Session 42
Fireseek 28, 622 CYCastle Greyhawk
Almost the full complement of the White Oak Company -- Haruspex Niv, Reed Underbough, Percy, John Grond, Father Langdon, Rom Riverbluff, Vask, and Maximus, plus the henchmen Peter, Herv, Muelara Wynna, Harvard, Biros Frapple, Genevieve, and Gendri, the hirelings Everard and Bella, and the animals Gert the Bear, and the three mules -- were approaching Castle Greyhawk on this wintry day. They had come, to find and kill their first dragon.
They were far from the fledgling adventurers they had once been. Haruspex Niv had just joined the Magicians Guild, despite still being a thaumaturgist. Reed was moonlighting as a bounty hunter during downtime, but rising in importance in the New Thieves Guild and was expecting promotion to its Council of Executives soon. Percy was training new workers to replace him at the orphange so he could spend more time on the important rituals and ceremonies of the Unorthodox Common Church of Greyhawk. John Grond shirked responsibility at every turn, reveling in his role as swashbuckler. Father Langdon and Vask, with Gendri, had just come back (though not all together) from Prospero’s house, where Vask and Gendri had been gifted with magic items. Rom had been asked, because of his reputation alone, to become a major in the Greyhawk Standing Army, and was seriously considering it. And Maximus…well, Maximus was still a fledgling adventurer, but he knew he had fallen in with the crowd that would help him reach greatness.
The drawbridge was down and they moved in -- but they immediately heard sounds at the high end of the courtyard. Taking the archway stairs to the top single file, they met three guards outside the stables, all strangers. These guards claimed to work for the wizard Eneever Zig, who was busy in the dungeon this same day. The stables were occupied by three wagons belonging to the wizard and there was no room for more…though, after being bribed with a 50-gold piece gem by John, the guards found room for the Company’s cart and two of the mules after all. Everard and Bella would remain with the cart, as always, but because no one trusted these guards, Biros was tasked with staying behind too. Gert was left behind as well; Vask couldn’t bear the thought of endangering her against the dragon.
Taking the stairs down through the tower, they reached level 1 of the dungeon and saw no sign of elf sentries this time. They moved past level 2 -- should they stop and ask Gordon the Chef for food first, the people who met Gordon on the last expedition wondered? No, better to have him prepare a celebratory feast for them once the dragon was dead!
As they reached level 3, they saw light coming up from below. All 14 of them moved off the stairs to the landing, just in time as Eneever Zig came up, alone, seeing by the magical light shed by the tip of his magic staff. After John identified them, Zig offered them a polite warning -- to stick to the top four levels. Everything below that was his. They said they were on their way to slay a dragon and Zig laughed and wished them luck. All he could tell them about the dragon is that he heard it was green.
((My players did a great job of pretending they had no player knowledge of what that meant.))
John and Reed, looking at their own copies of the level 3 map, briefly squabbled over the fastest route to the dragon, but the clearest way turned out to be south, over the course of several short zigzags, ignoring all doors and side passages. In this way they quickly reached the trapped hall their orc prisoners had led them to a month ago. They knew the way to the dragon was from this room, but they had never seen the east end of this long hall yet. When they got there (avoiding the magical trap, after enough of them overruled John and remembered how the trap worked correctly), they found three doors -- with no direction as to which one led to the dragon. There was no sound to the north or east, but a low, intermittent rumbling to the south. A dragon snoring? Best to go see and find out!
The front ranks began to file through, but as Herv came through, he stepped on a pressure plate that triggered a pit trap right behind him, in the room! Herv jumped forward and avoided it, but Haruspex, Reed, and Gendri all took a tumble 20’ to the floor of the pit. All were moderately hurt from the fall. Reed easily leaped out with his boots, while the others had to be hauled up. Spells were cast and Haruspex quaffed his long-held healing potion and soon all three of them were feeling better, if not perfect.
How to get everyone around the pit trap and through the door? It was decided to leave Peter behind here with the mule they had brought down and string rope between the mule and the strong fighters on the south side of the pit. Using the rope, everyone else could pull themselves across over the pit -- and they did.
