Adventure 6 -- Travel to Wildcross, Day 2

The group of three took the evening to recuperate from the previous day's encounter. With a day and a half to reach Wildcross, they set off early in the morning.
 
Leading the group, Cohor confidently forges ahead, the vizier and Talea conversing almost annoyingly. It appears their talking seemed to have driven off any would be predators, as the forest passed by in peace. The came across another area, however, this time much larger, where the canopy grew thicker, the ground squishier, the air heavier, and the branches droopier. They were in a swamp again...
 
The sounds of life in the swamp quickly became apparent. Up ahead, they saw some bullywugs spearfishing. The bullywugs, however, also noticed them.
 
The bullywugs approach, hostile. Combat ensues; Cohor manages to crack the leader's shield, but the leader and one of his companions managed to break Cohor's defenses.
 
Both bullywugs manage to thrust spears into Cohor's armor, which stopped fatal damage. Bonecounter, however, managed to smash the leader's face, collapsing it to the ground. He also managed to strike one of the minion's. It stumbled and then started favoring its side.
 
The one favoring its side pierced Cohor's armor again, the spear's sharp point causing dull pain. Cohor hit it again in the side, same spot. When it fell to the ground, it didn't get back up again.
 
Talea disengages and runs away.
 
Talea sprints away without disengaging.
 
Skill Challenge: Chase.
 
Talea fled, running with all she had. She started to outpace the bullywug, found a great place she could hide, and failed to do so. She saw a small ledge, however, that she was able to climb down. The bullywug got to the ledge, leered down at her, then turned and left her alone.
 
Encounter 1 Talea: She fled, turning it into a successfully escaped chase.
 
A rat scurried out of a hole in the rocky ledge and snipped its little diseased-filled mouth. Talea squashed it with her quarterstaff, but not before two more wriggled out of the same hole. Soon, she was standing amid three rat corpses... Better than having a frog-creature standing over your corpse, I suppose.
 
As she tried to still her shaking from the recent fight, she saw a figuring creaking towards her. No time to stop her shaking, it would seem... A skeleton pushed its way through some overhanging branches towards her. It managed to bash hard on her shield, a painful blow, but the power in her staff was able to smash it into the wall. Heart beating even faster, Talea slumped against the rocky ledge and waited to compose herself...
 
After Cohor defeated this group, he noticed a bullywug had chased down Talea. He healed himself and headed that way. He bid the vizier to follow. His dead heart dropped when he saw the bullywug returning. It croaked sharply, and two dinosaur creatures came to its aid...
 
It's a mystery how these little frog people were able to curb and train these creatures... But Cohor doesn't have time to ask such questions.
 
What ensued was a furious bombardment from bullywug javelin and ridged teeth to massive dinosaur tails smashing against Cohor. He called upon Kelemvor for a blessing, which made his attacks more effective against the bullywug. Bonecounter quickly sent the creature into trauma, and he landed some critical blows on the dinosaur's legs, giving him time to land the final strikes where the mattered.
 
After discovering that Talea was ok, if shaken up, Cohor decided to head towards where he heard lots of swamp noises. He was quickly discovered, however, and the bullywugs weren't friendly. He picked up the first one and threw it at the others in a display of strength and intimidation; the bullywugs scattered. He then tried to find out more about their home; it appears to be a fen of some sort, next to a ledge. The water of the fen seeps into massive opening in the ledge, which he assumed could only be their lair. He didn't see the sinking mud until his first foot sank 10 inches. Thankfully, his instincts kicked in and he knew to lay on his back to prevent the rest of him from sinking, then pull out his foot, though wrenching it free of the hungry earth was much more difficult than he had anticipated.
 
Talea noticed she wasn't feeling well. She had a ring of bug bites around the back of her neck. The nausea was intense, but she was able to push those intense levels of discomfort aside long enough to search for and identify a plant she could use to nullify the symptoms.
 
Successful Skill Check: Talea. Not affected by sickness.
 
