Character Roster:

• Sapphira
• Jedor (H)
• Phineas - Cleric 4, NG.
• Keisial
• Falavor - Thief
• Timbraun
• Litlee (H)
• Oswald
• BRON I
• Risten

We are heading back to the Druid Grove and the Tree of Elis'tun to investigate the released Bramble Beast and the locked stone door beneath the tree's roots.

During the downtime, Falavor discovered a property of his magic dagger: it changes to +2 for attacking a target that is smaller than a man. He gains 250 xp.

The party has gathered in Starling for this expedition.

Keisial will be on a Heavy Warhorse. Thorgard has a cart but we will have to leave it on the outside of the forest hex. Updated, we do not bring it.

For Mercenaries, in Starling there are:

• Heavy Horsemen x12 plus a Lieutenant

We head to Mombafra to look for more Mercenaries.

In Mombafra are the following:

• Heavy Horsemen x8 (Wearing plate, lance, broadsword, shield, and a mace.)
• Light Footmen x7 (Wearing padded armor, shield, spear, and a club.)
• Sergeant x2

Falavor hires the 8 Heavy Horsemen, 7 Light Footmen and the Sergeant. They are all hired for 5 days up front. The Sergeant is a 1st level Fighter and has plate mail and a longsword (not glowing). 325 gp is the total.

It is about 2 days to get to the Druid Grove. It is 2 days to get to Elir and the travel to Elir is uneventful, including the evening when we made camp.

There is no word about the Druids or the previous weeks events in Elir amongst the populace. “Billy Bob” and “Thornton” have not had any encounters with any beasts.

For next time, David will update the hex map.

The Druid Grove hex is located 4 hexes from the volcano within the Red Sun Valley.

Travel to the forest hex is uneventful and we get to the light forest that is near the small mountain range north of the forest.

We travel through the light forest and suddenly it gets thick when we reach the Bramble area.

The party decides to enter through the west end of the creek where we will go around the west end of the thicker forest. We find the outlet of the creek and it is oppressed by trees and growth on either side. We can slowly make our way through on foot so the Horses will not go upstream and the mercenaries will stay behind and watch our mounts.

Falavor stays in the back, behind the party.

The creek eventually empties into some kind of pond and we can make out some land beyond the water. The forest is very thick here. Dominating the air is a heavy presence that we can all sense.

We could skirt around the edge of the pond and it looks like a clear and mundane pond. Falavor will climb a tree to see what lies ahead. He rolls his chance and succeeds. He can see that some of the trees are over 100' tall. Falavor manages to get up 40' and can see into the clearing beyond. He can see the pond and the stream that continues north. There is a clearing on the other side of the pond. There are structures in the clearing including 2 longhouses and 2 smaller buildings. There is a garden in the south end of the clearing.

Falavor does see some movement in the clearing but it is hard to tell what they are. They resemble vaguely Human shapes moving around very slowly from place to place but with no purpose. They are not walking next to each other, just ambulating around. They do not seem to be wearing armor but look similar to the trees themselves.

The buildings look well built but are made of forest materials. They don't look like Orc buildings or other simple constructions. Risten wants to approach with an Elf or Half-Elf to parley.

We decide that we will try to hail them from outside of the grove. As we move forward, the forest opens up and we have the sight of the clearing. From this position, we can all see into the grove and see the two longhouses and two regular, smaller buildings. There is a beautiful garden in the south end with plenty of crops to feed a sizable group.

After a moment, we can finally see the people that are moving around. They look like Wood Elves but they are entirely draped in thorns and vines. There are brown and black brambles that cover their bodies, some of them come out of their faces. There are trails of dried blood coming out of their bodies as well. They are moving around like Zombies with swords in their hands.

There are 10 of them. The Bramble Elves are spread out.

• Sapphira detects evil.
• Risten casts ESP spell.
• Keisial braces for a charge.
• Fineas has a shield ready.
• Bron braces for a charge.
• Jedor draws his sword and looks to the back.
• Falavor hides in the shadows.
• Timbraun says lets get out of here.
• Litlee stands by.
• Oswald casts Prayer.

