2.5 Welcome to the Jungle

Twilight fell as the party
reveled in their triumph over Murag and Albert, both of whom, if
their eyes were to be believed, were firmly in Steave's grasp. Their
relief was palpable, but tempered with the constant *thud thud*
thudding *of the huge void spawn*
that had forced its way through the cracks in reality begotten by
Albert's misguided ritual. Cracks, mind you, that were apparently
spreading around the world. Stupid, stupid, stupid man, that Albert!

Hoping
that the doors of the old temple would hold it for a time now that
they were locked up tight, the group paused to speak with Smitty, one
of the late Murag's bound Ascendants, who had agreed to at least
talk with them instead of fleeing the instant Murag died. According
to him Albert had recently 'changed camps' as it were, deciding that
he wanted to pursue Wrynn's old goal of usurping the gods themselves.
How the breaking down of the barriers between our world and the 'dark
world' was supposed to help him with that is still a little unclear,
but apparently he imagined an army of void spawn would be of use to
him- especially if he could use his magic to enslave a void spawn
queen. But Smitty had his own questions to explore about the nature
of the gods. He was also terrified of None, leading him to refuse to
work with our noble heroes. So terrified of None was he that Smitty
actually snatched it and teleported away, to do what none can say.
(See what we did there?). Karhanza the goblin chaos mage, Murag's
third Ascendant, decided to accompany the party.

The
chosen of Astor could not bring themselves to be too upset however,
as None made them uncomfortable and, at any rate, Elizabel was sick.
Spending weeks trapped with Murag and Albert must have been
traumatizing for her and cannot have done much for her health.
Compounding this was the inhospitable jungle climate. She needed
water and rest, the former of which the party had limited supplies
of. Hoping to share the night, and supplies, with one of the goblin
tribes, they headed off towards where they had last seen the goblins
heading as they abandoned the temple.

They
found a goblin tribe, but were far less welcome than they had hoped.
The tribesman immediately pointed spears at them and tried to scare
them off. Language proved a barrier between them as the party tried
to parlay for help and the goblins tried to convince them to leave.
Misunderstanding nearly lead to a full-scale fight before a goblin
elder called off the tribesman and, in broken common, informed the
party that no outsiders were allowed in the village at night. The
woods *change* at night,
full of tricks and spirits. He warned the party to find shelter of
their own and then he and his tribesmen retreated.

Left
to their own devices, Astor's Chosen searched for shelter among the
susurus of the jungle trees. Perlapae wove together the branches of
some trees to make a platform they could rest on while Baygrith
argued with Elizabel over the construction of a moisture siphon to
draw water from the humid air and Travize spoke with the trees to see
if he could discover some useful information about the things they
should avoid in the night. He talked to the stones, too, but they
proved excessively unhelpful. All told, the party knew they needed to
avoid *something* that
wandered the night with gnarled flesh and a thirst for blood.

Timmeron
tried to comfort Elizabel as Baygrith poured over the schematics they
had come up with. They could indeed get moisture from the air, but
they would need some jungle moss to do it. Sajaina leaped at the
chance to get out of the trees and assist, accompanied by Travize and
Perlapae who were rather wary of sending anyone off alone. Together
they found the moss but, as fate would have it, also the creatures
they ought to avoid. There was a pack of the things, all gnarled and
tough flesh arranged in quadrupedal form. Using her newly uncovered
power to temporarily animate golems, Perlapae sent a construct of
swamp muck ahead to distract the things while Sajaina grabbed the
moss they would need. Travize watched the spirit creatures interact
and realized that, not only were they *talking to each*
other*, but his connection to*
could allow him to understand some of what they were saying. It seems
they had found some food they wanted to pursue. Lots of food. In the
direction of the party.

Surmising
that this was *bad*, the
trio rushed back to the group as Baygrith was putting the finishing
touches on his moisture siphon. Using the moss Sajaina had gathered
he got it so let out a steady, if slow, dribble of water which
Eizabel drank thirstily. Forewarned of the advance of the gnarled
horrors- a name we choose for evocation of imagery rather than for
entire accuracy- they readied themselves for moving at the least and
a fight at the worst.

As
time ran out, though, Travize tried to talk to them. The conversation
was halting and disjointed as neither group could fully understand
what the other was saying. The creatures were agitated by...
something Some outsiders that were invading their woods. The
description they gave sounded a lot like void spawn and they seemed
willing to, well, *not eat everyone*,
if the party helped them dispatch a pack of the horrid invaders. Our
protagonists were happy to agree to that, though suspicious of the
trustworthiness of these creatures. The gnarled horrors lead the way
to a spot they claimed the 'outsiders' would appear and, sure enough,
Karhanza said that she could see a weakness in the dimensional fabric
there. Within moments a dozen lesser void spawn had exploded through
the veil between dimensions.

