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Keep on going downstraem

0 (0%)

Time for some heroic swimming?...no?

0 (0%)

Find a dead tree or other long object, work as a group to hoist it across. (With emphasis on actually finding said object...)

4 (44.4%)

Invent some absurd creation involving rope and stuff which slowly pulls tied up people across…

5 (55.6%)

Total Members Voted: 9

[slowpokez]

Soooo...the bad news is that i started the new year by getting alcohol poisoning...but the good news are that I can get writing again since I gotta stay at home
Well yea...kinda glad my freind decided to punch me until I threw up, you know- probably saved my a trip to the hospital , shame though that in my drunken stupor decided to show my gratitude by punching him back...
Well life's all 'bout learnin' new stuff and there's no better way than stupid mistakes. First and last time I'll ever touch any sort of absint

     All right, 'nuff about me- let's get back to Nerin and the story and so on...

As we kept traveling onward on the forested path you could glimpse the hauting shadow of the smoke pillar between the treebranches. I had to continually slow down my hurried pace to not raise any suspicion, a deed which followed quite naturally due to our party's astonishingly slow speed. Well, at least I felt a bit better from the rest even though my wounds still were untended and for once we accually had some food...and a broom...

At daybreak we were forced to take a break, even though my worries were as prominent as ever my ribs could take no more, nor could the half-dead elf whom appeared to be on the verge of decay. Even though the voices probably had chosen the "delightful" onions as a joke Amathspar accually enjoyed the immensely, elves...
Finally managed to cure my paranoia with a swig of river spirits, a bit old but simply devine after a week of mostly water. Meanwhile Wilfred kept ignoring the lush patches of grass and tried to furiously chew down some rocks, not too bright even by goat standards...

For two days we continued like this, for each passing day I grew a bit weaker however my elven companion had regained some color, just a hunch but probably due to the absence of starvation. I'm glad we weren't met by any horrific accidents or unfortunate events, such as I-dont-know- a goblin ambush maybe? The true blessing though is that we no persuers have caught up with us...perhaps they never realised the cause of the fire...
Sigh...whishful thinking...

We didn't make contact with any sentient being during those days, it was just walking, walking, walking with the occasional swig of sweet, sweet alcohol. However on the afternoon of the second day we laid eyes upon a covered wagon accompanied by what appeared to be two traders.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The voices quickly identified them as traveling merchants, probably from Velîn, a shady bunch. Mostly keeps to themselves and serve under no law, the preaching ended with a warning to be wary and to keep a hand on my pouch.

The two traders were however very welcoming and seemed eager to make our acquaintance, before I knew what had happened we had already joined them at their little camp. They showed great interest in our fight with the greenskins earlier, without mentioning it they were already aware of my wounds. Except for their unexpectedly skillful perception they were full of other weird mannerisms, perhaps most of all their neglecting of our party’s unusual composition. We remained this way for a good hour, exchanging stories of our travels across the lands. In the corner of my eye I noticed some flurry of hands movements dangerously close to my Amathspar’s pockets; however I was not too worried as the best haul they could hope for would be some old onions. On the other hand I was a bit offended that they chose to go for the scrawny elf rather than me, but the foul play came to a halt as our awareness became mutually apparent leaving only Amathspar in the dark. 
Being merchants and all the conversation soon moved onto the exchanging of various wares, however even to my untrained eyes their prices seemed strangely high, single bottles of alcohol for hundreds of coins and pieces of colorful clothing worth more than my entire wardrobe, everything of course imported from faraway lands and worth every last crumb. The voices seemed doubtful so I was hesitant to make any deals, instead I tried to turn the table on them and take the role of the salesman. They seemed awfully unimpressed by all the junk flowing out of my bag until I reached the shrunken heads, and a flare of delight lit up in the trader’s eye.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

