[PF] Hold my Beer... a Pathfinder Campaign Journal

[Toxic Shaman]

Spoiler: Reunited

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"What's the plan" Janney asked.

Tuuchi kept her eyes on the undead coming through the portal. "I don’t have a lot that can affect skeletons directly, but they are likely to be under someone's control to move like that. I'll try to take whoever is controlling them.”

"Ugh, those are particularly vile." Birringle said "If they are what I think they are they will regenerate on their own eventually unless they are destroyed in a holy area. I can bless the area, but it could be dispelled so I would prefer to wait until they are no longer under control if possible since i can only do that once today."

Mortheus nodded. "Ok then, I'll take out the fliers then start pounding on the giants. I can hit them at range. Let me draw them up the hill. I can knock out some of them on the way, and we can retreat to the maze if we have to so they cant swarm us. Hopefully I can draw out the controller."

As they started walking down the hill they spread out. One of the Rocs swooped in to take a look at them and got caught in one of Mortheus's Ectoplasmic Cocoons and crashed into the ground where it was easily destroyed by Janney and Birringle.

Tuuchi was lagging behind and didn't notice that Alitha was following her until the girl spoke to her.

"Here, take this. It will help." Alitha said.

Tuuchi was surprised, she hadn't heard the girl speak before. She was distracted and didn't realize what Alitha was doing until the girl tapped her arm with the band she was holding, and it molded itself around the gnome's arm.

Tuuchi stiffened and began to sweat as she concentrated on fighting the artifact's influence. Eventually she was able to force herself to pull the band off her own arm. Her hands were shaking as she threw it on the ground and turned to look at Alitha.

"Child, that was a remarkably stupid thing to do" was all she said before she turned and walked back up the hill, away from the fight.

Alitha didn't seem bothered by the criticism at all and reached down to pick up the band with a big smile on her face. She slipped it over her ankle, and then cast a spell and disappeared.

Meanwhile Perle was almost back to the island. He had made himself invisible, and was flying as fast as he could straight for the corner of the island where the portal was.

By the time he arrived the portal had finally closed, and the undead giants were fighting their way up the hill. There were too many to easily count, but he estimated his friends were facing off against at least two dozen undead giants, with five additional skeletons already destroyed. He could see that his friends were already wounded and were retreating before they were surrounded.

He stopped for a moment to cast a spell that allowed him to see invisible creatures, and found two, both humanoid, walking about 20 yards behind the undead. Perle was pleased. Now he had something to target. He pulled a dagger out and started jogging up the hill to catch up before his invisibility spell ended.

Back at the top of the hill Mortheus stopped when he reached the standing stones. With Janney near him he changed tactics and formed compressed air into a whip, which he used to lash out against the giants that had moved in to attack.

Janney saw this, and started smacking a wounded Giant, knocking great shards of bones from it with each punch. Between the two of them they took out three giants in short order.

One standing stone away Birringle cast a spell and a wall of flame appeared among the giants. As they stumbled through he and Kady attacked and finished off two more. There were too many though, and they knew if they stayed they would be overrun. Birringle cast a flame strike, then they all retreated back to the door to the underground maze.

The entrance was only wide enough for three people, so Janney, Birringle and the cat took the front lines, with Mortheus behind using his kinetic whip over their heads. As the first two giants tried to force their way in they were mown down as fast as they could get into position.

This didn’t last though, and when the next wave of skeletons forced their way in, they heard someone chant, and a wave of cold and ice rolled over them. It didn’t seem to bother the undead, but Janney and Mortheus took damage from it. As usual, Birringle and the cat somehow managed to dodge it all.

Further down the hill Perle quietly moved into position, and attacked one of the spellcasters following the undead. He cast a silence spell using his Silent metamagic rod, then stabbed the man twice in the back, then slashed his throat as he tried to turn.

He instantly became visible, and the other spellcaster noticed him and turned and shouted for some of the skeletons to attack the new threat. Perle flipped two daggers into the man’s face as he began to cast, then tumbled backwards to avoid the giants that were rapidly closing in on him.

Nearby, Tuuchi had changed shape into that of a small seagull and was perched on top of a standing stone. She didn’t know who was attacking the spellcasters but made the obvious assumption that whoever it was had to be on her side.

