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Fafnir’s Journal Entry 33 - I think somebody’s been hittin’ the bottle

Fafnir’s Journal

After returning to town, everyone seemed to want to go their separate ways. I spent a few hours patching the floor of my house, but after that I thought we should get moving to the south. After all, while we knew that the portal we were seeking would not appear for another 10 or 12 days, all we really knew about it’s location was that it was “to the south of the highest peak in the Hellfurnaces.” That covers a whole lot of ground, and 10 days isn’t a whole lot of time to search half of a continent!

While I was pondering how to teleport our entire party such a long distance, Valon came to the rescue. He had purchased a silver egg that contained a powerful teleport spell... Powerful enough to transport us all to the Hellfurnaces instantly. As soon as we all gathered around him, he activated the single-use egg, and we were there! (For some reason Drusilia and Ghelt were confused by this... I thought the whole party knew where we were going!? But, as I would notice later, this was only the beginning of their strange behavior.)

No sooner had we arrived near the top of a volcano in the Hellfurnaces, than we noticed that a huge red dragon was coming right for us! This didn’t seem like the time to engage in a hopeless fight, so we ran! Luckily we had noticed a small cave inside the crater of the volcano. With a little ingenuity involving a rope, a piton, and Feather Fall, we were soon safe inside the cave... and not a moment too soon. As we were running down the passage way, a burst of flame followed us. Only Drusilia was hurt, as she was more concerned with casting protective spells on the rest of us than saving her own skin. I guess that is typical behavior for a cleric though.

Rather than going back to get killed by the dragon, we decided to explore the natural passageways we now found ourselves in. We soon found ourselves in a large cavern with several pools of lava. There were two passages leaving the cavern in opposite directions. While Ghelt and Drusilia were trying to determine which way was south, Pockets and I decided to just pick a passageway, and check it out. Aramil decided to come along. Just as we were preparing to go, Ghelt decided that the other way was south, and that is the way we should be going. Pockets and I explained that we wanted to check out the other passageway to be sure there were no nasty surprises that would follow behind us as we proceeded to the south. This is where the problem came in.

Ghelt, Drusilia, and Valon decided that the were under no circumstances going to help us in checking out the northern passageway... they would just wait in the main chamber and “maybe” would come help us if they heard our screams... IF they thought we were dying horribly. Hmmph! (That really didn’t seem like “normal” behavior for them, but as I mentioned earlier... they were acting strange.)

In any case, Pockets, Aramil, and I scouted to the north. A short way down the passage we came upon a strange creature... It was a living puddle of magma! (Actually, I guess it was probably an Ooze of some sort but “Magma Puddle” just seems like a better name.) While Pockets tried several different techniques of fighting it (water, arrows, and whatever else came to mind.), I let loose with a few Magic Missiles which seemed to be slowing it down. Aramil had a different plan.

Just after Pockets had dumped some water on the thing, and it was making a retreat, Aramil sprang into action! Grabbing one of his magical arrows that we had found in our travels, he proceeded to cast Magic Missile(!!) into the arrow, and fired at the fleeing creature! Now this has several problems. For one thing, why would you take the chance of missing with an arrow, when Magic Missile would have automatically hit?! Secondly, as the creature was on the retreat, it didn’t seem to make sense to waste a limited resource (the magic arrow), when the spell alone would have sufficed! Oh well, I guess it’s just “his way,” and it did finish off the creature.

After our little adventure, we continued on for about another quarter mile, where we found a split in the passageway. The left-hand tunnel traveled down into the depths of the earth, while the right-hand passage traveled upward. We followed the right-hand tunnel out into a valley.

As we were enjoying the fresh air, Pockets pointed out a cave opening on the other side of the valley. There was steam coming from the opening, and it looked suspiciously like it might be the dragon’s lair! Deciding that we weren’t quite ready to fight the dragon yet, and since there didn’t seem to be any lurking dangers that would be following us to the south, we decided to head back to the rest of the party. I did notice that Aramil had a strange glint in his eye every time we mentioned the dragon, though. I hope he isn’t planning anything foolish.

When we returned to the chamber where we had left the rest of the party, they were gone! I guess it’s a good thing we weren’t screaming for their assistance! After a little while they returned from the southern passage, where they apparently decided to go scouting as well. We excitedly told them of our finds: the magma puddle and the dragon’s lair, and they told us what they had “found”.

“Oh, we ran into Arkon the lich,” Drusilia said, “and then we found a city of Salamanders.”

OK, What kind of a rube do they take me for? While I have no doubt about the “city of salamanders,” I can’t believe they would try to tell us they ran into the lich! Why on Oerth would Arkon be wandering around in the depths of Hellfurnaces? And furthermore, they expected us to believe that after a “friendly chat,” he just walked off and let them go!

I am starting to suspect I understand what is going on now... Why Ghelt and Drusilia were so confused when we left town, why they were being argumentative about scouting north, and now this strange story... I think they must of spent the few hours in town this morning boozing it up! I am not sure how they convinced Valon to go along with their story, but I think he might just being doing it for a joke. That’s OK, I’ve played a few jokes myself... I’ll have to think up a good one to play on them when the time is right. Hehehe. :) A lich. Who would believe that?

So, once we wait for Ghelt and Drusilia to ‘sober up,’ we will have to decide what to do next. I am not sure going through a city of Salamanders is a good idea, but our other options don’t feel right either... A passage to the north, or a dragon’s lair. Maybe once we can all talk about it further, we will come up with a solution.

~=Fafnir Flamebrewer=~

Posted by Dave on August 24, 2003, 11:40 | Fafnir’s Journal