OOC note: This Progression was written as part of the Storyweb System, linked here. This post pertains to the activities of the Faraddi Explorers. Those interested to partake in this roleplay in future missions should seek out the League to offer assistance in roleplay, to fully partake in future posts. Route of the Golem Written alongside @Caelamus The Faraddi Explorers returned overseas to the far distant land of Farah’deen once more to continue their quest for knowledge and technological advancements in the field of clockwork engineering. They first arrived in a port that many among their company were already familiar with, Al-Alus. They arrived during the later hours of the night when the sweltering heat of the day had died down and just when most shops and honest folk were heading to bed to prepare for the next day. The company of explorers made their way across streets paved with cleanly cut sandstone to a local inn that gave boarding to visitors, sailors, merchants, and other traders coming in by ship to sell their goods on the local market. On their way to the inn, however, the company encountered a thief running frantically down a particularly thin stretch of road from a band of chasing guardsmen. After bearing witness to the scene, the group decided to be a little bit more cautious about their belongings and coin or at the very least until they got to the inn. Finally, they arrived and rented out most of the leftover rooms, which weren’t very many. Many of them had to share cramped spaces with one another. It was difficult to sleep due to all of the snoring, yelling and shouting by the other various tenants in other rooms but the company managed to get some sleep to prepare for the next day. When the next day finally came around the groups divided themselves up and set out to see what knowledge they could glean by asking around. The first group that consisted of; Naayj, Azra, Aaiminah, Aamir, Merilya and Birc set out to ask around the marketplace about new technology and see what was on sale with Naayj and Aaminah taking the forefront in asking about for information. While the rest of the group, Azra, Aamir, Merilya, and Birc surveyed the marketplace and merchandise being sold. They happened upon a rather fanciful weapon merchant, who appeared to have quite a rare weapon indeed; an Alaru Addir, previously used against the Bone Horrors in the field of battle and scavenged from either a fallen soldier or abandoned. While it caught the interest of Aaminah and Merilya, who the merchant primarily targeted to make the sale, Azra slipped a few coins to another merchant nearby to see if the item had any real validity. It was a hoax, the merchant informed her, one the weapon dealer tries to peddle on outsiders like Aaminah and Merilya, who were very clearly not Qadir, and saved the duo from any prospect of the false purchase and called the merchant out for the fake. Birc, Aamir, and Naayj wandered around a second area of the market, seeking whatever innovations they could find. Birc spotted an interesting shop which Aamir and Naayj investigated while Birc sought out anything else of interest, but to no avail. What was in the shop may not have been impressive, but some smooth talking by Naayj got a small show of the growing popularity of one specific new device. The merchant was all too proud to set the (somewhat cumbersome) machine onto the counter before the duo. He explained a lot of traders, banks, and large businesses have been using these sorting devices recently, and demonstrated by dropping a mixed bundle of coins into the top, and brought the machine alive. Miraculous or not, the machine distinguished each coin and sorted them by value, stacking the lot near the bottom in a stack. While the first group scoured the marketplace for information and what new inventions they could find being sold as well as what information they could glean from the local merchants, group two set out to investigate the various workshops that dotted the city. The group consisting of Amir, Aska, Fawza, Fahim, Maliq, and Korra set out on their venture to search neighboring workshops starting with the ones closest to the hustle and bustle of the nearby marketplace where group one was currently operating. The first clockwork shop they came upon was owned by a very rude and somewhat obnoxious fat Qadir man who introduced himself as “Abdullah al-Rabbani”, a ‘master’ of the art of clockwork engineering. First to speak up amongst the members of the group was Amir who asked the man if he had heard or seen any recent news about sightings concerning a golem outside the city, or if he knew anything about the latest innovations in clockwork technology. With no small measure of apprehension or disgust, the engineer Abdullah gave the Silven Amir no more than a disgusted glance as he continued talking about his inventions for sale to the rest of the group until Fawza, another of their party spoke up to ask the same question. The Qadir man continued on speaking despite Fawza’s request and only gave pause to answer him once he had completely finished, reaching over to take a nearby date to shove into his mouth. Amir stomped forward towards the Qadir, glaring and practically seething with rage from the scrutiny and disregard the man had shown him and his company. Without any hesitation Amir sent a punch flying straight for the man’s jaw, sending what was left of his date soaring through the air in a bloodied mess, accompanied by a few teeth! Fahim, Korra, and Mailq all quickly rushed towards Amir to grab him by the arms to stop him from brutalizing the man even further but before they could apologize Abdullah quickly rushed and scampered towards the door to call out for the help of a nearby guard who was previously patrolling the nearby market. The guard came rushing over to see what was going on with both Aska and Fawza trying to explain and being cut off by the Qadir man. The group clearly irritated and not wanting to go to prison opted to begrudgingly bribe both the guard and owner of the workshop to look the other way. Using their natural rogue training, Aska was successful in bribing the pair while the Fahim, Korra, and Mailq continued holding Amir back, practically having to drag him out into the street to get him to calm down which he eventually did. The group eventually moved on to another workshop further away down the street far from the other where they encountered a man far more reasonable than the last. This time Fahim was the one to step up to plate to ask if he had heard of any rumors or any particular innovations that stood out. The owner of the workshop shook his head and had practically rehashed much of what the engineers in the group already knew. Deciding against trying further and receiving the exact same response, the group took another approach and decided to head home to try with their family to see if they could glean anything there. Amir and Aska joined with Birc after