Current Training: Evus.

Donations: Helping Undrus dig to the East (50-60% done).

Exploration: still Gungla-ing around.

Sombdi, day 7 of Spring, 553.

Today I was off doing my usual ore prospecting when the call went out that a Fire Drake was ravishing town. I rushed back to help. That small decision led to a busy day, let me tell you!

We managed to lead the Drake into the "Zoo" at the Governor's mansion, which helped keep it from attacking exiles around town. Then we set out to kill it. Fire Drakes are hard to kill, not so much because they are hard to hit (and they are, actually) as they are prone to take flight before the final blow can be landed. Killing them quickly is key. This Drake was no exception.

Usually I've seen Drakes take a long running start before taking flight, so I was hoping that the Zoo wall would keep it penned in until we could finish it off. Alas no.

Raen and I were making good progress on killing the Drake, when it started to take flight right inside the Zoo. I immediately chained Raen and Baffina to get them away (Tara was beyond my immediate reach), and was starting to bring them South to safety when the Drake stripped them right off my chain and grabbed them up in it's immense claws! He took Tara, Raen, Baffina and Mjollnir, and started to fly toward the West, sailing right clear of the Zoo walls even with his load of fallen exiles.

We followed the Drake as it flew West across town, just out of reach. I swung wildly at it, but was unable to strike it. We chased it all the way to the Docks, and then across the ocean to Devil's Island.

Alas, our friends had likely been taken to the Drake lair deep within the volcano in the center of Devil's Island, to be a snack for a hungry Fire Drake and its little Drakelets!

Despite the hour and the relative quietness of town, I started to organize a rescue. When Raldin fortuitously appeared, I asked him to help us, since Mystic cooperation would be essential. Thankfully, he agreed, and so we set out. I hope he didn't come to regret that!

The Drake Den on Devil's Island is a particularly difficult place to go, being beyond several difficult paths, a cavern maze and a Mystical illusion. I seemed to to be the only one along with the requisite maps to find the way there, so I guess my time spent exploring here paid off today. With no small trepidation, our small group gathered on Devil's Island. I openned McBolie's Cavern easily enough, I was pleased to see, despite not having traversed this passage in quite some time. Carefully, we threaded our way through the cavern under the lake and emerged inside the Voolcon enclosure. With my hard-won maps of the Devil's Island passes in hand, we set out toward the next challenge, the protective Illusions shrouding the volcano peak and the entry to the Drake Den.

Piercing the Illusions took us ages, and was nearly our undoing. Like the Orga Camp, there are many Illusions here and most lead away from the goal rather than toward it.

On our first try, we lost several folks who entered various Illusions and found themselves inside and outside the Voolcon enclosure. We had to backtrack to gather up those fallen or lost inside the enclosure, and then exit to collect others. Then we all went around the island and started once again at McBolie's cavern.

The second attempt, Raldin unfortunately fell right into an Illusion just as we entered the area (and I had cautioned everyone to walk slowly), and of course no one could follow him as the Illusion sealed up behind him. He ended up elsewhere in the enclosure, and we had to go find him to try again. Someone else then slipped through a path leading back outside, so once again we restarted our adventure at the beginning.

The third time we didn't even make it to the Illusions before we started losing folks, and Norm wanted to join us anyway, so I went back into McBolie's from the enclosure, and used a little path I know of that leads quickly back to the North side of the Lake to pick them up. Once more through the cavern maze I went! Finally, the group regrouped and we tried Raldin's Illusions again. Unfortunately, he had a hard time deciding which was the true trail and which were false ones, so we again lost over half the group, who ended up outside the Crater area once again. However, he did finally find the proper trail, and six of us finally entered the Drake den area after some hours of trying.

In gaining control of the outer crater, we had to kill a number of Lava Walkers, but finally things seemed under control.

The Drake den proper is a large cavern entered by crossing a lava pit. With some trepidation, I skittered across as lightly as I could manage, and reached the den itself on a medium red. Ouch! Omega didn't make it, nor Raldin. After some time, Maquiladora also made it inside.

In the den, I found our fallen comrades (poor Tara having departed by this time, having been unable to wait longer for rescue), still watched closely by the Fire Drake. Too closely, it turned out.

I managed to get my last chain on Raen and Baffina (having burned out 2 others in various chainings in the crazy attempts to get everyone in here), but noticed that the Drake clung tightly to Mjollnir instead of chasing me. Curious!

