The Nightmare Market is a drop-in adventure for really any level. It's not a good first adventure, as it requires the players to have connections to at least one NPC (See "The Lamb" below) and a reason to want something that is in a vault. # Premise There is a market that meets, not always in the same place. The shops trade in _ephemera_, in items of transient qualities and fleeting existences. The shopkeepers are various forms of undead. The MacGuffin of the Market is that there is a Vault that, normally, is in the space where the Market currently exists. Inside the vault should be something the party needs for a quest outside of this little module. ## Objectives While in the Nightmare Market, the party should come to try and find the following: 1. **The Vault Door** 1. This is the main Quest Item. When the players open the vault they should find treasure and a quest item. Opening the Vault is effectively the end of the story. 2. The Nightmare Market deals in things that are _transitory_ or _liminal_ and doors, it turns out, are just that. 2. [[45.01 The Nightmare Market#The Lamb|The Lamb]] 1. The "Lamb" should be an NPC that the characters have met previously and have at least some positive feelings toward. ## Hook Have the players come into possession of a key to a Vault. they are told the vault is here, but when they get here there's a mysterious spooky market instead. ## Introduction > [!INFO] Description to Read to Players > The Nightmare Market exists in a small pocket of ephemeral space. The sky is low, a dirty brown and gray with scraps of cloud racing, although there is no discernable wind. > Dirt roads wind through tents and stalls, even a few solid-looking buildings here and there. Ravens and Buzzards scream from the rattling trees around the edges of the Market. > Voices can be heard as well, people calling out to passers-by, offering wares of various kinds. Feel free to describe stalls with jars of eyes, or small wiggly things in bowls. People selling various ghastly things, and lots of people selling emotions or events, like "forlorn hope" or "unrequited love". When the players are in the market, they will soon be greeted by The Mayor of the Market, a small, odd creature named [[45.01 The Nightmare Market#Fewmet, Mayor of the Market|Fewmet]]. He greets the party and explains the Market rules to them. He can also explain the currency system if they ask, but really anyone in the market can explain that. After a few words he will depart, but if the party asks, he can tell them who the "important" stalls are in the market. # Doing Business in the Market ## The Market Rules 1. The undead must _not_ touch the living. 2. Life and undeath are both _precious_. Violence against _anyone_ is punishable by fine. Killing anyone, including an undead, means the killer is no longer protected by the rules of the market. 3. Theft is equivalent to murder. ## Currency The Nightmare market deals in _Memories_, which are consolidated, physical representations of an actual memory. Memories are graded on _rarity_ more than contents, at least as a currency. The exchange rate is as follows: - A "**Humdrum**" (hd) memory is the least valuable. These are memories of daily activities like washing dishes or tending to a garden. - A "**Mundane**" (M) memory is something that isn't every day, but isn't all that interesting. Traveling to a nearby town once a month might be a Mundane memory, or a specific conversation with someone you talk to all the time. - A "**Singular**" (S) memory is something that happens only very rarely. Opening presents on Christmas might be Mundane (it happens every year) but getting a new puppy for Christmas would be Singular - An "**Epiphany**" (E) is a memory of an event that changed your life in some major way. A visit from a God, a realization that the _horrors_ are real. Other traumatic events. Prices are given from largest to smallest, so **1S 15hd** would be "One Singular and 15 humdrum". and so forth. All abbreviations are capitalized _except_ for "hd". The exchanges are as follows: | X | Humdrum | Mundane | Singular | Epiphany | | ------------ | --------- | ------- | -------- | --------- | | **Humdrum** | 1:1 | 10hd:1M | 100hd:1S | 1000hd:1E | | **Mundane** | 1M:10hd | 1:1 | 10M:1S | 100M:1E | | **Singular** | 1S:100hd | 1S:10M | 1:1 | 10M:1E | | **Epiphany** | 1E:1000hd | 1E:100M | 1E:10S | 1:1 | # Stalls and Shopkeepers The players can wander the Market freely and I'll include a table for random shops down below but here are the five that matter. The table below is a quick reference with the details of each shop below. | Shop | Preferred Goods | Shopkeeper | Key Item or Information | | ------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ---------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | The Ghoul's Bistro | Food! | Grindleghoul | his current dish of the day is [[45.01 The Nightmare Market#The Lamb\|The Lamb]] | | The Siren's Song | Broken dreams. Catastrophes that have been survived | Piper | Piper has the memories of [[45.01 The Nightmare Market#The Lamb\|The Lamb]] | | Memory Merchants | Basically a Bank. They are the best at extracting memories. They also provide deposit boxes for Memories and treasures. | Nemo | The Door is in a Safe