Thug Muggers in the City 10-14-23
Table Talk:
I gave Ashley/Sorin access to my running note on the City of Nibiru (which i need to post up on the blog too at some point, sorry for the delay). This makes sense, since Sorin grew up here and would know all the basic stuff like holidays, where things are, and who is feuding with who, basic traditions, the anthem, local history, etc.
Part D of Zaanth’s note that Rae decoded during the Long Rest, (also she saved on her Con roll):
This section is a red psychotic scribbling done as if in a trance. "Ro" was written over it later in black but it’s unclear as to the reason or meaning. Looking at it gives you a feeling of rage and hate. Stare too long, and it begins to pulse in your eyes and fill you with anger. Underneath it is a carefully lined symbol delicately shaded in except for the word "God" left clear in some long dead eldritch glyphs.
The Gargoyle will be very similar to Akris in how he becomes tamed. Cypress will have to roll to get the creature to do something, each success/failure and move up/down a scale similar to Death Saving Throws. At ten successes, the Gargoyle will be a full companion with no need to roll. Cypress will be using Animal Handling instead of Wisdom like Sorin does with Akris. Nymbus rolled an Animal Handling for last night. This didn’t start his points, but was to learn the Gargoyle’s name and coax it to be willing to be a familiar and eventually a companion. Cypress did decide to share the Gargoyle’s name with the group. The Gargoyle’s name is tZulée.
A quick reminder on acquiring items and shopping in the city; When searching for an item/information you will roll a contested D20 +/- bonuses based on the setting against the DM. If successful, you have found what you’re looking for. Then there is a second roll dice against the DM, to determine quality/price. For instance, searching in the Greater Square will always give advantage on the search roll, but disadvantage on the quality roll; while searching in the Lesser Square will always give disadvantage on the search roll, but advantage on the quality roll. Going to a place to find something (Woodrow for a chair, or Taylor Street for clothes), will always give bonuses to the search and quality, but will probably cost more, also it takes a turn to walk there so it will take awhile if you’re doing lots of kinds of shopping.
For example: You might look for a Spear in the Greater Square and roll a (13) (7) against the Dm’s (11), so you found someone selling a spear; then you roll a (11) (18) against my (15) so the spear (normally 1GP) might be 4GP or might be still 1GP but only does 1d4 (norally 1d6) damage.
Lastly, a small correction, The Nort Gate Inn doesn’t have any rooms with baths on the poorer side, so our heroes retroactively opted to spend 6 gold a night for the Tile Suite again to have some privacy, rather than bathing in the laundry tub with everyone else on the other side.
“I feel like it’s gotta be really hard as a sci-fi author, because everything you sit down, you’re like ‘Okay I guess I have to world build’, and that’s like 200 pages right there.”
“Oh, yeah, they hate that shit.”
—Rachel and Griffin McElroy, “Wonderful! 297: The Salty Baskets That Preachers Love (~4:30)”
🎲🗡️🔔✨🌿
Chapter 15: Shopping Montage
🎲🗡️🔔✨🌿 Chapter 15: Shopping Montage
Cypress is the first to rise and go through their morning routine. Yawn, bow, stretch, bathroom, rinse, dry, soda ash toothbrush, bow, dress, pray, then a couple more proper yoga stretches, and finally put on the outer garments.
As they’re looping the leather straps of the boots over their buttons he panics for a brief moment ‘I don’t think I could feel Sheela again’, then they relax and realize that that was probably just due to being half asleep. Not every prayer is met with a divine connection after all, and this one was just part of the morning routine.
While Cypress was doing their morning stretches, Sorin rolled a 22 stealth and slipped out of the room to head to the dark market before anyone could tell him not to.
The other Thug Muggers gather at the door and wait for Sorin… then look in all the rooms of the suite around and groan.
Sorin hears them in his Sending Stone telling him not to be stupid and just laughs, “When have I ever-”
Down the thin marble stares, Ari, Cypress and Rae head into the lounge to get their breakfast. There on the table behind the couch, where the roast and veggies were before, is a trough. It is six feet long, two feet wide and it is piled up with almost a foot high of veggie and bacon egg scramble. Cypress’s eyes glitter with love and greed as he picks up 3 bowls and shovels a good fraction of the almost twelve cubic foot mound. Rae grabs a single bowl, and Ari gets half a bowl, figuring Cypress can have whatever she doesn’t want of it…she’s pretty sure she saw some mushrooms in there, and a tomato…gross.
When Sorin walks out, he sees the water running in the stream across the street is not the usual crystal clear blue that it usually is this close to the gates. Today it’s a very familiar swirl color of oil specks, soot, dust and mud. He is instantly filled with a sense of joy and starts bubbling with excitement. Immediately he gets sidetracked from his goal at the Dark Market, and walks straight across the road to Ironton where he starts waving hi to old artisans, teachers, and friends (all much older adults of course, because this is Sorin afterall, and he embodies the gifted child within us all).
