Introduction
The adventurers rested and healed up, bought potions and another horse for Shamil to replace his lame one, then took the road again.
The mission: near the village of Melford, a man named Ulayah Reyn started up a spider farm and is harvesting silk and... other products. The organization behind Valeria had already sent in men to strike a deal with Ulayah, but, for one reason or another, he wasn't keen on selling poison. The adventurers had to go there, investigate the issue, and strike a deal with Ulayah, no matter the cost.
The road to Melford
Nothing happened! Yeah, I'm keeping the wolves and bandits in check. No reason to attack a fully healed and prepared party, right?
The adventurers arrived, stayed a night at the inn, talked to the barkeep for any rumors and asked about the farm, then went to bed and took the road again the next day.
The spider farm
Just near the spider farm, the adventurers met Heri, Ulayah's daughter. She was amazed to meet adventurers of any kind, and swiftly took them to see her father. Ulayah received what he thought of as fellow businessmen kindly, and took them for a tour of the farm.
Buildings above the ground, caves underneath.
With quite a lot of workers on hand, Ulayah was leading a fairly prosperous business - although he complained about not having his investment returned. They processed everything on site - silk and poison - into rope, cloth, clothes, acid, ink etc.
After some talk with Ulayah, and some investigations of their own (as the psychically gifted knight walked around, looking into the caves with his mind's eye), they thought to hammer out a reasonable business proposal. Ulayah agreed, but asked for time to look into his accounting and draft the contract. They were to meet again the day after. The adventurers left with the sense of a job well done.
They were in, of course, for a rude awakening.
The farm, attacked
The adventurers were happily eating breakfast when a commotion was heard from the town square. The town guard - and a horde of onlookers - were escorting a worker from the spider farm, his shirt all bloody. The worker let them know - before fainting - that the farm was attacked! Some of the workers were cut down, and he himself received an arrow in the back before escaping.
The party saddled up, rode hard, then approached the farm on foot. They managed to slip in undetected, approaching the main buildings - Ulayah's and the workers' quarters - from the rear. The knight again used his psychic vision to scout the buildings. To their dismay, there were quite a lot of men at arms, although they were lightly armed. Some were resting and sleeping, other were guarding tied-up workers; still others were torturing Ulayah.
After about 40 minutes of planning and no action by the players, I called the session.
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