Dramatis Personae
Beltin (Aasimar Dirge Bard/Cleric 11).
"Jake" aka Alex, the actual character name but I refuse to go back and edit the old entries (Human Wizard/Rogue 11).
The Smith (LN Half-Giant Aegis/Psychic Warrior 11).
This ain't no charity, Session 16.2 - 10/10/14
Day 33
The day after their rather anti-climactic victory over the dragon Malerix, the party, and by party I mean Jake and Jake alone, decides what to do with their shiny, "new" firebase. The party teleports back to the Camp, leaving the Greed Elementals to hold things down while they are gone.
As soon as they arrive in the town square, near the gallows, it is clear that something has happened while they were gone. Several buildings are heavily damaged and there is smoke coming from the north west part of town, like several huge bonfires had been lit. Make shift barricades and defenses are placed at key points. Groups of crusaders are patrolling around as craftsmen work to repair damaged structures. Old time campers sit around in their usual spots looking mostly nonplussed regardless of the strangeness around them.
Beltin and Jake approach one of the old timers and ask what the hell happened. The Smith, not caring and missing the forge, leaves to get back to his true passion. One of the old timers explains that there was some sort of massive spider raid on the Camp, like dozens if not hundreds of the bastards; the camper is drunk, as it tradition, so numbers do not seem to be his strong suit. Rumor is there queen was killed and they blamed the Camp, so they gathered and came en mass to take revenge and slaughter the Camp to the last man.
Fortunately Skeriber and his boys knew they were coming and gave warning. The crusaders built defenses and got ready. They let the ashborne arachnae push in before surrounding and decimating them; the north west section of the Camp got wrecked. Between the crusaders and the adventurers in town, the beasts stood little chance and were nearly all slaughtered. The smoke the party saw was from pyres for the creatures and for the Camp dead; all things considered, not many people were lost and most of them were no body important, though a high ranking crusader went down.
Percentile dice are rolled; yep, it was one of the people Beltin sold a mansion to, so now it reverts back to him as per his sleazy, dishonest real estate contract. Great success! More dice rolls confirm that no player property was in the war zone. More success!
The old timer continues that it seems that the Usurer didn't do shit and left it to the crusade to protect the Camp and now the crusaders are marching about like they own the place... huh, looks like there might be more bloodshed to come, but this time from within, concludes the drunk with an air of complete indifference.
Jake and Beltin response: "Kthxbai."
The Smith
Missing the explanation, the Smith heads straight for the Usurer and the forge and when he arrives he sees the Usurer talking to several men, all high ranking crusaders by their apparel. The Usurer is smiling the kind of smile that's more about showing teeth with the implied threat they may soon find your throat than about expressing warmness, but the crusaders talking to him either seem to not realize the dangerous ground they were treading or don't care. They seem agitated except for one; though the Smith wouldn't recognize him, the calm one is the head crusader, the leader, and a man who also has a reputation as one that is not to be trifled with.
It seems there is a disagreement of sorts happening before him, but being the Smith, he is uninterested and instead walks up and starts pointing out the flaws in the fine armor these important men are wearing. He does so not out of hubris or the will to mock them, but simply because he sees. One of the already affronted looking men looks more affronted and explains how his armor was past down for generations and was forged by the renowned smith X, etc, etc.
The whole exchange causes the Usurer to laugh in the man's face before telling the crusaders that they will have to continue this discussion another time as he has business to conduct. The crusaders leave but it is clear that they still have issues. The Smith gets some dirty looks on the way out, but he of course doesn't care.
The Usurer greets him warmly and with a real smile and brings out the manifest of the work that needs down, but the Smith stops him. He tells the Usurer that for his services he requires additional compensation on top of his dirt floor near the forge accommodations: He requires daily rations of bread and water. The Usurer considers this momentarily and says he thinks he can manage that. The Smith nods to him and goes to the forge. Oh, how he has missed it.