Sapphira does Detect Evil on the nearby Wood Elf and finds that it comes from an effect on the Wood Elf and not the elf itself. The Wood Elves begins moving around the side of the pond and moving towards the pond. When they get to the pond they begin moving toward the edge, going around in either direction.

About half of them are at the pond are moving for the edge of the forest while the other half is moving to follow their companions. Risten's ESP spell goes off. When they get to the edge of the forest, they move through it without being slowed at all. At the end of the round, half are in striking range of us but they did not charge. The Prayer spell goes off and lasts for 6 rounds.

Two of the Bramble Elves engage us. 3 are in the south side of the creek and will walk through it. Risten detects one of their thoughts which seem far away with feelings of anguish, fear and he can hear a sense of pleading for help from one of them. There are no thoughts on the other 4, just the thoughts on one of them. The other 5 are just behind the others. They are wearing armor below their brambles. They have thorns on them. We get no sweep attacks against these Bramble Elves.

• Timbraun withdrawls.
• Litlee engages.
• Bron attacks.
• Risten announces that their minds are corrupted. Fighting withdrawal to cast.
• Oswald will cast Dispel Magic
• Sapphira attacks
• Jedor draws his sword
• Fineas focuses his attacks on the bramble.
• Keisial attacks.
• Falavor moves silently.

Suddenly, 4 arrow shots are fired which are aimed at the back of the party. Falavor is hidden. Oswald, Litlee and Jedor are being attacked. PROTECTION FROM EVIL APPLIES!

Jedor is missed, 2 shots on Oswald who has AC -6 due to PFE and Prayer plus his armor type (weapons vs. AC). 20s are needed, Both shots MISSED! These are small arrows being shot from places unknown in the forest. 2 shots on Litlee, who has -4 AC, hits on 19, both missed!

2 Bramble Elves attack Risten and Sapphira. Risten is hit for 5 damage, he has 4 hp left. Sapphira is missed!

The other Bramble Elves are charging. Nevermind, they cannot charge due to the undergrowth. Dispel Magic is 6 segments.

They have AC 5/5.

Sapphira hits a Bramble Elf for 6 damage and hacks off a bunch of brambles. Keisial hits for 9 damage which kills one! Phineas hits for 5 damage.

4 more arrows are shot at the back group. They are fired on Jedor or Oswald.

2 on Oswald, both missed. 2 on Jedor, both missed.

All the Bramble Elves have moved to engage but some are now sopping wet. Dispel Magic goes off. There are 5 that he can effect. Oswald has 5 chances of 42% to succeed. The Dispel Magic does not work on any of them!

We all still have Protection From Evil.

• Oswald casts Hold Person.
• Sapphira attacks
• Jedor attacks
• Phineas attacks non-lethally
• Keisial attacks
• Falavor will backstab
• Timbraun casts sleep
• Litlee attacks
• Bron attacks.
• Risten was trying to escape.

Phineas hits for 2. Bron hits for 7. Falavor hits for 27 damage. Keisial hit for 8. Litlee did 5 damage.

We have taken out 4 of the Bramble Elves. Timbraun is focusing at range of 4“ for the Sleep spell to target whatever is shooting us from the forest. The Sleep spell finishes. There is no effect of them that is seen.

On segment 4 there are 2 more arrow shots going for Jedor and Oswald. Falavor is not a target. The 1 on Jedor misses. The 1 on Oswald misses.

We make our melee attacks on the Bramble Elves. Bron is getting mobbed by 4 Elves He has a total of -3 AC. ALL MISS!

On segment 6, Hold Person goes off on the 3 Elves. All of them fail their save and are Held! They are Held for 1 turn. The 1 Bramble Elf on Jedor is missed as is Oswald.

There is now only 1 active Elf left.

As we start fighting, we see some stuff from our peripheral. There is thick forest between us and we are on the edge of the river, trying to keep our balance. We can still see a large shape that is moving across the garden area. Some of us only catch a glimpse of it, which resembles a hulking form about 10-12' tall and longer than that. It moves quite quickly and it is 34” away, moving laterally.

