Moon Phase: Waxing Crescent
Moon Face: Clean Face
Zenith Deity: The Lady
Returning Characters:
- Nines. Inheritor. Desperate to see what's going on up at the surface.
- Bulgur, Son of Borgar. Barbarian. Reliably deadly.
- Manrat Snels. Ratman. Backstory increasingly complicated.
- Brie van der Hells. Necromancer. Only recently realised how reliant she is on reagents.
Events:
--- Preparations for an Ambush
- We rejoin our heroes in the not-yet-collapsed depths beneath the goblin capital of Drudgespar. The walls are unstable, made of the purple-veined black oozeblock that makes up the bulk of the city's infrastructure. They are in an old guardroom that was abandoned when the entrance fell in.
- The Underclock (as recently reconfigured) is close to ticking to a stop - goblin voices are closing in on the party. They can hear the patrol outside, questioning the (friendly after last session) goblin council over whether they've seen some "meatoids" around here. They overhear that this is a contingent of the Anti-Meatoid Coalition, here to expel non-vegetables from the area.
- A goblin with a sling peers past the collapsed front of the room as everyone hides behind various furniture and collapsed piles of oozeblock.
- Bulgur and Brie have had enough of this anti-flesh racism and approach the sling-wielder from both angles. Bulgur snaps its neck, Brie attempts to capture its Last Breath. Alas, it's not been alive long enough to have a soul.
- The Underclock (as recently reconfigured) is close to ticking to a stop - goblin voices are closing in on the party. They can hear the patrol outside, questioning the (friendly after last session) goblin council over whether they've seen some "meatoids" around here. They overhear that this is a contingent of the Anti-Meatoid Coalition, here to expel non-vegetables from the area.
- A goblin with a sling peers past the collapsed front of the room as everyone hides behind various furniture and collapsed piles of oozeblock.
- Bulgur and Brie have had enough of this anti-flesh racism and approach the sling-wielder from both angles. Bulgur snaps its neck, Brie attempts to capture its Last Breath. Alas, it's not been alive long enough to have a soul.
- Bulgur spots another goblin climbing spider-style across the ceiling and silently murders it before it can even shriek a warning.
- The hobgoblin leader talking to the council leaves to continue the search, unconcerned with his missing minions because he can just grow more. The council didn't sell out the party! Wonderful!
--- Unexpected Invitation
- The party emerges from the old guardroom and asks the council about something they mentioned last time - where's this mysterious door where they've heard Dwarves come out of?
- The goblin Misanthrope is given as a guide. Despite the missing Zeppelino, on whose good word the party was relying to anchor their friendship with the goblins, Misanthrope takes them all to the corridor where wax-masked goblins (presumed Dwarves in diguise) are sometimes spotted.
- Brie casts Detect Bones and discovers that it doesn't pick up goblins due to their celery-esque bone analog. However it does pick up a bunch of husky Dwarf-like shapes below! But how to get there?
- Brie casts Detect Bones and discovers that it doesn't pick up goblins due to their celery-esque bone analog. However it does pick up a bunch of husky Dwarf-like shapes below! But how to get there?
- Manrat has keen rat-senses and Nines knows the glyph that creates water, and between these two methods they find a cunningly hidden secret door! There's no obvious way in.
- Nines tries a Turn-Air glyph on the wall and, rather than simply vanishing the rock, it creates a transparent window into the secret room beyond. They can see stairs down and not much else.
- Luckily Nines has Backstory Bullshit and, summising that the group of Dwarves downstairs constitutes a social event, retroactively acquires an invite! In fact there's a Dwarf coming up to welcome them in now!
- Nines tries a Turn-Air glyph on the wall and, rather than simply vanishing the rock, it creates a transparent window into the secret room beyond. They can see stairs down and not much else.
- Luckily Nines has Backstory Bullshit and, summising that the group of Dwarves downstairs constitutes a social event, retroactively acquires an invite! In fact there's a Dwarf coming up to welcome them in now!
