Part XI: The Horrors of Illmarsh

Hot on the trail of the dark riders, we ended up in the town of Thrushmoor, nestled on the edge of Avalon Bay.  We found out that the riders had changed horses here and then split up. No-one knew where one of them had gone, but the other was seen heading south, along the coast, towards the town of Illmarsh.

As we headed along the coast road, the sky darkened, and a storm began to brew. The waves smashed up against the road edge, and a light rain began to fall. Suddenly we noticed a fishing trawler caught among the waves. It seemed to have only one crewman, who was struggling earnestly to steer the ship safely towards a nearby dock. Without hesitation, Skalif took to the air and flew over to the ship, and with his knowledge of the sea, he managed to bring the ship into the dock without any damage.

The grateful man was a white-haired old man named Horace Croon. he told us that he had been testing his new invention - a craft able to traverse underwater - when the storm hit. The rest of the crew had jumped overboard, leaving him on his own. Once we were sure he was ok, we said our goodbyes and continued towards Illmarsh.

The villagers of Illmarsh were insular and suspicious of strangers (which is nothing new in Ustalav), and our enquiries soon came to the attention of the local mayor - Early Greedle. He told us that the local church to Gozreh (god of nature, weather and the sea), the Recondite Order of the Indomitable Sea, was up to something strange and sinister, and he wanted us to put a stop to their evil ways.

So, we investigated the church, and found some clerics who were definitely not happy to see us. We also discovered that the church was actually dedicated to a demon lord known as Dagon, god of evil sea creatures, and that Gozreh was just a cover. We also discovered several corpses of locals without their heads. My medical knowledge could tell that they hadn't been decapitated with a weapon, but more like ripped off.

We also found something disturbing about a tradition of Illmarsh. Every second and third daughter that a couple had was given up for fostering to people known simply as "the neighbours". No-one knew who these mysterious people were, but apparently the young girls fostered lived a life of luxury with the people, but were never seen again. In exchange, the neighbours made sure that the fishermen's nets were always full. And it was the church that dealt with all of this.

However, it seemed that the neighbours hadn't been seen for a while, so the leader of the church had gone to a ruined manor house in the nearby swamp called Undiomede House - the house of the original founding family of Illmarsh - where he could supposedly contact the neighbours.

At the ruined house, we encountered High Priest Voltiaro and his lackeys. As usual, none of them were happy to see us. Voltiaro put up a fight, but Ichabod's strong sword arm soon brought him down. Or so we thought. As the fatal blow struck, Voltiaro staggered backwards, and then, to our horror, his head exploded, and hundreds of writhing tentacles emerged from his neck. And he kept on fighting! When we finally defeated this nightmare, four of the tentacles detached themselves as large slug-like creatures that slithered off into the shadows. One of them latched on to the grizzly bear that Ferdibrand had summoned, and it began to burrow towards its brain. Fortunately, Ellavorn was able to remove it before it got there.

What was going on in Illmarsh? What was the tentacled horror and the slug things it became? We needed to explore the rest of the ruined manor to find out...