"I can show ya the way to old grumpy ghost." Ingrahild tells. "One hour more shouldn't matter."
It isn't far, but in the shrub of the marsh, walking is really slow and strenuous. After fighting through that for a while in eastern direction.
On a clearing the group is suddenly attacked by a glowing ball with a ghostly face in it, that attacks out of nowhere.
Sending an electric jolt through the dwarf it starts shouting. "How dare you cross into our marsh! Get out of here! You will pay a high price for trespassing!"
Adding to the difficulty of the journey, Bupkis is constantly stopping and staring into space.
"Show lantern!", Bupkis urges. He addresses the will-o-wisp, "Need to find Vault of Thorns; get weapons to fight giants. Orcs and giants joining together!"
"Where did you get that?", the will o'whisp cries out "Your theft will not go unpunished! Give that back to us!"
Bupkis replies, "Silvermane gives it to us; druid in Trunau. Orcs attack Trunau — need to stop from attack again!"
The will o'whisp pauses for a moment to consider the words.
”The chieftain of the Twisted Hearts tribe, Grenseldek, sent an army of orcs to attack the village of Trunau. The village is apparently built over the tomb of a giant “hero” named Uskroth. In it was a stone carved with part of a map that Grenseldek seeks. We knew Grenseldek would keep sending her forces against us until she got it, so it was decided we would journey forth to Redlake Fort to stop her plans. Silvermane, who possesses great knowledge and wisdom, gave us this lantern, and told us we could find the Vault of Thorns within this marsh to gain weapons which would aid us against them. We want to put a stop to this invasion and threat to Trunau. Will you help us?”
Amira jumps in to distract the will o'whisp to not notice the rather harsh and commanding tone, Menrozzar uses to talk to the abberation. Once she has the attention she repeats what Menrozzar told with honeyed words trying to soothe the anger of the reincarnated druid.
"In that case follow me." the grumpy ball of light tells and flies away, further into the marsh.
The way isn't getting any better and the grumpy light complains all the way about the group being too slow. Taking the slander about this days heroes in stride all finally arrive at another clearing in the marsh containing a strange collection of pale, spongy spheres 1 foot in diameter. "There is what you need."
Daseem wasn't enjoying the marshy conditions. His boots where waterlogged and he was getting increasingly worried about his fancy new armor rusting. Then there where the midges, nasty blood sucking brutes! He tried to swipe a few with his sword but that simply wasn't happening. Things brightened up a little when Ivan got zapped, a fight seemed to be in the offing! Then lamentably the others talked the glowing puffball down, but for Gorum's sake why? A fight averted was reason enough to turn a reasonable man to drink in Daseem's opinion.
Following the magic puffball was doing his head in, so when it took them to a collection of pale spongy spheres and it declared they where there, Daseem's reaction was an incredulous "Eh?!"
Ivan merely glared at through smoking eyebrows at the blue-lighted orb. Fighting his rising urge to return the favor with him hammer. He cast his eyes to Daseem as the other talked the wisp down, and shared the sentiment of a missed fight. He asks to hold the wand for a bit.
Along the way, Ivan slowly gets into a grumbling contest with the wisp, particularly about the muck that seemeed to be trying to swallow the steel laden warrior alive.
Ivan walks up, more than through with this journey and pokes at one of the spheres.
Whatdya mean this is what we wanted?
He asks as he looks around.
"Oh Silvermane! Couldn't you find some competent people for this mission?" the will o'whisp curses. "Use your brain! There is still hope that you have it in you."
"Or are you liars that have no clue and Silvermane lies dead in his blood and you stole the lantern from him?" The rage comes back to the glowing ball.
Daseem's eyes narrow and he glances at Ivan as he thought, 'Can we take this thing?...'
Ivan turns to the wisp, the memory of silvermane's instructions coming back to him.
Silvermane told us we needed to place a dead wisp into the lantern, Wonderin' if ye could help us out with that. Ye kno' O' any rogue will-o-wisps?
Menrozzar looks at the spongey circles, then at the Will o’ Wisp, then back to the spongey circles. ”We have never harmed nor fought with Silvermane. We have also none of us encountered a will o’ wisp before. Is this what a...deceased...will o’ wisp looks like?”
Menrozzar tried to be civil, in the hopes the thing wouldn’t be irritated.
The will o'whisp is speechless...
After spacing out for a bit, Bupkis picks up one of the spongy balls and tries putting it in the lantern. "Now look for Vault of Thorns?
The lantern's light shines back into the direction you came from. Leaving the angry wil o'whisp behind you come back to the ring of stones.
The circle of monolithic standing stones surrounds a central menhir covered in a layer of thick, thorny vegetation. In all, eight formations surround the central stone: five intact trilithons and another three that have crumbled and partially sunk into the swamp’s soggy floor. As the light of the ghostlight lantern’s shines over the menhir, the thick vegetation covering the monolith quickly withers away, revealing a faintly glowing, olive-hued stone.
Before he leaves the will-o-wisps, Bukis asks, "Ingrahild brother missing after fight with giant near stone circle. Idea where she can search?"
"He is not in the marsh anymore." Ingrahild tells.
"I've seen no dwarf." the will o'whisp tells grumpily. "Only one who was taken by an orc raiding party."
"You's right. We's not smart. Mostly feels like we's just bumbling around alla the time. We's all there is though. We wanna get back on boat and keep going, but we can't until we doos what Silvermane said with the lantern."
"Maybees, if you helps us, we leaves you alone faster and goes away to be not smart somewhere else?"
Ivan raised an eyebrow.
One Taken away by an orc raiding party?
"Which way orcs go?", Bupkis asks.
After discussing the Ingrahild's missing sibling, he moves over to the olive colored stone and examines it.
