the others came around to see the gravestone, we all placed the pearls that Rhyme had given us into the flower pot, through the coin sized holes.

A few weeks later, when visiting the grave, to check if the pearl in the centrepiece was still there, and to change the flowers, we found something. As we opened the flowerpot, the noise of the pearls shaking around was louder than before. No longer were there just the pearls that Carnan, Sorrel, Ivan and I had placed inside. Now, there were other pearls too, as more of the people Rhyme had generously given a pearl, had come to pay tribute to her.