Band of Blades
The Commander of the Legion’s been captured. Zora (your Chosen) has elected to lead a frontal assault on a keep where they are being kept. Your squad is charged to use the distraction and a drainage pipe to either rescue them, or if need be - keep the Legion secrets safe from the Cinder King’s troops.
The Spymaster informs the squad that in general undead do not require the use of lights, and however lights have been seen in the chapel. There is a drainage pipe that will lead to the underneath of the castle as a way in. Zora intends to lead a charge as a diversion allowing the small group to enter and rescue the Commander.
Elrik (Officer) leads the Ember Wolves towards the drainage opening with an opening skirmish to progress at speed through the romero zombies. Upon the way, a sentry is spotted on the battlements. Emilinya (Rookie) and Riya (Rookie) volunteer (probably more the former, the latter realising how bad a shot Emilinya is decides to come along). Emilinya leads Riya through the pockmarked ground to get within range of the sentry, but notices the sentry stirring and sight scanning the area. Emilinya incompetently shoulders the rifle. Riya explains patiently to Emilinya how to handle the rifle and they both line up the sights to the sentry. At Riya’s countdown, they both take a shot. Riya’s textbook shot lines up perfectly and the sentry’s head flies clean off the body of the whilst Emilinya gets her best shot (1m to the left on the battlements). Riya then quickly drops to the ground and pulls down Emilinya.
After waving at the Officer, Elrik marches forward to the crater leading the rest of the squad. He congratulates Riya, but claps Emilinya on the back of the head, ordering double musket drills when they return as she still cannot handle the musket.
The group marches towards the opening, water becoming ankle deep. The way up to the point is lined with bodies on spikes, army dressed individuals. Presumably the final defenders of the castle before it fell.
Elrik commands the Freriya (Heavy) and Riya to move forwards as the shield bearers. He draws his pistol and carries on forward with them, with Emilinya holding the lantern. They move swiftly through to the tunnels stumbling upon an undead. Elrik commands Freriya to charge, she obliges and charges forward with bastard sword and shield in hand. Bashing the zombie’s head, the squad looks around. They note a small grate that would allow the smallest members to pass, the well that was mentioned by the Spymaster 40ft up and 10ft across, tunnels that lead further underneath the castle, and there are other bodies around the area, some of which may be undead.
Elrik directs the squad to set up a climb up the well, looking pointedly at Emilinya. Emilinya fishes out a grappling hook and hands it to the tall Freriya. Freriya hooks the grappling hook to the top of the well and Emilinya zooms up the rope and drops over the top of the well lip. It looks like this is some sort of storehouse. So Emilinya leans back down and pretty much shouts that “It’s all clear!”. With a sigh, Elrik ushers the rest of the squad to go up the rope.
Riya heading the echoing sound of Emilinya’s voice in the caves, hurries up the rope with Zaya (NPC Rookie) close behind. As Riya gets close to the top of the rope, he feels the hook slip. Vaulting upwards, he manages to get a hand on the lip and haul himself up. However, it means that the rope falls, and Zaya falls. The Officer heroically tries to catch Zaya, successfully breaking their fall, but the momentum forces him into the mass of bodies, which start groping at him. Stressed, Elrik shouts obscenities and again orders the rest of the squad to get the rope back up and to move up out of the well.
Once up to the top of the well, the squad looks around to locate where they are. The Commander is suspected to be in the Chapel as that’s where the light has been noted by the Spymaster. Upon locating where the storehouse is in relation to this, the squad realises that the quickest way to get there is across the courtyard. Also across a large group of zombies.
Elrik formulates a plan where he uses a flare to distract the group and then the squad can charge across. Elrik lines up a flare using his pistol, fires up in the air. The arc of the flare is beautiful and it falls into a group of zombies and sets some of the alight.
Freriya leads the charge, smashing through the large group of zombies, arriving at the door of the chapel. The door is locked. Freriya pulls out a prybar from her pack, and looks to pry the door open. She notes that the door is sealed on the outside, and readies her prybar to free the doors, which she does so successfully. So she kicks the door open.
Waves of death odour spill out of the chapel, this place is not a sacred place. The Commander is there, lain on the far end of the chapel. Accompanying the Commander, is a homely woman, and two guards in heavy armour, a red glow coming out from within. The red glow in the heavy armour may be what the stories call Cinder Guards, guards for the Cinder King under their control. The third individual looks heavily scarred, presumably the Interrogator as previously mentioned. Freriya shouts, “There are three of them”
Freriya stows the prybar and redraws the bastard sword and shield. Elrik leads the rest of the squad into the chapel and calls up the squad to charge.
The Interrogator apologises to the Commander, “I’m sorry!” as she draws a knife out and appears to start deliberating on where to cut the Commander.
Seeing this, Elrik lines up a shot on the Interrogator and takes a shot. He manages to blow a chunk out of the shoulder of the Interrogator, who continues to apologise to the Commander, “I’m so sorry!”, whilst making the first wild cut on the Commander’s skin.
Freriya in the meantime takes on one of the Cinder Guard. She confronts the Cinder Guard that is wielding a poleaxe. She smashes and moves inside the range of the poleaxe inside the range of the Cinder Guard’s easy attacks.
Riya calls the rest of the Ember Wolves to charge the other Cinder Guard. They fail and open themselves up to an attack. Riya spots this and parries, blocks, and takes a blow in place for the rest of the squad, losing function of her armour, shield, and suffers a teeny tiny crack to a rib.
The Interrogator continues to apologise to the Commander, whilst attempting to continue to cut them. Elrik lines up yet another shot and shoots the Interrogator with a fatal shot, freeing up the Commander.
Meanwhile Freriya stays within the easy reach of the poleaxe and studies the openings of the Cinder Guard. Finding a gap, she rams the sword down to the hilt between the glowing eyes of the helmet. As the sword slides down to the hilt, Freriya feels a glowing heat flow from the helmet over her arm, feeling sure that there’s blistering under the armour.
Upon seeing that Riya, has been kicked away and is recovering and grabbing her musket, Emilinya picks up the broken shield and runs into the fray to try and trap the zweihander to aid Riya. Taking a heavier blow to the chest, she never the less manages to temporarily trap the sword. Riya takes her chance and jumps into close range to shoot the Cinder Guard, successfully dehelmeting the guard. Revealing the glowing head of the guard.
Elrik shouts out orders and controls and coordinates the squad to ensure that progress is made. The squad jumps to the orders, saving the Commander, Riya reacting to the orders swings the musket as a club distracting the guard, allowing Freriya time to plunge her dagger into the midriff of the guard, finishing it off.
The squad reforms, collecting the Commander, moving as one protecting each other. Clouds start to form above the castle throwing down a deluge as they escape. They move towards the same way they came into the castle, to the storehouse and down the well. Elrik is the last one down, firing a flare into the barrels of gunpowder in the storehouse before jumping down himself. The rocks and masonry fall around them as the squad moves quickly through the tunnels back out into the river basin out of the drainage pipe.
As they emerge from the system, the squad sees that Zora is protecting a retreat as the diversion moves back. In the distance, large red birds are seen flying into the area.
The squad moves back to the meeting point where they are met by the Spymaster along with 8 horses to return to the rest of the legion.
We look back at Karlsburg across the Tigeria River. The broken walls and desolation due to the advance of the Cinder King’s troops. The upper brass met once again understanding the ways forward. An abnormal weather event to the south, a monastery to the east, and a scout sending about information back to the west. The Star Vipers are sent to investigate the anomaly to the south. The Ghost Owls are sent back west to retrieve the specialist scout to the west.
The Marshall enquires with the Quartermaster about the supplies of fresh horses that can be applied. The Scout, the Officer are sent with the Star Vipers and are supplied a set of horses by the Quartermaster. The Sniper and Medic are sent with the Ghost Owls to rescue the scout.
