A d20 Campaign
The 10th Hour: "And lo, though I walk through the
valley of death..."
The Valley of Dead Gods is
covered in dense, warm jungle. Lots of
Mosquitoes. Two suns
circle through the sky, chasing each other (one is small and blue). The stars look completely wrong. With Platinum
Blonde’s return, the
Gatecrashers are introduced to new allies Alice, Holden & Voh (all
recently
recruited while she searched for a cure for the terminally ill Henri). With Henri cured and recovering quietly in
his room, Holden & his men take charge of the Carriage house, lay
the dead
(or undead) heroes in state under a watchful eye, & begin the long
rituals
required to purify & bless the area.
Platinum drags Alice
off to give her a bath, while the others use this chance to rest.
Spotting his
beloved horse Diablo on
the distant shore, pursued by hoards of Zombies, Hobb grabs the
Gatecrashers
and heads off to the rescue, leaving Platinum & Holden’s men to
watch over
things. Coming to the
primitive village the
Gatecrashers had visited the first time they came to the Valley, they
find a
scene of abject horror. Bodies lie
everywhere, many apparently shot or cut to pieces.
At the outlying edges a number have been
impaled, their entrails strung about in an almost decorative &
festive
fashion. The most shocking element comes
when they realize all the bodies have had their eyes somehow
transformed to
miss-matched blue-green, same as that of the Destante family line. Badly disturbed by this, the party pulls
itself together, burns the bodies & prays for them, then moves on.
In searching for Diablo, they come
to the Southern Shrine, and find it already looted.
The secret doors have been ripped open, the
statue toppled, bullet-holes everywhere… They infer that Genevieve has
made a
visit prior to their own arrival. The guardian – a dead, gigantic
tentacled
worm-like beast lies here, filled with bullet-holes and carved up in
some parts.
They find a pedestal, similar to the one where Henri found a Horn in
one of the
other shrines, stands empty. They
recover another Elder Sign, and keep Alice
from activating the portal in the Portal room.
Winston, Holden’s man at arms, guesses that a reddish-black orb
found on
another pedestal is the source of the shrine’s evil, and destroys it
(and the
shrine itself, as a result).
Meanwhile
Hobb is distracted by a Gythzari Monk, who arrives leading Diablo by
the
reigns. The Gythzari – Godarii of the 7th
Hand, he calls himself - informs him that his drawing of the Flame Card
from
the Deck of Many Things some time back resulted in the destruction of
his
Monastery, and that he has come seeking retribution.
Hobb attempts to appease Godarii by tossing
him the offending deck, but the Monk refuses to let him off so easily,
and
“calls him out” for a duel. Unable to
hit his target, Hobb comes to the grim realization that he WILL loose,
but with
the timely intervention of Shelby & Winston the Monk is driven off…
back to
Questions or Comments?