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Post by whiteabk on Jan 7, 2017 13:55:05 GMT -5
On the northwestern shore of The Moonsea, at the termination of the River Stojanow, the city of Phlan is again being rebuilt. Under a constant state of construction, the city raises again, being built over the old. But the old city is not completely gone, and the business and the construction of the city sometimes disturbs its slumber. The regional branch of House Nanther, and the largest lending-house in the city, is under construction for an expansion. The workers have broken through to ruins of a previous building and go down to survey. Three go down, but only one comes out.
A large adult dragon flies north, crossing high over The Moonsea. Having eaten his fill while in the forest of Cormanthor, he returns to Mountains north of Thar. Long bouts of physical activity have been know to speed up passage through the digestive tract; having much more to travel, he gladly relaxes and lightens his load.
In the wee hours of the morning, a loud impact damages the roof, and some of the corresponding rooms on the second floor, of The Laughing Goblin Inn in Phlan. A motley crew of "adventures"; Valindra Brightmoon, Barunder Craghammer, Bran Shadowalker & Clare Fingers, are evicted from their rooms, forcing them down to the tavern where the apologetic owner, Hannah Lenark, provides them what she can while the rooms are being repaired.
Regional Branch Manager of House Nanther, Darvish Quam needs to quickly rectify the problem slowing down construction and killing off his workers. He needs to find some "adventures" and "adventures" in town usually stay at the local Inns. He would not dare go to Nat Wyler's Bell or the Bitter Blade for fear he might not make it out in one piece, and the Cracked Crown probably does not have anyone there who would be willing to do down into the hole where the problem is. He walks to the Laughing Goblin in the early morning and walks through the mostly empty room to talk to the owner Hannah. He ask her if there were any "adventures" staying here that he could talk to and she nods and points to the only people currently in the tavern.
Darvish propositions the group and offers 500 gp, to "clear out the problem". They tentatively agree, but first ask to speak with the lone survivor. They are lead to the regional branch of House Nanther and to a room in the back where a terrified Dwarven worker is huddled. To open him up, Barunder speaks the univeral language of Dwarves and offers the frighten Dwarf an Ale. That opens him up and the group learns that a large creature with long tentacles and a large mouth grabbed his two co-workers and ate them. They were not able to discern what the creature was from the description nor with some probing questions, but feeling better prepared than 3 construction workers, they felt they could handle it. They talked Darvish up to 1000 gp and ventured down.
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Post by whiteabk on Jan 7, 2017 14:42:20 GMT -5
They enter down a ladder into the ruins of a large room with a debris strewn floor and collapsed columns. They throw light into the room and peer into the darkness at the edge of there vision. Barunder leads the group into the room and they see were the debris has been disturbed off to the right, but no sign of a large creature, and 3 entrances at the end of the large room. They decide to enter the far left room, but on their way there, part of the ceiling collapses and hits Barunder on his Helmeted head.
Peering into the open room, they see an old armory, with pieces of broken and rusted armor and weapons, a sealed cabinet and 2 large Centipedes. The Centipedes look content to stay hidden, but the allure of what could be in the cabinet was too much for Clare to let sleeping Centipedes lie. She charges in and the rest follow and before the Centipedes even have a chance to act, they are cleared out. With some quick training, Clare is able to open the cabinet to find some well preserved armor.
Progressing into the next room, they are met by 4 skeletons, that are quickly dispatched by Valindra. Moving to the next room, they encounter the reason for them being here, an Otyugh lashes out at Barunder. It hits, revealing its location, but is unable to pull him in. The group squares up to attack, Barunder closing in, Valindra providing support, both Valindra and Bran peppering with missiles and Clare sneaking behind. Barunder, Valindra and Bran each get in an attack, but Clare comes up behind for the killing blow. To verify that this was the problem they were sent to take care of, Barunder splits open the Otyugh and finds two humanoids.
Finally entering the last room, 2 skeletons charge from the far side of the room. Having not "killed" anything yet, Barunder charges in and turns the skeletons before anyone else is able to "take his kill". They find an old alter and a large collection of coins as an offering to the alter. But before they can inspect further, they hear noises back in the large room. They inspect to find the Otyugh and the 2 humanoids as zombies. Valindra quickly gets rid of the 2 humanoids, but is unable to touch the large Otyugh. The Otyugh attacks Barunder and Barunder responses by charging in but opens himself up to a killing blow from the zombie. Barunder was going down when a quick spell from Valindra saved him and kept the fight going. They finally kill the Otyugh, again, and finish the inspection of the room.
Barunder realizes that this is an alter to the long gone god, Myrkul. They see that on top of the alter is embedded a very large black onyx gem. Clare tries to pry it out with a crowbar, but is unable, but with Barunder, they are able to work it loose, but not before the alter collapses into a pile of dirt and rock. Digging through the debris, they find the remains of the gem as a burned out shell.
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Post by whiteabk on Jan 7, 2017 16:53:29 GMT -5
Darvish receives a missive from Lord Nanther himself and ask if he is able to quickly send some neutral operatives to investigate and hopefully rectify a problem here in Melvaunt. Darvish, having just had a pretty positive encounter with just some operatives, returns to the Laughing Goblin. Darvish ask the group to travel to Melvaunt to meet with Lord Nanther on a matter of utmost importance, and provides the group with the seal of Woarsten Nanther and transportation.
The seal provided free passage and entrance into the smog filled city of Melvaunt, but not before a through inspection by the town watch, which seemed to be triggered by the presentation of the seal. With the drawing down of the day, the group decided to go straight to Lord Nanther's estate and see what this was all about. Menservants, after seeing the seal, graciously lead the group to a waiting room and soon after Lord Nanther arrived.
