Gaia, the Lonely Skies (Brookvale Brigade Campaign)

[StorybookParagon]

The trees grow long here. They've started to swallow the clear sky, shadows casted from an afternoon sun. Songbirds stop their songs as you pass by.

Tumbling through the forest, you are on the seats of the wagon that has only recently taken a swift turn off the road and into the unpaved and mostly unknown parts of the forests near Brookvale. It's bumpy, uncomfortable, and cramped enough that you wonder how you even managed to fit your equipment in the cart in the first place. Your driver, and employer, has a head so big it's a wonder the cart can even move with the amount of reckless assurance that stuffed in it. There seems to be nothing that's stopping him from driving headfirst into the forest. You barely had time to talk before he swept you up into the cart and started going. Strange noises, rickety cart, stubborn horse—that doesn't stop him from taking a sniff from the air like a bloodhound on the trail.

"Mmmnmnn. I can smell the gold already. A fat pile of gold a dragon left behind. Brighter than the sun!" He turns around to his passengers riding the wagon with a playful smirk on his lips. "Cheer up. Hardly any time for gloomy faces when we're headed right to a treasure trove. Sure, we've got whatever beast is running around, but this forest is so big that we're almost guaranteed not to run into it."

OOC

Introduce yourself and roll initiative. Initiative will be used in combat. Roleplay has no initiative.

 

[Ilikepie]

Darkness feels excitement as the wind rushes against her face from the speed of the wagon and the feel of her poor rat familiar bouncing around in her hood. How could she not be excited about finding lots of treasure? She was the first of the group to volunteer to join the strange elf on this journey. She is unsure what to think about the two human women and the male half-elf that joined after her since they were rushed onto the cart before she could learn anything about them. Darkness looks at the rest of the the group after the elf driving the cart spoke. "In case you were wondering who the awesome person in front of you is, I am Darkness Shadowblade." Darkness does a quick little pose from her seat. "I'm a halfling, it's really annoying when people mistake me for a child". Darkness glances away for a moment and then looks back towards them. "Don't you guys worry about this so called giant monster. I'm sure we can handle it since I'm here to put an end to it if it decides to mess with us". Darkness has a huge grin on her face as her familiar pops out of her hood to take a look at the rest of the group.

 

[Felis]

People do a lot of things they didn't think through when they're in need for money, Finne herself included. Still, as the cart barrels on through the forest, she begins to think this "expedition" may be setting a new record for all involved in that regard. It's too late for regrets, though - in for an inch, in for a mile.

Finne can't help but raise her eyebrows a bit at hearing the halfling's name - who names their child Darkness? - but she is thankful for any conversation that isn't their employer going on about his treasure hoard. "I'm Finne Sumber," she says, and though she hesitates for a heartbeat before she gives her family name, it's refreshing to go by it again and be her plain old self. No more fancy "Tempestweaver" for a while, if ever.

"And from your - both of your - lips to the gods' ears," Finne adds with a glance at the elf. "Maybe we don't have to worry about that monster, but forests can be dangerous even so. You know - bears, logs across the road that might trip the horse... Not that I want to jinx it."

(Initiative: 7+3 = 10)

 

[Ness]

Lysander watches the trees as they rush past, his face sickly and drained of all colour. He's wedged himself into one corner of the cart, legs drawn up to his chest to make room for the pack at his feet. His stomach lurches with each bounce of the cart, and he answers the elf's smirk with a distinctly unamused expression. He turns to the others and flashes a polite smile, a brief quirk of his mouth that doesn't quite reach his bleary eyes. "Call me Lysander."

He tugs absently at the edge of his sleeve, in some pointless attempt to smooth out the wrinkles. His clothing is of fine make, but visibly worn out. His silk shirt is creased from days of sleeping in it and wearing it under armour, the gold threading along the cuffs beginning to come loose. Mud is speckled across his boots and the hem of his pants. His hair is an uncombed mess. In different company he'd be mortified to be seen in this state, but as he watches a rat poke its head out of the halfling woman's clothing, he realizes that he could stand to relax his standards a bit. "There's, ah, something in your hood," he warns Darkness, pointing to the rat.

