Bishop quickly follows Pious. He is very excited to be inducted as a priest. "Well you see, when I first arrived in town, there was an issue with some guards. After talking with the captain, he recommended that I get some sort of disguise. His mage then cast this disguise on me and gave me paperwork to be signed by the head cleric. As much as I hate having to hide myself, it felt good to not be looked at like some sort of monster."
Aelar works his shift and listens carefully. He learns a little bit, but doesn't hear much to work off of. At the end of the night, he takes the key from Vior and makes his way to bed.
Lenzo agrees to find Answell for a drink, and makes sure to ask what tavern Answell frequents the most. Then, Lenzo bids Answell a good day and leaves to make his way to the Darkmast home, where he will speak with his father to learn of the family's current state of affairs, and more about the strange attack by the anarchists.
Given the circumstances, Ulrich accepts the man's words and signs the paper, writing in information as necessary. "Then I shall consider myself as a sorcerer of this College while... While I find my path." He reflects on the nature of his magic some, wondering just how he will be able to develop it. "And... Your name, may I ask what it is?"
He nods once and carefully takes the papers back from Ulrich. "Zilech," he says calmly. "As part of the College you are provided residence and a small stipend. It is suggested that you...hone your talents to earn currency for any additional needs."
Zilech got up from the desk and moved over to a small bookshelf. He hunted through it for a moment, and then pulled out a small chest. He opened the chest and you could ear the tinkling of coin. After a moment he pulled out a small pouch.
"Here," Zilech said. "Your first stipend. Five silver. We will need time to prepare you one of the College residences. I suggest staying at one of the many inns in the meanwhile." Zilech breathed out slowly. "The cheapest and most...accepting would be the Immoral Wench. There is a navigation point not too far from the Spire that can take you to the Clueless Navigator. From there it is about an hours walk south to the Immoral Wench."
When looking into the bag, you also find a small emblem with the same symbol that marks the door.
Wilkas returns to his parents' house and opens the door further, waiting a few moments before he decides to step inside.
As you step through the door you are hit by silence. It is eerie and unsettling. You've never known your family home to be silent. You don't see any of the usual servants bustling about, and all of the doors are shut on the first floor. There are two doors to your right and left, and a large pair of double doors under the stairs that you know leads to a dining hall and the ballroom.
The double set of stairs leads up to the second floor, a study right above the dining room and a few guests quarters and the servants quarters are there as well. The stairs continue up to the sides leading to the bedrooms, library, lesson halls, and various studies and sitting rooms. The amount of rooms honestly was rather ridiculous, but it is what you grew up with.
Angelus returns her smile and says, "I'd like to go to the clueless navigator please, and once again, thank you for being the first decent person I've met in this city."
She smiled, although it was more like the smile an exasperated parent gave to their child. With a wave of her hand the circles powers up with magic. The world around you blurs and when it comes back you are not in Madam Shyddra's back room. Instead you are in a place wrapped in wood. There are barrels and a tired looking human who waves to you.
"Welcome to the Clueless Navigator; please step out of the circle and be on your way."
Bishop quickly follows Pious. He is very excited to be inducted as a priest. "Well you see, when I first arrived in town, there was an issue with some guards. After talking with the captain, he recommended that I get some sort of disguise. His mage then cast this disguise on me and gave me paperwork to be signed by the head cleric. As much as I hate having to hide myself, it felt good to not be looked at like some sort of monster."
"The head cleric?" Pious sighed. "I will send a missive then. Honestly, that boy..." he shakes his head and opens a door that leads into what looks to be an office. "Sit, sit." Pious moves around you and begins to pull out several small pieces of papers that he places before you. With those out of the way he hauls up a chest and roots around in that as well before he drops a small bag of coin in front of you. He places the chest back where he pulled it from and moves towards the back wall. With a hum Pious runs his fingers along the books, and then plucks one out and places that also on the table.
It is similar to Feltorious' book.
"Fill out the paperwork to join our clergy," Pious says calmly. "In the bag you will find five silver and an our emblem. Keep the emblem on you. This will be your prayer book, keep it on you as well." Pious settled behind the desk. "You will be provided that five silver stipend and are encouraged to seek out work while you bring the care of the Mother to the world. You will be offered a residence but that takes time to set up. You may spend the night here or return to an inn. If you choose an inn...I;d suggest the Immoral Wench; Rheim tends to be fairly tolerant although..." Pious hummed.
Aelar works his shift and listens carefully. He learns a little bit, but doesn't hear much to work off of. At the end of the night, he takes the key from Vior and makes his way to bed.
You settle in to sleep with no trouble for the time being.
Lenzo agrees to find Answell for a drink, and makes sure to ask what tavern Answell frequents the most. Then, Lenzo bids Answell a good day and leaves to make his way to the Darkmast home, where he will speak with his father to learn of the family's current state of affairs, and more about the strange attack by the anarchists.
The route to your family's home is rather short. You can see several children darting around the small, homely house. They are laughing and cheering and a women watches them fondly. She see's you approach and lets out a slight gasp, rising to her feet almost instantly.
"Lenzo?" she cheers, and you recognize her as your cousin Tamela. She wastes no time before she's right up next to you, arms wrapped around you in a hug. "Welcome home," she breathes out.
Ulrich idly examines the emblem from the bag as he listens to the directions given by Zilech. The names of inns and the like in these areas struck him as odd and inelegant, but he accepted he couldn't be terribly picky about such things at the moment, nor could he wonder about the quality of such an establishment. Cheap and accepting would have to do for now. "I thank you for everything. I'll be on my way, now," Ulrich says with a nod. With a deep breath, steeling himself to face the outside once more, he turns and steps out of the room to follow the given instructions through the city and to the building known as the Immoral Wench. All the while, he keeps a steady grip on the bag and the emblem, wishing for no further difficulty from any of the great city's guards or anyone else of the like.
