MAL Ep. 34

Thanks for playing, everyone. Sorry about the technical difficulties and my frustrations therewith!

The pacing was a little odd in this adventure, but I do think most everyone had a chance to interact with what they wanted to on the board. As follows:

1) As Anselm had warned, performing psychic surgery on Jon without the illithid brain he said he needed did cause permanent brain damage (though luckily a comparatively inintrusive kind.) However, thanks in part to an 11th-hour memory check on Jay's part, Anselm was able to puzzle out that the disconnected neural pathways were related to the Plane of Chaos, and has now reconnected them. Jon explained his hypothesis that it may not be a specific fact Chavalk was trying to suppress, but rather his ability to synthesize interplanar information--and that he did not feel he would be able to play his part against the impending Invasion with that ability impaired, thus it was worth the risk.

2) The party decided that hiding their knowledge of the illithid secret from telepathy was worth the danger of the illithids tracking the crystal skull. Red decided to carry the skull, on the theory that while she is in dinosaur form the skull should not be able to be pickpocketed. (NB, though: She has been in human form throughout this adventure so far.)

3) Returning to the walking hut, the party encountered the gnollish leader, Ataman Finera. Khirg unhesitatingly offered her his golden bow, at which point she formally bestowed it upon him and declared him her champion, warning him to keep it out of enemy hands or the Xhorhasi (the gnollfolk) would be destroyed. Finera also agreed to join the allies at Red's meeting in Hastenport on May 17th (one week from today.)

4) The party went back to Delsin. There they met with Adriel's drow contact Nathali Ken'rae again (learning from the bartender that she had met with the necromancer Thrane Do'Ezzen earlier in the day, and that he is currently in Kiratas.) Nathali has secured a meeting between Adriel and her aunt Talisha in the drow city of Ellenun. She gave the party papers confirming this meeting, and gave them access to the border town of Kiratas beneath Delsin, telling them they could book passage to Ellenun from there.

5) The party chatted briefly with Nathali about the Darklands. She told them it would be impossible for her to brief them on the dangerous complexities of drow politics in the short amount of time you have, and recommended you stay out of drow politics completely. She gave as an example the recent clan war amongst the drow that had orphaned Aler (currently in disguise as surface elf Alan.) When questioned about this conflict, she said that House Vel'sharren had been destroyed and every survivor hunted down and killed (the party said nothing about Aler,) but that another House which had allied with them, House Do'ratha, still existed under new leadership, and warned the party against helping or appearing to help drow from that clan since House Ken'rae had fought against them and Vel'sharren during the war. Aler bought a stiff drink.

6) The party went to the supply shop to buy masks as recommended by Nathali, as the stagnant and spore-filled air of the Darklands make it hard for surfacers to breathe and cause constitution damage. The party decided to leave the horses with the walking hut, but worried about how to protect the team's animal companions, none of whom (other than Vanima Kaimelar) could wear a mask. The shopkeeper recommended talking to a ranger in Kiratas who might be able to help.

7) As they descended into the Darklands, Bay asked Aler (still in disguise as Alan) why the drow had not hunted him down and killed him like the other Vel'sharren. Aler did not know, but suspected they believed him to already be dead.

8) The party set a rule to always adhere to a buddy system in the Underdark and to work on the assumption that any party member who wandered off alone was under unwanted outside influence and react accordingly.

9) In the Underdark, the party went straight to the adventurer's shop (called the Happy Caver) to talk to the ranger Fendi. She sold them some supplies and gave them some information, particularly introducing them to the local currency (a diamond-shaped coin called "hyra," worth half a silver piece.) She told them the innkeeper would change money at no charge. She also told them that the spider and the owl definitely did not need masks, and she wouldn't guess a dinosaur would. She showed the party her shop's air purifier, but it costs 250 gold and weighs more than 200 pounds, so it would be difficult for Angara to manage. The party asked whether someone could make a smaller one and Fendi suggested talking to a duergar engineer named Benny at the brewery.

10) The party passed some other buildings which Jon advised against investigating, in order to try and keep their profile low (a bar called Spider Silk, an orcish gym, a public steam bath, and a slightly crumbling drow tower.) However, when the party passed a building with a red lantern in front and a passing duergar confirmed it was a brothel, Jon changed his mind and darted in, followed by Red as his buddy. After humorously assuming the duergar proprietor Big Frank was a woman, Jon learned that each of the hookers has her own underground apartment beneath the store and that half an hour with one of them costs 10 hyra (5 silvers.) He decided to come back later.

11) The rest of the party proceeded to the brewery to talk to Benny the duergar engineer, who was doing maintenance on the still. Benny was easily sold on the idea of building a tiger-mounted air purifier, and asked you to meet him at the market by the river in a couple of hours after he'd had a chance to check some equipment.

