- The group looted the giants bodies they killed, finding a spiffy pearl necklace. They also found a note written by Ilkaris the giant cleric, telling them to maintain their harassment of the humans.

- They go back to tell the goblins the giants have been eliminated, and that they are traveling to eliminate Ilkaris. Kreecheck tells them what he knows about Ilkaris, that he is staying someplace called Greenmount, an old human fort which was abandoned, and which the giants have taken over.

- They spend a little more time in Beldoran identifying drow items and crafting some wands, before setting off for Istavin again.

- They stop in to see Algorthas the sage’s house again, to see if there was any change since last time, when his house was ransacked. They were surprised to see that the house was fine. A servant answered the door, and brought them in to see the sage. He seemed very spaced out though, and did not seem like his old self. He did not remember much, and seemed not to really remember them or why they were there. Keldon noticed something was very amiss and mentioned it to Smoth, who took it upon himself to distract the sage and cast a dispel magic spell on him. This seemed to break whatever enchantment was on him, and he seemed to wake up. He did not realize that any time had passed since the last time the party had talked to him, roughly two months ago.

- They tell him what happened, what they know at least, and he gets very agitated, and insists he has to leave right now, in case whoever did this to him has been keeping watch and knows that he is awake. They help him pack what they can, as he is too upset to listen to any other course of action. They also quiz his servant, who he apparently hired while he was under. They decided that the kid did not know anything about the condition he was in, so they let him leave while they got ready to go.

- They take him to a small village on the way to greenmount, and he says he will stay there in hiding, and they explain to him everything that’s happened in the last 2 months, including the discovery of Duke Killingsworth, his ailment, their attempt at healing him, hunting Ilkaris, etc. He says that he will stay there in seclusion until they manage to do something about Ilkaris, so he can be reasonably sure the threat to him is gone. He also finds them a reference to the fist symbol they found on the giant letter, as well as the name which was written in the cells where they found killingsworth. It was the symbol for a demon (whose name escapes me right now, look it up) and the cult that worshipped him. There had to be some kind of connection between the demon and Ilkaris. He answered any questions he could of theirs about Greenmount and the demon, and also warned them about a white dragon flying around the area. Apparently though the keep was fairly small, there was a rather large contingent of giants camping around the area, probably numbering in the hundreds. Once they were ready, the group set off to try to put a stop to the madness.

How about now?

NEED WRITE UP

---

Experience

Defeated 4 hill giants and 1 frost giant – CR 11

11	3300
12	2400

More good RP w/ goblins – Story

300 xp each

XP / person:

11	1125
12	900

After securing the Drow tower, our heroes abandon it and head north. All that work, and nothing to show for it…

NEED WRITEUP

---

Experience

Defeated 3 hill giants and 2 dire wolves – CR 10

11	2200
12	1800

Good roleplaying w/ goblins – Story 300xp each

Total xp:

11	2500
12	2100

XP / person:

11	625
12	525

It’s a beautiful bright day and Fin has just summoned an Ape to smash through a door. The Ape smashes the door but it triggers a defense mechanism that emits a blue gas. The Ape recoils and flails his arms about. Alarms sound and two giant umber-hulks appear. Finn casts a flame-strike and positions it between the two Umber-hulks. Screams are heard as a golden light foreshadows flames that rip around the umber-hulks that leave them tattered. One of them charges at Keldon and the other attacks Fin, both fail at connecting any blows. Shun swiftly slices through the umber-hulk that came at Keldon. Spell-casting is heard and it becomes apparent that dimension is being used. Harcourt then attacks the same Umberhulk with his bastard sword. Fin just swings at the umberhulk with his paws. The first swing rips off the beast’s arm while the next swing disembowels him, for an instant kill. Smoth precisely fires at an umberhulk with his bow and arrow and which causes the creature to vent at Shun. Keldon slams his maze into the Umberhulk and confuses it. Shun steps in and finishes him off. The alarm continues to clang.

The Ape leads the party through the hole. Smoth searches for traps as they descend down a spiral stair-case that leads to a familiar, opened, steel door. Finn recalls how the hallway used to be and warns the party. Smoth is able to decipher that the extended hallway is an allusion and finds a trap. Keldon reaches into his bag of tricks and pulls out a Wolverine. The Wolverine enters the trap, and is immediately blown away from the staircase…falling into oblivion. Smoth spell-crafts on a metallic door and realizes that it’s made of adamantium. They go through the tower and enter a shed full of tools. Smoth rests and memorizes some spells. The party props themselves against the door and rest, but Fin hears something soon after. Smoth casts invisibility on himself as the door swings open. Harcourt draws his bastard sword. A Mantecor is revealed and whips it’s tail shooting a number of spikes the party. Harcourt feels a spike but no one else does, while Shun charges and slashes. Fin tells everyone to move back, as Smoth shoots a magic missile at the beast. The Mantecor turns and jumps off the spiral staircase in the darkness. Finn places halleberry bombs by the door as Harcourt and Smoth keep watch. The party slowly descends down…Smoth then finds yet another trap and more glyphys. Keldon pulls a bear out of his bag of tricks and has him walk into the trap. Smoth searches again and notices that the glyph is gone. As the party continues down, suspended off a cavern ceiling is a figure about to fire an arrow. He fires it at the bear, which bull-rushes it of the stair-case. Finn jumps off the stair case and turns into dyer eagle form. Finn instructs the party to get on the opposite side of the pillar. Smoth casts fly and follows after Finn. The dark figure with the powerful bow and arrow fires off two arrows that miss Smoth and hit the tower. Smoth tosses off a scorching ray at the dark archer. Keldon, Shun, and Harcourt look onwards and the sky is illuminated by combat. Flamestrike is sent out by Keldon which creates a visible halo around the Archer. Shun shoots an arrow wide as the archer drops to the floor of the cavern. Finn flies down as the figure drops and the archer fires arrows on his way down. Smoth fires an arrow at his shoulder sending the archer spiraling out of control. Finn slashes at the figure as they both fly down at astronomical speeds and grabs the archer. Finn ascends back up with the archer, flying higher and higher to the top. Finn crushes the archer to death with his talons. Smoth test the archers bow to get a sense of it’s power. The party continues down the stairs at a faster pace. Shun uses Smoth’s cloak to jump down, while Finn carries Keldon and Harcourt down in his talons. A fireball is detonated; Keldon and Harcourt are injured. Finn flies them to a more obscure safe place, as Harcourt drinks a cure moderate potion. A Mantecor, mage, woman, and two drow are ready to destroy. The Mantecor flies around and penetrates Keldon’s armor. Shun comes emerges from the darkness into the view of the enemy but they fail to shoot him down. The woman screams at Shun. Smoth pops a scroll, touches the pillar, and illuminates everything around them, blinding the drow. Finn fairy fires on a drow casting expeditious retreat. Harcourt fires an arrow at the mantecor and hits. Keldon has flame engulf the mantecor, singing it’s wings. The woman(blinded) gets closer to Shun which gives the opportunity to hammer her with his halberd. Smoth fires another arrow at the Mantecor slamming him back. The mage tries to cast on Finn but Finn is not impressed and unleashes a full attack on the mage, followed by a grapple. The mantecor is annoyed by Harcourt and attacks him. One of the drow charges at Shun. Keldon confuses the Mantecor with his maze. The woman tries reach out to Shun to kill him, but she fails. Shuns attempts to retaliate but fails also. Finn crushes the mage to death and intimidates the oncoming drow. Harcourt pounds into the Mantecor with his bastard sword. Drows and the Umber-hulk surround Shun but fail to hit him. The woman tries to touch Shun once again, but she fails and he slashes at her once again. Finn rushes the drow witch and leaves her on the floor bleeding. Harcourt drinks another cure serious potion. Shun comes out unscathed against a flurry of attacks from the drow and also staves of the dangerous glances of the uber-hulk. Keldon finishes of the mantecor with searing light. Smoth moves to flank the umber-hulk and initiates a shock-and-grasp then sends lightening up the beast. The crew emerges victorious.

