OOC here's the update I promised - as always, if you have any unfinished conversations, please use "Before briefing tag"

<Contract#2 Briefing> @Grall_Stonefist @Jorimel @Skarboy @Casavay @Maleth @TuskatheDaemonKilla @Vulpas @matt23 @lord-watchman @Keidivh

Eventually, the feast was over and everyone was free to go to their tents (or wherever they wanted) and rest for the night. Locals also went back to their homes, leaving the halflings to work overtime in order to clean everything and get ready to pack it tomorrow. The night was peaceful, quite different than these couple of past days where the team couldn't get the much needed rest.

Once the morning dawned upon the camp, they were awakened by Kolja, who went by each tent and called them to come out for breakfast. The smell of egg omelette mixed with bacon and cheese spread around the camp, the food placed at the big table they sat last night only this time, Constantine was there backed with the Dwarf Ori and a newcomer (@Skarboy ), by the looks of him, a Greatsword of some kind. "Everyone, meet Sir Fulke Ritter, the newest addition to our team," Constantine pointed at the man before opening couple of maps on the table in front of him, all of them picturing local area in Ostland as well as this south-eastern part of the Middle Mountains. "Alright eat up and let's get down to business."

"Behold Castle Lenkster, or more famously known as the High Rock," Thomas pointed at one of the dots on the map in front of him, the place not too far away from where they were currently and located on the road leading into the Middle Mountains. "Since our group grew a lot larger than what we had before, it has come to my understanding that a more centralized base of operations is required for us to operate at maximum efficiency than this traveling carnival we had so far. This situation was something I've planned for already, which is why last time I was in contact with our patron in Altdorf I received a special paper giving us the right to acquire this Castle for our own needs. I say acquire because...well, the Castle is haunted. Elector Count's office has already issued a sort of a bounty for those who would return the High Rock into the fold of the Empire, but we were able to obtain the rights to claim the place for ourselves if we are able to secure it. In any case, I won't bore you with legal details so I'll just skip and explain why was this place so important."

"High Rock was built around nine centuries ago by the Ostlander Count who at that time, understood quite well what threat the Greenskins and other type of evils which lurk between the crags of the Middle Mountains possess. Since the mountains are mostly inaccessible and hard to navigate, any road leading through them was very important. The only path on the east part of the mountains was in jurisdiction of this Count and he ordered for a mighty castle to be built on this side of the mountains to guard the way and act as the main fort from which the armies of Ostland would control this part of their province. And so it was that the Castle was built on the best strategic location possible, on top of the river Eiskalt's canyon, overlooking the road into the Middle Mountains."

"In first couple of centuries everything worked as intended, the castle was garrisoned by a powerful army and any Ork or Beastmen incursion was stopped without a problem. The Middle Mountains and this part of Ostland were kept safe and all was well. However, as the years passed by so did the attention of the men slowly started to fade, the ancient enemies lurking within the Mountains were all but a shadow. The army located in High Rock slowly became smaller and smaller, every new Elector Count sending less and less regiments there, explaining it that he didn't need a great force stationed in it and that his men were needed in the North, fighting the Chaos Marauders and East, fighting the undead of Sylvania."

"High Rock eventually fell into ruin and was conquered by a powerful Ork Boss up until one hundred years ago, when the Greenskins were driven off from it by an Order of the White Dawn, a Knightly order with somewhat unknown origins, which came to Ostland dedicating itself to fight the evil there. They recaptured the Castle and killed the Ork Boss, a feat for which the Elector Count gave them the Castle to act as sort of a Central Monastery of their order. Once again, peace returned to these lands, the Knights fought with great zeal and passion against the monsters and it would seem it was meant to last. And it did, up until 15 years ago when the Knights of the White Dawn were called up for a crusade to Araby to fight the evil sultan Selim."

"Most of their order went there and spent five years fighting against the tyrant across Estalia and Araby, freeing slaves and bringing an end to the sultan's reign of terror. When the crusade was over, only few of the Knights, under the lead of their Grandmaster Jan Obil have returned to Ostland and High Rock, but all of them were changed. They were cursed by the curse of undeath, or shall I say, they became vampires. How did that exactly happen during their crusade is unknown and we will probably never find that out, but what matters is that there was a great Castle right in Ostland on a very important strategic location controlled by a vampire. For the last 10 years Elector Count sent his armies on few occasions to try and recapture the High Rock, however all of them failed for the Grandmaster Obil, besides his superior tactical knowledge also had the necromantic powers at his disposal and a good defensive position which made it easy for him to defend the Castle."

