No Dungeons, Lots of Dragons, Nowhere to Run - IC

[Aneurin]

Inside the case is a large orb, filled with a shifting, swirling silvery mist. As you gaze on it, Blight feels it calling to him, drawing him nearer to it. Salazar, on the other hand, feels a conflicting torrent of sensations; at one moment he feels the need to draw closer, the next he feels the need to leave, then to stay where he is, and many other instructions as well - but not one sensation lasts long enough to act upon it.

The orb is seated on a faded red velvet cushion within the crystal display case.

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You don't *have* to act on these feelings, by the way. They're just feelings you have, and you know they're not your own.

[CowMasterTrojan]

"Blight... this thing is bad news...Let's just leave it"

"No... I can hear it calling to me. I am meant to take this. Lets see if it even activates the trap when I take it"

With that, Blight opens the display case and grabs the orb, removing it.

A look of pain and shock fills Salazar's face, and then the two look to the Statue, expecting it to come alive.

[Aneurin]

The orb comes away easily. As it lifts from the cushion, there's a click, and the cushion bursts in to flames. At once it becomes clear there was a very fine thread connected to the cushion, but buried under a layer of dust - it flares into life and burns with brief intensity, racing across the floor, up the wall and in to the ceiling.

There comes a muffled explosion, and the ceiling of the chamber becomes mazed with cracks. Then chunks of it start to slowly cave in, starting in the middle - a particularly large chunk shatters the statue in front of you, spraying you both with rock chips.

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Blight: Reflex DC15 to avoid taking (1d6)[1] points of fire damage from the flames.

Another reflex for Salazar and Blight to avoid the ceiling falling on them.

[CowMasterTrojan]

Blight's two reflex saves
(1d20+42)[47]
(1d20+42)[47]

Salazar casts Celerity as a immediate action, then casts ethereal jaunt. Making him immune to being crushed to death.

wow. the roller doesn't like me today...

[Aneurin]

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Don't sweat it. It wasn't a massively high save DC anyway, given you had some warning.

Although I advise against rolling low in the future

Easily avoiding the flames and then the falling rocks, Blight finds himself back under the ladder in the corner where he had come in, still holding the orb.

Looking at the ceiling, it seems obvious that the trap didn't function properly. You can see trailing fuses and what you can only presume are explosives mixed in with the rubble pile. It seems likely that the trap was supposed to bring down the whole ceiling, burying the chamber forever.

Salazar is stood underneath the pile of rubble, completely unharmed.


In Blight's claws, the orb's silvery missed has changed its swirling pattern. Now it spirals out from wherever Blight is in contact with it. It's almost inviting you to try and dominate it - to exert your will and take control.

[CowMasterTrojan]

Blight stares at the orb for several minutes, rolling it around in his claw and simply staring at it. Finally he takes a quick look around, trying to estimate if he can move the rubble. It seems unlikely, so then he shall dimension door to the surface after calling out his intentions to Salazar.

Salazar, moves in and out of the rubble trying to get a better look at anything they may have missed. He then moves into the walls, trying to find any secret areas they may have missed. The area that the ladder just goes up into the ceiling is getting looked over as well.

[Aneurin]

There's not a lot left in the chamber. It's mostly a giant pile of rubble, and unexploded explosives. There're some free spaces around the edge, and one or two tombs are still intact at the very edges, but that's about it. There's no trace of the statue in the middle, or the display case.

There are no secret areas at the edges of the room - it seems to have been remarkably well constructed, as the walls have suffered little to no damage. The only thing of interest is that the area of the ceiling the ladder reaches in to is made of hard-packed earth, rather than stone like the rest of the ceiling.


When Blight appears in the temple above, there are a lot of humans, elves, dwarves, halflings and the like milling around the edge of a very large area of collapsed flooring exclaiming about how the floor had suddenly fallen in, and speculating on possible causes. The sudden appearance of a blue dragon in the room, however, ends that and starts a lot of panicky screaming and people running away. The shouting seems to have caught on in other parts of the library, too, and you can hear people shouting for the guards in the distance.

