*** Session 13 - Cast of Characters ***

Yukiko Amagi (aka The Deadly Snow): A ten-year-old aberrant human girl; a major psychic trained as a secret assassin. She considers Tickles to be her father after he raised her as an orphan.

The Great Mulroney: A miscreant changeling witch who believes he is human and masquerades as a prestidigitator. He sold his soul to the devil prince Glebecar and has a devil familiar named Shoes.

Tickles: An anarchist coyle thief and minor psychic. He raised Yukiko from a little orphan girl into the assassin she is today so she could earn them money as a hardened killer.

Nardig: A miscreant hobgoblin mercenary exiled from his family for his evil deeds. He can control his tendencies for short periods of time to work with small groups, but will steal from them and turn on them with the slightest provocation.

*** Session 13 - Scene 1 (of 5) ***

With the door sealed and everyone safely in the chamber, discussions start to mount about exactly how long they may need to barricade themselves in to rest and heal up. Mulroney suggests a couple of days may be needed.

Concerned about whether they have enough water, Deadly Snow decides to venture back out to the font to collect as much water as possible so they won't run out.

When she gets to the water and begins filling her water skin, Deadly Snow notices a strange mist begins to form nearby. She makes haste, quickly heading back to the secure room. The mist appears to slowly follow her.

She shuts the door behind her when she gets back but the mist begins seeping in through the cracks. When she tells the others what has happened, Mulroney notes that since there is only one way out of this room, they will have to deal with the mist (or any creature that may be inside it) at some point, either in the room or outside.

Tickles wonders if the mist coming is related to taking the water. Mulroney notes that they already drank the water before and didn't see the mist, but Tickles isn't sure whether that situation was the same or not since they didn't fill up a container that time. Mulroney agrees he may have a point.

Deadly Snow decides to place the water skin down near the door and back away. After a short while, the mist seeps back out of the room.

Testing a hypothesis, Mulroney goes and grabs the water. The mist does not reappear, vexing him.

Given the strange situation, Mulroney offers to use most of his remaining magic to heal everyone as much as he can. After reviewing everyone's injuries, he has Shoes heal Deadly Snow three times while he heals Tickles twice. He debates also healing Nardig, but wants to keep some magic in reserve in case it is needed for a fight.

Needing rest to recover their inner strength and potential psychic energy respectively, Deadly Snow and Mulroney elect to sleep for three hours while Mulroney tells Nardig he is in charge for the first watch. Tickles says he does not require rest either and can help.

*** Session 13 - Scene 2 (of 5) ***

It isn't too long into the rest period when the mist begins seeping back into the room. Tickles takes the water skin from Mulroney and opens the door. Throwing the water skin out into the other room, he calls out "Sorry!" then closes the door again.

This mist goes away. But not even a half hour later, a soft knocking can be heard at the door.

Nardig immediately wakes everyone up to let them know. Mulroney is annoyed Nardig couldn't take care of it himself. He also notes he doesn't hear any knocking. Nardig insists he heard the knocking but it stopped as soon as he woke them up. He wonders (mostly to himself) if it could be Snarg returning to them.

Mulroney grumpily comments he wants to go back to sleep. Nardig opens the door slightly to look out, but doesn't see anything. Mulroney starts complaining they keep waking him up with all their nonsense opening and closing the door.

Tickles suggests they could stand guard outside. Deadly Snow says perhaps one should stand guard inside and one outside. In the end, Deadly Snow and Mulroney go back to sleep while Nardig and Tickles go back to guard (still staying inside the room).

Ten minutes later, the knocking sound returns. This time, Nardig resolves not to open the door. After a couple of minutes, the sound changes to sound more like a claw scraping against the door. Nardig still doesn't want to open it.

The scraping begins to increase in volume, but Nardig continues to try and ignore it. The scraping stops, but the mist begins seeping back into the room again.

The hobgoblin figures there is no real threat (and probably just an annoying poltergeist of some kind), so he ignores the mist as well. Tickles makes sure to stay back.

It doesn't take long before the situation escalates further. From a hole in the wall near the back, a rat enters the room. Followed by another. Then another. Suddenly, several more rats begin streaming into the room.

Nardig laughs at the situation, finding hilarity in the absurdity of it all. As he looks for something to plug up the hole, he notices the rats are heading for the sleeping members of the group to bite them.

Mulroney finds himself woken up by the sounds of the warrior smashing the rats with his weapon. As he looks over at the hobgoblin, Nardig tells him its OK to go back to sleep as he has this covered. Nevertheless, Mulroney instructs Shoes to make use of his natural form and play the "mouser".

Whacking away as the rats emerge, Nardig does his best but there are too many rats to keep up with. Mulroney says he has a feeling someone is working against them to make sure they don't get any rest.

