Jevar’kiev 18

Hell of a shock today. Got a message from home. From my mother.

As soon as I got it though, I suddenly remembered my home village and my parents. Well, village is a bit inaccurate. Nomadic tribe is more correct. So, briefly: my father, Mar, is a hedge ogre, and my mother, Nesh, is from a tribe of horse-warriors in the Meletian Kingdom (South and a bit to the east from Fangerie. Farzey sits nearly right on the border.). While I was raised by my mother’s clan, it was my father who trained me in the sword. Hedge ogres, as it turns out, use 2H swords exclusively.

I have to admit, I found that a little disturbing. Did I really just remember all that because of the message? That’s basically how associative memory works, so no problem there. Or, and this is the disturbing bit, did my arrival here with the intention of never going back to the keep trigger my backstory, which required creating details about my family?

Oh, I have siblings. My three elder siblings are fully human, the first two are female, Threl & Bricon, the third is male, Durovot. So, half-siblings technically. Then an orc raid killed their father, Vot. There was an Orc war, some sketchy details, a strange alliance, and eventually there was me. And sometime later my younger brother, also a half-ogre, named Ulled.

A bit about hedge ogres. They’re the (slightly) more civilized version of common ogres. A little cleaner, better dressed, better equipped, even a bit smarter. They’re not high ogres though, which is fortunate. High ogres require eating human flesh once a year to survive. Hedge ogres, classified as a low ogre, avoid the other low ogres (which includes trash ogres) and instead, tend to lead tribes of orcs.

So, did the orcs turn on my father’s tribe, and that led to the orc raids, the alliance, and.. eventually me? Something like that, at least.

Anyway, the message. Briefly, it was a how-are-you, you-never-write, you-have-a-niece, that-makes-me-a-grandmother, come-visit, yadda yadda. Honestly though, how would I even write a letter to a nomadic tribe?

----

Jevar’kiev 22

Today is a national holiday in the Meletian Kingdom, called the Freedom. It celebrates the tribes’ freedom to travel. In honor of that, I headed up to Fangerie, to follow up on my giant hunting idea.

----

Nadur’kiev 28

Boring month. Sold off my extra gear, taking extra time to get the very best prices I could, and purchased a giant-slayer sword like I planned. Then I found out they had a second one, in longsword form.

Dumb, in my opinion. Why would you use anything but the largest sword possible when attacking huge creatures?

Anyway, the shop offered to contact a wizard to steal the enchantment for me. I'd forgotten about that spell, from Tome of Magic. I'd have to purchase the longsword and pay the wizard, and the risk of failure would be entirely assumed by me. But recalling the way the failure chance worked, I could reduce it by making sure the wizard could cast 9th level spells, which would be a level 17 wizard at the least, and thus an 85% chance of success.

I think it's worth it.

----

Tomar’kiev 28

Took a heck of a lot more work than I expected, but I have both my giant-slayer blades. I ended up doing three weeks of caravan guard duty, working my way to the wizard’s tower in Krandaneer city, capital of the kingdom of Krandaneer. It’s done, it worked, so I have no complaints.

Spring is over, and here I am heading south in summer. But I’ve planned ahead! Now, I actually would have preferred a ring of fire resistance, but all that was available was a ring of coolness. It was a matched set with a ring of warmth, so I got both.

----

Blain’sa 28

The city of Melet, the capital of the Meletian Kingdom. What a dump. Spent much too long here trying to figure out where to find my mother’s tribe.

Another disquieting fact has occurred to me. Thor is one of the primary deities of the kingdom, along with Zelaur, Par’Kryus, and Raven. But I felt an instinctive desire to follow Thor. Some buried instinct, or the wurld being rewritten to fit me? I really hope it’s just the first and I’m being paranoid.

Also, Melet is getting reports of raids in the southern regions. This is common enough, but they’re not orcs this time. It’s giants. Hill, frost, and fire giants if the reports are correct. Something about that rings a bell, but I’m well pleased. Giant hunting is a go.

----

Sirin’sa 28

Three weeks of wandering the grasslands. After a while, it all started to seem familiar.

