Post by Andy D on Jun 17, 2023 22:15:12 GMT
Daring Heights - Stonegate
Comrade Dwirhian was accompanying her sister Liavri back to Galavir. It’s a long walk across the Sunset Spines, so she asked for companions. I had not been back to the Spines, or any mountain, recently. I agreed to go for my comrade, and for my own well-being. I had experienced a couple of mission failures recently, as well as a bitter moment in the Feywild. So, to mentally deal with these setbacks, I was looking for a win and/or a relaxing time - and my time in New Hillborrow last week, which was supposed to be a relaxing time, ended up as another mission failure!
I was first to arrive at the Stonegate. While I waited for others, I stood on my tip toes, reached up to the sky, held my immovable chin-up bar above me - parallel to the ground - and locked the magical workout apparatus in place. With my portable gym set up; I began to do sets of pull ups. Before I could move on to adding rings for my next exercise, my long time adventuring comrade turned up, Sergeant Derthaad; the blue dragonborn sorcerer Watch Investigator.
Derthaad offered me his support; he had heard from Sorrel and Beets about my recent time spent in the Damphenite Tangle - Nathalie and I, though still together, made the decision to remove the bangles that bonded our souls as one. We made that decision for her health, her people and her position as leader. The consequence of this though, is that we can never reattain the soul bond again. I appreciated my friend’s support. But, it is a matter for which I would not want to display sorrow in front of comrade Derthaad. I would not feel that is right. The reason being; he lost his fiancee, mine is still alive.
Comrade Dwirhian and her sister arrived next. There was more than just a familiar similarity between the sisters, they seem to have pursued similar paths. Both were, of course, similarly elfs, but also physically well put together. Liavri did a really nice flip from a handstand position on top of my chin up bar. It was good. I’ll have to practise that myself.
Liavri had pockets full of packages from Paradise Frost on her. When Lolli turned up, my harengon conjurer friend, she too came loaded with items from Paradise Frost. I began to wonder if I was supposed to make a trip to Paradise Frost myself. Although, from the look of it, it seemed Liavri and Lolli between them had bought everything that could have been available that morning - and it’s only a three day journey to Galavir. Derthaad himself (my ship’s, The Legacy’s, cook) made his own sweat treats - the protein brownies were pretty good.
Comrade Beets flew in on her fairy wings, turning up late. Beets said she would have been here earlier, but she had to find another way to bring sweet treats on the journey because Paradise Frost was all sold out.
Journey Begins and Silva’s Tree
It was an extremely hot day. Very muggy. But, Comrades Dwirhian and Liavri are excellent companions in hot weather; they can both create a pleasant mist to keep you cool.
Walking the quickest route to the Sunset Spines involves travelling over open fields. So, no shade. At one point in our journey we came across a large oak tree on a hill. On the map, this is known as Silva’s Tree. The tree’s leaves were so dry they might as well have been sand. But, the tree was so huge it’s branches offered enough shade. Lolli conjured a nice coffee table for lunch, and we dug into our supplies - mostly cake. Dwirhian brought savoury items though. Beets bugged me to go hunting, but we had plenty of food, so I turned down the suggestion.
Lolli has a Cocktail of Plenty, like me, but hers is summer themed, and alcohol free. So one pro one con. She was offering it around when a tree branch finger went into the vessel and sucked up the mocktail. This was where we met Silva herself, a dryad. Like the big oak tree, she was looking extremely parched.
Together, Dwirhian and Lolli magically created a gallon of water in the ground for Silva.
Silva mentioned the summer had been particularly dry, and the water that fed the land from the Spines hadn’t flowed for many months. Both her and the tree were severely lacking in water. We offered to help, since we were already heading to the Spines. Silva gave us a stick from her body to use as a water locating device. She was also interested in the lake-weave clothing of Dwirhian and Liavri.
I asked comrade Derthaad what object we could pick up to use as a device to help with teleporting back to Silva’s Tree.
