COMPLETED: Missing Shipments

General Summary

Just reported to Meave Grimjaw by her good friend, if not business rival, Phillip Lokharte that some shipments have gone missing. Upon investigation the party found that the barrels used to deliver the goods weren't missing, only their contents. Further scrutiny revealed one of the barrels contained a discoloration on the bottom. Shipments are received weekly on Tuesday, this initial investigation was on a Tuesday. Shipments are packed, weighed and certified Friday and leave from Triton Village to arrive in Farronvue Sunday afternoon, where they are weighed and certified again. They leave Farronvue to arrive in Fort Daneborough Monday evening, where they are weighed and certified for a final time.
Heading to Fort Daneborough the party investigates the weigh station, Rell Deadhand allows them to inspect the ledger and follow up with Stefan Steeleroot. They didn't gain much further information except that of the process of weighing and recording. Each barrel is checked individually for weight to match the manifest, during which time seals are checked for tampering after this is resolved the valet on assignment marks it as such in the ledger. While Stefan has no clear memory of the event he states if his signature was present then everything checked out.
While in Fort Daneborough the party overhears about a festival in the nearby village. Pious and Araz go to investigate some of the underground connections within town and stumble onto the Inky Squid which houses the Gutter Rats who will allow Pious an inside track on jobs within the town should he provide them information concerning the Scarab incursion. Pious agrees while Araz is pretty put off for being dragged around town for what seems like to him no reason. The rest of the party is looking for a library and stumbles upon the strangest library they'd ever seen with an even more mysterious host, Curator Senetra.
Pious follows up on several leads that drive him to find Amalie Ranni and inquire on what her connections are to the Scarab. She tells him she was to complete a job, part of the same job that brought Pious to the town. She however doesn't tell him what her part includes. He does find out that Amalie seduced and manipulated Detlav Blackham to take military actions against the Gutter Rats. Amalie warns that Pious should complete his task and that any attempt to warn the Gutter Rats would end poorly for him.
The party excluding Pious head to Farronvue to celebrate in the Towerfall Festival which is taking place Saturday evening though Sunday morning. Pious catches up for the last moments leading up to the lighting of the tower. The whole group parties through the night, Gilvamane Hava makes moves on Pious who accepts her advances.
The next morning they rest and set out to meet up with Giddlejoy Makone's shipment however they fail to recollect what would indicate his wagon and end up missing it, being forced to return to Farronvue the wagon with horses unbridled and waiting in the weigh station.
After watching the crew weigh and verify the seals there didn't seem anything amiss. They introduce themselves to the Quartermaster of Farronvue Baylen and are allowed to inspect the cargo. Having a contract from the Adventurer's Lodge they are permitted to break the seal in order to investigate the barrels. Within each, the party is shocked to discover, a dead body. They appear to be of varying ages and demographics. Suspicious of Giddlejoy Makone, Braumeister for Phillip, they set off immediately through the night with driver Vernon the Dustridden to await the dawn opening of the gates in Fort Daneborough.
It becomes obvious through dealings with the guards in both Farronvue and Fort Daneborough that the transportation of dead bodies is banned without specific authorization. They are able to reach Greensward early afternoon and report directly to Phillip concerning the case so far. Believing Giddlejoy to be in on some sort of conspiracy against him they ask some character questions concerning the Gnome. It turns out however that Giddlejoy and Phillip have been almost life long friends and it would be unlikely he would do anything to hinder their business together. Upon Giddlejoy's discovery of bodies within his hop containers he immediately dumps half of their remaining stock accounting for the previous shipments that have been tampered with. This leaves them about 1 week before a gap in viable product is formed.
The party's understanding might possibly be lacking, so they decide to talk it over with Meave and Clive Celaden, the latter pointing out that any mage could possibly cast mending and repair the broken seals on the lost shipments. Recounting the schedule they realize if they left now they could arrive in Fort Daneborough in time to catch anyone that might be stealing shipments from there. Araz hides within a barrel and the party waits for what might happen next. Around 1 o'clock the watch on the gatehouse disappear and 3 individuals approach with a handcart. The trap was sprung and the 3 individuals were captured without raising an alarm.
They interrogate the 2 conscious members of the trio. The first, Larry, was loose lipped but also naive to the exact details of the job. The second, Jeremy was much harder to break until Mess decided to kill him and bring him back to life. After which he was much more obliged to give up details on his employer. That being a tall religious man wearing a symbol of a hammer, correctly identified by Araz and Mess as the symbol of Torag. However this religious man spoke of a Lord of Light, not a known moniker of Torag. Further describing the man, he has a scar descending directly down from his right lip corner and has blonde hair. The rest of their job was to bring the bodies to spot a on the bridge marked with the following symbol.

