11th Eyre, 998 YK
- Tamara does the recap, even though she wasn't present for the session, and is rewarded with an Advance on one of her themes.
- Tamara's recap missed a big part, so Ell recapped that part and also got a reward
- Tresca Teesbeak is still explaining the process to stabilize the forge, when Nerysdeth Soranath arrives! They overslept and also got lost on the way to Drummond Independents. They are wearing bells, so they hear them before they see them.
- Tresca stops and asks if Nerys is lost? They confirm they are, but they're looking for the group. They say Damien's name wrong.
- Nerys has bad drawings of each of them. Damien questions it, and Yashira is like "I dunno what you mean, it's a perfect rendition of you!"
- Nerys introduces themselves, they're part of the team! They were just late! They're new to Sharn.
- Ruckus welcomes having a person with "deth" in their name
- Nerysdeth writes that down. "They have deth on their side"
- But the A is missing
- Yashira says they can take it from Damien's name, he isn't using it
- Nerys asks what kind of adventure quest the group is on right now.
- Tresca explains that the group helped her friends with some strike action!
- Oh, unionising!
- Yashira asks for Nerys' thoughts on Unions?
- Nerys says they're one of her favourite foods
- Yashira likes them, they can come
- Nerys then notices Charlie, and that he looks familiar? Does he perform?
- Nerys has seen Trixie Towers' show before! Maybe? They'll talk about that later.
- Stoke comes over to see what's going on and makes the same joke as when they first met him, for Nerys. Damien loses it, saying it's funnier the second time.
- Steph has to put some washing out so they talk amongst themselves until she comes back
- They all talk a bit about their backgrounds. Nerys mentions eating little gelatinous cubes, which Yashira is not a fan of.
- The Brelish (most of them) do eat spiders though! Yashira likes the crunch
- Damien gets a pack of trail spiders out and shares them out with the group.
- The green ones are a real tongue tingler
- Steph comes back and we can move on from eating spiders
- Tresca is very perplexed.
- Nevermind, Nerys suggests they finish the job and then get some spiders on the way back.
- Charlie starts going off about werepigeons. The pigeons in Sharn are spies, and lycanthropes!
- They begin the ritual to stabilize the forge.
- Forge elementals emerge from the flames to try and stop them. Charlie blasts one of them with ice magic, which causes it to explode and set him on fire!
- Damien rushes to the fountain, filling his crucible with water, and then douses two of the elementals, which instantly turns them to steam!
- Yashira rushes and douses Charlie to put him out, but then gets jumped on by a forge elemental
- Nerys uses their magic to summon ocean water from the Principalities to get the elemental off of Yashira, making her look even more like a drowned rat than Charlie did (but also turning the elemental to mist)
- Ruckus grabs the crucible off of Damien, and begins running to fill it with molten metal. One of the elementals goes for him on the way, and then a mechanical arm emerges from Ruckus, but fails to save him. He is tackled to the ground by the elemental, which begins burning him.
- Damien throws off his coat, dipping it into the water to make it wet, and then gets tackled by his own forge elemental. Now they both need help!
- Charlie runs over to help, waves his staff around, and tries to conjure ice to help. Nothing happens. At all.
- Yashira runs over, takes Charlie's (sopping wet) coat off and then rushes to smother the elemental on Ruckus, vaporising it but getting burned in the process
- Now free, Ruckus fills the crucible and rushes it to Tresca and pours it on the symbols
- The forge responds immediately, sending a wave of searing heat out. Nerys conjures the story of a blizzard to try and counteract it, but is unable to protect everyone. Yashira gets burned even more. She considers using Charlie's coat as a shield, but in the moment realises how loved it is and can't bring herself to destroy it. Instead, she uses her cape to try and protect herself.
- She avoids further injury, but loses her cape in the process
- Damien rolls around for a bit with the elemental on him, and then tries to Orien Step away, but his burns stop him from mustering the concentration and he just blinks in place.
