Hook:
A recruit promised his grandson he'd bring him back a dinosaur and, dagnabbit, he's going to try and keep his word to the young man!
034 - 250716 - Grandpa's Word
Date:
446 PC, Brightwane 30-33
Players:
Garth
Sorrel
Ragnum
Dev
Loot:
Dino scale [Garth]
Displacer Beast’s Body
After Actions:
Brightwane 30
The mood in camp is not good after Odett’s punishment. I found Ragnum in the mess tent, and we briefly contemplated whether there’s a way to get her out of the hole before her three days were up. We rejected the possibilities that occur to us as unfeasible.
Draylor came up to us cursing out Rector 9 for cutting off his drink tickets. It felt like it would be a good idea to get out of camp for a while. Ragnum agreed, and we headed off to Steve’s tent to see if there’s anything he has that we could lend our skills to. A blue mouse that could only be Draylor joined us on our way.
Steve was talking with one of the new recruits, an older man named Garth that I hadn’t met before. Garth is interested in finding dinosaurs, because he promised to bring one back to his grandson. Personally, I think a dinosaur would make a bad present, but what do I know? Anyway, it fit the bill – we wanted something to do away from camp.
While Ragnum was casting his augury ritual to find us a direction to search, Sarna flew into Steve’s tent with news that there’d been an escalation of the disobedience in camp. Someone painted graffiti on the ground outside the mess tent, and she suspected Draylor. She suggested that we make ourselves scarce, but she agreed to supply us for a 2-to 3-day expedition.We ventured out northwest of camp, heading into an area that hasn’t been explored very much yet. Before we got too far away from camp, Ragnum spotted Sorrel. Sorrel had been missing for a tenday, and he looked the worse for wear. We offered him some food and a clean poncho and reassured him that people weren’t really talking about the explosion anymore. He decided to join our search for dinosaurs.
We made good time traveling along the road. We passed several waypoints before setting up camp at one about 9 miles away at dusk. We noticed mountains in the distance, but we couldn’t really tell if they’re close, or if they’re far away and huge.
Draylor cast his locate animal spell, a ritual which involves burning the hair of a bloodhound, and it smelled foul. But he felt the presence of something large and reptilian about five miles away.Sorrel and I took first watch. He smelled a storm coming from the west before the rain started, and it was strong enough that it blew a board off of our shelter’s roof. Otherwise, the watch was uneventful.
At midnight, we woke the others and shared the stew that Ragnum had started cooking when we set up camp. We turned in and they kept watch for the rest of the night. At dawn, they roused us. Ragnum told us about discovering a frog that could mimic voices that had spooked them during the night, but their watch was uneventful too.
Brightwane 31
We continued the hunt for dinosaurs after we broke camp. The direction provided by Draylor’s spell made us leave the road and led us to a verdant forest. Unlike the Twilight Forest, the trees here look more natural. The thick undergrowth slowed our progress, and reluctantly we decided to leave our mule tied to a tree. Draylor set a snare spell, and I cast alarm just to give us some warning if anything tried to make Jon-e its lunch.
Draylor sprouted giant, spectral wings with majestic white feathers and flew up about 200 feet to scout. He reported back that the forest spread out for at least 100 square miles, and that the mountains were huge and very far away. He said that there was a section of black, reflective earth between us and the mountains. He noticed several carrion birds clustered in an area, but did not see any dinosaurs.
Draylor tried the spell to locate animals again and told us the dinosaur was about 4 miles into the forest. After about 2 or 3 miles, we found signs of a dinosaur’s passage. A very large bipedal carnivore.
We continued further on until we saw a Tyrannosaurus Rex about 90 feet away. Ragnum wanted to go fight it, Draylor wanted to go befriend it, and I wanted to get the hell out of there before we became lunch. Garth seemed disappointed, but was philosophical – he signed a 6-month contract, and there would be other chances when we were better prepared. Sorrel had some crazy suicidal plans, but was also willing to leave the fight for another day. As we retreated, Ragnum found a scale that the beast had lost and presented it to Garth.
When we got near the spot where we tied up Jon-e, my alarm spell went off and we heard a terrified mule screaming. Draylor’s snare caught a displacer beast, which we quickly dispatched. While he calmed down our mule, the rest of us rigged up a sledge to drag the displacer beast’s body back to camp. Our return took the rest of the day, but it passed uneventfully.