Deadly Snow suggests they may want to head back up. Tickles isn't so sure he wants to head up yet, as he's hoping to stay down here long enough for Doyle to think he's dead so they don't have any need to share treasure with him (or take other actions).

Mulroney isn't so sure about that plan as Doyle is bound to catch sight of them back in Beartooth at some point. Tickles disagrees, saying Materich will keep him at the ruins for some time. In his best-case scenario, Tickles offers that Materich may end up killing Doyle for his attempted coup.

Just then, a loud banging starts at the door shaking it slightly. Tickles calls out to ask who it is, but no one answers.

Mulroney suggests they all stand back and throw the door open. Deadly Snow says there won't be anything out there (since she also believes it to be a ghost haunting them), but agrees to open the door when the witch points out they'll have to open it to get back to the surface anyway.

In a bit of irony, Deadly Snow now finds the door doesn't want to open. It appears to be stuck on something as she attempts to open it.

*** Session 13 - Scene 3 (of 5) ***

Mulroney tells Nardig to use his strength to rush the door to knock it open. He says the alternative is to try and set it on fire.

Nardig shoves on the door, but it doesn't budge. Tickles tries to assist, but it still doesn't move. When Nardig tries to look under the door to see what is blocking it, the sliver is too small to see anything except a thin crack of light.

Apparently stuck in the room, Deadly Snow reviews their options. They could try to find another way out in the tomb, or possibly drink one of the potions they found to see if that would help somehow.

Deadly Snow suggests perhaps the smaller bottles cause one to become diminutive. She suggests Nardig should take one and see if he can go through the rat hole.

Nardig declines to try, so Mulroney grabs one of the small potions and drinks it. As he does so, he realizes he has just wasted a healing potion.

Mulroney gives the other small bottle to Nardig. He drinks it and feels slightly healed.

Tickles suggests the larger bottles might be more powerful healing potions. He says Nardig should drink one. The hobgoblin does so, and is further healed. Deadly Snow drinks the last large one herself to heal herself back further.

At this point, the mist seeps back under the door. Mulroney wonders if there could be any more hidden doors as an exit. They examine the area and the tomb further, but find nothing.

With a literal blanket of rats covering the floor by this point, Deadly Snow climbs on top of the tomb to sleep.

Mulroney wants to get out of the room. He'd like Nardig to do a running body block against the door, but the hobgoblin isn't so sure he wouldn't end up injured from the gambit.

Tickles has a much better idea – they can use the tomb lid as a battering ram against the door. Everyone likes the idea and they put it into motion. They debate letting Deadly Snow remain atop it like a palanquin, but she does ultimately get off.

After a couple of good smashes, the door breaks open. When they do so, they are greeted by a host of figures outside – four plague zombies, four skeletons, and a strange-looking man in back.

The man in back has very pale skin and wears dark clothes. His body is both gangly and muscled at the same time. His hair jet black with long, wild hair. He looks out at them with dark, sunken eyes.

From his strange appearance and odd mannerisms, everyone is certain he is a vampire. Mulroney vaguely recalls a tale about such a vampire in the area. According to the tales of Sestero the bard, his name was said to be Wi'zou...

*** Session 13 - Scene 4 (of 5) ***

Nardig backs up into the room to give himself room to fight. The plan is to attack the zombies and skeletons one at a time as they enter the door, but the creatures move too quickly. As he draws his long sword, they move in.

Two of the plague zombies shove their way inside as another two move to bite Tickles. He attempts to block them with his hercules club, but can't swing it in time. One bites into his armor while another manages to find exposed flesh.

The skeletons quickly follow. They strike out at Mulroney (who manages to avoid them) and Deadly Snow (who manages to get hit in her armor).

Wi'zou advances slowly, going straight for Mulroney. He strikes out with the magic sword he's carrying, slicing deep into Mulroney's armor and cleaving straight through.

Back up against the wall, Tickles fights back with his club. He smashes one of the zombies, but the creatures prove resilient.

Deadly Snow believes the vampire is the key to winning the encounter. She uses her psionic abilities to alter her aura to make herself seem more powerful than she really is. The girl then calls out to Wi'zou, telling him to call off his warriors and let them pass. The creature just gives a strange laugh.

Mulroney has a more effective idea for getting rid of the strange man. He isn't sure if his globe of daylight will drive the creature off, but has a guess. He has Shoes cast the spell while he attempts to pick the creature's pocket.

The pick pocket attempt proves fruitless, but the globe of daylight is effective. Covering from the light, the vampire shrieks and drops his sword. He quickly turns into mist and rushes off.

Nardig cuts away at the skeleton in front of him with his sword. He hits the monster, but the blow only manages to break off a small piece.

The zombies press their attacks. The ones biting Tickles only manage to damage his armor, while the other two advance on Mulroney.

