Life in Lowtown

After their harrowing journey through the Underdark the Outsiders continued on their journey towards the city of Steelcairn. After leaving the elven kingdom of Londar they traveled through the mountain passes in Davalon, until they reached the mountain city of Pinefrost. From there the Inalathin river flows flows west, at the edge of the lands of Tamor, towards the Wailing Sea. Near its delta stands the free city of Stoneharbour, a hub for trade and travel, a place our party will surely find passage towards Steelcairn. With that plan in mind our heroes booked passage on a merchant barge on the river from Pinefrost. It stops for a day or two stops at all cities along the river, but they were not in a hurry, so they settled in for a long journey.

### Welcome to Lowtown

On the fifth day of their journey the river barge arrived to the city of **Thasnora**. It is a major merchant city in the Tamorian Republic, ruled by the local nobles and merchants who, over the centuries, had merged into a single class. The city once spread to both banks of the river, but the southern part was destroyed during the Succession Wars and was only partially rebuilt. Meanwhile the northern bank is surrounded by hills, on which lies **Uptown** that houses the prosperous merchants and artisans of the city. The lower levels are separated from Uptown by an inner defensive wall, built to stop besiegers who would hope to take the city through the docks. There, near the river and docks the poor live in the squalor of **Lowtown**, surviving by doing hard labor at the docks.

The party disembarked with the rest of the passengers, while the crew started offloading their cargo. It would be two days until the barge sets sail again, so the Outsiders decided to find a room in a nearby inn, as they had been craving sleep on solid ground. Not far from the the docks the party finds the Willow Wheel Inn, a modest tavern from where lively music and the pleasant smell of elk stew was emanating. For a moment they considered heading through the gates to Uptown, but decided against it. *The Willow Wheel* was lively and (after a hearty dinner) our heroes joined in the revelry. It lasted well into the night.

The party awoke in their rooms to the sound of bells tolling. The sound of the bells felt like hammers pounding on their hungover brains and the Sun was shining brightly in through the windows. After taking a moment to gather themselves they looked out and saw people running around outside. They descended to the ground level, but the inn that was full of life yesterday was empty, even the innkeeper was absent. It was clear that something was up, so they gathered their equipment and headed out to the city.

### Trapped in Lowtown

Outside the city looked empty, people were running around scared, either heading to their homes carrying supplies or towards the gates. The party followed them and found a large gathering around the one of the gates leading to Uptown. The gates were locked and the walls were manned by dozens of guardsmen in full armor, aiming crossbows at the crowd. The guards are led be an officer who tried to reason with the crowd, but no one was listening to him. After a few minutes of listening to the shouts from the crowd and the few snippets they could overhear from the officer, the party managed to piece together what happened. Yesterday night a traveler was found dead in one of the inns. He had buboles on his body, a clear sign of the final stage of the Arpenian Plague. The city was put under quarantine, anyone attempting to leave was under sentence of death.

The party quickly realized what was happening: while the entirety of Thasnora is under quarantine, they chose to separate Lowtown frm the rest of the city. The Arpenian Plague can only be cured by complex alchemical mixtures and the divine magic of clerics, both of which are in short supply, and had likely been hoarded by the rich in Uptown. The poor of Lowtown were left to fend for themselves, the gates would remain locked until all infected die, which takes weeks. Without help, the Plague will likely kill 4 out of 5 people in Lowtown, and even the magic of the Outsiders would make no difference to that.

Not keen on dying a horrible and painful death, our heroes quickly headed to the docks. Even if the gates were locked, there might be a chance that they can escape by boat. But the smoke rising from the south bode ill. As they got closer they saw the docks on fire. Through the fogs and flame they could see the other side of the river, where a dozen catapults have been set up. They have rained fire down on the docks, setting all ships ablaze, caring not for the dozens of sailors on deck. All in order to stop the plague from spreading, in accordance with the ancient law...

The party spent the day exploring Lowtown. Looting had already started as the city guard had completely abandoned the quarantined area. But so far no one was foolish enough to accost a group of heavily armed adventurers. The guards have set up patrols over the entire inner wall and the party saw them shoot people trying to climb over. They also spotted robed figures on the walls, likely wizards and clerics sent by neighboring cities to "help". Ny discreetly examined the flow of magic around the walls and confirmed what they had all suspected: the wizards and clerics put up dozens of spells to prevent escape, including a device that makes teleportation magic unstable (on Rayne's insistence Ny elaborated that this means the possibility of arriving at the wrong destination with the wrong number of limbs).

### New Allies

Having found no means of escape, the party returned to *The Willow Wheel* for the evening. To their surprise the inn hadn't been looted, but they did find signs of battle: broken tables, blood. At the far corner they saw two armed figures looking at them: a gnome and a hulking half-orc (or maybe an actual orc?). They seemed ready to start a fight, when the gnome lowered his weapons and said: "*Wait, you are not looters. You are guests like us...*" Turns out these two had also been staying at The Willow Wheel, but they slept in even more than the party. They awoke to the sound of looters entering the inn, something they frowned upon, so when words failed, they used a language everyone understood to convince them to leave. The gnome introduced himself as Mahasamatman, but after seeing the glassy eyes of the others he told them to call him Maha. The orc did not appear interested in pleasantries and no one was brave enough to press the issue.