We descend to find the remaining drow…

We return to our group having taken out a drow mage and priestess, but allowing another mage to slip out while invisible. They ready themselves on the second floor, with Findale quickly dropping some readied holly on the doorway leading in. They back up, with commotion quickly approaching from below, and ready themselves. The door creaks open a crack, and magical darkness fills the entrance, and a looming form enters. Fin decided not to waste any time, activating the small natural bombs he had placed. The creature turned out to be an umber hulk, but it was ripped apart by the powerful cluster of explosives. More drow rushed in the room, and a melee ensued.

The party decides that they need to solidify Etine Tarris’s power and find a location for the school.

Our story begins back in the jail cells in Arness castle. We decide to keep Harcourt under wraps so that mob justice does not take him out. They decide to disguise him as a wounded soldier, take him to Etine, try to convince her to let him come with him. The troops around the castle cheer on the group as they head to Etine, and thank them. When asked why they are there, Smoth hints they were hired by a ‘lost son’ of Arness.

The party stands there for a moment soaking in the information, Harcourt kicked out of the capital, the wizards having turned against him. With a quick discussion the group decides now is the time to act.

The group flies into the city and decides to meet with Corwin’s contact. When they meet with him they tell him about their plans to enter into the castle. It is going to be enacted mostly by Smoth who will continuously set off the alarm and turn invisible. Smoth tell’s Leutenant Hevel to notify the Countess as to why the alarm is going off sporadically, and have her let the guards know that it’s a common occurance.

• Before Corwin will get the party past the Devereux guards, he asks for a favor. Countess Taris’ son, Derek (4 years old), has been taken hostage by Devereux henchmen and is being kept in a manor outside Arness. The party must rescue him before Corwin will help.

• Fin shapeshifts into a sparrow and flies to the manor to scout things out.

• Unable to find the boy outside or in any of the rooms with windows, Fin flies into an empty room and turns into a rat. He finds nothing but dire wolves and humans (probably werewolves) hanging around the house.

• Luckily, the wolves did not smell Fin and he was able to make it out. But not before he overheard some of the humans talking about what sounded like Derek (I think “little bastard” was the term used): ”...wonder if he’ll catch anything the first time out?”

• This made it seem like Derek was not at the manor anymore, so Fin shifted back into sparrow form and flew into the woods in search of Derek. Unable to locate the boy, he turned back to report to the party once it got dark.

• While Fin was scouting, Shun decided to get to know Corwin a little better. They mostly talk about politics and Shun discovers that Corwin actually thinks highly of Duke Harcourt. He doesn’t believe that Harcourt kmows what the Devereux’s have been up to. Corwin also talks about his hatred of Smoth’s father and how he’s the root of all Kensing’s problems. Since Smoth is not “Smoth”, he keeps his mouth shut, not wanting to start any trouble with an ally.

• Shun with help from the others finally convinces Corwin of Harcourt’s wickedness and Corwin pledges his men to our cause when we need them. Bonus!

• When Fin returned, the party decided to have Fin continue scouting in Eagle form and have the rest of the party wait on the fringes of the woods in case the boy came back.

• In a clearing in the woods, Fin sees 6 humans in loin-cloths eating a deer. One of the humans is a child.

• Assuming it must be Derik, Fin swoops in and grabs the child before any of his under-dressed companions can react.

• The child is reluctant to go. (The party thinks he’s already been turned into a werewolf by the Devereux’s) He struggles and causes Fin to lose his grip. The impact from the fall injured the child most severely, but Fin was able to heal him.

• After regrouping, Keldon teleported everyone back to Arness. Since they had a few extra people along this time, Smoth and Fin had to travel in the Bag of Holding.

• After the trip, both of them said it didn’t smell all that bad…

After defeating the guards outside of the mine, the party calls one of the workers over to discuss the situation. The man’s name is Vareth and after thanking everyone, he explains that there are still some mine bosses inside, but the main muscle is already defeated. Also, Corwin Flase, the previous captain of the guard in Arness, has been sent to work the mine in a recently reopened mine shaft. Vareth tells the party that the people assigned to work in that shaft have vanished, and only the biggest troublemakers get sent to work there.

After taking the two orphans to meet with Freka, the clan heads to Arness via the feather spell. Soldiers look suspiciously at the party as they walk through the gates; Smoth immediately hides his scabbard. A mace-wielding soldier asks the group’s business in being there in a very rude fashion. Eventually, he lets the party pass and they head to the temple of Boccob.

With Spring beginning, the former conscripts recruited by the party had plenty to do in tending to the crops and helping make Cranford more defensible. At this point, the adventurers had a couple of options. They could further investigate the rumors of the ruined tower to the north. This could provide a defensible base of operations for the planned resistance. But based on the rumors Smoth heard, it seemed a little too risky at the moment. Another option was to try to find some willing orphans to take back to Freka where they would learn the ways of the druids. Hopefully it wouldn’t take too long and it was something that needed to be done, so the party agreed to pursue this course.

The party learned of a group of officers in Harcourt’s army, who came to town and were collecting conscripts from the various towns. They discussed for a good while about what their plans were in terms of a resistance against Duke Harcourt, with them not really deciding what the best course of action would be. Ultimately they decided that the soldiers should be disposed of, and the conscripts freed of their duties. They attempted to wait along the path out of town for them, but they did not leave that day. Smoth attempted to force the brand to work on the two hooded figures in the inn of the group, but nothing happened. They decided to follow along behind once they did finally leave town, and did so.

After Defeating the Naga the party returns to the city, the last ingredient needed for crafting Gloves of Dexterity aquired.

The party returns to the leatherworker and manges to sell the entire Naga’s body for 300 gold, as it is in perfect condition. While there Keldon decides to purchase his own set of gloves for a lesser version of the Gloves of Dexterity than Fin and Smoth are having crafted.

With all the shopping and gathering business concluded, Asherok teleports us back to her house in the small village, and there in the basement Smoth and Asherok begin to work on the 3 pairs of gloves that are needed. During this time the rest of the party takes a long needed rest, except for Findail who spends every available moment scrying on the far away jungle. Eventually he starts asking Keldon to view the jungle with him, so that they might teleport there.

Keldon awaken his senses to realize more potential that was previously un-tapped, after spending time meditating and praying to Lirr. He then casts slay living into his ring, which seeps into his ring in the form of a black cloud. Smoth then slips the ring on his finger.

Ashaurok takes the clan shopping for various items via teleportation. They teleport into a cold, walled city that is much more metropolitan than the ones they had recently visited. Ashaurok takes the group to a gnome alchemy shop where they sell their items with ease. Finn then has his gloves embroidered with the outlines of various animals that inhabit nature. Smoth has a wolf-head embroidered on his gloves. While the gnome is willing to provide the gloves, he says that he will need poison from a Naga. Knowing full well that Nagas tend to live in evil underground places, they decide to seek out some sea caves.

Based on the outcome of the battle with the giants, the party decided to change their course of action. Since the Giants were too powerful for the party and the Giant Cleric was their only lead, they decided to abandon curing Duke Killingsworth for now. Having been in the northern part of the island of Kensing for some time now, the party decided to head back south towards Nent and check on their interests there. They also discussed the fact that causing a bit of trouble for Duke Harcourt while they were in the area would not be such a bad thing. But first, the party needed to go back to Istivin to pick up the magic items they ordered earlier. The only problem with this though was that the Istivin city guard would be on the lookout for all six of them. This ended up not being too much of a problem because Smoth had a completely new body, so no one would be able to recognize him. Fin decided to go along, pretending to be Smoth’s pet. He flew over and perched on Smoth’s shoulder and they were on their way. The rest of the party waited just inside the forest North of Istivin.