Deadly Snow bobs and weaves as the skeletons fighting her swing away with their swords, deflecting them with her daggers. Nardig has two to fend off as well, parrying both with his long sword.

Tickles attacks back with his hercules club. He gets a solid hit. The zombie is still active, but starting to look worse for wear.

Deadly Snow slashes away with her daggers. She scores a pair of hits, but unfortunately the weapons are ill-suited to taking on the hard bones of the skeletons. Meanwhile, Mulroney grabs the magic sword from the ground.

Swinging away, Nardig strikes into the skeleton and breaks off another piece. The skeletons strike back, with Nardig moving out of the way of one hit but the other penetrating his armor.

The zombies bite at Tickles, but he continues to fend them off with his club. Mulroney is also attacked, but is not able to block with his new sword and takes a couple of bite wounds.

Striking the zombie with his club, Tickles smashes in the head. As it goes down, he slams his club into the other one.

Deadly Snow blocks the skeletons fighting her. She responds by dropping her daggers and drawing her axe. With a couple of well-placed strikes, she manages to do a bit more damage to it.

Shoes blasts one of the zombies fighting Mulroney with an energy bolt. The witch follows it up with a swing of the sword, badly damaging it.

The skeletons continue to swing at Deadly Snow and Nardig. The young assassin manages to block the strikes, but Nardig's armor takes more damage.

Deadly Snow lunges forward with another axe strike, causing more minor damage to the skeleton. Nardig has similar luck fighting the skeletons on him.

Tickles has better luck with his club against the zombie he is fighting. As does Mulroney with his new sword.

The zombies attack back, with Mulroney fending off one of the attacks and getting bit with the other. As for the skeletons, Deadly Snow and Nardig easily parry their attacks.

As Deadly Snow chops into one of the skeletons again, Tickles takes out the other zombie fighting him.

Using tactical strikes, Nardig continues to strike away at the skeleton he is fighting. The skeletons fight back, with Nardig blocking them both. Deadly Snow avoids one attacking her and parries the other. She strikes back with another hit on the skeleton.

The remaining zombies press the attack against Mulroney. Using the sword, he fends them off. Tickles moves over to assist Mulroney, smashing down another of the zombies and striking into the other.

Nardig again strikes a glancing blow at the skeleton. Despite the odds, it continues to stand. Deadly Snow uses a couple of quick axe strikes to cut down one of the skeletons on her.

The remaining zombie bites at Tickles, who uses his club to force him back. He smashes it again in response.

Nearby, Nardig strikes into one of the skeletons again. They strike back, and he parries them both. The other skeleton strikes at Deadly Snow, who manages to fight them him as well.

With the zombie looking badly wounded, Mulroney gives a forceful kick to knock it back. The strike hits home, but isn't enough to kill the creature. Shoes assists by using a leaping strike with his claws, raking the zombie across the face and killing it.

Deadly Snow strikes her skeleton with another slice of her axe blade and counters when it tries to strike back.

Nardig hits his as well, breaking it into a dozen pieces. He blocks the other skeleton's attack with his shield.

Emboldened by his recent zombie killing. Mulroney rushes over and kicks the skeleton on Deadly Snow. Shoes also strikes out with his claws.

Pressing the attack, Deadly Snow hacks into the remaining skeleton on her with her axe. Nearby, Nardig gets in another solid hit on his skeleton as well. The skeletons lunge at Deadly Snow and Nardig, who easily fend them off.

Tickles assists Nardig with his skeleton, slamming into it with a couple of club strikes. Deadly Snow likewise scores a pair of hits on hers (along with another claw assist from Shoes). Seeing the skeleton is nearly destroyed, Deadly Snow does a high kick and finishes it off.

With the one skeleton left, Nardig strikes out with his sword. He chops away some more bones with the force of the blow. Tickles follows it up with a club smash.

Mulroney moves in to attack the skeleton with a kick, scoring a glancing strike. Shoes' claw attack finishes it off.

*** Session 13 - Scene 5 (of 5) ***

After killing off the skeletons and zombies, the group discusses what to do next. Neither Mulroney nor Deadly Snow feel it is worth risking encountering the vampire again with Mulroney's depleted magical abilities.

But they are also way of Doyle and his men, and Mulroney doesn't want to share his new sword with anyone. He looks it over to see if it is distinctive, and notices there are rune carvings on it.

Using some of his remaining magical ability to read the runes, he decodes it. He discovers it is the magical sword Moonblade, an ancestral sword of the Rodemus family.

According to the runes, Mulroney also discovers the sword has an ability to teleport a short distance that can damage any undead or demonic creatures in the immediate area he teleports to.

As they consider their options, Mulroney mulls over how he can use this sword to turn the situation to his advantage...

