The Night Mission

Night of the Barghest:

Having already faced off a major threat from the sea and hired a bunch of Hoodies as spies, the Irish Knights are resting up for even more mayhem during the night. They will be taking a jaunt into the Zoo, north of the Liffe and looking into a monster that is eating people. They will be joining forces with Gabriel McIntyre’s knights, with the idea of both slaying the beast but also currying favor with the people living in Baron Daedalus’ territory.

After returning from helping the Yardies fend off an invasion of Deep Ones, the Irish knights surround the entire House with the “goofa dust” thus making their property proof against spiritual and ethereal invasion.

Our heroes then wander off to their own habits… be it sharpening swords or sleeping, or praying. Either way, the hours pass and it is now time for them to head over the river and meet the Irish.

The Irish Plan:

Ash, David, and Ragnall take Ryan and Barry with them, every one shoves into the ambulance that is Ryan’s pride and joy and thankfully it resists the pull of Aysle as they leave the safety of the hardpoint in the House.

They meet Gabriel and his soldiers outside of the bistro/bar that Gabriel uses as his headquarters. All of them are mounted on horses and when the ambulance pulls up Gabriel gives it a look. Really, that’s what you go to battle in? But once they open the rear doors and introduce him to all nine feet of Barry, Gabriel’s demeanor changes sharply.

Gabriel leads the way with his men, and the Knights take up the rear. Despite the fact that they can reach the zoo on a single straight path, Gabriel leads them slightly north and then turns to angle THROUGH the Baron’s territory. Surprisingly they are not stopped by any border guards, and no one seems to contest their passage. The few people they pass on the streets seem more amazed by the rolling horseless box than but anything else.

The Zoo:

Very quickly they arrive at the massive park, Phoenix Park and the Zoological gardens are massive and there are other parks that are also associated with the area. However, most of the disturbances have been traced back to the Hill in Phoenix Park. [It should be noted that in Core Earth Phoenix park is a massive set of lawns with wandering deer and such (and not quite the zoo I thought existed), but the Aysle version of the park has replaced that large Obelisk monument with a large hill… and for my story there is an actual zoo with parking lots, concrete pens and etcetera. Though all of the animals were freed during the first weeks of the invasion.]

Gabriel’s plan is for him and his knights to circle around the park to the north and west, half of his knights will come in from the north while he and the remainder will come in from the west. He expects the party to enter the zoo from the east and meet him in the middle. The south is bounded by the massive hill and the river Liffe, if they find nothing meeting in the middle then the full force will turn south and explore the Hill.

As they are already on the eastern side of the park, the party sits back and waits for Gabriel and his men to move into position. After giving them a good twenty minutes, they roll the ambulance across the parking lot and look for a way into the zoo grounds.

As they slowly creep across the parking lot, looking for an open gate, Ragnall can just make out a band of the knights on their horses in the north. A shadowy shape detaches from the side of some trees and runs past the knights and heads straight for the zoo wall. The mounted knights react quickly, but not quick enough the creature out paces the horses!

The Chase is On:

Ragnall yells inarticulately as he points at the shadow heading for the wall, and despite the nonsense that comes from his mouth, Ryan reacts and punches the gas on the ambulance. They lurch forward and drive directly into the barred gate of the zoo, chain links snap and a horrible scraping sound tells them all that Ryan is going to cry about the paint job on the ambulance.

The chase becomes pure chaos, the inside of the zoo was NOT designed to have large vans driving through it and making the sharp turns to try and keep the inky black creature within the cone of the headlights proves near impossible.

The knights split into two groups, one follows the ambulance into the zoo and the other heads around to a gate further to the west, trying to get ahead of the creature.

Everyone loses sight of the creature for a second and in a bit of blind luck, Ryan has to blindly choose left or right, he jerks the steering wheel to the right. The van lurches and Barry curses in the cramped back. But the headlights hit directly on the large, hideous creature. It is half wolf, and half deformed thing. And it is directly pincered between the ambulance and the knights coming in from the West.

The creature skids to a halt, its feet coming out from beneath it and it slams into a “You are Here” sign. Looking at the knights charging its right side, and the lights on its left side the creature turns south and leaps the iron bars of the bear enclosure and heads into the rocky den.

Ryan slams on the brakes and skids the van into a halt, there is no path for the van into the bear pit.

Footrace:

A number of the knights split and wheel the horses to go around the massive bear enclosure and look for another path, but the party and Barry dismount the ambulance and give chase on foot.

Ash and David quickly leave Ragnall in the dust and Ryan stays with the Ambulance, he moves it around to get better light into the area and flicks on the high beams. There is a LOT of stumbling around and getting turned about as the chase goes awry [this was our first time trying out the chase rules in the game and it was a bit of a cluster F… we’ll skip a bit].

In the end David finally gets the creature in sight and charges it, just as Ryan pulls the van around and blinds the creature with the high beams. David yells out that he’s about to fight Grendel, but only Ryan would get the reference and he’s not within earshot.

Ash arrives seconds later to help Dave out and Ragnall comes in last, ONLY because Barry picked him up and carried him through the park.

