YE WHO ENTER HERE - 09/09/2021 - A Kavel Perspective

Entering Port Ffirst - a prologue of sorts

I have been to Fort Ettin and Daring Heights.

I should see all the towns of Kantas, as I try to find fellow strength enthusiasts and bring an Iron Strong Company chapter here to Kantas.

Port Ffirst will be where I find a new adventure!

I already had a mini adventure, more a learning adventure on the road here. It turns out I can now speak with sheep. I’m not just a strength enthusiast anymore. I am also an expert at animal languages!

As I arrived at Port Ffirst, I saw a notice on a board outside the guardhouse, someone was hiring adventurers to guard his caravans on route back to Daring Heights. I had some days before I needed to be back here to take the job, so I went to the local Fight Pit. An iron warrior has to stay battle ready between adventures.

Success!

I was told I battled so successfully, I couldn’t have earnt more golf than I did. I earnt more golf here than I did on my last adventure.

With more time on my hand, I bought a new javelin to replace the one I lost abandoned in the Angelbark Forest. I also put my masonry skills to use here at the Port. I did some plastering at the Town Hall - not my best work. I was appreciated, but no one felt like they owed me a favour.


Back to the guardhouse

It was time to meet up for the caravan guarding job.

As I approached the guardhouse’s noticeboard, I saw a creature almost 2 feet taller than myself! So, I introduced myself. The tall fellow was called Bargotin, a Firbolg. He seemed dishevelled, but who cares, I’m not particularly smartly attired, but I am clean and that’s good enough for Kavel and it’s good enough for Bar… oh, it’s not good enough for Bargotin. Not only was the handshake from my new comrade disappointing for one so large, his hand was soiled with dirt - and now so too was mine. Consequently, I decided not to extend my hand to the other four adventurers here.


Caravans approach

Three wagons turned up.

The two caravan’s at the rear were carrying cargo that was covered under a black tarpaulin. The employees disembarked and pulled a part of the tarps away to inspect the cargo. From this distance all I could see were wire mesh cages about 12”x18”.

The caravan at the front, however, was more luxurious. Fom the exterior it looked like a mobile home

One of the two men on the livable wagon came down, walked over, and introduced himself as, “Mr. Cleaves”, and asked if we were the adventurers who would be accompanying his caravans on their way to Daring Heights?

Mr. Cleaves, a merchant around these parts, was offering 20gp each for this task. One of my new comrades, Glint, a Fire-genasi, seemed pretty shrewd as he negotiated the price up to 25gp if we had to deal with bandits. I’m fond of strength, but brains is also important.

Turns out, the cargo is all ducks.

From where I stood I estimated… well I couldn’t see anything just yet because Bargotin in all his 9ft of height was now standing in front of me blocking my view. I had to move to his side to estimate 80 ducks in total. This was new to me - having to move to the side of someone to see. Normally not a problem at 7ft 4”.

Mr. Cleaves told us he wanted to sell these ducks fast, since despite their healthy bodies, which Glint confirmed by inspection, they didn’t make a ‘quack’ noise, they made a peculiar ‘quik’ noise, which we soon discovered for ourselves.


Leaving Port Ffirst

We began our journey to Daring Heights”.

The road took us through a boggy path for the first few hours and then an open hillscape with the Angelbark forest to the right. I thought about Alan the T.Rex and the Corpse-flowers we appear to have stopped. I hope he is alright.

Sten, the Half-Orc walked beside the rear wagon. He was a pretty big fella. He looked pretty strong - the mercenary type. He immediately took to guarding the wagons.

Bargotin was with me at the front with the fancier looking carriage. Both of us walked alongside the wagon.

“Why are the ducks broken?”, asked Bargotin to Mr. Cleaves and Jeeves, his assistant who was steering the front caravan.

“No idea. I just hope I can sell them to people who serve duck at their establishments”, came the reply from Mr. Cleaves.

Bargotin told us, “I can turn into a duck”. Well, this was strange, but I have come to expect all kinds of wizardry from the magically inclined, so rather than disbelieve this claim, I stored it in my brain for now.

Gerhard, the human, who was carrying a longbow much like my last adventuring comrades Angier and Sorrel, was a small distance away, for he was sitting on the back of the caravan we walked beside.

