Gorthug tried to pull his axe out of the beast. Failing to do so he slammed his hands against it until the axe came out with a disturbingly wet sound.
"Oh I do not like this one bit. Not even a little"
Tina struggles against the worm's grasp, wriggling to break herself free.
She moves back, to the back of the cave, "Hey all, Might I suggest a tactical retreat, and we come back with fire, and burn this cave to the ground?"
"Save me! I'm too pretty to die in a giant pile of crap again!"
By the skin of her less than diminutive teeth, Tina bursts out of the worms mouth, where she was accidentally swallowed.
"Fire bad! No fire!" Snowball replies to Tina.
Cindy stops in place to listen to Tina and gets confused. "Tactical retreat? What do you mean? I don't know what tactical means, and I really don't think we should be giving it a treat." In her confusion she absentmindedly starts stroking its scales. She doesn't realize she's doing it but it serves to accidentally distract it so that others might have an advantage.
Gorthug misses once but lands one blow, slightly damaging the worm. But its slightly dented exoskeleton pushes back out into its normal shape, repairing quickly. The worm is certainly damaged but not as much as you would like.
Xeria fires again and Ripper moves a bit closer to attack.
+
+
Goldslip severs her life link to Gorthug and starts a new one with Ripper. "Don't worry, Xeria, that wound will be healed soon!"
Ripper helps whittle away at the worm further while Goldslip heals the dino.
"Dont be sad, Bob. Mommy's knife seems to be broken or I've forgotten how to use it, but I'm not sad. I'll give you a good stir after we're done."
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The worm writhes, significantly damaged, and flips feces and rubbish everywhere on the slippery battlefield. It continues healing but is significantly damaged. It whips its hideous maw around and bites deeply into Gorthug (11 B/P/S dam).
Gorthug felt no pain. But now the creature was close enough for him to truly strike back.
Snowball continues to try to distract the worm.
Ripper continues to tear into the strange worm creature and Xeria, uncertain of whether her acid is affecting the writing mass, tries again.
+
+
Tina flits back in towards the worm, striking it with her tiny, but powerful fists.
DC 17 Fort Save against Paralysis.
She looks at the great worm, trying to assess how injured it is.
Cindy follows the beast as it backs off and continues to pet its scales and chat with it. Although this does nothing to the beast itself, she hopes to distract it from paying attention to the others that can attack it.
"Oh no, Gorthug!" cries Goldslip as she sees him take a nasty hit from the worm just like Ripper had. She doesn't think long about it, and severs her life link with the small dinosaur to start one anew with the draugr.
You determine that the creature is actually disabled and is near death.
The worm begins moving more slowly now as it is heavily injured but its wounds continue knitting back together. It bites at Gorthug again but the Draugr is able to deflect the blow with his armor and a small sidestep.
With the help of Bob’s distraction, the draugr slammed his axe into the beast once more. A mortal warrior might have felt fear at it’s gaping maw, but like all emotions, fear was foreign to him. A memory of a memory, something to be held into and savored on the rare moments that Goldslip graced him with a spark of her life, or when the mistress commanded him and the illusions took of him.
"Beneficium!" Goldslip calls out with uplifted hands.
Each ally gains a +1 morale bonus on attack rolls and on saving throws against fear effects.
Snowball backs up a few feet, still hovering. She unleashes her icy breath on the beast once again!
After a group effort damaging it from all sides for a long, long time the worm finally falls, greatly torn. It seems to try to heal slightly but the damage is too great and some axial healing organ no longer functions.
Very soon after your success, the quasit flies in absentmindedly while reading a scroll. It alights on the worms corpse and touches it. The corpse rises as a zombie and shuffles rapidly out of the refuse chamber. The quasit flies out without a word. Most of you find yourselves completely covered in filth...
Cindy wades back out of the refuse and wordlessly stands staring at the group, the filth on her dress slowly fading away leaving her pristine.
As the quasit leaves behind the worm, a mocking voice comes wafting back out from the hallway "I don't help anyone since I have no friends, but I'll take this worm to Mommy and pretend I'm important". Cindy tries to look shocked as if she was surprised at the quasit's honesty but then begins to giggle.
"No meat?"
Snowball flies away from the filth to the edge of the sloped area. She decides that she needs to take care of some business on the slope before getting further from the filth.
Having relieved herself, she mopes over near the door.
"Worm bad. Noxus bad. Why mommy like Noxos?"
Xeria giggles at the quasit's candor and begins to help out cleaning the group up.