The Ghost Owls are pulled aside as well as Grey Sleeping Storm (Sniper) and Reina Aurora Martiko (Medic) by the brass. They are informed about a scout (D. Dahmer) that was left behind as the legion pulled out from Karlsburg. Dahmer is holed up in a tavern called “The Last Drop” on the far side of the city. They are told of the encroaching bad weather, lightning storms, heavy rain that will hamper the 3-day round trip that will be required to return and rescue Dahmer.
There are also accounts of more intelligent foes in the path along the way. Allowing more glory, but yet more danger.
The squad packs for a normal load for the 3-day trek and heads back towards the burning city of Karlsburg. After a day’s travel, the squad approaches the remaining bridge that spans across the Tigeria River thanks to the actions of the Cinder King’s troops.
The bridge has blockades, trappings, ramparts, and obstacles indicative of some sort of defensible route. With no other choice, the squad regardless approaches the bridge. About ⅓ across the bridge, the squad notes that there is a disturbance in the smoke. Looking closer, the squad notes that there appears to be a gathering of civilians and a set of carts that are hurrying away from the burning city. Drawing the horses and carts forwards, they are moving through the heavy rain, amidst the cacophony of the regular lightning strikes. They hurry towards and start to cross over the bridge. Amongst the peoples there are a mix of backgrounds and heritages, from labourers to nobles, from mercenaries to children. The high sided wagons, are being pulled by not enough horses, requiring persons to help move.
Grey Sleeping Storm indicates to the squad to move out of sight to observe, apart from Garnet Growing (Rookie) to allow them to approach and gain information as they close the distance.
Garnet waits until the civilian party gets within 10m and jumps out in front of the party. With frying pan in hand, he looks for someone that is eating for an icebreaker… However, Garnet realises that none of the people have food, and in fact, look very gaunt. Many of the party just ignore this new individual in their path and continue onwards past him, paying Garnet no heed. Garnet waits until a member comes close and pulls on their sleeve.
Garnet asks what the party is moving from, and asks the location of “The Last Drop” tavern. The man jumps and with terror yelps. Others in the party finally are aware of the new individual’s presence and start shouting, “Hey, soldier boy, do you have some food? We haven’t eaten in days.”. Garnet with quick thinking says that he is just out of food and is, in fact, attempting to fish. The small mob believes his ruse, mumbling “He doesn’t have a lick of food on him”, and restart moving on further.
Other civilians in the crowd perk up on this exchange and enquire on why Garnet is looking for “The Last Drop”. Replying that he’s looking for a friend. Members of the crowd say, “Come with us, we will show you the truth”, with Garnet saying I wanna go that way, not the way you’re going. A couple members start moving forward, in a menacing way. Garnet starts moving backwards, using the frying pan as a shield, “Stay back, I wanted to cook a fish in this!” One of them pulls out a truncheon and the other bends down to initiate a tackle.
Colay Liavelich (Rookie) spots an old friend in the crowd, Alan. So he jumps out and starts shouting “Alan! Alan!”. Alan (possibly) doesn’t respond, he has blank glassy eyes, his glorious beard has not been brushed in the last hour.
Garnet tries to use this distraction to take a swipe with the frying pan against the individuals that are encroaching. He swings too late and the one tackling takes Garnet onto the ground. The one with the truncheon runs in quickly. Garnet manages to wriggle out of the hold.
Grey sets up an intimidation shot and attempts to ping a shot off the frying pan. The shots pings down the frying pan and gets deflected by the Garnet’s helmet. Reina Aurora Martiko (Medic) jumps out into sight and shouts, “In the name of Zora, Chosen of the Living God, I, Reina Aurora Martiko command you all to hold!”. Some of the crowd stop, six heads snap towards Aurora, eyes boring into her. Someone whispers, “I’m so, so sorry”. It can be seen that these individuals all have the same vacant stare, with deep cuts and scars showing from underneath their tattered clothes.
A man starts hefting an arm-length burning branch. This man appears to be more animated compared to the rest. Grey with his keen sniper eyes spots that this individual has a lower cut to his robes and notes that there is a small differently-coloured flesh disc the size of a coin sown into the skin of his chest using tendinous, large sutures.
Aurora realising this is going to be a fight, and remembering potential rumours of effectiveness of holy symbols upon members of the broken. She unhooks her holy symbol, wraps it around her hand and prepares to charge.
Grey readies to fire, “Oh for fuck’s sake”. Upon hearing this, Aurora charges to distract the crowd allowing Grey to fire unhindered. He hits the circle of skin on the Wagon Man. The disc starts undergoing necrosis.
Colay corrals the other rookies to fire as the crowd charges. Seeing the face of Alan charge him, the rookies shoot and down a number of the crowd. His heart strings are tugged as he watches Alan fall to the ground.
Aurora meets headlong into the members closing on Garnet. She hits one of the crowd, there is a flash of recognition and terror before the eyes glaze over again and they return attack and hit her head. Her head rings to the face of the blow.
Colay sees Alan fall to the ground, drops his rusty musket, draws a dagger and charges at the rest of the crowd. Leading the rest of the rookies including Garnet, who drops the frying pan to draw a knife, into the fray. The opponents are fairly trivial in terms of fighting, the rookies managing to fight off the group and clears an area around Alan. Colay looks down at Alan’s face, with tears dropping down his face onto Alan’s glorious beard. Alan appears to be still alive, eyes glazed, breathing shallowly, with red stains slowly spreading from the various puncture holes from the musket fire. Colay’s sobs over his dying friend are heard throughout the skirmish.
Garnet seeing that there may be a hasty escape soon, drops down and picks up his frying pan with his off-hand, ready to move.
Grey seeing that the Wagon Man has not reappeared, marshals the rookies to line up in a firing line to pepper the wagon with shot in the aim to injure or at least flush the Wagon Man out of the wagon. However due to the distractions of dying friends, due to the distractions of reclaiming frying pans, due to the rain, the muskets misfire and a only some shots hit the wagon. The wagon drapes fall away due the shots, the Wagon Man appears to be holding the burning brand, which is now glowing an otherworldly glow. He holds the brand over the contents of the wagon, a large pile of explosives. Grey manages to squeeze of one more shot, hitting the Wagon Man causing him to be unstable.
Aurora seeing this man with the brand reeling, but herself reeling from the concussion from before decides in the short time to charge forward to try and also shoot the man off the wagon. Garnet comes to support her clearing a way for Aurora to get past. Aurora takes the cleared route, and runs up to the wagon, unloading half her clip to destabilise the Wagon Man even more, whilst he murmurs “I’m so sorry”. A burst of heat splashes across his face.
Grey sees this opportunity, takes a deep breath and takes a shot, missing. Seeing the situation starting to slip, Grey takes another shot, managing to clip Aurora with the shot, but manages to hit the Wagon Man in the head, ending his life. As this happens, the rest of the crowd appears to fall and stops moving.
Alan’s eyes return to his beautiful green as they lock onto the eyes above him, “Colay?”. His head lulls and moves for the final town. Colay’s massive sob echoes across the now empty bridge. He cuts off an inch of Alan’s glorious beard as a keepsake. “Can we bury him sir? I knew him from before.”
Grey realising the noise that has been created as part of this commotion, ushers the whole squad to double-time it across the rest of the bridge towards Karlsburg. The squad enters the city. The city is in flames, many buildings are barely holding their structure, shambling figures are seen in the smoke, screams echo out from buildings and distances alike.
The squad moves forwards through the city, picking out a path between the burning buildings and attempting to avoid the shambling figures. Progress is slow, but at least it is made. The squad makes it to a manor house and its grounds, they scavenge what little is left in the area. From the manor grounds, “The Last Drop” can be seen. The squad decides to wait until nighttime before investigating the tavern.
Garnet searches the manor and finds a fully functioning kitchen. Relishing the time available, Garnet uses the time to use the scavenged food materials to create an allotment bruschetta and potato mash. The squad takes rest recovering from the nice meal prepared from Garnet. One can almost forget that they are in a burning city as they’re in this mansion sharing a well cooked meal.
