Most recent journal posting

When does one adventure end and another begin? Sometimes it's hard to tell. The party has finished the last adventure that much is true, they've divided the loot, sorted out some personal matters, and their training has begun. With the beginning of a new year, we begin a new journal. What will the future hold? What's the next adventure lying in the path of these S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S? Stay tuned to find out.

Real-world date: 14 Jan 2006
Game-world date: 11 - 16 Jularva 1002
Written by: Ashedyn

11 Jularva 1002
Newday

The most significant thing we found out about our stuff was that the fires that were inside Gavarize’s eyes and now are in Tanar’s eyes are really a kind of magic item.  It’s some kind of shroud that Tanar can use to make himself all covered in flames that hurt other people that are around him, but that don’t burn him or any of the stuff he’s carrying.  Unfortunately, if he dies, his body and all his stuff is immediately burned up, and he can’t get rid of the shroud unless he dies.

Thalidimar called a group meeting after dinner.  The first thing he wanted to talk about was letting Grenco join our group.  He called for a vote, and everybody but me voted to let him join.  Since everybody has to agree that he can join, this meant that he couldn’t.  Then everybody ganged up on me and started demanding me to explain myself and stuff.  I just think that there should be a good reason to let somebody join up with us, but everybody else seems to think that anybody should be able to join unless there’s a reason not to let them.  I guess any dumb yokel we run into can join our group just for asking.  Zeddishous eventually threw a hissy fit and said he wasn’t going to join in any more discussions until I let Grenco join.  He reminded me of Barnaby back home when I was a little kid.  Barnaby would always get pissed off about something when we were all playing warball, and then he’d take his ball and go home if he couldn’t get us to go along with what he wanted.  Zeddishous was just like that tonight.  We could have just gone on with the meeting without him since we only need a majority of the group’s members to hold a meeting, but the meeting wasn’t going anywhere anyway, so I just left and went to bed.

12 Jularva 1002
Nexsta’

Everybody else got together and went into town before I got up this morning.  Since X is off at his conference for the next few weeks, I decided to see what kinds of cool stuff he might be hiding in his bedroom.  I’ll bet he’s got some really interesting magic stuff in there.  Unfortunately, he’s got a really good lock on his door.  Instead of just one row of pins, there’s at least four rows around the cylinder.  And the pins are weird, too.  It’s like each pin has two or three concentric pins that all have to be pushed to the right spot, all at the same time to let the lock rotate.  And that’s just the beginnings of the mechanical parts of the lock.  I know there’s some magic parts, too.  I don’t know if I could have even gotten this lock with my magic picks, but since all I wanted to do was look at what was in his room, I didn’t bother with them.

While I was fiddling with the lock, everybody else showed up with some guy they had drug out with them to the manor from the Mages’ Guild.  I decided to ignore them, but then somebody cast a spell and I felt funny.  Thalidimar told me that we had all had a curse on us where none of us would have been willing to give away or spend some of the coins we had found.  But he also said that I had also had another curse on me that nobody else did where I would disagree with everybody all the time.  He said that both curses were gone from me now.

I spent the rest of the day in my room thinking about what he said.  I’ve been going back over my journal for the past few weeks.  I don’t know just when the curse started, but I can see now how it made me act like a total jerk.  I know that Hoar teaches that you should always answer back whenever someone does something wrong to you.  It makes sense that you should also try to make it up to someone when you’ve wronged them, but I don’t know for sure if that’s something else he teaches too.  I really need to study up more.  At any rate, I’ve decided to try and make it up to everybody else since they’ve had to put up with me lately.  When I joined everybody else for dinner, I apologized for how I’ve been acting lately.  They seem to understand that it wasn’t really me, but it was because of the curse.

Thalidimar called another group meeting after dinner, and this time I voted with everybody else to let Grenco join our group.  We also talked about whether Tanar’s shroud should be counted in the value of the treasure when figuring out everybody’s share and counted as one of the items that’s part of his share, or whether we should just pretend it doesn’t exist when figuring out both since he couldn’t sell it if he wanted to anyway.  We made him abstain from the vote, but then we were split even on which way to go, so since he volunteered to count it into the value and count it as one of his items, that’s what we ended up deciding to do.

Next we decided to make the rug/portable hole that we found a group item belonging to the party, along with the gem that cancels all magic around it and the box it comes in.  Since the value of those things is already much more than what would have been contributed to the party fund normally, we decided that was all that would be given to the party fund as its cut of the treasure this time.  Our party bank account is a little low right now, but I think we’re still OK for now.

We decided to put off splitting up the rest of the treasure until tomorrow so everybody has a chance to sleep on it and think about which items they want, and how much they’re willing to bid on them if someone else wants the same things.

13 Jularva 1002
Onward

We divided up the treasure during today’s after-dinner meeting.  I got an amulet that protects against curses.  Given what’s happened to me the last couple of jobs, everybody seems to think it’s a good thing for me to have.  I also took some of the rage drake scales.  I’ll have the Gnome at Bron Arvo’s Armory turn it into another helmet to replace the one I lost.  Kethri took the rest of the scales to turn into a whole suit of armor.  I noticed that Tanar took Rezigrene’s warhorse, but not the barding that went with it.  I know that he’s tight for cash and worried he won’t have enough to pay for training.  Since I’ve given him more grief than anybody else lately, I took the warhorse armor as part of my share of the treasure and gave it to him as a peace offering.

14 Jularva 1002
Forens

We took all the treasure that nobody had claimed into town today to sell.  Having to climb in and out of the portable hole over and over again to get out the stuff we were selling at each shop gave me an idea.  At dinner, I proposed that we find a carpenter to build some shelves inside the portable hole to keep things organized better than just throwing everything into a pile on a floor.  We could also have him build a ladder to climb in and out of it with.  Everybody seems to like the idea.

Since the party now has the new portable hole to keep stuff in, I offered to buy the party’s old bag of holding that we originally found in Explicita’s lair.  Everybody seemed fine with that, too.

16 Jularva 1002
Hafn’mor

I found this engineer guy in town this afternoon named Choré Glam that’ll make the shelves and ladder in the portable hole for us.  He’s also going to make a pulley set on the end of a retractable arm that we can pull up out of the hole to lower heavy stuff down with, and then fold it back down into the hole when we want to fold it up to carry around.  He says it should be done in a couple of days.

DM's note:
The party has completed their latest quest, and they're currently unwinding in Whillip. They've split up their treasure, they've balanced their check books, renewed some old acquaintances, and removed some curses. Kethri has left the party, and the characters are just about to begin their training. They're hoping to get through training and start their next adventure without a hitch. Or, at least that's what they're hoping to do. Is Whillip just a stopping off point for the next adventure? When is X going to get back? and what will the next adventure be? Check back here in a couple of weeks for the continued adventures of our heroes - The S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S.

Real-world date: 28 Jan 2006
Game-world date: 17 Jularva - 01 Detenday 1002
Written by: Ashedyn

17 Jularva 1002
Aprochen

Ellis joined us for breakfast this morning.  He had a couple of announcements for us.

First, it seems that Kethri has left.  Nathis found a note in her room this morning.  Basically, it sounded like she’s decided that she doesn’t really like adventuring all that much after all, so she’s going to hang out with Yorgel instead.

Next, Ellis told us that X is off somewhere training for something, and won’t be back for quite a while.

Ellis’s last announcement was that since Kethri left, he had posted a notice in Willip’s town commons that we were looking to hire somebody.  It worked, too.  This half-elf came to the manor around mid-morning asking about the notice.  He claims to be pretty good with weapons, and he has a really nice looking rapier, even if he does wear funny looking clothes.  Since we really need a warrior type, I told him to come back for dinner when everybody would be here.  He said he’d come and bring his man-servant with him.  What kind of adventurer needs a man-servant?  I could see Lumiarti or Alcarenque hiring one, I guess.  Maybe it’s his elf blood.  I hope it doesn’t mean he’ll be all stuck-up and snooty like those elves were, though.

When Thalidimar got back from running his errands in town, he told us he’d ran into a couple of elves just outside of X’s estate that were handing out this flyer.  It’s for a group that calls itself “C.O.E.P.A.S.”.  Basically, the group sounds like a bunch of elf-supremists that want to kill off everybody that isn’t an elf.  They say everybody else is ruining the world, and only elves can live without ruining everything around them.  The end of the flyer sounded like they want to start off by killing every half-elf and half-orc.  We didn’t think much of it at first.  After all, you can always find some kook on a street corner shouting something about how time doesn’t really exist, or that the world is going to end tomorrow by burning or freezing or flooding or lighting or whatever, or that the Mage’s Guild is putting something in the water that will make everybody sterile or will let them control your mind, or some other such nonsense.  But then Grenco got back from town, and he had a newspaper with him.  It seems that the town guard found a dead half-elf on the beach this morning.  He had been cut in half down the middle.  Grenco says that his new trainer had told him that there was a half-orc killed a couple of days ago, but he wasn’t cut in half or anything.

We went to see Dalek, since Thalidimar wanted to perform the speaking with the dead rites on the guy that X’s guards killed the night we got back into town.  He didn’t manage to learn anything useful, though.  We showed Dalek the flyer while we were there in case it might help at all.

While I was in town anyway, I decided to see if I could find a book about Hoar’s church that I could use to study up with.  It’s harder to learn about a god that doesn’t have any temples to go to, and who’s priests are always wandering around who-knows-where.  It’s also hard to find a book about his church that way.  I had to go to several book stores before I finally found one that had what I was looking for.  Still, when I have questions in the future about whether Hoar would approve of something I’m doing or not, I hope that the book I bought today can help me figure out the answers when there’s no priest around to help me out.

Caed came to dinner, and everybody seemed to like him well enough, so we voted him into our group and officially made him one of the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S.  He’s moving his stuff into his room here at the manor right now.

18 Jularva 1002
Longday

Another half-elf was cut in half last night.  He was found in a boat out in the harbor.

19 Jularva 1002
Endsnear

There was another half-elf killed last night, and so was one of the city guard.  The guard was a human, though.

20 Jularva 1002
Godsday

There was an announcement in today’s newspaper that there’s a 10,000gp reward for anybody that helps solve the half-elf and half-orc murders.

21 Jularva 1002
Newday

I started training with Arach-Nid today, and holy crap am I sore!  He made me stick around too late to go and get a massage, too.  This is going to suck.

29 Jularva 1002
Endsnear

Ever since we got back into town, Grenco’s been trying really hard to find a blink dog to buy.  He says it’s because he’s been asleep for 300 years so all of his family is dead and that makes him feel all alone.  He says he wants the dog to be his friend.  Well, he finally got one today, sort of.  He had to buy it at the slaver’s market, and he had it special ordered there a couple of weeks ago.  It finally came in today.  He took Tanar with him to go pick it up.  Tanar says it was chained inside a cage, and it looked really beat up.  He used a healing spell on it.  Then Grenco had him take them all to the Mage’s Guild ‘cause he wanted to have a spell cast on himself and the blink dog that lets them talk to each other without having to say anything out loud.  After that was done, Tanar says that Grenco let the blink dog out of the cage and unchained it, and it immediately just disappeared.  Grenco is sure that it will come back to him eventually, but I think he’s just wasted thousands of gold pieces.  It’s his money to waste, I guess.

07 Augot 1002
Aprochen

We had to elect new group officers today.  I was really shocked when Thalidimar nominated me for group leader, but I was even more surprised when I got elected.  Thalidimar is now the group chronicler, and Tanar is the group spokesman.  Caed got elected as the group treasurer.  Once again we’re trusting our money to someone we just met.  I’m still not convinced that’s a very good idea.

29 Octov 1002
Endsnear

Yay!  Arach-Nid decided he’s done training me for now.  Some of the other S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S. have a couple of weeks left before they’re done, though.

20 Novius 1002
Godsday

Everybody finished their training as of yesterday.  We’re going to take a week off and look for a job that starts after Moonfest.

01 Detenday 1002
Newday

A couple of the city guards came to X’s manor first thing this morning.  It seems that they’ve found out why they haven’t found any dead half-elfs or half-orcs in a while.  The bodies were being hidden.  They found 37 of them in a barn this morning.  Two of them were half-orc guards here at X’s manor, and that’s why the city guards came out to tell us about them.  Since X still isn’t back from his training yet, and he’s let us stay in his manor, we decided to check out his guards’ deaths for him.  We owe him at least that much.

Dalek was at the barn when we got there.  They wouldn’t let anybody in, but Thalidimar eventually convinced Dalek to let him in to perform the speak with the dead rites on one of X’s former guards.  All he really found out was that “men with knives” had killed the guard on a remote corner of X’s estate in the middle of the night.

While Thalidimar was busy with that, we talked to Dalek some more.  He said that the reward has been increased to 20,000gp.  He also said that Lumiarti has been seen handing out C.O.E.P.A.S. flyers in Willip.  Also, the farm with the barn where all the dead half-elfs and half-orcs were found used to be owned by some of Lumiarti’s relatives, but now it’s abandoned.  It looks like Lumiarti has really gone off the deep end, but now that I think about it, it doesn’t really surprise me that he’d get mixed up in a group like this C.O.E.P.A.S..

I thought that maybe it might be a good idea to have a chat with the Clean-up Crew since Lumiarti is one of them.  We eventually managed to track down Kragus at a bar called The Hollow Skull.  He says that Lumiarti has been out of town for a while tracking down a lead on a job for them.  We tried telling Kragus about Lumiarti being part of C.O.E.P.A.S., but he was already too drunk for any of it to sink in.  We asked if he could take us back to the Clean-up Crew’s house so we could talk to the whole group, but when we got there, they were already asleep for the night.  We’ll just have to head back there first thing in the morning.