Karhanza
hurried to work her magic, beginning to seal the rift. The rest of
the party engaged the enemy, wiping them out as fast as possible.
Timmeron's time-magic aided the party in dispatching the creatures as
Grukk and Cairean cut them into pieces while Sal and Perlapae
provided support. To make matters worse, Bagel was still unconscious
from their foray into the temple. Perlapae carried him while she
worked. Travize and Baygrith were somewhat less spectacularly
successful than the two swordsmen and Timmeron balanced his efforts
between helping in the fight and protecting his wife. The good guys
were winning the day handily when, just before Karhanza could seal
the spell that would keep the rift closed, two giant void spawn
managed to claw their way through. Taking the form of a gigantic,
burrowing worm, one of the things assaulted the party in a manner
much more deadly than the lesser void spawn had managed. The second
appeared as a misshapen, giant mosquito, though Travize and Timmeron,
with an assist from Baygrith, quickly put it down.

The
worm, though, proved a much more able opponent. It spurted clouds of
paralytic gas, gnashed with grinding teeth and extruded waves of
spines that flew from its hide like arrows. Cairean and Grukk harried
it relentlessly, tearing huge chunks out of it, while the rest of the
party focused on dealing with the few remaining lesser spawn. But
despite valiant efforts by Perlapae and Sal, all did not go well.
Caught in a poorly timed combination of paralytic gas and a hail of
sharp spines, Timmeron fell into the waiting arms of Steave.

Greeted
by the calm serenity of that gentleman's sophisticated drawl,
Timmeron was offered a choice. He could walk away from everything and
go with Steve beyond the dark gates of death, or he could live again
if he was willing to pay the price. Should Timmeron choose to live
on, he would never be allowed to cure the strange ailment afflicting
his arm. In a moment of generosity, Steve decided to tell Timmeron
what was happening to him so that he could make his choice fully
aware of what he was choosing. Should the unfinished necromancy
spreading through his arm reach his heart, Timmeron would become a
lich. Of course, if Timmeron took Steve's deal, it *would*
*reach his heart. He could do his*
best to slow it down, but the cure would be forever out of his reach.
Perhaps the worst part of all of it was, thanks to the nature of
deals with Steve, that he would never be able to tell anyone, least
of all Elizabel, that his arm could not be cured. Deciding that he
could, quite literally, live with that (or not?), Timmeron shook
Steve's hand and awoke to the ministrations of Elizabel and his
concerned teammates.

The
fight itself as finished when the party remembered it had Murag's
Void Staff which would allow them to command the void spawn. Why it
took them so long to realize they had that staff is anyone's guess,
but they were able to use it to pause the attacks of the worm.
Shortly thereafter they were forced to direct it to attack the
gnarled horrors which, as it turns out, do not honor their agreements
at all. The pack of horrors finished off the worm but lost so many in
the process that they retreated, leaving the party to recover under
the waning light of the moon.

It
was during Grukk's watch in the early hours of the morning that a new
spirit approached the group. A small, pale apparition, it proved
quite mischievous, tossing the party's belonging around and playing
tricks on Grukk who eventually woke Perlapae to help him deal with
it. The rest of the party soon woke to Grukk's screaming. The small
spirit had apparently set his eyes on fire. Sal was able to end the
effect, though Grukk''s eyes still burned red and raw. He soon
discovered, though, that the trauma had not damaged his eyes but,
instead, transformed them. While they seemed to have permanently
turned red, he found himself able to see the forces of magic at work.
Karhanza seemed to think that he would also be able to identify
weakened areas of the dimensional fabric between worlds. Travize used
his connection to nature spirits to communicate haltingly with this
new spirit which seemed to have given Grukk his new eyes as a gift
and an aid against the void spawn. Tired from the encounter, the
spirit fled.

The
party finally realized that, having left to fight Murag with such
haste, they had not made any plans to get out of the jungle. Using
the Etheric Emitter Torch they managed to get hold of Captain Veller.
He agreed to pick them up, though it was far out of his way, if they
would help him in turn. Now that the Dragon Wing's had lost their
leader a second time, he thought it was the perfect opportunity to
take out their main base- the location of which he knew! The party
largely agreed, with some reservation, and he said he was on the way.

Taking
the opportunity to call in backup, the party took turns using
Baygrith's wonderful Emitter Torch to contact the leaders of their
homelands and try to convince them to lend their aid in the upcoming
conflict against the sky-pirates. While the Emitter Torch's somewhat
spasmodic reliability produced some both hilarious and inconvenient
restrictions on communication, it was effective. The party secured
the aid of Crag, Laputa and Amalgama, as well as the dubious, but
possible, aid of Kazamara, and the Coral Isles. Great Trench declined
to take the call seriously and Mura'kesz was openly hostile. Enjoying
the company of a recovering Elizabel, and with the possibilities
dancing on the horizon, our heroes awaited the arrival of Captain
Veller.