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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Richards" data-source="post: 9741743" data-attributes="member: 508">ADVENTURE 4: DOWN IN THE DUMPSPC Roster:Adrielle, human/merfolk scout 1                     Brendan Conaill, human monk 1                     Kruz Taszan, changeling rogue 1                     Shiroko, snow fox hengeyokai wu jen 1NPC Roster:Hoppy, mongrelfolk adept 1Game Session Date: 16 August 2025 - - -Hoppy nervously approached the group as they finished up their breakfast in the Geshuku boardinghouse dining area.  He didn't often eat with the rest of the group, realizing how his appearance frightened the other guests.  "It is not my place to ask for your assistance," he began, "after you have already saved my miserable life...but if it would please you to do so, there are others of my kind who seek the aid of those more powerful than themselves.  Something is killing them off in a way completely unknown to them.""Of course we'll help your friends," Shiroko replied at once, speaking for the rest of the group.  Her ready agreement merely caused Hoppy to elevate his already-high opinion of her - she didn't balk for a moment at the thought of giving aid to those often called "sinborn," based on the belief that anyone born into such a hideous form must be paying off a karmic debt from a previous life.  (It was a belief Hoppy himself shared.)  "Have you eaten?"In response, Hoppy grabbed a muffin from the table and stuffed it inside his robes.  "I can eat on the way," he offered."Then lead on," suggested Adrielle.  Brendan merely scowled at their hasty departure - he wasn't quite ready to be finished with his free meal - and snagged up a pair of muffins to eat on the way as well.  "Yeah, okay, I'm ready," he said, grabbing up his quarterstaff.Hoppy led the group outside the boardinghouse - and as sweet as she was, Mrs. Geshuku was always happy to see the hideous sinborn leave her establishment - and down a set of side streets leading away from the part of the city settled by immigrants from Shiroko's homeland of Sokoku, an area several city blocks in length referred to as Furusato, or "hometown" in the Sokokuan language.  They went steadily south, to the very outskirts of Port Duralia altogether, and - to Brendan's consternation - he saw they were approaching the city dump, situated on the far edge of the city so its vile stench would inconvenience as few as possible.  "Your friends live there, in the dump?" he asked Hoppy."Yes, many sinborn live here - there are not so many smoo--" he caught himself about to say "smoothskins," the derogatory mongrelfolk term for those not of the mongrelfolk race - "...not so many people around to bother them.  Few people come out this way.""Yeah, no kidding," replied Brendan, tossing the half-eaten remains of his second "travel muffin" aside, to land in the street.  His gorge rose as they got nearer to the dump and the stench got even worse.  He now wished he had an empty stomach, but applied some breathing techniques he knew to try to keep from heaving."There is a hidden way in at the back," advised Hoppy, leading the group to the rear of the dump, as far away from the two gates on the north side as possible.  "The people who work here do not want the sinborn around, even in a place where garbage is collected and made into big piles."  The entire city dump was ringed by a large, wooden fence, made of vertical slats 15 feet high.  But one board in the back was loose, and Hoppy pulled it aside, swinging it over as it hung from a single nail towards the top.  The stench only increased as he slid his mismatched body through the opening.The others followed, none of them particularly happy about their current environment.  Shiroko cast a prestidigitation spell to create the scent of fresh lilacs just beneath her nose and Kruz did his best to ignore the stench, but Brendan and Adrielle were visibly sickened by the horrific odors wafting their way: rotting food, mold, and the sickly-sweet odor of dead things decomposing.Inside the dump, the group could see four large trash heaps scattered around the place, at more of less the halfway point.  To the north stood the twin gates, the small office area, and a shed where the tools used at the dump - picks, shovels, and long poles, mainly, along with a small fleet of wheelbarrows - were stored when not used.  Most of the southern half of the dump was taken up by an enormous pit dug down into the earth, with three large piles of dirt showing just how much had been removed to form the pit.  