3/21/17 The companions awoke at sunrise eager to begin exploring. They they decided to inspect a strange noise from the woods behind them which Theedi described as an "engine noise." Curious indeed. They walked for about a mile through the thick underbrush until finally emerging on the other side into a strange clearing. There they found the wall. The boundary of the world. The edge of this strange dimension. Gahldra hobbled the 100 feet to the wall and found it to be made of a swirling incorporeal mist. Intrigued that this wall and may be passable, she pressed her hand into the wall. Upon touching it, she felt an explosion of searing pain as the wall absorbed part of her hand! Terrified, she sprinted back to the party holding her mutilated stump for all to see. "Don't... touch... that wall..." Margrave, also horrified, clasped her mutilated hand prayed for mercy to his god. Much to Gahldra's surprise, her hand was restored! The moment was brief, however, as a disturbance caught the party's attention. The swirling mist of the wall seemed to come alive as numerous giant grey worms sprung from it, consumed a portion of the earth below them, and returned to their homes inside the wall. The wall then filled in the space that the worms consumed! The wall was closing in! As the party turned to put as much distance between themselves and that cursed wall, three of the floating misty worms broke off in pursuit. The party agreed that running for the cover of the tree line was their best chance of survival, so run they did. Gahldra was able to blast one of them with a gout of fire before escaping into the tree line. Unfortunately, the creature was able to quickly catch up to her in the forest by CONSUMING THE TREES that were in the way. It smashed her in the face, sending skin, blood, and 7 of her teeth flying into the underbrush and leaving her a crumpled mess in the dirt. Her consciousness immediately left her and darkness overtook her. Luckily her righteous companions were there to bring her back! In contrast, the fight seemed to be going quite well for the rest of the group. Behldor was rebuilt by Gahldra's little magical workers into a much larger and more powerful version of himself, Maugrave was blessed by Lichalia and fought well with holy fury and both Theedi and Hrissa scored multiple critical wounds on the creatures! All fought bravely against the misty monsters until they were vanquished. After the battle, Margrave found it within himself to ask his god to heal Gahldra's broken face... and his prayer was again answered! Her teeth were restored, but the nasty scar from the encounter remained... The party went back from where they had come and returned to the clearing on the ridge where they spent the night. Then they decided to descend into the valley and investigate the burned field. Upon reaching the edge of the field it became apparent that there was a battle raging a mile or so in. The group decided to use caution and stealth and sent Theedi and Behldor off to investigate. They soon returned saying the combatants were skeletons dressed in garb that seemed to divide them into teams: red, blue and yellow. It almost seemed like they were fighting for sport! The party decided to avoid the conflict and travel around the battleground to the building by the lake. The building, upon closer inspection, seemed to be falling into ruin. The party circled the structure cautiously and found a side entrance that led into a small soiled room. The group decided to enter and noted that the sun was beginning to set in the horizon. Paranoid, as one needs to be to survive the perils of adventuring, Theedi thoroughly searched the entryway for traps but found none there or anywhere inside. The group did however find a grizzly and ancient warrior sitting upon a gold throne in what looked like a grand throne room... or perhaps it was once grand. It had since fallen into ruin like the rest of the place. The man revealed himself to be Kaschei, a long-dead army captain who fights only for the whim of three mages. He explained that he had been led here many lifetimes ago by the jester and has been playing the mages' games ever since. He revealed that there are is another wizard called "the matron" and that she is above the three mages and that the jester randomly draws cards to see which of them has dominion for that day. He also challenged Bahldor to a duel, to which he wisely declined. "Old guy likes to fight..." As the party resumed exploring the ruined manor, they suddenly realized that little Maggie wasn't among them! They searched the remaining rooms frantically and found nothing - no sign of her at all! Theedie decided to search under the large red carpet in the throne room and found a most curious, but seemingly unrelated, clue. It was a large engraved stone set with three key holes - one iron, one copper and one gold. Inlaid in the stone was the image of a great dragon with three decapitated heads. "Maybe a way out of here...?" Their search led them to a large spiral staircase that ascended to the top of the manor's tower. There they found little Maggie sitting at a large round table with three robed and masked figures - each wearing a key around their necks! One of iron, one of copper and one of gold - just like on the stone slab under the rug! Also in the room the disturbed jester that led them to this world and one who could only be the Matron Kaschei spoke of. So cold was her visage that Gahldra thought she would tear the life from her eyes if she were to stare into them for more than a moment. Though terrified to suddenly be in the presence of the three (or four!) presumably most powerful creatures in this world, little Maggie seemed to be having a great time! She was laughing with the three masked figures like nothing was wrong! "I don't know what's going on... but something certainly isn't right here!"
