The Furious Fated - The World of Low'verok (Updated 10-26-03)

[Isida Kep'Tukari]

The session of Oct. 4 we added a new player, the guy who's my DM in another game. I decided he met up with the party while they were in Stone Bridge, right after their festival. Since he was also an adventurer, and was seeking to improve himself, he offered his powers of wizardry and war to the Furious Fated. Thusly, joining our cast of characters is:

Dante - human wizard 5, focused on self-buffing spells and wielding a bastard sword.

This adventure's tale is:

The Tale of the Guardian of the Road (and friends) or why marshes are bad and caves are worse.

The party departed from Stone Bridge, continuing their trip south to Port Lyalee. They got a day out of the city when they encountered a bridge. And by the bridge was a guardian, a tall, nearly eight-foot figure, very broad, dressed in a cloak. The party stopped a good distance away as the figure raised a massive hand in a palm-up stop gesture. Uianya and Helios spotted some other thing in the bushes near the figure as they pulled their mounts to a halt.

The figure demanded that they pay a told of four pieces of gold, as he was the one that had made the bridge. Helios asked what the figure in the bushes was, and was told that it was a "pet," though the voice that told him that was different than the voice that had demanded the toll. At this point Uianya sent her squirrel, Etriki, over to see what this pet was. The squirrel finds a strange creature with a orangey-brown turtle-like shell, four legs, a long tail, and antennae. It turned toward the squirrel, but as he stopped before getting too close, the strange thing only turned to look at him. Etriki then turned back to go to Uianya.

That was a good decision, as the party's continued questioning only continued to anger the Bridgekeeper, who demanded they pay now. As the party dithered, finally the Bridgekeeper's patience snapped. He threw down his cloak, revealing himself to be a two-headed giant wearing a loincloth and wielding a large club in each hand. Dante correctly remembered it to be an ettin, and that they were hard to affect with mind-affecting magic, as they had two minds.

The ettin charged Helios and dealt him a mighty blow as his pet moved out to engage the party. Helios retreated and cast entangle wrapping up the ettin and his pet. The party peppered both with spells and arrows. The pet finally managed to get free, while the ettin failed to rip out of the entangling vines.

Uianya attacked the pet with her scimitar, dealing a mighty blow... right before her blade rusted into powder. Oh yes, it was a rust monster boys and girls! Angered, she had Etriki attack, dealing the weakened rust monster a mighty bite and felling it. The others managed to kill the ettin with arrows and spells just as it was able to rip free of the vines. Poor ettin. The ettin had several gems and a strange nine-pointed star medallion on him, but not a lot else.

The party dragged the bodies off to the side of the road, then cast around for any tracks. Helios found the tracks of the ettin going off into the west; it appeared as if he had been using that path for a while. It took them an hour of tracking to get to where the tracks started,which proved to be a very ruined old fortress. Gorf flew high above it and then drew a simple picture as to what was within the crumbling walls. Several half-ruined buildings, only two of which even looked partially sound, and a few other buildings that weren't much more than rubble. A mucky, swampy pond was in the middle, with some faint shiny things in the mud around it. There was also a worn path from the entrance to one of the more sturdy buildings.

Helios looked for more tracks as they slowly went inside, and found some fainter tracks that ranged over the whole complex. The party went into what they guessed was the ettin's home first. It smelled terribly, but with a bit of searching the party found a goodly amount of gold buried in one corner. Then the party explored the rest on the compound, finding nothing but a lot of rubble. However, in the mostly destroyed building behind the ettin's home, there was what looked like a sinkhole in the corner.

Shrugging, the party went to go look at the lake, or more accurately, have Gorf go look at the shiny things. He said some of them were magical, and taking a closer look discovered that there were weapons buried in the muck all around the lake. However, as he said, this, he was viscously attacked by several of the weapons, each being wielded by a tentacle that emerged from the lake. Twelve tentacles erupted from the lake, each clutching a different weapon as they lashed at the party. Gorf was knocked silly, and managed to fly away before he collapsed on the ground. Helios, Dante, and Alarian all fired arrows or spells at it, while Etriki, in attempting to help Gorf, was speared by seven weapons and fell bleeding in the mud.

Jenna leapt to Etriki's aid, hauling him away, but was felled by nearly eight weapons that nearly cut her apart. Uianya hauled them both away and administered healing spells and potions while the others concentrated on taking it down from a distance. Alarian's last arrow sped very true and it speared into the middle of the lake, causing it to erupt in a fountain of black ichor as the tentacles slapped down on the ground, dead.

Collecting various party members, Dante set up a magical shelter in the stables so the party could recover. The party collected some good weapons from the edge of the lake, including a silver scythe, a magical warhammer, and a magical scimitar made from fever iron, as well as a great deal of gold. Uianya was ecstatic.

During the last watch of the night Helios and Rhianna heard some faint scraping sounds from the building behind the ettin's home. They investigated as well they could, but only found some fresh clods of dirt near the sinkhole. They decided to wait until morning to investigate further.

In the morning, the party went to investigate the sinkhole, noticing the fresh dirt. Using a rope they lowered themselves down about ten feet, into an underground passage. They pressed forward only to be stopped by a strange rumbling noise. Suddenly the side of the passage erupted, revealing a massive, insect-like creature. It gazed at them, confusing Rhianna and Gorf, and allowing Dante to recognize it as an umber hulk.

