Twelve Recorders

Waking up in Budya Mansion, the party opted to solve the mystery of what was behind the bricked up doorway.

Sending Nyx through using her ability to step into the ethereal plane, she was greeted by darkness as there was no light source in the room. Laithe repositioned her and then stepped back through the veil in order to cast Prestidigitation on a candle, causing his sister to suddenly be face to face with a mummified corpse.

An unexpected consequence of the prank however was that an Anguisher suddenly poured out of the mouth of the corpse and attacked Nyx, putting her on the brink of death and causing her to flee in terror.

This went on unknown to the rest of the party who were dealing with an unrelated problem of Morin suddenly disappearing. This was due to the activation of his Band of Obsession that he had been hiding from most of the party.

Teleporting to just outside of the mansion, Morin was quickly surrounded by a group of Mouruges and attacked viciously. It soon became clear however, that he was somehow tied to the Kindled Mouruge that was leading them they were sharing any damage taken by either of the pair.

As the party rushed to help, Nyx left the ethereal plane pursued by the Anguisher which knocked her unconscious at around the same time the the Mouruges did the same to Morin.

A fraught combat ensued where the party was forced to split into teams to fight their two seemingly unrelated opponents. Nikita and Ellucard (who racked up an impressive kill count) rushed to Morin's aid whilst Calesete went toe to toe with the Anguisher that was attacking Nyx. Lysistrata and Dr. Dibble floated between the two fights lending vital magical and alchemical support to both combats.

As the combat turned in the party's favour, Nikita noticed that the Kindled Mouruge was wearing a ring identical to one on Morin's hand and immediately informed everyone as to what was going on. Morin continued to beat himself half to death hitting the Mouruge in spite of this information even before Lysistrata slipped it from the Mouruge's hand with her Mage Hand.

Eventually emerging victorious, despite some fears that they wouldn't, the party retreated back into the mansion to heal and recuperate.

After Ellucard broke down the brick wall to investigate the hidden room in a more traditional manner, Lysistrata identified the mummified corpse of her former music teacher Urbain Chanson and the papers around the floor as sheet music documenting attempts to proceed beyond the first few bars of Peat and Sweet Berries with multiple abandoned attempts to write lyrics.

The item that caused the most discussion however was a wooden chest bearing the seal of Liesech. It contained 12 smaller boxes each with a recorder inside and a stack of blank sheet music. A note in Charneault said "Thank you for your order and apologies for the delay due to issues at our factory".

Rampant speculation ensued as to whether this box was what brought the Weeping Pox from Liesech to Budya and for what reason M. Chanson (who was chained to his bed and had no signs of pox-marks) had been subjected to such a cruel fate.

Ellucard identified the rings as Bands of Obsession and Lysistrata's new lyre as Night Caller.

A plan was made to sleep a second night in the mansion and then travel to Nov Ostoya, the nearest large city.