…wheredefakawi…out of the ocean and into the desert!

…as the plucky hobbit sails through the air, the ‘cat’ vanishes and Bud lands back on the ground. The gem is used to determine that the cat is ethereal, and pursuit is debated for a short while before the group resumes moving away from the denser mushroom areas. They climb out of the forest an into a meadow that broadens as they move along.
After a few moments, the ground begins to shake as an elephant-sized ‘puppy’ bounds down the trail. Alarmed by the idea of combat with the creature, they play fetch with it instead. Passing beyond the now sleeping pooch, the group sees a manor house with frog butlers. They bribe one to gain access to the place and spend a pleasant afternoon with the Dutchess – a bearded dwarven gal who is a few rocks shy of a quarry. They dine, they dance…they sing, they prance. Eventually they take their leave of the event and move down a path to the inevitable encounter with the Mad Hatter, the March Hare and the Doorrmouse. the group decides after about twenty minutes of insane banter that precious little is to be gained here, so they move on to a large tree with a door in the center. They open it and everything vanishes.

They find themselves in a large hall with candles and a small table and a lot of doors. Yegods! They are back to the beginning. This time they open a different door and exit into a large and very well tended garden. The gardeners do their best to ignore them and the soldiers are alert but not intrusive, The group wanders about then decides to exit the garden area. As they do so they encounter the garden’s owner
– The Queen. She comes with her royal procession and attendants and the statue of the white rabbit, the march hare and the mad hatter. The group is wrangled into a game of royal croquet, played with hedgehog balls and flamingo mallets.

The game is brief, for the group quickly tires of being bombarded with a prickly hedgehog and tries to quit the game. This angers he queen and she shouts for a beheading.as the group flees into the wilds. A brief encounter with the Smilodon Cat convinces them to seek refuge by the seashore until the hubbub dies down. Along the way they meet a talking griffon who enlists their aid in helping regain a lost treasure for his friend the ex-turtle. The group readily agrees – apparently being more vegetative makes them more agreeable as well – and they embark on the mission. They eat the glowing purple seaweed and hike out into the unknown waters of the apparent ocean.

They encounter a grotto filled with large and angry crustaceans and there is a pitched underwater battle. Eventually the lobster-y threat level is reduced to tolerable and the treasure is plundered. Some pearls and a chalice and a few verdigris’d coins and a flask for the turtle. They return to the shore, return the flask to the turtle and are approached by an emissary of the Queen, who wants them to return immediately to the game of croquet to which they have been invited.
the group RSVP’s to the request by stabbing the messenger to death on the beach.

They decide to leave the area and venture further along the coast.
Eventually they come across a small cove that has a longboat moored within. As the group debates the wisdom of venturing out into the unknown ocean, the sounds of queenly pursuit soon help them to decide in favor of the less immediately life threatening unknown as opposed to staying and facing the might of the queen’s guard armed with a few knives, a sword and shield. Off they go into the water and out to sea.
the further from shore the they travel, the foggier it becomes until soon they cannot see beyond the oars. The sound changes as though they were sculling through a large cavern. They row on….

Suddenly they spy a shaft of light that pierces the gloom and illuminates a large rock in the water. They beach the boat and climb onto the rock. As they gaze into the light they are ‘vacuumed’ into the sky – to reappear in a lake that spans the entrance room in which they first arrived. The difference this time is that there is a large circular opening in the ceiling of the room that was not there before.
The group moves to investigate and is once again whisked into the sky
– this time to ‘fall’ into the nighttime desert. Upon arrival, they are greeted by the enraged Tomorast.

The battle is brief and deadly, but it turns out that the rules lawyering is not in vain. Immediately the group activates various anti-magic protections and moves to engage the demon-wizard. He melees with the group and drains many life levels, and inflicts terrible damage, but beyond Feebleminding Dalliance he cannot cast many (any?) spells. As the saying goes, the pen is mightier than the sword, but the sword is mightier than a wizard without spells and eventually the daggers do the job as the whole group plays mr stabby with Tomorast.

Although the loss of levels will cost dearly, the group is relieved to be alive and back on their normal plane of existence. They camp in the desert for a few days until Dalliance can teleport them back to Waterdeep (or more likely – Shadowdale so the group can recover their items). It seems as though the arc of their lives involving Tomorast is over…at least for the time being. Wizards are pesky, and dead wizards are often even worse.