Once the party is sober again, they return to Kelmarane.
The new findings make the topic even more interesting and Princess Almah insists on visiting her Friend Rayhan in Katapesh. She writes a letter of introduction that she hands to the group.
"Thanks Princess Almah" Ohrmizd vows in front of the Princess and takes the letter. Then looks at Garavel "Anything you need from Katapesh boss?"
Later on, the Keleshite will go to the church of Sarenrae and ask if there is something required from the temple. Perhaps some message to be carried. Some supplies to be requested, etc.
Otherwise he will just pray to the Dawnflower for a successful trip to the jewel of the deserts.
In general, Ohrmizd is ready for the trip.
Roryx bows his thanks to the princess, and after a short formal meeting with Garavel to let him know the status of the Kelmarane guard, he and Swiper join the others, ready to travel.
"If you need any help on that front, I will be around for you."
Once it was all said and done, Heshan was ready to move on to their next adventure.
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With last preparations finished and shopping done the group finally leaves Kelmarane in direction of Katapesh. It will be a travel of several days through the dry and dusty plains that shape most of Katapesh.
After half a day of travel you see vultures circling in the sky and descending somewhere ahead of you. As you come closer you see a cart lying on the side, scorch marks all over it and a broken wheel. There are empty crates all over the place.
All the vultures sit on a dead camel that was put before the cart.
Ohrmizd passes most of the time asking questions to their new friend about his studies and getting to know him. From time to time, he scouts ahead with Roryx to make sure there are no more gnoll groups menacing their advance.
When they spot the cart, he quickly resorts to drawing the composite bow he took from the temple gnolls, and readying an arrow he casts heightened awareness and advances to a sand mount or rock where he can see without being seen "Empty crates and scorch marks... it seems they were assaulted and this is too late for whomever was here..."
The Keleshite inspects the footprints around, trying to understand when the attack happened, and who was involved.
There are footsteps of boots all over the place where the cart lies. But they all come from and go to the road. But there is no one seen ahead and no one came your way. But Ohrmizd also finds the tracks of someone who robbed over the ground. This tracks lead to a nearby group of large rocks.
Heshan looked down at the resulting mess with a hint of sadness before he can bring it back up. "Then we can hope that we make sure it doesn't happen again. Let's find those bandits."
"I will scout from above" - the magus informs the others, then takes flight to go and peer at those rocks from a high vantage point.
While Ohrmizd is looking for tracks, Omari examines the cart and debris, going so far as to shoo away the vultures to see what killed the camel. He is looking to find clues about the attacker(s), and what was taken.
7 rank +4 wis+3 racial
3 rank+3 trained +4 wis
There are arrows in the camel and it was cut down with a sharp blade. The cart wheel burst and fell apart. There is swerving and sliding of the cart for quite the distance leading here.
There is nothing left but empty crates and they are not labelled so it's hard to say what was taken.
The group of rocks is just that. Three rocks of different size, the largest about 10 feet in diameter. Also a withered bush. Something blue lies under the bush.
Samuel examines the cart, debris and camel with Omari. He glances up at Roryx from time to time.
"There are boot steps here, someone robbed over the ground towards those rocks" Ohrmizd points to the place the trail is going to and makes a sign "Can you cover me from up Roryx? I am going to have a look..."
The Keleshite hangs back the bow to his back and readies his shield, then advances cautiously using detect magic towards the rocks.
When he notices the blue thing under the bush, he approaches to have a better check of what it is.
Hidden between the rocks and underneath the bush lies a man in tattered robes that doesn't look good, with bruises and a bloody nose.
As Ohrmizd approaches him with the bow ready he robs away, with a stretched out defensive hand. "No please, don't."
Roryx nods at Ohrmizd and hovers above the rocks, on the lookout for any possible foul play.
Swiper seems pretty comfortable in her satchel, looking around curiously.
Ohrmizd blinks finding a man between the rocks "It's ok. Do not worry. Are you ok?"
The Keleshite turns to make a gesture to Roryx to come down and for others to approach as well.
"I am Ohrmizd, we come from Kalmerane. What has happened here?" he lowers his weapon while trying to calm down the man with his tone of voice.
"You're none of those bandits?" the man replies.
As no one attacks him, he gets up and dusts himself off. "My wagon and I were attacked by bandits. They shot my camel and the wagon flipped over. I crawled away and only could watch as they slaughtered my camel and carried away all my warez."
"I'm lucky, they didn't come after me."
Omari listens carefully as the man tells his story.
7 rank +3 Trained+4 Wis
Roryx floats down in silence to join the others, still paying attention to their surroundings.
"What were your wares?" - he questions.
"Bandits?" Ohrmizd looks up at Roryx "Seems you have some work pending in the area brother"
Then turns his attention back to the man "It is ok. You are safe with us. Did the bandits just attack you for loot or did they want something else?"
Scanning the man's aura with detect evil then chaos then good then law.
"Besides... do you have a name?"
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Radi detects as evil.
"My name is Radi Hamdi."
"Good to meet you Radi Hamdi" Ohrmizd stores his weapon in a sign of peace but notes the man is not answering Roryx about the wares "The roads are so unsafe nowadays, so full of miscreants..."
