Kivan is too busy thinking about where he is going to notice anything about his surroundings.
"I still don't see the point in all of this," says Maja, after the agreement is struck. "If I start calling myself Lady Maja Weatherseed, it'll make it harder to relate to most folks. I want to build a following based on Erastil and his teachings, not on a fancy title. Anyway, how would anyone really think I'm a noble? I've grown up as a peasant girl, and it'll show. I'm sure I'll look silly in a fancy dress. Maja seems to be uneasy about how she will be viewed at this birthday ball.
Seraphina smiled affectionately while shaking her head and sighing softly as she took her friends arm on their way out of the Lord-Mayor's palace. "Oh Maja, you've achieved an elevated position for undertaking and achieving a treacherous mission and you think people will think less of you for it? Nonsense! Nobles will know you are recently ennobled and you have no need for trying to take up their ways. You are a priestess of Erastil and your manner of dress should reflect that, not an attempt at some level of finery you think is now expected of you. And you should know well by now that not all nobility goes about introducing themselves as 'Lady So and so'. Have you seen me do so? Now stop looking so dour and try and enjoy this justly earned reward!"
She thanked the groom and agreed to leave the horses under his care. "They have indeed had a rough time of it recently. I'm sure they'll fare better under your ministrations."
Sera's too busy wondering why she appeared more excited about her friends ennoblement than they seemed to be to notice anything. But she was clearly outraged when she saw a blade leveled at Idris' throat. "If you know who we are then you know you're assaulting nobility, lower that blade and step off. We don't want any trouble and we don't know any orcs beyond the one we hunt ourselves. Let us through!"
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"Nobles bleed like any other, and lie just as badly," says the assassin as blades are drawn. "I cannot fathom why you're willing to die for an assassin, and a failure at that, but we'll find her with or without your help."
Even as Pretty tumbles around the female assassin, the nimble woman returns the favor and slips past the tiefling, piercing her armor with rapier-point as she passes. Without needing commands, another assassin tumbles past Idris to flank Pretty, but his blade-thrust is woefully off and she escapes further harm, though in a perilous position caught between the two assassins. Another assassin advances on Seraphina, scoring a cut down her arm with his rapier. The assassin from the north rushes Milo before he can bring his bow into action and puts the point of his blade into the ranger's leg. The man cutting off retreat tries to fend off the wolf in his face but misses, cutting only air.
On the rooftop, the two burly dock workers wind up to throw cobblestones but hold their fire, waiting for an opportune moment.
Sera stepped away from her attacker, taking up position at Idris' back. "Defending ourselves wouldn't count as 'street dueling' would it?" She asked just before casting Vanish on herself and disappearing from view.
Kivan steps back and casts a spell that causes hundreds of spiders to suddenly start climbing up his arm to form a whip before he uses his wizard powers to move closer to Nix so that he can assist.
"I'm no swordsman, but this sure doesn't seem like a duel to me!"
Milo staggers back after the blow from the assassin's sword, raises his bow, and fires a shot. Noticing the brick hurled at Kivan, he glances up, but cannot make out the men on the roofs from this angle.
Snarling, Nix lunges at the man in front of her.
Idris draws her sword and growls, "A failure? It's you who will fail utterly! Lord in Iron, help me kick this b!#*+'s ass!" Circling to her left, Idris intentionally puts herself in between the two assassins in order to give Pretty an advantage.
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Idris strikes powerfully at the attacker between herself and Pretty, then drops into the sinuous, cautious, free-handed style, ready to read the intentions of her foes.
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"We will worry about that when we kill them!"
If by chance Idris' blow didn't finish the bandit between them, Pretty will try to do it, changing her target to the head assassin as soon as she is able to!
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Idris and Pretty both score hits on the assassin between them, but the well-disciplined sneak shows no sign of pain and keeps fighting. The wounded assassin and the leader concentrate a flurry of attacks at Pretty! Only one gets through, but the leader twists her blade on the way out, leaving a painful wound that bleeds freely.
As Idris anticipated, the attacker harassing Seraphina forgoes any attempt to catch the vanished sorceress and instead moves to catch Idris in a flank. The sword thrust is obvious, and Idris steps aside and delivers a backhand to the man's face that doesn't seem to do much but redden his cheek.
Seeing Maja not cast any further spells, the brawny rooftop stalker who had been keeping an eye on her drops the cobble in his hand, descends from rooftop with an agile flip, and lays an iron grip on her collar, hauling the cleric to her toetips.
Like the other assassin, Milo's target takes the arrow in stride and continues his advance, scoring another sword thrust as he does so.
The other burly assassin also flips down from rooftop to land behind Kivan, who almost eludes his grasp. Unfortunately, the big man manages to keep a hold on the elf's sleeve, and he grins with the anticipation of an upcoming beatdown.
The rear-guard assassin doesn't quite manage to keep his composure like his fellows as Nix grabs his thigh and rips him to the ground. With a shout and a muffled thump, the assassin hits the street. He scrambles to his feet, earning himself another bite in the process but landing a blow in retaliation.
