The Quest of the Missing Quill

[HorizonsDream]

"Oh, you know that I'm ready for almost anything," Jasmine assures Gaheris with a grin. Clearly, she was itching to go at this point.

[keymeister16]

"and they say Orcs are impatient," Zurgo chuckled. "very well, LET US GO SAY HI AND HAVE TEA WITH OUR SOON TO BE DEAD ENEMIES!"

[Haahque]

Everyone: (Brook's farm, north of Trevsville)
"Well I know the brooks a bit, they often show up to service. They're hard working and not malicious, even if they can be a bit gruff towards strangers. I would be very surprised if they were intentionally poisoning the town. From what you friend said to me earlier, it sounds like cultists, possibly of Urgathoa are sneaking into farms, like brook's, and slaughtering the cows, replacing them with zombie cows."

And with that they left the church to follow a dirt trail to the north of the town.

It only takes a few minutes to get to the farm, even walking as they are. The first thing to notice about a cattle farm like Brook's is the cows, then when you get closer you smell the stench of manure, finally you get close enough to see the man sitting on the porch with a double barreled crossbow, talking to Ishan, who by this point is also sitting on the porch, making a rather poor attempt at trying to buy meat from the farmer who insists that he doesn't have any spare meat, except for what he plans on eating for supper. If he wants meat he'd have to buy a whole cow.

"Greetings Mr Brook, we've had some disturbing information that the cultists you've seen before might be influencing the starvation in Trevsville via means of the farms. Would you mind if we took a look at your crop?"

"Hi rev, I can assure you that my cows haven't been acting strangely, they still eat grass and shit menure and moo every now and then, but if it puts your mind to rest on the matter, please, make sure those blasted cultists haven't run off with any of my cows."

[Vrindlevine]

Ishan waves his hand angrily at the farmer before jumping down from the porch to greet his companions or employers.

"I'm glad you finally caught up, everything at this farm seems to be normal you may wish to have your holy man take a look around but these cows seem healthy (and violent) to me." He pats one on the rump while carefully avoiding the back hoof.

"I did manage to conduct a little reconnaissance before you arrived I managed to find two leads, one is a small lair of what may be the same cultists we encountered earlier, the other I have yet to investigate more closely and as I underestimated the number of idiots willing to join the dark powers I was forced to retreat, they have at least several walking corpses as well as a handful of acolytes, 3 by my count but their could be more."

"After your done investigating the farm I would like to deal with that shack you can accompany me if you wish, but I don't want them attacking the farmers, the Empire ill needs this kind of evil interfering with its work and I am still a citizen even if they did cast me out.

He leans on the fence and takes a drink from his flask and waves it, "If you have any questions ill be waiting."

[JadedDM]

"Ah, good job....you..," Gaheris says to the archer. "Actually, I never did catch your name," he admits. "Or yours," he adds, looking to the drow. "Or yours," he says to the dwarf. "Or yours," he adds to half-orc.

"Anyway, you say you found two hideouts for these necromancer cultists? One larger than the other?"

As an afterthought, he suddenly turns to the priest. "What was your name, come to think of it, padre? Err, anyway, how can we help in investigating the cows? It seems whatever is affecting them is invisible to the naked eye."

[keymeister16]

"Zurgo, and it's fine Gaheris, i normally don't bother remembering the names of random combatants until they've survived at least 3 battles with me," The green man chuckled. "well if Ishan's information is accurate we know WHERE the one's responsible are, we still don't know HOW but as you pointed out Gaheris, it's difficult to see to the naked eye," Zurgo drew his Axe.

"it may be quicker to just ask them directly, i have an idea for how to deal with these undeadmen,"

[JadedDM]

"Zurgo, eh? That seems...about right," Gaheris remarks. "How did you know my name?" He glances to Jasmine. "Ah, she must have told you. Anyway, that's right, Gaheris Argent, at your service."

He adds, "Perhaps we can take a few prisoners this time? I find they are easier to question when alive."

[HorizonsDream]

Jasmine giggles lightly as she hugs on to Gaheris' arm. "You're just now learning their names?" she tsks him playfully.

[Haahque]

Whole party: (Brook's farm, north of Trevsville)
"I'm Warren by the way. Father Warren if you would" The priest introduces himself with a smile, "If there are cultists near at hand, then it is quite possible that these cows could be infected." He mutters a few words with a sweeping gesture as he examines the surroundings. "Oh my. I'm sorry Brook, you're not going to like this news at all."

"Wonderful, I always like hearing that I've got bad news without hearing what the news is. Absolutely wonderful, thanks." Brooks has been listening in on the conversation, and with this news he looks cross and concerned.

