Far Isles Session #63 - That's Not A Ship!!!

DRAMATIS PERSONAE:

Rodrigo (Swashbuckler 4) with henchman Corvus (Fighter 3)

Chaff (Vivimancer 5), with familiar Pretty Bird, and riding dog Puppy Whuppy
Awg Wahmn (Calmonari 4)
Kwinsea (Aquamancer 5), with familiar Hermes and henchman Jaz (Elf 2)

Dream Leviathan

On board the "Purple Haze", the party prepared for battle. Chaff and Kwinsea cast some spells to protect themselves and beef up the party in general. Corvus and Chit the crossbowman headed below to the stern cabin windows, so they could snip with their bows. Lynessa had the crew slack the sails and then take cover. Everyone then waited for the enemy ship to approach. It closed fairly rapidly; in fact, both Chaff and Rodrigo noticed the speed of the ship did not change with the change in it's point of sail. That was very odd, and the pair joked that maybe this was another one of those whale-tail ships, like the one they'd had the option to buy. After that brief chuckle, the two looked back at their pursuer once more, and now noted the upper decks and sails of the ship started to waver and fade. In a few moments, it was clear to the two that this was no ship! An illusion of some sort had faded away, showing instead a massive leviathan. It opened it's huge toothed maw and surged forward at the "Purple Haze". Chaff and Rodrigo raised the alarm, and now everyone could see the true form of their foe. Lynessa screamed at the crew, who scrambled for rope and sail to get the ship underway and tuned so she was running before the wind. The leviathan continued to slowly gain, so the party did everything they could to slow it down/beat it down. Arrows and bolts flew, Jaz tossed off a magic missile, and Kwinsea tried to reduce it to a smaller menace (no luck). Once it got close enough, Awg and Chaff got into the fray with their laser pistols. In desperation, they even had the sailors run the raft out behind the ship, with the potion of watery death on it, in the hopes the thing would swallow it and drown. It did swallow the raft and potion, but the magic seemed to have no effect. However, by this point it was started to get irritated and mildly injured by all the missile fire, so it broke of the pursuit, dove and swam away. 

Brain Squid Attack!!

With a sigh of relief, they sailed on. Next morning, islands were visible ahead. Lynessa identified these as the "Krakens Claws", a series of rocky islets off the coast of Langushur between Cha'nrk and Xin. She turned the "Purple Haze" north and informed the party they should be in Xin in a few more days. They did not get far, however, when Corvus called out from the bow that there was a body in the water ahead. Without waiting, he jumped overboard and, using his ring of water walking, strolled over to the floating, face down corpse. The body appeared to be that of an ordinary female sailor, dead quite a few days. The fighter hauled out his sword and proceeded to flip the body over. On the sailors face there clung some sort of crustacean/squid thing, which quick as lightning released itself from the corpse and jumped at Corvus. It struck his face, and proceeded to extend a series of tentacles and proboscis into his mouth and nose until they reached his brain. The thing then started sucking away grey matter. Meanwhile, Chaff was getting the crew to lower him and the ships boat into the water, and Kwinsea dove in to go help as well. Jaz, however, saved the day with a sleep spell that took out both the brain squid and Corvus. When Chaff and Kwinsea reached the prone, floating fighter, they easily slid the squid-thing off his face. Kwinsea claimed it for her own, and imprisoned it into an empty water barrel; she intended to use it to pay her 'live octopus' debt to the aquamancer in Xin. Corvus they hauled back to the ship, and Torak performed the last rites of the Drowned God on the dead sailor before sending her to the deeps. 

The next two days were completely uneventful, until Lynessa brought the "Purple Haze" around the Rock of Vexation and into the stream of the Lorogano River below Xin. As they approached the Tower of the Malphegian Inferno and the raised harbor chain, a small boat  full of the Purple and a customs officer approached and hailed them. After answering some questions, the party allowed the officer aboard to inspect the ship and confirm the story told by Chaff; that they were unsuccessful explorers with little to show for their hardships in the Far Isles. Thankfully most of the treasure they did have was small and easily hidden, so they managed to convince the customs officer they had just a small amount of coin. He let them through after a paltry 4% tax on that small pile of coin, plus a 2% 'donation' to the customs guild. 

