D&D 5E Tales From The Awning Pothole

[rgoodbb]

"Hey, guys, look at this!" she called ...........

....."It's a map, with a convenient You are here X. Hang on. I don't understand. There appear to be places here that shouldn't be here."

"What do you me-ee-ee-an?" asked the Half-Goat

"Tyr, Huzuz, Krezk, for a start and a number of other places from different campaign settings that I'm not familiar with. What do we do with this?"

"We-e-e-e'll pick one."

"You choose."

"The first one then if I have to. Tyr. It has an iron mine nea-ea-rby apparently,"

As the group collected themselves and walked/clopped out of the cove-cave, they were almost overwhelmed by the sheer power of the sun, beating its radiation down upon them in oppressive waves. As they looked at the sea, they realised that it was no longer full of water, but a dusty silt. A boat was waiting for them and a woman full of concentration seemed to amazingly be steering it on the surface of the silt. "Where to luv?"

"Uhm, Tyr."

"Sure. Hop in, honey. Lovely weather we're having today ain't it."

 

[BoldItalic]

"Is anybody thirsty?" asked Tasha, who was getting uncomfortably hot inside her plate armour. "I lost my water bottle in the shipwreck."

"Me too," replied Albert. "I lost mine too. Is it far, to where we are going?"

"Couple of days, luv," answered the ferry-woman from the rear of the craft. "If we don't get delayed. It's a fair way to Tyr. Didn't you bring any supplies of your own? We don't carry extra, you know."

It turned out that no-one had any supplies at all. "I can do a Create Water offered Adeliva, but we would need a big bucket or something as a container."

"Will this do?" asked Goatee, conjuring a ten-gallon barrel out of thin air. He had made it like a beer barrel, with a spigot the bottom.

The ferry-woman made a sign to avert evil. "We get all sorts in our job," she said, "but I wouldn't be doing that kind of sorcery in Tyr. The mob will tear you apart. Some poor innkeeper is now having to explain to his customers why his pub has no beer, on account of his beer barrel having vanished. That's his livelihood gone bang. The common-folk don't like that. Not when it's their beer that's been stolen by a sorcerer."

Goatee was dismayed. It hadn't occurred to him that when he conjured something, it had to come from somewhere else. But Adeliva came to his rescue. "It's a nice barrel," she reassured him. "I'll create some water in it, then we can all have a good drink and you can send it back. They might not even notice it was gone."

"You'll be alright dear," said the ferry-woman "They like druids in Tyr."

"Goat, have you got any books about this place we are going to?" asked Tasha, who was beginning to sense that maybe Tyr was maybe a bit unusual.

"Careful ..."

But Goatee rummaged in his Bag of Book Holding and pulled out a perfectly ordinary copy of the 5th Edition Dark Sun Campaign Guide that wasn't magical at all and, in fact, was so new that it had never been opened and even Chris Perkins hadn't read it yet. He started leafing through it and let out a bleat of surprise. "They've changed a lot of stuff! Look, here, it says ..."

 

[rgoodbb]

"They've changed a lot of stuff! Look, here, it says ..."

"...No Paladins allowed. There are no Gnomes either. I wonder about Rapiers.....They keep it all pretty low-key.......I'm so excited. I've been waiting three ages for this book to come out. Tasha. I'm not sure about Half-Orcs."

"Well it's a good job I'm a not a Half-Orc then isn't it?"

"Well uhrm yes."

Adeliva frowned and started to pipe in with a question. ".."

..But was caught just in time by Goatee. "Not now Liv. Not worth it. So Halflings are savage, well we already knew that about Ha! Now recently they had some sort of cataclysm. They call it the Great Errata and the big bad is some dude called borys."

"Boris? Well that doesn't strike fear into the hearts of folk does it?"

"Not Boris, Borys. There's a difference."

"If you say so."

"Magic can kill the land if you defile. You can cast preserver magic though, so why wouldn't you? I wonder how my magic will work then?"

"You could ask the Sage I suppose." Exclaimed the ferry-woman.

"Yes we could do with some sage advice on this."

"I'll do a little detour on the way for you. All right?"

"That would be lovely."

The boat flowed this way and that until it headed to Ovthe Coast.....................

 

[BoldItalic]

A line of cliffs, rising out of the sand sea, appeared on the horizon and the ferry-woman steered towards them in an exaggeratedly zig-zag fashion, while blowing a horn at intervals. Apparently, this was to give plenty of time for the inhabitants to recognise the craft as not being hostile. There was a solitary stone tower visible on top of the cliff and she steered into a small dock beneath it, where they all disembarked. She led the way through a door in the cliff face and into a cool chamber from which a stairway ascended into the tower. The chamber was sparsely furnished with a table and benches and she dropped a pack of her own, that she had brought with her from her ship, onto the table in what seemed a well-worn ritual. She said she would wait for them there, but if they did not return by morning she would leave without them.

