Thotham's Journal Entry #10

Lefty grabbed the bag that fell from the dusty ashes of the demon and motioned to Salazar. When he approached, he sighed relief as we had recovered his bag of holding. Pulling the inventory list out of the bag, he began to go through his possessions within until, unfortunately, he announced an item was missing from his bag . . . a manual of flesh golems. After all this time, our enemy had finally gotten his hands on exactly what we were trying to stop him from obtaining.

With that, Salazar thanked us for our assistance in getting back his possessions and took his leave, retreating to the entrance of the dungeon. Meanwhile, picking through the remains of the battle, Feefifo found a key among the ashes. I produced the book from my own bag of holding and both the key and the book now glowed red as if they belonged together. 

We unlocked the book and it was passed to both Inrah and Sai to inspect for arcane knowledge. We discovered exactly what we had thought, we too were now in the possession of an opposing manual of flesh golems. Though Vax protested at the demonic thought, we knew that only one choice remained for us. What better strategy to combat a Thay wizard's Flesh golem than to summon one of our own! Sai agreed to construct our foul creation as I dumped out the head and arm we had gathered from the bag of holding and Feefifo rounded up the rest of the parts from around the dungeon.

Before Sai was to conduct the ritual to summon our lesser golem, there was one last thing for us to do with the book. We placed it in the bookshelf with the missing book and, as we suspected, unlocked a hidden passageway beyond. the passageway beyond the bookshelf had a short hallway and two doors. Using my boots of the elven kind, I stealthed forward, not making a sound and checked both doors for noise. No sound came from either. Peaking in, I saw giant sized weapons in a weaponry past the door on the right and a barracks past the door on the left . . . both were empty.

Sai began the hour long ritual to construct our golem while the rest of the party rested for the battle that was sure to come beyond the final door of the barracks. The door glowed red and was inscribed with an arcane sigil to bind it. Once Sai had constructed his golem, it arose and followed his commands to arm itself with a longsword and a scimitar from the weaponry. Next it was commanded to burst open the door containing the arcane sigil. With a mighty rush and a crash, our golem severed the defensive magic on the door, and we walked behind the mighty creation as we entered the room. (side note, Lefty had affectionately named our golem Jarold von Deathknight . . . Can't say a bit of humor before the grisly scene beyond the door wasn't warranted.)

There on a makeshift throne sat the "old" priest of shar from Phandalin. He sneered and told us we had troubled him long enough as he finally dropped his guise and the true, red Thay necromancer was in full view. In front of him stood, as we suspected, a horrifying Flesh Golem constructed of the parts that had disappeared throughout the dungeon.

As the battle commenced, more undead minions of the necromancer crashed through the wooden parts of the floor to join the fray as our golems battled each other in the center of the room. Sai had used the enlarge spell on our golem and turned him into a monstrous giant while the rest of us rushed into the room and attacked the enemies before us. 

Shadow, moved forward with frightening speed, his mind single on the Thay wizard. As he approached, he put a sphere of darkness around the wizard and rushed forward. Before Shadow could strike, the wizard cast fly and hovered over and out of the darkness. Sai to the opportunity to throw a bead of fireball upon him as Shadow once again pursued.

Meanwhile on the backlines, Inrah began a kind of wizard battle with the Thay who played a defensive game, casting shield to block her attacks. Feefifo, Zax, Lefty, and myself started to thin the army of undead that continued to pour out from the floors. 

About the floors . . . as it turns out, the floor of this room was suspended above a giant pit. As the golems attacked each other back and forth in the center, the blows were enough to start to crumble the sections of the floors below us. In fact, a section of floor that Shadow was standing on gave way and he tumbled down into the pit. Luckily, our friend landed on his feet and was able to sprint to a ladder at one end using his monk's Step of the Wind ability. 

After several back-and-forth attacks from the Golems, both of our creations were looking worse for wear. With a flair of genius, Inrah used Dissonant Whispers on our Thay's creation and mentally shattered the golem with a final scream inside its twisted mind and the battle seemed to suddenly sway in our favor . . . until our golem, bloodied and confused, went completely berserk and turned on Sai, simply because he happened to be the closest thing next to it.

