Blood Moon - 01 " A New Adventure Begins!"

Well, despite a TPK the last time around, we're all back for another try at Aeranos. This time we have our good friend Brady at the keyboard, telling the tale from his character's point of view...



Erstwhile, our plucky band of mis-adventurers had found themselves thrown through space (and perhaps time) into the inky black heart of an eldritch cavern, wherein, under the illumination of a single torch, they observed a murder.

Or perhaps an accidental death, but either way, there were a dead Orokan shaman bleedin on the floor.
( yes, this sentence, and perhaps a score more to follow, use irregular grammar, end-jambed rhyme, and the occasional lovecraftian adjective.
This is working as intended.)

There in the tenebrous halls, the ichorous contents of the shaman's organs warbled and oozed their way to the edges of a circle delved into the rough cavern floor.

"Bloody feckin christ!" exclaimed Famous Jim, our pirate incognito.

He noted in his immediate vicinity a fairly hot Syvani woman, an Orokan goth girl, a hugely muscled reject from the Argosian fighting pits, and a man who had very obviously been made as his mirror image.

Quite disturbed by this prospect, our plucky hero immediately shifted his mighty mind into his biceps, and thus strengthened, snubbed out the blood-filled circle – lest its eldritch magics further discombobulate his new-found crew.

"Waky-wakey, eggs & bakey!" Said Jim, ( who our readers may remember is actually the dread pirate Fathakk Burjinn, of the house Burjinn; and a more rascally, vicious scurve the Nine Seas have never since known!)

The new-found crew, however, were already awake, and seemingly unaware of their new employer-employee relationships.

Most took up a defensive position, some fiddling with magics, some with weapons, one with a very obviously dead (ish) Orokkan. Through the guttural, klingonian speech, Fath (Jim) was able to make out:
"Not....Swans? .......Feck."

Retreating to the shadows, Jim attempted to go through the pockets of the bleeding shaman, but was met with consternation and disapproving scowls. Thus is the result of lootery during an emergency first-aid attempt. Noting screams and sounds of battle from further down the grobbulous cavern's depths, Jim and his crew left the Orokkan goth girl to play with her new shaman doll's dead spirit. Needing light, and not wanting to create a steady target should there be foes ahead, Jim gifted one of the Syvanni's arrows with a mage glimmer, which produced yet another look a consternation, this one a bit stronger than the last.

Rounding the corner, the crew met with a cavern opening into the night air, and a hail of arrows. A lone Orokkan perched behind the rocky cliff-edge and returned fire to unseen foes below. The Syvanni woman ( Whose name turned out to be Rowan... go figure, bloody elves.) ran to the ledge & plopped down next to the Orokkan & began to open fire into the unidentified brigands below.
Being of a somewhat inquisitive nature, our hero gifted himself with an uncanny ability to leap vast distances, and launched over the cliff-face; nimbly dodging down through arrow fire and hurled ire, to land behind whatever villains might be found there.
"Halloo!" he quipped, while relieving a villain of his need for hat, helmet, or haircut. Bloody hot ichor splashed across Fathakk's visage as he lunged towards his next victim.
Said victim turned out to be a freakin huge Orrokan warrior, who was angry both at having his friend's blood all over him, and that a measly little twerp in a very tattered cloak seemed to be the culprit.
With a parry and a thrust and an acrobatic kick to the brave's mid-section, Fath was on his way down the hill when he realized there was a spear hurtling through the air towards his face. Plucking said spear from the air, he found himself engaged with two Orokkan braves, both of which outweighed him by a good fifty-stone.

Lucky for our hapless hero, the newly acquired pirate crew was also in the process of descending the cliff-face, and handily routed the Orok horse lords. Handily, at the same time, a princess was saved via a long bow-shot and a prayer, and a prince reunited with her via some rope and an unconscious abductor. The day roundly was saved.


/To be continued.../