*** Session 13 - Session Notes ***

This session wasn't very good. I was coming down with a cold (which I still am trying to get rid of the cough for) and was tired at the end of the week. I was also distracted as my wife was recovering from surgery that morning (though getting in and out of the parkade at the hospital was far more stressful than any worries I may have had about her routine surgery).

On top of that, I made some key mistakes in planning the session for the night. First, my intent was to show the PCs that something had been alerted to their presence and was trying to harass them as part of a strategy. Instead, it was taken as "evil DM mode" where the DM was trying to prevent them from resting. I probably should have gone with my original plan, let them rest but when they wake discover they have been entombed in the room.

The second mistake was four skeletons and four zombies along with the vampire was way too many combatants for one Palladium fight. The fight in the fourth scene took up most of the entire session.

The final mistake was bothering to have a session right after Star Wars opened. The reason the 5th scene is so short is we basically stopped playing because the other guys started talking movies for the remaining 45 minutes of the session. I couldn't even participate as I hadn't actually watched it by then (I just watched it the other day; I like Star Wars well enough, but not enough to fight crowds; I'm content to wait a week or two after they come out).

We're off again this week because the Mulroney player is headed out of town, so the next session won't be until the new year. Hopefully by then we can finish up the Rodemus saga.

Other thoughts about the session:
* I named the session "The Room" because the Deadly Snow player joked at the end about the fact the whole session was spent in that room. Also, I had just watched The Disaster Artist (right after re-watching The Room again), so it was in mind. As a result, I gave the vampire the name in the write-up (in the game, I just said "there's a vampire in back") as an homage and added the part about the bard Sestero. When I originally wrote up the dungeon for Rodemus, I had named him Vadin (though I don't recall if that was after anyone or not).

* Deadly Snow only went to grab the water because I started hinting they may not have enough water. I was joking, but I think it would have been better if I wouldn't have said anything and just had the mist come in the room to begin with. I did think it was funny that it inadvertently made them think the water was haunted.

* Note that Nardig never gets healed and Mulroney keeps volunteering him for things. The Mulroney player partially does that to keep him involved in what's going on (since Nardig is playing over Skype), and part because he knows that player is never fully paying attention so he uses him as cannon fodder.

* To me, the mist and rats things were self-explanatory (vampires forming into mist or summoning rats is pretty common), but I had to spell it out to the players when they encountered him that he was the one messing with their attempts to sleep.

* It's good the PCs are keeping Doyle in mind and thinking how they can get one over on him. As I mentioned before, I just hope they realize Doyle is planning to do the same thing to them.

* Mulroney started kicking because when the player gets bored, he likes to get reckless. He also did it to mock Deadly Snow and Tickles, who he constantly berates in OOC jokes because his "old man and a cat" always end up more effective in combat than they are. He particularly mocks that first session where they were on the ground kicking at the orc. Tickles with his club is actually fairly deadly now that he isn't trying to use his grappling hook any more (which the Mulroney player mockingly refers to as "Buffalo Bill and his lariat").

*  There was an out of character joke about how Doyle wouldn't know the magic sword was from the crypt unless it said "Property of Rodemus". Then Mulroney read the runes about being the ancestral Rodem family sword.

*** Session 14 - Cast of Characters ***

Yukiko Amagi (aka The Deadly Snow): A ten-year-old aberrant human girl; a major psychic trained as a secret assassin. She considers Tickles to be her father after he raised her as an orphan.

The Great Mulroney: A miscreant changeling witch who believes he is human and masquerades as a prestidigitator. He sold his soul to the devil prince Glebecar and has a devil familiar named Shoes.

Tickles: An anarchist coyle thief and minor psychic. He raised Yukiko from a little orphan girl into the assassin she is today so she could earn them money as a hardened killer.

Nardig: A miscreant hobgoblin mercenary exiled from his family for his evil deeds. He can control his tendencies for short periods of time to work with small groups, but will steal from them and turn on them with the slightest provocation.

*** Session 14 - Scene 1 (of 4) ***

The group spends some time discussing what to do next. The Great Mulroney feels the most important thing is to get a couple of days of rest before continuing to explore the ruins as they are getting weak.

Mulroney and Nardig favor trying to find a way to rest in the crypt, while Deadly Snow and Tickles want to leave but rest in the tower with Doyle and his men. Mulroney is nervous about Doyle discovering the magic sword he's found and doesn't want to hand it over to the thief (or engage the thieves in battle); he figures it would make more sense to go back to Beartooth if they leave the crypts.

Various schemes are discussed to hide the sword, avoid Doyle, fight Doyle by bringing back Materich, and other ideas. Tickles wants to finish with the crypt before getting embroiled into the guild war. They ultimately decide they will head back up and try to get back to Beartooth, with the plan for Mulroney to use his silver tongue to talk them past Doyle if needed.

With the plan finalized, they decide to make a run for the main door leading to the stairs up to the surface. Mulroney sends Shoes ahead to scout and make sure the area is clear. The cat moves across the rooms and gets to the door at the next room without incident.

