Date unknown some 8,000 years in the past, location unknown somewhere in the Dhankanni Emipre

Date unknown some 8,000 years in the past, location unknown somewhere in the Dhankanni Emipre

So much has occurred since my last entry that I feel as though I lived an entire life time since last I put ink to quill. It all started simply enough. After the severe trial that was the Red Hand War I had thought the Honor Guard had earned some well deserved rest. Such was not to be as Pazenga requested a leave of absence from the Honor Guard during which he would succor his kin held captive by the servants of the delkir and the Cult of the Dragon Below. I persuaded the gith martial artist to abide with us while I mastered new spells that would facilitate the success of his intended mission.

After separating from Zed, Pazenga Elarin and I traveled to Sharn so that I could learn new magics at Morgrave University. While in Sharn Elarin was framed for the horrific murders of two women of dubious virtue. Of course the whole thing was orchestrated from start to finish by House Phairlan to punish Elarin for his refusal to spy for them during the Red Hand War. After securing legal representation for our elven ally we were forced to desert him in order to fulfill my promise to Pazenga. We left him the majority of our healing potions and a ticket on a Lyrander elemental airship to Zilspar, a luxury which we denied ourselves.

After leaving Sharn the three of us were forced to further divide our company, my enchanted shadow-steeds were of no use to Zed’s own great clockwork bear mount, but their speed was too significant an advantage to pass up. Zed rode his bear straight to Zilspar while Pazenga and I zigzagged across western Khorvaire on our spell horses. The two of us traveled to Starsong Hill and the Korranburg Library where I learned a number of new magics that greatly improved the breadth and depth of my powers. As agreed we rendezvoused at Zilspar as soon as our business was completed. Zed arrived well before the rest of us, taking the direct route from Sharn with his tireless new mount, a huge bear-golem given to him by Prince Orgev.

After reuniting at Zilspar, Pazenga led us not to some hidden entrance to Kyber but to a Tharashk mining camp. The only conclusions we could draw was that this outpost of House Tharashk was now serving as cover for a cult of the Dragon Below, perhaps under magical coercion. Initially we sent Pazenga ahead to scout out the mining camp for us. While the gith was out on his recon patrol we were confronted by an orcish shaman of the Gatekeeper faith by the name of Braag. After a brief negotiation we managed to persuade the creature that we meant it no harm and that in fact our goals in opposing the Cult of the Dragon Below were similar enough to his own that we should make common cause and enter into a temporary alliance. Pazenga finally returned and confirmed that this was the location wherein his people were being held, the Honor Guard rested and prepared for a full scale stealth assault.

The following is Pazenga's account of his scouting mission written by his own hand:

I was asked to go into the camp and check things out. I was able to slip by everyone by stealth and went into one of the caves. I only had two encounters that I was able to dispatch without being detected. I worked my way to the great room where they where trying to get into the gate. I then noticed that the leader was using the piece that the orc druid talked about and said we needed to get. I was going to just go back to the group and report but then I remembered I had an invisible potion. I thought I could get by this large group moving silently and using the invisible potion to steal the stone. I attempted this and was detected by the taskmaster who could still see me. I thought for a second but decided I could not steal the stone and make it out alive. My quickness was all that saved me to make it out the door over 100 ft I got away before they closed the door on me. I ran the rest of the way back as fast as I could and got out before the full alarm was out. Then I reported to Din what just happened.

This ends Pazenga's account of his scouting mission.

The Honor Guard and our orc ally went over the cliff and down into the ravine at night covered in magical darkness. Most of our party utilized magical flight via the flying spell scrolls taken from the Red Hand Horde. We had some difficulty entering the mine complex due to the guards of House Tharashk but it was not as if they had a chance of standing against the exemplary fighting skills of Zed and Pazenga. The human cultists were soon cut down to a man, despite my sympathies to the contrary, we could not allow them warn their aberrant masters of our raid. After we had traveled a few dozen yards in to the mine complex a bizarre worm-like creature lurched out of a dark pit and attacked us. The strange Xoriat-spawn had a worm-like appearance but unlike a true worm the thing must have had an internal skeleton similar to a snake; for it had jaws like a vertebrate not the toothed sphincter-mouth of a leech. But like a leech the thing was blind and eyeless. The thing had arms after a fashion but they were more reminiscent of the forelimbs of a preying mantis than the arms of a demi-human. Even so the limbs were curved and incapable of the scissors action of a mantis, none the less deadly for all that.