Seeing Perle tumbled backwards, she did what she could to help by staring at the wounded spell caster and giving him the mental command to attack his nearest ally.

The man broke under her will and swung feebly at a Hill Giant skeleton, who was currently uncontrolled due to the death of the necromancer Perle had killed seconds before.

The Giant reached out with one huge arm and smacked the man across the face, and he fell to the ground and did not move. Not content with that, the Giant stomped on him a few times.

Perle kept backing up, and was able to keep distance between himself and the five skeletons chasing him. He couldn’t avoid the Roc though, which swooped in and grabbed him in its talons.

As it squeezed him he managed to get one hand free and kept slashing the bones holding him in place until the talon broke apart and he tumbled to the ground, bouncing twice before coming to a stop. As he shakily got to his feet he ducked under an attack from a nearby giant, and tumbled backwards to get some distance.

Back inside the underground maze the rest of the party had given up ground and backed around the first corner after taking two more Cones of Cold. Both Janney and Mortheus were down, leaving Birringle and his cat Kady to continue the fight alone.

Before he fell Mortheus had managed to drag Janney to the back line though and Birringle was hoping they were still alive. He decided he couldn’t retreat any further, or his friends would certainly be killed so this was where he planned on making his stand.

He could tell something had changed when he heard screams behind the front line of giant skeletons. Some of them were no longer under control, and had decided to attack the nearest living things, whichh happened to be the remaining to necromancers, who were frantically trying to protect themselves.

Back outside Tuuchi watched Perle attempt to escape and decided to give him some more help. With a screech she cast a spell and the tall grass wrapped around the legs of the Giants near Perle, slowing them down enough that he was able to get away.

The Roc flew by him and bit him and raked him with its talons, but was not able to grab him this time, and he slashed at it as it went by, managing to overcome its damage resistance.

He continued running up the hill and started shouting, causing some of the Giants who were trying to get into the underground maze to turn around and chase him instead.

He withstood two more flyby attacks from the Roc, and in the meantime kept leading Giants in circles around the island.

Back inside Birringle knew he was running out of time and luck. A few more hits and he would be down, and he could tell Kadywasn’t doing much better.

Fortunately Mortheus’s defenses were recovering on his own, and he woke up and healed himself enough to get to his feet, then used his kinetic whip to give Birringle some breathing room.

As the next wave of Giants stumbled in the three of them were able to mow them down, but more just kept pouring in.

At that moment Tuuchi burrowed her way through the floor in the form of a badger. Her odd looking familiar appeared next to her with a wand and began to pour healing energy into Kady, who was barely standing, while Tuuchi cast a wall of thorns across the entrance to the maze, then burrowed back down into the floor.

With the entrance temporarily blocked off they were all able to heal themselves somewhat and take out each skeleton as it pushed its way through the wall.

Outside Perle had finished off the Roc and was leading nine more skeletons around the island on his flying carpet, staying just out of range.

Seeing no more skeletons at the entrance, Tuuchi dispelled her Wall of Thorns and the rest of the party emerged above ground.

Seeing them Perle waved. “I’m back!” he shouted, forgetting that since he had been reincarnated they wouldn’t recognize him. Seeing the blank looks he added “Its Perle. I was reincarnated by a coven of witches. Don’t worry, they won’t be bothering us!”

“Oh great” Birringle muttered to himself as he continued destroying skeletons. He was not exactly thrilled to see Perle again but did his best not to show it.

Once the last one fell, they gathered all of the pieces they could find into one big pile, and Birringle blessed the area, destroying the skeletons completely.

[Elvensilver]

I really enjoy reading about your campaign. Keep up the good (and pleasingly regular) work!
May I ask about the builds -or just the classes- of Birringle and Tuuchi?

[Kapow]

Hey ToxicShaman,
I didn't get to read your journal for quite some time.
But I still like it. You're having a really great group/campaign there.
Keep it up!

[Toxic Shaman]

Glad you like it! I'll post another update later today. Some info on the newer two PCs.