The stairs rose in many flights through the rock and were lit at intervals by curious cactus-like plants set into niches in the stone. The plants glowed with a strange green florescence that was sufficient to see by as they made their way up the stairs but Adeliva did not recognise them and nor did any of the others. It seemed, as if there were any doubt, that they were in a very strange land indeed.

Albert estimated they had climbed about 300 feet when they arrived in an antechamber at the base of the tower that had a window overlooking the sand sea. The light from the window was momentarily blinding after the half-light of the stairway, so they waited a moment to get accustomed to it. The antechamber was furnished like the one below, with a table and benches, but the floor was gritty with sand that had obviously blown in through the unglazed window and not been swept away very recently. It seemed to be a place that tolerated visitors but did not welcome them.

A man stepped out of the shadows. He was dressed in a loose robe of undyed linen that was slightly frayed in places; he was evidently careless of his appearance. He spoke with a strange accent, as if he was more accustomed to talking in some native language of his own than in the common tongue. "I am Mirzak," he began. "This is my tower. I do not normally entertain visitors. Why have you come? You seem a curious collection of half-people. Are you abominations that have been sent here to be studied? My slave cages are quite full already. If not that, then what do you want? You there, yes, you, the man with the goat's head. Speak!"

"We seek to trade knowledge, Mirzak," began Goatee, as diplomatically as he could. "We have travelled many strange lands and we will gladly tell you of them but this is our first visit to this land of yours and we would be grateful for guidance on the customs of your people. We would not wish to give inadvertent offence through ignorance of your customs. I am but a humble keeper of books but my friend here, whose name is Footnote, can explain better than I for he is a musician and a teller of histories. This lady is named Adeliva and she is a druid. We take our two bodyguards everywhere," and with this he indicated Tasha and Albert, "for in many lands not everyone is honest and ferocious wild beasts are commonplace."

"I see," said Mirzak. "You travel light, three travellers with but two slaves. But my lady druid, I am remiss. You are most welcome to join me in my home and bring your two companions with you. I will see that your slaves are watered."

At this point Tasha boiled over with rage ...

 

[BoldItalic]

Tasha snapped. She was literally beside herself.

There was her body, staring at Mirzak, and there was her mind, next to her, a few feet to the left. Her body was furious but her mind was detached. She was a Half-Orc/Half-Orc body with a Half-Orc/Half-Orc mind, truly a Half-Orc/Half-Orc, but the two part/parts had separated into two other part/parts. She was a Mind/Body Half-Orc/Half-Orc. It was beyond weird. It was weird/weird.

She looked around. The others had their minds inside their heads in the proper places and seemed unaware of what she was doing. Adeliva seemed to be gazing distractedly at somewhere else, along a dimension that Tasha could not fathom. Perhaps she is seeing into the future, thought Tasha, but I am seeing into the now.

She turned her attention to Mirzak. His mind was huge - it spilled over outside his skull - and it was ugly. There was no other word to describe it. It was knotted and tangled and it pulsed with a redness that was just plain wrong. Tasha found she could move, and she peered closely at the mind of Mirzak. He seemed unaware of her - he was too bound up in himself. It was as though all the fibres of his mind were pre-occupied with holding himself together and they were full of tension, like the rubber bands inside a golf ball. Tasha felt the urge to cut just one or two and watch the whole thing burst apart.

Her mind was aware of the mind of her halberd. It winked at her. Somehow, she was not surprised. She caught its eye and nodded. The halberd understood. It struck. It sliced smoothly through the outer layers of the Mirzak mind like a knife through tangled spaghetti and something resembling tomato sauce spilled out. It was quite gruesome, in a normal sort of way. Tasha watched without emotion as the mind began to unravel.
​

Mirzak screamed ...

 

[rgoodbb]

"You have passed the first test Tasha. You are on your way to knowing the Way in a way others can't, mind, don't mind the mind on the floor there, that way's a bit gooey."

"Who is this voice in my head talking to me and you're saying way waaay too much for my liking by the w...dammit. What do you mean?"

"The Way. It's an energy field created by all living things. It surrounds us. It penetrates us. It binds the galaxy together. For my ally is the Way, and a powerful ally it is...."

"Sorry. you seemed a little distracted there. You were saying?"

"Tasha. Use the Way"

"Which way?"

"No. The way."

"Still not getting it."

"The way is strong in you."

"Nope....uhm....Is this part if the test? I came here for some sage advice. WTF has just happened"

"You are Half-Orc/Half-Orc. Never has there been two minds capable of using the way in the same head. Think of the possibilities."

"Who did you say you were again?"

