S2 E5: Arena Mayhem

General Summary

In which the party witnesses some messed up stuff, and a mission is completed.

• Cobalt explores some of the basement, finding storage for foodstuff, dishes and an inordinate amount of wine, as well as a locked door. He can't get it open, but he can tell that it's not impossible to pick, and returns upstairs after giving things a cursory look and fining crates of winebottles, dishware and the like.
• Le Chat and KC spend some time chatting with the other personal servants, but don't learn much other than the fact that servants bitch a lot in perivate. Several mention that there's an afterparty after the party, and most of them aren't invited, but they've heard that there's some kind of unlicensed animal fighting or something of that kind; the Watchmen evidently either don't know or pretend not to since Essi's girlfriend is an Exultant.
• Tatiana learns more about Wavebringer and tells some stories of her own, having impressed Essi with her gifts of two fine bottles of Mirevale wine. She finds herself the center of attention, a natural raconteur and the the object, eventually, of what seems more like awkward flirting, but is really an invitation to the afterparty. Eldara uses the distraction of the others to look and listen closely to the other guests; she finds the diamond in her slice of cake, and gives it to Tatiana, which attracts the attention of Solara Nantez, who clearly gave it to her on purpose; she finds that she has passed some kind of test that Solara was making, and later discovers that her sister had almost certainly been here before. Exactly why she was here, under what pretext, and what happened to her afterward is unclear, but it appears she left of her own accord.
• As the party winds down, the group takes a chance at scoping out the basement again. Eldara gets the door open and finds a hall leading to a dead end that can't possibly be a dead end; they even see a little light under the door, but no simple way to open it. The lion mural on the floor seems older than the rest of the hallway, which is also decorated with fight posters from the actual arena over in the Elven Qurter. Cobalt notices what looks to be a concealed trap-nozzle protruding ever-so-slightly from the lion's mouth. They get back into the kitchen before they get caught down there, and Eldara has the presence of mind to close and relock the door.
• Whether the care was needed or not is hard to say as Dantonio has had too much to drink. The group is combined into the rest of his entourage and is ushered into the basement, and the hidden hallway, where some kind of combination is worked out on the secret door. This leads to a large spectator area around a 15-20 foot pit in the center, about 25 feet across, with a couple of doors on the lower level; a goliath in what looks like a chainmail hoodie steps from another barred iron door in the southern end of the room and discusses something with Solara, who has also been drinking but shows no sign of impairment whatever.
• A few moments later, two white dragon wyrmlings enter the pit from the side doors, and bets are placed with the goliath, whose name is Trevor. Dantonio Essi assures them all that the Wyrmlings won't be hurt as each one cost him a fortune; but in fact, one emerges victorious, killing the other. Essi flips out but is quickly pacified - or perhaps outright charmed, in retrospect, by Solara.
• After the living Wyrmling and the dead carcass are moved from the pit into some other area behind the doors, three clowns - all fairly battered and dirty, one quite short and the other looking ghastly pale or even undead, come into the arena from behind the locked Iron door, led to three positions in the pit frmo a removable rope ladder that's taken back up. Eventually the undead one emerges victorious, but by that point the players have clearly seen that this is much worse than just cockfights or dogfights - even though they're clowns, it really still is murder. 
• When battle is joined, Solara drops her false appearance in order to access her powers - as a Succubus. Chaos erupts, with several guests too drunk to rapidly navigate the narrow edge falling in and one audibly snapping his neck, and others running into the hallway and triggering the spore trap that Cobalt had seen. Everyone at odds seems to join in the fight other than Lysandra, the oracle who seems to have her head in the clouds. 
• Succubis Solara takes some hits from the PCs, does some math, and decides it's best to simply not be there rather than to continue with - well, whatever the scheme was that she was involved in. She steps into the Ethereal, effectively getting away from the fight, leaving Eldara to wonder - are all the Nantez actually fiends? Was there a real Solara Nantez somewhere, hidden away as a priosoner while this false one went about living her life? And for how long? Could this have something in common with her own sister's fate?
• Dantonio Essi, drunk and befuddled, is easily put down. After this, Trevor sees his employer and source of future paychecks has been taken off the board, and his loyalty clearly was more to the money than the man. Lorenzo - Essi's bodyguard - is also noticably absent; they don't recall him even coming down to the arena as part of the entourage, in fact. Trevor sums up the new reality: "This is heat we don't need - we can get out through the tunnel to the dog pen." As they race down into the pit and through the doors to put as much distance as possible from the scene of - so very many crimes - and themselves, Cobolt recalls that the dogs in the pen seemed immediately hostile to him; Trevor seems to be some kind of animal handler so perhaps he hasn't thought of this.
• And who else might have been behind the Iron door besides those clowns?
• And what if no one finds them, because the people who knew about the arena are either dead, fleeing to the ethereal, or here in their group running away? Well, except for Lysandra who we just left standing around?

Missions/Quests Completed

• Dinner with the (different) devil
• Arena Mayhem
• Solara Succubus

Character(s) interacted with

• Solara Nantez, revealed to be a succubus and presumably an impostor
• Dantonio Essi, deceased
• Trevor the Goliath

Report Date

10 Oct 2023

Primary Location

Herron Heights

Secondary Location

Orendarium, Capitol of the Realm