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Malen smiled as Pharasma's grace got everyone looking better once again, though his eyes hardened as the gargoyle moved next to him. As the creatures burst through the doors, the priest found his body under assault through fell magic. He struggled for a moment, his limbs starting to grow sluggish, but managed to throw off the effects.
Seeing that Kalem and Bashiel were reliably cutting down the dangerous gargoyles, but unsure of what the new things even were, Malen took a step back from the gargoyle next to him and held his holy symbol aloft, calling down holy fire on the two creatures.
Ilsa delivers a couple solid strikes on the orange gargoyle. The creature barely stands, but then the woman stares at the gargoyle and the creature falls dead, hits the roof and rolls all down to the bottom ground.
Cinnabar steps to the side and effectively cuts at the gargoyle fighting Bashiel. Her sabertooth explodes with sonic reverberation as it vibrates with Zamanda's song.
Zamanda brings extra healing with her song.
With the orange one down, Kalem slashes at the blue gargoyle that clawed him in the back. After the third successful strike of his scythe, the gargoyle falls to the balcony defeated.
Bashiel manages to hover landing in the ground crontrolledly and completes Cinnabar's job killing the gargoyle with three slashes.
Malen's column of fire descends on the new comers. The flames seem to be totally harmless to them, but the divine power still causes some damage on them. Zamanda's song slightly heals the cleric.
The remaining skeleton minotaurs keep shooting at Ilsa.
But both shots go wide.
The gargoyles hover with great ease and keep trying on Kalem.
But the barbarian beast totem and his magical shield keep him well protected.
The purple gargoyle presses on Malen.
The creature cuts through the cleric's arms and stabs its horns on his neck.
While the green one hovers next to Bashiel.
And the spiritual knight dodges all of the attacks but one claw that makes a small scratch at his right leg.
Observing the effectiveness of his magic, the red devil shots again scorching rays at Zamanda "Focus on the singer brother, I despise her lively music"
Both rays strike true burning the aasimar.
The other one points to a place between Bashiel and Malen and uses unholy blight "Let's shut down that discording voice. I cannot suffer it neither"
Cinnabar seems to ignore the full of the coiling miasma, but Bashiel, Malen and particularly Zamanda suffer under it.
Bashiel pushes through the foul miasma, gritting his teeth, then steps forward. The spellcasters were proving more and more dangerous, but the gargoyles could also tear through his less well armored allies. He decides to tackle the closest threat first, hoping that the others would be able to endure another few seconds of fiendish spells.
He stabs the green gargoyle in rapid succession, seeking weak points.
Finding himself surrounded, Kalem spun on his heal and let loose a barrage of attacks at the one enemy who was alone. Between dodging, parrying, and attacking, he didn't have time to make any witty one-liners. Which was just as well, as it was too hard to come up with a good one when his attention was better used elsewhere.
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Bashiel fights back the unholy blight, then cuts through the creature with a good succession of attacks, one of them going deep the heart of the creature that falls dead after the third attack.
On the other side of the battlefield Kalem cuts down another gargoyle in three parts that fall to the roof and roll to the ground down below still burning in infernal flames.
Malen cursed in frustration as the gargoyle continued to get past his defenses, his heart stopping as he saw Zamanda fall under the onslaught of the devils. His keen eye saw that her chest still rose, and as her eyes opened with awareness he called upon Pharasma to try to keep her and the others upright, knowing that his allies continuing the onslaught against their attackers was the best way out of this mess.
Malen suffers half the unholy blight due to his balanced Pharasman neutrality.
Overtaken by the black miasma Zamanda plummets to the ground, her inspiring song ceasing to help.
As her song ends, Malen, Cinnabar and the same Zamanda are suddenly healed.
Cinnabar slides over the balcony stabbing deeply effectively on the gargoyle's belly.
Fortunately for everyone Ilsa manages to avoid damaging herself when she stumbles with the dead gargoyles.
Zamanda stands up from prone renewing her song as she does.
Malen raises again his holy symbol channeling more positive energy while excluding the enemies still alive.
The remaining skeleton minotaurs shot at Ilsa from the southeastern battlements.
