Chapter 5, Session 6: Nash is lost, Bazzle is found
General Summary
'Unintelligible chicken noises'Persicorum found themselves gathered in the forests outside of Eastbourne and lacking direction once more... though with a new ally in the form of Nash and the breathing Bazzle Strum-Strum whom they successfully saved from The Hook and Knife Foundation. The party were unsure of where to go for a time, discussing their options... which were limited as they continued to worry about the potential of Dashilla the Dark Queen returning to Alturis and the nation being, once more, unable to defend itself from the divine force set to visit it. Eventually, they decided it was time to visit the Monastery of Flowers to pay their respects to Elder Tai Shan and warn the monks about The Crownsguard press-ganging as well as find some protection from the various groups chasing them for a time. The party decided their route was going to go through the forests of Alturis and brave the mountains in order to take the most direct route to reach Easthaven before making the long and spiritual trek to the Monastery. During their first day of travel, the party found it had started to rain in the forests in a rather unnatural way as cats and dogs started to rapidly fall from the sky and violently slam onto the ground, occassionally impacting the party and damaging them. After a period of running away and doing their best to avoid being impacted, Thordak found a nearby cavern that would offer them cover from the strange weather. Meanwhile, Anastasia and Mimsi decided they wanted to learn more about what exactly was taking place and, soon enough, they caught one of the animals that revealed they could speak common and were, in fact, an elemental creature that formed a hive that waited for rain before transforming into pets in order to feel the rush of the quick and heavy fall. Once they hit the ground they simply dissipate into air elementals and repeat the process until the rain stops and they go in search of more weather to be a part of. After spending a short time waiting out the adverse weather, the party moved on and Nash asked the party what they were planning next, they explained that they wanted to save Lyren Killian to which Nash explained that Lyren could be anywhere in Alturis as he was capable of teleportation but that he was likely out of A'mlon and returned to his handler, who Nash knew was named Inquisitor Dairon... a familiar name to the party. Soon after, the party spent the night keeping watch and sharing their concerns and grievances with eachother, with Thordak and Anastasia having a successful hunt together and sharing some information from their lives, with Anastasia talking more about her love of The Feywild and her hatred for Dashilla and the way that the queen ruined the Feywild whilst the one who should have been watching her (Proto ) was fighting in another plane of existence. Thordak expressed his sympathies to Anastasia and promised her that she would receive closure for what happened to her family. Once the pair returned with the deer, Kodo and Thordak prepared jerky for the road and a soup for Bazzle Strum-Strum when the still-asleep goblin recovered. Whilst this was going on, Mimsi decided to go through the Hook and Knife foundation research papers, where she found the daily schedules of Hook and Knife as well as other details of their work, including their massive purchases of dragon eggs and the misgivings of staff who were made to disappear if they aired their grievances. Mimsi then uncovered a letter from the War Council of King's Bay expressing that they would be paying a visit to the Hook and Knife facilities in Wakefield in 10 days so that they may see 'the source' of The Talented themselves. Finally, Fen and Nash spent some time on watch together, with Nash promising Fen he would teach the wizard some spells in the future; with Fen especially interested in Nash's knowledge on necromancy spells. The next morning, Mimsi expressed to the party that she had a desire to visit Wakefield and intercept the meeting there to better understand what was happening to her, and all other goblins that had gone missing. Despite sympathising with her and being equally concerned, the rest of the party expressed that Hook and Knife would be far tighter in defences in this factory after what Persicorum had recently done to them and so they maintained the best path to take would be steering clear of Eastbourne and The Crownsguard for a time or run the risk of walking into a trap. Mimsi was upset by this decision as she felt the party were choosing to leave her family behind... in response to this, Nash volunteered to go to the Wakefield site in disguise to complete intel for the party and tell them what he discovered, Anastasia was EXTREMELY reluctant to allow him to leave, deeply concerned he would be recaptured by Inquisitors but she reluctantly agreed on the condition that Nash took her wolf Blackey with him. Moments later, Persicorum lost two of their allies as the Masked Mage and Blackey moved in the opposite direction to them to spy on Wakefield, promising an update as soon as they learned new information. Persicorum