Thug Muggers 8/21/22
Table Talk:
This week i had an idea, continuing my ongoing mission to bring the world and the game board to life. I decided to try and make some standees of the characters for the map table. I like having the miniatures and figures and we’ve been using small tokens for the PCs and NPCs. So, i wanted to try and make some standees similar to these Wizk!ds Acrylic 2D Minis packs. So i came up with 3 variations and spent some time on them. As much as i like the concept of the 4 way figures, i think the 2d ones are going to work best.
*staring at Diedrik* A small reminder that in game it is the evening of the 29th of Mirtul, meaning tomorrow (the 30th) is the end of the month and the and the next day is the start of the month of Kythorn (The Time of Flowers). I say this – just as a reminder – in case anyone in the party has any religious affiliations, and needs to do any rituals or anything during these days to avoid pissing off any god. Just hypothetically *staring at Diedrik*
I also got new maps printed up and i tried something a bit new this time. I decided to make the background dirt (a blurred out random stock image) instead of the plain empty white. So we’ll see how that goes. Maybe it’ll help us feel underground, or maybe if it’ll just be too much visual noise.
One mechanical note, I don’t think i’ve made clear. When looting, players can always loot for something specific, or roll for random loot like we’ve mostly been doing (or sometimes specific loot i have prewritten). For instance, if an enemy has a Crossbow when attacking you in a fight, or a Giant Club, players can loot specifically for that. It may be damaged, or not quite as easy to use, as i attempt to keep things balanced and fun, but we can play that out as we go.
This is a small section from my notes on The Church of Shadows. I sent this to Diedrik beforehand as knowledge that Cypress would have. (Note: it’s not as well written because it is just a copy-paste from my person DM notes)
CHURCH OF SHADOWS SYMBOLS: square cut diagonally, half black, half white. In the center is a face. Over the white half is the top of a gentle Buddha-like, smiling, kind face drawn in black lines. Over the black half is a skull drawing in white. Then the simple diagonal cut black and white square can be the easy symbol (like a cross) and the full face one can be a detailed more significant thing (like a crucifix). The symbol can even be above the church as an iron square with the top left have cut away and the bottom right have still there The church leaders (priests, ministry whatever) can be noted because they paint the bottom right half of their face black with a white skull, like a priest collar. They paint it on daily as a ritual / prayer. It stains over time so someone who has been in the church for a long time looks tattooed but still paints it on daily as a sign of devotion. People who die in the church are buried with a iron face mask cut diagonally in half so that as they decay they become half face half skull.
"'I don’t believe in Hell because it would make Heaven impossible.'
'Because you couldn’t enjoy Heaven if you knew those people were suffering.'
'I think if you’re capable of enjoying an eternal paradise while millions of other people are screaming in agony, forever, you’re a sociopath.'"
-Amy Sullivan –David Wong (Jason Pargin), “What The Hell Did I Just Read”
🎲🗡️🔔✨🌿Chapter 3: The War Room (cont.):
🎲🗡️🔔✨🌿Chapter 3: The War Room (cont.):
Ari stands in the entrance where everyone flooded in to fight. She is bent over, panting hard and gripping onto a stone pillar next to her. To her right is a simple wooden table with a lit lantern on it. Yup, just a lantern, that's it, oh and i guess there’s also like a pile of weapons and shields but who cares? Seriously, who cares, because at the base of the wall between that table and the northwest entry is a large chest with an open lid and lots of shiny stuff inside…oooo shiny.
Cypress is standing in the next entrance, leaning against the pillar there and taking a long drink of water like a responsible adult. On the other side of him is a plush looking couch. Or… It was a plush couch at one point – now it is ripped and torn and covered in slashes and bite marks, also has some shackle-style restraints chained to it in 6 places.
Rae is standing by the pillar at the soundwest entrance, picking blood and fur off of her staff that got left behind by the pile of dead Rat at her feet. It looks upsettingly like roadkill. Next to her is the large cage that the Rat was in until just recently. Its gate now flung open though, and the square lantern on top knocked over on its side. We notice that it actually looks a lot like the cages we saw in the other Thug room, and it’s next to a small chest.
The last entrance to the southeast doesn’t have any one in it… well no one conscious anyways. There is a knocked out Thug resting comfortably there with their half bitten-off arm bleeding onto their face, and their legs at an angle unavailable to most unbroken limbs. They’re taking a healthy nap under their brick patterned hood.
At the base of the next wall is another chest. This one has a sturdy lock on it, and next to it is a second couch. This one doesn’t have any restraints. In fact it has a pillow and a small backpack next to it, poking out from under a disheveled blanket. The far arm of the couch has a square lantern.
