04 How to kill a pirate Report

General Summary

Ripple sits on the beach, trying to open the cryptex. After a while, she realizes the code word is “Gisela” (the name of Sellock’s & Chatra’s first love, a women they both fought over, they also named their first ship after her). After opening the cryptex, you can complete the map, but there is no treasure marked. It takes the party another day to figure out, that this map has three errors (villages and islands named wrong or placed in the wrong location). After connecting these three errors, you get a triangle. Sellock is sure: the treasure must be in the center of this triangle.   You decide to travel there, find the treasure and goat the Black Merman to attack you. Sellock and his first mate want to pick up another member of their team on the way. Sellock whistles and a giant sea turtle with boards strapped to her as railing shows up next to your ship. He wants to meet you at the location in three days. Regi, still troubled, is intrigued by the sea turtle ship and asks if he can go with Sellock. He receives a ring of water breathing from Sellock and the party splits up. Seeing Regi standing next to Sellock, laughing at his jokes while the giant turtle, slowly descends under the sea makes Ripple feel uneasy.   A giant storm hits the ship as you travel west. Many hard skill checks follow, but in the end, you manage to get to the location in time. Sadly there is no island, nothing floating, just sea. A few hours later, Sellock shows up on his giant sea turtle, together with his crew and Regi, who now wears a bandana and seems to be in a much better mood. He keeps talking about a “life on and under the waves”. Sellock third mate thankfully has a spell scroll to control the sea. Reluctantly he agrees to use it and a giant columnar vortex forms in the sea, revealing an old Gillean shipwreck 200m down on the seafloor.   The party throws ropes from the ships, climbs down and searches the wreck in a hurry (as the spell to control the sea only lasts 10minutes). They find A LOT of gold and diamonds as well as some magic items. Sellock, who joined the party, seems uninterested in most of the treasure investigating it, but not taking any gems. He becomes more frustrated as time continues, and keeps shouting angry orders. The party and his crew try to bring up as much of the treasure as possible. By touching a gem encrusted oil lamp, the mute gnome Coco summons a djinn. The party now has to fight a very angry elemental while bringing up more treasure, as the vortex slowly closes around them. In this high stakes situation they manage to defeat the djinn just in time to climb up the ropes, before the water crushes down on them. Sellocks, who was not helping to fight the elemental, seems in a much better mood than before. He has a gem-encrusted dagger dangling on his side. Regi is disappointed that he was up on the ships, pulling treasure up, while the rest of the party was having an exciting, life-threatening evening.   Overall, you retrieved gold and items roughly worth 100.000 gold. Most gold pieces have the Gillaean coat of arms imprinted. The magic items have a weird combination of pious and seafaring details engraved into them. A treasure this large should be enough to lure out “The Black Merman”. The party travels to Mistrift and spends a few nights celebrating, spending an insane amount of money for everyone in the city to see. Viktor manages to get into the higher-up circles of the Mistrift nobility and is able to purchase a very rare antidote, made from various rare plants in the Gloom. Ripple has to report to Lady Lue again, which is an uneasy task for her. Pleased with her progress her former boss lets her continue on her mission, but Ripple has the weird feeling of being watched. Lady Lue demands from her to betray Weresoc and join her in Mistrift after they killed “The Black Merman”, or else Ripples brothers may have to suffer the consequences.   The party decides to travel home slowly, hoping for an attack of the Black Merman. While partying publicly the party was stealthily preparing Gisela with additional crew (Rigorberta), prototype cannons (Viktor), alchemist fire (Ripple) and other stuff to help them fight off a pirate fleet. Sellocks tell them, that the Black Merman is his biggest rival, and responsible for his expulsion from “The council” (a secret council of pirates, Lady Lue is one of the members as well). He also tells the party that The Black Merman has a crew of undead sailors, controlled by him personally via a ring that is bound to the Black Merman and cannot be attuned to anyone else. He tells the party that he will kill his nemesis personally, and will take a vendetta on anyone trying to kill him first.   The party leaves Mistrift on ship, sailing with glossy new red sails. They drop Sellock and his crew off, so they can secretly accompany the party via submarine giant turtle. Regi reluctantly stays with the party, as Sellock tells him that it would be the better choice to lure out the Black Merman. Regi, at this point is Sellocks biggest fan, hating The Black Merman deeply and idolising Sellock. He does not want to talk about anything besides Sellock, his giant turtle or to sing sea shanties. Asked about his baby, his responsibilities towards Weresoc etc. he quickly changes the subject, getting angry if anyone presses on the issue.   Soon enough a small fleet of four ships is seen on the horizon, that takes course on the Gisela. The party lets them catch up and a brutal fight ensues. Cannons are fired, a giant turtle emerges (sinking a smaller ship in the process), and even though Coco hacks them down continuously scores of undead skeletons rise again and again. Viktor sinks an enemy ship with a combination of Thunderwave and multiple Magic missiles. Even though Ripple, Viktor, Coco and Regi fight heroically, the situation looks dire as their own ship starts to take in water from a large hole on the side. The party is in serious trouble. Together with his first mate Bindree, Sellock starts a last effort, and storms at the Black Merman (Bindree is mortally wounded). The final battle, a one on one of the two pirate captains ensues. Regi sends his last bardic inspiration towards Sellock, aiding him additionally with Mage Hand. Not taking care of his own defence, Regi is attacked by five skeletons – only to be narrowly saved by Ripple.   Both pirate captains are at their absolute limit. They fight with unseen strength, dexterity and rage. Suddenly Sellock drops his rapier, completely opening up his sword arm. He draws the gem-encrusted dagger he stole from the Gillean shipwreck and while taking a massive hit from The Black Merman’s rapier, plunges the dagger into the heart of his nemesis. With a smile, he whispers “your soul belongs to me old friend!” Characters close enough can see a white fog flowing from the nose of The Black Merman into the magic dagger. The Black Merman is dead. Sellock is barely standing but grinning victorious. He cuts of the right index finger of his enemy, takes off a ring, puts it on his own bloodsoaked finger and yells “Stop now!”. At once all undead sailors cease to fight.   The party won. The Black Merman is dead.       While patching up her wounds, Coco sees two more ships appearing behind a reef not far away. These are war galleons and they are heading with full sail towards the party. As the party quickly tries to get the remaining ships in a defensive formation, the ships hoist Gillaean flags. Ripple tells the party to stand down, as their own ship carries the flag of Weresoc. The two galleons approach and a paladin in shining silver armor negotiates with Ripple: They are on the hunt for pirates, especially The Black Merman and “The Turtle”. While thankful that they killed The Black Merman, they demand Sellock and his remaining crew to surrender, to be tried in Gillaea for piracy. The party knows that this would likely be a death sentence for Sellock. Before Ripple can negotiate further Sellock screams “Attack!” and his new army of undead swarm the Gillaean ships. The Gillaeans answer with a salve of magically imbued crossbow bolts. The party realizes: This is not a fight Sellock alone can win. Ripple, Viktor and Coco have to decide: Do they help Sellock and sink the Gillaean ships or do they watch as the pirate captain is slaughtered by the Gillaean navy?