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Thesius knows that a Kalavakus is a more potent demon, and cold Iron and magic does not suffice to pierce its tough hide, actual weapons with a good aligned quality are required.
Its horns are also effective at disarming its foes, to render them powerless before them. Kalavakus are not very dextrous demons, although they can move with great speed when hasted, and rarely if ever bother to train their combat reflexes.
And this one must be pretty ancient, when Nahyndri was alive, Ragathiel still served hell.
There is also something else you know. You remember the victory at the grey garrison, where, instead of fighting directly, you simply applied the rod of cancellation to the crystal and won this way.
The demon may be hard to harm for you, but the soul gems in its body which power it? You still got that adamantine morning star.
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Thesius rushes the demon. Feeling unlikely to make the full distance, he opts to maintain the spear as his manner of attack.
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Thesius attack goes wide, but he feels the forces of luck aiding him somehow
Alas he still misses.
And I havent even enslaved your soul yet
The horned demons bariton voice mocks Thesius efforts
A Desnan? there is a pained voice in your head
I am trying to assist you from within, he will likely devour me next
Our names were Liandril and Sariniel, please tell Desna how we perished, and please also tell her you killed this enslaving, murderous fiend!
Elliot cast a glance behind him, seeing the situation, after a wordless glance at Merixia, who nods quickly, he activates his wand of dimension door and shifts both of them behind the demon.
The Kalavakus eyes flash with concern as the heroes surround him
Nope, you do not teleport the furious voice you heard previously announces with a sudden influx of smugness
Get him swordsister!
With his eyes red from both fury and fear, his left claw strikes the crimson red soul gem, as his movement becomes manic and rapid
Pffff worth it you hear the voice again, almost laughing although also in pain
I think it knows we are talking, but not what, but you seem to be best prepared of your group to weather its onslaught
It unleashes its full fury on Azira!
A barrage of hits strikes against her!
Divine Prison: At 8th level, once per day upon making a successful melee attack, you can affect your target with hold monster (Will negates).
Following the lead of their Leader, the 2 archers open fire on Azira, opting for volume over accuracy
The red line archer again gets lucky, striking Azira for 14 damage
GET OVER HERE YOU SLOVENLY FOOLS!
The horned demon shrieks, obeying his command, a rather cautious Brimorack teleports behind Azira, and a Brimorack who seems less worried teleports behind Wulfric.
Both Schirs break into a hasted double move and take up positions from which they could charge next turn. Had the demons been more coordinated, the Brimoracks would have teleported first, and provided flanking to their leader, but few Brimoracks would willingly teleport next to Azira unless directly ordered.
You feel something odd, as if something inside of the demon is linked to you and/or to your faith. More specifically, the crimson soul gem?
You dont directly hear a voice, but you sense a swelling of rage inside of yourself, that seems to resonate with something inside of the gem. It is by no means overpowering, or affecting your decisions.
Then you hear a voice, female, driven and determined
Can it be?
A follower of my general of vengeance?
The foe draws power from me, from those he has imprisoned and enslaved, and I am the strongest, by far, that he has imprisoned in himself. End my dishonor and crush this gem if you can, it is both tactically prudent and... it will end my dishonor.
You get a distinct sense of considerable shame, for having been imprisoned, and for having to ask for assistance.
Verene, who sees that separating the demon from its trapped souls is important but is not privy to the connections between them and her companions, whispers to all of them, "Can you cut the gems out of its hide? I am afraid breaking them might destroy the trapped souls as surely as the demon crushing them would, and I would like to save them if we can. My only way to remove them from its grasp is to shatter them with a spell, but I would need you buy me time to get out there. Alternatively, I can simply try to lock the demon's ethereal signature in place while you work — preventing it from teleporting away."
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Cut the soulgems out? During a fight with a powerful demon? Great. Sure. Why the hell not. "I can try. Give me a few seconds, I'll need a little more power if I'm going to cut into the demon's skin."
