This session begins once again within the town of Gren. Our party has consulted with Thomas Duskhallow regarding the large dirt mount and confirmed that it is likely a Giant Wasp nest. Duskhallow estimates that there could be between 20 and 40 Giant Wasps that will have made it their lair. Some of the wasps will be inside the mound and others will be outside.

Once we are prepared, we will set out into the Grasslands once again, starting with another investigation into the ruins where the late Bedford once dwelled.

Today's roster of characters consisted of:

- Giles the Morningstar, Half-Orc Fighter / Assassin.

- Vargas the Dark, Half-Orc Fighter / Assassin.

- Lathar Cassimir, Human Ranger.

- Maervahr, Human Magic-User and psion.

- Gil Buisarme, Half-Elf Cleric / Fighter of Nefer.

The day started off with mild weather but it started storming.

Traversing through the tall grasses, we arrive at the house of Bedford, the Hermit and begin some further investigation.

It is determined that a price of 5 sp would be the average cost for a good quality lock, even a pad lock.

We make it to the ruins of the old thorpe and the house of Bedford, everything just intact as we left it. Maervahr uses his Clairaudience ability to detect sound within the house but detects nothing. We go inside.

The basement still smells bad and there is nobody in there…it smells like death, but regardless we do a thorough examination of the walls. They are sturdy, there are no hollow spots and nothing weird going on.

The clothes that were piled up in here were not the belongings of any residents in town, based on their description. Gren has only noted the disappearances of foreigners but not of any residents in recent times. The skeletal forms were picked clean, most likely by the horde of giant rats that were once dwelling down here.

All of the other buildings in the ruined thorpe are hundreds of years old with only rubble and natural organic matter remaining. Back in Gren, we asked about the Bedford name and a couple people knew of the description. We talked to one person who knew of the ruins and that was the only detail we had of the place from people in Gren.

Maervahr goes inside, listens quietly, and only notices that there is a leak in the roof. Two buckets were placed around the leak but Vargas places one of the buckets directly under the leak. Meanwhile, we search through the house carefully and someone finds that hidden under the bed, there is a potion vial with a liquid inside. It is a deep red potion which we suspect might be a healing potion. Giles takes a sip and feels a general sense of well being and he is slightly healed.

We leave the ruined thorpe and head north east through the grasses until eventually fire is seen in the distance. We approach as the weather continues to storm. It is difficult to hear anything because thunder, lightning strikes and rain are making too much noise across the landscape. However, we can see that there is no movement coming from the area of the fire.

Lathar and some of the group begin checking for any tracks. At this point, the Ranger hears the yelling and laughing of creatures up ahead from voices that are deeper in tone than goblins, and they sound more gruff than regular men.

The party checks to see if Rangers in general understand these types of languages. One of the group's other Rangers, Oleander, is a Half-Elf and she has those types of languages spoken by Hobgoblins and Orcs but Lathar, a Human, cannot speak Orcish yet.

We can see that there are four non-humans about 50 feet ahead. Giles, a Half-Orc, understands Orcish and attempts to listen. The Orcs are camped around a fire with a roasting baby boar set on a spit across it. The fire produces mostly smoke due to the rain. Their backpacks, equipped for travel, and the group of them are huddled around the campfire. 20' away from where the grass breaks is where they have set up camp.

In total, there are 6 of these Orcs and they each wear ringmail and have a shield, giving them AC 6. For weapons, they appear to be wielding polearms, specifically glaives, and axes.

Maervahr lights his hooded lantern from about 20' away from the clearing where they are camped. Lathar indeed knows that they are Orcs.

We do not surprise them.

The small band of Orcs notice us and they are 20' away from the party. The Orcs draw out their weapons and immediately charge us. Maervahr takes a charge from 2 of them, and takes 3 damage, a light blow considering the potential.

Giles hits one of the Orcs for 4 damage and Vargas strikes a mighty blow for 12 damage. 2 of the Orcs are dropped! The small band is now required to make a morale roll. Giles swings his halberd at one of the remaining Orcs and has killed another while some of the other party members make their attacks. There are 2 glaive wielding Orcs left and one wielding a battle axe. These surviving Orcs immediately start running off but the party was able to slaughter them.

Combat ends and the party takes a moment to recover.

It is determined that healing potions must be drank in their entirety to function however potions of extra Healing can be drunk in thirds.

