The journey takes the majority of the day and as they
approach the fens the group can see numerous bubbling pools of various colours
and an awful smell of sulphur lingering in the air.
As they begin to travel into the fens the group soon notice
a small group of dark owls fly overhead whilst performing some sort of
aerobatic display before splitting and flying of in different directions.
As the group continue travelling Vaneer soon notices that
following Miro was a carpet, the cleric pointed this interesting sight out to
Otto whom attempted to pick up the carpet but found that oddly enough the
carpet had replaced the rouges shadow.
Off in the distance the group then spotted what appeared to
be a rather large owl could be seen flying away from them. The pair decided to
finally mention to Miro that his shadow had been replaced with a carpet
Miro seemed a little unimpressed as he remembered an old
child’s tale about an owl who would steal people’s shadows if they stayed out
too late and from that point on they would be forever cursed.
After much ridicule the group eventually decide to go
looking for this giant owl and head in the direction where they last saw it
heading which was towards an outcropping of trees in the distance.
They eventually spot the owl (Avoral) sitting within a tree,
“Greetings our feathered friend!” spoke Vaneer.
The owl spoke back in the celestial language which luckily
the cleric understood,
Vaneer asks if the owl had taken Miro’s shadow to which the
winged creature replies “Yes”.
Vaneer asks if there is in any way a possibility for them to
negotiate for the return of Miro’s shadow to which the owl asked what they had
to exchange; the group take some time to rummage through their portable hole and
eventually offered the owl an magical feather token to which the owl agreed was
an acceptable trade and then returned Miro’s shadow.
Before leaving the owl the group asked if it held one of the
creators tokens that they were seeking of which it didn’t. The owl did tell
them though who had the token they were looking for and so he told the tale of
Morning choir and Barrow king.
It appeared that Morning Choir originally had the token and
tried to eat it but she couldn’t stomach the agony of devouring her creator and
therefore regurgitated the token. Barrow King then took the token for himself
and now dislikes any living creature he sees.
The group say farewell to the owl after learning which
direction to head to find both Morning Choir and Barrow king.
Eventually they arrive at a still black icky looking lake
with an island in the centre, on the island numerous lights could be seen
bouncing around. It appeared though that the only dry way to the island was
over a nearby rope suspension bridge.
As they approached the bridge they could hear in the air the
sound of someone or something singing which was occasionally broken up with the
sounds of sobbing and crying. Next to the beginning of the bridge they could
see what could only be explained as a serpent with wings that was just slowly
fluttering around near the shore singing and crying to itself.
Otto greeted the creature and urged it to divulge to the
group as to the nature of why it appeared to be upset.
The creature turned out to be morning choir and she was just
so upset with what she and the others had done to their creator, she was
terribly upset also at never again being able to feel joy and laughter.
Feeling something close to pity for the creature the group
decide to spend some time with morning choir telling her jokes and attempting
to dance in hopes that in some way it might cheer her up if only for a little
while before asking her permission to pass over the bridge, though she warns of
Barrow kings evil and that as living creatures he will not listen to reasoning.
As the finish crossing the bridge they notice that the
dancing lights they had seen actually belonged to large quantities of fireflies
which seemed to form a path to a clearing outlined with little candles and in
the centre were two larger and whiter candles, one of which was already
extinguished and between those candles was an undead looking humanoid sitting
upon a sarcophagus.
As soon as the Barrow king saw the group he threatened them
to leave, they at least attempted some diplomacy but he would not listen and
jumped off the sarcophagus and then extinguished the flame on the last white
candle.
Just as the flame is snuffed out the earth beneath the
groups feet begins to shake violently as hundreds of hands erupt from beneath
the soil and attempts to grab hold of the group to which only Vaneer falls
victim to.
Miro attempts to feint Barrow king and succeeds at
distracting him but the Halfling fails to land the first blow,
Hugo charges in but also fails to land a blow,
Vaneer sensing that the hands are part of a Haunt releases a
positive energy burst to try and counter its affects,
Otto casts burning hands to re-ignite the candles which succeed,
causing the hands to recede back into the ground.
Boss takes a shot at the Barrow King but misses his target,
Barrow King laughs at Miro but fails to hit the Halfling,
Hugo gets behind Barrow King and manages to land a blow
against his foe,
Miro attacks again but still fails to score a blow,
Vaneer lets off a Holy Smite at the undead fiend,
Otto casts scorching ray and hits,
Boss shots again landing a well placed shot,
Barrow king attacks Hugo and hits which results in Hugo
looking rather pale afterwards,
Miro misses again,
Hugo attempts to hit back at the Barrow king but his
weakened state causes him to miss,
Vaneer cast searing light at his foe which seems to land a
hefty blow,
Otto casts magic missile which hits and turns the Barrow
King to dust.