Tuuchi Snefluegon: Old gnome Mesmerist 9 // Fey Speaker Druid 9
Description: Whatever she decides she wants to look like at the moment. Normally she looks like everyone's favority tiny gnome grandmother, with snow white hair, green freckles on really pale skin and dark blue eyes.
Personality: She conveys whatever emotions and actions she wants people to think about her. Whatever she is really thinking and feeling is something she doesn't show unless she wants to. She is extremely smart, charismatic and perceptive and her biggest flaw is that she knows it.
Build: Truly scary abilities in social skills backed up with strong enchantment and illusion spellcasting, and very good rogue skills. Useless in a physical fight, but usually able to avoid finding herself in one. She has a familiar (monkey from her monkey domain, reskinned as a fey creature)

Birringle Two Mules: Middle aged Aasimar Hunter 9 // Speaker for the Past (Battle Spirit) Shaman 9
Description: He looks like a heavily tattooed muscular halfling, with reddish brown curly hair that is going gray at the temples. His face is weathered and wrinkled from the sun.
Born to halfling parents, he only suspected he was something different as he aged much slower. He looks like a normal halfling other than that.
Build: Melee reach weapon build, his companion Kady is a mountain lion (small cat). His spellcasting is devoted mostly to buffs, heals and condition removal spells.

While I'm at it I'll cover a few campaign house rules:
Gestalt Campaign, but calculated slightly differently than normal Gestalt rules:
HPs: Class with higher HD provides base HPs. Bonus HPs per level based on HD of second class. D6: 1 HP, D8: 2 HPs, D10: 3 HPs
Skills: Full skill ranks for one class. Bonus Ranks per level equal to ranks from second class - 2. So an Oracle/Barbarian would have 4 + 4-2 = 6 ranks per level. I like skilled characters...
Feats: Every odd level as normal, but Bonus Feat at level 1, and ever 4 levels after that.
Attribute Points: 25 point base. +1 to an attribute ever four levels in each class. Max improvement to any one attribute still limited to char level/4.

[Toxic Shaman]

Spoiler: End of an Era

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Perle was almost in tears he was so happy to be back with his friends. When she saw him Janney wrapped him up in a bear hug that almost broke his back while Mortheus looked on laughing.

He introduced himself to Tuuchi, who had returned to her normal gnome form, and they all caught up with what had gone on recently.

They were all unnerved at Tuuchi’s description of what Alitha had tried to do to her with the artifact.

“That thing was really bad news” was all Tuuchi would say about her brief experience wearing it. She knew she had been lucky to rid herself of it.

While Tuuchi and Birringle slept to recover spells, the rest searched the island, but found no sign of it, or of Alitha. Eventually they gave up, and went to check on Gansell, as the solstice was less than a day away.

The cocoon looked the same as it had for weeks, but the magic radiating from it seemed even stronger. Gansell’s animal companion was still laying next to the cocoon watching them warily. It had not moved for months.

They were just about to head back to the surface when they saw three bolts of green fire shoot into the room from the underground maze. Mortheus was standing in the doorway and took all three in the back. He dropped like a rock, glowing with a sickly green light.

Janney and Perle raced towards the door as three semi-transparent women floated into the room, glowing with the same green light as their flames. When they saw Perle they snarled almost in unison, and he recognized them.

“Damn witches won’t stay dead” he said to Janney as she cast a spell that hasted both of them.

“Um, pretty sure they are dead Perle” Janney countered as one of them reached through her armor to inject green fire directly into her soul.

Perle was too busy trying to defend himself to respond.

The fight was brutal. Perle’s daggers were not very effective, only doing a fraction of the damage they would against a living foe. Janney had better luck, her punches seemed to be landing as if the Witchfire she was fighting was solid.

Gansell’s animal companion decided it was time to exert itself when Perle fell, and both Witchfires seemed more than happy to carve it up like they had Perle.

By the time Janney finished off the one facing her, the animal companion was down too, and both Witchfires had switched their attentions to the cocoon, which seemed to have enraged them. They both sunk their claws into it, and each time they did the light from it flared.

Janney attacked one of them, screaming for help at the top of her lungs. The one she attacked turned to face her, but the other one continued its assault on the magical barrier.

By the time Birringle and Tuuchi arrived , Janney, Perle, Mortheus and Gansell’s animal companion were all down. As Birringle raced in with his Bardiche he looked on in horror as the cocoon protecting Gansell burst, causing uncontrolled magical energy to wash over them. The two remaining Witchfires both screamed and staggered back, and then….

