240425 Exothermic Reaction
General Summary
We left our heroes after a session of bravado and victory! A tale of which was recorded by our very own bard Sentinel. Kurog, was touched by the dramatic prose and complex meter, after it was explained to him in words of one symbol and a few pictures. Jude kept quiet and listened carefully
and glanced at the pictures too and nodded to herself, with a “Ooh” of comprehension.
Now came the immediate problem of rest. Griff had cast himself to standstill and just didn’t have much left in him. Kurog, although had received the ministration of Team Healer, was eager to find time for his wounds to heal. Thorg, was nursing a few boo-boos too, but fair play to him, he didn’t
complain. They decided to pretend that they had left the halls and run for the hills.
Drogon did what Drogon does best and checked out all the nooks and crannies whilst the Fire giant King Snurre was licking his wounds and had run away. In a later interview with Snurre, he denies running away and called it a “tactical, fast paced removal of self in a contra-direction to others in the vicinity.”
Drogon discovered various rooms, including a kitchen and a store room, along with a door guarded by two Fire Giants. Drogon reported back to the team, and they opted to try and make the best of the Store Room. Griff the Resourceful came up with a wonderful plan of using the huge, giant-sized barrels to hide in. This writer suspects that he just wanted to use a new spell and had been desperate to find a use for it.
He shifted the barrel contents to the top and made hidey holes in the bottom of three barrels. The group crawled in, with two sharing each barrel. Sentinel and Jude got to have a nice girly chat, and discussed the rest of the group. The content of that discussion will have to remain secret as it may well affect the group dynamics. Suffice it to say, they laughed... a lot Maybe it was the wine fumes?
After a good eight hours, Team Stealth left the barrel of laughs and checked out the surrounding areas. Drogon listened in at the kitchen door and could hear a lot of raucous noise. Also, two distinct timbres of voices. Neither he nor Sentinel could work out what manner of creature had the
higher pitched voice. It seemed like a combination of guttural growls and barking. Drogon continued on his recce, leaving Sentinel to watch the two guards on the door. She noted the crown above the door. Much mapping was done by the sneaky rogue for which he was dutifully thanked.
There was a group huddle and a number of plans were discussed. Some involved the guarded door and how to eviscerate the duo of giants, others involved exploring further and looking at some doors further up the corridor. One involved drinking all the wine and mead, but they all ignored Jude as she tried to explain all the benefits. A rather cunning plan was formed, more on that later dear dedicated reader.
Drogon, feeling a little light-footed, managed to get into the Kitchen. He was faced with five giantesses and some fifteen human/hyena combos, which we recognised as gnolls. They were clearly the hired help, as the giantesses were slapping them about with gusto. He noticed a cooking
pit and also a rubbish chute. The hobbit couldn’t quite shake the feeling that others were talking about him and how he’d fit down it. He shook off the thought with a laugh. “No, not my friends!”.
Drogon’s tour of duty discovered that a lot had changed during their night of repose. Barricades has been erected and ballistae wheeled in, all facing the Main Entrance, it seemed the giants had bought into the scheme, that the adventurers had left the Hall. Fortunately, Team Giant Slayer was the right side of the defences and they did giggle about that. Rather smugly, I have to say.
Debate and banter ensued, along with a quick check in with the gods to make sure they were on the right track, which resulted in a plan. It was a good plan, a rather excellent plan and a safe plan. How did I, a mere writer, come to this conclusion. Well, Griff agreed to it! “Say no more!”, I hear you exclaim.
Sentinel was going to charm one of the giants to attack the other and then in perfect synchronicity, Jude would cast silence to cover the noise of the inevitable fight. Team Heavy Metal would then wade in and smack some giant leg, pretty much all they could reach. Kurog, Thorg and Jude were
bouncing up and down with excitement. All of this AND the whole group were going to look like gnolls thanks to Sentinels arsenal of illusion spells.
Griff’s sense of self-preservation kicked right back in and persuaded the group to wait until one giant was dead. It made sense, but the disappointment was palpable by the clanking of lowered plate mail clad heads.
The plan was executed flawlessly and the two giants set to, the curses they threw were some of the worst ever heard on this plan of existence, but of course we’ll never know what they were as they fought in perfect silence. The fight turned out to be one sided, as Giant Brutus crushed Giant
Proximus, only to be crushed in turn by the mighty Kurog, Thorg and Drogon. The spell casters watched on with raised eyebrows at the ultra-violence. Sentinel and Jude discussing the various techniques on display and critiquing Drogon’s stealth attacks.
