Campaign Log -- Day Thirteen (Days Eleven and Twelve irrelevant)

The 19th day of the month of Obad-Hai
The 110th year of the second Ravensblood dynasty

Hiddlebatch has been spending the past few days following its normal routine: go into town, find a public area, try to convert anyone listening to H’s heretical sect of Khurgorbaeyag, frighten the citizenry, and eventually get ushered away by the guards. At this point in time, Hiddlebatch’s flock consists of about a dozen goblins, most of whom don’t even show up at the chapel, instead staying at home and being horrified by the carven idols H has given them. Only one of her flock is Tainted himself -- Zonnd, who is possessed of an unsettling set of translucent mandibles, and can eat nothing but the still-beating hearts of birds. They don’t show up in the story much thus far.

On 19 Obad-Hai, Illuvatum arrives at the chapel to take possession of the glaive. He wastes no time with pleasantries. “Have you… acquired the glaive?”

Quimarel replies, “We’ve acquired something.” She hands him the golden polearm-haft. “This is what we got.”

Hiddlebatch tells him, however, that they could not find the command word -- so it might well be useless to them unless they have some way of working that out.
Illuvatum waves his hand. “We have resources; we can figure it out.”

Quimarel makes an abrupt segue: “What do you know about fairies?”
“We try not to associate with them, because they’re annoying as all Hells.”
“We happened to find one of them in the vault… do you know what we might do with it?”
“Fricassee? They’re just vermin that can talk.”

The party start muttering amongst themselves, trying to decide whether there’s anything else they can ask him about Silvermoss, but he cuts them off. “I don’t want to talk to you folks about fairies. You got the glaive. That’s great. The gratitude of Lord Jithanver the Blood-Drinker shall rain down upon you, assuming we can get this thing working.”
Tamarie seems confused. “How does gratitude ‘rain’?”
“In a metaphorical fashion.”

There’s a pause, then Illuvatum continues. “I will bring this to Lord Bashant, we will discuss, and perhaps we will contact you again in the near future with another task.”
Disgruntled muttering from the PCs follows. “This is what we are now,” grumbles Quimarel.

Illuvatum seems ready to depart. “You may now go about your regularly scheduled… whatever you people do. Just leave our possessions alone this time.”
Hiddlebatch takes exception. “And you don’t kidnap any of our friends.”
“We are within our rights to kidnap anyone who is in the way of our work.”
“Uh-huh. And, just so we know, what exactly is your work, and what stuff should we not mess with?”
“I’m not going to get into an argument with you people about this.”
“You’re already arguing! It’s too late!” Hiddlebatch is highly skilled in diplomatic discourse.
Illuvatum’s temper is cracking slightly. “Look, your freaky little lizard-thing is the one who came up to us while we were going about our duly-appointed --”
“She has a name!” Quimarel objects.

[Pause, while Quimarel’s player shuffles through her notes.]
[Giggling from around the table.]
GM: You had to look up her name, didn’t you?

“-- and it is Krich the Xenophilic!” Quimarel continues.

Quimarel OOC: Krich of the Golden Crotch.

“Your freaky little lizard-thing got in the way while we were conducting our business. We were merely protecting our interests, and then you folks broke in and fed one of my colleagues to spiders. All in all, you’re lucky our relationship is as amiable as it is.”

A cacaphony of objections arises from the PCs.

Makpov decides that his skills are needed to defuse the situation, and starts giving Illuvatum a shoulder massage. “There’s no reason you need to be so tense about this whole thing.”

GM: You need to roll Diplomacy,
Makpov: [seductive growling]
GM: … or possibly Intimidate, depending on what you’re going for there.
Makpov OOC: Diplomacy. 21.

Illuvatum finds himself oddly charmed by the malodorous savage and his slavering jaws -- Makpov’s Tainted ability to be perceived as supernaturally attractive comes through yet again.

“Perhaps you are right, strange pointy-nosed creature.” Illuvatum rolls a 2 on his check to resist Makpov’s advances, and completely backs off on the whole berating-the-party thing.

Quimarel OOC: Good work. Have a rawhide chew.

“Perhaps we will come to some more pleasant… social… situation. I must get back to business. Perhaps I will visit you again soon.”
Makpov attempts to bat his eyes. “ALL of us?”
“Yes. Yes. I will… see you again soon.” Illuvatum then leaves quickly, possibly to try and deal with the psychological fallout of his unexpected attraction to gnoll men.

[The players take some time to discuss the fact that they’ve basically been assuming that everyone is bisexual until proven otherwise.]
GM: Well, we’ve established that there’s less of a social stigma about that sort of thing here than in the real world… remember, in the last campaign, General Mathilde was involved with another woman, and the only issue was that Ilsa might get in trouble dating her commanding officer.
Hiddlebatch OOC: Well, it would suck if it WAS an issue in D&D… “persecute the gays” would be the weirdest quest ever.
[Hiddlebatch’s player then launches into a story about an unpleasant encounter she had with a very persistent evangelist -- moderately ironic considering what her character does.]

The party discuss amongst themselves what their next step should be. There’s probably something to be gained by getting involved with this weird cult-like organization, but on the other hand, they don’t want to screw up the town where they, you know, live. (Though Hiddlebatch argues that it will be easier to evangelize if the town falls apart and “everyone realizes their lives are empty and meaningless.”) Quimarel is more interested in financial gain and political power. Makpov plans to “dick around”, and Tamarie just wants to play with her alchemical tools.

Campaign Log -- Day Ten

The 16th day of the month of Obad-Hai
The 110th year of the second Ravensblood dynasty

The next day, the PCs gather at Hiddlebatch’s chapel to try and figure out what to do with the fairy. They put it in their own cage, and Quimarel gathers up some herbs that she’s heard can be used to counteract many types of drugs, including this one. Tamarie uses her Alchemy skills to make… something… out of them. (Craft [alchemy]: 7) She seems unsure of whether she’s been successful, and Quimarel makes the call that if the alchemist isn’t sure, she probably shouldn’t feed it to tiny fairies. They decide to wait for it to wake up on its own.

Hiddlebatch goes back to its street-corner preaching, and is “surprised” to hear of an investigation being conducted over the apparent presence of harlots in the Royal Intelligence Corps last night.

Tamarie decides to wander into the Broken Stone for breakfast, where she can inconspicuously (riiiiight) knit in the corner and overhear any rumors that might be floating around. The bar-wench who brings her food, Yona, seems slightly shaken for some reason. Maybe she had a rough night or something.

Quimarel pre-emptively reports her entirely-fabricated side of the story to the authorities. She finds the Intelligence Corps operative assigned to look into the matter, a young-ish goblin in low-profile black & gray garments. “We were hired for an event… and it was quite an event. I don’t know who hired me exactly; it came through several different channels.” She gives a speech designed to convince him that someone else paid her to provide a distraction, and further insists that she was genuinely concerned about the morale of the people who defend our fine town. She is, after all, a pillar of the community.

She rolls a 12 on her Bluff check.

“Is that so, Miss… Smith?” The operative seems suspicious.

“Yes. We’re very good at what we do.”

“I’m sure you are. Can you perhaps describe the person who allegedly hired you?”

“He was a goblin. Didn’t give me his name, but he said he wanted to reward the brave soldiers at the Intelligence Corps, and I thought, ‘You know what? They do work very hard. They deserve a break.’” [Bluff: 22]

The operative thinks that she’s hiding something, but it sounds plausible. He spends some time grilling her and trying to get a description of this alleged goblin. Quimarel intentionally gives the most generic description of a goblin she possibly can.

Quimarel OOC: I’m not going to come out and say that they all look alike to me, but…

The operative eventually does a sketch of the “suspect” and decides his time would be better spent elsewhere.

The others settle down to wait for the Kech to come meet them at Hiddlebatch’s temple on the appointed day. Quimarel and Hiddlebatch, as the only spellcasters in the party, start examining the spell scrolls. There’s some discussion about how this works: as a divine spellcaster, Hiddlebatch can cast them from a scroll, but can’t learn them (house rule -- I think it’s more fun when more party members have access to consumable resources like scrolls). Quimarel, as a bard/rogue, could theoretically adapt them into bard spells if her arcane spellcaster level were higher -- she only has one or two levels in bard at this point. And there’s always the danger of a spell mishap.

They then debate casting Ruinous Gift on the glaive, on the basis that it would be funny to curse the Kech or their rakshasa masters. It is, however, decided that they will hold onto the scrolls until Quimarel can learn them, unless an emergency comes up.

