"Oui, you should stay behind us as we move forward," Fallende says to the nervous doctor, placing a reassuring hand on her shoulder before moving forward.
The stairs to descend to a wide hall. A pillar stands at either end of this wide room. The northern pillar is carved with the image of a Runelord Alaznist wielding a ranseur. The southern pillar depicts seven robed men and women, their features eroded with the years. Each of them holds one segment of the seven-pointed star. Strange runes are carved into the floor.
The runes are in Thassilonian and ask, “Does true power lie within the one or the many?” The hall continues past these pillars.
Wesley detects faint magic in this area.
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When they are finished, the words everyone keeps saying finally settles in. "devils?" a shudder cracks her normally calm features, and spreads over her body. She hugs herself tightly to try and contain it "Maybe we should..." her dark eyes dart back the way they came, clearly starting to suggest that they leave. Now, and Never to come back!!!!!
A suggestion she manages to stop, somehow. "... be careful." a weak attempt, but still an attempt
"It's okay Lottie." Bel is there immediately, wrapping her friend in a hug and tucking her under Isabel's chin. "It's fine, just like we're back in Egorian. Same skills we used during all those horrid debutante balls. Except this time we can hit them. We'll be fine. I promise."
Once her friend is feeling better and able to continue Isabel retrieves her weapons and follows along.
Confronted by the riddle she frowns. "The First Emperor would have said that true power lay in balancing the many. But the runelords believed in the power of one... does it even matter? But since this is Alaznist's realm I'd expect evocation? Is that what you can see Wesley?"
Charlotte smiles, nestles into a hug, looks fondly at a hand on her shoulder, and nods, keeping her shaky voice silent to keep from screaming in memory.
"Oh, it's a trap?" she catches on, Bel's mind always much quicker than her own, not necessary more intelligent, just quicker, as Charlotte feels the need to weigh every thought.
"I believe it's transmutation magic, actually," Wesley says. "Curious. I wonder if the power might enhance those who choose correctly?"
Fallende chuckles.
"Power always resides in the 'Self'," she declares, stepping near the piller carved with the singular likeness of Alaznist.
"And she would have believed the same."
The elf looks over the carving seeking something obvious.
Charlotte tenses as the elf goes forward on her own, a worried frown on her lips. But she does nothing other than clasp the strap of her bag tightly and watch.
When Fallende touches the norther pillar, Alaznist's image glows for a moment. Fallende feels a surge of power fill her body.
A throaty groan is the elf's response to the rush of magic. "Ça fait du bien," she whispers in surprise. Taking a firmer grip on her weapon, she indicates that they should continue on.
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"Well that decides that." Isabel says softly, stepping forwards to touch the statue in turn, glancing back as she does to smile at Lottie.
She hisses as she touches the statue and her body is momentarily outlined in red light which fades rather grudgingly.
"You probably don't need to touch it." She reports to the remaining group members. "I'm feeling much happier with my weapons right now but I don't think that'll carry over to spells."
She shakes a couple of times as though she's trying to shake off an annoying itch and then smiles again.
"Let's go!"
Charlotte relaxes, accepts her friend's judgement, and nods, before moving forward behind the others.
Ahead, the passage splits again. To the east, you catch a strong smell of the sea, and salt encrusts the floor in a trail leading to a door. To the south, the hall continues around the corner. You can hear grunts of effort and squeals of delight coming from somewhere past the turn in the hall.
Fallende silently gestures with her weapon southward and moves slowly in that direction.
"It sounds like intercourse" Charlotte agrees with her friend, with a clinical tone. And follows behind.
The elf turns and looks between the two woman with a expression of disgust before shaking her head and returning her attention to the passage ahead of them.
The doctor arches a dark brow at Fallende's reaction, but makes no other comment.
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Unfortunately (?), the sounds you are hearing are not those of intercourse. The hall opens up onto a semi-circular room, with stairs leading up to a balcony on the far side. A pair of imps crouch on the balcony, cheering on a pair of hideous aberrations that grunt and moan as they claw at each other. While their heads and torsos are vaguely human, their arms are rubbery and move awkwardly at their sides. Their lower bodies look like those of disgusting slugs.