When the blind snake-worm attacked, Zed was still mounted upon his clockwork bear-steed and was therefore unable to come to grips with the aberration. Unable to assist one another due to hazard of the lightless pit, the creature rained havoc upon our party. The creature even singled me out for attack and moved in for the kill. This was its own undoing however, as I had no intention of facing it alone and retreated in Zed’s direction. The creature, yearning for my blood, pursued. Zed quickly dismounted and laid into the worm-aberration. The painful injuries caused by his byshek blade were multiplied by the bane enchantment we had purchased from House Cannith. The spell-sword caused the creature such distress that it fled back down the black pit. It would have been better to have eliminated the unnatural beast but we were satisfied that it showed no intention of warning its fellows or so I had hoped. Given the telepathic nature of these abominations one can never be too sure.

By this time our magical flight had worn off and we crept as quietly as possible in our best approximation of stealth. Of course Pazenga, as our scout and stealth operative, kept well ahead of us searching for ambushes and traps. In one of the dead end cave he investigated he stumbled upon a huge stalagmite-like creature with web-like ropes for arms and telepathic powers. Before he could react Pazenga was stunned and was being drawn towards the thing’s toothy maw.



Before the rest of us could react Braag the orcish druid charged into the small cavern and began to lay into the thing’s unprotected back with his byshek club. The creature retaliated by employing his barbed tongue to draw the orc’s head into his sphincter-like mouth. The stalagmite beast then tore off the top of Braag’s thick orcish skull in order to gorge on the revealed brain. This horrific distraction bought Zed the time he needed to slash into the thing with his byshek greatsword. Before the abomination could finish swallowing his grisly meal Pazenga and Zed put an end to the disgusting thing.

It was only a few minutes later when a pit suddenly opened under Zed’s feet causing him to disappear into what would later turn out to be a tunnel in a lower level. No sooner had Zed impacted the stone nearly seven yards below our feet then we were attacked by an immense aberration very reminiscent of the bipedal bug-ogres, servants of the Shadowed One.



The creature was huge with two sets of eyes; a human-like pair front and center and a bug’s compound eyes on the sides. I found myself staring into its eyes and the alien mind behind those eyes began to afflict me with a disorienting headache probably via some telepathic power. I quickly averted my and eyes and kept my gaze on the creature’s barrel chest. Its mouth was bracketed by an immense pair of pinchers very much like those of a soldier ant and similarly its skin was sheathed in brown chitin-ous armor plating. The creature paused only a heartbeat to scan its opposition and the alien intelligence contained within that bizarre exo-skull chose me as the likeliest target. I survived the beast’s initial rush only through reflexive use of illusion magic. I knew that the iron hard claws that tore through rock like it was moist earth could certainly rend me to shreds in an instant. I chose the better part of valor and leapt through the aberration’s own pit, scrabbling for handholds as I fell some twenty feet, barely avoiding landing atop Zed’s unyielding adamantine-plated form. The creature seemed to know instinctively that Zed’s baned byshek sword would spell its doom and so it gave up its pursuit of me and attacked Pazenga. As deadly as the creature was it could not find a counter to the gith’s preternatural speed and agility. The gith martial artist’s byshek gloves were brought into play and although Pazenga could barely crack the chitin armor, the pain caused by the ancient byshek gauntlets soon laid the beast low.

We traveled little more than another few dozen feet before we were attacked by another of the bug-like hulking aberrations. This time we were on our guard and the pit trick was entirely unsuccessful. With Pazenga’s invaluable assistance warforged warrior’s aberration-baned byshek warsword made short work of the mighty beast. Aside form healing their hurts after the battle, my assistance was not required.



A few minutes later we came to a bend in the tunnel and we were again ambushed. Blocking our advance was some three score of the goblin-like dolgrims and two robed and tentacle-bearded humanoids that I took to be the dreaded illthiads. Before we could react the two squid-headed mindflayers used their great psionic powers to levitate high into the air. The horde of dologrims surged forward but I was able to split their forces with a wall of fire. Pazenga and Zed surged forward and charged into the mass of tiny double-goblins and the hapless creatures began to fall in droves.