As sleep is taking the squad as some keep watch, a crash of masonry accompanied by a flash of light is experienced. A large cry is heard. The squad spots a number of beings sitting atop the fallen steeple of a church tower. A number of smaller winged beings with a wingspan as large as a person is tall. Surrounding a much larger glowing being that is over twice the size of the others. Rumours of such beings are passed between the Legion. They appear to be looking around the area of the city, searching for something of interest. The squad considers these beings and think that these beings are similar to stories of the rainbow creatures that were in the service of the Bartan Goddess, Vazara.
Aurora hands out an Owlsight Oil to the squad in case it is needed. She talks to Colay as well, trying untactfully to soothe his woes about Alan. So she gives him a emotion dampener to aid in his control as the squad moves out just before daybreak towards “The Last Drop”.
The squad moves quickly through the grounds of the manor, towards the tavern. They head towards the courtyard that houses the tavern. As they move, one of the smaller beasts unfurl, presumably noticing and being alerted to some of the movement. Colay reacting quickly to the movement, picks up a piece of rubble and throws as far as he can away from the rest of the squad. The clash of the rock on the masonry distracts the alerted beast, which flys off in that direction to investigate. The squad rushes forward using the opportunity to reach the tavern
The scene opens on a lone scout. Left behind by the retreating Legion, as they were returning from the town of Hearthold. With pressing news of the Cinder King’s forces of shambling undead moving eastwards towards the town of Karlsburg. With no horse for his use, he moves forwards dodging the forces by foot. We catch glimpses of the rooftops of various cities, over the canopy of the forests, along the cliff edges.
Confronting many of the forces of the Cinder King, this takes a toll on Diego Renault (Scout 2), fatiguing him in his own retreat. He’s losing time, the Legion will retreat from their current position soon, he needs to speed up. He comes across a wild mare, scrounging for some supplies, he offers an array of treats for this mare (oats, truffles…), which takes to him instantly.
As the wind whips through his hair, he spots the skyline of Karlsburg coming up in the distance. Coming up to the outskirts of Karlsburg, Diego dismounts and lovingly pats the horse, thanking them for their service. Climbing upon to the roofs of the buildings, he moves between them towards the meet up point, “The Last Drop” tavern.
Due to his fatigue, his movements were not as gentle as he would like, gaining the attention of large feathered red beasts. Remembering his previous times in the city, he weaves and dodges throughout the alleyways, managing to break line of sight, and the beast moves onwards to other easier prey. Reaching “The Last Drop”, an old guard post and the rendezvous point, he finds it empty, clearly left in a hurry. Untying the large red bandana from his head, Diego ties the bandana to the top of the old tower letting it fly in the wind.
The scene cuts to the distance, the legion Spymaster pulls out his Orite spyglass, and looks back at the town of Karlsburg. He turns to a legionnaire standing next to him, “Send for a squad, we have a mission.”
Diego waits over the next couple days, the city starts burning around him. Due to his fatigued state, he holed up in “The Last Drop” to continue the long wait. He also realises that these feathered beasts come and go and appear to hunt for something, possibly for him. He continues to wait.
The scene shifts back to the squad, they are rushing through the empty courtyard towards the tavern. Makit (Rookie) is first to the door, pushes the door open. The draft of fresh air flows into the tavern. Diego reclaims the bandana, “Glad to see you all”.
Grey responds, “I hope that intel you have is worth it”.
“Don’t worry, it’s definitely worth a few lives”.
Grey looks out the window, eyes searching for the feathered beasts. The rain lashes against the window making it hard to see. Amongst the shadows cast by the lightning, silhouettes of the smaller beasts, but there is no sign of the larger beast.
Guessing that Grey is looking for an opportunity to run, Diego relays the observations that he has seen over the last few days. Previously it was only the smaller beasts that were present and they were there in short burst, but something changed overnight. There is a larger beast, shimmering a slight silver, at least twice, maybe three times larger than the other smaller birds. The city is easier to move as it has started to burn out in certain areas, and Diego notes a number of routes that he has identified to move through the city. There is the Castle, the best protection, but there are still undead in the area. The Merchant’s Quarter may have some supplies, still has some cover, but Diego has seen a lesser presence of shamblers. The direct route is quickest, but there is the least amount of cover.
Diego relays this information to the squad leader. Grey realises speed is of the essence, but some cover is required. The Castle route appears to be the best option.
The squad heads out of the tavern, into the lash of the falling rain. The hissing of evaporating water on the burning buildings comes from all around them. Lightning flashes often casting shadows that counter the light from the flames. They move quickly through the outer city, towards the wall that divides the inner and outer rings of the castle fortifications. The gate appears to be seized due to damage, force does not appear to budge it at all. The shambling undead around the area has started to notice the noise that the group is making, and starts to move towards the sounds.
Retreating to shelter of a nearby building, the squad discusses the options to move forward. The wall looks to be the height of around 3 people, there are none of the stairs in sight. With speed still being an issue, the squad comes up to the idea to create a makeshift ladder to try and make it across. Diego, Garnet, and Grey start moving out to find materials that would be rigged to make this ladder. Grey keeps an eye out for the scroungers, allowing Diego to pick out his way back to the old carpenter’s workshop. Opening the door, they are presented to many intact materials that would be useful in this construction. Since the coast is clear, the three of them gather enough supplies and move back to the site of the wall where the rest of the squad is waiting.
Garnet looks at the items, starts strapping the materials together to create this climbing frame. In Garnet’s fervour, Diego has to stop him utilising some of the rotten, burnt, or weakened materials. It takes a bit more time than intended to get this contraption together. The squad throws the ladder on the wall, and Grey directs the squad to move quickly over the wall.
Garnet happily scoots up their own construction. The wall is about 3-4ft wide, and there is a 20ft drop the other side. He has a view of the other side of the wall, a large collection of wood and timber buildings that are in various stages of fiery deconstruction.
Diego moves to the top of the wall, and takes aim with the bow and arrow, taking a shot at the closer undead. As the front line of undead drops, the remaining undead surge forward as they sense the blood in the air. Violet (Rookie) and Colay (Rookie) are caught in the back. Garnet seeing his sister being in the arms of the danger, fires off a shot from his loaded musket to take out some of the closer bodies, toppling the rest of them. Violet and Colay use the time that they have been given to move forward to the ladder.
Grey seeing that the squad is making a load of sound due to the musket fire anyway, starts shouting and directing the rookies to move it up the ladder, Aurora stabilising the ladder, chivving them up quickly.
The squad moves over the wall, into the outer edges of the town. Many of the buildings have collapsed, providing some cover from the elements, but give no more cover from other obstacles. The feathered beasts can be seen to be circling overhead in the dredge. The squad huddles in another building to decide how to progress next.
Ahead of the squad, towards the Castle, the ground shows the marks of the distracting siege that Zora led a week prior. The smoldering remains of the cannons used, the churned mud, the scattered rubble, and a smoke column rising from the storehouse of the Castle lie ahead.
The Sniper sees the open ground in front of us, pulls out a number of their ammo. Suggests to Garnet to rig up an explosive device to cause a distraction such that the squad and sprint off across the land.
Garnet sets up this second contraption with the guidance of Diego for the best place to create the distraction. Mistiming the length of the fuse, Garnet becomes impatient and starts heading back to the contraption to check. As he draws close, the bomb goes off, knocking Garnet off his feet, back 10ft, his head impacts the floor hard.
Two of the feathered beasts definitely notice the explosion, land amongst the rubble and start furiously digging through it. Through his haze of vision, Garnet notes that these beasts look emaciated, and appear to consist of leathery skin taut over a bone skeleton.
Under instruction from the squad leader, the medic and a rookie moves forward to grab Garnet. Aurora unhooks another tonic from her belt, shoving it down Garnet’s throat. He feels the liquid slide down his gullet, his head clearing, at least for now. Grey shouts out to the whole squad to move it. They book it across the land towards the Castle.
