I must admit, I am very confused about all these goings on. What kind of machinist keeps going face first into this meat grinder? Or even tunes in each week for the body count update?
Finally staggered out of the entryway in pursuit of the gassy vamp. Several wandering idiots later, we're following a weather front. Arrived at their resting place to find the group curb stomping boxes and slinging dirt. Moved on to clear out the lich's new playroom, finding parts of Oona's dad; this day just gets better and better. Schlepped through some other rooms before heading to the big chamber Macer was going to take on by himself.
Glad he waited for the rest of us to catch up before doing the Leroy Jenkins, now I have another image of hell engraved in my brain. Nina yelled something about horrid wilting(very accurate description) while removing us from the ugly green cloud, leaving my lungs behind(try to remember where those were).
Breaking out the air support, need to get into this things face before it spells us out of the history books.
The lich did not like the sudden arrival of more of the group and once again cast another deadly cloud centering the spell on himself. He then cast some sort of black ray at me that my death ward spell seemed to nullify. I then proceeded to pummel him with my bare fists and I have to admit I was a little disconcerted because even though I pummeled him greatly he just kept looking at me like I was some sort of enigma or puzzle that he wanted to solve. If a man with a skull as a head could smile, he did. He continued to cast another cloud as well as another spell that was aimed at draining our fluids. I felt the spell wash over me and I drain me of fluids even in my elemental state. He kept backing away slowly from me and the others while maintaining the spells that filled the halls. Spells of wind from Nina was keeping most of the cloud away from us around the lich. He eventually asked, "Do I know you all? Who are you?"
I eventually had to dimensional skip over behind him to once again flank with Lugh and again punched the lich. This time I was rewarded by the lich falling to the ground after landing another solid blow. I knew he was dead as all the spells went away that had been filling the room. It was painful but I enjoyed it until Emma said that he wasn't truly dead. When I gave her a questioning look, as much as I could in this form at least. She said something about his factory. Regardless there were individuals that needed healing, and more importantly restorations to their health from some of the nasty spells the lich cast. So I did what I could for Nina and Emma and while I did this, the spells having a lengthy casting time, the others found a group of female slaves, a study and a list of names of vampires.
While looking through a library that we found, I decided to watch the room as a whole while the others looked around for books or items of interest. The boredom of this was interrupted thankfully by an attack of vampires. I pummeled the vampire that was attacking me and left him reeling but he still attacked back leaving savage wounds on my elemental form. He fell under the onslaught of the others as they rushed in to help. Just as he fell two more appeared on opposite sides of me and began attacking. These attacks were savage and brutal and almost killed me. One of the vampires turned his attention to Atz when he ran over and cast a damaging spell on one of them and promptly killed Atz for having done so. Thankfully Nina had a vial of the blue substance that went into Atz's mouth bringing him back from the boneyard. This place was a murder house, a fun murder house, but a murder house none the less. The others were going to stop getting up and I was almost completely out of my ability to speak with Gorum for spell favors which meant our ability to heal up after our conflicts was greatly diminished.
With that we decided to head back to our inn and get some rest. Many of us, me included, were greatly injured and needed to get some healing and rest.
Here's my thing: I am unable to implement a plan without working through the math in my head, and it was immediately apparent that this one wouldn't work. I had to throw out the counterspelling idea and go on the offensive. I also let myself realize that there was no way that Nina could have access to Dimensional Anchor; she's a Magus (although she hardly acts like one. I don't think she's thrown a 'touch' spell since I've known her). Lugh was the guy for that, and he was a little pre-occupied what with Huge carrying him into melee and all. It would be up to me.
Saunders began his long run around the Incendiary Cloud/Cloudkill in the center of the room, and I Dimension Doored to meet him on the far side. Others moved into position. Poor Macer came lumbering out of the cloud just in time to have another Cloudkill dropped on him by accident; the Lich centered this one on himself, and then hit Huge with (I think) a maximized Enervation. He was getting pounded from all sides, but I managed to catch him with the Dimensional Anchor, so he wasn't going anywhere but back to his phylactery in Magnimar today if I had anything to say about it. Then he dropped yet another quickened Cloudkill on Saunders and I, and hit those around him with Horrid Wilting. I must say that Saunders and I got the better end of that deal!
The 'fighters' continued to smash bone chips off him, and I caught him with a lovely Spellcrash just before he collapsed into bone dust, and the room cleared of the killing green mists. I just about collapsed where I stood coughing up sour phlegm and what looked like part of a lung, while Saunders stood there looking stoic.
We completed a search of the room, and Vex and Kelyn found the means by which Daddy Vassilli intended to kibosh the Collective with sunlight: a hidden switch on the throne, and another in the balcony would allow him to open up the room shutters and blast them all into nothing. That portion of his plan gave us ours: we would disable the switch on the throne, and Vex would hide near the balcony switch in case Daddy decided to test things before the party. The rest of us would take the next 24 hours to load for bear (or sixty-odd vampires, as the case may be) and port in just as the festivities got underway. Hopefully the Collective would collectively do Daddy Vassilli some damage before we had to wade in and destroy whoever was left.
Wish us luck, no plan survives contact with the enemy.
So as I wandered my way back to the inn, after canceling my wild shape, I used a majority of the magics stored in my healing wand. I decided before returning to the inn that I should pick up a few items that might help in our upcoming conflict with the vampires. The next morning after a good breakfast and my meditations on Gorum we made our way to the "party." We brought the stone girls and Ignis along, their abilities might prove useful since there was so many vampires. Not sure how many are going to be left after the shutters are dropped but anything more the four is going to be a problem.
As we went along Lugh and I talked with our stone girls and explained that we had in our possession almost a hundred vials of the substance distilled from their race to return to them for possible use in returning the un-animated statues of their race that was been recently found under Kaer Maga. I also handed each of them one of the potions I had purchased that should make them immune to the dominating effects of vampires for about ten minutes. It was an expensive potion, but I did't relish the idea of having to kill allies that were being used against their will to kill us.
We arrived around the beginning of the party with the intention of watching at a distance for a few hours before making our way inside to ruin whatever Oonas father had planned. That plan was shot to hell as Emma realized that all the vampires were there already from some spell she had cast. That was good with me since I didn't like having to wait long before the fight. Moving towards the entrance with the others I drank one of the potions and began casting other defense spells on myself or the group. Once that was done I moved down the hall under the balcony and shifted into my large elemental form and waited for whatever Vex was going to do.
Turns out that it wasn't Vex that was starting the entertainment at the party as Lugh stepped out from under the stairwell and tossed two alchemical grenades onto the table of a group of vampires. So I moved through the stone wall that separated the room from the hall and immediately saw Oona's father. Moving forward I sandwiched him between my fists knocking him silly. Murder house engaged!
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So, after picking up the pieces, we went back to the inn. Many of us needed to do some shopping, so I 'ported back to Magnimar to raid our dragon horde, noting how much of an advance I had taken on our next party split. Then back to Kaer Magga to shop; minor stuff mostly. Glove of storing, couple of lesser metemagic rods, beads of force, scroll or two. Then got some sleep before the party was to start.
Since we knew when the bloodsuckers were supposed to be gathering, my plan was to stake the place out early (see what I did there?) and send an extended, high level Arcane Eye in to the show, so that we could crash at the most opportune moment. Everyone agreed, and we set out and arrived an hour before the party was to start, figuring on the fashion plates arriving suitably late. Sure enough, two showed up and I read the scroll and sent my eye in after them.
Whoah, can you say disorienting? I followed the leeches into the darkened hall, and got the shock of my life: these weren't the first to arrive, they were the LAST! Oh crap, we have to go NOW! I started casting protective spells and reading scrolls like several of our lives depended on it, which they likely did, and we headed to the door. Kelyn opened it about as fast as turning the knob, and we just strolled in. I cast my last scroll to start flying, hit myself with the invisibility wand, and told Saunders to stick with Macer, as we took up positions in the T-corridor leading to the throne room.
I honestly expected Oona to kick things off, the way she froths at the mouth whenever someone even mentions vampires, but it was Lugh who tossed a couple of grenades onto a table as I was working my way into position to try to throw a bead of force onto daddy Vassilli. No such luck, but apparently Vex took the hint and dropped the shutters. Oh my, what absolute chaos! The stench of burning flesh quickly became overpowering as forty-some of the attendees burst into flame, but their screams were music to my ears. Huge and the rest burst into the room, and I lobbed my first bead onto the same table Lugh had hit with his grenades, that opening volley deserved a special followup as the leeches at that table were among the few who weren't emulating torches...
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Behold…the lambent glow!
THE DAWN BRINGS NEW LIGHT.
Gracious Sarenrae the faithful await the prophecy foretold,
of brilliant rays of holy fire ascending on healing wings!
Glory of the Dawnflower shine upon us.
Your splendor flares to announce the dawn.
Your radiant mercy piercing the gloom of night.
Oh Everlight, radiant redeemer,
And merciful healing light,
Banish the veil of darkness and the blindness of our ignorance.
All adoration and devotion unto you.
We had agreed to some sort of vagueness in our assault on what appeared to be a bite moot in the hall we had just invaded the previous day. I found rest a difficult proposition knowing we had made an appearance once the day prior to the moot laying waste to constructs and other foul creatures, liberating “concubines,” and left Vex to guard….I don’t know what? Why was the control of the window shutter switch an important accomplishment again? Shouldn’t we let it happen? The visage of Felu still haunted me as well.
