Arc 1 Post 36: Auspicious Acquisitions
Auspicious Acquisitions
The Season of Still Stone
At first you keep coming up with reasons why the trekker would be best; it could keep you warm in a pinch, wouldn't need as much care since it does not get sick and you, or more properly Gorok, would not have to hunt for it. It could even help dig through the soft sand that filled many of the tunnels and no doubt the furry fellow would be a lot sweeter about learning tricks than...
As if to outwardly make your point the slurk is sharpening its enormous teeth on the fence holding it in.
Maybe a little too sweet. The more you think about it the less sanguine you are at the prospect of protecting a beast as timid as a trekker. Maybe it's just you being too damned warm-souled, but the thought of seeing it bleeding out on some cave floor while Mina is out of the fight and you out of magic makes your gut tighten uncomfortably, not to mention it running off into the dark and being hunted by hollow fiends know what.
Between Gorok's preference and you laying out how dangerous a trek would be for the trekker would be in your company Mina caves and the deal is struck. Not without some mourning of all the gold passing out of your hands like water in flood season, but over all your companions are in surprising good cheer as you avail yourselves to the merchant's hospitality for the next meal. Its the least he can do for such great and glorious adventurers, he assures you.
"Dhish is 'eally good," Mina proclaims, taking a second helping from the large clay plate set in the middle of the table for all Ninnec's large and boisterous family to envoy. His father had obviously not been the only one with a propensity for siring many children.
Though you agree with your friend you do not share what's in the worm-mash, having learned what might upset her about what is in her food over the last while. A good rule of thumb, as it happens, is to ask Cob what his favorite meals are.
Lost 1200 gp -> Present Funds: 761 gp 22 sp 15 cp
Gained Unnamed Great Slurk (Feed Cost 30 cp/day; Stabling 5 sp/day)
"What should we name the Warty?" Cob asks, stops, and tilts his head quizzically before, with a huge teetth-filled grin, giving his own 'unique' suggestion. "Warty!"
Gorok looks up from his plate, vaguely bemused by the enthusiasm: "It's short, good name." Whereas Mina clearly had not considered frog names very deeply before. If anyone is going to come up with another name it's going to have to be you.
[] [NAME] Warty is fine
[] [NAME] Write in suggestion
***
While Gorok is harnessing your new warty companion and getting him accustomed to following his commands you Mina and Cob are back at the market looking over the mismatch of funguswood stands, raglichen blankets, and the coveted carved stone tables to see what else your coin might get you. Clothes are an easy buy and the seamstress, an old woman entirely blind to light but covered in a fine 'fur' of almost translucent filaments that can feel the vibrations in the air, is willing to reuse your old clothes for warm blankets. Stitched together from a triple layer of raglichen reinforced with leather too brittle to make proper armor out of the clothes are by far the stoutest you have ever worn, dyed decent browns and greys so the lot of you do not stand out with even the smallest spark of light. Mina also gets a new pair of snake-skin boots with getting Pepper a matching collar he is just as proud of.
Speaking of things that will help keep all of your alive, Mina spends thousand-beat after thousand-beat combing the markets for the things she needs to patch people up: needle and fine thread, bandages and numbing spores, as well as some rotgut at least two rungs above what you had used on that mold, enough so that you think it prudent to warn Cob against drinking it. As for Cob himself, he is bound and determined to get his 'picks and prods' back together. From the name you get the vague idea that this would involve small delicate tools fit for nimble fingers. While there are plenty of those, carved from delicate fish bone, there's also a ten foot pole ('prod'), wedges of bone, funguswood and metal ('props'), and hooks with oddly shaped ends ('pokers').
"Do they all have to start with a 'p'?" Mina asks finally, just as you were contemplating giving in and asking yourself.
"Yep, if they don't I make up new word, good way to remember. Then quick in case you have to use 'em quick."
As you contemplate the situation where one might need to get through a door or past a trap in a hurry you have to agree that sounds sensible, a lot more so than you would have given the goblin credit for when you had first met him. But then when you had met Mina would would not have wagered more than a silver piece on her keeping her head in battle. I wonder what they thought of me at first sight?
Lost 88 Gold -> Present Funds: 683 gp 22 sp 15 cp
Gained
- 4 Patchwork Blankets
- 8 Traveler's Outfits
- Common Thieves Tolls for Cob
- 1x Healer's Kit for Mina
***
Getting back to the stable you find Gorok getting to grips with the slurk, quite literally. You suspect a less thick-skinned beat would object to being poked and prodded quite so victoriously in the process of being prepared for travel. One of the less well-known advantages of the slurk is that it does not need much in the way of a harness, its sticky back being more than enough to hold most things in place, including....
"Is that a door?" Mina asks motioning to the platform Gorok had made the centerpiece of the harness.
"What's it made of?" you ask almost at the same time. The answer it turns out is tree-wood from the surface. How it had ended up in the hands of Hryx the Great Dragon Lord, Destroyer of Derro, Ripper of Roppers, Slayer of the Svirfneblin, etc... and his humble kobold servant Gorok had not asked. Mina recognizes the hammer of Torag on the door, a god of dwarfs she claims, but not the dwarfs you know. Those who had chosen to dwell under the sky and are as skilled at crafting as their deep-kin but not near so cruel, though part of you wonders if they are just better at hiding the greed and cruelty that in the legends of the People is the mark of all dwarf-kind.
Lost 3 gp 10 sp -> Present Funds: 680 gp 12 sp 15 cp
Mina Knowledge (History): 1d20+8 = 28 (Success)
Gained Darkwood Door (10 lbs of Darkwood)
Where does Akorian propose the party head to next?
(Upkeep Costs for Staying in Cauldron: 9 sp and 30 cp/day)
[] The Xulgath settlement to obtain the secret of steel
[] Back the way you came, you would like to see that ceiling set with bloody stars
[] Actually, maybe it would be worth your while to linger here and...
-[] Shop more (Write in what you are looking for)
-[] Look for that Dancer, you are... curious as to what one of your people might want in this place
-[] See if the orc brothers have more work, they seemed like they have more money than sense
[] Write in
OOC: I figured an update of buying necessities would not be that fun to read and in any case it's not like Kori decides every little thing
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