After a health breakfast where Cypress has nearly consumed his own size (and nearly broke some fundamental physical laws) of eggy, bacony, veggie goodness, the Thug Muggers head out to hit the town.
Cypress heads down to The Post, but Ari and Rae stop and stare. The people surrounding Ironton can only be described as a throng. And with a high perception check, they can clearly see Sorin in the crowd laughing and smiling…honestly it's a little worrying to see.
Ari puts her hand to her ear and asks over the Stones, “Uh, Sorin, is something going on today?”
“Sh sh, wait, hang on, guys, I have some out of town friends who don't know, sh, come here come here, heehee, sh sh , sh, on three, one, two, THREE!”
IT’S ANVIL WASHING DAY!
The yell is so loud that Ari and Rae could’ve heard it easily across the street without any magical help at all. They both cuss loudly and try to shake the ringing out of their ears.
The passersby give them affronted looks and a child asks if this is street theater or just someone out from the asylum.
Sorin comes out of the crowd and excited explains:
Anvil Washing, another local tradition. Is usually on the first weekend of Mirtul. After the muddy work of fixing farm tools on the days around Groundbreaking / Plow Day, the smiths, forgers and craftspeople of Ironton damp their coals, open the vents, and take down the tarps. For two to three days they do no crafting at all. Instead they clean tools, grind and wash anvils, brush out chimneys, oil the canvas and leather curtains, and so on. Usually this causes the water stream running by the North Road and through Woodrow to turn an even more rusty dirty brown than usual, and in fact, the last couple years have started a new part of the tradition where at the end of the holiday they block and clean the channel bricks at the end of the last day. During this holiday you cannot get anything custom made, but the Storefront Hall (where most of the actual selling happens and where Ari got her Rapier described in Thug Muggers in the City 9/25/22) stays open round the clock, usually with items on discounted pricing. The holiday also provides jobs to wanderers, kids, and beggars as the shops always need more hands to get everything clean by the end of the 2-3 day holiday. At the end, the headman of the Maid’s Guild is brought in to inspect and the cleanest shop gets to hold the honorable golden hammer and anvil for that year.
Or at least he explains the jist of it, obviously that was my explanation from my notes.
Meanwhile on the south end of town, Cypress debates throwing the Sending Stone in a fountain while his ears ring. At the last second he decides to keep it, and goes over to The Post.
He spends some time milling around people and looking around the post with the brass plaque reading “West / Notices / Other”.
There is one face on a poster he can almost recognize, but whether it’s from the bad block printing, or what, but he isn’t quite sure.
Back behind the shops of Ironton, Sorin walks through a puff of steam and rug dust to see a small crowd of blacksmiths laughing.
“Sorin, come have a look, Toffnar just found the biggest piece of dragon snot you’ve ever seen!”
Laughing, Sorin walks up to look at the lumpy metal. It’s the size of a head, with lumpy black bubbles and jagged silver grits. “Gond, Toffnar, how long has it been since you cleaned your forge!?”
Toffnar laughs and shakes the metal slag in his fist. “I thought I’d been doing a good job keeping up with it each week, but it looks like I didn’t make it down below the tuyere since last year! No wonder I’ve been getting such small ash. And here I thought maybe I was getting lucky with my new charcoal mix!”
Everyone laughs at this and Sorin moves a hand in front of his mouth and stage whispers to one of the other smiths “Orgōna, if he's that bad at cleaning his ash gate, I’d hate to stick my finger in his pritcket!”
Because this joke is very funny, all the smiths around laugh loudly and clap Sorin on the back. It leaves a sooty handprint there, but it feels like home. And yes this joke is funny, and yes i think most smiths i’ve known would laugh at it, though to be fair, i don’t know of any smiths regular cleaning their pricket holes and to be honest, i don’t think i’d even want to stick my pinky in my own hole.
Back in front of Ironton, Ari and Rae are in Storefront Hall looking at wares. After a few frustrated looks around, Rae asks someone if they’ve seen any enchanted rings. This earns a slight chuckle and “You’d want the Artificer's mall for that sorta thing I’m afraid,” From the woman behind the counter.
Then an elf next to her says, “Oh and it’s a good day to go too, the Brewen Brother’s are having their blind bag sale!”
“What?”
“Oh it’s a fun gamble, you never know what you might get and sometimes you get a real collectors piece!”
Rae shrugs, taps Ari on the shoulder, gestures, and heads out of the crowd and down towards the Artificer’s Mall.
Ari rolls a Nat’ 1 trying to find some +1 arrows. But she does roll high enough on her save to turn just in time to see the pickpocket moving his grubby hand toward her pouch. With surprise she realizes it’s the same kid she ran off, like a week ago in some other part of town that Kai is too lazy to look up right now. She shakes a fist at him, and he disappears again in the milling shoppers.