Everyone had flown off in all directions to rearm themselves for the coming fight. My question was…to what end? We have bested, with some effort, a single or sometimes a small number of vampires all of who were no equal to most of us. We now hoped to best a multitude of them? Something did not wax favorable in this endeavor. Even in the timely release of shudders, but we had seen to it that it wouldn’t be timely…and there were sure to be an unhealthy number of foes that were our equal or betters? We needed to refine our plan.
This was the divination gifted to me during my dawnwalk prayer. Upon my return a few of our party had already embarked on the assault to lay in wait and reconnoiter the comings and goings of the attendees. The rest left shortly after to arrive at the slaughter house before the noon hour. We madequick work of the entrance and asked the stone ladies to hold fast in any event. Scouts were sent out and no one noticed our arrival. We were in and much conversation and bustling could be heard. Oona and I entered into the serving room…galley…kitchen to find a scene of sanguine butchery. The wench was relieved of her consciousness, bound and gagged. Everyone approached and some entered the room with a veil obscuring them from the sight of the lifeless. I took a quick look around the corner to see a throng of undead guests and that was only a third of the room! I wanted to get the full view. I wanted to know the truth of our rivals strength. I took a deep breath and purposefully walked into the dark celebration to glimpse our quarry. Moving for a better vantage point I tossed an explosive into their midst, then another. Very shortly the shutters flew open smartly subjecting half…..ONLY HALF of the attendees in a state of smoldering stages of cooking. In the brief moment of clarity and keen observation I witnessed panic in much of the room, but in the eyes of the half unaffected by the opening of the shutters there was no panic. A number were at most confused but others seemed exalted pleased at our arrival to include Oona’s father. Even on our best day with all our faculties intact throughout a protracted battle we could not hope to best their BEST of the combined noble families of the collective which were here mustered in this chamber, totally unaffected by the rays of the noon day sun. The odds clearly 4 to 1 against us, I steeled myself for a profoundly wicked fight and took in a heavy breath in preparation to scream my last command to our band of hardened veterans when…. a brilliant burst of light bathed the entire room in a golden prismatic radiance.
Everything slowed so as to be nearly immobile. All were affected by the brazen bold light, squinting, covering or averting their eyes. All but me. There motionless above us in the center of the room was a winged beauty. She had silvery shining wings outstretched from a lithe body covered in fine crafted sparkling gold mesh chain, solid shoulder pauldrons, glowing metallic orange vambraces hung with dark chains steaming a shadowy vapor, a split white samite skirt and sandaled golden grieves. A soft womans voice echoed from a rugged closed visored helm capped with a fiercely burning halo speaking in the tongue of the host.
“Rush not head long to a hasty end, paradise awaits your arrival with infinite patience. Let the dark forces do their evil within their ranks, then cast your lot in the chance of battle. This is her wish for you…DO. NOT. WASTE IT!”
At which she began to speak words of creation, of making. They were painful and my eyes went dark. All had changed… I felt a comfort in my surroundings as I sat in conversation with my friends. A familiar conversation from the night previous. The one in which we laid the plans for the attack. As my vision slowly returned I changed my position on how we should conduct ourselves and began to attempt to convince my friends of the same.
Well, THAT was easier than expected.
As we were discussing our plans for the upcoming battle against the Vampire Legion, Lugh announced that we'd already done it, that it hadn't gone well, and that he had miracled us back to form a new plan. Huh.
So we discussed what we'd "done" and decided to make a few changes. Since our shopping was done, we headed for the scene of the crime immediately, and simply took up residence in two unused rooms (the Liche off rebuilding his undead self, Daddy Vasilli not staying on the premises, and all the minions already dead), I claimed the master bedroom since I needed to sleep and study spells. On the way, I had picked up a few pitted bullets for a little "blue goo" vampire surprise I had concocted. Clued Vex in to the revised plan, and hit the sack.
Just about all the vampires arrived early, but they didn't really start the shindig until 2 pm; those jokers REALLY like to scmooze. They had an incredibly archaic parliamentary proceedure, and eventually voted Daddy in charge of the meeting. They called for another vote, this one concerning our liche buddy, but instead of announcing the result, Daddy opened the shutters and literally smoked half the attendees, THEN the fight started amongst the remaining blood suckers.
The fight was winding down with just Daddy and a minion up against another leech, when we burst from hiding and laid the smack down. Minion and rival bampthed away but Daddy came straight for Oona and tried to freeze her in a temporal stasis, which she shook off. I was ready to hit him with a dimensional anchor, but Lugh beat me to the punch, and the gang rallied round to pound Daddy into vampire jelly. I took a few steps to get a clear line of fire, and shot him with the special package.
I had told these guys when I joined that if they ever actually heard my rifle go off that meant things had gone pear-shaped in a big way, but I proved myself wrong. The blue goo took Daddy from a smarting, fighting, spitting undead to a squishy dead undead, to a dry dead undead, to a pile of bones to dust in seconds.
Oona kept hitting the pile. Daddy issues will do that; I guess she really wanted that pony.
A couple of us noticed about then that just about all of the remains had their vault keys, so while the others went hunting our two strays, Kelyn and I began policing them up. Looks like we've got a few paydays coming.
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Dark. Warm. Quiet. Buried?
Wait, it doesn't feel that heavy; comfortable? Seems to be something else under here, can't quite tell...Good Morning, Sunshine! I do apologize for the early wake up, but am so glad not to be trapped alone under what now appears to be a mountain of blankets and comforters.
As I try to nestle back into peaceful slumber, my body takes this opportunity to spasm and cramp every joint and muscle. Just a subtle reminder that the last few days have not been a vacation and to JUST STOP IT!!! Others will have to piece together the exact sequence of events; been torn apart and reassembled so many times(Thank you again, Nina)that things are a bit fuzzy. Probably still in Kaer Maga, you just don't run across this smell anywhere else. Kind of remember many unclean things going away and much to still be done. No doubt some of the more driven will be pounding the door down any hour now, time to creak slowly into action.
First, will need a huge tub of near scalding water, preferably with tons of bubbles. Will surely cost a fortune, but well worth the mess. On that note; excuse me, Miss? I'll be requiring a qualified lifeguard, or at least a responsible adult, and was wondering if you might have a couple hours to spare?
Who would have thunk it? We might have actually done well enough to get some down time. Magnimar was mentioned(I'm in!), which also has a small mountain of goodies to be collected. Just love it when an unplanned series of coincidences comes together
Huge has brought word of a large gathering of giants setting up camp on the plain below town. While this is surely of great import to those goofy enough to live here, I plan on blowing this pop stand as soon as we finish arguing about the method of travel. On that subject, while walking/arguing, we begin to fall.
Not for heroes of our stature to trip over a curb and wind up in a drainage ditch, we seem to have fallen into The Elemental Plane of Not a Damn Thing; all that's here is darkness and down. Picking up a good deal of speed as much is said about doing something, a calm voice says "Carpet?". Capital idea! Reach into the bag for my favorite aerial floor covering and wrestle it into operation(much easier on a calm day with solid ground involved).
While recovering party member projectiles, we fly into a massive lightning storm. I get out the throw rug so Nina can remain above while us short-reach types can get closer to the problem. A web the size of a small town is occupied by hundreds of...things. Who(other than my brothers)would take a Drow, stick a giant spider to it's butt, and have it shoot lightning, and call it a good idea?
The ranged crowd starts dropping bombs on the mob while us sloped foreheads wade in. Close up these things don't make any more sense, so guess it's just as well to get rid of them. Find a two leg among them who was on the menu, will probably have a good tale to tell. A good fight, spells handle the numbers, and we find ourselves in the company of a pummeled(know the feeling well!)half orc.
First thing he says is that Felu hired him to get information to us, because she wasn't allowed to contact us herself. Pardon me, but the last I heard was that Felu had been dragged off to Hell and someone else had left to go and fix this. Now this guy pops up and says she's HERE?! Magnimar may have to wait a bit and somebody has a LOT of splaining to do.
Well that went well considering. Oona's father dead. LOTS of vampires dead. Only one of them got away but she was fighting against Oona's fathers so as far as vampires go, she apparently has a good sense of character. That was one of the better parties I've been to all things considered. Once we gathered up and healed the others found a lot of the keys that open their personal vaults.
Over the next few days I retrieved as many vials of the blue goo as I could with Vex's help and his portable hole. All of that was then given to the stone girls so they could use them on the vast array of inanimate versions of their "race." We kept the gold, although to be honest, gold has definitely lost its luster for me. I have a fair amount of the stuff, there is only so much I need and I've pretty much bought everything I imagine I need. Of course I won't tell Kelyn that, he'd ask for my share.
We split what we got and decided to gather up and teleport back to Magnimar. Not that I wanted to go to another city, but at least its more open that Kaer Maga is. This damn city is stifling and I want to get out of here as fast as possible. I honestly don't know how people can live here.
Just as we gathered up by the inn we had been staying at the ground gave way and swallowed us all whole. It didn't take long before what little light we had fell away into darkness. I shifted my sight over so that I could see in the dark and was able to see many of the others using whatever they could to either fly, float or slow their descent. I shifted into the form of an eagle and began moving people over to the magical carpets that Kelyn and Nina were using. About the time I had moved Macer over I could tell we were falling past multiple webs and there were several creatures that looked to be half spider and half dark skinned elves.
