Session 14 – Hammer Time

Campaign II, session 14. Previous: Session 13. Next: Session 15.

Interlude

• Mireya follows up on the allegedly crooked guards, trying to find out if money is being passed around under the table, and generally getting a sense of Bastion’s underground. She picks up the Streetwise proficiency.

  • The guards in question plead down to a lesser charge — unlicensed gambling: “no, we weren’t taking a bribe, he just owed us money for a lost bet!”

• Over the next few weeks, all the Lhazaarans in Bastion are rounded up, either on charges or for their own “protection.” Count Leng also calls up a militia and clashes with other Lhazaaran patrols in the area, taking many prisoners — and cultivating a reputation for treating captives well, at least inside Bastion.

  • Some prisoners are exchanged back to the Lhazaarans, like for like; others are exported to Atur for their fates to be decided later. There are rumors that a few are taken outside Bastion for “enhanced interrogation.”

• Fenmyra spends a couple of months with a local physician named Corin, learning the first rank of Healing.

• Cresilde accepts an offer to help study and identify the two magic items y’all retrieved earlier, working with the mage Thamior of the Hall of Scrolls. Afterward she works alongside the Count’s personal physician, Halven Rusk, keeping prisoners treated and fit to travel — the Count wants enough local prison capacity that those who can be moved are exchanged out or sent to Atur quickly, with only a few exceptions.

• Vezkha learns Caving from some of the local dwarves. Along the way she picks up a sidekick named Grath, a young orcblooded who wants to learn the ways of smashing!

  

• Vierath picks up two potential adventure hooks – he has arranged with Kerowyn Hucrele to transport a Sairan deserter to Fort Teryk, where the man is wanted for trial, and he has found a treasure map to a supposedly magical warhammer in the ruins of an Ancient Academy north of Bastion.

• When you finally meet up to plan your next moves together, a total stranger shows up, who seems to know you better than he should. Eventually he removes his hat, adjusts his hair and makeup, changes his voice, and reveals himself to be Zydell — he’s spent the downtime picking up the Disguise proficiency!

The Ancient Academy

Armed with Vierath’s treasure map, the party treks north to find the ruins of the Ancient Academy.

• Encounter: sheep

• Encounter: vista

• Into the dungeon

  • A giant statue of a bipedal frog

  • A sunken room with zombies and a gem

  • A ruined lab with one green potion (rampaging bugbear)

  • A ruined study with some salvageable notes on pond ecology and a spellbook

  • A ruined armory with rusty chainmail and spears

  • A couple of smashed up monk’s quarters (one had skeletons)

  • Abandoned storage room (ink and moldy paper)

  • Smoky bandits

    • A decent plan for smoking them out, but lack of prep for the bandits to run around the other side

    • A round of surprise on both sides, then a round of total misses, then a round of slaughtering bandits (one managed to slink off unseen)

  • Smoking down the bees

  • Ancient Crypt (6 more skeletons with ceremonial necklaces)

  • Cultists (Vezhka immune to fear, then Vezhka “dies” for a round)

  • Listen at the door, hear sounds of gnawing and crunching on bones

    • It’s an undead creature, gnawing on the corpse of another cultist!

    • Vezhka charges in, and strikes a solid blow. The creature retaliates, and after gouging Vezhka with its claw, she starts spasming uncontrollably and falls to the ground.

    • It was wearing a golden necklace and a discarded hammer (magical) could be found in the corner

    • Vezhka’s paralysis is cured by Cresilde, but she is still suffering from chills, shivering, pallid complexion and intense lethargy. It’s some kind of magical disease that will need a magical cure…