Tickles heads out next, attempting to move quickly and quietly. He manages to be quick, but not quiet. He stops to listen at the door, but hears nothing. He motions for the others to approach.

The scene repeats itself as Shoes heads to the main door up to the surface. Tickles again attempts to move quietly, but fails again. Mulroney notices the thief is actually getting louder as he continues.

Back across the room, Mulroney starts to notice some mist forming behind him. He tells Snarg and Deadly Snow to make a run for it.

Everyone begins charging for the door. Nardig is a little slower at moving than the others, and the vampire forms behind him. Giving the hobgoblin a glance, the vampire mesmerizes him as he tells him to look into his eyes.

Leaving Nardig to fend for himself, Deadly Snow and Mulroney run off. As they make their way towards the stairs, Mulroney turns and casts a globe of daylight. Wi'zou hisses and recoils behind his cape, but the light does not drive him off this time.

While still shielding himself from the globe of light, Wi'zou begins feeding on Nardig. As the blood drains from him, the hobgoblin has a feeling of euphoria.

*** Session 14 - Scene 2 (of 4) ***

As Tickles runs up the stairs, he triggers a tripwire ringing a bell and firing off some crossbows. Two bolts fly out and hit him, but only one manages to penetrate his armor.

Downstairs, Nardig continues to be drained by the vampire while his companions leave him for dead.

Up at the top, Tickles sees a couple of Doyle's men running towards him. He tries telling them he needs their help to come gather the treasure (briefly considering heading back down into the crypts), but they don't seem to be in a friendly mood.

As Nardig falls into the embrace of sweet, sweet unconsciousness Sirko attacks Tickles with his club. Tickles parries back with his own club. He asks Sirko why he's attacking, saying he thought they were friends.

Two of the other thieves, Viktor and Jurg, are heading for Mulroney. The witch draws on Shoes' energy to cast a levitation spell on Sirko.

Shoes rushes over to Novik, jumping up to claw at his eye. The claw scratches the hobgoblin's face.

Deadly Snow sees Sirko in the air near Tickles, with Novik getting ready to attack him. Nearby, Viktor and Jurg are closing in on Mulroney. She decides the best way to help her companions is to attack the levitated Sirko, but the thief parries the blow. Sirko throws his club at Deadly Snow, hitting her.

Tickles attempts to fight Novik, but the thief parries his blow. He attacks back, but Tickles is also able to fend off his attack. Shoes attacks the thief's face again with his claws.

Viktor and Jurg attack Mulroney, both cutting into him with their daggers. Deadly Snow ignores the witch in trouble against the goblins, and starts pushing Sirko in the air towards the stairs so he can be food for Wi'zou should the vampire emerge.

Tickles presses the attack against Novik, striking him hard with his heavy club. Novik strikes back, sticking Tickles in the gut. Tickles swings again, smashing the thief's head into pulp.

The thief then moves over to take on Jurg. He hits the goblin with a powerful strike, badly wounding him.

Deadly Snow manages to get Sirko over to the stairs as he curses and threatens her along the way. Just as she finishes, Wi'zou emerges from the stairs. Seeing the snack left for him, he begins feeding on the thief.

With the emergence of the vampire, Tickles leaves Mulroney to fend for himself and makes a run for it. The two goblins press their attacks against Mulroney, he blocks one but the other cuts him.

Deadly Snow moves over to assist. Using a telekinetic kick, she slams her foot into Jurg. The force of the blow breaks his neck, killing him.

Mulroney decides to make a run for it as well. Viktor stabs him as he passes by and starts pursuing him. The witch points back at Wi'zou, warning Viktor. Viktor, terrified, runs off in another direction.

It doesn't take long for Wi'zou to drain Sirko. Once he's done, he transforms into a wolf and chases after Viktor.

Meanwhile, Tickles is running by the tower when Doyle emerges. He decides to head over to kill the thief. Mulroney and Deadly Snow start heading in that direction as well, as the tower is near the path leading back to Beartooth.

Doyle sees everything going on. He asks Tickles what is going on. Tickles says they did exactly what they planned, they looked for the treasure and released the vampire in the process. Doyle calls him an idiot and tries to make a run for it but Tickles attacks him from behind, hitting him in the head with his club.

Running towards Doyle, Deadly Snow hurls a dagger into him. Mulroney reads his firebolt scroll, casting the spell at Doyle. He is blasted by the beam of fire. Shoes adds insult to injury by clawing at his eye.

As Viktor screams off in the distance, Tickles crushes Doyle's skull, killing him. Tickles tries to make a witty comment to Doyle about "here's your cut!", which would have made more sense had the thief been using an edged weapon. He then searches the corpse, taking the 15 gold coins he finds.

