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• Aros – Lightfoot Halfling, Rogue
  • Rubber Ducky of Inspiration
• Galiena Erenaeth – Half Elf, Celestial Warlock / Druid
  • Dearbhán – NPC, Fairy Dragon (Galiena’s pet)
  • Kavium – NPC, Tiefling Paladin (Oath of Conquest)
  • Darko Wintersage – NPC, Undead Wizard (Flame Skull)
• Baldur – Human, Pack Chain Warlock (Spear) / Paladin – Missed this session – Was partaking in a World of Darkness – Vampire the Masquerade game
  • Khor’taur – Dragon Spirit inside the Dracospear
  • Hellina Kaitlyn Deramu – Human NPC, Wererat

• After the battle with the Gaj (Session 44), Galiena decides to chew on some whistling leaf to recover some health
• Before scaling the mountain, Galiena chews on several whistling leaf, to get their healing properties, knowing her past attempts at climbing just about anything

• Aros, being the most dexterous between himself, Galiena, and Kavium decides he will be the one to ascend the cliff side first
  • However, for some reason – Aros struggles to get past the 36′ mark up the cliff side; each time he does he either loses his footing and some of the height he’d climbed, or falls for some damage
  • DM Note – After repeated failing to meet the DC – we were laughing quite a bit… I finally said, “Just a roll a damn d6 and this is how many hours you spend getting it right and finally scaling the side of the mountain to reach Ossis’ cave high up on the mountain…”

• After three hours, Aros finally reaches the mouth of the cave and slumps against the wall, breathing heavily
• Once Aros catches his breath and pulls out his rope; he realizes he’s scaled roughly 150 feet and he only has 50′ of rope on him. However, he did use pitons to climb so that should at least help. Galiena struggles getting to the rope – but once she’s gotten to the rope she’s easily able to scale the rest of the mountain with Kavium right behind her.
• As they gaze inside the cave, they can see the effects of Ossis’ Satyr corruption he’d originally mentioned (see Session 11) in the cave, since they last saw him – odd plants and mushrooms, similar to those seen in the Shadow Stone Realm, grow rampantly in the cave.
• The party decides to take a long rest at the mouth of the cave before they proceed inward; believing no monsters would attack them since all they saw were plants. Aros takes first watch and just before his shift ends, he hears a loud screech and looks outwards and sees a manticore patrolling the dark skies. He keeps a close eye and realizes somewhere on this mountain there must be a manticore nest. (DM Note – Was just something rolled on the Random Encounter table) Aros chooses not to alert Galiena or Kavium since he seems to be hunting things on the ground.

• The rest of the night goes without incident; Aros awakens Galiena and Kavium on their shift. As Galiena is sitting there, further down the cave she can definitely hear the sounds of running water, which would not be surprising, as this cave is less than 30′ away from an incredible waterfall
• The following morning Galiena seems very refreshed and asks Aros how he slept; Aros mutters that sleeping on the rock was not the best pillow; when Galiena asks that she was so tired that she slept so blissfully to the sound of the waterfall and asks if Aros heard it; to which he replies, “No, someone was snoring.” To which Galiena quickly replied, “I do not snore! It was probably Kavium.” Aros looks at her and chuckles.
• She then makes a snarky comment of, “Why don’t you go scout ahead?”
• As they slowly make their way through the unusual plants; with Aros stealthing ahead – Aros comes across a plant – and after his last encounter with the assassin vine – he pauses, hesitates, and thinks he’s heard of the flower in front of him – the three hook like appendages give him pause and he suspects Galiena might know more about it…

