Wilderness Crawl (Solo)
Mapping the North, Foray 4 - by Lommond Through the night there was a heated discussion about taking Hillock's body back to Middlestep for burial or burying him here in this ruined village. With nothing resolved, we resumed our exploration of the area and quickly happened upon another band of kobolds. This group was easily dispatched while three of the vermin surrendered and gladly gave up a couple of sacks of electrum coins. Skullcrusher interrogated them and they revealed that there was a pit full of coins nearby but they weren't clear about the direction. Klang and the others, though they think of kobolds as little more than rats, had reservations about executing a foe that surrendered. We decided that we couldn't take them with us so we bound them to the supports of the gallows in the square and went in search of this pit.
A fallen section of iron fencing poked out here and there from the undergrowth and we discovered a cemetery. Spearchucker and Klang resumed their debate about whether to bury Hillock here when Skullcrusher hushed them both and pointed into the heart of the cemetery. We all peered in to see a dragon head gazing balefully in our direction. With a snort and a hiss, it came bounding through the trees towards us. It was massive, maybe 40 feet long, and smaller trees and saplings yielded to its bulk. It moved awkwardly through the overgrown cemetery or it would have been on us otherwise. We sprinted back to the church, looking back periodically. I watched as the dragon took flight and landed atop the dilapidated walls of the roofless structure in which we killed the kobolds. Skullcrusher and Spearchucker threw the doors of the church open for me and Klang and then slammed them shut. The double doors of the front of the church were wide enough for the creature to squeeze through, so we quickly set about piling debris in front of the doors. After a moment, all of us huffing and puffing, the sound of yipping and yelping erupted into a cacophony somewhere in the distance. The sounds turned to throaty screams and then squeals... then silence. The dragon had found our kobold prisoners. Skullcrusher and Spearchucker took to the interior balcony, peeking out of the windows periodically. Every few minutes there would be a whoosh of wings and a shadow as the dragon's bulk blocked light from one of the windows. Skullcrusher whispered down to Klang, "It's circling above, waiting for us."
I looked to Klang, "We have all of this coin that we took from the Ratmen and Kobolds, perhaps we can buy our lives from the dragon?" Klang called up to Skullcrusher, "Can you see how many legs it has? What does the tail look like?" Skullcrusher moved to another window trying to track the beast before calling back, "Two legs and two wings. The tail is pointy, like a scorpion's."
Klang sighed and looked at me, "There's no reasoning with this beast. It's dragonkin for certain, but it has none of their intelligence or gift of speech. This beast is a wyvern. Though it collects baubles like a crow, it can't be negotiated with. It's ferocious and notoriously hostile."
Then the church shook and a scraping and rending sound came from the roof as the beast landed atop and started to rake at the tiles, then flew off again.
I've never felt such terror as I felt waiting for the beast to tear through the roof and devour us all. The creature was tenacious. Every hour or so a whoosh followed by a crash and more raking. This lasted through out the remains of the day and into the night.
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