-I take those, and you can have this beautiful mat? Good trade very nice carpet, lights up room like a seashore sunset!
-Uhmm, maybe I could get that in coins instead, it's a nice mat and all but...
-YES, it is very nice, take it!
-Nah...but you know I can't carry a mat...
-It's is okay goat carry mat?
-Well, I don't think Wilfred could handle that...
-A shame really...
-So how about it?
-30 pieces.
That's good right?
What that's only 10 pieces a head! Mmm pun-i-licious…
Wait really? I was planning of getting rid of them anyway.
No, they’re trying something here!
How can you be so sure?
-So yes? No?
-Uhmm, that seems a bit meager you know there’s three of them and all…
-Where else will you sell shrunken head? Hey, I’ll tell you! In nowhere!
-Hmmm, that’s a good point…I might take you up on your offer later on…
-Pfff, greedy dwarves, but hey you need doctor? I’m a good doctor, worked as doctor for many years! Good service and so.
-Uhmm
Maybe I should take him up on his offer; I don’t know how much further I’ll get traveling like this…
Mmm, you might be right…
Nah, he’s not a doctor! I can feel it!
Well…we’re kinda low on options at the moment…
-How much would that cost me?
-Very good service and highest professionalism!
-Yea, but how much?
-100 coins.
-That’s insane!
As much as bloody Dr.nuthead.
Yea…haggle?
-Noooo, equipment cost money I make no profit if I help people for free.
-How about…40 coins? That should cover any expenses on your part…right?
-Hahahha, no but maybe 80 as charity.
-Hey man I don’t even have 80 coins on me…
-Okay, 40 coins and the heads? Price for a friend, you can’t thank no?
-Hey…that’s still… a lot…
-Okay, okay 40 and the goat?
-Not Wilfred!
-My friend I’m trying to make business here!

Okay so how do I handle this? Just walk away and hope that some better option pops up along the way or take him up on either of his offers...maybe I'll try to get some information out of them, they seemed pretty talkative. Maybe I should pick up some provisions? We got food for another 3 nights and there's at least 4 or 5 remaining before we reach Seraté.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

I was kinda going to do the christmas thingie...but you know stuff happned...enjoy...*just pretend it's christmas aaaallllll over again!*

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[AfellowDwarf]

I have to wonder about his ability to screw us over during the operation. He could go organ harvesting, though we haven't seen any organs so that's probably not a likely scenario. He could just perform a plain robbery, though. Our stuff wouldn't be safe with the elf, and Nerin would likely pass out due to pain if we opt not to take a sedative. The elf probably can't stomach watching the operation, either. Do we know how to make Wilbert throw up? We could leave our stuff with him.

[gman8181]

We heal when we use the gauntlet, so we could just kill them with it to heal.

Maybe make a deal where we trade the heads just to stay with them for the night and then kill them  while they sleep and take their stuff.

[AfellowDwarf]

You'd think that these men would know better then to both sleep at the same time, considering they're conmen. Killing the gobbo also didn't heal us that much; we probably need to kill a lot more humans to restore our ribs to a servicable state. That would be perfectly fine if these broken ribs didn't hamper our ability to fight. We'll probably end up more wounded if we go on a masacre.

[gman8181]

I don't trust them as doctors either though.

Maybe the elf can lull them to sleep with his singing.

[AfellowDwarf]

If we do kill them, we need to figure out a way to do it quietly, or without alerting anyone of our intentions. Perhaps if one of them cought fire by accent, and we started to panic, hitting him with a heavy object in an attempt to put the fire out.

Edit:
I imagine they'll make a campfire by the night, so we can lure the other into attacking by saying that the burning human brought his fate on himself by burning those tree corpses, and call him names. Then we start kicking his corpse in anger, preferably in the head. I imagine the elf will get pretty vocal as well.

[NAV]

We should set their cart on fire.

[AfellowDwarf]

We should set their cart on fire.

But what about the booze in the cart?

Edit: If we do get a surgery, we could give them an incentive to keep us healthy and unrobbed. We could mention that, by the way, we know of a big hazard in the area* that we'll them about after the surgery. That way it'll be risky for them not keep their part of the bargain.

*Crazy, murderous, village burning bandits, they've seen the smoke and we can advise them to turn around. This'll prevent them from hearing another side of the story anytime soon.

[slowpokez]

Eh, someone surrender their vote or somethin' so we can get things goin' 

Edit: Cmon, you really gotta go n tie it up again!?

[crazedjesster]

Last time we got treatment good things happened!!!

[NAV]

Hmm. good point.
Accept the treatment.

[AfellowDwarf]

We want 'good thing' with.. the human?? Eugh, you guys disgust me.

[slowpokez]

Sooo...guys?
I think we'll go for the treatment, right?
Hell no! You'd really put your life in the hands of this lowlife?
Hey, it outta be better than the last doctor we went to? Amirite?
Nah...I just don't trust em...
Yea, we should kill them both in their sleep and take their stuff!
That would be perfectly fine if these broken ribs didn't hamper our ability to fight...We'd probably end up more wounded if we’d go on a killing spree!
It would have to be done stealthily…
Yea… I know exactly the way!
Huh?
Perhaps if one of them caught on fire by accident! And we started to panic, yes! Then hitting him with a heavy object in an attempt to put the fire out and…and like they'll make a campfire by the night, you know!  So…so like we can lure the other into attacking by saying that the burning human brought his fate on himself by burning those tree corpses, and call him names! And then we start kicking his corpse in anger, preferably in the head!
No fire.
Mmm, I think we should just go along with the operation, who knows when the next “traveling doctor appears out of nowhere?
But…
Last time we got treatment good things happened!!!
Hmm, good point. Accept the treatment.
We want 'good thing' with.. the human?? Eugh, you guys disgust me!
That's not what I...nevermind...

