Triple Click - Triple Quest, Act 1: The Call of Adventure

Episode Date: October 30, 2024

Bing, Leon, and Key hear from an old friend. A tchotchke seller has an unexpected windfall. Thornhold's friendliest guard makes some new acquaintances.Listen to Act Two right now by becoming a member at maximumfun.org/join.SCHEDULE:Triple Quest will be told in three acts, along with a "session zero" planning session. All episodes will be published to the members-only feed first, and will hit the main feed a month later. Part One and the planning session will debut at the end of September. Parts Two and Three will debut at the ends of October and November, respectively.  LINKS:Join the Triple Click Discord: http://discord.gg/tripleclickpodTriple Click Ethics Policy: https://maximumfun.org/triple-click-ethics-policy/ Happy MaxFunDrive! Right now is the best time to start a membership to support your favorite shows. Learn more and join at https://maximumfun.org/jointripleclick 🚀  SUPPORT TRIPLE CLICK:Join Maximum Fun | Buy TC Merch💬 JOIN THE TRIPLE CLICK DISCORD🎮 Triple Click Ethics Policy📱 SOCIALS | @tripleclickpodInstagram | YouTube | TikTok | Twitch

Hello everyone, Kirk here with a very special bonus. You probably heard my spiel before the session zero episode, but just in case anyone skips to this one, this is the first act of Triple Quest, a very fun adventure that we recorded earlier this year with special guest game master, Matthew Mercer. It was a ton of fun we recorded over the course of a few different sessions, including that planning session that you may or may not have just listened to. This is Act 1, which we recorded in Los Angeles, in my hotel room, which actually made for a very good recording studio. It was remarkably soundproof and the acoustics weren't great, but that kind of lent to that feeling of all being in a room together. Man, you've never set up

for a recording session until you've been trying to get your hotel room to work for a four-person D&D recording session with a celebrity guest who is really only free on that one day. I was kind of sweating it, but it worked out and it was really a lot of fun as you're about to hear. So this is Act 1. And of course, this is only made possible by the wonderful Maximum Fund members who support the creation of our show. And we have been giving members episodes of Triple Quest a month early in the Max Fund bonus feed. Ordinarily, you get bonus episodes from us, and of course, we'll continue to in the future. But for these three months, you're getting episodes of Triple Quest a month early. And that means that at the end of Act 1, if you want to find out what happens next, you can do so.

Just go to Maximumfund.org slash join, become a member. and you can immediately get into the thick of this heist. Let me tell you, some stuff goes down in Act 2. It's pretty cool. So yeah, this was great. We've never done anything like this before. It's way outside of our comfort zone, but that's kind of what makes it fun.

And if it's not for you, hey, normal episode will be out on Thursday. All right, well, the music is telling me it's time to do this thing, so let's get underway. I'm Maddie Myers. I'm Jason Shrier. I'm Kirk Hamilton. And I'm Matthew Mercer, and this is Triple. quest. So, for this fun adventure, we all got together and discussed your characters a bit

before we go ahead and jump into the adventure proper. I figure we can just do a quick round robin, tell us a little bit about your character, what would be a fun snippet of their history that we can kind of sink us into the world, and then I'll take it from there. So, you know, let's go ahead and start with Bing. I'm looking in this direction. So Bing is, is a teafling barbarian who was raised as a camp orphan with a mercenary outfit called the third section. And he and his sister, Biana, his twin sister, kind of were raised by just by the camp. They don't know how their parents died. And they then eventually left and went out on their own and formed their own mercenary sort of duo where they were a very formidable pair.

But then they kind of made their way to Waterdeep. They fell in with the Water Deep Thieves Guild, just doing some contract work for them. And that was where they were paired up with two new faces, Leon and Key, in very different circumstances, on a job that went horribly wrong and led to Biana getting captured by the Water Deep Guard and executed by the Lords of Waterdeep.

And the group scattered after that and Bing wound up on his own for the first time in a way that he was not really accustomed to. And he's still working as a mercenary, but just sort of has lost his way after the death of his sister. Fantastic. All right. Let's go and hop over here to Key Sandrine.

That's right. Key Sandrine, not her real name, but she won't tell you what it is. She came up with this when she was a teenager. But before that, she was an orphan. She's a half elf. Doesn't know who her parents are either. but was raised in a series of crappy foster situations, orphanages, and just straight up living on the streets.

And the best thing that ever happened to her was when, not through some cosmic or traumatic event, she simply discovered that she had magic when she was sneaking around a Lord's Mansion trying to steal stuff and realized that she could control some of the fire in candlelight and was like, oh, this is what was meant to be. I am a sorcerer. Finally something good has happened in my life.

And she continued being a thief and just general ruffian doesn't necessarily trust others but is willing to work with them in order to just continue to survive. So she steals to survive and puts herself first in general. And still secretly has a soft spot for being in Leon because, you know, the job went wrong and that kind of gets at her. Understood. Thank you so much. And rounding out this trio, we have the illustrious Leon Gold Pedal. Leon Gold Pedal. Unlike Bing and Key, Leon knows exactly who his parents are, but they were never around. Leon grew up rich. He's a high elf in Waterdeep, and his parents were always on business trips, always trading and doing other merchant-y things, and he decided to lash out a little bit by starting to steal things.

and he realized that he was very good at stealing things. And he started to get a real thrill out of it, eventually left home, joined the Thieves Guild. At this point in his life, where we are today, he has actually, he's got enough money. He's doing just fine that he doesn't need to steal, but he does it anyway, because it's such a rush,

such an adrenaline rush for Leon. He loves to steal, my man. So, all three of you pulled from disparate paths among the bustling and Opportunity Latin streets of Waterdeep. Each of you found your way into the, interests of the Black Boar tribe, a lesser-known Thieves Guild operating out of the Dock District of Waterdeep. Once a loosely organized troop of ruffians and brutes, they had recently begun to rise to respectable levels of prominence and organization under new leadership, leadership that

emphasized expanding the specialized skill sets of their members beyond just charged protection and targeted belligerence, and it was this outreach that found each of you. One of the tribe captains, a surly old retired pit brawler named Ivex the vice for his legendary vice-like bite that won him many a bloodsport became your contact and sponsor through your early climb within the expanding gang.

Numerous successful ventures into targeted burglary, evidence planting, blackmail, you name it. Your work made Ivex and the tribe's leadership. It seemed quite proud to have you among them. It wasn't until the fateful attempt to infiltrate the

home of Ogden, Frince. rumored member of the Jewelers Guild of Water Deep that things really turn. The three of you barely escaping with your lives, but sadly not with the freedom of being sister, Biana. It was her public execution that shattered your trio and sent you scattered to the four winds of Fyron to hide, ruminate. Maybe regret. A number of years have passed since. Each of you adrift upon whatever opportunities could float you from coin to coin, considering where you now belong within their realms.

Bing, where do you see yourself in this moment? Please, paint us a brief description of what you're doing this time later. Let's see. Bing is currently lodging in a small farmhouse, not too close to any major population center, in between jobs and just sort of keeping his ear to the ground for anyone who's looking, for someone who's very good at knocking things down and making sure they don't get back up. Great. So here in the outskirts of the small farm village of Amphail, you've been hired to a bit of maybe moderate frustration to keep watch over a shepherd's flock for the past week. It doesn't pay well, but it pays, and at this point in time, you need that. It's a bit of a hot midsummer day as you kind of wipe a bit of sweat from your brow, trying to keep what shade allows you there, hearing the nearby strange kind of braying of farm life and various beasts of burden. the scents themselves a thick mixture of midsummer grasses and fresh manure.

As you spit to the side of the road, you see a shadow begin to approach in the middle of the light, a heavy hood and a hand up blocking the sun from the eyes. As you see kind of just barely pulling out from the shaded hood, the familiar, kind of twice broken and repaired jaw and scraggly-looking beard

of the familiar Evax, the vice, as he kind of pulls the hood back a bit, is crystalline, almost bright blue sky, blue eyes looking towards you. Oh, don't mean the ball for you today, sir, but it's been a little bit. How's it going with you, Bing? How's it going, mate? Bing smiles and pulls his hood back and embraces Evax and says, my God, it's good to see you.

Tell me, you've got work for me. Right to the point. You know, it's one thing I always appreciate you about you. No bullshit. Nothing really getting in the way of what's the important matters. You know what I'm saying? No bullshit here, nothing but sheep shit all around me. About to say, it's a bit of an intense scent.

You know what, let's go ahead and step into a place a little more comfy. How about that, I? Being gestures toward the nearby, a nearby farm show and says, Step into my office. Moving up on the wheel, though, easy. Claps your back, and you both kind of step inside. He pulls out a small flask from the inside, and screws the cap, and the immediate kind of,

a warming smell of a slightly staled whiskey, possibly watered down, but good enough for the road's journey, kind of wafts out as he takes a swig and passes it to you. Hey, I know things have been a little scattered since the incident, I guess you'd say, is he kind of rubs his fingers through his beard

and probably picks some dried bits of his breakfast out and flicks him to the floor. Good news is, um, who's like fortune to turn around for the for the tribe these days we've um we've got an opportunity uh being as has kind of winced at the mention of what happened and took a swig he hands the drink back and says well tell me tell me more you know um we had we had some momentum just trajectory a while back and we've had a few stumbles here and there but it seems the uh shadow thieves are looking for some alliances, and it just might be enough to get us back and the good graces of the street level.

