"It is a fair distance," the goblinoid calls back to you, but he seems to otherwise be ignoring you.
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"A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step." Ziphora answers sagely as she stomps the paw of the hydra body for emphasis.
"Put one paw in front of the other. Do not try to lift more then 3 paws at the same time."
Tomorbataar seems able to contain himself well now, and is happy enough to remain quiet.
The journey does take a while. In fact, it takes more than a day. The drake and goblin(?) seem none too pleased with your slow pace, though they (just barely) don't say anything about it. Then again, you get the feeling the drake isn't too happy about the creature on its back, either.
Eventually, however, you come to the foot of another mountain, and the goblin-creature points up to a shape on its slopes. There seems to be a faint path beaten in the groundat the foot of the mountain leading up.
"The Master's fortress. You can climb there yourselves."
And with that, they take off.
Grash only votes to ambush the goblinoid if they can already see the lair by then. Otherwise he advocates holding off, for now.
Beachhead votes to go up the path towards the wizard's lair.
Ziphora agrees with Beachhead on marching up the wizard lair.
Shall we carry on then?
As does Tomorbataar.
"Aye, we be runnin' out of time if we wish to save them humans, since it will be another three days' walk back."
Grash also votes to go to wizard lair.
You start up the path, Mo trailing behind. It's clear it wasn't made for a creature of your... girth, but you manage to struggle up it without falling off the side of the mountain.
At the end of the path is a small fortress on a large, relatively flat part of the mountainside. The wizard from before is standing on the top of the fortress's wall. As he sees you come, he speaks, his voice magically amplified.
"Ah! So you have chosen the wise course of joining me."
"Well that depends if you're removing the flame seed from the humans encampment. " Ziphora temporizes.
We'd also like to know a bit more about your wall. Do you live in it? Tomorbataar examines the wall closely, seemingly interested.
"What? Don't tell me you actually care about them," the wizard scoffs. "If it weren't for the power behind them I would have simply obliterated them and been done with it."
He seems too caught up in this subject to care about Tomorbataar's question.
"I do care about them. They're my friends! They cured Beachhead's blue funk, introduced us to a lot of nice lizardmen..." Ziphora retorts.
"That do be raisin' the question of why ye be caring about them. They hardly seem to have done anaething to thee, and dinnae even know ye existed until recently."
Grash also idly summoned up a heavy drum, thumping it once or twice to check it's tone.
Grash votes to sneakily keep edging toward the wall.
After the others react, Tomorbataar stops studying the wall. What power behind them? Their king?
He then reaches out and taps the wall several times with his head, trying to get a feel for how hard it is.
Tomorbataar also votes to move close to the wall.
Anyway, we'd love to come inside and feast...
The wizard notices you're getting close to his fortress and holds up a hand. "Stop! Come no closer!" he commands. "I didn't give you permission to approach!"
Oh, sorry.
Tomorbataar votes to halt.
So uh, we officially request permission to come inside and have a conversation with a nice meal.
Tomorbataar mentally kicks the others at his pun this time, it's really quite jarring.
Oh, and he also stares rather intently at the wizard. His eyes are like laser beams, piercing into the wizard's soul.
Grash glared at the wizard with no-longer-hidden predatory intent and rage. "And why be we needin' your permission to approach? Ye be naught but a scrawny little elfling with an overinflated opinion of yerself and a few fancy tricks. Ye got a big mouth and a bigger ego, and ye be forgettin' that we be having the bigger body and sharper teeth. Now SHUT YER TRAP WHILE WE CRUSH YE!
As he spoke, Grash thumped his head against the drum with a steadily increasing tempo, a rising war-song building. As he finished speaking, he suddenly paused, the silence sudden and weighty, descending oppressively upon the wizard.
Grash votes CHAAAARGEEE!
Ziphora's head perks up as she gathers power, then takes Warheads cue to strike."For the humans! You big, bad, spellcasting bully who only uses magic to hurt people!" She releases a warcry of her own.
"A rather undignified display of strength," Tomorbataar begins, rearing his head up high, "but, as they say,
CHAAAAAAAARGE!!!!"
Tomorbataar votes to run away like a small child.
Oh wait, no.
Tomorbataar votes to CHAAAAAAAARGE with no fewer than four exclamation marks. !!!!
Beachhead just now realizes that he hasn't been stealthed, since the last time he tried it was when their guide drake was approaching. Oops.