Jake and Beltin
The two non-smiths head over to the crusader area and look to into meeting up with a high ranking crusader; they have business to conduct. Beltin sold a house to a man fitting that criteria, a man by the name of Rinswald, a man who happens to be in charge of the crusades tactical plans for cleansing the Desolation. They decide to pay a visit to Rinswald as he is the highest crusader they have had any dealings with.
They approach the crusade "high command," a semi-permanent, large tent structure. They are stopped by two guards outside and asked their business. They say they have important intel to deliver concerning a staging position for entry into Tsar. They are told to wait as one man goes inside and then 10 minutes later they are escorted inside.
The guard leads them into a fairly large room dominated by a table covered with a large map, clearly of the Desolation. It's covered with markers perhaps designating potential areas of interest, battles, and such. Jake and Beltin don't give a shit and a couple minutes later a stern looking man, Rinswald, walks in and tells them to give the goods.
Jake tells him to simmer down and that this kind of info doesn't come cheap. Rinswald gives Jake a look that clearly states his thoughts about money grubbing mercenaries such as himself, but to drive the point home he begins to lecture him on civil duty, concluding that some would say it is his moral obligation to deliver any information concerning the Desolation to the churches of Muir/Thyr and that duty is its own reward.
Jake disagrees, stating they didn't kill Malerix for nothing (this gets Rinswald attention), but before things can escalate Beltin intercedes and says that though they are devout believers in the cause of the crusade they are also a business; plus with one good deal the party will think of the crusade first for any other intel they find. Rinswald looks skeptical about one of those claims but then asks for a price.
Jake says 20,000 bits. Rinswald argues for 5,000. They end up meeting at 12,000 with conditions. The party will lead a group of the crusader engineers to scout the area and dependent on their report they will have a deal. The party will receive 5,000 bits up front but will be required to reimburse the crusade should a deal not be made. Lastly, the party will be responsible for making sure the area is secure until the crusade can move men into the area. Should things check out, it should take about a week for the crusaders to muster and prepare supplies for an appropriately sized force.
Jake agrees and says that he can teleport the inspectors to the site at any time. Rinswald says they will be ready within the hour.
An hour later, Jake meets with Horace, the crusader friend of the late BW, and a few crusader engineers. As they never actually met, the BW connection is not brought up, though Horace must know this was one of his friend's old partners. Jake teleports the men out to the firebase and the inspection begins.
The Greed Elementals stay out of the way though Horace questions them and Jake about the resistance faced here and from the surrounding area. Things have been keeping away, perhaps due to the reputation of the former occupants, so that's something. The engineers look over the position and declare it sound, but then they find the strangely marked canisters.
Jake tries to call is a selling point as they come with the place, but Horace and his men find this to be a dubious claim, especially after one of them recognizes the symbol of Tsar on them. The party negotiates with the crusaders and decide that they will take a canister back to be examined, but should they be a hazard to the firebase then the party will be responsible for eliminating them as per the "party must secure location" clause of the previous agreement.
They shake on it and they teleport back, but this time outside the Camp limits due to the unknown canister they have in tow. The engineers stay and guard it while Horace heads back to the high command and Jake leaves to do his thing. On the way back, Horace is friendly and asks for a blow by blow of what happened with the tar dragon. Jake tells him with minor embellishments to make himself look good and Horace is clearly impressed.
Later that day Jake is summoned to the high command, but instead of meeting with Rinswald or Horace, he is led to an agitated looking bureaucrat bearing a holy symbol of Thyr. The man doesn't waste time of pleasantries.
He explains that the canisters are dangerous and as such are the party's problem. Get rid of them. Jake inquires further and after a little resistance the bureaucratic crusader tells him they contain plagues.
They are weapons. Perhaps highly unstable weapons, given how regardless of their seeming preservation, they are several hundred year old thin metal cases holding horrible death inside. They don't know how to safely get rid of them, but that ain't their problem now.
