A write-up of our biweekly Dungeons & Dragons campaign from the perspective of my character, Heyou, a teenage elf barbarian. Heyou was kidnapped at a young age by bandits. His family was murdered and his face disfigured, including the almost complete removal of his ears, before being sold to the orphanage where he grew up. Orphanages are big business in our fictional world as they produce the laborers that power the economy. The disfigurement means it was impossible for any extended family to identify and claim him. As a result, Heyou has a very jaded world view but also sees the ability to make money by perpetuating the kidnap-and-sell scam. He is not very bright but considers himself so and thus he frequently uses words incorrectly. Heyou and several of his fellow orphanage mates have reached the age where they must leave and go find jobs in the fields they have trained all their lives, however they have chosen a different path and have overthrown the thieves guild that once ran their small corner of town.

Session 8: Liars and Tigermen and Poetic Justice. Oh my!

It’s time to put the candles and the striped hat in my trunk as the others around me start to climb out of their cots. We are called to the main room by the smell of fresh bread and omelets, and see Sanjay is hooking up a delicious breakfast.

I look at the pole wedged between the ceiling and the sewer trap door to see Dank wrapped around it. I shake my head. Dank is good people. Or good rat people. Whatever. Dank is alright by me but the guy is seriously damaged. And this is coming from a dude with a face that looks like he ran full-speed into a cleric that had cast Blade Barrier on himself.

We dig into Sanjay’s delicious meal and it is absolutely detectable. I call him over and tell him to take the ruby we got from Peyton and sell it. My instructions to him are to start at three months of funds but don’t negotiate lower than two months worth. His eyes get all big and he’s super excited to get his hands on the ruby.

Not so fast, I tell him though. Then I indicate my plate, the other dishes and the pots and utensils in the kitchen area. He gets the message and starts to clean up. While he is doing so, Black Lizard tells Sanjay to purchase 25 gold pieces worth of silver dust with the money he gets for the ruby. I instantly choke on a piece of bread.. We’d have to kidnap five kids to make that kind of money! Black Lizard better be cooking up something good. He’s my boy though so I think it will be ok.

I hope it will be ok. Five kids worth!

Just then there is a knock at the door, and not the secret knock either. We send Sanjay to open it while the rest of us prepare ourselves. Turns out its our old buddy Big Ulp. He tells us somewhat cricketly that someone wants an invitation and then hands us a black coin. Turns out that means Jill wants to have a meeting with us at The Regency. Well, well, well. Looks like someone got the message. A nod to myself in satisfaction. The poles rammed up the arses of our fallen enemies must have her scared. Good. She should be.

Big Ulp tells us she wants to meet us at noon for lunch and that we should not be late. With that he slips back out the door.

Black Lizard is thinking smart. He says we shouldn’t all go just in case its a ruse to lure us away from our territory so that they can hit the orphanage.

Dank thinks we should grab the magic kids at the orphanage, but since we don’t know how to identify them I’m not sure how we’d do that. I’m a thinker though so I get an idea. I suggest we cast Detect Magic on Mayella. She’s one of them special kids. If she starts glowing then we know how to find the magic little piles of money. Unfortunately, casting the spell on Mayella doesn’t do anything. I’m not convinced it’s the spell that didn’t work but rather Mayella ain’t all the special after all.

Black Lizard points out though that the spell doesn’t work that way. He starts going on about some gift or something from his god, Pele. I don’t put much stock in all that god stuff though. Most of the time it sounds like a scam to get some money out of gullible folks (Hmmmmmm……Idea), but then he holds his hands out and a wicked looking battle axe appears!

Before we head to The Regency, I decide to stake out the orphanage. After all, that’s our money Jill could potentially be messing with. I’ll keep a real low profile while Black Lizard pretends like he’s working in his shop forging something.

While we head out to do that, Dank says he needs to bathe. Bathe? Why? Dank is seriously messed up.

After checking out the orphanage and determining nothing or nobody looks funny, we head to The Regency. We arrive and are greeted like kings, as we should because we basically own this city at this point. Jill is no doubt here to beg for mercy in the safety of The Regency.

