Post by Markas Virnala on Sept 25, 2019 13:52:02 GMT
"Hal-Elf Overboard"
17th Entry in the journal of Markas Virnala
Finally Back after a week at sea again!
And another Dragon probably looking for me….
A bunch of us gathered in the Flourished Hook last week after seeing a parchment requesting "experienced adventurers".
I came down to find Faye, another lodger in the Hook, already ordering drinks from Himal along with a girl called Melissa who turned out to working with Rholor in Daring Heights! Igrainne was about, peering through the window(she seems reluctant to come into the hook for some reason?). And Traavor made an appearance as well, wearing a very tight cat suit made of seal skin.
Faye is an interesting character. She seems very sophisticated but playful at times. Well, I say she... they are very androgynous so I'm not actually sure if they are a man or a woman yet. They seemed to be flirting with everyone they could and clearly have use of magic.
Melissa is terrific though. She is quite tall with brown hair and green eyes and wore a breastplate with a quarter staff she could transform into a greatsword. She introduced herself as an acolyte of Selune and works with Rholor, though she is much more fun and easy going than the sombre one. She was drinking some whiskey from behind the bar that was way stronger than she expected and caused a bit of a scene, it was very funny!
The work, Himal explained, was to join a ship heading out in the morning for a week's sailing in search of another missing ship that was expected to arrive 2 weeks earlier. Aside from finding the ship, he was most pressing about a chest that was on the ship, but refused to tell us what was in it. I had my doubts given the last chest the Lenoirs had us open had a devil or demon creature in but we agreed to go anyway.
Given Mel was new in town, we decided to give her a tour of PF, not expecting to need much time to prepare, especially since Himal said our passage and food on the ship would be paid for. Igrainne was excited to show us a talking cat, one Faye seemed to know as well but turned out to be nothing. I've heard of animals talking, mystigon has sent me little bird messengers before now, but it sounded like an ordinary cat. They were adamant it was real but I'm not convinced...
The next day, we went to ship at first light as instructed to be greeted by the captain (Captain gloomy Angel - he was as gloomy as his name suggests) complaining we were late. I pointed out its first light but he wanted us ON the ship at first light... seemed a bit picky to me so I just stepped on the ship and he stopped complaining. The ship itself was immense, near 100ft long and very wide, she had a large mermaid holding a tankard as a figure head and was aptly called the drunken Mermaid!
Soon after we set off and were gathered on the deck by the captain and a huge Minotaur called Sherlock. I mean, he was massive, aside from these 2x tiny horns on his head. Faye made mention of them and was relegated to kitchen duty as a result. Speaking of which, we were gathered to be told the first day (excluding Faye for their horn comment), we were free to do what we wanted but from then on, we would be out to work!
The chef, a tiny Goblin called Frankie no more than 1'6" tall (honestly Baine's Frankie looked bigger than him) popped his head up from below deck, gave us all an odd look and then disappeared till dinner, where we were greeted by all of our favourite meals!
With the food, came drink. Two big bottles of Fire Whisky (That Mel had started on in the Hook) and a bottle of the drink we saw back in Za'Suul. Mel was quick to start drinking. She really is quite funny. She went to make a joke about Minotaurs with small horns but Sherlock heard it and tried intimidating her. I don't know if she just wasn'tafraid or was genuinely confused but she turned to me saying "I think he's trying to intimidate me"! I suggested to just let him to which she puts on a whole badly acted display!
For my part, I wasn't really feeling like drinking, I've been trying to stay away from Alcohol for a little bit lately, which was fine until Sherlock started demanding I drink and poured me a glass. I slipped it to Mel who was happy to drink it. He found out though and kept trying to press me into drinking but every time he handed me a glass, I just handed it to Mel, who was quickly getting very drunk. Sherlock only gave up trying once Mel got angry and started having a go at him, well, both of them she could see! It was quite funny, right up until she mentioned his tiny horns and he got angry. I managed to lead her away from him before it got ugly but not before he promised she would be scrubbing the decks the next day.
