A Box Full Of Heroes

Than tossed another log onto the fire, causing a shower of sparks to drift upwards. The sudden extra light illuminated Fern's face as she tenderly rubbed healing salve onto a nasty looking burn just below her left breast. Than studied the mage's pale face, framed by dark hair.

"So are you going to tell us about it or not?" inquired the warrior.

"You think there's much to tell?" inquired Fern, wincing slightly as the healing balm hit a particularly tender spot.

"You and Kyrin vanish and then, minutes later, reappear with a sack of loot each. You have what, to the inexpert eye, looks like a particularly nasty lightning blast burn, and Kyrin looks like she has been through the mill, and then gone ten rounds with a wraith." Than glanced dispassionately across the fire to where Nightingale was tending Kyrin's wounds, muttering quietly to herself. "You tell me...."

"It's a long story, but I guess we have plenty of time - He is not due to attack until the morning. This gathering of heroes began with a large pile of bodies -"

"Now there's a surprise!"

Fern gave her friend a withering glance and began the story.

A Blast From the Past.

When I awoke, there was a leg across my face. I gave it an experimental bite, and decided it was dwarf. A faint blue glow from the corner of the room illuminated a pile of bodies, in varying poses, and wearing a wide variety of equipment. We were lying on a polished wooden floor, and the walls were covered with particularly fine wooden panelling. My head had that traditional "you have been gathered" feeling, and so I looked around to see whose august company I was in. Moving my head proved to be a bad idea as lightning bolts ricocheted around the inside of my head. To my surprise, about the only faces I recognised were those of young Kyrin, standing up with the aid of her trident, Linstram, the elf mage, and Stumpy, light fingered dwarf. I was also surprised to find that, with the exception of a towering elf priest who called herself "Lady Morgain", I was the tallest of the group - many of the others were dwarves and half breeds. After brief introductions, we established that the following were present: Violet, the human nature priest; Maiyart, the oriental dwarf; Linstram, the elf mage; Shunt, the dwarf fighter; Fern, the human mage; Kyrin, the human fighter; Lady Morgain, the elf priestess; Grob, the half dark kin, half dwarf thief; Dragon, Shunt and Tomahawk, dwarf fighters.

The illumination in the place was being provided by a strange blue crystal in a corner alcove. Linstram picked it up and the glow promptly died. Undeterred, he pocketed the gem after appraising it carefully. Meanwhile, Grob had gone to the door, and carefully opened it. The group trooped into the next room. All except Violet, who was sitting cross legged on the floor, apparently meditating. As I watched, a distinctly worried look crossed her face. She later said that she had been trying to commune with the local wildlife, only to discover that there was none. The dwarves were also looking a little nervous because their in built depth sense was refusing to give them any clues at all.

We briefly explored the complex we were in. The next room seemed to be a bedroom, and contained a number of dwarf sized cloaks and sets of clothes, along with a couple of false beards and toupees. The next room was far more interesting - the walls were lined with containers of various sizes, together with crystals, levers and the occasional glyph. Some of the runes were obviously high Astoff, though even after some study, they meant very little to me. Linstram also gave them some thought, but seemed similarly nonplussed. Meanwhile the dwarves were doing what dwarves do best and were collecting some "souvenirs". As they removed some of the cylinders, there was a distinct smell of ozone and a slight crackle. Stumpy was standing in front of a large panel of buttons and levers with a distinctly dangerous look in his eye. I looked round; fortunately, a metal ladder led upwards to a trap door.

Violet, roused from her trance, had determined to escape this place and was already heading up the ladder. For some reason, there was a whole crowd of dwarves fighting to follow her up. It's amazing what the presence of a short skirt can do to a dwarf.....

