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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Brakkart" data-source="post: 1554014" data-attributes="member: 19617">Miles' Journal - Part Twenty SixKythorn 2nd - After waking and doing the usual morning routine of meditation, prayer and study, we set off back down the tunnel. Our aim now is to reach Lich's Mire (that name still chills my spine) and deal with whatever may be found there, and then on to Maerimydra. Again the day was quiet. I thought we were being scryed while I was on watch tonight.Kythorn 3rd - Halbrinn (who also felt the scrying attempt last night) cast a scry of his own this morning, spying on the drow priestess who escaped the temple at Szith Morcane. He did not learn much however, merely that she is alive and huddled in a cave somewhere. I think he may have scryed the priestess of Lolth we set free, rather than the one of Kiaransalee who fled the temple there, but I remained quiet on my thoughts. The gnome does not take criticism well. We made our way further back along the tunnel without any encounters today.Kythorn 4th - Continuing on our trek we arrived early today at at the junction we had followed this side tunnel from, and this time we took the southern tunnel towards Lich's Mire which we estimate to be between two and four days travel away (the map is hardly that accurately drawn to scale alas). There were no encounters. This part of the underdark seems very quiet.Kythorn 5th - We travelled onward, now heading south. all of us are uneasy at how easy our travel has been thus far. Which of course meant that we were bound to run into trouble in spades! We were alerted by the noise of their approach of a small horde of goblins and ogres, with an armoured fire giant and a vrock demon following them... all heading right for us! We set an ambush in the tunnel which we began with Halbrinn unleashing a fireball into the goblins at the head of the horde, annihilating half the oncoming group.  By Mask, the smell of burning flesh in the air was atrocious! I've seen Halbrinn use his fireball spell many times and smelt the aftermath, but never before has he had so densely packed a group of targets on which to use it. From the looks on the faces of the other Crusaders, they were as sickened from the stench as I was. He followed this with another fireball though, slaughtering the remaining ogres as they charged towards us, not one managing to land a blow. I swear there was a glint of pride in his work that bordered on cruelty. Seeing his followers massacred enraged the fire giant and he charged our line, bellowing vile curses... he was cut to ribbons in less time than it takes to tell by Stedd, Aeron and myself, without him managing to land a blow! That's what I call teamwork. The Crusaders then charged down the corridor towards the vrocks (because there were two of them by then), and most of the party were felled by the demons sonic screams, leaving just myself and my trusty partner Stedd to fight a brace of demons. They didn't stand a chance and we easily dispatched them, though oddly no bodies were left behind. We briefly paused to loot the various bodies and then continued on our way. Hours later we reached an area of passage riddled with side tunnels, the floor strewn with the dead bodies of goblins and ogres, most likely where the group nwe masacredc earlier today had passed through. We backed up and made camp, not wishing to walk into an ambush today.Kythorn 6th - Very early this morning we were attacked by a pair of Bulettes as Aeron, Rand and I were on guard.One went for Rand which I swiftly butchered with his aid, while the other proved a far trickier opponent as it went for our sleeping gnome wizard, almost dragging him (and his tent) away before the others managed to dissuade it, and it fled, tunnelling away through the earth. We rested late so our spellcasters could recover the spells they had cast. Finally setting off we carried on our way towards Lich's Mire, the tunnel we are traversing soon being joined by a stream flowing alongside the pathway we are plodding along. As the tunnel opened out into caverns I scouted ahead to discover two drow females farming mushrooms, oddly both were armoured. I launched an attack, dazzling both with a daylight enchanted coin and massacring one before she knew what hit her. And then the beholder arrived! Dropping out of a hole in the ceiling it unleashed a volley of rays at me. thankfully I am well trained, and was able to avoid or resist all of them. As the others raced to suport me, I was again subjected to a barrage of attacks. Again, none worked and then I could see nothing. I remained blinded for only a few seconds really, felt like forever though, and I could hear and smell the battle all around me. And then suddenly my sight returned and the beholder was dead, killed by Yvgeny and Rand. It would appear that I got caught in the creatures famed central eye beam, it negating my equipment including the goggles that allow me to see in these sunless caverns. Checking out the hole that the beholder had emerged from, we found a large cave filled with broken statues, the petrified victims of the beholder, most of which had been broken or rearranged in some way to form a truly perverse art gallery. Then we got to looting, finding a considerable haul of magic and treasure, much of it needing identifying. We decided that this was a fairly defensible position and so made camp.Kythorn 7th - Spent today asleep!! (This entry is written on Kythorn 8th for obvious reasons).Kythorn 8th - Woke up to find myself utterly alone. I headed through the various caverns of Lich's Mire, discovering a trail of carnage left by my so called friends who clearly went off to battle and left me asleep, unguarded, alone, in the underdark! Ba***rds the lot of them! Still, they didn't go that far, and after an hour or so of following their trail as they camped near the corpse of a recently slain Purple Worm, I strolled into their camp. They were preparing to set off having fought the worm as well a Grimlock, a Mind Flayer and a devil of some sort yesterday and having needed to rest.We headed off, still heading south towards Maerimydra with Aeron trying to explain what the Revenance effect entails and sounding thoroughly unconvincing in the process. What I do know is that certain powers in the region will most likely send armed forces to try and stop it (or take control of it) and they will not care who they have to trample or destroy in order to do so. Of the power groups that threaten the Dales, the one that bothers me the most with regard to the Revenance is not the Drow, but the Cult of the Dragon. I fear that the effect may well bolster their undead dragons and encourage them to increase their activities in the region.Daggerdale has had enough problems with a living dragon before and certainly will again before long, the last thing we need is having to deal with mad cultists as well.Kythorn 9th to 10th - Travelling through the Underdark towards Maerimydra. there were no incidents or happenings of any note on either of these days.Kythorn 11th - After travelling for quite a while today, the tunnel opened out ahead of us into a cave. what we could see of it had the floor covered torn up mushrooms, littered about the place. We advanced cautiously into the cavern and came under immediate attack as a fireball exploded amongst us which I thankfully dodged and then some other spells were cast which seemed to cause the others some discomfort but did not at all affect me. I turned myself invisible and headed towards a nearby wall when a wall of fire erupted in a ring around us. Our assailants turned out to be devils, a pair of them as it happened, though the larger winged one was quickly dispatched by a spell from Halbrinn which he calls Phantasmal Killer. I have seen him use it a few times before, and I am never less then impressed with its results. Stedd and I polished off the second, while the rest of the party dealt with a fire elemental inside the ring of fire, which turned out to be an illusion. Rand swears there was a third devil involved, but no-one else saw it, so I think he is just trying to save face. Having survived the ambush, we pressed onwards after some healing from Aeron. The cavern continued to widen out into a vast series of large broken chambers leading into larger chambers beyond. We searched for a likely campsite and settled down to rest for the night.</blockquote>

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