Come morning, we were woken up as Frankie, the chef, throws a mop at Mel and sends her to scrub the decks. She, of course, could remember none of the previous night so Faye caught up before going back to the kitchen and the rest of us were assigned tasks with the rest of the crew. Nothing really interesting went on then until around halfway through the day we could hear a noise in the distance, coming from what looked like a REALLY big fish. Sherlock pointed out it's not a fish but a Humpback whale but I have to agree with Mel here... it's in the sea, has fins, swims... sounds like a fish!
Anyway, Sherlock pointed out it was only a baby (once we saw the others and realised just how big they were, we could see how even this huge thing could be a baby) that must have gotten lost... Faye was of course immediately smitten with it and it was an interesting distraction until we saw two other whales heading in to attack it. Mel and I started trying to imitate the sound it was making and it actually started to head towards us! Wanting to save it, we asked Sherlock if we could do something and he set us up on the mounted Crossbows on the ship. Mel, Traavor and Faye manned one, each taking a different job from Loading, Aiming and Firing at the attacking whales. I ended up on another with Sherlock but he told me just to be ready to fire.... trying to load and aim himself (I'm still not clear on why he didn't just get one of the crew t help us.... he tried having a go at me for not doing more but i pointed out i did as he wanted and he seemed to let it slide?)
For her part, Igrainne decided to sit this out, saying "Guys, it's nature, just leave things be, sit back and watch" as she sat on a deck chair drinking a Martini. While we were rushing around, she was the picture of relaxation, even as one of the other crew members threw an apple at her for not helping.
Faye's group managed to fire off a round while Sherlock was loading ours still Faye even managed to come over and help him aim before he could finish loading fully! MEL on the other hand made it look easy! We fire off a shot as they prepare a second round just as the whale reaches the ship. One attacking whales (we could now see where Killer whales) had managed to catch up as well though and attacked the baby! I wasn't happy messing around with the crossbows so grabbed my new spear and jumped over the railing instead meeting the killers whales head on!
As i dropped into the water, i managed to stab the spear into one of the killer whales. The others seemed to follow my lead and started attack too (from the safety of the boat - except for Sherlock who only really ended up hitting himself somehow?), instead of using the crossbows. Even Igrainne, seeing me leap off decided to get involved finally. After hitting the water and stabbing at the first Killer whale, they both turned on me leaving the baby whale to get free. The first blasted me with some unreal sound that left me dazed for a bit, making me easy pickings for the second which took a bite at me. Thankfully, with everyone on deck focusing their attacks over the side, they didn’t last too long after that, with Igrainne finishing them off with some crazy glowing arrows.
Once Mel pulled me back onto deck, the crew started pulling one of the dead whales up onto the boat to carve meat from it. Meanwhile, Sherlock, now back on the boat and bleeding from his self-inflicted wounds decided to play a game and tried handing an axe to Faye but Mel took it from him pretty quickly. He placed an apple on both their heads and claimed the other had to cut it off without hurting them. It seemed like a stupid idea but I think wanted to prove something and Mel, for her part, seemed up for it. Sherlock went first, throwing one of his axes and cutting the apple clean in two without touching a hair on Mel's head. Instead of throwing hers, Mel stepped forward and in one swing completely cut the apple in two…. Somehow WITHOUT hitting Sherlock's Horns (I mean, I know they were small but still?)
The game over, Sherlock awarded Mel one of his axes as a prize, something she didn’t seem too interested in keeping as she offered it to me almost immediately! I didn't have much use for it either but I was sure Hoop would be interested anyway. Before heading off, I asked one of the crew to grab me a tooth from the Whale they had dragged on board as well, then dropped them off in Hoops room while on deck…. Which got me a lot of strange looks from everyone. (I forget how odd this looks from the outside)
The rest of the day was pretty peaceful after that. After fielding questions about Hoop (Who was loving the attention), we spotted some more whales who took Freddie (As Faye had started calling the baby whale) with them and the rest of us got on with our assigned works. Mel was made to clean up a broken glass that Igrainne had smashed earlier during the fight, while Igrainne seemed to get angry with one of the crew and threw an apple off the side of the boat…. I never asked why.
