Adventure Log, Session 4 The Old Orc Temple, Part 1
General Summary
Elitheris bought herself a framepack, as her small backpack couldn’t carry everything she was now packing. She moved the stuff in her sack to her larger backpack, and set about to make some arrows. She didn’t have all the time in the world, so she was forced to hurry a bit. She made two broadhead arrows, and six needle bodkins.
While in the tavern, Taid was approached by a Human, Kylen Pelorus, who had traveled from Sunmill with his mule, Clyde. Kylen related a tale of abductions and slavery, and people missing. And dreams; Kylen said that Mithras was sending him dreams, and he related five of them, filled with metaphorical symbology. Or history. Or both. With dreams, it was hard to tell.
“The dream started out normal. I was walking alone in some woods. Everything was green, even the tree trunks, except for some bushes that had blossoms of red that had five petals, and seemed to be grasping at something. It got dark, although the sky was as bright as ever. It seemed as if the trees themselves drank up the light, not letting it get shed properly. There was a distinct sense of foreboding. It was like Mithras himself was being kept from shining.”
The Dream of the Green Jungle
“I was walking in a town; it’s a normal town, during a normal day, filled with normal people. They were all Orcs, all doing normal things. Then I started noticing dead and bloody people through the windows of their homes, so I started running towards the outskirts of town. By the time I got there, people were dropping all around me, bleeding out through their mouth, nose, ears, and eyes. I could hear my footsteps splashing in the blood that threatened to rise above my ankles like a red flood.”
The Dream of the Orc Town
“I was flying, like a bird, over the jungle, in the morning, the sun hot on my left side. I think I had feathers, at least, that’s the impression I had. I bank and turn, and I fly over a town, along a river, dominated by a large ziggurat-like shrine, sixty or seventy feet tall. I think there were carvings on it, but I couldn’t make out details. I flew into the doorway in the building at the top, and everything went black.”
The Dream of the Jungle Temple
“I was on a horse, riding along a trail in the jungle. All of a sudden, out of the underbrush, an Orc tackles me off of my horse, and we both slam into the ground. The Orc is shouting something, over and over: “Crew”, or “Rouge”, or “Rogue”, or “Toogah”, or “Cruise”, or some such. I don’t know Lurkash, the Orcish tongue, and the dream was unclear and vague anyway. The Orc is shaking my shoulders, but I don’t think he was trying to hurt me. I don’t know what he wanted. Maybe to get my attention? Believe me, if I had been tackled by an Orc, he’d have my attention! I could hear the blood rushing in my ears, which made it seem as if the Orc shaking me was muffled and far away. Then the dream ended, fading away like dreams do.”
The Dream of the Attacking Orc
“Darkness, and darkness within darkness, but moving. All over, it’s moving. Shadows engulfed everything, and I could hear screams of abject terror, from unseen and unknown throats. The kind of screams that hint at utter despair and hopelessness. The kind that seem to be a mix of screams and weeping and choked up throats. Whatever was happening to those people must have been absolutely horrible. But worse was the sudden way in which some of those screams stopped. They ended with gurgles, as if they had lost the ability to scream properly.”
The Dream of the Screaming Darkness
The group agree to help him: Taid because he is a champion of Aheru-Mazda (the Dwarven name for the deity Mithras Elitheris because she wants to help; and Eykit because there might be some kind of reward. Kylen does say that he will take up a collection as compensation, although how much that will eventually be is unknown.
Kylen Pelorus
They assume, based on the dreams, that the abductions have to do with something in the past, specifically the reference to some sort of ziggurat and the town with only Orcs in it, and that it might be somewhere to the south. Having grown up in Port Karn, Eykit knew that the area had originally been Orcish, before the Tondenes conquered it, later forming the Empire. Both Eykit and Taid knew it to be a provincial capital, and thus likely to have government buildings, some of which might hold useful files or information.
