Tales of a time and place that has no name. Part 1
So let me tell you a tale of some adventurers. These adventurers are not the typical kind that you might have run across in your travels. You see they have issues. They have a hard time doing good. But I am getting ahead of myself. Let us start with introductions.
The eldest (but not wisest) of the group is a human sorcerer who goes by the name of Luther. He seems to lean no real direction on the alignment scale and instead is very interested in knowledge, particular he is very interested in other races, particular the mysterious or uncommon races. So much so that he has focused his innate natural talent into summoning monsters from the various plans to do his bidding, as well as focusing his magic on enhancing them. He quiet often turns himself invisible in order to let his creatures get the focus of hostile intentions. He sometimes has a familiar, a hawk, named Celes. But only sometimes. He occasionally leads the party.
The next on our list of odd adventurers is Dervok.. or Darvek. Some variation of a name such as that. He is also a human, far younger than Luther, and a Duskblade. Basically that means he wields a sword really well and can shoot tons of insects out of his hand that kills anything living. And occasionally he can summon everybody right near him (I assume to use as a shield against a charging monster or something). He seems to rather enjoy the killing of things. When he leads the party things tend to die. Did I mention he is scared of insects?
The third regular of the party is the Bardbarian Katrs. Bardbarian is the fancy term for a half-orc who has a few levels in bard, and a few more in barbarian. Katrs, being a very fine example of type half-orc intelligence, specializes in drums and killing people to death. Not always in that order. He was joined by a dog, who I believe has the name of dog. Who isn't a riding dog. Or a trained dog. Just a mutt who follows us around.
Two other characters whose names are lost to time joined these three at the start of their adventure. One was a dwarven cleric. If there was oddity to him it was never discovered. The second was a druid, possibly human. This druid had a fur-skin backpack which was later revealed to be a giant spider, his animal companion. Did I mention our Duskblade is afraid of insects?
So this odd little group of adventurers started its tale in a cave. They awoke to find themselves somewhere in the middle of a dungeon with no real memory of how they arrived. None of them seemed to be particularly hurt although one of them had an odd item on them. A metal cylinder with the etchings of a plus and minus on either end. There was also blood coming from one of the directions. So being the sensible adventuring party that we were, we went the other way. After encountering some orcs playing cards, a pit of doom, and locked doors whose adjoining walls had acid in them, the party finally manages to make it to the center of the dungeon, only to find a druid attending to various mechanical and magical looking devices.
The druid was in much haste and distraction and quickly demanded if we had brought the item. Still confused and somewhat amnesic we handed over the metal rod we had. Only after doing that did we decide that maybe that wasn't the best idea in the world. After doing something to the mechanisms he turned into a bird and flew away through a whole in the ceiling. After discussing we decided leaving promptly would be a good idea as well, as noises were being made that we did not like.
After exiting the dungeon we discovered we were more or less on top of a mountain and there was a town somewhere off in the distance. Making decent time we descended the mountain as quickly as possible, occasionally seeing a bear trailing us or paralleling us. With foreboding in the air we entered the town...
And were greeted with a Heroes Welcome! Which is, of course, when everything started to go down hill.
Next Time: Cast out!
The eldest (but not wisest) of the group is a human sorcerer who goes by the name of Luther. He seems to lean no real direction on the alignment scale and instead is very interested in knowledge, particular he is very interested in other races, particular the mysterious or uncommon races. So much so that he has focused his innate natural talent into summoning monsters from the various plans to do his bidding, as well as focusing his magic on enhancing them. He quiet often turns himself invisible in order to let his creatures get the focus of hostile intentions. He sometimes has a familiar, a hawk, named Celes. But only sometimes. He occasionally leads the party.
The next on our list of odd adventurers is Dervok.. or Darvek. Some variation of a name such as that. He is also a human, far younger than Luther, and a Duskblade. Basically that means he wields a sword really well and can shoot tons of insects out of his hand that kills anything living. And occasionally he can summon everybody right near him (I assume to use as a shield against a charging monster or something). He seems to rather enjoy the killing of things. When he leads the party things tend to die. Did I mention he is scared of insects?
The third regular of the party is the Bardbarian Katrs. Bardbarian is the fancy term for a half-orc who has a few levels in bard, and a few more in barbarian. Katrs, being a very fine example of type half-orc intelligence, specializes in drums and killing people to death. Not always in that order. He was joined by a dog, who I believe has the name of dog. Who isn't a riding dog. Or a trained dog. Just a mutt who follows us around.
Two other characters whose names are lost to time joined these three at the start of their adventure. One was a dwarven cleric. If there was oddity to him it was never discovered. The second was a druid, possibly human. This druid had a fur-skin backpack which was later revealed to be a giant spider, his animal companion. Did I mention our Duskblade is afraid of insects?
So this odd little group of adventurers started its tale in a cave. They awoke to find themselves somewhere in the middle of a dungeon with no real memory of how they arrived. None of them seemed to be particularly hurt although one of them had an odd item on them. A metal cylinder with the etchings of a plus and minus on either end. There was also blood coming from one of the directions. So being the sensible adventuring party that we were, we went the other way. After encountering some orcs playing cards, a pit of doom, and locked doors whose adjoining walls had acid in them, the party finally manages to make it to the center of the dungeon, only to find a druid attending to various mechanical and magical looking devices.
The druid was in much haste and distraction and quickly demanded if we had brought the item. Still confused and somewhat amnesic we handed over the metal rod we had. Only after doing that did we decide that maybe that wasn't the best idea in the world. After doing something to the mechanisms he turned into a bird and flew away through a whole in the ceiling. After discussing we decided leaving promptly would be a good idea as well, as noises were being made that we did not like.
After exiting the dungeon we discovered we were more or less on top of a mountain and there was a town somewhere off in the distance. Making decent time we descended the mountain as quickly as possible, occasionally seeing a bear trailing us or paralleling us. With foreboding in the air we entered the town...
And were greeted with a Heroes Welcome! Which is, of course, when everything started to go down hill.
Next Time: Cast out!