Hammer 7: Bold and daring, yet stealthy as a shadow, Diamond Cascade slipped into the very heart of the enemy camp, intent on learning their numbers. With all the intelligence needed to defeat the foul creatures of darkness, Diamond Cascade slipped away, silent as the night, and yet he was not alone. Another creature has also taken it upon themselves to learn the foul army’s strength, a lady of unsurpassed beauty, with skin of scaly bronze – none other than one of the great dragons that protect the land! With a wink and a nod to one another, Diamond Cascade and the dragon-lady crossed paths and were on their way.

I forget when it was. At some point we took a slimy captive. Turns out our new halfgit friend can talk slimy. Don’t remember whether it was the slimies in the day or the slimies in the night when we took one alive. Slimies in the day, I think. Asked it a load of questions. I think we even had some idea of getting it to lead us to the army it came from (Why? Why would we do that? Why are we going towards the army or orcs and slimies and gods-know-what? Because last I heard, we were supposed to be following a homicidal dwarven priest who was going to lead us to some caves that would take us down to the Underdark where we could fight our way into the middle of an entirely different army. An entirely different army made up of grey dwarves and black elves, half of whom are priests or wizards. And it’ll be in the dark. And miles underground. In tunnels. Where we won’t have a clue where we are. And the dwarven priest has gone to meet his dwarven maker and now we’re following an even more homicidal dwarf who talks to his axe. Yes, you may wonder why we’re looking for this other army, or even for any army at all. But we’re certainly not looking for one made up of orcs and slimies. This is not the orcish hordes we are looking for). Eventually some sense prevails and Shifty sticks a knife in the slimy and sends it off to slimy heaven. If only he’d follow up with The Gnome.

Of course, seeing as we are so amazingly competent, we nevertheless find the army we’re not looking for anyway. Admittedly, I say this as though it was some sort of random accident, but I’m not really a woods and wilderness sort, so for all I know, Wolfgirl led us straight to them under the mistaken impression that this is where we wanted to be. Close run thing as it is, we spot the enormous noisy smelly army only just slightly before they spot us. Trouble is, we’re really stupid, and also cold and hungry. For some reason largely related to the presence of food and warmth within the army camp and the distinct lack of it anywhere else, Shifty and I have this daft idea of sneaking in for a closer look and maybe helping ourselves to some food and blankets. And then let’s not talk about what happened next. We’ll not talk about the being spotted well before acquiring any such warmth or food. Nor about being chased by a gang of orcs and slimies, nor about hiding up a tree and feeling really smug and clever about giving them the slip. Certainly not about the dead branch I happened to hold on to and the being shot at and having nowhere to run. Frankly, if it wasn’t for the dragon-lady showing up and scaring them all off, there’s a good chance that the epic poem of Diamond Cascade would have come to an abrupt end right there and then. As for useful intelligence about the army, well, it’s big and full of slimies and orcs and ogres, right. And it’s still not the army we were looking for.

NEXT WEEK: GOING UNDERGROUND