Friday, December 22, 2017

Far Isles Session # 77 - How to Kill A Wizard

DRAMATIS PERSONAE:
Chaff (Vivimancer 6), with familiar Pretty Bird 
Torak (Cleric 6) 
Kwinsea (Aquamancer 6), with familiar Hermes and henchman Jaz (Elf 3)
Awg Wahmn (Calmonari 5)

The "Little Dolphin Inn" jutted out over the Pool, so the party had been taking turns keeping watch from the upper floor for a vessel that matched the description of Calcidius' "Blind Fury". On their sixth day in Xin, such a vessel appeared in the inner harbor. Chaff sent Pretty Bird aloft to spy on the small sailing ship as it docked about four hundred yards down the waterfront. As the ship maneuvered to pull into a mooring, Pretty Bird spied the wizard on deck talking to three men. Identity confirmed, the party rolled into action. The first step was to draw the wizard to them. Awg had the charmed merman Gurps swim over to taunt the wizard, calling him names and saying the party was waiting for him at the "Little Dolphin". The wizard  got more and more enraged, then quickly raised his hand and shot a fistful of magic missile at the unfortunate Gurps, who rolled over dead and sank to the bottom. Calcidius then turned to the three standing on deck with him. One suddenly disappeared, while the other two accompanied Calcidius below as the crew brought the "Blind Fury" into the dock.
The Little Dolphin Inn
Back at the inn, Chaff relayed the outcome of the taunting as seen through Pretty Bird's eyes. Expecting trouble, everyone started to get ready.  First of all, they cleared the inn by telling the patrons the fireball flinging wizard was coming., That got rid of most of them pretty fast, although it took more convincing to get Josiah the owner and his wife to leave.  The musketeers were placed in the windows on the upper floor with orders to shoot anyone matching Calcidius' description.  Chaff stripped down and cast transparency on himself, and smeared a dose of oil of true seeing on his eyelids. They assumed Calcidius' henchman had turned invisible, and this way Chaff (who went to hide outside) could see him. Jaz used some of the oil as well, then grabbed some wine and settled down with a half dozen winos out front to act drunk and keep an eye out for trouble. Inside, Awg charmed one of the inn's dolphins (just in case); Kwinsea used her scroll of control weather to summon a rainstorm in the hopes it would dampen any fireballs that got tossed around; and Torak cast a glyph of warding on the doorway. 

And then they waited, occasionally having to turn away tavern customers so they didn't trigger the glyph. It seemed to take forever,  but after about a half hour, Jaz noted someone approaching the inn. He was dressed in leather armor, and no one else walking the streets seemed to notice him as he slunk along the walls and worked his way around the "Little Dolphin". Best guess that this was Calcidius' spy, so when he got close to Jaz, she cast a web and glued him to the building on the opposite side of the alley. That startled the drunks, but liberal application of a few more bottles of wine settled them down. Chaff and Jaz approached the still invisible spy, and started to question him. The fellow, Dak by name, was entirely uncooperative even when threatened with violence and death. Dak was more scared of what Calcidius might do if he ratted the wizard out, that he was of a few scruffy adventurers. Torak came out and tried to command Dak to cooperate, but that didn't work either. The fear of Calcidius was too deeply ingrained. So they slit his throat, and left the invisible body webbed to the wall. 

At about this point, Pretty Bird relayed a view to Chaff of the other two of Calcidius' henchman leaving the ship and headed their way. They were generally acting normally, but obviously on alert and watching each others backs. They got to a point where they could see the "Little Dolphin", and then retreated a few blocks to casually take up station and wait. They stayed for almost an hour, looking around, up and down, before heading back to the "Blind Fury". Pretty Bird saw them board ship and go below. She kept watching but saw nothing else except sailors at work on the deck. 

