"Worth a try!" Astraden shouts over. "Tie the rope to Eben's ankle or something and lob him up."
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Eben looks nonplussed. "Does nobody in this group have something as basic as a ten-foot pole? Is 'lob the performer' our default go-to option?"
"...Haven't we used magic to see invisible things before? I could have sworn I choked down one of Carina's concoctions for that purpose just a couple of days ago."
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
"Sure, that's valid too. Anything that doesn't involve me being hurled at potential large, heavy objects."
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Tanith does a few throwing preparation stretches.
"Well, if you give me a minute, I could rework my healing extract into one that lets you see through illusions."
Carina kneels down on her pillar and begins rendering her healing extract inert with the use of a few neutralizing agents.
Carina is able to work unmolested.
"Alright--all done!" Carina holds up an extract of grey fluid. "Who needs it?"
"I can look around the best, in case they hid actual hidden doors and stuff behind the invisibility."
Farrukh drinks the potion.
The world is awash in fiery light. Farrukh scans the room, but he doesn't see any obvious invisible pillars.
He does notice something much smaller, though. Next to Tanith's foot on the wide pillar, a faint orange glow emanates. An arrow points to the center of the column. And as he looks closer, he realizes that there is another Seal of Law-shaped indentation there—much more cleverly hidden than the one on the door.
"Well, would you look at that. Sorry, you could if you'd drunk the potion I guess."
Farrukh inserts the Seal.
The pillar begins to rise. At first it moves slowly. Then it starts to accelerate, rising rapidly towards the ceiling.
"Bye Farrukh!" Astraden yells from her place at the room's entrance.
"Oh my heavens!" Carina jumps back in shock as the pillar starts rising!
She then races forward, trying to jump on the pillar before it finishes rising up...
"See you on the other side!"
Just to be safe, though, Farrukh drops on his back, curls up a bit, and braces his shield above him.
"Wait, don't you want to be brought back?"
Eben makes absolutely no effort to jump on board the pillar. "So... yeah, if it doesn't smash you into pulp, send it back down for me!" he calls after the rising trio.
Tanith braces himself when the pillar flies through the air.
Carina clears the gap and lands upon the pillar just as it rises out of reach. The pillar ascends into the clouds. This time, no lightning activates.
They speedily soar towards the marble ceiling. Just when they're about to hit, their vision goes dark. A moment later, the darkness passes, and they find themselves in a chamber above.
The chamber they find themselves in is modestly sized, but has a very high ceiling: nearly sixty feet high. The room is lit by elongated metal lanterns that glow with the colors of the rainbow. A white marble sarcophagus floats in the air at the far end of the room, ten feet off the floor. The sarcophagus bottom is carved with an image of a sleeping Wind Duke, two swords resting on its chest and a winged helmet at its feet.
The walls are carved to depict a funeral procession that winds up in a spiral, showing Wind Dukes, djinni, air elementals, and other elemental servants of Law in mourning as they attend the body of a fallen general. After the first spiral, the upper sections show the general's ascension into a primal vortex of wind and thunder. Many-eyed abominations, frog-like humanoids, and spider-like demons are trampled beneath his feet as he rises into a golden doorway at the end of the fresco.
Tanith, Carina and Farrukh are not alone.
Only Farrukh immediately realizes this.
First, the kolyarut is there. Its illuminated shape stands at the very far end of the room. Its sword is not drawn, but it appears to be watching the party intently. It doesn't seem immediately interested in attacking.
Second, there is a horrendous monster standing on top of the sarcophagus. It does.
The demon blinks a hundred eyes at once. The thing's eyes are in its head, its neck, its shoulders, and tiny rolling eyes in its fingertips. A massive, wicked-looking blade is clutched in one eye-covered claw.
Just as Farrukh tries to shout out a warning, he feels his body freezing up. He stares into those many eyes, and an agonizing force presses upon him from all sides. He feels like a lump of coal in a diamond press.
"How long should we wait before going after them?" Rodrigo asks Astraden.
Farrukh feels his body seizing up, but a surge of effort aids him in fighting it off.
"Invisible demon on top of the sarcophagus! It almost paralyzed me when I looked at it!" Farrukh calls.
"That Kolyarut's here too, but it doesn't seem hostile!"