When I did finally rush up to Mjollnir to try to chain him out from under the Drake, I noticed that the Drake had not let go of poor Mjollnir so I could not get a chain upon him. I advised him to nap for a time, hoping the Drake would let go for a later chain run, and headed out of the Cavern.

I was mightily surprised when I entered the lava pool on the way out and the intense heat made my chain slip off Baffina and Raen! After some thinking (and carefully removing fallen Omega and Raldin from blocking the cave entrance), we decided to rush back in and try pushing them out of the cavern.

I was crushed when I fell to the intense heat right at the cave entrance, and managed a perfect dive into the cave next to Baffina and Raen. Ugh! So much effort to finally fall to lava! Maquiladora managed to get in, but I was too fallen for her, so she pushed us all out. Maquiladora, Sunblaze and Highlander managed to keep alive in the outer crater despite Lava Walkers, but could not help any of us fallens, having neither chains nor healing potions among them. What they did do was call in the cavalry.

We were very, very lucky that the PTF exploration group was just about to start their expedition for this zodiac, and they kindly decided to help us out. Fairly quickly, they entered the Drake den in force and rescued the rescuers. Thanks so much PTF!

We even got to kill that Fire Drake instead of merely stealing his lunch (and I was shocked to see it was merely a slaughter!).

Still, it was quite an adventure for me to get so many exiles out here, and our Bravery and Compassion in pursuing the rescue for so long did not go unnoticed. Also, with the PTF folks controlling the area, I was able to map the entirety of the Drake den in peace.

In other events, several days ago I joined a group to venture deep inside the Tok'Han den within Melabrion's mines. We went quickly through all the levels I had ever seen before, then continued onward through several more caverns infested mainly with Green Tok'Hans. Finally we reached areas inhabited by Emerald and Lime Tok'hans, where our advance came to a rapid stop. These are very difficult beasts, and as we entered this tight cavern, we were utterly dependent on Garibaldi using his Bloodblade to actually kill these beasts. Unfortunately, we had a problem. One Emerald Tok'Han killed Garibaldi, then started rampaging at several other fighters and healers, forcing a retreat. Very unfortunately, I was near the front line and fell, and was the only pathfinder who could open the path leading into this cavern. Oops! We fallens were stuck. Thankfully, the survivors were able to hold the previous cavern and recruited a rescue squad including other pathfinders, and remarkably quickly we were chained out and raised. We advanced quite slowly after that point, but did manage to thrust quite deeply into the heart of Tok'Han territory before we finally were stopped totally and were forced to turn for home. Quite a lot more to explore down there than I thought! Among other things, I saw this shed Tok'Han skin along the way.

Merdi, day 80 of Winter, 553.

More hunting on Kizmia's Island. Last night, Mujin-kun, Tyndall, Degu and I started at the South beach hut and worked our way Northward into the night mists.

It's funny, but I keep finding Catsbane now that it is almost worthless (although I did manage to unload a pinch to Mjollnir today). Similarly, Lyfelidae fur was once in great demand and quite expensive, but now is also almost worthless and hard to even give away. In our hunting today, we all simply walked right past these two tufts of fur.

Lyfe fur: the new Brambleberry!

Most of our hunting was actually in the Lyfelidae caverns. We found some great Lyfelidae, from my perspective. Plenty of Thunders, Flowers and Pinks, several Orgaberries, and even a lone Cold. I had almost 90 vanquishes, and about that many kills, gaining me a lesson with Evus and then some.

Mujin-kun has a quite different opinion of most Lyfelidae types, but then again, she has nearly 3700 lessons under her belt to my nearly 2200! I'm sure that she is still gaining faster than me too ...

Of course, I was the one who fell the most, and at one point Tyndall had to use a Red Healing Potion to help raise me again after a particularly vicious Orgaberry slashed me deeply. Unfortunately, I immediately replaced his potion with one I was carrying.

Unfortunately, because not too long afterward, Tyndall was the one fallen beyond Degu's ability to raise, and I had no other potion, nor did Mujin-kun or Degu. So we headed out of the caves with Tyndall in tow, hoping to meet up with a small group (Natas, Yor and Kyp) who were hunting elsewhere on the island.

