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She stares at Terrence in genuine shock for a moment, before standing up and pacing back and forth in front of the group. ”He went....inside Rix-Maadi? What reason would he have for going inside there?” Lavinia thinks aloud as she paces, her hands moving back and forth in arcane movements meant to improve her mental acuity. ”Perhaps the cult’s headquarters and base of operations is actually deep inside the dungeon palace. It’s a dangerous place, and getting you there won’t be easy. But it appears as if that’s the next step in the investigation. I’m sorry to have dragged you into this, as it seems like we may have quite a bit of work ahead of us, but I know you are more than capable of handling anything the task may throw at you.”
Although Lavinia isn’t in her office when the group arrives to report, the guard from earlier is, and informs you that she has been called back in order to receive said report. In the meantime, the guard points you towards a seat on a set of relatively comfortable looking couches, and procures a set of plates and silverware to offer you some refreshments while you wait. Within the hour, Lavinia shows back up at her office, walking quickly through the hall in front of the main room to eagerly listen to your report. ”Go on then, be quick. Tell me what you have to report.”
The majority of the house is full of the more commonplace trappings of a wealthy Azorius’ dwelling, full of the color schemes of the Azorius. Overlaid above the general theme of blues, whites, and gold, however, is a more sinister layer of decorations more fitting a Rakdos torture house: spikes and wheels and altars and knives. Upstairs in what appears to be a bedroom, Thomas and Gilda (once she’s done attending to the victims) find what looks like the main resting place of Alabastor. Plenty of discarded cups and plates and utensils mark this as a comfortable hangout area. On one of the dressers in said room, the two hawk-eyed investigators find a hastily burned journal, indicating someone wanted this evidence gone before you arrived here, but didn’t have time to finish the job. An open window in the same room that opens out onto the flat roof of the building lends credit to this theory. You apparently missed him by mere minutes, as the pages are still warm. From what you can gather from the remaining material, Alabastor seems to have fled inside the one place outsiders (and more importantly, Azorius agents) aren’t allowed: Rix-Maadi, the Dungeon Palace. There seems to be a larger segment of the cult stationed inside the Palace, and that is where Alabastor has most likely made his escape to.
Gilda is able to stabilize the three victims left tied up after you finish off the cultists. The three cultists themselves, however, remain actually dead. The rest of the house is apparently unoccupied, as Alabastor has already vacated the premises.
Felicia’s brutal strike on the second cultist is enough to finish him off, as he collapses to the floor under the force of the blow. Seeing his two companions fall (to their actual death), the third cultist drops his sword and nods solemnly at the group of investigators, seeming to accept defeat.
Within moments, the third cultist is dead.
Gilda charges forward, and just barely manages to push past the sword wielding foe that attacked Terrence, making her way over to the incapacitated victims.
The woman of the trio falls under the assault from Felicia, her sword clanging to the floor even as the other two enemies press forward. The two cultists move expertly together, re-flanking Terrence in the melee.
The lady cultist cries out in some strange language after getting hit with the blackblade and Terrence’s off hand, and thrusts her short sword out at Thomas.
The two other cultists follows suit, crying out and joining her, making sure to flank Terrence from one side and Thomas from the other.
Gilda: Mechanically, the three enemies are all Healthy, whereas the four victims are fragile. No other life signs register, including the one that the woman threw into the fireplace.
Order: Thomas, Terrence, Them, Felicia, and then Gilda.
The woman, notably surprised by the sudden attack, cries out in pain before raising her knife, which closer to a short sword, threateningly. Her two accomplices in the room follow suit, drawing their own blades.
The next room over, behind a set of the flowing crimson curtains, is every bit affluent as the opening foyer of the house. A large wooden dining table occupied most of the room, with a marble fireplace taking up the wall opposite the table end of the room. The fireplace has an unusually blue-colored flame inside of it, although there doesn’t seem to be any wood or other fuel on the bricks. It is front of this fireplace that you find the few figures Terrence saw through the window. Several people are bound at the hands and wrists on their knees next to the marble blocks. As you push open the door and enters the room, the assistant is in the final steps of reading out some incomprehensible language. You can tell she is done because her voice rises in pitch and volume as she slides her knife across the throat of the closest victim and kicks the unfortunate woman into the blue flames. As she lay dying on the marble, the blue flames grow brighter and seem to reach out to her, engulfing her body completely. The flames crackle loudly, drowning out any screams of the dying woman before finally receding, revealing no trace of the woman’s body behind. “Who are you to dare interrupt the ritual?!” the assistant cries out, the bloody knife dripping onto the floor. “Explain yourselves!”
I want to sincerely apologize for my prolonged absence. I presented flu-like symptoms last week, and have been undergoing tests in the hospital to make sure it was just the flu, and not the new corona virus thing. Luckily, it was just the flu, so I am back home with my internet and computer now. I will be posting later today and getting things started again!
