Terrdi, 10 Winter 539 (8/28/00)

Things are certainly popping this year already, the Darshak were back with 'zerks and a fury to help them out, but this time they didn't bring enough thugs and we quickly mowed down the pirates and surrounded the orga. Still, this is another example of cooperation between orga and Darshaks, which is not a good sign for the future. And then no sooner do we clean up the last wandering marine than the tree giants and giant foxweirs decided to come out of the breeding ground and set up house in the east field, there was quite a bit of chasing about with things getting a bit desperate until Urgelt showed up and whittled the trees down to toothpicks. The highlight of the week was the end of the Volympics, the Zoulympians had trouble getting a group together for the boat race, and team captain Kojiro had to run two legs (and drink twice as much beer, poor guy). Then for the keg hunt I was the only Zou in the field, but when I learned that use of skristals was allowed I made a quick deal with Malkor to provide scrying support during the hunt. The clever dwarfs of the DM scattered across the lands to decoy the hunters, but Malkor and I located a several of them before Tarf gave out a hint that clued me in to the location of the keg in the copper mine, just two caverns over from my own home! Thanks to Malkor's help and Tarf's hint I managed to place third in the event, which seems to have edged the Zoulympians into third place over all after our good showing in the Drunkathon and Mysticwhack.

Lundi, 22 Winter 539 (8/31/00)

I was making my way through the Tanglewood the other day on my way to the Orga Camp when I ran into a solitary rage just north of the meadow. It was pretty weak for a rage and I quickly dispatched it, but when I recovered the chest it had been carrying I discovered that it had been burdened with 65 coins! I've heard reports of other large-chest orgas recently, and my theory is that these richer chests are payments from the Darshak for the recent orga assistance during the pirate invasions of Puddle. And in even more startling news, I've heard that the expert pathfinder Wisher actually managed to discover a path beyond the purple gate in the Bones snell of the Snagglewood, a path that is guarded by many strong orgas and 'locks, and Nyssa and others are reported to have been dragged off by "orga zealots" even deeper to a village somewhere beyond the Snaggy. Several expeditions have searched this area before, I was there with one just the other day, but the new area seems very hard to attack, I know that several attempts have been made with mixed results so far. These new areas bear more than a passing resemblance to the upper Orga Camps, and I seem to recall that Malkor mentioned magical emanations from the Snaggy as well as from the Camp on at least one full moon, so I would speculate that there may be another "power room" hidden somewhere in the Orga Village, a room that is somehow linked to the one in the Camp. Such a development would make the whole issue of full moon attacks even more of a challenge, we might need to take and hold not only OC4 but the Village as well!

Fordi, 47 Winter 539 (9/6/00)

After spending several days in the library and having a long chat with Master Evus I have finally taken the drastic step of training a little bit with Master Troilus. I don't plan to get anywhere near as much training as most of the other fighters seem to have, but I need to do something to deal with the accumulation of small bites from vermines and little orgas as I chase about the island. I missed out on any full moon activities this zodiac, I don't even know if an attack was attempted on either the Orga Camp or the Orga Village, and my only trip to Snaggy ended up not getting very far. A more interesting trip I took a couple of weeks ago was to Fire Island, where Skybird showed us some interesting lava caves and we fought with a couple of lava walkers, these didn't seem as tough as the ones I had encountered in earlier trips to the same area, and once we got organized we were able to finish them off without much too difficulty. I have heard that there are several pathfinder paths on Fire Island, but I'm still not sure that there is any way past the wall that guards the entrance to the volcano. Perhaps after the upcoming chaos storm I'll try and get another group together to explore some more.

Lundi, 71 Winter 539 (9/12/00)