As I climbed the ladder, I began to smell all those odours associated with the sea - seaweed, rotting fish and salt. To my surprise, I climbed out of a small trunk and found myself in a rather seedy alleyway. Violet was already back into unconscious mode, and Grob and another dwarf were being ejected from a building across the way, followed by the contents of a chamber pot. Gratified to see that the fate of the known universe was in such selfless hands, I looked round just in time to see a football bounce into the alley, followed by a small child, dressed in that traditional "this used to be my Sunday best before I started playing football" style. The child looked vaguely familiar, but I could not quite place him. The small child approached, unconscious of the danger, and certainly curious about the way the small trunk kept disgorging more and more people. And dwarves.

"’Ere. Who are you?"

"Where are we?"

"How did you get that many people in that errrrkkkk!"

Sad to say that I have never felt particularly maternal and, anyway, my head was still hurting. Picking the child up by the lapels, I slammed him into the nearest wall.

"Where. Are. We."

The small child squealed out "Spartqin." My attention wandered briefly. Spartqin! Now there was a blast from the past. One of the towns of my youth, one I had never thought to see again, not since the cataclysmic events at Baron Brocklebracks had blasted the remains of the Thanatari into the god forsaken world of Peldere. Spartqin! As my mind whirled, another small child came racing into the alley way yelling "Oy! Dar! Where's that ball? Oh....." Dar? I thought. This was getting weirder. But this was Spartqin, therefore, this child might be...

"Is your name Dardanius?" I asked the child.

The child nodded.

"Who's that?" I nodded at the other child.

"He's called Boltan."

My mind whirled. Were we really back in the past? If this was really Boltan, here was a chance to kill off one of the most prolific T'gellenites that ever lived. What repercussions on the future that might have I couldn't fathom. I almost raised the charmed ring and fired, but something held me back.

"What's that?" I asked Boltan, pointing towards the scraps of paper he was holding in a grimy hand.

The sheets of paper proved to be advertisements, written in a slightly uncultured script. The advertiser was seeking brave adventurers to join an adventuring band that (at least so the advert promised) was shortly to become rich and powerful. The leader of the group was currently to be found in the town square, whilst he assembled his group to be called the Runeics. This was getting weirder. A proto Deathlord and a proto Boltan in the same town. How ironic! I released the child and he ran off down the alley way.

With little better to do, the party agreed to meet a couple of hours later in a tavern called the "Golden Mug". We then went our various ways to see what we could learn. With Kyrin tagging along, my first stop was the alchemist’s on Ship Street who I had met in a few years time. (I hate time travel – there are never enough verbs to go round.) Talking to him soon convinced me that we were in the past – the party called "Silver Fern" were in town, a legend even now. Their leader, Lord Draco, was considered to be one of the most powerful men on the continent at the time. I briefly wondered how well he would stand up to Than now. Or myself. Either way, we made some purchases and headed off towards the town square, passing Linstram and some dwarves coming the other way. The elf mage gave me a suspicious look, and I smiled sweetly, contemplating the benefits of local knowledge.

In the town square, we met up with the leader of the Runeics, a chap named Ryelin. Off to one side, a couple of town guards were keeping an eye on the recruitment just to make sure the Runeics didn’t get up to any trouble. I looked at Ryelin again and realised, to my shock, that I recognised him. Later in life he would take the appellation of Deathlord and would become one of the most powerful V’garnians alive. Or dead. This Deathlord, however, not only still had a pulse, but looked distinctly gauche and naïve as he explained to us the benefits of joining the Runeics. We explained that we had a lead on a particularly large haul of loot and suggested he accompany us to the Golden Mug where we would be able to "recruit" more adventurers. Ryelin seemed to think this was a good idea and we moved camp to the terrace of the Golden Mug. The sun was shining and the sky was blue, so we ordered some beers and food, and waited for our colleagues. The terrace offered a particularly fine view across the town square and down Ship Street to the harbour, so it didn’t take long to find various of our colleagues.

