Round 4
Beari casts Maximized Chain Lightning twice: explodes two yellowjackets and kills many more.
Arden is concealed and reserved for target, while also ready to give spell directions. Yells for Zora to rejoin group.
Zora is still above ground and reserved for a target. She saves the second time against Y08’s Round 3 poison.
Ben casts Maximized Flame Strike-as-Lightning twice: kills all the rest of the yellowjackets in the chamber.
Y07 attacks Zora but she kills it first; Y08 misses Zora; Y09 misses Zora.
Y10-Y14 fly out of main hive entrance; all take damage from the Blade Barrier but live; all attack Zora: Y10 miss; Y11 miss; Y12 hits for 3 by Zora saves; Y13 miss; Y14 miss.
Round 5
Beari defers until after Arden; directs the Formians to dig the hive tunnel taller and wider.
Arden begins leading the way down the hive tunnel.
Formians dig tunnel taller and wider.
Y20-Y22 attack Formains: Y20 hits F1 for 4, poisoned; Y21 hits F2 for 3, poisoned; Y22 hits F3 for 1, poisoned.
Y08 hits Zora for 4, Zora saves; Y09 misses Zora; Y10 hits Zora for 1, Zora saves; Y12 misses; Y13 misses; Y14 misses
Y15-Y19 fly out of main hive entrance, all take damage from the Blade Barrier and die.
Zora comes down tunnel, stays near entrance still as rear guard; makes second time save against Y12’s Round 4 poison.
Round 6
F1 bites Y20 for 5; F2 bites Y21 for 2; F3 bites Y22 for 4; F4-F7 continue to dig, working around the three fighting pairs.
Arden appears, attacks Y20 with rapier, hits, hits; conceals.
Beari casts Mordenkainen’s Sword and hits Y20; casts Magic Missile and kills Y20.
Ben moves to mouth of tunnel from surface, reserves for target.
Zora reserves for target; makes second time save against Y08’s and Y10’s Round 5 poisons.
Y08-Y14 come down the tunnel.
Ben casts Searing Light on Y08 for 29.
Zora attacks Y08, kills.
Y09 misses Zora; Y10 misses Zora; Y11 hits Zora for 4, she saves.
Y21 hits F2 for 2, poisons; Y22 hits F3 for 2, poisons.
Round 7
F1 bites Y21 for 4; F2 misses; F3 bites Y22 for 1; F4-F7 continue digging towards the Queen’s chamber.
Arden appears, hits Y21, hits and kills Y21; conceals.
Beari Magic Missiles Y22, uses Mordenkainen’s Sword on Y22 for 16.
Ben hits Y10, kills; hits Y11, kills; hits Y09.
Zora makes second time save against Y11’s Round 6 poison; kills Y09; kills Y12; kills Y13; kills Y14.
Y22 attacks F3, kills; Y23 attacks F1, kills; Y24 attacks F2, kills; Y25-Y28 hit F4-F7.
Round 8
F4 misses Y25; F5 misses Y26; F6 hits Y27 for 3; F7 hits Y28 for 10.
Arden tumbles past melee, flanking hits Y25 for 44, for 16, for 1 kills.
Beari, “Zora! Ben! I’m using my sword!”, hits Y22 for 23, hits and kills Y22; hits Y23 for 15; Mordenkainen’s Sword hits Y23 for 20.
Ben moves, hits Y23 for 13, 11, 15.
Zora moves to a central position – Y27 AoO for 1, Zora saves – hits Y26 for 40, 36, ?? and kills; kills Y27; hits Y28 for 35, 32.
Y23 misses Beari; Y24 hits Beari for 4 + -1Dex; Y28 kill F7; Y29 misses Arden; Y30 misses Arden; Y31 misses Zora; Y32 misses Zora.
Round 9
F4 misses; F5 and F6 keep digging.
Arden tumbles, hits and kills Y28; conceals and reserves to protect Formians.
Beari makes second time save against Y24’s Round 8 poison; hits and kills Y23; hits Y24 for 21, 11; Mordenkaimen’s Sword hits Y24 for 23.
Ben hits Y24 for 16, for 14 and kills; moves towards Zora.
