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Previously on Call from the Deep
Starring:
Gotwald Ironhorn, level 2 minotaur Fighter
Mac, level 2 tortle Ranger
Savra Akkedis, level 2 lizardfolk School of Necromancy Wizard
Torrel, level 2 kenku Fathomless Warlock
Following our collectively-designed prologue in Session 0, our new level 2 heroes arrive in the port town of Saltmarsh near Neverwinter. Their vague mission is to investigate rumors of a haunted house.
Back in Neverwinter, a minotaur, lizardfolk, tortle, and kenku are head-turning oddballs.
In the smaller, backwater town of Saltmarsh, they’re met with open hostility.
Before a mob can form, the town militia, led by Captain Eliander Fireborn, approaches this armed group of monstrous adventurous and asks their business.
The poor party doesn’t have much to go on. Their mysterious patron had instructed them to check out a haunted house.
The Captain is familiar with the old house on the cliff, but still suspicious of the party’s intentions, even after Mac flashes his Neverwinter City Watch uniform, and claims they’re on official business.
The tense scene is diffused with the arrival of Gellan Primewater, notable merchant and councilor.
The smooth-talking Gellan welcomes the party. He explains that the house once belonged to old wizard or alchemist who mysteriously disappeared about a decade ago. Rumors of evil magic kept folks away, and the house fell into disrepair.
Gellan takes them to a rowdy local bar. The Empty Net is anything but, filled with drunk fishers and shipwrights in the middle of the afternoon.
They’re introduced to Ned, a young man already sleeping off an afternoon’s worth of drinking. He sobers up quickly when Gellan asks him to recount the tale of a recent foray into the house.
Ned admits that he and a buddy, Sanders, crept into the house a few weeks ago, looking for loot. Instead they were met with scary noises, moving shadows, and infested vermin.
When they reached the cellar, something screamed and attacked Sanders, and Ned’s nerve gave out. He ran out of the house, never looking back.
Sanders never left the house.
The party reassures Ned that they’ll check the house out, and Gellan gently suggests that Ned help lead them to it.
The house lies a few miles up a winding trail along the cliffs overlooking the sea. It’s decrepit, overgrown, and foreboding.
Gotwald doesn’t see much down the well in the yard. Savra glances through the broken windows to see a dark interior of rotting wood and torn, broken furniture.
Mac is nervous about entering a haunted house, and Torrel’s deadpan reassurance about his Fathomless god doesn’t go over well with Mac and Ned.
Gotwald breaks the front door lock with his horns, and the party enters the house.
Savra goes first. The necromancer is excited at the prospect of finding dead bodies — pretty much the opposite of Mac!
She leads the party into the first door she sees in the entryway — the kitchen (Area 9). Stairs lead upstairs, and another door leads to a scullery.
A closed cabinet proves tantalizing, and Savra uses her skeletal mage hand to open it.
It’s empty, but the nearby sink begins to bump. Ned whimpers, but Savra tries turning the spigot. Instead of water, several giant, angry centipedes come streaming out, biting Savra!
The rest of the party snaps into action. Mac fires his bow (over Ned’s head!), Torrel unleashes eldritch blast, and Gotwald stomps with his hooves and fists.
Once over the initial sting, Savra gets the first critical hit of the campaign on a chill touch.
The centipedes soon fall. Opening the scullery door, the party discovers stairs to the cellar (Area 10).
Ned begins to whimper, confirming the spot where he last saw his friend.
Gotwald steps onto the stairs, but a bone-chilling scream emanates from the dark depths below, sending he and Savra hurtling out of the room.
Instead of running after their allies, Mac and Torrel decide to investigate the cellar. Mac convinces himself the scream must be Sanders needing help. He lights a torch and they go down into the wine cellar (Area 20).
The large cellar holds racks of empty, broken bottles. But in the center of the room is a dead body, an adventurer by the looks of his armor and sword.
Torrel goes over to investigate the body, but it begins to jerk and move. Bursting out of the body is a swarm of rot grubs!
Torrel casts arms of hadar to knock them away (and hitting Mac), and realizes there’s a second swarm ready to bust out.
He hurries behind Mac. The tortle uses his torch and claws to attack the grubs, while Torrel blasts them backwards with his repelling eldritch blast. The effective combo makes short work of the maggots.
Back upstairs, Gotwald has rushed halfway down to the foyer (Area 1). Not wanting to get too far separated, he opens a nearby door to a small study (Area 8). He notices a loose stone in the fireplace. It doesn’t push in, so he pulls it out, finding a hidden compartment inside.
He also finds a swarm of annoyed spiders!
The spiders are unable to find purchase among the hairy brute’s armor. Gotwald is equally annoyed to not be punching ghosts (nor fighting things he can grapple) but he stomps them dead just the same.
His efforts are rewarded. The compartment holds some copper pieces and a bag of magic dust (Dust of Sneezing and Choking).
Savra had made it all the way to the second floor during her fearful flight. Her nerves somewhat calmer, she decides to explore the second floor, carefully opening investigating each old bedroom and storage room (Areas 11, 12, 16, 17).
Instead of choice loot, she finds a bunch of empty chests, soiled laundry, and rotting wood.
She grows suspicious when she finds recent, humanoid tracks in the ground leading to empty chests and recently-used beds.
When she tries crossing the balcony to the east side of the house, she crashes through the rotting wood, falling back into the foyer below (Area 1).
Growing increasingly suspicious and brazen (and dusting herself off from the fall), she explores the western half of the first floor.
In a library (Area 2) she discovers some books worth grabbing, as well as a soiled note that cryptically states, “beyond skeletons.”
In a larger study (Area 3), Savra finds an intact desk. Most of the drawers are empty, but a locked central door peaks her interest. Unfortunately her severed hand-like spider is unable to pick the lock.
When she enters the western living area (Area 4), a booming voice yells out and threatens her trespassing.
But Savra is beginning to doubt this house is actually haunted. She makes the save, and finds a hidden trapdoor in the floor.
Back in the wine cellar, Torrel resumes investigating the dead body. There’s nothing particularly ghostly or undead about it. It looks like the body was killed in a battle with bludgeoning and slashing weapons.
Ned gingerly comes down the stairs, cries out, and confirms the body of his friend.
Gotwald stomps down soon after, and excitedly rushes over to claim the body’s plate mail.
Mac investigates the room for secret doors, and quickly discovers a hidden lever in the nearby fireplace (probably suspicious that there’s a damn fireplace in the wine cellar!).
He pulls the lever and the fireplace begins to turn. At the same time upstairs, Savra opens the trapdoor in the floor.
We’ll find out what they see next week!
MVPC – Gotwald
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