It was Kyrin who first pointed out the tall form of Lady Morgain, loitering outside the alchemist’s. Seven foot elves do not loiter well, and Morgain was radiating nervousness. The reason soon became apparent as the door burst open. A flurry of powder wafted forth and the sound of dwarven berserkers echoed down the street. Nearby shoppers scattered and fled. As we watched a town guard patrol formed up and headed off, just as several small figures broke cover and tried to saunter casually down the street with assorted lumpy items under their cloaks. Also headed for cover was a tall Linstram-shaped figure. Given that they comprised pretty much the entire elven and dwarven populations of the town, I thought they were bloody lucky to get away with it. Perhaps the town guard were having an indifferent day – they certainly didn’t pursue with any vigour. I tried to figure out what the destruction of the alchemist’s might do to the timeline, but gave up as I realised that I had never bought anything off the Spartqin alchemist and really didn’t care. Whilst Kyrin and I enjoyed dessert, the culprits drifted in to the tavern, looking for a dark corner to hide in.

From the direction of the town council cambers came Dragon, Tomahawk and another short figure that I did not recognise. As he got closer, I noticed that the figure was wearing an obviously false hair piece and beard. I nudged Kyrin, who was working her way through a second slice of pie.

"Is that an Astoff?"

Kyrin squinted. "Yep."

"Should we kill him now or later?"

"Later - I want another beer first. Besides, on those short stumpy legs, he can’t get far."

Dragon, it transpired, had been on a tour of the town council chambers, having offered the guard a small gratuity. My opinion of dwarfish subtlety rose a notch. Whilst admiring some particularly fine examples of L’noval art (this had no real effect on my opinion about dwarves) he had been approached by the Astoff, who seemed to know his name. Said Astoff then explained that T’sardan had summoned us to help him retrieve some items of power and that the first step was to get a copy of the map he needed from the town clerk. The town clerk had sold the original to another Astoff the previous day, but did have a copy. Haggling ensued which ended up with the copy of the map, and no dead bodies. I was doubly impressed. The Astoff was called Delgardaro Farsorph, usually abbreviated (by us) to "Del boy". He explained that he had been researching the origins of a very powerful item, which consisted of three large gems and a pyramid like structure to hold them. If assembled, the device would grant god-like power to the user. Del boy explained that he had a renegade student by the name of Zastarinol Porvilak who had become obsessed by the power that the pyramid and crystals represented. It was he who had bought the map the previous day – the map gave directions to the locations of the four pieces of the puzzle. However, the map was no ordinary map because the pieces were spread through out space and time. Only Del could read it, and only the "travelling boxes" that he and Zast had could navigate the seas of fate. The only real problem I could see was that I might not be able to restrain myself from disembowelling the Astoff as he wittered on.

"But, now, we must go. Yes. Zast has at least a day’s lead on us. So we must. Go I mean. We must return to the travelling box and select a destination."

Various members of the party began to look shifty, perhaps realising that the trinkets they had looted from the museum might be more important than they had first thought.

"Shame about the damage." I commented quickly.

"Damage?" squeaked the Astoff, starting to sweat.

"Yes, those kids made a real mess. Little blighters!"

The Astoff blanched and headed off towards his travelling box.

"Oh no! The salamander! What, what, what have they done with it? And the energy leeches! I didn’t bring any spares! The dimensional stabilising gem! We’re doomed!"

Over the course of the next few minutes, various members of the party "discovered" various bits of kit in other rooms of the travelling box. Good thing the kids didn’t move them too far, I grinned to myself. Del attempted to start the travelling box, but was greeted with groaning and wheezing noises. A second attempt went the same way.

"Would it help if I got out and pushed?" I enquired acidly.

"Oh no. You mustn’t. Leave the box I mean. In motion. Or enter. No. That would be. Quite bad."

The travelling box eventually started, but only after I threatened to recharge the salamander with my flaming sword. I was starting the think that maybe the box was more sentient than the Astoff. Sparks rocketed around the walls and we decamped to the other rooms.