046 - 250910 - Larger Than Promised - Grandpa's Word II
Date:
446 PC, Brightwane 53-54
Players:
Garth
Fisher
Odett
Dev
Loot:
Dino Egg
After Actions:
Dev the Wizard
Brightwane 53 – Larger than Promised
This was probably a mistake, Soph.
Garth wanted to go looking for a dinosaur egg for his grandson, and Draylor volunteered to help him organize the expedition. I tagged along because I like them and don’t want to find out they committed suicide by Tyrannosaurus Rex. Fisher and Odett also joined us.
Fisher is making snares that he hopes will catch a dinosaur. Snares. May fortune favor the foolish.
Brightwane 54
Today’s the day. We’re going to head into the forest in search of a dinosaur nest.
Brightwane 54 – Later
Monkeys. Why did it have to be monkeys?
I managed to find a game trail in this crazy, hyper-real unnatural forest, but before we could really explore it we were attacked by glider monkeys. Our lookout somehow forgot to look up to see if anything was waiting to attack us from the trees.
Fortunately, we managed to route the monkeys before they really managed to hurt anyone besides Draylor, and Odett was able to patch him up. I used an illusion to convince the alpha monkey that the Tyrannosaurus Rex was coming to eat him, his friends, and us for breakfast.
Brightwane 54 – Later Still
We did it! Garth has his “dinosaur” eggs…although they’re from some type of monstrosity I’ve never seen or read about before.
We stumbled across a half-eaten carcass that was covered in some kind of crystalline goo, and we decided to set up an ambush. Once we saw the large, armored lizard, the flaw in Fisher’s plan became clear to everyone.
The snares weren’t going to cut it.
Odett cast Moonbeam and surprised it, I used an illusion to make it think it was on fire, and everyone else got their attacks in. It went down without hurting us at all.
Afterwards, we found its nest with eggs.
A successful mission, after all.046 - 250910 - Larger Than Promised - Grandpa's Word II
Date:
446 PC, Highflare 23
Players:
Garth
Fisher
Raven
Dev
Loot:
After Actions:
Dev's journal, part 1 (the weird stuff before we got to the forest)
High Flare 16
Ragnum figured out who stole Sarna’s pipeweed.
Merry thought it would make excellent tea. Do you believe it, Sophia? Tea.
If I weren’t absolutely terrified of Sarna’s reaction, this would be hilarious.
I don’t think Merry understands the concept of personal property, and they don’t really seem to believe many things are more important than making the perfect cup of tea – but I’ve got to convince them not to fuck around with Sarna anymore. And of course, Merry is going through a rebellious teenage phase.
I briefly thought about framing someone else – Ragnum gave me what was left of Sarna’s stash – but it’s probably best to face the music now. I dragged Fisher along with me for moral support. He’s not a bad guy, and he’s got some magic potential. He reminds me of me, once upon a time.
On the way to Sarna’s tent, we ran into Raven. She was still dressed as a mini version of Rector-9 from Die-Anna’s party, and we convinced her to come with us. Sarna was pissed and made me promise to keep “that damned bush” out of her tent. But at least the return of her pipeweed mellowed her reaction a bit. Ok, a lot. I still have all my limbs and my memories exactly where they belong, after all.
Draylor was asleep in a field near Sarna’s tent, also still in his costume from Die-Anna’s party. (Clearly my invitation was lost in the mail.) He said he felt a thumping from within the earth and it woke him up, and then he saw a goat-man’s face in the distance. My first thought was that he’d had too much to drink at the party, but he swore he hadn’t been drinking at all. And there’s weird shit happening in the Riftspan all the time, so who’s to say?
Garth arrived a few moments later to ask Sarna about the basilisk egg he acquired in the dinosaur forest. The egg isn’t right, and he wanted to consult a fey expert. Sarna compared fey energy to “fucked up fruit mold” – say a little mold gets onto an apple, well, it’s still an apple. But eventually, that mold works its way to the apple’s core, and it’s no longer an apple – it’s just a pile of mold. Sarna pointed out that some mold is good mold, like the kind you need to make cheese. Other mold is bad and gives you lung fever.
Sarna concluded that Garth’s egg would die without fey “mold.”
Garth asked me to look at the egg and tell him what I thought. I took it and opened myself to the arcane energies coming from the egg. I could sense something alive inside, but it was missing something vital that it needs to survive. I told him that its death wasn’t imminent, but it wouldn’t live long enough to hatch unless he found a way to provide that missing fey energy.
