It's time for annual Spring Festival at Meadowfen!  Every year on the first day of spring birdfolk and humblefolk from the town and surrounding countryside gather to celebrate.

As usual, there are competitions of strength, dexterity, and cunning.  The champions of these competitions get to travel with the hero Marcus Goldfeather and attempt to retrieve the fire from the eternal flame and bring it back.

Success means a year of good luck.  Failure means, well, social disgrace and a year of bad luck. 

This year saw several outstanding competitors.  Of special note were a group of four that stood out among all the others.  There was Dúnedain who entered the Hide and Seek competition and skillfully found the small Jerbeen who'd hidden in the local copse.  Snow was the only participant who was able to his Marcus two times.  Even more remarkable he earned Marcus' respect by evading over have of the blows Marcus tried to land on him.  The boxing match was an easy win for Cyrus the Black, he handily walked through the competition to earn the title of champion.  Perhaps most surprising was the victor in the Mr Meadowfen competition. Amichai Brecht sang a spectacular hymn, stunned the crowd during the swimsuit competition, and fumbled through the Q&A portion.  Despite that last little trip-up, he was hands down the most talented entrant and took the title of Mr. Meadowfen.

The next morning the party traveled with Marcus to the Eternal Flame.  He hinted that there were always some creatures lurking inside the cave and a few of the other competition winners declined to go inside once they arrive.  Undaunted, Dune, Snow, Cyrus, and Amichai went inside, crossing a strange circular entrance covered in runes.  Inside the cave they saw the flame on the far side and a few party members noticed a pseudodragon lurking in a fissure in the wall.  

Without warning, the party started shrinking, ending up about three inches tall.  With that, several rats, scurried out from holes in the wall and attacked the party.  At the same time the pseudodragon flew down thinking an easy meal had arrived.  At first the party was overwhelmed by these (now) huge rats and a pseudodragon that seemed the size of a real dragon.  They quickly adjusted their tactics, dispatched the rats (except for the one that dragged another dead rat off, likely for dinner), and focused on the pseudodragon.  Realizing this easy meal was actually putting up a fight the pseudodragon flew back into its "cave" and left the party alone.

After that it was a fairly simple matter of climbing up, lighting a torch from the eternal flame, and hiking back out of the cave.  A few moments after they climbed over the circular rune covered entrance, they went back to their normal size.  When asked, Marcus said that always happens.  It was some kind of ancient magic that no one seemed to be able to resist.

They party headed back to Meadowfen but had to camp for the night.  During the first watch Marcus had what must have been a nightmare and woke everyone up when he screamed in his sleep, "Don't open the chest!"  Snow asked him about it but all Marcus would say was that it happened in his early adventuring days up in the north.  Pressed further about what was in the box, all he said was, "Shame."

The next morning on the way to Meadowfen the party saw what was a huge dust or smoke column appear far away to the southwest.  Following that was booming shockwave.  They hurried the rest of the way to Meadowfen so they could drop off the eternal flame and then go see what the explosion was.

The party arrived in Meadowfen expecting the traditional triumphal entry that heroes of the festival usually get.  Instead everyone was worried about the explosion that had occurred, in the direction of Glenhaven.  

Leaving the torch lit by the eternal flame near the bonfire of the festival grounds, the party headed south following some Meadowfen residents who'd left earlier.  On the way they met this group coming back with some others from Glenhaven.  A huge explosion had wiped out much of the crops in the area.  They were heading to Meadowfen to put together some staples to help feed Glenhaven and hopefully find some grain to reseed the ruined crops.

The party continued on down to Glenhaven, curious about what had actually caused the explosion.  They arrived to find the town berating Nula, a young mapach.  Her rabbit Nibbles jumped into the well when the explosion happened and now the town was mad that their water supply would be poisoned by a dead rabbit.

Rather irritated that they were shouting at a child rather than climbing into the well, the party sprang into action and Snow climbed into the well.  At the water line there wasn't a dead rabbit but he did find a passageway that led toward Mokkden Caverns.  The rest of the party climbed down and they began to explore, following the rabbit tracks.

At first it was just a long rough passageway, well over a mile.  Then it opened up a little bit where the rock was more finished.  A couple of sticky slimes attacked the party but were quickly taken care of.  Another part of the cave had rudimentary sleeping quarters.  Everything was old, dust, and falling apart except for a blanket and some studded leather they found in a chest.

Continuing on they arrived in a large chamber with the back of it blown out revealing the devastated crops.  Inside the chamber were five or six creatures that resembled humblefolk (in that they didn't have feathers) but looked more like wild dogs.  Without hesitation they attacked the party.

Most of them used bows but one in the center kept trying to cast spells.  One of his arms was fused into a large rock, in fact there many of the large blocks of rocks (two to three feet square) scattered in the center of the room.  Some of those had body parts fused into them as well, but only bits and pieces like some of these creatures had been blown apart along with the rock.

The creature in the center never did cast a spell and when the tide turned in favor of the party, one of his own killed him before the party could.  It had been a tough fight, nearly losing Cyrus who went down in the middle of the battle.  Standing victorious the party noticed the rubble was beginning to glow purple.  Just as they began to run away another explosion happened and the party lost consciousness for some time.

When the came too the back wall of the cave had collapsed, making the large chamber a little smaller but now hidden from the outside.  Once they made sure everyone was all right, they looked over the bodies of the creatures and found a ring on the spellcaster and some silver coins on several others.  They also found the body party of another creature, an arm with a grayish purrple hue. 

Most interesting was an anti-magic zone in the middle of the room.  Whatever had exploded the first time had left a small (roughly) 20 foot cube where the weave couldn't be accessed.  Or perhaps the anti-magic zone is what caused the explosion.  The party wasn't sure.

While searching, Nibbles hopped out from a corner of the cave.  Clearly not a rabbit, it had the characteristics of several different animals.  Dune was pretty sure it wasn't a natural creature.

They cleared a small path in the rubble leading outside and took the amphibian looking arm and one of the other dead creatures with them.

Checking in with Glen Hedgewood, the mayor, he suggested they go see Evy Ashwood.  She was the most knowledgable person in the area and might now something about what these creature actually were.

The party left Glenhaven with the dead gnoll rolled up in the blanket they found and the odd limb they recovered in the cave too.  It was a two day trip to find Evy Ashwood's house with a stop in Meadowfen for the night.  

Along the way, a gallus named Adina joined the party.  She was looking for her missing chick and thought that wherever the groups was going was as good a place as any to begin her search.  

Before reaching Evy's House the party heard a low rumbling coming towards them.  Stampeding over the crest of a hill was a heard of buffalo.  The group tried to get out of the way, and most did, with only Amichai getting  trampled.  Dúne was surprised that the buffalo were so far south, they mostly stayed up in the north.

Evy was surprised that the Butchers of Meadowfen showed up at her house (really a stone tower).  When they told her what had happened at Glenhaven and of their adventures in the Wolpertinger Caves of Mokkden Caverns, she invited them in to have a look at the body and arm.  She didn't recognize either of them and said she would study them.  The party also showed her the ring they found so she cast detect magic.  It wasn't magical but the party (except for Adina) all glowed in transmutation magic.  They guessed it was from getting shrunk at the cave of the eternal flame.  Evy didn't agree, she know of that cave and what it did, and was sure it wouldn't leave that kind of a trace on anyone who'd been shrunk.

It turned out the studded leather armor and the blanket they'd wrapped around the dead creature were magical.  Evy went to cast identify but couldn't find the pearl she kept around for that spell.  She cast magic mouth and spoke a note to a farmer named Tam Loxwood.  His wife had a pearl necklace that they could borrow and bring back for Evy to cast the spell.

The party headed over to Tam's farm where he met them outside.  A very friendly vulpin, he agreed to Evy's request and brought out his wife's pearl necklace.  Being that it was covered in blood, everyone became a little suspicious.  At that point a creature appeared, it looked like those they fought in the caves.  A few party members had been charmed and didn't seem worried about it.  In fact Dúne wandered around back behind the windmill where he found two dead vulpin.  The creature asked a few questions and Tam could (mostly) understand it, interpreting for the party.  Having had enough, Cyrus ran up and attacked the creature. 

It cast several spells, one that churned the earth up around everyone.  Finally, Amichai cast sleep and they defeated the creature while keeping it alive.  Tam had been knocked unconscious and when he came to he wept uncontrollably over the death of his wife and the farm hand he'd hired.

• The party interrogated the creature with the help of Tam as an interpreter. 
• It called itself a Gnoll.
• Said it was scouting the area and had traveled from Camp 3.
• Said there were over 800 gnolls at the camp.
• Called Humblewood the Promised Land and said this was their new home.

It was getting late so the party went back to Evy with Tam and the gnoll.  The next morning they left to go find this camp and see what they could discover.  On the way they found some buffalo that were slaughtered and mutilated.  At the camp itself, there were less than ten gnolls left taking down tents from a huge encampment.  Most of the gnolls were Flesh Gnawers but there were a couple tougher Berserkers who would certainly put up a tougher fight.  The party stealthed around the camp taking the gnolls out one by one until they made too much noise, but by then half the gnolls were dead.  They dispatched the rest (not exactly an easy fight, but they won) and searched through the camp.

They didn't find much except for a map that was left behind, showing troop movements in western Humblewood.  It was clear all the major cities were about to be invaded.

The part spit up to try and warn everyone.  Cyrus went to Ashbarrow.  Snow headed to Winnowing Reach.  Dúne, Amichai, and Adina headed due south, stopping at Evy's on the way.  There was a gnoll patrol close by so Evy had them ransack both levels of her house making it look like gnolls had already been there.  She said she'd be fine and sent them on their way to Meadowfen with their captured gnoll.   

Despite their haste, the heroes were too late.  Each town had a large contingent of gnolls in them.  They were going house to house, searching for magic items, separating some bird and humble folk from their families, and making sure their superior strength and numbers were felt.  It did not look good for Humblewood at all.

For three months the party went their own way.  Cyrus stayed near Ashbarrow and took in folk escaping the gnolls.  Adina went back to her farm near Meadowfen.  Amichai went back to Meadowfen and working with Conicus again at their place of worship for Tyton.  Snow stayed in Winnowing Reach and aligned himself with others who actively opposed the gnolls.  Dúne fled with his family to the small forest south of Meadowfen.  They split up in different directions to find help, but Dúne stayed there picking off gnolls that wandered off alone.

The party found themselves back together where Dúne had been receiving messages and instructions from a mysterious "M" who was feeding him information about the resistance.  He'd been finding letters in a small hollow of a dead tree.  The latest message urged them all to go and find Marcus Goldfeather, he might not even know about the gnolls.  M provided a map to his house, several days northwest of Ashbarrow, and a plea to hurry. 

Staying off the main roads, the party had an uneventful trip until they had to travel though Scorched Grove.  They were attacked by pesky emberbats and two ash snakes that proved to be a challenge, which they overcame.  Later, off in the distance, they saw an Aspect of Fire that was (luckily) heading away from them. 

They had been traveling at a quick pace but it took a toll on Dúne as exhaustion piled up on him.  The group slowed down and reached Marcus Goldfeather's Home. 

They met a strig who claimed he was the brother of Marcus, who was off and would be back in a day or two.  The party didn't quite believe him.  He seemed quite dim-witted and weak, but clearly he wasn't telling them everything.

In the middle of the night the strig left with a full backpack.  The party followed him at a distance.  He entered a cave and lit a torch that had a strong smell of incense.  Inside the cave he started a fire and threw the backpack on it. 

When the party revealed themselves he was quite upset, said he just wanted to get rid of everything.  He threw the torch into some water, the smell went away, and moments later some slimes dropped on the party.  It was a challenging fight.  Whenever the slimes surrounded someone, they would take damage when the party attacked a slime.  Also, the strig, it really was Marcus, seemed intent on letting the slime kill him.

