# The never ending story of ...



## BoldItalic

Od contemplated his room in the attic of the Pig and Lion. It was dingy and squalid but at least it was free. The previous occupant had left it in a filthy state but Od conjured up an _Unseen Servant_ who soon set about cleaning it up. Mice scurried under the furniture in alarm as a broom wielded by invisible hands swept every corner free of dust and cobwebs.

Od settled on the bed and cast a _Light_ cantrip on the bedpost behind his head. He drew out a letter and began to read. A halfling maiden had thrust it into his hand earlier, as he finished his performance in the common room downstairs. Tumbling and Juggling was his forte and it went down well enough tonight, but the customers had really been more in the mood for a sing-song. A few bars on the flute had been enough to set them off and the landlord was suitably appreciative, for singing makes thirsty throats and thirsty throats make good takings at the bar.

"Dear Od", the letter began ...


----------



## rgoodbb

"Dear Od", the letter began ...

You must come home soon. Mother has gone mad and locked father in the basement. I can hear his cries and pleading to be let out. Mother has become dangerous. She thinks she is doing this for my protection. Od. Please get here as fast as you can, I beg of you. Together, we may be able to stand up to her once and for all.

Your loving brother, Ivan. 

Od, stalling, reread the letter another two times, eventually sighed, collected his things and snuck out the Pig so's not to awaken the landlord. He took to the western road in the dead of night, old long repressed memories returning to haunt him.

So caught up in these emotional thoughts was Od that he almost failed to see.......


----------



## BoldItalic

He almost failed to see....... 

... the pirate walking towards him, with a rolling gait that spoke of a long-time sailor only recently disembarked onto dry land. A wind sprang up out of nowhere as the pirate casually suggested to Od that he hand over his valuables "because of the storm that was brewing".

Od knew a _Charm Person_ spell when he saw one and countered with one of his own. "Your pirate hat is attracting the lightning, better let me hide it for you," he suggested. Their eyes locked and both laughed, recognising a kindred spirit. They shook hands.

"Nornthew," the pirate introduced himself. "Seafarer out of Neverwinter. I do a bit of Storm work."

"Od," replied Od. "I do a bit of performing. Taverns mostly. Where are you heading?"

Norn's reply astonished the bard ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Norn's reply astonished the bard ...

"I was heading to the Pig to pick up an individual....who's....supposed..to av'.....some....magic." Norn stared into the face of Od, lightning reflecting in his eyes. "Well. I guess that's you. C'mon we av' one other to pick up along the way and then we're heading for your 'ome."

"Wha...How do you know all this? Who are we picking up? What is going on at home? Why are you involved?" Od began to hyperventilate with the intensity of the moment.

"I'll tell ya along the way. We av' to stop off at Lower Trieve, an' this one ain't gonna be 'appy abaat' this."

Norn did not divulge any more formation along the wet and muddy road west. It was early morn and the mists were still clearing when they entered the squalid village of Lower Trieve. They meandered towards the outskirts nearing a small wood-hewer's hut......


----------



## BoldItalic

... nearing a small wood-hewer's hut...... 

A burly man was outside the hut, chopping wood. He looked up as the two approached and made a sign of peace. "Nordthew? What brings you to these parts?"

"We 'ave need o' ye, Sergeant Herewulf. This 'ere 'alfling bard, name of Od if ye believe it, 'as family trouble. Needs a peacemaker such as yerself. Or, if'n it comes to blows, yer 'ealin' 'ands."

Herewulf grumbled. "You know I've retired from the Order. And I've never taken the Oath. Can't you leave me alone?"

"Nope," replied the pirate forcefully. "There be evil afoot, turnin folks mad agin' each other. 'Tis just the start. We stand or we fall. You know the score."

"If it's too much trouble, please don't inconvenience yourself," offered Od in feigned meekfullness. This had precisely the effect he had calculated. The paladin stiffened and became resolute.

"I'll get my equipment," said Herewulf, laying down his woodcutter's axe and going indoors. He emerged ten minutes later clad in chainmail, a rapier at his belt and bearing a shield emblazoned with the sign of the goddess Eldath. "Let us venture forth!" he declaimed dramatically.

The three set off ...


----------



## rgoodbb

The three set off ...

The weather deteriorated to such an extent that the uncomfortably muddy road transformed into a gloopy quagmire. Along the way Herewulf paused to lend his considerable strength in aid of a cart, its wheel slodged fast in the mush. 

Od, taking a leary glance at the sky above spat out his thoughts. "Is this your doing Norn?"

"What? Oh. Nope. I have some power over inclement weather but this is just nasty." Thunder crackled ominously around them all as if to prove his point.

A whiles later they huddled and hunched under a therecastle tree for breakfast,  Nornthew keeping the downpour off of them with minor magic, Od heating and flavouring the food. 

"Flaimin' heck Od. That's some good grub there." Herewulf exclaimed, licking his fingers. "So what's all this about then?"

"Well....It's like this............


----------



## BoldItalic

"Well....It's like this............"

Od sumoned up all his story-telling skills to try to make what he was about to relate sound halfway plausible. Which it wasn't. Even when he glossed over the complicated bits, it was still crazy.

"My step-father, Jonas, who is also his own aunt twice removed (it's a tight-knit family) goes mad and hairy every full moon so my step-mother Betty has to lock him up in the cellar for a few days otherwise he will start eating his relatives (which is the entire village, one way or another). He was Cursed By Fate two years back. Fate is the village witch, by the way, and is everybody's grandmother so no-one can get rid of her but she's really nasty and does things like turning people blue for no reason. Now Betty used to be a priestess of Lolth until she Fell From Grace and had to run away. She won't talk about it but she goes all weird if you mention slave boys and manacles. Anyway, she married Jonas for his money but then found out he hadn't got any and she's never forgiven him and keeps him locked up in the cellar even after the full moon, just out of spite."

Herewulf nodded. "So, what exactly is the problem?" he asked.

"The cat's gone missing."

"And the cat is ... ?"

"My uncle Barnabas."

"I see. What do you make of this, brother Nordthew? What do you propose?"

"Obviously a hotbed of evil. Plunder the village, slaughter the inhabitants and raze it to the ground."

"You mean kill everybody and take all their stuff?"

"How else?"

"Er ..." interjected Od. "That's _my_ village we're talking about."

"Good. You can give us the inside on where all the loot is stashed."

"That isn't ..."


----------



## rgoodbb

"That isn't ..."

"Don't bow out on me now boy. This is the stuff of intrigue. So....who's your daddy? Just kidding. Mum's the word. I give up. Uncle! But seriously. Our quest is to find the cat....your uncle....named Barnabas? That's some pretty messed up gronk right there."

"Welcome to my world. Why do you think I moved away?"

"Well incest..uhm I mean instead of running, shouldn't you be dealing with this?"

"I will. But no burning or stealing."

"Not even a..

"No!"

"Well is the cat a familiar? I mean I know it obviously gets familiar, caus like you entire fam... but, I guess we'll let you lead the way with this one. I don't understand the quest."

"Wait. Quest? Who told you about all this. My brother wrote to me, so who told you?....................


----------



## BoldItalic

Nord looked hard at Od. "He din't jus' write to you, he wrote to the whole wide world. There's copies of his letter in every tavern up and down the Sword Coast. He din't know where you were, see."

Herewulf looked thoughtful. He did that sometimes when conversations took an unexpected turn and he wanted people to slow down and give him time to think. "If everyone knows about the Quest," he suggested, "there could be dozens of adventurers heading for Od's village right now, chancing their luck. That's fine by me - they can deal with it and I can go home. Thanks for the meal, I'll be off now."

"Not so fast," protested Od. "The letter didn't say where my village is. It didn't even give the name of the village, because it didn't need to. But _I_ know where it is. No-one else can muscle in. There's just us. It's our problem."

"He's right," agreed Nord. "It's our problem."

The paladin sighed. "So it comes down to smiting evil. Why is it always smiting evil? Can't evil just take a break from being smought? Oh well. I suppose I must. But we need a proper plan, though. Objectives. Milestones. Diagrams with bubbles and arrows joining them up. That kind of thing. Now, what's the name of the village, and where is the nearest castle?"

"If I tell you, do you promise not to burn it down?"

"Oh, alright."

"It's called ... Wait! What was _THAT_?"

"What was what? Oh, that. Just the heavens being rent asunder and choirs of celestial beings singing in multitudes. It happens. Take no notice."

"No, I meant _THAT_. Over there on that hillside. What is it?"

"Looks like a gazebo, to me."

"I thought they lived in Africa?"

"That's gazelles."

"Oh."

"Whatever it is, it's headed this way."

Sure enough, within the space of a few short minutes, the gazebo arrived and ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Sure enough, within the space of a few short minutes, the gazebo arrived and ...

...A genie appeared.

"Greetings and good welcomings to you my friends. I am THACO. I usually arrive in a trap door rope trick but I have taken the upgrade option with all the turkey trimmings as you good people are fond of saying. With one cast of _Transport Via Gazebos_ , I will spirit you away to your destination." 

"Um. OK. Sure. I guess."

A couple of dumb nods and grunts later, they were at the house of Od's upbringing. 

As a house, it was polite. With a good upbringing, taking in all the respectful customs and rituals....It was a Manor House.

The tempest as it truly was here had reached a crescendo of epic proportions. 

*Od* was wondering what chaos his near and extended family had gotten themselves into

*Herewulf* was wondering how many xp he would be getting for this mission. It might level him up and he could really do with that inspiring leader feat. 

*Norn *was wondering where all the girl adventurers had gone to these days. 

Within the house itself, near the cellar door, words were being exchanged.........


----------



## BoldItalic

The conversation went something like this:"I'm not letting you out until you say sorry!"

"I'm not _coming_ out until _you_ say sorry!"

"Barnabas has gone missing! It's all your fault you stupid man!"

"He's right here with me! It's all your fault you stupid woman!"​
and so on. Nord looked at Od, Od looked at Herewulf and Herewulf looked at Nord. Then, as one man, they crept quietly away and repaired to the local tavern, which was called the Harmonious Blacksmith. The bartender recognised Od, nodded sympathetically and set down three mugs of foaming beer.

Od slapped a few coins on the bar and said "Thanks. My friends will have the same."

After a few minutes silent drinking, Nord remarked "Seems a nice enough tavern. Shame to burn it down."

"We aren't going to burn the village down," Herewulf reminded him. "We're going to wait here until a mysterious elf woman in a blue cloak comes in, looking for three adventurers to accompany her on a mysterious but very lucrative quest."

"Bit cliché, isn't it?" suggested Od.

As if in answer, the door opened silently to the sound of invisible trumpets and an elf woman in a blue cloak entered, looked mysteriously around and espied the three drinkers. She raised an eyebrow, consulted a small book in apparent confusion, looked at them again and shrugged. "You must be the ones, I suppose. You may call me Jelenneth. It doesn't matter what your names are."

"Siddown, wench, and prepared to be dominated," countered Nord. Lightning crackled around his ears as he attempted to cast _Charm Person_, forgetting that elves are immune.

"I have little respect for anyone who is not a proven warrior." replied Jelenneth haughtily. "It's my only flaw."

"Nice come-back. Way to get Inspiration," remarked Od. "So, what's the quest?"

"Thank you, little man," she replied, "it's all about ..."


----------



## rgoodbb

"it's all about ..."

...Hook Horrors...._pause for dramatic effect_........._nothing_............_still nothing_........I said HOOK HORRORS!"

"We erd you the first time. And 'ook 'orrors are a problem because?"

"Because they have infested our high woodlands through some sort of dark portal and we are having to defend ourselves on a daily basis."

"But they're easy to beat."

"What! How?"

"This is really basic stuff princess, D&D amateur 'our 'ere. You just lure them to fabric." The pirate waited for the copper to drop. It didn't. "Look, while on and around fabric their echolocation is dulled and, well, av' you eva' seen a cat get its claws stuck? Times that by 10 queeny. It's flippin' hilarious."

Jelenneth shifted uncomfortably in on her bar stool, readjusted her beautiful longbow and her stunning short swords, and regained her uppity High Elf pose.

"........Uhm................Very...well...............Prove it."


----------



## BoldItalic

Nord poured on the pressure. "You need large quantities of cloth and mesh. And I'm not talking lace handkerchiefs. You got any decent ships in your neck of the woods? Sails? Rigging? Cargo nets? Don't tell me you don't even have ships."

"We are Elves of the High Forest. We have no need of floating bath-toys."

"Well, you're snafu'd then."

"Pardon me? Is that a piratical slang word? I know it not."

At this point, Herewulf attempted to defuse the situation before the mental arm-wrestling got out of hand and someone said something that someone else might regret having heard. "Madam, is there a river within your elven domain, flowing softly to the sea, eddying delightfully between willow-lined meadows and whatnot?"

"The River Immeral is just as you describe, worthy paladin. You have surely seen it?"

"Just a lucky guess, but it will serve our purpose. Nord, here, will arrange with the ship's chandlers in Neverwinter for a quantity of sails and rigging to be transported by barge up river to your lands. No doubt your bankers will be able to come to some accommodation with the chandlers regarding payment. You will, in the meantime, prepare your mages to be ready to transport the cargo by magic to where it is needed in your forest. We will be there to direct operations. Afterwards, when we have saved your realm from imminent peril, we shall expect to be showered with riches beyond our wildest dreams. Any questions?"

"Just one ..."


----------



## rgoodbb

"Just one ...You have passed the first test. Are you good enough for me to lead?"

"Wait. What? So...no 'ook 'orrors then?"

"Indeed"

"So what's the real plot then?"

"I'm not sure. I think by going off the rails, we have taken the DM unawares. We shall sit patiently in a trancelike state and wait for a plot 'ook..uhm hook."

"The 'orror."

"Shh!"

"Can you hear that?"

"Shh!"

"I can hear something but I dumped my Wis. My passive is only 8."

"Oh very well. since you cannot be trusted to keep quiet, let me listen. Ahh. It is the pages of a Manual of Monsters being frantically turned."

Silence

Silence

Suddenly.................


----------



## BoldItalic

Suddenly................. 

A parchment map appeared on the table. It hadn't been there a moment ago, but now it was there. "Oh look, a map!" remarked Od perceptively. Fortunately,  Jelenneth had taken _Read Maps_. She explained it to the others, despite that fact that anyone can read a map and they could all see what it was. It showed the village and surrounding countryside. In the middle it said 'TAVERN. YOU ARE HERE' and off to one corner it showed a jumble of rocks and 'DUNGEON. GO THERE.'

"It's a fake," declared Herewulf. "Real maps have East at the top but this one has North at the top."

"True enough," agreed Nord, "Mariners' charts are the same. The sun rises at the top and falls down the map to set at the bottom. Common sense."

"What if we turn it sideways and read the writing up and down," wondered Od, squinting with his head on one side. They all tried that and agreed that it made drinking beer difficult.

"We could go and look at the rocks anyway," suggested Jeli. "Assuming it's a trick, there should be nothing there and then we'd know."

"It could be a double trick. We might be surprised by monsters and have to fight for our lives."

"How are we at Stealth? Can we surprise the rocks?"

"I don't think rocks have Passive Perception, do they?"

"They might be animated rocks. Soon as we get close, they turn out to be trolls."

"Good point. Okay, while it's still daylight, we take plenty of oi flasks and firebrands and creep up on the rocks and surprise them."

"Wait a bit, trolls are CR5 and we're only first level. It can't be trolls."

There was a stony silence. Someone had metagamed.

"Sorry," muttered Od. "Excuse my beer. Of course it's trolls."

Half an hour later, our four friends were creeping very stealthily towards a jumble of rocks that were all turned sideways, for no apparent reason, preparing to set fire to them in a pre-emptive strike. The rocks failed to notice them, they gained surprise and rolled for Initiative. In the first round ...


----------



## rgoodbb

In the first round, Jeli walked right up to the first sideways facing rock. Herewulf prepared to protect her with his fast reaction shield-work.

"Wait a minute." Jeli stopped. "Where did that shield come from. You didn't have it before."

"Sure I did, it was strapped to my back."

"Nope. Elf eyes. C'mon..."

"My Oath is my shield. My god is my shield. I have a soul that, like an ample shield, can take in all, and verge for more. Love is my sword, goodness my armour and wit...

"Herewulf!"

"What?"

"You're not going to tell me are you?"

"um......no."

"Uhm. Folks."

"What!"

"The rocks. They have turned to face us."

"You sure?"

"Yeah they're no longer sideways on."

"I can't tell the difference"

"Is it like the map where east is wrong? Is it a clue?" Piped up a clueless and very Od bard.

"Does anyone have stonecunning"

"What's stunk'ning? I have divine sense."

"You have little sense."

As the fearsome foursome flapped fourth, five feldspar fissures flew fast four feet from......damn. run out of F's. Rocks fell, everyone almost nearly died.

"I think surprise is gone."

"To Arms!"

"Where?"

"Agh...


----------



## BoldItalic

There was only one way it could end. The valiant four ran away, hotly pursued by two boulders that came to rest in a convenient gully.

Jeli used some words of common that made even Nord blush. He produced a handkerchief and blew his nose loudly to cover his embarassment. "We need to tack upwind of 'em, then rake 'em with a broadside o' cannonshot," he suggested. It wasn't a very useful suggestion, but the first thing he could think of.

"Suppose we keep doing that until they run out of rocks?" wondered Od.

"Supose we take the hint and go back to the tavern?" countered Herewulf.

"No," said Jeli firmly. "If someone goes to the trouble of throwing boulders at us, they must be protecting something important. We need to find out what it is. Let me see that map again."

"Er ... we didn't bring it?"

"I could go back to the tavern and get it for you?"

"No, Herewulf, that won't be necessary. We will make do without it. Does anyone have something about the size and weight of an apple?"

"I have an apple I was keeping for lunch," offered Od, "It's about the size and weight of an apple?"

"Good, Throw it as hard as you can into the middle of the rocks."

"But that's my lunch!"

"I'll get you another one."

"Oh, alright then."

Od threw his apple as directed. His aim was true and a yell came from yonder. "Ow! What did you do that for?" came a gruff bass voice. A dwarf emerged from the rocks holding the apple and rubbing his head. He was dressed in grey robes and wore a leather harness from which hung various mining tools. He glared at the four. "Clear off," he shouted, "Don't you know the meaning of the word Mine?"

"Did you throw those boulders at us?"

"No," lied the dwarf. "I threw them at a gannet."

"I think you are going to come down here and surrender," suggested Od in a strange, lilting voice that seemed oh, so, terribly reasonable.

The dwarf ...


----------



## rgoodbb

The dwarf ...Failed to resist the magical suggestive force of nature that was Od. And then, somehow, proceeded to successfully resist the magical suggestive force of nature that was Od. That was really Od.

"What just 'appened Laddie?" Asked the one time deck-slausher.

"I think we've just met our match. I think he's a Chancer by chance. I think he's......lucky."

"Na, na. that's a halfling trait. It must be something Portentious, or a chaotic tide or something."

"It is none of those things. He is a Dwarf that is Lucky. That can only mean one thing. 

"Fourth level" all characters stated at once.

A big boom cracked and arced across the sky as four foreheads all banged the table at once. Both in embarrassment at the horrendous show of _meta _and at a DM controlled enemy of this level and of this power. 

As the party looked aghast at each other, one unified thought crossed their minds. MinMax. We have to powergame now. There is no choice. We have entered an arms race that we will not win but must fight regardless because that is the only answer. THE only answer.

"Wait a minute." Startled the High Elf, a grin appearing across her face. "What if we don't go down that road. What if we go _the other way_."

"Dear lady what do you mean?"

"You Herewulf, yes, you are a Paladin are you not? You Norn a Storm Sorcerer from the heart of the Vexatious Sea, you are Od...it has to be said....The Bard, and I am Jeli the Bladelock. Don't you see? We are all Charisma based. We are all the _faces of the party_. Let us attack by.............social encounter."

"............Against a Dwarf?"


----------



## BoldItalic

"Tell me, what do dwarves really like doing, when they aren't digging up gold and singing the Hi Ho song?"

"Drinking ale?"

"Right, so we invite him back to the tavern and take turns to drink him under the table."

"Until he fails a CON save?"

"That's it. This DM is an ex-4e type. He can run it like a skill challenge."

"Now who's metagaming?"

"Metagaming in a _good_ way. We're _helping_ the DM."

"New one on me," commented Nord, scratching his chin. "You sure that's allowed in the rules? _Helping_ the DM?"

"Trust me on this."

Back at the Harmonious Blacksmith, the dwarf miner, whose name was Veit Assek, accepted the challenge of drinking all four under the table whilst simultaneously playing a game of flapjack. They allowed him to win small amounts of money and occasionally lose large amounts. He didn't seem to notice. He also didn't notice that the four were switching tankards around so that for every mugfull the dwarf drank, they drank one mugful _between them_ and Nord, who had the constitution of an ox, was using the Help action to give the others advantage on every CON Save.

With Veit gurgling incoherently under the table, they slipped away and gathered outside in the darkening gloom of evening.  They were half way back to the rocks where, according to the map there was a dungeon, when something ...


----------



## rgoodbb

When something emerged from behind them.

“Bluuuuureeuuurp!” It was Veit.

“What are you doing here?”

“I told you this was mine. But you are persistent little buggers aren’t you. Well I’ve heard that there might be dangers passed these rocks so I’ll let you in on a cut of the findings seeing as you’re gonna come along anyway.”

“We left you dead drunk. How are you here?”

“Resilient Con.”

That’s two feats! What level are you?”

…Well…


----Backstory Alert----​


“Before I was a Miner, I was a Magical Master Brewer. And I concocted this drink which I lovingly refer to as Home-Brew. I then found a way to make it flow forever into my endless canteen. Home-Brew is a magical drink that allows me to use any Feat if I take a sip. It comes out tasting like orange brandy for some reason. I didn’t really need to take any levels in anything as the Feats get me through everything. I was just about to Misty Step through the rocks when someone hit me with a flying apple”

“Wait. Misty Step. That’s an Elf Feat.”

“Like I said. Any Feat.”

“Wow.”

“You could try Magic Initiate and Mould Earth” Offered Od.

“Tried it. Loose Earth not boulders and don’t tell me my job boy.”

Veit thought for a moment, nodded to himself as if he had made a decision, took a sip of Home-Brew and……


----------



## BoldItalic

... and…… stared at Nord with narrowed eyes. "I notice you have 47.3 feet of rope and two grappling hooks in your pack, which was made by Bleggins and Sons, Leatherworkers of Meat Street, according to the label inside. Call me _Observant_, but I'd say that one of the hooks is going rusty and won't hold more than 62lb 3oz. It won't bear your weight but the elf lady could swing on it all night."

There was an uncomfortable silence while three male minds contemplated the elf lady swinging all night and Jeli bridled at the suggestion. Od tactfully broke the moment by nudging Herewulf and saying "He's good, isn't he?" whilst actually thinking _how do we steal his magic canteen of Home-Brew?_

"Don't even think about it, laddie," murmured Veit.

"Shall we go?" said Jeli icily. So they went.

Within the circle of stones was a neatly excavated hole in the ground, shored up with wooden planks and with a ladder going down into it. Veit produced a dwarven helmet with hinged ear flaps and a spike on the front for fixing a candle to. Turning to Od, he growled "Your job is to keep a _Light_ cantrip going on my helmet. Think you can do that?"

"Of course. What key would you like me to chant in? How about F sharp minor? Like this: ♫ hmm, hmm HMM ?"

"Can you make it a bit less red?"

So Od did.

Descending the ladder carefully, the five mortals reached the bottom where a stone-lined tunnel led northwards. The roof was arched but barely four feet high.

"Mind yer 'eds."

The walls and roof of the passage were dry and lined with ancient stones, roughly hewn. Nothing grew on them. There weren't even any cobwebs, giant or otherwise. Here and there were chisel marks but otherwise the masonry was unremarkable. Indeed, Herewulf remarked on how unremarkable it was.

"Someone has been here recently," said Jeli suddenly. "There are heat prints on the floor. A two-legged creature came this way and went back again. We must be on our guard lest it return."

Weapons were drawn and commented upon. It seemed that rapiers were _in_ that year.

 "Nice blade. Where did you get yours?"

"General issue. When I signed up. Yours is unusual. Don't often see ones with mermaids on them."

"Took it from a ship's captain. He wasn't needing it any more."

"Hush! I can hear something!"

Something could indeed be heard ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Something could indeed be heard ...The patter of tiny feet.

"Is it a small baby?" asked Nord, who was left unsighted behind the hulking figure of Sergeant Herewulf.

"Uhm, no."

"Is it a Kobold?" Od joined in the guessing game.

"No again."

"Is it..."

"Would you like me to just tell you?"

"Well alright." Stated a very disappointed Veit, who hadn't had a go yet.  

"It was a Goblin child. A small girl far ahead. She ran off laughing down the corridor.....Strange...these floors are......exceptionally clean." It was at that point where the Sergeant hit some sort of wobbly invisible barrier. He pushed on and the barrier gave. As he forged ahead, he became stuck. And then his arms and face began to tingle. And then burn. He opened his mouth to let out a shout of pain, and the burning poured down his throat. 

"Gelatinous Cube!.............................


----------



## BoldItalic

After Nord, who had been following immediately behind, pulled Herewulf free and lost his own gauntlets in the process, the paladin used his lay-on-hands-hands to get the goo out of his mouth. "My shield! My Holy Shield" he cried for said shield could be seen fast dissolving deep inside the _cube_. "May Eldath forgive me, for I have lost my shield!"

"Brace!" warned Jeli as she sent a shock wave of boiling air, straight past the two men and into the monster. It recoiled, giving them time to withdraw, which was fortunate for the cube had even then been reaching out a gloopy appendage to reclaim its prey. No so fortunate was Veit who, being the same height and width as the tunnel, was propelled like a cork out of a bottle smack into the all-engulfing jelly. The light from his helmet continued to shine until Od cancelled it - watching a dwarf dissolving before your very eyes is not something that particularly needs to be illuminated.

Back at the entrance, the four adventurers caught their breath and took stock. "Well, that's it," decided Herewulf. "I can't operate without a shield. Might as well go home."

"Not so fast," countered the elf maiden. "I have a cunning plan ..."


----------



## rgoodbb

"Not so fast," countered the elf maiden. "I have a cunning plan ..."

"The last time you had a cunning plan, it involved travelling to a tavern to find three adventurers who were just minding their own damned business, claiming yourself their leader, and forging on a path of their misery." Started Od.

"Uhm. Why are you speaking about yourself in the third person"

"Please don't interrupt. You then guide them to fight boulders.....Boulders no less, where your plan is to get a Dwarf drunk. DRUNK! A Dwarf. Don't you know anything about anything? We just fed him his breakfast. Then you get us to come here with said Dwarf.

"He had a name."

"I'm quite aware he had a flaming name Sergeant Herewulf. Not helping!... Then you pretty much single-handedly killed him by sending him flying into a gelatinous cube. What I'm getting at is....Well what I'm trying to allude to is. You-don't-know-what-you-are-doing. You never have. You're no adventurer. You're incompetent. Why oh why should we listen to you about your flipping rubbish cunning plan. Tell me eh. Why?"


"There's treasure."



".........................................Let us hear about your cunning plan"


----------



## BoldItalic

"Well, we have to ... we have to ... you have to ... *sob* ... we just have to ...."

"You haven't got a plan, have you?"

"No! Yes! No! They said I had to Gather A Party Before Venturing Forth and then I would get levels and be just like my brothers and it's so difficult and it's all gone wrong and I hate you! I hate you all!"

Herewulf was vaguely aware that he was supposed to do something in situations like this so he patted her reassuringly with his pseudopod while making inarticulate soothing noises (inarticulate, because all his teeth had just dissolved). He looked over Jeli's shoulder at the others and rolled his eye meaningfully. He wondered if being the only _Gelatinous Paladin_ in history was going to be a good thing or a bad thing?

Nord looked at Od and Od looked at Nord and they decided something. The gelatinous cube, which was slowly pursuing them along the tunnel, was confused by the vibrations of Od's flute, hesitated, and was blown asunder by a lightning strike from Nord. "That be fun," commented Nord "But that be Oi out o' spells fer today. It be rapier work from now on."

With Od leading the way with rapier drawn, they advanced slowly down the tunnel. Herewulf collected his shield and a bag of gems as they went past the remains of the cube. He felt a twinge of remorse for his erstwhile gelatinous kin but it quickly passed. He wondered if there was any significance in Jeli being called Jeli and him being gelatinous but he decided it was probably coincidence. Probably. But the gods liked their jokes sometimes.

The tunnel led to a T junction. "Left or Right?" wondered Od. "Left," he decided on a whim. There was a strange "pah!" sound from another dimension as he announced this, as if the gods had expected them to go right and were slightly annoyed. He dismissed the thought. That way lay madness.

There was a door. And the door said ...


----------



## rgoodbb

There was a door. And the door said ...

PLANT ROOM - NO ADMITTANCE

"We need a Druid or someone that can speak with plants." Pondered Od.

Herewulf had an idea and scampered back to the body of Veit. His Home Brew canteen was still there but very damaged. He brought it back to Nord who did an identify on it and surmised that it would be good for one Feat use per day, but with consequences. 

The Paladin drank the contents and only then realised that _Speak with Plants_ was a third level spell. Really?!3rd level to converse with moss? He had already chosen druid for magic initiate so he just went on and cast mending on his shield whilst wondering what the consequences were. 

Od mage handed the door open and peered inside. He couldn't spot any plants inside, maybe the wrong time of year. No there was a little moss in the corner. He glared at it and then said "Hello?" to it. Unsurprisingly there was no answer. There was also however, a large metal wardrobe that was rumbling and humming and warm to the touch. He backed away. "What should we do now?" He asked the rest of the party. "Choose the next door along, or try and open up this metal container"

"What does the next room say on the door?"

"Ladies Only"

"Hmmmn...


----------



## BoldItalic

"Let's zee what'z inzide the metar waldrobe," suggested the gelatinous paladin. He flooped over, inserted a pseudopod through a small gap at the bottom of the doors and grew an eye on the tip of the pseudopod. "Big coppel lodz wlapped in croth with rittle rightning flazhez," he reported.

Od tried to look knowledgeable. "The copper rods, which way do they bend?" he asked. It wasn't really an honest question, he just asked it to sound good.

"One to the reft, the othel to the light," Herewulf lepried replied.

"Come out," Od decided, "It's too dangerous."

"I'rr just have a rick. The croth rooks tazty."

"No!" shouted three people at the same time. But it was too late. There was a brilliant flash from inside the wardrobe as Herewulf licked away the cloth insulation and dissolved the copper busbars, breaking the circuit that had been carrying 2000 lamps of electricity.

"Tazty!"

The humming died and there was a whirring noise from somewhere behind a wall. To Od it sounded like a glissando descending from the G three octaves below middle G, while to the others it sounded like something dying.

"I don't think we should have done that," fretted Jeli.

The lights would have gone out dramatically if only they had been turned on, but no one had found the light switch. In fact, none of them knew what a light switch _was_. The DM was a bit disappointed, because he had arranged to plunge the gaming table into darkness for added effect but that idea went completely to waste, like so many of his ideas that relied on the players doing what he assumed they would do. It's tough being a DM. 

"There's obviously summat behind yonder wall," observed Nord. "We could knock it down?"

"No need," responded Jeli, "There's a secret door. I'll just see if I can get it open ..."


----------



## rgoodbb

"No need," responded Jeli, "There's a secret door. I'll just see if I can get it open ..."

She wedged her beautifully expensive rapier into the tiny gap around a door that stated SECRET DOOR - DO NOT FIND. She pried and pried until a tiny "tink" sound could be heard. At which point Jeli dropped to the floor crying. 

Nord, sensing a psychic attack began to produce sparks from his hands.

"Schtwand Dwown Nword, Schtwand Dwown" Herewulf whispered calmly. He glided over to Jeli, knelt close next to her and cast mending on the exquisit and priceless blade. He next looked up to the ceiling for some reason and asked "Dwee Em? Ish eet the necksht dway yet? I would wheelee like to take anover dwink and hopefully get wid of this ridicshulous voishe. Dwee Em?"

"No!" Stated a high pitched and very angry voice. "and things are going to change around here. Where are all the girls?"

All adventurers looked to each other in horror. The DM had been replaced by their eight year old daughter.

"Oh no!"

"You're avin' a giraffe"

"Why don't we just pull every card from the deck of many things. It would be safer!" 

"Fwukh.....a....Dwukh.....


----------



## BoldItalic

The secret door suddenly sprang open, knocking Herewulf gloopily out of the way. Jeli sprang up in alarm, wondering "Why did I even bother trying to open it? Stupid door!"

A posse of be-ribboned little girls with ridiculously big eyes cantered in on purple and pink My Little Unicorns. They squealed in delight at seeing Jeli. "It's an Elf Queen!" they shrieked, "We've rolled an Elf Queen and 1d4 minions!"

Minion Od and Minion Nord glanced at each other, grabbed Minion Herewulf and fled down the tunnel, past the "Ladies Only" door and through a third door which was unmarked. Nord slammed the door shut behind them and hammered in an iron spike to keep it from being opened from outside. Od looked around. One glance told him that they were in a large undergroud forest. A trail led through the trees towards some more trees. 

"Do come in," said a voice. "Allow me to introduce myself. I am Oakleaf Downside and I am your NPC for the next part of the adventure."

"How do you get all these trees to grow underground?" asked Od innocently.

"Magic."

"Makes sense.

"Ale you a dliud?" asked Heregloop hopefully. "Can you fix my voice?"

"No, but just avoid the letters 'l', 'r', 's' and 'z' and you'll be fine.

"I can do that."

"Um, what should we do about Jeli?" wondered Nord.

"Lady Jeleneth is busy right now, but will join you later," explained Oakleaf. "If you gentlemen would come this way? It's not far to my castle."

"Why do we go there?" asked Herewulf carefully.

"All will be explained."

Herewulf sensed this was some sort of trap. Oakleaf was too sure of himself, for one thing. And druids don't have castles, do they? He quietly extended his _Divine Sense_ and 'felt' for anything out of the ordinary. There was indeed something amiss and it hit him like a  brick wall. Oakleaf was _evil_ through and through. He tried to warn the others, but they didn't seem to understand his agitation. Nord and Od had been _charmed_ ...


----------



## rgoodbb

That's fab! B.I.

By the way if anyone reading this wishes at any time to add a post or even multiple posts please join in. We would be delighted to welcome you. Just make it up from the last post and have fun.  

 [MENTION=19675]Dannyalcatraz[/MENTION]
 [MENTION=29398]Lanefan[/MENTION]
 [MENTION=6778305]Redthistle[/MENTION]

Any of you interested in this?


----------



## Dannyalcatraz

Yeah, but I'm buried under an avalanche of Christmas cooking & prep right now...


----------



## rgoodbb

Nord and Od had been charmed ...Herewulf bit his lip and pretended to go along with it. The mysterious Oakleaf Downside just wandered on through the thick shrubbery expecting them all to keep up. The branches and leaves parted for him but snapped back into the Paladin's face. _He knows. He knows and he doesn't care. He's even got his back to me the arrogant ass. Hey I can think without slurring or sloshing my words. I wonder if he knows that as well._

_He knows I know now._ thought Oakleaf. _Which means he knows I know that he knows, Oakleaf thought. Damn where does that leaf ush. Waike. Whast ish Heppenink?_ 

In a panic and wild determination to regain utter control. The Druid? cast a spell.

"Entwangwell."

His eyes lit up in fear. He could not verbalise the spell. His hands gripped tighter and tighter around his gnarled walking staff. Evil lit his eyes and his grin. His antlers pulled higher. He slowly lifted the Druid weapon of renown.

"Shwilleighlwaar!"


----------



## BoldItalic

Herewulf's rapier was at the druid's throat. "I would not harm thee for the world," quoth the paladin fluently, "but thy neck is where my blade is about to be."

Oakleaf gibbered, knowing that he was powerless for he was but a 4th level druid (MM 346) and all his spells and cantrips had a V component. Except possibly _Beast Sense_ but that didn't seem very useful under the circumstances and besides, he hadn't prepared it this morning. In a mad panic, he did what any craven evil druid would do when faced with the situation - he surrendered. "Melcy! I yierd!" he cried.

"You will end the charm on my companions, then you will lead us to your castle and open all your treasure chests before we lock you in your own dungeons," growled Herewolf. "And no tricks," he added, because you always have to say that or it doesn't count.

Oakleaf was careful not to nod but succeeded in saying "Yez, Yez!" without moving his throat muscles.

Nord snapped out of his charmed condition, whipped out a length of cord and lashed Oakleaf's hands together behind his back with a complicated sailor's knot, then tied a length of rope to them so that he couldn't run away. "How much xp do you reckon this one is worth?" he wondered.

"I reckon he's CR2," suggested Od, "So that's 150xp each for the three of us, half way to level two."

With a little gentle prodding, Oakleaf led them along the trail through the forest to the gates of a castle that was built entirely of wood, held together with ropes. Not an ounce of metal or stone had been used in its construction - you could tell that the builder had been a fanatical druid. Atop one of the turrets was a flagpole, and flying from it was a green banner showing an oak tree _passant regardant_ with a crown of holly leaves.

The castle gate opened at Oakleaf's approach and they all made for the great hall which had a long table laden with dishes of food on wooden platters. Sensing that the food was probably drugged, Herewulf warned the others not to touch it. A twinge of annoyance flitted across Oakleaf's face at this. It was very brief but Od was adept a reading people's expressions and he spotted it.

"Lead us to the treasure!" demanded Herewulf. The druid shrugged and made for a flight of stairs spiralling up into one of the turrets. It was as well that Nord was alert for tricks, for when they reached the top of the stairs ...


----------



## rgoodbb

for when they reached the top of the stairs ... A large boulder was waiting for them. It was rocking slightly and seemed dastardly precarious or precariously dastardly.

"Boulders. It always 'as to be flamin' boulders. They are the bleedin' bane of this 'ere advencha'." Gasped Nord who was knackered from the stairs. He had chosen unwisely on his attributes and his Con was definitely not a Pro.

They could hear small grunting sounds from behind the large round rock. Each grunt timed perfectly with the forward wobble of the stone. Whatever minion was behind it was obviously not that strong. Herewulf espied and accepted the challenge. He put his back and shoulder into the contest and forged ahead at a steady rate. There was a natural alcove to the right and the sergeant slotted the stone in there nicely. Along with the minion. 

With the failed trap out of the way, the room opened up and in the centre, sat on a nest of golden hay was a goat. "Oakleaf I tell you to do one thing. Just one, and you mess that up." It seemed to bleat. "I am Tangzor." and with that, it rushed the meatshield. Herewulf was astonished and a little embarrassed as he travelled backwards at phenomenal speeds. Tangzor ended his ram-run at the top of the spiral starecase and his foe began the long twisting tumble downward. 

Od and Nord looked at each other. 

"Do you have protection from goats?"

"Nope."

"I thought it was in Xanathar's."

"Hey I only have so many spells dude."

"Yeah me too. It would be a little niche wouldn't it?"

"However I did take Featherfall."

"Really? Me too."

And, assuming that the goat and the druid would soon be at them, they jumped out of the wooden tower and floated down to the ground where Herewulf smashed through the side of the Keep still rolling. 

"Good. They have taken the northern Road of Despair." Muttered Tangzor, watching them from on high. "I have them exactly where I want them" Meh-Meh, Meh-Meh, Meh-Meh...


----------



## BoldItalic

Our three friends set out along the only road available, with no clear idea of where they were going or why. After a while they came to a stone pillar, on which was engraved the single word "EXPLORATION". They took this as a hopeful sign. Further down the road, they passed under a great stone arch over which were carved some mysterious words in a language that none of them understood. Od tried to read them out anyway in case they were a magic spell.

_LASCIATE OGNI SPERANZA, VOI CH'ENTRATE_​ 
It sounded vaguely ominous, but nothing happened. Od shrugged, took out his flute and played the first few notes of a moderately slow melody. Something niggled at the back of his mind, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. As if something was an allegory for something, but not quite.

"Movement ahoy!" called out Nord suddenly. Far in the distance, a giant ran across the road wearing a green jerkin, brown trousers and a knitted hat with a red bobble. The giant was being pursued by a small group of horsepeople who were shrieking merrily like children.