And, well, we have to prove ourselves. And I think the skill sets that are needed for this particular job, well, I think they might be right up your alley. Are you interested? Bing leans against the door and says, I feel like I've proved myself so many times, but what's one more? If it'll get me out of here, I'm interested. Never done proven, ain't that just the way of the world, I? Come, me give you a few details as we wish back to the shadows. Leon, Leon Goldpedal, where do you see yourself at this moment in time all these years later?

Yeah, Leon, I think he hung around water deep. He went to a bunch of the kind of neighboring cities and towns and just stole, stole, stole until he couldn't steal no more. Sometimes he was driven out. occasionally he just felt like he had already taken more than the villagers had to give and he's just been kind of moving from place to place he doesn't like to stay in one place for too long okay uh so we'll say well we'll say kind of uh on the outskirts of the city of dagherford which is still along the uh the sword coast not terribly far um you've stumbled into what looks to be a minstrel band that is performing at this kind of ramshackle tavern uh and

And while it does appear to have the sense of put upon joviality for the sake of trying to extract coin from the locals, there is an aspect of a, I don't know, a familiar air of being raised among the more affluent, more affluent areas of water deep. And this distraction from the rural environment puts you a little bit of ease and comfort. As you sit there, kind of flicking a coin between your fingers, looking over the crowd, a hand gently clasps your shoulder, which kind of says you to a jolt. Leon jumps up. He's getting into fight or flight mode.

He's looking around, what? What the fuck is going on? As you pull back, a hand immediately reaches out and grabs your wrist before it goes for your weapon. What do you do? He takes, with his other hand, he grabs the hand that's collapsing his wrist and just pulls it off. Okay. As he pulls back, the other hand of this assailant grabs the hand you grabbed his and you're both now locked. into a game of Twister.

Yeah, exactly. The music kicks up and you both begin to bend lightly. In that locked moment, you're looking for a sign of the aggressor to make the maneuver so you can go ahead and dive out of the way

and repost, but it never comes. Instead, you just see this kind of white, toothy grin begin to appear beneath the shadow as you see the scraggly familiar beard of Evax. Aye, hi, still jumpy as ever, all we. Evax, you old so-and-sau. Takes you into a quick bear hug before setting you down.

Oh, yeah. You know, take someone like you to drag me to shitty establishments like this, I guess. You come to do an old con, I got a three-carmonte going over here. We could pull out the old two-sided coin. Maybe, maybe. I'm actually on the clock this time. And hoping that maybe drag you onto it as well. You ain't busy in recent weeks, are you?

Never too busy for you, Evax. Good, mate, good, mate. All right, so there's a job. A job. I know it's been dry for a bit, but this is one worth returning to. Tell you what, I'm getting the band back together a little bit.

Can't tell you too much here, but as he pulls you into whisper into your ear, we shift over to Key, Key, Sandrine. Where do you see yourself here in this period of time? I would see Key, He is also living downtown somewhere, but definitely homeless and literally living in a tent, but trying to cover for it in her day to day and hoping nobody knows that's her current situation. She's stolen enough that she has like a pretty good looking outfit on,

but she is sleeping on the ground at this time. But yeah, somewhere in a downtown bustling kind of a place, just trying to run cons and maybe live in a house. again. Gotcha. A gently fading morning rain has just finished passing through here on the outskirts of water deep. The little bit of mist is still dripping, and the mud puddles themselves are thick, and anybody who tries to clomp through here without the heaviest of boots is going to immediately suffer for the remainder of the day.

As you kind of glance out from your shaded space to hope the weather has passed, a small child kind of walks by with an untouched apple and kind of meets your gaze, kind of holding it out to them. Hey, kid, you know, this part of town is actually really dangerous, and I think you could probably use my help. Where are your parents, kiddo? I don't, I don't know. He gets a little closer and just kind of reaches out her hand and is like, oh, wow. you're so lonely. Oh my God. You know, if you look just down that road right there, there's actually

a really good shop that you can probably like find some other people who might be able to help you find your parents. You see right right down there. Kid looking. Make a perception check for me. Okay. So go ahead and roll. Add your perception modifier. 14. 14. As you're pointing out, you just barely see a shadow moving out of the corner of your eye, and you feel something quickly wrapped towards your neck. What do you do? Similar to Leon, I freak the heck out. I also try to grab this hand, but I don't think I'm as good at it as he is.

Go ahead and make a dexterity check for me. All right, same deal. Yeah. Two. Two. Okay. You reach up to try and grab it, but a secondary hand deflex it to the side, and you feel something hard pressed against your throat.

You try and grab up to deflect whatever this incoming strike is, and instead it overpowers you briefly. And you feel something dense, pressed against your throat. The child seems unmoved by this, still holding the apple, and kind of eyes, gazing past, gives a nod, and catches a coin from the figure behind you, or where the child drops the apple and runs off. Great. Love this day so far.

just what I wanted. You hear a slight crack sound as the twig that's been placed against your neck breaks. Very little impact, but all of a sudden the figure lets go and turns around and you see Evax there standing. You can't let your guard down, love. Evax, I am so glad it's you.

I have been having a time. I can tell. I can tell. Why is the thing? We've all been making our way through a very tough period for the guild, but it's looking a bit up and I've actually come to have a conversation. If you're interested, I've got some old friends coming in town for a bit of a discussion. No obligations, of course, but I think it could be worth you while. Do I really look like I can afford to say no?

I want to make sure there's a choice. I love the mutual respect. that we're trading on each other here. I am so in. We're meeting up at the singing show tavern. Just past sunset. Come alone. Don't make a mess.

I'll do my best. With that, Yvesk scatters. And as the day goes on, your disparate energies of anticipation, worry, concern, excitement, all begin to mingle until the sky turns from a bright blue to the darkened hues

of purples to that vibrant final stage of orange before the sun vanishes over the distant horizon. And at that, you separate moments walk up to the beautiful sounds of the multi-instrumented band that accompanies, indeed, the enchanted sword that sings upon the stage here night after night that gave the tavern its name. Stepping past the kind of motley crowd of individuals

that are both here for entertainment or for a bit of revelry or maybe the occasional fisticuff or two, You push past the curtain entrance to the interior, and after scanning the crowd for a good 10, 15 minutes or so, you find the familiar face of Evax, large tankard in the hand in the far corner, having an alcove-based booth already set and ready. Which one of you do you think arrives first?

It could be me. All right. Key, you excitedly sit down and wait in anticipation as the second member arrives. Leon comes in. rolls in. Finally, somebody to pay for these drinks. Oh, my God, it's key.

God, I haven't seen you since the incident. Yeah, I, yeah, we don't need to talk about that. However, finally somebody to pay for these drinks. Yeah, okay, I gotcha. Thank you. Thank you. It's about this time you see the familiar visage of Bing walk up. And to this point, too, give us a visual description of what,

what Bing looks like as you step forward. Bing is quite tall, I guess maybe nearing, like six foot five, maybe closing on towards seven feet, deep red, deep red skin and flowing purple hair that he is quite proud of, kind of flows out from his head. And usually wearing a hood on his cloak, but sometimes he lets it down and you can really see the hair.

He walks into the tavern and for a moment is just distracted looking at the stage and just staring at the sword. And then he sort of shakes his head and turns around, looks at the table, and sees Leon and immediately brightens up. Throws his head off and says, Leon, it's you. Ah, Bing, I should have known. I should have known. He grabs you bodily and pulls you out and gives you a big one.

It's lovely to see you, old friends. I never thought you'd write me back. And then he looks and says, and key. Key? And he kind of nods at her. She nods back. Her face changing a little as she realizes the three of them are together again. for the first time.

And do we need to raise that awkward topic? Because Key is kind of hoping no one brings it up, even though Leon already did. Key, we don't have to talk about it. Bing, I hope you're doing well, my old friend. He releases you and looks down at Evax and sort of says, Evax, you brought us all here. I did, I did.

And I think it's going to be an interesting possibility. as he glances across the table. Let's get a visual description of you, Key, if you don't mind. All right. So Key is the shortest of this group and a little resentful about it. She's got long black hair,

gray white skin, and again, wearing a pretty good outfit, trying to hold herself, again, not like an unhoused person. And just generally, having been back together

with two pals she hasn't seen in years, and again still has that sense of shame, she's trying to be like, I'm cool. I'm so cool. And to possibly contrast or compliment that, Leon, what is your presence and visage present in the middle of this tavern? Leon is tall, not quite as tall as Bing,

but he's got those elvish, an elvish stature. He's got big, pointy ears. And he wears what I would describe as Saul Goodman clothes. He wears big, bright, suit, flash, The most garish outfits possible, which he thinks is very useful as a distraction, so you don't notice that he's in your pocket. I love that. Ivex throws the cloak off his shoulder.