The pit itself was half-filled with a massive pile of assorted trash, and to the group's consternation, Hoppy started sliding down the dirt side of the pit, to land easily onto the trash pile.  Brendan almost let loose with another verbal complaint, until he saw where Hoppy was headed: to a small opening in the side of the pit, the start of a tunnel leading down further into the ground, all but hidden by the trash piles.  He supposed that made sense; deep underground, they would likely be far enough away from the trash that the stench would be much more bearable - and there was little likelihood of being discovered by the workers and run off.  The monk held his breath and slid down the side of the sloping pit walls, following in Hoppy's wake and eager to be away from the overpowering stench, even if that meant crawling through a narrow tunnel on hands and knees, as Hoppy was doing.Shiroko pushed her way in front of Brendan, crawling in directly behind Hoppy, but that was just so she could cast a dancing lights spell that she had float just before the mongrelfolk adept.  Brendan followed after Shiroko, and Adrielle and Kruz came after him, each crawling on hands and knees in the narrow passageway.  Brendan pulled down his skull mask, granting him darkvision but - just as importantly - putting a layer of cloth directly over his nose, which helped block out the stench of the dump.The passageway wound back and forth like an "S" but eventually opened into a wide, stone cavern, where the group could stand up once again and stretch.  But they weren't alone in the cavern, for standing at the other end were a pair of robed mongrelfolk, looking guiltily over at the newcomers.  The reason for their guilt lay at their feet: a human woman in an aristocrat's dress - and in the illumination provided by the dancing lights spell, everyone could see her ankles were bound together by a strand of rope and her hands were crossed at her waist, similarly bound."[Toad croak]," replied one of the robed sinborn, addressing Hoppy by his mongrelfolk name.  "What are you doing here?""I brought help," Hoppy replied.  "What are you doing, [snake hiss]?"  He looked down at the bound noblewoman, who seemed to be passed out on the ground at their feet.[Snake hiss] opted to ignore Hoppy's question.  "We don't need any smoothskin help," he snarled.  "We have everything under control.  You and your topsider friends can leave."  At the hooded mongrelfolk's tone, Brendan took a step forward and readied his quarterstaff for action.  Already his stomach was feeling less queasy from the horrible stench; if it came down to doing battle here in this cavern, he'd be ready and able to do his part.Kruz noticed a series of natural steps to the north leading down to an even lower level.  If he strained his ears, he thought he could hear the gentle sounds of snoring coming from that direction, and imagined it was a group of more sinborn, no doubt temporarily freed from their misshapen forms as they dreamt in peace.  He took a few steps down the natural stairwell, just enough to confirm his suppositions.The second robed sinborn's eyes widened - one was that of a human, the other an ogre's, giving him a lopsided expression - as his mismatched gaze fell upon Shiroko.  None of the city dump mongrelfolk had even seen a fox hengeyokai before, and in her hybrid form the wu jen appeared as an odd-looking human, with a pair of white-furred fox ears rising up out of her snow-white hair.  "That one can stay," the sinborn amended to [snake hiss's] order for the group to leave.  Shiroko wasn't sure whether to be flattered or not; she'd have been aghast to learn most mongrelfolk believed one day, one of their number would be born with all features matched up as the same creature (all human features, perhaps, or everything looking like that of a goblin), and on that day, the mongrelfolk curse would be lifted, and all sinborn would suddenly be able to change their shapes into those of any of their body parts, or the forms of any type of creature they had ever eaten.  [Owl screech] wasn't commenting upon the hengeyokai's natural beauty; he merely wished to devour her so if the mongrelfolk curse was ever lifted in his lifetime, he'd have yet one more form into which he could shapeshift.Adrielle pushed her way to the bound woman.  She couldn't determine whether the noblewoman was breathing or not, but she turned to the hooded pair and demanded, "Release her at once!"  Her hand dropped to the hilt of her sword, an implied threat if they failed to obey."This is none of your business," snarled [owl screech].  [Snake hiss], in the meantime, didn't like the combative stances of these smoothskin intruders, and liked the five-against-two odds even less.  