Menrozzar doesn't ask any further questions of the will o' wisp. He figured he'd annoyed the thing enough as is.
Once they get back to the stone circle and reveal the olive covered stone, Menrozzar studies it with Bupkis.
Once Daseem comes to inspect the stone too, he can tell it's magic. As the nosy goblin can't keep his hands off things he touches it and immediately disappears.
Ivan jumps as the goblin disappears. Before shaking his head and letting out a sigh. His face contorting into a grimace.
I jus' know I'm gonna regret this. Bloody fey magic.
He grumbles as He glances to the others before sighing again. Shaking his head, and placing his finger on the stone.
Ivan disappears too. And when even a dwarf can trust in the magic, the others can too and finally all find themselves in the Vault of Thorns.
A lone menhir stands in a clearing in a vibrant forest filled with thick, verdant plant life. Exotic flowers drape the standing stone, which pulses with brilliant chartreuse light. A path lined with rose petals leads from the monolith to a giant floral bloom carved from wood. Two carved wooden stamens stretch out toward the pulsating menhir, extending from either side of a set of ornate doors carved into the giant flower. An overpowering fragrance of flowers and sweet grass permeates the air. The sun above sits at its zenith, basking the area in light and warmth.
Above the door a cryptic text is engraved into the doorframe.
Bupkis stands in a daze for a few seconds, before snapping out of it. He looks around, trying to figure out what just happened.
Just as he's wondering what to do next, Ivan appears next to him, and then the others.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
"Eyyyy where'd he g-go?!" cried Daseem when Bupkis abruptly vanished. He looked all around puzzled. It was only when Ivan muttered about magic and vanished too that the penny dropped and Daseem understood. He didn't stop to think this might be a stone that devours souls, or a gateway to hell or some such. No he barreled in right after Ivan and touched it too.
Scrabblers eyes went wide as his friends vanished. He had no idea what to do, and was clearly frightened.
As Ivan and Daseem touched the stone to vanish, Menrozzar found himself wondering what the nature of the effect was.
Seeing Scrabbler's frightened expression, he said, "Scrabbler, I suspect that this stone takes us to the Vault of Thorns. In order to get there, we need to touch it. I'll wait until you go through to make sure nothing happens to you. Okay?"
Menrozzar, Ivan and Bupkis suddenly find themselves in a spray of splinters that come from a little biped creature that look like it is woven from brambles. And those splinters are really painful.
Another one of those stabs at Bupkis with an oversized toothpick into the heel.
And before someone can react another burst of tiny pointy woodpieces washes over the group.
Bupkis dodges the worst of the splinters, but makes no further move. "Bramble creature hurts," he comments as he eyes it curiously.
Menrozzar is able to avoid the worst of the blast from the first one, but the second burst hits him hard.
The bloodrager calls out, "These are tiny fey creatures that burn well. If we have any fire, we should use it!"
He then rages and swings his lucerne hammer at the one that stabbed Bupkis.
But misses.
Scrabbler nods hesitantly and runs to touch the disappeary thing.
Ivan raises his shield just in time to block a large part of the splinters from turning him into a wooden porcupine.
Now what did ye do that for!? We ain't here ta' hurt nothin'. Knew I'd bloody regret dealin' with sprite magic.
but should have kept his mouth shut as another batch slam him right in the mouth.
awghit, fhat does et. He manages to stammer out before moving to slam his hammer into one and try to turn it into kindling.
Not to be left alone Amira touches the glowing stone too.
"That's a good bye then. I won't come with you on that path. Maybe we'll meet again another time." Ingrahild tells Menrozzar as one after another disappear from the marsh.
Inside the vault the fight rages. And it is terrifying what pain these little things can cause.
"Aie!" Daseem cried at the unexpected spray of splinters!
Not knowing what they where facing, he growled "Gorum!" while dropping a large donkey femur he'd found a few days ago. This quivered in the air before rushing to intercept any attacks!
He then stalked towards the nearest little enemy, whipped his sword out and swung it in powerful arc hoping to slice it to pieces!
Ivan hits one of those walking weeds, most of the twigs it is made from breaking. But that doesn't stop that fey creature. Daseem tries the same, but those things are really hard to hit. Daseem drives the blade into the ground.
The two tiny bramble figures ignore all that and team up on Bupkis. With their little spears they poke at his feet and legs. They are tiny and one wouldn't expect it but the stabs with those wooden tools are very painful.
"Ow," Bupkis said passively as the tiny creatures stabbed him.
"Do something. Don't stand around like a memorial!" Amira tries to cheer on Bupkis.
Frustrated by his clumsy sword work, Daseem positively growls as he yanks the sword out of the ground. He cries something primal and incoherent before bringing his sword down in a great overhand chop on the nearest bramble figure!
"No hurt Bupkis!" Scrabbler squawked, lunging at the nearest wood-thing
Daseem focuses more closely on the enemy. No matter the size, an enemy has to be take seriously. And of course for a worthy fight, Daseem chooses his own little weed to attack and not the one Ivan has broken already. With his huge blade - compared to the foe - he sends it tumbling away from Bupkis, all twigs bruised.
Scrabbler on the other side is not used to fight enemies that run through below him. That's his role! He beats furiously at the tiny fey but only hits the ground.
Ivan turns and slams into one of the creatures, putting all his dwarven weight, and frustration, into the swing.
If it is still alive, or if it falls and he is in range of the remaining sapling he slams his head into them as well.
Ivan utterly destroys the walking tumbleweed in a way even its mother couldn't tell the species anymore. And as he is in such a rage he headbutts the other one too. Which looks weird, as he rams the creature into the ground with his head.
As Ivan gets up again the Twigjack is still standing but staggered.
Menrozzar rages, this space too small for the hammer. He claws at the most wounded twigjack.