Tamarie goes back to trying to brew up something to wake up their new captive fairy. It goes better this time (Craft [alchemy]: 21), and the atomie shakes itself into consciousness. “Hrml, hm, whoa. Who are you?”

[Note: everything involving the fairy is pure improvisation at this point. I added him into the vault at the last minute as window dressing, and didn’t expect the PCs to take him with them.]

Hiddlebatch replies, “That’s exactly what we were wondering about you. We found you, and, um, we were wondering what it was that you did that apparently upset some people.”
“Hm?”

Hiddlebatch OOC: Let’s see, do I have any spells that would help? I have… Blistering Invictus. [“Invective”, actually. Hiddlebatch’s player apparently can’t always read her own handwriting. She also notes that she has a spell called “Two Nes” -- i.e., “Tongues”]
Quimarel OOC: No! That sounds like a bad idea! I don’t even know what that is, but I think you shouldn’t cast it right now.

“My name is… Silvermoss.”
“And why would someone be upset with you?”
“I don’t know why anyone would be upset with me. I was just going about my business.”
“What is your business?”
“Okay, so I was going about my frolicking. And suddenly I was in a bag, and there were lots of colors…”

Quimarel OOC: How common are these guys?
GM: They’re not, like, ant-common, but if you were to wander around the wilderness for a few weeks, odds are you’d run into at least one of them. [Translation: they’re on my random encounter table.]
Quimarel OOC: How common are they as… spell components?
GM: … I’m sure you could use them for something.

Hiddlebatch continues the interrogation. “Have you heard of many of your people going missing lately?”
“No.”
“How important are you to your people?”
“I mean… I’m well-respected amongst my hive.”
“What do you do in your hive?”
“You know. Flit from blossom to blossom. I’m also very adept at playing amusing tricks on the larger races. And stabbing people.”
Quimarel sees an in. “So these tricks that you play. What’s the best one you’ve ever done? And by the way, can we offer you some food and drink?”
“I would love some food and drink.”
“What do fairies eat?”
“Got any honey?”

They bring him some honey, and Silvermoss goes on to tell a rambling story about filling some human traveller’s bag with poisonous snakes, which he considers hilarious. The PCs humor him.

Quimarel: Ah, the ol’ cobra-rope trick. Classic.

Hiddlebatch asks if he knows how long he’s been in that cage, which leads nowhere, since Silvermoss has only a rudimentary concept of time and he was drugged out of his mind for most of it. Hiddlebatch’s player takes some time to be confused by the fact that Silvermoss has no idea what date it was, but it becomes rapidly apparent that atomies don’t do the whole calendar thing at all.

“And you can’t think of any reason why anyone would want to take you captive?”
“No.”
The PCs decide this is going nowhere. Silvermoss demands and receives mead & nectar, and the PCs opt to keep him drunk and in a cage until they figure out how to follow up on this. The fact that they’ve rescued him from “drugged in a cage” into “drunk in a cage” does not pass them by. There is some discussion about what to do with him -- keeping him in the Squirting Squid is briefly suggested, but then Quimarel’s player says something about “the tiniest prostitute” and Hiddlebatch’s player makes an obscene comment about gerbils. They decide to keep him in Hiddlebatch’s chapel.

Quimarel: We’re going to go with our favorite standby: get him drunk and get him talking, then see what comes out.

They get a lot of “hilarious” prank stories, and really complicated stories about interpersonal fairy drama. The latter sounds like what you’d get if you put a bunch of sociopathic middle-schoolers in a Lord of the Flies scenario and dosed them all with hallucinogens.

Quimarel listens carefully to see if she can come up with any evidence that he played a prank on the wrong person or has any useful abilities that the RIC might have found interesting.

Hiddlebatch’s player has twigged to the fact that I’m making this up as I go along: “This feels like one of those times when the GM put some random thing in the description and we decided it was important. Like, ‘there’s a bell over here, and then we spend 48 hours trying to figure out what the bell does. ‘It just rings, guys, it RINGS!’ ‘No, it’s gotta be here for a reason.’ ‘Yes -- to RING!’”

From the stories Silvermoss tells, Quimarel is able to gather that he does have a few nifty fairy powers -- he can shrink people / objects, or turn invisible. She convinces him that he’s safest staying in the chapel with Hiddlebatch.

Hiddlebatch: Oh, and while we’re waiting for the Kech, Makpov should ask very casual questions to the people he’s having sex with.

Then everyone’s English-Department-grad-student reflexes kick in and they send Hiddlebatch to the town library to read up on atomies. Hiddlebatch spends the entire day there researching everything it can think of. It finds that atomies are generally thought of as a nuisance, that they’re extremely sneaky, and that there are very few reasons one would want to interact with them intentionally.

Quimarel OOC: Do we know any druid-ranger-type people we could ask about this?
GM: Not really, no.
Hiddlebatch OOC: Wait, no druids or rangers live in this town?
GM: They tend not to live in towns. It’s kind of their whole thing.
[Hiddlebatch’s player’s character in the previous campaign was a druid who started out as a rogue. She is generally referred to by Quimarel’s player as “the WORST druid”.]

Hiddlebatch decides to look up the history of the Flayed Fairy, and finds some local records. The story behind the name, apparently, is that while it was being built, a bunch of atomies kept harassing the goblins for giggles, and that eventually they got sick of it, caught one, killed it, and hung it on the building as a warning to others. They later dried and preserved the corpse, and still use it as a sign. As it dawns on the players that I mean there is an actual dead fairy hanging from their signpost, I have to remind them that this is not a nice town. The overall alignment is Chaotic Evil -- just in a very petty sort of way.

Hiddlebatch looks into historical records, and finds mention of atomies being pressed into service as scouts and spies. Specifically, goblins have been known to blackmail or extort atomies into working for them for as long as they can remember that they’re being extorted. It then goes back to its chapel and cheerfully relates the story of the Flayed Fairy, to Silvermoss’s moderate horror.

“Why are you telling me this? This is creepy!”
“I was just wondering if you’d heard of the place.”
“No!”
“Have you ever worked with our kind before?”
“I don’t think so.”

Quimarel and Hiddlebatch wonder if there’s something like the Eye of the Sleeper involved here, but Detect Magic turns up nothing. Tamarie knits him a little jumper, which makes him look slightly dorky and colorblind. (Craft check: 12) Silvermoss is not pleased with it.

Hiddlebatch OOC: We need to build him a place to live. Does anyone have Craft [home] or something?
Quimarel OOC: Or Knowledge [Martha Stewart]?
GM: I would not have given you this guy if I knew you were basically going to turn him into a gerbil. “Let’s make him a little home, with a plastic tunnel and a hamster wheel…”

Not recommended as a household pet.

The PCs put together a little house/prison/cage for him, with lots of mead.

Silvermoss: Thank you? This is a nice… gesture… though normally we live outside.

Eventually, the PCs decide to convince him to stay, unaware of his status as prisoner, until they can figure out something else.

Hiddlebatch OOC: Time passes in much this way?
GM: Time passes in much this way. Does anyone want to do anything not involving the… gerbil fairy?
Tamarie OOC: I want to knit a cover for his cage!
Quimarel OOC: Like a parakeet!

A few days pass, and eventually it’s time for the meeting with Illuvatum.

Campaign Log -- Day Nine Continues Into Day Ten

The 15th day of the month of Obad-Hai
The 110th year of the second Ravensblood dynasty

After Cpl. Motuy leaves, Makpov pulls Quimarel aside. It seems he has some moral qualms about sleeping with someone for information -- unusual, given that “seduce them” has been his go-to solution to most problems thus far.

“No, it’s okay,” Quimarel assures him. “You slept with him because he paid you. The information was a separate thing.”

Makpov accepts this.

Out of character, the game is derailed by some nonsense with a kitchen knife. Band-Aids are applied, and we return to the table.

Quimarel reviews, with the others, the information they have gathered on the trap situation,
“There’s a trap in the basement area where the vault is. The guard we spoke to says there’s a switch to turn it off, but he doesn’t know where it is because it’s above his pay grade.”

“Do we have any ideas other than just booking it in there?” asks Hiddlebatch.

“Well, we’re going to show up with whores and provide a distraction… while we are distracting them very thoroughly, you Jaunt through the walls.”

“I have to already be inside if you want me to be close enough to Jaunt into the vault.”

Tamarie suggests how she could help. “I could disguise myself, run in and say, ‘hey, whores are out here!’”

Quimarel finds this entertaining. “Whore delivery. Harlot-gram.”

Makpov OOC: Please tip your driver; whores carry less than $20 in cash.

