Everyone wakes up and goes into work. Yish would like to play minesweeper today. But then again, he decides to hand in the other jobs to get a new set of jobs (and let other teams take care of them, since he feels that it would be best to distribute time sensitive tasks so that they get done as soon as possible—-he doesn’t want any more young women getting kidnapped). There is a new rule for the group: in combat, everyone is to stand at least 10 feet away from Leaf.

The party decides to take the dire wolf job (the dire wolf was spotted outside of town; while reported by common citizen, the government would pay for the job, since this would fall under the public safety of the city). Clarion finishes building a bear trap. Yish warns the party that the dire wolf is very strong and perceptive. The party deliberates how best to handle the situation. At least Clarion has a slab of raw meat as bait. Maybe drug the meat? Well, the drugs seem to be too expensive, so Marda is going to try to talk with the dire wolf.

The party decides to set up the trap behind the dire wolf and lead it back to the trap, if necessary. Hnng decides to start screaming for whatever reason, which causes the dire wolf to move faster. As the party approaches some rocks, Lilith and Yish notice that the dire wolf is hiding behind them. Marda attempts to speak with it, but the dire wolf is not trusting. Marda then casts calm animal. The dire wolf comes out of cover. It then becomes apparent that the dire wolf is scarred and matted with blood. Marda offers the slab of meat. The dire wolf accepts the meat, but steps back. Marda steps up and pets the beast, and it accepts. Marda and the dire wolf then have a very short conversation wherein Marda discovers that the dire wolf’s name is Sif and that she wants protection from her previous owner. As Marda asks where the previous owner is, she exhausts her ability to speak with animal for the day, but she does understand that the previous owner must have come from the forests two days west.

The party decides to return to town. Sif follows. She stays close to Marda and tries to avoid the others. As the calm animal effect wears off, Sif gets even more nervous at the others. Noting this, Marda decides that it would be best not to take Sif into the city. She dismisses the others and stays with Sif. Yish orders Leaf (who sleeps out in the woods anyway) to be alert for screams in the middle of the night.

The party without Marda then report to Nen, informing him that they have calmed the dire wolf and that they are continuing the job. While the party is in the office, Marda unexpectedly shows up and reports that the job is done. Nen pays (14 silver pieces per person) as everyone is curious about how Marda has taken care of Sif. Marda doesn’t answer any curious stares but does mention that Sif might be joining them at a later date.

VERMIN purchases Clarion’s traps at 75% market value. Policy is that company traps can be used at any time but must be returned. If damaged, the user must pay 100% market value for the trap.

The party splits up for the day. Hnng is upset that there was so much planning and not enough action. In any case, the day ends.

The next day, Nen has a question for Marda: “What happened to the wolf?” Marda answers that it was taken care of. Nen then informs her that someone had come into the office looking for a wolf, claiming to be the owner. Marda then shares with Nen that Sif does not want to go back; Nen then apologizes that he had told the man that the Yish party had the wolf. But the man promised to return today. Besides Lilith, everyone else is in the office and overhears the conversation.

The party begins plotting how to ambush the man. Hnng is concerned that using a bear trap on a human might be a problem with the law. Clarion suggests giving the man gloves of fumbling and let him hold the bear trap. Yish suggests that they ought to hand the man over to Sif. But Marda is concerned about Sif’s fear of the man.

The party arrives at work. Hnng is waiting for orders. Voting was cast for taking care of the wizard’s construct and for the lesser demon. Yish is hesitant mostly because he almost died yesterday from some creature with a trident. He also felt somewhat bad for the girl getting captured and so was leaning towards jobs that seemed more time sensitive. But someone pointed out that as a result of the kidnapping, the job was paid better. At this, Yish thought it might be better to go kidnap people to increase profit. In any case, Yish decided that taking care of the lesser demon might be the best course of action:

“Someone dropped off a note about a lesser demon causing trouble in the lower town. It’s been quarantined but needs to be dealt with.”

Whatever “quarantined” means.

The party chooses to study lore on the lesser demon. It is a quasit. Yish reads out loud from the book. He notes that it can go invisible and shapeshift, which seems problematic. Of course, it weighs 8 pounds; maybe the party can handle it.

The party arrives at the address in the note. It’s a basement apartment off an alleyway. Yish knocks on the door. A slight fluttering is heard from inside (Yish concludes that it must be an f-ing demon). Hnng checks the door to see if it is unlocked; the door swings open. The rest of the party quickly enters the room. Clarion shuts the door behind her to prevent the demon from flying out.

There are books and scrolls all over the room. The table holds alchemy tools; a bookcase has smashed jars that may once have contained magical components. Hnng reads the glyphs on the floor and recognizes it as a magic circle for summoning demons. There is a corpse leaning upon a table with congealed blood. It’s very dead.