• Fineas attacks nonlethally.
• Keisial attacks.
• Falavor Moves Silently.
• Timbraun yells that we are not trying to hurt anybody.
• Litlee does a fighting withdrawal.
• Bron attacks the elf.
• Risten is out of melee.
• Oswald goes toward the arrow fire to the north.
• Sapphira attacks.
• Jedor moves.

More arrows are fired at us but both miss Jedor and Oswald. There is one attack from the Bramble Elf, this time is on Keisial. MISSED! Sapphira hits for 8 damage and Bron hits for 6, killing it!

There are 6 slain Bramble Elves, 3 held Elves and 1 unconscious Elf. Timbraun rolls a 56 for the Reaction roll against the invisible Sprites as she says that “We just wants to go see the door. We did not mean for all the trouble to happen”.

There is a Morale check for the hidden Sprites that were shooting arrows at us. Then, it stops. There is no more arrow fire. Phineas heals Risten for 5 hp.

Bron and some of the others go north and find two sleeping Sprite forms. Bron slays one and Falavor slays the other one.

Jedor does not sense any other creatures nearby. We can tell that they were about 2' tall and a little bow is pulled from their dead bodies along with some loose arrows. There was some liquid on the tip of the arrows, some type of poison.

Oswald ties up the held Bramble Elves and we try to remove all the vines and thorns. There is no difficulty as we pull them off, but the thorns just come back. The vines just manifest around the bodies.

These Elves are not zombies, they are just controlled mentally by something. The Elves facial features show that they were out of it and the Hold spell is still active on them.

We follow the stream further up past the pond to the north and see a bridge going over the stream, very nice and serene. It is connected to a path which goes further north. As we get to it, we can see into the clearing. Besides the buildings we can tell that there is an area nestled away toward the back. There is also another building that we did not see before.

Down in the south is a soiled pulpit, an elevated area that is covered in grass. There are organic ornaments around it, baubles and other objects with different colors: pinks, greens and whites. Sprinkled across the top are electrum, copper and silver coins that seem to be decorating the edge of the elevated area.

The area to the south east is shielded and forms a big archway as if to shield out the sun with leaves and branches. It resembles the archways used at some weddings but we cannot see what lies back there.

We check out the north building first. When we enter, we find that it has benches, tables and supplies for herbalism. There are clay and glass supplies that may have a decent value to them.

After this building, we decide to go into the first longhouse. It is a living space for about 15-20 people. It appears to be completely deserted. There are two rows of beds and some personal belongings including whetstones for maintaining weapons and there are some swords, sewing supplies. etc. lying about. Some of the belongings would have some value but they are not special. Nobody has used this building for several days at least.

Timbraun, Risten and Litlee go to sleep for 4 hours. Jedor will guard them. Actually no, they cancel this plan.

Looking through the whole of the longhouse we judge that there are 900 cp worth of belongings but nothing special or anything worth scavenging.

The next longhouse looks similar in arrangement and content with about 1,100 cp worth of belongings and nothing else of value.

We check out the building to the west. It appears to be a meeting hall with a small kitchen and plenty of seating. We do not find anything after searching thoroughly.

We go toward the south end building. Inside, we find that there is a chest that appears to be locked. Falavor will try to pick the lock, and he succeeds! The chest otherwise does not look to be trapped. Inside we find:

• 600 ep
• 700 gp

The very bountiful and lush garden outside has tomatoes, carrots, lettuce, celery, potatoes and herbs all in the garden. Bron eats a tomato and grabs a bunch of them. We find that there is a raised section in the back of the garden area.

Within the arched area, we can see that there is a shelf area covered with thorns and vines with some stuff underneath.

In the northern room the supplies:

• supplies worth 200 gp and weigh 400 coin.

We collect many coins from the pulpit:

• 7900 cp
• 6700 sp
• 2400 ep

As we gather up the coins, we can see that a lot of the flowers and ornaments have been trampled. There are many broken thorns and snapped off vines that are flattened in a big area.

The path north leads to another clearing where there are standing stones. They are about 20' tall and 8' wide, resembling elongated tombstones. They are Druidic but none of us can read the runes on the stones. There is another path to the south from here. Inside the clearing and inside the exterior standing stones, we can see more stones. There are 4 blocky ones that are less long and more bulky. They do not have a point to the top and they are more curved like tombstones.

