End of Session 1

The party manages to escape the Druid without too much incident, loathed as he was to leave his precious control panel. From there, the party busts their way through the stairwell leading out to the city. It might have sounded like a good idea, but the party quickly decides that it wasn't, and instead heads back to the room where they fought the Ogre Spider.

Climbing up the ladder to the cracked-open archers nest, they wait for another catapult barrage before securing Snargles grappling hook and quickly descending the wall. The Druid, with his attention on the catapults, almost misses the parties decent entirely, offering little resistance. Nark, Snargles trusty pig, is nonplussed about being manhandled by Hic for the second time that day.

On your return, Tumiko, the Iron Fist captain, seems genuinely surprised and quietly pleased that you not only survived, you turned out to be useful.

She listens to your story without interruption, before asking a few clarifying questions and congratulating you on a job well done. With that, she climbs on her oversized wolf, Tooth, and rides off to report to the Warden.

The Warden rides over on his horse, with the elven Wizard you previously saw directing the siege engines in tow. Although it isn't a Valley custom, the Warden excitedly fist-bumps you all and slaps you on the back, before inviting you to join him and the elf in capturing the gatehouse for sure this time. Heironymous might have giggled and blushed at the attention the Warden was giving him, but noone was dumb enough to call him out on it. The horse makes a disparaging remark regarding your mothers sexual prowess. Awkward silence follows.

Those of you who go with the two of them realise that getting inside the wall is a lot easier when you have a wizard who can cast both disintegrate and mass fly. Once in the wall, you quickly make your way to the gatehouse, where you discover the druid, still resting against his control panel.

What follows next is a bit of a battle of attrition. It appears that the druid had more than one Wall of Thorns prepared, but fortunately they turn out to be pretty flammable, if you're prepared to wait 10 minutes for them to burn. Once the wizard had set fire to the third wall in a row, it was a fairly easy task to corner and subdue the druid, as low as he was on spells and abilities

With the fighting out of the way, the Wizard listens carefully to Master Shanil's explanation of his experiences with the control panel, before sitting down in front of it, trying to recall any other scrap of knowledge he had on the subject. Eventually, after preparing himself mentally, he places his hands on the polished pane of wood, and rests his forehead against it

You can see the Wizard flinch when his head firsts touches the wood, but soon he can be seen smiling, talking to himself in the gentle language of the forest. The walls of Tsuen are a somewhat unique type of magic, and getting to experience it first hand is a joyous task for one such as he

After a few minutes, he reluctantly leans back, disengaging himself. He explains that Master Shanil took a huge risk trying to control the wall, not being an elf, or a sylvan speaker, and it reflects well on his abilities that he wasn't crushed by the weight of it. He goes on to say that while the wall is damaged, it would be possible to repair - carving out the emergency structual biomass and giving the tree the time and support it needs to reform the rooms

Lastly, the Wizard has you retell your account of the horror under the murder holes. He nods along as you tell it, eventually explaining that the creature is an undead beast known as a Warsworn. They are creatures made out of dead soldiers killed in horrific circumstances, that feed on the dying, growing as they go. They have limited telekenetic abilities, and can fling armour, shields and weapons out of itself at anything that is out of immediate reach. He thinks that the creature is not something they are able to immediately deal with, and suggests patience and planning. The Warden stalks off into a corner and sulks at the news.

-

Over the next week, a few things happen. A couple of permanent entries are set up in the walls - holes are made, then shored up with stone to prevent them closing, with long ramps leading allowing easy access.

Teams are set up to go through the passages, slowly removing the constricting biomass, working with the Wizard to correctly heal and reopen the previously closed and damaged rooms. With a bit of effort and more than a few of Long Yaks bombs, the split open archers-nest room is cracked once again, correctly healing his time, closing off the sky to invaders.

The wall is gradually cleaned up, filled with furniture and occupied, housing at least two hundred of the Iron Fists force.

Eventually, with preparations done, all eyes turn outwards once more. The Warden needs someone to run the zombie gauntlet to get some scouting done, and Captain Tumiko knows just the people to take on something as suicidal as that