>>5573083>>5573108>>5573150>>5573155>>5573184>Chase after the man! You might be able to put your blood magic inscription to use.You break into a sprint (jog) after the man, disciples in tow: your heels may sell the tall and imposing look, but they wreak havoc on your ankles while running. “The beast? What did he mean, the beast?” You ask the invalid breathlessly. “What kind of beast.?!”
“THE BEAST OF SEINS-DE-SAINT-ANNE. It was the talk of the town just a week or so ago..” The invalid grunts as he hefts his crutch and pitchfork up. “It was said a terrible, monstrous beast was loose in the village, setting upon cultists in the middle of the night and tearing them in twain in the streets. I thought it a fairy tale, the byproduct of hysterical cultists in fits of frenzy and paranoia–but then they caught it.”
“Oh, yes, yes! I remember this..!” The old lady adds over her owl’s caws. “I hear it took fifty men with silver bullets and blades to put the monster down, but that was only after a hundred more had lost their lives to wear away at its strength. The beast was attacking in isolation, setting up traps, remaining in shadows.. the intellect of a man with the might of a monster. What a fright.”
“It was a beast all the same, hag. They dragged it outside–clapped it in irons, starved it for days, carved out its eyes–then dragged it back in. They use it as some kind of mad guard dog, renewed by the curse at the start of every hour freshly starved and battered.” The invalid has begun to fall far, far behind, his voice faint. “That’s what they want to sic on us–on YOU.”
You come to the summit of the churchyard soon enough, the hill’s peak crowned by a decrepit church and studded with derelict cenotaphs. The rings of steel against steel echo out over the flowers and snow that dot the yard’s knoll like the tolls of a bell. The cultist has begun to hammer at chains that line the church’s door with his shovel, his swings frantic as he glances back over his shoulder at you.
“You cannot escape, outsiders! You are but fodder for the new age, you and all the others! You will only find mercy as stains on our lady’s teeth! The AGE OF MONSTERS is not over!” The man shouts–and with a great swing, the last chain of the church door breaks against his shovel’s beak. He takes a few steps back, his gaze now only on the dark. “Now, behold! The might of monsters! MORNE, the CHURCH GRIM..!”
The carved door creaks open, long and slow, to pitch-black chapel. You hear the church screech with the sound of chains against rotten wood. You can see faint puffs of warm breath against the night’s cold air. The scars that glare out from the darkness do not yet see you.
>Grab the gravedigger cultist. You can enact the power of your blood scrypt here.>Flee, and don’t you dare look back.>Have the invalid–wait, shit. The invalid’s hiding behind a grave.>Have the hag use her tarot on the beast.>Write-In. 