...

Tuuchi and Birringle found themselves standing in tall grass that came up to their knees in a meadow surrounded by huge Oaks. Birds were singing, flowers were blooming. It was the most beautiful soothing place either had ever seen.

“Nothing lasts forever” a young woman’s voice said matter of factly.

They looked around to see a young woman walking towards them, carrying a tall staff shod in silver, with an enormous emerald attached to the end of it. They recognized the staff as being the one Gansell was clutching when they first arrived at the island, before the cocoon obscured her completely.

“Do we have time for this?” Birringle asked. “We need to stop the Witchfires. Where are we?”

The woman looked pained. “I can’t answer you in a manner you would understand unfortunately”

“Try” Tuuchi hissed. She hated to be patronized.

The woman smiled slightly at that. “We are currently operating orthogonal to both space and time. While we are standing outside, so to speak, I have constructed the illusion of both to make it easier for us to converse.”

“So when we are finished here, we will return to the same spots at the instant we left then.” Birringle replied. “That is good.”

“The amount of energy I am expending to maintain this meadow is colossal and only hastens my own demise when we return to normal space-time, but I thought it important that we speak” Gansell replied. “With my death, everything I have built will be destroyed, and I’d prefer to spend my remaining time on more useful activities than trying to fully explain theoretical concepts that take most of a lifetime to learn.”

“So there is no way out?” Tuuchi asked, her tone softening a bit.

“Yes, there are a few options. That is what I would like to discuss” Gansell replied. “Both of you approach the magical arts in ways that are similar enough to how I approach things that it would be possible for either of you to take over my Mantle, albeit at a greatly reduced scope. If either of you are willing it is quite likely you could save yourselves, and your friends, though at a great cost.”

“I accept.” Birringle said immediately. “What do I have to do”

Tuuchi stayed silent.

Gansell looked concerned. “You would agree without knowing what you are agreeing to?”

“For a chance to save my friends, and keep Waldspiegal alive?” Birringle responded. “How could I not?”

“OK then” she replied. She gestured, and Tuuchi disappeared from the meadow.

...

Tuuchi blinked and realized that she was back in her body. The shift in perspective was jarring and she stumbled as the cocoon disrupted, splashing magical energy out over the entire room. It destroyed both Witchfires, and invigorated the remaining party members that were still alive.

Mortheus got to his feet slowly and looked around in confusion. Janney and Perle were both still dead.

Birringle stepped around their bodies and reached to grab Gansell’s staff, which was the only thing left inside the coccoon.

“We’re leaving in five minutes,” the halfling announced. “I’ll be right back, I need to get a few things, then we must go, the link back home won’t be stable for long.” He and Kady raced outside.

While they were gone Mortheus went through Perle’s pack and found his portable hole. He stripped both Perle and Janney completely to make sure they weren’t carrying any other extra-dimensional spaces, then gently placed both bodies in the portable hole. While he worked Tuuchi explained to him the conversation in the meadow.

By the time Birringle returned the ground was starting to rumble. Tuuchi, Mortheus and Kady quickly stepped back into the stairwell that led back to Waldspiegel. Once they were through, Birringle followed and concentrated for almost two minutes, while clutching Gansell’s staff in both hands.

When he was finished the portal was closed, and the stairwell had reshaped itself, to go up instead of down. They walked 17 steps up and found themselves back in Waldspiegel, in the woods behind Gansell’s cabin.

Another two minutes of effort from Gansell and the stairwell disappeared. Tuuchi tried to engage Birringle in a discussion of his new abilities, but he gently but firmly rebuffed her.

The next morning, Birringle prepared the bodies for a return to life. He reincarnated Perle first, and after removing his negative levels he sent him outside, while he worked on Janney.

Outside, Mortheus was surprised. “You are back in your original form” he told Perle. The two of them spoke quietly with Tuuchi to discuss what had happened while Perle was dead.

Inside, Birringle reincarnated and restored Janney, also in her original body. Once she had recovered a bit he broached a difficult subject.

“I couldn’t save your baby” Birringle said apologetically.