Down at The Post, Cypress is still looking at notices.
Remember that anything you can think of here to give yourself an advantage will boost your rolls. Asking around, or finding a ladder to get up higher.
Nymbus, laughing: “I’ll just Wild Shape into a giraffe so I’m taller.”
Sorin, laughing: “A giraffe walks into a post!”
Nymbus: “Okay, now I want a shirt with that.”
When a man walks out of the way, Cypress climbs up on a handy barrel at the base of the log and starts leafing through some of the notices there that have been stacked up on top of each other over the months. He stops when he sees a familiar face.
Notice of Oustage!
Blacklist!
Unreliable!
The face drawn below was hired for a caravan guard job by the sister of Nydra.
Took pay and ran.
Suspected of stealing supplies and goods from carts as well as the escortees.
130 Gold reward from the Sisters for items or proof of punishment in their name.
The face is clearly a remembered drawing, like a police sketch, but the details are clear enough, and Cypress recognizes it as one of the Thugs they took out in the Sewers. Only then, they’d been unconscious in a small room with a Violent Fungus thrashing around above them.
After they’re done laughing at Sorin’s very good smithing joke, one of the older artisans turns to Sorin. “It’s good to see you lad. If you need a job, you know it is Anvil Washing.”
“Whaddya need done?”
“The jaws on my shears need filing. I know you know how, and more important, how NOT to cut your fingers off while you do it. So I'll pay you fifty gold for some work. Fifty or any regular bits you need (any non magical piece of gear or weapon in the D&D player’s handbook) to free me up to get some of the other work done.”
Sorin sticks out his hand, “Deal.”
As you get started, give me a roll with your proficiency, basically a skill/crafting roll since this is something you know how to do. 16.
When Rae walks into the Artificer’s Mall she is immediately greeted by a cart sitting right at the entrance. It is piled high with two columns of canvas pouches on decorative displays shelves like a Christmas tree special at Albertsons. The one on her left has a gold filigree sign reading “Stones, Pearls, Crystals & more” and the column on her right has a silver filigree sign with “Jewelry: Necklaces, Tiaras, Rings & Broaches of all kinds”.
The gnome standing on the counter of this little stall, is in full swing as he barks to the on-lookers.
“Yes ladies and gentlemen! Yes, adventures and heroes! Yes, Misses, Misters and Mixes! Yes, to you traders and merchants and townsfolk alike! Yes, caravaners, carters, guards and scouts! Yes! Yes all and one at once and together. It is once again the time for the Brewen Brother’s blind bag extravaganza!” At this he bows with his hands out and sparks flip from his hands in bright hot colors that fall to the ground as pastel flower petals. “My brothers and I gave our fortune up years and years ago. Or, many and many-a as they say in the northeast. Or, moon and pass and pass again as they see in the South lands west over the mountain.”
There is a small cooing in the audience at his mention of such distant talk, and he shifts to a fake sad continuing.
“Yes, we gave up our riches, our home and our wealth to a heartless evil witch! A hag who promised us all that and more…”
He gives an obvious fake sniff that touches Rae’s heart, clearly thinking of ‘the good old days at home’.
“She traded us for a magic ring and when she took everything we had, the ring had turned to brass and glass.” A pause, as he fake washes his hands in a puff of smoke. “Aye but we mucked and we raked and we fished and we scraped and we found a true magic ring!” He disappears from sight with a sparkle in the air, and reappears on the sign at the top of the cart. “We found one and two and three and seven and five magic rings!”
The crowd ooh’s again, then laughs with him.
“And we never found a one that could make me good at numbers. Yes, we scour the countryside as we travel. We leave no brick unturned in a forgotten charcoaler’s hut. Yes, it is our curse. We find and collect these magic trinkets and come back to you when our sacks are full and our bellies are hungry.”
“Every bag has a single magic goodie inside! Stones of defense, Pearls fire, necklaces of fireBALLS, tiaras of future sight and rings of farting.”
A more honest laugh from the younger people gathered around the cart.
“Each bag has a Darkness Seal so it’s no use trying to shake them or peek inside.”
A few people grumble at having their plans foiled.
Quietly now, “Some bags have Common items,” louder, “some bags have Uncommon items,” louder, “some bags have Rare items,” now shouting, “and some bags have Very Rare items!”
The crowd erupts in cheers as he pulls out a ring from a chain on his neck and finishes in a crescendo,
“This ring is the evil hag’s ring! It turned out to only be brass and glass, but help us get our money back, and we’ll find her and shove it up the witch's ass!” He pumps the fist holding the ring in a fake uppercut, then jumps up and turns to smoke that slowly blows away.
Rae is one of the first to line up.
