Aporeu chronicles Issue 32: Mine your own Business

Stories from the adventurers

This week

We all thought he was crazy
but we were just lazy
he searched high and low
but all he found was sorrow
he pleaded he begged
thinking she was had

In his disbelief he heard
about cat bandits stealing for all their worth
people said it might be her
but he believed it wasn't in her fur

so he went on a quest
to defeat the bandits in the west
There he saw the horrible truth
they were using women in their youth

using them, hurting them, exploiting them
quick work he made of them

he went into the tunnels of fear
fighting everyone until it was clear

he found their hideout
he fought them in a large last bout

after defeating all of them
He found her and she looked like a gem

Unpolished for sure
but to him she looked like couture

they got out of there
and she finally got an answer to her prayer

and so the story goes
of a trapped girl and her hero

Mine your own Business by Gerolt

Right, so it ain’t exactly news at this point, but I wanted to get the story straight in my head first. Lotta stuff happened this mission that I wasn’t expectin’, and a lot of stuff I had to work out afterward.
It had been over 2 weeks since Jade disappeared on me, on us, without a trace. I had let myself give up on ever findin’ her again, thinkin’ she’d be better off far away from me. Never felt more directionless in my life, needed somethin’ to do. Takin’ out some idiot bandits seemed like the perfect distraction. Of course, that damned blue-tailed desk rat Loïs ruined the idea with some baseless accusations of Jade bein’ involved with the bandits.
Joinin’ me on this mission are Thamior, the bear druid; Noaz, the rookie; Quen, who’s a bit of a clown, but useful in his own way; some middle-aged guy named Joop; and of course, V, the doctor himself.
Now, the doc and I have some history together, but this is our first time side-by-side on a quest. Him and I have very different ideas of how things should be done, so we bump heads often. However, can’t deny his elixirs do the trick in a pinch.
Word is, these bandits have been hittin’ caravans goin’ in and out of the city; killin’ men, capturin’ women, and stealin’ goods. We decide best way to lure ‘em out is to head down the road with a cart of our own. I try to keep everyone in formation like proper caravan guards, but as usual, nobody’s interested in bein’ a team.
Halfway down the road, Quen does his usual magic scoutin’ thing and tells us there’s some bandit lookin’ types holdin’ an injured woman hostage; obvious trap. The group discusses how to approach, which takes way too long. In the end they come up with a plan that inevitably falls apart on first contact with the enemy.
Lucky for us, the bandits couldn’t aim to save their lives, literally. We tear through em pretty quick, again literally in the case of Thamior. Guy’s a beast; once again, literally. Despite the carnage, we manage to keep one from bleedin’ out; some blonde woman who was goin’ around tryin’ to heal her bandit buddies during the fight.
We decide to ask the woman they were usin’ as bait some questions. She don’t prove useful and Noaz gets suspicious. The rookie pulls out a magic scroll and then starts screamin’ paranoid about everyone bein’ goblins in disguise. Guess he learned my lesson from our last mission together a bit too well.
After we calm him down, we finally get some info out of the hostage. She tells us about other women being held captive, includin’ a Tabaxi. This, along with Loïs’ insinuations, sets my alarm bells ringin’. Quen nearly gives me a duzsad heart attack by magically makin’ himself look like Jade, and the woman confirms it’s her.
At this point, I don’t give a damn about the mission anymore. I slap Blondie awake and put my blade to her neck, demandin’ she bring us to Jade. She claims the best way there is through some mine shaft, so I make her our guide. We go into the mines, headin’ straight through.
Near the end, we encounter some idiots who think they can take us. We kill ‘em quick, but when I go to press on, the others stay behind to scrounge for trinkets; ‘cept Joop, he’s good in my books. Was especially disappointed with V, who I thought would care more about Jade than findin’ scraps to sell for a few gold pieces. He explained later he was tryin’ to keep the group from fallin’ apart. Don’t agree with his tactical assessment, but I’ve decided to accept he tried what he thought was best.
On the other end of the mines, we spot some lookouts, as well as the barracks that Jade was supposed to be held under. I decide best thing would be to make a distraction and get in ‘n out quick. I tell Blondie to go and gather her buds and lead them away. Like a good little doggy, she obeys and we head over to the barracks when the coast’s clear. On the way, I chug a potion I got from writin’ my last story, which seems to boost my muscle power through the roof; feels good.