Using swords, fire spells, and a bad attitude the party killed the umber hulk dead, though Gorf wandered away and Rhianna tried to backstab Helios. But they got better after being tied down for a couple minutes. Investigating the tunnel from where the umber hulk had emerged, they found a half-buried wooden shield carved with broken arrows on the front, a silver dagger with a yellow gem in the pommel, and a potion with a spider in it.

Investigating the tunnel further, they found it opened into a large chamber. Helios spotted something clinging to the ceiling above their heads, and shouted a warning as it dropped down. It wrapped up Rhianna and both the creature (a cloaker) and her took damage as the party rained blows down on it. Rhianna squirmed free as the party used spells and weapons (flaming sphere, produce flame, nagaika, greatsword, etc) to rip the thing to ribbons. Relaxing from that, the party explored the chamber and found a bedroll all laid out.

They investigated the rest of the cavern and didn't find much more than a few odds and ends (flint and steel, a bit of rope, a sack), but they eventually did hear someone calling from the direction of the hole. Helios and Rhianna heard it, and it was saying, "I know you're down here little ones. I saw what you did to Edare and his pet. I'm coming for you, little ones."

Freaked, the party quickly strategized. Dante, Alarian, and Helios moved near the entrance, while the rest of the party stayed behind. Dante spent a few seconds buffing himself as they heard something walking closer. Suddenly a huge figure dropped down from the ceiling. It was a tall and strong-looking troll, wearing studded leather armor and wielding a greatsword. As it advanced, it belched a gout of fire at Dante, which missed but both confused and frightened him.

Dante cast mirror image on himself while the others attacked once then retreated down the passage so that the rest of the party could join them. The party attacked and retreated drawing the troll along, who got in a couple good hits with his sword and then scorched Gorf with another gout of flame. Arrows at a distance didn't do too bad a job, but most of the party closed in to try to flank him on multiple sides. Uianya tried to run around the troll and got a wound for her trouble.

To the party's consternation, the fire spells that Uianya and Dante launched at the troll didn't seem to have much of an effect, though Gorf's acid arrow seemed to annoy the troll greatly. It took a mighty effort of sword and spell, but eventually the vicious troll lay near death. Taking Dante's advice to kill it (as they could see its wounds starting to close), Alarian beheaded the foul thing. Looting its body, they found (aside from its sword) it had a large mug made from silver and jade, carved with a dragon on the side. Gorf declared it to be magical.

Thusly pleased that all evil things were dead, the party returned to the road and resumed their journey southward.

 

[Isida Kep'Tukari]

After the last session, most of the party leveled up, so Uianya, Alarian, and Rhianna were all effectively 6th level, while Helios and Dante were still fifth (as were Jenna and Gorf).

This week's session (of 10-18) I call:

The Tale of the Troubled Farm or why little old ladies should not be on their own.

After dealing with the Bridgekeeper, the party finally got to Port Cross, looking for a place they could rest and sell some of their items. The guard at the gate asked them their names and wrote everything down carefully, along with what weapons they were carrying. The party decided to go to the Adventurer's Guild to tell them what had gone on on the road, and headed off in that direction. Rhianna also wanted to find the local Elemental guild, as she had made her decision to be an air genasi. (It's possible for someone in my world to become a genasi with sufficient knowledge, time, money, and ability to persuade other genasi that they are worthy to join their ranks.)

In the Adventurer's Guild, they were met by an air genasi man named Rishan. He got their group name, and carefully listened to their tales, and wrote them all down. Rhianna asked about the Elemental Guild, and Rishan said he might be able to help her, but wanted to ask a favor of the group. He wanted them to go out to his grandmother's farm, right outside of town, to check up on her. He usually did it every few days, but he had been swamped with work and hadn't been able to go. She had several farm hands to help her with the farm (raising cattle and chickens mostly), but he still worried. The party agreed to go in the afternoon. In return, Rhianna spent part of the morning being questioned by the Elemental Guild. If they found her to be true in her intent, and knowledgeable about the ways of genasi, they would do the ceremony tomorrow.

The also asked Rishan where they could go sell some things, weapons specifically, they had found in their travels. He directed them to Fireaxe's Smithy, which was run by a dwarf of excellent reputation. They went to said smithy, finding the smith at work with some of his apprentices. After getting his attention over the noise of the forge, they went into Master Fireaxe's office. They offered him most of the weapons they had gotten off of the darktentacles, as well as some minor magic weapons no one was able to use. In order to maximize their bargaining advantage, Alarian went out to their horses one more time to get an adamantine warhammer they also wanted to sell. While there he put on some magical perfume that aided in social interactions (+2 to Cha-based skill checks for one hour, they found it in the Tomb of Kosar).

Going back inside and adding the adamantine warhammer to the pile, Master Fireaxe snapped it right up, along with the magical weapons. The bargained, but the dwarf held firm on his price. They wanted to trade or purchase some armor from him (both Helios and Alarian had magical armor they were willing to trade for something better), and considering the amount they brought to the table, Master Fireaxe took them to a securely locked storeroom.

Inside he had several suits of armor, many of which Gorf said were magical, to a greater or lesser degree. Master Fireaxe offered Alarian a fine set of half-plate he said would "allow him to take the harshest hits with ease" and suggested a fine mithril shirt to Helios. After a bit of bargaining, which the smith got the better of, the party got the armor for Helios and Alarian as well as a good bit of gold. The party also got the name of an inn, the Golden Ale, as having good stables.