Wilkas is thoroughly confused. Curiouser and curiouser, he thinks as he walks in and starts searching the house, starting on the ground floor, going clockwise, then advancing to the next floor, going counterclockwise, until he finds someone or he finishes scouring the house.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Do you have difficulty fitting everything you want into your signature? Then check out the Extended Signature thread!
Angelus returns her smile and says, "I'd like to go to the clueless navigator please, and once again, thank you for being the first decent person I've met in this city."
She smiled, although it was more like the smile an exasperated parent gave to their child. With a wave of her hand the circles powers up with magic. The world around you blurs and when it comes back you are not in Madam Shyddra's back room. Instead you are in a place wrapped in wood. There are barrels and a tired looking human who waves to you.
"Welcome to the Clueless Navigator; please step out of the circle and be on your way."
"Right, then. If you could just point me in the direction of Rhein's place? Or was her name Rhyme? Something about a wench. I think." Angelus looked like he was trying to remember, but he wasn't very good with human names, or places. It all sounded the same to him. He looked expectantly at the tired human, so that he could hurry on his way.
At his cousin's embrace, any doubts that Lenzo had about his presence in the city evaporate. He feels a resurgence of affection for his family, and remembers how important it is that he prevents Vlaakith from destroying it. He can't muster what it would take to tell Tamela it's good to be home, since that isn't quite how Lenzo feels. For the first time, it occurs to Lenzo that it's going to be very difficult to explain to his family why he's back.
After returning Tamela's enthusiastic hug, Lenzo says, "Tell me, how are you? How is the family? I've heard ill tidings about things in the city."
Ulrich idly examines the emblem from the bag as he listens to the directions given by Zilech. The names of inns and the like in these areas struck him as odd and inelegant, but he accepted he couldn't be terribly picky about such things at the moment, nor could he wonder about the quality of such an establishment. Cheap and accepting would have to do for now. "I thank you for everything. I'll be on my way, now," Ulrich says with a nod. With a deep breath, steeling himself to face the outside once more, he turns and steps out of the room to follow the given instructions through the city and to the building known as the Immoral Wench. All the while, he keeps a steady grip on the bag and the emblem, wishing for no further difficulty from any of the great city's guards or anyone else of the like.
The first stop was to find someone who could take Ulrich to the transport that would pull him along to The Clueless Navigator. There was one such location here inside the Spire thankfully, and with short order Ulrich found himself between the two locations. From there, according to Zilech, it was a rough hour to two hour walk across the port to reach the Immoral Wench. Ulrich arrives at the location close to closing time. The inside is rowdy, patrons having their last send off before they are removed from the premises. Ulrich can see a somewhat stought, Rashemi woman standing off in the corner with her arms crossed and a sharp look about her. She watches the patrons like a hawk.
Behind the bar is a dwarf, he bustles about with the last orders of the night.
Wilkas is thoroughly confused. Curiouser and curiouser, he thinks as he walks in and starts searching the house, starting on the ground floor, going clockwise, then advancing to the next floor, going counterclockwise, until he finds someone or he finishes scouring the house.
The right door leads down a slight hall to three rooms. The first is a sitting room that your mother uses to entertain guests. The second room is a small reading room that, again, tends to be for guests and tending to guests. The third leads to a small enclosed green room. In each of these rooms you find nothing undisturbed, no signs of real life.
The left door leads down a slight hall to three more rooms. The first is a small library. Your father would handle meetings with other genteel folk here. The second is an office, where he tended toward business contracts. The third leads out to an open air patio typically used for smoking.
The dining hall is large and often hosted parties. You see a few plates settled out onto the large table that the servants would move when there was something more akin to a ball going on. There is a small patio to the back of the room, open air, leading out to the gardens in the back of the house. There are two additional doors here. The right side leads toward the kitchens and the cooks rooms. The larder is empty aside from a few mice and a few rats shuffling about. The large, wood burning oven is cold. The ashes and embers haven't been touched for some time. There are plates and dishes out, what looks to be meal preparation that has been left alone. There is a door that leads to the cooking staffs quarters.
You take careful time to draw out the symbol you knew was to one of the beings you could pull from; the ritual is short and with the passing of the crow you find yourself oddly…strengthened.
(Binding Check 16 for Naberius)
You try and determine how long it has been since the kitchen has been used, looking at the oven and embers, and the meal that seems to be part-way prepared
(Investigation 21)
It has been exactly 8 hours. You also notice that there is no signs of struggle. It is as if they cooks just got up and left mid-work.
There is a hallway that leads to several doors. Small common room, bathing rooms, a small meal room, connection to the larder. Three of the doors lead toward the sleeping rooms. You know the cooking staff tends to share rooms. As you open the door to the first of the sleeping rooms the smell hits you first. You recognize it. Corpse. Stepping into the room you see three of the cooking staff lain out on their beds, a knife stabbed into each of their necks. You notice that their throats were slit and the knife is placed into the center of the wound. Judging by the pool of blood both on the beds and on the ground, they bled out. There is no signs of a struggle. Their eyes are closed, hands placed on top of their chest. If it weren't for the knife and the blood you could almost see them as merely sleeping.
There is a single word on the wall, written in their blood.
STOLEN
(Investigation 15; Medicine 5)
You don't know much about the body, you didn't entirely observe the effects of your own kills. You can tell they are stiff, and judging by the smell at least several hours old. You can't judge the rigidity properly to get an exact time of death, but you know it to be somewhere in the vacinity of two hours or more.
You can reasonable assume by the dried blood that it's more likely 8 hours. Maybe a little less. While you are investigating you do notice something under the bed. Kneeling down you can't quite get a good look at what caught your attention. Whatever it is, is on the floor. It looks to be some sort of drawing.
You are able to move the bed. It's not that heavy and you can shove it aside with a bit of effort. Once the bed is out of the way enough to get a good look at the drawing, you see white lines of chalk. The chalk loops around into a seal, not unlike what you would leave behind with your kills. Except something about this seal is vastly different. It leaves you with a chill.