It's been hard to find time to set quill to parchment these last few days, and now that I am able to do so I find that I haven't actually been doing all that much to write about. There was one major battle against the orga a couple of weeks ago, exiles noticed a foul stench wafting on the breeze from the direction of the Orga Camp, and when I joined the fray there was a large army of orga just to the east of the meadow. We made repeated assaults and managed to clear the zerks, rages and furies so that we could get to the 'locks, then we had to do the same thing all over again for the area west of the OC. The orga must be cooking up something they don't want us to know about, to have such a strong force in the Tangle just to keep us away from their picnic. I have heard reports about several expeditions that have pushed far beyond Wisher's Gate in the Snaggy and discovered numerous areas infested with orga of the worst sort, including the extremely strong "orga hatred," but I haven't actually managed to take part in any of these expeditions myself, and have had to rely on news from Axell and others who have actually been there. I did see Nyssa in the Orga Camp just yesterday, she said that she had managed to escape on her own from the Orga Village, which nobody else has yet been able to reach other than by the rather rough invitation of the orga, but her story about defeating a hatred single-handed and then swimming past culcans sounded like a bit much; however, she swears that she did not depart. As for myself, I have been hunting cats and dogs quite a bit, the Northwest Forest, the Lily Pond, and the Savannah the most likely venues these days.

Fordi, 75 Winter 539 (9/13/00)

And here I was complaining about never doing anything very interesting. Shortly after my last entry I was recruited by my clanmate (and Volympics team captain) Kojiro to join a planned raid on the orga through the mysterious Wishergate, and when I reached the Orga Camp I found many strong exiles there preparing for the attack. We were quickly organized into teams by the cunning Urgelt and headed for the Snaggy on our way to "Bones" with more than thirty exiles in the party. We rapidly dispatched any unfortunate orga we happened to meet on the way, and soon had control of "Bones." I was looking forward to my first visit to a new area, but we were doomed to disappointment, as none of the experienced pathfinders in our group could find the path that led beyond the gate, despite patient and repeated attempts; it seems that none of them had been able to pass through the bushes before, and there was much speculation as to why other pathfinders have succeeded, but my impression is that nobody really understands how it works. Without access to our objective the troops began to leave, and we finally had to abandon the attempt.

And then there was the mirror that was left in the fairgrounds by some wandering wizard (probably not Geraldus, who is not a wizard at all); the mirror led to an area that no exile had seen before, outside a large and imposing castle surrounded by fields of golden poppies. A secret passage led inside the castle, which was guarded by armored soldiers and contained large numbers of undine in a variety of different forms. There was a maze of smoky chambers decorated with skulls and statues, and a tower full of rich furnishings that swarmed with death furies, skeletal rages, and (worst of all) banshees. We were working our way up the tower and most of us fell on one of the floors when a group of DF's and a banshee ambushed us, but Sala Dragon was able to take shelter behind some fallen and wear them down. We were able to take the next floor as well, but when we moved back down again we found not one but many banshees waiting for us, which quickly made short work of most of the exiles. Sala, Veer and Ippon again took shelter, and were able to hold out until help came from below, and eventually the rescuers were able to raise or chain out most of the fallen. It was quite a battle, and more than one exile had to depart.

Lundi, 2 Spring 539 (9/17/00)

I have heard more rumors of expeditions beyond Wisher's Gate, including one that is supposed to have reached the actual Orga Village and returned. I was in the Orga Camp when they emerged from the Snaggy and headed back to town, I was there with a few other exiles having a picnic and trading some tales, and I was just remarking on how few orga we had seen when a frenzy suddenly appeared and started chasing us about, accompanied by several 'zerks and any number of small orgas. Those of us not knocked down by the frenzy escaped into the Tanglewood, where they were met by even more orgas, including crowds of shamans and more frenzies. My theory is that the strong force or orgas that attacked us and took over the Tangle were a reaction to the earlier Orga Village raid, and (with my usual dwarfish luck) I just happened to be standing on ground zero when the counterattack came. As usual the exiles of Puddleby responded to the call, and a rescue force assembled and began chipping away at the frenzies outside the Camp. This took quite a while, and I ended up lying there for some time, and the first couple of attempts to retake the Camp itself didn't go so well, but with several fourth-circle fighters and healers working together even the frenzies could be worn down, and I was chained out and healed in time to take part in the final thrust to rescue the few remaining fallen and help finish off the last of the big red orgas.

