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Message: <blockquote data-quote="ilgatto" data-source="post: 9726684" data-attributes="member: 86051">Duergar & Daemons Part VIII: Back to the SurfaceIn which it seems that the visit to the palace led to nothing, that our noble heroes have returned to their folding boat, and that Navarre seems to have forgotten that he is actually quite inebriated.Night 57, continued: We join our noble heroes on their folding boat, where the chevalier speaks first.“Messieurs,” he says solemnly. “We must come up with a plan. We are too small in number, we have no cavalry and we lack the necessary arms. We must come up with a superior strategy. Now…”“I am against fighting the king,” Sir Suvali cuts in. “We are on his terrain.”“Vraiment?,” the chevalier says stiffly. “Would you care to put forward an alternative?”“Yes,” the sorcerer says. “We don’t fight the king.”“That isn’t an alternative, Sir. It’s a repeat of what you just said,” Navarre says, distinctly annoyed with the sorcerer’s attempts to torpedo the talks.“There is the story of the Primordial Gnome,” Sir Eber says. “He has an iron beard.”“He does?,” Navarre asks irritably. “What are you on about?”“We can spread the rumor that he is back, forcing the king to have to fight him,” the ranger says. “I’ll wear the helmet and pretend to be the prodigal son.”“To what end?,” Navarre asks. “It will still be you against a far more powerful opponent. We’ll need something more substantial.”The debate continues for a bit, with Sir Suvali suggesting the party move deeper into the Underdark; Sir Eber pushing hard for waging war against the king and his army; Sir Oengus suggesting our noble heroes return to Big Beach to retrieve his armored barge; the chevalier trying to discuss tactics for the fight against the king; and Navarre arguing that fighting the duergar king would be of little use if it would not lead to the duergar returning the favor and assisting our noble heroes in the fight against the traitorous Mim.“We shall put it to a vote,” the chevalier says at some point.“On what, old fruit?,” Navarre asks. “On waging war against the king and his army? I admit that I wouldn’t know how to vote. I will need someone to convince me.”The debate continues and, now, the notion to not attack the king and his army seems to gain momentum, with Navarre and Sir Oengus even starting to lean towards Sir Suvali’s suggestion to further explore the Underdark.“Perhaps an answer to the situation with both Mim and the duergar king awaits down here,” Navarre muses at some point. “It is a strange world and there’s no saying what we will find.”“Messieurs,” the chevalier says, after some time. “I believe that a consensus is within reach. It would seem that we are all leaning towards remaining neutral as far as the affair with the queen and her king is concerned. Both are forces of evil and it would seem that there is no reason to support either one or the other. We shall remain diplomatic in our dealings with both. Bon! As to our actions for the present, I do believe that venturing deeper into the Underdark seems to be winning over returning to the surface.”“Hmm…,” Sir Oengus says. “I’d still like to go to the surface. Think about it, lubbers! There’s too much we don’t know about. Walrus Island! We set out to explore the world and I says we haven’t finished by a long shot!”“True,” Navarre agrees. “I admit to remaining quite torn between staying down here and returning to the surface. But whom would our explorations up there serve? There is no legitimate king. I am at a loss.”“So it’s going to be diplomacy with the Underlings?,” Sir Eber says. “Know that my challenge to the king stands.”“It is for each to decide whoever they want to challenge,” the chevalier says.“Good,” Sir Eber says.“Challenging the king is perhaps not such a bad thing,” the chevalier continues. “The queen and this city seem to be the gate to the Underdark, so to speak, and she would be well served with the king’s death.”“True,” Navarre concurs.“I don’t care about that,” Sir Eber says. “The Underling ‘king’ is an evil bastard and my blood boils when I think of him.”“And what will you do if you should succeed in besting him?,” Navarre asks. ”Who’s next?”“Killing the king will give us more leverage,” Sir Eber says. “I’ll take it from there.”“Quite,” Navarre muses.“How about making the queen’s champion fight the king?,” Sir Suvali suggests. “We can help him with spells and potions.”“That would hardly be in accordance with the rules,” Navarre says.“I think Eber will lose the fight,” Sir Suvali says. “I cannot cast Haste again. I have made some calculations and the very best I can come up with is a fifty-fifty outcome, even if we should somehow manage to increase his fighting prowess. What’s more…”“Messieurs, a vote!,” the chevalier interrupts him. “All ye in favor of the war with Mim raise your hand.”Navarre raises a hand. He has decided that restoring order in The Forest will be the best basis for dealing with the situation in the Underdark. After a moment, Sir Eber also raises his hand.