2020-06-08

Previous: 2020-03-23-30

After a lapse of several weeks of logging games, wherein the party:

• took on the cultists of the undead inside the home of Farook ma'Faz, whom they killed and robbed, stole his body to leverage for money, and never quite finished finding out where the undead were coming from...
• took on the gang of Rufazi Hagar to retrieve an amulet, destroyed his dock cranes, killed his men, robbed his home, and left in his loft to plot their deaths at the hands of mercenaries...
• talked Kutaku out of immediately invading the Behamut Temple District and killing every last one of them...
• shrugged off tales of bounty hunters looking for them for Rufazi...
• shrugged off the burning and hanging body of their recently departed comrade-in-arms...
• shrugged off tales that the Blackpool Guard having been sent to Jantuwyn to "protect" them from the Blood Desert raiders...
• purchased a severely pimped-out wagon for their personal use...

...comes this new tale, wherein the party:

• finally decided to return to the ruins of Dol Londfolas to find out what Rose couldn't remember...
• decided to take Justice Lightbringer along with them seeing as they were returning to the place of so many undead...
• finally decided to set up camp outside the door of the Ruins of Dol Londfolas as it was getting late and Justice was tired...

Justice woke them all in the morning with a shout of, "Oh, this could be bad!" Two very young blue dragons danced, skittered and swooped through the air together until noticing Justice, the wagon, and Woofie. They soon approached, breathing lightning at Justice as they past. Though they missed, Kutaku and Woofie took the opportunity to leap into the air, with Kutaku leaping off of Woofie in mid-air. No sooner did Kutaku grab onto the dragon and swing a leg over than the dragon took evasive maneuvers to shake him off. As the dragons flew over, Adara shouted a word of command at the other dragon, hoping to bring it back to her, but unfortunately was unable to. Justice rained down fire on the two very young dragons, causing intense pain and driving them off. At that point, Jax and Rose emerged from the wagon now that things were safe and they could enter into the ruins.

The party then entered the ruins. Kutaku put Rose on Woofie and they sped down the corridors, looking for whatever Rose might find familiar. At the first T, Kutaku guided Woofie right. At the end of the hallway, where stairs led down, Kutaku set Woofie to run against the wall and flip - first head over tail, then a twist to right himself - and continued back the way they came. The move was too much for Rose, who fell at the stairs. That's when a bone-white halfling female leapt from the stairs to Rose, asking her, "Rose, are you alright? Thank you for coming back!"

Kutaku returned to help Rose against her "attacker" and as they saw him approaching, the halfling over Rose grabbed her by the shirt and rolled over into the stairwell. Kutaku was quick and cast a net over them. Just then, Adara approached from further down the hallway, hearing Rose screaming, "Stop! She is a friend!"

Adara immediately went to get Kutaku away from them, sitting as he was on Woofie, trident poised threateningly. "Alright, alright, just calm down," Adara told him, and with a quick twist and pull, disarmed him of his trident and bopped him on the head with it.

Jax caught up in time to get the bearings of the situation and approached Rose to see if there was anything he could do. As Jax quickly caught the tone, he turned to Justice - also hurrying down the hallway - and asked him, "can you go cover the entrance to make sure we're safe? I don't want anyone accidentally getting hurt."

"Hey, it's me!" Justice responded.

"Yes, exactly," Jax answered as Jax left to guard the entrance.

During that time, the hobwose Bunette explained everything to them: how Rose had mistakenly come down into their grotto, how they had talked to her about getting her and her friends' help in defeating a threat to them, and how they gave her a forget potion that would block out most of it. She said they had some way to go to get there and led them down corridors crissing and crossing under the ruins until they came to a corner and a secret door opened. Bunette took them to a separate hidden cul-de-sac in a cave system away from their usual grotto. A temporary halfling village sprang up in the cave, holding it seemed all of the halflings.

Bunette introduced them to the chieftain, Simwel, and his wife the chieftainess JOweysa. Simwel was injured, which Adara immediately came to his aid, casting Cure Moderate Wounds, which he said helped. The two of them then described the situation. The Grotto of the Guardians, where they normally live, have been overrun by the undead and their necromancer masters. They have overheard them speaking, saying they are from Nuz Golan. They have overrun their normal living space and they need help getting them out of their grotto and out of the ruins of Dol Londfolas as well. They are here because they want to break into the Catacombs of the Kings, a burial place of the kings of old Dol Londfolas. If they manage to do that, "they will have a magical weapons arsenal at their command." They described they layout to them: There is the main grotto, the Grotto of the Guardians. After that is the Grotto of the Kings, which contains a 30-feet deep lake and a blue dragon living inside. Past that grotto is the entrance to the Catacomb of the Kings.

Kutaku also asked them to agree to help them in return after this to overthrow the Temple of Behamut. In all cases, they have told Kutaku they would see what they could do. There is a tunnel that runs under that section of Ra'azum.