d20x5 Doomed Mythos Investigators

A generator to swiftly conjure victims to feed into the slavering maw of the cosmos. The other half of semiurge's draft swap with me- find their blog here.

The Sisterhood of St. Catherine- a location and tables

    You and your party are almost to the caravanserai in time, but the shadow crawls across the dunes faster. The ancient stone roads, long since covered by the shifting sands but still protruding through like a half-buried skeleton, have guided you far through the desert, but as the wall of blackness sweeps over your stumbling form, they disappear into the sudden shade. You half-slide, half-sprint down the valley’s slopes towards the imposing white walls as the far-off cackles suddenly ring out from much closer- six, eight, twelve phase hyenas, forms rippling and nebulous, burst over the rim to the west and sprint towards your companions. Shadows shift and twist as they seem to shiver across the sand, paws striking an irregular rhythm and jaws open and baying with a hunter’s delight. You trip on a buried stone, tumbling with the momentum and rolling down the slope uncontrollably, and the lead hyena howls as it closes in. Its tenebrous teeth reach for your throat before suddenly-

    A bright lance of glinting steel catches the beast in the jaws and carries it away in a flash as a streak of white, gold, and leather blurs in your vision. A cry of **Iya! Iya!** echoes with it, and you quickly scramble to your feet as your companion pulls at your arm- the danger is not yet past. A last desperate sprint to the caravanserai gates sees you into safety, but as the great iron chains clank again behind you, you turn to see the face of your rescuer. A noble catgirl, clothed in the white and gold armor of a Sister Mendicant, wheels her sand-goose for another charge, lance glinting in the reflection of the caravanserai’s fires. Her mount’s sharp beak honks in righteous rage, four wide-webbed feet finding sure footing on the sand’s treacherous surface and its barding covering its mottled white feathers with wide plates of painted steel. As the gates begin to close, the catgirl nun shouts another **Iya!** and drives hard for the banded doors, just slipping inside as they thunder shut. The yipping outside is drowned out by the bustle of activity inside, and the nun dismounts her goose to size you up. All around, catgirl nuns train with cruciform swords and bannered lances, merchants unload their caravans into warehouses with curses in twelve languages, and sand-geese drink from the central well and hiss at passersby. Over it all, the cloister rises with painted walls worn pale with time and sand, as bells call out the hour in the four corner towers. ”Welcome to the Sisterhood of St. Catherine, travelers. I’m about to visit the brewery- care to join me?”

    The Sisterhood of St. Catherine is a catgirl monastery placed north of the center of the Exile’s Desert, a caravanserai and adventuring hub dedicated to keeping the roads of the trade routes swept of sand, guarded from bandits, and warded from the worst of the wandering storm spirits. Its nuns take either a vow of anchorage or of chivalry, maintaining the caravanserai, its brewery, stores, and livestock, or wandering the desert searching for fresh exiles and lost caravans. Their sand-goose mounts are renowned for hardiness, speed, and fearlessness, though rightly avoided for their hostility towards all but the nuns. The beds of their inn are offered at reasonable prices and are gloriously soft, lined with catgirl fur and attended by soft music from the common area at all hours. Their beers are bitter but strong, and offered with cassava, cholla buds, and ricecakes. The walls are strong and said to be blessed, and roads to three cities meet at its gates.

A: The stables. Junior anchorites tend to the feeding troughs and brush feathers while the chivalric eat with their mounts and repair barding and saddles with careful claws and leather strips.

B: The central well. A wide stone basin that fills by a mechanism unknown since the caravanserai’s founding, the water is cool against the desert’s heat and much of the bustle congregates around it. Merchants argue while they draw water for their burden-beasts and children giggle as they splash each other; chivalric sisters carry buckets to the brewery as strength training, sometimes stacking  two or three on their outstretched limbs as practice in breathing disciplines.

C: The cloister. Its stone walls were once painted brightly with scenes from the life of St. Catherine, but are now faded by wind and sand. Some glimpses are still legible: the taming of the winds, the routing of the Red Scarf Army, the loss of her hand, her feast of birds. A careful cactus garden is grown in its open center, with anchorites wandering serenely in contemplation between the library and the dormitory. Laundry is left to air on long lines between the sides like a cavalcade of white flags. Four towers rise from its corners a short height, topped with bells that chime prayer hours and watch rotations.

D: The training field. A wide stretch of stone made smooth by generations of footsteps, here the nuns train in hand to hand combat and breathing disciplines. Senior sisters oversee drills and strength exercises, and are quick to swipe with a soft but firm paw at any student found lacking. Racks of swords, halberds, and lances are polished and sharpened, and the air cracks with the sounds of senior sisters landing dolorous blows against the stone pillars they erect each morning.

E: The bazaar. A riot of colors stretch between packbeasts, caravans, carts, stalls, extremely tall backpacks, and running youths as a horde of vendors shout to be heard over each other. The most common customers for these clangorous merchants are their fellow merchants, and so the haggling is nearly lethal. Those who cannot or will not pay the modest fee for a room in the inn sleep on spare bags of rice and scattered nests of cast-off fabrics, and crates and barrels of goods exotic and mundane are carried, rolled, stacked, and repacked at dizzying rates between the shaded warehouses and the bustling crowds. Over it all, a relief at finding safe rest in the inhospitable desert keeps the arguments in good faith and the shouting joyous, despite the exaggerated complaints of the caravan masters.

