Thaddeus gets together some supplies and takes them to Grey Owl.  As we are leaving Charlotte comes up and she is dressed very well.  Charlotte explains that she is back in the business, and Madame Lorlelai is her mistress.  We fill her in on our adventures.  She says the town is starting to come back to life, but she is concerned about the guy running for mayor, George Riley.  He is giving speeches saying that we are taking over the town.  She also says we should tell the town how we will be distributing the food, because they are starting to get worried.

We get to Grey Owls camp.  He is not currently around, but we see one set of hours tracks that arrived recently then headed off east.

Magnus wanders around town and meets Robert Ford.  Robert is trying to get the dance hall reopened.  He agrees to go talk to the mayor with Magnus.  The mayors office has been cleaned and organized.  Rusty is there and greets them.  He is happy to see them and they talk about how to distribute the supplies.  Rusty suggests giving them to the general store owner for distribution, but Magnus suggests the church.  Eva is giving services there and she will distribute the food.

We get back to town and find Lucille’s worshippers outside the Triple Tap.  Maverick suggests they should not bother her, but go do good deeds.   Jimmy steps up and says “I am Good Deeds”.  <ba dum dum>. We look around for the invisible drummer.  Thaddeus brews more of his potions.  Everyone turns in early.

Next morning, April 28th, we wake up and the church people show up to help us load the food.  We take the food over to the church.  Eva meets us and thanks us for the food.  Magnus realizes that she was one of the people in the vision where we also saw Lawrence being possessed.  She is free now.

We go to see Riley speak.  Lucille casts puppet on him.  Magnus engages him in conversation. Riley starts to say some bad things about us, but Lucille has him say other things.  He challenges Magnus to run for Mayor, and Magnus accepts.  Riley starts  to say he learned something about us, but Lucille uses telepathy to threaten him if he says anything.  He goes pale and endorses Magnus.  People keep coming up to him and introducing themselves.  We ask Rusty to help organize them into work crews to help building the town. We decide to head to the mine, after stopping at the Triple Tap for supplies.

We get there and starts head in, bu the meet the assayers on the site.  They head up with us.  He tells us that the mine is publicly owned so if we can get it going again the whole town will benefit.   He takes us to the junction with the older part of the mine then heads out.  We stealthily head back to where we saw the zombies.

As we get to the bottom we hear walking coming towards us.  We come to an open room and see 11 ghouls.  Fossar shovels one.  Another attacks him, but he kills it.  Lucille casts havoc and 3 of the ghouls fly against the walls.  Jimmy steps up and kills one of them.

Anita backs away from the barn, cursing and calling for help.  Magnus hits her with a bolt but she shrugs it off.  Jimmy tries grabbing the bag of spices from her neck, but she dodges.  Fossar taunts her and Thaddeus hits her with a potion, but she ignores them both.

Fossar taunts her a second time.  This time she seems affected.  She screams and moves away.  Several zombies appear from the old Indian longhouses and start moving toward us.  Thaddeus shoots and misses.  Magnus tries to pull out a new gun from his magic sack, but it fails miserably.  The gun blows up and injures him.  Jimmy runs up and slashes her.  Her head scarf flies off and the top of her head is missing.  Her brains are exposed, but she took no damage from the axe slashes.  He yells and swings again, aiming at her brain. Brains spray out and she seems injured for the first time.

Fossar keeps up his taunts, and Magnus shoots her again but with no damage.   The zombies move in and swarm Jimmy.   One hits but does not damage Jimmy.   One of the miners is killed by another zombie.  Jimmy swings wildly and kills Anita but smashing the last of her brains.  The zombies go crazy.  Thaddeus hits Jimmy and the zombies, trapping all of them.

Thaddeus shoots another zombie and kills it.  Fossar runs up and smashes another with a shovel.  He splatters it and is covered in infectious gore, but shrugs it off.  Jimmy breaks free and eliminates two more zombies.  The last zombie shoots Magnus with a bow and wounds him, but Fossar removes its head.

Thaddeus grabs the spices and gives some to Maverick, but it has no effect.  He starts to feel better after a while.  We drag the bodies into the barn and light it on fire.  We heal everyone who was hurt.  We search the town and find some newer tracks going into the homes.

We follow the tracks and find tons of supplies in some of the houses. We load up the wagon, and scrounge up another wagon as well.  What we can’t carry we hide in a cellar and booby trap.   Knowing it is too far we decide to spend the night before heading out.  We stash the wagons in a barn and set up watches.

About 4 am we hear noise coming down the street.  A tall man in black is dragging something.  As he gets closer we see that the man is dragging a body.  He talks to Fossar and says come down here, you got a live one.  Fossar walks up to him and sees it is Bat Masterson and he is moving.  We buried him because he was dead and cold.  The man in black says the dead around here don’t stay dead, so he helps by giving the dead an elixir that keeps the animating demon at bay.  The person can then lead a normal life, they just aren’t breathing.

The man in black introduces himself as the prospector.  He gives a bottle of the elixir to Fossar, then he says farewell and leave.  The condition of the recovered dead is “harrowed”, returned to the land of the living.

We head to Spar City, spend the night.  There is no one around.  We head out early and get to Paradise Falls in mid afternoon.  There is a large encampment that wasn’t there when we left.  They are the dust brothers, Jimmy’s kin and friends.  Jimmy greets them and talks to them, and so does Magnus.  We take the supplies to the Triple Tap.

We are greeted as heroes when we come in with the supplies.  We see several of the buildings have been repaired and the town is slowly coming back to life.

You also see a lot of signs talking about the new guy running for mayor.  We get to Triple Tap and a bunch of people are outside chanting.  Lucille is sitting in a chair in the corner, and these are her worshippers.  She leads the crowd out, then comes back in to talk to us. We bring in the rest of the food.  Thaddeus heads up to his lab to work on the new potions and the spices.  He realizes he can replicate the  Elixir but needs to find some more rare ingredients.  He can talk to Grey Owl to get the rest.

The noise is coming from all around the campsite.  Jimmy lets the party knows that the creatures like to attack from the side.  Maverick deals with the devil and now can see very well in the dark.  He flies around looking for the source of the noise.  They hear more grunting calls from across the hearing.  Jimmy backs into the clearing and closer to the. Fire.  Fossar keeps shouting “Where are they?”

