Rhin returned from his volcano reconnaissance with a report of an old crater with odd fires lingering about it. The party packed up and headed out to investigate. Siala took a closer look as an invisible cloud, and saw what were probably three fire elementals just hanging out on the surface. Enli, Rockaneeshoo, and Hrir (?) went to parley with them. The elementals were agitated, and expressed consternation at the fact that air elementals (aka the party) were bugging them. They threatened to burn the party, but Enli offered to help them. They told a disjointed and short tale of how they had been run off by something, and couldn't get back. Enli convinced them to show the party where they originally came from. It was a tunnel carved into the rock of a neighboring mountain. The party landed, and the fire elementals threatened again to help them NOW, or be burned.
At that point, a robed human came from inside the tunnel, and the fire elementals fled. There was a minor standoff, but introductions were made. He said his name was Pelfrey Godwin, and that he was an adventurer. He had heard that there was an underground hoard of magical treasure and knowledge here, and was exploring the tunnel. When asked why he was alone, he said that there weren't many people as powerful as him, and that the trip was mostly impossible for others. Seeing that the party was relatively powerful themselves, he asked if they could help him. He had disabled one trap, but then been stymied by the second.
Not to be easily tricked, the party asked if they could place a Quest or Geas on Pelfrey to be sure of his intent. He declined that course of action, as would most people. Enli suggested casting Zone of Truth, which Pelfrey agreed to. He then agreed to a non-aggression pact with the party. Enli detected an enchantment on him, but wasn't sure it was the Zone of Truth. Siala tried to detect his thoughts, but his mind was impenetrable. The party said that they'd help him, but that they had first dibs on treasure, and required the fist-sized stone called the Heart of Fire. He agreed to that, and the party moved inside the tunnel.
Siala took the point, and discovered several traps, all of which were quite tricky to detect and disarm. She exercised her skill to it's utmost, and had disabled a few traps when the party suddenly became impatient with her. Hrir decided to simply trigger the traps himself, and let her disable them later. Several fireballs, lightning bolts, and a cone of cold later, the party had come to a wide cave-like chamber with large iron doors on the opposite side. The party fanned out to explore, Siala started examining the door, and Enli cast Daylight on several walls.
At this point, Pelfrey laughed from behind them, and said that the party was stronger than he had anticipated. His laughter grew deeper and more sinister as he suddenly transformed into a gargantuan red dragon, blocking the exit passage with his massive body. Rhin made a run for it, dodging underneath his legs, but the dragon stomped upon him, pinning him to the ground, and cracking some of Rhin's bones. Rockaneeshoo saved Rhin with a timely Reverse Gravity, which released Rhin and hurled both Rhin and the dragon to the ceiling. Urgmob launched a barrage of arrows at the dragon, striking true several times. Siala found no mundane traps on the iron doors, but the magical aura persisted on it. She then started to unlock them. Enli and Hrir were busy casting buff spells for a few seconds, and then the dragon breathed fire on at least half the party. Urgmob and Rockaneeshoo took the brunt of the assault, and Enli was scorched a fair amount. Rhin was nearly destroyed from his tangle with the dragon, but was still making his way towards the exit.
Enli fired off a few massive healing spells and Hrir finally launched his melee assault. Rhin repaired himself with a Harm spell, and Urgmob kept up the archery attacks. Davinov, faced with yet another dragon backed up and "protected" Siala as she finally disabled the most intricate lock she'd ever encountered. Another breath of fire caught a majority of the party, but they were able to dodge a bit better this time, suffering only a minor scorching. Dragon blood flew everywhere once Hrir got into his stride, and when the dragon wavered just a bit, Rhin stepped in and magically drained the last life force from the massive beast. It fell, dead and messy.
Davinov stepped in to help Siala push the massively heavy doors open, and they swung open to reveal a darkness with the words "To Be Continued..."
For defeating the dragon, the party gets 2550xp.
This brings the totals (including magic item creation) to :
Urgmob = 129,610 (16th)
Rhin = 118,810 (15th)
Rockaneeshoo = 144,368 (17th)
Enli = 149,462 (17th)
Siala = 102,300 (14th)
Hrir = 117,917 (15th)
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