After a successful meeting with Big Mondo, the heroes are enjoying themselves aboard the airship casino when they encounter a halfling stowaway who wishes to join them on their adventures. Suddenly, the airship comes under attack by another stowaway – a warforged assassin that serves the Lord of Blades. The heroes find mechanical dragons among the mysterious crates aboard the ship and confront Sterryk ir’Tyran about the cargo. A fierce battle ensues against the warforged assassin that leaves the airship badly damaged, forcing the heroes to make a crash landing outside Wroat.
Player Characters: Balkris, Jeeves, Mickey Bishop, Reckoner, R. Sativus, Sane
I.
Lily Proudfoot, better known as “Sane” in the House Jorasco enclave and its House of Healing where she had grown up, was a stowaway aboard the Portent King.
Ever since she had been left at the House of Healing when her mother and father mysteriously departed, she wanted nothing more than to become an adventurer so that she might one day find her missing parents. After reading Balkris’ column in the Korranberg Chronicle, she became enthralled with his tales of adventure and heroism. She had snuck onto the airship in the hopes of meeting her hero in person and learning how she could become a great adventurer herself.
However, she never expected to be hiding under a table and staring at Balkris’ boots! After having snuck aboard the ship, she looked for the darkest place to conceal herself. Hiding beneath the Three Dragon Ante table, which was covered with a long tablecloth that came down to the floor, seemed like a good idea at the time.
That is, until Balkris and his companions sat down for a game of cards at the table. This was not how she imagined her first meeting with the great Balkris d’Vadalis to go! But Sane tried to keep her cool and held her breath while listening to Balkris playing, and surely winning, an exciting card game.
II.
After their successful meeting with Big Mondo, the Rabble were invited to enjoy themselves in the casino. R. Sativus and Timber had returned from the cargo hold and informed the others of what they had seen. They decided to split up so that Balkris, Reckoner, and Mickey Bishop remained in the casino to avoid arousing suspicion while R. Sativus and Jeeves, the latter posing as a waiter, snuck into the kitchen to gather more information about the mysterious crates among the airship’s cargo. Meanwhile, Timber helped himself to drinks until he was soon sprawled over the bar and sound asleep.
Balkris and Reckoner began to play a game of Three Dragon Ante in the casino. They were joined by a noblewoman carrying a magical staff and a tour guide for a group of four foreign elves, wearing the exotic robes and jewelry of faraway Aerenal. Balkris tried to give the Aereni elves tips on how to play Three Dragon Ante, which happened to be his specialty. Reckoner tried to intimidate the other players with his confidence, despite having no knowledge of card games.
“This is the winning hand,” Reckoner said with certainty. But the noblewoman with the staff won the first round and magically levitated her winnings toward her neatly stacked chips with a haughty smirk.
Mickey Bishop watched the players closely and soon joined the table. With his keen eyes and skill at card games, he began a winning streak. His growing stack of chips drew the attention of other guests, and the table was joined by four splendidly clad dwarves wearing the emblem of House Kundarak, the dwarven dragonmarked house with the Mark of Warding and the owners of the Kundarak Bank of Sharn which held the wealth of all the noble houses of the city.
A crowd began to gather around as the dwarven bankers and Mickey Bishop raised the stakes in turn. Soon, over a thousand galifars were on the table, an enormous fortune!
As the final hands were revealed, one of the dwarf bankers laughed confidently.
“This is the winning hand, gentlemen,” he declared. Hearing the certainty in the banker’s voice, Mickey felt his own confidence waver and thought he might lose. But he remembered a conversation with R. Sativus earlier in the day when the diviner had assure him that she had seen a vision of him winning a game of cards – or rather, she had seen his opponent losing the game. When Mickey’s attention returned to the present, he saw that he was the one who held the winning hand. The dwarf banker, who a moment ago had been sure he would win, was confounded that he held the losing hand instead. His companions grumbled in displeasure as Mickey Bishop collected his winnings with a grin.
Balkris was watching the game unfold when he felt a tug on his leg. He looked down and saw a young halfling woman in hiding. That was when the voice of Captain Calypso d’Lyrandar sounded from the loudspeaker stone.