*** Session 14 - Scene 3 (of 4) ***

Not wanting to face the vampire, Tickles suggests they head back down into the crypt. Mulroney isn't so sure, but guesses dealing with Nardig will be safer than Wi'zou. Deadly Snow isn't so sure of their logic that the crypt will protect them, so she stays above in the tower to see if she can protect herself there.

Mulroney, Shoes, and Tickles head back down into the undercroft. Deadly Snow does her best to fortify her position in Doyle's tower.

When they get down into the crypts, Mulroney says he needs to cure Nardig. Unfastening the hobgoblin's breastplate, he quickly takes out his wooden stakes and mallet and hammers one into Nardig's chest. Then, using moonblade, he separates the creature's head from his body and burns both after making sure to collect all the mercenary's possessions.

Tickles can only watch in a state of shock and horror. As the remains burn, he wonders if the magical fountain water could have cured Nardig. But it is too late now...

Up on top, Deadly Snow looks around the tower but finds little other than Doyle's makeshift throne. She looks outside one of the windows, but all appears quiet now.

As she looks for any type of secret passage into the lower level, the assassin spots some movement out of the corner of her eye. She begins to wonder if it was a bat she saw.

Out of the shadows, Wi'zou emerges in his humanoid form. She instantly puts up her mind block to protect her from his mesmerism powers and puts on her child skull mask.

Wi'zou laughs. He tells the girl he likes her spirit and asks her to come closer. She steps ever so closer, and gives her name as the Deadly Snow. He shares his name as well, confirming he is indeed Wi'zou.

The assassin then offers the vampire he may feed on her, but she is small and has little blood. She says if he lets her live, she can let him back into the undercroft, where he will find a better meal waiting.

Wi'zou says he does not want to go back to the crypts, as he was trapped there for a long time. According to him, he was cursed to remain there after his master killed off the Rodem family long ago.

Deadly Snow asks after his master, but Wi'zou says he does not know where the man went. He mentions his master used magic to trap him in the crypts because he was getting too powerful.

The assassin offers to help find Wi'zou find his master for revenge. The vampire says he thinks he can locate the master, but is interested if she already has any helpful information.

The vampire scratches a jagged spiral symbol into the wall, asking if she knows it. Deadly Snow recognizes it as the symbol her group has seen before – it was in Lady Rodem's journal and associated with a necromancer responsible for the zombie plague (though Mulroney lied about recognizing as the symbol of a demon named Reedikus; the same fake demon name he used in Beartooth when talking to Zaladane). Unknown to her, Nardig had also encountered the symbol on the chest in the lair of the evil wizard Bargle, who was also suspected of having ties to the plague zombies.

Deadly Snow mentions seeing it in the journal. Wi'zou says it is the symbol of the god his master serves, though doesn't give the deity's name. She also says the journal mentioned a necromancer, who the vampire confirms is his master.

She asks if the necromancer controls other creatures. He simply says, "some" but notes most of them at Rodemus have already been eliminated by her and her group.

Wi'zou asks if she knows where the master is. She says she hasn't yet, but is confident as she has various connections including people in other dimensions.

Hearing the mention of other dimensions, Wi'zou is intrigued. He says the master also came from another dimension a long time ago before becoming an Immortalus. Deadly Snow isn't sure what that means.

She says one of her companions might know more, as he is better versed in magic than her. She says he is down in the crypt, but Wi'zou doesn't wish to go see him, saying he'd rather go search for himself.

Wi'zou tells the girls she intrigues him, and notes he's already fed quite a bit, so he agrees to let her live for now. He also is sympathetic to her due to her appealing skull mask.

Before turning into a bat and disappearing back into the darkness, Wi'zou tells the girl to keep an ear out in case she comes across any information on "Bragosani the Damned" and they meet again. She assumes Bragosani must be the name of the vampire's master.

After he's gone, the assassin realizes she recognizes the master's name – it appears to be the same name Zhang Tong gave to Mulroney as one of his allies when he believed Mulroney to be someone named "Arlo", and part of a larger conspiracy involving people named "Nigel" and "Paldemar". According to Zhang Tong, Bragosani was suggested to be located somewhere called the "Pyramid of Shadows".

*** Session 14 - Scene 4 (of 4) ***

Back in the crypt, Tickles and Mulroney continue to explore the remainder of the crypt but find little outside of two more large rooms with sarcophagi in them. They spend a few hours to check all the graves, but find nothing of value.

Mapping the area out, Mulroney notices there appears to be a large space in the middle of several rooms. He and Tickles search around a particularly oddly-architected section of wall and the thief immediately finds a secret door there.

Tickles looks over the door carefully and notices it is coated with a deadly contact poison. Using the gloves he took off of Nardig, Mulroney gives them to Tickles so he can use them to carefully open the door.