Looking at the lantern and thinking about the dangers of fire if it got knocked over onto the couch, is Sorin. He’s in the same hallway as Ari and is doing nothing to help her.
In front of Ari is the unconscious Wererat. He is in a long flowing Tabard of White and Black. The bottom right in black, and the top left in white. And as we stare at him his features start to change, subtly shifting to be more human. He also has something clutched in his right hand-paw and two arrows in his two knees.
The Wererat is crumpled up in front of a roughly worked round wooden table. There are a couple of square lanterns on it and a brick cloak thrown on it as if recently taken off (there is no coat rack in this room). We also see a pickax, and a spear head sitting on the table. There are four chairs (oh yeah, one got smashed by hulkamania) three chairs around the table and the one by the rat cage is surprisingly fancy, it has no back, but all of it has soft red cushioning.
And lastly, between the table and Cypress is our third Thug, taller than the others. She has a sword in her outstretched hand, but is lying in the fetal position clutching at her stomach. Cypress looks down and notices she has no large bags or pockets attached to any belt, but her boots are covered in tiny pockets all over.
Oh, and also there is a thrown sword at Ari’s feet.
Everyone jumps in all at once wanting to loot, Cypress wants the Wererat, Sorin wants the pocket boots, Ari wants shiny things, etc. So to make this a little easier. Everyone, roll initiative and we'll make a turn order for everything.
Cypress goes over to the unconscious Wererat and the first thing he notices is his tabard. Cypress pauses for a moment looking at it. Something about it is bothering him, but he can’t quite put his finger on it (a poor Perception roll, try again next round). He decides to open the Wererat’s clutching hand and pulls at it. He accidentally tears off a bit off sleeve with some kind of Rank symbol stitched into it. He goes to open the hand again and (Strength Check), the Wererat’s eyes flash open wide and he claws out at Cypress, dropping the scrap of paper.
Cypress swings his staff up into the chin of the Wererat! With the painful sound of clicking teeth, he lies still once more. Our angry cleric picks the piece of paper off the floor and sees it is some kind of formulation, there are magic symbols and alchemical markings. “Sorin,” he waves over to the wizard, “What can you make of this?”
“Wow, that is… well it’s a lot, frankly. I’ll have to spend some time studying it before I can tell you anything.”
With an agitated sigh Cypress hands over the paper, “Alright, well let me know when you think you’ve pieced it together.”
Rae steps over the squishy Rat corpse and goes to open the chest next to the big cage. Inside she finds a medium length whip, a short riding crop, a hand full of collars and sturdy leashes, and two large empty syringes. She starts laughing. “Hey Sorin, I found Devin’s special box for you!”
“What, what is it?”
Rae lifts on one of the collars and leashes, “Collars and leashes and whips, for when he finally gets all three of his hands on you.”
Sorin goes very pale, and then a deep deep red, stammering as else cackles at his discomfort.
Wiping the blood off her face, and the laughter tears from her eyes, Ari goes over to the shiny box filled with shiny shinies, you know, shiny. She reaches out to plunge her hand in and count the gold, when a skeptical brain cell fires off and thinks “This is too easy isn’t it?” She stops her hand and decides to first examine it for traps.
After a second, through her blurry vision, Ari thinks she sees a fine wire running through the gold pieces, ‘It must be linked to some mechanism,’ she thinks. Then, out loud she calls, “Hey Rae, can you come help me with this trap?” Then staggering a little on her haunches, “I’m feeling pretty faint.”
Sorin, ignores his own earlier comment about wanting a cool pair of boots, and wanders over to the chest with the big lock on it. With a self satisfied chuckle at how smart he is, he sets to transmuting the sturdy iron padlock into a flimsy wooden padlock. Just to show any dungeon masters that might be watching how clever he is.
Cypress goes back to staring at the Wererat. With a second bad Perception roll, he still just can’t quite make sense of it. Vaguely he remembers hearing someone saying something about feeling faint. With a sigh he walks over to Ari, then casts Cure Wounds on her. In the brief moment he sees the face of Chauntea smiling down at him, the Goddess’s ethereal face resting over Ari’s before sinking back into hers, and taking away the blood, the cuts mending back together and leaving Ari looking almost back to normal.
“Thank you.” A grateful Ari turns back around to examine the traps more carefully.
A confused and somewhat impressed Rae turns to Ari, “You’re gonna have to help me find this trap, it’s so small I can’t even see it.”