The battle finally ended, they regrouped, grabbed the backpack which was full of Marcus' gear, and went back to his house.  He explained he never wanted to be the Hero of Humblewood.  It wasn't him anyway, it was all these magic items.  He was tired of it and just wanted to be himself now, live out his life in peace.

The party argued with him but in the end felt that it was his choice.  He game them his magic items and agreed, if the Resistance ever needed to send someone his way, he would take care of them.

On the way back to Wolpertinger Caves the party stopped in Ashbarrow to see what they were building.  It was a sturdy complex, not quite finished, and likely a jail.  

In the courtyard they noticed an odd humanoid in stocks.  It was hairless and featherless like a frog, except for hair on the top of its head.  

While they were watching a gnoll came out, the commander of Ashbarrow, and brought a chair with him.  It was an odd scene with Gonu talking in an unknown language (not gnoll-speak) in a very familiar way and the humanoid never reacted to what he said. 

After Gonu left the party took the prisoner with them.  He barely reacted to them, but followed as he could.  The whole trip back to Meadowfen he never said a word.  He would drink water when it was put to his lips and they had to spoon feed him to get him to eat.

There was paper waiting for the party in the hollow of the dead tree.  They wrote back that Marcus had an accident and wouldn't be joining the resistance, but his brother was still there and the house was available if needed.

 A note shows up in the hollow of the tree saying a couple "jobs" need to get done:  

The party studied the note from M carefully, making sure to remember all the important parts, and headed to Meadowfen on the night of the 21st to create a distraction.  At first they considered a plan that would have created a distraction and kept them hidden, but instead they went with plan B.  Where Snow and Adina ran into the center of town claiming a patrol of gnolls was attacked by some Owlbears.  (Side note: despite being called owlbears there are no bears in Humblewood.)  Even interpreted loosely, this probably went against M's wishes of don't get caught, don't even be seen.

The gnolls brought out Tam to translate and he appeared quite nervous when he recognized Snow and Adina.  The gnolls gathered more troops and the commander, Tare-gat, went with them too, forcing Snow and Adina to show them where the attack happened.  

Snow faked a broken ankle and the gnolls left him behind.  Adina took the gnolls a little further and the gnolls became suspicious.  Tare-gat left to do some tracking himself and the rest stayed behind.  Amichai had followed them and when he saw them stop he cast darkness around everyone standing around.  Adina had seen him and gave Tam a heads up, but when the darkness appeared Tam didn't run.  Adina got away and went back to town with Amichai. 

Meanwhile, Dúne had been keeping lookout in a tree in town.  He noticed a wanted poster and took one with him.  When Snow got back in town they decided to go to Tare-gat's house to see what they could find.  They stepped inside and found it torn apart, someone had beaten them to it.  They spent some time trying to put the house back in order so it wouldn't be quite so obvious someone had been there.

Returning to town to meet up with Dúne and Snow, Amichai saw a stack of papers moving along the side of the street.  He watched it for a little bit until they went into a house at the end of the lane.

Back at their campsite, southwest of Meadowfen, Dúne showed Amichai the reward poster.  Amichai explained he hadn't killed Conicus, he'd watched Conicus be taken away by the gnolls, and he certainly was alive, somewhere.

Several nights later the party made their way to meet Mésis and buy weapons from the Thieves Guild.  M had warned them not to trust Mésis and make sure the weapons were of usable quality.  Although it was tense, the weapons were in good shape, for being of gnoll make.  All went well until there was a flare of light, like someone threw down a lantern, and then a fireball erupted.  

The party was caught in it, along with several of Mésis' people who were the only ones to die.  Snow immediately took off to chase down who had done it.  Dúne turned his attention to Mésis who was searching the sky with his bow out.

Snow, some of Mésis' folk, and a blind fire bolt from Adina that hit its target captured the suspected traitor alive.  Mésis explained to Dúne that there must be a spellcaster flying a mount, the broken lantern was a signal for where to cast a fireball.  While they waited for the traitor (a vulpin) to come around, the party talked with Mésis.  He offered to buy the Gnoll Ring Snow was wearing, only gnoll commander's wore that ring.  Snow declined.  

Mésis also offered his opinion that the gnolls were afraid of something.  He didn't know what, but he was sure of it.  In return for saving the lives of his folk caught in the fireball, he broke a brittle coin and gave them half.  If the party breaks it again he will meet them at this location in two days, or a representative of his will.

With that, the vulpin that had been caught came around and everyone turned their attention to him.  The were many questions to ask, but first, how did he know something was happening here on this very night?  

As the party questioned the vulpin it became obvious he felt pressured to work for the gnolls out of a fear they would kill his family if he didn't.  They offered him the choice, what would he do if they could spirit his family out of Glenhaven?  He jumped at the offer and the party began planning how this could happen, perhaps using Wolpertinger Caves, or perhaps getting everyone in town out from under the gnolls too. Dúne mentioned that his grandfather and brother were hideing out in Glenhaven, and the whole town had helped protect them by pretending they'd always lived there. 

There was also Marcus Goldfeather's Home as a place to take the people of Glenhaven, but keeping a village of 75 people fed would be a challenge. For now, they set the idea aside and focused on the current mission.

Mésis wondered how the gnolls even new to be watching this particular area and blamed the resistance for having an informant.  The party wasn't as convinced, noting the theives guild was built on being duplicitous.  

They took the weapons to Evy Ashwood and she had them hide it behind her house.  She look quite disheveled and more than a little distracted, they attributed it to the whole "Humblewood has been invaded" thing.

There was one more mission for the party to finish, raiding the caravan that went through Beggar's Canyon.  They dropped off Max with Cyrus and their unnamed guest and headed to scout the canyon. 

The party found the perfect place to ambush the gnoll caravan.  They dropped a boulder at one of the narrowest parts so the wagons couldn't pass and took positions up above.  The wagons came around the corner, with humblefolk and birdfolk on them, not a single gnoll was in sight.  There was no questions about disregarding their instructions from M, the party was not going to kill their own kind.

Still, they had quite a few questions.  Approaching cautiously, they asked the folk what exactly they were doing working for the gnolls.  They all admitted to being employed by the gnolls, saying it was the only way they could make money to feed their families and it paid well too.  The pick up sight was the Western Encampment the party had been to.  From there they would take the goods to Winnowing Reach.  Mostly it was food from the gnolls home world and went high ranking gnolls.

The party glanced at each other, several of them thinking the same thing; if they could find a poison, they could do some damage to the gnolls.  Before they could ask anything else two of the hedge and corvin accused the vulpin of being an actual collaborator with the gnolls.  After some interrogating and an extremely suggestive dance by Adina that charmed the vulpin, he admitted he had just wanted to make some easy money like anyone would have done in his position.  But, luckily, he promised to repent and never do it again.

One Zone of Truth spell later, they knew he would never keep his word.  Not wanting to be cruel, they cast sleep on him, Amichai said a quick prayer to Tyton, and Snow performed the actual execution.  As for the rest of the folk, they all agreed to help the party any way they could.  The boulder that had originally blocked the path would be their drop point to leave messages for each other.

With that, the party headed back to Cyrus who'd been waiting in the small forest they'd come to think of as their home.  Passing by Meadowfen (but not too close) they looked up a saw someone had used the spell skywrite and written a message, "Kuato Lives."  

Part I

At the hollow tree the party found two notes.  The first one thanked them for buying the weapons, unfortunately they were weapons that the resistance had stolen from them recently.  It was likely the thieves guild stole them and resold them too.  The last part of the note asked them to travel to the crossroads south of Winnowing Reach and meet up with other resistance members. 

The second note was scribbled quickly urging them to leave immediately for the crossroads and get there as quick as possible.  Someone or something needed to be escorted to Winnowing Reach, the opportunity may have passed already.  Without a moment to lose the party left, Cyrus going with them this time, leaving Max to stay with their unnamed guest.

Normally what would have been at least a three day trip, the party covered in half the time, several of them arriving exhausted.  They were met by a hedge who introduced himself as Quill Parkit.  After some awkward conversation and introductions trying to figure out if everyone was with the resistance, a cervan named George came out and looked them over.  He walked a little ways away and stood for a minute before returning and saying their descriptions checked out with M.

The party was led to a camp in the woods that was well hidden.  Along with Quill and George there were three other folk waiting for a package to be delivered.  Quill didn't know what was in the package, but looked at George when he said this like George might know and wasn't talking.

The party learned a bit more about the resistance as they waited days for the package to arrive from Saltar's Port.  The leadership of the resistance had been based in Alderheart but roughly three weeks ago the gnolls rounded up many of the members.  Much of the top leadership was captured or killed and the resistance was struggling to reorganize itself. 

Dúne asked about his father who'd left for Alderheart, Quill and George had never heard of him.  Quill do know of Dúne's sister in Brackenmill, he'd been very active in the resistance there.  He said she was alive when he'd left.

The party took turns sharing watch, day and night waiting for the package.  When it did arrive (by a humblefolk on horse) the group immediately left for Winnowing Reach.  Thanks to Snow's knowledge of bandit trails, they traveled through the woods making good time.  Along the way Dune noticed three gnolls were following them.  After a quick debate of whether to outrun them or kill them, the group set an ambush killed the gnolls without much trouble.

Everyone agreed, it was unlikely to be a coincidence that gnolls found them in the forest.  Quill asked if anyone had been identified as members or suspected members of the resistance, everyone denied it.  George came over and asked why Dune, Snow, Amichai, Cyrus, and Adina all glowed with transmutation magic.  They explained the explosion in Wolpertinger Caves which seemed to satisfy everyone.  

Quill called for a vote of whether to slow down and be more careful or continue a fast pace.  All agreed, fast was better.  Once it got dark they came upon some ruins and they stopped for a short rest.  Cyrus and Stitches (the other mapach) patrolled the perimeter while everyone else took a break.

It was quiet, with nothing suspicious happening when Stitches pitched forward, dead, with an arrow in his back.  Cyrus quickly pulled him back to the rest of the party who was nearby.  Stitches was hearty enough a single arrow shouldn't have killed him.  Quill did a quick examination as everyone got their gear ready to go.  There was poison on the arrow and Quill said the The Scorpion, the Scorpion, must be out there.  His voice shook, betraying his fear.

Part II

Quill sent the party north to draw off the enemies and planned on taking George and the others a bit south, hoping to regroup.  The plan partially worked as the party quickly encountered gnolls and attacked.  Half a minute into the fight there was a loud howl to the south and the three gnolls immediately left and ran toward it.  This allowed the party to finish them off just as a fireball lit up the sky.  Moments later George found them and he said everyone else was either dead or worse, captured.  They immediately set out for the spider ruins.

Upon arriving they were very cautious, searching the area as quietly as they could.  George said they were supposed to have some horses and wagons there for the rest of the journey to Winnowing Reach.  The party found the wagons hidden in some underbrush (no sign of horses), an old teleportation circle that had been covered up, and a rock in the walls of the ruins with the message, "For K" scratched on it.  George had stayed behind and when they went back to him they overheard him talking to someone, saying there must have been a traitor in the group.  When asked who he was talking to, he said just himself.

George inspected the rock with the message and suggested everyone stay a safe distance away in case it was trapped.  When he came out, he had two healing potions and one potion of greater restoration.  Someone had left these for them, or for the resistance anyway.  He also took off an arm band and gave it to Amichai saying it was an Armband of Healing.

They sat down to wait and talked for a bit.  George said the resistance suffered a terrible blow when everyone was rounded up in Alderheart.  Very few got out and he assumed someone had turned traitor and informed the gnolls.  When asked who his guess was, he said look to the survivors first, likely it was one of them.  George admitted, the resistance was pretty much starting over.