Don’t Call Me Flopsy

Violet was the first out of the travelling box, with dwarves close behind her. A recurring motif there, I thought to myself as I climbed out. Another recurring theme was "Forest". The box, with true machine arrogance had appeared in a bramble thicket, whose thorns were sufficient to make even those of us wearing metal armour a little wary. Violet sat down and began to meditate, whilst Stumpy made a quick circuit of the area, looking for tracks.

"Err. Guys. I’ve found some rabbit tracks." Said Stumpy nervously. "They’re this big" he said, holding his hands a foot apart. Despite the obvious danger from six foot killer rabbits, we heroically elected to follow the trail and soon found ourselves over looking a rather primitive camp, that looked as though it might contain perhaps 200 rabbits, though as most of their burrows were underground, it was difficult to tell. The rabbits we could see were using primitive tools, and had a few primitive weapons on show. Violet announced that she was getting "good vibes" from the rabbits, and sauntered off into the village. The rest of us waited, watched and contemplated the mother of all rabbit stews. Violet soon returned and announced that the rabbits were quite friendly, and, provided we did not cause a stir, we were invited into the village. She had even managed to establish limited communication with them, but they weren’t very bright. They did convey the fact that some of the other local tribes were at war, but we managed to learn nothing actually useful. The conversation was turned to the subject of places that the bunnies didn’t like to go – guessing that the stone’s resting place might be a place of ill omen. Still nothing. Then Violet asked about their own gods, and it transpired they worshipped a chap with a third, green, gem-like eye. Violet immediately offered to join the religion, and after a certain amount of nose wrinkling and carrot chewing, the village elders agreed. Violet was led off whilst the rest off us continued with our meal, watching for signs of trouble.

To the disappointment of the dwarves, nothing happened. Violet returned wearing a very fetching head dress, and was treated to a barrage of "bunny girl" jokes. She confirmed that the gem looked promising and proceeded to describe the guards and the like. The statue the gem was set in was covered in wattle and daub, but was probably based on an older statue, buried under the muck. The consensus of opinion was that subtlety might pay off here, so, after we had finished our meal and general conversation, we bade the rabbits farewell. Violet, overcome by grief at the knowledge that she might not see her new deity again for a while, asked to revisit the shrine and was allowed to do so. An invisible Linstram tagged along to get a picture of the layout. The party then rendezvoused back at the travelling box. The plan was simple. Linstram would blink in to the main temple area with Kyrin along as "muscle" should the situation get rough. The mage would cast "confusion" on the bunny guards, and then fly up to the statue to tug loose the third eye whilst Kyrin stood guard.

As plans go, it seemed quite good, and Kyrin said it started quite well… "we teleported in, and the stupid rabbits didn’t notice us – we were invisible. As I looked on, Linstram flew up to the statue and started fiddling with the fist sized gem. What he couldn’t see was that as he did so, four wraiths appeared from the base of the statue. Two of the undead headed for Linstram, whilst two headed for me. The rabbit guards and priests immediately started kow-towing. With a massive heave, Linstram released the gem, turned and saw the wraiths. With the forethought and cunning that elves are famed for, he released a confusion spell that pole-axed me and the rabbits, but left the wraiths untouched. By the time Linstram got to me, I had suffered a number of real nasty wounds from the undead. Wretched elf!"

Our mission accomplished, Del boy fired up the travelling box to take us somewhere else…

Horror On The Dwarven Express

By the time the dwarves got the lid to the travelling box open, Violet was almost frantic. She hated being cut off from nature with a passion, and the travelling box moved through something that was profoundly unnatural. With a crash, the lid opened, and Violet practically flew up the ladder, heedless of any possible danger that awaited her on the outside. By the time I made it up the ladder, Violet was taking on the aspect of a trapped animal – she was still unable to feel anything natural about this place. The travelling box had obviously felt lonely, and had appeared in a large room with perhaps a hundred packing trunks, suitcases and the like. The dwarves, true to form, started smashing their way through the trunks looking for anything of interest. When it was pointed out to them that we were in a hurry, they took the only course of action open to them…. Rather than search the trunks, they upended them into the travelling box, causing a squawk of alarm from Del as a red full length dress settled over his head.

