Valeros winces as the flaming arrows hit home but continues his flight. He sets Kyra down on the cliff-top, then flies over to the devil and takes the fearsome, beautiful creature by the arm. "Come with me, my bruised beauty," he says, flying with her towards the solid ground of the cliff and removing any weapons she still carries.
The devil calmly flies on Valeros' arm back to the cliff and hands over her +1 longsword.
Veleros, you are injured! Do you require healing?
Valeros swipes his hand across a still-burning ember on the leather sleeve of his doublet, then pats the burned area until it is just smoking gently, before responding to Kyra. "Yeah, she's an oddly lovely one, but her kisses do sting! I wouldn't say no to being patched back together a bit."
"I was the concubine of Haliduras. I was fleeing Rachikan to get reinforcements to defeat the city's automated defenses when I spotted your ship. You posed a threat to Haliduras and the Aspis so I decided to deal with you first."
"I have cooperated. Now let me go."
"Not so fast, my lovely," responds Valeros. "Tell us more about these...what did you call them, otter-mated defenses? What are they? What were you going to get to defeat them? What other dangers await us in Rachikan?"
"Automated," the devil clarifies. "There are statues down there that can fight back."
Kyra will silently listen to the line of questioning while finding her Wand of Cure Light Wounds after a bit of a search. Healing Valeros, she taps him a number of times with the wand.
There, good as new. she says to herself.
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With a raised eyebrow Lindum considers the winged devil. He draws his unholy symbol of Asmodeus, casually holding it in his left hand for the Erinye to see.
"A question for you, Fury. I will cast dismissal upon you and release you from this mortal plane provided you answer truthfully. This is my deal, and I always keep my word.
Is Eldis still alive?"
The erinyes looks Lindum in the eyes and responds, "I honestly do not know who that is."
Lindum then dismisses the devil back to Hell.
A plume of thick, black smoke chokes out the horizon to the north. Sounds of clanking, banging, and chanting echo in the distance. Many emaciated figures in ragged clothing work furiously around a large wooden building. A single patrol of armed men direct the camp’s activity.
You notice 20 slaves buzzing about, erecting tents, working on the wooden building, and doing many other smaller tasks. A single patrol of armed guards secures the campsite.
There are four guards with heavy maces and longbows wearing chain shirts and light wooden shields. There is a man of obviously higher rank with a bastard sword and chain mail. All five of the men wear bronze badges.
Valeros studies the lay of the land for a moment, then says, ”Let’s do this quick and dirty. We’ll get as close as we can behind that screen of bushes, then charge them. If our magic-using friends can lend strength to me and Raph as we do the messy work, it’ll all be over that much faster. I think Raphael and I should target the commander if we can get to him, and if the others get in our way, maybe someone else can take him down from a distance, and we’ll finish him as quick as we can. Everyone got it?”
Once everyone agrees to the plan, Valeros moves toward the camp, attempting to keep out of the line of sight of the guards. When he’s close, or when he’s spotted, he moves quickly in and attacks.
EDIT: Then again, Prayer has a 40' radius burst centered on me. Pretty big area.
Valeros charges into the camp, catching the guards off-guard! He slices into the first one he can reach!
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Raphael surges with speed and moves up beside Valeros to help dispatch the first guard.
move 60' to the square on the east of Valeros, strike guard w/ PA and fighting defensively, swift action go into Crane Stance, free action release one hand from sword
attack vs guard
damage
AC-35
hp-66/66
hasted, fighting defensively, Crane Stance
Raphael moves in and finishes off the first guard before any of the Aspis even know what's going on. They are quick to respond however and begin to press the attack as the slaves panic and run away from the commotion.
The boss moves up to hit Valeros, drawing his bastard sword along the way.
The other guards draw their bows and aim for the invaders.
Valeros takes a hard hit from the captain, but his soldier's arrows whistle past harmlessly. Valeros then attacks the captain with a blade in each hand, the speed of his movements magically enhanced so that he appears to be surrounding by a shimmering cloud of flashing steel.
With four quick strikes, Valeros drops the boss to the ground.
Kyra elects to join the frey, seeing that Valeros has already downed the boss. She move to flank Guard #2 with Valeros and attack with her scimitar.
Weiman helps Valeros out and Kyra draws her scimitar to wade into battle. She is unable to break through the man's armor, though.
Bruxo pops up from behind a bush and covers two of the guards with glitter, blinding them. As they are still trying to reorient themselves, Lindum brings down a ball of fire on them.
And they both burn to a crisp. The final guard, seeing the dead bodies of his childhood friends about him, drops his sword and puts his hands in the air in surrender.
"Please, stop! I don't know what you want! The boss' half-brother is down below! Haliduras! Down in the city! They're having trouble getting rid of the ancient guardians. We've got reinforcements coming, you know!"
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Weiman digs around in his bag of Holding and adds some dialogue. He adopts a gravelly voice familiar to Bruxo. "Reinforcements? There ain't gonna be no reinforcements." He shoves his head into the bag and comes out wearing a rubber clown mask. He promptly drops the act and let's everyone else get back to interrogating him.
-Posted with Wayfinder
What else is down in the city? How many of your men are with this Haliduras?
The man is a bit off-put by Weiman but responds to Kyra just the same. "There are eleven more people inside with Haliduras," he says motioning towards the building. "I don't know how many are up here and how many are down below."
Valeros looks startled as Weiman briefly turns into a crazy clown, then laughs aloud and says, "You should answer my Shoanti friend quickly and truly, or we might just give you to the clown to answer his questions..."
Growing a bit impatient at the questioning, he takes a look around the camp, then calls out to the slaves, "Hey! We won't hurt you! What's in that building there?"
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Lindum strides up to the last guard, smirking at Weiman's impersonation. He turns to the Aspis slaver. "Greetings sir. My regrets about this terrible mess, but I'm sure no further violence is necessary. My friend here would like to know what is in that building and I am curious if by chance you know a gentleman by the name of Eldis. Once we get the information we require, you can be on your merry way."
"No, no, never heard of Eldis. The building holds the mineshaft that goes down. Way down. We use carts to get down there. There's more guard in there. Please, please, let me go now."