We review our notes, and recall that the Jotan told us that one of the creators (who did create the Dark Elves) is in the ring. He also said that to use the ring, we need to know the name of the one inside it.

Gromdain, Kaldmont (month 12) 9, 1027

Some discussion of the day of no magic. We would have heard that it is believed that when the Doomsday device was activated, the region in space relative to the sun is now magically broken. Hence, every year, Mystara passes through the same broken bit.

Back to the Dark Pyrondian, Corsha...

We meet him, after resting, and agree to travel with him. We head out, and start to follow his ship. The spikey things on his ship extend when he starts out, and stay that way whilst travelling. Later, when he nears slip stream, the spikey things on his ship change colour to red, it shakes a bit, and enters the slip stream.

We follow him in slip.

Tserdain, Kaldmont (month 12) 10, 1027

After about a day, the tips of the Dark Pyrondian vessel glow red again, and we drop out of slip.

>From nearby, a big ship appears, much like a flying crescent. It's three times bigger than us. The two ships communicate for a bit, and both enter slip. We follow.

Moldain, Kaldmont (month 12) 11, 1027

After another day, we drop out of slip again. At this location is an asteroid, with various docks. Corsha's ship docks. We follow.

There is another ship inside, perhaps a little smaller than ours.

A squad of 20 dark pyrondians, armed with crossbows, approach, and almost surround the ship. Corsha appears from his own vessel, and with another squad around him (together with his own , makes appeasing gestures, and talks rapidly to them. We pop the hatch. It seems that Corsha isn't associated with this operation, which is run by a Captain Zail. The Dark Pyrondians not associated with Zail looks like they'd be much happier with us dead. Corsha looks a little nervous.

[Corsha is a bit like Captain Jack Sparrow from Pirates of the Carribean.]

Apparently quarters have been prepared for us.

This place is Zail's base.

We get lead to a reasonably large common area, with a hodge podge of furniture. Shortly after a Dark Pyrondian in the prime of his life, in dark leathers. He is followed by a retinue of Dark Pyrondians, including a female who follows closely on his heels.

The boss, presumably Zail, heads off to have a chat with Corsha separately.

We chat with the female in the meantime. She said they were lifeshaped. The women is named Tirl.

Zail says he is in fact an adventurer.

Apparently we'll be staying a while. We get lead to a comfortable "quarters".

We have a chat with Corsha, quietly. Yes, we've been captured by a more powerful pirate, namely Zail. Zail's ship is called Pride. Although Corsha would probably be let go, he agrees to help us escape. Zail's been a thorn in his side for a while. On the side, Zail has a reputation for cruelty.

It seems that much of Dark Pyrondian space is like this - small warlords eveywhere.

The lights in here are pretty dim.

We update the captain, and decide upon a breakout strategy. The fighters from the Star Seeker will attack at about the same time we make a run for it. First, Zim sends an arcane eye by way of scouting. One of the guards at the door notices the arcane eye, but doesn't know what it is, and gets distracted as Grey decides he wants to go to the toilet.

Unfortunately, later, Zim's arcane eye gets spotted. We make a break for it, but it doesn't start off perfectly, as they get to shout a warning before downing them, and another Dark Pyrondian had also come earlier regarding the arcane sensor.

Grey chopped one of the guards in two.

Many more guards approach. We engage in combat. The second in command, Tirl, attacks, but gets held by a spell from Zim. Lani summons an elemental, which they can barely hurt.

We advance further. They bring in organic cannons, and Zail attacks from behind.

Grey moves behind to attack Zail, vampiric touching him.

Many of the drow seem to favour light rapier-like weapons, chain shirts, and small shields.

Zim, up front with some of our Dark Pyrondian allies, disables the organic cannon, and presses forward reaching the hangar area.

Meanwhile, Lani paralyses Zail.

The Dark Pyrondians seems very unfamiliar with arcane magics.

Lani and Grey try to get them to surrender. They don't, so Grey fireballs a bunch of them, killing them.

Meanwhile, back at Zim, some of them run away, into the third ship which is behind Corsha's ship and the Falcon. They get away, only to be attacked in the void.

We mop up, winning with some ease.

Tirl was also known as Drada, which means second.

Unfortunately, the big ship died. We managed to capture the little ship.

Lunadain, Kaldmont (month 12) 15, 1027

We bum around for a bit. Corsha seems to like the idea of cooperating with us, but wants more from us in return, as we've been very tight lipped towards him.

We cast some detection spells on him, to learn about his character. He is of neutral alignment. His "grafts" are not magical. We also got grafts from some of our prisoners, including, for example, dex enhancing shells that were grafted into the knuckles of Zain.

It requires a little skill to remove them safely.

Anyway, Corsha's favour with the Pantheon is nothing, and with Vanya is very low (5-10).

About half of Corsha's people detect as evil, and about 90% of the prisoners detect as evil. They tend towards chaos more than law.

We offer him the Pride (if it resurrects) [correction - likely to make this the smaller ship, after Glenn figures out how much the Pride is actually worth!] in exchange for information. However, he is very keen on learning about our magic. They do have magic, but not the sort that we have.