WSS Summary: World 11, Grinding Gears - Session 6

Present Party: Aria, Claudia, Emori, and Steve

Setting: The world is comprised of several floating islands, surrounded entirely by open sky, with no visible land below. The party spends this session briefly in the pirate-lead capital of Parofell - Port Aimore - before traversing the treacherous skyway of Avernus: the Dragons' Skies. They end the session in Kaetor, at Fort Dreadnought.

Captain Emma Thompson
Pirate Lord of Parofell,
Witchdoctor
(Art by @WTH153 on
Twitter)

After the party's wild night of trying and ultimately failing to catch a strange, illusive creature, they were invited by Captain Thompson to interrogate Phule: the Kaetorian Armada jester-creature the party had captured. Claudia was the only one who opted not to go. She was still reeling from the events from last night, still piecing together as much information as possible.

The other three members of the party returned to Captain Thompson's house and followed her further in and downstairs, where she had something of a dungeon set up. Phule was being kept in one of the cells, left cackling to himself mindlessly.

Phule
Elite Member of the
Kaetorian Armada
(Art from Kingisle's
"Pirate101")

Phule was an odd creature with two personalities, represented by the split mask over his face. When one of them wanted to speak, the head turned, presenting the profile of whichever mask chose to speak at the moment. The smiling white mask was pleasant and playful, while the scowling black mask was rude and condescending.

Phule wanted to make a deal. He knew how to infiltrate the royal palace in the capital of Kaetor quietly. He was willing to help the captains, so there would not have to be a full-fledged assault on the city - something the pirates would certainly lose.

Thompson explained, "We have enough people to take Fort Dreadnought, outside the stormgate once we leave Avernus. But... the royal palace will be crawling with soldiers."

Phule agreed. When asked what he gained from helping them, he explained, "I was Kane's first creation. And I am imperfect. He strives for perfection. If he has his way, and takes over all the skyways, there will be no place for me in his world. I have nothing to lose from helping you. The only thing that I ask is that if you win, you simply let me go."

Kane was the admiral of the Armada. He was Thompson's main target, and according to Phule, the creator of all of the other Armada.

The party was skeptical about letting him come along. Emori said, "If you come with us, you'd better not pull something where you switch sides again once we get there and screw us over."

"Why would I? Think about it. If I do that, and Kane wins, then I will die because I am not perfect. If I do that, and you win, then I will die because you will kill me for my betrayal. There's no winning there. The only way for me to win now is to help you, and then to be set free. And that is the only way I'll help you."

The party decided that Phule could be useful. Even they had struggled in a fight against him; it wouldn't hurt to have him on their side. Steve offered to take him on his ship when they travelled to Kaetor.

