| Forgotten Realms Campaign 2001 13 August, 2001 |
Player Characters
The morning following the manticore attack, 4 Eleint, the party headed back to the bridge where they had fought the giants the day before. After some brief planning, the party began to move down the cliff towards the cave opening. Sam loaned Thartok his pair of slippers of spider climbing and climbed into his bag of holding to be carried down. Hoshi donned his slippers of spider climbing, as well, and started down the face of the cliff with Thartok. Fraugh used dimension door to transport himself, his frog, and Mills directly to the cave opening.
When Thartok and Hoshi were half the distance to the cave opening (which was 200 feet down from the top of the cliff, and 800 feet up from the bottom of the chasm), 5 manticores flew into view and moved to attack. At a distance of 150 feet, the manticores began flinging their tailspiles at Thartok and Hoshi. Thartok stopped his climb to get his bronze griffon figurine out of his pack and send it to attack the manticores. Thartok was under continual attack, seeming to attract the manticore tailspikes. Hoshi had some luck in deflecting the incoming spikes, but was still hurt. The two climbed as fast as they could to reach the cave opening and remove themselves as primary targets. Fraugh cast several spells at the attacking manticores, as did Mills, though Mills also took several shots with his crossbow.
Finally, Thartok and Hoshi reached the cave opening, and the manticores seemed to run out of tailspikes. The surviving (non-blinded) manticores flew up to engage the party in melee. Fraugh, Mills, Thartok, and Sam were along the edge of the cave entrance, battling the manticores, as Hoshi stepped to look further back into the cave.
Hoshi watched the darkness move and come towards him, a red dragon flying just over his head towards the cave entrance. The dragon attempted to wing-buffet Fraugh and Thartok off the edge of the cave entrance before flying out of the cave.
The dragon then did a wing-over and flew back towards the cave, breathing fire into the entrance, heedless of the manticores. The last couple of manticores died. And so did Thartok.
The party panicked, but had little choice but to keep on fighting. They retreated back into the cave, drawing the dragon after them. The dragon focused on Fraugh, but had little success since the wizard had spent considerable magic protecting himself. This allowed Sam, Mills, and Hoshi to attack the dragon, whittling him down. The dragon died, leaving a very shaken Fraugh thanking his miss-percentages.
The man they had met the day before, Finglos, came out of the darkness in the back of the cave. He thanked the party for rescuing him, even if indirectly, and apologized for attempting to mislead them yesterday. He led the party back to the young dragon's lair, where a lot of stolen merchant goods were stacked up, along with a not-insignificant amount of treasure. Finglos took back his own items which the dragon had stolen from him, though he offered his healing potions to the party to use.
The next day, Mills resurrected Thartok. After packing up the treasure they wanted from the small horde, the party headed back to Oligo.
In Oligo, the party recounted the story of their adventure, presented the heads of several manticores and that of the dragon as proof, and were paid the rest of their wages. They also visited the tailor they had rescued, Berimir, and received their free outfits.
After several days in Oligo, re-outfitting, the party headed west once again. They arrived in Scornubel a tenday later, on 17 Eleint, 1372 DR.
Everyone received 4000XP. Fraugh became Level 10. [an error occurred while processing this directive]