The Barghest:

Half goblin, half wolf-like creature, the barghest is a twisted monster. As mentioned, David is the first to arrive, with two knights a few seconds behind him. He calls the creature Grendel but no one reacts to the name. Dave swings his vanquisher blade in a two-hand grip but totally misses the creature which is very agile for such a large beast. The creature leaps past David and pulls both knights off of their horses. Smashing them to the ground. They do not move and David is alone with the creature.

The barghest is ugly, limbs overlong and twisted, tipped with talons. Jaw misaligned and filled with too many sharp teeth. David doesn’t hesitate and doesn’t feel fear as he slams his sword into the creature. The blade bursts with white light, the vanquisher HATES supernatural evil. The Barghest reels back, wounded and burned by the holy light of the sword.

The barghest lashes out blindly, nearly taking Dave’s head off, but the stormknight ducks… unfortunately one of the knights’ horses is not so lucky and the blow kills the mount instantly. Ash, annoyed to not be in the fight, and perhaps worried for his companion, opens a portal and jumps the last 50 meters to arrive at the fight.

Ragnall, nestled against Barry’s chest, throws a ball of magelight into the air. Besides enlightening the situation, it is also as signal to Gabriel and the rest of his knights.

Ash is Quick to the Kill:

Ash pauses beside David for a second, just making sure his companion is ok before he lunges into the creature with his black blade. In a flash the creature’s entrails hit the ground and a second later its body follows. A single stroke from the elf is all that was needed to finish the beast.

Ragnall arrives a few seconds later, slightly annoyed that all he’d done was light up the clearing. But then again, he is also the only one intelligent enough to figure out what they have before them.

He immediately recognizes the creature as a Barghest. A fae creature that can shapeshift from a relatively non-threatening little goblin into this monstrous flesh-eating beast. If the creature had shifted into goblin form and run into the shadows, besides being even harder to see/find, it would have healed all of the wounds. By sneaking around as a goblin and shifting back and forth between forms it is nearly unkillable. Blinding speed was the only thing that had dropped it.

Ragnall: “We were lucky that Ash is so fast and lethal. Though if I remember correctly a barghest doesn’t always stay dead. I can’t remember how but there is a ritual that needs doing to keep it down.”

Ash: “Let’s just burn it to ashes.”

David, remember earth folk tales about creatures with the same name, “My gran said that they could be killed by decapitating them and putting the head on a silver spike. That keeps it from ever being able to reattach to the body.”

Ash mulls it over; “Let’s do both. Spike the head and burn the body.”

They make it so.

The zoo is a popular place:

It takes a while to get the body burnt and they don’t actually have a silver spike on them, so they’ll spike the head later when they get back to Dublin House. But while they are working on finishing the monster Gabriel and his knights start to trickle in. And a few minutes later a handful of more knights come in, but these last knights have interesting information.

Knight: “Sir, we found a large group of people moving through the park and toward Phoenix Hill. At least 50 people wearing hooded robes were observed walking in small groups.”

This piques everyone’s interest. Such a large number of people arriving in the park where a monster has been slaughtering and eating people for the last four days? And these hooded figured apparently oblivious to the mage light or the knights running around on horseback?

Ash; “Sounds like a bunch of very stupid cultists.”

Very Stupid Cultists:

As the fight with the barghest went far faster than expected, the knights are all looking for more of a fight. Gabriel does remind people that if the numbers are correct, they are still outnumbered 3-to-1. Ash merely looks back at Barry and chuckles.

Minutes later they come across close to 100 cultists who are standing in large groups around two main bonfires. They seem to be praying to the side of the Phoenix Hill, a sheer rock wall that has a single small hole bored into the side. The hole is less than three feet across and a group of cultists are shoving offerings into the hole.

What follows is a very one-sided affair… the cultists prove to be Lurks and Wights and the offerings prove to be human remains. Barry and his companions work their way through the 100 cultists. Killing and maiming at will.

It is over after a long time of and settles into silence. Everyone stands around for a few moments, kind of awe inspired by their own success in such a fight. Finally, Barry starts to stack up the dead and the moment of silence is broken.

The Bore Hole:

It is disturbing to say the least. The hole is small and disappears into the mountain and despite the fact that they saw lurks stuffing sacks into the hole, the hole is empty. Deep within the mountain there is a ruddy glow, as if from a fire and the hole seems to be breathing. Hot, fetid air puffs out of the end.

David: “Is anyone else worried that Lurks were feeding a hole in a mountain?”

Ash; “This is too much like the Tree, only cleaner. I don’t like it.”

Both look at Ragnall, expecting him to have all of the knowledge. He makes a show of thinking it through, rubbing the stubble on his chin as he paces back and forth and stares at the hole. Finally, he stops acting.

Ragnall: “I have no idea what they were doing. Something is alive within the mountain and they were feeding it. Killing them was probably a really good thing, cause I’m sure if they kept feeding this thing it would eventually wake up and we’d have a bigger problem. Maybe we should visit our friend the Sage, he knows much more than I. We could probably ask him about the Deep Ones and this how Eire thing as well.”

And with that… Act 9 comes to an end. The longest day of fighting in a very long time. [Literally that lurk fight was 3 pages of notes with hundreds of them battling back. It took hours of game time but I will not bore you with wonton slaughter.]