Mutants, Murder, & Wilderness Weirdness - Olathoë' Session Report Nine

Hyperborean trade house business, petty murder, & deep wasteland exploration market tonight's game. A trade caravan is now on its way deeper into the Western Wastelands. The part is going to be passing the head quarters of a cult  operating fifty miles outside of the Outpost of the Western Wastelands in an abandon temple of the Huldra ("hidden beings") but tonight their dealing with the threat of weird wilderness happenings!

So during tonight's game the market place started to break up & the local trade houses were breaking out their sky ships & putting together their mammoths, woolly rhinos, & other giant pack mammals for the caravan into the deeper into the Western wastelands to trade with the local tribes of cave men, mutants, etc. Leaper Camels, scouts, rangers, & several flyers started scouting ahead by a couple of days whilst blue mutant tribesmen came to trade crystals with one of the trade houses. Here's where things went down hill, the PC's last game had been invited onto the trade caravan.


artwork from C. Sedwick (1 April 2008).
"What Killed the Woolly Mammoth?". PLoS Biology 6 (4): e99

The blue mutant tribesmen were there to trade with one particular trade house but things went bad quickly as the trade representative only offered a third of what was originally promised. The tribesmen left in disgust as the party's bard stepped in.

"The Aeropile." Art by H. Lanos for
"When the Sleeper Wakes" by H. G. Wells (1899)


Meanwhile the party's sky ship pilot was given the routes through the wasteland along with the trade routes along the Old Mammoth trails. Guns, heavy crossbows, and other weaponry were loaded on the howdahs of the mammoths & pack animals because  the Hyperborean traders are worried about inhuman raiders! Meanwhile the mutant traders had wounded from an attack by a pride of rogue manticores. The pride had recently been displaced by an insect cult that had moved into their old temple digs & the manticores had settled into the mutant's crystal mine as a lair! Now to comesate the price of the crystals had risen in recent months. The crystals are used in certain alchemical applications. The bard who has some clerical style healing abilities treated the mutant tribesmen while the trade representative scoffed at him back at the camp's tent city.

An accidental heavy crossbow shot impaled the trade representative! Several witnesses swore that it was truly an accident. This was the same Hyperborean trade house that wanted to ritually eat the bard last game! He of the
Huldra ("hidden beings") bloodline! That night at camp there was a ceremony & some mockery on the part of the party. But things got on their way the next day as camp broke up! About ten miles outside the bounds of the Western Wastelands outpost patrol zone the caravan got shot at by Reu''rii mutant goblin tribesmen with their poorly constructed long guns. The whole thing was more for show & counting coup but several of the Hyperborean guardsmen returned fire killing the occasional goblin tribesmen.
Outside the patrol  perimeter the night passed quickly even as several groups of mutant junk dealer tribesmen approached the sky ship landing zone for trade. They were bold, ballsy, & aiming for a deal. They got one with the skyship's pilot who trade high quality parts & junk for a quick profit.

A soldier with a plume of peacock feathers in his helmet carries a young woman home on his horse with goblins giving him directions. Engraving by Ludwig Freidrich after Eduard Steinle. Iconographic Collections
A soldier with a plume of peacock feathers in his helmet car Wellcome V0039122.jpg

The trade caravan made it outside of the patrol parameter & out of the woodland trails. They were now out in the deep grasslands where wild mammoth, saber toothed tigers, dire wolves, and worse lay in wait. Everyone in the caravan was on edge. Across the temperate grasslands scattered here & there were giant alien totem pools of inhuman carving marking unknown territories. The scouts & rangers returned to the caravan reporting a rogue manticore lying in wait for a group of cavemen! The same cavemen who had signal fires lit for the trade caravan indicating they were open for trade & commerce with the Hyperborean houses! Several of the caravan guards & adventurers are moving in to assist them!


Will the party help the tribe of cave dwellers or could this be something worse? A possible set up of a trap but unknown hostile forces? Only time will tell what intent these people have or if they will survive at all unless the claws of the manticore get them!? The party is now in the grassland wilderness where life is cheap and danger is ever present! Could this be a set up for inhuman raiders?!

What happens next week?
Tune in next week!