DM's note:
The party has completed their training, and they're anxious to start a new adventure. Who is C.O.E.P.A.S., who's committing the 'Half' murders? and is Lumiarti really involved in something nefarious? What is this menace plaguing Whillip? Check back here in a couple of weeks for the continued adventures of our heroes - The S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S.

Real-world date: 11 Feb 2006
Game-world date: 02 Detenday 1002
Written by: The Dungeonmaster

02 Detenday 1002
Nexsta'

The party became embroiled in a costly battle on the evening of 02 Detenday, 1002 (Real world: 11 February, 2006). After investigating the deaths of some Whillip's citizens, Our heroes came under the scrutiny of a group of Elven supremacists (A group called C.O.E.P.A.S.). While the party has yet to take this recent threat seriously, someone is obviously taking the party seriously. While the party slumbered, an Elven assault group approached the Manor. The grounds of X's estate are quite large, and it's difficult to prevent unwanted visitors. The guards who man bridge post are mainly there to greet visitors and deter solicitors, and two of them (Two half-orcs) were recently the victims of the 'Half murderers'.

Stalking towards the Manor, this group didn't go completely unnoticed. With a cascade of multi-directional yelps, the party was alerted to the presence of intruders by an unlikely source. An orphaned Blink-Dog that's been hanging around the manor ever since Grenco freed it from a slave pen. It's calls alerted Grenco, who stood watch on the fateful night in question.

After alerting the rest of the party, the intent of the intruders became clear. Amid a startling series of thuds, thwacks and impacts, came a volley of flaming arrows. A barrage that set the manor's roof ablaze. As servants and hirelings scrambled to fetch ladder and bucket, the party emerged from within, ready to do battle with whatever evil might confront them.

The assault seemed rather straightforward. Elven warriors dressed in black leather and carrying barbed chains, the small assault group put up a valiant show as our adventurers filed out onto the battle-ground. It soon became evident that these warriors were way outclassed, as they fell from a single blow. Little did the party know that they would soon be in some serious trouble.

After two rounds of overmatched fighting, a new threat appeared. A strange looking beast, hopping and squealing, it lopped onto the field like some strange rabbit-pig mutant. Tanar immediately recognized these beasts for what they truly were. Hopping Pink Oinkers! A magical abomination, capable of draining away spells and charged items, a dangerous foe indeed; especially for a party that's heavily dependent on magic.

Within moments, the depth of the party's troubles became clear. Immune to normal weapons, and unaffected by everything but magical damage, these beasts grow as they take damage. After taking more damage than their bizarre life can endure, they explode in a shower of shredded flesh and gore - The damage from the blast isn't trivial, and Tanar suffered greatly after experiencing this particularly devastating passing. After finally defeating one of the beasts, the party was dismayed to find that absorbing magical damage causes these creatures to reproduce; instantly generating a new Oinker hungry for more magic.

A dangerous situation to be sure. Costly, but not necessarily deadly.

(If your interested, I've posted a detailed encounter synopsis with a graphic layout of the situation. You can access the scenario recap at my web site.)

DM's note:
We left the session with all but one of the Elven assault troops dead, and the party gathering around their anti-magic gem. An anathema to the Hopping Pink Oinkers, the anti-magic gem has once again proven it's worth. As the Oinkers seek magic to eat, the party is slowly trying to come to grips with this difficult enemy. What will happen when the whole party has retreated to the safety of the anti-magic gem? What will the Oinker's do then? Are there more troops waiting in the woods? Ashedyn didn't see any. How will the party deal with these diabolical fiends that eat magic, explode when killed, and reproduce by absorbing magical energy? Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion. Stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 25 Feb 2006
Game-world date: 01-02 Detenday 1002
Written by: Ashedyn

(A small bit of backtracking.)

27 Augot 1002
Aprochen

Grenco finished having something made yesterday, and he’s offered to make a couple more for the rest of the group.  It’s basically a metal hut with no floor and two doors.  There’s hooks inside to hang gear or a hammock or whatever from.  It’s the size of a large tent, and it has a small camp stove inside it to heat the inside and cook on.  He had a spell cast on it so that he can shrink it down to the size of a funny-looking hat, which makes it extremely light to carry around.  Me and Duracell paid him to have one made for us.  Unfortunately, only he can make the huts big or small, but as long as he’s around, they should be very useful.  Certainly better than just a tent.  When their ideas actually work out and don’t explode in everyone’s face, it can be useful to have a Gnome around sometimes.

(Back to the regular timeline.)

01 Detenday 1002
Newday

When we got back to X’s manor, I suggested that we should start posting watches.  I know that X has his own guards, but two of them have already been killed, and since we now have a half-elf in our party, we are probably a target for C.O.E.P.A.S.

02 Detenday 1002
Nexsta’

I was right about posting watches last night.  C.O.E.P.A.S. attacked X’s manor last night.  I had barely dozed off after my watch when Grenco woke us all back up.  He said that the blink dog he had bought told him that there are men in the woods.  Caed used a spell on himself to turn into an Avariel Elf, and flew out to scout.  When he got back, he told us that there were some men moving through the woods with what looked like torches or something.  Then we heard arrows hitting the manor, and the roof caught on fire.  Tanar told his servants to help out X’s house staff in putting out the fire.  I told Grenco to head out of the manor in one direction, and I’d head out the other, and we’d circle around behind the attackers in the woods.  When I worked my way back to the manor, there were a bunch of dead Elves in the yard, and Zeddishous shouted for me to follow him into the manor where they’d taken out the anti-magic gem.  On my way, I spotted some strange creatures across the yard.

When I got into the manor, Thalidimar told me that they’re called hopping pink oinkers, and that they eat magic stuff.  He also said that regular physical attacks won’t damage them.  I saw Tanar hit one with a spell that shoots fire, and it grew!  Then suddenly there were two standing where the one had been, but they were both back to being Gnome-sized.  Grenco eventually got them all to follow him into me and Zeddishous’ rooms and we locked them in until we could get the city pound to help us get rid of them in the morning.

Caed came flying back, but when he got near the anti-magic gem, his spell that turned him into an Avariel Elf stopped working, and he turned into a Fey’ri instead!  He told us he was a Half-elf, but I guess he just didn’t tell us what his other half is.

He was carrying something in his hat.  It turned out to be something that looked like a huge maggot.  He said that it had crawled out of one of the dead Elf’s ears, and he also said that one had crawled out of all of the Elfs’ ears.  We had captured one of the Elfs, so we tried to question him, but he wouldn’t say anything.  We took him away from the anti-magic gem so Caed could use another spell that would let him read the Elf’s mind a little bit.  He said it was strange because there were two minds in the Elf’s head, but he couldn’t get anything useful out of it.

Then we helped put out the fire on X’s roof.  By the time we got that all under control, it was morning, so we decided to head to the city pound to get some help getting rid of the Oinkers.  They wouldn’t help us, but they sent us to the Mage’s Guild, and the wizards at the Mage’s Guild were very interested in helping us get rid of the Oinkers.  Turns out that wizards don’t like hopping pink oinkers much, and they want to destroy every one they can get their hands on.  I guess Oinkers aren’t even natural creatures, but were created by some wizard, and now they’re getting out of control.

After the Oinkers were gone, we decided to take the elf to Dalek.  We explained what had happened at the manor last night.  He told us that they had found a stack of dead Half-elf bodies at the entrance to the manor this morning.  They must have cleared them out before we left for the pound.  We showed Dalek the maggot and explained what we’d learned about there being two minds in the Elf’s head.  Then Zeddishous had an idea.  He cast the spell that we used to keep Kazhreg from possessing us on the Elf, and it definitely had an effect.  He started talking to us.  He said his name is Ere’ Cretharis.  The last thing he said he remembered was going to a C.O.E.P.A.S. meeting to find out what it was about.  After some recruiting speech, he was taken into a back room and hit over the head.  That’s the last thing he remembers, and it was over a week ago.  He had no idea what we were talking about when we told him about how he attacked X’s manor last night.  He told us which building the meeting was at, and Dalek told us that it is owned by a high elf named Thuris Anetti.  Ere’ helped us draw a map of the parts of the building he saw, and he said the grounds it’s on were patrolled by guard dogs.  Dalek said that they’ve been watching the building, and there hasn’t been any activity there for days.

We decided to go to Tymora’s temple to see if anybody there could help Ere’ get rid of the maggot that might be controlling him.  On the way, we stopped by The Cleanup Crew’s place, but they weren’t there.  Their house guards told us that they’d left on an adventure this morning.  Lumiarti wasn’t with them, so I’m actually a bit relieved.  I’ve been worried for Kragus since we know that Lumiarti has gotten mixed up with C.O.E.P.A.S.  When we got to the temple, an elf named Telkan Nacklu agreed to come with us to the city jail and examine Ere’.  He said that he could see the maggot in Ere’s ear, and then he pulled out some instruments and told us that we needed to keep Ere’ from moving at all.  I clubbed Ere’ over the head and knocked him out (he won’t even remember it), and then Telkan used this thing that was like a long, slender drill that he’d heated up to go down into Ere’s ear and burn the maggot.  Then he pulled the maggot out, and it was obvious that it was dead.  When Ere’ woke back up, he seemed to be fine other than being a bit groggy.

(If your interested, I've posted a detailed encounter synopsis (of the battle at X's manor) with a graphic layout of the situation. You can access the scenario recap at my web site.)

DM's note:
The session ended with some promising leads. Fanatical Elven warriors, Worms which control people, a victim cured of possession. A possible location for the lair of C.O.E.P.A.S., and some new allies in this quest. They party still hasn't determined who's behind these murders, and what are their actual goals? Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion. Stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 11 Mar 2006
Game-world date: 02 - 03 Detenday 1002
Written by: Ashedyn

02 Detenday 1002
Nexsta’

Since I was up since yesterday morning, I decided to head back to the manor and get a nap in before dinner.  But first, me and Duracell had to put our room back together.  The Oinkers had really made a mess of it, but they didn’t really break much of anything, thank goodness.  We had to get a mop and a bucket of mop water from Peera to clean up where they’d peed, though.

Ellis had some business for us during our usual after-dinner meeting.  Castelly went and got some guard dogs since last night’s attack, and he wanted something from each of us that we’d worn recently so he could get the new dogs to smell it and they’d know not to attack us when they’re patrolling the grounds at night.  Also, if one of us goes missing, he said he could use the dogs to track us down.  They won’t start watching the grounds until tomorrow night, though, so we decided to set up double watches for tonight.  One person would be out patrolling the grounds, and the other person would wait near the manor and be ready to go and wake everybody up if the person patrolling gave the signal.  Everybody else would sleep in the basement, where we could all stay together and be harder to get to.

Thalidimar brought up a bit of a sticky point, too.  Since the elves that are attacking us are being controlled by the maggots in their ears, and they might not have gotten the maggots put in their ears by their own choice, many of them might not actually be responsible for their actions.  Which means that it really wouldn’t be right to kill them.  I said I’d start using my sap instead of my rapier if we have to fight any more of them, and Caed said he’d just disarm them.  I think everybody’s pretty much in agreement that we shouldn’t kill the elves of C.O.E.P.A.S., but it’s really a personal choice.

03 Detenday 1002
Onward

Zeddishous and Grenco had to take their pets to the kennels this morning so that Castelly could let the new guard dogs smell them too.  While we were all waiting, Dalek showed up and wanted to talk to me.  There were more murders last night, but this time one of his city guards thought he saw Duracell, Zeddishous and Thalidimar running away from one of them.  He wanted me to get them to write statements that said where they were early this morning, but I wasn’t supposed to tell them why.  I also got Caed to write a statement since he was on watch with Zeddishous and would have seen Thalidimar and Duracell when they changed watches.  Zeddishous said he’d talked to Nikel during his watch last night, and I told Dalek about it, so Dalek waited around until Nikel came down for his breakfast at noon.  Then he said that he wanted Duracell and Tanar to come down to his office to answer a few more questions this afternoon.

We decided to go check out the building that C.O.E.P.A.S. was using to recruit elves, and on the way into town, I told everybody about how it looks like someone is trying to make it look like we’re doing some of the murders, and that’s why Dalek wanted those statements.

When we got to the building, Caed broke through one of the windows while I was picking the lock on the front door.  There wasn’t much on the main floor, but when we went down some stairs we found, we were in a small barracks.  There was a prison cell off in one corner, and another set of stairs that led up to a trap door in the front porch of the building.  All the beds were made except one that looked like it was being used recently, and under its pillow we found a list of names - our names, plus Lumiarti, Kragus, and Kethri.  Also, in a cupboard of the barracks room we found a guy tied to a chair.  He’d been tortured to death.  Someone had cut off his eyelids and lips, and had also cut out his tongue and mangled his fingers.  He was only wearing pants, but they looked like the kind that are part of the city watch uniform.  Zeddishous got Fang to sniff the used bed and then follow the scent out the trap door.  While they were off doing that, Thalidimar and I lowered the dead guy into the magic rug to take to Dalek.  When Zeddishous got back, he said Fang lost the trail down by the river.

