Sovereign Sojourn

Hey guys, I am super sorry. I was just out of town for the past week. Let me explain...   Okay so, my work occasionally requires me to leave town to meet with clients or to install equipment. Typically, this happens less than once every three months, most of my work is within driving distance. To make a long story short, I normally have a LOT of heads-up on when I am leaving town, but this time, due to another employee of the company pulling the infamous no-show for an important job, I got tagged and ended up leaving town the very next morning, no real warning at all. I regret that I simply didn't have the time while I was packing for this sudden trip to update you guys, something I thought about more than a few times while on the job... Anyways, my apologies, that's my bad. I sincerely regret the bait and switch there since we JUST started this session. Let me know where the interest level is at, I understand that an early interruption like this can really bum people out and I admit I now have to get reoriented and remember what I was planning here. xD But I am back in orbit for the foreseeable future. Again, truest apologies!  

Alruna's hand snapped back when the pendant was revealed, and she makes no move to grab it. The hiss of a rattlesnake escapes her lips. Indeed, she takes a small step back and places the hand once offered to the woman for comfort on her own stomach. She felt uneasy... sick, even. The pendant carried an ill omen upon it... and troublingly, it was not one which Alruna immediately recognized. Further, she watches with a hawk's unblinking gaze as Alfdis picks it up... almost as if she had expecting something to happen when he touched it. She furrowed her brow, thinking hard. She was troubled by her own ignorance. She didn't recognize the image on the face of the article, but she knew the sense of foreboding in the back of her mind as well as she knew the songs of her clan. Something truly wretched had happened in these lands. In her internalized mysticism, she seemingly rather forgot the old woman, slowly backing away in a transfixed haze as the others tended to her bedding. She nods and moves to leave without another word, lost in thought, reclaiming her elk antler helm and following after Alfdis... after the pendant...

The wooden beam shatters at the subtle empowered touch of the foxes nose, instantly relieving the pressure on the woman's neck. She's able to push the rest of the wreckage off of herself and runs to assist the others. Rising to your collective feet, the five of you gather in the now ruined courtyard out front of what used to be the Grand Lodge of the Pathfinders. The bolt of molten terror had done a real number on the Lodge, collapsing the roof and multiple walls across the entire complex. Flames and smoke rise up high above the City. The woman who had emerged from the rubble stowed a sword on her hip, re-attached a steel shield to her forearm with a hard snap of it's leather bindings. She looked around at the wreckage as if she wasn't quite sure any of it was real. Green Cloaked Knight   "That was... th-thank you. Little... fox? I... Gods this is horrible..." But her quandary at being saved by a small mammal in the midst of sudden apocalypse was interrupted by another scream and a series of muffled shouts... ...from within the Pathfinder Lodge! "...We have to help them!" The green-cloak woman shouted. She didn't wait - she charged towards the front door and began to slam her shield against the twisted wood, once a passage way but now an obstacle between her and the victims she meant to save.     Even as she worked, another knight clad in shining armour rides past the complex, driving their steed so fast that they looked a blur. In their hand, a horn blasts a specific series of long and short callsKnowledge (Local) or similar roll to determine if you recognize the specific pattern of horn blasts.. After a moment, one, two, three, four more knights blast past the Lodge as well, following hard after the horn-bearer. Soon, the hooves clattering vanishes into the miasma of agonized sounds now emanating from Absalom. Beyond, you can hear what sounds like a thousand people shouting a thousand different terrified and wishful hopes to the Gods. You're keenly aware that the City just past your eye-sight must be gripped by total chaos. Horn-bearer Knight  

Alruna's eyes sweep back and forth over the broken woman, then up to the ceiling, then the eastward wall, then back to the woman. She looked to Hjarlof and gave a small, subtle shake of her head. Nothing. She focused on the wounds... started looking closer at the woman herself rather than the weave between them... looked into her teary eyes and then down to her thinning body... But then, it wasn't magic that caught the young shaman's eye. She restrained a gasp of surprise, and considered how she might move forward without upsetting the woman any further. After some consideration, she reaches up and removes her elk-antler helm, placing it on a side table. Alruna moves to the woman and motions to Ranulf, bidding caution, implying that he take great care in trying to move her. To Alruna's mind, she wasn't quite sure what might "set her off". But he was correct - there was no telling how long she had been here laying in her own filth. Hjarlof had at least been able to lay a hand on her shoulder, and so she took a similar tact. She reaches down and gingerly places her hand on the woman's wrist, not grasping but simply a gentle touch. She carried on where Hjarlof left off, speaking slow and soft; "...fréowíf, we have come here to put a stop to the wickedness, Odin willing. We need your help. Please... do you mind telling us... ...what it is that you have in your hand?"  

