Thraag moves to just shove it in and uses his crowbar to boot.
Narl drinks one of the potions and stows the other.
Turning his attention back to the vault, Narl rushes over to help Thraag heft an ornate box into the bag of holding.
"I hear the cavalry outside. Time to move!"
"Back door. Lead the way." Narl looks up at the Ratfolk Gunslinger expectantly as he helps Thraag cinch the bag of holding closed and passes it to whomever carried it here.
Nodding as he sees the haul disappear in the bag, Dunn gives Narl and his grievous wounds a glance. "I've got something for that when we get a moment to breathe. Leave the potions for now, friend.", he relays as he turns towards the burned, yellowish shrubs surrounding the front of the bank. He raises his hand at the earth, and the yellowish shrubs begin to spring to life and thicken, as if alive.
"Now, we run!", he shouts, as he runs to catch up with the others at the rear exit.
Thraag follows along quickly after the others. Once they are well out of sight he uses his hat to shift his appearance into a human in drab clothes.
Date: 2 Gozran, 4722 AR. Fireday. Time: ~7:00 AM. Current forecast in Ironside: Bronzetime. Magic is working normally, folks!
As you leave, the sounds of shouting and signal whistles are heard from the front of the bank and the far eastern and western ends of the alley. Deputy Shieldmarshal Loveless’s voice is heard, shouting commands to create a perimeter around the bank. A shieldmarshal replies, “Yes, Deputy! Right away!”
As the ragtag group of outlaws runs from Loveless and her gang, they approach a scrapyard known as the Wailing scrapyard. Right to the west of you, stands a literal Tower of Trash. Piles of discarded scrap metal, wood, and other garbage mark the edge of a path leading north into the scrapyard. Several bits of debris have recently collapsed into the entrance. Just west, the veritable tower of piled refuse wobbles precariously. The path opens to the north and east into the scrapyard or exits to the south into an alley between two buildings. Shouts and whistles can be heard coming from the direction of the Gold Tank Reserve, to the south.
As soon as you step foot into the scrapyard however, you hear and see a goblin shout in a lightly accented Taldane, "Hey! Longshanks! Shieldmarshals followin' you! Collapse the tower!"
Thraag looks for the right place to push. He loudly declares "Here!" as he pulls out a piece holding up the tower.
Once everyone is past, Narl throws his shoulder into where Thraag indicates.
As Thraag and Narl topple the pile of junk, they see Deputy Loveless, a tall, tan-skinned vourinoi elf with gunmetal blue-you hair and mismatched silver and amber eyes. She’s turning the corner in the alley chasing after you, accompanied by several shieldmarshals. Deputy Loveless draws her rifle and fires in one fluid motion, targeting Dunn, but her bullet ricochets off a piece of falling debris. Once the debris settles, she shouts from the other side of the rusty scrap heap, “I’m coming after you, and I always hit my target. After I’m done with you, there won’t be enough of your lead-pocked body left to identify. Do you hear me? You’ll pay for crossing Mugland! Pay in blood!”
To the west of you, a ring of old crates surrounds a makeshift campfire in this discrete corner of the junkyard. A complicated contraption
of gears and rods over the campfire forms a spit that can be rotated using two foot pedals attached to a gear. The smell of smoked meat manages to cut through the ambient stench of trash emanating from the scrapyard’s walls. Around the campfire are various patchwork tents and a large pavilion to the south. Piles of scrap surround the camp, conveniently stacked to make climbing to the top easier. A path on the northern edge of the camp leads east into the scrapyard. From there, a gaggle of Goblins, including the one who shouted at you to collapse the tower, surround you once it finally all settles. Some are groveling at your feet, others more confident, asking things such as "Are you here to fight the gnolls?" and “Can you help us? Do you know the shieldmarshals? (They’re mean!) Do you want to speak with Lord Glass?”