The party pursues this to it's natural conclusion and setup an ambush at the meeting spot. No one shows however as they have been tipped off somehow. Feeling their work is done the party attempts to receive their payment for the job. However on consulting with Meave they are sad to find out that the perpetrator, or the one putting the bodies in the barrels is still at large and it is their responsibility to apprehend and return the villain. She suggests that they follow-up with the driver Vernon, upon hearing who the driver was she asks the party to deliver a small package and a letter to him.
They return to Fort Daneborough to find him drunk in the Skewered Boar, he recounts again that the journey from Triton Village was uneventful, upon pressing him further. They discover that there is a church being built by a man named Caduceus, a tall man with a nasty scar on his right chin. He also make pretty good beer.
The party spends no time delaying and ventures forth to find him and the church he's building. After a day and a half's journey they approach the construction sight as the sun sets. They find three people in the middle of construction who drop what their doing to invite their guests for drink and soup.  Caduceus seems a nice fellow and serves them drink and soup before he and Karak Dorm, a Dwarf ranger, take the rest of the soup to the rest stop.  After a few minutes Caduceus returns alone.  The party makes no objection and the conversation which was cordial and lighthearted turned to more accusatory and probing.  Having suspected correctly that the party had come to investigate their subversive actions, of course with his medallion of thoughts it left little doubt in Caduceus' mind that the party meant to stop him.
Caduceus has by some means become a servant of a fallen god, known only to the party as the Lord of Light.  He demands bodies, and Caduceus is willing to perform the work.  He attempts to bargain with the party saying he'd stop using Giddlejoy's shipment if they would let him continue this work.  The party takes a quick aside but while still reading their surface thoughts it becomes clear to him that they do not intend to take him up on the offer, and prepares for battle.  The following battle falls handily into the parties hands and Caduceus and Karak are taken into custody, however Veldan did not survive the blast from Araz and died. 
Attempting to interrogate them resulted in very little.  Karak refused to speak and now while reading his thoughts they saw he was afraid though not from their interrogation methods, believing that whoever he works for has some control over the dead and feared that revealing anything about them would be worse than death.  Mess assuming it is about some necromancer.  Next they tried using the medallion of thoughts on Caduceus because they worried if he were allowed speak he could cast some spell.  Which he was impressed by as those were his surface thoughts, upon probing deeper Araz was able to see into his mind then asked "Who do you work for?" a clear image of a man in black and red robes, face concealed, standing in the midst of polished stonework appeared, then suddenly from behind the man a being of pure light formed and looked onto Araz.  Upon seeing the very same figure he saw while in the taurus beneath the Ruins of Alborect, Araz reels losing his connection and becoming exhausted.  Further probing would be useless. 
The rest of the party investigated the church.  In the main hall they found altars for all the Pantheon of the Nine  save Desna which generally doesn't have shrines within churches, being the Goddess of travel.  Behind the church Pious found stairs leading to an earthen cellar.  Upon opening the door a vile stench overcame Pious who promptly vomited. Araz finished his search finding a large mound of bodies, likely numbering 20-30.  Beside that some pilfered goods and a makeshift still.
They rested the rest of the evening before making way back to Farronvue.  Baylen Buckwater informed them they don't have a facility to house such dangerous criminals and to take them to Fort Daneborough however they did more adequately secure the prisoners.  Over the entire journey both Caduceus and Karak seems resigned. After leaving the prisoners in Fort Daneborough the party went back to Greensward to accept payment for the quest.

Report Date

16 Dec 2020