Leaving Nouchi
A cinematic one-off campaign in Nouchi following some previous epic characters.
Characters
- Esme Harrington, Cormirian archeologist played by Mel
- Vasker Raiden, Imperial Captain played by John
- Shier Pyreblade, Leonin prisoner played by Niki
- Pong Bing, Imperial dungeon guard played by Traci
Setup
Esme
Having gathered your stashed loot and sketching some pictures of the Orochi who watched you from the treetops as you passed through the Dulso forest, you return to Eigyou through Ramiin. Along the way, you gathered what knowledge you could about the Empire and the ruler Kijin Tono and the people of the land of Nouchi. You have sent letters back to your associates in Cormire detailing some of your journey and providing sketches and teasers to your upcoming article. While writing your article and staying in Eigyou trying to find passage back to the northern continent without having to pass through the Imperial security involving uncomfortable luggage checks and strip searches, you encounter Vasker on the piers of Eigyou. You were just trying to get a vessel to take you north without stopping in Shuto for imperial search and seizure.
Vasker
You are about to venture back into Shuto because a couple of weeks past you received distressing messages from Inarra. She again invaded your dreams and notified you that Imperial investigators were interrogating the priestesses and she suspected that they knew of the Eye heist. She feared for her well-being and was notifying you mostly of her concern. Days later she again appeared to you in your dreams. She was crying tears of blood in this dream. She mentioned that she had seen the future for her and it was short and painful in the tunnels beneath the imperial palace. She told you they had started taking priestesses away. In this brief vision she plead for you to return and liberate her, taking her far away from the service to the temple of the Spider and the Empire. You awoke and after some short words with the further transforming Yang, you left him and his colossus unescorted at the edge of the forest north of Teardrop lake. You rode with urgency eastward, hoping that Inarra would again visit your troubled slumber each short night.
You have just encountered Esme on the piers of Eigyou as you search for your merchant contact, Akbar.
Shier
You were sent but a handful of days past. You and your Wind-rider soared through the clouds of the empire to view a small fortress full of hairless human males in brown robes before soaring further north to where the clouds grew thicker and small bands of dark-armoured soldiers grew more prevalent. Sensing a great hub of magical power along the north-east coast, you began to migrate there. Late one night, as you were about to bed down, something aroused your senses just before a thick fog enshrouded your camp. You heard your wind-rider take flight just before three men approached you through the fog. Ah, a greeting party, finally. You tried to reason with them in their difficult tongue, taught to you hastily by the Atum before you left, but they seemed to have no interest in words. Their magic and blades were swift to respond to your questions and pleas for a peaceful reunion of your races. Fearful fools, you though. Within moments you realized you had no choice but to fight back or likely die. Sadly, you did not realize the frailty of humans and you killed one of the dark armored warriors and injured the gray robed man before you were overtaken. Regrettable. An attack will do no good to bring the Leonin back to the surface below, and a murder will not make us welcome.
Over what you guess are the last few days, you have awoken to a drugged stupor as humans have been poking, prodding and experimenting on you. At first they only brought you dead raw meat. No honor in an unclaimed kill. When you would not eat the meat, they began bringing you fruits and vegetables, mostly palatable. The last two meals you've been served were cooked meat and vegetables in a spicy sauce over some small white grain. No worthy utensils were given, but they did give you some mediocre tooth-picks. Mostly, you've been alone in a dark cell and haven't had the opportunity to talk to anyone. Any time such an opportunity arises, they shoot you with small darts, cowards which make you nearly unconscious and incapable of anything but slurred babblings, then muzzle you and cart you off through dark tunnels to work their dark science and magics upon you.
Pong Bing
You have recently been given the task of escorting lovely Priestesses of the Spider Temple from their dark dungeon cells to the interrogation/torture chambers. It is decreed that guards in your position are not to speak to prisoners. This has always been very difficult for you because you love meeting new people and learning about them, especially if they are different. The priestesses have been a bit difficult for you because you have heard they wield powerful magics and that they are powerful witches capable of bringing about your worst nightmares. Being so close to the subject of these rumors scares you. Badly. So, you haven't had too much trouble holding your tongue with them until the most recent of them.
