AAR: Paper Chase [7H] (18FEB21 @ 2359 GMT) UPDATED TIME

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Anoush
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Re: AAR: Paper Chase [7H] (18FEB21 @ 2359 GMT) UPDATED TIME

Post by Anoush » Mon Mar 08, 2021 2:47 am

Bloodbeat’s Journal:

Juniper (Shadow and Questor of Lochost) approached me one day, out of the blue. He reminded me about an adventure we’d participated in a few months ago, where we took down a slave camp at a mining operation. We referred to it as The Chains We Forge.

When searching the slavers’ camp, we had found notebooks and journals and ledgers, which Juniper quickly grabbed up. He hadn’t been idle. Over the last few months, Juniper had been studying the books. At first, the books had seemed written by a madman: words that made no sense, cryptic phrases, random symbols and numbers. Then he realized that the books were in code, and started to make sense of them. He thought he had identified a location that was part of the slaving operation. This location was in Bartertown, in an area considered bad, even by Bartertown standards. The location was reached by following a series of directions (e.g., turn left at the corner, proceed 100 paces), but Juniper could tell that the place was close by. He was collecting a group of adventurers to root out the slavers. So we arranged to meet the next day at a well-known kebab stand near the gates of Throal.

When I arrived at the kebab stand Juniper was already there buying enough kebabs for a half dozen Name-givers. Good thing, too. Shortly we were joined by the others that Juniper had recruited: Elisen (windling Cavalryman and Troubadour) along with his trusty mounts, Lazulin (troll Raider and Sun Herald), and Vralino (ork Swordmaster and Elementalist). As we ate, Juniper explained where we were going.

Then we proceeded into the slums of Bartertown. Frankly, I’d never been to this part of Bartertown before, and the conditions appalled even me. Eventually, the directions led us to an area of tight, narrow pathways, barely enough room for us to get through. Finally, Elisen’s dyre couldn’t fit. He managed to turn the mount around — and in the process knocked down a couple of ramshackle structures — and then ordered it to return to the gates and wait there.

Once we knew we were close to our destination — a block away — we began taking precautions. I cast Shadow Meld on everyone and moved unnoticed along the narrow pathway. Our destination was a particularly bleak looking shack, perhaps 15x20 yards in size, with a barely-there thatch roof. It was nestled up close to the Throal Mountains, in some very rocky terrain.

I used Lifesight and while I saw a lot of people in the area, there was no one inside the shack. Astrally, the area was Open, but with a lingering feeling of terror and despondency, sprinkled with a glimmer of hope.

We stealthily moved into an alleyway bordering the shack’s side wall. Using Viewpoint, we could see a dark room, with the occasional shaft of light. The room was very dusty, with piles of blankets and straw on the floor, a single cupboard, a dwarf-sized table and chairs, and a bucket.

Juniper walked openly to the front door of the shack, as if he owned it, and tried the latch. It was locked, mechanically. The door just wouldn’t budge. So I used Step Through Shadows to enter the room. I was immediately assaulted by a truly appalling intense smell: urine, spoilt food, and things even more putrid. As a nethermancer, I’m accustomed to strange smells, but this was worse than any failed experiment I’d ever participated in. I fumbled my way to the front door, and slid the latch open. It moved easily, without any creaks or groans, apparently well-oiled. Unlike most doors I’ve seen, it didn’t swing open on the hinges. I had to gently pull it open. With but a nudge, it swung silently open, well-oiled and well-balanced. A strange thing to see in the slums of Bartertown. The rest of the group piled into the room and we closed and latched the door behind us.

We searched the room for clues. Apart from debris, there wasn’t much. Of most interest was the cupboard. it was very, very heavy and very well built. We all assumed there must be a secret door behind or under it. But we looked and looked and found nothing. Studying the rest of the room, we realized that this shack had been renovated from the inside. From the outside, it appeared to be a shack, ready to fall down in a slight breeze. Inside, it was obviously well-built, with solid walls, floor and roof. The roof was solid wood, not the thatch we’d seen outside. I began prying up the floorboards, and found rough stone as would be normal here.

Finally we all got around the cupboard and together heaved mightily, and it toppled. Underneath, we did find a dark hole, just wide enough for Lazulin, the largest of us, to pass through. The sides of the hole were chipped rock, and we could tell it widened a ways below.

