The team had decided that the best course of action now was to go pursue a new lead Enigma had brought back. Ismark, a City Watch Captain and a member of the Lord's Alliance, had figured out that Vevette Blackwater had apparently been arrested in the Dock Ward after being cornered by Xanathar's Thieves Guild thugs. During the confrontation, a City Watch patrol lead by Captain Hyustus Staget - which struck the Lord's Alliance members as odd as Staget was unable to be reached for the past few days - had captured the survivors. Ismark, like Jalester, had assumed that Staget was simply busy cracking down on the Black Network (and rightly so, as the Dock Ward was the most dangerous area of Waterdeep), but had asked Enigma to go investigate. The location was the Honorable Courthouse, located near the Honorable Knight statue, appropriately enough. Heading there, the team discovered that indeed, Vevette Blackwater had been incarcerated for assault and disturbing the peace. She was being held for questioning and was apparently being interrogated by the Captain himself, right now. However, the courthouse clerk wasn't being terribly cooperative until Enigma showed his membership within the Lord's Alliance and managed to convince the clerk to meet with the local magister of the courthouse, Hester Barch, a much older, yet stern woman. Enigma tried to explain in a roundabout way that they needed to speak with Vevette Blackwater about something important, but Magister Barch wasn't having it, and told him to 'get to the point', as she wasn't going to let just anyone, not even Lord's Alliance members, interrupt her proceedings without due cause. He had explained about the Stone of Golorr and its importance to her - without exactly explaining that it lead to the Vault of Dragons. Magister Barch studied Enigma closely - almost as if she was seeing right into his mind - and relented, convinced that he was telling the truth. She lead the team to the holding cells, where they met their old 'friends', Losser Mirklav (the halfling necromancer), Raisha (the minotaur working for Xanathar), Urlaster and Volkarr (Losser's hapless henchmen) and finally Vevette, currently being interrogated by Staget. When Barch told him to step aside, he complained that he wasn't finished, but she said that members of the Lord's Alliance were here and it was of the utmost importance. Annoyed, Staget showed himself out, letting the team take the floor. Speaking with her proved to be fruitless, though - she wasn't going to tell them much of anything without striking some kind of deal. However, she did let slip that Staget had been asking her about the Stone too, which is unusual as the Stone's importance wasn't exactly public knowledge, not even among Watch officials. The team had wondered how Staget had come across this information... As Vevette was proving to be difficult, and the team wasn't budging much on cutting a deal with her, Barch stepped in, and asked the team to 'let her try something', having her personal bodyguard knight escort her to her magister chambers. The team waited outside... but realized that Staget was nowhere to be seen. The nearby guard informed them that Staget had headed outside. Perhaps a smoke break? However, he was nowhere to be found... uh oh! Did he somehow find the stone's location? Barch eventually returned, and sent Vevette back to her cell, and let the team know that what they seek is in an old tower on the east side of the city, and provided them the location. Ray suspected that Magister Barch might have some hidden ability to read the thoughts of others, which would prove to be an incredibly effective interrogation tactic - and wondered if Hyustus had the same. Scary! However, she also noted something else, when she had approached Staget - that he did not seem to be who she thought he was, and was suspicious of his intent. When she learned that he had left the courthouse, and the team realized that Staget may not appear to be the upstanding Watchman he appeared to be, the team quickly bid farewell with Barch's blessing and left the courthouse, Enigma throwing a platinum the way of a dray driver to fling them across town at top speed! However, Staget was nowhere to be found on the way, nor was he at the tower. The team approached the dilapidated building - it looked like it might have been a wizard's tower at some point. Yuan, not wanting to wait around, kicked down the metal door with one mighty stroke, and the team began to storm the place. They could hear muffled talking upstairs, and there was also a downstairs. The room was covered in dirt from disuse, which happened to leave perfect footprints to follow, which went downstairs. Alone for the moment, they explored the cellar of the tower, and found a space that looked like it had been lived in a bit - a table with playing cards, some barrels for chairs, and several crates. There was also a very heavily fortified