About 20 minutes after your Nano Tutorial for Far Realm Dummies, you exited the lock-up cage area and were immediately confronted by a loud alarm of some sort and a strange metal lady. She was definitely not human though about the same basic dimensions as a human female. Obviously from the metal skin it was some type of construct / golem though a highly advanced type no one had even seen before. She politely asked that the stolen items be returned or you would be terminated. The group decided that was not going to happen and Tess was going to "return" her item from the pointy end forward. Despite its somewhat ominous appearance this particular construct seemed to be malfunctioning in some way as it was not a particularly effective combatant (DM Dice were rusty from 2 weeks of non-use rolling terribly). Nano's description of the Vibroblade was on point (pun intended) and the item effortlessly sliced through the metal skin of the construct much easier than expected. The group went to work on the robot and in short order its head was toppled over and dangling while it was sparking, twitching, and malfunctioning. After seeing if it was salvageable for super-awesomeo far realm tech (nope!) they moved on backtracking towards the stairs down. After descending one floor they arrived in a common area that seemed to be used as a makeshift armory, mess hall / dining area, and latrine. (potty) Some quick (and poor) investigation revealed the areas to be mainly empty, which they were not, so Tess and Sana tried the east door quickly finding the latrine. Some poor militia guy was quite literally caught with his pants down. Embarassed by not only one person, but two people, and two -women- the guy just about died of a heart attack when they burst in. They both laughed their way back out while the poor fellow protested that he was really rethinking signing up for this job if he knew this was going to be how things were. The snooped around the armory looking for more goodies but finding nothing of merit, and then finally opened the door to the south where noises of crunching and slurping were heard. This turned out to be zombies gnawing on giant rats which is rather disgusting. Vitallis (Captain Undead Slayer) of course had to charge in with the ole "die foul beast!" and surprisingly actually handily dispatched one by simply removing its head from its shoulders. The rest of the group crushed in towards the cramped doorway. Vaughn quickly came in as well and released his turning ability to send the zombies scrambling away. Uriel wanted to try the sonic shotgun so tried a shot through several compatriots, having just picked up the weapon an hour ago he wasn't familiar enough to strike true so the shot went a bit wide and hit Tess in the back knocking her into a table instead. Sana took that opportunity to step into the space Tess use to be in and burninate the entire room setting all the zombies aflame at once with a stroke of luck since the zombies were in an almost perfect cone shaped area. Arlin was flinging firebolts as well as Sana just plinking away at the burning zombies, some hitting, some missing. About that time the two fellas in the mess hall heard the commotion and ran out the door the first one literally just about running into the 8ft tall hybrid form of Valeros. Shock on his face didn't last long as the guy was nearly eviscerated with two quick swipes from Valeros. His buddy behind him was offered 2 seconds to drop that spear or join his friend, after some quick internal negotiation he decided to NOPE! as he was a farmer that had just signed up for this duty recently. The rest of the zombies were finished off and the cowering farmer / militia man told the group what little he knew about what lied below and the involvement of the upper ranks of the Churchians with what happens in the basement levels. The group feeling they had learned most of what they could started to backtrack towards the ladder headed downward. Right about that time they saw Vitallis carrying Mr Poopypants in the air with his pants still sitting in the other room, naked from the waist down and feeling a little "cold" (LOL) Vitallis carried him into the mess hall so he could see the other dead guy. He started another 'interrogation' session that he seems to have some experience with in his role as Chief Investigator of Chiefly Investigating. After nearly making more poopy wondering who these psychopaths that pulled him off the toilet were when he clearly said "let me finish!" when disturbed the first time, Vitallis was finally satisfied he knew nothing. Sana was kind enough to fetch a shield from the armory to cover his junk likely as much for the group as for the guy. ;-) It seems the entire thing happened because Vitallis had heard a rumor the guy was actually Tywin Lannister a ruler of ancient legend who was so rich it was said he actually shit gold bricks like another rumored fairy creature that could spin gold out of straw. The group now understood why Vitallis had so traumatized and violated this poor guy, because the guy had shouted after the girls left him feeling awkward and stressed "I don't make enough gold for this!" which Vitallis heard as "I