Rose tisked judgmentally. "Remind me to teach you some better music..."
Nahia stares down at the broken used-to-be-a-tree-ent, her eyes full of hate, the wind whipping around her as she slowly lowers, her eyes closed and her head bowed.
I hope this amused you, Dark Prince, seeing the irony with which we dispatched this impediment… and thank you for keeping Grumble and the others safe...
She opens her eyes, her countenance much more jovial again, as she softly touches down in front of Rose with a smile.
Rose hopped down off her archon-lounge chair-saddle to meet Nahia and swept her up in a hug that lifted the taller woman up off the ground and into a spin.
"That was fantastic!"
Nahia bursts into giggles at Rose's excitement. "I can't take all the credit for that one. That was some quick thinking."
Apparently we do make a good team.
Nahia pets her hand through the hair of the ecstatic warrior and adds "Come, let's go check on the others."
As they walk back, a tiny, red tinged serpent slithers it's way back to Nahia, who kneels and holds and hand out for it. It quickly wraps its way up her arm, and she scratches under its chin. She hisses softly at it "Thank you again, my friend. I hope that wasn't too rough on you."
Andros looks back at the witch and replies ”He makes for a softer landing than he appears.”
The serpent coils his way up her arm before settling back around her neck and whispering ”That was an awfully risky plan though, to go chasing after a creature like that all by yourself. It worked out, but I’m not so sure it is a plan to be repeated.”
Nahia nods at the little snake, continuing her casual stroll back ”Indeed. I let the situation get the better of me. Hopefully I’ll have the sense not to repeat such a decision. And just as hopefully, I won’t be presented with such a situation again.”
But it is all hopeful thinking…
- - - - -
Nahia arrives back at the others and smiles. Looking at Hound and Grumblejack, she asks ”Are you two all right? You both took quite a walloping.” Her fingertips briefly run over the scorched hole in her clothing at her stomach.
We all did, really. That was far closer a battle than I would have preferred.
Hound is still oblivious, but now is imagining two nurses tending to him.
*hrg*
Finally, you can contemplate the place.
The great stone spire, rises some hundreds of feet high , the trees surrounding it, gigantic in stature, seems to be nothing in comparison.
Walking around it, you find ruins of what once appear to be the entrance to it.
A boulder rests in the smashed top floor of a three‐storey stout, stone watchtower. A nearby rotting catapult appears to be the culprit. The remains of a thick, reinforced wooden door lie scattered on the wide, stone steps leading up to the entrance. Bits of broken weapons and armour litter the otherwise intact interior.
Past the tower, scattered blocks of obsidian, inscribed with the iconography of an evil deity, surround the foundations of a once proud archway. A few outlying buildings remain relatively intact.
The entrance seems to have crumbled in most of the parts, and it leads down to a series of dark caverns.
The party searches the ruined tower, the nearby ruins for anything useful or interesting. Whatever secret it may had, it was long found and don’t offer anything of value.
From the ruins tho, you are able to gather that the first attack on the horn was swift and brutal, almost no damage was done to nearby structures, and from that you concluded that the defenders did not had time to mount any resistance.
As you explore the ruins, a fog begins to form in the place, it feels malevolent and evil, as if someone or something trying to reach from a faraway place.
With nothing to stop the group, you take a time to look around the horn, and search for any clear entrance.
There are two stairways leading to some entrance 100ft and 150ft high.
There’s a cave entrance leading beneath the stone spire.
There is sign of native life, animals and something you judge to be a walking tree. Near the stairs, there is no sign of passage or anyone going up. The caverns however have sign of constant usage, by something that appears to be a big biped frog, only it is more than one.
”Thanks un’ for the magik.” the ogre says somewhat sad, as he get’s up and lift Seren out of the bruches, to have her date with an impossible-to-free-from-under-a-gigantic-oak-not-a-tree-ent monster.
While carrying Seren, the ogre says ”Rotten un’ ” the ogre begins clearly distracted by something else ”Grumblejack knows this place. But don’t know.” he makes an impatient sound as he tries once more ”Here feel like someplace Grumblejack knew long ago, only that Grumblejack do not know this place.”
Rose spends a little time checking over Hound and Serin. She wasn't much of a healer, but she was concerned.
"You two took a pretty serious beating there. We need to stop for a bit and get you patched up."
