The Fellowship travelled to the Minty Mountains, but not before stopping to buy water wings. When they arrived at the Minty Mountains, they realized just how high mountains really were and, though it was too late to turn back now, they all made a silent vow to themselves never to travel via mountains again. While up on the mountains, they had to hide from a BirdVerve, a special flock of birds sent specifically by the evil wizard Zoolathreeb to track down the stalwart heroes and crap all over them. Once the BirdVerve was gone, the Fellowship went up to the peaks of the mountain range, where it was cold and snowy.

Labbo Leg-Of-Lamb, the wiry faggot-archer, was so thin and light he could walk right on the snow while all the rest of them slogged through it. He wasn't walking through the snow so much, however, when a big gust of wind picked his light homobones up and smashed him against the mountains. The rest of the Fellowship made him eat cakes and Grabby Groinloin was assigned to watch him to make sure he didn't run off crying and throw up the food because he thought he was fat.

The Fellowship also had the help of notorious sword-fighter and leg-man Borgonium and benefited from the return of Strider, Samgam, Pinniks and Trustlethwimble, all of who were dead at one point but who all came back to life by wishing very VERY hard. Finally, all together on the mountain, they decided to forget the quest and hunker down for a rib-roast and maybe an old-tyme jamboree.

Well that turned out to be a BAD idea! Zoolathreeb called upon the powers of Voldyvold to turn the top of the mountain into balls and made the balls fall on the heroes, much to the dismay of the Fellowship, all except Labbo, who liked having balls hit him. They decided they needed a new way to get to the evil land of Molehole so they could throw the Ring that Stopped The War into the pit of Swimbeasts who lived there and ate rings and pooped out mashed potatoes.

"We must destroy the ring!" said Galfgab.

"Mmmm. Mashed potatoes!" said Lordo.

"Who pissed on my blanket?" said Labbo.
"Oops. Sorry," said Grabby.

"No, no. I'm sorry. It was me," said Pinniks.

"What? No, I pissed on his blanket," said Trustlethwimble.

"You ALL pissed on my blanket?" shouted Labbo. Grabby, Pinniks and Trustlethwimble all blushed.

"We don't have time for this!" interjected Borgonium.

"Do we have time for a beer?" asked Grabby.

"Okay, one beer," said Borgonium.

"No, no. We have to go. I'm going. Anyone who wants to stay here can stay here and die for all I care," said Strider.

So Strider went on and the rest of them stayed, and oh, what times they had! Labbo spread out a Twister rug and invited everyone to play who wanted to, which turned out to be no one. Not to be disswayed, Labbo moved the Twister rug deeper into the cave and simply played with himself. Galfgab became immensely popular overnight when it was discovered he could turn snow into vodka, and quickly whipped together a lucrative enterprise with the rest of the fellowship for ten bucks a bottle.

By Tuesday Trustlethwimble had found the vodka spigot lodged into the side of the mountain, and everyone took turns flogging Galfgab with urine-drenched blankets until all the money had fallen out of his pockets. While he dabbed at his bruises, Galfgab told everyone of how the Big Big Giants used to live on the Minty Mountains, and harvested the mint trees and dug nightly for underground vodka wells, but he only got midway through his story before he realized no one was paying attention to his blatantly false ramblings. He stalked off further down the cave in a huff, but came running back twenty minutes later when he tripped over Labbo playing with himself.

A month and a half went by, and eventually everyone decided it was time to get on with the mission, for, as Galfgab predicted, "The storms of evil now blow from the South, and it is no longer safe." Nobody had any idea what Galfgab was talking about, but the vodka well had dried up that morning after Pinniks had made the fellowship steaming plates of his famous vodka eggs. Besides this everyone was getting a little sick of everyone else peeing on their blankets, which had started out in healthy competition but had quickly denigrated as the weeks rolled by, until at some point Grabby stopped aiming for the blanket entirely and went right for the open snoring mouth.

"Should we tell Labbo we're leaving?" asked Trustlethwimble.

"Help yourself," said Borgonium in a flat monotone, since he lacked the sufficient character development to have an opinion on anything this late in the story.

Trustlethwimble hiked deep into the cave calling out Labbo's name, and the rest of the Fellowship patiently waited, playing charades and joyously chucking the Halfsies into rocks. After a week had passed, it became abundantly clear to everyone that Trustlethwimble wasn't coming back, and further volunteers to go fetch Labbo were not forthcoming.

On the way down the mountain, the Fellowship encountered the frozen form of Strider Stepopolous, who had managed to everyone's considerable surprise to get as far away from camp as seventy feet before collapsing in a heap.

"So cold," said Strider.

"Yes," everyone agreed, stepping over him on their way down.

“Wait!" he called after them. "I am really Beaucoup-Beaucoup, son of Argogoragoran, the man who first tried to keep the one ring to ring the ring-dings back in the battle of Oopsalot!" Everyone ignored him, and eventually his protests petered out into a low sobbing.

"Oh, I can't believe this," moaned Galfgab, who reluctantly sent Grabby Groinloin to fetch the talent scout.

"You won't regret this!" said Strider gratefully, carried on Grabby's back. "We'd better not," said Borgonium. "You're on kitchen duty for the remainder of the journey." Strider cursed his luck, and tried to climb off Grabby's back so he could go back instead to die, but Grabby had his thighs in a deathgrip, and eventually he stopped thrashing around and instead decided to cry.

"Behold!" said Galfgab. "The Piles of Volvula!" And there they were. Everyone was genuinely not impressed, and told Galfgab so, and he got all sulky and went and sat by himself, until Lordo went to keep him company, which Galfgab decided was infinitely worse. He went to work at puzzling the riddle at the Gates of Volvula.

"What's black and white and red all over?" He asked aloud.

"A blanket?" asked Grabby.

"My hands?" asked Samgam.

"Methinks it is most certainly Samgam's hands," agreed Borgonium, and everyone rousingly agreed with his wisdom, picked him up, and carried him on their shoulders around the swamp. Galfgab went and sat by himself to sulk again.

They sat for days at the Gates of Volvula. Sporadically, one of them would try to shout out an answer to the riddle of the Gates.

"A newspaper!" shouted the wise Galfgab, to no avail.

"Samgam's hands!" shouted Lordo.

"Mickey Mouse, circa 1963!" Galfgab attempted.

"Samgam's hands!" cried Borgonium.

"My hands!" said Samgam.

"A menstruating zebra?" Galfgab guessed, growing less and less confident and now caring less and less whether they ever got anywhere because he was, quite frankly, suffering from the rheumatism in his bones and wouldn't have minded a couple of weeks to just rest and maybe play some canasta.

"Samgam's hands!" Strider bellowed, confidently.

"Samgam's penis!" Pinniks tried.

They all laughed and laughed at the red-faced Pinniks who had given away far too much information. Boy was the surprise on them the next morning when Pinniks was found laying next to six empty aspirin bottles with a note pinned to his chest. Galfgab read the note aloud.

"Fuck you all," he said.

At that, the Gates of Volvula opened.

Continue on to Chapter 4: Piddles In The Dark