After taking a month off so people could do vacation things (but playing one-shots of Longshot City and AGON), we triumphantly return to the land of Abhaile! Here's last time.
In the city of Cian, at a tavern called Nine Cups Inn, a group of local folks sit around and drunkenly tell stories they've heard about adventurers going out and doing their things. One talks about Zeke the Bleak, a dour and dire gnome wizard who threw fire and destroyed a host of enemies as well as some of his own companions. Another tells a story how this bard ended the rampage of some evil witch by seducing her, but then it went tits up anyway because the bard had also seduced that witch's husband (not a one-to-one to anything the characters have done, though certainly their bard has been known to seduce people). A third tops that with a story of how a group of adventures beat an owlbear by having their druid turn into an owlbear and lure the first owlbear away with her owlbear wiles. And another tells the story of how this band of adventurer took on a succubus that was posing as its own sister ("I want to meet a succubus," says one. "Frank, you're cut off," says the bartender).
The party's legend is growing, but they have other matters on their minds. They go back to the Arcanum to meet with Magister Luch, the wizard who was looking into the chant that the spider-monster was forcing its victims to repeat. Luch tells them that he couldn't fully translate it, even with magic, because he was just working with a phonetic repetition of the chant from Zook's memory, but he was able to come up with a few things he felt certain about.
First, he didn't know what language it was, but it wasn't any known language of Abhaile. As such, it must be something from beyond the borders (which, as we all know, is kind of big deal, since people in Abhaile don't tend to leave the nation). Second, Luch thinks it was a prayer or an entreaty to a god, also not something common here. He isn't sure the name of the god, but thinks that it was referred to as "dark queen" or "hungry cannibal mother". Zook notes that spiders are cannibals, so that kind of fits.
Luch has done a little research into what kinds of gods or demons might be called "hungry cannibal mother" ("dark queen" is far too basic), and Madoc the Necromancer came up in his research. The heroes have all heard the story of Madoc - he raised the dead of every cemetery from Cian to the eastern swamps and march on the city; it was the last time the great southern gates of Cian were closed. (This was mentioned back here.) Madoc's army was driven north to a gorge, and he himself fell into it, burning. The area is now called the Dead Valley.
The characters don't have much else in the way of leads; they talk about tracing Madoc's path backwards, heading east, but ultimately think it's probably more useful to look into where he ended up. Luch asks that if they're going to the Dead Valley, they make some notes about the physical and magical layout of the place - other bands of adventurers have descended into the Valley, but he's not aware of any that came out again. He gives Zook a scroll allowing the creation of magic circle, figuring it'll help him out. He tells them that the village of Salann is near the Valley, and they maintain a watch, as undead creatures sometimes crawl out.
The heroes spend a day or two preparing to go. Aisling buys a hand crossbow, while Zook picks up his saddle from Ioan Glassbeard. They also put some gold together and buy a donkey to pack their stuff onto (Dara asks it its name, and it replies that it doesn't really have one; its current own sometimes calls it "you stubborn ass". It does mention liking carrots, however, so Dara names it "Carrots"). The party heads out, going north, and in a couple of days they enter a pasture with a bunch of long-haired cows and the occasional ox. In the distance they see a watchtower, and momentarily a man rides up on a horse. "Ehya," he says, and then waves to the person in the tower. "You're not undead, can't have my cousin puttin' an arrow in your eye."
He rides with them back to the village proper, and tells them the story of the place. Salann herds cows and processes hide and meat and bone, but their other main function is to watch the Valley. Someone mans the two watchtowers day and night, and shoots any creatures that slither out. Failing that, the villagers attack them with pitchforks and throw them back in. Zook asks what they do with their own dead, and the Cowherd says they burn them. It's customary for the oldest and most able-bodied male relative of the deceased to sit up with the pyre while it burns, and other folks in the village will come and sit with them and talk (he had to do this when his mam passed last year). Aisling asks if they ever take the undead creatures from the valley and burn them, but the Cowherd says that they don't want to invite that curse into their village. The area around the Valley is blighted and salted; nothing grows there and they don't want that evil to spread.
The villagers put the heroes up for the night, give them beef and potatoes and beer, Aisling plays some songs and Zook makes some fireworks. These villagers are a little less starstruck by the adventurers than some of the others they've met (probably because of their proximity to Cian). The Cowherd tells them they basically have three approaches to the Valley - they can go in from the eastern entrance, and walk down the slope. They can rappel down the sides, or they can go to the western edge and climb/rappel down. That edge leads to the deepest part of the valley, but the edge is probably the easiest to climb. In years past there was a waterfall there, and the cliff is rocky, but now is blasted and dry from the curses on this place. "Scorches the hillside and salts every root," says the Cowherd.
The heroes decide to take the bull by the horns and go into the deepest bit. They leave Carrots and Maeve with the Cowherd, and head to the western edge. Dara casts spiderclimb and skitters down the side of the cliff, anchoring pitons and tying guide ropes, and Zook rappels down first, followed by Aisling, and then Clara.
Zook touches down and notes that there is nothing alive down here - no weeds, no moss, no insects. He expected something like this, but it's still disquieting to see it. He casts dancing lights to give a little illumination, and almost immediately, the undead respond.
A pair of skeletal bodies shambles out of the darkness, and a pair of much...meatier corpses wanders over as well. A couple of sets of armor shake themselves out of the blasted earth and advance on the gnome. Aisling, still on the rope, hurls a spell into the enemies' midst ("close your eyes!") and calls up a hypnotic lights display, and the two zombies just kind of stop and stare. Dara, still clinging to the wall, throws a moonbeam onto a creature lurking in the corner, and sees that it's a definitely a walking corpse, but it seems more aware than the others, holding a longsword like a warrior. But then the moonbeam hits it, and its flesh starts to burn away.
Zook hurls a fireball into the battlefield and incinerates the skeletons and one of the zombies. The armor is too close, though, and slams into him, but it barely has time to do more than knock him around a little before Clara lands next to him, dropping the last 40 feet like she's hopping off a log. She strikes the set of armor and knocks it over, and pounds on it until it stops moving. Aisling hits the other one with an arrow, and Zook finishes it with a barrage of magic missiles. Dara moves the moonbeam around and burns the last two undead, and all four of them gather at the bottom of the cliff.
The dark of the Dead Valley stretches before them, and Aisling activates her driftglobe, casting one bright light in the gloom...
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