Dame Edella Montfort – Human Paladin member of the Notorious Nine. Cheery, Stalwart champion of justice. Though out of her element she is determined to do what is needed to save the day.
Elriel (aka “the Opal”) – Elven Druid member of the Fate Fighters. Not the most personable of elves, but good hearted and powerful. Seems to prefer to remain the shape of a large tiger, but willing to take his normal form as needed.
Raskin Daggermaw – Half-Orc Rogue member of the Notorious Nine. Surly and braggadocious, he seems to be helping begrudgingly, but looks forward to using his skills at violence and (hopefully) getting paid.
Ron Cunningham – Halfling Bard member of the Notorious Nine. Good natured and willing to ride along for another adventure, crazy as this one seems to be. His artistic stylings are strange, but his magic is powerful.
Wu Xen – Human Monk/Cleric member of the Fate Fighters. Disciplined and holy, he seeks to do good and help to defeat the evil that threatens the Astral Plane. Nobody but Edella seems interested in his stories and parables.
Furreltuff “Furrel” Mellburrow – NPC Kender “handler.” Said to be able to lead the group to the town of Wativia and from there the location of the Planar Key of Water. Although excited at the news, Furrel has no idea what a Planar Key is or where might be found. That won’t stop him from trying though.
Gnimin – NPC Gnome Tinkerer. Captain and creator of an experimental submarine and happy to give the group a ride to Wativia. Friends with Furrel and Blash.
Blash – NPC Undine Sorcerer – Friend of Gnimin and Furrel. Offers his water breathing spells and wares…for a price.
Living Sea, Astral Plane. Date unknown
Gnimin led the group into his experimental submarine, the Underwatership thatglidesthroughthewaterlikeabrickpronetocatchingfirebutwillonedaydoitlikeanentirelynon-flammablefishormaybeeel. Within the small cramped vessel there was a chair in the middle of it that had a series of machines, ropes, pulleys, a periscope and other bells and whistles next to it. At the front and back are two seats that have pedals that could be used to get the engine moving and keep it going, along with a furnace connected to it for extra energy. There were a number of periscopes scattered around the sides of the ship with odd contraptions near them that Ron identified as some sort of weapons to defend the ship from outside attack.
Gnimin took a seat in the pilot’s chair and Edella, Raskin, Opal and Wu agreed to take pedal stations to help propel the ship. Furreltuff began to give directions to Gnimin to direct them to the underwater town of Wativa, though Opal and Wu quickly realized that he was awful at giving directions.
Despite Furrel’s bad directions, the journey started off well enough, though Raskin muttered constantly to himself how he felt like this ship was a deathtrap. After nearly an hour into the journey Gnimin, peering through a periscope, spied something. “Can you see that as well?” he asked, and Ron ran to one of the weapon stations to use the periscope there, quickly identifying three large Water Elementals coming straight for the ship.
“This happens sometimes,” Blash explained. “This ship is made of wood and metal and the Elementals don’t like it intruding on their realm.”
“Hardtoport!” Gnimin yelled, his words so fast they began to blend together. “Pedal!Fueltothefurnace!”
Everyone at the pedal stations began to give it their all, and Blash threw some strange bluish charcoal into the furnace to give extra speed. They were able to quickly outpace the Elementals and escape, but Blash threw too much fuel in and the furnace began to belch black smoke into the ship, choking everyone and making it hard for some to see. Even worse, Ferrel could not catch his breath and blacked out.
“Riseriserise!” Gnimin yelled, coughing and working the pullies near his chair as he spoke. “Keeppedaling!”
Wu, feeling Furrel may not have much time, leapt from his station while the others kept pedaling. The monk ran to Furrel and cast Air Bubble on him, which would allow him to keep breathing despite the choking smoke.
Soon enough the ship hit the surface, and Gnimin was able to open the hatch and allow the smoke to pour out of the cabin while everyone climbed to the top of the ship to catch their breath.
After the ship had aired out they went back in, despite Raskin’s now somewhat less quiet complaining about how the ship was a deathtrap. The journey continued on without incident and Furrell announced he felt they were very close to Wativia. However, the ship suddenly shuttered as if struck hard by something. Checking the Periscopes they saw that the Water Elementals had returned and struck the ship. After another shutter, however, the engine was thrown off it’s moorings, resulting in a huge explosion.
Everyone on the ship was wounded, but survived. Worse, however, was that the blast had blown a hole in the ship and they were taking on water very fast. “Weneedtosurfaceandstoptheleak!” Gnimin shouted, setting the course back to surface.