In addition, Uianya had been wanting to get her nagaika enchanted, and had asked Rishan about a reliable leather-worker to do it. Since the nagaika resembles, in part, a scourge (the favored weapon of Loviatar, the goddess of pain), finding someone to do such work is somewhat difficult. However, Rishan knew of the leatherworker by the name of Carn who generally knew how to keep his mouth shut. Uianya stopped by there after the party left Fireaxe's Smithy to see about making her nagaika magical.

Carn was a curiously colorless, expressionless, and humorless individual who regarded Uianya's question with a bleak gaze. He only nodded once in acquiescence to her request, and gave her a sharp glance when she didn't put enough money on the table right away. He said less than a half-dozen words to her, but promised her nagaika by the next day. Thus pleased, she returned to the group.

The party went and got rooms at the Golden Ale inn, then headed out to go visit Granny. It was only a half-mile outside of town to get to the farm, but as they passed the fenced in fields, they saw a horror. Jumping rats were consuming a cow; already part of its flank was stripped to the bone. But the worst thing was that the cow didn't seem to notice. It continued to eat grass as the rats consumed it alive. In the same field was a skeleton of a cow. Thoroughly disturbed, the party made haste to the farm proper.

They went to the farmhouse, and greeted Granny and told them why they were there. She told them that she hadn't heard or seen her farmhands all day. The party noticed that Granny's eyes were mostly opaque; the old woman was nearly blind. The party asked them what the farmhands were supposed to be doing, and she said they were supposed to be cleaning out the barn and taking care of her chickens, especially her prize chicken. When they asked about her prize chicken, she said she had raised it from a chick, and that it was very large and sure to win her a prize at the fair. When she indicated its size, she indicated a chicken almost three feet high.

The party wanted to take her back to town before they explored her farm further (fearing the rats), but Granny would have none of it. She offered the party cookies... which a few took, as the finally were able to convince her to barricade herself in the house while they went to go investigate the farm.

Walking toward the barn, they came to a chicken coop, beside which was a statue of a farmhand. Dante immediately thought "cockatrice, or maybe basilisk" and let everyone know it, so they could be prepared if it appeared. However, they couldn't hear anything, so gingerly passed on toward the barn. The walked in, and heard a faint squeaking. As they got to one of the end stalls, they saw the body of a man entirely covered by rats, most of his flesh gone. Seeing fresh meat, the rats leaped at them, jumping and running all over the party, thoroughly disgusting and disturbing them. The rats got in several bites, but mostly just gave the party a bad scare. It look some time, but between spells, teeth, swords, and strong language, the party was able to destroy the flesh-eating rats. They recognized the rats as flesh-strippers, a kind of furry locust that only appeared infrequently, but left utter devastation in their wake.

Just after this fight, as the party was recovering, they heard a clucking from behind them. Paranoid, Alarian immediately turned around so he could look behind himself with his shield, and Uianya and some of the others quickly wrapped loosely-woven stripes of cloth around their eyes to try to protect themselves. Out of the hen house stalked an incredibly ugly, three-foot high rooster with bat-like wings. Dante said that it was definitely a cockatrice, which could only turn people to stone by touching them, so the others felt safe to look at it. Which they all did. And Rhianna promptly turned to stone as the cockatrice gazed at the party.

Somewhat panicked, the party closed their eyes and attacked blindly, doing a decent amount of damage when they managed to hit. Dante tried to work his way around the back and hit it with a spell, which also helped. Through an amazing effort of blind luck (heh heh) the party was able to eventually take the cockatrice down. Searching the hen house, the party found a lot of stone chickens, as well as three large blue and green cockatrice eggs. Carefully taking them, Helios double-checked for tracks around the hen house. He found a couple pairs leading off away from the fields and house, and the party decided to follow them.

After several minutes of searching, the party found two exhausted farmhands at the edge of the woods. The two had seen their friend get stoned by the cockatrice and had fled into the woods in terror. They were greatly sorrowed to hear about the demise of Felise, the man that had been pitching hay in the barn.

Taking the farmhands, both statues, and Granny, the party headed back to town. Rishan was very grateful to the party for saving his grandmother, and quickly summoned a wizard to see if he could take care of the two stoned creatures. The party wished to go back to take care of the rest of the flesh-strippers the next day, and hope that Rhianna could be restored. The wizard, a short, intense-looking man called Norrin, demanded to know if the party had any of the cockatrice's eggs, which they did. Taking one in each hand, Norrin considered the statues for a minute, then smashed the eggs on the statues' heads. As the egg ran down their faces, stone became flesh once again. Norrin wanted to keep the third egg to study, which the party happily allowed.

Rhianna, glad at being flesh again, asked the party to fill her in. They did so, and decided to call it a day. Rhianna was still going to do her ritual the next day, and the party wanted to go see if any more flesh-strippers were still on the farm.

The next day, Rhianna went with the members of the Elemental Guild. A full description of her ritual is as follows:

Rhianna’s Ritual of Air

You are dressed in a gown of flowing white, and your hair is left loose and free. The other genasi wear robes of deep blue adorned with feathers, their own long hair cascading past their knees. You are taken to the high plains outside the city, where the wind blows constantly from the west. The air genasi take you to the top of a steep hill, bare of any stone or tree. Here they stand circled around you, and they burn exotic incenses as they call upon Akadi, the goddess of air, to witness this transformation. You join in their pleas, raising your arms to the ever-increasing wind. It circles around you, whipping your hair and gown.