With no time to waste, I breach the door and rush in, the rest followin’ behind. Inside, most of the bastards were sleepin’. We made sure half of them woke up to their own death. Once we finish off the toughest lookin’ guy, I notice some robed rat tryin’ to cast a spell or something. My blade through his back puts a stop to that gunshul right quick.
Unsurprisingly, the rest gets to lootin’ again while I try to get through a hatch leadin’ to the basement where Jade’s supposed to be. Some damn magic keeps the thing shut, but in the end the potion I drank wins out and I tear the hatch off its hinges.
Downstairs, in the damp, dark cell, I find her; cold, beaten, bruised, barely conscious. I take her in my arms and suddenly, I’m reminded of the song Phae made me learn, one about findin’ hope and light in darkness. Not knowin’ what else to do for Jade, I just start singin’ to her.
From there, it’s all a blur. We load the women we freed into the cart and head back to the city. I carry Jade to the nearest Inn to recover while the others continue back to the guild. From there starts a long road of recovery that’s still ongoin’. I swear to Lathander, I won’t rest ‘till Jade’s back to her annoyin’ly bouncy, happy self again.

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Mine your own Business by Thamior

I hadn’t been back for long when I got onto a mission to stop bandits robbing merchants on the road to Arnheim. It didn’t seem like a mission on which I had a lot of troubles; Stopping bandits is something I’ve been doing for as long as 50 years or something. The trouble is, I’ve never done it close to a city and never to a group bigger than one or two bandits. This was expected to be a lot harder, so I was glad that we had the mission as a group of the adventuring guild. That at least was until I saw who was coming. Doctor Vasilievski, with which I do not have a good understanding with at this moment because of his enchantment he put on Phaedra. He denies it, but they had fought before and now they’re the closest friends in Arnheim.
Joop was coming too. I hadn’t really seen him since he shot me in the back, but I did not press the issue with him because I didn’t really get a chance. Gerolt wanted to get going because Loïs mentioned a Tabaxi among the bandits and she said it could be Jade.
Quenvayas was also present. Don’t know why he would come on a mission to stop a group of bandits. He doesn’t do any damage to anyone and getting in the way of bandits most often means fighting. So I didn’t understand, but at least he was part of the group and a bigger group would probably be more intimidating.
There was one more person in the group. Noaz. Doctor Vasilievski called him the sword of the people. I didn’t really know him yet. So at that moment I didn’t really have a thought about the person.
Outside, Vasilievski laid out a possible plan, in which he wanted us to be merchants, pulling a cart over the road to be ambushed by the bandits. He wanted me to turn into a mule to pull the cart. Don’t know if he did that on purpose or not, but I still don’t think I’ve forgiven him that.
After renting a cart and a mule from the guild, which we could do with Loïs, we went on our way. It didn’t take long before we were at the hills and Gerolt wanted to have a strategy. He told Quenvayas to look into the future and tell us what he saw, so we protected Quenvayas from nothing while he was busy. After a few minutes he told us where we would encounter bandits with a bound lady among them and we decided on a plan. We would continue walking until we heard the lady screaming and then leave the cart behind to go further on foot directly to the lady. Some of us would try to sneak up to them from another direction and the rest would follow the initial plan. Noaz and the doctor went up a hill but it was quite clear what they were trying to do, so it wasn’t as sneakily as we wanted. Luckily the doctor noticed this as well and called out to the bandits so they knew we were split up.
We attacked them and easily won the combat, and also with a price. We captured their healer and saved the prisoner. She told us of Jade, which send Gerolt on a bigger warpath than he was already on. He told the healer to take us to Jade, which meant he didn’t stop from there. We crashed through the mines, the healer showed us. We encountered a set of bandits, which we killed quite fast, but not before Vasilievski almost stabbed me with his rapier.
At the end of the mine, Gerolt send the healer out, to get as much bandits away from the mine as possible, which, luckily, worked out great. There were only a few bandits left in the barracks, which we took out too. Noaz and Vasilievski even broke down a wall for it. When we tried to get to the cells with prisoners, there was just a problem. The hatch was magically closed and it took Gerolt a while to get through it, even with his strength. In the meantime there were more bandits coming over to see what the fuss was all about, but we scared them off and they left.
Finally Gerolt broke down the hatch and went in to find Jade, who was very hurt by her captors, but still alive. There was not much physical trauma, which was already healed when I had a chance to check up on her.
We’re all glad we saved Jade from those bandits.

On the next issue:

We need protecting