It's kind of revealing his burly form. He's in his early 60s, but a lifetime of hard battle in the various pit-fighting rings across the city has forged him into an intimidating figure at any age. his dark, like deeply tan, sun-scarred skin, his leather studded breastplate itself kind of creaks as he leans back in the booth and takes a large swig of his ale before slamming it down on the table. All right, friends, so.

This alliance with the Shadow Thieves is contingents on a number of trials they've placed to make sure that we're capable. One of these trials sits squarely in your skill sets, and my master specifically requested, that I reach out to you. So, at the very least, no, you're being fought of. The pay is significant and contacts within the shadow thieves will only bolster your careers

and opportunities. So, job itself, and you see, has a good gitty flash in his eyes. But too far from here, off the southern edge of the mirror of dead men in the north, lies the dwarfing keep of thornhold. There in recent years, the Dwarven Lady Obella Amberthak has settled in residence at Dornholt, following her marriage to the Marjester family. Lady Obelia, she's sort of a collector of relics and odd magics, and it is rumoured that she has completely overtaken the Eastern Tower of the Keep to protect her and her collection.

And she's a woman of means, and there's all sorts of strange rumours, but aren't there that around anyone of any sort of, uh, meger importance, I suppose. I mean, you'd know that. Yeah, yeah, like me, like me. Well, within her collection, sits a beautifully crafted bracelet of polished silver, with green emeralds and laid throughout ten in total. One of her crowning keepsakes referred to as the bracelet of the emerald mar. I need you three to infiltrate thornhold.

recover this bracelet, and return it to me here in the tavern within the week. Ivex, how can we do a job without Biana? Our gang is missing a member. We're 25% short. We can't go on a heist without our healer. Well, then you're going to have to work 25% harder, aren't you? Look, life in the realms is about adaptation. And I'll think, each of you has shown an ability to roll

to punches, eh? Bing has got his hands flat on the table and says, we'll tell us about pay. Well, we can fight you 500 gold pieces for supplies to spend as you need and he kind of slides a heavy bag

forward that kind of rolls slightly before kind of panicking out of the sheer volume of coins within. The sound of it hitting the table causes a few nearby folks to kind of glance over before you kind of instinctively hide the corner of space. Eyes to yourself, buddy.

But upon successful completion, you'll be awarded 2,000 gold pieces each. Not to mention, quite a bit of cloutes within this newly forged partnership. Bing sort of makes eye contact with Key and Leon is like... Key has the same thought and is desperately looking at Bing like trying to send a telepathic message. Like, Leon doesn't need this, but I do, and I'm looking at you and I think. you do, so let's make this happen. So Bing kind of just really subtly nods and looks back and says that would be adequate. Hold on, hold on.

Are you guys forgetting what happened last time? How could we do another ice together? After that? After Ogden? After everything. Okay. Let's learn a little bit more about how heavily guarded this bracelet is. Because, Leon, how bad could it be?

It's you, it's me. It could be pretty bad. It was pretty bad last time. Think says, you know what's pretty bad? Is spending six months shoveling sheep shit and standing under a tree. I'm ready for something different. All right. All right.

All right. So, the fort is built along the seaside cliff of the mere. It's got walls surrounding these small scattered buildings within the courtyard grounds. It's got the keeping. itself kind of in the centre, western side near the cliff with two flanking towers. It's not an incredibly large stronghold. The guard is maybe about 70 so guards in the entire premises. That's not at all times. That's in total. They've scattered amongst shifts. Now, your means of infiltration are your own. There are front gates. There are the walls as well.

There's the seaside cliff. We can provide you with horses, possibly a car. if you want to take it by land or road. It can provide you with a roadboat if you wish to take it by sea. Really, it's up to you. As far as we know, thankfully, the keep itself is not where this is being kept. It looks like the eastern towers

where the ladies taking up residence. Now, as far as the tower itself, we're uncertain of what sort of defences there might be beyond the guard since she's kind of, um, renovated, if you will, in recent months. Um, but I'm sure you're, um, You're a clever bat,

aren't she? Yeah, we are. Leon is, you can see the wheels turning at his head when he starts hearing about the heist and he starts getting pretty excited about the idea. His admonitions are a little bit, a little bit like fading away when he starts hearing about planning a heist.

He gets, he's pretty excited. All right, Yvesx, all right. Bing, Key, it's been a while. It's been a while since we did one of these. We got this. I can already tell. you are in, you are in. Look at your eyes.

Look at my eyes. We got this. And look at this guy. He's so strong. We're not even going to need a healer when we get there. We're just going to. Well, okay. I was going to say we're just going to charge him, but we're not.

We're going to carefully craft a plan using the genius of Leon Gold pedal. And then is just going to be a snap? Bing. I'm in. It sounds good. We could use a little bit more intelligence, though. Who's someone we could talk to who knows their way around this tower? Oh, well, that's the thing.

The pretty insular. We don't have any direct contacts there, but what I can do is kind of sketchy out a basic outline. And he does, and he kind of shows you that there is the cliffside of the region that goes behind the mirror of water, kind of the rocky cliffs that kind of meet the edge. The wall itself that surrounds it only surrounds it from cliffside to cliffside. It's like a semicircle wall using the cliff as its own defense element there. You can see there's maybe a dozen or so smaller structures within the courtyard, largely like a livery living quarters for some of the servants,

as well as maybe some storage parts as well. The keep is a modest-sized keep with a eastern and western tower that flank it. He kind of circles the eastern tower on the map. Best we can tell is this is where it would be found. Lady O'Bella is known to be a bit of an odd duck. She keeps hobbies

and palomistics and esoteric charms. So at the very least, be a little careful when it comes to the strange and goddy decool. You're not quite sure what's liable to bite back. Oh, okay. That's That kind of weirdo.

I get it. How do they handle resupplying, you know, food and other supplies? Oh, so they handle it like most well-guarded places do, with weapons at the ready and a very discerning eye. But I imagine they have to have supply drops maybe twice a week, especially if they've had guests. They've got to keep well-fed. And I know there are some supply caravans

that come along the roadways here on the Sword Coast. Is there a dock or any other way for the keep to access the water? There is a small dock at the very base of the cliff where they take seaside rivals, as well as an escape route in case any of the lords and ladies need to get out in the case of an attack. I don't know how long it's been in service, and it's the last time it was used. But I imagine if there's a dock at the bottom of the cliffs, that means it has to be a walkway or an entrance along them and up. So that's also an option. Might be a little small for us, a dwarver and entrance, they all dwarves in there.

I imagine the Lords of the dwarves, but they probably have a smattering of different folks from across the realm that are part of the populace, the help, and possibly even visitors. And dwarves, I mean, there's small but they're stocky, so as long as you can bow your head a bit, shouldn't be too bad. What do you say, guys? Should we start our supply trade? It's time for us to become suppliers. It's time for us to become food merchants, huh?

One way or another. Yeah, it's actually been my lifelong career dream to do that. To be a supplier. Can't wait to get into that biz. I didn't realize that key. I learned something new about you. It's nice to help someone realize their ambitions. Yes.

Yeah, I just figured it out about 30 seconds ago. And it's going to be great for me. Bing looks at least. And she says, I think she's being sarcastic, Leah. Yes. Good observation. You too. You know, it's been a couple years, but you're going to remember.

This is just how I talk. This is how it is. I'm not changing it. Bing sits back and says, it's nice to see the two. All right. So with what coin you have at your disposal and a little bit of time to prep, is there any additional equipment you want to try and acquire before this? venture. I think it'd be good to get some healing because being as acutely aware, however he may not

betray it, of his missing sister who used to take care of that kind of thing. So I would say some healing potions would not go amiss. You do have some contacts. Evax sends you to a small kind of alleyway herbalist who is known for her kooky concoctions, but fair pricing if they show the right sort of hand signal. In doing so, you can spend about 300 of your 500 gold to acquire two greater healing potions, if you'd like. I think we should probably do that. Sure. Absolutely. We should save. To distribute as you feel necessary. We should. Things onto one and he ends the other one to Leon, who's probably going to be closer to the front than key. We should save a little money to buy some supplies that we can then take and

or should we hijack their suppliers? Maybe we could save the money. We might want to bribe some as well. Okay. Okay. Could be useful. If we can't charm anybody on the way in. And then we can procure the rest on site. I am good of procuring things.

All right. So I think that's all we need. Shall we? Perfect. So partial coins still within your purses, your potions of healing at your disposal. You gather what you already have amongst yourselves, your thieves tools,

equipment, your weapons, and whatever else elements you may feel are necessary for this track. Rope, grappling hooks, anything that you think might be helpful in the heist-like infiltration of a space like this. So you can take note of those supplies before you leave, if you'd like. Yeah, I think a rope, a grappling hook, that would be definitely good. Leon's always got a grappling hook. He carries around a big bag. He's always got a grappling Heck, he's always got a set of rigged cards. He's always got a two-headed two-headed coin. He comes prepared.

