Aporeu chronicles Issue 30: Chapels of the Chaste
Stories from the adventurers
This week
This time we get stories about a great endeavor that has shed the light on the foul plot of the chapel of chastity.Chapels of the Chaste by Heubald
Our Glorious Crusade against the Chapels of the Chaste On the appointed time as was written on the notice, I found my way to an office at the Guild Hall to meet with the employers for this mission: lady Phaedra and doctor Vasilievski. The doctor was dressed in a very fine suit, lady Phaedra clad in a blue dress. Our other compatriots were Gwyn, a very flamboyant half-elf in formal wear, and Svæn, a… simple complicated man. A brute with occasionally very big insights dressed in a ...well… not very fancy outfit. As our quest was laid out for us we heard that we were to save Chloe and Lilandra, two ladies of negotiable favor. It seems Lilandra loves her work, but has recently joined the Chapel of Chastity. Chloe found her profession to help her sister, who is under contract which in effect makes her a slave. Chloe too has suddenly joined the Chapel of the Chaste. As the doctor saw it, each of us had a role to play in this quest: Svæn would be ‘eye candy’, I would be able to provide romantic musical accompaniment and as for Gwyn, apparently “We know”. Perhaps one day I will know as well. We had a number of leads: A Mr. Alder who is the previous owner of a brothel that went out of business, and has been taken over by the Chapel of the Chaste. Shi’Liane, who is a current brothel owner, and of whom the doctor was sure she had been approached by the chapel as well, and then there were new chapels which had been located, where we could investigate as well. We decided to go find Mr. Alder, however when we left the office into the main hall of the Guild we heard catcalling up ahead and saw a brown haired woman saunter up to us, sexy dressed, sexy looking, with clearly fake elf-like tips to her ears. She turned out to be Veera, working for Shi’Liana who firmly requested our presence. Lady Phaedra decided to change into a tight red dress with a mermaid cut, and floral patterns embroidered on it. Then on we went, walking after this woman through the streets, making our way to Faresh’nay’s Inn of Comforts. What we found was an… interesting place. I must admit I did not really know where to look, but I very much investigated the ceiling and walls. The floral patterns on the walls very much looked like the floral patterns on lady Phaedra’s dress. I did not ask her if that was because she worked there, and considering how the meeting went I am glad I did not. Meeting miss Shi’Liana was very interesting. She seems to be very much interested in the doctor, lady Phaedra very much did not appear to like Shi’Liana. There were some interesting jabs happening for sure. However eventually we did get the information we were seeking. It seemed boring men came by, telling her she is evil and corrupts the city, and trying to get her to close her establishment. She had the men followed and they went into a building, she told us where to look. While the rest of us were meeting Shi’Liana Svæn had a meeting of sorts himself with, one of the employees, a strong looking, rough dwarven lady named Rosa. After the meeting Gwyn spent some time with Shi’Liana so we hung around the Inn for about an hour, while the doctor went talking with the employees and lady Phaedra and me talked a bit, had some drinks and then I got engrossed in writing while she went for a talk with the doctor. After both Gwyn and Svæn were finished with their pleasure we could finally get back to our quest. Lady Phaedra and the doctor managed to convince Svæn that we would find Mr. Leland, who he was convinced we would be going to next, at the house that Shi’Liana mentioned. When we arrived we managed to talk our way past the guards and inside to talk with a Mr. Alexander Hallowsworth. While he claimed to be the major benefactor of the Chapel of the Chaste he also gave us some information for our quest, it seems the church was rapidly expanding, houses of sin being replaced by shrines of chastity. Each chapel had a head maiden and acolytes, many acolytes came from former brothels. It seems the church was led by Grakas. Eventually the doctor managed to form his verbal wonders, he is almost as good as the great Brindlo Wanderfoot with his words! Alexander paid the doctor money, and we promised to report back our findings to him. During a scuffle between Svæn and the doctor Gwyn managed to purloin an invoice which specified the great Giselbert Carbonneau was contracted to build a lot of statues for the Church of Chastity, which led us to go there next. In the workshop we saw a lot of beautiful statues of the ‘Veiled Maiden’, a woman with a veil coming down to under her nose. Lady Phaedra tried her hand at stone-working on the statue while Svæn stripped to pose for a future statue. He has… quite the physique.
