Blackheart

Blackheart is the first chapter of the second book in the series, Bad Tidings. It follows the Legends of Altmar as they travel to Vice to investigate the strange happenings there.

Plot
The Legends of Altmar regroup in Vice to visit the reclusive leader of the extravagant city but find something much more sinister lurking beneath in their attempt to stage an audience.

Synopsis
After arriving in Vice's outskirts, the party joined refugees from Heen in line to gain entrance into the city. While being questioned by the city guard, Baravio, in disguise, lied to to the watchmen and making their way into the city informed the rest of his party of his status as a criminal wanted for betraying the Velasco family, a local crime synicate he used to work for before his life as a Magician. Deciding to lay low to avoid suspicion, the party waited for Alia to arrive, checking the docks daily.

Finally Alia arrived aboard the Shady Goat and rejoined the rest of the party bidding farewell to her seafaring companions. The party then considered their next movs. Seeking to meet with the Doge to discuss his strange behavior, they decided to enter Vice's Kingside district in order to request an audience. Baravio however informed them that Kingside is off-limits without a pass and that the only way to get one is to know someone influential. Unfortunately the only people Baravio could have contacted were part of the crime family he betrayed. The party decided to ask around in Vice to find potential leads.

They discovered that they were not the first ones recently attempting to get into Kingside without a pass. They learned that an upstart theif found a way in but was captured by the Velascos. Only he knew how he got into the district. Tracking down the theif, the trail led them to a warehouse by the docks. While Baravio snuck in through a top window, the rest of the party attempted to bluff their way right through the front door. Niavara kicked the door in and loudly proclaimed that they were the Port Authority and were performing a random inspection. One of the guards on duty quickly pointed out that the Port Authority doesn't do random inspections and asked for identification. When the party could not provide it a fight broke out.

This was fortunately enough of a distraction to allow Baravio to move unimpeded through the upper floor of the warehouse where he found the thief they were looking for; a half-elf, Otie Felderson. He also discoverd a receipt in the warehouse office for a sale of an item to the Velasco family: An Ithilian sword sold by a man called Hieronyous Blackheart. Baravio and Otie regrouped with the rest of the party who had dispatched the guards and they made their escape into the city.

The next day, the party followed Otie to the secret passage he discoverd leading into Kingside, through a house basement and under the city wall. After sneaking through the house to gain access, they travelled through the tunnel only to find that it had been blocked in by the Velascos. Realizing they'd been had, the group headed back to the inn to plan their next move.

Otie told the others he heard the information secondhand from someone who was told about the passage by an information broker known only as Rift. They tracked Rift to the Arkava district, a notorious haven for narcotics abusers, thieves, and cutthroats. When they arrived the city watch was in full force, partitioning off a crime scene where a grisly vigilante murder had taken place, a bloody note on the ground claiming the victim was a rapist. Rikkert persuaded the guards to allow him to investigate the crime scene due to his background as a monster hunter. Rikkert deduced the death was caused by a werewolf, and the guards informed him that this sort of thing had been happening across the city recently.

Somewhat unnerved, the party continued their search for Rift which led them to a mistress brothel where they found Rift already tied up. He attempted to make his escape upon seeing Otie but was swiftly captured by the party. They interrogated him in an alleyway and after intimidating him, he revealed that they could get into Kingside through the sewers and that they should speak to a woman named Constance Borla who could help them find a way into the sewers. After roughing him up a little the party let him go and they headed to Feldrin's gate where the woman allegedly spent much of her time.

The group searched Feldrin's Gate's shantytown and quickly found Lady Borla, a widowed merchant's wife who ran a shop in Vice proper and provided food and medical supplies to the poor, which is precisely what she was doing upon the party arrival. After the crowd dispersed, she spoke with the group and told them finding a proper way into the sewers would not be easy. Given the option between staging another break-in at the waterway maintenance office and climbing down into the well in Feldrin Plaza, the party decided descending into the well would be easier (though not without risks of its own).

The well, as it turned out was not a well at all but a large cistern connected to the sewers via maintenance tunnels, allowing workers to fish the countless corpses of Vice's many unsolved murders that were dropped into the well on a daily basis. Heading through these tunnels the players entered the sewers far below Vice. There they encountered many perils such as drowners, sewer crocodiles, and the labyrinthine tunnels of the sewers themselves. More worrisome however were the corrupted creatures and demons they found patrolling the depths. After dispatching the demons they found their way into a large chamber below the city with caves leading even further down along with the massive skeleton of a dragon.

Studying the dragon's bones upon the party's arrival was a curious scholar who introduced himself as Hieronyous Blackheart. He claimed to be a scholar of dwarven history and was studying the ruins beneath the city. When asked if he knew anything about Pavel Jeffries mysterious reclusive behaviour, Blackheart noted that he was very familiar, as he served as one of the doge's advisors. He offered to arrange a meeting with Jeffries and to escort the to Kingside.