One of you has a disguised kit, is that right? Leon can cast a disguised self. A disguised self. I thought one of you had a disguise kit, which could possibly be useful? Probably. I don't think either of us Oh, no, I do. I do. I have a disguise kit. That's great. Okay, so we've got that.

Yeah, I mean, Bing travels pretty light. He's kind of got his cloak, his clothes, his sword, and he can take the grappling hooks, Since he's pretty strong, you probably throw it if we need it. So he throws that in his pack. And other than that, and the potion of healing, that's all he's got. Mm-hmm. Bing, key, I say we camp out, scope out the situation,

watch and listen and learn, and then we find a guard, and we kidnap him, and interrogate him. I know what we need to know. I think the first part of that sounds great, and then we can see if we could even access a guard. I think we'll probably have a better sense of our plan if we do a little bit of observation. Out of curiosity, are you bringing a tent? Because you usually have stuff, and I'm just wondering, like, do you have bed rolls?

Just out of curiosity, because, like, I do have all of that stuff, but I just feel like yours will be better than mine. I will bring you an extra tent. Don't worry. Great. Great. Thanks. Extra bed roll for you. I appreciate it.

All right, well, let's make our way there. How far is it that we have to travel? It's a few days along the Western roads, so it's not an extensive bit of travel. Within the week, and it's about two and a half days to get there. It gives you a little bit of time to scope it out if you want to. Do we have a deadline for this mission, Evax? Within the week, yeah, seven days is within the week. Let's make our way there, and we can scope out the situation. All righty.

Um, one of you roll a D20 for me? I'll do that. Seven? Seven, okay. All right. Uh, the weather is not as kind as you would have hoped along the journey. Uh, the storm that had just passed seemed to have been a precursor to a much heavier rain. Um, as you trek down the road, all of you become completely waterlogged and soaked.

Horses still provided as you ride down the road, um, but the, the chill can't be, uh, necessarily ignored. Eventually, you do have to stop and make some fire along the way. That's my job. The good news is it looks like the rain will continue through the time you will be there. So that could be a good or a bad thing. Meaning the terrain will be a bit slicker than normal, but it also means visibility is a little more limited. But as you kind of head down the road proper, eventually as you kind of breach the small, tough of forests that begin to part.

As you get closer to the seaside cliff, you can smell the sense of brine and splashing nearby ocean air, and you can see the dark shadow of the keep and towers looming over the walls, as you can see Thornhold in the distance. Keeping a safe enough distance, you kind of just make out the train.

And indeed, it seems that Evax was very honest and forthright in the display of the space. The wall, the exterior wall, stands about 15 feet tall, it looks like it's a combination of stone plaster and possibly like heavy wooden doors that are reinforced. There is a single walkway that marks along the top of this wall. And occasionally you do see the torch-bearing guard kind of just doing a patrol around. Maybe every 60 to 80 feet, there's a little parapet where their guards can trade out or they can walk down within the or behind the wall. you do see the flanking towers of the keep,

the one on the western side. It looks fairly simple. In fact, much of the stonework here is relatively, I want to say rudimentary, but it is plain and functional. This isn't an exemplary, wealthy family to the point where they're showing it as part of the display of their landscape here, at least from a distance. The eastern tower that you were noted,

However, looks markedly different from the rest of the environment. The same height as the others, but it is completely overgrown in ivy. And with what little bit of sunlight is beginning to catch the colors on the exterior, the green itself is broken up by dappled splashes, a vibrant purple color. It looks like almost like a vertical garden has taken root along the exterior of this tower. It stands out aggressively from the rest of the landscape, and you get the sense that Lady O'Bella has definitely made herself at home. Are the east and west, is the cliff on the north side of the...

The cliff is on the western side. The western side. So the eastern is farther away from the water? It is. And the western one is up against the water. Correct. Oh, okay. Are there multiple doors on the exterior wall, or is there just a single point of entry?

After taking a bit to peruse the exterior, you can see there is one main entrance. Make a perception check for me. Sure. 11. 11. At a safe distance, you only see one entrance. It is a massive double-dored entrance that you haven't seen open since you started scoping it. You get the sense this is probably where most supplies, arrivals, and exits occur.

That's the best you can make out of this time. And it looks like to the west, to the western side up against the water, there's less going on there. Do we see guards patrolling that part of the compound as well? If you want to inspect, because in order to get that side, you're going to have to step towards the cliff edge and have a possibility of being cited. I'd have you roll a stealth check for me, please. Great. That's an 11. 11, okay.

Not too bad. in peering as close to the cliff as you can to get a perspective where the wall comes to an end and there is one portion of the seaside cliff that is kind of an outcropping that exposes a little bit of the interior from a viewed perspective of where you're standing. It looks like the cliff side is not as heavily guarded.

You get the sense that people are more concerned with the arrivals from the majority of the landmass. than the ocean at this time. And right as you've taken that much information, you fear that somebody may have spotted you, at least a torch kind of flicks near a direction. You dodge back into the nearby shadows and it doesn't seem to cause any more of a stir.

So you manage to avoid truly getting somebody's attention. Bing, be careful, man. You've got to be careful. All right, I say that we disguise ourselves as a band of merchants, perhaps a brand of Curio merchants. Perfect. Love to sell Curios. We make our way in through the front door.

Not a bad idea. I've got disguises. I assume my disguise kit can handle all three of us. I'd say in preparation for this job. Yeah, you could have enough in your kit for the three of you. It will take you a little bit of time to do your work, but it's definitely doable. I have disguised help for myself also. Oh, cool.

Okay. So you don't even need my disguise kid? I do not. I should have known you wouldn't need me. Well, Bing, I did bring stuff for everyone, but that means I have things for you and me. If you want to get all merchandise up in here, we can make that happen, looks wise. Bing pulls off his hood and says, I look forward to seeing how you will make me more merchant tea. I have some ideas. So let's, okay, so let's all dress ourselves up. Do we have, so we have our horses. Maybe we should try to procure a cart of some sort of supply, some sort of supply wagon. Got to fill it with curios. That's what I'm hearing. And yeah, yeah, we need to figure out some merchandise. And disguising ourselves shouldn't be too hard, but we need to figure out how to get some merch. Do we know of the nearest sort of town or villager population center? Yeah, I mean, there's probably a small farming village, not far from, Thornhold.

With probably 40 or so gold, you could both buy a cart and any sort of kind of supply cartons and crates if you'd like to stock it up. Yeah, can we find an antique merchant? Is there a neighboring?

We can simply fill the cart with garbage and then I can charm the guard into believing that it's curious. We need an entire fortress full of people to believe. I think we're going to need a charm spell regardless. Let's stack the deck as much in our favor as we can.

I know you don't want to spend. But fine, fine. Key, we're fine. Don't worry. Okay. We're each going to get 2,000 gold after this is all set and done. Yeah, assuming it is all set and done. But, yeah.

All right. So going to the nearest podunk village you can find, you're able to acquire a cart and any sort of somewhat dry-rodded wood crates and a supply of Kutraman that can help. present that as far as looking for actual curios, there isn't a very old woman who has a small kind of cart tent arrangement set up within where you can see. It's probably like one of the retired mothers within the farming community who has spending her later days just making knickknacks, like small little clay sculptures and the equivalent of like a, what's it called the little

tiny like porcelain cherubs that you see on. Bing is momentarily. distracted by a sheep sheep nature. He's just sort of picking up and looking at thoughtfully. Existentially. Before putting it back down.

How are you looking to buy anything today? Anything in particular? Yes, we'll take all of your chachis. All of them. How much for all of them? Bing says, not this one. All of them except for the sheep.

Oh, that's my favorite sheep. Yeah, you can keep that favorite cheap. I wasn't expecting this. 15 go I'll give you five Make a persuasion of check Bing Just like

Swallows a laugh Uh 20 Not not 20 320 Oh It's been some kind Since someone showed interest

In my wares So You have yourself A video All right All right See Keith I did that for you Key is

Siked And grinning ear to ear That we pulled this off So we have a wagon full of curios now. You do. You do. Now, you see, fill the knickknacks. There's enough knickknacks to fill a surface,

but you may have to fill the crates with, like, dirt and sod and then kind of layer the top of it. He got her way. Look, we didn't have that much money, okay? But it shouldn't be smelly garbage. It needs to be, you know, garbage that smells fine because we don't want people to be. Hey, it's pretty stinky. Paper. Oh, yeah, that's fine.

How about dirt? Yeah. Dirt's. I guess that's fine. All right. We fill all the crates with dirt and all the top layers of every crate is curious. Yeah. If you'd like to make a nature check for me, a key.

