Climb and Choose is a 1:1 CoC scenario written and published by a participant in the Korea Tabletop RPG Instructors Association’s Creator Program. The following is a summary of a one-shot playtest in which I was the Keeper and the author was the Player. For this session, the Player chose one of the 1920s pre-generated investigators from the CoC Starter Set, combined with a tarot card reading to add detail to their backstory.

NOTE: The Mezzanine was an addition made by the Keeper.

It was an evening like any other for Wentworth Avebury, the 58-year-old professor of languages at Miskatonic University. He was walking home after his final lecture of the day. There was still a bit of sunlight hanging onto the horizon, dimly illuminating the streets. Arkham in the 1920s was in a transitional period between gaslight and electric lamps. The city lamplighters had yet to turn on the gas streetlamps at this twilight hour.

But Wentworth hardly paid attention to his surroundings now. All the days since his wife’s passing nearly a month ago seemed to blend together into a haze.

Jane was the light of his world, full of love, energy, and ideas, not to mention being the financial caretaker of the family. Wentworth’s own professorship provided a sound wage, but it was only a mere pittance compared to lucrative businesses under Jane’s management. Such was her drive and directness that her friends often compared her to the Queen of Swords in a tarot deck. It made her sudden illness all the more shocking to everyone around her, including her husband.

Wentworth suspected that there was something she wanted to tell him before she passed, but her condition deteriorated so abruptly that no one was prepared. She had not even had a chance to prepare her will. Perhaps she was trying to tell him how to manage the spousal inheritance without one. She was always thinking of him, even to the last.

Avebury thought of her now more than ever. He regretted the moments when he was too absorbed in his academic work to spend time with her. He always gave himself the excuse that she was busy enough with her own work. But now he felt doubt creeping over him. Perhaps she had thrown herself into her work to distract her own thoughts from loneliness. Maybe that was what she wanted to tell him. Now, he would never know.

The melancholy thoughts made him feel dizzy and overwhelmed. Suddenly, his vision began to go dark. Wentworth wasn’t sure whether his eyelids were closing of their own accord, or they were simply ceasing to function. Either way, he felt the cold ground greeting his cheek as he collapsed where he had stood.

The Stairs

How much time had passed, Wentworth could not tell. When he finally awoke, he was surrounded by darkness, broken only by a flickering light of the sort provided by electric lamps. Soon, the light became steady, and Wentworth could see beneath it the beginning of a stairwell, spiraling upward. Somehow, he had been transported to a cellar of some sort, and these stairs would likely take him to the ground floor where he might find the exit.

Wentworth stood and began to climb the stairs. He eventually found a door which he supposed was the way out. Above the door was a sign indicating that this was the first floor. He turned the door handle and stepped through into a bright light.

The First Floor

When his eyes adjusted, Wentworth was startled to find himself in the middle of the countryside. The door he had passed through was nowhere to be seen. He stood on the platform of a rural train station, surrounded by dense forests on all sides. The railway cut a path between the trees, leading from west to east. There was a fork in the rails on the eastward side, with a lever beside the junction roped off with a sign that said “Staff Only.” There was no one to be seen except for the silhouette of a figure on the far side of the foggy platform.

Wentworth approached the lone stranger and found him to be the station master, a gentleman in his late fifties close to Wentworth’s own age. When Wentworth asked where this place was, the station master informed him that it was a station near the town of Cobb’s Corners, Vermont. Wentworth had visited this area in the past to do case studies on regional dialects as part of his research. He recalled that an eastbound train would take him back to Arkham, so he sat on a bench and waited. 

Wentworth briefly wondered how he might have suddenly ended up in the next state over, but he soon gave up. He tried instead to explain away the inexplicable by owing it to his distraught disposition. Perhaps he had come here to enjoy the woodlands and listen to the birdsongs while reading a good book, all to take his mind away from his grief, and he had simply forgotten it. Given the hazy state of his mind, he forgave himself for having some gaps in his recent memory.

His jumbled train of thought was interrupted by a familiar voice. When he turned his head, Wentworth saw someone emerging from the fog. He recognized her as one of his students from Arkham University, a young woman by the name of Keiko Cain. She was a rare international student from the distant Empire of Japan. Her family had anglicized their surname to be easier to pronounce, but Keiko had chosen to keep her given name unlike her other family members.

“Keiko, my dear, what are you doing here?”

“Professor Avery! I’m glad to see you. I have no idea how I came to be here. One moment, I was walking home after class. The next thing I know, I am walking through the woods, just before meeting you.”

Keiko seemed just as perplexed by the situation as Wentworth was, but she made no mention of waking up in a building with a stairwell as Wentworth had. The two of them waited for the next train. When it did not arrive, they descended from the platform to explore the eastward rails. The station master warned them not to walk on the rails as the train could come at any moment. But Wentworth had been waiting all this time and there was no sign of any train approaching, so he thought little of the warning.

