The Gargantuan!
Oh gosh. Oh gee. How could I forget!
Sheila the Confessor, rescued from Farenth- turned out to be a doppelganger. She attempted to kill Dexter but was foiled easily by the suspicious Lochenvar and Malford. They disposed of her handily.
Did Farenth still have the real Sheila? Had he ever had her? In fact, was the doppelganger the real one? If not, was she dead?
They had no real leads that they could think of. They could come up with nowhere to begin a search. They would never know. Or at least- not until the Second Coming of Dexter.
Anyway, back to the gargantuan egg.
Camping on it was an interesting choice. All right, I confess: it wasn’t the whole party that camped on the egg, it was just Therena. She was the one who started the fire, too. Her reasoning was, there was no reason to hold off; they couldn’t very well just leave this huge egg waiting to hatch in the middle of the Kingdom of Thule. Sure, it might have been rash; but she had her reasons.*
Needless to say, the egg started to hatch.
The thing that came out of it was bizarre in appearance and incredible in size. Lochenvare- a tall man- did not even come to the top of the huge beast’s foot. It had a strange head like a cross between a wolf and a lizard, with tough, leathery skin. Long floppy wings covered in egg goo hung from its back. It was probably 100’ high.
With a great roar, the baby gargantuan began to rampage.
Our heroes tried to stand against it, but they could not. It solved the question of what to do with Akakathan for them by stomping him into jelly with a single ponderous step. The blows they rained on it seemed to hardly scratch it. Therena, however, managed to keep out of its reach and fire lightning bolts to some small effect. Malford, too, attempted a similar strategy: fly above it and hit it with whatever missiles and magic he can muster.
It was far and away too little.
A few blows and Lochenvare was forced to retreat, barely clinging to consciousness. And when it flapped its huge wings it generated a massive wind that blew Malford away from it like a leaf in a gale. Our heroes were forced to flee away from it and regroup some distance away. They watched grimly as the monstrous baby rampaged away from them.
Observing the monster for a while, the party noted that it seems to be going along a fairly straight path. “It will probably end up in or around the city of Ogremoch,” mused Rajah.
“We have to intercept it,” Dexter said. “Think of the damage it could cause! It could kill hundreds!”
“How can we fight that thing?” sneers Lochenvare. Then he turns more thoughtful. “Catapults?”
Malford nods. “In part. What we need is to be able to hit it from a distance. Catapults, bows, spells, all things of that nature.”
“And if we alert Ogremoch, surely they will send what defenders they can to aid us.” Therena nods. “It is a good plan, my lord.”
***
5/23/97, 4 p.m., the walls of Ogremoch
The city had provided what defenders it could. But there were only a few of quality. Malford went in with a stoneskin cast upon him by a friendly mage; a warrior in plate male named Planthus agreed to stand by Lochenvare when it came time to keep it from engaging the archers on the walls. There was a dwarven priest named Urock
Among the archers was an elf named Drelvin. He was not a normal part of the city’s defense; he was a traveler. But he was willing to lend his bow to the cause.
When the gargantuan came, the archers and spell-slingers began firing at it. When it came closer, Lochenvare and Planthus moved along the walls to be ready to draw it away from the others. The plan worked perfectly, and Drelvin’s first proving was right here. His skill with a bow first entered legend with the battle against the gargantuan.
Afterwards, with the immense carcass outside the city covering several fields of farms, Malford immediately hired Drelvin on.
***
Later, back in Var, after accepting all the necessary accolades, our heroes began planning their next move.
With Dexter being dogged by the forces of Bleak, it seemed that a worthy quest might be to get a holy avenger to use against them. Now, granted that the paladin (Charlotte) had died, but there are more paladins out there.
In fact, the party had ascertained that the legendary pit fiend of Blendorag guarded the egg of a phoenix. Hatching it would gain the group a wish. A holy avenger would be just right to overcome a pit fiend and get the best thing that Malford and Rajah, at least, could think of. So Malford had done some research to track down a holy avenger’s location. What he had found was- a challenge. To put it mildly.
The holy avenger was in the lair of a dragon far to the north.
“How far?”
“We don’t have maps of the area,” Malford elaborated. “We can probably find some somewhere, but it’s pretty far.”
They chewed the idea over. Rajah tried to get some help from the faerie dragon Jovius, but he wanted no part in slaying a green. The quest is kind of at the R&D stage, if you will.
Before they get to it, Dexter faces his greatest moral trial.
Next Time: The greatest moral trial of Dexter!
*Therena was initially an npc, but was taken over by Charlotte’s old player after she died in the big battle immediately preceding these events.