As we approached one of the thickest damn strands of spider web, large enough several wagons could cross the strand side by side, we saw a lone man fighting a horde of the creatures. As we got close he shouted for assistance, and I heard him use Felu's name. Well, now we had to save him for interrogation since Lugh mentioned that he swore he saw her in Kaer Maga. Of course that might be difficult considering they lit him up with a massive amount of magical lightning. He was still standing after that but was swaying so I flew down and gave him magical resistance against electricity. I then shifted out of animal form and began hacking into the 'spidelfs.'
The man, turned out to be a half-orc, or at least he sounded like one. His armor was interesting because it made him look like a dragon or some kind of lizard man. He said that he was sent by Felu to find a group of 'heroes' at our inn. He fell into the same trap we had. He introduced himself as Doragarr. Felu ran into him out near the field where the giants were assembling a few miles outside of Kaer Maga. Before we could find out more we heard a giant buzzing sound that was getting closer.
Nina yelled out that a bunch of demonic looking creatures were flying up from below. So I quickly cast a spell with Gorum's blessing that allowed everyone to move easier along the web among the bodies. Once that was complete I transformed into the large earth elemental form I have become accustomed to being. Turns out I found the weight limit the web strand could hold as I tore right through it and fell through. Along the way I caught a rather surprised demon and began squeezing it to death as I plummeted further down the hole. It stabbed futilely at me the poison from its stinger resisted by my druidic abilities.
You guys are and always will be heroes in my book. It's been many months without your company and many more before I am able to be back with you but I did send you a friend. Hopefully he remembered to tell you hi from me. He looked a little pre occupied or distracted when I talked to him. There's a lot going on in the world right now. Well I can't wait to see you all and tell you my adventures but for now I'll watch from the wings. Felu Waeglo
It's been just over a week since I got my mind back. My memory comes and goes. It's difficult to discern dreams and nightmares from reality. I now realize I've been working for evil for years now. It was easy to convince me to join with him. I wanted power and that's what I was promised. The truth is I became a willing slave. I hope I never see the gang again, I'm to ashamed of myself for what I became. I will stay here and try to figure a way to rectify my misdeeds. I'm probably not going to make much of a difference my master has already given so much away. Made deals with both devils and demons and that, that thing he calls "The Dr.". A timeless monster that wants to destroy humanity and remake it "His" way. As fodder for the ones to come. He says the death of the Runelords was the first step. He makes no sense.
Lugdog still here, still waiting for the right time. Have army now that grows and grows. Bagga's old friends forgot Lugdog, Bagga forgot Lugdog. Lugdog not forget them. Little nasty lizzard has been very busy. Can't keep track of him. To many places at once, very trixy.
Lugdog will still taste their flesh. Lugdog master of big baddies. Baddies destroy city where Lugdog lived in the sewers. People of city will wish to live in sewers soon enough. Lugdog needs more Stitch. Where is Stitch. Lugdog has collected many specimens for Stitch to use and make Lugdog better. Must find Stitch
They decided to change tactics and a group flew up and unleashed a volley of fire that cascaded over both me and their companion. The fire damage was substantial enough to warrant my letting my prey go and to protect myself with elemental protection. No sooner did I finish that spell than they flew off and I noticed another demon creature that looked like a giant winged snake woman ... thing rapidly climbing up from the depths I was plummeting into.
Had to change my tactics, as falling rapidly into something and the creatures now avoiding my reach made becoming an eagle important. Being away from the sturdy earth was disconcerting and fighting in the air wasn't pleasant, but I had no choice. It showed too as I flew towards the flying snake woman and missed one of my attacks. Being up close I could see she was some sort of modified upper planar creature. I think we found another cobbled together creature from the lich we sent to his factory. She had some sort of supernatural powers but I was able to resist their effects. Regardless in the form of the eagle I was no longer as resistant to damage as I am used to in elemental form, so her attacks still hurt. She also kept flying away after I'd attack her which was pissing me off to no end.
Having to use my shadow stepping ability I was able to continually get into her face without leaving myself open to attack. After having stepped twice I found myself with most of the others who were now fighting the buzzing demons. In short order the others were able to kill off the buzzing demons and I managed to kill the winged snake lady. It was at that moment that I had a memory pop into my head of the creature we fought in the clock tower many years ago that when it died some sort of creature ripped its way out of the corpse. No sooner had that thought run its course than I suddenly saw some sort of creature suddenly appear on the magical carpet where Nina and Atz were currently still fighing two of the buzzing demons. My cries of alarm went unheard since I couldn't vocalize a warning that was understood by the group.
So I flew over and began attacking the creature. I believe it was a little surprised when I actually clawed into its flesh with my talons. I saw that Lugh had cast a spell that prevented it from dimensionally moving away so I tore into the creature with reckless abandon. Everyone moved around the creature using Kelyn's carpets and laid into the creature killing it in fast order. With it dead we made fast work of the remaining buzzing demons. Now we just have to find Vex who had floated down during the whole fight.
The giant gate is finished on this end and almost finished in the city of monuments. The city and all the people will burn. Fire will cleanse the world of these pink skins. The star did not burn anything, very disappointed. Found old, old fake gods. Made deals Stitch doesn't need to know. Stitch hates old gods but they will help Lugdog. Old gods hate Stitch, Lugdog smart, uses both to help destroy Lugdog's enemies. Lugdog patient like spider and waits for right moment to strike.
Lugdog finds clues of lizzard in monument city. Little lizzard on top of list to kill. Lizzard killed many of Lugdog's friends in monument city sewers. Lizzard will die slowly as Lugdog takes him apart like he did Lugdog's friends.
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Yeah, Magnimar has to wait for a bit. While trying to make sense of what the half-orc was telling us, a very annoying buzzing swelled up all around. Couldn't pick out a threat until Nina pointed down and said a horde of planars were flying up to us, nothing she had ever encountered. As usual, no rest for the weary.
Nina and Atz stayed high while I moved the carpet to keep the enemy at a distance; no plan survives contact. The cloud of demons bore in, hewing flesh and throwing flame. Spells were running thin and our lifeblood was raining into the darkness. Kept moving to let the big fighters maim them, and try to take some pressure off the casters. Majority were the humanoid/insect/demons(?), but a stitch-job with angel wings really had it in for Lugh. It pressed in hard(big mistake) and ended up mechanically separated.
Finally, a few moments breather and a quick headcount. About then, it occurs that it's also quiet down below. In the rush to remain breathing, totally lost track of the other fight. An eagle flies up from the darkness; has to be HUGE cause it's making such a racket. You ever notice how a person that doesn't speak your language just gets louder and expects you to understand? Doesn't work with birds, either.
Catching my breath as some healing is passed around when it finally hits me:
Where's Vex?
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I flew down and noticed Oona had landed and was sneaking up on this monstrous looking cyclops creature. I circled overhead for a moment and Oona definitely got the drop on the creature. The grounds were covered in humans wandering around, I assume the darkness meant they couldn't see anything. The creatures seemed to be herding them in a direction farther than I could see.
So I decided to shift into the large elemental form and dropped onto the creatures that were now moving towards Oona. I landed on one of them doing substantial damage and surprising it. But it only took a few seconds before I was quickly surrounded and beat into unconsciousness. I don't think I gave as good as I received that was for sure. Means I need to train harder.
When my eyes opened I realized that it had only been a few seconds. I could see that Atz was nearby and had probably healed my many wounds. I could see several of the creatures had converged on the group and some winged woman that awfully familiar was flying a few feet away. I dimensionally hopped behind the one Oona was fighting and laid into it pretty good but it was still standing. I could see that Atz drew the attention of another creature and I was going to have to move over to save him. Of course he unleashed some spell that really messed it up so maybe he doesn't need my help. I rolled over it anyway knocking it to the ground.
The winged woman said to "have fun with my minions" and then teleported away. Gah!
The Countess' party is in full swing as we arrive. Nina and I stop for a quick nip just inside, quite bolstering. Spot Macer ahead, seems to be having some trouble. Going on about being blinded, but I see the real problem. The swollen eyes give him away, he's plastered. I say, man; use a bit of decorum. Just arrived and already blotto, not the way to leave a good impression. We help him along the halls, treacherous footing here. Where are the servants? Something really should be done. Nina stoically remains with our besotted friend as I race ahead to secure the best spot to see and be seen. Entering, I see it's becoming one of "those" parties. Everyone is rushing around, things are flying through the air, and HUGE is positively Gigantic; what do they feed that boy? Dive in to help contain the madness.
The seas are really coming up now, a true gale must be moving in. The deck is awash, and it's hard to keep footing with all this debris. Boarders continue to vault the rails, their numbers seem endless. Many obstacles on deck, must have a word with the quartermaster about cargo stowage. Doesn't he realize the danger of all this weight so high above keel? You there, lash that yardarm before we're all swept overboard! Tried a quick musket shot, but a sudden wave sent it wide. Fearing friendly casualties, I switch back to the blade. Clouds of enemy missiles are everywhere, they have no concern for their own. Damn, that was a gooey one; the day feels like elderberries.
The day is endless, as if we have been at this forever. I ache all over and am having a bit of trouble focusing, time to pull myself together. Spot Nina nearby, wondering where she's been when I get THE LOOK. No idea what I've done this time, it's like I'm supposed to be psychic. If I was psychic, I'd be rich; much more fun, much less work. The others finish clearing away the party detritus as I stand inspection. Nina appears impeccable as always while I seem to have fallen down several stairwells onto...
Just reading through the journals from the beginning and this is still one of my all time favorites. Kelyn's reaction to the kobold poison is just short of genius.
On another note, Vex has been telling me his side of the story and we will need to have a small critical shift as we wait for all to arrive.
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In other news, time to find Vex.
