The Flesh is Weak
I briefly had this up on Itch but it somehow didn’t feel right and I’m moving it here. It’s a wierd time here right now.
We flew halfway around the world on a day’s notice last week because my grandmother’s health had rapidly declined and, while we had a couple good last days with her, she’s on her deathbed right now. While I love her has family, I don’t really like her as a person and I’m not feeling really torn up. She’s 90 and it feels like her time has come. But watching her go through it is awful. I’ll let you look up terminal agitation rather than describing it here.
Much of my recent return to blogging has been spawned by seeking distraction from everything that’s going on here, and this dungeon is not exception; something that popped into my head as I was sitting with her earlier tonight to calm her during the agitation between spurts of rest.
I’ll let it speak for itself and shut up now.
The Flesh is Weak
A Dungeon About the Agony of Modern Death for Cairn
Content Warning and Introduction
I started writing this while sitting with my grandmother at her deathbed as she alternates endlessly between sleep and terminal restlessness. This is a way of processing the complicated feelings of not particularly liking her as a person but also not wishing what she’s going through on anyone.
Death will be a mercy when it comes for her and the fact we can’t end this sooner feels inhumane.
This means there’s descriptions of the things an old body goes through close to death and a bit of body horror as unlucky characters may get sucked into experiencing that themselves.
This won’t be for everyone, and you can stop reading here, but for once this is something I actually need to write and I’m going to do it.
Creature stats are used or adapted from the monster list on cairnrpg.com by Yochai Gal and licensed CC-BY-SA 4.0. This text © 2024 Luke Simonds and licensed CC-BY-SA 4.0. Ink Demon inspired by The Wizard of Abergavenny as told by Daniel Morden on Super Great Kids Stories.
In a Tower in the Woods a Wizard is Dying
Banzalibar dreaded death and was determined to delay it as long as possible. Two-hundred years ago he concocted a potion to extend life, slowing all his bodily processes down immensely. What he didn’t count on was that this would extend the agonizing days before death interminably.
He is stuck in a bed in his tower, unable to eat or speak except for bursts of mumbling “please” nearly silently; passing between fitful sleep and moments of sheer terror writhing in his bed in pain unable to do anything to relieve it. His skin is splotchy purple and bloated, his bowels painfully distended and unable to pass waste. The room reeks of death and urine. He would like nothing more than to die quickly and he can’t.
An adventuring party stumbling on his tower is his last chance to end it all.
What Lured You to the Tower?
Surely that old wizard is dead by now. Must be good stuff up in his tower.
A message on a scrap of paper in a broken bottle on rocks near the path thrown from the tower begs for help.
A strange voice in your head promises wealth if you come help an old man in need.
A goblin under what appears to be a painful body control spell spits out a command to go to the tower and help. It promptly falls down dead.
What Can the Wizard Do and What Does He Want?
Banzalibar can communicate telepathically up to 500 ft. outside the tower in bursts of d4 minutes of coherent speech interrupted by agonizing screams for d8 minutes; those he is in contact with hear the screams too.
He cannot interact with the physical world.
He will try to convince those he is speaking with to brew a poison for him from ingredients spread around the tower to quickly end his life. Ingredients are in rooms 3, 4, and 5 and must be brewed at the cauldron in 6.
When the poison is brought to him he realizes he has one final spell prepared and will attempt to cast it to swap bodies with an adventurer. He must grasp them with both hands to cast the spell. Depending on player response, STR or DEX saves to resist being grasped and/or WIL save to resist the effects of the spell being cast.
What’s In the Tower?
A musty, smokey space filled with magical and mundane bric-a-brac stacked floor to ceiling in corners and pouring from shelves and tables in all rooms. Smells of rotten food and decay. Dimly lit in all rooms by lanterns hung from hooks on walls.
Each room of the circular tower is a different floor from Room 1 at the ground to Room 6 at the top of the tower. See room descriptions for how they are connected. All can also be accessed through windows from exterior, relatively easy to climb with rough stones and ivy growing.
Random Encounters
Lantern goes out, room is dark, no sound, everyone’s heads fill with the wizard’s screams of pain.
D6 house goblins going about for chores.
A ghost of a former wizard’s apprentice emerges from the wall screaming.
One house goblin on the ground in the fetal position crying
D4 house goblins trying awkwardly to catch a ghost in a ghost jar.
Room becomes painfully cold for 10 minutes. Frostbite will set in soon if nothing is done to heat or leave room.
Creatures
House Goblin
4 HP, 8 STR, 12 DEX, 8 WIL, household tool (d4)
Small humanoid with greenish skin and large flappy ears wearing an old stained uniform; once white and now a splotchy mess of brown, red, and green.
