Session 386 - Halfling Death Cult

Date: 22 October 1624

Moon Phase: Waning Gibbous
Moon Face: Pocked

Zenith Deity: Dispater

New Characters:

- Zeppelino, an inventive Goblin whose tarpaulin parachute is all that's left of his experimental flying machine.

Returning Characters:

- Gaius Julius Drusus, Halfling. Commands the tamed Barbarian Lurpak.

- Nines, Inheritor.
- Manrat Snels, Ratman.

- Bulgur, Son of Borgar, Barbarian.

- Brie van der Hells, Necromancer. Commands the zombified corpse of Priest Nutella.

Events:

--- Mooching Towards Civilisation

- A tarp atop a hill moves and our new party emerges into a misty morning.

- The mists are everywhere, and bring with them a sense of wistful melancholy. Thorny bushes have sprouted in the night, bearing tart red berries that sap the spirit. They nickname them "Merry Berries".

- At sunset yesterday they saw smoke rising on the southern horizon, so they set off in that direction across the bruise-coloured wastes. The hills give way to the muddy flatland, scattered with humps and divots like a rucked blanket.

- Lurpak briefly yearns to return to his friends in the insect temple when he hears someone calling for him, but Gaius persuades him that they are on-mission and must head to the town to the south.

--- Driftwood Marionette

- After hours of trudging through the mists they hear a moaning and perk up from their doldrums. Coming at them through the fog is a man-shape, but it jerks like a marionette. As it becomes clearer they see that its mouth goes all the way down its chest and sloughs out rich loam.
- Gaius greets it and is brought to his knees by a wave of tiredness, beating at his mind. It's an attack!
- Bulgar reminds everyone that the God in the heavens is Oberon, and thus all the faithful Nonanists shall receive a blessing on their ranged attacks!
- This results in a hail of random objects being thrown from the high ground nearby, albeit mostly missing and getting stuck in the boggy ground between them. Unperturbed, the tree-being trudges forward! It's great sigh saps the spirit, and the loam spewing forth from its mouth firms up the ground.
- Manrat is downed, overcome with weariness. Thankfully his Goblin Religion bonus protects him from the worst of the harm, albeit he overextended on the yawn and hurt his jaw.

- Brie's zombified priest lurches forward and starts tearing into the dread ent, then Gaius follows up by flinging his copy of On Beers and Ales which finishes the creature off! It lodges in the creature's mouth as it falls to its knees, a man-sized bookstand, and Brie snags its last dusty breath in a vial.
- Nines shlorps through the boggy ground and collapses onto it as a pile of mud and ooze and mutating flesh. This is normal, he's an Inheritor, and he wants to take its powers. He steals the ability to create soil, which at the very least firms up boggy ground. They see that the loam that it dropped is already sinking into the wastes, hopefullyy to one day build up into fertile ground.

--- A Goblin Approaches!

- Just then, to everyone's surprise, a mysterious flying machine crash-lands nearby! Crawling from the wreckage is a Goblin who unaccountably immediately wants to join the party! This is Zeppelino, and he wields a tarp much like the absent Nostradama!
- Lurpak is asked about Honey the Thick and he tells the party that she's a Cleric of Jonathon Toast who helped bind everyone into a big group.
- Meanwhile others decide to forage for food. It's surprisingly successful! Bulgur and Manrat find some slopworms, sort of blind rubbery tentacle grubs. Nines catches some rolling cabbage - leafy greens that roll like tumbleweed.

- When they return they discover that there is a shimmering heat haze ahead, through which they can see the town ahead as through a lens! Little glowing points of light dance around it like bees around a flower. They try heading into it and find the distance shrinking before them, soon arriving slap bang in the middle of the town they were heading towards!
- It sounds like bollocks but Portal Haze is genuinely on the encounter table I swear!

---Welcome to Bunkertown

- Our heroes warp into the industrial sector of town and everyone here is an absolutely hateful racist. The place is choked with metallic-smelling smog. Children shriek and make awful comments. Gaius is in his element though, and shows off his tamed Barbarian to the locals!

- Bunkertown is basically a mix between the Shire and Fallout - every hobbit hole is its own little bunker with a big ol' vault door on it. Allegedly they're all connected to each other via some means. There is a collapsed pylon in the town square, a ferrofluid fountain, and a leaking river of black gunk that flows out of said collapsed pylon.

- Bulgur tries to find a pub, and lo! A pub appears! It's clearly just been been slapped together, is called The Buggered Goblin, and has a very explicit sign that is made of two taxidermied goblins in flagrante.

- Bulgur goes in and is offered some extremely obviously poisoned honey wine.

- Nines, meanwhile, asks a local whether they know the local area and is shown The Map. Everyone knows The Map. It was generated several years ago and propagated far and wide. Rumour says it's a snapshot taken by Eris as she fell from the heavens, but that doesn't exactly make sense in context... or does it??

- He points at various locations and asks what the deal is. Bunkertown is pointed out, as is Drudgespar the Goblin capital which was once a Dwarf fortress. The city of Grendel makes everyone go "oooo" because it's some sort of steampunk (or at the very least clockpunk) nonsense built around a single central crankshift that powers everything.
- The apocalypse dragon Mardük is currently in the northwest, but it tends to roam. It has a goblin city on its back and a chicken-legged house chained beneath its jaw.

