With their adventures in Zadash concluded, FCG set forth northward into the Marrow Valley, making their way towards the city of Hupperdook. The first few days of travel would’ve been uneventful had Conan not been enthralled by an inexplicable connection to the sinister black blade now traveling with the party. On the first night of their journey, Conan asked Endrin for an opportunity to examine the sword himself. Reluctantly, the wizard obliged and allowed Conan access to his pocket of holding where the sword was being held. Gripping the blade tightly, Conan spoke to it, “You”. Conan’s eyes rolled back as the fighter fell to his knees, still clutching the sword. The party spent the next hour trying to rouse their comrade from his coma, to no avail. When Conan finally came to, he was not the same. The pain of loss weighed heavy in his eyes and his physicality appeared drained, giving him a gaunt appearance. Conan tried to rid himself of the foul blade and it’s twisted visions, however, his friends were skeptical to take it back following the unsettling hour. An uneasy rest took them within Triple J’s conjured abode, and they continued on the next morning.
Soren’s illness worsened on the road, and a few days later, FCG arrived at the outskirts of the Labenda Swamp and began heading east along its southern border. One night, nestled just beyond the bog’s tree line, Soren heard a woman cry out for help somewhere deeper within. Compelled by her own righteousness, Soren roused her companions, and with a begrudging groan, the party headed in. Noticing Soren’s struggles traversing the bog, Triple J summoned a steed from beyond to ease the sickly paladin’s burden. Following a muddy trudge through the dark, Conan came across an unfortunately familiar scene. The fighter saw two grizzly bandits standing in a small clearing, attacking a damsel in distress. Conan ignored Endrin’s plea for caution and charged in head on. The fighter’s shoulder found its way right into the back of a bandit, but rather than armor and flesh, Conan was met with dank mucky ground as his charge went straight through the illusory bandit. Endrin shook his head.
Bewildered, Conan whirled around to interrogate the prone woman. She responded with a maniacal cackle that seemed to echo from the surrounding brush. Revealing her wort filled, crooked, visage, the hag and the rest of her coven began their attempt to harvest the party’s “parts”. Soren was polymorphed into a horse, while Triple J drew the ire of the central hag with some magic of his own. The coven unleashed a crackling torrent of lighting upon Conan, Triple J, and Endrin, causing the gnomish wizard to take to the skies for fear of being caught in a subsequent blast. From above, Endrin rained gravitic destruction upon the coven while Conan hacked away in the darkness below. Whether by misfortune or karma, the central hag’s head was removed from her shoulders by the blind warrior. The remaining two hags cried out as their profane arcane circuit was broken, and Soren was restored to her rightful form. It was not long before FCG dispatched the remnants of the coven with ease before making haste out of swamp.
Midway through the morrow’s journey, Triple J caught sight of some odd glowing lights occasionally peeking out at him from the forest. Utilizing his extra-planar steed, Triple J sent the telepathically linked beast to investigate. Upon following the trail of lights, seemingly luring the horse deeper, the beast came across a rather odd bush with red tipped, budding yellow flowers. The horse went up for a nibble, but as soon as it drew close, the bush suddenly uprooted and lashed the horse to death with its roots. Triple J relayed this information to the others, and the group decided to put up warning signs around the tree line to ward off other curious travelers. As Triple J was posting the last sign, one of the lights appeared right next to him and shocked him. Severely irked, the bard suggested that the only way to truly protect other travelers was to root out the bush and its foul lights altogether. With a collective shrug, FCG trudged back into the swamp.
Following the lights, Endrin firing pot shots at them along the way, the group came upon the menacing shrubbery. Keeping with FCG tradition, Conan charged right in. To his disgust, the plant rose from the ground, unleashing a horrendous stench seemingly sourced by the gaggle of corpses held within its writhing roots. Sustaining itself on past victims, the corpseflower engaged Conan and Soren with root and vine, each lash burning with poison. Triple J aided the two melee combatants, driving the bush insane with a relentless onslaught of dissonant whispers. Meanwhile, Endrin took flight and bombarded the entity with arcane missiles. As the corpseflower neared eminent demise, the alluring lights reappeared around the party, shocking many of the group. With extreme prejudice, FCG put an end to the twisted symbiotic relationship, felling the corpseflower and all but one of the Will-‘o-Wisps. With their good deed of the day complete, the party returned to their cart only to find their horse shocked to death by the vengeful wisp that got away.
