Nessey's notes

3-10-05 Game - Two Moons Over Tarrastra - Four Adventurers Under the Moons: Nessey, Caelesti, Carric and Yoshi

We have defeated the Weird Brain-Eating guy. Nessey is in a rage.

Nessey, "He threatened to eat my brain! I take that personally! He said he could almost taste it... What a creep! I should eat HIS brain - that would teach him!"

Yoshi, "What are you doing with that dagger?"

Nessey, "I'm going to cut out his brains."

Yoshi, "Why?"

Nessey, "I'm going to cook them up and see what they taste like!"

Yoshi, "Yuck!"

Carric, "I don't know if you should do that. He's a mutant. Might be poisonous..."

Nessey, "Well, it must have SOME value. And we need money for Cold Iron weapons... So let's take the brain out and preserve it and see if we can sell it. Caelesti, do you have any magical way of preserving things?"

Caelesti, "The only way I know of is to pickle it. Vinegar or alcohol."

Nessey, "Sounds good. Let's do that."

Caelesti, "Yeah, it might have magical uses. Might be really valuable to mages... We can get some alcohol at a pub and..."

Meanwhile: Carric, "Are you children alright? Not hurt or scared or anything."

Children, "We're scared of that Lizardman!"

Carric, "Now, now children, this lizardman, Gromlik, here is our friend. He came with us and helped us find you like a dog would."

Gromlik gives Carric a dirty look, but Carric plows on.

Carric, "We are ALL animals, lizardmen and people, like dogs are animals or cows are animals. We're all animals. We all have eyes and ears and noses. See, I have a nose..."

Children, "But you killed some of the lizardmen. Why?"

Carric, "Well, you know some animals are good animals and some are bad animals. And these animals we killed were friends of the tentacle guy and he was a... a really... a bad... a bad - THING!"

Children eye the dead body of "the tentacle guy" on the ground before them, "That's scary... We want to go home!"

Carric, "We can't do that right away. We have to go visit some lizardmen first. But don't worry these are GOOD ones, good animals."

Children, "How can you tell the good animals from the bad ones?"

Carric, "I'm a Druid and I know these things. I know all about animals. I can just tell. Now it might feel scary at the village of the lizardmen, but I'll be with you. And I'll explain to you about stuff and it will be something really interesting for you, okay?"

Children, "I don't know..."

Dad, "Come on, kids, let's go."

Children, "Yes, dad...."

Yoshi, "Have the kids ever heard of good people and bad people?"

Children, "Oh, yes, like bandits!"

Carric, "The bad lizardmen are just like bandits - just like that!"

Caelesti, "Have we searched the hut yet?"

Carric, "No. I guess we should do that."

Yoshi, "Stand back. I should go in first - in case anything is dangerous."

Yoshi goes in and pokes at things with a stick. Nothing blows up, so he motions for his friends to follow.

We find: a sack of coins, crude lizardmen clubs and furniture, small darkwood buckler, a small grey bag, and 3 tanglefoot bags. Carric detects magic on the grey bag. Caelesti opens it from a distance with a Cantrip. A rat comes out of the bag after Yoshi paws around in it. Yoshi seems to have a mental link with the rat and can get it to sit, walk and go back into the bag. Nessey dubs this item "The Rat Bag."

After the rat goes back into the bag, Yoshi closes it up and promptly hands it to Carric. Yoshi, "You know about animals. You should have this!"

Nessey offers Yoshi dibs on the darkwood buckler, but Yoshi turns that down too - and likewise the tanglefoot bags. So Nessey takes the buckler and the tanglefoot bags go to Nessey, Caelestic and Carric, one each. We will count the coins later.

Gromlik leads us back to the village of the lizardmen and his Shamen.

Yoshi and Carric hustle us all along so quickly that Nessey and Caelesti accidentally leave the Tentacle Guy's body behind - brain and all. ?

Nessey complains that we need *something* to bargain with - if we are going to get more weapons, but Carric is unwilling to consider selling anything: not the grey bag or the teeth or anything we've found so far.

Nessey can tell that Carric is "in one of his Druid moods" so she drops it for now.

Indeed, Carric is mentally occupied. He is pondering better ways to explain good and bad animals. And he is mentally practicing a speech about "peaceful enterprise" and "mutually beneficial trading practices" between lizardmen animals and people animals. He frowns with concentration all along the march to the village.

Gromlik, our lizardman guide, is very proud of our victory and preens himself along the march.

We get to Gromlik's village and the hut of his Shaman. Carric speaks to him in Druidic so that none of us will have any idea what they are saying. Yoshi notices this and nudges Carric to translate for us.

Carric, "Oh! Oh, yeah... Okay... Well he says he can heal any of us who are injured. And he says there is a Sacred Druid Site near here, to the north, but it is near the lair of a nasty 5-headed lizard-like creature, so no one goes there anymore. But he thinks we can get to the site from the north. We'll need go there from Meadowbrook then... He says each of the heads can bite. It's a fearsome creature! He also says that the Tower used to be a guard post long ago. He says they might be interested in trading fish for steel with humans. And I have referred him to the Druid in town should there be any trouble in the future..."