"Mysty, do you feel up to scouting around for a good place to hunker down?"
|
Mysty looks up at the Tower
I'm thinking that may not be a good place to sleep. And the cave seems to have a giant frog infestation. Or something.
She looks back the way they came.
We have located the place, but we are low on resources (and weapons). We aren't on a time restraint. Let's head back to town, re-equip and heal up, then return. We know the way now.
She shrugs
Let's hit this place fresh. But I'll have a look round first. Back in a bit.
Mysty stealths as best she can to the cave entrance, and peers inside.
"That works for me." Rose shrugs, looking to the others for any objections.
While a fair scout when not in his breastplate, Hound lets Mysty vanish into the underbrush. No objections.
Nahia looks over at Mysty and says "I don't know if that's a good idea. We're pretty beat up here, and if something is living in that cave, I'd rather not have to flee from it. Besides, what is the best thing that could happen from looking around now?"
Seren looks down at grumblejack. "Like deja vu? You think you've seen this place before but can't remember when? What kind of feeling does this place make you feel?" She asks curiously, looking between the entrance and grumble repeatedly.
Unsure of what to make of the comment at the moment, seren listens in silence as the party thinks about their next move.
Hearing about dealing with this later Seren announces suddenly. "I want a tree now then!" she laughs excitedly "Grumble back to the Treant!" She adds pointing back in the direction of their last fight.
Reaching the corpse of the Treant and the massive oak tree, Seren sighs in despair. "Well how am I going to get you out from under there then?" She asks herself aloud. She looks over at grumblejack a plan formulating in her mind...
"Grumble.. how would you like to play lumberjack for me? I promise to get you an awesome dinner. A dinner of your choice if you help." she asks, pleading with puppy dog eyes.
”Grumblejack can’t explain. Feel like… home?” he comments mostly to himself, as Seren calls him over the dead treant, and promises to treat him with a good dinner;
”Of Grumblejack choice?” he asks smiling wickedly as he stares at Nahia.
Seren laughs aloud as Grumble glares at Nahia "If you can convince Nahia to be our dinner then sure, she can be dinner, but she has to be willing." Seren adds, finger pointed sternly at Grumblejack.
"I was more thinking we could get a nice young girl in town. Or maybe a big elk or something."
”Grumblejack will wait. Not enough meet in those bones yet.” the ogre comments but then he continues ”Forget the meal, Grumblejack can get it by himself, get Grumblejack a new weapon.” he says indicating his destroyed Earthbreaker.
Even managing to convince the ogre to help, this are still better left to be done when the group returns, refreshed and resupplied. With that in mind, the party leaves, returning to Farhold, just one day after they left.
Hound will get 3 CMW potions to resupply.
Rose, back in her disguise, went with Mysty in search of a new haft for her weapon.
"Good thing about axes and hammers; hafts are pretty cheap."
What would you think about buying holy water from the Mitrian church? For one it would make good cover since we will appear to be pious servants buying the water to use against their foes, and we can also use it against any undead or daemons we encounter.
"...can we pay in silver and poison the coins?" Rose said bitterly.
We shouldn't start piling the bodies until we secure our new fortress.
Rose looked nonplussed but said "Fine. Pay the stupid Mitrans. We can get the gold back later."
- - - - -
On the way back, Nahia speaks up and says "I can repair everyone's weapons, but not restore their magics. Come to me back at the manor and I'll take care of it."
Turning to Grumblejack, Nahia raises and eyebrow and asks "And what of you, Big'un, where have you been staying?"
Hound considers changing into a simple guardsman and appearing to be a pious man who wishes to arm himself against dark forces, but remembering how poorly his last attempt to convince people went, he has some of the baron's servants get some for him. The baron is a respectable member of society after all.
Seren walks into Farhold, her mind rushing through the various materials she needed to free her next minion from its oaken prison. Axe, Saw, and probably more onyx, that bloody tree was huge.
She quickly separates from her companions rushing to the nearby market to try and find the necessary materials. The onyx was easy enough to get at the market, though finding an item large enough for grumble and Mr.Tree-Ant to use was proving to be more difficult. Grrr…. Okay…. Got to be something.
It took her most of the rest of the evening to finally locate an axe that she thought would work, finally settling on the largest greataxe she could find at the market. It wasn’t great, but it should work to do what she needed.
Satisfied with her haul, Seren heads back to the manor to once again reconvene with her companions. Seeing Nahia, Seren meanders over.