Terrdi, 11 Spring 539 (9/19/00)

The t'rools and their 'kin are at it again, they tried to stage another invasion of Puddle this past week and were soundly trounced by the exiles yet again. While the main force defended the town's southern approaches I was down by the mirrors with a small group trying to rescue Ippon from the other side of the bridge, where he had fallen fairly early in the action; but even with the help of the mighty fighters Babajaga and Yor we were unable to get close enough to throw a chain on him, and then a mob of 'kins ambushed the healers and things were looking grim until Galadriel arrived and got us fighters back up to strength. Poor Dandelion had to wait until the main force from town arrived, but when they reached the mirrors we got her and Ippon healed in no time. Babajaga was quite distracted throughout the battle, she kept mumbling something about Qual being in T'rool Town, I'm not sure if that's true or if she just imagined it. Still, one hopes that the t'rools will think twice before trying this sort of thing again. Then just yesterday I went on a quick tour of 'Noth Island led by Zorton and Urgelt, we covered many of the attractive sights and bashed any 'noths we ran into, which was a fair number, although not many of the stronger ones. I also managed to miss the "full moon" attack on the Orga Camp this week, which is probably just as well, since I heard it didn't go at all well.

Lundi, 23 Spring 539 (9/22/00)

This week Sagramor showed several of us some newly discovered paths in the North Forest that seem to have opened up during the recent Chaos Storm. The areas they lead to don't seem that different from the old North Forest or newer Northwest Forest, but there were certainly a lot of ferals, vermines and panthers running about up there. Yor was part of the group, and I was shocked to hear that he had been forced to ingest a 'dew by that fiendish Qual the Wizard. Yor was claiming that the process did not have any effect on him, but I'm not so sure that the results would be immediately apparent, especially in view of the way Babajaga has been behaving lately, she was one of the first 'dewed exiles that I heard about. This all adds up to a very good reason to stay away from 'Noth Island, which is where Qual prefers to perform this disgusting operation, and makes me very happy that we didn't run into him when I went there a few weeks ago. I've been spending a bit more time in the passes lately, and have been doing good business finding and selling metal; and expert pathfinder Bon Temps and I have been making regular visits to the Northwest Forest in order to harvest coins, it's even more lucrative than our previous expeditions to the South Forest.

Sombdi, 35 Spring 539 (9/25/00)

I was hunting coins up in the North Forest "Fringe" area with Lonesome and Mortis the other day when we started hearing sunstone reports about Darshaks spies in town, soon followed by messages that exiles were falling to Darshaks and undine. As we made out way back to town we were surprised to hear that guards, guard captains and dark knights were also taking part in the invasion, as well as the dreaded banshees, all minions of the mysterious "Tenebrion" whose castle we had invaded several times in recent weeks. There was a desperate battle at the West Gate, and we were forced to retreat into the town several times to lure rampaging banshees and wraiths on to Mai's Lawn while we healed up for another counterattack. By trapping the banshees a few at a time and employing the usual "surround and whiff" tactics we were able to regain control of the docks. At this point I retired to the library for a well-earned rest, but when I came out again I learned that rather than marking the end of the attack this was just the beginning, there was a massive Darshak assault that came close to taking over the town and was only beaten back with great effort. It seems pretty clear that Tenebrion and the Darshaks have formed some sort of alliance against us, and are working together towards our downfall and enslavement.

Merdi, 47 Spring 539 (9/28/00)

The "full moon" raid on the Orga Camp did not go well this month, I missed most of it but when I did finally turn up I learned that a group had made it to OC4 shortly before the full moon began but then had to retreat in the face of fierce lightning attacks. When I arrived at last a small group was attempting to retake OC2, but there were a large number of 'locks in there and I managed to get trapped and bolted fairly quickly, at which point the entrance got lost and a fury showed up in OC1. Eventually I ran out of time and had to depart (number 25, I had some overdue library books that needed to be returned), maybe next time I will remember that solo chain rescues don't really work in OC2. Then the other day I had a fun time hunting with a group of ELF members (including my friend Lundar), I joined them as they were taking over the Darshak Horde, and then we went and started working our way through the Dark Temple, something I haven't done much since the Rift War six years ago now. Speaking of mystics, I was on a 'Noids deep cavern rescue just yesterday and there were no fewer than five mystics helping out, with so many targets the 'noids couldn't decide which mystic to hit first and we fighters were able to sneak up behind and quickly dispatch them while the healers rescued the unfortunate Astor.

