The Needs of a Tree

Scribe Notes

Summary

Adventure: The Needs of a Tree

• aka To Slavery and Back

GM: Jason Saggers
Season: Winter 802 WK

Party

• T'ana Starflower Mind Elf/Dragon Female
• Vanderhan Non-mage Human Male
• Arwen (first half) Earth Human Female
• Grendel (second half) Mind Human Male
• Rowan Binder Elf Female
• GoK Shadow Celestial Elf/Vampire Male
• Sau Rus Infiltration Saurian Male
• Basalic Earth Human Male (Scribe)

Time on adventure

1st Frost 802 WK to 18th Seedtime 802 WK

Employer

A Millennium Tree

Mission

Find two missing parts of the Millennium Tree

Plane

Rifts Earth

Places visited

Africa

A second Millennium Tree

An abandoned military base

Atlantis

Splynn

Dragcona

The Preserves

Major NPCs encountered

Millennium Druids - They tend the Tree

Odin, Thor & the rest of the Norse Pantheon

Wei Soo Ling - shapechanged Oriental dragon

The Master - an evil Intelligence

Two Atlanteans (became our masters)

Original Scribe Notes

Media:Snwi0205.zip

Part 1. On Safari in Africa

The mission I signed up on was, believe it or not, to be summoned to help a tree. The person who introduced it at the Guild Meeting was an old gentleman with grey hair, wearing dirty brown robes. He spoke in an odd accent which was, at times, hard to understand. My fellow adventures were: T’ana Starflower. 6'4" stern looking female elf, with long auburn hair, wearing grey plate mail armour. A Mind Mage. Vanderhand. Human male with shoulder length hair, black pants, white shirt. Non-mage. Rowan - 6'1" elven female auburn red hair. Binder Gok. - 6'5" stocky elf. Long black cloak and pallid skin. Long dark hair and a scar running down one side of his face. Shadow celestial. Arwen - 5'11" female human with waist length brown hair. Earth mage. And I’m Basalic. Human male earth mage/warrior. Anyway we were asked if we were the Life Givers. We were then told that it was a hot, dry, place that we were going to and were given some leaves that we were told to eat upon arrival. According to their aura, they came from the Millennium Tree and their Plane of Origin was Earth. We were told that the Giver of Life (presumably the Tree) had been under assault and were weakened. The sect, that our employer belonged to, were trying to put it back together. They wanted us to help them retrieve two pieces, each about 5 to 6 foot long. We were also told that it would be advisable to leave things like portable holes behind. So much for my usual weapon loadout. The departure time was to be tomorrow midnight. After some discussion, I became the scribe (no one else wanted the job), Starflower the military scientist, and Arwen the party leader. I put Lesser Enchantments on my companions and Arwen put one on me. I also found some mistletoe out of my own garden for Arwen. Astrology readings were done in order to obtain more information such as ‘What dangers await’ - Dangers are few and far between. Hmmm A vision was also obtained of a tree, located inside a crater, being struck by lightning. 2 nd Frost At midnight we were at the appointed place. The spot glowed then a tear appeared in reality. We stepped through and seemed to be travelling down a glowing tube at great speed. Finally we landed in a sandy area. A blue glow could be seen on the horizon. I had to extricate my foot from under Starflower. For some reason she had changed into a large dragon. Also, as per instructions, we chewed the leaves we were given. Starflower on discovering she is a large dragon - “I seem to have a small problem” Vanderhand - “Small?” I could also see that everyone was brighter - except for Vanderhand. Then there was a loud BOOM and a nearby tree exploded. We all dived into a nearby hole. As we watched we could hear footsteps, loud clanging and, occasionally, objects were flying overhead. One landed near Gok and sent him flying. Vanderhand used his crystal ball and could see two large glittering metallic looking figures with smaller ones in a gully nearby. Suddenly something exploded nearby and we’re showered with sand and metallic fragments. We then saw a man beckoning from behind a nearby tree. We were about to go over when another explosion sent me hurtling in that direction. After following him for about ten minutes he walked into a medium sized tree and we followed onto a stairway going down. After what seemed like 15,000 steps later we reached a corridor and were lead into a room. We were given the opportunity to freshen up. I discovered that I was seeing magic auras around items. Also, since Starflower wasn’t able to use her chain shirt any more, I borrowed it. The rest of the night passed without incident and the next morning I discovered the joys of showering and singing in it. Have to figure out how to build one when we get back. An empty potion bottle was filled up with liquid soap. After breakfast, which consisted of a collection of cereal derivatives we were introduced to the people who needed our aid. They were known as the Millennium Druids and they tend the Tree. We were led to another room. On it was a pile of stuff, an item that looked like a rifle with no trigger, an overcoat of very resilient material, two acorns and two leaves each. Both the leaves and the acorns came from the Millennium Tree. The leaves gave us the equivalent of a Force Shield for 30 minutes while a single acorn would heal. Two together would resurrect. The surcoat would absorb damage while the rifle is a technowizardry device that would deal it out. Once we collected those we were led back to the first rooms and given some sort of history lesson consisting of moving pictures. From what I could understand there was a war that led to a terrible cataclysm and everything changed. We are now in the Phoenix Empire, somewhere in Africa. The giant things of armour were Glitterboys and there was a human inside them and