By now, the party wanted more concrete answers, and wanted to know if they could fully trust George.  Amichai cast zone of truth, and each party member stepped in and stated they never had and never will collaborate with the gnolls.  George did the same.  They asked him if he was talking to Kuato earlier and he admitted he was.  They asked what race Kuato was and he declined to answer, saying that the resistance preferred to keep that a secret for now, for safety reasons.

He showed them the item he'd been delivered, the Eye of Anubis, an artifact of the gnolls that the resistance knew was a sentient magic item.  The gnolls didn't know it had been stolen yet, and the plan was to get to Winnowing Reach where the resistance knew of an small anti-magic zone under one of their safe houses.  It could be safely hidden there and the resistance could decide what to do with it later.

A short time later the teleportation circle lit up and a corvum named Laney came through with horses.  He said Kuato told him George was here and ready to go.  He also said something had happened at The Avium, but he didn't have much information.  Whatever it was it had the gnolls worried, and nothing had been heard from Xander Zibbik.  George told him to get word to Kuato if he learns anything more, and Laney went back through the teleportation circle.

The party was off with the wagons going as fast as they felt safe.  Several were feeling exhausted from being on the run for over 24 hours straight.  A group of gnolls with chariots set upon the party.  Gritting their teeth, the party started killing the horses of the gnolls as the quickest way to defeat them and get away.  The last two gnolls were dealt with by Cyrus, who jumped onto their chariot and sent them flying out the back with a series of swift kicks and punches.  

After a long rest, the party snuck their way into Winnowing Reach the next night and found the safe house.  A group of four gnolls were carrying in what looked like cases of wine bottles, everyone agreed it looked like the safe house was compromised.  It turned out the gnolls were placing bottles of alchemist fire in the house which they lit and the house burst in flames.  The party moved quickly, killing the gnolls, Amichai used divine magic to put out the flames, and everyone quickly searched for the hidden door that led to the anti-magic zone.   It took a moment to find and they wasted no time getting the Eye of Anubis placed there just as alarm bells were beginning to sound.  Their mission complete, they lit the safe house back on fire and left town.

The party took George back to their camp south of Meadowfen and then showed him Wolpertinger Caves, as a possible new base for the Resistance.  Leading up to the caves were numerous signs written in Gnoll, warning everyone to stay away from the cave, it was cursed.  There were religious symbols drawn all over them too.

Inside the cave everything looked fine, because the game was running late and the DM decided not to have the roper attack which might have TPKed the party.  Opportunity lost, don't worry, there will be other opportunities.  Meanwhile, George like the look of the caves with the large meeting area and some places for quarters not too far away.  He also appreciated the anti-magic circle, which he thought the party should have mentioned when they realized the safe house was compromised.  The party looked at the ground, mumbled, and shuffled their feet.

The party had a few days to get ready for their first official mission for the resistance, destroying a weapons cache for the gnolls.  They hunted down and killed  rust monster and George took it to an alchemist who made a powder out of it.  With that and some alchemist fire they figured they would be able to destroy most if not all of the weapons they wouldn't be able to carry out.

Esme stopped by Wolpertinger Caves and showed them the posters that had gone up all around Meadowfen, calling all of them the Butchers of Meadowfen.  She also told them to get in touch with Mésis, he probably knew where the weapons cache was that she'd heard rumors about.

The meeting with Mésis went well, he wanted a meeting with Kuato which the party couldn't guarantee, but assured him they would pass the message along.  Not completely satisfied, he asked for them to steal a seal (a scorpion in the shape of an S) and the sealing wax from the tower where the cache was.  He promised it wasn't for his own profit, but rather to mess with the gnolls who were becoming a serious problem for the thieves guild.  The party agreed, but asked for access to the seal as well if they saw an opportunity.

On the way to the tower (north of Winnowing Reach) they came within sight of the main road that goes to the western towns.  A prison wagon and roughly 20 gnolls was on the road.  The party recognized Tam Loxwood and Buff Orpington in the wagon cage.  They followed the wagon from a distance and came up with a plan.  There were too many gnolls to take on, so Cyrus would sneak up to the wagon and give Tam a rock that Amichai had studied enough to cast Locate Object.  Everyone was pretty sure they were going to the prison in Ashbarrow, and the Locate Object would let them be able to pinpoint where Tam was. 

Cyrus stealthed up to the wagon without any trouble and gave Tam the rock.  Buff overhead him and passed along his journal, which he didn't want the gnolls to find.  It had all the information he'd collected over the years about the Lost Temple of Tyton.  He'd planned on searching the Isle of Tyton, but the gnoll invasion interrupted this.

Almost forgot, while the party was watching the gnolls Amichai started glowing a dark purple that got brighter and brighter.  It culminated in an explosion of light, much like what happened in chapter 02: Goodwill to Glenhaven when the remnants of the gate erupted in a last explosion of magic.  Amichai was unhurt, in fact he felt even healthier and heartier than he had before.

A day later the party arrived at the tower.  They waited until night and Adina sent her familiar up to the top of the tower to look for a way in.  There were stairs going down, along with a Wyvern.  The owl was able to explore several rooms, two of which had piles of weapons.

The party entered the tower through the second story windows.  They made their way up and realized there had to be secret rooms throughout the tower.  At the top Cyrus set the Wyvern free from the chains that kept it there and the party found a secret trap door.  Following this they came into a study where they grabbed all the papers and a map of Humblewood.  They also found the seal and wax that Mésis wanted.

Descending further the party entered a laboratory that had some poisons on a table.  There was also a weird alchemical skunk and a wall with a lot of arms that almost killed two of the party members.  Once that was dealt with, Cyrus unlocked a cabinet and they found the Bow of Reya that belongs to Dúne's mother, a Ring of Valor, and a Wand of Nystul's Magical Aura.

Exploring the tower a bit more they freed two folk that were the slave cooks for the gnolls.  They let the party know there were only four gnolls now in the tower.  The one in charge had left suddenly a week ago.  They also said the gnolls became rather lazy when the head gnoll was gone.

This turned out to be very true, all the gnolls were sleeping so the party took all their weapons and attacked.  One of the gnolls was able to summon hyenas, which was a bit of a surprise, but the party handled it quite well killing all the gnolls and not even saving one for questioning which wouldn't have mattered anyway because no one speaks gnoll.  So there's that anyway.

With that, the party finished their mission.  They took as many weapons as they could carry and destroyed the rest.

Part I 

The party headed south to look into what the gnolls were doing in Mokkden Caverns.  The resistance had rumors that they keep exploring the caves, but wasn't clear why.

During the trip South, Snow was contacted (via the Sending spell) by someone claiming to be Kuato asking how the mission went.  After a little back and forth over a series of spells, Snow felt confident the tiny voice was (at least) with the resistance, and he gave a report about how the raid on the tower went.  Also, over the several days of travel, Dúne, Cyrus, and Snow all had the same episode of glowing with purple light only to feel healthier afterward.

The party stopped at Amichai's childhood perch to check in on his parents.  No one was there and they did a quick search of the home.  It had been vacant for at least a month, there weren't any signs of a struggle, in fact a few essential things were missing like they'd left in an orderly manner.    

Amichai suggested they go to the small cave complex where his family harvested slimes.  All they found (other than a lot of slimes, as if there hadn't been a harvest in quite a while) was a jacket that was left behind with a letter from a neighbor.  The letter mentioned other neighbors had gone missing and described what obviously were gnolls in the area.  

Back at the perch  they settled in for the night and did a more thorough search.  On the back of a painting of Amichai as a hatchling they found a quickly sketched map that to an old outpost,  close to one of the major cave entrances to Mokkden Caverns.  Perhaps a clue left for Amichai?

The next day the party made their way to the outpost.  There were gnolls on the ramparts but they weren't keeping a close guard.  Cyrus and Dùne scouted around and saw at least 25 gnolls as well as an old teleportation circle.  Meanwhile, a group of gnolls entered the compound (with a humblefolk too) and a short time later another group left with a luma.  At about the same time, Düne sensed a portal opening up for a moment, in roughly the same direction the gnolls were headed.

The party headed in the same direction that the gnolls did and entered the caverns.  The first room they came across was a shrine covered in trinket offerings to the gnoll god, Anubis.  Düne could read a little bit of the writing and could make out the words of Promised Land and words of praise to Anubis.  

Amichai became aware that something invisible was in the room with them.  The party cornered whatever it was and it revealed itself, an odd looking stocky biped with long fur that hung off its chin.  It had on armor and was well armed, but took a defensive position and looked over the party.  They tried to talk with him, but didn't have a common language.  Cyrus picked up an Eye of Anubis trinket, threw it down and stomped on it.  The creature nodded his head and relaxed.  

They left the shrine and began exploring the rest of the cave system.  Soon they heard the distinct sounds of fighting.  Rushing forward they found the gnolls engaged with more of the same creature they'd just befriended, only some of them were large, over twice the size.  

The party joined against the gnolls and quickly dispatched them.  The large sized creatures (that for some reason the party was now calling Duergar) shrunk down to their "normal" size.  They picked up their dead as well as a few of the gnolls and headed to another cavern.  A portal opened up and they stepped through. 

The first Duergar they met paused and cut an insignia off his armor and gave it to the party.  Just as the portal was closing the party saw a different group of bipeds join the Duergar, they looked very similar to No-Name.  

After a lengthy discussion, the party decided to rescue Amichai's parents.  They waited until night and climbed over the wall, easily dispatching a guard.  It was so easy they decided to take all the other folk with them, a group of twenty or so.  Düne cast Pass Without Trace three times, which covered their tracks for a good three hours. They were pretty confident the gnolls wouldn't be able to find them.

It took several days to get back to Wolpertinger Caves where they left the folk.  They also show the patch to No-Name who grabbed it from Cyrus and began weeping.  He wouldn't give it back until Cyrus did a little scroungecrafting and made another one for him to keep.

After checking in with George and resting for the night, the party headed back to Mokkden Caverns to try and discover what it was the gnolls were looking for, or afraid of in the caverns.

Two days later the party found themselves exploring the caves again, this time going much deeper.  They entered a section that had an ambient glow from a sludge that trickled along the paths, sometimes getting a few feet deep, sometimes a few inches.

They encountered an odd plant and some gas bubbles that attacked them, but it seemed to be mostly annoying, nothing the party couldn't handle.

Part II

Exploring the rest of the cavern, the party  found a few piles of gold coins and some gems, nothing of much significance.  They came into a larger cavern and battled the Slime King, which seemed fairly anticlimactic after Cyrus punched-stunned him and then the party attacked en masse, taking him out before he ever recovered.  The rest of the slimes were defeated with ease.  They found a bit more treasure and a journal of some kind written in gnoll.  No one could read it so they took it with them.

They traveled back to the outpost where they'd rescued the folk.  It was deserted now.  An inner courtyard had eight gnolls that had been beheaded and in gnoll custom the heads were then burned.  One of them was the Captain who'd been in charge.  Looking through the rest of the outpost it looked like a faction had been either punished or overthrown, it was impossible to tell.  

Back at Wolpertinger Caves, George suggested they take the diary to Evy Ashwood and check in on her.  She'd been tasked with finding out where the gnolls came from and it had been almost a month since anyone had heard from her.  The party traveled for a few days and reached her keep.  Inside it was a mess with no sign of Evy anywhere, although they did find her cat but its whiskers were very odd, almost like tentacles.  Dúne detected some residual energy from a portal that had been opened within the last week.  Checking the area thoroughly they found a hidden door that led to the basement. 