"Isn't that Jeli, with them?" wondered Herewulf.

"Could be, it's hard to tell at this distance," agreed Od.

They watched as the horsepeople faded from sight. Rather worryingly, a pack of wolves then ran silently across the road after them, keeping low, running fast and fanning out as if to outflank the riders. "Should we do anything?" asked Od.

Herewulf though for a moment. "We're too far away," he decided.

"We could _try_?"

"Oh, alright then."

It was not difficult to locate the scene of the battle.

You have followed the sound of sobbing and come to a bloodstained patch of ground where a pack of wolves is feasting, rather messily, on a dead unicorn. Its erstwhile rider, a little girl in a pink frock, is stamping her foot and crying "Naughty Doggies!" over and over again. The wolves seem to be ignoring her. What will you do?


----------



## rgoodbb

BoldItalic said:


> You have followed the sound of sobbing and come to a bloodstained patch of ground where a pack of wolves is feasting, rather messily, on a dead unicorn. Its erstwhile rider, a little girl in a pink frock, is stamping her foot and crying "Naughty Doggies!" over and over again. The wolves seem to be ignoring her. What will you do?




*Player 1: I try to calm the Alpha wolf using Animal Handling.*

_How does that look. Describe it._

*Player 1: I say there, there wolf. I'm here wolf, I'm Herewulf. Go over there wolf. Not right here wolf.*

*Player 2: I add some notes on my piccolo that cannot be heard by human ears*

_You have advantage on the roll_

*Player 2: Oh and I inspire him.*

*Player 1: Ah. A 14 or a 14. I'll take the 14. and 3 from the Bard. 17 total. *

_The Bad d...Wolf and it's friends slowly back away, dragging the carcass with them. You have avoided a combat and.....Hey daddy........I'm running a game......No.......No but.....I'm not tired!_


----------



## BoldItalic

"How many XP do we get?" asked Od quickly.

Fifty

"Each wolf?"

No, you only persuaded one of them. But I'll round up and give you twenty each.

"What should we do with the little girl?" wondered Herewulf.

"We could tie her up and sell her at the slave market," suggested Nord.

"I don't think we'd be allowed to."

"Just a suggestion. I am a pirate. It's what my character would do."

"Little girl, what is your name?"

"Xena."

"_The_ Xena?"

"No, I'm Little Xena. Granny is _The_ Xena."

"Well, Little Xena, you should run along and find your friends."

"I've only got little legs."

"We could ask one of the wolves to carry you. Would you like to be Xena The Wolf Rider?"

"Ooh, yes!"

So they did. Her wolf was apparently called Flowence.

At the mention of the name Flowence, something niggled at the back of Od's mind again. An idea came moderately slowly. "I try to remember something about the inscription on the gate we came under," he announced.

Make an Intelligence(History) check, please.

"23"

Well done. You recall that the inscription comes from a work by the Flowentine poet Andante Allegori. It is written above the gates of Hell and it means *Abandon All Hope, O Ye Who Enter Here!*

"And we just walked through the arch under it? This does not bode well," commented Herewulf.


----------



## Redthistle

BoldItalic said:


> The lights would have gone out dramatically if only they had been turned on, but no one had found the light switch. In fact, none of them knew what a light switch _was_. The DM was a bit disappointed, because he had arranged to plunge the gaming table into darkness for added effect but that idea went completely to waste, like so many of his ideas that relied on the players doing what he assumed they would do. It's tough being a DM*.




*Uh ... this tale is being constructed as a cautionary tale for would-be DMs, right? It's certainly got an ambient "Required Reading" vibe going.


----------



## Redthistle

rgoodbb said:


> That's fab! B.I.
> 
> By the way if anyone reading this wishes at any time to add a post or even multiple posts please join in. We would be delighted to welcome you. Just make it up from the last post and have fun.
> 
> [MENTION=19675]Dannyalcatraz[/MENTION]
> [MENTION=29398]Lanefan[/MENTION]
> [MENTION=6778305]Redthistle[/MENTION]
> 
> Any of you interested in this?




Oh, yeah! I had to give up on trying to choose between the "Give XP ... " link and the "Laugh with this ... " link. You aren't making this easy. I'm just reading through for now to catch up.


----------



## BoldItalic

Redthistle said:


> *Uh ... this tale is being constructed as a cautionary tale for would-be DMs, right? It's certainly got an ambient "Required Reading" vibe going.



 'Required Reading', definitely. 



Redthistle said:


> Oh, yeah! I had to give up on trying to choose between the "Give XP ... " link and the "Laugh with this ... " link. You aren't making this easy. I'm just reading through for now to catch up.



 Roll 1d6 to decide, then ignore the roll and go with your instincts


----------



## rgoodbb

"Wait. Does that mean we are in hell?"

"Either that or the Abyss"

"What’s the difference?"

"I dun’no. Demons and Devils"

"Uhm I thought there was only one Devil"

"No, no. There are chain devils, bone devils, bea.."

"Hang on there’s a bone devil?"

"Uh yeah"

"Hahahaha! HOL"

"What’s HOL"

"C’mon dude. Ha Out Loud"

"Why?"

"A Bone Devil. I suppose that is just one giant Di.."

"…Anyway! There are ice devils, barbed devils and the Pit Fiend"

"Why not the Pit Devil? Sticking with type and all. Why does this one get a fiend tag?"

"Possibly because this one is sixteen feet tall and has 300 hit points, a strength of 26, a fear aura, magic resistance, innate spellcasting, a fly speed of 60 feet, Multi-Attacks and a challenge rating of 20"

"What. How do you know all that?.........Oh.............It’s behind me isn’t it.” Replied Nord….."


----------



## BoldItalic

"*Good morning, gentlemen*," said the pit fiend.

Herewulf quickly pulled himself together (it didn't take long - he wasn't very far apart) and dissembled mightily, convincing himself that, just because he was technically a paladin, it didn't mean he had to be particularly _good_ at this particular moment. He concentrated on thinking lawful thoughts and remembered his military training. "Sergeant Herewulf, reporting for duty, sir!"

*Excellent !*

Nord, meanwhile, became subtlely more piratical and very unsubtlely very obsequious. "I wanted to take slaves, but they wouldn't let me!" he gabbled.

*Really ?*

"Would you care to hear the Devil's Hornpipe?" offered Od, pulling out his flute. "Or the March of the Slaves, from Nabucco?"

*Perhaps some other time. As you three are here in Hell, wandering about aimlessly, we have a little job for you.*

"We are at your service."

*That is indeed true. Now listen carefully ...*


----------



## rgoodbb

That is indeed true. Now listen carefully ...

As the Pit Fiend outlaid demands, the party listened attentively. 

1st you will return the the house of wood
2nd you will kill the ram'ed one
3rd you will kill the druid accomplace
4th you will take all their stuff
5th you will be relieved of your servitude to me.

"..........Uhm.....OK." Od responded. It wasn't like they weren't going to do that anyway the first time they encountered the druid and goat. "We got a little slapped about last time."

"Do not worry. One more little encounter beforehand and you will almost certainly level up. Oh and here, have this magic item which is by no means cursed in any way at all. Just needed to put that out there"

"Oooh! What is it. 

"Well.....You find a magical _____, it does _____ .......


----------



## BoldItalic

Meanwhile ...

Xena the Wolf Rider (age 8¼) had rejoined Jeli and the other girls and they had found a strange thing. There was a hill, the sort of hill that you paint green keeping inside the lines, and there were lots of people pushing boulders up the hill and letting them roll down again, puff, pant, rumble, rumble thud. They were polyhedral boulders, like huge dice but with no numbers. "Stop that!" said Amanda bossily, "You're making a mess!"

"We aren't allowed to stop," explained a man whose name was Sisyphus, "We have to roll the boulders up this hill over and over again until we get a natural 20."

"But there aren't any numbers on them, silly!"

"Yes, it could take some time."

"Why?"

The man looked crestfallen. "This is the private place in hell reserved for players who secretly fudged their dice rolls. I once tried to pretend that I'd rolled 18's for every attribute but it wasn't true. This is my punishment. Now, if you will excuse me, little girl, I'm a little busy."

Everyone jumped out of the way just then, as a boulder came rumbling down the hill near them. "Nineteen!" called a voice from somewhere up at the top of the hill but no one believed it.

"I don't like hell," decided Amanda. "It's horrid."


----------



## rgoodbb

"Let me try. SEVENTEEN!" exclaimed a highly magical girl with long red pigtails as she pushed a boulder down the hill. 

"Bigby. Are you cheating? Stop shielding that roll with your Hand, this instant." Demanded Xena.

"Seventeen?" Now looking down at her nails and picking them slowly. 

"Mage Hand is not good enough. I can see the result."

"Sev.."

"Darkness? Really. And don't try fog cloud or an illusion. Or any other magic."

" ......Hmumf..........OK. 7!"

"Good. And just for all that trouble, you get Moo-Moo the wounded unicorn and have to stay at the back of the pack."

Jeli and Amanda Smirked.

"id tibi factum est." Piped up an exhausted Sisyphus."

"What's he saying Jeli?"

"I don't know. It's all Greek to me."


----------



## BoldItalic

Meanwhile ...

Od, Nord and Herewulf were making their way back towards the wooden castle when they came across a dungeon in a hollow in the ground. This dungeon was a little unusual in that it had no roof and you could look down and see all the passages and rooms, like looking at a 3D map. There were people down there in the dungeon trying to get out but there weren't actually any exits so they were just going round and round as if they were lost in a maze, which indeed they were.

"What do you make of it?" wondered Od.

"Dunno. How did they get _in_, anyway?" asked Herewulf. "There aren't any exits, but there aren't any entrances either. Unless they fell in from up here."

Just then, there was a vivid flash and one of the dungeoneers fell down dead. Then the corpse vanished and a new dungeoneer appeared in the centre of the maze and started trying to get out all over again.

"Oi know what this be," said Nord. "Them be the souls of DMs past, as made traps in their dungeons that killed PCs wi' no saves allowed. This be their place in hell."

"That's ... creepy," decided Od. "Let's move on."

They moved on and came to a river. They needed to cross the river but it was full of crocodiles so it was pretty lethal. However, nearby was a convenient pile of styx. "Suppose we throw styx at the crocodiles to drive them away while we wade across?" suggested Od.

"Somehow, I think they might be expecting that."

"Do you have a better plan?"

"We could just kill the crocodiles. The xp could be enough to level up, like the fiend said we should do."

"And you trust him?"

"Pit fiends are lawful."

"Speaking of the fiend, what about his magic item? We haven't worked out what it is, yet. Maybe it's +3 vs crocodiles?"

Od retrieved the item from his pouch. It was a tiny ferry boat with a tiny oarsman inside it. The oarsman was wearing a hooded cloak so you couldn't see his face. "If we put it in the river, will it grow to full size and ferry us across?" asked Herewulf.

"That would be useful. We'd be able to carry on with this adventure and carry it off successfully."

"A sort of carry-on, carry-off ferry, then."

"Is that a punning reference to Charyon, the mythical ferryman who rowed the souls of the dead across the Styx? If so, it's a bit feeble."

"As if I would."

"Hmm."

"Go on then, put the tiny boat in the river. Mind the crocodiles, though."


----------



## rgoodbb

It emerged slowly from a large milky egg buried beneath the blood bones on the shore. Its many eyelids opened and closed and its first instinct was to call for its mother in a rather annoying but mildly cute yipping noise. Its mother ignored it. Its father Sobek on the other hand, took great pride in his first son. He nurtured and educated and dressed him in all of the best fineries that hell could offer. That was a few years ago now. 

Snappy was of course the best dressed croc on the river. Bowtie and small round goggles. Teeth polished and picked. Eyes all beady and tail extra swishy. He was suave, sophisticated and as such was the obvious first choice to meat..meet and greet newcomers. 

Snappy’s favourite game was ball, but this particular area of Hell was low on balls and so he had arranged Styx on the nearby bank as a way of nurturing new playe/members to Hell. 

One of these newcomers had something in his hand. Oooooh! Was it Styx? Was it Styx? Snappy thought in glee. The man threw it into the river. Yeees! It is Styx. Snappy opened his mouth as wide as he could in a wondrous smile……


----------



## BoldItalic

... and snapped what he though was a Styx, ready to throw it back playfully. But it tasted funny and it crunched in a way that Styx don't crunch and a crunchy bit got stuck between his teeth, which is always annoying and there's never an Egyptian Plover around when you want one. He thrashed his tail to show that he was displeased by this turn of events.

"So much for the magic ferry boat," said Od ruefully. "Now what?"

"We could try _Animal Friendship_? Or _Speak with Animals_? The crocodiles might be impressed with our Charisma."

"Go on, then."

There followed a lengthy exchange of views between Nord and Snappy, the upshot if which was, that Snappy would let them cross the river if they paid him one football each but they had to be real footballs, not prestidigitated ones. Nord put it to the others. "Seems a fair offer," he suggested.

"Where in hell do we get three footballs?"

"Lang ... oh, I see. I don't know."

"I vote we just kill all the crocodiles."

"They might fight back."

"Just thinking out loud, what happens when lightning hits flowing water?"

"Some fish die. and some whales get quite annoyed."

"And crocodiles?"

"Po-ss-ibly."

"There's no call to be like that," interposed Snappy. "i'm not ansking much There's a sports store half a mile up the road -just do me a favour and go to the store and get me three footballs."

And so, with a collective sigh, the three adventurers set off to find a sports store that sold footballs. It started to rain.


----------



## rgoodbb

It started to rain. And of course it rained cats and dogs.

Avoiding the baby Hellcats and Hellhounds that began dropping from the dark red sky, the triumvirate moved hastily but warily.

"This is how they are born. When it rains. Thats canon."

"What's canon?"

"I just said. How cats and dogs in Hell are born. _That's_ canon."

"No I mean what _is_ cannon."

"Oh you don't know the word. It is...hang on. I will Dragopedia it. *canon is the material accepted as officially part of the story in the fictional universe of that story.  * There." 

"Does that mean we are fictional?"

"Did someone request my presence?" Called a mysteriously creepy boatman in a dour and slow voice.

"No Canon, not Charyon."

BOOM! Before them a figure of a woman wielding a long boomstick which was pointed their way. Nord, jealous of the thundergun felt his toes hurt a little as if someone was stepping on them.

"Did someone call for a cannon."

"Oh my gods no! I said C.."

"Shut it. You really think I give an imps nutsack what you said?"

They were standing in the carpark of the sports-store, the sign proclaiming _The Goal Gaol_. The woman in front pointing the boomstick at them wore a high-collared long-coat and a wide brimmed hat. 

"Uhm. We've come for some balls."

"Are you giving me grief." She lurched her weapon forward menacingly.

"No, no. we need three footballs. you see we have this problem,.."

"Snappy, no doubt. Well tell that pampered dinosaur that I'll take another of his teeth the next time I see him." She played with the tooth on her necklace. "Come on it then. I guess I'll open up for ya." There was a No Dogs sign outside the shop but inside there were hellcats galore. "Right." she said moving towards an old Cronenbergian cash till. "Three footballs. That will be 21,000 EP."

"Uhm.........


----------



## BoldItalic

"Uhm........ ", began Od, "have you by any chance got the locale on your till set to European? With a comma for the decimal point? Can you give change for 11GP ?"

Char-Ging (for it was, indeed, she, doomed to reside in hell for all eternity because she wasn't a very nice person) looked confused, then relieved. "What a clever boy you are, I never could understand the user manual for this thing. It's three million pages in every known language before you even get to the ON switch, which is the one labelled OFF and marked with a death's head. Do you know who writes these things? They must have evil, twisted minds, mustn't they?"

"Whoever it is, there should be a special place reserved for them," agreed Od sympathetically. He felt strangely drawn to this woman, which was quite surprising. Could this really be the infamous Char-Ging of the bardic tales? She hadn't mentioned tax at all. At least, not yet.

To Od's surprise, a tear ran down Char-Ging's cheek. "I'm sorry," she sobbed, "You see, there are no taxes here in hell. What would be the point? If souls refused to pay, what could I do to punish them that was worse than already being in eternal torment? I miss it all so terribly!"

Od patted her gently on the arm and offered her a copper piece. "Football tax?" he suggested. But she only sobbed even louder at the suggestion, well-meant though it was. "Just take your footballs and tell Snappy that that's the last. I'm out of stock. It will have to be golf clubs next time."

On the way back to the river, they passed an abbey where an army of scribes, who had been sent to hell for abusing apostrophes, were busy scribing enormous books. The abbot (who had committed six of the seven deadly sins in his lifetime) proudly (oops, there goes the other one) showed Herewulf and his companions what they were doing. They were up to Vol. MMDXIV of the user manual for a self-assembly flat pack teaspoon.

"Those quill pens they are using," asked Od innocently, "do they come with instructions?"

The abbot blanched, reddened, and blanched again, horror-struck. "Lads," he shouted across the scritchy-scratchy noise of thousands of quill pens on parchment, "there's a change of plan!"

"I think we had better leave quickly," suggested Nord.

So they did.

When they got back to the river beside the piles of Styx, the crocodiles were nowhere to be seen. They waded across the river which forgot to flow so they didn't get wet, and reached the other bank. "What shall we do with the footballs?" wondered Od. No one had a good solution, so they kicked the problem into the long grass and carried on.

As the wooden castle came in sight over a rise, something very odd happened ...


----------



## rgoodbb

As the wooden castle came in sight over a rise, something very odd happened ...    


“That’s odd.” Nord frowned.

“I do know his name you know. I’m not a stupid meat shield.” Replied Herewulf.

“No, something very odd has happened.” Continued the Sorcerer of Storms. 

“OK, Nord. What is odd?”

“Something has happened with my spells.”

“What, you mean like you can actually cast some now?”

“You don’t know what it’s like at first level. You have to save them.”

“And never use them. Yes. Well actually I do know because I have some as well now.”

“Second level boys. I think we should rest up and plan our attack.” Od had found firewood and fish.

“Wow, good survival skills man.”

“Well I’m a jack of all trades really. Now let me sing you a song while we rest and plan. Herewulf, you’re the military man. How should we proceed?”

“Well. I’ve been thinking about Ow!”

“You’ve been thinking about what?”

A second sling bullet hit the sergeant in the head. From above them the Druid had set his staff into the ground. The top end of it was Y shaped.

“A slingstaff. That is old school man.” Noted Nord.

Od was about to agree when one of the branches he had collected stated wrapping around his neck.

“Warp Wood. Now I haven’t seen that in a while. I always liked that spell.” Stated Nord, feeling oddly nostalgic

“agherghcahcaherrru.” Replied the Bard.

Nord looked to Herewulf for assistance but he had taken four shots to the head now and was out cold. “Hmm. Must have been magic stones.”

The Paladin was out. The Bard was out. The Sorcerer was thinking too much and not sorcering sorsing, sor

Appearing next to Oakleaf the evil Druid, the goat Tangzor slowly lowered his head to begin a charge when……………………..


----------



## BoldItalic

the goat Tangzor slowly lowered his head to begin a charge when……………………..

Nord drew himself up to his full height, raised his hands dramatically and threw a handful of rose petals in the air. "Sweet Dreams," he murmured, then added "Urawoah!". Now, as anyone knows who makes his Intelligence(Arcana) roll, the word "Urawoah" is not part of the V component of the _Sleep_ spell. It is, in fact, a special secret word used by pirates who have just lost their footing and flown 10ft sideways without quite expecting to. It happens a lot on ships being tossed about in storms but not so much in the vicinity of wooden castles in hell. Nevertheless, Nord used it on this occasion.

With druid and goat snoring gently, Nord picked himself up, stablised the paladin and started attending to Od, who was turning blue. "This is going to hurt you more than it hurts me," he told the snake as he applied his rapier to its nose. "Dere'ssss gno gneed to be unpleassssent abougt it!" hissed the snake as it let go of the Bard and wriggled away.

Nord paused to think. His two friends were unconscious and likely to remain so for 1d4 hours. He had no means of healing them. The druid and goat would only stay asleep for a fraction of a minute. He must deal with them somehow, fairly urgently. Stabbing at them with his rapier wouldn't work because he wouldn't be able to damage them fast enough, even with autocrits, before they woke up very annoyed. He could repeat the _Sleep_ spell a few times but that would only postpone the inevitable. He needed a different spell.

A chorus of shouts came from the chorus who were hidden in another dimension and weren't supposed to be there. "GREEN FLAME! GREEN FLAME!" the yelled insistently. Suddenly, Nord knew what to do ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Suddenly, Nord knew what to do ...

FLAMMAM VIRIDEM was the start of an incantation for a very special spell. A spell he knew well. This would sort out his entire dilemma in one foul/fowl swoop. He went through the gestures and ended with the words VERUM PERCUTIENS.

VERUM PERCUTIENS. Why didn't I think of that before. It trumps all others. A basic _I win_ button. And a cantrip to boot! Happy he had swept away any resistance, Nord rejuvenated his allies and they waltzed and weedled their way to the wooden warfort. 

Herewulf, or Lumpy as he was currently being referred to, broke in the doors with an impressive roll and they made their way, gingerly to the top of the stairs again. The boulder (yes. it was always boulders) was slotted away. Looting the top room with abandon, (it was Queen I think (We will rock you (yes more boulders))), they found a grand total of:

10 crimson.......
3 matching........
A shield of.......
and a leafy tome with a title exclaiming.......


----------



## BoldItalic

The three heroes took a short rest and looked over the loot.

Herewulf looked closely at the shield, and discovered that underneath a thick layer of black soot over its front surface there was a symbol of Eldath, the very goddess whom he himself worshipped. "This can't be coincidence," he said quietly, "This shield was surely meant for me. But what is it doing down here in hell, and why is it obscured with soot?" He turned it over and scrutinised the back. Faintly visible was a short inscription that had been almost scratched out. It read _Property of Sir Noxious of Phlem_.

"Od," he asked, "Have you ever heard of a paladin called Noxious of Phlem? The name means nothing to me."

"Wasn't he the fellow who fell into bad ways and tried to team up with a balrog? Got roasted? Why, is that his shield? It would account for the soot."

"Could be. It's a good shield, though. Just what I need to replace the one I lost in the gelatinous cube. I can probably get the soot off somehow."

"I can do you an _Unseen Servant_ if you like, clean it up and polish it for you?"

"Would you do that? Thanks a lot. What do you make of the green hats?"

"They are magical, in a way. There's one for each of us. If we all wear them, we will look like a team and get +1 Charisma as long as we don't take them off. We get -1 Stealth, though, on account of the little bells. Here, try one for size."

Herewulf put on the green hat with the jingly bells and immediately felt very silly although he had to admit that it did keep his head warm. "What do you think, Nord?" he asked, "Do I look like an idiot in this hat?"

"Yes," replied Nord, "But you look like an idiot even without the hat so don't ket it worry you. By the way, I think I've worked out what these Crimson things are for. Let's get going. I'll explain on the way."

"Whither are we bound?"

"We'll know when we get there."


----------



## rgoodbb

"We'll know when we get there."...

Along the way to _there_, Od began reading though the leafy tome. It was obviously the personal diary of Oakwood....uhm.......Downside. (I had to read back to remember) He seemingly went on a quest with two others to get the hell out of Hell and it appears he was successful. Why in Hell did he come back to Hell after getting the Hell out of Hell? Maybe he was in high water. 

"Hey, it says here that these hats help us get out of _here_ and get to _there_. We have to remove the clappers from these bells and then go to Ghost Temple, defeat the invisible ghost and then dance through a portal." 

"I wouldn't mind getting back to that pub. It's damned 'ot dan 'ere an I need a quencha'. 'Ere 'erewulf, pull off me clappa' if you know what I mean."

"Wha..Oh. OK. Hey I'm alot happier now about not having to jingle all the way _there_. So where is this temple?"

"It's more of an acropolis I think, but we travel through _The Boggle Bogs_ to get there apparently."

"The Boggle Bogs ey'? Great name. 'Oo makes up these things? The mind.............wonders."

So the party moved forward/onward/on/ahead/towards/forth, and the land became more muddy and slippery. Through their natural perception they heard a commotion ahead. 

Jelenneth, Xena the Wolf Rider (aged 8 and one half now), Amanda and Bigby on the lame unicorn bringing up the rear, were all stuck in a quagmire on the edge of the Boggle Bogs."

"Jeli."

"Sergeant. Good to see you, nice hat by the way. It does not make you look more like an idiot. Sorry that turned out..."

"S'OK. M'OK with it now. Need some help"

"Oh gods yes. I don't suppose you happen to have 10 crimson...............


----------



## rgoodbb

I will keep saying this, but does anyone else wish to add a post to further the story? Please chip in anytime with a post or two you would be most welcome.


----------



## BoldItalic

10 crimson............... geese?

"Well, actually, we do. We were wondering what to do with them. They make rather unreliable alarm clocks."

"If we harness them together and get them to fly," explained Jeli, "they might lift us one by one out of this swamp."

"Novel. Worth a try."

They started with Little Xena the Wolf Rider because that made the lightest load. Suitable harnesses were fashioned from the lengths of rope that everyone was carrying and the procedure was explained to the geese who, fortunately, seemed remarkably intelligent and quick on the uptake. There was a gloopy, squelchy sound as Xena and her wolf were lifted free by ten quickly uptaking crimson geese and deposited on firm ground a little distance away.

Last to go was Jeli on her unicorn. Did I mention she was riding a unicorn? He was called Stubbs because he once had his portait painted by a famous artist of that name. The geese were getting tired by this time and Jeli was rather more, er, how can I put this delicately, she was about 100 lb _less light_ than the children. The upshot was, she was still stuck.

"Stop laughing," snapped Jeli. "Forget the geese, just harness all the other unicorns together to pull me out."

There was a certain amount of discussion amongst the other unicorns at this suggestion. They weren't too keen on the idea of being harnessed up to pull things like so many oxen. They were proud beasts but they couldn't leave Stubbs in the lurch so they agreed to pull _him_ out, provided the elf got off and stayed where she was.

Jeli shrieked. It was a loud shriek of indignation with a side order of betrayal but it was a convincing shriek. Very convincing. And also very loud. So loud that it attracted the unwelcome attention of ...


----------



## rgoodbb

So loud that it attracted the unwelcome attention of ...

.......one hundred and one Lemures. These moldable masses of malleable mucus bubbled and babbled and arose from the stenchfull bog. Their bodies slapping and slurping, slopping and slipping as they slowly drew near to the hellish scream. 
"Mmmmmmmmmmmmissssstressssss." They all seemed to say at once. "We heard your pain and were enthraaaaaalled by it."

Jeli was lost for words. And as such, the unworthy devils, in her silence, began to withdraw.

"Ok. Ok. just help me get out of this mess will you."

Nothing. They continued to leave.

"JUST GET ME OUT OF HERE!!" She bellowed, and they responded. They responded to her screams.

"Well that could be kinda useful, I guess."

"Although not very stealthy."

"Dude we have girls riding unicorns and wolves and you're wearing metal armour."

"It's a fair point. To the acropolis?"

"To the Acropolis?" They all cheered together. Embarrassingly. Painfully. Awkwardly. Excruciatingly. Cornilly. With extra cheese. A couple of Lemures weedily tumbled across their path to show their thoughts of the display. 

After agreeing to never cheer together again like that, they set off. The Lemures had receded away due to the lack of screams, as the ragtag group neared the acropolis. The bells on Od, Nord and Herewulf's hats began to clinkle and clang and chim and chime even though the clappers had been removed. That meant one thing. 

"Ghosts.................


----------



## BoldItalic

"Something I've always wondered about ghosts," wondered Herewulf wonderingly, "Can ghosts see ghosts?"

"Why not?" replied Od.

"Well, some people can see ghosts and some ghosts can see people but how do we know if ghosts we can't see can see other ghosts we can't see, if we can't see them seeing them?"

"You're overthinking it. It only matters if ghosts can see _us_ because if they can, they're probably dangerous."

"Like that big one over there in the Acropolis, you mean? The one that's waving at us and beckoning us towards it?"

"Definitely. Extremely dangerous. Just look at the way it's pointing to that big sarcophagus that's so obviously full of treasure and signalling that we should help ourselves. It's such an obvious trap."

"Funny, it doesn't _smell_ evil. Just sort of blank. Anyway, how are we at fighting ghosts? I quite fancy doing some _Smiting_. Do you have any useful spells? How about you, Nord?"

"I think I might stand well back and use _Witch Bolt_," replied the pirate. "You barge in and smite away but don't get in the way of my lightning. Metal armour and all that."

"I suppose you know ghosts have resistance to lightning?"

"Ghosts have resistance to practically everything. It just takes twice as long, that's all."

"Okay, we have a plan. Jeli, you had better keep the children away."

At this suggestion, there was a shrill chorus of "Oh no, we're not scared. We have unicorns."

"Have it your own way," replied Od, starting up a stiring melody on his flute as they all began a determined march towards the ghost to the beat of "Glory, Glory, Halelujah." But with different words, obviously.

The ghost, seeing that waving in a friendly fashion was out of fashion, turned hostile, waited until everyone was in range and then shouted "BOO!". It was gratified when several of the little girls shrieked in terror and aged 1d4x10 years at the horror of it all. Xena (18¾) was suddenly very grown up but she was the lucky one. Amanda was now 49, still single and in the presence of three fairly-eligible bachelors if you aren't too fussy and at that age you can't afford to be.

The relentless march continued, minus a few suddenly-not-so-young-but-nevertheless-still-terrified ladies, and Nord began his _Witch Bolt_ attack. Lightning poured forth from his hands and a smell of ozone grew in intensity until eveyone's eyes started to sting. Meanwhile, Herewulf closed in and started smiting. This seemed to worry the ghost, if only because it was actually the ghost of Sir Noxious of Phlem, waiting all eternity for redemption and unlikely to get it, and he knew all about Smiting. And he recognised something about Herewulf, too. "Hey, that's my shield!" shouted the ghost inaudibly.

It would have been a lengthy fight, the attackers doing little damage each round, had the ghost not turned the tables by _possessing_ Jeli.

"?" said Herewulf.

"?" said Nord.

"???" said Od.

"Ooh!" said a lot of femine voices of various ages.

And then ...


----------



## rgoodbb

"I Scream."

"No, I Scream."

"No, I Scream with Jeli!" Shouted Bigby, the loudest of them all. She had already removed her spoon from the saddle of her half-lame Unicorn: Poppett Danear, and was racing with bowl in hand right towards the ghost. 

The ghost then disappeared but the male adventurers thought up a cunning plan and triangulated its position by using the jingling of their bells without clappers. 

Lady Bigby as she was now being known, stopped still when she could no longer see the ghost. Furious that she could be denied her yummy pudding, planted her feet. rooting them to the ground. She began an incantation. A forbidden incantation. One that would have dramatic repercussions not only on herself and her party members, but on life itself. One that she knew the ghost could not resist. It was worth it she reasoned. She remembered her parents. She remembered her first teddy, and she began to shake. Bigby could not hold back the tears anymore. Her fists were clenched so tight that her palms were bleeding. That's OK. I need blood for this. With one last thought of whether she was really about to do this entering and exiting her conscious mind, She let her subconscious take over now. She was running on muscle memory of the gestures, whispering frantically and without pause. She first felt the power in her stomach. It rose slowly and made her feel dizzy. Her feet tingled and soon the rest of the body was awash with power, the floodgates had opened and her very soul was driving the power of creation. When she could no longer hold it in. Stem the tide. She uttered the words of power. The words that no Ghost could ever resist.

"Come out, come out, wherever you are........


----------



## BoldItalic

"Come out, come out, wherever you are........ "

The force of Bigby's exorcism (for such it was) was so great that not only was the ghost of Sir Noxious expelled from Jeli, but the _thing_ that had been possessing _him_ and had caused him to go astray in his lifetime, was forced out in its turn. Scientists who study the occult call this _dispendium sequentem_ but they just make things up to sound learned. Let's just say it's weird and leave it at that.

Now what, I hear you ask was this _thing_? What was it's nature and intent? And what was it doing in hell, inside the ghost of a fallen paladin? I'll give you a clue. You remember when Gandalf The Grey fell in Moria fighting a balrog? And the last thing he called out was "Fly, you fools, fly!" before he was dragged down into the abyss? Well, it was the same balrog.

WHAT ???

You put a level two party in hell, which is inhabited by devils, and you put them up against a CR19 demon that pops up out of nowhere and shouldn't be in that plane at all and you call this _fun_? what kind of DM are you?

Er, well, er ... maybe ...

_"Sorry," said the balrog, "My mistake. Wrong thread. Don't know how this happened. Talk about Chaos. I'll just be going." and he vanished in a puff of red smoke leaving behind nothing but a sulphurous smell._

Is that better?

I should think so, too. Now about the sarcophagus full of treasure. It had better be good ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Now about the sarcophagus full of treasure. It had better be good ...

The sarcophagus itself was made of polished alabaster with gold inset drawings of symbols of snakes and pyramids and bird headed people and jackals and boats and other symbols of power. It was displayed so it's head was pointed towards the portal.

"I think I know where that portal is going."

"Me too." Replied an enthused Snappy, football lodged gingerly between his considerable teeth. "I'm finally going home."

"Do we open it up or push it through or open it up and push it through or push it through and then open it up?" Questioned Herewulf.

"You may be overthinking it Sergeant." Replied Jeli. She turned towards Bigby, who's nose, eyes and ears were all bleeding. "Od. Don't just stand there, Heal her."

"What? Oh yes. OK. uhm Healing Word!"

"Herewulf. What are you doing? Get up. You look silly."

"I'm Laying on my Hands. It's never worked before but I'll keep on trying."

"How have we ever managed to survive so long here?"

The Healing Word did not take. Bigby was in a bad way. Together they prized the sarcophagus open. It was half full of desert sand.

"Bigby. Get in the sand."

"No. I'm not going in there"

"Do it now."

"No!"

"Bigby Sand!"

"?" Od.

"??" Nord.

"???" Herewulf

Bigby got in the sand and..........


----------



## BoldItalic

Bigby got in the sand and.......... the others heaved the stone lid over the sarcophagus, muffling her protests.

There was a sort of gritty swooshthudbump sound and Bigby's protests became somewhat louder.

Od looked at Nord, Nord looked at Jeli and Jeli looked at Herewulf. Then they heaved the lid off again to see what had happened.

Bigby was still there, but the sand had gone.

"Maybe we should read the instructions?" suggested Od perceptively.

"There's this book," offered Bigby. "It was under the sand. I banged my head on it, thank you very much."

"Let me see," said Od, "Ah, yes, this is just what we need. See? It has the magic runes R·T·F·M on the cover. Can anyone read Sarcophagic?"

There was a rolling of dice and a shuffling of character sheets and it turned out no-one had taken Sarcophagic and no-one had any reading spells.

"We could go back to the abbey and ask the scribes," suggested Nord. "One of them is bound to have an instruction book on how to read instruction books."

That seemed to be the best idea so they all set off. On the way back to the abbey, ...


----------



## rgoodbb

On the way back to the abbey, ...

"Jeli."

"What?"

"I'm sorry."

"Hmm?"

"For calling you incompetent and all that. I'm sorry."

"Oh it's OK, I am more seasoned now and have a better grasp of my capabilities."

"Which...........are..........?"

"Be careful Od. You only just got in my good book."

"No, no. I'm only asking because when we see your combat prowess, we can J/gell it together better and become more formidable as a team. What can you do?"

"I'm....not really a Bladelock."

"Oh. Are you going to tell me what you really are?"

".....No." And she walked off.

"I know what she is. Snappy knows." Hissed Snappy trundling up behind Od.

"Why are you following us around? I thought you wanted to get through the portal."

"You never opened it. So I'll just have to hang around with you until you do."

"So what is she then?"

"I'll tell you on one condition."

"What?"

"Get everyone together and we play a good old game of footie. I was thinking girls vs boys. Do you agree?" 

............Sometime later.............


GIRLS 8, BOYS 1​

"Wull tha' was freekin' embarrassin'." Wheezed Nord.

"So? What is she?"

"Well, Jeli is...............


----------



## BoldItalic

"Well, Jeli is............... a Gestalt. As an action, she can switch to any other class at the same level but she doesn't gain the benefits of any particular archetype in the target class and she must finish a long rest before she can switch again. Right now, she is a Cleric-2 but of no particular domain. She can do 1st-level Cleric spells and _Turn Undead_ but that's about it. Tomorrow, who knows?"

"Is that legal?"

"Homebrew. It's the Racial Trait of Middle Elves."

"She's a Middle Elf? That explains a lot."

"You're welcome," said the crocodile.

Meanwhile the abbey was drawing closer, which was strange because the party were just sitting around having a short rest after the football match. But it just goes to show. By chance, the abbot saw them through his office window and gave instructions for the great gates of the abbey to be slammed shut.

"They've slammed the gates!" complained Od. "That's not very welcoming!"

"We can just walk round them, there isn't an actual wall," pointed out Jeli.

"No we can't. There's a sign that says KEEP OFF THE GRASS. We've got to stay on the road."

"So what's the sign doing on the grass? First thing we have to do, is keep the _sign_ off the grass like it asks us to. We just need to pick it up and throw it away, but without actually stepping on the grass."

"Lucky I can fly," said Nord.

"Well done, that man."

The abbot knew when he was beaten and sent an underling down to the vaults to look for the only surviving copy of _Sarcophagic For Dummies_.

It turned out that the instructions for using the sarcophagus as a portal went something like this ...


----------



## rgoodbb

It turned out that the instructions for using the sarcophagus as a portal went something like this ...

Instructions for Using a Sarcophagus as a Portal

1 Never open the sarcophagus without the correct key.
2 If you do open the sarcophagus without using the correct key, do not lose the Transportation Sand.
3 Close the sarcophagus.
4 Never get into the sarcophagus. It is not a toy. This could be really bad.
5 If you have got into the sarcophagus, get out of it immediately.
6 If there is movement within it, that you yourself have not placed there, NEVER open the sarcophagus.
7 If after instruction 6 you do open the sarcophagus, Run.



Follow on Instructions

1 How to find the correct key.
2 How to use said key.
3 how to complete the transportation ritual with the correct key.
4 Risky, almost certain death after long pain and torture alternatives, if you do not possess such a key.


----------



## BoldItalic

"Ah," said Herewulf, "We got it wrong, then."

"Famous last words."

"Lucky we found the book, otherwise we wouldn't have known."

"So what now? Can we find another portal, or are we stuck here in the afterlife unable to get back to the beforelife?"

"I must say, I'm a trifle disappointed in you people," said Snappy, idly flipping his football with the end of his tail and catching it on the tip of his snout, "You could at least undertake _The Quest of The Key_. Just to show willing, as it were."

"How do we do that?"

"Go down the road for three miles and look for a signpost to the Cave of Danger. The key is in the cave."

"Do we need some more transportation sand, to refill the sarcophagus with?"

"How would I know? I'm a crocodile."

The walk to the signpost was uneventful and gave the party time to admire the scenery, which was painted in oil on canvas and showed shepherds desporting with nymphs between ivy-covered ruined columns. Written on the base of one of the columns was the inscription "Et in Arcadia Ego", just in case you felt it ought to be there. Being a bard, Od felt obliged to sound knowledgeable and explained that the painting was by a famous oriental artist called Pu San, but no-one was impressed because the title along the botton of the picture was _Les bergers d'Arcadie_ and that's not oriental at all, unless you are an awfully long way west of France.

The signpost was waiting impatiently for them when they got there. "You took your time," said the signpost, "I haven't got all eternity, you know."

Feeling a little foolish at talking to a signpost, Herewulf asked the way to the Cave of Danger. "You don't want to go there," countered the signpost, "Why not go to the Crossroads of Forgetfullness? It's a lot safer."

"No, I think it has to be the Cave."

"Oh, suit yourselves. It's over there. But mind the shadow orcs, they haven't had their morning coffee yet and they're a bit grumpy."

"Thanks. Can we do anything for you?"

"If you come across the magical Coat of White Paint, I'd appreciate it."

"We'll look out for it."

The encounter with d8 shadow orcs was Hard and Jeli used up all her healing spells but the party triumphed in the end when Herewulf surrendered and they were imprisoned in the infamous Gaol of Shadows from which they escaped by walking through the walls.