During her couple of minutes in the queue she sees a halfling get a Ring of Protection and an elf get a Bead of Force and a dwarf get very excited at finding a Ring of the Ram. When she gets up at the counter the gnome there, clearly a brother of the one who was performing on top of the cart, asks her “Jewelry of Stones, miss? Stones are 111 Gold, and Jewelry are 122.”
“Jewelry” Rae says, thinking about that Ring of Protection she just saw and hoping against the odds.
She hands over the coins and the gnome says, “Aye of course, now which bag do you want?”
Rae thinks for a second, then points to a bag in the middle of the third shelf from the bottom.
Using a hook on a long stick the gnome brings the bag down and sets it on the counter. “Right then, open it up and let’s see whatcha’ve got.”
Rae can’t help grinning with anticipation as she undoes the ties and turns the pouch upside down over her palm. She dumps out a small bronze ring with inlaid green enamel leaves in the band. The gnome lets out and “ooooo” and the crowd gasps. “A Very Rare ring for the Miss, a Ring of Regeneration!
Rae jumps in the air, recognizing “regeneration” as an obviously useful thing.
At the table i had Sarah pick a card from a hand where she could not see any of the images or titles. She was indeed very lucky, this is one i almost didn’t include because it's so good, but i put in just to make things more exciting.
While Raelle is being extremely lucky at the Artificer’s Mall, her best friend Ari is suffering in the Ironton Storefront Hall.
“He sssent me to ssspy on you…” Akris is hissing in her ear, “To tell him whatsss you’re doing and howsss you sssmell!” He says with an evil sniff against the short hairs on the back of her neck.
“Gross.” Ari says and shudders. She tries again to look for arrows. (Rolling another critical failure)
Akris flicks his tongue against her earlobe and when she turns to swat him away, she’s just in time to see the same young pickpocket racing for her again. “You little b-” she starts, and grabs at them.
But the young thief yells, “Pocket SAND!” and disappears again in the crowd leaving Ari scraping dirt off her tongue and out of her eyes as Akris points his tail and laughs at her.
Cypress plucks the notice of the familiar Thug off its nail, tearing the page at the top and pocketing it. He steps off the barrel and moves around the log to look for more.
Hmm.. okay, with a nat’ 20 i think i’ll do this. I’ll give you something really good. Pretty meaty, but then you have to move on and be done searching here. Does that sound fair?
Nymbus: “Yes.”
Looking at the Weft Street side of the post now, Cypress can see a face they definitely remember. He jumps up and grabs the paper, and holds it close reading the Official Constabulary Wanted Poster. No simple sketch on this one but a real picture, a wood cut with a nearly real likeness to the first Wererat the Thug Muggers faced back in the first level of the sewers. The one in the Thug room with the maps and the couch that had chains on it…
WANTED
By order of the Berry Crown, through the Nibiru Constabulary
For crimes of theft, and violence.
NAME: unknown
LAST SEEN: near Faereck Plaza and Gear Row
CIRCLES: unknown or unaligned, if you know more please contact the watch!
KNOWN CRIMES: Breaking and entering (Maid’s guild), Violence to a citizen (food seller), Violence to a visitor(s) (nearby), Harmful and reckless use of magic in a public setting (Fear, Command, atmpt Witch Bolt).
NOTICES: Escaped capture in the third week of Tarsakh, and is believed to have fled the city. If seen, do not approach, do not sell or barter with, this individual is considered BARRED and BLACKLISTED from all city goods, commerce, charity and services until presented at trial in the Grand Court.
‘Well that’s all very useful!’ Cypress thinks as he looks over the paper and folds it into his pocket.
Sorin is filing the cutting edges on the various standing shears in the plate and armorer's shop.
Give me a Dexterity roll to see how well you’re doing. 17.
He’s careful as he pushes the file along and down the teeth. Making sure to steady his hands and not hit the locking bar while his fingers are inside the machine. He knows that if he does, the only thing holding the jaws open will give way. And, while the handle’s counterweight won't be enough to cut the bone of his fingers, it will go through everything up to the bone.
“Careful on the throatless shear by the way,” the smith shouts from the other side of a stained tarp, “The locking bar needs fixing, it’s way too loose.”
“What?” Sorin asks, sitting up to look over at the stained cloth. When he shifts his feet the stand trembles for a second and the locking bar clicks. The handle slams down and Sorin gulps looking at where his fingers were just working.
He stands up and gets a piece of scrap chain, loops it around the handle arm and then clamps the other end in a nearby vice.
“Did you hear me?” The smith asks, poking their head around the heavy curtain. They see the chain and smile, “Hey good thinking, nevermind then, you musta been being careful before I remembered. Carry on.”
The crowd around Rae is equal parts happy, excited, and angry at her amazing find. The gnome there at the counter grins a big toothy grin, “Try the Stones, miss, with luck like that you’re sure to get something good!”