“Nay?,” the chevalier asks.Only Sir Suvali raises his hand.“And who abstains?,” the chevalier continues.He raises his hand.“And therefore me,” Sir Oengus says.And so our noble heroes decide to leave the duergar to their own problems, at least until they have dealt with the traitorous Mim. This leaves the matters of the trade deal with the duergar king and Sir Eber’s challenge and they decide to go ahead with the wine deal, first because they have given the king their word and, second, because it gives them an excuse to meet with the king again. The operation will involve the transportation of twenty standard barrels of wine to Stalag, down the long stairway to the surface in the cavern with the waterfall. Since this means that they will have to get the barrels to the valley on the surface first, they discuss hiring bearers and using carts. They conclude that the wine will have to come from Dauberval – or perhaps from Sarazin and then taken to Dauberval and the mountains.As far as the fight with the king is concerned, our noble heroes have little doubt that it is rather likely to end quite badly for Sir Eber. And even if he should win, what will be next? Will the king’s men accept his victory? What if they don’t?The discussion turns to rigging or trapping the city again, if only to provide our noble heroes with an advantage should the king’s men decide to avenge the defeat of their king. Traps, floods, huge fires, involving the duergar of Stalag, the duergar priests, everything is considered until the chevalier suggests that the queen’s court is likely teeming with the king’s spies and that there is probably no way any of the duergar of Stalag can be involved in any way without the king getting wind of it.During all of this, the DM informs our noble heroes that, by law, the queen may not engage in any aggressive act against her king; that no duergar of the queen’s court would be a match for the king in any case; and that the god of the duergar is called Laduguer, the Exile.“Maybe this priest can be persuaded to join the fight if we somehow manage to convey to him that Eber is the bearer of the Sword of Shadows,” Navarre suggests. “The legend says that it is a weapon of Ulm and this… Laduguerre must be the duergar’s interpretation of him. The priest may see an advantage in backing the wielder of the sword.”“I am absolutely against using the sword,” the chevalier says with some vehemence. “It is a weapon of utter evil and we have agreed to use it only in the most dire of emergencies.”“I wouldn’t say the sword is evil as such,” Navarre says. “Ulm represents the negative aspects of life, not the evil ones. I would not say that death, disease, and perhaps even ‘shadow’ are necessarily ‛evil’. I’d say they rather represent the disinterest of God in the jollier aspects of life.”The chevalier discusses his understanding of Ulm with the DM.“I have absolutely nothing against using the Sword of Shadows against the king,” he resumes, to much laughter. “Au contraire! I think it is an excellent idea!”“It is agreed,” Sir Suvali says, making some notes. “We will consult the duergar priest and Eber will use the Sword of Shadows against the king. Anything else?”“I will need a plate armor,” Sir Eber says.Our noble heroes discuss the duel with the king for a bit but they cannot really come up with anything else they could use to their advantage. After a while, the discussion turns to the chevalier wanting to equip the Sarazin cavalry with plate armor to create a unit of heavy cavalry to bring into the field against the traitorous Mim. None of his noble companions seem very interested in the subject nor, indeed, in the nature of any trade deal with the duergar at all and so it is left to the chevalier to continue the trade talks with the queen. When the discussion ends thusly, the chevalier sits back.“Hmm,” he sighs contentedly. “War, a duel, heavy cavalry, wine… what’s not to like? With the wine being perhaps the best part!”“Ah, yes, the wine,” Navarre says, when the laughter has died down. “We will have to use the stairs to get it to Stalag. The exit in the egg will not be there until the next full moon, which isn’t any time before our rendezvous with the king.”Sir Suvali suggests that someone transport the barrels to the valley where he last left Navarre and that he will then fly the barrels up to the cave, which he says will take him a couple of days. The plan is discussed and it seems to be the way to go, especially after another plan involving the sorcerer flying the barrels directly to the mountain plateau is rejected because he says this would take too long, which it probably won’t but there you go.“Gentlemen,” Sir Suvali says. “I will fly to Diamond Castle and order the wine, which can then be in the valley in a ten-day, perhaps eleven days. I will fly the barrels up to the cave after that. What year?”