As the party discusses what they might be able to do, given that they can’t see the demon anywhere, they suggest trying to splash acid all over the place or detecting magic (the demon must be magical, after all); then again, this is a magical lab, so most things might be detected as magical. When a jar from the bookcase suddenly disappears, the party knows that battle is commencing. A vial of acid appears above Leaf’s head, falling on his head. It causes some burning; the quasit also appears above Leaf’s head. Lilith buffs Leaf’s defenses. Leaf chooses to cast a judgment on himself and then proceeds to slash at the quasit. Marda’s accuracy with her new trident is not good. Hnng’s acid splash misses the quasit. Clarion’s scarf attack misses as well. The quasit moves to retreat but takes a few swipes at Leaf in the process; Leaf feels a little scratching but suffers nothing else. Lilith inflicts light wounds on the quasit. As the quasit finally manages to poison Leaf, Leaf strikes back. The quasit gets smacked out of the air and doesn’t move.

Hnng ignores Leaf’s plight and investigates the corpse. Hnng finds a component pouch and three bloodstones in the bag. At this point, Yish begins to wonder what company policy is on notifying next of kin and who gets to claim the possessions of the dead. Marda fails to find any pretty pictures (the quasit has ripped up most of the things in the room). Yish takes the bloodstones to split up the worth among the party members. He also reveals that he’s into “whale step”.

Since the day isn’t even half over now (and since Leaf isn’t hurt too much), the party decides to visit the wizard and his construct. The party arrives at a semi-converted warehouse. It is not in great condition; all of the doors and windows have been boarded up. The contact, the head wizard, mentions that an apprentice making an unapproved and unsupervised modification on the tidy-up machine caused problems; the magical alarms went off when the machine got out of control, and the facilities were boarded up to prevent the machine from going into town. The apprentice was locked in, though. No food on the premises.

As the party enters the facilities, they notice that the shelves are completely clear and the room is spotless. The first thought to enter Yish’s mind was that they would need to shut down the trash compactor. Marda is imagining that the construct has taken all of the items and attached them to its arms, turning into a Megatron of sorts. Since the shelves are clear, the entire room is easy to see. The storage closet doors are closed. As the party approaches the closet doors, Yish smells the stench of defecation from the farther door. Hnng opens the door.

Inside the room are well-sorted and separated stacks of compacted garbage. One is refuse; another is metallic. Hnng shouts out into the room: “Hey, come out”. That causes noises to come out from the other door. Hnng opens the other door and steps to the side as he says “Hey you! Hey you! Hey you!” Marda sets her trident in front of the door ready for anything that comes out. Meanwhile, Clarion rolls a marble across the floor.

A small, round spider-like creature crawls out. Its body is made of cloth. Hnng greets the creature; it doesn’t react. Hnng asks the creature “what do you want?” Hnng notices that there is a piece of tubing that is sticking out of the opening in the cloth; that opening looks quite a lot like a mouth. Well, Marda reacts by lunging at the thing with her trident; still misses. Hnng decides to attack the thing with his punching dagger in surprise. After missing, he tries splashing it with acid; that misses as well. Yish decides to inspire courage. Clarion attempts to notice weak points using her engineering knowledge: she recognizes that the tube serves no purpose; the body is a metal frame holding open what appears to be a normal sack. Leaf approaches and misses wildly with his axe; instead, he hits Lilith. Lilith chooses to inflict light wounds; it appears to have been ineffective.

The construct begins a suction effect from its bag; it begins sucking at Leaf’s right boot. Marda decides to attack with her trident again (and she misses again). Hnng tries to punch the thing; he actually hits the thing (for one damage). Yish continues his bardic performance and throws some water on it from his water skin. The floor under Hnng gets wet. Clarion slides through the shelving (hard core parkour) for a better position. Leaf once again critically fails; being left-handed, Hnng gets eviscerated and collapses to the floor. Lilith pulls out her morningstar and smacks the construct. The suction effect stops immediately and the tube falls to the ground. The sack now has a hole in it. The construct tries to walk away, but bumps into Lilith’s leg (no damage). Marda stabilizes Hnng (Yish orders this, since he knows that Hnng wouldn’t want to be saved); Marda then drags Hnng away. Clarion strikes with her scarf through the shelving but misses. Leaf, feeling a little self-conscious over his previous attempts, steps five feet away from everyone and then strikes the construct with his axe (successfully, this time). Lilith misses. The construct moves into the water and blood on the ground and attempts to soak up the mess (it lost its sucking power once it got a hole in its body). Leaf steps up and smashes the construct with his greataxe. The construct stops moving.

Clarion inspects the construct; it has stopped being magical. Yish looks into the rooms. There are no signs of another person. Clarion retrieves her marble.