To the south, past a side passage west, was a small room where the Company found a 10’ tall stone idol head and shoulders, just sitting on the floor of an otherwise empty room. John addressed the statue to see if it was magical and would respond, but it did nothing. There was also a door to the north and an open passage west -- and from this open passage came the rumbling of a loud snore.
The open passage west soon opened into a large hall, mostly dark, but by their lantern light they could see the head of what looked like a green dragon resting on a small pile of coins.
Reed and Maximus moved into the room first, hoping to circle around the dragon, but the dragon was not asleep after all. Langdon drank what he believed to be a Potion of Speed, only it wasn’t. While the magic users hid in the previous room behind the great idol head, everyone else rushed in to surround the dragon. But the dragon surprised them by wanting to parlay. It did not care to fight, it said in the Common Tongue of Man, and they could help themselves to some old treasure in the open room behind it, to the west.
John, Rom, and Harvard all went west to check out that room, and saw the pile of treasure within. But they were skeptical and suspected a trap -- skepticism that bore out when Haruspex, who had cast ESP, shouted that the dragon was being deceptive.
The dragon had enough of waiting, but before it could act, Haruspex cast his new spell -- fireball -- into the room, centered on the dragon. The fireball only lightly hurt the dragon.
The dragon then breathed a cloud of chlorine gas into the corner where John, Rom, and Harvard were. Rom and Harvard when down, gasping for breath until they lost consciousness. John was choking too, but still conscious, for now.
Reed, who had been hiding behind the dragon, used his magic boots to spring onto the dragon’s head and “backstab” it in the eye. Now the dragon was moderately hurt.
Next was Herv, who delivered a ferocious stab with his magic spear -- and the dragon crashed to the floor, dying! Vask was close to getting in the next blow with his magic axe, but it was already unnecessary.
The dragon’s hoard, in this room, consisted of 35,000 copper pieces and 8,000 electrum pieces. But what was in the other room? As Percy, Langdon, and Genevieve began casting their remaining healing spells for John, Rom, and Harvard, Herv -- who felt invincible after delivering the death blow to a dragon -- insisted on going in and searching the suspicious room.
As Herv crossed the threshold, a bright flash of orange light lit the space in which he stood, and Herv fell to his knees in the room, in serious pain. When he recovered, he checked the other pile of treasure…and it was substantial. There was 8,000 gold pieces. There were valuable objects of art and jewelry. There was more copper, silver, electrum, some rare platinum pieces, and even a spellbook! There was the gem-studded chalice the dwarven ambassador at Grossettgrottell had told them about. Herv shoveled it all across the threshold from one room to the other over the course of 30 minutes. And then came the time to see if he could get out of the room safely. It did not look like he could; Langdon detected for magic and found the trap on the threshold was still active. Herv was given some rope to tie off on himself, so he could be pulled all the way through if he lost consciousness.
He did, so intense was the second burst of pain. In fact, he was dying from it. Vask saved him with their very last healing potion, forcing Herv to swallow it instead of choking and dying on it. Not one live was lost, save the dragon’s!
Souvenirs were collected from the dragon -- the remaining eye for Reed, the fangs for John. Percy wanted them to stay and skin the dragon. In the excitement of the moment, no one could remember if the dwarves had asked for the dragon’s head or not. But there was the logistics of getting all this treasure topside still to deal with. Multiple trips would be required, even using the mules. They loaded down the first mule and filled their packs to bursting, and returned safely to the surface. Comically, they pretended to have found nothing of value in front of Zig’s guards, even as their backpacks jingled with overflowing coinage.
Unexpected tragedy struck on the way back to the dragon’s lair. While entering the room with the great stone idol, a woman with snakes for hair jumped out from behind the idol and, when John and Langdon saw her -- they turned to stone! Haruspex dropped the monster quickly with a Sleep spell. Vask chopped off the monster’s head and they tossed it into a sack. But how to restore John and Langdon? None of them had that kind of magic. But…they knew there was a wizard wandering about the castle who might be persuaded to help…
Back on the surface (with another two mules loaded with treasure), they asked the guards where Zig was. He had gone into the tower, they were told. The Company went in, initially planning to find Zig…but as they discussed it, they realized there could be five levels of unexplored tower between them and Zig, and that was a danger they could avoid by simply waiting down here for Zig to come down.
