The party calms Barnaby down as the panic leaves him. Outside, the temperature continues to plummet, and visibility is severely limited. Everyone decides it would be best to head back inside the cabin and explore the remaining rooms.
As they walk inside, however, Barnaby and Krask make out the faint sound of knocking coming from the lower level of the cabin. They move downstairs to investigate, when suddenly the entire cabin begins creaking and shaking violently. Trace is knocked over and Fyn can barely stay upright.
Throwing caution to the wind, they rush outside only to find nobody waiting for them on the other side of the door. Fyn Dimension Steps outside with Trace, leaving Krask to fend for himself as ghostly dwarves appear in their periphery.
That intense hunger returns and the ghosts lurch at the party with incorporeal hands outstretched. Fortunately, none of the party comes possessed by these beings. The cabin suddenly stops convulsing and all of the ghosts dissipate, save for one.
It’s the same ghost that has been featured in several of the cabin’s haunts. The dwarf strains and struggles to get out that he is Silas Vekker. He can feel the pull of Xin-Shalast emanating from the party, and warns against going there. However, if the party’s mind is made up that the City of Greed is their true destination, then he can help.
All the party has to do is find his brother’s bones about a mile north of the cabin, on a mountain ledge. If they can bring the bones back, Silas can finally have closure and will share his information with them.
Step Back From that Ledge
My friends, the party is lucky to have such a skilled tracker like Fobias, who locates a rough trail heading off to the north. After an hour of bracing themselves against the frigid air, our heroes finally arrive at a large divot at the base of a 2,000 foot cliff. At this point, the party is approaching the peak of this particular mountain.
Despite tossing around the idea of riding bees and spider-climbing up the mountain, it’s eventually decided to just have Fyn teleport them to the top. They ascend to the foggy ledge and begin searching for the dwarven bones.
Fyn sees a faint glittering on the ground and uses his mage hand to brush the accumulated snow from the area. This reveals small gemstones inlaid into stones. A closer examination indicates that these gemstones are marking dwarven graves, albeit absent of bodies.
Fobias puts on the fog-cutting lenses and sees the charred remains of a long-dead campfire off to the east, along the cliff wall. As they approach, it’s actually Barnaby who discovers a dwarven body. It’s crumbled and bent in an unnatural way, and the bottoms of the legs are charred completely off. Fyn examines the corpse. It’s definitely a dwarf that possibly fell from a great height.
At that moment, as the body is disturbed, another ghostly dwarf appears. There is a faint Vekker resemblance in his taunt, chartreuse skin.
“At last,” the dwarf says through the whirling wind, “…food.”
The earth shakes and a gigantic ice worm erupts from the western side of the ledge. The ghost lets out a terrifying moan, which causes Fyn to panic. Fear reflects in his eyes as the worm unleashes its freezing breath weapon, enveloping the party.
Krask quickly turns and connects with his arrows, dealing some incredible damage. Barnaby activates his magical item, granting him flight and he moves towards the worm to engage it.
But Fyn is lost in fear. He stumbles back towards the edge of the cliff, absorbing a gnarly bite from the ghost on his way. Suddenly, there’s a *pop* and Fyn is gone.
Can the party withstand an onslaught like this without their primary caster? How will the party get down? How many wyrms, worms, and wurms are in this dang adventure?!