The Merchant’s Escape & the Empty Village

Ahhhh, THE DEMON BUNNY FELL!

Hugh’s warhammer CRUSHED the infernal rabbit into goo! But greater treachery awaited!

Our heroes attempted NEGOTIATION! Jotaro punched through Aldric’s window! The merchant offered terms! Claiming that they it was all just a misunderstanding! And that they had gotten off on the WRONG FOOT! Shakoom responded with a booming voice SHOOK THE WAGON demaind that Aldric STEP OUT AND TALK!

Aldric confessed that he was just a DISTRIBUTOR! That his supplier was downstream and to ask who inherited the Burgermeister’s research when he died! Ask who received equipment from LEPIDSTADT! Ask who has a laboratory in a river village!”

But Hugh grew SUSPICIOUS! He swung his warhammer—SHATTERING THE WAGON DOOR!

Inside, Aldric’s expression changed—cold, clinical, resolved! He pressed a button and shouted: “I will NOT be put up with this anymore! I shall END this charade of COMMERCE!”

THE WAGON EXPLODED!

Fire! Splinters! Alchemical smoke in violet and green! A crater FIVE FEET DEEP! Jotaro’s Shining Fist scooped snow and tossed it onto the burning wreckage in in SUPER SPEED MODE!

But Aldric was GONE! But Shakoom detected residual magic—TELEPORTATION CIRCLES burned into the wagon’s floorboards! This is how the merchant had ESCAPED amid the flaming doom the explosion!

When our heroes searched the wreckage! They found A TRADING ROUTE MAP with villages marked and crossed off on it. Notes reading “137 of 137 subjects infected, only three resistant—primary phase COMPLETE!” Along with six surviving tonics and extracts and a wax seal bearing insignia of a SKULL OVER CROSSED KEYS!

Now, the village Nová Zem stood SILENT AND EMPTY! Only one building showing signs of life. For its chimney smoked with sparks of gold, violet, and green! Inside the Last Hearth tavern, our heroes met GRIESEL—a RAUCH FEEN, a fey chimney sweep bound to the various hearths for FOUR HUNDRED YEARS and to this one for the last 10 YEARS!

The ancient fey told them everything! That a man in a festival wagon sold tonics six weeks ago! The folk grew STRONGER—then WRONG! Eyes went flat! Skin unhealthy! Always SMILING no matter what! Then the mist rolled in and they WALKED INTO IT—answering a call only they could hear!

Griesel named what they had become—LEBENDTOD! Living dead who don’t know they’ve died! And he shared their weakness: That they could not bear to look upon their reflection.”For it SHOWED them what they had become and wakes them from the NIGHTMARE of undeath for a moment or two.

Our heroes left Griesel and explored further in the silent and empty vilalge! In a storehouse they found six empty tonic bottles, instructions written in chalk on the table they sat. Stating to take one spoonful in the morning, one spoonful evening, DO NOT STOP. Along with finding a SPIRAL BURNED INTO THE FLOORBOARDS radiating necromantic dreamlands energy!

In another cottage they found EVERY MIRROR COVERED with blankets that were NAILED up to PERMANENTLY cover them! The victims eventually knew what was happening—and tried to hide from their own reflections!