Despite the unsettling vision of Sageblood in the night, Sturmburg and the party rest peacefully, albeit deeply, because of the incense, and awake with heavy drowsiness.
Before leaving the tavern, Kristov notes that Sageblood looks unnervingly hale — even compared to the night before. Meanwhile, the air hung heavy with the scent of incense, and Sageblood spoke grandiosely of restoring balance, his words ringing hollow to the seasoned peddler, who sensed a deeper deception.
Sageblood reluctantly agrees to lead the travelers to the ancient tree, a focal point of the village’s renewed prosperity.
While visiting the shops, Lucia tries to befriend a local maiden and learns of upsetting rumors of disappearances before being shooed out of the shop by the matronly owner.
Sturmberg takes the party to a smithy, where he starts a conversation with the owner. The smith’s apprentice — a large orc — looks on with disdain and concern for his gregarious master. The smith soon notices the party’s unease and quietly encourages them to head out of town and seek the counsel of the village’s former ranger — Cynthia Elsgreave.
While heading out of the town, Lucia earns the scorn of the villagers due to her loud disdain and complaints about the heavy incense blanketing the homes.
The travelers find Elsgreave’s cabin nestled on the edge of the woods. She confirmed their suspicions, detailing the changes that had swept through the village and offered to guide them to the ancient tree. At the tree, they discovered disturbing evidence of sacrifice, the nature of which remained chillingly ambiguous. Kristov, with a grim curiosity, extracted a sample of the tree’s unnatural, blood-like sap. Elsgreave, her ranger’s instincts on high alert, declared the tree unnatural, a blight upon the land.
The next day, the party, accompanied by Elsgreave, returned to a village thick with suspicion. The blacksmith’s frantic plea for help shattered the tense atmosphere: his daughter had been taken. The party, their suspicions coalescing, resolved to venture into the woods, their path leading them to the druid Sageblood.
A stop at Mistress Wisegood’s apothecary provided supplies and a chilling confirmation: the sap was unnatural. She gifted them a plague doctor’s mask and herbs to combat the cloying incense, a grim necessity for the journey ahead. Elsgreave, armed with a scrap of the missing girl’s clothing, set off to track her, promising to meet them at the grove.
At the grove, Sageblood awaited them, his facade of benevolence shattered. He admitted his anticipation of their confrontation, his words a chilling prelude to the horrors to come. The party, with cunning and courage, managed to extract a promise from Sageblood: the return of the girl and the ranger. But a palpable tension remained, a wariness of betrayal hanging heavy in the air.
As they crossed the bridge to the ancient grove, the forest itself turned against them. Monstrous vines erupted from the earth, animated by a corrupted forest spirit, a grotesque extension of the ancient tree’s evil. Sageblood, his true nature revealed, commanded the monstrous entity, his power a terrifying spectacle.
In a desperate battle against overwhelming odds, the heroes vanquished the evil druid and his monstrous creation. The death of the spirit triggered a violent release: the bulging roots of the ancestor tree burst, drenching the party and the hostages in its unnatural sap. Miraculously, the spell was broken, and the sap’s corruption seemed to have lost its potency.
Exhausted but victorious, the party began their trek back to the village. But the sight that greeted them was not one of celebration, but of horror: smoke billowed from behind the village walls, a silent testament to the evil that still lurked, or had returned, to Knightcross.
JesseFolk.com 