Sairina's Tales of Heroism

*The evening Sairina and her party return to town, she gathers a group of any adventurers who will listen near the fire to tell the tales of the Old Coot they captured and brought back to town.*

So I'm sure you've been wondering about the old man we dragged back to town, and how the entire expedition went, so let me fill you all in.

The group of us set off in the early afternoon. We had my good friend **Artemis**, little **Elphim** who you might have seen around, the wood elf **Furious**, and... I mean, I'm sure you've heard of **Adalius** by now. He was there too. *Sairina seems a bit uncomfortable when mentioning his name.*

After purchasing some last-minute supplies, we all headed out North towards the **Fisherman's village**. I'll be honest, we put **Elphim** in charge of the navigating, but somehow we ended up going a little off course, despite the mountains in the distance. I'm not really sure what happened, but I'm not a navigator myself, so I left it up to the halfling.

Soon we reached a **stone pillar jutting out of the ground**. I know a few of you mentioned this before, but it was my first time seeing it. This was the one with the snake, spider, and wolf niches and a giant chest. I think something definitely needs to go in each of those holes but unfortunately we haven't seen anything that could fit. Be sure to let me know if you find anything, because I'm really curious. We did notice that there seems to be a spell of warding lock on it, which I think will hold until we find the three keys.

There was also a dead body floating nearby. I'm not sure what happened to him, but he'd definitely been dead for at least a few days. The stench was horrible.

Anyway, we continued on, trying to get back on track, and ended up hitting a **swamp pond**. In the large pond there was an island. Here we spotted a large Drake fighting over a dead body with a few giant wasps! Since **Artemis** is partial to dragons, we decided to help the drake and kill the wasps.

We all stood on the edge flinging spells and firing arrows at the giant wasps. However **Furious** decides to throw himself at these giant wasps by hopping across lily pads to get to the island. Honestly, it was so insane I had half a mind to go chasing after him! However, I was in my chain mail at the time and I knew there was no way the lily pads would hold the weight of anyone wearing armor.

Thankfully we were able to slay the flying beasts and save **Furious**, but then the drake decided to come after us! Quite a rude creature honestly... you'd like that he'd be grateful for our support. But I guess these beings aren't very intelligent.

Thankfully **Elphim** is quite good with animals, so she was able to convince the creature to leave us be. I wanted to have a quick look at the body the drake was eating, but I didn't necessarily want to start a fight with the creature we were trying to save. If you do stumble on **the large pond**, it is just North of the pillar, so you may want to check the body for supplies if the drake is gone.

That night we camped North of the swamp with the drake, and had a pretty uneventful night... if you don't count **Adalius** morphing into a vision of **Artemis**, and then climbing into his tent NAKED during his watch. I can't believe **Elphim** didn't say anything, but the next morning when I went into the tent to wake up **Artemis**, there were two of him... and one was NAKED. I honestly never really expected to see **Artemis** naked, but there he was, running out of the tent as the real **Artemis** screamed bloody murder. I mean, what is this? School days? *Sairina rolls her eyes.*

Anyway, the group headed off that morning. We decided to go straight North towards the mountains, since we weren't exactly sure where the **Fisherman's Village** was. I know, right? Everyone seems to end up there except us.

On the way there we ran into **the keep** I know I've heard mentioned before. At the keep we realized we were too far West, so we turned directly east.

Pretty quickly we hit the **Skeleton idol** I've heard a few of you mention. This was the stone pillar with what seemed to be an orgy of skeletons on it. As many of you know, I encountered skeletons at Borin's Folly and dealt with them quite handedly, especially with the help of **Artemis** and his ability to scare the undead. However, **Artemis** was really against us fighting these skeletons, and I'm not quite sure why. We got into a little debate about the whole thing, but he was adamant that we should find the Old Druid and bring him to justice and worry about these skeletons later.