Merdi, 68 Spring 539 (10/3/00)

This month not only did I not make it to the "full moon" raid, I haven't even spoken with anyone who did, and I sort of suspect that nobody actually showed up to try, the paths from OC1 to OC2 have become so unreliable that other exiles have fallen into the same trap I did the previous month and have had to depart simply because it was no longer possible for the rescuers to reach them. This isn't to say I haven't been to the Orga Camp, there was a big battle with a number of frenzies earlier in the month that attracted one of the larger exile armies I've seen in a while. In the meantime I've been doing a little rescue work, I've managed to get my timing down to the point where I always arrive just as the last person is being raised by the actual rescuers, although there was one time when I did get to help, we had to traipse all over the eastern end of Fire Island looking for Tater and some other unfortunates, lucky for them Leonin showed up and led us right to the spot; who would have thought that a mystic could be useful!

Gradi, 80 Spring 539 (10/6/00)

I have been spending a fair amount of time wandering around Fire Island lately, most of it searching for fallens or a healer to prevent me from falling myself. There are some nasty traps there, Yor was trying to pull a whole raft of people to safety with his chain when he stumbled in to a flame vent and fell himself, it took a while to find them all but we finally managed it. Lundar has made a really admirable map of the place, much more complete than my own simple sketches, that has proved to be invaluable in my rescue searches. One of the more interesting recent discoveries on Fire Island is that a race of "vulcons" have taken up residence on the far side of the mysterious wall, so far as I know nobody can get in there at the moment, and the vulcons don't seem very interested in talking to us (or maybe they are, but I can't understand a word they say). The orga and Darshak seem strangely quiet lately, but the t'rools and their 'kin tried another invasion of the Outpost, no doubt an attempt to prevent the completion, and were handed yet another resounding defeat by the forces of Puddleby.

Fordi, 7 Summer 539 (10/10/00)

Here it is summer already, it's hard to believe that the year is half over. A lot has been going on, but as usual I'm experiencing most of it from the library. Kojiro has left the ZA clan, he has joined with Yor and several other more battle-minded exiles to form a local chapter of the Darkhorse clan. They and several other clans took part in a massive raid on the Orga Village, which went pretty well from all accounts, they even managed to wear down an orga hatred, currently the top rated foe in the orga areas. Speaking of the orga, I wandered up to the Orga Camp on the last full moon just to see what was happening, and there I met a large group of very strong exiles standing around waiting, it seems that Zorton the mystic had stepped through the gate into OC2 and gotten bolted, and now nobody was left to open it. I stayed in the camp ambushing zerks and 'locks as they came out of OC2, and then Groan showed up to try and open the portal, but we were still unable to gain entry to OC2, and after hours of waiting I finally had to give up. It is dismaying that after all of our effort in developing tactics for dealing with the upper camps we have been stopped dead by this twisty path thing. Then finally there was this really strange invasion of town several weeks ago, there were nasty rats by the dozens, then panthers, boloks and mahas, then strange clones, including "Norms" (only a slaughter for me, I'm afraid) and "Altheas"; and then we all turned in to butterflies, except for a few frogs, and then several exiles turned in to teapots and teacups. I swear I am not making this up. My theory is that Tenebrion was behind this, if so he seems to be a very powerful and very peculiar wizard.

Sombdi, 15 Summer 539 (10/12/00)

A pattern seems to be emerging in orga behavior, some time after a failed "full moon" raid they come out of their camp and try to take over portions of the Tanglewood. This last week there was a particularly large invasion, there were a dozen or more frenzies just outside the Orga Camp with supporting 'locks, zerks and whatnot. It took a very long time to kill off the bolt throwers, we would go in, hack a bit, then those of us who made it out would heal and come back in to chain those of us who didn't make it out. After hours and hours of this there was pretty much nothing left outside the camp but the frenzies, and by clever placement of kudzu most of them were walled up so that we could surround and take them out one at a time. The Orga Camp itself was almost an anticlimax, there were only a couple frenzies in there. This was one of the longest battles that I have seen in a while, with lots of exiles taking part, and many chains were broken as we tried to pull out the fallen; I only lost one myself, but then I immediately went back to town and broke another pulling a fallen out of the Fighter Hall, some times you just can't win.