And, 45 minutes later, Eneever Zig did. He was surprised they had defeated the dragon. He was only surprised they had encountered the medusa as high up as they had; he said they swarmed as thick as giant rats on the lowest levels. Could he restore them? Yes, though he did not have that spell prepared today. Would he? Yes, for a price, and he asked a price for each spell he would need to cast. If they gave him the medusa’s head, he would come back and cast the first spell for them tomorrow.
“How do we know you’ll return?” Haruspex asked.
“You’ll just have to trust that I will,” Zig said.
“It would look bad for you if you don’t…”
“There is no threat you can make to me that I need fear.”
“Not us, but…the Wizard’s Guild might hear that your word is not your bond. And that would not look good for you, would it?”
The Company camped in the shrine to Boccob, on all floors, waiting for Eneever Zig to be true to his word. Would he come back and cast the spell?
He did. John was restored. He looked around, confused, but then spotted a statue that looked like Langdon and, slowly, everything made sense.
Zig then asked for the dragon’s spellbook. The Company didn’t want to let it go at first, trying to get him to accept the dragon’s corpse, but Zig didn’t want that. Zig took the spellbook, promising to return.
Readying 2, 622 CY
The Company waited another day, but Zig did return again. They led him down to the stone idol room where Langdon stood. One spell later, Langdon was restored.
They all made it out. And rich!
Session 43
Readying 13, 622 CY
The City of Greyhawk
While Father Langdon was negotiating with the dwarves over the return of a certain chalice, a few members of the Company of the White Oak decided it was time for another expedition. Reed Underbough and Rom Riverbluff were ready, and they were able to talk their newest recruit, Maximus, into going too. But where? Castle Greyhawk, with such few in number?
Reed had another idea, remembering Lord Robilar’s Castle, which they had scouted out in the Menhir Hills months ago. They knew it was overrun with orcs. Perhaps this would be a good place for Maximus to really show what he could do.
Readying 14, 622 CY
The Village of Grossettgrottell
Grossettgrottell was a good launching point for reaching Lord Robilar’s Castle from. While there, they were openly discussing at the Corippo Inn how hard it might be to find the trails west under the winter snow.
Listening to them was a man named Hence. Hence desperately wanted to be an adventurer, thinking it was the quickest way to get rich and start the blacksmith shop in Greyhawk he always wanted. So he approached them and told them he knew the way to the castle and could lead them. The bluff worked, and Hence was able to trade his role as guide for full membership in the Company.
Cairn Hills
The four of them, along with their henchmen Herv, Muelara, Genevieve, and Reed’s newest hireling Ambrosio, and two new mules, had picked a bitterly cold day to start out. Their feet felt numb as they walked. The trail stayed invisible, but familiar-looking hills kept them on the right path. They had never gone straight to the castle before, but they figured they could find it again from the Hidden Vale, which Reed and Rom had visited enough times to surely find again.
That night, they camped outdoors. The hills sheltered them from the wind, but the cold was intense. They set fires and bunched together around them. It was so cold, it even kept all the monsters in the hills away.
Readying 16, 622 CY
Menhir Hills
Early in the day, they crossed through the long, straight vale that separated the two ranges of hills.
Later that day, they found the Hidden Vale, or assumed they had when they spotted the skeletons. The Company had long known that, during the showdown with the vampires, on the other side of the vale from them, their own allies suffered great losses holding back the vampires’ minions. The Company had heard the roll call of the dead, but had never actually seen them - until now. The corpses strewn about came from both sides, some as big as ogres.
Among the corpses were seven scavenging giant rats. The rats began to charge at the Company, just as their archers drew their bows (and magic crossbow) and prepared to waste them before they reached the Company. Two still did manage to reach the Company. They attacked quickly, and then tried to move past and keep going.
The reason why became clear soon enough, when ten wolves crested a hill and, howling, charged after the giant rats, right into the midst of the Company. The wolves proved a more serious threat, particularly to the fresh blood; Hence and Ambrosio were both seriously injured by wolf bites. Still, the wolves did not last long, particularly against the more seasoned adventurers, and only four wolves escaped with their lives.
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