He greeted his guest and then quickly got to the point. He was willing to pay 1,000 platinum pieces for the safe return of his missing son. His son had been missing for 5 days. His name is Oreal and he provided a sketch of his son. After some questions the group learns that he feels that he has many enemies, not the least of is Doring Leiyraghon, of another major house in the city, and Halmuth Bruil, the Lord of Keys (in charge of Army and city watch). His son has some ranger training that he received from a Dwarven Ranger named Dorn Crownshield and that Oreal liked to explore and to travel the Glister Road to escort caravans, but has not gone to escort in the last few weeks. He also has been know to have been seen with Elaint Marsk and Kara Calaudra, children of minor houses in Melvaunt, and that they also seem to be missing. Also, two others are missing; Argens Bruil and Kalman Leiyraghon. They also learn that orcs are know to be north of the city, in the Thar, and that House Bruil engages in some minor trade with them. But Lord Nanther believes that it is very unlikely that the orcs, House Bruil or the minor houses in Melvaunt would be able or willing to go against House Nanther.
Having gathered what info they could, they decided to rest and start fresh in the morning, and Lord Nanther suggest that they go to the Crow's Nest where he will provide them with rooms.
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Post by whiteabk on Jan 19, 2017 19:46:42 GMT -5
The next day, they begin their search. The men, Barunder and Bran, stayed at the Crow's nest and inquired what they could from the barmaids, and learned little. The women, Valindra and Clare, tried to investigate from another of the watering holes in Melvaunt. There are, in total, three Inns and three taverns; Clare decides to go to more familiar surroundings and goes to the taverns. One of the taverns, the Frothy Beard, sounds like a dwarven place, so she skips that one and drags Valindra to a dive called the Devil's Fire Tavern. There they are given drinks and hit on by the barkeep and a local smith. They ask about the young nobles and learn that one of the missing scions, Kalman Leiyraghon, has frequented this place, really all places at one time or another, but was lately hanging out at the Rusty Bucket. And in the process left the smith and barkeep on the verge of a barfight.
They then go to the Rusty Bucket and ask after the young noble and are told, after undoing a button or two and slyly undoing a tie, that Kalman frequented here and even had a room reserved in the back, and would meet with the dwarf, Dorn Crownshield, and others in cloaks. With some more persuasion, of the physical type, but not the type the barkeep was hoping for, they learn that about five days ago, Kalman was boasting of a treasure map that lead to the old orc ruins two days north of the city, that was sold to him from Old Tom. Later they break into Old Tom's shop and find it mostly empty, finding only an empty false bottom drawer.
The adventures decide to ask Lord Nather for horses to start there search at the old orc ruins, but on there way, they are ambushed by 5 thugs. They finish off the thugs, keeping one alive to take to Lord Nather, but as they are leaving the fight, 2 dwarves, who work for Lord Nather, said that the city watch would not take too kindly to outsiders roughing up locals and that they should leave as soon as possible, that they would take the thug and that with the Seal of Lord Nather they could get horses at the stable near the North Gate.
They Head north on the Glister Road and travel, uneventfully for the first day. But early the second day, they find a trail that heads to the North West off the main road toward the orc ruins and soon encounter the local wildlife. They meet a Dire Wolf and quickly clear the way. Soon they find the old orc ruins and signs of an ambush. They see dead orcs and a dead horse, currently being eaten by an Owlbear that was in no mood to share. They kill the Owlbear and search the area. They find a dwarven ranger, Dorn Crownshield, dead, under the horse, but no signs of the young nobles. But they are easily able to follow the tracks away from the ambush site in the soft ground.
While following the tracks, they encounter 2 patrolling Mountain Orcs. Bran puts one to sleep and they are quickly able to kill the other. They manacled the sleeping orc and question him. He is able to tell them that a bunch of young humans, and a half-elf, were captured and taken to Xul-Jarak, a fortress being used by Thrull, the new Warlord. But the information came at a promise of one on one combat with the dwarf. While the orc was eyeing the dwarf and licking his chops, Clare came to undo the manacles, and instead, stabbed him under his chin, killing him instantly.
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Post by whiteabk on Jan 22, 2017 19:22:49 GMT -5
Early on day three, the come upon an orc camp through the thick fog. Clare sneaks ahead and learns that there are 9 orcs (1 sergeant, 3 asleep, 2 on guard 30 feet from camp) and a dire boar that is in a cage. Clare quickly and quietly kills the first guard and then sneaks around to kill the second, but he is able to sound the alarm. The rest charge in as the orcs gather themselves for a fight. Clare charges in to coup a sleeping orc before he can wake, but the sergeant's first action is to release the dire boar and it heads straight for the nearest target, the lone rouge. The rest of the party attacks from the other side of the camp. Barunder sees Clare one-on-one with the dire boar and another orc closing in on her and charges to her rescue, but not before he sees her fall. The sergeant was putting an oil on his blade when felt the attack of a mage. He shook of the attack and found his first target. Valinda tried to draw fire from the vulnerable mage but was just taking a beating from the rest of the orc party. The sergeant finally felled the mage and then had Valinda flanked with his solider. Barunder and the dire boar traded blows, but the dire boar was too much for the dwarf, unaided and then he fell. Valindra finally killed the sergeant, but it was a lucky blow from the lone standing orc warrior that finished the party. The lone orc became leader of the "Lone Orc Standing Tribe" and ruled the West potion of the Thar for 10 years, ...till a bronze dragon... flying high over the Thar... gladly relaxed and lightened his load...
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