After a looooong hiatus due to the holidays and illness, we are back with dawgs! Here's last time.
The Pioneers wake up at the Houndton Pioneer's Guild House to find breakfast being provided by Mawrin Wolfhound and his wife, Bunny Basset. They talk about their next move - which is to head up into the mountains and investigate Castle Transylvanian-Hound! (castle thunder)
Mawrin tells them that there's a road that goes up into the mountains a ways, but it gets harder to hike as you go higher. The Pioneers start getting their gear ready, and Boomer Pitbull asks if the Pioneer House here has a magical weapon he might borrow. Just recently they've fought creatures that aren't affected by standard weapons. Anything big and heavy would do. Likewise, Gelert Sausagedog asks if there's a way to make invisible stuff visible, since they're all expecting the castle to be haunted.
Mawrin digs into the storehouse and finds a masterwork greatsword. Bunny finds a pouch of floury powder she calls "Pawprint Powder." Sprinkle it on the floor and anything walking over, regardless of corporeality, will leave prints. There just isn't much of it; it comes from the Monarchies and has to be imported here.
Peppa Papillon and Petunia Pibble leave their fancy clothes behind, figuring they probably aren't going to any formal affairs up in the mountains. Dire Newfoundland doesn't bother, since he's still carrying the sack of holding, so capacity isn't a big concern.
The dogs start hiking, and a couple of days later, wind up approaching Castle Transylvanian-Hound!
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The pathway they're on leads them onto the level grounds around the castle. They spot a drawbridge gate (and it's even down!), but Boomer suggests they make a sweep around the outside first, and the others agree.
There's a big area, now overgrown with weeds and some small trees, that was probably space for a market at one point. At the end of it, they find a short stone wall sectioning off a couple of smaller areas. One has a cemetery, the other has a small, squat stone building.
They check the graveyard first. It's old and overgrown with weeds in places, but none of the graves seem disturbed (from inside or outside). Petunia takes the time to set the tombstones that have fallen upright, and the other dogs help out by clearing away brush and tidying up a bit. Sausagedog finds a mausoleum, and shoulders the door open. Inside, three sarcophagi, each labeled: Zigiz Transylvanian, Dashiel Transylvanian, and Wisteria Transylvanian.
Petunia recalls that Zigiz was the noble in charge of the house when he was elected lord-mayor of Houndton, and tried to build a road up into the mountains to the castle and wound up bankrupting the whole family. Wisteria, his daughter, tried to hold the house together, but was unable to, and it fell apart shortly after her death (Dire notes that there are still Transylvania-Hounds, but no more House Transylvania-Hound). Peppa recalls this story, too, and remembers that Zigiz had a son as well. She remembers that because he was an Acolyte of Man, but doesn't remember his name. Why isn't he buried here?
With these questions on their minds, the dogs check the next area, with the little building. Approaching it, they think it might be a cell at first, but there are no bars on the window and not only is the door not locked, it doesn't have a lock. Dire enters and finds that the room is empty, apart from some woods carved on the wall: "IN THE STILLNESS AND QUIET, FEEL THE HAND OF MAN ON YOUR HEAD. YOU ARE A GOOD DOG."
The Pioneers figure this may have been the quarters of Brother Transylvanian-Hound, if he chose to live apart from the castle, or maybe just a meditation space. There's nothing else here, meaning any furniture or bedding has either been taken or rotted away. Peppa looks at the inscription quietly for a moment, and the dogs realize it's getting late. They decide to camp for the night, and continue on it the morning.
That night, Dire, Sausagedog, and Boomer all dream of a strange face. Rather, they all have the sorts of dreams they normally do - Sausagedog performs for a crowd, Boomer skips through a field of daisies - but in each of their dreams, well above all of them, a dog's face is watching them, silently. They've never seen it before, but it's clearly a hound of some kind...
They discuss this over morning rations, and then, it's time to go across the drawbridge! The bridge doesn't cover a moat, it covers a crevasse. Dire tosses a rock in, but no one hears it hit. The dogs decide to go across one at a time, and tie a rope around a tree on their side to act as an anchor. Petunia goes first, tapping the bridge, but no problems. Peppa goes next, but she's light enough that the timbers don't even creak.
Then Dire crosses. He gets about two-thirds across before they all hear a tremendous crack, and the timbers break! But Petunia is ready! She casts a spell to make him fall slower, and then an arcane lasso to yank him back onto the ground.
Sausagedog nimbly cartwheels across ("BARKOUR!"), leaving only Boomer, the biggest and heaviest of them. They fix the rope on the other side so Boomer can just hand-over-hand his way...but in the middle, the rope on the far side starts to come untied and it sags.