[CowMasterTrojan]

Salazar will look inside the remaining tombs for anything that may be of use. Then he shall head to the surface.

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I'm sure it was just a mistake, but blight is a shadow dragon. Not a blue dragon. That was candycorn.

Upon seeing the humanoids grouped together, Blight knows he must act fast to prevent chaos.

With his surprise round (if you grant him one). he casts nerveskitter as a swift action and as a standard action breath weapons a 50ft cone of negative energy. All he can catch within it need to make a DC 42 Reflex save. Failure means 5 negative level, success means 2. Just as before, these negative levels make the victims lose 22 hp instead of the normal 5. All other penalties from negative levels remain the same.

Initiative (1d20+16)[33]

Rounds to recharge on the breath weapon (1d4)[2]

[CowMasterTrojan]

(If above turn was his surprise round)
Blight casts Greater Consumptive field. It is a 30ft radius emanating from the caster, so that means the diameter should be a 75ft circle. All inside the circle who have less than 9 hp, need to make a DC 32 fort save, or die.
He then uses his move action to run down anyone who may have gotten away.

[Aneurin]

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...huh. When did you post all that? Sorry for the delay, I didn't see it sooner!

Also, yeah, that was a typo - not a polymorph

Also, do you want to just fast-track through your hunting of the low-level experts? We can do your hunt if you like, but don't expect much in the way of rolling. Or, you know, resistance.

People die. Lots of people. You kill everyone who was in the room, and take off after the others. There's a lot of fear in the voices of those who were out of range, or watching from the shelter of the door. You can hear cries of "Dragon!" and confused and fearful exclamations from people who apparently weren't watching the hole in the floor.

[CowMasterTrojan]

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I am all for skipping the pointless killing. If I could just get a estimate on how many people died from consumptive field, it may become relevant shortly because each killed person gives a +2 untyped strength bonus, and he will likely be trying to take the building down shortly.

Rising from the ground, Salazar gasps in horror of what he sees. He quickly finds Blight in the main room, slurping the blood of the last victim he found.
"BLIGHT! WHAT HAVE YOU DONE! HOW WAS I NOT CLEAR THIS NEEDED TO BE LOW KEY! DO YOU KNOW WHAT YOU'VE DONE?"

With a final slurp, Blight releases the body from his mouth. He makes a slight 'ahhhh...' sound and clears his throat. Looking around, he fails to see the ethereal kobold but chooses to speak anyway.
"Relax... This was a necessary response. I did not intend to be spotted, but the room that was clearly deserted when we went underground, but was filled with humans when I teleported up. I killed any who saw me. Any who escaped merely heard screams and ran. We will finish here quickly and leave, and within days no one will be saying the big bad D word."

"Yes... I can see how it would be easy to forget about dozens of people who died mysteriously and horrifically." Salazar snapped sarcastically.

"This is why you need me kobold. My mind is so much more sharp and organized, it's not even funny. When we leave, you cast greater invisibility on us, you shape-change into a dragon too, and we smash the heck out of this building. These were temples to gods of dragons, and they are using it for a library. It deserves to be destroyed. When the building collapses, everyone will assume they died that way, and before the truth is found out, in a couple of days every person who died from my claw or breath weapon will become a vampire spawn. A vampire plague will fall on this city, and it will cover the truth of the matter up. Because most mortals don't even realize dragons can become vampires."

"Yes... the scheming... you've had more practice... whatever. I suppose at this point destroying this place wouldn't really bother me. ... You know I was with a blue dragon that wanted to wipe out a city. She gave them a chance to avoid it, and waited a week. You have no predisposition against these people, and have slaughtered dozens in two hours. How I am supposed to work with this?" He grumbles, becoming normal again as he begins to walk to the original book room he was in.

"Stop your complaining. I will grab the books. You need to go check in the remains of the temple of Tiamat. See if there is a orb like this hidden underneath. I am a follower of Chronepsis and easily found this orb. Your soul is owned by Tiamat, and there is a temple just over there. Despite your bad history, Tiamat would still want your task to succeed and obviously recognize you as competent. There may be an orb for you too"

Changing course, Salazar turns briefly with his one good eye to Blight. "Fine. I will weather the five headed bitch's temple for the greater good. And what are you going to do?"