One of them in particular speaks up, bejeweled in coloured glass adjourning his leather armor. This, presumably, is Lord Glass, given the glass. [b]“Trusted longshanks,” intones Lord Glass, the bedazzled leader of the scavengers, in stilted Common. “We welcome you to Scrap City and accept your offer of help.” He bows deeply but, weighed down by the countless shards of colored glass lining his clothes, nearly loses his balance and falls off his stack of milk crates which he stands on. He gathers himself and clears his throat. “As promised, if you drive the gnolls away, we promise to give you our best junk. We have a deal?”
"How many gnolls are there? What are the doing that makes you want to hire people to deal with them?" Thraag asks.
"Goblins," Narl announces. Not too long ago, he would have announced the word with derision, but with his present appearance -- and in his present situation -- he's become a little more tolerant.
Narl asks, "And where can we lay low?"
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Lord Glass speaks up, gesticulating as he does so with his glass-studded armor, “They come to our scrapyard and attack us. They attack longshanks, too. The shieldmarshals think we attack longshanks, accuse us of killing them. But why would we kill when we have so much good scrap around? Makes no sense. All to say: These murderers are bad for business. And as for hiding out, doesn't your employer have somewhere you can scurry off to? We can sell you a few alchemical items if you need, as well. There are a good few of them, especially with our reduced number, north, over the wall. We put up sharp metal to keep them out, blocked their way with the old ship, the big metal box. We shut them out, but they’re still there. Go, make them gone! The easiest way for longshanks to get there is to go east, around the big metal box and the old ship.”
Erryll was, at best, unfamiliar with such well spoken civilized goblins; he had grown up with his relatives stories of "goblin hordes" and this seemed like a long way from that.
"There cartainly is a lot of good scrap here, you are quite blessed your Lordship ..."
"Well...we can take a look I guess." Thraag says as he considers the value of having a place to hide out in that the Shieldmarshals did not want to follow them into.
Narl turns to the others.
"What do you think? We don't really have any reason to wipe out a pack of gnolls, but doing so would keep us occupied until some of the heat from the Shieldmarshalls dies down."
"Well it's all too unwise to get involved in a scrapyard civil war, but I'd rather not pick lead out my hide after going to the wall.", Dunn shrugs. "And besides, it helps to have friends in all places."
He gestures to his gun. "I'll need some time to fix this danged contraption, though."
"We only have basic alchemical items, so don't go asking us for the new invention that showed up at Blythir or anything," Lord Glass intones. "And... wait, you aren't the mercenaries Pogi hired? In that case, you'll have to go through the gnolls anyways unless you want to risk tetanus a few times over climbing over scrapheap after scrapheap. In either case, we can get you rare metal if you do it for us, same deal that we would have offered to the hired mercenaries. Oh, and as long as the longshank who was yelling at you doesn't close in on the scrapyard, you should have time to clear out your pistol."
Some Goblins look at you condescendingly, but most of them look at up at you, or at eye level with the Ratfolk, with some glimmer of hope in their eyes.
"We need to lie low for a bit while our companion looks after his gear. Then we will go and see the gnolls. If they are just wildly attacking people, we will likely need to deal with it. Perhaps you could show my companions this new invention that showed up. It might give him great ideas on how to fix his equipment to stop the gnolls." Thraag says.
"We only heard about the explosion from Monsie, we don't have that thing on us! We'd be absolutely rich if we did, though!" one of the Goblins says, seemingly warming up to you as she grins.
Narl turns to Dunn.
"You said you could provide healing? Let us know when your gun is fixed, and we'll head out."
"We only heard about the explosion from Monsie, we don't have that thing on us! We'd be absolutely rich if we did, though!" one of the Goblins says, seemingly warming up to you as she grins.
"Interesting, I would love to hear this tale. Where would we find Monsie?" Thraag asks.
"Monsie could tell you better. We thought longshanks would have heard of the explosion at the college by now? Monsie said it was a big deal!" another Goblin, not Lord Glass himself, says, before Lord Glass comes in and interrupts, "Monsie’s the smartest Nailgobbler of all, an inventor. She makes lots of things: bombs, yummy drinks, tools, foot crank for the fire pit. She went to fight the gnolls but hasn’t come back. Wef ear the worst. Please find her. Please tell us she’s okay. We miss Monsie." You can tell in his voice that he's genuine, and that the inventor is dearly missed.