Phule cackled merrily at the idea of this alliance.

~~~~~

Shortly after, the members of this fleet gathered together to discuss how they would be travelling. The party aided in creating a formation for their ships as they went into Avernus. They had anticipated using Captain Taylor's and Emori's invisibility tricks to make the Armada believe that there were less ships than there actually were. That would be especially useful with Taylor's ship, The Avon Vale, because of its large crew size. Alcott and Rines both had ships that were major powerhouses, slower, and with larger crews. They acted as a rear guard. The smaller ships led the charge and acted as scouts.

The Gryphon Riders, led by Confidence Milton, were also present to offer some advice. Their group had been through Avernus before, and knew what to expect. Ideally, they were meant to avoid any of the native dragons if at all possible, especially since many were very large. Moving quickly and quietly would be the key. Luckily, they didn't have far to go to get to the stormgate that would lead them to the Obrira Skyway, and then to Kaetor.

With this plan in place, they set sail. Getting through the stormgate, now that they had the cyclostones, was easy. Although, travelling through a giant funnel cloud was less than ideal and rather nauseating. On the other side, they found a red sky, dotted with several outcroppings of large, jagged rocks. The fleet sailed as quietly as they could. Between Emori, Captain Black, and Aria's first mate, Gigi, they were also able to psychically link all of the captains to one another, as well as Confidence.

Even though this journey was meant to be short and simple, they found a roadblock almost immediately: a colossal red dragon - larger than most of their ships - fast asleep not far away on an outcrop of rocks. They attempted to sneak past.

Aria and Steve were the ones to notice it: that same creature from last night. That black ball with the green light in the center had returned, and was whizzing past them, over to another floating rock outcrop. There, they could see that it met with another creature. It was black, and vaguely humanoid with two legs, six arms, segmented wings connected with some kind of green flesh-like tissue, and glowing green eyes. The creature did not appear to have skin, but instead had some kind of exoskeleton that was certainly not natural, but rather crafted. When it leapt from the outcrop, its back also appeared to have jets that propelled it forward.

Captain Mina Alcott
Tiefling Pirate Lord
of Parofell, Privateer
(Art by Kiikiibee on Tumblr)

It flew, without hesitation, directly into Captain Alcott's ship - one of the more armored vessels in the fleet. It ripped a hole directly through to the other side of the hull, and her ship began to sink further below the clouds.

The noise woke the red dragon, and it roared fiercely. However, Claudia acted very quickly, and cast Banishment on the dragon. With a failed saving throw, the dragon was gone. Now, all they had to deal with was this new, mysterious creature...

And now it was flying directly towards Confidence Milton.

Confidence Milton
Tiefling, former Transmigrator
(Art made by me, using
Heroforge)

The other captains further back took care of collecting Captain Alcott and her crew from their sinking vessel while the party attempted to defend Confidence. However, their efforts were largely in vain. As Steve and Aria attacked this creature, it responded by freezing them in space. It slammed into the gryphon that Confidence was riding, and with a sickening crunch, the gryphon fell from the sky. The creature had hold of Confidence now... and then they were gone. Steve managed to catch the gryphon's body before it was lost forever to the open and endless skies, but something was strange about it.

The gryphon's saddle bags - the ones carried by the Gryphon Riders that kept their wares - were gone. This looked like an untamed, very dead (after being tackled and then hitting the deck of a ship) gryphon.

Ned, Steve's first mate, seemed very confused. He pointed out that the two Gryphon Riders were still there. Where did this one come from? Why had it just fallen from the sky?

Ned appeared to have no recollection of anything regarding Confidence Milton.

~~~~~

The siege of Fort Dreadnought, despite the intrusion of the dragon, went very well. The pirates still outnumbered the Armada in the fort itself. The fight didn't last all that long, and the pirates were victorious. None of the Armada seemed to have escaped either.

The pirates' map of Kaetor
Locations are unlabeled because they are unknown
(Map made by me, using Heroforge)

Settling in for the night, eating the gryphon that Steve had caught for them all, the pirates rejoiced in their victory.

The party, however, remained confused about the events that occurred in Avernus. Emori was particularly distraught. This was, as she viewed it, the third time that she'd lost Confidence and the second time in a row.

To their surprise, the party was visited shortly afterward by The Moderator. They ushered the party aboard one of their ships to talk.

"A recent anomaly had come to my attention that brought me here," they explained. "I thought it was a bug. I'd been following it, but then it suddenly disappeared. And there was little to no trace of it after that. It's gone, and it's not hiding. Transmigrators tend to attract or cause bugs. I wondered if you saw anything."

The party explained to Mod what had happened, and Mod needed to ask some clarifying questions.

"This person that the creature took... You said just now that you'd met him before in other worlds. Is this the same person you brought up to me on your second mission? That you said you'd seen in the first?"

They confirmed that it was. The last time they'd brought up Confidence to Mod, they had dismissed it as impossible. "His coding was natural to the world," they'd said. But now Mod really seemed to ponder something.

Claudia explained further, "We've been told several things by several of your coworkers. We've been told he's evil and not to be trusted but... someone else - the red one - seems to think he's the most important person ever."

Mod took in this information, and concluded, "I cannot say for sure what it is that I sensed here. It couldn't have been a bug; bugs don't just go away, and what you've described doesn't sound like a bug. Let me discuss this further with my other coworkers." They moved to leave, but then added, "If this is important to you, I'll keep you updated on what I find."

The party agreed that they would like that, and Mod disappeared, leaving them still with unanswered questions.

~~~~~

ART LINKS:

https://twitter.com/WTH153/status/975388174955376640

https://www.pirate101.com/free_game/newsletter/june2015

https://kiikiibee.tumblr.com/post/175200008557/commission-of-marquiskilljoy-s-tiefling-dragon

~~~~~

Credit to @ijaymendell inspiring this awesome campaign!