With a bit of effort you are able to shove the bed back into place.
The other three bedrooms are in a similar state. On the wall behind the victims are another two words.
OURS
YOURS
You checked the rest of the rooms, there was nothing of note. No bodies, no signs of any struggle, and everything is left where it was undisturbed.
The left side on the dining hall, that door leads to a private dining room that is again undisturbed. Upstairs you can go to the left or the right. The stairs loop around to a landing that brings the two sides of the house together. Directly above the dining/ballroom is the library with two double doors. It is a rather large area as your family has amassed quite a few books. Some arcana, some religion, some history -- its an eclectic mess.
The left side is the family wing. Your parents master bedroom is settled in the middle of the hall, a few study, play rooms, and sitting rooms specifically for family and entertainment nestle furthest back. Your bedroom, your brothers bedroom, and your sisters bedroom are closer toward the center with your parents. Yours is only a few doors down from the entrance to the hall, your brothers being closest to your parents with him being the youngest--the baby--and your sisters closer toward the study rooms. There are a few bathing rooms dotted around too -- you notice these aren't bothered when you look into them and neither are the studies, the play room, or any other room.
You open the door to your bedroom and find it completely and utterly trashed. Books from your shelves are flung about the room, some with pages torn. Your bed is overturned, the sheets ripped apart -- table, chairs; nothing seems to have survived the assault. You find the same sigil this time burned into your wall alongside the word:
BETRAYER.
Annoyed, you leave and seek out your sister’s room. The stench hits you first before you are even able to crack open the door. As it opens you are treated to a sight you'd only heard of in distant barbaric cities. Whereas downstairs the servants were ultimately peacefully murdered, your sister has been brutalized, desecrated, and left into a rather disturbed mess. There is blood on the walls repeating words over and over:
Your sister has been gutted, and violently at that. Blood spatter is completely destroyed by smears all along the room. Her intestines have been systematically removed and set on display upon her shevles, her desk -- in areas you know were important to her. Her eyes have been removed. They were pretty eyes, and you do not see them laid out like the rest of her. Like the servants downstairs she is on her bed, only her limbs are askew and the sheets messed. You do not see a visible sigil.
You are promptly sick from the sight.
(Con save 9)
Taking some time to calm your racing heart and push aside the twisting in your gut you open up the door to your brothers room perhaps more hesitant as to what you will see. What first catches your eye is that the room, like your own, has been tossed. Only unlike your own further has been flung around, smashed, and burned. Scribbled on the walls with ash, blood, and charcoal you find the words:
MINE NOW
(Investigation 20)
You see no body. Nothing to indicate he was even in this room at the time of the damage. You notice the blood is old. Much older than the servants blood downstairs. You do not see a discernable source of the blood used as writing.
Approaching the master bedroom leaves you with a sense of foreboding. So far you've seen a lot of details that have left you ill and disturbed, and you aren't quite sure what you'll find here. The hall seems to grow daker, and darker, and darker as you approach. Attempting to open the door you find that something blocks your way. The door is jammed.
The door has a little give, but not enough to open to see.
You hear a voice, faint and echoing from downstairs. "Sir? Sir are you there? I wanted t make sure you w--" You hear a cut off, gargled scream and a distant thump.
You make it to the center of the stairs down before the sight registers. The guard you had spoken to earlier now lay dead, decapitated, and a blade that you'd never seen before rested at neck height, sticking out from one of the elegant sculptures in the doorway, which you can see is cracked and damaged from this blade that should not have been there. A trap.
(Investigation 9)
You can't tell much about the trap to be honest. It seems to have been embedded into the statue. As you continue to look at it you hear a distant guard calling out. "Terrill? Terrill what the bleeding hell is going on?"
Wilkas yell out, "Hello?"
"Whose that?" the distant guard seems to sound a bit on edge and you can hear him approach. He get's closer and closer by the duge of his footsteps. As he moves towards the house a sound catches your attention. Shtk. The blade from the trap is gone.
"Wilkas Tenur, and I think Terill is dead. We need a cleric"
"What the bleeding hell are you talking about?" the guard sounds agitated now. "Dead? What did you do to him?" He slides the door open a little more as he approaches and then yells. "Hells!" He draws his weapon. "What did you do you vagrant?!"
"Oy, oy, calm down. I didn't do anything to him. I heard him yell, and his shout was cut short, so I came down and found this. I suppose all evidence points to the contrary, but I swear on the Spire its the truth."
(Persuasion 25)
The guard lowers his weapon. He's less suspicious of you and more suspicious of what happened then. "You the reason he ran off all willy nilly then?" he grumbles. "We was at our post and he runs off with a swear. By the Spire I was concerned about him. Never done shit like this." He humphs. "Ain't no cleric gonna fix that either, son, sorry to say." He steps through the door and heads over to Terrill's body.
"Perhaps. I'll tell you what I told him earlier."
As you start to explain the guard reaches Terrill, and there's a horrible whistling sound. The next second the trap is sprung again and the guards head rolls to your feet. His body falls atop Terrill.
"Well shit." You satre. "Seem's like someone's trying to frame me." You are also now covered in blood spatter.
The right wing is reserved for guests who are staying long term. You don't know of any guests that here at the moment, although there's always a chance your parents chose to entertain some while you were away. This is also the wing that houses the rest of the staff and servants quarters for those who live on the property. Those quarters are behind a small hidden door at the end of the hall, you remember. There are the typical bathing rooms, sitting rooms, and at least four guest bedrooms, the first few of which you see nothing.
The third guest bedroom you enter, however, has the walls painted red with blood. One small section is cleared away to spell a simple word:
RETRIBUTION
There is a body in the bed and a bucket filled with blood on the side of the bed. You see that the neck as been sliced open.
By this point your character definitely gets the feeling that someone is attempting to put on a show.
