We left the goblin cave and headed over to their fort that we had burnt to the ground when we were last in the area several months ago. It was near dark when we arrived. Many things had been either repaired or otherwise rebuilt since we had been here, but some things remained charred remains of what they once were. Ha ha.

After the others had talked me into scouting ahead, I surveyed my options. I could either climb over the wall, which I no doubt would have been successful in doing, or I could go through the main gate. Both of these ideas posed a problem. I was not sure if I would be able to climb back out once I got over the wall, and I wasn't in the mood to battle the entire garrison at the gate. When I pointed these things out to the others they criticized my lack of scouting. They did not give any suggestions, however.

We decided to go somewhere else for the time being. We headed over to the outpost where we had found a murdered man when we came to this forest in the first place. It was only a mile or two away from the fortress, but it was dark when we arrived.

The "outpost" is really a two storey cottage that has no defensive capabilities. It had a front door, two windows at one side, and one window at the other side. It probably had a backdoor as well. The top floor had a window, from which we could see a candlelight.

The others talked me into scouting. Apparently I am the only particularly stealthy individual in the group. Mort cast a spell that allowed me to see in the dark. I have to admit that I was quite impressed.

I snuck into the window on the side that had but one window. Inside there was a man that was sleeping. I looked around his surroundings, trying to determine who he was. Stitch and Griswold told me that the occupants might be their allies, but they might not be as well. I looked at the man, he was Celestine with dark hair. He had no weapons near at hand. The man had belongings that made me think that he thought that he was in a well-protected part of a city.

I was seriously tempted to slit his throat right then. I was thinking, if he is here so close to the bandit lair and can sleep without fear, this guy must surely be an ally to the bandits. The only thing that stopped me is that I didn't want to try to explain my actions should he be a friend to Stitch and Griswold. There are already minor occasions when Stitch and Mort question my values as it is. I didn't want to give them one more thing to hold against me. You can't even express your views around those two, they take it so personal.

I snuck back to the others, being Mort, Stitch, and Griswold, and I told them about what I had discovered. I kept my suspicion to myself, as I have learned that I should generally keep my mouth shut should Mort or Stitch brand me an enemy due to my viewpoint.

Griswold went up to the door, the rest of us decided to remain hidden from sight. Griswold knocked on it, and the sleeping man answered the door. I will call him Greeter. Griswold introduced himself and asked to use the "scrying orb". Griswold and Greeter talked, soon joined by Stitch. Griswold and Stitch went inside, and the door was closed.

After a few moments, Willy came out the window at the top floor and flashed at us in colors, giving us a signal to do something. Mort went over to the wall and braced himself against it. I then got up with my superior acrobatic skills and stood on his shoulders, getting my bow ready.

Inside Grisworld and Stitch were talking to two men, one being Greeter. The two men claimed that Stitch had been banished from something called the "Brotherhood". Listening more, it sounded like it is some sort of secret group for mages. Whatever, like I care. Still, I did wonder a bit about what would get Stitch kicked out of such a group. And yet, I doubted it was even true, as Stitch seemed to be genuinely surprised at such an accusation.

Apparently the two men were getting into some sort of magic duel with Griswold and Stitch. Stitch was talking like one of them had attempted to hurt him already, and he was giving the man a chance to back down. That man didn't, as his hand started to glow with a grey sort of light. I will call him Glowy.

I shot an arrow into that glowing hand, pinning it to the wall. Glowy screamed in agony. His hand had also stopped glowing. So, that is how you stop a glowing hand, shoot it with an arrow. Stitch had a look like "It was about time" and hit Glowy in the torso with his staff.

Greeter shot some sort of magical energy at Griswold with a wand. Griswold dodged in his usual manner by teleporting out of the way.

As I climbed into the window sill, Glowy had pulled out the arrow with his other hand. Stitch had pulled his sword out and it went forth as usual by its own magical power and cut off Glowy's other hand, dropping my arrow as it plopped onto the ground. He also hit him with his staff again, this time in the face.

I got out of the window sill, and moved a bit towards Greeter, quick-drawing my knife and throwing it at him. It would have hit, but he dodges like Griswold and he teleported out of the room altogether. He must have over-done it a bit, however, as he fell from the sky to smash into the ground at Mort's feet.

As I looked outside and smiled in amusement, I caught a glance of Griswold throwing an icy blade of magic into Glowy. Stitch insisted on stabilizing his wounds, however. Mort presumably took the smashed and unconscious Greeter inside and put him on a bed.

I watched Stitch use a magical orb to look at things. Stitch would look for something, and the orb would show it to him. Among seeing several things, there are two most important to me. First was that I saw where Shadrii was, which is the nation's capital of Pangoria. Second was that we saw that Hugo comes back to life in some graveyard in a fortified village of Suul that are near Redcliff. That means that they have a considerable base of operations inside Celestine border.