Yoshi, "Perhaps the tower can be re-purposed as a trading post?"

Carric, "Yeah, we should check it out first and go downstairs and make sure it is safe. Then perhaps the people and lizardmen could meet there."

It is mid-afternoon at this point. We are served a celebratory lunch of sushi. The kids are not into this, so we give them our rations to eat.

The Shaman tosses a whole fish in his mouth. We chop ours into little sushi pieces and are very happy with that.

Nessy, "Caelesti would like to mud wrestle."

Caelesti, "Yeah! Fun!"

Carric, "No! Lizardmen can hold their breath underwater a long, long time... I do not think that would be a good idea!"

Caelesti, "Then I would like to dance. Let's have some music."

The lizardmen break out the band (of reed flutes and lutes), but it is not like any music we have ever heard, not even melodic to our ears. The lizardmen seem to sway in a strange way to the sounds. Caelesti watches, then tries to imitate this dance. The Shaman thinks it was nice of her to try, but she needs MUCH more practice. He's clearly not impressed. Even Carric says, "I usually like your dancing, Caelesti Sweetie..." but shakes his head at this one.

Caelesti is not deterred and continues with her dance moves.

We make good friends among the lizardfolk. They fondly dub Nessey, "Little Lizard" - because she speaks their language (Draconic) and dub Caelesti "The Colorful One."

As we depart, Carric tells the lizardmen, "Remember, we are the Weapons of Good, happy to help should you ever need our services again."

Yoshi says, "We should clear out those five heads."

Carric, "We need to do to town first, to Meadowbrook, and approach that area from the north. But tonight we should camp at the Tower."

Yoshi, "Let's go down those stairs..."

Caelesti and Nessey chime in, "We shouldn't do anything to endanger the children!"

Yoshi, "We'll leave the children upstairs."

Nessey, "Unguarded and unprotected from the Redcaps or any other creatures who wander this way?"

Carric, "Nessey's right. We shouldn't leave Dad and the kids alone. We should escort them safely home, then come back on our own. In the meantime, Nessey, would you like to count up those coins in the sack?"

Nessey, "Sure. I'm good at that. One, two, three, four.... 616 copper pieces. One, two, three, four, five.... 418 silver pieces. One, two, three, four, five, six.... 389 gold pieces."

Yoshi, "That translates into 437 gold when we get to a place to convert it all. Very good! I will give to my temple in thanks for our blessings!"

Carric gives a couple odd copper pieces to the kids. We share our rations with the kids and their father and have a nice friendly meal together.

Caelesti, "We're going to have to buy more rations when we get to Meadowbrook. Make a note of that Carric, okay? Cause I won't remember."

We post watches. Nessey and Caelesti are on watch together. Caelesti takes the opportunity to work more on her lizard-dance. Carric pretends to sleep, but really keeps one eye open a crack to watch Caelesti undulating in the moonlight.

The night passes without incident. We get back to the farm house and Mom is beside herself with joy and practically crushes her children to death hugging them. ? "Thank you! Thank you! Oh, my babies... my babies..."

Carric has a private chat with Mom about good and bad lizard animals and how some of them are like human bandits. He's had a long time to practice this explanation and is much better at it now. Mom actually understands what Carric is saying. She even offers us a fine and hearty farm breakfast - which we gratefully accept. And she agrees to take a note to their resident druid from Carric.

Carric sits down and drafts the letter - outlining the recent chain of events and promoting the idea of intra-human-lizard-craft-swaps. He seals the letter and gives it to Mom, the now-happy-again farm woman. "We're going to clean out that tower now, " Carric tells her, "in case there are any more Redcaps lurking around. We want to make it safe for you before we leave this locale."

Caelesti, "Let's go into town first and buy some weapons and I need some new outfits."

Yoshi, "This is not a town, Caelesti."

Farmwoman, "We buy from a traveling peddler."

Caelesti, "Great! Where does he live?"

Farmwoman, "He doesn't live here. He just travels through here once in a while. No set dates."

Caelesti, "Where's the shops?"

Carric, "This is just a hamlet."

Caelesti, "Yeah, so where's the hamlet center with all the shops?"

Yoshi, "There are NO shops here"

Carric, "Meadowsbrook is the nearest town. We should clean out the tower before we go there."

Caelesti, "But what about my new outfits? I'd like to get something in pink..."

Yoshi, "Later!"

Carric changes his mind and decides we should all hike to the Druid's cottage and leave him the note ourselves, so as not to inconvenience anyone else. Always hopeful, Caelesti is disappointed that the Druid is not home and has no glittery outfits displayed for sale. While we are there, Carric takes time to learn new spells for the day.