--- Mission Planning
- A Dwarf opens the secret door with a saviourbone disk he has around his neck. He invites in Nines and a plus one. However, a Backstory Bullshit romantic advance from Brie makes him reconsider, as does a Backstory Bullshit connection to Bulgur's feudal claims in the Meatlands. Guess everyone's coming! Except for the minions, they've got to head back up to the surface.
- Brie swipes the saviourbone disc during a romantic beardscratch. The Dwarf is smitten, and tells her his name is Heatless. Manrat recognises it as a rune name, marking the Dwarf as being from Ur-Jeizhek.
- They are led down to a presentation being given to a fair few Dwarves. All have glyph tattoos, fancy helmets, and vaguely slavic accents.
- The presentation is on the plans to destroy Drudgespar from below. To everyone's surprise (except, presumably, the absent Zeppelino), the anti-Dwarf prejudice was actually kinda true! They are indeed trying to undermine Drudgespar!
--- Lore Dump
- It transpires that the Dwarven Arcology of Ur-Jeizhek is down below Drudgespar, far below the steadily rising wastes. The city is built upon it in fact. After the Goblin Rebellions it was vengeful Ur-Jeizhek Dwarves who sabotaged the Pyramid System and created the Drudge Wastes.
- It transpires that the Dwarven Arcology of Ur-Jeizhek is down below Drudgespar, far below the steadily rising wastes. The city is built upon it in fact. After the Goblin Rebellions it was vengeful Ur-Jeizhek Dwarves who sabotaged the Pyramid System and created the Drudge Wastes.
- The plan? Destroy Drudgespar, reclaim Ur-Jeizhek, and finally repair the Pyramids to send the poison down to the core instead of up to the surface! Simple right?
- The key component of their city sabotage is Glass Tears - incredibly stress-resistant glass that shatters when its tail is broken. They've been putting these things in the bucket-like city wall over the years, using their Dwarven architectural prowess to find the exact weak points necessary to collapse a part of the wall that keeps the poison gas weather fronts out.
- Upon being told that the weather isn't quite that toxic these days (more of a slow destruction than an instakill), they aren't dissuaded. Better than nothing, right? If they can set the goblins into disarray, they can hopefully take back the city! And the collapse of that slice of the wall should shear straight down through the wastes, opening a direct route to Ur-Jeizhek below!
- Upon being told that the weather isn't quite that toxic these days (more of a slow destruction than an instakill), they aren't dissuaded. Better than nothing, right? If they can set the goblins into disarray, they can hopefully take back the city! And the collapse of that slice of the wall should shear straight down through the wastes, opening a direct route to Ur-Jeizhek below!
- In any case, the plan will go ahead in April when their "contacts" in the wastes stage an attack on Drudgespar. They're just waiting for the sign. And the Glass Tears are vulnerable to electricity...
- They discuss various Dwarven arcology breeding programs. Due to ancient unforgiveable sins, Dwarves are cursed to have a low female birthrate. Different arcologies have different methods to deal with this, from the misogynist hell of Ur-Darghab to the stone sons of Ur-Kalladh. Ur-Jeizhek Dwarves prefer to do it the old-fashioned way, which is why barely any of them have ever seen a woman, which is at least one reason why Heatless here is so easily wooed by Brie van der Hells.
--- Not Now, Brie!
- Brie is tired (and low on Mana) so asks Heatless to go to a private room with him. They do so... but Heatless has a little breakdown over his feelings, how he's secretly lonely, over his self-loathing over trying it on with a human.
- He cries himself to sleep, and she tries to sleep herself but NO DICE! The others barge into the room and hustle her out, no time for napping! Or for anything else for that matter!
- He cries himself to sleep, and she tries to sleep herself but NO DICE! The others barge into the room and hustle her out, no time for napping! Or for anything else for that matter!
