The Temple

February 6, 2007

These pink skins think they can do whatever they want. They will learn. When great Tiamat blesses us. Our High Priest had a vision the other day. A vision of a sacrifice that would be performed at the altar. When this is done, I know we will rise again! How I wish I could be the one to find the pink skins. I have heard the stories about how they are tall and strong but I know that I am stronger than they are.

Wait.

What is that strange scent? I have not smelled it before and I have hunted everything in the region.

I see it! A pink skin! Not so tall, either. I am small but strong and it not even half my size. Now I will . . . where did it go? How did it disappear? I still smell it but I cannot see it. I must track it.

Perhaps it shows some intelligence, like the beasts I track. They can disappear from sight but not from smell. And it is scared. That smell is obvious and always so sweet! Ah, it must have hid in the grasses and the ran that way. I will hunt it down.

I come around the hill and am so interested in the scent that I almost failed great Tiamat. There are two more pink skins and their beats of burden, I think they are called ka-mals. I do not want to be afraid but I cannot let the sacrifices get away. I will call to my brethren so that we may deal with them.

I move away and make the cries to my brethren, knowing they will hear me and come. I know wait.

It does not take long before my brethren arrive. I join them as we approach the pink skins and attack! They try and fight back but they are weak and incompetent. We beat them down and it is all I can do not to kill them there. But that would deny Tiamat her sacrifice and I won't have that. We take their bodies and their ka-mals with us to our place of worship.

We rouse the others and I am greeted as a true warrior! Finally! It has been years in coming and now the day is mine. We put them near the altar and ready ourselves. The High Priest goes inside to prepare and I have been made his ceremonial guard. I might even get to slit the throat of one of the pink skins!

The High Priest comes to the altar. He carries the sacred dagger. The little one I first saw is bound to the altar and he hasn't squirned in a while. I hope he hasn't died yet. Not so quietly. Wait, what is happening to his skin? Why does he turn dark?

Aaaaaa!

What has happened? Where did they go? The High Priest stopped the little one from exploding but how do they do that? And how did the others get away? I do not smell them anymore. How can that be? There is no scent of them where we had tied them on the ground.

Who are the others fighting?

. . .

How can it be them? We had captured them! We had them! I cannot go and fight, for I must protect the High Priest. How did they already cut down three of us? They must not win! I will kill them now and slam their bodies on the altar! I hope that will appease Tiamat.

Here comes one now. How do they move so fast! I didn't know they could move so fast.

AAAAAaaaaa. The pain. My blows aren't getting through! He swings again and I move to block-.

***********

"Aw, man, these guys don't have much," says Duece as they look around. "Maybe there will be more underground."

"I can't believe how quickly I got the first ones and then it took forever on the final ones."

"Victor, you helped a lot. You did great!"

"Yeah, I know, but I started out so well. I got more than you, first time!" Victor smirks, the closest he has come to a grin in a while. Eric chuckles at his words.

"Guys, there are tunnels, probably crypts or catacombs. We are going to have to search them."

"Okay," calls Eric back to Duece. "Your illusions worked well! They really thought they had captured us."

"Yeah, I am just glad Shadow Magic gives them some substance. Too bad I couldn't have seen them closer, as I could have made them better."

"They worked."

"True. Now, let's search the place."

************

The group searches the place and finds a magic bow and a magic axe as well as some books. Many of the books are scratched and missing pages but are legible. They take what they can and head back to Arabel.

Notes

• We were short a player again.
• We started the session by eating pizza and watching The Gamers. Good times!
• We didn't have much time with everything else, so I had a quick little dungeon crawl prepared for it. I think it worked out pretty well, although when we got into it, time went pretty quickly!
• I did skip a lot of lead in or build up. I mean, when we finally started, within ten minutes, they were in the dungeon area and we were going. Very refreshing as I don't do that much.