Magnus preps a spell and Maverick lands inside the clearing.  Everyone is still waiting for something to happen.  Jimmy starts having more flashbacks about how he was attacked by a large female Sasquatch after he stumbled into its young.   Fossar thinks he sees one of them off in the distance.

Thaddeus stumbles into the clearing. The group tries to get a fire going but fails.  The miners say they want to go and start heading back to the road.  We follow them as a group, with Maverick and Thaddeus flying above them.

As we were are strung out we are attacked by a group of large creatures.  Maverick shoots one but it shakes it off.  Fossar also swings at one but does no damage.  Bat and Lawrence are terrified and take off.  The wendigo swings at Fossar and misses.  Another one attacks the miners and hits, leaving him shaken.  Fossar swings but misses.  Thaddeus drops a potion on one and shakes it.  Jimmy screams and run at the female that he remembered from his flashback.  He sinks two tomahawks into it, leaving it shaken.

Magnus blasts one with a ray gun.  Fossar swings at the same one and takes a huge chunk out of it, but it returns the pain with interest. The other one attacks Jimmy but misses.  Jimmy hits it again and Thaddeus blows up another one.

The combat continues until all of them are dead.  The last one falls on Jimmy as it is dying.  Only Fossar and Jimmy were wounded.  The posse pushes the dead thing off of Jimmy, and he and Fossar both drink a potion from Thaddeus and feel better.

Jimmy remembers being discovered, half-dead and mute, by the Dust Boys after his first encounter with the female beast, and being given his name by the leader, Glenn.

We get back to the horses.  Lawrence comes out of the woods.  Bat and Ollie say they are going on to solve the supply train problem.  We realize that is just 5 miles away and decide to head there too.

Chuck tells about his visions and says we will run into zombies at the supply station.

We get into town and it feels like Del Norte.  The supply depot is completely burned down, and there doesn’t seem to be anyone else around.  There are teepees and long houses of a Indian settlement not far away.  There is smoke coming out of a chimney from a ranch house on the edge of town.  We head there and see hunting rifles on the porch and see deer hanging.  We smell cooking food.  We knock and the door is answered by a short Native American woman, Anita.  We come in and talk to her.

She says that Soapy’s men arrived in town in February and burned the supply depot, and drove everyone away, a whooping and a hollering.   Anita and her husband hid in the cellar and have lived off of hunting ever since, but it is dangerous here and they do not venture outside often.  She says we will need to go NW to Lake City (25 miles) to get more supplies.

She serves stew and puts some extra spices in Jimmy’s.  When Maverick asks for spices she refuses. He eats it anyway.  Maverick decides to go upstairs and see the husband who is supposedly resting.

Meanwhile we go into the barn to see if we can help her repair it.  It smells like chemicals but we can’t place it.  She asks us to replace some of the rotten wood as it’s causing the barn to be unstable. She asks Jimmy to go get some wood from behind the farmhouse. He obliges, but suddenly we hear shots from the house.

The group in the barn moves back out, except for Anita, Thaddeus, and Magnus.  We hear Maverick shout from the house “Husband’s dead!”  Anita shouts “Kill them!” and runs out of the barn.

Several moaning shapes jump down from the hay loft right behind Magnus. They appear to be undead Indian braves, all covered with disgusting pus-oozing sores.

Thaddeus chases Anita and hits her with the butt of his shotgun as she tries to close and lock the door.  She takes no notice of the hit, and is definitely not of this world.  She hits him back with magical energy and he stumbles back.

Magnus brings up a barrier at the back of the barn, and throws a stick of dynamite over it to pulverize the zombies.  The blast is so powerful that it goes through the barrier and wounds him, but it does destroy the zombies. However a substance sprays onto Magnus and he is infected with the pox.  Maverick starts convulsing from eating the stew, which was apparently poisoned. He vomits blood and looks exhausted but is still standing.  The miners also vomit, and Bat and Ollie collapse to the ground. It appears that they aren’t breathing.

The heroes return from Spar City after having saved the remaining survivors. On the way back into Paradise Falls, the wagon train finds Alice on the edge of town. Magnus hops off the wagon to speak with her. Turn out  she is out there to get a breath of fresh air. She confides to Magnus that she’s doing what she can to behave and watch out for the town, but it’s difficult. She hasn’t had a drink in several days. She also admits that she has a Pony Express message for Magnus, and is curious why someone would risk sending a rider to such a volatile area, and questions his motives. Magnus takes the message and then proceeds to talk to Alice about her importance in the town. The two hop back on the wagon and make their way into town.

Once in town, the refugees meet family members they haven’t seen in months and there are lots of tearful reunions. Everyone throws praises at the posse and calls them heroes.

Magnus calls the group together and explains that he received a message from a friend in Salida who told him that the Priest and the Irishman were seen in South Fork. The group realizes that they will need to get some rest before they continue on with their next task, and head to the Long Draught.

After a while, Rusty comes to the posse and lets them know how much he and the town appreciate their help reuniting those who had left a few months ago. However, he notes that the supplies are in a dire situation and they have only a week left of food before nothing is left. In the posse’s absence, a group of people including Lawrence, Bat Masterson, Ollie O’Malley and six minors when to Clearwater to finally discover why the supply chain has been down for so long.

The group breaks and goes their separate ways. Magnus sees Alice hanging around the outside of the Long Draught and invites her in. She agrees, not expecting an invitation from him but not hating the idea, either. She and Magnus go up to his room and spend the rest of the afternoon up there.

Jimmy and Fossar head outside to spar. As they fight, a crowd gathers and Maverick takes bets from the townspeople. After a long battle, Fossar finally lays Jimmy out. Maverick pays out the bets and keeps 20%, but takes the two fighters to the bar for drinks.

Alice can be heard from Magnus’ room by the other posse members. Magnus summons some assistance for Alice’s pleasure. Magnus and Alice continue and Alice collapses from exhaustion and the two fall asleep.

The rest of the gang drink and fight through the night, and return around midnight. Maverick gambles with the locals and loses for the first time. He quits while he’s behind and heads back.