Having gotten past the taxman, Lynessa brought the "Purple Haze" into the Fogbound Quays and tied up at one of the jetty's. And then the crew took their back-pay and headed for the taverns, leaving their captain and employers alone on the deck. Leaving Lynessa in charge of repairing and resupplying the "Purple Haze", the rest of the party fanned out across the city in pursuit of their own goals. The party's activities in the City of Visions included:

• Awg tried to convince Chit to stay on as his loyal retainer. But the corssbowman had had enough adventure, and wasn't too keen on following a fish-man, so he took his gold and walked away;
• A delegation visited Munificent Submerser Oha at the Temple of Brall, and Brother Keera at the Temple of the Three Virtues, buying up healing potions (5 in total); 
• To beef up the ships locker, Rodrigo and Corvus went to buy enough powder, shot and muskets to arm a mercenary company. Which attracted the attention of a patrol of the Purple, who left without incident once they were convinced the two weren't smart enough to stage an armed insurrection. Afterwords, they went looking for their old nemesis Sergent Lunt, but could not find him anywhere; 
• Kwinsea visited her old geezer aquamancer friend and gave him the brain squid in final payment for the spell he'd taught her. She also was able to get him to teach her "Spider Climb", but only after she'd gathered one of every species of barnacle in the area of Xin (all 27). She then locked herself in her cabin and started transcribing spells into her spell book. In this she was joined by the loyal Jaz, who did the same;
• Chaff went to visit the old alchemist Gorbo, to get him to whip up some venom antitoxin for everyone. He also gave him some of the now dried up paralytic poison, which the old coot could use to whip them up a fresh batch;  and
• With all the hard work down, Corvus decided to try his luck in the wrestling pits again. With

  

  Tog & Corvus

  Rodrigo in tow, he found a likely place and plunked down 2000gp in front of the pit bookies. They agreed to his wager but only offered 1.5:1 ods, and insisted that they chose the opponent. Corvus, a little short on grey mater, agreed. After waiting around for awhile, Corvus met his foe. At almost 8' tall, hairy, and arms almost to his knees, Tog looked to be at least half ogre. And he made short work of Corvus, twisting the fighters arms somewhere up behind his head before rubbing his face in the mud. Which left Corvus humiliated and broke.

TOTAL XP

13

GAINS
none

KILLS

none

LOSSES

Some of Corvus' grey matter, most of his gold, and all of his dignity.

Far Isles Session #62 - Going Home

DRAMATIS PERSONAE:

Rodrigo (Swashbuckler 4)

Chaff (Vivimancer 5), with familiar Pretty Bird
Awg Wahmn (Calmonari 4)
Kwinsea (Aquamancer 5), with familiar Hermes and henchman Jaz (Elf 2)

Pahu-Mahu (Thief 3)

Back at the village, the party settled in for a much needed sleep before making further plans. First order of business in the morning was to check a few recovered items for magical properties. Chaff used Kalandrian Sight to determine the Shark Tooth Spear was a combination of enchantment/alteration magic, while the Stole of the Sacred  was, as expected, alteration magic. A quick scan of the bagged kopru idol proved that it was an object of enchantment/charming. Which immediately made everyone think; what the heck should they do with such an obviously cursed yet monetarily valuable item? They decided to bring it to the attention of Fano the Talking Chief and Umlat the witch doctor. Maybe the locals could help them decide. Fano, of course, led them to the 'real' Chief. Both he and Umlat prostrated themselves before the statuette and asked for it's guidance [Incidentally, Chaff's Kalandrian Sight was still active, and revealed that the statuette was in no way magical]. The the two stood up again, and Fano loudly proclaimed that the Chief had ordered the party and the kopru idol banished at once; they had brought bad taboo onto the village!! There was some inclination to argue, but in the end the party decided to simply leave, paddling back to the temple to rest for the night.

Once settled, the party now had to decide what to do with Abdul el Abdul. Given the length of time since his demise, and the sheer difficulty of getting his festering body out of the volcanic cone, the party reluctantly made the decision to say their last goodbyes.  Abdul el Abdul was sent off to his final rest on a burning pyre, accompanied by his treasured crystal grappling hook. The rest of his stuff the party confiscated. Next order of business was the idol. In memory of Abdul, Awg took up the Terminaxe and used the magical weapon to smash the cursed kopru to a pile of shattered coral and mangled gold. 

