1/18/2022 The session began with the party about to approach Poopy’s Place to receive a briefing by the Barons on the current state of the County. Just then, a rider from the north approached the party. It was a dwarf riding a black horse, looking for Igny. When Igny identified himself, the rider handed Igny a letter and a bag of gems. The letter was from Helden, the Death Lord of Tumeria, returning Igny’s tithe of 10,000 wheels and asking instead that Igny establish a fastness and temple to Humakt in the new County. Baron Markowitz expressed concern that a rider was so easily able to ride up uncontested to the new Counts, and offered to rally together some guards to protect them. Everyone agreed, and off Baron Markowitz went, agreeing to return before the briefing at Poopy’s Place. Then the party heard another rider, this one coming from the woods to the east. This rider was a halfling by the name of Ragin Bunce and came with a letter of introduction from Mittens. Because of Chance’s misgivings towards all halflings, the party agreed to question him under Igny’s Zone of Truth spell to see if he was in fact harmless. As it turned out, he was a harmless historian, as described by Mittens. After Bunce’s questioning, the party went to Poopy’s Place to get the briefing by Baron Kerin. Baron Markowitz had not yet returned. Kerin sent someone to find the Baron and bring him to the briefing. Meanwhile, Igny again cast Zone of Truth, and the briefing began right away. The situation in the county was indeed bad. The halflings controlled all human settlements in the County except for Eleva. Meanwhile, with the Duke no longer in control of the county, the various elven, human, and dwarven factions had begun fighting with each other in addition to the halflings. Baron Kerin also presented a two-handed greatsword left for the party by Ashe, a member of the (in)famous 4th Honor Company. The sword was indeed substantially magical and appeared a powerful weapon. However, the party had little time to further investigate the weapon, as word returned that Baron Markowitz had fled his home, bursting through the roof riding a flying red demon beast. He was last seen heading west. The party decided to quickly rush to the Baron’s estate to learn what they could. On the way, they encountered a dozen well-armed and armored halflings. A battle quickly ensued. Igny rushed in to draw the fire of the halflings, while Chance unleased a fireball, hitting most of the halflings. Gunther cast Haste on Igny, who was quickly surrounded by the halflings and absorbing blows from all sides. After a tough battle, where Igny briefly fell before being revived by Mobec, the party proved victorious. The party cautiously approached the manor, which appeared abandoned. Igny cast Detect Enemies and learned of two enemies on the top floor. The party decided to take a short rest before entering the house. Inside they encountered no resistance on the first and second floors. On the second floor, however, they found a “big-boned” mouse squeaking towards a makeshift idol. Igny cast Speak With Animals and learned that the mouse was named Meeze and was worshiping Radu. Meeze told the party that Baron Markowitz was an evil man conducting horrible experiments on his servants and that something had been summoned upstairs. The ranger, Maddeus, quickly formed a trusting bond with Meeze and agreed to carry Meeze with him to safety. On the top floor of the house, everything again appeared deserted. However, both a rug and a chest turned out to be mimics! The party deduced that the mimics were the enemies detected by Igny’s earlier spell, and quickly killed them. Investigation of the top floor showed a disturbing painting of a green demon, that it appeared that the Baron had been trying to summon. There was also a summoning circle of the floor, where presumably the flying demon had been summoned. The party gave some of the materials to Ragin Bunce and tasked him with learning the name of the summoned demon. However, Bunce seemed overly eager to learn as much as possible about the demons and the ancient artifacts used to summon them… And with that, the session ended. TL;DR: the party killed a dozen halflings and Baron Markowitz fled.