Ari swallows as she stares down with her now-cleared vision at a clearly un-trapped chest. “Uh, Yeah, Uh, I,” She starts again, “You know actually now that Cypress healed me I think I’ll be able to get it.” A bit flustered she adds, “You wanna see if anyone else needs a hand? Sorin’s been crouched in front of that box for a bit now.” She pulls out a couple of thieves' tools and kneels down close to the box, miming doing something rogue-y.
After a moment she glances up, then over her shoulder to make sure Rae is gone before putting the thieves' tools away, unused. Ari reaches into the box to find coins amounting to 10 gold pieces, and 2 rubies.
Having now turned the padlock to wood, Sorin very carefully finds a rock and smashes it. The bottom falls off leaving only the hasps hanging the loop securing the chest closed. Sorin rubs his greedy little hands together and takes the hasp out of the loop to f- there is a sudden line of bright light around the box where the lid met with the body of the box. After it fades, Sorin sees that the box is now one piece of wood, with no crack or anything to pry open.
“Uh… Rae..?”
Rae walks over and sighs. “What is it, magic boy?”
“You wanna help me smash this box open?”
Eyeing the Thug she wanted to loot, Rae sighs and goes over to help him. “Stand back, I don’t want you to get any splinters in your eyes.”
Rae hurts her hand. With the impact and technique she honed for years breaking boards, she strikes this box, but it does not burst apart or crack, in fact it doesn’t even budge an inch.
She backs up a step nursing a hand that will most likely be bruised tomorrow and thinks, ‘It's like the limp kick with the door all over again.’
Cypress grunts to himself and, in an effort to distract his brain, calmly takes the scimitar off the table next to him. He walks over to Rae, Ari and Sorin as they crowd around the box. He gently nudges them to each side, and then with a rage no one has really seen from the little cleric, he screams and swings the scimitar down with all the force he can muster.
Okay, so roll an attack roll. Okay you now have this sword wedged in deep, thrumming in the wood.
Diedrik: “I go to pull it out and swing again.”
Okay, so that’s gonna be a Strength Check. Okay, and another attack roll. Alright, so you have wedged it in deeper.
Diedrik: “I want to pull it out again, moving it side to side to try and widen the gap, and then hit it again.”
Alright so that’s another Strength…
This continues as Cypress hacks away at the box. The whole time, showing a furious rage new to him and muttering, “First it’s a closed fist, then it’s a paper I CAN’T even READ, and on top of that I STILL can’t figure it OUT!” Hitting the box with each punctuated word as his team slowly backs away from him. He finally misses the box, swinging the scimitar hard into the gravel floor, and leaving it quivering in the earth.
Panting, he looks at the large notch he’s taken out of the box and lets out a frustrated, “Is the whole thing just one big block of wood!?”
It is at this point that a light goes off in Sorin’s brain and he remembers the voice of a lecturer.
“When establishing a Spell Scroll, it is important to remember the headings and footers. When correctly written, Spells Scrolls can be LINKED to each other to go off in sequence or at the same time. For instance you might link a fire conjuration spell to a spell of Create or Destroy Water. This is a common combination to make steam for several useful proposes. Or you might link a trap wire to a spell of Mending and Higher Transmutation inside a chest, turning the air inside to wood, and then mending the wood and box together into one solid lump around your belongings. Similarly you might establish Cure Wounds with…”
Sorin clears his throat and conveys this memory to the party. A collective groan goes up and Sorin adds, “the good news is that the transmutation should only last 10 minutes. So after that, we’ll be able to at least break into the box.”
Just a side note here. This is actually one of my favorite traps to put in games. I’ve done it several different ways over the years, but the amount of frustration it always generates is *chef’s kiss* delicious.
With that Rae walks off to loot Hulkimania’s unconscious body muttering under her breath about finally doing something for herself. In a leather pouch strung across his back and under his brickwork cloak, she finds two sticks of dynamite. Rae lets out a silent prayer thanking whatever god made him fall face forward, as well as preventing anyone from hitting him in the back. As she stares down at him she decides that she’d actually like that leather vest, it would actually make some decent padding against the hits she keeps taking. With a low perception check, Sarah, go ahead and mark that down as “RL leather vest”.
Ari decides to loot the other Thug with the cool boots, opening up the pockets she finds some weed, a pipe, and a thieves map of a neighborhood the city with some houses circled and some X-ed out. After a moment comparing foot sizes she decides that the boots will just about fit. She pulls one of the chairs over and starts undoing her own worn leather boots.
“Hey, wait Ari, I wanted those boots.” Sorin pouts.
With a laugh Ari says, “Alright, how much wizard boy?”
“I mean, I don’t have a lot, but I wanted to keep my spell components in them. Think of how cool that would be!”