As the first members of the squad reach the Castle, a large thump, a shockwave lands on the ground behind. A howl echoes from behind, a wave of nausea flows across the members, causing them to fall to the ground and retch. Looking back, a large silvery beast looks towards the squad members, with the other smaller beings coming to join the leader.
Aurora picks themselves up from the ground, starts shouting and encouraging the other two members at the back to move forward into the gate. Garnet and Kaviya hearing the sound of her voice, start crawling and stumbling forward, just as a claw from the silver beast grasps at the ground where they once were.
Grey and Diego note that there is a tower just inside the castle. They head up to the top of the tower and take aim at the silver beast. Diego peppers the beast with a number of arrows to distract and disorientate the being. Grey takes a few deep breaths, breathes out, steadies his aim, blocks out his surroundings, and takes a shot. The black shot leaves his barrel, smoke trail billowing out behind the flying piece of metal. It impacts on the beast’s temple penetrating. With a scream, the beast still appears to survive, but starts rise into the sky. Grey has to stop Diego from launching himself off the tower onto the beast with a small hand axe.
The squad moves into the keep and notes the remains the chapel and a storehouse. The creature returns and attacks the tower where the squad used to be. Digging through the rubble of the storehouse, the squad finds the route that the Ember Wolves previously came into the castle with. Climbing down into the sewer system of the castle, the Ghost Owls retrace the route out of the system. Out of the sewer, the trees lining the route out of the sewer outlet are bereft of the bodies that the Ember Wolves had noted. Moving towards and between the trees of the forest, the squad picks up the body of Alan, placing him inside the wagon of explosives, and manually pushes this wagon back to the legion.
As the group comes back to the camp (2 Intel + Scout), they note the second squad trudging into the temporary camp at the same time. They look dejected, showing signs of a furious battle, two of their number missing from the Star Vipers (Mission succeeded. 2 dead, Level 2 harm to specialists. Gained 1 intel and Removed 1 time). Both squads move slowly through the mud into the camp. Upon reporting to the Legion leaders, the Ghost Owls and Diego (new Scout) provide the two pieces of Intel. The Star Vipers pass on the news of the two dead, the injuries the rest have gained, but the information that Intel and they did manage to obtain allowed the Legion to move faster than expected. During their mission they encountered a grove, where a figure appeared to be hanging corpses onto the trees that were glowing a dull spectral red. The Star Vipers, deciding that this could not be left to continue, launched themselves forward. The dead corpses levered themselves off the trees counterattacking and causing a resistance. During the fierce battle that ensues, they lose two of their number, but manage to chase off the figure conducting the ritual.
The squads move out of the tent and time moves into the evening, towards the evening meal. Both squads compare notes, grumbles are heard, and shouts start growing from the troops. After a while, many of the two squads move as a group to the Legion Commander’s tent. They state angrily that they will refuse to return to the battlefield with the captains that led them for the last mission. The losses that happened were due to the incompetence of their captains.
The Marshall stands from the meeting that the leaders were having, and addresses the rookies. He signals to the rest of the leaders to continue, he will have to placate these troops.
From the other side of the camp, Zora moves through the various rookies towards the Commander’s tent. Swapping greetings with the Marshall, she continues onwards and enters the Commander’s tent.
Zora relays that she believes she has identified the individual leading the chasing legion, applying pressure to the retreating forces. She believes it was the previous Chosen, Priestess Minika Arya, now a Broken. The Commander and our Chosen quickly discuss, and decide that they should move onwards to the agrarian town of Plainsworth. Zora offers to go forward before the rest of the Legion, to figure out the options to go forward. Contessa Severina Zardani (Commander) agrees on this plan, Zora looking annoyed that she was not argued with to stay with the Legion to fight, but she salutes and moves quickly out of the tent, presumably to push forward as agreed.
The Marshall rushes back into the tent, confers with Sapphire Growing (Quartermaster) to allow the whole Legion some liberty to reduce the stress that they all feel. Patrick Curtis (Spymaster) reports back that the spy network is on the verge of being expanded, as well as his idea that he’s drawing up plans to lay a trap for the next infamous that they encounter. Looking towards the Commander, the Marshall takes his orders about moving the legion the next day. The evening is spent in liberty, but as the morning comes, the Legion is ready to move.
Without too much pressure at this point, the Legion does not push their horses hard, they move with pace, towards Plainsworth. Rumours flow through the Legion and the surrounding civilian backdrop of this area of the creature that is chasing the Legion. The Broken, Priestess Minika Arya, is dubbed a number of names as the rumours fly through people as the stories are embellished. The Storm-breaker, Bringer of Thunder, the Weather Witch, the Undead Priestess. Patrick starts counter-rumours to try and head off the desperation that these names instill: Lightning Lacey, Rainy Rianna (No umbrella), Drizzling Dierdre, Spitting Susan
The Legion makes good progress throughout the day, they arrive near Plainsworth. It is clear that there is a makeshift refugee camp outside of the town itself. The Legion draws close and sets up camp nearby the other camp. The Spymaster heads towards and into the town of Plainsworth in search for information and the Chosen.
Plainsworth appears to no longer be the jewel of the agrarian landscape that it was once known. The town appears to be partially abandoned, many of the remaining buildings being taken over by squatters and refugees. Many of the faces look dejected, whilst there are also some in denial, attempting to continue their days as they currently stand.
Zora is found in the local inn, now mostly abandoned, waiting impatiently for the rest of the leaders to arrive. She looks eager to rejoin the troops, but quickly relays the options she has identified whilst the Legion was arriving.
There are three options:
Calling on the intel that the Commander has access to, information is unearthed about the invitation.
The Marshall has to continue to manage the discourse of the troops, so the other leaders discuss and choose to conduct Mission 2 (primary) with the Heavy, Officer, Medic, and Shattered Lions, and Mission 1 (secondary) with Scout (Diego), +??, and Silver Stags.
The Marshall bursts back into the Command Tent. Closely followed by Zora, she turns to the Marshall and states, “Organise me an escort to this damn ball”. Flustered, he turns to the other leaders. Accepting the piece of paper that has the suggestions, he flippantly just accepts the recommendations. Adding another name to the secondary mission, the Sniper. As he believes the stories of the Sniper and Scout (Diego) working well together from the previous mission…
The orders were passed down through the Legion. The members required for the primary mission are told to gear up. To create a statement, the suggestion is to bring and display the heaviest gear.
The heavily armoured Shattered Lions, specialists, and Zora moves through the town. Moving up the slope towards the mansion in the centre of the town. Music echoes out from the building, slowly growing louder as the troops approach.
The well-to-do of Plainsworth appear to be continuing with their lifestyle. As the squad reaches closer, they notice a line of people waiting to enter the grounds, a line of guards are noted lazily leaning on their halberds, keeping watch. They are made up of people who are too old or too young to have been conscripted. The guards see the squad approach, and open the gates allowing the squad to move through to the grounds and up to the house.
A guard sees the members to the front of the house, opening the door. A Master of Ceremonies looks up. Seeing who is coming through the door, quickly tidies up the scrolls that he has in front of him, readjusting his mask as he comes close to the approaching Chosen. “Welcome. Welcome to the house of the Viscount Leon Rodano”. Pushing the doors open through to the thrumbing room, announcing to the room, “The Chosen Zora, and her entourage”.
The squad moves through the door at the gesturing of the Master of Ceremonies. The other guests turn to stare at this group of soldiers that have turned up to this ball in full armour.
Zora turns to the rest of the group, suggesting that splitting up to create the best impression across a large number of people quickly. The Rookie Twins (Melislav & Adrimir Isalanaevich) The Officer, hiding his disdain of this situation under his mask, turns to the squad and says, “You two stay with the Chosen. The rest of you… *Mingle*”.
Freriya (Heavy) looks around, spots an individual that was previously throwing a slight look of disgust to the group. Marches straight up to the man, and demands that they dance. She takes the man’s hand, drags him towards the dance floor. She insists on leading the dance, but this seems to cause havoc in the middle of the stage. As the first few steps continue to collide, she realises that this person is none other Maleksei Daniovich, a childhood rival. He shouts out, “Is that you, Colayovna?”. Realising she has been recognised, she pulls away, returning to the squad, “Well, I mingled.”
