998 Spheros 7th-8th

998 Sypheros 7th Drenlin’s Ferry, New Cyre late at night

When we came within sight of Drenlin’s Ferry I felt it prudent to send Pazenga, our githzerai skirmisher, ahead to scout for the goblin army on the off chance that its vanguard might have arrived ahead of us. Paz returned quickly and told us there was nothing to fear.

Once in Drenlin’s Ferry I thought it an unspoken moral obligation to warn the human villagers of the impending goblin invasion. We were extremely surprised to discover that the locals were quite aware of the goblinoid threat and that they had been harassed by hobgoblins “and their ilk” for some time now. The human known as Speaker Noro Wiston seemed to be in charge, like some sort of mayor or town elder, though he was only of middle years as humans recon age. The captain of the town guard was a formidable, though handsome, female human seemingly young for a position of such authority (pity she was born with such a pathetically short nose) by the name of Captain Soranna. Speaker Wiston asked us to drive off a detachment of goblins that had taken up residence in an abandoned human keep as they were employing it as a base from which to launch raids against Drenlin’s Ferry. Speaker Wiston also mentioned that there was a particular bridge that the goblin army would have to cross if they did indeed intend to bring the mountain tribes into New Cyre.

I only reluctantly acceded to this desperate request. I was gravely concerned that such a side trek, no matter how vital, would make us late for our audience with Prince Oargev ir‘Wynarn. As much as I admire the Galifarian royal family, nobles can be a tad sensitive about getting stood up by commoners, even dragon marked ones. I consoled myself with the thought that Prince Oargev would approve of our actions on his people’s behalf and conversely we might earn his displeasure if it was known that we had refused to aid his subjects. In order to hedge my bets I insisted that Speaker Wiston send a message to Prince Oargev explaining the situation and his reasons for requesting our assistance.

998 Spheros 8th New Cyre, an human abandoned keep

We asked Failin to transport our company as close to the fallen fortress as was possible for the oversized elemental wagon. As we were reaching the limits of the wagon’s ability to negotiate wilderness, we came upon a rustic cabin. We knocked upon the door and the cabin’s sole occupant came to speak with us. Jorr Natherson was a rugged human frontiersman of advanced but indeterminate age. We told Jorr of our mission and he offered to guide us to the goblin fortress. Jorr and Failin then conferred and they came to the conclusion that the elemental wagon would be unable to take us much further due to the copious vegetation. Therefore we sent Failin back to Drenlin’s Ferry with word of our progress. After a couple of hours of hiking through the wilderness we came upon the fortress ruins. It was a small but formidable castle with towers and an open court yard. The gate house was the most heavily damaged part of the structure with a collapsed roof and broken walls. Strewn here and there were bones of an oversized humanoid with large teeth which we took to be the remains of one or more ogres.
Again we thought it wise to send Pazenga ahead to reconnoiter enemy dispositions in order to better form a battle strategy.

In one of the “barracks” Paz discovered a pair of child-sized orange-skinned goblins sleeping near their worg mounts. In the other barracks he found a small force of elite hobgoblin infantry and their bizarre minotaur commander. The hobgoblin platoon was also fast asleep. Unbelievably no guards had been posted. Although none of us are experts on the topic of monstrous humanoids, this particular minotaur seemed excessively mesomorphic even for their powerful race. Additionally this particular man-bull was missing his left hand and instead had some sort of sinister warforged-like contraption grafted to the stump. After filching the overly-muscled minotaur’s huge axe, Paz returned to our position to bring us word of the enemy. When Paz spoke of the mysterious metal prosthesis, we assumed it contained some sort of spring loaded blade, and to our later woe, we let the matter drop. After conferring briefly we thought that our best plan of attack was to hold the narrow defile provided by the fallen gate house and use this defensive position as a base from which to launch attacks against the goblinoids. We had thought that with the mighty minotaur forced to face Zed’s deadly adamantine sword weaponless, we should have an easy victory, our lack of understanding of the true situation would very nearly be our undoing.

Once again we sent Pazenga ahead, this time with the grim task of waking the goblinoids and causing as many casualties as possible in the attempt. Pazenga bypassed the goblin cavalry and chose the more dangerous target of the hobgoblin elite foot soldiers and their minotaur captain. Pazenga took to his charge with deadly efficiency. Creeping noiselessly from hobgoblin to hobgoblin. he dealt two of the sleeping soldiers powerful blows to the bridge of the nose, driving bone splinters in the hapless sleepers’ brains. Unbelievably the two hobgoblins were slain in absolute silence but the third stirred in his sleep just as Pazenga delivered the stiff fingered blow. The goblinoid warrior let out a blood curdling scream and the barracks erupted in chaos. Paz put down the screaming hobgoblin and fled the barracks, pursued by the single surviving hobgoblin and the huge minotaur. Paz sprinted back to our defensive position as planned, but immediately after that, our “clever” stratagem began to unravel.

