Thattaman's Haunting of Harrowstone

[archetypal]

Despite the frustrating encounter with the Sheriff, the five of you walk with him and the other farmers to the Harrowstone Memorial. While there is rampant speculation as to the culprit, none of you get involved in the discussion, cognizant as you are of the Sheriff's threat.

The memorial is visible from a significant distance away. It is a 25-foot tall moss-covered stone statue overlooking the river. It depicts a proud, muscular man dressed in leathers and wielding a truncheon. There are 25 names carved into the stone base of the statue, including those of Warden Hawkran, his wife Vesorianna, and 23 others; presumably guards who perished in the flames. A large, dark red 'V', apparently painted with now-dry blood, is scrawled over the names. There is additional blood splattering the main body of the statue, as well as the ground around the statue.

Harrowstone itself sits upon a hill to the south, near enough to be a constant presence on the minds of the people standing around the memorial, but too far away to see any details of its construction or state.

[Maralais]

Reymord examines the area and plays with his beard. "Freaky." he murmurs to himself, then looks at the blood on the ground. He tries to see if it has a strange pattern when looked as a whole, or if it shows anything strange about the ground(different levels of suction?), or if it makes a trail to anywhere. His lack of any kind of information about searching is pretty obvious, as he nonchalantly walks on the very blood he is examining, touches everything he sees, and generally looks like he has no idea.

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Untrained perception check gooo!
(1d20)[5]

[archetypal]

There is no obvious pattern to the blood other than the 'V'. There is no trail of blood on the ground, just splattering.

[Phasm]

"Well, that's just not right!" Siv frowns down at the defaced monument from her perch on Charles' shoulders. Blood will wash off in time, but still! The gnome starts to cast a spell, then pauses and looks around. The villagers might think she's cursing the monument or something if they see her, since they don't seem to like outsiders very much.

She looks at Lorrimor and nods toward the statue, carefully visualizing the owl flying low above the crowd's heads and perching on the stone hero's shoulder. The familiar takes off, following his mistress' unspoken instructions. That should be enough of a distraction, and if people don't know about wizards, they'll think he's a pet and pets are naughty sometimes so I can just pretend to scold him if they get mad. When something moves right over your head, the immediate impulse is to look at it.

While her owl draws the humans' attention, Siv forms a short series of gestures, whispering the familiar cantrip to detect magic on the monument.

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Casting detect magic, specifically on the part of the monument that's been defaced. She'll keep it up for the full three rounds if she can and there's something there.

Kno: arcana, just in case: (1d20+8)[25]

[archetypal]

Siv does not detect any auras on or around the memorial, and the distraction works as planned.

[ninthbit]

Like the rest, Jadzik checks the statue and immediate area for clues to the cause of the defacement.

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Perc: (1d20+11)[17]
Time permitting, he would take 20 (Total 31)

[Wyntonian]

Charles looks more shocked than anything, recalling playing around the foot of the monument as a child. "That's really, really not ok. I think I'm going to be mad, soon. Can you guys magic this away or something?"

[archetypal]

Jadzik examines the statue and surrounding clearing extremely carefully over the course of nearly 15 minutes. He realizes a few things.

First, the amount the blood has dried means that the earliest this 'V' could have been painted was sometime last night. Second, the blood was transported here from somewhere else - there is no indication of an animal or, gods forbid, a human being slaughtered here at the memorial to provide the blood used for painting. Third, the amount of blood is substantial - enough to paint the 'V' - but is not nearly as much blood as you would get from killing any animal larger than a chicken or a cat. Fourth, tracks in the hard dirt surrounding the statue indicate that the memorial has had many visitors today, at least 12 (currently there are 10 people standing around the memorial). Presumably the vandal's tracks might be among them, but they are not obvious even to a keen eye.

[archetypal]

In response to Charles, the Sheriff says, sharply "We are more than capable of removing vandalism from our own memorial, thank you very much."

His body language makes it clear that while he has tolerated your presence here so far, he would like you to leave.

[Larpus]

Gaspar mutters to himself with an annoyed expression,"Now that's bad..."

being anything but a tracker though, he pays little mind to the monument and instead watches the crowd, expecting to catch someone acting out of the ordinary.

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Perception: (1d20+6)[12]
Sense Motive: (1d20)[11]

[archetypal]

While the emotions of so many people are hard to read at once, Gaspar doesn't get the sense that anyone is hiding something.

The farmers and the Sheriff are all clearly distrustful of the five of you, especially as some of you have taken it upon yourselves to attempt to investigate the incident without the request of the Sheriff.

[ninthbit]

Friends, we are clearly not wanted here. Any trail has likely been trampled beyond following. We should leave this to the sheriff and go about our business.

If none object to leaving, then once they clear the town-folk's hearing, Over a dozen people have contaminated that area, not to mention it likely has nothing to do with what we're working on and is simple vandalism. It doesn’t help that their distrust only serves as a distraction to us both. We should give them a wide birth and continue are investigations elsewhere. The crypt remains to be located. I recommend we continue there as we had originally planned.

[archetypal]

The five of you withdraw from the monument under the watchful glare of the town Sheriff. Realizing that Grim is likely done with his research by this point, you travel north towards the Temple. He meets you at the fork in the road between the two town bridges, because he thought you might be in the town plaza. It is late afternoon, and the air is stagnant and beginning to cool a little bit as the sun falls towards the horizon.