“The stick Kavel,” was his response.
… Good point. We finished our lunch and set off again.
The Foot of the Sunset Spines
We reached the Spines in the evening. Lolli casted Galdur’s Tower. It took me a while to recognise that it’s the same spell Archie uses, because when Archie cast’s it, the tower looks like a noble person’s lakeside retreat. Lolli’s tower looked like a mini Fort Ettin (which is to say ‘pink’) but designed by someone on a diet of sweets, cake, and mind-altering, powerful drugs. To look at the pink tower, It was as if the stone work was made from large cubes of pink sugar. It was a nice tower though, with bedrooms, a washroom, kitchen and observatory.
I felt an annoying kick on my leg in the morning. It was Beets. She insisted we were going hunting together. But, I had plenty of rations in my kit to last me the expected duration of the journey to Galavir and back - I am a professional adventurer. When pressed why just us on a hunting trip, Beets didn’t know what to say. It was then that I suspected she wanted to talk to me in private. I then volunteered that if she didn’t bring enough food for the journey, then I would help her hunt. Hunting we went.
Whilst looking for animals and gathering berries, Beets wouldn’t stop looking my way. It turns out that seeing me and Nathalie together reminded her of her mother and father - this couldn’t be right. But then she clarified that she meant seeing me and Nathalie interact reminded her of how in love her parents were - this made more sense. Beets had not experienced any ‘Bogar’ related fury recently, which was good to hear. I enquired about her ‘gramps.’ Last Beets knew he was fine. I suggested she get help in going to see him again.
I think the talking did some good for Beets. However, it did nothing for the hunting trip. Beets had gathered some berries, but berries are not protein - she needed meat, and the only meat we could see were these cute animals; prairie dogs. So, since cute animals were the only protein source nearby; cute animals needed to be killed.
Luckily for the lone prairie dog we did find, I had first found an abandoned nest of eggs. As a result, Beets felt she had less incentive to kill the small animal - she even gave it a muffin. When we got back to the tower, Derthaad cooked up omelettes. They were good! The Legacy’s Cook is good.
The Temple to
When the stick of water-finding vibrated strongly towards White Dragon, I felt pretty certain where the source of water was going to be found.
It took a couple of hours of trekking to reach the stone bridge to the temple carved into the mountainside. The temple looked a little more dilapidated than when I last saw it. More trees were growing in spaces where there shouldn’t be any. The courtyard was empty, save for the strength apparatus we left behind.
We heard a draconic voice inside the temple and the sound of rocks crashing together. The stick was heavily vibrating in that direction too.
Dwirihian recognised who the voice belonged to, a blue-scaled kobold called Riggs, a merchant. Riggs had moved into the rock retailing business. As he explained, the OMTC makes all the money from large scale stone sales. But he has found good business in decorative, ornamental-sized stone. Additionally, we later discovered he had found a few Sending Stones, too.
An immense, very heavy stone, we discovered, was blocking the flow of water behind it, and also in Rigg’s way. Using my familiarity with mountains and stone work, I estimated the weight of the stone to be around 4,000lbs - a little heavier than I could lift*, and I wasn’t big enough to get leverage on it anyway. But then comrade Lolli said she could cast the Enlarge spell on me! So, what was once an immovable rock became no more than a warm-up lift for me at 15 ft tall, and super large. I shifted the rock - no problem.
Unfortunately, my super impressive effort began a waterslide that burst out from the smaller collection of stones behind the one I held. Everyone was flushed out of the room we were in and out onto the courtyard. Everyone except me - I was almost flushed off of the side of the cliff!
