Tilia’s Field Notes: Standing Stone Tunnels

Observations on the way to the standing stones, along the main road:

• Usual songbirds and “small woodland creatures” including squirrels, chipmunks, and a cottontail rabbit
• Seemed like there was something moving on the mountains above us, but never got a good view, much like the elusive creature in the forest

Observations in the dwarven tunnels beneath the standing stones:

• Reanimated skeleton warriors, 5, which our party quickly dispatched through rough blows
• A series of sarcophagi sized for dwarves and elves, occupied
• A mummy interred in one of the sarcophagi, loosed because one of our party was convinced live persons were trapped within, despite clear indications of necromancy around us

Our strategy for handling the creature released from the sarcophagus was deeply flawed. Our inexperience maximized our vulnerability, and after I cast a spell to create a bonfire beneath it, the mummy’s blow knocked me out. The last thing I saw before losing consciousness was its desiccated fist.

Our trusty paladin and one of our clerics came to my rescue, but all is not well, as it was after tending our injuries following prior encounters. The undead creature’s fetid blow left a blackened wound on my arm where I’d raised it in self-defense, the veins connecting to the adjacent brachial artery blackened along with it as the necrosis started to spread. My head is… not right… and the flesh is literally rotting off my arm.

It is terrifying. I have never seen anything like this undead rot when observing decomposing bodies as they fulfilled their final role in the ecosystem; the putrid aroma is suffocating. I believe that I have been infected with something grotesque and unnatural. This is no ordinary wound.

Although the party continues to chase muffled voices through the subterranean tunnels, like dogs with an awful undead bone, I fear we are no match for whatever lies behind the next door. And I am now a liability to the others. Another blow like the last could push me beyond the saving graces of spellcraft. I have retreated to the surface to tend my wounds, since it would take at least half our party to extract me from those narrow passages if I could not move on my own. I think I can still perform a healing spell to restore some of my energy, but after taking a moment to commune with nature, there was no restorative effect as there should be. I can no longer feel my left arm below the elbow. My body is heavy and weak, and my mind grows clouded.