The bolts only manage to shatter one of the illusory images around the mesmerist.
The black gargoyle easily hovers over Kalem while insisting to defeat him.
The tangle of claws surprises Kalem only once, with a scratch on his face.
The purple one kees its assault on Malen.
But this time the cleric is well readied and blocks most of the attacks, only one claw opening a gash on the arm holding the holy symbol.
"This pale hummingbird is most pervasive" the red fang-filled creature in the door growls while raising again his arm to shot more rays of fire on Zamanda.
Both rays again burn Zamanda with hellish flames.
The other one raises his hands and a grid of energy bursts in between Zamanda and Cinnabar with yellow lines of power. Bashiel seems comfortable with the risen order around him, while Zamanda again suffers the most.
The gargoyle seems also affected by the magic although not at full.
Zamanda collapses again, and this time she stays down.
Malen shrugged off the spell, the creature's spell feeling as though his mind was trying to grow more rigid and conforming to...something. Some ideal. Not really understanding what had happened, the priest saw Zamanda go down once again. Growing frustrated as the gargoyle next to him continued to harass him and the warriors of the party got bogged down in their fights, he yelled, "Does anyone know what those things are?", pointing to the newest arrivals to the battle.
Appalled at the frightful magic bringing Zamanda to the brink of death, Bashiel realizes that there'll be little chance of Malen healing her unless the demonic creatures are busy. He rushes over to interpose himself in front of both of them. With an angry "In Osiris' name, begone." he strikes at the green fiend, his rapier blazing into green-gold light right before it arcs inward.
With his back to the wall and a plethora of enemies in front of him, Kalem just swung his scythe for all he was worth. The scythe blazed with even more fire as he lost himself in the carnage.
Zamanda resists the spell but nevertheless collapses while Malen tries to figure out what the creatures are.
Bashiel marks one of the devils for punishment and brings his sword powerfully on it.
His sword cuts clean causing a terrible pain that leaves momentarily dazed the creature, but as he lowers his blade he painfully stabs himself on some of the devils barbs.
With rageful slices to one side and another, Kalem tears the gargoyle in front into four pieces, cleaning the way into the middle of the balcony.
His companions being too busy with their respective fights to provide feedback, Malen gritted his teeth and tried to go around Cinnabar to get to Zamanda, thinking the gargoyle would probably make him pay for the move.
Once there, the priest converted one of his blessings into potent healing magic, reaching down and touching the unconscious woman's arm to transfer the energy to her.
Cinnabar cuts deep with her sabers on the gargoyle, slicing one arm then delivering a killing blow on the heart of the beast that falls to the balcony dead.
With the gargoyle dead, It is easy for Malen to reach Zamanda and bring her back to consciousness.
Ilsa stares at the devil in the door and commands a powerful magic to make the devil thing of his death. But the magic is unable to crack the natural resistance to magic of the creature and the spell fails to invade its head.
The remaining skeleton minotaurs shot at Ilsa from the southeastern battlements.
The first minotaur manages to put a bolt in between Ilsa's images, while the other shatters another image, leaving only two behind.
The devil smited by Bashiel remains dazed unable to react.
"Ah! You will pay for what you have done to my brother!" the other devil attacks Bashiel with rage.
The devil laughs as he tears Bashiel with his claws, grabbing him and pushing him against the barbs in his body. The barbs impale the paladin who protected by his aura of courage does not feel any fear despite the scaring power of the attack "Why are you not scared human!" does the devil say surprised.
Caught by the devil, Bashiel focuses on his connection to Osiris to heal his wounds. Many of his more severe slashes seal up, though he's still left looking rather unpleasantly scarred by the spikes.
Although the red devil is keeping a grip on him, Bashiel largely ignores it to deliver righteous punishment to the green devil. His connection to Osiris empowers his strikes against it. He delivers a rapid flurry, aiming for the least bony parts. "I will never be afraid of your kind, fiend." He mutters out as he strikes.
Seeing Bashiel getting the glory of taking down the real foe, Kalem swung far too hastily at the creatures in front of him. Then, realizing that there was no point feeling jealous of something so petty, he returned his attention to his own fight. His follow up blows were much more focused.