(Initiative: 3 + 2 = 5)

 

[Ian Temero]

Life has a way of catching you by surprise. Sometimes your chicken lays two eggs in the morning. Sometimes times your neighbor bakes an extra pie and gives you one. And sometimes the head priest bursts into your room, tells you to pack your bags and go retrieve a long lost relic, and then shoves you into a cart full of strangers heading for the middle of nowhere. Yeah, it had been a pretty strange morning.

Willow hugged her pack to her chest, watching the scenery go by as they traveled further and further from the world she knew. Far from the safe walls of the church, the friendly townsfolk, the warm library. Why was she chosen for this job? She hardly seemed like the most suitable candidate for a holy quest. Surely there were others that could retrieve this relic? Others with more experience with this kind of thing? Like Brother Michael! He’d been on a quest already! Or Sister Briar!

She was pulled out of her thoughts as the others in the cart began to introduce themselves. The halfling Darkness; the woman Finne; and the sick looking half-elf Lysander. Was he okay? She wondered, then heard what else they were saying. Beasts? Giant Monsters? Bears? Just what had she been dragged into? Then she realized that it was her turn for an introduction. “Willow…” she said quietly “…Engelhart.”

(Initiative = 14)

 

[StorybookParagon]

"Come on now, the little one knows where it's at. All it's got to be is some smooth sailing and—"

It sounds like thunder for a second, but there are no storm clouds in the sky. As the cart slows down and rests at the crest of the hill, you can see through the trees smoke, tents, and the entrance to the dungeon. There's a large stone flung through air, sending shrapnel and rubble across the closed gates. A batter ram is slowly making its way up towards the gates. There's the faint yelling that you can barely make out to be goblinoid.

A large circle of tents surround the dungeon entrance. Rudimentary catapults and battering rams crawl their way through much of the chopped down parts of the forest. There's a clear path that runs down the hill straight into the campsite. Red marked barrels are being loaded up into carts and wheeled through the camps.

"A siege? Gods, are we too late? How did they know something like this was here?" The elf curses to himself in elvish.

 

[Ilikepie]

"Oh yes, that my mighty familiar Wiggles". Wiggles lets out a light squeak before going back to hide in the hood. Darkness feels the cart slow down and looks ahead at all the craziness around the dungeon that the group was heading to. "So what do we do now? Do we show off our awesomeness by fighting all of these enemies to get the treasure or do we try to sneak past them so we can get the treasure first?"

 

[StorybookParagon]

"This dungeon houses kobolds. There 'aught to be a few tunnels if we don't mind going through their traps and tight spaces. Just need to find them." He looks towards the out edges of the hills where the rubble has subsided and the conflict has left it untouched. There may very well be secret tunnels meant for kobolds buried beneath the hills. Would be a tight squeeze, but then why wouldn't the goblins have already taken them? "Somewhere..."

 

[Felis]

Because of course there are previously unmentioned kobolds. Smooth sailing indeed. The elf's saving grace at this point is that he, too, doesn't seem like he expected the catapults and the whole caboodle before them.

"I don't feel good about going into a place where we don't know much except it houses kobolds, and have these-" Finne points at the campsite, "at our back. If they break through the doors while we're inside, won't that be bad for us? Maybe we can scare them off or destroy some of their stuff to slow their progress down, at least." She looks to the others. After Darkness's suggestion, Finne feels like her own isn't so farfetched, but it does feel a bit odd throwing the idea of property damage out there so casually.

 

[Ian Temero]

Willow's face went pale as the siege came into view. "Oh! Oh dear, that's a lot..." She muttered. This day just kept on getting better and better. Oh and of course there were kobolds too. Why hadn't anybody bothered mentioning these things earlier?

