Read the OOC.
Questions, comments, and/or suggestions?
Game on!
, pass
Looking around, Veratash noticed that they were winning. A grid took his face, but he was unsure of whether they were safe from danger. Still, he had finally found his friend. He rushed after Sorashana and yelled "Sorashana, wait! I'm your friend! We'll make you all right again!"
"We should pursue. We cannot let her restart the cult elsewhere!"
Nyd sets action to words and begins pursuit with by moving in the direction of the fleeing Kalashtar.
Standing, Artur scooped up his rife, swapped mags, took aim at the Dragon's backside, and fired.
Not seeing the dragon immediately, Artur took the opportunity to heal Liti, drawing his first aid spray out and using a squirt of it on her prone form.
Her prey brought down or escaped, Briar loped back over towards Liti.
She picked up the weasel's body and cradled it.
"She needs healing, anyone please..."
OOC: The dragon is flying to the southeast, about 200' SE of the Mound this round.
Zdravko launched herself forward with tremendous speed, her spirit phasing momentarily into the ethereal plane.
OOC: the dragon is in the air and flying away so you won't get into melee with it.
Game on!
Sorry people, but I won't be able to update things tonight and tomorrow is not certain because I have another work event.
Thanks for your patience!
Game on!
Read the OOC.
Questions, comments, and/or suggestions?
Game on!
That roll sucked... :(
, pass
, fail
, pass
Seeing the villains retreating, Tharivol collapses his shield and draws his longbow. He pulls a fletching to his ear and releases the arrow with his held breath.
Artur scooped up his rifle, then moved forward and healed Veratash.
His shoulder cannon then fired at Sorshana.
Seeing Liti healed, Briar ran towards their remaining enemy, drawing a slim iron lance from her back as she shortened the distance to the kalashtar.
She put on a burst of speed and hurled the javelin in an arc through the intervening distance...
...it landed with a *shunk* in Sorashana's shoulder, leaving her impaled, a good foot of metal erupting from her back.
Veratash felt the blow and wasn't ready for it. He felt a strong pain before hitting the ground. The next thing he knew he was opening his eyes to a very disapproving Artur. "I'm sorry", he said to the artificer. "She's my friend and I let my guard down." He turned to the group overpowering Sorashana and said in a low voice "... was my friend" with sad eyes.
"I know how hard it can be. Mental magic is a motherf@#$er." Artur extended a hand to offer Veratash help up.
"The question now is: what are you going to do about it? Me, I'd recommend kicking her @$$."
Veratash accepted Artur's hand and gets up and said "Thank you. I still believe we can somehow undo what Dah'mir has done. But I understand if she perishes from our actions. Still, I will play no part in the latter, if it comes to that. I hope you can respect this." His eyes were calm as he said this.
Artur took a moment to take a few deep breaths and let his adrenaline cool. As he adrenaline fled, the litany of aches and pains all started screaming for his attention.
As usual, however, Artur ignored all of them.
Instead he moved over to Sorshana to check and see if she was still alive. Once he knew either way, he pulled his pistol and made sure that the Abominations were dead.
Once that was done, Artur took stock of his allies: everyone was alive and breathing, each processing what had occurred in their own way.
strapping on his holster and pistol, Artur called "We're not done yet. Let's go." to the group while walking towards the entrance to the mound.
Turning to Batul, Artur said "Will you hold down the things out here?"
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With the adrenaline retreating slower than the dragon, Tharivol catches his breath. He slings his longbow and surveys the battlefield.
Seeing Artur ready toward the mound, the dragonmarked elf replies, "we're all beat. Let's take a breather before spelunking."
Without having combat training, Veratash started shaking from the adrenaline. He had passed out twice during this raid and his head hurt like Dah'mir had played fetch with it. All he could do was walk alongside Artur as he went to check on Sorashana and stand next to him.
He tried communicating with her with his mind and sent "Are you there? Are you all right?" telepathically. Afterwards, he sat down without knowing how to stop shaking.
"We should check to see if the cult let any intelligence behind."
"Good point Zdravko." says Artur before levelling his rifle at the curtain and putting enough firebolts into it to set it ablaze.
At Tharivol's comment, Artur said "I'd like time to rest, but I would also like to have a beer, take my boots off, and prop my feet up on a table." Artur glanced around exaggeratedly before adding "doesn't look like either is on offer from our hosts though."
Artur shrugged and said "besides, you know what will happen if we wait; he'll fly down an alternate enterance and make off with something we'll need later or the like. Like in the stories."
Artur added the last part with a grin.
Waiting until she confirmed Sorashana was down and being monitored, Briar returned to Liti and made sure she was there as the weasel regained consciousness.
Liti snapped at Briar.
Briar stared for a moment, shrugged and walked away.
Liti glared, then followed.
Briar nodded to Artur by the mound
"Yes, we should investigate quickly and thoroughly, whatever is down here must be eradicated, any link to the mad ones utterly destroyed."
These guys are crazy. Tharivol shakes his head and plans to be at the back of the conga line down into the hole.
"I absolutely request we take at least a short rest first, however. I need to regain spell slots at an absolute minimum.
