Mandra shrugs and walks into the cold.  Her body starts to frost up as she pushes past frozen leaves and branches that, though appear frosty, are actually frozen solid and break off like glass when she pushes past them. Leaving shards of broken ice behind her she moves through the cold. You watch her until she's barely visible, with Krull watching from above.  She emerges from the far side, covered in frost and with several branches and chunks of ice frozen to any areas of revealed flesh.  She blinks a few times to clear the melting ice from her vision.  "I would imagine it'th cold in there, but....i couldn't really tell. I didn't thee anything intere'th'ting in the middle. Thorry." 

Chunks of ice and frozen twigs fall off her flesh, melting away as she stands in the humid heat of the jungle. 

The group spends a bit more time investigating the cold, but can find no source for its cold or sign of how it was created. Mandra does one more walk through but comes out empty handed. The group decides to move on. 

The rest of the day is uneventful and yet another day of slogging through the jungle has been completed.

The next day, you break camp. An hour in to your morning walk Azaka calls a halt. She points up. There seems to be clumps of matter up in the trees that look like perhaps nests. As you watch, you see tall, rather terrible looking primates that are perhaps 5 feet tall, thin and bony with moss like hair hanging from them, and dark eyes sunken into deep eye sockets. Their fingers end in fearsome looking claws.  They eye you, seemingly impassively from above.  You spot six...no..seven of them in the trees above watching you, perhaps 30 feet up.  Azaka looks back for guidance.  It'll probably only take thirty minutes to walk around them, but....you've also walked in such a zigzag through this jungle that you'd be surprised if you weren't covering every square foot of this place. 

"Let's proceed with caution," Silas stated as he tried to put his things away without looking away from the primates, He'll tighten the strap on his arm after slipping on his backpack.

"Perhaps we might pass by peacefully if we do not appear a threat." Yroc offers, although he has a lot of difficulty figuring out what anything in this jungle seems to want.

(DM: would stealth matter at this point? If so, Sickle will cast Pass Without Trace)

"This jungle does not know the concept of peace. Also they watching us, I don't think we can sneak pass at the moment," Silas says as he backs away from them slowly, "The question is why are they just watching. Azaka, you seem to know what they are, mind telling us?"

Sir Darak Darkhall: Shield raised and hand on the hilt of his sword, the Knight suggests, "Best to avoid conflict, if possible. Let us circle around them and continue our journey east. Do not turn your backs on them until we're out of sight."

Azaka, "Even I do not know all the secrets of the jungle. I've not seen these type of primates, but they do not look peaceful. Around we go." 

The afternoon is again filled with sheeting rain that drenches everyone. You're steaming as you walk through the rain that pours from the sky in waves. That evening you setup camp. Spiders, ants, a few snakes are all that bother you and everyone has gotten used to dealing with them after what must be nearly three weeks in the jungle. The next morning you continue pressing on. At noon Azaka motions for caution and everyone ducks down. To the right you notice a pack of ghouls slowly wandering through the forest. In front appears to be one that's more powerful, with a blue triangle tattooed on its forehead.  You stay quiet, and the undead moves past, perhaps fifteen or twenty of them in total, that you could see anyway.  Azaka, "The blue triangle is a mark of Ras Nsi's army. He was a necromancer who raised a powerful undead army based in Mezro. When the spellplague hit and destroyed Mezro, it removed his control over his undead army, which disbanded into the jungles and wander, uncontrolled. Considering we've been wandering through undead infested jungles for so long and only seen some undead now is quite remarkable.  They're a weekly plague on the Port."  

She shrugs and continues on. That afternoon the group emerges from the jungle, on a hill overlooking the ruins of Mezro, and waterway that stretches from Mezro's port out to the ocean. The ruins are a bumpy terrain of ruins covered by growth. It appears to be laid out in a large circle, with four main avenue's cutting through the space to meet in a large open square. The river Olung has overflowed its banks along the warf casting a quarter of the city under water, only the taller stone ruins peaking out of the murky depths. Crumbling, vine-covered buildings rise above the flooded streets that are now more like canals than roadways. A large tent appears to be setup against a larger ruin wall in the north of the city and you notice some people moving around, but it's too far to make out much detail from here.  Kasaaptu sends her familiar to scout it out, who returns with the following observations.  The creatures are huge, their size confusing your perspective from here. They have blue skin and are about twenty feet tall. She spotted three of them.  They appear to be they also have a white wolf with them that's a bit bigger than a dire wolf. They seem to have the dead body of a man strung up by their tent. They are camped and talking, but it's in giant which Kasaaptu's familiar doesn't understand.  