With three vicious and mighty strikes from his own creation, Sai collapsed to the ground. Zax rushed to his side and pulled him back to our secondary line where we could heal his wounds. The Thay wizard was looking worse for wear from the attacks of ours that were able to get through. Getting back on his feet, he looked at our Golem and sneered, seeing the mayhem it had created. Unfortunately, the very Golem in the center, crashing against the tiles would be his demise as the tile he was standing on crumbled underneath his feet and he fell to his death in the pit below.

The undead constructs attacking us immediately fell to the floor becoming inanimate and Sai, now back on his feet, took a heroic leap at this creation and pushed himself and the golem into the pit below, falling deep into a central pit below. It was a brave act that ultimately saved us from a rampaging golem as we rushed out of the dungeon before it would collapse in on us.

Emerging from the entrance, we did not find the cool chirping of the Neverwinter Woods. What we found instead were deep, ominous mists encircling us. Something outside had changed. Evil now seemed to thicken around us.   

Thotham's Journal Entry #9

Our group discovered an entrance to what appeared to be the Thay necromancer's lair right where Inrah's vision pointed us. A small 5ft passageway led deeper inside, only wide enough for one person to enter at a time. It was at that point I knew I needed to take to the shadows. If the Shadow master's Guild had any perfect opportunity to flank and trap us, this would be their opportunity. I couldn't let them see me enter if we were under their surveillance, and so I took to the shadows and let the group proceed without me until I could join them again.

In the darkness I waited until several minutes had past, and my stomach turned as I heard shouts, blasts, and the sound of battle from within. Having surveilled the area and determined it was safe, I snuck stealthily into the lair. What I found inside was that my party had dispatched a grave full of undead skeletons and skeletal wizards -- bone dust was everywhere, and it was good to see my "talents" weren't needed for the fight they faced.

Three doors exited the room and so we chose one and proceeded forward. The next room we encountered had a pedestal with two heads stitched together, the eye sockets replaced with gems. One a rather normal looking head (despite the gems for eyes), and another that was giant sized and covered with several other gems as if it had eyes everywhere. While the smell was horrific, that didn't stop Feefifo from walking forward and slapping the head covered in gems to see if it would animate. As he did, the normal looking head that was attached to it disappeared into dust, leaving the monstrous head behind.

I gave the large head a psychic shove with my telekinesis and it felt to the floor. When it did, a blast of force came out of one of the gems and hit Sai (still in his raptor wild shape and surrounded by circling winds from the previous battle). Seeing this head could possibly be weaponized, I pulled out a 10' pole from my bag of holding and stabbed at the head to try and mount it upon the pole. It struck the head true but didn't stick upon the pole . . . instead it exploded on me. While the blast could have been worse if I hadn't jumped out of the way, it was still extremely painful. Dangerous, but I bagged up the head into the bag of holding anyway . . . perhaps we could still weaponize this gemmed head in the future.

Sai blasted his way through a locked door and created a small hole large enough for his raptor form to sneak through. On the other side was what only could be described as a chalkboard detailing body parts and their benefits. it appeared as though this was the research study of the Thay necromancer who most certainly was on the quest to construct his flesh golem. We noticed among the notes a description of the two heads we had already found. In fact, the notes detailed two of every body part needed to construct a golem: torso, legs, head, left arm, and right arm.

Next, I led the group down the hallway beyond the head room and again, my reflexes saved me as the floor disappeared along our narrow pathway to reveal a pit below and only the doorway at the end. Inrah flew ahead of the group and attempted to open the door when it collapsed down upon her, causing her to fall down into the pit and sustain minor injuries, while the door created a natural bridge for 10 feet of the 20 foot pit. I lit a torch and lowered it down to Inrah with my telekinesis to see she was covered in very black dirt and help light her way as she flew out of the pit and over to the other side. Sai used a Fae Step to cross the gap. I used my Cloud's Jaunt to misty step the distance. Lefty picked up and threw Feefifo like a tumbling acrobat across the gap, and then leapt the distance himself.