When Smoth and Fin approached the gates of the city of Istivin, they immediately noticed the wanted poster nailed to the guardhouse. The main reward was for Capt. Belaine, being charged with treason. Smoth, Fin, Shun, and Keldon were only mentioned as a footnote with a supplemental reward. Smoth and Fin continued into town, slightly disappointed that they were not worth a higher reward. They went to the magic item dealer’s shop, and since they had their tokens given to them when they placed the order, they picked up their items without any problems. Before they left town, they also purchased five horses so every member of the party would have his own horse.

On the way out of town, Smoth and Fin dropped by Algorthas the Seer’s house on the way to meet back up with the rest of the party. Both the gate and the front door were locked, but Smoth picked both of them. The house was very cold with no signs of any activity in some time. But they could tell that someone had been there since their last visit because the body of the servant boy was gone. Smoth searched the library and found two books on animals that seemed interesting. Fin used Detect Magic and found a faint magic glow from a glass lens on one of the sage’s desks. He took the lens to identify later on.

After meeting up with the rest of the party, they rode south towards the village of Cranford. There they planned to visit Smoth’s teacher, Ashaurok. The weather was cold and snowy and the road deserted. They passed through a number of villages on the way, but almost all of them had been at least partially destroyed by giants. One village they passed through was in very bad shape, so Fin suggested they stop and help out a bit. He used his druidic magic to restore the wooden palisades and some of the buildings. He also magically softened the ground around the outside of the palisades to make it harder for attackers to walk through. While there, the party meet a ranger named Awcer, who was in charge of the defenses of the town, which the party learned was called Belvoran.

Some of the townsfolk sought spiritual counsel with Keldon and Shun. Smoth showed the children some magic and tried to teach them some, but they soon became afraid or disinterested. This caused Smoth to declare that he wanted to start a system of schools throughout Kensing to teach the magical arts to children who would otherwise not have access to such teachings. Keldon thought this was an excellent idea and pledged his full support in the endeavor. Keldon’s deity, Lirr, looks favorably upon those who further the teachings of magic and knowledge in general. After hearing this, Smoth seemed a little more interested in the teachings of Lirr.

By the time they got to Cranford, the weather had cleared and the sun was shinning. They went straight to Ashaurok’s hut and inside they found their old friend Solist sitting in a chair staring at the wall. Ashaurok was glad to see them and after her and Smoth caught up a bit (especially about Smoth’s latest reincarnation experience), they began to discuss more serious matters. Ashaurok took out the branding iron the party had found earlier and said she had tried to destroy it, but couldn’t. She also explained how she discovered that the brand was still having a controlling effect on the people it had marked even though she now possessed it instead of Harcourt. She also mentions that Nent is aggressively conscripting fighters and mages. Because of this, most of the towns and villages, including Cranford, are not pleased with Harcourt’s rule. With this advantage, the party decides to create dissension within the ranks of the newly conscripted armies, starting with the soldiers assigned to the small villages and hamlets in the countryside of Nent.

---

Experience

Roleplaying story award – 750xp each

Took the lead on bolstering the defenses of Belvoran – 200xp for Fin

The party is still in the forest after interrogating and killing a giant to learn the location of the giant’s cave. They identified a few items after resting for the night, including a very flexible suit of black chain mail, which Smoth took, and aided his tumbling ability. They also identified a short bow, which seemed to contain a large amount of malice for giants, which Smoth also decided to put to use. In the morning they tracked down the cave, and waited outside for any giants to wander out.

After a few hours, a single giant came outside the cave, to obey nature’s call, and our heroes decided to pounce. Smoth snuck up behind with it with the giant-bane bow, while Fin perched in the treetops nearby as a dire eagle. They hit the unsuspecting beast with a 1-2 punch of a barbed arrow to his side, and a flamestrike. However, it was not enough to down it, and it charged, howling, after Smoth as he beat a hasty retreat. An entangling did not slow it down much, while Smoth’s further arrows failed to hit their mark. Keldon and Shun closed the distance from where they waited, but none paid much attention to the unidentified spells they heard in the distance. This was to their folly, as two more giants ran up at incredible speed, surrounding the grounded heroes. Fin tried to befuddle the giants with a cloud of fog, but was interrupted by a huge lightning bolt striking him from an invisible enemy. Smoth pulled out his smoking bottle in order to facilitate their escape, and Keldon was able to elude the deadly circle unharmed, but Smoth was not quick enough to escape. The two hastened giants surrounded him and beat him mercilessly, a blur of motion from two tree trunk sized clubs. He was only conscious for perhaps a split second before his entire ribcage was crushed, his skull battered against the ground and split open.

The melee turned into a morass of confusion as the giants ran around in the fog trying to locate their enemies, and the party tried to both elude them, eliminate the one extremely damaged original target giant, and remove Smoth’s body from the field.

Once the party returned to their base camp with the still bundled Duke, and Blaine, they set about to reincarnate Smoth. Smoth had already been reincarnated once before, and was very interested in experiencing new races. He was kind of annoyed before, however, that he was reincarnated as a human.

For this ceremony, Fin crafted a body out of the surrounding snow, and as Blaine muttered about the unholiness of reincarnations in general, Smoth’s body drifted back from the upper planes to inhabit the vessel, and it was gradually transformed into an elf.

---

Experience

Good planning for the giant ambush – Story award – 500xp each

Jordan: This is applied after your reincarnation.

After the battle with the ogres, the party decided to head towards the caves previously occupied by the ogres and currently occupied by giants. As the party traveled along the path in the forest, some of the party members heard a commotion up ahead. Being in eagle form and able to investigate without being noticed, Fin along with his eagle companion Acer took to the air to find out what was going on. They discovered a small band of goblins fighting two hill giants. The leader of the goblins rode a worg and the arrows from his bow seemed like the only weapon that was able to affect the giants. He was able to get off plenty of good shots that weakened the giants, but his luck ran out as one of the large rocks thrown by a hill giant hit him square in the chest and knocked him off his mount. It didn’t take very long before his head was smashed by one of the giants. Without their leader, the goblin band soon became a non-issue to the giants because at this time, Fin and Acer decided to attack from the air.

Their initial attack disabled one of the giants and Fin initiated a grapple to hold him while Acer handled the remaining giant. Seeing that he was outnumbered, the mobile giant turned and started to run away. As Acer pursued, the giant periodically turned and attempted an attack with his club. The first few times he missed, but on one of his turnarounds he slammed his club directly into Acer’s head, giving him critical injuries. The giant then pressed the attack by following up with another swing of his oversized club. This second hit killed Acer. Hearing Acer’s dying call, Fin released his hold on his giant to pursue the Acer’s killer. By this time, the rest of the party had arrived and subdued the giant Fin left.

Enraged, Fin flew at high speeds and soon caught up with the fleeing giant. Fin attacked the giant and killed him. Not satisfied, Fin severed the giant’s spinal cord with his beak and removed the head from the giant’s lifeless body. Fin returned to the party with Acer and began to build a funeral pyre. During the ceremony, Fin swears an oath to take revenge upon the giants in this area, declaring that Acer did not die in vain. Sunn then led Fin in a prayer to St. Cuthbert to aid him in carrying out his oath.

