Malkiel's jaw drops open when he sees how brutal Natalya is attacked.Gods! Please don't let him turn around and do that to me!
He hopes to land more hits than last time as he continues to slash away at Yrax.
The sheer amount of hurt she takes is enough to shock Natalya out of rage for a split second, but her fury is too mighty a beast to be ended that easily and she retaliates with great force, determined to tear the warlord apart even if she has to do so from inside its stomach!
Izolda nearly screams as Natalya is savaged - she never considered that stripping a dragon of its higher functions might make it more dangerous. Mentally preparing a powerful curative spell in case she has to help out the witch flies closer and attempts to hex the dragon to suffer his own blows!
Izzy successfully hexes Yrax with retribution. Mal manages to stab the dragon twice more, but Greta and Natalya fail to wound the hulking warlord! Yrax continues to unleash his fury on Natalya, and while she tries her best to withstand terrible wounds the dragon inflicts (she does avoid one wing strike), with the final blow, the barbarian goes down! Several wounds rip open along the dragon's flank thanks to Izzy's hex, but the wyrm is still standing...
Natalya crashes down to the floor, wings limp.
Malkiel is seriously concerned when Natalya is swatted down in a ferocious series of attacks. Trying hard not to think about what that would do it him, he refrains from turning invisible telling himself it would do no good here.
Focusing, he sets about continuing his onslaught opposite Greta.
Izolda finishes her curative spell in a hurry and swoops as low as she can, practically crouching just above the icy floor to pick her friend up again.
Revived, at least for a moment, Natalya grasps her sword once more and starts hacking without even bothering to stand up straight.
Her enchanted blade cleaves deep into scale, muscle and flesh in a final, desperate strike!
Malkiel's daggers find a chink in Yrax's scales, drawing blood! Then Natalya stands up and, with a desperate strike, brutally cleaves the dragon's head from its body! Blood and gore spurt out from the wyrm's neck as the decapitated dragon thrashes about, finally collapsing to the floor and lying still!
Yrax wears four huge ruby-studded bracers (worth 2,000 gp each), a gold serpentine draconic armband (worth 1,000 gp), and two gold draconic torcs (worth 1,500 gp each). In addition, a coffer near his sleeping nest contains ample healing supplies, consisting of a potion of cure serious wounds, two potions of lesser restoration, a potion of remove blindness/deafness, and two applications of restorative ointment.
The steel door to Yrax's treasury is 2 feet thick and fitted with a highly complex lock. Fortunately, you find the key nearby. Inside the vault is an immense collection of wealth, truly worthy of the title dragon’s hoard. While Yrax has spent a significant amount outfitting and maintaining his invasion army, he still possesses an impressive hoard, sorted and tastefully arranged by general type. These riches consist of 75,604 cp, 8,773 sp, 6,111 gp, and 165 pp in a variety of coins, bars, and ingots; a black pearl worth 500 gp; two emeralds worth 1,000 gp each; a fire opal worth 650 gp; a sapphire worth 1,100 gp; and exotic hides, furs, and pelts worth a total of 5,000 gp. In addition to these mundane treasures, Yrax’s hoard also contains a gloom blade, a set of dragonbone divination sticks, a drinking horn of bottomless valor, a manual of war, an oil of magic vestment, a potion of good hope, a ring of x-ray vision, a suzerain scepter, and a scroll of hallucinatory terrain.
You also discover the following less obvious but highly valuable items in the hoard. A dull, pitted spherical rock 1-1/2 feet in diameter displayed on a sumptuous silk-covered stand is in fact a meteorite. It contains 15,000 gp worth of adamantine, but it weighs over 850 pounds. An unadorned leather case holds a long metallic tube and several other delicate mechanical devices, including a powerful telescope, an astrolabe, a sextant, a cylinder of star charts, and other astrophysical instruments, each beautifully constructed and exceptionally accurate (worth 7,000 gp as a set).
Finally, you discover a brown bearskin among the other exotic hides and furs in the vault. This bearskin is the second key to the Dancing Hut that Baba Yaga left on Triaxus!
"Holy frost dragons!" Natalya says, doubling over and breathing heavily with her blade still stuck in the warlord's corpse. "He hit too damn hard!" The hugely tough woman is battered all over and moves with the gingerly steps of someone who isn't sure if they have broken bones or not. "I really hope we can get out of here without any more fighting."
On the other hand there is a huge amount of treasure and the sight cheers the barbarian up immensely.
"Oh hells yes!" She crows upon entering the treasury. "We're rich! We're rich!"
The drinking horn goes on her belt as soon as Izolda explains what it does and Natalya quaffs it a few times, seemingly pleased with the results.
"Right, let's get this stuff back to the Mandate as quick as we can! I am done chasing Granny's tail!"
"Oh... my... Gods..." Malkiel says, his jaw hanging open at the sight of their treasure hoard. "I have a sudden urge to go bury myself in coins."
Shaking his head he snaps out of it and says "I agree, let's get what we can and get out of here!!!"