The Lion Twins are flanking either side of Zora, walking up to a group, she introduces herself. One of the nobles appears to jibe at Zora’s armour. Bristling with outrage, Adrimir spouts some incensed description of readiness for battle. Melislav glowers at man as his brother states this. The man, under the pressure of the twins, he realises that the Twins make a good point.
Aurora (Medic) moves through the crowd, using her noble background to move through the crowds quickly. She comes across a Dame from one of the Guided Halls. Swapping information, they discuss the findings of the undead and alchemical knowledge. The Dame provides a recipe for a concoction that she has developed. Stating that it is an alchemical tonic that in fact cleanses corruption.
Elrik (Officer) *mingles* through the crowd. He makes a beeline to the lowest of the “nobility” here, looking for practical personnel that have been invited to attend. He impresses on them the practicality of the situation. The fact that the Legion being present being close allows them some more protection than without the Legion. He finds a group of landowners, guardsmen, including the one who owns the land where the Silver Stags have headed off to for the supply mission. Elrik continues with the conversations with the various practical persons about moving onwards to the east, to move away from the approaching Cinder King’s legions. The conversation gets heated. Whilst Elrik manages to convince the people in the conversation, the loud discussion does draw the eyes and disapproval of other members of the party.
As time passes during the party, the music appears to come to a close. The Master of Ceremonies moves through the whole room from one end to the other. Coming to a stop next to a set of large double doors. He pushes them open to reveal a second large room, “Please come through to the ballroom.”
In the other room, up in a box overlooking the ballroom, people overlook interestedly at the squad walking by themselves into the ballroom. An individual dressed in all white and black, with a long-nosed presumably corvid mask gestures broadly, “Welcome! It is good to see you all on my return. I have so much to talk to you all about”
“It is a great honour for us today for the Chosen to be among us! Lady Zora, welcome to my home. It is my disappointment that I am not able to host you in a nicer time and circumstance. As it were, I believe it is imperative that we get to know each other”.
Zora looks uncomfortable with the direct attention, thinking quickly about this social situation, she responds positively. Reminding all in attendance that they are here to battle the Cinder King. The Twins usher the Chosen into a seat. The Viscount suggests a practical demonstration of the power of the Legion. Suggests that Zora fight a candidate of the Viscount’s choosing. Turning to one of his servants, he gestures, and some house “knights” appear with weapons.
Zora turns to her specialists, enquiring if she should accept. The Officer and the Medic suggest that she would be too powerful, and to demonstrate the strength of the legion, Aurora recommends the Rookies.
The Viscount looks disappointed that Zora herself is not fighting, but reluctantly agrees. He waves a hand and security window shutters, door portcullises, and steel doors fall into place securing the room. He gestures for the rest of the guests to move towards the other adjoining room to view the duel. The Twins get a talking to from Elrik about working together, keeping defences interlocked, demonstrating the discipline of the Legion.
The Twins confer between themselves on what they’re up to, and decide to both charge “the bald one”. They charge forward, stunning the first opponent, and turn towards the second. The second opponent has slightly better form, managing to get a hit in on Adrimir before Melislav knocks out the second. They roar the battle cry of the Shattered Lions, revelling in the scattered applause of the crowd.
The Viscount snarkily trash-talks the fight. Elrik counters, annoyed, telling the Viscount that it was his suggestion. The Viscount steers the conversation to a beast that he has apparently found on his travels, suggesting that the squad fights this creature. The Viscount gestures, metal grates appear to start lower across the windows. Elrik orders the Rookies to arm up with their muskets, he turns to Zora, “This farce has gone on long enough, I suggest that we end this”. Zora confirms, and as they prepare to take out the Viscount, he says, “So I might be able to see you fight after all”. A roar emanates from the curtains below the Viscount’s box, and as they draw aside, two hulking, four legged beasts can be seen, that are…. Lions? They look mangey, and are almost certainly dead.
A quick flashback occurs back to a scene in the Quartermaster’s tent. Elrik is slipping him a bottle in exchange for some of the off-the-books black shot. However, the Quartermaster is a miser. An exasperated Elrik is given a single black shot in return.
The squad draws their weapons. Elrik coordinates the Rookies to draw their muskets to fire a volley and then switch to their melee weapons. Mentioning that if one of them happens to “mistakenly” shoot the Viscount, they’ll get double rum rations for the month. The Rookies however fumble between their melee weapons, shields, and muskets and allow the lions time to advance. Not only that, Zora appears to break rank, starting to move quickly towards the enemy, in the way of the musket barrels.
Aurora, thinks back throughout the mansion, and during the events earlier in the evening, she has been discussing the decorations of the house which included a taxidermy lion. Pulling out of the book from before, she demonstrates to the firing line where to shoot to damage the musculature of the lions.
Elrik marshalls the squad again and they take the shot at the last minute. Elrik lands a hit, along with Adrimir, who does beautifully and manages to spin a shot that ricochets from the female lion towards the Viscount. The shot manages to clip the Viscount, but he moves inhumanly out of the way of the line of the shot, which lands destructively in the face of the person next to him. A splash of blood and gore sprays out from the landing shot, colouring the previously white clothes of the Viscount.
The remaining male lion charges Freriya, breaching through her range of attack, allowing her to swing down savagely in exchange for a swipe that destroys the integrity of the arm guard.
The Viscount gestures to a remaining individual next to him. The other individual pulls off the cover to an item, an Octagonal Lantern, a frame of steel and glass. It starts shining out in a caustic light, obscuring the view of the item within the frame. Zora, mid-step in her charge towards the Viscount, finds that her legs twist out from under her, she crashes to the ground on the far end of the room.
The Rookie Twins launch forward. In coordination, they swing towards the testes of the lion. They manage to finish off the second lion, a load of pus spurts out of the wound as they finish it off, landing on the Twins, causing lasting burns.
Elrik takes command of the situation, directs the squad to enact a number of actions: The Medic to Zora, rest to reload and look for a way out. The squad jumps and starts on the orders, the Medic attempts to move forward, Melislav throws a grappling hook towards the balcony, Freriya heads back to the barred doors back into the previous room.
As Aurora moves forward, it feels to her that the distance does not decrease. Suddenly, the caustic light gets covered. As eyes readjust, Aurora stumbles forward suddenly reaching Zora. A voice floats down from the Viscount, “That’ll do, that’ll do. We have found out enough. We have no more need for these guests.”
Adrimir follows the order to shoot. Leading the rest of the rookies, they fire a hail towards the bearer of the item. The shot lands on the head of the holder, the person slowly turns, and slowly slumps to the floor, inhumanly so, no living creature would die so slowly. A second individual comes and picks up the artifact and moves out of view.
Melislav climbs up the rope to the balcony, and finds that there is a doorway leading to the passageway via this balcony.
Aurora looks over Zora, she appears to recognise the item that the Viscount had with him.
The squad hears a hiss in the room that the local onlookers were present in, with the portcullis dividing them from the squad. It is suspected that some sort of gas is spreading within the adjoining room with the locals, which has presumably negative consequences
With the Viscount moving presumably towards the wing behind the balcony, the gas spreading in the room where the locals are, Zora being still disorientated, and time being of the essence, the squad turns to Elrik to gain their orders.
Elrik directs Adrimir and the other rookies on the floor to shoot out the far windows of the gassed room, and Freriya to redirect her wrecking gear to the portcullis to free the locals.
Adrimir leads the other three rookies forward to shoot at the windows. They are mostly successful in their endeavours. However, as the shots continue, he notices that his eyes start feeling heavy, the barrel of the musket starts to drop. Realising that Alika (Rookie) next to him was also starting to do the same, he moves to keep her from falling and keep her attention on the orders. Adrimir gestures for all of the rookies to move back away from the seeping gas through the portcullis, reporting successful completion of the orders.