"It appears that a great number of your cows are not, in fact alive. Many, if not most of them are actually undead, despite all appearances to the contrary." What follows is Brooks giving a line of local dialect which should not be mentioned in polite company, however it does articulate his reaction very precisely, and how it relates to a hairy mother's left ear. The priest follows in a measured tone. "The undead are not very powerful however, If you were able to gather all your cows near my I could weed out and destroy the evil ones within minutes without harming the living ones in any way."

Once Brooks gets control of himself once again he agrees to this course of action, "Well, the damage is done now. I wouldn't want to sell any more undead meat to the town then I probably have already." And he works on rounding up his cattle so that they surround the priest. He then calls upon the power of Sarenrae to wash over the cows, which instantly destroys some of them, seems to cause a number of others pain and does absolutely nothing to the rest of them. If anything, the other cows look a little more healthy afterwards. With a second wave of energy Warren destroys all the remaining undead cows, leaving only the actual living ones left standing, something which amounts to only about half of what he thought he had.

"I suppose I hadn't noticed it before since slaughtering the cow would have turned the undead cows just into dead meat like any other meat, but I can imagine that eating undead - redead meat could cause some problems." Warren reflects on the situation with the meat, while Brooks is more agape at how many cows he just lost.

"Well, I can't hold this against any of you I guess." Brooks finally reasons, "You may have pointed out to me that I've lost a goodly portion of everything I own, but it wasn't your fault I lost it, that would be because of the cultists. It would really make me feel better though, if you all came along while I slaughter those cultists for doing this to me. Say, where did you say they were again?"

Priest casts detect undead: yup, lots of undead nearby.
Priest uses channel energy: (I'll roll 3 times for damage and give use each number as the damage number for 1/3 of the undead cows) Will saves: 16, 17, 11. 2/3s of the undead take half damage: 3, 3, and 7. 1/3 of the undead cows are destroyed, the rest are injured.
Priest channels more energy: All the rest of the undead cows are destroyed.

[JadedDM]

Gaheris sighs and pats Jasmine's arm. "It's...been a very odd day," he admits.

"Anyway, well met, Father Warren." He watches as the priest destroys the undead cows. "Hmm, so it seems these necromancers found a way to not only animate dead flesh, but disguise it so nobody can tell. Rather ingenious, really. Now we need to find and take out the necromancers, or they'll just keep doing it. Father Warren can't check all of the livestock at every farm every day, after all."

He looks Brooks over, not yet speaking his thoughts on the farmer accompanying them. Instead, he turns back to the alchemist. "Can you tell us more about these hideouts you found?"

========

(OOC: Not sure what sort of check is needed for this, or if a check is needed at all, but basically Gaheris wants to look Brooks over and try to determine whether he looks like he would only get in the way or might actually be able to hold his own in battle.)

[Haahque]

I'm going to say that's a strait wisdom check (1d20+0): 15, he puts on a tough act and his weapon looks rather mean, but it's likely that he's seen little combat beyond chasing off animals (and the local children) from his farm, so he might want to call backup if he were fighting anything as dangerous as a wolf. (Brooks is a farmer with 10 HP and pretty bad hit chance/damage, but at least he's bringing a ranged weapon).

[Vrindlevine]

Ishan watches as bursts of light from the priest cause several of the cows to run around before dropping dead the living ones seem a little happier if a cow can be happy.

"Well I guess I'm glad I didn't buy a whole cow anyways." He says to no one in particular.

"While my comrades consolidate themselves for our foray why don't we help pile these animals somewhere where they can be buried or burned I suppose but undead cooking beef might attract some local wildlife. I guess we can decide once their moved. Zurgo? Kanock? Could you give me a hand?"

As he steps towards the bovine enclosure he nods to Generics, "It's Ishan by the way."

(Strength check to move cows hopefully with a group bonus)

[HorizonsDream]

Jasmine had watched as cow after cow dropped dead. "That is a lot of wasted meat," she says with a shake of her head. "Wouldn't the people that did this need to be pretty close to the farms?" she asks.

[keymeister16]

"at some point" Zurgo nodded to Jasmine as he unbuckled his pack in preparation for the labor. "but that very well could have been days ago, while you need a practitioner to 'start' magic you don't need one to maintain the effects afterwards. interesting enough, the necromancy spell for these cows was omitted from the book we recovered" finally after enough musing he helped move the mounds of undead beef. (strength check to help)

"i too am waiting to hear where you found these cultists," he murmurs at Ishan in agreement with Gaheris.

[JadedDM]

"Alright," Gaheris says to Brooks. "But stay in the back, in case things get out of hand. We don't know what to expect." He looks to Ishan. "Ishan, eh? Nice to meet you. So, what can you tell us about these hideouts you found?" he asks for the third time.

(OOC: Did the undead cows not disintegrate like in 2E? Or did they just fall over dead?)