Zora makes second time save against Y27’s Round 8 poison; hits Y29 for 43, 42 and kills; critical and kills Y30; hits Y31 for 40, critical and kills; hits Y32 for 39, 45 and kills.
Y33 hits F4; Y34 hits F5; Y35 hits F6.
Round 10
F4 misses Y33; F5 hits Y34 for 5; F6 hits Y35 for 2.
Arden appears, hits F33 for 60, 18, 15 and kills; conceals.
Beara moves forward; Mordenkaimern’s Sword hits Y34 for 21
Ben moves up.
Zora moves up.
Y34 hits F4; Y35 hits and kills F5; Y36 hits and kills F6.
Round 11
F4 withdraws.
Arden appears, critical Y34 for 50, critical Y34 for 21 and kills, hits Y35 for 16, 14.
Beari casts Lightning Bolt into chamber for 44 points to Y35 and Y36 (and also Y37 unseen in the chamber); Mordenkaimen’s Sword hits Y35 for 14 and kills.
Ben hits Y36 for 14, 15, 10 and kills; casts Restoration on F4 for +1 Dex.
Zora reserves for a target.
Round 12
F4 waits until Ben can heal him.
Arden requests Beari to tell F4 to dig the passageway – towards the Queen’s chamber – wider and taller; crawls forward to recon; sees Queen at far side of chamber, Y37 and Y38 flanking the entrance way; critical on Y37 for 48 and kills.
Beari moves up to Arden; casts Cone of Cold on Queen (and also several eggs) for 47; Mordenkaimen’s Sword hits Y38 for 15.
Ben casts Cure Light on F4 who is now back to full health (but still minus on Dex).
F4 follows orders and digs – by itself can only increase height and width for 10’ / round.
Zora guards the tunnels.
Y38 misses Arden.
Round 13
Arden attacks Y38 for critical, hit, hit, hit, critical.
Beari is stomping on eggs; Mordenkaimen’s Sword hits Y38 for 15 and kills.
Ben moves forward to F4.
F4 digs another 10’.
Zora guards the tunnels.
Round 14
Arden moves to Queen, critical for 18, critical for 21, miss.
Beari is breaking eggs; yells at Zora to “come on down”; Mordenkaimen’s Sword hits Queen for 25.
Ben waits for F4 to finish.
F4 widens tunnel all the way to the Queen’s Chamber.
Ben moves to chamber; tells Arden to back off so Ben can cast a spell against the Queen; reserves for Arden to do that.
Zora move up to the chamber; charges the Queen, criticals for 158, kills.
OUT OF ROUNDS
The Formian is sent away.
We break all the eggs.
Beari goes through all the tunnels (which are too small for the others) and verifies that they are empty.
Zora checks the surface and finds no more yellowjackets there.
Take the Queen’s body with us back to Ant Hillary.
EXP: 612.
Ant Hillary gives us a safe place to spend the rest of the night, regain points, renew spells.
Ben discovers that he is not allowed to take Commune as one of his spells. Perhaps Pelor is tired of being interrupted with questions.
Pail 5, 5043
Ant Hillary has ants lead us to a door into a hill. The tunnel leads spiral around and down about 600’ to a straight tunnel about 1,000’ long. That opens up into a large cavern which has heated stones randomly in the walls – thus allowing infra-red dark vision to see the entire chamber. The chamber is octagonal, about 500’ tall and 500’ feet across. On the opposite wall there is a 250’ tall oval (marked by a lack of heated stones) and, halfway up, to the right side of the oval, a very large keyhole: of the correct shape for our key, but much too big.
[Luckily there are no feminist snakes here.]
Arden flies up to look more closely at the keyhole. Zora flies up carrying Beari with the Key. When they get close the Key seems to simultaneously stay in Beari’s hand and also grow large enough to fit this keyhole. Zora hands Beari off to Arden and flies down to bring Ben up. With everyone touching each other, Beari puts the Key’s expansion into the keyhole and turns it. Upon which everyone is pulled through the portal.
We are in a clearing, about three or four acres in size. There is no sign of the portal from this side. The Key has returned to normal size.
