24 Lamashan, Fireday

So Takkad was scrying upon this likely looking giant we’d found, to see if we could determine his habits and such so we could figure out the best time to attack him. His spell allowed him to scry for HOURS, and for everyone around, it’s kind of like going to a play with a blindfold on but somebody whispering in your ear. Once in a while, Takkad would say something like, “he seems to spend a lot of time in what appears to be his study.” Really. Boring.

So when some tattooed giants came to visit him briefly, mounted on crag spiders, I perked up. They mentioned to him that there were unconfirmed reports of humans in the area, and we could see when they left (we were, after all, in an abandoned house near the giant’s) that the runes actually glowed. Now THESE might be servants of Karzoug! Maybe with more rings.

I immediately volunteered to follow them, in gaseous form (thanks Wind Walk!) The group looked at each other and seemed to collectively shrug. Avia said she’d go along, but I’m not sure why. We can’t communicate when in gaseous form, but maybe she’ll see something I’d miss.

So as they saddled up, I went to follow them. I stayed behind them and tried to stay out of their gaze. After a while, they took on the appearance of being on patrol, but same old same old. Like they’d done this a thousand times before, but they really weren’t looking. Their head would turn but you could tell they were thinking of something else. Sometimes, they even said something unintelligible to each other while looking away. Pretty rote.

Which got me thinking. I know in wind walk we can go something like 60mph max, which is pretty fast. But then I started thinking of that classic problem: which is faster, a man or a horse? Well a horse of course, unless the race is short enough because it takes a small amount of time to go from standing still to full speed. For a small amount of time, the man can actually accelerate faster because he’s smaller.

So I figured out the math (they were still going through the motions of a patrol) and I figured that 60mph was a mile a minute, or 1/60th mile per second. That’s like 90 ft per second, but I can cast a spell every five seconds. So if they did see me, I’d probably have at least five seconds to get away. Could I go a maximum of 450 feet? Or because I have to accelerate, would it be less?

So I tried it a couple of times. I said to myself, “Ready, set, go!” and I’d zoom off in a straight line as fast as I could, counting to myself “One Korsova, Two Korsova …” and see how far I could get before reaching “Five Korsova”. The first time I went pretty far, but then realized I had no way of knowing really how far I went. So I estimated how tall each floor was — here in the giant district each floor was something like three times my height, so, maybe about 18 feet? But that meant even a three story building was only a little over 50 feet. What would make a good yardstick for 450 feet? Nothing really presented itself. Maybe I should just do one second and try to measure 90 feet. Or less, if I’m not that fast. I still don’t know for sure if I can go zero to ninety in one second. One second is a little hard to measure too.

About this time, I noticed one of the giants had turned around and seemed to be looking right at me. Now I know I’m not cmmpletely invisible, but I’m also a little indistinct and hard to make out. He nudges his companion, who turns around as well, and he says in Common, “Human, come to me and yield.” I felt a little shiver, and realized he’d just tried to charm me or something. Heh, not this well ordered, resilient mind, thank you!!

And I realized just how prescient I’d been to see how fast I could move, because now I needed to. I immediately went about 450 feet straight up. (In the excitement of the moment, straight up was my unthinking choice). Looking down, I could see he and his companion still staring at the spot I’d been — they had no clue which direction I’d gone.

Well, I did go pretty fast! Apparently the acceleration is almost instantaneous! Other than something like a magical ray, I could probably elude almost anything.

Then I thought, “what’s Avia doing?” I looked around, but couldn’t see her anywhere. Of course she was as hard to see as I was, but I’d thought she was right nearby. Little irresponsible of her to just take off like that. I thought we were supposed to stay together.

Suddenly the giants around me scattered. It was not in panic, but it was almost as if in response to some sort of silent command. The way that they and the two runed giants themselves reacted I think the two giants raised an alarm somehow.

Clearly, it was time to end the surveillance. I thought for a moment. If the alarm had been raised back where Takkad was scrying, they’d know about it too, and would probably be preparing to leave or hide. Where was Avia?

Perhaps she’d already thought this through and headed back. Increasingly, I’ve noticed, the party individually comes to the same conclusion in about the same time whenever we discuss an issue. Is it so far fetched to think we might independently arrive at the same correct solution? So, back to Takkad it is.

In windwalk form, it took but seconds. I wasn’t all that far away; the giants hadn’t exactly been galloping on their steeds. But when I got there, people started yelling at me. Weird, how I can hear them but I can’t speak to them. Seems unfair. They clearly thought I’d done something wrong, when in fact, it was fortunate I was so adept at speedy movement. Avia wasn’t there yet. I started to solidify, but that takes like half a minute.

