Dwarven Vault III: Of
Dragons, Worms and Chaos! as told by Glaurung the Golden Sune's blessings on you all! Those of you familiar with our sorry tale to this point know
that we’d slunk back to town as penniless curs, robbed blind by that over-weaning
marauder Ragemaw. That humiliation didn’t sit well with any of us and we
counted the days until we’d recovered enough to venture forth to complete the
mission. On the 6 th day from
our return we set off once more, determined to see this through come dragons or
high water. Little did we know what was
to come. Led by our diviner the good Burglecut, our expedition
numbered five. Alongside our sweaty
leader there were Larry and Reggie, two halflings of some renown, Orax
Thunderfoot our redoubtable cleric and myself, Glaurung the Golden. Frank McStank didn’t join us this time,
perhaps the Emporium’s scented soap sale was too much for him to pass up? Our first day of travel went smoothly and we drank and made
merry that evening despite the cold of the swamps. As we turned in we dared to
hope we would easily make our way back to the dwarven mines. Alas it wasn’t to be. Deep in the night a pair of monstrous leeches
approached our camp. One of them even managed
to creep its way into Burglekutt’s tent.
Thankfully Orax raised the alarm with a thunder strike that
simultaneously woke us up and blasted the intrusive leech from where it was resting
on Burglekutt’s inner thigh. The fight was short and brutal, with the lesser leech soon
dispatched while the larger of the two took quite a pounding before finally
subsiding. A nasty beast it was, capable
of vomiting forth jets of tiny leeches.
Thankfully they didn’t land on target.
Larry as always proved deft with the butcher’s knife and he
filleted the thing into leech fillets, though most of us chose not to
partake. We pressed on the next morning and made good progress,
exiting the swamp and arriving at the foot of the mountains. We must have drifted a little further East
than intended for we found ourselves outside of the doors to the lost city of
Lull. It was an awe inspiring place
with imposing statues and magnificent stonework. Burglekutt, however, was much more interested in the
weathered outhouse and the strange treasures it might offer. Or perhaps he needed to visit the facilities. In any case while the rest of us stared at
the main doors he was peeking in the privy, searching for lost secrets in the
poo. That was when disaster struck. Perhaps offended by the literal shit stirring
in progress, a gigantic purple worm lunged out of the ground and swallowed the
outhouse whole, with Burglekutt inside! Unknowing of our leader’s fate the rest of us unleashed our
most potent attacks and magics against the purple horror, doing it great damage
in the process. Perhaps upset by our
attacks, or perhaps offended by the taste of our gnomish friend, the purple
work puked out Burglekutt and dived back beneath the ground. Rushing forward we revived our friend and dragged
him clear of the entrance to lull. The
only reward for our trouble was finding an ever burning torch in the purple
worm’s spew. Well, that and our lives, which we were most grateful to retain. Still shaken by the encounter we made camp, only for our
fortunes to turn even worse. In the
middle of the night that red winged road bandit Ragemaw overflew our camp and
decided to shake us down for a second time!
Reggie tried to appease the dragon with flattery and I added my voice to
the conversation, hoping to convince the wyrm to leave us be. Now personally I believe that the only way to deal with a dragon
is with a firm hand, it’s the only thing the brutes understand and it was a
point repeatedly made by my grandmother (a gold dragon as perhaps I’ve already
mentioned). I was about to give Ragemaw
a piece of my mind when I recalled a very recent conversation with Larry where
he’d convinced me that discretion was sometimes the better part of valour. With bile in my throat I flattered the beast and we managed
to convince it to leave us be. As it took
to the air, however, a most extraordinary thing happened. A far larger dragon appeared and blasted a
great fork of lighting up Ragemaw’s arse!
Oh what a glorious site to see that show boater go running when a real
dragon showed up! I’m informed the blue
dragon is Zundaedaerth and it’s clearly the real boss in town. We quaked our way through the rest of the night and fortunately
no-one else disturbed our rest. Toward the end of the next day we reached the dwarf mines and
without wasting time we proceeded within.
We went up the North passage and managed to cross the chasm though Larry
and I took a bit of a beating trying to cross the crude bridge. The ensuing battle with the pair of ankhegs was tougher than
anticipated as they burrowed up beneath our feet and crushed us with cascades
of stone. In the end we prevailed, though a great deal of our magic spells were expended. The threat wasn’t ended there, however, as
the final chamber contained a Chuul, an armour plated monstrosity like a giant
humanoid crab. Poor Orax took a fearful
beating trying to fend it off but in the end it succumbed to a hail of sling
bullets and spells! The source of the mine’s troubles proved to be a drow
artifact that lured beings of chaos. We
nullified the threat and were in the process of looting the treasure when Reggie
inadvertently set off a trap! He was
covered in clouds of poisonous gas and it was only Orax’s quick thinking that
saved him.
Our quest fulfilled we loaded up the gold and treasures (including
a well earned magic hammer and shield for Orax) and returned to Hope in triumph. Who else can say that they survived a purple
work and two dragons, all in one day?