While Merixia isn't sure that a good-aligned weapon is necessary here, it was for the vrock, so it follows that another powerful demon would also require a blessed cold iron weapon. She steps back a few feet and raises her holy symbol with her off hand, concentrating on the sea of stars that represents the myriad of spells the wardstone gave her access to. There, that one! In her mind's eye, she grabs the star, and suddenly she knows the words to the spell. As she recites the sacred phrases, the cleric's sword begins to glow golden.
...You know, before she commits to this plan, she should probably ask the trapped Ragathielite a question or two.
If I cut your gem out of the demon's skin, is there a way to release you? And I don't want to hear any of this trash about 'ending your dishonor'. There is no shame in fighting your best and being defeated by a more powerful enemy, only in giving up. The fact that you made the effort to let me know what the gems do tells me that you haven't given up.
Perhaps? Ceremonially smiting the gem on an altar dedicated to our lord Ragathiel should do it for me. Mabye?
Maybe the Protean would also survive if you just smash his gem, he is responsible for us being able to communicate with the outside world at all, for a manifestation of chaos he is surprisingly sensible, and he is great at cheating.
The female voice speaks, you can feel a spark of hope in her
A different voice speak
Greetings, I am them mentioned Protean Xyraxherax, Azuretzi, of the Boiling Spiral
My choir is used to getting souls out of soulgems, especially when fighting demons. My choirmate Lissdrxis, Illureshi sage, is a specialist. If you contact him via sending, add the words "Xyraxherax's Noodle-incident" to the sending, he will know that I send you, thus regarding your request favorably, even if I perish here
Proteans are the natives of the Maelstrom. While they, like demons are creatures of Chaos, they are on the neutral side of the good/evil spectrum.
You do know that they are... sometimes... organized in choirs, and that the Boiling Spiral choir is their main anti demon/anti Qlippoth force.
Ragathiels forces, being highly lawful, rarely ally with them, but the Boiling Spiral is highly friendly with Desna, Gorrum, Callistria and especially Cayden Caylean, whom they view as a kindred soul.
They also tend murder slavers on sight. Or smell, or any other weird protean sense.
"I can try. Give me a few seconds, I'll need a little more power if I'm going to cut into the demon's skin."
"Very well. If you think you might be able to do it, I will try to hold him here for you, then. Move a little to the south, please, so I can see him clearly."
Peering out the arrow slit once more, a chill breeze wafts over the back of Verene's neck and fills her with cool clarity. She blinks into the frozen awareness that lets her see the demon as strands of magical information, which also allows her to see exactly how she would need to manipulate those strands to knot them tight to this plane, preventing it from escaping by any form of extradimensional travel. She has to form a line between herself and the kalavakus momentarily, but this distance is not too far, and it is a large, none-too-graceful target.
She chants a long sentence of words she has never heard before, twisting her fingers as though knotting something with just that clawed hand, and points directly at the demon. A glowing green ray springs from her finger and flashes across the space between them.
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Verene, being skilled in targetting enemies who are engaged in a sprawling melee, manages to both overcome the Kalavakus spell resistance useing her prescience ability and land a very clever shot that narrowly passes by Elliot.
She does recognize that the demon has some type of deflection bonus, but his likely shield of faith is insufficient to stop the strike.
Mage, I will find you, I will break you and I will feed you to the dretches The demon, seeking to recognize the spell, snarls.
Your puny little attempt to disintegrate me did NOTHING to my might!
He says in a more smug way, seemingly thinking that the green ray was an attempt of disintegration which failed to penetrate its thick layers of protection, meaning he is unaware of being dimensionally anchored.
you also send absolutely no malice from the communication, with the entity calling itself Xyraxherax, even a sense of giddy but detached amusement?
The female voice claiming to the a servant of Ragathiel alternates between fury, shame and now hope.
Wrathfull weapon? Your hear the strange alien voice of the protean.
Little Mr. Feeblehorns, yes, he is of below average size for a Kalavakus, funnily enough, has corruption resistance up, but maybe I can do something about it, if you manage to damage my soulstone prison without completely crumpling it.
