The bard limps indoors and they close the doors behind him.
"Why keep fighting them? Should've at least come into the guardhouse where they couldn't mob you... come on, let's get you all patched up... there are more guards, and some fancy-dressed woman."
Kal hustles the others into the guardhouse and makes sure the doors are all barred.
"Thanks Kal. What's this about some fancy dressed woman? I thought we met Bonefist's first mate."
Air-Kal shrugs. "This one was wearing a dress, and said she's protecting Bonefist."
After patching themselves up, the party passes through the guard house and exits toward the larger build.
Standing outside waiting for them is the woman Kal mentioned, a pair of massively built dwarves, and the foppish bard.
”So you’ve rejected my offer to leave here in one piece twice now. That’s more than most get from me”, the woman says with a sneer.
”Take them.”
The woman moves forward with supernatural speed and gestures sending a wave of biting cold out at the group.
Opal screams in pain as the blast of cold hits her. She returns the favor with a blast of lightning.
Air-Kal flies up into the air and points at the nasty woman.
Kal’s spell seems to have no effect on the woman.
Woman: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (19) + 8 = 27
Opal: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (18) + 7 = 25
Kal: 1d20 + 16 ⇒ (6) + 16 = 22
???: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (17) + 4 = 21
Bard: 1d20 + 3 ⇒ (14) + 3 = 17
Swains: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (12) + 4 = 16
Luthor: 1d20 + 10 ⇒ (5) + 10 = 15
Bjorkus: 1d20 ⇒ 12
Zirul: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (4) + 7 = 11
The foppish man begins to play his flute and casts a spell to speed his allies.
The muscular dwarves move forward to engage the party.
Bjorkus snorts and charges across the space with his trident in hand.
He jabs at the flautist.
”Quiet boy!”
Luthor dodges the mini-blizzard and strikes at the dwarves trying to hold him down.
Luthor connects with each blow but finds that the dwarves’s skin has a stony texture.
Zirul grins, leaping well above the cone of ice coming towards him, and the muscled arms of the dwarves. "I'm afraid that just won't do."
His claws strike out in quick success at the shorter, gruff individual.
Zirul hits all three times but his claws do little to harm his burly opponent.
The woman hisses in frustration.
”You two are useless. Must I do this myself?”
She casts a spell that fills her with divine power.
Opal flies up and tries to remove the dwarves’s stony shell.
"You could still change your mind, you know," remarks Kal with a gesture at the woman. "Bonefist isn't worth this. He's a coward, and you seem to not like cowards; why protect him?"
He begins focusing on his connection to nature and calling it to his aid.
Bursting from the water with a titanic roar is an enormous sharkman, a head taller and broader than the ones seen previously. He grips a thick cutlass in one massive hand. The muscle-bound sharkman roars again and beats his chest issuing a challenge.
”Riptooth, deal with him”, the woman says with a gesture at Bjorkus.
The bard cries out as the minotaur’s trident pierces his side but manages to continue playing his flute. He looks to the newcomer sharkman with pleading eyes. He tries to cast another spell to bolster his allies.
The burly dwarves shift position and lunge for their targets again.
The dwarves grab Luthor and Zirul and begin to squeeze them in crushing bear hugs.
Luthor is surprised as the dwarf just barely grabs him.
Zirul groans, feeling his body beginning to bruise in many places. Knowing he is nowhere near flexible or strong enough to get free, the doctor strikes out at the monstrous dwarf, tooth and claw his tools.
Bjorkus ignores the newcomer’s challenge for a moment in favor of finishing off the fop.
After turning the bard into a gory mess, the bull turns and matches Riptooth’s gaze.
Without the stony shell to protect him, Zirul’s claws and fangs tear sizeable chunks from the dwarf.
Luthor will focus on beating down the dwarf who tried to wrestle him.
The dwarf weathers Luthor’s rain of blows and laughs as he tightens his grip.
The woman snaps her fingers and a pair of sharp swords appear in her hands. She gestures again and her form melts away becoming an inhuman monstrous thing. Where once stood a beautiful shapely woman now stands a creature with the lower half of a lion and the upper half of a woman. The half-monster twirls her swords and grins up at Kal.
Kal's spell finishes, and a massive tiger appears next to the shape-shifting woman. It starts out clawing and biting.
Air-Kal fires at the dwarf grappling Zirul.
Kal's conjured tiger comes close but fails to overcome the monstrous woman's magical defenses. His arrows strike true, wounding the hearty dwarf but not dropping him.
The huge sharkman drops his cutlass and cracks his knuckles with a gesture at Bjorkus.
"Bring it Tri-Tip", he taunts.
The dwarves continue to crush their victims.
***
Woman
Opal
Kal
Arnold-Shark
Swains
Luthor
Bjorkus
Zirul
Bjorkus drops his trident, lowers his horns, and charges the big wereshark.
"Keep talkin'. I'm gunna turn you into soup."
Luthor continues to pummel the dwarf who is squeezing the life out of him.
Zirul growls low, feeling the majority of his stony protection fall away. A howl rumbles deep from within his throat, as he knows the enemy will soon fall!
When Bjorkus closes in with his horns, the musclebound wereshark lunges for the bull.
But misses and gets gored.
The dwarf wrestling Luthor spits up a gob of blood and continues to squeeze.
Zirul's opponent finally succumbs to his assorted injuries, releasing the half elf from his grasp.
The half-woman spins and hacks at the tiger with her whirling blades.
Opal tries a spell to dismiss the monstrous woman's defenses.
Air-Kal glares swords at the woman as she makes minced tiger cubelets, and turns his bow to her.
The half-woman shrieks in pain as Air-Kal's arrows pierce her tough hide.
The burly dwarf ramps up the pressure on his bear hug.
The huge sharkman grunts as he pulls free of Bjorkus's horns and lunges for his opponent again.
This time he overpowers the minotaur, slipping a massive arm under the bull's shoulder.
"Let go!"
Surprised at his opponent's strength, Bjorkus struggles to get the upperhand.
Unable to take anymore punishment, Luthor's opponent goes down.
Bjorkus looks like he's going to out-wrestle the beefy sharkman but his muscles suddenly surge with power and he overpowers the minotaur again.
Zirul growls low. "Hold on, big guy! The cavalry's comin!" He several steps, knowing that he can handle taking on the woman, as his wounds seal a bit more.
"I've got this chump. Deal with the b#+#&!" Bjorkus manages despite being choked.
The monstrous woman turns her blades on Zirul.
Air-Kal winces and flies down to heal Zirul.
Opal flies a bit closer and hastes the party.
Zirul grunts out as the first two strikes of the blades take him by surprise, his cockiness taking a hit. Then it's back to business, as his body is a series of whirls, twirls, and leaps, staying just out of the reach of the monster's blades.
"I usually prefer not to hurt women. Good thing you're no woman! Let's break her, folks!"
And with that, he strikes out in a quick series of motions, blessed now by the fliers from the heavens. He prays, yet again, that the Queen of the Seas will make her presence to him, as time is of the essence now and becoming a smaller and smaller commodity.
Luthor will step to AF37, throwing hands at the would-be chefess of his allies.
The sharkinator bites into Bjorkus's shoulder as he wrenches on the bull's beefy shoulder.
But even with the sharkman's jagged teeth buried in his shoulder, Bjorkus muscles free.
Zirul connects several times (3) with his claws and fangs but seems to do little damage to her stony skin.
Luthor's baned knuckles have more luck delivering blow after punishing blow causing the monstrous woman the shriek in pain.
Bjorkus roars as he's freed from his opponent's muscular embrace and throws a series of punches in return.