This Chult's Got a Death Curse!

The aftermath of the pirate victories left the party stronger, but not secure. They woke amid rescued musicians and the wreckage of a shattered pirate network, with multiple ships captured, captains in chains, and only Laskilar still at large. The scale of what they had accomplished was unmistakable, yet so was the risk of overreaching now that their own crew was worn down and an open assault on the final pirate ship looked dangerous.

Much of the session revolved around what to do next. Parlay with Laskilar was clearly a trap if handled carelessly, and the party had to think like commanders rather than raiders. At the same time, downtime in Port Nyanzaru was becoming harder because fame now followed them, and even ordinary errands could not be done quietly anymore. This was one of the first sessions where their reputation itself became a mechanical obstacle instead of a simple reward.

The longer-term horizon also came into focus. Mezro, Artus Cimber, the Star Goddess wreck, and overland travel all pressed forward as possible next steps. The pirate campaign was winding down, but it had transformed the party from talented local meddlers into people with ships, enemies, and the sort of name that Chult would remember.

The party continued their voyage toward Jahaka Anchorage with pirate business already half tangled around them. Silver bullets had been prepared the night before in expectation of facing the wereboar captain rumored to rule one of the ships there, and along the way they managed to turn a few pirates to their side rather than simply cutting through everyone in their path. By the time they finally reached the hidden cove, they were arriving with more than just a plan to strike: they had allies, stolen momentum, and a growing sense that the pirate haven might be vulnerable from within.

Once ashore, they chose caution over spectacle. They slipped around the anchorage instead of charging straight into its busiest gathering place, sabotaged the alarm bell before it could raise the camp, and quietly removed sentries wherever they could. Three guards were taken out before the pirates properly understood they were under attack, and later two more thugs were killed in their sleep. The whole infiltration had the feel of a blade sliding between ribs, deliberate and close, with the party moving through the cove one problem at a time while avoiding the full weight of the pirate settlement for as long as possible.

That careful approach gave way to open violence when they trapped the doors to the bar and set the place ablaze. Pirates inside were sealed in as the fire spread, and when two men were sent to fight the flames they were cut down as well. In the chaos that followed, the party confronted Captain Zaroum and brought him down, breaking organized resistance at the anchorage. With the pirate captain defeated, they were able to locate Killa-T Rex’s imprisoned bandmates and free them at last, turning what had begun as a raid into a clear rescue.

After the fighting, the party swept the store rooms for anything worth taking and found a rich haul waiting behind the pirates’ defenses. Even then, Jahaka Anchorage had one final sting left in it: a bomb trap rigged to protect the cache. Rather than panic or blunder through it, the group worked together to disarm the device and claim the goods without losing anyone to a final desperate trick. By the end of the session, the anchorage had been gutted from the inside, its captain was dead, its prisoners were freed, and the party left with both treasure and the hard satisfaction of a carefully executed strike.

The assault on the Ocean Curse began under ugly circumstances. Another vessel burned nearby, and once aboard the pirates’ ship the party found a set of badly beaten hostages held at knifepoint as living shields. The pirates were nervous, disorganized, and dangerous, and the group had to approach carefully because a careless ranged attack could easily have turned the rescue into a massacre.

Conversation with the rescued adventurers and prisoners broadened the picture of what was happening along Chult’s coast. The death curse again intruded into ordinary plans when an attempted resurrection simply failed, and the rescued company’s tale about chasing treasure toward a tomb in Chult made it clear that many desperate expeditions were now converging on the peninsula. Meanwhile, the party had to weigh whether to keep drawing pirate recruits into its orbit, knowing that too many former enemies on deck might create a mutiny later.

By the session’s end, the group had not merely boarded another pirate ship. It had stepped deeper into the campaign’s growing convergence of death curse, treasure hunters, and coastal violence. Rescue, negotiation, and suspicion all pressed together, and the party was learning that every alliance in Chult came with a hook buried inside it.

The notes for this session are mostly logistical, but the shape of the day is still visible. The party spent time with a fishing contest and ship preparation, the sort of workmanlike interval that often sits between louder adventures. Even so, the details mattered, because they reflected the group settling into maritime business rather than merely hiring passage from others.

Food, crew, and cargo all had to be accounted for, and the party’s plans were starting to look more like a real expedition than an improvised street crew from Port Nyanzaru. Choices about supplies and manpower suggested that the next stage of the campaign would be fought on water and around ships, where preparation could matter as much as swordplay.

So while little in the notes reads like a dramatic climax, the session served as a hinge. The party was transitioning out of citybound investigation and into a broader operational mode, putting together the people and resources it would need for piracy, rescue, and coastal war in the sessions ahead.

After dealing with yuan-ti spies in Port Nyanzaru, the party emerged from the fighting with a much sharper sense of the city’s invisible architecture. The Harpers, Ytepka Society, Zhentarim, Emerald Enclave, Order of the Gauntlet, Lord’s Alliance, and yuan-ti all began to resolve into distinct powers rather than a blur of names. That clarity marked the group’s growth as much as any combat win, and the session formally brought them to third level.

They turned Lekhet over to the authorities and later watched his brutal death at Executioner’s Run, a scene that showed exactly what justice could look like in Port Nyanzaru when mixed with spectacle and vengeance. Elsewhere they spoke at length with Soggy Wren and Nerissa about the amulet stones, learning that the rock itself was native to Chult but needed imported power and repair methods. They also met with Zindar and the lighthouse keeper, gathering intelligence on pirate captains and ships as the campaign’s focus started to turn seaward.

There was room amid all this for gambling and smaller discoveries, including an Omuan coin and a profitable visit to the casino, but the session’s center of gravity was strategic. The party was no longer just stumbling from one odd job to another. It was choosing allies, identifying enemies, and preparing to move from city intrigue into the pirate war beyond the harbor.