I was dead.I knew I was dead as soon as I felt the hot caress of that foul creature’s claw on my neck. Intense pain and then nothing. The council woman and the two guards who I hoped to defend were now on their own. My body fell to the floor and my spirit kept going through the Astral plane to the path of Pharasma, Lady of the Graves.

I was standing in a graveyard with mounds of fresh earth stretching off in all directions. Aborez. The one graveyard where everyone who ever died or will ever die has a mound.Not their bones though. This is more like the place where their body fell in time. Or at least that is what Pharasma scholars believe. A bookmark in time. As I looked around I saw other people moving about. Merchants, peasants, soldiers. People from all walks of life and from all parts of the world. They all come here to be judged and sent to their final rest, but without a guide they can wonder the mounds for years.

I felt a weight on my hip and pulled out my dagger. Her dagger. I un-clipped the end of the leather thong and let the weight of the dagger fall, trailing out about two feet of leather cord. The dagger swung freely at the end of the thong. The other end held firmly in my hand.The thong was a fixed to the dagger in such a way that when it was held this way the blade and handle balanced and would end up parallel to the ground slowly spinning like a lodestone pointing north. This however pointed the way to the start of the spiral path to the boneyard and Pharasma’s seat of Judgement.

All true followers of Pharasma carried her talisman just for this moment. We were guides in life and now we had to be guides in death. The blade glowed pale white of old bone and stopped spinning pointing the way. Moving carefully not do step on the mounds I moved over to nearest other person and beckoned them to follow. He was dressed in the armor and colors of Taldan with a device pained on his shield proclaiming he had participated in the Shinning Crusade against the Whispering Tyrant some seven hundred years before. Scholars claim time passes normally in this realm but is unimportant to the shades who are residing here, but that soldier took one look at my dagger and followed me gratefully.
I moved down a row of mounds to a young girl who had a small bundle cradled in her thin arms. From her appearance I would said her baby and she died of starvation. Her clothes and lack of shoes proclaimed her a peasant from Ustalov. Reaching out I touched her and got her attention. There was not so much a sense of touch than a sense of pressure when my had got close to her arm. She looked at me blankly and then looked at the dagger and nodded and turned to follow me.

This continued for several hours as I moved about picking up people and working our way toward the spiral path. My mind could sense the passage of time but it had no concern. I did not breath, I had no heartbeat. I did not feel tired or hungry, happy or sad. I just felt the passage of time. I realized that time also flowed toward the spiral. That it was just as mortal as I and would eventually end in Pharasma’s boneyard too.Such a thought was humbling. Pharasma was the end of all things even existence itself.If this was the case then why did she worry about a few souls who avoided her accounting for awhile?

I was pondered this and other things as i moved across the endless mounds toward my Lady’s Spiral when I spied a most curious scene. A flock of whippoorwills were diving and darting at someone on one of the mounds. This person seemed different than others I had seen, more substantial. He was also damaging one of the mounds. Noe else I had seen had even touched one of the mounds but this person was digging into the mound as fast as possible while snarling and snapping at the birds.

As I moved closer I could see he was a man of some means. His Jacket and trousers were made of velvet sown with seed pearls and small gemstones. His boots were of the finest calfskin and of excellent make. He was obviously a nobleman from Caliphas but why was he digging in a mound I did not know.The birds had caused quite a bit of damage to him but he continued to furiously dig. I saw a cut through his neck so I knew he had been beheaded and then I saw his forehead clearly when he raised up his head trying to drive off the whippoorwills from his back and neck. He had the symbol of Pharasma cut into his flesh and the mark smoked and bubbled.This was one of the more powerful undead that preyed upon our world. A lich or vampire and it was fighting to return.

As I walked up to him he sensed me and lifted his head and hissed, his fangs dripped with blood and saliva. In the real world I would have never stood a chance against such a powerful creature, but here, in this realm I was the more powerful. reached out with my hand and chains rushed out of my palm wrapping the creature up so it could not attack or continue to dig. I then turned and continued to walk toward the spiral way my flock following me and the last being pulled along behind still attached to my hand by the mystic chains.

We walked thus for two more days accumulating lost souls and guiding them to the stair. Sometime on the third day I noticed a change to the landscape. We were several feel higher than the surrounding terrain. We were finally on the Spiral. I looked around but could not see a difference but as I continued to advance the mounds slowly fell away below us and ahead I could just make out the spiral, winding upward also ahead I could see two clerics of Pharama standing on the spiral as if awaiting for us. When I reached them the one on the left held up his hand to stop me and the one on the right reached out and took the chains from my hand and dragged the creature forward while beckoning the others of my temporary flock to follow him. He then lead them on up the path while the other kept me from following. Once they were gone he pointed at my dagger and I could see it was just slowly spinning and the glow had faded from its surface. I looked back up to him for guidance when he suddenly pushed me and I fell off the spiral to plummet into the mounds below. The ground rushed up and swallowed me and then with a shock I woke up back in my own body with the old cart-worn face of Father Grimburrow and a beautiful older woman I did not know.

