Session Log 2023-08-03

With the soldiers routed and their leaders taken down, the party recollected their equipment. Wondering at the point of the Torch's overwrought, unprompted, and futile betrayal, they decided to interrogate Captain Avraza. The elf was lightly treated with Ignis's healing liquer and awakened. He came to his senses disarmed, alone, and within the clutches of Klaitos.

Ignis demanded straight answers upon pain of death, and threatened to confirm those answers with the next officer. Avraza conceded to the credible threats of the party and admitted he'd probably be treating them the same in the same circumstances.

He told the party that he and the lieutenants were not the legitimate Torch militia, but a faction of mutineers that had siezed territorial control of the warehouses and hangar in order to hoard supplies for the siege. He confessed to little knowledge of the state of the city, except the two undead dragons downing most airships that dared fly. He guessed that a good number of citizens had probably died in the collapse of social order, but there hadn't been any reports of undead within the city walls.

The party decided that they had gotten sufficient answers out of Avraza and found him personally repellent, so Klaitos reiterated smashing the elf unconscious against the wall. Ignis then awoke Lieutenant Torrix, purging the poisons from the dwarf's bloodstream with liberal healing ale. He was grouchy to have lost such an unsporting brawl, but seemed to take the turned tables in relative stride.

He affirmed Avraza's claims about the city, including the general disinterest in the welfare of its citizens. The party asked if he'd want to help them out, but he was wary of trusting the lead of dirty fighters like them. They explained were on a mission that'd involve lots of fights and a better chance of getting out alive than following Avraza into the wall. Weighing his various self-interests, he decided they had a point.

Torrix noted that the halls were empty of guards because those guards were likely pillaging the warehouse stockpiles. The party raced out the warehouse plaza and saw, as the Lieutenant had described, soldiers and ragged citizens running in all directions to secure whatever supplies they could carry. Robin's Bracelet of Greed tug weakly at the vanishing stockpile.

Ignis assumed a commander's demeanor, as he was taught to in his military education, and shouted the riot to a halt. He told them that the mutiny was over, and to return to their positions for further orders. The already-routed soldiers complied with the orders of the people who had just defeated their bosses. A small group attempted to slip away while Ignis's reprimanding attention was elsewhere. They were carrying something distinctly valuable to Robin's sensory magic.

They were cornered before they could escape into the shadowy, overcast streets of Golarth by Robin, disguised as a Torch officer. She reiterated that the mutiny was over, and demanded they drop their plunderings and return to duty. They returned the food they had stolen, and a large high-quality shield with the crest of Lord Arva's House Siroon.

The party was able to restore the order that the mutineers had achieved, albeit with significantly less of the original stockpiles and with significantly more desertions. The party considered the dragons to be the biggest obstacle in any sort of rescue, and decided to go check if they could fight them with the great ballistae mounted to the top of the Golarth walls. They left Torrix in charge of the warehouse guard, promising him they'd return when they had somewhere violent to go.

The party climbed twenty flights of stairs to the top of the wall. The overcast sky hung low and quiet above them, smothered by the Umbra of the Gray Steps. Ekkels stared out over the city. The view was bleak - a battlefield of crashed ships and damaged structures, makeshift barriers, and active fires. His gaze travelled east, and he spied a figure or group running between the ash-spattered factories of Sootcorner.

Klaitos set about studying the ballista, but its elaborate and heavy-duty construction was beyond his tinkerer's reckoning. He wasn't sure how well it'd necessarily serve at range, and noticed only a dozen or so bolts left to reload - other had been wasted, pinning still-twitching undead to the ground below. He and Ignis wanted to figure out a means by which to set the drier, older dragon corpses aflame using the ballista. Setting the bolts aflame might work, but might damage both bolt and ballista, depending on their ability to reason their way through ballistic physics.

Robin, ignored the sky and the city in favor of a far more important goal - a way down that didn't involve stairs. She found an elevator shaft, its carraige devoid of the requisite operator on the ground below. She broke into the gate and rappelled down the pulley, then courteously reactivated the elevator to return and collect the party.