Inactive Inquisition Quest: Mysteries of Brocante

[Baltika9]

Gentlemen, baud has participated in these CYOAs alongside us for about seven years now.

Come and support our boy. Participate!

 

[vazha]

Village sounds the best best to actually have some disaster happen.

 

[Endemic]

Go to the village.

 

[Azira]

Nah, go to the hospital.

 

[baud]

Village sounds the best best to actually have some disaster happen.

As far as you know, all the inhabitants of the village are dead, their bodies burned or dumped in a mass grave.

And thanks for the votes, I'll roll a die if the tie don't get broken

 

[Azira]

 

[baud]

So for the vote:
1 for the hospital, using Baltika's write-in
2 for the village

Edit: So the party is going to the village where the virus first appeared!

 

[Azira]

 

[InD_ImaginE]

Wait so is this vote based with 1 protagonist and we vote for his action or is it more akin to we roleplay our own character here? Sorry, I am kinda confused. I think its the former yes?

 

[Baltika9]

Wait so is this vote based with 1 protagonist and we vote for his action or is it more akin to we roleplay our own character here? Sorry, I am kinda confused. I think its the former yes?

It is the former, yes. We can also do freeform write in options.

 

[baud]

I've just realized I've called the department you're working for H&M, just like the clothing store. I feel stupid.. I think I'll just never use the acronym.


Edit: github just fucking lost the work I've done this evening! FUCK!

 

[Reinhardt]

Then you can just go to hospital instead.

 

[baud]

Part 4: Road trip

Looking out of the windows of the train, you can see slag heaps, open-pit mines and abandoned refineries giving way to a mountain range separating the lowlands around the capital from the Wahun area. The Wahun area itself is a sharp contrast from the lowlands, all blue rolling fields, but instead of the swarms of farmers or agricultural machines preparing the coming harvest, the fields are unworked, left fallow in the wake of the epidemic.
The Wahun area had always been the breadbasket of the planet, having been spared the worst of the strip-mining inflicted upon this world while it was a mining world because of its lower mineral wealth and fertile plains. It had fed the miners during that time and now that the most productive veins had been exhausted and the planet redesignated as an Agri-World, it produces most of the tithe, which is then exported to the rest of the sub-sector.

The train quickly reached the city of Hubei, biggest city of Wahun and provincial capital and through its railway infrastructure, gateway to the rest of Brocante. Quickly leaving the organized chaos of the train station, you enter the city: contrasting the steel and rockrete construction style common all across the Imperium of Man, the buildings of Wahun mostly use local materials, pale grey stones and dark wood. Only official buildings displayed the usual metal arch and skull decorations. Though instead of the bustling streets shown in the picts on your dataslate, few people roamed the streets, mostly militia enforcing the martial law and orderlies going back and forth between the dispensaries and the main hospital.

---

You reach the offices of the Department of Health and Mores, which have stood empty for a few weeks, two of deputies dead from the virus, another half-dead in a faraway hospital and the rest having fled to the capital before the virus reached Hubei. In addition to the office, which will be used as lodgings for the duration of your assignment, you find a light ground car in the garage of the office, which will allow you to easily travel in the area.

"We'll leave tomorrow for Jianghu, the village where the virus first appeared. Our goal will be to investigate any trace of chaotic corruption that might signal the origin of the virus." you tell your acolytes once you've settled down.

Investigation roll Telemacus: 15: DC: 25 Fail.

Investigation roll: Balda: 18 DC: 25 Fail.

"Understood. I'll prepare the maps for the travel" answers Telemacus.

"I have opened a line of communications with Magos Zhu. He is available to see us in the next few days. He made clear he has a heavy workload and his time is not be be wasted on petty trivialities." says Electryos.

"Good work. That'd save up some time when we go see him. Can you check the car is ready for the travel tomorrow, please? I'd rather avoid issues on the roads." you ask

"I will execute the relevant blessings of the Omnissiah to soothe its machine spirit."

