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I had been doing treasure maps yesterday afternoon and my last one was south of the Justice shrine, in an area that often had a lot of ogres, titans and such roaming about. Indeed, there must have been family reunions being held for the forests were almost crowded with ogres, ogre lords, titans, cyclops, ettins, harpies, mongbats, and other assorted denizens.

I slowly progressed my way to the spot the treasure map indicated, slaying belligerent monsters with nearly every step of the way. I finally reached a small glade in the forest and began to dig. Two ettins protested my digging up their picnic spot and I had to smack them senseless with my shovel before opening the newly revealed chest. The chest instigated the appearance of several ominous looking liches, bone knights, magicians and skeletal school principals and I backed off to attempt to take them on in small groups. I especially enjoyed slaying the principals since they reminded me of my fourth grade principal who took great delight in paddling my young bottom for not obeying all the silly rules of the elementary school I attended.

After the bony carnage I meandered down to the brigand fort to see if they had any apple cider. My brother Wyspr takes his dragon there often and says his dragon always gets a great snack and I was thirsty so perhaps they'd share! I do think I'm going to have to lock Wyspr out of the house. The brigands, mages, adepts and pirates that lived there were quite rude and didn't offer me any cider. In fact, they attacked me without provocation and I had to paddle their bottoms with my waraxe. Just as I finished dispatching the last brigand warrior, a whole new group started appearing about me! I sighed and applied terminal discipline to all of those as well. I searched the outpost shelter for apple cider but there wasn't any. Selfish brigands must have drunk it all before I had arrived, I was glad they were dead!

Suddenly, I saw an outlaw warrior riding down the road. Hmm, perhaps he was looking for cider also. I hailed him and started to explain that the selfish group here had drunk it all when he tried to take my head off with a nasty looking halberd. I dissuaded him from the attempt and ended up having to kill his black horsie who was so angry that it shot balls of fire out of its nose! Then, more outlaws began to skulk closer. What was going on?

Outlaws had never been seen in this part of the forest before. Perhaps they were intending to over all the wilderness! This would not do at all. I knew how tough outlaws had gotten lately and carefully attended to their permanent dispersal. With bow and axe I reduced their numbers to zero and then I scouted about but found no camp. Ahh, perhaps I had broken up the party before they settled in. That would be a good thing.

A brooding Reaper decided I was an easy target, standing tired and disheveled in the middle of the road. It tossed firefields and poison fields as well as clanky blade spirits at me. I admit, it was kind of pretty with all those magical fields crackling in the road but the rudeness was too much to ignore and I reduced it into kindling, which I prudently stored in my pack for future campfires. After all this exertion, I was tired. I had been digging up buried chests and fighting monsters non-stop for at least two hours and it was time to take a break. I opened a portal to Jhelom and sold the loot from the two bags full I had acquired. I combined the two bags into one and then heard a panicked cry for help!

I blinked and then rubbed my eyes. This was Jhelom wasn't it? Yes, I lived here, I knew this place. So what was a mountain troll doing wandering about beating up townsfolk? I rode over and taught him manners and then had to teach his brother, a mountain warrior, manners as well. I'm not sure what they learned or how they'd use it though since they were both dead but it made me feel useful.

I had msg'd Edison and Angelica earlier and checked online, yes they had just finished digging up high level chests that I daren't even think of trying. The rumor is that even monstrous dragons leap out of some of those chests and I wasn't about to do that by myself! Now, I had killed drakes, named dragons, and even Greats by myself in the lake room in Despise but I wasn't sure I even wanted to try a Royal by myself. Anyway, I digress.

The list was still quite sparse so I now msg'd Edison and mentioned that there appeared to be an invasion of trolls in Jhelom. He said that he and Angelica would be there soon so I scanned my mental online list and frowned. Not too many people around at all but, ahhh, there was Belle Remings! She was an excellent person to have by your side in a battle! I msg'd her but she was busy paddling outlaw bottoms near her home. My oh my, a lot of paddling going on tonight, I thought.

I scouted ahead to see how massive the invasion was and discovered a curious and amusing sight. The battle pits at Jhelom were full of trolls! I chortled as I leaned over the wooden rail and peered down at them. "Hey, that's the pits, isn't it?" I yelled with good humored derision. A troll mage took exception to my quip and summoned a fire elemental outside the pit to teach me manners. Teach ME manners, huh? The mere thought burned me up and instead of tossing down another quip I got fired up and extinquished the elemental faster than you can say zippo.

I heard a groan of dismay and turned to see Edison regarding me with shocked eyes, Angelica muffling a laugh behind her hand. "I don't believe you actually constructed such an awful pun." he said with horror. I grinned and shrugged and just motioned to the pit. They were as entranced as I was at the population of trolls milling about. Troll Lords, Warlords, Mages, Marksman, Warriors, the whole family was there and they were all the tougher Mountain variety.

We entered the west side of the pit and considered things. In short time we worked out a plan. I went down to the entrance to the pits via a stairway and yelled bad puns at the trolls which, naturally, enraged them so they charged forward to attack me. But, the entrance was one way! Anyone going in from the pit was magically transported to the room above where Edison and Angelica waited. I'd do this for one or two trolls and then scamper up the steps to join in dispatching the deep voiced combatants. We eventually reduced the numbers to a level where we could actually enter the pit and finish off the shy and stupid ones that got confused and trapped in the bleachers.

After this, we went to the east side and noticed more Lords, Warlords, Mages and such. Whew, I hope my waraxe was up to the strain. It was good working with Angelica and Edison. They were experienced and reacted instantaneously to changing battle patterns as they occurred. I was the bait, the tank, and it worked well. The east side didn't go quite as planned. We polished off a few trolls when two Lords and a Mage surged into the room, deep bass voices thundering troll curses. I've got to learn that language, their curses are way impressive!