The next day, Mel and I were up in the Crow's nest keeping a look out. They even gave me a spy glass to use (which…. I may have neglected to return…). We spotted an island that some of the crew mentioned moved around? I wasn't buying it and asked how they knew since we were literally surrounded by ocean on all sides, there were no landmarks to reference it on but he assured me it moved none the less…. I should probably look into that at some point…. Anyway, not long after we passed that, we started to see wreckage in the water. Small items at first, a mug, some drift wood, but as we followed the trail of devastation, the pieces of a ship where starting to become recognisable, until we eventually spotted a huge section left floating on the water, on which seemed to be a survivor! I wasted no time and jumped in and swam over (I maybe shouldn't have jumped from so high…. It actually hurt a fair bit).
My eagerness seemed to jump back in the water, however, was a bit wasted. I can swim quite quick now thanks to the training with Paw, but not so quick that I could beat a ship. As I pulled myself onto the wreckage, the others had already sailed up and climbed down. For some reason, Faye was now dressed as a pirate?
The survivor was a woman. Humanoid with draconic features. We brought her on board and after some healing from Mel, she was put in the captains quarters to rest. A couple of hours later, she emerges and looks confused. We gather her name is Liz Sherman and she was on the ship we were looking for. A few days prior, they had noticed something in the water seeming to stalk them then, last night, it attacked. A Dragon Turtle (Which spawned a heated debate among us as to what to expect, was it a dragon or a turtle?) had wrecked the ship, leaving Liz as the apparent sole survivor. The Lenoir's had instructed us to look for this shipment and it didn't seem to be about the wreckage, so we made our way along the path of wreckage still, looking for where this creature went.
Liz, for her part, was reluctant to divulge too much information. She would only tell us she was looking for someone… who turned out, after much questioning to be Rama! Hearing that, Igrainne immediately said no and left…. She seems to have some history with Rama by the look of it. In fact, She threw a boomerang at him when we got back home and we saw him in the Flourished Hook!
As we sailed on, the floating debris finally came to an end in a shallower section of water, where we could see something deep beneath the surface. Traavor and I jumped in (Looking back, I spent an awful lot of this trip in the water?) for a quick scout and spotted what looked like a lot of ship wrecks around a cave, deeper in the water. Once we bought some water breathing equipment from Sherlock (since none of us thought to buy anything of the kind before leaving) before preparing ourselves to dive in. We had to wait a little while for Faye to finish arguing with Sherlock about the cost of the water breathing rings, especially since they were one use only, eventually managing to wrangle a receipt from Sherlock to try and get the cost back later (I say receipt, it was actually a VERY crude drawing of a minotaur with ridiculously large horns and a person…. That was it. Sherlock really seems to have a complex about the horns)
The water was quite dark as we went down, which wasn't an issue since most of us could see in the dark... all except Mel of course. I held onto her arm as we descended so she didn't get lost.
As we got closer down to the wrecks we started to make out 2 figures floating in front of a cave entrance. Shark people (Sharpies) holding trident. It didn't seem like they had spotted us while we tried to work out what exactly we were doing, until Mel made her Staff suddenly start glowing with bright light. I think she got fed up not being able to see. It was only seconds until they spotted us and made for us, stopping short of actually attacking us and began asking us questions on why we were there. They seemed to be looking at us more like food than anything though. Luckily they didn't seem to interested in starting a fight with us right now and swam back down to the cave.
Our brief chat did confirm that "Shivon", the Dragon Turtle was in the cave and had recently brought something in with him. For their part, they seemed to want to get on his good Graces
There was some debate as to how to proceed.... none of us really wanted to try tackling a Dragon Turtle right now but we also didn't want to come back empty handed. In retrospect, maybe that would have been a better option.
Too late now I suppose. For better or worse, we went ahead. We approached the sharks and surprised them, fighting our way in (I realise how ruthless that sounds but I dong believe they were really going to give us any other option), and swam into the cave. Mel was a bit despondent as between Faye, Traavor and myself we took care of them without her getting a chance to weigh in. Faye and I took the Bone Tridents they were carrying before we moved on. Not that I've tried using a Trident before…. I grabbed it for Hoop.
