Good!Party: Seeking the Druids

So, with Leira and Sacha safely married and Sacha newly empowered as the Avatar of Helios, we return to Ruin, Martini, and Marshall Mercy. It is now September, and beautiful in Duendewood. This group will be attempting to help the druids, and possibly the remains of the True Elf army.

 

We arrive in Duendewood, at a safehouse in the wilderness; it’s a rebel base, and does have some equipment available. It will serve as a base of operations. We take the opportunity to purchase another wand of Death Ward.

The druids are fractured and scattered, which works to Lamont’s favor. Still, it seems like there’s something else going on – the druids shouldn’t be falling this easily. Darvinin thinks there may be something sinister involved, especially since Lamont isn’t sending his Solari. The Resistance needs us to look into this nearby village, whose names translated as Happygreen. There were four druids just recently slain outside of town. Colonel Gozbec, in charge of Lamont’s troops, is currently occupying the time. The druids lived in a small cottage outside of Happygreen. Lamont, in case you’d forgotten, has been deporting elvish fighting men to the human towns along the edge of the forest. 

Gozbec has a whole detachment occupying the town. Gozbec may have been a guard captain promoted from Lamont’s personal troop. One of the druids had a t-rex, so we should possibly keep an eye out for that. Two of them had tigers. 

We head off for the town, and the first night we wake up with these horrible nightmares. Martini dreams that Tavros sentences her to be whipped, and then Leira condemns her to have a finger removed and more whipping; Martini basically can’t move when she wakes up. Marshall has the same sequence, but gets hanged. Ruin dreams of being pardoned by Tavros… and then Leira shows up and has his knees smashed and him whipped. We’re going to need some magical restoration.

So Ruin wakes up to find Martini unconscious and Marshall dead. We use the teleport stone to go back to Caristhium and get various combinations of Restoration and Regeneration and Resurrection. So the next morning we teleport back out, and Marshall is really confused by this because why were we walking again?

We arrive a few miles outside of Happygreen, and make our way to the cottage, leaving Marshall behind so Martini and Ruin can sneak. We are invisible and using Pass Without Trace, and both Martini and Ruin can move very quietly. 

We reach the cottage and discover a bunch of bodies out front, one of them kind of draped over a wagon in the yard. The one behind the wagon appears to have masterwork armor. Ruin checks the ground, and decides that a couple of bodies have probably been dragged off into the forest. Also, none of these bodies are druids; they look like Elven warriors who might have been helping the druids, and human warriors. We begin quietly looting the bodies, and also incidentally examining them. 

A very large, scaly head pokes through the trees. It looks around, and it kind of looks confused. It doesn’t seem to actually know we’re here. Ruin, meanwhile discovers a letter on the better-armored fellow who’s slumped across the overturned wagon. It’s from Col. Gosbec, and says they should head back as soon as the black ones have finished harvesting; they’ve finally been given permission to just start hanging elves. We’re finding a bit of spending money, but nothing significant.

Ruin backs away as the t-rex approaches, it sniffs around a bit and then starts eating the body he was just checking. The cottage door opens and then a druid walks out. “Barnabas! Stop eating the people.” He’s Pike, and he can see us. Braug, Merla, and Grillith follow him out of the cottage. 

Ruin: “How come you can see us?”

Two of them immediately shoot at us. We hear rolling thunder in the clouds overhead… again. Ruin absorbs a Flame Strike and then a Finger of Death. Martini: “Why was that necessary?”

They don’t really respond; they’re either not human, or they’re possessed by demons, or something. Martini darts over and stabs one of the other two druids, taking him by surprise with a rapier to the gullet. Ruin moves to flank her target and also hits him, but he manages to stay on his feet. The druid tries to cast a spell, but fails on account of blood loss. The one beside him moves over and tries a touch attack, but misses. 

