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Rowanna casts her hex on the first person at door. He gasps, then slumps to the ground. However, from her new position, Rowanna sees that there is another man behind him, and he promptly steps up over his ally's slumbering body.
Wayreth moves up and strikes at the awake enemy, punching him square in the face. These opponents look pretty tough though. It will take more than a punch to the face to defeat him. He responds with two rapid swings with his siangham.
But Wayreth is too quick for him.
Initiative:
Rowanna
Wayreth
Enemy 1
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Salubri (-9, -4 WIS drain)
Prig (-4)
Jani
Enemy 2
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Salubri tries to talk to the man down the hallway, but accidentally calls him a retard in the process, amongst other things. As if in reply the acid from the previous projectile eats at his skin a little more.
"Keep talking, fool. We're listening."
Prig moves up, but as he does, another man springs from an adjoining passageway and aims a flying kick at the incoming grippli.
He bounces off Prig's heavy armor.
He prepares to cast a spell at Salubri, but is hit and dazed by a burst of sonic energy from Jani before he can cast his spell.
Initiative:
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Rowanna
Wayreth
Enemy 1 (-11,asleep)
Salubri (-13, -4 WIS drain)
Prig (-4)
Jani
Enemy 2 (-,-)
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Wayreth's kicks collide with the man's skull with neck-breaking speed and force. The man crumples to the floor beside his sleeping ally.
Rowanna moves South and attempts to command Prig's assailant to fall.
He looks at Rowanna and replies, "no".
Initiative:
Wayreth
Rowanna
Enemy 1 (unconscious,asleep 4)
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Salubri (-13, -4 WIS drain)
Prig (-4)
Jani
Enemy 2 (-9,-)
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The man in front of Prig takes a step back and feebly pulls a potion from his belt, but he is struggling to move and does not drink it yet.
His ally behind him points at Prig and utters an incantation, causing three bolts of magical force to streak towards the frog.
Initiative:
----------------------------------------
Wayreth
Rowanna
Enemy 1 (unconscious,asleep 4)
Salubri (-8, -4 WIS drain)
Prig (-9)
Jani
Enemy 2 (-9,-31)
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Wayreth looks at the sleeping man at his feet.
"You Aspis have murdered many in cold blood today. And time spent on mercy to you is time not spent saving others from the blades of your allies."
Seeing this about to happen, "Stop." he yells. "We don't know they are a part of the Aspis, or what they are doing. We need answers, and death is never the way when one can be shown a different path. . ."
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Prig stabs at the staggered opponent, but Salubri is now in the way and the grippli is unable to get a clear stab.
The enemies continue to back away slowly. The man in front drinks his potion, and looks instantly more lively.
His ally behind him points at Salubri and begins chanting. Several red missiles of magical force fly towards the cleric and hammer into his chest.
Initiative:
----------------------------------
Wayreth
Rowanna
Salubri (-19, -4 WIS drain)
Prig (-9)
Jani
Enemies (-9,-27)
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"Ouch! What, the. . . Ow, OW!!!" shrugging off the 1,2, 3 he just received. "Stop that, or you will quickly move from the redeemable to the irredeemable in the yes of the Dawn. I have offered a hand to a drowning man once, but I WILL NOT allow myself to be pulled down with him when he bites back."
Flurry of Nonlethal Blows.
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A dull hum emanates from Skyreach as the ground trembles, trees sway, and glass shatters. A moment later, most of Skyreach’s northwest tower tears free from the keep; however, rather than crash to the ground, a visible aura holds the structure aloft and causes it to float above the Grand Lodge. Even the shower of stone blocks floats, swirling around the airborne tower in a nimbus of speeding debris.
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Wayreth looks at Salubri with incredulity.
"Does he really not grasp the situation we are in?"
"Hey Salubri, mercy's nice and all when we have the luxury of time, but these guys' allies are slaughtering our friends and acolytes as we speak, so unless they show a predisposition to talk, I'm just going to keep taking them down as quickly and as efficiently as I can, and if that means they die, well better them than our innocent friends and allies. A minute spent talking is a minute we could be saving others. I'll take saving the others thank you very much."
Just as he finishes, the tower begins to defy the laws of physics. Wayreth gives a low whistle as he sees what happens to the tower.
"Well that's not something you see every day."
Then he takes a double move to get up into the faces of the enemy.
"Hey you a%&+@%&s, if you surrender before I break your necks, you get to be under the custody of Mr Sunshine here. If you don't, I'm mowing you down and moving on to stop whatever other crap you guys are planning."
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The remaining enemies scoff at Wayreth's threat.
"Whether or not you kill us, we've already won this day! You think we are after mere slaughter? Fool!" the spellcaster jeers.
Even with the hex hanging over him, the spellcaster resists Rowanna's attempt at putting him to sleep.
"Weaklings! The Consortium will have this day!"
And just as he says that, Salubri knocks out his ally with a kick to the gut.