Then we all went to the city guards’ building to tell Dalek what we’d found and so Duracell and Thalidimar could answer Dalek’s questions.  There was a pretty big crowd in front of the building.  They’re recruiting the city militia to help out on patrols.  Dalek told us that he’d been attacked by members of his own staff (all 4 were elves), and that the reward has gone up to 50,000gp.  We showed him what we’d found in Thuris’s building.  He had us use our rug to bring the body to the body storage room for him so nobody would see it as we walked through the building and he didn’t have to worry about a big uproar because of it.  Thalidimar used his spell to let Dalek ask the dead guy some questions, but he couldn’t talk at all with his lips and tongue gone.  He could nod or shake his head for yes or no, though, so we found out that there was more than one person that helped torture him, and they weren’t all elves.

We heard a commotion out in the building.  The elves that had attacked Dalek were trying to kill themselves in their jail cells.  We managed to keep one alive, and Thalidimar used a spell he knows that cures sicknesses, and the elf started acting like he wasn’t under the control of the maggot in his ear anymore.  He was all confused and couldn’t remember attacking Dalek.

We decided to go to Yorgel’s grove and see if we could find Kethri so we could warn her since her name was on that list.  As we were leaving the city guards’ building, though, there was a lot of excited talking.  There had been a murder at Crunge’s Clock Tower, so we decided to go check it out first.  When we got there, we saw that someone had been impaled on one of its spikes up at the top of the tower.  Since Caed was being an Avariel today, he flew up to check it out, and when he got back, he said that it was a Raptoran woman.  Sure enough, when they managed to get her body down, we could see that it was Kethri.  Someone had cut off her eyelids and lips, too.

While I was in the middle of swearing every last curse I could think of, a High Elf stepped out of the crowd.  With the armor he was wearing and the weapons he was carrying, he was definitely another adventurer type.  He said his name was Ozzwehlyhxganhhakheron, and he said he had something for us.  He handed Duracell a scroll, and then he took two steps back and disappeared.  There was the definite sound of transport magic.  This seemed kind of fishy to us, so we decided to check out the scroll a bit before we opened it up.  After all, none of us wants to go around being called Mud or anything like that again.  Thalidimar used a spell that lets him tell if there’s magic around.  He said that the scroll had magic on it, and that it was a powerful kind of magic that summons things.  We decided to go to the Mages’ Guild and have them identify it.  Cussath told us that it was a cursed scroll.  A short time after it was opened (just enough time to read the message), a powerful demon would appear and attack the scroll’s reader.  The message on the scroll was, “Stop your meddling now, or suffer the same fate as Kethri.  Signed Ozzwehlyhxganhhakheron of C.O.E.P.A.S.”  There was a symbol after the name.

Since the scroll was made with some very powerful magic, we ended up selling it to Cussath and we deposited the gold in the party’s bank account.

DM's note:
The session ended with a dead end. A very unfortunate demise for a former party member. Kethri is the first (former) party member to die at the hands of C.O.E.P.A.S., but will she be the last?. The party definitely has an enemy now. Now C.O.E.P.A.S. will have to deal with the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S. Aside from Kethri's death, COEPAS is also trying to implicate the party in the murders, and it's become clear that Elves aren't the only ones enlisted by COEPAS. As the paranoia builds and the danger increases, the party still needs to find a solid lead in their quest. How will they discover the location of the Lair of COEPAS? Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion. Stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 25 Mar 2006
Game-world date: 03 - 04 Detenday 1002
Written by: Ashedyn

03 Detenday 1002
Onward

After that, I decided it would be good if we found out everything we could about this “Ozzy” guy (I don’t want to write out his name more often than I have to - I’ll explain why later on), so I told everybody to ask around about him with whatever contacts they have here in Whillip.  Since he can do at least some magic, I suggested that the Mages’ Guild might be a good place to start, and everybody else went off in that direction.

Since Ozzy and C.O.E.P.A.S. have been doing sneaky stuff, I figured that the local Thieves’ Guild would probably have noticed by now and are probably doing their best to find out what’s going on before someone tries to take over some of their territory.  I know that Arach Nid has contacts in the Thieves’ Guild, so I decided to have a talk with him.  Grenco didn’t think his trainer would have any information about Ozzy, so he tagged along with me.  When I tried to set up a meeting with Arach Nid, though, I couldn’t get any response until Grenco left (and put on his ring that makes him invisible and came back, but they didn’t know about that).  Arach Nid sent me a message to meet him in a bar.  When he showed up, he ordered this funny looking drink that he called Green Venom.  He said that it’s an acquired taste, and you have to start off only drinking small amounts of it at a time at first, and work up to full drinks over time.  He said that it helps build up some of the body’s natural resistances, though.  He even bought me a shot before he left.  It wasn’t horrible.  I’d take it over grzuk any day.

After a little bit of small talk, Arach Nid wanted to know what I wanted to talk to him about.  I told him that someone seems to be picking a fight with the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S., and they’ve even tried to start framing us for some of the half-elf murders the last couple of days.  I told him about the scroll being delivered to us this afternoon, but when I started to say Ozzy’s name, he cut me off.  He told me that Ozzy is a warlock, and that he has special powers connected to his name.  He said that just saying Ozzy’s name would let Ozzy get information about whoever said it, and the people near the person that said it.  (I don’t know if writing does the same thing, but I figured safe is better than sorry, so that’s why I don’t want to write the whole name out.)  He figures that Ozzy has about twice as much training as I do.  He said that Ozzy is part of some secret organization that the Thieves’ Guild and the Assassins’ Guild have both been fighting against together for at lest 20 years.  He said that this organization is very well organized.  At the bottom are people he called Stooges.  They’re basically controlled puppets, like the elves that attacked X’s manor the other night.  The organization uses them for the dangerous and menial tasks since if they get caught, they won’t even be able to remember anything anyway once the grubs in their ears die.  Above them are willing members (the Willing) of the organization that actually know what’s going on and are part of it because they want to be.  Above the willing members are Bosses.  Ozzy is one of them.  Another one of the bosses is another high elf named Chaswelli.  He’s supposed to be a Black Knight.  They’re supposed to be pretty high up in this organization, but they aren’t the top leaders.  Arach Nid didn’t know who Ozzy and Chaswelli answer to, though, just that there is definitely someone above them in the organization.  Ozzy is 580 years old, and he worships Bane.  He’s really good at making poisons.  He was an adventurer for several years, like I thought.  He’s been known to use a spell where he throws teeth on the ground that turn into creatures (like Gavarize did), and another one that makes a “Wall of visions”.  Arach Nid said that he thinks that this whole C.O.E.P.A.S. business is a way that this organization is recruiting more members, both Stooges and Willing.  He also thinks that it signals a new phase in the organization’s overall plan, whatever that might be.

So, basically we have to take on an entire secret organization that the Thieves’ Guild and Assassins’ Guild combined haven’t been able to take care of in 20 years?  That’s just great.  I kind of wish the Clean-up Crew was still in town so we could team up with them.  Kragus is probably better off out of town for now anyway, though.  Still, I figured we’d need allies if we’re going to even survive this, so I told Arach Nid we’d be willing to coordinate our efforts with the Thieves’ and Assassins’ Guilds for now while we try and fight this other organization Ozzy is part of.  He said he’d have to talk to his contacts and set up a meeting.  I asked if the rest of the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S. could also come to the meeting since this would involve them, and he said he’d let me know.

Me and Grenco headed back to the manor for some dinner and to let the others know what we had found out during the after-dinner meeting.  They had found out some stuff too.  A lot of it was the same as what I had found out, but some if it was different.  They didn’t have much luck at the Mages’ Guild since Ozzy is a warlock and not a mage or sorcerer, but they’re doing a search through their records for us anyway.  They did tell Thalidimar and them which building warlocks get their training at.  It’s called Seals of Doom, and it’s right across the street from the Baron’s keep.  Thalidimar and everybody went there, and I guess they actually met one of the guys that helped train Ozzy something like 20 years ago.  The guy had the same warning about not saying Ozzy’s name, and he also said that he had trained Ozzy how to use magic that can be used to control other peoples’ minds or change parts of their memories or even erase their memories.  Sounds like our guy.  On the way back to the manor, they stopped by Zed’s uncle’s place to ask him to see what he could find out since he studies history and works at the library and he likes researching and stuff.

Well, it looks like we’ve got our work cut out for us.

04 Detenday 1002
Forens

I got the message from Arach Nid this morning.  It simply said, “No meeting necessary.  417”  We weren’t sure what the “417” was supposed to mean.  According to the list of building numbers/names I bought from Bidvar, building 417 is a private residence.  We figured that would be as good a place to start as any, so we headed into town.

We got attacked on our way into town, though.  Right where the road from X’s manor joins up with the road into Whillip, we met Theodrus (Zed’s uncle).  He said that X’s guards wouldn’t let him go up to the manor, but then he changed into this other creature.  It had a long body like a snake’s, but it also had four arms and two heads that looked kind of like dragon heads.  After it attacked us, we beat it up pretty good before it used a transporting spell to get away from us.  It had managed to set some trees on fire, and when X’s guards came down to help put them out, Zed commented that it was a good thing they didn’t let his uncle on the grounds.  They said they hadn’t seen Theodrus this morning, though.

We decided to stop by Theodrus’s place and make sure he was ok.  When he didn’t answer his door, I let us in.  We found him in his bedroom.  All the furniture had been pushed against the walls, and he was laying in the middle of the floor in the middle of some kind of diagram that had been drawn around him.  He had been mutilated like the city guard we found, and like Kethri.  I tried scuffing up an edge of the diagram, but then it kind of exploded with some kind of cold fire.  I used my grapple hook to drag Theodrus’s body out of the diagram, and Thalidimar checked him out and said he was dead.  Zed had us take his uncle’s body to Tymora’s Temple so he could see if he could get his uncle brought back to life and fixed up.  But the priest at the temple said they 'couldn’t contact Theodrus’s soul'.  He said they’ve seen several cases like this recently.  They’re keeping Theodrus’s body from decaying for now until we can figure out what’s going on and if anything can be done.

DM's note:
Doom & Gloom. After a thoroughly investigative session, the party has learned more about the nature of their enemy. A high level Warlock and a Black Knight. After a brief encounter with a demon, they discovered that Zeddishous' uncle has become another victim in this increasingly personal confrontation. We left the party with a clue burning a hole in their hand: '417'. Is it a location? Will it lead the party to the heart of this mystery? Will they seek retribution? What of the lost souls they learned about? Whillip and the party definitely have an enemy now. Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion. Stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 08 Apr 2006
Game-world date: 04 Detenday 1002
Written by: Ashedyn

Then we decided to go check out building 417.  It had a sign out front that said it was available to rent.  The sign said to talk to Asvaari Norxi (pronounced 'Nors-eye') at building 418.  We decided to check around outside first.  Zeddishous said that nobody’s come through the front door in quite a while.  There was a shed and an outhouse out back.  I decided that we should talk to Asvaari before actually going inside so he wouldn’t think we were just breaking in or something, so I went next door.  The Elven woman that answered the door said he doesn’t get home until dusk, though, and he has the keys to the house, so we’d have to wait until then for him to let us in.

When I got back, Zed said that there had been some traffic to the house’s back door and to the outhouse recently, but there has been a lot more traffic coming in and out of the tool shed.  Some of it went to the path at the side of the house toward town, but some of it was from the woods beyond the house (it’s right on the edge of town).  Caed landed (he typically flies along over us as an Avariel when we’re outside) and told us that there were half-a-dozen people a little ways into the woods just kind of standing there watching us.  Grenco put on his invisibility ring and went to check it out.  He’s got this other trick he does where he can just whisper, but someone he wants to hear him that’s too far away can hear him anyways.  He used it to tell me that Caed was right; there were six people there.  They just looked like people from town.  Then he said that a Dwarf was leaving and heading away from town, and he was going to follow the Dwarf and see where he went.  (When he got back, he told us that the Dwarf had gone to one of the farms that are around Whillip.)

While he was off doing that, I decided to check out the house.  I went around to the front (‘cause you can’t see it from 418) and opened the lock.  It was a double-key padlock, but it wasn’t too much trouble.  The house was just basically an empty house, except that someone’s been hanging out in the cellar.

Then we decided we should check out the shed.  As soon as I started working on its lock, though, a symbol kind of flashed on its surface, and I was thrown really high up in the air.  Lucky for me Duracell has her magic belt and could fly up and catch me before I came falling back down to the ground!  Now that I knew about the trap, I tried to remove it, but it just threw me up in the air again (Duracell was waiting up there for me this time.)  So then Zed pulled out the anti-magic gem, and I was able to get the lock off.  It was a really simple combination lock, and that trick that Hectar taught me worked like a charm on it.  We touched it with the anti-magic gem to take the trap off of it.  There were the usual tools you’d expect to find hiding inside a shed in a back yard, and there were also some stairs heading down into the ground in the back.  Grenco said he’d keep a watch at the tool shed door so nobody would follow us down and sneak up on us, and the rest of us went down the stairs into another small cellar with more tools and stuff.  There was a door at the back, too.  Thalidimar was using a spell that lets him see magic traps, and he said that there was another one on the lock on this door too.  We used the anti-magic gem again to keep the trap from going off, and it was pretty easy to get this door open too.

Behind that door was a long wooden stair going further down into the ground.  We decided to go down this stair really cautiously since it looked like the perfect place for more traps.  I led the way trying to find them, but whoever dug this had a different kind of trap in mind.  Arrow slits opened up just ahead of where I was on both sides of the stairs and somebody shot arrows at me.  I stepped up to the arrow slits and drew my rapier and got ready to make somebody sorry when the arrow slits opened up again.  When they did, though, there were skeletons on the other side!  I still remember the first time I saw skeletons back at that temple in Orlane.  They still creep me out just as much.  My rapier didn’t do a thing to the skeleton I stabbed at, of course, so instead I punched it, and I managed to knock its head off.  When I turned around to hit the one on the other side, though, it had stepped back from the arrow slit, so I reached in and closed the door on the arrow slit as much as I could and waited for it to come open it back up.  It never did, though.  The others found the secret doors to get into where the skeletons were and destroyed them back there.

