The Casino Always Wins

Criminal Activity

The servants of the Shade Crystal hold their casino heist and steal the Karma's Embrace. Only once flying away with city alarms going off behind them did further knots in their plan come to light. The relations between their Temperance Shard contact, the owner, and the human to be humbled in this plot are much more closely tied together than anyone realized. In the end, the party finds itself with egg on its face and following through with a contract they would rather disavow to hold a second heist against their employer. In the end though, Chupta guides the party to following through on their word, acting in as good of faith as possible even if their employer doesn't.

With Astrid and Crush scoping out the Lady's Charity, a plan is hatched. The build-up was to produce a craze this coming weekend by advertising for free drinks and hors'devours on the common games. Amid that distemper, the next step was to acquire rice wine from the valley to mix with the rich coffee to spike many drinks in a casino full of non-alchololic dwarves. However, further investigation allowed for the finding of a hallucinogenic mushroom, Wandercaps, which would cause more chaos with less chance of being tasted beforehand. The end goal was to stir up enough trouble in the casino to pull as many of the airship guards away as possible to allow for easier boarding of the vessel suspended over the city. An unexpected aid to the chaos became apparent in that a the Lady's Charity already had its gala room scheduled for the marriage of Maha Badal's daughter.   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ We return to our narrative en medias res. The heist is a full go. Astrid managed to infiltrate the high-roller rooms and in doing so got the invisible Fozz back to the private Tea Master for them. Working out a partnership ahead of time with one of the other members of the Hand of Fate room, a rough start turned into a pretty hard sweep as the full effect of the Wandercap spike began to take the back rooms. Full effect, that is, for everyone besides Astrid. During this time, Crush witnessed a chest removed from the Karma's Embrace and eventually the garish Sicuro Altomari leaving the casino through the back.   Sicuro wasn't the only one to change his presence though. Fozz's backroom shenanigans didn't go so well upfont. Not timing a moment well, a full pot of water found itself across the front of the invisible elf caused the heightened concerns of the workers to spike as a pair of arcanists were brought out to scan for him, one dwarf from within the establishment the other being pulled from the Karma's Embrace itself.     Chuptah playing Comms the entire time, conflict truly began as Astrid attempted to make her escape. Fortunately, moving out the back door allowed for Chuptah to call in a Pacifist Support Package Streak with a tactical airdrop... of a tortle onto the guards. One by one, the party made their final exists. Crush disapparated into mist. Fozz utilized the social fo-pahs of his closest threat to be lead outside. Chuptah clipped through a door with a poorly timed Misty Step. Astrid, bringing the most concentrated aggression to her obliterated the retaliation with a surging of otherworldly tentacles giving Chuptah the chance to wisk her away.   Descending down to the 11th ledge just underneath the Lady's Charity, the guards upon the street had been reduced to one and one at the tethers mooring the floating vessel in place. The guards upon the vessel 100 feet out from the ledge hadalready docked once tonight, pulling the stern up to the street once, and it didn't look like they planned on it again any time soon. The party's actions in the casino cost them their mage. Quite expensive, the hired pilot Temren Kut stood at the ready to board the vessel when given the opportunity.   A Stutter-stop of moments. Chuptah attempted to simply fly Astrid across the gap to land her on the boat. The ship guards warning you away. Chuptah played drunk/not knowing how to fly. A thrown star (Astrid) repelled by an invisible wall. Begging, pleading , buffooning to get on board (Hanging from the curtains and drapes on the side of the boat, pretending to fall terrifying the men above into dropping the wall). A glitching of the force wall up and down (As they tried to keep it up as after thy got Astrid on deck but having to knock it down for her to leave and then up and down again as the fight commenced and Astid Commanded a man to drop it once more). Gaseous confusion and banishment below deck (As Crush fought with a second, unknown pair of wizards). A single assailant upon the cliffside laying low the guards and untethering the vessel (Fozz). Unauthorized ordered commands (Astrid). Guards blasted out the side of the hull (Crush).   In the end, the party aboard the vessel as flares of lights took the city. A voice from above bemoaning destruction led Chupta to pulling a man from a pockets space beneath the balloon crashing to the deck. After threats and powerful positioning, the gaunt, garish casino owner put on a set of bangles that cause his form to swell, shrink, and tighten all at once. Sicuro Altomari and Orwin Oresin and the dwarf's quote-unquote- employer all in one tight neat little package, obviously the writing advice of "reduce and combine characters" taken to the extreme. In the end, an aggravated social stalemate of distrust settled between the party and their misleading employer/goal/victim. The Altomar wanted the original bargain upkept while a bulk of the party innately saw their deal as defaulted on due to the trickery involved and doubtful of the future interactions to say the least.   The party tried to strongarm the rich buffoon into giving them the Temperance Shard but Altomari worked in confidence. The party had been seen by Altomari's men causing chaos at the casino and stealing his vessel. The maestro had ensured that the task included no deaths which means many witnesses. It was known he was on his ship tonight so either the party aid him in faking his own death after the attack on his business or he returns alive with the party be dubbed criminals. Despite threat of violence, Altomari didn't budge. He didn't even believe that option to be on the table. Altomari pressed that while obscured, he was ardent to keep up his end of the deal... which meant that now that the party had proven themselves, he was now ready to send them to gather antiques to trade for his Temperance Shards. Chuptah sided with Altomari. While he may have operated in bad faith, the deal was still present as they had agreed to.
After listing a host of items the party might retrieve, the nearest singular item of worth for trade was decided on: the symbolic item of rulership from Adossag, a lost kingdom within the Pyrewood Mounds. Altomari paid for Temren Kut's continued service for this mission to speed up the errand. For a moment, the party landed at dawn a handful of miles outside the city so that the they might return to reacquire left possessions and make purchases in preparation for their distempered task.   Returning to the distant airship, they were intercepted by a griffon riding Altomari giving his well wishes but having heard the call of duty. It seemed that during the raucous night, The Saquris Cross had a second tragedy: Maha Sadar of the Saquirs Cross was found Poisoned. Altomari in his new from of Orwin Oreson was flying in to begin taking care of the public and using his newly owned Casino Emergency Funds to help the people.     The party took the evening to tear away as much of the excess from the airship and make a bonfire of all of it.