Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Altalazar" data-source="post: 2939425" data-attributes="member: 939">Cordozo – Chapter Ninety-Five – Shopping for necessities – for the adventuring “profession”    My companions spent the day after our hire going about town, looking for adventuring “necessities” of magic, including strange brews, mystical writings, and items of power.  Morwen suggested I look for rings – she said one could wear one on each hand, rings of magic, no more, but obviously much less, because I had not a single ring on my finger, mystical, magical, or otherwise.  But I could not afford to spend vast sums – I had a lifestyle to maintain.      I picked up several strange and wondrous brews to protect my person should I ever stoop so low as to be engaged in a brawl.  And I selected two quaint rings, one of which, so it was claimed, would keep brawlers slightly at bay, and the other, even more fantastically, promised to turn any fall into a soft, safe, feathery fall leaving one totally unharmed.  Thus equipped, I went about much more important business.      Cordozo – Chapter Ninety-Six – Shopping for necessities – the REAL necessities    I set about looking for what was most important in town – the best restaurant with the best company.  Unfortunately, to dine in such a place required joining an exclusive, noble club.  And to join required dues and noble sponsorship.  Utilizing my contacts, I found the family of Vanderborn Manor to be most helpful in this regard.  For a very reasonable sum of two thousand pieces of gold they not only sponsored me, but they also paid my one thousand gold piece membership fee.  The club was so exclusive, once joined, no badge of membership was required – they knew all of their members on sight.  Thus, I became the newest member of the “Cusp of the Sunrise” and hobnobbed with the nobles of Cauldron.      Thus ennobled, I joined my fellow nobles for an early dinner, the royal buffet (for one), for a very reasonable price of twenty-five pieces of gold, twelve satisfying courses filled out the afternoon and evening, as well as my waiste-line.  Not entirely unmindful of my less fortunate companions, I asked for another full meal to be packed up for travel, which they did for a very reasonable fee.          Cordozo – Chapter Ninety-Seven – Road-worn travelers, we    We entered the road in pursuit of Celeste.  From what we knew, she was traveling with an old dwarf and his son to the City of Portsmith, part of the Metropolis of Dunkirk, a large enclave to the south.  I mounted my trusty horse, as yet unnamed (a good name should be earned or at least legally codified) and headed south with my companions.      For our first stop, I surprised my companions with my packed up royal buffet.  While the club frowns on distributing food to non-members, I knew such a frown was not legally binding, and what they do not know they cannot complain of.  My companions were appropriately grateful for the food that was not of the iron-ration variety.  Unfortunately, I only had one meal packed.  I did not think it would have lasted longer than one day in preservation, in any case.  But at least we started the journey right.      We traveled for two solid weeks, stopping every so often at thorps along the way to ask villagers if they had seen our quarry.  We had no luck in that regard.  Finally, our travels brought us to a thorp of reasonable size, known as Twin Oaks.  Happy farmers played with their families and readied themselves for the harvest.  Birds were singing, the crops were swelling, and they were very friendly.  X-shaped wooden fences held together with fire-hardened wooden staffs ringed the crop-land.  Eight buildings made up the Thorpe, including the Plough Tavern, whose innkeeper greeted us with a smile.  I was immediately suspicious.      Cordozo – Chapter Ninety-Eight – The Thorp of Demon Oaks, er, Twin Oaks        Bumone, the innkeeper owned the Plough Taven and ran it for his wife and three children.  I immediately asked him for his nicest room, which cost ten silver.  I held my tongue when he announced the price, not pointing out that he should simply have said that the room cost one gold.  Perhaps no one in this small town had any gold, to speak of.  That would soon change.  Cordozo was in town!  I tipped Bumone an extra gold for the night.      Morwen also took one of the three nice rooms in the inn, while Krynyn and Marcus sought to bilk an old lady out of free lodging by giving her healing for her pained joints.  Why they seem to need to use the legal fiction that it is charity offered for charity given when it is really nothing more than a standard commercial exchange of bartered services for lodgings is beyond me.  But then I have always found the holy ones perplexing.      