Episode 3: Oh Barry, I'm Not Your Daddy

## **Episode Summary**

The session picks up with the party alone with the injured Orc from the Shadow Guard. He was cut off from the rest of his squad who fled back to the Shadow Grove.

**Barra** having learnt that the Orc speaks Common, assures him that the party will not hurt him but will tie him up as a precaution. He signals **Kaman** to throw his rope over and binds the guard, who doesn't resist. **Kaman** and **Kie** decide to inspect the rock spikes that the Shadow Guards conjured earlier. **Barra** tells **Yrsa** to leave the interrogation to him. **Yrsa** allows it, narrows her eyes at the Orc guard and says 'Tell him what he wants to know' and walks over to **Kaman** and **Kie** to inspect the rock spikes. **Kaman** consults his gem on his forehead to learn more about the rock spikes but isn't able to find a way to undo them or remove them. The party could try digging through them however but it may take hours.

**Barra** illuminates his breast plate and shines light into the Orc guard's face. The party learns that the Orc's name is **Akras Dhiman**. After exchanging 'pleasantries', **Barra** casts a *Words of Terror* spell to threaten him 'Well, if you don't tell us what we wanna hear, maybe you won't be 'da man' any more? Maybe you'll just be a smear on a door, of blood and guts and uh, whatever it is you're wearing. I think that looks rather nice actually.' **Akras** looks back at **Barra**, deadpan, '...So what d'you wanna know, then?'. Barra uneasily asks 'So, just to check with you then, so are you frightened of me? Are you in a little bit terrified?' **Akras** says flatly 'I mean, yeah you're terrifying.' **Barra** claps his hands in affirmation 'All right! It's done it's done!' and calls the party back.

**Barra** asks **Akras** why did the Shadow Guard kidnap the emissary and the ambassador. **Akras** says he was just following orders, 'the orders were to set up, snatch the targets, and return'. But he doesn't specify where the end point is. **Barra** pushes **Akras** for the answer but **Akras** just tells the party to kill him and get on with it as he's considered dead to his people now. **Akras** tells the party more about himself that he is a member of the Shadow Guard, they hail from the Shadow Grove and his serial number is GX7293. He then insults **Barra** saying that he 'fucked his mother...and she enjoyed it'. **Barra** gets triggered, **Yrsa** calms him down. 'He's trying to get you to kill him.'

**Yrsa** knows that the Shadow Grove is regarded as a spooky place and is deemed dangerous. It is located on the other side of the Tarim Range mountains. In order to get to the Shadow Grove, she roughly knows the party could go North through the Carambir Pass.

**Kaman** tries to restraint **Barra** who is enraged at Akras's taunting, but **Barra** breaks free, pulls out his rapier and slashes at **Akras.** 'Don't give in to your hate!' yells **Kaman**. **Akras** gets slashed in the stomach but responds by kicking **Barra** in the groin who yells in excruciating pain. **Barra** swings his rapier again but **Akras** traps the blade with his bound hands and clubs **Barra** hard in the face. **Yrsa** slashes **Akras** with her battle axe as if saying 'enough is enough'. **Akras** stands down.

**Akras** disses the party for chasing the Shadow Guard saying that they were clearly out of their league. **Yrsa** says matter of factly that of course they had to because the Shadow Guard took their emissary. After repeated blows from both parties, **Akras** resigns and he'll stop messing around. **Kaman** questions **Akras** why won't he just kill himself or tell the party anything, and is it some honor related code he follows? **Akras** replies that the party need to be worthy in order for him to reveal anything and finally relents to telling them why the Shadow Grove took the emissary and how to get to the Shadow Grove. The party have untied his hands at this point. **Barra** decides to stop raging, walks a distance away, plug his ears and sings a parody of 'Karma Chameleon' to calm himself down.

**Akras** can identify that the party are from the Namandan Union and that the emissary was considered collateral damage to the Shadow Grove. He elaborates that there has been a long running battle between the Shadow Grove and the traders of the Sivalai Kingdom. **Akras** claims that the ambassador Djemana of the Sivalai Kingdom had 'broke faith, broke honor' and left the Shadow Grove for dead instead of sending aid to protect them from their enemies. The people of the Shadow Grove are angry at the betrayal and have thus taken the ambassador to spite the Sivalai Kingdom.

**Yrsa** calmly tells **Akras** that because the Shadow Grove also took the Namandan emissary, they naturally will have to respond to this. If his leaders can return her unharmed, everything would be fine. **Akras** shrugs that he's just a soldier and can't do much as he's protecting his nation's interests but he knows that they probably won't kill their emissary.

**Yrsa** negotiates with **Akras** to tell his people to return the emissary and that whatever dealings the Shadow Grove have with the Sivalai Kingdom, is not for the Namandan Union to care. She wants to at least talk to the Shadow Grove leaders about this. At this point, **Barra** is singing 'Sound of Silence' to himself with his ears plugged. **Akras** wants a guarantee that if the Shadow Grove returns the emissary, the Namandan Union won't declare war on them, but **Yrsa** is unable to promise this as that's up to the emissary to make the call.

**Akras** has a think about it and tells the party to let him have a private moment. The party walk away but keep him in their field of vision.

**Akras** sends a message to his people via a scroll messaging system. He pulls out a scroll from a tube and a charcoal piece that he uses as a pen. After scrawling his message, he puts the scroll back into the tube, twists it and keeps the tube. **Yrsa** walks over to **Barra** and informs him that she thinks the negotiations are successful and that Akras' people may return the emissary. But **Barra** must keep his cool because if he let's lose, he may jeopardize the negotiations. **Barra** says he will be cool and think about his 'inner beard'. While **Akras** waits for a response from his people, he apologizes to **Barra** for insulting his mother but still continues to heckle him. **Barra** is riled up but sings 'Sound of Silence' to calm himself down.