The air genasi circle around you, dancing and chanting. They leap into the air, seeming to float forever before they return to earth. They come toward you, making flowing gestures, the feathers on their robes mimicking their movements. Each reaches out to you with a fan of feathers, and you feel the wind intensify. It not only runs around you, it runs through you. You feel it running deep inside you, flowing in your veins, running through your soul. With a triumphant shout, you feel your feet leave the earth and you soar high above, looking down upon the hill where you once stood. From your height you can see the blue earth of the hill, and white rocks hidden in the grass come together to make the symbol of Akadi. Only from here could you see it.

“Welcome Sister!” the genasi sing to you, “Welcome Sashana, known as Rhianna. Fly among your new kin, learn your new name, and glory in the freedom of the winds!”

The rest of the party went back to the farm and went into the field were the cow was being eaten yesterday. That cow was down and stripped of all flesh, but they didn't see any other flesh-strippers anywhere. Helios and Uianya followed the tracks the best they could, over to the tree line of the forest. Invoking her ability to talk with plants, Uianya questioned an oak tree about the rats. The tree said they came from sundownward (from the west), and the last time they had come was when the tree was young.

[At one point during this conversation with the oak, Uianya asked the tree if any of the other trees knew anything else. I, as the tree, turned over my shoulder and called, "Hey Clyde! You seen anything today?" as if the trees were construction buddies or something on break. It was damn funny at the time, let me tell you. ]

This comforted Uianya, but Helios was less than comforted when a hoard of flesh-strippers jumped onto him from a different tree. Hacking and slashing at the jumping, bouncing rats, it took some time to finally cleave (or explode) all of the vile little things, and they delivered several bites before they went down. Thus annoyed and disgusted, the party returned to Port Cross, where they spent the night at the Golden Ale inn and tavern before leaving the next morning for Port Lyalee.

 

[Isida Kep'Tukari]

After last session, Helios and Dante went up to 6th level. Rhianna's player couldn't be here this week, so Rhianna was "in a trance to contemplate the changes in her life she had gone through recently."

This week's session (10-25) I call:

The Tale of the Fork in the Road or why a natural 20 can have a room full of gamers in stitches for a half hour.

The morning after waking up in the Golden Ale tavern the party went to see Rishan to make sure Granny was doing ok. Granny was indeed doing fine, and hugged the characters and told them they were such nice boys and girls for looking out for her. She petted Etriki and told him he was a good puppy. Rishan thanked them for helping him out.

One thing the party wanted to do was to figure out why the cockatrice was able to turn things into stone with a gaze, rather than by touch as it was supposed to. They thought that Norrin, the mage that had unstoned Rhianna and the farmhand might be able to tell them why this was so. Rishan gave them directions, and they went to his house.

It was cheerfully painted, with pleasant flower beds being tended to by a gnome gardener. After the inevitable garden gnome jokes, the party asked if the master of the house was in, to which the gnome replied no. Just after that, someone asked if Norrin was in, to which the gnome said yes. He said that Norrin's wife was at the market, but Norrin was in, and he went to ask him if he wanted visitors, warning the party to not touch the flowers. Returning, the gardener said they could go in, and not to touch anything.

Going in, the party found Norrin sitting in a chair reading. When they spoke to him about discovering why the cockatrice was so different, Norrin said it was interesting, but would take some time. He asked where they might be in a few weeks so he could leave a message for them. The party said they were going to Port Lyalee, so Norrin said he'd leave a message at the Adventurer's Guild when he found something.

Thusly satisfied, the party set off southward again. By their calculations it would take them about a week to get to Port Lyalee. The first two days were fairly uneventful, but when the third day began, things got interesting.

When going along, the party spotted a fork in the road. Being a wise guy, Helios' player said, "I pick it up." I told him it was made of silver. Hilarity ensued, particularly when the party spotted a spoon a bit off the road... and then a knife... and then another fork next to that. Then they heard something clanking off into the woods. Most of them spotted a small figure, cloaked and carrying a bundle. Fanning out, Helios sneaked around, while Dante turned invisible to go around the other side.

Uianya called out to ask who he was and what he was doing, and the figure tried to duck down to hide better. By this time Helios and Dante were around enough that they could see what was going on. The figure was trying to wedge himself under a bush, with not a lot of success. The party called out that they didn't mean to hurt him, and that they wanted him to come out so they could help him. The figure stood up, and it was a young, adolescent red-headed halfling boy.

They asked him what he was doing and he said that he was a merchant's apprentice and that his caravan had been attacked by a landshark. The kid had grabbed a blanket full of various valuables so that the landshark wouldn't destroy them, then fled. He told them the landshark had eaten one of the two human guards, so he had just run and not stopped running. The poor kid was obviously in shock and very scared, and the party told him they would go help his caravan and kill the landshark.

Helios put the kid up on his horse, and then the party rode off to go find the landshark. They rode about an hour (the kid had been going for a loooong time), finding the occasional piece of silver flatware along the way. Ahead they finally found the ambush site, seeing the churned earth, overturned wagon, and splashes of blood. In the middle of the road was a boulder. Quite paranoid enough, the party spent a few rounds buffing themselves before firing arrows and spells at the boulder.