I opened the door of the box room a crack. From outside, I could hear sounds of merry making. As I watched, a small dragon approached down the corridor. I almost panicked, then realised that this was no dragon, but a rather feeble young man wearing a dragon head carved from some rather soft material. The dragon greeted a dwarfish pirate coming the other way and I suddenly realised that V’garn had been kind to us indeed. This was a fancy dress party. And, boy, were we wearing some fancy dress! It transpired that we were on some sort of long moving conveyance that the locals referred to as a "T’rain". Perhaps he was the god of transport, I mused. This made our task much easier. The T’rain was moving through a tunnel at some considerable speed, and so the next piece of the puzzle must be here somewhere.

We spread out through the party, which occupied two carriages. Most of the dwarves headed for the forward carriage, whilst the others explored the carriage we had appeared in. We soon discovered one important fact; all magic had been lost in "the great cataclysm". Priests could still sense their gods, but mage magic was completely ineffective. To my surprise, this T’rain was entirely of dwarfish construction, powered by fire and steam. Poor Kyrin met up with the designer, an extremely dull dwarf called Norbel Ironwork, who proceeded to spout a great deal of nonsense about "pounds per square inch" and "torsion wheels". I’d always thought a torsion wheel was something F’norians used…..

I started to explore the cabins at the back of the train, and found myself in a particularly plush suite of rooms, complete with double bed and bathroom. In the bathroom, I bumped into a maid who was cleaning the bath – she seemed rather surprised, and started jabbering at me in a strange tongue. I feigned sickness for long enough to get close, and then stabbed her through the heart. Dumping the body in the formerly pristine bath, I said a brief prayer to V’garn. As I did so, I had an idea, and returned to the travelling box where I stripped off my armour (much to Del’s delight I suspect) and dug a really nice black dress out of the pile of clothes the dwarfs had left.

Five minutes later, a rather pretty (even if I do say so myself) young lady dressed in black swept into the party. I grabbed a drink and surveyed the scene. Little had changed since I was here last. I could see Linstram applying his charms to a rather vapid looking young lady over in one corner, whilst Kyrin looked as though her eyes were about to cross under the barrage of "hydraulic rams" and "torque ratings". Over in the other corner sat a very drunk looking young man, and I walked over to him. He turned out to be the fiancé of the young lady who was looking moon eyed up at Linstram, and was an easy mark for my charms. After some flattery, flirtation and general massaging of egos, we retired to the state room. He seemed almost thankful as I stabbed him through the heart, and I arranged him decoratively on the armchair next to the double bed.

My second mark was an adventurer called Cornelius, who had recently returned from an expedition in some big jungle. He was a rather more entertaining raconteur, and I dallied with him for rather longer. He ended up on the toilet with a rather surprised expression.

By this time however, my sixth sense was starting to tingle; the dwarfs had been on the train for sufficient time to cause some sort of trouble, so I returned to the travelling box and grabbed by helm, shield and weapons; metal armour is such a pain to put on in a hurry. As I swept back down the corridor, I fancy I must have looked something like a valkyrie with my flowing dress and armour. I passed Linstram and his paramour, whose name I later learnt was Milamene – they seemed to be heading for the state room, so I hoped they didn’t turn the lights on!

The party was starting to wind down so I headed for the next carriage. Just as I got there, the lights went off, and the T’rain slammed to a stop with a tortured screeching of metal. Many of the passengers were thrown from their feet, and I was lucky not to end up under the wheels of the carriage. I later learnt from Milamene that this had caused Linstram to come loose at an extremely inopportune moment. Of course, the young lady was even less impressed when she blundered in to her fiancé whilst trying to get out of the cabin. Ah, the tragedy of young love.