In the morning Alice has left Magnus’ room and the rest of the group begins to rise about 10 am. Maverick makes his way to the stables and tries to buy a horse to feed the town, saying that if they don’t start eating the horses that everyone will starve. He tries to intimidate the owner and the owner runs to get the Sheriff.

About this time Chuck the miner comes running into to town. He is all distraught. He goes on about Lawrence, Batt and the rest being ambushed by some sort of creature with huge claws.

As the rain moved in the group hurriedly gets on their horses and begin back to where Chuck was attacked. On the trail Chuck explains how he is able to see the supernatural.

We come upon a broken wagon with a dead horse on the side of the road. The horse’s throat has been ripped out. Fossar looks the site over and determines that there are tracks in and out of the woods. Maveric flies into the air and sees the tracks go off quite a ways and the tacks coming back have a longer stride (the person was running). Tommy sorts through the wagon and finds just a torso under some grain.

Maverick finds a camp site off the road. Fossar enters camp and investigates a pelt. He looks at it and it not something he recognizes. He rips it off the tree. There are six bodies littering the camp site.

Some mumbling can be heard coming from one of the tents. Fossar approaches the tent and and throws some dirt at it. Lawrence pops his head out and asks who’s out there.

Inside the tent Bat Masterson is lying very injured. Fossar just wants to bury everyone. Ollie is in there also. Ollie looks at the pelt and is not able to figure it out.

Magnus enters the camp and makes his way with Tommy and Chuck toward the tent. Magnus calls out to Fossar and he comes out of the tent. Lawrence and Ollie beckon Magnus to come help Batt. Magnus enters the tent. He states that he needs some room and then pulls a device out of his bag. Magnus puts it on Batt and fixes him up. They then lead Magnus to the other tent and Magnus fixes up the two wounded guys in that tent.

Shortly after that a sound comes from the woods.

Bar names; Triple Tap (marms, veins, beer)

Fossar breaks into the room an says “What is happening?!”  Everyone pauses for a moment and Charlotte just stares at us.  She starts move toward the door.  Thaddeus throws a sleep potion but she resists it.  Fossar swings at her and connects twice with the sharp side of his shovel and she is bleeding profusely from the head and neck, but still takes off running.  Maverick pushes her towards the corner and she falls down.  Magnus shoots her with a stun gun but she resists and still tries to get out the door.  Fossar knocks her down and she is bleeding out.

We heal her and tie her up.  Lucille look at her and casts a spell.  She says that the spirit infecting her will need to be killed to free her from it.  If not she will die anyway.

We leave her and head through the door she wanted to use. Lucille stays with Charlotte.  We open the door and see a dark room.  Jimmy goes in first followed by Fossar and Maverick.  We see a room with alcoves with 4 corpses in each.  The door slams shut and the the corpses sit up and start vomiting blood.  The blood rapidly rises up to our ankles and keeps going.  Magnus teleports us quickly back to where we came from.

We head to the next door in the entry room.  It open onto stairs that go up.  We start heading up the stairs to another door.  It does not budge when we try to open it.  Magnus lights a stick of dynamite and we run back down to the entry room and close the first door.   BANG!  We head back up the stairs,  and see a cruciform room.  In it are parts of zombies that are recollecting themselves and we see them forming larger zombies.

Jimmy charges in and attacks two of the zombies. He swings but does no damage.  Fossar runs in and swings wildly.  He dismembers one of the zombies and wounds another.  The zombies attack and miss us.  Maverick charges into the room and shoots.  He drops one and hits another.  Magnus and Thaddeus step in the door and shoot, which evaporates another zombie.  Maverick drops the last zombie with three well placed shots.

We search the rest of the room but there are just caskets and body parts.  There is a door on the far wall.  We blast this one open as well.    Beyond is a large room with pews and an altar.  The pews are full of zombies and there is a large worm towering over the altar.

They attack us but miss.  Jimmy hits and wounds one.  Maverick drops that one and wounds another.  Fossar charges and wounds one of them, but his shovel breaks.  Thaddeus hits the worm with a potion.  Magnus also hits it with a fireball.

Fossar is shovel-less but still tries to kick the zombies.  Pointless much?  Maverick shoots two of them and wounds them.  Magnus launches another fireball.  It fries 3 of the zombies and wounds the worm.  They all swing at us, and miss.  The worm moves closer, and Tommy Hawk gets a surge of adrenaline.  The worm attacks Fossar with his tongue and drags him in closer.   It also misses Thaddeus, who throws a potion back.  Jimmy dispatches one zombie and wounds another.

Thaddeus throws a different potion (banish) and we see the orange energy get pulled out of the worm, and it is now making  a different sound.  Clearly whatever was motivating it was removed from the creature.  Fossar breaks out of the tendril and tries to pull its tongue out but fails to move it.  The remaining zombie attacks Jimmy but misses.  The worm strikes at Jimmy and wraps him in its other tongue.  Maverick hits it with a bolt, but again it seems unfazed.  Jimmy tackles the tongue and slices himself free.  Magnus blasts it with a shotgun.

Maverick tries to deal with the devil and cast a spell, but it backfires on him and he has a headache.  He still shoots and hits it.  Fossar kicks it again in frustration, to no effect.  The worm bites Jimmy and gives hm a scar.  He attacks back and shakes the worm.  Angus misses.

Jimmy and Thaddeus wound the worm.  It bites Fossar.  Everyone else misses.

The worm and zombie attack and hit Maverick, but he magically ducks and evades the damage (thank you cards).  He shoots back and  wounds it, but it is still moving.

The worm bites Jimmy and he falls down and is bleeding out.  Maverick finally puts the worm down.  We heal Jimmy, and find the strongbox on the dais.  We open it and see a lot of papers including the founding papers, 2 sets.  One set has Jenkins and Otto Strauss, and another that does not have Otto’s name.

We take the box and catch up to the people heading to Paradise  Falls.  We take the papers with us and head back to town.

Maverick starts rounding up wagons and horses to transport people from Spar City.  Thaddeus stays up late and works up a new potion to deal with the strange new creatures we have been finding.