During that time, Sabin teleported to Avia, who was apparently still on a rooftop somewhere near where the giants had been, She’d solidified, thinking there was going to be a battle. I swear, she doesn’t know when to just run away! Anyway, he took her a ring of invisibility (borrowed from Rigel?) so that she could return undetected.

Meanwhile, search parties were being organized, and our spot on the third floor of a building would eventually be discovered. Judging from the shaking of his head and increasingly coherent mumbles, Nolin did not find their effort praiseworthy. At one point, I think I heard him say something about finding a lass with both hands. Or maybe he said “last boat in these lands” but that makes even less sense.

Anyway, Avia showed up soon enough and got all in my face about it, and tried to blame the whole thing on me. Takkad also seemed to take her side, and he wasn’t even there. I didn’t think it prudent to point it out to them, but hey – who got back on his own and who needed to be rescued? Hmm? I think she’s just a little embarrassed and reacting poorly because of that. Sometimes I think she still sees me as a little kid or something.

Meanwhile, the group decided to go back to gaseous state and go somewhere that wouldn’t be searched (or at least searched soon). Some in the party were paranoid that the search would find us, and that the search would be exhaustive and that nobody would sleep until the humans were found. Personally, I think it’s more likely that when no humans are found after an hour or two, life will return to normal.

I mean, Karzoug has been aware of us for a few days now, and HE hasn’t apparently raised the alarm.

Anyway, at first we thought we’d go to the coliseum, and then somebody had the idea that if we went up by the citadel where the air was deadly thin, then even if somebody was tracking us they wouldn’t be able to follow us. This would be a very uncomfortable permanent camp, but it did meet that odd criteria. Then Nolin surprised everyone by remarking, “You know, with the entire city in an uproar looking for the humans, this would be a good time to go after a dragon.”

Isn’t that a little like, “hey, as long as I’m bleeding so much and my blood pressure is down anyway, wouldn’t this be a good time to see how sharp this knife is on my skin?” Wouldn’t fighting a dragon with everybody in a heightened state make us even more likely to be discovered?

Nolin thinks no. And many agree with him! I raise an argument but nobody’s listening to me now. So we waft over to the place in the temple district where we know one had made his home. We went in prepared for electricity – I used five resist electricity spells on Takkad, Kane, myself, Sabin, and Sedgewick. Just out of paranoia, I also cast resist cold on myself. I get 8 2nd level spells per day, so this is a good use of them. Don’t use many other 2nd level spells these days.

Rigel and Nolin received protection from electricity.

And off we went to kill a dragon while the city hunted for us.
We entered the dragon’s lair (an abandoned government building) and wisped into a large chamber, well past the entrance. Apparently this building used to house tax collectors, and had fortifications that (now) were not in use. The chamber was 20′ tall and 40′ wide. Using detect magic, we discovered we’d narrowly missed tripping an alarm spell that was cast over the center portion of the floor in the main entry way. We hadn’t become solid until we were past the alarmed area. Unless … does wisping over an area trip an alarm, or does it require physical contact and corporeal form?

We’ll never know for sure, but odds are that it detected us, because we were there less than a minute before a dragon appeared from a corridor at the other end of the chamber and shot a lightning bolt at us and disappeared around the corner. It hit everyone but Kane and Sedgewick. Myself .. happy for my resist electricity spell!

Reviewing my options, it appeared the best way to help at this point was to haste everybody (or at least six of us that were in range) so the fighters could get multiple attacks. The dragon did not immediately reappear, so I also cast spell resistance on myself.

By this time we had moved cautiously in the direction of the dragon, but it had still not appeared. Rigel peeked around the corner and announced it was empty. Was it invisible? Or did it run farther away? Shrug. Easy answer to that one. I walked up alongside Rigel and cast fireball about 80 feet away. Nothing screamed. No dragon.

A couple of people were surprised at this method, but Avia just snorted and rolled her eyes, while Nolin looked a bit thoughtful.

I walked forward another 40 or 50 feet and cast ahead of me again. Foof went the fireball. No dragon. People followed behind me. Takkad had cast True Seeing on himself and the timing was such that he could generally confirm my findings a few seconds after I lit up the room.

Sedgewick had cast Mislead earlier and so had a copy of himself to move as well. He moved him into the room after my 2nd fireball and discovered he made an excellent target. A lightning bolt shot from the far corner of this large room, where a blue dragon crouched. More importantly, Takkad shouted that there was a larger dragon invisible just 50 or 60 feet away. It too shot lightning at Sedgewick’s illusion, which wasn’t exactly harmed, but the bolt also was aimed at myself and Nolin. I dodged and with my resist, took fairly minor damage. Now with a visible target, though, I dropped a fireball in behind it. Nolin was hurt not at all, but the Usual Suspects (Avia, Sabin, Nolin, and Takkad) dimension doored their hasted selves right next to the larger dragon. Takkad cast Greater Dispel at it – that had only a slight visual effect but Takkad felt it had been pretty successful.