By the time I got to the next carriage, I could hear the sounds of fighting, the gentle moaning of undead and the howling of an unhappy lycanthrope. It transpired that the dwarves, with their usual panache and style, had taken the direct route to danger and had run into a large contingent of undead coming the other way. The undead consisted of a seemingly endless selection of zombies, ghouls and the occasional mummy. The howling was coming from Mayairt, who had transformed into the shortest werewolf I had ever seen. He was obviously perturbed by this, especially given his highly magical flaming axe which lay behind him, and kept snarling commands to the other heroes. Sadly, no one could understand what he was saying…

For some reason, the dwarves had not sent word back to the rest of the heroes, who were still partying in the other carriage. As I turned to summon them, I was intercepted by Ryelin who was brandishing a journal.

"I have found the item we seek," he hissed. "An adventurer called Cornelius found a pyramid on his last exploration. We must find him and interrogate him! We must know what he did with the pyramid!!"

"Err, that could be difficult. He had a heart attack." I replied blandly and leafed to the last few entries of the journal. A quick perusal of the journal suggested that all of Cornelius’ stuff had been crated up and loaded onto a cargo carriage. The one the undead were coming out of…

I quickly rounded up a few hardy souls (Kyrin, Ryelin and Violet) and we jumped off the train and started jogging up the tunnel. From above we could hear skittering noises, sounding suspiciously like ghoulish claws on the roof of the train. My flaming sword cast dancing shadows on the tunnel wall as we moved. Looking through the train windows I could see that utter carnage was occurring in the train compartments; dwarfish axes rose and fell, splitting undead. The werewolf spat a chunk of zombie across the room and started to demolish a bandage wrapped figure. However, a couple of the dwarves were moving very slowly, and seemed almost paralysed. But I also noticed that many of the undead were turning away from the dwarves and heading back into the next carriage. This could only mean one thing: our enemies had found what the were looking for and had ordered the undead to return. I leapt onto the ‘tween carriages platform and burst into the next compartment; a line of undead stretched towards a travelling box into which they were climbing. A cowled figure was supervising them and had not yet noticed our arrival. With a cry, I charged towards the figure, Kyrin close on my heels. Ryelin chose to try to command the undead, but failed. I raised by flaming sword and released its power; one after another, three fire bolts gushed from the tip of the sword and struck the cowled figure on the chest and head. He fell back, flapping feebly at the smoking cloth, and Kyrin laid him out with a single blow to the head. Seized by sudden inspiration, I reached in to the other travelling box, grasped the metal ladder and released the contents of my ring. It worked! The area inside the travelling box was a place where magic still worked! The electric charge left my hand and skittered down the ladder where it burst into the rest of the room. Unseen voices cursed, the box started to fade out and I jerked my hand back just in time. I hoped I had caused the others some inconvenience…

Knowing that we had failed, we penned the remaining undead into the baggage compartment and returned to our own travelling box, taking the cowled prisoner with us. Some of the dwarves were looking rather the worse for wear, and were given some recuperative potions. After some consultation with Del boy, we headed for a new destination.

The Sea Of Darkness

As we travelled, we attempted to question our bald, pale faced prisoner whose name was Derthang. He turned out to be a V’garnian priest in the employ of an undead lord called Nebademus. I had vaguely heard of this undead; he made his home on the dead lands in a pointlessly ornate bone tower. Lord Nebademus had instructed Derthang to assist the bad guys in assembling the pyramid and crystals, though I strongly suspected that his final instructions would have been something along the lines of "and when you have them all, kill that foolish Astoff" followed by a manic cackle. Derthang let slip that his colleagues had already raided a dwarven village and secured the crystal there. After some pretty pointless questioning, we tied Derthang up and forced a sleep potion down his throat.