Since my return I feel different. My fear of water is gone. I still remember my dear sweet Elinor being pulled in to the well by that monster and then seeing its baleful eye looking at me from the depths when I rushed up to cry out her name, but now that nameless dread of the black mire is no more. Water is just water and that monster just got away and all I can do is to try and prevent other Elinor’s from dying.

One thing that bothers me about the whole ordeal is that during the time I was in the realm of Pharasma the only people I saw were either Ustavian or had something to do with the Whispering way. Was this some sort of message that The Lady of the Graves was passing to me, and why do I feel that just before I reached back to my body that some nameless dread had reached out of the void between the stars and tried to snare me with a loathsome tentacle.

While the main group was at the graveyard, there was a knock at the door to the Manor. As it was midnight, I answered it with weapon drawn. Outside the door was a Skeleton. I closed the door to allow Kendra to get away. I then opened the door, channeled energy , destroying it. Meanwhile, the rest of the group just got out the crypt, and as they were assessing themselves 3 more skeletons attacked. Delilah was able to use her disrupt undead spell, and Brennig opened a can on the skeletons killing them. The group then headed back to the manor. The spell casters tried to get some sleep but were awoken by the Sheriff coming to ask why we were at the graveyard. As our spell casters were needing sleep, we sent Brennig. This was a bad idea. The sheriff saw through the bluff and proceeded to ‘encourage’ us to go meet with the Father. Gregori repeated our story, and after the Good father seriously failed his sense motive check, the father believed our story. However, we have lost trust in the town.

From there the group proceeded to spread out to take care of various things. Tyrod and Gregori went to the church to get healing for Tyrod’s ability damage. Thankfully we had the coin to get him healed. The church offered to give Tyrod a 50% discount if he served on the Nightwatch. When the sheriff heard about it he was not pleased, to say the least. The rest of us went to the tavern to gather information. We came up with a few rumors and the name of the other person who was attacked the previous night (19th). Given the information we found, I went off to see if I could get information from the town hall, it was locked up but I would need to talk to one of the Councilmen to get access. I traveled to his home and was able to speak with him. He was inclined to help, but I rolled terribly on my diplomacy roll, and he couldn’t help us right now. So far we have tried to get information from the church and was shot down. We tried town hall and were shot down. Both of those were due to low trust score and bad diplomacy rolls. The last option we have is to get our information from the mages school in town. It was suggested that those of us who would be willing, become teachers at the school. That would give us free access to the library, and gain us some trust with the town [This never happened].

Also, we started working with the Sanity checks this week. We found Tyrod had a sanity threshold of 1. Because of that, he developed a psychosis [ madness]. He now has night terrors. Thankfully one of my powers allows me to remove fatigue 6 times a day. If he wants to get rid of it one of the party members must counsel him for a week. (If I remember correctly, but it is in the wiki).

Let me know if I missed anything. This is from memory, not notes.

Gregori was looked shocked at the condition of his brother, Tyrod, as he came limping out of the graveyard.

“Gods what happened? Were you attacked in the crypt?” Gregori asked hurrying over to help Tyrod sit down before his brother could collapse. Gregori could see several punctures in his brother’s clothes with a bit of blood seeping out, and upon closer inspection the wounds looked red and puffy around the edges.

Olivia stepped forward and carefully examined the wounds and after a few moments pronounced it was poison. A poison that effected Tyrod’s motor functions. It did not seem to be permanent but he would have trouble doing any fine motor skills for a week or so.

Tyrod gave his usual cheeky smirk and told us about his escape from five large bugs that had surprised him while he was in the crypt, but that he had also found the cachet of supplies that had been mentioned In Lorimor’s journal. Even though he was badly wounded he was all for going back to recover them. So were the rest of us. It might be dangerous but we were going to need those supplies.

Gods his brother almost died right there. Never again would Gregori sit back and let Tyrod go into some unknown hole in the ground without himself being close by. They may have their issues but Tyrod was Gregori’s brother and he would hate to lose him.

Going back through the break In the wall of the church graveyard the four of them made their way as quietly as possible back to the crypt that Tyrod had gone into, and while Tyrod kept watch Brennig, Delilah, and Gregori crept inside keeping a sharp look out for the bugs that they knew were some place inside.

It was very dark as only a crypt on a near moonless night can be, and spooky. The air was cold and still and smelled of leaf rot and moldy stone. Lighting a torch and closing the door Gregori stayed back as Delilah and Brennig moved forward to carefully examine the area.

