Session 47: A Nightmare Scenario


 * We are on our way to Thronehold! We head to the east…
 * Vikrit and Tork navigate and steer the ship.
 * Everyone is assigned chores again by Gettafix. Cornerio helps, but "not as much as I should". Vesun makes scrolls; Mogen works on her gun and on creating a homunculus.
 * Sarienne and Dax are helping move a crate when Dax gets frustrated and complains to Mogen about being stuck with Gettafix. He asks what he's supposed to do when they get to Thronehold since he doesn't have any fake papers. Sarienne offers to make him fake papers and he goes with d'Artagnan as a fake name. He's concerned she won't be able to replicate the seal properly, but she'll try anyway.
 * Gettafix makes us a simple dinner and tells us a scintillating story about being stuck on a ship for 2 months. Afterward, Orielle goes up to Vanesse. They discuss The Shadow and Vesun as a mentor, then Orielle asks if Vanesse wants to set up a fight club. She is of course enthusiastic and Orielle announces it to the rest of the ship.
 * Orielle and Vanesse fight. Tork and Cornerio come down to watch, as does a disapproving Gettafix. Vanesse lets Orielle whack her, then punches her back. They continue sparring and Orielle gets Vanesse in the face.
 * Orielle encourages some betting. Cornerio says he doesn't believe in gambling. Venga runs in circles and shadow-boxes (heh) to tell Sarienne to come down to check out the fight. Vanesse rolls a natural 20 on her grapple check and wins the fight, collecting 20 gold.
 * Later that night, Sarienne and Cornerio are on watch.
 * Gettafix comes over to them. He asks them to convince the rest of the crew not to have their fight club on the lower deck. He also has a list of sundries that he asks Sarienne to get in town, and wants her to post a couple of letters to send home to Sharn.
 * The rest of the trip is fairly uneventful; Dax works on hot potato rounds, Vesun makes some scrolls.
 * The next morning, Vikrit isn't fully notices a strange smell--the smell of fresh corpses.
 * He zeroes in on the Imisth forest and heads toward it. He tells Sarienne and Cornerio, and then gets the rest of the crew. Vikrit thinks maybe it's a giant corpse flower, but knows they don't grow in this area.
 * Tork touches Sarienne, Vikrit, and Vanesse and they're suddenly on the ground.
 * The four of us follow a river path into the woods. The river gets murkier, and there's clearly something that has died in the water up ahead. As we get closer, we see tons of human corpses in the river. There's a half-destroyed mill.
 * Tork puts on some beefy Mage Armor. Vanesse pokes one with a stick--looks like these are rural Aundarians. Sarienne notes that there are about 50 corpses, and Vikrit suggests we get the rest of the party. Sarienne calls Mogen and Cornerio says we shouldn't bother; Vikrit complains that it's been killing peasants and we should take care of this.
 * Vesun jumps off the side of the ship; Mogen follows. Vesun has a ring of Featherfall and falls gently; Mogen has wings built into her chair. Cornerio pushes Orielle off the side; they do not have a ring. The second party starts navigating up the river; thankfully Vesun points them in the right direction.
 * Meanwhile, Sarienne creeps closer to the mill. She spots some footprints, and sneaks up to the door to listen. She does hear some kind of heavy breathing… but it's coming from Vanesse. There are fairly recent bloodstains on the door and signs of struggle.
 * Sarienne opens the door and sees a ton of bloodstains and tons and tons of bones. There appears to be something sharp and shiny in the corner.
 * Vanesse and Vikrit hear some kind of raspy breathing coming from inside, and Vikrit frantically waves her back.
 * The door slowly creaks closed by itself. Vikrit sneaks up to look at the footprints. A whole bunch of crowded tracks (possibly the peasants) and soldiers' boot imprints. Normal mostly heading to the mill, soldiers all over the place.
 * As we wait for the rest of the party to arrive, we see some movement… but only Sarienne sees what looks like something under the water.
 * The rest of the party arrives. Vesun casts Detect Magic but doesn't detect anything. Tork creates the sound of rustling outside the door and Cornerio decides just to walk up to the door and open it, then steps inside. Vanesse follows.
