That Explains The Inflation! 5e WNW

Session 11 of the weird new world campaign was played on Friday 3/27

The party consisted of the following:
Veidt, 1/2 Elf Wizard 3 (John)
Nessendra, Wood Elf Cleric 3 (Erindale)
Kethra, Human Fighter 3 (Nikki)
Bach, Dragonborn Warlock 3 (Erik)
Riia, Human Ranger 3 (Hanna)
Guy Noir, ½ Elf Rogue 3 (Nadia)
Anya Bowen, Tiefling Ranger 3 (Allison)

The party finally arrives within sight of town. There are four guards at the opening of a gateway, looking quite sullen. Bach lengthens his stride in excitement, leaving the others behind. The guards notice him with a start. Bach, a large dragonborn with a huge grin, coming at them fast? They scramble in fear, ready to slam the gates shut. Bach yells a friendly greeting, which gives the guards some pause. Riia runs up as well, saying that he’s with her, which further eases their fears. The rest of the gang catches up, and the guards welcome them to the town Provolone, and states that it’s a gold coin to enter. Each. While the other party members are taken aback by the price, Bach asks the guards why the look so sullen. They inform him that it’s because they’re missing the games inside. There are gladiator fights that day in the coliseum at the center of town. “Is there now...” Without a second thought, Bach flips them a gold coin and marches off towards the coliseum, Veidt throwing a tracker on him so not to lose him.

The others stay to ask a few more questions before entering. Who is the leader around here, for one, and where can they find this Alabaster Lady? As it turns out, there is no big cheese in the town of Provolone; it being a long time since they had a mayor, and the Alabaster Lady comes and goes as she pleases, but she might be around. Thanking them anyways, they give a gold coin each and try to catch up with Bach. On their way, they notice the town looks rather run down; pothole filled roads, and stores boarded up. They also notice a lot more tieflings than usually occupy a single area. They find Bach standing outside the coliseum talking with another entrance guard. Apparently, it’s another gold to get in to watch the games. Pffting, Bach asks where the champions go. It’s around the back and down some stairs, so Bach is off again. Veidt, Riia, and Guy follow him down, while Nessendra, Kethra, and Anya decide to have a look around instead.

The later run into a merchant selling delicious swamp rats on a stick, sprinkled with his special Old Swamp® seasoning. He tells them how the town stopped having enough legal citizens to actually vote for a mayor twenty-odd years ago, and that the Alabaster Lady and the Red Ladies are the only ones with some kind of influence around here. It turns out that the Alabaster Lady has lizard-men who run errands for her. If they find one, it should take them to her. The Red Ladies, they might not have much interest in; unless they are inclined in that way, of course.

Around back and down the stairs of the coliseum, the others find themselves in a locker room of sorts for the fighters of the games. They’re stopped by a contentious fighter and asked what they’re doing down there. Bach informs him that he himself is here to be the champion of the games. Everyone who hears laughs at the idea. Bach insists, so the other fighter leads him to the sign up desk where a halfling is sitting doing paperwork. The halfling scoffs at Bach’s confidence, but decides to line him up in the very next fight, a malicious grin spreading across his face. He then asks what Veidt and Riia are doing there. Veidt explains that he is Bach’s embalmer should he fail, and Riia says she’s his fight manager. Them being of Bach’s managerial team, they get to have box seats for his fight. In the meantime, Guy has lingered back in the changing room to try to get some information from a scarcely clad fighter, Beefcake McMan, and possibly some other things.
Horns sound, and an announcer yells out that Bach’s fight is about to begin! Our group outside hears it. They roll their eyes and decide to pay to watch; Nessendra grumbling that, knowing Bach, he’ll probably need a healer. Having been in a soft muddy swamp for so long, they opt not to pay extra for cushions. The three of them file in and find seats; Kethra with two swamp rats on a stick to snack on. “Mmm… spicy.”.

The horns blare again, and Bach steps out shining bright in his Armor of Agathys. The game is on. Two drakes are let out and approach Bach warily, but there’s hunger in their eyes. Bach kneels down quick, takes a pinch of sand, and blows it at the two of them! … An audience member dozes off in the stands. Bach’s sleep spell is a fail! Taking advantage of Bach’s momentary bafflement, the drake closest to him attacks with a vicious bite! Unlucky for it though, Bach’s armor deals damage right back at it! Not only that, Bach retaliates with a Hellish rebuke, killing it on the spot! One down, he turns his attention to the second drake. It dashes in with a bite, getting another automatic damage. Then Bach uses his Agonizing Blast, finishing it! Our group jumps up out of their seats cheering, so unexpectedly, for their squishy dragonborn. That is, until they realize they’re the only ones doing so. The rest of the crowd just sit there, unimpressed and disappointed by the too short of a fight (failed performance roll). Bach catched a bag full of silver, his reward, and marches back to the changing room, strutting his stuff.

