as told by the cavalier Olmas Lurecia, himself.

Wealday, 27 Pharast

Examining the former belongings of the hobgoblins and giants, we found

[525,526] great clubs
[527] cure serious wounds (4)
[528] MW do-maru armor (6)
[529] MW heavy wooden shields (6)
[530] MW composite long bows ST +3 (6)
[531] MW morningstar (6)
[532] 74 arrows

We entered the hallway and discovered doors at each end. We piled the hill giant bodies in front of the south door to slow down anyone entering, and checked out things to the north. Radella took the lead, and I was by her side. It was not locked, and led to a short vestibule with another door in it. Caution again proved unnecessary, and it appeared to open into a corridor. To the north, we could hear voices – not alarmed, just talking. There was also a waterfall, which muffled a great deal of the conversations. We seem to be about 60′ above the activity below us, and a rickety ladder led down. Turning to the south, we saw the corridor seemed to have … decorations.

That is, if you can consider body parts “decorations”. It looked like more of the dishonorable behavior that had left two people impaled on the front door of this place, except nothing was left alive in this corridor. The smell was unnpleasant. As we moved south, it became apparent there was more than body parts here – there was another maimed body. A monk, perhaps, from the clothing …

Right then Qatana, Radella and myself distinctly heard the sound of breaking bones. At the same time, a spirit rose out of the body on the wall, wavered a bit and headed for Kali. Before anybody could take another action, it merged with Kali and her eyes went distant for a moment. We feared the worst.

We decided to use both the carrot and the stick. Radella said, not unkindly, “do you need help?” More directly, I said, “State your purpose!” Qatana looked annoyed and said, “it probably doesn’t know Common!” Then in Tien, she said, “Can we help you?”

Thru Kali, the spirit said, “I need vengeance” (in Tien, of course – Qatana translated for me.) Kali returned to us but said simply, “I’m okay. She needs to kill the oni.”

Well, we wanted to kill the oni too, so other than her taking over the body of one of our friends, we’re on the same page.

We continued to the end of the corridor where we found a small (1’x1′) iron grate. Nehali flew out and verified that this looked like the other end, in that we were about 60′ above the ground and various figures (including hobgoblins) were moving around below us. She also reported there being some stone house that apparently stood out.

We decided to rest, but Kali suggested that before we lie down, Nehali take a message to the people we rescued above us, to let them know that this was going to take longer than we thought. But Nehali returned fairly soon saying that there were hobgoblins heading towards them, so rest would have to wait.

We headed back to the entrance and encountered four hobgoblins that were apparently preparing to descend to us, but why take the chance? It looked like they might be using a magic rope to descend past the impossibly smooth portion of the opening, and while we were prepared to deal with that, Kali decided to hasten their descent by casting a sleet storm. Two lost their balance and fell to their death (or more accurately, to the party below that insured they were dead), one found themselves falling but at a very gentle rate (feather fall a la Kali). The 4th … I dispatched.

Qatana cast Hold Person on the gently fallen hobgoblin and Kali prepared to question him. But Dali, using, I guess, his thespian skills, convinced that hobgoblin that he was actually his commander, and we learned that this party was returning from a patrol and (to their knowledge) was the only one that had been out. Then we got him drunk on endless sake, and Ivan slit his throat when he passed out.

We again gained a few things:
[533] magic rope
[534] MW do-maru armor (4)
[535] MW heavy wooden shield (4)
[536] MW Composite longbows (+3 ST) (4)
[537] MW morningstar (4)
[538] 13 arrows

But no healing potions this time. Disappointing.

Returning, we discovered that Radella and Ivan had quietly pulled up the ladder to our level. And methodically destroyed it. Which I guess made us safer, but … how will we get down?

However, armed now with a little more information and a few less hobgoblins, we now at least felt safe in resting. We blocked off each end of the corridor and rested there.

Oathday, 28 Pharast

After a refreshing sleep, I arose to the sound of roosters crowing and a bright gleam hitting my eye as the sun rose over the edge of a cloudless horizon. The fresh straw beneath me yielded perceptibly as I shifted on one hip, shaded my eyes, and looked over the rest of our sleeping

Wait, what?

After a refreshing sleep, I arose to the smell of rotting body parts while in utter darkness. Virtually blind in the complete darkness, I listened carefully before cautiously sitting up. Since we required only two hours of sleep a night, many of the party were already up and doing something quietly. I strained desperately to hear crowing roosters or catch slivers of light, but lately, the dreams have been far better than the reality we are in.