Those who took rapier wounds in the first exchange of the battle start feeling a burning sensation radiating from your wounds and your head starts swimming...
Kivan just shakes his head at the human's foolishness and swings his whip out not at the man who's holding him, but at the other human who is attacking Nix.
Kivan then teleports out of the hands of the man who is holding him.
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Pretty attempts do cut the thug down, so she won't have to worry about him, and the leader would not caught her unprepared again.
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Milo continues to fall back from the assassin's accurate attacks. This time, he retreats around the corner of the building and fires. Now he is aiming his arrow at the man Kivan and Nix are attacking, hoping to take someone out of the fight to even the odds.
Bearing down on the man that struck her, Nix lashes out again, repeating her same trip attack.
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Behind the invisible veil of her Vanish spell, Sera clutched at the burning rapier wound. A cold sweat broke out over her and her eyes rolled wildly in their sockets. She looked around for her friends and gasped in horror as her eyes saw only dark, masked figures surrounding her. Cultists! Here? She could not fathom where her friends had gone, but she knew she had to get away from these madmen and find them.
She reeled backward away from the group closing in on her and smacked against the side of the building, hard.
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Pretty's aim is true, and the assassin falls to the ground clutching at his throat, futilely trying to stem the flow of blood. Idris steps past the dying man to engage the northern enemy, who parries her strike. Seeing the opportunity to take Pretty out of the fight, the assassin forgoes attacking Idris to step over his dying comrade to set up the leader for a devastating blow. The assassin leaves himself open as he moves, and Idris punishes him with a wicked punch to the face that flattens his nose and sends teeth flying. She is unable to stop the flank, however, and the leader of the assassins takes advantage of Pretty's distracted state to run her through with her rapier.
"A pawn for a pawn!" yells the woman as she wrenches her blade loose, letting Pretty fall senseless to the street.
Robbed of the chance to pin Maja, the brute who attacked her growls at the sight of Idris standing in the way. He shrugs and advances on the duelist, swinging a meaty fist which she is easily able to avoid.
Milo's arrow, Kivan's whip, and Nix's teeth all intersect at the rearmost assassin. Nix jerks the man off-balance, leaving him open to Kivan's horrid weapon. As the assassin recoils in horror from the crawling whip, Milo's arrow feathers his throat and he drops to the ground lifeless.
The other brute gives up on Kivan and moves to block Milo's retreat, pinning the ranger between himself and the pursuing assassin. Milo takes a left hook to the jaw, but evades the far more serious threat of rapier to kidneys.
Nix's hearty constitution is unfazed by the poison on the dead assassin's rapier. Seraphina still suffers, but her head clears sufficiently to act normally for the moment.
Kivan steps back around the corner and tries to hit the man flanking Milo with his whip.
Pretty was sure she had Idris at her back, with an old statue and a house blocking her flanks, but in a moment her ally was gone, and there was an assassin behind her, again! She worried too much about him, again, since she was on attack mode, and that left her open for the final strike!
"Ughhhh..." She fell limbless to the floor, as already described...
Surrounded by thugs on two sides and brick walls on the other two, Milo drops his bow and draws his longsword. His jaw throbbed from the punch. He hoped the combination of Kivan's strange whip and Nix's teeth could take the one attacker out quickly. He waits for Nix's pounce, hoping that she might knock him down, giving him an easier target.
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Idris curses herself for having stepped the wrong way and left Pretty's flank open.
"Maja, Pretty's down!" she exclaims, then lunges forward to attack the man who struck her down. "Touch her and die, scum!"
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Sera's head cleared enough to think rationally again for the moment and she heard Idris' call to Maja. Still so many, and I feel so weak... What can I do? She had planned to use Vanish to give her some time to get her defensive spells up, but it seemed cowardly now. Her attacker had turned away and joined the assault on her friends and now Pretty's life was at stake. She needed to do the opposite somehow... not be unseen, but somehow more visible. She stepped away from the grappler's groping hands and began to cast something she didn't fully understand, yet.
In her mind, she saw herself reflected in a looking glass. As she weaved her magic, she became surrounded by them until the reflections stepped free from the shining panes and clustered around her.
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Maja's charge through the scrum to tend to her fallen friend takes the assassin by surprise, and his attempt to exploit her dropped guard is too slow. His attention is further diverted by Idris' blade scoring a long slash across his back. He turns away from Pretty's bloodied form to defend himself, and is joined by the burly "laborer" who had been harassing Maja in a coordinated attack against Idris. The duelist responds flawlessly, sidestepping the assassin's rapier thrust and ducking her head to evade a punch from behind, which she correctly anticipates as aimed at the back of her head.
The leader of the assassins smiles at Maja, flicking blood off her sword. "Oh, that's quite unnecessary, love. I'm very thorough with my work." Moving to engage Maja, the leader stabs out twice with her blade, scoring a slight scratch on the outside of her arm.
