When last we left our heroes . . . (episode 2)

. . . Avantador used his Dancing Lights to create the shape of a humanoid at the entrance to the cave, which drew out a couple more goblins, who were quickly dispatched, and we made the brave decision to step into our first “dungeon” of sorts. 

Just inside the dungeon were a couple of chained up dogs . . . they were fierce mangy mutts that would sooner eat the side of your face than look at you twice.  That didn’t stop Melancholy’s big heart from taking a full day’s ration and tossing it to the two dogs to try and charm them into liking her.

It took some extreme talking by the others to convince Avantador that it was ok to let these two dogs go free, but he could see that Melancholy had at least filled their bellies and they weren’t out to eat much of anything anymore.

The dogs were let go, and they ran away into the woods never to be seen again? Well, we haven't seen them since at least . . .

The room itself was big and dirty with a giant garbage heap over on one side and what looked like a slide coming down to it. This will become more important in just a little bit . . . for now . . . ONWARD!

Back in the hallway we continued down the path and immediately what we noticed was a small creek that trickled down and a rope bridge high above.

We put two and two together and realized that taking the high road was probably the best action and soon enough everyone was parkour-ing (yup that’s a word) up to the bridge and dropping a rope down to those who weren’t nimble enough.

As we snaked our way down the tunnel we entered a large cavern where we could see a couple of goblins and a big dam of water. This would be our first big battle, and we did pretty darn good.  I can’t remember the particulars of the fight, but I do remember us being awesome and the dam breaking and washing everything downstream, which we smartly avoided. Yay us!

Oh yeah . . . except for one thing . . . three goblins had fled our awesomeness and jumped down the chute into the dog room below.  Not one to back down from a fight (or leave experience on the table) Avantador leaped down the chute after them. The only problem is that no one else followed him down . . . uh . . .

After rising from a fall into a pile of garbage, Avantador spied the three escapee goblin archers. Mustering up the scariest Dragonborn voice he could, he roared at them, “RUN!” (*insert failed intimidation*)

The goblins laughed, plucking him with two arrows that hit pretty dang hard for goblin arrows actually, and Avantador fell down bleeding out and dying in that heap of garbage . . . yes, his big beautiful 19 Charisma self was dying in a heap of garbage from a couple of punk goblins.

Luckily Graver and Melancholy stopped searching the crates above for loot and jumped down after hearing a sad Dragonborn moan from the garbage heap below. Graver shot out a couple of amazing magic missiles, which downed one and miraculously made the other two flee. Yup, a big 6’1” Dragonborn, not scary . . . a crazed rock gnome shooting magic missiles, scary. Got it.

Thankfully Melancholy patched up Avantador’s wounds, stabilizing him, and helped get him back on his feet. His first words upon returning to consciousness? “Thank you for not letting me die in garbage.” After drinking a healing potion, Avantador was ready to take up the rear of the group and pass around a few bardic inspirations because there was yet another hallway to venture down.

Eventually we got to another room full of goblins, and we were all having a very difficult time squeezing into the room and dealing with them because of the shape of the hallway, but eventually we took them all out thanks to some burning hands from Graver, some darts from Melancholy, and of course . . . the elf was hard at work.  Finally we ended up injuring and staring down a big bad hobgoblin boss that had captive one of our employers, Sildar Hallwinter, from the town of Leilon.

The hobgoblin had a knife to Sildar's back and told us that if we walked any farther he’d end his life.

For most of us in the party there was that tense moment of indecision, but not for Althea! *Twang* She took matters into her own hands and nailed that hobgoblin boss right between the eyes before he could do anything else. “HAHA! Love that elf!” What else could we say?

At least Sildar seemed appreciative . . . but where was Gundrun Rockseeker, companion to Sildar?  Was he dead? Alive? A traitor? One thing was for sure, he wasn’t with Sildar that day.

(to be continued . . .)