- They have a whispered planning session outside that room. Nines wants to go back up and see what's been happening up in the city above. Manrat is obsessed with a throwaway line about a cursed Denialist cleric elsewhere in this level whose head is a flaming skull. The rest of the party lean towards finding charismatic-protestant Ghost Rider.
--- Manrat Insists on the Prior Existence of Ratfink Babylon
- They head back to the goblin council who are packing up. In exchange for helping them stack their chairs after their session, the goblins give the party directions to the lair of the Ghost Preacher, whose area is known for having no doors (they were stolen for the dormitories).
- They follow the directions and find them correct! Lovely! After a bit of walking around they reach a hall which contains screams. It's just sound effects, but it's very disconcerting.
- They also see, smoking a cigarette through his lipless mouth and surrounded by a flock of pigeons, a ratman in a duster and hat. He pushes himself up from the wall he was leaning on and approaches Manrat Snels, who he seems to have an interest in. He asks a few questions. What are you searching for? and such.
- He leaves, his pigeons flapping after him in a cloud, and disappears into the dark with a "my name? Ratfink Babylon".
- Manrat starts. His player has experienced a memory. This Ratfink guy has been seen before! Somewhere in the depths of Fortress-City Fate! You know? When I talked to the tentacle? Before we fought the wizard who merged with shub-niggurath? You remember right? There were dragons! You were there! You remember!
- They follow the directions and find them correct! Lovely! After a bit of walking around they reach a hall which contains screams. It's just sound effects, but it's very disconcerting.
- They also see, smoking a cigarette through his lipless mouth and surrounded by a flock of pigeons, a ratman in a duster and hat. He pushes himself up from the wall he was leaning on and approaches Manrat Snels, who he seems to have an interest in. He asks a few questions. What are you searching for? and such.
- He leaves, his pigeons flapping after him in a cloud, and disappears into the dark with a "my name? Ratfink Babylon".
- Manrat starts. His player has experienced a memory. This Ratfink guy has been seen before! Somewhere in the depths of Fortress-City Fate! You know? When I talked to the tentacle? Before we fought the wizard who merged with shub-niggurath? You remember right? There were dragons! You were there! You remember!
- The party gaslights Manrat because in-character this was a timeskip ago. "What are you talking about? There was no ratman here!". It was a great moment but you really had to be there!
--- Evidence of a Skull on Fire
- They continue on and come to the first of the doorless halls. Braziers are at shoulder-height to the average human, all unlit and unfueled, but scorch marks at a similar height imply the existence of the Ghost Preacher.
- Seems safe enough though, so they decide to cook up a quick meal!
- Seems safe enough though, so they decide to cook up a quick meal!
- Brie is our chef today, and she cooks up "Three-Times Fried Kimchi-Stuffed Mushrooms" with plump helmet mushrooms, butter, and some kimchi they found. It's... pretty awful actually. Straight up badly cooked. Everyone pretends like it's pretty tasty while they pick burnt bits from their teeth when Brie's not looking.
Total: 8000 exp
Treasures Claimed:
- 2 Last Breaths
- Saviourbone Disc with Repel-Stone carved upon it (20 exp)
- Lore! Sweet sweet lore!
Total: 20 exp
Enemies Defeated:
- 2 Goblins (20 exp)
Total: 20 exp
OOC:
- Carter the Chronicler and Cartographer and furthermore Paymaster (300 exp/level)
- Kitty the Expedition Leader (100 exp/level)
- Kitty the Expedition Leader (100 exp/level)
- Ollie the Quartermaster and Chef (200 exp/level)
- George the Vanguard (100 exp/level)
Totals:
- Carter / Nines, Level 6 Inheritor: 54127 (Level up at 72000)
- Kitty / Bulgur, Son of Borgar, Level 6 Barbarian: 46527 (Level up at 64000)
- George / Manrat Snels, Level 6 Ratman: 37176 (Level up at 56000)
- Ollie / Brie van der Hells, Level 5 Necromancer: 35360 (Level up at 36000)
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Also check out this beautiful recap book that Carter got us!
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