2023/04/19

Last time in the Iron Kingdoms: Meeting Mortenebra at last

With their entrance to Lichgate secured, the party was making their way north from Skell. Leaving the ashen city of the Dragonfather behind them as they traveled. Before long they began seeing a lone mountain rising up above the foothills. The mountain was smoking and what looked like various structures built up along its sides. As the party got closer, their suspicions that this was indeed Lichgate were confirmed as two undead guards stopped them and asked what business they had coming to Lichgate. The party explained their meeting with Lich Lord Mortenebra and presented the medallion that Dhenghra had given to them. With everything seeming to be in order, the two guards began leading the party up the slopes of Lichgate, to Mortenebra's personal workshop. The workshop was near the top of the volcano and the party saw much of the industrial capabilities that took place in the city. Once they reached their destination, the guards left the party with a quick word of “Good Luck” leaving the party to enter the workshop on their own.

Inside the workshop, the lights were rather dim and there was a catwalk structure above the floor of the building. Half finished warjacks were scattered around the room, their intimidating Cryxian designs only amplified by the dim lighting. The party called out for Mortenebra, and then heard what sounded like tiny mechanical legs scuttling across the metal of the workshop. Out of the shadows surrounding the catwalk, the form of Mortenebra, a strange centipede like form with two addition pincer like arms extending over her shoulder, descended from the catwalk. Charlotte presented the party and explained their reasons for seeking Mortenebra out. At the explanation that the party was here on behalf of what was left of the Convergence of Cyriss; Mortenebra took greater interest in them, righting her form so that she was looking at them right side up as opposed to just viewing them while hanging from the catwalk. Mortenebra said that while she hadn't been a part of the Convergence for a couple hundred years she knew of a number of temples that were hidden out of the way. And if the party helped her she would be willing to pass along that knowledge. Charlotte knew that this was a likely outcome though wanted to know what the favor was that the party was to do for Mortenebra first. Mortenebra explained that she was looking for someone, or rather she was looking for the people that she had sent to retrieve said someone. The person in question is a Ranal Muller, an infernalist who was captured by Cygnar and knew a bit too much to just summarily execute, so instead Ranal was sent to Bloodshore Prison. Cygnar's supermax prison just of the coast of the lands of the Protectorate of Menoth. The party was to recover Ranal in whatever condition he was in, as Mortenebra had no problems ripping secrets from his corpse if necessary. The party agreed to this and began making their way back to their ship so that they could set off to look for this Ranal.

On the way there, the party had Hector begin asking questions of his hand, so that they knew what they were getting into. They were told that Ranal was being held in cell 714 by Mortenebra, and Charlotte and Xavier both knew that Bloodshore had a minor garrison to keep away anyone trying to free any of the prisoners. Though if they were to commit a prison break they would need more information. The first question Hector asked was where was Ranal currently, which returned the answer that he was “Liberated yet re-incarcerated on a new island”. The next question of which island was answered with “The smuggler's refuge” And at this point the party knew that they needed an expert's opinion. As they weren't smugglers nor was any of the crew of the ship that they were on, they instead returned to Blackwater to query the scum and villainy that resided there. While a number of the various sailors weren't willing to talk to the party, they did find one of the sailors that they had rescued from the island they were shipwrecked on who helped narrow down the area to search in. If Ranal had been freed by the previous group Mortenebra sent and was on their way back to deliver the infernalist, they likely would have gotten caught up in a storm on the Barrel Branch, a corridor that a lot of ships traverse. Steve the sailor didn't know more, though knew of a friend of his that was on a ship called the Forked Gator that was in a storm near there a while back. The party went to the Forked Gator, to find the man known as Albert to see if he had seen anyone in the area or knew of any island there that could be known as the smuggler's refuge. Albert did recall seeing a damaged ship sailing towards Blackwater sailing during the storm though he couldn't say for sure that it was the ship the party was looking for. As for the island, one of the islands along the branch did have stories that a famous trollkin smuggler by the name of Grindar had hidden his stash on the island before he was killed by other pirates. The stash has never been found on the island though a number of people have gone looking for it. Upon a little reflection it was possible that the ship that he had seen could have made it to that island.

With a good of lead as any, the party returned to their ship and set steam for Grindar's Island. The journey wasn't too long and after a couple hours of travel they found themselves off the coast of the island. Looking from the ship, they could see signs that a ship had been sunk near hear and much of its cargo had washed ashore. With that reassurance that they could be looking in the right place, the party and their jacks boarded one of the landing craft and rowed to shore. At the shore the party got a better look at the wreckage. It did seem like there were survivors initially, as there were signs that things were dragged deeper onto the island. Hopefully any survivors knew what happened to Ranal and that he wasn't somewhere at the bottom of the ocean. As the party followed the tracks Abe got a whiff of the smell of death, not decay as such but death. Warning the party, they continued a bit more carefully until they came to what could only be described as a corpse garden, corpses of sailors had been buried into the ground, and were in the process of desiccating into necrotite, the coal substitute that the Nightmare Empire uses to power its machines. There was a cave nearby and given that this didn't seem like the sort of thing that an infernalist would do the party decided to ring the doorbell as it were and announce their presence. Out of the cave came an iron lich who's body had seen better days. Rust covered much of the form and the eldritch green eyes that the party had seen on other iron liches was noticeably dimmer.

The Lich introduced himself as Kortesh and asked the party what they were doing here. The party explained that they were looking for Ranal and asked if he had seen him. Kortesh said he had, though was quickly distracted by Hector and the aura of necromantic energy that surrounded him. Hector said that he only dabbled in the field and tried to get the conversation back towards Ranal. Kortesh then explained that he had his corpse and was preparing it to become a scarlock, a sort of undead familiar. Ranal as an infernalist would make a particularly useful one and that an assistant would help out a lot here on the island. That was a problem for the party as they needed Ranal's body for Mortenebra and asked if there was anything that they could do to barter for it. Kortesh thought for a second, before replying that he was really looking for an assistant, and if Hector was willing to become his apprentice he would part with the body. Hector politely declined, which lead to if the party was willing to get another person for Kortesh to turn into a scarlock he'd trade the two. The party didn't like the idea of killing someone else to trade for a corpse so negotiations promptly broke down. Kortesh had a number of undead servants to fight the party and took a keen interest in Hector, perhaps fearing his potential skills in the necromantic arts. The party eventually won the fight and then buried Kortesh's body right side up in his corpse garden so that he can observe what was yet to come as he had asked. Inside the cave was Ranal's corpse in the middle of the preperations as well as some loot that Kortesh must have acquired at some point. The party took the corpse and delivered it to Mortenebra before setting steam back toward Five Fingers and home.