They go to the Ministry of Records, which includes offices covering births, deaths, land transactions, history, and surveying. They discover that before the Empire, the area around Port Karn was a loose federation of Orcish tribes, and that all of the towns were Orcish, some of which no longer exist. They were able to get the names of the towns, as well as a map of where they might have been (at least their approximate locations, as maps weren’t always accurate). Asking an Orcish clerk if he could tell them what the Orcish names meant, they found out that the four towns (Pulgoruzana, Gijak Balorat, Gultur Votar, and Ukavrong Krah) meant “Forest Stream”, “Blood Green”, “Boar Home”, and “Strong Arm”, respectively. They also discover that if they want more detailed historical or botanical information, they will need to go somewhere with more informational resources.
They head to the Shrine of Seshat, the goddess of knowledge and writing, which is the closest thing to a library that Port Karn has. It has an access fee of $20, which is usually high enough to keep the rabble out. Taid pays it and enters; Elitheris and Eykit stay outside. They know that they will be traveling through the jungle, and Elitheris finds out from Eykit who might be able to store some of her gear. Eykit knows of a tavern that has a series of safes, just for this purpose. He knows it’s pretty safe, as the tavern owner pays protection money to the New Town Skulls. Anyone who stole from the tavern would find the New Town Skulls paying them a rather uncomfortable visit. Besides, the locks are good; Eykit figures that Elend might have had something to do with the choice of locks and lock maker. Elitheris stashes her bottle of gin, and her two magical tomes.
Taid, meanwhile, has found out some history about the area. He finds out about some of the military campaigns fought in the area to subdue the Orc tribes. The four defunct towns on the map they had used to be the tribal capitals. Those tribes were Marzgi Kokasht (Pulgoruzana), Ak Doram (Gijak Balorat), Gulturkruz (Gultur Votar), and Vagun Sapat (Ukavrong Krah). Asking for some help with translation, he gets that the four tribes meant “Crushed Skull”, “Red Hand”, “Boar Riders”, and “Giant Axe”.
Taid had also been trying to find out about a red, five petaled flowering bush, but even the most Compleat Compendium of Botanie had absolutely nothing about a plant of that description. Aheru-Mazda must have been guiding his hand when he put it on that book, as it was the first one in the Botany section that he tried.
Kylen Pelorus lets the group borrow his mule, and they set off into the jungle that afternoon, taking the road south to Avondale, and then into the jungle, making their first camp in the area where they had fought the hydra the eightday before. After an uneventful night, they start fresh in the morning, cutting their way through the dense jungle with their knives and swords. They should probably invest in some machetes, one of these days….
Around midmorning, they come upon a wounded Hobbit. They bind his wounds, and Taid casts a Minor Healing on him. It turns out he had been traveling with a caravan from Sunmill to Port Karn, when the caravan had been attacked by brigands. He tried to fight, but the life of a baker typically doesn’t require much fighting skill, so the brigand only laughed and stabbed him in the shoulder. Felsin Honeybread, the baker, ran into the jungle. He wasn’t pursued, as the brigands had a caravan to loot. Felsin ran, and got lost in the jungle, wounded and tired. Fortunately, he had some food on him, so he wasn’t starving in the Human sense. (Hobbit-wise, however, meant he was missing several meals). Eykit being Eykit, he asked the baker for a reward for saving his life; Felsin handed over the last half loaf that he had. Feeling mush better, Felsin asked for directions to town, which were given. Once he found out that he wasn’t too far from civilization, he was sure he could make it back, and they parted company.
Later that day, they got a bit lost, but Elitheris made her Land Navigation roll, and it only delayed them a couple of hours, so it went unnoticed. Especially since they were making their own trail, it didn’t really matter. As it turns out, Eykit stumbles (well, not really a stumble, more like stubbing his toe) while walking through the jungle. He had found a foundation stone, part of the remains of a building long covered by the jungle. They spend a bit of time looking around, and find that they had located what was left of Gultur Votar, which was barely the outlines of what used to be some buildings. The jungle had taken the rest, centuries ago.
They make camp.