A lab of sorts was in the basement.  The first section had water tanks, one held an octopus that had way too many teeth instead of a beak.  The next area was empty except for workbenches.  The last section had four large cages and Evy was hunkered down in one trying to hide.  She'd made herself a necklace that looked like a beard of tentacles.  While trying to coax her out, three spider-like creatures attacked.

The spiders had tentacles that lashed out and attacked, along with a more typical spider bite and slash.  Swarms of tiny versions of these spiders came out and began webbing almost all of the party members, making it increasingly difficult to move.  And on top of all that, the octopus climbed out of its water tank and blasted the party with psychic energy.

It was a difficult battle for the party.  Some of them became fully restrained by the spider swarms, a few went unconscious and were healed by Amaichi mid battle, but the party finally prevailed.  They coaxed Evy out of the cage she was hiding in tried talking to her.  All she did was babble in an odd language that the party recognized as the same that Yoda spoke.

They also found a journal that documented Evy's attempts at finding the homeworld of the gnolls.  She felt she'd found their world, but then became obsessed with discovering what the other creature was the party had brought her.  They'd found it (in chapter 02: Goodwill to Glenhaven) among the rubble of the gnolls in Wolpertinger Caves.  Evy felt she'd discovered the world this creature came from too, but that it might be the same world as the gnolls.  After that her journal became increasingly erratic, changing to a language they couldn't read.

The party took Evy, her weird cat, and the journal back to the resistance headquarters.  They introduced her to Yoda and when she spoke he recognized the language.  He appeared very concerned about her and they talked but it was hard to tell if it was each of them rambling or if there was an actual conversation.  When Cyrus showed him Evy's cat he looked it over very carefully  and took it back to his quarters where, out of sight of Evy, he snapped its neck.

Word reached the resistance, one of Kuato's lieutenants from Alderheart, Evelyn, is being held at the prison in Ashbarrow. The party needed to break her out before she they kill her, or worse, get her to spill secrets about the resistnace.  Snow knew Evelyn and was very eager to start the mission and rescue her.

Matty Goodberry was able to provide a map of the inside of the prison.  She was pretty sure it's accurate, but no guarantees.    

 The party travelled to Ashbarrow and spoke with Digger O'Greedy, a Hedge who helped build the jail.  He said their best bet was to dig their way in, he knew of a corner in a cell where the pavers weren't quite put in that well.  While Digger put together a team to dig a passageway, the party used the time to scout the jail out.  They also got Amachai into the Tender's Lodge so he could make notes on the teleportation circle.

Within a few days the party was ready to go.  As some added insurance they poisoned the food that was taken to the guards just before they broke in.

It went well on the inside except for the fact Evelyn wasn't there.  Tam Loxwood and Buff Orpington were in a cell together and guessed that Evelyn had been taken to a nearby barracks the gnolls used for interrogations.   

The party surrounded the barracks and could hear a gnoll asking Evelyn questions about the resistance.  They broke in and got Evelyn out but not before the gnoll could sound an alarm.  While the room was mostly bare, a map did catch the eye of the party.

It was a tough fight as the party regrouped and made an escape to the nearby woods, all the while Snow was shouting that this wasn't Evelyn while she insisted she was and they needed to get away before even more gnolls showed up.

Once they were safely away they took a moment to sort out what was going on.  Evelyn clearly knew about the resistance, claimed to know Kuato and wanted to speak with her.  At the same time she admitted she didn't know Snow.

Adina cast detect magic on her and it revealed she was under the influence of a Wish spell.  This stunned the party.  First, that the gnolls had a caster powerful enough to cast the spell.  Also, what exactly had been done to this strig to make her believe she was Evelyn.

All they knew was that she shouldn't get near Kuato, wherever Kuato was.  Maybe it was time to have a heart to heart talk with George.

Back at Wolpertinger Caves they placed Evelyn in the anti-magic circle.  Inside the circle she was confused and worried.  She said her name was Jenny, but remembered thinking she was Evelyn.  She'd been part of the Resistance and Ashbarrow, but had been caught.  There was a slight gap in her memory and then she remembers believing she was Evelyn.  

When she left the anti-magic circle, she went back to believing she was Evelyn.  For now, she'd have to live inside the anti-magic circle until they could figure out what to do.

It's been difficult to get messages in and out of The Avium, they've been doing their best to create magic items to help in the fight while they're under occupation.  Also, quite a bit of research about the gates has happened.

Rumors that a significant magical event has happened there, even the gnolls aren't sure what it is.

The party has been tasked with finding out exactly what's going on.  Xander Zibbik is in charge of the Avium, so keep an eye out for him.

Part I

Before the party left, Dúne spent some time talking with Yoda.  He'd been listening and learning his language (yodaling) and finally had a breakthrough (at Level 6) and was able to communicate.

Yoda said his name was General Dak.  He'd been an ally of the gnolls, fighting alongside them against a mutual enemy.  The gnolls betrayed his race and fled to Humblewood in hopes of leaving the enemy behind.  Yoda assumed this enemy would follow the gnolls to Humblewood.

Due to the skills of Snow and Dúne, the party traveled quickly to The Avium.  There they met up with their contact, a cervan named Oak.  He took them to the library which was covered in a shield of magic.

Resistance members and gnolls had gone through the shield but never came back out.  Sometimes Oak said you could see people inside, but it was hard to make them out.

The party went through and began their investigation on the first floor.  The first thing they did was set off a trap of poison gas.  Next they discovered odd bug like motes of light that were attracted to magic items.  These motes surrounded the party doing some damage, enough to be annoying.  They also ran into a jerbeen named Jackel who seemed a bit off.  Mostly he seemed irritated at being  found and ran off to a new hiding place.  Cyrus doffed his magic gear and snuck through the rest of the first floor.  Everything was in disarray from fighting.  All he found were two odd leaking creatures eating some dead gnolls.

Down in the basement the party was attacked by a biped creature that looked like it had been stitched together from different animals.  Cyrus stunned it and the party made quick work of it.

They found a scroll of Dispel Magic (cast at a 9th level) and the corpse of Dúne's father.  He'd been killed recently, but there was no way to bring him back.  Dúne took the body with him and the party went up to the second floor.

The party could hear sounds of someone fighting gnolls.  Dúne could sense a portal ahead, but something felt slightly off.  They ran into what was the laboratory of the library where the ground was littered with dead gnolls and folk.  Just as the party readied to join the fight one of the guards shouted, "Here it comes, it's happening again."

There was a flash of blinding light and the party found themselves back where they'd entered the library.  Their health and magic had reset as well to the original moment they walked in, and any items they'd picked up since entering the library were gone.

Dúne immediately ran down to the basement to look for his father, but he wasn't there.  Everyone went up to the second floor and spoke with the guards there.  In the back Xander was casting a spell trying to contain a magic portal that was out of control.  The guards said that time reset periodically with no real pattern.  If they could get some items, Xander thought he could close the portal down.  Others were searching for the items too, but none had come back with all of them.

• In the basement, a scroll of dispel magic. 
• 1st floor, a jerbeen named Jackel had stolen and hid a diamond (worth 1000gp).
• 3rd floor, the wand in Xander's desk.
• 4th floor, a potion of look from the hedge Belkara.

The guards had seen Dúne's father, he'd been trying to get the scroll in the basement for some time, but they hadn't seen him for a couple loops.  The guards also mentioned that "things" were slipping through the portal to different floors of the library.

The party went to the third floor and ended up fighting an iron golem.  Apparently the library defenses were active.  Although the golem hit hard, and could summon fiery creatures they'd seen in Scorched Grove, they were able to defeat it.  

A quick search (and solving a puzzle) the party found the wand that Xander needed.

Part II

After finding the wand time reset again.  Snow ran to where Jackel was hiding and the party convinced him they could end the time loop if he'd give them the diamond Xander needed.  He told them where he hid it and Cyrus and Dùne were able to recover it without a problem.

On the third floor Adina sent her flying octopus familiar that looked exactly like an owl in to Xander's office and was able to recover the wand.

They headed up to the fourth floor and found Dúne's father was on the floor and unresponsive.  One minor restoration later and he was alright, though a bit shaken up.  He was going to head down to the basement and try and get the spell scroll but Dúne convinced him to wait, the party was in much better shape to try it.

The fourth floor of the library was filled with gargoyle looking statues.  The approached cautiously and nothing happened until Amichai felt the urge to defend the library and attacked the party.  A few rounds later he shook it off and the next thing they knew Dúne attacked the party.  

While trying to contain Dúne they found Balkira, who was apparently insane casting random spells in random directions.  They found the potion of luck (Dune stopped attacking but Cyrus began moments later) and exited as quick as they could.

After checking in on the second floor (where they mentioned look out for the library defenses) the party decided to let time reset again.  This would let some of the guards who died a chance to survive.  In fact, some had gone insane (like Belkara) and had to be killed whenever time reset.  This would allow the other guards to subdue them, and hopefully save them.

With one last reset, the party was able to get all four items Xander needed.  Putting them all to use he was able to contain the magic that had gotten out of hand, close the gate he'd been trying to create, and end the time loop.

With that completed, everyone ran out of the library before the gnolls descended on it. 

A group of gnolls in Brackenmill reached out to the resistance and they're offering to help.  Someone needs to go meet with them and suss out what exactly is going on.  That someone turned out to be the Butchers of Meadowfen.

Camped on the way to Brackenmill they could hear a pounding in the distance through several watches.  They headed that way and came to a quarry.  In the bottom was a large mechanical suit with Stitches (the mapach 06: Escort to Winnowing Reach) sitting in the top of it. He was cutting out rock that were five feet cubes and stacking them to the side. Examining a bit closer it looked like he was partly integrated into the machine and had a glazed over look in his eyes.  

Inside an office was a gnoll that didn't have much information to offer, other than he was glad it wasn't him stuck in that thing.  The party took the gnoll with them, debated for a bit, and decided Stitches wouldn't want to be left like that.  They did a mercy killing and went on their way.

At Winnowing reach they met up with their contact, and Jerbeen named Juno.  That night he took them to meet Tisk who had reached out to the Resistance and wanted to meet with someone who was "higher up."

The meeting went well, although all she wanted to do was set up another meeting with her benefactor who was out of town.  She described him as a business-gnoll who hoped that folk in humblewood could live peacefully alongside gnolls.  After some casting of Zone of Truth and Detect Magic, the party trusted her.

The next day the party met Tisk again at a park dedicated to Ardea in a neighborhood that was completely controlled by gnolls.  The first gnoll families had moved into this area and the party pretended to be delivering food to be allowed in.

Tisk said she'd contacted Clawmark, her patron, and he could meet them at midnight in the garden of heroes.  

That night they went to the garden, a hedge maze with statues of folk from Humblewood.  At the Center Clawmark waited for them and Cyrus immediately recognized him as The Scorpion, having seen him briefly in battle (Chapter 6).  

The Scorpion didn't recognize them and the party deceived him into thinking they could arrange a meeting with Kuato in two days.  The Scorpion agreed.

The party picked a spot for an ambush and took The Scorpion there.  He had several gnoll guards with him and they all agreed to give up their weapons to meet with Kuato.  Once they did this, the party attacked.

The guards weren't very difficult to deal with, but the Scorpion, even with his poisoned blades taken away, proved much harder.  Whenever someone scored a particularly damaging blow he would disappear into shadow and a shadow beast would take his place until it was defeated.  Then The Scorpion would appear again.

At last it looked like they were about to defeat him when he pressed his back into the rock wall where they'd pinned him and he melted into the stone.  Adina was familiar with this spell and new it could only last eight hours, but he could emerge at any time.  The party set up a watch and waited.

After the full eight hours The Scorpion appeared again having long rested.  He was at full power and the fight began all over again.  Although Cyrus went down at one point the party was able to defeat The Scorpion with Amachai using his spiritual weapon to deal the killing blow.

