So. Secret door. In we go. It leads to a room with a scrying mirror on one wall, a large statue on the other and a large bottomless glass cube floating in the middle about 10" off the floor. Clearly a trap. And we didn't fall for it! A Kobold appears. We attack. A second Kobold appears, armed with bombs. Clearly a worthier fellow, of finer aspect and nobler appearance. To add to the fun as some of us head toward the kobolds, the statue suddenly begins to move. In a pull out weapon and chop your head off sort of way. More worryingly in my direction. Could we be in a worse tactical situation? apparently so, as in the next instant the 4 armed creature Tazex appears in the corridor behind us.

The statue smacks me so hard I pee my pants. Only a timely heal from Galrin keeps me conscious. The first kobold goes down, and a direct hit from one of my last bombs dispatches the other, allowing Moxie, Callistan and Valstan to hold the line, with healing support from Galrin, against the statue and Tazex.

The statue targets Moxie, then Tazex, then Moxie. Moxie switches her attention to Tazex, who as before proves very hard to hurt. A massive blow from his battleaxe drops Moxie, and once again Galrin's healing comes to the rescue. Just as well, as Moxie seems the only one of us able to do some damage to Tazex.

As Tazex turns his attention to the statue, our intrepid stormtroopers manage to make a strategic withdrawal to catch their breath and come up with a new strategy that does not involve us getting our asses handed to us. Since most of Tazex's damage is dealt by his battle axe, Ridley tries disarming him. Unsuccessful. then Valstann uses that most essential of accesories, his scarf, to trip Tazex. Seizing the chance, i use my last bomb on the badly injured statue, finishing it off. And noting that the splash damage also burns Tazex. A bit. Enough to make him mad.

But the rest of the team also sieze the opportunity to attack the downed Tazex, and as he rises Valstannn trips him again. Moxie, Ridley and Valstann leap on him in a frenzy, and this time their attacks start to bite, and finally he goes down.

A brief respite to draw breath and locate all valuable items, then we continue the exploration, returning to the corridor we had passed by earlier. Which leads us to a room smelling of urine and animal musk. Much like my own accommodation in fact. Though my place lacks the huge Dire weasel that popped out of the rubble as Moxie approaches. We attack, and it bites Ridley. Clearly his blood is good stuff as the Weasel didnt want to let go. Until Valstann killed it. Another weasel appears, this time with a small companion. We stage a two pronged attack, with Moxie, Valstann and Ridley taking on the tiny figure of Fikk, while Mykhaila, Callistan and I take on the very big weasel. We hurt it with a round of arrows and slingshot, and it catches me as I withdraw. Ouch. As the weasel latches onto Mykhaila, I pop another sling shot right into its eye. And it dies most gratifyingly. As does Fikk. Score another round to the good guys.

Finally we come across a small prison area, with a couple of occupied cells, and a lone female kobold apparently guarding them. Sneaking up stealthily Ridley plunges his blade into her. She screams, and, rather surprisingly, the cell inmates begin shouting to leave her alone. And she tells us to leave the prisoners alone. We glean what little information we can from them. The most interesting fact being that the evil Goblin fellow was clearly rather fond of our lady Kobold, who tells us she too is a prisoner. She brightens when we inform her that Tazex is slain, as fear of him seems to be what has kept her here. She surrenders to us willingly enough, and places herself in an empty cell giving us the keys.

Mykhaila, having reminded the party of the outcome last time we spared enemies, alarmed at the thought of leaving any behind us takes a shot at the Goblin,. Horrified screams from the Kobold, an angry "No!" from Moxie. Galrin manages to stabilise the Goblin, and we use a precious healing potion to bring him back from the brink, promising the other prisoners that we wont harm them further.

Leaving them in their cells, we continue to the last chamber, housing a row of statues with movable heads, all holding various weapons. A puzzle! How splendid. Especially as it is a non lethal one. Aligning the heads correctly opens a secret door, that allows us to drag the heavy items of loot from the room we first ventured into through the halls without crossing the rickety bridge. So, laden with loot, we gently kick the still sleeping Khai awake, load up the horses and The Magnificent Seven - and Khai - head back to down.

Valstann is wandering, lost in the darkness. Time seems to stand still. The featureless darkness surrounds him. A primal fear grips the elf and he tries to scream, but no sound comes out. Just when he thinks he's gone mad from the fear, he sees something in the blackness. Is that a light? He rushes towards it, slowly pulling himself through the thick, viscous, cloying emptiness. He pulls closer to the light. Is that a color? Orange?

Grappling claws of inky darkness grasp at him, rending his garments as they try to pull him back into the black.