That night, while Taid was on watch, he stepped into a Reek, which stuck to his boot, its acidic body starting to burn through it. With a sharp tug, he pulled his boot free, but the Reek didn’t want to go without dinner, so it extruded a pseudopod and struck Taid on the chest. Now it was his chainmail that was starting to sizzle. He shouted, and cut at it with his knife, slicing open the tentacle. But the Reek put more of its gelatinous body into the tentacle, “refilling” it. Eykit and Elitheris woke up, scrambling out of their bedrolls. Taid cuts at the pseudopod again, and again it refills shortly thereafter.
Eykit throws a dagger at its body, now humped up a bit out of the forest duff. The dagger disappears into its body with a “gloop”. Elitheris, having pulled out her bow, and, questioning herself whether it will do any good, nocks and looses and arrow, piercing the tentacle 10” from Taid’s body, the arrow sticking out of both sides. It didn’t really do anything, as far as she could tell. Taid cuts at it again, but it still remains stuck to him. By now, links are falling out of his mail shirt where the tentacle is burning its way through them. Realizing that impaling attacks aren’t doing anything, Eykit runs up to it and cuts at it with his knife. It doesn’t do much damage, but it was enough to make the tentacle retract into the main body mass. It had eaten through the mail, and had been starting to eat through Taid’s gambeson. Angry that his armor had a hole in it, Taid grabs his halberd and, with a mighty blow (and Eykit’s assistance with his knife) finally kills the Reek.
The next day, they came to a fork in the river. They saw a pole boat, tied up. In it, under a tarp used to cover abductees/slaves (as determined by the iron rings that appear to have been used to secure chains) they found a bag with a few loaves of stale bread, about three days old. It had been abandoned about a day and half earlier, and they could see a trail cut and trampled by many feet, going in the direction of one of the forks. The boat had been left there because that fork was unnavigable.
Worried that someone might come for the boat, they moved away from the river’s fork, and found a campsite. It wasn't the best campsite, or even a particularly good one, but it would do in a pinch. They made a small fire, to cook the rabbit Elitheris had hunted while they were traveling. The smell of the roasting meat must have attracted the attention of a starving dog, because one showed up at the edge of the camp, warily watching them. Elitheris tossed a bit of roasted rabbit in it’s general direction, and it sniffed at it, then gobbled it up. She held out another in her hand, coaxing the stray to her. It came, its tail starting to wag, and ate it. Elitheris and Eykit showered it with attention, fed it, and named him “Mr. Wiggles”. While giving him belly rubs and pats on the head, they noticed that it had a battered collar. So it had been “civilized”, but was now without a humanoid companion. Mr. Wiggles now apparently had three.
Mister Wiggles (it would take a few days for him to know his new name) also knew the following tricks: Shake, and Sit (both in Imperial). He could be taught other doggie tricks, but it would take time and attention (or character points and attention, assuming he ever gets any). All of the usual dog tricks are available (as Techniques, based off of the the skill “Tricks”), and, unlike normal Techniques, if he doesn’t have a point in a trick, he doesn’t know it at all. So he wasn’t really well-trained. But he’s young, so he can be taught new tricks.
While in the tavern, Taid was approached by a Human, Kylen Pelorus, who had traveled from Sunmill with his mule, Clyde. Kylen related a tale of abductions and slavery, and people missing. And dreams; Kylen said that Mithras was sending him dreams, and he related five of them, filled with metaphorical symbology. Or history. Or both. With dreams, it was hard to tell.
“The dream started out normal. I was walking alone in some woods. Everything was green, even the tree trunks, except for some bushes that had blossoms of red that had five petals, and seemed to be grasping at something. It got dark, although the sky was as bright as ever. It seemed as if the trees themselves drank up the light, not letting it get shed properly. There was a distinct sense of foreboding. It was like Mithras himself was being kept from shining.”
“I was walking in a town; it’s a normal town, during a normal day, filled with normal people. They were all Orcs, all doing normal things. Then I started noticing dead and bloody people through the windows of their homes, so I started running towards the outskirts of town. By the time I got there, people were dropping all around me, bleeding out through their mouth, nose, ears, and eyes. I could hear my footsteps splashing in the blood that threatened to rise above my ankles like a red flood.”