“I’d say a mediocre vintage will be more than enough,” Navarre says. “The king isn’t very likely to know the difference.”“So that will be five silver per liter, for a profit of two hundred and fifty pieces of gold,” the sorcerer says.“I will accompany the caravan to the valley,” Sir Eber says, who still has an unused Weapon Proficiency slot ever since he reached Level 3. “I can train with the guards to become proficient in the use of the short sword.”“Gentlemen,” Sir Suvali says. “To surmise. One, we will go to the queen now to finalize a trade deal with her and ask her permission to speak to her priest. Two, we will go to the priest to get his opinion on the duel. Three, we will arrange for the wine to be brought to the valley and Eber will start practicing with the short sword. One last thing. I’ll do the talking to the queen this time because magic is involved.”And so it is decided. Navarre heaves a sigh of contentment, happy as he is that his noble companions have finally seen fit to discuss and decide on a comprehensive plan of action before charging into the unknown heads first. And all this at the instigation of the chevalier, no less! Perhaps his noble friend has finally come to his senses?When our noble heroes get to the palace, a herald tells them to follow him downstairs to the queen’s personal audience room. From somewhere up in the stalactite comes music again – apparently the duergar like to party a lot. When asked about it, the herald says that the party is in honor of the queen and her noble guests.“Ah!,” the chevalier says. “Are there more queens than one?”“Most certainly,” the herald says. “More than thirty.”Once again, Navarre wonders at the surprises the duergar people continue to spring on our noble heroes, and, more importantly, how many of them they still aren’t aware of.Perhaps unsurprisingly, it is the chevalier who speaks first when our noble heroes get to the queen’s room.“Sire!,” he sings with an elegant flourish. “Our hearts fill with joy to find majesté in all her resplendence and on the joyous occasion of a visit from her noble peers! I would ask majesté to allow me to repeat our full commitment to establishing good relations between majesté and the king above, to the benefit of both our peoples! I express our deepest sympathies for the discomfort caused by the tyrant king and I would ask majesté to allow me to inform her that there is currently an arrangement with the king involving the exchange of a number of barrels of wine for an amount of gold, for which we shall soon return to the surface. Eh, bien! I would humbly ask majesté to honor us with her requests for any and all goods majesté would wish us to bring back for her. Would majesté allow me to suggest an exchange of an amount of our most excellent wines for iron ore of equal value?”Navarre has to admit that the chevalier is getting quite good at this ‘trade ambassador’ malarkey.“Certainly wine is not all you offer?,” the queen asks.“The wishes of majesté are but ours to fulfill,” the chevalier replies smoothly.The negotiations commence and the queen expresses her desire for a variety of goods from the surface in exchange for iron ore. In the end, she and the chevalier settle for a deal involving duergar plate armor in exchange for goods from the surface – to the extent that the queen will start delivering ten plate armors per month in exchange for five to six thousand gold pieces worth of food, wine, and luxury goods.Perhaps more importantly, the queen also informs our noble heroes that there is an easier way for them to get the wine and the other goods to Stalag. She speaks of an exit in an old, abandoned duergar tin mine in the mountains close to the surface, a mine Navarre quickly identifies as one belonging to his family and located but a day’s travel from the Dauberval mountain castle. The queen announces that she will have ten plate armors and a steeder caravan waiting in the mine during the next Dark. It will take our noble heroes some six days of underground travel to get to the duergar mine and they will have to take the exit marked “2” on the map to get to it – the one the king and his men used to enter Stalag.“What if I kill the king?,” Sir Eber says, after all this. “How much will that net me?”“Rumors say rich merchants pay one thousand gold for king’s head,” the queen says, after some deliberation.“I’ll take that,” Sir Eber says.“We want to consult your priest,” Sir Suvali says. “Are we allowed to speak to him?”“Talk with priest is unwise,” the queen says, quite decidedly. “Priest is insane. Consorts with daemons. Priest very malevolent.”“Let’s forget about the priest,” Navarre says, eager to get on with it.“Then it is settled,” the chevalier says. “The surface world and the underworld stand in unison!”“Let’s start walking,” Sir Suvali says.