Arc II: Clearcoast Killer

Summary
In Clearcoast, it is a town that surrounds a lake with a nearby swamp attached. The townsfolk never stay out past 8 due to the magic glowing orbs that appear from the lake and disintegrate people, leaving nothing but their shadows behind. Their carriage driver Oxford becomes a victim of this on the first night as he wasn’t warned about the orbs and stayed out too late. The group attempts to solve this mystery. Tantris and Atticus go into the lake, where they find a massive crater that just drops at a 90 degree angle into the depths below. Atticus ties a rope around his waist and jumps into the hole in the lake. He finds a tube at one point, which he shoots with a guiding bolt, which illuminated the body of a massive creature with enormous red eyes, prompting Atticus and Tantris to flee.  

They ask around town, find out about a witch who was banned from town around the time the orbs started appearing. They go into the swamp to find her, fight a Crocodrake and kill it and talk to the witch. She sells Atticus drugs and also has no idea about anything going on in the town ever since the town priest told her to leave. She tells them the lake may be being used as a portal to another plane, as water is a good conductor for opening portals and Tantris had mentioned that the orbs didn’t appear to be effected by lake water. The group heads out to the island in the middle of the lake, finding a well that whispers for help in Deep Speech and Atticus jumps in. He is transported to another plane that mirrors their own, only it is in the process of dying and their are gooey, shadow corpses walking around. Atticus enters a cabin and finds a mind flayer inside. The mindflayer states that it studies dying planes and that the planar system is dying at an alarming rate. The mindflayer also informs Atticus that Oxford may still be alive, but likely does not have a lot of time left.

 

Atticus leaves, informs the group, and they come back the next day after breaking into the priest’s house and finding journal entries about these glow orbs and his plans to destroy all life on the planet. They find out the priest also has a child. Atticus jumps down the well and talks with the mindflayer more, which the mindflayer states that he also once saw a priest come out of the well and attract some strange creatures to absorb the lake water. The priest appears to be the one manipulating these glowing orbs to do his bidding. Atticus asks if he can keep in contact with the mindflayer, who says yes and penetrates Atticus’ skull with one of its tentacles, probing him with something and causing Atticus’ eye to become similar to that of a mindflayer’s. Estel, who is watching this through a fey Flower she can use as a familiar, sees this happen and has a panic attack for reasons other than the obvious. This panic attack scares Tantris, who is holding Atticus’ rope and causes it to fall down the well. The group go after Atticus.

 

The group reconvene at the lake bed, where they find giant, mosquito like creatures drinking the lake water. They pass over the lake bed and into the ruined town. They find Oxford currently possessed by the strange shadow goo and they fight and save him, bring his body back to the town. They narrowly get to the in they were staying at before the orbs arrive and run to confront the priest.

 

They find the priest below his church with an enormous, sun-like creature that they are then forced to fight. They kill the priest first, and then in a last ditch effort to survive, the sun creature possesses the priest’s body. They kill this sun creature and the glowing orbs vanish from town. The group find the priest’s son Icarus after the battle and tell him his father left town and left him behind, like Icarus’ mom had. They comfort the boy. The innkeeper, Oxford’s estranged son Andre, thanks the group and pays them in a large sum of gold. Atticus has a brief run in with Lavinia, who was reading over a book he’d been interested in buying before disappearing. Atticus buys the necromancy book. Elovi buys a book on ancient fire sorcery, where she meets a witch sitting by a fire who tells her about ‘The Life’s Flame’ and tells her it needs to be kindled. Elovi makes a pact with her. Tantris buys a book on Blood Magic.

 

The group spends one last day at the town. Elovi and Atticus mail letters, Haylen makes Atticus’ favorite food which Atticus hugs Haylen over, Estel takes Icarus to a Fey Oasis after being confronted briefly by Elovi and has Icarus make a pact with Zari to keep Icarus safe. The group all meets at the fey oasis and spend a day Healing there. After they leave, they inform Icarus that they will be leaving as well, to which Icarus begins to sob, asking why everyone in his life is leaving? This causes the majority of the group, aside from Tantris and Estel, to cry. Tantris holds Atticus’ hand while he cries. As they’re about to leave, Andre says he’ll watch over the kid til they get back to take him to an orphanage, but that he doesn’t know how the town will react to the kid after finding out his dad tried to kill them all. Atticus and Estel after they should take Icarus with them, and so the group does.