Arvien was stunned, how did that hag become bigger as she was walking away from us. Baru pointed out that the group had been shrunken. He pointed to the black cats that padded their way toward the party. Ralom looked around trying to find a way out, but Seglun immediately attacked the cats, even though she was tiny.
So a battle started with the large cats, Drovic tried to remove the curse of reduction that the witch cast on the party, to no effect. Arvien enlarged Baru so that at least one person was normal size. Grunyar jumped on Dirk's and rode him bareback. Varrid was looking to flank a cat and Ralom cast Bane on the visible cats but as the battle progressed more cast appeared on the roofs of the tenements surrounding the heroes. The cats were certainly not normal Baru concluded as it took several hits to kill one. Ralom cast a Prayer which also afflicted the cats. As several cats surrounded him Grunyar led Dirk into a mouse hole on the wall where he fired into the battle.
The party was successful at bringing down a cat or two, but each time this occurred another cat entered the fray. Soon the whole group was surrounded, cats at both ends of the alleyway. Arvien began discussing how to leave the area, she could cast Dimension Door, but as a tiny creature she couldn't take everyone with her. Ralom cast Air Walk on Baru and the rest of the party held hands and Arvien DDoored them out of danger.
The group found themselves next to an empty lot, the middle of which was a great pit, ten feet or more deep. The pit was full of discarded clothing, broken toys, and unidentifiable bones. Next to the pit was a hut made of some animal skin. As the party appeared, with Baru five feet in the air a hunched, ancient old woman stepped out of the hut, flew at the party and knocked Arvien directly into the pit. As the group moved to attack the old woman a macabre giant toy roused itself in the pit and attacked Arvien, who found herself paralyzed. The old woman then knocked Seglun into the pit also, where she was also paralyzed. Drovic turned into an air elemental and recovered Arvien while the rest of the party attacked the old woman. Ralom moved around the pit's north side to get a longer look and was shocked as the old woman rose in the air and let loose a fireball, killing Arvien, and Drovic. He also saw a identical woman in the hut flailing her hands and arms while mouthing something. Baru walked up to attack the hag but moved to the hut instead. He was trailed by Varrid and Summergale. Grunyar leaped into the pit to fight the toys with Seglun who recovered from the paralysis. The toys attacked Ralom without even climbing out of the pit, strange behavior indeed. Seglun was unimpressed and continued to attack but Grunyar was less gullible and found the pit and toys were not real. Baru and Varrid discovered that the woman in the tent was not real either but Ralom was hit by magic missiles from the floating witch in the sky. Drovic, apparently dead suddenly revived and the rest of the party noticed that the pit and the hut disappeared. The battle was continuing between tow tenement buildings. In the center of the lot, a single flower grew. As the moon reached the top of the sky, the flower blossomed to greet it. Waves of pure light emanated from the open flower, destroyed the toys and releasing the party from the spell, they were all now their normal size.
As the light from the rose engulfed the witch she rubbed her eyes and sped off in the sky. Meanwhile Arvien managed to determine that the whole shebang was an illusion, she was not dead just affected by the thought of a fireball. She rose and plucked the rose from its base and said "Let's go find a sphere and get out of here!"
Taking the captain and the two remaining sailors with them the party fled Nod, moved through the ever changing forest at a fast clip and entered the ring of spheres. Finding a rather large blank sphere they group joined hands and moved toward it. They felt themselves sucked into the middle of the sphere, which was filled with mists. The Dream-catcher started to pull them to the west. They followed the Dream-catcher for about 12 hours, and found themselves before an oval of utter blackness. The Dream-catcher pulled Seglun toward the center of the oval.
Exiting the oval the group found themselves on the street outside the Clinic for the Mentally Distressed. It was night, a storm was raging and the clinic was completely dark. Captain Sylus said "That's strange! There are always lights on in the clinic."
Baru pushed his way to the front, opened a door and barged into the foyer. The Clinic appeared abandoned, the stairs led up to the second floor in the darkness. The whole group entered and moved up the stairs to the second floor. Out of the darkness a thin man in a white coat moved froward and challenged the party's purpose. Ralom knew this was the evil Dr. Tasker and urged the group to kill or at least grapple him. Out of the shadows appeared six thugs who flanked and attacked the party at will. Grunyar and Drovic followed Dr, Tasker into the corner and attacked. The thugs caused bleeding damage but were not that strong and soon all fell to the ministrations of the entire group. Dr. Tasker didn't last as long as his thugs.
DM's Notes: The party earned 1,285 XP for the night and now have 72,437 XP.
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