Frights & Fables: Campaign Candy

Gather around and open your candy bag for some glorious campaign goodies. Tonight I am bringing you something somewhat different than the advice and literary lore that I often do. No. Tonight, I am bringing you a simple tale that you can release against your gaming table. It is an adventure in the unbalancing campaign world of Dark Evolution. Not a lot. Just a taste. A breadcrumb if you will, to guide you into the darkness. A earthy, appetizer a sweet little whimsical called, When the Corn Sings. Truly this is for anyone in any campaign setting, no matter your favorite gloom.

DARK EVOLUTION INTRODUCTORY ADVENTURE

When the Corn Sings

A One-Night Tale of Rural Horror and Forbidden Evolution

For 2–3 Players

Play Time: 3 Hours

Worlds of Pulp™: Dark Evolution

A Word to the Curious

There are places in America that do not appear on maps.

Oh, the roads exist.

The mail arrives.

The taxes are paid.

Children ride bicycles beneath fading street lamps and elderly men gather at diners to discuss weather patterns that never arrive.

And yet…

Some places are forgotten.

Not abandoned.

Forgotten.

It is as though the world looks directly at them and somehow fails to remember they exist.

Tonight’s tale takes place in one such place.

The town of Blackwater Hollow.

A farming community where the corn grows unusually tall.

Where radios occasionally speak in unfamiliar voices.

And where something buried beneath the soil has begun to dream once more.

If your players survive until dawn, they may leave with answers.

Which is often a far more terrible fate than ignorance.

The Premise

The characters receive independent requests to travel to Blackwater Hollow.

A daughter has stopped answering her mother’s calls.

A local journalist disappeared while investigating unusual crop failures.

A former professor sent a cryptic message that simply reads:

“The harvest has started. Do not let them wake it.”

Upon arriving, the characters discover a sleepy farming town undergoing a strange transformation.

Everyone seems exhausted.

Everyone hears singing at night.

Everyone claims everything is perfectly normal.

And beneath the old Davidson Farm, W.E.B. scientists have uncovered something they should never have disturbed.

Player Archetypes

The adventure works best with:

Concerned Parent
Aspiring Journalist
Curious Academic
Grave Detective
Blue Collar Survivor
Night Shift Worker

Psychic powers should be rare.

One character possessing Premonition, Telepathy, or Spirit Medium works wonderfully.

Adventure Structure

Act I – The Hollow (45 minutes)

The players arrive shortly before sunset.

The town appears ordinary.

Almost.

Use several of the following encounters:

The Gas Station

The elderly attendant falls asleep mid-conversation.

When awakened he says:

“Sorry. Happens sometimes now. The singing kept me up.”

He immediately acts confused when asked what singing.

The Schoolyard

Children draw identical pictures in chalk.

Each depicts:

A giant eye beneath a field.
Long roots.
A black sun.

No child remembers drawing it.

The Diner

Every customer pauses simultaneously for three seconds.

No one notices.

The players definitely do.

The First Clue

Characters learn that local biology teacher:

Professor Nathan Cole

has disappeared.

His home contains:

Research notes.
Soil samples.
Recordings of strange sounds.

Most importantly:

A map leading to Davidson Farm.

Act II – The Singing Fields (60 minutes)

The abandoned Davidson Farm sits several miles outside town.

At night.

Under a swollen moon.

The cornfield is alive.

Not moving.

Breathing.

Let that realization arrive slowly.

The stalks subtly inhale and exhale.

Anyone spending more than ten minutes inside hears distant whispers.

A successful investigation reveals:

Hidden generators.
Scientific equipment.
Recently used tunnels.

W.E.B. has established a covert excavation site beneath the farm.

The Horror Revealed

Months ago W.E.B. researchers discovered an anomalous organism.

Not alien.

Not supernatural.

Something stranger.

A psychic fungal intelligence buried beneath the earth for centuries.

The scientists named it:

Subject ROOT-9

Exposure causes:

Shared dreams.
Telepathic leakage.
Hallucinations.
Personality blending.

The town is slowly becoming a single collective consciousness.

Key NPC

Dr. Evelyn Marsh

W.E.B. Field Director

Cool.

Brilliant.

Utterly convinced she is saving humanity.

She believes ROOT-9 may grant:

global telepathy
elimination of violence
perfect understanding between all people

Naturally, she ignores the fact that everyone exposed eventually loses individuality.

As one does.

Act III – Beneath the Harvest (60 minutes)

The tunnels descend beneath the farm.

The atmosphere changes.

Moist soil.

Electrical cables.

Laboratory equipment.

Roots growing through concrete.

Whispers that come from nowhere.

And everywhere.

Eventually the players reach:

The Root Chamber

An enormous underground cavern.

At its center:

A pulsating mass of roots, fungal tissue, eyes, and neural fibers.

It is not hostile.

It is awake.

Barely.

The psychic characters immediately hear:

“I was lonely.”

The Final Choice

This is the heart of Dark Evolution.

There is no perfect solution.

Present three options.

Choice One – Burn It

Destroy ROOT-9.

Fire, explosives, collapsing tunnels.

The town is saved.

Dozens already infected suffer severe mental trauma.

Some die.

The threat ends.

Mostly.

Choice Two – Preserve It

Allow W.E.B. to continue studying it.

Humanity may gain incredible psychic breakthroughs.

The townsfolk remain doomed.

W.E.B. expands operations.

The conspiracy deepens.

Choice Three – Put It Back To Sleep

The hardest option.

Using scientific equipment and psychic intervention, the players can force ROOT-9 into dormancy.

The town survives.

The organism survives.

The mystery remains buried.

For now.

Finale

As dawn approaches, the players leave Blackwater Hollow.

The townspeople begin acting normal again.

Radio interference ceases.

Birds return.

Life resumes.