Tales of the Twisted -The Twisted Revenge (Part 1) (Original Title:Chronicles of the Twisted part 3 ) Written for an adventurousband who played together AD&D in the Forgotten Realms Re-written for the Nexus July 2010 He was standing on there of of the temple of peace having the best look at the nightly marketplace. It was early spring and still very cold as a gust of wind blew between his robes. His prey should come out of the house of the mayor soon. The hated dwarf would emerge from the Mayors house having rescued the teenage girl of the mayor and probably will went to the inn at the other side of the marketplace. About 400 feet to strike with his most potent spell. He clenched his fist and teeth hard remembering what the dwarf had done today. He was a half-elven Mage and a Priest of the god of destruction. Now he was only a priest due to the fact that the dwarf had burned his spell books. How he had found the hidden spell book behind in the magical protected wall was a mystery to him. Every Mage spell now cast would be gone forever until he would buy a spell book and write them down from his memory to the book. This would be expensive. How stupid he was not to take his travel spell book with him today. He clenched his fists even harder and recalled the recent events that brought him here. Before winter he had seen the teenage girl of the mayor of the nearby village play with some friends in the woods near the cave where he and his band of hobgoblins and thugs lived. The plan that he developed in the winter had come of yesterday and his hobgoblins had driven of the friends of the girl and taken her as hostage back to the cave. Today he went very early to the village to see that all went as anticipated. The mayor had already placed a notice at the town hall, that whoever brought his girl back from the hobgoblins would receive 200 gold pieces. So he went back to his cave to tell the the thugs and hobgoblins that had in the last two years gathered with him in the cave to have their last fun with the girl. He would then bring the corpse back to the mayor and receive the gold as planed. But as he returned around midday to the cave, he seen the girl with the bloodstained dwarf emerge from the cave and had barely the time to hide behind some bushes. The dwarf had a bag nearly as large as he was behind his back. They went back to the nearby street to the village. How asingle dwarf had overcome a dozen hobgoblins and a dozen thugs alone and rescued the girl was making him curious. He don't had to follow them to know where they went. So he went to the cave. The first corpse near the entry was the sentry who watched the nearby street for victims to be robbed. It seamed that the hobgoblin had left his lookout spot to return to the cave only to have a nasty deep cut in his back from an axe. Somehow the dwarf must have spotted him and chased him to the entry of the cave. A dwarf on foot faster than a hobgoblin? How was this possible? As he didn't find an answer to this question he entered the cave. In the narrow tunnel he found the two guards of the entry dead on the floor in their pools of blood. It seamed they had time to draw their weapons and alerted the others, only to die in a very short battle with two cuts of that axe of the dwarf. He then entered the main cave. The the thugs and hobgoblins tended to separate themselves in the two corners on the left and right of the main cave entrance. The whole left side had collapsed and out of the-rubble there and there poked out a hand and feet of some of thugs.The dwarf had charged in and not held the entrance as he had thought a single attacker would, caused a cave in hacking at the natural columns and turned to the hobgoblins on the right side. The dwarf had butchered the hobgoblins in the most brutal way. He had chopped the hobgoblins to pieces. The splatter of blond and gore was unbearable to his stomach. As he was relived of his breakfast he wondered if the dwarf had bested his traps and magical minions as well? He had to check what was left of is belongings. At the end of the main cave a tunnel separated to his private cave and to where he held the girl.After the what he had seen in the main cave he could imagine what had happened to the guards of the girl, so he went to his private cave. The spiked trap at the entrance of his cave had done no damage to the dwarf, because there was no blood on the spikes. Right behind the entrance of his cave he had positioned the pair of gargoyles he had charmed last year. He found only two piles of rubble of what remained of the two gargoyles.Only magic was capable to harm the creatures and since only dwarfish priests do magic and they are seldom traveling, he assumed that the blasted Axe of the dwarf must be magical. His private cave was parted by a large curtain and behind this his belongings where hidden in a trapped chest behind another curtain which blended perfectly with the cave walls. The cave was a mess a fire still glowed in the middle of the room, everything was turned upside down. The little statue of his god was smashed, the hidden curtain torn to the ground, The the top of the trapped chest in which he stored his most valuable belongings and spell books was smashed as well. In hacking the chest open the poisoned trap had never a chance to kill someone. He was in a state of shock and panic now. His spell books where gone. He hadn't taken even the travel spell book with him for the little trip to the village. In this stated he searched the cave of everything that was left.Nothing, not the wine, the beer, the potions, the gold, the jewelery and the magical amulet of protection was left. He hoped that the dwarf had taken the spell books with him so there might be a chance to steal them back, until he poked in the glowing fire to see what the dwarf had burned. Only the metal ornaments of the books had survived the fire. Now anger and furious rage made their way out of him and he shouted and smashed and kicked at everything that was there until he sweated and went silent. He would take revenge on the dwarf if it was the last thing he'd done. And now he was standing on the roof of highest building in the village, a small temple of the goddess of peace, and waiting for the dwarf to emerge form the mayors house. - End of Part 1 -