As the party emerges from the building, the wizard waiting outside is astonished out how bloody and cut up Lilith and Hnng are. He wonders what might have caused such wounds as every party member surreptitiously glances at Leaf. Yish reports that the construct is smashed and that no one else was to be found. He also directly orders Hnng not to say anything.

The party gets back to the office and receives compensation for work done. Hnng goes home so that he can change. Marda attempts to walk Hnng home, but Hnng refuses her offer. Clarion begins building traps to take on the next day’s excursions.

From the hillside, the party watches the mansion and the barn and the surrounding area. It is now noon. Nothing has happened for two hours. It’s been pretty boring. Clarion asks Yish what they should do. Yish makes two suggestions: making a mixtape or investigating the mansion. Lilith votes for the second. Besides, as Hnng points out, the hillside is not a good place to record. Some party members are hesitant to enter the mansion; Yish suggests burning it down. But then Clarion is not sure that burning the mansion would be a good idea, since there might be valuable things inside.

So they decide to stealthily approach the mansion. Hnng is afraid of the paperwork necessary to avoid getting sued for burning down the mansion. Clarion volunteers to provide the fire should “push come to shove.” The party finds themselves near the garage. There are deep ruts from recent activity; many carriages must have left in a hurry. The party is surprised that they hadn’t noticed the exodus; perhaps the carriages left while the party was in the blue portal.

Yish thinks back to his history knowledge and remembers that the mansion is a country house for the previous royalty, hunting lodge for the king.

The party continues into the garage. There are no horses left (but maybe there were other magical creatures that drew the carriages?). No cats either. Yish then directly orders Hnng to enter the mansion first. Leaf is ordered to have a hand on Hnng; Leaf is not happy to put his bare hand on Hnng; Yish suggests wearing a glove (but Leaf doesn’t wear such things).

Hnng finds himself in servants’ quarters, which seems to have been unused for some time. Everything is dusty except for a track into the house. Yish is interested in finding food; he is unsuccessful. Hnng enters the kitchen; it is clean and very well kept. Still no food. A door that is more used leads to the dining room. Clarion gives Yish one of her lunchables, since he seemed rather hungry (it is lunch time, after all). Marda marches on to the door on the opposite side. It is a sitting room with many books. There are some books left open, and some clothes are lying about; the room must have been heavily used. The party members look through the books left open, except Hnng, who stands in the corner defiantly.

Leaf finds a significant collection of law books from before the coup. Marda finds a book of family history of the previous monarchy. The page is open to a picture of a human king holding a glowing blue gem. In the corner of the room is a pedestal where a large book must have been. It is empty now. Clarion investigates the pedestal to see what she can see. It is not connected to anything structurally, and she finds that there are no magical runes on it.

Marda detects that the room was clearly built poorly, by Dwarven standards. Hnng follows an order to lie down on the ground and be quiet.

Yish and Marda notice that the section of the library devoted to family history has a large gap in the books. The book Marda found earlier doesn’t fit in that space. The space is four times as large as Marda’s book.

Lilith reads Marda’s book. It is about the founding of Ban Du. The tale told is of an item that helps determine who is fit to be king. Yish immediately decides that Vallin was not worthy to be king. Marda stuffs the book into her bag.

The next room is the main entryway, with a staircase leading up. One passageway leads deeper into the mansion; two others lead to the two wings of the mansion. The party goes up the stairs and goes to the back passage. There are bedrooms and bathrooms; these must have been used recently. In searching the rooms, there are a deck of playing cards, a cup of dice, and a few coins (3 silver, 25 copper). The dressers are mostly empty. What clothing is left in the dressers is clean. There are three bedrooms, each with their own bathrooms. The soiled clothing in the bathrooms is a mix of male and female clothing. As Hnng attempts to steal some soiled clothing, Leaf and Clarion notice. Marda looks under the beds and finds a dagger. Clarion claims the coins; Yish takes two candlesticks and two sets of light silk sheets (red and grey).

In the right wing, there are more bedrooms. Yish finds a coin purse (1 gold and 5 silver) in the dressers. Lilith finds much beauty products and scented bath salts in one of the bathrooms; Yish bargains with Lilith for one of the bath salts. Hnng stands in the hall doing nothing. Yish begins appraising the family portraits on the walls. He is interested to see how much they are worth (and to jump start his art career in collaging).

Skipping down the right passage with linked arms, the party finds many large windows opening out into the gardens. No weapons are left on the weapons racks. Yish throws some china into his pack. One set for eight people has a value of 5-8 silver per piece. Yish takes three pieces of the set.

In the other hallway, they find a few more linens and a bag of potatoes. Hnng and Clarion are tired of searching the mansion. The party agrees to leave. “Everybody came away from this experience a little richer in spirit.” Many hours have now elapsed.

