Astingaire amazingly gets caught in an area with little to no webbing when the spell is cast, however, he gets stuck when he takes a step.
Pulling sticky webs from his face, he "inspires" his teammates with Aroden's blessing.
The lizard squeals in pain as Caelreth slashes it with his sword. It seems very angry as jolts of electricity crackle in intensity about its body.
Caelreth: pending Ref save vs. shock.
Corba:
Malakar:
Astingaire: 3 nl
Beren:
Leon:
Shocker Lizard: -6 hp
Orange Merc: -8 hp, (asleep, rnd 3)
Yellow Merc: (asleep, rnd 2)
Driver boy 1: scared
Driver boy 2: run away!
Wizard: demoralized (2 rnds).
Leon hacks a sizable hole in the side of the wagon, but it's not nearly big enough for him to climb through.
The wizard shouts towards the wall in reply to Leon.
"Have at it, bandit! Then I shall be forced to blast your face with some magic missiles!"
The wizard ignores Corba's mind trick.
Malakar is caught in the webs. Picking sticky strands from his face, he manages to conjure a blob of acid and flings it at the sparky lizard.
The lizard yelps in pain again, yet continues to hold its ground at the wagon door.
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Beren tosses a ball of flame at the wagon, which quickly catches on fire. The wizard is unfazed by Corba's mind trick. The Aspis wizard glances at the small flames licking through the cracks of the side planks. As the flames increase, smoke billows into the cabin.
"Are you all friggin' crazy!?!"
He shouts, beginning to panic.
"You're not the usual run-of-the-mill bandits, are you!?! Why are you doing this? We've done nothing wrong!!!"
The angry and injured shocker lizard sends another bolt at Caelreth.
The Aspis mercenaries continue to snore as faeries with sugar plums dance in their heads.
Leon moves to hack at the wagon leaving the young driver to his own devices. The wagon driver gets up, letting the loose coil of rope drop to the ground, and darts to the northern wagon. Whimpering in panic, the boy begins to climb up into the driver's seat. As he does so, an alarm goes off, the annoying sound blaring through the woods.
The wizard --eyes wide momentarily in shock from everything going on around-- throws his head back and arms up in frustration as he lets out a heavy sigh.
"ugh... Really!?!"
He licks his finger and sneers as he points at Caelreth. A bolt of force punches the elf's chest.
Caelreth: -11 nonlethal, 5 pts lethal from magic missile. (Knocked out).
Corba:
Malakar:
Astingaire: 3 nl
Fire!: (Roll 1d8. Spreads in that direction clockwise starting from north).
Beren:
Leon: wagon wall @ 15/20 hp
Shocker Lizard: -8 hp
Orange Merc: -8 hp, (asleep, rnd 4)
Yellow Merc: (asleep, rnd 3)
Driver boy 1: Wagon seat.
Driver boy 2: gone!
Wizard: demoralized (1 rnds).
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A white raven begins circling overhead. The bird is Sheila Heidmarch’s signal that you should wrap things up and head back to Heidmarch Manor with or without the Aspis Consortium’s gold.
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The alarm continues to blare across the countryside.
Malakar tosses another acid blob, hitting the wagon's back end next to the door.
Caelreth lies unconscious on the ground snoring almost in unison with the sleeping mercenaries.
Leon hacks at the wagon's wall, tearing apart the planks.
Caelreth: K.O.d
Corba:
Malakar:
Astingaire: 3 nl
Beren:
Fire!: (Roll 1d8. Spreads in that direction starting from north).
Leon: wagon wall @ 8/20 hp
Shocker Lizard: -6 hp
Orange Merc: -8 hp, (asleep, rnd 4)
Yellow Merc: (asleep, rnd 3)
Driver boy 1: on horse
Driver boy 2:
Wizard: demoralized (1 rnds).
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Wishing he had a way to dispel what must be a magical alarm, Beren calls up to the driver over the keening klaxon sound that rings through the night air. "Just that alarm, or any other traps on this thing?"
He approaches the back of the wagon, and gives the door his own best examination. "What do you wanna bet this is where the gold is?"