He passes some paperwork on to Jake, saying it is a contract saying the destruction of the canisters will be carried out by the Greed Elementals as per the previous verbal agreement. The ease of which he is being put into the position of being responsible for highly dangerous biological weapons isn't lost on Jake.
The proper paperwork gets done and once it is the paper pusher of Thyr relaxes; it seems now that this is someone else's problem he can relax as the party will most definitely not hold onto weapons of mass destruction for their own potential use. Jake says they will bury them somewhere or something and no one will ever find them. Whatever, says the man behind the desk and Jake is dismissed.
Fun fact: The bureaucrat doesn't really care as his part is done. Yay, shortsightedness!
Fun fact 2: Due to clerical errors, the whole "we found biological weapons from Tsar" report never actually made it up to the actual high command, as if it did, they would not be okay with leaving their destruction to a band of highly suspect mercenaries.
But such is life. If only BW were still alive the party could become arms dealers to terrorists in the south. Missed opportunity.
After the meeting with the strange little crusader man, Jake meets up with Beltin and explains what they have. Yep, we're gonna keep those they decide. Perhaps at some point they can use them to hold Bard's Gate to ransom or something, brainstorms the party barring the Smith. Jake it seems just can't wait for the Greed Elementals to be branded a terrorist organization and get a crusade declared all over their punk asses.
The two collect the canister still stored near the Camp (after signing a release for it of course). It is decided that Beltin will make a worthless undead hold onto it and then he will store that undead in his staff for safe keeping.
Days 34-40
There is some down time while the party waits for the crusaders to muster before heading out to relieve the Greed Elementals of command.
The Smith spends his time working at the forge and has all the bread he can eat. At one point Beltin arrives with his share of the bits for the firebase deal; seeing them as worthless bits of metal, the Smith throws them into the fire and melts the several thousand bits into a few iron ingots. Beltin facepalms on the inside and decides he will never give the Smith money ever again.
The party debates looking into materials to create a private forge for the Smith at the Greed Elementals base (yay, not getting gouged by the Usurer for using his forge!), but no definite plans are made. The party gets the feeling they will still end up having to pay the Usurer off for bypassing his service fees.
Jake and Beltin spend most of the week back at the firebase. They teleport in, but on the night after the crusaders inspected the place the firebase was attacked by a large group of mostly stupid creatures. Due to the defenses of the place the Greed Elementals fought them off, but one man died.
The number of creatures involved was odd; it seems like something was corralling them in the base's direction. A few men thought they say demonic looking figures herding the beasts of the Desolation toward them.
Probing for weakness: Their enemies found some.
This is unacceptable to Jake and Beltin, so they stay. More "natural" attacks come, but this time Beltin is there and calls forth his skeletal tar dragon. Similar herding instances happen a few more times in the next few days, but each time undead Malerix is there which leads to predictable results.
Probing for weakness: Their enemies found none. The attacks cease and the firebase's reputation among the intelligent beings of the waste stays intact: "Not worth the effort."
Days 41 and 42
Beltin and Jake head back to the Camp and meet with the crusader expedition. They have 50 men and supplies for the long haul. They are ready to go. The expedition leader tells them they are ready to be led them to the spot, but Jake disagrees that leading them is their responsibility. They told them the location; it's not their job to get them there.
Things get nasty with the expedition leader but eventually Jake offers the party's services to escort the expedition as extra security. He asks for a rather outrageous sum and is refused. Fine, Jake says, see you guys when you get there. Yay, reputation decrease!
The whole party reunites and teleports out to the firebase to await the crusade expedition. While they wait, they plan their own moves to explore Tsar.
They know that supposedly the two side gates are destroyed and open for anyone who wants to enter, and that the main gates below that rather ominous tower known as the Tower of Weeping Sores is also reported to still be open... But then again they could just fly over the walls, so who needs gates?
Feeling they could use a good dungeon crawl, the party decides investigating the Tower of Weeping Sores will be their first outing into Tsar. What could possibly go wrong there, right?
End of session. No casualties besides a nameless grunt.
