Castle Whiterock 13 June 2022: Carry On Nixen

The murderhoboes

Garreth, half-orc swordsman
    Bleu, droning elf wizard
Zaber, suave and debonaire man
    Logan, wolverine
Polly, cute and deadly elf archer
Thrognar, half-orc holy warrior
Stonemaul, half-orc holy warrior

What they did

I point out the urchins. Garreth eyes them and Logan growls at them, and bubbles come out of his mouth. 

Since everyone agrees, I pull out my knife and slash the urchin twice, wounding it. It sticks its spikes back at me but misses. Logan bites twice at an urchin, but his bites cannot get through the stout carapace. Its spines miss him, then he sticks his claws in the gaps in its carapace, and wounds it. Thrognar runs at an urchin with his Seraphic Lance and hurts it. Polly moves into range. Garreth whips out Scalemar and concentrates. Stonemaul shows up as the urchins try to shove their spines in the rest of us but miss. He charges into an urchin with his shield then chops it with his katana, and gets away from its spines.

Again, I cut the urchin nearest me, again wounding it, and again getting away from its spines. Logan shoves his claws into the carapace, trying to get what he thinks has to taste good, and wounds it and gets away from the spines. Thrognar drops his lance, pulls out his greatsword, and chops an urchin to bits. Polly likewise pulls out her rapier and chops up an urchin, even getting a slice at another one nearby when she fells the first one. The urchins shove their spines into us, not only missing, but the one on me falls onto my knife, dying. "And, ah, let that be a lesson to you, you spiny squishy thing!" Garreth whacks it with Scalemar, but takes a spine back. The poison runs through his blood and … does nothing, since he's Garreth. Stonemaul kills an urchin with his katana.

I turn to another urchin and cut it up, while Logan fights to get to eat his lunch. Thrognar stuns the urchin near him with his blows, and Polly kills an urchin. At last, Logan gets a moment and pulls open the urchin, and eats its yummy innards.

I step inside the tower, and the others follow. Through the gloom of the darkness at least half a dozen swimming humanoids come out. Each levels a loaded crossbow not quite toward your group and waits. The six-inch-tall humanoids have delicate scales and flowing long hair that sometimes betrays elven-like ears. Each wears a simple loincloth and vest and carries a shortsword at his or her side. As they drift closer, a muscular nix comes nearer, wearing mail armor made of interlocking shells.

Garreth raises his hand and waves, then says in Aquan, "Glug!" After a few glugs back and forth, the nixen swim towards us with vials. Garreth says these these potions will let us speak Aquan, so we glug the potion of glug. The nix, named Caendril, then lets us inside. The nixen gather the shells of the urchins and feed them to us, and bring out some Kelpenbrau, which are a big bubbles of alcohol in which you float, drinking the booze around you. 

As I float in the bubble, Garreth sings for the nixen, and Logan harmonizes. After a rousing concert, the nixen ask us to hand over our missile weapons to bless them. I hand over my crossbow, as does everyone else, though Polly balks a little at handing over her bow. Then, we promise to come back in a week to get our weapons, bring snacks, and have Garreth and Logan sing again. They also give Garreth a counter to the urchin poison, though it hasn't hurt him much as it is.

Castle Whiterock 23 May 2022: We all babble on

The murderhoboes

Garreth, half-orc swordsman
    Bleu, droning elf wizard
Zaber, suave and debonaire man
    Logan, wolverine
Polly, cute and deadly elf archer
Thrognar, half-orc holy warrior
(Stonemaul, half-orc holy warrior)

What they did

We take Bleu to the Temple of Ildavir to bring her back to life. There, we meet Elias, who greets us. "I wish I could have joined you for the flailing but I have been so busy here at the temple." He takes a look at Bleu's body. "Ah! The spirit has fled the body, may Ildavir bless her soul! But is not completely fled. Please insert 14,000 copper into yon donation box before she arrives at the Great Tree in the Sky." Garreth dutifully counts out coins. Eli yells, "Flailings!" and waves his flail vigorously. It has Flaming Weapon on it. Acolytes hurry to move flammable relics away from him. "Where's evil?"

Garreth and I start drinking the sacramental wine, and Garreth gives Elias a swig of whatever he carries from his hip flask. Elias drinks long enough to stop swinging his flail, then starts the ceremony:

"Sword Cut, spear stab, mace smash, arrow jab,

"Let the white light of healing descend on thee.

"Let the white light of healing stop thy spilling blood.

"Let the white light of healing mend thy bones.

"Let the white light of healing close thy wounds.

"Let the white light of healing restore thy vigor.

"The white light of healing hath resurrected thee.”

Eli flails the flaming flail around over Bleu and has an acolyte splash her with sacred wine which roars to flame as it hits the flail, and in a great cascade of flames Bleu is now in one piece again.

Meanwhile, I'm smoking the incense. After coughing from my first incense joint, I find a less harsh incense, then see that I look around for more sacred wines. "Why do folks suddenly have less booze when we're around?"

Garreth watches for signs of life. Bleu's eyes flutter open. "Oh, am I alive again? Oh, yes, I am fine."

Garreth gently touches her hand. "You gonna make it, little lady? Sorry about that. We got the hydra, but things were touch and go for a while."

I come over to the ceremony, big blunt of the temple's finest incense in one hand and a bottle of sacramental wine in the other, and ask Bleu, "So, ah, Bleu, what did you see before you woke up?"

Thrognar wanders over and asks, "Yes, what was waiting for you?"

Bleu says, "I was counting leaves of the Great Tree and making notes on how many and what colors."

Garreth asks, "So, was that paradise or punishment?"

Bleu says, "It was restful."

Garreth says, "The Tree will still be there next time. For now, there's more loot to get."

