Hey folks, obviously I haven't found my stride to get back into the boards. Not sure why this move is so significant over others.
Unlikely to change any time soon, lots of other things to focus on.
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Still trying to find my rhythm. New job start is rough ... travel is starting again and still haven't finished unpacking the house.
Got internet yesterday. Final delivery of house stuff comes on Monday. Little behind (weather is taking some getting used to). Be back on track soon!
The move is going well. We have transitioned to our new location. Accept the house and start the new job tomorrow. Movers come up Wednesday and hopefully have wifi by the weekend. Should be up to normal speed in a week or 2. Thanks for bearing with me!
The juju zombie continues to fight while prone swinging at Relan taking the time to make a good swing at the human's legs, clipping his calf. The zombie then hauls itself to its feet, provoking attacks of opportunity. ; Braelex is paralyzed, but Number One turns back to the remaining mummy and slashes it twice, its hardened skin difficult to penetrate, but the bladed arms of the golem do damage nonetheless. Vuloo's archon hits the juju zombie once with a light blast, searing off dead skin.
The mummy assaults the golem again.
Gemel is paralyzed in despair.
Number One slashes down the engaged zombie and then follows up with a vicious strike on the juju zombie, cutting into its arm easily.
Relan steps over to, trips, and then severs the head off the mangled mummy.
Paralyzation Duration in Rounds:
Braelex cowers in indecision, trapped in her own mind ... Gemel joins her in consternation and despair. Vuloo's archon (singular, yes?) arrives and pummels the northeast mummy, the rays of light incinerating portions of the undead creature's chest. It staggers forward past the unreachable archon, its necromantic essence leaking visibly and approaches Braelex. It swings a hammering overhanded two-handed blow, but catches a wrapping on a loose nail and missed the unmoving tiefling. ; miss The other two attack the golem with similar club-handed blows. ;
Andel begins to identify mummy weaknesses.
Still moving and working on getting the computer fixed. Moving a family across the nation and transitioning from 1 high profile job to another while in the midst of a bizarre housing market and a notable lack of long haul drivers for moving companies is consuming my world. I have not forgotten you (or any of my other games), I just need the month to get back level. Will keep you informed.
Hey team. I'm in the middle of a last.minute move across country AND my computer bitlockered itself early.last week and I haven't had the opportunity to get it fixed/wiped. I have phone access but it is terrible for combat. Bear with me this month. I'll post when able but its gonna be tight until we settle in 1st week of August.
As the mummified corpses rush forward, the intensity of their hatred for life washes over you and you feel absolute despair for living when these things no longer can.
Braelex and Number One engage the zombie, but the creature is both deft and tough and is able to deflect the golem's attack with a quick parry and the crossbow bolt deflects off its dried hide. Vuloo starts casting a spell as Gemel identifies the other three as mummies, moving and preparing a spell as the mummies rush forward. One of them charges Number One and leaves the circle of Gemel's spell decision.
The other two move up perfectly and Gemel drops a fireball on them and the zombie. ; fail
The fireball speeds out and detonates with a concussive force. The two mummies immediately catch fire and the force of the blast almost completely incinerates their wrappings leaving charred yet still moving emaciated bodies. The juju zombie leaps aside but catches the full force of the blast, but it washes over it as a hint of a magical barrier flashes quickly just as it is about to touch its skin. It appears unharmed.
Relan lashes out with the hook of his guisarme and pulls the massive creature to the ground, following up with a chopping blow cutting like butter through the dead thing's skin. He pulls back trying to hook the blade out of the thing's grasp but the creature yanks it back ... too strong for the warrior. Andel begins to shout out and the zombie attacks with fanatic speed, still moaning desperately, "Why can't I feel ..." but Relan is able to step aside from the feebly aimed blows fairly easily.
The bookcases beside the window are almost empty, and contain just a few books of obscure poetry and litanies written in Aklo and Abyssal—a collection of demonic literature. On the table is a small book of poems in Abyssal dedicated to the demon lords of Golarion. The inside back cover of this book has been used to scribble a short poem (see Poem Handout in Roll 20) The books on the shelves, while also grim and blasphemous in subject matter, are rare editions worth 400gp in all.
Relan takes stock of the creature moving out into the room to get a good gander, watching how its skin stretches dry and tight and notices the speed at which it moves, and he identifies it as a juju zombie that was once a bugbear albeit a huge one, coming in at 10 feet tall. Andel confirms it with a quick commentary and then retreats back into the North Tower. The creature, while slow to get up, suddenly rushes forward with unnatural alacrity, swinging its axe as it closes with Relan, slamming the warrior and sapping at his soul ... Relan fends off the drain, but hears a voice calling for him as the blade touches his skin. ; HIT!;
The party heads up the stairs and they end in a short ladder and trap door. Pushing through the trap door, the party finds themselves in the top floor of the north tower.