Gerhard was examining parchments and looking up at the sky a lot. Glint, seemed fascinated in Gerhard’s parchements and offered his help. I was more fascinated by Gerhard's bow. It made me feel positive in the strength of my comrades, for if he was anything like Angier and Sorrel, I could expect great arrow assistance when needed.

Sparks-in-Shades, a kenku, who made the military officer’s jacket he wore look terrible, was napping in the middle carriage.

Another hour of travelling and Fort Ettin could be seen in the distance. I wonder if anyone was training in Kavel’s Corner?

Beside the road we could see fauns, deers and slightly large rabbits in the distance. And with that thought, it was time to pause and eat lunch by the road.


Lunch by the road - it’s own adventure

We all had some provisions.

The wagon steerers on the caravans had extra to share, but Glint wanted a freshly roasted duck.

Mr. Cleaves was happy to sell a duck to Glint for 5sp. Glint agreed and soon, after the middle wagon’s tarp was moved aside to grab one of the small cages, Glint found himself with a freshly bought duck. But, he then paused and seemed unsure. The duck in his hands fell to the ground. Why did Glint drop his lunch?

“... would you like me to prep it for you?”, asked Mr. Cleaves.

“... yes. Sure”, came the unsteady response from Glint.

By this time, the duck was already waddling away, making a ‘quiking’ noise from its beak. Eventually Mr. Cleaves caught it, brought it back to Glint by the middle carriage where the tarp had not been reset. So, when Mr. Cleaves put knife to duck, it was in line of sight of the poor ducks in the middle caravan.

If the duck killing, de-feathering and cleaning for cooking wasn’t torture enough for the other ducks, Glint decided a magical roasting of the ducks was in order. With the prepped duck on a steak, he brought his hands together and produced what seemed an excessive amount of fire from his hands. It looked like there was room to cook another 20 ducks at least. The duck was cooked - thoroughly.

Glint offered us all some burnt duck.

Normally I would not eat this. Not because of the strange ‘quiking’ noise. No. I won’t eat duck, because it is a weak animal. But, I thought it would be rude to not take what was offered by my new comrade, so I ate some. Sparks ate some too. Is that cannibalism for a kenku?


Tiny voice

Bargotin swore he heard a tiny voice.

None of us could see anything. Are the ducks talking?

“Step forward, we’re friends here”, said Sten to the open, and a tiny creature appeared before us that was no more than 6” tall. A pixie. The pixie said her friend was being attacked by shadow creatures. I reasoned that if tiny shadow creatures were hurting tiny pixie creatures then naturally us adventurers could resolve matters easily. I wasn’t sure if my comrades agreed with my keen assessment, but fortunately they all agreed to help, and Mr. Cleaves was not opposed to his guards disappearing for a moment.

The pixie led us into a grove, her voice guiding us rather than her small, quickly flying body.

A voice in distress was growing louder the further we ventured into the grove, as too were these cackling voices - tormentors, no doubt.

Glint sent a magical owl, Stryx, I believe, ahead of us as a scout. Sparks too had a magical bird named Mac-5 with him. Speaking of which, where were they? We were all spread out, but I could not see them.

We approached a mound of earth within the grove, and suddenly we knew where the distressed voice was located. We could see a large white rabbit being tortured by three shadowy creatures. There appeared to be a tear in reality again! Near the three shadowy creatures was a shadowy cut to the air.

At the sight of the rabbit, the pixie screamed, “Colin!”


Fight! Round 1!

We were a short distance away from our adversaries up on the mound.

Glint reacted first. He said a joke, which I thought was inappropriate for the moment, but then suddenly the shadow creature closest to Colin fell to the floor laughing hideously. The joke had rendered it incapacitated. Magic has once again surprised me with it’s peculiar shapes and forms.

The pixie then did some magic to Glint and transformed him into an elephant!

“Woah! That is much better than transforming into a duck!”, I thought to myself.

Impressed to have a comrade turn into such a large, strong animal, I charged forward, quickened my breathing and entered a fighting rage. Focused only on fighting, I ignored the incapacited shadow beast and went for the nearest of the other two, and swung my maul at its body. The creature was now in pain. So much pain that it disappeared into a shadowy smoke away from me into some trees below the mound.