In the room beyond was a familiar face but also one contorted in pain. It was Salazar! Salazar the warforged merchant from our previous travels to Neverwinter. Sai held him down while I pulled out the dagger in his stomach and Inrah healed him with her wand. He soon passed out, but Sai was able to wake him with a pouch of smelling salts. He had no recollection of how he arrived here, but what he was missing was his own bag of holding that someone had stolen from him after an ambush back in Neverwinter.

To add to the strangeness, the room he was in had the two torsos mentioned earlier: One that was thin, and one that appeared muscular. Sai touched the muscular torso and the thin legs disappeared. Inrah mentioned that it appeared that perhaps we were somehow constructing the golem for the necromancer or possibly making a choice for him. The torso didn't fit in the bag of holding, so we left it behind, healed Salazar enough for him to join us and continued through the dungeon.

one by one as we worked our way through the dungeon we found the remaining body parts. While our plan was to never touch make the choice by avoiding touching the legs to select or disintegrate one, Sai couldn't resist his curiosity and touched the legs.

We encountered more trapped doors and dangers along the way until lefty found a strange wooden duck in a box. He ascertained no threat from the automaton and picked it up to claim the strange device for himself.  That was a bad decision.  It exploded in a fiery blast and while most of us dodged the main explosion, Feefifo took the full brunt of the explosion and passed out from the trap. Inrah healed him awake quickly while Sai cast a healing spirit in the form of a radiant beetle. We each touched the beetle and received its healing blessing. I can't say how nice it is to have friends with the healer's art.

by the time we had searched through most of the rooms we had touched an arm here, and a leg there thinking that perhaps that was how we finally escape this lair. The original doorway out had sealed, and it felt like we would be trapped here forever unless we figured out what the Thay's game exactly was. There was even a bookshelf in one corner that seemed to be missing a book, begging for us to return the book of flesh golem to it, but we resisted the temptation to do so.

Instead, we wandered through the final doorway we hadn't gone through back at the room full of skeletons, which took us right into the trap of the very demon who took the key from Seegis the mage of the magical tower outside of Phandalin! With a sneer he cornered us and simply said, "Now, you die" as we were charged by two hell fire boars, a demonic giant spider, and the undead griffon under his command. What followed truly was a vicious battle. Sai had enlarged himself and transformed into a giant toad. Inrah summoned for a flaming sword and began slicing at the demon. Lefty was petrified in fear from the sight of the giant spider, while swing and slashing at the hell boars. Feefifo was taking careful steady aimed shots at the griffon dealing shots with deadly precision. I was throwing my psychic daggers above the head of Lefty and into the boars and spiders . . . really anything I could see, and even Salazar joined in the fight with what appeared to be some kind of warforged gun.

In the end, we dispatched them all as they disappeared into flames. The demon dropped a bag on the ground as he disappeared in hellfire. We had won, and now it may finally be time to rest for a bit and discover if this is Salazar's bag and what it may have inside that was so attractive to the demon and his hoard. 

Thotham's Journal Entry #8

We took a moment to organize ourselves in the shelter of the Abbey basement. I slipped on a new pair of Boots of the Elvenkind and pocketed the magical dust of choking and sneezing. Having a spare trick or trap up my sleeve will be nice. Zax took the Decanter of Endless Water. Sai was left in charge of the Necklace of Fireballs and Periapt of Wound Closure. Inrah donned the Robe of Useful Items and the Blood Well. The rest of our haul from the seer's trials would be divided between Shadow, Feefifo, and Lefty.

Upon further inspection, we found a journal in the basement left behind by the Thay Wizard from Inrah's scrying. The journal seemed to fill in a lot of the missing blanks in our mysterious hunt. An entry from three weeks ago noted that the wizard had found a manual of Flesh Golems and locked it with a key for safekeeping. An entry from two weeks ago noted progress on his experiments with constructing golems from corpses of animals from the nearby surroundings. The last entry in the journal caught us up to today. The Thay knows we have his book and has headed to his secondary base . . . the very location Inrah scryed deep in Neverwinter Woods.

