Having arrived at the Rusty Anchor, Lucius informed the party that the boat that was picking him up should hopefully arrive in the next day or two. He paid for rooms for everyone to spend the night there, as well as providing food and drink for the group. Folbys played some music and got some silver for his efforts. Upon seeing this, Dirtnap decided to try and put on a show of his own. Doing a series of one armed push ups and a few lunges, the people in the Rusty Anchor gave him some strange looks. Freya, the barmaid, laughed at him and warned that he probably shouldn't do that again. She did however give him a free pint for the entertainment!
As the afternoon wore on, and it started to get dark outside, Norris noticed that the number of guards on watch and patrolling around were slowly increasing. He also noticed that they all seemed to be wearing some kind of whistle around their necks. Norris, Kevin and Kronos took it upon themselves to ask some of the guards what the whistles were for. The guards informed them that they were used to signal that they were under attack, as Brightwall often found itself being attacked by undead, and that the frequency of attacks had been increasing of late. Upon hearing this, Folbys asked Freya if she knew anything else about this, and as a result discovered that there were rumours of a band of orcs to the North that from all accounts appeared to worship undead.
Shortly after, the sound of whistles could be heard from outside. Two militia men who were in the tavern made their way outside to offer assistance, telling the people inside to remain where they are for their own safety. Not long after, the sound of whistles and combat subsided. All seemed to be calm, and everyone in the bar continued with their drinks. There was a scream from one side of the tavern, as a shadowy figure stepped through the tavern wall and struck a patron, knocking him to the floor unconscious. The whistling outside resumed, this time it seemed to be much more energetic and frantic.
Waves of undead assailed the tavern from all sides, two shadowy creatures appeared through the walls, one of them managing to strike Folbys with a solid blow, draining his strength in the process. Zombies came through a number of the doors, and Freya joined in the combat - all time shouting to the people who were normal townsfolk to hide in the back room of her tavern. Norris blasted one of the shadowy creatures with radiant magic, destroying it in an eerie puff of black smoke. Folbys did much the same to the other shadowy creature, using dissonant whispers to psychically obliterate the create where it floated menacingly.
The fight was going fairly well, but the zombies were very resilient and didn't seem to want to go down, no matter how much they were hit. The group thought they were winning, but then another wave of undead emerged from the pool in the middle of the tavern. Six skeletons, along with what appeared to be a much more intelligent and fast moving form of undead. "It's a Ghoul!!" shouted Irina "Don't let it hit you with it's claws, it's really bad!"- the warning was heeded by all and things got serious.
Sephiroth finally got a zombie to the floor, to cheers from his companions. Dirtnap followed up quickly with a couple of massive blows that knocked two more of them to the floor. Norris smashed a skeleton to bits with his mace. Things were looking up! Then disaster struck - it seemed the gods did not smile upon the tavern in the following moments, as a number of hard hits, from zombies and skeletons alike, smashed damage in to the whole party. Everyone was injured and it was again looking like this was not going to end well. Freya used her magic to try and keep everyone alive, the radiance emanating from her and settling on everyone in the room. Despite the healing, the fight continued to go against them. Kronos and Sephiroth fell to hideous blows, forcing Irina and Norris to use their magical powers to save their lives using words of healing.
Dirtnap and Kevin smashed another 2 zombies to the floor, Irina stood toe to toe with a skeleton, and Norris found himself flanked by two of them. Sephiroth, seeing the battle slipping away from them reached in to his bags, and in an act of desperation threw a bomb in to the middle of the fight. Luck was not on their side, as all of the undead in the bombs area appeared to survive undamaged. Kevin was struck by a foul blow, knocking him to the floor, causing Dirtnap to become enraged and smash the skeleton that delivered the blow in to a pile of bones.
The situation was dire, so Freya took a drastic measure. Reaching in to her cloak, she retrieved a golden orb and appeared to utter some kind of celestial words. The orb began to glow brightly, and a wave of bright radiant energy rippled across the room. It cured the wounds of the living, whilst doing damage to the undead - destroying what was left of them. Freya fell to the floor and didn't seem to be in a good way - Norris rushed over to help her so that she did not bleed to death.
And that, was where we left it...
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