Daring rescues

Rescue, such a funny word. It's a portmanteau from "rest barbecue." You know, the heroes would be sitting around, eating their smokey, delicious turkey legs (which is why they have turkey legs at Ren Fests, natch. The whole thing about the turkey being a North American bird, and not part of the old world? Rubbish. The heroes just ate them all for their tasty, tasty legs) when a page would run up and shout about some trouble. So the heroes would rest their 'cue on whatever was handy and go out to save the day. And that's where the word comes from.

Well, perhaps I'm making that up, like the time I convinced some younger kids that the word island stemmed from people in crow's nests shouting "It IS land!" on explorer ships way back in history. However, you have to admit it's far more entertaining than what the online etymology dictionary tells us. Apparently it's from Latin via Old French. And, while you might rescue a princess, it wasn't a daring rescue, it was a daring rescous.

Of course this is only relevant because my players rescued someone in our last session. And circumvented half the dungeon (well, maybe a third) by managing to tear down a door I didn't expect them to. Remember what I said about players and unexpected plans?

Anyways, I suppose a little background on the campaign wouldn't be amiss here. The world itself is a semi-random one, based on The Welsh Piper's amazing hexcrawl system, with a good bit of the stuff proposed by the old Dungeoncraft column in Dragon magazine. The gods are active in the world, with their own agendas and goals. There's some political stuff I have brewing on the back burner, ready to boil over into all out war if my players don't get the hints I'm going to be throwing out there and act on them. But, right now, my players are in the Town of Spielburg (I've decided to link to anything that inspired names, settings, whatever), sleeping in their beds in The Vulgar Unicorn after dropping their charge at the cleric's temple for rest and relaxation.

They thought they were dealing with kobolds, but I found something about applying a flaming template to skeletons in a book and had to use it. So they're actually dealing with necromancy. There's also profane temples and human sacrifices. You know, all the tried and true fantasy tropes. And there's much, much more. However, my players have been linked to this blog, so those secrets will keep themselves until a future time.

You pause a moment, and pull out the journal you discovered with the deceased half-elf Sam and peruse it a bit more.

So, here I am, stuck in a sewer with a couple of weights companions, surrounded by clicking noises. Of all the places I could find myself, this is probably the worst. Then the clicking manifested itself into horribly large centipedes. Being the quick and amazing person I am, I quickly skewered a few of them. The monk's fists flew like lightning and he smashed a couple of them as well. That crazy elf, finally doing something worthwhile for once, toasted the remainder. Sadly, thinking things through appears to not be one of his skills, as the burst of flames combined with sewer water to become the most disgusting steam you're lucky to have never smelled.

Anyways, once the foulness died down, we started heading out of the sewers and back into the city. That's when we saw the loathsome goblin. I ducked into a side passage while the rest of the party headed on. I leapt out and took the goblin by surprise. Unfortunately, this was the biggest, meanest, toughest goblin that ever lived. He managed to overpower me, and attacked me fiercely before I, with my usual aplomb, dispatched the foul bugger.
There was a single item of note on him, an odd cube made of metal rods. This is an enigma that desperately craves a solution.

Anyways, we soon made our way out of the sewers. I re-examined the box on our way through, after realizing I forgot to check for a secret bottom. It sure made my day when I discovered one. Opening the bottom was far more complex than you'd imagine a shithouse cashbox's false bottom would be to open. And it was far sturdier than the box itself. Of course, that's why I keep these fools around, and I got the monk to smash it up. PAYDAY! Inside was a decent amount of fisstech. Unfortunately, the wizard realized its value, and I had to split it with him.

After a quick visit to a bed and a good night's sleep (as well as a good look at that ring I'm carrying, which promises to be quite worth my while indeed), we headed on out to The Salty Dog. I questioned a few people about the enigmatic cube. One of them was a guardsman who ended up being quite the asshole.

I followed him home, then paid a few urchins to keep track of him. A quick visit to The Saucy Mermaid yielded the information that the guy with the tattoos is still regularly showing up here. So, I find myself sipping a nice ale, and awaiting his return.