Can You Hear The People Sing? (Hell's Rebels)

Game Master Paladin of Baha-who?

"Oh, no, no actual wasps! There's a statue of the goddess with a couple giant wasps on her shoulders and one on her hand, that's why I called it that."

Domitius reaches in his belt, pulls out a coin, and holds it up. "I'm calling it right now, one or more of those wasps will animate and attack. Who's got a sail that says they won't?"

Domitius reaches in his belt, pulls out a coin, and holds it up. "I'm calling it right now, one or more of those wasps will animate and attack. Who's got a sail that says they won't?"

Jessibel is uncharacteristically silent on the other side of the screen.

Kiri was surprised at the appearance of strix words in the document and piped up, "At least those words I recognize from my own language." She proceeded to translate those words to give Rexus a starting point for the translation.

As the discussions continued she almost laughed at Jessi's statement and then found her attention caught by the shrine below the coffee house. "A missing person and Calistrian shrine, sounds interesting." She looked at Dom and said, "Check it out?"

"Check it out?"

Domitius is a little surprised at the suggestion. "What, d'you mean right now? He takes a moment to ponder it. "I mean, you and I probably have the freshest legs of anyone here, but I think havin' the lot of us go is the best way to avoid disaster."

Kiri's head shook in negation of Dom's question, "I didn't mean now, I know everyone needs the rest."

Nodding, Dom says, "Great, just makin' sure. Then yeah, it's on. We shouldn't do somethin' crazy-reckless like goin' off alone," Dom says, the gleam in his eye rising. "It'd make Jessibel think we were stealin' her, her... what's the word I'm lookin' for, Jess?"

"It sounds to me that you're looking for trouble!" the bard quips. "And I'll have you know that I'm neither crazy nor reckless. I took a calculated risk going off alone the other night and came through it unscathed. I believe the word for what I showed is awesomeness."

Dom's face twists into an expression of disbelief. "Neither crazy nor reckless, huh? Those words were just uttered by the girl who insisted on a night at the Dragon's Tooth? Insisted!"

"I'm calling it right now, one or more of those wasps will animate and attack. Who's got a sail that says they won't?"

"I'll take your bet," Leora says to Dom.

Leora asks Laria "Do you know which direction Nan probably went in the tunnels? Or is there really only one way to go?"

Lucius considers Dom's bet for a bit. "I'm more on your side of betting that they will Dom, just so in either case I win. Also, what's this Nan fellow look like anyways?"

"Varisian, has brown hair with a little grey in it, a scar on his cheek, likes to wear the color red, has a bit of a limp on his left side, and has a long droopy, bushy moustache. He lets it get all scraggly and no matter how many times he's asked, I won't kiss him as long as he has it!"

"The tunnel down below leads into the sewer system, which is a maze, but there's markers on the wall on the path we used to get out. If he's not down there, he's probably gone from the city through that route."

As Domitius crosses the room to shake on the bet with Leora, he nods to Lucius. "Sensible guy," he says.

"So we all agree this can wait for the morning, right? No reason to think we have to go running down there half-exhausted?"

"Agreed," says Jessi, emerging from behind the bathing screen again decked out in her Thrune-colored armor, her dark hair gleaming but lank from the water.

Turning to Leora, the bard says, "I'd still like to have our discussion about Cayden Cailean--assuming there's some wine left. The sooner we start, the sooner we'll finish and be able to call it a night. I'll try to get up early tomorrow morning, but if I drink too much wine...."

Grinning impishly, the girl concludes, "...then I'll sleep in and call it an act of the gods--the Drunken Hero in particular."

Ready to move on. Jess & Leora don't need to RP their talk (unless Leora wants to).

Leora shakes Dom's hand, agreeing to the bet. "We're on."

"I won't keep Jessibel awake too late. It's important that we find Nan as soon as we can." Leora promises. She's excited to talk with Jessibel about the Drunken Hero after the others have gone their way for the evening.

Sorry, looking at the older posts, Laria told Leora about Nan on her first day at the coffee house and I don't think she ever mentioned it to the group.

OK so if any other preparations desired before heading down into the tunnels, just let me know in spoilers or whatever. Prepared casters can change up their spells if they want.

The next morning, rejuvenated with rest, coffee, and pastries, the team prepares to descend into the tunnels Laria has dubbed "The Wasp Nest".