"Eventually, the Elector Count stopped sending armies for it turned out that the Knights, even in their new form, still kept some sort of honor, and rarely went outside to pillage the cities of Ostland. Instead, they mostly focused their attention on conquering the Greenskin tribes of the Middle Mountains and keeping few nearby Ostlander villages in their thrall, a thing not seen as problematic for the Count who was as ever, worried about some other more dire problem. And this is where we come in."

"Outside the money reward we'll get from taking back the Castle and of course the Castle itself, it has come to my attention that the Knights got their hands on a powerful artifact called "Desert's Fire", they found it during their crusade in Araby and brought it back with them all the way up here. It is a magical curved sword, or a saber if you will, with powerful enchantments on it that if the old scrolls are correct, "can summon spirits of the desert to come in aid of whoever wields the saber". As I did more research I found out it's nothing that spectacular, probably just a some sort of older magic, possibly the similar or a copy of the magic used to create some of the enchantments on the Sunfang, a sword one of the High Elf princes' carries at the moment."

"In any case, this is the plan - since the place is not so far out, we would use the southeastern road to travel to it from this side, possibly go through a village in the base of the mountains, climb it and reach the Castle. Once there, we would infiltrate it, find this Grandmaster and slay him for when he dies, all of his forces will die as well. I know that it probably sounds way too dangerous, but I believe that a smaller team like ours can accomplish this task where a huge army could not. Count on only our team of course, because the halflings and the rest of our personnel will act as a "train" and go behind us, not going into battle unless it's absolutely necessary."

"Alright, that's the plan," Constantine drank a glass of water once he finished, "Do you have any questions?"


OOC Damn, these briefing walls always turn out to be much bigger than I originally intended lol. Also, if possible guys @lord-watchman & @Vulpas , I would like you to drop a post after this briefing so I know if you are still with us here

@Casavay Before Briefing
Kristoff couldn't help but chuckle at seeing the engineer get buzzed after only half a pint. Wish I could get hammered that easily still. He recalled early in his initiation he challenged all the other initiates to a drinking contest. Drank nearly every single one of them under the table, before blacking out for a solid day. That was a good night.

After listening to her story, Kristoff cracked a smile as he tried to wipe away some of the ale in his beard. "You think one week is bad? Try nearly two months! Had to survive in the outskirts of the Drakenwald. That's actually where I found my little brother here." He gestured to the Arctic wolf, who was now resting his massive head on Feuerstolz lap, a drunken sparkle in his eye. "Looks like he took a liking to you."

At her last question, Kristoff sat back in his seat, staring down at his cup of ale for a moment, lost in thought as he stroked his beard. "Aye, nearly all our life is dedicated to war. I've spent more of my life on campaign than I have at home. Even a priest of the war God can tire of such a thing. Grim work, blessed, but grim. So I left to travel, adventure, and meet fine pyromaniacs like yourself." He chuckled as he took a sip from his tankard.

Sebine looked at the others with a slight smile, "so vampires, is that all we face or is there more" as she spoke she looked at the others "i dont know about anyone else but they can be a pain to fight"

Before Briefing
@Keidivh |

Truth be told, Feuerstolz did not know how to react to this canine placing his head in her lap, looking down at it before awkwardly, slowly, moving her free hand forward to let Vorgen sniff the sweat and sulfur that had become her new personal smell. "That's reassuring, considering his size alone..."

She reached for her mug and drew another long sip. "Then let us hope that our motley company will strike a balance of adventure and scraps that will please you, war-priest. Can't say that I know what war weariness is like, but I'll imagine it is not a pleasant feeling", Wiebke belatedly toasted.

"Well I reckon there is at least one powerful vampire in this Castle, probably the Grandmaster himself. Other than him, I would expect a classic array of the undead forces pitted against us, maybe even some reanimated Greenskins or even a human thrall or two. In any case, I planned to reach the base of the mountains in the evening and find lodging in one of the villages there where we could possibly find more clues to how far the vampire corruption spreads or even find some information on how to beat them. Of course, the actual Castle infiltration shall be done in the morning while we have sun at our back because I don't fancy our chances going straight at them during the night - they will be a bit weakened during the day at least."

<Yesterday>
Having found her tent, Alozia thanked the guide for the help before slipping inside her abode. To see a lovely bath made for her pretty much filled out her plans for the rest of the evening, and dipping find the water was hot was to her a welcome relief. Obviously after having a luxurious bath, the Druchii went to sleep quite soundly with her clothing dumped in the bath to help try and clean it for tomorrow, which she kinda hoped was a little more down time before doing something else.

