Nightwick Abbey - Session 49 - Blossom the Rogue's Excellent All-Natural 100% Authentic Real Fake Children (and Some Silly Gooses)

Previously, on the road from Nightwick....

Session 49 - 17th of Primes 1392

This week's adventurers:

Blossom (Rogue 4)

Sotar (Cleric 4)

Cherwe (Cleric 4)

Mayfly (Magic-User 3)

Liminal Space (Changeling 3)

Yevgeniy the Coward (Cleric 2)

Verinka (Changeling 2)

Mechtild (Fighter 2)

Hirelings: Gerung Floating Disk (MU 1), Ticze (Changeling 1), Ditl (Cleric 1) + All the others

Arriving in Frogguts

The party has just arrived at Frogguts, a town that seems to have based its entire identity on hating Froglings. Unlike Knightpath and Nightwick, the buildings of Frogguts are packed in tightly together in three large blocks. As we walk down the street towards the Frog Legs Inn, we notice that we don't see any children in town. Liminal Space, our most charismatic party member, talks to one of the villagers we pass. 

"Hello peasant, I see that you have no children."

Said peasant goes into her house silently and continues to warily watch the party through a window. Once we make it to the inn, we note that the population seems to be all Realmish people with none of the local Bogdonis present. 

The Mumblety-Peg Tik-Tok Challenge

In an effort to spread some goodwill around and to have some fun, Mayfly loudly announces a game of Mumblety-peg! The rules are simple. Everyone takes turn throwing a knife at their own foot. Whoever gets theirs the closest, wins! 

One villager accepts Mayfly's challenge as others in the inn crown around. Mayfly wins the first round and several others, Liminal Space and Blossom included, join in the fun. After a couple of rounds, some silver changes hands and a lot of people get knives stuck in their feet. 

The clerics watch on and wonder aloud if their prohibition against edged weapons came about from too many clerics losing toes to Mumblety-peg - like a medieval tide pod challenge.

Trouble in Frogguts

After the game, Liminal finally gets to sit down with the innkeeper and enjoy some charming banter. "Hello. This town in so respectable, but where are all the children. So weird," he asks in a normal way. He finds out that Frogguts has been stalked by an invisible creature who snatches children who lie, "which is every child." Liminal manages to get us a contract to kill the monster - 150gp for its head. 

The Perfect Decoy

The party goes out to the town square and comes up with a plan. We debate using our shortest hireling (Heyno) as bait, but Blossom fashions some fake children decoys out of hay and spare clothes. Liminal Space casts Fog over the decoys to help with the ruse. After a few moments, he hears the spiteful voice of his mother calling out to him, "Lying again? You're always lying!"

Frogguts Alight

As Liminal starts to argue with the disembodied voice of his mother (he had a bad childhood), the monster appears before us. A 7' tall skinless humanoid with a large hide like a house cat and jaw tendons intertwined into its skin. It blinks into existence right in front of Liminal. 

The creatures hits hard, hurting Liminal and Cherwe and forcing them to retreat. We quickly discover that only silver or magic weapons work against the creature and it is too powerful to be affected by Hold Person. Mayfly casts Fireball behind the creature, hitting it but also catching the thatched roof of the nearby thatched roof cottage on fire. Blossom immediately orders our hirelings to go to work putting out the fire.

Sotar then hits it with his mace, smashing its jaw, and Verinka hits and kills it with a silver arrow. As it dies, it releases a horrible spray of blood and smoke and, when it clears, all we see are the decayed bodies of a man and a cat. Once it's clear that the creature is dead, we all rush to put out the fire. 

We manage to get it under control - the building is ruined, but nobody was harmed. Mayfly explains to the villagers that the damage to the building is too extensive for him to determine what magic was used to start the fire.

Onward To Blackleg

We're paid the 150gp and are given a feast in celebration the next day. We spend that day (the 18th) resting and feasting and set out on the road on the 19th of Primes. The weather is nice as we continue south. Blossom, scouting ahead, has a minor mishap with a thorny bush and discovers a group of merchants loaded down with iron - a sign that we are approaching the mining town. Sure enough, towards the end of the day, we reach Blackleg.

Hiring Mercenaries

There are two inns in town, the Pizzled Gules (ask your heraldry friend what that means) and the Black Cockrel. We are directed to latter to find mercenaries. After advertising about town and in the inn, we pique the interest of four mercenary companies, all willing to help us fight the White Lady, for a price.

1. The Corbies - led by Sir. Guant of Fatstaff, this is a band of 100 medium calvary clad in gold skull helmets. They ask for 150gp for 1 month of fighting.
2. The Brown Company - led by Frock, they are a group of 200 light infantry. They want 40gp to fight for us.
   
3. The Company of the Goose - led by St. Gunther, an actual silly, goofy goose. They are 200 crossbowmen who offer to fight for free as St. Gunther, that silly, bloodthirsty goose, has ordered them to take up the holy fight against the White Lady. The spirit of a goose is ornery and loves to fight.
4. The Middle Sons - a company of 200 heavy infantry led by Adolphus the Lesser. The company entirely consists of middle children of nobles with chips on their shoulders (indeed, Adolphus the Lesser curses an Adolphus the Greater and Adolphus the Younger as we talk with him). They want 60gp to fight the White Lady.
   

We hire all four groups, the Corbies willing to take their payment in the form of the spoils of war, and all go off to learn the mass combat rules in Fantastic Medieval Campaigns, for when we meet the White Lady on the field of battle. We use our 150gp reward to pay for mercs, but each gain 163xp, which is enough for Mayfly to advance to level 4!

St. Gunther prepares for bloodshed.