Laughing and enjoying the peer pressure, Rae plops down the coin and points to a bag on the Stones side. This time she chooses a bag high up and the gnome takes a second to extend the hook before reaching down the bag.
“Here we go!” she undoes the ties and tilts the rock out. She stares unimpressed at the lavender rock. “Uh what is-”
“Holy Feareck Saints!” someone nearby exclaims and the shopkeeper gnome laughs in a way that is either fake nervous or trying to cover genuine nervousness. “Miss, are you trying to clear us out of all the Very Rare’s? That's the Ioun Stone of Absorption!”
Another Very Rare that i put in on a whim and Sarah picked out very much against my intentions…
“Okay, Akris, if you're here, will you at least help me?” Ari asks the demonic familiar, now getting frustrated.
Roll Charisma for me. 6.
Akris agrees, and does in fact help Ari look, spotting a seller with bundles of arrows laid out…
…Behind her back, his tale lightly lifts the flap of her pouch and curls around a few gold coins. Then with one look back over her shoulder, he tosses them to the pickpocket and laughs as the kid grins and gives a thumbs up to the demon.
Cypress heads to the Tower of the Constabulary to talk to someone about the notices he just found.
Sorin, give me a Charisma check to see how good you do, finishing the work. 14.
Sorin finishes a little bit early and takes the time to oil the jaws, then run some old sacking over them to get any last filings or grit. Then he finds the pile of tanned and un-dyed leather strapping and slowly cuts pieces off with each set of shears to make sure they’re polished on the edges, and that the faces are in good shape.
Rae laughs as the crowd eggs her on again and again to do another bag. She succeeds a Charisma save though, and backs out of the milling people holding up her two new prizes.
On her way out of the mall, she can see a clearly high-level paladin in fancy polished armor walking around. She can see the glowing tattoos along her thick muscular neck and it gives her an idea.
“Hey, this is maybe a weird question from a stranger, but are those tattoos magic?” she asks, pointing.
“Yeah, good eye.” The paladin answers in a rough sultry voice. “They help me channel Shar and give me strength!”
“Nice! That’s awesome! Did you get them done here in town?”
“Yeah, there’s a little place up on Glory Street that specializes in them.”
Rae beams and thanks the good looking stranger. Then she leaves to head north, hearing the paladin saying behind her, “Oh sweet, they’re doing a blind bag thing here too, I just came from the potion one!”
On her way a thought occurs to her and she decides to check in with Sorin, “Hey Sorin, a hot muscly paladin just told me a good shop to get some magic tattoos,” she teases, “Do you know of any other good places to look?”
“Didyougettheirrname!?”
“No.”
“Dangit!”
“Tattoos?”
“Oh yeah, sure, well,” Sorin explains, “I know of two decent places for sure. There’s the one that the school sorta unofficially recommends. LIke, it’s on the pamphlets you get and stuff. It’s over by the apothecaries in Faereck Plaza, but I don’t think I know anyone who’s actually gone there. All the students go to this place down by the arena! They tend to do a lot of work for the arena fighters and the bards in the theatre over there. So like, it's got some coolness caché if you get it done there. Plus, they’ve been doing the arena champions for ages, so you can get, like, the exact same tattoo of power that Barb the Beef Smasher* had in her prime!”
*In the city, Arena fighters are a lot like the WWE for us. Champions and warriors put on huge elaborate battles and fights. About half are scripted and half are actual fights against beasts and monsters. Barb the Beef Smasher, often shouted out as “BBS” was the face to the heel Terance the Tyrant of Tavrin (TTT), and was a hero in Sorin’s youth. He no doubt had a poster of her with her catchphrase “Smash down for righteous love!” in big block letters. She retired when the league tried to do a face turn with Terence as Traveler Terry, but the fans booed him down and the league soon relented; scared that the religious followers of The Traveler (seen in the CoGG) would take this booing as a religious hate crime.
Rae thinks for a second and asks, “Okay, but do you know anything about the one up on Glory Street?”
“There’s a magical tattoo place up there?”
“That answers that.” Cypress chimes in, laughing.
“Okay, well I'll check it out and let you know if it’s any good.”
Because i took pity on Brooke for not rolling higher than an 8 all day, Ari was able to someone selling +1 arrows in bundles of five for 20 Gold each.
She checks her pouch, sees the missing gold and groans. She presses a finger to her ear and whines, “Rae… um.. Can I ask a favor?”
Rae, laughing in her good mood, “Yeah, anything, what’s up, best friend?”
“Can I borrow some money to buy some +1 arrows?”
“Yeah, sure, no problem.”
“WHAT!?” Sorin squawks before they cut the connection.
Ari buys two of the bundles with the Thug Muggers joint money and makes a note to pay it back right away.
It’s about midday now, and Cypress can feel his stomach wanting another five or eight helpings of the bacon veggie scramble. He pauses halfway up the street. There's a vending machine there and he spends a gold to get five BreadBerry packs (2 silver each).
