Mercenary 970622

3rd: Expedition with the Amaran Bishop, (Played June 22, 1997)
Amaran cultists desire to recover more artifacts related to the Amaran cult. Giuseppe Spini's papers hold clues to where more ancient artifacts can be recovered and the Amaran cultists are funding an expedition to discover two artifacts they hope to recover.
Adventure Background, Adventure Outline
Players: Joe White, Kara White, Scott Chelette, Ray Turney, Ken McKinney, Ron Shigeta, Garrett ??, Sam Jennings (part)
Summaries: Chelette

Adventure Background

The papers recovered from the leather-pouched box on Giuseppi Spini indicated more sites and treasures they planned to explore before they were interrupted (on 1st adventure) by the party. The party put off the Amaran cultists for a few months, but finally sent Cosimo to see what kind of deal could be worked out for the party's services as guides and in exchange for the papers.

The Deal: Cosimo's negotiation skills knew no match this time as the rich Amaran cultists were squeezed for the following deal. The party will not need to enter any of the sites. If one or both main artifacts are recoved, each party member will receive a one POW item personalized for them, in addition to the obscene fees below. Upkeep costs of all expedition members will be covered by the Amaran cultists for the duration of the mission.

Schedule of Payments:
50 gold per week of travel [per team mercenary leader (player)]
200 gold in advance (for services) [total]
300 gold for the papers (in advance) [total], dividable with Cosimo
Personal 1 POW Item for artifact(s) [each person]

The Expedition

The party has two days to get ready and then the expedition leaves.

Bishop Guerilimo, High Priest del Tosta, Priest Pastessi, Lord Uliari, Lord Pramma, and Lord Hofmeyer (a teutan and former sorcerer) are the Amaran members of the expedition. They have eight mules full of supplies and are very eager and excited to go. The first leg of the expedition is a barge ride to Lulac, port city (10,000) on Lac Vond.

Adventure Outline

None Yet

970622.Chelette

3rd: Expedition with the Amaran Bishop

The Characters: Cosmo (Joe), Dagmar (Kara), Marco Lamberti (Ken), Cosimo (Ray), Thor (Scott), Sir Orlando Laurenti (Garrett), (Ron), and (Sam)

At the end of the last mission, Cosimo skillfully negotiated very favorable terms for the next adventure: Expedition with the Amaran Bishop. The Worshippers of the Sun Goddess have generously agreed to hire the party as a security force for their mission to recover cult artifacts. The papers recovered from the late Giuseppe Spini provide valuable clues. The Amaran contingent includes a Bishop, two High Priests and three Rune Lords.

On the overland march from Melbin, the party stops over at the keep of a Knight who Sir Orlando happens to know. The party leaves the next day, but Sir Orlando is destracted by a Boar Hunt. He does well in the hunt, taking second place, but looses track of the party. We move on to investigate some ancient ruins in Forna, then continue on to a second set of ruins. Joe and the four barbarians go on to Riga and retrieve Sir Orlando. When the Cultists arrive, King Ike of Riga generously lets them use his archives after receiving a suitable donation. After the information is gathered, The characters get a sense that the Cultists are concealing information, but everything is fine so far.

Eventually we make it to yet another set of ruins. We find a big stone slab covering an opening in the ground. There is an POW 40+ spirit guarding, but one of the Rune Lords manages to defeat it. Removing the slab, we find an ancient sun observatory and a library holding hundreds of clay tablets. Calculating the encumbrance, the cultists realize that it will take a mule train to transport the huge quantity of tablets. That will have to wait. The tablets apparently contain sacred writings that could provoke a scism. Poking around the ruins, Cosimo finds a second slab covering shallower shaft that glows magic. Sam's character's mystic vision reveals powerful spirit magic he can't understand.

Going down the shaft, we discover an opening to a large outdoor area. We see trees and realize that it is nighttime in the forest, even though it is daylight topside. We wait until sunset at the top, and learn that it is morning below. Apparently there is a time differential. Ron's character scouts ahead. The area is a wooded valley. He finds human tracks on the side of the trail and we follow them for a while. Eventually we see smoke from a nearby village. Marco scouts it out and discovers it is an apparrently normal farming village. We approach a farmer plowing a field, but he speaks only ancient Galeric and some other unknown tongue. We learn there is a city nearby, but the Cultists want to look for a rift valley apparently mentioned in one of their texts.

We wander around for a while and eventually find a saddle point between two mountains that is apparently the rift valley. Poking around on the side of the valley, we find the entrance to a huge hall where everything glows magic. There is light coming from the celing and a balcony level on the far wall. Going up to the balcony, we discover an exit corridor. Strangely, no light penetrates the corridor. No one wants to enter, but when the Cultists offer Thor 50 gold, the price is right. He walks into the corridor and has no idea what happens until he emerges minutes later, posessed by a POW 34 pain spirit. Apparently he was befuddled before the spirit attacked and was not able to run away. No one present can excorcise the spirit and we are uncertain about what to do.

Another 50 gold convinces Thor to try the corridor again. After all, he can only be posessed by one spirit at a time. Thor sprints down the black corridor and finds a door at the end. He smashes it open and finds 8 human guards in plate armor waiting in the next room. Sensing extreme danger, he runs back down the corridor yelling and screaming. Thinking Thor is insanely posessed, Dagmar grapples him as he emerges. In the confusion, both of them end up on the ground as the guards emerge and engage the party. The guards turn out to be blindingly fast skeletons wielding two handed swords. Thor's followers Uller and Loki are cut down in the first round. Slashing mindlessly, the skeletons deal huge damage. Dagmar and Ron's character quickly loose limbs and the battle seems to be going badly. Just in time, the Bishop casts Blessing of Amaron and everyone receives healing and protection 6. We fight it out for a few more rounds before someone finally manages to get a hit past one of the skeleton's armor. It instantly dissolves into mist and fades away, armor and all. Once the Amaran Rune Lords get into the battle, the skeletons are easily destroyed. Luckily no one was permanently damaged.

Two of the Rune Lords go down the corridor and find the guard chamber empty. They then find an enormous cult spirit guarding a sacred chalice. They try and fail to convince the spirit to give them the chalice. Apparently they are not pure enough. The Bishop and High Priests also try, but none passes the spirit's test. They decide to return later with a Cult Hero and try again. We leave the site and return to Riga. We try to get King Ike to arrange to have Thor excorcised but he isn't interested. Eventually the spirit is removed, but Sir Orlando manages to get in some trouble. He tries to win the kings favor with the gift of a "falcon" he has been sold. His gift and oration fail miserably so he turns to the mercenary guild for help with the excorcism. Unfortunately, His conversation with them is so bad that it is completely misconstrued. Sir Orlando is then thrown into jail a spy. He spends some time in the slammer and even has a trial. We try to get him off, but his noble arrogance isn't helping his cause. Eventually the Amaran Bishop makes a deal with the King and Sir Orlando is freed. He gets away with only torture injuries but has to do is repay the Cultists.

We look around for another three weeks but do not find the other sacred site. On the way back via Port Lulac and the River, we enter a small village. The inhabitants are surprised to see the second group of strangers in such a short time. It turns out that another group of armed men was in town recently. Ron's Character scouts ahead to the next village and finds the men at the local inn. There are twelve of them and they look serious. In a stroke of good fortune, Ron's character recognizes them as Amsulae Cult hit men. This is bad news since Amsulae, Daughter of the Moon is opposed to the Amaran Cult. He returns with the news and we change course completely to avoid them. The hit men don't expect us to return home by the back way, so we make it back to Melbin safely.