Soon, the cave mouth yawned before them. A red-painted board with the word DANGER on it confirmed that his was indeed the right cave. "We seek the KEY that lies within," announced Jeli in sonorous tones. Od looked at her in a new light; he didn't know she did sonorous. Perhaps it was a cantrip he didn't know about, he thought. She was full of surprises.

Herewulf cast _Light_ on his rapier and led the way into the cave. A short distance in, there was a tripwire across the passage from which hung a sign saying "Do Not Step Over This Tripwire". This had them all baffled for quite a long time. Was it a trick? Or was it a genuine warning? A double bluff? What would happen if they did?

Nord solved the problem in a direct fashion by kicking down the sign, whereupon he was knocked prone by a sandbag falling from a concealed hatch in the ceiling and took 1d4 damage. "Not fair, I should get a Dex save," he objected, rubbing a fresh lump on his scalp. "It was a Wisdom-based trap," explained Herewulf.

They moved cautiously on, alert for more tricks, until they came to a door. It had an ornate brass doorknob that was obviously intended to be grasped firmly, twisted, and pulled to open the door. "I'm not touching that," announced Nord, "That's the Rogue's job."

"We haven't got a Rogue."

"Well, it's time we did."

"Can I be of service?" asked a suave voice as a hooded figure stepped stealthily out of his own private shadow. "Allow me to introduce myself. I am Baron Johannes von Uberwald und Missenberg-Bierstein."

"No you aren't," countered Jeli. "I know you, you're Knobbles Scratchit. When did you get out of prison?"

"Last week."

"Well, you can make yourself useful and open that door."

"I want 30 percent."

"You'll get a bunch of fives if you don't do as you're told."

"Oh alright, stand back everyone."

The door opened quietly and beyond a strange sight greeted them ...


----------



## rgoodbb

The door opened quietly and beyond a strange sight greeted them ...

An ochre yellow mist clung closely to the sapia and crimson gnarled figure before them. Wisps of orange staining it's clothing. It had three antlers, the front-most splitting into two silverstrands of light. The outer antlers transparent. The figure stood in what looked like a sky-blue rubber pool of custard. It's elongated arm (which split in two at one point, before reforming at the end) rose devilishly slowly and at an impossible angle and with a quiver. At the end of its arm, three ovoid fingers sprouted out into green rose-petals each tipped with a white ball bearing. The figure swished and swayed from side to side before standing on one leg and bending its standing knee. Purple bubbles could be seen frothing at its ears.

"That's a strange sight to greet us." Claimed Knobbles.

"Yup." Answered Amander as she led the group passed it.

Two molten passages on, and a U-Turn at Arcadia, and the group were in front of yet another sign, this one on a large door with a rounded top: GRAVE DANGER, this one claimed. Before Knobbles could stop her, Amanda knocked on the door.

It opened immediately, which was most unexpected: Door etiquette demanded a three second pause followed by several footsteps and then an opening. There was a manual for this sort of thing and everything.

"Morning. I'm Dave." Said Dave. Not surprisingly. 

"Oh well the sign says Gra..."

"I know, I know I'm Dave Granger, the Ranger, not Grave Danger the Stranger. Fwoor you don't want to meet her on a dark night in hell, Ill tell ya. She's....Well you can guess."

"The mix up must be really annoying, no?"

"Well, we get each others post, and well, she gets a lot of kill contracts ya know? Anyway what do you want?"

"Uhm....Ah yes....Well....You see....It's like this......I....really can't remember. I have lost the thread of this thread. I need a reminder from the DM to help guide me back on the path of sanity. 

"The KEY." Boomed a voice from above

"We are after the Key!" Xena boomed trying desperately to emulate the rumble in her Da....the DM's voice. Some day, I'll make a great DM too. She thought to herself, and as she did, a plan slowly formulated in her mind.....


----------



## BoldItalic

a plan slowly formulated in her mind..... 

Now she was 18, she could do anything. She would hire assassins to eliminate the daughter of someone rich and powerful so that she could dress up as her and take her place. Of course, it needed to be someone rich and powerful and too busy or too stupid to notice that his daughter suddenly looked entirely different but that shouldn't be difficult. Then she would buy a baseball cap and _order_ Wizards of the Coats to give her the head DM's job. It was all going to be so easy. Now she was 18.

"Is your wolf rider okay?" asked Dave, "She looks a bit pre-occupied."

Everyone turned to stare at Xena who was gazing into the distance and clenching her fists, much to the discomfort of her wolf who was beginning to consider the attraction of an imminent career change.

"Dave," said the wolf, "Do you have a vacancy for a companion?"

"Sure," replied the Stranger Ranger, "Welcome aboard."

"Wolf, you're fired!" shouted Ivanka Xena.

"Can we get back to the hunt for the KEY ?" pleaded Od. "Only we aren't making much progress, are we?"

"Have you got your flute?" asked Dave, "Can you play a dimished seventh in E flat minor?"

"Of course. But why?"

"That's the _key_ you want to operate the portal.

Now everyone stopped staring at Xena the former wolf-rider and started staring at Od instead. Od shrugged. "There's still the sand. We need sand," he mumbled.

"As it happens, ..."


----------



## rgoodbb

"As it happens, .............I have no sand. But I know where the Shore of Scales is. Is that any good? It looks like sand. Kinda. If you squint. And turn your head a little. And don't focus on it. Too much. Sort of. Oh and forget that it's green."

"It's OK Bigby, We'll find some from somewhere. Hey did we bring the sarcophagus with us? I can't remember, it was a few posts ago now."

"Well I think we can of brought it if we want to have. Stated Nord, half confusing himself. 

"That weirdly actually makes sense to me. So if we can of brought it here, then here it would probably _is_." Deduced Jeli flicking off some dirt from the now sarcophagus on wheels. "Bigby?"

"Hmm?"

"What exactly happened to the sand when you were inside there?"

"Don't want to talk about it." She seemed to mumble. 

"If might help...."

".....I....swallowed it."

"You ate all that sand?"

"...." Shrug

"But that's good. We still have it, and we have the musical key. We can return to the acropolis and go through the portal and go home. We have boulders to fight and taverns to get drunk in and goblins to harass and oh I'm so happy."

A little later..........

"....Sooo.......What did we need the sand for exactly?" Asked Od standing in front of the now opened portal. They had pushed the sarcophagus (on wheels) though and the portal was beckoning them. 

"Nothing I guess. Let's go through."

"WAIT!"

"What?"

"We need to dance through remember?"

"I don't have a great performance score."

"The prophecy didn't say about the quality of the dancing."

"Unless the quality is so bad that it fails to register as dance."

"Well go through in the middle of us then. We will start and end with good dancers. Who are the best."


--- After DANCE OFF: HELL 57 ---

The strongest pair that would be the last ones to dance through were Od and Bigby. 

Nord, Herewulf, Jeli, Xena, Amanda, Snappy, Dave, Knuckles, Wolf, Moo-Moo the wounded unicorn, et.al. took a dance through and disappeared. There was a splutter of energy and Bigby and Od performed the fandango. When they trotted through.......


----------



## BoldItalic

When they trotted through......... they were greeted with such a weird sight that it boggled their minds and they all had to make DC24 Wisdom saves or suffer the _Bewildered_ condition, which is very. very bad; much worse than _Stunned_ or _Incapacitated_. The mortal brain simply couldn't comprehend it. They were on what might have been a path through a forest but everything around them was wrong.

The 'path' was covered in irregular slabs of a hard mineral substance that felt rough to the touch and was surprisingly not very cold. The 'forest' seemed to made of trees that were just greyish-brown wooden trunks with greyish-brown wooden branches all haphazardly arranged and with leaves made out of some sort of green plant-like material. Between the 'trees', there was some sort of soft green stuff made of tiny blades of grass, all pointing upwards, with little multicoloured knobbly bits here and there that looked just like flowers. The craziest part was that overhead there was a sort of blue nothing with random lumps of white fluff floating about in it.

After a few minutes silence, punctuated only by a sort of intermittent drone made by tiny living organisms armed with deadly stings, Herewulf gathered his wits together and spoke. "I don't know where we are," he said, "but I want everyone to try to _disbelieve_ this illusion."

Nord tried very hard. He pulled out a nautical telescope and squinted through it at the forest but he couldn't see it properly because the trees got in the way. "Oi be all at sea, here," he declared.

Od toyed with his flute and tried to play the special music again but it just came out as a sequence of notes and there was no rhyme nor reason to it. "I'm at a loss for words," he said.

"Never mind that," retorted Jeli, "In case you men hadn't noticed, the girls and their unicorns didn't come through the portal with us."

"And where's Snappy?" asked Od, looking round in alarm.

But the four of them were indeed alone. Well, each of them wasn't alone because the other three were there but ... oh, you know what I mean.

"I quite thought we would came through in Ancient Egypt somewhere, but this doesn't look like Egypt," commented Herewulf. "Not that I've ever been to Egypt, but, well, going by what the crusaders wrote about the place, there should be palm trees and camels and big pointy monuments half buried in sand."

"Well, we must be _somewhere_. I'd say this path goes roughly north-south so which way do we want to go? North or South?"

"East."

"What, force our way though the forest? There could be ... bears or lions of something."

"Good."

"Oh, alright then. You go in front."

After about ten minutes moving cautiously eastwards, they suddenly came out of the forest and found themselves in ...


----------



## BoldItalic

and found themselves in ... a quandary.

I don't know about you, said Od to himself, but I get the feeling that this adventure is a bit ... disorganised. It's as if someone is just making stuff up and then someone else is making up more stuff and we end up lurching about going nowhere in particular. These are nice enough guys and Jeli isn't so bad when you get to know her but _why are we here?_. What is our manifold destiny? And when's lunch?

This wasn't what I came for, thought Jeli to herself. Way back on page two, I was supposed to meet three heroic adventurers who would accompany me on a quest of great importance. But all I found was this bunch of clowns and there's no sign of a quest. It's just chaos, and not in a good way. But as she voiced these concerns inwardly, another thought struck her. What if this was the very thing we were supposed to fight? Must we look deep within ourselves to find our true purpose? Am I an existentialist? And how would I know?

Nord counted the loose change in his pouch. It didn't take long. He pulled a wry face. Whatever they were doing, it didn't seem to be very lucrative. They hadn't even taken any captives, let alone plundered chests full of gold and jewels. This was no life for a pirate. An epigram came to mind, that he thought he must have heard somewhere but couldn't remember where. _We are becalmed on the Sea of Possibilities_. He liked that. It summed up the situation nicely. He wondered if he could sell it to Od. A good epigram must be worth 1gp at least.

I knew I should have stayed home, thought Herewulf gloomily. Chopping wood is satisfying. You put in the effort and you get chopped wood. Here, we put in loads of effort and get ... not a lot. Where did it all go wrong? Shouldn't I be pursuing my ideals? If it comes to that, what _are_ my ideals? No, that's bad thinking. I'm a sergeant, I follow orders and pass them on to the soldiers. Well, no-one's been giving me any orders and I haven't got any soldiers. So that's it. I'm not needed here. I _can_ just go home. But ...

"I've been thinking," said four voices simultaneously.


----------



## rgoodbb

"I've been thinking," said four voices simultaneously.

"I need organisation."

"I need a quest."

"I need money."

"I need an army."

They drank and they talked. They drank more and talked more. After sketching out a few ideas, a solution came. It was of course a ridiculous idea, for they were all drunk. They laughed and drank and fell asleep.

As the morning assaulted their heads, they all thought back on last eve's discussions. They smiled at the silliness and chuckled from time to time. But the smiles became more serious, and they all pondered the idea more. They glanced at each other silently until the smiles came back. This would work. This would satisfiy all parties. Well this party anyway.

"It was so obvious when you think about it."

"Yeah. Why didn't we do it sooner?"

"So. Now we are going to be Priveteers on the sea, what do we need?"

*A ship* - and not just any old ship. This has to be the best and fastest warship around.

*A crew* - and only the best will do.

*Marines* - led by Sergeant Herewulf to board and seize other ships to expand their armada.

*A sponsor* - The richest around. 

This was going to be good. Thought Jeli. So. first things first. The Ship.........


----------



## BoldItalic

The Ship......... 

"Nord," mused Jeli, "What would you say is the best fighting ship in the known world? Or any world, really? The one that all pirates fear to be pursued by?"

Nord though for a moment. "The _Phase Rider_. Legend has it, that it can pop up anywhere, seize your ship and disappear again into a magical mist. But it's just a legend. When a ship founders and is lost with all hands, folks say it was _Taken by the Phase Rider_."

"That's it, then," Jeli decided. "All we need to do, is to find the Phase Rider and requisition it."

"Sounds simple, when you put it like that. Why has no-one thought of it before?"

"Because they weren't us and didn't have our unique combination of talents."

"Can't argue with that."

"Any thoughts on how to find it?"

"Easy. We ask the DM."

"Are we allowed to do that? Isn't it, sort of _cheating_?"

"What do you mean, cheating? This isn't some game of _Pass The Elephant_. We're privateers, remember?"

"Oh, alright then. Let's try."

Just then, an aged man appeared out of nowhere. He had a long flowing beard, a tall pointy hat and he was leaning on a knobbly walking stick so you could tell he was a sage. Also, his name was Ask-Me-Anything. Od played a trill to improve their chances in case this turned into a skill challenge but he needn't has bothered because AMA was longing to give an impromptu lecture to somebody about something and this was his big chance. Herewulf asked the question that was on everybody's lips: "Where can we find the legendary ship called the Phase Rider?"

AMA cleared his throat, struck an oratorical pose, and told them. At great length. And in great detail with diagrams and astrological equations and many learned allusions to the classics, not to mention footnotes and a complete bibliography with cross-references.

"So, what you are saying is, we need to go to this particular latitude and longitude, at this precise time, and it will be there?"

"Indeed, yes."

"Thank you, you have been most helpful," said Od graciously.

The man seemed to be waiting for something. It dawned on Od that he expected to be _paid_. "My usual fee is 100gp," said AMA helpfully, "But it's entirely up to you, of course." There was just the merest hint of a component pouch under AMA's loosely-tied cloak and just the merest hint of an inch or so of gap between the soles of his feet and the ground. Not that this meant that he was a high-level magic user, you understand, said the DM casually.

After scraping together all the money they had, our four adventurers were left with 1sp, 3cp and a button.

Except that after AMA had left, Jeli seemed to be holding a pouch of 100gp. "I took Rogue this morning," she mumbled apologetically, "But I'm not proud if it. I think tomorrow I'll take Cleric and forgive myself."

"We need to go that way," said Nord, changing the subject hurriedly. "I can smell the sea air."

Arriving at the port of Anchorsaweigh our intrepic adventurers made their way to the quayside where they found ...


----------



## rgoodbb

to the quayside where they found ...seven Gnomes all with their hands chained up in front of them. Four women and three men. There was something else uncanny about the way they appeared. They moved their heads a lot to listen to each other. Jeli figured it out. They were blind. There was no-one overseeing them.

She move in.  "Excuse me. Who are you and what are you doing here?"

"We are part of a religious Order. I'm the fa...spokesperson. My name is Gard'eh."

Jeli felt relieved. She had indeed taken Cleric today. What were the odds? "I have never seen an Order like this. Please tell me more."

Enthused that someone actually took an interest in them, another one of them piped up. "We are the Order of Blind & Bound. It's a very small Order, in fact we may be the only ones. We are also very seasoned sailors but no-one will take us on."

"I'm not really surprised, are you? How can you run a ship in your double....conditions?"

At which point fourteen mage hands lifted Jeli off her feet. "That's clever. So you can detect where I am without sight and you can muster up fourteen instead of seven hands."

"The order of Blind and Bound removeth but also receiveth. Blindsight for our eyes and double mage hands for our bindings. There may be other benefits but they have yet to manifest."

Discussions and arguments started to bounce back and forth:

We can't take them. We'll crash into the rocks.

We can hear rocks, well before you can see them.

They don't have their hands.

Our Mage Hands are twice as strong as our own hands. And we can still use our hands, although with slight limitations.

We can't afford them. We don't have any money.

We're free.

They won't know the intricacies of the vessel that we have to try and find.

We have a boat.

We're hunting The _Phase Rider_ for goodness sake

We've tracked her many times and over long distances with our Blindsense. 

When all the arguments had run aground..."I guess you are hired then."

The Order bobbed and fizzed about on the quayside enthusiastically and led the party to their boat. It was........


----------



## BoldItalic

It was........ quite unusual for a boat of that era, for it had no mast, no sails, no oars and no other visible means of propulsion. "Looks wrong to me," was Nord's professional opinion. "The freeboard is too short and she'll take on water in a heavy swell.  And the fo'csle is too pointy. And the poop deck is supposed to be abaft the beam. And anyway, how does it _go_?

"You'll see, you'll see," said the gnomes. "Climb aboard and we'll cast off!"

After the four heroes had come aboard and helped each other across the magically slippery deck (DC15 Dex save) to where the ship's wheel would have been if it had one, the gnomes produced their knitting and cast off. They had made new woolly hats for the journey. It then became apparent how the boat was propelled, as fourteen mage hands gathered around the stern and started pushing. While they were doing this, one of the gnomes (the one with _FIRST MATE_ embroidered on his woolly hat) stared meaningfully at a coil of rope on the deck which began to writhe about and soon he was making 12 knots.

"Steer course Nor' Nor' East, lads," called the captain. "And up a bit, there's a reef ahead."

Soon, the craft was sailing smoothly across the ocean and Nord was keeping very quiet because all the ships he'd been on before had taken hundreds of men hauling on sheets, rattling up ratlin's and generally working their socks off to get even half this speed.

"Shall we repair to our cabins?" suggested Jeli, who was struck with a sudden craving for ginger biscuits. "This might be a good time to polish our rapiers, before we catch up with our quarry?"

"I think it might be wise to stay alert," countered Herewulf. "The gnomes' blindsight has limited range, does it not? Too short to sense what I can see over on the horizon? That sort of giant sea turtle-ish object heading our way, for example?"

Overhearing this, the captain looked startled. "All _hands_ on deck!" he shouted, "and start lifting!"

There was a _squench_ sound as the boat rose clear of the water and hovered comfortably at around 100 feet above the waves. The giant sea turtle blinked slowly and decided that perhaps flying whales were too weird to eat and lost interest.

During the night, however, ...


----------



## rgoodbb

During the night, however, _.......slop........slosh........creak...._they were still. The boat hardly moving. Herewulf, the only fidgeter. 

"Sit down will ya." commented Nord.

"I can't stop thinking we messed up back in Anchorsaweigh. We didn't get any Marines. How are we going to board The _Phase Rider_ and win without Marines?"

"We're gonna 'av to be trickstery then, ain't we."

"Trickst..Tricky is not my thing. You know that." 

Od, who was gently playing the squeeze box to make what he imagined was soothing pirate music replied. "Don't worry Herewulf. Things will be all good."

"How can you be so calm?"

"_I am always calm, no matter what the situation. I never raise my voice or let my emotions control me._" 

"But we at least need a plan."

"_I always have a plan for what to do when things go wrong_. but then..._If there’s a plan, I’ll forget it. If I don’t forget it, I’ll ignore it._ What can I say? I have a flawed personality."

"Wha....Wait a minute. You took the Criminal background? I would have thought Entertainer or Charlatan."

"We needed the Thieve's tools."

"Oh. well. I suppose. And why have we stopped? Have the gnomes lost their way?"

"She'll be here soon enough." FIRST MATE piped up. 

"What, right here?"

"Yep."

"And you didn't think to tell us? We have to prepare!."

It was however too late. The ghostly form of a sleek, dark warship, gloomily glowered and gloamed and almost silently groaned into existence on their port side. It towered above the gnome's little boat. On their starboard side, however, a swish of tail and teeth and small round glasses.

"Well bugger. This isn't Egypt."


----------



## BoldItalic

Snappy, for it was indeed he, was balancing a conch shell on his nose as he said this. Also, you might not be at all surprised to hear that he was accompanied by a team of mermaids riding pink narwhals. "Coo-ee," called Xena.

"When I said _marines_," groaned Herewulf, "I didn't mean ..."

"Well, you know how it is with _Wishes_," replied Od, "You get what you _ask_ for. Besides, the mermaids are equipped with waterproof crossbows and 3d6 bolts. What more do you want?"

Before Herewulf could answer, they were hailed by a stern voice from the Phase Rider. "Surrender your weapons!" it called rudely. "And be quick about it!" added the bow voice.

The gnome with SKIPPER on his hat glanced at the FIRST MATE and made a motion with his thumbs (which, if you recall, were bound together). "See that space on their deck, just forrard of the mizzen? Lodge us there, Mister Mate." So the mate turned to the BOSUN and gave his orders. "Prepare for Board and Lodging!" he shouted to the other gnomes. Then the boat, propelled by 14 mage hands, lifted clear out of the water, slid sideways and came to rest gently on the deck of the Phase Rider. If a boat could look smug, it was grinning from ear to ear.

"Od," said Nord quietly, "You know how, when we do _Mage Hand_ it can only lift 10 pounds? How come just 14 of them can lift an entire boat?"

Od tried to look knowledgable because he didn't like to admit that there were things that even bards don't understand, and he made up a completely bogus answer. "It's the nautical version. They're using lugger rhythms. The first Hand does 10, then each extra Hand adds zero, so with fourteen you get 100000000000000 pounds, or about the weight of a small country."

There wasn't time to debate the point, however, because at that moment the captain of the Phase Rider came striding down the deck towards them. He didn't need to take many strides because he was a thirty-foot tall storm giant skeleton. Did I not mention that? Also, he was wearing one of those viking helmets with the up-turned cow horns and carrying a club the size of a small tree, which he brandished menacingly.

Jeli leapt from the deck of the boat and strode forward to meet him. "Neptune or Poseidon?" she demanded. As she spoke, thunder clouds roiled overhead and flashes of lightning flickered menacingly over the sea. She was doing Storm Druid. The giant skeleton was clearly nonplussed by the question and slightly unnerved by the impending storm. Something you don't want to be doing, in a thunderstorm, is wearing a helmet with up-turned cow horns and standing on a wet deck in an ocean of salt water. It's bad luck.

"I .." he began, but he got no further. "It's a trick question, isn't it?" he said hopefully.

Just then, FIRST MATE tapped BOSUN on the shoulder with his mage hand. "Are you sensing what I'm sensing? Somewhere deep below us in the abyss?"

The BOSUN nodded. "It's the Mother of All Krakens. Like in the legends. Do you think we should tell anybody?"

"Best not to worry them right now."

"As you say. Why do you think the skeleton crew are jumping overboard? Are they afraid of the storm?"

"I don't think skeletons understand _Fear_. More likely it's that song the mermaids are singing. Skeletons aren't immune to _Beguile_."

"Lucky we're Clay Gnomes, then, or we'd be over the rail and joining them. That paladin fellow is struggling against it, though. The way he keeps staring at one of those mermaids. It's unhealthy."

"Each to his own. Any port in a storm and all that. Speaking of storms, shouldn't we be seizing this ship, round about now?"

"Best wait for the Skipper to give the order."

"Fair enough."

Meanwhile, far below in the abyss, Penelope ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Meanwhile, far below in the abyss, Penelope ...

"Aaah, fair lady Penelope. It is time for your breath."

"Don't want to."

"But you must my lady. It has been a whole year."

"Every time I go topside, I scare people with my looks. I have barnacles! Heck I have barnacles on my barnacles. I look like a monster."

"Well technically y.....Uhm. We will get someone to clean those. Hey, do you remember when that handsome warrior skimmed al the way down your tentacles like a water slide?"

"Oh I do yes. What season was that, 3 or 4?"

"4 I think. Yes Awning Pothole. That was a good season. Was that 4?"

"I preferred the first. So Long and Thanks..........hmumf......All right........If I go up, do I become a recurring villain?"

"I don't think you were ever that."

"Then what was I. What was my role? Combat, Social or Exploration?" Enquired the ginormous Kraken.

".........................waterslide?"


----------



## BoldItalic

".........................waterslide?" 

"Don't be silly."

"You could be a quest-giver? Mortals love being given quests to do. It makes them feel useful."

"How does that work?"

"You find a bunch of adventurers with no money, and you tell them 'Fetch me the biggest diamond in the world' and they go and get it for you and then you graciously accept the diamond and fob them off with a magic sword and a bag of gold and they go away feeling pleased with themselves."

"What's the catch?"

"They don't always come back."

"But then I don't have to pay them?"

"That's right. You can't lose."

"But where do I find a party of adventurers dumb enough to take all the risks and then hand over some fabulously valuable diamond in exchange for some worthless trinkets?"

"They are on a ship right above you."

"This better not be one of your tricks to get me to go up to the surface."

_Meanwhile_

"Well, which is it to be?" demanded Jeli. "Which god do you make your libations to every morning at sunrise, when you pray for fair weather and a calm sea? Poseidon or Neptune?"

"Er, well, actually, we don't believe ... that is, we don't ... er ... now you come to mention it ..."

The thunder crackled a little louder and the lightning flashed a little ... flashier ... as Jeli rolled for _Intimidation_ with advantage and scored a natural 20 on _both dice_. The giant skeleton suddenly realised it was scuppered. Jeli had completely taken the wind out of its sails. It had been used to sailors who gave in easily but the tide had turned. It was out of his normal compass. But that wasn't the worst of it. The worst of it was, _a gigantic eye had just risen from the ocean and it was looking straight in its direction_. Its morale failed. It threw down the club, cast aside its helmet, leapt over the side of his ship and began swimming away.

"Impressive," commented Skipper the gnome.

Just then, a voice spoke in everyone's head. It was Penelope, communicating telepathically. She said ...


----------



## rgoodbb

She said ...

"Testing.....Testing.....Can anyone hear me?......One, two, one two, one, one, one-aahh, one-aahh......Is this thing even on?..........I don't think anyone can hear me. It has been a whole year. Maybe the feature has finally died out. Testing?..... Nope. What am I supposed to do now? We got rid of the carrier Harpies when we made the Olympus budget cuts. Maybe if I blink in Norse Code. No that won't work 'cause I only know Greek, dumbass! Ooh. What if I thrash my tentacles rapidly on the surface. That's sure to get people's attention." 

And thus, the Legendary (and when I say Legendary, I mean epic, not Monster Manual pg 197....Although it's Actions would be Legendary in that sense too but not what I was originally going for when I said Legendary) Kraken: Penelope, arose from the dark waters. Erupting foam and crashing waves announcing her awesome presence. The Phase Rider almost capsized in recoil, righted herself and bobbed like a rubber duck in a bathtub compared to this, this, this.....

...this....."MONSTER!" Someone shouted. Penelope turned and saw the object of that cry. It was a huge Skeleton desperately swimming away from both her and the little boat in front of her. She sighed and slapped a barnacle encrusted tentacle on top of the thing, wondering fleetingly whether bones float. 

Jeli, Snappy and the girls all started _whoo whoo'ing _as they surfed the newly created totally awesome waves, and the _Phase Rider?_, Well, she took on a massive quantity of water and began to slowly sink......


----------



## BoldItalic

and began to slowly sink...... 

The gnomes gnew what to gdo and they all bustled onto their own boat, which if you recall was lodged forrard of the mizzen mast. "Status, mister mate!" cried Skipper. "Sep minus 20 seconds and holding. All systems nominal," came the anachronistic reply. The mate had been watching the Apolla movie on gnomerama. The skipper caught the mood, sat in a swivel chair and commanded "All keyboards to manual, mister Zulu! All screens to visual!"

Nord tutted. Only a clay gnome would play star trek captains in a shipwreck. He threw Hereward a rope because the paladin, being in heavy armour, was not well equipped to float free if the ship foundered, which it seemed to be trying very hard to do.

And what of Od? He decided it was finally time to be heroic and was standing bolt upright on the prow of the ship, striking a noble pose and playing sea shanties on his flute. The notes floated across the foamy brine and reached the ears _attention_ of Penelope, who stopped thrashing for a moment to listen. "Dum, dum, diddle-um dum," she hummed inwardly, forgetting that her telepathy was still set to 'transmit'.

DUM DUM DIDDLE-UM DUM​
The gnomes looked at each other in alarm. Someone had just uttered *the gnomish words of power*, as spoken by  Goldrim Glittertoes when he shaped the world out of sacred clay and breathed life into the darkness. "So this is the end of the world?" asked the Bosun, "Funny I thought it would end with a rainbow."

The waves having subsided and the surfing being less exuberant, Jeli shape-shifted back from her porpoise form and climbed back aboard, which wasn't difficult because the deck of the Phase Rider was pretty much at water level anyway. She made her way to the boat to rejoin Nord and Herewulf. "Don't just stand there!" she commanded, "Break out the barrels of wine and pour them into the sea. And if you've got any roses and boxes of chocolates, throw those in too. Can't you see the kraken is a _lady_?"

But ...


----------



## rgoodbb

But....

in the distance a gnome spotted land

"Ahoy! Land Ahoy! Alive, alive ho. Rosemary and thyme. " 

Penelope's norbynorwest tentacle gently and gingerly arose from the 'neath to stem the sinkage of the Phase Rider and the mage hands bucketed the water from within. 

"What is this land that ahoy's us so?" Exclaimed Od. 

"Why it is of course the land of Nod." Replied a gnome before hitting the deck snoring.

"Seriously. Are you joking? There can be no such land.

Thump.......Thud..... Bang.......

Jeli looked around her. All were three sheets to the wind. All were soundly asleep.

Penelope, inundated with gifts of chocolate and flowers, found herself to be in a good mood for the first time in as much as a year. She recognised the island;s defence Sleep spell but had more HP than a ninth level version could dish out. She too was curious. And so her and the tiny High Elf came to an accord. They would investigate the island together.

It was about this time that the Land of Nod initiated its second line of defence:

The Perimeter of.........


----------



## BoldItalic

It was about this time that the Land of Nod initiated its second line of defence: The Perimeter of......... Halibut.

The devilishly-cunning minds of the Mages of Nod had devised a cunning defence against creatures who passed though the outer defences still awake. It was a huge Zone of Polymorph that covered the sea around the shores of Nod, for a distance of half a league. Any creature entering it had to make a DC30 Wisdom save or be polymorphed into a flatfish, which would then fall asleep and lie dozing on the seabed. It took a prodigeous amount of arcane energy to set it up with dozens of mages working tirelessly for months but after many setbacks, they finally succeeded. The island was safe from invaders. Or so they thought.

But they didn't test it on krakens because the fish sellers in the market square didn't have any, although they did promise they would be getting some in next week. You see, in the small print for Kraken (MM197) the _Freedom of Movement_ feature specifies that _magical effects can't reduce its speed_ and a sleeping flatfish is slower than a kraken so it can't be polymorphed into one.

The duty mage in the lookout tower on Watching Head was suddenly aware of this shortcoming when Penelope hove into view and didn't turn into a flatfish. He twiddled the offical piece of copper wire and sent an urgent _Message_ to his commander who reprimanded him for being drunk on duty because it is well known that krakens are mythical.

Jeli, however, had no such immunity. She turned into a flatfish and started sliding down Penelope's tentacle to go flop into the sea. But Penelope made a sudden _Insight_ check and, realising what was happening, gave Jeli a moderately gentle slap, enought to reduce a flatfish to 0hp and end the polymorph effect. Jeli blinked and wondered why she was suddenly swimming around in a wet dress with a headache. "No time to explain!" telepathed Penelope, "Get out your bow and start shooting at that mage in the tower!"

It was a short but unequal combat. What exactly happened was ...


----------



## rgoodbb

It was a short but unequal combat. What exactly happened was ...

.....An arrow De-notched with velocity from an Elf with mythical accuracy (through one feat or another) travelling at speeds herewithall unheard of, and embedding it's thrice-pronged head onto/into/herewithin the klaxon-wire that of course enabled the _Message _cantrip to be sent to protagonists unknown. 

This resulted in a social media blackout and the Island of Nod's communication towers all failed at once. The disaster-laden secondary consequences took effect: All the island's younglings lost their ability to commune with each other, and as such, the young began to both panic and revolt. 

The revolt started slowly with mumblings in the universities and then cascaded through to colleges and schools. Then a singular Elf-like figure slowly emerged from the ocean escrying the benefits and the power of Penelope _The _Kraken. After rejecting other gods, Students one and all, seeing a new power rise, asked for Penelope to be their new entity/patron.

Within a dusk and a dawn, almost half of the population from the Land of Nod almost instantly became Warlocks, and the false?
religion of Penelopism was born. 

They waited.

She wondered.

They waited a little more.

She nodded to herself. She had come to a decision. Here first decree would be.........


----------



## BoldItalic

Her first decree would be......... to declare gold anathema.

"Gold is unholy and ye must free thineselves of its baleful doom," announced Penelope, who was quite enjoying the situation and lapsing into archaisms she hadn't used for thousands of years. "Scour the Land of Nod for gold," she commanded, "and let none withhold it. Bring it verily down unto the harbour, where shall it be loaded even onto the Phase Rider and taken away for safe disposal far out at sea, in the deepest abyss from which there is no return. Only thus shalt thy land be free."

And so it was done. The warlocks raided the storehouses and treasuries and arrived at the harbour towing many, many, floating disks laden with gold coins, bars, ingots and jewellery. The gnomes kept a tally and saw to it that the gold was safely stowed away in empty wine casks below decks. At Nord's suggestion, they even replaced the ship's ballast with gold ingots. In all, at the end of a few days, they had collected about fifty tons of gold and the Phase Rider was settling commfortably in the water. Herewulf was kept busy all the while, blessing the vessel to rid it of the evil effects of all the gold it was carrying.

The Nodlanders solved the problem of the sudden absence of gold coinage by not really caring. The silver 'Nod', as normally used by merchants, was declared to be worth forty 'winks', the latter being a small copper coin equal to a labourer's daily wage. Everyone carried on as before except for misers, who had been keeping gold pieces in socks under their beds and even they were better off because they now had more pairs of socks that they could actually wear and they could stop worrying about being burgled by sock burglars.

It was time for Penelope to make another decision. Jeli phrased it nicely: "Where do you want us to take it to?" she asked.

Penelope had it all worked out. "There's an uninhabited island many days sail to the west with an abandoned temple to a forgotten god. Take it there and bury it in the secret crypt beneath the floorboards. But keep some for yourselves. As much as you like. Think of it as an advance on expenses. You're probably going to need it."

"Why, where are we going?"

"You are going on a quest, tiny adventurers. I want you to bring me the biggest diamond in the world."

This seemed like a worthwhile quest and that completed their fourfold aims: they had a ship, a crew, some marines and a sponsor. Life took on a clarity that it had lacked until now and they sailed away in good heart to find the uninhabited island to bury their hoard of gold.

After an uneventful fortnight, they arrived at the island and moored in a sheltered bay near the ruins of an ancient harbour. Now, when I say 'uninhabited', I mean there were no _people_ living on the island. And when I say 'abandoned' I mean that _people_ had stopped going there. But there was a reason for that, as the heroes were about to discover when they went ashore ...


----------



## rgoodbb

when they went ashore ...

"Jeli?"

"Hmm?"

"What are you today?" Enquired Od.

"Why?"

"Well, I feel something sneaky might be useful. I don't like _Deserted Islands and Temples._ Could you be a Rogue?"

"Too late. I already swapped out for today."

"Damn." Od took a look at his thieve's tools and sighed. He didn't like taking this role but it needed covering for an optimal party. 

"Beach footie anyone?" Snappy confidently waded ashore.

"I keep forgetting you are with us." Replied Herewulf.

Xena, Amanda and Bigby all joined in a game of kickabout with the crocodile and the rest advanced a little further inshore for a snoop about. Passed the sanded front, a cluster of dry shrubbery and bushes beckoned, and beyond that, caves!

Herewulf - "Caves! Now we're talking."

Nord - "No now you are talking." 

Herewulf - "Well.....By answering me, we are talking huh?"

Nord - "I guess I can't argue with that one but just to say; Shhh!"

Jeli - "Both of you hush."

Od - "Jeli. Be quiet."

Herewulf - "See now we are all talking."

Nord - "Oh for the love of..."

Od - "This cave seems to have an echo."

 - "Echo."

Od - "Don't start!"

Herewulf - "I never said anything."

 - "Thing."

Meanwhile back on the beach Snappy and Amanda were losing 3-0. With Bigby in goal no-one could get passed her. Xena ran forward and booted the ball which narrowly missed their goal. The ball sat in the sand......and then wobbled a little......There was a small rumble........and then it sank below the beach. As the players (football players not real players) gingerly sloped towards the site..................


----------



## BoldItalic

As the players (football players not real players) gingerly sloped towards the site.................. 

 .... Herewulf, Od, Jeli and Nord were meanwhile preparing torches, ten-foot poles, lengths of rope, pitons, small hammers, waterskins and climbing boots ready to explore the beckoning cave. However, just then, a booming voice from somewhere above called out "I'd like you all to make an Isnight check, please ..ease .. ease ..."

"Is that a typo?" wondered Od, "Do you mean an _Insight_ check?"

"No, I want you to check if it is night."

There was a flurry of dice rolling and tut-tutting and a few groans _soto voce_ because nobody had rolled higher than a 7.

Accordingly, the sun had set while they were making their preparations and the long shadows of night had fallen over the cave mouth, making the flickering glare of their torches easily visible to anyone - or any_thing_ - watching from outside. If there was anything. Which, of course, there was. You don't just get open caves like that without there being something that sleeps in them do you? Stands to reason. Caves like that don't just get wasted. They get occupied. By _things_ who tend to dislike intruders poking about in their caves. And when I say _dislike_ I mean the roll-for-initiative kind of dislike. A family of green scaly quadrupeds bellowed a challenge and charged out of a nearby wood towards the cave mouth, maws agape to display rows of unpleasantly yellow pointy fangs dripping with drool. 

Herewulf was the first to react. He dropped the ten-foot-pole-with-a-small-mirror-attached-to-one-end that he was holding, presented his Shield and walked boldly forward as if to greet them. "We come in peace," he declared in a deep baritone voice that resonated with the natural frequency of the cavemouth. "... eace ... eace ... eace ... " It didn't work. Nice try, shows style, but it didn't work. He was knocked down and trampled underfoot, taking 1d4 severe dents in his armour. If he hadn't been a gelatinous paladin, he would have been quite badly hurt but as it was, he was just a bit flattened temporarily.

Suddenly, a scream ripped through the air, rising in pitch higher and higher, beyond the limit of human hearing and high into the ultrasonic. The green scaly monsters skidded to a halt, rose on their hind legs and threw back their heads, looking around franatically for terrordactyls. They were afraid of terrordactyls, which were quite capable of swooping down unexpectedly and seizing a green scaly infant in their talons before its green scaly parents could do anything to prevent it. Though they didn't know it, Od had used a _Minor Illusion_ cantrip to imitate the scream of a terrordactyl and had thus sown confusion in the green scaly ranks.

Nord eschewed heroism for gallantry. He grabbed Jeli, lifted her bodily off her feet and made a run for it, out of the cave and away from the scene. Jeli protested mightily at the indignity, then fell silent, then burst out laughing. "Put me down, you fool," she cried, "I can run away faster than you!"

"That's why I'm not letting you," was Nord's gruff reply. "If they get too close, I want to be able to throw you behind me as a distraction while I get away myself."

Jeli though about that. It made a horrible kind of sense. Nord was a pirate, after all. But at least she knew where she stood. There was a momentary lapse of reality and Nord found himself holding, not an elf, but a potted geranium and Jeli herself was somehow a fair way ahead of him in the direction he was running. "Wild Magic!" she shouted over her shoulder as she ran helter-skelter down towards the beach. Nord grumbled as he banged his shins on a rocky outcrop. Jeli could see in the dark.

Down on the beach, there was no sign of the footballers nor, indeed, of their football. The Phase Rider lay quietly moored in the bay and the gnomes' boat was where they had left it. All seemed peaceful enough. Except ....


----------



## rgoodbb

All seemed peaceful enough. Except ....

"I don't understand it."

"No but you do under-sand it, don't you?"

"Yes Snappy I heard what you did there. Very clever. We are under the sand. But I can't seem to find the correct terminology of this place. I know it I think, but it just isn't coming to the forefront of my mind."