- Finally, Zeppelino gives Nines a brief rundown on the Goblin Religion. It's not a religion for the goblins, it's just how the world works. It comes down to the concept of everything having two souls. One is born with their Body Soul, which starts strong and becomes weak. Over time one develops a Self Soul, which starts weak and grows over time. Objects can gain a Self Soul if they're loved and cared for. It's a bit Shinto, it's a bit speculative evolutionary biology, it's more than it sounds and less than it seems.

--- The Worst Pub

- Bulgur slams down the poisoned wine and begins to die.
- Outside, Gaius and Nines are offering Nines' services as a soil generator to various locals, earning some sort of monopoly money.
- Bulgur is dying for real though. Blood stains his lips. He looks at the bartender and the bartender says "oh no I must have given you the honey bleach!! Oh no!!!".

- Luckily Bulgur has the incredible ability to convert death to mere damage, chokes, and holds onto his life!
- The bartender tries to tame Bulgur with his Halfling mind control powers and Bulgur is having none of it! The mental backlash throws the Halfling to the floor, and then Bulgur reaches over and crunches the hobbit's head into the floor over and over and over.
- Bulgur grabs the honey wine from behind the bar (instead of the honey bleach) and takes a big swig. It is in fact also poisoned and he keels over as his guts start to dissolve.
- Brie arrives, says "oh no let me help!", and tries to seize Bulgur's last breath. Awkwardly Bulgur isn't quite dead, so Brie pretends like she was actually trying to help, honest.

- Brie flips the sign from open to closed and ah fuck... the waitress. The waitress turns out to be fucking hench and is insanely good at wrestling! Zeppelino runs in and immediately gets wrecked, getting corkscrewed in the face and rolling back and forth behind the counter until a lucky roll finally lets him get the better of the evil Halfling.

- Bulgur is weeping blood, so Brie pulls the First Aid kit off the wall, attempts First Aid and... holy shit! It works! Bulgur is saved!
- Bulgur takes the opportunity to pour honey wine down the slit throat of the Halfling waitress, she chokes on her own honey-tinted blood.

--- Anything You Can Find in the Mug House

- Brie takes the waitress' Last Breath and looks awkwardly at Bulgur. She got a Last Breath in the end so no hard feelings right?

- It's raining outside. Manrat opens the door, sees the absurd amount of blood, and enters in a vaguely apologetic sort of way. It's an Unmaking Rain outdoors, the sort of weather that unpicks stitches, ruins tents, and washes away the works of man, so he wants to get out of it for clear reasons.

- We briefly have to contend with the idea that Nines' clothes are made out of his own flesh. 

- I foolishly say that "anything you can find in this real pub" is in the fantasy pub, and so suddenly the party has a handcart and various accoutrements.

--- The Basement

- After a bit of a search in the back room (which is largely just a bunch of pub-related props) they find a hatch into the basement! Turns out these hobbit holes are spherical and the lower level has a ferrofluid-powered heat pump and further storage.

- Those exploring the basement start to sound deep-voiced - some sort of gas related issue. They leave in good time.

- Given that it's raining outside and nobody has bothered them just yet, they assume that the rest of the town's populace haven't quite realised that there's been one or more murders in this fake pub.

- Gaius takes the opportunity to cook "Spring Rain Rolls", utilising Slopworm, Rolling Cabbage, some non-poisoned Wine, Butter, and one of Manrat's ever-present rats. It's bizarrely tasty!

Total: 8000 exp

Loot:

- Poisoned Bar Snacks

- 17 debatably fake Halfling Dollars (17 exp)
- Poisoned honey wine

- A roll of 10-20 Boil-in-the-bag Body Bags

- Handfuls of "Merry Berries" (50 exp)
- Non-poisoned Wine (wow!) (100 exp)
- Book #410: How to Cook Humans (100 exp)
- Book #411: How to Cook Exactly Four Humans (100 exp)

- Book #161: Death and Sainthood (100 exp)

- Halfling-sized Vault-Tec suits (200 exp)
- Halfling-Sized blood-powered pip-boys (500 exp)

- Book #301: POWERLAD's Massive Weapon (100 exp)

- Book #129: The Shame of Dwarves (100 exp)
- Book #238: On Moondin (100 exp)
Total: 1467 exp

Murders:

- Driftwood Marionette (25 exp)
- Halfling Bartenders (100 exp)
Total: 125 exp

Exp Totals:

- Timothy / Gaius Julius Drusus, Level 2 Halfling: 2968 (Level up at 4000)
Level Up! +1d6 HP! +1 to Saves! +1 Taming! +Backstory!

- Carter / Nines, Level 2 Inheritor: 2968 (Level up at 4500)

Level Up! +1d6 HP! +1 to Saves! +1 Meat Point! +Backstory!

- Kitty / Bulgur, Son of Borgar, Level 2 Barbarian: 2868 (Level up at 4000)
Level Up! +1d8 HP! +1 to Saves! +Barbarian Power! +Backstory!

- George / Manrat Snels, Level 2 Ratman: 2868 (Level up at 3500)
Level Up! +1d6 HP! +1 to Saves! A whole 4 Rats wow!  +Backstory!

- Ollie / Brie van der Hells, Level 2 Necromancer: 2768 (Level up at 4500)

Level Up! +1d4 HP! +1 to Saves! +1 Mana! +New Spell!  +Backstory!

- Charles / Zeppelino, Level 1 Goblin: 1384 (Level up at 2000)