Session 43: Seaweed Skirmish
The party resumes their trek north to Biavon. They come across a patch of upturned dirt and stone, with blood spattered about. The Sprite rolls 22 on Medicine and determines it to be a little over a day old. Sartorii looks around and notices gouge marks in the stone and a few pieces of leather armor scraps. She gets the feeling that someone was jumped here, probably robbed. Not enough blood to indicate someone died, the victim most likely was the bandits themselves.Night falls as the party arrives at Biavon. Smaller than the capital, but still a decently lively fishing town. There is a crowd gathered about the docks, not entirely pleased to be there.
Sartorii and Clarence spot at least two people with blooms in their hair, along with several posters of Deacon.
The Sprite saunters up to someone in the crowd, a man who seems like he has a buzz about him. He's angry, goes on about how this is ridiculous, the fairy who runs between Biavon and Soquay since he was a little kid—he leans on the Sprite, practically squishing him—and complains about how the bars here suck. The ferry's closed, stranding a bunch of drunk folk here. They're investergating a missing boat. The drunk man thinks they had just hired a young man who can't sail worth a damn.
The Sprite gives him some trail mix, and agrees to go talk to the dock worker.
The party makes good on this and goes to the ferry office!
The ferry office is lit up, with a few dock workers outside looking out over the water with spyglasses. From here, the lights of Soquay can be seen in the distance, shining in stark contrast to the complete lack of lights on the lake.
A short, broad lady with long gray hair and calloused hands stands in the center of the room barking orders to the workers. The party overhears her needing to return the bar's payment as they can't run the party boat.
When the party walks in she immediately says, "No, I can't make an exception. We just have to wait for the boat to get back."
"So the boat's missing, huh?"
"Ah, you're not here to complain, then. Sorry. As for why there's a bunch of drunk people outside, I blame society, but on a more relevant note... Last night, the last ferry back from Soquay up and vanished. Not many people on it, just one of my overnighters and a few stragglers. They never made it to Soquay, and they never made it back. I'm not sending anyone else out on that lake until we're sure they can come back."
Sartorii mentions she saw a ferry vanish into the waves last night.
The lady looks up and takes a breath. "Oh. Well if that's the case, I certainly can't open this place up, not until I can figure out what's sinking these ships. God's, I hope they're okay."
Sartorii gives a rough estimate of where she saw it.
"You travel the roads? Did nobody warn you of the woods? For the longest time the woods around here have been pretty dangerous, there's like, creatures in there! You don't go walking into the swamp, you don't go walking into the woods. Most people take the ferry so as to avoid the woods entirely. The only people who spend any time in the woods are those folks from Greenwater, and the smiths out west. Count yourselves lucky you haven't run into anything so far. Bandits will be the least terrifying things you find in those woods."
Sartorii asks if anyone came into town injured.
"You'd have to check with the guards or healers. If you've been running the roads without issue... If I was to provision up one of my boats, would you mind running guard on the way to Soquay?"
The Sprite thinks it sounds fun! General consensus is as long as they don't go in the water. It would take an entire day to get to Soquay.
Alexia Crew is the ferry master. She would hire someone to look after the cart and the animals. That's the quest for tomorrow!
The party finds a tavern named The Oaken Arch. It was built by someone who wandered down from way up north; they're big, they're blonde, and they're boisterous.
Rutana rolls on the rumor mill:
Sartorii rolls 15 on Society to ask around about the lake. She discovers no one goes to the island in the middle because it's weird and no one likes it. She also discovers there is an old creature in the lake, an ancient, massive fucking creature, that has existed in this lake for as long as anyone can remember, sightings for as long as anyone can remember. They call it The Great Orm! It's also referred to as the King of the Lake. No one knows how to find it, it just shows up sometimes.
The party spends 5s each to book a room at the tavern.
27 degrees Farenheit, barrel clouds. It'll feel a lot colder on the water.
The next morning, people gather around to see a boat being readied. Excitement swiftly turns to disappointment as they're told the boat is specifically for the party to investigate the disappearances.
"We want to go home!"
"Take the roads!"
"There's things on the roads!"
"There's things in the water!"
The boat is pretty sturdy. Alexia takes good care of her fleet.
Sartorii suggests maybe it's the Orm threatening their livelihood.
The sailors aboard get defensive of him, but say they haven't seen it themselves. One sailor's pa did, though! It's twice as big as any ship, and just swims about, don't bother nobody.
The ship shoves off. The sky opens up above the party, long strips of clouds that look like a storm might happen eventually, but it's nice enough for now. The water is calm, the ship creaking happily away. Once far enough out to the water, with land out of sight, another ship approaches! It sails close to the party's ship after a while and comes up alongside.
"Ho there! Would you mind if we anchored and spoke for a moment?" a man at the helm in full armor with a holy symbol on his chest calls across the water. Clarence recognizes it as one of the most prevalent deities in all of Brevoy; Iomeday. She is the youngest deity, once human. When the God of Man died, she ascended to inherit his domain. She is the goddess of honor, justice, and valor, she refuses to abandon companions in need, is temperate and fights for justice afraid, etc. Gung ho, but nice.
There appear to be four other people aboard, all wearing some form of the same symbol.
The party agrees, with Clarence taking charge. Both ships drop anchor.
The war cleric approaches the edge of his ship. He's very fancy, gilded sword decked out in jewels. Clarence likewise approaches, and the war cleric inspects him for a silent minute.
"...Clarence?! As I live and breathe!" He introduces himself as...
An incredibly handsome cat folk once he takes off his helmet.
"What are you doing here, of all places? Strange enough that we should meet, but, ships crossing?"