We swam on in through the dark, towing Mel along to keep her safe while she was blind till we came to a natural cave where we could surface. Not knowing where the Dragon Turtle was, we opted to try and stay quiet as we clambered out of the water. The cave itself was quite large with lots of jagged outcroppings spread around. As we took our first few steps forward we saw a massive pile of treasure! Coins and gems all piled high but more importantly, nearby was a large heavy looking chest with the Lenoir's trading symbol emblazoned on it, the chest we were looking for!.
before any of us could make a move, however, we also saw an entire wall of the cave shift to one side slightly and a deep rumble sound come from behind it….. Well, once I had a second to look properly, I realised it wasn't actually a wall but the rocky protrusions off the back of the Dragon Turtle and a flipper! It was massive… but based on the movement and subsequent stillness, seemed to be asleep. We took our opportunity to get away while we could with the chest, which was much heavier than we had initially expected it to be…
Mel, Igrainne and me went about slowly trying to lift it and get it to the water. We started making progress until Igrainne almost sent it tipping over but I managed to keep it steady for us to reach the water (To be honest, I was impressed with how she lifted it up to begin with, it was really big). As we made our way back, we passed Faye silently telling off Traavor, trying to stop him from stealing anything and possibly making some noise. A few moments later, and we had the chest slowly lowered in the water and were making our way back through the cave.
It was an effort but we got it back up to sea level and Sherlock and the crew began helping us hoist it on deck. We made it just in time! As the last of us were climbing back onto deck we all heard an all mighty roar and rumble from beneath the waves. Seemed like seconds and the crew already had the sails unfurled and we were racing away! I climbed back up towards the crows Nest to scout behind us using the scope, only to see a massive head rise from the water behind us. All of us heard the voice however. That angry rumbling voice calling out over the water to us: "I WILL FIND YOU!". Needless to say that go the crew worked up even more. Even Mel was running around shouting Guidance and tapping people (Not sure what that was about but seemed to be helping?)
The trip back was largely uneventful otherwise. Well, until Traavor decided to try and open the chest of course. It was rigged with a poison trap though and he started to look pretty bad pretty quick. While he lay on the floor, Faye opened the chest to find a massive carved Amber Gem. They came back to tell us and of course see about helping Traavor but we had nothing to help…. We ended up going to the captain for help, see if he had something to save Traavor. He called us on trying open the chest even with Faye suggesting he "bumped" into it. He didn’t buy it.
After messing around and dodging the question of whether he could help us, Mel seemed to finally snap, turning her Staff into a Greatsword and began ranting at the captain. Well, I say rant. She completely flew off the handle. The rant turned into screaming and her face went red as she went into a garbled rage just screaming at him, a lot like How Ghesh goes into a rage…. It was actually quite scary to see! It seemed to do the trick anyway as the captain finally relinquished an antidote the Himal had provided to him before we left, apparently expecting someone to try and open it.
Back in PF, we gathered at the Hook again to be met by Himal, who immediately smirked at the now Purple Traavor (A side effect of the poison… apparently would take a week or so to stop!). He was happy we brought the item, though less happy when we told him off the Dragon Turtle, asking why did we take it? Needless to say, everyone was fairly annoyed with him. Traavor even stormed out of the Hook, only to walk straight back in once he realised he was actually staying there.
As Himal left, refusing to pay Faye back for the Water Breathing Ring based off a crude drawing, Liz made her way in a sat down with Rama… she got what she was looking for at any rate. I do wonder who she is to make him sink in his chair like that…. And then of course, as mentioned, Igrainne hit him with a boomerang!
Then we all went our separate ways. Igrainne ran off before Rama could give chase, Traavor slunk away to his room, still purple, Mel said her goodbyes and started to head back towards Daring Heights and Faye went running upstairs shouting something… Grenbo? Greego? I don't know….
17th Entry in the journal of Markas Virnala
Finally Back after a week at sea again!
And another Dragon probably looking for me….
A bunch of us gathered in the Flourished Hook last week after seeing a parchment requesting "experienced adventurers".