Garth asked us to go with him back to the forest. I weighed the risk of the forest against the risk of being anywhere near Sarna when her high wore off and jumped at the chance to join him. We gathered provisions and traveled back to the forest.
High Flare 20
We’ve been traveling through the woods for two days already. Same tall trees growing up to the sky in crazy corkscrew shapes. Fisher noticed that we haven’t seen any of the weird crystalline goop this time. He made the connection that the lizard spit was the source of it – gross.
I tried to look into the Weave to find our path to the nest site, but everything’s so fucking weird here that I got us totally lost. Fortunately Draylor’s bushcraft was up to the task and he was able to guide us there. All the remaining eggs crushed and something had scattered the bones of the basilisk we killed the last time we were here.
Draylor noticed a five-legged, purple arboreal rodent and managed to talk to it. It gave him directions toward the “big water”and Draylor convinced Raven to let it eat one of her bugs in exchange.
Draylor’s hands started to glow, and as he was waving them around he touched the ground and a flower grew there. Fisher cast Detect Magic and sensed a divine presence.
Draylor used his celestial wings to fly up and confirm that we were headed in the right direction before we set up camp for the night. Garth took first watch, Fisher took second, and I took third.
Garth’s watch was uneventful, but Fisher’s nearly ended in disaster. We’re not really sure what happened, but somehow Fisher got charmed by a dryad and was nearly spirited away. The rest of us got tangled up in plant vines while we were sleeping.
Garth managed to call out a warning that we were under attack, but only Draylor was able to break free. Raven said she bit one of the dryads and it ran away. Draylor managed to kill one, but the others ran away with Fisher. Draylor chased after them in bear form and caught Fisher. He was able to subdue him and drag him back to our camp.
From the story I pieced together, the dryads weren’t what I was expecting. Dryads are typically guardians of an area and don’t exhibit the range that this group did when they fled. The also seemed to be enraged by the presence of forged metal – I can be thankful that I don’t carry much and don’t make a habit of sleeping with my daggers on me, I guess.
After the excitement, my watch passed uneventfully, and we planned to set out for the “Big Water”in the morning even though Fisher looked a lot worse for wear.
High Flare 21
The air itself seemed to glow with the morning sunlight. As we traveled on, we began to notice signs of civilization. We saw small wooden whistles and bells woven into the trees, and there were signs someone was maintaining a defined hiking trail. To Garth’s delight, we also noticed some velociraptor footprints.
Suddenly, we heard someone yodeling. Before we could discern where it was coming from, an older human woman descended from the treetops and asked who we were. Garth told her about the dryad attack, and her reaction was basically, “yeah, stuff like that happens.”
Draylor disturbed her with how freely he was sharing Fisher’s name. I got him to stop and reminded everyone that this might not be the best place to give away names, but she decided we were too weird or too dangerous to deal with. She blew one of those wooden whistles and said that she’d let the wardens handle it. She did try to pull us into a circle – I think she meant to protect us, but she might have been trying to trap us.
We decided we should head back to camp to see if we could get Marris or one of the clerics to patch up Fisher a bit more rather than continue to investigate.Dev the Wizard
Report to Steve on the continued exploration of the Dinosaur/Fey Forest
Filed on High Flare 23 by Recruit Dev
Recruits Draylor, Garth, Fisher, Raven and I continued exploration of the Dinosaur/Fey Forest during the past week.
There are other people who have settled in the forest. We met one woman, who seemed friendly but extremely cautious. There were signs of a larger settlement, but we did not stay to investigate further due to injuries sustained by Recruit Fisher.
We were attacked in the forest by dryads, who seemed to be perverted from their normal nature. Dryads are typically protective forest spirits bound to a particular area, but these seemed to be enraged by forged metal much like a bull will target a matador’s red cape. Recruit Fisher was nearly spirited away, but thanks to Recruit Draylor’s heroic actions we were able to bring him back to camp.
PS
As I'm sure you're aware, there are rumors of a were-squirrel running through the camp. Do you need us to investigate?Other notes:
"We find small wooden whistles and bells woven into the trees. There are signs that someone has been maintaining a defined hiking trail. We see velociraptor footprints and hear a yodeling from the treetops.