Mentally enslaved by Banzalibar and cursed to serve here in the tower until death.
Critical Damage: Mental control spell attempts to transfer to target. WIL save or become controlled by Banzalibar directly for d4 minutes until the spell fades entirely. Goblin dies immediately if spell transfers.
Wizards Apprentice Ghost
8 HP, 14 STR, 12 DEX, 15 WIL, life drain (d6)
Incorporeal spirits of the restless dead, vulnerable only to magic and specific anointed rites.
May cast spell from one random spellbook at will from memory
Critical Damage: Target must save WIL or is possessed, acting only on behalf of the ghost’s whims.
Room 1
Entryway piled with chests and bags holding 5,000 gp in coins and gemstones. A skeleton in adventuring clothes lies with a hand in a bag. Touching treasure while Banzalibar still lives freezes the one who touched it in place permanently.
Spiral staircase up to Room 2
Room 2
Banzalibar’s bedroom; lined with dressing table, washbasin, etc… on walls. Bed with rails in center holds the wizard. 2-in-6 chance he is resting when adventurers enter, otherwise he writhes silently in pain. 2-in-6 chance every 10 minutes house goblins come in to change bedpan, force feed, sponge bath, etc…
If he has not already, he will explain that he needs components from Rooms 3, 4, and 5 brewed into a poison in Room 6 and brought to kill him.
Spiral stairs down to Room 2. Doors marked 3, 4, 5, and 6 in what should be an exterior wall are portals directly to each of those rooms. Doors to 3, 4, and 5 are stuck shut from rust. Door to 6 is locked. Key to 6 is on his nightstand.
Room 3
Magical storeroom lined with shelves of jars in uncountable colors, shapes, and sizes. Reeks of formaldehyde. Preserved leaves, fruits, and animals and animal parts in jars.
Poison requires preserved snake from this room.
Gloves on hooks on wall covered in dust, slime, and spiderwebs. Sign above says “Cautious Wizards Wear Their Gloves.” If touching a preserved animal without gloves, it comes to life and will break out of the jar to attack within d4 minutes.
Use stats for viper or other creatures from Cairn bestiary as appropriate.
Viper
3 HP, 5 STR, 12 DEX, 3 WIL, bite (d6)
Poisonous snakes often found in caves, pits, and other dark places. An antitoxin can be made from their poison sacs.
Use heat and smell to track their victims. Critical Damage: Target is poisoned, dying in 1d12 hours without a cure.
Portal door to Room 2.
Room 4
Kitchen bustling with 2d6 house goblins carrying on with their chores, crying and unable to stop. Hands raw and bleeding from overwork. Massive hearth with stews and roasts going makes the room swelteringly hot.
Poison requires nightshade from the herb stores in this room, but goblins are enchanted to stop thieves and must be distracted or otherwise dealt with.
500 gp in rare spices also stocked in kitchen.
Portal door to Room 2.
Room 5
Library with no shelves; books piled in the floor, tables, and windowsills. One book sits on a pedestal reading stand in center of room.
d6 random spellbooks may be found among books with 10 minutes searching per spellbook.
Book on pedestal is locked with cheap lock on clasp. Cover has hastily scrawled note that says “secrets for wizards only.” If book is opened words are swimming around page, forming and reforming randomly, but each time saying “Read Me.” If someone says “Read Me” aloud the Ink Demon is released and demands a task.
Poison requires an instruction book from this room. Book may be found with 10 minutes searching stacks.
Portal Door to Room 2. Ladder through trapdoor in ceiling to Room 6.
Ink Demon
16 HP, 18 STR, 14 DEX, 18 WIL, suffocating ink (d10+d10)
Malevolent spirit of an old story dead set on escaping and forging his own path in the world instead of acting out the old tale. Trapped by Banzalibar in this book.
Inky, giant, shifting form looms in shadows and changes shapes; always terrifying. States it will do any task requested of it as thanks for being released, but will go on its own if the releaser cannot think of a task. It is incredibly fast and completes any task in d4 minutes.
It is not allowed on sacred ground by the old laws of magic. If asked to do a task in sacred ground, it will state that it cannot, and the releaser may then force it back into the book. Banzalibar knows this and will reach out telepathically to help after the creature had completed d4 tasks for the releaser.
Room 6
Potionmaking shop; oddly clean compared to all other rooms. Large cauldron in center and jars of components and tools neatly arranged on tables.
Lighting fire for cauldron requires 10 minutes work. All other components for poison listed in recipe may be found on tables with 10 minutes searching. Brewing potion once fire is lit and all components are found takes 10 minutes.
Portal door to Room 2. Trapdoor and ladder down to Room 5.