"Abria!" Straya Kraum instantly recognizes the child as her granddaughter and bursts into tears of gratitude. She immediately takes the infant into her home, but soon returns.
"Please, please - you have saved this family from a worse fate than we believed. Please take this family heirloom", as she presents a small silver cloak clasp in the shape of an arrow.
Also in graditude for your agreeing to help their kin, the village quickly gathers food and water for 2 weeks to send you on your way.
The giants headed south when they left the village, and according to your map, Minderhal’s Valley lies in the same direction.
After leaving Shinnerman’s Fortune, you continue on toward the giants’ valley. About a mile outside the village, Birdzar spots a pair of humanoid creatures darting through the thickets. It appears they are fleeing a cyclops who is sniffing the air and searching for them.
Birdzar quickly flies back to the party, flapping his wings urgently and otherwise making a ruckus. We really need to sort out a code of some sort.
Hoping his message of danger has been received, he flies off in the direction of the two fleeing humanoids. Once overhead, he caws as loudly as he can. Might not know what I am, but they’ll definitely know I’m here!
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Ulark is relieved beyond words when the baby is found, and again when it can later be returned to its kin. Still, the hard spot in his heart twinges again. Another giant orphan. And that's the one we could save. There will be more. Always too many more.
The dwarven warrior is in a fairly quiet mood for the rest of the party's stop in Shinnerman's Fortune, and on the road as they continue south. But as Thozar returns and begins flapping urgently, he grips his spear hard and begins running in the direction from whence the bird came.
The hiding humans don’t know what to make of the cawing bird. The cyclops takes notice though, and tries to figure out what the bird is cawing about.
You can start at any distance, really. With Birdzar flying scout, you are probably a couple hundred yards away when he first takes notice.
If you get within 200', though, make a stealth check against the cyclops to see if he notices you.
He is about 40 feet from the hiding humans, but hasn't spotted them yet.
No sense in bringing the cyclops to the humans... Birdzar takes wing again, cawing loudly as he passes just out of reach of the cyclops overhead. If the giant doesn’t begin following him, he circles above him a few times before pooping on the creature and heading in the general direction of the party.
Ingrahild waited until the cyclops got into range. Standing in the open, she let her arrows fly. The runes on her bow flowed, promising death to all giant-kin.
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The annoying bird distracts the cyclops until everyone else gets into range, and Ingrahild puts an arrow in its thick hide, as Gundar launches a crossbow bolt.
The cyclops looks at Ingrahild and picks up a large rock to throw at her. Luckily the throw is off, but it looks like it would have hurt!
Ingrahild lined up her first shot, but it went wide as a boulder launched by the giant landed near her.
Getting bearings back, she let loose arrow after arrow. Each one hitting with enough force to knock a charging orc off its feet.
Birdzar pauses mid-flap as the consecutive ballista bolts Ingrahild fires collide with their mark. I almost feel bad for it, by the Divine!
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Gundar cranks the winch on his crossbow and loads another bolt. The urge to charge in tickles at his feet, but wisdom restrains him. They have the giant trapped at range and should be plenty capable of downing him with little risk to themselves.
Ulark rushes forwards after Belir, his short legs pounding against the ground.
Umlo starts to work his way around the outside, carrying his frying pan like an axe.
Looking up at the bird trowing acid, the Cyclops releases a force of energy from it's one eye. Then it moves away, towards some other large rocks (boulders, really).
Ingrahild looked at the giant with surprise. How was it still standing? She checked the runes on her bow to see if they still glowed, only to realize that she had no idea how the magic worked anyways. So she contented herself with keeping up the steady stream of arrows, hoping that the beast would soon fall.
The cyclops avoids two of the arrows, dodging as if he sensed where he should not be. But the third stuck home, and the cyclops looks quite unwell.
Gundar moves up a bit to get a better shot and looses another bolt.
Oh shit.
As the blast of force crashes into him, Birdzar does his best to flap his wings hard and fast to prevent himself from getting any closer to the Cyclops. Thing is lasting a little longer than I thought it would considering how hard Ingrahild has been striking it!
Taking the hint and having clearly diverted it's focus from the runners, Birdzar flutters away to let his allies work at their foe. If it lasts another barrage, I'll take more direct action, but there is a little more bite to it than I thought.
________
Ulark continues to rush forwards, bellowing to try and get the one-eyed giant's attention.
Umlo also double moves.
The giant cyclops picks up a large rock and hurls it at Ingrahilde, hitting her shoulder hard.
Ingrahild connected with a solid shot...only to be struck by a boulder. The blow sent her falling to the ground. It had only grazed her...a more direct Hit would have crushed anyone her size. Gritting her teeth she got back to her feet, but her subsequent arrows were nowhere near as accurate.
Ingrahilde's first arrow flies straight and true, and lodges right in the cyclop's eye, dropping him where he stands.
Ingrahild rolled her bruised shoulder as she began jogging over. ”Mighty stubborn giant that was. Either that or too stupid to know when he was already dead.”
A little of both, it seems.
The giant is now very dead.
As the cyclops is felled Ulark continues running forwards to the corpse. He calls out. The biggun's dropped! You can come out now!
After a few moments, you see a couple peek out from behind a tree. "OH thank you! There are more... giants up ahead, leading our fellow villagers chained together..."
Thozar, in bird form, flies on ahead.
Four ogres are sitting around a small campfire, arguing over their human captives. Thozar can overhear the giants’ argument. Three of the ogres are hungry and are trying to convince the other to roast at least one of the prisoners. The fourth ogre, who seems to be the leader, insists on keeping the captives alive to use as a bargaining chip with a more powerful giant called Gristlecrack.
In order to report, Birdzar transforms back into a dwarf to tell you what he found.
”Seems like we need to hurry. Need to put the giants down before they get moving again. No way we’ll easily catch them if this becomes a foot race.”
"Aye, best get moving," Gundar says as he racks another bolt.
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Thozar replies. "They aren't far. The prisoners are very close and beaten and probably slowing them down. I don't see how we might get them out of there unseen."
"We could probably sneak up on them... you know, if we weren't dwarves. Ha!"
Gundar side-eyes the druid. "Maybe you lot don't know how to stalk quarry. Give me a bit to get around the other side of them."
Gundar sneaks up and sees the humans all bound together in a small clearing.
While Gundar does his hunter thing, Thozar begins restoring the party's bruised and battered flesh. "Ingrahild, those arrows of yours were incredible! I could feel their wake from the sky!"
________
Ingrahild smiled as she tapped her bow. ”And for that I thank the craftsman who made this bow and the runes etched into it. The arrows might have been given accuracy by my hand, but the sheer power? More than my skill went into that.”
Map up. Let me know the plan...
”A clearing. No giants. Just peasants. This smells like a trap.”