Of Sound Mind the Halfling Way

[the Jester]

Holstein!

The town is dominated by the strange factory, or refinery, or whatever it is. The buildings squat next to some sort of strange water wheel, which seems to change a strong, broad stream into a weak, polluted trickle. The water seems to be consumed somehow, somewhere between the wheel and factory setup and the downstream edge of town.

Like an angry pack of wolves, our heroes descend upon this affront to nature. Spells blast out and weapons hack at the wheel. The townsfolk do not dare put up any resistance to lightning from the sky and exploding fireballs. Panic spreads; screams echo through the town as the folk flee, scrambling inside, running away into the fields or hiding down alleys or behind barrels of garbage.

With a massive, echoing crash, the water wheel topples as Ari, in the form of a dire bear, shoves it over with a roar. Flames lick up along the walls of the refinery, or factory, or whatever it is. Oily, mustard-tinted smoke boils into the sky. The slick of pollution atop the river downstream of the factory burns with a thin blue flame, then goes out, and then alights again for a few moments.

Ari changes back into his halfling form and shouts at the top of his lungs at the fleeing villagers. “RESPECT NATURE!!” he bellows. “IF YOU TRY TO REBUILD THIS ATROCITY, WE WILL RETURN AND DESTROY IT AGAIN!!!”

Smoke rises over the town.

***

“Not bad,” smirks Erasmuz.

“We did well,” Ari agrees. “That place was a blight on nature.”

“I just hope that the people there have another way to make a living,” whines Federico. “What if they were being forced to do that work? You know, on peril of their lives?”

Naomi shrugs. “Well, they could have said something while we were there.”

“That’s true,” Federico agrees thoughtfully.

Rush just snorts.

The party is walking south, towards the Stern Mountains in the distance and their presumptive rendezvous with Auntie Flapjacks. There are copses of trees here and there on the plains, and the party is passing one such copse when, suddenly, figures begin to emerge from the trees.

Minotaurs.

They are led by a massive, muscled minotaur bull that is white with big black spots (including one on his belly). A broad girdle is strapped around his waist; each of his meaty hands holds a hand axe. One of the axes is alight with a bright orange flame.

“Uh, hi,” says Erasmuz.

More and more minotaurs emerge behind Holstein until there are eight more- if our heroes only knew; these are Holstein’s young, strong and arrogant sons. Finally, a massive bison trots out of the stand of trees and stands next to Holstein, snorting and glaring at the halflings.

“I wonder if these guys are connected to that sour cream,” Nara starts, but she doesn’t have a chance to say much else, for the minotaur gang gives out a roar and rushes to the attack. Before they can get very far forward, they are met by a fireball as Naomi channels elemental energy and blasts them. Then Ari throws an entangle spell, and the minotaurs are largely stopped in their tracks, at least for the moment!

Ari’s wolf rushes forward into melee with the foremost minotaurs, and it starts snapping and snarling at them. Their axes hack down towards it, but it dances back. Ari (still a dire bear) manages to cast greater magic fang on it, and it lunges forward again. Nara vanishes into a timeslip, and Naomi initiates her energy retort. Her fat face is distorted with a malevolent grin; she licks her lips, clearly wondering how minotaur tastes.

The minotaurs, meanwhile, struggle in the entangling plants. A couple of them manage to break free and reach the party; one of them swings its axe and catches Naomi a glancing blow across the side. She stumbles away, giving a cry of pain, but then she grins as her energy retort triggers and a blast of flame shoots into the minotaur that struck her, killing it!

A flame strike bursts down as Nara reappears, engulfing and killing a pair of the minotaurs that are stuck in the entangle. Rush charges forward and fells a minotaur in a single blow backed by incredible psionic potency. He whirls, focuses, and springs forward, running another of the minotaurs through with his mind blade.

Holstein charges forward, but Erasmuz is ready for him. The little ur-priest sucks away divine power from the gods and casts slay living. Holstein drops in his tracks, slain without a sound or a chance to attack.*

The remaining minotaurs give a collective low of despair. Rush moves inexorably to the next one and decapitates him, and Ari- still in dire bear form- rushes the last one and mauls it to death in a few rough seconds.

The grass and brush still twists, keeping the corpses tangled, as our heroes draw back for a moment. They take stock of their situation, and to their surprise (and pleasure!) they find that they are barely wounded- only Naomi and the wolf even got hurt.

“You know, I bet there’s a connection between these guys and that town,” Ari declares, turning back into his true, halfling form.

“Maybe they attacked us because we took out their operation,” Naomi says.

“We could backtrack them and find out where they came from,” suggests Nara.

“Well, we’re barely outside of the town,” Ari replies. “If these minotaurs were responsible for that water wheel- because, let’s face it, those peasants didn’t set that up- maybe if we take the leader’s head back to them, they’ll take heart.”

Rush snorts again. The message is clear: Who cares about the stupid peasants? The halflings ignore him, however; they cut off Holstein’s head and walk the ten minutes back to the town. When the townsfolk see them coming, about a dozen of them form a loose skirmish line with hoes, shovels, kitchen knives and the like as crude weapons.

Ari steps forward. “We aren’t here to hurt you!” he shouts, and hurls Holstein’s severed head to the ground before them. A great murmur arises from the crowd. “We came back to show you we mean what we say. You will not rebuild that monstrosity! You are now free to do as you will!”

Our heroes turn around and depart the town again, leaving it in a bit of uproar. They return to the site of the minotaur ambush and begin to track Holstein and his brood back to their lair. Soon they find a small craggy area, and the trail leads into a cave in the crags.

Within the cave our heroes find a prison, and within the prison- minotaur cows. They are chained to the ground, and several of them shows the signs of beatings. They cower in their cells when the party enters the chamber. A strange apparatus with hoses and tubes and a crank and nozzles and bottles is in the center of the cell block; the hoses appear long enough to reach into the cells. A little examination, and Erasmuz surmises that the contraption is some sort of milking machine. He glances slyly into one of the cells, fingering the end of the hose suggestively, and is gratified to see the minotaur female shrink back from him. He cackles evilly.