The servants quarters again has the staff in the same position as the cooking staff downstairs. The words here:
ENJOY
There is no other sign of answers that you can see as to what happened or why.
(Investigation 14)
You find what you think might be the entrance to the servants passages, but for hte life of you you can't find the trigger to open it. You spend a good couple of minutes testing a few out before it becomes apparent that yes, you really can't find it.
Exhausted, emotionally gutted, you turn around and head out to the front porch of your house. You settle down to sleep—the house itself was not worth the attempted stay at this point. You curl up, pulling your cloak close around you, and drift off in the sea-chilled air.
At roughly midnight you are awoken by the sound of shuffling around you. There is a moment, and then you hear the sound of flames erupting and heat at your back.
"Right, then. If you could just point me in the direction of Rhein's place? Or was her name Rhyme? Something about a wench. I think." Angelus looked like he was trying to remember, but he wasn't very good with human names, or places. It all sounded the same to him. He looked expectantly at the tired human, so that he could hurry on his way.
"Rheim," he drawled. "Out the doors. Out the building. Head south for about an hour. You can't miss it. Loud."
He doesn't offer anything else. He looks about ready to reiterate to get out of the way when there is a burst of magic.
This post has potentially manipulated dice roll results.
Ulrich takes in the look of the interior and the crowd of various people inside building of the Immoral Wench. Avoiding eye contact with the establishment's many currently-visiting patrons, Ulrich makes his way to the bar. When the dwarf working the bar seems available for a moment, Ulrich addresses him, saying, "I've interest in a meal and room for the night." After spending so long walking and finding his way through the city, it occurs to Ulrich that he's not eaten much of anything for the majority of the day. A meal, even a simple one, to be had while mulling over his next course of action would be very appreciated. While in the bar, he also realizes that it may be to his benefit listen to ongoing conversations around him and be on the lookout for any news of interest. Even if nothing of note turns up, he prefers to be aware of what others around him are doing.
Perception check 7 as Ulrich tries to listen for information of any note from ongoing conversations near him.
It is midnight. The halls of the Immoral Wench are silent except for a slight creaking of the wood of the building and the soft whisper of blades in flesh. Carefully the door to Brash and Aquariel's rooms slip open--the creak as they do so and the darkly clothed figures let out a hiss of frustration. The soft whisper of cloth and the creak of the door is enough to grab Brash and Aquariel's attentions, however, and both awake to find darkly dressed figures slowly moving to loom over their beds.
The door to Ulrich's room opens with a silent swish, and the floorboards barely creak. The darkly dressed figure makes their way to where Ulrich sleeps peacefully and pulls out a bladed dagger. There is a faint hiss of green along the edge--with a flair for the dramatics the figure raises the dagger high and swings down to stab--in his sleep Ulrich turns over and instead the dagger slams home into the would-be-assassins knee. He let's out a knee-jerk response, a foul scream and curse that jolts Ulrich awake. The yell is loud enough for Brash and Aquariel to hear.
"A SHIT ******* HELL!"
As your characters go first, please feel free to post your actions. Provide all rolls in the discord chat and then place them on the thread under a spoiler tag. A map will be provided in discord shortly, and this post updated with it as soon as I've got it on my desktop.
Ulrich awakens in a panic at the sound of the cursing. Acting on instincts, his heart racing, his first thought is to scramble away from his attacker only to realize a wall blocks him and to move away would provide too much of an opening for this would-be assassin. Instead, Ulrich hurriedly climbs out of the bed next to the intruder. As his eyes see through the darkness of the room easily, he focuses his gaze on the intruder. With no hesitation, Ulrich whispers a spell incantation, conjuring a thin layer of frost over the intruder's body.
Presumably having been prone on account of being asleep prior to this, Ulrich spends half his movement to stand and spends another 5 ft. of movement to move one square northwest (M2), remaining in the attacker's reach to avoid opportunity attacks. As any ranged spell attacks will suffer disadvantage in these conditions, Ulrich instead casts frostbite. The attacker must make a DC 14 Constitution saving throw. On a failure, he suffers 6 cold damage and has disadvantage on the next weapon attack roll he makes before the end of his next turn.
Aquariel moves swiftly, almost like air and water combined, and launches to her feet. She pulls her dagger from her pillow as she does so and slashes across the assassins face. He howls and jerks back. He swings a dagger wildly, a soft green sheen to its edge, but it flies just past Aquariel's nose and doesn't hit her. He tries to stab out with his sword from his other hand but ends up overbalanced. The would-be-assassin fumbles.
Aquariel 18 to attack. 3 damage to assassin. Assassin 12 and 7 to attack. Failed.
Down the hall in the room Brash occupies the assassin numbly moves out of the way, a little to the left, before he rears up with his own dagger and stabs out. He scores a glancing hit to Brash's belly and grins wickedly. The wound stings, and there is a creeping feeling along the edges that threatens to pull Brash down. It burns like fire.
The assassin in Ulrich's room lurches for an attack, and promptly flops over unconscious with a strangle moan. The wound upon his leg festers a little, and his muscles spasm.
Ulrich flinches at first, expecting the pain of a dagger piercing his flesh, only to realize the intruder has ceased to be a threat. Ulrich's eyes dart over the unconscious figure before him, only to realize that similar sounds - a shout and hurried shuffling - can be heard just outside in other rooms. With question rising as to what these intruders want, and little time to stop and think, Ulrich grabs the dagger that the man held and runs through the door out into the hallway, frantically looking around for any other signs of a threat.
Aquariel, after her first successful swipe, stabs out with her dagger again between the folds of the would-be-assassin's armor. She gets a decent cut on him, enough that when he goes to attack once more he flounders and ends up slipping his grip with the poisoned dagger. It tumbles, the point of the blade cutting into the skin between his thumb and forefinger. He louts out a shout and jerks back, stumbling down onto his ass.