[After this, several haphazard, mostly out-of-game conversations happen, which leads to the following:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The chevalier mentions that the presence of spies at the queen’s court probably means that the king will soon know of what has been said today and then some, to which Navarre replies that this is all the more reason to deal with him</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Sir Suvali inquires after the need to get some more potions from Wandering Bandolo and the coven</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">It is currently what the duergar call the ‘Dark’; the next Dark is forty days from now</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Our noble heroes must get the wine for the king to the tin mine no later than twenty-five days from now</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Our noble heroes will bring samples of goods from the surface when they return to the Underdark with the wine for the king</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The queen will send one of her guards to escort our noble heroes to the tin mine</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">It will take about a day’s travel to get from the capital of Dauberval to Sarazin via the River Dusk</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Trade with the queen will commence fifty-five days from now. The queen will send a steeder caravan to collect her goods</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The chevalier and Sir Suvali repeatedly express their concern about the possibility of the king simply taking the wine without paying a sou. But Navarre, Sir Eber, and Sir Oengus are not overly concerned, with the first stating that a king’s word is a king’s word and the others even seeming to welcome the prospect of a fight with the king and his army</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Sir Eber announces that he is ‘in his physical energy and that he will be touchy until the fight with king’.]</li> </ul>And so it is that our noble heroes return to the folding boat to prepare for the long walk ahead. Some two hours later, a young duergar arrives.“Message!,” he says. “Message for human champion from Huldor the Black, High Priest of duergar. High priest pray to Laduguer for human champion when he fight king.”“Good to hear,” Sir Eber says. “What will he do? Lightning from the walls? Will I be stronger?”“Er…,” the young duergar says. “High priest pray.”“That strengthens me,” Sir Eber says.Night 58: Sir Oengus commands the folding boat to turn into a box again and then our noble heroes start for the exit they have to take from Stalag to get to the old tin mine in Dauberval. When they get there, a duergar appears out of nothing – their guide until they reach the mine. The duergar takes them into the tunnel and our noble heroes find it has a downward slope to it, occasionally with some steps for easier passage, and that two gully-like depressions run along each wall. The company are about an hour into the tunnel when a light appears ahead.“I say,” Navarre says to the guide. “Is that the tavern or does it move?”“Traffic comes,” the guide says.The company halt and wait until a young duergar appears, soon followed by ten steeders and another young duergar behind them. Both duergar wear chain mail armor and distinctive, wide-rimmed hats.“Rothmen,” the guide says to our noble heroes before the newcomers start cursing and yelling at him.“Now listen here, my good man,” Navarre says to the guide. “What is this all about?”“We go,” the guide says.“Not so fast, old sport,” Navarre says. “What do these chaps want? Trade?”“Rothmen,” the guide says again. “Have rothé meat, biltong. Maybe you want pay more than market price?”“Not at all, old boy,” Navarre says. “I’d say we have enough supplies.”“Rothmen say king robbed rothmen,” the guard says. “One time when he come to Stalag and second when he return.”“By Olm!,” Sir Eber bursts out. “What in the name of all that is holy is this place? This is all like some sort of twisted hell to me! I’m getting sick and tired of this naughty word about trade. It is too weak!”“Calm down, old boy,” Navarre says. “It is going to be a long trip.”When the company take their leave of the rothmen and are on their way again, Navarre and the ranger discuss the subject of the Underdark and the duergar for some time, with Sir Eber once more expressing his disgust of the duergar and their evil ways in the strongest of terms and Navarre arguing that each has his own place in the world, though this doesn’t mean that he approves of wanton murder and slavery.For the next six days, the company trudge down the long, long, very long tunnel completely devoid of any signs of life at all except for some minor passages, usually to the left, which the guide says were made by duergar in search of ores.</blockquote>

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