The northwest corner of this room is circular, with windows that overlook the sea. In the round-shaped section of the room, a high-backed leather armchair sits facing one of the windows, its leather surface stained and stinking of decayed meat.
The door to the south leads to a rectangular room that is almost completely lined in wood and furnished with a round table with a single chair, several stools near a large fireplace, and two tall bookcases flanking a window with flowery stained-glass designs.
The door to the east leads to a massive chamber. This huge room is a large open central chamber surrounded by an ambulatory, creating a sort of indoor arcade with numerous five-foot-wide arches providing access into the center. In the central chamber, which sits under a vaulted twenty-foot-high ceiling supported by wooden timbers, twenty-one ornate chairs stand in solemn ring, their backs against the walls of the arcade between each of the arches. On the high back of each chair is the beautifully sculpted holy symbol of one of the major deities of Golarion. An immense dark fireplace looms to the west. To the north a door leads out to the balcony the redcaps were firing at you from earlier. Standing around the room in various locations are corpses, mummified and wrapped but very much animate as their red eyes turn to face you as you enter. Your attention however is drawn to the massive creature seated in the chair of Urgathoa. A horribly decayed and oversized goblinoid of some sort. It stands slowly as you enter, hefting a huge axe that pulses with a necromantic energy. "Can't ... feeel," it moans and the other corpses in the room shamble toward you.
Dunno why time is slipping away from me. I owe you guys a post. Ill try and squeeze some time in today. May accelerate a room or 2 to get some momentum.
Braelex scours the item for traps, but after careful scrutiny declares it safe.
Braelex suppresses the evil vision with a shudder, and notes a nearly invisible glyph inscribed on the headdress' crown. "Wouldn't touch this ... nasty bit here."
I'm in the middle of a significant job transition, so I'm gonna hold off on kicking off the next chapter until probably August or so. I'll send an email out to everyone once we kick this back off (and I'll summarize where we're at)
The party steels themselves and heads back out into the infiltrated Abbey, slipping across the courtyard and past the bodies of the slain ettins into the refectory.
An elaborate fresco depicting a banquet shared by the many deities of Golarion decorates the four walls of this dining hall. The refectory is in complete disarray, with smashed tables and chairs and all kinds of cutlery and crockery scattered here and there amid loads of dirt and rubbish.
A grand stairwell to the upper floor is set along the west wall, splitting to the north and south in flanking ascending flights. An extravagant headdress consisting of a veil hanging from a silvery crown is draped over the north banister at the foot of the stairs. Based on your conversation with Casamir, you surmise the headdress is the titular symbol of the Masked Abbot, the office accorded to the highest ranking priest in the Abbey at any given time.
Casamir easily heals up Braelex's wounds with the practiced grace of someone who has spent decades communing with their god.
Bevaluu, eh? Took them long enough to figure out we were in dire straits ...", the half-elf sighs as he leads you up the stairs. You are first hit by the stench of what's obviously the result of someone living in a closed container for weeks on end. It's touch not to retch and you see the priest flush slightly in embarrassment, "I knew it was cowardice to flee here when the Abbey was attacked, but it was going to be a slaughter, and this place is stout and defendable, plus I've been tending it for years, so I know it's ins and outs." he says by way of explanation, but not really apology. "The man that led the attack was Ardathanatus, I am sure of it. He was the last recorded priest of Pharasma on duty when Aroden died and I suspect he has turned to chaos and evil, and has some designs on bringing some sort of catastrophic planar invasion. It was he who brought the ettins and redcaps along with the thrice-cursed medusa (I assume that's the Hen your redcap prisoner talked of)." The pained look flashes across his face again and then he waves it off muttering, "In a moment." He then continues, "Adarthanatus has help from Zolerim, the local priest of Nethys, who violated the Windsong Truce and helped the invaders kill the Masked Abbott. I am unsure why, Zolerim was always a mysterious bugger." You arrive at the the room at the top of the spiral stairway which is encased in thin, immaculate walls windowed with large, colorless glass panes. In the middle shines a huge iridescent sphere, whose dazzling colors are magnificently reflected all over the surrounding white walls and window panes. The walls of the room have been covered to a height of seven feet with tangled scribbles and drawings of butterflies and angelic women.
Sam, there is magic everywhere. You don't really need to have detect magic to figure it out, but it's overwhelming conjuration magic. The portal appears to be about a mile in diameter and from Hollowsky it's a blight in the sky over the caldera of Cauldron that radiates a reddish/purple light all throughout the night. You discover that Lady Ophelia has set up a haphazard library in her estate as the Acadamae and the temples all saved most of their books and documents in fleeing the city. Your access to research any of these items would be unimpededed.