Sure. Is that a 202? Yep. All right. It's nature. Yeah. Your nature skill or survival, whichever is higher. My nature's plus one.

Oh, plus three. Let's do that. Because I only rolled a four. Four. Four. Okay. So that would be a seven. All right.

So after packing the cart and looking for ways to to make it smell a little less conspicuous. You look for various herbs and, you know, alongside of the road as you travel, things that might plus the scent. And you do. You find a handful of nice herbs that you kind of smear among the exterior of some of these things.

And it smells very nice for about an hour. And then it turns. And you forget, oh, this is, these are the sour petals. Dang it. And it has. is just the gentlest smell of like old attic meets old milk. But you know what? It also, it doesn't dispel antique.

Just maybe an antique store that needs a good cleaning. Right, yeah. So we're going to have to sell ourselves as having had really old stuff. Like these little curios are old as heck. We're all on that page. Yeah, maybe we clearly. We cleared these out of a store where they've been languishing for too long, hence the slightly sour aroma.

Exactly. Perfect. You're right on track. Should we disguise ourselves or should we go on natural? Nah, we got to disguise ourselves because I look too good. So I'm just going to go ahead and put on this canvas smock and just this sash. And I'm going to give one to Bing that matches because we're a very organized, a mercantile trio. and we have little uniforms because we want people to trust us

and know that we're all put together. And Bing sort of studies the cart to see if there's somewhere where he could stash his great sword, which usually wears on his back but isn't very merchanty. Understood. Yeah, yeah, easy enough to kind of wedge it between the inside wall of the cart and two of the crates that you have there. It would only be visible to a very discerning eye with a very intense look.

And also, it's not uncommon for traveling merchants to have means of defending themselves. I'm not on the open road. So not too much to worry about. Bing your sword is going to smell forever now. That's all right. It already smells of pretty much everything I've ever killed with it. So it's okay.

Leon casts a disguise self to make himself look like these two. So we all kind of have our merchants' gear, our outfits, or merchants' outfits. But Leon adds a flourish of like bright red and all sorts of kind of like garish colors. Hell yeah. Okay, awesome. I love it. He is judging that.

Maybe Bing is, we're having horses pull the cart. So Bing is on the cart with the reins of the horses as we prepare to approach the gate. Yes, to do it. We go up to the gate. So Bing stays up, I guess. He's sitting up behind the two of you. And using a disguise kit, are you doing anything beyond just dressing up? Or are you like altering features?

Is it kind of a, a, a, makeup shift at all? This guy includes all sorts of things, like fake beards and noses and prosthetics. Yeah, I think I'm going to go full fake beards, too. I give myself a totally different hair. I'm going to be blonde and I'm going to have blue skin now. And I'm going to have not that many ideas for Bing because he's got horns. So it's not like we can really make him look that different.

but and his hair is so pretty, but I do manage to convince him that he should have a totally different hairstyle because, you know, what if somebody somehow recognizes us from some other job? I'm more thinking of myself here because I've been pulling cons for years. And so Bing is going to wear a beard and a wig that could be black, which is way boring compared to his usual locks. We can say that Bing, yeah, and he allowed you to kind of pull his hair back, and at least the top part is darkened a little bit. It was a little grudging, but he acknowledges that it is pretty noticeable hair, and it could be that someone would recognize him. He looks less remarkable now. And we're getting in character, Bing. This is an acting exercise. Bing just sort of nods at that.

Perfect. So if you want to go ahead and roll at E20. Sure. Add your dexterity or intelligence modifier. Are you helping out with this disguise process? Yes. Okay. Then you can actually roll with advantage.

You can roll twice and take the higher number. What's your modifier, mani? It's plus two. Mine's a 14. So 16. 16. And because you're proficient with a disguise kit, you get to add your proficiency modifier as well.

Ooh. Which is plus three. Indeed. 19. 19. Great. Pretty confident. and your ability to have masqueraded the things you wanted to

and accentuate the features you wanted to. So I guess my question is, are you approaching during daylight or evening? Raining either way, so. I say daylight. We're just trying to be normal as heck. Honest, normal merchants. Yeah, why would we be there at night?

Maybe a little bit. People are awake now. Maybe a little bit later in the day kind of planning for potential nightfall as we're there. Tea time. Late afternoon, I would say. Okay, great. All right.

So as the gray skies begin to darken the signs of an imminent sunset, you breach the outside of the tree line and approach the central road that curves into and through the thornhold as you begin to just have the horses claw up, kind of holding the reins and slowly approaching, pushing through the mud, occasionally like slipping off the road with the horses right it. You can see the torches

that are slightly patrolling the tops of the wall. One of them stops and you hear some sort of call like somebody's not yelling to you but to the interior, likely letting them know that there's somebody approaching.

As you get within about 100 feet, you see the main gate open slight and what looks to be one armored figure begins to approach. A squat dwarven figure in a breastplate helmet with a red cloak

with gold trim that itself looks quite muddied, as well as this thick mud-coated boots. He kind of shivers a bit as he approaches holding the torch out and steps up to the front of the cart. Hey, uh, who goes there? What's your business, sir, Donald? Hail, my dwarven friend. We are curio merchants from Waterdeep,

and we have come to sell our fine wares. If you'd let us through, we can, of course, show you, and you can sample them and see the, magical nature of our wonderful goods. Are you affiliated with the Waterdeep Guild? Uh, no, no, we are independent merchants, independent curio merchants, and we heard that there are some connoisseurs in the area.

Make a deception check for me. Go ahead and roll a deep 20. Add your deception skill. 20, not natural. 20? All right, right. And what sort of curious, uh, Are you open to present?

They offer good luck and good health. Anything from curing a headache to curing a broken heart or all broken hearts hereafter. For anyone who purchases the correct one will guide you through that process. I'd like you to also make a deception check for me, please. Oh, boy. 17.

Should be fine? Oh, that's right. 25, that's quite slick. Kind of looks about the interior, the cart looks up at you for a second, kind of gives a discerning glare, but then passes over that. All right, the weather is quite bad.

Take refuge within the walls. Just be respectful of the grounds. Don't cause any scenes, or you'll be ejected immediately. I'll notify the head of the guard that we have a merchantile passing through for the next day or so. Welcome to Arnold.

Thank you, Z. Turns around and kind of leads you with the torch. He races a hand up to a guard that's on the wall. You can see them perched with a heavy crossbow, kind of just leaned over the edge of the wall. That then gets pulled back into a less aggressive and ready position. There's a loud whistle, and you hear the chains go tot as the gates begin to open.

Kind of dragging these large streaks through the muddy road, revealing the interior courtyard of Thornhold. Bing snaps the rain. and the horses begin to pull the cart slowly into the courtyard. Stepping in with the splashy sounds, you can see the flickers of numerous torches and brazers that kind of stand against the rain, saying, curse you, rain, but we'll burn anyway.

Magical or not, a lot of these flames seem to have either been well-kept, well-oiled, or arcane in nature. the rainfall itself darkening much of the interior, you can see there are occasional figures darting past with supplies. You can see there are small homesteads and warehouse structures throughout the grounds, but it's hard to not just be taken by the keep itself and the flanking towers on each side. The keep is a massive stone structure. It looks like four crenellated parapets at each major question.

corner of the keep, and you can see numerous entryways and arrow slits that belie a warm, kind of crackling flame-lit interior. You can see there are banners strung across various small pillars that hold the torch braziers to light the courtyard. It's a nice interior. There's a number of trees that are planted within that are growing. Looks like there's almost a garden that's been waterlogged and become muddied to the point where the greens have now given to browns. It looks like some of the folks here are a bit miserable with the current turn of weather. And there are signs that tell you that maybe there was a celebration recently that is still being cleaned up. There are tables and chairs that are being removed from what looks to be what was a central gathering event, which might explain the banners.

But the guard leads you further in, off to the side of the livery, kind of points to a place and goes, You can set up your cart and whatever tense you need to stay on these grounds here, should you need any help. Rooster! And you see he shouts over, and now you get a better look at this, this dwarf under his last week you can see, he has this, like, really kind of wiry, gray beard that is mostly, like, tucked into his cloak and into the underneath the breastplate. Shouts over, Luther, come here! And you see this young, kind of scrawny-looking dwarf guard who, wearing the same breastplate and helmet, but the helmet doesn't quite fit right

and kind of off-kilter one side. He has these bright red mutton chops that just consume each side of his face jowl and kind of out from underneath the helmet. I'm starting up. Aye, aye. What, what's... Oh, hello? I'm a miser.

You're there, charge. Keep an eye. Anything goes wrong? Shooting. I'm kidding. That was a joke. No, seriously, if anything goes wrong with you. and the initial guard kind of wanders off as Luther kind of gives a salute with a fist clasped over his shoulder towards that guard looks back uh hello I'm Luther uh welcome the Thornhold hey Luther you seem like one of the brightest guards that uh that Thorntonhold us offer it's it's lovely to meet you oh you're you're too kind I'm I'm just uh I've been working here for a few months I'm sort of on the up and up so uh

can do to be of service, I'm at your disposal. Luther, what happened here? Was there some sort of celebration? Hey, aye. The lady and Lord were married about six months before, and they've taken to re-celebrating once a month. They celebrate their marriage once a month. Hey.