The first step in fulfilling Fin’s oath was to question the surviving giant about his tribe and their hideout in the cave. After a few hand gestures and incantations, Keldon laid his hand on Fin’s shoulder. The magical energy transferred to Fin gave him the power to temporarily speak and understand any language, including Giant. Fin then questioned the giant but didn’t find out much. The giant was reluctant to give out information and what he did say could not be taken as being completely true. He did go into some detail about the giants’ current feud with the local goblin tribe. Realizing that he had gotten all of the information that he could out of the giant and deciding that it wasn’t satisfactory, Fin asked Smoth if he wanted to deal the death blow with his dagger. Smoth obliged and the party then searched the dead for treasure. The goblin that was riding the worg had a very nice short bow and a black chain shirt. The bow was of great interest to the party after seeing a single goblin almost slay a giant with it. But since no one had any spells prepared to identify it, they’d have to wait until they rested. By this time it was getting close to dawn, so the party (really just Keldon and Smoth, due to lack of sustenance rings) needed to rest anyway.

---

Experience

Defeated 2 giants – CR 8

8	2400xp
9	1800xp
10	1500xp

XP / person:

8	600xp
9	450xp
10	375xp

The party members interrogate the ogre who was captured during an ambush. After tying his hands and feet, they take turns intimidating and chatting him up. Finally, he gives a little information, the name of the leader of his tribe, Yarnat. Yarnat had given instructions to ambush travelers on the roads, which they had been doing for a while. Telling more, the ogre speaks about having to leave his favorite cave after giants took it over, but he hadn’t heard anything specific about Ilkaris. When asked about what sorts of giants inhabit the mountains, he explains that the population is mostly hill giants, with scattered frost. Mustering up some bravery, he refuses to reveal any more information about Yarnat or the giants, so after repeated warnings Smoth Harkshire slits his throat, sacrificing the ogre’s life to power his magical poisonous dagger.

While conferring on what to do next, Keldon sits down and identifies some red velvet boots that had been sitting in the bag of holding for while, and Smoth carves out an ogre tooth for his collection.

After a short discussion, the party decides to go after the ogres and try to take them out, because they are still a danger to the people in the area. Fin takes to the skies in eagle form to scout around and look for ogres, finding several in a camp with some crude, poorly constructed teepees.

Having two poison charged items, his dagger and spell-storing javelin, Smoth casts invisibility on himslef and sneaks into the camp. Keldon and Fin wait anxiously, waiting for the telltale sounds of commotion before attacking.

Smoth searches around between the tents, and begins counting adversaries: six ogres in the camp, one patrolling, one asleep, and then two of them having a conference of some sort in a large tent. The two in the tent are dressed differently than the others. One wears normal ogre garb, but has a massive axe with him, while the other wears a cape, chain mail, and sits with a broad sword across its knees. Smoth tries to keep investigating tents, but the female in mail hears him, and defensively casts a sleep spell on the area where she hears the noise, but Smoth easily resists it. However, within seconds she raises the alarm, and Smoth is forced to move to the outside of the camp as ogres begin spilling out of the tents.

Smoth tried to run back to Keldon (while still invisible) to give him some warning as to the numbers they were facing. Fin meanwhile, sees the commotion from his vantage point in the sky and decides to attack. Tucking his wings and going into a steep dive, Fin drops several hundred feet in only seconds. Without giving warning, he attacks the large ogre wielding the massive axe. In short order, Fin is surrounded, but acting quickly, he retreats back into the air and drops a flame strike on several of the ogres, killing them.

Combat rages on, with javelins thrown by ogres, searing light shooting out from Keldon’s outstretched finger, and a cone of cold from the suddenly un-invisible, flying ogre mage. Smoth, still invisible, intently scans the ogre mage, finding a weak spot to attack, only to have her turn invisibile again.

Rushing into melee, Keldon and Shun find the ogres to be strong opponents. Using some nearby trees as a wall, the two fight back to back, preventing the ogres from flanking from too many directions. Still, blow after blow rains down, nearly killing both of them.

Deciding that he can no longer stay out of the fight, Smoth, still invisible, creeps up behind the axe-wielder. Appearing suddenly with electricity crackling across his outstretched fingers, Smoth delivers a shocking grasp directly to the back of the ogre’s knee in a crippling sneak attack. Staggered, the ogre stumbles around the battlefield . Any strain on his part will surely cause him to collapse, yet he knows that when the fatigue from his rage takes its toll, he will die anyway.

Fin manages to summon 2 unicorns which run in and heal Shun and Keldon enough to survive. Taking a chance, Keldon spends precious time radiating a healing aura, in which their cures are maximally effective. Seizing the moment, Fin and Shun cast maximized cure spells and heal their most grevious wounds. Realizing the fight was lost, the ogre mage flees while invisible. Finn wild shapes into a giant bat and uses his echo-location to try to locate him, but finds nothing. Strange…

After the fight, they examine the surrounding carnage and reflect on just how lucky they are to have survived. Having faced death on many occasions, and sometimes losing, they decide to be more cautious in the future.

The party continued to battle the crazed wizard. At this point in the fight, the party members were beginning to wear down. To add to this, the wizard cast Feeblemind on Keldon, making him as intelligent as a common lizard. After the wizard cast another Wall of Fire, the party decided to retreat to the room containing the dungeon exit. They split into two groups with Shun, Keldon, and Smoth going one way and Finn going the other on the walkway around the center pool. While waiting to see if the wizard would follow them, some of the party members used the paintbrush to heal wounds. Of course Shun had to use the brush on Keldon because he was too busy drooling and staring at the wall to do it himself.

After no advance from the wizard, Smoth became fed up with the situation and decided to cast Silence centered on himself and run towards the wizard. Since the wizard had no weapon and could not cast spells while in range of Smoth’s Silence spell, he ran away into one of the cells while he continued his insanely screaming and ranting. Even though the party could not understand most of what the wizard was screaming, they did make out the name “Malgoth”, the same name spelled out in blood on one of the cell walls.

With the wizard cornered and unable to cast spells, the party made easy work of him. The party suspected that he might have information about Duke Killingsworth or might even be the Duke himself, so Finn used his healing skill to keep the wizard alive.

The party then left the dungeon and headed straight to the Temple of Pelor to see Father Cathaway. The priest was not being very helpful and the party sensed that something was wrong. He did give the wizard a sedative, but was reluctant to give the party any healing assistance. This was not like Father Cathaway, who is usually very generous when good-aligned parties require assistance. Keldon seemed especially disappointed in this turn of events and showed it by drooling a little extra and moaning slightly.

The priest did offer the party food, but at this time some of the party members began noticing Father Cathaway’s automated behavior. Finn and Smoth soon realized the priest was under someone else’s control and pretended to play along. They tried to give secret hand signals and gestures to each other indicating that someone needed to go get help, but it was lost in translation. Finn took initiative and excused himself from the temple. Knowing that Captain Belaine would surely provide assistance, he ran to the main city guard station.

After Finn left, Father Cathaway went to the back to get the food he promised earlier. Smoth and Shun were a little suspicious of this “meal”, so Shun and Keldon left while Smoth decided to stay and find out some more information. As his ferret familiar Qianto made a mess in the kitchen just for good measure, Smoth stood right outside the door to a back chamber and tried to make out the conversation taking place. He heard an unfamiliar voice giving Father Cathaway orders. By the sound of the voice, the creature it belonged to was otherworldly and not very friendly. Not wanting to find out for sure, Smoth retrieved Qianto and left the temple heading straight to the guard house.

Finn easily convinced Captain Belaine to assist the party and they decided to seek refuge at the Temple of Heironeous. The temple was small, but built more like a fortress than a temple. The lone cleric there welcomed the party and even used a scroll of Heal on Keldon to remove the effects of the Feeblemind spell. Weakened by their encounters in the dungeon, the party decided to rest for the night.