With a snorting laugh Cypress chirps up, “Oh yeah it’ll be great ‘I cast Firebolt, waiting hang on I just need - let me bend over here real quick - where is it? Oh damn it’s in the other one - just a sec - don’t move - it’s coming!’”
As usual, everyone has a good laugh at Sorin’s expense, and he pouts off to the corner to dig through the pile of weapons. For weapons, there is a barbed net, a light crossbow, and the scimitar now sheathed in the ground. For armor there is a wooden round shield, a bulky pauldron, and a set of thick leather gauntlets. Sorin decided to take the crossbow and the few bolts sitting there. Then after a minute, he turns back around to grab the net making little ooo-ing noises over some new terrible idea.
Having taken out his frustration and cleared his head, Cypress takes another look at the Wererat to figure out what’s been feeling so off. With a good roll (finally), he sees it. He picks up the black part of the tabard and looks at it closely. Traditionally, the tabard starts off gray and in a days-long ceremony to become a priest, the person will hand-stitch all the black and all the white thread onto it in satin stitches until it becomes a black and white cloth. But here, in the black, Cypress noticed something wrong. Instead of just straight or crossed lines, the black is made up of lots of stitched images of rats with black spaces between them.
Tucking the Tabard in his bag for further examination, Cypress looks again at the Wererat. Now he is mostly in a human-form, and in fact the bottom right half of his face is stained with black paint and white lines in the shape of a skull. This is a man who had to have been in the Church of Shadows for a very long time.
As a last thought, Cypress digs through the man’s pockets for anything valuable, and finds something very valuable indeed. But it is a kind of evil he does not want. The man had a Wand of Fear on him. Literally, a terrifying device – it can cast the Fear spell on anyone and can be used to bend people to the wielder’s will. With a gulp Cypress rolls it in the tabard and sticks it in his bag, not wanting to even touch something so opposite to his nature, and against the nature of Chauntea; the goddess of life.
With the looting out the way, we all stand around for a minute discussing what to do next when something unexpected happens.
Raelle-the-Now-Unconscious is struck in the chest with a heavy crossbow bolt and falls to the ground behind the table… now unconscious.
First in the initiative order, Cypress rushes over and pulls the bolt out of Rae’s chest, casting Spare the Dying on the monk. Now any Death Rolls have no penalty, she is just trying to get conscious, but is not losing more HP.
Sorin figures out the angle the bolt must have been fired from, “the tunnel to the north west!” He charges into the hallway to see a Thug crouched in the shadows there reloading a crossbow. He casts Firebolt, and ducks back around his corner of the wall.
Rae attempts to save for consciousness… nothing.
Ari, upset that her friend is dying, steps into the hallway. She loses an arrow from her short bow doing 3 more damage, then stands there blocking her friend from more fire.
I mean, she’s behind the table, you don’t really half to, he can’t really hit Rae.
Brooke, defiant: “I stand there blocking the hallway so he can’t shoot her again!”
Okay…
The Thug takes 4 damage from being on fire, and then shoots Ari in the chest. He crits and Ari goes down.
Back to the top of the order.
First in the initiative order, Cypress rushes over and pulls the bolt out of Ari’s chest, casting Spare the Dying on the rogue. Now any Death Rolls have no penalty, she is just trying to get conscious, but is not losing more HP. I feel like i’ve written this before…
Sorin ducks out to cast another Firebolt for 5 damage, and ducks back behind cover.
Rae and Ari attempt to save for consciousness…. nothing.
Now, it’s just Two Mages, a Crossbow, and a Pizza Place.
The Thug takes some more fire damage and shoots a bolt at Cypress as he kneels over Ari. He misses as Cypress does a cool tuck and roll behind the cover of the other wall.
Then Cypress ducks out into the hallway and casts Sacred Flame for 5 damage.
Sorin ducks around the other corner with another Firebolt.
The Thug finally slumps over… smoldering.
During the next little bit, just know that Rae is periodically attempting to successfully save and regain consciousness. The entire time, no one attempts to help her.
“We need to barricade this hallway so that more of them can’t come in here.” Cypress says dragging over bits of furniture and starting a small pile.
Sorin picks up the long wooden table with the weapons and lays it on its side to form a barrier blocking off most of the entrance on that side. Then he stacks some chairs behind it as a brace. Cypress and Sorin realize that they’re going to have to move Ari or the barricade is gonna be stacked on top of her.
Sorin picks Ari up and moves her to the couch with Cypress keeping a careful eye on him to watch out for any funny business. Then, they go back to stacking boxes and furniture, and begin arguing over whether or not to save some items to block up the other hallways.