12) Meanwhile, Zadkiel and Khirg noticed a small blue genie on a long chain under the still behind the boilers. He spoke Auran, but Khirg successfully communicated with him in Undercommon. His name is Asthan and he introduced himself glumly as the genie of the stamworks. He explained that he and his clan had made a deal to serve one of the drow Houses, but then that House was destroyed, leaving the genie clan trapped in indistinct servitude in the Darklands, since there was no one left with the authority to release them. "This possibility had never occurred to us. The drow war amongst themselves often, but this is the first time we have heard of a Great House being completely eradicated." The House was, of course, Vel'sharren. The party relayed this information to Aler, who decided to go to the market with Red while the others continued chatting up the genie. The genie told them his clan contained 144 genies, most of whom lived in the drow cities, including Ellenun. He himself had been the personal steward to a Vel'sharren wizard who used to live in the small tower nearby. She tried to stay out of the war but had to flee during the subsequent purge, and was caught and killed with the others, leaving Asthan stranded. Zadkiel questioned him on how he could be set free, and he said it was impossible because the ranking member of House Vel'sharren would have to release their contract and there is no one left in House Vel'sharren. Zadkiel asked whether it would work if they used some method such as time travel to get a Vel'sharren house member to release the clan, and Asthan was confused but said probably, as long as it was the highest-ranking member of the House at that time. Zadkiel said they would come back later.

13) Red and Aler checked out the marketplace, which was clearly primarily aimed at merchant-to-merchant transactions but was willing to sell to individuals as well. They found a terrified purple bat crammed into a metal cage at a foods market, and decided to buy it and some grasshoppers to feed it. With Aler's natural 20 on his wild empathy roll, it is now superglued to his side. The bat provided Red and Aler with some basic information about predators in the area via Speak With Animals.

14) Reconvening, the group decided to go to the inn and inquire there about the best way to get to Ellenun. Adriel and Red wanted to check out a large tent along the way, but Jon disagreed and didn't want to draw attention to themselves by talking to more locals. Red pointed out that Jon had talked to the pimp, and she and Adriel went to look at the tent while the rest of the group proceeded to the inn.

15) Red and Adriel found a group of lizardfolk inside the tent, weaving baskets. They were surprised to see the humans, but tried to sell them some baskets using pantomime, demonstrating that some of them were so tightly woven as to be watertight. Red wanted to buy some baskets, but didn't have any hyra, and the lizardfolk didn't know what silvers were worth. They fetched another lizardman named Aishek, who speaks Undercommon and broken Malachian, who brokered the sale for Red and then asked where she was going and if she needed a guide. Red hired him for 5 silver a day. Red and Adriel asked him about getting to Ellenun, and Aishek said that a drow boat could get them there in a day, whereas walking overland would be more like a week.

16) The rest of the party went to the inn, called the Worm Hotel, and talked to the minotaur proprietor Grondor. Despite the weird name, it is actually a high-end inn (the placard out front has a purple worm on it.) Grondor gave them directions to the ticket office by the river where they could book passage to Ellenun.

17) The party converged on the ticket office, where Red justified hiring a guide to Jon. Aler performed a sniff test on Aishek, determining that he is not odorless. Then they bought tickets on the next ship to Ellenun, which will leave the next morning at 11AM.

18) The party met with Benny again, who said he could make a 25-pound air purifier for 110 gold and could have it ready by the next morning. Aler agreed and paid him.

19) The party went back to the inn to rent rooms. On the way they noticed a building with a good smell coming from it, which the innkeeper said was the best restaurant in town, but that surfacers might prefer to eat at the bakery where the food was more familiar. The party went to the restaurant anyway, named Marinella. The waitress brought them "human food," which turned out to be hardtack, beef jerky, and peanuts (well, that's what the human adventurers who come through town are usually buying at the store!)  Red ordered a fish, which was excellent. Khirg and Zadkiel bought curry rice they saw some duergar eating which looked and smelled good. Everyone seemed to be watching them eat. Aler went to the restroom and eavesdropped till he found some patrons speaking Undercommon, who were saying they had never seen a surfacer eat maggots before. He strolled back to the table and casually informed the other PCs what they were eating was not actually rice. They decided to finish their meal anyway.

20) And there we broke for the day. It is about 8PM, though you only know that because the innkeeper has a magical clock. It is difficult to mark the passage of time accurately underground--you can buy a magical watch from the Happy Caver if you are concerned.

Next session we will begin with Jon, Red, and Bay returning to the brothel, plus anything else the PCs may want to do in Kiratas (or Delsin, which is only about two hours upstairs from Kiratas and one hour down.) After that, it's off to Ellenun!

Onward,

Laura