The Ho'morco

The Ho'morco Chapter

The Ho'morco Chapter of the Guild of Adventurers-upon-Return is based out of Gwaerenlad, a city on the shores of a massive inland lake large enough to be a small sea, the Earonlin, the Great Lake. This city is unfortunately known for its terrible wintery weather, age and decrepitude, levered against a long history of industrious might and sometimes crippling corruption. The most potent powers in the city are the Civic Guild (non-aligned city guard and judicial guild), the Birchbark Wagonners Guild, and the Black Cowl and Dagger Society, likely the most powerful rogues guild in Tir Lauchmar.

Purpose:

the Ho'morco Chapter operates a guild house in Gwaerenlad. Given the amount of land and lake-borne trade that moves through the city, there are plenty of guildsmen and women passing through at any given time, and they need to eat, drink, and resupply. While not a chapter house, Ho'morco Hall has food and drink so long as guests have coin. Guildsmen get preferential treatment and move to the front of the line, but Ho'morco Hall is open to the citizens of the city. This is important because given the terrible weather and heavy snowfalls, this and other similar guild halls are sometimes the only hot food and drink residents can get.

Intially founded as a guild chow hall, the Ho'morco grew to embrace the culture of Gwaerenlad and had inroads to the criminal underground of the city. The founder did a lot of footwork for that guild, and the Ho'morco acted as a front for the black market for years.

Agenda:

Operate as the Best Guild Hall in the World

Push the limits of modern cuisine

Leader:

Guildmaster Lukan Homorco inherited leadership of the Ho'morco Guildhall from his deceased older brother. The hall belonged to the brother, and not the guild itself. He is a young driven man notable for his noble bearing and mein, as well as piercing blue eyes, and exceptional intensity. Lukan was apprenticed to a master in the Hostellier's Guild and was destined for a life working in an inn's kitchen until he signed on with a non-aligned dungeon raiding party. The raid into the Gyre was disastrous for the ad hoc team. Rather than running home, Homorco stayed in Terrasquestone for several years, working a day job in the great keep's kitchens. He studied under the master chefs and bakers there. At night he would join forays into the Gyre, where he found his skills both with the shortsword and the cookpot increasing with intoxicating speed.

Homorco ended up stranded in the Gyre twice, barely escaping alive the first time. The second time he ended up on the wrong side of the Garlandier's concierge Dazal Dondim. The cloven-faced wight dragged Homorco into the kitchens of the Garlandier and started his true apprenticeship. In the depths of the Gyre he was made to go from being a functional cook to a master chef through prolonged verbal, emotional, and psychological abuse. This was balanced out with absolute candor with his actual work, as well as a steady supply of dungeon leaf, and spirits. Between gaining cooking mastery and avoiding the ire of the wight lords over the kitchen, he engaged in knife-fighting, gambling at cards, and was gifted a Cold Skin body tattoo. This allows him to always stay emotionally cool, and he is almost completely unbothered by how hot a kitchen can get. He is remarkably hard to burn, and his heat tolerance is just shy of grabbing pots and pans out of ovens or pulling burning logs from a fire.

Founder:

Emil Homorco founded the Ho'morco guildhall originally a mess hall for residents of the city, with an interest in drawing in the guildsmen as repeat customers. He was a muscular and athletic man who for a variety of his own reasons didn't pursue a career in the military, knightly service, or any of the guilds. Rather, he was adjacent to the Black Cowl and Dagger Society. He was a bagman and debt collector for the guild, with gold passing through his hands at a greater rate than the crusty bread and meat sandwiches the hall had become known for. Eventually, he ended up being recruited into the Guild of Adventurers-Upon-Return. The guild had realized how much he was doing and how many of their own were in the hall at any given time. They were also aware the Guild of Heroes was making eyes at Emil and the hall, as roughly half of his staff was demihuman. The AuR refused to allow the Heroes guild to gain any more ground in the city than the already had, and the rest is history.

