Tuesday, 27 May 2025

Session 408 - Queue Anon

Date: 20th May 1625

Moon Phase: Third Quarter
Moon Face: Dragon Face
Zenith Deity: The Allfather



Events:

--- Bulgur's First Fall
- We rejoin the party in a roomful of "Golive Oil", being olive oil infused with the piquant flavour of goblin flesh. They are in an upper layer of Ur-Jeizhek, the long-buried Dwarven arcology beneath Drudgespar. The stonework interlocks pleasingly.
- They head out and find a room with drinks trolleys lined up against one wall! There are glass bottles of water, and old nasty biscuits. They're just scooping up the biscuits when an alarm sounds and the whole room rumbles and somehow swings like it's on a big hinge!
- They worry that this means they've been taken elsewhere as if on a big elevator, but thankfully not. The drinks trolleys somehow stay exactly where they are as everyone falls towards the far wall which is briefly testing out the idea of being a floor.
- The room swings back into place and the doors reopen. They come out onto a long corridor. Directly across is a circular room with a big sandpit in the middle, a big lump of pumice and a tiny play-pickaxe, and a counter with fake coins on it. Manrat identifies it immediately as a Dwarf creche!
- Also in this room, amongst the circling seats, they find some real Ur-Jeizhek coinage and a book written in that language. The book has a sort of Vitruvian Dwarf on it surrounded by 9 satellite gods.
- They continue along the corridor and Bulgur falls! He stepped on an irising door and it opened underneath him! He falls about 20' (which isn't as bad due to his magic float boots) into a corridor that's oriented up-down, as if it's meant to be on its side. Zeppelino catches himself before he falls in too!

--- Occupied
- They scope out some more rooms, these ones with signs. One has a Dwarven variation on a ninefold Nonanist symbol, the other a pile of gems. Of course they go into the gems room!
- Inside there are lots of stalls. Turns out the pile of gems sign is Dwarven for the lavatories. One of the stalls is occupied, however...
- After much shenanigans trying to look under, over and around the toilet stall, Zeppelino gets out an array of perfumes and lollipops and pretends to be the Toilet Man.
- The guy in the toilet finally comes out and... it's a guy! Like a human man! He's got very long billowy culty robes, and his name is Morden Diablo. When asked what he's doing here, he answers that he was doing a poo. Further questioning reveals that he's here to find treasure and meaning, and his boss is Higher-Lower-Middle-Cultist Guthrie Clamps. They let him go on his way.
- Studying the toilets reveals that they're a sort of gem recycler system for the Dwarves who culturally eat gems. They rattle down the toilet, get polished and cleaned, and are then collected from near the door to be re-eaten. There's only gem dust in the collector, alas.

--- Rats!
- Just then a pale blue light begins coalescing in the middle of the bathroom and suddenly forms into a single human eye! It looks all around the room and sees them, then ponks to the floor. Rats start pouring from the pipes!
- Manrat sends out a rat delegation to talk to them, and the rats agree not to attack if they're bought off with fresh-ish meat. Manrat chucks them some hellhound meat and they're very happy!

--- Cultists!
 - Another eye warps into the room and Bulgur slices it in half... but not before it's alerted more reinforcements!
- Zeppelino is already out the door and hiding in the god room. Inside the Nine High Gods are depicted in statue form, but they're double-wide Dwarves like the Terrans. It's all been graffitied and generally messed with by the cultists though. Much sacrilege.
- Outside he can hear Morden Diablo has returned but with backup! He's got some cultist buddies and a load of skeletons! Battle is joined!
- It's a chaotic battle. Bulgur smashing the skeletons to bits while Manrat fires into the melee, hitting Bulgur. Two of the cultists tear their way out of their own skins and go to attack in skeleton form... but Manrat sends his rats to nibble on their discarded flesh! It's horrifying!
- Zeppelino and his goblin firing squad attack from the side of the skeleton column to surprisingly good effect!
- An ectenic blast from one of the cultists blasts Bulgur into two of the skeletons, destroying them both with sheer blunt force!
- Seeing the tide turn (and the skeleton-cultists seeing that the rats are devouring their spleens) the cultists turn and try to run! Alas it's not enough. The skeleton-cultists grab their rat-infested skins and flee, and Morden Diablo himself is struck down as he turns to run.
- The last surviving cultists begs for his life. He says he's from the Unctuous Aspirants cult and that they've been here for months after finding a hidden way in from the wastes. He also says that this corridor is the VIP lane, the cult is down the other corridor which is the Pleb lane.
- They truss up the cultist and force him to take them to the pleb line, but every time they try to make him give directions he ends up shouting and yelling. The pleb line is easy enough to find anyway! It's just right at the entrance instead of left.