Along the wall are barrels of water, but upon examination, they prove to be polluted water from the stream outside, rather than pure water.

“Aha,” Naomi mutters. “So the polluted water is what makes the minotaur milk taste funny, so that when it turns into sour cream it has that unique tang.”

“And of course,” Nara nods, “the minotaur women don’t want to drink that crap, so he has to force feed it to them.”

“That’s horrible!” Ari exclaims.

Erasmuz, meanwhile, hooks one of the minotaur cows into the milking machine, cackling villainously, and begins to extract the milk from her teats. She bleats out a despairing cry. A bottle begins to fill with strangely-tainted milk.

Next Time: Where is Aunty Flapjacks?


*This is how my players know that I am a “let the dice fall where they may” dm: I make really cool villains, and let them die before they have a chance to act via a pc’s death magic. It makes me sad; I wanted to use my 10th level ranger minotaur! Oh well, at least his story came out in the game. That counts for something- as often as not, I have bitchin’ backstories for my npcs, and the party never learns anything about them except, once in a while, via the story hours.

 

[Alcar]

......

That's called milking the cow(minotaur) for all it's worth..

Backstory..minotaur..haha.

The frontstory of Holstein's life is now he's dead...bravo, excellent story.

BUMP

 

[the Jester]

10 a.m., 11/4/372 O.L.G., the plains north of the Stern Mountains

Ari, as a hawk, flaps down and settles in next to the others. His form melts like wax, and sudenly he’s a halfling again. “Hey, guys,” he tells the rest of the party, “there’s a trio of halfling wagons ahead!”

“Really?” exclaims Federico. “I hope that they are Flapjacks, and not Peachtrees. I don’t want to fight any Peachtree halflings. Or really, any halflings at all.” The little kobold’s tail is tucked between his legs.

“They are Flapjacks- at least, two of them are,” Ari nods. “I checked it out pretty closely. The third wagon is a Hempflower clan wagon.”

“Martini’s birth clan!” Federico squeals. “I wonder if he’s back on Strogass!” Then he grins. “I hope Aunty is with those wagons!”

“I thought he was still on Dyshim? Well, who knows,” Ari says.

“Who are you talking about?” Rush asks.

“Martini. An old clan mate.” Federico explains, “The halfling clans that wander Strogass, when they meet up, they often trade kids. Like, one from each clan will go over to live with the other clan. This helps cement friendships between clans, arrange marriages- you know, the usual stuff. Martini was the Hempflower boy that I grew up with, and he grew into a fine, mighty ranger. He traveled with us for many adventures.”*

“Only one way to find out,” grunts Chief Jawbreaker. “Let’s go!”

The party moves forward at a quick pace. There is a spring in their step. They are about to meet friendly folk- and maybe, even, Aunty Flapjacks! Soon the wagons come into view, and soon they spot the party approaching. Halflings gather outside. Federico grins and runs forward into their smiling, welcoming embrace. “Hi, everyone! It’s been so long since I’ve seen all of you!” He is licking everyone, showing his belly, being a good dog. Berry Flapjacks, who spent years growing up together with Federico (as the clan dog), is there, and she rapidly proves to be the leader of the group. Feddie’s tail thumps wildly as she scratches him under the belly. Her boyfriend, Luke Goodwheel, is with her. Federico doesn’t know him, and he proves to play the flute much more than he talks.

Cookie is there, too; he is an old man, Berry’s great uncle. When Federico was a pup, Cookie used to tease him with food, but would always cave in eventually. Now Cookie has gone senile and is wracked with a horrid phlegmatic cough. Federico feels rather sad for him.

Then there is the 20-year-old Keldrin Flapjacks. Keldrin was the Flapjacks child traded for Martini and has lived with the Hempflowers until the two clans’ wagons met up about 2 weeks ago. Further, Mango Flapjacks, a traveling druidess, has come to aid Berry. Mango always traveled a lot, so Feddie never really go to know her very well.

From the Hempflower wagon, there is no sign of Martini. In his stead, our heroes find his father, Martin Hempflower. He tells the party that although his clan remains neutral in the feud, his heart is with the Flapjacks. He warns them that he will not do anything to drag his own kin into the conflict, however.

In addition, there are quite a few children present. From the Flapjacks clan, there are Posie, Drelsie, Muffin and George (all of whom are essentially cousins to Federico); along with them as fosters are Palindrome Hodiddly and Harthing Hempflower (Martini’s cousin). Martin’s oldest grandson, Wheat, is with him, but Wheat is only 1 year old.

Notably absent is Aunty.

So, of course, Federico asks. “Where’s Aunty?”

Berry sighs. “We’re not exactly sure, though we do have a good idea,” she answers him. “We don’t know how worried to be, or when to be worried about this. She went to consult some kind of entity for knowledge concerning...” She hesitates for a moment, watching Federico intently. “Concerning whatever it was she called you back here for. I don’t know exactly, but I think it has to do with the feud.”

“The feud with the Peachtrees?” asks the kobold.

”Vendetta,” she nods. “They’ve declared vendetta. I fear many lives may be lost.”

“That’s terrible!” exclaims Federico.

“What do you know about this ‘entity?’” asks Erasmuz, pleased at his ability to maintain a straight face and hold his tongue as several reckless things to say occur to him.

“Not much,” admits Berry. “She was going to trade some books for information to them. I did overhear something Aunty Flapjacks tell another of the clan elders before the wagons left their previous camp to come here: I have to go seek answers from the Myriad Glimpses. There is something else behind this feud, and I think the kids faced it before. I hope that dog is taking good care of them!”

“I do my best,” whines Federico.

“And,” Berry adds, “I know where she went.” She turns and points into the distance. “That mountain there.”

Our heroes exchange a very meaningful glance.

***

The top of the mountain takes minutes to reach via wind walk. At the top is an old shrine, open to the elements. It is quite cold; a few spots have ice or snow on them, but only a few. The shrine consists of a 30’ diameter dais, raised 10’ above the surrounding ground, that the path leads directly up. There are six pillars arranged along the perimeter of the shrine; it has no walls. Old books are scattered around the shrine. Along the edge of the roof, some words are written in some incomprehensible language, repeating the same few words over and over again.