Wow. Bing is sort of beginning to unpack the cart and set things up and says, I mean, I guess any excuse for a celebration, right? Do I guess so? You know, don't mind, it's good eating. At least the scraps we get. But, you know, the music's fine. And we sneak a few.

And the guy catches himself being too friendly immediately out of the gate. By the way, what's your names? I haven't actually met you. And I'm sorry, you just have those faces. My name is Noel. Noel, Noel. It's a pleasure to meet you, Luther. You just seem like the strong as dwarf here.

You're too kind. And you are? My name is Catherine. Catherine, no and will. All right. And Bing sets down a box and makes his way, makes his way over to Lutheran says, I'm bong. He holds out his hand. Bong!

It clasps your hand. He says, good, strong handshake. He looks at his hand with disbelief. Right, thank you. And he claps him on the shoulder and goes back over to Leon Unkey. Is the Luther, who is this new lord that the lady married? Oh, well, actually, the Lord's been here a while. The lady's kind of a new arrival.

So the Lord Everett Colm, Margister, this is one of the Margister family that has long held this keep for generations, from what they've been told at least. But I guess he was abroad last year and met the lady Obela Amberthak Margister. Now she's in the family. I can't do that again.

punishment severe. You're okay, Luther. Don't worry about it. We all tell anybody. I appreciate that. But I, I, the ladies come in and just brought a whole new, a lively color. What I've been told. I don't know. It's better than shoveling pig shit. Being sort of gestures with his head toward the iv-covered tower and said, and says, it seems like she brought a lot of color to that tower more than the other tower. I, uh I bet on natural But you know

Beautiful It didn't look like that before No no no no no no I don't know When the lady walks she just kind of I don't know Bring a Livelyness to her space

You see his smiles But like there's like a A bit of discomfort in his gaze He says Sounds interesting Sounds maybe magical Oh, aye, she's brought a collection A lot of boxes of fine china

Quite a collection of small dolls To one of the chambers there She's a collector I wouldn't say hoarder per se Because it's all very well organized But yeah, she's got a lot of interests What hobbies Do you think we could see her

And perhaps bring some of our curios It sounds like she might like them very much Maybe I can I can let leadership know and they can let the lady know that you've brought your vass and in the morning, perhaps she can come down and prove what you've brought. I do think we might be able to bring them to her and we could see how they fit in among her collection.

We could perhaps place them in different locations through our tower. Make a persuasion check. That would be 17. 17. Oh, you know, let me ask. Let me ask. you know, yeah it's a bit

the ordinary seeing as I've been here for five minutes but I'll I'll talk to my my superiors and see what we can muster

do you think you could do that right now Luther? I sure, sure yeah I mean I'm charged with your keeping so I'll get right to it

you keep unpacking and he kind of jaunts off through the rain Bing sort of chuckles and says, should I even bother setting up our tents? Yeah, we got to act like we're in it for the long haul. We're here for the next couple days. Yeah.

I mean, that tower, what do we think? Really weird looking tower. I haven't seen anything like that before. So I don't even know what kind of magic that is. I mean, I do know that fire destroys most plants, but I don't know. What do we think? Bing is rolling out some tarps underneath the tents and says,

definitely magical. Let's figure out how to get inside it before we start talking about how to burn it down. That's true. But I mean, I don't know how much Pol Luther has around here, but I guess we'll see what he can do for us. I think we should watch out for magical traps as we make our way into this tower. Agreed. We need to be extra careful. Agreed.

Lansing here is you can now kind of take a moment to take in the side of the tower that is visible even here in the ever-darkening, sky and rainfall. The tower itself rising up seven, maybe eight stories to a point peak roof. You can see there's balconies alternating every even floors, the second floor, fourth floor, sixth floor. There are visibly three balconies of different widths. And you can see, while they have, it looks to be curtained, obscuration to the majority of it, a little bit of light peeks through to insinuate a warm interior. The ivy is, you can see some of the stone peaking through,

but the ivy is almost completely grown over the tower in nearly like a downward spiral sort of pattern. It's beautiful, very almost fairy tale, like someone were to paint what a mystical tower would look like. That's what this is aspiring to be, which makes it stand out that much more against the rest of its relatively normal-looking keep interior. But yeah, it is also, there are two guards stationed towards the one entrance that you can make out.

There's about a six-foot step rise that goes to a large double door, and there are guards flanking the bottom of the stairs on each side. They won't let us in. We can look at those balconies, perhaps try to climb our way inside. We do have the grappling hook. You're probably a better climber than I am, but I think we could probably get up there if we needed to. Yeah, we would need to not be seen.

for a while because it's a long climb. It seems like we've got an angle to possibly get inside without having to break in and we should also be thinking about how we're going to get out. Yeah, ooh, good point.

You hear the thick, heavy mud footfalls of Utha rushing up with a big smile. Sorry about that. I'm as supervisor said, absolutely not. But tomorrow, they will pass on the information to the lady and should she find it within her good grace,

she will grease your wares with her presence. I make no promises, and if she doesn't, I guarantee you, it's nothing personal. She's probably busy or doesn't care. All right, well, thank you, Luther. I appreciate you asking. Yeah, thanks for trying. Of course. I'll just, I'll be around.

Call my name if he need me. Sounds good. All right, so Bing finishes setting up the tents. All right, so as I see, we have two options. Tonight we can try to get in there and hope that some of the guards are, that is a little less guarded and people are asleep. We can try to climb our way in.

Or we may till tomorrow, meet the lady, see how it goes from there. Bing still setting up tents and sleeping material says, it's been two days. We have time. I think we shouldn't rush it. We should meet the lady and see what she's made of. Wade it out? Yeah, I agree.

She sounds, again, like a real weirdo. So let's just see what we're working with. Plus, she collects dolls. I mean, all of this is adding up to paint a real creepy picture to me. And whatever clues we can get about what's actually going to be inside this tower, I think, the better. So let's try to get a read on this lady, you know? I want to cast my Magean cantrip and just kind of like a little thing, like away from on some side of the tower up above that nobody can really see. Just to get a feel, like feel the ivy and see if it's real ivy or if it's an illusion or what.

Okay. So you're kind of, are you trying to stealth by the tower or are you trying to? cast it from just where I am, like just cast a mage in, like, all the way up on the top of the tower. Let me check in on the arcane trickster real fast. I know that... The hand, it has to be 30 feet away within 30 feet. But, yeah, we... So, like, wherever 30 feet up above us.

Right. So the nearest balcony on this would be on the second floor, which is about 12 to 15 feet front of you. So you'd have to be about 15 feet from the tower base. So you'd have to get up real close to the... close to do it. So you could try and stealth around and come from the backside and like stay among the, because our clusters of like bushes and greenery that is

grown around the base of the tower, you can try and hide through that. Or you can try and approach and pass yourself off as just a person wandering through, but that would also mean having to have a conversation. So it's, whatever your approach is you're up to you? Yeah, I mean how far is our tent, our setup

from the tower? Probably about a good 150 feet. You're like you're on the you're set up on the opposite side of that tower. Like they're keeping you as far away from the main towers and keep as possible to keep an eye on what you're doing and to make sure that those who live here in the affluent interior, those structures can feel safe from any sort of riffraud. Gotcha. Are we the only kind of visitors or do we see anyone else who's kind of like a merchant or a visitor or anything like that? Glancing around, you don't see any other merchants at the moment. You see in the mud there are tracks that seem like there have been people recently.

set up here. So it looks like there may have been a caravan that came through possibly to help on whatever this recent celebration was, the monthly wedding celebration, but have recently exited. And you can see like the grooves in the mud and dirt of this caravan exiting recently. So you're primarily the only merchants that are traveling merchants that are present, but also at this time of night as it grows dark, most of the other structures are already kind of closed, people are staying indoors. It's kind of a quiet and still night under the rain. So what do you think? Are you going to stealth over? I think we should do a little bit of scouting before we call it for the evening. Okay, I'm going to go over. I think I'm just kind of acting like, hey Luther, I'm going for a walk and I'm just kind of walking around and we're allowed to be here. So why should I have to sneak? Why should I have to skulk through the shadows?

Do you say that out loud? I do. I'm allowed to be here. We are allowed to be here. I am allowed here. Just saying. That's for the rest here. I'm sorry, but sure.

And I walk up until I'm close enough to the tower that I could kind of like cast mage in without people really paying to. Without people really noticing me, I'm just kind of hanging out. You kind of begin to approach the exterior of the tower and you see the two guards kind of take notice. of course as you walk out in the open. They both look at each other, give a nod. One stays posted, and the other just kind of approaches you. Can I help you? You see this. This is a half-orcan figure. Well-shaven. Looks like he has brass cusps on the edge of his tusks, a bit of a pencil mustache across his upper lip, wearing the same kind of guard armor, and he kind of steps over. over kind of looming.

