Week 8 (Part 1): "Kittens and Gnolls"

(Dumoose and Ai No Miko were absent this session. Their characters are, respectively, meditating in the wilderness and searching for leads via the city's clergy.)

With one final bounty on their list, Rolith felt it pertinent for him to have a giant bullseye on the back of his helm, seeing as how often he gets hit in that general area. Cysero facilitated this by stealing a deluxe set of paints from an artisan, and Alac's character reluctantly agreed to paint the design, although not before Rolith's character completely offended her. Alac's character and Rolith's character don't get along very well!

And so, Rolith now has a pink kitten painted on the back of his helm.

Tracking down their final bounty to a plot of farmland to the south, the party discovered a tragic sight: a family of poor Gnoll* farmers, guilty of nothing more than being the same race as the most wanted assassin in the country, had fallen upon hard times at the hands of xenophobic prejudice. Paranoid citizens were constantly harassing them, salting their farmland and vandalizing their home, and as such, the family was apprehensive at the approach of more well-armed "man-things."

*Gnolls are a race of semi-intelligent, bipedal, hyena-like creatures native to the DnD universe.

The party was able to convince the farmers that they meant no harm, and Alac was even able to charm one of the shy gnoll younglings with a playful magic trick. The little gnoll then regaled the party with a tale of "other gnolls" and "black fire" in the woods, which her mother chalked up to a young, overactive imagination. The party decided to act on this lead, venturing into the woods and camping for the night. While Artix and Alac tended to the camp, Rolith went hunting and bagged a rabbit! Meanwhile, Cysero scouted further into the woods, spying shadowy humanoid figures far off in the darkness.

The next morning, the party continued their hike, finding a quiet forest clearing leading up to an abandoned barn on a hill. Although they cautiously proceeded forward, the party was ambushed by a gnoll hunting party, who had grown wise to being spotted by Cysero the following night!

The leader, a Gnoll Scourge, released his body guards, a vicious duo of Gnoll Clawfighters. They charged Cysero, striking for a ferocious amount of damage! Meanwhile, a Gnoll Huntmaster fired arrows at the party from a distance. Cysero was close to death several times, whipping the gnolls into a frenzy of blood lust! Luckily, the party quickly finished off the Gnoll Scourge, and Artix used his inspiring healing powers to keep Cysero alive, despite critically failing on one of his healing abilities (which, of course, ended up healing the enemies!).

The Huntmaster now called in a pack of hyenas to protect him! Once the party finished off the Clawfighters, they charged foward, surrounding Rolith! Alac's character, with a wry grin, cast "Scorching Burst" ON ROLITH, which not only engulfed him in flames, but vanquished all of the hyenas! Did I mention that their characters aren't fond of each other? I suppose you could see a pattern at this point...

The party finished off the now defenseless Huntmaster and continued up the hill toward the old barn. When Artix tried to pry the barn door open, he triggered not one, but TWO traps, taking a nice chunk out of his HP. Ouch, talk about bad luck...

To be continued...