Chapter 1: The burning city

We smelled it before we heard or saw it.

As the group traveled West on the great wilderness we began to catch wiffs of the smell. That smell will remain forever fixed in my mind. It smelled of burning wood mixed with tar, flesh and hair. Our ranger knew immediately something was wrong. As we went towards the smell we stopped before the peak of a hill. Our ranger was able to spot chaos. People were looting a nearby village, burning down the houses and taking what they wanted.

Suddenly we heard a sound that shook me to the core. A dragon raged above the keep, spewing lightning out of it's mouth. We looked at each other and decided we needed to help these people. Running in through the gates we were expecting to encounter enemies at any time. What was more creepy, however, was the lack of action. Nothing was in the area save for bunt out shops and houses. That all changed when we got closer to the keep.

Suddenly we heard a high pitch screaming. A young woman, who could not have been older than 17 or 18, ran out of an alley clutching two children to her bosom. After her ran several Kolbolds, fiercely ugly creatures with a habit of eating whatever they could get their hands on. The woman tripped and the foul creatures surrounded her. There was no time to think, we immediately jumped into action.

We were able to pick of the creatures one by one, but eventually one of them croaked out something.

"Stop, prisoner."

Not knowing what the creature was talking about I attempted to stop the group from attacking, maybe we could have resolved this without further bloodshed. My attempts went in vein though, with our barbarian smashing the creature's  head in. Finally, after the sorceress yelled through the creatures' minds and I caused one to fall over laughing, the group ran. We had one, and we could interrogate it. That is, until the barbarian took its head off.

We needed to find out what was going on, so we took shelter in a nearby shop as our paladin took off, disguising himself as a Kobold he went to the group standing guard in front of the Keep. I later found out this group was Cultists. I can hardly keep my quill steady as I shake with rage. Those fucking bastards, they needed to pay. I can't believe I almost let one live.

The wizard noticed the group was gone, and we headed towards the Keep. Once inside we learned the Cultists were looting the village, and they did not think they could fight them off while keeping the Dragon at bay. After talking with the leader of the soldiers we set off to find a way out of the Keep in case we had to make a quick escape. We found a sewer tunnel, guarded by a little gnome. The half-ork does not like gnomes.

We were able to convince the gnome to help us out and we secured the tunnel. When we returned to the Keep we found our Paladin and Ranger, who sneaked into the Cultist's camp. They were severely outnumbering us. They let us know just how bad the situation was. Just then, the roar came again.

The Dragon was back

We ran outside into the courtyard to confront the beast. Any attempts we had to communicate it were in vein, it just wanted to kill and destroy. After a lengthy battle, and many dead guards. Our ranger was able to get an arrow past the creature's hide. The Dragon grunted in surprise and flew off. Our party went into the infirmary to rest before the leader of the keep came back to us.

"I have another favor to ask of you," he said.

Here we go.