Re: OOC Chat
Okay, I think this is the plan:
Hanse (whose mercenary company is being left in a "to be determined later" state) is on a leave of absence to pursue a bounty. Specifically, he is being asked to hunt down some deserters from a subsidiary mercenary group, the Zawek Volunteer Militia. Six men are accused of war crimes but escaped before their execution. One of the six "volunteers" Hanse is hunting was captured trying to steal food from a Fiwood homestead. The local magistrate is holding the man until Hanse can interrogate him.
The bounty is 800 gold for a man named "Godemir Wolenski" who leads the deserters, and an additional 50 gold each for the other five men in his squad. Rachel could have gotten involved because Wolenski is also a suspected warlock. Pact-breaking is frowned upon by the University, so they're always keeping tabs on that thing. It's mostly just rumors, but that could give her a veneer of plausibility to investigate, and strike out with Hanse from Rivai.
We know the real reason that Rachel is leaving Rivai, though, is to get away from Professor Edgar Kokoschka. I'll leave up to Rachel and Oliver (Lira's player, I mean) what his specialty was exactly, but it should be something high-level and sort of unnerving. He could be in charge of the post mortem of the changeling fiasco, or doing research into cutting edge golems and constructs, or maybe one of the inventors of daemonlock firearms (making him basically an arms dealer).
Rachel can decide what exactly annoyed her about her mentor, but Oliver and I were talking over PM and agreed that Lira would have been a rival of Rachel's at Rivai, as the two have very similar backstories. Basically Lira is Masonite and lower class whereas Rachel is Makerite and middle class. Rachel was accepted into the fold post graduation, whereas Lira was less so. I think if it would be cool if Lira was up for the same position as Rachel, and didn't make the cut. This is a large part of why she's out adventuring instead of continuing her education at Rivai. So to see the woman who took her job suddenly appear in the same podunk town she happens to be in...
Rachel, for her part, can be a jerk but is smart enough to know Lira and know that she is likewise pretty smart. For a bumpkin.
Lira was Oliver's alt in the old game, but I'll be playing her as a DM NPC to give you guys a good strong four man party. Oliver will get roped in by the local magistrate, who has decided to meddle and ask Oliver to sit in on Hanse's interrogation, to make sure everything is above board. Oliver was a decorated dragoon who came out of retirement to deal with the crisis on the Golish border; also due to his knighthood he is seen as the closest thing to a representative of the king here, besides the magistrate himself.
Oliver agrees, brings Lira to the interrogation, Lira and Rachel recognize one another and can begrudgingly vouch for one another, everybody agrees to split the bounty and work together.
Does that all sound feasible? At least you don't all meet in tavern...