Hiddlebatch makes sure Quimarel knows what she’s getting into. “If they aren’t distracted, you’re going to have to have sex with them anyway. Then the next night, we use fire. Those are our only real options. And if you get caught, blame it all on them. You’re a pillar of the community trying to raise the morale of the town.”
Having concocted their Plan, the party approaches the Royal Intelligence Corps that night. Quimarel approaches first, with several of her employees and some wine.

Quimarel OOC: I saunter, and… stuff… I don’t know how to do this sort of thing. And I go “Haaaaaay”. Is the guard from earlier one of the ones outside?
[Nonsense ensues, in which I try to get someone to hand me the coin I flipped earlier, locate it, then clumsily learn that half-dollars don’t flip well and make crappy d2s.]
GM: Okay… heads. He’s one of the outside guards at the moment.
Quimarel OOC: So we saunter up to him and go. “Haaaaaay”. But, you know, in a sexy way.

Cpl. Motuy is the picture of subtlety. “Hello, scantily-clad women I have never met!”

Makpov: And Makpov.
Cpl. Motuy: And scantily-clad hyena!

Quimarel takes control of the conversation away from those two. “We just thought you boys could use a little break. You work so hard.”
Motuy continues to be subtle. “We do work so hard. Is not… is not that right, Cpl. Bogdun?”
Cpl. Bogdun nods.
Motuy goes on, “Yes, we do work so hard. We should take these lovely young ladies inside.”
“That would be a fantastic idea,” Quimarel says.

GM: Are you… taking pictures of me doing the NPC stuff?
Makpov OOC: I took a video!
GM: You should delete that.
[Makpov’s player shows the others her cell-phone video]
Quimarel OOC: And the GM goes to drown himself in the lake in shame!
GM: I’m just letting the dog out.
Quimarel OOC: In shame!

The guards escort Quimarel and her employees into the lobby/common area. During the day, this is where people who have business with the RIC wait -- it’s the only room you can get into without having to talk your way past a guard. During the night, there are still guards, but there’s also lots of unoccupied furniture. The exterior guards start explaining the “ale and whores” situation to the interior guards, and Quimarel carefully ensures that the door is left open so Hiddlebatch can slip through.

Motuy goes up to his co-workers. “Ladies and gentlemen. We have these impromptu whores and booze. I suggest we not think about why.”

Quimarel OOC: Don’t look a gift whore in the mouth.

Motuy and the other guards discuss. “Should we get the upstairs folk in on this?”
“I don’t know, Specialist Ouryka still owes me five silver. Maybe we should leave her out of it.”

Tamarie: We could give you an extra five silver worth of services.
GM: You’re not even a whore! You’re a tailor!
Tamarie OOC: I have four raccoon arms! They are all deft!
GM: Are you even in here?
Tamarie OOC: I don’t know!
Hiddlebatch OOC: You’re outside with me. You’re just saying this to me and I’m very confused.
Tamarie, to Hiddlebatch: I have four raccoon arms!
GM: It’s an all-purpose sentence. It could mean anything.

After some discussion, Quimarel manages to convince them that all five of the guards need to be here, and also gets them to move this party to the scriptorium. “I can do a lot of things with a writing-desk.”

Hiddlebatch and Tamarie slip into the lobby once everyone’s gone, and start staring at the door to the basement, wishing the rogue weren’t so busy with her orgy so that someone could check for traps. So H considers using her Ethereal Jaunt trick right away, and hoping the map was accurate enough that she can navigate into the vault before it wears off.

[The game comes to a momentary pause while I go stop my dog from trying to eat an umbrella. The recording catches Makpov’s player talking to her dog.]
Makpov OOC: I just want you to know that you’re better than her.

After a brief singalong to the Proclaimers’ "I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)", the game gets back on track.

Eventually, it is decided that they are going to risk that door being trapped, because if they don’t get through it, Hiddlebatch might not have enough time on its Ethereal Jaunt to reach the vault. Hiddlebatch gives some instructions to Tamarie in case something goes horribly wrong. “If you hear me screaming really loud, come get me. Our alibi is that we came here looking for the whores.” Tamarie tries and fails to pick the lock, then opts to take 20 to try again. She also successfully makes a stealth check to avoid attracting attention from the scriptorium.

Hiddlebatch slips through the door, crosses the records room, then Jaunts down the stairway into the vault. H runs through the wall, avoiding the attention of any horrible monsters from whatever weird demi-plane it’s travelling through. It begins looking around the room with its hobgoblin darkvision. There are a couple shelves on the walls, lined with preserved herbs -- H’s Knowledge [nature] identifies a sizable stash of probably-confiscated visionvine, a hallucinogenic drug common in this region -- and another shelf with a number of small curios. A cage hanging from the wall holds an old leatherbound book. A large, detailed ogre statue takes up one corner of the room, and there’s a birdcage hanging from the ceiling that holds a little winged figure who appears to be in a drugged stupor. Hiddlebatch recognizes the winged figure as an atomie despite its very low Knowledge [nature] roll to identify it -- it’s pretty easy, since a local tavern called the Flayed Faerie has a preserved atomie hanging out front as a sign. (Remember, most of the populace of this town are technically Chaotic Evil.)

H throws out a Detect Good, and finds nothing. It then tries a Detect Magic, and a number of things light up: the curios on the shelf, and a few things in the big trunk in the corner. H recognizes the items on the shelf (Knowledge [arcana] roll: natural 20):

• Candle of Truth
• 3 deactivated Eyes of Jak (these are from a previous campaign, in which Hiddlebatch’s and Quimarel’s characters participated -- they’re little carven eyeballs that essentially function as permanent Arcane Eyes, and were the preferred surveillance method of the now-destroyed lich Jak the Panoptic.)
• 1 Eye of the Sleeper (Another of Jak the Panoptic’s inventions -- it’s used to create an unknowing sleeper agent. It comes with Clairaudience/Clairvoyance, a 1/day Dominate Person, and a Flesh to Stone failsafe.)
• A quill that should be paired with an Inkwell of Authority, a communications device that the Cult of Hextor used to use before they were wiped out and their territory became the Black Sands. It’s no good unless you have both a quill and an inkwell, though.

Hiddlebatch doesn’t see the glaive it’s been sent here to get, but notices that the trunk in the corner is probably big enough to hold one, and it does have a few magical auras in it. H considers this. H considers that she can’t search for traps. H decides to hide behind the ogre statue and cast Knock. The trunk opens anticlimactically.

H goes to look into the trunk. It contains a number of containers with disturbingly-organic contents, A Knowledge [nature] check tells Hiddlebatch that it is looking at a small phial of basilisk bile --

Quimarel OOC: Worst Dr. Seuss book ever.

-- a pouch of powdered unicorn horn, a box of wyvern bones, a jar of viper teeth, and a few pickled troll hearts. H also identifies an egg in a glass box as belonging to a harpy. A Knowledge [arcana] roll does little for Hiddlebatch, as this is way outside of its field. H can tell, however, that a witch might use these as ritual components. The trunk also contains a stack of parchment scrolls, and what looks like the golden haft of a polearm. Knowledge [arcana] leads Hiddlebatch to suspect that the glaive has no blade because it is a Brilliant Energy weapon, and the blade will pop into existence with a command word. (This is then explained out of character as “magical lightsaber”.)

The parchments prove to be spell scrolls, none of which contain spells H has even heard of before. Assumedly, they were custom-made by the witch who used to own this stuff (or members of her coven.)

The text of the spells follows:

Ruinous Gift

Level: 7
Casting Time: One minute

Components: Verbal, Somatic

Range: Touch

Target: An item you own

Effect: Cursed item

Duration: Permanent

Saving Throw: n/a

Spell Resistance: n/a 

The item on which this spell is cast will bring bad luck and financial ruin to the owner. The only way to end the effect other than breaking the spell through arcane means is to give the item to another, who must accept it of their own free will.
The spell must initially be cast upon an item you own, and then you must give the item to another.
The owner of the Ruinous Gift, in addition to taking a -5 penalty to all checks, is subject to the dire version of Murphy’s Law: everything that might go wrong, will go wrong, in the worst possible way, at the worst possible time.

Broneden’s True Empathy

Level: 4

Casting Time: One minute

Components: Verbal, Somatic

Range: One hundred feet

Target: One creature

Effect: Shared emotions

Duration: One hour

Saving Throw: Will Negates

Spell Resistance: Yes 

For one hour, the target feels all of the emotions and physical sensations that the caster does, as they occur. The target does not actually take damage if the caster does, but they do feel the accompanying pain. 

