The characters all lived in Hollin, and we discussed their homes a little, deciding:
Beowolf heard from an old friend, Beacher, that he might be able to revisit Highpyre, his birth city on Hilde.
Beowolf is told by a friend who knows his background that in a few weeks a navy expedition is going to Hilde. They've recently had two separate expeditions to Hilde go missing, both ships commanded by excellent officers. The last sighting of one of them was in Beowolf's former village - Highpyre. Would Beowolf go with them to find the fate of the expeditions? The date of the search leaving isn't fixed yet, possibly within a few weeks.
When asked if the characters would condone illicit bare knuckle boxing, the players enthusiastically said yes. So, since the ship wasn't leaving immediately, the party decided to go to the Whipsaw, a bar with boxing and betting in the basement. As a raging barbarian, Beowolf was soon lured into ring - a ten foot radius pit in the floor with planks as the wall. After he easily defeated his first opponent, he was mismatched against the crowd favorite, Mulebeck (character sheet), who easily beat him.
Kasskar discovered after leaving the bar that, while he had been pressed in with the raucous crowd watching the fight, a note had been slipped into his pocket: "Would you be interested in some confidential work? Contact me tonight through your recent friend." They followed this up with their only recent new friend, Gregor.
Assuming they do go to Gregor, he introduces the characters to Turnfield and Herndon. Turnfield is a doctor who studies deficiencies. Many of the ships leaving port now carry limes to prevent scurvy, and that's because Turnfield advocates strongly for it. Right now he's testing Gregor's crazy-sounding theory that sunlight can prevent rickets.
The second doctor is Herndon, an anatomist. As an anatomist, Herndon studies the human body by dissection. Herndon has a contact at Meade Hospital who says that right now, there's a body in the Meade Hospital Morgue with goiter. Since goiter isn't fatal, it's actually pretty rare to hear of a body with goiter. So, Herndon and Turnfield feel very strongly that they would like to study that body.
Unfortunately, in Hollin, dissecting bodies is a crime. So, this is where the confidential work comes in. Herndon and Turnfield propose to steal this body from the morgue and Kasskar's lockpicking ability would come in very handy for this. They can offer the party (only) 50 pennies to help with this.
If the characters agree, they'll break into the morgue through the sewers. Gregor, Herndon, and Turnfield know a private entrance to the sewers that they can use, but they should wait until night to maximize the chance that the morgue will be empty of workers.
The characters agreed, and they went to the private entrance.
The private entrance is at a sanctuary run by one of their fellow doctors, Werner, for untouchables and girls "in trouble." Herndon warns them that, for the benefit of the patients, the sanctuary is secret, so please don't discuss the sanctuary with anyone.
When they get there, they see that it's a former merchants' hostel. You've seen others in the city like it - the Mooncalf is a very well-known one - and it has the common design of a large courtyard surrounded on all sides by the building. Herndon has brought a horse-drawn carriage, a sheet, and a stretcher, and when the party arrives Werner opens an overhead door in one side of the building that they can drive their carriage through. When they get into the courtyard, it seems that it has just been cleared of patients for their benefit, and the last few are still scurrying out: a pregnant girl and a couple other women. One of the women is a young girl herself and catches the characters' eyes - she's a Lauren Hill type. Herndon tells them that's the midwife Idri, and that the other older woman is also a midwife, Clara.
The party traveled through the sewers without any trouble, and soon arrived under Meade Hospital. Coming up through a sewer grate, which Kasskar unlocked, they entered the hospital morgue, and were met with the smell of embalming fluid. Exploring, they soon found the morgue's Great Hall. There, they learned that the morgue was a waiting morgue, meaning that the deceased were held there for a few days to confirm they had actually died and wouldn't be buried alive.
The Great Hall is like the Registry Room at Ellis Island. It's 200 feet by 100 feet. It has high vaulted ceilings about 50 feet high at the apex. It's masonry everywhere. There are many marble slabs - spaced on a regular grid throughout the hall - with many additional rolling beds along the walls or between the slabs.
The characters have to split up and search the bodies to find the one they're looking for. As they begin to search, they inadvertently ring some bells on the wrists and ankles of the bodies. Herndon says that this is "waiting morgue," which means that bodies brought here are kept for several days to watch for signs of life, to prevent burying someone alive. The bells are so that if there is any stirring, an attendant can hear it. So, try not to get the attendants' attention by ringing the bells.
Despite their best efforts, the party did ring a few bells while looking under the bodies' sheets. Soon however, they heard bells ringing that they had not rung. Some of the bodies were alive, or as they soon discovered, walking dead.
The characters were attacked by three second-level zombies, who they defeated, but not quietly. During the fight, an attendant came in to check on the ringing bells, but the attendant was Herndon's contact at the morgue, and he quickly left when he saw what was happening.
After surviving the zombie attack, the party hurriedly found the body with goiter. They returned to Werner's sanctuary, carrying the body on a stretcher, and claimed the 50 gold piece reward.
Jennish also claimed a curious gadget in the morgue.
In the course of the search, Jennish notices a curious machine that he deduces (1) pumps out blood and pumps in embalming fluid; and (2) is broken. It's about the size of a cooler and on wheels so that if he has the urge they can steal that thing too.
In the first few games of the campaign, I wanted to use pennies as the base coin instead of gold pieces, to make Hollin feel more English and emphasize everyone's modest means. So, in the quote text above, Herndon and Turnfield offer the characters 50 pennies to steal the body. But, after another game or two we abandoned the idea and switched to gold pieces.
The midwife Clara, who the party saw scurrying out of sight at the sanctuary, was a recurring character in the campaign, but she was inadvertently renamed Wren in later games.
The morgue's floorplan was borrowed from the City State of the Invincible Overlord's Three Temples.
