Shadows in the Harbor Session 33
General Summary
What Can You Tell Us?
The following morning, the 18th of Uhr 1428, the party returned to Hardingham Keep. This time they were going to see their prisoners, Medarin Clubs and Matilde Carson. They wound their way through the keep, the guards making way for the heroes who they had come to respect. The dungeon entrance was across from the sheriff's office, next to the gallows. The entrance led down into a dimly lit basement area protected by an equally dim older guard. He wasn't expecting any company so he tried his best to seem official and ask some questions, but it became apparent to the party that he wasn't the sharpest cookie in the shed. But after some straightening out, the guard yielded and let them pass. Medarin and Matilde were being held in separate cells toward the end of the narrow hall. Medarin seemed unrepentant and Keck's words were unable to sway him. So they simply turned to Matilde's cell and approached her for questioning. Matilde looked terrified and she cowered in the corner as Keck and Damakos approached her. It didn't take much convincing to get her to talk. A bit of good cop/bad cop from Keck and Damakos, respectively, coupled with some incentives for leniency, and Matilde was ready to give up what little she knew. She told the party that there was a warehouse farther down the docks where some of the crates would get syphoned off to, but she'd only ever been there once before. She didn't know who owned it or what was in the crates, but she always got a bad feeling about them. Keck asked her to lead them to the warehouse. Matilde complied, albeit hesitantly.I Told You They Were Real
Matilde led the party across the docks towards the fishery. Along the way, Malark tried to explain to her that they'd found Warforged in the crates and that they'd fought them before. Matilde didn't believe them; Warforged were the stuff of history books and legends used mainly to scare small children into behaving along with hags and mindflayers. As they approached the warehouse, Matilde could feel the hairs on the back of her neck start to rise. She began to hyperventalate and fell into a full on panic attack. Malark stayed behind to watch the prisoner and keep her from escaping while the rest of the party went to investigate the warehouse. Tim the Not-so-Tiny listened closely at the door, but didn't hear anything unusual. He prompted Keck, who used his lockpicking kit to open the door. Meanwhile, Matilde continued her panic attack, growing ever more incoherent. The door opened quietly, revealing a red-robe clad cultist sitting by himself silently meditating. Several large crates, similar to the ones the party had found while in the Sanguine Abyss. Tim tip-toed into the unlit room and attacked the cultist! He staggered to his feet and fought back furiously but it wasn't enough to hold back or even threaten the party. The party searched the body briefly revealing him to be a member of the Cult of Baal. Damakos recognized the cultist's robes and symbols instantly as the same cult that had kidnapped him from his home years earlier. He was on a mission of vengeance and he would have it one way or the other. A quick inspection of the crates turned up the same rose imprint on all five of them, including the small one in the center of the room. Keck broke out his crowbar and cranked open the small one first. Inside it he found several stones which Baron Deeplight recognized as Bloodstone and Shadowiron. While he recognized the material, he failed to understand their purpose and acknowledged that the party would need the aid of a blacksmith. Realizing what was in the other boxes, which were much taller and resembled the ones from the Sanguine Abyss, the party knew they had to be careful. They slowly wheeled one out to the docks and prepared to open it. Damakos and the Baron stayed back along with Fel'Shu; Malark was still watching over Matilde. Tim and Keck carefully pried it open, revealing a large amount of packing hay. Two glowing red eyes appeared behind the hay and an arm shot out, grabbing Keck by the colar. The metallic voice accused Keck of being an interloper, but Keck tried to reason with it. Tim, on the other hand, realized that the situation was headed south really quickly, so he body checked the crate with the Warforged into the bay in the hopes that it would sink along with its occupant. As the crate lay bobbing in the water, the Warforged called out to his brothers in the warehouse. Almost all at once, fists burst out of the crates and additional Warforged appeared. Matilde was in full on panic mode. These were beings of myth and legend and had been extinct for millenia. The three Warforged attempted to rushed out of the warehouse to aid their brother. Baron and Damakos fought the remaining two while Fel'Shu charged in. Tim and Keck prepared for the worst while the Warforged in the water slowly climbed up and attacked from behind. Some of these constructs were stronger than the previous ones they'd fought. Perhaps there were different variations of these beings...? Damakos and Baron finished off one of the warehouse Warforged, but not without Baron taking a beating. He was forced to misty step out of the reach of the remaining automaton, but not before casting shatter centered between the two. It was enough to buy him the time he needed, causing tremendous damage to the Warforged as well as demolishing part of the stone wall. One of the Warforged came rushing out and Fel'Shu gave chase. Fel'Shu attempted to reason with it, speaking to it in broken Phasnoshi. Apparently the Warforged didn't like what Fel'Shu had to say and redoubled its attack. Fel'Shu defended himself and defeated the Warforged soundly. Tim and Keck had their hands full with the waterlogged construct, but were able to defeat it as well. Damakos finished off the last of them. Matilde had calmed down by this point and was thoroughly impressed by the party and the fact that they had fought (and won) these beings before. Keck and Malark explained to her that their company had been shipping these across the kingdom and other locales. They needed some kind of way to defeat them en masse, knowing full well that they couldn't go from town to town hunting these. They had problems to consider, so they headed back...Rewards Granted
- 375xp per player for fighting the Warforged in the Warehouse
- 300xp per player for advancing the plot
Report Date
06 Sep 2024
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