Comrade Bargotin threw his spear at the prone shadow creature, but missed. He then ran towards the adversary. Quite the spirit he had even though he was without weapons, but then he transformed like Glint did, and now running forward was a strong brown bear! Impressive! Much better than a weak duck.

My runaway opponent summoned two new allies near him among the trees.

Fortunately, the method of this reproduction of allies was not the same as it was with the corpse-flowers. The rift on the hill grew bigger.

The last of the original three shadow beasts, who was next to me, made a conjuring gesture with its hands, and suddenly - darkness!

I could not see.

The darkness conjurer decided to use my lack of sight to hurry away rather than attack me. The mistake was its own! I swung my maul blindy and managed to hit it. I think it then flew off down the hill.

The laughing creature had stopped laughing.

Gerhard, my new rangering comrade saw an opportunity to gain an elevated position and mounted the now elephant Glint.

From on high, looking down at one of the new shadow creatures, a whizz of air could be heard as Gerhard loosed an arrow into one of the newer foes. This foe then did the teleporting trick and vanished into some trees nearer Sten, who attacked it with his spear.


Round 2

Glint with passenger Gerhard on back, charged his elephant mass at one of the fresh shadow creatures. With a mighty swing of his trunk in transit, the creature was brutally knocked into a tree and fell instantly unconscious! Woah. Whatever pacifism Glint showed earlier, unable to kill a duck to eat, it did not seem on display now. Go my elephant comrade, go!

Pixie, unable to confront these beasts head-on, must have used her disappearance trick. I could no longer track her movement. Then again, how could I? One of my two foes has blinded me. My brown bear comrade Bargotin too, from the sounds of the frustrated growling I could hear in the darkness.

It seemed that moving off of the hill might unblind me. So I did that.

Success! I could see again.

Behind me, a sphere of darkness, but in front of me I could see both my cowardly teleporting enemies in two separate gatherings of trees. I picked the one on the right and stormed down the hill at it and smashed it into oblivion with my maul. Victory! But, upon deathly impact, the foul shadow beast had its revenge. As it died it exploded a horrible necrotic, and painful matter on its immediate surroundings, and these surroundings included me. It stung a little.

“Comrades! They can’t teleport if you smash them dead!”, I shouted for my allies. It seemed the more important lesson to communicate at the time. But, I probably should have mentioned the explosion. To my disappointment, not all my allies are as conditioned a specimen as I.

From the sphere of darkness I could hear Bargotin the bear biting and clawing at a shadow foe. Then a pause. His foe must have teleported.

Damn it!
More of these smokey creatures have spawned. They are now actively exhaling a dark necrotic cloud on my comrades when attacking. It’s not just a last goodbye when they perish.

From the corner of my eye, my comrade sat on top of my other comrade looses another arrow at his foe. Another kill. And what battle awareness by my comrade Gerhard. By using a ranged weapon, he and Glint do not suffer any shadow explosive damage from the foe’s demise, like I do when I bludgeon a shadow enemy to death at close range. Oh. But, Sten was engaged with Gerhard’s foe at melee range, so he did get hit by the backblast.

I hear Gerhard yelling, “sorry”.

Out of nowhere, Sparks appears!
From Sparks’ outstretched fingers, bolts of magic fly forward that look like… if I had to say so, three dirty pigeons.

Why does his magic seem so stained compared to other magic users I’ve seen?

Regardless, these magical dirty birds hit their intended target as if guided. The target teleports away.

Sten is casting magic now. But, this he casts; on himself, Glint-ephant, and rider Gerhard. I’ve seen this before. It is a divine spell, Bless.


Round 3

Glint-ephant seems to be looking for the pixie and steadying himself for an attack from our teleporting evil-doers.

One of my two foes is still alive and still all by itself some distance away. I move towards it, drop my maul, retrieve a javelin and hurl it towards the adversary. I land a great hit, but still it has strength to teleport away.

Bargotin-bear is trying to maul one of the shadow creatures and does well. But whilst trying to claw the same foe, naturally, it teleports to safety.

All of my allies and I then get attacked by our enemies’ shadow cloud attack.