"I don't feel I can accompany you safely, friends, but let me send some of my magic with you," Rexus says. He touches Lydia's shoulder, and she feels armor of magical force surround her, though Rexus spoke no words and made no gestures. "Would anyone else like some protection? It will last a couple hours -- I didn't use it yesterday because I judged it would have dissipated by the time you reached the livery."

Rexus is offering Mage Armor for up to three more people.

When preparations are complete, Laria leads all of you into the pantry, and pulls up a cleverly-concealed trap door, leading you down into a storage cellar. "This is a deception within a deception. If the dottari decide to search my place, they may or may not find that trap door. If they do, it leads down here, where they'll find a bunch of foreign spices and ingredients that, whoopsie, I forgot to pay import duties on. Rule of thumb: Always hide your illegal activities behind something else illegal, because there's nothing so suspicious as the appearance of utter innocence. If that happens, I'll grumble and complain but pay the fine for failing to pay them, the dottari get to report they served the cause of law and order, and, most importantly, they don't keep searching and find this."

The halfling steps on a loose floorboard, twists a nail sticking out of the wall, and tugs on a torch sconce in the wall. With a grinding sound of stone on stone, a portion of the wall that looked entirely solid slides forward and moves aside, offering a doorway into a dark tunnel.

Map is updated and a new image of Laria is on the NPC gallery.

Domitius is impressed. "Pretty slick, Miss Laria." Dom takes a place at the front of the group, ready to lead on.

Or he would, if I could move my piece on the map, which I cannot for reasons unknown.

My bad, I hadn't enabled editing on the map.

Talking with Rexus and the party the night before
"So Rexus, we are planning on leaving one of the silver raven figurines here with you, in case you need to get in touch with us if some of us aren't here. Or those of us who are staying at the Coffeehouse can use it to contact others. Here Lydia, why don't you take this one and keep it at Songbird Hall? And Davina, Kiri, you can each have one to keep at your places. One for Jessi... and one more for us to carry with us when we are out adventuring in case we need to send a message to someone like Rexus, Sabrina, or Laria." Leora passes out the figurines as she talks. If no one else takes it, she will carry the party's raven, though anyone can hang onto it.

The next morning
Leora is impressed by Laria's scheme, and the mechanism for getting into the basement. This seems pretty secure to her! She gets behind Domitius as they prepare to go into the wasp nest, glad she'd drank a cup of coffee this morning since it had been a late night with Jessibel.

Davina is impressed with the scheme of giving them something to find. She's ready to head down the dark tunnel. "Where do you expect Nat to be? she asks.

Laria is about to lead the way into the tunnels when a voice calls from the trap door above your heads. "Miss Laria? Miss Laria! Captain Nobs is here and asking to talk to you."

"Oh, s~+&," Laria says, but the way she says it sounds resigned rather than upset or scared. "Gotta go deal with that. Not a big deal but he'll get nosy if I'm not available during breakfast hours. I'll join you again as soon as I can. If Nan's not in the tunnels here, don't enter the sewers without me, you'll probably get lost. Anywhere you can go without wading is fine."

"Anywhere you can go without wading is fine."

"Wading...? Oh, this is gonna be lots of fun, isn't it?" With a resigned shrug, Domitius draws his sword and heads into the tunnels.

I moved my piece into the tunnel.

Before heading into the dark, dank tunnels, Jessibel casts a light spell on her drawn rapier, offering to do the same for anyone else who requires light. Since the group's not going out on the streets of Kintargo, Jessi's going full-Thrune with her red-and-black armor, Thrune amulet, and CCG armband. She's scowling a bit more than usual in an attempt to appear fierce.

Spellcraft: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (1) + 5 = 6

Jessi's not spellcrafty enough to know that a mage armor spell would be superior to what she's wearing, so she won't take Rexus up on his offer unless someone points it out to her.

EDIT: Moved Jessi (eventually) into the room next to Dom. Hopefully gave him enough time to scan south with his darkvision before ruining it. :)

Kiri moved to follow behind Jessi, her students attempt to appear intimidating and a Thrune loyalist was actually humorous though she managed not to snicker...for now. The light made her head turn away as it appeared on the rapier but after a moment she was able to look past it well enough. She was ready as she'd ever be now and spoke up, "Lead the way Dom, I'm right behind the apprentice."