They cleared the area containing the bullywug lair and came across an impressive ridge line, barring their way to Wildcross.
 
Starting Easy Skill Check: Talea.
Successful Skill Check: Talea. Found a 'safe' way to the top of the ridgeline.
 
Starting Easy Skill Check: Cohor.
Successful Skill Check: Cohor. Managed to climb his way up. He pushed a little too hard a few times, causing him to slip, but he was able to grab hold of something else. Towards the end, he was too exhausted to pull the vizier up, so he had to persuade the man to complete the final ten feet of the climb without Cohor's aid.
 
In the distance Cohor and Talea noticed a neat ring of standing stones, overlooking a 100-foot cliff. Curious, they headed that way, cautiously and wary of their surroundings.
 
Several large ravens were flittering about overhead, which caused Cohor to look up. Had it not been for the snapped twig, he would have missed the cloaked figure approaching him in the darkness, scimitar gleaming reflections of the stars.
 
The cloaked figure struck at Cohor, the blade of the scimitar clipped into his side once and managed to take a second jab. Kelemvor smiled upon Cohor, instilling him with discomforting brutality. He crushed his mace into the attacker's hip and used his shield to shove it to the ground. Imposing, Cohor stood towering above the humanoid, who's hood had fallen, revealing a scaly, human face. With violent ravens swirling around, diving into Cohor with their violent beaks, the dead man brutally swung his mace down several times on the prone snakeperson. He swung until the creature's strugglings ceased.
 
The ravens swarmed viciously about him; most of their beaks glanced off his chain mail, however. He smashed two with his shield at once out of the air, crushed another like a baseball homerun and caught the final in a down swing. Talea looked at him, eyes wide. The vizier just as astonished.
 
They continued on, towards the standing stones. Looks like more of the snake-humans performing some kind of a ritual or worship...
 
More ravens... Cohor's attempt to get closer to the worshippers quietly had no chance of success. He remembered about his little brazier, however. As the creatures raced towards him in hostility, he placed the brazier on the ground.
 
And from the tendrils of the smoke that never fades, a fire elemental reared its smoldering head. It looked to Cohor, expectantly.
 
“Burn them.” Cohor says, pointing in the direction of the cultists.
 
The Fire Elemental nodded its acknowledgement and roared forward, a torment of vicious flames. It passed through several crows, causing them to fall out of the air in smoldering heaps, then reached one of the yuan-ti and touched it. It ignited in flames and shriveled to the ground.
 
The remainder of the ravens flew passed the elemental, swarming down on top of Cohor. One scored a beak to his forehead, but squashed some with his shield and batted the rest away with Bonecounter.
 
The remaining snakeperson skirted around the fire elemental, stopping short in front of Cohor, and doused him with a cloud of poison. Cohor smiled, grateful for being dead, then marched forward and motion for the Elemental to approach their enemy from behind to flank it.
 
The elemental approached from behind and engulfed the cultist in flames, setting its close ablaze. Cohor slammed Bonecounter into its arm with a wincing crack. It raised its scimitar to deflect his next blow, causing it stagger backwards. Fear filled its eyes as its skin started to stick to its burning clothes. The dead man ended its suffering.
 
Whilst Cohor was handling his fight, two other yuan-ti broke off to take care of Talea and the vizier.
 
Both battles didn't last more than 20 seconds. Talea shattered the knee of one with her magical quarterstaff and caught the second in the throat, just as Cohor put the smoldering yuan-ti out of its burning misery.
 
They snoop around the standing stones and Talea finds a map! (Possible waygate? I really wanna find one of these. May be protected by hostile yuan-ti)
 
The group presses on, leaving the standing stones behind. Once they break free of the ridge more... swamp. A slow 5 miles; Cohor's fiery friend bids him farewell as his full form quickly sucks up into a small, floating flame and then disappears.
 
Eventually, they find themselves looking out at a large lake, full of ghostly ships.
 
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