Aquariel 21 to attack. 3 damage. Assassin 4 and 11 to attack. CON save 18.
The poison stings, then fades away into the background. Brash goes to attack again, frustrated at the first missed swing, and misses the second. The assassin ducks under the blade, drops the dagger, and stabs out with the shortsword. He gets the large soldier in the gut. Brash falls, his consciousness fading.
Brash 8 to attack. Assassin 24 to attack. 14 damage. Brash is now unconscious.
Assured that his prey would not survive--the wound was straight into the abdomen, few would survive that after all, the assassin books it. He races out the door on quiet feet, right in front of Ulrich, and heads down the hall. He doesn't even notice the shadow sorcerer in his attempt to get to his next location.
As Ulrich sees another figure run past him in the darkness from the closest open door, he takes no time to consider his options, only the possibilities of what may happen if any of these assassins escape, and immediately casts another spell. He conjures a beam of sickly energy and aims it at the man trying to escape down the hall.
Brash now in great pain, trying to keep awake, yells out the best he can “HELP”and realizes it may not have been as loud as it was in his head. He begins to think back to his childhood and how he will not find the honor he was seeking.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Elon Andrael- High Elf sorcerer- Waterdeep Dragon Heist
Tomac- goliath barbarian- Yet Another Storm Kings Thunder
The assassin dodges out of Ulrich's blast with uncanny percision into a roll toward the right. He comes to a stop just at the corner and stares, searching for his attack. There's a hissed grunt. For Ulrich the sound of footsteps are loud, as if the assassin doesn't know the meaning of the word 'stealth'. His head turns then towards the door he'd walked past, frowning.
From inside Aquariel lashes out again with her dagger, snaring another slice on her attack--death by a thousand cuts, near-like--and bares her teeth. The assassin takes the chance and grabs the dagger he dropped, thrusting up. It grazes across the exposed part of her stomach. For a minute she tenses, and then her eyes narrow.
Aquariel 14 to attack. 3 damage. Assassin 20 and 7 to attack. 5 damage. Aquariel CON save 17.
Bishop quickly follows Pious. He is very excited to be inducted as a priest. "Well you see, when I first arrived in town, there was an issue with some guards. After talking with the captain, he recommended that I get some sort of disguise. His mage then cast this disguise on me and gave me paperwork to be signed by the head cleric. As much as I hate having to hide myself, it felt good to not be looked at like some sort of monster."
Aelar works his shift and listens carefully. He learns a little bit, but doesn't hear much to work off of. At the end of the night, he takes the key from Vior and makes his way to bed.
Lenzo agrees to find Answell for a drink, and makes sure to ask what tavern Answell frequents the most. Then, Lenzo bids Answell a good day and leaves to make his way to the Darkmast home, where he will speak with his father to learn of the family's current state of affairs, and more about the strange attack by the anarchists.
Aelar is on pause for the moment.
Current:
Secrets of the Greenwold - DM | Recruiting Thread | Campaign Thread
Historic:
Dawning - A Homebrew Campaign - DMTomb of Annihilation - DM
Dragon Heist of Waterdeep - DM
Hoard of the Dragon Queen - DM | Recruiting Thread | Campaign Thread
Ulrich idly examines the emblem from the bag as he listens to the directions given by Zilech. The names of inns and the like in these areas struck him as odd and inelegant, but he accepted he couldn't be terribly picky about such things at the moment, nor could he wonder about the quality of such an establishment. Cheap and accepting would have to do for now.
"I thank you for everything. I'll be on my way, now," Ulrich says with a nod. With a deep breath, steeling himself to face the outside once more, he turns and steps out of the room to follow the given instructions through the city and to the building known as the Immoral Wench. All the while, he keeps a steady grip on the bag and the emblem, wishing for no further difficulty from any of the great city's guards or anyone else of the like.
Wilkas is thoroughly confused. Curiouser and curiouser, he thinks as he walks in and starts searching the house, starting on the ground floor, going clockwise, then advancing to the next floor, going counterclockwise, until he finds someone or he finishes scouring the house.
Do you have difficulty fitting everything you want into your signature? Then check out the Extended Signature thread!
Here's my Extended Signature!
At his cousin's embrace, any doubts that Lenzo had about his presence in the city evaporate. He feels a resurgence of affection for his family, and remembers how important it is that he prevents Vlaakith from destroying it. He can't muster what it would take to tell Tamela it's good to be home, since that isn't quite how Lenzo feels. For the first time, it occurs to Lenzo that it's going to be very difficult to explain to his family why he's back.
After returning Tamela's enthusiastic hug, Lenzo says, "Tell me, how are you? How is the family? I've heard ill tidings about things in the city."
The right door leads down a slight hall to three rooms. The first is a sitting room that your mother uses to entertain guests. The second room is a small reading room that, again, tends to be for guests and tending to guests. The third leads to a small enclosed green room. In each of these rooms you find nothing undisturbed, no signs of real life.
The left door leads down a slight hall to three more rooms. The first is a small library. Your father would handle meetings with other genteel folk here. The second is an office, where he tended toward business contracts. The third leads out to an open air patio typically used for smoking.
The dining hall is large and often hosted parties. You see a few plates settled out onto the large table that the servants would move when there was something more akin to a ball going on. There is a small patio to the back of the room, open air, leading out to the gardens in the back of the house. There are two additional doors here. The right side leads toward the kitchens and the cooks rooms. The larder is empty aside from a few mice and a few rats shuffling about. The large, wood burning oven is cold. The ashes and embers haven't been touched for some time. There are plates and dishes out, what looks to be meal preparation that has been left alone. There is a door that leads to the cooking staffs quarters.
You take careful time to draw out the symbol you knew was to one of the beings you could pull from; the ritual is short and with the passing of the crow you find yourself oddly…strengthened.
