Since I’m going to be out in the field on ogre duty the next couple days, I won’t be doing a mailbag today. Don’t worry, keep those e-mails coming, we’ll have one soon for sure.  Meanwhile…

Garona and I split up on our way out of the Steam Pools resort. She disappeared off into the woods heading back into Feralas, and I took off by air with Mortimer. (For those of you keeping score, I had Mokvar go ahead to Stonemaul Hold to wait for us.)

It took a little circling around the Lower Wilds, but I ended up spotting the abandoned gnoll camp that the Twilights were talking about. There were a few tattered tents left standing among the hills, and a campfire tucked away in one corner under cover of trees and rocks, so it wasn’t letting off a lot of smoke that would be easily visible. On a couple passes I thought I could see some movement, but I tried not to get so close that I’d be noticed. Not yet, anyway. I wanted to get as good a look as I could at what we were going to be up against first.

On one circle around, I spotted some red and purple poking out from the foliage. No shock – a couple Twilight cultists, coming in from the northwest. Couldn’t get that good a look at them from the altitude I was at, but I could swear they were a dwarf and a troll, so they could have been the two that got away from me back at Isildien. Turns out it was a good thing I was keeping a good distance – after they were wandering through the woods some, all of a sudden there was this piercing shriek, and an enormous blue and white chimaera swooped in out of nowhere, grabbed the two Twilights up one in each talon, and flew off.

I followed the chimaera at a distance while it flew – you guessed it – back to the gnoll camp. This time, there wasn’t any question about whether someone was home. A pretty good-sized ogre in warlord’s armor was waiting at the edge of the camp. Place your bets among yourselves as to whether that would be Skarr. (Pro tip: Don’t bet your Vial of the Sands money that he’s not.) The chimaera flew in, dropped the two Twilights in front of the ogre, then hovered there nearby. I’m not positive but I think I even saw the ogre pat it on the head. From what I could see, it looked like the ogre and the Twilights were talking back and forth some, and then the ogre looked much more animated like something was upsetting him…then broke into this big laugh. The cultists meanwhile started seeming more jittery, and then broke out screaming about something just as Skarr waved his arm around in the air and walked away, and next thing you knew the chimaera was back on the cultists, grabbing them up again and flying off with them, screaming all the way, clear as day now.

So, again, some of these ogres really know how to get shit done.

I’ve just landed on the mountainside overlooking the camp, and I’m using Spazzle’s why-fly gizmo to make this post while I get set to pay our ogre friend a visit. No sign of Garona, but hey, since when do I need backup, right?

More soon.

[Header image provided by Angelya from Revive and Rejuvenate, used here with permission and many thanks.]