“Attention, passengers. This is the captain speaking. We have a stowaway aboard the airship. Please remain in your quarters and current whereabouts while the staff and security search the vessel.”
III.
R. Sativus and Jeeves returned from the kitchens, where the chef and culinary staff were battling a monstrous soup that seemed to be writhing in its pot. They learned little about the mysterious crates in the cargo hold, though they did learn more about the security measures guarding the cargo, which included automated elemental defenses in addition to the rotating guards posted at the entrance.
The companions debated what to do, including what ought to be done about the halfling stowaway aboard their midst.
“Oh, please, Mr. Balkris, will you take me with you on your adventures? I only want to learn how to become a great adventurer, just like you! I promise I will not be a burden to you,” Sane implored.
As the heroes were deliberating, there came a blood-curdling shriek from the upper deck. Guards began to rush upstairs, and a moment later, the captain’s voice came on the loudspeaker again.
“Attention, passengers. This is an emergency! The stowaway is a dangerous killer. Please remain — Aaarghhh!”
The captain’s scream was cut off as the loudspeaker stone went dead with staticky silence.
The Rabble rushed up to the helm of the airship, but the killer was already gone. They found only the captain’s eviscerated body, cut to shreds by a thousand lacerations.
From down the hallway, another scream could be heard. The killer was on the prowl.
The heroes, suspecting the cargo hold of holding dangerous warforged weapons, feared what might happen if the killer reached the cargo and got their hands on its contents. With their strength and magic, they punched a hole into the floor of the captain’s helm to get into the cargo hold without activating the elemental security system.
When they entered the cargo hold, one of the large crates with the emblem of House Cannith had been broken open. And they soon saw what had emerged from it. Watching them from the shadows was a large mechanical dragon.
Clearly this was a new weapon of war devised by the Cannith artificers! The Rabble prepared to defend themselves against the machine. But the mechanical dragon looked at them curiously, with the innocence of a newborn creature.
Sane had been the first to see the dragon, and she was the first to approach it. She reached out her hand, and the dragon sniffed at it with its metallic snout.
“Hello there! What’s your name?” Sane asked.
Reckoner saw that this creature was not unlike a newly born warforged emerging from a Creation Forge. Its mind was a blank slate, ready to be implanted with knowledge of the world. It responded to Sane’s question by trying to speak, but the strange noises it made threatened to attract the guards outside the cargo hold.
“You must act more… appropriately,” Reckoner said firmly.
The dragon grew quiet, seeming to understand Reckoner’s tone more than the meaning of his words.
The heroes investigated the remaining crates and found other mechanical creatures of different shapes. One of them was an enormous humanoid with a dragon’s head and large metal wings. Reckoner felt a strange sense of affinity, himself being a warforged with an unusual, dragon-like head. He wondered if there might be some connection between himself and these mechanical creations.
Yet there was little time to dwell on these thoughts. More screams were heard from the far side of the airship. Whomever the killer was and whatever their intentions might be, they were killing the passengers aboard the Portent King one after another. The Rabble feared what might happen if the warforged killer reached the cargo hold and managed to awaken one of the other mechanical creatures aboard the airship. They decided that the only person who could tell them how to these mechanical creatures worked was the man who brought the crates abroad: Sterryk ir’Tyran.
V.
The Rabble found Sterryk barricaded inside the room, armed with a heavy crossbow which he fired as Balkris broke down the door, mistaking him for the warforged killer.
“Oh, thank the Sovereigns you are here, Lord Balkris. Please, save me!”
But the heroes saw through Sterryk’s ruse. It was clear that he knew who they were and their role in uncovering Merrix d’Cannith’s schemes – selling weapons to the Swords of Liberty to support their armed revolution against the Brelish crown. When confronted about the truth, Sterryk dropped the pretense and took on his haughty demeanor.
“You rabble are out of your league and do not know what you are meddling in. How dare you stand against Baron Merrix d’Cannith and the great change he aims to bring!”
Then turning to Reckoner and Jeeves, Sterryk went on to describe how Merrix was trying to lift up the warforged from their plight and bring them to their rightful place in the world.