- Yashira bundles up Charlie's coat and wraps it around her shoulder, and then shoulder checks the elemental off of Damien and pushes it into the fountain.
- Another wave of elemental emerge, but Stoke just smacks one of them back into the forge.
- Charlie is quite embarassed, with his coat missing and his magic failing him. He's also covered in water and they can all see his nipples through his shirt.
- He takes a page out of Stoke's book and tries to push one of the elementals back into the forge. It holds onto the staff though, and when Charlie pulls it out, the elemental is on the staff and spits a glob of fire into Charlie's face
- Nerys starts spinning a tale about a water genasi, and molds the water that hasn't evaporated and engulfs two of the elementals, extinguishing them.
- Ruckus sprints to Charlie to help him with the elemental on his staff, and his uses exosuits arms to backhand the elemental off of Charlie
- This works, but it causes the elemental to explode!
- Charlie, Damien, Ruckus and Yashira are all in the range.
- Charlie tries to summon ice armour to take the hit
- Damien is too distracted by his own burns to teleport, and takes the full brunt of it
- Yashira bundles Ruckus up and takes the burn for him
- Damien is now super burned, he needs help
- "King, no more trying to teleport. You got feet, use em, get in the water"
- Damien stumbles over the fountain and Ban pushes him over the edge into the water.
- Damien has never experienced bliss like getting in cold water with 4 stacks of burned
- The forge is almost stabilized, and the forge erupts again with a wave of superheated air
- Nerys rushes to shield the others with his book, and the book sets on fire
- Damien is fine, in the water
- Ban joins him in the water
- Charlie and Yashira both drop to the ground but it fails to save them. Ruckus burns up despite being wrapped in Charlie's wet coat
- With that final wave of heat, the forge is stable and Tresca looks up from the runes. She takes in the chaos, the burned heroes, and then cheerfully calls "great work, everyone!"
- Tresca mentions that now they can start working on the idol!
- Everyone (except Nerys) jumps in the fountain to try and cool off. The water turns brown after Ruckus gets in. This is his first bath in weeks.
- Yashira retrieves Charlie's coat and apologises to him for using it as a shield, she'll patch it up!
- Nerys begins to cry about her book getting burned. Yashira tries to comfort them, they can get a new book!
- But they wrote so many stories in that book!
- Yashira tries to get Nerys to see that they can write new stories, it's a new beginning, not an ending!
- All of them are traumatised by today, they'll never view fire the same again.
- Tresca finishes the Burning Idol, and then passes it to Charlie. "It's warm, but should be safe to touch!"
- Tresca thanks them for their help, she probably would've died without their help!
- That's all they need from here, they can head back to Clifftop!
- Yashira asks Damien if she can ask a question, and he asks if he can have some wine first. Yashira agrees it'd probably be better.
- Nerys asks about the mechanical arms that came out of Ruckus' backpack. Ruckus is a bit cagey about it, just says it's something he was working on in his spare time.
- Ruckus deploys the full exosuit, so two mechanical arms emerge and a brace goes over his legs.
- Nerys asks what was the thought behind this?
- Ruckus says he's been watching a lot of warforged down in the Cogs. Yashira asks if he's using actual warforged arms?
- "What? No, of course not!"
- The design is just inspired by them!
- Whilst they're grilling Ruckus, a booming voice calls out "Drummond! You worm! We've come to collect"
- They strongly debate just leaving, but they probably should investigate. At the least just go see what's going on
- They head out to the front of the workshop and see what's going on.
- They see a twelve-foot tall, two-headed woman built like a lightning rail car waiting outside the gate, thumping a club off the ground. "Blood or money, Drummond." says one head. "Money or blood" says the other
- Drummond sees the group and begs them to help. "All will be forgiven if you get rid of her!"
- Oh, all will be forgiven will it?
- Yashira asks what's actually going on?
- Yadha-Ro explains that Drummond hasn't been paying his protection money!
- Nerys asks what they need protection from? Are they like an insurance company?
- Something like that
- Ruckus says they don't wanna piss off Daask.