I came down to find Faye, another lodger in the Hook, already ordering drinks from Himal along with a girl called Melissa who turned out to working with Rholor in Daring Heights! Igrainne was about, peering through the window(she seems reluctant to come into the hook for some reason?). And Traavor made an appearance as well, wearing a very tight cat suit made of seal skin.
Faye is an interesting character. She seems very sophisticated but playful at times. Well, I say she... they are very androgynous so I'm not actually sure if they are a man or a woman yet. They seemed to be flirting with everyone they could and clearly have use of magic.
Melissa is terrific though. She is quite tall with brown hair and green eyes and wore a breastplate with a quarter staff she could transform into a greatsword. She introduced herself as an acolyte of Selune and works with Rholor, though she is much more fun and easy going than the sombre one. She was drinking some whiskey from behind the bar that was way stronger than she expected and caused a bit of a scene, it was very funny!
The work, Himal explained, was to join a ship heading out in the morning for a week's sailing in search of another missing ship that was expected to arrive 2 weeks earlier. Aside from finding the ship, he was most pressing about a chest that was on the ship, but refused to tell us what was in it. I had my doubts given the last chest the Lenoirs had us open had a devil or demon creature in but we agreed to go anyway.
Given Mel was new in town, we decided to give her a tour of PF, not expecting to need much time to prepare, especially since Himal said our passage and food on the ship would be paid for. Igrainne was excited to show us a talking cat, one Faye seemed to know as well but turned out to be nothing. I've heard of animals talking, mystigon has sent me little bird messengers before now, but it sounded like an ordinary cat. They were adamant it was real but I'm not convinced...
The next day, we went to ship at first light as instructed to be greeted by the captain (Captain gloomy Angel - he was as gloomy as his name suggests) complaining we were late. I pointed out its first light but he wanted us ON the ship at first light... seemed a bit picky to me so I just stepped on the ship and he stopped complaining. The ship itself was immense, near 100ft long and very wide, she had a large mermaid holding a tankard as a figure head and was aptly called the drunken Mermaid!
Soon after we set off and were gathered on the deck by the captain and a huge Minotaur called Sherlock. I mean, he was massive, aside from these 2x tiny horns on his head. Faye made mention of them and was relegated to kitchen duty as a result. Speaking of which, we were gathered to be told the first day (excluding Faye for their horn comment), we were free to do what we wanted but from then on, we would be out to work!
The chef, a tiny Goblin called Frankie no more than 1'6" tall (honestly Baine's Frankie looked bigger than him) popped his head up from below deck, gave us all an odd look and then disappeared till dinner, where we were greeted by all of our favourite meals!
- Faye had a single tiny white capsule with a minty flavour to it... it looked very odd on the huge plate but they seemed excited anyway.
- Traavor had what looked like a perfectly grilled pork chop with a pineapple ring on top and mashed potatoes
- Mel had a meaty dish with sheets of pasta on in a piping hot dish that smelled divine.
- Igrainne had Fried Quipper fish and chips
- For me, is presented with a simple cake that tasted exactly like the ones my mum used to bring us. It was a pleasant surprise and made me think of Hugao and Aila again, only this time it felt good to think back on those times.
With the food, came drink. Two big bottles of Fire Whisky (That Mel had started on in the Hook) and a bottle of the drink we saw back in Za'Suul. Mel was quick to start drinking. She really is quite funny. She went to make a joke about Minotaurs with small horns but Sherlock heard it and tried intimidating her. I don't know if she just wasn'tafraid or was genuinely confused but she turned to me saying "I think he's trying to intimidate me"! I suggested to just let him to which she puts on a whole badly acted display!
For my part, I wasn't really feeling like drinking, I've been trying to stay away from Alcohol for a little bit lately, which was fine until Sherlock started demanding I drink and poured me a glass. I slipped it to Mel who was happy to drink it. He found out though and kept trying to press me into drinking but every time he handed me a glass, I just handed it to Mel, who was quickly getting very drunk. Sherlock only gave up trying once Mel got angry and started having a go at him, well, both of them she could see! It was quite funny, right up until she mentioned his tiny horns and he got angry. I managed to lead her away from him before it got ugly but not before he promised she would be scrubbing the decks the next day.