“You, Reckoner, most of all should know what that means! You were the first of our experimental warforged, born from the crucible of a technological revolution. It is the likes of you and your kindred who should inherit this world.”
Before Sterryk could say any more, a voice came on the loudspeaker, but this was one was not a human voice. It was cold and mechanical, like iron grating against stone – the voice of a warforged.
“All… flesh… must… die…”
Sterryk grew alarmed and warned the heroes that the warforged must not reach the cargo hold, or else he might awaken the mechanical creatures held in the Cannith crates. Yet the heroes were equally concerned that without a Captain, the vessel might never be able to land safely. They knew that there was only own other person aboard the airship with the Mark of Storm needed to pilot the ship: the chef, who was a distant cousin of Captain Calypso. The Rabble rushed below deck, with Sterryk being carried over Reckoner’s shoulder.
They found the chef in the kitchen, with most of the culinary staff dead or having fled. The monstrous soup had come to life and was lashing out at those nearby with its deadly tentacles. The Rabble narrowly defeated to aberration and save the chef, but now they knew that there was no time to waste. They needed to hurry back to the cargo hold before it was too late!
V.
The Rabble arrived in the cargo hold and found the mechanical dragon battling a large winged humanoid warforged with a dragon’s head. Beside them stood a strange warforged the likes of each the heroes, not even Jeeves and Reckoner, had ever seen. Its body was bristling with blades, and it held in its large metal hands a weapon that looked like a bladed parasol. The warforged killer reached out a hand toward Reckoner and Jeeves, addressing them like comrades. But he spoke with a jargon and cadence that was utterly alien to them. In fact, the killer was a devotee of the Lord of Blades – the self-styled messianic leader of the warforged that dwelled in the Mournland who sought to herald in a world ruled by machines.
“My brothers… Join us, and come into the fold… The Lord of Blades guides us… his countless blades protect us… Together, we will lay claim to our birthright… Together, we will rid the world of the filthy fleshborn…”
But Reckoner and Jeeves were not so easily swayed. They stood firmly beside their companions.
“You would stand by these fleshborn against your own kind? Then you have chosen your fate… and will perish with them…”
A brief but fearsome battle ensued. The warforged killer spun the parasol, releasing a rain of blades upon the heroes. The mechanical dragonborn under his sway breathed green flames upon them. Using this distraction, the warforged killer attempted to escape by breaking a hole into the hull of the airship. Spreading wings made of blades, the killer flew out of the vessel and glided away. The two mechanical dragon creatures were battling one another nearby and tumbled out of the hole. But Sane saved the friendly mechanical dragon with a spell that caused it to float gently as a feather.
Meanwhile, R. Sativus enchanted Mickey Bishop with the power of flight. Mickey leapt through the hole in the side of the ship and went in pursuit of the escaped warforged. The changeling warlock and the warforged killer battled in the air, exchanging eldritch bolts and sharp metal blades. But at the end of the midair battle, Mickey emerged victory, and the smoking body of the warforged plummeted through the sky.
VI.
With help from the Rabble, the chef managed to safely make a crash landing on the outskirts of Wroat. The heroes breathed a sigh of relief as they landed in the field.
It was only then that they saw that Sterryk ir’Tyran was dead. Had he perished during the battle with the warforged? None of them knew the truth… except for Mickey Bishop.
In their haste, none of them noticed that for a brief instant, Mickey had dropped his guise as a common criminal and had become his true self: a dark and fiendish creature that had made a pact with the demons of Khyber. He silently killed Sterryk with an evil hex, and none realized until it was too late that Reckoner had been carrying the lifeless body of the nobleman on his shoulder.
Meanwhile, a short distance away they saw that Big Mondo, who had escaped on an emergency air skiff and had landed in a nearby field, was being arrested by the local authorities from Wroat, on charges of recklessly endangering the Brelish capital with his airship.
As the trial of Breland v. Big Mondo was announced in the Korranberg Chronicle, the embattled mob boss and city councilor implored the Rabble to aid him in his legal defense.
“Mickey and Balkris! You and your friends have got to help me! You’re the only ones that can get me off the hook!”
Against the Lightning
Treasure
– 1440 gp