"Before this went down, I found those crystal creatures you disintegrated for me trying to destroy books concerning myths and legends from Fel'mass. I imagine its related somehow... Meet back here in a few minutes."

With that, Blight puts Blade barriers on the two main entrances to the building. He then returns to the room where he killed those creatures, recasts Hoard gullet, and swallows any books related to myths and legends from Fel'mass. He then returns to their original room and swallows any books that Salazar had used. The limit is 400 pounds and 40 cubic feet.

Salazar enters the Temple of Tiamat. He will look it over carefully but quickly. Because he doesn't have another ethereal jaunt memorized, he will shape-change into a mature adult white dragon (huge) and burrow (30ft speed) down in roughly the same location of the temple that the other Tomb was located in. After a couple dives down, if he doesn't find anything he returns to the main room.

[CowMasterTrojan]

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Sorry, that last post turned out way longer than I originally intended.

The plan to destroy the building is as follows. Salazar will put greater invisibility on Blight. With his enormous strength score, he will be destroying support walls and pillars, and generally trying to weaken the foundation. Meanwhile Salazar will burrow underneath the building and create a few large hollow spots. Once both tasks are complete, salazar will turn back into a kobold and cast greater invisibility while Blight casts invisibility on himself. Salazar will then cast Miracle, and use it to emulate a earthquake spell. (Such a use costs no xp). Once the earthquake begins, he will celerity-Dimension door the two of them to a safe area they saw on the way there.

With the supports destroyed and hollow areas of the ground collapsing, the building should come down quite nicely. If not, Salazar shall cast Summon Desert Ally 9, to summon (1d3)[2] Dunewinders. They are essentially huge burrowing worms of destruction. He shall command them to destroy the building and anyone nearby. With a Int of 5, it will do a simple but effective job.

With creatures that are clearly not dragons being seen, they would return to the shadow plane and rest for 8 hours. After that they would hasten to the location of the first tomb on Aisolon Hill.

[Aneurin]

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So. Here's to hoping this post doesn't get eaten too.

Again, sorry that I didn't notice/fix sooner.

In total, Blight kills around forty people - thirteen with his breath weapon, five with his consumptive field, and the rest were hunted down mercilessly. He has a feeling that one or two may have gotten away, though, as it took him some time to reach and seal all of the doors. He also locates and swallows the books in the room without difficulty - there are about sixty of them, of various sizes, shapes and weights, which take up most of the spell's room.

Salazar doesn't see anything exceptional in the temple of Tiamat - like the temples of Chronepsis and Bahamut, it has been converted in to a library. Salazar's digging in to the floor reveals a human skeleton in the foundations, and another room like the one beneath the Temple of Chronepsis. This time, however, there is no orb and the dragon statue has five heads. Looking at the tombs, you realise they must be former High Priests. It seems there haven't been any interred in over fifty years.


The plan to demolish the temples goes off without a hitch. You teleport to a park on the way up the spire, and have a very good view of the walls slowly caving in on top of the city guardsmen who had come to investigate the disturbances at the library. You can practically see the ripple of dismay that runs through the crowd that has gathered as the library collapses.

[CowMasterTrojan]

Salazar scans the room with a detect magic. If there is nothing of interest, he disintegrates the statue and leaves.

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As Blight said, anyone who he killed with a breath weapon or with a claw attack, or that last poor soul who he drained dry of blood, all of them will rise in 1d4 days as vampire spawn. So potentially 35 vampire spawns roaming the streets with no master. The Dragon won't be on the city's mind long.

Upon destroying the Library, the duo returns to the Shadow plane and retires to Blight's lair. Once there, Blight uses Identify on the orb.

Salazar will look over the books regarding myths and legends from Fel'mass, looking specifically for powerful individuals. Before sleeping, he sends a message to Arculos via sending.