Our heroes search around, but they find little of use. The books are in poor shape, having been exposed to the elements for quite some time, at least in many cases. There are halfling-sized tracks, less than a week old; but they don’t seem to leave again. Finally, Federico casts detect secret doors and is pleased to discover that one of the pillars does indeed contain a secret door.

Our heroes soon open it and discern that the interior of the pillar is actually an elevator.Though it is only big enough for one of them at a time, or two if they squeeze, it only takes a couple of minutes for everyone to descend.

At the bottom of the elevator shaft, our heroes find themselves in what is unquestionably a crypt. And, a few dozen feet inside, is a perfectly rendered statue of Aunty Flapjacks.

Next Time: Can Aunty be saved?


*Vic, who is Martini’s player, no longer lives across the street. In fact, the distance has increased significantly. Plus, he’s a family man, and the missus doesn’t like giving him too much time to get in trouble with the boys. Can’t say as I blame her, really.

 

[the Jester]

To Save Aunty Flapjacks!

The sky is grey and clouded. Atop the peak of a mountain, a small, untended shrine stands alone and, to all appearances, uninhabited. To a casual observer, there is nothing to see here except for a crumbling structure and scattered, weathered books.

But pass through a hidden door on one of the structure’s pillars and you would find an elevator; ride the elevator to the bottom of its shaft and you find a crypt. And there, within that long, sprawling crypt with its many niches extending out of the main room like twisted arthritic fingers, are our heroes. The smell of corruption, though faint, lingers in their noses; and the sight of the stone form of Aunty Flapjacks, whom they have traveled far to meet up with, makes their blood run cold.

“Is it...?” wonders Ari.

Jawbreaker chortles, “She got stoned.” He walks forward and takes hold of the statue, testing its weight. He grunts noncommitally.

At the far end of the chamber, something squirms up, emerging from the ground. It does not appear to leave a hole or trail behind. “Halt,” it commands, “and state your intentions. If they are not proper...” It lets the words hang as a threat.

Our heroes stare. The creature is quite strange- it looks almost like a stone caterpillar. It is not very big, nor is it very threatening; however, it does have the distorted face of a man.

Rush begins moving towards it. “We will state nothing,” he says.

“Rush,” warns Ari. “Wait a minute.”

But Rush is already faltering, staring at his arm.

It is beginning to calcify- to turn to stone. With horror, the soulknife feels his body starting to stiffen all over! With a cry of anger, he rushes at the caterpillar, which promptly slips into the ground, leaving not a mark. Rush skids to a halt where the thing had been, looking about wildly. “Where did it go??” he cries. “I want to kill it!” But the calcifying effect has stopped, at least for the moment.

“Dammit,” mutters Ari under his breath, “why do you always have to start a fight, Rush?” He starts casting summon nature’s ally VI; he is pretty well convinced that the wormy creature will be coming back around. Erasmuz is, too; he casts barkskin on himself.

“That thing not important,” Jawbreaker scolds the others. “Aunty important!” He grabs the statue and then begins carefully backing towards the elevator while dragging it. Before he can get very far- for she is heavy enough that he cannot move very quickly while carrying her- the worm spring up from the ground in the midst of our heroes! Immediately its calcifying aura starts to work, and though most of the party resists the power of the worm’s presence, Ari starts to turn to stone. He groans in dismay, but maintains his concentration on his summoning spell.

However, the kobolds are ready for it. Federico hits it with a pair of magic missiles, and Yip hits it with his crossbow.

Erasmuz steps up and casts harm. He touches the worm, but fails to penetrate its spell resistance. “Watch out,” he warns his friends. “It will be hard to hurt with spells.”

“Depends on the spell,” Ari retorts wittily. His spell is finished at last! Five minor xorns appear, surrounding the wormy creature. “Try your flee into the ground trick against these guys!” he crows.

Yip pounces in, concentrating to make his fist like unto a thing of iron, and he strikes it hard from flanking. Rush, too, hits the monster solidly. It does not seem to feel any pain, but the party is hewing chunks of it away. Surely it cannot survive much more! Federico shoots it with his crossbow, and finally the creature decides that it has had enough. It tries to escape and drop away into the ground, but several of our heroes manage to hit it as it flees, and the weird stone caterpillar thing dies.

“Do you always have to do that?” Ari demands of Rush.

“Do what?”

The druid just sighs.

***

With some maneuvering, the party manages to get the statue into a bag of holding. Once that is taken care of, they loot the crypt (perhaps, on reflection, their intentions weren’t entirely proper) and then wind walk back to the halfling wagons. In the morning, they figure, they can turn Aunty Flapjacks back to flesh.

But when the morning comes, they find the mistake in their thinking. When Erasmuz casts break enchantment, Aunty Flapjacks does indeed turn back into flesh- but she collapses immediately, dead.

Ari smacks his forehead. “Of course! The calcifying aura!*” In dismay, he says, “Now what?”

“This is just a minor setback, buddy,” Erasmuz assures him. “We just need a bunch of diamonds, and I can raise him from the dead.”

“Oh yeah, you’re a cleric,” Ari replies.

“Sure, buddy.” Erasmuz grins, but inside he is laughing maniacally. Cleric! I am no cleric! I am an ur-priest! I do not serve the powers that call themselves gods; I take power from them!

“Who’s your god, again?”

“That’s not the point. The point is, we need to get some diamonds.” Erasmuz says, “I have a thousand gold pieces worth of diamond dust, which I have for some other spells, but I can kick them down. We need 5000. Does anyone else have any?”

Putting their resources together, the party finds that they have only about half of the value of what they need to bring back Aunty Flapjacks. They wind walk to a small village with a diamond merchant; there they buy as much as they can afford, then wind walk back to the halfling wagons.

Aunty Flapjacks returns from beyond the veil of death in a shower of stolen divine energy, with the cackles of Erasmuz echoing in the background. At first she is quite disoriented; she does not know Erasmuz, or Ari, or Rush; but then she spies Federico and a huge grins breaks out on her face. “Federico!” she cries. “It has been so long!!”