Upon spotting you, the imps chortle. "Oh, what fun! Mortals to kill! Attack them, fleshwarps!"
The two grotesque monsters slowly turn their attention from each other and onto you!
One look at the imp's makes the young woman freeze. She knew what they were, and where they came from. Most important she knew her fire was useless against them. "I... can't" she stammers, before sending a ball of flame at one of the slug people.
The imps hang back and cheer their aberrant champions on. The slug-things let out piteous moans as Charlotte scorches one of them. They slither forward and claw at Fallende and Isabel.
Charlotte sends more fire into the one she hit before.
Fallende grunts in pain, but cleaves the monstrosity with her long blade, following up with a deep stab.
***
Isabel swings futilely at the monsters, but Falende fares much better. She slashes into her attacker once, then tears it in half with a critical hit! As the disgusting monster dies, its digestive organs rupture, unleashing alchemical acid and poison upon Fallende and Isabel!
Charlotte and Wesley both hurl fire at the remaining foe. It takes the hits as it continues to claw at Isabel. It follows Fallende's example, landing one hit before following up with a critical hit that leaves Isabel bleeding on the floor! The imps cackle and cheer!
The elf's stomach revolts as the vile substance splashes over her and burns her skin.
"Doctor! Isabela is down!" she shouts out as she continues to wage war against the remaining abomination.
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Isabel wasn't expecting the disgusting explosion and made the rather elementary mistake of dropping her guard as she tried to keep the horrid substances off her face. That left her horrendously open to the remaining monster and before she knows what's happening Isabel is on the ground bleeding rather profusely.
Bizarrely even her blood seems to be changed, it glows slightly in the dimness of the room with a faint golden light and pools around her head despite the wounds in her belly. It almost looks as though she's an angel from a devotional painting. Perhaps a martyred one.
Charlotte doesn't need the order.
No time for fear or worry about her best friend bleeding golden light around her, just time to do what has been trained into her over and over. Her medical skills, but she ignores that completely and prays instead, knowing the goddess of healing has a special place in her heart for young pretty heroes that make others smile.
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The wound in Isabel's stomach closes in an instant and the young woman heaves herself off the floor with no apparent effort or strain, flashing a grin at her friend as she does so. Strangely the blood comes with her and by the time Isabel is fully upright she does have a halo, casting a bright and heavenly radiance across the battlefield.
Isabel's weapon is also coated in her blood, but if anything that seems to help as she strikes at the demon before her!
Wesley burns the creature again, and while Fallende misses, Isabel lands a solid blow! Like its companion, its body ruptures and bursts upon its death!
The two imps who had been laughing and cheering shriek with frustration as the monsters die. They vanish from sight, and you can hear their little wings flapping as they fly away.
The rumblings in her stomach haven't stopped, but with potential threats still hovering around unseen, Fallende doesn't allow herself the luxury of giving in to the urge to vomit.
Taking deep breaths to keep control, she turns to the injured Isabel. "You are not entirely human," she states with a narrowing of her almond-shaped eyes.
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Isabel doubles over as she is doused in vile fluids again, but maintains enough spirit to look archly up at Fallende between dry heaves.
"What... urgh... gave it away?" She asks, finally straightening up and spitting a couple of times before reaching for her canteen. The golden ring above her head is still in place, washing the area in golden light and making Isabel look downright unearthly, even covered in grime and demonic...ness as she is.
She's too proud to ask for Lottie's help, but when she tilts her head to drink and the room sways around her, Isabel reaches for her friend entirely automatically.
The elf rolls her eyes, assuming the response to be sarcastic.
"We should find a place to rest," she says to Charlotte. "Some of us could use a moment to recover."
Charlotte is there immediately to help her wobbly friend, slipping her head under her arm and helping lead her to the other room. "A rest will do us all good." the dark eyed woman says for all, adding another whispered question of "this is new... isn't it?" at least she never remembered Bel with a halo, which she had to say illuminated her face in such a way that was equally stunning and... oddly, hurt her eyes.