Come morning, we were woken up as Frankie, the chef, throws a mop at Mel and sends her to scrub the decks. She, of course, could remember none of the previous night so Faye caught up before going back to the kitchen and the rest of us were assigned tasks with the rest of the crew. Nothing really interesting went on then until around halfway through the day we could hear a noise in the distance, coming from what looked like a REALLY big fish. Sherlock pointed out it's not a fish but a Humpback whale but I have to agree with Mel here... it's in the sea, has fins, swims... sounds like a fish!
Anyway, Sherlock pointed out it was only a baby (once we saw the others and realised just how big they were, we could see how even this huge thing could be a baby) that must have gotten lost... Faye was of course immediately smitten with it and it was an interesting distraction until we saw two other whales heading in to attack it. Mel and I started trying to imitate the sound it was making and it actually started to head towards us! Wanting to save it, we asked Sherlock if we could do something and he set us up on the mounted Crossbows on the ship. Mel, Traavor and Faye manned one, each taking a different job from Loading, Aiming and Firing at the attacking whales. I ended up on another with Sherlock but he told me just to be ready to fire.... trying to load and aim himself (I'm still not clear on why he didn't just get one of the crew t help us.... he tried having a go at me for not doing more but i pointed out i did as he wanted and he seemed to let it slide?)
For her part, Igrainne decided to sit this out, saying "Guys, it's nature, just leave things be, sit back and watch" as she sat on a deck chair drinking a Martini. While we were rushing around, she was the picture of relaxation, even as one of the other crew members threw an apple at her for not helping.
Faye's group managed to fire off a round while Sherlock was loading ours still Faye even managed to come over and help him aim before he could finish loading fully! MEL on the other hand made it look easy! We fire off a shot as they prepare a second round just as the whale reaches the ship. One attacking whales (we could now see where Killer whales) had managed to catch up as well though and attacked the baby! I wasn't happy messing around with the crossbows so grabbed my new spear and jumped over the railing instead meeting the killers whales head on!
As i dropped into the water, i managed to stab the spear into one of the killer whales. The others seemed to follow my lead and started attack too (from the safety of the boat - except for Sherlock who only really ended up hitting himself somehow?), instead of using the crossbows. Even Igrainne, seeing me leap off decided to get involved finally. After hitting the water and stabbing at the first Killer whale, they both turned on me leaving the baby whale to get free. The first blasted me with some unreal sound that left me dazed for a bit, making me easy pickings for the second which took a bite at me. Thankfully, with everyone on deck focusing their attacks over the side, they didn’t last too long after that, with Igrainne finishing them off with some crazy glowing arrows.
Once Mel pulled me back onto deck, the crew started pulling one of the dead whales up onto the boat to carve meat from it. Meanwhile, Sherlock, now back on the boat and bleeding from his self-inflicted wounds decided to play a game and tried handing an axe to Faye but Mel took it from him pretty quickly. He placed an apple on both their heads and claimed the other had to cut it off without hurting them. It seemed like a stupid idea but I think wanted to prove something and Mel, for her part, seemed up for it. Sherlock went first, throwing one of his axes and cutting the apple clean in two without touching a hair on Mel's head. Instead of throwing hers, Mel stepped forward and in one swing completely cut the apple in two…. Somehow WITHOUT hitting Sherlock's Horns (I mean, I know they were small but still?)
The game over, Sherlock awarded Mel one of his axes as a prize, something she didn’t seem too interested in keeping as she offered it to me almost immediately! I didn't have much use for it either but I was sure Hoop would be interested anyway. Before heading off, I asked one of the crew to grab me a tooth from the Whale they had dragged on board as well, then dropped them off in Hoops room while on deck…. Which got me a lot of strange looks from everyone. (I forget how odd this looks from the outside)
The rest of the day was pretty peaceful after that. After fielding questions about Hoop (Who was loving the attention), we spotted some more whales who took Freddie (As Faye had started calling the baby whale) with them and the rest of us got on with our assigned works. Mel was made to clean up a broken glass that Igrainne had smashed earlier during the fight, while Igrainne seemed to get angry with one of the crew and threw an apple off the side of the boat…. I never asked why.