The violet-skinned mindflayers attempted to telepathically control the three of us but our determination to save Pazenga’s people was too great to for their psionic deceptions to overcome. Soon the only surviving dolgrims were the ones on the other side of the firewall. There was a brief pause in the fighting while both sides waited for my wall to burn off. The minflayers must have sensed that the tide of battle had passed them by for their nerve broke and they ordered their remaining dolgrim servants to slaughter the slaves while they made good their escape. I cancelled the wall of fire and we chased down the short legged aberrations before the slaves could be annihilated. Tragically many slaves were slain before the dolgrims were put down but we saved many more than were slain. We bade the survivors escape the mine while we kept the Cult of the Dragon Below occupied.

Finally we were at the door to the ritual room wherein Pazenga had reported spying out the stone key I had lost all those months ago in our battle with the Shadowed one. As we stood before the immense double doors I prayed to the Soverign Host for courage and assistance in the desperate battle to come. Then I cast all the battle magic I had held in reserve. In our many weeks of travel I had developed an intricate plan that just might enable us to prevail against the superior forces arrayed against us. Zed rent a whole in the door with his unbreakable adamantine sword and we leapt into the room and put our plan into operation.



I had only the briefest glimpse of the Xoriat-spawned forces arrayed against us before I was forced to focus on my own efforts on preserving our lives. Arrayed against us were two blind lizard-skinned dog-like creatures, six of the tentacled dolgaunts, eight goblin-like dolgrims, the two illthiads that had fled from us previously, two of the bipedal blind snake-worms, two cultists of the Dragon Below, and their leader a mindflayer nearly as tall as an ogre. The cultist stepped through the byshek column behind the altar and disappeared.



As planned, my first casting surrounded the three of us in a huge cylinder of fire. This spell-wall had the dual purpose of hiding us from the eyes of the half dozen crossbow wielding dolgrims while simultaneously providing a forbidding barrier to melee forces. The ceremonial chamber was large enough that we enjoyed a brief respite while the Xoriat-spawn charged our position. I used the time and the combination of invisibility and fly magic to maximize our defensive position. The second and most critical spell I employed was the druidic stone caltrops spell I had recently learned from the elves at Starsong Hill. I cast it diagonally across the chamber in order to maximize the length of time the creatures would be exposed to the deadly magical caltrops. The spikes created by this spell project from stone reactively and thus it is difficult for one’s opponent know the spell’s dimensions short of a deadly trial and error. The blind tentacle-armed dolgaunts foolishly charged toward our fire cylinder and thus had their feet torn to ribbons by the thrusting spike stones. This further slowed their advance allowing me to cast yet another spell. My third spell was my Prismatic Mist globe and, while it does little damage, it added to the chaos and confusion by weakening the aberrations long before they could come to grips with us. As I finished casting my mist spell, the first dolgaunt leapt through the flaming barrier with shredded feet, blazing like a fire elemental. He landed, staggered a few steps, and flopped to the ground to be consumed by the greedy flames. My role in the opening gambit of the battle was over and therefore I cast my extra-dimensional pocket spell and retreated inside leaving only a dozen feet of rope to mark the portal’s location. At this point my allies were supposed to climb the rope and join me in the extra dimensional space, removed from any possibility of harm. Meanwhile our enemies were forced to run the gauntlet of magical defenses I had left behind. At least that was the plan.



Zed was supposed to clamber up the rope to the portal next but the two mindflayers, strode forward and unleashed their mindblasts staying well away from the warforged’s deadly byshek blade. Zed was staggered, his artificial brain jarred and unable to command his golem-like limbs. Pazenga also was unable to retreat as he was forced to defend the helpless warforged. We had foreseen such an eventuality and Zed’s clockwork bear leapt through the hole to defend his master, my defensive spells allowing it to ignore the searing flames of the fire cylinder. At set back to sure but my basic plan was still working as anticipated.



The dolgaunts and the humanoid worms that managed to survive my gauntlet of defensive spells were in no condition to face our invincible gith martial artist and by the golem-bear. Pazenga’s own psionic powers allowed him to resist the mindblasts of the illthiads and Zed’s steed had no mind to speak of and thus could not harmed by such simple telepathic tricks.

