For a change, we have full attendance. For a bigger change, we also start on time. Our happy gang remains: Tim (Antok of the Storm Tribe), Chris (Dojango Sangaree), Chuck (Arnoux Urag), Paul (Marik) and Bruce (nobody).
The characters depart the Fisher Village and continue traveling up the Thunafel River. They note very quickly that the hills on the eastern bank rise up only a short distance from the river. There is a small river plain that probably qualifies as marginal farmland, but few signs of any current inhabitants. The tree-covered hillsides rise sharply enough that climbing them would be difficult. Marik continues to provide the group's motive power, using his magic to levitate the boat upriver in small jumps. During rest periods, he spends his time discussing various nifty spells that he could learn with Antok of the Storm Tribe. The rest of the group simply grit their teeth and wait it out, reasoning that the alternative (learning to sail a boat) would be more painful.
After most of a day, the scenery changes a bit. The group sees the western bank become substantially rougher through the day, with little river plain to speak of. A short time before sunset, a break in the hills becomes visible on the eastern bank, while a collection of impressive stone ruins comes into view atop the rise to the west. Several characters conclude that the ruins are most likely the remains of the city of Kufry, which they had been given as a landmark to watch for. They look for a good place to land on the eastern bank, and fairly quickly spot a tumbledown wooden dock.
Dojango Sangaree takes a look at the dock and recalls the advice the old woman offered about ruined towns overridden with malicious Old Dead. He comments, "I'm not sure this dock looks like a good idea - if there was a town near here this place is going to be lousy with evil spirits." The characters decide to tie up anyway, just to check the scene out. They bring the boat near the shore and secure it to some of the surviving pilings. At this point, they are able to see a cluster of old, wrecked buildings inland. Most of them are little more than scraps of wall, but a couple of squarish stone structures in the center have clearly survived the years much better. A couple of people are visible in the distance. Dojango is unambiguous about his opinion: "This place is ghost central. We're out of here." Nobody offers any dispute, so the characters head a bit further upriver and pull up at a small inlet bordered by reeds. They don't see anyone around, so they figure that the area is safe.
The characters make camp. They are somewhat concerned about midnight visitors, so they make a number of preparations. Antok casts Continual Light (bright as a fire) upon the point of one of his spears and sticks it into the ground as a beacon. Dojango suddenly realizes that he can't see in the dark, so he also votes for a campfire. They arrange for four watches, with Antok and Arnoux Urag taking the darkest shifts (both of them can see at night).
Some time before dawn Arnoux hears a "substantial rustling" up the hillside. He decides that whatever is making the noise is large enough to be either a threat or breakfast, so he wakes the other characters. Dojango wakes to find himself handed a glowing spear (courtesy of Antok) and the power of flight (thanks to Marik's spells). He flies out towards the hills, casting about for anything suspicious. He doesn't see anything, but he does hear a couple of strange "thruffing" noises that he doesn't like much. He is eventually joined by Antok and Arnoux, who sneak towards the sound. All three of them find nothing but some strange impressions in the ground that Dojango thinks are similar to (but much larger than) tracks left by snakes in the Garden.
Antok decides to go all-out. He borrows back Dojango's glowing spear and runs into the darkness. He casts the spear out ahead of him, then runs towards where it landed, looking for monsters in the darkness along the way. After his second cast, he is more than rewarded: a terrible monster rises up in front of him. The creature is three times his height and four times his width, with bony ribbing and tentacles lining it's belly. It stares down at him with baleful red eyes. He stabs at it only to see it's belly plates blunt his spear. He responds to this setback by failing a Fright Check and running screaming towards the boat. The other characters hold a debate as to whether he sounds more like a girl or a deranged lemur.
Shortly afterwards, Marik is attacked by a terrible flying demon. This creature looks like a scrap of living darkness, though it appears to possess the same baleful red eyes as Antok's nemesis. Marik performs a retreating dodge, hurling himself away from the creature's path. He can almost feel it's serrated metal claws brush past him. Arnoux and Dojango run to join him, Arnoux casting a couple of hexes of darkness around himself on the way as a sort of stygian security blanket. After the creature passes, Marik searches around and finds a huge arrow sticking in a nearby bush. Antok looks at it and realizes that it would take a very strong man to draw a bow able to fire that arrow.
At this point, the characters realize that they haven't seen Bauen for a while. They rush back to the camp to find that he is gone, but that his boots are still next to his pack. Two sets of snakelike tracks lead back from his blanket to the river. It is quickly clear that something has stolen him away.
The characters debate the number and locations of the attackers. There is much debate over what the creatures were doing in the river and whether they might have headed across the river or simply traveled along it. Dojango and Arnoux wrestle the boat out into the river and head across to the other side. They quickly find that the opposite bank rises at quite a sharp grade, and is studded with scree - very painful to go across if you were a big snake. They conclude that it is unlikely that Bauen's captors went that way. They return across the river to find Marik resting and singing about how he's a squirrel. Arnoux makes no particular comment upon this behaviour.
Dojango decides to follow the snakelike tracks away from the camp. He spends an hour tracking them, finally following the trail to a cave near the top of the hill. Two sets of tracks lead to it. He goes back to fetch the others before heading in to kill lots of the creatures.