Ahead of the other two, Dom smirks to himself at Kiri's description of Jessibel. "'Apprentice.' You startin' a doomsday cult or something we oughta know about?"

The dark hallway beyond becomes visible in the light shed by Jessibel's rapier, and Dom's darkvision pierces the gloom beyond the light's radius. The tunnel opens up and you can see the edge of a dark pool of water, as well as a few side passages.

Davina pulls her rapier and moves up behind and peers over Domitius' shoulder. "No wading? Should we do this systematically and turn right first?

Please move me behind Dom.

Chronically unable to keep quiet, Jessibel softly follows Davina's words with her own pearl of wisdom: "Always go right and you can't go wrong."

Moved Davina's token.

"Always go right and you can't go wrong."

Dom looks back over his shoulder at Jess and gives her an eye, as if to say, Are you quite done? A smile afterwards, to try and show no hard feelings, and after that, he heads down the corridor, following Davina's advice and heading for the passage to his right...

I don't know how quiet we need to be, after all, we kind of want this Nan guy to hear us, but no reason to go full-on marching band, I guess.

Stealth: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (11) + 2 = 13

GM, if nothing awful is going to prompt an initiative roll, I'll just move to the opening of that branch corridor to Dom's right, which is 7 squares down and one to the left (designated mover, s'il vous plait). If something is going to spring out at us, then just move me 20 ft. to start.

"The Apprentice" follows Domitius, staying a bit behind him on his left (1 square above and to his right on the map).

Stealth: 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (16) + 1 = 17

Leora makes sure the door is closed securely behind them as they enter the tunnel so Laria's visitors don't find them. Once they've made their way into the tunnel, she belatedly wonders "I hope we can get back in! And that the Dottari aren't waiting on the other side. " She attempts to quietly follow a little ways behind Dom.

in terms of the map, Leora would stay about 20 ft behind Dom since he's much quiter than her. Please move my token if you have a moment.

Moved Dom, Jessi, and Leora's tokens to requested positions. Also took the liberty to move everyone else at least into the hall beyond the secret door, since Leora made it a point to close it behind the group.

Feel free to reposition your tokens or tell me where you'd like to be positioned.

Lucius steps up and begins looking around for any signs of recent activity in the tunnel.

Perception: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (8) + 4 = 12

Kiri seemed slightly amused at the thought and replied to Dom, "No, no cult. She wanted to learn to be sneaky and I took her under my wing. that makes her my apprentice." As they progressed through the tunnel Kiri made sure to blend into the background as best she could while keeping an eye out for trouble.

Stealth: 1d20 + 9 ⇒ (10) + 9 = 19
Perception: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (2) + 5 = 7

As Domitius moves further into the dark tunnels, an aroma of rotting meat begins to assail his senses. He can see a makeshift dock, perhaps once used for launching small boats into the waterways of the storm sewers, jutting out into the water. In the other direction, he sees a room full of bunk beds and other furniture, mostly smashed or falling apart.

Perception: 1d20 ⇒ 12

Jessibel creeps along a bit behind Dom, seeing nothing, hearing nothing, and smelling...something nasty.

Leora attempts to creep along behind Dom and Jessi, her eyes peeled for any signs of Nan or any trouble.

perception: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (16) + 5 = 21
stealth: 1d20 ⇒ 4

"Hey, do you guys see that? A fish or a log or something like that in the water near the pier? " Leora whispers, noticing whatever the thing is in the tunnel and pointing. Maybe not whispering with a stealth check like that. . .

With Leora pointing it out, you can reroll your perception with a +4 bonus. Anyone who makes it can make the following checks:

Lucius takes another look around.

Perception: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (3) + 8 = 11

But he still can't see anything out of place. "I can't see anything like that Leora."

Jessibel squints (not that that ever helps) and takes another look in the direction of the dock and water.

"Yes, I definitely see the dock...and the water."

Perception w/Bonus: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (3) + 4 = 7

Knowledge (local): 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (6) + 6 = 12

Perception: 1d20 + 4 + 4 ⇒ (14) + 4 + 4 = 22

Knowledge (Local): 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (13) + 6 = 19

I can live with that. :)

Following Leora's gaze, Dom sees the outline of the creature in the water.