In the morning, we had our breakfast and then moved on, traveling another week on the road until we came across something unusual.      Cordozo – Chapter Ninety-Nine – Roadside interlude    Another week of travel on the road led us through many more tiny thorps, none worth mentioning, but what was most interesting was between thorps.  We saw heading down the road toward us a fancy, noble carriage traveling at a good rate of speed.  As it passed us by, heading north, Morwen spotted a regal young lady in the rear of the carriage.  She was probably eight to ten summers old and very well dressed.      I got a peek at her as well.  So there goes another demon off to kill all of the nobles, this time perhaps in Cauldron.  Either that or she’ll feed in Demon Oaks.  Our return trip is sure to be an interesting one.      Cordozo – Chapter One Hundred – Days in and out    Six days more travel on the road, we found ourselves in a town on the outskirts of the Dunkirk metropolis.  We made it to an inn at dusk known as The Day in, Day Out Inn.  This place had a somewhat decent room for the peasant-busting price of two gold per night.  So, of course, I paid four.  My coin gave me first use of the bathwater for the evening, a luxury I took full advantage of, cleaning off the sticky dust of the road before heading down for the evening’s meal.      As I enjoyed my somewhat bland meal, I inquired of the innkeeper any word about Celeste.      “Yes, my lord, we did see her come by about two months ago.  She was accompanied by an old dwarf and a strange grey furry creature in a cage.”      This was interesting.  Further inquiry led us to discover that this creature was most likely a “sloth,” something not seen in these particular parts outside the conjuration circles of those trained in the mystical arts.      “Two days later, my lord, she returned, heading north and traveling alone.  She looked highly agitated.  She stated something about going to talk to the Lord Mayor to give him a piece of her mind.”  The only Lord Mayor north of here would be that of Cauldron.  Curious.      We finished our meal, retired for the night, then headed south in the morning.      Cordozo – Chapter One-Hundred One – Something rotten in Dunkirk    We arrived just before dark in Dunkirk.  Morwen and I spent coin freely trying to loosen the tongues of anyone who might have seen Celeste or the old dwarf and the sloth.  Inexplicably, we could not find a single soul who could recall seeing any of them.  Stranger still, their destination, the dwarf’s manor known as Splintershield Estate, was also unknown to anyone, but there was a place in the same location known as Carpenter’s Manor that had not been used in years.      Immediately, I began to wonder if angels or demons or both had once again moved us or perhaps Celeste and this dwarf to another time, just to make life difficult.  Appropriately, Carpenter’s Manor, once the home of a very successful merchant named Carpenter, was rumored to be occupied by spirits.  Morwen wanted to go there immediately.  I looked at the sun going down and announced we would wait until morning.  Why give the demons any advantages?      Cordozo – Chapter One-Hundred Two – At least one thing not so rotten in Dunkirk    I finally found an inn suitable for my standing as an attorney.  It cost a respectable twenty-five gold per night, so of course, I paid them fifty, just to make sure they got the message that I want the best.      We all retired to our respective inns (my companions stayed somewhere much cheaper in a less respectable part of Dunkirk).  I was about to drift off when I heard a knock at my door.  Ever alert for an ambush, and worried that I was alone, I quickly sent a call through the mindlink to my companions and warned them that someone was at my door.  I queried who was there.    “My name is Candy.”      “Of course you are.”      She apparently was there to offer her “services” to me, courtesy of the inn, but also for a charge of five gold coins.  This was unexpected.  I guess they know how to treat their guests well.  Of course, I paid her ten.      Just in case, I kept my companions apprised through the mindlink as to what was happening.  Once Candy was more comfortable, I heard Marcus over the link implore, “Can you terminate the link now??”      Fortunately, I was safe.  I guess nobles do well, as one should expect.  Two thousand gold well spent.  Membership has its privileges.     Just before I drifted off, I sent one last message through the mindlink.    “Krynyn or Marcus, might I trouble you for a ‘cure disease’ in the morning?”      Cordozo – Chapter One-Hundred Three – Breakfast and Carpenter’s Manor    The morning found Candy departing, but asking me how long I would be in town.  We then left for Carpenter’s Manor, the full light of the sun leading the way to clear out path of demons, ghosts, and vampires.  