Guy doesn’t get much information during Bach’s fight, being thoroughly distracted with other intentions, except for the whole Chaos and demons thing that only ending 75 years ago, and that there are stories and fear still going around about it. Oh, and that there’s a temple/dungeon near here or whatever. “Yeah yeah, so what are you doing later?”. Guy does mention that he saw a dragon named Blightfang down river, though. At the name, all blood drains from McMan’s face, and Guy quickly rescinds the statement to alleviate his obvious fears. How can he have fun later if McMan’s all terrified after all? Bach, passing by, hears them talking and says in his voluminous voice, “Did you say Blightfang? My BFF?” Bach then holds up a selfie of himself and Blightfang; him with an enormous grin with a thumbs up, and Blightfang staring at the camera with contempt. Guy can only drop his head in his hands. When he looks up to say Bach is only joking, he sees the entire cumulation of fighters have disappeared from the room. Cursing, he trudges out after Bach.

The party finds an overpriced inn with a bathing facility and they clean up, have dinner, and discuss their plan for the next day. They’re going to find the Alabaster Lady, see what up with that, and find some place to get their (whisper) wererat affliction *ahem* cured. Anya realizes that the only damage she ever took was that slight scratch during the wererat smothering, and it just wouldn’t be right if she turned into a wererat because of it! Maybe after they do all that, they’ll venture off to that temple/dungeon Guy heard about. They retire to their beds, and Guy leaves a potted flower on Riia’s doorstep, knowing how much she likes flowers and all things plant. He then goes off to the red ladies for a good night and some more info, but instead pays five gold for only one lay and an STD (failed constitution saving throw)… “What a rip off!”

The next morning, they are woken by Riia’s scream of rage as she destroys “an evil plant that was about to attack!”. They have some breakfast and go out to look for the Alabaster Lady when *smash!*, Riia walks out the door and right into one of the lizard men. She apologizes, but the lizard man only gestures silently for them to follow. He leads them back inside the coliseum where a little market of venders has sprung up. There at the end stands the Alabaster Lady. Beautiful, pale, and completely made of alabaster stone! She beckons to them, stating that she has been expecting them.
“Oh? What for?” She knows that they opened the gate for Chaos, allowing the demons to escape. She also knows that Blightfang is the one who heralded the age of Chaos so long ago. Asking her how it was ended back then, she tells them that a mortal was the one who finally ended the onslaught 75 years ago, but at the cost his life. The party finds this an appropriate time to inform her that Blightfang is back! They saw her down river just a few weeks ago! The Chaos blight has begun again!
She only shakes her head. “No.” she says regretfully. “Blightfang /was/ the herald of Chaos. The same Chaos you released 200 years ago.” The group exchange puzzled looks. “…..Wha? N-no. Two weeks ago. We saw her 2 /weeks/ ago. She’s /back/! The 200 year ago thing? Wasn’t us. We /just/ did that. If that’s what we did.” She shakes her head again, and gives them the current year. It’s 200 years later.

A moment passes, and it finally hits. “…..WHAT!?!?!?!?” Questions and worries fly out as they generally freak-out. How could this happen? Why? When?? Their families. Friends. Loved ones. Everyone, and everything they’ve ever known, aside from each other, is gone. Dead and gone forever.. It can’t be..
The Alabaster Lady waits patiently as their shock wears off. Suddenly, Riia straightens and exclaims, “That explains all the inflation!” With that the bereavement breaks, at least outwardly, and they pull themselves together for the next step. The Lady then goes on to ask for their help. Her husband, Anura, is trapped in the Black Mire swamp (where they’ve just come out of), only he’s northwest of here, and she asks for them to please rescue him. The party asks how the lady and her husband can still be alive after so long. It turns out that they indeed lived during the Chaos, but they were also locked into their current forms by it. The party then ask if she can cure the ones with the wererat ailment. She cannot, not being of that level of power, however her husband can. If they save him, he will surely cure them. Although, she can cure the one with STD’s. Yes, plural. She bopps Guy on the head and he’s clean!

There lives have changed drastically. What will the party do? They missed the age of Chaos. Transported to another time, what adventures await them now?