The Collective - Session 12

This is the twelfth session in The Collective campaign and the third in the On the Road Again storyline of the The Dwarven Sword arc. Player feedback ranks this session at an 8.00.

Notable Events

 * Badger and Gorrn learned of the necromancer's ability to return from the dead, defeating him with his own sacrificial dagger and taking it with them.
 * The duo brought Trin, Gnorbitt, and Roscoe out of the mines and to safety.
 * The duo met a man named Lieutenant Clifford, a member of Belvast's militia, and learned of his association with Knight-Captain John Harris during the Human-Orcish War.
 * The duo learned of Roscoe's upcoming performance and prepared to cover for him, with Badger assuming the role of "Doscoe", an upper-body double of Roscoe.
 * Astrid learned of Badger's Changeling heritage.

Summary
TUESDAY, AUGUST 1, 1000: After defeating the necromancer, Gnorbitt and Roscoe succumbed to their wounds and fell unconscious, unable to continue fighting. The door sealing the entrance to the room opened once more and Gorrn picked up the two and brought them to Badger, where he explained what had happened. While the two rested, they began to feel tremors in the ground and the stomping of some terrible creature echoing from the now dark room in which the necromancer was defeated. They both hid, and watched in horror as the necromancer's corpse stood before them, covered in an assorted armor of rotting flesh and bone, a behemoth twice the size of his original form.

Gorrn and Badger, after sustaining heavy damage from the behemoth, managed to defeat it by plunging the sacrificial dagger used by the necromancer to kill Roscoe back into it, draining the unholy power from it. In his death throes, the necromancer spat out cryptic threats about the party's future after having interfered with his mistress before finally dying, crumbling into dust not unlike Kosvir's clones in Paradeen. Badger taste tested it just to make sure.

Victorious, they left the mines, carrying Roscoe, Gnorbitt (who was, at this point, naked and covered in soot and coal dust), and Trin. They soon encountered one Lieutenant Clifford of the Belvast militia and learned of his relationship with Knight-Captain John Harris during their shared time in the war. Clifford provided to them a small reward for helping to secure the mines, then allowed them to return to the circus. Along the way, they encountered many fliers advertising Roscoe's performance that night, and when they arrived at the circus, events were already in full swing. The injured party members were brought to Badger's infirmary tent, while Gorrn went off to go find food before joining the clowns, and Badger stripped Roscoe and assumed his form (only the top half; Roscoe's torso on beefy, regular legs). Astrid inconveniently walked in on Badger doing this and learned of his true identity as a Changeling, prompting Badger to threaten violence if she revealed this to anyone else. She agreed to keep it a secret and brought Badger (now wearing Roscoe's clothing and a cloak) to Frederick to prepare for the performance.