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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Kerrick" data-source="post: 1023053" data-attributes="member: 4722">From the journal of Kyra the rogue:  I'm writing this as we take a break about halfway up the mountain, after spending the better part of a day creating a ramp to climb up a sheer cliff face. If we weren't being promised wealth beyond our wildest dreams, I scarcely would have considered this to be worth it. We were, though, so here we sit, sweaty and tired.   Did I mention we were promised wealth beyond our wildest dreams? I thought I did. Some mercenaries, friends of ours we had gone drinking with in Tavek-Eck, sent a homing pigeon back to us.with a message: "Gather together enough equipment for a long underground expedition into a huge dwarven fortress." Accompanying it was a map which led to the dwarven city of Marktik-Van, a place which everyone knew had been sealed for nearly 700 years. And which everyone knew was the largest and richest mine in the world. If our friends had actually found a way inside, like they claimed... this would make our careers.   So we spent the next few days buying up supplies for an extended underground expedition – wagons, mules, dungeoneering equipment, food, pigs, oxen, and chickens, etc. etc. When we were done, we were very nearly broke and we looked like we were leading a trading caravan, but we had everything we could possibly think we needed.  It looks like we're going to get moving, so I'll continue this later.  It's the next day, and we finally reached the first valley. There's an encampment near the gate, and it looks like someone's been there recently, but no one's there now. While we waited for our friends, we spent the time unloading equipment and setting up camp. The only notable event that occurred was that something     (we think it was a squid, but it had to have had arms nearly 100 feet long) reached up out of the water and tried to snatch one of the oxen. We beat it back and decided to move the camp away from the water. I wonder if our friends fell victim to the squid... but their gear would still be here, and there's nothing here beyond the basic stuff you'd see in a camp.   The first part of the night passed uneventfully; the blackguard was on watch around the middle of the night when the squid actually pulled itself out of the water (or so he said) and crawled across the ground toward the camp where we had moved it about a quarter-mile away. Of course, he also said the thing's head was plated in armor and it had eyes all around the head, except for one that had a greataxe sticking out of it. He drove it off by shooting an arrow at it - apparently it was wary of sharp objects near its eyes. The next person on watch reported that it kept peeking out of the water, but it remained IN the water.    Nevertheless, we moved the camp into the first gate the next day. The second night, the blackguard again reported something strange - someone banging on the gate, followed by various attempts to get us to open up, like "It's Droog - I've got the gear you requested!" and "Ahh! Open the gate!" Fortunately, the blackguard and the psychic warrior (who was next on watch) didn't fall for such a simple ruse. We concluded that, given the circumstances, the thing could only be a Horror of War, one of the living war machines left over from the Elder God War.  The first two gates were empty – we saw no sign of our friends. In the third gate, however, someone had written "Siege Equipment Here" in chalk on the wall, pointing up to the cavern where it was stored. How nice of them.   Now armed with a siege tower and a portable fortress, we passed through the far end of the third gate. The valley was blocked by a large castle wall, complete with towers, crenellations, and a huge gate. Parts of the wall had been breached, the gate had been smashed, and skeletons still hung over the walls or lay on the ground where the defenders had been killed. We found our friends' tracks heading toward a gap to the right of the main gate, so we followed them, leaving the majority of the equipment behind while we scouted ahead.   The first thing we saw as we passed over the gap was a siege tower and a fortress like ours, both hacked to pieces and burned. No bodies, though; maybe our friends had escaped and fled deeper into the valley. A second wall, five times as high as the first, blocked access to the rest of the valley. This one had not breached, that we could see, but a broad stone bridge led across a deep moat to a gate in the wall.   No sooner had we gotten over the gap than a hail of what we assumed were arrows bounced off the metal plates of the turtle shell. We immediately spotted the archers - they were firing from slits in the towers in the wall behind us. We wheeled the fortress around and linked it up with the doorway of the tower, then waited for the soldiers inside to come to us.  And come they did, eventually - skeletal infantry with pikes and tower shields. We dealt with them easily, since they could only come at us one at a time. The party's blackguard then charged down the passage into the tower room, bulling into a trio of skeletons with tower shields guarding a mage. The rest of us followed, and we hacked apart them and some archers that dropped through a hole in the ceiling. There was blood splattered liberally about the place, but no bodies - apparently our friends had fallen foul of these undead soldiers, but their bodies were nowhere to be found. We could only hope they hadn't been raised also.  We went on through the tower, hacking down defenders when we encountered them. We eventually found our friends' bodies and used some of the scrolls of resurrection we had bought on them. Then, together, everyone finished clearing the tower and ambushed a group of skeletons who had circled around and were attempting to destroy the fortress.   After that, we retreated back to the second gate and made camp, where our friends filled us in on what had happened. They had hauled the slab up to the third gate, where they discovered that a large part of the chain used to open the gates was missing. Fortunately, they had enough chain to bridge the gap, so they hooked it up and opened the gate with the slab and keys. They hadn't been as prepared as we were when passing through the breach in the wall, though - they had been caught from behind by the archers, who had shot most of the party down; two of them had fallen near the doorway to the tower, where they had charged the defenders.   Tomorrow, they plan on moving over the bridge and leaving us in reserve to keep an eye on things; if they're not back in a day or two, we're to go find them and rescue them (again). I don't know that I appreciate being relegated to search and rescue, but given that they're suffering most of the risk and we still get a fair amount of treasure, I guess it all balances out in the end.  Yes, that's right kids - TOTAL PARTY WIPEOUT! We walked right into it, and we got ripped apart.   Along with the journal, Ralts (the DM) will be posting maps of the area, writeups of the characters we're using, and writeups for some of the original monsters we face. Stay tuned for more!</blockquote>

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