(Binding Check 16 for Naberius)
You try and determine how long it has been since the kitchen has been used, looking at the oven and embers, and the meal that seems to be part-way prepared
(Investigation 21)
It has been exactly 8 hours. You also notice that there is no signs of struggle. It is as if they cooks just got up and left mid-work.
There is a hallway that leads to several doors. Small common room, bathing rooms, a small meal room, connection to the larder. Three of the doors lead toward the sleeping rooms. You know the cooking staff tends to share rooms. As you open the door to the first of the sleeping rooms the smell hits you first. You recognize it. Corpse. Stepping into the room you see three of the cooking staff lain out on their beds, a knife stabbed into each of their necks. You notice that their throats were slit and the knife is placed into the center of the wound. Judging by the pool of blood both on the beds and on the ground, they bled out. There is no signs of a struggle. Their eyes are closed, hands placed on top of their chest. If it weren't for the knife and the blood you could almost see them as merely sleeping.
There is a single word on the wall, written in their blood.
STOLEN
(Investigation 15; Medicine 5)
You don't know much about the body, you didn't entirely observe the effects of your own kills. You can tell they are stiff, and judging by the smell at least several hours old. You can't judge the rigidity properly to get an exact time of death, but you know it to be somewhere in the vacinity of two hours or more.
You can reasonable assume by the dried blood that it's more likely 8 hours. Maybe a little less. While you are investigating you do notice something under the bed. Kneeling down you can't quite get a good look at what caught your attention. Whatever it is, is on the floor. It looks to be some sort of drawing.
You are able to move the bed. It's not that heavy and you can shove it aside with a bit of effort. Once the bed is out of the way enough to get a good look at the drawing, you see white lines of chalk. The chalk loops around into a seal, not unlike what you would leave behind with your kills. Except something about this seal is vastly different. It leaves you with a chill.
With a bit of effort you are able to shove the bed back into place.
The other three bedrooms are in a similar state. On the wall behind the victims are another two words.
OURS
YOURS
You checked the rest of the rooms, there was nothing of note. No bodies, no signs of any struggle, and everything is left where it was undisturbed.
The left side on the dining hall, that door leads to a private dining room that is again undisturbed. Upstairs you can go to the left or the right. The stairs loop around to a landing that brings the two sides of the house together. Directly above the dining/ballroom is the library with two double doors. It is a rather large area as your family has amassed quite a few books. Some arcana, some religion, some history -- its an eclectic mess.
The left side is the family wing. Your parents master bedroom is settled in the middle of the hall, a few study, play rooms, and sitting rooms specifically for family and entertainment nestle furthest back. Your bedroom, your brothers bedroom, and your sisters bedroom are closer toward the center with your parents. Yours is only a few doors down from the entrance to the hall, your brothers being closest to your parents with him being the youngest--the baby--and your sisters closer toward the study rooms. There are a few bathing rooms dotted around too -- you notice these aren't bothered when you look into them and neither are the studies, the play room, or any other room.
You open the door to your bedroom and find it completely and utterly trashed. Books from your shelves are flung about the room, some with pages torn. Your bed is overturned, the sheets ripped apart -- table, chairs; nothing seems to have survived the assault. You find the same sigil this time burned into your wall alongside the word:
BETRAYER.
Annoyed, you leave and seek out your sister’s room. The stench hits you first before you are even able to crack open the door. As it opens you are treated to a sight you'd only heard of in distant barbaric cities. Whereas downstairs the servants were ultimately peacefully murdered, your sister has been brutalized, desecrated, and left into a rather disturbed mess. There is blood on the walls repeating words over and over:
SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF SOUL THIEF
Your sister has been gutted, and violently at that. Blood spatter is completely destroyed by smears all along the room. Her intestines have been systematically removed and set on display upon her shevles, her desk -- in areas you know were important to her. Her eyes have been removed. They were pretty eyes, and you do not see them laid out like the rest of her. Like the servants downstairs she is on her bed, only her limbs are askew and the sheets messed. You do not see a visible sigil.
You are promptly sick from the sight.
(Con save 9)
Taking some time to calm your racing heart and push aside the twisting in your gut you open up the door to your brothers room perhaps more hesitant as to what you will see. What first catches your eye is that the room, like your own, has been tossed. Only unlike your own further has been flung around, smashed, and burned. Scribbled on the walls with ash, blood, and charcoal you find the words:
MINE NOW
(Investigation 20)
You see no body. Nothing to indicate he was even in this room at the time of the damage. You notice the blood is old. Much older than the servants blood downstairs. You do not see a discernable source of the blood used as writing.
Approaching the master bedroom leaves you with a sense of foreboding. So far you've seen a lot of details that have left you ill and disturbed, and you aren't quite sure what you'll find here. The hall seems to grow daker, and darker, and darker as you approach. Attempting to open the door you find that something blocks your way. The door is jammed.
The door has a little give, but not enough to open to see.
You hear a voice, faint and echoing from downstairs. "Sir? Sir are you there? I wanted t make sure you w--" You hear a cut off, gargled scream and a distant thump.
You make it to the center of the stairs down before the sight registers. The guard you had spoken to earlier now lay dead, decapitated, and a blade that you'd never seen before rested at neck height, sticking out from one of the elegant sculptures in the doorway, which you can see is cracked and damaged from this blade that should not have been there. A trap.
(Investigation 9)
You can't tell much about the trap to be honest. It seems to have been embedded into the statue. As you continue to look at it you hear a distant guard calling out. "Terrill? Terrill what the bleeding hell is going on?"
Wilkas yell out, "Hello?"
"Whose that?" the distant guard seems to sound a bit on edge and you can hear him approach. He get's closer and closer by the duge of his footsteps. As he moves towards the house a sound catches your attention. Shtk. The blade from the trap is gone.
"Wilkas Tenur, and I think Terill is dead. We need a cleric"
"What the bleeding hell are you talking about?" the guard sounds agitated now. "Dead? What did you do to him?" He slides the door open a little more as he approaches and then yells. "Hells!" He draws his weapon. "What did you do you vagrant?!"