<Today, After Briefing>
When Constantine started with the briefing, the Sorceress was fairly sure it would be some task that was relatively simple, surely he wouldn't be willing to try something bold and foolish when the band had just gotten over their first job as a group.... And by the end of the briefing, she wasn't sure if he was just slightly unhinged and brilliant or was completely mad, given that he was proposing that they go and take over a castle held by a bunch of Vampires that armies had failed.

Then again, once Alozia had thought about it, having an actual castle with proper rooms would be far better for everyone rather than having reside in a simple bunch of tents(regardless of how nice they were). So instead of complaining about it, she remained quite to let everyone else get their questions in.

Briefing
After drinking near a full keg of ale by himself, Kristoff drifted into a lovely peaceful, alcohol induced coma for some time, until it was unpleasantly interrupted by the priestess, who gave him a long, harsh scolding for acting blatantly ignoring her command. Thankfully he was still a bit buzzed, so the whole thing was a blur.

After taking some time to eat Kristoff's head began to clear, luckily just in time for the briefing. He continued to woof down a great deal of bacon, eggs and whatever else he could find on the table. This slowly came to a stop as Constantine began to describe their mission, and he became quite invested in it.

"What a grand mission this shall be! A brave band of ragtag warriors, overthrowing a mighty Vampire overlord! Worthy of Ulric himself!" He smashed his fist into the table, showing his enthusiasm. Vorgen seemed to be listening quite intently as well, his eyes never leaving Constantine as he described the details of the mission. He then turned his head towards Kristoff, letting out a couple small barks.

"Ah, my brother brings up a fine point here. Can this vampire lord be killed by conventional means? By which of course I mean smashing him to bits."

Tuska had been drinking and eating nonstop since he sat down and eventually found himself dozing off still seated at the table, non of the halflings dared to wake him and the rest of the group seemed to not care. He even still had a boar leg in his mouth and a tankard in his hand. He slowly opened his eyes to find himself with another feast and day light and quickly swallowed the leg whole and downed what remained of the drink realized that Constantine was talking about a new mission. He didn't really care about the details and only really listened at the end when he said their plan. It seemed simple enough be all sneaky and kunning and kill da git in charge and hopefully get to smash lots of things on the way. Tuska remained silent as he had nothing to contribute other than an answer to the Wolfpriest's question. "Of course wez can kill em by smashin em why else would wez be goin?" He said as he grabbed another drink.

Khelandria finished eating and, since few of her fellow mercenaries were in the mood for talking, she retired to bed sooner than she had expected. But all the better for a good night's rest, she was up and ready to go early, though she would miss the tent with its lovely bath.

Listening to Master Constantine's plan, she paused to consider its merits.

"Storming a castle is seldom in the favour of the attacker," she agreed, "so a more stealthy approach would be better." She had experience, after all, every Death Night. But that wasn't so much stealthy as sheer bloody-minded violence. Khelandria did not mention the wild Bacchanal of Khaine - not everyone shared her blessed devotion, after all.

Fulke stifled a yawn before placing his empty plate back to the table, the dark rings around his eyes apparently having darkened despite the most luxurious accommodations he had experienced since.. Forever. It had been yet another late night, as the former Greatsword had stalked the carnival's edges with the spare torches that Constantine's hired bear had provided him. Where the darkness encroached, he had spared a light to push it back for a time. There could be no sleep for a man from Essen knowing that there was some dark corner that the deathless might lurk in.

After that there had been poring over tattered texts, the scribbles of madmen and self-proclaimed survivors of Sylvania's minions. After the broth brought in by Kolja, Fulke had sunk into the lukewarm bath that he had drawn before it had time to turn to ice. Then came an uncomfortable night of tossing and turning, a dagger under his pillow and a stake within reach, incoherent prayers to Morr mixed with curses spat at that same god.

It seems that Morr has plans for me yet. Surely no coincidence that a stronghold of the dead awaits me, even on this new path.

"The.. Elf, makes a fair point. But we do not sneak in at night. Coordinate by the rising of the sun, we'll have a full day to hunt the leeches as they cower and slumber. Now sir, what of the dead? You mentioned Greenskins and thralls. I assume that they have the corpses of Orcs among them? What of the castle, do we have any reports of it's defenses - historical or otherwise?" Fulke leaned forward, hands clasped together and covering his mouth as he himself attempted to dredge up any memory of High Rock. As ever, it was the clandestine nature of vampire hunters that often lead to gaping, often lethal holes in their knowledge of the foe.