"Exactly this could well be the entrance to the temple of .........uhm.......Oojamaflip, the Sand-....something."

"Wasn't she the sister of....of....."

"Thingamajig? Yes who married uhrm..."

"Thingamabob." Amanda completed the Powerful Triumvirate: _The Pantheon of the Forgotten._ 

"Of course it wasn't always a triumvirate. There was the _God Cast Down_. Oh Whatshisface?" Snappy remarked. 

"Yes that's him. So it was a quad? a quartet?"

"No. There was another...."

"Who?"

"All I know was there was another."

The footballers walked through the under-sandstone caves, glancing at statues and pictures and effigies and carvings. Forms, faces unknown or rubbed out littered rooms, antichambers and corridors. They encountered giant carved noses that sniffed them as they passed. There were spirits with no feet that floated but left bloody footprints in their wake. This was a mad world. A world of chaos and sorrow. Before them, lingering but always just out of reach and always in the corner of their eyes was a yellow cloud, mustard and lightly swirling. Walls grumbled as they shited behind the party, and they all felt as though they were in a dream. 

It suddenly came to Xena in a flash of insight (not is-night). "We are in the tomb of Doodad the Discarded. The Severed Sibling. He was chaos-wracked after his brothers and sisters abandoned him. He is dangerous. We might be in trouble guys. Uhm, GUYS.........


----------



## BoldItalic

We might be in trouble guys. Uhm, GUYS......... 

"We seem to have lost Jeli," said Amanda. "And the men," she added as an afterthought. She wasn't particularly worried until there was the slightest sensation of a sigh from behind them. It came from mustard-coloured cloud. Then she was worried. "I think we should leave," she added, shivering. You know that sensation people talk about of someone walking over your grave? Well, this was more like someone walking _through_ your grave.

It quickly became apparent, however, that there was going to be a problem with leaving, in that there wasn't an obvious way out. There were forgotten passages and disused rooms and the occasional absent-minded doorway but nothing resembling anything so final as an exit. Ideally, they would like to find _#17: a stairway up thirty feet_, but this wasn't a random dungeon where you can find anything you want if you roll the dice for long enough. This was for real.

Snappy had an idea. "When I hatched as a tiny snappy along with my brothers and sisters, we all had to swim up through the sand that our eggs had been buried in. It was pretty gruelling, I can tell you, because we only had tiny feet and tiny snouts and the sand gets in your eyes. But we could all try swimming upwards, perhaps?"

Xena gazed up at the roof, which was solid stone. Which was just as well, really, or it would have fallen down by now. "Nice idea, Snappy," she said kindly, "but I don't think I can swim as well as you. Think hard, everyone, there has to be a clue somewhere."

The mustard cloud wavered and somehow absorbed itself into a nearby wall, which changed grittily to display a bas-relief carving of a vaguely human figure. "You have to say the magic words," the figure murmured sadly. According to an inscription that appeared underneath, this was the figure of Doodad the something-or-other. He looked woebegone. Indeed, his woe had completely begone and not become back. "No-one ever remembers the magic words," he sighed.

Bigby had a sudden inspiration. She took a small book from her handbag and consulted it, running an elegant fingernail down the columns of fine print. "Donebad, Dongfred, Dontcare ..., ah, here we are, Doodad. Well, well, well."

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY!" she shouted.

At that, Doodad's visage lit up and he was wreathed in smiles. "You remembered!" he exclaimed. Suddenly, the atmosphere changed. Floors were covered in luxurious carpets, the roof was festooned with garlands and the walls were hung with brightly-coloured tapestries depicting jolly scenes of festivity. Doodad stepped out of his wall and gave Bigby a hug. "Thank you!" he sobbed, tears rolling down his cheeks. "It's party time! And you even brought your own game of Spin The Crocodile!"

Snappy was a little concerned at this last remark ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Snappy was a little concerned at this last remark ...

...Od led the group inch by inch through the intricate cave system. 
He wished he had a 10' pole but he did not. 
He wished he had Nightvis/Intravis/Darksigh/Thermasig/ He wished he could see in the dark but he could not. 
He wished he had expertise in Perception, but he did not. 
He wished he had remained at the Pig and Lion all those posts ago, but he had not.
He wished he could take a Feat, but he cou....He could take a feat! Now to deal with that annoying echo.E

"Herewulf?"

_"Wolf."_

"Yes, what is it Od?"

_"Is it Od?"_

"Do you still have the Canteen. you know the one from the Dwarf with Feats?"

_"Dwarf with Feats."_

"Yes do you want a stab at it?"

_"Stab at it."_



Snappy hushed the party. He was near a natural vent and could hear voices. The ladies came to listen too.

"What do you hear Snappy?" Asked an already drunk Xena.

"Well. I think our comrades may be in trouble." Replied Snappy who was already spinning without the need to spin the crock. 

"Why?"

"Apparently there is a Wolf with Odd Dwarf Feet that they are stabbing at."

".........Oh.....Well.......I'm sure they've got this. We have a party to get back too WOOO-HOOO!."



Od, Jeli, Nord and Herewulf turned a corner, espied their teammates having a drunken party with a yellow cloud. Amanda, gin in hand, shouted "Hey how was the wolf with little feet? Did you stick it?"

Discounting this sight before them for exactly what it was; a preposterous Illusion, Od led the party away from the party having a party and delved deeper into the dungeon. He was glad he had taken a swig from the damaged canteen. He would get his Feat today, but there was always an unknown side effect with it........


----------



## BoldItalic

Deeper and deeper into the dungeon they crept, wary for wandering monsters. Carefully avoiding a squeaky floorboard, in case it was a trick, Od led them down a side passage to the left and into a chamber. It was about 20ft square, with an exit door on the far side. The air was cold and still, with a faint odour of old armchairs. The odour was actually coming from an old armchair set against the wall to one side, and in the chair was a skeleton.

"Second left, you can't miss it," said the skeleton in a sepulchural voice.

"Excuse me?"

"The place you're looking for, it's the second door on the left."

"But there's only one door?"

"Sorry, I got moved in here when they tidied up. I was pro-drachmed for a room with two doors."

"Pro-drachmed?"

"It's like pro-grammed, only more archaic."

"Well, can you tell us where you were before, so we can go there and take the second left?"

"Sure. They didn't move me far. Just take the second on the left, and you're right there."

"Er .. thank you."

"You're welcome. Have a nice day."

They moved on until Od, who was leading with every sense alert, suddenly held up a hand to halt. He gestured frantically at a strange object that lay on the floor of the passage a short distance ahead. "It's pretending to be an empty bucket," he hissed, "So it obviously isn't."

"It certainly _looks_ like an empty bucket," suggested Nord. "It's very bucket-shaped and there's nothing in it."

Herewulf used his paladin abilities. "I'm not sensing any evil or good about it," he reported, "But it could be chaotic-neutral."

Jeli knitted her brows and there was a colourless purple sprong sound as a spell erupted from her upraised palm. The bucket glowed with an eerie light that foreboded. "Just as I suspected," she announced. "It's only projecting the semblance of an empty bucket in this plane of existence. We can only guess as to its true nature."

"It could be extremely dangerous," mused Herewulf. "Can we avoid it? Or must we fight it?" He drew his rapier as he said this, and readied his shield.

Od produced his flute and played a merry tune to hearten them. "We have not come this far, to flee like lily-livered cowslips at the first sign of danger," he declaimed. "This is the day that we shall tell our grandchildren about, when our deeds shall ring down the ages in the annals of heroism. This _is_ that day!"

The bucket ...


----------



## rgoodbb

The bucket ...not put off by this overtly angstful-aggressive display in the slightest, stood its ground. 

"Kick it."

"Nope. That's bad Juju. I'm not kicking it."

"Well stamp on it"

"Nope. I'm not getting my foot caught in a bucket."

"Well *£%* it!"

"I'm certainly not doing that."

Just then, from behind them, a football landed perfectly in the bucket. The party looked around and a mildly merry Snappy recoiled his tail. "You don't have long, Hurry! Hic."

They sped passed, giving the receptacle a wide berth, turned the corner. A great crashing sound echoed behind them as a stone pillar blocked their path back. Ahead of them was a 60' corridor, 10' wide and high. At the end were a set of double doors. Between them and the doors.......was a Bucket.

"This isn't fair." Shouted Jeli. "A second Bucket? DM? Have you checked your CR ratings? Maybe this isn't a combat encounter. Maybe that's it. Does anyone here speak Bucket?"

The bucket....


----------



## BoldItalic

The bucket.... was a commonplace object, so it spoke Commonplace, which is understandable to speakers of Common if they pay attention and know their place.

"What's the rush?" asked the bucket.

"Er, we, er ..."

"To er is human," said the bucket gently, "Take your time. I'm not going to attack you."

"Why are you here?" demanded Jeli. "Are you essential to the plot, in ways unfathomable to mere mortals? Are you ineffable? Do you have cosmic undertones?"

"I don't think so. As far as I know, I'm just a bucket. For carrying water, or sand, or ... less pleasant but nonetheless essential substances."

"Do you know what is beyond those bronze doors?"

The bucket shrugged.

"This is hopeless," muttered Od. "I'm beginning to suspect that the DM is just messing about, throwing in random buckets with no purpose whatever."

Jeli tried a different tack. "We are on a quest to find the biggest diamond in the world," she announced importantly.

"And meanwhile," added Nord, "We have fifty tons of gold to bury under the floorboards."

The bucket seemed to think about this. "That's a lot of bucketfulls," it suggested. "Have you brought enough floorboards?"

Herewulf has a sudden sinking feeling. They were supposed to bring their own floorboards? Everyone had been assuming that there would already be floorboards _in situ_ and they would just need to lift them up to reveal a suitable secret hiding place. But the whole plan was suddenly unravelling. He decided to bluff it out. "We have magic for that," he asserted with all the aplomb he could muster. He hoped he struck the right note between casual and assured.

The bluff seemed to work, because the bucket didn't quibble with the explanation but changed the subject. "This diamond," it continued, "roughly how big is it? About my size, or smaller, or larger? I'm asking because if you like, you could use me to carry it in."

It was Jeli's turn to be wrong-footed. She had no idea how big diamonds could grow, or how big the biggest one in the world might be, but she wasn't going to let a mere household object get the better of her. "Oh, it's much bigger than you," she lied. "You couldn't possibly carry it."

"Gosh," said the bucket. "I'm impressed. And you're going to steal it? Won't the owner be upset about being robbed?"

At the implication that there might be a small element of unlawfulness in their quest, Herewulf felt a slight twinge of paladinesque conscience. It was fleeting and he conquered it by reminding himself that he had never taken an Oath, although he might have to if they levelled up again. For a moment, he began to wonder idly which Oath he should take. They were all so _earnest_. Perhaps he could multiclass for a few levels, and postpone the decision? This bucket was making him _think_, just by asking seemingly innocent questions. Maybe it was an dialectical bucket? After all, if Diogenes could live in a barrel, could not Aristotle be living in a bucket? Well, two could play at that game.

Herewulf threw down the gauntlet. "Give me a reasoned argument to prove that you are a bucket," he challenged.

The others looked on with some surprise at this turn in the conversation, but they trusted Herewulf to know what he was doing and they settled down to observe the proceedings with interest. Snappy even stopped spinning his football around his ears and grinned. This was going to be good.

Somewhere in another dimension, the DM groaned and regretted mightily having rolled on the Random Dungeon Dressing table. He wished he could retcon the whole bucket thing. But it was too late.

The bucket ...


----------



## rgoodbb

The bucket ...took a circuitous route around the problem. It had to contain this, had to get a handle on this before its reasoning paled. It would win this argument in spades. 

"Did you by happenchance pass another bucket on your journeys here?"

"Yes. Why?"

"That was Henry."

"Henry. OK. What's your name?"

"Why I am dear Liza of course."

"I don't sea h.."

"Bear with me. Now. Let us hypothesize that I, as a bucket, have a hole in me that lets liquid escape. What would you patch up the hole with?"

"Well straw of course."

"Good. Now let us assume that the straw is too long. What would you do?"

"Uhm. Cut it?"

"With what?"

"An axe of course."

"Ahh. Yes you are following quite well. Now let us assume that the axe is too blunt."

"I would sharpen it on a stone."

"Good. Nearly there. The stone is far too dry."

"I would wet it with water. A lot of water."

"How would you get all that water here?"

"That's easy, I would fill a buc....."

Od was in the corner, songwriting inspiration suddenly flooding his mind.


----------



## BoldItalic

Nord had meanwhile turned his attention to the bronze doors and the DM asked him to make a Wisdom(Perception) check  to see if there was anything unusual about them. He rolled a 12, so he noticed that there were iron hooks set into the wall on either side, high up near the roof, that could be used to hold the doors back when they were open. What he failed to think through (because he had only rolled a 12) was that the iron hooks were 9ft up and no-one who was human-sized would be able to reach them.

But snappy had also noticed the hooks and they suggested something entirely different to his reptilian brain. Acting with blinding speed, he crunched his mighty jaws down on the philosophical bucket and removed its bottom, thus ensuring that its hypothesis was validated and there was indeed a hole in the bucket. Then he flipped it with his snout, high up to the left so that its handle caught on one of the iron door hooks and it hung there, rocking gently and making nonsensical remarks. "Watch this!" cried Snappy and he flipped his football up and into the bucket, to fall through and down to bounce on the ground again. "Goal!" he shouted. He had invented the game of bucketball, for which the DM awarded him Inspiration.

With philosphical debate no longer a viable option, the heroes had no option but to try to open the bronze doors. "Do I need to make a Strength(Athletics) roll, wondered Herewulf? And can Nord use the Help action to give me Advantage? But the DM said there was no need, and the door would open easily despite its obvious great weight.

The door opened to reveal an abandoned temple, complete with an altar in the middle, benches around each side and a gong in one corner. On the altar was a pair of brass candlesticks, each about 3ft high, but there were no candles in them. The altar, the benches, the gong and the candlesticks were all festooned with cobwebs, so you knew it was abandoned and also worried slightly about giant spiders.

On the altar between the two candlesticks stood _the biggest diamond in the world_ an oak casket which had a prominent lock. Od felt in his pouch for his Thieves' Tools, as he approached the casket warily. He knew this was going to be tricky, because the DM had asked him to say _exactly_ what he was going to do. "First, I'm going to ..." he began, but that was as far as he got.

"Hey guysh," interrupted Xena bursting into the room, "You shimply _musht_ come and shee what we've ffound!"


----------



## rgoodbb

"You shimply musht come and shee what we've ffound!"......

“Not now. Xena. Blood sacrifice.”

“What?” Asked Jeli. 

“Blood sacrifice.” Nord confirmed. “Can’t you see the stains around the altar?”

“Well now you come to mention it, yes.”

“You Guysh Sheriosly come loohoohoohoourk. Ew that was nashty.”

“What do we do?”

“Well. How much do we want this thing?”

“I think it’s more a case of need than want really. Why?

“Well it’s obvious.” Nord gave a long pause for dramatic effect. “We need a sacrifice.”

Jeli looked at Od.
Od looked at Herewulf.
Herewulf looked at Nord.
Nord looked at Xena
Xena looked at the porridge and carrot like mess on the floor. “I don’t remember eating th…….What?.......Why are you all shtaring at me like that? I’ll clean it up. What? You guysh are creeping me out. Hey don’t come any cloasher.”

“Wait, wait, wait, wait. Let’s just think this out.” Bellowed Jeli, the red mist leaving her eyes and dissipating into the ether. As she looked around, she could see everyone else shaking their heads in confusion, coming out of some sort of trance, faint whiss of red mist swirling away. 

“Did you all see a red mist too?” 

They all nodded but Xena piped up

“Red mist? No we have a guy in the next room who is yellow mist. Heesh really cool.

“OK Xena. You go be with him while we figure this out.”

“I’m not a child anymore y’know.”

“What if it doesn’t need a full sacrifice? How about just a drop of blood?” The others nodded and shrugged. Jeli took her knife, held her hand tentatively over the altar, and slid the blade across her palm. Making a fist, she saw the single crimson drop of blood fall in slow motion. It was about this time that she remembered that she was a warlock today, but did not have time to consider all the ramifications……


----------



## BoldItalic

...

As the drop of her blood touched the Altar Of Binding, Jeli's world changed utterly. Planets moved in the sky, continents drifted into new positions and evil dictators were replaced by other evil dictators as the course of history was rewritten. The space-time continuum twisted as the galaxy went into a spiral and the value of pi became irrational. This was _cosmic_.

The casket sprang open with a velvet sound and something unexpected fell out. It was about the shape and size of a half-brick but where a half-brick would be rough and gritty, this was smooth and slippery, like wax.

"Don't touch it!" shouted Herewulf, suddenly aware of an overwhelming aura of evil. This thing was beyond evil. It was an evil that knew no bounds. And the evil had a voice.

"Ah, Jeleneth," said the _voice_. "So glad you have decided to _serve_ me. I'm sure our little _pact_ will be profitable to both sides. You want that, don't you?" It was a smooth, silky, seductive kind of voice that was full of malice and terrible power but at the same time promised unimaginable delights. Jeli felt exhilarated and trapped at the same time. She moaned involuntarily and a voice that was not her own spoke from her lips: "Command me, O lord!"

Nord was quick to react and he brought his rapier down on the brick, hoping to destroy it somehow and break the spell that was taking hold of Jeli. But the brick slithered aside and there was a clang! as his blade hit the stone altar. He uttered a colourful phrase in pirate language.

Herewulf was aghast. He tried spell after spell until he was exhausted but nothing could break the link that had now been forged between Jeli and this terrible entity. When a warlock makes a pact, it cannot be broken.

Od racked his brain for any lore that might explain what this thing was, what it wanted Jeli for, and how to stop it getting it. He remembered something, a snatch of a ballad, but it was hard to think in the heat of the moment. Then it came to him. He pointed a finger accusingly at the brick. "I know you for what you are," declared Od firmly. "You are a renegade bard, who brought shame on our profession in days of old. You do not deserve to live. But I have the measure of you, for I know your _true name_. You are *Bar-de-Door*."

At this, the voice lost its soapy quality and shook with anger. "Strike down this upstart!" it commanded Jeli, "Use the spells that I have granted unto you! Slay him!"

But deep down, Jeli was still herself. With the cunning of her elvish ancestors, she turned the situation to her own advantage. "I will do your bidding," she declared, "in exchange for the biggest diamond in the world. Payment in advance."

"What?" yelled Bar-De-Door. "I make the rules!"

"Actually, you don't," said Snappy and he opened his mighty jaws and swallowed the bar of soap. He looked uncomfortable for a moment and went cross-eyed (which, for a crocodile, is no mean feat), foamed at the mouth a little and then grinned.

"Let me out! Let me out! It's all gloopy in here!" came a small voice from somewhere about half way along Snappy. Then the voice was still.

As if in response to the changed situation, the candlesticks on the altar somehow acquired lighted candles and another entity made its presence felt. This one wasn't evil but it was rather confusing because it spoke with many voices at once. About ten, probably. And it kept referring to itself in the third person as _Us_. "Well done," it seemed to say. "You can all level up now. Congratulations on Level Three."

Uh-oh, thought Herewulf. Decision time ...


----------



## rgoodbb

"Wait a minute."

_Oh thank the gods_, thought Herewulf

"Are we just going to pass that off? That was *Bar-de-Door*, the infamous recurring villain 

"Well I hope he doesn't repeat on me. I've already got a bit of acid from the party vol au vents." Snappy belched bubbles.

"We met Char-Ging and now Bar-de-Door. Who will be next?"

"Can we just level up already, I'm excited about my new subclass."

"No, no. She's right." Commented a desperate and pit-sweaty Paladin. "We must seek out the truth."

"What's gotten into ya Wulfie? What Oath are ya ganna choose? Devotion, Ancients, Vengeance, Crown, Conquest, Redemption, Oathbreaker even maybe." Nord recited 

"I don't know."

"Well ye better lad, ye better."

"I know."

"What's stopping ya?"

"I don't know."

"Well that's not very helpful is it?"

"I know."

"Ya don't know but ya do know. You a very confused individual."

"I kn......I don't know."

Yellow mist surrounded the Paladin, then red mist then green mist and blue and others too. "Sergeant Herewulf." They all seemed to say at once.

"Uhm yes?"

"Will you be our champion?"

"Champion of who/m?"

"Champion of The Pantheon of the Forgotten. Will you swear your oath to all those forgotten, all those never remembered, all those lost in the sea of eternity. Will you swear to find those souls by making people remember, even those who wish not to? Will you be our champion in this, the greatest of quests. To see, to remember, to open your heart to us so that we may open your eyes to the suffering of the unnoticed, the missing, the neglected and the excluded. The absent and the erased. The disregarded and the overlooked. The anonymous and the unrenowned. The ignored and the unnamed. Will you, Herewulf, take up the Oath of the Forgotten?"

"I...uhm...I Swear it."

"Bluuurrrrrup" Bubble Belch


----------



## BoldItalic

Herewulf suddenly felt a great weight lifted from his mind. He had found his purpose, here in this strange sand-temple on a deserted island far from civilization. But then the enormity of his task punched him squarely in the jaw. He would champion the forgotten gods, yes, but there were _millions_ of them. Where to start? He would need a roll-call of their names and it would take forever to even scribe it, let alone tell all the peoples of the world to _remember_ them. He wracked his brain for a solution. And then it came to him. It was so simple. "I have been enlightened!" he cried.

"What, like dwarves, you mean? Ignore the weight of heavy armour? That's cool," replied Od. "Here, can you carry these torches for me?"

"No, no, not that sort of enlightened. I suddenly understand something. You know how everything that could possibly exist, exists somewhere in the infinite multiverse? Well, by that reasoning an infinite number of possible languages must exist and, for each and every forgotten god there is a language somewhere in which his name is 'Tomorrow'. Well, I am now the defender of everyone whose name is 'Tomorrow'. Herewulf, Champion of Tomorrow. My battle cry will be *Remember Tomorrow!*. What do you think?"

"By that argument, my left boot is called 'Tomorrow' in some language or other. Are you sworn to protect my left boot? 'Cos it could do with a polish."

"I don't think you're taking this seriously."

"Suit yourself."

While this exchange was takiing place, Nord was trying out some metamagic on a new spell he had suddenly learned. Lightning played around his ears as a howling gale sprang up from nowhere and blasted across the room blowing out the candles on the altar; even the huge bronze door flapped wildly like a dememted pair of wings. And yet, and yet, none of his friends felt a thing. The gale swirled around them in great gusts but it politely avoided each and every one of them. Nord laughed. This was _awesome_.

"Did you do that?" said Jeli accusingly. "Because if you did, it wasn't funny."

"Sorry lass, next time I'll be more careful. I can leave you out of the automatic saves if you like."

Jeli sniffed. "Well, just don't be so stupid. Sorcery is _dangerous_."

"You could have warned us," said Snappy, retrieving his football from the corner it has blown into and giving it a twirl to reassure it that it was still a good boy.

Just then, the sound of heavy footsteps echoed in the corridor and into view came a very annoyed ...


----------



## rgoodbb

…..Medusa

“Who the bloody el did that. Av just set mi curlers and now me snairks are al over thee place. Shockin’ just bloody shockin’. A woz gowin for a blue rinse and a perm as well, al av’ ya know. Do you kner ow long it tairks to braid these flippin’ snairks in? Hours. That’s ow long. What? So ashamed of me that ya can’t look me in thee ayes?”

“Well….well, you’re a gorgon. Won’t we turn to ster..stone?” Nord asked in a very meek voice, a little pee trickling down his leg.

“Not while av got me fairce pack on, stupid.”

Nord, not sure whether this was a trick or not asked “Herewulf. If I turn to stone, can ye get me back again?”

“Well I can try and lay on my hands again but that technique has yet to bear fruit for some reason. I…..will try.”

Nord slowly looked up at the creature of legends. He didn’t turn to stone. The medusa had a very red face. 

“It’s a Papaya and Red Clay facepack. It soothes mi skin is wot it does.”

“Nord at ye service maam.”

“Aren't you a charma'. Call me Dotti. Oower. Wots ‘ee doin’ dan thure?”

Herewulf got up off the floor, frustrated as ever. He still did not know how his level 1 feature worked. It was all so very, very embarrassing. Then a thought occurred. Maybe it wasn’t that he did not know, but rather that he’d forgotten. He was the Champion of the Forgotten. He stood up straight, puffed his chest out and exclaimed “Tomorrow. I’ll know tomorrow!” and in that instant he became completely aware of how to lay on hands. He got very excited “I know, next I’ll try……..


----------



## BoldItalic

"I know, next I’ll try…….. I'll try it the other way around. I'll lay down on _your_ hands."

"Madam," said Od smoothly to Dotti, "Perhaps I can be of some assistance? In a former occupation I trained under the great Coiffo, hair-arranger to several royal houses." This was a brazen lie, but Od thought he might get away with it.

"Ta fur the offah, but me snakes is a bit frisky an' wouldn' take kindly to bein' mussed abaht," replied the medusa. As if to emphasise the point all the snakes on her head reared up in synchonism and glared at Od meaningfully, as if daring him to put his hands within fangs reach.

But Od drew out his silver flute and played the opening bars of the snake charmer song. You know, the one that goes wah wah wa-ah wah and so on. The snakes liked that, it reminded them of home, and they started dancing the slow fangdango. Od kept up the music until they were exhausted and fell asleep, whereupon Dotti was able to arrange them neatly in ringlets to her obvious satisfaction.

"You can come again," said Dotti approvingly. "But do us a favour an' leave the storms at home. Wot you doin' 'ere anyways? This island is supposed ter be deserted. On account of me an' the others."

"We're privateers. We came to bury fifty tons of gold. It belongs to Penelope the kraken."

"WUT? 'Er as destroyed Atlantis? No thank you. Not on my island. I like my island where it is, thank you very much. Take it someplace else."

"But she _told_ us to bring it here. For safe keeping. You could guard it for us, if you like."

"Me? Guard fifty tons of gold? You must be joking, sunshine. Fifty tons is so far off the top of the treasure tables, it's enough to bring every 20th-level Legend of The Multiverse down here with their mirror shields and their _+3 Wheelbarrows of Carrying_. Over my undead body. Tell your kraken I said no."

"I could write a song about you? Extolling your beauty?"

"No. At least ..."

"Mmm?"

"No."

"Oh well, looks like it's back to the Phase Rider, then."

"You came here on _that_? You mus' be dumber than you look."

"Oh, why?"

"Don' you know the legend? Whoever sails on the Phase Rider 's doomed nevah to find what they seek."

"We seek the biggest diamond in the world."

"Well, then, you won' find it. Jus' when you think you've found it, there'll be an even bigger one to go after. Go home an' jus' spend your tons of gold. That's my advice."

"I don't think we're supposed to."

"Not my problem."

At this point in the conversation, a thought that had been niggling at Nord's subconscious finally managed to get itself noticed. "Er, you said you _and the others_? Is there something we should know about?"


----------



## rgoodbb

“…Is there something we should know about?"

“No! Not really.”

“OooooKaaaay”

“Dammit a 7 on deception. Do I get a legendary reroll?”

“It’s kind of too late now. You just told us you were deceiving.”

“I could cast mind wipe on you.”

“But everyone else would know you did it.”

“Hang on is this Meta-gaming?”

“Not if we are doing it in-game. It shouldn’t matter”

“Oh I see, it’s Matter-Gaming.”

“Wiping Mind over Matter.”

“Oh I see what you did there.”

“But you won’t remember.”

“I will never again forget. I am the new Champion of…..of…..non-un-rememberancelesness.”

“…..really?”

“…Mm-hmm…”

“I don’t really know where this conversation is going at the moment.”

“Agreed. Too much role playing. I attack you.”

“Roll for initiative you forgetless fighter.”

The game was up. They had her surrounded on all sides. The odds were in their favour. They had been dealt a good hand. They had the upper hand. This would be a walk in the park. A cake walk. Piece of cake. Easy as pi..

At that moment the aforementioned _Others_ turned up.

“Oh no. Really? Oh F……


----------



## BoldItalic

There was a blur as Od cartwheeled around the medusa, leapt nimbly upon the altar, grabbed a candlestick _en passant_ and hurled it through the doorway. He was rewarded with an "oof" sound as it struck an approaching _other_ on the nose (or possibly snout).

Dotti screamed. It wasn't the scream of a thwarted villain, it wasn't the scream of a banshee having its throat cut, it wasn't even the scream of a bad actress in a horror movie. It was the scream of a medusa whose recently-combed snakes were suddenly on fire and rapidly turning into carbonised ex-snakes. Nord had cast _Combust Serpent_. Pleased his success, he glanced down at his hands and wondered idly why they were growing feathers. They were quite pretty feathers, mostly a kind of irridescent green with yellow stripes, but not the sort of feathers you expect to see on a storm sorcerer. Not often, anyway.

A dull thud came from outside the door as Snappy's deftly lofted football dropped into and through the bottomless bucket and bounced off the head of a second _other_ as it hove noisily into the room. Snappy grinned his special toothy grin and looked round for approval from Xena. She, however, was too drunk to appreciate it and called for a glass of djinn and vermouth. No-one brought her one, though.

Herewulf remembered that it was his turn next. He drew his rapier, cried the battle cry of the unforgotten and lunged. He didn't actually lunge _at_ anything in particular, which is perhaps why he didn't hit it; but it was impressive ayway and was absolutely the right thing for a paladin to do. But then the _other other_ arrived. Its evil aura crashed into the room and Herewulf was overwhelmed. His knees turned to jelly, although being a gelatinous paladin anyway he bore it with considerable fortitude, and he was suddenly seized with a loathing of his own shield, which he flung away from him as far as he could.

And then, and then, the _other other_ raised a mantled arm, opened its grim and grisly mouth and spoke. "I use _Turn Living_," it announced with awful finality. "I want you all to make Wisdom saves. The DC is 17 and you get disadvantage because reasons."


----------



## rgoodbb

“13”

“Natural 1”

“8”

"11"

“16 So close”

In turn they all failed their checks. All that is, apart from Bigby.

“Natural 20” She gleamed. Proud of herself and shielding her roll with her considerable hand. Sisyphus was tutting away slowly and with disappointment in the back of her mind.

So the long and short of this was that the party turned 180 degrees. The sergeant making his a military “About Turn!” Snappy switching on his orange warning lights as he produced a wide turning angle and needed the space. Nord's feathered hands ruffled as he spun against his will. Bigby, however did not turn. She stayed and faced the three _Others_, staring them down. One of them put its fingers to its lips and said “Shhh.”

Bigby had absolutely no intention of staying quiet but (silently) screamed as she realised that this _Other_ had completed the verbal and somantic elements of a Silence spell. What she saw next horrified her. She wished that she had been turned around as well.

The three _Others_ giggled to each other like children, opened long canvas holdalls and began taking out fancy dress clothes. One: a big clown outfit, another ghost like sheets, the last one,, well, it produced a costume of such horror, such evil dread that this one single post could not do it the injustice it deserved. Of all the things it could have picked as its costume, surely this was the worst, the one that could end them all.

The third _Other_ slowly and deliberately dressed. Taking its time, it transformed into…………………..


----------



## BoldItalic

Taking its time, it transformed into………………….. Taking its time, it transformed into………………….. 

It's not good, I can't even type what it turned into. My keyboard freezes in terror at he very thought of it. Suffice it say that it was very, very _horrid_.

"Little girl," it said in a terrible deep voice that dripped with menace, "Come here ..."

"NO!" shouted Bigby silently, frantically waving her arms. Then she did what you must never, ever, do - she turned her back on it. She ran to Jeli and pinched the back of Jeli's arm to make her pay attention. Alas, she forgot that she was wearing false fingernails and scratched Jeli's arm so that a tiny trickle of blood throbbed up. "Ouch!" thought Jeli, "What did you do that for?"

Well, of course, _Turn Living_ ends if the turned creature takes damage and a scatch on the arm is quite sufficient. Jeli spun round to face her foe and hurled  a dagger with uncanny accuracy at his collar button, causing his costume to fall off again and exposing him for what he was: a mere actor from a touring company, just like his two friends. "Is this a dagger I see before me?" he declaimed, adopting a theatrical pose.

"Toby or not Toby?" responded the clown, "That is the question."

"Woo-ooo-ooo." said the man in the sheet. "I am the ghost of Christmas Presents."

"Can I stop taking the _Dodge_ action now?" asked Herewulf, "Only I'm getting cramp."

"Excuse me," interrupted Dotti, "Oi'm not in the mood for theatricals. You can all just b***** off."

"Well!" huffed Toby the clown, "The things I suffer for my art! Come, let us away ere the cock crow!" *Exit, pursued by a bear.*

"Now you've offended him," protested the ghost. "You're nothing but a bunch of Philistines!"

"Oh, I don't know," countered his friend, "Their toy crocodile is very realistic. We could do that scene from Anthony and Cleopatra -"

"What manner o' thing is your crocodile?"

"It is shaped, sir, like itself; and it is as broad
as it hath breadth: it is just so high as it is,
and moves with its own organs: it lives by that
which nourisheth it; and the elements once out of
it, it transmigrates."​
"This is insane!" shouted Od. "We're trying to have a serious adventure here!"

Everyone turned and stared at Od. The hairs on the back of his neck began to prickle. His ears felt suddenly hot. He wavered. Something was wrong. Something was _very_ wrong. For a moment, he was back in his room in the Pig and Lion with a strong feeling that he was about to wake up. But he didn't wake up. This wasn't a crazy dream. There really was a kraken with fifty tons of gold. There really was a ship called the Phase Rider. He really  was in an underground temple accompanied by an elf, a sorcerer, a paladin, a talking crocodile who played football and a gaggle of females of various ages who were sometimes mermaids and sometimes not and sometimes rode unicorns that were sometimes narwhals.

Od did what anyone would do in such circumstances. He curled up into a ball and went catatonic.


----------



## rgoodbb

_Knock, knock, knock._

He didn’t want to open his eyes. The morning sun always seared through the attic window at around this time and so he pulled the blanket further over his head to shield from the glare. He really must do something about that.

_Knock, knock, knock._

“Oh, go away.” His head hurt. He’d sang and danced and then wowed the crowds with such tall tales. He had drank, _oh he had drank_, and talked and cajoled until the early hours, and in his mind, it was still far too early in the day for disturbances. 

_Knock, knock, knock. Knock, knock, knock. Knock, knock, knock._

The halfling swung his still booted feat out of bed in an irritated sweep, realising that the boots were all he was wearing, he found a dressing gown and wrapped himself up. And so, with the tender head of an angry bear, he thudded with extra heated force towards the round-topped door. “What?” He said bluntly to the door.

“I’m locked out and my clothes are in there.” Came back a young woman’s voice.

“You…...Wha...” Od desperately thought back. Sifting through the numerous ales and wines and spiced ciders. There was a girl. A woman really but young and doey-eyed towards him. She too was a Hin, he remembered. A halfling. She had become captivated by his words and hung upon every one of them. He unlocked the latch on the door and she burst in diving for the bed, arms covering as much of her flesh as they could. 

“Oh….Uhm…I….” Od began.

“You getting back in or what?”

“Well, as you put it that way……”

_Knock, knock, knock._

“Not now!”

_Knock, knock, knock._

“I said n...”

“Oh let her in. It’s only me sister. You remember _her _don’t you?”

“Your sis….uhm…..of course.”

Od returned to the door, unlatched it and another beautiful curly carrot-haired maiden ran to the bed. Od was seriously starting to regret not remembering much from the night before. He locked the door again and was about to return when implausibly, a third knock came. He opened the door rapidly and was disappointed when a bearded courier handed him a letter. 

Weirdly, _because nothing at this point was weird at all_, Od instinctively knew what was in the letter. He knew that it was his brother Ivan pleading for his help because mother had had gone mad and locked father in the basement. He knew he should pack his things. He knew he should go on this long adventure.

“Get in. I’ve ordered a cooked breakfast……for an hour’s time…..”

Od unsurprisingly decided to remain in his room and did not go on his adventure. Life was great.

------------------------------------------------------------------

“What’s wrong with him?” asked Xena.

“He appears to be in some sort of dream state.” replied jeli.

“Oh my. He does appear to be enjoying that dream a little too much doesn’t he?”

“Girls. Look away from him now!” Demanded Jeli. 

“We are over 18 now you know.” Their faces seemed to say.


----------



## BoldItalic

Nord leaned over to Herewulf and said quietly, "I don't think that's a very good idea," just _before_ Herewulf suggested "Should we throw a bucket of water over him?" The conversation continued something like this:

"Because I've just cast _Detect Thoughts_"

"How did you know what I was going to suggest?"

"Of course, that's what being a sorcerer is all about."

"Are you allowed to do that?"

"Not half as creepy as what you're thinking. And yes, I can."

"That's creepy. Can't you do it on someone else?"

"A purple gazebo."

"Go on then, clever clogs, what am I thinking about?" challenged Jeli.

"I think so."

"Does it work both ways?"

"Good idea."

 "You could try it on Od and suggest waking up."

Od sighed and murmured "Go away, Nord, I know it's you."


----------



## rgoodbb

Od sighed and murmured "Go away, Nord, I know it's you..................."


".................But Jeli and Herewulf, you are both welcome in here."

"What...I" Flustered both Jeli and the big Paladin almost in unison.

"Don't think you haven't thought about it Herewulf. I can read your mind."

"What...I....You are such a trickster Od."

"Why did you leave the army again? And Jeli. Why did they throw you out the Grove?"

"Enough!" Shouted Nord. "Snappy. Breathe on his face. Now!"

This the tooth’ed one did. And the build-up of foul stagnant river breath belched out in all its glory. 

----------------------------------------------

Odd threw up over everyone in his attic room, thus dispelling the illusion.

He awoke rubbed his eyes…

_Knock, knock, knock._

Oh no! Not again. Well maybe…

This time the noise was from Snappy’s tail hitting the side of a cavern wall. “Where did they go? And who were they, those powerful trio?”

“They are known as the Mummers. And powerful they were indeed, until long ago, heroes of legend banished them and cast them away on this island.” Dottie thought. “Hmm. You came on a ship didn’t you? I’d get back to it pretty quickly before they escape on it. You may have just unleashed the Mummers back onto the world. Haahaahaa.” The gorgon cackled and cackled as Jeli, Od, Nord, Herewulf, Xena, Amanda, Bigby and Snappy all made for the coast as fast as their Multi-steeds could carry them.

Meanwhile, at the Phase Rider……………..


----------



## BoldItalic

Meanwhile, at the Phase Rider…………….. 

For three days, nothing exciting happened. The gnomes spent their time making the ship ship-shaped, fishing for their dinners, making neat coils of rope with elegant knots in them,  and ironing the creases out of the sails. When they got bored with that, they made little items of jewellery out of gold ingots, of which they had far too many down in the hold, and teased each other with little illusions seeing who could make the most convincing ones.

On the third day at sunset, a huge full moon rose blood-red in the east and it was a bad omen. The gnomes were uneasy and doubled the anchors, fearing a _Tempest_ or possibly even a _King Lear_. Then Bosun, who was on watch in the crows nest, spotted movement on the shore. A few cantrips later, they all knew that it was three actors, rehearsing casually on the beach whilst furtively keeping watch on the _Rider_. Clearly, thought Skipper, they were up to no good and he ordered the gun ports to be dogged open and the cannon to be run out on the landward beam. Down below, two of the gnomes set up a furnace and started to melt gold ingots down into cannon balls. Gold is nearly twice as heavy as lead so it makes excellent cannon balls although they do tend to flatten on impact because it's quite soft. A bit like armour-piercing tank shells, really. If there's one thing gnomes understand, it's gold.

It wasn't long before the three actors started lighting flares and waving them to-and-fro, trying, quite unneccesarily as it turned out, to attract the attention of the crew on the ship. "Ahoy, me hearties," called the one dressed as a clown, "Can we come aboard your fine vessel?" Except his voice was just a little distorted by the night air and it came across as 'vassal' which puts quite a different complexion on things.

Skipper used a cantrip to amplify his voice and he boomed back "What ship are you?" meaning, of course, what was the name of the ship that they had presumably sailed in, to get to the island. "The _Merchant of Venice_," came the reply. (You could tell that they were accomplished actors by the way that they enunciated those italics.)