With the frantic pedaling of Raskin, Edella, Wu and Opal they were able to breech the surface. Gnimin shouted that they had to patch the leak or the ship would still sink and he, Blash, and Wu began to try to patch the ship while everyone else climbed out to attempt to fight the elementals.
The elementals came to the side of the ship and attacked Raskin and Ron, injuring them.
Furrel, hefting his strange sling staff, asked Edella if he should use fire or lightning. Edella suggested lighting, and Furrel held the staff up, its bottom pointed at an elemental and shouted “Bind!” Suddenly a huge lightning bolt flew from the end of the staff, striking the elemental and seeming to injure it.
Opal followed suit, casting Call Lightning, injuring the same elemental. Edella ran up and stabbed it with her ranseur and Raskin leapt into the water to try to get a flank and stab the elemental. He struck it, but it was hard to tell if he and Edella were hurting it.
Realizing that Raskin’s usual flanking attacks were not as effective, Ron leaped into the water (getting smacked hard by an elemental on the way) and teleported Raskin back onto the ship. The elementals attacked both Raskin and Furrel, and the kender fell back, activating his staff again and causing small fiery meteors to fall from the sky, slaying one of the elementals and injuring the other. The other was injured further when Opal directed two more lightning bolts at it from the stormcloud that he had conjured.
Raskin, spotting something in the distance pointed. “Uh, guys. The third one is on its way.”
Edella turned to attack the one that had struck Furrel, destroying it in a flurry of impressive blows from her ranseur. By then the final elemental was upon them. Raskin attempted to keep it’s attention on him, as he’d come to realize he could not stab a living wave of water in the organs since it didn’t have any. While the half-orc distracted, Ferrel drew his short sword, which had a strange blueish blade, and attack the creature. He fumbled the blade, however, and it fell in the water.
“Frosty no!” Furrel yelled, diving in after it (and being struck by the elemental as he went.) Fortunately some more lightning blasts from Opal and another flurry of attacks from Edella slew the final elemental as well.
Ferrel secured his sword and returned to the top of the ship as Raskin was asking “Is this deathtrap gonna sink or what?”
A short time later Wu emerged, announcing that they had prevented the worst of the leaking but that Gnimin wanted to take the ship out of the water to conduct repairs and that they’d take quite some time.
“Fine, I wasn’t going to get back in this thing anyway,” Raskin declared.
“We aren’t too far from Wativia,” Ferrel said. Adding, “…I think…”
“I can turn to a whale and carry you all there from here if you like,” Opal said. This prompted a slew of questions from Furrel about being a whale and the elf soon turned himself to an Orca, purposefully neglecting to first cast the spell that would let him talk to Furrel in his whale form. Unfortunately this did not prevent Furrel’s stream of questions during the journey.
Wu and Edella thanked Gnimi and Blash for their assistance and everyone climbed onto Opal and he carried them back under the water. Furreltuff’s directions were actually quite good and before long the group arrived at Wativa. It was a small village, but because the Astral Plane lacked gravity, all of the structures were built upon coral reefs and another stone formations with little uniformity or linear consistency.
Ferrel informed everyone that he had been here before, but that they’d asked him to leave. He was sure they weren’t mad at him, however, and that they’d surely forgotten the reason they kicked him out. He then rattled off the tavern names in the town and when Raskin heard there was a tavern called The Lusty Mermaid, he insisted they go there.
“They have taverns?” Ron asked. “For what? Nobody needs to eat or drink?”
“But they like to sometimes,” Furrel said.
When Ron asked about payment Furrel assured him that they accepted coin.
“Like this?” Ron said, holding out a handful of coins.
“Oooh, I’ve never seen a mint like this!” Ferrel said, absently pocking a few of Ron’s coins. The halfling opted to let the matter go, as Furreltuff had immediately moved on to show them to the Lusty Mermaid.
Swimming along after Furrel they soon reached the tavern and were greeted by a merman barkeep who identified himself as Rhaen.
Raskin ordered some food, though he was a little reluctant when given scallops and kelp. Edella asked if there were any forts or strongholds nearby and Rhaen seemed anxious.
“You’re not with them are you?” the merman inquired.
“Them who?” She asked.
“The Sahuagin,” Rhaen explained. “There is a castle made of coral nearby, it’s been abandoned ever since we gave up having a lord here, but awhile back the Sahuagin came in with their sharks and started pushing everyone around, beating or killing us if we don’t give them what they want. Your buddy there,” he gestured to Furrel, who was chatting up an aquatic elf across the room, “Killed a couple of them when he found them beating a few of our citizens. We asked him to leave so the Sahuagin wouldn’t kill too many of us in retaliation.”
