The threat of Selbingen
After almost a year of pen and paper, our four friends actually arrived in the next village in the last session. Selbingen is a village located directly on Lake Selbig, which is a good bit bigger than Fichtenstein. But apparently Selbingen is threatened by an unknown danger, at least that’s what the priest Herbert had hinted at.
To find out more, our heroes now stand in front of Selbingen’s town hall to meet the mayor, Siegfried. They enter the once splendid building, which now looks rather empty and empty. An elderly man in a fine turtleneck jumper stands on a higher gallery and begins to descend a flight of stairs as soon as they enter the building. He welcomes them to Selbingen, but seems very depressed right from the start. So Aldric doesn’t take long to ask Siegfried what is going on here in Selbingen. At first, Siegfried tries to hide the fact that something is bothering him, but when Löwenzahn confirms that they would like to help, he begins to talk. As Selbingen lies directly on the lake, it is quite common for deep fog to lie over the town at night. Recently, however, these have been accompanied by a raid. Strangely pale and transparent-looking men land on the shore in small boats and raid the houses. They enrich themselves with the property and are gone again before the end of the night. The inhabitants are afraid of the eerie figures and hardly dare to fight them. The few who have dared to do so now lie buried in a nearby cemetery. He has already sent for help from the royal army, but is still waiting for a response from the Zyren.
Our four listen to the whole thing with interest and offer their help. Siegfried can hardly believe it at first, but is then delighted and very grateful that someone is finally taking care of the problem. He promises them all the support they need and bids them farewell. It occurs to them that accommodation would be very practical. With a sad face, Siegfried tells them that the fight against the sinister enemies has already claimed a few victims and that they can temporarily use one of the empty houses. It is located in the centre of Selbingen, right on the market square. Satisfied with this result, they accept the keys and say goodbye to Siegfried.
Our friends leave the town hall and stroll through the centre of the market square. In addition to a stall selling food and drink, where Aldric buys a recipe for cabbage soup, there are two other stalls here. One for everyday items such as parchment and feathers, but also a bag for alchemy ingredients and a copper cauldron to process them. Theo in particular spends some time here and returns to his group as the proud owner of a cauldron. Meanwhile, they are already at the last stall selling jewellery. Kel flirts for a while with metal caps in the shape of wolf heads that can be attached to the tops of boots, but his yawningly empty wallet prevents him from buying them. So they continue on to the smithy on the other side of the market square.
A short, rather sturdy man with a bright red head approaches them and introduces himself as Meckmo Hämmerich, the best blacksmith in the Nordmark. Unfortunately, he has to disappoint her interest in weapons, as they were stolen during the raids. As he says this, his head turns even redder and they are a little worried that Meckmo’s head is about to explode. Fortunately, it doesn’t. Instead, Meckmo begins to rant bitterly about the robberies and explains that he would love to fight back. To his delight, his new customers support him in this endeavour. However, they need decent weapons to do so, and they need him for that. This makes sense to Meckmo and he offers them a deal. They can take his coal wagon to the nearby iron mine, which has not been used for decades, and get him some of the ore. He still has enough coal and with fresh iron ore he can forge new weapons again. He doesn’t have to convince our friends of this deal for very long and less than five minutes later our friends are marching through Selbingen with the coal cart.
They head directly north, where the mine is said to be located about an hour further on, on the left-hand side of the Helenau trade route in Astral, a small hilly area. But before they leave the settlement, they pass the stables of Selbingen, which gives them an idea. With horses, they could get to the mine and back a whole lot quicker and the next route to another town would also be much quicker. So they knock at the house, which is right next to the stables. A young, blonde woman opens the door, beams at them and introduces herself as Bibiane. Whilst Kel’s interest is now more focussed on Bibiane, the other three are keen to find out whether she has horses and the necessary equipment for sale. Bibiane can actually show them some animals and even Theo’s needs could be satisfied with a pony. Unfortunately, the prices are so astronomically high that the wolf-shaped iron caps suddenly seem like a bargain. And so they have to use their legs to reach the iron mine after all, but they won’t be travelling that way until the next time they play Arkanthia Pen and Paper.
