Log7th Sea: The Search for Salvation-2012/12/06-Jason-1

Game log for the 2012/12/06 session of 7th Sea: The Search for Salvation, as taken by Jason

29 Octavus

Janisse arrives and immediately realizes what we need. She's just barely able to stabilize Antonia, but that doesn't get her out of the woods, since she got those gaping wounds in a sewer. Infection poses a serious risk here. Janisse then asks whether we're heading down there again. Not tonight. No, sir.

In the morning, Reginald goes to the Explorer's Society to see if they can refer a doctor. Reginald also looks for and finds a diagram for a device meant to spring traps, involved in a weighted barrel on a yoke. He borrows Claude to go shopping for supplies to make such a device.

A couple hours after Reginald left, there's a knock on the door. It's not the gendarme, it's the doctor arriving. OK, not The Doctor, just your local medical professional. He's a wizened old dude who gives Janisse a nod as he sees her, and she greets him as "Martin." He checks her out and doesn't really see any major areas for improvement over Janisse's work. He does prescribe some medicine. The scar will of course be epic. As Martin says, "With a dress on, she'll still be pretty." Meanwhile, Léon uses his mojo to make sure that his mother is prepared to take the boys in. An hour later, she confirms that she's happy to help. We ask to see if they'd like to get out of town now and have Antonia follow when she's well, but they prefer to stay with their sister.

That night, we return to the sewers. Reginald suggests that we might avoid traps by going right to one of the patrolled areas, but that means fighting musketeers. That could go poorly for us in terms of both combat damage and an alarm getting out. Felix thinks it likely that anyone we meet would be open to a bribe, but if we can't afford it, or they're not honestly corrupt, the whole plan could still screw us harshly. Best to take our chances with the traps.

As we head for the sewers, Reginald's contraption draws some admiring looks from people who think he's got a really clever way to move barrels. Janisse once again dumps blood in a different part of the sewer to draw the ghouls away. Our marching order is Nikolai, Reginald, Benito, Léon, Claude, Felix. We move along smoothly enough until the barrel runs over a pressure plate that collapses the roof into the barrel, burying it. Oops. Reginald takes the lead now, since he's best at spotting traps.

Official note: On the 29th of Octavus, 1668, Reginald announced, "We'll be fine."

We dig our way past the rock fall. We notice the water level dropping, and then Nikolai and Claude both think they hear gunfire. We decide to avoid the area where that gunfire happened. As the ground continues to rise, we hear a hollow, rushing sound from ahead. There's also a hole in the floor of the tunnel, and when we look through it, we can see a lot of water, a long way down. We have the tools to check the soundness of the floor, so we just more carefully around the hole. As the other members of the party investigate the hole, Felix stays back to make sure we aren't being followed, and hears more gunfire. Bad stuff is going on. And then, we come to a door.

We go through the door and the next chamber is brightly lit. We hear gunfire from inside somewhere. Yowza. We begin trying to edge around to investigate without exposing ourselves unnecessarily. As we draw nearer, the veterans recognize the sound of volley fire. We also hear weird noises, snarls, etc. This is a pitchedbattle. Benito sees freakishly fast figures moving. And then we hear "fire at will!" Yeah. We need to find a different vector. Of the several that went past, one comes back. Then it comes running toward us. Benito fires past Nikolai but misses. Felix moves up to try to cover Nikolai's left, while Reginald moves back. Felix fires a pistol and misses, allowing the monster to to melee range of Nikolai. Nikolai swats it with his axe but it's all over him. Felix fires his other pistol but the thing's insane thrashing makes it too hard a target at close range. Léon steps up and skewers it, delivering a wound that would have killed a normal man. Since this thing is already dead, that doesn't stop it. Nikolai hammers it again and this time it seems to feel it. Benito slices deep into one leg, which doesn't seem to disturb it as much as one might hope, but should slow it down. Léon runs it through, although it refuses to be slowed down. Benito cuts for the other leg but can't connect. Felix assumes back stance. Léon stabs at it one more time but can't keep up with.

Nikolai swings hard and does some damage, enough that it feels it. Felix strikes from backward stance and finishes the damage Nikolai had started, cutting up from the rip cage through the spine and shoulder. It stops moving and thrashing. The eyes, however, keep glowing until Nikolai crushes its head.

Nikolai orders us to fall back behind the door. We secure the door and reload. We can still hear the fighting, though, and Léon and Benito can't just sit here and let other men get killed by zombies. Benito waffles a bit while Reginald argues for staying out of it, but in the end he can't resist and he says we should go. Nikolai immediately obeys.

As we head toward the shooting, ghouls see us, with two headed our way. The musketeers are continuing to fight, with people behind them pounding on a door, trying to get out. That's a bad sigh. Also there's a glossy floating black orb at the top of the dome. Whoa.

We move out into the walkway to meet the ghoul attack, so that we can just knock them over the side into the water instead of having to kill them to death. Felix barks out a hasty set of battle orders to keep us from getting tangled up in close quarters. As the first ghoul arrives, Nikolai times his counter perfectly and knocks it directly off the platform. The second one tries to leap on to Nikolai but he sidesteps. Felix meets the charge of the second ghoul with a slightly twisted strike from high stance that knocks the second ghoul over the rail after the first.

As we catch our breath, Léon notices that the non-Musketeers above are dressed like academics. Perhaps a study of the conditions down here ran into Balrogs. Reginald looks around for his hat but doesn't see it. He also notices a Musketeer working on what appears to be a grenado, although he doesn't recognize it as such. We begin running to help out while trying to look out for ghouls heading our way. At that point we transition to mass combat rules.

Benito gets heavily engaged and takes a dramatic wound but earns six Reputation points. Reginald, in the reserve, gets a reputation point. Nikolai, heavily engaged, takes a dramatic wound and earns six reputation points. Léon, heavily engaged, gets a dramatic wound and 6 rep. Claude, heavily engaged and struggling to protect his charge, takes two dramatic wounds. Felix gets six reputation points and just a few scratches. As the tide begins to turn in our favor, we regroup a bit. Benito gets four more rep points and not a scratch. Reginald spots a fallen Musketeer and drags him free of the fray, getting him an extra 5 rep points. Nikolai gets more 5 more rep and no serious damage. He stands like a rock against the ghoul onslaught, allowing none to pass. Léon helps shift Claude to safety and four rep points but suffers a dramatic wound. Felix charges from behind Nikolai's wall and breaks the ghoul "line", earning 5 rep points but taking a dramatic wound. Benito kills the last ghoul and picks up an extra 2 rep points for finishing off the battle with style.

We get ourselves together, Léon carrying an unconscious Claude. The Musketeers begin chopping heads off, though some few of them try to hold us at swordpoint. The officer who had the grenado comes over, blows out his taper, and asks, "Lost?"