I was sure we’d be seeing all three at the manor.          The entrance to the manor was hidden from the street, allowing Morwen to more stealthily determine that the gate was already “unlocked.”  The house itself had a double wooden door, but we found that the entrance from the stable actually really was unlocked, causing me to remark to Marcus, “See, they left the door open, just like the gate.”     Inside, there was a lot of dust, though some rooms had less dust than others.  It looked like the house was generally abandoned, but perhaps it was used by someone in some rooms more recently.  But there was no sign of them, beyond the disturbed dust.      The manor was a dead end, so we returned to the city to look for more information.     Cordozo – Chapter One-Hundred Four – More information, less sense    Talking around town, spreading a few coins around, I determined that the young lady / demon / vampire spawn / evil double of a little girl that we saw on the road was the niece of the king of Bellanon who had come to Dunkirk to stay at the King’s Manor.  Her name was Princess Perstefanie.      Since the last time we saw her was a week prior, we figured she was at the Demon Oaks Thorpe by now.  So either she is a demon and she’s eaten them all, or she’ll be eaten by one there.  That was my prediction.      We quickly headed back north.  We determined that since Celeste had gone north, and she was the one we were paid to locate, that was the direction we would go.  Though it was strange that no one in Demon Oaks (Twin Demon Oaks?) had seen her in either direction.      Cordozo – Chapter One-Hundred Five – Back to Demon Oaks    Two weeks later, we walked back into Demon Oaks.  As expected, the fresh crops were still ungathered.  And now there was something different.  There were no children out playing.  And the tavernkeeper seemed eager for us to leave.  I could read the fear in his mind just by looking at his face.      Two patrons sat at a table in the inn, watching us while pretending not to.  I knew the innkeeper would never talk to me, so I linked with his mind and asked him what was going on – I assured him it was safe.    “No, go!  They’ll kill our children!  Go!  Go!”    “No, they will kill them if we leave.  Trust us.  We’re here to help.  You have nothing to fear.”      I passed on our conversation through my mindlink with my companions.      Krynyn went out to the outhouse and cast a spell in view of the flies, but no one else.  He then scanned the area for evil, finding, unsurprisingly, two weak evil auras in the inn, and then two more just outside one of the houses.  But what really stood out was the moderately strong aura under the inn.      Meanwhile, the innkeeper seemed impossible to convince, so I decided we needed a plan.    “I can control these two goons here.  Then we still have the two outside, and then there’s the evil in the basement of the inn.  We should take that out first, and maybe the rest will scatter.”    My companions disagreed, and wanted to save the children first.      “But we can always raise them from the dead if that is a problem,” I suggested helpfully.    Morwen, in her infinite wisdom, pointed out the high cost of the materials required for a raising.  So off to the children we went.          Cordozo – Chapter One-Hundred Six – I gain some new “bodyguards”     I went over to sit with my companions at a table.  Marcus asked for some supplies, to give us an excuse to not have left yet.  Then I reached out the tendrils of my mind to the two rough-looking types sitting at the table nearby.  I quickly crushed their wills beneath mine, taking it over and making them my personal bodyguards.  Then I tried to explain this new situation to the innkeeper, who took a while to finally understand the concept that they were now not a threat to him.      Meanwhile, Morwen went out invisible, scouting out the building with all of the children in it.  She reported back to me in the mindlink that she saw some of the children plus two more thugs inside added to the one at the front and the one at the back of the building.  She snuck around the back of the building and stood behind the thug back there.      I then began phase two, walking outside with my new bodyguards flanking all of us, as if they were escorting us.  It was enough to get us right up to the one at the front.  Morwen quickly dispatched the thug in back.  Krynyn quickly slayed the one in front, and then Krynyn, Marcus, and Morwen ran inside and dealt with the two inside.      I stood outside with my “bodyguards” waiting until I heard the all clear inside.  I was already starting to wrap the tendrils of my mind around my two new “friends,” waiting for the word that would allow me to crush their tiny little brains.  Wait for it…</blockquote>

Verification