As Wentworth and Keiko walked along the rails, the fog around them seemed to thicken. Soon, Wentworth could not see his companion any longer. He called out to her but heard no reply, so he began to walk back toward the station. Then he finally heard Keiko’s voice again, but she sounded distressed. He hastened his pace and soon found Keiko again, but somehow she was lying on the ground bound by rope. Keiko was on the side rail curving away from the junction. As the fog cleared even more, Wentworth saw on the main rail a group of five people, all tied up and lying on the rails as Keiko was. They were all students from Miskatonic University whom Wentworth recognized, and they were all understandably agitated. 

However, everyone became silent when they heard the piercing screech and cry of a steam engine approaching in the distance. From the west, an eastbound train was heading in their direction, straight toward the junction and the rails where five students were bound.

Wentworth did not hesitate or take time to wonder what had happened to Keiko and the other students. He knelt down beside Keiko and began to pull apart the rope that bound her. By some miracle, Wentworth discovered a hidden strength that had long been dormant during his years as an academic. He tore apart the rope and freed Keiko in an instant. Then swiftly, he went to pull the lever that controlled the path at the junction to turn the train away from the remaining students. But to his dismay, the lever became jammed when the track at the junction was only partly turned.

It was then that the station master appeared. When he saw the state of the lever and the junction, he was not pleased.

“What have you done?” cried the station master. “With the lever and junction in this state, the train will become derailed. There are hundreds of passengers aboard!”

“What can we do?” asked Wentworth, half panicking and half pleading.

“We can turn it back to the wait it was,” the station master answered calmly.

Wentworth was aghast at the implication and the manner in which the station master spoke.

“But that will mean the death of those five students!” Wentworth exclaimed.

“Would you rather condemn all those passengers instead?” replied the station master. “You can try to pull the lever all the way, but you risk breaking it and dooming all those aboard the train.”

Wentworth decided to take the risk. By yet another miracle, he pulled the lever completely and changed the direction of the train in the knick of time.

But just as he began to breathe a sigh of relief, he saw to his horror that Keiko, confused and disoriented, was still on the railway track where she had been released, standing in the path of the train. 

Wentworth reached out to pull her away, but it was too late. He watched helplessly as Keiko’s body was flung away, crashing head-first onto the ground. Like a marionette suddenly dropped upon the stage, Keiko lay still and unmoving.

Wentworth stepped toward her, but he felt lightheaded and dizzy. He stumbled and collapsed to the ground.

When he awoke, he found himself alone once more in the empty stairwell.

Confused and distressed, Wentworth began to climb the stairs again, being unsure what else he should do. He came upon another door, this one apparently leading to the mezzanine.

The Mezzanine

When he passed through the door, Wentworth found himself in the hallway of a hospital. Once again, the door from the stairwell had vanished. By the appearance of the place, he suspected it was a large hospital in an urban location, perhaps even Arkham, though he could not recall any such hallway in the hospital at Miskatonic University’s medical school.

In the far side of the hall, he heard a commotion. People were being rushed through the hallway on stretchers by hospital workers in white gowns. One of the workers pulled Wentworth along, addressing him as “Doctor Avebury.” Wentworth looked down and saw that he too was wearing a white hospital gown. 

Avebury wanted to protest that he was a professor with a doctorate in linguistics and had no medical expertise. But somehow, he found himself following the other people and pushing one of the stretchers with them, as if he had done so countless times before.

He soon arrived in a large hospital ward which appeared to be an operating room, with six patients laid out on tables being prepped for surgery. Wentworth found himself asking about their conditions, using medical terminology that he didn’t even realize that he knew. He learned that the six patients were involved in various accidents around the city, and they were all in need of organ donations, each person requiring a replacement of a different kind.

It was then that Wentworth noticed a seventh patient, surrounded by more physicians and attendants than the others. The lead surgeon in that throng of medical professionals was an Asian man in his late thirties. On his doctor’s gown, there was a name tag that read “Dr. E. Cain.” Wentworth somehow knew that the man’s name was Edward, and he had been Wentworth’s own student of medicine, in whatever alternate reality or dream this might be.

Edward was looking intently at the seventh patient. When Wentworth took a closer look, he realized that the person on the operating table was Keiko Cain. She looked to be in better health than Wentworth might have expected, given her condition when he had last seen her. She was sound asleep and breathing comfortably. One might have thought she was enjoying a pleasant dream had she been lying in bed at home rather than a hospital ward.

Wentworth’s attention was drawn to the conversations around him, and he gradually came to understand Edward’s intense expression. Keiko was Edward’s blood relative, perhaps even his daughter, though Wentworth couldn’t be sure. All that he knew was that Keiko was alive and could easily be saved, compared to the other six patients in this ward. However, if she were to make a brave sacrifice, then the other six patients could live. Of course, she was not in a condition to make such a decision of her own accord, so the choice would need to be made on her behalf by her next of kin.