The next morning we find a bunch of people (5) sitting outside of the Long Draught.  Magnus approaches them and asks what they want.  They have covered themselves with symbols that match what Lucille  was drawing on buildings.  They immediately bow down to her.  She asks what they want and they say they are following her holy writings.   Some of them claimed that she protected them and helped them find food and good fortune.  They ask her to tell them the path. She tells them to help Maverick load the wagon.

Robert quits his job and says F@(k this I’m moving to Montana.

We jump in the wagons and start to Spar City.  We have horses tied to the back of the wagons.  Jimmy is out in front as our scout.  We raise a huge cloud of dust as we ride, moving at super speed.   Thaddeus is snoring in the back of one of the wagons, but Jimmy senses the spirit of Grey Owl speeding us along.   We don’t stop, and soon we the outskirts of Spar City.  We see smashed buildings and fire scars.   We see someone in the road in front of us.

Jimmy rides up to the person.  He sees that it is a kid.  We stop behind Jimmy rides around in front of the kid.  It is the kid, and he is drawing on his sketch pad.  He says this is a bad time.  Jimmy looks at his sketch pad.  The town on the pad shows huge tentacles crushing the buildings.  We feel a sense of unease that is extremely strong.  There is something very wrong with this town.  Maverick asks if there are people in the church.  Lucille detects arcana on the kid.  She can tell that he is slightly magical.  He says that he is not going into the town and starts to walk away.   Thaddeus mounts his own horse and we start moving into the town with Jimmy, followed by the wagons.  We notice that there is no vegetation around the town, and all of the field around it are dead and cracked.  The church is the only thing standing.  We see bones all over the ground.  Some have meat on them but others are bare.  There is no sound but the carrion birds.

Lucille says not to touch the bones, but we can’t stop the horses from stepping on them.  Thaddeus’ horse rears and starts running out of town.  Lucille talks to it and suddenly it turns around and heads back into town.   We get to the church.  Lucille sees the energy coalesce around us and warns us to watch the bones.  Jimmy starts riding around to crunch up more of the bones.  We see recent signs of activity, such as freshly dug graves with crosses on them.

We move up to the church.  Lucille does not detect anything from the graves, but there is a lot of magical energy coalescing in the area. Jimmy tracks around the graves, and sees the tracks go straight back to the church.  Charlotte jumps down and looks at the graves.

Maverick shoots one shot to let anyone on the church know we are here.  There is a sound like a large exhale and we see skeletons pop up around us.  They seem to be made out of many different people and are screaming in pain and rage.  They pick up stick and attack us. Charlotte shoots one with a shotgun and it disintegrates.  We see an orange energy as the skeleton disintegrates.  Jimmy lets out a war cry, WHICH WE HEAR.  He is surprised, but still jumps off his horse and still tomahawks another skeleton.  There is still blood coming out of the skeletons, which is weird.   The skeletons move in.  One swings at Jimmy and misses.  One swings at Charlotte and his arm falls off.  One swings and Thaddeus and connects, and another hits Maverick.   Maverick returns the favor and blows three away.  Thaddeus shoots another in the face.   Lucille is obviously casting a big spell, and 4 zombies pop up out of the graves of the townspeople.

Joker for Maverick.  He mows another three down.   Charlotte blows way one of Lucille’s zombies.  Jimmy cuts down two in front of him.  Magnus blows away the third, and the ground rumbles as the last zombie sinks into the ground.  Lucilles shouts not to kill the last zombies, which are hers.  We ride up to the church and announce ourselves.  After some convincing the doors open and we see a women and man.  They see Lucille’s zombies and shut the door immediately.

Maverick flies up to the steeple (this is new).  The group in the church shoots up at Maverick and misses.   Charlotte talks to them and tries to persuade them, but fails miserably.  Thaddeus also tries to persuade them to come out.  The woman opens the door and  tells everyone inside that we are friends.  Magnus pulls out a bowler hat and convinces them to come out of the church.

They open the doors and 40 people come out.  We load up all of the people on the wagons, plus putting the rest on the extra horses and the backs of ours.  The person we talked to initially is Madame Lorelei, and the guy is Fred Lawson, former proprietor of the General Store in Paradise Falls.   We ask about the town papers, but Lorelei says she hid them under the floorboards of the church and they heard noises under there so they haven’t gone back. Once they arrived at Spar City there were 80 people here and things were OK, but this spring the vegetation started dying off and supplies ran out.  A few weeks ago, there was a large fight in the center of town over who was hogging the remaining resources and the townspeople massacred each other, even the women and children.  The survivors from Paradise Falls barricaded themselves into the church and were spared, but the town was destroyed, and soon after the corpses rose up and attacked them.  They have been hiding in the church ever since.

We load up everyone and escort them out to the edge of town where the weirdness ends.  Then we go back and go into the church.  It smells from all the people living here for weeks, and is extremely dark.

We find the loose floor boards and climb down to a small crawl space.  Maverick and Jimmy crawl down.  Both notice that there are racks of old moldering books, and notice that there are a lot of foot prints around an area where there was obviously a box.  The tracks lead up to a wall behind the box.  The Indian sees nothing, but Maverick finds a secret door.  Two passages lead off, and we follow the right into a large room.  There are catacombs under the church.

As we walk into the room we feel the same rumbling as above.  The lights go out, and a voice says it has heard of us.  It says ‘I  have heard of you, and I thought that you would come. ‘  We see a vision of ourselves in our idealized selves.   We are captivated for a few seconds, and then we see the same orange tentacles rise up and the visions turn to evil.

Corpses start piling out of the walls.  Jimmy runs up to two of them and drops one.   Charlotte blasts another one.  Maverick drops another three.  They attack and miss us all.  Magnus shoots one, and Lucille controls another.    Thaddeus blasts another.

Thaddeus moves quickly and blows away another.   Jimmy drops the last two.  We see the energy drift out of their bodies and go under the wall.  A door is visible.  Charlotte opens the door and sees a hallway.  She charges in……

We see another large room where the light is sucked out of the room and we hear the voice again, but instead of ourselves we see of others being pulled apart by the evil orange tentacles.  They all are affected and then start behaving strangely.  They are all possessed.   One is another woman from town, and Lawrence is also affected.  Off in the distance we see the kid furiously writing and drawing a huge mosaic, which shows each of the people being affected by the tentacles.  The voice says “My brother told me about you, but I will be the one to destroy you… “  As Charlotte turns to look at us, her eyes are orange.

