Kormatin Solo Session 9, including Tihalt's heroic death 8-3-2022
General Summary
Between sessions, I nailed down the specifics of the information Gerallt the ogre snitch shared ast time. A skin changer witch named Huelwen with seven ogres (not counting Gerrallt) and four human minions, one human was a skilled a burglar named Dillon. The ogres included the skin changers son Ceron and daughter Cedrwen and five ogres split off from the Swynfaredian crime syndicate named “the Jelacdracar” which loosely translates to “The Hungry Dragons” in Draconic. Their plan was to corner the local fencing market and try to acquire espionage worthy secrets to sell to either or both side during the upcoming Swynfaredian/Fumayan war.
We retconned that the PCs requisitioned a healing potion from the ogre snitch last session.
Now to the session proper.
Kormatin was summoned early in the morning before King Henryk (who clearly had not slept well the night before).
King Henryk talked about how his great grandfather had an ogre problem in King’s Lake, and this led to a panic and a witch hunt where vigilante justice killed the ogres but also killed a lot of innocent people and much property damage. He thus ordered Kormatin to be discrete in his ogre hunt.
King Henryk told Kormatin he could show mercy to criminals who turn stool pigeon unless they are skinchangers in which case they must die. He was ordered to give killing the Skinchangers top priority above all other tasks.
He said he would not arrest his half-sister on the word of an ogre alone but he was not going to take her innocence for granted either. He was going to assign men to watch her and ordered Kormatin to leave her alone.
Once debriefed by the king’s new orders, Kormatin and his usual sidekicks and took Lady Anja Deorac III with them to investigate a fence Gerallt implicated. With the help of Anja’s clairvoyance spell, they determined there was an ordinary human running the front and the fencing operation while an ogress was in the back for security.
Tihalt and Brigid took the back door while Kormatin, Anja, and Ragini went in the front. Ragani incapacitated the normal criminal with the staff of Plant magic Hahn gave them and the ogress charged forward responding to the noise.
Ragani summoned two lions and secured the surrender of the normal criminal while the rest of the party wailed on the ogress until she surrendered.
The ogress and human went full stool pigeon. They confirmed what Gerralt told them. The normal human promised he would owe Kormatin a favor. The ogress added she knew were Dillon the burglar was sleeping and that Dillon did not know any ogres knew that. She also revealed that Heulwen’s daughter was a neophyte Skinchanger.
They got another healing potion and a small amount of coin. They gave their prisoner’s to the king’s men.
Kormatin and company staked out Dillon’s inn. Kormatin, Brigid, and Tihalt rushed him while Ragani, some summoned flyers, and Anja covered the window exit. Dillon tried to escape through the window, but to no avail. Kormatin and company beat the crap out of them and enticed him to surrender.
He reluctantly sold out the ogres while denying affiliation with them. He confirmed the old information and revealed that Heulwen was planning to kidnap and eat the king’s sister to gain the power of her royal blood.
They sent a message to the king along with their new prisoner. They went to scope out the king’s bastard’s sister’s home but found she had already been kidnapped and a lot of the king’s men were wounded or slain trying to stop them.
Using detect magic to follow the skinchanger’s residual magic trail plus mundane detective work, they found the ogre’s hideout (which was sort of given away by two ogres guarding the door). Anja’s clairvoyance quickly revealed that the skin changer had a cooking pot ready and had the king’s half-sister almost ready to be butchered. They quickly cast a round of buff spells and rushed in.
Anja blasted one of the door guards and Tihalt attacked the other one. Kormatin, Brigid, and Ragani rushed in past the guards while they were engaged.
Only the door guards and Huelwen’s son Ceron had armor but all of the others were able to grab weapons and shields in response to the intruders. Immediately, Huelwen cast Combat Invisibility on herself.
Ragani used summoned lions and healing spells, while Kormatin cast his protection magic and those who didn’t have it and started swording ogres while Brigid fought and buff spelled as best she could.
Huelwen tried to cast Bodywarp on Kormatin but it was thwarted by his protective talisman. She tried to use touch attack invocations on Kormatin and then later Brigid. Eventually she attacked Brigid and later Tihalt with a Bodywarping spell. Much potion drinking later Kormatin and his allies began wearing the ogres down but the tables truly turned when Anja and Tihalt were able to seriously wound the door guards and drive them off. Anja kept shooting spells at the fleeing ogres while Tihalt joined in. Kormatin and company started taking down ogres starting with Heulwen’s daughter the neophyte skin changer but unfortunately Tihalt was slain by a lucky axe strike.
When it was down to only Huelwen and one her ogre thugs, Huelwen tried to flee, but Brigid yelled at Anja to cast dispel magic at the door while she tried to flee and this exposed her. Out for blood to avenge Tihalt, the party took down all the remainder. One of the wounded door guards and fled the battle, but Kormatin was able to track him down and kill him fairly easily as he was leaving a trail of blood. They freed the king’s half-sister.
Kormatin and company acquired a fair amount of gold and reagents. Kormatin turned over most of the gold King Henryk, but out of respect for Tihalt, the king donated all of the gold to the local Guardians. Kormatin sent the reagents on to Revered Mother Frymar. The PCs used Heulwen’s notes to round up her remaining accomplices.
The king threw a heroes funeral for Tihalt and the other men who died in service fighting the ogres. He opted to executed all of Huelwen’s accomplices in captivity other than two ogres and one normal human who were already released.
They took time off to mourn. During the downtime, two newly minted dwarf journeyman responded to Kormatin’s invitation. Nuldren’s nephew Borsas Dragonbane and his friend Elbrus Bristlebranch about the time when Kormatin was setting up a house/blacksmith shop for Kormatin and Brigid to live and work in. Borsass and Elbrus would work with Brigid when they are in town, and work by themselves otherwise. Kormatin asked his new employees to sell a few things for appearances, but mostly they were to stockpile arms and armor for Kormatin’s upcoming military moves.
Nuldrun Dragon by Eron12 using Hero Forge
We retconned that Nuldrun Dragonbane asked Kormatin if he wanted to hire his nephew and nephew’s friend, two newly minted journeyman smiths so we said they already sent a letter out offering to hire them.
Long ago, Kormatin asked Revered Mother Alexandra Frymar for another wand of Divination ●●●. It finally arrived and Kormatin sent her back some reagents in return.
by Me with Hero Forge
Anja Deorac by Eron12 with Hero Forge
Ragani portrait by Eron12 using Hero Forge
by Eron12 with Hero Forge
Guardian Icon by me
Borsas Dragonbane by Eron12 with Hero Forge
Elbus Bristlebranch by Eron12 with Heroforge
A delegation of Red Shaft Clan dwarves arrived to reclaim the wood cut heirloom Henryk/Kormatin promised to return and they left a few more metal smiths to help arm Fumaya.
Crude Red Shaft Sigil by me
Ragani took a lot of their trade goods (jewelry, wood cuts, tapestries, high end clothing, etc) and liquidated them into coin, as much as she could. Kormatin gave Reeyak the Tengku Reeyak the Tengku about 50 gold worth of fine silver goods as a thank you for his information against the ogre criminals.
Report Date
03 Aug 2022
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