This leads to the question, at the table: are there two in a pack like pop tarts, or only one. So i decided that there is only one to a pack, but they are scaled up to be as thick as two pop tarts. Also, if you think a vending machine is out of place in a medieval-esque fantasy town, you might find it interesting that Hero of Alexandria (the same guy that made the first known steam engine) actually made the first vending machines in first-century Roman Egypt. They were used to dispense holy water and the design didn’t change substantially until the cigarette machines of the 1900’s. …
This is what being at a D&D table is like sometimes, sorry.
Anyways, Cypress buys some pop ta- BreadBerrys and heads to the police station, what was i saying?
Sorin opts to take the pay instead of the gear from this impromptu filing job. They count out the 50 gold and then pause.
16 crafting, 17 Dex, and 14 Cha is a 16 average, so 1.6 rounded up to two.
They toss on an extra 2 gold and clap Sorin on the back. “You did good work, and I thank ya. Come back when you need more work, and maybe you can help me get the golden anvil this year!” they laugh and Sorin heads back out to the street.
With the extra cash Sorin feels pretty good and decides to treat himself to some tacos for lunch. He finds the Drow with the long U-shaped trough cart and waves him down. He pays 18 silver for 3 tacos and builds them there on the cart. Hard chickpea shells, beans and beef, lettuce, merk leaf, tomato, and haunted sauce. He thanks the Drow with a cheerful wave and heads south towards the Dark Market.
Make a Wisdom save, Rae. Oooo not good.
Rae is also hungry.
Good thing there’s this friendly looking guy with this cart here. And it smells so good!
The cart is a design she’s seen a lot around the city, built for people selling soups and stews. It’s basically just a wheelbarrow with a big stock pot instead of the barrow, and a Thermal Stone underneath to keep it warm.
“S’loof de Puos,” the man is calling out in a high brow fancy accent, “S’loof de Puos! Four Geld. S’loof de Puos!”
“That smells so good! What is it?” Rae says approaching the cart.
The man curls his cartoonish thin handlebar mustache, and pretends not to understand, “Quesque se? C’est S’loof de Puos, si? Es ist fer Geld, no? S’loof de Puos,” he says, choking back a laugh and holding up four fingers.
“Sure, of course!” Rea says and hands him the coins.
The man hurriedly ladles out a pressed sawdust bowl. The soup is thick and creamy with herbs and lumps floating in it. Then the man quickly pushes his cart away down the street shouting, “S’loof de Puos!”
Rae stares at the soup in wonder, then growing apprehension…
The further away the man with the cart gets, the more the delicious smell seems to fade.. And the delicious soup seems to clarify.
Soon she is staring down at an obvious bowl of clear water.
She turns to see the cart about 20 yards away, and a thought crosses her mind, ‘Ari can make basic images and smells with her thaumaturgy right? But for how far, about 20 yards?’ Then she looks at the ‘soup’ and sees a Stable sign reflected in the water as ‘elbatS’. She thinks about the sign on the man’s cart. ‘‘De’ means ‘of’ right?’ she thinks it over. ‘S’loof of Puos!’, ‘souP fo fool’S’, ‘Soup of Fools’.
Rae slowly turns the bowl of water over and lets it trickle out on the ground. Then she sighs and walks away with her stomach still rumbling.
Ari is heading towards the Dark market when her stomach starts rumbling. She is at the Turret Road intersection with Arena Row, over by the well fountain where the three streams meet, and she sees a friendly enough vendor. Her stall is a sturdy looking thing with an older pot belly stove in it and a sign reading ‘Wetsluf; local specialty!’ The smells billowing from the smokestack are so good that Ari decides she has to try it out.
The cook, an older looking orc with a huge belly (about the size of a couple hotel pillows if they were stuffed up a shirt, actually) waves to Ari and offers her a bowl.
Ari, give me a Wisdom saving throw.
Brooke, groaning: “Uuuuggggh 6.”
Okay well-
Someone at the table: “Wait, Brooke, ask the cook what’s in it.”
Nymbus: “Ooo, yeah, say you have a religious diet so you have to know what’s in it.”
“It smells so good,” Ari looks in the bowl and asks, “What’s in it, I have some allergies and stuff.”
The orc woman just leers with a CONfident smile, “I promise you, it’s nothing you haven’t had before. And, for a new customer I'll give you a bowl for only one gold piece.”
Akris leans into Ari’s ear and whispers hypnotically, “And besssidesss it sssmellsss ssso goooood…”
Ari relents and hands the orc a gold coin.
She hands over the bowl of soup then barks, “Eat it while you walk though, don’t be crowding my stall, I got other people to serve!”