"Oy, oy, calm down. I didn't do anything to him. I heard him yell, and his shout was cut short, so I came down and found this. I suppose all evidence points to the contrary, but I swear on the Spire its the truth."
(Persuasion 25)
The guard lowers his weapon. He's less suspicious of you and more suspicious of what happened then. "You the reason he ran off all willy nilly then?" he grumbles. "We was at our post and he runs off with a swear. By the Spire I was concerned about him. Never done shit like this." He humphs. "Ain't no cleric gonna fix that either, son, sorry to say." He steps through the door and heads over to Terrill's body.
"Perhaps. I'll tell you what I told him earlier."
As you start to explain the guard reaches Terrill, and there's a horrible whistling sound. The next second the trap is sprung again and the guards head rolls to your feet. His body falls atop Terrill.
"Well shit." You satre. "Seem's like someone's trying to frame me." You are also now covered in blood spatter.
The right wing is reserved for guests who are staying long term. You don't know of any guests that here at the moment, although there's always a chance your parents chose to entertain some while you were away. This is also the wing that houses the rest of the staff and servants quarters for those who live on the property. Those quarters are behind a small hidden door at the end of the hall, you remember. There are the typical bathing rooms, sitting rooms, and at least four guest bedrooms, the first few of which you see nothing.
The third guest bedroom you enter, however, has the walls painted red with blood. One small section is cleared away to spell a simple word:
RETRIBUTION
There is a body in the bed and a bucket filled with blood on the side of the bed. You see that the neck as been sliced open.
By this point your character definitely gets the feeling that someone is attempting to put on a show.
The servants quarters again has the staff in the same position as the cooking staff downstairs. The words here:
ENJOY
There is no other sign of answers that you can see as to what happened or why.
(Investigation 14)
You find what you think might be the entrance to the servants passages, but for hte life of you you can't find the trigger to open it. You spend a good couple of minutes testing a few out before it becomes apparent that yes, you really can't find it.
Exhausted, emotionally gutted, you turn around and head out to the front porch of your house. You settle down to sleep—the house itself was not worth the attempted stay at this point. You curl up, pulling your cloak close around you, and drift off in the sea-chilled air.
At roughly midnight you are awoken by the sound of shuffling around you. There is a moment, and then you hear the sound of flames erupting and heat at your back.
Current:
Secrets of the Greenwold - DM | Recruiting Thread | Campaign Thread
Historic:
Dawning - A Homebrew Campaign - DMTomb of Annihilation - DM
Dragon Heist of Waterdeep - DM
Hoard of the Dragon Queen - DM | Recruiting Thread | Campaign Thread
As the doors behind him explode with flame, Wilkas manages to roll out of the way [Dexterity saving throw 21].
"Well shit. And here I was hoping that I'd inherit the place if I'm not jailed and executed."
Wilkas moves away from the house, but remains on the property, moving into the gardener's shed.
Do you have difficulty fitting everything you want into your signature? Then check out the Extended Signature thread!
Here's my Extended Signature!
Ulrich takes in the look of the interior and the crowd of various people inside building of the Immoral Wench. Avoiding eye contact with the establishment's many currently-visiting patrons, Ulrich makes his way to the bar. When the dwarf working the bar seems available for a moment, Ulrich addresses him, saying, "I've interest in a meal and room for the night." After spending so long walking and finding his way through the city, it occurs to Ulrich that he's not eaten much of anything for the majority of the day. A meal, even a simple one, to be had while mulling over his next course of action would be very appreciated.
While in the bar, he also realizes that it may be to his benefit listen to ongoing conversations around him and be on the lookout for any news of interest. Even if nothing of note turns up, he prefers to be aware of what others around him are doing.
Perception check 7 as Ulrich tries to listen for information of any note from ongoing conversations near him.
The Immoral Wench
It is midnight. The halls of the Immoral Wench are silent except for a slight creaking of the wood of the building and the soft whisper of blades in flesh. Carefully the door to Brash and Aquariel's rooms slip open--the creak as they do so and the darkly clothed figures let out a hiss of frustration. The soft whisper of cloth and the creak of the door is enough to grab Brash and Aquariel's attentions, however, and both awake to find darkly dressed figures slowly moving to loom over their beds.
The door to Ulrich's room opens with a silent swish, and the floorboards barely creak. The darkly dressed figure makes their way to where Ulrich sleeps peacefully and pulls out a bladed dagger. There is a faint hiss of green along the edge--with a flair for the dramatics the figure raises the dagger high and swings down to stab--in his sleep Ulrich turns over and instead the dagger slams home into the would-be-assassins knee. He let's out a knee-jerk response, a foul scream and curse that jolts Ulrich awake. The yell is loud enough for Brash and Aquariel to hear.
"A SHIT ******* HELL!"
As your characters go first, please feel free to post your actions. Provide all rolls in the discord chat and then place them on the thread under a spoiler tag. A map will be provided in discord shortly, and this post updated with it as soon as I've got it on my desktop.
Current:
Secrets of the Greenwold - DM | Recruiting Thread | Campaign Thread
Historic:
Dawning - A Homebrew Campaign - DMTomb of Annihilation - DM
Dragon Heist of Waterdeep - DM
Hoard of the Dragon Queen - DM | Recruiting Thread | Campaign Thread
Ulrich awakens in a panic at the sound of the cursing. Acting on instincts, his heart racing, his first thought is to scramble away from his attacker only to realize a wall blocks him and to move away would provide too much of an opening for this would-be assassin. Instead, Ulrich hurriedly climbs out of the bed next to the intruder. As his eyes see through the darkness of the room easily, he focuses his gaze on the intruder. With no hesitation, Ulrich whispers a spell incantation, conjuring a thin layer of frost over the intruder's body.