--- Bulgur Falls Again
- They head along the pleb line queue and - oh no! - Bulgur falls into a pit again! He gets out with his moon boots, but still this is pretty much the only way he's been getting hurt!
- The next room has a sort of coin machine next to a door, and the main queue line going onwards to the right.
- Bulgur puts coins in, and after 10 the door opens! It's some sort of fast track lane! He goes through and the door shunks shut behind him.
- Bulgur strides through the velvet ropes marking the queueing lanes and raps on the door at the end. There's a red light but nothing happens.
- Finally it goes green! Bulgur goes through and is stopped at... another door. He waits, and as he waits he feels his back going numb...
- There's nothing behind him so he flails with his axe, hitting a gelatinous cube! They exchange blows and Bulgur is very lucky to not get hit! He makes short work of the cube, then turns back to the door to wait.

--- Heathrow Vibes
The other two have gone through the non-fasttrack line and are in a wide hall with velvet ropes to show where to queue! They ignore them and head to the front of the room. They see an (empty) guard room that stretches nearly across the whole room, and booths at the front where presumably their passports would be inspected.
- Hearing a distant yell from Bulgur, they run across the room!

--- Clamps Cliffhanger
- The door in front of the goo-covered Bulgur opens into a short glass-walled tunnel that looks out into a main room. In said main room are loads of undead and necromancers! They're eating lunch, and look up in concern as Bulgur says something muffled behind the glass!
- On a throne of bone, Guthrie Clamps himself sits smirking! Behind him is a big horrible undead contruct of some sort, a towering man-shaped thing with strips of leprous skin hanging off its swollen body.
- Guthrie lazily slurps a Last Breath and commands his minions to attack Bulgur!
- Bulgur yells a battle cry, hefts his pumpkinhead axe, and readies a charge! Zeppelino and Manrat rush across the security hall to his aid! And... the pub does last orders and closes for the evening.
- Next time... death!?

Total: 8000 exp


Treasure:
- 46 Ur-Jeizhek coins (46 exp)
- A stone book about gods written in Ur-Jeizhek (50 exp)
- 3 Last Breaths
- Flask of strong liquor
Total: 96 exp


Foes:
- Several rat swarms (60 exp)
- Some Necromancers (300 exp)
- A bunch of skeletons (100 exp)
- A gelatinous cube (300 exp)
Total: 760 exp


OOC:
- Kitty the Chronicler & Paymaster (200 exp/level)
- Charles the Expedition Leader & Chef (200 exp/level)
- George the Vanguard (100 exp/level)

Exp Totals
- Kitty / Bulgur, Son of Borgar, Level 7 Barbarian: 97080 (Level up at 128000)
- George / Manrat Snels, Level 7 Ratman: 76979 (Level up at 112000)
- Charles / Zeppelino, Level 7 Goblin: 75881 (Level up at 128000)

Tuesday, 20 May 2025

Session 407 - Oiling Up in Ur-Jeizhek

Date: 29th April 1625

Moon Phase: Waxing Crescent
Moon Face: Clean Face
Zenith Deity: Alaunus


New Characters:
- Algernon, a mayfly awakened by circumstances unknown. Its familiar is a human man. Muscle Wizard (he's the muscle, it's the wizard).

New Backstory:
- Strangers entered Zeppelino's town (Drudgespar) and he helped scare them away due to suspicions that they were in league with the hated Dwarves. +2 Strength.
- While Zeppelino was in the lost dimension, he saw something awful vanish away... Once per session, induce crippling fear in a creature who sees something horrible behind you.

Events:

--- Death and Taxes
- Algernon the Mayfly flits around the head of his human familiar as it enters the bustling goblin city of Drudgespar. According to the guards, the city is being lifted so it's lucky to get in when it still can!
- Roofworks continue - large-scale Repel Lightning runes are being drawn facing upwards towards the lightning-wielding Drakencult in the Rigging above. The Rigging itself strains against the upwards force of an enormous stitched-together blue whale balloon, pulling the city out of the sucking muck of the Wastes.
- It sees a strange sight. In front of an enormous part-mechanical scorpion, a haphazard party of adventurer types is being accosted by goblin tax collectors, demanding back taxes. With a lazy flick of the claw the tax collectors are all mulched!
- Algernon is somehow enamoured with joining this group. Algernon joins the party!

--- Ur-Jeizhek Exposed!
- The party is debating where to go next since Drudgespar is, for now, in an uneasy truce between the Drakencult above and the main population below.
- But wait, wasn't Ur-Jeizhek accessible now since the city's being lifted into the air? Let's go there!
- Maxwell grabs some explosives, Zeppelino recruits some more goblins, and they take the attack scorpion to the outside of the city.
- It's a sloppy slide down through the muck, the scorpion bracing against the slick melted-together brick of outer Drudgespar. They can see changes in the strata of the city walls as they go down, the colours of the oozing wasteland through time. Various shades of purples and blues and blacks, with the occasional stark band of green.
- They soon arrive at the bottom and see glowing Ur-Jeizhek, the first surface-worlders to see it for over a thousand years! The surface is a football field-sized plane of verdegrised brass carved with softly glowing sigils. Five obvious entrances (with turnstiles) are arranged around the space in a pentagon, it looks like the exposed turnstiles structures could hinge closed to be flush with the surface.

