Ralph, Bart, and Milhouse, each a different shade of dragonborn, come to the table, drinks in hand. Observant folks might note that Ralph is a rust-colored sort, while Bart is a shade of blue, and Milhouse, a whiter shade of pale. While all three have left their equipment upstairs for now, Milhouse still wears a small silver holy symbol on a chain around his neck.

Ralph beams at the others as they take their seats at the table. Bart seems more poker-faced, while Milhouse smiles shyly as another group approaches the table.

A youngish brown-haired halfling makes his way to the table, looking back at his party. Eventually he is joined by a fair-haired gnome, and they take seats at the table, waving for booster seats so that they can see everyone clearly.

"Leon's the name, and this here's Gary. We speak for the Whores, since I recruited them all. Except for Vir, that is, may he rest in peace. But we're not the only ones who've lost party members, I see."

"I am Cyrus von Styker of the House von Stryker" answered the man in the red robes before offering additional introductions "This is Postue" indicating the chap in the sweet bearskin armor "and Yor"pointing to the green robed man.  After a short pause "and Zed Beardface." taking note of the clearly odious Dwarf.

Zed nodded while swilling his ale "Charmed, I'm sure."

Thw Dwarf eyed the three Party Posse Dragonborns "I think I heard of you guys.  But I thought you was all yellow-scaled types with four fingers?"

Cyrus acknowledged their losses to date "Yes, we have lost several members to various tragedies, but we remain undaunted."

"Our party has spoken at length and we thought it would be a good idea if our three groups, the most prominent in town, should compare notes.  From our preliminary scouting and research we are convinced that the ruins are quite extensive.  So much so that it is unlikely that 1 or 2 or even a half dozen groups could loot the entire thing." 

The magic-user leaned back and took deep breath before continuing "With so many riches to be had it seems unnecessary to be neutral or even at odds with each other.  On the contrary, in my estimation I believe it increases all our odds of success if we pooled our knowledge and-

Postue breaks in "Look.  What the Mayor of Gasbaggia here is trying to ask is 'Do you blokes want to swap info over ale and food or not?'"

Leon looks around the table and takes in the other faces before saying, "Sure. We've taken a good-sized chunk out of Level One, and we've found ways down deeper, but we haven't taken them... yet," he smirks.

"Same here, and we've learned at least one place to avoid, at least for now. It's the Hall of the Slain, and it's deadly."

"We've started in the ruins.  We've cleared out the everything except Keep.  We have just started on it.  Have any of you heard anything about it?  Even rumors would be helpful" said Cyrus.

Postue chimes in "We've discovered a few ways down too.  Haven't explored them yet.  There's a few places outside the walls.  There were a couple of towers in the ruins we decided to pass on.  You guys may be braver than us if you want a few things to clear up top?"

Leon thinks for a second and says, "I think our next trip, we're heading to Level Two, at least for a bit."

In reply to The Adventure Whores (msg # 296):

Cyrus paged through a book "Hmmm...2nd level you say?  We heard a rumor or two...

It seems that ,on the second level, there is an underground river. If you have a way to breathe water, it can make a good escape route as it empties into the Ashel River not far from the ruins."

Postue adds "In the north west corner of the ruins there is a broken down building where the jousters would gather.  That west corner is a tourney grounds.  In the building there is a trap door that leads down pretty deep.  It may bypass the 1st level right on down into the second.  Also in that building is a shrine dedicated to St. George.  If you pray at it you may receive a blessing."

"You ever hear about the Eye of the Frost Troll?" demanded Zed

"No one has heard a rumor about the Keep itself?" Cyrus asked again.

"We heard this a while back... 'Ah, the Keep? That's where Yeffal had his throne room. Also, so it's said, where he practiced his magic experiments. My grandsire was one of the dwarves taken slave by Yeffal and forced to work on the construction. He, like all the other builders, was never seen again. I'll tell you this, Yeffal wouldn't have needed so many dwarven engineers if he didn't want to fill up the keep with secret passages. Oh, and I'm sure some of the looted great treasures must be there, where he could have admired them, rather than down in the dungeons guarded by who knows what. Best of luck to you. And remember, if you come back with gems and jewels, I'll be happy to trade them in for cash...for a small surcharge.'"

Leon says, "Sorry, friend, we heard nothing about a frost troll's eye, that I can recall."

"There's also the body we found on a side level.  It was bitten in half and there was a big body and heavy breathing coming from another chamber.  Something like that must have treasure horde.  Any time you guys want to team up and investigate we'd split the rewards with you." offered Cyrus.

"Sounds fair."

Cyrus seemed a bit disappointed "If there's nothing else, I say we drink up and enjoy the night.  Cheers, all."

Upon reaching town, we head to the

House of Gold

We ask Arvel what he makes of our recent haul.

The House of Gold

Arvan gets out his scales, magnifying lens, and a reference book. He spends several minutes examining the various items.

"This bracelet is mahogany, from the old pirate kingdom of the south, I'd wager. 400 gold coins for it. Now this gold clasp is nice. Elven, and while they ain't much for fighting...no offense Master Keldon, but we dwarves make better warriors you know, anyhoo, the elves do know how to craft beautiful jewels. This one's smallish, worth 500 gold coins. Oh, now this jeweled scabbard is a beauty, and Gnomish. That's why it's only dagger size. 700 gold for that one. I'm not sure who or what made this crystal decanter, but it's high quality crystal. 800 golds for this beauty. Finally, this brocade doublet bears the crest of the fallen House of Durairen, from this here kingdom, but of old. The pearls worked into the stitching and the rarity of brocade make it worth 900 gold."