 * As he looks around, he feels a tentacle wrap around his neck and gets squeezed but manages to rip it off his neck. He sees the choker… and a second one.
 * FIGHT!
 * Cornerio gets dragged further in then hits the one dragging him hard. Vikrit fires an arrow in and misses. Sarienne jumps down from her tree and moves next to the door. Vesun moves up to the door; Orielle moves up around the non-river side. Tork follows her and magic missiles the choker next to the door to death. Mogen goes inside and draws her kukri.
 * Sarienne notices something amorphous and black, with blue eyes, poking out from the other side of the river… and taps Vesun on the shoulder to where it is. It's taller than the building; it's a Nightmare.
 * Vanesse slashes at the nightmare and it doesn't appear to have done anything. The remaining choker misses Cornerio; the nightmare slams into Vanesse, doing nearly 50 damage. Cornerio smooshes the choker. Vikrit scampers over to Sarienne and casts Fell the Greatest Foe on her.
 * Vesun dimension doors himself and Sarienne behind the monster; Orielle runs toward it. Sarienne tries to hit it but can't. Tork thinks it's some powerful form of undead; he lightning bolts it but fails a caster level check and doesn't hit it. Mogen lines up a shot at the nightmare. Vanesse heals herself… for 1 HP.
 * The nightmare turns to face Sarienne and she slashes at it during her AoO and doesn't do anything. It points a finger at her and a Ray of Exhaustion hits her, and she drops to her hands and knees. Cornerio uses Detect Thoughts on the nightmare; he has to make a Will save as the negative energy overwhelms him. Vikrit tries to cast Nature's Wrath but can't beat the CL with a 25. Vesun finally is able to hit it with Searing Light and blasts it hard. Sarienne tries to move back and gets hit hard by the nightmare. Tork casts Force Claw near it.
 * Mogen fires off her shot but rolls a 2 and she misses. Vanesse moves up and tries to heal it for damage, but cannot beat the CL check so it fizzles. Vesun gets smashed into the ground.
 * Cornerio continues trying to read its mind and discovers that it's as smart as Mogen (and therefore smarter than the rest of us). Vikrit casts Guidance on Tork. Sarienne drags herself away and switches to her bow. Tork acid arrows the nightmare. Mogen loads her gun. Vesun cures critical wounds on himself, then uses Righteous Might on himself.
 * Vanesse activates her Gauntlets of True Strike and power attacks, taking a chunk out of it. Cornerio continues detecting thoughts; the nightmare gives him images of pain and rage, images of the Thranean army. The nightmare attacks Large Vesun and shoots out a ray of ice, leaving him with 2 HP and hitting Sarienne behind him. Vikrit rolls a 1 on his first rapidshot roll and has to spend the rest of the round restringing his bow.
 * Sarienne shoots the nightmare but it doesn't do much. Tork's acid continues eating away at the nightmare and shoots another acid arrow at it. Mogen blasts the nightmare with a fire round. Vesun tries to attack it but doesn't do much. Orielle connects with her flail. Vanesse slashes again and hits with her first attack, her sword suddenly glowing, and rips down its back, doing exactly enough damage to kill it (13).
 * Vikrit runs over and heals Sarienne, who is nearly dead. Vesun decides not to restore her. Cornerio complains that we didn't need to come here.
 * Vikrit and Sarienne find: a bloodstained knife and a bloodstained shortsword and helmet; each look like they're from the Thranean army. We look through the bodies, mostly Aundarians (humans and half-elves).
 * Sarienne suggests we head west. The footprints look like it wasn't an entire army; Vikrit loses the trail after a while.
 * We head back and dig a mass grave. Vikrit helps by casting Aspect of the Earth Hunter and turns into a bulette. They successfully bury all of the bodies and head back; Mogen takes the Thranean helmet.
 * When we get up in the air, we realize we're near Marketplace, where Rio committed a few murders. We decide to tell Central Control what happened. They pry the name "Watcher" out of the person on the other line and report the nightmare.
 * We continue on to Thronehold.
 * About mid-afternoon the next day, we can see Thronehold in the distance.
