The warband works to heal Kricker's wounds. "Perhaps we won't camp in that canyon," Asumi observes. She leads the group northward until they find an eroded ditch with an overhanging tree that provides cover from the rapidly lightening sky.
The travelers rest undisturbed that day and after a quick meal head north once again under heavy clouds and gusty winds. A steady rain falls and their progress is slowed as water pools into muddy puddles. Wet and cold, they find a small cave in the rough hills and hole up to awake shivering the next night which arrives clear and near freezing.
Asumi advises stoking the fire and staying put until it gets warmer.
I don’t think we are in a hurry. I see no reason to push through the cold if we don’t have to. It will give me time to do maintenance on my equipment.
"I'll keep watch while you do," Drahlneep says firmly as he moves to find a spot to watch anyone approaching from the shadows of the cave mouth.
"Yes. We can wait."
Indeed the night is very cold and the strange variability of the environment of the surface world a strange thing compared to the stability conditions in the warren. The stoked embers of fire pit keep all in the cave warm with the minimum of light. There is plenty of time to work on equipment.
The next night is nearly as cold and the rain has returned promising to make travel uncomfortable and slow. Asumi asserts that the rains will pass the soon and the war party can continue then.
Asumi, Since it looks like we are going to have some time here, I have never even heard of your kind. Could you tell us more of yourself and your people? Where did you get such a fabulous weapon?
The tall four-armed alien makes no move and all is still besides the sound of he rain outside the cave. Kricker wonders if his question was heard and is about to repeat it when Isuma quietly responds. "My people are... were? I do not know if they even still survive. It has centuries, maybe millennia. I came from a desert planet under a dying star. The Kasathans are perhaps not so different from the kobolds- proud, respectful of tradition and fierce warriors. We were not technologically advanced however, and were in awe of the Androffans when they arrived at Kasatha."
"I volunteered to go with the strangers as an ambassador and learn their ways. I did not know that they took others against their will and kept them in cages as animals. I do not know why. Why was I treated differently. Was I just another experiment to see if I could learn abut their technology? I don't think that I will ever get an answer now. The Dark Ones infiltrated the ship and now it is destroyed with the Androffan's aboard."
She raises her weapon to ponder it. "This is a Zero-rifle. I took it long with an escape shuttle when I realized the Androffan's deception. They were too busy with the Dark One's incursion to pursue me."
"How long has it been since you took this...escape shuttle? Do you know if any of these Androffans survived their encounters with the Dark Ones? Do you know what the Dark Ones are, or what they want? Could any of them have followed you here? Were there more escape shuttles?"
Jeji's questions came rolling out one after another, almost without pause. After a moment, she continued. "I am sorry. I mean no disrespect. Sometimes my curiosity gets me excited. You carry a great pain. You have lost more than most. Maybe others escaped as well."
Isuma smiles faintly. "So many questions. I will tell you what I can. I don't know what they Dark Ones are. They are very different from the life forms that we know. Their technology is.. more organic. It seems to work on sentient minds. They harness and manipulate or just steal brains leaving their victims insane or dead. Even the Divinity's AI was corrupted by the invaders and the great ship ended up disintegrating in the atmosphere of this planet."
"I found the escape shuttle just in time and locked myself in a stasis chamber within- a machine that freezes you in time so that you don't age. There may have been others, but the Dark Ones have most likely found them all. I do not know how long I was frozen in stasis, but judging by the remains of the great ship, it has been thousands of years. The Dark Ones found me eventually and awoke me for their foul experiments, but I escaped. Now I hunt them."
She stops talking lost in her thoughts and the only sound is the hiss of the rain and occasional pop from the smoldering fire.
Drahlneep stares out at the rain, the strange alien tale only partly heard. "We can't be sitting here waiting for whoever has been spying on us to find us," he says after a pause in the story.
"I don't know who we left behind, but I do know what is ahead, Drahlneep. Do not be too impatient. Anyway, we have a far greater chance of encountering Technic League spies once we get on the road."