Serpentine Thief

Level: 5

Casting Time: One minute

Components: Verbal, Somatic

Range: Ten feet

Target: Snake or other serpentine creature with an Int of 5 or less.

Effect: Assigns a task to the target.

Duration: Ten minutes

Saving Throw: Will negates

Spell Resistance: Yes

When cast on a snake, this spell allows you to instruct the animal to retrieve one item that you can clearly picture in your head. The snake will unerringly go to the target item, and will attempt, to the best of its ability, to retrieve it and bring it back to you. It will stop only for biological necessities.

River Seed
Level: 8
Casting Time: Ten Minutes
Components: Verbal, Somatic
Range: One hundred feet
Target: 5-ft radius
Effect: Artificial spring
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: n/a
Spell Resistance: n/a
At a point you indicate, a hole is bored straight down through the earth until it hits a subterranean body of water, whereupon it reshapes the stone to cause that water to be continuously forced up, creating an artificial spring.
Magic is not required to sustain the spring’s existence, though the aquifer, subterranean lake, or what have you may eventually run dry.

Primordial Portal

Level: 9

Casting Time: One minute

Components: Verbal, Somatic

Range: One hundred feet

Target: n/a

Effect: Ten-foot-radius portal to pre-designated point in past

Duration: Ten minutes

Saving Throw: n/a

Spell Resistance: n/a

This spell, when cast, creates a two-way portal to a point in the distant past. Targeting a specific time is extremely difficult, and requires a caster level check. The margins of error are so expansive that it is ill-advised for the inexperienced to attempt anything too specific -- you are lucky to get within a few centuries of your target. The portal remains open for ten minutes, and then closes instantaneously. Anything that is partway through the portal when it closes is bisected, so keep your vital organs clear.

When the spell is cast, choose a target time and roll a check: d20 + caster level + Int bonus. Knowledge (History) provides a +2 synergy bonus. Then consult the chart. (Flip a coin to see if the portal’s target is displaced forward or backward in time.) Again, specific targets are very difficult to hit, so this spell is not advised for accessing an exact point in history.

Phoenix Oath

Level: 9

Casting Time: One hour

Components: Verbal, Somatic

Range: Personal

Target: You

Effect: Future animation of self as undead

Duration: Instantaneous

Saving Throw: n/a

Spell Resistance: n/a

When casting this spell, the caster must articulate an oath that they will perform a specific task. If the caster dies with the task incomplete, they will be instantaneously animated as an undead creature of the DM’s choice. The undead creature will be driven to complete the task above all else. If the undead creature is destroyed, they do not animate again. Upon reanimation, the power of the magic sufficiently warps and twists the body and mind of the caster that Raise Dead will not work on their remains -- stronger magic is required.

Nassim’s Scalding Skin

Level: 3

Casting Time: One round

Components: Verbal, Somatic 

Range: One hundred feet

Target: One creature

Effect: Continuous fire damage

Duration: One minute

Saving Throw: Fortitude Negates

Spell Resistance: Yes

The target’s own skin becomes extremely hot, and begins to char & blister. The target takes 1d6 fire damage each round.

Grand Frost
Level: 6
Casting Time: One round
Components: Verbal, Somatic
Range: Personal
Target: You
Effect: Temporary access to cold-based powers
Duration: Concentration (see below)
Saving Throw: n/a
Spell Resistance: n/a
You tap into the energy of the Paraelemental Plane of Ice. For the duration of the spell, you have immunity to cold, your touch deals 3d6 cold damage, and you can cast Ray of Frost at will. In addition, two ice mephits are summoned and do your bidding for the duration of the spell.
This comes with some highly noticeable visual effects: frost forms under your feet, and inverted icicles grow up from your head to create a frozen crown.
In combat, you must make a DC10 Concentration check every round or the spell is dismissed. Out of combat, you must make the check once a minute. Failure means the spell ends.

Hiddlebatch pockets them, and tries to wake up the atomie.

“Hrm? Mblhrmbl. Grfkjbal” It doesn’t seem to be capable of functioning on its own.

H considers taking it along too, and stops by the book cage. “Hello?” The book does not respond. Since there’s no writing on the cover, Hiddlebatch has no idea what the book might be about. H decides to take the glaive, the scrolls, the candle, and the Eye of the Sleeper. The theory here is that someone’s going to notice that the place has been burgled anyway, so they might as well go for broke.

A Detect Poison and some Knowledge rolls tell Hiddlebatch that the atomie has been fed a concoction made with the blood of a Corpse Rook, and it will be in this quasi-responsive state for a while yet, until the poison wears off in a couple days. It takes some time for H to decide that it’s worth taking along as well. Hiddlebatch then gathers up her plunder, and prepares to cast Passwall with the glaive… then remembers that it needs a command word. And H can’t do the Ethereal Jaunt thing more than once a day.

Hiddlebatch OOC: I’ll just hunker down here overnight and regret all my life choices.

Then Hiddlebatch’s player remember she has one casting of Knock left, and suddenly things get a lot easier. The door swings open, and fires a storm of needles… towards the imaginary intruder on the stairs. The guards are still very distracted, and roll a 4 on their Perception check, so they don’t hear anything. Hiddlebatch kicks the needles aside so the guards will be less likely to notice them, and sneaks back out of the building.

At this point, Hiddlebatch botches a Stealth roll…

Yona Tribe Muck-Laugh is out for a midnight stroll to decompress after a long shift waiting tables at the Broken Stone, when she runs smack into the very-recognizable hobgoblin priest from the edge of town. Said priest seems to be sneaking out of the Royal Intelligence Corps with a suspiciously bulging sack over one shoulder. For a second, the two stare at each other in mutual surprise & incomprehension.

Then the crazy priest strikes a pose and booms, “the harlots in there refuse to repent! They will not listen!” Yona is too tired to deal with this crap, so she just nods, smiles, and tries to move on. (Sense Motive: 6) The priest isn’t done yet, though. “You should not be out at this hour either! You should be at temple!” Then it hands her a terrifying carven idol. “This terror will watch you! Do not lose it, or you will die!” (Intimidate: 24)

“O - okay…” Yona decides to head home.

Tamarie and Hiddlebatch take their ill-gotten gains to Hiddlebatch’s chapel outside of town.

Campaign Log -- Day Nine

The 15th day of the month of Obad-Hai
The 110th year of the second Ravensblood dynasty

Corporal Motuy Tribe Muck-Laugh has decided that, after weeks of nightly guard duty, he deserves some time to himself. Before his shift starts on the evening of the 15th, he heads over to the Squirting Squid, which he has heard gives discounts to law-enforcement personnel. Sure, he’s a security guard for the Intelligence Corps, but that’s pretty close to law enforcement, and he’s been noticing the lovely exotic women who work there wandering around town at night. Motuy is even pretty sure one of them winked at him earlier in the week.

He walks in to find a large common room, with a well-stocked bar, expensive-looking wall hangings, and a few women of various species lounging about in harem outfits. The room is permeated by an odd sweet scent, and hookah smoke drifts through the air. “Hello?” At the sound of his voice, a large gnoll of indeterminate gender strikes a pose, but says nothing.

After a pause, a well-dressed halfling woman comes over to welcome him, “Can I offer you some booze?” She gestures at the bar.
“I would love some booze, yes. What are you offering?”
“Our best goblin ale for this fine gentleman!”
“Is that made for goblins or from goblins?” Motuy has seen some stuff in his time with the Royal Intelligence Corps, even if he’s not technically cleared to know about any of it, and he’s learned that this is the sort of thing you need to ask.
“For. And by! We only purchase local brews.”
“We’re stimulating the local economy,” the gnoll chimes in, with an eloquence completely at odds with… his? (yeah, that’s a male gnoll -- the females are taller, right?) … glassy eyes and lolling tongue.
“We stimulate a lot of things here,” says the halfling, regaining control of the conversation. She must be Madame Smith, Motuy thinks. He’s heard about her.

Mme. Smith seems to possess a practiced blend of charm and professionalism [Diplomacy check: 27], and Motuy relaxes onto a seat at the bar as the barkeep presses an ale into his hand. “Maglubiyet… why haven’t I come here before?” He takes a sip. “This is delicious. It’s just like mother used to make.” Mme. Smith gives him a funny look. “Mother kept a copper still in the woods outside town.”

Hiddlebatch OOC: I like that it’s his mother. [Other GM] is always sexist and all the NPCs are men.
GM: Isn’t that mostly because of a lack of female miniatures?
Hiddlebatch OOC: Okay, there’s that.