MAKE (shit?) GOLD", at least now, the mystery had been solved. Phew.... lucky for that poor guy and the group had some deep insight into how 'Investigation' works! The Chief Investigator of Chiefly Investigating, work and mission accomplished, felt confident with the following conclusion of his hard work and insight: After passing around massive amounts of hand sanitizer to scrub both their bodies and minds of the incident the group proceeded down the vertical shaft using the ladder. Almost directly at the bottom half a dozen "people" were discovered in a small northern chamber with tubes of all manner protruding from them. They were crucified upside down, and 'alive' in the loosest sense of the word. The eerie purple glowing tubes protruding from them supplying energy to "something" in the middle of a dimly lit blue pool of liquid to the south visible through a portcullis. After some quick mental calculus they figured out these batteries were the same ones powering the spelljamming ship that crashed. Arlin feeling plucky and overly brave for some reason decided to test fate by pressing the source crystals up to the metal plates on the chests of the poor human batteries. They immediately expired and the crystal was glowing with newly charged humming power. Wanting to once again dance with the devil Arlin was going to press the already charged crystal again sensing some deep found calling to the woods and the lifestyle of a ranger, but thought better of it at the last minute. They quickly mercy killed the remaining batteries and thereby shut off the power to "whatever" in the pool. Some more fumbling around revealed a locked gate. Tess picked the lock but nearly caught a poisoned xbow bolt with her face. She made a mental note that checking for traps may be something worth doing in the future. This was a holding and prison area and all three of the prisoners from the previous night were held here. They managed to free them all, mission accomplished! Sort of... Queeqeg the poor kobold who had suffered mightily under the Churchians and the Raiders before them pointed out a secret door the Confessor himself used (guy in the funny hat). Opening the door they entered the room where the charged fluid sat around a raised platform with an impossibly smooth 7 foot tall metal cylinder. Vaughn, against all reasoning, decided to go for a swim in the nano-statically active electrolytic milk, because why not? What could go wrong?! Thankfully for him, he made his save so suffered only paralysis instead of being de-molecularized by the nanites into his constituent parts. Uriel jumped Arlin and Queeqeg who wanted to look at the SHINY! up close too over to the raised dais. Arlin still feeling the unshakeable pull and "call of the wild" and the forest decided to YOLO and put his hand on the side of the metal object. It immediately seemed to 'break' some holding field that had been in place the entire structure of the cylinder became unstable and the metal liquified. Sensing danger Arlin was lucky enough (like Vaughn) to be able to quickly pull his hand away, Uriel seeing this as well lept back over out of harms away. Poor Queeqeg who wasn't really paying attention was immediately snatched from feet to to torso into the cylinder's interior. His little head poking out in terror his parting and final words were- "But why??" and with that he was absorbed into the cylinder. The object started undergoing incredible and rapid changes with the metal taking a vaguely humanoid shape and growing in size. The final creature resembled Queeqeg's MUCH bigger and meaner older brother. Queeqeg v1.0 was 2.5 ft tall. Queeqeg v2.0 was 7 feet tall. The other AI introduced itself as 'AM'. It thanked its liberators who were unsure of its intentions, it almost amusingly explained that if its intentions were hostile they'd be dead already. Given the creature was able to nanomorph some Far Realm armour and weaponry as well as radically modifying Queeqeg's genetic material there was probably some weight behind the statement. It explained it had a seething hatred for those that had imprisoned it here and forced it to do their bidding. It also expressed no love at all for inferior 'meatbags', with their stink, sweat, and fragile flesh. But it would make an exception for the group who freed it. It opened a top hatch with a vertical shaft that went up 5 floors all the way to the bell tower where the focus crystal had been and rocketed out of the area with the ominous " Three days" meaning it would be ready for whatever and contact the group at that time. (presumably). As a happy coincidence, this also gave the group a potential quick exit if they could make their way to the top. They had to make a plan as it was obvious that "AM" was no true friend at all and simply 'the enemy of my enemy' as it were. There appeared to now be 3 factions of influence in the land. Strahd (the incumbent), the Churchians (though they had just been dealt a tremendous blow to their power by removal of their biggest toy), and said toy who had been freed from captivity with vengeance and murder on its rather impressively large / powerful mind. So, rock, paper, scissors, or what? Who knows...