Under assault from both sides, Milo is unable to bring his blade to bear, but Nix squeezes past Kivan and sinks his teeth into the burly man's leg. Kivan's whip cracks past the man's head with a harmless snap, and the large man brings his knee up in a painful blow to the ranger's back.
Idris jumps to the side to cover Maja's back and slashes at the man between her and Pretty.
As the poison's fog of confusion fell away, Seraphina flexed her claws, imbuing them with magic as she sized up the battle field with clearer eyes. A target presented itself readily enough and she slashed at the big man as he moved past her, flashing back into view.
Six Seraphinas glowered angrily at the burly assasin and her voice rumbled like thunder as she called forth her caustic energy and lunged to deliver it.
Milo grunrs in pain at the blow to his back. He commands Nix to continue attacking. Fighting these men in a narrow alley was nothing like hunting bear and mink in the forest or stalking a deer on the plains. He couldn't even use use what little magic he had, surrounded like this. Again, he waits for Nix's attack before making his own, hoping they could drop this man out of the fight and get our of this awkward positioning in the alley.
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Edit: no longer relevant.
If the burly man is still standing after that Kivan begins taking a few deep breaths not used to actually fighting something before. He will then throw the whip out, but instead of having it strike at the burly man it instead just detaches from Kivan's arm and begins swarming in his area.
Pretty pretends to be dead for the round.
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Kivan's throw is true, and the horrifying mass of spiders rushes up the man's leg leaving scores of bloody bites.
Nix's teeth tear another chunk out of the assassin's leg, but he manages to stay on his feet, even as Milo's sword scores a hit to his shoulder.
Seraphina's sudden appearance takes her target by surprise, and the burly assassin lets a gasp of pain slip through his disciplined mask as acid bubbles searing tracks down his chest next to red claw wounds.
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Maja's club glances off the studs of the assassin's leather armor, rocking the man slightly but causing no real harm.
The leader of the assassins coolly assesses her chance of catching Maja in a flanking situation, and decides instead to make a classical fencing lunge. As Maja tries to twist out of the way, the deadly woman abruptly steps to the side with a stab to Maja's face - her telegraphed intentions were a ruse! Fortunately for Maja, the assassin's swift movement is too demanding for the slick cobblestone she is standing upon and the assassin stumbles with a curse, her attack ruined.
Her companion steps away from the melee, opening a spot by which Idris can attempt vengeance for Pretty on the leader... and waits.
The burly assassin facing Seraphina squints at the six identical copies of the fiery-haired sorceress. Picking one, he decks it with a solid punch that whiffs through empty air and dispels that image.
Milo continues to be pressed hard, the muscle-bound attacker serving as sufficient distraction for his more nimble companion to deal a painful stab to the ranger.
Idris steps forward and slashes at the rogue in front of her, wanting to finish him off first.
"Shit! Milo's in trouble! Dammit, dammit! "
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Five Seraphinas smirked in unison as the burly man failed in his first attempt at hide and seek. "Missed me! Care to try again, Big Fella?" Her eyes flickered to the other assassin hesitating nearby and stepped to place her back to the wall, hoping to avoid being the meat in another deadly sandwich.
She concentrated again on her casting, tracing a circular disk in the air before her as she cast her Shield.
Milo concentrates, willing away the pain. He recalls a cool spring breeze, soothing the burning of his wounds and whisking away the fatigue. Feeling somewhat better, he shouts to Idris "We've got it under control... I think."
Nix continues assaulting the burly man, intent on ripping him into pieces despite the spiders swarming over his legs.
Pretty, still on the floor, seeks to throw them into shadows, preventing the others from finding vital spots and sneak attacking, but she of course continues to play dead!
The swarm continues to move up and down the burly man eating away at him before disappearing as the magic that created them ends.
Kivan pulls out his wand and fires it at either the burly man if he's still up or the other man attacking Milo if the burly man goes down.
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Idris' enraged blow beats through the defense of the assassin, snapping his rapier blade off at the hilt and sinking deeply into the man's chest. As she pulls the blade out, the assassin's eyes roll up and he collapses.
Nearly simultaneously, the burly assassin attacking Milo goes down hard when Nix pulls his feet out from under him. As the man crashes to the cobbles, the spider swarm writhes over his face and neck. The assassin's discipline cracks and he starts screaming horribly. Kivan's magic missiles shut him up.
Moving as if coordinated by an unspoken command, both of the remaining assassins give up the attack and tumble away from their targets. Feet pumping, they flee the scene with great alacrity. Each makes for the rooftops, one bounding up a pile of firewood and the other simply lunging for a gutter and hauling himself up. One above the battlefield, they run along the tiled roofs.
"We will meet again," says the leader in the darkness. "Savor your luck."
With that, she's also at rooftop level and fleeing.
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"Get the leader!" Idris yells as she begins the pursuit.
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