Mission: Make Safe the Path

Warring goblins and kobolds were making the road south unsafe to travel. The party befriended the goblin village by the river and convinced them to try to make peace with the kobolds. The kobolds agreed to make peace if their god agreed, so the party hiked up the mountain to meet their god -- a dragonborn monk named "Khatir". The monk agreed to help but instead of making peace, he destroyed the goblin village and commanded the kobolds to let travelers pass unmolested. The party was unhappy, but the mission was accomplished, so they headed home.

## Make Safe the Path (by Rheinhart)

Chipper Chappy, Vacuous Vacant, Dynamo Dando, Tenacious Takeda, and I volunteered to once more head towards the mountains to the east. Not in search of haunted ruins, this time, but to try and put a stop to the dangerous clan wars between the Rab Kobolds and the Yeetz Goblins. I once helped fend off a kobold ambush and scared off a possible goblin one, but haven’t really dealt with the situation, yet. Seems they’re making the road unsafe for travel and we’ve been asked to see if we could do something to make them safer “by any means necessary.”

Once we entered the disputed territory between the two tribes, we happened upon a couple of goblins that were patrolling / scouting / possibly laying traps for their adversaries on the side of the road. A couple of us were able to understand their speech (not I) and we managed to parlay with them and managed to convince them to take us back to their clan leader… or at least the leader of a single village between the road and the river that seemed to be of tactical importance.

Thankfully, their leader understood and spoke in a manner we could all understand and after a night of discussions and playing raucous music with them, we convinced them to write a letter to the kobolds and allowed us as intermediaries to try and broker a peace between the two tribes. Chappy was especially taken a liking to the goblin tribe as they are a likeable, relaxed lot.

As the only one of the party that could speak to the kobolds in their own language, I was elected pointman for making contact with the kobolds once we encountered them. I vaguely recall some plan to counter-ambush the kobolds, but it’s kind of hazy. My initial parlay with the kobolds ended with them attacking us and we showed them our strength of resolve and the might of our weapons in return. Two managed to survive, one of which we healed up so he could lead us back to their village with him proclaiming me as their new and rightful king.  I did like the sound of being called king!

Once we got to the Raab tribe village, many of them understood the common tongue so we could all communicate fairly well. Their customs and mannerisms seem a lot more civilized than the goblins, but it also made them more stoic and “uptight” as Chappy put it. They didn’t much care for Chappy’s brand of raucous music, but they really enjoyed one of the classics from my homeland. I even entertained some of their children with some of the magic I’ve been learning.

Another night spent waiting for their elders to discuss the Yeetz letter and terms of peace offered. In the morning, they decided not to decide, but instead defer to their god that lives at the top of the nearby mountain. It was SUCH a joy to hike up that terrible mountain in full armor and kit. Exhausting! At the summit, we actually met their god in person. I must say, I was NOT expecting that at all. He turned out to be a powerful green dragonborn monk named Khatir. He seemed annoyed by the worshiping kobolds and was fairly pleasant when we spoke at length with him about the situation.

Khatir bid for us to rest while he went down the mountain to ensure there was lasting peace between the goblins and kobolds so that Farhaven’s residents need not be concerned about the clan wars causing problems on the road. While he was gone and we rested at his little camp for one at the summit, we were attacked by the trees of the forest itself! Such a strange land this is!

Upon Khatir’s return the next day, he said he had dealt with the issue and we should not have any further problems. We thanked him and went back down the mountain. We thanked the kobolds and asked if they wished to write a letter back to the goblins since we’re heading back there to say our farewells and they looked at us as if we were crazy. We got a very bad feeling about that!

Rushing back to the goblin camp, the only one left barely alive was the likable goblin elder that wrote the peace letter. We healed him as best we could, but it was clear this village was done for. Everyone else was slain and all the huts were destroyed!  Khatir dealt with the problem, all right. He commanded the kobolds to stop attacking travellers on the road, but he also “dealt with the goblin problem” by just wiping out their village. We all had heavy hearts at this point and rushed back up the mountain to confront Khatir at his handling of the problem.

We confronted Khatir and let him know how disappointed we were in his decision to just wipe out the goblins after we had a peace treaty with them in hand. As a local to this region, he tried to explain to us how useless that was and the only way for lasting peace was the peace of the dead. It was difficult to accept his cold logic and ruthless efficiency at solving our dilemma and we very nearly came to blows over his handling of it. Chappy was even knocked out during our standoff with Khatir before we picked him up and left the summit.

To this day, I’m not quite sure *why* we left without it coming to blows, it just felt like the right thing to do despite our outrage over the deaths of our newfound friendly goblins. Maybe they were fair-weather friends only like Khatir painted them. Maybe they would have been trusted allies. What ifs are all that we have left. We returned to Farhaven victorious in that our mission was a success, but a heavy heart at the cost of the success kept us less than jovial upon our return.