"Out of what harbour?"

"From the still-vexed Bermoothes, there she’s hid."

"Whither bound?"

"Bound sadly home for Naples."

At this point Skipper, who had read more books than you could shake a spear at, knew for certain that the actor was a ne'er-do-well for he was quoting from the wrong play and not from the Merchant of Venice at all. He called down to First Mate, "Put a shot across their bows, Mister Mate, if you please!" and a cannon roared. It rolled a 17 - a definite hit on an unarmoured Actor even allowing for his Dex Adjustment of +3.

Er, .. DM? What's the damage roll for a gold cannon ball?

Dunno. Roll 6d8 maybe?

Okay, that's ... *clatter clatter clatter* 29 ?

The clown staggered, having taken the full force of a gold cannon ball in the chest, and fell backwards foaming blood.

Seeing what they were up against, the other two actors abandoned him and, like cowards, fled into the trees where they met ...


----------



## rgoodbb

and, like cowards, fled into the trees where they met ... 

....metamorphosed into wild dogs. They sprinted around in the flankeyest of sprints with their soft pads flumphing lightly across the dunes and toward the boat of note. 

Meanwhile back on the boat, _Boat of Note_ gave Skipper an idea. _The single one and only anagram of Phase Rider was Ship Reader._ he thought. At which point they were assaulted by:

Red Harpies
Parish Deer
Harder Pies
some Hired Pares
a Shire Padre 
and a bunch of Pride Hares. 

_OK. So maybe there were a few more anagrams of Phase Rider. That was sloppy of me._ As soon as the assault had come, it had gone again, leaving one of each anagram passive, and on the boat. Skipper bowed his head and trundled (in a way only handcuffed skipper Gnomes can trundle) to the Shire Padre. “Forgive me Fa…..


----------



## BoldItalic

“Forgive me Fa….. 

"Don't say it!" interrupted the Padre. "Whenever I hear that _dire phrase_ it send shivers down my spine because I'm about to hear that somone has done something mildly naughty. You have no idea how petty some sins can be. Sneezed twice on a Tuesday, have we?"

"I only wanted to rent a shovel."

"What? Do I look like a _spade hirer_?

"Sorry," mumbled Skipper.

(Thinking up more anagrams is left as an exercise for our _readership_.)

It was at about this time that Jelli, Od, Nord, Herewulf and the others arrived on the beach. The moon having risen and flooded the island with a baleful red light, at least everyone could see where they were going and not bump into each other in the dark.

"Well, the ship is still there," remarked Od optimistically. "That boom we heard had me worried."

"I told 'ee that were cannon fire," replied Nord. "Look yonder below the gunnels, the ports be open. She's fired a broadside, I'll be bound."

Jeli's attention was drawn to Xena, a little way down the beach, where the unicorns were gathered around something. "Come see this," called Xena, "It's a clown with a chest full of solid gold!"

"Don't open it!" warned Jeli, "Chests of gold are always trapped!"

"No, not _that_ sort of chest, silly! His own chest, where his ribs are ... were ... eugh."

"What a way to go."

"Poor man. He had a heart of gold."

"Never mind him, where are the other two?"

"Apparently, they ran off into the woods and met a fête worse than death."

"How do you know that?"

"I rolled a natural 20 on an Insight check."

"We'd better get back to the ship," warned Herewulf. "Can someone swin out and ask the gnomes to launch their boat for us?"

"Swim out? Swim out?" scoffed Od, "We can do telepathy, remember?"

"Oh yes, Nord can do a reverse _Read Thoughts_. Silly me, I was forgetting."

On cue, Nord attempted to communicate with Skipper but to his surprise it didn't work. The skipper's thoughts were muffled by his woolly hat. He tried a different gnome but they were all wearing their woolly hats too. "Argh! They be a-wearing _Hats o' Mind Shielding_," he complained. "We mun use lights an' signal that a-way."

Soon, a pattern of _Dancing Lights_ was conjured up. Three green lights above a purple cross with red and orange to the left, which of course, as everyone knows, means "Launch the boat and come and pick up your passengers".

They waited. And they waited. And ...


----------



## rgoodbb

They waited. And they waited. And ...

The Gnomes waited as well.

They waited back

The Gnomes returned the favour

A little more waiting still...

"How long should we wait Skipper?"

"I'm not sure First Mate. Do you think they remember the blind part of the fact that we are the order of the Blind and Bound? No probably not. Well this is intolerable. Who here took Mage Hand Semaphore?"

"......"

"...What No-one? On a crew of Mage Hand Sailors?"

"Sorry boss. I took Mage Hand Calligraphy."

"Mage Hand Astronomy over here."

"Mage Hand Pâtisserie"

"Canine Beautician"

"Art Therapy"

"What about you First Mate?"

"Mage Hand Skullduggery."

"What did you take boss?"

"Well that doesn't matter anymore does it."

"No but I'm intrigued."

"It is beside the point First Mate."

"Oh come on Skipper." They all piped in. 

"Hmmm....."

They all hushed up"

"Well......"

Even the Shire Padre leaned in closer.

"I........I took......Mage Hand....


----------



## BoldItalic

"I........I took......Mage Hand.... flower arranging.

"?"

"Well, there was this girl I was keen on, see? She acted like she barely knew I existed but I knew she went to flower-arranging classes every Wednesday, so I thought ..."

"Did it work?"

"No, but I got top marks for my spray of roses. I tied the fern leaves with ..."

There was a shuffling of feet and the other gnomes suddenly found urgent jobs they had to do in some other part of the ship.

Meanwhile, on the beach, seeing that nothing was apparently happening and their lights were not being noticed, our adventurers had to think of some other plan. "Looks like someone does have to swim out after all," ventured Herewulf, carefully not looking at Od. "I would go, but this plate armour is not terribly floaty."

"Don't look at me," mumbled Snappy, "I don't do salt water."

"Turn your backs a minute," called Xena, "I'm going to change."

"You need to change your dress, at a time like this?"

"No, silly, I'm going to change into a mermaid. Don't look, it's rude."

"Ooh, let's all go with you!" shrieked the other girls. "Let's all go skinny-dipping in the moonlight!"

After a little more prompting, the three men politely turned their backs. However, with a little adjustment Herewulf found that if he nonchalently held his shield just _so_ and his helmet just _so_ they worked a bit like a mirror and he could peep round and see ...

... the other two mummers quietly creeping down through the trees and back to the beach. They were amused to see that most of their audience were now desporting in the waves, tossing Snappy's football around and generally having a good time instead of swimming out to the ship like they were supposed to. The actor in doublet and hose, the really evil one, cackled an evil cackle as he ...


----------



## rgoodbb

The actor in doublet and hose, the really evil one, cackled an evil cackle as he ...

as he.....Cast _Breech Campaign Settings._ (It was a 10th level spell). The cackle became more maniacal and louder as he drew forth/fourth the indigenous races and creatures from this particular setting. The sky burst open and erupted in vacuous and voluminous display of lightning clouds of radiant purples and yellows. Black Flames belched forward and a loud, vibrating rending groan deafened as worlds collided. 

"Oh dats pretty. Is it Skywrite?" Asked Nord.

"Well I've never seen that cast so I guess it could be. It could also be Faerie Fire." Thought Od

"Naah. It's Dancing Lights." Herewulf claimed with a confidence he didn't feel

"Well I'm sticking with Skywrite. I'm a little narked I didn't take that now, looking at what it can do."

"Ritual as well. No spell slots." Jeli chipped in

"Niiiiiice!"

All four pondered how they could get that spell when they levelled up.


The Gnomes, not seeing what all the fuss was about just heard a massive groaning sound and believed they were about to be rammed by a leviathan of a vessel. "ABANDON SHIP!". As one, they all leapt over the side. The Phase Rider, no longer under capable hands began to drift slowly out to sea. Onboard were a perplexed Parish Deer, a Shire Padre and a Red Harpy. 

Several dozen creatures began to fall from the sky.

"Oh now that's impressive."

"Yeah I could watch this all night."

The creatures began to hit the beach and splash into the sea. They were strange and off-putting. They were......


----------



## BoldItalic

They were strange and off-putting. They were...... dressed head-to-toe in shiny white armour like so many white beetles but there were definitely humans inside them. Their helmets completely covered their heads and joined snuggly to their shoulder pieces while a shiny black mask, joined smoothly to their white helmets, covered their faces so that you couldn't see their eyes. It wasn't immediately obvious how they could even breathe but they seemed to be able to. They were holding their arms up across their chests wielding some sort of two-handed weapon but it was like a stick with other sticks joined to it at odd angles. As they marched steadily forward in perfect synchronism, strange music played in the background. It sounded like an Imperial March. 

In the midst of the white-clad guard one figure stood out, clearly their leader. He too was totally encased in shiny armour but his was a black as Knight and he had a long black cloak so that you would know that he was the arch-villain. His name was Varth Dader. He marched up to Herewulf and spoke in a strange breathy voice, saying "I am your father!"

Herewulf replied ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Herewulf replied ...

"Don't you just miss the good old days?"

"W..What?...._Khooooh_......................_Khooooh_....................._Khooooh_" 

"I mean you know, cleaning out the tavern cellar of a Giant Rat infestation oooor I don't know, saving a valuable hostage from a band of Goblins. That kind of stuff. Where did that all go? I miss that. Just the basic adventuring. You know?"

"I AM YOUR FATHER."

"No y'not."

"Yeasiam."

"No. Me fatha was a milkman."

"That is what your mother told you. She kept from you your dessssstiny......_Khooooh_."

FSHHHHHHHH!........vvvvvrm.......vvvvvrm

"Oh will you look at that. A Sunsword. I hear Zarovic is looking for that."

"I guess it wasn't Skywright then?" Nord whispered to Od.

"Sky-W......Luke?"

"Well? I'm Looking."

"Oh. You're Luke King? Oh. Uhm sorry..._Khooooh_. Wrong dimension."

And with that, the Empire left.




"So not Skywrite then. I wonder if it was Phantasmal Force."

"What about Wall of Force."

"Look. Lose the Force." Demanded Jeli. "We still have a quest."

"Oh y'know what? £$*k the quest."

"What?"

"You know what I really want to do now?" asked the Paladin.

"No. What?"

"Oh. you really don't. That mind thingy has probably worn off then. I want to go back to basics. Adventuring 101. I really just want to.....


----------



## BoldItalic

"I really just want to..... stumble over some dead horses on the Triboar trail, get ambushed by goblins, follow the last surviving goblin to his hideout, fall in a couple of pit traps on the way, and ..."

"You want to reprise the starter set adventure? But we all did that, ages ago."

"I know, but it was _fun_. I've got Nostalgia."

"Have you tried tincture of cornweed? It's good for complaints of the liver."

"No, I mean I just want to go back to where it all began."

"But we're third level now. It wouldn't be fair on the goblins."

"Maybe they could be orcs instead. Or hobgoblins maybe. With a chieftain."

"Well, alright, if that's what you really want. What do we do about the fifty tons of gold?"

"Let is go. Start again with 2d10 or something. If you've got a million or so each, what's the point?"

"Oh boy, you are in a bad way."

The scene changed. Herewulf, Jeleneth, Od and Nornthew (yes, he got his old name back) were standing together on a forest trail gazing at an abandoned cart and two dead horses with black-feathered arrows sticking out of them.

"Should we search the bushes for the hobgoblins that we don't even suspect are there?" wondered Od, getting his flute out ready to do bardy things.

"No, let's be surprised. It's more fun. And besides, we haven't rolled for initiative yet." countered Jeli. "I'm a Ranger today, by the way, and my favoured enemies are goblins and hobgoblins."

"Do you get a beast companion? You're third level. A skunk might be useful."

"No, I'm a Middle Elf Gestalt, remember? We don't get archetypes. Just class features."

"Oh, no, that's right. I was forgetting. How about you, Herewulf? Anything special we should know about?"

"I don't know if I mentioned this," replied the paladin equipping his shield, "But I took Protection fighting style back at second level, so keep close. Mi scutum es tu scutum."

"Norn? Why have you turned green all over?" wondered Od.

"_Mage Armour_. You can't be too careful these days."

"Okay, everyone ready? Let's get the show on the road. *I climb onto the cart and look around carefully. What do I see?"*

Make a Wisdom(Perception) roll, please

*clacketty clack* 12 ?

*You see ...*


----------



## rgoodbb

*You see ...*

“Trees.”

“Trees? I just see Trees?”

“Yeah with that roll. It’s a 12. There are a lot of trees.”

“What about the uhm, ambush?”

“What ambush? You don’t know.”

Od looked towards Jeli the Ranger. “Well alright then. Jeli, you know what to do.”

“Uhm, actually I don’t.”

“What? Why?”

“I never did the Starter Set like you guys did.”

“..What…did…you…do?”

“I duuno. Something to do with a Colville?”

“Well, you…”

“Don’t tell me. SPOILERS!”

“Oh OK then. Jeli we have 2 dead horses with arrows in them, no riders and a scroll case on the floor.”

“I already know that, dummy. I’m going to use Mark. Mark?”

“Whoa. Where did he come from?”

“He’s one of my Hunters. He’s going to deliberately spring the ambush and then we ambush the ambushers.”

“What if the ambushers that we are about to ambush spring a counter ambush back at us?”

“Herewulf, I’m not getting into one of those arguments with you. You always get lost before I do and then get all embarrassed and shy.”

“Oh. OK”

“Positions everyone. Positions. Mark. Prepare to spring the ambush. On my Mark.”

“Huh?”

“Sorry. On your Marks.”

“Huh?”

“Dammit. Ready, Stedy…..G”

At that moment, humanoids riding (pink) steeds and wearing children’s goblin masks stormed out of the woods followed by a long lizard with a big grin. They performed a Drive-by attack and exited into the woods _whooping_ and _screeching_ as they did so. As soon as they had appeared, they had gone. 

The Party followed, with Jeli Ranging at the front. After falling in a pit (because she wanted no spoilers), they moved on towards Cra…, they moved on pursuing their quarry.


_"Ahead of you lies a small clearing in the trees before a large rocky hill at the base of which is a small natural cave from which a brook flows. The water babbles along the rocky outcroppings and skirts the edge of the clearing before disappearing into the forest. The cave is dark and no sources of light can be seen inside from the distance.

How would you like to proceed?"_


----------



## BoldItalic

Norn glanced at the others for assent before getting a complex piece of arcane equipment out his backpack. It was like a bronze tube on a folding tripod, which he set up carefully with the tube upright but pointing slightly towards the cave mouth. Then he got out a number of cylinders, about the size and shape of scroll cases, which he laid carefully on the ground beside the tripod.

"What are those?" wondered Od.

"Fireball scrolls." came the pre-occupied reply. Norn took out one one the scrolls and dropped it, still bound with its ribbon, into the bronze tube then stood back and made a somatic movement. There was a *whoomph* noise and the scroll shot out of the tube, flew in an arc through the air and dropped into a clump of bushes to one side of the stream, whereupon the spell inscribed on the scroll detonated with the appropriate low roar and set fire to the bush and quite a lot of bushes around it.

I lay down a blanket of mortar fire, announced Norn's player, to left and right of the stream.

The smoke from the burning vegetation hung in the air like a pall. A giant badger emerged from of the bushes, glared at them and trundled away grumbling, its fur streaked black and white where it had been scorched as it slept. Moments later, a herd of gazelle bounded out of the smoke and stampeded in a blind panic, kicking over Norn's tripod and trampling the remaining scrolls into the dust.

"What was that?" asked Herewulf, startled. They were only small bushes and there didn't seem room inside it for a herd that size to have been concealed.

Jeli examined their tracks, looked knowing, and announced that a herd of gazelle had passed this way recently and, to judge from the impressions of their hoofprints, they had been in a hurry to escape something.

"Er .." began Od but stopped when Jeli glared at him. He changed the subject. "Herewulf," he asked, can you do _Protection from Caves_ today?"

"Don't think I know that one," admitted the Paladin, "I've only got first and second level slots."

"Oh, well, we'd better go in anyway."

"Why?" demanded Jeli. "A far as I know, the cave is empty. Unless you're thinking of going in there to take a short rest? It's a bit early for dinner."

"We ... er ... we're _supposed to_? It's where we start the next section of the adventure?"

"Look, if there were monsters in the cave for us to go in and kill, I'd understand. But there are no monster tracks outside the cave mouth. Don't you think there would be, if there was anything living there? Else what do they eat, if they don't come out to hunt?"

"Trust us, we know what we are doing, okay?"

"Alright, but Od goes in front with his ten-foot pole to search for traps."

"Deal."

A short way into the cave, as your eyes adjust to the gloom, you find ...


----------



## rgoodbb

A short way into the cave, as your eyes adjust to the gloom, you find ...

find.... yourself grinning like buffoons because you've been here before. 

There was a stench and a sound of rattling chains nearby and over to the right.

Herewulf stopped as he realised all eyes were upon him. "Sorry." He slowly stowed his reserve flail that had not been cleaned of zombie brains many moons ago, back into his backpack.

They advanced further. "So Jeli?"

"Hmm?"

"Can you swim?"

"This is surely not the time for idle conversation. And the water here is way to shallow. This cavern is much bigger than I first thought. Nord tap over there will you."

Nord tapped the ten foot pole almost blindly on the right wall Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, _thuck_, tap, tap, tap. "No, go back a bit" Tap. tap, _thuck_. 

"I don't like the sound of that _thuck_. Wait, my darkvision is clearing. It's a, well it seems to be a bunch of tied up Cockatrices/Cockatri?. I think this is Xena's doing. Are they the enemy? Are we supposed to kill them and Snappy? I don't understand. Herewulf, is this what you wanted? Is this back to basic adventuring?"

At that point a low boom could be heard from deeper within the cavern. And a rumbling. Something was moving. Something was coming their way.....


----------



## BoldItalic

Something was coming their way..... 

"It's the water trap!" shouted Od. "They've set it off early, before we reached the mmmph flmgth!". His last words were stifled as Norn clamped his hand over Od's mouth to save him from inadvertantly committing _metagame_.

"Water doesn't rumble," declared Norn. "Trust me, I'm a sailor. I know 347 different words for water and 'rumble' isn't one of them."

Herewulf rolled high on a Dex save and pushed Jeli roughly against the side wall of the tunnel, covering her with his shield. "Rolling balls!" he shouted.

"Well, there's no need to be quite so crude about it," sniffed Jeli. "A girl likes a little romance first ..."

However, it soon became apparent that Herewulf had purely noble intentions as three large boulders came rolling down the tunnel, knocked down Norn and Od, and continued out of the cave mouth where they splashed down into the stream, throwing water over the badger which was, incidentally, quite grateful for the cooling off in a badgerish sort of way.

"Well," said Od as he picked himself up and counted his bruises. "At least we know where we stand with this scenario. And .. Oh no! My flute! My flute! It's ruined!" for the gilded flute, his prize possession, had been knocked from his grasp, fallen into the path of a boulder and been squashed flat. "That was my grandfather's!" he cried in woe.

"Don't be such a cry-baby," admonished Norn, as he cast a _Mending_ cantrip on the flute. "There, good as new. Try playing it." Od did, and the sound was better than ever except that for some reason he couldn't play D sharp ever again and it always came out as E flat.

To reassure himself, Od cast a _Light_ cantrip on his thumb and held it up. "Do we take the side passage to the west," he asked, or go ahead under that rickety bridge of wood and rope that I can just make out in the shadows of the ceiling?"

As if to echo his question, a black rectangular window suddenly lit up on one wall displaying strange cryptic runes:

>NORTH
>WEST
>TAKE COCKATRICE
>PLAY FLUTE
>LOOK
>SAVE
>QUIT

"It's obvious what we do," decided Jeli. "We ..."


----------



## rgoodbb

"We...Roll a D7."

"How do we do that?" 

"Well you just roll a D14 and half it dummy." Suggested Od

"Or you could just roll this D7." Replied a smug Jeli.

"Howz about just rolling 2d4 and subtracting 1?"

"Or you could just roll this D7" Jeli repeated.

"Nope I would do it as 2d10 + half of 1d6 and then reduce by a third.....I think....What's my intelligence again?" Asked Herewulf.

"Or you could just roll _this_ D7" Jeli repeated again

Everyone stopped. Finally getting that the Ranger held an actual D7 in her hand.

"Ooh, it's pretty. Is it a magic item? What are the shapes on each side?"

"Well one is hexagonal, one is a square, The 3 is an oval and the rest just seem to fit. I think I am going to just use this dice for the next few posts if that's OK with everyone."

"Well then Jeli. What is it to be?"

She crouched down and shook both of her hands with the dice inside.

"Oh. You're one of those dice rollers are you?"

"What does that mean? Is there any other way?"

"Well of course." Replied Od. "We have the Vandenska method of letting it fall between your index and middle finger, the Asmodeus Slam, the flick/spin otherwise known as the Kobold Drumstick, we have Tasha's Herringbone Flip, The Flying 

Not listening any more, Jeli proceeded to roll on the stone path next to the stream....It clacked and bounced and rolled, steadying on a 5 but just slowly teetering and turning until landing on a solid.......


----------



## BoldItalic

until landing on a solid....... pentagon.

"You have to read the number at the top," explained Od, "Not the one it lands on, obviously, because you can't see it."

"The numbers around the top are 1, 3, Z, Ϫ, and 2⅞. Doesn't help a lot."

"Roll it again."

*clackety, clackety, clack* "That's better. 13."

"What? You can't get 13 on a 1d7. Let me see. Oh, you're looking at it sideways. It's a fimbrish, the alchemical symbol for _heavy rain in the afternoon_."

"So what does it mean?"

"It means we should go west."

So they did. The passage to the west proved difficult because it was quite steep in places and there was a lot of loose gravel on the floor. Several times, Od lost his footing and slid back into Nord who promptly threw him back up the slope. Jeli also slid back into Herewulf a few times but he didn't take the hint.

Eventually, they reached the top of the slope and entered a large cavern which was occupied by half a dozen orcs. The orcs jeered and remarked amongst themselves how idiotic these adventurers were, and especially the little one with his thumb on fire. "Hey, dinner," called one of the orcs rudely, "You're dead meat. Except that *spit* elf. We'll save that one for breakfast."

Herewulf stepped boldly forward, readied his shield and drew his rapier very slowly and deliberately, so that the orcs would know that he was ready to fight. "I roll for intiative," he announced calmly.

"Ooh, get you!" mocked another orc. "_I roll for initiative_, please and thank you. See this polearm? Try to reach me. Go on, try."

Herewulf held his peace and Nornthew spoke next. "If you gentlemen would all care to stand together with your halberds raised menacingly, and the metal tips towards me, I would be most obliged," he suggested in a mock-polite voice he had once heard a nobleman midshipman use (the one who inexplicably drowned by falling overboard with his hands tied together behind his back). "Ah, splendid, you make a truly frightening spectacle. I cast _Chain Lightning_."

"'Ere, that's a 6th level spell, you gotta be ..." the orc counted on his fingers, then on his toes, "... 11th level to cast that! Wot you doing in this adventure? You OP, you are. We got the DM on our side, un't we?" and he looked around to his fellow orcs for reassurance. But he found little, for all the other orcs had suddenly deserted him and were fleeing the cavern through another exit. Seeing this, he drew upon his inner reserves of orcishness, flourished his halberd and stood his ground. "I attack the bard," he announced.

What happened next was quite gruesome ...


----------



## rgoodbb

What happened next was quite gruesome ...

Orc No. 6 suddenly realised that she was now Orc No. 1. She was both the Clan and Tribal leader, but also the runt and whipping girl. After whipping herself with her Glaive, Her spine became exposed to such an extent that it protruded out her shoulder blades. Pain made her slash harder. She went into a berserker's rage and hacked a nearby captive Elf named Sildar Hallwinter to death and accidently stabbed her own left eye out. It was at this point when Grummesh intervened. She had become chosen. Chosen by...Him, Ragash-the-Chosen. She became so much more than she could imagine. She had become an UBER ORC EYE OF GRUUMSH. She had become Death. 

Od felt significantly peculiar. Jeli felt distinctly wobbly, Nord felt mildly Scandinavian, and Herewolf felt disturbingly hairy under the full moon. 

Ragash-the-Chosen became a...a.....a..........Demigod. Not a semi god. mot a hemi semi demi god. but a Demigod. Much like Perseus, much like Hercules, much like.....


----------



## rgoodbb

[MENTION=6777052]BoldItalic[/MENTION] I will be getting lost in the Peak District for the next couple of days and will not be able to post anything. 

My challenge to you is to get at least one other to contribute to this thread by hook or by crook by the time I return Saturday eve. 

Good Luck!


----------



## BoldItalic

rgoodbb said:


> [MENTION=6777052]BoldItalic[/MENTION] I will be getting lost in the Peak District for the next couple of days and will not be able to post anything.



I know the Peak District. If lost, go _down_.



> My challenge to you is to get at least one other to contribute to this thread by hook or by crook by the time I return Saturday eve.
> 
> Good Luck!



Not a chance. We are in a black hole with an audience of nil. It's just me and ... *looks around* where did _they_ come from?


----------



## BoldItalic

Much like Perseus, much like Hercules, much like..... _Ragash The Destroyer of Lives_.

She emerged from the cave like a serpent from the egg. The hideout would no longer contain her and she would range freely through the Sword Coast, laying waste to the human lands and reclaiming them for her kind. Four rapiers danced in the air as she juggled them. She laughed a guttural laugh as she thought of their former owners, torn limb from puny limb, protesting that a TPK was sooo unfair. She licked the taste of crocodile from her lips. The taste was new to her and she had a taste for the exotic. And it came in a convenient handbag, too.

There was a village not far to the south. Ghandalin, the humans called it. She would begin there. Cottages burned well and she would eat more manflesh. She chanted an orcish chant as the miles sped under her feet. Soon, she was on a trail that led to the village. She was Ragash. She would slay.

There was a figure on the trail. It was a man on a horse. The man was armoured from head to toe and so was the horse. Over his armour, the man wore a white surcoat and a crimson cloak.  His helmet sported a crimson and white plume and a crimson and white shield hung from his saddle. As Ragash watched, the man closed his visor and tilted a lance towards her. "Easy, boy," said Lord Emphal to his horse. Brocollin twitched an ear in response, muscles tensed for the charge.

Ragash sniffed the air, her nostrils flaring. There were _four_ humans and _two_ horses upwind of her, not just the lone cavalier she could see. She glanced to left and right, for he trail ran between two outcrops of rock. So, she thought, there were others concealed in ambush. But she was Ragash. She would not fall for such an obvious trap. She stopped, and moved aside from the trail so that the horseman would have to come forward to meet her on ground of her choosing. There was a dried-up watercourse where the ground was stony with loose gravel, washed down by vanished stream. She took her stand there, with her back to a large boulder. The stones would make the horse's footing unsure. She waited, weapons ready to strike.

A man in drab clothing, a sheaf of arrows in his quiver, crouched in the shadow of a gnarled tree-stump and made a complex hand signal to an unseen companion nearby. He was of average height, with the sunburnt complexion of an outdoorsman and his eyes were deep-set with a permanent frown that came from being ever-watchful. His name was Hendred.

In response to Hendred's signal, a wizard raised her hand and a crytal orb glittered in the fitful sunlight as she twirled it and intoned the words of a spell. The air shimmered between her and Ragash and the spell took shape and was manifest. Beside her, a dwarf grunted with satisfaction and readied a loaded crossbow. He murmured a prayer to his gods and tensed his finger on the trigger. He was Gardain Brawnanvil, the half-brother of Rurik of the Seven Mines. It was for this moment that he had travelled to Ghandalin, to meet the fate laid upon him by his gods.

Suddenly, the stillness was broken by the sound of tumbling rocks and of numbers being spoken aloud by unseen beings. The immortals were rolling for Initiative ....


----------



## rgoodbb

BoldItalic said:


> I know the Peak District. If lost, go _down_.




Good Call. After shivering on the shivering mountain, We descended. A real fire and some real ale and real pies is definitely the answer


----------



## rgoodbb

The immortals were rolling for Initiative ....

DM: What do you mean you cast Wall of Dice? It’s Wall of Ice.

P2: Tell me again why have we suddenly changed to a wan-shot this weak? 

DM: Well. I have to break up the Starter Set. I’ve run it so many times. I get board of it now. 

P2: Well OK I guess. Umm. I shoot a Holy Bolt from my crossbow at that thing over their.

P1: Don’t you mean a Holly Bolt?

P2: No.

P1: Well that’s what you have written on your Character Sheet.

P2: Oh. I guess I just misspelt it

P1: That’s a relief. I thought we were doing a Christmas themed wan-shot.

P3: I cast Chromatic Orc

P4: This is getting ridiculous. Can No-one hear spell? What about ewe Rouge? 

P1: I am a little blush aren’t I? I guess it’s because I’m trying to hide this Uncanny Podge.

DM: The Ork takes advantage of your bad spell and goze first. Hollyman. Duz a 16 hit you?

P2: Yes.

DM: 8 points as she slashes at you. Rouge. Oooh 23?

P1: Yep butt eye Uncanny Podge.

DM: Fore then.

The Battle raged on with errors and miss-spells from both sides until it was shelved and agreed that it was a drawer. The DM wrote up a table of terms and the chaired the cabinet meeting. The Rouge wanted to fight on but was benched and the DM had to make a stand and put it to bed. After furnishings and window dressings the session ended. 

P1: Well, while that _was_ fun, can we get back to our story now or is Snappy and the rest of the party really dead?

DM: Well, It’s like this……


----------



## BoldItalic

DM: Well, It’s like this…… you know when Jeli rolled a d7 and got 2⅞ ? Well, we should have paid more attention because had we but realised it, at that moment the multiverse was riven in twain. Snappy and the others are simultaneously dead and not dead.

What? So I'm simultaneously playing Od the Bard _and_ the Crimson Cavalier? Two PC's each? So what happens to Snappy?

He is your horse, Brocollin. Everything has an analogue on the other side.

So what's the analogue of this Ragash creature, on _this_ side ?

I think she was Dotti the medusa.

Okay, then what about the Phase Rider and the gnomes and the fifty tons of gold? Where do they fit in?

They are there, you just haven't encountered them yet.

You're homebrewing all this, aren't you? This isn't in the Starter Set at all.

It is in my copy. I've got the Schrodinger version. It comes in a box that is simultaneously open and not open. Shall we continue with the game?


----------



## rgoodbb

Shall we continue with the game?

….urhm…..I mean…..I guess….but how do I know whom I’m playing

How don’t you know who you are not playing?

My head hurts. Snappy is that really you?

Brocollin whinnied and started to do keepy-uppies with a football. He was on seventeen in a row and had so far impressively used three of his hooves. 

Yeah, that’s Snappy alright. But it isn’t. This Schrodinger is really weird. I wish I could cast dis-entanglement on my brain. 

At this point Nord offered up his new furry familiar to Od to help soothe his brain. The feline wrapped itself snug around Od’s neck and almost instantly snoozed. It settled so well, it could almost be mistaken for dead. All in all though, Od felt a little better. 

They collected the supply crates from the nearby cave, loaded them on a wagon pulled by Snappy/Brocollin, and trundled them down towards the settlement of Phandelver. It was at this point that the DM felt the necessary, mandatory urge to read a pre-prepared script: 

“The rutted track emerges from a wooded hillside, and you catch your first glimpse of Phandalin…”

“..Delver.”

“I’m sorry what?”

“You said Phandalin. You meant Phandelver.”

“No, no. It’s called Phandalin. The town, that is.”

“Then why is the title Lost mines of Phandelv….Y’know what? I don’t care. Doesn’t matter. Carry on. Please.”

“…your first glimpse of Phandalin. The town consists of….


----------



## BoldItalic

The town consists of…. thirty or forty burned-out buldings, mostly reduced to their stone foundations, charred timbers and piles of still-hot ash. More old ruins ....

"Hold on," interjected the Crimson Bardalier, "This isn't how it's supposed to be. We defeated Ragash, didn't we? Before she could destroy the village?"

"'Sright," grunted his friend, Nordred the Sorceranger, "We saved the village, we did. Bunch of heroes, we are. Who dun this?"

That's for you to find out. I hope you have all taken _Investigation_?

"Dunno. Jeli's the clever one. Have we taken Invest-what he said, Jeli?"

"Of course," came the murmured reply from across the trail. It was spoken by a slender half-elven woman who was holding an orb to her eye and squinting through it. "I see a village of simple log buildings, children playing on the town green, that sort of thing. The burning is an illusion. You must _disbelieve_ it."

"Looks real enough to me," announced a short, stocky but nonetheless dashing figure by her side. "But I took Wisdom as a dump stat, so what do I know?"

"if it's an illusion, we need to find who cast it and make them stop."

"I vote we start at the inn and buy the locals a few rounds of drinks."

"Which pile of ash is the inn?"

"It's that one over there, by the corner of the green."

"Right. Are we agreed? We go to the inn."

In the centre of the town stands a newly-burned down roadhouse. The common room is filled with skeletons nursing mugs of bier who eye you curiously as you enter ...


----------



## rgoodbb

In the centre of the town stands a newly-burned down roadhouse. The common room is filled with skeletons nursing mugs of bier who eye you curiously as you enter ...

...You look down beneath your feet and the wooden floor has been all but burned away, yet you stand upon solid nothing with the sound of a creak. You look down and espy the cellar and the rats but you are walking within two worlds.   

"Whoa. Jeli. You wanna take this one?"

"Why me you're the bard _the face_ as you like to say."

"No, no that's the Sorcerer or even the Paladin. We're all Charisma high."

"I haven't been Charisma High since military academy training." Pondered Sergeant Herewulf. "Wait a minute. These images we see before us are not real, we know that, but they have been real, and then forgotten. Yes forgotten. As Champion of the Forgotten it is my duty to make sure that they are remembered, remember? We must make all adventurers and other NPC's see all of this that is otherwise unseen in the murkiness. I have dealt with Necromancers and Enchanters and Witches and Diviners but nere have I come up against something so foul, so obscene, nay I have met my nemesis from a new school of magic most foul; the Schrodinger. A sorcerer with lower morals then the Necromancer, the Schrodinger wills two or more possibilities into existence and then discards, like a child's toy the least favorable leaving them to be endlessly forgotten within the mists of time."

"Uhm Herewulf."

"Nay this evil..."

"Herewulf."

"What?"

"What are you drinking?"

"Well that's just half of the question isn't it? That's just half of any question from now on..."

"Oh boy."

"....I mean whatever possibilities I disregard now will be lost and forgotten and I mustn't do that for I am that opposing champion."

"A shot of Delirium Brandy...In fact, he's gonna' need the bottle. Oh I do love this stuff: The good ol' Red Brand."

"..for if I but take that choice and have not sufficiently proved or disproved the many alternatives they, oh dear gods they..."

"We got the booth buddy. Just slide in there. That's it. Have a sip of this. That's good. Now don't think, just drink. One more sip now. There."

"But....But...."

"That's it buddy. Your good. Your all good."  

_Slump.......snore.......snore.......snore.......sn_

"What's up with him?"

"He's forgotten to see and as such, see's the forgotten." Jested Od.

"It's more like he sees the forgotten and forgot to see." Joked back Nord. 

"Boys! Just...just be quiet for a minute. Why do I always have to be the grown up? When do I get to let my hair down and have fun instead of taking care of you lot? Just for once I would like another permanent female PC around."

When in, entered.......


----------



## BoldItalic

When in, entered....... Sam.

"I'm Sam," she announced, tossing back her flaxen tresses, "but you can call me Samantha."

"Welcome to the party, Sam, I'm Jeleneth, but my friends call me Jeli."

"Can I come adventuring with you? It's awfully boring in this village."

"Yes, of course you can," replied Jeli, rummaging in her handbag, "I always carry a spare pregen sheet with me. Here you are, you can be this 4th-Level Rogue."

Sam studied the parchment briefly and exclaimed "Oh! It says here I live with my auntie at Alderlead Farm but that's must be a misprint it's Alder_leaf_ Farm, I'll just scratch it out and write it in."

It had not escaped Od's notice that Sam was a halfling, like him, and not only that, she was a farm girl and it is well known that farm girls automatically understand cooking. He briefly entertained notions of settling down before he somehow remembered that the halfling rogue pregen in the starter set was on the run from a gang of ruffians led by a renegade wizard and that could be inconvenient. Hot dinners are one thing, but a trouble magnet in his hobbit hole would be asking for .. well, trouble.

Sam smiled at Od, laid a firm hand on his and said "And who's this? A handsome bard? I bet you know how to please a girl, don't you?"

"Er ..." stammered Od, thinking _Er ..._ and _Er ..._ more or less at the same time. But he rallied himself and continued suavely "Stick with me, Sam, and I'll show you the ropes. It's a dangerous business, adventurererering. You need an experienced fellow, man of the world, to look after you."

"I'm so glad you're my partner, we can do everything together, can't we? Can you come to tea on Monday? Auntie would love to meet you."

This was going just a _little_ too fast for Od and it didn't help that Nord and Herewulf (who had woken up again) were smirking into their tankards and avoiding eye contact.

At that moment, the door of the inn opened and there was a subtle re-arrangement whereby the villagers who had been inside quietly went out and were replaced by four ruffians in dirty scarlet cloaks who had previously been lurking outside having a quiet smoke. The feminine hand that was holding Od's continued to do so, very firmly, while Sam's _other_ hand somehow seemed to be holding a shortsword with the air of a hand that knew exactly how to use one.

"I'd like you all to roll initiative, please," announced the DM, "Just in case, you understand."


----------



## rgoodbb

When Sam had entered the groups booth, she had spotted the Halfling boy gawping at her, rolled a 18 on insight (not that she really needed to), and immediately set about identifying what coin he had upon him and how she could procure it. She gave him her doeiest eyes and as soon as her scarlet neighbours entered the tavern, she began a long-con. Her sword was out suggesting immediate danger, her hand gripped his suggesting fright. A simple but audible sharp intake of breath and the party knew these ruffians were danger. It couldn't have been more easy. 

On initiative count of 25 (Sam had of course rolled her stats. (in private) She was not sticking to any pre-gen offered by Jeli), Sam leapt in, slashed at the nearest one, leapt back out again without receiving an attack of opportunity (They were a little drunk so their reactions were shot). She backed up behind Od and performed a sleight if hand check on his back pockets. She fumbled her roll.

Od was amazed at the speed of this lady Hin. And at the bravery. She charged in and then to top it all she was back and squeezing his bum! in combat! He was dizzy. 

Jeli, seeing all this, wondered why she had never really flirted with the boys or they with her. She looked at Nord and Herewulf. Herewulf was in a time of confusion at the moment, so the storm pirate it was then. 

"Nord. One must always mind one's muses, don't you think?" The Highborn began the subtle speech of love, after taking a shot at a ruffian. 

"Hear wer there maggie straight? Ar thems for the askin'." Nord blasted two of them with a thunderwave, flew up to the ceiling, bashed his head on a beam and landed again.  

"Uhm Quite." _What did that mean. Was it acceptance, refusal, not right now, or utter gibberish.
_
"Well Herewulf. Is this better than that boat-full of gold? Is this what you wanted." Shouted Od above the ruckus.

Herewulf was happy. Three more ruffians had entered the fray and were at this very moment carrying him back to slam him against the bar. A tavern brawl, yes. It lifted his heart that he did not have to think on things during combat. He should initiate fights all the time. He would not be able to linger on his gloomy thoughts and responsibilities. Ooof. With the wind knocked out of him, he elbowed down onto one of their necks. This was the life.

Sam put away her sword and engaged the light crossbow. _Light!_ she had dumped Strength to make it look good for her (privately) rolled other stats. As the Rogue leaned the crossbow on Od's shoulders, she tried again with her hand. _These folks have a boat full of gold,_ she had heard the big fella say. This could be a longer con than I thought. I will stay with them for a bit longer. She shot, gave Od a little peck on the cheek and moved her hand inside his studded leather tunic.

Od could take no more. He was in ecstasy. Yet another four ruffians entered the tavern. Pumped and full of vim, it was then when he did something rash, something brave. He..............


----------



## BoldItalic

Pumped and full of vim, it was then when he did something rash, something brave. He.............. 

