Waterday, 5^th Planting, 591 CY (low summer)

Leaving Corvin* to rest after his ordeal with the zombies, the rest of the party re-enter the tomb, Idni scouting ahead. They check out the room at the end of the corridor, that they had so far ignored, finding sandals, cloaks, swords and more shields. They take some, and head back to the well where they saw spurts of fire from below.

Zarkov puts back the stone book he read, and picks up another [#70]. Then they proceed to the well. First they lower a shield down on some rope, hoping to attract the attention of anything down there, but after nothing happens the party volunteer Idni to go down to have a look. He does so, pokes his head out into a cavern below, and spots a giant slug oozing fire; it spits at him, singeing his hair, and he hollers up to the others demanding to be hauled up swiftly; they do so, and he avoids being charred further. They decide that they need some bait, to lure the creature beneath the well, so they can shoot it from above; the human bodies in the room of corpses seems ideal.

For once they they are not cautious as they head to the room, and Idni runs straight into five more of the zombies, which immediately attack. Halmary and Ungrid form their usual shield wall as Idni backs off behind them; but the zombies grab Ungrid and pull him into their midst, forcing Zarkov to step up to close the gap.

This battle turns out to be the longest one ever, 13 rounds of near-misses as both the party and zombies fail to land a hit; but over the course of the fight the zombies are slowly picked off, but Ungrid is beaten and bitten and half-way through he falls to the floor, trampled over as the zombies close in. Idni takes a vicious bite as well, as does Halmary, and Zarkov uses the Staff of Healing to heal as he can, but only Halmary’s lay on hands manages to stabilise Ungrid.

After the zombies are defeated, turns out that Ungrid is now crippled. Both his legs are crushed. With two party members down, they decide to abandon the tomb and return to their cave, to regroup and recover. They travel, slowly, safely back to the smugglers cave and decide to travel all the way to Hochoch, to see if they can find a cleric to restore their missing limbs and useless legs. Luck is with them, and despite taking three weeks to arrive at the city, they avoid any encounters along the way.

At the city they are in luck and find a cleric who can restore life & limb over the course of a few days. They donate hundreds of gold to the church, and the spells are cast with great ceremony:

• Halmary has his hand regenerated, and feels blessed by his god;
• Ungrid has his legs restored, but is now consumed with an insatiable hunger for alcohol. He is now an alcoholic dwarf [needs to consume a pint every hour or suffer -1 to all saving throws];
• Corvin may or may not be cured of his addled-brain**.

They stay for a further month in the city, allowing the restored party members to recover. While their they learn that the armies have moved on to Preston and wiped out the giants there, and a call has gone out for adventurers to clear up the forest. Meanwhile, the armies are moving slowly towards Gorna. They also learn that the Dim Forest has places to adventure, and decide that what they need to do is gather more experience and treasure, before taking on the giants in their hometown.

So that is where they are heading next, the Dim Forest.

End Date: Earthday, 6^th Wealsun, 591 CY (low summer)

End of Session

Kills: Five dwarf zombies;
PC’s KO’d: Ungrid (mortally wounded, needed a month’s rest, had both legs crushed).

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