It was clear that they were all in trouble. Within a matter of days the streets of Lowtown would be littered with the dead, even if Daronton put all his healing magic to work. They had no intention to wait that out. After an hour of examining some of the insane plans Rayne, Maha and Ea came up with, the party concluded that it was impossible to escape over the wall and similarly hard to go over the river. Ny suggested an aerial route but with the abundance of guards with crossbows, not to mention the wizards, it was deemed unfeasible. In the end they agreed to continue the discussion the next day and retired to sleep.

In the morning the party found Markus badly wounded on the ground floor. He told them that he found a way out of Lowtown. There was a smuggler in Thasnora who worked with his former employers, the Black Talons, to move goods and people through the city. Last night Markus paid him a visit. After a "friendly chat" the smuggler revealed that he moved cargo through the sewer system, but that had been sealed shut by the city guard (explaining why he hadn't escaped Lowtown). But the smuggler also told of an ancient city under Thasnora, and those ruins went on for miles underground. After giving the smuggler his heartfelt thanks, Markus returned to the inn (this might have been a euphemism, as he was cleaning a bloody dagger while telling this). He gave the party the map he "borrowed" from the smuggler that marked the ruin's entrance. Finally he told the party that he had to stay behind, something was preventing him from leaving. But they should not worry, as he had survived the Plague as a child, so he will surely catch up with them in Steelcairn.

### The Forgotten Ruins

The journey through the sewers was disgusting, but, thankfully, uneventful. The smuggler's map turned out to be fairly accurate and after an hour of trudging through the refuse of Lowtown, our heroes found a tunnel leading deep underground. They were descending for quite some time, they were at least a few hundred feet underground. They found themselves in a ruined complex of some ancient civilization. They discarded their map, as it would be of no use any more, and started exploring the ruins in search for another route to the surface. The ruins were dark, and most of them had caved in over the millennia, yet the party could still make out the intricate and disturbing architecture of the place, which for some reason triggered an inexplicable, primordial fear in them.

They spent ours exploring the ruins, until they happened upon a large chamber that seem to have survived the ages of decay relatively intact. Its shape was hard to grasp, as if its builders intentionally broke with all conventions of geometry. The walls were covered in strange reliefs depicting strange creatures in front of which smaller beings prostrated themselves, maybe praying to their gods? Ea was the first to notice the draft coming from a hole near the ceiling: a way out perhaps? But how to get up there?

Our heroes quickly got to work, Maha skillfully climbed up the walls and affixed a rope to a rock. After that his orc companion started climbing up and driving pitons into the rock to make the party's ascent easier. Meanwhile Ny and Daronton started examining the strange reliefs on the walls to figure out who lived here. Most of the iconography was depicting some winged creature with tentacles, a being they had not heard of before. But the smaller creatures praying to them, they also seemed to have tentacled heads. Recognition came quickly to Daronton: these ruins once belonged to the Illithids, better known to the common folk as mind flayers, tyrants of the mind who enslaved millions. Meanwhile Ny found an ornate chest full of strange figurines made from various stones. As he retrieved a piece for further examination an otherworldly darkness fell onto the chamber, almost extinguishing their lights and muffling all sounds. In this darkness a beam of pale orange light glowed, shining down on the party. For a moment it felt as if Time itself had stopped, then our heroes screamed in pain as they felt the attention of something infinitely greater turned upon them. It presented them a wordless question, a question it had always been asking them. It was a question, but not a choice, for this could only end one way: with them as its obedient slaves.

Our heroes were caught in this otherworldly gaze, except for Maha and the orc, who had already made their way up to the hole in the ceiling. At first they did not understand what was happening, but then they saw the others paralyzed by the pale light. It emanated from the giant relief depicting the winged monstrosity. For a moment they paused, the tunnel leading to the surface was right in front of them, the draft showing them the way to safety and freedom. In the end they could not abandon the others, so they leapt down from the ledge, hoping to smash the relief. But the gaze turned towards them, paralyzing Maha. But whoever was behind this magic underestimated the mixture of orc blood and pure barbaric rage, as the orc shrugged off the gaze and charged towards the relief with a battle cry that would terrify the Gods themselves. He smashed the relief and suddenly the pale light disappeared and the darkness retreated.

### Breathing Free Air Again

The tunnel led to a cave, from where they could reach the surface by following the draft. No words were spoken on this journey, but the Outsiders all understood that they had been saved from a fate worse than death. Once on the surface they made camp and spent many hours cleansing themselves and their equipment of all traces of the Plague, with the magic of Daronton, Ny and Maha. In the morning the time came to move on, and the Outsiders invited the gnome and the orc to join them on their journey to Steelcairn, where great riches awaited them all.

The party decided to move westward for a couple of days then, after putting enough distance between themselves and Thasnora to avoid suspicious questions, they entered a fishing village, looking for passage towards the sea. They spent the next week traveling on fishing boats from one village to another, until they finally arrived at the great city of Stoneharbor. There they booked passage on a merchant ship heading directly to Steelcairn. After four days of sailing the party finally laid eyes on the bustling city of Steelcairn. Soon their ship would dock and the Outsiders can finally deliver the *adamantine crown* and reap the reward they deserve...