door, which was locked, and between Sigurd and Enigma's efforts, they were able to pick the door open... and inside was a teleportation circle. It was wondered who might be using this, and not wanting to take any chances, Yuan decided to erase the circle to prevent anyone else from using it. Ray noted that the dirty footprints that came down here, seemed to disappear into thin air... and Enigma found a dead naked guy in a box! He looked like he had been beaten to dead, hard. Sigurd put these clues together and surmised that Staget, or whoever is posing as him, came down here for some purpose, beat up this man, and stole his clothes, also for unknown reason. They didn't have all the pieces of the puzzle, but something strange was definitely going on here... Heading upstairs into the second floor, the team interrupted a ritual - a priestess of Bane, the god of tyranny, leading a chant around a gagged and blindfolded middle-aged man with a group of acolytes. She quickly took offense, quipped that the team does not belong here, and a fight broke out! The evil priestess broke out a powerful incantation, covering the room in fiendish Spirit Guardians, which hampered the team's movement and damaged them constantly. She had to be eliminated quickly, or the team would be overwhelmed. Making things more difficult were a collection of winged snakes hiding in the rafters and one particular acolyte who seemed to stand out from the rest, who were flinging cantrips at the party. Ray shut down all of that with a Silence spell, making the fight a bit easier, but found himself having to defend from multiple angles of attack. Enigma was able to eliminate a good number of the opposition alongside Yuan and Sigurd as the team fought for their lives. Eventually, the priestess and her acolytes were defeated, and the remaining acolyte, who was using his fists instead of a club, decided that he had enough - especially after being blasted by Sigurd's gun - and attempted to flee, weirdly contorting his body through an arrow slit in an attempt to escape. Enigma was slim enough to give chase and managed to corner him outside while Sigurd used his metallic breath weapon to incapacitate the enemy briefly before finishing him off with a well placed spear throw, taking him out, and revealing him for the threat he truly was - a doppelganger!? The form was grotesque and monstrous, a hairless alien-like being. Perhaps this was Staget's true form all along... Returning to the tower, Ray searched the body of the priestess, and found a few things. One was a note from "M" explaining that he will meet with her at Yellowspire (the name of the tower) on the 10th of Eleasis to claim the stone. Ray had then found the grand prize - The Stone of Golorr! Finally. He had slipped it quietly into a pocket as he freed the old man from his bindings, who revealed himself to be Shien Chen, a writer for the Targe broadsheet. Apparently, the acolytes of Bane had kidnapped him and been trying to subjugate him and break his will to force him to write papers that spread tyranny and fear, as information control was the main objective of the leader of the whole thing. Manshoon. It was true. Manshoon, the man who supposedly died in a cloning accident, the original creator of the Zhentarim over two hundred years ago, a ruthless, calculating wizard and possibly Lif's murderer, was here in Waterdeep. Chen also explained that Manshoon was supposed to arrive via a teleportation circle to pick up some kind of object from the priestess. However, that ended up not happening - thanks to the inadvertent genius of Yuan scratching away the teleportation circle downstairs. The team had accidentally avoided a major fight with a deadly foe! Sigurd pointed out that the team should vacate the premises immediately, as if Manshoon was on his way here, it would spell big trouble, especially if he knew that his main method of transport had been destroyed. However, he'd need to get here on foot now, which would take way longer - giving plenty of time for the team to escape. They freed Chen from his prison who was glad for the party's help and parted ways. Back at the Song and Spirit, the team now had a decision to make... They are the only ones who know they have the Stone - for now. Sigurd explained that the Stone was the only known key for figuring out how to open the Vault of Dragons, where Dagult Neverember, previous Open Lord, had hidden away his embezzled funds to retrieve later, and also to reclaim the priceless Waterdhavian artifact, the Dragonstaff of Ahghairon, which allowed dragons it touched to bypass the dragonward of the city freely, among other things. In order to learn this information, though, the team had to pick someone to attune to the stone... Who would have the honor? What might happen from here? Is there anybody trustworthy that they could tell about the Stone...? Find out next time... on Waterdeep: Dragon Heist!