 

[BoldItalic]

"My name is Will. I am your mentor."

"Why?"

"You have taken the first step on the way. The way that we call The Way. Others have trodden that path before you, and more will follow after you, but we are few in numbers and we do not like to see those who set out on The Way stumble and fall by the wayside for lack of a helping hand."

"What do you want me to do?"

"I want you to make your own way along The Way. There is one Way but there are many ways to follow it."

"You've lost me again."

"Try to tell me what you did with your mind, just then. Put it into words. Don't worry about getting it exactly right, just tell it in your own way."

"Well, I stepped outside myself, with my mind. And I could see other people's minds."

"Good. That "stepping outside", we call Detachment. Even for those who have the innate capability, it often does not appear until a time of great stress, when the mind is compelled to force its way through the veil. This is what happened to you. You have always been capable of Detachment, Tasha, but you just didn't know it. I want you to practice doing it over the next few days. Now that you have experienced it, you will find it gets easier. And practice Reattachment too, of course. You need to be able to get back into your own body!

With that, Tasha felt the contact with her mentor fade but she knew he would return when the time was right.​

Mirzak had collapsed on the floor, writhing and convulsing, and uttering inarticulate cries. Goatee was non-plussed. "What did I say?" he asked. "He said something about walking the staves, which made no sense, and then had some sort of seizure." He looked to Adeliva for help and she looked to him. Neither of them knew what to do.

"Is it heatstroke?" wondered Albert, "Should we throw a bucket of water over him?"

"There's never a cleric around when you need one," remarked Footnote, unhelpfully.

Tasha shifted her halberd on her shoulder. She had Reattached. "I could perform a cephalectomy," she offered laughingly, "to put him out of his misery?" She realised as she said this, that she sounded callous but she was back in her body and her glands were still reacting emotionally to the remark about slaves. She had to be careful, she thought; she wasn't at all sure that she wanted the others to guess what she had done; technically, she had struck a blow without rolling initiative but did it count if you were only doing it with your mind? Anyway, without a DM, who's going to make a ruling? She realised, even as this thought occurred to her, that she had made some sort of alignment shift towards Neutral and she felt she needed time to reflect on that.

"I don't think that's a very nice suggestion, Tasha," said Adeliva reprovingly, "even as a joke." Then she pulled the requisition pad out of her pack. "I could put in for a healing potion but I don't know what sort to ask for. Any ideas?"

Goatee consulted a medical manual, thumbing through the index to try to find something that matched the symptoms. "I think he's got rabies," was the nearest he could come up with. "We mustn't let him bite us, or we'll catch it too." They all backed away from the still-convulsed Mirzak. "It's apparently incurable and death is inevitable within days," added Goatee.

"Any way we can get a cleric here?" wondered Albert. "Do they even have clerics in this world? Or do people just die a lot? Look, you lot wait here and I'll explore the tower to see if there is anything useful up there. He might have some healing stuff put by."

"Wait, there is something," mumbled Footnote, awkwardly shuffling his hoof, "I can do Lesser Restoration but I don't know if it will do much good. If it is something like rabies, it might work, though, it does cure diseases." He looked at Tasha. "Up to you, boss. Do you want me to try?"

"Yes, anything," Tasha said, dissembling madly. She knew perfectly well that it wouldn't restore a mind that was slashed to pieces but she didn't want anyone to guess that she knew.

Footnote began to play an eerie melody and pace out a complex stamping dance. It was his way of weaving magic. At first, it seemed to work and Mirzak grew quiet but as Footnote went on, his tune was increasingly drowned out by the howling of a wind from outside the window. A mighty sandstorm was brewing up and twisting vortices of sand began to fling themselves into the chamber, swirling about and stinging their unguarded faces. "STOP!" cried Goatee, who realised what was happening. "Your magic is unstabilising this crazy world!"

Just then, there was a commotion on the stairs below and the ferry-woman came rushing in. "We must leave! NOW!" she cried, "We must run before the storm or my ship will be sunk beneath the sand within minutes!" At that moment, she spotted Mirzak lying at their feet and saw instantly what the situation was, or at least what it looked like. "Bring him with us! There is no time!"

The sands of time are indeed running out for Mirzak. Does he survive? Do we want him to? Does the sand ship escape the storm? And who is the mysterious Will? Is he a powerful psychic, or is it all in Tasha's deranged imagination? Tune in tomorrow for the next exciting installment!

 

[rgoodbb]

Mirzak stirred, cocked his boggled and frenzied head to the left and without warning, and in a deranged moment, autodefenestrated into the storm, The others, quickly recovering from their initial shock at this madness, ran down the steps and dived into the boat, The ferry-woman was only just able to control the boat with her psionic talent before, above them a crack and a crumbling and a rumbling as the cliff split in the storm. Rocks fell from high above, they hit the boat and smashed portions of it. It jinked and jerked with each successive hit until the strain was no longer bearable for the boat or the ferry-woman. They all sank to the bottom of the silt sea and suffocated and drowned and died....