The clearing has ground cover about an inch tall, predominately clover-like with sprinklings of small colorful wildflowers. The entire effect is very pretty, and actually somewhat charming. The north side of the clearing is bordered by a small stream – wider than a step, narrower than a leap – flowing west to east, fed from an eight foot high waterfall, tumbling down with a merry gurgle, at the northwest corner of the clearing.
We are under a mostly clear sky, deep blue, the sun is bright, westering, seems to be the same size and color we are sued to. The far bank of the stream goes up steeply about eight feet, the top of the bank and beyond – as much as we can see – is forested and with heavy undergrowth. Just past the east end of the clearing the stream widens out into a pond.
The pond is generated by a beaver dam a couple of hundred yards east of the clearing. We can see a couple of beavers swimming in the pond, and there are obvious beaver-gnawed stumps up the hillside on the north side of the pond. Bordering the east of the clearing, and adjacent to the beaver pond, is a marsh, cattails and other wetlands plants, and we can hear insects humming and strumming. We are finding this somewhat de-stressing to once again be back in a normal sized environment.
To the west of the clearing is a steep embankment, about eight feet high at the northwest corner, decreasing down to nothing at the southwest corner. West and south of the clearing are forested, with heavy undergrowth, like that across the stream, at the edges of the clearing. The trees and underbrush look like normal plants.
Arden points to the East and announces that the four clouds there not only look like people, but are acting like people. They look like: a young lady in braids and a “sailor”’s blouse and cap; a sailor in a captain’s uniform; a mature man in a suit and with sideburns; and an older man in a double-buttoned great coat. The young lady cloud is looking at us and raising her left arm to point; the other three cloud people are turning to look at us.
Beari thinks the cloud people are about 100 miles away, and about two miles tall. At those dimensions, it would take about five minutes to raise an arm from waist-high to shoulder-high.
Arden, Beari, and Ben, suddenly notice that Zora is not moving, or reacting to the rest of the team; is instead staring fixedly, not blinking, at the cloud people; and in fact is staring specifically at the young lady cloud, who seems to be staring back while her other, not-pointing, hand is raising to shade her eyes. Beari attempts to shake Zora, but before she can lay a hand on Zora a sudden, directed strong gust of wind blows her 34 feet away; she falls, but manages to tumble back to her feet with no damage. Arden also tries, but before he can touch Zora another sudden, directed stong gust of wind blows him 31 feet away, but he keeps his balance and does not fall. Arden and Beari rejoin Ben, near Zora. Beari tries to call to, shout at Zora, but is ignored. Beari casts Prestidigitation, but someone counter-casts and the spell does not activate. Ben casts Light, but someone counter-casts and the spell does not activate. Then Ben casts True Seeing, which is also counter-cast-ed and does not activate.
Zora comes out of the trance and tells the group that the cloud lady had been looking through her mind, and then had implanted a lot of information into her mind, which she is going to need some time to fully assimilate. As Zora relates this, the cloud people turn to the east and begin walking away. It takes them about half an hour to disappear over the horizon. Some of what Zora has learned:
a) this is not our world, but it contains another portal which will lead towards our world;
b) the cloud people call themselves “Azamaondi” and think of themselves as people; they think of us a “very fast, very, very, very small people”;
c) there are no other “very, very, very small people” on this world;
d) they would like us to fix a problem on this world: the Waalder Forest is being destroyed by an Evil Wizard. If we can (1) defeat the monsters he has placed in the forest; (2) stop the machine generating the evil miasma which is destroying the forest; (3) probably then deal with the wizard; and (4) then assist the forest helpers in restoring the forest, we will also discover the portal we need.
Zora knows landmarks to guide us to the forest. Arden flies up, about 7,500 feet, and finds the first landmark: which he estimates is about 250 miles to the NNW.
Zora knows the effects that the miasma will have on us (negative, increasing every hour) and on the evil monsters (lots of plusses). Also that it severely limits sight and sound, and prevents all location spells.
Zora knows some about the device which is creating the miasma – it sounds formidable.
Zora knows a little about the evil wizard: is probably at least 25th level, and is not currently on this world.
Zora thinks she will know more once she has had a chance to think through all the knowledge which has been fed into her – not all of which relates to this world, or directly to the Waalder Forest.
END OF RUN