Going down the driveway, the party finds that the wagon wheel tracks are no longer fresh and so they cannot easily see which way on the main road the wagons went.

The party visits Clarion’s house, since they want to make sure that it is safe. Clarion’s house seems untouched. Hnng departs for his house, assuming that his house will be safe if Clarion’s house is safe. After Hnng leaves, the rest of the party goes back into the office. Nen Wess is not sure why the party hasn’t done a job in the past three days, but otherwise says nothing. The rest of the party now disbands to rest for the night.

The next morning, everyone shows up at the office. Hnng goes into his office and closes the door. Yish left his art supplies at home. After weighing the options, the party decides to do the lone skum job.

The party arrives at the location. The party engages the farmers; one of the elder daughters (17 years old) of one of the farming families has gone missing. She had been out in the fields of her father’s farm, near the mountains. This is the region where the skum was seen. The party verifies multiple evidences of a skum living in this region and begins exploring in pairs: Clarion with Marda, Lilith with Leaf, and Yish with Hnng. Leaf climbs up a tree to see the area better and then climbs down.

At this point, a skum jumps down from a tree next to Yish, slashing with a trident. The critical blow knocks Yish bleeding to the ground. The second blow misses Hnng; Hnng’s counterattack also misses. Marda rushes towards Yish but gets hit by the skum’s trident as well. Leaf smacks the skum quite heavily but doesn’t manage to kill it. Clarion whips off her scarf from 20 feet away and launches one end into the skum; the scarf turns into steel as it hits the skum. The scarf turns back into cloth as Clarion retracts the scarf. After many blows missing, Marda finally reaches Yish and stabilizes him. Leaf lands a final critical blow on the scum, which cleaves it in half (vertically).

Hnng and Clarion go to the cave. They find the girl beaten up and unconscious inside; her clothes are torn. Marda channels positive energy, at which the girl regains consciousness. Yish approaches (all gory from the recent combat); the girl is clearly frightened as she tries to gather her rags around her body. Yish finds a cloak in a satchel and gives it to her. After masterfully conversing with the girl, Yish calms her down and convinces her to follow the party back to her farm. She continues to stay silent. Under a pile of bones, Yish finds a ring.

Marda lays claim to the the skum’s trident (Leaf allows her to take it), which is of elven make and fine quality (masterwork). Lilith detects magic on the trident. So it turns out to be a +1 trident. Lilith also finds out that the ring is magical. However, she doesn’t figure out what it does; Leaf attempts to identify the properties of the ring as well, but he doesn’t figure it out either.

The party returns the girl to her farm and then goes back to the office. Yish complains to Nen about being nearly killed. The day ends.

The day begins as the party wakes up at Lilith’s house. Yish Garj can’t remember why he’s here. Clarion feels that it would be better to visit the warehouse instead of taking on jobs that Yish Garj had lined up from earlier. Everyone agrees.

On approaching the property, the party sees that the grounds are very well kept for a supposedly abandoned mansion. The warehouse, more like a barn, is off to one side of the grounds, while the mansion looms up before them. Hnng notices that the garden has been tended in the last three days. Yish Garj leads the party up to the door of the warehouse.

Marda notices that someone is on the roof; she can’t tell any details, but the signs of movement were undeniable. Leaf volunteers to climb up the wall of the barn, while the others are worried about finding a ladder (none were found); the warehouse is three storeys high. Hnng proposes to shoot crossbow bolts up onto the roof, but Clarion thinks it would be better to try communication.

The party decides to go through the front door; Yish Garj begins strategizing (Clarion stays by the doors, Lilith takes point, Hnng is put on watch out). Leaf is eagerly waiting at the door. Clarion volunteers to set traps. After much debate, Marda decides to push the door open; it gives easily. Yish Garj holds back Marda from rushing in and asks Clarion for light (dancing lights). Clarion then ties a bell to the door (to hear if anyone comes through the door).

Hnng shouts out into the darkness: “Hiiiii!” Nobody responds. Hnng surmises that the warehouse is abandoned; Leaf suggests that they may be lying in wait. But everyone immediately notices that the location is unusually well kept for being abandoned. Leaf climbs up the ladder to the hay loft. Yish, Clarion, and Marda follow up. There is nothing up on the loft, but they find a side room where cloth was draped over three bales of hay (or bail hays, as hipsters would say) pushed against each other. Yish senses the motive of the sheet and has a good hunch that the sheet is nothing but cloth. Further investigation confirms Yish’s hunch.