Their paranoia was well-founded as the boulder moved toward them, the huge form of the landshark becoming visible as it threw itself out of the ground and ran towards them. The party attacked it, Etriki biting, Alarian swinging his sword, etc. The landshark didn't like that, and so jumped on Alarian and tried to squish him. He didn't succeed, but still got in a few good hits. Helios and Alarian finished it off with swordwork. Dante remembered that landshark hide made good armor, and took the time to pry off a piece of it.

The other party members inspected the ambush site. Helios found two left hands, human-sized, among the pieces, and decided that both humans must have gotten eaten. The tracks of the halflings went into the forest towards the cliffs in the west (the cliffs went up, not down). Quickly the party overturned the wagon and strapped the remaining trade goods (cloth mostly) on the backs of their horses so they wouldn't be taken by anyone else.

Then they went into the woods, Helios and Uianya tracked the halflings to the cliff-face, and two a couple of narrow cracks in the rock where the halflings had gone in. They also noted the horse tracks (from the horses that had been pulling the wagon) paralleled the cliff. They had the kid call into the cracks in the cliffs, and eventually the halflings came out. The lead trader, Tess, counted noses and came up three short, and lamented that in their panic-driven flight into the woods, they might have lost some people.

The party looked about for tracks, backtracking where they could, and found that some of the tracks just simply vanished in midstep. Suddenly realizing what this meant, the party looked up at the cliff-face. They spotted a high cave... just in time for Alarian to get speared through the shoulder by an enormous spike. A vicious creature with the wings of a bat, body of a lion, head of a human, and a tail bristling with spikes launched itself out of the cave. Dante recognized it as a manticore. Gorf launched an acid arrow at it, but then Alarian quickly fired three arrows, and felled the beast at once (three hits, one of which was a crit, with a might longbow. x3 crit. 40+ points of damage. One very dead manticore).

However, the manticore's mate didn't care for that, and she came launching out of the cave next, hitting Alarian with no less than five spikes from her tail. Helios fired his bow, Gorf used magic missile, and Dante cast sheild. She swung up and out, and fired her spikes again, catching Alarian before he could get under cover. He fired more arrows at her, and wounded her further. Uianya threw some fire at her, then decided to wild shape into an eagle.

During this time Jenna was looking out for the halflings, and Gorf had cast a touch spell on himself and was flying (very slowly, flumphs aren't too fast) toward the manticore.

The next round she did so (there were more arrows from Helios, and Alarian was now firing from underneath Dante's shield, though one more spike got through), and after that flew to the manticore and tried to claw at her. Both claws missed, and the manticore savaged her nearly to death. Wounded, Uianya flew down. Alarian decided to stop hiding behind the shield, and stepped out and fired three arrows again. These were the trick, and the female manticore died like her mate, plowing into the earth.

Dante said the spines were good for some spell components, and plucked about a dozen out of Alarian before chopping off the tails of the manticores. They also took the heads to prove the manticore's deaths. Since there were two manticores lairing together, the party thought there might be a baby manticore. Gorf volunteered to go up (his spell was still active) and take care of any babies. He went up, and there was a crackle of lightning from within the cave. Then Gorf dropped a rope down from within the cave.

The party found the remains of the three halflings (as well as the now-dead baby manticore), as well as a few things the manticores must have picked up (a belt pouch with some gold and a gem in it, a potion of some sort, and the rope). Going down the cliff again, Jenna said she had found a larger cave a bit further along that they could stay in tonight.

The party decided to rest now and then go find the horses in the morning. The night passed uneventfully, and after a couple hour's search, the party found the horses drinking by a stream. Bringing them back, the party returned to the road. Dante decided to cut part of the "fin" off of the landshark as proof of its death. The traders quickly put their own trade goods back on their own horses and took turns leading them along as they pressed southward.

The next couple days of travel were uneventful. They spent the next couple nights at small farming towns, and met a couple other traders. They told them about the dead landshark, for which the traders were grateful. The only thing of note that happened was that Helios was finally able to find his animal companion, a jaguar. He calls her Xot.

Finally the party reached Port Lyalee, which had white walls from pieces of crushed shell being used in its construction. The scent of the sea was in the air. The one fairly usual thing about Port Lyalee was that it is run almost exclusively by halflings that do a lot of trading between Albon and the coast. Many parts of the city are sized for halflings only, but it is a trade town, and there are many kinds of people there.

At the gate, the guard asked what was happening. They told her, and she brought the halfling traders inside for a minute and talked to them. Satisfied, the traders waved good-bye and then the guard motioned the party in. Helios asked where a good inn might be where he would be able to take Xot. The guard pondered for a minute, and thought that the Jeweled Parrot might be the place. Port Lyalee got several shipments of unusual animals, and often they stayed at the Parrot. Lots of entertainers stayed there too.

First things first, the party went to the Adventurer's Guild to tell them what was going on and update them on their activities. The man behind the counter looked quite weather-beaten, and his hair was crusted with salt, as if he had taken a recent swim in the sea. The party told him their name, and he exclaimed that they were "the new, up-and-coming group." They told him of their battles with the landshark and manticores, and produced the heads and fin. He told them there was a bounty on them, which the party gleefully collected.