So he bellowed out at the top of his lungs, "Brothers!  We're under attack!"Hoppy had his wand of cure light wounds out and was staring at the bound noblewoman, trying to decide if she needed healing or not.  He didn't see any obvious wounds on her, but then, to his surprise, he saw a bulge in her abdomen suddenly appear - and then move off to the right.  "Guys!" he called out, pointing at the woman's stomach.Brendan dared a momentary glance away from the hooded mongrelfolk and saw two distinct lumps moving about in the area between the woman's arms, bound at the wrist before her.  With his mask providing him perfect darkvision, he also spotted two holes in the far wall, each about 3 or 4 feet up from the ground and no thicker than the width of his forearm.In the lower cavern, some of the sleeping mongrelfolk had awakened from [snake hiss]'s call and were stumbling to their feet to see what all the fuss was about.  Kruz had his light crossbow loaded and ready to shoot if there was any trouble, but the sinborn seemed more confused than anything.  It seemed to the changeling rogue whatever evil scheme the two hooded mongrelfolk were up to with their bound noblewoman, the others in the group weren't a part of it.Adrielle whipped out her longsword and approached the robed sinborn, but then her blade came striking down not at either of them but the ropes binding the unmoving woman at their feet.  Two swift slashes and the ropes binding her ankles and wrists were cut open - but still the woman did not move, other than the unseemly lumps in her abdomen.  Shiroko stared in horror at the shifting lumps, recalling tales of "worms of death" from her homeland - did they have those here in Armaturia?[Snake hiss] tired of having his orders being ignored; he lunged at Adrielle with a club he pulled from the belt on his robes.  But she'd been expecting the attack and blocked his weapon with her own, then pressed on the attack and stabbed him in his midsection.  [Owl screech] looked down at their captive, saw she was no longer bound by their ropes, and stepped back, a fearful expression on his mismatched facial features.  Sure enough, the woman finally started moving, haltingly, rolling onto her side and slowly staggering to her feet.  She seemed woozy, swaying first one way and then another, almost as if drunk - but then her abdomen ripped open as the three dregworms that had been feasting on her organs since burrowing into her flesh and slaying her some hours ago suddenly exploded outwards in a splash of viscera.  One went flying across the distance to snap its toothy maw at [snake hiss] (who shrieked in fear and swatted it away with his club), while another went flying in Brendan's direction, its mouth full of sharp teeth open wide and eager to bite into the monk and burrow into his body.  But Brendan slapped it away with his quarterstaff, avoiding the similarly, high-pitched shriek that threatened to explode from his throat.  The third dregworm fell onto the stone cavern floor, then began wriggling its way towards Adrielle.  The noblewoman's body, no longer being controlled by the dregworms from the inside, collapsed in a lifeless heap."Stay back!" commanded Hoppy, running up beside Kruz and preventing the awakening sinborn from advancing into the upper cavern.  "There are deadly worms here, and my friends will kill them before they can harm any of you!"  None of the sinborn opted to do anything but follow Hoppy's directions; he was both known to them and universally trusted as being level-headed.Brendan stabbed the tip of his staff into the dregworm attacking him, pinning it down in the center of its serpentine body.  Then Kruz stepped forward and sent his crossbow bolt shooting straight into the thing's head.  It died with a wet gurgle.  Shiroko cast an elemental burst spell at the floor between the dregworm attacking [snake hiss] and the hooded mongrelfolk himself, catching both in the explosion of stone shards erupting up from the floor and slaying the worm.  Adrielle severed the head from the one crawling her way, leaving the cavern free of living dregworms.That wasn't the case for long, however, as a fourth dregworm came dropping down from one of the narrow holes in the back wall Brendan had spotted earlier.  Neither of the hooded sinborn noticed, though, as they concentrated on fighting off the smoothskins invading their home.  [Snake hiss] got in a lucky hit on Brendan with his club, and [owl screech] likewise got past Adrielle's defenses to strike her on the side of the head.  