Zed was positioned in the front rank to counter the melee threat of the minotaur but such a threat never materialized. The huge man-bull strode a few yards in our direction and, instead of charging as expected, he raised the strange metal prosthesis and blasted an ebony ray straight into Zed’s chest. The powerful ray left Zed reeling in what would have been called pain if the warforged had been flesh and blood. Even after the two worg mounted goblins entered the fray we held to our defensive position. Then the minotaur fired a second blast from the prosthesis and again Zed was severely blasted with the black energy ray. We were faced with the possibility that the magical contraption could generate an infinite number of volleys and this would spell our doom. Our only counter was Elarin’s fire blast and this seemed to cause the minotaur little concern. Therefore we were forced to break formation by allowing Zed to charge the dangerous minotaur. The goblin cavalry meanwhile, rained crossbow bolts down on us causing no serious injuries but neither did we have a counter for their relentless attack.

Just prior to Zed’s desperate charge, a leonine bat winged creature appeared on the intact gate house wall to our left. The beast began a murderous rain of tail spikes far more dangerous than any goblin crossbow. The first volley would nearly have done for me save for a quick defensive illusion and Brianna’s healing magic. Elarin responded with a searing fire-bolt and the creature retreated. I knew the manticore was not seriously injured and would return so I cast a spell of levitation on Pazenga and began raising him to the parapet.

After the initial charge Zed found himself fighting for his life. The minotaur, demonstrating uncharacteristic cunning, continually retreated out of sword reach and blasted Zed over and over with the prosthesis generated black ray. The two worg riders joined their minotaur officer, surrounding and harassing Zed, though in truth the child-sized goblinoids could do little to his adamantine skin. Zed was growing weaker by the second and if he fell, we would be wiped out. The situation was so desperate that Elarin charged in to relieve our beleaguered warforged warrior. Elarin delivered his deadly magically charged sword thrust and dealt the creature its first serious wound. Elarin then turned on the goblin cavalry to distract them from their harassment of Zed. Our warforged swordsman was blasted again and again and seemed to be at the end of his endurance but the minotaur was also slowing due to the many minor wounds. In a last burst of desperate energy Zed leapt in and cleaved the bovine head from the hirsute humanoid body.

Zed immediately joined Elarin against the goblin cavalry and was in the process of wiping them out when a huge hairy goblinoid spellbinder charged out of the tower’s doorway and cast some sort of a spell on me. I had no way of knowing what sort of magic he placed on me but I managed to fight off its effects through sheer force of will. This, apparently, was the mighty “Wyrmlord Koth” we had been warned of by our captive hobgoblin. Zed closed with the bugbear sorcerer, quickly followed by Elarin. Before either could land a significant blow Zed was blasted to his knees by a bolt of lightning cast by the bugbear war-wizard. When the smoke and dust cleared I expected to see Zed lying on the ground deactivated but miraculously he was still somehow on his feet staggering forward to the attack! Thinking quickly, I shouted for Zed to not resist my spell and I cast a sphere of silence on him. The silence prevented Wyrmlord Koth from speaking words of magic and thus spared Zed another of the deadly lightning strikes. Unfortunately the spell could do nothing to stop his cruelly spiked morning star. Only Zed’s adamantine skin kept his head from being bashed in. Elarin dealt the hairy sorcerer a stinging flesh wound to the side with his razor sharp elven estoc. Zed used Elarin’s painful distraction to cut the bugbear in two from collar to crotch.

As Zed and Elarin finished off the goblinoid sorcerer, the manticore returned and landed on the wall walk to face Pazenga at close quarters. The human faced beast laid into Pazenga like the animal he so closely resembled. To the untrained eye it might have looked like a one sided battle, the skinny githzerai, unarmed, facing off against the razor sharp claws and fangs of the mighty beast. Deceptive, in that the beast could not touch the agile martial artist. Paz seemed to know where the beast would strike before the blow was even launched. Although Pazenga’s blows inflicted only superficial lacerations on the mighty beast, it was clear who the victor would be. Eventually Paz dealt the creature mighty kick that sent the manticore tumbling off the ramparts. The creature’s bat-like wings prevented any serious damage from the fall so Paz leapt off the parapet and delivered a vicious kick to the beast’s back that left it reeling. Paz followed up this blow with a punch to the throat that crushed its windpipe and ended its life.

In the aftermath of the battle, I ran to Zed and used just enough charges from our repair wand to bring Zed back into fighting trim, should more enemies arrive. We then looted the battlefield gaining more weapons and armor for the soldiers of New Cyre. While searching the premises, Elarin discovered a hidden passage that led to a long forgotten treasure room. In this room we acquired much wealth as well as two magic hand-and-half swords (one human sized and one giant sized), a powerful healing staff with a few charges remaining, strength enhancing gloves, and an extra dimensional storage bag. More importantly, we found a map among the effects of Wyrmlord Koth detailing the goblinoid invasion plan. And as we were warned at Drenlin’s Ferry, the goblin army must cross a particular bridge to enter New Cyre. I wish I knew if the bridge were stone or wood.......