Cpl. Motuy is, as Quimarel puts it “wined and dined”. He finds himself pleasantly inebriated, and the gnoll -- “Makpov”, was it? -- is being very friendly, leaning on the bar with him. He’s even feeding Motuy little morsels of dire rat, which is nice. He may not usually swing that way, but what the hell, you only live once…

Makpov’s player has decided to act this out.

Quimarel OOC: Let’s hope the guard is making a less distressed face than the GM just did.
GM: I wasn’t expecting to be fed. Anyway, let’s fast-forward -- um -- fast-for -- quit trying to feed me things. Let’s fade to black on Makpov and the goblin.

Various innuendos ensue, and Makpov’s player spends a few minutes playing hyena sounds on her laptop and asking whether she should roll for this. I tell her she can roll Dexterity if she really wants to, and she gets a 7. Makpov just isn’t feeling it tonight. More innuendo ensues, and eventually the game gets back on track.

Cpl. Motuy comes back out (or, as I was forced to phrase it after the rest of the table spent some time cheerfully turning my narration into more innuendo whenever possible, “he emerges from the room, through the door, with his opposable thumbs”). Quimarel, having decided that the afterglow is the best time to get him to talk, asks what his job is like.

“Oh, I spend all night walking back and forth carrying a big pike… it’s like I’m an NPC in some magitech video game.”
“That sounds terrible; really a waste of your abilities.”
“Well, pike-carrying is part of my core skill set.”
“I like a man who knows how to handle a pike.” The table collapses into laughter again.
“...anyway, I spend my nights guarding a building that nobody ever tries to break into. I mean, who would break into a building full of spies who like poisoning and checking up on people and hunting down their loved ones and that kind of thing?”

The table spends some time being entertained by the idea of dangerous spies sitting around in the records room doing paperwork.

Quimarel OOC: But everyone knows they’re in there? That’s the opposite of spying!
GM: Everyone knows where the CIA building is, too.

Quimarel knows an opportunity to ply her trade when she sees one. “You know what would be fun… if we came by to liven up your guard duty.”
“That would be fun… but we’d have to make sure my bosses didn’t find out about it.”
“We could arrange that; and I bet your co-workers would like to have some fun too.”
“I bet they would… and that does sound fun, but we would have to be careful, because my bosses can be extra strict.”
“Who are your bosses? I mean, they can’t be watching you all the time.”
“Well, not all the time, but we do have to make reports… and they have a way of finding things out… ultimately, I guess my boss is Spymistress Zubynna. And she’s old and cranky, and I don’t think she’d be happy about us having whores over while we’re on duty.”

A note: in the previous campaign, the players recruited several goblin tribes to assist in a war effort, and Tribe Muck-Laugh, the tribe who founded Noroiras, was one of them. They assigned Muck-Laugh to intelligence-gathering efforts, and formalized a sort of spy network, Over the past century, that has evolved into Tribe Muck-Laugh running the local arm of the Royal Intelligence Corps directly -- the head of the tribe gets the Spymaster/Spymistress title automatically.

Quimarel: How old is she?
Motuy: She’s… about forty.
[The table is reminded that goblins are short-lived; they hit “venerable” at 40. Motuy is probably not yet 20.]

“I don’t know,” Motuy dithers. “It sounds really fun, but I’m just not sure.”
“Well, if you can get enough of your co-workers in on it, we can probably make sure no one bothers us.”
“That could work...”
“It’s not like your boss is going to actually be there.”
“She could still find out… she has ways.”

Ve haff vays of makink you talk.

At this point, Quimarel starts having fun with the drunken, slightly-dazed goblin security guard. “Like… spies?”
“Exactly! It’s like she has spies… oh, right.”
“Do you think your co-workers might be spies?”
“Oh, Maglubiyet… they all are!” Pause. “The real question is, are they spying with me… or at me?”

Quimarel deflects the conversation back on track. “Isn’t it scary being there at night? I mean, with all the traps and stuff, you’ve probably got to be careful.”
“Well, I think the only trap is the one in the basement, and we don’t even go down there.”
“Because…”
“Oh, because we don’t know where the switch is to make it not kill us all. That’s above our pay grade.”
“That sucks.”
“Yes. But we just keep people from going into the trapped room.”
“That makes sense.”
“Yeah. It is kind of spooky in there, though.”
“What makes it so spooky?”
“Well, it’s dark, and there’s not many people there, and who knows what these people leave lying around. It could be, like, poison… or… I don’t know what spies have. You know, the things. The things that do the things.”
Makpov, entering the common area, chimes in. “You work for the spies.”
“Yeah, but I’m not cleared for any of this. I just carry a pike. I don’t get to do the actual spying.”
“So… if we were to stop by to break up the monotony, what time would be best?”
“Sometime in the wee hours of the morning, I guess. When there aren’t a lot of people around.”
“What if someone inside the building sees you? Aren’t there guards inside?”
“Yeah…”
“Where are they stationed?”
“They move around a lot… I think we’d have to get them in on it too.”
“We can do that. The more the merrier!”
“But how are we going to get them all in on it? I can’t just ask, ‘hey, y’all want to shirk your duties and bring in some whores?’”
“I think it would be different if there were already whores there. It’s easier to say ‘no’ to a hypothetical situation.”
“That could work. But you gotta not tell them that it was my idea.”
“I’m good at keeping secrets. Tell you what; if they’re not into it, you can lead us back off the property. And while we’re out of earshot…”
“Okay…”
The conversation drifts back to general small talk. Motuy eventually leaves for his shift on duty, sobering up as much as he can.

Campaign Log -- Days Four Through Eight

The 10th day of the month of Obad-Hai
The 110th year of the second Ravensblood dynasty

The next day, Quimarel and her entourage head to the Marketplace of Rats to try and turn their gems into gold. As it is, they’re more or less useless for any purchases of less than 50 gold or so, Since they live in a fairly poor community, there’s not much one can do with that kind of lump sum -- nobody deals in that kind of money, and nobody can provide change. So the only actual purpose they can find for these gems is what the Kech do with them -- bribery.

They find the only jeweller in town, running a tastelessly-overstated stall in the marketplace, and show them one of their gems. Nothing doing -- seems a lot of people have been trying to sell him these little emeralds lately, and he’s got all he can afford as it is. Some cajoling and bribery reveals that he’s bought several off of the town guard and the staff at the Broken Stone. He’s made some nice jewelry with them, but the price range means he hasn’t managed to sell any of those pieces yet, so he’s not anxious to make any more.

Frustrated and dejected, the PCs return to the brothel, where they are soon approached by the four Kech from the inn, and a fifth, much smaller, cloaked figure. It’s well before business hours, so they can talk privately.

The smaller cloaked figure throws back his hood, revealing the fanged, blue-skinned visage that Hiddlebatch saw in the caverns. “I am Lord Bashant of the Thin Bladesh, and I feel that we have shome mattersh to dishcush.”

Some minor panic ensues, but it is made clear that this is not going to lead to violence.

“The four of you,” says Lord Bashant, “have been caushing trouble with our operationsh here in town. We have looked into the poshibility of eliminating you, but…” he shrugs. “It would attract unwanted attention if the ownersh of two well-known bushineshesh were to dishappear… and shertainly people would notish if shuch a colorful local figure ash the priesht here were no longer sheen on the shtreetsh… and we have no interesht in antagonishing the ambashador from Mormanori by interfering with hish favored companion…” he indicates Quimarel, Tamarie, Hiddlebatch, and Makpov in turn, “sho we have deshided to conshider an alternate approach,”

The party look at each other nervously as Lord Bashant says something to Illuvatum, who hands him a sheet of parchment.

“We would like to exshtend to you an opportunity to work with ush rather than againsht ush. You are free to decline, but… in shuch an event, we would have to be lesh shqueamish about attracting attention, and shertain contingenshiesh would have to come to pash.” As Bashant reaches into his pockets for a quill, he ostentatiously brushes his cloak aside to reveal a selection of long, thin knives.

He hands the PCs the parchment and the quill, and they see that it has been written on in an unfamiliar hand. The text is in the same strange alphabet as the scrolls they took earlier, and a translation into Goblin follows. “You will read thish and shign in blood. You will cooperate with ush, or our relationship will change in waysh not to your liking.” He grins a predatory grin.

The parchment reads as follows:

There is much negotiation regarding a salary. They will receive none, but Lord Bashant assures them that the gratitude of his masters is very valuable. There is discussion regarding getting out of the contract, and Bashant reluctantly allows that they may leave his service if they so choose, but he is not responsible for the consequences. Even if the consequences are inflicted by him personally, in a lightless room, with a selection of sharpened instruments, he forgoes responsibility. The PCs are very concerned about the punishments for violation, and there is much discussion. In the end, they sign.