Brooke rolls a crit and Ari wakes up on the couch with 1 HP. She carefully looks around trying not to move. She notices her friends doing a bunch of heavy lifting, and pretends to still be passed out. After a minute she feels the couch swaying as Cypress and Sorin lift it up and start dragging it into position.
“We need to barricade the other entrances so it’s safe for us to sleep here!”
“There is no way we’re sleeping here, we need to go back to Bostra!”
“Oh and just leave Raelle here?!”
“You could always heal her.”
“I only have enough magic left for one last spell and I need to save it in case we get attacked again.”
And so on. Eventually, Ari gets tired of the bickering and sits up, “Listen you two…”
“You were awake that whole time!?”
The halfling and the wizard throw their hands in the air and walk away.
Ari sighs, “Did you guys at least put a necklace on the Thug that shot us so that we get paid?”
“Yeah,” Cypress says, turning back around, “I threw one at him so they can find him when they go get it.”
“Umm… It has to be on him.” Sorin says.
“What?”
“Yeah, it has to be on him, like wrapped around some part of his body or it won’t give off a signal that it needs collected.”
Cypress groans and moves a crate aside to form a small gap. He goes out into the hallway and picks up the necklace off the ground. Placing it over the Thug’s head. Then they kick the crossbow away from his hands and start walking back. He stops, reconsidering, then picks up the crossbow and starts walking back. A moment later, he thinks again and goes back to get any bolts the Thug had. He almost walks back again and thinks, “I’m already this far, I might as well check him for valuables.” Digging through his pockets and bag, Cypress does find a Wand of Secrets which he takes before actually heading back to the others.
Again, please know that Rae has been attempting periodic saves this whole time.
Cypress gets back to the main room and then blocks up the little hole with the crate again, then he dumps the crossbow in the corner that the table of weapons had been in.
And now, Rae is finally awake. Still at 0 HP – but awake.
With that, we have a heated discussion of where to go and what to do next. I’ll try to summarize it very quickly.
“Stay here. Rest!”
“Don’t want sleep here, got shot here!”
“Don’t want go sewers, might find bad things!”
“Don’t want stay here, bad Thugs come back!”
“Oh wait, couldn’t we get back through the mechanical and filtration rooms, those are used a lot, the Thugs wouldn’t go near them and there weren't any signs of animals.”
“Oh yeah huh… Ok let’s do that.”
Pausing only for Rae to get the new Heavy Crossbow and bolts Cypress took from the last Thug, and the one bloody bolt from where it landed on the floor after Cypress took it out of her – gross. We head back to Bostra and Pulgrok to report and get a Long Rest.
🎲🗡️🔔✨🌿Chapter 4: A Long Rest is Better with a Paycheck
🎲🗡️🔔✨🌿Chapter 4: A Long Rest is Better with a Paycheck
The following bit was a prewritten thing i had for last session, but we didn’t take the hallway i thought we would. Everyone agreed it was much funnier to go ahead and play it out, like an NPC in an old video game where you already did the side quest and they have a set order of speech scenes.
Walking up the hallway we see something unusual, the spot on the wall where we left the Thug’s tunnel this morning is blinking. As we get closure we see it is the mortar gap between bricks that keeps randomly giving off a flashes of light. Sorin figures out it’s a spell of mending, or something close to it. But it also smells a bit like burning paper. As we realize this, we hear a grunt on the other side.
A brick falls out of the wall towards us. We watch the brick land on the ground with a thud and look back at its hole to see the eyes of Bostra the gnome looking down on us from a hole just over Ari’s head height.
“Oh, good it’s you lot. I wanted to get a message to you, and this is easier than hypnotizing another Cat. I wanted to let you know that I'm shoring up these two rooms and the tunnels leading to them. I’m setting some traps, too, so be careful when you come in. I'll make some marks for you so you know how to get in safely. I’m fixing these bricks to work like a door so you don’t have to keep brick laying every time you need to come in here to rest. You’re all terrible masons, by the way. But I want the Thugs to think they can keep coming here, so I'm trying to trap them when they do.
“ALSO, I’m gonna be laying a few papers around with the Constabulary Seal, IGNORE THEM! They’re a trap to convince these idiots it’s safe and make your job easier, so that hopefully you’ll start running into more of them as they think we’ve given up.
“ALSO, I wanted to tell you that I figured out a bit more about them. I’m pretty sure, their meeting room is in the space southwest of the Faerick Crypt nearby. I thought it would be here, but this looks to just be a camp, no maps or anything. So if you want to get more of them, that’s a good place to look for. Just know the ones you find there are probably going to be leaders, and much tougher than the ones you’ve hit so far.
