10-01-2025: A Jolly Phoinx and Goblins

The session started in Pharkan. The party helped the village with finding their missing guards. With still 5 days until they have to get back in Thalaniel. They decided to head to one more village which needs help, Helby Village. This small village has been plagued by raids by goblins and a Giant Spider taking their lifestock. The small farming community has no guards to protect them and the villages around them are too understaffed to be of any assistance. The party headed in the morning to the village which was to the West of their location.   During their journey, surrounded by the pure whiteness of the snow, they came upon something colorful. An orange and purple feather were dancing in the wind right ahead of them. A bit further they saw another feather in the same colors and it seemed that a trail of those feathers, were heading into the forest. Suspicious of the feathers, they cautiously followed the trail. Not to far off they found the bird to which the feathers belonged to. A big, round, orange and purple colored bird was up in a tree sitting on his nest. It appeared as if it was busy hatching its eggs during this winter, since it remained in one place. The party tried to communicate with it, but received only some caws in return. To their suprise Kiwi, the pet of Jaina, understood what the bird was saying. Thanks to the Collar of Translation that Jaina recently bought for Kiwi, they could now directly talk to each other. Thanks to Kiwi they learned that the bird is a Jolly Phoinx. This bird usually resides in the Celestial Plane, but because the plane is too hot to hatch their eggs, they transport their nest to the Material Plane during winter. The bird wanted a blanket for himself to keep him warm and some food, as the snow prevented him from leaving the nest. So the party provided him with a small rag and some berries to feed him. The Jolly Phoinx also asked them if they wanted to protect his nest, in case any predators are trying to disturb him. So they spent the night under his nest and kept an eye out. Nothing tried to bother them during the night, so halfway through the morning their job was done. The eggs hatched and small, little birds were making some noise for food. Their father fed his newborn children and asked for Kiwi and Jaina to go back up the tree for their reward. The bird plucked one of his head feathers and presented it to Jaina. The feather has magical properties to point to the direction she asks for, however it only works 3 times a day and it can also fail to point the right direction. He also paid her with a ruby, an emerald and a magical ring with emeralds embedded in it. The bird is not aware what kind of magic it wields. Mind asked how the bird came upon all these items, to which it replied that it has a knack for finding valuables. The bird thanked the party and portalled his nest back to the Celestial Plane.   Happy with their rewards, the party continued their journey to Helby Village without any other distractions. The village was a small farming community of no more than 60 people. In the village lived more livestock than people. They talked with one of the farmers who didn't look too busy to ask what was going on. He explained that the goblins would appear on certain nights to steal cows and sheep. It seemed to the farmed that they have no means to stop and two youngsters who foolishly tried, lost their lives. It appears they always come from the north-east of the forest. When asked for a reward, the farmer said they were willing to part with two workhorses as payment. The party agreed and took on the quest, wasting no time and immediately heading north-west.    The goblins made little effort the hide their tracks, so Jaina quickly found their tracks. The party tried to sneak upon the goblins, but were spotted before they could get into position. A fight ensued, with Jaina immediately shooting the Giant Spider down, much to the anger of her mother, a Huge Spider. Which entered the battle immediately and shot webs on everyone of the party, except Jaina. Mind and Maeve got caught heavily in the webs. Mind Misty Stepped to the side and with the help of Hugin released himself of the webs. Aerith moved away from the webs with more ease and shot her Eldritch Blasts on the Huge Spider, leaving quite some damage on her. However, one of the goblins shot a fire arrow on the webs, igniting the webs and burning the remaining party members, who were caught within the webs. Poor Kiwi got burned but was saved by the Pendant of Safe Haven of Jaina. Gotrick and Maeve also took some damage caused by the burning webs. This fire only fueled the anger of Gotrick who has a particular hatred for big spiders and used this anger to charge at the Huge Spider. He broke free of the webs and with his warhammer he hit the spider hard on the legs, making it stumble to the ground; its head perfectly placed for his second hit. He rose his warhammer high to bring a swift and devasting blow to head of the spider, divine lighting striking it and squashing the head. Gotrick got splattered all over with the blood of the spider. The remaining goblins were easy pickings. Jaina shot down their leader with her arrows, ensuring that their leader wasn't able to do anything meaningful in the fight. Mind blew up the goblins with a powerful fireball standing on the right of the spider. Aerith used her Psyonic Blasts to destroy the minds of the goblins to the left. Ieghi finished it all up by slashing and biting the head off of the last remaining goblin.   After a failed attempt of extracting spider venom, the party poorly cut off the head of the Giant Spider as proof. Gotrick accidently destroyed the rest of the body of the huge spider and they decided to return to Helby Village. With their quest done, they received their two horses. A brown one and a brown horse with white marks all over. With just a few days to go they returned to Thalaniel to get back to The Keep of Adamant. During their travels they received two letters. One from Gundren Rockseeker with their share of the profits and one of Mot'Jhazar, asking how their search for Tacton was faring. Jaina was to write back to Mot'Jhazar and Mind to Gundren. Aerith also decided to write a letter to Lady Aenysiel. She wants to let her know that soon they will be in Illumé and would like for the Order to stay at her personal residence.   The session ended with the party back in their Keep in Thalaniel. The following days their guests would be arriving; Alban Farrow and Ornn with his crew.