there were also juicers, soldiers that were drugged up out of their minds. The Tree had been subjugated by the Empire who were taking bits of it for their own use. The Tree called for us as it was believed we could do what the Druids could not. .2. Lunch time was the basic fare, cheeses, fruits and bread. Afterwards we were taken to the training grounds, so we could learn to use these ‘rifles’. This involved several corridors and stairs, finally through a big iron door, then up a ramp to the surface. Outside we could see some disguised buildings and what looked like archery targets. Vanderhand’s ‘rifle’ was slightly different than ours. His had a ‘powerpack’ attached since ours were powered by us drawing mana as we were spellcasters. Since Vanderhand was a non-mage he had to use a different source. So we spent the whole afternoon blasting at targets and figuring out how to use them properly. The next couple of days was also spent practising. 5 th Frost Other preparations also had to be done. A city called Rana was mentioned at some point, otherwise known as the City of Doom. It was ruled by a Phaeroh with a necromantic fetish. It was also rather hot so I ditched the drow half-plate in favour of the leather. Besides, I may need to at least attempt to cast magic. That night we were guided out by three druids in front and three behind. After going outside we were led to a spot between two trees and told to wait until it was safe. A few minutes later we were waved through. Soon we were out of the oasis. I could see two large blue walls on either side of us and they seemed to converge up ahead, where we were going. It was a long journey and several times we were told to hug the ground and stay quiet ad objects roared overhead. We also had to duck when our guides heard footsteps. It was like we were avoiding contact with anything. Finally, 4 to 5 hours later, the sand underfoot gave way to grass and I could feel a tingling in the air. After avoiding more potential trouble, we finally saw the Tree, or at least an 800ft tall skeleton of one. There was an intense ‘glow’ around it and it looked broken and scarred. There were very few leaves left on it. The trunk was 200 feet wide. When we arrived at the base, the druids started talking to it then introduced us. The tree then communicated back to us in dreams and feelings, all except Gok. He didn’t pick up a thing. There were two distinct carved items we had to find, each 4 ½ ft long and were quite nasty items. Basically they were corrupted staves. The Tree had been tortured and abused by the Phoenix Empire into this state. After two hours we snuck back. 6 th Frost Slept most of the day. Starflower was able to find some very old, pre cataclysm, maps and located the first one to the south of us on the same landmass. The second one she had to get a complete world map and discovered it was somewhere in the ocean to the west. However, upon questioning the druids we discovered that the new continent of Atlantis was located there. .3. Late that afternoon we took off from the archery range using various flight spells and headed south. Starflower turned into a rather hungry looking dragon. A couple of hours later she unexpectedly shapeshifted back in midflight and fell. Fortunately Gok was able to get a set of wings on her and we continued on. Starflower - “I’ll cast Mind Speech cause sometimes it provokes trouble.” A short while later I spotted a magical burst in the air and we changed course to avoid it. The air felt warm and tingly, then the air around the burst began to be whipped up. So we changed course to the west in order to get out of the area of effect as quickly as possible. Half an hour later we flew out of the periphery. Behind us a whirlwind had formed. The air still felt charged but was not magical. The burst of light got brighter and bulged outwards as we increased our distance from it and I could still see magical energies around it. Fortunately it did us no harm and soon began to fade. Two hours later, we landed and made camp as dawn arrived. 7 th Frost It was very hot. A person on a dune was spotted watching us and Arwen thought it was her god Odin. I found that hard to believe. Gods making personal appearances? I think not. My thoughts on the subject were immediately stopped when both Starflower and Vanderhand reported the sound of shifting sands. When we went to the top of a dune to look we saw no less than three large, 120ft long, sandworms heading in our direction. Naturally we immediately broke camp and took off, Starflower in dragonform. According to their aura, they were ‘Blow Worms’ and as we flew away one of them spat at Vanderhand and covered him in sticky goo. Mid afternoon and we reached savannah country and changed course to the south east.. As darkness fell, the temperature fell and the goo around Vanderhand began hardening. At nightfall, we found a forest and landed. We tried to get Vanderhand out of the goo but soon realised we required strong acid. Starflower found a plant that had acidic juices but as she did, a vine hit her. Meanwhile we were towing a gummed up Vanderhand using the sphere of weightlessness. Someone referred to him as a Vanderzepplin. Meanwhile Starflower sliced the vine but another had a go at me and I ended up upside down. Starflower cut me down but not before the vine drained a lot of my magic potential. Finally we started negotiating with the plant. It wanted sunlight in exchange for the juices. As Rowen had a golen carefully dig the plant up, Arwen was sure Odin was watching again, and this time I was also getting the feeling that I was being watched. Arwen then summoned a 50ft tall elemental to move the plant into the clearing. Once it was in place, it grew another ten feet. We then tapped it for acid and got Vanderhand out. There was enough left for one decanter full.