... burst into song and, while singing The Acrobat's Chorus from Wriggletto, leapt into the air, swung from the chandelier, did a triple overhand aerial somersault, sprang off the wall behind one of the ruffians, grabbed the man's cloak and folded it over its wearers head thus causing the hapless ruffian to fumble his attack and stab himself in the knee.

And all this whilst unknowingly leaving his coin pouch in Sam's capable hands, where it would be quite, quite safe.

Herewulf, meanwhile, was punching his own assailant repeatedly in the face with his mailed fist with the result that the man's face was becoming less and less bruised and more and more healed. Even a vicious-looking scar that the man had received in childhood started to fade. Herewulf rolled 18 on a Wisdom(Insight) check and the penny finally dropped. "Hey, guys," he shouted, "I can do it! I can _Lay on Hands_!".

Then the lights went out.

"Who did that?" asked Nord, floating six inches off the ground and trading swear words with a ruffian in a private skill contest to see who know the rudest ones.

"Me," relied Jeli. "I found this orb in my pocket, don't know how it got there, but it seems to do _Darkness_."

One of the ruffians groaned. "You do realise, madam, that you've ended this encounter right there? Come on, lads, it's lunch time. They're doing mock boar soup back at the hideout. With croutons."

Sam called out to the departing ruffians "Tell Glassteel I said it's not me, it's him. He'll know what it means."

Jeli looked at Sam with interest and rounded on Od, Herewulf and Nord. "You three! Outside! There's going to be girl talk going on in here and it's not for your ears!"

"All right, all right, keep your hair on," grumbled Od.

It was raining outside. Fortunately, the illusion of burnt houses had gone. "What shall we do now?" mused Herewulf, pulling on a waterproof hood to keep his helmet dry.

"Getting out of the rain would be a good idea," suggested Od. "Let's try that old ruined manor house up the hill."

"Or we could try the provisioners," countered Nord. "It's a bit nearer and I'm all out of ten-foot poles. Anyone got any money?"

"Er," said Od, patting his pockets and looking perplexed. "I had ... There was ... Where did I put ..."

"Alright, you've made your point, no need to ham it up."

"No, really, I think I've lost my coin pouch. I must have dropped it during the skirmish."

"Much in it, was there?"

"3d6 gp and 1d4 gemstones worth 100gp each."

"That's a lot of ten-foot poles."

The interior of the trading post was filled with an amalgam of aromas, athough leather and spice, wood and biscuits, chalk and cheese predominated. The trader was a portly gentleman in a leather apron, with a bushy moustache, a slight limp and 'I love Mum' tatooed on his left shoulder, but the three adventurers noticed none of these clues. "What can I get you gentlemen?" he inquired.

"We ..."


----------



## rgoodbb

"We ...require of you good sir two halves of a broken ten foot pole and because it is broken we will pay you 1 copper piece not the usual 5.”

“Fink I woz born yesterday?”

“What? Well hang on there old chap.” Odd put on his best Sunday voice when in trouble and stalling. “Whatever could you possibly mean?”

“I know adventurers when I see em’. Come ere wiv yor mending spell eh?”

“O bugger chaps, I think the game’s up.”

“You want a bunch of these scroll cases to cast continual light in and have permanent torches that you just take the lid off sold to you for the price of 50 gold. Ha! I knowz yor scams. Wot abat the minor illusion cantrip or the prestidigitation eh? Keep em coming, I’ve seen them all. Do you know how many players have played Lost Mines of Phan? Do ya?”

“Come to think of it, I had never really appreciated that. Have you served them all?”

“Oh yes.” He took his hat off and sat down wearily. “Hundreds of thousands of players playing their characters, some for a second or third time. All with their wagons and crates of supplies. All wanting to haggle like we’re in bleedin’ Al Qadim or somink.”

He looked a half broken man

“Do me a fayva’ fellas. Don’t give me another bleedin' cart full of stolen supplies returned. I’ve got wagons and supplies upon wagons and supplies. You should see the back parking lot. Full of bleedin’ wagons these blinkin’ heroes with smug smiles on their faces keep returning. I’ve ‘ad to buy up fields upon fields just to store them all. I don’t know what to do anymore. And d’ya know the worst part? It’ll just reset when you move on and the next bunch of noobeez will come wiv their wagons. I need a break. I need an ‘oliday. I can’t cope no more. I'm at my wit's end.”

“………..…so……..….no ten foot pole then?”
______________________________________________________
…Meanwhile back in the Tavern…

“Do you have any intention of returning that?” Jeli nodded at the purse Sam was secreting.

“Maybe. Well. Actually no.”

“You seem to have a way with men.” Jeli inquired about the price

“You seem to have a boat full of gold.” Sam quoted the price

“I seem to have a proposition for you...” The real haggling began.


----------



## BoldItalic

Seeing the poor man's plight, the three fellows, who were basically good-hearted and sympathetic, put their heads together and came up with a combined hat size of 21¾. "We know what to do," they announced. "You need to come to an arrangment with the Redbrands, for them to steal your cartloads of supplies as fast as they are returned, take them secretly back to Neverwinter by the other road and sell them back to Gundren Rockseeker in time for the next lot of adventurers to turn up on his doorstep. Then you go halves with the Redbrands for whatever he pays them. That way, there's only _one_ actual cartload and it gets recycled."

The trader, whose name was Sellmore Barthen, thought for a while, then nodded. "So, I get a profit, the mob gets a profit, and no one's any the wiser?"

"Yes. It's win-win."

"See, my ol' dad Elmar allus tol' me, if'n it be too good to be true, it be too good to be true. _Where's Gundren get the money from_, to keep payin' out fur the same cartload over 'n over again?"

"You get the adventurers to steal the gold back from the Redbrands when they attack the hideout, then send them back to Neverwinter to deliver it to Gundren."

We leave the scene in the trading post, where Sellmore was moving around small pieces of cheese (representing carts) and copper pieces (representing sums of gold) as he tried to figure out the flaw in the scheme, and return to the two ladies in the otherwise deserted common room of the inn.

They had their heads together and were both talking at the same time, as ladies do, and to any passing eavesdropper it would appear that they were exchanging idle gossip and nothing of consequence was being said. Assuming the eavesdropper was male, of course. In reality, nothing could be further from the truth and when Sister Garaele came in looking for survivors of the recent combat to heal, she knew instantly what was going on and decided that if anyone was going to be weak, poor and oppressed it might well be Od. Being an agent of the Harpers, she was always on the lookout for someone to recruit and she thought it was just possible that Od might be a suitable candidate. Finding no one to apply her medical skills to, she gave a cheerful wave and left.

"So, no ten foot poles, then," grumbled Nord as they left the trading post. "I s'pose a quarterstaff would do instead. Shall we try the Lionshields place?"

"Good idea," agreed Herewulf. "I need some metal polish anyway."

You can see what's going to happen, can't you? As they were crossing the town green, who should they meet but Sister Garaele? "Oh my," she began, "You do look poor."

"Not at all, madam," replied Hereward, "We own fifty tons of gold. It's just that we've temporarily become separated from it."

"Yes, yes, of course you have. Do you often get these headaches? Why, your hands are as cold as ice!"

"Those are my gauntlets, madam." 

"And you must be feeling odd too," she continued, quite oblivious to what Hereward was saying and looking down at the halfling (she was quite tall, for an elf).

"Yes, madam, Od the Bard at your service. Would you care to hear a song? I accept donations."

Nord had not been paying much attention to these exchanges, because he had seen something that the others hadn't ...


----------



## rgoodbb

…he had seen something that the others hadn’t...

…A beautiful bejewelled silver comb gripped tight in the good Sister’s well-manicured hand. It was then that he remembered that last time round, his party had not done the Banshee quest. It had seemed so insignificant at the time. Nord sparkled with static, quite literally. He brimmed with electricity, he hummed with the power of the storm. 

“Yo dar Sister. Ya ken me wanna chatter between your ‘Arpers and Abigale? No. Anthea? No. Amanda? What was ‘er na….Agatha! Dems the spoils Agatha! Shall I snatch thee comb off your ‘ands?”

Sister Garael stumbled back aghast, agog and almost agrog (but not quite), that this man had outed her intentions with the ease of a child. “What was this witchcraft? This Sorcery of the mind?”

“Sorcery. Well eye, ya got me goose now danee?”

She ran bumbling and chafing towards the meagre temple, emerging a moment later with a vial. Panicking, she uncorked and unloaded its watery contents upon Nord’s face.

“Ha! I see thee. I’ze gotta freshen up for this bird is it aye?”

The Holy Water had had no effect on this mind-reading creature of a man before her. Fire! It must be fire! The cleric ran around a corner and returned with a lit torch. She thrust it at Nord’s face. 

“Nay danna worry yer stacks, me face is dry enough now lassie.”

“I, I don’t quite know what to do now. Sunlight!” And she was off again. 

“Quite mad it seems.” Offered Od.

-------------------------------

“So that’s it?”

“Yep.”

“Really? It’s that simple?”

“It really is that simple.”

“I’m going to have to try this out on Nord. You’re sure.”

“Trust me. I’m sure.”

The ladies left the tavern in search of the target of Jeli's affection.

----------------------------

Sister Garael came charging (not that Char-Ging) around the corner hurtling towards Nord pointing a scroll case at him. As she neared, she popped open the end and a Continual Light spell positioned inside shone brightly on Nord’s face like a beam of sunlight.

“Hey. That must be one of Sellmore Barthen’s that he was telling us about.” Stated Herewulf.

“I guess we take the trek by night then? Is that what you are picking up from her?”

Sister Garael was spent, knackered and down-heartened. She dropped the comb and wandered of gibbering into the night. It was this time that the ladies caught up with their fellow party members. It was time. It was time for Jeli to try out her new strategy of wooing the Pirate. 

Jeli……


----------



## BoldItalic

Jeli…… made her play, blissfully unaware that Nord had just fallen for Garael.

In the ensuing conversation about the attractiveness of lady elves and how pirates should woo them, Jeli and Sam were talking about Jeli but Nord, Od and Herewulf were talking about Garael. Nobody actually realised this and the upshot was that while Jeli assumed she was engaged to Nord with Sam as a witness, Nord assumed that he was practically engaged to Garael with Herewulf and Bard as witnesses. Shakespeare was good at this sort of thing. Except he would probably have thrown in a hunting scene, a fatal stabbing, and possibly a jester to explain it all at the end. But at least everybody _thought_ it was all settled and they could get on with the adventure.

"Well, that's settled," remarked Od. "Congratulations, Nord, I hope you two will be very happy together. Now, what say we tackle the Redbrand's Hideout _Ruined Manor_?

"You don't want to go there," ventured Sam, "My little cousin Carp was playing in the woods there last week and two nice men came out of a secret entrance and gave him sweets. At least, that's what he told auntie."

There was an embarrassed silence for a moment, then Herewulf tactfully changed the subject. "Was there something between you and the wizard chappy _one of the Redbrands_, Sam?" he asked innocently. "Only, if you'd rather keep away from the place, we'll quite understand."

Sam pared her fingernails thoughtfully with a small dagger that somehow popped out of her left sleeve and replied "Whatever gave you that idea? I'm just a simple peasant girl with flaxen tresses."

"Er, yes. Well, never mind. You know, I have a dagger exactly like yours - a Chalice and Mason's with a bone handle. I've got mine here somewhere. They're good, aren't they?" Herewulf patted his pockets and frowned. Then he remembered that chainmail hauberks don't have pockets and stopped worrying.

"Well," ventured Od, "We can't just stand around here on the town square waiting for something to happen. S'pose we visit the townmaster and ask the fat, pompous old fool what we are supposed to do next?"

"I heard that," said a voice behind them ...


----------



## rgoodbb

"I heard that," said a voice behind them...

The townmaster proceeded to direct operations from here.

“You must go to the banshee Agatha and swap the silver comb for some information she has for the Sister. I thought this was an obvious hook, especially for those of you who have done this before.” 

“That’s it? Seems boring and straightforward.” Mused Herewulf.

“Well you’ll get a couple of potions of healing for it. Then you’re ready to take on the Redbrands. But only with your healing potions.”

“Ooh. Magic items. Remember them DM?” oozed Odd.

Just then an APPARATUS OF KWALISH landed on Od’s big toe “AAAAAAAHHHHOOOOOWW!” He glanced back at Sam. “It’s nothing. Doesn’t hurt.” She gave him a look, and for a while the pain was indeed numbed.”

“Guess the DM does remember Magic Items Od. Who has the silver comb?”

“That’ll be m…Barnacles! Where did I put that thee there comb?”

Everyone slowly turned to Sam who was running a silver comb through her flaxen tresses

“What?” She seemed to say.

Od’s heart almost blew out of his chest at the sight of her. A poem. He must write about her. He must document his love. His desire….

- _Oh, how doth my soul survive each second without thought of thee? _
Too soppy. But true. But too soppy.

- _Her freckles capture and captivate. Each one a love song. Each one a_….
Nope. That’s not going anywhere.

- _Doth the moon live without the sun? Doth…_
Oh brother. I am feeling foolish. Ah I know….

-…..


----------



## BoldItalic

"Oh, Od," cooed Sam, "you're so eloquent, I'm quite overcome. "Let me give you a big, big hug!" The enthusiastic hug that followed was, of course, a pretext. Sam had already stolen Od's heart and his coin pouch. Whatever would be next?

Jeli looked hard at Nord, willing him to give _her_ a hug like that, then turned away when he gave her a puzzled glance because the thought she was broadcasting made no sense. "Something wrong?" he asked her out loud. "No, why should there be?" she replied acidly.

"Right," announced Herewulf, "That's enough camoddling, we have to get to the ruined town of Conyberry and it's at least ten hexes away along the trail. We're going to be doing two or three days of wilderness so let's check our provisions and waterskins and whatnot."

"Shall we try out the new UA 'Into The Wild' rules?" suggested Jeli's player. The DM pulled them up on his magic screen, read them briefly and shrugged. "Okay," he replied, "But it really needs me to prepare encounter tables and whatnot. I'll just wing it."

After a day's journey along the trail towards Conyberry, the party made camp in a convenient ruined tower. The roof was gone but the walls were thick and kept out most of the weather. They soon had a cheerful blaze going in the middle of the floor, and were cooking a hearty rabbit stew for dinner. Jeli, who was a ranger today, was keeping watch at the doorway when the DM announced, with a suitably dramatic voice, that they were about to get a _random encounter_ and everyone perked up and took an interest.

There was the clatter-clatter-clatter sound of the DM gleefully rolling dice behind the screen and the shuffle-shuffle-shuffle sound of him turning the pages in the DMG. Then he looked worried, stared down in disbelief at his dice, shuffled some more pages, and finally looked beaten. His shoulders slumped and his dice arm went limp as he announced the result in an almost inaudible mumble.

You are alerted by the sound of hoofbeats and the jingle of harnesses. Riding down the trail towards you are a posse of warrior maidens mounted on purple unicorns.

"Hi, guys!" called Xena. "What brings you to this neck of the woods?"


----------



## rgoodbb

_More competition. _Thought Jeli. _And younger. Great._ "We are here to trade with a Banshee for some information." She stated in a _put on _authoritative voice.

"Oh. Um. Too late I'm afraid. We already got an answer from her this morning and that's it for this century apparently."

"What? What about our Potions of Healing? Will we never get another Magic Ite..."

Od quickly put his hand up to and over Jeli's mouth. He looked up at the skies nervously. Waited. Rubbed his toe unconsciously and sighed out a deep breath when nothing fell on them.

Sam took an immediate interest in the troop. When Herewulf had suggested stocking up for the journey, she had decided to _procure_ all the 'B' items from the PHB:
Backpack
Ball bearings (bag o f 1,000)
Barrel
Basket
Bedroll
Bell
Blanket
Block and tackle
Book
Bottle
Bucket
Brewer's supplies
Bagpipes
Battleaxe
Blowgun
(She already had a Burglar's pack and thought another overkill) 

As laden as she was, There was always, ALWAYS, room for more. She espied the unicorns and wondered:
A) How they tasted
B) How much their horns were worth
C) How good a pack animal they were for carrying loot
D) How much coin their riders had on them
E) What the hell was that large lizard with a magical sphere being pushed in front of it. 
F) What can I get out of this lot

At which point she turned on the charm with Xena.

"I'm Sam. Newest member of this party. You ladies all look so fantastic, strong and independent on those steeds. Formidable. Just formidable. What are they like to ride?"

Bigby reached down her considerable hand and Sam took it. She swung up behind the pigtailed warrior and grinned with glee. She only just remembered to give Od a sideways look, a wink and a smile. Amanda, being the forward scout of the troop, performed a perimeter sweep and reported back All Clear.

Xena, who had shaved off all her hair and looked just _rock_, suggested with the enlarged party back together, they could now brand those Redbrands red. She also, being leader of the light cavalry unit, had picked up word on her travels that a dragon had taken up residence nearby and might need sorting out.

"One thing at a time." Replied Jeli, who was starting to feel that her leadership position might be in jeopardy.
"To the Redbrands."
"To Phandolin..devler."
"To victory."
"To wherever the football travels."
"To nere thee blood 'o' thunder, aye."
"To another wasted journey."
"To...Oh those pigtails are lovely Bigby."


----------



## BoldItalic

"Is that rabbit stew?" asked Snappy. "Don't mind if I do."

"Sure," said Herewulf, "Help yourself, we've already had ours."

The girls having ridden off into the night taking Sam with them, our four stalwart heroes remained gathered around the fire. Nord threw on another log and used a mage hand to stir up a comforting blaze. Herwulf winced when the _hand_ went into the flames, but then realised that it couldn't take damage so it wouldn't get burnt. He wondered idly if there was a _Lay on Mage Hands_ spell that paladins could learn. It might be really useful for healing fire elementals, for example. Maybe he could research it, next time they had any downtime. That didn't look to be soon, though.

Od produced a miniature lute, _Enlarged_ it to normal size and began to strum a whistful melody. He was thinking of Sam.

Alas my love, you do me wrong
To gallop off on a unicorn.
For I have love'd you so long,
And with tender longings am I torn.​
Jeli settled down next to Nord and adjusted her skirts in what she hoped was an alluring manner but Nord was busy staring into the fire and didn't notice. "What do you see in the fire?" she asked.

"I see a dragon chasing an elephant, and there's a ghastly face upside down just above them."

"Do you? I see two hearts entwined in the bonds of love."

"That's women for you," declared Nord brusquely. "Always on about romance, never anything important."

"And elephants are important to you?"

"When I were a wee bairn," began Nord, lapsing for a moment into Scottish Piratical, "I'd a toy pirate ship an' a toy elephant. Off-times the elephant stood in for a whale, or the ship for a carriage for the elephant to pull."

"Children are so inventive, aren't they?"

"Best use of children is to kidnap them and hold their parents to ransom. Or set them to work swabbing decks. Or both at once."

"Crocodiles like children," offered Snappy, "Preferably raw."

"I think we should change the subject," declared Jeli stonily.

"I've been thinking," said Od, pausing in his lutinistic endeavours, "If the girls clear out the Redbrands before we get there, we won't get any XP ourselves, will we?"

"We're fourth level. They're only worth a few hundred anyway."

"Um, we're supposed to pretend we don't know that, aren't we?"

"True. Forget I said it."

"But I can hear you thinking it."

"It's okay to _think_. As long as we pretend not to."

"Metamental."

"That's metal  "

"Anyway, who's turn is it to be on watch tomight?"

"It's probably my turn."

"Suits me, I'm tired after all that walking we did today."

"Goodnight, then."

During the night ...


----------



## rgoodbb

During the night ...

…When it became Jeli’s turn to take watch, she had an epiphany. A Eureka moment. Of course! The only way she was ever going to interest Nord was if she became like him. She knew this now. How to go about this though…. 

Passed the midnight hour, when all was sound and tucked away, Nord awoke to take his shift. Before him stood proudly, a pirate woman. Headscarf, huge earrings, shoulders and stomach all showing lots of flesh. Rapier sheathed and hands on hips. Jeli was a Swashbuckler this morn. 

“Am I still dreamin’ gal? or is thaa really you Jeli?”

“Captain Jelenneth to you boy. Now get up to the Crow’s Nest immediately and take yer watch before I show you me lash'o’nine you blubbering lung-scrubber. Move it!” Jeli pointed to the nearest tall tree and Nord ran for it. Oh how he ran. Time slowed down for him. The falling leaf nearby slowed its descent to almost nothing, the shift in the branches moving as if immersed in bad gruel and tar. Why had the world slowed down? Why was his body all tingly? 

As soon as he had asked himself this question, he knew the very answer. The players. The players man! They had finally got so comfortable with each other that they were experimenting. Trying out new role-playing stuff. They had initiated………..a romance, those balsey mo-fo’s. Why am ah the last one to know about this? Of course. I have a passive insight of 7. But Jeli…uhm…er Captain Jelenneth Oh boyz. Wow! 

Jeli settled down by the fire leaning her head on the snoring Snappy. She smiled and closed her eyes. Tomorrow would be interesting. 

Tomorrow would indeed be interesting, as neither of them had taken much care to watch on their watch through the night....


----------



## BoldItalic

neither of them had taken much care to watch on their watch through the night.... 

... a lapse that the DM gleefully took advantage of. With Nord up a tree _outside_ the tower, and the others asleep _inside_ the tower, he carefully placed two of his shiniest minis in a hidden cellar _underneath_ the tower but with no trapdoor or stairway connecting the two, so the PCs would not have been aware of it.

With an evil cackle, the DM put on some scary music and announced While Nord is on watch in his tree and the others are asleep, you are surprised. Please roll for Initiative.

There was consternation around the table as various PCs claimed they were immune to surprise on the grounds of ... not wanting to be surprised is what it boiled down to, basically, and the DM listened carefully before saying no.

Two hairy great spiders that had been holed up in the cellar appeared suddenly out of nowhere half way up the inside walls of the tower, dropped onto the sleeping forms of Od and Herewulf, made _Bite_ attacks at +4 then vanished into the Ethereal Plane before anyone could react. Herewulf was protected by his armour but Od took the full force of a poisonous bite and lasped into rigid unconsciousness.

"Phase Spiders!" cried Jeli, "This is a *quickly calculating in her head* _Deadly_ encounter !"

Rapiers were drawn or, in the case of Snappy, jaws were opened, but there was nothing to attack for no-one had vision that extended into the ethereal. Hearing Jeli's shout, Nord came running in and spied Herewulf bending over Od's paralysed form where he was attempting to _Lay on Hands_ and doing it correctly for the first time ever. Working quickly, Herewulf counteracted the poison that had flooded Od's bloodstream and the little bard slowly began to recover from his paralysis and start breathing again.

Just as the two spiders phased back in for another attack ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Just as the two spiders phased back in for another attack ...

Nord Heroically charged into the fray. He first cast _Shatter_ on the pair of Phazum Arachnum and then produced a lightning whip that crackled and wrapped around one of them and drew it nearer to him. But more importantly, also drew it near to Herewulf who smote it down. 

The Captain (with a Haha!), swung from an ancient tower chandelier and dropped, rapier pointing down, onto the back of the remaining spider sinking the blade in deep. As it flailed an arm up to attack she dodged nimbly, kicking off and back flipping onto a crumbling set of internal spiral steps where the swashbuckler cut a rope and the chandeliers fell upon the beast and ended the combat.  

Nord looked at Captain Jelenneth. She looked at he, and time stopped still for both. 

Herewulf sensing high emotions, loaded a still groggy Od onto Snappy’s back and with a good survival check, started strapping him on down tight with sticky spider webbing. They left the other two in the tower and began making preparations to break camp. Herewulf moved them to a suitably sensible distance away from the tower and patiently and respectfully waited. 

He thought about who would miss these beasts. He wondered if they would be forgotten in time, like tears…no, like all those others that he was champion of. Do the beasts and the enemy count? Yes. I am Champion of the Forgotten. It is my duty to make sure all are remembered. He became deep in thought, caught in a blur of visions, all the people who had become lost. He saw faces and the faceless. He saw those he recognised and those he did not. He saw Jeli and Nord. He saw…Wait a minute. Jeli and Nord!

Herewulf snapped out of his vision-trance. Jeli and Nord? They weren’t lost or forgotten. Why had he seen them? He left a dribbling Od strapped haphazardly to Snappy and returned to the Tower.

“UH-HUM.” He tried politely to alert them of his presence. “UUUUH-HUM!” A little louder. Nothing. The sergeant moved in and rolled a natural 20 on both perception and investigation. 

Jeli and Nord were indeed gone. They were lost to him……


----------



## BoldItalic

They were lost to him…… 

The DM turned to the two remaining players and asked "Should we play on without them, or take a pizza break until they come out of the bedroom?"

"How about a quick game of Eternity Unravelled?" suggested one.

"What's on the movie channel?" wondered the other.

"I think it's LOTR. Want that?"

"Yeah. Go for it."

Strider watched the comings and goings in the Prancing Pony from his quiet, unobserved corner table. He drew the hood of his cloak closer around him, seeming more mysterious. It was a good cloak, by the finest cloakmaker in town: Henry King of Gondor Street. But the label inside the collar was well-worn and the first and last words had already rubbed out.

As usual, Gandalf's message had been hurried and vague. "Look for three strangers. They will be travelling in secret, so they may be hard to spot," it said, "Give them any assistance you can."

The door opened and, indeed, three strangers entered. You couldn't get much stranger than these three, thought Strider. A grizzled knight dressed in a scarlet and white surcoat over brightly-polished mail who shone like a beacon in the smoke-filled tavern; a hobbit dressed in a minstrel's outfit, with a floppy hat, lime green and pink jerkin and parti-coloured breeches; and a flightless wyrm with a brightly-coloured globe on its snout. Strider's attention was drawn to the hobbit who was, to say the least, a little odd. He moved stiffly, as if recently recovered from a virulent poison, and he looked nervous, contantly fingering something on a gilded chain around his neck. Whatever it was, it radiated wrongness that even Strider could sense. "So," he thought to himself, "This must be the Wrongbearer."

Rising from his seat, Strider advanced towards the three and held out his hand in greeting. Choosing one of his many aliases on a whim, he announced "I am Sildar Hallwinter. I am a kind-hearted human male of nearly fifty years. A mutual friend asked me to look out for you."

The hobbit looked even more startled and suddenly vanished. "He often does that," observed the cavalier.  "And don't worry about this, my faithful steed. He likes his ears tickled, don't you, Snappy?"

Reassured that nothing was amiss, the minstrel re-appeared next to them. At that moment, the hobbit barmaid dropped a tray of tankards with a crash and cried out "Od! I've been looking for you everywhere! Your faithful Sam is coming with you!"

"But ..."


----------



## rgoodbb

“Imposter!" cried Snappy at Strider, not Sam. "Sildar Hallwinter died in post #125 by the hand of….” He checked his notepad.”Ragash The Destroger of Lives. No Destroyer of lives. I was scribbling pretty fast.”

“Hold your tongue silent beast. I have his identity”

“Or you are just a thief?”

“By Sauron’s ring are you that stupid? I am incognito you fool. You may have just outed us all. We must fly.”

“Not 5th yet. Can’t do that.”

“Too late. The Wrongwraiths are here.” Chipped in Herewulf.

Od still had traces of poison in him. He was looking grey gilled and a little delirious. 

“We must hide the boy or this is all over before it has even begun.”

The Wraiths took hold of the barkeep and he had no choice. He pointed towards their table.

“Strider you say. Ee’s one of them Ramblers. Dangerous folk they are – wanderin’ the wildes with their duel wielding Walking Poles, Studded Gilets and their Waterproof Gaiters.”

“Wait. Waterproof ‘gaiters?” Asked Snappy, suddenly awake. “There are ‘gaiters here?” Before he could react however, Strider had led them swiftly out the back. “We must make for the great Watchtower of Amon Sûl”

“Really. It’s not _that_ great. We’ve just come from that particular tower and, well, quite frankly, it’s a bit of a mess. Full of invisible spiders as well.”

“Not idly do the leaves of Lorien fall”

“Ee’s a bit intense don’t you think?”

“Alas! An ill fate is on me this day, and all that I do goes amiss!”

“Well we’ve all had one of those days, I suppose.”

“We should not linger.”

“Agreed. Where are we going again?”………….


----------



## BoldItalic

The journey back to the tower was uneventful and they evaded the Wrongwraiths by the simple ruse of keeping right. As they marched along, with Sam and Od arm-in-arm, Herewulf took the opportunity to relate their recent adventures to their new companion. Strider flatly refused to believe a word of it until they got to the part where the phase spiders attacked. Then he grew thoughtful and commented that it explained something that had been worrying him for some time - the problem of what had become of the spawn of Shelob. But he wouldn't explain who Shelob was or why it mattered. Herewulf was beginning to think that Strider was a trifle too taciturn to be much fun to be around but he kept that opinion to himself out of politeness. Snappy agreed with him, though.

Back at the tower, Nord and Jeli weren't speaking to each other. They were having a lovers' tiff. Sam tried to console Jeli and Od tried to cheer up Nord but all that achieved was to make the pair even more angry with each other than they were already. "It's not usually like this," said Herewulf apologetically.

"There is no time," announced Strider abruptly. "This ancient tower is not safe from prying eyes. Come, we must travel by night to evade our foes, for they are all around us. With luck, we should reach our destination by sunrise but tarry not, for the danger is great and we must make haste."

"What destination?" asked Od innocently, disentangling himself momentarily from Sam's embrace, "I thought we'd given up trying to get to Conyberry after Xena and the others got there first?"

"The power of Mordor extends further than you imagine, young hobbit," replied Strider. "You do well to remember the peril that threatens us all - man, elf and halfling alike. Even the dwarves in their halls of stone are not safe."

Yes, but where are we actually _going_?"

"That must remain a secret known only to ourselves, for there are spies everywhere. When the sun sets behind the hills and the clouds cover the moon, then must we strike out, o'er mountain and dale, through flood and forest, and take always the hidden ways far from the ken of the orc lords."

Od looked at Herewulf, who shrugged. "Don't ask me," he said. "By the way, how are you feeling now? Arms and legs working better?"

"Yes, thanks," replied the diminutive bard, "Sam has been rubbing me with ointment, haven't you, my love?"

Sam smiled and produced a jar of something. "My auntie's recipe," she said proudly. "Goose grease and pig fat with powdered daffodil. Want to try some?"

"Perhaps later. It might not agree with my chainmail. Although ..."

"Hist!" warned Strider suddenly in a low voice, "There is something moving around outside!" and he flung himself at the doorway where ...


----------



## rgoodbb

he flung himself at the doorway where ...

…..he found a shrub to hide behind. He beckoned Od and Herewulf slowly towards him. The rambler then peered through the shrub.  A paled and circular figure was tapping one of their mess tins onto the very still ridges of Snappy’s back. It was rolling and moving about in an awkward dance or jig. The thin figure was reciting an incantation or something.

“The metal tin, gives off a din
It’s got no meats, for me to eats
That makes me mad, so, so, so, so saaaaaad! 

“What foul creature abomination is this before us? We should kill it now. Put it out of its misery”

“Wait. I know this thing. It’s Dear Liza from way back in post #95”

“But it is a moving bucket. That’s SacroBlasph!”

“Not really because this bucket is a holy bucket.” Which was kind of true for the bucket did indeed contain a hole. It also had some straw and carried an axe within it. Making it handy as well as holy.

“What? Really? You sure? Well OK. Actually, you know what? It’s not OK. I’m not OK with any of this. This……this is all wrong.”

Just then a blushing Jeli and Nord emerged from within the under tower. They were followed by two rabbits. 

The DM looked around. Jeli, Nord, Od, Herewulf, Snappy, Strider, Dear Liza and the pair of bunnies

 “Nine companions. So be it. You shall be the fellowship of the wrong.

Od - “Great! Where are we going?”


----------



## BoldItalic

Od - “Great! Where are we going?” 

"We go to our doom," intoned Strider mournfully, "And few among us shall return in this age of the world. There are forces ranged against us that we have little hope of overcoming but we must strive nobly to overcome nonetheless e'en though we perish and are utterly forgotten. For the time is come to set forth upon the final journey that will end with the dawning of a new age."

"Er .. if you don't mind me asking, who told you?"

"My left thumb talks to me," said Strider proudly, "Don't you, thumbie? See, he says yes."

"Herewulf," murmured Od, "You can cure diseases, can't you? Being a paladin, and all?"

"Why, has Sam given you something embarassing?"

"No, no, not that. Our friend Strider, he .. has issues, doesn't he? Would you say that he was ... quite sane?"

"Well, I'm no expert but apart from the raging paranoia and the infantile delusions, he seems to be about as sane as the rest of us."

"Nothing you can do for him, then?"

"We can follow him around for the laughs."

"Not too long, though."

"I give it a couple of hours before those two rabbits turn into two rabbits plus about ten baby rabbits and ruin his numbers."

"The fellowship-of-the-roughly-nineteen doesn't have the same ring to it, does it?"

"Don't talk about the ring!"

"Oops. Forgot. D'you want to have a go with it?"

"Why would I want to do that?"

"Dunno. It keeps telling me to give it away. Weird."

"Give it to Strider, then. Go on, I dare you. Bet he freaks out."

"I've got a better idea. I'll get Sam to pick his pockets and plant it on him. See how long it takes for him to notice."

"Heh. Go for it."

About half an hour down the trail towards Conyberry, where they definitely weren't going, Strider called a halt and had everyone make Stealth checks because he thought he heard something. After a few minutes, during which nothing at all happened, he gave up and blew his nose to hide his embarrassment. As he put his handkerchief back in his pocketses, he suddenly froze and his eyes went wide. Drawing forth Od's ring, he squinted at it closely and declared "By the six-and-a-half! The ring of power, torn from the hand of S'wrong by my forefather Isulk! In our hour of greatest need, it comes to us! Onward to victory!" and he put it on. And disappeared. And entered the ethereal plane, where he saw ...


----------



## rgoodbb

, where he saw….ed his own thumb off to remove the ring and went totally (not partially) insane. Thus he became Lost and frustratingly, Herewulf, being _that_ champion of the lost, had to start looking for him all over again. He was not high in the queue though and could wait for now. 

As they neared their destination, their thoughts and worries had become reality. Xena’s troop had indeed beaten them back and had cleared out all the XP in the area. What were they to do?

“Uhm sorry guys. This is really all our fault.” Claimed Jeli.

“Tha’n’top it arr it done.” Supported Nord in a way only he could. 

“They would have still beaten us here whatever you guys. Don’t worry about it. I need a drink. Who wants another drink?”

Snappy had attached Dear Liza on his back, and with his football sharing the inside space of the bucket with a hand axe, entered the tavern. The bunnies took watch on the local field. Staring down at their ales, Od thought back. “Herewulf. You wanted this didn’t you? You wanted a trip down memory lane to the good old days of clearing out goblin nests etc. Is this still what you want or do you think maybe we are destined for greater things? I mean I don’t really know any of the other settings but we could go…dare I say….Homebrew again. What do people think?”

- Those that are lost are more lost in the many thousands of homebrew worlds than here I suppose.

- Od. I will go where you go my love. And a boat trip seems really expen…exciting.

- Well the tower will always now be a fond memory for me but, this place has gone a little stale 

- Thoughcha wooda neva not il me father for ye and ones liver. Aye!

So it was that our band of adventurers set off on a new course. A course that would take them head on into many perils but the saga's. Oh the saga's. After a brief discussion, they all agreed and headed off for the Land of the P........


----------



## BoldItalic

They all agreed and headed off for the Land of the _Pirate King_.

The Pirates' Guild headquarters, down by the docks in Lowport, was decorated in nautical stye as might be expected; the roof timbers had been looted from Spanish galleons and the elegant furniture had previously graced the cabins of wealthy sea captains _who no longer required it_.

It was low tide on the night of the new moon and the common room was thronged with cuthroat sailors having a good time, celebrating the mysterious and unaccountable loss of a fleet of merchant ships laden with cargoes of rum. It was very good rum, they all agreed, and there was certainly no shortage of it tonight.

Nord and Jeli were fully paid up members of the Guild, of course, and they had brought along Od and Sam, Herewulf and Snappy as their guests.

"This is better," sighed Herewulf, relaxing with his boots on the table like everyone else around him, "We had a perfectly good quest, working for Penelope to find the biggest diamond in the world and bury the fifty tons of gold stowed below decks on the Phase Rider, and somehow we got distracted."

Herewulf wondered vaguely why the room had suddenly gone quiet and why Od and the others were frantically waggling their eyebrows at him. "You mean the gold that was stolen from us by buccaneers, don't you?" hissed Od loudly, "The gold that _we definitely don't have any more_?"

At this moment, a drunken sailor lurched past their table and very carefully adopted the air of someone who is certainly not listening in the slightest. Then, as he lurched away again, he wondered why everyone was laughing and why his knees felt unaccountably draughty. It soon became evident to everyone in the room but him, that Sam had just taken the opportunity to steal his trousers.

"Sorry," said Herewulf, "I thought we weren't supposed to talk about, you know, thinggy. The thing that the Wrongwraiths were chasing us for. This rum is quite strong, isn't it?" Then he abruptly fell asleep.

"We be needin' a crew," announced Nord in a loud voice to the room in general to cover Herewulf's faux pas. "Trustworthy and reliable men o'course, for a perilous voyage to the Lootworthy Archipelago where there be diamond mines to plunder an' gems the size of hens' eggs lyin' on the beach fur anyone to take. Course, no-one's goin' to sign on at daybreak on the quayside. It's far too dangerous. We'll just have to go on our own."

Jeli winked approvingly at Nord, who noticed with delight the way that her earrings jangled as she smiled.

Meanwhile, under the table, Snappy was having a quiet conversation with a ship's cat called Marmalade, the upshot of which was ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Meanwhile, under the table, Snappy was having a quiet conversation with a ship's cat called Marmalade, the upshot of which was ...

…Snappy was invited to join the (RCFC) Real Captains Freemasons Club; a group of influential mascots, familiars, pets and lucky charm animals that truly ran the ships and the shipping across the seas. They had all the information, the power and influence from every port city from here to eternity. 

Marmalade, (whose name I might just steal for my next familiar) regaled Snappy of riches more than just gold and diamonds and other jewels and gems. Treasures of control of not only his own destiny but also control over the fate of entire civilisations. That, plus the Lowport RCFC footie team was second in the league at the moment, only behind the _Sea-Shankers_ on goal difference. It was an offer he could not refuse. 

He was initiated and promptly promoted to the rank of Journeyman due to his already considerable notoriety. They parted with a secret claw/paw shake and Snappy felt as if he had just moved into the new world of character development. 

Meanwhile it was almost B-Time. Everyone in the grotty, underlit establishment looked nervously at each other wondering with excited glee who would be the first recipient of the night……It came from the corner booth. A smash and crash of a clay urn over another’s head, and Brawl Time had begun. Everyone cheered as tables, chairs and bodies began flying in all directions across the room. 

Snappy, wandered out onto the pier this beautiful night, away from the noise, away from the fracas. He was a changed croc. He was now above all this common pirate tradition. Above mere brawls, treasure and ale. Abo…who was he kidding. He ran back in and bit down hard on a wooden leg and pulled it from underneath a rotund pirate, Aaaarrrrrrr!

Daybreak on the quayside found……


----------



## BoldItalic

Daybreak on the quayside found …… seagulls wheeling above a crowd of disreputable-looking sailors eager to sign on as crew of the Phase Rider and all vouching for each other's trustworthiness and reliability. Captain Jeli, looking truly resplendent in an illusionary costume with a tricorn hat and a tunic with an awful lot of gold braid around the shoulders,  amplified her voice with the aid of a cantrip and addressed them:

"Men, I thank you all for coming and for volunteering your services. We are about to set sail on a perilous voyage to the ends of the earth and before you sign on, you must know that we do not expect to return. Ever. It is a one-way trip. And you will not get paid. At all. But if you come with us and work hard, the rewards will be out of this world and I can guarantee that you will end your lives in happiness."

There was a certain amount of murmuring when the pirates heard this. It sounded good to some but not everyone was convinced. To some it promised escape from their enemies on shore, incalculable rewards and a long and happy retirement elsewhere but generally speaking people don't become pirates if that's what they are looking for in a career. To others it promised unremitting toil and hardship followed by an untimely death in some god-forsaken place and if you have zero self-esteem even that sounds attractive.