Knowing we only had 5 days' time, we quickly headed out toward the edge of Neverwinter Forest. While we walked, Sai was busy with a druidic ritual to find us some friendly horses to make the journey less exhausting. At first, he found some horses already occupied by Lord's Alliance riders, but at the end of the day, he found us a small heard. I've never seen anyone as adept at handling animals than Sai. It was truly a marvel to see him work and before we knew it, we had horses that took us right to the edge of Neverwinter Forest to where we could follow the river to our ultimate destination.

Sai thanked the horses by causing an apple tree to spontaneously bloom and provide them with a couple bushels of apples. As for us, we continued along the path going deeper and deeper into the forest. Old specters of our last visit seemed to arise as Zax heard a cackling and creaking of rocking chair. The forest grew darker and more menacing with each footstep. Even the waters appeared unnatural, dark, and full of an unnatural murkiness.

As nighttime came, it was time to set up camp, and we found a nice plateau with a vantage point that overlooked the river and forest. Zax and Sai took up watches while the rest of us settled down to what was supposed to be an uneventful sleep. Unfortunately, it was not.

From the depths of the river came two enormous, demonic-like giant toads with glowing red eyes. Zax woke us at the first signs of trouble as they moved in for the attack. Despite using magic to blind and reveal the location of the toads, ended up swallowed inside the gaping stomachs of the beasts. 

I suddenly felt the pull to manifest something new inside me! Psychic knifes appeared in my hands, and so I did what any newly born Soulknife Rogue would do. I used them, striking true to the unholy toads that had attacked us! 

Sai shapeshifted inside one of the toads and turned into a raptor beast that clawed and bit the beast from the inside out. Inrah pulled out a 10-foot pole from her Robe of Useful Items and magically impaled the toad that had swallowed her, but unfortunately the piercing damage it inflicted seemed ineffective. With a final two blows, I threw a psychic knife that landed right between the eyes of the beast that had swallowed Inrah, penetrating its skull with psychic pain that caused it to blow apart and release Inrah, who now was holding a flaming sword, ready to hack her way out from the inside.  

Zax ran forward and used her paladin's smite and dealt a holy blast that caused the other toad holding Sai to blow apart as well. Let's just say . . . it was a mess. Thankfully there was a river nearby to wash ourselves . . . except for Sai, who remained transformed as a dinosaur that seemed perfectly at home sleeping in the innards of a giant toad.

The rest of the evening was thankfully uneventful, and we set off for the clearing in the morning. Of strange note! Before we left, I found a small toad that seemed to take an interest in me. I'm not sure what to make of it, but it's happily hitching a ride on my shoulder for now.  I'm taking this friend of the forest as a good omen.

Thotham's Journal Entry #7

Our new seer friend asked us to choose someone from the party to receive a vision, and so, after a short discussion, we decided that the most magical of us should receive the vision. Inrah bravely agreed, and asked, "Where is the person responsible for the undead attacks in Phandalin?" 

The witch blew a pink powder on her face, and after several moments, Inrah broke from a trance and toppled over as if stunned! We tried to wake her, and eventually, after the effects wore off, she came to her senses and let us know the vision she had received.

In her vision, Inrah flew above the Neverwinter forest and then drifted down into a hidden basement in the chapel in Phandalin. There she saw a bald Thay wizard in a red cloak, tattoos adorning his head. The wizard had a pile of corpses there he was stitching together and performing the vilest of rituals to bring them to life.  Inrah then rose in the air facing toward Neverwinter and saw day become night and night become day seven times before descending back into the Neverwinter forest, near a river, into a clearing to the Northeast.

The witch escorted us out of her hut and pointed us in the direction of Neverwinter, then disappeared with a cackle. Before she left, however, Inrah and Sai both noticed something that the rest of us did not. As she raised her cloak over her head, a half mask appeared over her face. 