What's your business? My name is Noel, and I just wanted to ask, sir, is that real gold on your tusks there? No, it's brass. No, oh my God, that is brass. Oh, you are. That is some fine metal, sir. It looks like gold to me.

Your eyes lie to you. What is your business here? Oh, I'm just, we're traveling merchants. We're looking around. I heard that your lady is very fun of, curios and dolls and knick-knacks of all sorts, and that is what we happen to sell. Wonderful.

And perhaps she'll come to you as another time. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I just wanted to check out. I mean, this tower is unusual-looking compared to the rest of the keep, and I thought I would check it out. Then enjoy checking it out. Thank you, I will.

Have a good night, sir. You as well. And I, so when I count, Cast a cantrip, is that like noticeable? Will they like notice me casting it? Let's check. Stealth casting, is that a thing? Yeah.

It is. It can be. So with you, verbal in semantics, which means you have to speak and move your hands to cast it. And as you're walking, the guard is staying 15 feet behind you. Like he's letting you do your thing, but he's also doing his job. Okay. So if you want to do it stealthily, you can make a sleight of hand check to try and do it. Okay.

13. 13. Okay, you go ahead and cast the spell subversively. That's not a good face. Or maybe it's a great face. As you cast the spell and you'll kind of just glance over your shoulder to make sure it's not being seen. You look back and you see he's scraping some sort of animal dung off of his boot. It's like, God, I can't believe me.

Nice. Sheeperns supposed to be allowed in this. It's pack. It just did not notice it. The same thing. A natural one on that one. Amazing. Yeah, so I cast a mage hand and I want to kind of like scope out the ivy, the cure,

like see what the tower kind of feels like, if it's an illusion, if it's magic, or real ivy. So as you kind of drift your invisible mage hand across the side, you can see what kind of the ivy shifts as the magical hand glides across it. It is an illusion and the ivy holds pretty strong. If it has been grown recently, it's rooted like it had been there for 100 years. Is it climable? Can the hand kind of tell if it's like it'll support our weight? Make a perception check for me.

Okay. This is to see at this distance in the weather that you can make that sort of assumption. 23. 23. I saw it. That's like, you gather that parts of it could possibly hold, your weight. The weather makes it a little more challenging than it would be otherwise,

but it's possible. Possible. While I'm here also, I just want to scatter around and see if I notice anything else on the tower that is unusual or noteworthy. With that high enough perception check, too, as you glance about, you see the balconies that are on each of these floors. They're a little bit offsets. Like there's the one that's facing mostly in the direction.

The front door on the second floor. Then there's the one on the fourth floor is facing a little bit westward. And then the one on the sixth floor is facing a little bit eastward. They all seem to have like double glass doors, like French pane glass doors that are closed and locked that face outward under the balcony. And you can see curtains hanging kind of obscuring most of the interior from what you can make out. There are no arrow slits. the other tower has our aeroslits and is built defensively.

This seems to have eschewed that for presentory aesthetic. And you said they're locked, the glass doors, you said? Oh, you can't tell from the distance. But they're closed and, like, latched shut. Okay. And which of them, like, I guess

which direction are the guards facing? So, like, which of the windows would be most out of sight of the guards? Either the western or eastern ones would be kind of equally out of sight they're facing in the opposite directions. The one that's in the second floor is facing in the direction they are, which is also the easiest one to get to, unfortunately. Okay, I go back to Key and Bing,

and I tell them everything I saw and what I learned. So some of the ivy might be climbable, or really I think that the western and the eastern balconies are our way to go if we need to infiltrate without being invited in. Tomorrow we may be able to convince the lady to let us in. I love the optimism. And Bing says, and you really think that ivy could be climable? It could be.

I mean, when it's raining this hard, it might not be. It might be too slippery. But the thing with the ivy is if we try climbing that, I mean, the guards will probably see us. Again, I'm thinking about exfiltration and not infiltration. Right, we need a way out. In a pinch. In a pinch, yes. We do need a way out.

Key, do you have the featherfall spell or anything like that? No, I got Misty Step. That's just you. That's the you can get out. I mean, you said it, not me. Okay. But it is true that I can get out. And I do have a variety of other heavy hitting spells at my disposal.

I mean, I'm not saying we're going to have to fight our way out. I'm just, I just got fire on the brain, I guess. And, you know. You always do. I'm just saying, I'm just saying I can control it. You know, we got to do what we got to do. but yeah, exfiltration, that is a toughie. All right, let's sleep on it.

We'll see how tomorrow goes. Yeah, I want to meet this lady. I want to see what she's like. We set up our tent and our bedrolls and our merchant stand and then we go to sleep. Great. All right. It's a chilly night, especially here in the elements, for those of you who are a little more used to the comfort. This is easy going for you, Kee.

Like, this is... Yeah, I don't even bother to offer lighting a fire because I'm like, this is fine. Temp-wise. You were forged in this weather. Leon is a little cold. Yeah. No need for a rooster to awaken you as the crack of thunder pulls you from your slumber.

And here in the mid-morning, it seems the cloudy sky is indeed calling forth a roiling thunderstorm that is looking to park its way over this region for the remainder of the next day or two. We're in it. We're in this storm for the long haul. Indeed, with this early morning, you can see the muddy interior of the street is solemnly traversed

other than the handful of servants. The stableman is in the process of feeding the horses and trying to brush them and keep them dry. You can see the guards. There's a small barracks chamber that is separate from the main keep. It looks like there's some transitioning of guards, between different, word escape to me suddenly. Posts.

Posts, thank you, I was gonna say. Because every now in the brain's like, you don't need that word right now. But it's definitely feels like a little bit of a lonely or at least cold and energyless period here within the keep. So your arrival here as merchants both stands out, but also means that it's more, more prominent.

Did Bing get a sense of looking at the guard rotations of when the guards in front of the door to the east tower switched out with another group of guards or is it the same guards that Leon talked to the night before? No, different set of guards than the ones you talked before. And if you were keeping it out that night, which I'll say that's part of your job here, you'd noticed shortly before midnight both of those guards changed. They didn't change at the same time.

one left to retrieve. And so that way there was never like a period of time where it was completely left alone. But that's around the time where they transitioned. And they transitioned with like other guards in the area. Like they didn't go into the tower. They just switched off with other people. Correct. Yeah.

Nobody. The doors stayed closed the whole time. Nobody's gone in that tower. Okay. How long is it just one person? About two minutes. Two minutes. Okay.

Okay. So it's mid-morning. Indeed. Do you set up a presentory display of your wear. We got to get ready for the lady. Yes, yes, yes, yes. We set up our best, the best looking knickknacks we set

up on the table. Your haphazard presentation just barely finishes in time before you glance over your shoulder and see the unexpected appearance of an entourage of four guards and you see an elegant dwarven woman with like deep, dark, purple

hair. Her pale skin appears to have inked tattoo along side, each part of the chin where it almost has like a built-in high collar, but it's just part of her tattooed presentation. She has a beautiful dress.

And you notice that her dress as she walks does not pick up the mud as she steps. And in fact, the rain that falls also seems to just dodge around her. As she approaches kind of a cloak over her shoulders, her striking green eyes

kind of scan across you all. Her falling kind of black curls. briefly obscuring what you see is a lavender shade nighting game. That's kind of nestled into her shoulder. That she kind of just cuddles with one hand as she steps forward. Good morning, lovelies. I've been notified of your arrival and told that you have interesting wares to present. Bing sort of shuffles uncomfortably and is just staring at her hair.

Yes, my lady. It is an honor to meet you, and we have heard that you are an appreciator of fine, fine curios, which is exactly what we have to sell. Good. Show me your finest, please. Leon pulls out, like he shows the table, he kind of pulls out some of the finest statues of birds and a little, those Russian matriotska dolls. This is very much like, like, that truck stop on the road trip that has way too many.

things in it while you're trying to just get like some power aid and use the bathroom. Exactly. Exactly. He's got everything. It's all just set up on this table. He's showing like looking for reactions in the ladies as the lady sees them all. Her eyes dart from side to side

and you see an expression. Actually all three of you make insight checks for me please. Five. Eleven. 18. 18. she looks

oddly intrigued by the wares that you're presenting you pick up an absolute comical appreciation for something so bad you cannot help but enjoy it she is watching Tommy Wiseau's the room the Knick-Nack collection

and she just kind of like clasps her hands together her nightingale kind of like flickers off and kind of just steps and lands on your shoulder. She was, This is a marvelous display. Where are you all from? We're from Waterdeep, my lady,

and thank you so much, I agree. This is a marvelous display. Tell me, tell me, tell me, what is the story behind some of these wares I'm intrigued? Well, of course, my lady, this doll here, It is from the far east. And it is said that you'll never experience any type of bodily aches or pains again if you hold it in your possession or especially if you carry it with you. It'll just, you know how we get old and you know you wake up your back.