The fork provides you with a decent metaphor for planning your next move; you can take the eastern path and head back towards Kendra's house and the town, perhaps to conduct further research, or you can head northwest to the Restlands to investigate the cache that is potentially hidden there by going around the outskirts of the town, walking past the Temple in the process.

[Down Comforter]

Grumpy from being stuffed up in the temple library for so long, Grim immediately takes the road in the direction of the Restlands, grumbling out, "Check the cache now. Research and read up in bed. Tired. C'mon."

[ninthbit]

Finally...

[Thattaman]

As you head towards the graveyard the air gets noticeably colder and you can practically feel ghosts and creatures around you. The false crypt is near to Petros Lorrimor's grave. The lock is already broken.

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Make a perception check.

[Larpus]

"I guess it's clobbering time...!", says Gaspar with a malicious smile to his face as he touches his morningstar on his belt. "That said...I'll make a return after dark to collect a sample, I would like to check if that's humanoid or animal blood, if it's animal, mr. Jadzik is most probably right and it's a random act of vandalism, if it's humanoid, however...i might be related to our enemies in some form or the other..."

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Perception: (1d20+6)[23]

EDIT: God darnit, I always forget to close the spoiler tag!

[Wyntonian]

Charles shivers at the sensations of the cold dusk air, the slight rustlings at the edge of his hearing and the feeling of old, malicious eyes. He hefts his axe and peers at the broken lock. "That's not right. They lock these pretty good. Hold on." He holds up his birthmarked hand, and wiggles, his thumb and little finger, making the butterfly wave its wings asymmetrically. "Desna, can we please have some light? Thank you!"

His palms begins glowing slightly, then surges with light in the shadows of the evening. "Better?"

[Down Comforter]

Grim nods slightly, his elven blood helping to keep the shadows from being a hindrance. He flexes his hands, "Should we be concerned about violence in the immediate future?" He examines the door with the broken lock and checks about, looking for danger.

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Perception
(1d20+4)[6]

[ninthbit]

Jadzik looks at Charles with a peculiar look. Can you not see in the dark? I've always found a bit of clarity for finer details without the light and color.

As for danger, I don't think theres much to be concerned with, we already suspected that the Professor was here. It makes sense that he would have needed to break the lock to enter. I doubt he has any skill with a set of picks. This just helps confrim that he was here. He then opens the door wide and walks in.

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Perception: (1d20+11)[28]

[Phasm]

As they approach the false crypt, Siv climbs down from Charles' back. "Thanks for the ride, Charles." Lorrimor descends to perch on her shoulder, large yellow eyes scanning the area. "Woo, feels spooky here." She speaks a few mystic words and touches a large glass cabochon in a gaudy decorative comb holding her arrangement of pink braids in place. It immediately lights up like Charles' butterfly birthmark. "There. Two lights are always better than one, and now Charles can hold stuff if he needs to without worrying about shutting off our only light." One of the professors at Lepidstadt University wore a helmet with an everlasting flame on the front for night expeditions, and Siv thought that was an excellent idea. She doesn't like helmets, but the light spell can be cast on almost anything.

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Perception for Siv, assuming the area counts as shadows or darkness: (1d20+5)[16]

Perception for Lorrimor the Owl: (1d20+12)[13]

Both of them have low-light vision.

[Thattaman]

When inspectred closely you can see that the lock has been destroyed with acid recently. You can tell that no one other than the proffesor has been in here and you can see his tracks in the dust, leading up to a sarcophagus.

[Maralais]

Reymord walks to the sarcophagus, keeping one had on his rapier, should he need to draw it. "Let's be quick about this cache, shall we? I really don't like the idea of walking in a graveyard."

[ninthbit]

Jadzik begins to look around.

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Autoloot=Yes
Has Darkvision
Perception: (1d20+11)[22]

[Wyntonian]

Charles likewise ducks his head inside, his glowing hand held up, the other on his axe.

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Darkvision as well.

If you feel the need to have a marching order, please put me near the front.

Perception: (1d20+3)[23]

[Down Comforter]

"How big is this tomb?" Grim wonders, as he slips inside behind Charles and looks about.

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Perception
(1d20+4)[13]

[Phasm]

Siv takes a place in the middle of the group, sending Lorrimor to fly above their heads. Slinging her Wizard's Staff across her back, the gnome loads her crossbow for battle.

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Perception for Siv: (1d20+5)[18]

Perception for Lorrimor the Owl: (1d20+12)[16]

[ninthbit]

Jadzik gives the gnome a peculiar look. "Are you expecting company?.."

[Phasm]

"You never know in crypts, even fake ones!" Satisfied, she looks up at Jadzik. "And loading a crossbow in battle is kind of a pain, and it's a real pain if it's not actually in your hands and you've got a staff in your hands that's a nice one that you don't want to lose! So I load it up ahead of time and put the staff away if there's even the littlest possibility that something with a taste for gnomes might be around." Siv's voice is unusually quiet, just loud enough for the party to hear.

[Maralais]

Reymord follows the others, pondering if he's actually the only one completely vulnerable to darkness. Instead, he focuses on sounds, but certainly not on smell, for very nauseating reasons.

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Perception check: (1d20)[5]