---

Early the following morning, you put on the sash with the emblem of the Department of Health and Mores (hands clasped over a mining drill) and leave, dodging heavy trafic around the train station caused by the arrival of another relief train, this one carrying supplies. As you leave the city, you drive along hastily dug mass graves being filled by the last casualties of the epidemic, with a Ecclesiarchy priest waving his censer and exhorting the souls of the deceased to pass quietly into the void.

Navigating roll: 75

You successfully manage to navigate the network of dirt paths that make up most of the road infrastructure in the area, using the scribbles Telemacus made on the map to find the most direct route. Once you've left Hubei behind, you barely cross any other vehicles, mostly escorted trucks carrying food or various medicinal supplies.

But as you've passed the midpoint of your route, you come across a checkpoint manned by a group of bored-looking PDF soldiers, which are controlling all movement across the area. You would have preferred travelling without any notice, but at least the group buy your story of checking the quarantine measure in a dispensary close by and your papers are in order. You guess you'll have to travel there on your way back.

---

The village of Jianghu is reached in the afternoon, an empty and desolate place, with the cold ashes of a pyre where bodies of the villagers were burned in a failed attempt to stop the spread of the virus. The village itself is a small group of houses with a few warehouses, all vernacular, with barely mark of the technology of the Mechanicus.

But your focus is mostly on the group of six scavengers, arrived in a beat-up truck carrying their misbegotten gains. You've surprised them as they are transporting random loot from the first houses. They are a ragtag bunch, dressed in mismatched clothes, some obviously stolen. You don't see any visible firearm, but they all grab various improvised weapons or knife when they see you approching.

"Come on, my guv! The poor saps ain't have no use for this anymor'. " one, who look like a leader, shouts to you

"Yeah, that's not hurting no-one, cuz they got fraked by the virus. We gotta eat, we got folks waitin' for us, ya know." add another, who's missing half his teeth, giving him a lopsided grin.

[] Kill them. They are in your way and they are stealing from the dead.
[] Let them go. The epidemic have stopped most work in the area, they have to find ways to survive
[] Let them go, but bribe them so that they leave any loot from this village: the clues you're looking for might be among it.

Carried weapons:
Balda: Fancy high-caliber stub revolver
Electryos: Las-carbine
Telemacus: Autopistol

Spoiler

I used Baltika's idea of contacting the Magos beforehand.

Investigation rolls in the update would have revealed more information on your current investigation, but you should be able to make do without. I'm not really sure about using dice rolls, but we'll see how it goes.

 

[Baltika9]

C

 

[Gondolin]

C

C, but also interrogate them if possible. Ask them to tell you everything they know about what happens in the villages during the epidemic and its aftermath.

 

[Azira]

They might carry the taint. Suffer not heresy.

A

 

[Endemic]

C, but also interrogate them if possible. Ask them to tell you everything they know about what happens in the villages during the epidemic and its aftermath.

Agreed.

 

[baud]

Thank you for the write-in, I'll add that to the update (unless another option wins, but I doubt it)

 

[InD_ImaginE]

Also C.

What these people do are of no importance to us. Just ensure that our clue won't be taken by them and we are gucci.

 

[True Ukrainian]

C

 

[Azira]

I am, frankly, disgusted by all the people here deigning to consort with degenerate looters and lowlife scum! Clearly, these people (the looters) are no better than outright cultists themselves! They do not deserve mercy. What they deserve is to be purified by flame, like any other beast of carrion!

 

[Baltika9]

Dead men tell no tales.

 

[Gondolin]

I am, frankly, disgusted by all the people here deigning to consort with degenerate looters and lowlife scum! Clearly, these people (the looters) are no better than outright cultists themselves! They do not deserve mercy. What they deserve is to be purified by flame, like any other beast of carrion!

Go ahead and be disgusted. I'm more interested in why these looters aren't dead. Does it mean that you can handle objects touched by infected people? Which objects are safe? How many looters died? Stuff like that.

 

[True Ukrainian]

We all know the answer already. The pandemic has a long incubation period where it is undetectable. That's why the looters are seemingly uninfected. I just want to see whether our Inquisitor can be blessed with the gift of the grandfather.