The dust on the floor had been recently churned up from Tyrod’s previous visit but there was not a sound other than the party’s own movements and breathing. As Brennig and Delilah moved past some pale stone statuary of a weeping woman, Brennig suddenly stopped and turned to face the wall beside the small statue and pointed out a small cleft in the stone somewhat hidden by the angle of the statue. As we listened we could hear a faint slithering in the dark hole.

Delilah checked the area around her statue and Gregori moved forward to support Brennig. Brennig hefted his huge ax and waited to see if the creatures would come out. Delilah did not see any opening around her statue and stated moving down the steps into the main crypt over toward the coffin.

Out of the crack in the wall popped out the head of a grotesque creature. Hugh mandibles arced out from its head and its large compound eyes gleamed in the groups torch held in Gregori’s hand. Before the monstrosity could do more than stick its head out, Brennig slashed down with his ax and with a wet thunk split the creatures head open. Its companions came boiling out of the hole and attacked Brennig with a singleness of purpose. Their segmented bodies twisting and writhing, as they reached with their black, dripping, mandibles.

Gregori reached out with his mace and struck one of the creatures a wound and Delilah looked on with a worried frown upon her lips as she looked for an opening with her crossbow. Brennig slashed again with his ax, his eyes open very wide and gleamed manically, spittle started forming on his lips. His ax just missed one of the hideous beasts and took out a chunk of masonry. Then he growled in pain as one of the beast struck with its mandibles digging deeply into his leg.

Gregori struck one of the creatures, crushing its body with his mace and Brennig whipped his ax around so hard it cleaved one of the creatures in half and sent it body parts arcing halfway across the room. Spaying blood and ichor on the walls and everyone around. The last creature struggled to crawl out of the hole and missed with its attack, it seemed confused with all the noise and lights, and Brennig chopped into it ending its existence.

The stench was sickening and a slow clacking sound could be heard from the creatures as they quivered in death. The party wasted no time getting to the coffin and throwing off the lid. Inside gleamed a wide assortment of useful items that they would need if the journal was to be believed.

The session picked up immediately after we rested for the night after session #0. During the night Olivia noticed something of a ruckus outside; however did not deem it worth investigating. The next morning we discovered that someone had vandalized the monument just outside of town. We split the party in an attempt to cover more ground. The clerics went and visited the church of Pharasma in an attempt to gain access to the death records from Harrowstone. They were not able to convince Father Grimburrow of the parties legitimate need for the records. While they spoke with the church rest of the party visited the monument. There wasn’t much information to be had at the monument, save for the fact that the vandalism had been completed with a copious amount of blood. After we finished at the monument we approached the outer wall of Harrowstone prison. While there we found the location that we believed that Professor Lorimor was killed, as well as some strange arcane runes around the outskirts of the prison. We then returned to the town and supped at the Laughing Demon Inn. We gathered a few small pieces of information, but nothing seemingly vital to the mysteries that keep popping up such as the ghost raven, or the morbid children’s song. We then devised a plan to break into the crypt in the Restlands in order to get the equipment we needed to explore Harrowstone. Brennig, Delilah, and Gregori distracted the Graveyard keeper while Tyrod broke into the crypt; however Tyrod discovered that the crypt had already been broken into by an unknown third party. While in the crypt he discovered a cache of hidden items, but was attacked by several large centipedes and was grievously injured. He managed to escape and rendezvous with the party. We then returned to the crypt while hiding from the grave keeper, and slew the centipedes. In the cache we found multiples items that seemed to be intended for ghost fighting. We once again escaped from the Restlands and that is where the session let off

Dearest Friend,

It is with great sadness that I must inform you of the sudden and tragic death of my father, Professor Petros Lorrimor. On the eighteenth day of Calistril, he is to be interred in the Restlands cemetary here in Ravengro, and he left special instructions asking for your attendance. He often told tales of the adventures he shared with you. Perhaps your presence can bring some peace in these troubled times.

Sincerely,

Kendra Lorrimor

Tales are told throughout Golarion of shadowy figures that lurk in dark corners, stories recounted at children’s bedsides feature bestial creatures that come out only when the moon is right, and fireside legends speak of otherworldly beings beyond reckoning, whose very existence is more than the human mind can bear to know. These are the legends that explain where the blood of the family cow went, and why clerics spend so much time ensuring the proper Pharasmin rites are observed at gravesites throughout the Inner Sea. One can write them off as simple, scary stories in Absalom or Westcrown, but in Ustalav, everyone knows the truth of the things that go bump in the night.

In the Carrion Crown Adventure Path, the horrors of the night become undeniably real as you undertake a journey that will decide the future of a nation.