Initiative:
Wayreth
Rowanna
Salubri (-19, -4 WIS drain)
----------------------------------
Prig (-9)
Jani
Enemies (-9,-27 and 7 NLD unconscious)
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Prig hears the tower break off, but being inside the mausoleum at the time, just yells "I hope nothing terrible happened!" before hopping into the room with the last enemy, dropping his lance and drawing a masterwork scimitar in two hands before approaching the caster. "One wrong move for you and I cut you in two! Surrender like breeze-boy says. You have been given one chance by the great Prig Lil, and one chance is all you ever get!"
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Despite being cornered, the sorcerer refuses to back down.
"I have enough prestige with the Consortium to arrange for my resurrection! TO VICTORY!"
He moves to cast yes another spell, but Prig swiftly cuts at him, and cuts him down with a single swift strike.
A quick search of the mausoleum shows that it has been ransacked, but there are no signs of any other aspis agents here. A search of your defeated foes yields no clue as to what was being searched for or taken from this place, but does yield the following items which you can use for the rest of the scenario:
javelin x 3
masterwork siangham x 3
cloak of resistance +1 x 4
ring of protection +1 x 3
potions of cure light wounds x 5
potion of cure moderate wounds
potion of invisibility
scrolls of levitate x 2
scroll of ray of exhaustion
scroll of silent image
wand of entangle (20 charges),
smokestick
masterwork light crossbow with 10 bolts
masterwork light mace
Upon arriving at the quadrangle, you see the solitary figure of Ambrus Valsin himself jog out of the Quadrangle’s courtyard.
“You lot, we have a crisis here that can’t wait.” He turns and gestures to the Quadrangle. “When the banquet started, I dismissed the first-year initiates back here to continue their studies for a few more hours. The damned Aspis were waiting inside two of the dormitories,” the venture-captain says, pointing to two ivy-covered stone buildings. “I think their plan is to leverage the initiates as hostages if they have no other escape route.”
Venture-Captain Valsin regards you with an inscrutable look. “This situation can only become more desperate. The safety of our initiates can’t wait another minute. Consider yourself drafted, because you’re all I’ve got. I’m heading to the southern dormitory. You head to the northern dormitory. Talk them down, or hit them hard and fast.”
"From what I know, the hostage-taker is alone and has declared that he can kill all the hostages almost instantly. I do not think the threat stems from a magical spell, but I otherwise believe it to be credible. Thus far, the hostage taker has remained close to the main door, so reconnaissance is possible—although the doors are locked and the keys are missing."
The courtyard dormitories are well known to all of you. All of the rooms except the main hall have small windows, thought the curtains are currently drawn. The main hall has 20-foot-tall ceilings. A large window 10 feet off the ground on the western wall allows the afternoon
sun to illuminate the hall. The ivy on the western wall is particularly thick, and you might be able to scale the wall to the large window with a good Climb check. That window is open at the moment and should allow you to get a view of what is going on inside... but if you are spotted it might not end well for the hostage acolytes.
You can see the whole map because it is assumed that you know the layout of the dormitories, but you do not know where inside the hostages and hostage-holder are.
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Jani uses a pearl of power to get back their scream spell, and takes one of the cloaks and a ring.
"Wayreth could drink the potion, and use it to sneak into the hall and deliver an unexpected assault against the hostage-taker. Rowanna, we could coordinate with you to hex the asp simultaneously. We weaken his mind against your sleep hex. The Levitation scrolls could allow us to reach a high window easily. Prig and Salubri could attempt to make a sham of negotiating for the hostages, distracting him from these assaults."
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Wayreth also takes a cloak, ring and healing potion (the potion of cure moderate wounds if no one else minds, being a somewhat glassy cannon).
"I'm willing to try it. Between the invisibility and my own skill at moving unseen, I should be able to move up to him undetected. And if Prig and Salubri can hold his attention towards the main door, I can also try to sneak in from the Southern side door. I am no stranger to opening closed doors."
Wayreth thinks about it a little more, then speaks again.
"On second thought, let's go with the levitation. Whilst I can pick the lock easily enough, it's all over if he sees the door opening. Once I get in there, Jani and Rowanna can wait for his first cry of pain or surprise before showing themselves to attempt their hexes. If he resists Rowanna and Jani's attempts to put him to sleep, it will fall to me to beat him senseless before he can react."
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"I can fly for a few more minutes, so we can use one of the scrolls of Levitation on you Wayreth, while Jani uses the other one. Once you are in position, we dismiss the levitation, then attempt the hexes while you charge in. By having Wayreth fly, we prevent the possibility of the hostage-taker from hearing him climb up."
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Rowanna reads one of the scrolls and levitates Wayreth to the window, the nods at him to drink the potion. Once he disappears from sight, Jani reads the other scroll and the two witches levitate to just beneath the sill of the large West-facing window to await Wayreth's "signal".
