The Cave

It was mentioned this mission is "officially" called "The Dragon Hatchery", so obviously we have no idea that we're heading back to the raider camp. No idea at all.

We visit the monk Leosin again. He's standing, and looks much better than when we last saw him.

He tells us that he needs our help. With all we've already done for Greenest, he doesn't want to ask more, but the need is great.

He wants us to return to camp, and see if anything substantial is carried in or out of the camp. He doesn't recommend getting captured, as after he and Alissa escaped being prisoners before, they'd probably execute us on the spot.

We ask how long we should say, and he answers simply that we should stay long enough to discover their plans, and where they go next.

He tells us to meet him in the city Elturel, and tells us he has a reward of 150 gold a piece for us, if we succeed. If he's not there, find a paladin called "Ontharr Frume".

We tell him we'll do our best, and leave.

We get close to camp. Alissa cautiously scouts out the outskirts of the camp. She doesn't see any patrols, although the watchtowers could still be manned.

She returns, and suggests we approach cautiously. Perhaps we can pass as mercenaries. Alissa and Luke disguise themselves, but Shale and I possess no such skill, so we let them go ahead.

The camp seems to have been burned deliberately, and the watchtowers are unmanned. We head towards the back of the camp, where some small fires still smolder.

It seems the back of the camp has been converted into a butchery, where a small hunting party composed of several kobolds is skinning some antelope. It looks like there is room for several other hunting parties as well. At the cave entrance, which we have heard there are hatchlings within, stand two guards.

We can see a recent path leading west, which seems most likely where the rest of the camp went, with anything they couldn't take with them and didn't leave the hunting parties, being burned down.

We decide we should probably figure out where the rest of the raid camp went, and catch up with them. Leosin will want to know.

We pass as mercenaries, and so Luke and Alissa go to talk to the two guards outside of the cave. They talk a little, one of the guards gestures at a still standing tent, and then Luke and Alissa return to Shale and I.

They didn't find anything useful. In fact, they've directed us to be on hunting duty as well. Luke wants to check the cave out, so veils himself with an invisibility spell, and sneaks past the guards.

After almost an hour, Luke returns. There's a bunch of cultists inside he tells us, where a barracks area was set up. We should be able to avoid them though, as they're in a hallway off to the side. There's something weird inside though, something we should investigate.

There's a drop off into a violet fungus patch, but there's a small stairway down into it, and two paths around the fungus. Unfortunately, the stairway is also trapped, with a ramp trap of sorts, which he had activated accidentally.

Luke really wants to know what is on the other side, but it seems like its probably too dangerous to go alone. He can use his invisibility on the rest of us, but it'll take time, as he can only sustain it on one person at a time. He'll give us 20 minutes each to get in and get hidden, before he dispels the invisibility and starts getting the next person in.

It's not long until nightfall, so we wait, and decide that we should send Alissa first, and then Shale, with me going third. Luke will come in last.

Twenty minutes pass, and Luke dispels the invisibility on Alissa and applies it to Shale.

Shale is halfway to the cave entrance, when we hear yelling from inside the cave. The guards start to turn, and Shale charges forward, and impales him, dispelling the invisibility effect Luke had cast upon her. Luke and I charge into the cave after.

I put some of them to sleep, and my magic flows out of me, making me glow very brightly. Shale lights her sword on fire, so it also grows brightly, with a divine fire.

We can see several cultists running from the side hallway towards the stairs where Alissa is. Alissa comes up from the stairs, and I put one of the cultists blocking her way to sleep (causing another surge of uncontrollable power, which opens my third eye), so she runs over him to us.

Apparently Alissa couldn't see very well in the darkness, fell down the stairs on the trap, and then stumbled into the fungus, where one of them wanged her in head. She crawled out of the way, and a winged kobold landed on her head, without realizing what it had found. Alissa escaped the kobold, and rolling a natural one accidentally stumbled into a group of kobolds, giving them a bug hug.

They yelled, and Alissa yelled, and Alissa got stabbed by small pointy sticks, and that was when we heard something wrong.

I'm very bright, and several cultists run up to me, but find my light blinding. Luke is very cold, and cultists find attacking him inflicts them with a deep cold. With that, and Shale's glowing sword, we make good work of them.

Alissa stands too closely to me and is blinded by my light, and one of the cultists takes an opportunity to knock her out cold. More cultists fall to us, and with only two left, suddenly everything turns back to me as well.

I was out for only a moment, apparently, and Shale and Luke vanquished the last two cultists. Luke had tended to Alissa first Who immediately rolled a natural one on death saving throws, so was in very desperate need of attention, and was now tending to me.

I stand up, a little wobbly, and walk over to the edge of the fungal pit, with my light still gleaming and my third eye still open. I can see where Alissa went wrong. The stairs lead down into pit, and it leads directly into the right path. But the right path is only barely tread, and the left path is much more obviously used, and the route Alissa should have taken.

We explore the barracks area. Luke had mentioned a drunk cultist before, and while the other cultists had come to fight us, the battle hadn't seemed to bother this one, who is still sleeping among a pile of bottles.

We slap him awake, and attempt to interrogate him, but he refuses to talk. We discuss what to do with him, but I don't remember what we ended up doing. As far as I'm concerned, we probably slit his throat. It's okay, he's evil.

We find a hallway Luke hadn't found on his first look around. We decide we should continue down it, and find an office of sorts. It's dimly lit by two oil lamps, and dragon themed rugs cover the floor.

In the center of the room is a desk, with maps and notes. One of the maps is of the Greenfields around Greenest, and is heavily marked. An arrow points towards the west at Bereghost. Another arrow points north, with numerals and in columns "everything must be freighted north to Naerytar". It also says "Rezmir let us keep ring and small stones" and has some bad poetry about dragons.

There are several trunks, which Alissa investigates. Some of it is some common well made clothing, but one of them is a purple robes, which Alissa says is the full cult of dragon regalia, for Mondath.

Luke notices that one of the rugs seems depressed. so blue seems to be covering some sort of depression, and points it out to Alissa. Alissa rolls natural one rips the rug off the hole, revealing a rope ladder leading down.

We start down the tunnel, with Alissa leading first.

Alissa seriously, stop rolling natural ones slips on the ladder, letting a bunch of rocks and dirt from the tunnel wall fall noisily.

A voice from below yells "I'm surprised you survived, Shale, and I don't know if it's good or bad. Come down and fight me!"

It's Cyanwrath's voice. We couldn't possibly fight him and survive. Doing so is certain death. Shale protests, but we head back up the tunnel, with Cyanwrath yelling of our cowardice behind us.

We cautiously leave the cave and return to Greenest.

The mayor seems to always be happy when we show up.

We tell him what we found, and say we need to head to Bereghost, to try to head of the attack, and that we need to have a message sent to Leosin. He frowns at this.

He says Leosin has bought horses for us, and riding gear. He strongly suggests we go to Leosin directly, as Leosin would better be able to get access to allys. It's strongly suggested that we wouldn't be able to stand up against the attackers, and it wouldn't change anything other than causing our own deaths. It's also implied that the players going that direction isn't planned, and we already have messed some things up with how the cave went.

Ok, we'll send a messenger to Bereghost, and head to Elturel.

..Jeff seriously rolled like six natural ones...