Kuti heels with her companion, remaining faithfully by Beren's side.
"Okay, okay!!! Put the fire out!!!"
The wizard drops to his knees in surrender and flings his wand of web out the door which lands at Malakar's feet. He grabs the shocker lizard by the tail and quickly, but gently slides it into its cage in the corner of the wagon.
(Hopefully, Beren quickly extinguishes the flames lapping at the corner of the wagon.)
The wagon driver undoes the quick release loop from the horse's muzzle and takes off into the forest. A few seconds later, a loud "thump" sound of a forehead hitting a low tree branch and a yelp of pain from the wagon driver can be heard deeper in the woods.
After a few moments, the web spell dissipates and the mercenaries begin to awaken.
With spare ropes available in the wagons, the group manages to tie the Aspis agents up and remove any weapons on their person. On the wizard, you find a note in his pocket regarding the terms of sale of a non-intelligent rare magical beast for 20,000 gp.
With a few threats from Leon, the wizard shuts off the alarm spell blaring from the north wagon.
Beren finds a large chest filled with gold trade bars.
During this time, the wizard and mercenaries wonder who you are.
"You're not ordinary bandits. Who are you? The Aspis will hunt you down, you know..."
Caelreth is healed up, and with Corba's promise, she stops the wounded mercenary's wound from continuing to bleed.
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Now that the Aspis were being helpful, Beren returns to the burning wagon and pretty quickly puts the fire out.
"We taking the beast, too? Seems pretty valuable, and we know who to sell it to," he clarifies, pointing at the note with the terms of sale.
To the Aspis' question, he only responds vaguely. "We're just really well informed--and really committed--bandits. Your unlucky day."
The next morning, two hours before the auction is slated to begin, Sheila Heidmarch calls everyone back to the theater for another emergency briefing. She appears greatly agitated and her tenor is one of immediacy.
”My friends, we have little time and much work to do, so I’m going to make this simple. While you were dealing with the Aspis Consortium, my informants in the city investigated the individuals you reported on from last night’s gala. It seems a number of them have sufficient funds to jeopardize our efforts. In what little time remains, I need you to prevent as many of them from participating in the auction as possible. My agents will provide each of your groups with a mission brief. Once you complete the task, return here to inform us of the results, and we shall quickly set you upon another mission. Again, we need you to complete as many missions as you can before the auction starts. But remember to keep your efforts clandestine and try not to kill anyone important. We’re still trying to win the auction somewhat legally.”
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“I think we got lucky with our merchant friend, Falrig Sneve. He mentioned that he was trying to conserve funds for the auction, so we sent him an invitation to stay at Haruka House on the grounds of our manor. If you have yet to see it, Haruka House sits alone on the west side of the main house and is the most luxurious of the four Thassilonian cottages on the property. As far as I can tell, Sneve suspects us of no foul play. Still, we can’t have him mucking up the auction, can we? Thankfully, I doubt we have to do much. Ensure no actual harm comes to him, though, as such would reflect poorly upon Heidmarch Manor and the Pathfinder Society. Rather, somehow trick him into believing the Runecarved Key is cursed and he should withdraw from the auction without any further urging.”
The group strolls over to Haruka House. On the way there they discuss how they're going to deal with Falrig.
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"I have a spell that can make a person or object glow. If one of you--someone who's good with words and can be convincing--tells Sneve that I can cast a spell that detects a curse, I could cast it on him. Then, we just 'share' that I did the same for all of us this morning, we all glowed, and now we're visiting everyone who was at the auction to warn them. If the curse is strong enough to affect people who were only in the room with the Key, imagine if you actually possessed it or tried to use it!"
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Approaching Haruka House, you see that it is a quaint little guest cabin. A serene pond with flowering lily pads sits behind the cottage. Papyrus reeds in select spots around the pond provide shade for the coy gently swimming in the placid water.
A few moments after knocking on the cabin door, Falrig Sneve opens it and looks a bit surprised. It takes a moment for him to recognize a few of you from the gala.
"Oh... Oh my goodness. I wasn't expecting company. Good day, friends. Is there something I can help you with?"