"An older human woman descends from the treetops and asks who we are. Garth tells her about the dryad attack, and she basically shrugs and says something like 'yeah, that happens.' We seem to be causing her distress. She does not like it when Draylor says Fisher's name aloud.
"She blows a wooden whistle and says that she's going to let the wardens handle it. Then she tries to pull us into a circle, but we decide to turn back to camp." [Note, this was due to running out of time for the session.]
057 - 251125 - Good Neighbors - Grandpa's Word IV
Date:
446 PC, Highflare 30-33
Players:
Keres
Donk
Sorrel
Odette
Raven
Dev
Loot:
After Actions:
Keres
Highflare 30th
Woke up today with Donk in his feelings? During breakfast with Sorrel, he took veggies with his meal, which, apparently, is not normal at all.
Meres approached us (Donk, Sorrel, Odette, Raven, Dev) later about finding some "brain good" herb out west, supposed to help deal with trauma that this weird place gives you. We met with Sarna, took three healing pots, and left.
After three days we made it past some humid forest, a bird dropped a feather that Sorrel turned into a quill, later found some foot prints of the "seven toed" variety, whatever THAT is, then one morning I woke to Sorrel yelling "TUNA" and chasing a ferret.
There was an odd light that Odette caught right around dawn, a soft peach color that faded after a moment. Not odd at all.
Cont on, we later found a circle of stone with crushed herbs and sap in it's center. If the tight space of this forest wasn't already freaking me out, the bad vibe from that thing definitely put me on edge. I think I held Odette's hand at a point.
Sorrel's legs ( metal by the way ) also started vibrating, and he concluded that we should use his legs as a dowsing rod since we were looking for any body of water at that point. But after clearing some more forest, the trees started to clear up in a more arranged manner, the brush was cleared out and it was like there was an intentional path in front of us.
In that area we found pebbles stacked near a bush thats likely used for superstitous warding. After, something in the forest started rushing at us, we could feel it in the ground first, then a utah raptor with a rider showed up.
He's an old dwarf named Haren, told us "The metal is loud out here" which isn't cryptic at all, then just shimmed off his high horse to put a salve on Sorrels legs to make them quiet.
I don't trust this guy. But he's straightforward; we didn't give our names and instead used fake ones. He led us to his home, "Witchlight" and there is just...a whole village out there, sitting pretty and safe. Haren had us meet with their village Elder, Sera. If anyone meets her, she's recognizable by her pale vine vine-patterned scars.
Then she mentioned a fever that comes with the mist of the forest? It's a week quarantine if you catch it, "Myreblad Fever", she calls it, comes with chills, fever, and who knows what else. Not in the mood to catch an unknown illness...
We found out the area we're from is called "Sifferan" while Sorrel was showing the map we used. I tried discouraging them from sharing information they haven't asked for yet. We don't know them, or what they want, and being careful doesn't hurt.
Haren eventually showed us the way to the "brain good" herb near the marshlands. Sorrel crafted a cute little flower crown in exchange to thank nature for the trade, we ended up taking about nine of them. On the way back to Witchlight, Sera handed a letter over to us to hand to our superiors. Buttt, since Meres told us Steve isn't supposed to know crap about our little mission west, anyone else's eyes can read it.
Also found a juicy tidbit about Taliyah through Donk and his very sad mood, she has a husband apparently. Definitely going to follow up on that. Of all people Donk doesn't deserve that.Dev's longer recap
Highflare 30
Remember last week when we had our run in with the Good Neighbors? I still wake up in a panic if the sheet gets coiled around my leg while I’m asleep – for a moment, I think it’s the vine again. Fisher has had it worse – full blown nightmares, according to Marris. She says a lot of people aren’t doing too well. She wanted someone to look for an herb that has a ridiculously long eleven name – we started calling it the “brain good” herb because it can be used for treating shock and arcane trauma. Oghma knows, we have more than enough need for it.
Our party, which included Donk, Odett, Raven, Keres and Sorrel, stopped by Sarna’s tent for supplies. She handed out healing potions, but Donk pushed away the one she offered to him without a word. Donk is not a big talker, but something’s up there – I’m worried about him.
Highflare 31
We followed the map Marris gave us, which leads to a marshy area in the Dinosaur Forest near where we had the encounter with the Good Neighbors. Our first day of travel was uneventful – the most exciting thing that happened was a pretty little Quill Finch dropping a feather that Sorrel turned into a pen.