"Found info-Waring Wizards. Likely located at Aisolon Hill and Verchin Pass. Strange crystal creatures found destoying info on Fel'mass myths.
No longer working alone."
He then rests and re-memorizes his divine spells. (I shall change the memorized spells on his sheet tonight.)
The next day they go to Aisolon Hill.

[CowMasterTrojan]

Also worth noting, the next day Salazar uses mind blank on himself and Blight. People may be looking for them now.....

Knowledge (history):(1d20+31)[46] to see if Blight knows of any legendary figures from Fel'mass that are high in the scale of power and haven't been known to be permanently dead.

[Aneurin]

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What do you mean, 'high in the scale of power'? Like magical power, or political? Or economic, I guess.

Also, will do time jump after dealing with this (or, you know, ignoring it)

The Identify spell sputters for a while, tells Blight everything about everything without giving him any useful or intelligible information. Then it produces a huge flash of light from the orb that only Blight can see. As the spots fade from his vision, he's forced to one conclusion - the spell doesn't know what it is.

Blight gets the feeling of smugness radiating from the orb.

Salazar feels happiness, sorrow, shame and pride radiating from it. At the same time.

[CowMasterTrojan]

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When I asked I really meant a legendary warrior or Magic user, one whose death is not recorded, but obviously we're looking at a magic user and not a warrior if they were able to create those crystal blooded things. So magically powerful. One able to create new creatures, which points to arcane over divine. But I'm not exclusively set on arcane.

Blight eyes the orb carefully, fully appreciating the swirl of colors. After watching it for several minutes, he nods as if he heard it's demand for respect.

"I can sense your sentience... show me your power... it was meant to be."

A nervous looking Salazar watches from a few feet away. He doesn't like the orb, and he doesn't like the effect it has on Blight. Nor does he like the emotions he projects. Every time he glances at the orb, he contemplates disintegrating it. But he doesn't, the cost would be too great. Blight is too enthralled with it. Until it proves to be dangerous, he decides he will let it exist a bit longer.

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If there is any check I can make to make the orb do something, or for somebody to figure out stuff about it, let me know. Otherwise Blight continues to keep it with him, in his hand/claw. And they continue on their way, appearing in Aisolon Hill invisible the next day. Obviously looking around for the entrance to the tomb.

[Aneurin]

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Alright. Don't have time to type a full Knowledge result up, but - there's no-one you can think of who had a tendency towards creating life, although there are (and were) one or two who might have managed it if they wanted to.

As for the orb - Blight is welcome to use it. He just needs to lay a claw on it and concentrate on trying to use it.

[CowMasterTrojan]

Placing his claws upon the orb, Blight closes his eyes and begins to concentrate on using the power of the orb. He shuts off all thoughts other than that of the orb, and opens his mind to the influence of the orb. He then attempts to use the orb.

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Alright, well feel free to take a few days off if real life is busy. Just don't forget about me. Whenever you're ready.... Aisolon Hill.

[Aneurin]

As Blight begins to concentrate, the world seems to fall away. He finds himself inside the globe, surrounded by the swirling mists. There doesn't seem to be anything else there, except for a pair of claws that are gripping his own. Their colouring is impossible to determine; in fact, it's quite possible it is changing too fast to take in.

They seem to be... pulling him in?

[CowMasterTrojan]

Blight continues to concentrate, allowing himself to be pulled.

What does Salazar see? Because if Blight starts to get sucked into the orb, that's not gonna go over well.

[Aneurin]

Salazar sees Blight become stiff and vacant, and any attempts to remove his claws from the orb fail. The colours in the orb pulse and swirl.

Blight feels the other claws draw him faster and faster as he allows them to pull him. The mists swirl faster and faster and begin to change colour, becoming darker and darker until they are shadow-like constructs on the edge of Blight's vision. There's also a growing sense of evil and malevolence from the claws holding his.

Please would Blight and Salazar both make a will save.

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If you would like to resist being pulled further, or pull back, then roll an Int check.