After an uneventful night, Chaff summoned the ebony fly and the party proceeded with the airlift out of the crater and back onto the high plateau. By mid afternoon, they'd all made it back to their base camp. There, they found a single crossbowman and Puppy Whuppy. Chit reported that his two companions had fallen in combat to dire wolves while out foraging; he himself survived by slaying one of the beasts and driving the rest off. And then made dire wolf jerky, which was good since the party had not been able to restock on supplies before the villagers kicked then out. Taking up the load of food, the party started the journey back to the "Purple Haze" and the "Loreman's Passage".  That journey was uneventful, the only real encounter happening the next morning when a column of zombies marched off the mountainside, bypassed and completely ignored the party camp, before tumbling over the side of the gorge into the raging river below.  Definitely weird, but that seemed to be the norm on this island. 

Mutiny!

The party picked up their raft along the way to make it a quicker/easier journey back to the ship. As they entered the swampy delta where the river met the sea, the sound of a gunshot was heard from far ahead. From out at sea in fact, and immediately all were concerned there was a problem on their ships. As the rest of the party poled the raft at high speed, Chaff sent Pretty Bird on ahead to see what was going on. Upon it's return, the vivimancer's familiar reported there was just one ship at anchor, and there was some kind of commotion among the humans on deck. By this point the raft had emerged from the swamps, and Awg and Kwinsea dove in to swim to the ship and investigate. It was the "Purple Haze", and the two climbed up the stern to the deck. There, they found Lynessa facing down an agitated crew over a pair of loaded pistols, with one bleeding body already on the deck. As Chaff appeared overhead on the fly, the two tried talking with the crew to see what was wrong. A spokesman was shoved forward, and he told a tale of woes; food rotten and running out, everyone bored and baking under the tropical sun, tired of being at sea for two months, afraid the party was dead and they'd all die in this hellhole too, etc etc etc. The trio also learned that the "Loreman's Passage" crew had mutinied some days before, killed their newly appointed captain, and sailed off. That seems to have given the crew of the "Purple Haze" the idea to do the same. The calmonari, vivimancer and aquamancer reasoned with the surly crew, showing them the treasures they'd recovered, and promising them a bonus if they returned to their duties. Awg also went out to charm a tuna to serve at a feast for the crew.  The party then informed the crew that the "Purple Haze" would soon head back to Xin, making a brief stop back at the native village of Tanaroa to resupply and rest for a few days.

The and crew turned to go about the business of preparing the ship for sea, and the "Purple Haze" was soon underway, heading south. As the end of day approached, the ship passed through a channel between an offshore island and the main Isle of Dread. Rodrigo, standing watch on the forecastle, spied something large and tentacled in the water ahead. The party rushed on deck in response to his cries, and Jaz loosed a magic missile into the monsters flesh. That forced it to dive, leaving everyone unsure of what to do next. That indecision was solved when the beast (now obviously a giant squid), appeared below the ship and proceeded to climb partway up the stern and use it's tentacles and beck to hack at the ship. Jaz cast another magic missile and Chaff tried to calm it's attack with a polyvorousness spell (no luck). Rodrigo and Pahu Mahu slashed at the beast, but that proved difficult as it was some distance below the level of the deck.  As the vicious beast continued to rip at the woodwork, Chaff, Kwinsea and Rodrigo ran below to attack it through the stern windows. Pahu Mahu, gripping his mighty Shark Tooth Spear, jumped off the stern and drove the spear tip into the squids head. Awg choose an easier route, using his sword to levitate close to the beast and then blast it with a laser pistol. The squid's body exploded in a gout of ink and gore, and it's remains slid down into the sea.

Squid Attack

Thinking the monsters lair must be nearby, half the party prepared to dive below and investigate. Awg and Kwinsea had no trouble in the water, and the impetuous Pahu Mahu dove in after them. At which point he (and everyone else) was surprised to find he'd turned into an albino mako shark. Sensing an opportunity, Rodrigo quaffed a potion of water breathing, and climbed on top of the shark to accompany the search in style. The four swam down, and Kwinsea used her speak with aquatic animals to get directions to the giant squids lair, in an old lava tube nearby. There, the party searched through a garbage dump of old planks, sails, and rusty iron, finding just a single potion bottle for their troubles. 