Boomer looks down into the darkness of the crevasse and realizes that if he falls, he's gone...but then Petunia casts the spell again and yanks him to safety.
The dogs collect themselves and move on, through the gate. They find themselves on a wide, cobblestone path, and as they walk, the stones start to move. The rise up in a pattern, and they spell out:
CLEANSE THIS PLACE
"Nice to have clear instructions for a change," says Peppa. Just then the gate behind them slams shut. Nothing for it but to move.
They go through another gate (turns out castles have a lot of gates), and wind up walking down a slope next to a high wall. On the other side of the wall, a grassy area and a big tree at one end. Sausagedog leaps up onto the wall to have a look at the tree, and then drops down next to it, but doesn't see or smell anything interesting. He turns his back on the tree and has time to hear some crackling twigs before something hits him!
Sausagedog is knocked to the ground! He rolls over to see a dog made of wood standing there, with nasty-looking thorns - some of them bloodied! - coming out of its fists. It flicks its hand towards the grass, and seeds land there. The ground starts roiling as vines erupt, and the creature advances and slugs Sausagedog again.
Dire charges in and yanks Sausagedog out of the way. Sausagedog recovers his composure and runs to the spots where the seeds fell. Vines are erupting from the ground, so he chops one of the bundles to bloody bits with his hand ax. Petunia, seeing this, tries to disrupt whatever magic is making that happen, but the spell fails, and the vines stand up into horrible, wriggling figures made of plant matter and dirt. Dire, noting that Sausagedog is once again in trouble, runs over to guard him. Sausagedog hits one of the vine creatures, but gets a snootful of pollen for his trouble. He coughs up yellow gunk and recoils.
Peppa summons a spiritual weapon and calls a healing bark toward Sausagedog. Boomer charges in and rages, smashing the wooden dog with his greatsword, but this causes it to release a burst of pollen!
Dire, always thinking strategically, yells back to Petunia "we need some firepower!" Petunia runs up and lines herself up with all three opponents (and Boomer, but he can take it) and throws a beam of fire, scorching the plant creatures. Boomer pounds on the wooden dog, and Petunia strikes the deathblow with her magical stick, splitting it into wormy, burning chunks of wood. The other dogs make quick working of the seedlings, and they all take a breather.
Dire examines the tree, and finds an iron ring jutting out of the notch where the thickest branches emerge. He yanks it out, and finds it's attached to a spike. As soon as he pulls it out, the tree collapses. Petunia examines it, and determines that it's a demonic artifact. Jammed into a sapling, it turns it into a big tree that houses a Darkwood Dryad (the thing they just fought). The Dryad then attempts to beat enemies unconscious and plant a seed in their chests, making their bodies grow into trees as well.
Thanking Man that this didn't happen to any of them, Dire performs a cleansing ritual over the spike, calling on his newfound Acolyte training. It seems to work - the spike rusts over, and Petunia confirms it no longer smells of Unseen. Congratulating themselves on this victory, the dogs move on.
The next area is a short, covered tower that contains portraits, presumably of the past Transylvanian-Hounds. They're moldy and ruined, though, so it's hard to identify anything. One portrait, though, has four names on the nameplate - Zigiz, Dashiel, Wisteria, and Owlet - and Peppa recalls that Owlet was the name of the Transylvanian-Hound scion that turned to the Church. She peers as his garb in the portrait to try and get a sense of where he might have taken vows, but the picture is too hard to see.
The next area they find is the castle forge. Dire rushes in, hoping to perhaps finally be able to take the auva fragments and make armor, but although the over and the anvil are here, the tools are long gone. Dire looks around for any other items of interest, but doesn't find anything.
Petunia, though, thinks to check the ashes of the fire. She finds a horn - a long, curved horn...still attached to a skull. She pulls it out, and the dogs realize it's not canine (or, indeed, feline). Dire suggests cow, but the horns are too curvy, maybe more like a goat. Petunia sniffs it for magic, and recoils in pain. It's like a snootful of cleansing lye!
And then the skull shakes a little. A spinal column grows from the neck, shoulders crackle out, and arms emerge from those. Robes unfurl from nowhere, and the demonic goat-skulled creature stands there, taller by half than even Dire. It swirls its bony hand around and summons fire, and then shapes the fire into a huge staff, solidified into red-orange crystals. It snorts and turns to face the dogs.
"I know you're evil," says Dire, unhooking his hammer, "but that was a really cool entrance."
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