The travelling box materialised on a beach, just on the edge of the water. Slate cliffs towered overhead, and waves crashed on nearby rocks. Violet was in heaven, but the rest of us were more concerned about the box getting flooded, so we hiked it up the beach a bit further. Stumpy quickly found some tracks and diagnosed that somewhere close there was a nasty dose of dark kin waiting to be lanced. A cave entrance was duly discovered and we followed he dwarves in. They soon encountered some dark kin with whom our half dark kin, Grob, started to talk. Negotiations were soon interrupted by Linstram who inconveniently berserked one of the dwarves. The party bombshelled in an attempt to take out the dark kin with despatch. For the record I should point out that the dwarves found a set of cells and a work room.

The cells contained three occupants: an old man who was knifed before we could learn anything about him, a rather badly injured knight of T’gellen who had been thoroughly tortured and a peasant girl called Susha who claimed to have been recently captured. In fact, she was a skilled assassin, who attached herself with unerring accuracy to Linstram. She subsequently wheedled a magic dagger out of him and used it to try and kill Ryelin. She almost succeeded, too.

The work room contained a flesh golem who proved to be invulnerable to anything the dwarves (or Linstram) could throw at it. Lady Morgain managed to banish it to another part of the complex, and the poor old golem spent the next couple of hours chasing various "heroes" around the complex.

Meanwhile, Kyrin, Stumpy and I had found a narrow crawl way leading upwards. We sent Stumpy for a look, who after disarming or avoiding several traps, managed to get into the upper level of the tunnel complex. Once he had cleared the way, I used my small skills to teleport myself, Meyairt, Kyrin and Violet to Stumpy’s location; a long corridor with several doors. The first door we opened led into a cold room which had racks of arms on hooks. The arms had strange markings inscribed on them and several of them reached for Stumpy as he approached. We decided to leave that room for later.

We blundered around for a while until we could find a really exciting trap to set off. The one we found was a particularly big chest, which Stumpy managed to open but he failed to disarm the warding glyph which let out a hideous howl as soon as the lid was opened. We knew that trouble would shortly be with us, so we got out into the corridor, just in time to see one of the other doors open. Out of the room stepped a tall thin man wearing traditional "lunatic-religious-type" robes. Fortunately Kyrin managed to react first, and hit the acolyte with several blasts from her trident. As the smoke and fumes cleared, we could see the man getting up and bushing himself off. His robes looked a little charred, but he looked more annoyed than anything else! Through the tattered remains of his shirt I could see that his torso was covered in glyphs.

I had been busy with a spell, and transported myself and Kyrin to the door way as the man produced a wand from his belt. With no weapons to hand, and only a scroll to hit him with, I kicked out at the wand. The man cried out in pain as my boot slammed into his wrist, sending the wand skittering across the room. A second kick sent him staggering back into the room. He reacted by raising his other hand and releasing the contents of a ring at us. Kyrin and I staggered back under a storm of lightning, smoking about as much as the ring was. Knowing that hesitation was death, I charged, drawing my flaming sword. Kyrin was close by my side and I could hear small stumpy footsteps hammering down the corridor. The man raised his hand but his instructions for us to "halt or face a fate worse than death" were interrupted when I neatly lopped his hand off, sending it and the ring into a bath of bubbling black, viscous liquid. The hand hissed and dissolved. I drove the wizard back with a flurry of kicks and body slams, assisted by Kryin and some very well placed head butts from the dwarf. The man lost his footing, and a final kick broke his neck on the edge of the bath. Silence settled around us. It was about this time that the others arrived. They were looking a little damp; almost as if they had set the traps in the corridor off. But no one could be that stupid I thought to myself with a grin.

