| Shadows in Amberton |
| Leaving the tower the next day, the party (Avan, Ignatius, Jack, and Nemo with Jilt and Rigg) traveled on to Amberton. Amberton is a picturesque small farming village centered on a deep lake at the end of the Red River, north of Avalon. Upon entering town, Jilt left the party to deal with last rites for Ara (killed by the desert orcs). The party split up to scout the town. Avan quickly discovered that an ogre and his goblin cronies had taken over the town. The others found much the same while investigating the ruins of the weapon shop. Getting back to the caravan they ran into Portia, their old partner in adventuring. She was making her way north to Tethyr and had stopped here due to some rumors of a thief�s treasure. Another town member was also in town, a portly paladin named Harvey. She told them the giants had attacked the town recently and taken over, leaving a garrison of goblins to extract tribute. Also they had left a powerful goblin cleric to raise an undead army in an ancient cemetery nearby. At this point the party ran afoul of a band of goblins. Spurred on by some insults by Portia, the nasty humanoids attacked (and in less than 8 seconds were all dead). After quickly disposing of the corpses in the lake, Jack convinced Jilt�s guards to move the caravan to the waterfront where they planned to take care of any goblins that investigated. By nightfall, all were sunk to the bottom of the lake (one band came to in search of the others and the last batch were ambushed in a bar). At that point the party became divided about attacking at night (where they couldn�t see but the ogre might be resting) or at first light. Jack and Portia went out to scout that night but unfortunately for them the ogre was an early riser. Fleeing the scene, Jack ran off while Portia went invisible. The others hearing the commotion hurried to help. While most of them engaged in a fight of retreats and advances, Jack invisibly snuck into the ogre�s quarters and stole his treasure. In the end, Avan stunned the ogre, letting Nemo finish him off. The goblin sorcerer had managed to hide in a rope trick but Ignatius incapacitated the goblin adept with a web. At this point, Nemo began to torture the goblin adept to find out about what was happening at the cemetery. Despite losing his fingers, he didn�t break and his corpse was tossed into the lake. However his friend, the sorcerer, was caught and spilled the beans before they killed him. The most powerful goblin warriors in the area were there as well as the cleric. After resting a day they set out to the cemetery leaving Harvey to guard the town. The catacombs were mostly empty, with a couple rooms stuffed with zombies and skeletons. Nemo had some close encounters with a gelatinous cube and a carrion crawler. Finally they ran into some goblin guards and found their way into a secret crypt. There they found the goblin priest and his lackeys already being finished off by living shadows. Aided by the ogre�s magical great sword, Nemo made short work of the first shadow while the party moved into the room. As they defeated the other shadow and killed the remaining goblin, the priest rose as a shadow and inflicted further mayhem before being destroyed. After that the party searched the almost barren room. They found two secret doors, the goblins equipment and a tombstone that said: Here lies Daman, Lord of Shadows, I have seen the truth of the world, I have fought in the great false war, And seen the forces that drove it, Lords of Entropy and Slavery, May the darkness find them. Searching the passages that the secret doors led to, Jack discovered that the ceiling would collapse if the door at the end of either passage was opened. Nemo, despite being weak as a new born babe, opened the first door (with some coffins supporting the ceiling). After digging him out of the rubble they looted the tomb of a magical rope, a bracelet (of friends), a ring, and a dagger that was quickly claimed by Portia. The other room yielded, after digging out Jack, some well made non magical replicas. Splitting the treasure the party went back to town and rested, while Jilt took the town�s remaining money supply. |