The front door is actually surprisingly unlocked, as the inhabitants clearly expected the guard to defend it better than he did. Entering the foyer of what looks like a decadent mansion on the inside, Felicia is the first to be exposed to the richly designed interior of the house. Thick silk curtains drape on the entrances between rooms, colored in a darker bloody red, and the curves stair case directly in front of you making its way up to the next floor is made of carved wood. It appears to be one entire tree, shaped with magic and tools into the magnificent staircase before you. The room that Terrence saw the assistant with the knife lies to the left, on the first floor, through a set of the crimson curtains.
Felicia’s surprisingly strong attack catches the guard off his game, but it doesn’t finish him off. It takes the doctor’s precise cane strike to finish off the man. He crumbles to the floor of the porch, slouching against one of the pillars holding the next floor up. The way is clear for you to progress!
He takes the strength sapping magic in stride, reaching out to punch back at Felicia, apparently aiming to injure.
Thomas shoots a ray of enfeeblement towards the man currently engaged in fisticuffs with Felicia, striking him in the chest with it. As if this poor man’s day wasn’t already bad enough!
Combat order:
Thomas, you’re up!
The man, stunned by the sudden attack and fist to the face, is obviously not as ready as you thought he was for this fight.
The man on the porch startles, noticing several people basically charging towards him, and places a hand on his sword’s pommel as he stands up from his seat. ”What can I help you with this time? Another ‘friend’ you need help finding?” he calls out to the group threateningly, obviously done with your tricks and games.
Right as he turns to leave, Terrence sees the lady from the porch earlier inside one of the windows. She walks into the room slowly, carrying what seems to be a fancy ritual knife. She makes her way over to a corner of the room Terrence can’t see, her back to him, and raises the knife above her head. Swiftly bringing it down, Terrence hears a faint, muffled scream that quickly dies out as the woman continues to move her arms around. The sound of conversation can be heard just barely as Terrence actually does leave, but the actual words cannot be made out.
The man’s look switches from suspicious to legitimately confused as this strange half-elf walks up to him and asks him a seemingly random question. His guard seems to have been lowered by the innocent questioning. ”U-uh....I don’t know a, Willis, you said? Did he give you an actual address or just give you the general location?”
Failing to see Terrence sneaking around the corner, the man’s attention seems to be solely focused on Felicia. Inside the few windows the house does have, Terrence sees thick curtains draped across the openings, making it somewhat hard to discern what is inside. What he can see, however, is piece after piece of crude Rakdos celebration equipment. The entire house, from what he can see, is full of the spiked wheels, racks, explosives, and other accoutrements of the Rakdos cult.
The man suspiciously sets his book aside and glares down the party, his face especially unfriendly. ”How can I help you? What do you want?” You feel as if he doesn’t know who you are, and certainly doesn’t trust you in the slightest.
The man has not left the porch, but he does appear to be somewhat distracted by the book he is reading. Other than the one man on the porch, there does not appear to be any other guards of any sort hanging around the house.
So by the time the woman, conveniently dressed in the dark reds and blacks of the Rakdos cult, made her way to the porch and entered the house, Terrence has joined the group and assisted in the surveillance.
Hello everyone! Hope you all had a wonderful holiday season, celebrating whichever of the holidays you observe. I just got back in, so I won’t be posting tonight, but expect us to get this show going again (and more permanently) tomorrow!
I expect slower posts until after New Years' anyway, so no worries. We'll get back when we get back!
Terrence and Sarv, and anyone else:
Sarv nods to the group as they leave, turning his attention back to Terrence quickly.
”Well, now that it’s just you and me, how is the investigation going? How do you like your new assignment? And your partners, what do you think of them?” Gil and her gang: The address you were given belongs to a what appears to be a rather impressive home, squashed though it is between two marketplaces. Luckily for you, the marketplaces give you ample time and place to find a suitable hiding spot from which to watch unnoticed.
The houses’ stone stairway leads up into a luxurious porch, complete with engraved wood columns holding up the ceiling so as to create some shade for the excessively comfortable looking bench on the porch. Sitting on the porch is a figure in darker clothing, a book in his hands. He seems to be engrossed in the book completely, although after a short few minutes you notice he hasn’t turned a page yet. Around an hour and a half after you arrive at the marketplace (), another woman strides confidently up the stone steps, stops to talk with the man on the bench shortly, and then passes into the house.
”Leaving so soon?” Sarv exclaims loudly before laughing genuinely. ”Oh, no bother. I’m sure Terrence here has quite a bit of questioning left for me, don’t you?”
Gil wants to go look at the address separately, with Felicia? Be sure to let me know when they do eventually leave the meeting, and I'll let you know what you find there!
"Well we actually have quite a bit of information on the Massacre Girl, as she has been around for years without being able to be caught." He motions to one of the bookcases beside him, indicating it may be full of cases and books full of data on her crimes. "However, we have no reason to believe she is involved, as the signature calling card details aren't exactly as normal. It appears as if someone was trying significantly hard to make sure we thought it was another Massacre Girl murder. Alas, I don't believe that it was her at all."
He easily gives up the assistants’ address, and as soon as he begins speaking a wave of eerie shivers runs across your skin. For the address he gives you is the exact same one from the Senator’s notes. ”Do try to be courteous when you visit, I don’t want to disturb him too harshly on his day off. He’s a good man, he deserves it.” ”As for the Massacre Girl, what would you like to know? She’s been a thorn in the side of the Azorius for years now, although we are still uncertain if she is one woman of a collection of criminals working together. I’d be willing to answer any questions you may have.”