“ALSO, can you hand me that brick?
Thanks”
Ari passes the reddish brick back through the hole and after it slides into place, we see a small flash around it, and Bostra is gone.
We walk a little further up to Pulgrok’s office and limp in with Rae using her new Crossbow as a cane. (Why the crossbow when she has a staff? because that’s just how my mind pictured it, that’s why.)
Everyone reports the takedowns from the day and they agree to put the money from that into the Thug Mugger debt. But, they each decide to keep their 2 gold for the day. Cypress pulls Pulgrok to the side and shows him the church belongings in his bag, explaining how they were on the Thugs.
“I’m not really one who follows the religions around here myself, *croak* but I do know that they shouldn’t be in the sewers if they are with the church. I’ll make *croak* a report so the city can confront the church and they can deal with it.”
“Wait a sec, hang on,” Cypress says thinking, “If we report it they’ll catch on, and I don’t know how they’ll react.” Cypress looks up and the large smiling wet face of the toad man. “Pulgrok, can you do me a favor and wait to report it?”
“*offended croak* I’ll bury it in the paperwork and hold off as long as I think I can. I am good at my job, and I won’t put my reputation on the line.”
“That’s fine, and thank you.”
With that, we leave Pulgrok’s office and go back to our old pal Bostra for a sleepover.
Next, we find the Thug Muggers standing staring at a brick wall.
“Bostra said he’d leave a sign for us to know how to get in without hitting the traps.”
“I know,” Ari says.
“Well do you see a mark, some thief code that says ‘push here’?”
“Yes,” Ari says.
“Well, then push it.”
“Okay, which one should I push?” Ari asks.
The place where the wall gives way has a slightly red tint to it, and Ari points out the four thieves' cant markings. They’re all slightly different, and each one translates to ‘push here’. Her finger traces a large square over the bricks, making sure to avoid actually touching the wall.
It is a well known fact that inspiration is an element heavier than air. That’s why you notice when it hits you. And, because it is heavier than air, when inspiration is in the area, it is most often found close to the ground. Halflings are very inspirational.
Cypress points at the wall. “They form a square right? What if you draw an ‘X’ between the four corners?”
Ari does.
“Hmmm… try pushing on the brick where the lines of the ‘X’ cross.”
Ari does, and the panel of bricks gently swings away, exposing the pathway beyond.
Through the hallway, they come to the room full of cages and notice two things. First, all the blood is all gone, and the room actually looks pretty clean. Second, some of the stones in the room are darker than the others, another Bostra trap.
Cypress whips out his Wand of Secrets and uses it to take a look around the room. He hops to one darker stone and looks around then hops to the next. He puts the wand away and turns back to the others, “I think the dark stones are here for us, a marker to know where to step.”
With that our brave adventures engage in ‘The floor is lava’ - to the death! Nah, they found the trap here and they make it into the hallway safely.
At the next door. Ari reaches out for the handle when a hand stops her, Cypress is holding her hand back, and pointing to the thin barely noticeable wire tied to the handle.
“Oh come on!”
What can i say? I told you, inspiration.
In fact a big cloud of inspiration wafts into Cypress and he gets an idea, “Look at the hinges.”
Ari does, and with a sigh, she pulls down on them. The door swings open in the wrong direction, the handle side staying attached to the wall, and the hinge side swinging away.
With that, our tired heroes shuffle into the main room and slump down on the chairs like exhausted cartoon teenagers going through ‘a mood’.
Bostra looks around and tips a plate towards the group. “Want some orange?
“Yeah actually, that sounds great,” everyone says with Cypress adding, “teach me the ways of your magic MREs.”
Bostra looks confused and on guard. “What the hell’s wrong with you?First you’re disgusted by my food, and now it’s all you want!? Make your own damn food.”
Cypress walks over and rummages through the supply boxes to find something to make a decent meal. He finds another sachet of spices, this one “Mrs. Rush’s Troll Medley: Rockoning Blend (With no Sulfur)” he pockets it maybe to sell later and continues looking.
Because my favorite food joke is ‘help me quick, there’s a leek in the pan’, Cypress finds a bundle of still mostly fresh leeks, as well as a string of extremely potent onions. He sets to making a soup, and the others shed their gear, make up some bedding, and tend to their injuries.
After a very good, but very smelly, soup. Everyone is feeling sleepy and getting ready to rest.
Unpacking his bag, Cypress takes out the rolled up Church of Shadows tabard with the wand hidden inside it. He explains to Bostra about the Wererat, and everything else he’s been piecing together.