Waking up on the ground, looking up into Malen's worried face, Zamanda realizes that she has once again been pulled back from the brink of death. She dismisses her urge to run away, trying to be the good person that would stay and support her fellows as Malen is obviously doing.
She stands up with her bow in hand and once again begins to sing.
Bashiel feels the spirits at his back while his wounds disappear, and with great resolve he counter attacks. The devil makes his best to block one attack, but the rapier finds prey killing the creature with the last pounding.
Zamanda stands up once more as a symbol of true resistance against the evilness around! Like a ray of hope her voice, which the devils wanted to silence, resumes greater and holier than ever!
Ilsa cracks the barbed devil's magical protections, cursing him with bad omens.
Seeing the doorway well under control Kalem takes flight in his rage, flapping his wings to reach the eastern battlements where he strikes strong on the red skeleton minotaur, breaking a lot of bones.
Malen comes into the help of Bashiel, whispering resting words as he attempts to touch the devil with gentle rest.
The alive creature is left staggered by the coldness
The skeletons step back and shot at their new friend.
But their bolts all go wide and fail to reach Kalem.
Unable to full attack, the devil decides to keep its grapple on Bashiel.
Despite the impaling barbs, this is not enough to fully defeat Bashiel, leaving the creature exposed to the party's combined might.
Finding himself alone against two gigantic skeletons, Kalem used a flap of his wings to force himself towards the opponents without any hesitation. The sheer amount of magic coursing through him was intoxicating. It came from so many different sources. His bloodline. The Shoanti charms. Zamanda's arcane might. He felt invincible as his flaming scythe cut a swath of destruction. It was a feeling that he never wanted to end.
The painful barbs don't slow Bashiel's counterattack by much. He grits his teeth, reverses his grip on his rapier and stabs down in succession, trying to find the core of the fiend beyond all the bony protrusions.
When his awkward strikes find little purchase in the devil's body, he calls again upon his connection to Osiris for healing.
Zamanda continues to sing while she takes a moment to steady her shot and then uses her Seeker Arrow ability to shoot at the Red Devil.
Seeker Arrow (Su) [At 4th level, an arcane archer can launch an arrow at a target known to him within range, and the arrow travels to the target, even around corners. Only an unavoidable obstacle or the limit of the arrow’s range prevents the arrow’s flight. This ability negates cover and concealment modifiers, but otherwise the attack is rolled normally. Using this ability is a standard action (and shooting the arrow is part of the action). An arcane archer can use this ability once per day at 4th level, and one additional time per day for every two levels beyond 4th, to a maximum of four times per day at 10th level.]
(Inspire, point blank, bullseye shot)
(acid, cold, sonic, inspire, point blank)
True or just a feeling, Kalem's scythe shatters the bones of one of the large skeletons only before totally destroying the other, leaving himself with no more enemies in the battlements. From his position he is able to see a small door inside the tower that gives entrance to the higher section to the west.
Bashiel's wounds divinely heal as he makes a blessing to Osiris. His attacks fall short due to the strong grab of the devil.
Zamanda's arrow strikes true in the devil but only the sonic damage affects him aside from a small part of the arrow.
Ilsa attempts to curse the devil, and this time she manages to really crack the devil's magical resistance.
Observing Bashiel's bad state, Malen decides to step back and raises his holy symbol channeling energy and healing the closest team members but excluding the enemies.
No longer staggered, the devil releases his grab on Bashiel to fully attack the paladin.
But cursed as it is, it totally fails to scratch the well trained man.
Zamanda, seeing that the danger seemed largely past, and that her bow was largely ineffective against the remaining creature, continues to sing to support her friends in finishing off the last enemies, and starts shooting arrows into the fallen foes, trying to ensure that none of them would ever get up again.
Buoyed by the sight of his allies standing strong once more, Bashiel tries to finish off the devil.
Unable to get within striking distance, Kalem merely unfolded his wings and took to the sky, landing behind Bashiel.