At the bottom of the stairs was a small room that had a door in the other three walls from where we came in.  One of the doors had a trap on it that made the door explode at me when I tried to get the trap off.  There was just a small closet behind the door with nothing in it.  The next door was locked, and when I got it open, there was another small closet with a big creature stuffed in it.  The creature hit me really damned hard and knocked be back into the room, and then stepped out and started attacking all of us.  It took up almost the whole room, and it looked like a bad sculptor had tried to sculpt a large man.  Duracell shouted that it was a clay golem, and that when it hits you, magic can’t heal the wounds it causes.  Zed pulled out the anti-magic gem again and touched the golem with it, and the golem just collapsed on the floor.  Tanar thought that this was really strange.  He said that golems normally keep working just fine even in places where there isn’t any magic.  He thinks that whoever made this golem was either in a hurry or was lazy or cheap or something, ‘cause they obviously took some shortcuts when they made it and didn’t do it right.  Lucky for us.  I unlocked the third door, but I let Thalidimar open it this time.  I had my fair share of the traps in that place so far.  There was another strange looking creature on the other side that attacked us.  It looked like it was made out of dirt.  Caed said that it was an Earth Elemental.  We killed it pretty quick.

DM's note:
Doom & Gloom down below. Is the subterranean root cellar behind this nondescript rental actually the entrance to a lair of C.O.E.P.A.S.? Or is it merely a trap, a diversion, a one way trip to nowhere? The adventurers have followed many leads to this tiny tool shed on the edge of Whillip proper. Beneath the tool shed was a well guarded underground cellar. Filled with traps and monsters, it appears to be a dead-end. Why would there be such a path worn to it's door? What secrets still lay below? Whillip and the party are facing a powerful and determined enemy. What infernal purpose could the lost souls be powering? Are their victims damned for eternity? or can there be salvation at the hands of our brave band of adventurers? Stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 22 Apr 2006
Game-world date: 04 Detenday 1002
Written by: Ashedyn

There was nothing in the little closet the Earth Elemental was in either, so it looked like we had reached a dead end.  I figured this whole thing was just a trap that had been set up for us by C.O.E.P.A.S. and decided to leave.  Before I went, though, I figured I’d see how the people watching us out in the woods would react if I approached them and tried to talk to them.  Zeddishous and Tanar came with me, but they just ran off in different directions.  We didn’t think it’d be worth it to chase one of them down.

I was ready to head back to the manor, but Tanar suggested we look the place over more closely one more time since we were there anyway.  When I eventually examined the lantern hanging in the middle of the last room, I noticed something funny about the hook it was hanging from.  The hook pulled down from the ceiling a little ways, and then it could be rotated into a different position before being able to go back up.  It was obviously part of some kind of mechanism, but the mechanism didn’t seem to be connected to anything or do anything other than hold the hook in a couple of different positions.  After a bit of thinking, Tanar suggested that maybe the mechanism was partly magic, too, and maybe we needed to speak a particular word at the same time that we moved the hook to get it to do whatever it was supposed to do.  So I started moving the hook back and forth while he tried saying a bunch of different words he thought might work.

The right word turned out to be rather obvious, though.  Duracell said “C.O.E.P.A.S.”, and then we all felt kind of faint for a moment.  Several of us actually passed out.  We thought that was all that happened until we started looking around again.  A couple of new corridors had appeared at the bottom of the stairs just before the bottom room, and the secret doors and arrow slits on both sides of the stairs were gone.  I went up to the top and looked out of the door of the shed, and we weren’t in Whillip anymore.  It looked like we were out in the middle of some forest.

We decided to try the hook again to see if we could get back to Whillip the same way.  Besides, Grenco was outside of the building when we traveled here, so he didn’t come with us and we needed to go back and get him.  The hooked worked both ways, so we decided to check out this new place, wherever it was.

Grenco was scouting out ahead of us, as usual, when he asked me to check out this gate he had found.  Then he went around a corner and down another corridor a little ways.  I heard him yell something about a big monster, and this eyeball with batwings flew over my head.  Then Thalidimar shouted that it’s harder to damage with weapons, and it heals wounds quick like a troll, and the eyeballs help it hit things better.  I could hear the others fighting the creature, so I decided to try and take out the eyeball that flew past me.  I couldn’t manage to hit it, though, so I went to see if I could help the others.  I saw a really strong looking body with no head.  Behind it was floating a weird looking thing.  It looked kind of like a big purple cauliflower with tentacles dangling from it.  (Thalidimar told us later that the “head”, body, and eyeballs are all part of the same creature, and he called it a Thogsilla.)  The body had grabbed Thalidimar and was trying to squeeze the breath out of him, but a spell that Tanar uses that makes a whole bunch of little biting mouths damaged it enough that it collapsed.  I had to dodge out of the way of a lighting bolt, and then I shot one of my flaming arrows at the head thing, and it caught on fire and the mouths damaged it enough that it died too.  I burned the body since Thalidimar had said that it heals itself like a troll.

The Thogsilla had come out of this room near the end of the hall.  There was a stone coffin on top of a dirt mound against one wall.  There was a C.O.E.P.A.S. symbol on the wall above the coffin, and there were a whole bunch of daggers stuck in the coffin’s lid.  There was also some kind of symbol drawn in a circle on the floor around the coffin.  We decided to leave it alone.  The other three walls were lined with shelves, and the shelves were full of jars that had one gem in each of them.  Tanar said it reminded him of a spell where you can trap someone’s soul in a gem.  We put all of the jars in our rug to take back and see if there are souls trapped in them.  If there are, we’ll find a way to release them.  Then we decided to leave since some of us had been hurt pretty bad fighting the Thogsilla and everyone that can cast spells had used all of them for the day.  But at least we had finally managed to take the fight to C.O.E.P.A.S. instead of just defending ourselves when they attack us.

DM's note:
The lair of C.O.E.P.A.S. The subterranean root cellar behind a nondescript rental has turned out to be the entrance to a lair of C.O.E.P.A.S. The party has finally managed to take the fight to C.O.E.P.A.S. but the party hasn't gone unscathed. Their fight with a 'Thogsilla' wasn't any walk in the park, and there might be another one down here. After fighting this guardian beast, the party looted a temple of sorts. Securing a cache of gems, there's speculation that these gems contain souls. If that's the case, the party is shouldering a heavy responsibility, and the consequences of their actions have yet to be revealed. What secrets still lay below? Whillip and the party are facing a powerful and determined enemy. What infernal purpose could the lost souls be powering? Are their victims damned for eternity? or can there be salvation at the hands of our brave band of adventurers? Stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 06 May 2006
Game-world date: 04 - 05 Detenday 1002
Written by: Ashedyn

I suggested that instead of heading back to the manor, we camp out in the woods I saw when I poked my head out of the door earlier.  C.O.E.P.A.S. is sure to figure out someone visited them before we go back tomorrow, and I thought they might set more traps or have more guards or change the password or something so we couldn’t get back in the morning.  Besides, they know where to find us at the manor.  When we looked out of the shack door again, though, we saw this really big lizard that walks on just two legs and stands higher than a house.  It was eating meat off another big creature.  We decided going back to Willip would probably be safer.  We didn’t go back to the manor though.  We’re spending the night about a block away from 417 in an empty warehouse we found that’s for rent.  The owner even knew us and is letting us spend the night for free.

05 Detenday 1002
Freeday

I wasn’t even asleep yet last night when there was this mob beating on the door.  They were screaming things like “Death to C.O.E.P.A.S.!” and stuff.  They recognized us and tried to say we brought C.O.E.P.A.S. to Willip, but even they knew how stupid that sounded.  So then they went next door and pounded on the door there.  They probably would have all gotten wiped out if they ever really did find C.O.E.P.A.S., but like most mobs, there was a lot more anger than brains running the group.

Before we went back this morning, we tried to make a plan.  From what we had seen, it looked like there was another room like the one where we got all the gems in the jars yesterday, so we figured there would be another Thogsilla.  We came up with a plan where we could get it to where these two corridors came together and fight it on three sides.  It turns out that we were right about another Thogsilla, but our plan didn’t work like we wanted it to.  While I was getting into position, the Thogsilla just kind of showed up out of nowhere and hit me.  We forgot that it can turn invisible just like Grenco.  We still managed to kill it without anybody getting hurt too bad, though.

We were also right about there being another room with gems and a coffin just like the first one.  While everybody else was putting the jars with gems from the second room in our rug, me and Zed went back to the first room and checked it out.  Thalidimar had used a spell that lets him see stuff that’s magic, and the symbol drawn on the floor was and so was the coffin.  Zed handed me the magic-canceling gem, and I used it to scratch out the symbol on the floor.  While I was doing that, he checked out the daggers stuck into the lid of the coffin.  There were actually sheathes in the coffin lid that he daggers were put in.  The daggers and the sheaths were both silver, and there was a different symbol on each dagger.  I couldn’t figure out what the symbols were supposed to be, though.  Thalidimar smashed the coffin, and when he did, one of the petals turned black on the flower on my amulet that protects me from curses.

DM's note:
The party has discovered the lair of C.O.E.P.A.S. The party has finally managed to take the fight to C.O.E.P.A.S. After fighting a pair of guardian monsters, they've desecrated a pair of twin temples. In doing so, they've secured a cache of gems. There's good reason to believe that these gems contain souls. If that's the case, the party is shouldering a heavy responsibility, and the consequences of their actions have yet to be revealed. What secrets still lay below? Whillip and the party are facing a powerful and determined enemy. What infernal purpose could the lost souls be powering? Are their victims damned for eternity? or can there be salvation at the hands of our brave band of adventurers? Stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 20 May 2006
Game-world date: 04 - 05 Detenday 1002
Written by: Ashedyn

05 Detenday 1002
Freeday

When we smashed up the coffin shaped alter in the other room, we kept the magic stopping gem out so it couldn’t curse us.  Then we put all the silver daggers and sheathes in our rug.

I went back to the gate I started to look at yesterday just before the first Thogsilla attacked us.  Behind it was a corridor that went about five paces before there was another gate, and then it looked like a dead end just a little ways past that.  Obvious place for a trap.  The gate I was at had a trigger attached to it that looked like it would set off a signal somewhere else when the gate moved.  I disconnected it, and then I tried to unlock the gate.  Unfortunately, it required three keys to get unlocked, and I could only pick two of the keyholes at a time.  Nobody could help me, so instead of unlocking it, I ended up cutting out some of the bars so we could slip through.  The traps were about halfway between the two gates, like you’d expect, so I jumped over them and started looking at the second gate.

But then I heard Thalidimar shout that they were being attacked by Hell-hounds, so I went back through the first gate.  I heard Caed shout that Tanar was down, so Thalidimar told me to take his place so he could go help Tanar.  There were quite a few Hell-hounds.  They were coming through small doors at the ends of the halls next to the coffin rooms, and they just kept coming and coming, so we had to kill them all.

After they quit coming, we decided to check out where they came from to make sure there weren’t going to be more of them.  There was a kennel that they had come from that connected to both of the doors where they came out.  In an alcove in the kennel Grenco found another one of the magic traps that throw you up, but we weren’t outside, so he hit the ceiling really hard.  Thalidimar healed him up a bit, and we used the gem to get rid of the trap.  There was a hidden door there that opened up on in the dead end of the hall with the two gates.  Then there was a door in the floor of the dead end and a shaft with a ladder that went down more than ten men high to another door.  When we opened the door at the bottom, we were looking through the ceiling of another underground corridor.

DM's note:
The party has discovered the lair of C.O.E.P.A.S. and they're taking the fight to C.O.E.P.A.S. After fighting a pair of guardian monsters, they've desecrated a pair of twin temples. In doing so, they've secured a cache of gems. There's good reason to believe that these gems contain souls. If that's the case, the party is shouldering a heavy responsibility, and the consequences of their actions have yet to be revealed. What secrets still lay below? Whillip and the party are facing a powerful and determined enemy. What infernal purpose could the lost souls be powering? Are their victims damned for eternity? or can there be salvation at the hands of our brave band of adventurers? Stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 03 Jun 2006
Game-world date: 05 - 06 Detenday 1002
Written by: Thalidimar

05 Detenday 1002
Freeday

We were going down the ladder.. We were debating on resting before going on (a lot of good that did) when the gnome spotted a treasure chest. He called Ash down to help. As usual, he disabled the trap. I think he said it was a gas trap and he was going to try to take it. But instead of putting everyone in harm's way, he messed it up so that no one could use it again. We threw the rest of our healing spells before we rested, then relaxed as best we could. Nothing bothered us down there while we tried to recuperate.