Freriya, seeing that the rookies have moved away from the doors, charges through the gas to get the portcullis open. She takes a deep breath and tears the opening apart. However she realises that has to hold the opening wide for the locals to stream past. Freriya’s eyes start to droop as she also realises that she has started to lose sensation in her extremities. Many of the locals move out of the room, but there are some that appear to be convulsing on the floor of the trapped room.
Elrik looks around at the situation, he directs people to get the windows open towards the garden. Turning up to Melislav on the balcony, “Find out where the Viscount has gone”.
Nervously, Melislav realises that he is alone and has been directed to follow the Viscount. Keeping his distance, Melislav keeps his distance but manages to keep the path the retreating Viscount has taken. As he comes to the third corner, one of the Viscount’s followers turns unnaturally quickly, draws a weapon and moves quickly back towards the tail.
Melislav realising that he’s been rumbled, moves back towards the corner, waits for the escort to come to the corner, and prepares to swing half the family sword at the enemy. He times it well, rushes out and swings hard, sure to connect. Surprisingly the crow-faced guard almost flutters back out of the power swing. Off-balance, the escort rushes back within the swing of the sword, jabbing hard with the dagger. Melislav sees the attacks coming, and manages to twist and turn to deflect the blade, but loses grip on his shield by doing so.
Switching back to the main ballroom, Elrik marches over to Aurora and Zora, and inquires about the state of the Chosen. Informing that Zora is likely on the recovery, as once the artifact light was covered the various symptoms seemed to start recovering. Elrik mentions that we need to move Zora asap due to the gas. Aurora is surprised and asks permission to go help the remaining locals in the gassed room. Elrik nods, and Aurora moves quickly towards the room, whilst Elrik picks up the bleary Zora and moves towards the door to the garden.
Aurora moves towards the portcullis that is held by Freriya, pulling out two vials from her bandolier. Popping both, she downs one, and thrusts the other down Freriya’s throat as she passes through the opening to aid the remaining downed citizens. With Freriya’s help, Aurora with some difficulty, manages to treat and pull the citizens out of the gas.
Letting the portcullis crash as the last local is dragged out of the room, Freriya turns her attention to the window shutters and starts attempting to force them open, aided by the rookies. A small hole appears in the security features, and the squad aids the locals in moving out of the ballroom.
The viewpoint moves back to Melislav. Realising that he’s probably outclassed against this opponent, chooses to flee. As he takes the first step, he realises that to make good time in his heavy armour, he just has to rush. Unfortunately with this decision, his movement path is fairly predictable and a crash of thunder can be heard as a pistol shot cracks out. The impact of the shot hits Melislav in the back of the chest flooring him.
The rest of the squad hears this sound back in the ballroom, Adrimir reacts quickly and moves towards the sound of the pistol, and where his brother is. Elrik realising what may have happened, instructs Zora and the rookies to coordinate the remaining locals out through the window, and the remaining members to follow the quickly moving Adrimir.
Moving quickly, Adrimir reaches his brother in good time, just as the crow-mask comes to stand over his brother, starting to aim the pistol. Melislav, realising that Adrimir is present, distracts and destabilises the guard, whilst Adrimir lines up a shot. The musket shot hits the guard squarely, and the body appears to deflate from the shot as the robes crumple to the ground.
The rest of the squad catches up. Upon treatment by Aurora, Melislav insists that he is fine to continue, and points towards the room which he saw the Viscount enter. Elrik coordinates an attack into the room. The squad charges into the room dispatching the guards in the room, as they notice the Viscount in a gilded cage that appears to be of Orite manufacture, which starts moving downwards.
Aurora quickly moves to the control mechanism and through her haze of concussion, pulls on the wires managing to slow the contraption. Meanwhile, Elrik jumps onto the top of the elevator, and supported by Melislav, attempts to reach over the side of the lift and attempts to shoot into the box.
The elevator judders and Elrik loses his footing and falls off the top of the elevator box, grabs unto the side of the cage. The Viscount starts picking apart Elrik’s grip to make him fall down the rest of the shaft that falls down into darkness. Melislav sees this and dives into the shaft and manages to reduce the speed of Elrik’s fall.
Upon seeing the desperation of the situation, Aurora turns to Adrimir asking, “Can you shoot upside down?”. Adrimir confirms he can, and they jump down onto the top of the box. Aurora turns to Melislav and asks for help to hold Adrimir’s weight to dangle him to take the shot.
As Adrimir drops across the edge of the box, he sees the back of the Viscount. Having loaded the single black shot bullet that he had been given, he takes aim, and pulls the trigger. His gaze follows the line of the black shot out of the barrel, through the box of the elevator, into the back of the Viscount’s head. As he sees the spray of gore, he feels the grips on his legs loosen, and he subsequently finds himself falling towards the floor to join the Officer at the bottom of the shaft.
Melislav lunges towards his brother, and also slips off the oily surface of the box. Followed by Aurora, grabbing Melislav as he falls. The three of them fall to the bottom of the shaft in a large thump. Freriya enters the lift and presses the button to move downwards.
With the sounds of their own groaning, the squad at the bottom of the shaft realise that there are other groans that are not theirs. Elrik pulls out the flare gun and shoots towards where he thinks the sound is. The flare hits with a metallic clang against a sheet of metal. As the flare sputters to life, the scene unfolds in the growing light. A being’s silhouette can be seen, a being made of a number of corpses. It appears to be made of a number of bodies bolted to other bodies, forming a large 14ft creature. The three heads move around, one tracks the sputtering flare, one looking towards the squad in the lift shaft.
Reacting to the sounds in the lift shaft, the beast starts moving towards the source of the sound. Melislav pulls out the remaining oil and passes it to the members that have functional shoulders. Adrimir with the best shot throws the oil successfully on the creature. Freriya arrives at the lowest floor and spots the shambling beast. She pulls out a flare gun, and hearing Elrik’s instruction and also the offering for a second flare gun, she repeatedly shoots the beast, igniting it.
The beast slows in its movements, but still continues to move towards the group. Aurora, seeing the approaching burning effigy, drags the wounded Adrimir along with the rest of the squad, to the bottom lip of the elevator box. She pushes Adrimir up into the box, saying, “Up! Up! Up!”. The rest of the squad moves up into the box quickly and as Aurora pulls her into the box, and jabs the button, falls back unconscious.
As the elevator arrives at the next floor up, grasping hands appear at the edge of the elevator shaft. The squad moves quickly out of the box and turns back and drops the elevator on the being.
Moving through the house, the squad returns to the other half of the members and the Chosen. There appears to be bodies of the other crow-guards around the Chosen, who appears to be holding a box. Elrik reports that the Viscount has been dealt with, but the artifact was lost, and that there is a creature in the basement, and suggests burning this whole building. Zora confirms that she has managed to secure the artifact, and confirms the order to burn everything.
The Shattered Lions carry out burning the building, and then return the Legion.
The other squad of the Silver Stags report that on their return from the outlying land, they faced opposition. Villagers demanding food assailed the convoy and started a riot, and some bad apples in the convoy also struck some blows, killing 2 Stags (human stags). The convoy owner gives some supplies to the Stags who return to camp.
Whilst the Viscount’s manor continues to burn in the evening light, Zora strides into the Commander’s tent still holding the artefact, which she pops on the table in front of them. Sitting at one end of the table, and wearing her ceremonial (now blood-spattered) armour, and the core greet her back, observing her state of general disrepair. She indicates the artefact is worrying, part of something/someone she wasn’t expecting to see again, or how it got where it was. 300 years ago she fought alongside another Chosen (Oysingra). When they slayed the Emperor, the other Chosen was nowhere to be seen and it’s unclear what happened to her afterwards - but part of her seems to have been corrupted and is with us now in the box. It’s an eye in the box, and the observation is there may be a lot more corrupted parts out there (unless only eyes are interesting in piece-form). Ah, she was a seer/oracle. Which makes a little more sense.