When the four climbed back on board, the "Purple Haze" continued on it's way, reaching the village of Tanaroa the next day. There they bartered for supplies, allowed the crew a few days to rest ashore, and learned that this place was just as full of zombies as the rest of the island. Soon, however, the "Purple Haze" was ready and they set sail for home. The Jungle Isles were left behind, and the ship passed into cooler waters. They encountered no storms and, with a fair south wind, made good time over the next few days. The easy travel continued under clear skies until the fifth day, when the dawn came grey, rainy and foggy.  Which meant when Rodrigo spied a ship on their larboard side, the vessel was already quite close. The two masted ship flew no colours, and as soon as she spied the "Purple Haze", changed course to pursue. Chaff sent Pretty Bird aloft, and through the fog and drizzle the bird spied it's decks packed with armed men. It looked like there was another fight at hand ...

TOTAL XP

1070

GAINS
Potion of Heroism

KILLS

1 Giant Squid

LOSSES

A few crewmen

Far Isles Session #61 - Saved by the Saves

DRAMATIS PERSONAE:

Rodrigo (Swashbuckler 4)

Chaff (Vivimancer 5), with familiar Pretty Bird
Awg Wahmn (Calmonari 4)
Torak (Cleric 5)

Kwinsea (Aquamancer 5), with familiar Hermes and henchman Jaz (Elf 2)

Pahu-Mahu (Thief 3) 

The party spent the rest of the day and night resting and recovering in the village. There was a lengthy discussion regarding what to do next. Cut their loses and take their fallen and wounded out of the crater and back to the ship; or brave the kopru and make one last push into the mud caverns to look for more loot. While the ripe smell of rotting Abdul pushed the party initially towards 'option a', they decided in the end to finish their exploration of the mud-pits. That way Abdul el Abdul's sacrifice would not be in vain. Or something like that. 

The party pushed off in their dugout canoes the next morning, joined by one of the only non-geriatric tribe members; Pahu-Mahu. They crossed the lake and passed through the upper temple without event, finding themselves once more on the wide mineral terrace overlooking the hellish cavern. Worried about losing someone to the charms of the kopru, they party roped together like mountaineers before proceeding further. Based on Pretty Bird's previous scouting mission, they headed around the first mud-pit to another series of mineral terraces along the south wall. Being extra cautious, Rodrigo started to hammer spikes into the mineral crust for tie-offs. The party quickly stopped that practice when the crust cracked beneath their feet, threatening them with a dunking in the boiling mud.   The instead opted to run s quickly as possible past the mud pits and up onto the terrace.  Just as they paused to start climbing, however, Torak felt the tell-tale tug at his brain, which told the party the kopru was about. They turned at bay, searching the adjacent mud pit for their enemy. Of it they could see no sign, so everyone climbed up and proceeded to their destination. 

Mineral Spring

These terraces were quite extensive,  and at the highest point a column of steam was seen rising into he air. Approaching closer, the source proved to be a bubbling pool of milky mineral-ly water. Too opaque to see through,  Pahu-Mahu and Jaz  poked into the depths with pole-arms. They found it was just over 10' deep, but there seemed to be another exit to one side at the bottom. No one could think of a good way to explore further without getting scalded, so the party returned to the floor of the cavern to make a run for their next objective; another terrace on the west wall. Once more, just as they were making the last turn before climbing the headwall, the mind- probing of the kopru returned. This time Kwinsea was the target, but the aquamancer held off the mental assault. Scanning the mud-pits again, this time a bulbous head was seen bobbing at the surface about 20' away. The party unleashed a barrage of spells, with a bonewarp from Chaff, magic missiles from Jaz, reduce thanks to Kwinsea, and a spiritual weapon called down from Brall by Torak. The creature shrugged off most of the prestidigitation, and also avoided arows from Pahu-Mahu. Rodrigo meanwhile was backing slowly away from his precarious position at the edge of the mud, and Awg used his sword to levitate above the fray. From there, he opened up with a laser pistol, while Chaff did the same from his lower elevation. Awg hit the kopru with a mighty blast, sending glowing, melted flesh all around. Kwinsea had attached a rope to the thing, and with Rodrigo's help started to haul it closer. It, meanwhile, sent out mental feelers once more, this time targeting Chaff. The vivmancers intellect matching is stature, he could not stop the intrusion, and now felt the need to help the kopru regain their domination over humanity. First step was to save it from the little vivimancer's companions, so Chaff cut his safety rope and started over behind the bulk of the party. He was just about to web the lot of them, and dump them in the boiling mud, when Awg blasted the kopru one more time with laser fire. The creatures head exploded in a spray of blue/green ichor, allowing Rodrigo and Kwinsea to pull the now limp body out of the mud. They examined it from headless head to triple flukes, then cut off a piece to take with them to see if it would regenerate. 