Ari is a little taken aback by this sudden change, but shrugs and walks away eating the soup…eating the… eating… drinking…
She holds the spoon up for the fourth mouthful and looks at it. She drops the spoon and claps a hand to her ear to muffle Akris’s howling laughter. “Wetsssluf, wetsssluf, oh damned that’sss a good one.”
“Why’re you laughing, jerk?”
“What’sss it tassste like?”
“...why?”
“What’sss it tassste like?”
“...if you must know… it tastes like water.”
Akris bursts out laughing again. “That’sss becaussse that’sss all it isss! Jussst water ss sss ss! Wetsssluf, getsss it?”
Ari blinks, “Wait, what?”
“Wetsssluf, ←→ fool stew!” (Yes Akris can pronounce arrows out-loud)
“AND YOU KNEW!?”
A few angry moments later, Ari is explaining this to the others on the Sending Stones and telling them to look out for the scam.
“Oh yeah, um thanks, for the heads up,” Rae says sheepishly, “and S’loof de Puos too, that’s uh, another one I heard about.”
Cypress is back in the ground floor lobby of the Constabulary Tower now. Once again it’s a packed mess. Munching on a BreadBerry, they look around and after a minute. They spot the same constable that they talked to with Sorin yesterday.
“Wanna BreadBerry?” they ask as they step up to his counter and hold out the shiny paper packet.
With a high Charisma roll the officer sees this as just hobbit hospitality and not an attempt at bribery. He shakes his head.
Cypress shrugs and then pulls the flyers out of his pouch and sets them on the counter. “I found these at the post, and I recognize the two of them.”
The officer sighs and takes a look at the posters then hands them back. “Normally I’d be able to help you with this and take down your information.”
“But…”
“But normally we aren’t so busy, and normally people don’t already have an appointment with the head of the watch.” The officer yawns and tries to smile politely, but it just looks tired, edging to exasperated. “Are these related to the whole thing with Bostra and Gaibon and everything?”
“Yes…”
“Then I'd suggest that you bring them with you when you meet with him. I’m sure he’ll be able to get you more information, or to take note of what’s most important.”
Cypress can feel the skin under his ‘ACAB’ patch itching at this obvious dismissal, but the cleric in him can sense this man’s overworked tiredness. Instead of snapping some unkind words, they offer the shiny packet again, “You sure you don’t want one, looks like you could use it.”
The officer stops and gives his first genuine smile, probably in days, “Thank you, but I can’t accept that. Still… I appreciate your kindness. Thank you, Flower.”
Cypress thinks about correcting his misidentification of their rank, but chooses to see it as him making an effort. They shrug and hop down from the stool. “We’re in the Tile Suite at the Nort Gate. Just in case that helps when Gaibon is ready.” With that, they head back out into the street.
A little while later, Rae sees Cypress walking ahead of her on Glory Street and flags him down. She explains about the magic tattoos as she swallows down one of the offered BreadBerrys and talks Cypress into going with her.
The sign is written in viny thorny letters that seem to glow a pale blue around the edges. It’s made of petrified wood and hangs on thick bronze square chain. “Marks of Gods”.
They walk in, and the Dwarf behind the little counter takes her feet down off the desk. She’s young and bald, with several piercings including some large gauged earrings and her purple lipstick is eye-catching. Her most prominent feature is her bright orange-red beard, ironed flat and fanned out into a huge half circle around the bottom of her face like a lion’s mane or the rays of an ancient sun god. She’s wearing stereotypical skimpy druid/monk clothes that are just some too-tight pants showing off her veiny muscular thighs, and a cloth tied in a tight complex knot around her bust. Other than the huge iron boots, that’s the whole outfit, and it leaves everything else exposed. Her skin is covered in glyphs, runes, symbols and art, many of them glowing faintly in rhythm with her breathing.
“Yo,” she says, standing up, “you guys looking for a tattoo?”
“Yeah,” Rae and Cypress say in unison, trying not to drool as they stare at the hot goth dwarf punk.
“Cool, just so you know though, we don’t do, like, normal tattoos. We do,” she waves a hand over an angry looking glyph on her forearm and a glowing blue shield emerges from her skin. She hunkers behind it, then stands back up and lets it disperse. Then she leans against the counter casually, “Magic tattoos.”
After a hesitant pause she straightens up, “Man, I really hope that’s what you’re looking for, cause if not I just burned one of my uses on that cool demo…”
“No, that is very much the kind of tattoo we're after!” Raelle-The-Wide-Eyed-Kid-In-A-Dangerous-Candy-Store giggles.
“Sweeeeet!”
While Cypress flips through the artist portfolios looking at the designs and reading the descriptions, Rae asks about the idea she had.
“A Barbarian Rage tattoo? Ah hells yeah man, that’d be sick!” The dwarf reaches up under her beard to scratch her chin, “It’d be pricey though… I mean the Basilisk Blood alone would be like 200 before we even mix the ink.”
