Adventure Gamers - Forums

>hit michael with tome
(first taking The Compleat Manual of Wardes and Seales)
Without even blinking, Michael knocks The Compleat Manual of Wardes and Seales from your hands, then backhands you hard enough to send sparks across your vision. “Odd choice of weapon,” he remarks. “Silly bitch,” he sneers. “There’s nothing you can do to hurt me.”

Grimly, Michael continues to strangle you…

>hit michael with lantern
Without even blinking, Michael knocks the lantern from your hands, then backhands you hard enough to send sparks across your vision. “Odd choice of weapon,” he remarks. “Silly bitch,” he sneers. “There’s nothing you can do to hurt me.”

dead…

>light match
(first taking the book of matches)
One of the matches starts to burn.

Grimly, Michael continues to strangle you…

>burn michael with match
Petty arson isn’t going to solve your problems.

dead…

>show wedding ring to michael
There is one chance—if you can only somehow reach whatever weak flicker of humanity still survives within that shell; if the person who was your husband still exists somewhere, buried beneath the part that is Croseus Verlac…

Silently, you raise up your left hand, your wedding ring gleaming softly in the strange, green light.

Michael is transfixed. He seems to want to recoil from the sight, yet is somehow simultaneously drawn to it. Suddenly, his face crumbles, the madness and stoic evil falling away to reveal confusion, fear, vulnerability and anguish—all superimposed upon the malevolent features of Croseus, struggling to regain control.

Your score has just gone up by five points.

>ask michael about michael
You can’t speak; you can’t force any air past your strangled throat.

For just a moment, he is almost back with you; his features soften, his grip around your throat weakens. For just a moment, the thing that possesses him falters and loosens its hold.

>kiss michael
This is not your husband anymore; you don’t even want to get near it.

Then, it is gone. Michael shudders, shakes his head as if to clear it of a fog; and when he turns back to you, his eyes burn with the red-rimmed madness of Croseus Verlac.

>give amulet to Michael
or
>hang amulet on Michael’s neck
or
>apply amulet to Michael
He needs to be protected now!

Luna Sevithiainen - 17 October 2016 07:07 AM

>give amulet to Michael
or
>hang amulet on Michael’s neck
or
>apply amulet to Michael
He needs to be protected now!

Yes, let’s.

>show wedding ring to michael
There is one chance—if you can only somehow reach whatever weak flicker of humanity still survives within that shell; if the person who was your husband still exists somewhere, buried beneath the part that is Croseus Verlac…

Silently, you raise up your left hand, your wedding ring gleaming softly in the strange, green light.

Michael is transfixed. He seems to want to recoil from the sight, yet is somehow simultaneously drawn to it. Suddenly, his face crumbles, the madness and stoic evil falling away to reveal confusion, fear, vulnerability and anguish—all superimposed upon the malevolent features of Croseus, struggling to regain control.

Your score has just gone up by five points.

>put amulet on michael
In his moment of hesitation, you see your chance; straining against his choking grip, you slip the amulet’s cord around Michael’s neck, letting the silver pendant drop to his chest.

Instantly Michael begins convulsing, arching his back and clawing at his chest. His jaws stretch open as if to release a howl of torment, but instead of voice, a thick, ropy stream of ectoplasmic mist pours from his throat. It pools into the center of the room, roils about, then coalesces into a human form—the vaporous, half-rotted apparition of Croseus Verlac himself!

Michael is doubled over with racking coughs, bringing up a thin trickle of blood.

Your score has just gone up by five points.

If he is, we could try to
>tie rope to Michael
>tie rope to self
Last time we managed to not get flushed ourselves so we should be good now too.

>cover hole 4
(first taking the strange metal flute)
You place your finger over the fourth flute hole.

>cover hole 5
You place your finger over the fifth flute hole.

The ghost lets out a chilling, sepulchral laugh. “You useless, puny mortal,” it cries. “Did you really think that there was any way on earth you could stop me? I have lived and thrived for over four hundred years—not even Death can claim me!”

Michael begins shaking uncontrollably.

>play flute
(the strange metal flute)
The flute emits an odd mixture of metallic, warbling notes which intertwine and harmonize eerily with each other.

The strange harmony of the flute blends with the atonal ringing of the two columns, and the three sounds suddenly grow stronger, resonating with and reinforcing one another, intertwining like a dissonant, invisible braid. The sound increases in volume, piercing your eardrums and causing the very air to shimmer.