Not because I was traveling in circles. That did occur to me.

I finally found them near Hevor, one of the smaller towns on the edge of the grasslands. It was a good reunion, and my niece was certainly cute, though very tiny.

However, I now know why mother wanted me back. The problem is Ulled. Somehow or other, he’s found the path of the berserker. The hackpangs that warned me away from the class are a serious problem for him. I can appreciate it somewhat, having fallen into a hackfrenzy a few times. But he’s got to deal with hacklust, too. Anyhow, mother came up with a uniquely mother-type solution.

My mother has asked me to take my younger brother adventuring.

Seriously??

----

Yurn’sa 17

Meleti day, national holiday. This one is more for the city folk, so I’ll leave it at that.

The reports of raids by giants are getting much worse. There are now tales of hill and frost giants working together. The Duke of Fraduir has sent messages throughout the kingdom, calling for a gathering in two weeks time. Ulled and I will be there. (Thanks, mother.)

Similarly to barbarians, berserkers disdain armor. Ulled wouldn’t even consider the elven steel elven chain I have. He was impressed by my swords, but he’s got his own. A huge longsword, taken from a hill giant. It’s sort of technically a 2H sword for ogres, but I’ve grown very fond of my two sword style. Unlike barbarians, he doesn’t have the same revulsion to magic gear, which I’ve mostly outgrown now.

Father is quite proud of us, so that feels good.

Another clue on that front. Father is a devout follower of Thor, to such an extent that I think he’d join the priesthood and become a cleric if he could. That explains a few things, like why he’s traveling with the tribe, why they let him, and I really hope the fact that I wanted to follow Thor isn’t part of it but I really think it might be.

----

Flur’mar

It’s my actual literal birthday. I was definitely born under a bad sign.

----

Monz’tera 2

Duromar and Ulled stood to the side of the audience chamber, out of the way of the bunch of adventurers gathered. Half a dozen humans, a single dwarf, one elf, and a half-elf. They individually looked fairly experienced but didn’t stand together as a single group.

The Duke of Fraduir walked into the chamber and began speaking immediately. “You all know of the giants who have been raiding our lands, causing widespread death and destruction - and great consternation to we noble rulers sworn to protect the life and goods of certain influential members of the populace.”

Duromar did not miss the unsubtle implication that the adventurers in front of the duke were not included in that influential group.

“Therefore, a party of the bravest and most powerful adventurers was assembled and given the assignment to punish the miscreant giants. Unfortunately, they charged too much so you will have to do!”

More than a few disgruntled expressions were sparked by that insult. Duromar had to hide a smile.

“You must deliver a sharp check to the giants, or else return and put your heads upon the block for the headsman’s axe!” At this, his advisor wheezed, then urgently leaned in to whisper something in the duke’s ear. “Volunteers? Oh, I see. Never mind that then. We will supply any standard wilderness and dungeon exploration items needed and any of you who need one will be loaned a fine horse.” The duke glanced at Duromar and Ulled, frowning. “Assuming we have draft horses large enough. Guides are available to escort you to the fortress of the Hill Giant chieftain. This chief, one Ivar, is a huge and thoroughly despicable creature, sly and vicious, loving ambush and backstabbing.

“We are graciously forfeiting our rightful share of any loot you gather from the giants. In return, we expect you to investigate this unusual banding of different races of giants, and follow any clues discovered if such point toward the sinister hand suspected of guiding the rising, and report back when you determine exactly the reason or force behind this alliance of evil. Regardless, there’s undoubtedly plenty of giants to hack and treasure to loot. Annihilate them all if you must, one way or another the raids must stop.”

“Now, in the name of honor, gather your supplies and be on your way. Head south from here to the village of Morton’s Grove and meet up with a servant of the Meletian Kingdom, one Torwald Ookvie. He will guide you where you need to go.”

With that, the duke turned and left. His advisor led the group down to the stables, and within a half-hour, the group found themselves on their way to Morton’s Grove without anyone quite being sure when they had actually agreed to the task.

To no great surprise, there were no draft horses of sufficient size.

