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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Silver Moon" data-source="post: 2875851" data-attributes="member: 8530">Chapter Twenty-six, “The Grand Enigma“, August 8th, 1018Blip continues to fly eastward.  After nearly an hour navigating through the storm she spots Northpoint Island in the distance, with the ship Grand Enigma sailing towards it, now about three-quarters of a mile from the dock.   The two-mast merchant ship measures 100 feet long, with a rounded shape to it, being nearly fifty feet wide at its greatest point.   There is a single aft-castle on its last twenty-five feet, with the man viewed through the crystal ball steering the ship from the top of this uppermost deck.Blip comes in low, spotting a total of three people on the topside of the ship, the one steering on the uppermost deck, and two more below, handling the rigging, tacking the sails to take full advantage of the strong winds.   Staying low to the water, she gets a short distance ahead of the ship’s bow, to allow her party time to get oriented in the water before the hull reaches them.  She empties the party out of both bags of holding and into the ocean.    The group assembles alongside the port side of the ship, grabbing onto an external ladder.   Blip flies behind the ship, and hovers behind the man steering on the top deck.Narg holds onto the ladder and hoists himself up, using the Wand of Exchange on the enemy crewmember nearest him.  This causes Narg to appear on deck, and the man to appear in the air beside the ladder.  As the man drops into the ocean, the lizardmen Lars and Spudnick both grab him, and drag him beneath the water towards the ocean floor.  The man manages to catch his breath before going under.On deck, Narg moves back to hide behind the nearest mast before the other enemy nearby spots him.  He is unsuccessful at this, as the sail reacts to no longer being tacked on the port side, and the man to starboard glances to his left to find out why.   Mojo takes this as his cue, and lets loose the Hammer of Scull Crushing, striking the foe.   Simultaneously, Blip flies in for a backstab on the man steering the ship.Vincenzo begins a Prayer spell as Luekia climbs the ladders up to where the ship’s wheel is located.  Narg is struck by Magic Missiles thrown by his opponent.  Mojo lets loose his hammer, striking the foe for eleven points and knocking him down onto the top deck.   Narg charges forth, with the man turning himself invisible once Narg is close to him.  Above, Blip is unsuccessful with the backstab, and the man moves away from the ship’s wheel to attack her.  Luekia lets fly three star shurkens, which pass between the foe and Blip.   Vincenzo motions Ssam to climb aboard and follow her.Meanwhile, eighty feet back and forty feet below, the submerged enemy is doing remarkably well, managing to continue to hold his breath and thrust his magical sword into the two lizardmen.   Spudnick is reduced to a single hit point and is forced to retreat to the surface, leaving Lars alone to fight the man.Mojo is not able to target his foe, since the man has turned invisible.  Narg however, was close enough to be able to now see where the rain is falling on the person, silhouetting the body (with player references to the Kevin Bacon film Hollow Man)  and successfully strikes the man.  This causes the foe to quickly crawl further from Narg on the deck, consuming a healing potion along the way.   Narg draws his Rope of Climbing, and uses it to attach a loop onto the foe’s ankle.  Narg then pulls the rope towards him.  Watching the end of the rope, Mojo is now able to target his next hammer throw.   Above, Luekia’s next shuirkins also miss, enabling Blip to realize that the foe is wearing a Cloak of Displacement, which she communicates to Luekia, who rushes forward swinging her Bo-stick in the general vicinity of where Blip sees him.    He in turn lashes out, with rapid speed, and grabs the stick in mid-air.   The two continue what is obviously a monk-tug-of-war.    Well behind the ship, Spudnick surfaces and swims towards the ship.  Below, Lars attempts to try to force the magical sword out of the man’s grip.  He is successful, but only after the enemy gets a very good thrust into him, reducing him to a pair of hit points.   The foe rapidly swims up towards the surface, as Lars dives after the now falling sword.Narg and Mojo each strike their invisible foe, stopping him from moving.   They quickly start to search the body.  Mojo removes a ring, causing the body to become visible.   Mojo,  acting like a kid at Christmas time, puts his new bauble onto his finger and makes himself invisible.   Narg and Mojo head over towards the doors to the rear cabins on the deck, listening at them, but hearing nothing.  Above, Blip comes to Luekia’s assistance, and casts a Blindness onto the monk she is fighting, preventing him from seeing.  She maneuvers him over to the edge of the boat, and throws him overboard.   Blip flies down to where she expects him to surface, but he does not come back up.  The lizardman Ssam takes the ship’s wheel, and continues to sail towards the island.Blip sees the enemy fighter surface, and swim towards the ship at a very rapid pace.  She yells out “Vinnie, incoming!”  Being in merman form, he quickly intercepts the man.   