Chapter 1: The Next Adventure Begins

January 27

The group receives information through different channels that the adventurers’ guild has something for them, and the group gathers at the Rusty Dragon because of this. There they meet the guild master who appears to be a capable swordsman. Ertak magically transforms Neiia’s juice into wine, so Neiia gets quite intoxicated. The master introduces himself as Cygar. Cygar explains that the adventurers’ guild has been reviewing the group’s first task, the tomb. They have noticed that it apparently wasn’t just a grave robbery. Cygar asks about the amulet with a map fragment that the group had found earlier. Neiia states that it’s among her belongings at Kieron’s place. Kieron explains that she moved all of Neiia’s things into one closet, so finding that amulet would be somewhat difficult, but they should go there and search for it.

The group moves to Kieron’s place and when they examine Neiia’s possessions, Kieron notices that someone has clearly gone through Neiia’s things after she dumped them there, because these piles are much neater. They notice that the amulet cannot be found. Kieron says that she threw Neiia’s things in here just under a month ago for the New Year’s celebration. The festivities ended five days ago when Kieron received a message about this meeting, and it took a couple of days to throw out the revelers and another three days for cleaning, so she doesn’t know when the amulet was stolen.

Cygar explains that they suspect the culprits could be followers of Razmir. The followers of Razmir had established a temple in Riddleport just before the group went to the crypt. Cygar says that Reginar from the adventurers’ guild had an idea about how to get into the temple. The temple accepts new priest apprentices once a month, so that could be one approach. Reginar lives in an inn called Forest Bounty in Riddleport.

The group takes Captain Welren’s barge with its timber cargo and travels that way to Riddleport. The priests of Razmir apparently hear about many different things, so it would be better for the group to be properly disguised when going in.

February 1

Late in the evening, the group reaches near Riddleport, when Welren states that caution is needed here because last time he was attacked in this area, but he shot the attacker with his crossbow so the attacker is now at the bottom of the sea.

Ertak and Agnarr are at the bow keeping watch and Kieron is on the aft deck tuning her instrument. Neiia is at the bow talking with Ertak and Agnarr. Suddenly Agnarr notices a boat approaching their ship from behind, so Agnarr warns Ertak and starts running across the log pile toward the stern. Neiia didn’t hear what Agnarr says, so Ertak stays to explain the situation to Neiia. Agnarr reaches the stern near the captain in five seconds and explains the situation to him. Kieron hears Agnarr’s explanation from nearby and immediately begins preparing for battle.

The enemy boat is about nine feet long and has two enemies aiming with crossbows and a helmsman. The boat is still over 50 yards away. Kieron tries to shoot at them with her pistol and the enemies shoot back with their crossbows. One enemy manages to hit Kieron once.

Agnarr takes cover behind his shield while Welren loads his crossbow. Ertak and Neiia arrive at the scene shortly before the boat reaches the ship. Ertak falls while trying to pass Agnarr and drops down into the cargo hold. When Ertak comes up from the hold, he shouts, “There’s also an attack from there, a sea monster.” Ertak goes to the side and casts light into the water.

Kieron hides herself in a perfect darkness spell area and waits, drawing a longsword and stabs from the darkness at an enemy who had thrown a grappling hook. Kieron hears the enemies talking about bombs and at the same time something flies at her feet, so she jumps to safety. The enemies try to board the ship, but Agnarr hits one so badly that the enemy drops back down into the boat. The other manages to climb onto the ship and enters the dark area, so his actions are not clearly visible. The enemy attacks Kieron and lands quite a hard blow that Kieron doesn’t have time to dodge. Meanwhile, Ertak joins the others in fighting against the boat. A moment later, the group sees that the boat is escaping, so Neiia shouts to be careful as she’s going to shoot there, and fires a large explosive ice ball at it. Neiia, Ertak, and Agnarr jump ashore to safety, but Kieron wants to watch and sees how the boat explodes into small pieces.