continued to move with a disgruntled Mimsi in tow... with Kodo filling the time FULLY FUCKING DUNKING on Grendel throughout. Halfway through their travel, Bazzle Strum-Strum finally woke up and seemed energised and helped by being able to see his friends in Persicorum once more. He embraced Mimsi and greeted the rest of the party (along with meeting and being introduced to Anastasia) before asking them why they didn't get in touch for over a year. The party told Bazzle about their adventures in The Feywild and how time worked differently there, forcing them to miss a year in Alturis... as a result they were still coming to grips with what had changed and where their main allies had gone. Bazzle momentarily reprimanded Thordak for the sheer quantity of times he has allowed Mimsi to almost die, though he assured Thordak it was a joke before climbing onto Kodo for a height advantage and protection... as well as to eat the soup Kodo had prepared the day before. As a way of protecting Bazzle, Mimsi teased Thordak into having a fight with her and the two playfully sparred, with Thordak refusing to use his weapons. During the fight, Fen approached Bazzle, asking about The Grimoires the grinner possessed to which Bazzle nervously said they would speak that night. It was admittedly a very difficult fight for the two of them, with each landing strong punches and showing how skilled they were as fighters. Though eventually, Mimsi (using all of her ki points to outrun Thordak into submission) emerged victorious and the two playfully exchanged compliments, with Thordak stating that he needed to have a fight like that to improve his mood for the time being. Lighter in feeling, and able to use Bazzle as a source of information, the party had an easy day of travel to the relief of party members that were monitoring Mimsi and Thordak's damaged states. Soon enough the party set up camp and Bazzle showed off a new spell he possessed, a teleportation circle exclusively created for summoning his book collection to his side (deeply cluttering the camp with piles of books in the process), with his book collection the party asked him some more questions and Mimsi asked him to help her research the papers from Hook and Knife (though Bazzle didn't see anything she hadn't already noted), Bazzle however, did explain that in his incarceration, he overheard that whatever the 'Source' was, it sounded like a finite supply as the lab technicians desperately tried to use Bazzle as a replacement to create more Talented... though Bazzle revealed every goblin brought in to the lab and infused with Bazzle's body died within days. Bazzle also took this chance to express his disdain for Nash, whom was ever-present to use necromancy to make Bazzle suffer (though he softened when Anastasia revealed that Nash was being controlled and that she trusted him implicitly). Later in the night, as the party were keeping watch, Fen visited Bazzle and spoke with the goblin. Trying his best to explain to Bazzle that Fen would never harm him, not even for a Grimoire. Bazzle believed him before stating that he wasn't a grimoire user; rather, he bought the Grimoire he possesses on impulse at a book auction (a favourite hobby of Bazzle's), not realising it's importance until he identified it afterwards. Bazzle has researched since and revealed that the grimoires were once created by an entity known as The Knowing, an entity with an endless appetite for knowledge who created the grimoires to see what ordinary mages could achieve. However, the Grimoires were then corrupted by the entity known as The Chaos and turned into a death game to sow discord across Alturis. Bazzle then revealed to Fen what the greatest lie of the Grimoire's was, you cannot complete a grimoire, you merely keep collecting. Bazzle knows this as he has heard a rumour that Xan Prayerkeep has a library just filled with the endless grimoire's he has taken. Bazzle then gave Fen his grimoire with one condition, that Fen can fulfil his potential and be not just a better mage, but a better PERSON than the other grimoire users in the world, Fen agreed he would do his best and was gifted the Grimoire of the Deal Maker by Bazzle. The next day, the party climbed into the mountains of Alturis and were immediately left concerned by the tough climate and, more worryingly, a large pit with thick broken platinum bars set across it and a blood trail leading away from the pit. Additionally, the pit was marked with a sign stating 'Rank 1 Witch Bound, Do Not Uncover, Ruled by Hunter Devrim' as it seemed a member of The Claret Order by the name of Hunter Devrim had trapped a creature there that had since broken out. Leaving behind the platinum bars, the party tracked through the snow in the same direction as the figure was moving. As they approached, the party saw her figure in the distance, greedily sucking the blood out of a rabbit before she stopped, hearing a couple of them approach, and turned with a bloodied mouth to ask them a simple question 'Who visits the Unwaking?'
- Mimsi taunts Thordak to fill time during boring travel.
Report Date
03 Jan 2022
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