Rova 11th 17 - Fort Confusion

The group awake well rested and Vaneer provides a heroes feast to bolster their efforts for the day.

The group gather their gear and begin to head up the stairs.

50ft climb later the stairs end in a solid stone wall where Miro manages to find a locked secret door which takes him a while to pick the lock open.

They open the door into a dusty room in some sort of underground basement and from the looks of it the room hadn’t been used for a long time and there appeared to be no other way out then the door they had just entered in.

After some time Vaneer finds two secret doors leading out of the room.

After waiting for an extended amount of time Miro finally unlocks both secret doors, they then open the door to the south and find a wine cellar.

The other door lead into a large room with a set of stairs heading upwards and a number of cells.

The cells were all occupied with Baron Deleth, his wife and their general.

Miro again takes some extended time to unlock the cells and let out the nobles where the group directed them to the secret passageway and told them that they should head to the velvet corner.

As they begin to head up the stairs the group could hear voices above.

Otto casts an invisibility sphere whilst Vaneer dropped a sword on the floor to make a noise and hopefully attract the attention of those upstairs.

One mercenary comes down the stairs to investigate as he calls up to whomever is still at the top of the stairs.

Otto casts deep slumber at the top of the stairs and another guard fell to the bottom of the stairway where Miro then jumped into action taking both guards out before any alarms could be raised to their presence.

The group drag the bodies of the deceased guards into the now empty cells and then make their way up the stairs.

The top of the stairs opened onto a large landing area with numerous doors including the main door to the fort and another set of stairs heading upwards, the group decide to bar the main door closed from inside and then investigated the other doors.

The doors lead into various storerooms, cloakrooms, kitchen, pantry, workshop and washrooms which had nothing of interest for looting purposes.

The group head up the stairs to the second floor where they hear faint voices coming from one of the rooms nearby. Otto turns himself invisible and creeps over and cracks open the door to see around eight people sitting and eating at a large table.

Otto casts confusion into the room which affects five of the room’s eight occupants and then closes the door to leave the spell to work its magic whilst the group continue to investigate the rest of the second floor.

The rest of the floor contained a library, latrine, study and access to the ramparts. The group lock the doors to the ramparts and return to the dining room to review the confusion spells after effects.

As the group approached the door to the dining area one of the occupants came running through the door and bounced off Hugo’s chest and whilst still recovering from the shock Otto, Natalia and Miro silence him quickly.

Otto then peered through the door and took note of the aftermath of the confusion spell, two mercenaries were still alive although badly injured while the rest appeared to be dead. The group move in quickly and finish the two remaining mercs before heading up to the third floor.

At the top of the stairs the group find a locked door denying them access to the third floor. Miro is left to struggle with the lock and eventually opens the door.

The group enters into what looks like an art gallery with two bedrooms, a washroom and a balcony overlooking the fort’s courtyard.

With nothing of much interest they head up to the fourth floor which opens into a corridor with multiple doors leading off from it.

The first door lead into a large bedroom with a massive wardrobe, the second door lead to another bed chamber and washroom, the third door lead into another bedroom decorated with pictures of Nymphs’ and Satyrs cavorting, the fourth door lead into a bedroom decorated with a lot of axes….lots of axes!!!!

The group head back down to the balcony and take a sneak peak out to the courtyards and notice six giants standing around in the outer courtyard and a total of five guards in the tower platforms overlooking the courtyards with more guards dotted around the ramparts.

Otto casts confusion onto the six giants of which only two succumb to the spells effects, Otto casts the spell twice more and finally gets all six which ends up with them all brawling against each other and acting as a perfect distraction as the guards start watching and cheering the fight.

The group descend back to the second floor and under the guise of an Invisibility sphere they exited the main fort and made their way across to the nearest guard tower. As they enter the tower on the second floor they find it empty an so quickly head up to the top level to kill the sole guard discreetly whilst he was watching the giant fighting match.

With the rest of the tower confirmed empty the group move on to the next tower.

As they entered on the second floor of the next tower they could instantly hear cheering from a room ahead and above of them.

Otto and Boss stay on the second floor whilst Otto casts confusion into the barracks where more mercenaries were watching the giant fight which soon turned them into a brawling mess.

The rest of the group headed up to the top floor to take out the four bodies that were supposedly on watch.

They all then head down to the bottom floor of the tower to find an empty meeting room before returning to the barracks to mop up the remaining two mercenaries.

Then again under the shield of an invisibility sphere and stealth skills the group make their way round the ramparts killing of one guard after the after.

Once the ramparts are cleared the group descend into the inner courtyard and start peering into the buildings contained within, they soon find a washroom and a number of commoners doing the keeps laundry to which they warn them to stay put for a while to keep them safe.

The group then make their way towards the outer courtyard and head for the stables where they find it completely empty.

As they exit the stables they catch sight of the four remaining giants struggling to stand upright from the after effects of their brawl so the group make their way to finish the job.

Instead of going straight into the fight they head back up to the ramparts and try to throw pebbles at the giants to instigate another fight but it fails so Otto casts another confusion spell which affects three of the four giants.

When only the fourth giant was left Otto cast a scorching ray killing it off.

With no sign of the leaders at the fort the group decide that it was about time to head back to the rebellion at the velvet corner.

As they enter into the velvet corner to find the place in complete disarray with some people kneeling on the floor with hoods over their heads with others lying dead on the floor. Standing behind the kneeling figures were the mercenary leaders that the group had gone looking for.

It turned out they had come looking for the group at the same time the group had gone looking for them. Tension rises but the group offers them the same permanent deal that Armag had offered them with the addition of a position on the Wyvernshore council.

The leaders, Vardigan (Barbarian), Imeckus (Wizard) and Lady Quintesa (Bard) have a heated discussion between them. Imeckus and Quintesa agree to the offer but Vardigan refuses, he spurs into a rage and attacks Otto.

Vaneer casts a searing light at Vardigan.

Vardigan hits Otto hard.

Miro attacks Vardigan but some sort of force prevents his blade from connecting.

Imeckus casts a scorching ray at the barbarian and hits.

Natalia starts casting.

Lady Quintesa starts singing.

Otto casts Mirror image on himself.

Boss attacks Vardigan and hits.

Vaneer casts sound blast and hits the barbarian.

Vardigan destroys two of Otto’s mirror images as well as hitting Otto.

Hugo attacks the barbarian and hits.

Miro manages to sink a blow into Vardigan’s calf doing some serious damage.

Imeckus casts a disintegrate spell which fails to affect followed by a quickened magic missile.

Bob attacks and hits Vardigan.

An earth elemental appears and hits the barbarian.

Lady Quintesa sings some weird words and Vardigan drops down dead.

The group release the prisoners and get them to start putting the velvet corner back together.

Lady Quintesa offers to return to the garrison and to tell her troops to stand down and inform them of the new deal.

Before she leaves though the lady informs the group of what she knows about Armag.

‘Armag believes he is the second coming of the great barbarian Armag and when he has the sword their souls will combine together and he can then call the souls of all the fallen barbarians.’

When asked about the black sisters the group find out that they’re worshippers of Gyronna and that they are hoping that Armag will run chaos over all the kingdoms including Dragonmere.

The group decide to rest and head north to intercept Armag the next day.