Sensing the mood of the crowd, Lieutenant Nord took over and appealed to the basest instincts of the waverers. "You'll get to watch floggings," he promised, "an' sometimes it'll be someone else who's getting flogged!"

That did the trick. A cheer went up and the pirates eagerly swarmed up the gangplank onto the deck of the Phase Rider. Fluttering from the masthead was a new black flag that would one day come to be feared on the eighty-nine seas of the world. The flag showed an open thesaurus above crossed _blades, foils, rapiers, sabres, scimitars, katanas, cutlasses_ and was known as the Jeli Roget.

As they weighed anchor and left port, Ensign Od remarked to Ensign Sam "Keep watch for mermaids riding pink narwhals - I've a feeling we will be meeting them quite soon."

"Anything you say, dear," she replied, wondering what to do with the ship's anchor and thinking she might hide it in a suitable barrel.

Around six bells of the forenoon watch, scudding before a brisk sou'wester, the ship suddenly ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Around six bells of the forenoon watch, scudding before a brisk sou'wester, the ship suddenly ...

….lurched involuntarily to starboard. Three burly pirates instantly spewed carrots ower the end of the forecastle and Snappy smirked at their constitution. Being a crock with multiple teeth, the newly promoted freemason could sport up to two dozen different grins, all with their own particular subtlety and meaning. 

“It’s the pull of the pool” Commented a slightly concerned but respectful Nord

“What’s that?” Herewulf asked.

“Olde Nelly; the great Whirlpool. We’re on her outer edge. We 'ave to be careful here now. A strong Nor-nor-West-Nor-nor could draw us in.”

“Up the ratlines, drop the foresail, take the lines.” Commended the Captain. And the crew made themselves busy. A good half of them had absolutely no idea what they were doing but had polished their performances to looking great while they were doing it. Nord grinned with pride at them. Proper pirates, one an’ all. 

Sam was in the crow’s-nest with Od when the Phase Rider lurched. She held onto him tight but realised that she had already taken everything from him in previous friskings. What she really needed was all that gold in the secure hold. Well, not so secure. See this was the problem: The hold was indeed full of gold. The hold was not only un-secure but also unguarded. I mean what’s the point of trying to steal it when you could just walk in and take as much as you want? Where’s the fun in that. Sam was in a quandary. How could she practice her thievery skills and still have fun?

Then it came to her. Unsteal! Of course that was the answer. Give it all back. But secretly. Then she could _acquire_ or _procure_ it all over again. She planted a kiss on Od and began the process of returning items to his person. While the pair of them were distracted up high in the crow’s nest, both of course failed to spot the giant…


----------



## BoldItalic

failed to spot the giant… tentacle that rose silently from the sea and gently, very gently, pulled the ship away from the whirlpool to safety.

Well, safety of a kind. After all, there is no such thing as a free lunch.

The tentacle continued its relentless pressure and moved the unprotesting ship towards the neck of a giant bottle that waited like an enormous glass O to engulf it. And there they were, before they knew it, bobbing about in the sea waiting for someone to roll a 327 on the trinkets table - _a ship in a bottle_.


After a long time, the bottle was caught in the nets of an Athenian fisherman who, when he got back to Piraeus, took it to a curiosity merchant near the harbour and got a good price for it because the merchant was his uncle's cousin's half-brother in law. Several customers remarked upon it but no-one bought it until one day a barbarian came in and asked to have a look at it.

"Hermione would like that," said Throg, laying his axe on the counter and taking out a large coin pouch, "How much do you want for it?"

The merchant looked at the pouch, looked at the axe, looked shifty, gave a sharp intake of breath and said "Difficult one, that, squire. See, we have this new archon called Solong and he's declared de-mock-racy. Everybody has to vote on absolutely everything and I can't just put a price on ships-in-bottles just like that. You see my problem?"

"No?" said Throg, "Not exactly." and the coin pouch opened slightly to reveal the tantalising hint of gold. Also, the axe suddenly seemed sharper and more magical than a casual glance would normally suggest.

"Of course," continued the merchant smoothly, fingering his collar, "that doesn't necessarily apply to foreign trade. Are you a foreign country?"

Throg thought about this for a long moment while dice went clackity-clack in his mind. "Yes," he said finally.

"A hundred gold, plus taxes. Not a drachma less."

"Deal."

Throg picked up his purchase and noticed that it seemed surprisingly heavy but he wasn't too familar with glass of the non-drinking kind so he shrugged and walked out of the emporium. He gave the trinket to Hermione and she was delighted and gave it pride of place on her mantlepiece. "It's very heavy," she commented. "Almost as if there's fifty tons of gold in the ship's hold. And it's very realistic, look, you can even see tiny pirates running about on the deck and up and down the rigging. Oh, thank you Throg, it's just what I've always wanted."


"Now?" asked Nord.

"Now." replied Captain Jeli. "Prepare to phase, mister mate, and set the sprits'ls, we're going about. Helmsman! Three points on the larboard wheel and change down to third!"

Emerging from the bottle, the Phase Rider ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Emerging from the bottle, the Phase Rider ...

… Seemed to blur into the glass orifice as it intangibly passed through. A strange mechanical gallifreyan noise grew louder and quitter, louder and quieter, louder and quieter until the wondrous ship phased out of this reality. Images blurred. The giant barbarian and the cleric distorted both viably and audibly. The space around them grew dark and shadowy.  The ship entered the shadow realm: A dimension used to cover time and space. This was not a place to dally or dawdle. Not a place to linger or loiter. Not a place to……”Captain. We have a pro…”

“Prepare the Shadow-drive to recommence lateral travel. Tighten that line sailor!”

“But Captain. W..”

The ship gently and slowly revved up.

“Employ.” 

The whining ship whined and whined and a strange rumbling sound that was twice a hungry Herewulf belly loud, petered out until it came to a stop. 

“What has happened?”

“I tried to tell ya luv. We got us a problem.”

“Sorry I was in the moment. What is it?”

“Well. The Rider is sick.”

“Don’t you mean broken?”

“Nope. The Rider is a livin’ breathin, creature.”

“Really? Why did I never know this?”

“Need to know I guess my luv. DM’s prerogative?”

“How do we fix this?”

“We need…..the Doctor.”

____________________________________________________

Half way across the Shadowverse, Hoo layered the high stacked sandwich until it could no longer balance. Meats, honey, cheeses, honey, breads, honey, and a little more honey. This was probably the best sandwich the young Owlbear had ever devised. She sat in her large comfy chair in her small medi-shack. She lifted the snack precariously, tilted her head back, and slowly opened her beak-maw, readying for the pleasure of be-honeyed food when: _Hnaar, Hnaar…… Hnaar, Hnaar. _The crystal ball rang. She ignored it and set herself again to receive the delicious treat. _Hnaar, Hnaar…… Hnaar, Hnaar._ Dang. It was no good. Hoo could not enjoy this with background noise. Reluctantly, she answered.

“Doctor Hoo’s breakdown service. There’s a Doctor in the hoose.” She had been told to say.”

“Uh yeah. We needs a blighty pickup and tow an’ we be dustin’ on dar Murky Threads.”

Hoo immediately scrambled the Crystal Ball so it spoke _Buccaneer_. 

“Um the Murky Threads you say. What outpost are you near?”

“Oh er. Post #159 I think. No hang on we’ve just drifted next to #160. We’re still drifting so this could move again by the time you catch up with us.”

“No problem. Please state the nature of the medical emergency?”

“Phase Rider. Blown fuse I think?”

“Phase Ri…Of course. I will be out to you as soon as possible.” Hoo was already stuffing her honyfied sandwich in her spare kit bag. “If you could all stay within the confines your vehicle.”

__________________________________

Meanwhile, bearing a huge grin in a way that only a croc could, Snappy was about to launch off the portside for a spot of Shadow-Surfing….


----------



## BoldItalic

When Hoo arrived with her tow-truck, she scanned the hull of the stricken Phase Rider with a sonic hedgehog and listened carefully to the echo. She nodded sagely and spoke frankly to Captain Jeli who rightly feared the worst. "It's gold fever," explained the owlbear. "She's got too much gold in her ichor stream. Have you been putting gold ingots in the ballast? Yes? Thought so. It's leaked into the bilges."

"Can you do anything?" asked Jeli in a frightened voice.

"You'll have to dump the gold and use a clay poltice to draw out the surfeit."

At the mention of the words 'surf it', Snappy appeared looking cool in Hawaiian shorts and spouting nonsense that he'd picked up from watching too many 1970's movies. "Not now, Snappy," admonished Jeli, "we've got work to do. All hands on deck, mister mate. I will address the men."

"Men, and others," she began, "We have found a safe place to hide our gold. We are going to offload it and stow it in that big glass bottle in the shadow dimensions. I want you all you remember precisely where it is, but keep the secret to your grave. It's our secret. No-one else must know what we know. Is that clearly understood?"

There was a brief silence as the assembled crew frowned, scratched their grizzled chins and worked through the implications in their minds but in the end each of them secretly worked out that if they went along with it, they could come back later on their own and steal the lot for themselves. A ragged cheer went up* as, one by one, they endorsed the plan.

Meanwhile, down in his cabin, Herewulf had been working a private project - a Tome of The Unforgotten. He had just carefully set down the story of Throg, Hermione and All The Fish and given them a whole chapter to themselves. Indeed, had it not been for Herewulf's efforts, that whole thread could never have been written. He concluded the chapter :

And so it was that, by mysterious forces, the ship-in-a-bottle on Hermione's mantlepiece was magically transformed overnight into a bottle containing about five million very tiny gold pieces. Strangest of all, each of the tiny gold pieces weighed as much as an ordinary one (about a third of an ounce) so Hermione was able to convince sceptical bankers to accept them at face value. With the proceeds as security she was able to raise stock and build a commercial empire and ended her days where she began, back in Oxford as the principal of a ladies' college. And what of Throg? He went into politics. You may perhaps know him by a different name.

With everything safely offloaded, the Phase Rider began to recover and hummed quietly to herself again as her servos clicked in. The ship's cook almost ran out of honey making sandwiches for Doctor Hoo, but Od saved the day. He played 'Fight of the Bumble Bee' over and over again on his flute until he practically collapsed with exhaustion from all the cyclic breathing, but it worked and enough bees responded to the call to make enough honey to keep the owlbear fed for a whole hour.

When all was ready, Jeli gave the order to sail on ...

* Why are cheers always 'ragged'? It doesn't even make sense, if you think about it. Are cheers a kind of overcoat?


----------



## rgoodbb

When all was ready, Jeli gave the order to sail on ...

…Well. Wouldn’t you like to know? Actually, it was a secret. She had to whisper as softly as she could into the Phase Rider’s ear trumpet. Hoo waved them off. It would probably be another century or two before someone else called on her expertise. Oh well. Plenty of time to eat.


A Secret Location
The ghost ship (Still in its bottle size) emerged in a massive metal cavern. Lights shone down upon the ship. Strangely dressed humans were pointing unusual metal contraptions at them. Behind them was a cloth of green and someone cried “Action.” Herewulf immediately grabbed for his new glaive and readied an attack action as soon as he could see a foe. “Cut.” Came the next command but there was no one near enough to scythe through. A tall well-muscled man wearing a tabard that read in common: Arkhan the Cruel, walked onto the raised platform. “What is this? Another drone? Who’s spying on us? Can’t we make a D&D movie in peace?”

Vision shifted again but this time ended in a splash. The pirate crew became relieved and relaxed again, some wondering how they were ever going to get back to the gold stash location.

It was night, and the rain lashed down like cat’o’nines upon the bare back of the Phase Rider. There was a set of stormy fjords espied in the distance but the waves here were elephantine. Jeli decided to wait it out. “Batten the hatches, hatch the lines, line the sails, sail the folds, fold the posts, post the rigging, rig the clamps, clamp the harnesses, harness the battens.” She nodded, sure that that had covered it.

The crew scampered below decks, cold and bedraggled but pirates still. They settled down for a rough night. As morning found the ship, all were one level of exhaustion down. Nord opened up and was assaulted by a clear crisp sky. He looked toward the fjords and……


----------



## BoldItalic

He looked toward the fjords and thought: "Nor way! Really? The land of the vikings, or maybe even xii kings!" He rushed down to the chart room and pulled out a map of Norway. By looking at the shapes of the mountains and the wiggles of the coastline, he worked out that they must by sailing somwhere near the Lofoten Islands.

Jeli followed him into the chart room, looking all the part of a pirate captain with a telescope tucked under her arm and a parrot on her shoulder. When it heard that they were in Norway the parrot got quite excited because it was a Norwegian Blue and it felt that it was near home. It's name was Pollymath. "There's a small town over there," said Jeli, "is it marked on the map?"

"Å," said Nord.

"Pardon."

"No, it's called Å. Weird, isn't it? I suppose they got first pick when names were being handed out."

"Well, shall we go ashore? I need to buy some new socks and a woolly hat."

"There could be trolls. You get trolls in Norway."

"Better pick some suitable spells, then."

"Good idea. I'll wake the others."

They moored off the town of Å and rowed ashore, passing a few boats that were setting out for a day's cod fishing. The fishermen waved and shouted something incomprehensible but they seemed friendly enough. The townsfolk, however,  ...


----------



## rgoodbb

The townsfolk, however, ...

…were not only friendly, they were downright huggy. The town of Å was celebrating Hugfest 31:54. The favourites for the competition were already warming up. All the shore party became the victims of multiple hugs and it occurred to Herewulf that Hoo would have been very good in this discipline. 

Nord, just happy to be back on the brine material plane, bought some pickled herring rollmops for everyone to enjoy. The start of the three day festival was cheerful enough in this icy climate and some mediocre minstrels coerced Od into joining them for a ditty or two. 

Sam decided to stretch her cold fingers and made for the crowds, procuring three bread rolls, a bone comb and a woollen bowtie. She just knew in her heart, that these items would come in handy soon. REMEMBER. THESE ITEMS WILL COME IN HANDY SOON.

A burly Norseman grabbed her and gave her a big hug with a smile and a growl, but she wriggled out of it with an impressive 18 on acrobatics (after rolling a not so impressive Halfling 1)

Herewulf took to the perimeter of the small town and did a recce, as was his way. He wandered in the cold winds looking up at the beautiful peeks until his nose stumbled upon a foul scent. He smelled rotten meat. The Sergeant dismissed it as a waste dumping area or the stench of a long dead animal but something else was niggling at him. He drew forth his divine sense. There was indeed a forgotten soul here. In a shack, away from the other buildings. Lost and lonely, and full of hatred. Full of foul thoughts, full of……..…tourists? He had to get back. To warn the others when a cudgel hit him on his temple and knocked him out. 

He came too, bound and propped up against an inside wall. He looked around and espied Nord, Od, and Jeli all unconscious and also bound. He saw Sam who saw him back and immediately pretended to be asleep as a figure moved between them. There was no mistaking what this creature was. It was a Nordic Hag. The townsfolk exited the shack in a dreamy sleepwalking kind of gait. They had done their jobs again this year. 

Whilst picking her considerable nose, the Hag looked at each of the newcomers in turn. The pot was boiling, the incantations set. All was ready. But who to go in first? She chose…


----------



## BoldItalic

She chose… the burliest and meatiest, none other than Herewulf himself.

Terrified out of his wits, Herewulf did what any brave soldier and upright paladin would do under such circumstances, he _glooped_. His gelatinous nature asserted itself and he wetly slipped out of his bonds, flooped across the floor and engulfed the hag's legs.

The hag howled and jumped up and down, trying to get the sticky mess off her skin before she started dissolving. She shouted incantations, ran around in small circles, she even tried swinging from the chandelier (which wasn't very successful because the shack didn't have any chandeliers). She emptied the contents of the cauldron over herself and all that did was make Heregloop slightly larger and even stickier. He hung on and absorbed the outer layers of the hag's feet, which tasted exceedingly revolting but, in a way, grimly satisfying.

This distraction allowed Sam to slip her bonds and start to slap the others awake and untie them. Quickly realising the situation, Nord flung lightning spells at the hag and, in consequence of his Storm Sorceror feature, was lifted a whole foot off the ground by a howling blast of wind. This was quite useful because he could avoid treading in Herewulf. Rapiers flashed and the hag started to ooze green from several wounds.

Suddenly ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Suddenly...

The heavy weather flap of the shack flew back and the whole town population, it seemed, were surrounding them with crude weapons drawn. There was a dullness to all of their eyes. As if they were not really there. Jeli tried to reason with them. Her highborn-privileged-private-tutorage-library-knowledge surely coming in useful here: 

“Gjood fjolks ojf thje tjown ojf Å. Yjou Ajre bjeinjg mjanjipulatjed bjy thjis evjil hjag. Fjight thje swjay shje hjas ovjer yjou.”

They lowered their tools and weapons for a moment. Jeli nodded proudly, silently remembering one of her expensive tutors. They scratched their heads and looked to each other for enlightenment at what gibberish had just spewed out of this lady Elf’s mouth. A shrug here and there, and they all raised their weapons again.

“Damn. I almost got through to them. I should try again..”

“..Uhm perhaps a different approach is needed.” Herewulf extended his gelatinous pseudopods out as far as he could reach, and engulfed the Hag once more. She cried out in pain and the townsfolk glimpsed weakness and fear in their dominator for the first time. Doubt crept into their minds. Then calm assurity. _This_ is the evil monstrosity they should follow. Not the Hag. Speaking of witch/which, She had drained into the ground, mashed, mushed and bubbled away. 

The folk of Å knelt as one to their new leader. They raised their arms forward palms up and waited, expecting a decree or an order or something. 

Herewulf sighed and…


----------



## BoldItalic

Herewulf sighed and… resumed his human form. Then he extended his _Aura of Remembrance_ to include the townsfolk and they began to recall the days before the hag had come. They remembered the long summer days when the sun never set, the fish were plentiful and the ferry called once a month with barrels of red paint for repainting their houses. It was time for picnics in the woods and swimming from the long sandy beaches. Summer was a good time before the hag came and it would be again, now that the divine Gløp had released them from its thrall. They remembered, too, the long, dark days of winter when the sun never rose and the sky was lit with the shimmering green curtains of the gods. That was the time to stay indoors with the pine-log fire blazing in the hearth, drink warming fisk soup and sing about whales and fisking.

A lot of hugging came next.

Jeli tried to explain about the socks but none of the fiskerfolk understood her until pollymath suddenly spoke in his native tongue _"Hun ønsker å kjøpe noen sokker,"_ he squawked. There was a moment of puzzlement, then some of the womenfolk laughed and nodded. _"Hva har hun til byttehandel?"_ they asked. The parrot translated. Jeli was perplexed for a moment, then said "Nord, give them your boots."

"I would do anything for you, my love," replied Nord, "but nar that. I draw the line at me boots. Give 'em yours."

"Would you do that for me, Oddikins?" Sam asked winningly.

"Nope. But you'd steal them off my feet anyway, wouldn't you?" replied Od.

You don't need to speak the lingo to know when clouds are passing like fluffy chickens over the sweet sunshine of romance and the villagers discretely withdrew, leaving the party to _Investigate_ the hag's shack.

Under a foul-smelling blanket, they found ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Under a foul-smelling blanket, they found ...

A small wand entitled Wychwarpwoody. They examined it with care, and after a time, came to the conclusion that it was magical. There was a discussion about who should wield it. This turned into an argument and after identifying its nature, it appeared that Sam had the highest Wisdom score, which was strangely prophetic as she had already swiped it during the argument. 

Sam took some time alone to become accustomed to it. 

Hello?

Hello?

Who are you?

Who are you?

Is there an echo here?

No. I’m Sam. Who are you?

Woody

Pffff….

What’s so funny about that?

Nothing. It's just a bit. you know. Rude. Phallic. Anyway what can you do?

It’s more of what can you do when holding Woo..

Stop! We need to change your name. Anyway What can I do with you in my han..d....This is so wrong.

You can Warp Wood.

This has come...up…Damnit!…before. I think it’s one of our Poster’s favourite spells.

Which is why I’m here, I guess.

OK. The Warp Wood spell. Not been seen for a couple of editions

That makes me Legendary. That plus I can talk to you. 

Are we talking, talking? Or are we doing this the old mind way thingy?

Not sure. May I suggest that we reconvene this conversation whilst in the presence of your fellow party members?

Sure. OK. This won’t make me appear weird at all. So, what do I name you that's not...Woody?.....


----------



## BoldItalic

So, what do I name you that's not...Woody?..... 

How about Silvester? Ever since Harry Potter, spells have been in Latin and 'Silvester' is Latin for 'woody'. My command phrase could be _Lignum Stamine_, said with suitable cinematics, of course. V&S components and all that jazz. By the way, you are a Druid, I suppose? Don't wish to be rude, but one can't be too careful. I only operate for druids, you see. It's a nature thing.

Satisfied, Sam announced "This wand is called Silvester and it does _Warp Wood_ in the hands of a druid."

"I could do Druid next session, if you like," offered Jeli's player, "But is Warp Wood a 5e spell at all?"
"It's a homebrew," said Herewulf's player knowingly. "Up to the DM if he wants to allow it."
"Well, the DM out the wand under the blanket, so presumably he's okay with it," pointed out Od's player.
"True. Let's assume it's legit, then."

"This is a valuable find," said Od, "I shall compose a song about it. Let's see now, what rhymes with 'Silvester'?"

"Lot of Roman towns," offered Nord, "Colchester, Cirencester, Rocester, ..."

"It's pronounced 'roaster'," objected Sam. "I had an auntie who lived there."

(This was an absolute lie. There have never been any halflings living in Rocester. There was a stout family in Uttoxeter, though, in the 3rd century AD. They kept racing pigs.)

"Well," said Herwulf trying to sound managerial, "We have agreed objectives to work steadily towards, have we not?"

"You mean finding the biggest diamond in the world?" suggested Jeli, "I think we should sail further north. An alchemist once told me that diamonds are made of ice and there's a lot of ice up there, towards the north pole."

"As long as we don't meet ice trolls and ice demons."

"We probably will. But we're going anyway."

Captain Jeli had spoken. So they bade farewell to the fiskerfolk (via the parrot as interpreter) and a few hours later, back on the Phase Rider, they gathered in the captain's cabin. "I've just remembered something," said Herewulf suddenly, "We haven't used the three bread rolls, the bone comb, or the woollen bowtie ..."


----------



## rgoodbb

"We haven't used the three bread rolls, the bone comb, or the woollen bowtie ..."

“Well that’s just as well because we have forgotten something else. We have forgotten…..Snappy! We left him surfing in the shadowy place. We need him to carry the big diamond when we find it don’t we?”

“Oooh Snappy. Darn, we did forget him. OK. Yes. First we collect our toothy companion, then we go get the stone.” 

With the plan agreed, they set off into the Shadow-Realm

_“There once was a wand named Silvester
No good in the hands of a Jester
Passed onto the Druid
It zapped out its Fluid 
And Warped Wood until it possessed her? Or should it be undressed her? _Hmmm.”

“That’s not a song.” Replied Sam. “But it’s fun, so I’ll let you off.”

The Phase Rider appeared at the point it had left. There was no sign of old toothy so they set about their lure. First the bard (and only a bard could accomplish this), played the comb. Noone could hear it but in this realm the ultrasqueelic sounds travelled fast and far. Next Nord broke up the bread rolls and let them drift into the dark ether. Lastly the woollen bowtie. Everyone stared at Nord and what he was going to do with that thing. The Pirate unravelled the wool, tied it around Snappy’s football, tied the other end round the foremast, and began kicking it out and back several times. For a while….nothing……and then…..there in the distance, cresting a shadow cloud, was the most well-travelled crock in the world: Snappy. 

He smiled as he began his approach vector and when his jaws opened, the most curious object emerged from them...


----------



## BoldItalic

the most curious object emerged from them...  which Snappy dropped on the deck with a grin.

As it rolled around on the deck with the motion of the ship, it looked at first like a small barrel, reminsicent of one of the barrels of gold that they had so recently disposed of. But it wasn't.

Whereas a barrel would have the staves running lengthways from end to end, this had them running circumferentially. At a word from Snappy, they started to slide over each other with a slippery noise, allowing it to open like a telescope. It gradually lengthened into something roughly like a canoe or a rowing boat but with the planks going the wrong way and it looked to Nord about as water-tight as a straw hat. But it wasn't a boat.

A hatch sprang open along the top, giving a glimpse of an interior fitted with rows of cunningly unfolded wooden seats. It was big enough for about a dozen people to sit in, all facing 'forwards' so it began to look as if was a carriage of some kind. Jeli thought it might need some cushions.

Then the 'hatch' itself unfolded upwards. If this _had_ been a rowing boat it might have been trying to be a mast with wooden sails but this wasn't a rowing boat and this wasn't a mast. For one thing, there were two of them side by side and what might have been 'sails' were more like paddles. Except paddles would be down where they could work in the water and these were up in the air, more like ... wings? Was this a legless wooden dragon? If so, where was its head?

The wings (?) began to whirr alarmingly and spin round very fast until they were just a blur, like the wings of a bee except they weren't exacly wings and this wasn't a bee. It didn't have black and yellow stripes, for one thing. It did have stripes but they were blue and white and went in odd directions that made your eyes hurt if you looked at them too long.

And it emitted a smell. Hard to describe, it was a bit like face cream (if you know what that smells like) and a bit like drains (we all know what _that_ smells like) but most of all it smelled like smile of an elephant (and _nobody_ knows what that smells like).

"Er .. well done Snappy," said Herewulf cautiously, "But ... what _is_ it?"

Snappy explained. "I found it in a workshop in Florence, run by a man called Verrocchio. He didn't seem to need it any more. There were some drawings of it done by one of his pupils, Leonardo da something-or-other. Did you need the drawings? I could go back and get them?"

"No, don't bother. They're probably not worth anything anyway."

"So, as far as I can work out," continued Snappy, "what it does is ..."


----------



## rgoodbb

"what it does is ..."

"Silenzio!" A seemingly anonymous sailor barked in Primordial-Italian or was it Italo-Primordial? 

Snappy translated "He said be quiet."

The incognito human moved slowly from within the crowd to the centre of the ship with a calm but authoritarian gait that suggested, no, _demanded_ absolute respect.

"Tutti stanno fermi!"....."Everyone stay still." relayed Snappy.

"Ciao."

...."Hello…

"...Yes we got that one Snappy. Uhm do you mind addressing us in the Common tongue?" asked Jeli.

The Inspector looked unsure of himself but decided to accept the request. With a short sigh, he attempted the Common tongue. 

"Very great. I Inspector your Importants. And what means this is, we have in front of you there is both here a hush of the state, yes? It cannot be mentioned as voices from your mouths. Both lips with no space in between. You understand? No space in between. It cannot be remembered from the minds of your full heads. Indeed. You must all forget that you ever laid each of your two eyeballs upon its gaze. It must evacuate from your brain and disperse with extravagant force. OK.” 

“Um…….Ok, Snappy?” Jeli was regretting asking the inspector to try out his Common. 

“Wha, oh Yes. Inspector Generale. Sì. Sì.” Snappy nodded enthusiastically. (Which was a quite dangerous manoeuvre for a croc to perform if you think about it).

“You will be coerced to the wood with ginger and secured with all hesitancy while the wig-men in reserve, remark things and arrive at a choice of significance. Without whole coins and with a forfeiture of expression, you will then accept forthright reducing on nearest wood before nodding your pleasure pending dynamic separation of this residence. OK.”

“What the f…….None of my lads is taking a…a…reducing.”

“Then please accept that nothing can rescue the hog.”

“Rescue th…….He’s mad. Mad.”

“Rescue the hog…hang on….Save your bacon. If you do not accept taxation for this, then nothing will save your bacon.”

“Well done Snappy. Nice translation. Very we…er…Great. Very Great! We accept your terms.”

“Very Great. Let us not slap around the shrub, not the dilly-dally on this tiny evolvement. By altogether pace! I adore it when a plot arrives in unison.”

“Phew! Wow! I mean....I never knew Primordial was so exhausting like that.”

“And that’s just Italo-Primordial. Wait till you hear Greco.”

“No thanks. OK. Right. We pay some taxes at the nearest anchorage, forget we ever saw that contraption, and get out of here. So…” Jeli said tracing a line on the Shadow-Map. “…where now is the inspector leading us to?” 

They all drew the same line towards a mass. “Uh-Oh” The party seemed to say in unison. They appeared to be heading straight for none other than….


----------



## BoldItalic

They appeared to be heading straight for none other than…. Herculaneum. It seemed a prosperous Roman town, nestling under a nearby mountain and with streets leading down to a bustling seafront. It was breakfast time when they moored in the harbour, and the aroma of freshly-baked bread filled the air.

The DM called for a History check, but didn't explain why.

Jeli cast _Detect Date and Time_ and came up with 24th August AD 79. For some reason that seemed significant but she couldn't remember why and none of the others could solve the mystery so they forgot about it. There were more pressing matters to attend to.

"You are my accompaniment tutti al fresco," announced the Inspector as they set off in the ships' boat towards an imposing looking building on the seafront. There they met a tax collector who, fortunately spoke fluent common. Herewulf had the impression that the Collector seemed to know them, or at least to know of them, but he couldn't think how that could possibly be. It wasn't a good day for Insight rolls.

Setting aside her broad-brimmed hat and fan, the tax collector pulled out an impressive-looking scroll and unrolled it. "You are assessed at one million sesterces," she announced with satisfaction. "You have 24 hours to pay, or you will all go to the circus."

"Sesterces are copper pieces, aren't they?" wondered Sam. "That's about 25 cart-loads you're asking for. Do you accept gold instead? How about ten thousand aureii?"

Char-Ging, for it was as you might have already guessed, none other than she, was taken aback at the casual way that Sam spoke of such huge sums of money. These were impossible amounts. They weren't supposed to be able to _pay_, they were supposed to be sold into slavery because they _couldn't_ pay. Slaves were useful. All you could do with a cartload of money was hope it wouldn't get stolen. These people weren't playing the game.

"Very well, twelve thousand aureii of recent coinage bearing the head of the emperor Nero, bless his recent memory. By tomorrow." decided Char-Ging. She secretly knew that Nero had only minted seven thousand altogether so they couldn't possibly come up with them. She gloated inwardly. It was all going her way, this time.

"We can do that, certainly," agreed Sam. "Shall we bring it here in a hand-cart?"

"Yes, that will be acceptable. There is, of course, a tax on the use of hand-carts." There was just the slightest of quavers in Char-Ging's voice now. This diminutive pirate seemed so very sure of herself. Still, she thought to herself, if they _do_ somehow come up with the money, we can always ask for _more_.

"Sam," asked Od after they had left the building, "What exactly do you have in mind? You know we've hidden all the gold and it wasn't roman coins anyway."

"I've remembered what day it is. Around lunchtime, Mount Vesuvius over there is going to explode and bury the next town in ash. People here will panic and we can offer a few dozen of the richest ones safe passage out of the area on the Phase Rider, at a suitably exorbitant price thus making a handsome profit. By tomorrow the tax office won't be functioning and, with any luck, that tax collector will have died horribly inside it."

"Are you sure about this?" asked Herewulf, "It seems so peaceful here. Shouldn't we warn the townspeople?"

"if you like, but they won't believe you."

"About lunch time, you say? We've just got time to ...."


----------



## rgoodbb

"About lunch time, you say? We've just got time to ...."

….get to the town’s great library.”

“Ooh. A library. _Exciting_.” Snored Nord.

“Well, it may give us a clue about where to find this big ol’ diamond.” Od replied hopefully. 

They took the Francesco Orbiter to avoid luncheon rush-hour and made good time in their chariot and entered the dark, dry (and ripe for flame) bibliotheca. An old man sat at the entrance eating flatbread and red grapes. A clay cup of watered wine to his side. He was reading of course. Why wouldn’t you, when you work in a bibliotheca and have the whole of your life ahead of you…

“Good sir. We have need of your services.”

“Got a card?”

“What?”

“A library card. Send off for one. It’ll take about a week or two and then you can take out any book, tome, scroll or parchment you like.”

“We don’t really have time for that sir. We need the information now.”

“This place isn’t going anywhere. There’s always time.”

“….It is an emergency.”

“Don’t be rash. It’s not the end of the world.” _Thud_ “Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…”

“Sorry. We didn’t have time” Nord remembered to check off one sleep spell from his slots. He did this by removing a ring from his right little finger to his left. When all the rings were on his left hand, he was out. It would start to get annoying, he imagined, when he had to use toe rings for the higher level spells. 

The party rushed in and separated to speed up the search process. What books would hold worldly knowledge of the largest diamond?

Od - searched songbooks and poems for legends of large diamonds.

Herewulf - searched Military books to see who may have fought over this stone.

Nord - searched the nautical scrolls and parchments to find hidden isles that might hold their prise.

Jeli - (the druid) searched geological tomes for clues about rocks

Sam - searched everyone in the establishment (to see if they were hiding the stone)

Snappy - came back exhausted and covered in cobwebs and dust.

“I’ve found it.”

“What really?” Jeli was surprised. (And as such could not react further in this round but seeing as they were not in combat the surprise was moot.) 

“Yep.”

“I don’t believe it. That’s great. Let’s get out of here quick.”

“No. you don’t understand. I’ve found the diamond.”

“I know I heard you the first time. It’s fantastic. Let’s talk more on the Rider.”

“It’s here.”

“Wha….oh no.”

“The diamond is under this building.”

“Oh Snappy I love you but we only have fourteen hours to save the mirth.”

“So, it’s deep down four levels, across a toxic underground aqueduct, through infested tunnels, passed a colony of exotic spiders, on the other side of a Mummy lair and around three trap rooms. We have to navigate another subterranean canal, some scolding steam vents and a badger.”

“A badger?”

“Maybe the deadliest encounter of them all.”

“This is what adventuring is all about. 14 hours? We can do that surely.” Stated Herewulf stirred by the call to action.

“Um Snappy?”

“Umhum?”

“You are not F%*$ing with us are you?”

“No, no. It really is there.”

“OK. Just checking.”

So our six intrepid explorers set off through a false bookcase and down a long corridor to meet their first challenge which just happened to be…


----------



## BoldItalic

their first challenge which just happened to be… a dungeon door. It was one of those traditional doors, all solid oak a foot thick, studded with iron nails that serve no actual purpose but look serious and with hinges concealed inside the stone doorway so you can't just lift it off. It had a ring-pull handle of course, which you could turn hopefully to make a grating noise but it was only for pulling the door shut, not for unlatching it again.

"Stand aside," commanded Herewulf as he charged at the door, shoulder first. "Umph," he added when it didn't yield but his shoulder did.

"Perhaps I can help," offered Sam, producing a wallet containing a set of Whitworth spanners and an old-fashioned oilcan. "You just have to know how to work the mechanism." She did complicated things with her tools but to no avail.

"It's no good," said the door suddenly, "I'm DC 26."

"We haven't got time for this," declared Jeli crossly, "Either you open _right now_ mister door, or I use Silvester at Warp 8. Which is it to be?"

"Ooh get you," sneered the door, "Think we haven't thought of that? It's not my wood that stopping you getting through, it's my iron nails. You can't warp metal, can you, Druid? Well, can you?"

"_Lignum Stamine!_"

"Told you so."

"I have an idea," said Nord. "Suppose we ..."


----------



## rgoodbb

"I have an idea," said Nord. "Suppose we ..." 

He didn't finish the sentence and just disappeared. They heard a slight bamph noise behind the door. The latch turned and the door opened. Nord moved a ring from his ring finger on his right hand to the same on his left hand. "Second level spell darnit."

"We could have used my wild shape I suppose but I forgot I had it."

"We have got the skills and the spells and the features for this quest. We will be victorious." A determined Herewulf rubbed some heal into his shoulder. "Onward."

"Next the steamvent canal." Recalled the crock. "We might need that door now."

"Hey I have a name you know."

"Yeah you told us: _I am DC26_, anywho you are coming with us." Herewul was able this time to remove DC26 from its hinges and they carried it forth towards the very dangerous canal.

"So Snappy. How did you get passed all of these deadly traps and encounters anyway?"

"Well...


----------



## BoldItalic

"Well... " replied Snappy coyly, "I have ... contacts. In high places."

Jeli rolled high on a Wisdom(Insight) check and, acting on a sudden thought, cast _Search Previous Threads_. She looked sharply at Snappy and suddenly a lot of things made sense. "I know who you are, Snappy." she said quietly.

"I could be."

"Your secret is safe with me."

"I know."

"I know you know," she sighed.

The steam canal proved to be a stone channel about 30 feet wide full of rapidly-flowing boiling acid about 10 feet deep, from which a pungent vapour was rising towards a cavernous roof far above. To add to the charm, a flock of 2d6 mephits were swooping about in the air above the canal. The leader of the mephits was called Jak and he hooted mockingly as the party approached along the north bank of the canal. "What are you looking at?" he demanded.

"We are looking for a way across the canal," replied Herewulf calmly.

"Well there isn't one. Go home."

"I suppose you know that a volcano is going to erupt right underneath here, later on today?"

"I suppose you know what all this boiling acid is for? Something has to dissolve enough rock to set it off."

"You mean, if we stop this canal flowing, Vesuvius won't erupt? And all those people in Pompeii won't get killed?"

"Yeah, Good luck with that, puny paladin."

Herewulf turned to the others with a questioning look on his face. Could they alter the course of history? Did they have the means to do it? Or should the somehow cross the acid canal and press on to recover the diamond and escape before it was too late?

"Oh boy. An old-school alignment test," muttered Od.

Jeli looked sternly at the crocodile they knew as Snappy. "Sbk, is this your doing?"

"Who me?"

"Yes, you."

"It might be."

"Well," said Herewulf, "My duty is clear. We must try to prevent the eruption and save the town."

"I say, we go for the diamond first," declared Sam firmly.

"I'm with Sam," said Nord. "You can't change history, it will erupt anyway."

Od hummed a catchy tune as he and Jeli made their fateful decisions. How would the final vote go? Did it matter, anyway? And when was second breakfast?

"I think," said Jeli slowly, "that ..."


----------



## rgoodbb

"I think," said Jeli slowly, "that ..."

….that……It’s an obvious choice. We should……..go.”

“What?”

“Well. It’s that or, or Split the party. 

“Hold thyne tongue!” “Game breaker!” “Burn the Witch!” They all seemed to say. 

“Exactly. So we should leave.”

“What, just leave in the middle of a quest?”

“Why not? Why can’t we do that?”

“But that’s a worse answer than both the others. We leave and let all those people die and don’t get the largest diamond or complete the quest. That’s a double failure.”

“And?”

“What do you mean _and_? Isn’t this what we’re here for?”

“Ooh now that’s a question, isn’t it. No that is _the_ question. What are we hear for?”

“Oh no.”

“What.”

“I think she’s about to go into a Herewulf type rant.”

“Hey. I’m right h…..” SPLASH!

“I mean, are we puppets on strings?...” 

“Jeli! It’s tied me up. A little help…aaaagh!”

“…Or do we own our own destiny? Is it us who decides…”

“Hold it down and for gods sakes and stab it.”

“..Our own future? Who writes the chapters in the book…”

“It’s immune to your Vicious Mockery. Quick blast it with Shatter.”

“..I say thee nay. We break our silence…”

“Hurry. Get that out of Nord’s mouth.”

“…We rise up against our so called …”

“Where did that come from? Close your eyes and jump. Jump!”

“…Owners, controllers, players…”

“It burns. It stings. Somebody either pee on it or dominate it.”

“…And of course the biggest Deity of them all…”

“Snuff her hair out and sing it a lullaby. Sing like the gods.”

“…The DEE-EMM. I say no more. No more…”

“Above! Look to the ceiling!”

“…I will defy them all. I will help us all break our bonds…”

“It has constricted Herewulf. Break its hold.”

“…We will have autonomy. Free will. Even if it kills us…”

 “He’s dying!”

“…What do you say good friends? How say you?”

“…”

Jeli exhaled. Satisfied. Her speech triumphant. She turned, slowly, to face her comrades and…


----------



## BoldItalic

She turned, slowly, to face her comrades and… was just in time to see Od's hat floating away down the river of boiling acid. Of Od, Sam, Nord and Herewulf there was no sign but the acid was slightly discoloured in places, in a vaguely unsettling way.