We are still in the Hunting Grounds and running away from the scene of the sacrifice.  Jenkins’ spirit is following us.  We see some people to the side of the path, and hear screams, but we heed Grey Owl’s advice and keep moving to the exit.

We finally get back to the gate.  Jenkins’ spirit thanks us for freeing him, but says he cannot leave.  He can answer our questions for a few minutes.  He says that once the mine dried up and after his wife died, strange things started to happen in town.  A group of people said they wanted to leave, led by Lorelei, the madame of the brothel at the Paradise Hotel. Jenkins tried to convince her to stay, but he was also worried about the future.  He gave her the town papers, which was a contract between him and the townspeople to share all of the mine’s wealth.  He put the papers in a strong box, and only his daughter Dolly knew about Lorelei taking it. The group of 60 people left and went south toward Spar City.

A week later he was walking home late at night, and the man with glowing eyes rode Jenkins down.   He didn’t kill him but someohow infected him with a magical curse. After that he sickened and eventually died.  Thaddeus asks what so special about the papers.  Jenkins explains how the town was founded — he came out West in the early 1860s with a land investor from out East named Otto Stauss.  They found silver and started mining, but it took years to get the town growing.  They started the compound in those years and hired miners.  Jenkins’ idea was to share any wealth from the mine with everyone in town, but Stauss was not a fan. The town papers were signed anyway. After the mine didn’t produce for a long period Strauss got tired of waiting and eventually left, but Jenkins and his family stayed. Stauss’s son stayed on but moved to a shack SE of town.  The papers were re-written to remove Stauss as one of the founders. Jenkins kept on and brought in the sheriff, reverend and others.  Then about 1875 they found ghost rock and silver and things started going well.  Then in 1879 his wife died, the mine slowed and dried up, and people started leaving.  More criminals came into town and caused more problems.  Finally he asks us to at least save some of his family if we can’t save the city.

We fall out of the portal into the shore near the pond.  Grey Owl welcomes us back.  We ask about a shack to the SE, and he says he is aware of one.  We thank him and start heading back to town.

On the way back we hear gunfire off the side of the road and up on a low rise.  We go in to investigate, and it appears that a battle is going on between two forces.  Most of the party starts up the hill while Lucille and Thaddeus continue down the road.  Lucille casts a spell and charms one of the men to put down his gun and walk toward her.  Maverick casts speed and the rest of the party moves up the hill.  We see  group of Soapy’s cowboys attacking a group of people dressed in stitched-together clothing, probably drifters. Fossar shovel f***s two of them and Maverick shoots another.  Jimmy throws knives but misses.  The bad guys shoot at the drifters and one falls.  We all move in.

Maverick drops the last two cowboys.  Magnus runs up to the drifter who dropped and dismounts.  Charlotte convinces another one to lower his gun, but that one sees Jimmy and calls out to him.  It is Glenn and the Dust Boys. They greet each other warmly.  Magnus heals the one who was hit.

Maverick searches the bodies and we find $45, and an assortment of rifles, pistols, and shotguns.  Glenn, a big talker, tells us that they roamed through here and they jumped these cowboys.  They almost had them….

Magnus invites the group to come to Paradise Falls, as we have dealt with the criminal element. Glenn says that they also killed a few that they saw fleeing the town. The Dust Boys agree to accompany us back to town, maybe.  They are a little scared of us, especially Magnus’ gadgets and Fossar’s shovel (and missing eyes).  Glenn also tells us that Jimmy was found half mauled to death, and being pursued by some large unnatural creature. He took Jimmy into the Dust Boys group after he recovered, and gave him his name. They leave.

Meanwhile, Lucille reanimates one of the corpses, and it starts piling the other corpses.  The zombie then takes a torch and goes and lays on the pile.  The corpses start burning and we head back to town.

It is now completely dark, and our only light comes from a magic rock Lucille has.  We hear a strange noise from the side of the trail, like something eating to the left of the trail.  Fossar vaults off his horse and runs toward the noise.  He sees a tall obese grotesque humanoid creature that is eating a pile of dead bodies.  The creature moves toward him, but Fossar swings quickly and connects.  The ghoul shakes it off and attacks back but misses.  We all move up on the trail, but can’t see into the dark forest.

Jimmy runs into he trees and throws a lasso over the ghoul, pulling him off his feet.  The ghoul jumps up and bites Fossar, wounding him.  Lucille uses Mind Rider to see where Fossar is and what he’s doing. Fossar swings back and drops the ghoul, spraying gore everywhere.  Lucille rapidly drops mind rider, as that is some disgusting shit.

A moment later, a man with a horse and cart comes out of the darkness, and calls out.  He tells us that his name is Augustus, and he is lost on the trail.  He is coming from Spar City.  Charlotte convinces him to come with us to Paradise Falls.  We finally roll into town well past midnight.  Some people are still awake and cleaning up the town.  Lucille goes to the sheriff’s office and the rest of us head to our saloon.  Maverick and Magnus talk to Augustus, and Magnus intimidates him.  Augustus tells us that he came from the west from Silverton.  When he got to Spar City it had been decimated, and the only building still standing is the church.  There are bones and gore everywhere, so he left in haste.  We all retire for the night.

The next morning Magnus and others go to talk to Rusty.  Lucille, meanwhile, is busy painting meaningless voodoo symbols on all the buildings in town (just for effect). Magnus tells him that we saw his father and he gave us a lead on the papers, and also what we learned from Augustus.

Maverick heads to the compound to talk to Jenkins’ daughter. Her husband Jed answers the door then calls for Dolly.  When Maverick start to tell her he talked to the ghost of her dead father, she closes the door in his face.

