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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ralts Bloodthorne" data-source="post: 4073463" data-attributes="member: 6390">The group of colonists, animals, and wagons moved back down the side of the mesa, with their champion Hoggle in the lead, Verdoon sitting with several injured colonists, Ambrosia sitting with the pregnant women, and Kalife walking next to Hoggle. Acorn rode on his shoulder, nervously watching the woods about them once they descended the mesa and reached the road.After a short discussion, the group decided to head north along the old highway, and hope it eventually either turned to the west, or branched off to the west."Hey, Kalife?" Hoggle blurted out suddenly."Yeah?" Kalife was watching acorn scramble down the road and plunge into piles of leaves to inspect them."Are any of the widows treating you different?" Hoggle asked, and Kalife noticed he was flushing."No. Not really. Widow Prudence insists on bringing me dinner, but the rest of the ladies just ignore me." Kalife answered."Oh." Hoggle said, and an uncomfortable silence shut down the conversation.After nearly a week the road led either west or north, and the colonists chose west, and the mountains drew ever closer. At the base of the mountains was a boulder painted with a flying lizard in red, and two stakes proclaiming that this was the lands of the tribe of the red flying lizard.A quick discussion between the four champions of the caravan decided that they would go up the pass to check on the condition of the pass, while the caravan would pull a half days travel back along the road.The group snuck up to the top, and saw two ruined fortresses at the mouth of the pass, ruined buildings in the pass, and two wild orchards. Concerned, the party snuck forward, wondering what could have torn apart the keep on the right.One of the Mogu-Kia saw them, screamed out something, and ran toward the tower. The party pursued, but the creature outran them. As they left the cover of the orchard, dozens of arrows arced out of the ruined keep and while only Verdoon was hit, once in the arm, the group faltered as another flight took to the air."We should flee." Acorn murmmured."I agree." Verdoon answered.Just then, screaming their war cries, a literal flood of the Mogu-Kia swept over the top of the ramp of rubble leading into the keep."FLEE! ALL IS LOST!" Acorn screamed."FALL BACK!" Hoggle yelled."RUN FOR IT!" Kalife yelled."Go go go!" Ambrosia cried out.Verdoon said nothing, just ran.They ran to the edge, where the road sliced down, and turned to look. Hundred of Mogu-Kia were coming at them, arrows were plunging around them.Verdoon kept running.Hoggle paused long enough to take accounting of their forces, and realized that without a fresh and equipped Century, those things were unstoppable.A gout of flame burst from the cavern, and while Hoggle watched, a huge scaled beast, with a massive wingspan, erupted from the ruined keep and took to the air."By Pelor's eyes." He murmured, and chased after his friends.The dragon swept over where Hoggle had been, blasting the area with flame, then began circling low to the forest, searching for the companions.When they stopped to gather their breath, they were attacked by Mogu-Kia weilding old Uruk-Hia short swords as two handed weapons. Unlike the others, these wore no intricate beading, no buckskin, only rotten leather rags.Kalife grabbed one of the short swords, and they kept moving.Another group of Mogu-Kia managed to ambush them, but Hoggle waded through their arrows, most of them bouncing off the ancient, but sturdy, Uruk-Hia Full Plate. The bows, used by two Mogu-Kia at a time, were only pullable by Hoggle, who took one, with two wrapped bundles of arrows.Three more ambushes, and Hoggle had suffered enough."I will not suffer the attacks by these creature no more." He looked around, at Verdoon's famaliar, at Acorn. "You two go that way and that way, come back if you find more of the twisted creatures. The four of us will wait here. Ambrosia, can you call upon your God to strengthen me? Verdoon, can you call upon the spirits to protect me?"Ambrosia recited prayers, Verdoon had Hoggle remove his helmet and painted his hair, jamming a chickenbone from her belt pouch through his nose. She hung two skulls on his shoulder plates, and wrapped forest vines around his arms and legs."He looks like something out of the old tales." Kalife said.Acorn said that "lots and lots" of them were gathering, and led Hoggle to them.In the clearing nearly three dozen of them, a dozen of them armed with bows, were listening to a larger one chant, repeating a single word at intervals.With a roar of rage, Hoggle burst from the forest, leapt up, and cleaved the one leading the prayer in two. While the rest were stunned at the appearance of this horrible creature, and the killing of their shaman, Hoggle waded into the others, his greatsword killing multiples of them at a time.Before long, they all laid dead, and the weasel had found another group. The blood lust still filling him, Hoggle charged after the next group, springing among them and repeating his actions. Entrails flew everywhere and blood sheeted across the forest."More coming, masters. Over forty, lead by six large ones." Acorn said."There. Climb up those stairs to the top, we'll hold there. Gather up the bows, whether you know how to use them or not. We'll pepper them with arrows." Hoggle said, pointing at some ruins.The group climbed to the top of the stairs, and spread out across the ruin. The twisted Mogu Kia swept into the clearing, and the lead one pointed at Hoggle and began to roar something.Hoggle put an arrow into his throat.The fight was brutal, with the Mogu-Kia recieving reenforcements twice."ALL IS LOST!" Acorn screamed, and Hoggle looked up, seeing the huge winged lizard swooping down at them."JUMP!" Hoggle yelled, and the group jumped from the top of the rocks and scrambled for the forest. Fire erupted from the lizard's mouth, ad the ruins smoked and crumbled.Twice more they were ambushed, but fought through, and three times they ambushed their ambushers, and wiped them out to the last.It was nightfall by the time they reached the colonists. Battered, bloody, harrowed and riven. The two most pregnant woman had gone into labor when the flying lizard has attacked the caravan, and many men had died while the women and children were pulled to safety. After killing a score of men, the lizard had grabbed an ox in its jaws and taken to the sky."We must keep moving. Back to Mesa of Graven Faces." Verdoon said, rising from the spilled guts of a ram. "There we may be safe."Ambrosia and Verdoon tended to the younger of the women in labor. The other had born six children, and the newest one would be no problem. The nun Constance was watching over her.The baby survived, but the young widow did not.At the top of the mesa, two weeks later, they turned into the forest, and Hoggle and Kalife managed to find a spring flowing out of the rock."Here. We will build a new colony here." Hoggle proclaimed.Until the threat of the huge red dragon could be handled, there was no other way to cross the mountains. Either the four companions would find another way, defeat the dragon, or they would all die when the volcanoes erupted in a cataclysmic fury.Next: Marriages, Adoptees, Rebuilding, and the Cult of the Bear.</blockquote>

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