Opening the secret door, there is a hidden room between the other rooms filled with six large chests. It appears to be the hidden treasury of the lost Rodem family fortune.

After confirming the chests appear safe, they open each in turn. The first chest holds 1,500 gold worth of jewelry, a map, and a special-looking amulet.

Tickles takes the map and the amulet. He notices the map appears to detail a hidden series of tunnels leading to a temple. A symbol next to the temple appears to be the same astrological symbol Deadly Snow was researching before – the Azure Dragon.

Mulroney examines the magical amulet, but isn't sure what it is. Tickles decides to put it in his pocket for now.

Moving on to the other chests, Mulroney finds the next three contain 500 gold coins each and the last two contain 500 silver coins each.

Since the treasure is too much for them to move by themselves, Mulroney suggests they go up to see if Deadly Snow survived against the vampire. He notes to Tickles they may need to "cure" her too, but the coyle won't hear of any such violence against his adopted daughter.

They head up just as Deadly Snow is leaving the tower to head back to town after a night of rest. She sees them before they see her, and uses her powers of levitation to float and ectoplasm to create a mist to try and fake being turned to a vampire.

Mulroney takes out his wooden cross to keep her at bay while Tickles says they don't want to kill her. Deadly Snow continues to float towards Mulroney, so he decides she is faking it. He tells her as much.

She drops the act, and Tickles tells her it wasn't funny. Deadly Snow then explains what Wi'zou said to her.

Mulroney doesn't want to spend too much time dwelling on her tale, as he is concerned with how to get the treasure back. She offers Nardig is strong and should be of help, but Tickles has to explain the hobgoblin is dead. Mulroney says something about the cure being too strong for him and goes into a melodramatic tale of Nardig's last words (which are fairly flattering towards himself).

They look around for anything to help them transport the treasure. Nearby, they find a mule used by Doyle's gang for transport. There is no wagon, but the mule does have saddlebags.

Mulroney's idea is to take some spare lumber lying around and construct a sled. They spend some time talking about whether to keep some of the treasure hidden at Rodemus. Mulroney eventually convinces them to take it all back to town (insisting that would be "what Nardig would have wanted").

Tickles gives the map with the symbol of the Azure Dragon to Deadly Snow. He also asks her about the amulet, but she suggests he just try putting it on.

When he does so, it transforms his appearance. Suddenly he appears to have beautiful long, blond hair and sparkling blue eyes along with softer, more feminine features. Mulroney finds the appearance very attractive, making him quite uncomfortable. He insists Tickles take the amulet off as he resists the urge to try and smell the coyle's hair. The reason he gives are that there are many magical amulets in the world but none should be taken lightly.

They manage to construct a sled for the mule, but don't want to head back to town before resting. They tie up the mule near the crypt stairs (as the mule will not go down into the crypts), and head into the undercroft to rest by sealing themselves in the treasury. The next couple of days are spend resting and healing up.

When they emerge, they find the mule dead and drained of blood. Mulroney quickly surmises it was attacked by the vampires of Viktor and Sirko, who he didn't think to destroy when he had the chance. He also wonders if he should have thought to have Shoes stay out there to keep watch.

Deciding it is time to head back to town, they leave half of the treasure sealed up under Rodemus while Mulroney takes the chest of jewelry and Deadly Snow and Tickles taking a chest of gold each. Then they head off into the caverns...

*** Session 14 - Session Notes ***

The oddest thing about this session is how brief the write-up really is. The session itself was the same 2 1/2 hours or so our sessions usually are. There wasn't a lot of OOC talk not related to the game. The combat did take up a good chunk of time but wasn't nearly as involved in the previous session. Overall, it's was a fun session and moved the game forward. And yet, in the end, not a whole lot was there to be written up.

I record the audio for sessions then type it up. This was one of the only times I could do it without stopping the audio all that much (usually it takes me 5-6 hours to type up the notes for a session, I easily did it in 3 this time). The reason was the players took a very, very long time to make the few decisions they made. There was a ton of OOC debate on what the safest option to take would be and clearly not everyone always agreed (thus, the group splitting up).

My favorite part of the session was getting to throw down some exposition with Wi'zou. Usually the PCs don't let the villains talk long enough to get the plot points out.

My least favorite part was Nardig's (unnecessary) death. The problem is, that player requires a fair amount of hand-holding to get a new character up and running so it will be a mad dash to have something ready for next session.

Other notes about the session:
* The Mulroney player (correctly) foreshadowed in some of the IC/OOC chatter about where to rest that Doyle and his men were totally planning to murder the group to take whatever treasure they had found.

* I suppose it was in character to leave Nardig to fend for himself with the vampire, but still kind of a crappy thing to do. I gave the Nardig player multiple chances to try and break out of the super hypnosis, but he kept rolling terribly.

