Chapter 17: Something rotten this way comes

General Summary

I woke up to something rotten in the air.
I got up, and Ash hurried out to see what is going on, and something attacked him. I threw a flashbang into the hallway and pulled him back toward me.
DaVinci ran into our room, ducking under Ash, then stopped in shock when he saw the beard I grew.
I maintain, rabbits are always fuzzy, just because I'm slightly more fuzzy, does not mean I now have a beard. But I digress from the story.
Alfred stumbled out of his door and DaVinci yelled something about Ash being possessed.
Meanwhile, Ash ran down the stairs trying to find the undead we smelled.
DaVinci followed him out the door and yelled back, "Something is marking the inn."
"Smoke!" yells came through the night. "Fire at the North gate!"
Ash and Hemlock ran back to the inn to get help for the fires. Alfred ran out the door and axes flew by him, barely missing him. DaVinci ran over and grabbed the figure marking the inn. Another figure threw axes and two of the guards went down.
Hemlock summoned a snake and sent it out. It slithered through the now open gate and wrapped itself around one of the attacking figures. The shadows hit DaVinci and the snake.
"I'm not ready for this," DaVinci said as he scrambled away from the figures.
"Duck DaVinci," I yelled and threw a bomb.
Ash ran back with buckets as the snake continued to attack the figures ahead of us. Hemlock threw fire on them and in the brief flare of light I realized it was trolls attacking us. He threw a spell and they were briefly outlined, and I threw a bomb at the light, but it bounced slightly only catching a part of their crowd. They threw their axes, and I felt it hit my arm, tearing a hole in it.
Around us the town is on fire as more and more trolls appear out of the shadows. One of the trolls points at Ash who grips Thor's hammer.
Ash looks around at the town on fire, and the crowds of trolls surrounding us and screams to the sky, "Thor, you seem to want them to have it. So your will be," and he tossed the hammer past the trolls. It landed with a thud and lightning crackled around it.
The troll leader picked up the hammer, and withdrew. We were left with a burning town.
We spent the night putting out the fires and set out slightly later in the day than usual to head back to the Citadel.

Returning to the Citadel

As we marched back to the Citadel, we heard a great noise ahead of us. We marched forward slowly, and there was a horde of undead marching from the direction of where we headed.
"That is not good," I said. "We'll need another way in clearly."
We headed to a different entrance and went down a couple of floors. Ahead of us we saw a robot picking a lock. He seemed to be talking to himself.
"That could be the robot we need to get the priest," Hemlock said.
"I don't know," I replied, but before we got much farther the robot got the door open and undead dwarves sprang through the door.
The first came forward and hit Alfred. Another passed him and hit Ash, and a third hit the robot thief. From the back someone hit me with lightning.
DaVinchi threw his hammer. I threw a holy bomb at the guy who hit me with lightning.
The fight started, the dwarves cheated and flowed through the door, trying to flank us, but thankfully Ash was able to stop the attempt.
The ghost dwarves hit hard, and nearly took us down, but after several blows back and forth we go them down.
And that's when we realized the robot thief was not a robot, but a gnome inside of an armored suit rather like the robots.
"Who are you?" I asked.
"My name is Clankety Clank, do I know you from somewhere?" he answered.
"I don't think so. I would remember a robot gnome."
"I'm not a robot," he answered. "I'm a gnome. I have to stay near here because something is wrong."
Honestly, it was a very long and confusing conversation, that I don't really remember much of and it went back and forth, but long and short he's a gnome, and he seems to talk to himself an awful lot.
Eventually, we headed down to the next floor to find the robot we needed. Unfortunately, we were not the healthiest, and we ran into some undead creature that caused Alfred to lose consciousness, and we couldn't wake him up.
We left Clankety Clank guarding him as we made another attempt to get the robots, but as I attempted to follow DaVinci and Ash, I stepped on a giant pile of rubble and the resulting crash caused something to attack me. Hemlock was right behind me and the creatures attacked both of us.
Hemlock and I ran out of the dungeon trying to escape whatever was following us. DaVinci and Ash continued on down.
I do not know how we will get that robot with how things are going.

Report Date

13 Jan 2024