-Hey…uhm…I think I’d still go for the first option…you know with the heads and that…
-Wonderful!
-Shall we get started right away?
-Uhmm…
I see no reason to wait?
mmm
-Yea…sure...

The following procedure was utterly painful in every respect, lacking any form of sedative and performed with subpar equipment. I don’t have the expertise to fault his ability as a doctor but considering the circumstances I’ll simply assume that they weren’t really representative of the price. And to add insult to injury he chose to use the rest of my liquor as a sanitizer, simply brushing it off by offering me to buy a bottle of finer spirits for a whopping 200 coins…
The whole scene was quite absurd; due to the lack of a tranquilizer we had to perform do a strange group effort to keep me restrained during the surgery….       

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

(This is one of those pictures that looks absolutly ridicilous OOC )

However in the end the treatment was a success and I left their camp with mixed impressions, on one hand happy that I might actually manage the rest of the trip but on the other I’m fucking mad that they took my own alcohol for an already paid treatment! I decided on the latter as they waved us off with big grins upon their faces, very unfitting for a “noble savior”.

Well, after resting the first night I felt better than what I had done for quite a while and so did my onion eating companion. When we set out on the morrow there was an apparent increase in our speed, at this rate we’d probably reach our destination in 4 days rather than 5 or 6. Not being quite as focused on managing to put one foot before the other I noticed all of Wilfred’s weird behavior, skipping around eating mud, digging up small trees and getting in to fights with substantially smaller foes in the form of frogs, wasps and other woodland critters. (yea…waps and frogs… the most typical woodland critters out there) Occasionally he’d just stop and stare into nothingness and then a few urists later continue his stupid mud eating or sneeze loudly.             I also noticed how the vegetation had begun to slowly change, here and there it would pop up some strange plant I’d never seen and sometimes the mossy wilderness I was used to got exchanged by some lush fields of fern.
All and all things were good, the people we met along the way seemed friendly enough, if not a bit surprised at the sight of our party. In celebration of my improved health I was tempted to try out the tobacco that I…”borrowed”, I was not quite sure what the elf thought of smoking though…I lit my pipe and looked towards Amthspar worriedly anticipating his reaction; however he didn’t seem to mind. Elves are tricky creatures…The following few urists was a moment of true bliss, having smoked so many socks, unwillingly I might add, I seemed to have forgotten the taste of the real deal…

All the terrible events recently seemed to have made Amathspar lose his talkative nature, so we traveled forth in silence, not me against though. The silence was only broken occasionally by a “-Wilfred NO! Don’t eat that!” or a “-those fckn traders, huh? Can you believe it?”. Surprisingly enough my grumpiness led to a great revelation. For apparently the reason to why Amathspar didn’t share my malice towards the exploitative traders was because the money in question would come to no use in Seraté. Their society doesn’t revolves around a monetary system like most other places and it seems like they only really use money when it comes to external entities, I guess it kind of makes sense as they do not work metal either. The more I hear about the elves the more alien their world seems; no meat, no metal, no money! Elves sure are tricky creatures…   

Yet another day passed by without any noteworthy events, but as dusk arrived so did something else…

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[AfellowDwarf]

The furthest eyes looked like they migh belong to a non-wolf at first, but it seems like there's a wolveen silhouete present.

I can think of four things that might be going on:

1. It's just a wolf pack. I don't think we'd be able to take them normally, and it might be better to err on the side of caution in respects to both group and animal testing the gauntlet. It's pretty hard to reason with wolves without meat on hand, though.

2. These wolves belong to an elven patroll unit. If our elf's view of his military is at all in touch with reality, one of them might just have decided to chew first and then ask questions. Fighting the wolves normally could lead to arrow-in-head type of problems, and fighting him the gauntlet could leave him to bail, reporting back to base and ruining any diplomatic posibility between us and the elves.

3. One of the humans tracked us down. He might accept a surrender, but I don't fancy going to human prison. I hear it's not very flammable. Here, we face the same combat problems as with the elf, except our oponent will likely be wearing armor. Using the gauntlet will bring no diplomatic dificulties with the elf, but we have to think of how effective it'll be if we get stabbed in the chest.

4. The other eyes reveal themselves to be crundles. I could feel my Crundle Sense at any moment now.

[HissinhWalnuts]

Kobolds?