There have been some grizzly attacks on gnolls in Saltar's Port which is probably why the town is under such a harsh lockdown.  The Resistance sent a cell down, they made initial contact with another rebel group, and then nothing else was heard from them.  The last message of the cell said the leader in Saltar's Port goes by the code name, Chicken Tender.

Maybe a more experienced group can deliver some answers.

Before the party left for Saltar's Port, Amachai helped create a teleportation circle with Xander and Kuato.  This was the first time they met Kuato, a jerbeen who travels around hidden in George's breastplate.

The party began the trek to Saltar's Port, sped up by Dúne and Snow's skill.  They went through  Marshview and checked in with the Resistance there.  Amachai learned the runes for the teleportation circle, but it was underneath the rubble of a collapsed building so travel to and from it has to be done prone.

A day from Marshview the party got a message from Kuato saying that Ashbarrow was in open rebellion, get there as soon as possible.  Backtracking as quick as they could, the party teleported from Marshview and joined the battle.

Many folk had already died and the gnolls were gaining the upper hand but the party was able to rally the town and defeat the gnolls. Also, Amachai cast Moonbeam, but there were no shapechangers in the battle.   This was the first town to be liberated.

After a rest the party headed back to Saltar's Port teleporting to Marshview.  Two days later they came to the main road leading into the city.  On each side of the road, for over a mile long, folk were crucified (Sparticus style) and left there. 

A group of gnolls were making four folk construct their own crosses.  The party dispatched them without any trouble (Also, Amachai cast Moonbeam, but there were no shapechangers in the battle) and received a tip from the folk they rescued.

The city was under terrible persecution.  Papers were required to be carried if you were out of your neighborhood.  And the resistance was fighting back just as fiercely too.  

Hops, a luma they rescued, asked for the party to find his family and tell them he was alive.  He also suggested they enter town through the sewers at night.  The town walls were fortified and air patrols went by regularly.

The party went through the sewers as suggested and found their way to a room with giant gears turning.  These were what operated the elevators that moved goods up and down the cliffs from the port.  Also in the room were some werecrocodiles that attacked the party.  It took some work but the party defeated them.  Also, Amachai didn't cast Moonbeam, even though there were shapechangers in the battle.

With that, the party climbed up onto a deserted street in Saltar's Port.  

Part I

(Click here to skip to Part II)  

The party emerged from the sewers in the middle of a neighborhood and were immediately attacked by small orbs of light that drained their health, what felt like permanently. In the middle of the battle a mapach opened his door and motioned them inside.  They killed the last of the orbs and ran into his house.

His name was Bob Tail and he was happy to help them out and tell them what he knew.  The orbs traveled throughout out the city and attacked whoever they came across, even gnolls.  They wouldn't enter a building though, so gnolls made everyone leave their doors unlocked so they could run inside any house if they needed to.

Bob knew about the resistance but didn't know anyone who was involved.  He also cautioned the party about being seen during the day, the gnolls would eventually ask to see their "papers" and would be arrested when they couldn't produce any.

All the party knew was that they were looking for Little Wing, no idea who they were or where they might be.  They decided to use the rest of the night to look for him/her.  Since all houses were unlocked, Cyrus went in and woke up the inhabitants and asked if they knew Little Wing.  It took quite a few tries, but they finally got a tip.  Go to the market and ask for Little Wing and they would be contacted later that night.

Before going to bed they searched for the market, keeping an eye out for the orbs, or Night Wanderers.  They didn't run into those, but did come across two gnolls on patrol.  They weren't sure what to do when they heard a spell being cast and the gnolls fell down asleep.  A hooded figure went to the bodies, seeming to check on them.  Dúne stepped out of hiding and the figure waved him off, then ran away.

Moments later some Night Wanderers appeared, five or six.  They attacked the gnolls, who woke up, but it was already too late, their life force was drained and they quickly died.

The next day Amachai went to the small market, there were only three folk selling anything.  He tried his best to look like he belonged there but his best was an abysmal failure.  Asking all the folk if the new a Little Wing he attracted the gnolls attention.  They sent the merchants off and surrounded Amachai frisking him when he didn't produce any papers.

One sleep spell later and Amachai ran away as fast as he could.  More gnolls poured out of the barracks blowing whistles and sounding an alarm.

Other members of the party followed the merchants from the market, but didn't turn anything up.  That night, a butterfly came to Amachai and told him to meet Little Wing north of the market.

A jerbeen met them and took them to a small shack with a hidden trap door.  They went down to a small room that had been dug out.  Little Wing told them Chicken Tender would meet with them, IF they proved themselves by helping the Saltar's Port Resistance (SPR) with a small problem.

An Inn had been taken over by the gnolls that was an ex-thieves guild hideout.  The SPR wanted the party to find the hidden rooms, locate the teleportation circle, and if possible, make sure the gnolls never went into the Inn again.

The party lost no time getting started.  They watched the Inn for a day and crossed the river to it that night.  It was empty except for two gnolls that had passed out drinking.  In the basement, behind a barrel, Dúne found a hidden door.  They went through and into a nicely furnished cave system that had been deserted for some time.

While exploring they came across bipedal fish like creatures cowing in the corner.  The party tried to talk to them, but they seemed more animal in nature.  Meanwhile, behind the party, a creature with seaweed tendrils crawled out of the water and attacked.

Of course, Cyrus stunned it, and the DM was left to watch as the party pummeled it to death in short order.  Once it was dead the fishy creatures stampeded past the party and into the water.

When the party walked back into the room there was a cervan sitting at a table.  He'd been watching the whole encounter unfold.

It was an odd conversation as the cervan slowly dropped hints as to who he was.  He claimed to be a dragon from another world.  He'd been pulled through one of the gnolls Gates and had decided to stay in Humblewood for a while.  He really wanted to meet a dragon from this world, promising a favor if they found one and told him about it.

The party dubbed him Q and he didn't seem to care if they called him that or not.  Q showed them to where the Teleportation Circle was hidden and said the Resistance was welcome to use the space, although he'd probably be there on occasion.

With that, the party went back to the inn, dumped out all the hard liquor they weren't taking with them, and lit the place on fire.  It went up in flames quickly and burned throughout the rest of the night.

It was time to get some sleep.  The party should be meeting with Chicken Little the next night, if they hold up their end of the deal.

Part II

The party woke up the next morning to the gnolls having gathered each neighborhood together.  In retribution for the inn being burned the night before, two folk from each neighborhood were burned alive in a pyre.  The party wanted to take action right away, but the numbers of gnolls present would only lead to their inevitable deaths.

That night they met with the Chicken Tender.  The talk immediately turned to folk who died that morning.  "Casualty of war," Chicken Tender said.  This did not sit well with the party.

Adina stepped forward, "Is that you, my little Chicken Nugget?"

"Wait, I thought his name was Chicken Tender," the DM said.

"No, it was Chicken Nugget," Adina said, "but I like Chicken Tender better."

"That's right," Chicken Tender said, "I changed my name so the gnolls wouldn't know who I was."

He asked about his brothers, Quack, Squawk, and Whack.  Adina told him they had all died at the hands of the gnolls.  This sent Chicken Tender into a fury, raging around the room at this news.  Dúne stepped up and said, "Just another casualty of war."  Chicken Tender eyed Dúne, but said nothing more.

Despite their differences, the party and CT began talking about next steps in Saltar's Port.  They quickly began planning to take out the Commander and all his Captains.

They all met together every morning for a briefing in an Opera House.  The party started watching the briefings, hidden in a balcony.  All the captains and some of their staff showed up every day. 

The only catch, they would need to wait until the wizard was out of town.  CT described him as an immensely powerful wizard, had seen him actually cast a spell that stopped time.

Five days later their opportunity came.  They snuck in that night and Amichai cast Glyphs of Warding in several spots while Dúne rigged some ceiling tiles to fall.  In addition to this, Little Wing would join them and add her spell casting ability to the fight.

It was a well executed plan.  Hell and fire (balls) reigned down on the gnolls as Snow focused on Garek Grimehead. Cyrus dealt strategic blows throughout the ranks and Dúne worked as a sniper from the balcony.  Amachi cast spirit guardians and added to the chaos on stage with Garek while Adina cast a variety of spells taking whole swaths of gnolls out of the fight.  Looking back, it was more of a massacre than a fight, and very satisfying.

Word went out and the town immediately rose up against the rest of the gnolls.  Some were put up on the same crosses folk had died on, others were tied to a stake and burned to death, it was a grim retribution as Saltar's Port took their freedom back.

The party joined in for a while and then made their way to The Wizard's tower.  It took a dispel magic from Little Wing to get them inside.  They explored five floors, finding some interesting items and a treatise on psychic damage that had been heavily annotated.  

At the top of a tower was a large crystal that Adina cast identify on.  If energized by a spell it would take them to the next level in the tower.  They did this and it was an empty room with eight other rooms connected to it, and another crystal in the center of this room.  Suspicious of what all this was, Adina cast identify on the crystal.  This time, it opened small portals in each room.

With no other choice, the party readied themselves.  The portals opened and for a moment nothing happened.  They recognized several of the portals to different parts of Humblewood.  Then, creatures emerged from nearly every portal and moved toward the party.  Overwhelmed, they began defending themselves but it didn't look good . . . 

As the battle began, Amichai heard the voice of Tyton calling to him.  At first he thought it was a call to the grave.  Further into the battle it became clear, Tyton had opened a path through one of the portals, one that would provide an escape.

It was clear the party could not defeat this many creatures.  They rallied and retreated the the portal that Amichai indicated, a hundred foot drop into snowy mountains.

Part I

The party fell through the portal in the Wizard's Tower and into snowy mountains well above any tree line.  Snow's best guess was somewhere in the central range of the Crest Mountains.  

After reviving a couple members who didn't do so well with the 100 foot fall out of the portal, they set about finding a good spot to camp for the night.  The DM waited patiently for Adina to cast Leomond's Tiny Hut, which he swore she tried to cast in a previous adventure, but maybe not.  Instead the party created a fire from the torches they had and huddled up for the night.

Amichai woke up in the middle of the night, having had another dream of Tyton calling to him to head north and cleanse his temple.  He got up and was going to leave right at that moment, but the party convinced him to finish resting for the night and they'd all go with him in the morning.

After a breakfast of a goodberry from Dúne, they party headed north.  It took half a day's travel and they came to an ice cliff with what looked like an entrance or at least a shelter of some kind about a quarter mile up the side.  It looked like a rough climb up the ice to get there.  The DM waited for Adina to use her magical bagpipes to fly up and secure ropes for the party, but alas, she didn't.  Instead Snow made the treacherous trip up and helped the rest of the party up on ropes.

There were two huge doors with the symbol of Tyton on them, frozen shut.  They cast some spells to melt the ice and then Snow and Dúne pulled one door open.  They walked into an entrance hall of a massive temple.

Shrines to other Humblewood gods were off to each side of the hall.  The further in the party went, the more they felt the coldness grip them and definite sense of dread.  Finally they reached some double doors, opened them, and went through into the main chamber.

The floor of the immense hall was littered with bones of folk, a foot deep in places.  They approached the altar of Tyton cautiously, ready for anything.  When they were close, a creature appeared, tall and lanky, almost a skeleton but with skin stretched tight over it.

It called itself The Mouth of Tyton, saying that Tyton and Ardea had been reborn and demanded the party abandon the old gods and worship the new.  Of course, none of the party were putting up with any of that kind of crap talk.

The Mouth planted a staff with a desiccated sun and moon hanging off it, he disappeared, and all the bones on the floor began to morph into creatures.