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Thesius responds back through Verene's message. "Good aligned weapons are needing for this one and I would prefer to save the souls if possible, but it will likely continue to consume them if it takes further injuries in the mean time."
With his companions having closed the distance to Kalavakus, he turns his attention instead to the brimorak next to Wulfric.
Inspired by Wulfric, and again unsually lucky, Thesius strikes the brimorack twice, dealing a total of 38 damage, severely injuring the demon
Ah, a minion. Yes, against my minions, you may have some impact
The Kalavakus smirks as he witnesses Thesius having a bit more luck against the Brimoracks
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As Aziras blade impacts the soul gem she can literally feel the fury of whoever is inside, hot burning rage, tempered by discipline and reason.
Whatever it is, it is probably not an angel, in a split second decision, Azira funnels her mythic power into the soul gems outer shell, breaking it!
You hear a shriek, female, as the red essence manifests into a female figure, nearly 7 feet tall, with corded muscles. The figure is not armed, nor armored, but the black feathery wings, horns and tail do not exactly look angelic.
She is wearing rags, and you can see tatooted closed gauntletet fists on her shoulders, with the image of a raven made of flame holding a bastard sword in its talons being prominently displayed on her back.
That is Ragathiels well... unholy symbol back when he was part of hell.
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Will bot Elliot tomorow, feel free to react!
Bad guys are still going to have their turn
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This is a Munagola or executioner devil
Rare but long-existing members of devilkind, munagolas are the result of the single-minded ambition of Eiseth, the Erinyes Queen and Hell’s Valkyrie. Shortly after she established her realm in Dis, Eiseth set about creating an army worthy of her rage and might. The result of fleshwarping and infernal tinkering that defies even the archdevils’ scrutiny, munagolas combine the aerial strength and craftiness of erinyes with the sheer brute force of barbed devils, bone devils, and even pit fiends. It takes centuries to create one munagola from a progenitor erinyes, but once she’s transformed, the devil is even stronger, more furious, and more determined to conquer Hell on Eiseth’s behalf than ever before.
Devils dont do tatoos, not on themselfs that is, they stopped with that when... Oh, when Ragathiel left hell and any devil who had any Ragathielan heraldy tatooed on him or her was a target for vicious repression.
Greetings mortals, I, Irathiel, strike leader in the 6th wings of dread, vasall of Lord Ragathiel the Raven Prince, acknowledge my debt.
I do not recommend breaking the other soul gems directly if your desire is to free the captives, I barely survived this, and the others are weaker then I am, 2 Liliend azatas, an Almuuth psychopomp and an Azuretzi protean
The newcomer 5 foot steps away from the kalavkus and the Brimorak, points her hands at him and blats him with 3 rays of fire
Scorching ray
Two of her blasts go wide, but the third one hits the demon in the throat, the demon has a level of resistance to fire, but that blast strikes true.
Anyone got a spare axe, that was some pretty piddly damage The newcome says outloud, apparently unsatisfied with the amount of damage she dealt
Not quite sure if I lop off your head, or cleave you in two like Lord Ragathiel did with Xar-Azmask, or maybe I rip off your horns, beat you to death with them and shout *stop hitting yourself*, but nah, thats too demonlike behaviour.
And you are such an insignificant little slaving mercenary shit that there is no way the f&&@ing dimension is going to collapse upon itself when you die.
She berates the Kalavakus
Xar Azmask was a demonlord of rust, decay, disease and entrophy. His force once managed to ruin part of Dis, Dispaters capital. Dispater killed Xar Azmask in Dis, but, given that major demonlord reincarnate, was unsatisfied and sent an army to permanently kill Xar Azmask in his own plane.
You do not know which devil actually killed that demonlord, only that the demonlord died.
You do as a matter of fact know that Ragathiel lead Dispaters punitive expedition, that Ragathiel was heavily displeased by the support, or lack thereoff, he got from Moloch, that Ragathiel succeeded anyway, partly by sidestepping Xar Azmasks defenses via invading a different demonlords, Luralune's specifically, domain. That one of hells greatest deeds was done by one who abandoned it later is the core cause as to why this is not know widely. Ragathiel meanwhile abandoned all claims on anything that has anything to do with hell, including the glory of having killed a demonlord in its own domain in single combat, so he doesnt talk about it too.
