Mission 013: The Masked Mystique
A series of grisly murders has rocked the upper class of a small but prosperous city. The Golden Standard has been contracted to do something about it...on the eve of the most anticipated social event of the season!
Mission Log
The Golden Standard was contracted by a merchant named Sabine Janssen to investigate a series of recent, seemingly unconnected murders targeting some of Deastok's wealthy upper class citizens. They met with her in a seedy tavern called the Grumpy Lily in the Bursar Plaza district, where she took them to a private room to fill them in on the details of the job. They learned that all three murders were committed in different locations, by different methods (one of which instantly set off Auron, Fanny, and Anaya's immediate cult suspicions after their recent brush in the Orrery), and without any serious suspects, though Sabine attributed the lack of serious effort on Starosta McGinness's behalf in the investigation to his ties to the Truscan family, the most wealthy and influential family in the area, implying heavily that the Starosta might be under their influence and therefore have been discouraged from disrupting business too heavily. She informed them that she'd made arrangements for them to attend a masquerade ball at the Truscan's estate that very evening, a party in honor of Rhys Truscan's eighteenth birthday, where they would be able to hopefully question the most important members of society and also stop any further potential murders. Handing them invitations that identified them as guests of her associate, a former mercenary named Kai Brühl (whose father-in-law was among the deceased), and a metal token with an engraved symbol that would allow them to purchase proper attire before the masquerade, Sabine sent the party on their way in a carriage.
The party proceeded to A Cut Above, a high-class tailor shop owned by halfling sisters Myrna and Velma, who accepted the token without comment and proceeded to whip up bespoke outfits on the spot according to each of the party member's tastes. Once dressed, the sisters informed the party that their armor would be sent to the Grumpy Lily for safekeeping, much to their (especially Fanny's) clear dismay. They climbed into the carriage to be taken to the lavish Truscan estate in the Garden Grounds district. Before they even reached the entrance, however, an unexpected visitor knocked on their door: Sabine herself slipped into the carriage to tell them that she'd just learned that one of the guests, Dagmar Lorelei, had been caught red-handed at the scene of the last murder, seemingly without knowledge of what she'd done. She'd been released after questioning and was going to be in attendance. Sabine's final word of warning to the party before departing: some people are not what they seem, and some people are exactly what they seem.
Inside the estate, the foursome presented their invitations to the black-furred tabaxi inside the door and were given a choice of black and silver animal masks to choose for their masquerade disguise of the evening: Auron chose a fox, Anaya chose an owl, Letheia chose a hare, and Fanny chose a squirrel. They slipped their choices on and headed directly to the decadently decorated main hall, where they were announced to the guests within as guests of Kai Brühl, who subtly identified himself to them as a half-elf with daggers wearing a wraith mask. Auron, Letheia, and Anaya each grabbed wine (Letheia choosing to double-fist an extra glass in case she could be generous) while Fanny snagged a delicious pastry before making their way over to talk to Kai and his partner, another half-elf in a vampire mask who introduced himself as Klaus Brühl, son of recently murdered shipping mogul Helmut Brühl. Though Kai was rather short-spoken, Klaus quickly warmed to the party, flirting freely with Auron and offering his biased, gossip-laden primer on the noble houses of Deastok, identifying them around the room by mask and giving some background on each. He was able to point out the Truscans (Rhys mysteriously absent), as well as directing his rage towards a dazed-looking Dagmar Lorelei at Lady Charmaine's side. The party then decided they needed to introduce themselves to noted lesbians Irmina and Delia Erbach, whose son Christof was among the victims. Letheia found a surprising opener when she was able to identify Irmina as a veteran soldier and mentioned her own service, drawing some warmth from the otherwise reserved half-orc woman, who was then willing to provide more information and opinions about both the Truscans and the other guests. Delia's grieving, inebriated state made her both more talkative and more sensitive, as Fanny found out when she inquired about the details of their dead son's now-cancelled wedding and provoked an emotional breakdown.
Fanny grabbed a couple extra pastries to avoid further foot-in-mouth syndrome before the party decided to venture out of the main hall to explore the estate and search for Rhys Truscan, afraid that he might be the prime target for a murderer with a sense of irony. They paused briefly to examine two large, prominently placed portraits of Truscan family members (Lord Pryor Truscan and Lady Truscan) hanging outside the main hall before wandering into a quiet room with a fortune teller and a tiefling named Sabbath, who was offering magical tattoos as part of the party's entertainment. Immediately intrigued by the tiefling (especially Anaya, whom Auron graciously attempted to wingman), the four adventurers decided to each get commemorative tattoos of each of their mask animals. As the first to take the offer, Auron's tattoo had an additional magical enchantment of protection woven into it. Their conversation with Sabbath proved enlightening, especially after Letheia permanently promised a snippet of her latest composition in exchange for a secret: Sabbath informed them that the master bedroom held information regarding Rhys, and suggested that if they wanted to know some real shit about what went down at these parties, to not let any locked door stop them. Armed with that knowledge, half of the party drunk on Kamordan wine, and filled with the sudden rush of both power and weakness as the foursome attuned to their enchanted masquerade masks, the four headed upstairs to try to find the master bedroom and hopefully locate Rhys.