Wayreth easily pulls himself through the open window and his partially-gaseous physiology allows him to drops noiselessly and harmlessly to the ground on the other side. The hostage taker and the acolytes detect nothing more than a brief draft.
Inside the building, Wayreth sees one hostage taker and ten initiates who are bound and gagged around the center table. The initiates are conscious, but are also all suffering from various wounds - it looks like they were each beaten to within an inch of their lives before or after being bound. The hostage taker paces between the stage and the main door and then stares at the door with his back to the hall for a moment before he walks another circuit.
Wayreth is able to walk up to her completely unseen. The acolytes hang their heads in despair, fearing that even if rescuers come, they will only end up hastening the inevitable.
Initiative order:
Wayreth (Surprise!)
Jani
Wayreth
Rowanna
Hostage-taker
Just as the hostage taker turns away from the door, he feels a strong breeze behind his head. He doesn't even see the first strike coming.
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Wayreth looks at Salubri with incredulity.
"Does he really not grasp the situation we are in?"
"Hey Salubri, mercy's nice and all when we have the luxury of time, but these guys' allies are slaughtering our friends and acolytes as we speak, so unless they show a predisposition to talk, I'm just going to keep taking them down as quickly and as efficiently as I can, and if that means they die, well better them than our innocent friends and allies. A minute spent talking is a minute we could be saving others. I'll take saving the others thank you very much."
Returning the same look, "Blaming your actions on time, or other excuses does not remove burden of failure, friend, and all you have done as pass a quick judgment on another without knowing any of the facts and murder someone we could have used to our advantage in saving many others. It's childish talk and thoughts like that that have dragged the Society's name through the mud throughout the world, and we have no one to blame for that but ourselves. You could have, if you really where so concerned with time, moved to a threat that was actually a threat. . ."
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The kidnapper cries out in alarm as she realises something is happening, only to be struck by a whirling tornado of kicks. She is unconscious by the time Wayreth's second kick connects, and the third snaps her neck.
The acolytes stare dumbfounded at Wayreth for a moment, then at Jani and Rowanna who have appeared at the top of the window. Then realisation dawns upon them that against all odds they have been rescued, and a cheer of relief and exultation fills the hall.
As you untie them, they explain that a suspended from the ceiling by a string contains a single bead from a necklace of fireballs, and that the hostage taker had an amulet that he could use to tip the goblet over, dropping the fireball on the acolytes and, in their current condition, likely killing all of them.
They are also sufficiently inspired by your performance that they gather what supplies they have and tell you that they will take all they have to the infirmary for the treatment of the wounded.
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Returning the same look, "Blaming your actions on time, or other excuses does not remove burden of failure, friend, and all you have done as pass a quick judgment on another without knowing any of the facts and murder someone we could have used to our advantage in saving many others. It's childish talk and thoughts like that that have dragged the Society's name through the mud throughout the world, and we have no one to blame for that but ourselves. You could have, if you really where so concerned with time, moved to a threat that was actually a threat. . ."
"I'm not 'blaming' anything on anything. I think my actions entirely justified. When there is a pack of wolves attacking your flock, taking the time to pacify one wolf when there are dozens more attacking the other sheep just ends up with more animals killed, and all of them being the innocent sheep. If they want to surrender, they are welcome to, but I am making a deliberate choice not to spend additional time persuading them to do so when there is nothing to indicate that it might be a worthwhile endeavour. And if the actions of his allies were anything to go by, it wouldn't have been. I finished off that Aspis agent because there was no telling how much longer he would stay asleep, and from what I know of the magic used to put him to sleep, it rarely lasts more than a minute. Better to finish him off whilst I could and move on to other threats than move on immediately only to return a minute later to find him woken up and being a threat once more. The more efficiently we take out the wolves, the more of the flock we save. And if that efficiency means lethal efficiency, then so be it."
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Wayreth heaves a sigh of relief when the hostager falls. Then he hears Prig's voice and with a grin replies from the other side of the door in a parody-imitation of the grippli's accent as he walks towards the door.
"Ve vill only negotiate if ve zee zat zere be no beings wth green skin behind zis door."
He winks to the acolytes and puts a finger to his lips as he opens the door, though he is careful to hide behind the door as he pulls it open, lest he cop a lance to the face.
"Mission accomplished," he says with a grin as he peeks out from behind the door. His mood darkens considerably however once he realises that the acolytes appear to have been deliberately beaten so that they would be near-death and easy to kill off. "Those curs. This is all-out war, and with the lowest most despicable tactics to boot!"
He turns to Salubri and adds, "they did this to our acolytes, and were furthermore prepared to kill all 10 of these young ones in cold blood for the sake of a tactical advantage. Still feel like playing nice with them, Sunshine?"
"Let's get these acolytes to safety asap. We've still got that floating tower to worry about. I'm going to go ahead and guess it's not the Decemvirate's doing. But given the state of the acolytes, we probably want to escort them to the infirmary first."