There is a latch and trapdoor leading from the loft to the roof. A stick holds the trapdoor open just enough for someone on the roof to open it. Yish orders Leaf to go through. Leaf bursts through the trapdoor but sees nothing on this side of the roof. Climbing up to the other side, Leaf sees a man taking a nap with a red cloak rolled up as a pillow. As the rest of the party approaches the sleeping man, Yish and Marda notice a group of people moving across the grounds, approaching the barn. There is clearly a gagged and blindfolded captive in the middle of the crowd; they are all casually walking.

The party decides to hide. Lilith and Hnng get notified of the approaching group and so hide as best they can in the hay loft. They overhear the men speaking of their captive as “the princess”. The rest of party takes cover on the roof but do not hear the men.

The princess is put into an animal stall, un-blindfolded, and ungagged. She is a tall, slender human wearing a green and gold dress. The leader of the group approaches her and speaks in a low enough volume that Lilith and Hnng cannot hear him. The princess does not respond. The leader is clearly not trying to harm her; quite the contrary, he seems to be attempting to convince her of something. 14 guards are on the ground. After an hour, the floorboards underneath Hnng creak as some loose straw near Lilith drops onto the floor. Meanwhile, Marda slips on some roof tiles and slams onto the roof (although she doesn’t slip off the roof). Yish curses loudly. At this, the leader silently points his men to the ladder.

Lilith and Hnng push a hay bail off the loft at the ladder as Lilith lights it on fire. The men congregating at the base of the ladder scatter. The leader tells some of his men to move the princess to safety and others to stand guard around the ladder.

The leader then demands to know who they are and what they are doing up on the hay loft. Hnng immediately responds by telling him that they are the extermination company V.E.R.M.I.N. The leader asks why they tried to light his barn on fire. Hnng blames Lilith’s haunting. The leader then demands to know how many of them there are. Hnng answers that there are about six of them. The leader demands that all of them come down and surrender weapons to have a discussion. Hnng immediately comes down and gives up his weapons. Lilith informs the others on the roof of the situation. Lilith then comes down and surrenders her weapons. Neither Lilith nor Hnng are left unbound, but guards are posted over them. The leader orders some more men to go outside and make sure that no one goes down from the roof.

As the others on the roof do not seem to be coming down quickly, the leader demands the others to go down the roof. Marda inquires after Lilith and Hnng. The leader looks at the two expectantly, at which Hnng reassures Marda that they are unharmed.

The others on roof notice that the man on the roof is now fully awake and alert. He informs the leader that there are four on the roof. They all eventually submit.

(Hnng has had experience being arrested.) Like Hnng and Lilith, the others are obliged to hand over weapons (even those which they were attempting to conceal); they are allowed to retain their packs. When everyone is captured, Hnng asks whether the leader knows about Vallan Dallinheart. The leader becomes very interested and asks Hnng whether he knows of Vallan. Hnng spills everything he knows about Vallan.

The leader then asks why the party is here. Lilith responds that there was an anonymous tip of hauntings in the area for them to exterminate. The leader asks for identification to verify that they are truly extermination company employees. Meanwhile, Lilith attempts to communicate with Yish; since the captives were lined up in the order they submitted, this required playing “telephone”.

Leaf doesn’t have identification (he never carries such things). Marda offers her PETA-MOO (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals Magical Or Otherwise) card, but the leader demands proof of employment at the extermination company. Marda procures the appropriate documentation. Yish prominently displays his middle finger as he hands over his identification. After verification, all of the documentation is returned. Marda encourages the leader to keep the PETA-MOO card, but he hands it back as well.

The leader now asks what they have heard. Hnng confesses that he overheard something about a princess. Yish claims that Hnng is mentally unstable. Hnng declares that “the kingdom sucks and has terrible social health care.” Lilith reveals that Hnng likes tentacles. One of the guards looks rather deeply at Hnng. Hnng is intimidated.

The leader then has a conversation with the second in command.

Second in command: “What should we do, sir?”
Leader: “Well, they’re definitely lying, but there isn’t much we can do. We’ll have to move headquarters. You know what to do.”

At this moment, Yish’s bag begins to glow blue. Only Hnng and Clarion notice the glowing. As Hnng begins to make noises, the leader turns and also sees the blue light out of the corner of his eye. He orders his men to back away, at which moment Yish casts unnatural lust on the leader. The spell does not take effect on the leader, but he knows that Yish has cast a spell against him. He advances angrily at Yish and says “You have it!” At this moment, a blue portal opens where Yish’s bag was and sucks the entire party through before closing.

They pick their brains trying to figure out what is going on. They ascertain that they are not in immediate danger. The party finds themselves on a platform held up by ropes attached to pillars all around. Underneath is rocky shallows very far down. The rope is too thin to climb up. All party members are facing the same direction. They see a bridge far off; one side has many creatures (troglodytes and orcs and such) chasing women and children. The women and children are on one side of the bridge, but the monsters are on the other side; they will soon cross the bridge. The ropes on the platform are clearly attached to the ropes on the bridge. Yish jumps on the platform, which visibly shakes the bridge. This causes the monsters to slow their advance.