Lazulin entered first, head first, and the rest of us followed. Someone had spent a lot of time crafting this tunnel, really a mine shaft now that we studied it up close. The mountains of Throal were riddled with mine tunnels, so we shouldn’t have been surprised. Eventually, we found a ladder on one side of the hole, which helped our progress, and we reached the bottom which ended in a worked cavern.

Vralino began exploring, and suddenly knew, just knew, there was danger here! As she realized this, her foot just barely nudged a large bear (really Name-giver) trap on the floor, and it snapped shut resoundingly. There were several such traps scattered about on the floor, but now that we knew they were they, we could avoid them.

On the left, the cavern opened up into a tunnel, while on the right was a solid wall. Against the wall, we saw a statue of what could only be Dis, a woman holden chains and a crown. Then the statue moved and attacked and at the same time we heard a metal clattering come from the other side. The noise turned out to be from the claw of a group of human-sized cave crabs as they scuttled towards us. First, we took down the “Goddess”, but not before Vralino was unconscious on the floor. Then we took care of the crabs.

We brought Vralino back to consciousness and then cautiously explored the cave. Following a tunnel, we found about 30 Name-givers, of a variety of races. They were huddled in one corner of a cavern, all dressed in sackcloth, but without shackles, staring timidly at us. Juniper talked to them and convinced them that we weren’t associated with “them,” the slavers who’d brought them here. Eventually, we learned that their captors brought food down every few days, warning them not to eat it all at once. Some of the slaves had been here for quite some time, while others were newcomers; other slaves had come and gone, too.

Juniper convinced them to follow us up out of the cave. The slaves were strangely placid, but also had an aura of despondency, as if nothing mattered any more. Upon reflection, we concluded that this must have been due to the influence of Dis and her questors. Juniper used his Resist Influence questor ability on one of them, and it worked. That slave — a young man — was helpful in guiding the others to safety. He also reported that whatever the slavers had done to them, it had sapped his will, made him not care what happened, and not want to do anything himself.

Eventually, our group including the slaves reached the shack. We heard a tap on the door in a peculiar rhythm. Could that have been some kind of code? We quietly ignored it and whoever it was left. At that point, we opened the door and looked around. We identified a dwarf on a goat-drawn night-soil collection cart that had probably done the knocking. We followed the cart to a barn, and then the dwarf into a tavern.

Meanwhile, we freed the slaves, brought them to the temple of Garlen and Lochost to return to their senses. Juniper performed Resist Influence on as many as he could, and returned the next day to finish the task.

Elisen approached the night-soil collector and noticed that the dwarf was dressed too well for the area. The dwarf was Named Fofraeck Leadriver, and now that his work was finished, was busy getting drunk. Elisen chatted to him and bought them both drinks, so much so that Fofraeck was suspicious, asking “Why’re you so friendly?” Elisen sang some soothing songs and Fofraeck’s suspicion subsided.

Gradually, Elisen learned that Fofraeck had a usual daily route. Each day he stopped at a couple of places, including the shack and knocked. Sometimes someone would answer, but mostly not. Each morning there’d be a note on his cart telling him where to stop that day, and he’d get paid well for doing so. If there was no note, he just made his usual collection route. The notes gave him directions much like the journal had been written, as turn-by-turn directions, not with simple addresses.

That day’s note had also had Fofraeck stop at a villa, out in the farming district. We followed those directions and found the estate ourselves. Using heraldry, Elisen recognized the villa as belonging to a known Throalic noble, one who was not a supporter of Varulus III. The villa was the estate of Dwolgret Woldbuckle, who was next in line to the Throalic throne if Varulus’ line failed.

On the outskirts of the estate, we stopped one of the farm workers and learned that the master lived in the great house, which we could see in the distance. But the master wasn’t present at that point. We did a bit more scouting, but realized we needed more information, so we returned to Throal.

We talked to Fofraeck again and learned the special knock that he used. Fofraeck caught on quickly that we were trying to gain knowledge and entry to the estate, and he was willing to help. So the following day we aaccompanied Fofraeck’s cart and headed to the estate. Since the cart’s presence was normal, no one challenged us on the estate, and we went up to the back door, the servants’ entrance. In the villa, only one chimney was smoking, and using Lifesight I learned that there were only seven people in the house, all in the servants’ quarters.

We knocked on the door with Fofraeck’s special knock and an armored man answered. Seeing us he yelled, “Tricked,” and raced back into the house. Juniper pushed the door in and we followed. Inside, the servants attacked us and we responded in kind. One of them yelled out, “Burn it all!”, which we took to meant that they were going to burn all the records of their activities. We killed some of them, but the rest ran off.