I just had a thought. What if the Emperor were an evil bastard, and we decided to help these Suul take him out? Here we are killing these people when there is a possibility that they could be our allies in the future. I had better keep silent on this thought, as Mort and Stitch would complain for sure.

I later assisted Griswold in the interrogation of Greeter in the cellar of this "outpost". He was an agent of a group that he called the "Organization". Wow, that is original. He watches people for a woman in Tristen that is named Larena. After he yammered and whimpered for a while, with my boot ready to crush his neck, and answering Griswold's questions he teleported away.

Upon being told about his teleporting away, Stitch pushed the unconscious Glowy out the upstairs window and he smacked onto the ground in a sick thud. I ran over to him and knifed him to make sure that he was dead.

I then went with Griswold to get Darby. Darby had remained with some refugees that we had liberated from inside the caves. Darby then left with Griswold to go to the outpost. I remained to guard the refugees. After a while the others returned and we headed back towards Tristen.

Two days later we arrived at Tristen in the middle of the night. The refugees spread grandiose stories about how Mort and Griswold had saved them. They didn't pay me too much attention, though. I didn't really care. While I know that those that witness my skills would be in awe, I do prefer to keep as low of a profile as I can. Why attract attention to myself? I know that I am good, as do my friends. There is no need to have others spread rumors about you, whether true or not.

18th of Suntide Continued

Corvis sat on his horse, over-dressed for riding around the countryside. The man with him had dismounted, and told us that he wanted to search our possessions. I vehemently declined him, especially with the way that he kept looking at me. I figured that this was some sort of elaborate scheme of banditry, and I wasn't going to give them anything without a fight.

My companions continued diplomacy and searched their belongings. I stood there, contemplating what my companions would say if I just killed the would-be bandits here and now. The man seemed to know that whatever the hell they were looking for was in my pack. Perhaps the over-dressed Corvis had used magic to put it in my pack, and that is why he knew it was there. More reason to just kill them for their troubles.

Corvis claimed to be a man of magic, a magistrate in the nearby city of Glimmering. I really was not impressed, and told him so, and asserted that I did not believe him. The other man claimed it to be true, but that didn't mean anything to me. Big deal, so they share the same "story" for their banditry.

Finally, deciding that I would never hear the end of it from my companions, I complied. The thing was in my pack. I gave it to them, wondering when they would attack us. I was ready to begin the dance of death, knife and sword both ready for the killing blow.

Stitch made an illusion of the man that he been in our camp earlier. The over-dressed Corvis seemed surprised, and claimed that the man had died some time ago. I didn't care, I am getting used to people dying and then me having to kill them again.

The man remounted and the two headed south. Six other horsemen came out of the trees, and joined them. Stitch agreed with my suspicion; they probably were bandits, waiting to ambush us.

We approached the small city, or large town, of Glimmering. It has a big tower in its center. The city appears to be newer than Tristen. It is designed around the tower, and probably houses around six thousand people.

Glimmering is newer as it had suffered great damage from fire and had to be rebuilt. Apparently, Corvis really is a magistrate here. Whether or not that was the real Corvis? Stitch doubted so.

When we were walking towards an inn that a guardsman had pointed us to, some old man approached Griswold, claiming that Griswold is Schmendrick. The man, Aaron, with a scraggly beard that grows like Schmendrick's did, says that he is a scholar-type, a researcher of magic, and that he used to work alongside Schmendrick in the past. Stitch didn't recall him, but he offered him a drink at the inn, the Rusty Mug.

Aaron told us that things are very tightly controlled at Pangoria. He and Stitch then went upstairs to a private room to speak. I wasn't in the mood to sit around downstairs, so I went upstairs and stood outside their door as a guard. After a while, they were done with their discussion and we joined the others downstairs.

After a few hours, I was told that we had apparently volunteered to help Aaron with a ghost problem. His friend, Winston, was here to help us, using some sort of a gemstone that he claims will capture a ghost.

As we were going to leave, three muscular soldierly men came in, looking for Aaron. It turns out that he wasn't with us, and we claimed to have no idea who he was. We left, walking past them as if we didn't care. I know that I wasn't acting, because really I didn't care.

Winston took us to a library. Aaron joined with us. There was a short, skinny man that was apparently waiting for them. He said that inside it was a terrible mess and that she was at it again.

The basement of the library was definitely a mess. Books were in piles, papers were scattered. Stitch yelled out and asked the woman that none of us could see what she was looking for. He then declared that he had the book that she was looking for and ran up the stairs.

The ghost woman appeared, passing through bookcases as she "ran". She then stopped when she saw Griswold, saying that she used to date him. Stitch then reminded her that he had her book and she flew up through the ceiling to get to him.