Zax quickly turned about and headed back in pursuit to where the witch's hut was, and Inrah and I followed. Sai on the other hand, unbeknownst to us, headed in the direction of Neverwinter. 

Arriving at the witch's hut, everything was empty. The only thing that remained was the seer's rocking chair that was still rocking slowly back and forth. A note was on the hut's front door that read in draconic, If you want help, bring the daughter to us. The note sent Zax into a fury and she burned the hut to the ground. As it burned, it seemed to burn ominously in the colors of the Chromatic dragons.

It was at this moment that we noticed Sai was missing from our party! Inrah flew up into the sky and looked for Sai and could not see him, but what she did see was that it was suddenly nighttime. The forest's magic had seemed to pass time more quickly for us inside. 

Unable to search for Sai in the darkness of the woods, we decided to set up camp and trade watches. As I kept first watch, I was holding the necklace of fireballs close in case there was an attack. Strangely, there was no attack, but when my watch was done the necklace seemed to contain seven beads now instead of six! Magic was all around us. Thankfully this time, it worked to our advantage.

When we awoke, I noticed a strange shuffling in the bushes nearby when suddenly I was pounced upon by a large panther who simply said, "Gotcha!" It was Sai!  Come to find out, Sai had been wandering in the woods for 18 hours looking for us. I was so happy to see him again. I really don't like splitting the party like that .  . . at all!

Now that the daytime had arrived, we headed as a group out of the woods and back to the road between Neverwinter and Phandalin. We were pushing it, figuring Inrah's vision gave us about a week before evil would descend on Neverwinter Woods.

On our path, we met a wandering Artificer Merchant named Salazar. He was interested in trading with us, so since none of us were particularly interested in the magical billowing cloak, I traded with him for a potion of gaseous form. Inrah also bought a magical endless journal and inkwell. She said she was inspired by my own journaling and would like to sketch our adventures.

After two exhausting day's journey, we arrived in Phandalin and promptly made our way to the chapel and opened the doors. It was abandoned, but we noticed the construction materials had all been used to patch up the place. Everything also appeared magically clean as if it had almost a permanent aura of prestidigitation! 

We were on the hunt for this basement that had alluded us before, which Inrah saw in her vision. Sai was using his elementalism to spray the floor with water looking for areas that showed signs of seeping through. Eventually he found a small 3-foot by 3-foot square that seemed to seep through. Pushing it did nothing, so we searched for some kind of mechanism or trick to opening it. 

Zax pushed the top off of the alter and what was left was a stone statue of the symbol of Shar. We turned the stone and noticed a grinding sound beneath the floor, yet nothing seemed to open . . . that's when I remembered the new potion of gaseous form I had purchased from Salazar! I drank the potion and became a cloud. Such an interesting feeling to be free in this form. It allowed me to slip through the cracks of the basement door, where I noticed, the stone had been attached to a steel bar that held the door shut, by turning it, we had unlocked the bar. Unfortunately, I realized I had pretty much just wasted this potion . . . all we needed to do was push on the door to open it now that we had unlocked it.

After regaining my form, we did just that. The basement, however, was empty. No Thay. No bodies. Nothing. It was all empty. Certainly, the Thay wizard would be headed back into the forest to the clearing Inrah had seen in her vision. 

Two days of our week had been taken. We'd need to hurry back to the forest as fast as possible! 

Thotham's Journal Entry #6

After spending the evening at a local inn, we set out in the morning to stock up on some much-needed healing potions. Fefifo, the halfling who thinks he's a giant, also picked up a couple of growth potions, understandably. Right as we were wrapping up our business, a small boy tugged on Vax's armor and said his master would like to speak with us.

Following the boy outside of the gates of Neverwinter, we found ourselves inside a strange hut that was much larger on the inside that it appeared on the outside. Within, an old woman sat stirring a large cauldron. Without stopping her stir, she explained she had scryed that we needed her help with a scrying of our own. The problem was that she was missing the literal keys to her power. Someone, or something, had hidden her power away in the form of keys. If we retrieved her keys, she would scry the information we were seeking and make it worth our while.