Farrukh crawls up off the floor, Studies the beast, averts his gaze, and readies an attack for if the creature gets close.
In response to Farrukh's calling out of the invisible demon, Carina stares at the floor and chugs a shield extract with one hand while handing another one off to Tanith.
Eben studies the risen pillar from where he is. "Well, there wasn't any sound of agonized screaming as their flesh was pulverized into a bloody paste, so they must have made it through!" He begins bouncing south along the path to the others.
Tanith takes the offered extract and chugs it, wary of invisible paralyzing demons.
Out of the corner of his eye, Farrukh sees the demon's form contract, refract, and multiply. It suddenly becomes slightly harder to avoid looking at it.
Meanwhile, Eben and Astraden wait. There is a slight delay after the pillar clicks up into the ceiling.
The demon leaps down, swinging at Carina. As it does so, the invisibility spell around it fades.
The blade cuts into Carina like butter, and though it's ultimately a shallow slice, she and Tanith alike can feel the purest evil suffusing the demon's weapon.
At the same time, three of its eyes light up and release bright yellow beams, one firing at each of its three adversaries.
Whether or not you make the save, you still take the damage.
Farrukh, wanting NONE of that Gaze attack, closes his eyes and relies on his other senses to fight.
"Stay behind me a little Carina!"
Farrukh attempts to guard the squishy Alchemist with his shield.
Farrukh feels his klar and scimitar score two hits, though he can't tell his effective they are—something about the demon feels...porous. Like he's cutting through thick sponges.
"Great! You got any cards or something we can use to pass the time?" Astraden asks Eben.
Stricken by the demon's blast, Tanith mutters a prayer to the Brawler for courage and strength. He reaches out to place a blessing on the blindly flailing Farrukh's weapon.
The demon eyes Tanith's rapid spellcasting and sudden recovery with evident irritation. The demon eyes everything, really. Its eyes all roll.
A reeling Carina manages to power on through the demon's paralytic gaze, evil-infused sword and eyebolts!
"Gonna have to try a lot harder than THAT." She growls, spitting a defiant gob of blood at the demon's feet.
She yanks two more bombs from her belt, shuts her eyes, and throws them at the demon...
Carina hears a demonic, "Ow."
As Carina leaves its reach, the demon focuses on the thing between her and it: a Kettite slayer.
If you failed one save, you are Sickened for 1 hour.
If you failed two saves, you are Panicked for rounds (and also Sickened).
If you failed all three saves, you are knocked unconscious for hours, or until you receive some sort of medical attention.
Farrukh feels a foul force cut into him, but the unholy weapon doesn't particularly hurt. It's kind of itchy, though. Tanith sees the demon's many eyes scowl. It appears to recognize that Farrukh is not its optimal target.
Farrukh feels nauseous as he bleeds.
"Of course!" Eben replies to Astraden, slipping a deck of cards out of a pocket and beginning shuffling.
"Anyone know how to play Ogre's Bloody Heart?" he asks as the cards slide down in front of Astraden, Rodrigo, Robin, and himself. He notices his fingers are less nimble than they were a minute ago. "Oh, cat's grace must have worn off..." he muses as he recasts it. "Which means my other spells did too. I mean, no biggie, if they were in trouble upstairs they'd be screaming down for help, right?"
After shaking off the chilling gaze again, Tanith rears back and throws a whistling haymaker. As he swings the roaring bear tattooed across the big man's shoulder and chest leaps off his skin long enough to rake the demon's eyes as well.
"I'm familiar but you'll have to remind me what the wand cards mean. And no, I'm sure they'd call if they wanted help."
Astraden takes a moment to listen for screaming.
"Don't hear nothin'. Hey Robin, get over here! We need a full table."
Tanith swings twice, but only succeeds in slaying two of the many demon mirror images.
Robin raises an eyebrow and lowers himself to sit. "I'll confess I haven't played cards in some time now. I trust you will not attempt to swindle me too badly." He grins, taking out an arrow which he then proceeds to gnaw on.
"Sure. Though, I used up all my petty cash yesterday, so I've only got platinum bars left. Everyone's able to meet that ante, right?"
Carina steps out from behind Farrukh and makes a grab for the seal in the floor, being mindful of the demon's sharp evil sword.
Before Carina does that, Farrukh lays into the demon, hoping it doesn't kill him for doing so.