Play Report
1/17/26
A cold, yet calm winter’s day. Men bring picks, axes, and swords down on the dense thicket surrounding the base of the small motte of Koriszegy Keep. The burnt remains of the nearby burg are hacked apart. All is brought up to the bailey of the crumbling stone walls, to feed the enormous bonfires which are the only heat for the men. Others are hard at work digging and planting palisade stakes, an inner wall and a small building of wood to get out of the cold.
All this work is interrupted by screams from the tent of Albert the Alchemist. “OsheisseOsheissesheissesheisseSHEISSE!” Albert is running out of his tent at top speed. From within, the sounds of smashed pottery and glass can be heard.
As the sounds of things breaking continues, Albert turns, fumes, and lets out a wordless, hoarse scream.
Ruderick barely manages to avoid running into the man, asking “What’s the matter, alchemist?”
Sourly, Albert points at the tent. “That”. After a few moments, an enormous gray blob bubbles and slimes its way out of the wreckage of the tent, slurping along the ground towards the nearest person. It leaves a trail of melting snow behind it. Fortunately the blob is very slow and even surprised men are easily able to outrun it.
Albert raises his voice. “Keep your men away. I’ll clean this thing up.” Albert takes up a position some distance away, and begins tracing lines in the air.
At Albert’s pointed finger, a deafening peal of thunder resounds from the blob. It splatters in all directions. Men cover their ears, the walls of the castle crack, or shift, rubble falls. As the seconds pass, the ooze begins to bring itself back together. Albert fumes some more. “No, that’s not it...”
“Would you mind explaining?!” Bellows Ruderick in frustration as he sees the walls of his castle crumble further from the blast waves of Albert’s magic..
“That thing was in one of the bottles you gave me to look at. I dropped it. Out popped that thing, obviously a gray ooze. Fire doesn’t hurt it. It eats steel for breakfast. Arcanery does nothing... Aha! I’ve got it. Be a good man and lure it over to the gatehouse, if you would herr Ruderick?”
With that, Albert takes off towards the center of the keep’s grounds. Ruderick raps out orders to his men. As the blob is lured over to the gatehouse, Albert strikes another pose. “Get out of the way!” He shouts, and then begins casting again. The men dive away, the blob oozes its way through the gatehouse...
Albert casts Thunderbolt!
The blob sizzles and is blasted apart. the steaming blackened chunks now inert. The gatehouse is smoked, chunks of masonry have fallen from the shockwave of the thunderbolt. The gatehouse still stands, though it is obviously weakened by the blast.
Albert runs a hand through his hair, still sour-faced. “Get a clay jug over here. Even if my portable lab was eaten by that thing, I can at least try to make something of that stuff once I rebuild back in Luln...”
The high mage turns to Ruderick.
“I’m sorry to say that the other two potions, along with most of my equipment, are gone... I’ll pack up what’s left and return to Luln. I’ll send for some specialists to handle those manticores once I arrive.”
“Bloody wizards…” Ruderick fumes as he inspects the crumbling masonry. Albert leaves on a horse-pulled sled late in the afternoon. For the next several days the weather grows colder and the winds fiercer. Stocks of wood for the fires are getting very low at Koriszegy keep. Tents and furs are not enough. The thickets and town ruins around the keep have already been broken up and used as fuel for the massive bonfires within the ruined walls. The area immediately around the keep is denuded of woodland, and so Ruderick sends out work gangs with axes and sleds, to the north and south. With temperatures well below zero, some men not adequately protected from the cold contract frostbite. A few die. However multiple cords of wood are cut and brought back to the keep over a few days of work.
The southern group of laborers are made up mostly of hobgoblin prisoners. They are watched over by crossbowmen. On the march to the edge of alfheim forest, the group is ambushed by two enormous, pale snow worms, each bigger than a horse. the worms kill a hobgoblin and wound a few men before they are shot down. During the ight the hobgoblins attempt to flee, but fail to get out of range before the crossbowmen start shooting them down. The survivors once again submit and perform adequate labor. No one cares when several contract frostbite.
Cassandra and her company leave the keep for civilization at Eduardschloss. The unicorns are shy and decide to stay at the keep.
on January 23rd, the weather warms up considerably. Ruderick decides to take a large group of horsemen and ride for Eduardschloss. On the way, they Encounter ‘Men, Merchant.’ I decide on the spot that this is a supply caravan from the larger Order, with soldiers, laborers, food, and construction supplies. Ruderick and company push on to the town. There they meet with Franz Schwarz, the Lord Protector of the town. He says that his scouts report meeting a group of men with CHAOS TATTOOS. He asks that Ruderick deal with them, which the crusader is only too happy to do.
However, instead of chaos warriors, they find a group of friendly men at arms, who report a trio of giants in the long valley over the next ridge. With Eman in the group, it is stupidly easy to win Surprise over the giants, and with 40+ archers it only takes a few rounds for the giants to be shot down. Upon thinking why these frost giants would be here, I decide that with the cold weather they would attempt trade with the ‘little ones’, and obviously apart from any jewelry on them, their trade goods would be furs and amber. Perhaps I was too generous, but Ruderick promises to make good use of the furs to cover costs of construction, investment in his new domain and the men’s pay.
Eman was sure that the giants had a nearby lair, and where giants lair, they surely keep giant-sized treasures! Following such impeccable logic, the group followed the giant-sized bootprints in the fresh snow, up the valley towards the ruins of Skandrosbrucke. They find little but giant-sized disappointment.
Twenty miles through snow and biting winds, the giant boots going further and further from civilization. At the ruins of the bridge gatehouse, they see woodsmoke.
Obviously the ruins are occupied. As for the giants, their tracks can be seen coming from the other side of the river. Here the party elects to return home. The return journey is cold, and takes a couple more days. They spot a small party of fur-clad hunters, but nothing else. Heralds are sent to give word that the Order will pay money for adventurous men to scout the ruins of the gatehouse.