#soundstone

“THE CHOSEN FOUR” (2017)

June 27 (Saturday Evening)

Fresh from their shenanigans at Stout Manor, Norm, Lucky, and Q head back from whence they came. Kalani is playing with their new mask and serving as the party's lookout gnome/plant. An acorn flies through the air and smacks into Norm's head from across the street. There's a man standing there who Norm recognizes as another undercover officer with the constabulary. The officer nods his head toward a dead drop location in a storm drain and walks off.

Norm saunters over to the storm drain and pulls out a flyer advertising Salem's, the rich person's magic store. The flyer is wrapped around a brick and the only clues are these: the word "meeting" on the back of the flyer, and the word "NOW" carved into the brick. Norm goes back to the party and announces that it's quitting time and heads off to Salem's alone.

The rest of the party agree and split up for the night to go about their various personal errands. Lucky opts to hone her cooking skills to impress Hilaria with food that remains unexploded when consumed. Lady Jangles makes an unexpected appearance with a curious wearable contraption that she would like Lucky to test. Jangles calls it the Mizzium apparatus and needs someone to test it who is experienced with chaotic energies, mostly because the apparatus has a tendency of behaving... unexpectedly. Lucky agrees to be the test subject.

Kalani goes off to play with Skara in the meantime, while Q heads back to their place to get cleaned up and maybe hit a show at a tavern. We'll get back to these fine adventurers in a moment, but their activities are about to be unpleasantly interrupted. For now, though, let us turn our attention to Norm Nimblebottom who is walking alone toward an unknown meeting.

Norm takes a winding route toward Salem's, periodically checking to make sure he is not being followed. He walks into a Salem's just as the proprietor (the eponymous Salem DuVernay) is preparing to close up for the evening. Norm tries to gain access to whatever secret meeting is being held by putting the flyer down on the counter, but this isn't the invitation that Salem requires. Norm tries to intimidate Salem to let him into the meeting, but Salem finds the intimidation endearing and mistakes it for flirtation. Salem offers to set up another, different meeting tomorrow, provided Norm brings a bagel with grape jelly tomorrow morning.

It's time for a different plan of action, and Norm tries to subdue Salem by exploiting pressure points. Norm goes for the neck, but the difference in their respective heights makes estimating distances a little tricky. The neck pinch ends up turning into a Purple Nurple. But there's no time for awkwardness as the town's alarm bells begin to toll.

Kalani is the first to feel the earthquake, as they are wandering the sewers with Skara. Something is moving through the earth itself. Lucky successfully creates a perfectly-safe-to-eat dish, but the alarms blare before she can taste test. Q manages to get a bath, but any plans after that are scrapped as the rest of the party converges on the dangerous situation near Salem's.

Small sinkholes are opening up in the area, some of which contain a large worm-like creature. Norm and Kalani aren't sure what the worm things are, but Lucky and Q know that those worms look like bigger versions of the creatures in the eggs from Outflow Station 1. Lucky creates a minor illusion of feet stomping nearby one of the worms to see if it responds to it. The worm takes the bait and lunges after the footsteps. Salem yells that everyone needs to go to the store's vault if they want to stay safe.

The vault is deep in the heart of the store, with thick stone walls etched in magical symbols. Locked strongboxes make up most of the sparse furniture in the room. Lucky asks how safe things are in here. While Salem's wares are of the safest and highest quality, he cannot vouch for the contents he stores for other people. It's full of traps and unstable magic, just the kind of stuff that should avoid contact with a wild surge.

Kalani casts find traps to see where most of the danger is. They see lots of things that might cause area of effect injuries, and a single locked box that is protected solely by an alarm spell. While Salem is securing the rest of the building, Lucky casts Mage Hand to investigate the area and try to trigger the alarm. The box doesn't open at first, so Lucky breaks out the Mizzium Apparatus and tries to cast knock. The chaotic energies of the apparatus do not cooperate entirely, and even after triggering a wild surge to gain advantage, Melf's Acid Arrow is cast instead. The damage does manage to melt the lock and open the box, though! As a side effect of the wild surge, a compass arrow appears above Lucky's head and points in a random direction.

Just for fun, the party follows the arrow out of Salem's and toward wherever it's pointing. Unfortunately for everyone, the arrow is leading straight toward Brynnan. Brynnan is running to Salem's to check on the status of the item he's storing in the alarmed box in Salem's vault. Lucky tries to cast Haste using the Mizzium Apparatus in order to beat Brynnan back to the shop, but she ends up casting Stinking Cloud on Brynnan instead.

Norm sees an opportunity to slow down Brynnan even more. He tosses a folding boat into the stinking cloud just in front of Brynnan and says the command word to turn it into a boat. The boat pops open and blocks Brynnan's progress for the moment. Meanwhile Kalani transforms into a swift panther and dashes back toward Salem's with Q in tow.

Brynnan stumbles out of the stinking cloud, and Lucky apologizes for "accidentally" targeting him with the spell. She offers him a candy as a consolation prize, but this act of generosity is a clever deception! The candy is actually one of Jangles' Fartknocker pills, and Lucky is VERY convincing. Brynnan pops the pill and gloats about having his superiority finally acknowledged.

Norm tries to retrieve his boat from the lingering cloud, but the stench is so overpowering that he is quickly overcome with assorted unpleasant bodily functions. Meanwhile, Kalani reaches the store and rushes past Salem on the way to the vault. They activate the soundstone contained in the box and hear an audio snippet of Anaxilas giving a speech in front of the whole town at the Spring Planting Festival. Anaxilas isn't feeling very well after eating some potentially bad food, and ends up having a booty blowout on stage in front of everyone. The crowd laughs and Anaxilas runs off stage in tears.

Back in the combat zone, Lucky dismisses her cloud right as Brynnan fails to hold in his own gargantuan fart. No sphincter is strong enough to contain such gastrointestinal rage and Brynnan ends up emitting another Stinking Cloud centered on himself. Brynnan is unable to avoid the consequences of such a foul smell and collapses to the ground as Lucky runs over to Norm and readies another spell.

Salem is freaking out about the sudden appearance of a panther in the vault, but Q is there to assure him that they have a way with animals and will get the panther out of the vault safely. Q makes a flashy show of entering the vault and has a discreet head-nodding conversation with Ultimate Panther Kalani about verifying what was on the soundstone. Once the stone's authenticity is verified, Q pockets the stone and leads the Definitely-Real-Panther out of the shop. As Kalani and Q make it back to the rest of the party, Lucky casts Thunder Step and teleports a short distance away with Norm, though another wild magic surge happens and makes Lucky grow 5 inches taller.

Everyone goes back to SHART HQ where Dave and Joe Longfellow are waiting. Dave is glad that the party is safe, and Joe Longfellow is eager to verify the authenticity of the object. Joe asks for some privacy as they adjourn to the soundproof "Sewer Treasures" room to listen to the stone. Once the first few words are spoken, Joe smashes the stone on the floor and declares that the mission is completed. He pays the party with a bag of cut gemstones that he definitely obtained through legitimate means as a regular common merchant and not as a famous adventurer. Joe leaves the room before Q can make Joe squirm too much more.

Once Joe leaves, the party assesses the situation. Kalani suggests repairing the stone so that it's physically intact and using the no-longer-magical stone as potential leverage with Salem, Brynnan, and Joe. Minor illusions could replicate the appearance of the recording that was destroyed by Joe. Who knows what sorts of shenanigans this party will invoke with this sort of thing!