We get escorted to the meeting room and are offered drinks until lunch arrives. Red comes out eventually and is like, “My favorite guild!”

Naturally.

He then tells us that Jill is running late. Lame. She’s such a coward.

Lunch is ready and rather than wait on Jill we decide to eat. As usual, the food served at The Regency would put even Sanjay to shame. About halfway through the meal, we hear a commotion outside the room and it turns out the Free Shipping Company leaders are trying to force their way in. They eventually do get in and drop a box on the table.

I look at Red and I can tell he is horrified by this. He tells the Free Shipping Company that what they are doing is not allowed at The Regency, but Red is a crafty one. I see a hint of a smile on his face. That tells me he wants them to do something stupid that’s going to get them dead by my hands. And I am more than happy to oblige for Red.

Mayella opens the box and inside is Bryan’s head but with the eyes removed. Meh. No big loss.

Red tells us though that this is a threat and Jill trying to misdirect us. He urges us to get home right way and says The Regency has resources available to us to get us back quicker since the Free Shipping Company misdirected us.

The others run out the door and grab carriages provided by The Regency. I hang back to ask Red about the smile on his face when the box was delivered but before I can speak Mayella butts in and asks for condensation for Bryan’s family. Really? For Bryan? Who cares about Bryan? He was one of the bad guys. And then he sold out the bad guys! He got what he deserved.

I push Mayella aside and ask Red about the smile. He plays it off but I know he is not being honest. I don’t have time to debate with him though so I grab Mayella by the wrists and drag her toward the door where horses are waiting for us.

Jillian is the first to arrive at the hideout. She doesn’t see any signs of damage or forced entry but then suddenly a hail or arrows fly out and a few strike her. Another round of arrows follows that but there is a distinct “twang” and the cursing of the enemy which generally indicates the snapping of a bowstring. Spotting an attacker on the roof nearby with a longbow, she starts to climb the outside of the building to get at him.

Suddenly, a tiger crashes down on the scaffolding near her as more arrows hiss through the air. Jill cries out, “Fight me like a man!” and then stabs the tiger twice with her silver short sword. It roars in pain and tries to leap away but Jillian manages to stab it once again. Instead of running away though, the tiger merely leaped off the wall and then back at Jillian, swiping at her with its massive paw. It strikes a glancing blow but not before one of the archers aims poorly and sinks an arrow deep into the tiger’s hide.

Seeing an opportunity, Jillian heals herself before pointing at the Tiger and yelling, “I’m going to make a rug out of you!” This is brilliant and it will look amazing in our hideout. She then stabs the tiger again. They exchange swipes and blows a few times before the tiger changes into a man! What is going on in this town? First Dank and his rat people thieves and now a man-tiger? Jillian accepts a minor cut from the man and delivers her own wound but the man still will not fall. How much abuse can these things take? Their tiger hides are no good to me full of slashes!

Meanwhile, Black Lizard goes to check on Brandy’s. As he arrives, he is attacked by archers as well but fortunately they miss. The next round though? Not so lucky as multiple arrows strike home. He is unable to see the attackers but understands the general direction from which they are shooting. He takes a moment to cast a spell on himself and then crashes into Brandy’s bakery so he can also heal himself.

Inside the bakery, people are ducking down, hiding behind shelves and laying on the floor. Looks of fear are etched on all their faces as they are now caught in the line of fire too. Black Lizard knows having the people we protect end up as collapsible damage is no good so he races toward the bakery’s back door where he finds Brandy cowering. After reassuring her, he heals himself once again and then heads outside where he sees Mayella and me arriving and gaining the attention of three archers.

Black Lizard has got us covered though. He casts a spell and suddenly the peal of a great hammer striking an anvil rings loudly through our territory. The tiger it was meant for shakes off whatever effect it might have had though. Black Lizard then races into the building with the archers up top aiming at me and Mayella and heads for the roof.

