Last Game

I announced I couldn't heal anymore, so we rested in the room where there had been lightning.
After our rest, Gribble and Becki decided to dance around for us with music. Then a voice started talking, about... something. The statue in the middle of the room fell over, and lightning flew everywhere. I didn't dodge it fast enough, and the last thing I felt was incredible pain. Kalhiss survived I think though.

Any incomplete posts will be finished. And if Kalhiss is still alive when APL hits 9.5, let's talk ghost maybe.

A Story of the Striking Weatherhead

Also to come later today.

Fewer Games

Before leaving, there was an explosion. Apparently, the draka had been hurt, I healed him. *growl* He really seems to get hurt a lot, even more than Cade. The explosion was loud enough that some monsters came and attacked us. The hunt was short and most the group left, except for Silens, who came and ate with me. The draka didn't want to eat, he's big, maybe he wasn't yet hungry. Gribble also stayed and watched (i'm playing to the high wisdom) but he didn't come eat with us. Maybe he's more of a scabenzer. While we were eating, I think Becki passed by again, I'm not too sure, and one of the short lizards set a trap. I guess being small they have to use traps to get food.

The draka decided to play more games, one involved a lot of lightning, and the other involved smoke and bad smells - like when a city-person tried to cook on a campfire for too long. Apparently there had been some form of dog in the room, so I howled. I didn't hear any response, so I felt confident that we were not impeding on any territory. We advanced a little bit, before the draka REALLY MESSED UP. He was supposed to jump out of the way of a couple big stone blocks I think, but they hit him both. He looked really really bad, so I helped move them, and used my last healing spell on him (except the tiny healings). He should practice more. Becki mentioned something about the Striking Weatherhead to Cade. I think I know the story she was mentioning.

The Tale of the Bar Guest

One story I really liked was that of the Bar Guest. I heard it so many times, I remembered it all.


In a distant time ago, a greedy halfling named Zyth lived. Now Zyth wasn't a thief of any sort, but rather, he liked to gamble. He would gain the upper hand, and then bet on rediculous things. One day, he came across a small town. This town wasn't very special, but there was one man who was. A mysterious man, dressed in a leather jacket and cap, had stayed in the town for many a day. He was known to stick around the bar, and he would drink epic amounts. When he had drank his fill, he would become extremely violent, often leaving the bar to abuse anyone unfortunate enough to cross his path. He usually slept in the bar, always having a drink in his hand. Because his peculiar choice of residence, he was known as the Bar Guest.

Zyth over the next couple weeks, cheated most people out of their money. Eventually, it came time for Zyth to cheat the Bar Guest. Zyth carefully watched the Bar Guest's patterns, payed the bartender some money, and the next day, challenged the Bar Guest to keep himself under control for a certain number of drinks, which was near the maximum limit as observed by the Bar Guest. He accepted, since the money was good and it seemed reasonable. The Bar Guest began to drink, and realized that his drink was stronger than normal. He said nothing. He continued to drink. Zyth stared on in horror, as the Bar Guest didn't even twitch. After a while, Zyth couldn't take his eyes away, even when the Bar Guest stood up, took all Zyth's money, and left. Zyth never did learn who the Bar Guest really was, but after that, he became a new halfling. The Bar Guest, having somehow survived the ordeal, like all other heroes, wandered off, to wherever heroes go.

As for how he fooled Zyth, his kindness towards the bartender had earned him a warning. With that, he had removed something from under his hat, and his gaze had stunned Zyth. Who, or what the Bar Guest was, is anyone's guess.

Bad Play

Kalhiss wanted to talk, so Zoostick helped me understand again. Kalhiss doesn't really seem to like me, because he doesn't seem to value me much. I'll make him understand. People healed quickly, and we left again. After a while we met a girl who called herself Becki, and took a while to introduce ourselves. Zoostick introduced me. We then found a room that interested a few of the group, something about a sword. We left right afterwards. We then came to a pair of doors. It turns out that I was about to play my first game with the group.

Once inside, Cade opened another door, and then all the doors closed! Kalhiss, the small lizards, and Gribble were still outside. Then the far wall started moving, and both walls grew lots of oily pointy metal. Cade and Becki were playing a different game with the wall, the one with little metal sticks, while Zoostick and Fanfare tried to break a door. I tried to break the door we came in through, but it wasn't working. The wall kept coming towards us, only slowed because the draka was pushing back on it. Becki helped by taking a ladder out of her backpack and blocking the wall with it. The wall broke it.

Pretty soon I had to stand to keep pushing, but the floor was really slippery! I kept falling and getting poked by the spikes, and they felt extra-bad. The draka had lost the game, and he was lying on the ground not moving. Then Kalhiss opened the door! I was so happy that he saved us from all losing the game. I couldn't hiss, but I rubbed against him. He patted me in return. I was wrong about him before. I wonder what I can do for him. He saved me. I'm supposed to return him to his tribe already. I'll ask him later. I really wanted to tell Kalhiss at that moment "I don't like this game." Oh well, maybe he already knows. Gribble healed me a lot.

Going back in to help the Draka, Zoostick was smashing the oily pointy metal off the wall. Then, him, me, and Becky dragged the draka back to where we had slept earlier. I prayed, and then cured myself. Then I helped the draka a little, and finished fixing his book. We stayed for a very long time, I got my spells back, healed what little damage was left on the draka. I told Kalhiss through Zoostick about the sibeccai way of loyalty, of which Kalhiss said he'd think about it. I studied him, he looked a different kind of drained, that I couldn't help. I still have to do something for him!