"I was exactly telling my friend Omari we should make sure to not lose sight of our most precious item. They always complain I am overcautious and plan too much. But you cannot just trust what you find in the road, it is full of evil people" the Keleshite offers a wide smile "But come with us Radi, let's share a tea in our campsite, we can heal your wounds and share our stories"
"That is very kind of you. I'll gladly have tea with you." Radi tells.
"About my warez. It was mostly everyday stuff you can buy in any general store. And not too much of that. I'm on my way back from Osirion, and would restock on that in Katapesh. But I also had some Orsirian jewellery. Most of it just nice to look at, gilded, not gold. But that could have been sold for a good price in Katapesh. It really hurts that that is gone. And of course they took all the coin I had in the cart. You saw it, there was nothing left behind!"
Jafar looks Radi over for anything still on him that thieves would have taken. He then moves over to the area where he was found. He looks for tracks or anything of value in the area.
Heshan looked him over with sympathy. "We will do our best to help stop those bandits... and hopefully get your jewelry back. We have some capable trackers after all."
Samuel also finds nothing but empty boxes.
"You can and would take on a whole group of bandits to get my wares back? Isn't that too dangerous? And I can't pay you for that. Not now. I could if you get it back and we're in Katapesh, but... I don't know, what payment would you expect?"
Sam just looks at Heshan as he volunteers our services. He then asks Radi "Master Radi. I am Samuel Jafar, a merchant of sorts as well. I must ask you sir, how many of them were there?" He looks at Heshan with a smile while his question is being answered.
"Are you wounded Radi? If you are I will help you." Offers Omari.
"I don't know for sure. Maybe a dozen?"
"Just a few bruises when I fell of the moving cart, nothing serious."
Ohrmizd nods and starts walking back to their horses "That sounds like a very valuable cargo. You must be a wealthy man. Did you not have a few guards to protect you and your large wealth?"
The Keleshite looks towards the footprints "Lucky bandits"
"It's not that easy. The stuff that was stolen might be overall at thousand gold. My cost that is. The profit I'd expect from that would be 1500 gold if I'm lucky or 1200 gold if someone was faster selling this kind of stuff in Katapesh. I travel to Osirion and back in about three month. To be safe I'd have to hire at least four experienced guards. That would cost me at least 2 gold a day, plus feeding them. Which would cost me around 250 gold."
"So best case it halves my profit, worst case it would lead to a net loss. I always was lucky in regards to bandits, but this time my luck ran out. I should have waited for a group of merchants to travel that direction. That would have been safer."
"I may have been a bit overzealous," Heshan admitted with a shrug. "We are on our way to Katapesh ourselves, so the least we can do is help you get there safely."
"Agreed" - Roryx nods at Heshan, then turns to the man - "You can travel with us. Though... I am thinking these bandits must have a nearby base of operations of some sort, or a camp, or something. I don't believe they would be striking out from a town, when there is none really near is there?" - he ponders, looking at his companions - "Maybe we get a chance to offer them some payback, and make sure the road is safer for the next travelers?"
"Well you last all now, and you could have lost your life by traveling alone." Ohrmizd stretches his eyes as he examines the man weaponry "How did you manage to survive the attack and even escape?"
The Keleshite will examine the footprints in order to find out if they can track down the bandits.
Sam equips his spring loaded wrist sheaths with a wand of shocking grasp (reach) and touch of gracelessness (reach). He will tap himself with a wand of mage armor the moment they set out.
"I was thrown off the cart as it was still moving and crawled away. Luckily they didn't come after me."
Ohrmizd narrows down the footprints and starts leading the group towards the direction the bandits took "How many bandits did you say attacked your cart, Radi?"
"I don't know for sure. Maybe a dozen?"
"Ok" Ohrmizd nods then looks forward to the tracks and slowly draws his scimitar pointing it towards the merchant "That is enough Radi, cease with your lies. There is something fishy in all this, no more than one or two people left these footprints in the sand, and I doubt you have said a single word of truth since we found you! Who you really are and what do you want from us?! Answer!"
If his friends get alerted by the display, the Kheleshite raises his voice still pointing at the "merchant" "The soul of this one is so tainted by darkness that I can feel it reeking evilness even from here!"
Whatever the man says back, Ohrmizd scrutinizes the answer with the discern lies of his goddess.
Radi doesn't answer, but runs away.
Radi doesn't answer, but runs away.
"Khedron", with a word and a pat, Omari sends Khedron loping off to cut off Radi's flight and herd him back to us...
"Are you crazy?!? Call that thing off!"
"Just ask Khedron to barrel him over" - Roryx chuckled.
"I'm not coming back to that crazy guy."
"Damned man!" Ohrmizd quickly reacts running after Radi. At the first opportunity he shouts at him with an ear piercing scream "Bad move! You are pointing yourself more guilty with each action you take!"
"Radi, you can do this the easy way or the hard way. The choice is yours. Perhaps a poisonous viper could persuade you to act more reasonably. I highly recommend you comply before I complete this." The conjurer begins his casting.
https://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/animals/snake/snake-vipe r/summoned-creature-viper
Augmented, celestial template
Sam will stop the casting if Radi complies before completion.
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Radi holds his ears and falls to his knees in pain.