Imagine my distress when I found Zos sitting next to a living, breathing, blinking, pale hill giant, grinning. “What???” I exclaimed. “You can create undead? What are you doing?” But he quickly explained, and Qatana confirmed, that this was neither living nor breathing. (It did blink on occasion, but far more slowly than normal.) “Think of this as a crude golem,” he said.

I expressed concern, but he said, “nothing to be worried about. It’s just alchemy!” and he headed off to the other hill giant corpse. I looked at Qatana, but she was following him as if ready to take notes. Nobody else seemed concerned, but it all seemed … wrong to me.

At one point, we heard a mildly distant voice complain beyond the north door, “Aw, they took the ladder again!” Nice to know you’re appreciated.

Once everyone was up, we made our plan. Everyone would need dark vision, and we’d need either fly or airwalk. Suishen could help me with the latter, and a few of the magic users could help themselves, but for the most part, we burned some more charges on the wands. Thus prepared, we would head directly for the stone house that Nehali had seen, on the assumption that our pig hobgoblin leader creature would be there. The strategy that had worked best for us so far was “don’t use the front door”. With that in mind, our target was the roof. The reanimated hill giants were left behind as possible deterrents.

With all of us present, Dasi concentrated for a bit and said that below us was about 10 creatures of average intelligence, and there seemed there might some mild dissension below. We figured the house had three levels, so there might be a few hobgoblins on each level. That should be quiet doable. Some disagreement or dissension among themselves was an added bonus. Radella quietly led the way down, and I followed.

Unfortunately, even though I was using airwalk and not touching the ground, I guess I must have brushed a wall or something, because all of a sudden the hobgoblins in the room spun and looked right at us sneaking down the stairs. Oops. Oh well.

There were 6 warriors, 4 lesser armed females around the chief, and the swine guy himself. Qatana threw up a stone wall to keep the chief and his concubines isolated, and the rest of us were able to dispatch the fighters in under 20 seconds of fierce battle. I made some strong hits on the chief, and his response was to scream, “Munasukaru, I know you’re watching!” and commit ritual suicide. I climbed over the stone wall to take care of the concubines, and suddenly it was over. Kali had summoned an earth elemental and Ivan reported giants and other bad smells below us, so we sent the elemental down there. The giants killed it, but then ran off on their own, unhappy after dealing with it.

We were left with bodies and quiet. The house was far enough away from other things that unless the giants raised an alarm, probably nobody realized what had just happened. Well, to be honest, we were also left with a few items …

[539] +2 o-yoioi armor (like plate)
[540] +1 thundering great axe
[541] gold hilted dagger
[542] MW composite longbow (+4 ST)
[543] 20 arrows
[544] belt of giant strength +4 (Qatana)
[545] leather cloak of resistance +1
[546] conical warhat +1 luck bonus to AC, 1/day negate critical or sneak (Olmas)
[547] bronze rice bowl
[548] carved box with 6 spinnets
[549] carved horn libation cup
[550] MW morningstars (6)
[551] MW composite longbow (+3 ST)
[552] MW armor (6)
[553] MW heavy wooden shields (6)
[554] 32 arrows
47 gp

That warhat would improve my increasingly insufficient armor. This mithril breastplate is nice and light but it’s starting to not be enough to protect me.

Back up on the roof, we could see a bridge that led to a passage down. And down. And down. It went down something on the order of 200 ft. There were, again, disturbing images on the wall .. more like a mural. As we descended, a dull roar was also getting louder. The corridor finally opened into a chasm which held a thundering waterfall.

Following the outflow we quickly discovered a stone house, with a drawbridge on the other side. How might we get them to drop the drawbridge. Here we got very clever. By the grace of the spirit inhabiting Kali, she knew what Munasukaru looked like. So she could create an image of her, and while we’ve no idea what her voice sounds like, it couldn’t be heard here anyway due to the waterfall. The figure could probably get them to lower the drawbridge just by gestures. Qatana and I could play the part of prisoners, but all simply float over the water, further demonstrating Munasukaru’s great power.

Clever idea. Would have worked if there weren’t two giant water elementals living in the water that were poised to simply attack anything passing over the water. Attack HARD. Qatana and I retreated hastily, but the image, of course, was unaffected and still indicated to drop the drawbridge.

And they did! So it half worked, although it was rather painful for me. Ivan did plug some with arrows, although I’m not confident that arrows can really hurt water elementals.