I am about to ask about the leaves of the Great Tree, but realize that Bleu will never shut up about them, so I stop. I'm not that drunk or stoned. Then I see Logan rooting around in a coffin. "Logan, get out of that! Sorry, I'm sure the deceased's family will understand that wolverines do that while looking for food."

Eli says, "Uhm, please have your mustelid put the limb of the deceased back." Logan puts back the arm.

An acolyte brings sawdust cookies and says, "Body of the Great Tree." Logan leans up and eats a bunch right off the platter. I try one; they taste like sawdust but are high in fiber. Logan doesn't care.

This delights Elias. "Ah! The Mustelid is a true believer! We must have more sawdust cookies!" He leaves.

The acolyte says, "Oh no, last time Father Eli went to the Reliquary of Sawdust there was—" BOOOOM!

Garreth shrugs. He calmly takes out some free range organic goat jerky (extra chewy) and starts chewing. The acolyte, now worried, says, "Oh no, we will need to close the temple for repairs. Perhaps you gentlemen, gentleladies, and um, gentlemustelid would care to visit some other time?"

I belch. "Yeah, I just drank the last of your sacramental wine, so we totally need to move on."

The acolyte's face falls farther. "Oh no, we must brew more sap wine." His green hair seems to be prematurely greying as he talks.

Garreth wanders out chewing goat jerky. I look around as I walk out. "Wow, this is starting to resemble the last bar we were at. You should open it up for happy hour more often." Logan follows Garreth, who has the jerky, and we can hear the acolyte weeping in despair behind us. I tell Polly, "Y'know, Polly, if more churches had happy hour, I'd go to church more!" Garreth burps, releasing a hellacious mix of Sriracha Goat jerky and rotgut liquor.

Logan nudges Garreth's hand, looking up at him for food. Garreth eyes the wolverine. "Is he safe to eat sriracha?"

I say, "Aw, you know him. He'll eat shit on rubber." Garreth tears off a hunk and drops it to the wolverine. Logan eats up the jerky, oblivious to the spiciness, and looks up at Garreth again.

Quintus dodders over, "There you are! Have you found the Bladderwort?"

Garreth says, "Oh, we saw it, I think, but there were sharks, and a Hydra and …. It's been a mess. One thing lead to another and bam! We're in the temple drinking booze and paying for resurrections."

Quintus says, "I can't finish up your herbicide without it, though goodness knows where I'll find the time with Lyssa done being all independent."

I ask, "Wait, why were we in the temple when we could have gone to one of the taverns?"

Polly says, "We were visiting Eli I think and Thrognar had to use the Sun Box."

I say, "Oh, yeah, that's right, the temple had happy hour."

Garreth says, "And barkeeps can't cast resurrection … yet."

Quintus asks, "Happy Hour at the Temple of Ildavir?"

Garreth asks, "Did you know they keep wine in there?"

I say, "They kept wine, yes. But they chased us out. Eli blew up something while making cookies."

Quintus nods. "That Eli was inordinately fond of Flaming Weapon."

Thrognar says, "Yes, very rude of them. We didn't blow anything up."

Quintus chuckles. "Sure, you didn't blow anything up. Why, just last week at the Slumbering Drake I heard a rumor that a vampire named Ivy kept claiming she didn't blow anything up!"

I ask, "Did she blow up anything?"

Quintus grins, "Probably. If she didn't blow anything up why would she claim she didn't? Not that I ever talked to her myself."

I say, "Well, we didn't blow up anything yet, but we've only been back a few hours." I think for a moment, then remember something. "Hey, wait, Quintus, did you know we saw some of that bladderwort stuff down in the lake?"

Garreth asks, "Wait, they had a vampire in the Drake?" He looks at the sword on his back. "Does consorting with vampires make a dragon evil?"

Quintus says, "Aren't most dragons evil? I suppose it depends on the dragon and the vampire."

I say, "The ones with long-lost vintages definitely are. Hey, wait, wasn't there something about a vampire?"

Bleu starts babbling about Veil theory, which this vampire allegedly wrote. It seems to be kind of like describing blades of grass on both sides of your neighbors fence, except none of them are actually greener. I say, "Y'know, she had more interesting stories to tell until we brought her to the bar for Eli."

After some more chatter about dragons, evil, apprentices, resurrection, herbicide, weeds, and moral relativism, we get ready to set forth for the lake. I let Garreth know that he has to dress up for the nixen, so he gets into into his courtly getup from the last time he performed, and loads his armor into the bag of holding.

I try to figure out Bleu's Veil theory. It seems to be that there are the normal things you see, and then there are the things like werewolves, succubi and vampires that hide among people, unseen, and eat them. "Y'know, Bleu, you look way hotter when you're not talking, right?" Bleu helpfully talks about many theories of physical and mental attraction, like Von Hollinger's Twelfth Axiom of Mutual Incompatibility, and something about putting fruit flies into jars. I facepalm.

So, we set forth for the lake, and when we get there, Garreth puts on the Aquan ring, and we go back into the underwater arena. There, a 15-foot-wide fallen swath of wall leads into the inky darkness of the tower. A thick carpet of brown-green algae clings to the walls, hanging over the opening. There is a little light, but its nearer to nothing than something.

I go first because I know the nixen will be thrilled to see me. When I step forth, I see a bunch of big spiky things hiding among the algae. They look like the big spiky things that shot holes in the skiffs earlier. Logan sniffs to see if he can eat them, and I wave to everyone that we might have a problem.

Garreth calls out in Aquan, "Glurgle gurgle glug glug."

A nixie says back in Aquan, "Glug glug gurgle gurgle."

Garreth shrugs and draws Scalemar.