- With the crossbowmen in the back and the raiders in the front, the Peas prepared a defensible position for battle
- While the raiders hammered on Yoxxel, Wander began shooting back at the crossbowmen that began firing down at the party and Phaelnah molded herself into the stone cliff side.
- Feeling the hurt, Yoxxel retreated behind the party and prepared something in her spell book as Leadbelly took the lead position. Grognock prevented the worgs from surrounding the back of the party as Seamus lopped one of the beasts’ heads off, and Tyerjon anxiously waited for his chance to strike as a horn blasted from the direction of the archers.
- Journey remained invisible for a time as Phaelnah contemplated life inside the cliff side and healed herself a little bit.
- Grognock began scaling the cliff side, doing battle with the crossbowmen as the hobgoblins and worgs converged on Leadbelly. After taking heavy damage, Leadbelly retreated slightly as Seamus headed to the front and Tyerjon released his frost breath upon the raiders
- As Grognock clocked one of the crossbowmen on the head, killing him instantly, Wander continued to attack the archers as Journey laid down a sleet storm, and Phaelnah freed herself from the stone.
- Phaelnah began healing the wounded members of the party as the enemy numbers began to thin from the efforts of the fighters. The commander of the raiders emerged, and seeing his men receive heavy damage, ordering a retreat. Wander cast grease on the ground, burning a few of the raiders.
- As Yoxxel laid down a giant ring of squirming, burning thorny vines, the group began to pick off the surviving raiders as they attempted to run, constantly slipping on the sleet and grease and burning in the hellish arena Yoxxel created.
- Grognock, after catching multiple arrows, throwing one back at a worg, and being thrown off a cliff, scrambled back up the cliff face with demonic speed. The hobgoblin at the top, seeing his allies retreating, began to climb down the cliff. Grognock attacked him with a flying kick, eliminating his neck from the material plane.
- As the remaining raiders fled, Yoxxel gave chase as the party recognized a new threat emerging from a back passage.
- The arriving group, identifying themselves as servants of Aeltra, demanded that the group surrender themselves as they unlocked some cages in the camp containing a smelly chef, some sort of priest, and a Sanarian guard, who gave Seamus a strange look.
- Bound by the Aeltran zealots, the party was led out of the camp, when suddenly Yoxxel returned, attempting a flying kick against the strange leader figure covered in a dress of leaves. She was easily knocked out and captured by a vine the figure manifested from the ground.
- The group was escorted through a number of narrow mountain passes, and deposited in a strange, out of place grove located amongst the dry rocks of the mountains
- They party was questioned briefly by the man covered in leaves, referred to by the others as the Speaker.
- Apparently on a mission, the majority of the zealots left, leaving only a young half-elven woman to look over the party
- Phaelnah spoke to the woman, learning that the zealots were in the area to destroy devils that they believe had permeated elven society in Tygarl and Hymnethas, and also that she is apparently the child of Inglis Alexander.
- Yoxxel awoke, apparently recognizing the young zealot, spitting blood at her and going silent
- Grognock convinced the zealot to allow him to heal Yoxxel a little bit, and she allowed him to do so under the point of a blade
- While the woman explained the process for converting heathens into creatures of the forest, or even trees, Wander and Tyerjon freed themselves from their binds
- The guard from before began yelling at Seamus from across the camp, and Seamus finally recognized him as Berik McCloisterberry, an acquaintance from his village who had joined the Emerald Guard.
- The group took advantage of the zealot’s distraction to free themselves from their binds, as Tyerjon snuck up on her and restrained the half elf.
- Leadbelly tied up the zealot, and Seamus stuffed her mouth full of peas to silence her.
- After freeing Berik, the priest, and the weird smelly chef, Berik continued to catch up with Seamus as the priest, a Frozen Priest of Patalir, took some of the pain of the party, offering it to his goddess
- The motley crew said their goodbyes to the restrained zealot, and with Journey recalling the way back through the maze of mountain passages, ended up back at the hobgoblin camp.
- Wander scouted ahead, not detecting any of the zealots near the camp.
- Phaelnah casted Pass without Trace, though the smelly chef man made a lot of noise regardless.
- The camp had been picked clean of resources, likely by the zealots.
- Making their way back down the pass, the party said their goodbyes to Berik and the others, and followed Yoxxel to a Zadaran temple, where she claimed they could stay the night
- The group met Yankaffa, a patient monk of Zadara that allowed them to stay in the temple for the night.
- Inside the temple was a large, deep crack containing some font of poison
- As the party rested, Seamus nearly fell into the crevice, as the party found that the flooring of the temple was slightly inclined towards the center, where the crack was. He was fished out by Grognock.
- Tyerjon elected to spend the rest of his night outside.
- In the morning, Grognock, Wander, and Seamus engaged in a meditative prayer alongside Yankaffa. He presented the three with a small Zadaran pendant, which Grognock took.
- Wander spent some time contemplating how to get the poison from the pit.
- He attempted to use mage hand to dip a vial in, but the hand dissipated after crossing the threshold of the pit, and the vial fell into the roiling poison
- Journey used her Wand of Yarn and Wander dipped the yarn into the pit, noting that the yarn soaked up the poison
- He then lowered his wizardly cloak into the poison so that it soaked it up, bought the cloak up and used his mage hand to wring the poison out into his vials
- Yankaffa was intrigued by Wander’s unique solution
- Leadbelly investigated the mysterious stone using his magnifying glass, peering into the enigmatic void of possibility
- Wander gave a vial of his poison to Tyerjon
- The group set off from the temple towards Hymathel in the morning of Endelshine 4th, spending a day on the road.
- By nightfall the group had reached the bottom of a large incline with a spire situated at the peak, which Seamus recognized as the delineator between the Tygarl and Hymnethas districts
Important things to note:
- The party is currently traveling with Yoxxel to Hymathel
- The group left the half elven zealot bound in the Aeltran zealot encampment
- The zealots are killing (suspected) devils in order to purify the land
- Mange has run off