Presumably having been prone on account of being asleep prior to this, Ulrich spends half his movement to stand and spends another 5 ft. of movement to move one square northwest (M2), remaining in the attacker's reach to avoid opportunity attacks. As any ranged spell attacks will suffer disadvantage in these conditions, Ulrich instead casts frostbite. The attacker must make a DC 14 Constitution saving throw. On a failure, he suffers 6 cold damage and has disadvantage on the next weapon attack roll he makes before the end of his next turn.
By pure instinct, Brash leaps to his feet grabbing his axe and with a great yell swings at the intruder.
attack: 1d20+5=9
damage: 1d12+3=8
Elon Andrael- High Elf sorcerer- Waterdeep Dragon Heist
Tomac- goliath barbarian- Yet Another Storm Kings Thunder
Aquariel moves swiftly, almost like air and water combined, and launches to her feet. She pulls her dagger from her pillow as she does so and slashes across the assassins face. He howls and jerks back. He swings a dagger wildly, a soft green sheen to its edge, but it flies just past Aquariel's nose and doesn't hit her. He tries to stab out with his sword from his other hand but ends up overbalanced. The would-be-assassin fumbles.
Aquariel 18 to attack. 3 damage to assassin.
Assassin 12 and 7 to attack. Failed.
Down the hall in the room Brash occupies the assassin numbly moves out of the way, a little to the left, before he rears up with his own dagger and stabs out. He scores a glancing hit to Brash's belly and grins wickedly. The wound stings, and there is a creeping feeling along the edges that threatens to pull Brash down. It burns like fire.
20 to attack. 5 damage.
DC 13 CON save. Failed save you are Poisoned. If the save fails by 5 or more you are unconscious and poisoned.
The assassin brings up his blade and swings this time his shortsword from its scabbard, scoring another hit over Brash's middle.
17 to attack. 6 damage.
The assassin in Ulrich's room lurches for an attack, and promptly flops over unconscious with a strangle moan. The wound upon his leg festers a little, and his muscles spasm.
Failed constitution save against Poisoned
Updated Map:
Current:
Secrets of the Greenwold - DM | Recruiting Thread | Campaign Thread
Historic:
Dawning - A Homebrew Campaign - DMTomb of Annihilation - DM
Dragon Heist of Waterdeep - DM
Hoard of the Dragon Queen - DM | Recruiting Thread | Campaign Thread
Ulrich flinches at first, expecting the pain of a dagger piercing his flesh, only to realize the intruder has ceased to be a threat. Ulrich's eyes dart over the unconscious figure before him, only to realize that similar sounds - a shout and hurried shuffling - can be heard just outside in other rooms. With question rising as to what these intruders want, and little time to stop and think, Ulrich grabs the dagger that the man held and runs through the door out into the hallway, frantically looking around for any other signs of a threat.
Aquariel, after her first successful swipe, stabs out with her dagger again between the folds of the would-be-assassin's armor. She gets a decent cut on him, enough that when he goes to attack once more he flounders and ends up slipping his grip with the poisoned dagger. It tumbles, the point of the blade cutting into the skin between his thumb and forefinger. He louts out a shout and jerks back, stumbling down onto his ass.
Aquariel 21 to attack. 3 damage.
Assassin 4 and 11 to attack. CON save 18.
The poison stings, then fades away into the background. Brash goes to attack again, frustrated at the first missed swing, and misses the second. The assassin ducks under the blade, drops the dagger, and stabs out with the shortsword. He gets the large soldier in the gut. Brash falls, his consciousness fading.
Brash 8 to attack.
Assassin 24 to attack. 14 damage. Brash is now unconscious.
Assured that his prey would not survive--the wound was straight into the abdomen, few would survive that after all, the assassin books it. He races out the door on quiet feet, right in front of Ulrich, and heads down the hall. He doesn't even notice the shadow sorcerer in his attempt to get to his next location.
Assasin takes a Dash as a bonus action.
Current:
Secrets of the Greenwold - DM | Recruiting Thread | Campaign Thread
Historic:
Dawning - A Homebrew Campaign - DMTomb of Annihilation - DM
Dragon Heist of Waterdeep - DM
Hoard of the Dragon Queen - DM | Recruiting Thread | Campaign Thread
As Ulrich sees another figure run past him in the darkness from the closest open door, he takes no time to consider his options, only the possibilities of what may happen if any of these assassins escape, and immediately casts another spell. He conjures a beam of sickly energy and aims it at the man trying to escape down the hall.
Ulrich casts ray of sickness at the escaping assassin.
Brash now in great pain, trying to keep awake, yells out the best he can “HELP”and realizes it may not have been as loud as it was in his head. He begins to think back to his childhood and how he will not find the honor he was seeking.
Elon Andrael- High Elf sorcerer- Waterdeep Dragon Heist
Tomac- goliath barbarian- Yet Another Storm Kings Thunder
The assassin dodges out of Ulrich's blast with uncanny percision into a roll toward the right. He comes to a stop just at the corner and stares, searching for his attack. There's a hissed grunt. For Ulrich the sound of footsteps are loud, as if the assassin doesn't know the meaning of the word 'stealth'. His head turns then towards the door he'd walked past, frowning.
From inside Aquariel lashes out again with her dagger, snaring another slice on her attack--death by a thousand cuts, near-like--and bares her teeth. The assassin takes the chance and grabs the dagger he dropped, thrusting up. It grazes across the exposed part of her stomach. For a minute she tenses, and then her eyes narrow.
Aquariel 14 to attack. 3 damage.
Assassin 20 and 7 to attack. 5 damage.
Aquariel CON save 17.
Current:
Secrets of the Greenwold - DM | Recruiting Thread | Campaign Thread
Historic:
Dawning - A Homebrew Campaign - DMTomb of Annihilation - DM
Dragon Heist of Waterdeep - DM
Hoard of the Dragon Queen - DM | Recruiting Thread | Campaign Thread