They asked where one could find a blacksmith who could fashion a shield from a piece of landshark hide and he directed them to Tiddlywinks, the gnome blacksmith. Thanking him, the party went to find the gnome. His shop was more cheerfully painted than most, and Tiddlywinks himself greeted them. They asked him about making a shield from the piece of landshark hide, and he took it from them an examined it. He said he could make a good large shield from the piece they had, or he could also make one good buckler from the middle of it. He could make it good enough to be enchanted, for a mere two hundred gold pieces. Alarian tried to talk him down, but Tiddlywinks held firm and finally he paid the full two hundred. Then the party finally went to the Jeweled Parrot.

It was painted in a riot of colors, appearing to be a brightly colored bird. Inside, several brightly colored birds were flying around, landing on the rafters. Several people had animals, mostly merchant-types. One had a lap dog, and another fat man had an equally fat small jaguar-type animal with a collar and leash by his side. Helios cast speak with animals to converse with the little jaguar, and asked it how it was being treated. It said it was being treated fine, it got lots of fish, and that this was a good place. Xot agreed that this place smelled right, and thus they decided to stay.

As Helios was finishing up talking to the cats, one of the birds landed above the party on the rafter and squawked, "Welcome! Welcome to the Jeweled Parrot! Welcome!" Somewhat amazed, Uianya asked the bird if it had actually talked to them. "Welcome!" was the bird's response.

The party got a table and a few rooms, and sat down to dinner. They asked a very young serving girl what the birds were.

Her response, "A corollax!"

"What's a corollax?"

"Like a parrot, but different."

"What's a parrot?"

"Like a corollax, but not quite."

Probing a bit to see what made the two different, the girl said that you don't make loud noises around a corollax because they can "made the loud colors." Which didn't help at all.

Note: The following may offend Eric's Grandmother. Read at your own risk.

After dinner, a bard by the name of Brightfire got up to sing and play the lute. She was very lovely, with brilliant blue skin and dark pink hair. Dante recognized her as one of the rare radiance genasi, touched by the elemental plane of light and color. Both Helios and Alarian vied for her attention, but it was Helios she smiled at. He wanted to convince her to be his company for the night, or so he was hinting.

Now, here's where it gets zany.

On pure whim I asked Helios' character to make a "booty call" check (it was the end of the session). He rolled and then started laughing. Natural 20.

Wow.

Ok, so a natural 20 booty call check pretty much covers all of the bases and few I didn't know existed, so Brightfire took Helios up to her room.

The next half hour were taken up with such descriptions as to Helios' new outfit: big white jacket with fur trim, big had with a feather, lots of jewelry, and silver-topped cane. Much was made of the fact that he would have to get a white horse with fuzzy barding, silk saddlebags, with fuzzy dice hanging between the horse's ears, with a halfling on the back doing his best imitation of a beat box. His new attacks were described; the ultimate pimp slap, with his jewel-encrusted rings of ultimate pimpin.'

Phrases were bandied about such as the fact that Brightfire was to be "appraising his family jewels," that Helios was now "The Staffmaster," and another title that revolved around him being the master of felines. Except the word feline wasn't used.

Colors were discussed such as magenta and chartreuse crushed velvet. Alarian ran right out and got Helios a hat with a big red feather. Much was made of the fact that Brightfire was going to be composing some songs that would give Helios a +20 to all future booty call checks after singing them. Then Helios' player mentioned that Brightfire had already been singing a song tonight... I mentioned that I had seen a Master Pimp PrC that I was going to have to find for him...

And much more. Pretty much the whole group was in stitches for a good 20 minutes as we kept coming up with more comments and additions.

I will never look at a natural 20 the same way. Ever. Again.

 

[Emperor Valerian]

Story is great so far, Ray Silver! Me and the other gamers in your group really appreciate the work you've put into it!

 

[Isida Kep'Tukari]

The game from November 1st marked the return of Rhianna's player, as well as my foray into a new gaming frontier. It being the day after Halloween, I wanted to run a horror-type game.

However, before I could get to the soul-sucking horror, I had a little one-on-one session to run. Uianya's player's very first D&D character was a weretiger, and she had wanted to be a weretiger in this game. However, the weretiger is one of the stronger lycanthropes, and I had no time to figure out a balanced ECL for one. Thusly, she played her druid and kept her weretigran dreams to herself.

Then Dragon #313 came out. This is the issue that contained the weretiger character classes, and thus a way for a weretiger to be a balanced option for a character to take. I showed it to her, and she was quite happy about it. We decided she would burn her (recently) acquired level of druid to take this, and that we'd run a little one-on-one session to get her properly intiated into lycanthropy.

I didn't want her to be a cursed lycanthrope, as the dealing with the rampant violence every full moon didn't appeal to me. I think there's a time, place, and group to deal with that kind of thing, and this was none of the three. Besides, no one likes to have their character under the DM's control half the time. Thusly with a dash of altruism, a bit of prophecy, and a vision from a god, the following tale was born...

The Tale of the Lurker in Darkness or tyger, tyger, burning bright...

Uianya wanted to get away from the city, after all the traveling she had done in a large group. She wanted to be on her own with nature. Etriki and her traveled several hours' journey, enjoying the woods and peace of nature. However, she came across a rather unusual sight. In the middle of a clearing was a bunny sitting on a tree stump, and across the clearing a person that was both tiger and man (hybrid form lycanthrope). However, just as the tiger-man started running out into the clearing, Uianya noticed that the "harmless little bunny" actually seemed to be part of the stump.

