Strange and Dangerous Encounters: A Strange Tale by Bartholomew

''You never know what you are going to encounter on this island, as we found out today. The bounty was potential deadly but we knew what we were getting into. For the safety of the camp a handful of us set off deal with....something that has been spotted in the wooded area by the river. Whatever this thing was it has been making an awful noise and scaring the workers. We set off for the day towards the last known location the roars came from. We traveled for a good couple of hours before we began hearing panicked screams coming from the west, we dashed over to find the source as it sounded like there was someone in distressed.'' '' When we arrived at the source of the cries for help we found a man none of us had ever seen before up in a tree, and beneath him were two wounded ogres. Based on the scene we could see that these ogres had chased this man up into this tree, we quickly dispatched of the ogres as they were already peppered with arrows and bruises all along their bodies. We helped the man down from the tree, he introduced himself as Millard Mastrinovikowitzkyman. The man was as peculiar as his looked, he was dressed in fine clothes, such that you would see at a noble's ball, he claimed to be a researcher that had been on this island for over a year. He agreed to answer only 5 questions for us that we had for him, that number he derived by rolling a strange die that I had never seen before. I asked him if he had any knowledge of the beast that was roaming these woods, I didn't believe it was a pack of ogres it had to be something larger and it was. He told us of a hydra near by in the lake, not only did he tell us of the hydra he told us what we needed to do to defeat it. By collapsing a tower that was near by the river we could take it by surprise and use the rubble as a make shift bridge that would make it trivial for us to stand on and assult the beast.''

''However many questions raced in my mind, like how did he acquire all of this information, how did he make it to this island before us, and who or what was he. The other members of our group were equally suspicious, especially Jarion. Jarion asked him of the cloak figure that was on the island that was telling the group of barbarians and druids that we were out to destroy everything we came in contact with. Millard knew nothing of this masked figure but Jairon's suspicions got the better of him as he attempted to grapple him with a hold spell. It looked like Millard was able to avoid it fairly easily, he then took what looked like a black bead from this ascot and dropped it on the floor, then absolute darkness took over the area. We attempted to find Millard but he eluded us to the north, I did take the shattered bead for study however. After Millard's escape we set up camp for the evening.''

''Before I went to sleep I pondered on the possibility of Millard being the masked man myself, as he did know a lot about us and who we were, and he definitely knew about Jarion and his private life. It also appeared that he had taken a liking to Jayne as well. When I woke, Bobby was cooking what I believe to be a rabbit, regardless it was food and held us over for the rest of the day. That wasn't it however, it seems that Millard was keeping watch over us or spying on us. A note was sent to our camp by the rabbit according to Bobby, each time one of us read the note it had a personalized message, I got my cards ready to detect magic. I believed we might be under the effects of an illusion spell, as I laid my cards out to detect magic something that has never happened before occurred. Some other force was directing the flow of magic threw my cards, the cards for The Magician, The Lovers (pointed at Jayne), The Devil, The Tower, and The Moon came out. This seemed to be a more literal meaning than most readings I do. It appears that The magician who fancied Jayne, wanted us to destroy the tower....However even he didn't know the outcome of doing this.''

''After putting the camp out we went onward towards the lake where the hydra was supposed to be. Before we reached our destination Jarion had made friends with one of the local fauna of the area, a wolf by the name of Wilbur. The wolf told him that Millard was definitely around the camp watching us, and that he had actually set up some barrels at the base of a tower in the lake. When we reached the lake, we saw a decently made by badly maintained bridge, along with a stone tower with barrels around the base of it, which we assumed to be some type of explosive powder, as confirmed by Jeremiah. It was here when we were at a crossroads with what we wanted to do, both Jarion and Jeremiah didn't want to crumble the tower as they believed it would be playing into Millard's schemes and instead wanted to climb the tower. Bobby, Jayne and myself saw no reason to distrust Millard just yet and wanted to down the tower in hopes of putting a swift end to the hydra. However there was no harm in at least looking at the inside of the tower...at least I thought. The two then climbed up and attempted to enter the tower through the only entrance at the top of the tower. As they did a massive sound rung from the top of the tower like a crash of thunder, at this point we believed the hydra had been alerted. Soon the beast showed it's self and we readied ourselves for a fight.''

''We moved back towards the tower and I positioned myself to let off a fire spell to ignite the barrels of power the second both Jeremiah and Jarion were out of the tower. However during the fight the hydra took hold of Jayne and nearly killed her. Then like a miracle something cured her and brought her back from the brink of death....Millard. Soon Jarion was able to jump from the tower and land safely, Jeremiah told me to fire and that he would be fine. I was hesitant but he seemed sure so I did. And with a massive explosion the tower crumbled and crashed down into the river, nearly damming it. As the tower was falling Jeremiah was able to miraculously run down the tower and land completely unscathed. I positioned myself on the bridge and began to launch fire and force at the monstrosity. Arrows also began to fly at the hydra, however some of them didn't come from our archers...'' '' After horrifying the beast and having it return to us, Jarion felled it with a massive burst of radiant energy from his bow. However Jayne and I were on the rubble where the hydra ran up to before his death and collapsed the rubble beneath us, I was swept away and nearly dragged down stream. Had it not been for both Jeremiah and Jarion I would possibly not be here writing this down. It was definitely one of the most horrifying moments of my life so far. Once the fighting had ended we had called out for Millard to come out to us, and he did in the form of a small animal. Bobby let him on his shoulder before Jarion then launched an attack at him. I attempted to diffuse the situation but I fear I only made it worse and I may have said some cutting words to Jarion, of which I would still like to apologize for. However, I did take a note from Jeremiah that he found in the top of the tower before it fell, it was another one of those magic notes. It was Millard accepting my thanks, and telling me to continue looking forward into the future. I still have the note and would like to study it further, as hopefully I would be able to make a magical item such as this. However, I know Millard is somewhere watching us, already knowing what I intend to do with this note...maybe even reading what I am currently writing.''

''The trek back was uneventful, as for my analysis of Millard is as followed: As of right now I neither trust nor distrust him. He definitely has his own agenda that he wants to keep hidden from others. However he does appear to be a wealth of knowledge, and possibly being friendly with him could be to our advantage. As of right now there isn't a magical library or any where to study, so he could be my only way right now of learning more magic and possibly helping me unlock the secrets of this old book that Elijah left me. Only time will tell....''