The door was opened revealing a war room of some sort, a table with a number of giant-sized chairs along with a smaller chair designed for a more humanoid figure. Scrolls covered one wall and two chests were on the opposite one. Team Body Snatcher dragged the corpses of the two giants into
the room, after debating propping them up against a barricade. A group of Ettins changed their minds on that front.
Drogon quickly assessed the chests and found them both to be trapped. He turned to the team and told them they had a poisoned pin trap. Jude scoffed at poisoned pins and offered to just open them. “What can possibly go wrong?” she asked playfully. The others tried to keep a straight face
as the “pin” turned out to be six giant sized pins, or as I like to call them, arrows. Three arrows ‘thunked’ into her, ruining her armour, pride, and standing with the rest of the group. She tried to shrug it off and laugh, but it turned into a rather pained wince.
For all her pain, she’d won a chest full of garden rocks. No amount of checking for secrets and illusions could rescue her from further ignominy. Drogon then nonchalantly disarmed the trap and opened the other chest, to reveal a stack of what the party assumed to be courier’s scroll holders.
Each had the markings of King Snurre. No treasure as such, but it allowed him to grin at the bleeding Jude.
The wall of scrolls revealed two excellent pieces of evidence! One was a map showing a defence plan for the giants, lovingly drawn along with details of positions, numbers and rooms. Although written in Giantish, the runes were dwarvern. The second was a letter written to Snurre from one
Eclavdra, a known name from previous encounters.
The letter had several pieces of information pertinent to the current mission. Team Scroll were able to discern that the giants had help from an ambassador called Caelkotha, a name of Elven decent possibly? Also, of note were plans for Chark as well. Jude was shocked, seems her involvement with the group was serendipitous.
With nothing more to do here, the group decided to investigate a small more human sized door, listening they could hear gnolls gambling on the other side. Now, if you’ve been keeping up wonderous reader, you’ll remember our team were all disguised as gnolls themselves. A plan formed, another rather cunning plan.
They opened the door and stepped in to find eight gnolls around a table. Sentinel with her ever present Tongues spell allowed her to understand to be told to “Fuck Off, veterans only” by one feisty gnoll. Griff transmuted some coins and handed them to Sentinel so she could “buy in”. All this time
gnoll Thorg, gnoll Drogon and gnoll Kurog kept walking in and surrounding the gnolls leaving Sentinel, Griff standing behind gnoll Jude at the door way.
In time honoured fashion of this group’s diplomacy techniques, they laid into the gnolls with sword and spell. Jude squealed in delight at finally being able to cast her Spirit Guardians, which promptly chewed into all the gnolls. Team Heavy Metal and Team Robe Wearer did what they did best,
slaughtering lesser creatures. As the fight was nearing its end, poor Thorg felt a horrific pain in his back and turned to find a dwarf had backstabbed him.
One minute empty space, the next dwarf! Thorg was not amused. At all. Not a bit. He pretended not to hear the rest of the group telling him not to kill the dwarf. “Flame on!” he shouted. “No, No, No Flame off!!” wailed the others as Thorg smacked fifteen different types and styles of excrement
from the diminutive, yet stout fellow.
For comedy, everyone laid into this back-stabbing dwarf shouting “non-lethal damage” as he was stabbed, blasted, crushed and generally abused into unconsciousness. He was tied and then bound by Gaes spell to Jude for thirty days. A few instructions and questions later, the dwarf revealed
himself to be none other than Ombi, son of Algononn (previous king of the Stonefist dwarves). Nice plot twist!
Ombi spilled his guts whilst staring adoringly at his new mistress. He had been captive for a hundred years and had been helping the giants with their defences, the map they’d found earlier was his work. Turns out, he hadn’t really thought about escaping much and kept saying “It’s just not that
easy”, despite obviously being a sneaky type with invisibility skills. “Hum” I hear you say dear reader. Yup, definitely not the sharpest tool in the box that one.
The group learnt about all of the other “pale elves” that came and went, and that the hall had a further two levels below this one. He’d not been down there, so had little info beyond forges and temples and such. He did say that the elves came from below that final layer, but couldn’t really
explain more.
And that is where we have to leave the story for now, more next time on “The Adventures of The Band of Tomb-Thieving Assassins”. Perhaps next time I’ll tell you beautiful reader about the quest for a better name for this eclectic group.
Report Date
25 Apr 2024
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