But then Hoppy stepped up, knowing full well his role in the group; he cast a cure light wounds spell on the human monk, sealing up the bruise Brendan had just received from [snake hiss]'s swinging club.Brendan, fully refreshed, initiated a flurry of blows against [snake hiss], tagging him first with one end of his quarterstaff and then the other in rapid succession.  The sinborn was stunned by the attacks, unable to move for a moment as his nervous system tried to catch up to what had just occurred.  By this time, all of the fighting and commotion had awakened all seven of the mongrelfolk in the lower cavern, and Hoppy quickly filled in those late to waking on what was going on.  They all wisely chose to stay down in the lower cavern where it was safe.Kruz slapped another quarrel into his light crossbow and fired it across the cavern at [snake hiss], dropping him unconscious to the ground.  Shiroko cast a daze spell at [owl screech], using a bit of wu jen spell-trickery to extend the effects longer than normal, but the sinborn managed to avoid the effects nevertheless.  Adrielle cut the fourth dregworm in half as it plopped onto the cavern floor, then swung her blade until it touched [owl screech]'s neck.  "Don't even think of moving," she warned.[Owl screech] not only thought about moving, it was the only thought occupying his brain as he ducked back away from the scout's blade, spun in place, and high-tailed it over to the tunnel entrance.  But to do so, he had to run past Kruz, and the changeling plunged a dagger-blade into the sinborn's side as he raced past.  Hoppy limped forward on his mismatched feet and cast a second cure light wounds spell, this time healing up Adrielle's wounds.Before [owl screech] could escape from the cavern, he'd taken another stab from Kruz's blade, fought off the effects of a hypnosis spell cast by Shiroko, and finally succumbed to his wounds when Adrielle cut him down with her longsword.  Brendan, in the meantime, checked out the noblewoman, confirmed she was dead, and started ripping lengths of cloth from her gown to stuff into the hole in the wall from which the fourth dregworm had emerged.  Of course, he realized this was only a stopgap measure; they'd apparently burrowed their way through the stone of the cavern wall, so a chunk of tightly-stuffed fabric wasn't going to be much of a deterrent, but it would hopefully keep them at bay long enough for the group who'd come to save the mongrelfolk dump squatters to bug out with the sinborn they'd come to save.At Brendan's request, Hoppy cast a cure minor wounds spell on [snake hiss], just enough healing to stop him from bleeding out - the monk wanted him alive for questioning.  The monk, in the meantime, continued stuffing the first "worm hole" in the stone wall with torn pieces of the dead woman's skirts.  Seeing what he was doing, Kruz moved over to the second such hole and started pouring rum down into it, thinking to set the interior of the narrow tunnel on fire.  Once he voiced his plans aloud, Adrielle came over and assisted him, lighting the rum ablaze with sparks from the rogue's flint and steel.While all of this was going on, Shiroko approached the frightened mongrelfolk and asked them if they knew what had been going on.  As she had expected, they all professed ignorance, but she could tell by their frightened and horrified expressions that they were telling the truth.  One mongrelfolk's mismatched eyes lit up and he pointed hurriedly behind the hengeyokai, calling out, "Look out!"The others looked to where he was pointing, and saw a dire rat come slinking down the entry tunnel, scampering forth on all fours and not needing to duck at all in the low tunnel.  But then, as it reached the cavern, its features shifted, and it took on the appearance of a rat-headed humanoid.  "Brothers!" it called out.  "See how sleek and smooth my face is - all of the features match!  Let me do the same for you!""No!" cried Hoppy.  "Do not accept the offer!  You risk your next lives if you try to bypass life in your current forms!"  Shiroko was confused, thinking the mongrelfolk wererat was a rat hengeyokai, or perhaps a nezumi - what was all this talk about sleek and smooth features?  The other mongrelfolk muttered among themselves, some of them obviously tempted by the wererat's offer, while others stoically realized living their lives in their sinborn bodies was a sure way - the only way, really - to be born into a less hideous body in their next lives.Brendan dug out a torch from his backpack and set it ablaze from the rum-fed flames emanating from the second dregworm hole in the wall, while Kruz decided to let the wererat know what he thought about his offer to the mongrelfolk by shooting the rat-headed hybrid with his next crossbow bolt.  