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Sakitu sees movement out of the corner of her eye and turns to see a goat, with a lantern hanging from it's neck. The light from the lantern washes over her like a slow flood of putrid yellow slime. She feels the panic that she is all too familiar rising in her chest. No! she tells herself. No. You can get this under control. You are stronger than this!. She closes her eyes a moment to screw up her courage. When she's ready, she looks full at the undead goat and raises her hands towards it. With a few quick arcane words and matching gestures, a hemisphere of ice, 14 inches thick, forms out of thin air as a dome over the goat.
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Knowing the towers’ search lights are sweeping the tower, Fin switches to a firing technique he had been practicing, shooting on the run…he’ll move to an arrow slit, fire a single cold iron arrow at the nearest Cossack that’s fighting Maka and then move away from the slit to avoid the machine gun fire…
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Quasit lunges out from her hiding place and attacks the horseman from behind as it fences with Bulvi.
And then she notices the sallow light coming from behind her, looking around expecting some new horseman guard to be approaching, she is startled by the appearance of the shambling undead goat and its uncanny lantern.
"What in the Seven Hells...?" she gasps as her blood goes cold.
"Are you guys seeing this thing? They have a pet!" she croaks awkwardly.
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Chest Thumper cocks a curious head at the goat. For a moment, he contemplates whether or not he can eat it. But given its state of active decay, he decides that's a bad idea.
He gives an involuntary shiver at the odd light but doesn't seem too disturbed by it.
He finally gets within reach of one of the headless riders and tries to make it armless, too.
Kalchine continues to hustle toward the fight though he also pauses as the odd creature comes out.
"Those horns! Those inhuman eyes! Is that...is that some sort of demon?" he asks, having never seen a creature like that.
Maka's toothy grin spread wide as she found herself surrounded by foes. She barely noticed the goat as she lashed out with a flurry of flaming furry.
Bulvi focused on the undead Cossack in the unfortunate tactical position of being stuck between himself and Quasit. He peers around unable to see the demon Kal speaks of from where he stood.
You're able to destroy the remaining cossacks, but the big machine gun in the southeast corner tower fires on Fin's position as the searchlight in it turns on the domed temple tower. Unlike the smaller guns in the tower by the camp, its bullets go straight through the dome.
A number of the bullets narrowly miss him... but perhaps more concerningly, the holes left behind look to have cracks spreading from them...
You hear a smashing sound from inside the dome of ice. Cracks show in it near where Quasit stands.
The remaining soldiers in the nearby guard tower shout to their fellows in the trench and turn their searchlight onto the party, and said soldiers turn around and fire on Sakitu and Quasit (the only two they can see between the tents).
In a burst of blue flame, Maka shot through the air and smashed into the searchlight targeting the party.
Selena uses her witchy abilities to reform the ice hemisphere that Saki made, but this time stronger (her ability increases the hardness and HP of ice for a few hours, hardness 5, 10hp per inch).
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Sakitu winces at the sound of the goat smashing her ice dome. She stares at it for a moment, just hoping and praying that it will hold. Then, suddenly, the ground around her erupts with tiny of small explosions. Clods of frozen dirt fly up in to the air all around her. Only a split second later she hears the sharp staccato of pops coming from one of the towers. She leaps back and tries to put one of the fence posts between her and the noise. She's partially successful but she still feels the burning pain as some of the projectiles tear through her flesh.
Only a few paces away is a tent that should give her cover -- the same place Quasit just threw herself into. Sakitu scrunches up her courage and then in a burst, races across the open ground and jumps through the tent opening.
She skids to a stop right by Quasit. There are few bleeding wounds on her legs and arms but she seems to be ignoring them. "Did you see that dome over the goat? I think that Selena did something to it and made it even stronger. That should keep that horrid thing trapped. But those guys in the tower. Did they get you?"
While she's talking, she digs in her bag searching for her healing wand.
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Quasit shakes her head. "No, I'm fine. And yeah, I saw the dome. That was one strange critter. Who would keep an undead goat around? I doubt they're milking it to make cheese."
She peeks out the tent flap cautiously to see how the others are faring.
"Dammit, I didn't know these guys could yell! If they start up that siren again we're cooked --we'd have to retreat again. But we're so close to finding the other part of Miroslav! We may not get a chance like this again."