"Huh, I'll be damned. I know a guy who said he'd seen a 'Monster from Mwangi' down here in the sewers, but he was claiming it was a dinosaur or somethin', eighty, ninety feet long. Let's keep cool, and keep an eye on him, discourage him from coming over and saying hi."

Dom waves Jessibel and the others to the other corridor, getting between them and the pier, sword out.

Paging one of our designated movers! Please move me two to the right and one down, that should put me three squares directly below Kiri. As I said, Dom is motioning to the others to head toward C3.

Although Jessibel dearly wants to see a "Monster from Mwangi" or a dinosaur, she allows herself to be herded west by her friend. Suddenly aware that she's got point, the girl proceeds cautiously, peering into the gloom lit up some by her glowing rapier.

Perception: 1d20 ⇒ 12

Not sure what those squiggly lines on the maps represent; pretty sure that even if they're some sort of difficult terrain, Jessi would be able to move where I've put her on the map with one move action, allowing her to do an active scan of the area as well. Also, moved Dom's token as requested.

Oh, and in case this becomes relevant: assuming actions/time permits before any trouble starts, Dom will apply Studied Target to the gator, and ready an action to attack if it comes within sword reach.

Kiri looked into the room where Leora pointed and quickly spotted the strange log in the water. She watched carefully and made sure she was in range of the beast. When Dom was ready Kiri said, "Air in the whole." She sent a blast of air at the "log", best to try and weaken it before it rushed them.

Perception: 1d20 + 9 ⇒ (14) + 9 = 23
Air Blast add +1 atk and dmg if point blank applies.: 1d20 + 3 ⇒ (19) + 3 = 221d6 + 1 + 3 ⇒ (1) + 1 + 3 = 5

I'll accept the point of burn if it's more than 30 ft away from me.

"A dinosaur-monster? In the sewers? Gross." Leora glad she hadn't heard that tale before. She follows Jessi towards the next room, where Domitius had pointed, but she waits outside for some of the others to move in, and casts light on her own rapier as well, just in case Jessibel gets too far away.

Moved my own token for once ;)

Davina takes a look around to the corner to see if she can locate the log or the fish that Leora points out. A "Monster from Mwangi" doesn't sound like anymore fun than the grimples.

Perception: 1d20 + 2 + 4 ⇒ (5) + 2 + 4 = 11

"I don't see it, but I'll take your word for it." She takes Dom's advice and follows Jessibel into the next room.

Perception: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (12) + 2 = 14

The wavy lines are stairs, but they're not steep enough to be difficult terrain or anything. They lead up into the bunk room.

Jessibel steps up the stairs into the bunk room as Domitius and Kiri move to intercept the alligator before it attacks.

Kiri's airblast smashes its way through some of the dock's pilings and impacts the reptile painfully. It ducks below the water's surface, and disappears from view.

A loud croaking cry draw's Jessibel's attention. She turns to the north and in an alcove of the bunkroom, a large crow-like humanoid is rising to its feet. She recalls the tengu, who are a small minority but not unheard of in Kintargo, but the crow-men are usually svelte and agile -- this creature is a feathery mass of muscles.

Whatever it is, it looks dangerous. The creature approaches her slowly, displaying sharp claws at the ends of its arms. It croaks again, speaking words she can't understand, but it gestures towards the entrance Jessibel just came in. The threat is clear -- "GET OUT!"

Init order:
Lydia
(Alligator -- doesn't act at this time)
Domitius
Dire Corby
Davina
Jessibel
Leora
Kiri
Lucius

Domitius and Lydia may act!

Knowledge (nature): 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (4) + 2 = 6

Slightly surprised by Kiri's sudden decision to attack, Dom holds his position, trying to spot the animal before it comes back to the surface.

Move action: Perception check, Standard: Readied action to attack the gator if it comes within sword range. Per check includes +1 from Studied Target.

Perception: 1d20 + 4 + 1 ⇒ (12) + 4 + 1 = 17

Moving for Lydia. Unfortunately I haven't heard from her in a while.

Lydia moves up behind Dom and prepares to cast a spell on the first enemy to attack. Readied action to cast Wrack.

The crow-like creature, deciding to make its point physically, charges up and shoves Jessibel, pushing her away rather than clawing at her. Lydia responds with her readied spell, but the creature resists it. The shove sends Jessi stumbling back, staggering away as she tries to keep to her feet. Bull rush pushes Jessi 15 feet back.