We battled them for a bit when Angelica had to retired momentarily to build a quick campfire to replenish her mana reserves and heal herself. I found myself trading blows with these immensely powerful Lords, the mage was already lying dead upon the wooden floor of the room, but I wasn't too worried. After all, Edison was there and I was healing myself with bandages and had plenty of GH potions. But, the sheer power of two Troll Lords is more than I imagined now that there were focused on me. Edison healed, I drank a potion, I completed a bandage and still, in less time than it takes to say "ouch" I was down to perhaps 10 points of health. Angelica charged back in fearlessly, her hair swirling about her and her eyes filled with determined light. I felt the comforting embrace of her healing spell embrace me but the Lords struck me again simultaneously! I tried to dart away and through the door to the outside but Darlin stumbled over the dead body of the mage and one of the Lords merely flipped me off with its horny finger. I was dead.

I stood there, gray surrounding me and saw the Lords charging Edison. He had made personal comments about their parentage in an effort to get them stop attacking me and it worked! Angelica started casting heal upon him but these bad boys didn't understand the word "no". They surrounded him and before he could draw a breath, he too was lying upon the floor.

Msg's began to flood in from the ether. "Bayn, need help?" "Bayn, your death cries are deafening me. Need help?" "What's going on?" and so on. Buster, Thane Stormrider, Sachiko, Cathavene, and others queried me and soon reinforcements began to arrive. None of these people had even been in the world earlier and I was surprised until I realized how much time had passed since the start of the battle. Edison and I recovered out possessions and a team formed.

Angelica, Cathavene, Ciara, Edison, Sachiko, Thorn Stormrider, and myself organized, buffed, and relentless hunted down every last moutain troll in the area. We were congratulating each other when the first outlaw assassin leaped out from beside a building and attacked us! Oh my, mountain trolls and now outlaws?

What the heck were they doing in Jhelom. In fact, they had no business there! They had stated they didn't want to be near the cities and here they were, in the middle of Jhelom. Ooooh, liars, one and all of them. I felt good working with such an accomplished group of experienced adventurers and kept my puns to a minimum to try to achieve some level of professionalism, but is was difficult. I tend to talk to my monsters as I kill them, it amuses me and my horsie.

We dispatched the single assassin and then noticed more outlaws to the north. Simon joined us at this time and together, we all slowly moved forward, sending outlaw spirits shriekign with despair into the depths of hell. I somehow had been turned into the official looter and was kept very busy fighting and yoiking. People would ask me if a note had been found but I had no idea. I didn't pay attention to what I yoinked, there was too much. Besides, as a matter of everyday habit, I try not to "see" what I yoink so it is a surprise when I sell off the ordinary to a shopkeeper and see what's left.

There were bottles of pumpkin juice though and I moved those all to a separate sack for later dispersal to everyone. The outlaw battle went on and on and on. We'd finish one corner and start clearing another when the corner behind us strangely sprouted more outlaws like sick blossoms. Most of the outlaws carried little but leather armor and their weapons. A lawyer and a DA assaulted us with stern writs and ominous appeals at one point. After we stopped laughing, we listened carefully to them and then killed 'em. I mean, what else are you expected to do with lawyers?

Jhelom was clean of outlaws and mountain trolls. We all sat on our steeds quietly in the southern part of time and caught our breath. We debated where to go next and Angelica remarked about the Grim Reapers infesting Trinsic so we agreed to go there. However, no Reapers were in evidence and instead she gave a tour of her most beautiful home. Shortly after that, Reapers did indeed appear but they were the weak variety and went down fast. Ciara murmured quietly about being set up for ancient level Reapers and Edison said loudly, in case anyone was listening, that no seer would ever do a sneaky underhanded thing like that! *grin* We were all tired and journeyed to Britain finally to make the split.

I somehow got confused with all the bags of loot I had and sold off all the pumpkin juice. I do apologize to all for that mistake. I'll try to acquire more! Ciara, Edison, Angelica, Cathavene left with fond farewells and I sorted through the loot. There was remarkably little gold after all that slaughter and only a couple Benson'able type items and a few maps. Thorn didn't want the maps since he only did ragged and worn so I grabbed the two ragged ones I had just acquired the day before from my bank box and handed those to him. I ended up with the 2 frayed and frazzled maps as well as a portion of the gold. I think Thorn got one Benson and I the other. Sachiko refused gold and everything else except a fishing net I tossed into her backpack. Simon accepted as much gold as he could carry and grinned as he made a deposit.

When all was done, I finally noticed two items underneath some hides. A "knitting" and a "lockpicks". The "knitting" was two knitting needles with yarn between them and the "lockpicks" must have been special because they didn't look like normal lockpicks. Since only Sachiko and I were left when I made the discovery, I gave her the "knitting" and kept the "lockpicks" for myself. However, now that I think of it, if Angelica, Cathavene, Ciara, Thorn or Edison wants the lockpicks, I'd be happy to hand them over or we can spin the dice. I checked and they were acquired during the troll battles so all have a right to them.

Thank you to the Seer who made it all possible. A wild, dangerous but uplifting quest that showed the power of our teamwork.

Thanks Bayn for writing this up for all of us It was a rip-roaring good time! Thanks for asking me along

A couple pics at the end: on the one that has AllNames, look at the white figure sprawled just above Sachiko.


http://www.saltcom.net/wod/lawyer1.jpg

http://www.saltcom.net/wod/lawyer.jpg

"A corpse of a lawyer"

That's not right.