---

Experience

Escaped from the dominated Father Cathaway – Story award – 300xp each

Convinced Capt. Belaine to escape w/ you and left town – story award – 300xp each

Defeated an ogre ambush on the road – CR 8

8	2400xp
9	1800xp
10	1500xp

XP / person:

8	1200xp
9	1050xp
10	975xp

REVELATION!

Fresh off their encounter with the VROCK, our team wandered the halls before Finn crawled into what appeared to be a prison cell, while Smoth and Shun waited outside. Finn saw the horrid sight of a decapitated head hanging off a metal spike on the wall and also saw a demented, deceptive looking creature in his mid-forties rocking back and forth. There was writing behind him that predominantly spelled out the word “Malgoth”.

Suddenly! Finn pounced and slashed at the creature, the being became maniacal and erratic as Shun walked into the cell, and Finn struck again with a flame strike. The flame strike and no effect on the entity, and it retaliated by summoning a fire elemental that immolated Shun and Finn, via fire wall. By this time, the creature had unleashed a wasp swarm was spreading throughout the cell and Smoth stormed in trying to attack the fire elemental with his ice knife.

Keldon, the tied up prisoner, summoned two water elementals to battle with the fire elemental, meanwhile, Smoth opened up a smoke bottle to help conceal and protect the group from the wasps and elementals. Then Finn decided to use his “rod of water” to create a “Wall of Water” that would further aid the clan in beating the wasp swarm.

As the water flooded the room, the group found themselves completely submerged and suspended in the grey pool of silence. Little beads of light ignited the water and symbolically described the “pockets of hope” that have motivated them to continue their quest. It is clear that the overwhelming chaos that surrounds them is only trumped by the pure, morally praiseworthy people they have met and become.

Finn, now in cheetah form, guides the members to safety as the “wall of water” evaporates, leaving a floor covered with dead wasps in its wake. As the atmosphere settles and composes itself, a revelation reveals itself…..

IT’S THE DUKE!!!!

He was possessed and became the wasp swarming, elemental summoning beast. He’s still in horrid condition, and the group along with Keldon, take him back to the surface.

With the capture of the sorcerer turned frog and the guards who wreaked havoc the night before, the party met up with the captain of the city guard, Captain Belaine. With the help of the captain they subdued the guards safely and restrained the sorcerer with cuffs designed to create spell failures.

The party re-entered Istivin’s dungeons, looking for the missing Duke Killingsworth. Their previous incursion had been a bit of a stalemate, as the devils they encountered could teleport at will, making it nearly impossible to ever deal the final killing blow.

Upon entering the torture chamber, they again confronted the Vrock they had fought before. Teleporting into their midst, surrounded by mirror images, he attacked Shun with a fury.

Thinking quickly, Smoth uncorked the eversmoking bottle, filling the chamber with thick obscuring smoke. Both Smoth and Shun were wearing their goggles of fireyes, so the smoke was no problem. Finn quickly cast fireyes on himself, leaving only the Vrock unable to see.

Flailing about, unable to see, the Vrock was quickly out-classed. It made one last-ditch attempt to telekinetically throw Findail into a pool of acid, but failed. Heavily wounded and lying on the ground, the Vrock made a tactical retreat and teleported deeper into the dungeon.

After healing themselves and letting the smoke dissipate, the party pushed further on, only to encounter the same Vrock, this time supported by several Babau demons. Luckily, the passageways were narrow, and by cornering the demons, the heroes were able to dispatch them back to the Abyss.

The party arrived at Istivin, and with minor incident found their way into town. They meandered around the square for a bit, noticing that there was a large brownish stain near the center of the square, which seemed to be avoided by the populace at large. Other than that, the city seemed to be a large bustling city, though teeming with guards.

While looking around, debating which shops to look at, and who to talk to to get an audience with the duke, they were interrupted by the sound of stone cracking. The base of a large statue of Pelor was breaking, and the stone piece was falling into the square, and looked like it would fall directly on a small girl. While the party was still getting their bearings, a nearby bard quickly cast some grease on the statue to try to redirect its fall, but it didn’t do much good, it still headed towards the girl. However, Shun was able to make a mad dash to the girl and shove her out of the way before the statue hit the ground.

However, as soon as the statue touched ground, it immediately seemed to change. Its eyes, which before had been just stone, now were a blue fire. It stood up of its own accord, and started laying waste to everyone around it. Shun still tried to protect the girl, turning his body into a shield around her. Blow after blow fell upon his back, as everyone else, along with the town guards, tried to find a way to stop the rampaging golem. After hitting it with an array of spells and weaponry, it collapsed into a pile of rubble, leaving behind two blue fiery gems.

After it was defeated, a priest came out of the temple, and was shocked at the state of affairs. He invited everyone inside, including the bard, whose name was Klandarian. While going inside, they noticed that the people of the town had returned to their normal business, with no real interest in the matter of the giant rampaging statue. Inside, the priest thanked them for their help in fighting the statue, and assured them that he was not the cause of it. He described to them the state of the city: Duke Killingsworth had disappeared 10-11 months ago, very shortly after he made known his intent to seek the crown. After this, his wife had taken over running the city, but strange events had started occurring since then. There were random deaths at night, along with strange creatures roaming the streets killing anyone out at night.

Smoth and Klandarian immediately took a disliking to each other, and exchanged some rude words. They left the temple in order to offer their services to the duchess. The priest offered to give them lodging in one of the nicer inns for the night. Klandarian opted to spend his time that afternoon auditioning for various taverns, and trying to make money performing. Eventually, they all stayed that night in the swank hotel.

That night, while sleeping, a loud boom was heard. Another building down the street from the hotel had caught fire. As the group piled out of their hotel room, they saw guards standing dazed in the street, while some figure flew around up above, cackling. Findail created a huge updraft, which put out the fire and blew back the flying figure. The figure ordered the guards to attack, and most of the party then spent their time trying to placate the suddenly vicious guards. Fin managed to polymorph the villain into a frog, which then tried to run (it still being able to fly, and now blinking thanks to a previous spell). However, Fin and Smoth were able to combine to track it down, using Fin’s flight and eyes in eagle form, along with both of them detecting magic to sense it.

We last left our heros having recovered Ashaurok’s spare spellbook. With her backup book returned to her Ashaurok was able to teleport the entire party to her tower to attempt to recover her main spellbook. Of course her tower was watched and the fearless heros had to protect her as she attempted to solve the puzzle that guarded her spellbook. It was an ingenious device made out to look like artwork of some ships on the wall, but the ships had to be arranged in a specific order to unlock. To make this even tougher the puzzle changed itself every time, so Ashaurok always has to solve it again. While she is solving the puzzle the battle rages on, a tough fight in which Ashaurok and Solist almost die. Barely surviving the encounter, the party teleports out, returning to Ashaurok’s safehouse, in a small village a couple days journey away.

Once again safe the party decides to help clean out the cave in which Ashaurok had hidden her backup spellbook. It took a few days, and on the final day of cleaning and repairing the cave to be a place for the townsfolk to retreat to if they are in trouble, devils teleport in seemingly without warning, although Solist had gotten a strong sense of danger from his magic amulet just moments before. In a brutal fight the party is victorious, only barely avoiding having townsfolk killed in the fight. The next night Solist wakes in the middle of the night, shouts for the party to get ready, and casts a protective spell right before the wall of the inn is blown off. Once more devils have come for the heros, and again they have caught them almost totally unaware. The leader of the devils casts a magic rope at Solist, which entangles him grappling him and dragging him to her. There she removes Solist’s magic amulet before vanishing while the other devils kept Findail, Shun, and Smoth busy fighting for their lives.