06 Detenday 1002
Hafn'mor

The scout had apparently found a secret door. Ash pulled the lever and it opened. Before any of us could decide what to do, Ash went out into the huge room by himself. He got zapped with what appeared to be electricity. Many of his belongings were melted or damaged beyond repair. Zed went into the room next, and threw a grapnel hook and rope up into a high ceiling bunker. The gnome scurried up the rope and said that there were skeletons and a wooden tree-like creature with a bow as part of his arm. Rather than throw destruction at the bunker, our mage tried opening the doors around the rooms perimeter. I presented Tymora's holy symbol to the monsters, hoping that they were looking at me through the holes. Tymora granted an especially strong show of positive energy that obliterated the undead things. Ash went back into the hallway, but he came back out again and was summarily zapped again. Duracell dragged him back into the corridor after I had healed him. I threw my strongest healing spell, but the smoldering corpse that was my long time friend stayed still. I whispered to Duracell that I healed him, but... I could not find the words to explain. I saw the panic and fear in her eyes. I couldn't say out loud that Ash was gone (I prayed over and over that I was wrong). The war mage threw a ball of fire into the bunker that apparently disintegrated the wooden thing; but it was too late. Our leader was gone. The question was asked if we would continue, but none had the will to go on. Duracell said that we had to go and bring Ash back. I knew that if we did go on, that it might spell disaster. Duracell at least was in no shape to fight. We would likely have lost more. At that point, I really didn't care. The only family I've known since pushing away the gambling, had been taken from me.

We left the lair and went directly to the temple of Tymora, where we'd hoped that a priest could bring back our rogue. When the spirit of Ash was asked if he wanted to be brought back, he said something incomprehensible. He said no. No what?! Maybe the spirit didn't understand the question. I don't understand why Tymora did not answer my silent prayers... why Ash couldn't feel the need to be with the ones that loved him. I stifled my tears, until I could be alone, maybe my room at X's. It was hard though, seeing the tears roll down Duracell's face. I don't think any of us really believe he's gone; it hasn't really hit us yet.

Do we give up the fight? How can we go on while we mourn? We must somehow use this hardship to beat back the evil that has been growing right under our own noses... right in this fair town. But how? How can a meager handful go up against a ring of evil so foul, to have survived so long against the combined might of the thieves guild and the assassin's guild? Maybe one of the guilds will give us an army to help us destroy this sickening evil. Or perhaps we are lost.

A Posthumous entry from Ashedyn:
05 Detenday 1002
Freeday

The corridor went just a short ways, and there was a chest at the end.  Looked like another trap, so Grenco and me checked it out, and it was.  There was this spring and clockwork mechanism attached to the lock that would open up this bottle of gas if you screwed up picking the lock.  I disconnected it, and the lock was pretty easy to open.  The chest looked empty, but if you took out the panel at the bottom, there was a lever that was actually in the floor of the corridor.  Thalidimar wanted to rest before we went too much farther into this underground lair, so I put the chest bottom back and took out a bunch of parts from the trap so someone couldn’t just reset it before we came back.  Then we all went up in the kennel where we’re spending the night since it’s a pretty defensible spot.

06 Detenday 1002
Hafn’mor

We went back to the chest this morning, and like I thought, it made a secret door open behind the chest.  There was a pretty big room on the other side.  It was really tall, and there was this stone box sticking down just a little bit from the ceiling with slits in its bottom.  There were doors in the other three walls, and I tried walking around the edge of the room so I wouldn’t be under the box where someone could drop something on me through one of the slits.  But then an arrow hit the wall next to me and a lighting bolt hit me and burned up some of my stuff.  I grabbed some of my stuff up off the floor and went back to the hall while everybody else came into the room to try and figure out how to fight whatever was in the box on the ceiling.  After I had stuffed my junk into my backpack, I went back in the room.  Duracell was using her belt to fly up, so I took out my bow and told her to carry me up there too.

But then another arrow hit me, and so did another lightning bolt.  I felt myself fall down, and then I was looking down at myself laying on the floor.  I was curious what was in the box on the ceiling, so I went up there.  There was this strange looking creature.  It looked like it was a small tree that someone had shaped to make it look sort of like a person.  There was a bow at the end of one of its arms instead of a hand.  Grenco used a spell from his sword that makes a cloud that burns things with acid, and then Tanar used a spell that makes a fiery explosion, and it was dead.

While they were doing that, Thalidimar ran over to me and tried to use a spell to heal me, but it didn’t do any good.  I was beyond healing by that point.  He looked so stunned I thought he was going to fall over.  Duracell dragged me back into the corridor and begged Thalidimar to heal me.

Grenco decided to check out the other doors in the room.  There was just a stone wall behind all of them.  Eventually he found a hidden trap door in the center of the floor of the room.

Thalidimar decided that they should all go back to Willip and regroup before going any farther.  When they got back to town, they found it was night.  They took my body to Tymora’s Temple, and they had one of the priests there perform the rites that lets you talk to a dead person.  What was weird, though, was that even though I tried to answer, my body talked to them by itself.  I always thought that you were talking to the dead person, not just its body.  I wonder if they know that?  Anyway, my body told them not to bring me back.  I’ve been beat down my whole life, and I’m sick of it.  I’d be better off just moving on.  Duracell was pretty upset and started saying that they were going to bring me back anyway, but nobody else would go along with her.  They asked my body what they should do with my stuff.  It told them to give my bank account and my first journal to the church of Hoar.  I wrote about my childhood in that first journal, and I hope the money will get the church’s attention and get them to take care of Grindell and his goons in my place.  I told them that Duracell gets first pick from the rest of my stuff, and whatever she doesn’t want should just go in the party treasure for everybody to split up or sell.  They asked me if there was anybody else that they should contact, but I really don’t care what my father thinks, so I told them no.

They were all sort of just looking at each other and trying to figure out how to get Duracell to stop crying when they just sort of faded out and then I found myself here. . .

DM's note:
The party has recently begun a new adventure. With X on an extended sabbatical, the party is investigating a series of murders and heinous crimes in their own backyard. A murderous cult of supremacist Elves has Whillip in a state of constant fear and suspicion. What are the real goals behind the group known as C.O.E.P.A.S.? Who's really committing all these 'Half' murders? Following a twisted trail of leads, the party has discovered a a lair of C.O.E.P.A.S. They've finally managed to take the fight to C.O.E.P.A.S. but the party hasn't gone unscathed. After fighting a pair of 'Thogsillas' and securing a cache of soul gems, the party pushed onward. After a brief respite, the party descended deeper into the lair of this cult and the consequences were dire. In an encounter with a lightning bolt wielding golem, the party lost a member. They lost their leader - long time adventurer Ashedyn, felled by a volley of magical lightning. After incinerating their opponent, the group has retreated from the lair. Returning to Whillip, the party now faces a difficult decision. They're facing a powerful and determined enemy, and the stakes are high. Will they back down? is Whillip destined to succumb to this infernal cult, or can there be salvation at the hands of our brave band of adventurers? Stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 17 Jun 2006
Game-world date: 07 - 08 Detenday 1002
Written by: Duracell

07 - 08 Detenday 1002
Aprochen & Longday

These last couple days have been emotionally draining for me. The death of my beau, Ashedyn Marshlek has hit me hard. I don't know how I will go on.

While we were at the temple of Tymora making arrangements for Ashedyn's services, the party noticed that several fires had broken out across the city. When talking with some of the town's people, we found out that martial law had been declared.

When I was done saying my farewells to Ashedyn, I headed out of the temple to meet up wtih the rest of the party. With red rimmed eyes I joined the party to head to the Mages Guild. But there was a problem. All the streets were barricaded by the city guard. So I suggested that Caed and I fly and scout out a place to land. Caed found a spot behind an eight foot privacy fence, just on the perimeter of the Mages Guild. As we climbed over the fence, we were approached and surrounded until we could be positively identified as the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S. , then we were allowed to enter the Mages Guild. It is surprising the extremes people will go to to protect their property under these conditions. We had the jars we retrieved from the alters identified. Turns out they were trapped souls. Upon this discovery, we released the souls by crushing the gems.

On 7 Detenday, at 2:00p.m we had a service for Ashedyn. It was very difficult for me to get thru after our long history together. The service was set up on the beach. Thanks to the church of Tymora for handling the arrangements. As I lit the pyre afire, my whole body was shaking. It was a very touching service and several people showed up, besides the party.

Earlier in the day, Grenco had put a notice on the kiosk in the town square, inviting Ashedyn's contacts at the Thieves Guild. Some of them showed up at the service and Grenco put in a request that they colud help us find someone to fill Ashedyn's spot till we finish this quest (i.e. rogue type).

Tonight there is another night of fires in Willip. We need to get back to the tool shed and complete this quest before there is nothing left of willip but ashes!

DM's note:
The party has recently begun a new adventure. With X on an extended sabbatical, the party is investigating a series of murders and heinous crimes in their own backyard. A murderous cult of supremacist Elves has Whillip in a state of constant fear and suspicion. What are the real goals behind the group known as C.O.E.P.A.S.? Who's really committing all these 'Half' murders? and what is the purpose behind the soul gems? Following a twisted trail of leads, the party has discovered a lair of C.O.E.P.A.S. and they're taking the fight to C.O.E.P.A.S. After fighting a pair of guardian monsters, they recovered a cache of soul gems and desecrated a pair of temples. The quest has been dangerous and difficult; fraught with intrigue and peril. Scores of citizens lay dead, and one of the party members was struck down by a gaurdian golem. Forced to retreat, the party returned to town in order to lick their wounds and lay Ashedyn to rest. Whillip and the party are facing a powerful and determined enemy, and the stakes are high. Will they back down? is Whillip destined to succumb to this infernal cult, or can there be salvation at the hands of our brave band of adventurers? Stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 01 July 2006
Game-world date: 08 Detenday 1002
Written by: Grenco

08 Detenday 1002
Longday

I’m not entirely sure what I got myself into.  I’m all for adventuring, but this group I’ve joined up with seems to have trouble looking for them.  We were headed back down to that ‘other world’ down in the shack this morning, when we got jumped by what appeared to be villagers.  Not elite trained soldiers, just normal common folk.  In fact there was a little innocent girl that I passed  (I was invisible) that, when the rest of the party caught up, signaled some kind of ambush.  I didn’t realize what was happening until the villagers got the jump on our group.  They used some kind of magic grenades that caused darkness and sent lightning bolts flying around.  After seeing what happened to Ashedyn, we needed to get these people subdued immediately.  What was rather unfortunate though was that we couldn’t get them all safely subdued before they started attacking with those magic grenades and killing each other in the splash damage.  Zed also got hurt pretty badly and lost a lot of items to the lightning damage.  After the incident, we took the survivors to the mages guild so that they could be freed of the mind controlling grubs.

We resumed our quest back to the shack without further incident and when we arrived, we found the shack had been burned to the ground and there were people guarding the hole in the ground where the shack used to be.  The leader of the group said that people tried to destroy the entrance but they were able to salvage it and keep it safe.  Down we go. 

We were mostly aware of the traps that we passed the last time, but as we pushed on, we found more.  They seem to like these gas traps, whatever they do.  I also found I can find the traps okay but disabling them is quite difficult.  Ashedyn made it seem so easy.  Oh yeah, and as for disabling locks and such, I need much practice. 

The party finally reached a larger room after descending down a ladder, but it was kind of weird.  The opening into the room seemed to narrow, almost like a funnel of some sort.  We gathered in the room and proceeded through some double doors.  There were actually many doors with different locks on them, but no traps. As we continued through  the passage the doors were stronger and harder to break down.  We finally reached what seemed to be the end. There we found a smaller room with lava and a bridge of bones.  There were also bars on either side.  Duracell and Zed thought it would be a good idea to stay off the bones, so Duracell activated her flying belt and carried Zed over to the doors on the other side.  As soon as he tried to knock down the doors all hell broke loose.

I heard a loud crashing noise but didn’t pay as much attention because I was forced to jump into the lava room.  If I hadn’t moved, a large boulder would have crushed me from up above.  I’m not sure what’s happening on the other side of the rock, but I don’t have a good feeling about any of it.  I can’t put my finger on it either, but something has changed……something has happened……something bad.  Just a gut feeling.  Now we have to find a way out of here.

DM's note:
The party has recently begun a new adventure. With X on an extended sabbatical, the party is investigating a series of murders and heinous crimes in their own backyard. A murderous cult of supremacist Elves has Whillip in a state of constant fear and suspicion. What are the real goals behind the group known as C.O.E.P.A.S.? Who's really committing all these 'Half' murders? and what is the purpose behind the soul gems? Following a twisted trail of leads, the party has discovered a lair of C.O.E.P.A.S. and they're taking the fight to C.O.E.P.A.S. After fighting a pair of guardian monsters, they recovered a cache of soul gems and desecrated a pair of temples. The quest has been dangerous and difficult; fraught with intrigue and peril. Scores of citizens lay dead, and one of the party members was struck down by a guardian golem. After returning from a brief respite in the city, the party has returned to lair, only to find an enemy determined to seal off the entrance to this lair. Descending down into the lair, the party has walked directly into some sort of nefarious trap involving falling stone blocks and bubbling lava. Trapped, and running low on air, the party is sealed into a bone lined room that threatens to become a tomb. Whillip and the party are facing a powerful and determined enemy, and the stakes are high. Will they back down? is Whillip destined to succumb to this infernal cult, or can there be salvation at the hands of our brave band of adventurers? Stay tuned for adventure!

If you'd like to read the DM's synopsis of this last meeting, point your browser to my 'Fire & Water' page.
It's a recap of the events that transpired when the party returned to the lair of C.O.E.P.A.S. without Ashedyn leading the way.