He emerges from the stairwell door and immediately slams the archer on the roof with his magically summoned battle axe. The archer then pulls out a pair of scimitars. He looks real confident but then he fumbles one off the roof. Black Lizard absorbs a blow from the other scimitar though. Before the attacker can get too smug though an eruption of fire springs forth from Black Lizard and engulfs him.

While this is going on, Dank is thinking like a boss. He heads out to make sure our investments are safe but he too gets attacked as he reaches the orphanage, taking damage from a trio of arrows. More arrows stream in his direction but he blasts through the orphanage door, but not before one nicks him.

Inside the air is filled with cries of terror. He follows the sounds, and his nose, to the basement where he finds Peyton and the kids. He quickly tells them to keep quiet and then cautiously heads back up the stairs. The archers on Dale the Miller’s roof across the way must have eagle eyes because they still manage to spot Dank creeping up the steps and send a volley of missiles his way.

Dank makes the wise decision to approach Dale’s place from a position of strength so he leaps back downstairs, flips open the sewer entrance and begins winding his way toward the entrance to the Miller’s. He pops out of the sewers and then makes his way to the roof where he sees one of the archers firing at Me and Mayella. Creeping slowly and quietly toward the archer, Black Lizard draws his weapon and stabs the archer. The archer yelps with surprise before dropping his longbow and instead drawing his pair of silver-lined scimitars.

Thinking craftily, Dank rushes the archer to try and trip him off the roof. He was unsuccessful and receives a cut for his troubles.

As Mayella and I arrive, we find chaos all around the cul de sac. One of the carriages the others took is heading away from the battle but the driver points toward one of the nearby roofs and makes a bow and arrow gesture. A barrage of arrows falls all about Mayella and me. Anger boils up within me as I look around and see the handful of archers on a few of the roofs.

I yank the reins of my horse toward the closest building with an archer on top and once I am close I climb atop the horse back and leap up to the ledge of the building’s roof. Meanwhile Mayella simply disappears into a cloud of mist and then reappears in front of me. Before the archer can react, a stream of magical bolts flies forth from her, drilling the archer.

Ok. Maybe I have been a bit harsh about Mayella. Score one check in the Con column for murdering her in her sleep or selling her to the Rose Guild.

After taking the hits from Mayella, the archer turns into a tiger man and pulls out two scimitars while the two other archers continue firing at Mayella and me. I run up to the tiger man with the swords and slam Wererat Slayer hard into his mangy body, ripping a good size gash. .I know I just ruined a potential tiger skin rug but I am hoping Jillian can fix it. The weretiger gets this look of fear on his face - as he should - but then he gets real angry. Before he can do something though he’s blasted by some ice cold magic from Mayella.

While me and tiger man are squaring off, the other archers take some cheap shots at me. I shake them off though and just keep hacking away at the tiger with the scimitars. Mayella hits him with another cold magic thingy but it doesn’t seem to be doing anything. Jeez, Mayella. Do you think you could maybe help me out here?

Consider that a check in the Pro column.

I sense some motion over my shoulder so I dodge out of the way, just in time to see a tiger come flying at me from out of nowhere. It hits the tiger man I was dueling with instead and they both go tumbling off the roof.

Dank then leaps onto our roof and tells me he is heading down into the sewers to go protect the kids in the orphanage.

I jump off the roof and slam Wererat Slayer into the bloodied tiger man as Mayella delivers a pair of magical blasts into him too. He decides to wuss out by turning into a tiger and running away from the fight. The other guy though, who is already a tiger, pounces onto the roof and swipes at Mayella, missing.

Whatever happens with Mayella happens with Mayella, I decide, so I race off down the alley after the cowardly tiger. I manage to catch him and drive my sword through his hide with all my fury. And he dies! Yes! We have a rug!

Suddenly all of the weretigers get cold paws and leap away, running in all directions away from the fight. I am relieved for it to be over but can’t hide my disappointment that we didn’t get any more rugs. And also that there are no corpses to sodomize and ship back to Jill.