Luckily for me, if I had fallen, my Ring of Feather Fall would have saved me from the half mile drop. But, I managed to set the stone aside at the edge of the cliff, and grab hold of the ledge with my powerful grip strength. So, I didn’t succumb to being flushed down the side of the mountain. Purchase attained, I was able to jump-fly my way back to the courtyard. Everyone, including myself (quite considerably so) was bruised up. The courtyard floor was unforgiving on my comrades and Mr. Riggs. The interior walls and the immense rock I was holding were extremely unforgiving on me. I apologised to everyone for not taking more safety precautions before shifting the rock.
Dwirhian provided healing for Riggs, and we all took a short pause to attend to our injuries. In that time, we were treated to a view of the Sun Temple that could not have been witnessed for a while. There was no waterfall when I visited the temple two times before. Dwirhian had mentioned that she knew of a tale of three temples around here that were dedicated to the rising and setting of the sun. With the waterfall restored, not only would Silva and her tree regain their source of sustenance, but we saw the beauty and serenity of the falling water reflect light shone onto the mountain rock around the temple, and form a display of light that produced a beautiful rainbow display. This is a nice temple, I thought to myself, as I enjoyed the spectacle of light. It’s a shame it isn’t used much.
I made a note to myself to come back here. Maybe with Kruger, and we could tend to the stone, and render the place occupiable again, then others could trek to the temple and enjoy the views on offer and the serenity one could find here.
Before leaving, I searched the place for any remaining items that Kruger, Tim and Sampson may have left there. Both Derthaad and I took a rock each, which I will smooth out with my masonry tools when I get the time, just to make the stone nicer - most importantly, now we had a way to teleport directly to the temple for future journeys.
Galavir
We reached Galavir later the same day. There were new turnip fields surrounding the lake. The refugees from the Turning Fields had settled in well.
Lolli found a market stall where she was able to buy a new galavan fabric; turnip-weave. It looked much better than it sounded, the material was very light - good for summer - and had the same pearly-lake shimmer to it that the Galavir Lake does. I’ve asked Lolli to make another dress for Nathalie - the material and its appearance seem to suit the Damphenite Tangle. Lolli got enough material for Fitzgrove Fashion, and some for Silva, since she was interested in the lake-weave.
We had some local food for dinner. The clouds above were shaped into mythical creatures. The source of the manipulated clouds came from the mountains - Ethelex, who Dwirhian had come all this way to see.
Ethelex and Keltigern
We had a chat with Ethelex. Well, Dwirhian and Derthaad did. I was content to watch Derthaad’s Draconic Spirit summon, Ulhar, give Keltigern flying lessons. I did, however, overhear some of the matters that were being discussed. At one point, I could literally see one of Ethelex’s tales, because he did his trick of revealing a memory/story that is inside his wings. I was already vaguely aware that young Keltigern is a refugee dragon, and the deformed adult-sized paw on his adolescent body was a result of some magical misdemeanour the population of his village had been involved in, whilst trying to control said magical thing. That day, I learned that the village is in some kind of time lock, and my comrades wish to go back and try and help the villages against the two hungry god-like beings that are consuming everything there. Ethelex advised not to go back, but if they do, they should make sure not to lose their way back, or they could be trapped there. Tiamat and Primus are involved somehow, like in the time I went into Derthaad’s memories with him, courtesy of Ethelex.
We stayed in Galavir for the night. The next morning, Derthaad teleported us back to Silva’s Tree, so Lolli could measure Silva up and give her a choice of different fabric designs. And then, we headed back to the city. I needed to get back - I was going to begin giving lessons in the Giant language to comrade Orianna. It would involve strength and conditioning exercises too, for this is important in Giant culture. Atleast, it is important to Half-Giant culture… or maybe just my mountain tribe, or just the Iron Strong Company? … Either way, Oriana’s lessons in Giant would involve strength and conditioning too.
* Editor’s note: Kavel’s current Carrying Capacity (CC) is 1,200lbs. His Push, Drag Lift (PDL) is 2,400lbs. An ordinary humanoid of impressive STR 20 would have a CC of 300lbs, and a PDL of 600lbs. Kavel is awesome.