Real-world date: 15 July 2006
Game-world date: 08 Detenday 1002
Written by: Thalidimar

08 Detenday 1002
Longday

Water Trap
We were cut off from our monk, ranger, and scout, by a huge wall of stone. One that nearly crushed the fast little Gnome. In front of us, behind a river of water rushing over our feet, our swashbuckler and wolf were apparently dead or dying. The war mage and I stood but 20 feet from the largest metallic automaton I have ever seen. He was much too big to fit into the 5 foot tall hallway, but it didn't matter since the corridor was fast filling with water behind us. Tanar threw a fire spell at it that seemed to dispel into nothingness. I cast the only two spells that might do some good, both to help whatever spells the mage was going to throw. He cast an acid spell that seemed to not only hit the metal monster, but with also a lingering burn. With some semblance of intelligence, it strategically moved around the corner and out of the line of fire, probably trying to lure us into the open. I ran out to the entrance and tried my best to taunt the thing into coming after me by calling it some names and waving my fanny at him. And then ran back behind Tanar. I noticed that the celestial bison that I'd summoned was still standing there and remembered that I hadn't given it any commands to attack. So I had it move to the opposite side of the entrance, hoping to lure the rusty gargantuan into view. Sure enough, the metal head went right after the poor creature. Three swipes with it's gigantic fists and the brave bison was completely obliterated. But not before Tanar got off 3 more stinging acid spells. He threw the spell over and over until the water was at our necks. In what seemed like many minutes, thank Tymora, the titan finally went down in pieces.

Although Tanar and I both raised our arms and cheered wildly, the end of the monster was only the beginning of our long trial. I went immediately to Caed to see if he was still breathing. But no, yet another of our brave band was dead. I ran over to Fang as well, but the intelligent dog was only faking. He stood right up, wagged his tail, and gave me a friendly lick. Just then a bolt of lightning struck a rock plug above us, where the opening used to be. Tanar was apparently trying to keep us from drowning, the floor now glistening with several inches of water. I went back over to Caed, and removed his famous pirate shirt thinking that it would better serve our mage now. I opened our rug and pushed Caed's torn form in, along with a cascade of water, and then closed it. It didn't seem like Tanar's spells were doing all that much damage to the ceiling, and he had to already have been spent. So I gave him the shirt and started up the ladder. Calling down to Tanar to stop the barrage of spells, I began whacking at the ceiling as small debris rained down. Did I hit the rock a hundred times? I had lost count. I heard banging on the stone from up above, and took heart that perhaps someone was here to help us. I said a quick prayer and continued to hope (we were in the lair of the enemy after all). As the last of the stones broke apart, what looked eyes behind a shiny mask were looking down at me. At first I thought that it was the tin can's little brother. But, it said hello.

It introduced itself as Solmar and in behind it came a heavily muscled creature I had only heard tales of before, with 4 arms and no shirt at all. He said that his name was Greves or something like that; it was all a bit too much to take in at one time. Tanar explained to the golem-like creature that our other companions were at the end of the hall. I cast a light spell on his crotch area, so he could see underwater. It came back a little later saying that nothing was down there. We then explained that they were behind another big rock. The four-armed guy asked that we tie some rope to him that maybe he could help any swimmers. Apparently, Solmar doesn't need to breathe, because a long time later, only after the rest of the party swam to the ladder and get out to the top, did Solmar's head protrude from the water as it climbed up the ladder. Did he say the church of Helm? Maybe another cleric?

Back in the upper tunnel, I started healing. Zedd was wet, but looked no worse for wear. And Duracell needed only a minor spell to get her back to normal. On the other hand, Grenco looked like a little lobster. Every inch of exposed skin was beet red. A strong cure spell later had us just looking around at each other. Most of us were near to exhaustion, with a mix of emotions arrayed on our faces (with the exception of Solmar). Glad and thankful that we'd made it out of that trap. Sorrowful for the loss of yet another companion. Surprised that we were even still alive and with two new hardy additions. Tymora smiles upon us... apparently, it is not yet time to give up the good fight.

DM's note:
The party has recently begun a new adventure. With X on an extended sabbatical, the party is investigating a series of murders and heinous crimes in their own backyard. A murderous cult of supremacist Elves has Whillip in a state of constant fear and suspicion. What are the real goals behind the group known as C.O.E.P.A.S.? Who's really committing all these 'Half' murders? and what is the purpose behind the soul gems? Following a twisted trail of leads, the party has discovered a lair of C.O.E.P.A.S. and they're taking the fight to C.O.E.P.A.S. After fighting a pair of guardian monsters, they recovered a cache of soul gems and desecrated a pair of temples. After a deadly battle with two more golems and a very dangerous trap, the party lost two members. With a couple of reinforcements, the party is licking their wounds and wondering 'what next?'. The quest has been dangerous and difficult; fraught with intrigue and peril. Scores of citizens lay dead, and two party member have fallen. Whillip and the party are facing a powerful and determined enemy, and the stakes are high. Will they back down? is Whillip destined to succumb to this infernal cult, or can there be salvation at the hands of our brave band of adventurers? Stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 15 July 2006
Game-world date: 04 - 08 Detenday 1002
Written by: Solmar

04 Detenday 1002
Forens

There were more murders last night.  Trying to guard particular places or people just isn’t working.  We still have no idea who’s behind this "church" of C.O.E.P.A.S.

Garivek has another idea.  He’s heard of a group called the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S. that seems to have been singled out by C.O.E.P.A.S.  He thinks that perhaps if I escort them, I might learn who is committing these murders.  They reside at the manor just outside Whillip belonging to Maghrev Eiddiesse Ekhhs.  When I got there, though, a houseman named Nathis informed me that the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S. left this morning and have not yet returned.  I will bivouac here until their return.

05 Detenday 1002
Freeday

The S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S. never returned to Ekhhs’s manor last night.  Garivek thinks they may be getting close to ferreting out the forces behind C.O.E.P.A.S.   I just hope they haven’t overcommitted themselves.  They are our best lead right now.  And the entire city is getting agitated.

06 Detenday 1002
Hafn’mor

The situation in Whillip is really getting dangerous.  Civilians are gathering in mobs and roaming the streets on witch hunts trying to purge the presence of C.O.E.P.A.S. from the city.  Their intentions may be noble, but they are only making things worse.  If this keeps up, the city will simply tear itself apart.  Was that C.O.E.P.A.S.’s intent all along?

07 Detenday 1002
Aprochen

Things have turned out as I feared.  The city has become so chaotic that Baron Gentwell had to declare martial law.  I spent the entire day with the city guard trying to break up fights and restore some semblance of order in the streets.  I’m afraid that we were only marginally effective.

There was another bit of news today, however.  I spotted a funeral notice posted by the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S.  It appears that one of their members has perished.  The notice indicated that the fallen followed Hoar, but the services were held at Tymora’s Temple?  I would have contacted them there and offered to accompany them against C.O.E.P.A.S., but I didn’t see the notice until several hours after the service was held.  But now that we know they are back in town, perhaps it will be possible to contact them tomorrow.

08 Detenday 1002
Longday

Garivek returned shortly after midday and told me that he had made arrangements for me to catch up with the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S.  He said that I had to go to building 417, and someone from the Thieve’s Guild would guide me to the entrance of the stronghold that the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S. have been bravely trying to assault.  The situation in Whillip must truly be dire indeed if we must collaborate with thieves.  Garivek gave me a description of all the members of the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S., although one of them is now missing.

When I arrived at 417, there was an Elf standing guard over a nearly collapsed shed in the back.  There was also a Hakheerian, whom the Thieve’s Guild were sending to help the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S.  I introduced myself, but he just eyed me warily.  There’s something shifty about him, but what else would you expect from a member of that organization?  At least he’s not outright evil.

We traveled down some stairs into what turned out to be more than just a cellar, but it still soon came to a dead end.  We had to ask the Elf back at the entrance how to proceed from there.  He explained that there was a hook in the ceiling of the last room that you pull down and turn while saying "Coepas".  We did so, and then I was being awakened by the Hahkeerian slapping me in the face.  We found ourselves in a series of stone corridors.  It wasn’t difficult to follow the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.’s trail, as they left behind a series of open or smashed doors.

We followed them down, and down, and down still, until we came to a vertical shaft blocked at the bottom by a large hewn stone.  There was a large iron ring embedded in the top of the stone.  In the ceiling directly above where the shaft dropped through the corridor’s floor was a void space, and in the top of that was what looked like some kind of mechanism that once held the iron ring in the top of the stone plug.  I climbed down onto the plug and put my ear to it, and I could hear a rhythmic pulse coming through it, like someone was hitting it on the other side.  So I began smashing it as best I could.  It took a while, but eventuall I had to step to the side and hang on to the ladder in the side of the shaft as a hole crumbled away in the center of the stone.

I was looking into the face of a human male.  He seemed to recognize me.  He was clinging to the top of a ladder that extended downward from where the shaft penetrated the center of the ceiling of a large room.  Below him, the room was filling with water.  There was another human male lower on the ladder, and a wolf was trying to keep swimming despite it's obvious exhaustion.  I asked if I had found the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S., and the human at the top of the ladder confirmed that I had.  He then asked the Hakheerian to carry the wolf up into the corridor.  While he was doing that, the human introduced himself as Thalidimar, and the human further down the ladder was Tanar.  He told me that the rest of his comrades were trapped behind another stone plug at the end of a hallway under the water.  After he cast a light spell on me, I descended the hallway.  I began working on the ceiling adjacent to the stone blocking the passage hoping that there would be a void above it from its fall.  There was, and it quickly filled with water.  I climbed up onto the stone, and I could see that the water was beginning to flow through cracks in the opposite wall and into the room beyond, where the other S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S. were trapped.  The leak was weakening the wall, and it gave way after just a few blows.  Once the flow into the room beyond had slowed enough, a lightly armored Aasimar followed by a female Human and then a Gnome swam through.  I helped them back to the ladder in the big room, and we all climbed up.

Once everybody was safe, we all made a round of introductions.  The Human Ashedyn and the Half-elf Caed were not present, so it must have been one of them that the funeral was for yesterday.  Present were: Thalidimar the Human Cleric of Tymora, Duracell the Human monk, Zeddishous the Aasimar ranger, Grenco the Gnome scout, and Tanar the warmage.  The Hakheerian finally offered up his name, Greven.  We began to discuss our next move.

DM's note:
Not only did Mark introduce a new character during tonight's session, we introduced two new characters, and two new players as well. The other new character is Greven, a Hakheerian (4 armed humanoid), Rogue/Monk. The two new players are Philip and Stephen. I'm sure that the introduction of this 'new blood' will help enervate the party and bring about a swift demise to the corruption know as "C.O.E.P.A.S."

Real-world date: 29 July 2006
Game-world date: 08 Detenday 1002
Written by: Solmar

08 Detenday 1002
Longday

Grenco, Duracell and Zeddishous reported that the room they had come from was a dead end – there was nothing beyond it.  Greven felt that the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S. must have missed something, so he started looking around.  At the bottom of the shaft leading down into the large room, just above where the stone plug had come to rest, he found a small section of the shaft wall that lifted up and revealed a passage beyond it.  At the end of the passage was another trap door in the floor, and Greven announced that it was trapped.  He also said that he couldn’t do anything about it and asked Grenco to disarm it for him.  Grenco was convinced that there was no trap, but he went through the motions of removing it anyway.

Below the trap door was another shaft that dropped down to a small room.  Instead of iron rungs embedded in the side of the shaft, this one had a series of bars that bisected the shaft at successively deeper elevations to form a ladder.  Grenco said that the bars were trapped so that if any weight was placed on them (such as when you’re trying to climb down them), the walls of the shaft would come together and crush anything in the shaft.  Greven said that Grenco was mistaken, but we proceeded cautiously anyway.  We tied a rope to Grenco, and Greven lowered him down the shaft.  Grenco took Zeddishous’s greataxe with him.  Apparently, it has been enchanted to be impossible to break.  Grenco wedged it across the shaft to prevent the walls from coming together.

Then Grenco opened the trap door at the bottom of the shaft, and below it was a closet-sized room with four passages leading away from it.  The passages looked to be just large enough to belly-crawl through.  Something interesting happened when Grenco was lowered down into the room, though.  He appeared to shrink to about half his already diminutive size.  He yelled up to us that the room is actually larger than it appears.  There was obviously some kind of magical effect going on, but the only thing we could really do was to continue pressing forward.  When I got into the room, it did indeed turn out to be larger than it had originally appeared to be, and the passages were large enough to walk down.

The passages were filled with a magical darkness.  I had barely proceeded a couple of steps down one when Grenco yelled that there were four elf warriors.  Tanar had preceded me down the passage.  Since I had no idea at all which direction the elf warriors were, I passed Tanar and told him to rejoin the rest of our group.  This mage may wear armor, but he is still more vulnerable to attack than I am and needs to be protected in order to be able to utilize his arts effectively.  The warriors must have been down a different passage, though, because I heard Greven yelling for them to surrender.  They must have been rather fresh recruits, though, because they were defeated after just a minor scuffle.

The four passages each led just a few paces to four more rooms, each with a trap door in the floor.  We decided to descend the shaft under the trap door in the room from whence the elves had come.  Grenco and Greven repeated their arguments about what was trapped and what wasn’t as they had done at the previous shaft.  We will have to separate them at some point, because their pointless bickering can grind our progress to a halt at times.  At any rate, this shaft was identical to the previous one, except that there was no illusory size change when we passed into the room below.  There was a single darkness-filled passage leading from this room.  Grenco pulled out a box, and when he opened it, all of our magical torches were momentarily extinguished.  When their light returned, Grenco told us that the passageway led just a short distance to another room, and that room had two other passageways leading from it to either side.  We proceeded to that room, and Grenco scouted down one of the passageways.  He very quickly returned, however, yelling about some kind of swarm of little creatures.  They followed closely behind him, and they seemed to concentrate on attacking the spellcasters.  Greven immediately ran away, followed closely by Duracell, but the rest of us managed to squash enough of the creatures to cause the survivors to scatter.  Even Zeddishous’s wolf companion Fang helped.  Duracell called the creatures a mageripper swarm.

