PHASE 1 - TRAVEL TEIM
So, a recap from last time, folks. You all met up with lady springdew, you received inventory equivalents, and she said that you all had to leave for another town for the time being in order to take some of the heat off of them. she asks that you take a path behind the monastery, and she says that the journey should take you about five days to get to Helmsfield. Do any of you have other questions of her or the two drow people that brought you here, or would you like to just get travelling?
From behind the monastery you are able to see that about half a kilometre away there is a path that leads up north towards the mountains. After walking for about a day, you are able to come to the conclusion that the walk is not strenuous nor does it seem to be very dangerous. You pass through a couple of swaths of forest here and there, but more or less the path is clear and without danger. However, as you rest for the 2nd night in a swath of forest, I would like to know who is standing watch this evening.
[EVERYONE ON WATCH MAKES A PERCEPTION CHECK. They all just get a different color of cat if they see it].
[GIVE IT TO THEM ON A PIECE OF PAPER]
DC17 PERCEPTION - you see a [COLOUR] housecat staring at you from atop a tree. When you meet eyes with it, it bounds away.
DC3 NATURE OR DC3 WISDOM - housecats don't live in forests, you dingus.
DC13 WISDOM, PERCEPTION, OR INVESTIGATION - there aren't any houses or villages nearby for the cat to have escaped from.
Morning comes, and here again you have another opportunity. If you want to talk with one another, ask questions of one another, strategize, etc, but if you want, we can also cut to black to when you're on your final day.
PHASE 2 - Cohra Wolp
As you round a corner of a final forest at dusk on your 5th day of travel, you all smell something. Something foul. The town of Helmsfield is within view, but it is still to far away to make any details out. To the right of you you can see a quarry and behind the town you can see the Mountains of Indefinite Wanderers. However, there is a tang of something in the air. Can everyone please make a wisdom check for me?
[GIVE IT TO THEM ON A SEPARATE PIECE OF PAPER]
DC12 - You smell rotting corpses.
DC15 - You smell rotting corpses that have been left in the sun for a couple of days.
Those of you who have made the check, it is up to you whether or not you want to divulge that information, and whether or not you want to stop the group because of it.
~~~THEY APPROACH THE TOWN~~~
As you near the town, you all are starting to pick up on details that you didn't see from when you first turned the corner. First of all, you see blood. Lots of blood. Blood on walls, blood on doors, blood in the streets. And as you approach the street you begin to see what produces those foul odors. You see bodies. Bodies on bodies. It's not difficult to assume that literally the entire town has been slaughtered.
What would you like to do?
[IF INVESTIGATION CHECK DC13 you find that there are no drow corpses.]
DC10 investigation you are able to see that most of this town was populated by humans but there is a small spattering of dwarves around.
DC7 INVESTIGATION you find that while none of the homes are destroyed, you find evidence of breaking and entering. There's one house with its door smashed in where you find the corpses of a family at a dining table. Another with a shattered window and you find an adolescent dwarf killed in their own bed. The intent of the attackers clearly was to just kill everyone in the town, by whatever means possible.]
However, I would like for you all to make for me a perception check.
DC10 PERCEPTION - You hear a clanging, coming from somewhere in the town but you can't really pinpoint where. It's not terribly loud at the moment.
DC15 - AND You are able to tell that there are multiple sources of the clanging, coming from the east of town.
DC17 - AND You also hear the slap of bare feet on stone. You can't discern where it is coming from due to the clanging.
DC20+ - AND You are able to tell that the sound of bare feet is coming from the east end of town. The footsteps seem to be running.
[if they investigate the edges of town, they will find two cadaver collectors coming from the west. DC17 WISDOM to know what they are]
[if investigating the slap of bare feet they will find Cohra Wolp running from the east side of town. she will grab and pull at the pc's to attempt to yoink them over to a house northwest of the well in the main square. if she sees other pc's she will pull them too]
[if no pc's investigate her/none make the check to see her roll d(amount of pcs on east side of town) and have her run into them and try and pull them into the cellar, in the building northwest of the main square]
[if pc's try to fight the cadaver collectors, the constructs will yeet them for 1d6 bludgeoning damage upon the fall]
PHASE 3 - IN THE CELLAR
[so this bit is a smidge more abstract than the other bits. Cohra Wolp will try and keep them down in the cellar for the rest of the night.
BASEMENT: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ZNuGr2WZsKtnr4nvDm6xRrSyC0NeM63T/view?usp=sharing]
DC13 INVESTIGATION finds a stack of papers contracting the mining of crimson malachite in the mountains near the town. DC7 INVESTIGATION of the papers finds that they have been signed by someone named Lopigall Crownad and someone named Cecilia Pelopp. Nothing else can really be gleaned from the contract, as it appears to just be a mix of legal, formal, and mining jargon that doesn't really matter.
PHASE 4 - DEPARTURE
[again, a bit more abstract. Cohra Wolp will check to see if the coast is clear, and then she will lead the pcs out of the house. the cadaver collectors are gone, but so are all the bodies in the town. Cohra Wolp doesn't really make any moves to leave the town, and if the pc's try and convince her, she will be very unwilling to leave the town, but can be worn down. they should walk back to town and have no issues with doing so.