Part I
As the barge was prepared, the party sailed downstream, picking up Kultzman and his detachment, and eventually made their way into the Harbour of Nuln, the trading hub of the South of the Empire located at a fork in one of the major rivers, and the source of the Empire’s famed educational and technological achievements.
As they arrived in the city, Kultzman ordered Durak and Albert to contact some people in the city with the hopes of drawing support for his bid to reclaim his late father’s feifdom in the Stirlands.
Roland Kultzman’s brother, Heiser Kultzman, had been in the city on his way back to the Stirlands just a short time ahead of the party, and so they decided to dock in the poorer districts with the hopes of avoiding notice and consequently not falling for any traps the rival Kultzman may have set for them.
Albert’s party visited four nobles with ties to the Eastern Stirland: Petrus Walder, Rigo Eldebrant, Magnus Olberholtzman, and Frau Oppenheimer. All of the nobles seemed nervous to tie themselves to Roland, except for Oppenheimer (wom many people claimed is a witch). Visits to most of the nobles’ homes were neither particularly fruitful nor volatile. The nobles seemed to be operating within a certain degree of caution, although ears remained upon to Albert’s propositions. Durak found the guardsman at the Walders’ manor to be most loathe and could not help but be seriously suspicious of the man.
On their way between houses, one of their bodyguards was attacked on a visit to the outhouse, but his assualters were chased off as the other guards arrived to find out what had happened. A bit later, the party came across a large group of people holding up dogs and screaming into an Inn to see an Herr Zimmerman. The Innkeeper did not take too well to the crowd outfront and emptied a chamberpot into the streets over their heads before threatening them with a blunderbuss to disperse. Albert stepped in and had a word with everyone present, managing to calm the situation. Eventually everybody left the secene, with no violence occuring thanks to Albert’s efforts.
At Oppenheimers delapidated manor, she told Albert’s diplomatic party plus bodyguards that she would be willing to throw Oppenheimer support behind young Kultzman’s claim if his retainers could retrieve for her a set of earrings she believes she missplaced while dining at Chez Louis and listening to a musician sing there. Curiously, the woman couldn’t remember taking off the earrings or even what had been on her menu, only that she really enjoyed the singing and that despite having lost her earrings, she had really quite enjoyed herself. The woman had known Kultzmann when he was youngers, and the boy had even been fostered for a time in her families keep back in Sylvania.
Albert told the woman not to worry about her earrings and that his men would surely find them with no problem. He had little trou ble convincing Magnus Oberholtzman and Rigo Eldebrandt to support Roland Kultzman’s claim. The only trouble would be with Petrus Walder, and Albert had lined up a meeting for the following day. That evening the party returned back to Kultzmann and told him what had happened that day, with Albert asking for more specific details about what Kultzmann would be willing to barter for support. Kultzmann outlined some economic incentives that Albert would be able to use in the following day of negotiations.
Unbeknownst to other members of the party, that evening Durak, Ada Mourer, and one patrol of the militia led by the Shallyan Priest Felix escorted disguised mutants from the boat to a barber-surgeons shop in the poorer quarter of town. There Ada and Durak were first to recieve some form of surgery in order to remove their mutations. The treatment lasted through the night and Durak and Ada would not return to the Kultzmann barge until morning.
Part II
The following day a pile of dead dogs was resting on the side of the dock in front of the Kultzmann barge. Albert was up early, summoned by Kultzmann who reported that due to some form of suspicion from witchhunters, Zane Leopold would be taking his leave immediately. As Albert escorted Leopold to the ferry, when he noticed the dogs’ bodies and ordered some of Durak’s men to throw them into the river. As he returned from escorting Leopold, Albert came across a decrepit Durak and Ada being helped along by members of the milita and the blind Felix. Durak refused to answer questions concerning his previous whereabouts, and Kultzmann told the dwarf to make sure it didn’t happen again.
