The week I’m going to continue the adventure. I had hoped to be able to knock this out in two posts but it looks like it’s going to be 3. If you missed part 1, you may find it here.

I will pick up were we left off last week with covering the remaining areas that the party may want to visit. As a result of their investigations, it is likely the adventurers will zero in on the ruins of Kelthura as a likely location to search for the beast.

Kelthura was an ancient city nestled at the foot of the mountains to the northeast. Little is known of the peoples who once lived there, though local legends claim that they were practitioners of dark magic. The ruins themselves are largely shunned by the locals and have gradually been swallowed up by the marsh over the years.

Location #3 Anya Ivanova’s Foraging Spot

If the party should inquire about Anya Ivanova, the villagers will be able to direct them to where her body was found.  The most recent victim, her remains were recovered 3 days ago. She was found in the woods, a little over two miles from the village and across a small stream. Luckily she was known to often forage for mushrooms and herbs in the area or it may have taken much longer to find her.

Arriving on the scene, the party will note signs of a recent disturbance at the location (marked with a #3 on the map). The earth is upturned and a few broken twigs and crushed leaves are scattered around. The area is surrounded by tall trees, their branches creating a canopy overhead, filtering the sunlight, and casting the forest floor in a dappled light.

Off to the side of the clearing, the party spots a large, flat rock. As they approach, they see that it’s been defaced with a chilling message. Scrawled in a deep red color, clearly blood, are the letters “Kel…” before the message trails off. It is possible that villagers may provide the party with this clue without them venturing out to the location themselves. However, without any of the other clues, none of the villagers will be able to speculate as to what it means.

Location #4 The Berry Patch

The berry patch is where Valentyna Russoff caught a glimpse of the beast. Alongside Alexi’s farm, this area is well-maintained. Rows of trees and bushes are neatly arranged in the fertile soil. The air is thick with the sweet scent of ripe berries, and the sounds of buzzing bees and chirping birds can be heard all around.

As the party arrives on the scene they will notice a group of rough-looking men milling about in the patch. This is the group of outsiders who arrived in town last week. They brought with them the carcass of a giant wolf and attempted to claim the reward for killing the beast. When the mayor refused to pay, the group became disgruntled and unruly.

There is some room here to play this out at you like. It is certainly possible that this group of 5 ruffians won’t take kindly to the fact that the party has been “snooping” around town and possibly honing in on their quarry. If you need to kill some time, the outsiders could become belligerent and end up fighting the party right in the berry patch.

In the event that a fight does break out, the group will surrender as soon as the party starts to get the upper hand. This is just a group of random thugs and they will not be prepared to go toe to toe with an equipped adventuring party.

Whether there is an altercation or not, this encounter is here to give you the ability to pass extra information on to the party as needed. If you are short on time and need to keep things clipping along, these fellows could pass along the clues found at any of the other sites. This could be done as an apology for getting involved in a skirmish or in hope of getting a few coins from the thankful adventurers.

Back to the Village?

To keep this as simple as possible there are 3 main clues the party might uncover while they investigate sites related to the attacks. Any other these on their own aren’t going to be enough to tip the party off in any particular direction. However, should the party inquire about the clues with the villagers, a clear picture will start to form that it would be wise to head to the ruins of Kelthura.

• The reddish mud found at location #1: Villagers with outdoorsy type occupations will be able to point out that mud resembling this is common in the marshy areas at the foot of the mountains to the northeast.

• The pendant with the strange rune found at location #2: Old-timers will recognize the rune as coming from an ancient people who resided in a city named “Kelthura”. The ruins of Kelthura are actually located roughly 5 miles to the northeast. What they won’t realize is the fact that the pendant had been around the beast’s neck. Lawrence managed to rip it off during the struggle.

• “Kel…”: The letters that Anya scrawled won’t mean much to anyone on their own. However, combined with either of the other two clues, the connection may be made that perhaps she was trying to write “Kelthura”. As someone who would often lose herself in her forest wanderings, Anya was known to sometimes venture to the ruins. Why she would choose to communicate the name of these ancient ruins would still be a bit of a mystery.

Armed with these bits of information it is likely that the party will want to know more about the ruins of Kelthura. If they conclude their investigations and are still not drawn to the ruins, I suggest having the beast make another attack on one of the outlying villagers. This will allow the adventurers to get to the scene while it is still fresh and find fresh tracks that will lead them to Kelthura.

To be continued!

That’s going to do it for me for this week. In my next post I’ll uncover the beast itself, describe the ruins of Kelthura, and provide a number of unanswered questions to hopefully spark ideas for your campaign.

In the meantime if you’d like to check out any other maps with plot hooks I’ve collected them here.

Hello future people! I’ve completed part 3 and you may find it here!

Thank you for reading and have a great week!