Once more, the direction of our travels has been decided by Halflings. This time it resulted in one of them dying.

Soon after waking, Trap and Korin started exploring. Looking down over a nearby waterfall they saw a group of hobgoblins and a Hill Giant. To most people this would seem like a bad thing, but to the Half-wits, this spelled F-U-N.

Korin’s response was to try to jump in a barrel and “ride the waterfall.” Not wanting to see this happen, Ghelt and I attempted to keep him in camp by sealing him in the barrel. Meanwhile, Trap decided that he would get the F-U-N to come to us, and began trying to attract their attention. After succeeding at this, he came back to camp and pushed the barrel (containing Korin) into the water. (I have no idea why he did this, other than maybe that Korin was requesting it.)

We were about to do something about getting Korin out of the lake, when we were attacked by the Hobgoblins and their Hill Giant friend!

It was a long fight, and we only barely survived. I ended up using almost all of my offensive spells, and all of our fighters were in pretty bad shape (except for Korin, who was happily riding the falls in a barrel!).

I was relieved to still be alive, but apparently the stress had been too much for Ghelt. Immediately following the battle, she took the Holy Sword of Pelor that Trap had been wielding, and threw it into the lake!!!

Trap and Drusilia both jumped in the lake to get it, while Ghelt then took off downstream, presumably to find Korin. Drusilia managed to find the sword, but Trap, having not removed his armor before jumping in, was swept downstream and over the waterfall. Luckily, he landed in a net, and all was well. (By ‘well,’ I mean he wasn’t dead yet — we did find him and Korin cannibalizing some fellow halfings and wearing their scalps, but I don’t want to remember that any more than I have to.)

Holy Relic recovered, we followed after Ghelt. This is when the other Hill Giant attacked! We all began to run. After all, we barely killed the previous one, and had no chance in the nine hells of killing another! Apparently Trap and Korin disagreed, as after a minute, they stopped, turned around, and hid behind trees! Not sure what to make of this, the rest of us stopped and hid as well, a bit further on. (I don’t know about the others, but I was hoping the Hill Giant would not see us, and would pass by... No such luck.)

No sooner had the giant come within 100 paces, then Trap and Korin both leaped out from behind their trees and attacked the Giant! Well, the Giant would have none of it, and soon Trap was dead, and Korin mortally wounded. Not seeing a choice, I was preparing to save my own life by fleeing, when we were rescued by some passing Stone Giants. Apparently they are much friendlier than the Hill variety. This did allow Drusilia to heal Korin, but as I said before, it was too late for Trap. Ahh, well, Live Stupid, Die Stupid, I guess.

The rest of us travelled off to the Stone Giant’s town, where we are now resting. The party’s intelligence level seems to have risen a bit, now that we only have one halfing, but only a little — It seems Korin now believes that he is both Korin AND Trap, and is doing quite well at being even more scatterbrained than they were before. I am not sure what this says about my theory of halfling intellect. Ahh, well, Live Stupid, Die Stupid I suspect.

~=Fafnir Flamebrewer=~
Flocktime 3, 592 CY