Zamanda's inspiring words keep boosting the party performance while her arrows ensure there are no surprises with the fallen enemies.
Unhindered by the released grapple, Bashiel stabs his rapier twice in the barbed devil, one of the times going deep into its vitals. As this ones is not smited, the blade does not pierce as easily as with the previous one. The creature does also seem resistant to the acid of his gloves.
With each strike, the barbs offer retaliation against Bashiel attacks.
While Kalem flies back to the group, Ilsa once more cracks the magic resistant and curses the devil.
The devil looks at you aggressively "I could destroy you all now, but Nihil requires me. If you are clever you will flee away and never come back to this fortress"
That said, the devil steps back and suddenly disappears, even for those of you able to see invisible creatures.
None of the enemies seems to have any equipment, besides the minotaur skeletons crossbows.
Inside the building you can see a hallway with many doors and some stairs going down.
This dark hallway is made even gloomier by the presence of thick sheets of cobwebs that hang from above and drifts of dust and fragments of bone on the floor below. Portraits hang askew on the walls, but all of their subjects have been lost to a layer of mold and grime.
One of the ruined portraits is in fact not ruined at all, and its subject is singularly disturbing: you see yourself being beheaded by Kazavon himself. One blink later, the portrait reverts to its true state—a moldy sheet of ruined canvas on which no details can be discerned.
Bashiel holds his rapier at the ready for a few more moments, but as it becomes clear that the fiend's teleportation took it far away, he whips the blade to the side to clear it and turns back to the team. "Teleported. Likely to Nihil, whoever that might be. Although it warned us to flee, I'd say that only makes me more sure that we should press our advantage. How is everyone? That was quite the welcoming party."
As he speaks, he peeks inside the hallway to the north.
"Pleasant place." He scowls at the paintings on the walls. "Considering that Serithial's poem spoke of one guardian 'waiting high in tower cold', I'd say we should sweep across this level first before going down. One of these towers might hold the infernal soul we're looking for." He looks up to the central glass-enclosed room. "Unless that was the elven spirit."
Zamanda stops singing, and after checking the bodies for valuables (unsuccessfully, since they have no equipment), she goes up to Malen and thanks him for keeping her alive.
I know I would be dead were it not for you. Thank you. I owe you.
Kalem’s wings evaporated, his claws retracted and the glow in his eyes went out. The tiefling, covered in sweat and breathing heavily, sat down with his back against a wall and tried to catch his breath. With a weary smile he said ”Well, that was fun.”
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With the enemies defeated, Ilsa looks on Zamanda with concern.
"I am uninjured, but you took the brunt of their attack when they came out those doors. I guess you're okay," she says as Zamanda regathers strength.
When Bashiel discusses pressing their advantage, she says "I agree. We may have all kinds of reinforcements coming now that they know we're here."
An exhausted Kalem laughed. "Good! That saves us the trouble of hunting them all down and it means fewer ambushes."
Yep, I'll be okay. We might want to teleport inside the building next time though. That was... too many at once.
Expecting more trouble, Bashiel briefly stows his weapon to bring out his new spellcasting rod. It takes him half a minutes to prepare and recharge his spells. . He takes up his arms afterward.
"Agreed Zamanda. Maybe we can work out some innocuous room inside here that no one would think to guard." He points inside the central block of the massive castle. "In the mean time though, let's find ourselves an infernal soul."
Bashiel leads the way inside, eyes open for any traps. Considering the layout he saw while still flying, he heads eastward, curious if the tower to the northeast might be the lair of the first guardian.
Assuming he doesn't come across any, he opens the first door inside to the south-east, and then if there's nothing interesting inside, the door to the east into the vaguely trapezoid shaped structure.
The group takes a short respite to recover. Bashiel drinks many potions until he feels his belly full.
This room contains a wealth of ruined crates, rotten firewood, moldy barrels, and other mundane supplies that are long past their prime.
Touching the area, you reveal a secret door in the west wall. The stone door seems locked and protected by abjuration feint auras.
Bashiel continues opening doors after seeing there is no one in the first room.