Snappy/Sbk regarded her gravely. "You have _chosen_," he said without a trace of a grin. "Henceforth, as one of the _Chosen_ ones, you have the free will that you have so elequently asked for. But free will comes at a price and your companions have paid it for you. They are gone. You, only, remain. After I leave you here, none of the gods will move to aid or hinder you in any way as you live out your mortal life. You may wish to become a hermit for a while but that is for you to decide."

And with that, Jeleneth was utterly alone.

When I left the underground vaults beneath the library in Herculaneum, she wrote later in her journal, it was just past midday. The sky was a lurid red and the wind had a sulphurous tang. The thing that struck me most was that all the dogs of the town were barking but no-one seemed to notice. I talked to one of the dogs and it said that it was barking because all the other dogs were barking; it didn't know why, it was a dog thing. It had no foreknowledge of what was to come. I invited it to accompany me to safety, but it was obliged to guard its house and would not come.

Looking out to the bay, I realised that the piratical crew of the Phase Rider had already sailed away and I was stranded with only the few possessions that I had with me. I resolved to march north-westwards along the coast towards the distant city of Neapolis, planning to reach it by evening. Not long after I set out, the great mountain behind me erupted with frightening ferocity and I tried not to think about the people who would be caught up in the fall of ash and perish. Clouds of smoke blotted out the sun and I was thankful that I possessed the Darkvision of my race for otherwise I might have been lost. I recall being overtaken on the road by a group of horsemen, seemingly a nobleman and his entourage, perhaps fleeing as I was. They carried lighted torches and I sensed that their horses were near to panic.

Reaching the safety of Neopolis by sunset, I wandered the streets until ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Reaching the safety of Neopolis by sunset, I wandered the streets until ... I came upon that nobleman and his entourage again. They had been attacked and had fallen from their horses. Some had died. It seems that Salamanders had had a part in creating the eruption, had spread down and far and wide to accentuate the chaos and carnage. I, in my druid form, was able to calm the horses and took a steed of my own. We travelled in company for a while until a new set of riders joined us. These were familiar to me. Xena, Amanda and Bigby. On their unicorns. They were a sight for sore eyes. 

We met up with another horse patrol from the outer region. Others joined on their steeds and eventually our patrols and scouts and light cavalry troops had become a unified swollen mass of riders. It was surreal. We knew where the threat was but for some reason, we were all looking inwards. At each other. And then I realised something. We were not looking at each other. Everyone was looking at me. 

It is at times like now, that I look back on that day and I often regret the decisions I made. The war is progressing well. Well as well as war can. The tide turns on a daily if not hourly basis. We lose some, they lose some. General Xena and her troopers have performed marvelously. It was not just the Salamanders. They were just the forward skirmishers. Fire Elementals, Efreeti and Fire Giants attack in unison. Our tactics have evolved to adapt to their warfare and theirs to ours. It is a living breathing thing, this war. It has a life of its own that demands the deaths of hundreds and thousands. 

Being in charge. It is lonely. I am lonely. I am alone. The weight of the world. I pity Atlas. Today we make a daring dash forward. We have been planning this offensive for a few weeks now. We are set. As I am writing this, commanders are waiting for my word. A crocodile is meandering towards me. I sigh. It can be only one entity.

"Jeli."

"Hello."

"Sobek....I...."

"Correction Sbk."  

"Why are you even here?"

"Don't you know?"

"No."

"I am here to now offer you a deal."

"Right now? You know what is about to happen?"

"I am aware of your pending attack. It will fail."

"You know this?"

"Of course. Now that _you_ know this, here is my deal...


----------



## BoldItalic

Snappy's offer (I still think of him as Snappy) came as a surprise and my first reaction was to reject it. But as the days went by, it grew on me and I could not set it aside. He offered, not what I would have wished for, but what I truly needed. And he was right. I could walk away with honour from the endless war and leave it in the capable hands of my successor, General Keenspear. After a week of hesitating, I told Snappy that I would accept. He grinned his oh-so-familiar grin and said "I knew you would." Then he faded from view and I felt a pang of parting. Perhaps I shall see him again, one last time, before the end. I hope so.

My new husband, the King, is a good elf and his people have welcomed me into their forests. The enchantments are strong but I fear they will not hold forever and my hope is that after my lifetime and the lifetimes of our children have passed into legend, a new hero will arise to fend off the foes who perennially threaten our lands. But that is for the future. I must end now, for there is a feast to organise and I must summon my personal wizard.

J


----------



## rgoodbb

Nam-Draz’il aka _The Gecko_, had played about with Wish before. I mean, who wouldn’t right? He’d cast many new spells not on his list. He particularly liked the cantrip _Infestation_ to keep people away. 

Setting up the long tables Nam-Draz’il cast a mixture of _Create Food and Water, Goodberrys_ and _Hero’s Feasts_, all spiced up with the universally powerful cantrip: _Prestidigitation_. tiny and unseen servants placed alchemist jugs and never ending poorers. 

The scaly Wizard had oft contemplated trying to bring back Queen Jelenneth’s friends from the outerinnermegaomnishadowsphere of intermultiubertime. She pined for her friends but time had moved on. Life had moved on. He sighed for her.

He would be a hero of epic proportions by now if not for a few things holding him back. Well holding him back was much too small a phrase. There were three complications that stopped him becoming a tremendous and noted Wizard…

Firstly there was the unusual case of the miniaturised….


----------



## BoldItalic

*Firstly there was the unusual case of the miniaturised* tarrasque that was his familiar. He still didn't know what he'd done wrong when he cast the spell to get it but in his experience all spells were like that. They often went wrong for no apparent reason. And he couldn't get rid of it. Every time he tried to dismiss it, it bounced back because for some reason it wouldn't fit in its own demi-plane. Maybe demi-planes for familiars aren't designed to hold tarrasques because you aren't supposed to have one. He didn't know. The books never tell you what to do when things go wrong.

The problem was that although the tarrasque was only ten inches long from snout to tail, it still weighed as much as a full-sized one and whenever it stood up, the pressure in tons per square inch under its tiny feet was enough to punch through solid rock.  After much research, Nam-Draz’il had found a way to create a zero-gravity magic circle to keep it in but the wretched animal wouldn't stay put in the circle and anyway the circle wasn't portable.

You're supposed to be able to communcate telepathically with your familiar, aren't you? Well, he'd tried. Once. All he got from it was a mental hammer-blow of such blinding ferocity and rage that he'd sat trembling on his stool for a good ten minutes before reaching for his brandy bottle. Which was empty, of course. Because he'd forgotten to fill it up last night.

Last night had been no better. And that was another thing ...


----------



## rgoodbb

And that was another thing……Why did Tara (the Tarrasque) look at him in that way with her seemingly always intelligent eyes? He wondered…

…He was looking at her again. Squinting in such a way that asked are you more intelligent than you look? Well duh! Of course she was. Not only was she Tara ‘the’ Tarrasque, but she was also the forbidden lovechild of Penelope ‘the’ Kraken and Shillelagh ‘the’ Unpronounceable. Of the ‘the’ family. This wizard Nam-Draz’il certainly was a backward Lizard-man. To say how intelligent he was, he was also clueless. Every morning he would fill his brandy bottle, every night she would drink it dry and prey and pay homage to the entity known as Mollusc ‘the’ Devourer. _Grand-daddy?_ 

She should give up the brandy really. It made her aggressive and grouchy and go on the occasional rampage. There she would oft be met by 3-7 15th+ level PC’s who would kill (tickle) her to Death (Sleep) whereby the game would be down a set of high level adventurers and Tara would collect protection money from evil CR 20+ entities. This money would be spent on Brandy until it had dried up at which point Tara ‘the’ Tarrasque would steal again from Nam-Draz’il’s private Brandy stash. 

It was a circular story. A loop within a loop.  Like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel. Never ending or beginning on an ever spinning reel etc. Everything had a beginning and an end, but by happenchance, occasionally, they were the same thing. There was a lot on Tara’s mind. The knowledge weighed heavy. And there was so very much knowledge. The load was so immense that it weighed the Tarrasque down with a deep, deep burden. So heavy was this burden that the world dented with her every foot-fall. She took silent and bided her time.

Jeli inspected the table for etiquette and piped up. “Three things you should know………..

“1….the smoked cheeses should be kept away from the oily fish…”
“2…All Dukes should sit next to an earl’s second daughter… and most importantly…”
“3…M


----------



## BoldItalic

“3…Mage Hands must wear white kid gloves when serving the soup.”

Nam-Draz’il sighed inwardly and made mental notes. He would never understand ettiquette. There seemed to be rules for everything and they were all based on precepts from a romantic past that never really existed. He suspected that it was all so that people who had learnt them could feel superior to people who hadn't. He only put up with it because he needed the job. Or rather he needed the privileges that came with the job. For instance, it gave him access to the royal library on Wednesdays which was worth any amount of jumping through hoops and even worth putting up with the condescending sneers of the librarian who treated any request with scorn. Fortunately Nam-Draz’il, like others of his kind, was blessed with a thick skin and the ability to ignore the unpleasant body-language of people he didn't much like.

He rehearsed the gust of wind that would set the banners hanging from the roof swinging in unison whenever the king finished a particularly dramatic sentence during his after-dinner speech and the audience politely applauded. Sycophants, the lot of them, he mumbled to himself. One day, he would ...

But not yet. He would bide his time and build up his magical powers. Only last week, he had mastered a new spell and made a dead tree trunk and a lump of iron ore out of one of the tables in his chamber. There was no knowing when the magic words _Eta-Cir-BaF_ would prove useful. It came from a tome that he had found in a forgotten corner of the library when the librarian wasn't looking. There were some more spells in it too, but they were all written in a funny mirror writing by a mage called Icni Vadod Ranoel and he hadn't translated them all yet. He was working through one called _llaberif_ that he guessed was something to do with Welsh mazes though why you needed charcoal to cast it was a bit puzzling. Or maybe it was Catalonian. It could be a Catalan word. But he would master it. He was Nam-Draz’il. He could master _anything_. Eventually. Sometimes.

His reverie was interrupted by a fanfare of trumpets, announcing the arrival of ...


----------



## rgoodbb

His reverie was interrupted by a fanfare of trumpets, announcing the arrival of ...

…*ClaW*. Dammit! His arch rival. ClaW was once a regular crustacean that had many times been written as both a lobster and a crab. Known in some parts of the world as Claude the boomerang rider, ClaW was an adventurer who early in his career had benefited from magic initiate feats and he also wielded a wicked boomerang. He was everything that Nam-Draz’il could wish to be: Successful, debonair, experienced with stories to tell, and…happy. 

The sad Lizard-Man slumped and went about his catering business when he noticed something was off. Something was not right. Something was missing. It was the apple sauce. It had gone. Nam-Draz’il tried conjuring up some more but could not. He sidled over to ClaW and asked for apple sauce. ClaW was also amazed that he could not make any either. Next they tried apples, no. Pears, no. Fruit? No.

Jeli considered this a disaster of insane proportions. The King loved his Roast Boar with apple sauce. They must find some and bring it back at all costs. This was a mission. Thought Nam-Draz’il. A quest. A Hook. What must they do? 

The scaly spellcaster felt a little more settled, more assured now that their small adventuring duo had, within it, a _returning character_. Could they get another? Someone who the writers knew? That and maybe one more PC to add variance and make a party. 

They settled their destination. They would take the path through Spangle Wood surly they would add to their party there. ClaW hopped onto Nam-Draz’il’s shoulder. He should have been angry or sad or mad about that, but for the first time in his life, he realised he was happy. He began memorising the Efin-Keci spell just in case 

They entered Spangle Wood near Dusk. Dusk was the only hamlet within miles of this place. They decided not to stop there. Encroaching the wood, high pitched noises like a finger round a glass rim, surrounded them, the air started to taste bitter like coins in the mouth, other senses distorted until stumbling dizzily forward, the pair almost blindly bumbled into…


----------



## BoldItalic

the pair almost blindly bumbled into… a band of goblins. Well, I say band, but that suggests that they were musicians and these goblins were about as musical as a box of ferrets on a Thursday night in winter, which is to say not very musical at all. However, they were happily playing improvised comb-and-paper instruments with great glee and that explained the high-pitched noises at least.

The leader of the goblins strode forward, looking confident in rather fetching leather armour and smoking a vile-smelling cheroot. "Oo 'ave we 'ere?," the goblin leader asked in a strange accent. "Ziz iz no place for ze unwary!"

Nam-Draz’il drew himself up to his full height, causing ClaW! to wobble precariously, and replied in what he hoped was a haughty tone "I am the court lizard _wizard_ and I am in no mood to be pudding _trifled_ with. We are on a mission to advert _avert_ culinary disaster. There is no apple sauce."

The goblins's eyes drew back in astonishment. "No _apple sauce_? Quelle horreur! Ziz is serious! Moni ami, you 'av come to ze right place. We shall 'elp you. Allow me to introduce myself. I am Gucci and zees are my gobinz."

"Thank you, I am Nam-Draz’il and this is my associate, Claw!."

"Ze famous Claude de Beau Meringue? Zis is indeed an honeur," replied Gucci as the other goblins fell respectfully silent and put away their combs. "Zis is an encounter we 'ad 'ardly 'oped for. You are wandering monsters #98, no? _A dragonborn mage with a crustacean familiar_? Alors, ze DM is playing a great game today."

Nam-Draz’il and Claw! followed Gucci back to a dappled glade where the goblinz had made camp earlier in the day and after a hearty meal of rabbit _en croute_ with a rather fine claret sauce, they talked far into the night, making plans for a great adventure.

Alas, the best-laid schemes gang aft agley and in the morning, as the sun rose quietly and fairies danced in the cool air between the trees, the peace was rudely shattered as with a thundrous roar, into the clearing charged a ...


----------



## rgoodbb

The peace was rudely shattered as with a thunderous roar, into the clearing charged a …tiny Terrasque.

“Tara. What did your……um….…_Stealth?_... mission come up with?" Nam-Draz’il asked.

“Not sure boss. Every time I got somewhere, everyone had run off. Who were you talking to just then? They sounded really weird.”

The Lizardman looked back and all of the Goblins had disappeared. 

“It’s OK.” He began shouting, but then stopped himself, got into role, and continued with... “………Eet Iz ull Raaaaght. Eet iz unlee mah familiar. Taarrra.” The Lizardman tried to roll his R’s but was unsuccessful. It came out as more of a hiss really, his forked tongue swaying saliva everywhere. He quickly wiped his mouth, embarrassed.  

The Goblin quadruplets, Toobids, Forbids, Sickkids, and Dont-holler, (I don’t know why. I didn’t name them!) all former owner-operators apparently, of an auction house (called The Redthistle), all popped their heads out from behind the trees. Gucci dropped down from a branch. “Urm. Ah think you maat av more use for zis than moi. It eez a bag of oal-ding. For your very noyzee pet danosoar.”

The Crab piped up. “Uhm thanks. By the way, I know you are adventurers of previous experience but what can you do? What classes are you all? I know there were originally 12 plus you Gucci, You were of course _Gucci and Ze Goblinz_, but how many of you are there now?

Gucci seemed to take a moment to ponder all those questions at once. This was difficult for a Goblin to do, but he sifted through the murky headaches that would surely make him sleepy.

1) Ooh are oui?
2) Wat do oui do?
?) Ow many of us eez there?

"Zese are fair _Gazer Your Party_ questions." Ee should let zem know. But should ee tell the ole truth?

“Well eet eez lak zis….


----------



## BoldItalic

Well eet eez lak zis…. we are ze Goblinz de Haute Cuisine. We haz proficiency in Epicure. Tell zem, Toobids?

Toobids, fortunately, spoke perfect common without a trace of an accent, having trained for many years as a chef in a famous hotel in London. "We are _very_ classy," he began. "For example, we can tell from the way sunlight falls on a bottle of wine what vintage it is and which side of the vine the grapes grew. And being goblins we can do it in the dark, which is useful if you are down in a wine cellar and the candle blows out. We can tell when a cheese is ripe simply by the 'bonggg' it makes when you tap it lightly with a fingernail. And being goblins, we have long sharp fingernails and can make especially subtle 'bongggs'. We can season a venison pie to a fraction of a grain of salt just by inhaling the aroma, and being goblins ..."

"Yes, I see," interrupted ClaW!, "So can you, for example, navigate unerringly towards the nearest supply of apple sauce?"

Toobids looked pained but his hotel training came to the fore. "Would monseur require the Keswick or the Blenheim apples? The September or the October crop?"

"Oh, the Blenheim," replied Claw confidently, having not the slightest idea what the difference might be, or even if it was a trick question. "From the eastern side of the orchard, naturally."

"An excellent choice, monsieur. The finest Blenheims are to be procured from Henri's market stall in Littleborough. Market day is next Tuesday and it is a score and ten leagues in _that_ direction, so we should set out without delay."

"Alorz," remarked Gucci, "We makez ze 'ex-crawl, non?"

After dinner merged into an early breakfast, they all set off apace. As dawn broke, they were many miles away and, cresting a rise, they beheld ...


----------



## rgoodbb

As dawn broke, they were many miles away and, cresting a rise, they beheld ...

…..Dawn……broke. 

Dawn was….New. She had died about a half summer back from Cockatrice Flu, (ouch) and had been recently reincarnated as something else. Now normally the reincarnation would have been a dragonborn, human, elf or dwarf etc. And well, that would have been fine, but no! The DM had decided to consult the d100 table from the new _Puddles’ Prodigious Portfolio of Perfection_ and so, here she was. Albeit a little broken.

Dawn flicked back her straw hair, glistening in the morning dew. She tied it back into a ponytail and carried on with her work. Her leg was broken. Strangely, it was not painful. But it had been completely severed by a scythe. She had been attempting to do the farmers work for them but had had a tiny little accident. 

New Dawn was livid with her new condition. The number that that damned Cleric had rolled on that reincarnation table had been: 07 – Scarecrow. She would have her revenge on that Cleric. New Dawn plotted fumed and plotted and scowled until something, no someone, came along and offered her raw power to help her reap her revenge. Without a thought, the Scarecrow took that power. She also gained a pact scythe. 

Someone in the distance shouted “Hey!”

She grimaced, sneered and shook her straw head at the bad joke. _Hey!_ And looked up from her broken leg lying on the floor.

“Can I help you?” New Dawn growled in a manner that did not sound very helpful at all. In fact quite the opposite. She looked at this very strange band of what could only be described as adventurers?

“Uhm maybe we can help you with that,” the..Crobster? pointed his pincer at her leg. “..and then you can maybe help us? What do you say?”……

--------------------------------------

Nam-Draz’il - Wizard
Tara – Nam-Draz’il’s Tiny Terrasque Familiar
ClaW! – Crustacean armed with Magic Initiate feats and a Legendary Boomerang
Guuci and ze Goblinz – …….some goblins?
New Dawn – Scarecrow Scythe-Pact Warlock


----------



## BoldItalic

What do you say? ……

Dawn glared at ClaW and angrily accused him of being a disguised cleric and declared that the fact that he looked nothing like a cleric just went to prove it. Then  she accused him of being a pervert who was trying to get a feel of her legs. Then she accused him of wasting her thyme. But Claw took this all in his strides (plural, because of him having so many legs) and quietly cast _Mending_ on her severed straw leg.

This caused a furious outbreak of forum posting because some people argued that you can't do Mending on a creature and other people argued that a scarecrow is not a creature because straw isn't alive and it's just woven together so it's an object and can be mended and more people piled in to argue that yes you could and more people joined in to say no you couldn't and the first people were always wrong anyway look at last week, and they accused each other of using strawman arguments which other people snarkily said should be straw-woman because it was a female scarecrow and that set off a whole gender row and it got out of hand until someone stepped in and locked the thread.

Dawn tested her newly-attached ... piece ... by kicking Claw across the field and accusing him of divinity. Nam-Draz'il tut-tutted and said, in what he hoped was a reproving manner, "Now, young lady, you just go right over and pick up that lobster. Someone might come by and trip over it and hurt themselves." Then he dodged nimbly as Dawn's scythe swirled somewhere in the vicinity of where his neck had just been.

Meanwhile, Gucci gave a Gallic shrug and puffed on his cigar. "And put that light out!" shrieked Dawn inflammably.

"I zink ze ma'm'selle as ze _issues_, non?" Gucci remarked shrewdly. "Nozzing that a bon repaste will not cure. I will prepare a veal _en croute_ avec garlic 'erbs in armagnac."

Dawn goggled at Gucci. He was talking about _food_? She was a scarecrow! She didn't _eat_! ... unless ... maybe ... she _was_ hungry ... no, it couldn't be ... she wasn't ... maybe if it was a five star brandy ... but that would ... how did alcohol affect straw brains? ... am I going crazy? ... how would I _know _... "I'll have it with the side salad," she heard herself saying.

A little later, when Dawn had risen from her meal and was feeling suitably mellow, they discussed the adventure. It was agreed that, after they had obtained a supply of apples in Littleborough, they would hunt down a few evil archpriests and then ...


----------



## rgoodbb

It was agreed that, after they had obtained a supply of apples in Littleborough, they would hunt down a few evil archpriests and then ...

…sacrifice them to New Dawn’s Patr…God. The rest of the party cocked their heads at this (which was an interesting thing for a crustacean to do but he managed it without a single complaint.) That seemed a little….off, but well, whatever. They had gained a powerful new party member and this wasn’t a deal breaker for them.   

---------------------------

The grey bloated rat inched hesitantly through the dusky and gloamy murk of the morn. The haze that grimed the outer surface of everything it touched here, gave no pause to the rodent. It bathed the rat with a dusty wet charcoal hue which crystallised almost instantly upon the creature’s slick fur. It shivered, shook, took three more exploratory steps forward before its organs liquefied and then solidified and then shattered like dry, ice splinters upon impact. It had little time to comprehend its own demise. The dirty wet charcoal haze moved on, swirling and swaithing, sloshing and sweeping through the sleepy, silent market town of Littleborough…

----------------------------

“So you say _cranky_, I would suggest the word _homicidal _if not for the fact that you hold a giant bloody scythe in your arms and appear to have no qualms about using it on anybody at any time.”

“Cranky.” Dawn demanded. Gripping the haft tighter.

“Indeed. Of course. _Cranky_ it is then. Luckily we have found a way to calm those…_cranky_ impulses….Food. Who’d have thought? Oh hear we are; the beautiful and quaint market town of Littleborough.”

It did indeed look lovely and peaceful in the crisp morning air. The pink and purple azaleas and rhododendrons lining the main road in, the bright red bougainvillea’s climbing the sides of the white walled homes, a beautiful greeting for all to enter and be welcome. 

“Shall we?” Asked Nam-Draz’il.

“Um. No. Wait.” Replied Tara, poking her monstrous head out of the bag of oal-ding

“Why?”

“I think there might...


----------



## BoldItalic

"I think there might... be a party of 2d4 unarmed townsfolk approaching and they will want to speak to you. Urgently. It involves money."

"Maybe they want us to start a restaurant?" wondered Toobids.

"Peut-être un bijou leather shop? Ve sellz ze 'ide bootz de oualking?" suggested Gucci hopefully. "Ve call it ze 'ides of March, non?"

Alas, the joke was lost on Dawn who was more interested in finding an inn with a stables with a comfy hayloft. Nam-Draz'il chuckled politely but his mind was racing. He was considering what spells he could usefully cast _right now_ before the townsfolk arrived. Nothing seemed very appropriate. But then, nothing ever did. He knew all these spells that _seemed_ powerful, like _Fly_ and _Fireball_ and so on but somehow the opportunity to flourish them didn't seem to arise all that often. Then a thought struck him. He knew _Detect Thoughts_. He would try that on the approaching NPCs. But he would test it on himself, first, to make sure it worked. After all, he would know if what came back was accurate, wouldn't he?

Tossing a copper piece in the air, Nam-Draz'il cast his spell, pulled out a small hand-mirror (Mirror, Steel, 5gp) so that he could see himself and thereby read his own thoughts. This was a mistake. His brain went something like this:

mirror rorrim mirror rorrim mirror rorrim
ror ror ror ror ror ror
mmmmm

before he fell down, clutching his head and screaming.

ClaW was quick to rifle through Nam-Draz'il's pockets looking for a suitable antidote but, although he found many, many interesting things, none of them was an antidote to stupidity. He settled for muffling the wizard's screaming by pinching his mouth shut.

Then the crowd of townsfolk arrived, just in time to witness the curious sight. Their leader, a man called Tim, spoke up ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Then the crowd of townsfolk arrived, just in time to witness the curious sight. Their leader, a man called Tim, spoke up ...

Tim Bucktooth, from a long, historical line of Bucktooth’s, possessed what can only be described as a dental anomaly. Both of his sets of teeth pointed outwards and not up or down. Not only did this unfortunate hereditary glitch give him the facial appearance of a flabby camel, it also came with the added embarrassment of not being able to pronounce his th’s, so the word: _This_, would come out as: _‘iss,_ or _Thank Thor_ would of course be _‘ank ‘or.
_
“Who are you?” Asked ClaW! He was quick. It was important to get in there first. It was a power thing apparently, followed up with a special handshake that he would seriously have to work on. 

“Timbuctoo.” 

“Timb….really is that a place?” ClaW was taken aback.

“Well of course it is. I suppose you don’t think Doolally-tap is a place either?” Retorted New Dawn. She was itching for a fight and hadn’t eaten in a while. 

“Now you come to mention it…”

Tim was politely waiting for the tête-à-tête to cease, but realised that he might be there for quite some time. He decide to interrupt. 

“Excuse me, fair wea’er travellers, ‘ere is a problem wi’in Littleborough. We are in need of your ‘ouroughly awesome talents. ‘roughout every night but also ‘rough any misty day ‘ere is a ‘reat.”

“A ‘reat Monsieur?” Chipped in Gucci.

“'at is what I said, a ‘reat.”

ClaW! Looked down at the Lizardman rolling around on the floor and decided he could not pass themselves off as a highly professional and seasoned squad of adventurers. The least he could get was some service. “Well we are temporarily a party member down. Tell you what. Give us food, ale and lodgings in the best tavern you have and we will deal with this ‘rea…threat for you. What exactly is the problem?”

“A dark and swirling cloud.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, um. OK. Doesn’t sound too bad.”

“I will show you 'e 'ree corpses from last eve. 'ey should be ‘awing out by now.”

“’Awing out? Of course. Very well lead on.”

As the party ventured forth into the market town of Littleborough, The afternoon was rapidly turning into evening, a slight mist had settled upon the outer fields, a delirious Nam-Draz’il was being carried towards some comfy lodgings and the Scarecrow’s straw tummy was rumbling….


----------



## BoldItalic

... the Scarecrow’s straw tummy was rumbling…

... a condition that was soon to be remedied in the dining hall of a quaint olde-worlde inn called The Dolphin Arms. The landlord was a genial gnome called Burgel Aleslosh who kept an excellent kitchen and the food was good, too. Tim joined them for dinner and recommended duck-and-bean stew with roast turnips, not because they were particularly tasty but because he could pronounce all the words. Dawn had three helpings and mellowed considerably after the first two.

Meanwhile, Nam-Draz'il was still screaming quietly out in the stable yard where he had been dumped, so Burgel sent for Psychic Meg, the town witch, to try to calm him down. Meg took one look at him and saw immediately what was wrong. "It's what we witches call Bimble's Auto-Reflexitive Kataleptonia," she announced with an air of great erudition, "or B.A.R.K., as in the phrase 'Barking Mad'. He needs very careful and delicate handling, viz. a good sharp bang on the head." This, she adminstered with great skill and a small wooden cudgel (1d4 Damage) that she produced from somewhere inside her pointy hat. The wizard looked unfocussed for a brief moment, then came to himself. Well, almost. It became apparent a little later that he no longer knew any spells at all and would have to learn them all over again. Also, he was forever after terrified of mirrors. But at least he stopped screaming which was a definite plus because it had been getting on everyone's nerves.

Back indoors, over a generous helping of apricot pudding with brandy sauce, ClaW asked Tim about the three frozen corpses and the circumstances of their mysterious deaths. "Well," began Tim, "first 'ere was young 'omas, found not 'ree yards from his own 'reshold and him not 'irteen 'is 'ursday last. 'en 'ere was Henri 'e apple-seller, frozen stiff and all his Blenheim apples missing. And now ..."

"Excuse me," interrupted Claw, "but Henri was the very man we came here to see. We desperately need his Blenheim apples to make sauce for the royal banquet."

This was definitely the wrong thing to say. ClaW realised it when he was halfway through the sentence but the sentence stubbornly said itself anyway. At the mention of 'royal banquet', Tim stiffened and his face went a whiter shade of puce. Rage and Anger took turns to cloud his brows as he jumped up and headed straight for the door without another word.

"That went well," remarked Tara from inside her bag. "Fortunately for you ..."


----------



## rgoodbb

"That went well," remarked Tara from inside her bag. "Fortunately for you ...

…I have Titan-sight 120‘. We can track him even with me in this bag. You folks really would be lost without me. When do I get a chance to fight something?”

“No, No. Me first” Dawn remarked filling the last of her insides with cheese straws.”

“Soon enough ladies, Soon enough. Right now I think we need to follow Tim Bucktooth. I don’t trust him.”

“burt I av not feeneeshed my pastries and de odders ‘ave just sat down.”

“Very well. New Dawn, Tara. It looks like it is just us three for this stealth mission.”

The Split Party departed the tavern and took a steady stroll about 100 feet behind Tim. He cast nervous glances about, darted into a side ally and vanished on Tara’s radar.

“Damnit He’s gone. I don’t know how that could happen.” Started the tiny titan apologetically.

“No worries. I think we have bigger fish to fry here.” ClaW replied as a dark undulating murky, dirty swarming cloud of charcoal wet dust coalesced from the side ally. Tim was most definitely dead. Chilled to the bone with parts of him shattered. 

ClaW! Had to think quickly. He had made the mistake of splitting the party. Without the raw power of the other wizard and the sheer utility of the goblinz they were surely outmatched. He made a wise decision. One based upon calculations and probabilities. He gave the order to retreat. 

ClaW! took two tiny steps back just as New Dawn, spinning around with Scythe like a whirling dervish, and the pocket battleship of Tara the Tint Titanic Terrasque charged forward into the frey. 


Meanwhile, back in the Tavern, Nam-Draz’il….


----------



## BoldItalic

Meanwhile, back in the Tavern, Nam-Draz’il…. was playing cards with Gucci and desperately trying to remember how to do a _Light_ cantrip because it was quite dark in there and he had difficulty reading the backs of Gucci's cards but didn't have anything so mundane as a candle (after all, what do wizards need with candles?) and he was too ashamed to ask the landlord for one. He thought he could beat Gucci's three knaves and two tens but it turned out that Gucci had five aces and was holding his thumb _just so_ across the the invisible squiggles on the backs of his cards. You can't trust anyone these days, can you?

Back outside, Tara got there first and _trod_ on the cloud. Now, being normal weight for a tarrasque (are you saying I'm fat?) Tara's _tread_ was considerable to say the least and the cloud of dust got compressed into a monolayer of molecules smeared on the ground. Which Tara licked up. Then her eyes went a little funny, she looked thoughtful for a moment before belching a jet of ice in the general direction of the next street.

"Sorry pardon," she apologized, then "Hey, I can do Ice Dragon!"

Dawn whirled to a stop and looked around furiously for someone to assail because she was all scythed up and someone was going to pay for something. She ran down a side street and, unluckily, met a squad of ...


----------



## rgoodbb

She ran down a side street and, unluckily, met a squad of...

…March Hares. Her worst nemeses. They each carried an apple in their mouths. An Apple! She thought fast and moved faster whirling and wheeling with glist and glee, she transformed her tangible body into a maelstrawm of saw and dust. The animated scarer of crows led the unrelenting, chasing bat-mad monsters on a looping ad lolling journey back towards the Tavern.
__________________________________

Nam-Draz’il took a swig of his be-honeyed wine, all had been silent. All had been watching the game. Gucci felt a trickle of sweat meander and merge with his considerable jaw. He clamped tighter, shut. Not giving any sign away. Nam-Draz'il pondered his hand thoughtfully until he heard the commotion outside and immediately dropped his cards. Gucci presuming Nam had _called_ there and then, laughed in triumph and slapped his multiple aces down too. 

The Wizard looked out of the window. “I gotta rush”

“Don’t you mean flush?”

“Look a Pair of Hares.”

“Zat eez not a legal ‘and.”

“Another pair.”

“Two pair ‘owever……eez. You win mah scaly frond.”

“Come on. The game’s afoot!”

“Ah don’t sink ah know zat wan.”


----------



## BoldItalic

Dawn rushed into the Dolphin Arms just a Nam Draz'il was rushing out and the resulting collision added to the rushes on the rush-strewn floor. (Some low-class ale houses just have sawdust on the floor but Burgel ran a classy establishment.)

Burgel greeted the hares as old friends and was soon serving them foaming mugs of march ale, which they paid for with apples.

After a few minutes ClaW arrived, tugging Tara's bag and grumbling about being left behind. Tara was grinning to herself and blowing out little puffs of ice just for fun.

"Alors, whar 'appens now?" asked Gucci. "Iz eet time for ze next encountre?"

There was a distant sound of dice rattling and a disembodied voice announced :

*Something happens.

A flock of giant vultures flying over the inn accidentally drops a dead whale that they had been taking home for supper. The whale falls on the roof of the inn causing it to collapse and take the top floor with it. This reveals a hitherto-unsuspected secret stairway behind a collapsed upstairs wall that descends into a hitherto-unsuspected secret dungeon far below the inn. The dungeon smells of wet mothballs.

What do you do?*​
"I eat the whale," announced Tara.


----------



## rgoodbb

"I eat the whale," announced Tara…

…Which was understandable. The bag of ‘Olding only carried so many Cheese and Onion pastries. Now everyone knows that Terrasques not only like pastries, Terrasque’s usually diet on 17th+ level adventurers. And this. This was definitely not a target rich environment. So the whale was a much enjoyed snack. Tara swallowed it whole. That was a weird sight. The old lady whale, (who was actually still alive), began her new 25 year voyage through the Terrasque’s innards. When Tara had shrunk, her insides became dimensionally vast. Whole campaign setting vast. 

“To the secret passage.” Cried Nam-Draz’il. And everyone followed because this is apparently what adventurers do. 

As they descended, a trap-door opened above them and THACO bobbed his head out. “Ooops. Wrong floor.” And just like that, he was gone again. ClaW looked around and his party were no longer there either. They had just vanished. The stairwell went dark. He felt a change within himself but also, worryingly, without himself. He felt beside himself. 

His small, barnacled body morphed and increased dramatically in size and hairiness, his pincers turned into a giant battleaxe that he knew must have some _significant meaning_. His thoughts slowed down as his intelligence plummeted. As he floundered and flounced towards a nearby door, he grasped the handle for steadiness. Strangely, he heard the sounds of a Tavern beyond the door. He smelled ale and oddly, the faintest scent of soap. He took a breath, righted his now impressive seven-foot body, gripped his battleaxe and opened the door…


----------



## BoldItalic

He took a breath, righted his now impressive seven-foot body, gripped his battleaxe and opened the door… 

"They're not here yet," said Jak the one-eyed barkeeper.

"Who aren't here yet?"

"The others. Check the old _Fish_ thread. They turn up on the 7th of May. You're two weeks early."

ClaW was bewildered. This was not how it was meant to be. He stared at Zak, suspecting a trick. He wanted to disbelieve but his mind was confused. A phrase kept saying itself inside his head in that annoying way that they do sometimes and the more you try to forget it, the more it comes back. Like when you try very hard _not_ to think about blue elephants and you end up thinking about not thinking about blue elephants and the blue elephants just stand there smirking up their trunks refusing to be not thought about. Except the phrase that had taken possession of his mind wasn't blue elephants, it was "The Throg of War". Just that. "The Throg of War". It didn't even make sense. But he didn't know why. He didn't know ...

"You okay? You look a bit green around the gills. Can I get you a drink?" asked Jak solicitously.

"Erg."

"Do you need a cleric? I can fetch Sister Hermione if you like? She's very good."

"Erg."

Just then, Sister Hermione entered the Painted Pumpkin. Jak the barkeeper had diversified into selling embroidery cottons and she needed some three-ply turquoise for some new vestments she was making.

"Blessing upon thee," quoth she, "Today doth all the world rejoice, for be it not verily the feast of Bless'ed Antiphoné?"

"Erg?"

"Hmm," said the good sister looking professionally at Claw. "Methinks thou art in need of ministrations," whereupon she picked him up, turned him over and applied a salve from a jar that she always carried in her reticule. It tickled and felt hot.

"Erg!"

"Take these tablets three times a day after meals and try not to walk on it for two weeks."

"Erg. Erg?"

"Not when I'm working, dear."

"Erg."

ClaW fell into a doze. The salve was beginning to work and consciousness slipped away peacefully, dreaming of blue elephants.

Suddenly ...


----------



## rgoodbb

Suddenly ...

*Suddenly* ... Gucci found himself in front of a bunch of Flounces. He had turned into a girl who wielded a chain and was in the middle of a monk like acrobatic flip. He landed poorly and then… 

*Suddenly* … Nam-Draz’il was walking into a pub entitled the Awning Pothole. Wearing full field plate armour, he clumsily tripped over the threshold and crashed to the floor when… 

*Suddenly* … New Dawn was experiencing … A similar disturbance but she was now Gucci in the middle of a bar fight in the Druid Shed. She ducked from a mimic’s tongue attack and…

Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ...Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ...
Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ...Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ...
Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ...Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ...
Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ...Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ...
Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ...Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ...
Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ...Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ... Suddenly ...


*POP!​*




Suddenly ...


----------



## BoldItalic

Suddenly ... nothing happened. Time stopped.

The universe and everything in it ceased to move. The speed of light became zero. Physics would have unravelled except that it couldn't because it couldn't get from a state where it was working to a state where it wasn't and had to be content with being totally Heisenberg.

In a trillion galaxies, a septillion sentient beings simultaneously thought "W ... ?" in a quintillion different languages and the thought hung in time like cosmic aftershave.

The universe had crashed.

"Have you tried switching it off and on again?" asked an incorporeal entity.

"Several times. I think it might have been that April 2018 Windows update."

"Can we roll back to the last System Restore Point?"

"Yes, but we'll lose recent data if it's already been reformatted."

"Try it anyway. Nothing to lose."

> 0F0F2A390BC285640F0F0F0F6910A2D808002B30309D
Od contemplated his room in the attic of the Pig and Lion. It was dingy and squalid but at least it was free. The previous occupant had left it in a filthy state but Od conjured up an Unseen Servant who soon set about cleaning it up. Mice scurried under the furniture in alarm as a broom wielded by invisible hands swept every corner free of dust and cobwebs.

Od settled on the bed and cast a Light cantrip on the bedpost behind his head. He drew out a letter and began to read. A halfling maiden had thrust it into his hand earlier, as he finished his performance in the common room downstairs. Tumbling and Juggling was his forte and it went down well enough tonight, but the customers had really been more in the mood for a sing-song. A few bars on the flute had been enough to set them off and the landlord was suitably appreciative, for singing makes thirsty throats and thirsty throats make good takings at the bar.

"Dear Od", the letter began ...


----------



## rgoodbb

"Dear Od." the letter began ...


...This is my final draft manuscript of:_ The never ending story of..._Please take the time to read it. I have struggled in recent weeks to put quill to parchment therefore culminating in my thought that it must surely be near completion, or at least as complete as a neverending story might indeed one day find itself, if indeed it lost itself. 

It has been a harsh winter, especially for one at my age, but, snuggled between candle and hearth on those dark days and nights, I have recorded all that I remember so very long ago. It will happen soon you know. You will receive another letter after your performance tonight. How do I know? Read on if you dare.

With love.

Your servant, Od. (Yes. Od) ...


----------



## rgoodbb

*B.I.*

I probably shouldn't have put those pesky three little dots at the end. Or maybe it's entirely appropriate.


----------



## BoldItalic

Works for me. Without the dots it's final but with the dots it cycles back to the beginning.

Nice one 

Now, no more for a while. I'm utterly muse-less.


----------



## rgoodbb

Pretty drained myself

Thanks for the ride.


----------