The group pulled together and noted our mistrust of anyone whose power was hidden away like this and decided to head to the mage's guild in search of more information. We quickly came up with an excuse and dismissed ourselves saying we'd be back after running an errand we were already committed to, but we assured her we'd be back.

We quickly returned to Neverwinter and straight to the Mage's Guild to see what we could find out before committing to a dangerous and almost certainly magical task. What we found there was a librarian and a lot of books that would take days to digest, not hours. Using his mask of disguise, Fefifo transformed himself into the old woman and asked the librarian if she had seen her before. She had not. The librarian did dig up a book that might have more information on the famous magic users of Neverwinter. I asked her to hold it for us and we'd return.

Without much additional information about curses, keys that lock away magic, or strange old women outside the walls of Neverwinter offering quests, we returned again to the old woman's hovel and relented to her request to find her keys . . . we had no idea what we were in for.

Instantly she transported our party to a magical cave where we found a table filled with six magical bottles, one for each of us to use on our journey. They were labeled Speed, Power, Space, Foresight, Nature, and Duplication. We each chose a potion from the table as the voice of the old woman filled our minds, "You may each have one bottle to help you find the keys, it will give you a boon that will help you . . . but each also comes with a downside."

I gulped down my bottle of foresight and suddenly I had truesight and saw with perfect clarity but could see nothing beyond 40 feet ahead. Lefty drank the bottle of Space and became incorporeal and phased between dimensions, but his speech was muddy and hard to understand. Shadow drank the bottle of power and became stronger and quicker than normal but seemed to lose just as much intelligence. Vax drank the bottle of speed and gained the ability to move quickly and jump long distances, but went completely blind. Inrah drank the nature bottle, and became jelly like with tentacles, but maintained their wings (who thought an octopus could fly?). Fefifo drank the duplication bottle and split into 6 colored illusions, but his real body petrified into a platinum statue. With that, the trial of the magic keys began! 

Shadow opened the door with a powerful, but unneeded, shove. What we found beyond was a maze of pillars with a sea of lava below. My senses exploded, and I could sense a large entity inside the lava below. Not to worry, Inrah attached her tentacles to Vax's back and said she would guide her jumps and be her eyes. It was risky, but after the first jump, it looked like this could actually work! Inrah guided Vax through six jumps (a few shaky ones, but Vax held fast) and on to the other side where one of the keys was waiting.  As soon as Vax grabbed the key, we were all magically transported back to the cave entrance. one trial down, two to go.

I sensed through the second door, an area teaming with life. Again, without much thought from our powerful dunce, Shadow opened the door. We all followed. On the opposite side was an ocean reef with (as my companions explained to me) a sunken ship on the far end where the magical keys certainly sat hidden. Inrah attached herself to Shadow, who dove in, sinking 80 feet to the ocean floor and began pushing through the water.

As he did this, I sensed a shark magically appear. I alerted the party to the shark and used my speed to swim as fast as possible in what I believed was the direction of the ship. What followed was a race and a battle for the keys. Inrah released her grasp on Shadow and began slithering her octopus body from reef to reef. Shadow grappled the shark while Fefifo's duplicates and Lefty shot arrows through the water at the shark in shadow's grasp. 

Unfortunately, defeating the shark just spawned a larger and faster shark in its stead. Unfortunately, defeating the larger and faster shark just spawned a gigantic sea serpent. While Lefty, Fefifo's army of duplicates, and Shadow were valiant (and definitely slowed down the enemy while Inrah and myself made our way to the ship), eventually the sea serpent downed Shadow with a vicious bite, knocking him unconscious.

Inrah grabbed a key in the depths of the ship, and I grabbed another from behind the sunken captain's wheel, right as the sea serpent was speeding towards me.  Again, as soon as I touched the final key, we were all magically transported back to the cave entrance. The second key trial was a success!