He also votes to CHAAAAAAAAAAARGE.
The problem with Grash's speech was that it gave the wizard time to realize you were about to attack. Time enough to cast a spell first. copies of the wizard appear as he backs away from the edge of the wall.
This doesn't put him out of range of Ziphora's blast. However, the water simply passes through one of the copies, making it vanish.
Then your body... well, more like the base of your necks strike the wall with a tremendous crash. It hurts, but neither you nor the wall are really that badly damaged. Still, you cracked a few of the stone blocks that make up the wall. It'd take you a while, but you could probably smash it.
Now that your heads are over the top of the wall, you can see that the fortress is actually all one large building. It has a very slight slope to its roof, but it's actually fairly flat except for the tower to the east on which a fire drake perches. After your rather dramatic display of hostility, it seems to be getting ready to take off. You also notice a couple other drakes that were lounging around on the roof getting up.
The wizard, finding himself robbed of his voice by Grash's spell, runs over to the tower and opens a door in the back of it, disappearing into the tower.
Ziphora fires a water blast at the firedrake!
Grumbling that the wizard got away before he could strike, Beachhead bravely vanishes from sight.
He'll then wait until a drake is in range before bellowing with a rage-unintelligible "NinJAAaaAaA!" and sneak attacking.
Ziphora's water jet strikes the nearby drake straight in the chest. It staggers backward, then roars in rage and takes off, diving at Ziphora.
...Only for Beachhead to appear next to it and tear its throat out. It crashes down on the roof of the fortress, looking rather dead.
The other two drakes roar in unison. One charges forward and tries to bite the now-visible Beachhead.
But the slippery ninja head nimbly evades its fangs.
The other one takes the simple expedient of engulfing all four of you in a fireball.
Ziphora handily dodges most of the fireball.
Tomorbataar notices the drake about to blast them and slips out of the way just in time, narrowly avoiding the fireball by placing his head very close to the ground. He pops back up, moving in close to the charging drake and giving a firm skull on skull blow.
Mo! Tomorbataar calls out after striking, Got any rocks handy? That one's flying.
Trusting her brothers to finish the ones on the ground, Ziphora focuses on the flying drake that tossed a fireball at them all. "You show me fire, I show you water! Water beats fire!" Ziphora staunchly declares as she launches a waterjet at the drake.
"Mo! Quit slacking at the back and help us with the drakes!" Ziphora commands.
Turning his attention to the only drake within reach, Beachhead tears into it with gusto.
Grash avoids most of the heat, partially by continuing to frantically beat on his drum. Then, with an inarticulate growl of rage (because his mouth is full), he lifts the heavy wood-and-bone drum and hurls it at the closer drake... realizing only afterwards that he just threw his only drum.
"At 3rd level and every 3 levels thereafter, a skald learns a rage power that affects the skald and any allies under the influence of his inspired rage."
Beachhead votes for the body to try and crash through the doors (assuming those blocks along the wall right in front of us on the map are the doors in question).
Grash, realizing he'd forgotten something, votes GRAWR SMASH PUNY DOORS.
Tomorbataar strikes the drake squarely on the head, but it manages to keep its wits about it well enough to not be stunned. Beachhead takes a bite out of it, while Ziphora's water jet and Grash's drum strike the other drake.
Mo, who had been hanging back, obediently throws a rock.
His boulder smacks it right in the chest, but it somehow remains airborne. It seems rather hesitant to approach, however, instead hanging back while it catches its breath.
The other drake seems rather leery of you, as well, and it takes a step back and spits a fireball at you.
At Beachhead and Grash's urging, your body rears up to smash the doors. They give surprisingly easily... oh, wait, no, someone opened them. You feel something cutting into your chest, but with all of your heads above the fortress's roof you can't see what it is.
"Oh no, you don't ye fire breathing lizards!" Ziphora retorts as she returns fire water jets.
Tomorbataar easily ducks behind the wall before the fireball explodes, avoiding any damage. Can't reach drake, better pull back.
Tomorbataar votes to take a step back to investigate the mystery of the chest pains.
Once they've taken a step, Tomorbataar reaches out towards the newfound foe. If whatever creature stands in the doorway is no larger than a large human, he tries to sweep it off it's feet. If, however, it is a larger creature, he instead shows lateral thinking by smashing his head into it.