Hnng makes a case for the orcs doing the right thing by killing the evil women and children, to which Yish orders Hnng to jump off the platform out of his sight. Hnng moves out of Yish’s view but decides to stay on the platform.

Yish allows Lilith to check the sapphire. She knows many things, including the fact that the sapphire is currently activated.

As the monsters advance, one sees the party and slashes one of the ropes, which causes one of the supporting ropes of the platform to come loose. The monster happily sees the distress of the party.

Thinking a little bit, the party begins to believe that the sapphire is linked to the owner being in a dangerous situation. Leaf volunteers to punch Yish; Yish asks for a slow punch.

Before Leaf can punch Yish, the monsters advance some more, and another rope gets cut. At this rate, it becomes obvious that any five ropes cut would cause the platform to collapse. Since the platform acts as counterweight to the bridge, the collapse of the platform will cause the collapse of the bridge. Somehow, Hnng convinces the party that the situation is such that they will inevitably fall to their deaths one way or another: they can choose to die now by cutting the ropes to the platform and thereby break the bridge, which would save the women and children from the monsters, or they can let the monsters reach the women and children and let the monsters cut down the bridge, which would cause the platform to collapse and thereby cause them all to fall. Yish, Marda, and Clarion hack away at three ropes with their daggers (which they find from their packs). They all attempt to stand as close to Yish as possible. Everyone except Clarion holds on to the platform as it swings to crash into the pillars. Clarion falls and disappears right before she hits the rocky shallows; everyone else disappears as the platform crashes into the pillars.

The party reappears at the barn. All of their weapons are left; no one is there. Yish notices a note nailed to the door. It says: “The stone is mine. Next time we meet, just give it to me.” Yish promotes everyone to outrank Hnng so that Hnng must obey orders from everyone else. All investigate their weapons to make sure that they were not tampered with. It seems that they were not gone longer than a half hour.

At this point, Yish recalls that the princess is known throughout the city. In the upper city, she comes out to events rarely and is often quiet. In the lower city, people are not happy with how the king treats the princess, keeping her away from the public; however, some seem to recall fond memories when she was newly born, but they didn’t reveal more than this.

The party would like to visit the mansion later, but are afraid that there will be more bandits there still. The party checks the roof to make sure no one is there. Yish believes that hunkering down and keeping a lookout until the evening would be the best option. The party chooses to leave the barn and spend the day on the hillside.

The adventurers begin the next day by submitting their reports on the disappearance of Vallan. Nen Wess, the branch president, is upset by the disappearance of Vallan, especially since that means this group is down a person. On the prompting of Hnng, Nen nominates a new leader for the group. Yish Garj is designated. Yish’s first order is to send Hnng to his office. Clarion then nominates Lilith as the newest member of the group (via slam poetry, as ordered by Yish).

Yish attempts to recruit Lilith. She is interested to know how much the company will pay her. Hnng refuses to tell Yish how much she would be paid, but Lilith nevertheless decides to join the company. Hnng finishes the paperwork to complete hiring Lilith.

The group now moves on to inform next of kin of the disappearance of Vallan (Nen reminds them about company policy). They find the farmhouse of the Dallinhearts. Marda knocks on the door, which immediately swings open. Several pieces of furniture are clearly knocked over; Yish decides to enter (Hnng, citing “breaking and entering”, refuses to enter; however, Hnng decides to go searching for other people, feeling that trespassing is better than breaking and entering. Hnng finds that the potted mushroom cultures were scattered all over the place, with the pots broken). Yish finds that all of the house was ransacked, with every compartment opened, and various valuables strewn across the ground.

Further investigation shows that there are many footprints (but no blood). Especially conspicuous are some tracks that lead into the mushroom cave, with markings of someone being dragged away from the cave. Those marks go into the low brush,. The group decides to enter the cave to see what they might find.

The cave is lighted with a very dim glow. The spores from the mushrooms cultivated in the cave cause Hnng to sneeze. Yish is glad to know that Leaf has darkvision, since the half-elf has high in confidence in the half-orc’s ability to kill dangerous things. Clarion summons a lantern to increase the amount of light in the cave. Leaf is afraid of triggering traps as others enter the room. There are signs of people having been in the area lately. One passage has been boarded up, while down the other, Yish spies a figure backing away as surreptitiously as it is able. Before Yish can investigate the semi-hidden person, Leaf climbs up onto a ledge, which suddenly moves and engulfs his feet. What had at first appeared to be a patch of fungus turned out to be a slime intent on its next meal. Yish proposes to use unnatural lust on the slime that has grappled Leaf; Leaf was rather against this plan.