Terrdi, 40 Summer 539 (10/18/00)

It's been nearly a moon since I have put quill to parchment, my studies in the library seem to consume all of my time these days, which means that I'm missing out on making use of these long summer evenings for hunting. I have managed a few expeditions outside of the back shelves, including several runs through the passes and a number of visits to the lily pond, but once again I managed to completely miss the "full moon" raid (which again ran into severe problems with the disappearing path to OC2), and then a few weeks ago I came out of the library just in time to see the end of another raid on the town beach by Tenebrion's forces. The rumor is that an unknown exile has sold Tenebrion a purgatory pendant, and he is now hot to talk with Virgil, the trainer for their use, and is offering the Puddlebians the services of his dwarfish smith in exchange; but a group of wise exiles, including Urgelt, who is himself a smith, has declined the offer, being somewhat suspicious of Tenebrion's motives. And it's hard to blame them, he does seem to have a thing for undines of all stripes.

Then there's the recent chaos storm, surely one of the most severe on record, it seems to have blasted a hole in the mountains and rearranged large portions of the east forest. I've only had a short time to wander around in the area, parts of which are still quite familiar, but other portions are completely strange, with species of trees that I have never seen before on the island. Perhaps with further exploration we can find our way to the mysterious eastern shore...

Soldi, 51 Summer 539 (10/21/00)

Late last moon I tagged along on a rescue in the Dark Chamber and Dark Temple, there were a bunch of ghastly presences in the DC and it took a bit of running about to isolate and surround each one, and then a few people strayed in to the DT and met a liche on the way out, once the big guns moved in they were able to brick the liche and eventually wear down and kill it. I've also spent a little time exploring the expanded eastern forests, some of the paths are a bit confusing and many of the areas seem to be rather dark and foreboding, although no actual boding seems to be taking place; about all you meet are the trees and a few rats. Perhaps once the chaos tides that formed the new regions recede the beasts will start moving in. And several things are coming up, the full moon is coming around again, and I've heard rumors that the mystics are working on some new techniques to open the paths to the higher Orga Camps; Yor of the Darkhorse clan is attempting to organize another attempt on Alchy's Folly; and (most disturbing of all) I've heard that the Feast of Tsrrin is fast approaching, and we all know what that means! I just hope that Chum sticks to fishing and doesn't get "undined" like he did last time.

Sombdi, 64 Summer 539 (10/24/00)

Once again I missed out on the "full moon" raid, I actually made it to the Orga Camp late on the evening of the full moon, but by that by that time the few exiles who had shown up to make the attempt had given up without making it further than OC1. And once again the orga have made a major invasion of the Tanglewood, Kojiro told me that there are a large number of 'locks camping out west of OC1. He's trying to organize another assault for the next full moon, but I'm worried that it falls too close to the Tsrrin festival and will be just as sparsely attended as the recent months. My frequent trips to check out the Orga Camp did pay off in one respect, though: I managed to stumble across a cluster of orgaberries, only the second time I've seen them in the wild and the first time I managed to snag the bunch myself. They seem to be quite in demand, I was able to sell them almost at once for a pretty good price, as opposed to bramble berries, which you can't even give away these days.

Merdi, 83 Summer 539 (10/29/00)

The Feast of Tsrrin is upon us again, the costume shop has opened for business, and candies are once again available to the intrepid trick-or-treater. I haven't yet heard any reports of exile-undines, but then I'm taking extra care not to fall and I hope everybody else is too. But as if the Feast itself wasn't enough, there's been a lot of talk lately about Tenebrion's continuing efforts to gain access to Virgil, the healer guild's Pendant trainer. There was an attempt to negotiate a deal this past week, but Tarf and a few other exiles decided that knowledge of the Pendant was too dangerous to share with a wizard with Tenebrion's dubious motives, and taking matters in to their own hands they chopped down Tenebrion's representative, at which point Tenebrion chopped down Elenis, who was acting as Puddle's ambassador. A number of people are pretty steamed with Tarf at this point, all the more so since he's probably right and we shouldn't be letting Tenebrion in to Purgatory; what if he turns around and sells that magic to the orga? We happen to know (from the Altar War) that Bartok would be very interested in destroying our ability to depart, and will go to any length to achieve that goal. And speaking of the orga, it's almost the full moon again, maybe if we all show up in the Orga Camp wearing our Tsrrin costumes we will so confuse the orga spellcasters that they won't be able to keep us from finding the gates...

