Big Po - Hungry Hungry Sumotori
Michelangelo - Friendly Capoeirista
Roberto King - Murderous Dagger Fighter
Dan da Ying - Helpful Eagle-Stylist
Twinhorn Gold Mine
Willy grabbed "the kid who looked the most like a future player character", and Roberto tried using Hypnotic Hands to break the "mind control". Though he had to take lots of extra time to offset his base skill of 8, it worked, and he went about curing the rest of the child soldiers over a couple hours. Once he was finished, Roberto asked if any of these children had seen his daughter, and one said that she had been training with them, but was gone now.
The party decided to wait for "Lucia" and her men to show up at the mine, ambush them, make sure Roberto didn't kill them, and then interrogate them about Roberto's daughter. They settled in to camp, and Mike drank a second sinchu root mixture without ill effects. The freed slaves decided they'd just go back to town now, and bid the party farewell. Willy got to work making an impromptu sledge using the mine cart so that he could transport the gold out of the mine.
1 day later, nobody had showed up, but the party had mostly recovered from their wounds (though Dan had to Luck a crit-fail) and decided to head to the Gilded Pony back in Sweetwater. Willy had disappeared in the night, so that nobody could follow him to where he had buried the gold, but left an obvious trail from the sledge behind him. As they entered town, the people of the town cheered their arrival, but they did not have congratulatory muffin baskets for them, much to Po's chagrin.
In the Gilded Pony, the bartender cheerfully told Po that every day was 2 for 1 slop day for him, and the sumo dug in to two bowls of... something. Roberto Intimidated the barkeep, who told him that Lucia and the other Ginto Boys had fled to the north on foot after the kidnapped townsfolk had returned, fearing a mob might form. He also offered Roberto all the money in the register, which he gleefully took ("I used to be an outlaw, it's a habit").
The party figured their quarry had probably gone all the way to Hangman's Mesa (AKA "Bad Man Mountain") and the Outlaw King's fort, but they might be able to overtake them, now that the party would be on horses (or, in Po's case, a comically undersized donkey). Besides, Gila Gulch was also due north, and they needed to resupply on sinchu roots before taking on either the "cowboys" to the east, or the "black dragons" to the west.
Gila Gulch
Just before sunset, the party rode into Gila Gulch, and unlike the last time they'd been here, people were actually outside, no longer cowering in fear of the Mountain Apes. They easily found out that Lucia's gang had gone around town this morning on foot, and had surely made it to Hangman's Mesa by now. Po asked around if there was a doctor, which surprised the people he'd asked, as Po had met with their indigenous doctor, Apha, several days ago.
Po explained that he had suffered some severe head wounds recently, and the party decided to head to Apha's in the morning. They went to the Happy Rancher Saloon for a hearty meal of slop; afterwards, Roberto had the barkeep kick a couple prostitutes out of a room so that he could have it, while the others slept outside.
At daybreak, the party headed to Apha's place, obvious thanks to the large sign reading "Doctor" and the barber's pole out front. A poster with hours was on the door, which noted that he was open from 9AM-10AM every day, except Thursdays and Sundays. While Po and Dan were content to wait for several hours, Roberto knocked on the door, and Apha crabbily asked who was knocking so early, though he invited them in when he saw who it was.
As before, Apha healed Dan and Po with his chi massage techniques, and gave them another six sinchu roots; though he grumbled about all the harvesting and processing taking up his time, he still seemed helpful. He advised them to not get killed, and sent them on their way, which turned out to be to the town of Three Trees to the west.
Three Trees
Despite what they'd been told, Three Trees was the biggest town in the area, putting even Sweetwater to shame as crowds of people filled the streets. It was the eastern terminus of a railway, though that was soon to change as the track running south to Sweetwater was almost done, and would complete the transcontinental line. The town was full of labourers working on the line, mostly Irish and Chinese, and featured multiple hotels and even a branch of First Capital Bank.
Seeing all the tall buildings, Dan gave in to Obsession: Climbing Inaccessible Locations, and climbed a nearby church spire, surveiled the surroundings, and leapt into a convenient bale of hay at the bottom. Figuring that they were pursuing scum and villainy, the party sought out the dirtiest, most dangerous drinking establishment they could, and found the Black Rock. Dan asked the heavily-scarred bartender for lemonade, and was told to go somewhere else. Mike asked for a beer and was likewise told to pound sand; they only served hard liquor here.
None of the patrons here were Chinese, so it was unlikely they would find leads on the Black Dragons here, but Roberto questioned some random thug about gangs anyway. The man said that he hadn't heard of the Black Dragons, and that the only Chinese gang he knew of was the chain gang out building the railway. They didn't even count, because they didn't commit cool crimes like real criminals.
Po used a Lucked Carousing roll to ask for intel more nicely, and learned that a bunch of local troublemakers had been arrested recently. The governor was coming to ride the inaugural train, and they didn't want any riffraff making a mess of his visit. He asked if any of the criminals were Chinese, but the man he was speaking to called him a racist, and told him that everybody knew that all criminals were Irish.
Realizing that apparently the criminals in town wouldn't know anything about the Black Dragons, the party headed out to where the railway line was under construction to speak with the Chinese railway workers. Dan, relying on their shared ethnicity, took the lead on questioning the workers, and found out that they were working for the Red Rock Railway company, and lived in group housing also owned by the RRR, because "capitalism is a fuck".
More importantly, however, they learned that some of the workers had red dragon tattoos, and got pointed towards a tattooed man named Wong.
Notes:
Willie had apparently spent the time before he returned moving the gold to the boat, realizing the boat would sink if he tried to take it in the rapids, then moving the gold back to the mine cart.
I rolled for how close the party were to catching Lucia, and got a 17, so they were long gone.
We did a really bad job of staying on track this session, which lead to not much being accomplished. In a 3-hour session, there was maybe 50 minutes of actual gameplay.
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