Is this reverse psychology? Insult the demon so he doesnt go for her? It may actually work.
Huh? the newcomers voice speaks in your head
I guess the Lord Ragathiel has pact servants now? Suits him much better then it does the big A. and dont worry too much, I am from the "kick all the demon ass" department, not from the "corrupt all the mortals" department.
Immediately upon getting a good look at the black-winged fury that appears from the broken soul gem, Verene recalls many things in quick succession.
"An executioner devil." Her whisper to the others sounds surprised. "Or munagola, as they are called. They are something like a stronger erinyes — the female devils we named Furies — that Eiseth, queen of the erinyes, crafted over many years to combine flight, cunning and brute force. She built them into an army made to conquer the rest of Hell from her realm on its second layer, Dis. It is rare for a devil to have such tattoos, however. Presumably this one dates to a time before Ragathiel ascended."
She falls silent as the telepathic voice immediately confirms her thought, and thinks back as politely as she can. Greetings to you, Irathiel, vassal of Ragathiel. I am Verene. Thank you for your assistance and advice about the other gems. Is there an order in which we should target them, or anything else we should know about this demon?
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Greetings Lady Verene
Any order is fine, but try to extract them intact for purposes of a more controlled liberation later. The Kalavakus needs to have an arm free to crush them to fuel himself, regrettfully I am too energy drained to grapple and pin him myself.
The Protean in the green gem... may have the 50/50 % chance of surviving you smashing it open while its in contact with the demon, which is better then his chances of surviving if the Kalavakus consumes him. I dont normally respect Proteans, but indirectly he may have a high *demons died because of me* count then I do. He also never submitted, I respect that as well.
The teal one is an Almuuth psychopomp, fairly weak and depressed, like, some psychopomps are skilled fighters, this one isnt, and the orange one is a Liliend Azata, I can respect that she at least fights her imprisonment. They wont be useful directly, but both Desna and Pharasma pay their debts.
You all hear the newcomer
----
Oh, is this on? You all hear the sibilant voice of something else
Its me the protean in the green soul gem. You have my leave to smash it, I may die, but if the demon consumes it I will die, easy choice.
What nearly got Irathiel killed looked like a negative energy effect, not unlike an energy drain abilitiy, if you have ways to mitigate that, casting it on the essence once it gets out of the gem probably works.
Or threathen him enough into parting with the soul gems, in exchange for safe passage, but the f*@$er doesnt actually know he is dimensional anchored yet.
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Greetings, I am them mentioned Protean Xyraxherax, Azuretzi, of the Boiling Spiral
My choir is used to getting souls out of soulgems, especially when fighting demons. My choirmate Lissdrxis, Illureshi sage, is a specialist. If you contact him via sending, add the words "Xyraxherax's Noodle-incident" to the sending, he will know that I send you, thus regarding your request favorably, even if I perish here.
...
Wrathfull weapon? Your hear the strange alien voice of the protean.
Little Mr. Feeblehorns, yes, he is of below average size for a Kalavakus, funnily enough, has corruption resistance up, but maybe I can do something about it, if you manage to damage my soulstone prison without completely crumpling it.
A protean? Well, war makes for strange bedfellows. Merixia tries to form her thoughts clearly for them. Boiling Spiral, huh? Word has it you like to kill slavers. If that's true, we have something in common! I'll do my best to remove your gem intact, but if I can't, I will contact your choirmate and let him know what happened.
Merixia stares up at the newly released fiend- a munagola, according to Verene, which means that she is most definitely a munagola. Wow. I did not see that one coming. She thought for sure that the voice from the red gem was an angel or archon. Well... again, strange bedfellows and all that.
Greetings mortals, I, Irathiel, strike leader in the 6th wings of dread, vasall of Lord Ragathiel the Raven Prince, acknowledge my debt.