• Just before Aros turns around to make his way back to Galiena, he suddenly hears Ossis shouting from somewhere down deep in the cave in a pleading voice, “No! Stop! You must not! You do not know what you’re doing!”
• Aros quickly makes his way back and explains to Galiena that he hears Ossis yelling up ahead – but more importantly there’s something more dangerous – a plant. (Aros had a bad experience with an Assassin Vine that also had a pretty flower in Session 43). Whether it’s because of Aros’ rushed tone, having heard Ossis screaming, or being shaken by flowers, Galiena’s not able to get a clear picture of the flower. Galiena asks Aros to physically draw it in the dirt – and he does so, and she is now able to tell it’s a yellow musk creeper.
• She explains that it was a good idea he came back; as she explains that if the plant senses movement near it, it emits a pollen that will charm a person into walking towards it; once they walk towards it; the plant uses its hooks to inject a toxin that psychically damages the mind and turns people in something known as yellow musk zombies. Which essentially means becoming the host for the plant inside of you until it matures in seven days and bursts out of your chest and using your corpses for food resource for its roots.
• Aros sighs – and begins to believe all beautiful flowers are dangerous
• Galiena points out, similar to a weed, the plant will automatically regenerate itself rather quickly; and the best thing against it is fire. At that moment, Galiena recalls Darko and pulls her out of her bag.
• Darko emerges and looks around. “Shock and surprise. No body to possess and another horrible, retched location. You guys take me to all the best place. What do you need now?” he sighs, the sound, very odd coming from his empty, flaming skull.
• Galiena points to the deadly yellow musk creeper and tells Darko to destroy with his fire; and with two blasts, he’s able to set the flowers ablaze, destroy any chance of it releasing it’s dangerous pollen as well; after a moment, the party rushes through the burning brush and emerges on the other side and see something spherical fighting Ossis – a beam coming from it to Ossis – and it reminds Aros, Kavium and Galiena of the undead Beholder they’d just fought – but upon hearing the party bust through the brush – the floating sphere turns – and it is clearly not undead, nor like any beholder any of them had seen before!

• Despite Aros’ Natural 20 on Initiative – both of his attacks fail (clearly, his arms are still tired from the treacherous climb up the mountain)

• As the party engages with the Gauth (DM Note – each time I had it attack the player, I had the player roll which eye beam it would be to target them! This was fun and helped keep the players engaged and feel like it was really fun to do! Putting the fate in their own hands!) – they notice one eye beam remains focused on Ossis who seems to be suffering for it
• The party finally defeats the Gauth and rushes to Ossis’ side (although Aros, subconsciously picks up something from the ground without examining it and puts it in his pocket – it is another small, crystal shard, similar to the one he’d found in Chalice after defeating the undead Beholder) – and, though paranoid and a little mentally broke after all he’s gone through at the hands of Lord Brenmoon – the party manages to finally convince Ossis to take the cure and that they’re not there to try and poison and kill him and that a friend of his named Celan Gradon had made the potion to try and cure him (the party was sent on the quest for the items she needed in Session 42 with the potion being made in Session 44)
• After consuming the potion, Ossis becomes violently ill and the party briefly wonders if they’ve been tricked by Celan; before they realize, he’s experiencing the same thing that the dogs had that the party recently rescued from the troll infection – again, with Celan’s help (see Session 39) – they too had gotten sick as a means for their body shaking off the infection. (Celan had also mentioned she was not a potion maker by trade, and mostly knew of small cures and survival tricks, as she was a ranger/hunter).
• Ossis finally reverts back to his true self…

• Ossis then tells the party that there’d been a young boy who would bring him food and put them on the stone at the base of the mountain for him – and he was moved by the gesture, as Ossis was once the most well known person in Greenhaven, before the curse came; because he’d originally come here to visit Greenhaven, having heard of these “incredible apples.” His normal self, was one of joyous singing and laughter; and he was well loved, despite his Satyr appearance, by all at Greenhaven.
• He explains that he saw the boy a few days ago, on a tree limb – it was the boy’s clothing but he looked very different – as if he too, had now become cursed somehow. And Ossis explains he feels he might be to blame – from the corruption he emitted. He explains the boy flew off – yes, flew – as he describes the boy with a bat-like appearance, but the face was something that looked like a stirge…

• Ossis explains after he flew off he’s not sure where the boy went; but he’s not been back for a few days which is very unusual. He asks the party to find and help him if at all possible…