Return of the Cult

The Vast

The victorious band returns to Soffleport and proceed to collect their reward from the foreign gentleman.

Rista is called away on temple duty.

As the others enjoy a night on town they are summoned to the office of the Rural Prefect. The latter is a rarely used and rarely useful institution who for once has something to do by informing the adventurers about trouble.

Out east there seems to be a new monstrosity on the loose and hints are left in the wake of the mayhem that it is revenge for the actions of our merry band.

This does not sit well with the proud adventurers who set out to rectify matters. Rista is to join the others later on once her clerical duties have been fulfilled.

After a few weeks journey back to where the demonic troubles of the early summer began they find the villagers and farmers in the region armed and angry. After some quizzing they ascertain that the culprit is an unusually large and aggressive Owl Bear.

After some further deliberation they reach the conclusion that it has been infested with demonic possession like the dire boar they previously fought. The heroes set out to the first demonic shrine to see if they can find any further clues. Indeed they find signs telling that some sort of wicked ritual has been enacted upon some large beast. Suddenly the owl bear leaps out of the bushes and attacks Said who is sorely wounded and withdraws lest he perishes! The horror is not only possessed but signs of cruel ritual torture has given the creature feral ferocity! While Jaden and Brother Gates use their magics to support the fight, Rob charges the owl bear and Legolars fires arrow after arrow into the unnaturally fast healing flesh of the monster.

Only after Said has managed to heal and tumble to outflank the creature and slashing at it with his blades while Rob rains savage blows with his axes on it does the fiendish feral owl bear finally perish.

After catching their breaths, they gather around the dead creature to study it. Only Said and Legolars go on a short tour to make sure nothing else lurks nearby.

Said soon is bored with the woods and too jittery after the owl bears assault to do any real good, leaving Legolars to scout by himself. The elf finds tracks of someone having watched the fight from a distance and a faint trace of smoke from a campfire in a neraby ravine.

He sets out to reconnoiter.

Indeed it is a camp. It has been hurriedly broken and whomever was there before has left, but not before having summoned a bunch of lousy manes as a rear guard.

Legolars easily dispatches the revolting creatures and alert the others to the situation afterward.

After some further deliberation the gang decides that the summoner is likely long gone and they should go to the second shrine to see if further wickedness is afoot.

Said and Legolars are once again sent in advance to scout aafter Gates and Jaden has heard voices in the distance.

As they come closer, Said and Legolars hear two men saying "You are already a monster. Why not let us finish the process?" The woman is heard to promise to eat their brains for this offense.

Creeping even closer the scouting fellows see a fit, buxom, woman bound to the demonic altar where two gawky-looking demonologists are busy painting heinous runes upon her naked flesh. Behind them is a gaggle of manes.

Jaden has joined Said and Legolars by now and after having cast a Ghoul Touch channeled through a Mage Hand, paralyzing one of the wizards the fight is on. Said leaps forth and slashes the paralyzed demonolator to well-deserved early death and Legolars takes the reaming one out with two well placed arrows. The manes are then obliterated by a Fireball from Jaden's magic wand.

As Rob and Gates trot up to the scene, Said cuts the bound woman loose and retruns her rather ragged looking clothes to her.

Gates casts Speak with the dead on one of the dead wizards and makes it reveal that the hideout of the demon cult is in a desecrated monastery nearby yet another lake in the woods.

This is verified by the unbound woman, who introduces herself as Tasha. She is a surly type and apparently afflicted with lycanthropy. The wizards's plan was to have her possessed as well as turned feral and then turned on the adventurers.

She agrees to aid the gang on the condition that she is allowed to eat the dead cultists who have offended her.

After only the briefest of hesitations do the heroes agree, considering this to be quite fair and just, especially since they are allowed to keep all and any loot they find.

They return to the village to meet up with Rista and prepare for yet another demon-slaying swathe across the countryside.