We killed 6 of these Orcs and found 50 ep, 6 hand axes, 6 shields, 6 glaives and 6 battle axes. Their sacks contain bedrolls and tents as well as a couple knives. There is also a tinder Box and a torch. We can get half of the book value for the weapons and half for their armor, which is 6 suits of ring mail. We gather up all the gear and take it back to the ruined thorpe to store it in the house for now.

Following this, we decide to head further south and stumble upon another Orc camp but this time, all of the inhabitants are dead, sprawled out on their backs. Their weapons lie strewn all around. After investigating the bodies, we find that these Orcs look to have been dead for a few days.

We notice that their bodies are all laying in the same direction and that they have massive bruising on parts of their chest. Their faces have been caved in by some catastrophic blow and 4 of them appear to have enormous rending wounds. Some kind of sharp, large and relatively thick object was taken to their bodies and ripped away flesh. We see no burn marks and the wounds only appear on an upper third of their bodies.

We recall the tales of a legendary beast that is said to roam the grasslands and look around for any sign of the Goreson. The upper body wounds are grievous as if they were struck violently with great force and killed instantly.

Looking around the area of the camp from about 50 feet away, there is a wide path of trampled tall grasses as if something moose sized or Goreson sized passed that way. The trail stops abruptly into a large area with tracks that are indicative of hooves.

Amongst the dead orc bodies are 6 glaives and 2 battle axes, 58 ep. 8 suits of ring mail, 8 hand axes, and 8 shields.

With this news, we continue on our way back to Gren.

The party makes it back to town without any incidences along the way.

We are looking at getting a pack mule for the next expedition into the grasslands and spend 24 gp plus 15 sp for a mule, bit and bridle and a harness.

Alltogether, we recovered about 224 gp worth of items and treasure. Divided up, this means we get 64gp and 16 sp.

Today the weather is more pleasant being that is is only partly cloudy and the storms have moved on.

We will head to the Bedford's house and the ruined thorpe in the morning.

Once we arrive at this hub within the otherwise featureless grasslands, we hear a noise coming from the direction of the bodies that were moved out of the cellar. We can hear a grotesque sound as though it was right next to us but it the bodies are 100 feet away.

Our group does not have someone that can Move Silently but we will take our chances.

Vargas manages to climb up on the roof of the house and we can see a creature, within the grass, standing about 5 to 6 feet tall. It is devouring the corpse of a humanoid. The large bison creature raises its head to chew and we see that it appears to have the head of a jackal and razor sharp claws. The bison creature displays a permanent grin on its face but its eye coloring is solid black though rimmed in pure white. Black is the pupil of this beast, with large thick horns. It moves straight forward.

Vargas continues to examine this fearsome creature from afar and do not believe it to be some type of undead monstrosity. It does not resemble a zombie of some type. However, its eyes look soulless…perhaps demon-esque.

The walls of some of the ruined structures around us are still standing but their roofs have all entirely caved in. There are a few that still have perpendicular walls that could be used as a barricade to stand behind. The size of this demonic bison creature is large. When we previously asked about it in town, we heard of its ability to magically fly and we can that this thing can hover over the ground.

The main danger of this Goreson creature, is to become struck by its deadly charge. Thomas Duskhallow says its main instinct was not to leave the grasslands and that it would not be encountered in other regions. The reward for the Goreson is 1,250 gp with a bonus of 500 gp if we bring back the head of the formidable monster.

At this point we believe we are not equipped to handle the Goreson so we decide to go back and get reinforcements.

We head back to Gren.

At the local hiring house we find that there are 8 heavy horsemen lead by a sergeant that are available for hire. They explain that they are just a small band of heavy horsemen that travels through the villages of the region. They travel far enough up from the hills to take jobs with whomever will hire them. They appear to be clean with well kept weapons and armor. They each have matching decorations on their saddle bags. Although they are unaffiliated with another organization or guard, they are a well ordered group just looking for work as mercenaries. They explain that they do have their own arms and armor.

Hiring this group would cost more than a few silver pieces but this is not the first time they have heard of the beast we intend to kill, the Goreson. Our party makes an offer and the sergeant accepts. The mercenaries agree that they will return back half of the payment if the Goreson is not found within a week. We learn that the sergeant goes by the name Buckford and he tells us that two of his men needed to purchase a lance before departing.

