A year Passes Eventfully

You all have been hired for various tasks by the Karrnath Government. You will be earning cash from various side missions and solo or joint activities. You may write stories about these missions and earn extra gold, or simply request particular items as rewards, perhaps the item was the whole purpose of the mission that you wrote about. You are free to also request any item be made, do not consider gold as a limiting factor, shoot for the stars! While you may not get the actual requested item, you might get something close. A good story ALWAYS helps. Don't request artifiacts, mjaor or minor unless you think your story is THAT awesome...

I'm glad to see the creative juices have been flowing so freely *cough aaron cough* At least the juices are flowing somewhere, if not necessarily over here.

I f*cking love Orange Juice!

i thought it was hummus?

Thunk had spent his day throwing skeletal soldiers around at the "Bear-axe". It had been a very disappointing day for him due to a mixture of the soldiers not being a challenge and there having been neither a bear or an axe in sight, let alone a mixture of the two.
He had been trudging back to the lodging that had been arranged for him when he saw a man showing a magical device to a pair of customers. Thunk saw a portal appear over the device that showed far away mysteries. Thunk read the sign on the door. "Ackbar's Diabolical Box". He came in to see the shopkeeper cringe away and the customers clear out quickly. He spoke to "Ackbar". "Do... again..." The man looked puzzled. Thunk picked up the device (or what he believed to have been the device) and held it out, and made jazz hands over it, then handed it to him. Ackbar did. Thunk spoke again. "Teach me."
Ackbar saw an opportunity to make some good money and agreed to if the barbarian would pay for all spent devices, which thunk happily agreed to. The first one the man attempted to teach him launched a lightning bolt, which startled Thunk and he threw it across the room. "None of those!" He roared! The man nearly ran, but caught his wits and realized that the half-orc had no interest in destructive magics. Only pretty kinds. It would be a long, but profitable venture for the store-keep, as Thunk only seemed to learn through trial and error (mostly error). After a while Thunk had summoned a number of Astral beings in succession, and with great satisfaction bought numerous scrolls and trinkets. The man waved goodbye and closed shop for the night and sighed. Then he perked up when he realized he could afford to close shop for weeks

As Bertram was working, he felt like being generous!
There were things that he could make without much fuss.
So he went into Karnath and got all he could grab,
Then he headed back towards his private lab.
For his stalwart warforged servant Ash,
Always so big, brave, and brash,
A tinfoil helmet made for his kind,
One that would protect him and his mind.
Kun was next on his giving list.
A changeling needs something with a twist.
He decided upon a nice and fashionable hat!
It would make her smart, nothing wrong with that.
Thugg was the new member to the team,
Fighting was what he loved, it would seem.
A maul he would be given to match his size.
Bertram was sure it would be a great prize.
Finally, there was Dareil, his necrotic friend,
Who wanted to become undead in the end.
A robe would keep him nice and warm.
It should also help protect him from harm.
The ideas were all formed as Bertram began to run,
All these gifts – they were going to have so much fun!

While in Karrnath I acquired a job training regular army regiments and smaller elite groups for the Karrnathian army. I had 3 month training seasons, so I ended up training 4 separate groups of troops. In my regular trips to the Taverns with my men after hard days of training I would occasionally hear bards tell tales of dragons becoming ever more present in the North and Eastern mountain ranges of the region and starting to terrorize the local townsfolk living in the valleys(eating livestock, people sometimes, and occasionally destroying whole villages). With these tales I saw an opportunity to profit by doing what I do best, killing things.

I spoke with General Vlad about taking out the dragons in the mountains. I explained to him that it would be excellent training for the elite regiments that I was training. It would also allow the elite squads of Karrnath that I trained to set themselves apart with the excellent dragon scale armor that they would receive for passing their graduating exam. He agreed. Not only would it help better equip his elites and make them more battle hardened, but it would help alleviate this ever increasing menace in the outskirts of Karrnath. I then proceeded to negotiate my compensation.

You should have seen the look on my men’s faces when I told them the assignment. I told them that it takes great courage to face a dragon, but the respect that they would gain afterwards would be unsurpassed, and they would be set apart from the other elites by the dragonscale armor that they would receive.

The first three excursions with my elites went quite well. We killed a green and two black dragons, with only 6 overall casualties. It was with my last group of elites that we got what was coming to us. We were hunting the Black Wyrm Xak-Tsaroth, however when we encountered her that’s when she sprung her own trap on us. She had surprisingly allied with a younger but still fairly powerful red dragon that ambushed us right as we started our initial assault. We were ill prepared to fight a red dragon when it came to breath weapon protection. I lost 5 good men in that initial burst of flames that flowed though our ranks.

I immediately took flight to engage the red dragon and draw him away from the rest of my unprotected men. The battle was tough and fierce, and in the end we were victorious in slaying the red dragon, however Xak-Tsaroth ended up escaping. As our one mage who was with us whose sole purpose was to prevent the dragons escape explained that the dragon had a contingency spell applied to teleport her away if she got severely injured, and without knowledge of this, he was unable to prevent it from occurring.

Only 10 of my 25 men survived to see graduation in that rotation. They all wear their red dragon armor with great pride and have a great story to tell at the taverns that can rival some of the best bards tales.

At the end of my last rotation I was rewarded very well for my training efforts, with a fair amount of my funds coming from the dragon stashes. I was also rewarded with a nice pair of goggles for my services. Before leaving, I challenged General Vlad to a duel(not to the death) in which to become an honorary general of Karnath. He was a tough opponent, but not a match for me. General Ash has such a nice ring to it.