So this is going to need some backstory.
This was during the time when me and my friends where playing 3rd edition D&D. Our DM had told us that he had a new campaign planned where humans where socially superior to the other fantasy races. This was around that time Witcher 3 was released and he wanted to imitate that feeling where elves and dwarfes were seen as lower class citizens and in many cases, even magic users where under some kind of persecution. Very grimdark kind of setting.
So our rollcall is: Me, the human thief with a heart of gold. Mike, the human wizard who always managed to loose his glasses, Sarah the human cleric and grandmother to all. Our last player (and this is really his story) was Tim. Tim had never played any kind of tabletop rpg before but was really interessted in giving it a try, so once a spot opened up in our group we invited him in. Tim was something of the quiet type and me and Mike was a bit worried that we, not only as more experienced players but due to our personalities would scare him away as we both liked to steal the spotlight whenever we got the chance. And we worried that we would scare him away so we both decided to dial it back to give him some room to operate, knowing well sure that we would not be able to do that for long. Our worries where quashed once Tim presented his character. It was inspired by his world of warcraft character and thus he ended up playing as Quest…the…goblin…barbarian.
Quest's backstory was that during his childhood had his family of goblins been raided by a group of adventurers and all slain, exept for Quest. He had been out that day and only saw the adventurers leaving his home while fighting a bear. Quest was so impressed by their strenght that he started idolizing them and see them as the greatest heroes ever. One of the adventurers took pity on Quest and gave him the name and tought him to fight. Quest dreamt of becoming a big adventurer like his mentor one day. But one fateful day his party was defeated by the BBEG and Quest was left all alone. Shunned by all, with no home to go to. Until the day he fell into our group. Which proved a lot harder to make happen than planned as the goblin only new one word in common. His name. And no one in the party spoke goblin.
But Tim did not let that stop him and eagerly screamed, muttered, laughed his name and even made Quest into a swearword while gesticulating wildly to make his point. I mean, for a first time player he was pretty impressive.
So we do a few quests and we bond and cheer and soon a few month has passed and we reached lvl 5.
This is where things would start to go wrong.
We had managed to scrape up quite a bit of coin, Both from me stealing, as rewards and as acting as a travelling group of entertainers. Me as a juggler, Mike as a magician, Sarah as a fortuneteller and Quest as the Incredible frogboy. We were by no means worried over our financial status. But only two steps into a large port town call Stalwart harbor we were mugged by seven bandits.
We had learned during this time that Quest had this problem with being called short. Apparently he understood that word and various synonyms to it. Every time anyone called him short he would raise his hand and glare angrily at them while presenting three fingers. If he was called short again he would lover one finger. Once all finger where lowered he would attack and gnaw and bite at their knees, tearing them off if possible.
So when one of the bandits said those dreaded words we all new what was going to happen.
"What's the matter shorty? Cat got your tongue?" One of the bandits taunted.
Quest's hand immediately was raised into the air.
"Look at the green midget. He thinks he's dangerous! The bandits laughed as a finger was lowered.
"Oh look at that, Gibbs. He's warning ya." Another bandit laughed.
"Now look here you little wippersnappers…" Sarah interuppted in her oldest granny voice.
"Look, we dont want to harm ya. We only want your money. give it here and we'll part ways peacefully." The leader of the bandits explained calmly.
I prepared a knife behind my back. Mike tightened the grip around his staff, Quest… Quest stood still with two fingers till in the air.
"Yeah well. we're not going to give you our money. Best we just go on our merry way and never speak of this again, what do you say?" I tried to persuade them. I failed.
"We're ready to fight if it comes to that. So why not do this the easy way and we can just share a beer at the tavern." Mike tried to calm the situation. He failed.
"Give us your money now or we'll kill all of you. starting with your green small friend over there." The leader shouted and pointed at Quest who lowered a finger.
"Quest. calm down. We don't want any unwanted attention. Goblins aren't popular here as it is." Mike whispered.
"Quest!" Quest responded with a determined look.
"Ah damnit" Mike sighed.
"Oi Shor…" One of the bandits started to shout but was interuppted by Sarah who began screaming for the guards.
The entire party took a breath of relief as we saw that Quest hadn't lowered his last finger yet.
The bandits froze and soon voices could be heard from the approaching guards.
The bandits scattered as fast as they could. We rushed to dress Quest in a hankerchief to hide his ears and his goblinage.
The guards helped us back onto the street and pointed us to the nearest tavern.
One of the guards noticed Quest less than common appearance and commented.
"Whoah there small-fry. you might wanna visit at doctor."
Quest lowered his last finger.
The following seconds were just pure chaos as Quest attacks the guard while the three of us tries to hold him back.
"Goblin!" A voice screamed.
More and more civilians noticed the scene and more guards came running.
Tim was going abroad for a month due to this our DM judged that Quest was captured and brought to prison to have an ingame reason for him to not be in our party for some time.
We ignored most of the DM hooks during this time. all of our energy was spent in planning and preparing his breakout and sabotaging the many many attempts on his life from civilians and even town officials.
This led us to do a mission for a seedy merchant wich inturn led to a dragon being released in the city. Oops.
The dragon flew over the city and was brutally bombarded by the city ballistas and siege weapons. One clean hit forced it down where it crashed right into the buidling Quest was located. From the rubble we can all hear a triumphant voice screaming "QUEESST!"
And the small goblin ran over the dragon's neck and down its tail to the street were we met him. The dragon took flight again. Townsfolk from all around began cursing at Quest that it was his fault and that he had summoned the Dragon. Quest stood silently just letting them speak. If he didn't understand or if he was just letting them vent, I'll never know.
The dragon blew a large pillar of fire over the city as it swooped down.
Quest looked to all of us and smiled rougishly.
"Quest!" He said with his determined smile.
We all nodded. knowing what had to be done.
Knowing that we were way to weak to handle this dragon in a hands on fight we started to run towards the closest pathway up the city walls to reach a siege weapon.
We reached the closest stairway and quickly started to climb when the dragon crashed through the wall. The stair way collapsed as we ran up it. We just managed to reach the upper ledge when the last step fell down.
Up on the top we saw a ballista. the soldiers had been killed from one of the earlier attacks. We quickly worked together to get the ballista shooting again and launched a projectile toward the dragon. We missed.
Quest stood like crazed, screaming and cursing at the dragon whil waving his axe in the air.
He jumped up onto the next baliista arrow and screamed "QUEEEEST!" as he pointed his axe at the dragon.
We aimed and shot… Nat 20.
Quest rode the arrow through the air and landed hard on the dragon. Jumping and screaming and biting he attacked over and over again, barely manageing to hold on.
Finally he managed to pierce the eyes and blind the dragon completely. The Dragon crashed into the city one last time sending Quest tumbling down the street. Broken and lifeless.
We gathered around him and held him as he looked at us with a faint smile.
We all eagerly awaited his final words as we saw his life slowly leave him.
"Quest?" He whispered.
"Yes…" Mike whispered. "You are a hero. One of the best."
Quest smiled. "Quest." he whispered before his body turned limp.
Mike started to cry. holding Quest's body tight as the rain started to fall.
It was all very dramatic until we realized that we could bring him back with a ressurect dead scroll we've gotten for a mission and never used. Tim suggested to let Quest be. as he was tired with allways having the party to take great meassures to even let him walk around in a town. And wanted to make a new character anyway.
Quest has since been a recurring npc for other campaigns. And usually meets his demise in some crazy way or another.
[zombify_post]
0 Comments