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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Kayne" data-source="post: 1009623" data-attributes="member: 13153">Takes up the story...Miles' Journal - Part ElevenHammer 10th continued - Later, after we had bid Rand a fond farewell, no sooner had he passed out of Dagger Falls gates, than a strange thing happened. A nearby man suddenly erupted in a sickly greenish light, which when it dissipated revealed another man standing there, spouting utter gibberish. within a few minutes though, he seemed to develop the ability to speak and understand our tongue, indeed within quarter of an hour he spoke it as well as I!He introduced himself as Adamo, who apparently is from another world, one where many of the things we take for granted do not exist, like Orcs. He says the world he comes from is called Earth. At any rate he is clearly a wizard of some kill, and as we were now in need of such we have enlisted him to help us. We spent the evening in the tavern dividing out our spoils from recent battles, and with a view towards the coming fight against the ogres, I mamaged to secure an enchanted chain shirt and a greatsword (though this is a secondary weapon only). I also filled my potion belt with vials of healing fluid and one that promises faster movement and co-ordination. That done, we retired to our rooms for the night.Hammer 11th - We got up and set off early, and thankfully met with no encounters during our travels, well apart from the rotting corpse of an Ettin, which Khondar proudly declared that he had slain some time back, indeed I do recall him mentioning such. While he boasted however, I think the rest of us were more keen on controlling our urge to vomit, so badly did the body smell. We got past it as quick as possible, and the night was uneventful.Hammer 12th - We woke up to a vicious frost this morning, which did not abate, the sun remaining behind the clouds the whole day long. The temperature got lower still as we started trekking up into the mountains. Though the day was quiet, tonight, not long after we set camp, we came under attack by a pair of strange bipedal creatures that sprayed acid from their long mouths. during the fight, Adamo shocked us all by summoning a creature to our aid that was hideous. He swears that the thing was actually a lion, and that his magic is cursed to always make abominations out of the creatures he summons. I do not like this development at all.Hammer 13th - Very little to write about today, we continued trekking into the mountains, the day started off cold and got colder. I am very glad of my wool cloak right about now. Aside from the occassional bird in the sky, and mountain goat we encountered nothing.Hammer 14th - Well after a quiet day yesterday, we had to have a day where all hell broke loose didn't we? As we were walking aong around noon a wyvern spotted us and evidently decided that we'd make a nice snack, diving down to attack. Adamo summoned one of his monstrosities (he claims it was just an owl... the thing had bat wings and tentacles... lots of tentacles!), to keep it occupied while myself and Khondar shot it with arrows. Once we had taken it down, we searched the area, easily finding its lair and took a few items from it, though nothing (besides some coins) that took my interest.We camped in a large crater tonight, an ancient battleground it seems. Not long into first watch (when I was sound asleep), the campsite was attacked by a skeleton that defied belief. No fewer than 130' in height, it pounded us, our wizards taking their time to get into the fight. It was up to Yvgeny, Stedd, Khondar and myself, we like ants around its ankles, to bring it low. Thankfully Khondar is an awesome ally in a fight, his axes chipping great chunks of bone from the creature, and eventually it could stand no longer, toppling over and shattering in a storm of shards.Hammer 15th - Not quite as cold today, which came as a relief to all of us. We continued on our way, Khondar leading us, as he is the only one who has been to the Rudenheim clanhold before and thus knows the way there. Dwarves being dwarves, if it were not for him knowing the way, we could likely search these mountains for an eon and not find the place. As we sat down to grab a bite to eat for lunch (well everyone else did, my ring ensures I do not need to bother with eating or drinking and thus relieves me of the burden of carrying provisions), I became aware of at least one creature approaching fast... from underground. As I looked for the source of the rumbling, my eyes went wide as the dorsal fin of a Bulette burst out of the ground. shouting to my companions to move, I started sprinting, only for a second Bulette to burst from the ground, lunging right into me! Stedd desperatly battled the creature, as I was quickly overcome