“I was flying, like a bird, over the jungle, in the morning, the sun hot on my left side. I think I had feathers, at least, that’s the impression I had. I bank and turn, and I fly over a town, along a river, dominated by a large ziggurat-like shrine, sixty or seventy feet tall. I think there were carvings on it, but I couldn’t make out details. I flew into the doorway in the building at the top, and everything went black.”
“I was on a horse, riding along a trail in the jungle. All of a sudden, out of the underbrush, an Orc tackles me off of my horse, and we both slam into the ground. The Orc is shouting something, over and over: “Crew”, or “Rouge”, or “Rogue”, or “Toogah”, or “Cruise”, or some such. I don’t know Lurkash, the Orcish tongue, and the dream was unclear and vague anyway. The Orc is shaking my shoulders, but I don’t think he was trying to hurt me. I don’t know what he wanted. Maybe to get my attention? Believe me, if I had been tackled by an Orc, he’d have my attention! I could hear the blood rushing in my ears, which made it seem as if the Orc shaking me was muffled and far away. Then the dream ended, fading away like dreams do.”
“Darkness, and darkness within darkness, but moving. All over, it’s moving. Shadows engulfed everything, and I could hear screams of abject terror, from unseen and unknown throats. The kind of screams that hint at utter despair and hopelessness. The kind that seem to be a mix of screams and weeping and choked up throats. Whatever was happening to those people must have been absolutely horrible. But worse was the sudden way in which some of those screams stopped. They ended with gurgles, as if they had lost the ability to scream properly.”
The group agree to help him: Taid because he is a champion of Aheru-Mazda (the Dwarven name for the deity Mithras Elitheris because she wants to help; and Eykit because there might be some kind of reward. Kylen does say that he will take up a collection as compensation, although how much that will eventually be is unknown.
They assume, based on the dreams, that the abductions have to do with something in the past, specifically the reference to some sort of ziggurat and the town with only Orcs in it, and that it might be somewhere to the south. Having grown up in Port Karn, Eykit knew that the area had originally been Orcish, before the Tondenes conquered it, later forming the Empire. Both Eykit and Taid knew it to be a provincial capital, and thus likely to have government buildings, some of which might hold useful files or information.
They go to the Ministry of Records, which includes offices covering births, deaths, land transactions, history, and surveying. They discover that before the Empire, the area around Port Karn was a loose federation of Orcish tribes, and that all of the towns were Orcish, some of which no longer exist. They were able to get the names of the towns, as well as a map of where they might have been (at least their approximate locations, as maps weren’t always accurate). Asking an Orcish clerk if he could tell them what the Orcish names meant, they found out that the four towns (Pulgoruzana, Gijak Balorat, Gultur Votar, and Ukavrong Krah) meant “Forest Stream”, “Blood Green”, “Boar Home”, and “Strong Arm”, respectively. They also discover that if they want more detailed historical or botanical information, they will need to go somewhere with more informational resources.
They head to the Shrine of Seshat, the goddess of knowledge and writing, which is the closest thing to a library that Port Karn has. It has an access fee of $20, which is usually high enough to keep the rabble out. Taid pays it and enters; Elitheris and Eykit stay outside. They know that they will be traveling through the jungle, and Elitheris finds out from Eykit who might be able to store some of her gear. Eykit knows of a tavern that has a series of safes, just for this purpose. He knows it’s pretty safe, as the tavern owner pays protection money to the New Town Skulls. Anyone who stole from the tavern would find the New Town Skulls paying them a rather uncomfortable visit. Besides, the locks are good; Eykit figures that Elend might have had something to do with the choice of locks and lock maker. Elitheris stashes her bottle of gin, and her two magical tomes.
