As promised by the letter you received when you took over the kingdom, you have been recruited into the Droaam army. It will be a short stint of only a few months, really a token service in order to prove your loyalty, although the exact amount of time depends on how the war goes.
Marching off to war are Grim, Verschoyle, Zumm, Hurgadar, Zurga, Primrose the flesh golem, and fifty goblin troopers. This left Castle Granis only lightly defended, but Verschoyle's regular scrying of the castle shows soldiers from across your territory arriving at the castle for the training Grim promised. So far roughly twenty goblins and twenty orcs have arrived, as near as Verschoyle can estimate. Skardash is doing his best to train them but his lack of experience means that they are not showing any improvements; but the castle is at least defended, and is as peaceful as a castle full of orcs from different villages could be expected to be (i.e. not very).
Meanwhile, a changeling bard named Paik has been assigned to your unit to keep an eye on you and report on your loyalty, and also to help inspire your troops with his bardic music.
After a short stay in Graywall (during which Verschoyle spent lots of money in an attempt to impress everyone and in particular his wizard friend Tharrad Katarn), the army marched south for several weeks towards the Temple of the Cleansing Blade. The political situation, as explained by Warchief Tygor, is:
One of the warlords is attempting to break away from the rule of the hags and carve out his own nation. You will join one of a number of hordes that the Daughters are sending to crush the rebellion.
The rebel warlord is Thurizan the Strong, a mighty orc warrior. His territory is in the south-eastern corner of Droaam, adjoining the coastline and the Graywall Mountains that form the border with Breland. His capital is the inaccessible fortress of Shaarat Kol. The majority of the population in his territory is made up of orcs, with some humans, hill giants, goblins and other races.
Thurizan is very popular with the people in and surrounding his territory, and part of the reason for this is to do with religion. The Daughters of Sora Kell have a secular government, not invoking the gods in their rule and not making any laws concerning religion. In contrast, Thurizan claims to rule with the endorsement of the Dark Six. This is helped by the fact that his army has gained control of the Temple of the Cleansing blade, the largest temple to the Mockery in Droaam. The high priest of the temple has publically supported Thurizan as ruler.
You will be part of an army that is being assembled to re-take the Temple of the Cleansing Blade. The temple is of some strategic importance, but its main value will be as a propaganda victory: if Thurizan loses control of the temple, then his subjects may think again about his claim to be chosen by the gods.
Your immediate commander is Warchief Tygor, a hardened gnoll career soldier whose fur bears many bare patches where scars have healed. Your ultimate commander is Horde Commander Koll, a bulky, heavily armoured orc warlord whose territoy is on the other side of Graywall from yours.
The first combat you saw was on the approach to the temple when you had to remove catapults from hills to let the army pass. You dispatched the defender quickly, with Grim bravely rushing past the two hill giants in order to attack a battle sorceror before he had a chance to cast his spells, and then returning to slice off the hill giant's arm with a mighty blow.
Your next mission was to neutralize an enemy spy who was hiding in a nearby hamlet. Warchief Tygor ordered you to do this by massacring everyone in the village, but Zumm (in a surprising non-evil outburst; I was expecting Verschoyle to say this) argued that they should try to find the spy and spare the rest of the village if possible. Zumm and Piak got to show off their infiltration skills and saw through the spy's disguise, and after a brief fight chased him into the open. He was invisible, but Verschoyle zapped him with magic missiles and your goblin archers all fired on the spot where the magic missiles hit, kind of like at the end of
Star Trek VI.
You re-joined the army at nightfall as it was setting up camp around the temple and its small town (called simply Blade-town). In the middle of the night the army was attacked by skeletons, which were driven off easily but succeeded in demoralizing the troops. The only serious attack was on the command tent itself, which was attacked by three hideous undead creatures, the animated corpses of people who had had all the skin flayed from their bodies. Zumm, Grim and Hurgadar found Horde Commander Koll defending himself against the three creatures, while his entourage cowered or fled. With the help of Verschoyle's flesh golem you managed to defeat them. Paik slept through the whole thing.
