Yho Yho goes through a vicious molting during the night filled with horrid nightmares. Upon awaking, he notices that his talons have elongated giving him a 5 ft reach with them. He rushes in joining his allies just in time to make the portal.
You advance quietly and quickly. You can almost feel hostile eyes sliding over your hiding selves. You work your way up the ravine for perhaps half an hour brie you come to your first obstacle. The Cabal has dammed the steam that used to flow down this gully, probably to prevent it from supplying the Sanctuary. Your problem is that you need to find a way over or around it without making to much of a fuss. You're practically in the middle of the beseiging force and enemy forces are Everywhere.
Frist hisses and claws the muddy ground silently in frustration.
"Looks like we need a distraction so the others can slip away."
At Frist's assertion of the need for a distraction Yho Yho chuckles a bit.
♫"All those that can self-resurrect, and thus get a plausible shot at escaping said distraction raise a paw or wing..."♫
He raises his wing and pretends to be shocked that no one else does and smirks.
♫"Well, it seems I have drawn the short straw...more exactly, I believe I AM the short straw!"♫
"I can go scout and come back, should it be needed."
"I can stay stealthy, but I doubt any better than Ard, and I' m not a teleporter, though I can take to the sky. This might be a situation calling for more subtlety than brute force; not my specialty, exactly..."
Frist snorts quietly.
"I can move pretty quickly in the air for a short period of time. Enough to get past these main front-line troops at least if there is a distraction. I can probably give someone small enough a ride while doing so, but I can't guarantee anyone's safety while doing it. I could cull plenty of troops with my fire, but I would be targeted and overwhelmed quickly once I was noticed. Invisibility would be easier in my case since I'm so large, but I didn't think of that in advance."
As the group gets within view of the Dam, Ardwellyn takes a look at it to see how hard he thinks it would be to destroy.
It's made of stone and large logs.
♫"Well, if our current spot seems clandestine enough, or we can find such an area-AND have an hour to spare,I can finally get my daily meditaion in and come up with some appropriate divine incantations from the blessed Dawnflower..."♫
"I think we should destroy the dam."
The current spot is under a slight overhang and in a depression carved by a now-dry waterfall. It's secluded enough, though staying for more than a couple hours would probably be unwise. It's highly likely that this ravine is periodically patrolled.
Frist looks at the dam and shrugs his muscled shoulders.
"I could light the dam on fire of course, but I don't know if I can do enough damage to take it out in one hit. Anything other than that and we would be asking for trouble. The water flow is dammed from this side? Could the enemy have set up the dam to fail in order to trap troops trying to come out like us? If so, we can simply use that...but how do we set it off without us being discovered and either trapped or drowned?"
"If all we need is a distraction, a fireball or two might do it, but then you'd need to fly back to us unseen-- might be hard, and if they spot you, they might see us all. It'd be harder to set up the distraction maybe, but I think Ard might have the better shot at escaping back to us successfully."
"Agreed, as I do not need to breath, which means that I can go break the dam and retreat using teleportation magic."
Ard uses his natural abilities to bypass most of the guards he sees going up to the dam. The dam itself is rather lightly guarded and it's a simple thing to slip down into the water. It's pitch black here, but Ard is not from this world and the darkens only causes minor inconveniences.
Ard, how do you plan to break the dam?
Others, will you assist him somehow, or just wait for everything to go to pieces, literally.
Drawing his blade, Ardwellyn teleports directly against the base of the dam at the bottom of the lake and begins chopping at the dam.
It takes a long time. Like, hours. You're just starting to wonder if this idea could work when something moves just enough. The result is nothing short of cataclysmic. Water rushes forward from the splintering dam preceded by a rush of wind! Rocks and lose debris are swept up by the rushing water and it threatens to take you along for the ride as well!
If Frist can reach, he will try to grab Abrasax with his long tail.