The horned one, the living god and Askira are the ones we know remain, but we know little of the lost/broken ones. The Loremaster therefore asks if this eye belongs to a Lost or a Broken? Zora restates the point that the Cinder King is only a recent thing - Oysingra to defeat the Emperor some time ago, the 9 chosen now are only recently chosen to fight the new threat. The Loremaster also asks if chosens replace fallen ones so there’s always 9 including new ones, but Zora can’t answer for the gods. It’s unclear exactly what happened to her (Oysingra), when she died, etc. - whether this eye was unearthed long after death, who knows. Maybe she’s Broken. Maybe she’s still around with one eye? Either way we have to investigate. Loremaster says, best case scenario, the King and his entourage have found her dead body. That makes Zora wilt a little and worries what the reality is.
Zora suggests sticking a bunch of engineers, mercies, alchemists on the job to do some serious teamworking investigation. The Loremaster asks why she thinks it’s an eye - Zora says she saw it and she wouldn’t recommend it looking at him. The Loremaster recalls an antidote to corruption was found recently, and may be of use in this respect, Zora doesn’t disagree to an extent. Zora suggests finding/recruiting an alchemist, and it’s time for the Lorekeeper to spin a yarn for them. Zora picks up the box, leaves, and the Loremaster exits too.
The Legion has assembled, within earshot. Zora walks alongs the men, sits and joins the Lions to hear the Loremaster’s story, setting the artifact between her feet. Cloaky Zemyati Loremaster is covered in furs but is surprisingly slight underneath. He has one eye - a scar crossing the other cheekbone/brow - at least, people assume he’s blind in that eye, and his hands are always inky blue and it flies everywhichway when scribing. He sits down and gestures in the ‘huddle round’ motion of all seasoned storytellers. The Loremaster begins naming the dead, including Alan, and invites Colay to stand up and tell the crowd something about Alan. Colay’s right at the back and gets shoved forward, gets a hug from the Loremaster and the Loremaster continues, reminding the crowd of why we’re legion, who we work for, where we come from etc. and how our vows also include protecting Alan, one of the fallen. Colay says very few words and retreats to the back of the crowd again. The Loremaster explains how people like Alan need protecting from the kooky supernatural stuff.
According to the annals of the 7th Emperor Tantarus, the legion was founded 427yrs ago in the 422nd year of the Old Empire. Tantarus ascended at 408 as a kid, had fought through many battles but he saw the world change underneath him as arose otherworldly, supernatural tales. In these, supernatural beings began affecting the everyday person’s ways - people like Alan! - in their daily business. The Empire came together to fight these beings, and in 422 Tantarus as noted above founded the Legion, instructing his younger sister to lead a group, headhunting people trained and equipped to deal with these threats - the elite group of which all in this campsite are these elites! This younger sister to the 7th Emperor was known to be loyal and able to command her own group but chose to serve the wider needs and people. Around this time Chosen appeared as a threat emerged - that of the undead. Apparently some skywhales came down from the sky to give her power and tell her to travel the world in order to find the new generation of Chosen, to band together and push back the First Undead. Loremaster notes all the peoples are represented here in the Legion - Orites, Panyar, Zemyati, and Bartans. It took 4 generations of fighting to get any form of withstanding and defending the Empire. We continue that struggle and in unity, the Loremaster says we’ll push the Cinder Kings back.
Applause rings out!
The Marshal wanders in and confirms despite the absolute beating they’re taking, morale is up! The Loremaster observes quite the level of dishevelry in the crowd, and the Captain suggests using medical supplies and mercies (singular), so we do, then the smith and sniper test and upgrade muskets, boosting their range to 100yds. Spymaster calls his ring of spies and sends a Zemyati spy out to recruit some more spies. Bortis travels around Plainsworth to find a member of the nobility that is sympathetic to the Legion cause, Antoinette. Unfortunately during the return to the Spymaster, they run into a remaining crow-guard of the Viscount’s. Bortis taking a wound to ensure that Antoinette makes it back to the Legion unharmed. The Spymaster’s other spy, Igrid, awaits instructions.
A large storm front starts appearing from the south and west, from where the Legion came from. The lands are drenched with the torrential rain that falls from the ominous clouds overnight. In the morning, Zora enters the Commander’s tent to discuss the options for the Legion and their next steps. The Commander agrees with Zora’s evaluation that the season’s change is drawing near, and suggests that it is time for the Legion to move onwards, and hope that they have done enough work with the people of Plainsworth that they will abandon the town and also move on.
The Commander leans over the map and studies the routes that the Legion can take towards Skydagger Keep. There are two main routes, towards Sunstrider Camp, a trading post run by the various horse lords, or the Long Road towards the Barrak Mines, a riskier route due to the potential to be cornered, but has much more abundant supplies, for example black shot and alchemists.
The Commander takes counsel from the other members of the command, but then decides to move towards the Barrak Mines to gain access to more war supplies. The Quartermaster spends the rest of the time in Plainsworth stocking up on food and supplies for the journey on the Long Road.
The Legion travels along the Long Road. Whilst the road is an easy way to tread, there appears to be very little in the availability of supplies that the scouts would normally gain to supplement the Legion’s needs. With the town of Plainsworth back in the distance, just a speck behind them, the forward troops notes a set of wagons ahead of them.
Some of the troops in the Legion report that some of the waystones that line the Long Road appear to cause distraction amongst the troops. Attention keeps being drawn away from the duties that are required by them.
The watchers and overnight guard have also noted that there are lights and fires that have been started in the woods lining the road. The manner of which these fires have started suggest that these fires are the work of Stormbreaker. The people are unnerved, and some are interested in taking a force to stop further instances of these fires.
Morning breaks in the camp and it is visible in the distance behind the legion, it can be seen that a great wagon train has been attacked and some smouldering remains exist. The Marshall calls on Diego (Scout), Grey (Sniper), and Aurora (Medic) to take the Grinning Ravens to investigate the caravan. Alexneyev (Scout) and Elrik (Officer) are sent with the Silver Stags to investigate the waystones that have been distracting members of the Legion.
The Grinning Ravens along with the specialist dress lightly to move fast along the road back down the Long Road. As they travel, they come across a broken wagon that appears to be further forward, and therefore closer to the group. They draw closer, a volley of fire is heard and seen off to one side of the wagon, hitting the wagon causing a hiss to start emanating from it. The Medic attempts to corral the squad to move back to cover, but through the chaos of the initial barrage, the attempt fails. Muddy (Rookie) even runs towards the wagon and looks inside, noticing that there are barrels inside. Turning back, he runs away, shouting, “Run!”. The squad scatters in various directions, as the wagon explodes.
Grey and Diego are the first to recover, looking at the scattered members of the squad, they start laying covering fire to allow the squad to regroup. They suppress the area where the shots started the wagon on fire, and the group comes together. However, there are more shots from a different direction, hitting the individuals giving covering fire and those still out in the open.
Diego realises that part of the squad needs to get higher ground. He calls on two of the rookies and leads a charge up. Unfortunately, as they start moving up the nearby slope, two more enemies appear and pepper the three squad members. Suffering a variety of injuries, the trio look up at the duo shooting down at them. The pair are cloaked in large bulky woolen garments, handling their weapons with practiced ease.
The squad members switch to close quarter weapons and start charging the enemy pair. Silvin (Rookie) charges ahead and manages to dispatch the duo with a couple well placed shots even before the other two squad members make it there.
Aurora appears to see red, and charges a second pair of enemies, pulling a vial of from her bandolier, downing it. Seeing this, Grey leads the remaining rookies in covering fire, whilst Aurora defeats the two enemies that she faces with her bare hands.
Seeing this situation, the other enemies are routed and retreat. All but one of them are taken down by the retreating fire by Grey and the rookies. Diego, instructs Muddy and a couple rookies to investigate the remaining wagons, whilst he moves towards the trapped enemy and interrogates him.