Emil eventually died, after a not terribly long but highly colorful life. Before his passing, he made it known that the guildhall was to pass to his younger brother and not to the guild. Almost as if summoned, Lukan appeared in time to attend the funeral. The Gyre learned of these things through its intermediaries and made sure that Dazal had the young Lukan released from his kitchens in time to take over the Hall and attend his brother's death rites. Lukan has fragmentary memories of his time in the dungeon, refers to them as his training, and tells people it was just a few places he worked in Terrasquestone. Emil's legacy remains as the black market agents of the Black Cowl and Dagger Society are regular guests, as are different representatives from the other guilds. There are rumors that Emil was killed because he wouldn't change allegiances, that he was considering it, or that he owed someone too much money. It's a mystery that hands over Lukan, along with his dungeon-borne PTSD.

Membership:

The Ho'morco Chapter is small, less than a dozen members at any given time.

Damede Homorco, Lukan's oldest sister, handles the finances and liaison work with the Guild of Adventurers. She struggles to find a line between being the refined upper-society dame she wants to be, and the easily provoked aggressive woman she actually is.

Suhemo Londas is a normal hobgobliness and Lukan's second in command. She is young, has a fiery temper, and comes from a very rough background. Where she truly excels is that her palate and sense of smell are second to none. This, along with her tutelage in the kitchens of Terrasquestone have made a skilled cook. Lukan is working to bring out her confidence while controlling her temper, which can be difficult, as he has his own temper.

Lords in their tower, those two should just go screw behind the smoking shed and get it over with.

Numrum Umnum is a large gnoll, notable for his thick scarred shoulders, scarred face, and large clawed hands. Most casual visitors are quickly frightened by his presence, but regulars know better. He has been in the Hall since Emil opened the place, and despite being illiterate, completely uneducated, and a jackal-headed demihuman, he is a local favorite. Numrum is an incorrigible gossip, loves the worst jokes, has the best sense of smell, and can guess what someone wants by their smell alone. Spicy beast sandwich, regular beast sandwich extra sauce, extra-spicy beast sandwich, beast sandwich with sour pickles, yes yes.

Gatchunda is an older female hobgoblin. She was once someone of importance but was replaced by a younger, stronger, more aggressive female hobgoblin, this one chromatic to her normal mottled green-grey skin. This rankled, and how quickly she was cast aside has made her bitter. Emil took her in, and she has been chain-smoking dungeon leaf while working as a menial cook for him. She has been far less accepting of Lukan, as he is quickly moving away from just slinging braised flesh and bread like his older brother and has pretensions of high cuisine.

Karnil is a strange-looking not-quite-human, tall and broad-shouldered, with skin the color of coal. He is part wight, part human, and was born deep in the Gyre. He was treated as an outcast for years and once old enough to escape Understone, he did. He made his way to Gwaerenlad and struck a fast friendship with Emil, and became one of his kitchen menials. He specialized in baking, and the crusty bread was his own ever-evolving recipe. Lukan has fully leaned into this and now Karnil is the master baker of the Hall and is growing into pastries and other highly advanced cooking techniques.

Brut and Krech Ugmik are the craftsmen who keep the Hall in good repair. They are jack of all trades who repair furniture, keep the lamps oiled and lit, the walls repaired and painted, and all the rest. They are also a pair of remarkably ugly ogres. Runts by the standards of ogre kind, they are constantly bickering and joking brothers who are as quick to get in a fight with each other as do their work. They are also furious defenders of the Hall and the Homorco brothers. What makes them stand out from their kind is that they take great effort to fit in like humans, which means wearing undersized hats, trying to keep up with fashion, and what they consider the greatest pursuit, intellectualism. While reading on a 2nd-grade level, they will constantly try to read and discuss any book or scroll they can get their huge hands on.

Resources

The Guildhall known as the Ho'morco. A large building capable of seating and serving 80 people, though most company comes in, gets their food, and leave.

The Games Room has cards, dice, and dart boards, though darts tend to be in short supply.

The kitchen is well stocked and in good repair with four large iron ovens fed from a single draft induction furnace behind the hall. This is where the staff will take break, and where the Ugmiks pile wood and anything else they can feed to the furnace.

Homorco has a sizeable account with the Wizard's Cache

Contacts in the Black Cowl and Dagger Society

Contacts in the Guild of Heroes

Alliance with the Guild of Adventurers-upon-Return

Symbol:

The Ho'morco has a rearing white owlbear as its symbol, and its colors are white with light blue accents.

Ho'morco is elfin for Owlbear