oh yeah, your new job is definetely gonna occupy more time.
RECAP:
The Efreet hovered toward the mages on a flame surfboard and somewhat perturbed by the ice blasts created the illusion of horrid smoke on the battlefield after moving to engage the fighters followed by a celestial pig.
According to my quick check everyone failed to see through the illusion, so you can only see flamer if he is right next to you.
Everyone knows where he is though.
So Jon moved in on his last position and laid some blade into him, leaving a massive gash across his chest.
Syd is a few steps away, but can easily close from his position.
The mages have a little farther to go.
Cordoba continues circling around the north of the map to see where the others have gone.
Bump
Cordoba looks over the dune to see if he is near his target using his dagger as an improvised mirror.
Cordoba looks over the dune to see if he is near his target using his dagger as an improvised mirror.
They are running away, and making good time at that.
Cordoba breaks cover and moves after the targets as swiftly as he can.
Syd snarls, "Geddoudofit!" as he swings his new claymore in a mighty arc.
Rackham raises his hands in a grand sweeping motion, and a blast of red ice erupts from the ground beneath the efreet, pelting the creature with freezing shards.
Lungs burning with the sulfuric miasma Syd lunges through the heat warped air and slashes the Efreet opening a blazing gash in its thigh.
The strange ring around its neck flares with a white fire. It snarls and spits in an unknown tongue... what are no doubt curses...
Pulsifer's surreal red ice sweeps up over the Efreet and the peccary. Steam fills the air as ice crackles into vapor against the Efreet's skin, staggering it for a moment.
The peccary squeals as ice tears through it.
Aref moves to V7 to keep the flank on the Efreet after the peccary vanishes. Drawing a dagger, he'll fight defensively as a standard action.
Round 3
The Efreet looks like it's on its last legs.
You have it flanked. +2 flanking bonuses.
24 The Deceiver: Init +7 (DEX 16)
20 Aref Sami Sharokh: Init +3 (DEX 16)
19 Sydley Hentooth: Init +2 (DEX 14)
18 Efreeti
18 Rackham Pulsifer: Init +1 (DEX 13)
18 Jon Qiang: Init +1 (DEX 12)
15 Swordsmen
13 Mage
<Shouting.>
"What the fnck is going on and why am I on a camel?"
For Kruelaid
Confirmation Roll 1d20+7=23, 1d6+1=2
The Deceiver emerges from hiding and backstabs the Efreeti.
Disbelieving the Efreet's magics, Cordoba steps through the illusory smoke, coming out behind it with a flanking sneak attack, and a killing blow.
It laughs as space warps around it and it returns to whence it was calle, as does the scimitar, leaving only a whispered word as it evaporates: "...finally."
The smoke clears.
The others have gone, pointing their way, a trail of hurried footprints over the dunes.
Syd:
"Poor bastard," Syd mutters, "Fink we be'er 'ave a word wiv 'is 'employers'..."
Aref moves to V7 to keep the flank on the Efreet after the peccary vanishes. Drawing a dagger, he'll fight defensively as a standard action.
"Good hit, my friend! Ve seem to have ended the creature. Vhere are his comrades?"
Cordoba waves at the tracks... they have fled over the dunes toward Katheer.
"Everyone alright?"
"Everyone alright?"
"Everyone alright?"
"I'm alright, friend. We should follow the efreet's masters."
"Everyone alright?""I'm alright, friend. We should follow the efreet's masters."
I agree. Anyone enslaving a creature such as dat is one to be contenting with. Let us go.
"Forward then!"
Roger that...
"Le's geddem!"
<From Drasheer's hump.>
"Guys? What the frack? Ryor? Remember? Picked the locks? Killed pirates? Lugged s*&@ across the desert? Remember?"
You set off over the dunes on the trail of the Efreet's masters, wondering where Vass has gone and counting the days passed to guess how far ahead Book may be.
Over the sand the three move with the speed of natives, and as the trail moves from shifting dune back into the flat, sharp scrub closer to the river, the trail becomes harder to follow - but their advantage of speed vanishes.
Aref:
Before long you are on the North Road from Katheer to the Inner Sea. Those new to the area are struck by the turns and curves the wheel worn trail takes on such flat land. But before long all quickly see that the trail snakes around gullies and erosion of the Qadr's edge.
The sun creeps down behind you from its burning apex above. You sweat. You drink. Sharp gravel gnaws at your boots, leaping in and slashing your blisters. Still air smothers you, smolders. The horizon quivers behind a curtain of rising heat. The torture is interrupted by breezes that bring short conversations, relieved sighs and sips of the awakening water brought from the temple.
By the time you actually see the Qadr the sun is well behind you.
Aref:
Separating the Hives from the walls, the Wards are an open strip of land outside the walls that hide an arcane barrier to undead and unnamed abominations which inevitably try to creep in from the desert. More obviously it allows wall guardsmen a significant field of fire - it is a defensive buffer where no permanent buildings may be erected and tremendous firepower may be focused from the walls themselves.
Inside the walls the city is built largely on the Qadiran plain but falls off in quarried layers or steps down into the River Qadr’s canyon. The bottommost layers of the city, the docks and the mud domed shacks of those who ply the river rest fearfully on a flood plain that literally sweeps the scum out of Katheer every year. This, no doubt, is where your friends will find their friend Book.
Evening – Pharast 27th, 4708 - River Qadr
Tired from the day's march, you drag your feet through the gravel and dust as the trail bends toward a ledge. Step by step, a breathtaking panorama unfolds.
From the widening road you gaze out over a ledge, across a deep green snake of water cutting through a canyon stacked with curving layers of yellows, reds, and browns. The sight is so beautiful that everyone stops and stares in silence.
River Qadr runs through a canyon cut from rocky plains by eons of annual floods and Katheer was founded to secure trade along it - trade between Casmaron and Avistan. Overlooking the Qadr from a plain in the middle of a desert, the city oversees, supports, regulates and protects all commerce and all travel on the River Qadr. So overwhelming is Katheer's strategic command of the water below that only attack by land is feasible, and that must be made over daunting miles of burning, shifting, sand.
It sobers everyone to think that almost every coin that moves between two continents passes on the water below.
You keep moving...
After staring out over Shat Al Qadr for a time Aref calls for haste so that you can make the outskirts of Katheer by sundown.
Invigorated by your short stop you make speed... until a cloud of dust in the east warns you of riders fast approaching from the very direction you walk.
hide stay on the road
hide stay on the road
Clear as mud. What you guys gonna do with Ryor? Untie him?
"A man who knows his friends. Thanks big guy!"
<Rubbing his wrists.>