Jarna & Anoushka – evil gypsies with heather and stuff
Jarred – Micheliner type goody
Grimtooth – Great big slobbering Half Orc fighter
Sly like fox – Barbarian with very short skirt and funny underwear
Raul – elven ranger
Kaleb – elven ranger
Meric – Human scouty type
Democritus – A wandering vagrant from the labyrinth of xenos we found in the forest
Jynx – a baby half-orc fighter (they start off so small and cute, but then grow up into dribbling drunken things…)
Dibbler – Meself, a butcher with a dream to improve ‘is self
And of course Walker, our guide for the mission.

There may have been somebody else, but I was very drunk a lot of the time so the memories are hazy.

We were mostly new to this whole adventuring lark when we started out. We had all been told to go out for a short wander, and find out what had been happening to a load of scouts who had been going missing. Since we were new to this whole business we had been told that we should just go out, poke around and interfere a bit, run away from anything big and horrible, and then report back.

Unfortunately, it was to turn out to be a lot less easy than this…

It all started out so nicely – a little wander in the woods, some flowers, a few fluffy creatures which I turned into a very pleasant stew. Then, just as night drew in, things started to turn a little bit nasty. We started off by meeting some Saldorians, who talked nicely to us for a while, and then kindly offered to ‘cleanse’ the non-human members of the party. We decided that this was not a very nice idea, and chopped them into little pieces.

Then we were waylayed by some lurching undead, which received similar treatment, before we met their delightfully pleasant master, a dymwan, who told us that he had also lost some people in the area. We got bored of talking to him after a while, so we turned him and his undead into mincemeat and continued our journey.

We arrived at the waystation in good spirits after successfully winning our first few fights, and got down to some drinking. I think some people might have visited us and chtted to us a bit, but I don’t remember much about what they had to say.

The next thing I remember is a bunch of Gypsies coming in, trying to sell us pegs and attempting to rob stuff. We chatted to them for a while, and then Jarna told us to kill them all because she was bored of talking to them (a theme which continued throughout our little ramble) This was a little harder to do than we expected, and Meric took a nasty beating and had to be elixired, but we eventually killed them all and robbed their corpses (one of them was carrying an elixir, which we used on Meric, handy!) With his last dying breath, one of the Gypsies cursed 3 of our party, which made everybody feel a little concerned…

With that, we decided it was getting late, and everything else in the area that needed a kicking would have to wait until morning.

When we woke up, we decided that we should go for a little wander around the area, to see if we could find out anything about what was going on. At this point we were convinced that the Dymwan were being a bit naughty and taking people to turn into undead. This was reinforced by a bunch of undead attacking us during breakfast, who looked suspiciously like the gypsies we had slain the night before. They even placed pegs on members of the party, presumably continuing the work they had done when alive. The pegs made everybody even more worried, since we didn’t know whether to leave them on or take them off… in the end 3 members of the party ended up spending the rest of the mission wandering around with pegs clipped to them.

With the undead put down, we departed the waystation to poke our noses into the goings on in the area.

We started off by meeting some Halmadonians, who told us that they were also missing some people. We thanked them for their information, and, for a change, didn’t get involved in a fight with them. After the Halmodonians we met some hoardlings, who seemed to have body which they were particularly interested in. The hoardlings seemed rather ill, and we found a novel way of curing their illnesses, by giving them the opportunity to be reborn in the mists. Foolishly I followed the party’s suggestion to examine the body that the Hoardlings were interfering with, and contracted a nasty little disease, which also affected 3 other members of the party – Jynx, Kaleb and Raul. This became a problem when we encountered some baby minotaurs chasing a Xenos drone. The drone seemed friendly and recognised my colours, so we let him live and turned the minotaurs into a greasy stain on the path. This turned out to be a good move, since the Xenos drone was named Democritus, and turned out to be a valuable member of the party.

Futher down the path we met some towerless. I had been unable to cure the diseases placed on our party, and so 4 of us simply followed along behind. Jarna spoke with the towerless, who told us of a box which they had found. The box was, however, guarded by a goat thing. We agreed to help the towerless retrieve the box in exchange for a share in whatever it contained. As soon as the towerless turned their backs we beat them to the floor and started off to retrieve the box – well we wouldn’t want to annoy the shadowsfall would we?

After dispatching the nasty great big goat thing we were in possession of the box. There was much discussion about what we should do with the box – some thought we should take it back to our waystation and examine it, while Jarna and others believed it best just to open it – after all, who’s ever heard of a box in the middle of a forest having a trap on it eh? We decided in the end to just open it, and it was with much trepidation that we opened the lid…

The air around us shimmered and warped, and before we knew it we were standing in a darkened room with a horrible figure whose face was an evil looking skull thing. I immediately started to feel uneasy. Other members of the party, notably those who were of a more evil persuasion actually felt like they quite liked the place.

The nasty skull beast told us that we had been brought there as part of a test, and that we had already proved that we were greedy. He then told us to prove that we had intelligence, and that we had to complete the puzzles in the room.

