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- Archive Page Twenty Five -

WHO FOUND DR. BEDLAM'S ASYLUM … AND WHY AREN'T THEY TELLING?

Dateline: 7-5-516

By Jacquetta Anichoson, Investigative Reporter


"Doctor Nathaniel Bedlam was an expert in the science of the mind, studying the sickness that has befallen the insane. Some years ago, accused of unsavory practices, the Doctor became a recluse, hiding within his immense asylum with a small staff and his patients. Nobody has heard from him for some time, but regular supplies have still been ordered and delivered until a few months ago when even this stopped. Now, those in the villages near Ghorst have reported strange howling and terrible screams from within those drab grey walls. Inspectors for the Crown have not returned from their visits and with the Army currently heavily occupied, The Royal Courts have put out a call to adventurers to investigate the matter.  Given some of the strange rumours about the place, the sooner the better."

Thus read the notice posted by the Crown several months back along with other recently uncovered dangers and locales the Crown wished investigated. Adventurers flocked to discover the whereabouts of these other locations. The prospect of undead haunted dungeons, unscalable mountains, and rescuing the Dwarf King proved a sexy draw compared to bogged down campaigns against goblins, antitheticals, and dragon haunted volcanoes. Despite this fever of exploration, one of these dangerous places, and perhaps the most immediate threat to a large nearby civic population, has gone unaddressed … at least until now.

Sources have finally come forward confirming the location of Doctor Bedlam's Asylum Northeast of Ghorst in a previously undocumented section of light woodland. Despite these concerned citizens coming forward, it seems this is just the first public report. They seem to indicate that others can certainly lay claim to finding the Asylum before them, they just haven't spoken up. What nefarious, selfish, or unfortunate reasons for this are unknown. Before delving into that, this reporter has tracked down one of Doctor Bedlam's frequent correspondents, Dr. Herbert West.

Doctor West is a noted Anatomist who's research has been helpful in aiding the recovery of the sick and injured. His knowledge of the human, and inhuman, body is second to none. Unfortunately, the eventual ends the Doctor turned his research toward, the animation of the deceased through use of 'scientific methods' had caused quite a stir. Whether it was always his position or simply a result of his research, Dr. West had also expressed a rather heretical view of religion. This negative reflection of his work has caused him to step down as a landed noble and Knight Commander of the White Codex of the White Tower Guild. Without the resources of his estate, he has been forced to relocate to a new facility in the wilds of Frost Ward. This is where he was found in a rather new, if still creepy, asylum of his own design.

"Nathaniel and I used to correspond on a weekly bases," Doctor West confesses over a pot of tea. "I found his research in the workings of the human mind quite fascinating and with my own work in anatomy near completion, something I wanted to investigate myself. In fact," he goes on to say, "his observations on the positive attitudes of patients recovering from sickness or injury helping to improve speed and success in those cases when recovery was possible certainly helped my research. Further, my explanation of various alchemical activities in the human body and their effect on human personality was quite helpful in his formulating many of his theories."

When this reporter pressed him on recent correspondence, Doctor West seemed a bit evasive, "Of course, I still corresponded with him after his falling out with the Crown. Scientific research must press forward even in an environment of ignorance. The good that can be discovered is paramount to societal growth," he says excitedly before toning himself down. "Still, I can't explain why I haven't heard from him in so long. Nothing in his last letters indicated anything amiss. Though he did note trouble with one of his patients. An psycho killer of some small repute, though he didn't mention him by name."

The doctor then stares thoughtfully as if calculating his next words. "When I last sent my own personal messenger, Howard Cornbury, he never returned. Howard has been known to daudle on his return trips, but after three months time, I knew something was up. Certainly, Nathaniel, and Howard, had fallen to some foul play, so I immediately told the authorities my suspicions. When they implied that Nathaniel might be behind Howard's disappearance based on some unfounded belief's of spooked villagers near his asylum, I knew no justice would be served from them." Doctor West had no further words to share when this reporter suggested that Crown's concerns maybe grounded in fact. A quick escort out of the facility followed soon after when some unexplained moans began issuing from Doctor West's own basement.

It was on the fields Northeast of Ghorst that this reporter rendezvoused with Freesia Rosebud, Warrior Pixie of the Fae realm. In a high-pitched twittering voice that could hardly be kept up with, she explains the discovery of the asylum. How a barbarian wagon guard found a well-hidden track near a Crown watch tower on the road Northwest of Ghorst. The glacial warrior followed it some ways before fearing soldiers of the tower might take advantage of the driver of the merchant wagon she was guarding and suggest a price less than fair for the barrels of barley beer they had sought to sell there. Not wanting the track to go unexplored, the guard sent word to her employer, who passed it along to Baron Edison, Lord of a nearby estate. He then asked Freesia, who was a frequent visitor of the estate, to follow up on the wagon guard's discovery.

Freesia followed the track to its end in a small area of light woodland. Near the center of the wood, a clearing was home to the asylum, but it wasn't this discovery that seemed amiss. It was the seven units of estate militia gathered outside the Facility's door. Six of the units flew the colors of former Baron Rheil's estate, while one could be identified as coming from Ithilien Deep. A knight, who couldn't be identified from a distance, was also in the area. "Had it only been the Ithiliens, I would have thought nothing of it," squeaks the excited pixie, "But so many troops of a demoted Baron? Something is terribly wrong here." The militia weren't the only ones in the area. A centaur, Brae'Kinnetta, known for her overland explorations and a human warrior, Jeremiah Pegalor, were outside the asylum doors as well.

Freesia moved in closer to get a better look as she watched the units of militia enter the asylum's front doors. The two adventurers moved further a field seemingly uninterested, but the knight remained outside. Perhaps has a guard to warn those inside of other explorers in the area? Whatever his mission, Freesia slipped inside to take a look herself.

Rumors had circulated that another adventurer had found the asylum before any others, but that this adventurer met a grizzly end at the hands of a psycho killer inmate of the asylum. How much truth there is to the rumor is unknown, but what Freesia found in the Asylum's entry hall was far worse than the rumor.

"There must have been a dozen men, ripped to pieces in the entry hall at the hands of gangs of undead inmates," the pixie squeaked in horror. "It was a slaughter house. Deeper in the hall, I saw a still living inmate doused in blood and laughing manically. If he held the head of a dead adventurer or one of the militia aloft I don't know, but if he wasn't a psycho killer when he arrived at the asylum, he certainly looked the part now." When Freesia was pressed as to the where about to the other thirty men she saw enter the building, she could only shake her head, "The colors of both Rheil and Ithilien were stained in blood upon the floor. If the others somehow pressed deeper into the asylum or escaped, I couldn't tell. But there was so much blood!"

Freesia went on to explain Baron Edison's plan to sponsor a small group of Terin'Sha and Brokenlands survivors to go investigate the asylum upon the first reports of its location. Freesia was going to join them, but after what she saw, she doesn't think she could re-enter and plans to talk the Baron out of this plans … or send an entire company of militia.

So what is going on inside the asylum? What happened to all those men? Is the former Baron Rheil somehow involved or are his men just victims like those of Ithilien Deep? And where is Dr. Bedlam in all this? Certainly more blood will be spilled before the truth is known.


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