”What I’m saying is that any dealing ‘I’ had with the Senator and his investigation was handled through my assistant, Alabastor. I am more than sure he would be interested in speaking with you about any such dealings.” He notices Terrence’s glances back towards the party, and seems wary. ”He has the day off today, however, and is currently at his house on Tin Street, I presume. Is something wrong? Should I call him in?”
The document mentions various interferences, including tying the investigation permissions up in lower courts behind red tape usually only reserved for much more formal investigations. Sarv's agents also appeared to target the Senator's operations for the codified random office searches and inspections way more than usual, but no one outside of the Senator questioned the reason why (and even the senator did so quietly), as the orders likely came from Sarv himself.
He acknowledges Terrence, a hand waved in somewhat of a greeting before listening keenly. ”Such a sad set of circumstances that we meet under, then. I worked with the Senator on a handful of cases, and he was a respected colleague.” ”My direct knowledge of the investigation is unfortunately quite limited, as there is simply too much going on recently to keep informed on everything. I know he was investigating rumors of some sort of split off from the main cult of Rakdos, correct? Other than that, I had no dealings with this particular case. We’ve been quite busy with a spree of Golgari dealings down below. Nasty business, that.”
Hope you all had a wonderful food-filled Thanksgiving! For those of you that celebrated it anyway.
It’s as easy to find Arbiter Sarv as Terrence thought it would be, as he was in fact just holding court in his office. The tall white columns on either side of the walls bookend a great courtroom, with many rows of pews in the center of the room. At the very top of the wall, there’s a large ledge wrapped around the entire room. On this ledge sit many a griffin, most of them wearing a saddle and other riding paraphernalia. ”Ah, my friends! I’ve been waiting for you.” the Arbiter says, waving his arms at you, indicating you come forward. ”How can I help you today?”
Terrence is easily able to locate the Arbiter, as he is just in his office conducting his normal day to day meetings. One of said meetings is yours, and he is waiting. You are also fairly certain that you could find the address from the senator quite effortlessly, so whichever way you choose to go is up to the group.
Hey guys, checking in. Just finishing up some work I need to do tonight, so I'll have a post up tomorrow sometime to keep this going. Sorry for the inconvenience!
While you're cleaning off and reading the note, Giliad speaks up once more, coughing quietly before doing so. "Regrettably, I must inform you of some unfortunate bad news. The higher ups in the Azorius have deemed it necessary to reassign me to another mission related to the investigation, and I am to stop working with you for now. I am unsure what I will be doing, but it has been a pleasure working with you for this short amount of time. Until we meet again!" With that, he makes his leave, shaking several hands (of those who aren't busy, anyway) and exits through the door, quickly heading out of sight.
The note, once cleaned, displays quite a bit of interesting information. It’s formatted less as a letter and more of a scrambled collection of thoughts jotted down hastily. Most of the note is actually still illegible, but what you can make out reads as such. ”Cultists holed up inside Rix Maadi...unsure of exact location...exterior base located at abandoned house at address...danger...creatures and magic unknown to...traps and hazards...must investigate further...” Could this ‘exterior base’ be concrete evidence that something fishy is going on around the Senator’s death and this Cult of the Titan?
”My apologies, I misspoke.” Giliad continues. ”He found his investigations interrupted by the Arbiter himself, or rather, his minions and cohorts. You know, bringing up old statutes that aren’t really followed much anymore and hindering the work with forms and meetings and such. It was...unusual, to say the least.”
Giliad speaks up again, breaking into the conversation to add another piece of information. ”Speaking of Sarv, the Senator found his investigations interrupted at several different points. It’s still unclear if the interruptions had a sinister purpose, as he didn’t know enough about the Arbiter to make such a conclusion, quite yet.”
The unorthodox wand holds the remnants of what appears to be a Disintegrate Spell, but modified with potent necromancy bindings so that it can be used as a weapon.
Giliad takes this chance to speak up, presenting the folder of information he has acquired from Uzana, briefly explaining what it contains. ”Unfortunately it seems as if there may a cult or other related gathering of miscreants involved, as the symbol you found at the crime scene matches the symbol of a group already under investigation by the Azorius. Our eyes are everywhere, and they have seen a schism inside the Cult of Rakdos. One devoted to ‘the Titan’. As of yet, we are unaware of what this Titan is, or why they are worshipping it.” He takes a short breath before continuing.
Getting Giliad’s response together guys, sorry for the wait! I’ll have it up tonight.
If you’re not satisfied with the way he handled the interview, and you’d like to go back and do it ourselves, I wouldn’t mind doing that at all. Which would the group prefer?
I don’t feel it’s necessary for me to say anything in this particular part of the conversation, but I’m still reading along and if anyone has any actual questions for me, feel free to put in [ooc] so I know you want me to answer it. I love the inter-group roleplay we have going on, y’all are doing an amazing job! |