Sombdi, 9 Autumn 539 (11/2/00)

I have got to get to this diary more often, these long breaks mean that there is even more news when I finally start writing. As usual I missed the "full moon" raid on the deep Orga Camp, and then as usual the attack was unable to reach OC4. Kojiro told me that a strong force showed up, the mystics found the entrance to OC2, and they quickly reached OC3 and gained control...but despite the best efforts of many mystics the entrance to OC4 remained closed. He was visibly upset by the whole thing, and I don't blame him, he's been putting a lot of effort to get exiles to take part, and then to have them sit in OC3 for hours on end without any sign of progress makes it even harder to attract a crowd the following week. Somehow we've got to find the key that lets us in so we can get back to the main business of getting fried by the dozens of 'locks in OC4.

Then there's the whole deal with Tenebrion, Tarf's action has set off a firestorm of debate about how to deal with the wizard. At one point there was some talk about having Urgelt be our chief negotiator, but during a big meeting in town last week several exiles expressed some concern about the fact that Tenebrion is offering his blacksmith's services in exchange for access to Virgil, and since Urgelt is a blacksmith by trade they were worried that he might make a bad deal for Puddle in exchange for personal considerations. All I can say is that Urgelt is the last dwarf who would do something dishonorable like that, and that I think he would have been an excellent ambassador, but he was justifiably upset over the suspicions and has refused the post. He is now arguing that we need to organize some sort of town government to resolve issues like this; I wish him luck, he's going to need it.

And then the Feast of Tsrrin culminated in an undine attack of massive proportions, most of which I managed to avoid by my usual practice of hiding in the library under a pile of books. At first it wasn't too bad, some strong exiles/undines were running about town but Gurgi was able to deal with the worst of them and we regained control. But then the orga took advantage of the chaos and sneaked a big party of zerks, rages and frenzies into the center of town, resulting in even more crowds of undines. The center of town was taken by the combined orga/undine forces, but a group set up in south Puddle and gradually regained control. I managed to make it back to the library with only two more departs, but by that point there were still undine all over the place. I have heard that it became much worse later on; thank goodness this only happens every four years or so!

Lundi, 18 Autumn 539 (11/4/00)

I was hit by some bad weather this week while hunting in the Lily Pond, so I stumbled in to the hut there in order to wait it out. When I woke later and headed back to town I stepped out into the North Forest and was immediately hit by a lightning bolt; the orga were on the warpath, and their forces had reached the northeast field outside the grumpy farmer's hut. I pitched in for a short time, took a break for a meal, and when I came back the focus of the battle had shifted to the Tanglewood, where the orga army was now firmly encamped north of the meadow, cutting off access from the outside unless you could run the gauntlet of 'locks, furies, and zealots, who throw really big fireballs (just like the ones Geraldus can't throw). My gauntlet-running was a bit rusty and I soon added to the piles of fallen, where I ended up waiting for quite a while as the forces in the meadow slowly accumulated and their repeated raids slowly cleared the woods. From sunstone reports I gathered that there were fallen exiles all over the Tangle, and lots of orgas outside and inside the Orga Camp as well. This is the biggest attack the orga have staged since we took OC4; I believe that they are growing in strength as our attempts to retake the mysterious "power room" are frustrated each full moon. This coming Soldi (24 Autumn) is the next opportunity to disrupt their magical workings. We have confidence that we can take OC1 through OC3, now we just need to pierce the last illusion barrier to reach our objective. That, and kill all those 'locks...

Gradi, 26 Autumn 539 (11/6/00)

The Orga Camp has been taken! The turnout for this month's "full moon" raid was immense, and with expert door opener Robin Greyhawk along the lead force was able to reach OC4 early in the day, and with some careful positioning of the rods they were able to gain some measure of control, despite wave after wave of 'locks being flung against them. I arrived late as usual but was able to help out in retaking the lower camps, which had been swarmed by a few 'locks and zerks, and I made it as far as OC3 when all of a sudden things started happening. I talked to Robin shortly after and he told me that he found a strange stone; I have also heard that there was an orga "magician" of some sort in OC4 which met with a sudden demise. While this was going on we got a number of sunstone messages that the t'rools and their 'kin were invading the South Forest, no doubt at the behest of Qual, who was on the sunstone himself making his usual snide remarks. The exiles in the camps immediately turned about and headed to the defense of Puddle.

