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Rules • Themes • Bestiary • Religion • Races • Guilds • Families • Arlinac City • Maps • Adventures • Stories |
A legend describes a strange building in the Enchanted Forest. Each day the building is newly created, with different appearance and inhabitants. Yet always the building has a single item made of pure gold. The adventurer who can retrieve this gold item will be blessed with good fortune as well as the worth of the gold.
Today the building appears as a four-story keep inside a hedge-bordered yard. The keep is inhabited by a strange woman. Four elementals keep her company. But why does the yard contain a scaffold and graves?
The GM should make sure the PC has a reason to be questing for the gold object. If possible, this back-story should be arranged so that once the PC enters he or she will suffer some kind of failure if her or she leaves the location without the gold item. (For example, a potential employer is testing the PC.) If this is not done then the PC could simply visit the location for several days to wait for an easier version of the quest!
This adventure uses the Secluded Keep map.
When the adventure begins the PC is only aware of the first objective. But this adventure, as always, has the possibility of earning three experience points.
The woman who lives in the keep is named Fmizda. She is tall and beautiful. She is also says she is an Ogress. But no one meets female Ogres! (Is she really an Ogress? Is she pretending or deluded? Or is the entire Enchanted Forest pretending or deluded?)
Fmizda is friendly and talkative. If the PC approaches her keep politely, she will answer the door and be sociable. Early in the conversation she will ask the PC for some of his or her hair, to add to her collection of hair in the pantry. She also keeps many varieties of currants in the pantry, as well as other normal food stuffs. Fmizda takes pride in her hair-and-currant pies, and will cook a fresh one for her guest if she receives the slightest hope that this would make her guest happy. Getting Fmizda up to the third floor and the kitchen is easy, but she will be deeply suspicious of anyone wanting to go up to the fourth floor. As happened with Palb, any intention or attempt at thievery or aggression will cause Fmizda to immediately change from an awkwardly generous hostess to a fierce fighter.
Fmizda can be fought. In combat she should be slightly more capable than the PC. If Fmizda is killed, immobilized, put to sleep, etc. then her body will turn to ashes. The ashes slowly rise in a tiny whirlwind and blow to the gate, where she will then reappear; a quick PC can escape from the yard through the gate before enough time passes for Fmizda to reappear.
The four elemental creatures are equally strange. Normally there are no such things as elementals! Each resembles a cubic meter of its elemental material. None of the elementals can be hurt. Transmutery does not affect them. The elementals can talk. Each has a one-track mind, focused on the item it desires. Wider conversation is possible but is difficult and wearisome. Their names are:
There is also a Therion's ghost wandering in the yard. This is also odd, for normally there are no such things as ghosts! The Therion's name is Palb. He is unable to interact with the PC until seen by the PC. If the PC has been friendly, he will approach the PC to describe his situation and ask for help. If the PC has not yet interacted with Fmizda or the elementals, or was rude or aggressive when doing so, he will stay hidden on the far side of the keep. Palb cannot rest in peace because his skeleton is in the pool instead of buried in a grave. There are two empty graves dug in the yard, with dirt piled beside them. If the PC buries his bones in either grave then he will thank the PC and vanish while singing softly. Palb cannot be fought.
None of the NPCs are aware that they are temporary creations of the enchanted forest. When talking about the past they will say things like, "It has always been this way" or "I have trouble remembering yesterday."
The current pure gold item is a hairbrush, on the dressing table in the bedroom on the top floor of the keep. It is indeed pure gold, and valuable as gold. However, the item does not actually bestow luck or good fortune despite what the legend describes.
Next to the hairbrush, on the dressing table, is an ornate bronze dagger that once belonged to Palb. Some of Palb's hair is in the pantry.
Fmizda wants vegetables from her garden to cook soup. But Ehala the earth elemental will not let her have them. She would give her hairbrush to anyone who could help her get her vegetables.
Ehala would become friendly and share the vegetables, but it wants a bucket of ash for its dirt. The only ash in the yard is in the oven, and Fiza the fire elemental will not share.
Fiza would share the oven's ash if it were given pieces of dead wood. The only dead wood in the yard is high up in the giant oak tree. But Wona the air elemental guards the oak tree possessively.
Wona loves the oak tree and would bring down some or all of its dead branches in exchange for having the tree watered with at least five liters of water. But the only water is in the pool.
Yeala is happy to share water from its pool. But the pool is dangerous. In the past (exactly when is vague to all the NPCs) Palb entered the yard and keep trying to steal from Fmizda. Fmizda killed him, and hung him on the scaffold until nightfall. Then she cut off his hair (she has a strange kind of Ogre's Hunger and only eats the hair of intelligent humanoids), took his ornate bronze dagger, and dumped his body in the pool. His skeleton is all that remains, but it is animated and will attack anyone besides Yeala who touches the water.
Palb knows what needs to be done to allow him to rest in peace. He also knows where his skeleton is, and that it is vulnerable to his hair and bronze dagger. He is normally invisible but can be seen by anyone standing on the scaffold.
Although this adventure has no linear plot the natural chain of events is linear: get water from the pool, exchange the water for dead branches, exchange the dead branches for ash, exchange the ash for vegetables, exchange the vegetables for the gold hairbrush.
If the PC happens to be carrying five liters of water, an armfull of dead wood, or a bucket of ash then the chain of events can be short-circuited easily. But hopefully the PC lacks these, and cannot leave the yard to fetch any these items.
The upper floors of the keep have windows, but these are closed and locked. If the PC is a Therion with a flying pet, the PC might somehow be able to arrange for a fourth-floor window to be opened, enabling the PC to stealthily retrieve the hairbrush using an animal form.
Hedge The hedge that surrounds the yard is enchanted. Climbing over, under, or through the hedge is impossible. The only way in or out of the yard is through the gate.
Statues These eight marble statues, representing the eight singing races, decorate one corner of the yard. They are alive. Although they cannot walk or move about they will try to grab anything that comes within reach.
Pool The skeleton of Palb starts in the pool and will attack anyone besides Yeala who touches the water. It will not go too near the eight statues nor the scaffold, so either of these places can be a safe haven for a PC pursued by the skeleton. (If the PC is unaware that the statues move, running into their midst is dangerous; but the statues are far enough apart from each other than anyone who has seen them move can run among them safely.) The skeleton is destroyed if Palb's hair is sprinkled onto it or his bronze dagger touches it: then it will fall apart into normal bones that can be easily buried. The PC could also get it to annoy Fmizda, so she attacks and destroys it.
1. Entry Hall Nicely decorated with furniture and artwork that is tasteful but not especially valuable.
2. Storage A large closet that extends under the stairs.
3. Study Only one bookshelf, which is full of cookbooks that would be only appealing to an Ogress.
4. Closet Has literal skeletons.
5. Dining Room Again the furniture, art, and tableware is tasteful but not valuable. The table is set only for one person dining, since Fmizda normally eats alone. If the PC has befriended her, she quickly apologizes and begins to set a second place setting.
6. Kitchen A partially eaten hair-and-currant pie, baked "yesterday", is on the table.
7. Pantry Palb's hair is among the food on jars and cans on the shelves.
8. Restroom Flowers decorate the sink.
9. Bedroom The gold hairbrush and the ornate bronze dagger are both on the dressing table.
10. Closet Only one pair of shoes, but dozens of hats.
11. Restroom The mirror enjoys making small talk about the weather.