Gareth stood tall opposite the party, assured in his knowledge that they would become loyal servants of his master.

“Subdue them.” He gestured to the shadowy figure next to him. It immediately began to move forward, revealing itself to be a wight. Of course, this put it in Bask’s line of sight, and it began to petrify as Bask focused on it.

“A new beastly servant as well, I see. It seems I shall have to take care of it myself, however.” Gareth sneered at Bask before beginning to chant a spell.

Kurt managed to hit the Wight with the party’s only vial of holy water, but the vial again refused to break. Sylvester missed his attack and Karrank jammed his crossbow, giving Gareth the opportunity to finish his casting.

Instantly, Bask froze in place and the Wight stopped petrifying. Gareth began to stroll forward while the Wight continued making its way to the party. It swiped at Neil who barely managed to duck into Sylvester’s protective aura.

Both Gareth and Neil began to chant spells, but while Neil was safe, Gareth was not. Sylvester swung Thyellaphos’s censer and smashed it into the side of his head, nearly causing him to collapse to the floor. Kurt and Karrank worked on fighting the Wight, easily avoiding its blows by ducking back into the protected area. Neil managed to finish his casting of Magic Missile, producing three more emerald wisps which shot out. Two struck the Wight and the third caught Gareth in the side.

That provided Karrank the opportunity to finish off the Wight and begin turning his attentions toward Gareth. Seeing the tide turning against him, Gareth refused to retreat and doubled down on his vicious strikes. Unfortunately for him, this opened his back to Sylvester who used the opportunity to knock him out.

They quickly tied him up and claimed the small ring of keys that he had.

“So, where to now?” Kurt asked while reclaiming the unbroken vial of holy water.

“The Naga, through the secret passage in this room.” Sylvester declared, while holding up Thyellaphos to illuminate it.

“Hmm. I’m not sure how possible it is to quietly or quickly get this open.” Karrank muttered while looking over the secret door.

“That is because the lever to open it,” Sylvester explained while grabbing the Naga Statue’s head and twisting it. “is right… here!”

The secret passage quickly opened, and Sylvester led the party through it. Before they continued through the final door, however, they stopped to prepare ahead of time.

Bask had its cloth blinders put back on, to prevent it from being charmed, and Kurt was handed the Spear of Thorns. Then, Sylvester used one the Druun scrolls to cast Protection from Evil on Neil, who was the most important one to protect. Finally, Sylvester spent a significant portion of his internal energy to cast a Prayer over the group.

Everyone took a moment to psych themselves up, and then Sylvester threw open the door.

“So, you are finally ready to face me?” the naga hissed at them, already waiting. “Prepare to serve me or die!”

The group ignored her taunts and began to charge. She began to chant a spell at the same time that Sylvester and Neil did. Kurt, Karrank, and Bask all continued to charge toward her. Luckily, Sylvester and Neil managed to finish casting their spells before she did.

While Explicita Defilus had chosen to cast the powerful Fireball, Neil and Sylvester had chosen much easier spells. Neil cast out more magic missiles which turned into emerald streaks as they slammed into her and interrupted her casting. Sylvester, in contrast, managed to finish his Light miracle and caused her eyes to begin faintly glowing and completely blinding her.

“Gaaah! What have you done! You WORMS!” She shrieked as she began to thrash around.

She began to chant once more, opposed only by Neil who continued to stand his ground and chant spells. Sylvester didn’t bother to continue casting spells and moved to join with the others. Without needing to worry about making eye contact with her anymore, they had a much easier time landing their blows. Together, they managed to wound her and continually prevent her from casting any spells. Neil fired off a sickly ray of light that struck Explicita, causing her to shriek while almost seeming to wither. Unfortunately, she shook off the effect and returned to normal.

Kurt managed to activate the Spear of Thorns when hitting her, causing angry red brambles to sprout and cover her body, but she easily shattered them by flexing her serpentine body. Despite the ease with which she did this, Explicita finally realized the danger she was in and gave up on casting spells. Instead, she began to whip her tail and move to bite whoever she could find. Kurt was nearly smashed with a sweeping tail attack, but he managed to duck under the blind attack.

Unfortunately for her, Explicita was blind and being attacked on all sides. She never retreated, refusing to admit she could be defeated by these lesser beings, only becoming more frantic and frenzied with her blows as attacks found their marks and she began to fall.

“I will… kill you…” She gasped out before finally collapsing, dead.

Everyone immediately breathed a sigh of relief once they were sure that she was completely dead.

“Gods was she tough.” Kurt complained while laying on his back, breathing hard.

“But now we don’t have to worry about any more charmed people.” Neil replied hopefully while not looking particularly tired.

Once everyone had caught their breath, they quickly set about looting all the treasure. Sylvester managed to find a small messenger bag, which he informed the group was a Bag of Holding.

“You mean we don’t have to carry everything anymore!” Karrank was probably the most excited member of the group.

