Catuesque

The gang arrives in Varak. They are fleeced by the racist Jimmy and take a gondola along with Dorice and two others. Sora robs the gondolier and the gang arrives at the burnt out temple of Diana.

Abe accosts the incense bearers and they get mad and try to force them out. The gang does not engage in the fight and the priest is easily handling Abe.

The group eventually makes their way back into the temple by various means and watch as the angel appears. Everyone is chanting and in a trance of some kind (sincere religious trance) and Dorice is chosen because the gang asks them to choose her. The angel agrees and Dorice convulses on the ground, the world turns black, and she and the angel disappear.

Sora witnesses a strange winged creature flying off into the distance. Sora, disguised as a novice, talks to the priest and learns vaguely where the compound is.

The gang goes to Nana Mike’s where Livius sleeps with Nana Mike. The next morning Livius uses his find familiar to track the angel.

After hours and hours of wandering the woods, and after an encounter with a rusalka which downs Livius and then escapes in a puddle of water, and a cave of wolves, a dead body in the woods, a dryad, the owl comes back and reports.

The next day the owl takes the gang to the compound. It is the second day since they departed.

The gang arrives in the compound. Abe and a mute Sora talk their way into the compound to meet Sofronia. Cas tries to climb the fence but falls and hurts himself a lot. Liv gets discovered by some cultists and disguises himself in their garb.

Cas discovers that the bull is used to kill people. Sofronia takes the gang to see Taedor and Abe does a smoke bomb and tries to extricate Taedor and the rest of them. Sofronia does not let her disguise show through but she is able to fight them ok.

The gang runs away with Taedor, Sofronia reveals her true form, Liv is charmed, Sofronia lets the gang escape.

From the Notes of Abraham Washington

As the former employees of Hespiro look for more information about this Cult of the Angel, the find a gondola going out to an old, worn-down temple to Diana. The gondolaneer is a cantankerous old racist who charges the heroes four times as much gold to get to the temple than he does to anyone else. The party is displeased but pay the extortisionist anyway as they have things they need to do. While riding down the canal streets, Abraham meets a young elf child named Doresse. This pitiful child’s tale of suffering and woe reminds him of his own early childhood and he sets his mind on trying to protect the girl and get her healed. As a bit of karmic balance at the end of the journey, Sora, the beautiful and dangerous dragonborn bodyguard of some dude we met awhile back, got a stealth fingered discount on the gold pieces and returned what the party had been forced to pay back to each person.

Meeting the folks who were also gathered on the island went less than spectacalurly for our intrepid journey men (and lady). Due to a misunderstanding with some priests Abraham was forced, FORCED, into an altercation with the leader of the Angelic Cult. The man was Xanathos and he did not like being asked questions about his faith even if they were perfectly innocent questions by those who were new to the faith. Abraham was abandoned by the catuesque Chaz who hid beneath a bench and his lovely Zasou who fled outside. Only Levi stayed in the room, but at least he blundered into one of the priests and broke his foot. Overcome by the dark magic of the cult, Abraham ran outside to meet with Zasou.

Sensing a weakness diplomacy could exploit, Abraham bravely denounced his association with the others allowing the elf child to stay safe. The priest in their callousness were willing to cast her out as well, killing her in their negligence. Knowing now for certain these are evil men Abraham vowed to himself to bring them all down before he set foot on the road out of Varock.

Having had to leave the island and travel to the mainland the heroes picked up shelter at a local inn. The keep was a woman named Nana Mike, and the chemisty she had with Levi was palpable and electrified the air between the two. They engaged in a dance of words and body language that could only be described as a transcendental ballet. They disappeared into each other and the individuals only resurfaced after the sun and warmed the morning dew away. Truly, love blossoms in the most unusal places. It did my heart good to see.

From there the heroes paraded down the paths into the woods following the whisper of a form we witnessed flying from the Temple of Diana into the wilds beyond Varock. Our way was detoured when I heard the sobbing of a maiden off the trail. Racing to the aid of an innocent in trouble, I saw her there blue skinned and half drowned and tried to pull her our of the water into safety. The demon attacking her also made a grab for me and lucky I was indeed that Levi and Zasou were there to fire their magics and steel at the demon. Chaz landed a blow that sent the demon bubbling down to the depths taking with it the poor, innocent maiden as well. I cursed myself for my failure, but these tragedies are part of an adventurers life and we had to shoulder on to our main goal.

The road was long but eventually a friendly owl tooks us to a spot where we could wait until it scouted out the area and bring us back information about the citadel where the “chosen” of the angel Malthematic were “allowed” to “live” in “peace” and “happiness”. I found a cave nearby that we could have slept in, but a preliminary search revelaed it was already occupied by a family of wolves. They followed me out and our group was forced to adhere the Law of the Wild, kill or be killed. After this unpleasentness was handled, Chaz told us all of an old woman who had gotten stuck in a tree nearby. We decided to rest and then see what we could do about getting her out. At about the same time the friendly owl we named Owl Wishes returned to us and Levi now seems to know where to find the base of the angle Maltremoric. We must be close now.

Thanks for the recap, Daniel. This is very good. 

By the way, I do keep a campaign journal, but I do not intend to share it with you guys. I do definitely encourage this type of thing (it’s why I ask you at the top what happened last time), so please feel free to send anything that is your character’s interpretation or notes on what happened last time (not mandatory of course, but it’s neat). Indeed, Livius’s campaign journal for this last session is probably X-rated, so please do not send. 

The campaign journal I keep is only to issue corrections and clarifications, below. I don’t want to take anything away from any in-character recaps, in case they are inaccurate on purpose, so these are corrections in case the rest of you did not keep clear notes and don’t want to be led astray by Abraham’s blood-red tinted glasses: 

Dorice is the elf child. She does get the gondolier down to 2 gold after much negotiation and watery eyes. The two other people who came onto the boat were just as fleeced as the rest of you. The town is Varak. Malthemac is the angel. The maiden and the demon were one in the same. Sorry if I was not clear on that. The priest’s name was Phil. (As in Phillip, like of Macedon, so it does keep with the milieu, I promise.) Xanathos was one of the incense-burners. 

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