As you were unlocking her cell two days ago she mentioned quietly to you that you'd best steel yourself for a great adventure.
That has vexed you since. Was she conjuring up some mischief? Should you tell your superiors? Perhaps you will ask Pei Pei what he thinks when you next run into him.
This morning when escorting the same woman from the interrogation chamber, she bled from her eye-sockets...not an uncommon experience, but for whatever reason you felt great pity for her. You had to say something just before closing her cell door. All you could muster was a bumbling inquiry...I'm sorry for your sight, but what of adventure? She replied simply in between sobs, Find Vasker.
What Happened
Vasker searched the docks trying to avoid recognition with his three-week beard and low-pulled cloak. Esme, trying to talk her way onto a vessel heading to the northern continent with nothing more than insufficient coin and her oh-so-charming smile spotted him. Together they found Akbar. They convinced him to take them back to Shuto in his fishing vessel, concealed in the fish hold. During the voyage, they spoke of rumored unrest in the empire and priestesses of the Temple of the Spider disappearing.
Upon arrival, Vasker had Akbar deposit them on the northmost pier, closest to the cliff-faced temple. They found an open bar at which to eat, where Vasker overheard a man named Pei Pei telling his drinking companion about his new client who was reportedly tall and covered with hair. This peaked Vasker's interest as it rang of some of Yang's tales of ancient magical races of Shuto. Later, Pei Pei's company changed and he was drinking with an imperial guard named Pong Bing who spoke of a priestess.
Vasker and Esme followed Pei Pei and Pong out of the bar to the alley where Pei Pei relieved himself on a building as Pong asked for his advice on how to act on the words of the priestess. The captain and outlander then followed the two off-duty prison guards to Pei Pei's apartment where they confronted them in the darkness.
Vasker and Esme led Pong to a dark alley and gathered more info from him before joining him to his apartment where they stayed the night and hatched multiple plans to rescue Innara, revealed as Vasker's love, from the depths of the Imperial dungeons.
The next day Vasker and Esme visited the Temple of the Spider where Vasker was recognized by Houshi, a good man and now gate-guard of the temple. There was some dispute with Houshi's partner but eventually they were let in where Vasker briefly questioned a priestess, then had a patrolling guard take him and Esme to one of the high priestesses. She informed him that he must hurry as Inarra needed him. He tried to convince her to take the priestesses and flee before the corruption of the empire did them in. She assured him that she had forseen more than his predictions and sent him on his way before the new captain of the temple arrived. On their way out, Vasker implored guards to do what they knew and felt was right despite the shadow of the empire.
Vasker sent Esme, with her large pack and his saddle-bags, to seek out Akbar or any vessel by which they could gain passage out to sea away from Shuto and Nouchi as he joined Pong to work in the dungeons.
Vasker and Pong socially engineered their way deeper and deeper into the obscure tunnels beneath Shuto until the last guard near Pong's ward would not allow Captain Jon Smith to enter without paperwork, holding fast to his job duty. Vasker demanded Pong arrest him. As the guard tried to blow his whistle, Pong swiftly drew his baton and bashed in the mans head, knocking him unconscious and dragging him into an empty cell. Vasker retrieved his whistle and baton. Just as they locked the door behind them, Pei Pei appeared at the end of a hall.
Pong approached him and introduced him to Cpt Smith, then they went to Inarra's cell where Vasker was overtaken by her state, blinded and badly bruised, starved and dehydrated, tortured and left in pain and suffering. Pei Pei approached looking for the missing guard as they were to deliver the monster from his hall to the alchemists. Pong went to help. Pong pretended to poison a dart, then totally missed when shooting at the cat beast. Opening the cell, Pong tried to speak to the monster who spoke back, despite Pei Pei's argument and caution. Vasker came over and ended their tense discussion by sending Pei Pei for water, then ordered Pong to open cells of prisoners who would be disruptive but not dangerous in order to cause a distraction for them to use whilst escaping.
Vasker then introduced himself to the starved and dehydrated Shier and gave her a baton and her freedom. As she stepped out and stretched cat-like Pei Pei began freaking out. Vasker convinced him to lock himself in a cell to be free of suspicion. Vasker carried Inarra and Shier followed as Pong led them to an grate where street droppings fed an underground drainage system Pong explained was used to carry waste and over-tortured bodies out to sea.