Suddenly the air above the altar begins to ripple as though with extreme heat. The very fabric of space seems to twist and buckle between the two columns; and then, with a sound like a wet sheet being torn slowly down the middle, the fabric splits.

You are immediately swept off your feet by a powerful sucking vacuum, pulling everything within reach toward the portal. Dust and debris; bones and loose rock from the burial niches; everything not nailed down goes flying across the temple and into the all-devouring maw hovering over the altar-stone. Desperately, you wedge your fingers into a crack in the floor; with the other hand you grasp hold of Michael’s pants leg and hang on for dear life.

Verlac is caught like a gossamer thread in a tornado. Frantically he claws at the air, but as an insubstantial ghost there is nothing for him to hang on to. Shrieking and cursing, he is dragged inexorably back, closer and closer to the portal, until the suction draws his corpus out into a long, trailing ribbon, like an unraveling cable-knit sweater—and in the next moment he is gone forever, sucked into whatever alien dimension lies beyond that horrible rift.

For a few agonizing moments you don’t think you’re going to make it; then, suddenly, the chaos stops, leaving you breathless on the floor.

Painstakingly, you pry your stiff, bleeding fingers out of the crack and roll over. The rift is gone. The air is normal, and the columns are ringing quietly, as if nothing had happened.

Silence reigns.

There passes some time that your memory cannot account for; a brief period of blackness and oblivion, you and your unconscious husband, together in the subterranean vault. Perhaps you were unconscious as well; you cannot remember. At some point you become conscious again. You lift Michael to his feet, putting his arm around your shoulders, and the two of you stagger up the titan stairs to the surface. The ground begins rumbling just as you are exiting the house, but by that time Michael has recovered some of his senses and can walk a bit faster.

You make it down to the bend in the road overlooking the town just in time to see the town square collapse, the vile obelisk sinking into the earth. Several buildings are dragged down along with it. A gas pipe ruptures in the courthouse, sending a gout of flame high into the air, and soon the entire town is burning.

Behind you, a muffled explosion and a sudden warmth against your back bespeak a similar end to the Verlac family mansion. For a moment you find yourself almost turning back, driven by instinct to rescue your belongings—but you stop. You turn away. And while Michael rests, you stand at the overlook and watch the sparks rise like fireflies, mingling with the stars in a clear, cloudless sky.

Home, one year later

Home
You are home, and it is a momentous event. Downstairs, Michael is waiting for you to bring him the wondrous news. To the east is the bedroom you both share, and to the north is your bathroom.

A cool wave of uneasiness washes slowly over you; you’re not sure why.

Your score has just gone up by fifteen points.

>d
You don’t want to go downstairs until you have something to tell Michael.

“Well?” Michael calls excitedly from downstairs. “Have you looked yet?”

Maybe the pregnancy test is in the bathroom?
>n

>n
You can barely feel yourself walking; it’s almost as if some outer force were moving you of its own accord.

Your Bathroom
Your bathroom; an ordinary place. A normal, safe, familiar place.

On the counter is a home pregnancy test.

Michael calls up again, this time sounding slightly worried: “Hon? Everything okay up there?”

>x test
It’s an ordinary pregnancy test, the kind you can get at any drugstore; the kind with the little window that turns pink if you’re going to have a baby.

A nameless, formless apprehension grips you suddenly, leaving you short of breath. Why are you so frightened, on what should be such a joyous occasion?

>get it
Taken.

You can hear a fly buzzing around, right around your head.

>x window
You stare down at the little plastic indicator, and an inexplicable horror seizes you as you recall Edward Verlac’s last words:

And besides; who could say whether the crafty devil Croseus might not concoct some new way to enter the world, through a new body—through that of one of my daughters, perhaps? The ritual has always demanded a grandson, but Croseus was never one to let such a trivial inconvenience stop him. He would find a way. He always returns to his blood.

The window is pink. The test is positive.

From downstairs, you can hear Michael joyfully talking to himself:

“Oh, I hope it’s a little girl,” he says. “I’ve always wanted to have a little girl.”


  *** You have won… for now ***


In that game you scored 99 out of a possible 100 points; you have banished the evil and saved your husband from a fate most hideous—but you were unable to solve the entire mystery.

Thank you for playing Anchorhead!

We won!

Wonder where we lost the one remaining point though.

And of course a big thanks to Karlok for leading this playthrough