----

Morton’s Grove was a textbook example of a village raided by giants. Boulders lay scattered amongst shattered wooden walls and ruined buildings. As they walked down the dirt road, it became evident some of the central buildings had been partially repaired, including the inn.

Sitting on a pile of rubble in the village green was a human dressed like a woodsman, probably a ranger. The human fighter who had taken the lead horseman position rode directly up to him.

“Tarwalk Ookie?”

The ranger grimaced. “Torwald Ookvie. Yes, I am he. I assume you are the ones sent by the duke? Come, we have rooms at the inn.”

----

I knew something sounded familiar. Against the Giants, module G-1-2-3. Hill giants, frost giants, and then fire giants. I don’t recall all the details now, but the hill giants were having some kind of feast on the night we attacked, and you had to go down into the basement/dungeon level to find the treasure room that had the weird black chain that transported you to the next location. Oh, and you needed a map to hold out to indicate your destination.

The hill giant villa was fairly straightforward, as I recall, but I will never forget the mated pair of white dragons near the frost giants. That encounter was a nightmare. We avoided the red dragon later on out of healthy precaution, so I'm not actually sure how strong it was.

And the drow turned out to be behind it all, with a campaign option of going on to modules D-1-2-3 then Q1. We opted out, so I never played those. Although, the silver anniversary edition had another option, of taking on cloud giants next, if I recall correctly.

But, I shouldn't get ahead of myself.

----

Monz’tera 4

Spent the last two days traveling through some fairly rough terrain. Slow going. Spent a bit of time getting to know who we’re traveling with. In summary:

Gleep Wurp the Eyebiter: Human magic-user. If he can actually cast Eyebite, then he’s at least 12th level. Wouldn’t talk to me enough to confirm. Cloyer Bulse the Magsman: Human thief. No idea of his level. Roaky Swerked: Human cleric of Zelaur. Had a hard time figuring him out, he knew spells by different names, but he’s got 6th level spells, so that’s 12th or 13th. Frush O’ Suggill: Human fighter. Favors a spear, the madman. Unofficial leader. No idea of his level. Fonkin Hoddypeak: Elf fighter/magic-user, I think. He might only be a 7th level MU. I was chatting about Ice Storm and Fireball, in case we ran into fire or frost giants, and he said he had Fireball, and could now learn Ice Storm, but didn’t have it yet. Gleep offered to trade spells. Flerd Trantle: Human cleric of Benyar. Same problem as Roaky, but I think he’s 9th or 10th. Redmod Dumple: Dwarf fighter. No idea of his level. Faffle Dwe’o-mercraeft: Human magic-user. At least 9th, he just got Cone of Cold. Beek Gwanders of Croodle: Half-elf ranger. 8th or 9th, as he recently started casting druid spells. But, weirdly, he’s also got a magic-user’s spellbook, and he said he can prepare one per day, which started after the druid spells did! What kind of ranger gets MU spells?

Glass houses and stones when it comes to names, but who named these guys, Gygax himself?

We arrived at the forward observation post late today. It’s really just a big cave with a briar patch covering the entrance. They’ve got makeshift stables for the horses here, we’ll all be going on foot from here. The head scout, an elf named Alajo, reported seeing a great deal of activity earlier today, so we’re taking a few hours to rest and decide if the assault happens tonight. If it’s the night of the feast like it was before, attacking drunk hill giants would be ideal.

----

Monz’tera 5

“Rise and shine, assault crew! It’s time to go in.”

Duromar and Ulled filed out of the cave entrance with the others. Sometime in the last few hours, they’d decided on how to group themselves. None of them had seemed interested in having a berserker by their side, so Duromar had quite happily agreed to a group of just the two half-ogres.

Alajo and Torwald led them along a tortuous path that went uphill most of the way. Near the final crest, Torwald stopped the groups while Alajo went on ahead. “The giants’ villa is just over the top here. When you’re finished, we’ll be waiting here for you. Any questions?”

The elf returned a few minutes later. “The watchtower is empty right now. If you’re quick, you should be able to get right up to the villa without being spotted.”