HUGE seems sure Vex is somewhere below us(birds can point?), so down we go. It becomes apparent quite quickly that my mode of transport doesn't measure up to the expectations of the group. While "The Girl from Kaer Maga" plays in the background, I'm skewered by glares and bombarded by endless "Are we there yet?". The group stoically remains on board, deciding not to dive off into darkness; all talk, no action. Note to self; sell these things when we get back to civilization, hate to keep such objects of disappointment around.
Finally arrive at solid ground to find HUGE happily squashing things and Oona screaming about dismemberment; you know, just another day. Land the rug next to a couple demons and the meat are happy again. Spend some time hopping the carpet to keep people in contact, but just not feeling it. Eventually wear down the opposition and pretty sure I heard Vex near the finish, but still can't see him. Now I'm hearing there's another horde moving in to swarm us before we have a chance to regroup or hustle up a quick lunch.
Like I said, just another day.
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Vex made a comment that a few hundred feet was a cave where we could bottle neck the cyclopean giants that were forming up. Grabbing Atz and Lugh I began moving in the direction Vex was pointing to. We moved into the tunnel setting up for a nice defensive fight and the half-orc we picked up and Macer made short work of the front ranks after eating magical balls of fire from, I assume, Nina.
So with that under control, I moved down the hall making sure nothing was going to sneak up behind us. Atz followed along and thats when the winged woman showed back up - BEHIND ATZ! As I spun to face her I realized where I remember her from. She's the woman that we had been fighting that would run when getting bested and spawning the creatures that resembled her that we have killed all over Golarion. She's not getting away this time and I began swinging. Her magical images of her were no defense from my true sight. So what happened? She bloddy ran! Gods how I hate her.
Vex yelled that she could be down in the room beyond the hallway. So, like the others, I ran on into the room. The room was covered in silk curtains with multiple cubes of something in silk. Vex pointed in one corner of the room so headed in that direction only to see her fly up into the room beyond my reach. In my anger I tried to launch a rock at her but missed of course. Vex apparently opened the magical hole because a sudden wash of pure elemental fire or lava spewed from what I assume was Ignis into her. That seemed to seal the deal because she teleported away...again.
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In the process of looking behind a few of the giant frilly silk curtains along the wall I found a secret door. Turns out the ability of earth elementals to move through earth makes finding those rather easy. I let the others know what I had found and then moved into the hall to "literally poke my head around in." I found a winding passage that looked to reveal a massive looking trap so I figured it was best to get Vex and Kelyn to confirm that suspicion.
It took a while for Kelyn to figure out how to open the door even with Vex's help so I spent that time healing Oona and checking up on everyone's overall health. Looked to me like Atz was keeping everyone on their feet well enough. Vex even brought Ignis out from the hole. Once through we made our way to what in fact wasn't a trap but an old ladder that had been removed from a wall.
We eventually came to a large arching bridge where the middle section was missing from the bridge. As the group decided to mount up on the multiple magical carpets I was limited in my elemental form so I decided to move to the bottom of the room and move across and then back up to the others. When I reached the bottom I found a large ziggurat with some sort of massive semi-glowing rod. Thats when I heard a voice, she sounded ... lovely. She said her name was Sorshen and we talked. For some reason any hostility I had towards her, even though I wasn't sure I had any, went away leaving only someone I could like.
She asked about someone name Artemus Hindersett who immediately made sense somehow to be lich we killed and sent to his factory. She also mentioned a Lugdog who didn't sound familiar to me. Sorshen mentioned that Delvahine only allowed her to talk with those two as a means of protection. She thanked me for my time and asked me who I thought was beautiful. I don't think she meant in the motherly sense and I have to admit Ignis quickly flashed into my mind. Not sure why, but maybe because I was in my elemental form. I even tried to break the tube after she asked but I couldn't harm it. I did notice that a small hairline crack had formed from the falling bridge but I couldn't expand that crack any. With that done I began my trek back to the others. Some would say talking with her and breaking her out wasn't wise but it seemed like a plausible thing to do.
When I caught up with the others I explained what I had found and learned. They were suspect, which is the best I can say to what I had learned. We decided to use Kelyn's tower to rest in for the night and during the night, I had the best dreams ever. I don't remember what they were exactly, but I can bet it wouldn't be something I should write about. It took a while for the others to wake me up and I have to admit that the dreams made certain ... parts ... bigger and more embarassing. I'm pretty sure Nina was smirking and I can only hope she hadn't been reading my mind when I woke up.
Regardless though, when I shook off the fog of the deep sleep I felt an immediate anxiety about going home. I made my desire to depart this wretched cave known to the others and I have to admit that I wasn't being diplomatic about it. So in two groups we teleported home. Emma took my group to Vex's warehouse and once I realized where we were I bolted out one of the doors and began the long trek up to the house.
I had gone a few blocks when I realized that the city was quiet. Much quieter than it should be. Fearing the worst I transformed into the form of an eagle and flew as quickly home as I could. Once I got airborne I could see that large areas of the city had been destroyed. Some of the homes had been burnt down and still smoldered. This destruction left a deep pit of fear in my stomach and when I arrived at my house I transformed and kicked in the door, sword in hand. I found Shalelu, the elven ranger we had met a while ago in Sandpoint. She told me that my family was safe, and they were at the Hobart estate along with Atz's family. She then explained that Lugh's family had taken losses. The temple where Lugh's mother and sisters were at was destroyed and their bodies had never been found. Divinations gave no insight to their location but the rest of the family was recovering in a church somewhere. For some reason groups of monsters began appearing in Magnimar and fights would break out and then they would just leave. Needless to say the explanation was vague. To me, Gorum has blessed Magnimar with a war but I needed to make sure the family was safe. Before that though, I needed to meet Lugh at his home to make sure he knew what had happened from a friend before despair would set in.
When I got there I ran into Zandende or whatever her name was. She was the cleric of Sarenrae that had fallen and had been dominated by Delvahine or one of her cohorts. She had been told by Sarenrae that we were coming and she had been waiting for days. She retold me what I already knew, except she added that Sarenrae told her that Lugh's mother and sisters were safe. So we went as a group to the church where we learned that the clerics there were having problems healing his family. For some reason the heals wouldn't take hold and they were slowly dying. Thats when I remembered the shadow demon parasite things that we've encounted in the past and with my true sight I could tell the family had those parasites on them. So once I suggested the priests remove curse they should be able to be healed. It worked and once that had been done we left to Hobarts estate with Lugh's family.
The family reunion was nice and to see my family safe and sound removed the anxiety I had been feeling since I had woke up that day. For the next hour or so everyone talked with members of their families in quiet corners. I even saw Kiara and made a point of talking with her for a few minutes. We learned that the attacks seemed to happen at night and so we decided to go out hunting. We decided to start at the Irespan since Macer mention his father was missing and that was the last place he had been seen.
After we got there, Atz, Vex and Lugh's ... creature went down into the Gecko piling we had gone into as kids. After a few minutes we got word that we needed to get in there as something was happening down below in the piling. So we made our way inside using the magical carpets the group had. Moving down the stairs we came to the trash eating creatures that were eating dead bodies that had been dropped down into the piling. Not sure how the bodies got there we decided this was a false lead and head back out onto the Irespan. From there we made our way down into Underbridge to see what trouble we could get into.
We made it to the temple to Sarenrae and Lugh and I both noticed a glowing effect of a Sarenrae idol that was no longer there, but glowed as if it was. Lugh took a knee and began praying. Time seemed to rapidly move forward and the gecko piling began to shimmer and a huge gate opened up and creatures began pouring out. Gorum has blessed the evening indeed.
A few spare moments to catch up before being overrun by the hordes of the abyss.
When last we left the story, a swarm of one-eyed mummies(rather large) were closing on us. Vex, who I could finally see, spoke of a nearby tunnel that could be held by a few against many; nice to know there are walls in this vastness. Found the hole and packed in to receive guests, Macer and the orc were first in line as greeters. Bit too tight for all of us to be useful, flew Nina out and up so she could rain cleansing fire on the things. Good teamwork made short work of them, and we moved to catch up with those who had moved into a large chamber. Seems they were chasing a woman named Delvaheen(?)who has a problem with us, Lugh in particular. Think she was involved with the problems at his temple under the bridge, possibly some other things. She evaded several attempts of dimensional binding, and left some of the group quite surly.
Our route continued to an interesting door with a clever lock. HUGE passed through the wall while I needed a minute to allow the rest of us mere mortals to continue. Looks like someone has gone to great lengths to keep something stuck in here; can't wait to meet it! Path led to an immense chamber crossed by a slender, arcing bridge that was missing it's center section. Huge elected to flow down the wall and across the assumed floor as we floated across(just no way to get his multi-ton butt on these little rugs). No sign of the big guy when we reach the far wall, but am sure he'll be along.
Entered a large chamber, complete with throne and dais. On it sat a well equipped, one-eyed woman(something in the water?) with Delvaheen tugging at her arm. Since most prisoners aren't allowed to keep weapons and armor, figured this must be another guard. Nina jumped several of us into contact, and a lively dance erupted; literally! The subtle weave of deadly weapons was suddenly blasted apart by great streams of lava. Ignis had received here invitation to our little soiree, and she really DOES NOT LIKE one or both of these women. The cyclops was holding her own, parrying with a clumsy longsword like it was a willow switch; quite vexing. Almost giving in to frustration, we finally crushed the woman and the sword clattered to the floor. It had a strong draw to it, but I'm already spoken for. Of course, Delvaheen had teleported away, the craven bint. Collected useful things, including some minor organs, and decided some rest was in order before going on. Put the tower up in front of the door(did I mention it;s a Really big room?) and snuggled in for much needed sleep, dreaming of our return to Magnimar.