The next day, Mel and I were up in the Crow's nest keeping a look out. They even gave me a spy glass to use (which…. I may have neglected to return…). We spotted an island that some of the crew mentioned moved around? I wasn't buying it and asked how they knew since we were literally surrounded by ocean on all sides, there were no landmarks to reference it on but he assured me it moved none the less…. I should probably look into that at some point…. Anyway, not long after we passed that, we started to see wreckage in the water. Small items at first, a mug, some drift wood, but as we followed the trail of devastation, the pieces of a ship where starting to become recognisable, until we eventually spotted a huge section left floating on the water, on which seemed to be a survivor! I wasted no time and jumped in and swam over (I maybe shouldn't have jumped from so high…. It actually hurt a fair bit).
My eagerness seemed to jump back in the water, however, was a bit wasted. I can swim quite quick now thanks to the training with Paw, but not so quick that I could beat a ship. As I pulled myself onto the wreckage, the others had already sailed up and climbed down. For some reason, Faye was now dressed as a pirate?
The survivor was a woman. Humanoid with draconic features. We brought her on board and after some healing from Mel, she was put in the captains quarters to rest. A couple of hours later, she emerges and looks confused. We gather her name is Liz Sherman and she was on the ship we were looking for. A few days prior, they had noticed something in the water seeming to stalk them then, last night, it attacked. A Dragon Turtle (Which spawned a heated debate among us as to what to expect, was it a dragon or a turtle?) had wrecked the ship, leaving Liz as the apparent sole survivor. The Lenoir's had instructed us to look for this shipment and it didn't seem to be about the wreckage, so we made our way along the path of wreckage still, looking for where this creature went.
Liz, for her part, was reluctant to divulge too much information. She would only tell us she was looking for someone… who turned out, after much questioning to be Rama! Hearing that, Igrainne immediately said no and left…. She seems to have some history with Rama by the look of it. In fact, She threw a boomerang at him when we got back home and we saw him in the Flourished Hook!
As we sailed on, the floating debris finally came to an end in a shallower section of water, where we could see something deep beneath the surface. Traavor and I jumped in (Looking back, I spent an awful lot of this trip in the water?) for a quick scout and spotted what looked like a lot of ship wrecks around a cave, deeper in the water. Once we bought some water breathing equipment from Sherlock (since none of us thought to buy anything of the kind before leaving) before preparing ourselves to dive in. We had to wait a little while for Faye to finish arguing with Sherlock about the cost of the water breathing rings, especially since they were one use only, eventually managing to wrangle a receipt from Sherlock to try and get the cost back later (I say receipt, it was actually a VERY crude drawing of a minotaur with ridiculously large horns and a person…. That was it. Sherlock really seems to have a complex about the horns)
The water was quite dark as we went down, which wasn't an issue since most of us could see in the dark... all except Mel of course. I held onto her arm as we descended so she didn't get lost.
As we got closer down to the wrecks we started to make out 2 figures floating in front of a cave entrance. Shark people (Sharpies) holding trident. It didn't seem like they had spotted us while we tried to work out what exactly we were doing, until Mel made her Staff suddenly start glowing with bright light. I think she got fed up not being able to see. It was only seconds until they spotted us and made for us, stopping short of actually attacking us and began asking us questions on why we were there. They seemed to be looking at us more like food than anything though. Luckily they didn't seem to interested in starting a fight with us right now and swam back down to the cave.
Our brief chat did confirm that "Shivon", the Dragon Turtle was in the cave and had recently brought something in with him. For their part, they seemed to want to get on his good Graces
There was some debate as to how to proceed.... none of us really wanted to try tackling a Dragon Turtle right now but we also didn't want to come back empty handed. In retrospect, maybe that would have been a better option.