Deposit Box in their vault. | | Wraith and Banshees | Final words, memories of people dying. | Phil | Information about the "Mayor of the Market" | | Scrivener and Sons | Physical records, information about transactions. | Robbie and Louis | Who bought the Door, information about other matters, can exchange gold for Memories. | ## The Ghoul's Bistro > [!INFO] Description to Read to Players > The Ghoul's Bistro is a small shop near the center of the Market. The Ghoul himself is clean and well kempt, wearing a spotless apron and chef's hat, old but well cared for clothing. The scent of his cooking is pleasant and inviting. His little shop has a few tables sitting in the open courtyard out front. Near the counter where the Ghoul sells his food there is a menu board: ### Welcome to the Bistro #### "Come meet the meat!" - **Leg**: 2 Mundane - ***Fresh* leg**: 5 Mundane - **Community Stew**: 1 M 5 hd - **Frog's-eye pudding**: 75 hd - **Frogtails in cream sauce**: 1 Mundane - **Arm**: 3 Mundane - **Finger steaks**: - E: 3M 75 hd - H: 2M 25 hd - ½: 2M - **Ladyfingers**: - E: 5 M - H: 3 M 35 hd - ½: 3M - *Dish of the day*: (Name of [[45.01 The Nightmare Market#The Lamb|the Lamb]]) (Price varies) The Menu items listed as "E", "H" and ½ are "Elf", "Human", and "Halfling" respectively. With a DC 15 Persuasion check the party can also ask for mundane food for not-ghouls. Things like "fried chicken" and "beef stew". They will ask the party to keep this _quiet_, they have a reputation to protect as a merchant of ghoul food, after all. ### The NPC The Ghoul's "Dish of the Day" should be an NPC the players have met before in some setting. They are standing mindless and staring out at the café. They will not answer any questions put to them. The Ghoul can be convinced to sell the NPC whole and uncooked. The base price is 2E, 5S. The players can negotiate this price. See [[45.01 The Nightmare Market#The Lamb|The Lamb]] below for the full story of how they ended up here. ## The Siren's Song >[!INFO] Description to Read to Players > _The Siren's Song_ is a building made out of an old shipwreck. There is a massive gash in the hull of the ship, into which an elegant door has been built. The sign above the door changes based on who is looking at it. The words remain the same, but the style of the text modifies itself to be most pleasing to the person reading the text. Piper is a _Siren_ and upon meeting her the players must make a DC 18 Wisdom save. On failure they are captivated by Piper and will want to move into her arms. Piper will focus on one member of the party, others can attempt to block or halt the member in their slow walk toward Piper. If unimpeded, the captivated player will reach Piper in 1d6 turns. If the player makes contact with Piper she will do 1d6 psychic damage and grapple the player until the player makes a DC 18 Wisdom save, or the rest of the party pries her off of the player, or the player falls to 0 hp. Once Piper's first siren song is over, the players can make deals with her. Piper holds the memories of the Lamb. Piper is not interested in the Lamb's memories _per se_, she is planning on just using them as currency. The Players can choose a multitude of ways to get the Lamb's memories: 1. Simply buy them 1:1 if the party has the money. The NPC's memories amount to 3 Epiphanies, 4 Singular. 2. Ask Piper if they can review the memories for clues as to why the Lamb sold all their memories, and suggest that if they find out what traumatic event forced her to sell her memories, Piper can have the person who harmed the Lamb 3. Fight Piper. This is a bad idea. (Make this a bad idea. Fighting shopkeepers should **never** be encouraged.) 4. Haggling of course. Piper is a DC 16 persuasion check by default, but modify this based on the party's interactions with her. 5. Sell a few memories that Piper might like more. Piper likes dashed hopes, long, slow despair, missed chances...basically anything that would apply to Odysseus from the Odyssey. ## Memory Merchants >[!INFO] Description to Read to Players > The building that bears the name "Memory Merchants" is the only solid-looking building in the Nightmare Market. the outside walls appear to be marble, with faux-columns on the facade. The door is heavy and solid. Inside, the building has a black and white tiled floor. At the far end of the room is a row of teller windows, and to the left of the entrance is the locked door to the safe deposit box vault. The Memory Merchants looks like a bank. If the players want to have memories extracted and turned into currency this is the _best_ place to have that done. The Teller is a very neat and well kempt man named "Nemo" who got his name from his mother [^2]. Nemo will answer any questions and ensures the players that his organization is the best and most skilled at removing memories. When the players know that the Mayor of the Market purchased the Door to the Vault, they can make a DC 12 Investigation or Perception check to see the Mayor heading into the safe deposit boxes. Nemo will be easy to persuade to look the other way while the players accost the Mayor. If the players choose to fight the Mayor it will be a tight fight, the safe deposit vault is a small space, no more than 25 x 25 feet