Behind the third and final door appeared a maze. Lefty used his incorporeal form to phase through the walls and guide us on our journey. I used my magical foresight to discover our way through illusionary walls. My gloves of thievery came in handy as well as the maze was riddled with traps, and I was able to successfully disarm them. As it turns out, the maze was also riddled with chests full of magical items! Not only did we find the keys, but we found boots, bags, cloaks, pearls, amulets, and more! 

When the last key was found, we were all again magically transported . . . but not back to the cave. This time we were transported back to the old woman's hut, where she gladly pocketed the keys and offered us two more magic items from a choice of four. 

Hopefully we haven't chosen poorly to return this woman her magic. We shall see what she scrys for us!

Thotham's Journal Entry #5

We were left to the aftermath of our battle. The mage healed our party; we bound the dragon cultist that remained alive; and the crow returned to his master (despite me offering my shoulder and thanking him for his assistance). To say the mage we saved was grateful would be an understatement! He wanted to make sure that each and every one of us was gifted with a magical item (of lesser value in his words -- he was "overstocked"). 

Fefifo was gifted a mask of disguise, allowing him to cast disguise self and change his appearance. Zax was gifted a magical timepiece that grew into a shield that deflects magic missiles. Lefty was allowed to keep his amulet, which was revealed to be an amulet of health. Inrah was gifted a wand of cure wounds. Shadow had his cursed ring . . . of course. As for me, I scored a nice set of thievery gloves that I believe will make my pickpocketing skills somewhat legendary! In addition, we each received 200 gold, and the party gained a potion of clarity. The loot overflowed for our job well done!

The mage revealed his name to be Seegis. We talked at length about the key that was stolen from him, and he simply had no idea how it came to him, other than his tower brought him to the location and "gifted" it to him. 

As for the cultist, it was left to us to deal with him. He was obstinate and wanted a blood oath before coughing up any information, but I had a better idea. Placing the immovable rod against his throat, I put him in a choke hold he couldn't escape and offered him a simple deal, five questions in exchange for his freedom . . . and his life. Then Fefifo upped the ante and produced some extremely smelly cheese and put it right into his nose. Ingenious! Who knew the power of smell could be used so well for interrogation?

Unfortunately, we didn't get much information, but we did get another piece of the puzzle. The dragon cultist was sent to the tower by his superior, who had advanced knowledge of where the key would be. The superior is most likely a seer who wears a half mask and resides in Neverwinter. I had to part with 10 gold for the latter piece of information, but we were true to our deal and let him go free. (Besides, I knew we'd be able to track him as he retreated anyway.)

We said our farewells to Seegis (still fuming a bit after Zax busted his panel) and followed the cultist's tracks. Zax was excellent at using their survival skills and tracked him right to the edge of some tall grass. Zax even discovered where he had leaped into the grass and waited. Zax even tracked him to a clearing where you could see he had been on his knees and taken away on horseback. After that, the horse tracks were easy to follow back to the main road leading to Neverwinter. We pursued.

As we traveled the road, we questioned the merchants heading south, away from Neverwinter, if they had seen a group on horseback with a prisoner. They had! As it turns out, it was a contingency of the Lord's Alliance that had captured him, much to our luck.

We continued on to Neverwinter, presented our paperwork at the gate, made a quick stop at the garrison, and then on to the commandment of the Lord's Alliance to speak with our financer . . . who made us fill out the most awful paperwork about our experience. That said, we were offered another job to hunt the necromantic Thay plaguing Phandalin for a sum of 400 gold each.

Before we leave town again, the group discussed how it might be beneficial to speak with the archmage of Neverwinter to see if they might know who this half-masked seer could be. For now, we're keeping our book a secret and keeping it on the move. It is dangerous to keep with us, and we have no idea if the seer knows its location . . . they are a seer, however . . . best watch our backs.

Thotham's Journal Entry #4

Sensing my presence may actually have been harming the safety of the group as the Shadowmasters most certainly are hunting me, I opted to stay hidden in the shadows as our group pressed forward. But from the shadows, I followed and watched as my companions saved a Wizard's crow familiar in Phandalin from pursuing undead falcons and what appeared to be a stitched-together griffon. As it turns out, the curious crow could actually speak in the common tongue! The clever bird told a tale of his master trapped in his tower and led my companions there as I watched on from a distance.