Woke up full of energy and new spells. Nina would take Atz, Macer, and us to my house while Emma(has she been here the whole time? I'm a little unclear) takes the rest to a warehouse in Vex's growing financial empire. Words are spoken and we appear in the receiving circle upstairs. Mother is there, looking weary, and gathers us in her arms. She speaks of war come to Magnimar, and the families of our group seem to be targeted. Macer curses and vanishes, didn't ever hear him click his heels. The family has held our neighborhood at a cost, but others haven't been as lucky. Atz' family has located with Lugh's, and after quick greetings(really? my brothers haven't been maimed or seriously wounded? OW!! Sorry! just figured it might build character) we set off to check on them. After an eventful trip, we find HUGE's assassin and the ranger from Sandpoint(definitely an S word; nice girl, just needs to clean up and spend more time with people, maybe get a few fashion tips from Nina) who told us most of the families had gathered at Hobart's. Sent Atz there to check in and the two of us set out for the warehouse to see what the others had gotten into. Long montage of random creatures, burnt city, and helping the locals before tracking them down at Hobart's; of course.
Spent time trying to gather all the stories and make sense of it. Monsters appear, usually at night, and tear everything up. Lugh's temple is leveled, as is most of Underbridge. A spirit, like the one that had Hobart, was removed from Lugh's father; need to watch out for more of those. Macer insisted on going to the Irespan, the last place his dad was reported. We headed there, and would then drop down to inspect underneath. Bridge proved to be a bust and checked the Piling we had explored as kids. Nothing but some carrion eaters down below, probably a good thing considering the smell coming out of there.
Continued below to look over the temple location, this place is going to need lots of work when we clear up the current problems.
speaking of problems, the whole side of that piling is glowing and all manner of things are launching out into the city.
Like I said, just another day.
Before moving out I blessed the group with a spell that allowed for nimble movement among the rubble as the entire area was nothing but rubble. With that done I moved forward towards the hoard of creatures pouring from the gate. There were goblins, orcs, giants and ... other things, probably demonic. Lugh and Kelyn joined me at the line and then I shifted into my mastodon form. With a quick spell I gave myself the ability to move at the speed of a big cat but in the size of my armored mastodon. I then trampled through the hoarde knocking them down or killing them outright. The goblins and orcs died with their weapons bouncing harmlessly off my armored hide. The giants were bowled over taking damage from either the spikes from the armor, my tusks or my feet.
Once through the gate I found myself on the plain near Kaer Maga looking at the hoarde I had seen a few days earlier. Two very surprised wizards holding the gate opened looked rather surprised at my appearance. Moving up to the closest wizard I laid into him with the giant tusks. Their zeal to keep the gate open left them wide open to more attacks and I followed it up by killing the one wizard and shutting off the gate. Thats when the remaining wizard realized the danger he was in. Of course, I was also on the wrong side of the gate now. I went ahead and attacked the wizard anyway. Getting back to Magnimar was going to take a while. I will actually get to use the joke, "I just flew in and boy are my arms tired."
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Good thing we didn't bother coming up with an intricately planned(or any other kind of) plan, because there is NO way it would have survived this contact.
All manner of things walked, ran, bounced, flew, and crawled from the portal and headed to all points of the compass. The battle line of intrepid heroes that was drawn up to valiantly crush the horde was generally ignored, most contact being incidental; Just the proper kick in the shorts in case anyone was still under the illusion of making a difference. Tightened up the(brown) big boy pants and wandered into the fray.
The lead wave of torch-wielding goblins was going down nicely when I noticed something unusual, even for goblins. Two of them, engulfed in flame, were riding odd beasts that hopped erratically forward. Not wanting these to get loose in the still-standing neighborhoods, I moved to engage; good idea, less than optimal execution. Piercing the thing caused it to erupt in a wave of sticky fire, luckily catching the second one and setting it off too. All of the goblins in the area were incinerated, taking them out of the fight. On the other hand, our group was left standing in a lake of fire, giving me the stink-eye. It's not like these things have safety warnings on them, and if this was covered in the prefight briefing, I was thinking of something else. Nina, from a tactically sound position in the camping tower, was laying down a carpet of bombs in the heavies as they approach. Some of the blasts are cold and ice, very effective on the planars and misc. creatures. I can imagine the beaming smile this brings to her lips.
About then, HUGE(the four-legged version) charged through the mass at incredible speed, knocking the giants around like tenpins; very interesting. This probably would have been the most memorable part of the entire battle, if Macer hadn't decided to stop fighting and start removing his armor. In the middle of the battle. In front of everyone. I know someone will have a perfectly rational explanation for this later, so I turn back and continue the fight, ankle deep in flaming goop.
The free-for-all continues, and it seems we may be making some progress. Looking over the heaps of fallen enemies brings hope, as an enraged wail carries across the field. Oona is saying that her mealticket is down and being carried away. This brings me pause; she could only mean Vex, and he doesn't fall down, he makes other things go away. Looking around, I spot a quadruped stomping off, with the lizard apparently impaled on its tail. As I try to disable the governor on this rug, several spells crash in to slow it's escape. As he is not trying to bore through the creature, can only assume Vex is truly dead, so he can't be more dead from more damage, right? Just know that the creature is NOT getting away with our little(scheming, lying sociopath, but probably not Really treacherous) buddy.
Where's HUGE?
Before I was going to be able to make that joke to the others, I was going to have to avoid the army that probably just saw me stomp the wizards to death. Not to mention I no longer had the ability to shift my form for the rest of the day. So I went ahead and removed the mastodon form and gaining the ability to move with the speed of a small cat with a spell I moved quickly away from the gate. Once I had gone a good distance I began moving quietly and quickly away.
After a few minutes of looking over my shoulder I saw that Delvahine woman flying above the trees looking for something or someone. I didn't have to guess she was looking for me. She was covered in blood so I have an idea that she was probably just in Magnimar and once again ran. As much as I wanted to kill her, the army camped close by meant that idea was right out. So we played cat and mouse for a while but I eventually gave her the slip and made my way to Kaer Maga.
Wow, it seems like we have been fighting for days.
Oh wait, we HAVE been fighting for days. Starting off with the fall into the spider centaur webs, then on down and into the tunnels and the cyclops things, and now finally back to Magnimar. From the state of the old home town, I'm glad my mom is relatively safe in Absolom.
We got to Lugh'S little church project in Underbridge in time to see a wave of goblins, giants, and demons emerge from a huge gate in one of the Irespan pilings and come swarming at us in their haste to reach the intact parts of the city. Didn't we just leave this party? Huge threw a spell to help us move through the rubble, Kelyn'S instant fortress made an appearance and Nina rushed inside. I Dimension Doored Saunders and I to the top. Saunders immediately lost his sword over the side and had to run back down to get it; I was about to be far too busy.
Nina tossed a Cone of Cold out a lower window and caused some inconvenience to the first wave of flying demons, so I hit them again with the Maximized version, dropping several in the process. I hardly noticed when Igniss shied away from me as I did it. Noticed an explosion near where I had last seen Kelyn, which wiped most of the goblins, and Huge had changed to Mastodon form and steamrollered his way straight into the still open gate. Macer was doing some kind of strip tease with his armor, and Lugh was entertaining Delvahine yet again. Wanted to lend a hand there, so smacked her with back to back Maximized Enervations. I don't think she likes me now.
Gate closed, and the new kid was getting involved. Huge hadn't come back, and Vex was nowhere to be seen (not unusual). I switched to Chain Lightning to thin out the swarm of giants approaching the tower. Oona and Kelyn seemed to be occupied in a little scrum off in right field, when I noticed a succubus approaching. Blipped Saunders and myself off toward Lugh to intercept (after my spellcrash failed), and we ultimately wasted her as she tried to escape again.
Is it over yet?
OK, so the thing that grabbed Vex only has two legs and is about HUGE's size (when He infrequently goes about on two legs).
Catching up as Oona wades in and begins slapping it. Just a whole lot of rage in that woman, don't want to be in the area when her seams split. the creature tosses something down, a portable hole? Oona dashes in and lobs... GODS ABOVE AND BELOW!!! The crazy wench threw another port. hole into the first, sucking both into nothing. Could have taken everything in the area, and I was WAY too close for comfort. If we survive this, will have to hold classes on the proper care and handling of extra-dimensional spaces.
Heavy fire continued from the tower as those of us with sharp bits cleaved away. Checking that Oona had no more wads of black cloth in her hands, I moved to engage the beast. Was doing well, but had no luck drawing attention away from Oona; this thing was focused. It kept grabbing at her, and I swear it was trying to eat her; how's that supposed to work? A succubus returned and headed for our little scrum, with most of the fire from the tower moving to her. The thing finally went down, and the flyer veared off to escape. A quick ambush put her in the dirt for a long nap, so went back to the frog creature (don't ask me, I just work here). No sign of Vex, Oona says it swallowed him; yeah, right. Not wanting to upset her further, just started splitting it open. What do you know, there's what's left of Vex, a little digested around the edges. No sleeping on the job in this outfit, hit him with the goo and got him back on his feet.
Gathering up as things quieted down, the big brains figured a large sacrifice powered the gate, probably the smell down in the piling. Maybe if we ask nicely, Ignis could reduce everything in there to ash and throw off the schedule. The city could use some breathing room to recover and start cleaning up. While we, of course, throw ourselves into stopping the flow of reprobates, and 86ing the ass hats behind this little operation.