He fiddles with an abacus for a few seconds then double checks his book to make sure he's assessed everything correctly.

"If you want to convert it all to coin, that comes to 3300 gold, and my fee comes to 99 gold."

OOC: Assuming you don't show him the sword. He could assess that, too, if you like.

OOC: That's fine. We'll give him an even 100 to make the math easier. Can he convert this to gems for us?

The House of Gold

Arvan hands over three harlequin opals, worth 1000gp each, and a pair of amethysts worth 100gp each in payment for the treasures. "Pleasure doing business with you lads."

We head to Rupert's Tower, and hope the wizard is there to check out the centaur's sword.

Rupert's Tower

Rupert meets with the Adventure Whores, his fingers stained with inks from scroll scribing. Apprentices, one in green and one in purple robes and pointed hats, scurry around, cleaning up the sitting room.

Rupert takes the sword and begins to examine it. [OOC: assuming from your post you're paying him his standard 100gp fee for magic item examinations].

"Very interesting. The blade is one of the most well balanced, finely crafted blades I've ever seen. Now I'm no swordsman, of course. But even I can tell that this blade is something special. In fact...Darlene, bring me the treatise of Oakeshott the Blade Mage, would you?"

The apprentice in green runs to the bookshelf, scans the titles, and brings a thin volume to the town mage. He thumbs through it. "Ah, here we are! This is the Six-fingered blade of Montoya! Forged by special order for a noble with six fingers on his right hand, Montoya slaved an entire year to make this blade only to have the noble strike him down, refusing to pay his price. His son later avenged his death, and the sword ended up in the hands of the Dread Pirate Roberts after that. How it got into Yeffal's Dungeon I'll never know!"

OOC: normal sword +1 game mechanics wise, but very cool RP wise!

OOC: Sweet.  :^)

We thank Rupert and head for the Trade Bazaar to see what we can see, keeping our gems tucked safely away.

Trade Bazaar

The bazaar is fairly busy today, with local farmers selling fresh produce and dairy products, fresh fish from the river being hawked by fishmongers, and a pair of merchants from out of town selling wine and silk, respectively.

Unfortunately, other than a nice vintage from Garlan or some fine fabric for a new shirt, there is nothing an adventurer might want to purchase today.

The Party Posse returns to town and heads for the

Weaponsmith

We ask if he takes in used weapons and shields.

We head to

The Grey Friars Monastery

and ask how many healing potions they have on hand for sale.

@The Party Posse:
Weaponsmith

Justarin Smalls, a short, barrel-chested man with a thick brown beard, will buy the leftover weapons and shields as scrap to be reforged later. He pays half the normal purchase price for the weapons, but only 1gp per shield as they're mostly wood and there isn't much metal to salvage on them.

@The Adventure Whores:
The Grey Friars Monastery

Brother Holger has four potions of healing prepared right now. "I'm happy to take any orders you may have," he says. "Recently, we were able to uncover the formulas for potions of growth, which transform you for a time into a giant, and potions of speed, that as you would guess make you move quickly. They're a bit more expensive than the other potions I can brew, though."

13:00, Today: Dungeon Master rolled 4 using 1d6.  how many potions?

Pot. Growth 600gp
Pot. Speed 750gp

Oak and Eagle
Dead Reckoning returns to Oak and Eagle laden down with corpses and loot.  The retainers are thanked and group is liberal with rewards and buys their home tavern a round of drinks for everyone!


Party pays another week for a room (7gp

Zed stays in the common room for 2 days (2 sp)

Temple of the Sun
Cyrus, Martel, Geisler and Zed head there with Yor's corpse.

The party pays to have Geisler and Zed healed (down 3 hp and 4 hp).

Martel hands Yor's body over to Sister Clarion "Please, Sister, see to his needs.  Yor was a boon companion and will be missed."

Grey Friar's Monastery
Postue and the Butcher head there.

Postue asks if his green goo is ready?

The Butcher shows Brother Holger the snake heads and dragonling corpses "What do you make of these, Friar?  Can anything useful be made from the venom of these snakes?  Or these little lizard-swabs?" 

Trade Bizarre
The Twins lug the load of toys they found in the Keep to see if any of the vendors there are willing to buy them.



Kane explains in his harsh, whispering voice "These are from Yeffel's Keep;  Children's toys kept there presumably to distract them while their parents were being terrorized by the hateful magic-user overlord.  Much history here.  One could make a fortune selling this type of misery to the foolish."

Kano glares silently at the vendors as his brother speaks; one interpretation of this look could be that not buying these toys may have consequences...


At night at the Oak and Eagle:
Cyrus spends time transcribing Yor's spells into his own spellbook and transcribes Yor's notes into Renn's book.

The door opens and a brawny well-armed Elf steps in "I seek treasure and adventure!"

Martel stands and greets the fellow "You seem like an honorable and trustworthy sort.  You are welcome to join us.  We have delved into the Keep and found treasure glory and death aplenty."

The Elf smiles "Tell me of your adventures, Sir!  I am a Bard and would hear your stories and, if the gods will it, I will add my own to your!"

Postue sighed as he was poking through Yor's old gear "Here, I might as well give all this now before Martel yells at me." The thief pushed the ex-wizard's gear to the newest member of Dead Reckoning.

"I thank you, my friend, I will put this to good use.  I am Melaris." said the Elf.

The group spins tales for Melaris catching him up on all that has come before.  The Elven Bard drinks it all in with a gusto "I will begin a memoir immediately."

This message was last edited by the player at 00:36, Sat 01 Aug 2020.