The characters approach the cave in daylight. Along the way, they discuss their plans. Arnoux asks the others, "Weren't there two of these things? They could be Mommy and Daddy, which may mean that there are a lot of little ones" Marik discounts his fears, arguing that the creatures will be hostile anyway, so there's not much that would make the female any more dangerous that she already is.
The characters walk into the cave carefully, backed up by Antok's Continual Light rocks and spears. The cave bottom is quite sandy and level. Wary of traps, Antok leads the way, casting a glowing rock tethered by a cord into the darkness ahead.
The characters enter a chamber with a clever rack arrangement on the ceiling. They traverse it. Along the way, Arnoux kicks a coin purse in the sand. It proves to be quite fragile, and falls apart when he hits it with his saber. It spills out a handful of local coins- five panthers and twenty-five gazelles. The characters gather them up and continue on to find that the cave ends with a blank wall.
Not being tremendously trusting, even of their own senses, the characters continue to investigate the dead end, eventually concluding that it is nothing more than an illusionary wall. Arnoux takes stock of the situation: "These creatures are illusionist, intelligent, tool-using snakes. We should be careful." Antok listens to this wise council and decides to take full advantage of it: "I'm going to rush through the wall whooping and screaming!" He casts Might upon himself, 5 points of it, then heads through the wall. He hits the pit trap just beyond the illusionary wall. He takes damage. He decides that in future, his stone-throwing process should be modified to include dragging backwards.
Marik decides that the situation demands dramatic action. He turns himself into a tiger.
The characters find that the chamber beyond the illusionary wall appears to be the Rope-Necks' larder. They find Bauen, tied from his feet and wrapped up like a Christmas turkey. Tied up next to him are several other bodies of varying age and condition. Arnoux climbs up to cut down the bodies and check out their boots. He finds that several of the unfortunates are wearing extremely nice boots. The characters loot the bodies, recovering:
Dojango puts the coins, gemstones and spirit trap in his pack. Everything else is placed into the tarp that once held Bauen, which the characters then give over to him to carry. Along the way, Bauen tells the characters that there are at least four of the creatures: the two that grabbed him, plus one more that joined them on the way and another that was in the cave.
The characters continue on deeper into the caves. They are faced with a choice of three directions to take and select the leftmost one, leading them into a long chamber littered with Rope-Neck artifacts and one Rope-Neck sleeping in a hammock at the far end. Sensing that his moment has come, Antok murders the creature by stabbing it through it's mouth after waking it by stabbing it in the throat.
Within a few moments, three more Rope-Necks enter into the chamber and attack with bow and club. They make good use of their illusory powers by calling up two phantoms that appear to rise up through the sand and spend their time fighting against Arnoux. The characters manage to win the day, though Dojango is quite badly hurt in the process.
With the battle won, Antok starts removing Rope-Neck hearts and eating them. He finds that after this rather grotesque feast he can spend points on up to four illusion spells or four Extra Fatigue points. He chooses Simple Illusion, Independence, Know Illusion, and Illusion Disguise.
During the violence, Antok had uncovered the existence of yet another illusory wall (he had been rather desperately searching for some means of escape). The passage beyond proves to lead to another substantial cavern. A massive cauldron squats upon a fire in the center. Something inedible is boiling within it. Some of the characters suspect that the cauldron may contain animal sinews that the Rope-Necks had intended to make into bowstrings and whatnot. The characters find this place to be to their taste and rest for several hours, healing each other and performing various other tasks. In particular, Dojango uses his Leatherworking skills to skin the four Rope-Necks. He determines that each skin can be made into a suit of armor with PD 2, DR 3 and the same weight as leather armor. Once Dojango is done with the creatures, Antok decapitates all four and wraps the heads in the tarp. The characters also investigate the two bales in the Rope-Neck's first cavern. They find:
Antok plays with one of the spirit traps, which appears to contain a young woman. He notes that she seems eager to get out, but doesn't respond to any stimulus. He then digs into a sand hollow and finds a bag of jerky. It's very spicy, and everyone else persuades him to not eat it. They reason that it was probably made from the creature that forms much of the Rope-Necks' diet.
Aided by his ability to dissect the creatures, Marik decides that three were male and one was female. There is no sign of eggs in the cave, making the characters think that this complex may be nothing more than a temporary camp. His biological hobbies dealt with, he then devotes himself to identifying all the items the group has pulled from the caves. Among other items, he determines the functions of the anti-magic staff (which he decides he wants to keep). He figures out the spirit traps, and decides to not mess with them (in part because the referee doesn't know how they work yet). He also manages to identify the various potions, carefully labeling the Eris potion bottles "DO NOT DRINK!" Altogether the process takes a total of nineteen hours (a total of two days). The last item he looks at is the magical broadsword, which turns out to be less valuable to the group than it might otherwise have been, as it turns out that nobody thought to buy broadsword skill.
While Antok fools with bodies and Marik identifies things, Dojango and Arnoux bring the boat closer and hide it. Everyone divides up the money, amounting to some 53 gazelles. They leave the gold coins as party loot until they figure out what they are. Antok, Dojango and Arnoux each take one Ares potion. They keep the Eris potions in common. Dojango takes the Tyche potion. Arnoux takes the Sand Jet spellstone.
The session ends with the characters resting in the Rope-Necks' cave. Each character gains four experience points.