A few shelves line the walls of this room, holding a modest collection of books and scrolls. A table with a comfortable, velvet-lined chair stands between the chamber’s arrow slits. The melted stumps of two thick candles rest upon it. Two arrow slits to the east have rotting shutters that no longer serve to keep the damp out of the room.
Though not overly interested in literature, Kazavon did keep a small collection of writings. The books here have been strangely well maintained, but still feel brittle to the touch. Most are historical and geographical works relevant 7 centuries ago, from which you could learn much about the history of Belkzen, Ustalav, and even the reign of the Whispering Tyrant.
While others inspect the books, you move on to the next room, completely clearing the eastern area of this level.
This bedroom’s contents are in shambles. A partially ruined circle of arcane marks has been inscribed on the floor in blood.
The arcane marks on the floor are a magic circle that was used in the conjuration of devils via planar binding, although it no longer functions. This was the abode of a powerful wizard who probably conjured some of the devils that attacked you in your arrival.
The circle have not been used in a long time.
Tailing along with the group, Zamanda casts detect magic in each room so she can more easily see any magical signatures and looks around carefully.
(pass)
(pass)
Zaranna finds a secret door in the first room, which she points out to the others, and a hollowed out book and some scrolls in the library.
Looks like that hidden door is locked and also has a magical aura... might be a trap?
Kalem nodded in appreciation to Zamanda’s talents. He’d been looking to see if any of the books had any pictures, which was much less useful to the group. ”Can it be disarmed?”
"Assuming that the secret door doesn't lead anywhere dangerous, this room might be a good place to teleport to on repeat visits. Doesn't look like anyone comes through here." Bashiel speaks of D4. "As for the secret door, the 'smash through it' plan hasn't failed us yet. Though Zamanda, if you're able to give it a more subtle attempt first, that'd be appreciated."
When Zamanda points out the cache of valuables in the library, Bashiel gathers up the items and distributes them to interested parties. In the ransacked bedroom, Bashiel's lips tighten at the circle of blood surrounded by arcane marks. "Maybe something related to teleportation? I don't know."
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Kalem smirked at that. ”Tough enough to take on the world. Expendable enough to be allowed to try. I think that I should make some business cards.”
The secret door actually proofs quite difficult, and it takes half a minute before Zamanda finally manages to force the lock.
The secret chamber’s walls are lined with lead; the room was used by Kazavon to store various rare components and item crafting tools. Within is a roll top desk holding numerous rare spell components (of which 9,000 gp in gems and diamond dust remain usable) and sheaves of fine parchment and powders for making ink (these have all decayed to uselessness).
Leaning against the desk is an apparently mundane walking stick that quickly rings as magical when using detect magic in the room.
With the eastern side covered you move to the central and western rooms.
This sparsely furnished chamber appears to be a guardroom with a single table, two chairs, and a tarnished brazier. Hanging above the table is a bronze gong and striker.
You find barbs in between some of the tiles. The devils you half-defeated must have been guarding in this room, but apparently they moved in an out without opening the door.
A trapdoor in the corner leads up, to the tower where the banshee was guarding the fortress.
A single ruined table sits in a heap in the center of this otherwise barren room. A gleaming red metal glaive has been impaled into the wood of the western door and wedged into a crack in the floor.
The western door to this room is wedged shut from the inside by the glaive that pings as magical.
This is a +2 glaive.
The glaive that is wedging the door shut has, over the many years, become infused with infernal energies left behind by the barbed devils that were slaughtered in the castle when Mandraivus stormed Scarwall. As long as the castle curse remains active, this weapon is an unwieldy glaive, but once the curse is lifted, it becomes a regular +2 glaive.
The glaive still can be used as a +2 glaive despite the curse.
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Ilsa chuckles at Kalem's jest, despite the dark circumstances.
"You're not expendable to me," she assures him with a pat on his massive arm.
Ilsa watches Zamanda do her work, and is always impressed with the woman's skill. She tries to make use of her own as they find a few magical items, but there is something about the intellect of magic that has always failed the mesmerist.
My magic is intuitive--I have no idea what these things do.
"Zamanda, you'll have to make yourself useful once again. I can't tell what these do."