Footsteps scrape across the collapsed shrine above. Graven raises his shield as a mud-streaked young woman, slight and pale-faced, with cropped auburn hair, a torn brown wool coat, and a crooked silver earring appears at the broken entrance, breathless and clutching the stonework for balance.
The Ritual Survivor
I followed the signs of your descent. This passage resembles the chamber where they prepared me for sacrifice.
Father Oren tightens his grip on the cracked boundary stone. The ritual-bound skeleton turns its skull toward the newcomer, while Graven keeps his shield between her and the pit.
Father Oren Vale
You should not have followed. What did the shrine show you?
The Ritual Survivor
I came because the same marks were near the village. I was going to tell you why, but—
The mouth-shaped impressions below flex together. Their first sound is wet stone, their second a woman's remembered whisper, repeating a private phrase no stranger should know.
The Ritual-Bound Skeleton
The mouths know her hidden words.
✓ Quest Accepted
Protect the ritual survivor from the mouths below
✓ Quest Accepted
Determine whether the ritual survivor brings a genuine warning
“i weave my magic into the mouths to silence them permanently.”
SUCCESS (Great Willpower, rolled +2)
Lushion threads the Staff of Dark Rituals through the mouth-shaped impressions. His attention keeps splitting between the living woman and Father Oren, guarding against betrayal even as the rite takes shape.
Forbidden Knowledge supplies the silencing pattern: not destruction, but a permanent severing of every mouth from the voice it was built to carry. The staff narrows the current until no power spills beyond the marks.
Protective Warding folds around Lushion and the others, turning the impressions' remembered whisper inward. The mouths strain soundlessly beneath the ward, unable to reach a living voice.
The final thread enters the deepest impression. One by one, the damp mouths flatten into ordinary stone, their edges drying as the last stolen phrase collapses into silence.
The Ritual Survivor
It stopped. They cannot use my words anymore.
Father Oren Vale
You sealed the relay completely. Nothing below can borrow a voice through it now.
Graven
The passage is silent, master. I hear no summons.
The ward settles around the landing. The ritual-bound skeleton lowers its skull toward the sealed impressions, while Father Oren keeps the cracked boundary stone pressed against his chest.
✓ Quest Accepted
Have the ritual survivor explain the shrine marks
Quest Complete
Protect the ritual survivor from the mouths below
“I ask the ritual survivor to explain the marks near her village.”
SUCCESS (Legendary Occult Lore, rolled -2)
Lushion Everstar
Explain the marks you saw near your village.
The ritual survivor steadies herself beside the sealed impressions. Lushion’s Paranoid attention checks her hands and face while his staff keeps the ward narrow around them.
The Ritual Survivor
They were cut into the stones around the old well, three rings broken by short lines. The outer ring faced the village road.
Forbidden Knowledge matches the arrangement to a relay meant to gather spoken names from passing villagers. Entity Appraisal finds its purpose preparatory, not active.
The Ritual Survivor
The inner marks pointed toward the eastern ruins. People who slept nearby woke repeating words they had never learned. I covered the stones with ash before I fled.
The Staff of Dark Rituals draws the pattern through Lushion’s awareness without reopening the sealed relay. Its channel confirms the marks redirected voices toward the shrine.
The knowledge is enough to identify the rite, but one cost remains: the collapsed well hid the final stroke, leaving the marks’ exact maker uncertain.
Quest Complete
Determine whether the ritual survivor brings a genuine warning
Attribute Upgrade: Willpower Great→Superb
Quest Complete
Have the ritual survivor explain the shrine marks