A helpful, hapless servant named Strella in a nearby room filled with overbearing hunting trophies was able to accidentally point the party towards Rhys Truscan's bedroom. Fanny's attempt to pick the lock proved unsuccessful, but Kai materialized to aid the party with his own skills at breaking and entering. Cautiously wary, Anaya sent their familiar Bhoot ahead first, only to lose the fragile fey creature to a swinging blade trap triggered just inside. Fanny entered next, but instead of finding Rhys Truscan, she discovered a gory scene: dismembered limbs littered the room in bloody piles, with bodies stacked in his bed. Auron and Letheia couldn't stomach the gore (which did, at least, help sober them up somewhat), but managed to attempt some cleanup with help from Anaya's Mage Hand. On the desk, they found an open box full of locks of hair as well as a pair of orcish tusks; recognizing this as potential evidence, they decided to show it to Kai and strap the box to Letheia's thigh under her frilly dress to try to smuggle it out of the room. Kai seemed both shocked and unsurprised by Rhys's bedroom of horrors, but suggested they might need more evidence before accusing him of responsibility for the three recent murders, and offered to help them break into the master bedroom downstairs. To provide a distraction while Kai broke in, all four party members staged a dance-off between Letheia and Auron which drew enough attention to let him work without being noticed.
Inside the Truscan's suspiciously normal bedroom, the party discovered that their hosts have terrible taste, too much money, a large number of potions and perfumes, and a collection of terrible novels and erotica. Anaya picked up a statue of a goat on top of a hunk of polished amber that made her feel suspiciously randy, Letheia discovered a heart-shaped potion bottle among Lady Charmaine's perfumes, Auron tried on and discarded one of Lord Deacon's robes, and Fanny tried to take The Arcana Sutra for herself -- only to trigger a secret door in the bookshelf which revealed a candle-filled secret sex dungeon full of family secrets and magical items. They discovered that the Truscan's power came from intermarrying with demons in every generation back to their founder, that Rhys was a cambion (the direct offspring of a succubus and a humsan), and in examining a heavily chained magical book, realized that at least some member of every major noble family at the party seemed to have made a demonic deal at some point. As Auron and Anaya began to feel the increasing magical influence of the succubus whispering temptations in their minds, the four discovered that Kai had abandoned them and that they were no longer alone in the secret room, coming face to face with Lady Charmaine Truscan in her true form as the succubus Thelnixi. She offered them deal after deal as they plied her for information, intimating that the party was too late to stop her son's birthday murder spree and attempting to convince one of the party members to let her come with them, until Auron took advantage of their stalling for time to set the demonic book on fire with a magical Firebolt and cut Thelnixi's anchor to the material plane, sending her directly back to hell in a blaze of purple fire.
As the party rushed out of the bedroom and discovered the masquerade had descended into confused chaos, they were confronted in the main hall by a furious, tantruming Rhys Truscan in full cambion form and flanked by servants-turned-imp as well as his father. As the battle began, Dagmar Lorelai shook off Thelnixi's influence and transformed into a white werewolf before fleeing the house. Aided by Irmina and Kai, the party fought the flying lordling with Auron's flaming sacred sword, well-placed cubes of thunder energy, powerful bursts of magic missiles, caustic mockery, and a clutch Chill Touch from Letheia that prevented Deacon Truscan from sacrificing his lifeforce to keep his son alive.
Finally, Rhys was impaled on Auron's radiant flaming sword and incinerated, crumbing to ash.
The party spoke to a now-lucid Gemma and Dean Truscan, Deacon's younger siblings, who gathered along with Irmina and Kai to try to sort out what had happened and thank them for killing Thelnixi once and for all, freeing them from her demonic influence and ending the cycle of death. Anaya suggested they forward all appreciation in cash, care of the Golden Standard, which they tentatively agreed to consider. With the Crownsguard incoming, the party decided to make a hasty exit, with the exception of Auron, who confidently suggested that Klaus and Kai could show their appreciation in other ways and was claimed for the rest of the evening by the husbands. Back at the Grumpy Lily with Sabine, the party collected their belongings, their payment, and the mysterious addition of four tokens similar to the one they brought to the tailors earlier, with a sly suggestion from Sabine that they might serve the party well should they seek out favors at any seedy establishment in the future. Activate bracers, homeward bound...
SUMMARY
DM Zoe
PLAYERS Ash (Letheia), Julie (Fanny), Lou (Auron), Puja (Anaya)
RESULT Mission Complete
TOTAL XP 1980 each
TOTAL GP 25 gp each