RPG Campaigns

Giraine Summaries

Hiya,

You talked it over and decided to splurge for the Excelsiinn's finery for a night of resting up after your sewer slithering escapades. There, you met the Captain Gulos waiting outside with his men and his Zzaburi, the enigmatic Ytor the Sinister. It seems that Gulos's network of informants had seen you coming and they opted to meet you at the inn, with Gulos eager to get the scoop on what you'd done down below New Arvonesse. He received the Lur Horn (was it magical? Some sort of barbarian treasure? You were not sure, but once he had it Gulos seemed mostly interested in talking to you) and then, surprisingly to some of you, Gulos offered information and acted keen to deliver information that might truly be helpful, if he could.

You learned that Lesoncurre was originally a loner but had begun to chafe the Captain G by accumulating worrying amounts of influence amongst those in the New Arv/Fort Mudlark area that also hated the “frog fuckers”. Gulos speculated, or to those of you with insight bluntly stated, that Lesoncurre hated the Giranois not only because they were odd, ugly savages but also because they burned his Rokari missionary parents to death. Hints were dropped that the ruins of the Rokari mission in town were not only recent ruins but also maybe Gulos had some hand in that ruination… But Gulos had nothing against the Girainois himself, yet neither did he wish to join Captain Ahappi on a new revolt against the Rokari: he professed loyalty to Big Ron's (and his Baronet Barapitis in New Arv) goal to keep the peace, for now. There were some loaded words there said to Captain A, like “Progress can test our tolerance; not every threat can be quenched.”– surely Gulos had considered you or at least Ahappi as threats at some point or even now?

Talk moved on to other topics; you asked again about the snake cults or other presences in town and Gulos insisted he knew nothing, although he did mutter something to Orsattus about a family legend that would “stay in the family” at least for now. Gulos asked about your experiences in the sewers and visibly was upset about the chaos you'd encountered. He was earnest in hatred of chaos and had cleansed the sewers of it when he'd moved here years ago, so he thought it either must have dug its way up from the depths, where his team had never plumbed, or come from elsewhere. Ytor the Zzaburi also hinted that he not only wanted to help rid the land of chaos but that he knew more about its cause or something– he was vague there. He asked Maugis for a report on the chaos and other interesting findings in the sewers, and Maugis ventured that maybe they could become allies, which Ytor was opaque about in response.

Gulos admitted that his people had never delved deep into the more watery regions of the sewers, being fond of breathing air and not so fond of drowning, as he put it. But he also had been harried by “swift pirates” lately- not Dripping Beards or others you knew of, but some strange band that struck fast and then vanished, and he thought they might be coming from within the sewers but had no means to chase them in there. Some of you figured that he saw your band as a new means to do so, or at least learn more about this threat.

The sewers were deep and old, Gulos and Ytor explained, with Second Age fortifications and artifices built there at this Godlearner estuarine port town of old, and probably built atop older things, then left alone for some six centuries to fester in lonely ruin until he and the rest of Big Ron's/Barapitis's people moved in here and poked around again.

The “Strangers” (tough people who moved through town lately) remained a mystery to Gulos and he welcomed more information. But they seemed distinct from the Dripping Beards, who were just a pirate gang only fit to decorate spears with their heads around the town walls if they ever came around New Arv.

Finally, you agreed to go back into the sewers with some help from Ytor. The mage had devised a counterspell that might work to mask your magics from whatever corrupt anti-magic plagued the sewer (the gorp room); an anti-anti magic blessing. It was a clever formula and he'd try casting it as an experiment if you reported back to him on its results (presuming your survival). With some nudging, you got Gulos to agree to allow you to enter the sewers through the trapdoor (near the Night Market), rather than struggle getting through the harbor waters with fire magics cast. You grabbed a few bits of extra gear from Gulos and the market (e.g. Fraud Shaven got a new shield) and rested in the Inn and by morning you were ready to delve back in.

And this plan worked! You rushed back to the archway at the gorp-room and your spells held up as you entered. With a couple of rounds of hacking at the slimy glob with fireblades, you dispatched the horrid thing. Fraud Shaven was disappointed to find that his anti-chaos sorcery did not work in this anti-magic field (only your previously cast spells were protected). Once you defeated the gorp and left the room, climbing a staircase up into a smaller chamber, you perceived that the anti-magic was no longer present there.

In this next chamber, splattered with blood and scrawled with bloody graffiti, you found the gnawed remains of a human skeleton, only a couple of days dead at most, and under a bloody bedroll Maugis found a vellum parchment with a note (in flowery Tradetalk– I didn't note that, as a literate Zzaburi, Maugis would be 1 person in the party that can read this) that left him bemused:

"Dear Kruushla, or is it Kim? Words travel far- the limerick about your efforts in Jrustela gave us many a chuckle here in Sun County. I wish I had such a gift of eloquent verse. May your aspirations bear sweet fruits. Nanni Pola (maybe you've heard of me?)." -- Hmmm... 

Meanwhile, Fraud Shaven read some of the bloody scrawlings on the walls and retreated, very disturbed, heading back down the stairway to meditate. Soon the others, who'd been exploring the gorp-room and found nothing, came in. You saw a passage heading north-ish to a rune-carved archway into a room, and a damp tunnel sloping downwards southeast-ish, with signs of a lot of past traffic. In the chamber where Maugis had found the parchment (on strange vellum- not sheepskin?), you read poetry in those bloody scrawlings that rambled about cannibalism and discord, celebrating apocalypses. Hmmm again…

The archway was still enchanted, powerfully, and some prodding with Maugis's staff revealed that it conjured burning energies that explained why a stub of a torch lay nearby and charcoal-scribblings warned of some danger there, using nonsensical Seshnegi poetry. The room beyond was a mostly-intact Godlearner chamber of some kind, with a central circle ringed by runes. There were old shelves lining the walls with tatters of papers and dusty bottles, but the arch's enchantment scared you off for now.

Down the sloping tunnel, you found that it meandered around and grew more moist and fungus-coated as it did, curving northward. Fraud Shaven led the exploration followed by others, but Orsattus slipped and slid downward, narrowly missing each of the others in front of him until he (if my memory serves) slid into dark brackish water, where he could see a dim, globular heat source sliding toward him. It was surely another gorp! He managed to get out and you tried to lure the gorp out of the water but it lurked down there in its cunning, inscrutable malevolence. Frustrated, you climbed back up the treacherous tunnel and took another look at the archway-room back above, then debated what to do..

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