When the tiger man got within a few feet, a vine growing near the stump suddenly lashed out and grabbed him around the waist, pinning his arms. Uianya stepped into action, coming out and running over to help. Unfortunately, the vine/stump thing had different ideas and lashed her up as well.

Etriki came up to save the day, biting at the vine, while the tiger man struggled and the vine squeezed. Eventually the tiger man got free, and ran to the bushes to grab his crossbow. Firing at it, finally Etriki got Uianya free. The tiger man attacked it with his claws while Uianya hacked it at with her scimitar. Between the two, they managed to break open the "stump."

[It was a wolf-in-sheep's-clothing, a great monster if you can want to torment your PCs with something that looks innocent.]

The tiger man changed into human form, introduced himself as He-terron, and wanted to know her reason for helping him. Most would be glad to see a lycanthrope like him die. She said that she was a child of nature, a druid, and that she has always had an attraction to the large cats. She also introduces Etriki, though the squirrel seems somewhat frightened (understandably) by the huge former-tiger-man. He-terron also asked about her race, as her coloring indicated that she was not entirely human. When she said she was a steam genasi, the combination of fire and water, He-terron seems very interested. So interested that he suggested she come with him and see his sister. Curious, she agreed.

Leading her through the heavy forest, through many twists and turns, he leads her to the gates of a beautiful stone city, tucked away in the wilderness. He-terron named it Jazarra, and took her inside. Etriki pressed against her leg, as everyone he passed on the streets seemed to be viewing him as a tasty morsel. He-terron brings her to a large, and well-appointed house. Going upstairs, he returns with an elegantly-dressed woman wearing red. She introduces herself as Zakara, a priestess of Kossuth, the god of fire.

Asking about Uianya's heritage, she seems intrigued that she was "fire kin." Zakara said that it was fortuitous that Uianya had showed up, as she had had a vision that one of her kind would be needed. It seemed that there the city wished to expand, but there was an old, abandoned temple of the Firelord near the place where they wanted to build. Zakara said that Kossuth had withdrawn his favor from the old place, but some of the old guardians remained and must be dealt with. The most worrisome was one she named the "lurker in darkness." No ordinary hero would do, only one named to her from her divinations and dreams, which meant Uianya was destined to go.

The priestess allowed Uianya to rest in her home, rousing her early the next morning. Assembled in her home were He-terron and two other women that Zakara introduced as her acolytes. She said they would all help her defeat the lurker and cleanse the temple for Jazarra's safety and continue glory. After the priestess' blessing, the four set forth.

Uianya couldn't help but be somewhat impressed by He-terron, even to the point of having a bit of a crush on him. Etriki didn't needle her about it though, as he had bigger worries on his mind.

It was midmorning by the time they arrived at the cave entrance that marked the old fire temple. Mentally preparing themselves, they all started down the slope. Fires burned in niches along the walls, giving a very warm atmosphere to the broad downward slope. As they proceeded downward they noticed two large braziers filled with fire bracketing the hallway. Uianya noted a bit of movement in one, and called the others' attention to it.

As they drew closer a serpant coiled in the flame launched itself at her, scaring everyone. Claws and scimitar were joined as they hacked the small snake to pieces. Startled, they continued forward, their nerves on a hair trigger. Finally the long passageway debauched into a huge cavern, in the middle of which was an enormous bonfire burning out of the stone. The entire place was lit with the hellish glare. And in the center of the flames a huge form waited. Large as all but the largest dragons, though lacking wings, the lurker in darkness lunged out of the flames, spraying them all with his flaming breath.

The two acolytes hurled themselves at it in hybrid form, while He-terron, in the form of an enormous tiger, jumped onto its back. Uianya waited and judged the time was not yet ready for her to strike, holding Etriki back wit her. While He-terron began digging a terrible wound in the lurker's side, the lurker jumped up in the air and pinned the two acolytes under its claws, crushing them unmercifully.

Dashing to their rescue, Uianya ordered Etriki to climb up the lurker and take out its eyes. Bounding away with a will, the dire squirrel evaded a bite from the lurker and scaled its enormous neck. He-terron continued to work on its back, causing it to howl in pain. Etriki reached the top of its head and valiently bit his sharp teeth into the lurker's eye. Screaming the lurker swung its head, throwing Etriki across the chamber, knocking the squirrel out.

Furious at her companion's treatment, Uianya threw herself into the fray, stabbing the lurker even as He-terron continued to rake at its side. The two acolytes remained pinned, their cried growing weaker as the huge beast slowly crushed them. It bit at the druid, its huge jaws snapping deep into her side. Blood dripping from its jaws, it tried to gnash at He-terron, but missed. Though blood dripped from her side and down her leg, Uianya readied herself for one last assault.

For Etriki! she thought as she lunged forward. Her sword penetrated deep into its hide, seeking and finding its heart. As burning hot blood flowed over her hand, she withdrew. The beast thundered to the ground, dead. He-terron and the acolytes drew themselves upright, panting in exhertion and pain. Uianya tended to Etriki as the others praised her for her bravery against the lurker.

"You were a true hero today," He-terron said, his voice rumbling with approval as he helped her from the temple.

They all walked back to Jazarra, the day seeming brighter and sweeter than ever after the sweltering heat and terror of the old fire temple. Zakara welcomed them back, praising Kossuth that they had done well. Looking at Uianya curiously, she took the druid aside.