The familiar didn't see any other signs of activity in the ruins on the way to and from the giants. 

"Giants are bad, really bad," Silas said as he grabs his holy symbol to clam himself, "Giants tend to stand out so got any knowledge of these giants Azaka?" when turning to the group, "Anyone fought a giant before? Any tips?"

Maybe these are big friendly giants! says Badger, half to himself. Then, turning and seeing the look of disbelief from Silas, he adds: Urgh, there was a family of stone giants living not far from my burrow. They weren't exactly the most social neighbours, but they would trade the gems they found for tools we made for them. Maybe these giants are just ... traders? Badger seems a bit uncertain about that last part as he looks again at the dead body strung up.

Azaka shakes her head, "Giants are not common in Chult. I've never heard of blue skin giants before." 

Sir Darak Darkhall: Between gritted teeth, Darak growls, "Frost Giants."

Addressing the party, the Knight continues, "Strange to find them in the jungle... Facing even one of them would likely be suicide, but we must know if this has anything to do with the Death Curse. Badger, Kasaaptu - perhaps your familars can explore further and discover the Giant's purpose here?"

"Maybe they're responsible for the ice we encountered," Silas chimes in after heading what they were.

You can probably explore around half of the ruins and stay hidden from the giants if you wanted. The familiars can scope out the giant's more, but unless they have some way to understand Giant language, you won't be able to understand most of what they're talking about.  

Part of the reason for coming here was now you can head straight south along the river on the way to Tiriki, the place where the Aarokcra is from. 

The zombie pipes up, "I can underthtand giant if you want...."  The body which you've relegated to walking behind the group by 20 feet smells quite badly, its flesh rotting in the humid heat. 

Badger looks up in surprise at Mandra's claimed skill in Giant-ese. He doesn't mind putting the zombie to a little bit of risk (like testing the fro-zone), but no point wasting an opportunity with carelessness.

Urgh, so you could understand their conversation? You'd need to get closer though, and you ...er... might not be welcome. Perhaps I could render you invisible first. 

(OOC: Send the invisible zombie to eavesdrop? Only downside is we can't have a two-way conversation - unless Mandra translates verbally, Krull spies, and Kasaaptu tunes in?? Still can't ask questions though, except what we prep Mandra for in advance.)

Sickle shakes his head. “Ice giants. Not to be trifled with.  I say we sneak around and take a look through the city, then maybe set up and observe them from closer, to get a sense of what they are doing here.”

Kasaaptu likes the idea of the invisible zombie spy. she hands her some paper and a pencil to write down important things she might hear, and tells her if she is discovered, to jsut act like a mindless zombie and they will likely ignore her. While the rest of the party sneaks and peaks around the ruins, She will have KRULL keep an eye on Mandra and the giants to give early warning if the giants become aware of the partys presence

Cool. Once we get close enough we can enact the plan. Meanwhile we can enter the ruins and have a look around, right?

The zombie's rotting fingers clumsily hold the paper and pencil. It looks up at Kasaaptu, then down at the paper and pencil, then back up at Kasaaptu.  "ooookk..." 

The group descends the hill amongst ruined buildings and into the city proper.  The group figures the area to the south is safe to explore. You agree to meet back up at this 2 story ruin. Badger casts his spell upon the zombie who fades out of existence with a shimmering sparkle. You hear the sound of it limping away. The group then begins to explore.  The sense you get of these ruins as you wander around is that they are frequented by people. You find numerous camp-sites throughout, and it seems as if every possible door is opened or pulled off, that all the piles have been picked through, and that every remaining room has had it's good pulled out and either broken down to trash, or pulled apart.  

The stroll through the ruins is not meeting your expectations for an exploration of a foreign jungle land. You find yourselves kicking rocks down the cobbled road. 

An hour passes very quickly and you head back to see if the Zombie has done any better. You turn back and are walking when you all pick up a strange scent...a strong smell of roses....and...is that ham?  A strange being emerges in the road in front of you.  He stands 4 foot 10, and appears to be a dinosaur like creature, but standing on two feet and wearing clothes. He has a lime green hide and is wearing a brown smock, with a brown fur lined cloak.  A backpack hangs off one shoulder, and a gleaming sword is grasped in his hands. The sword appears to have a bright silver appearance with a very intricate handle and hilt.  

Sir Darak, you suddenly sense a quiet ringing noise, like a faint chime that fades away as quickly as you sensed it. 

The dinosaur stands there before you, seemingly waiting for you to say something. His eyes dart to each of you, his pose full of caution. There is something else there in his eyes.  Sadness?