Duromar grinned to himself at his first look at the enormous stone villa. Finally, a building that was large enough to feel comfortable in. Too bad it was so far out of the way.

Torwald gestured to the great doors that were clearly the entrance. “That’s your way in, but there should be a guard or two behind it. Good luck.” With that, the two guides stepped aside and they headed in.

A minute later they arrived at the entrance.

It didn’t take long for the humans to realize the massive doors were too heavy for any of them to move. Redmod, the dwarf fighter, was especially embarrassed by his feeble attempt.

Duromar pressed through the crowd, easing the others back. “Allow me.” He reached out with a single hand and easily pulled the door open. He slipped inside with the same motion, getting his first look inside. Ulled came in right behind him, gesturing for the others to wait.

It was a cloakroom, essentially. Cloaks, capes, and bags hung from wooden pegs on the walls. But the most important occupants were the two hill giants lying on the floor, snoring. Judging from the numerous tankards and spilled beer on the floor, they were likely drunk as well.

Duromar headed to the side of one giant while Ulled went to the other. They swung swords at the same moment, trying to kill both before they could awaken. [-58] He could tell the first blow wasn’t quite enough, so swung the other sword as well. [-58] Looking up, he could see Ulled hadn’t quite managed to kill his target and in fact, the creature was waking up!

Luckily, the hill giant was utterly wasted, and Ulled managed to get in another blow before the giant managed to wake up enough that the alarm could be raised. There was a soft groan of pain as the giant’s head dropped back to the floor. Ulled callously stabbed him once more, finishing him off. [+3150 E.P.]

Annihilate the Giants!

Hill Giants (2/65)

The rest of the team filed into the room as they dragged the corpses out of the way. Frush looked around, nodding to himself. “Right. Three exits, three groups.” He gestured at Duromar and Ulled. “You choose first, and we’ll sort out the other two.”

Glancing at Ulled, who simply shrugged to indicate he could choose, Duromar looked at the choices. There was a double door, which presumably led into the main part of the villa, a side door past a staircase, and a secondary door near the double doors. Going by the dungeoneer’s adage, he picked the left-most door, past the staircase. “We’ll take that one.” Thinking, he added, “And we’ll check up the watchtower stairs as well. Just in case.” Decided, he headed right up the steps with Ulled on his heels as the others huddled up to pick a route.

There was another sleeping giant above, laying on a pile of hides. Duromar crept up next to him, and this time managed to simply slit his throat. [+3150 E.P.]

Annihilate the Giants!

Hill Giants (3/65)

This one had a gem-studded gold buckle that looked somewhat valuable, so he took the time to loot that. Heading back down the steps, the entry room was now empty of the other raiders. Pulling open the door he’d picked, he and Ulled walked into a giant armory. The room was unoccupied, but easily had a hundred assorted weapons, a few dozen suits of armor, a few score helmets, and four crossbows large enough to be siege weapons.

Duromar watched as Ulled picked a few weapons that he stored in a bag of holding, then wondered whether they could utterly disarm the villa. “Ulled, how much space do you have in that bag?”

Ulled smirked as he said, “Heh. It’s endless. I can fit as much as I want. Why?”

“Nice. Take it all. I know we don’t want to use it, but it’ll deprive them.” Duromar started helping him then, and the pair shoved every single weapon, shield, suit of armor, and helmet into the bag.

----

They stepped out of the door leading further into the villa into chaos. There was a great deal of shouting echoing in the hallways, unfortunately, all of it in the hill giant language. More importantly, there was a group headed to the armory door. It was just a single hill giant, but he had four dire wolves with him.

The giant barked out a word, and the wolves leapt to attack. To Duromar’s surprise, Ulled was just a bit faster on the draw and attacked before even he had a chance. There was a crunch as he struck the lead wolf and it went down with a cry of pain. He hit the second one instead, hard [-35], but not hard enough. The front wolves bit at both of them without any luck. Duromar swung again, taking out the injured wolf [-24] and slicing into the third. The last wolf slipped into the gap left and snapped at Duromar ineffectively. The giant, moving slower than everyone else, swung his club at Duromar. It was such a laughably poor blow he didn’t even have to dodge. There was a biting snap at Ulled, then a roar of rage was returned as a wolf body thudded against a stone wall.