**Akras** gets a response eventually and says that the Namandan emissary is fine, they will not harm her, however the Shadow Grove leaders would like the Namandan Union to cease discussions with the 'Oathbreakers' (the Sivalai Kingdom) and would like to arrange a discussion point. They would like to meet in Southern Marabanda where the party can have their emissary, but she will need to engage in talks with the Shadow Grove leaders. **Akras** will help navigate the party there however they may need to go through several other underground tribes that are enemies with the Shadow Grove to 'prove their worth' in order to get to South Marabanda. **Akras** says dryly 'I don't get politicians, they just fuck up everything.' in which **Yrsa** replies instinctively 'yeah, me too.'

**Barra** asks **Akras** if they can see the message as **Yrsa** can read Orcish. He agrees and passes the message to her to read. **Yrsa** reads the coded message written in short phrases and nods. **Barra** asks about the 'secondary targets' in the message and wonders if they're kobolds. **Akras** says they're troglodytes. **Barra** has limited knowledge about troglodytes and thinks they're these fossil like creatures. **Yrsa** asks **Akras** if he knows what a troglodyte is in which he says its an aggressive, tribal creature.

**Akras** says he could take them back to the railway to take a mine car to South Marabanda. **Yrsa** tells the party that they should sneak back in to Samar Junction, steal a mine car and drive to South Marabanda. 'Because I really don't want to give some long ass explanation about how you fuck them and they fucked you and all that shit, no?' **Barra** wonders if the Fire Newts would have some dynamite or something they could use to blow up the rock spikes blocking the tunnel way instead. **Yrsa** thinks its a good idea to talk to the Fire Newts since its on the way back to Samar Junction and to take advantage of the hospitality they showed earlier.

The party disarm **Akras** of his curved blade, tie his hands in the front and decide to head to Billston to see **Reeve**. Casually, **Barra** chats with **Kie** about learning meditation but it seems he is too antsy and agitated to be really trying. He sings 'I'm a Survivor' and dance to himself instead.

**Yrsa** asks **Akras** if he was the one who was rude to **Reeve** earlier, **Akras** laughs and said that it was his sergeant. It turns out that **Reeve** invited the Shadow Guard orcs earlier to have tea and wanted to charge them for it! It was not revealed how much **Reeve** wanted to charge however. **Barra** says they should still have tea with **Reeve** anyway because they promised earlier. **Kaman** and **Kie** remark that they have no money on them, **Barra** claims he has 'shit loads of money'. **Yrsa** tells **Barra** to pretend he doesn't have much so that the Fire Newts don't rob them.

The party return to Billston with **Akras** to see **Reeve**. **Reeve** is ecstatic and glad to see them but yelps when he sees **Akras** as he is a large intimidating Orc. **Barra** asks **Reeve** upfront if they happen to have any dynamite they could use and promise to have lots of tea with Reeve. To pacify **Reeve**, **Barra** sings a parody of 'Hey Jude'. **Reeve** is absolutely enthralled and says the Fire Newts have blasting charges to pass to the party 'we'll even knock off the extra supplement charges on top of it!'

**Reeve's** minions come in with detonators, blasting charges, gunpowder as well as trays of cake, refreshments and tea. **Reeve** hands them the bill which sums up to 72 Gold 48 Silver, 17 Copper. **Barra** haggles with **Reeve** to drop the price to 60 Gold and throw in a song. **Reeve** pauses and says '65 Gold and a song!' **Barra** looks at the party and asks 'Right, anybody got any money?' in which the party all point to him. **Barra** sings a variation of 'Total Eclipse of the Heart', and everyone loves it! **Reeve** applauses 'That was beautiful! 60 Gold please.'

The party enjoy the tea **Reeve** provides and finds it quite refreshing. **Yrsa** asks what's in the tea and learns that its made from 'various animal bits'. **Yrsa** totally regrets asking and feels slightly disturbed. **Barra** tells the party they all owe him 3 Gold and the party set off back to the tunnel. The Fire Newt **sergeant** from earlier politely bids them goodbye and says 'do us a favor: go away and don't come back'.

Team 3 make their way back to the tunnel with the stone spikes. **Kaman** asks if anyone is trained to use gun powder whereby **Akras** offers to help with the detonation since he's skilled. The way is cleared by the explosive charges and the party are able to pass through the tunnel.

Upon reaching a cavern, **Akras** says he is really exhausted and asks the party for a break. **Yrsa** tells **Akras** to inform his people that the party are on their way and will reach the rendezvous point tomorrow. **Akras** suggests not to message yet until they're nearer as he can't guarantee the party will reach tomorrow.

The party settle down to rest. **Kaman** takes the 1st watch and with no incident. **Yrsa** takes the 2nd Watch. Just as she nears the end of her shift, she feels a strange shuddering in the ground. She asks **Akras** about it and he agrees its a bad sign and they all need to move, quietly. **Yrsa** steps over and quietly wakes the other members. **Yrsa** tells everyone to wait around for 15 minutes to see if the shuddering goes away. It seems there was no further incident after so the party go back to sleep.

**Kie** does the 3rd watch with no incident. **Akras** decides to have a chat with **Kie** 'Monk huh, what possessed you to do that? Seems like no drinking, no fucking, what's the point of that?' in which **Kie** replies calmly 'Inner peace.' The night passes with no other incident.

Everyone wakes up refreshed the next morning! **Barra** sings a parody of 'We are family' to get the party pumped and rearing to go! The session ends with Team 3 continuing their journey to Southern Marabanda.

END OF SESSION

Next Episode 4: The Funk of 40 Thousand Years

Previous Episode 2: A Miner Problem

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