Vinnie grabs the man and swims downward.  This time, the man fails to get a good breathe before being pulled under, and begins to drown.  Vinnie keeps him under a while before resurfacing, dragging the body after him back to the ship, where both injured lizardmen are now on deck.  Looking at the body, Spudnick recognizes him as Lorne, the ship's captain.Mojo opens the door to one cabin, seeing an armored fighter sitting inside and reading a book, totally unaware to what has transpired outside.  Mojo leaves the door open a crack.  They then wait until the wind and rain blow through the opening and catch the fighter’s attention, and he heads over to close the door.   Mojo lightly holds the knob outside of the door until the fighter’s hand pulls on the knob on the other side of the door.  Mojo then yanks the door open with his full strength, pulling the fighter out into the storm on the main deck, where both Narg and Mojo then attack him.  (This series of actions also proves to be both the best and luckiest player accomplishment of the game night, as any fighting inside of this cabin would have alerted the mage, currently resting in the cabin immediately below it.)The enemy fighter proves to be quite formidable, slashing his broadsword into both Narg and Mojo in the first round.  They continue to exchange blows for several rounds, with the man taking over seventy points of damage before giving any real indication of being hurt.   Above, Luekia rushes over and starts to hit him from above.   The three eventually manage to drop him, but only after both Narg and Mojo have taken considerable damage.Narg, Mojo and Luekia check out the other cabin beneath the aft-castle, finding a ladder down.  It leads to a room with two doors, one to the ship’s hold, the other to an adjacent cabin.   Narg opens the door to the adjacent cabin, staring straight at a mage.  The mage lets loose a Magic Missile spell, hitting Narg with eight missiles.  Narg and Mojo both charge into the room towards the mage.  The mage draws a wand and points it towards Narg, who makes his saving throw.  Luekia heads into the ship’s hold, heading towards another door into the room with the Mage.Mojo closes on his opponent the, planning to strike the mage with the Sword of Cancellation.  The mage points the wand towards Mojo, and muttering something softly.   Mojo throws his sword just as he begins to transform into a swan.  The sword sails through the air, striking the mage for minimal damage, but the cancellation magic also negates all of his memorized spells.  Not letting the transformation into a large bird deter him, Mojo continues to charge the man, and takes a chomp at the man’s crotch [Editor’s note, feel free to insert you own comment here, as a few stated at game time are not deemed suitable for a family audience].The swan is successful at keeping the mage from using another spell, but does not keep him from pointing the wand at Narg and softly saying what sounds like the word “Arm”.   Narg transforms into a female sheep [Again prompting some comments unsuitable for publication].    Just then, Luekia opens the door into cabin. Still distracted by the Swan attached to him, the mage does not see her approach.   She hits his arm with a karate chop, causing him to drop the wand.   The Sheep picks up the wand, but is unable to get it to operate.   The mage is unsure of what to make of this martial-arts-using female Triton, and attempts to move back.  Luekia strikes the mage again, this time on the head, knocking him unconscious.    She immediately pulls out a rope and ties him up.  Luekia then takes a good look at both Narg and Mojo in animal forms, deducing what has happened when she sees their armor and clothing piled on the floor, and uncharacteristically bursts out laughing  (in the eight years with the group, nobody has ever seen this character smile, let alone laugh).  This uncontrollable laughter continues, much to the annoyance of the sheep and swan.  Eventually, she calms down, and carries the sheep up the ladder to the top deck, followed by the tied up mage, the swan flying after her (and continuing to peck at the mage).   Luekia drags the mage out onto the top deck, following by the two animals.  Blip gestures to the animals, and asks “What’s with the livestock?”   Luekia again breaks out into uncontrollable laughter, which takes some time to die down.  She then tells them that the sheep is Narg the swan is Mojo.   Vincenzo, Blip and both lizardmen, Lars and Spudnick, also break into laughter, again to the annoyance of the two polymorphed fighters.   The lizardman Lars comes over to Narg and asks “How are ewe, get it, ewe?”  Narg kicks at him.All five adventurers gather together, and Vinnie casts a Dispel Magic on them, transforming them all back into their usual humanoid forms.  Both Narg and Mojo get dressed again and demand that all present be sworn to secrecy, and not tell anybody else about their animal transformations.  Vinnie says “You’re just lucky Jerry or Serita weren’t here to see it, you’d never hear the end of it.”  Blip asks “How are you feeling?”  Narg answers “Fine, other than this sudden craving for hay.”  A search of the ship finds no one on board, as well as none of their magic.</blockquote>

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