Session 115: The best “laid” plan (September 10, 2026)
Last session, our heroes woke up from a well-deserved long rest. Eden got up early to practice the Strumbox she had acquired from Himeji, inspiring Heph and herself in the process. Maho woke up passed out on the grounds of the shrine to Hake after a caretaker dumped cold mop water onto her face. She wandered around the shrine, trying to see how different it was from her childhood, and was struck by a vision through the thin Shroud around the temple. She saw the flames of Hake’s eyes, followed by a sudden a strong connection from Hooded Beth, who reached through her and re-established the will of one of the masked shadowy Parishioners down below. Its Blind shattered and it broke free of its wooden container, screaming in pain as it dashed through the early morning sunlight into the shadows of the forested mountain, dashing from tree to tree towards Maho.
The party met back up outside Tavern 13 and got the lowdown of the encampment from Harry Nickel. It was run by General Samin Klarck, while Lieutenant Sascha Scheuer was “head of stealth and traps”. They learned the encampment was spread out into many small sub camps so as to maintain stealth, each with a small number of soldiers assigned to them. Each sub camp had a Horn of Silent Alarm to spread word of intruders between all the other camps. This information in hand, the party, along with the goliaths, Io, and Ana, headed east into the forest.
After some hours, Karrl spotted something large moving through the woods towards them. It was a massive bigfoot, which loped out of the trees, hurling rocks and swinging claws at Maho, all of which missed. After Heph attempted to cast Reduce on it, he discovered that it was merely an illusion, apparently set up as one of Lieutenant Scheuer’s traps. They continued on, avoiding a cleverly-disguised spike pit next to a not-so-cleverly-disguised spike pit, and came upon their first small camp.
Eden cast Messaggestion (or Suggestage) on the soldier with the Horn of Silent Alarm on his belt, telling him to announce he needed to pee, then walk into the woods, place the Horn on the ground, plug his ears, and repeat “la la la” indefinitely. Eden snagged the Horn, and with the alarm effectively disabled Heph blew up their cooking cauldron of soup with Shatter and the party set about horrifically destroying the small encampment. Maho fully sliced two in half hot dog style and Heph, Eden, and Io finished up the others. They tied up the still “la la la”ing soldier, named Hans, and set about deciding their next steps.
- We debate what to do for a bit, and decide to interrogate Hans
- The group arranges itself threateningly around Hans and Eden drops the spell and nicely asks him if he’s amenable to being questioned
- He is utterly terrified, and agrees to give us anything we want
- We learn that Harry Nickel was part of their group, and Hans claims to be much more loyal than Harry and offers his services to us, saying he owes us a Life Debt
- Eden unties Hans and we ask him a few more questions, which Maho styles as a quiz and threatens him with more violence if he doesn’t answer
- The first question is about the shadow creatures, and we learn that Hans is part of the expedition that recovered the creatures from Wichthafen
- Central Command has known about the Spectres of Wichthafen for some time, and when they got the masks from Sentin they figured out how to use them to control the shadow creatures
- When they are masked, they are commanded to obey the military hierarchy, specifically they report to the field generals, in charge of the full encampment
- We learn there are 10 encampments in the woods, each with one general, each encampment having about 100 soldiers
- There are a few hundred soldiers marching with the shadow creatures, and there are a few dozen shadow creatures, maybe around 80
- Maho next asks who the brains of the operation is out here, and we learn that they came out here with orders and each encampment is operating rather independently
- The orders they were given were to observe/recon, and to take some prisoners if they can without being caught and ship them down the mountain
- They have been up here for a while, they were involved in the abduction of Suzuki and Izume
- He explains that he is secretly very sad as his friends and lover are dead and he is mourning his way of life, and when he is left alone he will probably cry
- Eden promises we will find him a new lover, but it won’t be one of us
- Maho asks if they have retreat orders, but their main orders are to wait for backup, although they will potentially retreat if they are outmatched
- Maho points to Suzuki and asks Hans if he saw Suzuki get masked,
and he recounts the events of Suzuki’s masking
- Maho asks if he’s seen another Goliath woman that looks like her, asking about her mom, and he responds that he hasn’t seen any goliath like that
- Heph asks about the layout of their encampment and where his general is
- He draws a map of about 20 subcamps, each one within 600 feet of at least one more, most of which are like this one
- He draws little stars next to about half, which he explains have conjurers
- He draws an X on the central subcamp where the general is, which is inside a cave
- Maho asks if any of the other soldiers have lovers here, and he explains they have been up there for months and are mostly confined to their camps, so many of the soldiers absolutely have one or more lovers
- Lieutenant Sascha Scheuer (strategist) is sleeping with one of the conjurers in camp 7, and Hans’ camp is camp 3
- General Samin Klarck is not sleeping with anyone, but she does have a stone that plays illusions with sound and visuals
- Commander Fritz Babo (quartermaster) is a himbo and certainly gets around
- Hans tells us that Sascha comes to camp 7 since they knows where the traps are, and they go about 100 feet outside of camp 7 to hook up
- Heph calls over Io, who is a bit shocked at what’s been happening,
and asks her what sort of information we need to bring back to Hojo for proof
- Heph cleans up some of the blood on her, but the majority of her shock is coming from the interaction we have been having
- We decide our best course of action is probably trying to get documents from the quartermaster, as he seems like the easiest target
- He draws a more detailed map of camp 1, as best as he knows, and it seems like inside the cave the bunks and store are to the left, and the general’s chambers are to the right
- He explains that they came up here initially with enough supplies to cover them for a bit, and the incoming force is bringing supplies to resupply them
- We learn they periodically have an Eyes Wide Shut style masquerade, and incidentally the next one is actually coming up that night
- It happens at a clearing in the woods near a lake, so they can clean themselves and avoid getting any T̈Is
- We decide we are going to use the party as a cover to sneak into camp 1 in
disguise
- Hans fills in some additional information about each officer, specifically that General Samin Klarck has a pet bear, and Commander Fritz Babo knows all of “Ben’s” secrets
- Hans creates a duplicate map for us to send back, with a naked man with an Eyes Wide Shut mask on the back side
- Ando and the other Goliath will head back to Hojo with Hans, and Io, Suzuki and Tomatsu will stay
- Ana, Maho, and Heph/Eden will go into camp 1 in Eyes Wide Shut disguises to try to locate some documents from the quartermaster for proof
- We prepare to do some fishing and find a spot to hide out and spy on camp 1, waiting for our opportunity to sneak in