Crespin had showed her his ghost-slaying-again sword. Her response was to hide from us and cry. What a bully, making the monster cry. While she was crying, Stitch actually did find the book that she was looking for.

When Stitch took it to her and was about to give it to her, Winston sucked her up into his gemstone. Stitch made a pentagram, and then put the book and gemstone inside it. Aaron let her out of the gem. She was trapped inside the pentagram, and read the last chapter of the book. She is Sarah, and she was the librarian however long ago it was that she lived.

Sarah was introduced to the librarian. He was obviously afraid of her, the coward. She promised to be nice. She was let out of the pentagram and started to clean the place up as we were leaving.

We went back to the Rusty Mug to retire for the night. I was awakened by a woman's scream. It was the room across from Griswold and Saffrin. Green slime was on the door. Crespin kicked the door open. Did he even bother to see if it was locked first?

Crespin "saved" a woman in her thirties. He talked her into staying in his room with him. I offered to let her stay in mine instead, but she stayed with Crespin. Oh well, I only offered just so that I could tease Crespin about it in the morning if she came with me instead.

Some ghost had went into her room, and it had tromped around downstairs. It also went up to bother Griswold before it left. I went back to bed because I don't care about this place. They don't pay me to care, so I won't.

19th of Suntide

We packed up to move on to leave Glimmering to its fate. They don't pay us to make the city's problems our problems, so we might as well stop the charity act. Winston can use his magic gem on the other ghosts. As for the giant rats that Aaron mentioned, how much are you offering? Nothing? See ya.

19th of Suntide (Continued)

We left from the mineshaft. As we traveled back towards Glimmering, we beheld that the lights were still in the sky, going towards the tower in some sort of magical energy.

We arrived in Glimmering at about 2:00 in the afternoon. Many townsfolk were standing around, gawking at the lights, and looking utterly stupefied as to what it was all about. After talking to some of them it became apparent that the Varu woman that we are after has gone into the tower with Corvis.

Aaron was no longer with us. How and when did he leave our group, none of us are certain. None of us seemed to even realize that he was no longer with us. Perhaps he was hiding from those men that were after him last night. Or even better, hopefully he was getting us some more money.

We were allowed past the crowds and were escorted into the tower. Some villagers had attempted to come inside with us, claiming to be a part of our group. Such was discouraged by Mort, who stood in full plate, shield, and a large axe that was held at the ready. He can look rather imposing when he wants to.

Inside the tower had a mosaic on the floor. I thought nothing of it, but Griswold and Schmendrick (or are we supposed to still call him Stitch?) pointed out that it had a fully functional pentagram that was hidden within the mosaic.

There were two floaty things that you can stand on and you fly up to a higher level in the tower. While in use, there is a green energy barrier that surrounds the floaty thing, presumably so the occupants will not fall off. I thought that they were rather neat, but kept my comments to myself as the others didn't seem too impressed.

Above the main floor was an open area (there was no ceiling) and we could see several floors up. I counted about 10 floors up, but from the outside it looked like there were 15 floors.

Apparently people lived inside this tower. On the fifth floor there was a opened door that opened to what had probably once been a nice home. It had seen some serious rummaging, however. Somebody was really looking for something or someone.

While the other floors had 8 doors each, the tenth floor had but a single door. Near it was some rubble, much like what was left of that earth elemental from this morning after we beat it to bits. Griswold either didn't believe me, or he wanted to find something out. He cast a spell that confirmed it.

The door opened to a spiral staircase that presumably went up the remaining 5 floors. At the thirteenth floor we found some broken weapons and discovered (or rather noticed the obvious) massive claw mark, probably from a big bear. The claw mark was in a door. The bear was probably looking for a picnic basket. Inside the room was what appeared to be the remains of a recently-broken glass orb. Wasn't that supposed to be a magical orb? I was under the impression that magic things blow up and hurt everything in the area, but apparently that is not always the case.

At the fourteenth floor, we found what was probably the big bear that had left that claw mark. A big bear was in the doorway that we needed to get through. It stood there and growled at us. I got ready to kill it with my arrow that I had readied earlier. Darby said some prayer thing and the bear sat down and stopped its growling.

Crespin walked up to and then past the bear. It got up and started to follow him with its teeth showing. It roared at Crespin, and then sat down again. Schmitch cast some spell and it stayed in place and we walked by. It didn't get up to roar at any more of us. We then proceeded to the 15th floor.

On the roof of the tower was a strange building. A goofy looking woman was standing on top of it, watching the lights. There were two big bear-like dogs that were at each side of her.

Schmitch called out to her. She turned towards us and, in a demonic voice if I had ever heard one, asked us "Are you a god?". Three of us answered at the same time. Schmitch said "no", while both Crespin and I said "yes". Hey, if she had to ask, she didn't know otherwise. And besides, you should see me shoot a bow.

