New Crew

The party's failure to return to the Spessartite capital did not go unnoticed. The Marshal hired two trackers to find the four missing party members. The first was an elf paladin who was hired to train special operations forces in the Spessartite Army. The second was Captain Nahiko who had transported the party on mission in the Goblin Isles. The two tracked the party to somewhere in the border region of the Ganudikadvo colony and the Fur Dwarf Nation. The to docked at the Crescent City and travelled to the frontier.

The party spent a year among the dark elves who sheltered them for the winter and from Spessartite armies. The party returned from a bison hunt one day to find two trackers in the village looking for them. Captain Nahiko explained why she came and introduced the elf paladin. The six left the village and headed east. After a week, the group stopped at a trading post- a small station surrounded by dark elf traders. A blind prophet sat with Mistahimaskwa and told him of the oncoming dangers. The message was cryptic and alarming. A great danger was coming that the group was not prepared for.

The party continued east when they encountered a slave trader's caravan. As they thought of a way to break the slaves out of their chains, bolts from crossbows flew in from the forest. Two bounty hunters emerged to explain they were tracking two wanted dwarves who were the ones leading the slave caravan. After releasing the slaves, the bounty hunters invited the party to their camp for the night.

Wake, a human, explained he had been freed by his dwarf companion from a similar slave caravan two years prior. The dwarf freed him and Wake became his deputy. Wake further explained he has a wife somewhere in the south lands of the Fur Dwarf Nation and he and the other bounty hunter were headed to free her from the plantation.

The next morning, the party left the two bounty hunters and continued east. They crossed the Father of Waters when the rainy season hit and prevented them from leaving. They acquainted themselves with the congregation of a new temple dedicated to the end of slavery on Turtle Island. Just as the rainy season ended- nearly a month after arriving at the fort- Wake rode quickly into the town. He reported his companion had been killed at the plantation where his wife is being held. The two were ambushed by vampires, and even though the pair slew eleven vampires between them, Wake was still overcome and barely escaped with his life. The party agreed to help and the seven bought a raft and headed down river.

The party traveled south down the Father of Waters, a massive river that cut the Fur Dwarf lands in half. Wake told the party about the history of the nation since its successful revolution against the Spessartites. He told them about the enslavement of humans, and why vampires are such an issue.

"The vampires are farming humans," Wake explained. "And using slavery as a mask. During the day, they work the slaves in cotton fields, but they never sell the cotton. The vampires buy the weak and old slaves for cheap, then raise them like livestock to feed on them down the road."

The party arrived outside the plantation at night. Wake busted in through the front door, sending five vampires to true death before charging into the heart of the plantation house in search of his wife. The rest of the party battled with the vampires in the parlor. They killed two, but eight more continued to hammer the party. Bonastre himself was nearly killed in the battle. Ruban created a wall of fire that greatly damaged the fiends as the fight raged. Finally, Ruban set an explosive and the party retreated in hopes that Wake and his wife had left the building.

The plantation house exploded in fire as Captain Nahiko helped the greatly wounded Bonastre to safety. Wake emerged from the flames with his wife in his arms. She had been turned into a vampire. Wake slew the vampire that had become his wife, briefly thanked the party for their assistance, then rode off into the night.

The party members convinced the two trackers to also ignore the Spessartite charter to accompany them on their quest to find the origin of the Warehouse and the magic behind the force watching them. They headed to the Crescent City, boarded Captain Nahiko's ship and sailed off in defiance of the Spessartites.