The water is a force unlike anything you've felt before. It hits you like a stone wall and drags you along whether you like it or not! Both Ard and Frist are caught up, only to be saved by Mar! The Unicorn plants his hooves and uses his proud horn to scoop his allies from the water! Frist snatches the alchemist Abrasax from the water as he is being hauled up and you all survive, if only by the slimmest of margins!
The destruction of the dam is just the distraction you needed. As you head on through the deep canyon that was under water just minutes ago you can see hordes of undead rushing to the site. You barely squeeze though the hole before they arrive and thus slip through their clutches.
It takes two days to make your way through the rear of the siege and into the mountains. They rise black and imposing as you near, full of sharp cliffs and stunted trees.
Abrasax takes the lead here and it takes you two more days to reach the narrow valley with the specialist ingredients you need to cure your ailing dragon friend.
You don't have to look long before you find them... and the guardian the Cabal has send to secure it. The plant you need grows in a grove beside a spring high on the northern face of the valley. Curled around the entire grove is a rotted corpse of a kind of lizard-like demon. the stream flows through it's body and the entire valley shows signs of it's corruption.
Lagging slightly behind, Yho Yho slips through the opening and gets dragged by the water. He teleports out of it just a few feet over the shore and rejoins his party.
Upon seeing the rotting corpse he casts Hedging Weapons, and two shimmering scimitars made of divine force appear and begin circling around him.
Frist's form flickers as he activates one of his new Magical Tatoos, which quickly disappears as the magic is used up.
"I do not recognize the demon, but we should move it's body to prevent it's taint from spreading so virulently." says Ardwellyn, who then does just that.
Ard approaches, goes to lift the body, and a half-decomposed demon head, with all of its teeth stop in tact, whips around and strikes at him!
The monster tries to hold him, but he flinches free.
The monster rears up and great, leathery wings unfold. Huge feet impact the ground as a Zombie Demon that also looks like a horrible Zombie Dragon makes its presence known!
Frist leaps into the air, and races past the zombie thing!
Ardwellyn, veteran of the many wars that are fought between the forces of the demons and the hosts of heaven, was prepared for such tricks, but he did not expect the creature to rise as an undead.
Drawing his blade, he swings his blade at it.
Mar swoops in behind Frist, propelling himself forward as fast as he can in the drake-wake, and barreling headfirst, well Horn-first, into the demon's face!
The party dives into combat with wild abandon and all their strikes are true! The Dragon roars and fell magic radiates from it's voice!
Mar recoils in fear, while attempting to overcome the imposing might of the dragon beast...
Attacks
Damage
Flyby attack!
A few hits, a few misses, and one savage fight in the making! The Dragon unleashes a flurry of attacks, aiming two at each of you!
Mar and Ard both get a claw! Frist almost gets blasted by a gust of wind from its wings! The turbulence, though not strictly harmful, still plays havoc with his flight!
Frist tumbles through the air, blasted by his enemy's attack.
Regaining his stability, Frist roars at the draconic abomination.
"False dragon! Corrupted corpse! Face me! You would fight me in the air like a true dragon would, if you were even half of what you were originally!"
That this being was suffused with evil energy vexed Ardwellyn, but he knew now was not the time to dwell on such matters; instead, he focused on the battle at hand, as he had since the time of his creation.
Still shaken by the intimidating presence of the guardian, Mar focuses on the fact that it's undead, pretending it's just another skeletal warrior, and not a giant monster of Doom. Holding his ground, he Attacks with fury, holding nothing back.
Attacks
Damage
The zombie dragon spares a glance up at frist as he defends against the onslaught from Ard and Mar. He huffs. A Dragonkin claiming draconic rights. How mundane.
Mar gets about half of his attacks through, while Ard's practiced strokes both land due to his lifetimes of experience! The strokes seem to be less effective than they should be, maybe because of this thing's truly massive scale.
The monster rears up and breathes corruption down upon Mar and Ard! Frist is flying up above the torrent, so he is spared. Mar, Ard, you feel your bodies and souls being suffused with filth and corruption! Make a DC 20 Fort save for half of this damage!