First to check on family and friends, ensure they weathered the latest incursion. There are still some unaccounted for. Speaking of missing, where the heck is HUGE? How do you mislay something of that size? Maybe we're getting sloppy.
Time to change the (brown) big boy pants, and continue charging headlong into the grinder.
I need to coral the troops. I leave for a short time (3 days) and Delvahine thinks she's in charge. Her god is going to be very disappointed in her when she realizes that Delvahine continues to fail at bringing her a body to inhabit. I myself went after Macer's Dragon (Vex). I had a reliable source that put Vex in Sand Point, then in Magnimar. But on my return I find out that Vex's whole group had been right here with Delvahine. I still don't know how that is possible unless Vex isn't traveling with his companions. And that idea does make sense, Vex on his own would be a lot harder to find than the whole group.
But Delvahine insists that Vex was in Magnimar just last night and that doesn't match my information. (Is she lying to me?)
I'm so glad that I've taken proper precautions with Lugh's mom and sisters. Delvahine has no idea where I've hidden them. That's my Ace up the sleeve.
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We've had our Halloween gaming break and we'll be back in Magnimar on Tuesday night. I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. See you Tuesday.
When I arrived in Kaer Maga I found that the people, as a whole, where acting differently. It took a while for me to find out but with the death of the vampires there was a power struggle going on. Not to mention all travel through the half-light path was closed off as there was an increase of creatures from below attempting to reach the surface. The dusk wardens were busy.
I learned most of this from the dusk wardens and listening to the crowds in the market. I also overheard a few wizardly looking men talking about the army of "builders" below. I struck up a conversation with these men and in turn for a teleport to Magnimar, I told them everything I knew about these "builders," our travels far to the east of the Marshfens in the Fenwall mountains. All about he ancient, and destroyed, civilization and everything I knew of these titans.
Before being teleported to Magnimar I visited the vault where the "builders" were stored under Kaer Maga through an entrance the dusk wardens didn't know about. The vault itself was empty, so I guess they used the blue goo we had given them to great effect. Although I have no idea where they had gone.
Once back in Magnimar I made my way back to Underbridge trying to find the others. Along the way there I was able to tell that the damage Magnimar had sustained during this siege was not all caused by what Delvahine was sending through the gate. The people of Magnimar were turning on themselves as well. Looting was rampant among the populace once the guards were no longer able to maintain the peace. We were going to have to get this under control and quickly. As much as the idea of battle was wonderful to me, the idea of it happening around my family was not wonderful.
Once I got back with the others I was handed a rather stupid amount of gold and gems. My share of the dragons spoils from so long ago. I have no idea who needs that much money but whatever. I got ahold of Kriger through a scry and using a over priced scroll of message that Emma cast I asked for Kriger to return to Magnimar. The hope being that he and his men could assist Sabriyya in the Bazaar of Sails. With all the looting and general lawlessness I wanted to help get Magnimar back to normal so I wouldn't have to worry about my family. If all goes well, he should be here in a week. Of course I didn't talk to her first but she'll be cool with it, or I'll make her cool with it.
After a few days I began wandering around Underbridge during the days to see if there were any hold outs from the gate fiasco and unfortunately wasn't rewarded with finding anything. I also decided to check out the gecko piling where the root of the magic was that had opened the gate in the first place. I learned about that from the others. I could tell that after Ignis had "burned" that problem away someone had been moving about in the area. I left a rather blunt message for whoever it was, telling them to leave. I also found a statue, oddly enough, of Sabriyya hidden among the rubble in the piling. It was exquisitely carved and looked eerily lifelike. The statue was out of place enough that I took it and gave it to Sabriyya when I informed her of my intent of enforcing the safety of the Bazaar of Sails. She accepted the assistance, and hells, she even knew me by name. She also didn't know anything about the statue. Unconcerned, I let her keep it.
I found out a few days later who the statue belonged to when a tiefling who had been spending a few days drinking with Oona had breakfast with all of us. She introduced herself as Ayavah, a sculptor that had been using the statue to scry on. She was concerned that her piling, the harpy one, was going to have the same "problems" that the gecko one was having. It was then that we realized WE NEVER, EVER, TOOK THE TIME TO LOOK AT THE PILING COVERED IN STATUES OF CREATURES THAT HAS BEEN GIVING US NOTHING BUT TROUBLE.
What? Who? Where? Ooooowwwwwww!!!!! Did I get hit in the head again? How long was I out this time?
Nevermind, too much to do, this place looks like heck. Need to get things calmed down and start putting them back together.
What piling?
So as it turns out the others did research on their own and they not only found Macer's father but the location of Lugh's mother and sisters as well. They were both located together, sort of, in the Turmoil Vaults/Terror Maze, some where in the World Wound. Well, this is going to get really damn interesting. Sounds like a rescue and a vacation all in one for me.
So everyone purchased a great many things, using the vast wealth from the dragon hoard to purchase anything and everything. I picked up another wand and prepared a great number of Life Bubble spells to help out the group. With the assistance from the church of Abadar we were teleported to where Macer's father was supposedly located at. In order to help our travels there we were each carrying manacles that would prevent planar travel by accident. Not sure how that is going to work but whatever.
So the teleport happened, and immediately we were getting tossed around in the planes because everyone started disappearing and reappearing a few seconds later. Including some creatures that looked like slimes that were asking for help as they too were trapped. Eventually everyone got their shackles on when were all together and we stopped disappearing. Problem was I couldn't dimensionally hop now, as I learned when I tried to do that.
After a few seconds, Macer's father appeared and reattached his own shackles that he had. How everyone knew about this is beyond me but with these people I am amazed I can dress myself in the morning. Using some location magics we zeroed in on Lugh's missing family members and began looking. We kept following along but kept coming to dead ends. So I shifted into earth elemental form and slid through the stone looking for their room. I found them in a cage along with twelve demonicially augmented orcs moving about the room as guards. So I returned to the others and we decided to cheat a little. Using another portable hole, with Lugh inside of the hole, I carried the hole to the cage sliding up through the floor of the cage. Then snuck them out with none of the orcs being the wiser.
No fights, which sucked, but in the end getting the families out safely was more important than getting my rocks off, pun intended.
What year is it? Hard to keep track of events when not sure what day of the week it is.
Managed to break up another extradimentional invasion of the city, this time from the "demonic" bridge footing(how, exactly did we miss THAT little gem?). The ladies of Lugh's family and Mr Macer's dad were still on the missing list, so much research was done. He managed to get word that he was in the World Wound, and the women were being held nearby. After a short buying frenzy, we gathered at the temple of Abadar(Her church is currently closed for minor renovations) for transport into the lair. One of the clergy mentioned the usefulness of dimentional shackles to avoid random porting, apparently a common problem around there, and we convieniently have a couple dozen sets(makes me wonder what some of these folks get up to in their spare time). Wait, who am I talking about? Our group? Strike that side comment, these are just everyday knick-knacks. If someone were to pull out a half dozen of those crawdad submersibles, that might raise an eyebrow.
Ported to an undergroud complex with shackles in hand; good plan, less than optimal execution. Arrived to not find Mr Macer's dad, then lose some of the group, get some back, then lose others. With patience and a lot of luck, got all assembled and locked to the same place. Using magical direction finding, we wandered about till HUGE got bored and elementaled thru the mountain. Found the ladies in dimension locked cage guarded by a dozen orc/demon/lego things, and returned so we could join the fun. A new plan was suggested, where Lugh would get in a port hole with a bottle of air, HUGE takes it to the cage, Lugh gets his family in the hole, and HUGE just wlks them back and we leave. And we didn't break a single thing! Can't imagine that maturity or wisdom are creeping in, so will have to give a great deal of thought as to just how this happened.
So, back in Magnimar mostly assembled, if not quite safe. Now for the next step in our plan to save the world, if we can just figure out what that might be.
When we arrived back in the church we discovered that time had apparently been operating ... differently. To the priests of Abadar we had been gone for six days, but to us it had only been a few hours. No sooner do we begin to leave the church when all of a sudden something, I am not sure what, seems really damn funny. So funny, I can't stop laughing. I wasn't alone as several of the group were laughing, as well as the priests of Abadar. That is when the parishioners started attacking en masse.
Unfortunately I couldn't stop laughing, even as they began beating on me. Problem was they were even attacking Lugh's family. Suddenly I was no longer finding the activities funny as Macer began waving his banner above his head. Several of us stopped laughing as well. Now free from whatever was happening I shifted once again into elemental form and got ready to start swinging. I heard spirited yells that Delvahine was on one of the flanks but once again ran after getting hurt. Thats when Emma started yelling that she was going to the Deverin estate to go after other family members. So I dimensionally hopped to her and shifted form back into my normal self to be ready for the teleport that Emma was preparing to cast.
Just before we left by Emma's spell, one of the parishioner's told me to kneel and even though I didn't want to, I did. Then we appeared in the Deverin estate in the main hall, with me still kneeling and for no reason wanting to stand.
One one-thousand, two one-thousand...
Here's my thing: I get in the habit of counting to time something and it's really hard to stop. Kind of like when you notice you're breathing and then can't stop noticing, right? So in the demi-plane shifting maze where Mr. Macer's dad and the Lugh family were being held, I had to time the shifts. Not too hard when drippy planar things and herds of cats were blipping in and out every few seconds.