Highflare 32
We entered the woods proper. No matter how much time I spend in a forest, it’s never going to feel “right”- I’m always going to be a city boy. The trees closed in around us oppressively, and we saw signs of some of the forest’s larger inhabitants. I hope we will be able to avoid them. Shortly after mid-day, we happened upon a confusing split in the path. Odett led us in the correct direction, and we continued to move closer to the area Marris sent us to.
Highflare 33
Sorrel woke everyone up chasing after his ferret in a slapstick comedy routine. After our camp settled down, Odett told us she saw a peachy-colored glow at the end of her watch. We broke camp and continued along as the trail turned into a winding path. We found our way back to the site of our ambush two weeks ago, and the area still showed signs of the fight.
As Sorrel crossed a trickle of water, he felt unusual feedback in his mechanical legs. This disturbed him because he couldn’t identify the cause, but it didn’t seem to affect their function.
The air is very humid, and the forest seems attentive to us. Someone had passed through the ambush site – Keres noticed some humanoid tracks and some larger, three-toed tracks in addition to ours. These newer tracks only seemed a few days old.
Donk found a ring of smooth stones near a tree, with sap and crushed herbs in the center. The weave felt muted near the circle somehow. Sorrel felt slightly stronger feedback in his legs here.
Odett asked for a stick to use as a dowsing rod, and Raven found one for her…but Sorrel had the idea to use his legs as a dowsing rod for the fluctuations in the weave. Donk picked him up and started waving him around, but it didn’t seem all that productive.
Odett noticed some fresher humanoid tracks, and they led us to a more maintained path. We saw the same reed whistles and directional markers that we saw on our last trip. The wind died away without warning, and we all felt a buzzing in our legs like Sorrel had described. We saw a small shrub that someone had started to prune and stopped suddenly when they were only half-done.
I got spooked and cast Mage Armor in case we got ambushed again. Keres found a stack of three smooth pebbles stacked near the base of the bush, which reminded her of what they did in her sailing days to appease or word off hostile entities.
Further along the path, we noticed trees bending to form an archway and roots sculpted into seats. Sorrel stepped forward to reach for a whistle, but the vines and undergrowth visibly pulled back as if to brace for something. The forest fell silent.
There was a burst of movement and a dwarf riding a dark grey Utah raptor with green feathers appeared out of nowhere. He told us not to move.
“You guys came through the wrong side!” he said. “Do you have anything on you that the forest tried to take? Any shaped metal?”
The dwarf seemed especially perturbed by Sorrel’s legs. “Metal is loud,” he told us as he spread some kind of salve over the mechanical appendages. “It upsets the roots.”
I could feel the fey influence in the Weave recede a little as he did his work.
“Welcome to Whichlight,” he said. “How did you find us? They call me Herren.”
I offered that he may call me Leaf. Everyone else picked a nature-inspired moniker – they remembered my warning about how the woman responded during our previous encounter. Herren led us to town.
During the walk, Donk shared that he found out that Talia is married. I suggested that he could simply remove Talia’s husband from the picture – he clearly isn’t important to her.
“The wraiths don’t bother you,” Herren asked, adding another more pressing worry to my list.
A mix of species watched as we approached. The children among them scampered indoors as we drew closer. Herren wanted to bring us before the elders.
An older woman, slight in stature, stepped forward. Her arms were covered in vine-shaped scars, and she smelled of crushed herbs. She allowed us to call her Sera and offered to let us settle in Witchlight after a week in quarantine.
They’re concerned about a fever that comes with the fog, which is less common in the summer (and probably explains why we’ve been lucky on that score so far.)
We shared our mission to find the “brain good” herb and told her that we weren’t planning to stay – our group had settled in Sifren. While they were discussing what to do with us, I overheard someone ask, “What if they’re from the other side of the chasm?”
It’s clear that Sera didn’t trust us, but she did offer to have Herren escort us to where the herb grows and send us home. We were warned, “Be sure to ask permission before you uproot anything.”
Sorrel made a masterwork flower crown to leave as an offering, and we were able to bring back several clumps of the herb. Sera gave Keres a letter to take back to the leader of our group and warned us to steer clear of the Neighbors’ forest on our way back.Unresolved Threads:
Dinosaurs are found in a ~100 sq mile forest north of the city
Plane of Black glass to the NW of the city
Large Mountains, including one very tall peak to the NW of city
Other people in the rift (faries, dwarf)?