We rescued some papers from the flames and added them to our collection. One of these papers contained an exhortation to the questor of Dis, demanding greater discretion, noting that certain disappearances had been noticed. A second letter was address to the Warlord, demanding to know why the costs were so high and why the timetable of operations had moved out. Obviously, more study was needed to determine where to go next. Although we’d damaged their slaving operation, it was still in business.

sigfriedmcwild
Posts:335
Joined:Wed Nov 13, 2019 6:59 am

Re: AAR: Paper Chase [7H] (18FEB21 @ 2359 GMT) UPDATED TIME

Post by sigfriedmcwild » Fri Mar 12, 2021 12:33 am

From the memoirs of Elisen of clan Adorjan, Haressa-tis and Lore Keeper

When I met Juniper (Solanus Pyrocantha, elven Shadow and Questor of Lochost) for our usual not quite breakfast, not quite lunch hanging out at an inn, they were dragging a rather confused or possibly star struck looking Vralino (Vralino Hammershield, orc Swordmaster and Elementalist) along and muttering something about being kicked out.

Turns out they'd been "shacking up" with someone name Ginepro, who has just kicked them out this morning for "investigating the enemies of the people and planning Lochost's retribution". According to Vralino this involved a lot of red strings and pins on one of the walls, I can see why this Ginepro may have been upset. On the positive side Juniper was convinced that they'd cracked the code in the journal from the slavers we'd eliminated months before (see my notes on the chains we forge) and was ready to track down the lead.

Once Bloodbeat (Bloodbeat II of Syrtis, t'skrang Nethermancer and Weaponsmith) and Lazulin (troll Raider and Sun Herald) had joined us and we were suitably fed, we went into the nascent "barter town" to visit righteous retribution on some slavers. As we trudged through the muck, I noticed more people that usual staring at us, with a mix of fear and anger, which to be honest I was not used to from people that aren't trying to kill me on the spot. It turns out that the "buildings" to the side of the "street" we were walking down were not abandoned ruins, but actually homes and Isidoros had be wrecking their way through since the "street" was so narrow. Extremely embarassed by this faux pas, I sent Isidoros back to wait by the gates, while I proceeded with just Jacint.

As we approached out destination I took to flying higher to keep an eye on the general situation. The others attempted to approach our target, a rather non descript shack right next to the mountain, stealthily. Bloodbeat took a look at the astral in the area and did not find anything. The inside seemed dark and empty. The only access was through the front door which was locked, but Bloodbeat has learnt how to step between shadows, so they stepped inside and unlocked it for the rest of us.

We started looking around and quickly noticed that the inside of the shack was a really high quality, almost as if the outside was camouflage. After much looking and some property damage, we figured out that the extremely heavy cupboard in a corner hid a tunnel into the mountains. We managed to make our way down, Vralino found a trap with some kind of poison on it.

As we were getting our bearings the giant statue on one side of the room came to life while two rock crabs came at us from deeper in. The fight was rough with Lazulin getting squished by a crab and Vralino getting beaten up by the statue. Once we were done with the creatures we noticed that the crabs were chained and some people were huddled at the far end. Turns out the cave was used as a holding pen for slaves and the crabs, statue, and traps were there to prevent escape.

We made our way out with the slaves and as we were about to leave the shack, someone knocked in an over elaborate pattern on the door. And then left, leaving a cart in front of the door. I spotted a well dressed dwarf making their way to a nearby "inn". I followed in and started chatting with them, their name was Fofraeck and they traded in carrying muck away from town, and is paid handsomely to park his cart in front of the shack for a while with some regularity. He then gets directions to somewhere else where he parks and waits again.

Definitely not a patsy used to moved slaves around. Why does nobody ever question "free cash"?

The others found a note pinned to one of the slaves with a set of convoluted directions, we follow the directions and find ourselves at the estate of Dwolgret Woldbuckle, a well known noble that is not the staunchest supporter of the crown. Juniper talks with one of the workers there, apparently the lord is not in but someone is living in the villa.

We trudge back to Fofraeck, get him to take us down to the estate in his cart. Turns out he'd already made drops here and knows where to go. We make our move, terrify the seven goons inside into surrendering, the boss tries to run away but Lazulin impales him with a spear. The "fight" was quick enough that they couldn't even burn their incriminating correspondence.

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