So I used one of Macer's gate scrolls to bring everyone back (Huge had to be reminded about taking off the shackles. Twice), and we're back in the temple of Abadar... six days later. Darned demi-planes. As we head for the door, nearly everyone started laughing (not me, I don't know how) and the congregation attacked us. Not a laughing matter, so I set up a force wall to cut off half of them, but they figured it out and started coming around the ends. Some of them actually started hitting me, and Saunders doubled over with laughter can't help me.
So, quickened dimension door to a vacant area, drop the force wall, and set up a selective lightning arc... which dropped one (1!) out of ten or so, skipping Vex. Nina was yelling about undead, and pointed out our friend Delvahine, now sans wingy bits. Knowing she would just dispel a dimensional anchor, I decided to set up a dimensional lock around her, and the thrice-damned biatch just ran out of it, right at me. She then blew me a kiss as she teleported away.
Something in her eyes just before she vanished made me realize that she had to buy her way back into SOMEONE'S good graces, so she couldn't really leave without...something. An intuitive leap, and I shouted that she was heading for the Deverin mansion, and anyone who wanted to come should get to me right away; Huge and the new guy, Duergar responded, and we were off to the races.
Now, what is it that Delvahine wants?
So, got the family members, confounded the demon/orcs, and bliped back to the church in short order. Except we were six days late/overdue? Stupid planes.
Left the clegy to contemplate the existential ramifications and headed for the exit. Passing through the main hall, the congregation rose and the world got funny. Not little lights funny, but deep belly, crying and pointing funny. Nothing to do with the big mob of undead witch things that were tearing into the group and going for the family members. There was something I was supposed to be doing, but it was all too absurd to bother. About then, Nina reached over, slapped me upside the head, and asked if it would be too much trouble for me to eviserate Delvahene, who happened to be among the crowd.
As the day returned to its' usual bloody state, I smiled my thanks and tore into the silly bint. It seems to have some power to fend off the badger; does a lot of damage, but just can't unleash for a proper dismemberment. Need to look into this if time permits.
Everything went green as the b#*~! turned, ran over and kissed the new girl(don't ask, don't tell; I hear there's nothing wrong with it), and ported(as usual). The girl yelled for all to gather on her to port to Hobart's to cover family there, but I waved her on, being busy saving the present ones. Once we get them home, then to the mansion.
Travelling the planes gets to be so tiring. Finally stabilized everyone at one location, and started hunting for our people. HUGE got bored, went elemental, and slid off. Came back with their location, Lugh jumped in a port hole(with air), went back and freed the ladies from a cage guarded by demon orcs(don't ask). Quick Gate spell and we were back at Abadar's temple, six days later. Again, dimentional travel can be quite annoying; so hard to keep track of important dates, things that matter.
Leaving the church, most of the worshippers stood up and turned on us. Unusual crowd, being undead witches with a few of the standard demonic legos mixed in. The curve ball came when most of the group erupted in helples laughter. Started slinging damage to slow the things down(remember to send funds to the clergy for new pews and cleaning supplies), and get the others on board with the current situation. The day wasn't going so well, so I politely asked Kelyn if he could possibly stop embarrassing me; perhaps give Delvahene a proper greeting, as she had gone to the troble of joining us. He shook his head, smiled, and lauched into the demon/thing(whaty has she done with her wings? Never my favorite feature, but the stumps are just so tacky). It turned and ran towards Emma, leaving the dimentional lock, blew her a kiss and vanished. Emma called for help at Hobart's, but need to move these noncombatants to the Morrn residence; they are in dire staights. These dead witches are swarming, so will have to do it the painful way. Then on to Hobart's to settle some accounts(and more clean up; I swear, that nice man is eventually going to tire of us and what we do to his property), and bring a vexatious end to the ones behind this unpleasentness. Targeting family and innocents is just not done!
Everyone took off in different directions, but Emma stopped after a few feet and countered the dominating magic that was affecting me. Free again, I took off towards the kitchen knowing my mother would be ignoring the servants protests and preparing meals for the entire house. Along the way I took out one of the potions to help prevent against the domination to drink as I made my way to the kitchen. I wandered about the mansion unable to find anyone and was beginning to get worried. Then I heard Emma screaming she was wrong, and that Delvahine went for reinforcements and was going after Oona.
By Gorums armored balls! I am missing out on a glorious fight teleporting around Magnimar where there wasn't a fight. So I went ahead and cast a spell that allowed me to regenerate my wounds like salamander and readied myself for another teleport. Before departing I went ahead and apologized to my family, who were in the room where Oona was. I think I may have spooked my little sister being covered in blood and several nasty wounds. She'll have to learn sometime the horrors of war. In time she'll be ready.
We teleported into a bloodbath. Bodies were everywhere. I could see that Lugh was surrounded by the succubi and I overheard them yelling that one of them was invisible. Shifting my sight I found her cowering behind Lugh and dimensionally hopped behind her, flanking with Lugh and brought the sword down. I was rewarded by damn near driving my sword deep into her unhallowed hide. This allowed Lugh to take advantage of my attack and followed suit with a stab of his own. I'm beginning to think I have spent to long in my animal and elemental forms and realized how much I missed swinging my sword. It's still mighty sharp.
Here's my thing: when I'm wrong, I admit it.
We popped into the great hall of the Deverin mansion and everyone began to scatter... except for Huge, who was kneeling. Oh yeah, he'd been dominated by one of the succubi before we 'ported out; a targetted dispel took care of it handily, otherwise he would have been there for weeks. As amusing as that might be, we had a time crunch.
Hearing a clamor of voices, I entered a side hall where it seemed some sort of council of war was going on. I took a second to cast Infernal Healing on myself, the pain from my wounds was becoming a distraction. Nearly everyone in the families was present, but no Delvahine; and the rising voices were a distraction too.
I raised my voice, saying, "yes we are back and Lugh's family and Mister Macer's dad are with us. Now if everyone will be quiet for a moment and let me think!"
Delvahine had lost her wings, so she had vexed (heh) her patron once too often, and needed to get back into good graces. Who was her patron? Well, this whole business started with Delvahine building shrines to Sorshen, so that was a good bet. What did Sorshen want? She was the vainest of the Runelords, and wanted to come back as pretty as ever... crap.
It had to be Oona.
Delvahine had just gone to beg reinforcements of a higher order than she could call herself.
We had to get back, right away.
I'm afraid I actually screamed at that point. The idea of having to protect that crazy slitch Oona from a fate worse than death was galling. I mean, who among us was more deserving of a fate worse than death? Problem was the price was bringing back a Runelord, and that was too high for the world to pay. Damn the bad luck.
Everyone needing to go were around me by this time, so I touched one of my pearls of power and took us back to the temple of Abadar, right where we had left from. Less than a minute had passed, and the fight was NOT going well. Huge rushed over to help Lugh, and I tossed some Chain Lightning over that way to thin the herd. Oona was near the center of my Dimensional Anchor so I told her to stay put, telling the others (no matter how much it hurt) that we needed to protect Oona.
About that time, I felt the displacement of air indicating that something big had just been teleported into our vicinity...
Unfortunately I did not get to enjoy that for long. Bursting into the temple were two large...worm like creature with a somewhat female torso on the upper half. Whatever though it was, it packed a mighty punch and caused the wound to begin bleeding. By this time I was already starting to see stars at the edge of my vision and knew I was close to passing out. So I had to dimensionally hop away and shift for the final time that day into my large elemental form again. The regeneration was helping but was to slow for the power of their hits, and I was going to have to spend a few seconds healing myself before moving back in. Hopefully I wouldn't be to late.
I dimensionally hopped away from the pickle I found myself in and was ready to cure myself when they closed in on Lugh and I realized that he wouldn't last long so I hopped back in since they had an enormous amount of reach. Lugh realized my attack and we immediately fell into our old school training of flank fighting. Kelyn even arrived on the scene and was doing a wonderful job hitting the creature in vulnerable areas causing the creature to stagger. After almost a minute of fighting we managed to down one of the creatures. Thankfully I was allowed to continue my fight because Atz had arrived and cast powerful healing magics to restore my health. That guy is a life saver, literally!
When it dropped we all poured in on the remaining one and attacked with relentless abandon. It didn't take long with the combined attacks of the entire party. After it fell, I turned and offered a high five to Atz for his stellar healing.
...at the rear of the hall, two things slithered from the shadows as Delvahine peered around a pillar. These things were something like giant nagas with immensely bloated, slug-like bodies; they positively pulsed with obscene life-force. I had heard of them but couldn't quite recall their name, I did know that they were vulnerable to negative energy snd THAT is something I can do.
Macer was running toward Oona, shouting about getting to Lugh's (destroyed) temple, and it was painfully obvious that he had been dominated. I told Oona to stay in the anchor and not to listen to him.
As the monsters slammed into the party, I sent Saunders to help, then pulled out something special I'd been saving: reach vampiric touch, and began zapping the creatures, using my pearls to cast it repeatedly. I feared that Lugh and Huge wouldn't last, but we finally brought the things down with the help of Atz and some timely healing under fire.
This was one hell of a day. My skills were tested and I can only imagine that Gorum was pleased with my performance. If only some of the remaining people who lived through everything that had happened in the church of Abadar. It didn't take long before a few of the people began saying that we had brought this down on them. Lugh and Vex really didn't take that to well. Once we got everyone calmed down, some of them forcefully, we left to Kelyns home where the family had been teleported to while I was running around the Deverin estate looking for Delvahine. From there we escorted them to the rest of the families at Hobarts.