While the more intelligent members of the party grappled with the puzzles, we were watched by a nasty black thing with glowing green eyes. I informed the party, very vocally, that the thing, and the place that we were in, made me feel nasty and scared, and that I wanted to go home. The thing then informed us that we were in the abyss. I have to say that this left me feeling a little uneasy, to say the least.

When we completed the puzzles, and got out of the room, we found a skeleton with a pathfinder tabard on. After reading his diary we found out that this was Gillius, one of the scouts we were looking for. He had been unable to complete the last puzzle, since there was only one of him… silly fool… everybody knows you don’t go out wandering alone!

After exiting the building, we were faced with the horribleness of the abyss. Let it never be said, by anybody, especially the more evilly aligned members of the party, that the abyss is a pleasant place for a wander. It isn’t. It’s a horrible place filled with creepy crawlies that eat your pants, and fairies that steal beer. A word to the wise – DON’T GO THERE!!

The horrible skull man returned shortly after we released ourselves from the room, and told us that he was impressed by our ability to free ourselves. He then gave us a mission to go get an item for him. It was pointed out that anything a huge evil black hepath from the abyss couldn’t get hold of was likely to be out of the reach of a group of first time adventurers, but this point seemed to be ignored.

And so our wander in the abyss began. The trees were filled with menacing shadows, the flowers kept eating small furry creatures with glowing red eyes, and screams filled the air. Apparently this meant that it was a quiet day, since nothing had eaten US yet. We met 2 lost pathfinders on the path who seemed confused and frightened. After spending a bit of time trying to reason with them we simply power drained them and slung their limp corpses over our shoulders.

After being severely beaten about by a group of Drow, we arrived at the place that the Hepath had told us housed the item he wanted. We quickly decided to attack, and as we did so the air shimmered and I found myself somewhere else, in the presence of Jarrad and an angel, a male one, wearing a disturbingly revealing white dress and nothing on his feet. The angel told us that we were being misled by the evil hepath of horribleness. He told us that there was a battle going on for supremacy in the abyss, and that the evil black guy was trying to get the item so that it would make him the ruler of the abyss. The angel then told us that the evil hepath was going to slaughter us all horribly after we gave him the item.

Being a nice guy, the angel offered us an alternative. If we went back to the Evil hepath’s house, told him that we’d not got the item today, and then got the item tomorrow, and gave it to the angel, he’d not only let us live, but would send us back home again. Myself and Jarred decided that this sounded much better than being horribly killed and agreed to convince the rest of the party of this.

The air shimmered again, and we were back with the party, who were just beginning the attack, as if no time had passed at all. We shouted for them to stop, and explained what had just happened. They didn’t seem too happy to believe us at first, but decided, after much argument, that maybe the white flowery angel was a better bet than the black evil skull faced hepath. We decided that we would go back to the waystation and tell the hepath that we’d not managed to get it today due to injuries, but would go back tomorrow and do it. Just as the party were discussing how to make sure we looked injured enough, everything went black.

I awoke to find my head all bandaged up, and was told by members of the party that a branch had fallen on my head. There didn’t seem to be any fallen branches around, but I see no reason to disbelieve a party made up mainly of evilly aligned individuals…

We arrived back, and gave our excuse to the hepath, who seemed displeased, but let us live.

About an hour later I was making a nice cup of tea, when the doors to the room we were staying in slammed shut. Myself, Walker, Kaleb and Democritus (I think) were stuck inside the room! What made matters worse was when 5 Morgothins, angry ones, appeared in the room, to be told the same thing by the hepath as we had been told. The hepath was obviously covering his back by bringing in others in case we faield. The Morgothins, unfortunately, didn’t seem interested in discussing the problem, and simply laid into use with great gusto. We had a hard time finishing them off, and I was left completely out of power when the last one lay dead. Additionally we had to complete all the puzzles again!

A few random abyssal types came to visit us in the evening, and we went out for a short night time wander in the abyss to retrieve an item for the angel, who incidentally kept appearing in visions to me. In these visions he refilled me with power and healed me! What a great guy!

The next day dawned in an eerie, abyssal kind of way, and we set off out once again to retrieve the item which we were still pretending we were going to give to the hepath of horror and nastiness. We took several more horrifying thumpings, before eventually securing the item, and wandering off back. The angel had told us that he would meet us at the room we were staying in, and would do a ritual, which would reduce the power of mr nasty hepath, and would also send us back off home.

On the way back, we met the most insane Dymwan Necromancer ever to exist, and dispatched her and her undead scum friends as quickly as was practical.

When we arrived back, the nice angel guy was waiting for us and took the item into a circle, where he began to cast. We were told that if we stepped out of the circle, then we would be gruesomely killed by the hepath of unspeakable evil. In typical ‘evil-doer’ fashion, the hepath first sent his weaker minions at us, before appearing himself. He cast several horrific invocations, including one which drained all of the life out of Walker, and one which gave Jarna a disease which was really REALLY nasty and would have killed her were it not for the swift intervention of the angel guy. As the ritual went on, the nasty hepath’s power weakened, and his invocations failed.

With a final cry he died, and there was a bright flash. We all woke up, safe and sound back home! Our first outing was over, and we had all survived our little jaunt in the abyss…

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