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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Black Omega" data-source="post: 1201312" data-attributes="member: 79">Finding out jade burned him seemed to finally shake up Mindra and he finally related everything that had been going on with the spirit, how it rescued him from the Black Wave and had been trying to help him since then.  Also seemingly it led the group into the ambush with the Tsuno, which might explain why none of the Tsuno had made a real effort to kill Mindra.There was some furious discussion over what to do with Mindra.  The Volodni had ideas of their own for a bloody, but final solution.  But the rest of Bansho Kishu finally settled on taking him back home to Ryoko Owari and seeing what the shugenja in Daikoku’s Shadow could do.  Volar teleported back with Mindra, Kaz and Toshiro to take the monkey in for testing while Mir and Verick stayed behind with the Tsuno.The tests at the temple complex in Ryoko Owari confirmed Mindra had been tainted by the spirit, but not fatally.  Mindra’s refusal to draw on the power offered by the spirit had saved him.  The torments the Vanara was put through over the next few days forced the taint from his body inch by excruciating inch.  His fur blackening as the taint was forced outward.  Until the final process stripped the oily fur from his body.  A hairless monkey was not a pretty sight, but preferable to tainted and haunted by a spirit that reported Bansho Kishu’s every move.  And Mindra could use his talisman to look Rokugani, where the bald look wasn’t quite so bad.In the mean time Toshiro visited his wife and Kaz checked in on the kid’s training and how things were going in his area.  So far, so peaceful happily.Shinomen forest was not quite so peaceful.  The Volodni had a host of questions for Verick and Mir, very suspicious of the intentions the human and Aasimar had for their forest.  Mir ‘s charm slowly won them over, as did Verick’s blunt honesty.  The Volodni didn’t become friends of theirs, but at least they became more friendly.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Much delayed, the adventure resumed with Volar and the others teleporting back.  A brief delay when they found the Volodni village the two had been staying at was destroyed.  But a few Sendings later and Bansho Kishu were back together.The Volodni solemnly wondered what the group was up to.  Tsuno patrols were out in force again and two Volodni settlements had been attacked to far..  the Volodni knew of the grove that Mir and the others were looking for, the Tsuno had driven them from the grove just months before.  From the information the Volodni had, there had to be a hundred Tsuno in the area.There was a certain temptation on the part of some members of Bansho Kishu to say “Good luck Mir, time for us to head back to Ryoko Owari.”  But that thought was never spoken.  And after some negotiation, the group found the Volodni would be willing to help them against the Tsuno.  But first, they wanted some help against the force that was sickening the forest.  An undead creature only called ‘He-Whom-We-Do-Not-Name’.  This creature had arrived a hundred years before and built a strong hold in some caves and surrounded it in a field that killed off all plants.  Effectively making sure the Volodni could not even get close to him.The group debated a little and then cast their fortune coins, carefully asking “If we attack the Tsuno before taking care of this undead, what would be the result?”  The coins showed very clearly ‘Woe.’  So it was decided, Bansho Kishu was attack the undead before moving on to confront the Tsuno.  Though Volar thought to himself “We never asked what the result will be even after we’ve taken care of  ‘He-Whom-We-Do-Not-Name’.  A guide took them to the edge of the barren lands, a place where all plant life was withered away into nothing.  It as like this for a mile around ‘He-Whom-We-Do-Not-Name’s stronghold.  Volar had an idea for trying to sneak in, though it took a little convincing for the others.  He used a spell the make the group look like Tsuno, and a Polymorph on Verick to make him truly a Tsuno.[GM Note - The switch to 3.5 is coming after this adventure.]Traveling on they quickly ran into a group of humans who seemed to be waiting on someone.  They didn’t   seem shocked to meet Tsuno and parleyed.  Mir spoke for the group and tried to keep them out of trouble while finding it the ‘Lord of the Barren Lands’ clearly had some sort of deal with the Tsuno.  That was as far as it go, though.  Verick’s Tsuno form was being stalked by a human cleric who seemed to be...flirting with him?  Verick wasn’t pleased with that at all, and the others saw their cover getting blown way to quickly , so they attacked.  The slim man with the skull motif who had been doing the talking for the group was cut down in seconds but then the battle got tough.  While the others got wrapped up with the warriors, Toshiro charged up to the cleric, only to be quickly frozen in place by a spell.  The cleric’s caress quickly discovered Toshiro was no Tsuno, at which point she started draining off his life energy with Inflict spells.One surprising opponent the group didn’t expect to find was Malachai, the half orc-half halfling from Kuzo.  He tumbled into view and flanked Kaz, the orcling’s axes not doing nearly as much damage as his sneak attack.  Volar’s magic turned a Hordeland looking warrior against the others and they were able to cut their way to Toshiro, chasing off the cleric  then healing him up.  Mindra helped out Kaz and quickly enough Malachai took off running.  Not a long trip, Kaz activated his Bansho Kishu badge for Expeditious Retreat and was able to chase down the little runt this time, finally finishing the job of killing him.Pragmatically, some in the group looted the bodies while the samurai questioned the Hordelander.  He served the Lord of the Barren Lands, a lich of some power.  Malachai and the necromancer’s body was tossed into the bag of holding, just in case someone wanted to raise them.  And the group used their guide to head on to the stronghold of ‘He-Whom-We-Do-Not-Name’.  [GM Note – The group was certainly pleased to kill Malachai.  Though I was a little surprised they made no effort to find out what he was doing here, so far from where he had been.  The group had used Speak with Dead often enough in the past.  Ah well, one more mystery for the group later.<img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />]</blockquote>

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