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”Good day? Hardly. You see, there's trouble. Last night I felt a little strange, so I asked my friend Beren here, if he could have a look. Turns out, I'm jinxed with the curse of Ill Omen! And not only me, everyone else here has been feeling a little strange, so Beren checked all of them - and himself, too - with the result that we are all cursed!”
She makes a dramatic pause.
”We quickly figured out that it must have to do something with the display of the Key. That was the only place where we were all together. And if you recall, somebody even said, that the key itself might be cursed. I paid no attention at the moment, because, you know, rumors are just that: rumors. And usually you have to touch a cursed item to be affected. But now I'm really worried. What if the key is an evil artifact that can curse you even by looking at it? So we are tracking down everyone who was there to make sure they are ok - or if they are not, that they at least know and can do something about it.”
She gestures at the druid.
”If you allow it, my friend Beren will cast a spell on you to detect if you are cursed or not. If you are jinxed like us, you will glow.”
Falrig's eyes go wide in shock.
"C-c-cursed!?! I knew it! I heard people at the gala saying it was cursed and it does look to be a quite sinister object. Oh, goodness. I can't have an item like that in my collection. What if..."
He pauses in mid sentence and gives a look of doubt as Corba's face is about to crack into a grin.
Falrig seems doubtful about your claim. He looks at you with suspicion.
"Heyyy. Wait a second. Is the key really cursed?"
You continue to try to convince Falrig that the key, and possibly him, are cursed. He accepts being subjected to your "detect curse" spell.
"Okay. Lay it on me," he says as he holds out his arms and tilts his head back.
"Oh please don't be cursed, oh please don't be cursed...
He mumbles under his breath.
He opens his eyes and looks down at his glowing arms, body, and legs.
"Gahhh!!! I'm cursed!!! No no no no! This will not do. I don't want that terrible key anymore. I'm leaving."
Falrig runs around the cottage in a panic packing his belongings.
"Good luck to you and that cursed key."
He says as he exits the door and hurries off the grounds of Heidmarch manor.
With Falrig Sneve taken care of, you head back to the manor for another mission. You are offered refreshments while you wait.
After about 15 minutes, one of Sheila's assistants approaches your group. She congratulates you on a job well done convincing Falrig to withdraw from the auction. She then gives you your next mission...
“While we’re not sure how much of a threat Dymal Rinks poses to our winning the auction, we don’t want to take any chances. Our informants tell us that Rinks owes a considerable debt to the proprietor of the Matador, Master Basaale Minvandu. Short on the funds to cover his debts, Dymal Rinks hopes to cash in on the Runecarved Key as part of a wild investment scheme. Unfortunately for Rinks, Minvandu wants his debts paid immediately and has sent his collectors to track the halfling down. I suspect we can easily knock Rinks out of the auction by turning him over to Minvandu’s thugs. Still, I’m a little wary of this course of action as handing Rinks over to the bone-breakers may very well result in his death. Despite being a desperate little imp, Rinks is a decent arbitrator and if word gets back that we played a part in his death, it might make things difficult in the future. If you can avoid getting him killed it might help. Perhaps you can pretend to be thugs and scare him off or simply threaten to rat him out to Minvandu if he doesn’t back out of the auction. In any event, do whatever you need to do to drive him away. Oh, and he lied about his whereabouts. Our informants say he’s hiding out at the Galesford Inn in Dockway.”
You head across town to the Galesford Inn. Inquiring with the innkeeper and paying a generous tip supplied by the Heidmarch's, he tells you Rinks is up the stairs in the last room on the left.
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"A bit of intimidation is likely to ward off this Dymal Rinks," Astingaire proposes. "We simply approach the man, explain how his scheme will come of no avail and that he is better off providing what coin he has to Minvandu's minions when they come."
"If that is insufficient to convince him, we could offer to broker some sort of installment deal to provide a payment plan to alleviate Rinks' debt and placate Minvandu's men. After all, I suspect that Minvandu is a man of business and realizes the value of having at least most of his owed coin at present rather than less and a lifeless corpse."