”So… I know we want to look into the horn and all right away, but I’m going to need a couple of days to deal with this Mr.Tree-Ant issue, and by issue, I mean I want a undead tree minion.” Seren says sweetly. ”Think we could convince Mysty and Rose to hold off a day on investigating it?” She adds, ignoring the fact that Nahia might oppose her suggestion.
Nahia grins at Seren's saccharin manner. "Honestly, that was a really rough fight, and I think any advantage we could bring to bear moving forward is a good idea. So I don't see a problem with it. Mysty might be a little impatient, but I think Rose could agree with the idea too."
Looking thoughtful for a moment, she asks "And what exactly do you plan to do to... err... extract it?"
So far, so good. the witch things as she heads to her room, after a day of meetings and with spies and gathering information. Soon we finish this, soon I’ll be out of this dammed place. she continues as she walks up the stairs to her room and immediately she knows something is different, wrong.
Steeling herself, and preparing for battle, she silently opens the door, only to find Nahia sound asleep in her bed. Well, maybe not so soon… she thinks.
A malicious smile, as she closes the door and walks over to the bed, her eyes fixed on the little snake.
A jolt of fear, pain, anger rushes through her body, jolting awake the sleeping witch. Something attacked Andros, and what she felt was their connecting, his raw emotions.
But something was wrong as well, the witch could not see, something covering her eyes. She tried to talk, only to find there was something in her mouth, making it impossible to talk. Her hands and feet bound, and she could not move as well.
From above, a cruel voice ”It’s time the lesson begins.”
”Just outside” the ogre says before you enter the city ”Grumblejack is used to scouting cities and staying out of trouble, or was until the tin can caught him.”
When they got back into town, Rose tucked her hand into the crook of Hound's arm and strolled to the market.
"We're going to get you a backup weapon and some food, and then we're going to abuse the Baron's private bathhouse. We deserve it."
"That was a hell of a beating you took back there. I'm glad you aren't dead." Somehow, the way she said it was sincere and possibly even loving.
Strangely enough, none of what you searched is available anymore. Shops have new items to sell. Here they are:
Here are your findings:
Armour +2 scale mail (4,200 gp), breastplate of command (24,500 gp)
Potions & Oils bull’s strength (300 gp), protection from chaos (50 gp), remove paralysis (300 gp), shillelagh (50 gp)
Ring improved swimming (10,000 gp)
Rods flame extinguishing (15,000 gp),metamagic silent spell (11,000 gp), viper (19,000 gp)
Scrolls (Arcane) invisibility (150 gp), misdirection (150 gp), nondetection (425 gp), sending (1,125 gp)
Scroll (Divine) produce flame (25 gp)
Staff defence (62,000 gp)
Weapons +3 sickle (18,306 gp), +1 adamantine greatsword (5,050 gp)
Wondrous Items dusty rose prism ioun stone (5,000 gp), winged boots (16,000 gp)
Common items and MW quality are available as well.
Normally, in such a situation, Nahia would have stayed calm, maybe even pretended to still be unconscious as she tested her bonds. But the feelings of pain and anger from Andros makes such calm calculation impossible. Her hands start to tug at her bonds, her sharp nails raking and scratching at what held her, her breathing jagged, as she tried to either escape or at least draw attention away from the serpent and to herself.
"What's this? Trying to resist?" the same cruel voice asks "Let's begin your new education..."
Hound nods to Rose. A good meal and bath sounds good. I do have a good selection of weapons available but just did not use the polearm I did when I should have. It would have given me proper reach to fight the tree. Hound has his usual deadpan expression and monotone voice. He was never the expressive outside of combat.
Rose buys the scroll of invisibility from the shopkeeper.
"Wouldn't have helped that much. Those things had longer branches than your polearm."
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Rose buys the scroll of invisibility from the shopkeeper.
"Me. Nothing. Grumble... Grumble will help." Seren states, pointing at the large greataxe beside her. "Time he learned to be a lumberjack. shouldn't need to do much, and then Mr.Tree-Ant can chop himself out. Should be a grand afternoon!"
She skips happily off to her bedroom, ready to dream of fantastical things and riding around on the shoulders of a giant dead Tree.
After buying, resting, talking, and planning, the group seems to be ready to venture into the keep again.
Hound is ready to go, hopefully with no more rampaging trees.