Her response to Schmitch's foolish "no" was to blast a lightning bolt at each of Schmitch, Mort, and Alex. Mort blocked with his shield but got a little jolt. Alex did what he does best and got blasted. Schmitch managed to dodge his, and then he healed Alex.

Alex threw his spear at a nearest bear-dog, but it dodged. I shot at the other one, aiming for its eye. As what seems to be usual these days, it dodged. My aim was true, even with the distance and all of the other considerations at make such a shot more difficult for the unskilled, but somehow my target managed to dodge in time.

Well, if they are always going to dodge, I need to attack more often so that their chances of defending are diminished. I readied my sword in one hand, mace in the other. As I was making the shift to melee battle mode, I watched as Griswold threw an ice shard at the goofy woman. She not only dodged, but she jumped 20 feet in the air as she did so. I was somewhat impressed. Only somewhat as I wondered what value such a great jump had. I mean, why bother to jump so high? I suppose that if I could jump that high, perhaps I would have done so as well, just because I could.

Seargent Mort yelled for us to get closer to the base of the small building. That was a good idea as that goofy jumpy woman was still on top of it and she would have a harder time shooting her lightning from her ass at all of us if we aren't in the open.

I engaged the nearer bear-dog in combat. As it attempted to claw me, I did a graceful backflip. I wasn't able to jump 20 feet in the air while doing so, but no doubt it was still impressive, especially for the new-comer Alex who was near me. It was still more than sufficient to get me out of harm's way. If I jumped 20 feet away I wouldn't be able to attack the bear the next time that I get an opening.

I didn't get a chance to kill the bear-dog. Mort hit it with a mighty swing of his axe and it collapsed to the ground and turned into Rachel, the screaming woman from the Rusty Mug. For a brief moment I considered stabbing her anyway for being such a bear-bitch for trying to claw me.

Alex and I moved closer to the doorway of the smaller building. I noticed the Goofy Super-Jumping Lady above us. Apparently, Alex didn't. I dodged the lightning blast that she sent at me. Alex didn't. He kept his feet, however.

Ahead of us, into the open and away from the smaller building was Vance, attempting to take on the other bear-dog. He wasn't so much trying to actually fight it, but to keep its attention while he focused on dodging it. Alex and I ran over to help Vance.

As I passed Alex, I noticed that my sword and mace, and Alex's spear, which he had recently recovered, and his sword were all glowing yellow. We glanced at each other, shrugged, and went on to help poor offense-less Vance.

I tried to slip around behind the bear as it faced Vance. As I swung my mace at it, I slipped on a loose stone in the roof. Alex plunged his yellow-glowy spear into the bear-dog's side. It turned into Aaron. How the hell did he get here? The spear was still in his side, and it had stopped glowing yellow. His sword continued to glow, however.

I shrugged, my own weapons glowing, and ran to the small building. Inside were Tommy and Corvis, both of them had been beaten severely by Mort and Crespin, who had presumably continued upstairs.

My assessment was disrupted by the sound of one of Griswold's concussion bolts going off behind me. The tower had shuddered from the force. I turned around to find that he had blown apart the stairway. It looked like Griswold had really missed his aim this time...

I heard the others yell, to find that there was a massive chicken on top of the small building. I watched it as I got my bow ready again, and it continued to grow in size as I did so.

As the chicken reached about 21 feet in height, I saw that it had seemed to have lost a leg. Mort had probably hacked it off with his axe. As it hit about 24' tall, I had shot it in the vitals. Meanwhile it had lost its other leg. And it fell.

The chicken fell onto the roof of the tower and started to roll towards the front of the tower, or at least it was away from the front of the small building. Before it went off the edge it had hit 30 feet tall, and I had shot it with another arrow to the vitals.

At 33 feet tall, it hit the edge of the roof of the tower, and tore its crenulations free in doing so. The chicken and the debris fell to the ground below. Too bad for those that came to gawk and stare at the tower below.

Schmitch teleported us onto the ground on the side opposite to the falling chicken. We were safe. Those on the other side of the tower were not. We helped the guards to tend to the wounded and to maintain order in the area. Corvis was taken away by some guards. The chicken thing had already started to decompose. So much for the good meal that I was planning.

Aaron claimed that he couldn't remember the entire day. He didn't recall that he had hired us. However, Griswold was able to convince him of it, especially as he produced the contract that proved it. Either he really didn't remember, or he was just trying to rip us off, I guess it didn't really matter as he was wise in acknowledging the contract.

Now... if only Corvis will pay up. He probably is not happy to have had his ass handed to him by Crespin. Or was it Mort? I will have to ask them for details that I was too occupied to take part in.