Cultists in the rain

Now, where was I?

SPOILERS below!

Ah yes... our intrepid troublemakers had just left the Grünewald Lodge to track down three cultists that had escaped the night before. The party headed south, reasoning that their quarry would most likely head towards Ubersreik. As the road past through villages and settlement they heard from the locals that three individuals with haggard looks on their faces had indeed past this way the night before. The hunt was afoot!

Hans Fleischmann the Sigmarite warrior priest and Snorri Kurgansson the troll slayer had decided to join the party. Hans wanted to make sure no Chaos worshippers managed to escape, while Snorri simply wanted to take revenge for what the cult had done to his cousin.

After a forced march they reached Ubersreik at midnight where they decided to rest. Mannfred's wounds in particular made it impossible to continue. Asking around they didn't have much luck discovering where the three cultists had gone (or even if they'd left the city at all), but they did recieve a job offer from the Merchants Guild; one of their members, a herr Florian Wechsel, had gone on a business journey to the small city of Stromdorf to the north and had not been heard from again. The guild wanted our heroes to find him or at least find out what had happened to him. Seeing this as a sign they decided to head out towards Stromdorf and at the same time keep an eye out for the cultists.

They didn't have to wait long. Just a few hours beyond Ubersreik Rex the mutt started barking and ran out on a nearby field. Dieter immediately followed him and discovered a pair of legs sticking out from under a haystack! The party approached carefully but soon discovered that it was Otto the librarian and that he was dead as a doornail. His throat had been slit and he had been ransacked of his valuables. After this a discussion followed about what to do with the corpse. Dieter wanted to hang him, preferably upside down, in a nearby tree to show others what happens to heretics! Hans opposed this as being to grisly and in the end they simply left him where he lay. Obviously this showed that the cultists had been taking the same road. The question was simply what had happened. The party came to the conclusion that there'd been some infighting in the group. Maybe Otto, being old and fat, had slowed them down too much and paid the price for it...

As they made their way north along the river Teufel the weather was steadily growing worse and soon Snorri felt raindrops on his naked skin. Heinrich tried to use his arcane powers to stay dry, but the rain was simply too heavy and soon he too was soaked to the bone. When they arrived at the bridge leading across to Stromdorf they discovered that the rains had made the river overflow and the rickety bridge seemed to almost buckle under the pressure from the stream. Heinrich, Mannfred and Hans quickly made it across, but as Dieter ran across a couple of planks fell away and he almost fell into the water. Only Snorri was left and he eyed the bridge with suspicion, "well then... here I go" he said to himself and started running. If it was because of the weight of the dwarf's muscled frame or simply because of his clumsiness we will never know, but half way across the bridge crashed into the river and with it Snorri! The swift current pulled him along and before the others had time to react the slayer was disappearing beyond a turn in the river. After a bit of panicky improvisation and some creative magic use from Heinrich Snorri was pulled spitting and sputtering onto the shore.

An hour later our troublemakers finally arrived at the Sigmarforsaken city of Stromdorf. Sure their thunderbrew beer was famous, but who'd actually want to live in this rainy  backwater?! Outside the gate they were greeted by two corpses hanging from the local gibbet, apparently cattle rustlers. Asking the guards at the gate they were told that no one had passed through during the last couple of days so obviously their quarry had some other destination in mind. Backtracking they noticed a smaller path branching off from the main road going south west. Following it the party soon arrived at a garden of Morr that they had spotted from across the river as they made their way north from Ubersreik. As they were pondering what to do next a wizened priest of Morr suddenly appeared from behind a small shed next to the main gates. He seemed to be tending to the weeds growing near the wall and didn't notice he had company until Hans called out to him.

The priest's name was Theoderic Grabbe and he actually had seen two strangers approaching the garden only a few hours before. They seemed agitated and in the end they turned around and kept walking south. He decided not to approach them as the large one had a wild look in his eyes and kept scratching his neck in a "alarming manner". Hans quickly thanked his colleague and the party continued south post haste!

At this time the weather had turned from bad to worse and thunder bolts lit up the sky again and again. Even so Heinrich and Snorri still could hear the loud voices of two people in a heated argument. The party decided to approach carefully with Dieter and Rex doing a flanking maneuver. They had finally found Albrecht and Pieter!

It seemed like the two were disagreeing about something and had Snorri not kicked some loose stones, alerting the cultists of his presence, the two might have come to blows. Spying the group, Pieter suddenly pulled out a blunderbuss and miraculously it fired in the pouring rain! The effect was limited however, as Snorri took most of the brunt, which only made him angrier. Our fearless heroes charged and even though the huge Albrecht put up a fierce fight it wasn't long until the cultists lay dead on the moor. Desperate shouts of "take them alive!" had obviously fallen on deaf ears...

Ransacking the corpses they discovered that Albrecht was actually a mutant as his entire back and neck was covered by thick, bristly, greenish hair! Considering this a great price the group decided to carry (ie drag) Albrecht with them back towards Stromdorf.


Jeez, I just don't seem to be able to keep these nice and short. Continue reading here.


Oh... and congratulations to me for my 100th post on Fire Broadside! Wooo!!