Bashant also demands that they return the “Spear of the Harsh Winter”, which they do reluctantly. He then departs. Warden Illuvatum instructs the party to meet with him the next day for an assignment, and then the Kech leave as well.


The 11th day of the month of Obad-Hai
The 110th year of the second Ravensblood dynasty

The meeting with Warden Illuvatum is simple and direct. They discuss the map of the Royal Intelligence Corps that the party had taken a few days ago. Warden Illuvatum wants them to make use of the information by breaking into the Intelligence Corps vault and retrieving the enchanted weapon Golden Glitter. They have one week to do so, at which point they will meet at Hiddlebatch’s chapel outside of town.

In the discussion, Illuvatum assures the party that they have no interest in the other contents of the vault, so if the PCs wish to compound their felony by taking something else that catches their fancy, Illuvatum does not need to know about it.

The party is dismissed, and they begin to hatch a Plan in earnest.


The 12th day of the month of Obad-Hai
The 110th year of the second Ravensblood dynasty

“So,” says Quimarel, “the trick is getting into this guarded building and getting down to the vault. Apparently the Kech hadn’t decided how to get past the guards.”

“We could seduce them,” suggests Makpov predictably.

GM: This is always the plan with you, isn’t it?
Makpov OOC: I have a very specific skill set.
GM: You or your character?
Makpov OOC: MY CHARACTER.

The conversation moves on. “So, there are guards patrolling inside and outside,” says Quimarel. “And we don’t know how to get past them. But once we get the thing… we can walk through walls. So getting out is not the hard part.”

There is some discussion of the Passwall spell, which is what the weapon casts, and it is established that it causes the walls to physically open up, so there is no issue of what equipment or people you can take with you.

Tamarie has a new alchemical trick that they consider using -- Dust Form. This has some clear benefits when it comes to sneaking in and out of places. Eventually, though, Hiddlebatch brings up her Ethereal Jaunt trick, which is slightly more useful since it can actually go incorporeal. And slightly more dangerous because H could be eaten by horrible extraplanar abominations.

Hiddlebatch also pitches the idea of setting fire to the building and then pulling the glaive from the wreckage. This is seriously considered for some time, and eventually discarded because the vault is underground. They then consider the value of fire as a distraction,

They return to the seduction idea, and Hiddlebatch suggests that it could use its Intimidate skill to assist Quimarel’s attempts to seduce the guards.

Hiddlebatch OOC: I could just stand there and go, “HAVE SEX WITH HER!”
Quimarel OOC: It doesn’t work in my dating life; it’s not going to work in Pathfinder.

Eventually, they decide to pump the guards for information, figuring that Quimarel and her employees will be vastly underestimated due to their profession.

Quimarel: Step one is gaining their trust. Through their genitals.

So they decide that it would be least suspicious if they waited for a guard to show up at the Squirting Squid rather than seeking one out. They do, however, spread the word that discounts are available for law enforcement personnel, both in the town guard and in the Intelligence Corps. Quimarel, however, rolls an 8 on her Diplomacy check, so her efforts to advertise this discount aren’t terribly successful.

Hiddlebatch: Can I help spread the word?
Quimarel: I’m not sure I want you associated with my brothel. You are a distinctly un-sexy creature.
Makpov: What if I act as poster boy?
Quimarel: Each poster scented with his musk for extra potency!
[Makpov rolls a 19]
GM: Okay, your advertising campaign isn’t going so well, but once you have Makpov strolling around flaunting his…
Makpov OOC: Spots.
GM: …spots and shaggy fur and slavering jaws…
Quimarel OOC: And horrible stench.
GM: … and horrible carrion stench…
[Makpov’s player acts out panting like a dog]
GM: … for some reason, everybody’s way more enthusiastic about the possibility of discounts.

Makpov goes around town making sure everyone knows about their law-enforcement discounts, and generally talks up the brothel.

Quimarel ensures that at least one of her employees happens to walk past the Royal Intelligence Corps every night.

Out of character, Hiddlebatch’s player objects to Quimarel’s player referring to her employees as “girls” and “boys”, or collectively as her “stable”.

Hiddlebatch OOC: It makes them sound like horses.
Quimarel OOC: Makpov’s a hyena.
Makpov OOC: And I’m eleven years old.
(Gnolls have a short lifespan -- they hit adulthood at 8, middle age at 20, and rarely live past 50. In “hyena years”, Makpov is somewhere in his 20s, but in actual calendar years, he’s 11.)
Quimarel OOC: I think I need to go pray.

Hiddlebatch makes a point of taking strolls in the area where the RIC is located, so that when the time comes, nobody will find it suspicious that it’s near the building. As it does so, it corners passers-by and yells that they have not been to temple recently, then gives them a horrific carven idol and tells them Khurgorbaeyag is watching, The table is reminded that Hiddlebatch travels with a half-tame wolf, which makes this whole scene more terrifying for all civilians involved. H manages to convert a couple goblins to its belief system.

GM: Let’s ask Mme. Four-Sider how long it takes for a guard to show up at the brothel…

A few days pass. The Feast of Obad-Hai comes and goes with little fanfare, there not being many Obad-Hai worshippers in town. Eventually, however, a guard who works for the Royal Intelligence Corps comes into the Squirting Squid.

Campaign Log -- The End of Day Three

The 9th day of the month of Obad-Hai
The 110th year of the second Ravensblood dynasty

The overseer, realizing that reinforcements cannot realistically be expected at the moment, runs up to Makpov, and takes a fairly ineffective swing at him, Makpov, burdened by a halfling riding piggyback, tries to retaliate with his battleaxe, but overbalances and misses disgracefully. Tamarie, reluctant to break out her alchemical bombs for fear of hurting Quimarel (for she is “wee” and will not take well to further damage), joins in the ballet of incompetence by flailing around with her insect arm, and Quimarel adds a flourish by missing wildly with her dagger.

The Kech breaks the theme by nearly disembowelling Makpov with a well-placed claw, and Makpov, thanks to our handy critical-hit table, responds by slicing its leg off at the knee. The others beat on him while he’s prone -- Tamarie stabs him with a knitting needle -- and the screaming, bleeding Kech starts dragging himself away. The chain gang cheers from the sidelines. Makpov, in a rare burst of “good idea”, drags the Kech to the door, shoves him through, and shuts the door again. A few seconds later, they hear louder screams that abruptly cut off, accompanied by the sound of spiders eating.

GM: All right, you just threw the Kech overseer to the spiders. Now what?
Quimarel OOC: I take his robe.
GM: He’s being eaten by spiders.
Quimarel OOC: Crap.
Hiddlebatch OOC: We already HAVE robes. From their room.

Quimarel tries to disguise Makpov as a Kech; it’s fairly unconvincing, but they figure it will pass in dim light. The party assumes that any reinforcements that might have been alerted by the screaming Kech will be delayed by spiders, so Tamarie sets to picking the locks on the chain gang’s manacles.

***

Elsewhere in the cavern complex, Hiddlebatch has decided to check out the swearing she heard behind that door earlier. She opens the door as quietly as possible, and sees a room full of broken, rusty furniture & equipment. Another basidirond seems to be growing in the ruins, and a small humanoid creature -- the source of the swearing -- seems to be attempting to kill it. The creature resembles a blue-skinned caricature of a goblin, complete with a mouth full of enormous, unwieldy fangs (probably the reason for the speech defect noted earlier). It also has backwards-facing hands.

Hiddlebatch has more points in relevant knowledge skills than the others, and rolls above 20 on its check, so it recognizes the backwards hands as the identifying characteristic of a rakshasa, a creature of which it has heard rumors and stories.

Apparently, when giving Hiddlebatch’s player a quick rundown of what a rakshasa is, I used the phrase “pretty dang evil”. I need to prepare my exposition better.

The rakshasa notices Hiddlebatch, having beaten its Stealth check by a good margin. It turns towards Hiddlebatch… who closes the door and runs away.

Voice from behind Hiddlebatch: WHO IN THE HELLSH WASH THAT?

Hiddlebatch runs towards the room full of purple moss, yelling for the goblins to follow H and hold their breath. They go through the room, and come out in the same cavern that the rest of the party arrived in. Hiddlebatch cautiously proceeds towards a partially-buried building… and a darkmantle drops on H’s head. H casts Inflict Light Wounds, causing the creature to shriek and abandon its prey.