We head back to the site of the ruined thorpe once again, this time with the group of mercenaries we hired. Lathar will start tracking the beast amongst the ruins if he can. The party returns to the exact place where it was gruesomely eating the humanoid body but we find that all of the bodies and their bones are entirely gone. A few bits of meat are all that remain to mark that the event even transpired.

Our mounted horsemen can see over the tall grass but do not see anything immediately. Maervahr uses Clairaudience to listen at the site of the slaughtered Orc encampments but hears no sound other than the breeze and swaying of the grass. Our group does notice some tracks that head to the south east.

There are numerous signs of the great beast. At times, its tracks seem to disappear from the ground and then occasionally we find a large depressed area of grass. The Goreson appears to walk most of the time, rather than hover along the ground, which aids in tracking our quarry.

We come to the clearing where we found the dead Orcs. Two of the bodies have been destroyed and consumed. More tracks continue on to the south east for about 3/4 of a mile. Suddenly, the heavy horsemen dismount and duck down with their weapons ready as if they have seen it. The group motions that could see the creature about 100 yards out. The sergeant finds a padded clearing to gather up his men.

Along the trail, there is a discoloration of blood that seems to come from the Goreson, Combat begins…

Again we see the pitch black demonic circles with the white bordered eyes. Our horsemen seem surprised during the encounter but the party moves in and makes several solid hits. Perhaps anticlimactically, the party has killed it…the great Goreson now lies dead. A small collection of 10 ep is recovered from from its remains.

Despite the short work we made against the legendary creature, we thank the heavy horsemen and pay Buckford the promised 100 gp.

The head of the Goreson is removed and Maervahr harvests some of the parts to manufacture magical inks, a requirement for copying spells and creating scrolls in the future. Following the battle, we head back to town.

Back in Gren, we head to the Temple of Riswa where Syrah agress to give us the 250 gp up front for bringing back the head of the Goreson which we are allowed to keep. This equals to 50 gp per character for proving its demise.

We try to sell the horns of the Goreson and check around town, including some of the local taverns. One tavern in particular called “The Haunt” is known to sell the famous Moonbreeze Ale. Another tavern is simply called “The Other Side” and both are located near to the grasslands relative to the rest of town.

The proprietor of “The Other Side” offers us 50 gp for the horns but will give us 150 gp for the whole head, skull and all. We decide to sell it to The Other Side tavern, which is run by Blake Core. Rudolph is Blake's rival and the proprietor of The Haunt tavern.

We receive 30 gp each from Blake, who will display the skull of the Goresin in her establishment, The Other Side tavern.

We searched the last two parts of the grasslands and cleared out everything, except the Giant Wasps, as per Syrah's request. After completing this, we head back to the site where the Goresin's body was left. We find the headless corpse of the gruesome creature and open its belly to search for loot that it may have consumed in the past. We find inside the corpse at total of 8 pp and a fine bracelet made of pure gold. The bracelet is non-magical to our detections and appears to be worth more than 1,000 gold coins.

The party once again, returns back to Gren with our task nearly completed and some new treasure in our pouches.

The Jeweler of Gren is called Norb Quicksilver. He heard about the slaying of the legendary Goresin, and even though the bracelet was once in the belly of a demonic beast, he offers us 1,300 gp for the valuable jewelry. That means we each gain 260 gp.

The jeweler sells gems of all sorts as well and he has a 280 gp amber which Maervahr purchases, for later use in spellcasting.

Although we have cleared out most of the grasslands, we have not yet dealt with the Giant Wasp mound. Maervahr uses Clairaudience periodically throughout the day to focus in on the mound, to find out when the wasps are most active. During the night he finds that the sounds around the mound are at their faintest around midnight and did not hear any wasps outside the mound at this time.

Maervahr conceives of a plan to use a cart with several logs and oil to attempt to burn down the Giant Wasps within their mound. The basic premise of this plan will be to gather several logs to construct a pyramid type barrier on a cart and use that to protect against the Giant Wasps. Our material costs would be 1 sp for each bundle of hay, a cart for 12 gp, a pint of shitty oil is 2 gp but for a large amount is 60 gp total.

Each share for the total cost of all items is 14 gp, 10 sp per person. Vargas buys the draft horse, which can barely pull the cart with each of the logs, hay and other items.

Due to not having full confidence in his plan, Maervahr wills all of his gold to Ithimyr.