We finally arrive at the Tower shortly after noon. Yoshi, after all the delay, seems now to have ants in his pants (if monks wear pants?) and can't wait - but rushes down the stairs immediately, alone, in the dark. We hear him call up to us, "It's quiet and dark down here. I can't see anything and so far nothing has jumped out at me." He comes back up.

Caelesti, "I'll look. I can see a little better than you can."

Caelesti softly pads down the stairs. Yoshi follows her. Caelesti doesn't expect this and is startled by the heavy breathing behind her. She comes back up, followed by Yoshi.

Caelesti, "Couldn't see anything."

Nessey raises her eyebrows, gives Caelesti and Yoshi both a look. Nessey goes down the stairs and casts Daylight. The rest of the party follow her - all able to see just fine now.

We see a 20' x 20' room with a heap of coins scattered around the floor and one door to an adjoining room. Yoshi is suspicious of the coins and stirs them with a stick - "in case they are not what they seem." The coins clank in a typical coin-like manner. So Yoshi gathers them up.

Caelesti wants to open the door to the adjoining room. Yoshi runs and gets in front of her. He opens the door and enters first - to act as a human body shield for the rest of us. So chivalrous, just like the brave knights in the tales Nanna used to read to little Nessey when she was a wee child... Fortunately nothing attacks Yoshi. ? No dragons like in Nanna's tales. (this time!)

We see a small room with a hole in the floor. The hole is rough and does not seem to be a well of any kind. The hole slants steeply and connects with an underground passage.

With what is rapidly becoming a characteristic disregard for safety, especially his own, Yoshi lights a torch and wants to dive down into the hole, unaided, flames in hand. He won't listen to anything the women say to warn him - but finally listens to reason from Carric (a fellow MAN) and waits while Carric goes back for a rope and stake. Carric pounds the stake into the dirt floor and attaches the rope and Yoshi plunges first to the bottom - awkward with the rope - but adequate to prevent broken limbs.

The rest of us follow, more cautiously.

We find the passageway to be rough, but more level, with a gentle slope. It seems to lead in the direction of the River. Caelesti draws her weapon as we proceed down the passage. We travel about a hundred feet and then the passage opens into a low cavern. Directly across the cavern from us - can be seen the opening of another passageway. Yoshi boldly crosses the cavern (40') to the other passageway. The rest of us hang back with caution.

Carric moves to the front of our line and peers into the cavern. He notices that the sand is disturbed in a weird way... like a wave pattern. Before he can point this out to the rest of us, Yoshi yells, "There's a passage here that leads to the river, come on!" Caelesti and Nessey venture into the cavern and are suddenly accosted by a giant, worm-like creature with four tentacles!

The critter is as long as a man is tall. It's four tentacles are longer than human arms. And it's body is segmented, like a worm. Each of the tentacles is covered in suckers. Yikes! We've never see the likes of this before!

Caelesti throws a dagger at it, but misses. Nessey readies her rapier. Yoshi runs back to us and punches the creature. His fists sink it and bounce back - doing no damage. Caelesti pulls out her short sword and swipes at it, but misses. Carric summons a wolf which appears about this time and helps to distract the creature. Carric strikes and misses.

Yoshi tries "sharpies" instead of punches, but that doesn't do any good either. The creature's hide is very resilient. The critter goes for Yoshi in return, but misses. Caelesti misses the creature with her sword again. Nessey hits for 6pnts - but her rapier bounces back - leaving no damage. Nessey drops her rapier and takes out a silver dagger, but that weapon doesn't work either.

Someone tries a cold iron dagger on it, but that doesn't have any better effect than silver or steel. While Yoshi is in the process of suggesting we retreat, the creature reaches out and does 10pnts of damage to him with its tentacles and suckers. Our devout monk is now covered in "hickeys." ;-) Very cute. ?

Caelesti tries to Sleep the Wormy Thing, but it resists. Carric hits it with a tanglefoot bag and the Wormy Thing is temporarily stuck to the cavern floor. This enables us all to make a fast retreat, out the passage to the Riverbank, leaving many of our weapons behind, but successfully escaping.

We go back to the Tower and down the stairs and recover our rope.

Caelesti, "We can't just leave that creature there to terrorize the innocent people of the town..."

Yoshi, "If Caelesti could Sleep it, then maybe we could carry it up and drop it off the Tower to go splat."

Nessey, "If only we had some acid or even oil and fire..."

Carric, "I'm thinking Fang Tooth spell on Yoshi's fists..."

Yoshi, "Maybe if Caelesti didn't wear her armor?"

Caelesti, "If I didn't wear my armor ever or just this once?"

Carric, "Just when you cast magic at this creature. I think you should wear your armor in general."

Nessey, "What about my lost rapier?"

Caelesti, "What about my new outfits I need to buy?"

Nessey counts the coins we found and says, "We are 120 gp richer. You should have no problem buying new outfits when we get to Meadowbrook."

Carric, "That's right. But first we need a plan to defeat this Worm Thing."

End-of-Session