Aporeu chronicles Issue 75: Before the storm

Before the storm by Mud

Before the Storm   New aventur! Now Mud teached Rawr not to attack people so Rawr can come with Mud on aventur. And with Mud there is going human lady with red hair and human man with red hair, little old Gnome man who talks veeeeery much, way to much... And Dwarf man with noisy Shield and little monsterman with many metal armor. Lornan say we have to talk to lady in a bar, so we go to bar and talk to lady. She wants halfdragonman in city Apethorn to be dead. So we go to city Apethorn, and I ride on Rawr and Rawr is being very good girl! Very proud, so I give juicy meat for being good.   Then when we ride, we see 2 human mans standing with swords too each other and they maby fight. Red haired human Lady asks why the go fight and they say they go fight because they both want horsy. They show paper that says they're boss of horsy, but paper is broken in two pieces and winner of fight gets broken paper of the other one. Red hair human Lady takes broken papers and does magics to make two broken papers, one not-broken paper. She says to the human mans to take paper and share. The human mans say oké. And we go. But when we go Mud does sneaky tricksy magics and take paper from two humans mans. Mud is now horsy boss. Muhahaha!   Then we get to Apethorn ferry and some guards don't like aventururs so Mud do little magic and they so scared they almost poop pants Muhahhaha! And human lady red hair also do little magic! In Apethorn other aventururs go do boring stuff in libairy, so Mud and red hair lady go do fun little magic tricks stuff. Mud is little bit better with tricks magic stuff but red lady also good. She is named Blehr Macanroodoodoo (editors note: we presume he's referring to the adventurer 'Blaire Mac an Ruaidh'), she nice human lady.   Then everyone finish boring stuff and we go into big building. But there is guard, so we stand around corner and then Mud goes to guard, give middlefinger and show butt Muhahhaha, and guard runs after Mud around corner and there we make him go sleep a little bit.   Then we go to building and go inside. Blehr whisper to Mud if Mud knows tricksy magic 'Sleep', and yes, Mud knows it, so she whisper to Mud that he should play it when she says to. Muhahhaa! This is very fun times. So we go in building and many people and everybody boring talks and then Blehr Whispers and Mud plays Sleep! And then everybody goes fighting!! Muhahhaa! So Mud goes fighting too! Much shooting and sneaky hiding and many nasty humans dead and two run upstairs and we run after them and Mud plays Sleep again! Muhahaha! And more sneaky hiding upstairs and shooting dead nasty humans! Muhahaha! Mud also quickly goes downstairs alone because some humans not dead but sleeping and they maby wake up and get help when we upstairs. So Mud quickly stab them so they don't wake up no more. And then go upstairs again to other aventururs and all bad nasty humans there all sleeping or dead, so Mud goes to make sleeping ones sleep forever, but little monster man in many much metal armor say "No" to Mud... Aaw... Oké... So no stabbing the sleepy people. Then we go upstairs one more time and there is halfdragonman who have to die! So sad he has to die, he is very pretty, but we said to lady in Arnheim we would do it so...   But then! Everyone goes talking boring again! So no fighting. Mud just wait, being little bored, eating piece of tasty meat. Then, talking is finished. We don't kill halfdragonman and our little monsterman in many much metal is staying with halfdragonman. Okay. So we go back to Arnheim. Little sad Mud doesn't get so much money because halfdragonman no dead, but this was very fun day. Sometimes little boring, but more fun times. Bye!

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Before the storm by Blaire

So I heard you can get a reward for writing a story for the paper. Great idea! So this is my piece.   I was on my second adventure for the guild, and my brother was coming too. I was excited about that at first, but now I kinda don’t want to do it anymore, because he ended up nearly dead. I don’t want to see that again. Ever. Luckily, Calek the half-dragon, who was the boss of the Stormbringers,was not actually intend on killing us.