Some avoid the range of this weapon, but of all of us who failed to avoid it, my battle conditioned body copes with the necrotic damage the best.

The one enemy who was torturing Colin as we approached has just left the sphere of darkness, where it must have been hiding for some time.

It steps forward to where Glint-ephant and Gerhard are in range of its cloud attack and lets loose. I see now what Glint was preparing for, as he responds quickly and raises his left side high to attempt to shield Gerhard from harm. Curses though! Both rider and elephant have been hit, but Glint more, which he was prepared to do.

Damn it!
Another shadow-spite has cloud-attacked my same allies from their opposite flank. They have been pincered. Gerhard looses an arrow at one of his assailants. He lands well, but no kill. Again a reactionary teleportation from this creature.

Sparks sends more dirty pigeons to attack the two foes flanking Glint and Gerhard. Success. But, no kills. He also commanded Mac-5 to fly into the darkness sphere, and as the bird does so, we lose sight of him.

Comrade Sten attempts a tricky maneuver to reach one of Glint and Gerhard’s adversaries and successfully slides under Glint’s elephant body to reach, what I assume is the range needed for his next divine spell. I did not hear the word he said, but when he said it one of the foes looked hurt and the other exploded. Sadly of course, the death of a shadow foe, at close range, meant three of my comrades were hit with the end-of-days necrotic cloud. It was a gamble that paid off though, and Sten appeared to be divinely healing himself. I guess that was part of his plan of attack to begin with.


Round 4 - Finale

All my allies, big or small, pull their own weight.

Stryx comes down to distract the remaining foe facing Glint, Gerhard and Sten. With this distraction the shadow-beast is too late to notice the elephant forcefully swing up at it with its front leg, which sends the shadow-fiend hurtling into a tree some distance away. Glint is a powerful, strong elephant. I must commend him on his strength at disposing of an enemy so effortlessly.

Pixie reappeared and dispelled the darkness up on the hill.

Glint and Gerhard moved up to the hill to check on the rift.

The remaining of my two foes, who survived the point of my javelin, did not survive one more swing of my maul. More necrotic cloud hit me as the shadow-beast died. I was used to it by this point.

I joined my allies on the hill.

The rift was diminishing.

Colin… had six legs.

Sadly, though, in all the combat, we did not manage to aid Colin quickly enough. He had died from his wounds.

Bargotin chomped at one of the final two shadow creatures and took the full necrotic force of the creature dying. Only one now remained - the one that elephant Glint knocked unconscious near the start of battle.


A sad end

Sten tries to use a divine spell to save Colin, but it’s too late even for his life-saving magic.

The pixie is hugging the body of her dead friend as tears fall from her eyes and her voice shakes.

Bargotin expresses sentiment for the group, as he apologises to the pixie that we did not arrive in time to save Colin. In her obvious state of sorrow, it is kind of her to acknowledge that we tried.

Glint is still an elephant, and he prods the now diminutive rift with his trunk to inspect it.

Spark sends Mac-5 through the rift. A brave decision. With luck, Mac-5 will not only make it back safely, but with information.

Gerhard retrieves the unconscious remaining foe and brings it to the hill.

My allies and I surround it, a bit away from the pixie and her departed friend. Glint’s elephant trunk is making a funny shape. If only someone here could speak to animals? But no worries, the pixie ends the polymorph spell early and Glint turns back into his fire-genasi self. He begins to magically investigate the rift, and informs us this is a path to the shadow plain.

We find ourselves now with time to ask the pixie how this all came about.

The pixie tells us that her home with Colin is nearby and the rift to the shadow plain emerged out of nowhere on the mound, and the first three of the shadow meffits (as she called them) came out. She and Colin tried to remain silent, but Colin couldn’t hold in a sneeze, and as a large white rabbit, was more visible than a pixie. Colin had no chance to escape, and was captured and toyed with, which is why the pixie came darting out of the grove seeking help.

It is clear at this point that the rift only remains open in it’s weakened state due to the unconscious, but living final foe before us. So, I turn my maul upside down, its head is hovering over the meffit, and I hammer my maul into its chest.

I am a foolish goliath.