I smelled Becki, she smelled really different from anyone I've met. She mentioned something about Arkliss being a bar guest. Maybe she meant the Bar Guest from the story. We decided it was time to leave again.

Sports

Continuing forward, we wandered through a lot of halls, when Cade stopped in front of a wall. He patted it for a while, then it slid into the ceiling. There were some boxes on the other side, but they didn't smell like anything. The wall closed again, but it opened a few seconds later. Perhaps it was another game! I went back outside, since I remembered that I was supposed to find lizardmen, and there was one in the back of the group. Maybe he was hiding a snake. Unfortunately, according to Zoostick this lizardman didn't speak people talk. Instead he just hissed and spat a lot. Zoostick understood it though. Apparently the lizardman just wanted to know where I got the necklace, and that Slisth, along with the others, were dead. Promptly, we realized that it was our turn to play, so Zoostick and I tried to find the right place to hit on the wall. The lizardman banged on the wall and it opened! Maybe he'll tell me how he did that.

Cade was standing at another door, and he was shoving little metal sticks into the lock. He seems to play this game a lot. I asked Zoostick about the smoke-door game, and he said it wasn't a game, and that a "trap" had caused everything. It didn't seem like a very good trap anyway, since you can't eat whatever's caught if it's going to get burned.

And also playing with the boxes, by opening them in funny ways, was another short person, Gribble or something. Anyway, earlier he kept saying he wasn't tasty so I had asked Zoostick if this was why we needed "holy" relish. He said they were looking for a holy relic, not relish. Cade said a holy relic was a very special item. He still didn't say why we needed it though!

Continuing on, Cade kept playing with locks (how come we don't get to play?) and we eventually stopped in a room with a desk. The draka picked up a ring that shot fire, and it burned the book a little bit. We found another room a little bit later, that had some glass bottles, I asked the draka for them and filled them with water (and made rain on Silens!) Zoostick took the bottles.

We left after that, and came to another more interesting room. There were a couple nice blankets on the walls, and lots of colorful tiles on the ground. Cade advanced, jumping around in a funny way. I'll have to ask him how this game works too! Unfortunately, he seemed to be playing badly, since he kept saying bad things and falling down. He looked a little drained from his falls so I used a spell to restore what I could. I should have had another ready, but I didn't. He had taken the blanket from the far wall, and was wearing it. It looked really nice, and it had shaped itself into a good piece of breastplate. Since Cade was having trouble walking, Zoostick and I helped him back to the room where I made it rain, and I fixed the book a little. Then the short lizards went to rest.

Breakfast and Smoke

From Madrudur, a door took me to somewhere else, a lot of other creatures were there too. Apparently, it was some kind of prison as one of the talkative gnomes said. He talked a lot, but it was fairly uninteresting (not to mention he was talking half nonsense anyway, something about frictals and zef and medumas and such), however, they had conveniently left a few doglike bodies there for breakfast. Silens waited until I had begun eating before he did, and after a while, the large lizardlike beast (a draka by the name of Fanfare if I remember right) accepted an invitation to eat as well. The rest of the group seemed to find the offer rather odd (maybe they were afraid of the quills). Fanfare and I had a brief conversation, until I had eaten enough. After that I took a brief nap while the same gnome kept on talking. Eventually Fanfare woke me up and said that we were leaving.

We eventually came across a statue which seemed to divert some attention from the more heavily armored gnome, who said his name, but it was terribly long and all I remember of it was something like Zoostick. He seems to like sticking his hands out in front of him and staring for a while, and then announcing how much evil he feels. Well, at any rate, we went into the adjacent room (apparently, the other room probably had more of the howlies we had eaten), and the halfling, Cade, investigated a nice looking pedestal in the center of the room. He was hit by a stunning number of needles, and obviously needing help, I used a curative spell to help his wounds. Zoostick also seemed to do something like that to Cade. After that, the talkative one, Farmock, started studying the pedestal. The rest of the group shifted to the other room and started yelling at eachother, I played with Silens in the meantime, since I'm pretty sure he was as bored as I was.

After a while the group came back to the pedestal room and started talking, something about holy relish, and more about the prison. I stopped playing with Silens as we went north, and found some yellow dogs. They looked like they didn't want to be bothered, so the group closed the door, before I could even try to do anything. Not that it was important. I felt as a good gesture, it would be best to see if there were any other dogs, as so to avoid terrority problems. I howled, Silens joining me. Only the dogs we had just disturbed responded, so it was pretty obvious that there were no other territories to worry about (other than the goblins and bogbears that were being talked about). We came to another room with a weapon rack, we left quickly though as nobody needed them.

We found anothe room that was made of wood, with a large sack of gold in the middle. Farmock threw something that smelled oily into the room, and it burst into flames. Not wanting to have to keep smelling the smoke, I retreated with Silens a fair distance. After a while, Fanfare went into the room, I guess closing the door. Zoostick and a couple others charged down the door, and they decided it was time to leave. Or maybe they had already decided it was time to leave and this was no time to play games? Or were they playing something with Fanfare? I must remember to ask. We pressed onwards, seeing the room nearly entirely in flames at this point.