After saving Leaf from the slime, Clarion suggests that they move together as a group. Leaf suggests that nice people go after the figure in the shadows while the not nice people go break down the boarded up passage. Yish decides that it would better to follow Clarion’s advice and keep the group together. They all enter the next room, where Leaf, Lilith, and Hnng see the figure attempting to hide behind a large rock. As Lilith approaches the figure, clearly an older Dwarf, it squeaks out in common: “please don’t hurt me.” Lilith replies in Dwarven: “We won’t kill you.” Yish takes over in common and discovers that this Dwarf is Vallan’s father.

The group then informs Mr. Dallinheart about the disappearance of Vallan. Mr. Dallinheart informs them that a group of men armed with big, shiny weapons and wearing red had come to ransack the home. He wasn’t sure what they were after, since he hid himself as soon as he spotted them. Mr. Dallinheart also warns the group of the colony of slime molds behind the boarded up passage.

Hnng investigates the bushes to see that the drag marks end where hoofprints begin, which lead back to the city of Ban Du. So the group decides to go back to the city. Upon returning back to company headquarters, the group meets with Nen Wess, who informs them that the office was ransacked the night before. Hnng hastily locks himself into his office and spends some time there. Leaf suggests that the ruby and sapphire be protected in the Church of Nethys (the others are not keen on this plan). Yish finds that personnel records were stolen: specifically, the records for all who had worked on Vallan’s team.

Fearing for what may happen if they all individually went home (the personnel records had home addresses), the group decides to stay the night at Lilith’s home (Lilith’s father’s records were not taken, nor were Lilith’s). Yish convinces everyone to stay together (Hnng was not excited to have to spend the night with his co-workers).

Hnng studies the ruby and sapphire. Although he does not discover any new information about the ruby, he does discover that the sapphire has two magical effects. One seems to cause the sapphire to shine brightly; the other seems to be connected to inter-dimensional travel. But he does not figure out the activation phrases.

The group decides to visit the temple of Lamashtu (they wear red). Hnng (excited about their tentacled lordess=lady) boldly asks the head priestess whether they had attacked a mushroom farm. Clarion inquires whether anyone of their congregation had recently come in with a case of paralysis. The priestess glares at Hnng before informing Clarion that no one had come in with such a problem lately. Yish decides that as the worshipers of Lamashtu wear red and yellow, they are not likely to have been the ransackers.

Yish Garj thinks about the situation and remembers that the colors of the king before the coup several years ago was red. The colors of the current monarchy are green and gold.

Leaf feels weak today. Everyone immediately recognizes that the slime mold’s disease has taken effect on Leaf. They escort Leaf to the church of Nethys. No one else enters. While being treated, Leaf asks the priest whether he knows about red-garbed people connected to the previous monarchy. The priest informs him that after the coup, a group of local brigands took up the colors. Leaf informs the rest of the group about his discovery.

Yish thinks a little bit and recalls that within a few hours from the city, there is an old mansion with multiple warehouses. There is also a river nearby, with a cave hidden around the bend. The group had done some jobs in the warehouses but had never visited the old mansion. The cave they had not seen for themselves but had heard about from others.

Yish goes to a pub to try to find out more about these locations. Hnng (not wanting to go to a brothel) and Clarion and Leaf follow Yish. As Clarion attempts to flirt with Hnng (in Halfling), Yish asks Leaf to walk between the two. Lilith and Marda go to the brothels. Yish finds out from the barkeeper that the mansion and one of the warehouses were owned by the previous monarchy. Marda finds out that one of the warehouses is “a really nice place to go”. Lilith further discovers that one of the warehouses is the place where the hookers go often (which Lilith calls the “hooker warehouse”).

The group decides to stay the night at Lilith’s house. Hnng is not allowed to use the one shower in the house. Lilith warns them to keep a candle lit at night. Yish attempts to light two candles, but the second one always gets mysteriously put out. After a few tries, Yish tells the candle “go F yourself” and goes to bed. Lilith’s father is very excited that so many people are staying the night and is very hospitable (he offers ale). Hnng takes advantage of the hospitality and stuffs as much of the food offered as he can into his bag.

There is, in the land of L’lanon, a company of exterminators, known throughout the city of Ban Du as V.E.R.M.I.N. (Very Eclectic Removers of Monsters Identified as Nuisances).

It is time for the company Christmas party. Most companies call it the winter solstice party., but Yish thought that since the company was full of differing religious backgrounds, it would be best to hold the party in honor of a religious tradition different from all of the others within the company (besides, a company winter solstice would be way too mainstream). So they met at the local Grog ‘n Coffee for a Christmas party.

