Session notes 10-1-2020

8th of Aestrun
 
 
The day was far from over, as Thalmiir, William, Erky and Copper decided to go and take the boat to cross the lava after Coppers ritual. As Thalmiir send me and Liya a message, we arrived just in time to see their paddle float away.
 
Liya and I wait a while while the rest of the party is out and about on their boat. We play some rock paper scissors and continue the conversation we were having in the pub.
 
After a while, Thalmiir and William return in the small boat and tell us about a duergar/gnome (it was a gnome disguised as a duergar) they had found with a larger boat down the lava-river.
Apparently he: 1 had some kind of device Erky has (a gun)
and 2: need some help finding something and the boat we had used was his brothers.
 
While paddling back to the larger boat and its owner, William and Thalmiir talk about some kind of crystal that the gnome had lost, that was supposed to power his boat. It was much more than an ordinary boat he had said, as it was the life's work of him and his brother: he did the mechanics, his brother the magic.
 
To be honest, we were kind of unsure about this at first, but the gnome seemed nice and in need of help - especially with the cave slowly collapsing- so we decided to go for it. Copper and William stayed with the gnome, to help him guard his ship and himself.
 
Liya, Erky, Thalmiir and I followed the path that the gnome had pointed us in and we quickly found a large quarry which was down in a spiral. Here, we saw two duergar mining. The mine itself was about 200 ft across and at least 200ft down. The duergar were about a quarter of the way down the first cycle, the next path being about 30ft down. We decided to just walk with purpose and follow the way down the path. I went disguised as one of the duergar and on we went.
 
This did not go as we expected it to go. The two tried to flee as soon as they saw us. They jumped in the minecart and tried to get town as soon as possible.
To prevent this, without murdering them, I tried to hypnotise them with a spell, which worked on one of them. As the cart sprinted away, with one hypnotised and one awake duergar, Thalmiir had the idea to block the path one circle down by breaking part of the rock. I helped him by Shattering the stone and before the cart had done a full round, a pile of rocks blocked the way.
Liya and Erky were both shooting at the rolling cart, hoping to hit the duergar inside. Erky even chasted it down on the back of his mechanical dog.
 
A few moments past and a cart with a very dead and a very hypnotised duergar arrives at the blockade and crash horribly into the rocks. This wakes the hypnotised one and he tries to turn invisible and run. A few well-aimed shots of Erky later and also this duergar is bloodied on the ground.
 
During the crash, the gems and metals that had been mined were swung out of the car unto the ground. During this, Thalmiir managed to catch a fancy ruby which he immediately estimated to be worth around 2500gp.
 
Because of the noise we caused, several others were coming from the gate at the lowest level of this mine. We decided to pick up some of the gems and go for a deceptive move. I changed into one of the guys we just killed, while Thalmiir and Erky hid themselves and one of the bodies. Liya sneaked away, somehow completely disappearing into the shadows.
 
The duergar approached, I started an act of being in shock pretending there had been an explosive compound that exploded while we tried to mine it. Trying to get away, scared of the cave collapsing, we had jumped into the cart and attempted to run away, only for our path to be blocked by a collapsing part of the wall.
Even though I was speaking in dwarvish, they believed it. A large stone creature had followed them, and it seemed to be focussed on the place where we had seen Liya last. Strangely he seemed to notice her while none of us were able to see Liya. The earth elemental picked up a large part of rock, and showed it to me and the other duergar, not speaking just holding it in front of us. I played along, said i did not understand and followed them down deeper into the mines, while acting shaken. The elemental followed with Liya in a pile of rocks.
 
Thalmiir and Erky soon followed. Disguising themselves - in a very creative way- to look like the duergar.
 
 
Some conversing later, I had heard about the large 'gem' we were looking for. Apparently some had found it and brought it to the 'leader' of these people. He seemed to be really happy with it and kept it in his throneroom all the time. Shortly after this, Thalmiir joined the conversation, introducing himself as a new member of the miners, along with his somewhat brain-damaged grandfather (Erky) who only said 'eeeeehmff' in different intonation -as he does not understand dwarvish or undercommon-. This went relatively smoothly, and as they were new they got a small tour through the common room, sleeping quarters and throne room, where the guide signed to the leader (a Sand Genashi) to show us the large gem they had brought him. Dao proudly showed us the power source we were looking for, after which he sat back down on his pile of gems. Erky and Thalmiir were appointed work, sorting and mining respectively, after which we were told to take it easy and rest for the evening. We gathered in the sleeping quarters, where Liya and Erky soon found us and we quietly spend the night.
 
9th of Aestrun
 
Thalmiir, Erky and I are sent to go and work. Liya is dodging the earth elementals and scouts around the camp towards the throne room, waiting for the one thing that can sense her - the earth elemental- to leave.
During the work, some jokes are made, some rumours are talked about - there was a body found in the rubble that looked just like me, interesting- During work, Thalmiir correctly notices that nobody is happy about the situation they are in, and decided to take a prominent place among the group and shout out, rallying the duergar. With words of freedom, solidarity and fraternity, the miners started to rise up.
The Dao and its earth elementals heard the noise of the rebellion and made their way towards the quarry, after which Liya quickly made her way into the throne room.
During all this, Erky had made friends with the miners and had stolen a few nice gems for himself during his work. At the moment the rally started, he too made his way towards the throne room.
 
In the mine, a battle between the duergar and the earth elementals took place. The combined forces of the miners proved too much for two of these creatures, as they were slowly pick-axe-ed to pieces. The Dao, who had also made his way, was hurt badly by his former involuntary workers and fled as he realised he could not stop this.
As Thalmiir saw this, he send a message to Liya, urging her to leave as the Dao was returning.
During the battle in the quarry, Liya had retrieved the power crystal, and both she and Erky had taken this time to stuff their bags with as many gems as possible.
 
Moments after our party members had left the throne room, the Dao entered. He gathered a pile of the gems and used a portal to leave.
 
As the horde of duergar made their way to the very same throne room, Thalmiir urged them to take all they needed and that they should remember the name Doghmar, who had lead them the way towards this freedom(!).
 
We took the rush towards the gold and gems as our queue to leave, and we returned to the boat where William and Copper and the gnome (Dreshar Everharn?) were waiting for us.
 
 
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Gems we picked up:
Thalmiir: Emerald (1000gp), small crystals (+-150gp/p), ruby (2500gp)
Erky: Azurite (10gp) | 400lbs of gemstones from the Dao's room
Liya: Obsidian (10gp), tigereye (10gp) | 400lbs of gemstones from Dao's room
Nimueh: Topas (600gp)