The wererat hissed in pain but plucked the bolt contemptuously away; only then did Kruz recall that silver weapons were the only ones guaranteed to do severe damage to a lycanthrope.Shiroko, all out of attack spells, readied her wand of magic missiles as she called out to the wererat in the hengeyokai language.  She was disappointed to note he apparently didn't understand a word she was saying.  But in a burst of speed, the wererat dashed forward, eager to pass on the gift of lycanthropy to all of his former dwelling-mates.  Hoppy was the closest sinborn in the cavern, so he was the wererat's first target.  But Shiroko got off a blast from her wand before the wererat made it to Hoppy, and he cried out in pain and retreated to the tunnel entrance.  He'd been counting on the fact that normal weapons couldn't harm his as much as normal, but he hadn't factored in magic spells!  "I will take care of these interlopers, then return with my gift!" promised the wererat, before shifting back into dire rat form and scampering back up the winding slope.As the fire died out in the second dregworm hole, Adrielle stuffed it with dress material, more concerned about more dregworms getting in than the cowardly wererat's threats.  It was Hoppy who first heard the skittering noises coming from the tunnel, followed by the unmistakable squeaks of rat voices.  Sure enough, the glowing eyes of dozens, then scores, and eventually hundreds of rats came down the tunnel. the filthy vermin climbing over themselves in their eagerness to bite the "smoothskins" as ordered by their new master.Brendan hurled a flask of oil onto the stone cavern floor at the end of the entry tunnel, and Kruz mirrored his actions, the two splash areas overlapping and covering a wide patch of stone floor.  He passed another flask over to Shiroko, who widened the oil patch even more.  Adrielle cranked her heavy crossbow, getting the string in place and then fitting a quarrel into her weapon.  She moved up by Brendan, her weapon aimed at the tunnel entrance.As the swarm of rats scrambled over the patch of oil, Brendan tossed his torch into the middle of them.  The flames spread almost instantaneously, covering the oil-soaked rats and setting them ablaze.  But then he realized the rats, even those actively on fire, weren't dying fast enough; they cascaded into the cavern, engulfing him and Adrielle as they bit in a pain-crazed frenzy.  The scout managed to avoid getting set on fire - her heavier leather boots and armor no doubt helped on that front - but Brendan soon found his pants legs ablaze.Kruz, realizing none of his weapons were optimal for fighting off a swarm of flaming rats, ran over to [snake hiss] and grabbed up his club.  (Seeing a short sword lying there, he grabbed that up as well - it seemed of decent construction.)  Then, as the wave of rats came his way, he started bashing them on their little rodent heads with his bludgeoning weapon.  Shiroko, seeing the logic behind the changeling's tactics, grabbed up [owl screech]'s club and started doing likewise.Adrielle managed to step away from the rats trying to engulf her, scraping them off with the blade of her longsword; she'd realized her loaded heavy crossbow was a poor choice for fighting off hundreds of individual rats.  Hoppy used his wand to cast a cure light wounds spell on the scout, healing up some of the wounds she'd taken in the fight thus far.  But Brendan was being overcome, as burning rats climbed up his clothes and bit him with their disease-ridden teeth.  (The monk realized these were not only dirty, filthy rats, some of them actually on fire, but they were also rats that lived in the trash heaps of the city dump - could there be any worse kind of rat swarm to be up against?)  He tried his best to swat the rats away with his quarterstaff, but he was soon buried in a coating of burning rats, and he fell over as consciousness left him, unaware that as he struck the stone floor, he crushed half a dozen of the nasty vermin to death with the weight of his body.Kruz was crushing rat skulls with his borrowed club; Shiroko was doing the same but saw Brendan fall out of the corner of her eye and activated her unseen servant, having it pull the unconscious monk away from the rat swarm, many of whom were dying from the flames eating away at their furry bodies.  At her command, the invisible force patted out the flames on Brendan's clothing, ensuring he wouldn't burn to death like so many of the rats were doing.The wererat re-entered the tunnel once the flames died down, still in dire rat form, fully expecting his minions to have taken care of the smoothskin interlopers.  