“I’ve prayed to just about every God and Goddess and Sacred Anteater under the sun during one crisis or another,” Bostra says at he pulls out a cigar and sticks an iron match into the belly of the stove, “but despite all of their best efforts I’ve never really been the religion type.” He takes a moment to touch the red hot end of the match to the cigar and puff it to life. “Never really got the rituals and all that.” He sighs letting out a cloud of sweet smelling smoke, “I guess what I mean is, I’m not gonna be too much help to you on this one, sorry.”
Cypress gives him a respectful nod, “More than any real instruction, I just wanted to show all this to someone in a position of authority.” He tucks the Wand of Fear back into the tabard and starts rolling it back up again. “I’m not really sure what I’m gonna do yet, but I wanted to make sure that if I do have to do something, that you know why.” He pauses for a second as he pushes the roll back into his bag, “In fact, really I should find a way to get a message to those priests, after all, they’re the main reason I’m looking into this. Bostra, do you know how I could get a message to the Church of Glorious Gods?”
Bostra lifts his head from the wall where it was leaning and takes the cigar out of his mouth, “Um…” he says looking around a little confused, “you can just go to the street level and walk in. You guys can go to the surface anytime.”
“Wait what!?”
“Yeah, I mean you guys still have a contracted job down here, so I doubt that the Nibiru Sewer Company would be thrilled at you walking out on your debt. But you’re free to do whatever, you’re not in police custody anymore, you paid off your sentence with us.”
“Huh, that changes some things.”
“Yeah,” Sorin adds, “It would be good to check in at the school and let them know I’m not missing or anything.”
“I can ask the priests for their thoughts, and get some advice on our next steps.”
“I wouldn’t mind a chance at a real bath to clean up.”
“Plus a chance to get some better gear and supplies”
With that, a plan is formed, in the morning we head to the surface, and see how badly the sunshine hurts our eyes.
It’s morning.
We wake up, eat, get some basic directions from Bostra, and are on our way!
Bostra marks on our map how to get up to the nearest storm drain and pipe to climb up. Back, out in the sewer tunnels we seal the brick door and head north. At the first turn we head due west, and pass a turn off into a small storage room.
Right after Ari and Cypress pass the storage room, a creature jumps out and divides the party with Rae and Sorin on the other side of it.
In front of us is the largest insect we’ve ever seen. Its beetle-like body is covered in a hard rust or bronze colored shell. A small head is tucked underneath an armor with long moth-like antennae flicking out at random. Its back grass-hopper-y legs leave it close to the ground as its long scaly tail swishes in the air.
Rae is the first to lash out, swinging her staff at the body of the beast. Her staff bounces off and the creature turns to stare at her.
Sorin puts his arm out like a kid with an iron man blaster and casts a Firebolt. But the beast has recently fed, and the hard carapace glows for a second like heated metal, taking only half damage.
Ari is quick to draw her rapier and slash it apart. Her blade swings against the shell, but doesn’t manage to cut into it. As she watches, dots of rust appear on the blade, clustered where it struck.
By the way Ari, that rapier now has a -1 on it.
Brooke, indignant: “What!? For how long? Wait, permanently?”
Yup, because you all are fighting a Rust Monster, one of my favorite little creatures to throw out into the world just to make things difficult. Any non-magical weapon made of metal that hits the rust monster corrodes. After dealing damage, the weapon takes a permanent and cumulative −1 penalty to damage rolls.
Cypress casts Scared Flame, having seen that Sorin’s fire didn’t do much, and chooses an attack with radiant damage instead. The Rust Monster however, does succeed its Dex Save, so it misses.
The Rust Monster’s antenna points towards Ari. She feels a tingle of magic and looks down to see one of the daggers on her belt starting to corrode as the beast lets out a satisfied gurgle.
Rae, with no worries about any metal weapons, aims her staff for a shop in the creature’s face… and misses again.
Sorin casts Magic Missile this time and the Monster takes 11 damage as the magic projectiles pierce its carapace, leaving three large gaping holes through it.
Ari has clearly been training in her spare time… training with Rae, because her attack also misses.
Cypress takes a hint from the other two and swings his mace with deadly force, missing the Rust Monster.
The Monster turns and bites Rae in leg, not missing.
Rae – just to prove she can do something – climbs on top of the Rust Monster; weirdly half riding it, like a child on a large dog.
Dear reader, none of us know why she did this. I fear it will forever remain a mystery.
Ari, decides to back up a ways in the hallway so she can shoot her short bow without disadvantage and without corroding any more sharp-and-pointy’s.
As Ari backs into the corner and takes aim, the Giant Bat there takes an attack of opportunity, swooping down and biting into her neck.