The moment we exited the cave, we ran into this:

Thankfully, we all made it across the bridge intact and were able to hold what turned out to be 14 Thunder Lyfelidae at bay, from across the freezing river. With help from Kyp, Degu was able to raise Tyndall, and then with Natas and Yor, we proceeded to kill off this enormous bonanza of Thunder Lyfelidae. Just after we finished this, the Sun rose, and we all headed back the the South hut to the Portal and town.

I did stop in to see the tunnel digger near the river, but he was no longer accepting donations and was awaiting permits to begin the actual digging. Does Kizmia herself hand out those permits? Or maybe Groar!

Gradi, day 51 of Winter, 553.

A group of us set to hunting several evenings ago heading North hugging Eastern shore of Kizmia's Island. We had reached the Northernmost snell, and had just started our way back South following the rock wall that divides the island, when we ran into serious trouble. Many strong Lyfelidae quickly overpowered most of the group, and only Dongle, Gold Moon and myself successfully retreated to the North. Unfortuanetly, before we could really recover, several Lyfelidae followed us. I asked the others to retreat further to the Southeast, since we had also recently cleared there and they were both wounded. I was still quite healthy, and headed back Southwest to grab some fallens. With some quick gyrations, I was able to grab everyone, including Dongle, who had followed me anyway. I headed East, but didnt't see Gold Moon, so I started dragging my load of fallen exiles back South expecting to find her along the way. By the time I made it back to the hut, I was hurting from numerous nips by cave Cobras and Valley Cougars I ran into on the way. But no Gold Moon. It turns out she had gone back into the Northernmost snell and fallen there. Luckily, we were able to get everyone back on their feet to go retrieve her before a Saber Owl snatched her away to Groar's Cave! The scavengers had feasted on her until she was the dreaded PND, though, and she had to be brought to town to be raised again.

On Kizmia's Island, always be aware of where your tree is. Also recently, I was on a typical daytime Kizmia's Island hunt with a fairly loose group, when I lost track of precisely where we were in the North end of the East side of the Island. That's usually not a problem, but it was the same snell as I did that chain rescue from, and I accidentally bumped into the Human Fighter tree while running around tagging and avoiding being tagged by several Lyfelidae. Yep, I unintentionally fell right into my tree, and while at low health to boot! After some hurried discussion, Veer dropped into his tree and brought an extra barrel of tar (I had 2 logs but an empty barrel only, not expecting I'd need any tar today) and we ran/fought our way out to the North cave and the boatmaker. In the Northern Scarmis area, we set out to clear the entire snell as a safe retreat before pressing onward. It was a tense moment when I fell to a Scarmis Tunneler I was fighting (after killing off a number of pesky Harvesters), but it was clear enough for Veer to trap the remaining Scarmis behind a rock so he could raise me to finish the job. After healing up, we ran North and actually made it, I was delighted to realize, after quickly bypassing two cave Cobras in the North cave. Thanks Veer! Above and beyond the call of duty! I doubt I would have made it alone to one of the Pathfinder trails back to the South side of the island, which was my only real option at that point.

I have still found time to wander about on Gungla Island, of course. Nothing really new to report, except that I have finally seen Wild Boars and Baby Plesio'dons. Several interesting new species on Gungla (along with Seta Lizards), but no new birds seem to nest here. Ahh well, naturalists must be content to live with the world as it presents itself.

I had heard that it was almost impossible to hunt the Plesio'dons. Yesterday, Mujin-kun and Puffy-s came to rescue me after I had yet another unfortunate accident with a Cave Cobra, and after I was up they wanted to hunt Plesio'dons. I had already noted that I only infrequently hit them (but had, with persistence), but that they didn't hit me very often either, so I was willing to try it. Mujin had already located one in the Marsh, so we set out. It took some effort, and some healing by Puffy-s to keep me healthy, but we made steady progress at killing that Plesio'don with it attacking me primarily, and Mujin hitting it from behind now and again. The biggest problem was the annoying Swamp Gasses collecting about us and getting in the way of swings, so we moved a bit every now and then. After a few minutes of effort, I had my first Baby Plesio'don vanquish under my belt. I'm sure there will be more to come.

When I was fallen to that Cave Cobra, someone eventually asked me to toggle if I was fallen in the "Damp" area. I was really confused, and asked later what this meant. Apparently, some exiles are calling the dark green Mossy areas around the Village of Khororan "Damp". I prefer Mossy, but then again the spots most folks call "Muddy" I think of as "Mossy" already. I guess "Damp" works. We'll see if this sticks as a descriptor.

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