Ducking another blow from the giant, Duromar did not have enough time to worry about his brother’s rage. He swung at the giant twice, hitting [-33] once and [Fumble!] trying his best to throw his second weapon away. But it refused to go, locked in by the new gauntlets. Unfortunately, the giant barely seemed to react to the blow that did hit. Duromar swung again [-37] and again [Fumble!], once more straining the locking device on his left hand as it saved him for the second time in a row.

Finally, his third strike at the giant [-34] paid off, and the giant slumped to the ground. At that point, he stepped back to let Ulled finish the final wolf, hoping to burn off any remaining rage. One more swing from Ulled did exactly that. [+3402 E.P.]

Annihilate the Giants!

Hill Giants (4/65)

The fight, short as it was, did not seem to attract any extra attention. Duromar ducked into a nearby short hallway that had a door on each side of it. Ulled followed after, seemingly calm. He rested his sword on his shoulder as he turned to Duromar. “Not bad for a warm-up, but let’s face some real giants now.”

Duromar grinned but then turned serious. “Was that a bit of hacklust I saw?”

Ulled shook his head. “Nah. Used to be easy to slip into it, but it seems to take more now.”

Duromar nodded distractedly, glancing at his own saving throws on his character sheet. That made a lot of sense, really. That didn’t eliminate the risk of coming to blows with each other, but it did diminish it.

“Good to know.” He gestured at the door to his right. “Let’s find some trouble.”

The door led into a barracks that was mostly unoccupied. Ten huge beds, but only two were filled, both with loudly snoring hill giants. As with the entry room, they split up to assassinate both at the same time.

Duromar struck once [-58], burying his sword in the giant not quite far enough, and struck again [-58], utterly finishing him. Ulled didn’t seem to fare as well, as his target woke up and started moving to get up. Duromar moved to back him up but [Fumble!] managed to stick his sword [-14] into Ulled instead! The giant came up swinging, drunkenly flailing at Ulled and hit hard. Duromar was at the wrong angle to see the momentary glint of fury in his eyes. Duromar swung at the giant again and hit this time [-41], still without finishing him off. A moment later, Ulled finished it. [+4725 E.P.]

Annihilate the Giants!

Hill Giants (6/65)

Duromar backed off a step at the irritated look in Ulled’s eyes when he turned around. “Watch where you’re swinging those things, dammit! That hurt.”

Duromar gave an apologetic smile. “Sorry. Should have trusted you to finish it off.” Ulled simply scowled at him and started searching the room. The marginally nicer chest had a small--for a giant--bag of platinum, but there was little else.

----

Back in the hallway, the noise level had subsided a little. Whatever disturbance had been going on was probably resolved now. Somehow, it had slipped Duromar’s mind that the most likely disturbance would have been the other two groups.

They continued on across the hall, opening the second door. This room was a mess. A dozen hill giant youngsters, probably teens, were having a party to rival any frat party Duromar had ever heard of and never attended. The furniture was tossed to the walls, one of which had been the target for many bowls of porridge, and the center of the room had been cleared out to host a brawling pit.

Opening the door caught their attention though. Duromar was startled to realize that the young giants were all smaller than he was, and given his height, they might see him as an adult catching children behaving rowdily. Unfortunately, Ulled moved to attack before he could take advantage of it.

Duromar dashed in behind him, striking [-25] twice [-29] and dropping both in the throes of pain. The remaining ten swarmed around both of them, swinging clubs that mostly didn’t connect. He swung again, hitting [-23] the same one twice [-33] and cutting through to a second. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Ulled taking hard blows from all sides. Still, he had his own handful to deal with first.