Escaping from Ivoryglass is as simple as hopping on the backs of your allied dragonkin, flying up and away while Yrax's forces remain in disarray! "Ha! You did it!" Nevra shouts triumphantly as you soar through the frigid air away from Ivoryglass. "You have changed the fates of countless beings on Triaxus for the better. The Skyfire Mandate is in your debt!"
You return to Spurhorn to claim the two-headed eagle from Commander Pharamol as your reward. The Dragon Legion hails you as heroes, and there is no doubt that with Yrax's death, the barbarian Drakelands army will fall apart, no longer a threat.
The dragonkin escort you back to the Dancing Hut, where most of your new friends bid you farewell. Nevra, though, remains. "We are bonded now, Natalya. Where you go, I go. I am excited to see what strange new worlds we will go to next!"
It seems it is time to move on from Triaxus. All you need to do is mix the two ingredients in Baba Yaga's cauldron when you are ready...
Nevra receives a hug that would probably strangle a lesser being as she makes her pronouncement.
"I'm so glad you're coming!" Natalya says with a huge smile. "There's so much I want us to see together."
Before leaving the mandate Natalya ensures that some of the less portable treasures remain on Triaxus, particularly the suzerain scepter, which she entrusts to Commander Pharamol to aid the Dragon Legion against any further threats.
Once back at the hut Natalya uses the jewel to summon their friendly extra-planar shop-keeper and set to some serious haggling!
Izolda's jaw drops at the vast amount of wealth they have just come into and, in scooping up Aurora, joins her friends in gathering everything and legging it back to their rides - just like when they used to steal the good Cherry Pie from Auntie Frieda when they were little.
Once back at the hut Izolda spends some time nuzzling with Aurora, with complete relief that they managed the absolute madness that has been Triaxus. As Nevra declares her eternal bond to Natalya, Izolda cannot help but fill up with emotion and clutch her fluffy rabbit even closer.
"So, we all have our own pets now Aurora - I have you, Natalya has Nevra and Mal has Greta!" Izoda mutters, not managing to hold back a cheeky snigger. "You're still the best though."
The jovial mercane merchant app appears in the hut to trade you some mighty treasures from across the planes! Once all of your business on Triaxus is concluded, you mix the bearskin and the eagle into the cauldron in the center of the Dancing Hut. As before, the world warps and shifts around you as you travel to a strange new destination...
Part 5: Rasputin Must Die!
Golden birdcages fill this chamber from floor to ceiling, hanging from every beam and resting on every shelf. While a few of the cages are empty, the majority of them hold the mummified remains of tiny stunted, bearded men. The large enchanted cauldron bubbles and smokes in the center of the room.
Besides containing the cauldron and birdcages, this chamber appears to be a cluttered, one-room log hut, with a single door of rough-hewn planks, a cold fireplace opposite, a simple window, and a rickety ladder leading to a trap door in the ceiling. The single window displays a curious sight: a bone fence fallen into disrepair and overgrown with thorny vines, and the carcass of a rusted metal wagon. Beyond stand the tall, dark trees of an ancient forest.
Looking closer at the cages, you can see nine tiny men still survive among the hundreds of corpses. Surprisingly, even these few weak, emaciated survivors seem oddly resigned to their fate, sitting placidly and chewing slowly on tiny bird bones. They mutter and whisper in a strange language.
"Hello?" Natalya asks from her position wrapped up in Nevra's long forearm. She tries the same greeting in both Draconic and Triaxian, neither of them good, but evidence of the work she's been putting in with her new partner.
The little men do not respond to Natalya's calls. If they understand her, they show no signs of it.
Izolda puts down Aurora before examining the little men more closely trying to see if they can even tell that she is standing before them before looking back at Natalya quickly.
"I promise Im not about to show off....much."
Launching into greetings in every language she knows, Izolda can feel a little pride in her chest, knowing just so many languages is no small feat!
The little men continue to mutter in the strange language, not acknowledging Izolda.
Izolda shrugs. "Nothing more I can do here. Let's leave them to their misery." Aurora tail bounces as she hops up behind the witch, her nose twitching as she sniffs out any clues before Izolda scoops her up. "Let's see whats up there." She says, pointing to the rickety ladder leading up to the loft.
"After you Mal." A cheeky grin stretches across her face as she volunteers her good friend.
"I'll go." Natalya says, levering herself up. "Don't worry Nevra, we'll be out of here in a jiffy. The hut does this every time we go somewhere new."
She clambers up the ladder and braces herself before opening the trap-door, ready for whatever nastiness is on the other side.
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"Who's worried?" Nevra says, worriedly.
The trap door opens into a cramped attic. Clutter and other detritus litter the floor. The center of the loft is open to the room below, bordered by a ten-foot-wide walkway of wooden planks. A narrow window sits in the southern wall of the loft, but it is caked with centuries of accumulated dirt that refuses to be cleaned off and only allows dim light to filter through.
Natalya finds nothing here aside from clutter, old mattresses, and other useless junk. She climbs back down and instead leads the way through the door in the room below.