Crystallized Skull

Feeling cocky now, the party moved on to the small terrace they'd been approaching. This was quite narrow, so not all the party could reach the top at the same time. There they encountered another wall of flowstone, which was covering another stone bench. On this one lay a prone, skeletal figure, but  no obvious signs of treasure.Which didn't stop anyone from chipping away at it, and after about a half hour the skull was uncovered. This was no ordinary skull, for it had crystallized into amethyst under the influence of the minerals. The party continued to chip away at the body to see if it was the same, but instead were surprised to find the remains rising up from the bench. It consisted of a long snake-like, skeletal spine, atop which perched the skull.   Kwinsea, standing closest to it, immediately cast a rope trick to tie the creature jaw shut. Jaz tired to stab at it, but her seemingly solid blow glanced off with no effect. The creature now started to sway in a hypnotic dance, weaving back and forth. Awg and Kwinsea both fell into a hypnotic stupor as they watched, while the rest of the party once more unleashed spells and stabbing. Jaz used one of Abdul's magical bolts as a crude dagger and hit, while Rodrigo sliced and diced with his twin swords. Chaff, feeling vulnerable, cast a vitality surge to beef himself up, and Torak chanted a blessing from the drowned god. In the end, it took just one more blow from Rodrigo to fell the creature, which had all this time been trying to speak or scream through tightly bound jaws. Unfortunately, the battle had done severe damage to the crystal skull, which Pahu-Mahu appraised as now being worth just 2200gp rather than the original 7000gp.

The Last Skeleton

After a quick scan for more loot, the party prepared to move out again. Once more they argued over cutting their losses and leaving, vs checking out that one last and vast terrace to the north. In the end, greed overcame caution, and they formed up in marching order once more. They probed a few dead end paths between the pits. Including one where Rodrigo, walking point, broke through the crust and fell into the boiling mud below. Reacting swiftly, the swashbuckler flicked his whip overhead, which Jaz grabbed so the party could haul his blistered body out of the mud. They pushed on carefully now, approaching the great terrace. As they did, they once more observed a kopru observing them from the adjacent mud-pit. With another flurry of spells and lasers, the party retreated behind the cover of a fog cloud from Kwinsea to a nearby rise to face off against the beast. Torak once more blessed the party, and Awg blasted away with his laser pistol, finally burning out the weapons' power-pack. As the kopru emerged from the fog cloud, Pahu-Mahu felt it try to take over his mind, but the native son was able to resist. It's mental attacked having failed, the kopru leapt out of the mud to attack with it's suckered mouth and talon-ed flukes. This proved fatal, as it was cut down by the weapons of the party in relatively short order. Having already determined it wouldn't regenerate, the party left the body and pressed on.  

Climbing the high, broad terraces, they came once more to a familiar flowstone column, hiding skeletal remains. This once was not as thickly covered as the previous two, and a shroud of jewels was obvious. Held in one hand was a spear, the point being a massive shark tooth bound to the shaft by gold wire. Pahu-Mahu quickly chipped this out and claimed it, while the rest of the party chipped away the rest of the skeleton so they could loot the gems.  Nothing arose to attack, and after some time the party's sacks were bulging with treasure. And at that, the decision was made to head back to the surface and the village. The sulfurous cavern was traversed with no problem, and there were no delays in the temple or on the lake. The party, probably for the last time, hauled their canoes up on the beach and headed into the village.

TOTAL XP

12710

GAINS
1 somewhat battered crystal & amethyst skull (2200gp)
More gem and jewelry grave goods (7600gp)
Shark Tooth Spear

KILLS

2 Kopru AKA Mud Cthulhu
1 Crystal-skull necrophidius thing

LOSSES

None