We start collecting booty left behind by the weretiger assassins and come up with eight scimitars lined with silver, four longbows (all with broken strings though) and 20 silver-tipped arrows.

As we are finishing that up, a man appears from The Regency to collect the horses. He sends apologies on behalf of The Regency for the breech in protocol and hands us a black coin. He also gives us a Marker. I am completely rocked back on my heels over that one. A Marker! That’s an unbreakable oath. We can turn that it for just about any special favor we need!

With the spoils of battle in hand, we head back to our base of operations. Dank tells us that he is aware of the weretiger assassins from his time as the wererats’ pet. They are a high-priced assassins guild. Someone really, really wants us dead.

We arrive at the hideout to find Sanjay has not returned from his shopping trip yet. Hopefully that means he put proper time into haggling the sale price for the ruby. Big Ulp arrives shortly after us however and informs us that the Free Shipping Company has been rumored to have taken on a large amount of debt. No shocker, but I think we can sunrise who hired the tigermen.

Someone raps the secret knock on our door so we open it to find Sanjay has returned and is laden with sacks of food and silverdust. He hands the silverdust to Black Lizard, telling him he purchased 150 gold pieces worth!

A hundred and fifty gold pieces worth? I am about to turn Sanjay into a rug too when he suddenly dumps out a mountain of gold coins - six months of funding worth!

I clap Sanjay on the back but he’s not done yet. He then begins laying out our new guild uniforms. Black and gold with blue trim. I don’t think I have ever been happier in my life.

And then Mayella goes and ruins it.

She refuses to wear the uniforms for some pituitary reason. While I am scrawling another check in the Pro column, Sanjay produces a uniform sized for Mayella’s creepy and gross doll. Whatever though. Now she’s in so I guess Sanjay made another good call.

We begin to discuss how to retaliate against Jill. Do we do a full frontal assault on the warehouse? Do we hire the weretigers to assassinate her in a twist of irony? Do we hit the supply carts?

As the leader, I suggest the perfect course of action. We should burn the supply carts, steal the food and kill the drivers. Mayella says no. Burn the carts, steal the food and maim the drivers? Mayella says no. Burn the carts, steal the found and wound the drivers? Mayella is ok with that. I still think we need to send a message though so I try to amend the plan by recommending we cut the thumbs off the drivers. She says no to that too.

Dank pipes up and says we should recon the warehouse so we can get a better understanding of their delivery patterns. That way we can hit several carts at once to really hurt them. That sounds like a great idea so he and Veego head out.

They observe that there are more government carts coming and going and much more traffic in general. There is word on the street of a blight and a border skirmish taking place.

Jill’s Free Shipping Company has a government contract to move troops but the rumor mill says she’s working all sides, moving troops for both. I still want to kill her but I gotta admit, I respect the hustle there. We can’t find anyone with substantial proof of this rumor though. We do hear a lot about her taking on a sizable loan recently and that the Company is hurting for cash. Another rumor is that Jill is collecting weapons being forged onsite at various orphanages.

I suggest we have a parlay with Jill at The Regency, but then we hire the weretigers assassins to ambush her on the way and kill her. Then we take over her operation, take the government contract, and seize power. Once we have that going, we then take out the Rose Guild.

We go to see Red to ask about the cost of hiring the weretigers and how to go about doing it. He is with someone else when we arrive so we get taken to a room where we can rest while we wait. Big Ulp greets us there eventually instead and takes us to a private room to talk.

After paying him a small consultation fee, he tells us it will probably cost us five black coins to hire the weretigers to do what we want. Black Lizard asks Big Ulp if there is a message he wants us to send on behalf of The Regency. Big Ulp gets a sparkle in his eyes and says a message has already been sent. He confirms Jill is still alive though.

I tell Black Lizard to pay the man the five black coins to arrange the meeting with the tigermen. We set it for breakfast tomorrow at The Regency.

I smile and rub my hands together as we depart. The bitch is going to get what she deserves. More importantly though, our little guild is going to get what we deserve.

Power.