January 21, 118 SE
The party approach the town of Frosthaven, passing by several corpses on the way. Ellyanna tries melting away the snow around the first they encounter, and Calanon uses his divine powers to attempt to sense the presence of the undead, but both attempts reveal nothing. The party decide that the first ambush was most likely a one-time thing and continue moving forwards.
After about fifteen minutes, they arrive at the outskirts of the village. From here, they can see bodies lying in the streets, and signs of great disturbances on the snow, as if many people had been moving all through the village. Many of the doors and windows on the houses have been smashed in.
The party decide to walk the perimeter of the village before going in any further, which takes them about an hour. They discover two facts of interest. There is a wide trail, as if produced by many feet, leaving the town to the northeast; none of the party members are aware of any major landmarks in that direction. There is also a large cemetery near the village, and another large trail leading between the cemetery and the village. Ellyanna determines that the tracks lead from the cemetery to the village, rather than the other way around.
The group decide to investigate the cemetery before the town. It's only a few minutes away, and when they arrive, their first impression is that the cemetery is way too big for Frosthaven - it's nearly the size of the town itself. Like the town, the snow and earth is disturbed throughout the cemetery, and its most prominent feature is a large mausoleum located towards the far end of the cemetery.
They circle to the back of the cemetery and walk in, taking a look at the graves. They see that many, but not all, of the graves are open; it seems that the occupants of many of the graves have burst out of their coffins and clawed their way up through the earth. They spend some time investigating the tombstones, and they realize that there are two distinct populations - most of the tombstones are extremely old, such that the engravings are worn away and illegible, while a minority are much newer; 150 years old at the oldest. Only the older graves are disturbed.
They make their way to the mausoleum, approaching from the back. The structure is ancient and made of heavy stone, with an entrance on the other end. Creeping around to the front, they see that the door is open, and Calanon's divine sense tells him that three undead creatures are within.
Darkstar sneaks around to the other site of the of the mausoleum, and Elvish tosses him a rope; the two of them hold it in front of the entrance as a tripwire. Ellyanna steps in front of the entrance, hoping to catch all three creatures in a single Burning Hands spell.
Once she's looking directly into the mausoleum, Ellyanna sees several things of note. First, the huge stone door is not just open, it has been smashed right off its hinges. The sarcophagus is also open, and three skeletons stand in front of it. Two of the skeletons step forward to attack, but the third moves back, into the sarcophagus, and descends, as if the sarcophagus actually contained a staircase.
Ellyanna blasts the remaining skeletons with her spell, but they take only minor damage. One of the skeletons sees the tripwire and steps over it as it approaches, while the other runs into it. It manages to keep its balance, but it stumbles and misses its opportunity to attack. The first skeleton attacks Ellyanna with its sword, but she dodges the blow and retreats back as Elvish, Darkstar and Calannon move into melee, and Grrrr Yip attacks with spells from a distance. The party dispatch the skeletons with relative ease; Elvish is moderately wounded by a sword's slash but otherwise everyone comes out unharmed.
Darkstar and Calanon replace the sarcophagus lid on the sarcophagus, as Ellyanna begins casting a ritual that will alert her if anything comes through the sarcophagus from below. However, the ritual takes ten minutes to cast, and several minutes into it, the party hears the sound of something smashing into the lid from below. Calanon's divine sense confirms the presence of eight fiendish beings under the sarcophagus, and the party decide to flee back to town. The run the whole way back without looking back.
When they arrive back at Frosthaven, they look back at the graveyard but they can't see anything at this distance. They don't appear to have been followed. They decide to head for the village temple, assuming that it will be one of the largest and most important buildings. They head to the center of town and fairly easily spot the temple of Vorn, as it is indeed the largest building around.
A corpse is lying outside of the temple, and when they walk up to it and turn it over, Calanon recognizes it as the corpse of Nera, the priestess of Vorn who had joined the second expedition to Frosthaven. Walking into the temple, they see that there are corpses of villagers all over, as well as the destroyed remains of several undead creatures. Lying against the back wall of the building, they finally encounter a survivor - an elf woman with a nasty stomach wound who seems to be just barely clinging to life.
A healing spell manages to restore the woman slightly; well enough for her to talk to the party. She is Ellesera, the captain of Duskveil's guard, who led the second expedition. She explains that, when her party arrived at Frosthaven, they headed to the center of town to investigate what had happened, where they were ambushed by the undead. They fought their way to the temple, but were cut down by the undead; probably the only reason that she's still alive is that the creatures didn't realize that she wasn't dead.
Having spent the last of their healing magic on Ellesera, the party decide to retreat back to their camp for now. Ellesera cannot walk on her own, so they help her make her way out. As they're walking past various houses, a man stumbles out of one of them into their path. He has an obvious head wound and seems to be somewhat delirious. They move forward to speak with him.
Although the man's wound impairs his speech and thought, they manage to learn that his name is Kaplan Brash, and he lives in town with his mother. He was present for the attack, which started at night while he was sleeping. He was awoken by his mother's screams; he fought of the undead that were attacking her, but was too late to save her. Heading into town, he tried to help the townsfolk fight, but between the darkness, the blizzard, and the overwhelming numbers of the undead, they really stood no chance. During the fight, he suffered a head wound and he can't remember much of what happened between then and now.
The party convince Kaplan to join them, and after a brief stop in his house to grab his weapons, armor, and gear, they leave Frosthaven and begin the trip back to their camp. With both Kaplan and Ellesera slowing them down, the journey is slow and they only arrive back at the camp around midnight. At the camp, Vilhelm has build a respectable log cabin, and once they're safely inside, everyone rests for the night.
January 22, 118 SE
The next morning, Kaplan and Ellesera have both largely recovered, and they discuss what to do next. They decide to send Ellesera, Vilhelm, and the two farmers back to Duskveil to inform the townsfolk of what they've discovered, warn the nearby towns, and try to gather some help. Meanwhile, everyone else will return to Frosthaven and continue investigating, trying to learn what caused the undead to attack.