Hiddlebatch’s player rolls a Knowledge [nature] check to identify the beast as a darkmantle, and we have another conversation about whether this creature has any tricky vulnerabilities or immunities. (I blame myself for having them deal with fey in the last campaign -- now they’re always looking for the equivalent of cold iron.) Eventually we establish that they are, in my words, “just… THINGS”, and that they are vulnerable to being stabbed with pointy bits of metal.

After some exploration, Hiddlebatch decides to enter a sizable, partially-buried building on the grounds that there don’t seem to be any Kech or dangerous wildlife behind that door, just some rats. H flies above them, careful in case there’s another acid-spitting surprise in store. It leaves the goblins behind, attempting to take shelter from the darkmantles.

H ducks through a door on the far side of the rat room, only to find an enormous ballroom where a pair of spider-things are snacking on corpses. As it tries to decide what to do, a goblin with Makpov’s battle axe comes through another door, followed by an ablative layer of other goblins, followed by the PCs. (Quimarel’s plans are all about not hurting Quimarel.) A quick and largely silent reunion ensues, and the group slips past the distracted spiders to the original cavern.

They gather the human slaves Quimarel’s group freed and the goblin slaves Hiddlebatch freed. Tamarie picks the locks on the remaining leg irons, and Hiddlebatch decides to make an impromptu speech to the liberated chain gangs..
“You see? You doubted the great and mighty Khurgorbaeyag --”
“We did?”
“ -- I told you that he would see us through this -- ”
“You did?”
“I did! He has seen us through! You will go to the chapel to pay your respects!” Hiddlebatch rolls a 26 to Intimidate, and shows them one of her frightening little carven idols. They are intimidated, and consider attending the chapel, or possibly leaving town as soon as possible.

Once Hiddlebatch is done terrifying the populace, Quimarel tells her what they found out earlier -- there’s something valuable in one of the rooms nearby, but the Kech can’t get at it because of some sort of invisible creature that wandered in recently and took up residence. PCs being PCs, they decide to go check this out. They also are sticking to their original “set it on fire” approach. A quick inventory determines that they have plenty of flammable material, including rope, clothing, and goblins.

Quimarel suggests collecting a large quantity of blood, then splashing the phantom fungus (Knowledge [nature] courtesy of Hiddlebatch) with it to make it visible.

GM: Why do you go straight for blood?
Quimarel OOC: Well, what other semi-liquids do we have?
GM: Mud?
Quimarel OOC: There’s mud in here?
GM: You’re in a big hole in the ground!

Eventually, a plan is hatched. They take the robe they were using to disguise Makpov and light it on fire, then Hiddlebatch flies into the room with the phantom fungus (which turns out to be an old library) and drops the flaming robe onto the beast. There is much inhuman shrieking, and Hiddlebatch continues to the area beyond the library while it is distracted.

On the other side of the library is a small open cavern that contains a single mostly-buried building. Hiddlebatch avoids the predations of a cave fisher and enters the building. It proves to be empty, except for some sort of rusty metal display case that contains a grime-covered spear. A quick casting of Knock opens the case, Hiddlebatch grabs the spear, and then flies back out through the somewhat-on-fire library. The party agrees that it’s time to leave very quickly.

Hiddlebatch flies up, lowers the rope from the original well, and helps the others out of the caverns. There are no further falling-related adventures. The liberated chain gangs also follow them up, at which point they scatter. Most of them aren’t from this area, and they strike out for home. A minority decide to stay in town for a while.

The Brambleforth trade caravan leaves abruptly that afternoon.

The PCs head back to the Squirting Squid and start discussing how to deal with recent events. Hiddlebatch asks if they should go to the authorities.
“Hey,” says Tamarie, acting out this scenario, “we found some slaves…”
“The whole town is basically evil,” Quimarel reminds the others. “If the authorities are getting a kickback from this cult, or if they hold some sort of sway over them, they’re not going to give a crap.”
“But these guys are really suspicious,” says Tamarie. “Wouldn’t they want to know what these suspicious people are doing?”
“Remember yesterday?” Quimarel asks. “One of them was talking to the guard. I couldn’t tell what they were saying, but I could tell that they were talking, and the guards were real willing to let them go and look at us.”
Tamarie thinks about this. “I would not put it above the guards to go, ‘these people are causing trouble for the foreigners who are bribing us’.”

There is a pause, and an abrupt change of subject. Tamarie asks, “so what kind of spear did you get there?”

They don’t know. And then, once they realize there is stuff they don’t know, their grad-student instincts kick in. Quimarel starts making a list of things they need to research at the library, and they head over there. At the library, they dig up a couple books. Dunyz Tribe Far-Eye’s Taxonomy of Creatures has an entry on the rakshasa, which I cobble together from the Pathfinder Bestiary and my campaign notes. Hiddlebatch wants to know if there’s anything in there about emeralds, but Quimarel is pretty sure that the bags of gems are just their “petty cash”.

They also, when looking for anything about buried cities, dig up a scroll about goblin folklore that recounts “The Legend of Vyutommourt”. The players note that the legend of Vyutommourt fits into a pretty standard goblin-folklore archetype, i.e., “we used to be awesome and now we aren’t, but it’s not our fault; someone else screwed us over.” This sort of thing is pretty integral to the goblin worldview.

Hiddlebatch asks where the vulture guy fits in, and the party starts putting it together. In Vyutommourt, they worshipped the Lord of Life and Death, who made the fields and orchards grow in exchange for sacrifice. The vulture-headed god had a sacrifice on his statue when the party found it, and Quimarel recalls that the shield that was dug out of that field a while back showed him in an orchard… they begin to wonder whether there’s a way to force the dead god into reincarnation. Hiddlebatch is frustrated that there is no mention of the spear.

They leave the library and try to appraise the spear’s value. Brushing away the dirt and grime, they find intricate carvings along the shaft, and the spearhead proves to be solid gold. Hiddlebatch, possibly spurred on by the uselessness of a mundane weapon made of gold, casts Detect Magic and finds that it glows intensely under magical sight.

Quimarel comes up with a test to find out what the spear does. “Stab a live thing, then stab a dead thing. Then stab both things again.” They round up some verminous rodents for test subjects, and proceed. During the test, they notice that wherever they carry the spear, there seems to be a cold wind coming from nowhere, and the spear ices over whenever they use it to stab something. Some extremely low Knowledge [arcana] rolls result in them really not knowing much at all, but Quimarel’s Bardic Knowledge tells her that there are many stories about magical weapons with elemental motifs.

There is some discussion about the extent of the freezing on the dead rodents to try and determine whether the spear has been doing cold damage. They decide it probably has been. Quimarel begins speculating about the value of a Summon Ham spell to distract any giant spider-things they encounter in future, and the session ends.

Campaign Log -- More of Day Three

The 9th day of the month of Obad-Hai
The 110th year of the second Ravensblood dynasty

Makpov starts beating on the statue with his morningstar. The repairs aren’t very sturdy, so he easily bashes some large bits off.

“This’ll be fine,” says Tamarie, smiling serenely in her unnatural optimism.
“Yeah, we’re all going to die,” replies Quimarel. “I mean, it’ll probably be fine.”

They decide to get out of there before someone comes and sees them beating up the image of the god, so the three of them head to one of the other doors. It’s old and mostly rotted wood, and they push it open to find a scriptorium filled with broken desks and crumbling scrolls. Quimarel tries to read some of the scrolls, but their condition is far too poor. They search around the room to try and figure out what this ancient city they’ve found might be, but all they can gather is that all the furniture is goblin-sized, and the words they can make out on the scrolls seem to be somewhat akin to the modern Goblin language.

There are two doors out, and they pick the northern one. There’s a noise coming from behind it that doesn’t remind them of any language or any sound they’ve heard coming from a beast. They try the other door.

[Quimarel rolls Perception]
GM: You hear --
Hiddlebatch OOC: [completely incomprehensible sounds as a result of trying to tell the others something and eat snacks at the same time]
GM: -- that. You hear that.

In actual fact, all they can hear is the sound of muffled snoring. Quimarel makes another Perception check, and guesses that the people making the snoring noise are much larger than she is, but smaller than Makpov. Makpov suggests that he could sneak in there and lick them, inflicting his hallucinogenic saliva upon whomever the room contains. The others seem strangely on board with this, and try to open the door as quietly as possible. On the other side is a human chain gang, sleeping -- much like the goblins Hiddlebatch found itself chained to earlier that morning.

The characters who have lived in the Capran Protectorates for some time are more or less unfazed by this. A common sentence for criminals in Capra proper is several years’ hard labor in the Protectorates, so there are similar chain gangs working the nearby farms and digging out a mine not far to the north. This one just happens to be working for someone else -- and the jury is out on whether these are sentenced Capran criminals or just some folks the Kech kidnapped.