“Oh, Auntie!” he squeals, rushing up to hug her. “We were so worried- you were gone, and then you were stone, and then you were dead-”

“It’s okay now,” she soothes him. “I am okay now.”

“But what were you doing? What’s going on? Why did you summon me back?”

“It all has to do with the vendetta,” she says.

The vendetta. The word makes our heroes’ hearts heavy. The Peachtrees have declared vendetta against the Flapjacks. And the blame weighs heavily on the party, because they are the evolution of the party that started it all. Though only Federico remains of the original group, the party shot out Benjy Peachtree’s eye early in their career during an abortive attempt to steal his mount. Later, Jawbreaker accidentally broke the neck of Heather Peachtree in an attempt to court her. She survived, but was permanently paralyzed.

Now the Peachtrees have sworn vengeance against the entire Flapjacks clan. Already, the violence has taken several lives on both sides. None of our heroes want to see halflings die (with the possible, occasional exception of Rush). It’s a terrible thing.

Now Aunty tells them that she is convinced that there is something else influencing the vendetta. Flapjacks efforts to negotiate a settlement were fruitless; their every overture was rebuffed. Certainly, under almost any circumstance, there should have been at least a nod towards diplomacy between the clans. Internecine halfling violence is an awful thing. Yet, nothing- and only two of the injured clan’s people were injured, and neither even killed!

Convinced, Aunty had set out to consult with an entity called Illurien of the Myriad Glimpses. She could be traded knowledge (in the form of rare books) for the answer to a single oracular question.

“What was your question?” asks Naomi, her chins jiggling.

“I asked, ‘What is the entity that has been encouraging the feud between the Flapjacks and the Peachtrees?’”

“What was the answer?”

“It was, ‘You ask about that which is not.’”

“Some kind of riddle,” remarks Federico.

“Obviously,” nods Rush.

“So, what now?” wonders Queffe.

“Well,” Aunty Flapjacks says, “I suggest that you visit Illurien. But you have to bring books of sufficient worth to her!”

“We don’t have a bunch of spare books right now,” Nara points out.

“But I know where you can get some.” Aunty smiles broadly. “There’s a ruined, sunken city, mostly gone- but the library still has enough books that you could probably buy your way to a question from Illurien.” She frowns. “But be careful! There are a pair or immense, panther-like creatures with tentacles emerging from their shoulders that lair there. I snuck past them, but there are many of you, and I don’t know if you are stealthy as I am.”

“We can take the monsters,” Jawbreaker grunts. “No problem. Sounds like we have plan.”

“Well, I think it’s time to spring into action- right after elevensies,” declares Erasmuz.

The party eats, and then begins to go towards the ruins wherein they will find their books. Erasmuz offers to wind walk the party, then changes his mind. Then he changes his mind again, and offers to cast the spell, only to change his mind again.

Our heroes walk. They spend a night on the road, and Erasmuz debates casting wind walk yet again on the morn, but our heroes continue to walk. The weather is bad; cold rain spatters down. Most of the party receives endure elements spells, and even those who don’t are kept warm enough by the exertions of their journey.

Soon, following Aunty’s directions, they come to a distinctive dimple in the land, and following it down to the center they see the collapsed remains of a few buidlings. In one place, the land is rent apart and an opening leads below. Our heroes enter, and find themselves in a passage formed by a layer of dirt and rock atop the remains of an old city. They begin exploring, still doing their best to follow Aunty’s directions. As they shuffle past a set of seriously damaged double doors, Rush pauses.

“I hear something.”

There is a low growl from the other side of the doorway.

With a yell, Rush pushes past the doorway.

Next Time: Diplacer beast pack lords! Illurien! And our heroes go back to the beginning!

*The calcifying aura slowly turns you to stone as it does con damage to you.

 

[the Jester]

CURRENT PARTY ROSTER

Nara- female halfling cleric 5/prophet 7; LN
Erasmuz- male halfling wizard 1/psion 1/ranger 1/ex-monk 1/ur-priest 7; NE
Queffe- female halfling barbarian 1/fighter 4/dervish 3; CN
Rush- male human soulknife 11; N
Ari- male halfling druid 12; N
Federico- male kobold bard 7/sorcerer 3/jester 2; CG
Jawbreaker- male halfling barbarian ?/bear warrior ? (total level 11); CG
Naomi- female halfling psion 6/elementalist 6; LE

 

[the Jester]

The old stone door shudders open as Rush muscles his way through. On the other side is a large ruined gallery that serves as the home of a pair of enormous displacer beasts. Seeing them, our heroes hesitate long enough to pull weapons and for Federico to apply mage armor to his cohort. Erasmuz, pretty much in the rear of the party, clambers down the hole leading to the doors and casts shield of faithlessness on himself.

Rush is the one of them that does not hesitate. Instead- pretty much as usual- he charges, rushing up to one of the pack lords and strikes it, unleashing his psychic strike and psionic weapon in a burst of mental energy accompanied by the distinctive smell of burning metal.

“I don’t think we want them charging us,” Ari comments, and uses a stone shape to form a barrier between the halflings and the displacer beasts. The beasts, however, seem to have decided to rip Rush to shreds, as he is the one so far bold enough to move in on them. Their tentacles flail at him with immense amounts of force.

Nara says, “Here, let me see what I can do with this.” She casts charm monster on the uninjured beast. Suddenly it whirls, screaming and hissing, and attacks its fellow! The two beasts flail madly at each other for a moment, while Jawbreaker and Queffe move in, flanking the one that remains hostile to them. Erasmuz contributes an inflict serious wounds, and the beast screams a horrible angry scream again. Then, while its head it drawn back to strike again, Queffe draws her scimitar across its throat. Blood gushes all over her; she draws back a step.

The hostile displacer beast collapses.

The other one immediately turns, hissing and growling at the party. It is clear that it is not directing its anger at Nara, but that the others are fair game. Quickly, the prophetess steps to the front and tries to calm it. She tells the others, “Go get the books while I keep this thing happy!”