DM's note:
Deeper still into the lair of C.O.E.P.A.S. With new blood, the party has delved deeper into the maze-like underground lair of the enemy. Encountering some minions, and a new threat. A swarm of creatures which cause continuous damage, eat spells, dispel magic, and nauseates it's victims. The party continues the hunt for those who would take down Whillip, enslave thousands, murder the innocent citizens of Sembia, tarnish the name of the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S., and who knows what else? The battle continues!

Real-world date: 12 August 2006
Game-world date: 08 - 09 Detenday 1002
Written by: Solmar

08 Detenday 1002
Longday

The S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S. were looking pretty haggard by this point, so we decided to rest here.  Thalidimar explained to me that there are two high elves behind C.O.E.P.A.S.: a black knight named Chaswelli, and a warlock that he did not want to name for fear of discovery.  Thalidimar seems to think that they answer to a higher ranking individual, but who that might be is a total mystery to him at this point.

09 Detenday 1002
Endsnear

Greven and Grenco have managed to find a way to work together instead of against each other.  Greven now allows Grenco to scout ahead for us, offering his close support when needed.

Once again, we decided to follow the path that seemed to be guarded by proceeding through the room that the mage ripper swarm had come from last evening.  This place seems to be a maddeningly complex warren of 10-ft.-cube rooms connected by magically darkened 10-ft.-long passages, sometimes going up through the ceiling or down through the floor.  We had to deal with another mage ripper swarm.  They managed to take my ability to cure diseases, but hopefully just for this week.

Later, where we had to climb up another shaft in the ceiling, there were skeletons waiting for us in the room above.  The first one climbed down chasing after Grenco as he retreated, and Greven yanked it off the ladder above and into pieces.  Thalidimar easily took care of the rest with a couple of turnings.

After the skeletons, we once again began to encounter groups of 4 elves dressed in light armor and carrying weapons, although I would not call them warriors.  The first group did more damage to themselves than to us.  They have been so easy to defeat, and they are so obviously overmatched by us, it just didn’t seem right to be killing them.  I discussed this with Thalidimar, and he explained to me that many of them are being controlled by some kind of parasite that has been placed in their ears.  He agreed that they should be subdued rather than killed, so we changed our tactics.  Grenco pulled out a magical net that we used to ensnare later groups of elves so that they could more easily be knocked unconscious.

After we had neutralized the next group of elves, Thalidimar wanted to try an experiment.  With everyone helping as he instructed, he managed to kill the grub-like creatures in the elve’s ears.  When they awoke, they were quite disoriented and claimed to be weavers, fishermen, etc.  We escorted them out of the dungeon so that they would not be lynched by the townsfolk of Whillip.  However, the elves we encountered later we simply bound and brought back to Whillip to be cured in the temples.  We don’t have the time to be performing all the necessary surgeries ourselves as we go along.

DM's note:
Deeper still into the lair of C.O.E.P.A.S. With new blood, the party has delved deeper into the maze-like underground lair of the enemy. Now the party is being slowed down by bothersome opponents. Spell devouring swarms of mage-rippers, skeletons and possessed elven warriors. Is there any way to cut to the chase and strike a blow directly into the heart of this enemy? The party continues the hunt for those who would take down Whillip, enslave thousands, murder the innocent citizens of Sembia, tarnish the name of the S.C.R.E.W.O.F.F.S., and who knows what else? The battle continues!

Real-world date: 26 August 2006
Game-world date: 09 Detenday 1002
Written by: Solmar

09 Detenday 1002
Endsnear

The next level down finally brought a change to the pattern of the rooms.  There were still 10-ft.-cube rooms connected by magically darkened corridors, but the rooms were separated by more than just 10 ft., and the corridors sometimes intersected each other rather than just leading from room to room.  Grenco had barely begun to scout this new area when an explosion belched fire at us back down the corridor he had disappeared into.  Almost immediately after that, the ember of a fireball spell came flying into the room from the other corridor and detonated right in our midst.

Zeddishous cast a spell that allowed us to see down the corridor that the ember had come from, and we could see a vile looking creature.  Its main body was a large snake that split into two heads, and four smaller snakes sprouted from the body to act as arms.  I struck it with my sword, but then it slithered away down a corridor.  I tried to follow, but I quickly lost it.  It obviously knew the lair, because it could move through the magically darkened corridors as if it could see, while we stumbled through them; groping at the walls to guide us.  It threw fireballs and lightning bolts at us without even the slightest bit of pause or effort that all other creatures capable of producing those effects must take.

I told everybody to scatter, so that the creature could not continue to get all of us at once with its magical attacks, and then I backed up into a corner and took a couple of moments to think.

DM's note:
Deeper still into the lair of C.O.E.P.A.S. With new blood, the party has delved deeper into the maze-like underground lair of the enemy. After encounters with spell devouring mage-rippers, skeletons and possessed elven warriors, the party has encountered the Serpentine Demon they encountered at the perimeter of the manor. When we last left the party, they were reeling from this second meeting. Still in the midst of the encounter, the party is currently licking their wounds and trying to figure out how to effectively counter this beasts deadly tactics. Spreading out to avoid area effect attacks, the party is tempting doom by presenting the creature with seven separate targets. Will the party be able to overcome this seemingly invincible opponent? Is this demon guarding something?

You can see an encounter synopsis (with illustrations) by pointing your browser here <https://www.robsworld.org/sencounter.html>

Real-world date: 09 September 2006
Game-world date: 09 Detenday 1002
Written by: Greven

Where they left off: When we last left the party, they were in the middle of a dangerous battle with a deadly foe. A serpent like Demon capable of dishing out dangerous attacks, rapid movement and surprising resilience. You can see an encounter synopsis (with illustrations) by pointing your browser here <https://www.robsworld.org/sencounter.html>

09 Detenday 1002
Endsnear

Immediately after knocking all the possessed Elves unconscious, I heard Grenco yell for me to come assist him in making torches.  I dropped down from the room above to help.  After I dismantled a crate, and lit a torch, we called for everyone to re-group.  After a short debate, the group agreed that we should explore the level together, with the aid of the anti-magic field.  Soon after we began to search the area, Duracell spotted the Creature over-head just before it dropped down on us.  We delivered a quick beating to the Creature, but we also discovered that the creature was healing nearly as fast as we could damage it. After this quick hit and run battle, it made another escape.

We decided that we would heal a little before going on.  After healing, we quickly finished exploring the level. That's when we discovered the Elves that I had incapacitated earlier. They were dead, ripped to shreds and piled in a heap beneath the room I'd left them in. Apparently the creature had been through here while we were searching. Then I made the mistake of suggesting that we go up the ladder to the room that the Elves were in.  Before Solmar could think better of it, he'd climbed the ladder and was attacked by the creature.  In my horror at discovering my suggestion might get my friend killed, I leapt up and climbed the other side of the ladder.  We split the creature’s attention and I tried to wrestle with it.  I soon discovered that the creature is much stronger than myself.  It beat me pretty good, so I decided to fall to the floor below; allowing more room for my fellow group members to attack it.  I fell to the ground and suddenly felt very weak, so I informed the group of our current situation - “We’re losing” - Then I fell down for a quick rest (Sorry everyone).

DM's note:
Deeper still into the lair of C.O.E.P.A.S. With new blood, the party has delved deeper into the maze-like underground lair of the enemy. After encounters with spell devouring mage-rippers, skeletons and possessed elven warriors, the party has encountered a Serpentine Demon inhabiting the lower reaches of the lair. After an initial beating, the party has gathered some senses and come up with an effective strategy. Their anti-magic gem has once again proven to be an invaluable tool in dealing with creatures that wield magic like a warrior swings a sword. Gathered around the gem, the party has completed a search of this lower level. As they head back up, another encounter with this deadly demon seems inevitable. Few opponents have proven as elusive or dangerous. What are it's true goals? Is this demon guarding something? Can the party avoid it and still accomplish their goal? Will they be able to find the true source of evil in this underground lair? Stay tuned for danger, stay tuned for mystery, stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 23 September 2006
Game-world date: 09 - 10 Detenday 1002
Written by: Thalidimar & Solmar

09 Detenday 1002
Endsnear

[Thalidimar] After a few minutes of trading blows with hell's serpent, we were battered and bloody. We needed to rest. No wandering monsters met us while we mended and gained back our spells. Perhaps it was Helm or Tymora watching over us. Or maybe it was just that no other creature was stupid enough to enter this lair. [/Thalidimar]

[Solmar] Several of us were significantly damaged, so we rested.  Will Keep gem out entire night. [/Solmar]

10 Detenday 1002
Endsnear

[Thalidimar] We searched the last corner of the lowest level. There it was waiting for us again, another ambush! It snapped at us a couple of times and then ran away again. Demon spawn... Cunning or cowardice? We must have brought it close to death, or else why would it have left so quickly? Or was it leading us?

Zed said he thought he found a way to the center. He led us up and towards another ladder. It did indeed look as if it would take us to the heart. Solmar asked Tanar to close the box to the anti-magic gem and he tried to sense evil below. In the span of a few heart beats, we heard him say that there was an evil presence, and then we were ambushed again. Tanar was bowled over by something we couldn't see. He quickly opened the box again, and there appeared an evil apparition we've seen too many times. Things happened so quickly, my adrenaline was pumping... I can't recall the sequence of events clearly. I remember the brain sucker attacking someone while I swung crusher at the huge body pushing itself up through the hole. The Gnome tried to dash for the back but the brain eater latched onto him and began burrowing into his head. Another swing and flash of a spell, and the Gnome was gone. Did the flying head engulf him or did he get away? Tanar was wearing the braineater like a hat as the body forced itself into the already cramped room. Solmar's blade dug into the hulking form. And then it was limp on the ground. I continued to flail at it wildly, while fire was blistering my skin. I think I heard the construct ask why I was still attacking. Someone said because it regenerated. Red trickled down Tanar's cheek and I took a futile swipe in his direction. Afraid I'd hit him instead of the monster, I went to the back of the group to see if Grenco got away. I doubt the Gnome knew how comforting it was to see his bloody form still moving; as the waves of panic evaporated, instinct brought my hand to his shoulder to heal him. Tymora give us strength. [/Thalidimar]

[Solmar] Snake creature’s area seems to be lowest level.  No shafts down, only up.  Traveled in gem’s anti-magic field while exploring all rooms immediately above snake creature’s lair.  One hit-and-run by snake creature, Then we were attacked by another group of creatures - a big headless body, a floating creature with tentacles, and small flying eyeballs.  We killed it. [/Solmar]

DM's note:
Deeper still into the lair of C.O.E.P.A.S. With new blood in the group, the party has delved deeper into the maze-like underground lair of the enemy. After encounters with spell devouring mage-rippers, skeletons and possessed elven warriors, the party has encountered a Serpentine Demon inhabiting the lower reaches of the lair. After an initial beating, the party has gathered some senses and come up with an effective strategy. Their anti-magic gem has once again proven to be an invaluable tool in dealing with creatures that wield magic like a warrior swings a sword. Gathered around the gem, the party continues it's quest to find the heart of evil in this underground lair. As they delve deeper, the monsters seem fiercer. What abominations lay ahead? How far will they have to go? Stay tuned for danger, stay tuned for mystery, stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 07 October 2006
Game-world date: 10 - 11 Detenday 1002
Written by: Tanar & Solmar

10 Detenday 1002
Endsnear

[Solmar] Thalidimar says that the body, eyeballs, and tentacle creature were all parts of a single creature called a thogsilla. [/Solmar]

[Tanar] I hate this place. I need open spaces so I can use my spells of mass destruction. Between the damn anti-magic gem and not wanting to kill the Elves who were being controlled by the slugs in their ears, I have had nothing to do. Now at last I got some action. When the rest of us heard a strange cawing noise; Solmar and Grenco jumped down into the center chamber of the ring we had been running around for the longest time. A moment later, first one then another cockatrice came up the ladder to attack us. After all the time I spent standing around, I needed some physical gratification, so I disregarded my spells to hit them with my mace. Oh how it felt good to kill something, finally.

[Solmar] I jumped down into the room the thogsilla had come from since that appeared to be the guarded path.  Cockatrices attacked from a neighboring room. [/Solmar]

[Tanar] After we killed the cockatrices up top, Thalidimar climbed down, followed by Greven. When Greven was dangling from the last rung of the later he just froze in place, two hands holding on and two holding out his torches. He looked like some kind of strange chandelier. When I got down, I found that there were three more cockatrice already dead, and that one of them had turned our healer Thalidimar into stone. As I stepped forward into the room, I was overcome by the most horrid feeling that almost rooted me to the spot. [/Tanar]

[Solmar] One of them petrified Thalidimar before we could kill all of them. [/Solmar]

[Tanar] Then I saw it. It was some kind of giant slug with arms and a gaping mouth. Solmar was standing toe to slime with it. I managed to get off one acid arrow before I was incapacitated with a feeling of dreadful despair. Solmar seemed to shrug off the effect like it was nothing, and beat away at the slimy thing. After several intense moments it was over, the thing was dead and everyone that had been paralyzed was free. [/Tanar]

[Solmar] Enormous slug-like creature in next room, with a large mass of the ear grubs.  Mother grub?  Nearly everyone else became paralyzed when they neared it.  Tanar and I had to kill it.  Ear grubs rapidly died after mother grub dead.  Grub room appeared to be center of complex. [/Solmar]

[Tanar] Looking into the Taxini's lair, we saw thousands of the slugs like those that were in the ears of the Elves. With the mother grub dead they too were dying. That's when we were attacked by another Thogsilla. The already wounded Solmar blocked it's way to us and began to hack at it. Having found a opportunity to use a fire ball I let one loose to little effect. Following my lead, Grenco used the last charge of acid storm from his sword. It was actually a nastier fight than the mother grub but we managed to kill the Thogsilla.