The team further debates the merit of applying hallucinogenic saliva to see what happens, but eventually Quimarel just shakes one of the humans awake.

“What -- blarg -- agh -- whaddayouwant?”
“Who are you?”
“Huh? Who are you?”
“We’re, um, a local rescue group.”
Sense Motive checks are rolled and failed.
“Um, hi. My name is Vinnheim.”
“How did you get down here?”
“Well, me and my… people here were doing our normal kind of… trade route… thing… nearby, We were just north of Noroiras… then these weird hairy people in robes jumped us, and we woke up down here.”

Sense Motive checks are rolled and failed. The prisoner’s inconsistent accent is discussed by the players, who declare that he sounds like he’s from “the Mississippi of Russia”.

“Hey,” says Vinnheim, “can you let us out? We had to kill this big spider thing yesterday because it was living in this room that the bosses wanted to check out…”
“Do you know the way out of here?”
“Well, there’s a big hole in the ceiling of the cavern over there. That’s probably the way out.”
The players are disappointed that there isn’t another exit.
“So, since you’ve been killing off the things infesting these rooms, you know which ones are clear and what’s in the ones that aren’t?”
“Yeah. Well, in the immediate area.”
“If you help us find who we’re looking for, we’d be happy to let you out.”
“Sure. Who are you looking for?”
“An employee of mine. She’s a gold-scaled kobold.”
“Oh, I have seen one of those down here. She’s in a different chain gang.”
“And also a racist priest with giant butterfly wings.”
“No, I think I would remember that.”

Tamarie picks the locks on the humans’ leg irons. As the humans get up and move towards the door, the group spots a dead insect/arachnid/crustacean thing in the corner, larger than anyone in the room except Makpov.

“Whoa,” says Quimarel, “how many of those are down here?”
“I think there are still a couple around.”
“And… do you know what the thing we heard on the other side of that door is?”
“Oh. You don’t want to go in there.”
“So you do know what it is.”
“Kind of?”
“Can you describe it?”
“No.”
Here the group stops moving and stares at Vinnheim until he explains. “It’s invisible.”
Cue chorus of “WHAT?!”

Hiddlebatch’s player, who ran a one-shot with a phantom fungus encounter a while back, chimes in at this point to warn them off, abruptly realizes she’s metagaming, and starts going, “No, I mean, I don’t know what it is. You should totally go in there.”

Vinnheim mentions that it also killed and ate a group of ten goblins yesterday, and they decide they’re not going to mess with that. He says that it’s actually a major concern for the bosses, because they thought they found something in one of the rooms around here, but when the invisible thing moved in, it made this part of the complex too dangerous for them to enter. At the suggestion of loot, the players begin planning strategies for getting past it, all with a distinctly pyrotechnic bent. Basically, they immediately decide that the best solution is to light the thing on fire, and then all their plans are about the best way to light things on fire with their current inventory.

“Oh,” says Quimarel, “you said my kobold was on another chain gang. Where are the other chain gangs?”
“I think the one she’s on is digging out a wall near here.” He leads them back to the large cavern where they started, and indicates a sizable building that’s about ¾ unearthed. “On the other side of that.”
“Mind sticking around until we find her?”
“Uh…”
“Just to make sure we can all get out.”
“I guess?”

Makpov decides the solution is to seduce this man. Whether Makpov has any kind of grasp on the situation is questionable. He makes his Charisma roll, as his player attempts to imitate “seductive” theme music.
Vinnheim is somewhat surprised, but rolls with it. “That’s very tempting… sir… but I think we’re going to have to put that on hold. Matter of life and death and all. Maybe we could get a drink later, though.” He goes back to his guide duties, and indicates a pair of double doors set into the large building. “Those doors will get you there, but you want to be careful, because I hear some of those spider things are making a nest in that building.”

Quimarel looks to her companions. “How do you feel about killing some spiders?”
Tamarie has some trademark optimism ready. “They’re real big, but I bet we can do it! Yeah!”

Quimarel begins formulating a plan that involves sending the former chain gang in first. The humans weren’t allowed to keep their weapons on them when they weren’t being watched, but she suggests they might be able to hit the spiders with the chains from their leg irons.

“Makpov,” she says, “you’ve got two weapons. We can give… Vinny here one of them. Would you help us if you were way better armed, Vinny?”
“... suuuuuuuuure.”
“He’s got a battle axe and a morningstar. Which one would you be more comfortable with?”
“You know, I think I can use an axe if it comes to it.”
Makpov decides to be motivating in his own innuendo-laden way. “Yeah you can.”

Quimarel OOC: Makpov is a motivational tool.

“Vinny, do you have any idea of approximately how many spiders are in here?”

GM: Let me check my notes… I say out of character, because the slaves don’t have notebooks.
Quimarel OOC: He barely has pants.

Vinny thinks there are only a couple.
Quimarel continues to pump him for information. “What’s the best way to kill them?”
“Hit them a lot? I don’t know; I’m not an expert combatant in spider-killing.”
Tamarie is skeptical. “You should be -- that’s what you do!”
“Not originally! Not until… um… I don’t know how long it’s been, because it’s always dark down here.”

Quimarel begins strategizing. “Okay, I’m small and fragile and my only decent weapon is this light crossbow, so I’m not going to be in the thick of this.” Quimarel’s strategies tend to focus around making sure nothing bad happens to Quimarel.

Vinny suggests that they just try to sneak through and avoid getting eaten by spiders altogether. “Not that I’m not willing to fight a spider!” The others decide this is a good plan, and go over to listen at the door. They can’t hear anything, so Quimarel opens the door as quietly as possible. Inside is an ancient ruined ballroom of some sort, with marble floors & wide open spaces & highly-decorative pillars. At the point where the pillars meet the ceiling, there are two spider-things crouched in a huge web, more or less motionless. There is some discussion regarding whether spiders sleep, and then they decide to “hug the wall and move quietly” until they get through.

Excuse me -- I will have you know that I am of the order Solifugae.
So knock it off with this "spider" business.

The highest Stealth check in the party is a 10 -- their feet echo on the marble floor, and the spider-things start descending. For the first time this session, the battle mat is unrolled and set up.

Tamarie: I have a real good feeling about this.

The spiders get to act first, and they spend their turn reaching the ground.

Quimarel immediately instructs Makpov to pick her up and run for the door they’re trying to reach. “I move slow, but I won’t weigh you down much.”

Quimarel OOC: On my character sheet, my weight is listed as “fuck off”.

They then begin hurriedly trying to decide what they should do now that their plan of "don't get eaten by spiders" looks to be on the verge of failing.

Quimarel OOC: What does Mending do?
GM: Fixes things.
Quimarel OOC: Does it fill in holes?
GM: Yes.
Quimarel OOC: If I cast Mending on the web, would it encase the spiders?
GM: No. That’s not fixing it, that’s making it do something it’s not designed to do.
Quimarel OOC: There are holes in the web.
GM: In the same way that there’s a hole in the wall called a “door”, yes.

Quimarel, riding on Makpov, fires a crossbow bolt and misses by a mile. Makpov uses her turn to run to the door. Tamarie and Vinny runs after them. The spiders follow. Vinny is closest to the spiders, and one of them bites him. Its enormous mandibles tear a gaping wound in his side, and he collapses.

Tamarie OOC: WHAT?!
GM: He had, like, four hp.
Tamarie OOC: FOUR?
GM: He’s just some guy.
Tamarie OOC: But he fights spiders and stuff!
GM: Yeah, they lose a lot of people doing that.
Quimarel OOC: We collected a redshirt!
Tamarie OOC: Get that axe back from him.
Makpov OOC: Yeah!
Quimarel OOC: And lick him real quick, so his last moments are trippy.

The other spider bites Makpov, doing significantly less damage. Luckily, they are nonvenomous. Quimarel gives the door a quick once-over for traps, then Makpov opens the door and runs through it. Tamarie follows, and closes the door behind them.

They find themselves in another large open cavern, with a goblin chain gang over at the edge. The chain gang also contains the kobold, Krich the Xenophilic, and a halfling that is probably her client, Alton Brambleforth. A Kech is guarding them, and he turns towards the noise.

“Who are you people?” he demands. “What are you doing down here?”
Quimarel attempts to think fast. “We’re here to save you.” She fails her Bluff check.
“Um… no. Guards! Guards!”
Makpov tries the same lie. “No, really, we’re here to save you.” It doesn’t work any better the second time.