 * Vikrit gathers the troops and reminds them of their code names and the pass phrase. Vesun looks like a minor Sharn noble.
 * A canoe approaches us with 2 people and boards. The other inspector says he's named Mr. Johnston. Mogen says she will show him any contraband and leads him away. Sarienne goes up to Bubsy (a dwarf) and shows him our papers, distracting him.
 * Mogen drops the phrase and he responds with the correct countersign. He says there are more of us than expected. He says stuff is going on so House Deneith is more suspicious, so we have to leave our weapons on the ship and we need to head straight to the Reichministry.
 * The inspector tells us to pull over in a spot in Freeport, wishes us luck and says "Gods save the King." We steer the ship into the docking bay.
 * We deboard in Freeport; Mogen ties off the ship and Tork helps her by making them tie themselves.
 * Everyone puts their best weapons in the rope dimension and leaves their other weapons in the armory so it's not empty.
 * Vikrit checks that Gettafix is okay with staying on the ship. Sarienne makes a forged document for Dax, but can't really replicate the seal. Orielle plans to stay on the ship. Gettafix gives Sarienne the letter to mail back to Sharn and a list of supplies. Mogen talks with Dax and he says he doesn't think the forgery is going to work; he insists she has to get him off the ship by 4 weeks later or he's going to murder Gettafix.
 * We need to go through the Aundairian Quarter to get to the Karrnathi Quarter.
 * We pass a lot of people waiting, presumably to get home; it looks like transport vessels have been commandeered by the military.
 * We get to the Freeport-Aundairian Quarter border crossing. We all go through without incident, and travel through to the Karrnathi Quarter border crossing. Sarienne is the only one to fail her bluff check, and the guard asks her how long she's lived in Sharn… she and Tork bribe him to let her through.
 * We head to the Reichministry of Colonial Affairs. It looks not well-maintained. The door slowly creaks open, and a gnome with purple hair is standing there. He welcomes us in and introduces himself as Sam. He says he came up with our fake names and leads us upstairs; we head into the study. There are a bunch of ancient Karrnathi artifacts, and a diagram of Karrnath's expansion..
 * Sam offers to get us some drinks and walks away. Vikrit notes that it smells dusty in here, and he can only smell Sam, not any other living creature. In the kitchen, we can hear him speaking to "the Master". We see a very tall, pale, thin man, wearing a pith helmet and thin moustache… he seems undead in some way. He introduces himself as Helmeth von Tappen, the Reichminister.
 * Cornerio and Mogen make jokes at his expense that he ignores (but looks slightly hurt by), and he looks to Tork as the most responsible-seeming member of the party. He confirms we're the "Sharks of the Ghost" and says he's the spymaster.
 * Helmeth asks if we've been briefed on the mission: Lenore is one of Queen Arla's handmaidens who was captured by the Thraneans; we need to get her back, interrogate her, and either get rid of her or make sure she isn't accessible by the Thraneans. He says he needs to go rest (it's during the day) and that he'll explain more at dinner that evening. Cornerio asks how long he's been at this post; he says 60-70 years ago joined "the other side". After Cornerio prods him, he admits to being a vampire (which is not a big deal in Karrnath). He also tells us that he found out Yanger has been staying in the Royal Residence with Kalti, at the same as Lord Darro.
 * We talk with Sam about Helmeth, Vikrit checks if he's been enslaved, but he insists he's there of his own accord (he's worked there for 6 years) and Helmeth isn't "that kind of vampire". He doesn't know where the blood comes from in Karrnath but doesn't seem too bothered by it.
 * Sam pulls out a map with a house marked, a house called Officers Club owned by Thranean army, should scout out 1st. The Lost Egg is a storage facility nearby owned by one of their assets (Arnold), and suggests we stash things in there. We need to figure out how to get Lenore back through the Thrane Quarter; in a pre-positioned boat on the river?
 * He recommends The Raised Brow for costumes. Vikrit asks about going into the Thranean Quarter; apparently he and Vanesse need to have legal custodians assigned while there. He says if we scout it out, don't go to "a burning" since we "won't be able to forget it".
 * RULES FOR THE CITY: No armor heavier than light; only weapons like daggers that can be hidden in public.