"You have proved yourself to be a worthy individual, not only in my eyes and the eyes of my people, but in the eyes of my god. It is apparent that you were destined to become one of us in time. Would you sacrifice what you are to become what we are? Would you take this honor into yourself, giving up some of your own self to embrace us?"

"I would be honored," Uianya said, deeply touched.

They took her to Zakara's secluded temple that evening, along with He-terron and the acolytes. As He-terron held her, Zakara opened the skylight to let the moon fall on her. The acolytes bit Uianya as Zakara used a silver amulet to imbue her with the sacred lycanthropy as if she had been born to it. Uianya felt the change deep inside her as her very blood and marrow changed to accept her new form. When it was done, she was able to change her form to that of the powerful and beautiful tiger!

 

[Isida Kep'Tukari]

Ok, now getting to the horror tale proper:

The Tale of the Dying Daughter

[Party learns of murders, party goes to noble's ball, party talks to Ravare Darvano, party investigates rumors about Darvano family, discovers that Ravare might be involved, goes into family crypt, fights Eye of Fear and Flame, confronts Ravare and fights her. Subdues Ravare and hands her over to the church of Pelor.]

 

[Isida Kep'Tukari]

Nov. 8th

The Tale of the Demon in the Crypt

[Party investigates the disappearance of Ravare's aunt. Talks to Ravare, scares the piss out of her parents, investigates the uncle's house, and looks at the Darvano's library. Eventually goes underneath the Darvano house and discovers the ancient sunken noble's house. Investigates an art gallery, and encounter a cave crow and a mobile skeletal hand clutching incense. Find the hidden demonic altar and fight the demon therein. Destroys the altar and an idol, come back to the surface and find Ravare dead. Go and get drunk, Helios has a bad dream in which Ravare tells them to leave or die and they discover they are marked for death.]

 

[Isida Kep'Tukari]

Nov. 14

The Tale of the Ghost of the Dying Daughter

[Party checks out Ravare's body and discovers it dessicated and drained of all life. Terrorizes her family some more. Church of Pelor agrees to take care of any children they might have. Party investigates the rest of the books in the library and conclude they have to go back into the family crypt. Obtain some of Lord Darvano's blood and go back down there. Investigate armory and kitchen, then go to great hall where they encounter the ghost of Ravare. She strikes Helios blind, deaf, and mute, and scares Rhianna nearly to death. The battle is difficult, but the party succeeds. They go get extremely drunk and get silly for the rest of the night. Helios tries to find Uianya some company. Alarian finds two willing barmaids. Someone puts a big frog in Uianya's room. Rhianna steals people blind. And Gorf gets drunk and sings showtunes.]

 

[Isida Kep'Tukari]

Nov. 29

The Tale of Fire, Ice, and Death

[The party goes to spend some of their hard-earned gold. But can't quite buy what they want. The Mage's Guild cuts them a deal, escort a sorceress to the neighboring town and they'll knock off some of the price. The whole party goes and it's uneventful. They hear there are stone bats in the area and ask a local taxidermist what's going on. They see a stone bat in his possession and Uianya determines it's bad. They go to find them and find a warren of rabbits displaced by the bats. The rabbits cousins, four al-mi'rajes, agree to go help them evict the bats. Dante buffs up the bunnies and they drive the bats out of the warren for the party to slay. They do. The party proceeds onward to Port Jarlo (next big town) and discover a small magma pool accidentally brought there from the plane of fire. A fire mephit, Rosh, asks there help in sending him and his friends home, as it's now a one-way portal from the plane of fire. They agree to help and notice a burn trail from one of the other mephits that they might follow. They go to Port Jarlo and ask the Mage's Guild to try to close the portal. They'll try, but they have mephit problems of their own. The party learns of a being called Immo, a sage that runs a place called the Cold Library north of town. They go there, discovering that the burn trail leads right to Immo's place. In there is a magma mephit called Tesh along with his magma ooze mount Kish. They've been harassing Immo for nearly a week and almost killed him three times in an attempt to get the spell they want from him. Their presense is destroying the library and Immo wants them out. Neither are willing to compromise. The party tries to help both sides, but are not too successful. Dante tries to find the right scroll, but when Immo goes to get it, finds it missing. Pissed off, he fires chain lightning to Dante's chest. Then cone of cold. Dante dies. The party kills Immo. Much subdued, Gorf and Brightfire stay behind to try to find the scroll for Tesh before he brings the library down while the party tries to raise Dante. Dante refuses to come back and his body is burned at the church of Boccob.]

 

[Isida Kep'Tukari]

Dec. 6

The Tale of Many Eyes

[The party finds a strange box in Immo's library along with some strange notes. The contents lead them to believe that they must go to the Forbidden Lands to stop some ancient evil. In Port Jarlo they talk to a man called Zijare, a weird and creepy shopkeeper with an obsession with eyes and watching others. He tells them something terrible is coming. They purchase a pair of glasses that let them see water and leave. In traveling to Fort Medren they are set upon by The Hunter, a werewolf and his murderous pack. They are able to kill him, and proceed to the Fort. Once there, they tell the city watch of the Hunter's death and go the adventurer's guild. The halfling there tells them what they need for a desert trek and they get themselves outfitted. At the inn Alarian notices a young man counting a bag full of loot, which they discover is full of glasses and silverwear from the Darvano household. Alarian let him go and even gave him some good, though Uianya harassed him for a bit because she could. Gorf got drunk again and sang "The Greatest American Hero."]