...Or that is how Tasha's mind played it out. What had just happened there? Had she seen what she wanted to see, what she expected to see, what she feared to see or had she actually seen the future. No she had seen exactly what Adeliva had seen. In Tasha's mind she was now looking upon Adeliva's visions of the future.

Mirzak stirred, cocked his boggled and frenzied head to the left and........

 

[BoldItalic]

Mirzak stirred, cocked his boggled and frenzied head to the left and........ got unsteadily to his feet, helped by Albert on one side and Goatee on the other. His eyes were blank and unseeing but he seemed to take in something of his surroundings nevertheless. The storm howled. Mirzak came to a momentous decision; he grew larger somehow, and more dramatic. His hair crackled and Goatee recognised the snangle of arcane power coming to the boil. "Take cover!" he shouted and dived under the table.

Mirzak raised both hands jerkily and his jaw moved as if it were on strings like a puppet. Then, he drew a great breath and shouted out

۞⁂⁑⁎۩ !​

Whatever the word meant, it was clearly very powerful for Mirzak somehow drew the storm into himself. It became a tempest that whirled around him tighter and tighter, its noise rising like a scream beyond human hearing, until suddenly there was calm. The storm had imploded, along with Mirzak. In his place was a potted geranium.

"Well, I never," said the ferry-woman as she picked herself up from the floor. "They do say that he was a sorcerer in his youth but repented and shut himself away in this tower until he could find a cure for it. Looks like he never did. I'm leaving. This place gives me the creeps. You can come with me or stay here. Up to you."

Tasha glanced at Adeliva, who shrugged. She looked around at the others and they looked back. It was Tasha's decision. "Can you come back for us in a week?" she asked.

"Alright. But it's payment in advance."

"Agreed. Pay the lady, Albert."

"Why me?"

"Because you're the one who picked Mirzak's pockets when you helped him up, and we haven't got any local currency otherwise."

"Didn't think you'd seen me."

"Well I did. Pay up."

After the ferry-woman had gone back downstairs, Tasha did a brief Detach and checked the geranium. It had no mind at all. Mirzak was completely gone. While she was "out" she also glanced at Adeliva, who was checking the geranium for greenfly, and noticed something about the way she tried to see into its future.

"Liv," began Tasha carefully, "You can see into the future a little, can't you?"

"Yes, but it's not very useful. I can see what might happen but there are always lots of things that might happen and they all get muddled up together. It's like peeping through a keyhole. You can't see the whole room."

"You need to use all your eyes. Not just your third eye. Try shutting your ordinary eyes and blinking them open in your mind, the same way you do with your special one."

"I don't think I can do that but ... YeahWhatWow! It works! I can see ... all kind of things all spread out! Hey, this is amazing! How did you know to do that, Tasha?"

"We can all see depth in space with two eyes. With three eyes you can see depth in time as well. It's a precious gift."

Goatee looked at Tasha strangely. "Where did you read that?" he asked. "I've never heard you talk like that before."

"I've ... changed. I can ... see peoples' minds. Not what they are thinking, but how they think. How their minds work. Your mind is full of words. Albert's mind is full of pictures. Footnote's mind is full of rhythms. Everybody is different."

"That's awesome. And scary at the same time."

"I think this is only the beginning for all of us, Goat."

At this moment Adeliva suddenly interrupted the conversation. "We're going upstairs," she said, "And we're going to find ..."

 

[rgoodbb]

"And we're going to find ..."

"....Seven Obsidian Orbs. Each one larger than the other."

"We're spending a week here and that's all you have for us? We could have just requisitioned seven of those....... Really?"

"It kinda looked better in my head somehow."

"What are we supposed to do with them?"

"We could always eat them. I'm famished. What do they eat around here on this island. I presume we are on an island."

"Let us first ascend the stairs of this very clean tower. In fact it's so clean, one could almost call it pris..."

"Someones up there!" Albert interrupted. "On the top floor. I hear movement.....Was this in your mind as well?"

"No actually. Approach with caution."

As the party slowly and stealthily climbed the last few immaculate steps, they slowed once more. Albert stealthed the last part solo. He took from his kit a small mirror mounted on a metal handle and used it to slowly look around the corner. There was a man with a bald head, He was chained to the floor. The chains and manacles were huge. The man looked like a mix between a non-hairy dwarf and a human. Battle scars adorned his sun-bronzed bare torso, head, arms and legs. The rest of the party rounded the corner on the all clear from Albert.

"Who is he?"

"He is Old Man Rikus.....................