"It's been a long day, I'm ready for a nap after all this killing." she laughs and flies over to clean up ripper.
With just a few more seconds, Goldslip is able to heal Gorthug and Ripper almost completely.
"I was worried about you, Gorthug, after the big bite that worm took out of you," says Goldslip as she walks toward the draugr. The tiny nixie reaches with her hand for one of his, and wraps her hand around a couple of his bony fingers. "I'm glad you're okay."
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Gorthug turned to look at Goldslip. The connection between the two was a small spark of life. His mind was like a ship, lost in a dark ocean. Carried by waves controlled by others. But the life-link, it was as unto a light house. A distant point by which he could center himself. The mistress had wanted a slave that retained its martial prowess without the dangers of free will. It was a delicate balance. Gorthug focused on the connection, trying to bring himself to the present. Her hands touched his.
”H-help...”
He was under water, being held down. The orc’s head broke above the surface as he took a desperate gasp of breath. Terror and anger warred for control of his facial features as dead hands dragged him back under. He was regretting angering the Wizard. His taunts had been, on recollection, ill-made. He was getting tired. Again and again he tried to fight his way to the surface. Looking up he could see the distorted face of the mage. She was waiting for the moment of death to cast her spell. Drowning was part of the ritual, apparently. He didn’t want to give her the satisfaction, but the zombies did not tire. He did. Some of the hands that held him down belonged to his comrades. He wanted to cry out for help, but nobody was there to do so. Everyone was dead. And soon he would be damned. He tried to claw his way to the surface again, but-
The words died as the light faded. The memories were painful. Past and present merged together to the point where it was hard to tell which was which. The fog returned, leaving the draugr standing there, silently looming over her.
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Bob jumps on to Tina, and her head bobbles uneasily, as her neck struggles to support the ooze whose diameter is twice her height. She flutters a bit, before Bob slips down over her wings, causing them both to crash to the floor.
Bob deforms a bit, and absorbs the fall, safely cradling Tina, who swims around a bit in Bob as he scoots along on the floor. "Onward, my glorpy steed! Left! Right! Jump! Hahaha!" she thinks loudly at her friend, as she encourages Bob and steers him around the refuse room. "No, not a noble steed. You're more like... mmm... A sentient battle armor!"
"Ooh, I want to try something. hold on tight to me," she thinks at Bob, as she starts shifting around inside of him. "There was this one time a few decades ago, I fought a cleric of some god or another, and I thought he was insane, because he came at me alone. Turns out he wasn't alone, but his armor was actually a construct that he was wearing. Dang thing jumped off him and caught me by surprise. But you know what it couldn't do that we can?"
As she wiggles her wings free, just poking outside of Bob's diameter, Tina begins to flap and yell as loud as possible, "Flight Mode, ENGAGE!", the sound of her voice muffled through Bob's gel. She splays her limbs, giving Bob as much to hold onto as possible, while lifting him high towards the ceiling. "You're flying, Bob"
Cindy, much like most children, thought that the world revolved around her (and her Mommy.) Seeing her two newest friends bonding with the two flying women she begins to feel very alone. At least the swimmy one liked my joke...
Upset, she sits down in the middle of the chamber and sulks. The emotions that would be obvious in her previous life are not so easily shown in her new body however, so to the outside observer she seems to just be sitting there expressionless and unblinking.
Feeling left out when Tina attempts to fly around with Bob, Snowball glomps her favorite playmate, Cindy, and tries to fly around the room with the living doll.
"Snowball fly too! Cindy fly too!"
Still a sullen face.
"hmmph. he. heee."
A slight smile.
"mmmhmmhmmhmmmhmm"
A huge grin.
"HA HA HA HA HEE HEE HEE HAHHAHA!!!"
Then...the inevitable crash followed by much giggling.
After celebrating your victory, you calm down somewhat for the evening. The night passes as uneventfully as it usually does (some goblins chase each other cursing, zombies moan, a few bats flutter in after feeding at dusk, normal stuff). In the morning, Sevren Aldor walks dejectedly up to the lot of you. "I'm supposed to head into town to buy some things. My mom said I should take some monsters with me. I'll need help carrying stuff and keeping an eye out for bears."
A wide-eyed Cindy perks up. "Bears? I've always wanted a bear. Can I come with you Sevren?"
Gorthug shuffled behind Sevren, his axe held loosely in his hands. It was rusted, dull, and heavy enough that the first two didn’t matter. The zombie stood silently, his dead eyes fixated on the youth.
"I would be glad to, friend" Cindy grabs the pot and gets ready to travel.