reuniting with the first group set out to head to their homes and place of birth outside of the main city of Al-Alus. With the rest of the group not far behind the group first began with Amir’s, then Askas, receiving nothing but vague rumors and things they already knew. Things grew more interesting when they arrived in Birc’s settlement where the company heard a rumor of a recent attack led by the Golem on an outlying village that often saw caravaneers traveling to and from as a stop to rest and fill up their water supply. The village settlement was near the border on the Songaskian territories, the group not wanting to accidentally make their way into hostile territory decided to hire a guide that knew the area to avoid the risk possible enslavement or worse, at the very least not yet. The company of explorers mounted upon the backs of their Jamals and set out to see what they could discover for themselves. Following in the tracks of the rumor, they had hoped to follow the path of the destruction to see what they could find and with any luck, they could at the very least garner a physical description or perhaps how it had behaved from the inhabitants... If indeed any survived... The journey through the desert was one long and harsh, the decision to hire a guide was well worth it as the group followed the path of destruction left in the golem’s wake. Eventual questioning and query at a tavern got the group pointed in the direction of a local man who frequented the villages back in his day. Upon meeting him, they were met with little more than sheer annoyance and unkind remarks, stating he knew nothing of the machine and what had happened; he had assumed they were more guards and investigators come to interrogate him, albeit with more suspicion considering the amount of non-Qadir among the party. Once the miscommunication was settled, he seemed to relax a bit but was reluctant to join along and head to the village for fear of the guards assuming he was truly involved. In his stead, he sent his son to guide the party to the village. Finally, they came upon the rumored settlement only to find absolute destruction left in the wake of the golem. Machines previously built to help maintain gardens were attacking their former owners, while golems formerly used by local guards had turned against them. The company of explorers found themselves in the middle of a glorified brass warzone of machinery going haywire. Quickly the company of explorers rushed to defend themselves. Azra was the first to arrive and used her magic to help her make her way stealthily across the destroyed village in search of survivors while the rest of the group led by Amir stepped up armed with a spear and began stabbing at a nearby brass golem that was rushing towards nearby Maliq while Birc covered Amir with his sword and shield, hacking away a nearby clockwork spider. Birc quickly dispatched the spider by slicing into its central core and damaging its power supply but received several scratches to his legs as a trade-off. Amir, on the other hand, was successful in holding back the golem with no more than a nasty bruise and minor concussion from being struck over the head. Merilya and Fahim armed themselves with their bows and opened fire from behind a barricade, managing to finally put an end to the golem that Amir was successfully fending off. It wasn’t until before long a large clock tick spider emerged from some of the nearby rubble and began clanking its way towards the group with twitchy frantic motions. Fawza then stepped up to the plate seeing the whirling monstrosity coming towards them at the barricade, quickly she used her magic to take control over the whirling and twitching monstrosity of metal to turn it against the other clockwork devices going awry-- though her control over it was very loose. The machine went off on what seemed more like an organized rampage than anything, smashing and destroying clockwork assailant and what remained of buildings alike until it finally destroyed itself by damaging its power so badly it could no longer function. Aaminah quickly caught up to and joined Azra in her sneaking about looking for survivors, together the pair dispatched a few clockwork automatons of their own using their skills in throwing and nimble work with blades before the machines could register and react to what was going on. Nearby Korra also joined to help the others using the alchemical concoction Glace Goberièn to freeze some of the clockwork devices in place, albeit it wasn’t much good under the sweltering heat of the desert sun, it bought the group enough time to finish off the remaining crazed automatons. After the chaos came to a close the company gathered in the center of what was left of the settlement and began the search looking around for what they could glean from the attack, any clues or survivors but were mortified to find that absolutely no survivors remained. There were only piles and piles of dead bodies enshrouded by rubble and ash. Some parts of the town still raged and burned in a vicious fire fueled by the heat of the arid sun. The league found nothing other than the damaged clockwork automatons and massive footprints in the sand leading out of town. It was difficult to tell exactly where the golem had gone but what is certain is that the rumors were indeed true. The laborers of the group set out to investigate some of the rubble that had stopped burning while the clockwork engineers of amongst them set out to investigate what caused the automatons to go awry. Both were inconclusive and discovered very little. The league mortified by their discovery decided to turn back and head back to Regalia, for now, it seemed like if they wished to discover more they may have needed to investigate further into the Songaskian territory. Upon both their guide urging them to head back and their own fears, the league made their way back to the city and territories of Al-Alus with their discovery. A short debriefing took place, where the group looked over everything they had uncovered and learned along with their visit. The golem itself continued to elude them, but they had been well in the wake of its destruction. There was a clear danger roaming the Qadir lands, and they had seen it for themselves. Once the group reached the coastline, a few coins passed to a Regalian merchant vessel bought them passage back to the Archipelago, and the capital’s shores once more. With the sights of barren villages fresh in their minds, the party returned to their lives in Regalia for the time being to discuss their next plan of action. It was clear that if they wanted to investigate further they may have had to risk venturing further or deeper into the desert following the path of destruction led by the golem. Truly, it’s gigantic footprints were not that difficult to track even for the most novice of trackers. Perhaps they would uncover more by witnessing the destruction for themselves?