Veratash was unsure whether he's ready to descend, but he knew they needed to go. "Some rest would do some good. We don't know what's down there. How are the orcs faring?", he asked without having the will to check himself.
OOC:
I intend to move things along later today.
Going down 'now' or resting and then going down?
I don't think there's been a definitive answer.
If no definitive answer is put forth then I'll roll of it.
Questions?
Game on!
Veratash remembered that a contraption was needed for Dah'mir to torture him. He went over to Sorashana and examined her to see if there was anything that seemed out of place.
OOC: Sorashana got to negative hit points and no one said they were trying to knock her out. Moreover, Artur put 'bullets' in the heads of the 'abominations', but it wasn't clear whether Artur considered Sorashana an 'abomination'.
Questions?
Game on!
Artur opened his mouth to argue, then promptly closed it.
Nyd just yelled at me. Good for him! Artur thought to himself, a grin creeping across his face as he looked at Nyd. "Good for you." was all that came out of his mouth with a nod of respect towards Nyd.
"Okay, go ahead and rest. Everyone, drink some water and eat something small: a piece of jerkey or bread, or something along those lines. Check yourself for leeches again as well. I know we were out of the water, but this place is disgusting."
"Batul, you should gather up your people. I think they'll appreciate Tharivol's playing."
Artur then walked over to check on Briar and Liti, the latter of whom he tossed a piece of jerky to. "You doing ok? You need anything?" he asked Briar. After finding out the answers to his question, Artur moved over to check on Zdravko, saying "Nothing broken?"
Finally, he made his way quietly over to Veratash and put his arm on his shoulder. He didn't say anything.
what could I really say? Artur corrected himself.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Finally, after checking on everyone, Artur propped himself up against the wall of a hut and took his own advice: he checked himself for leeches, drank some water, and ate some jerky.
It wasn't an ideal outcome, but the group lived and they enemies were dead or fled. What more could you ask for in life?
"I am loathe to wait, however it is important that the pack survives, so we should take a few minutes."
She locked gazes with Zdravko
"Whilst the others rest, you and can will scout the area, see if the orcs need help"[b]
Liti moved to limp after her, she growled low and guttural, there was a noiseless snarl in reply, then Liti curled up on a swamp tussock and closed her eyes.
[b]"Batul, it is a victory this day, thank you for your trust and the strength of your tribe."
Eventually, they realize the folly of their decisions. Or, at least that's what I keep telling myself. Tharivol thinks about half the group.
He starts picking away at a melody to represent the transformation into a dragon. Starting slow and deep, and picking up speed with staccato notes into a more frenetic, I cannot believe that there's a friggin dragon here, kind of phrasing.
"Was the cult leader a dragon, or was he someone who changed into a dragon? There was that weird dragon shard embedded in him after all."
Veratash mechanically followed Artur's advice after thanking him for his silent support. He ate some salted meat and chugged a large amount of water and checked his body for some leeches. Although he didn't find any, he noticed his body was itching all over. He felt a drowsiness come over him and forced himself to stay awake. After about half an hour, he felt strong enough to get up and found he needed to stretch his legs.
Veratash noticed the crown bruises on Sorashana's head and examined them.
How does this work?, he thought making much effort to remember what it felt like to wear that weird crown. Why did she follow his orders? Was she tortured into submission?, he continued his line of thought.
He asked for the other's advice. He said "I'm having a hard time accepting what happened. Not Sorashana's demise, that part is understandable. But why was she following Dah'mir's orders? She would never do that. I remember, originally, Dah'mir wanted to work with kalashtar specifically. Only later did we realize that dragon wanted to experiment on and torture us. But why kalashtar? Maybe it was our connection with our Quori spirit. Maybe he.... it was trying to sever us from our spirit, and that drove Sorashana mad."
Looking to the others, he said "I believe this could be a piece in the puzzle of their plan. If Dah'mir can sever kalashtar from their Quori spirit and command them like so, he could build an army of powerful psychics which would be very nasty when allied with the aberrations from that.... cave", meaning the cave where they had found Tam Tam.
After discussing, Veratash found a gem in Sorashana's possession and put it away without thinking about it. He insisted on burying her right then and there, and refused to move away otherwise. He would dig alone if he would have to. After she was buried, he thought of so many things to say. He remembered her how she was, how pure and beautiful her heart was. But the only thing he could muster was "Dah'mir will pay for this."
Walking back with the group to decide their descent, he remembered the gem with pulsating rage in his pocket. He picked it up and said "Hello?" Without any answer, he sent telepathically "Who's there?"
OOC: healing hit points; just tell me if you want to top them off or get within 10% or even tell me a number you want to get to. There is no need for rolling. And yes, you all get the benefit from Tharivol's song of rest.
I intend to move this along today.
Questions?
Game on!
OOC: I see your point but it could be that:
- you entered the camp and routed the enemies (they were all defeated and/or fled)
- you saw things come out of the Mound (chuul, dolgaunt, and Dah'mir)
- you almost died so decided to take a breather while the orcs made sure the camp was safe and you all kept a close watch for the returning dragon and/or anything coming out of the Mound.
Looking at this way, I can see some logic to it.
Game on!