In the very center is a very large fire pit and two longer stones along with the remnants of thorns and brambles. This area has been used heavily but there are no bushes or anything.

Bron takes a look at the center stones but does not see anything more besides the stones. We continue onward toward the east path and see that the sides of the stream are overgrown. We will have to ford across in the stream in this area and it is 6-8' deep.

If we carry more than 200 coins we will just sink to the bottom. Timbraun will swim across and he makes it, then secures the rope. Falavor will go across to secure the rope and we get to the other side without much difficulty.

There are a couple of colored mushrooms toward a pathway to the south but we ignore this for now and continue north. Now we can see that the Bramble Wall is gone as it has all crashed down. The path is completely open and there is a smaller path area leading further east.

We can see a bowl and a green pouch that were left discarded. Also, we can see that there is blood on the floor of the forest here though there are no bodies. There is no blood trail besides the dried pools we find.

We continue on and Bron has his sword out with his shield.

In here are 8 Bramble Wood Elves. 7 of them have shields and longswords and 1 has plate armor. A 3rd has a staff sling. They look lost and disoriented mentally. They turn to face in our direction. There are a total of 8 Bramble Elves.

• Falavor shoots
• Timbraun will throw daggers
• Litlee charges the Staff Sling
• Bron will charge.
• Risten will magic missile one
• Oswald charges
• Sapphira charges
• Jedor charges
• Phineas charges

We lose intiiative 6 to 1. The one with the staff sling casts a spell while the other elves are charging at us.

They are going for the front lines, Bron, Phineas and Keisial. Phineas is attacked by the one wearing plate mail. He has AC 0 due to his charge as they meet and he is hit on a 17. IT HITS! Phineas takes 8 damage! Other 6 are also going for the front line. They attack Keisial x3 and Phineas x3. They hit on 17s. One hits Phineas dealing 5 damage. There are 3 on Keisial and he has AC -1 but all of them miss.

Bron hits one for 3 damage.

The plate wearer has AC 3/2. Keisial's attack missed and Phineas also missed.

Falavor must his AC 8/8 against the Bramble Elf caster. He hits, dealing 6 damage! The spell is ruined! There is another 2 damage from Falavor. Sapphira misses as does Phineas who also missed. Oswald misses as well. Sapphira hits for 2 damage.

Timbraun can throw daggers this round and Risten's Magic Missile goes off, dealing 4 damage.

• Phineas does a fighting retreat
• Litlee fighting retreat.
• Timbraun does nothing.
• Risten casts Magic Missile again.
• Everyone else attacks.

We got the initiative.

Bron hits one for 9 damage which kills it! Falavor kills the staff sling wielder! Risten blasts one to pieces with his Magic Missile spell!

Litlee is attacked twice, actually 3 times and there is 1 on Oswald this time. Oswald is missed and Litlee is also missed. Another attack on Oswald hits and he takes 2 damage. Litlee misses with her attack.

• Risten hangs back.
• Litlee does a fighting withdrawal.
• Falavor moves silently.
• Phineas casts Spiritual Hammer.
• The rest of us attack.

There is a 5 segment spell casting time for Spiritual Hammer.

Bron hits the plate wearer Bramble Elf for 9 damage. Keisial also hits the plate wearer for 9 damage, but it still fights on! Oswald hit one for 5 damage.

None are killed this round so far.

Keisial is missed. Bron is missed. Jedor is missed. Litlee is missed. The plate wearer misses Oswald.

Spiritual Hammer hits for 5 damage, killing one!

• Falavor tries to backstab the plate wearer.
• Litlee continues to withdraw.
• Phineas attacks with Spiritual Hammer.

Bron misses this time. Falavor misses too as does everyone else.

The Bramble Elves attack Litlee and Jedor. Jedor is missed. Litlee is missed. Falavor is missed. The plate Wearer attacks Keisial and misses.

Suddenly, our rear line is now under arrow fire! There are a total of 8 shots against the people who are not in melee.

There is 1 on Phineas, 4 on Timbraun and 3 on Risten.

