Welcome to Crooked Keg

By the time the adventurers reached Crooked Keg, the village was already on fire in several places that were absolutely not supposed to be on fire. Fog rolled off the black river and swallowed the crooked docks, the leaning tavern-boat, and the old stone tollhouse where a very important goose was honking with the authority of elected office. Goblins swarmed the piers in dented helmets and stolen boots, kicking over crates, waving rusty blades, and arguing over whether “loot” included pickled eggs. At their center stood Captain Snaggit Three-Teeth, a goblin raider in a feathered hat, holding an enormous soup ladle like a royal scepter. He declared Crooked Keg under new management and demanded payment in gold, turnips, or “boots of impressive shininess.”


The adventurers were not the sort of heroes anyone would have sent on purpose. Their shield was a baking tray, their mage mostly knew how to make things damp, and their healer carried a frying pan with more confidence than training. But as the goblins dragged a flaming, wobbling siege contraption onto the dock, the party saw what the raiders did not: Crooked Keg was barely held together by rope, rot, and bad decisions. Loose planks, oil barrels, hanging nets, slick stones, and one suspiciously smoking tavern-boat surrounded the enemy like a gift from the gods of slapstick violence. Then the goose mayor waddled onto the tollhouse roof, spread his wings, and honked like a war trumpet. The underdogs drew their weapons, grinned through the smoke, and realized they didn’t need to be stronger than the goblins. They only needed to be clever enough to let Crooked Keg destroy them first.
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