"I wish I knew what we were looking for. It might be something in that leader's tent. But I don't really get it -- the body we have is pretty whole. It's even still got his fake leg. What's missing?"
For the moment, she keeps to herself her worry about Findurel alone up in the tower.
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”Erastil’s antlers!” Fin swears as many bullets whizz by him in addition to ripping apart the tower. He hightails down the stairs before they bring the tower down with their fire. Then he moves to the SE corner of the ruins to get a good vantage point but remain out of sight as he observes and ponders his next move, hoping his friends are faring well…
As Kalchine sees fire erupt from one of the towers and tracers of light zip into the tower Fin is firing from, he decides to bring forth some fire of his own.
He summons up both the heat latent in the ground and the divine energy that remains from what was corrupted here, causing a cylinder of fire and light to engulf the tower.
Meanwhile, Chest Thumper, remembering just how much the burning stingers hurt, darts into a nearby tent.
The reinforced dome is holding... for now.
The soldiers in the tower are injured by Kalchine's flame strike, but not dead.
Maka smashes the searchlight in the tower.
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Sakitu tries not to think too much of all the dead body parts that Quasit has collected. She'll just be glad when this whole ordeal is over. She peeks out of the tent as well, just in time to see the tower where Fin was peppered with bullets.
She gasps. "Oh! Quasit! They're attacking the tower where Fin is. He's safe, right? He's got to be safe. But what if he's not." Sakitu's mind fills with a vision of Fin laying on the floor of the tower, bleeding and unconscious.
"I have to go help him." She pulls the flap of the tent to the side and tries to see a clear path to run back to the building. It is too far. The guns in the tower will spot her and start shooting at her again. She stifles a cry and turns back to Quasit. "What are we going to do about Fin?" Her voice is on the brink of a sob.
Bulvi moves closer to the nearby tent and focuses on his sword and the spirit of the blade. A red shimmer can faintly be seen as the light reflects off it. "If whatever it is breaks out soon I'll be ready... or if we move out."
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She gasps. "Oh! Quasit! They're attacking the tower where Fin is. He's safe, right? He's got to be safe. But what if he's not." Sakitu's mind fills with a vision of Fin laying on the floor of the tower, bleeding and unconscious.
"I have to go help him." She pulls the flap of the tent to the side and tries to see a clear path to run back to the building. It is too far. The guns in the tower will spot her and start shooting at her again. She stifles a cry and turns back to Quasit. "What are we going to do about Fin?" Her voice is on the brink of a sob.
"C'mon Saki, he's gonna be fine. We've faced worse than this. If I know Fin, he got out of there long before they started to shoot it up. He's probably moved to some new hiding place. If you run out there into the open ground looking for him, you'll just get yourself shot up." She gives her pal a sturdy side hug for encouragement.
She takes another look around outside. "It looks like that spotlight has been knocked out. This might be our chance to take down that nasty old goat. Can you dismiss the ice dome? I've got a hunch that Billy might be related somehow to what we're looking for. We need to finish this before they start up that siren again."
"Ooh, or better yet, can you open another of those acid pits under the goat while he's trapped in the dome? Or do you have to see where it's going?"
The soldiers in the tower Maka is attacking focus their fire on her.
The heavy machine gun further to the south keeps firing on the dome, which begins to collapse not long after Fin has escaped down the stairs.
The troops in the trench, without being able to see their targets, begin firing randomly.
Bullets whiz all through the camp, but none of them hit any of you.
No more reinforcements are responding at present as far as you can tell.
Maka's speed and maneuverability continued to allow her to dodge the majority of the soldier's attacks. She barely even felt the rounds that grazed her skin as she launched herself at the machine gunner.
Selena decided on a bold course of action, she casts Ironskin on herself, then shield, then beast shape 2, turning into a white dire tiger that is unusually hard to hit and hurt.
”Quasit! Give me a few moments and I’ll have a distraction! Saki, armor spell please!”
Once she is a terrible beast, she will roar and fly over to the trenches to attract the attention of those soldiers and from within the trenches (so they can’t gang up on her), she will start tearing through people, more to intimidate and terrify and hopefully to make them run or at least be disorganized.
”Can’t buff anyone else, and I have to touch you to teleport you anyway! Unless someone else wants to be a barely protected raging beast?!”