Sam and Nowzai discover that their telepoetation spells and abilities no longer work. Something is interfering with the ability to move into that extradimensional space.
As Andel and Relan approach the door coming up near the invisible Vuloo, the door suddenly swings open. Standing in the door beckoning to you is a thin, tall, blue-eyed and red-haired elf, the one Vuloo saw earlier through the top of Pharus Pharasmae. You note wrinkles appearing on his head and sides of his eyes ... making him a very old elf. "Quickly get in!" He clutches at a holy symbol of Desna on a chain around his neck and grasps a starknife tightly in his other hand.
Standard 6.5 foot human-sized door.
She nods and scampers off, and startling you, the four gargoyle like structures above take flight in a cloud of dust and zoom after her, red eyes blazing as they glare menacingly at you and fly around her in a protective circle as she darts for the front gate.
Vuloo takes matters into his own hands and heads to the entrance to the lighthouse. His detect magic finds faint abjuration magic on the door frame and lock.
Sam notes as he takes stock that the smaller portals have stopped raining demodands on the area and now it's simply the churn of the larger portal above as it continues to coalesce merging towards an eventual final form, the effects of which are unknown, but likely catastrophic. Epik talks with the Town Guard as Jenya works with the priests. It appears that the combination of the two are putting folks to work helping construct their own temporary refugee camp near Hollowsky. Sheepishly the Town Guard Lieutenant that Epik talks to mentions having just got back from the siege of Redgorge. Following the Blue Duke's death, the Cauldronite Guardsmen overthrew the half-orc mercenaries and ran most of them off. He bemoans that if they hadn't essentially razed the town, there might have been a good opportunity to leverage that city as well, but instead you now have refugees from both Cauldron AND Redgorge flowing to Hollowsky. "If only we'd had some brave folks like you all to stand up to the Blue Duke and his cronies earlier. Ah well, lava under the bridge, no?" Epik hangs near the back with the guardsmen sweeping people away from the burning city and towards shelter and food. Dalamus forges ahead. Unsurprising to the assassin, his home's half-elves and halflings have turned out en masse to support as best they can. Fetching water and emptying their stores, slaughtering livestock etc. The other high priests and the Guard leadership lead the effort in the refugee camp outside the village outskirts. You quickly find out that many of the notable nobles have holed up with Lady Knowles as well. You discover Vortimax Weer along the way who queries Nowzai about transportation spells, informing the wizard that his own teleports have failed due to some disturbance with the portal. Apparently an epicly large dimensional anchor-like effect has settled on the area.
The fae points to the south southwest and slightly up.
Gemel pieces together that the redcap says that Ricle Peaks, their leader, is through a locked door nearby and the key belongs to The Hen, who apparently will "make rocks of you"
The party quickly moves to the northern gates as the city rumbles and spits around them, holes of gas and lava bubbles appearing more frequently and the forming portal above the city gets more ominous. Dodging demodands left and right, and seeing no more citizens on the street, they make it to the gate to follow the long line of refugees out. Sam is able to get to the Inn and get the chest out quickly, he darts up into the air just as the southern wall of the city cracks open and a torrent of lava explodes out from the southern edge of Crater Lake and flows south running through the streets and collapsing buildings into quickly melted slag. Even from several 100 feet away, the tiefling can feel the heat as he alone watches a quarter of the city disappear under a torrential lava flow. With nothing to do about it, he joins the party as Cauldron is abandoned, a sense of defeat heavy in the air.
"Ricle Peaks kennae bring us. Ya ned'n nigh dur locken ta gets 'im. Th' Hen hae th key, but she tae make rocks ay ya!" the little redcap woman replies to Gemel's question.
Heh. Fair. Tonight, Ill play catch up. I've been lazy hanging with the family in Florida but I have time.
Epik starts leading the way out as the city streets continue to break apart. Bubbling lave begins to roil out in places, rolling down the street. Parts of the southern outer wall begin to collapse as the cracks in the foundation get worse.
Gemel determines that the redcap thinks you're here to see some sort of older cleric of Desna (Auld Swallertail) is in lighthouse dedicated to Pharasma (Flappy Lassie). Apparently the cleric doesn't come out much, so much so that someone important named Ricle can't even get him to come out.
14 is the target ... achieved 4 months ago ... next rest.
"Ahhh!" she shouts out when Gemel speaks directly to her, pushing further into the. "Ya gonnae come fer Auld Swallertail in 'at lighthoose? He wulnae come it onytime suin. Ricle is a win’poke nae big enaw tae blaw aff 'at shiny hut. An' Auld Swallertail main gie his scran an' bevvy frae Flappy Lassie, th' a body he is aye blaitherin' abit!" She screeches at you and waves back to the door you came through.
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