Session IV: Floon's Fate

General Summary

After finding Renaer in the warehouse, the party decides, with some convincing from Renaers side, to continue their search for Floon immediately - or at the very least after they've searched the warehouse further. While searching around the warehouse, Holtz find a dried up bloodtrail that leads to the upper level. There, they find a Tabaxi with leopard coloured fur hidden behind some crates, with a bleeding wound on her side. The party approaches her carefully, but weapons are drawn and tensions ensue. The Tabaxi, calling herself Emerald, explains that she and her family are the owners of the warehouse, which they rent out to whoever wants to use it. When she came to check up on it, the warehouse was attacked. During the attack, she was wounded, but she managed to escape the fray and hide. After exchanging some suspicious looks and confirming that she doesn't have any Zentharim or Xanathar related tattoos, the party decides that she probably isn't dangerous.   Emerald wants to come with the party to make sure that the people who attacked her warehouse are punished. They decide that the best way to go forward is to go to the nearest manhole and enter the sewers. Before they can leave the warehouse, however, they hear footsteps outside and voices yelling. The City Watch has arrived on location and are surrounding the warehouse. Soon after, they break into the warehouse and tell everyone to drop their weapons and to get on the ground. Most of the party complies, but Naeri and Emerald jump through one of the back windows of the warehouse and make a run for it in the alleys of the Dock Ward. The City Watch inquires about what happened here, and the party members explain what they know. Renaer manages to convince the City Watch to let them go without any charges, albeit with the empty promise of not going after the Xanathar guild further.  

Best not to meddle in criminal matters. Leave this dirty business to the City Watch.

— Captain Staget

  After this run-in with the authorities, the party makes its way to the nearest manhole. There, they meet up with Emerald again, who managed to escape the grasp of the City Watch. The party begins to descend in to the sewers, but Irven never enters. Instead, Emerald hears a weird sound at the top of the sewer entrance, followed by Irven yelling out to someone and the same weird sound again. When they go to check up on him again, Irven is nowhere to find. The party decides to continue their search for Floon, as they have no clue as to where Irven went.   They quickly find the first yellow mark the Kenku told them about, a circle with ten equidistant spokes radiating out from it. They begin following the marks through the sewers, and after about an hour of walking through the sewers, they arrive at a T-section with a metal ladder going up in the middle of it and another mark on the wall of the tunnel on the left side. Floating before the mark is what seems to be a miniature version of the creature that the party saw in the shopwindow of Old Xoblob Shop. Not aware of the party at first, Kairon calls out to it, after which it turns its eyes to them and begins shooting multiple rays, one of which knocks Kairon back and into the sewer water. A fight breaks out, and a well aimed fire bolt from Holtz manages to finish up the creature. The party makes their way further in to the sewers, which after a while tapers into a hallway with no walkways. Holtz, Kairon and Renaer begin to wade through the sewer water, while Xiaobo sits on Karions shoulders and Emerald climbs on the slippery walls.   Holtz sends Web out in front to explore, and sees a seemingly save roundabout and the sewer continuing to the left and the right. When they arrive at the roundabout however, Holtz is shot by two arrows coming from slits in the walls. In the chaos that ensues, Xiabo tends to Holtz' wounds and Kairon carries him to safety on a nearby platform, while Emerald and Renaer take care of the creatures behind the slits who fired the arrows. With Holtz still unconscious, the party makes its way carefully through a door on the plaform and finds a safe room with some old clothes and weapons in it, where they decide to rest a little. After about an hour of resting, Holtz finally wakes up, and the party continues on their mission.   Further on in the lair the party finds a small room with one of the goblins that shot arrows at Holtz lying dead on the floor and a room with beds made of hay. Behind a door they hear a discussion about how to best barricade the door. Without a moment to lose, Kairon kicks in the door, which splinters to pieces against the wall, and the party takes a bald human and a Duergar by suprise. The human is quickly killed and, on insistence of Kairon, the Duergar is knocked out by Renaer. Holtz explores the room, and finds that the Xanathar thugs were actually trying to barricade another door in the room. Upon further inspection with Web, a grey liquid begins spolling through the cracks, and an ooze forms itself in the room. Everyone immediately bolts to safety in the previous room, but Renaer quickly rushes in again and slashes the ooze to bits.   The Duergar is bounded by the party and wakes up after a while. The party tries to intimidate him into giving up information, including threatening to burn him alive, but he doesn't seem to budge. When they mention telling Xanathar that he "helped" them, however, he suddenly gets very scared and begins talking. He tells the party that his boss, Grum'shar, is further down the hall interrogating the captive. The party knocks the Duergar out again and make their way down the hall, getting ever so close to rescuing Floon.  

It would be a pity if we told Xanathar that a certain Duergar gave us some real interesting information, wouldn't it?

— Kairon Blackfeather

  When they get close to the next room, they hear a threatening voice yelling at someone. The party rushes in and sees an Half-Orc with his foot on Floon and a flaming hand near his face. Further down the room they see a stone throne, in which a tall, purple-ish humanoid creature is seated. The creature wears black clothes and a black mask, and has tentacles coming from his mouth. On his lap sits what looks like a brain with legs. Grum'shar seems suprised, but the creature on the throne calmly stands up, sets down the brain, and walks out of the room. Grum'shar, with some help from the brain, tries to defend himself against the party, but he is quickly slain. Holtz hastes himself to the room the creature entered, but he seems to have dissapeared. In the middle of the new room Holtz finds a stone pillar with the same circle with ten spokes that they saw in the sewer engraved in it. A circular indentation sits inside the circle.   The party decides that it is probably best to leave as quickly as possible. They rapidly search the room and find some treasure behind the throne. Then they head out, kill the Duergar and eventually make their way to manhole where they entered. From there, they get back to the Yawning Portal without a hitch. Renaer and Floon express their gratitude to the party for their help. Renaer promises that they can ask him any questions they still have in the morning, but now he really needs a good nights rest. The party decides that it's probably best to get some sleep themselves too and rent some rooms.   When they wake up in the morning, they find - to their suprise - that Renaer and Floon are gone. Durnan explains that they left and hour before the party woke up. The party eats some breakfast and decides to head to Volos' to collect their reward and, by happy coincidence, they run into him as soon as they walk out the door. Volos' tells them that he just talked with Renaer, who informed him of the successful completion of their mission. Volos gives his thanks, but has to admit that he is a little short on cash and can't pay the amount he previously promised. What he can give, however, is a deed to an old tavern in the North Ward. The party decides that they find this satisfactory, and Volos leaves to set up an appointment to make the transferal of the ownership of the building official. Curious as to what the tavern looks like, the party heads to the Trollskull Alley in the North Ward and find a run-down but large building with four stories, five chimneys and balconies and a semi-circular tower at the front.

Rewards Granted

Several nibs, shards and dragons from Xanathar thugs
Grum'shars spellbook
Wooden chest with 2 potions of healing and 16 dragons, 82 shards and 250 nibs

Missions/Quests Completed

The search for Floon

Character(s) interacted with

Renaer
Captain Staget
Zemk
Durnan
Volothamp Geddarm