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"Tough," Kalchine comments, a little disconcerted, when it becomes apparent that the people in the watchtower weren't killed by his pillar of divine flame.
But with Maka handling them, he focuses on the men in the trenches.
Moving closer, he summons up a new power he has found but never used.
A Fire Storm erupts in the trenches, engulfing much of them.
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Sakitu cocks her head to the side and scrunches up her face. "Wait, I don't understand Selena. You want to run out there and get all shot at? As a tiger?"
Even though she doesn't quite understand the plan, she prepares to case the Mage Armor spell on Selena.
"Yeah, that's my point!"
Sakitu pulls her hands back. "Wait. Am I casting the spell or not?"
She hears a noise of roaring flames and peeks outside the tent just in time to see giant tongues of fire racing up and down the trenches where the soldiers were hiding. Huge gouts of black, oily smoke swirl and float up into the air.
"Uh. We might not need to worry about the trench anyway."
Bulvi re positioned closer to the icy dome taking cover behind a smaller tent and trying to keep their group more spaced out. He stayed on his toes and alert.
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Quasit growls like a badger over the raging battle with the soldiers. "OK, I guess we're committed now. Saki, Selena, if you have any range spells that can help take out the soldiers in the trench or the towers, then go for it. But stay close together here -- we may need to teleport out quickly."
"I'm going to see if I can get a peek inside that Leader's tent. Maybe the piece of Miroslav is in there. If you see Bulvi or Fin, tell them to keep an eye on that goat-in-a-box, in case he breaks out. I'll be back in a couple minutes."
She takes the edge of her cloak and swoops it around herself dramatically, disappearing into a little cloud of snowflakes.
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Sakitu peeks around the other side of the tent. "Maybe I can stop those soldiers in the trench. Let's see how they like a big blast of fire."
She raises a hand in the direction of the trench. A pea-sized ball of fire shoots from her finger and races across the space to explode into the troop in the trench.
The soldiers in the trench, accustomed to artillery bombardments, have no trouble taking cover from the spell barrage, though they don't recognize an illusion for what it is. Maka kills one of the four soldiers in the guard tower, but another takes up the machine gun and fires on her again
The other soldiers attack her with bayonets.
None of them are effective.
The soldiers in the trench keep up their barrage.
This time both Kalchine and Selena are in areas swept with rifle bullets.
The spotlights to the north and south swing towards the tower Maka is attacking, drawn by all the firey explosions. They search around the ground for a bit, then find Maka and focus on her, though they don't fire with friendlies around her.
Kalchine is hammered by gun fire, left staggered by the impact and wounds.
His military training helps him focus, despite the pain and he sends out a burst of healing energy, not just for himself but for his wounded allies, as well.
He then bolts into the tent with Chest Thumper to get out of sight of the gunmen.
"I know, I know! I don't like them either!" Kalchine replies to the frost ape as it whines in protest.
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The healing energy washes over Sakitu and closes up all her wounds but she barely notices. She peeks around the corner of the tent to where the troop is still hiding in the trench. It seems that none of her magic has been having any effect on them. At least none of the magic that she can cast from a distance. She will have to get closer to use some of her more potent spells. She takes a moment to turn herself invisible and then races to the next tent ahead of her that moves her closer to the trench.
Another soldier mounted the machine gun but fired so wildly that most of the bullets went well above Maka. The other soldiers closed and attempted to skewer her with the blades at the end of their rifles. However, their attempts were so clumsy that Maka barely even had to dodge. Flames engulfed her fists as she lashed out, a toothy grin wide across her face.
Bulvi repositions again while keeping his defense up in case the demonic goat breaks free
You kill the remaining soldiers in the trench and the guard tower just as the goat, taking advantage of a section of the ice dome that had been weakened by taking a volley of bullets, smashes its way back out.
Given what it looks like and how it's acting, Kalchine assumes it is a long shot, but he reaches out with his connection to nature to try to keep the creature from acting.
With the last of the soldier's slain in the tower, Maka again took to the air. Several quick explosions flung her towards the goat with the ghostly lantern. While her aim was true, Maka locked eyes with the goat and couldn't bring herself to smite it. Twisting at the last moment, Maka sent her flames towards the sky and slid to a stop behind the goat.
"Wait, are we sure this isn't just a goat someone tied a magic lantern to!?" Maka yelled to the others.