The Loving Earth

A Shotgun Scenario for Puritan Delta Green (Name Pending)

Summary

A month ago, Thomas Nurse dug a new well to water his crops. A fissure at the bottom of the well allowed the slithering tendrils of Nyogtha to infect the water. A god born from the remains of unnatural things buried far beneath the earth, Nyogtha wishes to live again, and it subsumes and puppets living things in a futile attempt to regain what it has lost. Thomas Nurse, his family, and his crops have all become vessels for the Embalming God, walking corpses re-enacting a simulation of life, running on autopilot off of devoured memories. Two days ago, the thing that believes itself to be Thomas Nurse discovered a foul, black, worm-like ooze inside of his crops. He has written to the local magistrate, asking for a group of witch-finders to come and investigate this foul magic.

Briefing

The year is 1688. The players are a group of witchfinders, appointed to investigate the work of the Devil in New England. They have been summoned to the homestead of Thomas Nurse after receiving the following letter:

To you goode and honest servants of the Lord; My name be Thomas Nurse of the towne of Ashby in the colonie of Massachusetts Bay. I write because my family has come upon a great mysfortune, brought about by the fowl work of the Devil hisself. This morn, I espied some great strangeness within one pumpkin in my field, and upon breaking it open, found it to be filled with a writhing black mass of worms, which burst into fire in the sun’s light. This surely be the work of some great devilry. Good witchfinders, make haste to my home, and see that this evil is cast out.

Travelling by foot, Ashby is a journey of two days from Boston or Salem, out on the heavily wooded frontier of the colony. The Nurse homestead lies about twenty minutes from Ashby proper.

The Homestead

The Hosts

The infected members of the Nurse family are, from outside appearances, perfectly normal people. Underneath the skin, however, their bones and organs have been replaced with Nyogtha. The Hosts are not aware that this change has occurred. They operate according the information that was present in their brains when they were infected. They are good at dealing with familiar situations, but when encountering anything extreme or out of the ordinary, they react strangely. Thomas gets angry. Dorcas freezes up. Experience becomes scared. John gurgles. Processing new information is difficult for them, and they will struggle to remember the names of their guests.

The Hosts’ skins are strangely tough and resistant. A small injury will cause drops of black, oily fluid to well up. This is extremely distressing to the Nurses, but they will attempt to understand and rationalize it. A large wound reveals that there is no bone, organs, or tissue beneath the skin- only the worm-like, writhing mass of Nyogtha. This realization is enough to obliterate the simulated mind of a Host and throw them into a frenzy of self-preservation. If a Host’s skin is damaged enough that it loses all usefulness, black ooze will pour out and either attempt to escape or to attack and consume a new host. If the ooze emerges during the day, it will never flee into direct sunlight, instead slipping between the floorboards and hiding away beneath the house, only creeping out at night and attempting to slip into the well, rejoining the rest of Nyogtha beneath the earth.

Supper

Before the investigation begins, Thomas Nurse offers the witchfinders a good supper after a long day of travel. They are treated to a meager dinner of stew and old bread. The bread is fine, but the stew tastes acidic and foul. The Nurses don’t seem to mind, and if the witchfinders bring it up, Thomas just replies with a few snide remarks about his wife’s cooking. Nyogtha contaminated some of the vegetables the stew was made from, but it is not concentrated enough to infect those who eat it. Thomas is very interested in the witchfinders’ work, but doesn’t seem to truly process anything they tell him. He may ask the same question once or twice in the conversation. The rest of his family remains silent, except for the occasional interruption of Old John’s hacking cough.

The Crops

Thomas Nurse will eagerly show witchfinders the remains of the pumpkin he found. The black ooze has been burnt away to nothing, but the outer layer of the pumpkin is in a strange halfway point between life and decomposition, the colors bright and vibrant and without a smell, but the flesh is mushy.

Inspecting the Nurses’ crops (pumpkins, corn, and beans) finds them all to share the same characteristics- appearing outwardly normal and healthy, only to find them filled with a mass of writhing black worms. Ooze that has consumed plant matter hasn’t inherited a strong sense of self-preservation, and remains mostly inert unless exposed to sunlight.

The Well

Drawing water up from the Nurse’s well finds that it seemingly normal, but specifically sifting along the bottom pulls up a thin, foul film of black oil that burns in the sun. The easiest way to deal with Nyogtha is to destroy the roof of the well, exposing the water to sunlight and causing it to writhe and boil, receding back into the crevice beneath the earth.

The Nurses

Thomas Nurse (23) lives with his wife, Dorcas (20), his son Experience (3), his daughter Charity (3 months old), and his father, John (59). They have a goat, Bathsheba, and a pig, Barabbas. All of them, save for Charity and Bathsheba, have become Hosts of Nyogtha.

