Halwyr in the Valley Of The Titans, AP#1
This AP is written by one of my players, in the voice of his character, Halwyr the Wizard, with only minor edits and comments by me. Warning, it’s long. 😉 Commencing copy-paste!
“We found ourselves heading towards the Valley of the Titans, a land of death and destruction where the gods sent their titan-servants to do battle for them. [I’ve since drifted this interpretation a bit. Titans can ascend to become gods, and gods can fall, becoming titans again. Both were involved in the War Of The Gods that preceded our adventure in the Valley. -JW] Many of those titans still roam the lands and the people of the valley have inked themselves in shimmering tattoos to identify which Titan they belong to (and to make sure they are seen and not smushed as the Titans walk by).
Early in our travels, a group of such valleyfolk got incensed with us for trespassing on their land and for eyeing their sacred fruit. Let me tell you, we should have heeded their warnings. After threatening to eat one of their precious fruit if they didn’t leave us alone, they attacked. So I ate the fruit and turned into a woman. I’m not sure if Flobee the Paladin was jealous or aroused.
I also had a vision that showed me the ancient Angelic Sword – a key to finding out if I was part of a prophecy that would make me take the place of the existing god of magic.
I was able to convince the villagers that their god Pria had given me the vision and described the sword. They want the sword back for themselves, so we were escorted to their village. They mocked Flobee for his simplistic devotion to Pelor. And Kila the Bard sang songs of valour and combat to entertain the villagers. We watched and then participated in a ritual test of strength, which I won. (I’m strong for a wizard, plus I turned the spear into a snake which helped).
Overnight, Flobee was attacked by some kind of darkness and we don’t know what it did to him. Meanwhile, I returned to normal in the morning. It was a mystery whether the Angelic Sword was still in the belly of the dead Titan Arkus who had swallowed it, or stolen by villagers and placed inside the Crawling Labyrinth. I summoned the spirit of Arkus who demanded that the sword be returned to his belly at once! So we made tracks towards Labyrinth.
Then things got…interesting. It was several days journey to the Crawling Labyrinth and we chose to go through the Hills, risking awakening Pengi – the Titan of Hills and Smoke, who actually looked like a small hill. Well, wouldn’t you know it, we found him. And as usual, Flobee’s adherence to the Truth nearly got us all killed.
See, he had promised Pelor to SLAY A TITAN! In return, Pelor promised him the ability to discern lies. So wouldn’t you know it, as soon as we see this giant hill, stand up, shake the boulders from its back and attack us with a freaking giant tree, Flobee goes CHARGING IN! I mean this thing wasn’t the size of a hill…it WAS a hill!
The tree bounces off Flobee’s shield and with one mighty thrust, he stabs Pengi right through his baby toe – the only weak spot the Titan has! The entire hill collapses on Flobee and we spent the next 2 hours digging him out from underneath all the rubble and rocks. Well, I’ll never doubt Pelor again, that’s for sure. But that Paladin is still nuts, I tell ya. Who in their right mind charges a HILL???
– Halwyr The Wizard