“Nuts!” exclaimed Vaneer “We should have tried asking him
where he keeps his token!” the cleric continued.
The group realising what their hastiness had caused them
groaned at the thought of having to search the entire island for a small gem…if
it was on the island at all!
Otto begins the search and finds nothing only for Miro’s
keen eyes to find the heart shaped ruby well hidden in the Barrow kings
sarcophagus.
The group then look at the map of the land and decide to
next head to the Smiths Caldera.
The journey is short but by the time they arrive it is
obvious that it starting to get late as the first hints of sunset could be seen
in the child drawn sky above as a couple of red and orange squiggly lines.
In front of them stood an enormous volcano with a stairway
leading up to what they suspected was the volcanoes peak and so they started
the long climb.
Near the summit they find a flattened plateau, the stairs
continued no further and in the side of the volcano stood a very large set of
double doors, though standing in between the group and the doors were two
creatures whom looked like they had been cross bred with a giant, a earth
elemental, fire elemental and a dwarf! (Think giant rocky dwarf with actual
flaming hair and beard!)
“Bugger off!” one of the dwarf creatures shout to the group
“Err No!” replies Miro
“You heard me now bugger off!” the dwarf shouted again over
the roar of the volcano
“We come looking for a token” shouted Otto back
“Sod….Off!” is the response back
“Look we only want to talk to someone inside” exclaimed
Vaneer as the group approached.
“Tough! Only Dwarves are allowed in” responded one of the
door keepers as he spat in the groups direction out of discuss
“But I am a Dwarf!” shouted Miro
“You! A Dwarf, come on laddie you no more a dwarf than that
pile of rocks there!” said the guard on the left
“No no wait!” exclaimed the other dwarf “In fact you have
more in common with that pile of rocks than you do with us dwarves” he
continued,
“Yeah, we have more intelligence!” retorted Miro
“Why you, I ought ta!” the right guard started to lose his
temper
For the next 10 minutes a match of insults is hurled back
and forth between Miro and the dwarves when eventually the dwarves begin to
laugh,
“Ya know what lad, ya be al’right, come! come! we’ll let you
through the doors” the guard on the left said as he wiped a tear from his eye.
A little stunned at Miro’s luck the group slowly make their
way through the double doors into what appeared to be a tavern, there were
numerous firey/rocky dwarves sitting around the place and an Cyclops standing
behind the bar serving drinks.
The group approach the bar and attempt to order some drinks
though the barman just glares at them before stating,
“GIANT’S ONLY!”
“Now, I’ve had enough of this!” Miro shouts back, “I’ve just
had to explain it to those thick skulled idiots out there and now I have to do
it again! I am a fricking giant dwarf! I errr just suffer from Shrinking giants
disease so give me a flagon of your best now!”
The silence could be touched as the group waited for the
obvious reaction from the Cyclops whilst subtly getting ready to defend
themselves.
So it was a shock when the Cyclops placed down a giant sized
flagon on the bar in front of Miro, “Sorry mister! We have to make sure we keep
the rif raf out you understand, if I had known you and your friends were SGD
suffers I wouldn’t have questioned you” the Cyclops said.
“Its fine, it happens all the time” Miro smirked as he
wrestled with his larger than life drink.
After a couple of sips the group realise that the drinks
were quite potent though Miro continues to drink because as he put it “I worked
hard for this!”
Whilst looking around Otto notices that there is a giant
standing in front of another set of double doors leading out of the bar area
and so asks the Cyclops as to where the door leads.
“Ah you see master dwarf sir that door leads to the smithy
but ol’Ongar there aint letting anyone pass you sees because of the incident”
the bartender kindly informed.
When pushed further on the incident it appeared that a giant
dwarf smith had got careless and had smashed through the ceiling of the
workshops below and got his head stuck in hole which is the floor of the room
beyond the door. The foreman didn’t like this and so got the dwarf turned to
stone to which Ongar protested and until the dwarf is turned back he refuses to
let anyone through the doors to the smithy.
The group finding this interesting decided to talk to Ongar
as they needed to get through and talk to this ‘foreman’ as chances were he or
she obviously could hold one of the tokens.
Vaneer approaches Ongar and asks to see the dwarf turned to
stone, at first Ongar declines but Vaneer insists stating that he may be able
to help but first he needed to look the victim over.
Ongar finally agrees and opens the door to the next camber
where the group are met but a massive grinning stone head sticking out of the
floor.
Otto questions Ongar about the foreman and learn that ‘tick
tock man’ could be found through another set of doors leading out of this
chamber though he refused to let them through that door.
Vaneer then proposes a deal to Ongar, it would have to wait
till tomorrow but if he could undo the petrification spell as requested then in
return Ongar would have to take the group to see ‘tick tock’ and help defeat
him.
Ongar took a moment to think and happily agreed to the deal
and showed the group to some bunks where they could rest for the night.
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