Twenty or so skeletons kept trying to drag party members into alcoves on either side and four more undead creatures appeared around the staff to defend it. One alcove reeked a rotten death smell, and the other had poisonous vines all over the floor.

Amichai tried to Turn Undead and the staff kept him from being able to access that power.  A few moments later, The Mouth reappeared and joined the battle.

Dúne was able to grab the staff off the altar which freed up Amichai to turn undead.  But by that time the battle was clearly in their favor.  Snow how brought down two massive smites on The Mouth and though he teleported into the hallway to get away, Snow was able to overtake him and cut him down with a final smite.

The rest of the undead creatures were dealt with and the party took a moment to gather themselves.  They expected the sense of dread and feeling of necrotic energy to have gone, having defeated their enemies, but it was still as oppressive as before.

Part II

The party scouted around the room and found a hidden staircase in the altar.  They descended into a much older section of the temple filled with a putrid amber colored air.  They would discover later that the air was slightly toxic, making it impossible to long rest as they took small amounts of damage over each hour.

They began exploring discovering some traps along the way, along with a variety of creatures, not all of which were aggressive.  The Lord of Snails was helpful, directing them to a hidden passage to the north.  He said the north was where they'd find Tyton, who was always fighting with Ardea.

Amichai began to liberate the temple of any gems and coins he ran across, claiming Tyton would not want any of this to remain in the defiled temple.  

The most annoying creatures (other than the undead mapach the party woke up) were some beetles that swarmed and glittered a prismatic rainbow which stunned several party members.

Part III

The party continued to explore, discovering a few traps here and there, setting some traps off here and there. Snow briefly fought a copy of himself, but he got off the first smite and, of course, that was that.  Cyrus got his arm caught in a trap with needles slowly extending toward his hand.  That caused a flurry of activity trying to get him out.  The party ended up with a fancy ring and Cyrus kept his hand

In another room they thought they had found the source of corruption, a statue of a large giant like creature made from different parts of humblefolk and birdfolk.  After they destroyed it, nothing had changed.  

At the other end of the chamber the party found a glowing well of odd liquid that covered Dùne's face when he tried to drink it, and he began suffocating.  The same thing happened to Amichai when he jumped in the well.  They finally figured out that moving into total darkness allowed them to get rid of the viscous covering.

Above the well there was a hole in the ceiling leading up to a room with a grumpy Oni.  The party would have left it alone but there wasn't any of the poisonous gas there.  They knocked the Oni unconscious but he escaped just a little later.  Hopefully there was no hard feelings over the whole thing.

Everyone finally got a long rest and felt fully refreshed in the morning.  They continued exploring, fought off a brood of ash snakes (rather easily) and found some stairs going down, deeper into the oldest parts of the temple.  It definitely felt colder and fouler as they began to descend.

Part IV

The lower level felt much more tainted and the air was even more toxic.  The party explored this level, found some yellow mold, an odd mirror, and set a messenger of the gods free (who was quite appreciative and handed over a nice Periapt of Wound Closure.

Another room had an odd diorama covering the whole floor.  Different areas seemed to have magical effects that slowed the party down for a bit, but eventually everyone stayed on the path and jumped down a hole in the center of the room.  This was a chute that led to the lowest part of the dungeon.

A long hallway led to an unfinished cave.  Waiting inside was a zombie beholder that claimed the title of the new god Tyton.  Just as the party finished it off a beholder appeared saying she was Ardea, saw the body of Tyton and immediately attacked the party.  Although this was a tougher battle, the party ultimately prevailed.

Upon the death of of the beholders the party fell into a trance as Tyton (the real Tyton) blessed them with a vision.  It was clear now what the gnolls were fleeing from, and that these creatures were already on their way to Humblewood.

The party made their way back up to the first level of the temple where they were greeted by the messenger they had freed earlier.  It said they could ask three questions of Tyton and he would bring back answers.  Also, each party member received a divination blessing (each player rolled a d20, and can use that roll for any d20 roll made in the game, declared before the actual roll).

The party went to Wolpertinger Caves for a meeting with the leaders of the Resistance and talked about what the vision from Tyton revealed.  The gnolls are the pressing problem, but scouts are being sent out to look for any signs of mind flayers.  

Kuato reported that the gnolls seem to be consolidating their resources toward the east.  Alderheart, the Avium and Brackenmill are solidly under gnoll control.  Along with Saltar's Port and Ashbarrow, Meadowfen gained independence too.  Marshview and Winnowing Reach are the next focus for the resistance.

The Resistance agreed that the party should seek out the artifact on the Isle of Tyton.  On the way, they can look into the death squads in Brackenmill.

The Brackenmill resistance leader Nico greeted them when they arrived and introduced them to his second in command, Corvin.  They told the party about the death squads, Corvin being the only one to survive an attack by hiding and waiting it out.

The squads have attacked resistance members as well as those suspected of being in the resistance.  Their shields have an emblem of a scorpion on them, reminiscent of The Scorpion's talisman when he was alive.

The party decided to go speak with Tisk who's been under arrest since the death of The Scorpion.  Even though folk aren't allowed in gnoll town anymore, it didn't stop the party.  Adina and Cyrus made their way inside and spoke with Tisk.

She'd heard The Scorpion talking about beginning the training of the death squads.  She knew the plan was for them to travel in groups of five or six, often with an arcane caster. 

She asked Cyrus and Adina to take her with them, she still wanted to help the resistance.  The only reason she was being kept alive was because her father was Tork Mukluk, the commander of Brackenmill.  Her "servant", Madricen, wanted to join them as well.  Cyrus and Adina said not now, they'd be back.  When they told the rest of the party about all this Düne was amazed, they'd found his sister whom he'd forgot all about until the DM reminded him.

The next morning the party investigated the sight of another attack at an abandoned bell tower.  Suspecting a trap, they guessed right.  They ended up killing three gnolls, including a spell caster, but some others got away.

Nico said only three folk knew about this particular cell, so one of them must be a traitor.

The party went and spoke to each of them using a zone of truth spell.  Wyandotte turned out to be a spellcaster who'd hid that from the resistance.  Likewise, the vulpin, Austis the Mute was a sorcerer and wasn't exactly a mute.  Aldrich Ames, a corvin, wasn't a spell caster.  But he was a bit touched in the head, keeping a gnoll in his closet to torture.  He seemed to have a whole list of gnolls he wanted to do this to.

All of them swore under a zone of truth they weren't the traitor.  This left the party wondering, could it possibly be Corvin, the second in command?  The only folk who has survived a death squad attack.  It is certainly suspicious. 

While doing all of this, Amichai had the foresight to turn the dead gnoll that Austis had in his closet into a zombie.  They threw a cloak over it and had it walk into the gnoll encampment and start attacking.  It was quite enjoyable to watch, Aldrich in particular enjoyed himself.  Probably too much.  It caused so much of a comotion Tork Mukluk came out to see what was going on.  They were clearly disturbed on of their missing gnolls had returned as a zombie.

The party went to Niko and Corvin and put both of them under a zone of truth, which they passed.  They debated for a while whether there was an actual traitor, with Niko insisting it had to be one of the folk they'd already interviewed.

Going back to them, they cast identify on Austis and Aldrich (they'd done this to Wyondette earlier).  Austis checked out all right but Aldrich was very cagey about this being done to him.  He eventually agreed and it was clear, that like Jenny, he was under the influence of a Wish spell.

The heroes confronted him and he offered to make a deal.  If they let him live he'd tell them the location of the teleportation circle that the Scorpion Squads used.  They agreed and he drew them a map.  He also said a gnoll wizard had cast the wish spell on him, he didn't know the wizard's name, and turned him into a birdfolk.  Also, Aldrich mentioned the wizard couldn't ever cast wish again.  Something happened when he did it to Aldrich and he "burnt himself out."  

A quick side note:  Amachai sent another zombie gnoll into the gnoll barracks.  It looks like they're getting a little jumpy about this.

The party handed Aldrich over to Niko and headed to the teleportation circle.  They found the remnants of the squad they'd encountered the day before and engaged them.  Shortly after the battle began, the teleportation circle lit up and a fresh squad teleported in.  It was a vicious battle that taxed the resources of the party.  They eventually gained the upper hand (claw?  paw?)  and defeated both Scorpion Squads.

Buff Orpington is convinced the Lost Temple of Tyton is on the island.  Turns out he's an idiot. 

The party found the Lost Temple of Tyton, and were told to seek out a magic item on the Isle of Tyton.  The exact words were, "Visit the Altar of Ardea on the Isle of Tyton and you'll find help there."

Before leaving Brackenmill, the party helped Tisk and Madricen escape from the gnoll's house arrest.  They are now safely with Nico and the resistance.  

The heroes traveled north along the coast for four days.  There were a few encounters along the way, sending some wolves away from a stag they were trying to kill, chasing down some of the gnoll's hyenas that seemed to be running in packs through the woods.  

When they arrived at the coast they came upon the rotting remains of a kraken that had washed ashore.  They could smell it from over a mile away.  Once they were close, they could hear a moaning coming from inside of it.  Adina sent her owl familiar in and in the belly of the kraken was a whale that was barely alive.

Amachai did some healing, Snow cut through the kraken to get rid of the acids in the stomach, and Adina animated some of the detritus in the stomach and lifted the whale out and into the sea.  Sitting outside the kraken was a small jerbeen with very rat-like features.  He introduced himself, Ratagast Noblewood, and thanked the party for rescuing the whale.  It was obvious he was a druid of some power and knew of the party's travels over the last few days.  He knew nothing of the gnolls (let along the mind flayers) and the party brought him up to speed.

He promised to help them get to the Island of Tyton so they could continue their quest to find the artifact at Ardea's temple.  "Hang on," Amachai said, "this is really confusing.  It's Tyton's island but Ardea's temple?  What's up with that."  "Give me a break," the DM said, "I named the island before I came up with the adventure and you'd just found the Lost Temple of Tyton so I changed things here to Ardea.  Also, you're character is dead, now shut up."

Ratagast convinced the whale to help the party out and the next morning they sailed out to see on a raft that Dune built and climbed on board the whale, which had a very handy deck attached to its back which made the trip quite enjoyable.

Well, quite enjoyable until a junior kraken tried to pull them into whirlpool.  It was just a minor setback, nothing the party couldn't handle.  They got dropped off at the island and the whale left before they could even ask it to wait for them.  It was late in the day and they slept inland just a bit.  In the morning they made their way to a high point and surveyed the rest of the island.  They didn't see anything that looked like a temple, but there were clearly two villages.  One in the trees to the west and one in a clearing to the east.  They decided to head to the western village, assuming it would be birdfolk there.

Cyrus got a little worried, being the only humblefolk headed into a birdfolk village, and used his scroungecraft to construct a disguise so he would fit in better.  It worked great.  The party was welcomed to the village and taken to speak with the village shaman.  He listened about their quest, and the goings on in Humblewood and agreed to help them.  At the meal though, it became obvious that Cyrus was NOT a birdfolk and that didn't go over so well.  It all worked out, but clearly the birdfolk and humblefolk didn't get along on the island.

The next day the party arrived at the Temple of Ardea.  Once inside they encountered puzzles that slowly unlocked the sepulchre of Ardea.  Each puzzle was in a different season (fall, summer, spring, winter) that they traveled to using gemstones.  Once the sepulchre was unlocked, they found the artifact, The Chain of Ardea.

The plan had been, go to the gnoll world, see what information can be gathered about the mind flayers, return to Humblewood.  That's what Xander Zibbik promised anyway.

Here's what actually happened.  Xander screwed up.  Again. 

The party went to another world, but clearly it wasn't the gnoll's world.  Tasked with finding a sword and shield the party traveled to forest, desert, and mountain to look for these items. 