“We should just kill it,” grumbles Rush.

“No need,” Jawbreaker shakes his head. “We get books. That is what we are here for. Not to beat up kitty.”

The party gathers as many books as they can. They can just manage to carry all the remaining books that are at all legible. Clearly, the library that existed down here has had its share of looters over the years. “I hope that these are enough books for us to give to this entity of your aunt’s,” Queffe remarks to Federico.

“Me too!” the kobold replies.

***

Given that they are not wind walking, it takes two days for the party to return to the halfling wagons that are their current temporary base of operations. During this time, Nara has an interesting prophetic dream. In it, she has a peach pie, but a section of it is rotten. She cuts it out and discards it. The rest of the pie is quite tasty. The party eats it, then continues adventuring. The years go by, and their adventures continue as the party grows older and older. And they never reach the Promised Land.

Then she is young again. The pie, with its rotten piece still in it, is before her. This time, instead of discarding the rotten piece, she casts purify food and drink and heals the rotten piece. Then the party eats the pie, and their adventures continue- but only for a short time before they come to a gateway. Through the gate, Nara sees a beautiful meadow with a brook running through it. Trees with cobblers for fruit are spread throughout it; honeycomb adorns the trees. Bushes of bacon stand ready for the eating. The halflings step through, and the portal closes behind them. And Nara awakens. She thinks about her dream for a long time: it has the feel of a foretelling.*

They continue up to the mountaintop shrine of Illurien.

Now that Aunty has instructed them on how to conjure this strange entity, and informed them of the coin that they can use to bargain for answers- knowledge- they are prepared. Naomi calls to the wind, loudly: “Illurien, Illurien, Illurien!”

For a few moments, the only answer is the high, thin whistle of the wind. Then, with appalling speed, clouds rush in overhead. In only seconds, the sky over the peak goes from mostly clear to completely covered by dark storm clouds. In about a minute, fat, cold drops of rain begin to patter down.

“Interesting,” murmurs Ari. His voice is overpowered by a staggeringly loud peal of thunder, simultaneous with a bright flash of lightning. The rain is pounding down suddenly, out of nowhere.

Then, in a rough twirl of wind and rain, something congeals before the party. Forming from whirling droplets, dancing like a Peshan sister, a slender female body, easily ten feet tall, forms. She is clad is robes of grey water. Her most striking feature, however, is her utter lack of features: she has no face, other than her vivid, sapphire-blue eyes. Rainwater whirls around her, spraying in all directions. With them, visions spray: those of our heroes who are too close to her suddenly are filled with strange images, fragments of knowledge and truths. It is staggering; the storm of visions is almost enough to stun our heroes. They begin to back off, keeping a respectful distance.

I AM ILLURIEN, everyone hears in their mind. WHAT DO YOU OFFER AS A SACRIFICE?

“We have come with books,” cries Erasmuz. “Old, obscure books! We offer you knowledge!”

Quickly, the party pours out the books. Illurien says nothing for a few moments, and then the powerful voice rings out telepathically. THAT WILL SUFFICE. I WILL ANSWER A QUESTION FROM EACH OF YOU.

Immediately, Federico pipes up. “How can we reconcile with the Peachtrees?”

UNTIL THE CYCLOPS LOSES THE JEWEL IN HIS EYE HE WILL WHISPER WITH A VOICE FORGOTTEN.

“Where do we find the cornbread we need to find the Promised Land?” asks Nara.

BREAD MUST BE BROKEN AND OLD ENMITIES FORGIVEN BEFORE CORNBREAD COMES TO BAKE; THE SICKNESS MUST BE CUT OUT AND THE PEACH LEFT HALE AND WHOLE.

“These answers are cryptic, but I guess that’s what we get,” grumbles Erasmuz. “Hey, buddy, I know you told Aunty Flapjacks that she was ‘asking about what is not’ when you answered her question about what was encouraging the feud between the Flapjacks and the Peachtrees. How is this: Where is the entity encouraging or exacerbating the feud?”

YOU ASK ABOUT THAT WHICH IS NOT.

“Damn,” swears Erasmuz.

“It’s a riddle,” Rush grumbles. “Some kind of stupid riddle. I ask this instead: Where is Benjy Peachtree?”

HE SITS NEXT TO HIS OWN BELLY, HIS OWN CORPSE, WHERE IT ALL BEGAN.

“I wonder if he’s undead,” Naomi murmurs thoughtfully.

“It does not matter. We shall re-kill him if we must,” Rush snorts.

Ari asks, “Must we make peace with the Peachtrees?”

ONLY IF YOU WISH TO TAKE IN AN ETERNAL SUPPLY OF BACON.

“This doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense,” muses Yip. “We are making some big assumptions here.” To Illurien, he calls, “Is there an entity encouraging the feud?”

AN ECHO, A MEMORY, A THOUGHT; FROM THE BEGINNING, TO THE END; THE TOLLING OF THE BELL RINGS IN THE MIND.

“Tolling of the bell...?” Federico’s brow furrows for a moment. Then, suddenly, he yelps, “Bellhold!”

“What?” asks Naomi.

“Bellhold!” repeats the kobold. “It’s where all of our adventures began- we had to commission a new bell for the annual halfling gathering, and while we were there- oh, it’s been so long!” He squeezes his eyes shut in concentration as he struggles to recall the details of his first adventure so long ago. “There was a stone!” he says. Excitement begins to run through his frame. His tail begins wagging furiously and his body starts to shake. “That’s right! And we had to destroy it somehow... there was a bell tower... the stone, hmm, I think it had some kind of mind control powers, didn’t it?” He looks around, but then he realizes that none of the halflings who were there at the time remain with the party. A sudden sadness washes over him for his lost friends- so many lost friends! From Coco to Trinia to Airhead Ed, from Brother He to Timothy to Mama Flapjacks herself... At least Martini is still alive somewhere, he thinks sadly. And Thelonious. And maybe Ed, who knows- though we lost her in that murky, memory-lost time when the mind flayers enslaved us.