Master Carbonneau eventually showed up schematics of a statue he created for the Churches inner sanctum, a veiled maiden with some technical stuff inserted in it. One curious thing that the master had objected to but still carved was that the statue had a forked tongue. He also told us the location of the sanctum, as well as a back entrance to get in.
We decided to go by one of the chapels before going to the sanctum. Along the way it was decided that four of us would pretend to be sinners, come to convert, the doctor would remain outside.
I had to pull from some of the… elaborate stories my father told me, when we were older, the ones where he bragged about his prowess with the ladies on his adventures. I have to admit these are some stories I have trouble to believe. I told the head maiden, Eleta a story about evenings pleasuring ‘6, 7, 8 women at the same time’. Somehow, she believed me, and we were rushed into a back room for expedited initiation into the church.
The room was prepared, with incense in large bowls that when lit caused a heavy, pungent smell in the room.. We felt our minds getting clouded, and everything that was said seemed very…. Logical.. Rational and true. At one point Lady Phaedra did run away, and later on the doctor came in and killed the head maiden.
As our heads became clearer, the doctor carried Chloe to Shi’Liane who made sure her mind was her own, and that she was safe. Chloe would be working at Faresh’nay’s Inn of comforts from now on.
Next our adventure took us to the sanctum, the head chapel. From the outside it looked like a rather normal building. Following the plans by Master Carbonneau we went to the back of the building, finding a metal door. As the door was opened we noticed a small silver wire strung across the door, and I carefully removed it, disabling the alarm spell in the works.
Inside we found a dark room with another door. Gwyn managed to unlock it and, after adding some oil, we opened the door to find the statue crafted by the master. There were stairs leading up and down from the door, there was also a pool attached to the statue which just seemed to contain some image of an empty room. Somehow this made lady Phaedra and the doctor quite upset, something about it spying on them in their room. We also heard the sound of knocking coming from the pool.
Svæn decided to have a swim in the pool, breaking the image, while Gwyn and I hid behind the statue. When someone came through a door upstairs and told us to leave he was told to fetch their leader. Before I could stop him, Gwyn shot an arrow at the man but he missed, hitting the door. We again hid, and a whole host of guards came out, and I even heard footsteps coming from the room through which we had entered.
Eventually a handsome half-elf in robes entered, and revealed himself to be the leader. What then happened, you will not believe it, but suddenly an image of a very large scantily clad Elven woman appeared, which seems to be Aphrodite. She threatened the leader and his guards for a moment, but after just a few seconds she also disappeared again. Still, the image, the sound, even the smell. I was honored to have been in the presence of a Goddess, dear reader, just as my father has been in the presence of Gods before me!
A fight ensued, in which Svæn took a remarkable amount of hits without going down, lady Phaedra, the doctor and me used our magic as best we could to support our compatriots and hinder or damage the enemy. Gwyn… also did his best to keep the enemy away from those of us who were casting spells. Eventually when the leader had died, and just two guards were let one of them fled to be killed by Gwyn, and the other surrendered, only to be knocked unconscious by lady Phaedra and Svæn, and subsequently murdered by Gwyn.
After the fight was concluded we could take our time investigating the rest of the church. Downstairs we found a few horrible rooms, one containing some sort of Altar on which a man was bled to death, the next very cold containing rows and rows of corpses who were gutted. The doctor recognized one because of her… special features… even though when we found her, she was shown to be a grey skinned creature with white hair… A changeling, like me. The doctor carried her out to give her a proper burial.
We did finish searching the rest of the church, finding papers as evidence of the church's plot to make the city of Arnheim chaste, decrease population growth to prepare it for eventual conquering. We also found some money in the process.
I… joined the doctor and lady Phaedra for the burial, it felt like the right thing to do. How many more of us are there out there, I wonder?
It was an amazing quest, I have learned a lot… and it has left me with stories, songs, and a lot to think about.
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