I do not recommend breaking the other soul gems directly if your desire is to free the captives, I barely survived this, and the others are weaker then I am, 2 Liliend azatas, an Almuuth psychopomp and an Azuretzi protean....
Huh? the newcomers voice speaks in your head I guess the Lord Ragathiel has pact servants now? Suits him much better then it does the big A. and dont worry too much, I am from the "kick all the demon ass" department, not from the "corrupt all the mortals" department.
Wait. Wait wait wait. This Irathiel claims to have served Ragathiel in Hell before he defected to Heaven, and apparently that was a thing! Merixia knew her patron was half devil, of course, but not that he had actually served in the armies of Hell. Wow. His atonement and redemption are even more impressive now.
That's something to contemplate later. Irathiel seems sincere in her desire to kill the kalavakus, and right now that's the most important thing. You must have been trapped in there for a long time. Stick around and talk to us before you leave, there are some things you really need to know about Ragathiel and Hell. Going into that now would only distract the munagola, and if breaking her gem injured her that badly, a distraction is the last thing she needs.
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Thesius' mind is flooded with a wealth of information as things unfold in front of him.
With a quick reply he offers his longspear to the potential ally. "I've no axe, but I can lend you a spear." It was likely this being would be able to make better use of the weapon then he.
The Kalavakus is fooled into ignoring the weakened and drained devil
Foolish little devil, you seek to provoke me into killing you, so that your torment does not continue.
You there, flank with me!
And you little Paladin, you took something precious from me, I shall return the favor!
With the assistance of the flanking Brimorak, the Kalavakus nearly manages to disarm Azira, but somehow, even if she is not in proper position, the Munagola offers the benefits from flanking to Azira.
Heh, noodlehorns. The devil smirks
--------------LAST TURN RETCON------------------
misses
--------------Azira still takes 52 damage from the last round-------
I know your fighting style, you can only parry once!
Snarling, it attempts to disarm again with its hasted horns, this time wresting Radiance from Aziras hands!
BWHAHAHAHAHAHAH WHAT NOW MORTAL!
The demon laughs as radiance flies out of Aziras hand, impacting the wall 10 feet behind her, and then richots, right into Brimoracks back.
The minor demon takes a significant blow
FIGHT DEFENSIVELY AND DIMENSION DOOR OUT! The Kalavakus shouts
With Azira disarmed, the kalavakus focuses his attention onto more threatening targets, striking repeatedly at elliot.
Striking him twice for 27 damage
Hmmm, I taste true love upon your soul mortal, there are some whorehouses that pay great for slaves such as you!
Inspite of his damage, the demon feels cocky enough to use his enslave soul ability on Elliot
But Elliot resist him
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Summary Kalavakus turn
The green Brimorack total defenses.
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Submitting this part of the post so it doesnt get eaten.
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Now up, various minor minions
---Blue Brimorak-------------------------------------
The blue lines Brimorack 5 foot steps towards the Munagola and full attacks her
LORD BAPHOMEEEET WILL PRAISE ME IF I SLAY YOU
Due to the Munagolas uncharacteristic lack of armor and drained state, all of his attacks hit
The Munagola puts up a fairly impressive show of pretending actually taking damage, when her fire immunity and DR10 good makes it impossible for the Brimorack to damage her on anything but a crit.
The minor demons have a hard time penetrating my skin.
-----------------------2 backline cultist archers------------------
Whom do we shoot?
If in doubt the healer!
--------------------2 Schirs--------------------------
Both Schirs charge thesius!
he takes 45 damage
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--Blue Brimorak full attacks Munagola, failing utterly to penetrate her DR
--Both Cultist archers full attack on Merixia, but whiff
--Both Schirs powerfull charge Thesius, possible critting him, for a total of 45 damage.
Elliot -27 hp
Theisus -45 hp if his AC is indeed only 20, if its 22 then -31
Thesius was holding his longspear, so he totally gets AoO (2 if he has combat reflexes).
HEROES ARE UP