His amulet gone, Solist is a broken man. He rarely talks and is constantly staring at the ground in a distracted silence, a glazed look covering his unfocused eyes. Only when repeatedly and rigorously addressed does he return to the active world for brief moments before once again staring at the ground. Sadly he is no longer in a condition to adventure. The party has no choice but to leave him with Ashaurok under her care. With Solist safe, the party decides to head north to discover what Killingsworth is like,the only contender for the throne that the party has no idea about. While traveling there the group notices a ravaged countryside. Stopping in one of the villages our heros find out giants from the east have been terrorizing the populace because Killingsworth recalled all his troops at the request of his wife. With this troubling news the party heads to Istivin to speak with Killingsworth and offer their services to stop the giants.

Our heroes were in a long tunnel type area that extended to a door. They had were tired of the acid traps and were ready to put this to an end. Solist shot a fireball precisely into the door slot and the screams were silent within due time.

The warriors went deeper into the dungeon and into a room with Smoth leading the way. As Smoth marched into the room, a portcullis swiftly came down behind him. While Smoth was calculating what had just happened two digesters revealed themselves and moved in Smoth’s direction. One digester spat acid at Smoth while the other moved into a position to flank him. Smoth tumbled away and tossed off an Ice knife, slowing down one of the monsters. With remarkable ease, Smoth was able to completely evade blast after blast of deadly acid.

While Smoth dealt with the digesters, Fin summoned a Dire Wolf into the room and had the wolf trip the other un-slowed digester. The digester swiftly got up and attacked Smoth with his burning acid. His luck finally expended, Smoth went down as the acid burned threw his skin, nearly killing him in a single blow.

Meanwhile, Solist and Shun attacked from outside the portcullis. Solist casted a fireball, while Shun fired an arow. Following the outside assualt, Solist cast levitate on the portcullis in order to gain entry to the room for the rest of the party.

As the portcullis moved up, Shun charged in and slashed his halberd at a digester. Following Shun’s attack, Fin summoned a unicorn to heal Smoth. While taking another attack Shun is also spat at by a digester.

Smoth slowly got up after being healed. Regaining his composure, he firee a magic missile which brought down one of the beasts. While Smoth basked in the glory of killing a digester, Finn healed Shun who was badly burned by acid.

Shun, now fully healed, attacked the remaining digester with his halberd, while Smoth flanked the beast with a Shocking Grasp. Managing to execute a sneak attack, Smoth discharged a burst of electricity directly into the digester’s hip joint, causing the monster excrutiating pain. Shun finally silenced the digester for good with a strong swipe to the Digester’s forehead with his halberd.

Surrounded by carnage and the stench of digested flesh, the party rested for a moment and tried to decide what to do next.

Ok, here we go. If anybody has changes, remembers things differently, just make comments and whatnot.

When last we saw our heroes, they had descended the giant staircase down underground near Vassar, in pursuit of the desecrorb. They had fought the contingent of drow at the bottom of the stair, and beaten them, along with a dragon (color?).

When they finished fighting, they scouted around the town, which was made entirely of stone. They found a house converted into a stable for the giant bats which the drow rode, which also held a small halfling-like creature, which was in a prostrate position, and did not move, even when called to. Smoth did not trust this small, silent creature, and so snuck up and sapped it into insensibility. When they examined him, they found that he carried no weapons, and also had his tongue cut out. They decided to leave him there. In another large house, they found two more halflingish servants, in the same positions. Solist tried communicating with them in undercommon, and managed to convince one to write down some answers to his questions on a piece of parchment. They were able to find that the desecrorb had left town with the ‘mistress’. Solist tried to convince them that the drow were gone, and that the servants were free, and after some coaxing, they seemed to believe him.

While searching for an out of the way place to rest, the group discovered a barn full of crates, which seemed to be the spoils of the drow raiding parties. Smoth was never one to pass up an opportunity, and so confiscated a bolt of green silk from an open crate.

The party rested the night and then set out along the path sent on by their servant informant. It was 8 hours of drudgery and mind numbing boredom from the landscape, along with the maddening silence which accompanies underground travel. While they slept, Smoth had more dreams, in which his mentor Ashaurak seemed to be calling out to him. They set out the next day using magical horses summoned by Solist, and eventually came across a lake, with a pair of docks stretching out from the path. There was a boat sitting by one of the docks, which had no sail, mast, or oars. They were hesitant to just jump in, so Smoth went ahead and searched the area. He found nothing worrisome, except for the lone contents of the boat, a smallish chest. He thought it was trap free, but was proven wrong as a small dart shot out and pierced his skull between the eyes. However, he was easily healed of this wound, and the chest was opened to reveal what looked like sea charts – however, they were written in undercommon, and even Solist could not make head or tail of the writings.

They waited to decide what to do, without knowing the layout of the lake, it would be foolhardy to set off into this giant unknown, but they did not want to turn back after coming this far. Shun fired off lighted arrows to try to gauge the size of the lake, but it revealed nothing – it stretched out far beyond what they could discern. However, after several hours, Solist was able to discern the charts, and figure out where they were. It turned out that the lake was massive, extending under large portions of the island. He was even able to figure out the location of another staircase labeled ‘Mensington’, which was surely the orb’s destination. The party decided to set off in this direction. The magical till and rudder of the boat enabled it to travel, and they were on their way. After 2 days of travel, Fin heard voices while flying above the boat. He scouted ahead and found a group of drow fixing their boat on a small island. The group figured that this probably was the ‘mistress’ with the orb, and so devised a plan of attack. Smoth would swim forward in one direction with the smoking bottle, a stone of daylight, and the newly acquired goggles to see through the fog, Fin would fly in from another angle to fire off spells from afar, and on the side would come Solist and Shun in the boat. Their plan worked up until the point where the drow Mistress cast a spell to allow her to walk on water, and then raced up to the boat, where she cast Slay Living on Solist, who was unable to resist the powerful magic. Eventually they overcame her, but were left with the body of their dead comrade.

Summary

Derek Harkshire was a one-time Red Lion who then settled down as a minor noble in Arness. About a year ago, he vanished in the night after receiving a cryptic letter. All he took with him was his sword and his armor.

Since then he has been spotted in the company of undead and evil soldiers in the service of Baron Edwards.

Worst of all, Derek is accused of murdering Count Alron Tarris. For this, Duke Harcourt has stripped House Harkshire of all lands and titles and proclaimed all Harkshire’s to be enemies of Nent.

The Letter and Derek’s disappearance

Oh so long ago, when the party first met in Arness, Smoth was living with his parents in their manor house. One day, the family butler, Mendes, came to Smoth very distraught. According to Mendes, Derek had received a cryptic letter late in the night. It said (paraphrasing…so long ago…):

Derek, a promise was made a long time ago and now it must be honored. You know where to find me.

Derek gathered his sword, armor, and horse. Then, in a solemn ceremony, he drew his sword from its scabbard and swore that the blade would be bared until his work was complete. Mendes was confused, but sensed the gravity of the situation. At that, Derek told Mendes to burn the letter and speak of it to no one. Then, Derek rode off into the night.

Rather than destroying the letter, Mendes took it to Smoth, asking of the significance. He also gave to Smoth Derek’s scabbard, a gift from the King for Derek’s service as a Red Lion. Unable to puzzle out the meaning of the letter, Smoth only knew that his father had ridden south, so he decided to follow.

Nent and the attack

A week or so later, when the party was resting in Nent, it was attacked in the night. Swarms of undead were coming off ships in the harbor and killing citizens in the streets. The party managed to fight their way to the docks, cutting through zombies and skeletons along the way.