Just what have you done to it? That will never happen to you again if you have this little doll. And some of our wares are quite, quite more impressive than that. just these dolls. I noticed my lady is looking at these dolls, but for example, this little box that you could store something in, if you were to keep this little box, it would potentially cure you of ever, ever experiencing any sort of just day-to-day disappointments that you might have. You'll always feel that your breakfast was well-cooked if you have this little box in your possession. make a deception check for me please key

as convincing as that was I don't understand oh shit oh shit all right is that a nine it's a six but all right six plus eight 14 plus eight on your deception is 14 14 14 he goes

that is something my goodness I've traveled quite the lengths and breadth of the Sword Coast and are myself a woman of exquisite exotic tastes and I have not seen anything quite like this. My lady, is it true that you are also a collector of these fine delights and antiques? I am a collector of fine things, yes. If it's not too much to ask, my lady, would it be possible for us to see your collection as well? throw them out.

And she turns around and walks away. And the guards start, like, pushing you towards your gear. They're going to throw you out. Bing is sort of tries to keep them from touching the dolls. Yeah. Hands off the merchandise. Yeah, can we just be like, listen, we just need a little time to pack up. We'll be right on our way.

Yep, you heard the ladies. We'll leave. We'll leave. They, like, take their hands up for a bit. You have two hours. You have to go. and you see like Luther's like I'm sorry

you still standing there Bing looks at Luther and says Luther there's nothing you can do you seem to be a very high station here I don't know she seems a bit wound up I'm so sorry about this I'll see if I get some provisions for you at least for the road

and he like darts off so Bing just sort of gives a look to Key and Leon and begins kind of slowly packing up the small dolls. What do we do? I think our operation needs to move more quickly than we thought.

I think they need to think that we're gone. Yes, right. I think. Is there anywhere around here that we could conceivably hide until nightfall? I mean, if we're going to sneak into this tower, I don't know if we can do it in broad daylight. But on the other hand, it's raining really freaking hard. Do you have any illusion spells that would make it?

It seemed like our camp and we are gone so we can sneak in. I have a minor illusion, but I'm not sure that'll help. I mean, I also have minor illusion, maybe between the two of us. Or alternately, like, is there a place we can hide and sort of, like, also have a minor illusion? I know there were a bunch of bushes near the tower, but that probably is not. I have darkness as a spell that I can cast. I don't know if that would be. Well, it could cloak us in darkness, but it might just be weird for there to be, like,

a dark area where there wasn't one real lot. Yeah. I mean, minor illusion is a 30 foot range and it lasts about a minute.

It's like a small creation. Yeah, so it's like not like we could just... So you could be creative in its use. But, you know, if you were to either pick the card outside and return somehow or to find a way to hide the cart

and hide yourselves, like there are places to hide on the ground. Yeah, that's what I was thinking. So do you? Yeah, looking around, do we see, uh, Bing looks around and can he see a way to get to the like ramparts above the wall?

Yes. How does that work? You see the wall itself, it's too thin to have an interior to it, but there are a number of ladders, like reinforced iron ladders that are arranged at the back of each one of those kind of like tower points along the wall. So yeah, there are probably 12 of them across the entirety of the wall perimeter. Could we use a combination of minor illusions and mage hand to kind of make it seem like the three of us are walking off with the cart and the mage hand is pulling the cart with our illusion? Right. Like we actually are getting rid of the cart because we really don't need it anymore. Well, right.

So the cart with the three of us so everyone thinks that they're leaving while we hide in the cover of darkness. You can certainly try. Okay. Even maybe one of us could hide. I mean like if we could like get a road. rope over the wall or something to get people back in. Sure. Afterward, we really kind of just need one person.

We can do that. I can hide. I can hide in the shadows. Yeah, I feel like Leon probably has the best chance. Yeah, the highest decks. Of hiding overnight. Okay. So can we use a minor illusion?

Okay, so the two of them, pull the cart and a minor illusion to make it seem like I'm with them, but I'm really hiding behind. You want to do that? Okay. Yeah, that was. So we finished packing up slowly. Bing is very careful with each of the miniatures. He packs them very carefully.

and just in a way that he's hoping no one notices, but he's just being very gentle with them all. Yeah. And gets all the boxes back up. And Leon says, I'll meet you too on the wall, on the eastern wall, uh,

uh, at dusk, at darkness when it, when it gets dark out. So you guys will leave. I'll hide until darkness and then I'll meet you. On top of the wall, I'll throw a rope down so you guys can get back in

and then we'll make our way into the tower. And Bing says, and I'll be thinking about a distraction that we can maybe set up outside of the walls. The way. I love distract. to draw some people. Good idea. I think maybe fire could be involved.

What if you set a fire on the western side of the keep? Love this. I'm going to have to be over there. Yeah. Although, am I though? Because I have that like distance. Well, you guys will be leaving through the front door. You can camp out outside there.

Set a fire on the west side and then make your way to the east side where I'll meet you from the top of the rampart. That's the plan. So you're staying behind. Staying behind. All right. So with the rainfall, the guards, all eyes and the cart being loaded up. you find a moment in which the eyes are not entirely locked on your movements to try and find a place to hide.

There are a number of bushes around the nearby gardens. Go ahead and make a stealth check for me, please. Alrighty. Seven. Seven. Okay. This plan is going right already. You kind of chuck off to the side and dart into the nearby bushes.

And as you kind of get down low and turn back, you hear look up. And that same half-orke guard with the brass tusks is popping a squat on premises. When you have to go, you have to go, my friend. And by the way, your tusks look fantastic this fine morning. You are making me blush. It just looks at you sternly. There is an outhouse to finish your business. Then beyond.

Which way is the outhouse, my friend? Points to the opposite side of the warehouse next to where your cart was set. I follow him to the outhouse while gesturing to these guys to keep going. And I go inside and do my business. Is he, like, waiting outside? You kind of glanced through one of the cracks at house,

and he's there just kind of waiting. Okay, so we're loading up the card as that happens. Have you cast minor illusion? Yeah, and could you now? Well, I guess I haven't made it seem since I got caught before I can make, cast the illusion to, can I, I can make myself appear with a minor illusion? Is that allowed? I'll, like, make it look like you're leaving.

I'll allow it. But it's brief, and it doesn't hold up a scrutiny. If it was like a distant glance, it might catch somebody anywhere, but it, because it's a can trip. It's very limited in its ability and scope, and it only lasts for a minute. So we're up on the cart now, and that I think would be a good time to do it because we're kind of far away from it. Right, right, right. So I cast minor illusion to make it seem like Even though he knows he's standing in front of the outhouse

I cast minor illusion to make it seem like I'm with them Like a few feet away from Yeah, exactly Yeah All right, well he's looking at So both of you kind of pushing the cart away There's a brief kind of fuzzy illusion Of Leon appearing in the cart next to you

And Bing says, oh Leon, good to see you Or a, oh no, no He catches himself Oh no Good to see you. Let's be on the road. And spurs the horses in the direction. The illusion does not move. It's very much like a mannequin in the driveway of the passenger seat. But as it coasts through and the guards can appear over the side, the Orkish Guard, notices, here's that in the corner, looks over, looks confused, and kind of like, against to jog off in the direction of where the cart's going to confirm what he saw.

I quickly leave the outhouse and sneak into the shadows. Okay, make another stealth trick. This time, this time it'll go well. Maybe because you're not undergaze and because the rain is helping you, you do have advantage in this. Excellent. Oh, no. That I fell.

That's cocked. Roll it again. All right. That's 14. 14. 14, that'll be enough. So you go ahead and dive into the nearby brush in the outside of the warehouse. And while all eyes are kind of focused in that direction,

you find an area there that is comfortable enough, like a little pocket within the brush so you're not like jammed by nearby thorns. And after a few moments, get a sense that you have gone undetected. Like flops. The cart exits the gates. They close behind. And as you kind of begin to pull away towards the tree line, you hear the of thunder rolling in the distance as the looming sunset begins to push towards your meeting time.

And I think we'll go ahead and take that as our break for act one. We'll come back here for the next bit of this session where we'll pick up at the actual beginning of this infiltration now that you've gathered some information about the contents of the hold, the lady who resides within the tower of your intent and the strangest that might await you as you go on this heist.

Triple Quest was written by Matthew Mercer with improvisational assistance by Jason Schreer, Maddie Myers, and me, Kirk Hamilton. I edited and mixed the show and also wrote and performed the music. It was produced by me, Jason, and Maddie, as always. We were only able to afford to hire Matt to run this game because of the generous support of our Maximum Fun members. So if that's you, thank you so much. And if you'd like to help make it possible for us to do things like this in the future,

consider becoming a member at maximum fun.org slash join. Okay. We know the job. We've seen the tower. We don't know how we're going to get in, get the goods, and get out the live, but we can maybe figure that out next time. on Part 2 of TripleQuest.