Unbeknownst to most of us, Rigel had invisibly lined herself up to do some serious damage. She pulled out her last arrow of Dragon Slaying, invoked True Strike, and let loose. While her arrow did not, as the name implies, slay it outright, the dragon was very very very upset with her and howled in great distress. Meanwhile, Avia was smiting and slaying and cutting and I think she also got a dozen steaks and a nice roast judging from the way she carved up the dragon. It was dead before anyone could utter “steak sauce”.

Rigel was now visible, of course, and within range of the smaller dragon. I put up an opaque wall of flame between her and the dragon and put myself between her and the dragon until she could become invisible again, but … no worry. Takkad called Destruction upon the smaller dragon, and it obliged him by not dodging destruction.

The battle was over. The big dragon was dead. The little dragon was dead. And outside, still the city hunted for us.

Inside, we were inspecting the bodies to see if they actually carried any magic items. The large dragon did:

[1616] a sihedron ring (yay, this was the goal after all) {Nolin}
[1617] a ring of greater cold resistance which, if nobody objects, I’d like to take. {Trask}

Sabin suggested we identify “the other rings” too. Other rings? Apparently while Takkad had been scrying the giant, Rigel and Kane and Sabin teleported over to raid his personal treasure chest. Really? And I was accused of living dangerously? Sheesh! Anyway, those two rings were

[1614] ring to engage a magical shield, but it was part of a pair and they needed to operate together .. or reciprocally, if I understood correctly.
[1615] ring of invisibility (maybe this is the one they lent to Avia?)

Now there was a pool in this room, and we thought that there might be loot there, or that it might be the RunePool running the alarm around the citadel on the mountain … but no, it wasn’t even magical. There was a dais, or at least raised portion of the room off to one side (I could imagine an art display there had this former government building still been in use). Sedgewick used his secret door detection and found a secret door on the back wall of this dais. It led through an irregularly cut corridor to an apparent dead end, but magic revealed another secret door at that end. There was sounds of commotion on the other side, so we chose not to open it and expose ourselves, but Sedgewick reported later that he heard, through the door and the hubbub, a voice say, “Karn – while everyone is looking for the humans, we should start the rebellion.”

Rebellion. Interesting times we are living in.

Meanwhile, there were some obvious doors on the east side, and Rigel checked them for traps. None. Opened them carefully …

… and found that the dragon we’d killed had been just a wee bit over-neat. Over-organized, perhaps. This was the most meticulously organized dragon hoard I’d ever seen. Well, okay, that’s not much since I’ve only seen three. Let’s just say, the most meticulously organized treasure room I’d ever seen. Coins were stacked. Like items were placed together, rings over here, wands over there. Detect magic told us it was similarly organized along those lines too – non-magic here, magic there.

It made it easy to determine there was about 128,000 silver coins here. (A lot to carry even with bags of holding.) There were about 42,000 gold pieces, and 1040 platinum. We snatched up those last two. But we also found

[1618] gold coffer w/70 gemstones (~20k gp)
[1619] silver bracelet
[1620] jade comb
[1621] red silk gloves with gold thread in a glass display box
[1622] masterwork mithril 1/2 plate
[1623] masterwork breast plate
[1624] banded mail (magic: +2)
[1625] wand of lightning (caster level 6) [23 charges] {Trask}
leather bag with six vials, the first five frozen solid:
[1626] cure light wounds
[1627] cure light wounds
[1628] cure light wounds
[1629] cure light wounds
[1630] owl’s wisdom
[1631] oil of magic vestment +4
[1632] bejewelled ivory scroll tube {Trask}
scroll of keen edge
scroll of unseen servant
[1633] ring of evasion
[1634] rod of extend metamagic (3x per day) {Sabin}

Having located (for some of us) the main reason for killing a dragon, the party continued on with less enthusiasm and alacrity. I’ve noticed that after finding a bunch of valuable things, the group takes on an attitude not unlike that of a person who has just eaten a good, full meal. Yes there are things I should be doing, yes of course I’m with you, but just tell me where to stand and I will support you from there.

That in mind, we continued on. There was another door to inspect yet. It had locks, yet was not locked. We entered and it revealed a ramp up, and more smallish rooms .. really, it looked like we’d entered some office space. Well, except for the area that seemed to have arrow slits; clearly we’d entered the tower.

We found a likely looking room, and I again created a Rope Trick to allow everyone to rest in semi-seclusion. Paranoid because of the ongoing search, Takkad also placed a glyph of warding in the hallway before reaching this room.

It has been a good day. And to think we might not have killed a dragon today had I not been quick enough to escape the grasp and sight of those two runed giants.