It was difficult at first to figure out what was going on, with exiles falling all over the South Forest, but a group formed in the South Farms and headed south, meeting strong resistance from vol'kin, 'dews, and the occasional maha. There was a while lot of hacking going on, touch and go at times, but when the dust settled we were in control of the area south of the Sylvan Scout. Unfortunately while this was going on the 'kin pulled an end run and invaded the town through the east gate, taking over town square and looting several of the buildings. Some quick thinking exiles blocked the east gate with kudzu, and others of us headed in to town, where we were able to surround and defeat the now isolated t'rools. A counterattack from the Scout area now began, but I'm afraid I missed the later parts of the long battle; I have heard that it ended with the destruction of the remaining 'kin forces.

After all of this you'd think things would settle down, but just yesterday the Darshak were attacking the town again trying to steal more beer. The initial wave was soundly defeated, and the pirates looting the brewery were dispatched, but then some of the foolish exiles began sampling the kegs which the Darshaks had left lying about and so when the second wave arrived they were not quite ready for battle. Things were looking grim for a short time, but with some strong fighters on hand the tide was turned and our beer was saved. And on top of all of this, the oracles are predicting a massive chaos storm coming up, as if we didn't have enough excitement already...

Gradi, 47 Autumn 539 (11/11/00)

I have heard from several exiles that the strange stone that Robin recovered from the "power room" in the last OC4 full moon raid was a teleportation stone of some sort, and that after a few trials the thing shattered in his hands as he was attempting to research its capabilities. This seems a bit harsh, but it does raise an interesting question, if the thing can be destroyed might there be more than one of them in the world? Already I have heard some talk about another attack on the next few moon, now only a few days away. I have also not seen or heard of any big orga counterattack this month, no doubt due to the substantial defeat that we handed out to the orga during that raid. On other fronts, we have received an invitation from Tenebrion the Wizard to send three emissaries to negotiate an end to hostilities, and I was a bit surprised when Shamhat told me that my name had been mentioned as a possible candidate; surprised and a bit nervous, given what happened to Elenis when he was the ambassador last time. I personally think that Urgelt would be the best dwarf for the job, I'm sure he'd be much less nervous around the wizard than I would be.

Lundi, 60 Autumn 539 (11/14/00)

It's hard to believe that there's only one more month left before the new year; this one seems to be flying by at a rapid clip. If the next year continues at the pace this one has, we are in for a wild ride. I have been told that there was another "full moon" raid this month, and that after some struggling with the illusion gates the exiles were again able to gain control of OC4 and slay another orga "magician," although this time the attempt on the power room was not successful. Then last week there was a major myrm eruption, with fiery myrms digging their tunnels right into town. Many exiles ventured in to the holes, only to slide down the steep slopes and end up in the middle of the Queen's Chamber, surrounded by hungry ants. I joined a group assaulting through the usual entrance, and we quickly gained control of the tunnel, but then I stumbled down a hole and out of the chamber, and when I foolishly tried to double back the way I came I ended up joining the fallen. And finally McBain has reported that a group of explorers has found a path inside the wall on Fire Island, Lundar told me that it was a timed pathway that only opens at at particular time of day. I haven't yet heard what lies beyond the wall, the last time I managed to get in there I ended up departing...

Lundi, 88 Autumn 539 (11/21/00)

Every time something interesting seems to be going on I find myself heading back to the library for one reason or another. There was a big t'rool and 'dew invasion just before the last chaos storm, and I missed a good bit of that; and then the chaos storm was a big one, with all sorts of strange goings-on. Things seem to have settled down a bit, although there has been a bit of trouble with the bank, they started offering clan accounts before they were quite ready, and several clans lost a fair amount of copper. I ended up being the Zouclougeist treasurer, and I'm happy to say that due to my careful management the ZA account lost not one single coin (mainly because nobody put any in). The bank management is trying to patch things up, but there are still a number of annoyed clans about. I was able to help a little bit with the "full moon" raid last month, but it wasn't going well due to lack of rods, we didn't have quite enough people this time, and then of course I had to head back to the library just as push was coming to shove (I'm starting to hate the library, it's so dusty). I have heard that Thuja, J'nder, and Elenis had a nice chat with Tenebrion, but nothing seems to have been resolved. I'm starting to think that he is just playing us along and relying on renegade exiles to provide him with the information he needs, he is very evasive on the subject of what his ultimate aims are. And to top it all off here we are at the end of the year, one of my resolutions for the new year is to get out of that darn library more often!