Tzaron continues to fire at the minotaur.
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Iso quickly calms down, and picks up the little halfling in a big bear hug. Froth from his mouth is liberally wiped over her hair.
"Iso is soo happy to see little Janira again. We had exciting time. It looks like you did too."
He starts to burble about gillmen, both alive and dead, and mouldy slimes.
"Iso wrote it all down!" he says with a degree of pride. The writing itself resembles a spider having crawled out of an ink pot.
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"Oh yes..."
Iso proceeds to try and juggle Janira with one hand while holding his axe with another and somehow also retrieve the everburning torch. Eventually he puts down the axe.
"Look. Lots of them. Oh and in the cave there were lots of carvings. Old writings about Aroden. Lots of rituals for priests. I think someone said they are different from the modern ones."
Eventually his words stop and he pauses for breath.
"There was another cave leading from the Gillman..."
Tzaron smiles briefly at Iso's antics and Eldlen's attempt at heroics,
Why not return underground? I for one am curious about what else lies beneath us.
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Tippy gives a start, as he was intending to follow Eldlen (especially after all his posing and grand word; so much material there). When it becomes clear that he won't be able to follow the elf, he actually looks quite crestfallen himself, mumbles, "Someone should look and see if that thing was carrying anything valuable," and trudges back up the hill to the cave entrance.
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Janira refuses to come with you into the cave, her duty was to take you here and back to Absalom. It's your confirmation and she does not want to interfere. Iaodal decides to stay with her, she looks tired from fighting the minotaur and he's going to protect her in case other creatures escape from the woods.
Back in the cave in the big chamber with the lake and the model of Absalom you can see that the gillman already left the cave. By the time you were fighting the minotaur the new day started. You take the tunnel to the other side which leads you to another chamber.
The persistent glow of the bluish fungi dimly lights the way deeper below the Kortos Mounts. The tunnels broaden to reveal a shallow river that bisects an immense tunnel stretching to the north and south. To the east a small passage exits the chamber at a steep incline.
On the other side of the river you see two kobolds. They show their tiny sharp teeth and say
Tzaron
Eldlen
Tippy
Kobolds
Iso
Tzaron looses an arrow at the red kobold
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Tippy gets closer to the river and the kobolds and throws a dagger but the cobold dodges just in the right moment. The arrows of Tippy and Eldlen also don't hit the kobolds. Iso jumps across the river and swings at one of the kobolds and slices it into two pieces. You can hear Iaodal coming behind you through the tunnel.
The kobolds shoot with their slings.
Tzaron
Eldlen
Tippy
Kobold
Iso
Iaodal
Tzaron fires at Eldlen's target
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Iso grins.
"Sounds like a drinking song. And I've got a thirst up now. Back to Absalom, whose public wait with baited breath for my latest review of the theatre. Although I may pen a missive on these caves. And then, a public house, where the waiting is of another sort, and I know one with very agreeable staff."
Tzaron claps Eldlen on the back as he walks by him,
Please stop whistling, my ears are beginning to hurt.
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After you met Janira at the exit, you return to Absalom to meet Master Shaine. He welcomes you and says some words about the three duties. After that he hands a brand new wayfinder to everybody. Every Piece is engraved with your personal initials. He congratulates you to your successfull confirmation and leaves.
"Well done, you are now full pathfinders. Congratulations to all of you!" Janira says with a smile.
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----- A few weeks later -----
Your boots squash with fetid water as you plod through the puddles. A thick fog hangs in the air, seeming almost to caress the flesh with an unnatural chill. As you stand outside the Soggy Piper in a foot and a half of brackish brine, you try to recall what was so damned important to demand your presence in the halfflooded slum during Absalom’s rainy season. You remember your meeting at the Lodge just a few hours earlier with your Venture-Captain, Adril Hestram.
A bear of a man with only a few teeth remaining in his head, he motioned you into the meeting hall with a casual wave of his grizzled hand. The human captain outweighs most of Absalom’s half-orcs, and though a layer of beefy blubber coats his frame, those of you who have tangled with him in the Lodge sparring ring know that beneath this thin veneer of fat lies nothing but solid, steely sinew. Adril’s wild beard wags to the ponderous shake of his massive head as he examines a scrap of ancient parchment on the table before raising his eyes to greet your gaze and speaking:
"Come in then, friends, and thank you for answering my summons so swiftly. The society is in need. An old and quite penniless historian, a bespectacled wag-beard by the name of Yargos Gill has recently made a discovery in an old archive that we have a great interest in obtaining: an ancient codebook, left behind in the wake of one of Taldor’s many failed attempts at invasion. This several-hundred-year-old text would prove an excellent addition to our collection, and must be preserved. Yargos makes his home in ‘The Puddles,’ Absalom’s poorest district, suffering from a well-known reputation as a haven for lowlifes. Following an earthquake ten years ago, parts of the Puddles now rest below sea level, resulting in frequent and untimely flooding. Those who can afford not to live there—don’t. The district is the stomping ground of pimps, harlots, addicts, knifers, and hoards of unseemly derelicts. It’s never been a kind place, but recent reports reveal some new nameless terror on her waterlogged streets. Several persons claim to have seen cloaked, skeletal-like figures marching through an unnatural fog. Ill tidings indeed. Tracking down Yargos is now a priority - lest some yellow-toothed thug cut him down, or one of these strange wraiths carry him beyond the pale. Find him, fellow Pathfinders, and find the codebook. Your exploits will be recorded in the Chronicles if you succeed."
The memory fades as a fresh deluge of cold seawater rounds a bend in the lane and assaults your knees. After searching for Yargos at his favorite eatery, the Soggy Piper, you learned you just missed him. According to the Piper’s staff, a gang of dangerous young tattooed toughs arrived ahead of you. They grabbed Yargos and several of his friends from their dinner table and dragged them to a nearby cliff at the edge of the Puddle District. The watch was called, but they will arrive too late, as they often do in the Puddles, when they bother to venture there at all.
It is early evening, the first Wealday of the month of Desnus, an old man is about to face some awful fate at the sea cliff known as Torsen’s Maw, and you are no closer to finding the codebook Adril sent you for.
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The red-bearded dwarf covering in decidedly nasty looking spikey armor slogs through water up to his waist, offering a hand to Tippy anytime it seems like the halfling is falling behind or about to be washed away. "Rovagug's spawn! Been from the heat of Katheer to a damn underwater city district in the last month. Think the Maw is right by the harbor Celentrai, but I have to admit Absalom isn't my usual stomping ground 'cept for the time those damn monkeys got loose in the Blakros. Any of you see those thugs and our itinerant charge up ahead?" Borrobol peers through the fog, thankful for his dwarven vision and slaps his warhammer, happy to look forward to cracking some heads once we track down the toughs who have absconded with Yargos.
