Upgrades
With a loud bang, our friends introduced themselves to the Shadows two weeks ago. Whether it was this impressive display that convinced them to become members of the guild, or rather the glowing recommendations of Lieutenant Kampf, is something everyone can decide for themselves. In any case, as true Shadows, they can now pick up their first assignment from the Shadow leader Plasura. They walk along the cold rock passage and knock cautiously on the door of their new boss. A quiet “Come in” answers, and they enter Plasura’s study. “I’m sure you want to receive your first assignment now, am I right?” she asks, but her face clearly shows that she expected this question. “You must kill a Balrum spy in Gelduk. He has infiltrated the army there and must be hunted down.” “We know how to kill people, don’t worry,” Aldric reassures her. Plasura nods contentedly and motions for them to leave her study with a slight wave of her hand.
They carefully close the door behind them and return to the entrance hall, where some members of the Shadows are still waiting for them. A certain Randy Marsh greets them warmly and engages the four in a really boring conversation full of small talk. They endure it for a few minutes, but then they’ve had enough. With the clever question of where to buy equipment here, Theo steers the conversation toward something that actually interests him. “Yes, um, well… first of all, there’s our blacksmith Alfred, of course. Here you can buy some armor and weapons, but you can also have equipment upgraded. Isa sells leather goods and armor, which are especially good if you focus on sneaking and sneak attacks. And then there are the twins Kira and Kino, who experiment with alchemy ingredients,“ Randy replies, unaware that he is making himself extremely uninteresting. ”Yeah, thanks for that,” Theo says goodbye, and his three friends also take the opportunity to escape Randy.
“Let’s go to Isa first, that’s probably interesting for all of us,” suggests Dandelion. So they knock on a few doors until they finally find Isa – in fact, they could have just followed their noses, because a tannery gives off a rather intense smell. Isa greets the four of them warmly and asks about the history of her new colleagues. After a few minutes, she gets down to business and asks to see their goods. “I have some very good leather goods. My boots in particular are excellent and made of especially soft leather. That could certainly be useful to you when sneaking around,” she explains with a wink. She has obviously hit the nail on the head, because all four of them want the boots immediately. Theo also has his damaged armor repaired before they say goodbye.
“I’d really like to go see the two alchemists now,” says Theo as soon as they are back in the hallway. Since his three friends are more interested in armor and weapons, they split up for the time being. While Theo makes his way to Kino and Kira, the others enter Alfred’s smithy shortly thereafter. “Ah, you must be the new ones,” Alfred greets them with a laugh, but then looks puzzled. “I thought there were four of you?” After Dandelion explains that they have simply split up, Alfred presents his wares. Unfortunately, he doesn’t have a crossbow for Aldric either, and the remaining weapons would break Kel and Löwenzahn’s bank, so they are mainly interested in upgrade options. However, these are also expensive. Since Kel mostly uses a magic weapon anyway and Aldric shoots arrows, both decide against upgrades. Dandelion, on the other hand, upgrades his battle spear from “normal” to ‘improved’ to “fine” and pays 60 silver coins for it. In return, his spear now causes two more damage points per attack.
Meanwhile, Theo has Kino and Kira explain various herbs to him. However, he is particularly interested in potions and poisons. “Hmm, yes, we have quite a few,” Kino assures him with a grin and pulls out a large wooden chest. Theo is amazed when he discovers at least fifty different potions – and just as amazed when he sees the price tags on the bottles. Finally, he decides on a fairly potent poison that still fits reasonably well into his budget, as well as a few healing potions.
“We’ve heard you have talents in a wide variety of disciplines,” Kira calls after Theo as he is about to leave. “Uh, what exactly do you mean by that?” Theo asks, visibly confused. But this question remains unanswered for another two weeks – until we continue with Arkanthia Pen and Paper.
