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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Joshua Randall" data-source="post: 9578658" data-attributes="member: 7737">19, redux [to refresh your memory after my long digression into gamebook mechanics]The manticore thrashes its tail which is so powerfully muscled that it lifts us off the ground as we try to hang on.Make a DEX test!(36) if 18 or more;(7) if less than 18.---36We roll 1 & 6, add this to our base DEX of 11, and eke out an 18. (Less than 18 and we die ignominiously, savaged by the manticore, three sections into the gamebook.)We channel our inner mountaineer-sheepherder from our youth, grab a big handful of the manticore’s tail, and squeeze as hard as we can, really feeling that tail in our hands. Err… we close our fingers around one of the tail spikes and wrench it free from "the membrane that holds the quill-cluster." [Aaaaargh! They're not quills!]Waving our prize in one hand, we yell to Dalris that she should "kill this thing" so we can get out of here.Dalris tells us that no killing will be necessary. She stands with her hands clenched in front of her face. [That’s a weird somatic component.]"Mignam flerol, lursip gravdam," Dalris says in the "spell language of the aboriginal Kandian druids."These are the words of an Entangle spell which causes roots and creepers and entire saplings to bend into a cage for the manticore. We barely manage to slip through the thickening tree trunks before we are trapped inside. We emerge next to Dalris and a now visible Rufyl who resembles a "four-foot-high" red dragon. Dalris says she could have handled the manticore without our help [which is good, because we didn’t do crap], and our interior monologue reminds us that her “strict druid faith” makes her a protector of all living things, even ferocious, wild, man-eating beasts like the manticore.We retort that we should’ve used our original plan to cripple the manticore with Magic Missile and then grabbed a tail spike before it died.Dalris understandably remarks that she should have left us trapped with the savage manticore: "The two of you would have gotten along nicely." She wants to know why we can’t leave innocent man-eating beasts alone rather than use them for our magical experiments.We say that we’re tired of defending our magic to Dalris. After all, Landor was a proud Kandian. "His magic has its roots in the Bhukodian sorceries of your precious ancestors, and they weren’t druids!"We "watch with amusement and joy as the bard’s clear eyes sparkle with fury, bringing her wild beauty to life."The "lithe" Dalris has heard this taunting many times. She bounds away into the forest, leaving Rufyl and us behind. We mentally command Rufyl to go after her in case the bloodthirsty man-eating manticore has a mate nearby.Rufyl doesn’t have to be told twice. He has formed a strong bond with Dalris and would do anything to protect her. The pseudodragon fades away into invisibility.We hurry toward Wealwood and hope that we reach it before nightfall.Turn to (46).</blockquote>

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