Taid, meanwhile, has found out some history about the area. He finds out about some of the military campaigns fought in the area to subdue the Orc tribes. The four defunct towns on the map they had used to be the tribal capitals. Those tribes were Marzgi Kokasht (Pulgoruzana), Ak Doram (Gijak Balorat), Gulturkruz (Gultur Votar), and Vagun Sapat (Ukavrong Krah). Asking for some help with translation, he gets that the four tribes meant “Crushed Skull”, “Red Hand”, “Boar Riders”, and “Giant Axe”.
Taid had also been trying to find out about a red, five petaled flowering bush, but even the most Compleat Compendium of Botanie had absolutely nothing about a plant of that description. Aheru-Mazda must have been guiding his hand when he put it on that book, as it was the first one in the Botany section that he tried.
Kylen Pelorus lets the group borrow his mule, and they set off into the jungle that afternoon, taking the road south to Avondale, and then into the jungle, making their first camp in the area where they had fought the hydra the eightday before. After an uneventful night, they start fresh in the morning, cutting their way through the dense jungle with their knives and swords. They should probably invest in some machetes, one of these days….
Later that day, they got a bit lost, but Elitheris made her Land Navigation roll, and it only delayed them a couple of hours, so it went unnoticed. Especially since they were making their own trail, it didn’t really matter. As it turns out, Eykit stumbles (well, not really a stumble, more like stubbing his toe) while walking through the jungle. He had found a foundation stone, part of the remains of a building long covered by the jungle. They spend a bit of time looking around, and find that they had located what was left of Gultur Votar, which was barely the outlines of what used to be some buildings. The jungle had taken the rest, centuries ago.
That night, while Taid was on watch, he stepped into a Reek, which stuck to his boot, its acidic body starting to burn through it. With a sharp tug, he pulled his boot free, but the Reek didn’t want to go without dinner, so it extruded a pseudopod and struck Taid on the chest. Now it was his chainmail that was starting to sizzle. He shouted, and cut at it with his knife, slicing open the tentacle. But the Reek put more of its gelatinous body into the tentacle, “refilling” it. Eykit and Elitheris woke up, scrambling out of their bedrolls. Taid cuts at the pseudopod again, and again it refills shortly thereafter.
Eykit throws a dagger at its body, now humped up a bit out of the forest duff. The dagger disappears into its body with a “gloop”. Elitheris, having pulled out her bow, and, questioning herself whether it will do any good, nocks and looses and arrow, piercing the tentacle 10” from Taid’s body, the arrow sticking out of both sides. It didn’t really do anything, as far as she could tell. Taid cuts at it again, but it still remains stuck to him. By now, links are falling out of his mail shirt where the tentacle is burning its way through them. Realizing that impaling attacks aren’t doing anything, Eykit runs up to it and cuts at it with his knife. It doesn’t do much damage, but it was enough to make the tentacle retract into the main body mass. It had eaten through the mail, and had been starting to eat through Taid’s gambeson. Angry that his armor had a hole in it, Taid grabs his halberd and, with a mighty blow (and Eykit’s assistance with his knife) finally kills the Reek.
The next day, they came to a fork in the river. They saw a pole boat, tied up. In it, under a tarp used to cover abductees/slaves (as determined by the iron rings that appear to have been used to secure chains) they found a bag with a few loaves of stale bread, about three days old. It had been abandoned about a day and half earlier, and they could see a trail cut and trampled by many feet, going in the direction of one of the forks. The boat had been left there because that fork was unnavigable.
Mister Wiggles (it would take a few days for him to know his new name) also knew the following tricks: Shake, and Sit (both in Imperial). He could be taught other doggie tricks, but it would take time and attention (or character points and attention, assuming he ever gets any). All of the usual dog tricks are available (as Techniques, based off of the the skill “Tricks”), and, unlike normal Techniques, if he doesn’t have a point in a trick, he doesn’t know it at all. So he wasn’t really well-trained. But he’s young, so he can be taught new tricks.
Rewards Granted
The promise of some donations, assuming Kylen Pelorus can drum some up. 3 character points each.
Mr. Wiggles.
Players: Erin, Elizabeth, Steve
Report Date
07 Nov 2021
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