Our plan to release the dragons into the fortress in hopes that they would cover up our presence here was wildly successful, far more so than we had imagined. Cona informed us this morning that the two young wyrms were blamed for the escape of the dwarves, the deaths of the ogres and giants in the forge, and even the lammia. They were captured and killed with further served the purpose of leaving no witnesses to our presence in the caverns. Not only does no one know we are here, but there is no reason to even suspect it. We have bought ourselves more time and considerable freedom of movement.

But there is still Mokmurian. Alert to our presence or not, he is a dangerous foe and even more so surrounded by the beings with whom he has entered into service and they must be dealt with.

The first of these was an ancient hill giant which occupied a room on this very level. The battle with him was brutal and unexpectedly lengthy, for he could meld into the dirt to heal himself and we had no means (magic or otherwise) for affecting him in this state. The first time he did this we could do nothing but wait for him to return and we were interrupted by a pair of stone giants who had come wandering in for reasons unknown. We killed them and tied them up on posts that were in the room for this purpose to make it look like the hill giant had lost his temper and patience– something we were told was not unheard of– and thus set him up as responsible for their deaths. When he emerged from the dirt we were ready for him and took him down quickly, and we buried his remains save for his head which we took with us. In this manner we have used his reputation to our advantage, and once again we seem to have covered our tracks and bought ourselves more time.

The passage to the lower levels that house Mokmurian’s chambers and study are private, and no one dares enter there except at his order. With the hill giant dead there is not likely to be someone who will follow us there. As for the lower levels themselves, what we have seen so far is a single path through a series of chambers, some with traps, some occupied by allies. This does suggest that we will have to fight our way to Mokmurian, which I am sure is intentional, but it also means we will not have to watch our backs. Or so I hope.