The first two druids move, one of them also trying to flank and touch attack, but he also misses, The last one tries the same trick on Ruin, but also misses. Martini stabs our first target again, and takes him down. We finish them off, but not before Martini falls to a Finger of Death. Ruin scoops her up and Dimension Doors back to Marshall. He restores her to life, though he also complains about being woken from his nap.

We bring Marshall up to speed, and then head back to examine the cottage. The t-rex has eaten the druids’ corpses, and now looks full and sleepy. We check the cottage, and it looks abandoned – it doesn’t look lived-in at all. There’s no food, no water, nothing that would indicate human habitation. The chairs are still warm, though, so the druids weren't undead as such. 

On the outside of the back of the cabin is a mark of Appollyon, though there doesn’t seem to be any magic associated with it. So there’s very likely some sort of deviltry involved here. Ruin takes some time to gather one of the local plants that’s known to induce diarrhea, and feeds it to Barnabas. We start towards town, and the t-rex comes with us. It’s… getting a lot closer to giving us back the druids’ treasure by the time we get near town. It’s also getting a little cranky, what with the stomach ache and all. 

There are platforms set up in front of the town hall, with scaffolding, with a bunch of elves ready to be strung up, guards around them, and a crowd in front. We’re heading down the street with the t-rex Barnabas, people are cheering and jeering. “And we’ll show you bastards not to mess with our troops! From now on you will respect Gosbec! Gosbec is God to you!” This appears to be Gosbec monologuing.

Marshall uses Dominate Monster on the t-rex, and Marshall commands him to run forward and fetch. He runs forward and retrieves a civilian and brings its (newly a) corpse back to us. The crowd erupts into chaos, and archers move in and start shooting at the t-rex. The t-rex is taking some damage. 

Martini casts Greater Invisibility on herself and moves in. 

Ruin uses Dimension Door to get behind the priest of Appollyon, who's standing on the platform next to Gosbec. The t-rex continues to fetch, and poop. Marshall drops Fire Storm in front of the scaffolding, where the archers and foot soldiers are gathered. The archers die, and the soldiers are injured. Marshall takes to the air to catch up with Martini. 

The cleric of Appollyon casts Firestorm at Marshall in return. Marshall avoids the worst of fire damage, and Martini avoids it entirely. The smell is incredible: fresh-burnt poop.

The fighters start moving up. Gosbec calls for us to call off our attack or he’ll execute the elves. Ruin cuts Gosbec down and attacks the cleric. The t-rex reaches the fighters, and bites one of them in half. He promptly swallows the body, which – contrary to t-rex logic – does not make his stomach feel better. 

Marshall casts Earthquake. Fortunately he’s flying, so he doesn’t fall over. All but one of the guards fall down. Nearby houses start crumbling. City hall hall falls down too, as does the scaffolding --so nobody is getting hanged. Barnabas the t-rex keeps his feet. So does the priest of Appollyon. He tries to cast Destruction on Marshall. Marshall resists, and takes damage but doesn’t die. 

Out in the square, the fighters stand up and Barnabas attacks one of them, biting him rather badly. The fighters attack him in turn, injuring the diarrheasaur. The executioners scatter. The druids try finger of death. Martini perforates one of the druids; Ruin tries to finish the priest and misses entirely, then manages to catch his sword in a noose and drop it. Barnabas eats another fighter, and Marshall tries to implode the priest of Appollyon… and succeeds. So, we won’t be questioning that guy. 

Barnabas gets carved to pieces and then explodes in a welter of internal gasses. It knocks the fighters over, cracks windows, and drenches the area in blood, viscera, shit, incredibly foul fart-smell, and treasure. Townsfolk are scrambling over each other to get to the treasure. The last remaining druid tries to tag Martini with Finger of Death and succeeds. Ruin tackles him. Marshall implodes one of the fighters, dissolving him into a fine red mist for the benefit of the citizens. The last fighter stands up and scrambles away through the filth. Ruin pins the druid, and Marshall implodes the last fighter. 

 

This story will be retold unto the generations, until Happygreen is known only as Happyshat.