Hnng is grating at the fact that he has to be at the party, while Clarion flirts with him (just to get on his nerves). Yish Garj would like to go to the bathroom, but he refuses to go anywhere except gender-neutral bathrooms. So he decides to hold it.

At this moment, Yish and Marda notice something unusual: Vallan’s coat pocket is glowing red. Yish approaches and notifies Vallan of the glowing redness, at which Vallan pulls out a ruby pulsating with magic. Vallan acts quickly: “Yish, I entrust to you this sapphire.” (He pulls out a sapphire from another coat pocket.) “ It is very important that you find the rightful owner.” Yish is confused (as he accepts the sapphire): “Dude, when did you get those things?” Vallan responds: “There is no time to explain. You must get away from me now.” Yish chooses to follow Vallan’s injunction by getting away quickly. At the same time, Vallan hurries into the corner of the establishment and shouts for all to hear: “Good bye, my associates. Find a good replacement.”

At this moment, a red portal opens where Vallan is standing. With a flash of red light, black tendrils lash out from the portal and latch onto Vallan’s legs (Hnng gets very excited about the tentacles). Vallan desperately clings to a nearby pillar as rats come streaming out of the red beyond. While most of the company flees from the danger, Clarion, Hnng, Yish, Leaf, and Marda move toward Vallan; Lilith decides to move towards the door in search of her father. Yish’s effort manifests as attempting to shoot at the closest rat. However, he missed his shot and hit Vallan’s arm. His second attempt was not as disastrous, but it did no good either. Leaf smashes two rats with his greataxe. Marda attempts to calm some of the rats as she reaches out to grab Vallan. As if in reaction to Marda’s efforts to rescue Vallan, the tendrils yank extra hard, at which point Vallan loses his grip and gets pulled straight into the red portal. Before Vallan completely disappears, the ruby drops onto the ground. Once Vallan is pulled through, the portal closes, and the ruby stops glowing.

Everyone stares in disbelief as Vallan disappears. Hnng wonders who to suck up to, now that his boss is gone. Marda is sad that her efforts proved futile. And Lilith is interested in the ruby. But there are rats remaining, which are eventually dispatched by acid, greataxe, punching dagger, sickle, and friendly suggestion.

With the rats gone, Yish, Leaf, Marda, Lilith, Clarion, and Hnng, immediately think not about their lost co-worker but who should take possession of the ruby he left behind. Leaf feels that he deserves it for having killed four rats—-more than anyone else. Hnng feels that it is company property, since the former owner disappeared at a company function. But Clarion takes charge as the team’s tech support; she wants to check the ruby in case it will open another portal. As Hnng assumes authority for giving permission to Clarion, other members of the team are disgruntled. Clarion deems the ruby unable to open another portal for a little while, at least. Meanwhile, Leaf volunteers to protect the ruby, since he is the strongest (and as worshiper of Nethys, he believes magical items belong to his god).

At this point, Yish feels concern for Vallan being gone. Yish remembers that Vallan carried the ruby on his person always and remembers that Vallan is married. He suggests that the team go visit Vallan’s wife and family (he and his wife live with his father and brothers), but Leaf reminds them that it is late at night. The team decides to wait until morning to break the news to Vallan’s wife.

As the team members disband for the night, Hnng reminds everyone to submit reports about the incident (Lilith’s father is the record keeper who will accept these reports). Hnng then decides to eat and drink as much as possible. Leaf follows Clarion in order to protect the ruby. Marda chooses to calm her nerves with drink. Yish goes off alone.

Wondering how to get started? Here are a few tips:

1. Invite your players

Invite them with either their email address or their Obsidian Portal username.

2. Edit your home page

Make a few changes to the home page and give people an idea of what your campaign is about. That will let people know you’re serious and not just playing with the system.

3. Choose a theme

If you want to set a specific mood for your campaign, we have several backgrounds to choose from. Accentuate it by creating a top banner image.

4. Create some NPCs

Characters form the core of every campaign, so take a few minutes to list out the major NPCs in your campaign.

A quick tip: The “+” icon in the top right of every section is how to add a new item, whether it’s a new character or adventure log post, or anything else.

5. Write your first Adventure Log post

The adventure log is where you list the sessions and adventures your party has been on, but for now, we suggest doing a very light “story so far” post. Just give a brief overview of what the party has done up to this point. After each future session, create a new post detailing that night’s adventures.

One final tip: Don’t stress about making your Obsidian Portal campaign look perfect. Instead, just make it work for you and your group. If everyone is having fun, then you’re using Obsidian Portal exactly as it was designed, even if your adventure log isn’t always up to date or your characters don’t all have portrait pictures.

That’s it! The rest is up to your and your players.