Edward looked to Wentworth for advice, or maybe for absolution for whatever he would need to do next. Wentworth looked upon him with pity, being aware of the impossible choice that was before him. He knew that he needed to say something to his former pupil, and that his next words would be of great significance.

It was then that Wentworth thought of his late wife Jane, and therefore his words of wisdom to Edward were ultimately about the importance of family.

“Keiko is your own blood, and she is also the patient under your care with the greatest chance of survival. You should do what is in the best interests of your patient and your kin.”

With those words, Wentworth knew that the fates of all the patients in the ward were sealed. He found the very notion to be nauseating, and a feeling of dizziness soon overtook him. 

He closed his eyes and collapsed where he stood. He awoke only to find himself back in the empty stairwell. Upon climbing the stairs, the next door led to the second floor of this seemingly endless tower.

The Second Floor

Wentworth stepped through the door and into a large courtroom. The door from the stairwell had turned into a pair of large swinging doors, which now swung open. A crowd of people streamed inside, pushing Wentworth toward the far end of the courtroom. Some of them were referring to Wentworth as “your honor” and “chief justice” as they ushered him onto the seat behind the judge’s bench. As Wentworth sat down, he realized that he was wearing a judge’s robe and held a gavel in his hand.

On the table in front of him, Wentworth saw the papers for the trial that was about to commence. The perpetrator sitting in the courtroom was Edward Cain, a former medical practitioner turned serial killer. According to police records, he had slain 37 people, all patients in his hospital, in order to harvest their organs. He had used pieces of his victims to keep a single patient in good health. That patient, Keiko Cain, was in a perpetual coma due to a brain injury sustained in a railway accident. Though she was fortunate to have survived the incident at all, it seemed that her luck had run out, which had resulted in Edward’s desperate crimes.

Wentworth was horrified by the implications. Had his words of advice and consolation contributed to Edward’s descent into madness? He looked at Edward but saw no glint of recognition in his eyes. Nor did he find any hint of guilt or remorse. Now, Wentworth understood that in this reality, whatever it may be, he was a judge with no prior relationship with the perpetrator whatsoever. Moreover, it was up to him to pass judgment upon the accused.

The courtroom was packed with people, mostly the friends and relatives of the many victims of Edward’s atrocities. They were shouting threats and insults, and some were hurling eggs and other small projectiles that splattered on his shoulders.

Wentworth struck his gavel, and the courtroom fell silent. He began to speak, reviewing the gruesome facts of the case before reminding those present, and perhaps himself as well, that he fell upon him to make a ruling in this trial.

When it came time for the accused to make his final statement, Edward made no protests but accepted his fate with cold detachment.

“My victims were innocent people. Their families are right to hate me. And you all are within your rights to have me executed for my crimes.”

Wentworth prepared to make his final statement when a loud crash was heard outside, and then the entire courthouse shook as if caught in an earthquake.

Everyone looked outside the windows and were shocked to see their city being brought to utter ruin. Buildings collapsed and their pieces floated down the river that ran through the city. The source of the devastation was a gigantic monster from the nightmarish depths of the world. Its enormous tentacles rose out of the earth and throttled the city’s skyline until it crumbled under the weight of their cyclopean grasp.

Wentworth’s mind went blank as he witnessed the grotesque and impossible scene. Many of the people in the courtroom fainted. Only Edward Cain sat in his seat, utterly calm and composed. At last, he spoke.

“Among my victims, I happened upon a man who was a member of an occult tradition that worshiped creatures like the one that you are witnessing at this very moment. His possessions included a rare tome of conjuration and banishment, which I had the chance to study before my arrest and incarceration. If you care to release me, I know the means by which we may attempt to rid ourselves of the foul creature that threatens to annihilate us all.”

“If we release you, will you do as you say?” asked a member of the courtroom nervously.

But Edward merely shrugged and replied, “It is up to you to trust me or not. The city is certain to be lost if I am executed, but I make no guarantees if I am released.”

Wentworth reminded Edward that his own kin, Keiko Cain, was in the city’s hospital, which would be destroyed in the monster’s rampage. That seemed to make Edward thoughtful, and he eventually agreed to do what he could to stop the monster if he were to be released.

Therefore, it was with a heavy conscience that Wentworth ordered Edward to be released, absolving him of his crimes, due to extraordinary circumstances in which thousands of lives were at risk.

Edward left the courtroom a free man, and made the attempt to perform the occult rites of banishment that he had read in the occult manual of his victim, as he had promised to do. But it was apparently beyond his understanding or capabilities, for the ritual ultimately failed. Seeing that there was nothing else he could do, Edward rescued Keiko from the hospital and then fled from the city. 

