[Gardens of Ynn] Session 2 – Lost in Ynn

The Ultraviolet Grasslands-isms here are because I ran Gardens of Ynn as an intro to a UVG campaign, as well as to introduce the players to the system we'd be using: Knave with GLOG classes and some house rules for good measure. It's a messy work in progress.

Dramatis Personae

• Limon Field. Lime nomad Steppelander climate migrant. Fled to the Yellowlands during a great drought where he trained as a showfighter in a traveling circus.
• "Mercutio Coffeeya" Grove. Grapefruit nomad Steppelander Coffee-maker. A trained Black Gold industrialist from a clan of coffee-middlemen. Has a secret.
• Astia Rudeni. Dwarf Decapolitan Ambassador Biomancer. Learned Flesh-crafting at the Cobalt Ziggu-Rot where he was later appointed Ambassador, as a Dwarf holds higher standing in the Decapolis than the degenerate Bluelanders.

A Routine Trade Visit

On a regular, perfectly normal trade mission to the Purple University, Astia and a handful of Bluelander lackeys found themselves roped into an expedition. You see, cadavers don't come cheap, and the Ziggu-Rot's coffers aren't exactly overflowing. So in exchange for a few wheelbarrows full of dead bodies, Astia and crew agreed to explore an extra-dimensional anomaly.

Everything Was Going Fine Until They All Died

Whereas Finn, OG, Limon, and Mercutio had entered through the doorway into a copse of trees by a mausoleum, Astia and crew were deposited into an herb garden. Deciding it was best not to touch anything, they ventured forth and stumbled upon a gazebo within which rested a brazier. So long as a fire burned in this brazier, nothing could enter the gazebo without their permission, so they burned firewood to keep out the gnats and bats as they slept. This evidently irked a nearby Gardener Golem whose twisted, hulking form of interlocking petrified wood lumbered up and slashed one of the Bluelanders' throats with a giant, sharpened trowel. The others, including Astia, fled the scene, running blindly deeper into the Gardens.

Enter Limon and Mercutio

The two Steppelanders found themselves stranded in the floating cemetery on hovering, individual grave plots, inexplicably separated from Finn and OG. Hopping from plot to plot over the infinite, yawning blue abyss, they came across Astia, at the time engrossed in deciphering the ancient language comprising the tombstones' epitaphs. On a solid-land cliff opposite Astia rested a 10-foot-tall person made of wood sitting in a meditative pose and clutching a great, sharpened trowel. The Gardener Golem had followed Astia to the floating graveyard and now moved only to clear the occasional weeds or detritus from the Gardens. After a brief yet risky inspection of the golem, Limon decided it was best to leave the thing alone and try to find a different way back to the door (as they were all now thoroughly lost). The newly-formed group traveled elseways to a new destination.

The Shooting Range

They arrived at a finely manicured lawn with stakes driven into one end. Tied to these stakes were human skeletons, killed by gun or crossbow fire judging from the injuries. At the other end of this range, curiously, was a black, wrought iron lamppost. It was identical to the lamppost in the clearing at the mausoleum, but its candle was lit this time. Limon and Mercutio had little time to scratch their heads at this, however, as from the nearby shrubs emerged three beasts with the bodies and faces of wolves but the heads, necks, and antlers of elk. The two elk-wolves in front parted to reveal the third limping, with blood matted to the fur of its leg.

The group managed to keep the aberrant animals calm while extracting what turned out to be a rose vine from the injured one's front leg. Its thorns had grown long and worm-like, reaching deep within the elk-wolf, not unlike Chancellor Kevin's warning. Astia tasted the blood of this creature and confirmed it was a chimera, though in addition to elk and wolf, there was a third type of blood that couldn't be so easily identified. On a whim, Limon asked if the creatures could help them find their way back to the entrance, and with a knowing nod, the elk-wolves lead the party off-trail through the woods to a statuary.

Bees in the Trap

The elk-wolf chimera left, refusing to enter the rows of meticulously sculpted marble statues in the style of antiquity. Flowers of tarnished silver grew naturally here, adding an ethereal beauty to contrast the pained, anguished, and horrified expressions of a disconcerting number of these statues. Weary of boring old statues of conventionally attractive, physically fit men and women, our heroes sought out an unconventional likeness, and after scanning dozens of rows, found one: a corpulent man with an engorged member, face immortalized in an expression combining fear and happiness. Further inspection reveal the statue was hollow, so they smashed it and out poured bees!

Angry as hell, the bees attacked, but not before the soporific effect of their hive's wax took effect: Mercutio's meticulous disguise melted away, revealing that he had been Marceline, a 16-year-old girl, the entire time! Limon bashed with a dagger-axe, Astia flung arrows of acid from their flesh-toaster, Marceline loosed arrows of normal from her bow, and before too long the apian adversaries had been annihilated.

Shocked and exhausted, the trio set up camp to prepare for the Ynnian half-day "night."