Two [-25] hits [-27], one more down. As he ducked three more blows, he saw Ulled go down, unconscious or dead, he couldn’t tell. Roaring in victory, the young giants joined the ones attacking him. In the flurry of blows that followed, he missed one [-10 dam] but avoided the rest. He struck back, cutting one down [-42] then [-33] another. A glance at his brother. Bleeding out or dead? He swung again, taking [-33] out one more. Just four left now. No more blows struck him, but his [-31] left another on the floor. Again. Fear drove his arm now, striking [-38] down [-24] one more. Two left. He chopped at one and hit [-28], then struck again [-35], cutting through and into the last hard enough to put both down. [+7166 E.P.]

Annihilate the Giants!

Hill Giants (18/65)

Duromar grabbed a healing potion from his belt and force-fed it to Ulled without even checking to see if he was still alive. There was a cough, and a groan as Ulled stirred, still breathing.

As soon as he was certain Ulled would live, he went back to the giants and slit every throat, finishing the ones still lingering.

Checking his brother again, he could see the wounds very slowly closing. As slow as it was, it was still much faster than his own wounds could close. Just how high was his brother’s Con, anyhow? Searching the room found nothing of value, to no great surprise.

As Duromar finished searching, Ulled woke up. “Ow.” He sat up, and oddly, stared at his right hand, grinning. “Saved my life again.” As he spoke, he showed the hand to Duromar. Around one finger was a ring with a winding vine and tiny leaves painted green.

“A ring of regeneration‽ That’s a treasure.”

Ulled climbed to his feet. “But it’ll need a day to restore me fully.” He looked around the room. “You finished all of them…” he trailed off, then sighed.

“I’ve got a plan I know you’ll hate. Rest here for a bit, and I’ll scout ahead.”

Ulled scowled. “I hate that plan.”

Duromar shrugged. “We could do ‘get help’ instead.”

His scowl got worse. “We do not need help. You’re smirking. Why are you smirking? Fine, I’ll rest.” He pulled the bag of holding from his hip and tossed it. “I get half of whatever you find.”

Duromar nodded in agreement but waited until his brother actually sat down again before he left the room, closing the door behind himself.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Also, very lucky he had that ring. Without it, he’d be dead for certain. He’d actually be better off removing the ring of protection though because it’s making it harder to fail the save vs. hackfrenzy/hacklust. He’s got better AC when berserk.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Name: Duromar

E.P.(+5%): 216306

Next Level: 275001

Weapon - Giant Slayer 2H Sword +2

Spd

Atk

M

L

H

G

BSL

vs. True Giant

-2

+11

2d10+13

6d6+18

4d10+18

4d12+18

14

vs. giant, giant-kin, Ettin, Ogre Magi, Titan

-2

+11

d10+13

3d6+18

2d10+18

2d12+18

14

vs. other

-2

+10

d10+12

3d6+17

2d10+17

2d12+17

13

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Name: Ulled

Race: Half-Ogre

Class: Berserker

Level: 7

Fame: 63

Sex: Male

Alignment: CN

E.P.(+15%): 179072

Next Level: 275001

Str: 19/12

Dex: 17/58

Con: 19/10

Int: 7/68

Wis: 7/12

Cha: 9/88

Com: 1/66

Hon: Great

Front AC: 2

Rear AC: 5

Berserk Front AC: -5

Berserk Rear AC: -2

HP: 104/111 (½ vs. crushing)

Move: 13”

Reaction: +4

ToP: 69

FF: 9

Fatigue Check: 13

Weapon

Spd

Atk

M

L

H

G

BSL

Huge Longsword

-4

+4

2d8+8

2d12+8

4d6+8

4d8+8

8

Berserk H. LS.

-4

+5

2d8+10

2d12+10

4d6+10

4d8+10

9

Flaws: HackFrenzy, HackLust, Armor Snobbery, Clingy

Special: Infravision 30’, +1 to-hit/damage with longsword, Dense Skin, Tough Hide, -2 to-hit Dwarves, -4 to-hit Gnomes

STP: WP 2H Sword, WP Longsword, WP Handaxe, WP Footman’s Flail, Dirty Fighting 58%, Weapon Maintenance, Unyielding

Equipment: Huge Longsword, 2H Sword, Ring of Protection +3, Ring of Regeneration, Bag of Endless Storage