UT04: Setting Out, Heading South
General Summary
As our group assembles in the Dancing Donkey for a quick breakfast, we notice Uriel come into the tavern and sit in his usual seat. Red calls him over to join us, he accepts and sits down for a glass of milk. Uriel lets them and Wolfgang know that he’s pleased with how the church is coming along, and that two friars (Robin and Loxley) from his parish have arrived in town to assist him in repairs. Wolfgang welcomes this news along with the fact that they may have brought the town some gold.
Upon hearing about the group's upcoming adventures, Uriel agrees to take the blood oath and join them in their quest to understand what is causing the recent dragon attacks. Setting out for Albrighing, we head southwest around the base of the mountains, following the well-traveled Felgoff’s Route. As we approach the junction with Rigby’s Road, we stop off and have a small lunch before heading back out, eager to make town by nightfall.
Arriving at Albrighing just after sunset, we find an eager stable-boy who stables our horses for the night and directs us to the local tavern for dinner. We meet the owner, a tall gnome named Daavis who introduces himself and eagerly regales us with stories about his town noting that it’s only a few generations old. He tells us there hasn’t been any recent trouble there, just that about five years ago a couple of ogres came through and caused a bother, but otherwise the town was a well-traveled enough place to be fairly safe.
Daavis tells us to see Annie next door about rooms for the night. We have a good rest and head out the next morning. As we travel south the winter winds pick up and it starts to become significantly colder. Oz notices Tonks shivering with exhaustion and he grabs some rocks and heats them up to create a traveling fireless fireplace to warm the group. Our spirits refreshed, we continued on much the same as the day before, stopping only for a quick lunch.
Around nightfall, we enter an area where the trees have closed in toward the path and notice some movement in the treelines. Not looking for any trouble, we press the horses faster and sprint them through the area until we reach a clearer spot where the rock-face of the mountain would give us cover on one side. The horses needed some rest and this looked a decent spot to setup camp. We kept the fireless fireplace going so as not to draw attention with an actual fire. Tonks offered to keep watch but Shannon told the group she had a magical bow that would alert them if anything dangerous approached. So they all tried to get some rest. Tonks and Shannon slept in the cart while Oz, Uriel, and Red snuggled underneath.
We rested for a few hours until Tonks and Shannon felt a buzzing sensation and bolted awake. Noticing several pairs of red eyes from about 60 feet away in the forest, they quietly alert the rest of the group that they are not alone. Oz attempts to command one of the creatures to approach but it doesn’t seem to understand him. While the creature is distracted, Tonks mumbles something under her breath, cuts her own hand and wipes her bow with her own blood before firing off a couple well-placed arrows and killing it.
Uriel leaps out from under the cart and begins to disrobe. He puts his shield on his back and drops two long silver whips from each side. One in each hand, he stands at his full height and stares down the creatures. Shannon blushes at the display.
The creatures seem suitably scared and run around Uriel to attack the least threatening target Red. Out in the open, we’re able to see that they look like emaciated dogs with wedge-shaped heads. There are three of them left and Red attempts to knock them back with a thunderwave before hightailing it to the other side of the cart.
Shannon and Tonks take out the second dog as the horses get startled and begin to rustle around, knocking both of them off their feet in the cart. As Tonks tries rather unsuccessfully to calm the horses down, Uriel starts laying a smackdown on the other dogs. Oz kills the third with a firebolt and Red kills the fourth with a stone smash to the head.
Deciding it isn’t safe to rest here any longer, we decide to push on slowly to take it easy on the horses and reach Maclif just after the break of dawn.
We see the remains of a small village that appears to have been home to some simple hunters and trappers. There’s a mountain river that flows down into a pond nearby that drains underground. As we walk around the remains of the singed town, we see that it appears to have been destroyed not in a long blast of flame, but in arcs of destruction that look like acid burns. This ties in with Tonks' belief that it’s the work of a black dragon who blasts not fire, but acid.
Curiously, some of the roofs appear to have been torn open and inside those buildings are severe acid burns, almost like the dragon had looked inside of them for something. As this was a small simple town where the people were already unable to pay their taxes, we theorize that maybe something was commanding the dragon to look for something, rather than a dragon on its own looking for treasure.
Finding little else in the way of clues, we decide to head down to the nearby town of Somania. We take some supplies to make ourselves some winter jackets and begin the trek south. On our way, Uriel is keeping watch from the cart and he notices eyes that appear to be watching us from the treelines as we leave the forest.
We arrived in Somania late morning. Slightly larger than Herthe, we find it a charming village on the shores of Kilkburg Lake. We stable the horses and head into the Two Drunk Goats for some food. This is an even larger tavern than the Dancing Donkey and it is quite busy as it’s lunch time. Two stories tall with large tables and a bard playing lunchtime music in the corner.
A middle-aged woman introduces herself as Chathi D’Karri and takes our orders. After hearing that we came from Maclif she tells us a man came from there a few weeks ago claiming he’d gone to town to try and sell his furs when a large dragon appeared and began spitting acid all over the town. She didn’t want to believe him as they’ve had enough troubles in the recent past. Her drunken husband had almost burned the bar down and she herself had been taken prisoner in some portal in Altherstab a while back.
Trying to piece together what they know, Tonks says that the six or seven towns she’s seen destroyed were all small villages with nothing of notable worth. If the dragon is targeting them, there must be some reason they don’t yet know. Uriel thinks the local parish may have some information on the tax systems and they may be able to discern which other towns may be likely targets.
Shannon Roxley
Ozan Redberry
Tonks Nïhlson
Rhol Colbrood
Uriel Astra
Report Date
13 Feb 2024
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Secondary Location
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