Just as it seemed that the tide of battle had shifted decisively in our favor, the aberrations brought forward their equivalent of a siege engine. Two of the great eyeless dog-like creatures strode forward and let loose with an ear piercing shriek that could rend both metal and flesh. Zed and Pazenga endured blast after blast, fluid dripping out of nose and ears. Finally Zed regained control of his limbs and fled the room barely alive while Pazenga sped up the rope like a squirrel chased by an angry hound. The next phase of the battle was fought by the mechanical bear alone. The mindflayers thought better of facing a golem that was immune to their telepathic powers and retreated on the wings of teleportation. All the other aberrations, aside from the two blind shrieking dog-lizards, had perished by flame or fallen to the stone floor to be pierced a thousand times by the stone caltrops. The bear-golem fought on alone, a desperate battle against two of the dog-creatures. Somehow the golem managed to survive while I healed Pazenga in the safety of my extra-dimensional space and Zed quaffed curing potions while hidden behind the remnants of the great door. Despite their powerful sonic screams the dog-lizards had no counter to the mechanical bear’s ferocious strength and they were soon torn to ribbons. The three of us came out of hiding to find the room was empty of everything except furnishings and corpses, the enemy fled or slain.



After a brief consultation and with much trepidation we followed the human cultists through the byshek gate. On the other side we found much to our surprise, a small army of hobgoblins and not the crazed beasts of Xoriat that we expected. Their speech was strange but my knowledge of the goblin language allowed me to understand much of what they said. The hobgoblin warriors took us to their king and we entered a protracted negotiation. It soon became apparent that somehow we had crossed a time barrier as this was a contingent of the Dhakani Empire of some eight thousand years ago. The hobgoblins had slain the cultists of the Dragon Below that had preceded us but they were now under attack from the aberratant forces of the delkir of eyes, Belyshyra. Just as we agreed to assist the hobgoblins in their war against the Xoriat spawn, Elarin passed through the gate behind us. Obviously much had happened since we had last seen him but this was neither the time nor the place to catch up.



It was then that Hobgoblin scouts reported that a horde of aberrations, lead by one of the dreaded eye-tyrants, were assaulting the basement. The Hobgoblin king Gaalm asked for our assistance and because I had already prepared spells to counter the danger posed by a beholder I offered to have the Honor Guard lead the assault. We descended the stairs to within one flight of the lower level and I cast my most powerful invisibility spell on Pazenga as the battle began.



Just as I had hoped, the beholder had difficulty targeting Pazenga with his deadly eye rays. An invisible target combined with Pazenga’s own uncanny speed and agility turned what should have been a slaughter into a true chance for victory. Unfortunately the beholder had wisely pulled itself back and was using its eye rays from the safety of the ceiling. The creature was bodiless, just a great round head with fanged jaws and eye stalks where hair should be. For some reason the aberration kept its great central eye closed the entire battle. Unable to reach the eye-tyrant, Pazenga turned his martial arts talents against the creature’s dolgaunt and Xoriat-warped dwarven servants. An over anxious hobgoblin warrior charged out of the adjacent stair case and joined Pazenga against the dolgaunts. Very brave it was but also very foolish and ultimately futile. While the goblinoid warrior might have been able to hold his own against his chosen targets, the dolgaunt martial artists, this maneuver merely gave the beholder a target he could use his deadly eye rays upon. The hobgoblin was disintegrated before he could land a single blow. After this the other hobgoblins held back as they had been advised. Meanwhile I had cast a second greater invisibility spell upon Zed and he also waded out into combat against the dolgaunt monks.



At this point I was very concerned as to what the beholder might be up to and so I cast yet another invisibility spell upon Elarin and begged him to unleash his most powerful magics upon the beholder before it killed anyone else. Elarin leapt into the room but before he could unleash his spell he was blasted by numbing cold ray. Frostbitten and half dead Elarin still managed to unleash his deadly swarm of fire rays and the scorched beholder was soon in even worse shape than the elf. A second volley and the creature burst into flames and crashed to the floor. With the beholder slain the hobgoblins swept into fray like a scarlet and silver tidal wave and the few remaining dolgaunts were quickly overwhelmed.