Thaddeus asks Augustus for more detail about Spar City.  Augustus says that the church was barricaded and appeared to be fortified.  The rest of the town was destroyed by combat, with claw marks in the destroyed buildings.  He saw horse and wagon tracks in town, along with fresh dead people as well as skeletons.  With Thaddeus’ knowledge, he determines that Augustus is a total fraud snake oil salesman. Thaddeus lets him know that he is on to him, and Augustus makes a hasty departure.  Spar City is 14 miles, or 1/2day  away by horse.

At noon, we head to the town meeting. The posse is all there except for Jimmy, Charlotte and Fossar, and Ollie O’Malley, Robert Ford and Bat Masterson are there too.  Rusty tells us that 15 townspeople died and 5 women were raped.  Ollie’s Bar, the Yellow Canary, The Dancing Club, a hotel, and several homes were destroyed, and many other buildings were damaged.  Currently the Grand Hotel is being used as a triage ward for the injured.  Magnus promises to help heal anyone else who is injured. Robert Ford volunteers to lead the rebuilding effort, along with some miners and the blacksmith, who he says remains neutral and passive about almost everything. He is pretty sure that he can get him engaged.  Bat Masterson says that the supply chain is imperative, so we should find out what happened to the supply depot west of town in Clear Creek.  We tell them about Spar City, and volunteer to go there and save the remaining townspeople (if there are any).  We need to be back in a week, so that then we can work on the supply chain.  Magnus tells them that we saw zombie miners in the mine, and warns them to stay away from there.  He wonders if the missing townspeople could be there instead of Spar City, but they don’t think so — the mine was in operation until last month. Rusty then calls for a vote for Sheriff, and nominates Robert Ford.  The posse tries to convince Lucille to let there be a vote, since she will be leaving town to help with the rescue effort.

Poker Alice and Lawrence walk in and Alice says she should be the sheriff.  We all vote for Robert, except for Lucille, Lawrence, and Charlotte who vote for Alice.  Magnus tries to talk her into staying, but she walks away.  He goes after her and says that she really helped during the siege and that the town needs her. She still grumbles but promises to help protect the town while the posse is gone. Robert takes the badge, and we get ready to head to Spar City early in the morning. Horses for everyone and two wagons are procured to hold the townspeople we are bringing back.

<metagame> Jimmy uses the “Spurred On” card, so our posse’s pace is doubled for one day.

Maverick and Magnus notice that Lucille is staring at the gravesite at the funeral.  She is sweating and looks shaken. Maverick asks her what is wrong.  She says she needs a horse, and needs to go to Grey Owl now.

Rusty asks Magnus for help in rebuilding the town.  We will meet with him tomorrow.  He is also talking to Bat Masterson andRobert Ford, not Lawrence.

Lucille tells us that she saw a bunch of visions over the grave site.  First was a floating vision of Soapy and he was talking to someone she couldn’t see.  He was begging not to be punished, but ends up being burned as punishment.  His spirit is destroyed.  Next she sees Edward O’Kelly being reassembled from the parts that we left him in.  He begs for death but is brought back anyway.  Next Jenkins is floating Christ like over his own grave and then gets pulled down by orange tentacles.  Finally she sees a vision of a dragon’s head made of orange fire.  It looks right at her, opens its mouth, and blasts fire at her.  She sees Grey Owl standing between her and the fire, but she sees him burned and fall to the ground.  Here endeth the vision.

We grab some of the newly freed up horses and head out of town.  The town tries to have a meager banquet for the funeral, so we give them the bacon, not a euphemism.   We also see the girl that Maverick gave food to when we first rode in.  She smiles and waves as we ride out.

As we ride through the forest we hear a loud buzzing coming from the trees on both sides of the trail.  We see giant wasps dropping out of the trees.  Magnus casts a wall behind the party, right in front of the wasps.  Most of the party rides on but Maverick slows and turns. 2 of the wasps hit the wall, but one slides around it and attacks Thaddeus.  It hits him, but he is able to recover and gallop away.

Maverick just got two jokers in one deal.  No really.  He shoots the one wasp that made it around the wall.  Really, really shoots it.  Bug goo rains to the ground.  Lucille, Charlotte, and Thaddeus keep riding.  One surviving wasp slides around the wall and attacks Magnus.  It stings him, but does not damage him.  He unloads with the lightning gun and Magnus invents the bug zapper.

We regroup, but more wasps swarm out of the trees, including the extra large queen.  Magnus evaporates one.  Maverick blasts the queen with a bolt, and two shots, but she is still up.  Lucille casts a windstorm that blinds the queen and one other.  Thaddeus blasts the queen with a scattergun and puts her down.  Charlotte blasts another one.  Several of the wasps attack the party, and Charlotte is hit.

Maverick gets another Joker.  No really.  He drops three wasps.  Charlotte ends the last wasp.  Jon hates reshuffling.

We finally get to Grey Owls tepee.  It is really quiet, but we still have the same sense of calm.  Lucille opens the tepee and sees him on the floor.  Thaddeus tries to heal him but he declines.  Lucille heals him.

He explains that we need to help Jenkins, and that Lucille possess all that she needs.  She must enter the hunting grounds, and rescue Jenkins.  The Manitou is trying to turn Jenkins into a dark spirit.  Lucille must find him in the hunting grounds and rescue him.  The sprits there can not be killed but can be dispersed.  We need to find him and remove the tendrils of evil that are penetrating him.

Grey Owl starts the ritual.  While he’s starting, Magnus imbues a device that can be used to cast Smite on mundane weapons, allowing them to damage the spirits.  Grey Owl gets more heated in his ritual, and a tear in reality appears on top of a pond next to his tepee.  We see a strange land and sky beyond.  We jump through the tear, and land roughly in the new world.

There is a starry sky, visible through the haze.  There is a little ambient light, but we can’t tell where it is coming from.  The ground is sandy and rocky.  We hear a constant low level of screaming, but cant tell where that comes from either.   We move forward, but see other creatures try to get back out.  A burst of energy stops them and the vanish into dust.

Lucille stops and casts a spell.  A spirit appears in front of her that takes the form of a bison.  It sniffs her, and then lowers its head.  Lucille asks it where she can find Jenkins.  The buffalo turns, and disappears, but we see glowing buffalo tracks leading off in the distance.  We follow the trail, but off to the sides we see the ground moving.  We make rock markers as we move so we can find the way back.  We hear some screaming that is getting louder.  We crest a ridge and start down the steep rocks on the other side.  Lucille slips and starts to slide, but Magnus quickly teleports her to the bottom of the ridge.  The rest of us climb down after her.

