Aury wonders if it is normal for a dragon turtle to have telepathy.
You haven't heard of it, but all you really know is that they are reknown for their steam breath. Lore surrounding dragons is often shrouded in mystery and often requires advanced study.
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Sly watches as many of those gathered seem to drift off into their mental conversations. Unwilling to forgo the opportunity to speak with one of his 'relatives', he tries it out for himself.
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"Fellow scaled one, a pleasure to meet you also cousin! I would happily attempt to seek out a temple, although I am not very mobile out of the water. The temple beneath the lake is not the one you seek, and as others have asked, I unfortunately do not know about Kao Lor or his descendents. I do the the ability to mimic certain spells, and I can do some divinations! Unfortunately the spells are very costly, so I have humbly asked if your group would be able to facilitate the financial portion of this while I provide the magical."
You do get some sort of hunch or vibe that something isn't quite right. It may just be due to how the telepathy doesn't translate well as a conversation, because there are no associated nonverbal cues like you would get in a face to face verbal exchange, at least none from the turtle. Although it may be hard in the huge crowd to determine who is talking to him. It just feels off, and somewhat creepy.
Spoiler:"No, we don't know anything about this world anymore, it's all been lost to time. Can you tell us what you know about those cities? Anything that could help us know what to expect would be appreciated."
"I know where these cities are but my kind is not welcome to enter them and I know they are port cities of various nations of the world. I could possibly go into more details, but it would take a considerable amount of time, and your companions are also inundating me with questions. I apologize for the brevity of my answers as I am trying to respond to everyone."
On the way back to their camp, Aury tries to sever any telepathic connections to Akluzzar by thinking about gardening, the best brushes to use for calligraphy, and the colors of her favorite books in Goodwin's library. Aury pulls Sly and the rest of her group aside.
"I think we should continue working on getting supplies. I don't trust Akluzzar's motives, and I don't think we can count on his or the goatling's support. They have other priorities to deal with than helping a bunch of strangers that showed up in their lands. We might be able to trade a little, but I don't think we can expect to be able to stay in the valley long." She says to them in Ancient Draconic.
"Hmmmmmm....... You can leave a sign at the entrance to my lair."
The response seems curt and skeptical of your enthusiasm.
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On the way back to their camp, Aury tries to sever any telepathic connections to Akluzzar by thinking about gardening, the best brushes to use for calligraphy, and the colors of her favorite books in Goodwin's library. Aury pulls Sly and the rest of her group aside.
"I think we should continue working on getting supplies. I don't trust Akluzzar's motives, and I don't think we can count on his or the goatling's support. They have other priorities to deal with than helping a bunch of strangers that showed up in their lands. We might be able to trade a little, but I don't think we can expect to be able to stay in the valley long." She says to them in Ancient Draconic.
Sly doesn't resist as Aury'tss leads him away from the gathering. "You are right. Something feels off. Like a film of oil on top of water. The claw marks that we saw at the bottom of the lake, I believe they were made by Ak-, him. And he doesn't seem to want us to investigate the structure down there. I do not think our cousin is as benevolent as he would like to appear."
Aury looks surprised to see Sly agree with her. "It probably just wants us to bring a bunch of treasure so he can take it to a hoard in the lake. But it's too dangerous to investigate right now, and the others seem to trust it."
She thinks for a moment.
"We should do some research on dragon turtles, and this valley, before bringing it up with anyone, I think."
After the Dragon Turtle attempted to contact Grubgullet through his mind, Grubgullet simply stared at it for several minutes, with no idea what to say. He recognized the familiar sense of psychic contact as something Master Goodwin would have been capable of, but he had no idea what the question meant.
Eventually, his group seemed to start splitting off from the others, so he hung his head and followed them off.
Day 3 - Morning
Your group returns to their own camp that evening and it takes a while again to get there. You sleep in later and a new day arrives. The night was uneventful and those on watch saw nor heard anything more interesting than an owl, or other nocturnal wildlife coming to the lake for water. A few raccoons come looking for crayfish. The dawn comes, the sun peaking over the eastern mountains and it slips higher into the sky before anyone is fully rested and ready to prepare spells for the day.
You know that Golden Ram had planned to hold Council today for anyone who wanted any further words. Otherwise the day is yours.
In the morning the small kobold brushes off first and grass from her nightclothes and casts a simple spell to clean them.
"So when we left there were still a bunch of us there. Do you all think we need to head back to talk to the leader?"
"I bet that they will be able to set up trading with them, we could spend today gathering more food to try to trade to them"
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"This might be a bit risky, but Hseir, what do you think of checking out the lair while our cousin is otherwise engaged with the goat-men.?"
Aury doesn't object to the plan, but looks worried when it's brought up. "But do we know that Akluzzar will be at the goatling's camp? If the yearly ceremony is over, he might just return to his cave until called again."
"We wouldn't even be able to feign ignorance if caught, because I already brought asked Akluzzar whether that was his home, and he said not to visit it."
Grubgullet, hours later, realized that he could have asked the turtle for food, and immediately began to sulk.
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-------------------------------------------------------------------"This might be a bit risky, but Hseir, what do you think of checking out the lair while our cousin is otherwise engaged with the goat-men.?"
"Even with him being a pretender dragon, Sly, he is most likely powerful enough that we should not mess with his home. Perhaps later, when we know he is not in the lake."
"I tire of these goatmen. They are not our problem; why should we stay to make amends for a winning the battle? No, we owe them nothing, and we should move on,."