The rain ends with the coming of the morning and Drahlneep continues to chafe until the next night when the war band continues it's march to the north. The moon rises smaller and later each night and though still chilly, the weather is clear.
A short way from the road to Kuratown, Isuma leads the kobolds to a cave that she has used before and they make preparations to pass by the mutant orc settlement the next night. The day is stormy again and the wind whistles and shrieks against the low cave entrance.
The storm intensifies into the night and the wind howls at the cave entrance so forcefully that Isuma has to warn patience again as the winds outside seem strong enough to knock a kobold to the ground. The cave dwellers find the constantly changing weather of the overground unsettling to say the least and even Isuma says that she has never seen a storm like this.
"Could it be the result of magic? Didn't you say the pinkskins here worship the nature god?" Drahlneep asks Isuma, weary of being pinned down. "Perhaps they know about the dwarf and are closing in on us."
If the weather isn't too awful, we might take advantage of it and sneak past the orcs on a night when they are likely not to be out and about.
"I don't know if this is the Hunting God's wrath, but there won't be any humans or orcs out tonight," Isuma says. "Anyone risking these winds will be taking their life in their hands." She illustrates by clenching her four hands. As if to emphasize the point, there is a nearby crash, likely a tree being blown down.
"Going out in this weather is not conducive to bodily integrity."
"Neither is being caught by the orcs."
The kobolds are impatient, but decide to trust Isuma's experience with the surface world. The windstorm dies down the next day and by nightfall all is calm again. The warband emerges from the cave and follow a rough trace through the badlands in the direction of the orc settlement. The vanishing moon has started before them and soon sinks below the horizon ahead of them leaving only the pinpricks of light called stars. They aren't so bad, they seem much like glowworms of the caverns underground, but much farther away.
At the top of a crest, Isuma peers off to the north where only darkness is seen. "I think that we have passed Kuratown, but I cannot tell. There should be a light there where the orcs have allowed a small inn for travelers. Mostly Technic League members heading to scavenge in the hills that are too powerful to risk attacking and pay a decent toll anyway. I cannot find the light though. Perhaps that windstorm caused heavy damage to the town. If so, we may have an easy trip ahead if teh orcs are busy with repairs."
Indeed, she angles your route so that you reach to road and the group travels much more quickly, resting off the road hidden in stone clefts of behind rocky hummocks and moving at night in the darkness. You see no orcs or other travelers and soon enough reach the Technic League site that Isuma has mentioned near the Scar of the Spider.
Other than the nasty weather that went better than expected. What do you know about this Technic League site? Should we assume anyone we meet there is hostile to us?
"I would not classify the Technic League as hostile so much as ruthless in their pursuit of wealth and technology. Members can be cooperative unless they see you as competition. Many of those in the camp are likely to be slaves. It might be best to survey the camp first to determine what we're facing."
"What slaves do they keep? We might be able to gain some allies."
"Yes, quite possible. I believe that I mentioned before that I saw kobolds among the slaves last time I passed through here."
"Then we have a good, righteous task before us," Drahlneep says before checking his weapons and gear. "We rescue our people and get them to safety. We liberate the other slaves to disrupt the league and possibly make other allies. Then we can take what they are hoarding while they're distracted."
Sounds glorious! Hopefully we will get in a fight with some of the League slavers as well. Shall we send our most stealthy member to take a look? I can enhance her armor for several hours to help in case she gets spotted.
"That is a most excellent..." Jeji began. She turned and started to look at each kobold and as she moved from one to the next, her frown got a little more pronounced. "...idea"
She sighed. "Perhaps if we had some rags, I could slip in disguised as a slave...although that might just get me locked up with others. Hmm, what is it exactly that I should be trying to accomplish?" she asked.
"Learning how the slaves are held, so that we can best plan how to free them."
I dont think you have to play as a slave, just remain unseen. You are a very tricky kobold and I have faith in your abiliies. I agree, figuring out the slave situation is good. Also getting an idea of how many technic league masters there are and their capabilities would also be useful.
