Stragglers

## Summary

The party returned to Greenest with Dr. Gerark tending to Leozin. Leozin is both grateful and resentful of the rescue. Jojo and Cora Treecreak keep everyone's spirits alive with music, jokes and even breakdancing. Durian Dunklebeard tries to speak to Langdedrosa Cyanwrath further as Leonzin talked about what he learned. Apparently the cave next to the camp is a dragon hatchery. Leozin shares this news with the rest of the town and asks the party to check if anything's changed. Jojo agrees if there's anyone to watch thier backs if they go into the cave. They ask Tarbaw Nighthill for help. He gives them two guards: Frederick and Curtis.

They head into town to stock up on weapons with Frederick and Curtis leading the way. Cora remarks that Curtis is young to be joining the guard at only ninteen. Dr. Gerark says that thirteen is the age that a boy becomes a man. They arrives at Wina's armaments with Wina herself having a sewn nametag out. Jojo notes how progressive it is and gets two sets of theives tools thanks to Cora. He also gets a hook for his rope to make it a grappling hook with Cora surprised that she had the most money out of anyone. Jojo looks at a set of caltrops when Wina notices that Jojo is the cat person who saved someone from a burning building and lets him take the caltrops as long as he pays it back. Jojo suggests going to a butcher shop next to get some meat to bait the dragons. They leave the shop with a silver piece left by Dr. Gerark.

The butcher shop turns out to be still under repairs. Jojo decides to buy a few bloody, smelly scraps with Gerark paying the seven silver needed. Gerark tries to use a preserving potion but realizes he's run out. Thankfully there's a chemist in town and Jojo buys the chemical needed. Cora thinks about selling her bottle of poison but decides against it. Jojo mentions he has a jar that he hasn't been able to work with. The gnome apothecary notes that it's an enchanted jar designed to be unbreakable and unopenable. Jojo offers to sell it to her but she refuses. However Dr. Gerark decides to take it and gets two empty vails for later. After unsuccessfully trying to talk down the prices for some healing potions, they head out.

While on the road, Jojo tries to learn from Dr. Gerark about CPR but fails. They return to the camp to find it fairly empty. Jojo listens around the large tent and hears some fidgeting going on inside. Jojo notes that there are some cultists in there that aren't like the ones from before. Jojo makes an entrance and the cultists ask what he's doing here. Jojo says they want to fight some dragons and the cultists want Jojo to prove it. They end up firing a warning shot so Gerark bursts into the tent and grabs one of them.

Cora uses an illusion to seemingly trap one of them in a box. Jojo captures one of the arrows thrown at him but the other one knicks him. He tries to attack the 'trapped' cultist but trips. Jojo dodges the first cultist's attacks but gets cut by the second. Fredrick throws his spear at the elf with Jojo telling him not to kill them. Curtis follows suit as Dr. Gerark smashes the back end of his javelin into the elf he's holding.

Cora notes that these opponents are stronger than kobolds for they broke her illusion easily. She casts hideous laughter on the guy in the back but it doesn't work. Dr. Gerark is struck with two arrows. Jojo tries attacking again but falls down. Jojo is struck by one guy but dodges the other as the guards come in. Frederick misses his attack but Curtis lands his. Dr. Gerark hulks up and decapitates one of them before moving to the guy in the back and stabbing his leg. Cora begins healing Dr. Gerark and Jojo. The cultist stabs Dr. Gerark as Jojo keeps missing with his swings. He eventually tells the others to back off. Dr. Gerark can't leave in his state so he does a spin-attack to cleave the guy he's attacking in half with both halves falling on the two remaining elves. Dr. Gerark says that they're next so the remaining elves scramble to run. Jojo quickly knocks them both out.

Jojo begins searching the bodies as Cora heals Dr. Gerark. They take a short rest in the tent after tying up the two bodies. One of the elves comes around and mentions that they were hunters that weren't involved with the cultists. Despite Dr. Gerark's request to leave them, Jojo lets the elves go.

The trio head into the hatchery as Frederick gives Jojo a potion of healing. Cora spots two high-ranking cultist members heading deeper into the cave. As they head in, they notice one of the cult members hiding in an alcove above them. They decide to take down the ambushers and Dr. Gerark takes on Jojo's bad luck before Cora makes him invisible. Jojo sees a fungus cave ahead along with a trap on the stairs. Jojo arrives only for the cult members to see him. Jojo backs off but turns right back to knock out a cultist that Dr. Gerark pinned accidentally. Dr. Gerark nearly knocks the other guy out but Jojo convinces the cultist to play dead anyway.

They head to the fungus cave with Jojo climbing down and Dr. Gerark accidentally landing on Jojo. Cora climbs down the cliff while reminding them that she can't heal them any more. She mentions that she misses Durian as Jojo looks over the purple fungus. Cora notes that they're violet fungus that are actually violent so they hug the wall to avoid them. They find a nook in the wall and decide to take a nap before Jojo meets up with the guards. They take the cultists in and promise to watch them if they behave. They rest throughout the night and shimmy past the violet fungus (with Jojo crawling on the walls).

In the next chamber, Jojo sees bats on the ceiling along with a few stirges among them. Jojo throws a piece of the meat away from the bats and they are not interested in it. They quietly slip by and come to a three pronged fork in the road. Jojo gazes ahead of them only to smell something terrible down there. He asks Cora to check it out. She says it's poop but Jojo notices something gleaming in the muck. It's unfounded though as it's only belt buckles and shattered lamps. Jojo quickly leaves and the group heads down some steps towards a large curtain.

They head south first and Jojo notices tiny barbs in the curtain, so he uses his staff. They find a meat locker with 75 copper and 25 silver in a drawer. Dr. Gerark also finds an enchanted necklace with a rakshasa's hand. Jojo guesses that this is a necklace of mage hand as Cora finds another magic scroll. They find more kobolds in the room north of the bat chamber and Cora nearly freaks out when a bat eats a bug off her nose. Jojo has an idea of using some of the poison on the meat on the kobolds with Cora mimicking the voice of a cultist and tossing the meat in there. The plan works as two drakes and two kobolds snarf down the meat and keel over.

As Jojo walks into the next room, he finds three kobolds and a drake. They try to come up with a plan with the caltrops as the kobolds notice them. Jojo tries throwing them only for him to trip. The drake rushes forward and gets impaled by hidden spikes. The kobold with wings sighs and throws a rock at Jojo only for him to miss. Cora retaliates with a throwing dagger as Dr. Gerark moves past the spikes that came up. He hulks up and takes all three of them out with a spin attack. Cora is baffled that the spike trap worked as she picks up a copper ring from the dead kobold. Cora is fasinated with the ring but Jojo stops her to point to the trap. He skips the step to avoid it. Inside the room are a few kobolds. Jojo and Cora come up with the plan of dropping the trap on them. It works spectacularly leaving the two that weren't buried to flee further into the cave. Jojo quickly crawls through and uses his elongated staff and claws to take them out.

## Notable Events

* The party heads back to the camp to check out the dragon hatchery
* Jojo finds some money, Dr. Gerark finds a mage hand necklace and Cora Treecreak finds a scroll
* ThatCreepyReading was unable to make it to this session due to personal reasons.