Ari yells but still manages to fire off a shot at the Monster, landing an arrow in its face and killing it.
I didn’t think they’d ever manage it, because the secret was to aim for something other than its knees.
Rae draws and fires her new crossbow at the Giant Bat as it bites her friend. The arrow lands for 3 damage, infecting it with anything that was in her own blood, since she used the bolt that knocked her out yesterday.
I forget what Cypress and Sorin do here, but Ari crits, pushing the Bat up against the wall then stabbing it with her still-good dagger. Panting as it falls dead to the floor.
With that we stow our weapons and head on, deciding we’re better off getting up to the street fast, rather than looting some monsters. Our tunnel jogs north before continuing west. We stop in the hallway and groan as a couple of Stirge fly at us.
The first Stirge latches onto Ari getting a good slurp of fresh rogue juice.
The second Stirge latches onto Rae to try out the new monk flavor.
Sorin leaps at the chance to impress his crush and casts a Firebolt, knocking the Stirge off Ari’s face and killing it in a puff of blood-red steam (don’t think about it) in her face.
Cypress swings his staff knocking the second Stirge off of Rae’s face for 3 damage.
Ari lashes out at it with a dagger, but misses, as it flies back at Rea.
Rae has had enough. She punches out, squishing the Sitrge against the wall with a messy wet splat.
Okay, back to it!
We look down at the map.
“We must be close, just down this wa-”
There is an angry hiss from behind the map.
We look up from the map.
A Giant Rat.
Everyone groans as we get ready to roll initiative when Ari stops us, “You know what? NO!” She casts Thaumaturgy and her voice rings through the tunnel making the Rat panic and scurry away. Ari’s one word, ‘NO’ booms against the brick walls, echoing through the tunnels.
A few feet ahead, we turn to see a large pipe with hand holds leading to the street level. And next to it, the familiar shape of Devin’s mark.
“Oh yeah… yeah lets talk with Devin and sell some stuff before we go up.”
Ari takes out a Copper and places it into the circle of the mark. With a hiss, the coin vanishes into the wall and a smoky vapor plumes out obscuring the view as we hear the click-clacking of sharp claws on bricks and metal pipes.
“Well, hello again.”
“I’ve missed all of your smiling faces.” Devin says, his second tongue making lazy circles in the air. “So… Who wants to go first?”
Rae steps up and asks the price of the poison sacks she’d cut out of something recently. Kai forgot to look that up and figure a price so it’ll have to wait for next time. Next she asks about the bottle of Eyeball Ichor from the Giant Frog.
“Come a little closer, I want to ask you something,” Devin murmurs, waving her close.
Rae steps close and one head circles around her blocking her from the view of the others, as the other head bends in to whisper to her. “Look, um, I know there’s no great way to ask, so I’ll just ask.” He looks Rae in the eyes. “This whole eye ichor, poison sack, bodily fluid thing…” His other head looks at the others to make sure they can’t hear, “is it a fetish thing?”
Rae pulls back stunned, accidentally bumping into the other head. Devin mutters, “Look, I was just asking, no judgment here, I got my own kinks too you know.”
As Rae backs away the other head chimes in, looking around, “Who’s up next?”
Ari sells her rubies at 50 gold each, as well as her growing collection of left-handed gloves. Then she asks Devin to find out the price he’d buy a severed zombie hand for.
Sorin and Rae buy a bundle of crossbow bolts each,
“Anything else before I leave you all to it?” Devin asks.
“Wanna hear a joke?”
“Oh my, yes.”
“Where do rats go when they have a cavity? The rodentist!”
We look on as a shiver slowly runs through Devin’s scaly body. He lets out a tiny moan and flatly says, “I um, I have to go be alone.”
And with a poof of Devin-dust, we end the session.
Next time the Thug Muggers will get to the surface, and split up to do a bunch of separate tasks.
Up next: “Chapter 5: Sunlight”
“Circumstances might be hard enough that maybe you need to find the little comforts, even if they aren’t good for you.”
–Wildbow [J. C. McCray], “Worm: Chapter 18 ‘Queen’; Interlude A”
Table talk:
Sorin and Rae both hit level 3, so we’ll need to set aside time to do that. Which actually brings up a good question from Diedrik, do we want to all level together, or individually? It’s something to spend some time discussing next time.
The only other thing here is that i need to get stats to people for their new equipment (crossbows, vest, wands, etc.)
And now if you’ll excuse me, i have a LOT of prep to do to get this set up for us all to get into the city. I have to dust off old maps, work out mechanics for things like shopping, give priests and teachers names, decide on voices, decide on plot points, i have to……… *the voice slowly fades into the distance*