square. ## Wraith and Banshees >[!INFO] Description to Read to Players > The _Wraith and Banshees_ building looks like it has stood here for centuries. The wood is old, carefully painted but the paint is peeling. The front of the building has a tall Facade that is cracked and chipped. Inside, the floor is similarly warped, made of boards that creak and groan when you walk across them. Players can, if they choose, make a DC 18 Stealth check to move soundlessly across the shop. It doesn't _matter_ but don't stop them. The Wraith is a male ghost, in appearance roughly fifty years old, slightly balding, but what hair he has floats around his head in whisps. He has a calm voice and greets the party warmly. His name is Phil [^1]. The Wraith and Banshees specialize memories of _death_. Since a dead person can't really sell their memories, they will buy memories of a person being killed. Yes it's grim. Depending on the age of the party they probably have a few they can sell, Any memorable bad guys they have killed. Let the party negotiate but overall figure that a memory of killing a being is worth 1 Singular for the being's DC. So if they killed a DC 5 creature, they can get 5 singular for the memory of doing so. If the players choose to sell some memories, see [[45.01 The Nightmare Market#Dealing With Memories|Dealing With Memories]] below. The Wraith will speak about his "sisters" from time to time, who are banshees and seek out information on the dead and dying. Meeting the Banshees is a bad idea, but if one of the players sneaks into the back room have them instantly make a DC 14 WIS save, taking 2d8 psychic damage on a fail, half as much on a save. They are pushed back out into the main room as well. When talking to Phil about others in the Market the players should discover that the Mayor of the Market, who presents himself as a Zombie, is in fact _alive_. ## Scrivener and Sons > [!INFO] Description to Read to Players > Four tables are arranged to make a U-shape in front of a large, spreading tree: Two tables across the front, one each on either side. Hanging in the branches of the tree is a sign reading "Scrivener & Sons". > Sitting on a battered wooden chair between the tables is a deceased human male, probably twenty-five years of age at his time of death. He is dressed in a torn tunic and breeches. His thin hair, and his clothing are all damp, and constantly dripping. He has red-rimmed, affable eyes, and is staring off into nothing, a very small smile on his pale face. > ### Robbie and Louie #### Robbie No matter what the players say to the man in the stall he will immediately respond, "HI! I'm Robbie! I'm watching the store for my brother! He told me to sit here! I'm so hungry! How are you?" Robbie will almost never answer questions directly. He will cycle over a few topics: - Father went to meat! That's what he said! He has to go meat! - Louie often goes away! I don't know where! He doesn't like me asking! - Louie said I can sit still and not talk too much and I will be a good boy! - I am so hungry! I hope Louie comes back with food! - Water is so cold! Food should come up a _lot_. If asked, he will say that he likes "ladyfingers" and Louie likes "finger steaks". A DC 10 Investigation will reveal that Robbie is wearing an ID bracelet with the name > Robert Louis engraved on it. [^3] Bringing Robbie either dish from the Ghoul's Café will lead to him eating _ravenously_. When he finishes, he will stand up and his bearing will be very different. #### Louie Once Robbie has been fed, the "Louie" personality will emerge. Louie prefers to be called "Louis", and is much more coherent. He refers to Robbie as his brother, but is aware that they are in the same body. If the players ask nicely they can learn their tragic backstory which has no bearing on anything but players like knowing stuff. Louie has actually useful things to say. His father recently "procured" a valuable item (the Door to the Vault) but sold it. Have the players work to get him to tell them who bought the door. It was the Mayor of the Market. Louie's father (Stephen) is currently negotiating for some extra Space in the market to turn their little stall into a real shop. This is of no real import. This is the only shop in the Market that accepts regular currency, and can be used as an exchange if the players want to buy Memories for trade instead of having them extracted. The exchange rate is open to a DC 15 Persuasion check, but use a base rate of 10GP for 1 Singular. > [!NOTE] Tragic Backstory > Robbie and Louie are indeed brothers. When they were alive, they went fishing. Robbie got a bite and stood up to angle the fish to the boat. But fell out of the boat instead. Louis dove in to rescue him. Robbie thought Louie was trying to drown him, and strangled Louie in the water. When they were fished out of the water, they could not separate their bodies. In the afterlife they share a single doomed body. ### Buying From the Scrivener and Sons This shop deals in _records_ not memories. They collect mundane information recorded in boring old paper and ink. If they players so choose, they can buy information pertaining to an ongoing quest (at the DM's discretion). Set prices accordingly. They will also have information on the Lamb, if the players have not already figured out the story or steps needed there. # NPCs ## Fewmet, Mayor of the Market ### Rumors All of the details in this section can be given to the players by various NPCs throughout the adventure. 