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Malakon's Dream

So I had this dream. I guess it was a dream ... pretty bizarre, actually. It seemed so real, though. Eh, who cares? It was pretty fun. I've heard, actually, that in certain stretches of the Caerbreddyn coastline you can find a variety of blue tuber that's supposed to duplicate the effects of dreaming. Either that or it makes you go mad for brief periods of time. I bet it's pretty hard to tell the difference sometimes... I wonder where you get shit like that up here in the damn hinterlands? We are out in the middle of Danaforsaken nowhere! I must admit, though, that Gamryth has more amenities than I was expecting. Not that I care.

Anyway, I digress. This dream I had...

I was there, and Sandy was there. There was a monk named Bhakti, and a sorcerer named Cesaire, and we all woke up together in a room in an inn. I'm not sure what we had been doing before, but everyone in my dream kept on telling me that I had had a lot to drink the previous night, so I guess that's my way of telling myself that I'm too lazy to come up with a reason for being where I was. Either that, or this was just another one of those "getting sucked into another universe" things, which is ok with me. I'm easy going like that.

So we all sheepishly introduce ourselves and head downstairs, after hearing something howling out in the darkness. It turns out that we're in a village that's being threatened. Surprise suprise. It also turns out that in my "drunken haze" we were all hired by Marious, who was in charge of something called the Temple of the East Wind. He hired us to come here and get rid of whatever was threatening the villagers - several had turned up dead or missing, and a lot of the victims were children. This had apparently been going on for months, and several bands of heroes before us had already failed.

So, against the advice of the locals, we ventured out into the night to see what we could see. As it turned out, we couldn't see a lot. You see, I apparently forgot to populate my dreamworld with a cosmos, or at least ordered it late and couldn't assemble it properly for show time, as all there was to see in the sky was a big jumbled mass of stars smack in the middle. Bhakti said this was the Core, and that there were no stars because their world was situated on the edge of the universe. I have to admit that this made me feel better about my ability to invent things. You see, this was the first time I'd ever had a real, lucid dream before, and I was a little nervous about watching my subconscious at work up close and personal.

So, we walk around. It's really dark. I considered apologizing to everyone, but it was one of those sorts of dreams where I was pretty sure no one would understand what the hell I was talking about, so I kept my mouth shut. We find claw marks going up the side of the inn to our window. Nice. We find an enchanted metal hangman's tree, complete with swinging bodies. At this point, I was starting to get excited because I had no idea that I was such a fan of noir fiction. I mean, I know it's all the rage in Perelinn right now. What's his name? Stevan Righ? His stuff is HUGE! But I hate it, at least when I'm awake. I guess I'm just jaded by all the tentacled things we fight. Maybe at least now I can tell pops that I'm high society when I'm dreaming. I wonder if he'd care? He probably doesn't like them either, come to think of it. He'd just probably kick me through the window and tell me to stop being a "wetnobby" or something lame like that. I can't understand a godsdamned thing he says most of the time.

Anyway, right, the story. So, we also walk past Dox the smith's shop, and hear him up banging away late at night. We thought that that was odd until we learned that he was holding himself partially responsible for the death of one of the kids, who got stolen while under his protection.

That was pretty much it for that night. Oddly enough, the world kind of dissolved, and then everything reformed the next morning as we were on our way to the Temple of the East Wind to get our bearings. Not a lot of intervening time. I thought it was pretty convenient. No one else seemed to notice it, though...

At the temple, we met Marious and his assistant Malisha. Malisha was a healer, and they both put on a big show of concern for the villagers, but Malisha seemed all bent on people converting to her religion and whatnot. I'm pretty good at reading people, especially wenches, and so I immediately knew that she was a useless bitch. She and Marious were actually both useless bitches, because we came out of there with the creeps, and not a heck of a lot else. We had the same story – bad things happening, East Wind will save you, feeble attempts on the part of Marious and Co. to "stop" whatever was happening.

On the advice of the locals, we stopped by a funeral on the way back. We were supposed to talk to Gaul, who was leading the services for the little kid who'd gotten iced a few days earlier - the same kid who had made the smith feel so guilty about himself. Gaul was an asshole too, but at least he had some info. He said he suspected the people at the temple, and I was like "Really? I must have missed that." Anyway, before I could say anything, Malisha shows up again and starts screeching about following the East Wind, blah blah blah. We went over to talk to her, but when Big S came over with her Paladin Peepers, the evil whore took off in a hurry.

So, the upshot is we eventually headed to the Temple to kick some ass. First we talked to Dox the smith. Yeah, we talked shop for a little while. Turns out that he's a Psionicist, which comes in handy for the smithing. No burns. Of course, you don't get the wicked ass scars on you arms and hands and face that the ladies like so much, but I guess to some people giving up a little pain is worth it. I can't really understand it myself. So, anyway, Dox is assembling more branches for the metal hangman's tree. He said that he was assembling them for Malisha, who had apparently had them made somewhere else, or had done it herself. Of course, I didn't really think that she could have lifted a leather apron, much less smith tools. Anyway, we put 2 and 2 together for him, and determined that the tree was some sort of magical mind control device, probably designed to keep the villagers complacent while they were being picked over like livestock. Needless to say, Dox agreed to stop making them, and agreed to smash them all up while we were painting the temple walls East Wind Red.

Well, we got to the Temple, and sure enough it was even creepier than before. We had done some snooping earlier, and found a back entranceway. We decided not to use it, though, and went in through the big gaping maw of a front door instead. Long story short, we found Marious, and freed him from an enchantment he was under, which was perpetuated by an amulet he was wearing. We kicked the amulet's ass, and he went unconscious. We also kicked a stained glass window's ass. Sandy told me afterwards that shattering the glass had actually broken the enchantment on the place. I told her that that was cool.

So, we hunted around a bit and made our way to the basement. There, we had to deal with some undead and a few traps. Good thing we had a paladin and a sorcerer with passwall. That'll teach evildoers to not plan for all eventualities! We finally made it to a big chamber where we ran in to Malisha, Marious AGAIN, (this time in some weird hybrid beast form), and eventually a demon called a Plague Troll. As it turns our Malisha was the Plague Troll's minion. She had enchanted the Paladin Marious and had forced him to help her kidnap victims to sacrifice to the Plague Troll. Apparently, it feeds on souls or something.

So, we kicked Malisha's ass, and we kicked the Plague Troll's ass. We only knocked out Marious, as he wasn't Pure Evil. He'll have to do some Dream Atoning soon, or else he won't have any of his cool Paladin perks back. Have you seen the shit these guys can do, just for dedicating themselves body and spirit to a god for all eternity? It's pretty amazing. I've been hanging out with Bahamut some, and I gotta say I like his style. I'd like to have a special buddy some time. I have Gwion, my hawk, but he doesn't hang around much. I can't ride on him either.

Oh yeah, and then I woke up