Blackheart treated the aprty to luxurious hotels, meals, and baths during their stay in Kingside and gets them a pass to move through the city unimpeded. still concerned about the threat of werewolves, Rikkert found a smith to silver his weapon, while Niavara purchased a silver dagger from a merchant. While shopping in Vice proper, the party came across another grisly murder scene similar to the one they witnessed in Arkava. Rikkert decided something needed to be done about the vigilantes. he and the party tracked them down to a secret entrance to a different part of Vice's sewer system and found the werewolves' hideout, with no werewolves. While trying to figure out what to do, Rikkert sarcastically suggested that they leave their own mark and let the wolves find them. Otie not realizing the joke, did exactly that. They quickly retreated back to Kingside as night fell to take baths before the wolves could track them down.

Eventually, Blackheart invited the group to view his private collection of dwarven artifacts. While examining his collection, Baravio noticed a strange rob, glowing orange. Recognizing it immediately as a Chaos Orb, Baravio demanded to know where Blackheart obtained such an item. Blackheart quickly became angered with them when Rikkert demand they hand the orb over, throwing them out of his quarters and denying them an audience with Pavel Jeffries. Realizing something was very wrong with Blackheart, they made a plan to sneak into the Doge's quarters.

Rikkert and Baravio were to sneak in and meet the Doge while Alia, Emilia, Niavaara, and Otie distracted the guards by causing a ruckus in the armory. The plan was a success and Rikkert and Baravio entered the Doge's chambers to find a horribly disfigured and mostly insane Pavel Jeffries gazing into the Chaos Orb. After a brief conversation he attacked them and they subdued the man, knocking unconscious. Quickly grabbing him and rushing for an escape, they retreated from the palace with guards on their trail. Meanwhile the others battlde Vicean guards in the armory and face much more resistance than expected. They managed to break through though Emilia and Otie ended up killing a few of the guards. They made their way to Velen Park to retreat into the sewers, losing the guards where they met back up with Rikkert and Baravio who had the doge's corrupted unconscious body.

Emilia, with the stress of killing a man, the demons, and being on the run, breaks down and abandoned the party in tears. They continue into the ruins of Old Byseah without her to lick their wounds. However while they are hiding in the old dwarven town, Rikkert and Otie's monster hunting plan paided off to their horror when they are approached and surrounded by a pack of werewolves led by a creature called Fang who tracked them through Otie's scent. Also in the pack was Lady Constance Borla. A standoff occured as the wolves attempted to pursuade the party into assisting them with killing a prominent member of the Velasco family. Baravio successfully brokered an agreement with the wolves but Rikkert took matters into his own hands marching up to and attacking the werewolves, stating that they were monsters. The rest of the party rushed into assist and together they narrowly defeated the wolves though Rikkert was bitten and cursed in the process, unbeknownst to the rest of the party. One wolf tried to escape before being chased down and killed by Niavara. The party spared Lady Borla who did not attack them.

After defeating the wolves, the group explored the ruins of Old Byseah, discovering Dragonic statues, temples, and a mysterious seal. Together they entered the grand temple at the center of the old dwarven city. Inside they took refuge finding more dragonic diagrams. Feeling Jeffries was too far gone, Alia removed his head killing him for good before they descended into the temple sanctum. To their shock they found demons inhabiting the lower levels of the temple and battled their way to the worship hall where they discovered the mutaded form of Hieronyous Blackheart reporting to a large demon who exited through a portal. Blackheart painfully claimed to the party he served Overlord now and though with some resistance, he attacked the heroes who ended up slaying him. After the fight Baravio gazed into the portal seeing a horrific hellscape that huanted him to his core. Rikkert then tossed the stone into the portal, closing it.

The party found their way out through the sewers back into Feldrin's Gate. The town was in an uproar due to the missing Doge, and the city watch's response, as they suspected an Imperial assassin was lurking within the city and were engaging in a manhunt. The party snuck out of the city disguised while Baravio returned to Vice proper to retrieve Atlas from a stable. During his foray into the city Baravio witnessed a shocking sight. Tens of thousands of dead fish had washed up on the shores of Vice harbour a crowd gathering around the bizarre scene. Sensing an incoming panic from the crowd, Baravio rushed off with Atlas, rejoining the party after they escaped from Vice.

Bestiary

 * Werewolf
 * Corrupted Carrion Crawler
 * Watcher (homebrew monster)
 * Giant Crocodile
 * Bearded Devil
 * Drowner (homebrew monster)
 * Guard (Vice)


 * Blackheart

Trivia

 * First Appearance of: Oteak Felderson, Heironyous Blackheart, Pavel Jeffries, Fang, Constance Borla, Rift
 * Originally, this chapter was intended to be much longer and more open ended, but was cut for time, and due to complexity. This more open design would later be used in The Path.
 * An optional sidequest to retrieve Raviel's Blade was ignored by the party and would have involved the party dealing with the Velasco crime family, getting more into Baravio's backstory.
 * The players solved the center grate puzzle in the sewers by random chance on the first try.
 * The Sewers of Vice dungeon was reused in an SKT game where the players in that game also solved the center grate puzzle by random chance on the first try.