Too late now I suppose. For better or worse, we went ahead. We approached the sharks and surprised them, fighting our way in (I realise how ruthless that sounds but I dong believe they were really going to give us any other option), and swam into the cave. Mel was a bit despondent as between Faye, Traavor and myself we took care of them without her getting a chance to weigh in. Faye and I took the Bone Tridents they were carrying before we moved on. Not that I've tried using a Trident before…. I grabbed it for Hoop.
We swam on in through the dark, towing Mel along to keep her safe while she was blind till we came to a natural cave where we could surface. Not knowing where the Dragon Turtle was, we opted to try and stay quiet as we clambered out of the water. The cave itself was quite large with lots of jagged outcroppings spread around. As we took our first few steps forward we saw a massive pile of treasure! Coins and gems all piled high but more importantly, nearby was a large heavy looking chest with the Lenoir's trading symbol emblazoned on it, the chest we were looking for!.
before any of us could make a move, however, we also saw an entire wall of the cave shift to one side slightly and a deep rumble sound come from behind it….. Well, once I had a second to look properly, I realised it wasn't actually a wall but the rocky protrusions off the back of the Dragon Turtle and a flipper! It was massive… but based on the movement and subsequent stillness, seemed to be asleep. We took our opportunity to get away while we could with the chest, which was much heavier than we had initially expected it to be…
Mel, Igrainne and me went about slowly trying to lift it and get it to the water. We started making progress until Igrainne almost sent it tipping over but I managed to keep it steady for us to reach the water (To be honest, I was impressed with how she lifted it up to begin with, it was really big). As we made our way back, we passed Faye silently telling off Traavor, trying to stop him from stealing anything and possibly making some noise. A few moments later, and we had the chest slowly lowered in the water and were making our way back through the cave.
It was an effort but we got it back up to sea level and Sherlock and the crew began helping us hoist it on deck. We made it just in time! As the last of us were climbing back onto deck we all heard an all mighty roar and rumble from beneath the waves. Seemed like seconds and the crew already had the sails unfurled and we were racing away! I climbed back up towards the crows Nest to scout behind us using the scope, only to see a massive head rise from the water behind us. All of us heard the voice however. That angry rumbling voice calling out over the water to us: "I WILL FIND YOU!". Needless to say that go the crew worked up even more. Even Mel was running around shouting Guidance and tapping people (Not sure what that was about but seemed to be helping?)
The trip back was largely uneventful otherwise. Well, until Traavor decided to try and open the chest of course. It was rigged with a poison trap though and he started to look pretty bad pretty quick. While he lay on the floor, Faye opened the chest to find a massive carved Amber Gem. They came back to tell us and of course see about helping Traavor but we had nothing to help…. We ended up going to the captain for help, see if he had something to save Traavor. He called us on trying open the chest even with Faye suggesting he "bumped" into it. He didn’t buy it.
After messing around and dodging the question of whether he could help us, Mel seemed to finally snap, turning her Staff into a Greatsword and began ranting at the captain. Well, I say rant. She completely flew off the handle. The rant turned into screaming and her face went red as she went into a garbled rage just screaming at him, a lot like How Ghesh goes into a rage…. It was actually quite scary to see! It seemed to do the trick anyway as the captain finally relinquished an antidote the Himal had provided to him before we left, apparently expecting someone to try and open it.
Back in PF, we gathered at the Hook again to be met by Himal, who immediately smirked at the now Purple Traavor (A side effect of the poison… apparently would take a week or so to stop!). He was happy we brought the item, though less happy when we told him off the Dragon Turtle, asking why did we take it? Needless to say, everyone was fairly annoyed with him. Traavor even stormed out of the Hook, only to walk straight back in once he realised he was actually staying there.
As Himal left, refusing to pay Faye back for the Water Breathing Ring based off a crude drawing, Liz made her way in a sat down with Rama… she got what she was looking for at any rate. I do wonder who she is to make him sink in his chair like that…. And then of course, as mentioned, Igrainne hit him with a boomerang!
Then we all went our separate ways. Igrainne ran off before Rama could give chase, Traavor slunk away to his room, still purple, Mel said her goodbyes and started to head back towards Daring Heights and Faye went running upstairs shouting something… Grenbo? Greego? I don't know….