Janney said nothing, but her immediate reaction was relief, then shame at that relief, and then sadness at what could have been.

“I was able to talk to Gansell a bit before she died” he continued. “She told me that in the instant the barrier dropped she had almost a second to scan everything nearby. According to her your baby bore the mark of a God. I will not say Her name here and would thank you to do the same….Do you have any idea what I am talking about?”

“Yes, I think I do” Janney responded, remembering an unexpected night in a cave.

“I don’t know what Her reaction will be when She learns that the baby did not survive. I thought I should warn you though.” he said. “I cannot be certain, but Gansell thought it likely that you would not have survived the child’s birth, as the baby was drawing much more from you than a normal child.”

She nodded, not wanting to think about it. What now?”

He opened the door to the cabin, and motioned the others to come back in.

“I now possess some of the powers Gansell had” he began. “The Portal to the other world is closed, and Waldspiegel is a good bit smaller than it used to be. I am staying here to work on assimilating my new powers and responsibilities, and need to do that on my own. I will transport you to the border, and then it will close, at least until I understand things well enough to allow access again. Once I can allow visitors again, I will find a way to contact you”

Realizing he was serious about them leaving immediately they were a bit hurt, but realized he had a lot on his plate, so they said their goodbyes. He escorted them a few hundred yards and then stopped and pointed. “Keep going and you will be back on the road, about 15 miles from Crenshaw.”

“You going to be OK?” Mortheus asked him quietly.

“Yes, I have a purpose again” Birringle responded, seeming a bit less melancholy than he had been since the monk had first met him.

[Toxic Shaman]

Spoiler: Epilogue: Part 1

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They kept walking and found themselves on the road leading to Crenshaw. Mortheus immediately tried to communicate with Berry, and was uncharacteristically emotional when he was able to contact her. She told him she was worried at not hearing from him for five days, and he told her that they would be there shortly, and would explain everything.

Tuuchi decided not to accompany them any further. She didn't say anything about her plans and wished them the best then took off.

The reunion at Lord Gar's estate was rough. They explained what happened, their journey to another world, the terrible battles they had to fight to get home and how Alitha had somehow managed to grab the artifact and leave again.

Berry took hearing that her sister was trapped on another world under the control of a magical artifact surprisingly well under the circumstances. She understood that much of everything that took place was driven by their attempts to rescue Alitha, and she felt her own guilt that she encouraged them to help. She knew that Mortheus was infatuated with her and there was likely nothing he wouldn’t do if she even hinted that it would make her happy.

The three of them stayed with Lord Gar and his wife overnight, and in the morning Perle and Janney left.

Perle planned on traveling back to Southpointe, then to Crenshaw. He had not forgotten about Dreyfus, or the secret meetings and mysterious knights gathering, and wanted to learn more about what was going on.

Janney's plans were a bit more straightforward. She just wanted a hot bath, a good meal, and to drink and have some good rowdy fun. The Gars were nice and all, but she just wanted to cut loose.

Mortheus wanted only to be near to Berry, who had managed to become quite close to the Gars while he was gone and was strongly considering becoming a Cleric. He was initially distraught to hear this until he realized that clerics of Rao did not have to take vows of celibacy.

His complete inability to hide his emotions coupled with his desperate and painfully obvious longing for Berry made her blush, but did not seem to repulse her. Seeing this the Gars took pity on the young monk and welcomed him to stay as long as he wanted.

So the three of them said their goodbyes, not really being sure they would ever get back together again, their goals were just too different.

Interlude before Part II

Spoiler: The Fall

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One day about five weeks later, the Hextor Knight Marissa rode into the village of Burge, about 40 miles from the Gar estate. She handed off her horse to the inn’s stable boy and headed inside to get a room and a meal. While she was not dressed in her normal Hextor knight attire, anyone who saw her would immediately recognize she was not someone to be trifled with, just from the attitude she radiated.

She was eating dinner at a table in the back of the inn when the commotion began.

“I’m sorry miss, you are not welcome here” the innkeeper said, sounding a bit nervous.

“Jus a lil drink, jus one, OK?” a very drunk female voice responded.

Marissa looked up and saw the young brawler she had fought a month earlier. She was shocked at the woman’s appearance. She could barely stand, and was leaning on the bar to prop herself up. Her clothing was ripped and muddy, and she was barefoot.