As the buildings collapsed all around the courthouse, Wentworth regretted his decision even as the ceiling fell down on top of him. 

He shut his eyes and thought that this would surely be his end. Instead, everything went quiet around him. When he opened his eyes, he was in the stairwell again, this time leading up to a door to the third floor of the tower.

The Third Floor

Upon opening the door, Wentworth’s ears were bombarded by a loud humming noise, like a tidal wave of bees buzzing together, or a million tiny clockwork gears spinning rapidly all at once. The space was simultaneously dark and bright, if that were possible. The darkness was broken by a sea of tiny lights emanating from a series of strange and impossibly complex machines. These were joined by innumerable cables and wires to what appeared to be helmets worn by individuals wearing white clothes and sitting in large, cushioned chairs.

One of those helmeted individuals had the face of Edward Cain, but he was pale and emaciated, as if he had been sitting in that chair for a very long time. The helmet covered most of his face, but Wentworth could see his hideously grinning mouth, from which issued a trickle of drool that fell onto the white shirt over his skeletal chest. In this state, he looked more like a patient in a ward than even Keiko had.

The questions began to flood into Wentworth’s mind. Was this the same Edward Cain whom he had released from the courthouse? What was this place, and was this man bound here by some incomprehensible compulsion? What in the world were all these bizarre contraptions?

Even as the last question leaped into his mind, it was pushed aside by an answering voice that echoed all around him, and perhaps even inside his own thoughts. It was a calm voice that was not unpleasant to hear. He might even have thought it resembled the voice of his late wife, if that voice had contained even a hint of authentic emotion, of which it was entirely devoid.

“This is the Experience Room,” said the voice. “This facility contains the Experience Machines, which have the capacity to bestow on their users a limitless sensory experience akin to what you would call reality. However, since their foundations are built upon the imperfect techniques of generative artificial intelligence, there is a 10% chance that the user may enter a perpetual catatonic state of sensory deprivation, an experience akin to what you might call purgatory, or death. You need only sign the user agreement and terms of service to begin your experience.”

Wentworth could not grasp all that he had heard, but he understood enough to realize the possibilities of what he was being offered. In the illusion provided by the Experience Machine, he could be reunited with Jane and spend the rest of his existence in a perfect fantasy world with the love of his life. 

He saw the man resembling Edward and realized that he must have been enjoying his own fantasy, but it had been interrupted by a malfunction in the machine which had roused him from his endless dream. The man tried to raise a hand toward a button on the side of his helmet, but his muscles were far too atrophied.

“Who’s there?” said the man weakly. “Can you help me turn this thing back on? My fingers are too weak to press the reset button.”

Wentworth looked down at the man with pity and pressed the button on the side of his helmet. The man returned to his fantasy, making a final remark before his words trailed off into a murmur.

“Don’t worry, Keiko. I’ll save you…”

Only then did Wentworth realize that this was the same Edward Cain who had murdered 37 patients after hearing his mentor’s advice. He felt revulsion welling up inside of him, but the voice in the room assured him not to worry. All he needed to do was to plug himself into one of the Experience Machines, and he too could be free from the guilt and remorse of his past mistakes. Instead of being trapped in an endless cycle of regret, he could reward himself with an eternal paradise in the company of all the loved ones he had lost.

Wentworth might have thought of the students who relied on him at Miskatonic University. He might even have remembered the people he had encountered in this new reality, including the victims of Edward Cain and their families. But in that moment, all he could think about was his beloved Jane and wanting to be with her again.

In his mind, the decision had already been made. He sat in a cushioned chair, donned a wired helmet, and fell into a deep, comfortable sleep.

The next sensation he experienced was a cool breeze on his cheeks. He heard the sound of waves gently rolling ashore and people laughing cheerfully. Among those happy voices was that of his wife.

Wentworth opened what he believed to be his eyes and saw her dancing upon a sandy beach. He was sitting in a folding chair, with a book on his lap. Birds chirped as they flew overhead toward the tree line which stretched behind him.

He was somewhere along the shoreline of Lake Champlain, near one of the communities in Vermont where he had conducted his case studies of regional dialects many years ago. He was with Jane, enjoying both the beach and the woodlands, and they were happy.

Wentworth would spend what would feel like months or perhaps years in that place. Sometimes, he would venture afield into the remote settlements that he had visited in the past. Oddly enough, he would never be able to find anyone who spoke the dialects he had discovered years ago. Such were the limits of the ravenously bloated yet still primitive predictive engines on which the Experience Machine’s sensory illusion depended. But such minor details mattered little to Wentworth now. He was content to have Jane by his side in his own personal dreamland, even as his real body grew frail and withered away in a darkly illuminated corner of the Experience Room.

There was one more door leading to the rooftop, which Wentworth Avebury never reached.