In the last play session, Henry was captured and tortured before I had him escape Vranik. Now that I’m back in Rattay with Sir Radzig, it’s time to make plans to go to Vranik for payback.
Rally the Troops with Sir Divish
Sir Hanush and Sir Radzig ordered me to meet with Captain Bernard before heading off to to Talmberg to convince Sir Divish to add his troops to our effort. It appears this little talk with Bernard was just a chance for Bernard to give you equipment had you chosen not to risk getting your stuff in Vranik (I took the risk and got my stuff last time).
I rode off to Talmberg and talked to Sir Divish. He agreed to rally the troops and head off to Vranik. This queued a cutscene of our troops riding off and a scout in the woods watching us. A not so subtle hint this was a trap, but it turned out to be worse than that.
Storming the Gates of Vranik
Men from Rattay met up with the group from Talmberg and we went over the plan of attack. The shit heap I escaped out of would be part of the plan, but I didn’t have to deal with that stench this time. The attack started and some arrows came flying our way, but we got inside pretty easily.
Once inside, it was simple for me to cut down the bandits. I pushed to the flank of my men and took swings at bandits trying to fight the guy in front of them. My stats helped me make quick work of the ones at the entrance, the perimeter and then the inner gate. I think it took me less than 10 minutes, but oh it was fun cutting through them. Good thing too, because all save options were disabled for this mission.
Searching for Clues
Once we destroyed all the troops, the lords realized Toth and most of the men were not there from our initial estimate. I was ordered to search for clues as to where the troops have gone and why. In the main house where I first met Erik, I found a letter that mentioned taking the men to capture a castle.
When the cut scene earlier showed a scout, I knew it would lead to something bad. Well the cut scene that triggered at this point showed Toth and a few of his men pretending to be injured to con their way into Talmberg. They took the Queen, Lady Stephanie, captive and their men took control of the castle. Fun fact, Lady Stephanie seduced Henry in a side mission a while back, so Henry has extra motivation to save her.
Racing to Save Talmberg
Finding that we were too late to reach the castle, we fought our way inside and the portcullis closed behind me. I fought my way to open it up and let reinforcements in, but this just triggered a cutscene showing Toth with a knife to Lady Stephanie’s throat.
To make things worse, he also captured Sir Radzig during the fight. When we backed off, he ordered the outer buildings be set fire with arrows and shot 1 into Sir Divish’s shoulder. It forced our men to retreat outside of Talberg. Discussion began immediately on what to do next.
Night Raid
Hanush proposed besieging the castle, but Divish pointed out it would risk the hostages. Robard steps in and suggests a night raid to try to sneak in and rescue hostages. Everyone agrees and the planning begins. As suggested by the mission indicator, I put on my darkest, stealthiest clothing. Lord Capon agreed to come with us for some “fun”.
When the raid started, we had some soldiers carrying ladders to the wall for us to use. They climbed first to take out the guards on watch and we followed. Once up top, Hans Capon volunteered me to take out the 2 guards at the gatehouse. I took them both out easily with my high stealth stats.
I followed Capon down to the courtyard and stuck close. Guards were patrolling, but his sneaking was good enough to keep us where we were out of sight. The house in the courtyard had hostages, but not Sir Radzig or Lady Stephanie.
I report back to Capon and he was promptly shot by an arrow from a guard up top. Now it was a matter of carrying him out the way we came. I had been in that castle enough that this was easy to navigate the way out.
Once we were safe, it was obvious that a siege was our only option. Until next time.