Spoiler Warning
This game report will (hopefully) be an entertaining read and be a useful resource, both for GMs in particular to see one route this scenario can take if they are thinking of running it, and for people who just want to get a feel for a Call of Cthulhu game. If you are a player then you read on at your own risk, as it is contains many spoilers. You have been warned!
We last left our investigators and their hosts being eyed up by a demented quarter-tonne of wild boar, making up its mind who to grind to a bloody paste first. The decision made, the boar crushed its owner, Malcom Jarvey, against the stone chimney stack of his own farmhouse, before charging off into the underbrush to a volley of gunfire and thrown objects from the investigators. The party made the wise decision to leave Edith to her grieving, with the contorted body of Old Pete, lying in a pool of vomited black foulness, serving as a mutely stark warning of the horrors to come…but not before they found a strange, delirious letter from Prof. Roades, alluding cryptically to a cave, dynamite and his mother in equal measure.
Despite this disturbing communique, the investigators had one immediate priority – to check on Webster Jackson, who had camped out alone at the old dig site rather than stay overnight at the farm. Upon arrival, they found Webster’s campsite a trampled mess of churned mud and and crumpled canvas, with no sign of their comrade. A hideously mutated deer lay breathing its last nearby, which promptly spewed diseased bile over poor Dunk’s face as he and Tom Higgins checked the site over for clues. A swathe of sylvan destruction leading into the forest and a mess of hoofprints were their only clues as to Webster’s fate.
Meanwhile, intrepid reporter Rita Eisler and doughty Dorothy Brunswick made inquiries in the settlement of Blackwater Creek, where they had a disturbing encounter with some children, who all appeared to be suffering from some sort of malady and were in possession of a mason jar of water containing small, carnivorous organisms – from the creek, apparently. The party rejoined and discussed the plan of action and their suspicions about the water from the creek, linking it to the mutations seen in animals and the condition of Old Pete the night before.
They then headed for Prof. Roades’ abandoned main camp, before heading down to the dammed-up creek. They noted several changes in the vegetation as they journeyed through the forest, most notably a sickly-sweet smell hanging in the air, strange, livid growths on the trees, and odd fungi – one puffball-like example of which sent Rita coughing and choking back to the group when she trod on it seeking to take a picture of a particular growth.
Upon reaching the lake formed by the damming of the creek – and noting odd movements seen within the water – Dorothy, through her rifle scope, spotted something colourful on the other side: Webster’s jacket, neatly hung on a tree branch! Perhaps their comrade was alive? Swiftly moving to where the creek entered the lake from higher ground, the investigator fixed a rope and crossed, but not without the large-framed ‘tiny’ Tom Higgins taking an impromptu dip. Rita, feeling slightly unwell, elected to stay on the other bank. Tom and Dunk, backed up by Dorothy, advanced into the woods behind Webster’s jacket, only to find him headless and entangled in the branches of a tree. As their mouths gaped in horror and they backed away, the tree’s branches suddenly shed their bark to reveal slick black flesh beneath, and these arboreal tendrils lashed out towards the investigators…
Alone on the other back, the elegant Rita Eisler looked down…and noticed the rash of black lesions sprouting on her arms. Before her very eyes, one of them burst, dripping black, viscous fluid onto the ground. Sudden nausea overcame her, and she pitched forward…