Session 48: Visiting Granny Gertrude
The party all awake with blood on their foreheads. The Sprite hurries to Sartorii's room to ask if she had the same dream. Yep. Sartorii washes the blood off herself and the Sprite.The party heads down to the common area, sees Viri. He asks how the party slept.
Long pause.
Sprite holds up bloody rag.
Sartorii explains collective nightmare.
Oh dear. Viri suggests talking to, y'know, the son of the Lady of Nightmares. He's probably still asleep.
Party makes breakfast with Viri. Eggs!
Ekis, the snake gentleman who gave sermon yesterday, comes in and sits down.
Viri goes silent. He and Ekis stare at each other for a few seconds before Viri has to return attention to the stove. He then leaves the room without eating.
Rutana follows Viri. Viri is not running, not rushing, just purposefully striding. He does stop when Rutana waves him down. Not any personal slight between them, but a grudge older than either Viri or Ekis.
After discussion, Viri excuses himself to go wake Rutana's brother.
Ekis eats an uncooked egg and heads for the door.
Sartorii calls out to Ekis.
"What do you require?"
Merely satisfying curiosity.
Ekis feels the same latent god-grudge. He had tried to talk to Tuly about it, but Tuly had been very flippant about it.
Sartorii offers an ear if Ekis ever needs to talk about it.
Having said his piece, Ekis leaves.
Rutana shares with the part some interesting trivia she knows: Ekis could only be born specifically of a naga. Tuly had to get some fucked up shit to birth that.
Just as Rutana shares this, Tuly shows up! He's super stoked to see everyone awake and fed. He feigns being energetic, but he is very much not a morning person.
Sprite holds up bloody rag. Tuly looks it. Change of plans he wants to talk about this now. He asks if she was beautiful, explains that he hasn't seen her since he was born.
Discussion about the dream, and how it means she approves of them.
Tuly picks up that Clarence is scared, disgusted.
Some more discussion regarding the dream, the Sprite shares he thinks the egg is in danger. Tuly assigned an extra guard to the egg.
Then it's time to head on to Gertrude Quest.
Back to the collapsed basement complex. Still smells terrible, though the party is used to it by now.
Tuly is very excited looking in the rooms.
Sartorii leads the way inside.
Tuly is very surprised seeing how big Gertrude has grown. It would take a lot of power to grow and reproduce like this.
Tuly is going to try talking to her. She's not that sapient, but she's trained to listen to him. He walks right up to her, her children waking as Tuly walks past.
As she rises, a heartbeat starts to resound through the room. With each pulse a purple glow reverberates through her veins. A glowing, purple gem sits lodged in the center of her chest. Within the gem are three dots of light, darting around like pupils.
Tuly walks up to investigate.
Gertrude roars.
Party rolls initiative.
The roar rolls over Tuly, draining all curiosity and eagerness from him.
"Ah, I knew you were too good to be true. How dare you lay a hand on my creation, my aberration. The flesh of this world is mine to change, mine to control, not yours. Friends! (Sartorii: Sup?) Please don't scream."
In the darkness, the flesh that contains Tuly rips like wrapping paper. He pours out of himself and grows, and grows. It is hard to tell what part of him is flesh or organ or slime.
The party rolls will save.
Clarence is Frightened 2. He hates this guy, he sucks. The Sprite fully comprehends that this could've happened at any time, gains Frightened 1.
Tuly squashes the Grothlut next to him as he flails to escape his body, crushing it instantly.
Rutana gets a crit on Exploit Vulnerability. The grothlut are immune to acid and mental effects.
Due to the crit, new plan: cause bleeding damage then set them on fire. For this counter specifically, party can take a minus to attack rolls to aim for an artery to cause bleeding.
Rutana then gets a crit on Ray of Frost, one-hit kill.
A distant Grothlut spends its whole turn crossing the cavern toward Rutana.
Clarences steps up to that Grothlut and gets to clawing. Grothlut's still standing.
Sartorii trains her bow on the same Grothlut; one hit, one crit. Grothlut's bleeding. At this point it looks like it's leaking, more than it normally does at least.
The Sprite casts Ignition, misses. He casts Shield and ends turn.
The other two Grothlut surround Clarence and attak for 14 damage.
Gertrude begins keening. Many more small Grothlut emerge from the cavern's entrance. She then goes tendril to tentacle with Tuly.
Tuly strikes back with a crit. He flops on top of her and a multitude of mini mouths start chomping on her.
One of his larger mouths opens up and fires a laser of Divine Wrath.
Rutana scooches back and Ray of Frosts the damaged Grothlut. Crit, no explosion damage.
Sartorii shoots the other large Grothlut twice. It remains standing.
Clarence gets back to clawing the large Grothlut. It's still standing, but coming apart at the seams.
The Sprite casts Fireball at the pile of Grothlut in the entrance. All five of them pop like popcorn.
The original set of Grothlut resume attacking Clarence. Rutana raises her amulet to abjure some of the damage.
Gertrude again keens, summoning another four small Grothlut and one large Grothlut. She whales on Tuly, tearing chunks off him and flinging them at walls.
Tuly reciprocates. Gertrude is on her last legs.
Rutana crits another Ray of Frost on the small Grothlut, but it remains standing. Barely.
Clarence claws the small Grothlut the last of the way to death.
Sartorii turns her bow on the remaining large Grothlut, crit. It dies, exploding 5 damage onto Clarence and the Sprite.
Finally free of weird creatures, Clarence uses Lay on Hands to heal himself. He then shuffles closer to Rutana to put his aura in a better position, then raises shield and ends turn.
Sprite drains bonded item to get Fireball back, then Fireballs the newcomers again.
Gertrude again keens for backup. Eight more Grothlut approach. Two more attacks against Tuly.
Tuly finally delivers the killing blow on Gertrude. She pops, goo splattering an entire 60-foot radius. The party is luckily well out of range. The Grothlut in the entrance all pop afterward.
The gem previously embedded in Gertrude's chest clatters onto the groud.
Tuly slowly shrinks back down to his true self. He looks like absolute shit.
Sartorii and the Sprite dump some healing potions on Tuly, though it doesn't do much.
Discussion on whether to wait for Lay on Hands to recharge, or carry Tuly back.
Tuly says if we don't figure out what's causing all this we can't stop it. He has a vast bank of knowledge of the natural world, and he knows that this thing was not of the natural world.
Debate and debrief next session.