 

[baud]

Part 5: Negotiations

"So, what you gonna do? Snitch us to the coppers? Try to use dat shiny gun to off us?" said one of the scavengers, eyeing with disdain your visible handgun.

Well, first it's not shiny, it's engraved and second, no you're not going to start a fight, since they are a potential source of information, beyond the dry-as-dust reports you got when you arrived in Hubei.

"I'd be more interested in some business. Like buying some of what's in your truck." you answer, while taking a casual stance and flipping a throne up and down.

"What, you're slumming, my lordship? But if you got the dosh, we can flog some tat your way." the apparent leader says, showing the loot in his truck. And as he talks, his colleagues relax, dropping their makeshift weapons or sheathing their knives.

Social roll: 28

You move closer to look through the loot, but their stances are still guarded. You try to ask a few questions as you do it, even if that kind of interrogation isn't what you're used to.

"You've got a good haul. You've been in the area for long?" you ask

"You bonkers or what? We' just got here from the other side of Wahun. Had to wait for the risk of catching that Pelforth crap go down and avoid the patrols." the leader answers.

"How do you know there's no risk now?"

"Hong's cousin mucks in a dispensary back in Zhelaizhai, she talked 'bout this stuff. Take two or three weeks and objects are safe. Still got to wear gloves and avoid takin' shit like clothes.", he answers, showing his gloved hands. You also spot on his belt a mask similar to the one you're wearing.

You successfully get a pile of what they appropriated from this village and haggled the price down to some thrones, even if you know you're getting fleeced. The leader share with you and his "partners" a goblet of disgusting hooch to cement the deal and you take the opportunity to ask a few more questions.

"So you weren't there at the start of the epidemic?"

"Yup. Had a graft setting up a food processing plant, dat joint would produce as much as 300 workers working their ass of, but with like 20 geezers pushing buttons. Reckon it's going to be needed now with all the poor bastards who croaked." this time it's not the leader who answer, but a scrawny guy with a lho-stick hanging from his lips.

"Do you remember when it started?"

"Dunno, heard it have been around the time of St Yonis's feasts. 'Had some family around this end, they were worried 'bout the cog-freaks setting up shop in the area. Those metal weirdo ain't know to grow nuthing.". He continues after finishing his drink "Tough they were chuffed the sun loonies weren't showing their ugly mugs dat year. Ain't no matter in the end, dem got the virus and conked out pretty badly."

From one your files, the festival of Saint Yonis is a week-long midsummer festival, particular to the Wahun area. It is suspected that the virus had first spread during that period, with the farmers often visiting family in other villages or towns, helping spread the virus across the village.

"My condolences. What's those sun loonies you're talking about?"

"'nutters who preach the Almighty's in the Sun, givin' life to all on the planet. Heretics, the lot of them and that kretin deacon still hasn't burned 'em all." another scavenger says, making the sign of the Aquilla as he's answering you.

Different ways of worshiping the Emperor are common throughout the Imperium, with most of Brocante worshiping the Emperor as the Lord of the Deeps, Who is giving the planet the ore it needs to function. But particular faiths tend to be shaped by their environment and that another one, more suitable for a agricultural province, had emerged, isn't surprising.
But as you are about to ask more questions, their boss cut the conversation short.

"Deal's done and ain't got all day for natter.", giving a hard look to the two who answered you, who clamp up, most likely realizing they've talked too much to an official. "We movin', muckers" the boss calls and his subordinates follow, boarding the truck haphazardly, with the driver starting up the engine.

[] Let them go. You got some information and your work here isn't done
[] Write-in (note that attempts to prevent their departure for whatever reason will most likely devolve into violence)

Spoiler

the roll was for how much information you would be able to get; too low and the scavengers would have attacked instead. Also writing slang is complicated as an ESL, it might not have been a good idea. Still I'm not completely sure about offering a choice here, but I prefer to have the investigation in the village in another part and I prefer to end the chapter with a choice.