We were hurting. Solmar, though standing, looked bad, and Thalidimar was a statue. I did what little healing I could and we did a strategic retreat. [/Tanar]

[Solmar] Spent next 10 minutes debating what route to take to carry Thalidimar back to Whillip.  SCREWOFFS have no command structure.  Their leader recently died earlier in this complex, and they have not replaced him.  No organized chain of command below leader.  Explains SCREWOFFS frequent disorganization and ineffectiveness. [/Solmar]

[Tanar] On our way out, we came across many Elves who were freed from the mind control now that the mother grub was dead. We took them with us to the surface, and told the thieves guild about the mother grub and that the Elves were back to normal now. [/Tanar]

[Solmar] Encountered 20 more elves during retreat to Whillip.  All confused, formerly controlled by ear grubs.  We led them out with us. [/Solmar]

[Tanar] We went to the mage's guild, and I related the death of the mother grub and asked the guild to fix Thalidimar. For our service to the town, he was turned back to normal free of charge. We then decided to take a needed rest before returning. Grenco needed three days until he got a new spell for his sword, so we decided to wait until he had a new spell before heading back in. [/Tanar]

[Solmar] Brought Thalidimar to Mages Guild.  They restored him back to flesh for free, when they learned we had killed the mother grub, and ended the Elf possessions.  Whillip still in chaos, so we will rest here at the mages guild for now to heal.  Perhaps order can now be restored? [/Solmar]

DM's note:
With the Taxini slain, Whillip is released from the thrall of subversion and fear. The good citizens of Whillip are no longer enslaved by a mind-controlling fiend. While gangs still roam the streets, and the city struggles to restore order, the party has left the lair in order to heal. With the elimination of the Taxini, the threat of C.O.E.P.A.S. seems to be controlled. The Taxini, through it's proxy army, waged war on Whillip towards an unknown goal. The party never learned the Taxini's true intentions, and there is some speculation that the Taxini itself may have been working for, under the influence or control, of some stronger entity or group. What of Ozzy and Chaswelli? Were they simply pawns? Controlled by the Taxini? Perhaps there is another leader further up the chain in this nefarious organization. Does C.O.E.P.A.S. still pose a threat to Whillip? Stay tuned for danger, stay tuned for mystery, stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 04 November 2006
Game-world date: 11 Detenday 1002
Written by: Solmar, Duracell and Greven (I sure hope you're not color-blind)

11 Detenday 1002
Newday

[Greven] After leaving the lair of C.O.E.P.A.S., we decided to go off to the mage’s guild, in order to rest up and heal. [/Solmar]

[Duracell] After a morning meeting, Solmar and Thalidimar left the Mage's Guild to do some errands. Tanar, Grenco and Greven left for the monastery. Since Tanar left the Mage's Guild, Zed and I must leave as well. We headed out of town, towards the manor. We wanted to see if it was still standing. [/Duracell]

[Greven] Solmar and I decided that while we were in Whillip, we should see to our responsibilities immediately, so we went our separate ways for the day.  Tanar decided he would accompany me.  Thalidimar went off with Solmar.  Zed and Duracell decided to visit our benefactor, and Grenco… well he did whatever it is short, troublemakers like him do. [/Greven]

[Solmar] Proceeded to city guard barracks to report in to Garivek.  Thalidimar accompanied.  Perhaps he seeks some camaraderie with another servant of a church?  Remaining SCREWOFFS do not seem to practice any of their gods’ rituals in any way. [/Solmar]

[Duracell] On our way to the manor, we see a house burning and decide to give the firefighters a hand. We joined the bucket brigade, and with our help, over half the building was saved. Continuing out of town, we came upon a group of people chained together, marching thru town while people threw rotten fruit and vegetables at them. They were being escorted by the city guard and they seemed to have everything under control, so on we continued. [/Duracell]

[Greven] On the way to the monastery, Tanar and I spotted a gang of criminals running from city guards.  I, of course, lent my assistance to the guards in apprehension of the gang.  I knocked two of the hoodlums down, and I can only hope that the guards followed and took them into custody, but I went after the last one and took him down.  I escorted him to the only place I could think of at the time - The monastery, a place I thought was about order and justice.  I thought maybe they could help this poor fool like they once helped another poor four armed fool. However, these were not followers of knowledge like the monks who helped me.  I decided that I would just have to turn him over to the local authorities. [/Greven]

[Solmar] Mobs still rule the streets of Whillip.  Failed to break up a lynching in time to save an Elven citizen, but we did manage to apprehend the mob leader and one of his henchmen.  Took them to the city guard barracks. [/Solmar]

[Solmar] While at guard barracks, A Captain of the guard reported that Garivek died in one of the fires that burned many of Whillip’s buildings.  Assured Captain that I would join patrols after completing a couple of personal errands. [/Solmar]

[Duracell] As we approached the Manor's grounds, there were warning signs. According to the signs, entering the grounds was "at your own risk", "Beware of invisible stalkers". That's when I decided to take a look from the air, to see if the manor was still intact. It was! - Yeah! But was X on the premises? Once in the air, I saw a couple of guards point to me, and one of them headed inside the manor. I thought to myself - "Do they recognize me? Or do they think I'm and intruder?" I didn't know what a invisible stalker was, but I didn't think it could fly. I proceeded onto the property, flying towards the manor. Within seconds, I was attacked by an invisible stalker, OUCH!! That was dumb. [/Duracell]

[Greven] The city was in near total chaos.  I suggested that Tanar go back to the guild while I help to restore order.  He declined, and decided to stay and help (I guess not all mages are cowards).  We attached ourselves to a group of city guard who were investigating some arsons, burglaries, and an attempted bank robbery.  I thought I should show them how an investigation was done, so I tracked the alleged offenders to their base of operations.  The building seemed deserted. Some large rock had crashed through the ceiling (very odd).  We decided to check the building out anyway. [/Greven]

[Solmar] Visited provincial orphanage next.  Still standing, untouched by any mobs.  Praises to Helm, for he surely must have watched over the children in my absence.  Many more children there now.  Mostly new Elf children.  More than the orphanage can barrack. Many live in tents in the school yard.  Resembles a refugee camp.  Morale low.  Sanitary conditions bad.  Staff I’ve never met before recognized me – asked if I would help dig a new well.  I will work on that overnight. [/Solmar]

[Duracell] The attack by the invisible stalker left me reeling, so I withdrew, and landed near Zed. I spent the next few minutes telling him what I had seen. After some discussion, we decided to head back to the Mage's Guild and meet up with Grenco. [/Duracell]

[Solmar] Findar’s Stable and Smithy was burned to the ground.  Nishing and Rothkel both either dead or missing.  Thalidimar suggested I take the horses’ tack and barding to Tymora’s temple for safer storage until I find more permanent arrangements.  While there, he performed a ceremony over a dead body.  He later explained that the body was Zeddishous’s uncle, who died only very recently.  They were unable to contact his soul to ask about final wishes, so Thalidimar is keeping the body fresh until the soul can be contacted. [/Solmar] Note from DM: Nishing and Rothkel are Solmar's horses.

[Duracell] On the way back to the Mage's Guild, we came upon a group of ten vigilante. They recognized Zed and myself and wanted to help us maintain law & order in the city. We suggested to them that they volunteer at the city barracks. They said they had, but they were simply told to go home. The city is better off now than it was a week ago, but it's still in a state of lawlessness. One needs to take great care while traveling in the city. [/Duracell]

[Greven] Down in the buildings cellar, we found all the evidence we needed.  The captain of the guard decided to wait and set up an ambush, in order to catch the criminals. I informed him that his plan was foolish and foolhardy.  However, I decided that if I didn't stay and help, the entire attempt would be completely bungled.  When the criminals came back to their base, they found a nasty surprise, but we also got a surprise. For some reason, all the sound kept going away.  This little problem almost led to complete failure. Thankfully, the guard showed an impressive ability to adapt and take advantage of the confusion. As a result they were able to lure most of the criminals in.  I decided that due to an existing flaw in the plan, I had better take some risky chances and circle around the building. My actions were designed to trap the criminals, so that they couldn't escape the poorly set up trap.  Eventually the criminals began to flee the scene. Thanks to my quick thinking, I was able to head off a few of them. I believe two got away. [/Greven]

[Solmar] Thalidimar decided to return to SCREWOFFS.  I spent the afternoon helping the city guard round up stray animals.  Maybe not the most high profile work, but necessary to eventually restore order in the city.  Now I must write letter to former commanders in Waterdeep, requesting another Priest to lead Helm’s church in Whillip.  Then I will get to work on the well. [/Solmar]

[Greven] Once the whole thing was finished, I found out that some of our problems stemmed from a little Gnome sneaking around. In the end, he helped apprehend the criminals, and he showed his love for justice and law (ha-ha). Grenco captured three of the criminals single handedly.  Then of course he disappeared again. [/Greven]

DM's note:
With the Taxini slain, Whillip is released from the thrall of subversion and fear. The good citizens of Whillip are no longer enslaved by a mind-controlling fiend. While gangs still roam the streets, and the city struggles to restore order, the party has left the lair in order to heal, take care of some loose ends and help with the clean-up efforts. With the elimination of the Taxini, the threat of C.O.E.P.A.S. seems to be controlled. The Taxini, through it's proxy army, waged war on Whillip towards an unknown goal. The party never learned the Taxini's true intentions, and there is some speculation that the Taxini itself may have been working for, under the influence or control, of some stronger entity or group. What of Ozzy and Chaswelli? Were they simply pawns? Controlled by the Taxini? Perhaps there is another leader further up the chain in this nefarious organization. Does C.O.E.P.A.S. still pose a threat to Whillip? Stay tuned for danger, stay tuned for mystery, stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 18 November 2006
Game-world date: 12 Detenday 1002
Written by: Solmar

11 Detenday 1002
Nexsta'

Finished digging well before sunrise.  Met SCREWOFFS as they left Mages Guild and enlisted them to help retrieve statues from slug room.  Zed wished to attempt contact with his uncle’s soul again, so SCREWOFFS went to Tymora’s temple.

I went directly to COEPAS lair entrance – Greven accompanied.  More destruction last night at lair entrance.  Underground room where activation hook was located was now a pool of lava.  This route into the lair was therefore effectively cut off.  City guard lightened watch here since elves no longer controlled.  They reported appearance last night of a “snake creature” and an elf fitting the description of one COEPAS leader, who caused new destruction and killed guards on duty.  Consequences of lapse in vigilance.  They should have known better.  Definitely need to increase awareness of Helm in Whillip.

When SCREWOFFS arrived, we went back to Mages Guild.  Paid for spells to protect us from snake creature’s magical attacks and for transport spells back to lair.  Snake creature no longer guarding area – probably pointless now that slug creature destroyed.  We decided to explore remaining warren for information about COEPAS.  Attacked by strange green creature Tanar called a whisper demon.  Cowardly creature attacks from inside walls or floor, uses telepathic voices inside your head to distract you.

DM's note:
With the Taxini slain, Whillip is released from the thrall of subversion and fear. The good citizens of Whillip are no longer enslaved by a mind-controlling fiend. While gangs still roam the streets, and the city struggles to restore order, the party has returned to the lair in order to search for the remaining leaders of C.O.E.P.A.S. Soon after their return to the lair, they've discovered a large chamber containing treasure. Unfortunately for them, the treasure is guarded by a powerful demon. When we last left our party, they were engaged in a struggle with this 'Whisper Demon'. Will the party survive their encounter with this insubstantial demon? Where are Ozzy and Chaswelli? Were they simply pawns? Controlled by the Taxini? Perhaps there is another leader further up the chain in this nefarious organization. Does C.O.E.P.A.S. still pose a threat to Whillip? Stay tuned for danger, stay tuned for mystery, stay tuned for adventure!

Real-world date: 02 December 2006
Game-world date: 12 Detenday 1002
Written by: Solmar

11 Detenday 1002
Nexsta'

Attacked by strange green creature Tanar called a whisper demon.  Cowardly creature attacks from inside walls or floor, uses telepathic voices inside your head to distract you. We defeated it anyway, although whether we killed it or it fled was unclear.  It was guarding a small store of treasure.  A note addressed to SCREWOFFS admitted COEPAS ploy defeated, and indicated that operation COEPAS would be abandoned.  Note was signed “Ozzwehlyhxganhhakheron”.  We assumed that he has also left the area, and further exploration of the warren was pointless.  We gathered the treasure and the statues and returned to Whillip using a spell stored in Grenco’s short sword.

Some of the gems and jewelry we recovered were known to be stolen, so we returned them to authorities to be returned to rightful owners.  We also collected a 50,000gp reward from the city for ending the COEPAS threat.  Then we returned to the Mages Guild to identify magic items collected. Sent another letter to Inaen regarding death of Garivek.

DM's note:
With the Taxini slain, and the leaders C.O.E.P.A.S. on the run, Whillip is released from the thrall of subversion and fear. The good citizens of Whillip are no longer enslaved by a mind-controlling fiend. While the city struggles to restore order, the party has completed another hard fought adventure. They've returned to Whillip, and will soon be engaged in a training and recovery phase. What lies in store around the next corner? Stay tuned for danger, stay tuned for mystery, stay tuned for adventure!