Thomas

Thomas Nurse presents himself as a pious, amiable, and stoic man, and is generally respected by his neighbors. In private, he is selfish, casually cruel, and prone to fits of paranoia. When the witchfinders arrive, Thomas will not mention anything wrong with himself or his family, only focusing on the effects of the crops. He knows the witchfinders are a double-edged sword, and that drawing attention to his own potential infection could have terrible consequences. If the witchfinders begin killing Hosts, Thomas will eagerly support them, up until they turn their attention to him, which will cause him to resist violently.

Dorcas

Dorcas is a quiet, beleaguered woman. A few days ago, she discovered that her breast milk had become black and oily. Horrified, she has kept this secret from her husband, but as the witchfinders investigate the homestead and find more evidence of corruption, a dawning sense of horror will fill her. She’s terrified of Thomas, but will divulge information if she thinks it can save the life of her children. Killing Hosts provokes an extreme reaction from Dorcas. She will do anything to prevent harm from coming to Experience or Charity. If the black worms are discovered inside of Thomas or John, she will take a knife and cut her own throat, realizing that the same thing is lurking inside of her.

Experience

In Experience, Nyogtha has found an ideal host. Somehow, Experience has proven immune to the slow degradation that usually afflicts Hosts, meaning that Nyogtha can occupy his body indefinitely. Experience feels a greater connection to the greater whole of Nyogtha, and, while still thinking and acting like an ordinary little boy, often sneaks out at night to speak with ‘the boy in the well’, communing with Nyogtha below and finding small animals to feed it. Experience will not speak unless prompted by the witchfinders and given permission by his father. If the witchfinders begin killing any of the Hosts, Experience will flee and attempt to escape into the woods.

Charity

Charity is the only human inhabitant of the Nurse homestead to remain uninfected. When Dorcas noticed her milk had become black, she stopped breastfeeding Charity, only feeding her with Bathsheba’s milk instead. She is a normal, healthy, three month old baby girl.

John

Thomas’ sickly father, John Nurse has proven the weakest of Nyogtha’s Hosts, and has body has already begun deteriorating. He sits in the corner of the house, rarely speaking and coughing up oily phlegm. He can barely move, and his mind has all but faded away. At his request, the curtains of the house have been drawn to keep out the sunlight.

Barabbas

Barabbas’ infection is easier to notice than that of the humans. He is slow and sickly, and his skin is sagging and bloated. Close inspection notices wriggling beneath the skin.

Bathsheba

For whatever reason, Bathsheba has refused to eat or drink anything contaminated by Nyogtha, and remains uninfected.

Stat Blocks

Host of Nyogtha

STR 8 CON 8 DEX 7 INT 7 POW 7 CHA 7

HP 8 WP 7 SAN 7

ARMOR: 2 points for hardened outer layer of skin

SKILLS: All Hosts have only baseline levels for each skill.

ATTACKS: Unarmed 40%, damage 1D4-2, Knife 30%, damage 1D4.

FALSE LIFE: Being injured and witnessing small amounts of ooze dripping out inflicts 1D4 SAN damage on Hosts. Discovering another Host’s true nature inflicts 1D6 SAN damage. Witnessing that there is nothing but ooze inside of itself instantly drops a Host’s SAN to 0. At 0 SAN, hosts are thrown into a violent frenzy and lose all traces of their feigned humanity.

SHELL: If the Host takes any damage, it takes 1 damage per turn as ooze leaks out. Once the Host reaches 0 hit points, Nyogtha abandons the crumbling host body and becomes a Black Ooze with six hit points.

UNNATURAL BIOLOGY: Called shots for seemingly vulnerable areas deal only normal damage.

SUNLIGHT SENSITIVITY: The Hosts feel discomfort when exposed to direct sunlight and experience an aversion to fire. If a host is wounded in any way outside, they will retreat into shade as soon as possible, the area of injury smoking and burning. If a Host is on fire, the Black Ooze immediately vacates the body.

Black Ooze

STR 14 CON 14 DEX 12 INT 2 POW 10

HP 6 WP 10

SKILLS: Athletics 70%, Stealth 60%

ATTACKS: Pseudopod 30%, Lethality 15%

FUSION: A Black Ooze in proximity to another will join together, combining their hit point total and increasing the Lethality of it’s Pseudopod attack by 5%.

HITCHHIKER: If a Pseudopod attack kills a target, a Black Ooze can spend a turn occupying and consuming the corpse, turning them into a new Host of Nyogtha.