As we were arguing, **Adalius** starting playing his flute very loudly. I think he was trying to attract the attention of the skeletons and force a combat. Honestly, he should've let us finish discussing before he jumped right in with his noisy flute, but I guess he can't really discuss anything with that missing tongue of his so... yeah.

Right as we decide to move on, we run into **Johnathan Corsair**, who apparently was one of the adventurers who originally looked into the missing fishermen. I was a bit suspicious of him arriving out of the blue, but **Artemis** said his sister **Alexandria** vouched for him. Well, if **Artemis** vouches for him, then he's welcome.

Once we arrived at the camp we entered the central structure which reeked of a dead body. I mean, wow, the smell was beyond horrific, so we spent some time cleaning out the dead and setting up camp inside.

This is when **Johnathan Corsair** brought out the journal from an adventurer detailing his experiences with the "Old Coot" druid and his "child" followers.

The next morning we set off to the **druid's cave** which is just West of the **Fisherman's Village**. We found it very quickly, and quietly entered inside. However, before we could get in the mouth of the cave, we were attacked by a young druid, an orc, and three cats the size of rats. We tried to reason with them, but they weren't interested.

We made very quick work of all of these creatures. When we were fighting the orc screamed *"Zuctomony"* but none of us knew what it meant... Does anyone here speak orcish? No? Oh well.

Anyway, we continued inside and found a cave full of wolves and a grizzly bear chained up. We distracted them with a few rations, and continued in.

The group of us made our way inside the cave on a path next to a small stream. But once we got further up into the cave, I heard some footsteps running away, and all of a sudden a giant wave of water hit us. Thankfully I was able to throw myself into the side of the cave wall, but almost all my companions were swept out of the cave in the wave of water!

I ran back to check on them, and then we healed up and continued back inside the cave... and were hit with another water wave! More of us were able to dodge the wave this time since we were prepared, but a few people were still swept out again. We later saw that there were dams upstream that a young boy had released on us.

Once we made it back inside the cave, we rounded a set of steps and found the boy, along with a few more giant wasps. Who knew there were so many giant wasps?

My plan was to negotiate with the boy and get him to tell us where the old man was, but before I had a chance we were attacked not only by wasps, but also by giant ants with swollen bottoms full of acid. Someone killed the boy before I had a chance to talk to him... not sure who it was. I was busy surrounded by ants that wouldn't seem to die no matter how many times I slashed at them with my sword. At one point I was completely surrounded by giant ants and wasps!

Right as I thought we had the combat in hand, **the druid** made an appearance and summoned not only two giant weasels, but also a swarm of scarabs. The weasels immediately started making short work of the party, and we looked to be in grave danger. So... I made a quick decision to save the party.

I took my sword and sprinted at the druid, who was all but defenseless way back inside the cave. Of course he immediately had his weasels and scarabs attack me, and I was surrounded by all of them. I managed to fend off their attacks, and dealt a punishing blow to the druid. he kept up a good fight, but when he saw what I could do with a sword, he relented and called off all of his beasts.

Thankfully we still had a few people alive and conscious to apprehend the druid. He admitted he was bested, and as a gift he gave me this magic shield! *Sairina holds up the fungal shield in her possession.*

While I wouldn't normally go for a mushroom shield myself, I know it has magical properties that will help me communicate with people telepathically! *Sairina hands out the shield for people to look at and pass around.*

Anyway, after the adventure we all made it home safe. **The druid** is here if anyone would like to question him. He did tell us about a **spiritual site** nearby with savages practicing human sacrifice. **Artemis** and I will be leading a party there eventually to deal with these evildoers if anyone is interested. However, I believe we'll need some experienced adventurers for this one, so if you're interested, please let me know and we can have a discussion about whether you're qualified to come with us.

*Sairina then pulls out a piece of parchment*

Now that I'm back I also made a quick map of my best guess as to where everything is. Let me know if you have any insight, and feel free to have a look. We can even post it in the tavern if anyone needs to see it.