We see a rocky grotto.  Jenkins is laying on a slab in the center, and is surrounded by demons, who are glowing orange.  The demons are dancing around Jenkins, and orange tentacles are invading his body.

Now Lucille gets the Joker.  She casts fear on the group, but it has no affect.  Three of the demons run at the party and attack, and Magnus and Charlotte are wounded.  Magnus casts a wall in front of the demons.  Thaddeus runs towards Jenkins.

Maverick also runs up and drops two of the demons.  Magnus teleports in and grabs Jenkins, but Jenkins can not teleport away with him.  Magnus appears without Jenkins.  Thaddeus runs in and starts cutting tentacles.  He cuts one away, but realizes we need to get 19 more.

The rest of the party moves up.  Charlotte, Magnus, and Maverick all shoot tendrils but nothing happens.  Lucille manages to cut one, but Thaddeus misses.

The party keeps sawing at tentacles and another several snap.  Maverick find and axe and with a might swing snaps several of the tentacles.  He swings again and several more snap.  Thaddeus also cuts a few.  We are now half way through the total.  Lucille also cuts some more.

We keep cutting.  Thaddeus slices a few more.  There are just a few left.  The demons respawn and charge us, but Magnus puts up a wall to keep them back.  Finally Maverick snaps the last tendrils.  We see Jenkins spirit float free.    Several of the demons hit the wall, but the rest move up on us.  One hits Maverick.

Thaddeus tosses a blast potion over the wall and hits two of them.  Magnus evaporates another one with the lightning.  Maverick drops another demon.

We start running towards the hill to escape from the grotto.  Magnus teleports the whole party out of there.  Jenkins spirit follows us away.

The party goes through the bodies and divides up some loot, including Colt Pacemakers, leather armor, some knives and money.

There is still a lot of shooting and shouting in town, mostly from the west, in the vicinity of city hall.  The party regroups and heads that way.   There are eight guys on the stable and next to the sheriff’s office.   Maverick drops two of the guys on the roof.  Magnus  lights them up with the lightning gun and evaporates the last guy on the roof.  Charlotte runs back to Thaddeus and gets her Colt Dragoon back.  Fossar runs up the wall of the stable and lands on the roof of the stables.  Jimmy moves up.  They throw dynamite back at us and Magnus and Fossar are wounded.  The entire front of the stables is destroyed.  A few more shoot and Magnus drops.  Thaddeus runs up and throws one of his potions which explodes and drops two of guys.

Maverick drops two more of the cowboys.   Thaddeus shoves a potion down Magnus’ throat and Magnus wakes up.  Jimmy runs up and throws his knives and knocks the cowboy back.  Alice and Fossar move up.  The cowboy is shaken and can’t act.  Magnus is pissed, jumps up and evaporates the last cowboy with his lighting gun.

We hear more voices and fighting coming from the theater nearby.  Magnus kicks in the door and we see 5 cowboys fighting several townsfolk.  Maverick just got his third joker in a row, no shit.  He pushes into the room and drops 3 of the cowboys.  We are all very impressed.  Fossar runs in and cuts the head off another cowboy with his shovel.  Jimmy runs in and tomahawks the last cowboy.

Several townsfolk come out including Robert Ford and Bat Masterson and the big Russian guy, and several others townsfolk.  Several of them are wounded, but Lawrence and Thaddeus heal some of the wounded.   The others go through the bodies and find $85, some cheap guns and knives, and bacon.   Also a shotgun and 6 Colt Frontiers.  Magnus heals Fossar.

Things have calmed down in town and people are starting to come out.  Charlotte talks to the townsfolk and persuades them that the sheriff, the reverend, and Soapy were all in cahoots.  Lucille is now the new sheriff.  The townsfolk were trying to stop the cowboys from getting to city hall.  Big Ed was wearing some kind of armor and he and some others took over city hall.

Magnus tries to teleports the party into the mayor’s office but the device fails.  Maverick peeks in the window and sees 5 cowboys and a deputy confronting  Rusty.  Rusty is looking through the papers but says ‘ it is not here’.

Maverick shoots through the window and drops one cowboy and wounds another.  Charlotte shoots but misses.  Magnus throws dynamite in the window and mists two more of the cowboys and creates a new door to city hall.  Fossar and Jimmy jump through the window and drop two other cowboys.  Thaddeus throws in a potion and one of the cowboys falls asleep.  He is dispatched.

Maverick drops the deputy.  We climb into the room and question Rusty.  Charlotte calms him down and has they were demanding papers not he founding of the town.  Big Ed is upstairs with his dad and is still looking for the papers.  He says that they had a big guy with knives and several others.

We charge up the stairs and Fossar runs up the side of the building and in through the window.  We see 4 cowboys and Big Ed, who is threatening and torturing Jenkins.

Jimmy runs-up and tomahawks Ed, and Maverick shoots him.  Ed is wounded but still up.   Big Ed hits Jimmy and wounds him.  Fossar smashes through the window and takes the head off one of the cowboys.  Thaddeus throws a potion and Jimmy and one off the bad guys fall asleep.  Magnus tries to conjure a device and fails.  Charlotte taunts Big Ed’s manhood and he is vulnerable and shaken.

Thaddeus shoots Big Ed but he is not wounded.  Maverick casts three bolts and wounds Big Ed severely.  Jimmy tomahawks BigEd and drops him.  Magnus blasts one of the cowboys and Fossar shovels the other.  Charlotte shoots the last cowboys and drops him.

We hear shots from outside the window and see several other cowboys heading out of town.  We heal Mayor Jenkins, then rifle the bodies.  We find 4 more Colt Frontier pistols and $40.   On Big Ed we find $225 and some steel weave armor with hand blades attached.  Jimmy takes the armor and Fossar takes Jimmy’s old armor.   Total money $350.