The marauder mentions that he doesn’t follow a banner any more, and now is under the lead of Dame Chiara Garossi. Someone who has found “something new”. As the interrogation continues, the marauder passes into the afterlife, and whilst Diego and Aurora discuss this, they hear the trapped enemy stand up and easily raise the heavy wagon wheel that was trapping him. The cloak falls away and it is clear that this person’s body is covered with boils, sores, and pus, a sign of extreme levels of corruption. Aurora reacts quickly and moves behind the undead and twists off his head. Realising that if this body that has just passed into death and then into undeath this quickly, she looks around at the other bodies of the deceased attackers.
Muddy leads the pair of other rookies to investigate the other wagons. One wagon contains a cadaver, some are sleeping wagons, and some supply wagons. They find some notes that are “alchemmemical”, not understanding any of it, they take back the notes back towards the specialists to report what they have found.
All this time, Grey took to higher ground to look around the area. He spots some horses to the west, and evidence of a trail towards the east, which might be a trail of the survivors.
The squad converges and shares the information that they each have found. After some discussion, the squad decides to investigate the wagon that contains the cadaver. Silvin is ordered to lead the entrance to the wagon to be explored. After checking that this cadaver has no chance of rising, he waves the others in. Aurora shakily walks into the wagon to study the details of the information and tools, noting that these notes were authored by an alchemist named Aether Magnus.
Whilst this is happening, Diego instructs the rookies to corral the pair of horses such that they can hitch them nearby ready to move a wagon at a later stage. The rest of the squad keeps watch and starts condensing the remaining useful supplies into a working wagon to be able to return to the Legion.
The troops then move out following the trail that Grey previously spotted. Following the tracks left, it takes a few hours and the squad notices a low line of wood smoke coming from the forest ahead. Going further forward, they come to a lip of a basin, within which is the source of the smoke, and presumably a camp. The group decides to send the scouts ahead first, not using the main trail, to investigate the surrounding area ahead.
The advance team of Diego, Grey, and Muddy spot another trio that appear to be moving towards the camp. On discussion, they look to set up an ambush for these other individuals. With some setup, they successfully take out the trio without them reacting. Upon investigation of their bodies, it is noted that they’re very similar in terms of the amount of corruption on their bodies.
Moving further forward, the squad comes closer to the camp. They realise that this camp supports around 20 or so people, with individuals conducting standard activities to maintain the camp.
The forward party comes to the edge of the cliff, looking over into the bandit camp, they decide to bring the other members of the squad to the front line.
Diego and Grey decide to move into the camp to investigate the area, leaving the others behind to rest, but ready to move forward if required.
The pair moves into the camp, taking the higher risk to attempt to find more information, making careful way into the area. During their time in the camp, they see a gaudy man being escorted between two different tents. The rest of the camp appears to have supplies covered and scattered around the camp. They note that there’s a smell of alchemical solvents in the air.
Diego and Grey return to the rest of the group to relay and discuss the findings. Diego brings together a plan to create havoc in the camp such that the squad overall can rescue the captured alchemist and hopefully the rest of the prisoners.
The squad waits for the cover of night, Diego’s plan initially involves the spooking of the horses. He leads Aurora towards the horses. As they move quickly, Diego realises that one of the sentries is missing. The sound of a stream of liquid emanates from the bushes to the side. Diego uses his astounding scouting skills to locate the individual by sound. A shout floats across from the camp, calling the individual back to the camp. Quickly aligning up a shot, Diego expertly threads an arrow straight through the neck of them. Waving a hand, Diego indicates to Aurora to move forwards to cut the ropes. She counters by pointing at her leg. Diego therefore moves forwards to cut the tie lines.
As he turns back after cutting the lines, he sees that Aurora is lighting the rigged firecracker. She throws it under the nearest horse and waits for it to blow. In a bright flash, the rigged firecracker is much more potent than Muddy intended to create it, vapourising the horse above it. Whilst the chunks of horse meat rain from the sky, the other horses bolt into the camp, causing a lot of distraction. The camp is thrown into disarray as individuals quickly exit tents to corral the bolting horses, as well as a number of guards arriving to look towards the source of the flash.
Taking this as the signal to fire, the rest of the squad open fire towards a tent that the scout party had previously identified as a supplies tent. Landing a number of shots on the tent, it explodes in a fireball.
In the midst of the distractions, Diego moves towards the prisoner tents. The Viscount realises the actions being taken, and lines up some shots as covering fire. However, all this does is to alert the guards of his location, and they return fire and counter-suppress.
Hoping to use the distraction that the guards are shooting at the squad on the hill, Diego tries to move across to the tent to investigate. However, as he runs out, he gets hit by one of the rampaging horses, throwing him into the side of one of the tents.
The Viscount and the rest of the rookies use a gap in the enemies fire to return fire and start to move forwards out of the position. Successfully pushing the guards back under a barrage of fire, they start to move towards the camp.
Off to the side, a pair of bandits are pulling on a pair of chains that lead into a fissure in the rocks. A low growl emanates from the crack, reverberating across the camp.
Aurora moves forward to support Diego and together they move towards the tent. Whilst they are doing so, towards the cave, the handlers fall back and a large, four-legged, carapaced, bullet-shaped, digging creature rushes out and heads towards the pair.
Taking out the second explosive that Muddy had provided her, Aurora plants it in the ground. Turning to Diego and timing the lighting of the bomb for the arrival of the creature, they run. The makeshift bomb does go off, obliterating another horse, whilst causing a large wound across the pursuing creature.
Arriving at the objective tent, there appears to be a man in there holding a set of glasses. Diego tries to persuade the man to leave unsuccessfully. But with some reiteration and physical persuasion, the man, presumably Aether Magnus, starts following the Scout.
Muddy attempts to locate a route out of the camp. He successfully does this, by falling through a patch of nettles into a handy cave tearing his Achilles. He realises that this cave would likely lead out of the camp and would serve as an escape route. He therefore sends a message back to the rest of the squad.
Grey remembers when he and Aurora were talking about this monster, remembering where the gap between the hard plates were, takes a deep breath and lines up the shot. As he takes the shot, he notes a glint indicating a shot towards him. Rolling out of the way, he manages to negate the worst of the shot.
The monster rushes towards Diego and Aurora. Diego pushes the alchemist out of the way, Aurora uses the creature’s pounce to jump onto the creature’s side, realising the previous shot that Grey exposed the weakpoint of the creature, she buries her fist into the wound, killing the creature. The creature falls and comes to a stop in front of Diego, where it then unloads the contents of its stomach all over Diego.
The bandits appear to start reorganising under a leader. Grey spots this, seeing the rousing actions that they are exhibiting, chooses an opportune moment to take the leader out. The remaining bandits are left in disarray. Allowing the squad to leave via the exit route established by Muddy.
The Silver Stags along with Alexneyev (Scout) and Elrik (Officer) head towards the Waystones. They come across an obelisk with individuals all sitting around it. The group realise that the central stone appears to be the core of this. So the group successfully deactivates the stone and releases the enraptured people from it’s grasp. The group starts returning to the Legion, each of them gaining maddening voices. Two of the Silver Stags fall to the maddening voices and do not make it back to the Legion.
The Legion moves onwards on the Long Road. The road is long, towards the Barrak Mines in the mountains. The seasons start to change towards the colder, leaves start to change colour, start to fall.
The Quartermaster declares a time of rest and recuperation and stress busting for the Legion before they move forwards along the last of the Long Road up towards the Barrak Mines. The Commander eventually orders the onward march up the slope.
The Legion comes across the entrance of the Oysingra Barrak Mines. This is the location of the discovery of the fabled black shot that managed to push the Cinder King back previously. All manner of people come out to greet the members of the Legion, pushing drinks to the members no matter the rank.
The Legion pitches camp outside of the city, an invite comes through to the commanding officers. They accept and move into Oysingra proper. Being led through a many winding route within the caves, they come to a small office. With just enough space to fit the Legion leaders in with the local leader Tatinka Daniovna. Contessa Severina (Commander) reminisces with them, before they move to discuss the issues in the local area.
Calling on the intel that the Commander has access to, information is unearthed about the invitation.