So we traveled with horse and wagon from Arnheim, where we encountered 2 men ready to duel. Turned out they were brothers, and upon the demise of their father, they both got half of the deed to a horse. I thought it was a rather stupid affair, so took charge and demanded to see the paperwork. I then proceeded to let GnArt mend it with his magic, and declared the horse mine. Those faces! It was priceless. They knew they could never handle us, so they had to concede. Honestly, I was not interested at all in this horse as it was not there, so I gave the deed back in return for their weapons, and suggested they might sell the beast and split the money. That seemed to be a satisfactory outcome, and I felt good about my awesome diplomatic skills. However, not much later, I saw Mud (the funniest sneaky bastard I’ve ever seen) cackling on his pet wolf, holding the deed. I was laughing so hard!   So we actually got the quest from a woman named Aurora Princess. She was telling us about a bounty she took for a half-Dragon guy named Calek, a cult leader, and that attacking the cult had cost her her husband. I can imagine why she wanted revenge.   In Apethorn is apparently a great library. As soon as we got there, some of our group wanted to go there to research this place and this cult. While Iain got lost in this library, and GnArt was looking for building plans, and Rurik was doing research about bullets? Anyway, Mud and I decided to have some fun at Apethorn market, challenging each other with our mage hand power, scaring some people and doing some pranks. He was very good at it.   So, at the cult hideout, apparently Ruzak had spent a lot of time on the outhouse? Seemed like a smart plan, but smelly. Ugh. Anyway, apparently the cult is called ‘Stormbringers’, and they are recruiting. So I propose that we pretend we’re a group of recruits, and I dunno who but someone said to lure the guard out. So Mud does that, and Ruzak knocks him out and we put him in the outhouse, while I take his guise. We get in, find a group at dinner, perfectly situated at a table. I sign to Mud to ask if he can put them to sleep, and he does so. Then the fight is on. The good thing is, they think I’m one of them at the start of the fight. They only realized their error until it was too late.   Right, before I forget, if anyone wants to join the Stormbringers, please go to Apethorn and tell them Blaire sent you!   We quickly dispatch them (leaving them knocked out rather than dead if we can help it), even though one escapes upstairs and warns the others. I’m happy with how this goes, as it was our assignment to kill this cult. One floor up, we find another group, who had put on some ramshackle defenses in the form of upturned tables. I make a critical error here, as I position myself wrongly, and nearly get an arrow between my eyes. Luckily, Ruzak is besides me and he manages to throw his shield in to deflect the arrow. I have a tiny scar to prove it, as it nicked the bridge of my nose. After that scare, I reposition myself behind the staircase and shoot from there.   We also dispatch this group, even though this fight was slightly harder. The floor above us is barricaded, so we set it on fire. After the fire dies, we check it out and find another floor, where this Calek guy stands in front of a lot of scared people. He wants to parley. I yell at him that we sadly need his head as per the assignment, and Rurik agrees; says it’s fancy elven stuff? (That didn’t make any sense to me to be honest). But the people can go for all I care, I’m not an executioner. So the people leave the building. GnArt is adamant on talking to this guy though. And it’s probably for the best. Apparently he was not a cult leader, but just some guy who wants to raise an army to defeat the restless orc tribes around Apethorn, that may be plotting against the city. And we kinda sorta killed most of his fighting force in this barracks (Mud had snuck down to kill all that we left knocked out). He seems decent enough, telling us about a dispute he has with the Firebeard Dwarves, and Ruzak didn’t take kindly to that, so Calek sends a lightning bolt through his head. And manages to hit Iain, who was unfortunately somewhere behind Ruzak. I scream as Iain drops down, but luckily GnArt gets him up again. Honestly. The talk is difficult, but Rurik saves the day. He offers Calek to stay behind, help rebuild the army we destroyed, and will serve as a quartermaster. He also mentions that he was raised by the Ironhammers, which made me perk up immediately. I need to talk to this guy.   Anyway, we live, we promise Calek to recruit new people for him, we go back to Arnheim. Oh, he gave us some money and his shiny spear, which I have now. The end.

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On the next issue:

Champions of the Colosseum 2