Gingerbread and candy form the walls of this chamber! It features furniture of stick candy, a large ribbon candy cabinet, curtains of licorice, and a cupcake table, all illuminated by distorted amber light streaming in from windows of glazed sugar brittle! Piles of cooking utensils and baking crockery tower precariously, threatening to collapse at any moment.
It all looks so delicious...
Izolda glances around and takes in a deep breath, feeling giddy at the amount of sugar in the room before having some unpleasant flashbacks to her apprenticeship with Old Martha.
"Good thing for me that Old Martha used to make this kind of stuff and it always looked so good but usually had a trick to it, an unpleasant lesson to learn if you will. That old witch..." Izolda says, not so fondly. "Whatever you do....don't eat it, its probably too good to be true! Izolda warns, hopefully quick enough to stop her friends doing something foolish.
Natalya's stomach rumbles loudly but, with a supreme effort of will, she manages to avoid pouncing on the confectionery.
"Stupid witchcraft!" She grumbles. "Making bad magic look so tasty! Hey, Mal! Have we got any more food?"
She starts searching for anything useful in the room, with her sword out... just in case...
A copper kettle encrusted with hardened brittle is actually a beaten cauldron of plenty. There doesn't seem to be anything else of actual value here.
The main exit to this room is through a large ribbon-candy cupboard against the north wall. Opening its door reveals a dark, 5-foot square tunnel lined with burned and broken skulls. The tunnel emerges through the soot-stained walls of a large hearth in the next room.
Bright sunlight filtered by a forest canopy streams into this derelict cottage room from a single large window to the northwest. Trees jut up from the dirt floor, bursting through the thatch ceiling above, and dead leaves cover a rusted iron stove and an old straw mattress. No door exits the cottage, only a rotten doorframe to the east, overgrown with thick vines blocking passage to the forest beyond. The large stone fireplace that you emerged from sits to the south.
Natalya straightens out after an unpleasant crawl and marches on the eastern doorway, sword out and ready to do some gardening!
As Natalya walks towards the door, she catches a glimpse of her own reflection in the northwest window. She feels herself being drawn towards it...
Natalya's response is utterly predictable to anyone who knows her. She whirls around and brings Magecleaver around to crash into the window.
The window shatters into shards of glass, but in destroying the wicked device, it frees the fiend trapped inside! A deadly and vicious bouquet of insectile claws sprouts from this horrid, three-legged, multi-eyed beast. It roars in fury and prepares to attack!
Luckily the spider is crawling out of space right next to Natalya. This makes it easy to swing a very large sword at it.
Malkiel helps by furiously stabbing the spider over and over again.
Mal stabs the fiend in several vulnerable spots, while Natalya lands a hit on it. The creature chitters angrily as it claws at Nat! Somehow, it only manages to hit her once! Its mandibles and chitinous plates click and grind together, threatening to scramble your thoughts!
Malkiel hesitates as the spell takes hold of him, causing him to babble nonsense incoherently. As the creature continues to attack Nat, Malkiel continues to stab.
+4 Bleed damage with SA.
Natalya likewise just can't think with that stupid buzzing in her ears. But thinking is over-rated anyway!
Even while not in their right minds, Mal and Natalya prove more than a match for a single fiend, no matter how big and scary it seems. Blood and body parts fly as the monster dies!
Natalya stamps around for a couple of minutes looking for other things to kill until the noise finally goes away and her temper eases in response.
"Stupid thing!" She says, kicking the corpse. "Let's go!"
She heads towards the doorway once more, intent on cutting a way out.
Natalya hacks the vines clear, then opens the door to the next room. Thick vines and tendrils of ivy twist and writhe over every surface of this overgrown cottage room. This room is furnished with cluttered tables and stuffed cabinets, but with ivy writhing through every nook. More disturbingly, the vines support dozens of withered humanoid and animal corpses, their desiccated forms sucked dry of all life and vitality.
An overgrown mandragora inhabits this chamber. Disgustingly overgrown and mightily corpulent, the mandragora is over 8 feet tall and almost as wide around. It licks its barklike lips and addresses you in the Abyssal tongue, holding out a hand.
"I speak more than fifteen languages, but their tongue is not one of them I'm afraid."
Analyzing the extended hand he concludes, "It's clear it's asking for payment for passage, the question is what exactly is it expecting? What would a plant monster want? Certainly not coin."
"How can none of us talk to it?" Izolda asks in exasperation. Speaking ten languages herself it is an unusual and frustrating experience to not be able to communicate.
"We don't understand you." She says in Sylvan. "Do you know any other languages?"
Izolda recognizes the creature as an enormous mandragora, similar to small one you fought in Radosek's ice tower all the way back in Irrisen. The monster tries to speak to you again in two other, unfamiliar languages. Realizing that you can't understand it, the creature shrieks and then lumbers forward to reach for you, giant maw opening wide!
"Ah!" Mal exclaims, "This I do understand! To arms!"
+4 Bleed damage with SA.