Sartorii asks if Clarence will introduce them to his friend.
Clarence just stops and blinks. "I was going to ask you the same questions." Turns around to look at the party, looks back.
Alastor jumps across to the party's ship.
"We were looking for what's sinking ships."
"What a coincidence, so am I! Perhaps we should work together? I ask for no bounty in return."
Clarence seems very nervous, shocked at the offer to work together. "If you want to work with us..."
"It would be good to work together again. Put some things to rest." He claps Clarence on the shoulder, then jumps back to his own ship. They'll bring the boat around and sail together.
Clarence can't believe Alastor wants to work with him again. He hesitates, calculating how to explain things. Alastor was his former partner, and Clarence thinks Alastor doesn't think highly of him. Rutana asks to define partner, as in romantic or business.
Both. Things didn't go to plan, they got separated, Clarence thought he was dead, but nope.
It takes about ten minutes for Alastor's boat to come about. Alastor takes watch at the bow. Sartorii perches in the crow's nest.
Party rolls Will saves. Everyone passes!
Suddenly, Alastor's ship starts to veer starboard, pulling away from the party's ship. Alastor takes notice and runs over to his pilot. The boat starts moving toward a small landmass, a shallow shoal.
Sartorii rolls Perception. 31, she sees All.
The shoal starts to move and two beady, red eyes peer out from the seaweed, almost as if it was just one creature, 15 feet in diameter.
Alastor fights with his pilot as they sail straight towards this thing.
The Sprite casts mage hand to steer Alastor's ship back on course while Alastor and the pilot are struggling, mimicking what his own ship's pilot is doing to make sure they're moving right.
When the ships pull up alongside the creature, two of Alastor's shipmates jump overboard and swim toward it.
Rutana starts off by casting Ray of Frost. 30 on attack roll, 9 cold damage. Perception check, 31. She notices the creature shrugs off cold as if it's no big deal. She shares with the party that the creature is weak to slashing attacks and fire.
Alastor's turn. He first swears a whole bunch for a free action, then knocks his pilot unconscious and drops anchor. He then reaches out and chants in celestial, casting Summon Lesser Servitor. From Arcadia emerges a giant, golden bat. The gold bat flies out and picks up one of the men in the water.
The second man in the water swims toward the creature and digs into the seaweed tendrils, appearing happier than he's ever been.
Sartorii flies over to Alastor's crow's nest then fires an arrow at the creature. 3 damage! Second arrow, nat 20: 13 damage!
Another of Alastor's crewmates dives overboard. The party's captain runs crazed across the boats and follows.
The Sprite energizes his wings and flies over to the starboard side of Alastor's ship to get closure to the creature.
The sargassum heap eats the man cuddled up in its tendrils. It then wades toward the party's captain and attacks, incapacitating him.
Alastor's last remaining shipmate dives in the water and swims toward the heap.
Clarence's turn. He jumps over to Alastor's ship then jumps toward the heap, claws at the ready. 10 damage!
Back to Rutana! She hops across to Alastor's ship, but can't get close enough to cast the spell she wants. Ray of Frost time. 7 damage!
Alastor runs as close as he can and calls to Rutana, "Take heart, scholar, I too am out of range!"
He runs closer.
His bat drops its passenger on the deck square on his head, knocking him unconscious. The bat then flies back toward the heap and screeches at it.
Sartorii fires three more arrows, hitting twice. 6 damage total.
One of the men in the water swims up to the heap and appears to kiss one of the bulbs in the heap.
Clarence recognizes what the creature is; a sargassum heap that floats across the water, dispersing hypnotic spores to lure sailors in to its clutches with visions of their deepest desires, to then drag them into its mass and use their corpses as fertilizer. The spore orbs (sporbs) can be harvested and sold.
The unconscious captain fails a death saving throw.
The Sprite scooches out from behind Alastor and casts Ignition, setting the heap on fire. 11 damage, plus persistent fire damage.
Heap's turn. It does not like being on fire, so it approaches the Sprite, clambering over the side of the boat. It lashes out a tendril and grabs the Sprite, dealing 20 damage.
The heap takes more damage from the persistent fire, but manages to put the flames out.
Clarence's turn. He resumes clawing the shit out of this thing. The heap flails about, very much the worse for wear, but it still stands.
Rutana rushes over to the heap and uses a wand of healing to heal the Sprite for 15. She then swings on that fucker, dealing 12 damage. The heap's grumbling in pain.
Alastor smiles and taunts the heap. He draws his sword, black iron, the crossguard shaped like to sabertooth tiger teeth, the hilt covered in sterling silver filigree. He steps up to the heap and attacks, dealing 14 damage. Second strike misses.
Sartorii time. She leaps from the crow's nest, dagger in hand, landing on the heap with a horrible squelching noise. She sinks into her waist, feeling like she's in a bathtub full of cold spaghetti. 10 damage! The heap doesn't look great, chunks of bloody seaweed and old corpses falling into the water.
Alastor's bat flaps over to the other side and attacks for 8 damage.
The Sprite struggles to escape the heap's grasp, but fails. He casts Floating Flame right atop the creature, dealing 7 damage.
Heap's turn. It swings at Sartorii, but misses. It constricts around the Sprite, dealing 11 damage.
Clarence's turn. He resumes swiping at the heap, finally tearing the beast to shreds. He climbs out of the top of the thing as it collapses into the water. Sartorii triumphantly catches the falling Sprite.
The captain is dead. Six bodies are retrieved from the water, some having drifted free from the heap. Three of Alastor's acolytes survived.
To start the next session: collect pods from the heap's corpse.