“You wrecked my place two nights ago. You are not welcome here” the innkeeper responded firmly. He could not hide his fear though.

Janney slammed her hand down on the bar. “gimme a bottle then. I’ll pay ya as soon as I find the bastad that took my stuff”

Seeing that this was not going to end well, Marissa took pity on the innkeeper and stood up and walked over to the bar.

“Is there a problem here?” she asked pleasantly. “I think the man asked you to leave”

Janney looked at her without seeming to recognize her. She thought for a long moment, and then her expression hardened. She threw a wide roundhouse punch that Marissa easily dodged.

Marissa responded by punching her in the stomach. As Janney bent over Marissa got her in a headlock and calmly dragged her outside and threw her into the watering trough for the horses.

Janney giggled drunkenly. “I’ve been in one of these before, you gonna have to do better than that.”

As she got to her feet Marissa hit her again. Janney stumbled but recovered quickly and tried to trip her but missed.

With a crowd gathering now, Marissa beat Janney until she was unconscious. After checking to make sure she was stabilized, Marissa looked up. Seeing the sable boy watching she said “Get me a blanket and some buckets of water” and flipped him a gold piece.

“Show’s over, go back in” she told the crowd, with enough menace in her voice to get them to move quickly.

Once they were gone and the stable boy returned she removed Janney’s clothes and rinsed her off using buckets of water, then wrapped her in the blanket, which smelled strongly of horses but still smelled much better than Janney did.

She picked up up easily and threw her over her shoulder and walked back into the inn.

“I need another meal sent to my room please” she told the innkeeper, handing him a few gold pieces. “Don’t worry, she will not cause any more trouble.”

Once inside her room she set Janney down on the floor and finished her dinner.

The next morning Marissa was up and dressed by the time Janney groaned and sat up, her face all puffy from the booze and the beating she took the night before.

She looked around blearily, then crawled over to the chamber pot near the door, where she vomited.

Marissa waited until she was done before handing the larger woman a long shirt, rough leggings and some sandals, which was what the local peasants typically wore in the area. “Get dressed. We’re leaving”

Spoiler: Mortheus gains insight and loses a few other things

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Mortheus spent many of his days working with Lord Gar, who was quite impressed with his ability to move heavy objects with his mind, and came up with a number of ways to use that ability to improve his rock garden, and to build a stone gazebo.

Gar had an understanding of mathematics and construction techniques that he shared with the young monk, who lapped up the knowledge as fast as the Lord could express it.

His evenings were spent with the Gars and with Berry, who spent most of her days working with Lady Gar, who was instructing her in religious study.

The physical and mental activity was good for the young monk, and kept him occupied enough that his thoughts and gaze were not completely focused on Berry 100% of the time. His time with the family also exposed him to the concept of small talk, something he had never considered before.

He was desperate and motivated enough to try to learn how to speak with people without making them want to run away. He approached this like he did everything else, with fierce enthusiasm, lots of meditation and experimentation, and while he wasn’t very good at it, he could tell that Berry appreciated the effort he was putting into it.

While he didn’t realize it, the biggest change was that he started to be interested in what others thought. He had always been the smartest person he knew, and his arrogance was such that he paid little attention to what anyone else said. When he realized that occasionally the people around him had something to offer and started listening, he turned the corner, and overcame the main barrier to make himself worthy in Berry’s eyes.

She came to his room one night after everyone else was asleep, and introduced him to yet another activity he was unfamiliar with. Initially he was even more inept at this than he was with conversation.

Berry was just as inexperienced, but they eventually worked it out.

Spoiler: Man on a mission

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Perle threw himself into finding out what was going on with Dreyfus. He spent a few days in Southpointe catching up on local rumors and recognized some of his own actions in a few of them.

There were a few rumblings of local unrest in a number of smaller villages, and talk of a massacre in the woods, and weird happenings in and around Crenshaw. In most, Drefyus was the hero fighting dark forces that were threatening the common man, which irritated him to no end. He learned nothing really new though.

He also did some shopping. His portable hole and bag of holding were stuffed with magic items from all the people he had killed. He didn’t really have a use for most of them, and he managed to trade much of what he had acquired for some more powerful daggers, better armor, and a hat of disguise.