If anyone asks Narl if they should rescue Monsie, he'll shrug and say, "Probably a good idea."
"How's that gun coming, Dunn? We need to get moving."
As you head to the right (area B3/B4), you see a large winch-driven crane towering over the piles of discarded machinery. The crane’s base is totally entrenched
in debris, and rust pits its arm. In the crane’s cockpit, the control panel’s faceplate has been removed, exposing the gears and mechanisms behind the foot pedals and long rusty levers. A wall of debris looms to the south, extending east and west. The open stone to the north is flooded with oily water.
Narl stops at the clearing and assesses the situation.
"That crane has seen better days, but maybe we could use it. Anybody know how those things work?"
Thraag moves to operate the crane and avoid the oily water.
As soon as Thraag drains the pool of rust-water, a creature emerges from it. It's a throbbing glob of reddish-brown material, sitting just where the grate that was removed is. Secondly, you hear a cacophony of buzzing and skittering as a Goblin begins frantically waving his arms and shouting, "ACK! THE COCKROACH SWARM! MONSIE USUALLY PLACATES THE THING," he screeches as it emerges from the underside of the crane that Thraag is operating.
Clearly revolted, Erryll pulls out his revolver, spins the chamber, and speaks softly in Elvish ...
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The cockroaches are all singed and burned by the flame, some of them still on fire, as the swarm shrinks a tad bit in size as a few die off. The ooze composed of rust itself slithers its way over to the witch Erryll, "smelling" the metal, as it attempts to wrap a pseudopod around the hand holding the metal object.
Erryll dodges deftly the rusty "arm" the creature has created, avoiding whatever damage it can cause, and whatever disease it might invite on the half-elf. Chatter can be heard among the cowering goblins, one of them even says something along the lines of "Should one of us feed the things?" responded by a starsh, stern response from their leader in the form of a guttural "DO YOU WANT TETANUS FROM THAT RUSTY BLOB?"
Thraag cries out as the swarm comes right at him and a burst of magic sends a blast of flame at it.
Dunn and Maximillian both take aim at the rust ooze and fire roughly simultaneously, with the ratfolk rotating his barrel to get the pistol to a chamber that actually has a bullet, with the druid instead firing a shot from a far enough distance to see the entire thing go wide.
Max's short, however, hits true and the bullet corrodes as it seems to hit the creature. The swarm, however, starts to gnaw on Thraag as he deals with a distracting amount of bites and flying insects.
The goblins start shouting towards the group of you while Thraag is being practically eaten alive by thousands of cockroaches, "Hey, longshanks! Got any food to toss to the critters," Lord Glass frantically screeches at the top of his lungs trying to get your attention.
Narl tears his eyes away from the rusty horror that's come out of the grate, turning to see Thraag covered in roaches.
The goblins start shouting towards the group of you while Thraag is being practically eaten alive by thousands of cockroaches, "Hey, longshanks! Got any food to toss to the critters," Lord Glass frantically screeches at the top of his lungs trying to get your attention.
Not seeing how his sword is going to do well fighting either of these monstrosities, Narl digs some jerky out of his pouch and breaks and crumbles it, hoping the smell will attract the roaches away from Thraag. He'll throw some into the swarm.
Narl tears his eyes away from the rusty horror that's come out of the grate, turning to see Thraag covered in roaches.
The goblins start shouting towards the group of you while Thraag is being practically eaten alive by thousands of cockroaches, "Hey, longshanks! Got any food to toss to the critters," Lord Glass frantically screeches at the top of his lungs trying to get your attention.Not seeing how his sword is going to do well fighting either of these monstrosities, Narl digs some jerky out of his pouch and breaks and crumbles it, hoping the smell will attract the roaches away from Thraag. He'll throw some into the swarm.
Erryll points the barrel of his revolver at the jerky, hoping the roaches will take the bait. There was a little more fire to be had if they did ...