The woman, Fern, had killed a powerful wizard particularly interested in Golem creation. What the wizard was unaware of was that his complex contained, buried under a rock fall, an entrance into a different realm. T’sardan’s accomplices uncovered this entrance, and after a staggering amount of wasted time managed to get through a particularly simple puzzle door. Anyone touching the door was instantly removed from the corridor and taken "somewhere else". There the bold adventurer was asked a particularly easy riddle. If he failed, he was returned to the corridor unconscious. If he succeeded, he went through the door. Of course, for witnesses, this produced a long trail of unconscious or vanished bodies! A bit unnerving for those poor simple heroes I expect! After a short exploration of the rooms they were now in, the explorers discovered a type three transport portal, which took them to the burial place of a long dead F’norian Hero called Duke Garath, otherwise known as "The Lion". Their only problems remained to prove that they were worthy to approach his final resting place, and that involved traversing several moderately dangerous rooms.

The first room was made of white marble veined with blue. A thick mist swirled around and, as the explorers pondered what malice was to come their way, formed into a number of shadowy crystal like figures with long claws. Rather than hang back and shatter these creatures with missiles, the dwarves elected to engage them in combat. Poor fools! They swiftly learnt that these creatures possessed amazing freezing abilities. The first into the melee was Lady Morgain, whose shield shattered under a blow from one of the creatures. The priest, Ryelin, was next, his cheek shattered by a wicked scything blow. Fortunately for the adventurers, their opponents were also fragile, and shattered into flinders under a suitably mighty blow. Linstram discovered, to his annoyance, that magic once again did not work. His attempt to channel a fireball through some crystal and fire it into the melee failed – had they realised what he was up to, the dwarves might have become nervous!

The next room had a strong chess motif. Black and white flagstones covered the floor, upon which stood 15 figures armoured in black plate mail, carrying large black swords. As one, the figures advanced a step, waving their swords. Grob reacted with lightning swift thought and hurled a bag full of marbles to the floor, almost taking down several of his companions as they danced through this new obstruction. With a clatter and crunch of marble ground under foot, the figures advanced again… battle was joined.

Some of the party, learning from their mistakes, employed missile weapons. The dwarves elected to attack one flank whilst the woman, Kyrin, attacked the figures on the other flank. The black armour proved to be unoccupied, and had to be destroyed piecemeal, though the occasional lucky blow would stop one in its tracks. The figures were eventually defeated, though Kyrin was close to death.

A further door led to a room with a spiral staircase and several terribly lifelike statues. The upper area of the room turned out to be occupied by some form of paralysing flying snake’s head. Quite nasty, but easily lured into a rather crude ambush and destroyed. On the upper area was a portal, through which the heroes stepped.

They found themselves on a jetty, in a very black cavern, surrounded by very black, oily looking water. Moored to the jetty was a boat large enough for about six people. The first boating expedition was plagued by ripples in the water and a general sensation that something large was stalking them. After some searching, they found a small island with a sarcophagus. Fools that they were, they elected to go back for a second ship load of warriors. This turned out to cost them dear when Bruno was grabbed and pulled overboard by a long black octopoid tentacle. Such a shame!

The survivors clustered around the island sarcophagus, doubtless expecting the corpse to leap out at them. They levered the thing open and found the body, bedecked with valuables and the crystal they sought. The expected attack then occurred, but not from the expected direction. The oily black water was suddenly alive with tentacles that curled blindly over the island looking for something to attack. Leaving a rearguard, the noble heroes piled into their boat and swiftly paddled for the shore. The woman, Fern, took a risk and used a potion of flying – she cannot have known whether it would work in this world where no magic would prevail – and flew the remainder of the heroes back to the jetty. When she arrived, the boat was half destroyed by the tomb’s defender, and Lady Morgain was floating face down in the water. The mage retrieved the sodden elf and then, with an act of generosity, flew out over the black water in the hopes of finding Bruno. She soon found the dwarf, unconscious in the water, buoyed up by his leather armour. Perhaps stress related flatulence has a use after all.

As the jetty continued to shake and crack, the heroes ran for their lives, and soon returned to the box. From their they rendezvoused with their master, T’sardan. His purpose for the crystals is still under investigation.

End of report 1401/13452. Sealed by my hand,

Grey Sage Jethrus