by my wounds, slipping into blackness. From asking the others after I was revived, I learned that Khondar made a bloody mess out of both landsharks and that Halbrinn had saved me from Mask's kingdom this day.Hammer 16th - We got up early and resolved to attack the hold, with a view to getting inside and securing a foothold. Things did not go quite to plan! We arrived at mountian pass at what we guessed to be roughly 11am and were immediately spotted by an ogre guard. Naturally we charged and atttacked the ogre before he could sound off an alarm. Halbrinn went invisible and set off to secure the main door to prevent it being closed, and us being locked outside. We swiftly killed the ogre guard, and then some party members were sniped at by skeletons using Heavy Crossbows, firing through arrow slits to either side of the main doors. Adamo summoned a creature that he swears blind was a gorilla, into the corridor beyond the slits, and  it destroyed some of the skeletons before he lost control over it and it rampaged off through the clanhold. The rest of the skeletons were dealt with by Yevgeny, who turned them.At this point we saw a second ogre, and we contuined foward to attack him. Halbrinn reached the door, but found that it was already barred. Finishing off the second ogre, myself and Khondar spent 5 minutes bashing at the door before it finally gave way (which was good, because frankly my shoulder couldn't have taken much more!). We opened the door into the entrance chamber of the clanhold, and met the "welcoming committee", namely a Hill giant and 3 ogres who begun to throw rocks and javalins at us. Of course we returned fire back at them (as charging wasn't an option, the room being divided by a deep chasm), but their missiles were considerably more effective than ours!Halbrinn then used an illusion spell and tried to fool the monsters into thinking we had created a magical bridge over the chasm, but it didnt work and they waited for us to break our cover and then pounded us with more missile fire when we did. I took a nasty hit and pulled back to the mountain pass, as I was no longer in any shape to fight on. Yev conjured up a magic hammer to knock the boulder pile into the chasm, thus denying the giant his ammunition. Frustrated by this the hill giant used his club to smash off some loose rock from the walls to throw at us and it almost broke his club.Both partys fired at the others for awile with no real effect, even to the extent that Halbrinn cast a fireball at them but failed to kill any of them! However, this did spur one of the ogres to head though a door at the back of the chamber, doubtless to summon reinforcements. Seeing this Adamo webbed the monsters, and the party took the oppurtunity to move foward to the chasm's edge. The Ogres and Giant begun to slowly move through the web to the back of the chamber... where the missing ogre was waiting with a basket of ammo for them.At this, Stedd threw a flaming torch into the web to clear a path for Khondar, and Halbrinn cast a fly spell on the crazed dwarf, who flew over the chasm to do battle with his axes. Adamo tried to keep the monsters contained at the rear of the room by summoning more of his twisted creatures, vipers and a lion.Stedd then jumped over the chasm to join Khondar, while Yvgeny and Halbrinn continued to fire in support. The giant though, made short work of the vipers and closed to deal with Khondar. Seeing this, Hal and Adamo blasted spells into him, Magic Missiles and Acid Bolts showered the lumbering behemoth, but did not slow him by much. From outside, I could hear the battlecry and roar of pain, as Khondar raged and took a huge chunk out of the giant with his axes. The giant didnt like that and he raged too! By now Stedd had killed one ogre whilst  another was felled by the constant missile fire from Yevgeny. The giant swung his club at Khondar knocking him unconscious and almost destroying the stone pillar he was using as cover. In his next blow the giant then almost killed Stedd who realised he could not kill the giant alone so jumped back across the chasm, only to be knocked out by a stone thrown by the giant as he landed. The giant took one last bellow as his rage wore off and Adamo's acid arrows killed him, though by this time Khondar had succumbed to his wounds and died. We retrieved his body, and retreated back down the mountain. In all our great and doomed assault had lasted just over an hour! We retreated a long way from the clanhold, fearing a retaliatory strike by those inside, and then Halbrinn used Khondar's Teleport ring to return to Dagger Falls and get him resurrected. The rest of us, hung our heads in our hands and waited for their return as night came down.P.S. For the record I play Miles, who is writing this journal.</blockquote>

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