1. Fewmet _invented_ the title "Mayor of the Market". He has no actual position or jurisdiction. 2. Fewmet came to the market only two months ago, and has not made a good impression on the actual stallholders. 3. Fewmet is an old word for "deer dung". 4. Fewmet seemed to be only interested in the Vault Door 5. Fewmet seems to be alive (see the hint from Phil above) 6. Fewmet claims to be a zombie ### Appearance Fewmet is three and a half feet tall, but wears a very tall stovepipe hat to look taller. His limbs are thick and seemingly deformed but strong looking. His face is covered in a scruffy and patchy red beard. ### Secrets Fewmet is in fact a Kobold that was modified by an evil wizard. Feel free to tie this into some part of the player's larger campaign setting if you like. He is a mercenary and was sent here to procure the Vault Door and return it to his patron, so that they can get the Treasure before the party does. ## The Lamb The NPC in the Ghoul's Café should be someone the party has met previously. Parties have a habit of finding favorite NPCs, this shouldn't be too hard. Someone they do _not_ want to see sectioned and sold as food. Since I don't know the name of the NPC your players have adopted, I'm just calling them "The Lamb". The Lamb will occasionally ask if it's "time to die?" with apparent eagerness. ### Story The Lamb needs a _truly_ tragic Epiphany that made them decide to sell all their memories. They were told about this place by a ruffian near where they lived, and ended up in the Siren's Song. Piper extracted all their memories, leaving them a mindless shell, only "operating instructions" left in their mind. Piper has no real use for the Lamb's memories other than currency, and sold the Lamb's body to the Ghoul because she has no real use for it either. If the players procure the Lamb's memories from Piper and the Lamb's body from the Ghoul, the Memory merchants can restore the Lamb's memories. The players can choose to omit the deeply tragic memory. # Dealing With Memories Given that Memories are a form of currency in the Market, the players will have to learn at least a bit about how they are handled. In the Market, Memories look like pieces of paper or canvas, but the image on them is indistinct, foggy, flowing. Do not let the players try to ID every single memory unless you want to make up countless boring scenes. However, with Piper's help, or Nemo's help, the players can view a few specific memories. For example, Finding the Lamb's most traumatic memory could be good, so that they don't restore that memory to the Lamb. ## Effect of Having a Memory Extracted Memory Extraction, like everything in the Nightmare Market, follows very specific rules. When a memory is extracted, the person losing the memory must agree to the exact subject, event, and duration of the memory being extracted. For example, "The first time I kissed my first girlfriend, named [girlfriend's name], when I was [age]. I will sell exactly two minutes from when I first leaned toward her." The person extracting the memory must only take that memory. If they take more or different, and are caught, they are evicted from the market and forced to pay 40x reparation, as well as helping the victim recover the memory. If a player chooses to sell a memory, have an NPC explain the effects. The player can write down the memory before hand and read what they wrote after. But it won't _restore_ the memory. It will show up in their mind as if they had read it in a book. The time of the memory will be entirely blank, and there is no way to "regrow" the memory from context. Memories can be restored (see below). ## Restoring a Memory If a player wants to restore a memory, that can be done at the Memory Merchants. The Memory must meet the following requirements: 1. Be the original memory, obvs. 2. Be no more than 20 days from the time of extraction 3. It must have been used in fewer than 2d10 transactions. (Roll at time of memory extraction, this is a measurement of how well preserved the memory was at time of extraction.) Memory restoration costs one tenth of the value of the memory. So to restore a Singular memory costs a Mundane. To restore an Epiphany costs a Singular. # Appendix: Full list of NPCs | Name | Location | Image | | ----------------- | ----------------- | ------------------------------- | | Piper | Siren's Song | ![[Piper.jpeg\|250]] | | Fewmet | Central Square | ![[Fewmet.jpeg\|250]] | | Banshee(s) | Wraith & Banshees | ![[Banshee.jpeg\|250]] | | Ghoul | Ghoul's Café | ![[Ghoul.jpeg\|250]] | | Lamb | Ghoul's Café | ![[Lamb.jpeg\|250]] | | Robert/Louis | Scrivener & Sons | ![[Robert Louis.jpeg\|250]] | | Stephen Scrivener | Town Square | ![[Scrivener.jpeg\|250]] | | Phil | Wraith & Banshees | ![[Wraith.jpeg\|200]] | | Big Bads | Pumpkin Patch | ![[big bads (and fewmet).jpeg]] | --- [^1]: Phil Specter. It's a dumb joke. [^2]: Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory. [^3]: Robert and Louis are Stephen's Sons. Another pun. Thank you.