Brooke: “Oh hey, Basilisk, we might find one. Maybe you can make a deal with her if you bring her the ingredients.
*Shaking my head* No, sorry. No Basilisks anytime soon, although... Well no wait, i mean that’s close, but it doesn’t have blood.
Silence around the table.
Nymbus: “What a horrible thing to say, how dare you.”
Seeing the money shock in Rae’s eyes the dwarf tries again, “Without the Basilisk Blood, we could do one that you tap or hit and it would give you most of the Rage effects? That would be around 320 gold.”
Sorin is walking to the Dark market when he gets close enough to sense Akris. Knowing he’s with Ari, the wizard makes an about face and walks in the other direction.
Rae’s talk of a magic tattoo had got him thinking. He thinks it over for a minute, debates about being a cool kid…then goes with the square option and heads away from Gladiator Glyphs (the arena champion and bard tattoo place), and towards the school recommended shop.
Outside the dark market, Ari is pleading with her bully and tormentor.
“Akris, can you please stay out here, please, just uh, please.”
Roll.
“SsssSss s sss S! No, I’sss want to sssee what’sss in there.”
“Akris, if you stay out here, you can keep watch for Sorin and ruin his plans if he tries to come here.” Ari tries, deciding on the new tactic of feeding someone else to the troll.
Roll again for me.
Akris thinks about it nodding…then seeing the relief on Ari’s face he grins, “No, it ssseemsss more fffun to go wittthhh you.”
Cypress is looking through the tattoo book and is feeling a bit of disappointment. He was hoping for one to buff his healing ability, and there are certainly those here, but they are all from different gods and the thought of another God’s mark in his skin makes him uncomfortable and itchy.
“Sheela? Yeah, we can,” The dwarf says when he asks about it, “we just haven’t so we don’t have anything prepped. It’d be a custom job so it’ll take a bit of time to get some texts and make the design though.”
“What about druid tattoos?”
“Aww yeah, man those are sick,” she says with an appreciative nod, “We maybe can, but to be honest we mostly service clerics and paladins here. Most druids don’t really come into the city for too long so we don’t see them enough to do it sorry.”
Cypress nods.
“I did hear about this old lady in the woods doing druid ink though! I saw a guy with a Barkskin Spell tattoo and the embedded ink was made out of literal tree bark!”
“That’s intense!”
“Yeah that’s what i’m saying,” The dwarf nods and her piercing jingle, “She lives in a tent somewhere in the forest.”
Boo tomato tomato tomato!
“What about this?” Rae asks and points to a Darkvision tattoo.
“Oh yeah those are really popular, we can do that for 50.”
“I don’t know… I have my moss lantern…”
“Yeah…” Rae says with a kind hand on his shoulder, “But it does make us a bit noticeable in the dark…”
After a minute Cypress nods, and hands over the coins.
Sorin walks through the shiny clean glass doors of ‘SAFE AND MAGICAL TATTOOS’ on the edge of Faereck Plaza.
We ended up having a discussion about various tattoo options, here. The main one that Ashley wanted was something to store and restore unused spell slots. I poopooed this. Not because of the mechanic, but because the concept, as a tattoo, really goes against how i envision magic (and in particular spell slots) working in this world. I explained that i’m fine with a spell slot storing item (in fact Rae almost pulled a Ring of Spell Storing), but that i just feel that as a tattoo, it would have to do damage to the body. Ashley consented and so instead…
Sorin walks up to the clean shaven nondescript human male at the counter, “How much is a Barrier Tattoo?”
He hears the price and his eyes glaze over. “I’ll be right back,” he says, and walks out of the shop.
Along the street outside Sorin sighs, “Maybe in a few weeks if I can save and don’t have to buy too many health potions…”
Rae talks with the dwarf some more about Rage Tattoo designs, but eventually just decides to wait until she has the money for the full thing.
She points to a picture of a Spiked Chain tattooed over a fighter's knuckles and the drawing next to it showing the glowing magical spikes coming out of their skin as they punch.
“Aww yeah, an Eldritch Claw, hells yeah, let's do it, man!”
Rae hands over the gold and they high five.
That’s where we leave off this week. Sorin disappointed about economics, Ari almost in tears from bad rolls and chaotic demons, Rae feeling super lucky, and Cypress getting a buff that they're a little sad about. I guess next time we’ll have to see if Sorin makes it to the Dark Market, if Ari manages to find anything or roll over 10, if Rae goes for the potion blind bags, and if Cypress can feel Sheela at her shrine in the Church of Glorious Gods. See you soon everybody! Bye! *waving*
“[T]he attitude of the knife—chopping off what’s incomplete and saying: “Now, it’s complete because it’s ended here.”
-Arrakeen Saying —Frank Herbert, “Dune: Chapter 20”
Table talk:
No real table talk this week, just a reminder to keep sending in magic items for me to look over if you want to buy them next time.