Adrielle didn't notice, as she was too busy hacking at the rats with her longsword; each hit severed a rat or two, but there were plenty of them left in the swarm, so she wasn't seeming to make a whole lot of progress.  Fortunately, the last of the fire took care of the majority of the remaining rats, and the small handful left after that went scampering in all directions, looking to save themselves now that they no longer had overwhelming numbers to their advantage.Hoppy bent over Brendan and brought him back to consciousness with a charge from his wand of cure light wounds.  He woke up swatting at the rats he remembered swarming all over him, although that was no longer the case.  But he saw the dire rat enter the cavern and whacked him with his quarterstaff - not enough to deal him any real damage (he wished he had another application of the oil of shillelagh he'd used against the kenku in the Aerie on hand), but enough to let the wererat know the "interlopers" were still quite in business.  Kruz shot him again with his crossbow to hammer home the point, and when Shiroko fired off another bolt from her wand of magic missiles, the wererat fled back the way it had come for the second time in as many minutes.This time, though, there was nothing preventing the heroes from following, although they lost a bit of ground by having to crawl forward on hands and knees.  Once back outside on the trash heap, though, they could see him fleeing to the far side and scrambling up the sloping dirt wall of the trash pit.  Shiroko shot him with another charge from her wand, striking him unerringly in the back.  Kruz shot at him with his crossbow but missed, but Adrielle had better luck with her larger, heavier crossbow - her bolt caught him in the back of the neck and slew him instantly.The seven mongrelfolk stepped back out into the open air of the trash heap, oblivious to the horrible stench that had Brendan grateful for his skull mask to keep the worst of the odor at bay.  "If you like," suggested Shiroko, "I can have my unseen servant try to widen those holes the worms of death dug through your cavern wall, so we can make our way to the other side and kill the rest of them for you.""Please do not trouble yourselves," replied one of the sinborn, a taller member of their strange race, with a crablike pincer-claw in place of a right hand.  "We no longer feel safe in this place.  Many of us have decided to return to the relative safety of the sewers, while others will take their chances living in the alleyways of the city.  But we thank you for your aid, and apologize for the actions of [snake hiss] and [owl screech].  I imagine they intended to release the woman in the better part of the city, so the dregworms would infest those among the higher ranks of the city's society."Hoppy had been scrambling over the trash heap to check out the dire rat's body, to ensure he was dead.  That was quite evident, but the mongrelfolk wererat had reverted to his sinborn form upon death, and Hoppy recognized his face as a former member of the city dump-dwelling group.  "It's Spider Face!" he called, using the name others called him instead of his sinborn name.  Spider Face had been well-named, for while about a quarter of his face was that of a human, the entire rest of it sported features more often found upon a hunting spider."It is probably wrong of me to admit this," replied Hoppy with a shudder once he'd returned to the others, "but that guy's face always freaked me the Hell out." - - -So that was adventure number four.  The next game session - currently scheduled for 13 September - will have the PCs attempt to join the local Adventurers Guild (at the urging of the Silent Sodality - it makes for a good cover), after which time everyone will upgrade to 2nd level.  As Hoppy won't be joining them (the Adventurers Guild doesn't recruit mongrelfolk), I went ahead and upgraded him already; 2nd-level adepts get a familiar, and Hoppy's chosen a feral rat from the city dump he's named Scruffy.  (We'll assume he wasn't one of the rats attacking the PCs in this adventure.)Incidentally, Spider Face had no idea how lycanthropy works: he'd been bitten by a natural wererat and assumed he'd be able to pass on his lycanthropy by biting the other mongrelfolk, but as an afflicted lycanthropy he lacked that ability.  Any sinborn who might have taken him up on his offer would have been sorely disappointed. - - -T-shirt worn: Still my "Happy Happy Happy" T-shirt from the previous adventure, as the two short adventures took place during the same game session.</blockquote>

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