--- Queue Jumping Not Tolerated
- Alas, these are person-sized entrances, so the attack scorpion will have to wait here for now. Manrat puts it on sentry mode (ie. the crew is on standby).
- Maxwell tries to hope the nearest turnstile and... BAM! A Dwarf-shaped robot pops up and shoots him!
- Zeppelino flings his Gunk Bomb into the place where the robot popped out, and the next time someone jumps the turnstile it pops up into the glue, disabling it! Zeppelino leaves an Out of Order sign and the party continue in.

--- Ungreased Tube
- Below, the entry chamber is dominated by a big statue of the Allfather. He looks Terran - double-wide Dwarf - rather than the human form our resident Nonanists are used to. The surroundings are carved with images of abundance. Vast crops of Plump Helmet mushrooms and overpopulated fields of meat beasts like rats and grubs.
- They discover that the eyes of the Allfather are actually buttons! A flume opens up beneath the statue, perfectly person-sized. Algernon sends his man-shaped familiar down the chute, a booming voice says "death waits for you!", and the familiar somehow reforms from the mayfly's body. Something killed it.
- Maxwell pours some oil down the flume and sets it alight, hoping to burn whatever it is down there. Then they tie a rope around Bulgur and send him down to scout. He can't see what's down there, but the echoes indicate that there's a room down there. They slide down a torch.
- Bulgur, now holding the torch, looks around the place. The flume does indeed end in a big pit, there are bones at the bottom. The pit is in a larger room though, with floors made from fused stone and copper.
- They lower Bulgur into the pit proper and he roots around the remains. He finds a fleshy Elf ear with an earring worth 1720 obols! Result!

--- Rune Revelations
- Carved upon the walls of this chamber are various reliefs showing Major Runes and their relationships to various arcologies. Make is associated with the Forge Lore Dwarfs of Ur-Kalladh, Beam with the Glyph Lore Dwarves of Ur-Jeizhek, and so on.
- Most intriguingly, two new Major Runes are shown! Experimentation reveals that one (like a double concave lens) allows one to commune with its element. The other (an inverted T-shape) is like a compass that points to the nearest and/or largest concentration of the element. Carter, I mean Algernon, is thrilled!
- On another wall is a mural depicting a strange ritual - "The Ineluctable Pallid Commandment to Bind the Suckered Abomination".

--- Deep Fried
- The next room has lots of crates and barrels. Goblin zombies leap out from behind them to attack! They smell super tasty because they've been infusing the olive oil and air-dried since being somehow zombified.
- Zeppelino unleashes his firing squad of goblin bowmen, while Manrat's pistol unfortunately explodes! Bulgur fumbles his Pumpkinhead Axe attack, chipping the magical weapon!
- Maxwell gambits to yank two zombies into each other, crits, Bulgur joins in, fumbles, and gets bitten! He passes his Doom save versus whatever it is these zombies do to you!
- Between the goblin horde (now down a Goblin, alas poor Bean) and Bulgur's wild axe-swinging, the zoblins are finally defeated!

--- Oil and Feasting
- They inspect the barrels and ohohooo! It's loads of tasty olive oil infused with the fresh taste of Goblin! Dubbing it "Golive Oil" they take the lot! 4 barrels at 2000 obols each makes this a very lucrative find!
- They also find pastes and embalming tools made from the bones of humans and elves... concerning.
- Manrat sets up a field kitchen as the others look around the rest of the room, finding various other loot.
- He cooks "Fish and Chips But With a Cobra" which contains cobra meat, pickled goblin, plump helmet mushroom, potato, and golive oil. It's tasty! The dinner perk gives +2 to cooked meal deliciousness, which will be helpful.
- The party settles down to eat their first meal inside Ur-Jeizhek proper... but will it be their last??

Total: 8000 exp


Treasure:
- 4 barrels of Golive Oil (8000 exp)
- Pierced Elf Ear (1720 exp)
- Vial of Lubricant
- 3 Red Eye Cigarettes grant infravision while smoked
- Rare inks and Parchments halve spell research cost.
- Trinkets worth 1000 obols (1000 exp)
- Hastily drawn map of dungeon area
- 3 Blue Eye Cigarettes grant +4 Charisma while smoked
Total: 10720 exp


Murders:
- A few olive oil zombies (80 exp)
Total: 80 exp


OOC:
- Carter the Chronicler, Cartographer and Paymaster (300 exp/level)
- Kitty the Expedition Leader (100 exp/level)
- Mason the Vanguard (100 exp/level)
- George the Chef (100 exp/level)


Exp Totals:
- Kitty / Bulgur, Son of Borgar, Level 7 Barbarian: 92728 (Level up at 128000)
- George / Manrat Snels, Level 7 Ratman: 73327 (Level up at 112000)
- Charles / Zeppelino, Level 7 Goblin: 71529 (Level up at 128000)
- Carter / Maxwell, Level 6 Specialist: 49171 (Level up at 56000)
- Mason / Algernon, Level 2 Mayfly Muscle Wizard: 3860 (Level up at 4500)
*LEVEL UP! +1d4 HP! +1 to Saves! +1 Mana! +Free Spell! Plus Backstory!