F: The inn. A wide building attended at all times by the pleasantly drunk, the inn is a simple construction of stone, the ground floor occupied by a kitchen and common area and attached to the brewery. Beer is chilled below-ground, the lower floor and its rooms kept cool by the solid rock the caravanserai is built atop. Storage and sleeping rooms are kept separate by a wide hallway carpeted in a fine rug once gifted by the sorcerer-queen of Attar-in-Mourning. The beer is pleasant, but sometimes contains bits of fur- for this reason customers with outstanding tabs may be conscripted to aid in the brewing process and lend their labor to the mashing and soaking of sprouted grains, without fear of shedding in the product. Sitar music and singing are a constant pleasantry in the common room.

1d6 Nuns of the Sisterhood

1. Mother Superior Freij. Black fur with a terrible puckered scar from her lip to her right ear. Cordial but always occupied. Black robes and a steel-tipped cane.
2. Prioress Szymon of the Anchorite Tradition. Cream-dipped black fur, unusually fluffy tail. Matronly and worryingly adept at convincing people to help her in her chores. Always bustling between two places with arms full. White robes with a black habit and a number of stains, which she tuts about.
3. Prioress Fidelis of the Chivalric Tradition. Mottled brown and white fur, wide and intense eyes. Usually wearing her painted armor rather than habit, but keeps head covered with black wrappings. Quiet but polite. Master of three ascended sword forms and practitioner of wind-breathing technique.
4. Sister Margaret, anchorite. Cream white fur with sandy freckles, twitching tail and nervous ears. Manages the bazaar as best she can, but is frankly overwhelmed at all times. Has difficulty reminding merchants of the recommended tithe, but enjoys the diaspora of cultures she interacts with. White robes and habit with a belt that holds simple scale measures (for impartiality) and a ledger and charcoal pencil. 
5. Sister Nicosia, chivalric. Black fur verging on blue, one protruding fang. Minds the sand-goose chicks and herds them (chases them) loosely around the caravanserai. Always missing one or two, but enjoys the hunt. Hands are scarred from hundreds of little nips. Wears a cloak with simple gold thread patterns embroidered into it over white robes and habit.
6. Guard Captain Elzear, anchorite. Mottled gray fur with pale scraping scars across her hands. Gruff and suspicious, but mostly exaggeratedly. Has little time to talk , but is willing to discuss frankly with people who ask straightforward questions. Never seen outside of her painted armor, and wears a helmet painted black instead of a habit, which Szymon complains about.

1d6 Sand-Geese For Sale

1. Nips- clouded feathers, nasty temperament even for a goose. Unusually clever and adept at untying simple knots with his beak. Will calm down for extra snacks.
2. Begets-Grace, snow white with a longer fanning tail. Calm , but yet untested in battle. Shrugs barding uncomfortably and will honk in annoyance if forced to wear it.
3. Flatfoot, black banded on milky white. Even temperament, but tendency to take inconvenient naps. Truly immovable when she desires.
4. Sweetness, cowardly and nervous but an excellent snuggler. Faithful to the last person who fed her treats.
5. Brazen, a mottling of brown and white like sand on stone. Only sweet to Sister Nicosia, even though she already has a mount. To all others huffy but serviceable.
6. Moonie, silvery white with bright beautiful eyes. Still a juvenile and unfit to be ridden by any but children, though still strong enough to carry heavy saddlebags. Used to being coddled, but friendly and inquisitive.

1d6 Travelers in the Inn

1. Imitates-Rivers, a great serpent from far-off Chryselephantine selling fine silks, threads, and fabrics. Thick form draped in bangles and burgundy sashes, carrying their cart by means of a great harness. Speaks only the snake-tongue, but has a human youth, Khemri, who speaks trade-sign and a handful of other languages well enough to translate.
2. The mercenary band the Rippers, exiles looking to make good coin as bodyguards for merchants or to catch a whisper of treasure hunting, which they’d prefer.  Led by a human named Winsome Jack, who claims to know one of the breathing disciplines of the nuns. He also claims to have slept with a number of them, and so is most likely simply braggadocious.
3. Yenefer the Black, a catgirl thief from the Uncountable Pillar Marches here to track down a ruin of the ancient Wind Knights. Mostly answers coyly to avoid revealing her true goals, but willing to work with those she finds martially impressive if their goals align. Liable to plant stolen goods on the party if the nuns or merchants begin to grow suspicious.
4. Ing, a great charcoal lizard blacksmith and sun-mage. Twenty feet long, eyeless, and with breath like lava, he enjoys the heat of the desert but mostly avoids the other merchants. Very gruff and clipped speech, in an old and unusual dialect. Willing to perform simple crafting and repair work for those who can pay their prices, and to exchange spells with those who pay in unusual weapons or metals.
5. Three magi agents of the sorcerer-queen of Attar-in-Morning, here to observe the caravanserai for rebellious elements hiding from the queen’s wrath. Unpleasant but cordial, they respond to insult or hostility with a bitter smile, but will silently curse the offender with a spell of shattergem- the next gemstone they touch breaks into an infestation of shining beetles that devour fabrics and cause irritating bites.
6. Second-Heightening, an immortal crowkin with sunken features and oily feathers. A necromancer conclave, they are distracted but friendly. Prone to rambling conversation on obscure topics. A book merchant by trade, they only accept scrolls and tomes in payment, but will also copy them for a fee.