While trying to break through the grate above, the weight and force on the grate below, caused it to give way and Pong disappeared into the dark current below, dousing the party in darkness as the torch fell. He shouted from below that he was going out to the sea. While Vasker stared in awe, Shier overcame her fear of water and followed her code of honor to aid someone in need by jumping into the darkness after him. As Shier struggled for air, thrashing down the tube, Pong heard her and helped her remain undrown as they were carried through the tubes. Vasker dreaded taking the broken and weak Inarra into fast-flowing sewage, despite her urging him to act as time grew short. Moments later, guards spotted them and approached.
Esme having convinced Akbar to try fishing beneath the temple, where no one sailed happened to look up and see one of the high priestess direct her south along the cliff's edge. She hurried to help Akbar tie bouys to his full fishnets so they could cease trolling and go where she thought Vasker would need them.
Vasker let arrows fly, putting the first two guards to the ground as Inarra mumbled about water and pawed blindly at the floor. She slipped through the broken grate moments before Vasker as he fled an approaching guard with a crossbow. Vasker fought against the water in his armor and gear for moments before passing out.
Pong managed to keep Shier from drowning through the tubes and out into the sea, where Shier fought to subdue her fear of seas and oceans while Pong tried to help her gain purchase on the rock wall. While the Leonin scrabbled against the rock, Inarra and Vasker poured into the sea. Pong helped the fatigued Inarra keep Vasker from drowning while Shier clung to the cliff's edge desperately.
Pong started screaming at the nearby ships for assistance as it began to rain. Luckily, one of the ships was Akbar's. Esme began arguing with Akbar to sail to the cliff-edge rather than away from it as Vasker needed them. He was reluctant and feared they had already likely gained too much imperial attention AND sailing near the cliff in such a storm would surely kill them all. She finally convinced him by telling him she would frame him as a hero in her upcoming article. Esme threw a rope the blind Inarra and then slid down it to later haul Inarra back up to the deck of the vessel on her shoulders while Akbar and his two-man crew tried to ready a fishing net to throw to the others. Shier's tired, starved arms finally failed in the pouring rain and she fell unconscious to the water. Pong desperately tried to haul Vasker over to assist the enigmatic beast, but pushed himself too far and also passed out. The net was thrown to the three unconscious and one of Akbar's sailors dove valiantly into the angry sea to bind them all to the net so they could be hauled aboard.
Once aboard, Esme poured a magic potion into the mouth of Vasker who sputtered to life and coughed up sea water. Moments later Akbar's crewman efficiently saved resuscitated the creature his great-grandmother told him used to teach her tribe how to track and hunt. Esme tried stubbornly to bring Pong back from the sea's cold grasp, rubbing a strange Jasper stone on him and emulating the first-aid she'd seen the fisherman perform on Shier. Faces were long as she struggled and hope was diminishing, but finally, Pong gasped for breath and life seemed to gurgle up from within him in bubbling labored breaths.
The boat turned north with Akbar sternly barking orders to his crew in an ancient Nouchian dialect. They retrieved the load of fish under the cover of the storm and sailed to a fishing village along the northern coast of the island while the party all slept below deck atop the piles of fish. Much of the fish was traded at the village before Akbar struck northward across the great sea in his tiny fishing vessel. The next day beneath the great sun and blue sky, Akbar noted repeatedly that if they survived this insanity, Vasker owed him a king's ransom. Vasker and Inarra partook of a seemingly unending stream of endearing moments while Shier fought off a newly discovered sea-sickness. Eventually Pong awoke and had Akbar help him fry up a fish.
Later that day, Shier's wind-rider approached from the south and circled the boat while all were in awe, except Vasker who was preparing for combat and Esme who scrambled for her journal. Shier roared intimidatingly to cease the confusion and told them that this immense beast was her friend as it landed, perched on the aft of the vessel. Moments later, after thanking her rescuers, Shier gracefully slid into the saddle on the back of the wind-rider and took flight, heading northward. The fishing vessel sailed northward into unknown waters.