“Then you think we need to go back to Bellhold?” asks Naomi. Federico nods.

“How far away is it?” wonders Erasmuz. “Should we wind walk?”

Federico nods. “Yeah, it’s far.” He shivers. “I don’t know if I have the strength to walk that far.”

“What, thirty yards?” Ari teases.

***

The next night, at dark, Erasmuz casts a wind walk that encompasses the entire party. Slowly they shift into a vaporous form, and then with a roar, they race back towards the beginning. A couple of hours and they are there: Bellhold. The small town has a large central square centered on a statue of a group of halflings and their kobold companion. All around the square are businesses, most of them closed for the night, but a tavern called the Bell and Clapper remains open, with bright light and music pouring out of the open windows. Despite the chill of the night, the tavern has abundant warmth. When our heroes enter, Federico is instantly recognized, but the others are initially taken as hangers-on and frauds wanting to live off of the legacy of the halflings who were here so long ago.

Still, it only takes a few minutes to find out what the party needs to know. A one-eyed halfling came through town about a year previous. “He went up to the Old Mines up on the Steeple and never came back down, far as I know,” the bartender says. “Frankly, I always just assumed that he got nabbed by goblins; they’re pretty prevalent around here.”

“What’s the Steeple?” asks Federico.

“Steeple Mountain. When you’re outside, you can’t miss it: it’s the tallest mountain right near town. it’s a real piece of work. There’s only one trail up it, far as I know, and the rest of it’s damn near unclimbable. The mines are up there.”

“Thanks for your help.” Federico tosses him a platinum piece.

The party exits the tavern, resumes their wind walk form, and in only a few minutes they have flown up the trail, up the side of the mountain, and to the gaping opening of the old mine. They resume their physical forms and pause for a moment while Nara scries Benjy Peachtree.

And gasps.

She sees him- gaunt, slack-jawed and drooling. He is strapped into some sort of metal and crystal apparatus. Wires run under the eye patch that covers the ruined eye that Airhead Ed long ago shot out, and brilliant blue light blazes from beneath it. He is not moving. He is somewhere underground, and some sort of large reptilian corpse lies indistinct in the background.

“Right,” she says, “there is definitely something influencing Benjy.” She stares at the rest of the party with a look of utter abject horror on her face. “He looks like he is starving.”

Next Time: Our heroes enter the old mines in the hopes of finding Benjy Peachtree!


*Nara is a prophet (a homebrewed Cydran prestige class). I am not 100% positive, but I think that this is the first time her foretelling ability has come into play- it basically has a 20% chance/month of giving her a cryptic, foreshadowing kind of dream.

 

[the Jester]

“I think we should go back to Bellhold and rest first,” Ari suggests abruptly.* “I feel on the verge of an epiphany. I just need to sleep on it.”

“Um, okay,” sighs Queffe. “Just tell me that you’ll cast wind walk again tomorrow,” she says to Erasmuz.

“Sure, buddy!” he replies cheerfully.**

The party wind walks back to Bellhold and secures lodging at the Bell and Clapper. They raise quite a stir yet again in the little town, but retire before it grows too late.

In the morning, they find Ari dead.

His room is a bloody mess. Both he and his dire wolf companion have been assassinated in their sleep. Even the keen senses of the wolf were insufficient to save them.

“That’s horrible!” cries Nara.

“Is- is there anything you can do?” Queffe chokes out.

“Yes,” Nara and Erasmuz reply simultaneously.

***

It is expensive to accumulate the diamonds for a raise dead, but our heroes do it. Ari’s eyes flutter and his pale lips twitch. Suddenly the corpse draws in a shuddering breath and its eyes snap open.

Ari groans, “What happened?” He sits up. His head is spinning.

“You were assassinated,” Nara tells him grimly.

“What?” the druid explodes. His eyes take in the slaughtered form of his animal companion. “NO! Who did this?” he demands.

“We don’t know yet,” Erasmuz pipes up.

“Let’s find out,” Ari says angrily. Nara begins the process of healing him.

***

After Ari recuperates enough to fight the party begins tracking his assailant. For someone as skilled at tracking as the druid is, it is child’s play to find the trail and follow it- especially since he can employ the sharp nose of a bloodhound, the magical divining abilities of his friend Nara (who is, after all, a prophet) and the reputation of his friend Federico and the Flapjacks clan. The combination means that, slightly after noon, our heroes approach a two-storey home. They approach; Ari moves to the window, while Nara and the others go to the front door. She tries the door, but it’s locked. She is about to tell the others this when she hears a wild cry from within the building and the sound of the window shattering as someone inside charges Ari, stabbing him with a rapier to deadly effect and breaking his collarbone.

“You again!” cries the rapier-wielder.

Ari can see the person behind the pointy thing currently lodged in the white-hot pain part of his shoulder. It’s an elf, with his teeth filed to sharp points. He is dressed somewhat savagely. He wears no armor, but bears a hide-covered wooden shield. Several amulets dangle from around his neck; most are primitive-looking, with bits of bone, rock, horn and such on simply leather thongs. One is more noteworthy, being bronze edged with jet. He looks like a cannabix! Ari realizes with a shiver.*** Then there’s another flash of pain as the rapier withdraws from his bone. The druid grits his teeth against the pain and casts baleful polymorph, but the assassin resists his spell, gnashing his teeth at Ari.

Theevis Stingblade (our assassin’s name) casts a spell that clinches it, as far as Ari is concerned. Called foul cloud, it is unique to cannabix. The air is tainted by a strange, foul brown mist. Queffe begins to cough and wheeze as the vapors surround her, instantly becoming fatigued. Quickly, Ari backs away and casts cure moderate wounds on his shoulder. I don’t think I want to get caught in that cloud, he thinks.

Nara and Erasmuz try to disable the assassin, using impeding permission and hold person respectively, but Theevis seems to have a formidable will. He grins ferociously as he throws off their attempts to lay mental chains on him. He leans forward and pricks Erasmuz with his rapier, then laughs maliciously.