Yet again only thinking of my own conditioning, all my allies and I are hit with a necrotic cloud.
“Sorry comrades!", I begin, "I carelessly forgot about the implication of killing one of them”.
An embarrassing end.
At least the rift vanished immediately afterwards.

With the rift shut, poor Sparks has lost his comrade familiar Mac-5.
This must be devastating for him, but he has put on an extremely brave face - near happy I dare say - to not concern his comrades. What a good person.


A parting gift

The pixie asks us to bare with her for a while.

She wishes to do something for her lost friend and us.

She produces a tiny knife, and takes care to respectfully prepare Colin for burial, but also something else.

When she is done, she gifts all six of us, with one of Colin’s six feet, well-preserved. She recognises that in some of our cultures, a rabbit's foot is seen as lucky. But, also, it may serve as a reminder that it is a worthy thing to try and save someone, no matter how small they are.

It turned out, the pixie’s name was Pixy. She returned to her home not far from where we were and came out with more gifts for us. She had a platinum piece for us all. She also had flower crowns made from daisies for us too. They fit well as rings. When we wore them, the flowers disappeared into a glittering tattoo for a while, before returning to its original state.

I asked if Pixy was worried about more rifts and if she should move, but she was comfortable in her home, so understandably not actually eager to live elsewhere, despite what had happened.

Glint said she would leave Stryx with Pixy to keep her company for a while, which she did.

We said our farewells to Pixy.


Back to the caravans

We returned to Mr. Cleaves and his caravans.

We had been gone for half an hour. He asked if everything went well, and we explained the positive, but also tragic outcome.

With no reason to remain where we were, we carried on along the path to Daring Heights.


Daring Heights

We eventually made it to the more developed city of Daring Heights.

We walked the cobbled streets and saw the many well-established temples and taverns that were on offer in Daring Heights.

Mr Cleaves successfully offloaded his cargo of ‘quiking’ ducks, and paid us the agreed 20gp each.

The ducks were still in sight as Mr Cleaves paid us our earnings, and as I thought to myself, “why do those ducks say, ‘quik’ and not ‘quack’”, I remembered that I was fluent in sheep. Could I be fluent in duck? I’ve spent some time with them recently...

I went over to one of the wagons that had ducks on them.

“Excuse me. Could one of you please tell me why you say ‘quik’ and not ‘quack’? It is most strange”, I asked in what I hoped was good duck.

“... hello. Well, it’s just our accent. I guess other ducks speak differently”, came the reply.

Okay. Well that explains that. And yes, I guess I am a fluent duck speaker.

“So, I guess we’re going to be served as food soon?”, the responsive duck said.

Oh, this was a bit awkward.

“Well, I’m not sure at this point what will happen to you, my job is done”, I started, but then I am not one for dishonesty, so I continued, “... well, to be honest, I imagine yes, you will be served as food soon enough”.

The ducks, though obviously not happy, did appreciate my candor and wished me a good day.

“Yes. I guess I will have”. Perhaps my candor is too frank at times?

As I walked back to my comrades, “it’s an accent! The ‘quik’ is just an accent. I speak duck.”, I told them.

This news triggered a curiosity in the ever investigative Glint, which compelled him to buy one of the wagons of accented ducks and have it sent to the Daring Heights Academy for research. Fair enough I suppose. A kinder fate for the animals. Although, they just witnessed the person who had one of their flock killed and then roasted before them give this order to have them sent somewhere. So, maybe they don’t see the upside yet?

As me and my new comrades say our goodbyes, I take the opportunity to tell them about the exciting new addition of Kavel’s Corner to the training grounds at Fort Ettin, which we passed on our journey here. No doubt I will see them there at some point and we will all practice strength and conditioning together. What fun!


Epilogue

I am walking the streets of Daring Heights.

I have only really been to the Three Headed Dragon, the Daring Academy, and naturally a Fighting Pit. Should I go to a pit again? Perhaps I should try helping at construction again to make non-adventurer comrades. My more charismatic-than-strong adventuring allies seem to be doing this kind of thing.

But, wait what is this?

I see a notice pinned up on a board. It reads:


Oh!
Someone has heard of my exploits. Nice!
I must meet this Ka’zzam at the Djinn&Tonic.