Welcome to Gaia! ::

((I'm going to take this as the cue to move on.))

You all walk in relative silence as you follow the trail. The combined light of the lantern and orb seem to hold the shadows at bay, and it seems the sky is finally content with the current level of darkness. The path begins to widen after an hour or so, and recent, heavy traffic is evident along the forest floor. As the path widens to about a dozen feet, the forest floor suddenly expands in all directions before you. Laying within the thick oaks is a broken, and obviously ancient ruin of a city. The thirty-some-odd buildings all seem to be made of stone, and most were well fitted enough to stand the ages. About a third of the buildings have collapsed in on themselves, but not a one is clear of the encroaching ivy and moss, making it seem as if the forest itself is trying to devour the place bit by ancient bit. Off to your left, almost twenty feet away, stands a large watchtower, etched in arcane runes similar to the ones on the body of the Tainted Mage. Beyond that, barely discernible in this light, is the cities graveyard. It lies still and quite, just like death should be. However, the serene beauty of the place is broken, as you notice that beneath the moss and ivy lay the bodies of the citizens that once inhabited this place. Their perfectly preserved bodies stand as a monument to the horror that befell this place. Looks of utter fear, pain and loss are etched forever on the faces of those that fell here. Wounds, each covered over and even filled by the fauna around them, are still evident. That these people died violently is evident, but the cause is impossible to see yet. The wind is much more evident here, and the starry night above gives you enough light that the lantern and orb are almost unneeded. However, the lantern is reacting strangely to this place, pulling ever-so-slightly toward the center of the town, where a large, towering monument of some kind is evident in the distance. However, the large amount of plant life that covers it makes it impossible to see what it is of...

((You may continue when ready. I should also mention that the city square is not the only place to check. You can check each of the 20 buildings (I'll group them together), the graveyard, the watchtower, and obviously you can check the square as well. Just let me know which you want to check.))

[[ Woah, so they're mummified? Or frozen by magics? eek ]]

Her jaw dropped. This partially eaten town was not at all what she was expecting. Kary sighed with joy. This place was amazing, it called to her storyteller's soul, a real lost city. Then her shock and surprise melted away like ice cream smothered with hot chocolate sauce, when she felt something pricking the back of her neck. This place was seriously no good. She heard screams in her head and the bard realized this place was drenched with the pains of violence and death.

"Well let's look around Varnis, no use waltzing in when we've no clue what this place is or what happened. Time for some detective work, eh? The tower's nearby, let's see if the guards new what was happening to this town before they ended up with the reaper."

"All right. lets go then." He replied as he walked over to the tower keeping an eye out for anything strange. Although the place was abandoned, he knew that other things would like to move in. The silence was enough to bother him, before there where wails and screams coming from with in the forest, now nothing. Reaching the tower, he opened the door (If its knocked down, or isn't one ignore this.) and looked about inside the tower making sure there where no creatures in it, and hoping there might be some treasures as well.

The door creaks open on rusted hinges, and dust pours from the opening. Inside the guard tower it appears as if each of the twenty, perfectly-preserved guards committed suicide by ramming their own swords through their stomachs and pinning themselves to the stone walls behind them. It appears that their blood was then drained through the wound and used to write the ancient runes of power that cover the whole of the floor, and while gibberish to Varnis, Kary and Coralie immediately recognize them as symbols of summoning. Not just that, but they seem to link directly to the one of the lower layers of Hell. The bindings on them seem broken though, so immediate danger is not likely, but the level of precision and power in their making is not something easily blown over; nor how easy it would be to fix the circle's damaged portions with minimal effort...Varnis notices the staircase to the right, being as he is not distracted in the least by the circles of gibberish, which lead in a spiral to the second and (you assume) third floor. Small, weak moans can be heard from above this floor; weak, and ominously low in pitch.

((You can inspect this floor, move on to the next, or go to another area.))

"It's like this town was some freakish sacrifice to a baddie demon deity..." Kary observed, thoroughly shaken,"Coralie what do you think? I've only heard of happenings like this in story circles but whenever those were mention they were ancient tales, atrocities of ages past..."

The half elf shivered, this place was so cold. Everything here chilled her blood and looking at Varnis' raised heckles it didn't look they weren't out of danger in the least. She kept her hands wrapped around her lyre. It was a comfort thing and besides she might get tempted to start touching things... That was never a good idea.

The bard trotted in cautiously, taking pains not to disrupt the circle. "Alright guys make sure not to touch anything in the circle, there might be enchantments and curses the caster places around the area to stop him/her getting distracted. I vote we look around, incase there's more clues under all this dust. What do you think boss?" Kary eyed Varnis anxiously, "And what's wrong?"

As soon as there was the thump, Varnis quickly drew his sword and hurried up the stairs with out replying.

Reaching the top of the stairs, he held his shield out in front of him looking about the room. He was quiet, didn't want to draw attention to himself incase it was another one of those things from before.

((On a loaner for now, but the hdd is being evaluated now, feeling it'll turn out good. Except for the ground shipping... So in the meantime, let's hopefully assume Coralie mumbled something at least in response to Kary, Fae, and then I'm gonna go ahead and pull a repeat move of what I did last combat, with heals on Kary and Varnis at the start. I'll see if I can grab another loaner again tonight.))