Each area was inhabited by an odd array of creatures that the party randomly made up names for these creatures like chuchus, or bokoblins.  Or the one eyed giant a hynox.

The final battle against four shadow beasts proved difficult.  If only one was left alive it let out a howl that resurrected all the beasts and healed all their wounds.  It took some patience but they were able to kill the last two at the same time and win the battle.  After the battle a portal appeared that took them back to Xander.  

Here is Hyrule Field, the center of the land.  To the north, Hebra Mountains.  East was Gerudo Dessert.  West led to Hyrule Forest.  And south, which was blocked off, was a shadow land.

It's time for the resistance to send a party to take care of him before he wreaks more havok.  Better to face him alone than in the middle of a battle where he's not expected.

You talk to Xander who has been to the observatory many times.  He tells you about its three levels.  The top floor houses the telescope.  The main floor is a work area and a bedroom.  The basement is for storage and where novice spellcasters would stay.  Most likely there are multiple ways to get inside.

After teleporting to The Avium the party began their trek to the observatory.  A couple days in Amachai spotted a gnoll flying steed heading toward the observatory.  He pointed it out to Dúne who drew his bow (cast Haste) and shot down the pterodactyl-like creature.  For good measure he put a couple arrows into the gnoll as it fell too.  They hiked over to the body and found a message from General Groundfang to Fang the Damned.  It appeared Fang was going to attempt something his brother (that was new information!) didn't want him to do.  That night, Dúne sensed a portal of immense size in the direction of the observatory.

A couple nights later the party came upon on of the cabins that had been used, back before the gnolls arrived, by students of the Avium to get to the observatory.  This one was occupied by some gnolls, with an inattentive guard outside.  It was a quick combat where the gnolls tried to throw a box off the nearby cliff to keep the party from getting it.  Two gnolls survived, one wasn't terribly cooperative which cut the count down to one who, after answering some questions, was killed and turned into a zombie by amachai and given the title General Commander Rob the Zombie.  Some jokes were made about their old title, the Butchers of Meadowfen.

Amachai performed a ritual and asked his god Tyton how to destroy the phylactery.  The answer came back, "Throw it between the worlds and he will never come back."

The box was supposed to be delivered to General Groundfang along with the message from Fang, My life is in your hands.  An identify spell, knock, and another identify spell, and the party realized that inside the box was the phylactery of Fang, who'd turned himself into a lich, sacrificing Tare-gat.  This was disappointing to learn that Tare-gat had been alive and now they wouldn't get to kill him.  And also, they would soon be facing a lich. 

The next evening they reached the observatory.  Searching the outside they found a series of pipes going into the cliffside.  Cyrus tapped into one and a blue-ish liquid covered him, causing quite a bit of damage.  (Also, he gained proficiency in a random saving throw, but that's meta-gaming and takes us out of the narrative.)  Moving on, the party found a pool of water with a drain pipe that went into the basement.  Skipping the actual observatory levels, they began exploring.

The first level of the basement appeared to be living quarters for students, or more recently, gnolls that had trashed the place.  A more thorough examination revealed a secret trap door, which dropped down into a different level of the dungeon, an oubliette of sorts, although this reference was completely lost on the party who only wanted to get to the lich, not expand their vocabulary.

Dropping down to the next level, the party discovered a pit trap, with a teleportation rune at the bottom that sent the victims to a room above the trap.  When the lever at the bottom was pulled it released the victims and they fell into the trap a second time.  Well, that's how it was supposed to work but Cyrus the Monk was the one who fell into the trap so it wasn't as cool as the DM hoped, what with slow fall and everything.  The party did appreciate the attempt.

There was a nice ring (Ring of Swarms) the party found at the bottom of a foul pool of water.  And some nice poison that Cyrus took.  And some skeletons that exploded in necromantic energy when killed.  That was fun.  Also, more pipes like they'd seen outside.

About this time Dúne was almost incapacitated as he sensed the portal from a few nights ago open up again.  This time directly below them.  While he wasn't sure of the size, it was the immense power of it that felt overwhelming.

The next level down they found a whole pool of the magical liquid Cyrus cleverly discovered on the surface.  A few arcana checks later and (one down one zombie they had jump in) they were pretty sure this was some form of pure magic. Most likely this was connected to the portal.

Further back in the underground structure they discovered an altar with Tare-Gat's body on it.  He'd been ritually killed, which fit in with what the party knew about lichs.  Cyrus set about destroying the altar and it shifted.  Snow helped push it and they found a staircase leading down.

On the way down (to the last level) Fang began speaking to them.  He told Snow he knew where Evelyn was and showed an image Snow's mind of her chained to the floor in front of a gate with brainlike creatures coming through toward her.  He revealed to Amachai where Conicus was being held captive, in a giant temple dedicated to Anubis.  Dúne was shown his sister Madricen serving Tisk, saying Dúne could rescue her.  Dúne knew she was safe though, having rescued her and Tisk recently.  Adina was offered the knowledge, hey, wait, where the hell's Adina?  It's like she totally blew off the second half of the mission because she was there for the first half last week and said she'd make it for the second half.  Anyway, Cyrus was told they all have the same goal-destroy the mind flayers.  And Fang had a plan that would do just that if they would let him proceed.  Otherwise, Evelyn, Conicus and Madricen would all be killed.

They arrived on the bottom level, a huge inter-dimensional gate was on the floor but only showing stars and flashing colors.  The party plied Fang with a few more questions, but it became obvious that he did have a plan to get rid of the mind flayers, and send the gnolls to a different world.  The catch was that he'd also send all of Humblewood with the mind flayers to this "demi-plane".  Not an optimal plan if you're hoping to save Humblewood.

A battle ensued with Fang throwing up several defenses that slowed the party down, making them take precious time to get to him.  It was inevitable though, one strong spell caster against four hardened adventurers.  Any of who could have killed him once they were within striking distance.

When the killing blow was dealt, Fang grinned, telling the party he'd be back, hunt them down and kill them slowly one by one.  Which is why it gave them great satisfaction to direct his attention to his phylactery which was floating in the inbetween nether-world of nowhere.  It gave them the satisfaction of a job well done thinking he'd be floating for eternity in place outside of any known realm.

Not to be wasteful, Amachai immediately turned Fang's body into a zombie.  They explored the rest of the observatory, befriended a gnoll briefly before they killed him, and found some of Fang's notes.  This led them to using the telescope and seeing what had to be a Githzerai Encampment, the Temple of Anubis where Conicus was, and Fang's best guess as to where the mind flayers would arrive: on top of Mokkden Caverns.

The party is heading back to Wolpertinger Caves to brief Kuato on what has happened.  Next, they plan to take Dak (aka Yoda) with them to speak with the Githzerai.  If all goes well, a couple quick missions to rescue Evelyn and Conicus will follow.

At Wolpertinger Caves the party updated the resistance council of what they'd done at the observatory, and explained why they now had a zombie that was a former lich.  The party learned that Winnowing Reach was nearly ready to liberate themselves of the gnolls.  They also debated whether the last gate the gnolls had to their world should be destroyed.  The consensus was to destroy it, Xander could always send them to the world the party had traveled to if they felt merciful, once the gnolls were defeated.

Taking Dak (still called Yoda by the party) with them, they headed to the Githzerai Encampment.  It was a large encampment but looked a bit shabby, this was not a fresh fighting force.  When a group of gith approached the party Dúne stepped up and spoke with them in the language he'd learned from Dak and Evy Ashwood.  This immediately put the gith on edge.  It turned out to be the language of the mind flayers.

It took some explaining, and some spellcasting by the gith (Circle of Truth, Protection for Evil and Good) for the party to be trusted.  They spent the rest of their time bartering with the gith, offering to help with the mind flayers and asking in return for help with the gnolls.  A deal was worked out and the Resistance would add their forces to attacking the mind flayers and the Gith would (with some amount of joy) help free Alderheart.

With this concluded the party had roughly two weeks before the mind flayers were expected to arrive.  Snow convinced them to head toward the Central Gate where Evelyn was reportedly being held.  Granted, the report came from a gnoll lich who was now following them around as a zombie under Amichai's control, but that was good enough for Snow.

The party teleported to The Avium and spent a few days hiking and searching for the central gate.  When they finally arrived they found a group of twelve or so folk on a small island at the center of the pond.  Gnolls were gathered around jeering at them, telling them to make a choice of who to kill.  The heroes dispatched them quickly.

To their surprise the folk refused to leave the island.  They said at least one of them had had their brain taken over by some creatures the gnolls let through their gate, but they didn't know who.  The gnolls had been making them guess who it was and killing them to see if one of the brain creatures crawled out (they'd made several wrong guesses already).

When Snow asked about Evelyn they said she'd been taken to have one of the brain creatures take her over.  She wouldn't talk to the gnolls about the resistance so they were going to try and bargain with the brain creature once it had control of her.

Inside an old temple Evelyn was chained to the ground, the gate was open, and the gnolls were watching at several of these quadruped brain creatures approached her.  It wasn't an easy fight, taking on the gnolls and these other creatures at the same time.  Ultimately the party persevered and rescued Evelyn.

Evelyn insisted on returning to Alderheart where she'd been rebuilding the resistance.  The party tried to persuade her to head to Wolpertinger Caves, but she insisted, much to Snow's dismay (smitten as he was).  She gave them the location of a food vender in one of the markets where she could be contacted.

Next, the party headed to rescue Conicus who was being held at a gnoll temple built for their god Anubis.  On the way they got a message from Kuato that the Winnowing Reach insurrection had begun and wasn't going well.  The Resistance was calling for additional help.  After a short debate the party backtracked to the teleportation circle at The Avium and traveled to the Spider Ruins teleportation circle, still a day away from Winnowing Reach.  Skipping any kind of rest they pushed on.

When they arrived that night, Winnowing Reach was in ruins.  Most of the city was burned many folk were dead in the streets along with gnolls.  It was difficult to tell who had attained the pyrrhic victory.  With just a moment to react, a dragon strafed the party with a breath weapon of pure magic and Vox Groundfang, the gnoll general, leapt off its back.  

It was a brutal battle with several party members already exhausted from the sprint to Winnowing Reach.  Vox appeared confident, even with Fang the Damned now a zombie under Amichai's control.  But the tide turned against him as the party focused on defeating him.  The dragon continued to pummel the party with attacks, whittling down their health.  Eventually Vox saw he couldn't win and fear overtook him as all the party's fury was unleashed.  Vox dropped to the ground dead and the party turned to face the dragon.

Rather than attacking it backed away in confusion.  The party approached cautiously, ready to fight if it turned on them.  But this was a dragon native to Humblewood and had been under some kind of control of Vox. Now that he was dead it had regained control of itself again.  It thanked the party and agreed to grant them a request, which was to go and visit Queue in Saltar's Port.  Or, outside of Saltar's Port since they thought a dragon landing in the middle of town might cause a bit of a disruption.  Queue had promised the party a favor if they ever sent a dragon his way he could speak with.

Taking a day to recover, the party began the trek back to the Temple of Anubis where they hoped to find Conicus.  Finally arriving several days later, the temple was newly built and already falling apart.  Clearly the gnolls were having trouble completing this gigantic endeavor.  

Outside the immense pyramid the party was attacked by large builders, constructs with folk fused into them, like they seen at the quarry where they'd killed Stitches (in Chapter 12: Friendly Gnolls in Brackenmill?).  Sadly, the folk no longer seemed aware of what they were doing and the party killed them out of mercy.  Except for the one or two that had gnolls in them, those they killed out of spite.