The next evening, the party departs for the Giant Wasp mound with the cart / tank in tow behind the draft horse.

As we approach and get closer to the mound, we can feel very low vibrations coming through the ground. Giles detects no heat or anything up ahead using his infravision. He only sees the shadow of the mound in the distance, which is around 10' tall.

Suddenly, our presence stirs up the dangerous insects and they begin to emerge out of the mound. The Giant Wasps are coming!

We light the oil and hay bales and make it back to the “tank” cart. The wasps' buzzing gets loud as they are coming out from the earth around us, clicking and crawling. Gil begins firing his bow through the gaps at the top of the log pyramid.

Meanwhile, a pillar of flame rises up from the mound, where the hay bales have been set in a blaze. Our cart suddenly lurches forward and the group inside piles up on top of each other. The draft horse outside is being attacked and in a panic, takes us 20 feet away from our original position. We continue to hear the soft clicking and buzzing sounds and witness some movement in the grass.

Around 30 or 40' away, we see the burning flames. Our cart is now surrounded by horrible noises of fire and insects climbing all around as the cart shakes back and forth. We hear some intense scraping along the log walls of our crude cart / tank and can see movement in the sky, off in the distance. There are numerous creatures crawling by the cart are on the ground. Human-sized wasps attacking the cart like oversized cockroaches and yet, our fortification is holding.

Six minutes pass until eventually, the buzzing noises die down and we can see light coming from different areas. It appears as if they are scattering…the Giant Wasps have dispersed.

Vargas steps out of the tank slowly to scan the situation. He sees that a few patches of grass have broken out into flames to about a radius of 20'. He does not see any wasps, except for one huge human sized wasp that is filled with Gil's arrows. He notices that the grassfires are spreading.

The party is aware that supposedly, the lair of the Giant Wasps will have gems but we will have to return after the fires have managed to die down more. We head back to town, as we are not equipped to deal with a rampant grassfire.

The party of foolhardy adventurers make it back to Gren and we step outside the inn's room where we are staying. Out toward the western fields in the distance we can see trails of smoke rising, coming from a range of about 3 to 4 miles away. This looks like the grasslands have burned but they have not been entirely consumed.

Around town, the people are talking about it but generally, they are not too surprised. People wonder how much of the grasses are gone and when the fires do happen, it is not considered all that uncommon. If the fires approach the town, most of the inhabitants may go to undesirable places outside of Gren or away from the grasslands.

The next day we decide to head back and find that the grassland has been torched almost entirely, from the river near the Chapel out to nearly 3 miles towards the forest. The tall grasses are burned away and gone. All the remains are ash and the sporadic remnants of fire.

We manage to find the Giant Wasp mound and carefully make our way inside the earth, leading down. Maervahr pulls out his hooded lantern as the party descends into caverns, but more like tunnels, that are filled with small to medium sized creatures. Everywhere we can see animal corpses and refuse, all covered in a gross shiny stuff that the wasps use to pack down the place. The corpses are filled with large writhing maggots, including some dead foxes and boars.

We also see that packed into the walls of the tunnels are numerous gems. As we approach with our light, the Larvae squirm and writhe, causing corpses to move and roll over. Despite the gruesome bodies and terrible smell, we collect a bunch of the gems. There are maggots everywhere but we still manage to clear it out after about 1-2 hours. We leave the mound with a hefty pile of 30 gems of 6 different types.

Emerging from the mound, we notice the burned remnants of our makeshift tank. Considering that we do not want to advertise to the local residents about what may have started the fires, we decide to hide the burned cart / tank behind the Chapterhouse, on the Chapel grounds. Following this, we make our way back to Gren with our collection of treasure.

Back in Gren, we divide up the treasure:

Tsanu and Halzgaz as well as the rest of us all get 214 gp, 5 sp and 8 cp each.

The gems include 6 very nice banded agates (50 gp), 4 shitty jaspers (10 gp), 4 amethysts (100 gp), 3 citrines (50 gp), 7 topazes (500 gp), and 6 peridots (750 gp).

Maervahr gets 1 peridot worth 750 gp, 2 topaz worth 500 gp each, and 1 banded agate worth 50 gp as well as 478 gp.

Each character receives 1,778 in treasure xp value.

1778 xp 1956 1259 xp 1385

Maervahr needs a trainer to attain level 2 Magic-User.

With a rating of an E or S, the training costs can be paid partially in service.