At the docks, they faced several soldiers clad in matte black armor, with helms painted as skulls. As they fought, more soldiers on a nearby galleon rained arrows down onto the party. At the stern of the ship stood a man in gleaming armor with a sword in his hands. When it was clear that the party would overwhelm the soldiers on the shore, he called out for the ship to undock and leave. Even over the clamor of battle, Smoth was able to identify his father’s voice. The ship left the dock and sailed out into the night. However, Smoth was able to learn that the soldiers were members of Baron Edwards’ elite squadron, the Body of Death.

Mensington and the Body of Death

While in Mensington, the party learned that the Body of Death is an elite squadron of soldiers answering directly to Baron Edwards. They are recruited and trained in isolation in his keep on the cliff overlooking Mensington. Not much is known, except that the training is brutal and many do not survive.

The Haunted Keep

Some time later, the party found itself investigating a haunted keep. Shadows had been terrorizing a nearby town, and the party was tasked with finding the source and eliminating it.

Near the keep, the party came upon a group of non-hostile ghosts. They were drawn to Smoth, somehow recognizing him. They managed to communicate to him that if he were able to destroy a nearby marauding shadow, they would speak with him.

Inside the castle, the party found several shadows and a headless ghost. They destroyed the shadow, but the ghost seemed impervious. At one point, it jumped into Smoth’s body, and using Smoth’s sword, attempted to cut his own head off. Disaster was narrowly averted, and Smoth managed to force the ghost out. However, when they were connected, Smoth saw some of the ghost’s last memories of life. He saw his father’s young face, as he drew back his sword, then swung it at Smoth/ghost’s neck. As his severed head bounced along the floor, he glimpsed 2 other figures: one in a deep cloak, and a sneering man in full plate with a religious symbol on it. Then everything went black.

After escaping the castle and the ghost, they met again with the ghosts outside. One of them jumped into Smoth’s body, allowing Smoth to view his final memories. This time, Smoth was with a small army besieging the castle, led by Derek Harskshire. In the night, the army was attacked by shadows. As the men fell, they rose immediately as shadows, turning on their former companions. Soon enough, Derek ordered his men to kill anyone who came close to falling to the shadows. In mere minutes, the battle was over and the survivors laid on the ground, sapped of their strength by the shadows.

The same to figures from the other ghost’s vision came out of the castle and approached Smoth/ghost and Derek. The cloaked figure spoke to Derek, obviously recognizing him. He had specifically spared him, and offered him his life in exchange for service. Derek refused immediately. At that point, the figure mentioned Derek’s pregnant wife.

“If you will not serve, then I will take your wife and unborn child. She will be my wife, and he shall be raised as my son. You shall not die here, but shall serve me eternally in a state of undeath.”

At this, Derek’s composure broke, and through tears, he agreed to the figure’s demands. The sneering man in armor stepped forward, brandished a holy symbol, and restored some of Derek’s strength. Derek and the cloaked figure headed towards the castle, and the last thing that Smoth/ghost heard was, “First Derek, I have a gift for you…”

At that, evil sneering cleric turned towards Smoth/ghost and said (in a Spanish accent), “Yes, I see you there. I know you’re alive. You too shall serve my master.” At that, he pulled out a black onyx gem and roughly shoved it into Smoth/ghost’s mouth. However, before he could cast the spell, Smoth/ghost was able to summon the strength to draw a dagger and stab himself through the throat.

Starting status:

Party Members: Smoth, Famish, Fin, Roland, Shin, Solist.

copied directly from an email: The party found a small log cabin that had some hill giants hanging around it. On investigation, they found a young ranger waiting in the woods nearby observing the giants. He asked them to help him find his mentor, a druid, who was dragged away by some more giants. They recaptured the log cabin, found out where the other giants were heading, then cut them off at the pass. It was a pretty well executed ambush and they handily slaughtered the giants, while only heavily scorching their captive.

So, the druid has offered a small reward (which was not detailed last time, but I think Finn will be very interested) and noted that the giants in the Slaghorn Mts. (nearby to the east) have become much more troublesome lately.

The group headed back to Arness in order to find out the truth in the rumors of Smoth’s family being stripped of their titles due to his father’s being named as a criminal. They were in fact completely true. When they arrived, Smoth found that his family estate lay in ruins after a mob had destroyed it, and his mother was basically being held in the nearby temple of heironeous for her own protection. They quietly left the town, Smoth not wanting to bear seeing his destroyed home, and not knowing how to face his mother.

From there they headed north to Kensor. There are a lot of refugees trying to gain entrance to the city, which results in long lines as they are all approved by the gate guards. While standing in line, someone in the party is asked to smuggle in a small white pearl looking item, which is extremely cold to the touch. Ever the entrepreneurs, they agreed to for a fee.

Apparently Roland got killed at some point around here? Also we went here to meet someone at the request of Dagenar Brownstone, don’t know who?

Inside the city they decided not to hand over the white pearl thing, and instead fought and defeated the smuggler they were supposed to deliver it to, and instead turned him in for the bounty. They also encountered an extremely annoying bard named Tamradin. He seemed to want to become some sort of Agent for the group, bringing fights to them or something.

Also while there, Roland took on a new cohort Galen, and helped him finish his trials in the temple of St. Cuthbert. Various other regular stuff happened there.

They then headed northward to Vennar, in order to try to find Krag, who had sent them a message (I believe he sent us a message…or we found out from those assassins). Along the way, as they headed into Baron Oglethorpe’s territory, they discovered that the Baron was using brigades of monsters as a form of army, along with other more traditional mercenaries. The monsters were harassing the populace and treating them about as well as an invading army does, so the party was attacking them and taking them out when they could. They made plans to attack one manor house along the way which seemed to house a decent amount of trolls, which seemed to be some of the commanders. However, after putting their plan into motion, they realized they were outnumbered and overpowered, especially with the several medusa which were living in the house. The entire party was eventually turned to stone.

They also investigated a demi-plane, a portal to which had been created in the church of Boccob again, I wasn’t here for this…anybody remember this?

Not really sure about the details of this – Finn was on some solo mission or something, when he got the note from Crag

Also we did the thing about infiltrating the thieves guild, I REALLY don’t remember that much

The group had by now performed several helpful deeds for the temple of Boccob, and were regulars in their library. The head of the library, Father Johannsen, considered them close enough allies to ask for their help with a sensitive task. He needed them to do some spying on a low-level librarian who he thought was a spy ? was it a spy? for who? However, the whole secrecy aspect was flubbed, and they ended up fighting in the corridors of the library, as well as exposing Johannsen as the one who asked them to do it. Famish in particular was responsible for a lot of the problems, and he apologized profusely before sulking for the rest of the day in his room. At this point, everyone decided it was probably a good time to leave Mensington.

Who is Ormun? I see the name in some emails, but I have no idea who that is – apparently we wanted to teleport him to the underwater temple? or something?

The group left Mensington and headed north to a small logging community called Crenshaw. While wandering about in the woods, they discovered that the loggers were being attacked from something in the woods. While investigating, Smoth encountered a Unicorn, which asked for his help in getting the loggers to stop cutting down so many trees. He was willing to help, and tried to come to a peaceful agreement with the loggers. However, due to some kind of misunderstanding, Shin attacked the Unicorn without realizing it, of course earning its undying enmity.

Moving on to the next town, there was some kind of poisoning or something. Fixing it entailed traveling into some kind of small dungeon, first through a sort of sluice showing dwarven carvings on the inside, with a very dangerous pit at the bottom of it, and then a few rooms past it. However, after that was a gigantic spiral staircase, which went down several hundred floors, and eventually into a giant cavern. The party fought their way past several drow to get down there. what we did down here I don’t really remember, other than that we found that coin with the skeletal hand which seemed to be causing the poisoning…and we could scry on it to see another coin in a giant pile of treasure.