As Albert yet again bribed a dock urchin to keep an eye on this boat throughout the day, the boy reported that some members of a local criminal ring were reponsible for the bodies of the dogs in front of the boat. The party suspected this had something to do with the crowd the previous day who had been holding up dogs while seraching for Herr Zimmerman at the Inn, but had little time to think it over before the Harbourmaster and his halflling clerk arrived. The Harbourmaster began by repproaching the group for dumping the bodies of dogs into the river and fining them for each dog’s body. Durak was a bit phased out it a this time and began staring into a set of eyes that only he could see in the sky. Ada seemed somewhat better off, having taken much more to the medicine povided to her by Felix. Albert seemed upset about the fine, but Kultzmann paid up and very half-heartedly scolded his men. A red-headed halfling girl accompanied the Harbourmaster and she and Albert made eye contact more than a few times. Meanwhile, a local dwarf, Rosgrad son of Barholt asked to join Kultzmann’s militia. He was accepted with Kultzmann’s approval and Durak watched Rosgrad in a sparring match before formally admitting him into the militia.
Following the episode with the dwarfen recruit, Durak, Albert, and Leo von Helmholtz headed of to the Walder manner to keep a midday appointment. After the PCs were left to wait alone for quite some time, Petrus Walder finally made his appearance. The gaurdsmen at the door continued to act in a manner Durak found extremely menacing. Walder listened to Albert speak on the situation for some time before making an offer of his own. In exchange for his support to Roland Kultzman’s claim to the Kultzmann fiefdom back in the Stirland, Kultzmann would have to marry Petrus’ daughter Helga Walder.
After reporting the news to Kultzmann, the party was told to begin investigations concerning Frau Oppenheimers missing earrings. Quite naturally, the party went to the restaurant where the earrings had been lost, only to find it closed. The group stopped at a small cart run by a few halflings selling meat pies, and had a bite to eat. The halflings there asked Albert to help them find jobs for some relatives (as Albert’s affluence is quite easily noticed by his fine attire). Albert told them to come by the boat the following morning for possible work as cooks aboard the barge. As he was having this conversation, he noticed a drunken student stumbling towards Durak and without thinking stepped in front of the lad to usher him off to one way before he knocked into Durak.
As Albert did so, his chest was peirced with a dagger. In a few moments the student was knocked unconscious and dragged into an alleyway, while one of the men returned Albert back to the barge, as it was suspected he had been poisoned. After the man came too, Durak interrogated the man and found evidence that he had been hired as an assassin and seemed to be in the employ of house Quintis of Dunkelburg. Durak dispatched of the man with his axe, thinking it best not to let a potential enemy live on the threaten him another day.
After Felix had a look at Albert, the party returned to Chez Louis and spoke to a staff member behind the bar. They found out the name of a woman named Greta who used to work at the restaurant but had recently quarrelled with the owner, Louis, and consequently lost her job. They also learned, after a small bribe, that the Countess Isabella Emanuelle would be dining at the restaurant the following evening so security was being tightened. The boy gave the name of an Inn where Greta could usually found drinking, and suggested that she might know something about the strange robberies that had been taking place but had stopped ever since the captain of the guard had begun dining at the restaurant every evening.
As night fell, the party returned to the docks where their Lord’s barge was docked only to find two rival riff-raff gangs staring at one another with hatred… and upon seeing Albert all looked upon him with a curious intensity. The Halfling broke into a speech discouraging any violence, and threatening any who dared to make a move against him to try their might against the Ogre Changil that currently walked beside him. As the PC’s party passed through the space between the two rival factions, a small bubble of space rippled around them, with noone wanting to be within the reach of the great ogre that strode at the very centre. Albert kept up his speaking, and the once-tense mood dissolved, with men slowly filtering away from the scene in a certain amount of unmotivated disinterest. The harbourmaster came by later on to ask about what had happened, and Albert learned his halfling red-headed assistant’s name to be Gabi Bowbarrel, with whom he managed to schedule a lunch date for the next day.
