| You reunite at camp and Bog and Shrett learn of what has happened. They’ve been concocting their own plan in the meantime. As dusk has come, Shrett casts his See at Night and Stalking spells and heads down the main trail into the Brena Marsh, hoping to see that ghost-monk you’d heard of. It quickly becomes a foggy labyrinth of creeks with chest-high mud in many places off of any trail; or even open wateer. The topography is flat and mostly treeless, so there is good line-of-sight, but the fog eventually obliterates views. About 15 minutes into the marsh, the fog is thicker now. There are faint cries here and there in the distance; maybe birds, maybe not; well, indeed Shrett is sure they are not. They’re something unpleasant. Then there is a silhouette some uncertain ways ahead. It is a figure that turns its ?hood? his way, then back. The fog swirls around it in eddies. Shrett doesn’t think it saw him, so he follows a little ways, gets closer, and sees it is in a monk’s robe but does not have the particular frame of Knower Gofrey. It is slouched over, as if in pain, and limping, and he glimpses an unusually large hand with pallid white flesh that is moist. He notes its tracks, which are unshod, and uncommonly large like that hand was, and not shaped quite like a man’s, but no beast’s, either; maybe deformed? He backs off as it limps off and vanishes into the mist. He returns to camp and brings Bog back to this spot, with Stalking cast on Bog. They try to continue the hunt. But, just past the spot where Shrett followed that figure, Shrett wisely spots a place where a concealed creek crosses the trail and there is much risk of falling in and drowning. On inspection, the tracks do not cross the creek. Shrett enters the cold water and swims upstream, finding no clues, and Bog tries following along the shore but immediately finds that the ground off of the trail soon turns to treacherous ground: thick mud and other terrain that is a deathtrap to those that don’t know the ways of the swamp. Especially anyone in armour could sink and never be seen again, lost in the muck. Shrett swims downstream with no results, returns, and the two go back to camp, feeling that any further action is foolhardy for now. | You reunite at camp and Bog and Shrett learn of what has happened. They’ve been concocting their own plan in the meantime. As dusk has come, Shrett casts his See at Night and Stalking spells and heads down the main trail into the Brena Marsh, hoping to see that ghost-monk you’d heard of. It quickly becomes a foggy labyrinth of creeks with chest-high mud in many places off of any trail; or even open wateer. The topography is flat and mostly treeless, so there is good line-of-sight, but the fog eventually obliterates views. About 15 minutes into the marsh, the fog is thicker now. There are faint cries here and there in the distance; maybe birds, maybe not; well, indeed Shrett is sure they are not. They’re something unpleasant. Then there is a silhouette some uncertain ways ahead. It is a figure that turns its ?hood? his way, then back. The fog swirls around it in eddies. Shrett doesn’t think it saw him, so he follows a little ways, gets closer, and sees it is in a monk’s robe but does not have the particular frame of Knower Gofrey. It is slouched over, as if in pain, and limping, and he glimpses an unusually large hand with pallid white flesh that is moist. He notes its tracks, which are unshod, and uncommonly large like that hand was, and not shaped quite like a man’s, but no beast’s, either; maybe deformed? He backs off as it limps off and vanishes into the mist. He returns to camp and brings Bog back to this spot, with Stalking cast on Bog. They try to continue the hunt. But, just past the spot where Shrett followed that figure, Shrett wisely spots a place where a concealed creek crosses the trail and there is much risk of falling in and drowning. On inspection, the tracks do not cross the creek. Shrett enters the cold water and swims upstream, finding no clues, and Bog tries following along the shore but immediately finds that the ground off of the trail soon turns to treacherous ground: thick mud and other terrain that is a deathtrap to those that don’t know the ways of the swamp. Especially anyone in armour could sink and never be seen again, lost in the muck. Shrett swims downstream with no results, returns, and the two go back to camp, feeling that any further action is foolhardy for now. |