- Damien asks if Drummond has wine?
- He does!
- Damien asks if they can pay with the wine?
- Yadha says they're mostly here to send a message. Does he prefer his left or right leg?
- Ah
- Nerys tries to delay, saying he can pay in a week! Then nobody has to get hurt?
- Ro was really looking forward to breaking his legs, though
- Nerys, Ruckus and Yashira all interject and try to convince them. Yashira mentions someone else who's short, throwing them under the bus to buy some time.
- Yadha-Ro aren't unreasonable, they're business people. They're open to negotiations, what if the group owe them a favour?
- Nerys is confused, why would an insurance company need adventurers?
- Yadha-Ro, perplexed, looks to Yashira instead
- Yashira thinks they've done them enough favours? They wouldn't know about that other debtor!
- Yadha-Ro gets into her face and intimidates her, and she fast talks them out of her own legs being broken.
- Yadha-Ro will be back if Yashira's lead doesn't pan out.
- Nerys asks if she should get insurance?
- No, no no no no no
- Yashira orders Drummond to get his finest wine for Damien, since they're now involved in his bullshit. He retrieves a pretty shitty wine.
- Well, they can't be too hard on him
- They ask how much money he owes? He says the fee is like 200gp a month
- And he's behind?
- He mumbles
- Yashira's patience is running very thin, she asks again
- He owes like 350gp if they don't add any more.
- Nerys says "oh interest, I've heard of that!"
- Sovereigns above
- So they need to pay that off, make sure Daask don't add more interest, and also ensure that the business is in a good enough position to keep paying his workers and Daask
- Charlie goes through Drummond's books and rips into his expenses. He voted on Pegasus in the Race of Eight Winds? What is he doing?
- He does make enough money from the forge to pay the workers and Daask, if he managed his own expenses better. Charlie suggests cheaper "going out" activities that aren't Hareth's Folly.
- This is a solveable problem!
- Drummond comments that they've put him in a difficult situation here
- "It's really not" - Yashira
- but at least he still has both his legs
- Drummond's had enough of them, and asks them to leave.
- Yashira chews him out. It's not just him on the block here! If he doesn't pay Daask, his legs will be broken (tragedy), his workers won't be paid, and Daask will probably come for Yashira! "Spend less on personal expenses, pay your workers better, and you'll probably find the income improves! People do better when they feel valued!"
- He takes this in, thanks them, and then asks them again to leave. He also comments that one of them smells really bad.
- Ruckus says "hey! Damien doesn't smell that bad!"
- They leave, and return to Clifftop Adventurer's Guild with the idol.
- On their way, a common street rat gets in their way and speaks to them. "Your help of Chandra Thane was appreciated. If you ever need a favour from her new family, say it in ear shot of a rat and we'll find you"
- Damien looks at the bottle of wine in shock.
- Charlie starts going on about his shapeshifter conspiracies again.
- Ban's very chill
- They proceed to Clifftop, where Lhara is waiting for them. She asks how it went with a grin
- Several seconds of silence from the group who look like drowned, burned rats. Damien takes a swig.
- Okay
- Well, they got the idol at least
- Charlie gives Lhara the idol.
- Speaking of which, Lhara has someone to introduce them to! She takes them to her office, where a well-to-do academic is waiting for him. He doesn't notice their arrival, until Lhara clears her throat.
- Lhara introduces them to Professor Nigel Faurious, the client for this job!
- Nigel asks if they are going to ask why he wanted the idol?
- Charlie takes the bait, and Nigel infodumps about the planes and manifest zones to him. Lhara interrupts, saying the rest of them don't have time for this. Nigel and Charlie schedule a date to discuss it further.
- Damien and Yashira are just passing the bottle of wine between each other, washing down some crunchy spiders.
- A couple of days later, they read about their own adventure in the Voice of Breland, Houses fund 'forged Riot in the Cogs (CM)
- We'll start next session with PAYING THEM FOR THE JOB THEY JUST DID and a camping scene before the next adventure.