I did not see your message, which is weird. No notification? Hm. Umm... I can go check, I think I have an old account I can recover. But I mean... I'm not likely to check it any more or less often than Myth-Weavers and I'm not like, "trained" to check Discord every day, it's not something I am used to using at all. So hopefully I won't forget? I will check and see if I can find the log-in...  

The dwelling before them sets the wyrd-weaver's hair on end. A sense of foreboding nearly upsets Alruna's careful serenity, but she growl's a low wolf-call and grits her teeth through the uncertainty. Alruna's nostrils flare as she enters the pitch blackness of the make-shift infirmary. Before her, a sad scene unfolds as her eyes adjust to the absence of proper light. She makes no move to directly confront the woman, and steps to the side of the bed opposite Hjarlof. She remained silent, her eyes snapping up to the unexpected sound of song escaping the skald's lips. Alruna watches Hjarlof with the quiet intent of a student, unable to fully mask the wonderment in her own eyes as his song brought comfort, seemed to quiet the harshness of the stench, made the room seem just a little less dark and dreary. Be this seiðr, too? Or merely her own playful imagination? Alruna "listens" for some trace Odin's presence even as her eyes sweep over the elder, her true focus on the detection of any malign influence or unwelcome spirits casting ill omens or sickness over the woman.       seiðr Casting Orison "Detect Magic". 1st Round: Presence or absence of magical auras.  

  Oh I am 100% on board with your vision for magic in this low-magic setting. Alruna's "magic" carries little to no visual cues, she enters trances, recites incantations, creates wards against evil spirits that include odd little physical totems and decorations she might hang off her comrade's clothing. It's also my intent with her selection of spells and hexes, all of which are designed to inspire her allies to greatness and make her foes terrified beyond comprehension. The most magical thing about her might be her Contact Entity ability, which is meant to represent her ability to ask questions of the Norn. Not something she's likely to even do unless the situation turns more dire and again, mostly a ritual/trance situation.

Alruna's initial reaction would be to start trying to discern if she is still under a malign influence a.k.a., Detect Magic. I don't actually have her built as a healer but as a buffer/debuffer, so not much she can do beyond granting her a single temporary hit point... which might make her feel better? More potent healing may be in order, but Alruna cannot help Hjarlof.

You're good. @TheFred get in here we are throwing a dungeons and dragon party. Dragon's already here. Dungeon incoming!!!! :)

  ...my regrets deepen. Let's just be clear, this is neither Nicol Bolas... nor a keeper of dragonballs. xD Hahaha.

So funny enough, I chose this dragon more because of the way he looks than anything else. Also I guess because sub-consciously I associated Bolas with "above average intelligence dragon", which... I've said too much.

Perception check: Success! Almost immediately, someone cries out; one of the other Pathfinder initiates you had been standing beside prior to the attack screams for help... ...beneath the rubble of the collapsed eastern wall. You can even see her; an Elven Knight of some order, whose forest green robes, adorned with silver and golden filigree stuck in your memory, now just barely visible beneath crisscrossing wooden beams and fragmented stone-work. She's pinned against the ground but also against the base of the collapsed wall, her neck bent at an awkward and horrible-looking angle... and she clearly struggles to move at all. But when she speaks, you realize that by some stupid luck that her injuries are not so severe - her voice is strong and clear, but afraid and partially choked off by the support beam leaning hard against her face and the side of her neck. "...H-here! Help! Please! I'm... I think I'm bleeding! Please, help me!!" she cries out, clearly terrified, in pain, and on the edge of full panic.

I was hoping against hope that no one would recognize him haha.

That is my reading. Also the old-school D&D nerd in me is wondering why this negative energy doesn't heal undead...? I thought about it, this lies outside of what I'm hoping for at game start. However, your "wish list" has been updated. :) The DM giveth generously, even as he taketh away.

Hush you, I couldn't find a cooler looking dragon. 😅 Yes, I will waive this prerequisite. It's not REALLY a high psionics game per se, but I also sort of view this as a feat tax so, yeah.