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"Yeah..." Isabel replies and then, noticing how her friend is squinting to look her in the eye, frowns for a moment. The halo winks out as suddenly as it came, leaving the room remarkably dark for a brief moment until eyes adjust to the sudden lack of light.
"Sorry." She murmurs for Lottie's ears alone. "Didn't mean to make you uncomfortable."
Fallende's elvish ears pick up the whispered conversation, but as propriety dictates, she carries on, the words clearly not meant for her.
Charlotte responds with a saddened whisper of "I wish it didn't... it was very beautiful." the slight smell of sulfur had been building but dissipates when the angelic light does.
"Tend to her," Fallende says to Charlotte with a gesture at the sleeping woman. "I'll keep watch." The elf remains standing with her blade in her hand, intending to do exactly that in spite of the green caste to her skin and the gurgling of her stomach.
Charlotte lays her friend down, after creating a pillow from her coat. Then the dark eyed doctor comes to check on the green elf. "Sit, please." she says, calmly but with persistence.
After Charlotte diagnoses, and tends to whatever she can, she fixes Fallende with her firm gaze "In all things martial, I recognize your experience outweighs mine, so I will listen to your advise. But in all things medical, I hope you would do me the same courtesy. Welsely and I can keep watch. YOU need your rest."
Wesley mostly keeps to himself as you camp in a safe room in the dungeon, studying his spellbook. The night passes without incident, and the next day, you resume your exploration, moving past where you fought the disgusting aberrations.
A low table sits in the center of the room at the end of the hall. Two low benches sit on either side of the table, and a wooden stringed instrument of archaic design leans against one of them.
The two imps who fled earlier are in here, as well as another small devil with the head and torso of a pudgy human infant and the lower body, wings, mouths, and eyes of a fat housefly.
"Ah! Mortals!" the devil declares. "I am Lord Baz, the proper ruler of this laboratory complex. I demand your services in removing a thorn in my side!"
After Charlotte diagnoses, and tends to whatever she can, she fixes Fallende with her firm gaze "In all things martial, I recognize your experience outweighs mine, so I will listen to your advise. But in all things medical, I hope you would do me the same courtesy. Welsely and I can keep watch. YOU need your rest."
Fallende seems quite ready to argue, but her wrenching intestines make the decision for her. She lurches towards the shadows behind one of the large columns and a wet splattering on the stone floor indicates her body winning the war against her will. She returns to the demanding doctor and nods silently, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.
---
Tightening her grip on her blade, Fallende is ready to engage the vile devil when Isabel opens negotiations, of all things. Turning an incredulous gaze at the woman, she remains silent.
Fallende seems quite ready to argue, but her wrenching intestines make the decision for her. She lurches towards the shadows behind one of the large columns and a wet splattering on the stone floor indicates her body winning the war against her will. She returns to the demanding doctor and nods silently, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.
Charlotte returns the nod, before taking the elf's hand and wiping it with a handkerchief, followed by the elf's mouth. Then she takes up her post for watch.
Fear radiates off of the doctor when Lord Baz speaks, but she manages to swallow it as much as possible. She stays behind her comrades, but can still be seen by the creature.
Charlotte recognizes the devil as a zebub. Zebubs form from the souls of childish and craven mortals, reshaped by the archdevil Baalzebul in the frozen, filthy wastes of Hell's seventh layer, Cocytus. Zebubs serve as Hell's messengers and spies. Their ability to share what they've seen with other creatures makes them especially useful—not only to other devils, but also to mortal conjurers. While arrogant and deceitful, zebubs lack the cunning and confidence of most devils, and thus their schemes often focus on satisfying self-serving or self-destructive ambitions.
"To the west of here is an upstart imp who thinks he's all high and mighty," Baz says. "Calls himself the 'Suzerain of Little Erebus.' He is trying to take over my domain. I want you to get rid of him! Slay the ingrate and please your lord!"
Charlotte leans close to her friend "its a zebub, deceitful, arrogant, and almost assuredly will try to betray us once we do its deed."