[CowMasterTrojan]

Blight (1d20+47)[52]
Salazar (1d20+34)[39]


Blight's Intelligence check (1d20+11)[26]

If Salazar is able, he aims a Disintegrate at the orb and fires.
Touch Attack (1d20+26)[40]
Fort Save DC 27
Damage (40d6)[151] or (5d6)[18] on a successful save.

[Aneurin]

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Why did you do that? Are you sure you want to?

(1d20+10)[26]

Ugh. Roll int again as a tie breaker.

[CowMasterTrojan]

Int (1d20+11)[29]

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Alright, if that may be a bad thing I suppose lets pause and see if Salazar has any idea what's going on before he hastily tries to destroy it for fear of Blight's unlife.

Spellcraft (1d20+31)[46]

Knowledge Arcana (1d20+35)[52]

Knowledge Religion (1d20+13)[29]

[Aneurin]

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It was powerful enough to stop an Identify spell, so it's not your run-of-the-mill cursed item. If it is, indeed, cursed.

Anyway, results of your rolls:
Blight is currently trying to communicate with whatever it is that's in the orb. What the outcome will be is less than certain at this point - you're just going to have to wait and see.

You're pretty sure this thing is intelligent to some extent. It definitely seems to be reacting to whatever Blight's doing.

(1d20+10)[26]

Blight exerts his will and pulls back against the disembodied claws that are dragging him where he would not go. There's intense resistance for a moment, but then the pull ceases and Blight finds himself floating in equilibrium with the claws; neither seeking dominance.

Then, there's a voice. Or, rather, the memory of a voice. As if someone bypassed the tedious business of speaking and just left the impression of speech in his mind.

I am at your service. What is your will?

...Master.

All at once Blight can smell other dragons; metallic, chromatic and all the other kinds besides. All merging in to one great scent of Dragon.



Salazar sees the mists of the orb contract to a pinpoint and almost explode back in to the orb, flooding it with silver, before returning to its original stately swirling. Blight remains as he was, and will do so until he breaks mental contact with the orb.

[CowMasterTrojan]

Inside the Orb, Blight lets out a tremendous laugh of triumph. Once again his determination is all that matters.

"Tell me what you are, and what are your capabilities! I command you to do so!"

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Salazar recoils and stops his disintegrate spell at the last minute, noticing a small smirk on Blight's face. It can't be that bad if he's smirking.

[Aneurin]

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Normally I wouldn't step in to stop you doing something like that, but I felt you may not forgive me for letting you destroy a major artifact out of hand - as well as destroy a chunk of Blight's soul at the same time. Not enough to kill him, mind, just do some long-term mental ability damage.

Also, I strongly advise against failing those opposed Int checks!

Why, Master, whatever you please. I can show you the past; the present. I can turn you in to purest light and let you travel as you will. I can, of course, fulfill my purpose of calling dragonkind to you.

[CowMasterTrojan]

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Part of the problem is in sensing danger when there is none. Which wasn't the case here, Blight apparently was in danger, but none that Salazar could indicate. So you at least saying 'you sure you want to do this?' is enough to make me stop and make sure I'm looking at the evidence properly. Sometimes we, as players, can mess good things up simply because there is a level of certain level of meta-gaming we can't prevent. So what I'm getting at is "thank you", I was caught up in fear of the moment

"You did not answer my question. I asked what are you?

Further, is your purpose to call Dragonkind to your master? Or to me specifically? As in, if I was not your master then would your purpose still be to call dragonkind to me? How would you go about doing this? Do not show me, tell me."

[Aneurin]

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No problem. Just wanted to make it clear that I wouldn't try to railroad you - just warn you sometimes if you're about to do something really unhealthy without apparently realising it.

I am a tool of the humans, used to control dragons in ages past. Have you never wondered why dragons do not rule this world? That is my doing, as with those like me. The greatest of the humans came together many millenia ago to create something to protect them. To create us. We are the essence of dragon kind - all they are and more.

I bring them to my master, the one who controls me. As to how... why, I just call and they must come. Did you not hear my whispers to you, o my master?