“Not quite. It has a limit,” Sylvester put a halt to his enthusiasm. “It only fits two and a half stone.”

“That’s barely anything!” Karrank groaned. “I doubt that would even fit most of what is in this pile here!”

“No, it won’t. But it will hold our most valuable and magical items for us.” Sylvester tried to console him.

Karrank just shook his head and went back to stuffing all the coins into sacks with Neil and Kurt. Sylvester picked through the pile, pulling out some boots, a horn, two rings, six potions, two intricate scroll tubes, some gold coins, and some jewelry and tossed it all into the bag.

The others managed to fit the rest of the coins into six small sacks. They did a quick sweep to check for any lost treasures but didn’t find any. Satisfied that they had everything, they made their way back through the secret passage and all the way to the prisons.

The holding room had five cells within it, but only two of them had prisoners. The first had a young man and woman inside and the second had a finely dressed man and an older woman. They looked up with fear when they saw the party enter the room.

“Hey, you don’t need to worry. We’re here to get you out.” Sylvester explained when they flinched at the sight of him pulling out keys.

“Really? You’re here to rescue us?” The young man tentatively asked, hope in his eyes.

“Yes, we are.” Sylvester declared, opening their cell door and moving onto the other one. “We already defeated the Naga and are on the way out.”

“You really defeated that vile beast!” The finely dressed man, a merchant, exclaimed.

“It was a tough fight too. We nearly lost our lives!” Karrank immediately started bragging about the party’s accomplishment.

The prisoners, now freed, immediately began to break down into tears of joy to hear that the naga had been slain and their friends and families were freed from its evil magic.

Kurt helped them up and explained they were heading toward the exit but needed to grab some things before leaving. If they were willing to help, the party was willing to give them some of the treasure. The four were willing to do so for free, just for saving them, but Kurt refused.

Sylvester led the way back to where the party had hidden the chests earlier and quickly pulled them out with Karrank’s help. The brother and sister worked together to carry the heavier chest while the merchant was able to carry the lighter one on his own.

They safely exited the dungeon and were greeted by Kirsten, Molli, Jennan, and Val who had some soup being warmed over a small fire. The rescues left while the others loaded up the treasure.

When Sylvester and the others went back down to get more treasure, however, the freed villagers offered to help carry more stuff. Perhaps it was their greed or their gratitude, but they still offered. The party accepted and went back into the dungeon.

They waded into the muddy room that had once held killer frogs and into the hidden area with the heaviest treasure in the dungeon. It took them quite a bit of time to split all the coins and semi-precious stones into sacks, but they managed it without too much trouble. At one point a giant lizard wandered by and attacked them, but they were able to easily repel it.

It took two trips to get all the treasure from that secret room out, but they did manage it in the end. The party, without their rescues, dove back into the dungeon one last time to take care of a Harpy and collect its impressive jewelry collection. They managed it without incident, and soon the wagons were packed.

It had been five hours since they started diving that they were finally done, so they were forced to spend the night next to the dungeon again. They didn’t have any issues, and they quickly set off to return to town. Sylvester Kurt, Karrank, and Bask all ended up having to walk as they simply ran out of room. Their supplies were shrinking, but they still needed space, just like the four rescues they were taking with them. Normally it wouldn’t have been a problem, but the group had pulled out so much treasure that it took a wagon just to transport it all. It was primarily copper, which may have reduced its value, but it certainly didn’t reduce its weight.

They set off though the swamp and passed through it without being bothered by anything other than a lone stirge. Bask easily petrified it and the party moved on. The managed to make it through the two-day stint in the dim forest without any encounters and that allowed them to reach Orlane nine days after they had first passed it.

Everyone was happy to see some of the missing townsfolk returned. While the party had been travelling, the town’s wizard, Ramne, and two elves who had been called by the mayor had worked on clearing out the rest of the cult. With everyone free from the naga’s charm, they were easily able to figure out what was going on and clear things out.

That night, the town hosted a feast to celebrate the defeat of the naga and their return to freedom. The celebration went deep into the night, with a large portion of the town ending up asleep in the common room at the Inn of the Slumbering Serpent.

The next morning, the party gave a way a huge number of copper coins, easily halving the amount of treasure they had to carry around. Unfortunately, there wasn’t anywhere in town to sell much of their treasure so they had to make do with exchanging what they could at the local moneychanger.

Haskali was more than happy to exchange their money, even offering a discount on his normal rates for saving the town. They gave him all their remaining copper as well as most of the silver coins they had collected. In return, he provided them with a variety of gems and some gold coins.

Through their gifts and their exchanges, the party managed to consolidate their wagon-full of treasure down to enough to fit in a single chest. It was nearly 18,000 silver pieces when put together, but most of it was in the form of gems and jewelry that needed to be sold. They also had a variety of magic items to go through, but they decided to worry about splitting everything once all the other treasure had been sold.

After purchasing some more supplies for their journey, the party set off toward Dolmvay once again.