They then traveled on to Wessen, this being the place that Smoth had heard his father had some kind of bad experience in before he was born. There they found some kind of haunted castle. They met with a cleric of Pelor(?), a dwarf named Daganar Brownstone. They also discovered that a lot of soldiers were staying in town, and garrisoning themselves in the local temple of Farlanghen(spelling, pfah). Roland was very upset about this as it offended his sense of good soldiering and decency, and Famish was very upset about this as he felt a great kinship with Farlanghn even if he was not a devout worshipper. They both set about in various ways to expel them. However, before fully dealing with them, they were attacked by shadows, seemingly from the haunted castle, and the ‘Shadowmaster’ who seemed to live within.

What happened in the castle – still need to find detailed account – it involves Smoth and maybe more people having their bodies taken over, Smoth’s father killing some people, and Smoth now wants to find the head of the long dead Count Arcanor, and return it so he can have his eternal rest.

After returning from the Castle, Roland made good on his word to get rid of the soldiers from the temple and people’s houses. Though it actually ended up being Fin to faced him in single combat (I think? the emails seem to imply it), due to Liam’s insults. (Liam being the captain of the soldiers there.) A new barracks was built for the soldiers, and all was well.

However, it seemed that the group got too complacent in their victories, for as soon as they set out from the town, they were attacked in the night by a pack of dire wolves, and Solist and Shin were slain after they were overwhelmed. They managed to beat them back before any more deaths. Famish had a single teleport scroll he kept in reserve, and he used it to teleport some of them to Nent in order to allow them to get reincarnated. Fin could cast the spell, but did not have all the necessary oils and potions on hand. The spell worked successfully, though Solist was brought back as a half-orc and Shin as a dwarf, which neither of them appreciated. However, this left Solist, Fin, Famish, and Shin in Nent, while Smoth and Roland were still over 100 miles away near Rockham. (Along with James, roland’s follower, and Thon, Fin’s gorilla animal companion).

While traveling, the sub-group discovered that Duke Harcourt and Baron Edwards had apparently started open warfare, they had to ease their travels farther east and ford a river with the stupid wagon that smoth always brought along in order to avoid fighting.

They arrived in Nent, I think. Who knows.

Everyone was a little shook up after the undead invasion, and everyone re-examined their priorities. Crag decided that he would be better off searching for his half-brother on his own, and set off to pave his own path. Jervais, who had been eager to find and join the Red Lion Elite (the elite king’s guard) decided to stop adventuring and devote his time to study of the Desecrorb. Smoth intensified his magical study. He spent time in the nearby forest communing with nature, and after several hours, re-joined the remaining group with a small ferret companion, who he dubbed Qianto. Famish decided that what his life was lacking was an even greater store of randomness and flashy colors, so he set about to research and find or build a rod of many colors.

While traipsing about the city, they even discovered some new blood to bring with them – a halfling barbarian named Shin, and a drow wizard named Solist. Shin had been carried to the island against his will, sold as a slave in the black market. He had broken free, and was adamant about not being captured again. The group aided him in a fight against something, so he claimed he was blood bonded and would help protect them. Solist was in the city to do research of some kind – he had a very strange amulet he wore which seemed to have some kind of connection, and he wanted to know more about it.

They even got to talk to the governor of the city, Duke Harcourt. After helping fight back the undead invasion, they were allowed to come to the palace for official thanks from his lordship. Smoth discovered that he had actually known his father Derrick, had fought alongside him in the Red Lions. Smoth asked about his memories of their service together (to subtly find out about anything that might have sparked his current behavior), and was told about a certain event that happened in Wessen.

However, Ashaurok had assignments for her new student, and sent him off to a submerged ancient temple out in the bay a ways from the coast of Nent. She did not have a familiar, strange for a wizard as experienced and powerful as herself, but in the previous weeks she had felt a strange connection with some creature there. She knew that it was her future familiar, and wanted Smoth to go collect it. Everyone was up for exploring ancient temples and taking valuable treasure, so they went.

Using scrolls of water breathing, they descended down. The temple contained mostly air, so they were able to function normally after entering. The first room contained 3 statues of men with diferent animal’s heads being consumed by sharks, as well as a painting on the ceiling of ‘The Storm Queen’, an angry scaly female, raising a horrible storm. The Storm Queen, whose temple it seemed to be, was apparently an evil nature goddess. The party puzzled over the levers, but eventually figured out their trick and made their way through the temple. They fought off sharks and other underwater animals, as well as different varieties of lizards, but ultimately found their goal – there was a group of small creatures that looked like halflings with black fins (actually a water mephit). They seemed to be kept there for sacrifices to the Storm Queen. The group rescued them all, as well as bringing a certain one back to Ashaurok. They also nabbed some very interesting tridents from a series of statues in one of the halls, and Smoth took a very interesting dagger from one of the priests. It was constructed out of a large sharktooth, with smaller teeth forming the hilt guard. When holding it, he could feel a sort of hate and disdain for humans – pretty disconcerting, since he was one himself.

Plans were hatched to travel westward, to the city of Mensington. Famish wanted to do research at the library in the temple of Boccob there, as there was none in Nent. He had heard that he could find information there on the fabled Rod of Many Colors, which occupied most of his thoughts. Smoth had been given another task by Ashaurok, to kill the familiar of a wizard called Fuegis who lives in Mensington. They had been rivals for a long time, and Fuegis had killed Ashaurok’s old familiar after catching it trying to steal a ring from him. He had sent the familiar’s ashes back to her, along with the ring, claiming that it was unimportant. Now Ashaurok wanted revenge, and for Smoth to kill his familiar Flammon, and leave the ring on its corpse.

Shin was very determined to NOT get on a boat again, since he had arrived on the island in the hull of a slaver ship, did we cross on a ship or not? But ultimately, they arrived in Mensington. There were several things that struck them about the city. To go inside, you first had to be tested by the guards for arcane magical ability. Anyone who tested positive was classified as Arcane, and had to wear a large red A. Anyone who tested negatively had to wear a drab lowercase m, for mundane. Mundanes were considered second class citizens here, with open discrimination against them. Among the four of them who made the trip, Smoth, Famish, Solist, and Shin, only Shin had no magical abilities, but he seemed to take it in stride. He wasn’t too concerned about what a city full of weirdos thought of him.

While exploring the city, they were in for a large surprise. There were troops moving around in the city, seemingly separate from the regular guard force, or even regular military. These special troops were wearing the exact same type of armor worn by the commanders on the ships of the undead invasion; black and with distinctive skull images on them. Smoth was left with no choice but to think his father now worked for Baron Edwards, the governor of the city, and another who vied for the Red Lion throne.

Famish and Solist set about to find the Library of Boccob, but were denied access to go inside. They only allowed members inside, of which there were different levels of membership. Most of them involved very large sums of cash, but they did seem to have special cases for those without such money. Famish agreed to take on a task involving hunting basilisks and collecting their eyes, while Solist agreed to investigate the strange happenings with the sewers. While in the sewers the party stumbled across an entrance to a demiplane where multiple sewers in the world drain into. While there they discovered a crazy gnome scientist experimenting on two captured people, a human Kensai with a flaming adamantine sword named Roland, who had been a member of the Red Lion guard, and an Anthropomorphic-Bat creature named Findail the Destroyer, a druid. The party rescued these two adventurers, and in gratitude they both joined the party to offer their assistance.

They completed those missions I wasn’t there for the basilisk mission someone should fill it in, and were granted access. .

History had a way of catching up to Smoth and Famish, who were targeted for an attack by a group of Banderans. Apparently the mercenary band stretched across the island, and had not forgotten their run-in in Nent. All of the original group was being targeted, and they thought about finding Crag and warning him. Jervais was still in the temple of Heironeus in Nent, so he seemed to be safe enough.