Then we had a few days to just relax which admittedly was rather welcome. Wetting the blade is fun and all, but days of rest are nice too. I learned that Kriger and his men were beginning to outlast their welcome. So before we had to endure Macers father asking either Kriger to leave or asking me to ask him to leave, I hinted to Kriger that maybe it was time to do some raiding. He informed me he had learned much from his time with Sabriyya and was ready to leave.
After a week, Magnimar had settle down and my family returned home. The follower of Saranrae we had saved many years ago had gone around and cast wards on the homes to help protect them. From what I have no idea. I do know they didn't protect the house from the small family drama that happened when mom realized that my sister had snuck out to leave with Kriger. At first I was upset to think Kriger did that but I know my sister did this without his knowledge. He will protect her of that I am sure, she just better come back or my mom will tear Kriger apart. She may do that even if he does bring her back.
The next four months rolled by with everyone doing their own thing. I spent a large amount of time helping Lugh and his family rebuild the temple to Sarenrae in Underbridge. Then in our off time we were rebuilding the family home for Lugh. Oddly enough I was getting reports from earth elementals during this time telling me about Ignis. She was up in the world wound building a wall or something with the help of the Builders. After a few days of this Lugh had to inform me that Ignis was trying to impress me and that I should give a compliment or two.
Eventually the lot of us were getting restless and we spent a few days talking about what we wanted to do next and the decision of tracking down the lich was what won out. So we spent a few days preparing and left for the Marsh Fens one morning. So once again I shifted into Mastodon form with the howdah attached and most of the group riding me. Kelyn and Nina were on their flying carpet with Oona also on her carpet. Vex had learned how to fly somehow and spent some of his time soaring around with occasionally resting with the others on the howdah.
When we got near the area where the tower should be we spotted modified giants that were hidden in the swampy ground. Before they were able to act I trampled one of the creatures as those on my back unloaded with arrows and spells.
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Alright, alright; nothing special, just trying to catch up.
The carnage went on and on for semmingly endless minutes. While HUGE enjoys these little gatherings, this really doesn't fit my idea of church services. One would think that the loaded high-brows that favor Abadar should present a bit more decorum. After the first group left for Hobart's, carved a path to the family and gave Nina some room. She ported them home to be looked after, and then to help at Hobart's. More disassembling when I noticed the new girl had returned and was yelling that Oona was the target and we had to protect her(the strickened look on her face showed just how much that hurt to say). Not seeing Nina in the fray, I called her back so she wouldn't miss the shindig, and got yet another of those looks(#867 or 8, hard to keep track any more; if there was ever time to explain, I'm sure these things would go much smoother).
Oona was "safe" in her green circle, and the undead/demon legos were thinning out. The THING sent in some proxies to keep us entertained; for the life of me, I have NO idea what those were. There was talk of them being very chrarismatic, but every time I went for a lunge, I threw up a little more. Finally put them all down and started to bring some order to this charnel house. Some of the bystanders spared a grisley end started muttering how it was Our fault it happened, but it seems to me that a crowd as flush as this could afford better security. A few dislocated jaws later, we set off to my house to pick up the missing. Extensive cleaning enroute as I knew better than to try to show up covered in bloody, decaying clumps of ....whatever. Hugs, smiles, relief; was even civil to the bane of my life. Maybe this is part of that maturity thing.
Suddenly, we hit a long stretch of peace. While there was work to be done, no one(or thing) was trying to shuffle off our mortal coils. Just to make things perfect, it was decided that I was getting pudgy and that WE would work to fix this. While going against many things I hold dear(sleeping, rich foods, canoodling, etc), pursuing a certain individual through the streets of Magnimar does have its perks.
Guess this vacation is coming to an end, there's talk of dealing with the lego man and the army-leading goblin(that's just Never going to stop being funny). Also need to turn Delvawho into a throw rug or something, but there probably won't be much left after Lugh gets done with his rightous retribution. Don't poke the badger if you can't suvive the spoon!
We then moved about and made short work of the creatures with tusk, spells, arrows and blades. Much like the creature we fought in the clock tower a year ago, when it died the skin tore off its body revealing a creature that was invisible. I was able to see them with my true sight and so could a few of the others. We again brought the full wrath of the group on them and felled them rather quickly.
Once dead we resumed our trek and eventually found the tower. It was shifted into the ethereal plane and was rather hard to see. How the others saw it is beyond me. Once inside, there were wooden constructs that asked us politely to leave. Emma was able to convince them that we were 'allies' and they asked for our assistance in removing the 'other intruders.' Not sure who they were but it would give us free reign to move about the tower.
We didn't go to far before one of these dark skinned elf looking creatures attacked. This was probably going to be a boring fight. The construct called them librarians.
Turned out, it took awhile for Delvahine to get back to us. A few days turned into a few weeks, turned into a few months. I decided pretty early on that I would try to convince the group that we needed to get ahead of the curve and stop reacting to whatever plot was grinding ahead; we needed to accomplish something that had been pushed to the back burner: we needed to find and destroy that damned liche along with his phylactery. I started studying and memorizing spells to deal with constructs.
Eventually, I got my way and we found ourselves in the Mushfens, looking for the tower that Huge had tracked the liche to way back when, when Saunders and I had first joined up. When we started up a bunch of weird swampy flesh-golems that hatched invisible pigasauruses when badly damaged, I knew we were close.
Lichey-boy had hidden his tower away on the ethereal plane, but we managed to find the door when it opened to disgorge another construct-creature. Kelyn was able to get his foot inside (almost literally), and the rest of us piled in despite the protests of a couple of weird wooden constructs. They were a bit simple minded, and I was able to wheedle them into showing us around the place in order to rid them of some "other intruders" who were looking for "the Master's" library, something I wouldn't mind having a look at myself. Since one of the constructs was able to access this library via something resembling a secret chest spell, I figured it was in some sort of pocket dimension grafted on to the tower. Also, the Master didn't seem to be in residence, so the pounder types needed SOMETHING to keep them occupied...
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So, here we are cruising a swamp. Not much to look at, the smell is difficult to describe, but do so enjoy the company. I appreciate HUGE's effort, but bouncing along on a small hairy hill just can't compare to gliding smoothly while taking in what passes for a view.
In the middle of nowhere, noticed several large ogres curled up under brush, half burrowed in the muck. Yelled at the all-terrain beastie (are they sleeping down there?) and moved to engage. The things crawled from their holes(really wish they wouldn't have) and turned out to be larger versions of the clocktower beast. True to form, they shed magic like rain, so went in the old fashioned way. Got real fun when the first one went down; the skin slid off, and a huge cat/bat/dunno waded in. At least they took magic damage, so Nina was much happier to be able to blast them. Noticed a distinct lack of support; lots of yelling about not being able to see any foes. Guess they weren't sleeping on the trip out, but were doing shots; and I'M the irresponsible one. Enough mud and blood were kicked up to find them and continue the trek.
Later, another trash-patch thing(can't even describe them anymore, just not right)took off ahead of us, and HUGE did his super speed thing to catch up. Which seemed the thing to do, except flying over to the tower it came out of appeared to be more useful. Went to the open door, but when I tried to enter, a stick-man(?) told me we had to leave, and slammed the door. As the tower is on the Ethereal plane, popping the lock is going to be tough. Just then, the door reopened and Vex invited us in; glad he's mostly on our side. The stick was politely telling us to GTFO as we weren't allowed to be there. The new kid convinced it we were, and we would evict other trespassers already inside; some kind of drow(?).
Moved around the amazingly spacious thirty foot tower; not sure how he packed all this mansion into a little tower, but need to find out and upgrade the camping tower. No sign of the lego man, but Vex did find one of the dark gits. Confronted it and informed him that it was time to go, but it did not comply. Looks like we'll have to beat him down and give it a proper 86ing. We live in such uncivil times.
Wouldn't you know it, this darned place isn't full of undead demonic golem constructs, it's full of plane-hopping weirdo elven maguses. They are nimble little minxes, too. Just had one side-step a forest of black tentacles, so area spells are out. I would like to question one, and wonder of wonders, Vex actually tried to help subdue one, but the others smashed him to goo, dammit.
Atz, we need to see if Atz can talk to them after they're dead. At this rate the boyz are just going to kill them all...
Well, they were pretty violent librarians. At least the first few we encountered. Thankfully my true sight worked because at least one of them was using magical invisibility. Of course during the second fight a sudden explosion of heat, not fire, and grit appeared in the room narrowly missing me but seemed to affect Vex and I heard a cry of alarm at the spell so they must have some sort magical attack. Of course they were also very fast and used spells channeled through their sword. I was going to have to change form to withstand any more fighting with them.
Shifting into living iron I moved to flank the librarian with Macer who was still fighting him through the door frame. My sudden shift in form caused the librarian to swing at Macer instead with horrifying effect. Vex reappeared next to me placing a dagger in the back of the librarian. I followed up with a swing of my own and caused him to drop
I had enough time to catch my breath when I heard fighting in the hall. By the time I made it out of the room the fight ended. We spent the next few minutes patching our wounds. Lugh and I ended up using all the magic available out of two wands as well as several castings of curative magics just to get everyone back up. These librarians definitely hit pretty damn hard.
We proceeded further up the tower with our two wooden attendants in tow and eventually Lugh started commenting that he could sense more creatures. We debated moving past them but the decision was to fight. We didn't do much before an explosion of cold magic clipped the edge of the group and washed over all of us. That was not something I knew they could do. It did not feel well. Fights on!