Session 11: Arrival at Ketra

It is midday on the 2nd to last day of the year 1136 AV.

### Flying through Wildspace

With their unwelcome passenger defeated, the pursuing enemy ships led astray by their evasive maneuvers, and the scrying attempt on Virta Harrowthorn failed, the party headed for the planet Ketra with the two Bralian guards, Virta, and Deg at the helm of the Valiant.

En route to Ketra, the party made several repairs to the ship, rested, practiced their crafts or their magic, and had some discussions with the other passengers.

### Ketra from the air

The Valiant arrived at Ketra to find a shattered world. It looks as it has been half blown apart, with a magma core exposed to open space and floating bits of the planet suspended around the exposed area of the planet's crust. Long ago, said Virta, it is believed that dwarven miners under the employ of King Gloringraed used magic to blow the planet's hard outer crust apart to get at the valuable visorium that lay within. Their human successors continued strip mining the planet, carving great rectangles into its crust to get at the valuable material, a nonmagical but valuable glowing mineral that could enhance vision when made into a visor or be used as lighting. Scaffolding hung from these slices, and small lights indicated the activity of miners working along them. Ships occasionally ferried miners and visorium ore back and forth from the mines.

As the Valiant moved closer, the party could see a large chunk of rock from the planet suspended with cables tied to hooks drilled into the rock. On it a fortress has been built with a large dock that is now empty. The Bral Second Fleet is usually docked at Fort Ketra, said Virta. The party begins to fear the Second Fleet was destroyed by the dark ships over Bral. Ropes dangle from the dock, but no ships are tethered to them. Empty crates litter the inside. No troops are seen.

Below the empty fort is the planet's single tiny town, the spaceport of Ketratown, standing opposite the mining pits. The Prospect Road running through it leads out of town toward a mining base at the edge of the pits. Its buildings are constructed of sandstone slag, a waste product of the mining process.

### Heading into town

Deg landed the Valiant in a sand dune on the crater-pocked surface of Ketra, just outside of Ketratown, and the party went into town to look around and to resupply. The two Bralian guards left for the Regional Government Office and Virta left for the Crater Cantina. There are several places in town the party visited, noticed, or heard about:

#### Regional Office of the Far-Vassalages Excavation Company

An imposing tower of intricately carved walls and parapets, this is the tallest building in town and the only one not constructed out of sandstone. It serves as the headquarters of a ruthless corporation often just referred to as "the company" that has a monopoly on the visorium mining industry on Ketra. With the Bralian military mobilized away from the planet, the company is by far the largest paramilitary force on the planet, mostly composed of thri-kreen mercenaries, and seems to basically run the place. Although they are notorious for mistreating their miners, nearly everyone is too afraid of them to do anything about it. The tower is guarded by many thri-kreen and miners and mine supervisors stream in and out. Above the parapets, a large half-orc seems to have an authoritative presence, surrounded by mine supervisors and thri-kreen guards. Townsfolk refer to him as the Director. There is a long history of conflict between the company and the Adventurer-Antiquarians, and in fact tensions have flared recently over rumors of a discovery of some new ruins that the company will not allow the antiquarians to access. The party has not yet visited the tower.

#### Crater Cantina

The second-largest building in Ketratown seems to be a sort of nightclub where, lo and behold, loud, bumping music is playing, indicating something had changed from when music had ceased to function in Bralspace the day before. The party heard townsfolk boast that Zephyr, a famous wizard DJ who spins discs of pink magical energy to make music of a genre called "visorcore", was playing a special show to celebrate the return of music, and that many townsfolk were there. The party has not yet visited it.

#### Minor Guildhall of the Association of Adventurer-Antiquarians

The third largest building in Ketra is a guildhall for a chapter of an archeologist's guild stationed on Ketra. Right before the session ended, the party went and started talking to the antiquarians inside: a tall green plasmoid artificer named Flubbert, a blue tropical aarakocra named Pantanala, a lizardfolk named Cragclaw, and a halfling artificer wearing a gleaming brass suit of armor named Anara Lightfoot. They were discussing what to do about the situation with the company and the rumors of ruins discovered recently. The party told them about the Battle of Bral and the breaking of the asteroid and the dwarven citadel that emerged, which fascinated Flubbert in particular, since his area of professional expertise was dwarven and beholder relics.

#### Boltwrench Tinker Bay

A construct repair and sales shop run by a piranhaar named Bubbles Boltwrench, who wears a construct suit made of wood and iron. She employed an apprentice who was none other than Fizzgork Buzzbang, the fireworks salesgoblin who the party had encountered back on Pryzonis, in front of the Tipsy Tarrasque. Fizzgork told them that Maryl Sildis had set up a spaceport over the exploded ruin of Mount Pegasus, and showed them an updated map of the region. He mentioned he'd met Maryl in Ketra recently as well. He told the party about how he'd gone out to look for adventure in the cosmos and found work at this construct shop. The shop had an assortment of deactivated Bralian monodrones, company mining bots, clockwork horrors, and various other constructs and construct parts. Among the bots was what appeared to be a deactivated autognome similar to the one the party had seen imprisoned below the Donjon. Perceptive party members noticed it very briefly seem to wake up and glance over at the party before quickly deactivating again. Bubbles seemed to have no clue that it might be anything other than a mindless automaton like other constructs.

#### Fantastic Curiosities & Fascinations

A magic item shop that was run by an extravagantly dressed human man named Majesk the Magnificent. Though he boasts about the quality of his magic items extensively, they are generally mediocre and severely overpriced. The party visited and purchased supplies.

#### Ketra General Supply and Trading Post

A general store that was run by a dwarven woman named Beldona Stonefoot. The party visited and purchased supplies.

#### Cargo Depot

A small building where cargo was assembled for transport to or from spelljamming ships that land edon the adjacent small body of water, Saltlick Lake. When the orbits of the planets in the Bralian system cause Bral to be several hours further along the North Rim Trail or Far North Route, spelljammer pilots of freighter ships hauling cargo will often drop off or pick up on Ketra instead, and then the cargo is shuttled to Bral. The merchant guilds keep meticulous track of planetary orbits and cross-reference them with freight schedules to ensure everything gets where it needs to go. The party has not yet visited.

#### The Rock Inn

A small inn that was cut into the rock of The Rifts, a large rock formation which much of Ketratown was built into. The party has not yet visited.

#### Regional Government Office

A small building that seemed to be the bureaucratic office of the Bralian government on Ketra. The party heard the mobilization had left it understaffed, but has not yet visited.