Orion Malanis - Delivery Report

Hazel reached out for assistance in delivering some goods to a group stationed out in the tunnels. She provided a cart and two Rothes to pull it. Aside from myself and my two undead servants there were five others who were contracted for this work, including a drow and some kind of sailor with bad wrists. The others in the group struggled to lift up the largest of the boxes into the cart, with the aforementioned sailor hurting himself in the process. In the end I had to step forward and lift the boxes, despite being the smallest in the group.

Once the cart was loaded we quickly made our way through the tunnels. Nothing of note happened until we reached the darker parts of the caves nearer our destination, though the sailor seemed to blabber incessantly about ships and tall tales. Things did quieten down however when we came across a trail of lanterns, signalling we were drawing closer to our destination, and the Rothe halted in their tracks, seemingly spooked by something. I will admit that the drow woman did a good job managing and comforting the beasts, which helped keep the cart under our control.

After the Rothe got spooked three of the group disappeared into the darkness ahead to scout out the route; the sailor, the rogue and the sorcerer. They weren’t gone for long before they came back reporting there was some kind of activity or danger in the route ahead, giving us an opportunity to prepare ourselves and form a defensive formation around the cart before pushing forward.

The threat in this case was a group of beasts dwelling in the darkness. Three large feline like beasts with sleek black fur, large eyes and what I can only describe as tusks coming from their jaws. Unlike my previous encounter with foes out in the caves, these beasts were easy enough to dispatch. They were thick skinned and had a nasty set of claws but with my undead servants and the frontlines of the group drawing most of the danger to themselves, the other casters and myself were able to stand back and assist with various spells. I was able to get through the encounter with not even a scratch, though I did end up expending all my third level spells.

With the threat gone we pushed on to the destination of our journey, a small camp home to many interesting and unusual races. As we approached one of their scouts, a woman named "Mags", sneaked up behind us and confronted us at gunpoint. Fortunately we were able to talk in a civil and control manner, clearing up any misconceptions. She had a larger fellow come by and unload the cart as the sailor injured himself again trying to pick up any boxes. Goods were exchanged, the cart was loaded with some materials to be brought back to Hazel and we headed home. The trip back was quick and less eventful.

Overall a relatively smooth and easy job, the other members of the group seemed capable enough in a pinch.

Orion Malanis - Report

This was one of my first ventures into the caverns which surround the city. When I saw the original notice I was unsure if my own abilities would be up to the task, however after meeting the rest of the group it became clear they were all well equipped and capable of making up for where I lacked.

Our journey through the sand layer was uneventful. We ran into no major issues and we're able to get a rest in for a few hours before we pushed into the deeper areas. I was able to find some time to summon a bat familiar and cast mage armour, in preparation for whatever we might run into.

As we pushed onwards we picked up a trail of blood. I myself was unable to gleam much from it but from what I heard it seemed to be a few days old and from a humanoid creature. Tracking it led us almost straight to a camp where we found gore, bones and several dangerous masked creatures.

Never before have I seen such unnatural and strange beings. Their limbs were long and narrow, like they had been stretched. They often moved on all fours, like some kind of beast, but in a way that just looked wrong. Each beast wore a mask, all with differences, though I didn't get close enough to examine any of these masks in detail.

The fight with the beasts was intense. Several of our group took the front lines while myself, another mage and some kind of ratfolk in a armoured vehicle attacked from behind. It was a long and tedious fight but we did eventually succeed, thought a bulette did intrude during the conflict and caused some serious harm to both our frontline and the strange creatures.

Worth noting is that these creatures seemed to be unaffected by many of my necrotic and poisonous spells. Also, they had a tendency to scream and wail, which seemed to have some kind of negative affect on those with weaker mental defenses. Nothing a simple warding wind could not deal with but it did cause some problems in our front line.

After dealing with the creatures and escaping the bulette we found a straggler, similar to the other masked beasts, that was showing some interest in a small cavern. We swiftly dealt with this beast and then found one survivor of the attack, hidden in the back of the space.

This final beast left its mask behind, which one of our group attempted to cast remove curse on. Unfortunately the spell seemed to fail and the mask seemed to fuse itself with her hand and caused her flesh to turn to what appears to be porcelain, starting from the point of contact. The spread was stopped by wrapping her upper arm with chain, which lasted until we made it back to town with the survivor.

For the most part we handled the work well, dealt with the creatures and retrieved the survivors. However I believe this could be a cautionary tale about using remove curse without being aware of the strength and properties of the curse itself.