Phineas is hit for 2 damage. He goes down! Phineas is at 0 hp and unconscious!

Timbraun has 10/10 AC and there are 2 arrow hits! He takes a total of 3 damage and must save against poison twice! He saves against both. The arrows are coming from the south.

Risten will be hit on a 4 and he takes 3 hits for 5 damage, 4 damage and he is now at 0 hp. HE DROPS! Last shot is on Timbraun but it misses.

The invisible creatures are more Sprites.

• Keisial attacks.
• Falavor moves silently.
• Timbraun takes cover 75% cover.
• Litlee does a fighting withdrawl.
• Bron attacks the plate wearer.
• Oswald attacks the plate wearer.
• Jedor attacks the normal Elves

Oswald hits one Bramble Elf for 4 damage and Bron hits one for 5 damage. Finally, Jedor hits one for 9, killing it!

The plate wearer is still alive plus there are 2 more.

Falavor is moving silently. Sapphira is attacked as is Litlee. This time, Sapphira is hit and she takes 4 damage. Litlee is missed and she misses with her retaliation strike.

The Sprite's arrows are now shooting into melee.

There are 8 shots this time and 2 are on our enemies with 6 arrow shots on us. The 2 shots are on the regular Bramble Elves and both miss! Of the 6 arrows on us, 1 is on Keisial, 4 are on Oswald, 1 on Bron. There are 4 arrow attacks on Oswald, 1 on Keisial, and 1 on BRON.

Keisial is missed. Bron is missed. Of the 4 shots on Oswald, who has AC 2/2, 1 hits and he takes 6 damage. He also makes his save against the poison!

• Timbraun wants to parley with them saying that “we have no quarrel, if you want us to leave we will leave”.
• Everyone else attacks.

We lose the initiative. The 2 normal Bramble Elves attack, going after Keisial and Sapphira this time. Keisial is missed. Sapphira is hit for 7 damage.

8 bow shots are fired into melee and again, there are 2 on enemies and 6 on us. 1 enemy is struck by the bow shots and takes 6 damage which kills it! There are 6 shots on us, Oswald is missed, Bron is missed, Litlee is missed, Jedor is missed, Bron is missed again!

Timbraun rolls a Reaction check at -30 while trying to parley. The voices from the south shout that they heard what we said the last time and they won't be tricked again! Litlee misses.

The plate wearer is hit for 6 damage by Oswald, 9 damage by Keisial, and a successful backstab for 30 damage by Falavor! Litlee is now out of melee.

• Litlee binds Risten's wounds who is currently at -3 hp.
• Falavor starts shooting at the Sprites.
• Timbraun stays behind cover.
• Everyone else attacks.

There is a melee attack against Sapphira but it misses! 8 bowshots are fired: Sapphira is missed, Bron is missed, Keisial is missed and Bron is missed again.

The last Bramble Elf is slain!

Falavor shoots the invisible Sprites but misses.

They continue their ranged attacks and there are 8 more shots. Bron is missed, Keisial is missed, Bron is missed again and Jedor is missed. Falavor misses his second bow shot.

• Falavor keeps shooting.
• Timbraun goes under cover and Litlee stays under cover.
• Bron will also shoot with his bow.
• Oswald grabs Ristens body and drags him out.
• Sapphira will lay on hands on Phineas.
• Jedor lay on hands for Risten.
• Keisial check plate armored elf for loot.

Falavor shoots first but misses.

There are now going to be some morale check for the Sprites but they roll a 36. There are no more shots coming at us and it is completely silent. We decide to get out of here…

We grab the gems that were lying around this part of the clearing and go. They are all semi-precious gems, about 600 coins worth.

The party manages to escape back to Starling without encountering any more of the Bramble Elves or Sprites. We make it back successfully.

Total Treasure:

• 3000 ep
• 700 gp

All the gems are worth 600 gp.

We have a total of 310 treasure xp each. 155 treasure xp for the henchmen.

We each get:

• 144 gp.
• 332 ep.
• Henchmen get half.

Henchmen get 143 xp each. PCs get 439 xp each.

Phineas is now xp capped.