Inside the temple, on the first floor they entered a large sanctuary with a huge statue of Anubis behind an altar.  There were hundreds of gnolls, apparently holy fighters, listening to a priest as he gave a rallying speech to them.  Düne interpreted for the party.  "My brothers, our holy leader brought us here to the promised land and General Groundfang has done nothing to secure it for us.  Oh crap, where are my notes for this speech."

"Ummm, did he really say that?" Düne asked.

"No," the DM said, "I'd written this speech out but it didn't get saved in my notes."  He flipped through all the papers in front of him double checking.

"He says that then?"

"No, he doesn't say that either.  Shut up.  Okay, I remember most of it.  Here we go."

The crowd of gnolls pounded their speers on the ground in agreement.  The cleric continued, "We will march on the central city and take control of the military.  They have squandered the Promised Land.  General Groundfang does not deserve to lead anymore!"

At this point, Amichai had zombie General Groundfang walk up the center isle because of course he'd zombified him after the battle, wanting to reunite the two brothers in zombiehood.  This silenced the speaker and got everyone's attentioin as Zombie Groundfang shambled up to the front.  Seizing the moment, the party attacked.

The swarms of holy spear fighters were a challenge, as well as the three spellcasters.  This was, after all, the strongest fighters and clerics in the priestly caste.  Although a few party members did go down, Amichai was there to heal them and ultimately the heroes prevailed.  Rather than continue their exploration of the temple, they found a safe place to rest and heal up.

The next day they explored the rest of the temple and found a group of humblefolk and birdfolk cleric in a re-education camp at the top of the pyramid.  A few folk had accepted Anubis and were trying to convert the other prisoners.  The party had little use for these traitors.  Conicus was there and had a heartfelt reunion with Amichai, although the session was running a bit late so the sentimentality was short lived. 

With the resistance about to battle the gnolls for Alderheart, first the mind flayers must be defeated when they land or a victory at Alderheart won't matter.

The resistance sent forces to the Gith camp where they coordinated the forces to prepare for the illithid invasion.  The gith welcomed the help, but didn't expect much from the resistance.  This chaffed the Butchers of Meadowfen but they felt no need to prove themselves.  The gith shared that there were likely to be ulitharid, large mind flayers, as part of the invasion.  Not to mention slaves that would be fighting for them.  They also touted the device that Xander Zibbik created that he guaranteed would stun the Elder Brain and allow them to kill it with ease.  The party rolled their eyes at the suggestion Xander would be helpful but didn't say anything.  In the morning they prepared for the invasion with a Heroes Feast and left to scout for the nautiloid ship.

The first sign of the mind flayers was a crashed ship, much smaller than the party expected.  They easily dispatched a mind flayer and another creature that floated and shot beams from its eyes.  Some gith showed up after the battle and appeared quite worried.  Scout ships only accompanied Ancient Elder Brains.  This was not what they expected, it would be a much tougher battle.

A mile away the nautiloid ship descended and all the gith and folk forces converged on it.  The party was told to wait outside and look for any mind flayer stragglers that emerged with the gith went to the real fight.  Of course, the heroes immediately entered the ship and began searching for the Elder Brain.

After several small skirmishes against some large lizard folk the party found the lair of the Elder Brain.  It sat in a vat, unmoving (Xander's device must have worked), with a magical shield keeping the party from being able to attack it.  There were two power sources feeding the shield and the party began damaging one as several mind flayers and two large ulitharids converged to protect the Elder Brain.

The shield dropped just as the Elder Brain began to slowly wake up and the party was hit with a mind blast from an ulitharid, stunning almost half the party.  Suddenly things looked very bad as all the mind flayers converged on them.  Eventually everyone in the party recovered from the mind blast but it took them a few more rounds to regain their footing.

The Elder Brain began grappling the party with tentacles which made it even more difficult to approach it.  Adina activated the The Chain of Ardea and the tide began to turn.  Soon the party was on the attack and the Elder Brain was reeling from the damage.  Unable to stun all of the party at once, the Elder Brain was defeated which left the mind flayers stunned for a moment.  After that they fighting was uncoordinated and the disadvantage made them much easier to defeat.

Once again, the legendary Butchers of Meadowfen had proven themselves in battle.

Ulitharid Mastermind

The capital of Humblewood has been under gnoll control the longest and the resistance isn't quite sure what to expect.  Certainly, desperation on the part of the gnolls will be part of it.

The council convened and selected the heroes (once known as the Butchers of Meadowfen) to be the initial group to enter Alderheart. They've been assigned the job of eliminating the rest of the Gnoll Commanders who are gathered at Alderheart.  Without their leadership the gnolls will be completely disorganized, ensuring victory for Humblewood.

Their first step is for the party to make contact with Evelyn at the Owl's Roost in the Canopy Market.

The first discovery the party made was hundreds of bodies of folk in The Underfall.  They'd been thrown from the boughs of Alderheart far above, hands tied together if they had the ability to glide.

Closer to the trunk was a gnoll built fort where a battle was raging.  Gnolls were fighting each other.  After watching and enjoying the scene for a bit, the party found a gnoll and he begged them to help.  Clerics were in a tower summoning the devil, Yeenoghu to set loose on Humblewood.  This was retribution for the slaughter at the Temple of Anubis (the party nodded, yeah, good times huh?).

Stepping into the foray, the party dispatched the defenders and ran into the tower.  A fierce battle against the devil and some clerics was cut short as Cyrus the Black was finally able to stun Yeenoghu and Snow began smiting with a vengeance.  Thus, Humblewood was once again saved.

The heroes waited until night and snuck there way up to Owl Market.  This was about midnight and only gnoll patrols were out.  The party searched the market for signs of Evelyn or the resistance to no avail, except for wanted posters of Evelyn.  While searching Amichai Brecht was attacked by an invisible assailant.  The party was spread out and everyone ran to help him (Dúnedain in particular cursing that he hadn't kept his bow on him).  The creature was killed but never did become visible.  They talked about throwing it into their bag of devouring but instead Amichai turned it into an (invisible) zombie under his control.  After this, the party found a hiding spot and waited until morning when the market started up.

It took some asking around, but the heroes finally found a corvum in the market who told them where to find Evelyn.  Traveling separately they made their way to the resistance stronghold and had a long talk with Evelyn.   

A few priorities emerged but first they needed to investigate the meeting that was happening in the Windy Limbs neighborhood.  The party snuck there way there and saw some gnolls meeting, and one hedge as well.  Cyrus ran into the middle of it, stunned the two clerics who were preparing spells to cast, and the party mopped up the rest.  Mopping up being mostly throwing them off the branches to their deaths.

Questioning the one gnoll they left alive (briefly) and the hedge gave them a clearer picture of what was going on.  Ute Spitbarb was trying to convince Gnit Fizmaw to vote for him as general.  They had sent their "secretaries" to discuss this ahead of the vote.  The hedge had been forced into the service of Gnit and didn't know that his town was free and his family was safe.  Once he learned this he was more than willing to help the resistance.

The party now had a location and approximate date for the gather of commanders to vote for their new general.

The next day was a coordinated attack on the "killing limbs".  This was where gnolls held suspected resistance members or their families hostage.  They were hung from the branches and their ropes could be cut at a moments notice if anyone tried to rescue them.  

The party rescued two groups easily, but then the gnolls went on alert and things got much more difficult.  Once again Cyrus showed off his monk abilities (hasted by Dúne) and was able to run very quickly to rescue more hostages.  Amichai summoned a celestial creature who helped rescue hostages and took out a few gnolls too.  Snow and Dúne backed up Cyrus with firebolts and arrows.  In all only five hostages were killed and three times as many were rescued.

On the way back to the safe house the party passed a Temple of Ardea.  They looked inside and it had been converted into a hospital with several dozen beds.  Nuns were taking care of humblefolk, birdfolk, and gnolls.  Of course the party started asking questions.  The nuns said they'd sworn an oath to Ardea to treat any in need and that oath extended to gnolls as well.

The heroes talked it over for a bit and finally decided that leaving gnolls alive to kill more folk didn't sit well with them.  "After all," Cyrus said, "we are the Butchers of Meadowfen."  Over the protests of the nuns (and cheers from injured folk in their beds) the party threw the gnolls off the branches and sent them to their death.

The next day was their chance to kill the gnoll leadership.  They traveled to The Boughs and stealthed their way to what had to be the meeting place of the commanders.  Dozens of archers were patrolling the limbs, and many small houses were scattered about.  In the center was a dwelling big enough to hold all the commanders and captains as they elected a new general.

After watching for a bit Amachai cast a few spells to buff the party and the attack began.  It was easy at first.  Dúne stayed in the back picking off archers and guards with his bow.  Amichai continued to cast spells to aid the party.  Cyrus quick ran into the battle striking and stunning adversaries.  And Snow followed up with powerful smites that quickly struck down any in his path.

Soon though, gnoll clerics came out of huts and a wizard too.  After that a wave of captains ran out of the central house and engaged the party.  Amichai's celestial spirit focused on the wizard as did Dúne, taking him down.  Cyrus stunned one of the clerics and Snow placed himself in the middle of the captains.

Moments later Pinch and Gnit emerged and threw themselves into the battle.  It was getting increasingly hard for the party to keep up with all their adversaries.  Deciding the time was right, Amachai activated the The Chain of Ardea and the found their footing again.

With most of the captains killed by this time, the party heard a frightening roar as Ute Spitbarb and Tork Mukluk joined the battle in full plate and wielding huge flails.  At this point Dúne was being surrounded by guards and archers but he deftly teleported out of the way leaving them to chase him again.  Amachai had cast Sanctuary on himself and continued to heal and buff the party.  Cyrus and Snow were fully engage with the few remaining captains and all four commanders.

The heroes clearly had the upper hand.  Pinch and Gnit were killed, Ute (or was it Tork-kind of hard to tell them apart in the armor) was stunned and about to die and Snow was smiting with all his strength.  

Ute was cut down with a flurry of blows from Cyrus and Snow hit Tork with a devastating smite than finished him off.  After that it was an easy mop up of the few remaining guards and archers that were running away.

Once again, the party had saved Humblewood.

With all the Captains and Commanders killed in The Last Battle at Alderheart, the gnolls splintered into small groups.  Most fled Alderheart fearing for their lives.  The Resistance convened a meeting to decide what to do with the remaining gnolls.  Some argued for showing no mercy, hunt down and kill every last gnoll.  Others suggested finding another world for them to go to and live.  The discussion lasted for days and eventually a consensus came together.  

The resistance leaders agreed that killing all gnolls, even the non-combatant men, women and children who'd been brought into Humblewood, would be an atrocity.  At the same time, sending the gnolls to another world where they would subjugate the races there was not a choice either.  Xander said it was possible to find a world that could sustain the gnolls and where they would be the only intelligent race.

So the gnolls were offered a choice, lay down their weapons and travel to another world, or fight and die.  Tisk, the gnoll who'd been with the Resistance for some time, became their leader and took the willing gnolls through the portal Xander opened for them.

The Heroes of Meadowfen helped hunt down the gnolls who remained.  Their ferocity persuaded more than one group accept the leadership of Tisk and travel to her.  Eventually the party came together one last time in Meadowfen where they'd all first met and parted as friends each going their own way.

Snow went back to Alderheart and married Evelyn.  They became a famous couple known as Snevelyn and had a whole flock of children.  Amichai Brecht returned to live in Meadowfen and rebuilt the Temple of Tyton that the gnolls had destroyed.  His mentor, Conicus joined him there and together they ministered to the towns of the area.   Stories of Cyrus the Black would occasionally pop up throughout Humblewood of him showing up and helping Humblefolk and Birdfolk in need, only to disappear again without a trace.  Dúnedain returned to his family home in Meadowfen and continued his family's business, often visiting Marcus Goldfeather to commiserate that being a hero isn't all it's cracked up to be.