* Since Mulroney already used the globe of daylight on him once, I figured it wouldn't be as effective a second time. My problem with Palladium magic overall is that extremely effective spells have very low PPE requirements. Also, Kevin Seimbeida's rules are written for vampires are terrible and make them far too weak to be a real threat.

* I was totally going to let the fountain water keep Nardig alive. Failing that, I was ready to have Nardig stay in the game as a vampire. When I told the Mulroney player that after he killed / destroyed Nardig, he felt really bad.

* The PCs felt very threatened by the thieves, but honestly none of the thieves were remotely a real threat stats-wise. The real threat (which the PCs eventually figured out) from them was in delaying things long enough for the vampire to emerge.

* The Mulroney player kept insisting Shoes should be able to claw out the eye of his opponents. I'm not sure how serious he was.

* Everyone mocked the Tickles player for trying to use an action movie line that made no sense when he killed Doyle with the club.

* Hopefully Wi'zou's conversation with Deadly Snow will help the group start to put some of the plot thread pieces together. I sent out a separate "open plot threads" email to them as well as some other hints. While I understand my plots are purposely complex, sometimes I think the players don't take nearly enough time to even try to unravel what is going on.

* The players did a great job finding all the treasure. But I had to kill the mule after they foolishly forgot to dispose of the other new vampires (more on that next session).

* The players finally got a large cache of treasure. They expect to lose it on the way back to Beartooth, which is why I plan to surprise them next session by starting after they've already arrived back there safely.

* After this session, all three of the surviving characters have reached level 4 which should keep them fairly powerful. Given Palladium's XP tables, I assume this will be about as far as the PCs get in the campaign but who knows...

*** Session 15 - Cast of Characters ***

Yukiko Amagi (aka The Deadly Snow): A ten-year-old aberrant human girl; a major psychic trained as a secret assassin. She considers Tickles to be her father after he raised her as an orphan.

The Great Mulroney: A miscreant changeling witch who believes he is human and masquerades as a prestidigitator. He sold his soul to the devil prince Glebecar and has a devil familiar named Shoes.

Viktor: A former thief working for Doyle. Turned into a secondary vampire by Wi'zou at Rodemus. Joined the group under his master's orders to keep an eye on them and their connection to Bragosani the Damned.

*** Session 15 - Scene 1 (of 7) ***

Despite initial concerns, the group makes it back to Beartooth without any trouble. After selling off some of Nardig's unneeded goods and selling the jewels, the group is flush with gold. They take a week or so to recuperate and refresh their equipment.

The Great Mulroney uses their contacts with the Scarlet Alliance to get a couple of their magic items identified. The other amulet Tickles carries is identified as the Amulet of Rurga, which makes sense as the entry in Lady Lissa's journal specifically mentioned Kandia had left it behind when she went to find the Priests of Pah-Ma. It is said the amulet has the power to grant Rurga's beautiful visage on anyone who wears it.

As for the magical arrows Nardig took from the Rillietann elves (the Harlequins of the Cult of Cegaroch) at the Black Vault, those are said to be the Arrows of the Dark Reaper, capable of piercing any armor. Mulroney gives them to Deadly Snow, who purchases a small bow to use them with.

For himself, Mulroney keeps the Armor of the Exarch but elects not to spend the time and gold to have it fully repaired. Instead, he decides to spend the money on a horse for himself. But the limited availability and high costs of mounts leads him to purchase a rather rough-looking draft horse instead of the magnificent riding steed he envisioned. Despite this setback, he still thinks of himself as somewhat a knight riding his horse in plate armor and considers changing his nom de guerre to "The Grand Mulroney". For the horse, he wants to name it something absurd and comes up with "Gorn Clinker".

With Tickles busy for a while on guild business (particularly making sure to keep a close connection with Materich after killing Doyle, so as to not seem a threat), Mulroney and Deadly Snow discuss the various items on their to-do list to see if they can accomplish anything in the meantime. The list is getting rather long, and they are having trouble keeping track of what all they need to do between Bragosani, the Zombie Plague, and the Cross-Dimensional Conspiracy; Sa'lid Dra'lah and the Ebony Blade; Lorna, Ma'leese, and Charno; the Overlord of Rikki, the Thieves of Harr-Ki, and the Herald of the Giants; the thief and the Azure Dragon; Lady Lissa's mention of the lost temple of the Priests of Pah-Ma; the job Nardig set up with Theosius at the Inn of the Red Bull; and the dinner Jogores requested with them to discuss a business venture. After much deliberation, they decide the best thing to do is start with the map they found at Rodemus showing a hidden path through a series of tunnels leading to a temple with the mark of the Azure Dragon.

As the map begins at Rodemus, they decide to head back their first. Mulroney wants to grab the extra treasure from there, but Deadly Snow notes it would be best to get the treasure on their way back to Beartooth once they find the temple.