Isuma goes over her gear and makes sure her long gun is fully charged. "I think that I know a place where the rest of us can stay hidden and watch. If Jeji has any difficulty, she can signal us and we can help her."
Isuma leads the warband through the moonless night to a sloped boulder field. Even the group's darksight does not reveal much more than the outline of a mountainside ahead and the impression of shacks and tents huddled at the base. Jeji moves stealthily away and the others remain attentive peering hard at the darkness and listening for any sounds of trouble.
Stripping away most of her possessions, Jeji passed them to Drahlneep. Everything except a few flasks, one grenade, and her arc pistol. She did her best to conceal the few items about per body.
She took one last look at each of her companions before nodding and setting off.
Jeji minimizes the gear she carries that might give her away settling for only a few small items weapons and potions that are easily hidden. As Jeji nears the settlement, she can make out more details. The makeshift worker housing huddles near the mouth of a mine that pierces the side of a steep cliff. A far more substantial and comfortable structure lies at the edge of the camp and is the only place with light spilling from the windows.
There is a terrible grinding and clanking noise from a trio of heavy metal plated machine men that patrol the place. They don't look to be in the best condition with mismatched metal patches and exposed wires, but they still seem formidable to the cautious kobold. None of them appear to notice the stealthy spy however, and she is free to roam around the camp.
Jeji sneaks over to the lit window and carefully peers inside. There are three male humans and a female elf. Two of the humans look like barbarian thugs. The other human is much better dressed and the scrolls and tools readied on his belt suggest he's spellcaster and member of the Technic League. The gear-shaped clasp on the elf's cloak identifies her as a member of that ruthless organization as well.
Jeji silently returns to her companions to report what she's seen...
"Those metal guardians and the wizard are our obvious problems, but what of this elf? Did you see any obvious weapons? And no other guards beyond the metal men?"
Jeji reports that she saw no other guards than the metal men and the thugs. The elf bore a spear and the human a whip.
"The whip is probably just his symbol of authority as a slaver. We need to find a place for an ambush, draw the TEK golems away first, give the slaves a chance to rise up."
Yeah even though those TEK golems look beat up, I still think we have no chance if all three engage us at the same time as a mage. I can probably disable one of the humans for a bit, but we need to avoid engaging them all at once. Maybe wait until early in the morning when the pink-skins are likely to be asleep, or maybe try in the middle of the day when most of the beef is likely guarding what ever slaves they have in the mines.
Isuma ponders. "The machine men will not sleep, but maybe we could surprise the slavers before dawn as you say. I think it will be more dangerous for you attacking during the day, though I like the idea of their forces being spread out then. Another option is to sneak inside the mine to set up an ambush there."
I am partial to sneaking inside the mine myself, Kobolds should be at an advantage in the dark underground. Maybe we can figure out what they are trying to dig up as well.
"Yeah." Drahlneep says in agreement with Kricker with a grin and mischievous look in his eye.
Jeji nodded excitedly at mention of the mine.
"I too think that would be our best option" Jeji said as she began replacing all of her equipment.
"Mining operations are something I have studied in passing. If this is an open pit mine, there will be no tunnels to conceal ourselves in. Some deeper underground mines, though, require ventilation so that the miners have enough air to breath. Let us try to find them, or some other form of secondary access."
From Jeji's description, the mine entrance or adit is at the far edge of the town where the cliff rises above the hovels. The ventilation shaft is spotted in the center of town. Likely the easiest entrance would be the main entrance. The group just has to avoid the circulating machine men. The light from the slavers' house goes off soon enough and the kobolds prepare to creep over to the mine.
"Jeji, you go first. Isuma, follow her. Get your extracts ready and any other preparations you can. Perrik and Kricker, you two go next. If you're spotted I can move in to buy you time to get inside. Those TEK golems will need to be alerted, but let's try and get everyone inside and set. If it goes well, I get the golem's attention and duck back inside."