“Oh yeah?” Erasmuz sneers. He reaches out with his ur-priest powers, stealing divine energy from the gods, and casts inflict critical wounds. He thrusts his hand forward and touches Theevis, but the assassin resists the worst of the spell.

Theevis Stingblade continues whirling from one enemy to another, thrusting and parrying. Suddenly, the bronze amulet that he is wearing flashes and cracks and a strange, centipede-like being with a disturbingly human face appears. It leaps and tumbles over the top of Queffe and Erasmuz. It cartwheels over and attempts to invoke some kind of magical ability, but the presence of Queffe nearby apparently disconcerts it, for the monster fails to manifest its power.

Ari shifts into eagle form to heal some more, then calls lightning down on the enemy as Erasmuz begins to summon some aid of his own. Nara curses as the assassin shrugs off a charm monster. “We can’t get his mind,” she laments.

“That’s right!” Theevis sneers, and stabs Nara twice, hitting her so hard that she’s staggered! Meanwhile, the centipede-monster exudes some sort of nasty, oily substance onto the ground and into the air around it. It slithers around, looking for a target to bite, but ends up biting itself by accident. Which is good, since our heroes have not hurt it yet.

Meanwhile, Erasmuz finishes his summons. Three large air elementals whir into existence! Immediately, they move to attack the assassin. Erasmuz cackles gleefully at the cannabix’ sudden distress. But then Theevis turns invisible, vanishing even more quickly than Erasmuz’ grin. The ur-priest’s eyes go left, then right, then left, looking for any sign of the assassin.

Suddenly, the centipede-like thing appears right next to Erasmuz, rearing up before him! “Oh,” Erasmuz says, “surely, great demon, you will spare me, for we share the same moral perspective! I surrender to you,” he lies.

Queffe tumbles towards the centipede, but the invisible assassin suddenly reappears as his rapier jabs into Queffe! Then Theevis quickly spins and begins jabbing at Erasmuz.

“Hey, I surrendered!” the ur-priest cries out. The elf laughs, and Erasmuz frowns. “Fine!” he says angrily. “If you’re going to be that way about it...” He concentrates, casting a deadly spell indeed: slay living. He reaches out and touches Theevis on the arm.

The assassin’s eyes widen in horror. He gasps. “No,” he croaks, and falls over dead.

The centipede grins with its human-like face. Then it laughs- and then it teleports away.

“Where’d it go?” cries Nara.

“If it was summoned, it won’t last long,” Ari answers. “It probably doesn’t matter.”

“What if it wasn’t summoned? What if it was called?” Erasmuz sighs. “It could stick around for a while, in that case.”

Our heroes mull this over for a few minutes. “Well, in any event, it doesn’t seem to be coming back right now,” Queffe comments. “So let’s continue on with our mission here.”

“Well, he’s dead,” Ari states. “It’ll be kind of hard to question him now.”

“Not really,” Erasmuz smirks. Nara nods agreement.

***

A search of the assassin with detect magic running turns up a few magic items: his bracers, cloak, rapier, shield and ring. The amulet no longer radiates magic, and it has turned a foul brown color and partially melted. The party hypothesizes that it may have been a single-use item of some kind, or one that the assassin had just expended the last charge from. Since the centipede monster still hasn’t returned, the group stops to think about things for a few moments, and Ari decides to remain in the house for a while, using his one thousand faces ability to impersonate the assassin.

“Why?” asks Nara.

“To find out who hired him.”

“We already know,” Erasmuz says, “don’t we? The Peachtrees?”

Ari stops and sighs. “Of course, you’re right.”

“But maybe we can find out more when we question his head,” Nara adds.

***

The prophet Nara lets her mind settle into a profound equilibrium. There is nothing within; there is nothing without. Her mind is empty. And then it reaches out through the cosmic void- and touches her goddess’ mind.

Nara communes:

Who hired the assassin? Yes or no.
Did Benjy Peachtree hire the assassin? Yes.
Is Benjy Peachtree in Steeple Mountain? Yes.
Does the assassin have more loot? Yes.
Does Benjy know where he left it? No.
Is this guy a member of the Assassins’ Guild? Yes.
Does our innkeeper know how to get in touch with them? No.
Will Benjy wield magic against us should we encounter him? No.
How about mind powers? No. (Nara gets the sense that this is not the whole story.)
Is Benjy Peachtree under the direct influence of another creature or entity? No.
Is there anyone else hired to assassinate us? Not presently.
Show me an image of Benjy’s contract? Yes or no.

When she comes out of her trance, Nara relates what she has learned. She then attempts a speak with dead, but even with the assassin dead, his will is too strong to interrogate. Nara frowns, but then shrugs. “We’ll just have to do this the hard way,” she sighs.

Erasmuz casts wind walk and our heroes return to the entrance to the old mine.

Next Time: Into the mines! No, really! I mean it this time!


*I’d just given xps, and Ari had leveled to 13th. However, I generally rule that you have to rest before you get all your level up stuff.

**I’d just like to remind everyone that Erasmuz basically looks like a halfling Anton LaVey. (Which is who the picture of the ur-priest in Complete Divine is modeled after, I am convinced.) “Sure, buddy!” he replies cheerfully, indeed.

***The Cannabix are a savage religion that fears nature; a cannabix makes sacrifices to the Sea, Sky and Land to propitiate them in order to avoid various disasters. The sacrifices are living things, and the cannabix eats their hearts in order to gain a portion of their power (in the form of ability score increases). Cannabix are a homebrewed Cydran base class, based on a Cydran 2e specialty priest type.

 

[Krud]

So did Ari level and then die and lose that level due to raise dead?

 

[the Jester]

So did Ari level and then die and lose that level due to raise dead?

More or less... though I'm using a "permanent negative level til you have enough xp to be your level again" variant rather than actual level loss.

 

[the Jester]

The party bursts into the mines violently, tearing into the goblins that guard the way ferociously. The goblins scream and fall back, and as the party presses forward- four nauseating, disgusting masses flow down from the ceiling above.

“What the hell are those??” exclaims Nara.