She listened as the others gave their opinions on what to do next, then gave a small squeak when their eyes turned to her. She wasn't aware that she had a say in this trip. "Oh, um... well..." Oh boy. She took a deep breath to steady her nerves. "S-sneaking is okay." It was the least violent option as far as she could tell.

 

[StorybookParagon]

"Well, I didn't expect there to be goblins running around!" He's purposefully avoiding the implication that he withheld information. "They're probably guarding it pretty well. We'll probably have some time before the gate totally collapses. If that's enough time, I don't know. I don't know. Let's find these tunnels and get in there before the whole thing comes crashing down on us. Can't bring the cart in, but I'd rather be inconvenienced than dead."

OOC

The cart rolls around. Only so much you can do stuck in it.

[DC 20 Animal Handling] Take the reigns from the elf's hands! Charge!
[DC 15 Survival with Advantage] Watch the ground. Kobolds have probably been using them a lot.
[DC 10 Insight] Squint at the elf. Is he hiding something else?

 

[Ilikepie]

Darkness squints at the elf since he seems to hiding something from them and she should know since was taught how to lie from the best.

20+2=22

 

[StorybookParagon]

Insight: Critical Success

"It"? He just said "It" singular. Is there something in particular he's looking for? And the way he has been smoothly traversing the terrain without so much as crashing the cart despite the break neck speed, the way he seems to know there are secret tunnels... This is not the first time he has been here.

 

[Felis]

"Hmm," Finne grumbles. She, too, would rather be inconvenienced than dead, of course. As she sees it, though, they're just trading one danger for another, but oh well. Willow already seems spooked (though who can blame her), the elf isn't going to be any help either way, from what they've seen, and who can say what's going through Lysander's head. And it's not like Finne knows what she's doing, really.

So she sits back, arms crossed, and blows a strand of stray black hair out of her face as she stares down onto the road and underbrush passing by. The faster they get this done, the better. Surely even kobolds wouldn't crawl through the underbrush on a different path everytime they used these tunnels. There have to be some tracks or the like, right?

(Survival: 20+3=23)

 

[StorybookParagon]

Survival: Critical Success

A lot of noise is found atop the ground. Panic, mostly. There are even goblin tracks that seem to be tailing kobold tracks before abruptly being cut off at a pile of rubble from a collapsed tunnel. Many examples of this are shown as you look further and further. A little more searching around and the cart slows down just enough for you to catch a glimpse of an open tunnel that looks like it would lead straight towards the dungeon. The most recent tracks are seen going into the tunnels, but they are neither kobold or goblin.

 

[Ilikepie]

Darkness looks over to a tunnel Finne is looking at. She takes a quick glance at the elf to see if he will say anything else, but it didn't seem like he would. "Lets do this!" Darkness runs in front of Finne and enters the tunnel. Darkness has complete confidence that she will be able to get the treasure before their enemies manage to find it and take it away. She doesn't go too far ahead since she still needs the others in case a fight breaks out.

 

[Felis]

"Wait!" Finne reflexively reaches out as Darkness runs in the direction Finne spotted the open tunnel, but far too slow to do anything to stop the halfling. She sighs and turns to the elf.

"Well, stop the cart, then," Finne says as she prepares to hop out herself. "There's an open tunnel over there. The others are collapsed or blocked, I'd guess the kobolds closed them off because of the goblins." She nods towards where Darkness vanished. "And there are tracks of someone or something else going in there, too - one more thing you didn't expect? And maybe you'd like to finally tell us your name so we can say something other than 'you' if we need to get your attention. You know, in case of danger and such."

Finne feels half sorry for letting her irritation break through, but only half. So far, nothing has gone according to the faint outline of a "plan" that they have, and their employer must either be incompetent or untrustworthy. Finne decided to take this job, so she'll do it, but she doesn't have to be happy doing it under these circumstances. With a soft humph, she jumps from the cart once it's slowed down enough and follows Darkness to the entrance of the tunnel.