My sentiments exactly, they attacked us. WE defended ourselves, we won. That puts them in our debt. We owe no life dept, nor any other debt for sparing them.
Shaeyl considers we had originally thought to head for the mountains, is everyone still in accord with that?
Aury sits on a log, surrounded by her spellbook and notes as she studies. "We should learn more about the humans and dwarves first. If we can trade with them for supplies it could save us weeks, and we could learn more about the area instead of wandering aimlessly north."
"I remember that someone said Jovar and Tolhemia were heading south, maybe they will come back with news soon."
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Sly nods in acceptance of Hseir's point about Akluzzar.
"I obviously agree about not owing a debt to the goatlings. I would, however, like to know what they will ask of our 'siblings'. And they are our most immediate source of basic goods, if we are so inclined, though, not shoes, I imagine. After that, I'm willing to find out more about and from the humans and dwarves, if they will speak to us."
"Alright then today we can visit the camp and talk with their leader. We have more than enough food to spend some time there."
"More tiny berries..?"
Grubgullet seems very disappointed by the notion.
"Go on, I shall stay behind, gather food and make some tools or something. I have no wish to speak to the goatmen, and would probably cause more problems than I solve."
"But, by no means allow me to stop you. Go."
[dice=Survival]1d10+10
Aury heads over to the goatling camp in the morning after preparing spells.
Shaeyl stays back at camp working on wicker baskets.
Day 3 - Mid Morning
In the morning, as some of you prepare to go meet with Golden Ram, Jovar appears to update everyone on the status of Tolhemia and her group. He flew through the night to arrive here.
"Greetings friends. Tolhemia has established a temporary home in one of the villages of the goatlings. They are taking up residence there and sending envoys to parley with the Dwarven Thain who runs the lakeside cliff fort that borders the goatling lands. The dwarves are in charge of this fortified town that is a joint interest of the human and dwarven kingdoms. Due to the large mining and logging resources, the two races have pooled their efforts to keep the area safe. A significant halfling population is employed in the logging industry at the lake front so say our scouting attempts. Gnomes also make up a small population. There are few if any elves seen. If discussions go well with the Thain, they will see if they can move to the fort town itself and use it as their next stepping stone before moving further. The goal being to learn enough of the world to make intelligent choices about where to begin the search for Goodwin. Tolhemia wishes to communicate her effort will be twofold. One, to seek out divination magics that will reveal where Goodwin is. Two, to strengthen in power, knowledge and wealth to afford the divination, or to master such magics ourselves. With extra strength and power, we can secure Goodwin's rescue. If the Thain rebuffs our efforts to peaceably join their town, they will remain with the Goatlings and seek a method to enter the civilized nations elsewhere. Several groups have split from Tolhemia's and are fanning out to attempt to explore into other lands. If you have messages you wish to relay to Tolhemia or other groups let me know. I see that many are still here at the lake."
Jovar also shows you a crude area map that Tolhemia had created on a scrap of cloth.
Aury studies the map. "Looks like we aren't going north after all! We'll still need most of the supplies we planned for anyway, we can't count on everywhere outside of the plateau to be as easy to gather food in."
The goatlings may not have decent weapons, we can hope they at least have cloth or leather. We'll need some cold weather gear. Writing supplies would be nice too. Several of us could readily benefit from sharing a few basic spells.
Shaeyl was sorting through the various sticks, twigs, and grasses, organizing them by how green they were and how long. Making a couple of baskets would be interesting, he hadn't done this without any tools in ages, like ten thousand of them.
"From what we've seen, Shaeyl, I'm not sure they'll have much of what we need. They are quite primitive, from a technology standpoint."
"For now, myself and a few of my companions are in need of supplies before we travel anywhere. We do not have much to trade, but we have had great luck gathering food in our short time here. I am sure after such a grand ceremony, it would be good to replenish your stores."
Aury smiles as she mentions the ceremony, and continues.
"It is good to hear you can make cloth and leather crafts. Before we travel, my companions want to be prepared for anything we might encounter, as we will not have much support in this world. If we could trade for warm clothing, backpacks and waterskins, that would save us weeks of crafting ourselves."
"Metalworking is completely out of our reach right now, so any bronze knives and tools to work leather on our own would be appreciated"
Aury'tss, that discussion can happen easily, perhaps with one of the Elders. You take on aside and work on the logistics. They say yes if you come to their village with Golden Ram when they return today, they can provision you with those supplies. They are not really backpack users, but they have satchels, and other things that your group could modify so be similar.
Day 3 - Late Morning
The initial group discussion seems to be winding up at the main tent. Those who wish to hold smaller meetings or even one on one are encouraged to visit. The campsite itself is being restored to a condition you can scarcely believe housed over a hundred individuals the night before. The campfires are extinguised, the ashes scattered, large rocks returned to their orginal spots. All refuse and garbage is picked up. Tents are all packed away aside from Golden Ram's tent and the goatlings are busy at work, making sure the beach looked unspoiled.
Aury marvels at the goatling's hard work in taking apart their campsite, and says to Sly, "We should try to do the same with our campsite when we leave. It's their land after all."
Aury switches to Ancient Draconic in her response, as goatlings work on the camp around them. "It seems like it's most likely his presence, but I haven't asked any further. Perhaps we can ask some questions about the goatling's history on our walk back to their camp, but we should be careful. I might not trust Akluzzar, but these people seem straightforward and friendly enough that I don't want to insult them."
She thinks to herself how nice it is to have a reason to speak her native tongue.