Upon entering the tower, my companions had a run-in with what appeared to be dragon clan cultists and their four drakes. After they dispatched them, I watched my companions disable a barrier around the tower, not by manipulating its curious electrified panel, but through the power of Zax's sword crashing down upon the panel instead. When ingenuity fails, strength prevails!

I continued keeping my distance and followed them inside, just a few steps behind. They definitely did all the heavy lifting, figuring out how to use levers to ride platforms up the mage's tower and defeating undead bodyguards on the way up to the upper levels of the tower. Unfortunately, the fight was very unforgiving to my companions, and finally, feeling safe from the eyes of the Shadowmasters, I decided it was time to come forth and rejoin the group, as even more danger was surely ahead of us. 

We found the crow familiar, believed to have been killed in the fight with the undead bodyguards, seemingly unharmed and sleeping in the corner of his master's bedroom . . . where we found two interesting magic items: a golden ring and a heart-shaped amulet.

Shadow, the warforged, placed the ring upon his finger and began to attune. As he did, the ring turned dark black and surrounded him with a shadow of necrosis. I'm still unsure if he is cursed or simply more powerful than before. Lefty focused on the amulet, but couldn't seem to quite figure out what it was. FeeFiFo and Sai opted for a quick nap.

As for me, since my companions were busy, I opted to approach our sleeping crow friend and offer it some food. When I woke it, it flew around the room with its eyes flashing black and blue until it seemed to return to its senses. Poor Lefty. That crow was pretty mad at him for letting him die in the previous battle. I guess being a familiar means you feel all the pains of death with none of its sting. What a curious bird!

Once the party had rested and recovered from its previous encounter, we pressed on to the final floor of the tower, where the crow familiar had told us his master was trapped. What we found was a horrible scene. The mage was giving everything he had to maintain a shield of blue magic between himself and a horrible demon-like humanoid, accompanied by a powerful multi-armed undead servant. 

Also in the room was another unit of opportunistic cultists engaged in combat . . . that's when we burst in and the chaos of battle erupted. Lefty and Shadow sprang through the door and began attacking the multi-armed undead and the demon. The demon continued his assault on the mage's shield. The cultists split themselves between attacking us and the demon. The undead griffon returned through an open window and started wreaking absolute havoc, throwing bodies of friend and foe alike through the window and into each other. 

Sai and I opted to strike at both parties from the shadows, darting in and out of the doorway. While I was taking shots with my bow, Sai transformed into a panther and darted in and out while dealing devastating claw attacks.  

Shadow was using his new strange magic to deal incredible swings upon the multi-armed undead golem, but it seemed that with each swing, it both bolstered and harmed him. Eventually, Shadow fell unconscious during combat. Eventually, FeeFiFo and Lefty fell unconscious as well, but not before dispatching of the powerful undead multiarmed golem and all the cultists, minus their leader.

Speaking of that cultist leader, he was quite troublesome and kept dominating my thoughts with magic, commanding me to fetch him a key during combat. I wasn't quite sure who had the key, but I had no control over myself in my desire for this key. It was terrifying to be possessed like this. Truly terrifying. Only one thought echoed inside my head, Fetch him the key. 

Suddenly, when things seemed their most dire and Shadow was bleeding out, the power of the ring seemed to possess him at his most desperate moment with one thought, and one thought only: fight, fight, FIGHT! This was surely our moment for victory!

. . . but it was at that very moment when the demon cut our battle short with scintillating lights that stunned everyone in his sight as he grabbed the key from the master mage of the tower (the very key the cultist leader had commanded me to obtain), and then, in the claws of the griffon, flew out the tower window cackling to himself with demonic glee, "The master will be pleased."

Sai seemed to be the only one of us unaffected by the charming illusion and took one final swipe at the escaping demon, but alas, he got away. 

What is the power of this strange key, and why was it so important? Surely the leader of the Cultists will know.