The battle seemed to be over, but Pazenga, perhaps sensing the power of Xoriat energies nearby sprinted to an adjacent chamber where he discovered more of the mutated dwarves. The dwarves seemed to have their attention riveted upon a large and dark colored gem, seemingly a khyber dragonshard. A figure began to coalesce in an energy cloud that surrounded the gem. It was an amorphous column of dark violet and charcoal grey flesh covered with eyes of various sizes and colors with pseudopods instead of tentacles. Pazenga attempted to pick up the gem but the Xoriat supplied power that radiated from it proved too ruinous for Pazenga to grasp it for any length of time. In short order the amorphous creature crossed over from Xoriat, or Khyber, or wherever into the world of the living. We were shocked when the thing began firing deadly rays from its numerous and varied eyes.



For a few desperate moments Pazenga fought the thing unaided while simultaneously keeping the warped dwarves at bay. But soon Zed the warforged swordmaster came to his rescue and laid into the aberration with his byshek greatsword. As the Xoriat-warped dwarves were slain Elarin and I charged into the room and joined the fray. My own spells were all but useless due to the creature’s innate magical resistance. Elarin was slightly more successful even though the creature targeted him with some sort of an abjuration ray that made it difficult for him to cast his deadly spells. By constantly moving the elf was able to escape the anti-magic ray and he blasted the creature with a couple of his own fire rays. King Gaalm and his warriors rushed to our aid but the amorphous aberration merely used a telepathic eye ray to gain control of their leader and turn him against his own men. I was forced to abandon my admittedly futile spell barrage in order to prevent the hobgoblin infantry from being slaughtered by their own king. Thinking quickly I employed a spherical defensive spell that severed the aberration’s telepathic link with King Gaalm. In the end it was really Pazenga and especially Zed that brought the creature down with their enchanted items of pure byshek. Though to take credit where it is due, my own spells of invisibility provided our warriors with some basic defense against the otherwise unbeatable eye rays.




Finally the deadly clash was ended and the hobgoblins and the Honor Guard withdrew to King Gaalm ‘s great hall. The king held a great feast in our honor and we were treated as friends or even heroes. I was asked to give our new allies a tale and so I chose to explain how we came to there, it seemed to make sense at the time, sort of killing two birds with one stone. I used illusion magic to tell our story and this seemed to please them though I must admit I am not much of a story teller. I am more of a student of stories rather than a teller of stories. In any case I took no poetic license and I suppose some of the events made us look rather incompetent, such as the battle in the ritual cavern. It did serve one useful purpose in that it identified the cultists that passed through the portal before us. The fate of those cultists led to a discussion of the stone shard key that we sought. The hobgoblins began to discuss what happened to after their second in command had slain the cultists and soon a controversy ensued between the second and third in command.

Pazenga seemed to believe the second in command, the swordsman Skraz, was lying though how he sensed this when he did not speak their language is beyond me. Skraz refused to submit to magic that would verify that he was telling the truth and so I used my command of the goblin language to allow Pazenga to challenge the hobgoblin swordsman to single combat, with the proviso that the gith would not slay him. When the duel commenced it became clear that the hobgoblin swordsman could not cope the gith’s preternatural speed. A blow to the neck brought the duel to an end and I thought to parley the gith’s victory into a ploy to force the swordman to answer questions under truth magic. Hobgoblin “honor” prevented this once the second in command came to he was slain by his brethren, apparently for losing an honor duel. As though nothing untoward had happened, the hobgoblins installed their new second in command. It was at this time that Pazenga noticed something moving under the hobgoblin spellbinder’s robes. We thought that Kasad was in actuality a dolgaunt but when he was confronted by Pazenga a worm like creature exited his body and attacked us. It was quick and difficult to kill but, with the Honor Guard and a hobgoblin army chasing it, the aberration stood no chance.



After the creature was slain we deduced what had happened. The worm-beast had traveled through the portal inside one of the cultists, as would any parasite. When the humans had been slain by Skraz the creature had entered his body, fiddled with his memories and then left him for the third in command, Kasad. We are now resting up after the festivities and are preparing for the next phase of this mission. The hobgoblins have given us the very stone key I had lost so many months ago. We are to take it into the prison of the delkir Lord of Slime Kyrzin and then leave it inside thus forever trapping him within forever with no hope of rescue from his cultists. The delkir are beings of god-like power and if we are forced to fight Kyrzin we will surely lose. In my heart of hearts I feel that we have finally danced too close to the flame. I fear that from this quest there will be no return.