"Give me your hand Valstann!" comes a high-pitched voice, shattering the silence. Valstann peers into the maelstrom of blackness and sees a friendly-looking humanoid fox reaching through a "rip" in the dark, holding out a hand to him.

"C'mon! Take my hand and I can get you out of here." squeaks the fox."

Valstann grasps the fox's white gloved hand and is pulled through the rip. He's standing in an ancient forest of southern red, bur, and black oak trees. It is night time, but the forest is alive with multicolored lights; each tree contains hundreds of spheres of flickering color.

The humanoid fox is with him. "Beautiful, isn't it? This is where I live. It's called the Forest of Lanterns."

Valstann looks at the creature standing with him. "Who are you?" he asks.

The fox smiles at him. "You know me Valstann. I'm Tommy. Tommy Tails." He points with his thumb towards his backside and shows Valstann his two tails.

"That was a scary dream you were having. How about you sit down under that oak tree? The ground is very soft and I'll tell you a story...

Once upon a time, two young children named Michael and Alyssa discovered a wondrous old forest called the Forest of Lanterns. It was named so because of the thousands of magical lamps hanging from the ancient trees. As they explored the forest they spotted a kitten stuck in the high branches of an old oak tree. Michael was quite a little climber. He expertly scaled the old tree and brought the kitten down safely. It was the cutest thing Alyssa had ever seen, so she named it Cuddly–Wuddly and brought it with them. As they continued their adventure in the forest, they ran afoul of a sneaky leprechaun that tricked them into entering a fairy ring where they were trapped unless they could beat him in a game of riddles. Fortunately for them, Alyssa was quite skilled when it came to riddles and bested the leprechaun at his game. Reluctantly, the leprechaun had to...


Suddenly it is morning and Valstann wakes up in his room at the Slumbering Drake. As he gets washes and dresses, Valstann vows to cut back on his wine intake and not eat spicy foods before bed.

After tidying up at Underwoods coffins (by which I mean removing anything of value) the party decided it was time to return to Castle Whiterock. En route we came across the sad sight of an ambushed caravan. All dead. Worse, anything valuable had been removed. Our Dogboy was able to pick up the trail of the attackers and succesfully follow it back to a stoney hollow in the hillside, with some stoney friezes and statuary. Some elementary deductive reasoning led us to access a secret door, which led us to a room with a few Kobolds. They died. Quickly. Though not before I managed to ever so slightly singe both Moxie and Valstann.

Along another passage, where strong strange magic was sensed, and a warning statue stood. Warning us no doubt that we would regret not seeing things through, so we pressed on. Into another room. With a large foul smelling barricade of garbage. And more Kobolds manning the barricade. They died. Quickly.

Once we had found a way through the barricade and searched the bodies, we found a potion which i could tell was an oil to place magic on a weapon. Also an interesting iron torch with a green flame. Moxie pulled it free from its sconce - and damn nearly pulled the wall down while she was at it! When she turned to show us her eyes were already starting to glow red. Like Khai's after a(nother) night of drinking, but even more so. Quickly stuffing the torch away, we were all relieved to see the red glow fade.

Continuing on we came to another chamber. On entering those at the front of the party suddenly fell to the floor in some kind of somnambulistic state. Fortunately a gentle tap to the head with the point of a boot seemed to rouse them, just in time to confront superfast Kobolds. They died. Superquickly.

Across a rickety rope ladder and onward through a catacomb of empty sarcophagi, when all of a sudden, nothing happened. Actually it did, but we didn't see it. Because invisibility. Callistan had stepped into an alcove and became intermittently invisible. Rounding another corner we encountered a Kobold guard. Ridley leapt in and slew him where he stood. Which turned out to be at the entrance of another tunnel. Full of Kobolds. Oh so very full of Kobolds. And to add to the excitement suddenly out of nowhere behind us appeared a strange multi limbed beasty, that proved quite resistant to our initial attacks, and had a habit of dissapearing. Much like any drink in the vicinity of Khai.

Determining that i would be more effective against the kobolds, i moved forward and began what was effectively a carpet firebombing of their entire settlement. An effective firebombing too. Not that the others didnt whittle down their numbers too, while Moxie and Mykhaila and Galrin kept the other character busy. So. Lots of Kobolds. Small room. My bombs. Result: small room full of lots of dead smoking Kobold corpses. An ideal battle situation for my talents. Though it did require much dodging of their slings. In Ridley's case he just seemed to dance past almost every attempt to hit him! I'm sure I heard him humming "Can't touch this" as he did so...

With the last Kobold family slain, and the other mysterious assailant remaining disappeared, we back tracked a little to investigate further. Discovering three of the Sarcophagi room alcoves had magic effects on anyone entering. Good job the Kobolds hadn't had a chance to use them! And then we discovered a secret door...