“These guys sound like my kind of guys,” Raskin smirked, getting a side eye from Wu and an embarrassed rebuke from Edella.
“Well obviously we have to make sure these guys can’t hurt anyone here ever again,” Edella said, to which Wu immediately agreed.
“Kill ‘em all,” Raskin said. “That’s what I heard.”
“We shall give them a chance to surrender or leave on their own,” Wu replied. “But we cannot allow them to be in a position to harm these people any longer.”
“Agreed,” Edella said.
Rhaen took a little more convincing, but Edella and Wu gave him their word that they would not allow the Sahuagin to harm anyone else in the town. A little more at ease, he provided them with directions to the Coral Castle, and said that he believed they had a boss of some sort, but that he wasn’t sure.
“What do we know about these creatures, Ron?” Edella asked. The halfling responded that they were cruel and vicious and they existed on Goric too, living in oceans and occasionally raiding costal towns. He added that they tended to be over seven feet tall and often weighed over two hundred pounds.
“And we’re gonna kill all of ‘em” Raskin smirked, with a look at Edella.
“Are you implying you are not powerful enough to do so?” Wu asked.
“Of course not, I’ll waste ‘em” Raskin declared.
When asked if anyone else in town might know anything more about the Coral Castle Rhaen said he didn’t think so, but stated that they could speak with the mayor or perhaps an old sorcerer who lived outside of town or maybe their local cleric.
Deciding that loading up on healing potions or items might be a good idea, as neither Edella nor Wu were very powerful healers, they decided to pay a visit to the local temple. There they found an old merman cleric who identified himself as Maelinnus and declared the blessings of a deity called the Water Lord upon them. None of the group was familiar with this god, but they thanked the cleric all the same.
They inquired after healing potions or items and Maelinnus became nervous and swore that all he had was taken by the Sahuagin. Raskin, however immediately saw through the old man’s bluff and confronted him. His aggressive style was mollified a bit by Wu, who assured him that they were not spies for the Sahuaginand were offering coin in trade.
Maelinnus relented, admitting that while the Sahuagin had taken much of his coin and goods, he had a few items squirrelled away that they had not found or that he’d created in the meantime. The options were somewhat meagre, but he had managed to secure a fully charged Wand of Cure Light Wounds and a Ring of Swimming. As Edella was short of coin, Wu spent almost all of his money on these items, asking only that the ring come to his group when the adventures were over, adding that water encounters seemed especially challenging for his companions.
Edella requested healing from Maelinnus, as most everyone was still injured from their experience on Gnimin’s submarine, and after securing a promise that they would do something about the Shaughain , the merman healed everyone of their injuries.
With little else to do in town the group soon followed Rhaen’s directions and headed to the Coral Castle. The found it easily, although it’s appearance was not what they expected. Like Wativia it existed in an environment without gravity and so was more of a coral blob with fortifications than anything else.
From the distance they spied the structure, finding that there was a figure in each of the guard towers. After some discussion, they decided to use a pair of Invisibility potions on Edella and Raskin and have the latter swim into one of the guard towers to silence a guard and enter the structure through the tower.
Invisible, Raskin swam forward, coming up behind the unaware Sahuagin with Onyx Razor in hand.
In two swift moves Raskin had fallen upon the creature and stabbed it in what passed for lungs and slit it’s throat. Unfortunately, the Sahuagin in the nearby tower seemed to be looking in the direction of the tower and would soon spot Raskin, who had become visible after slaying the sentry. Spotting this, Opal, who had taken the form of a water elemental, swam with amazing speed into the other tower, slamming the Sahuagin guard into the wall and pummeling him to death. Unfortunately, down the nearby stairs and deeper into the structure, Opal heard two creatures conversing urgently in a language he did not speak. It seemed the stealth approach might not be able to continue…
DM’s Notes : Although current events with the Titan, a submersible that seemed to somehow be a worse deathtrap than the Underwatershipthat glidesthroughthewaterlikeabrickpronetocatchingfirebutwillonedaydoitlikeanentirelynon-flammablefishormaybeeel, occurred right around the time I ran this adventure, I would like it known that I had this adventure written well before I knew about the doomed submersible.
As for our heroes, the stealth option might be off the table very soon if they don’t act fast and get lucky. Let’s hope they have a plan B!
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