This left the party in a dilemma; do they stay at the inn where they are prepared for Calcidius, or take the fight to him? After a short discussion, they decided to take the fight to him. Kwinsea, Awg, and the his/her charmed dolphin dropped into the water and swam towards the "Blind Fury". The calmonari had the instant fortress tucked in his belt, the ring of invisibility on one finger and a stone with silence 15' radius (courtesy of Torak) in one hand. Jaz meanwhile stumbled along acting drunk to keep an eye out from the landward side, while Chaff (still transparent) led the musketeers along some distance behind her. When the swimming duo reached the ship, Kwinsea and the dolphin held back to watch while Awg climbed up the stern and onto the deck. There was no one on the stern castle, but a half dozen sailors performed various task on the main deck below. The calmonari, invisible and silent, crept over to the edge of the stern castle. Once there, he tossed the silenced rock towards the dock, quickly shouted the command word for the instant fortress, and then dove into the water. The fortress instantly appeared on deck. It seemed to hover for a moment, and then crashed down through the decks, before toppling over into the water.  However, by that time, the stern of the "Blind Fury was completely wrecked, and the rest of the ship started to flood and settle into the water as the sailors all dove overboard or jumped down on the dock and ran. 

On shore, chaos ensued as the crowds reacted to the destruction. Awg and Kwinsea waited to see if Calcidius appeared, but there was no sign of the wizard. At about this point Torak, having used the shark spear to turn into a shark, appeared alongside his companions (scaring away the dolphin in the process). By now, a thin sheen of blood and bits of crushed flesh started to drift out from the wrecked ship.  Some of the body parts were draped in Calcidius' robes, so the party sighed in relief that he seemed to have been in the stern cabin and not the bow. Torak had cast detect magic before transforming, and he honed in on on mashed hand with a still intact ring on it, which he scooped up in his mouth. Awg meanwhile said the command word for the instant fortress again and returned to normal size, which caused yet a greater stir on the docks.  By this time the Chaff-led musketeers had arrived, and were immediately accosted by one of the squads of the Purple who'd likewise arrived on the scene. Sergeant Wilhelm talked the musketeers out of trouble, saying they'd heard the commotion and came to help. But there were way too many guardsmen and hysterical people around for comfort, so Chaff, Jaz and the musketeers retreated to the "No Man's Sea", as did the three in the water. They decided to avoid the "Little Dolphin Inn" for now, except to go back, pay off the innkeeper with  700gp of hush-money, and gather their things, plus the invisible body of Dak (which they later found was also wearing a magic ring)    


"Do What?!?"
Deciding this would be an excellent time to lay low, the party decided to get out of town for a few days and follow up on Kwinsea's quest to collect a sample of the stomach contents from the Tentacled beast of the Vasak Depths. They sailed out to the appropriate location, and Team Aquatic (Awg, Kwinsea and Torak-shark) jumped into the water. Kwinsea first cast a summon aquatic monster spell, which gained her a half dozen hooded seals to help. These she sent into the depths to draw up the Beast. About 10 minutes later, the seals swam by at high speed to hide behind Kwnisea. And then out of the inky darkness came the Beast itself. Kwinsea, having taken the time to cast speak with aquatic animals, greeted to beast and asked it to parley. She was looking for it's help, and offered whatever the Beast would desire in return. The Beast was hesitant at first, but agreed to listen. Kwinsea laid out her need for stomach contents, and the Beast insisted it would need a full meal to replace what it disgorged. Making sure they couldn't hear here, Kwinsea offered the seals as a meal. The beast agreed, and proceeded to spew forth a massive cloud of vomitous discharge, which the aquamancer scooped up in a specially prepared sack. She then directed the seals to their doom, and the Beast charged into their midst and started snapping them up. At this point, the party got out of the way, returned to the surface and thence back to Xin. Kwinsea then went off to meet with Xerious to give him his squid vomit, and then sat down with the naked aquamancer to learn her new spell. Chaff likewise took the opportunity to seek out Lady Volana with a bag full of collected fingers to do the same. 

TOTAL XP

7160

GAINS
Ring of Protection +1
Ring of Protection +1

KILLS
Calcidius the Insane Wizard
Philidona and Cymar [Swashbucklers]
Dak [Thief]

LOSSES
Gurps the Merman
6 Hooded Seals

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