We talk to Rusty but he does not know here the towns founding papers are located.  Jenkins is alive but is still crazy and non responsive.  The townsfolk are putting out fires and routing the last of the cowboys.  Rusty had no idea where the founding papers fro the town are, or why they would be important.  We head to the church and Deacon Barton is dead but the reverend is not there.  We have Lucille do mind rider on the knife while the rest search the church.  Charlotte finds a loose floorboard in the reverends office and finds a chest with $1500, gold, and some gems.  It is a small fortune.

We regroup with the townsfolk.  Several bars burned down and some houses were damaged.  Ollie agrees to run our bar and start to figure out how we will run the town without the Sheriff.

Jenkins daughter comes to us later in  the day and lets us know that he passed away from his wounds.  There is a funeral the next day.  Rusty speaks but has a tough time talking.  His sister does not seem to be on the same page as Rustywhen it comes to the town’s Founding Papers.

<metagame> The party used ALL of their bennies this session .  Level up to veteran.  </metagame>

Charlotte is gang walked out and taken behind the hotel.  Charlotte sees Soapy, the Sheriff, and Edward O”Kelly.  Soapy says “I hear you are looking for me.  You picked the wrong town”.  Edward wants to kill Charlotte, but Soapy gestures no.  A bunch of other men go into the hotel and start killing people in the hotel.  The sheriff stays back from Edward.  The sheriff protests and tries to get Soapy to start but Soapy shuts him down.  Soapy says “What would your sister think of this?”

Magnus teleports us out of the basement to behind the hotel.  We engage.  Thaddeus throws a potion that knocks out several of the guards.  Fossar grabs on to the walls of the hotel and climbs up onto the roof.  Who knew he invented parkour?  Jimmy runs up to the corner, but holds on to his precious tomahawk.  Magnus runs up to the corner and teleports next to Charlotte.  He grabs her and teleports her back around of the corner of the hotel.  Maverick deals with the devil and starts running up to the hotel corner.

People inside the hotel start shooting out the windows.  Maverick dodges one bullet and has a hole in his shirt , but another hits Charlotte, but she is unfazed.  Another shoots at Thaddeus but misses.  Soapy runs away like the bitch ass that he is.  The Sheriff shoots at us  and hits Jimmy.  Jimmy is wounded.  Thaddeus is hit but takes a sip from a flask in his coat and is fine.  (It does work!)  Lucille casts Fear Loas and the Sheriff and several of the henchman panic.  The one henchman runs away and the sheriff is shaken.

Thaddeus throws another potion that explodes and kills one henchman and wounds the Sheriff.  Charlotte hides between the windows of the hotel.  Jimmy splits one of the gunman in half and throws his other tomahawk at the sheriff, who takes it in the forehead and dies.  Lucille runs over to Charlotte and touches her shirt.  She sees Soapy in the hotel.  Fossar  shovels one of the guys on the roof and then throws his shovel at the other one but misses.  Maverick blows away one guy in the hotel.  The other ones are shaken but recover.  They shoot back and wound Maverick.   Magnus runs up to the last standing henchman outside and wastes him.

Thaddeus and Maverick take out another two guys in the hotel.  Fossar takes other hit from the last guy on the roof, meanwhile the one henchman is still asleep.  Maverick gets hit again but shakes it off.  Fossar runes, slides, and gets his shovel, then hits the last guy on the roof, knocking him silly.  Jimmy ends the sleeping guy by turning him into hamburger.  Lucille picks Charlottes cuffs and she is free.  Charlotte then hits the last guy in the hotel who drops.  Magnus heals Jimmy.

Charlotte shoots at the last guy in the hotel and misses.  Lucille heals Maverick.  Fossar swings at the last guy on the roof and misses.  Thaddeus drops the last guy in the hotel.  Magnus heals Jimmy, who then dives through the hotel windows and comes up in one of the rooms.  Two cowboys are raping a woman.  One takes a tomahawk in the face.  Those cowboys try to respond.  One takes a swing and shakes him.  Maverick vaults into the hotel and sees two cowboys behind the desk, who drop with severe lead poisoning.

Charlotte follows Maverick through the window.  Magnus drops one of the cowboys in the room .   Fossar finally kills the last guy on the roof and busts through a window on the second floor.  Maverick busts into another room and shoots one guy while the other looks surprised.  He wings Maverick.  The rapist shoots at Jimmy and misses, so Jimmy ends him and castrates him.   Lucille takes the sheriffs badge and hat.

Edward O’Kelly walks out of one of the upstairs rooms and runs at Fossar.  As Edward runs up, Fossar uses his shovel to greet his face, but Edward does not take damage.  Edward does stick Fossar with his knives.  Maverick kills the last cowboy in his room.  Jimmy in his rag kills the woman in the room.  Thaddeus runs upstairs and shoots Edward, followed by Charlotte.

Thaddeus drills Edward again.  Edward turn and runs to Charlotte and knifes her.  She is shaken.  Soapy jumps out a window on the second floor and lands clumsily.  Lucille casts an entangle on him but he escapes.  MAverick busts out a window and shoots him.  Magnus teleports in and hits him with a shotgun, then teleports out again.  Charlotte shoots Edward at close range.  Jimmy runs up to the stairs.

Magus leans out a window and shoots Soapy in the street.  Lucille casts again and entangles Soapy in the street.  Jimmy runs upstairs and tomahawks Edward to death.   Thaddeus leans out the window and shoots Soapy.    Fossar wakes up and smashes Edwards corpse with his shovel.   Maverick leans out the window and drops Soapy in the street.

That ends the combat.  Thaddeus and Lucille heal Fossar, and others search Soapy .  We start clearing he hotel.  As we clean up we see Lawrence shooting some people, and we see another woman, Poker Alice, who is shooting at others.  They are killing other cowboys near the general store.  Lucille looks at Edward and determines he was a Harrowde, undead.  Maverick takes Soapy’s Peacemaker pistols and $600. Plus a really nice Bowie knife and a pocket watch.   Jimmy picks up Edwards knives.  Lucille takes the sheriffs badge.

Magnus and Charlotte run over and help Lawrence and Poker Alice.  They eliminate the remaining cowboys.  It looks like the remaining cowboys are at the town hall.