The forms are ooze-like, the brown-green shade of sewage gone wrong. Within the masses of the creatures are a multitude of angry-looking, red eyes.

Gong! One of the goblins strikes a gong and screams at his fellows, in the Goblin tongue, to fall back. Those of our heroes who speak Goblin think, ironically enough, that this shows remarkable discipline for these goblins.

The party turns to deal with what is apparently the real threat- the strange, disgusting, sewage ooze things. Nara quickly invokes freedom of movement on herself, while Queffe throws herself aside to avoid a deadly thrown javelin from one of the retreating goblins. Ari drops a flame strike on the retreating goblins, blowing several of them to bits, and then he begins moving forward. The eye-filled ooze things flow forward, lashing out with pseudopodia at both Nara and Queffe. Each of the two of them suffers a minor blow, but although the wound is relatively minor, both of them are left coated in a thick, viscous slime. Suddenly it starts to animate, flailing at them with more tendrils of nastiness!

“I don’t think I like these things, buddies,” Erasmuz announces, and begins a summoning spell. A few seconds later, several fire elementals appear and set to work, engaging the sick-smelling creatures. The ur-priest smirks and casts shield of faithlessness. Nara, meanwhile, timeslips away, the better to deal with the slimy coating that is flailing at her.

But the rest of our heroes, along with the fire elementals, are doing profound damage to the nasty enemies. The semi-fluid creatures are being torn apart and burned to death. They prove able to move effortlessly through and around our heroes, but there is not enough time or space for them to truly get away, and the fire elementals pursue them relentlessly. Soon the battle is over.

“The goblins got away,” remarks Ari. “And they sounded a gong. It’s safe to assume that Benjy knows that we’re coming.”

“Remember,” Nara cautions the others, “we don’t want to hurt any halflings if we can help it. Remember my vision of the pie- I think we need to make peace with the Peachtrees in order to make sure that we can reach the Promised Land. The vendetta between them and the Flapjacks must end.”

“Sure, buddy,” replies Erasmuz with a grin. “Now let’s get going.”

The party advances through a large old cave. Puddles of slime or ooze cover the floor. Small stalactites hang from the 15 foot tall ceiling. The group hurries across; there is no sign of the bandits. On the opposite side, they find a four-way intersection. For some reason, they go right (‘left to live’ is their usual motto). After about 20’, the hall they are following opens up into a rough-hewn room about 60’ on a side that seems to be serving as a goblin barracks. Naturally, there are about twenty goblins in there.

“GET THEM!!” shouts Nara. She casts magic vestment on her shield and begins moving up. Yip bounces to the front of the party and readies himself for the approach of a goblin. The goblins begin to move forward, and the little kobold slides forward and smacks one of them in the head so hard that the goblin collapses onto the ground! Federico drops a second one with a bolt from his crossbow, and then the goblins and the party are really mixing it up. Queffe- a dervish- really has a chance to shine, using her dervish dance to full effect. She slices one goblin across the chest and drops it, then decapitates another and finally cuts another’s arm off. Screaming, it dies.

Erasmuz, meanwhile, casts righteous might and swells in size until he is as tall as a human! Then he begins punching, drawing on his old monk training from before he turned away from Law. A flurry of blows, and two more goblins fall.

Jawbreaker cleaves left and right with his axe, dropping one, then another, then another goblin.

The goblins try to rally. Several of them are sergeants, but it isn’t enough. One or two blows land on our heroes, but they do not do nearly enough damage to stop the Halfling Action Militia from overwhelming the goblin resistance. In just under a minute, the fight is over.*

Back to the four-way intersection they go, as there are no further passages out of here; and they take the next direction over. This proves to be a long passage, with many side passages running off of it.

“These are mines,” Federico says happily. He is wagging his tail.

The passage ends in a door. However, it proves to be locked. Strangely, for a party composed almost entirely of halflings, there is no rogue in the group, so instead of picking the lock, they open the door the Jawbreaker way. The Chief throws himself against the door with all his might and bursts it open. The large room revealed is marked with scorches all over it. Rubble is scattered throughout the room. The walls have carvings depicting tribute being paid to some kind of dragon or lizard god; some of these have been roughly defaced, and many now show scorch marks. Dog turds that smolder like coals are scattered here and there throughout the room. And the source of those turds is here too- in the form of a pack of eight hell hounds, two of which are particularly large and dangerous-looking. Immediately they begin barking and charge forward, breathing fire.

Nara trips over her own feet and falls prone. Embarrassed, she casts sound burst and manages to stun almost all of the hounds! Grinning shakily, she struggles up to her feet.

One of the huge hounds, and one of the smaller ones as well, breathes fire on the party. It could be worse, but it isn’t very nice. Erasmuz casts resist fire while Federico magic missiles one of the wounded hounds.

As the hounds start to shrug off the stunning effects of her sound burst, Nara casts another one, stunning most of them again! Our heroes tear into them, with Jawbreaker, Erasmuz, Nara, Yip and Queffe combining their efforts to tear the hell hound pack apart. Even the two larger hounds are no match for the power of H.A.M.! Finally, Jawbreaker and Erasmuz’ spiritual weapon pound the last two hounds down, and our heroes set about quickly healing their wounds

Three exits emerge from the large chamber, other than the shattered door that Jawbreaker broke down. Our heroes start with the one to the left of the door, but find that it peters out pretty quickly; it is simply another mining shaft. The party returns to the large room and moves to the next exit, which leads them around a left turn and into another large chamber with slimy puddles all over the floor. A table with a few goblins gambling at it is in the center of the chamber; they jump up to fight, only to be cut down with little effort by our heroes. One goblin survives, caught by a charm monster spell cast by Nara. The halflings do take note of the fact that one of the goblins in the room was much tougher than either the standard goblins or the goblin sergeants that the party has already encountered.

Our heroes thus sit down to a snack with the goblin. He proves stupid and fairly useless, so they let him go and wind walk out to rest.

Next Time: Back into the depths of the old mines, in pursuit of Benjy Peachtree- our heroes find a PEACH GOLEM!! Who will eat whom??

*Yep, 9 round combat.