With that out of the way he left for Crenshaw. The manor house was mostly empty, with only one servant left behind to take care of the place. By asking around a bit he learned that Dreyfus's knights had left three days earlier, along with three large wagons of supplies. Dreyfus had not been seen for days.

Perle then visited the mansion in the woods he had followed Dreyfus to one night, and it too was empty. With no other leads Perle traveled around the countryside, looking for any signs of the militias that Mortheus had seen drilling.

He found nothing, until two weeks later he happened to overhear a conversation at a small country general store. It was an argument between two men, one middle-aged, the other a teenager.

The younger man was upset, and kept saying he wanted to act now. The older man kept trying to calm him down without success. Perle overheard him plead for patience, that they would rise up when the time was right.

When the younger man stormed off Perle followed him. The man had calmed down a bit by the time he reached his destination, which was a large prosperous looking mill built along a fast running stream. The man walked into the large stone house next door.

Perle kept his distance and hid in the woods while watching the house. Over the next few days he learned more. The yioung man’s name was Jervist, and he was the younger brother of the miller. He spent much of his days helping his brother in the mill, and seemed pretty unhappy with his life.

Two days later Jervist left in the late afternoon and walked to a nearby inn, where he met with two other young men. Perle followed him inside and sat nearby, listening to them talk as they drank for the next few hours. Gradually he was able to put together a decent picture of who they were.

All three were sons or younger brothers of businessmen in the area, and none of them were members of the nobility. Their families were wealthy enough that they could live well, but not wealthy enough to allow these men to live how they wanted, and they were bored. All three aspired to be knights, and they idolized Dreyfus. They dreamed of riding around in shining armor doing great things. They were frustrated with the slow pace of their own lives, and were looking for adventure.

A few hours later they stumbled out of the inn and went their separate ways. Perle followed Jervist as he stumbled down the road towards his home 3/4 of a mile away.

When he was half way home Perle walked up behind him.

"Good evening 'sir' " Perle said, in a mocking tone of voice.

Jervist stiffened, and whirled around. Perle had used his hat to make himself look smaller and skinnier, with blonde hair and brown eyed, dressed in cheap, well worn clothing to make himself look like a bandit.

"I'll take your purse, your highness" Perle continued. "since you have so much, you wont mind sharing."

He could tell that Jervist was getting angry, so he started laughing, goading him to act and pull the sword he wore.

"I'll have you know I have been trained by some of the finest knights of the realm" Jervist bragged as he drew the sword, holding it up in a practiced, but not expert manner.

Perle continued to laugh. "A little rich boy like you, a trained warrior? Oh, this is getting good. Let me guess, you are one of Dreyfus's knight wannabes. How precious..."

Jervist scowled, but became a little more cautious when Perle mentioned Dreyfus.

"A bunch of rich boys, pretending to be men" Perle sneered.

"We will, you'll see. When he calls us, we'll be ready!" Jervist said, his shock at hearing Dreyfus's name forgotten in his anger.

Perle laughed again. "What, to play with your own swords? I've heard that's what 'men' like you are good for."

Jervis lost it at that, and rushed Perle, who calmly parried the blow, and as the young man stumbled past him he reached out and shoved him.

Jervist stumbled and whirled around. His anger warred briefly with his instinct for self preservation and being young, anger won.

He attacked again, and Perle let him think he was doing well, barely evading his sword and ignoring all the opportunities for counter attack.

"Not bad" Perle commented, removing the mocking tone from his voice as he pretended to have to scramble to avoid being hit.

"We're going to hit them soon, you'll see" Jervist bragged. "Er, um,.. No. You won't see, because you'll be DEAD!!!"

Gaining confidence from that devastating verbal assault Jervist feinted and brought in his sword for the killing blow, and seemed startled when Perle casually parried it with his dagger and tripped him while he was off balance.

Jervist ended up on his back with Perle's boot on his chest.

Perle leaned over and tucked the tip of his dagger in the young man’s nose. "Interesting, tell me more...." he said quietly.

[Toxic Shaman]

Spoiler: Tough love, Hextor Style

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Janney didn’t argue. She got dressed and followed Marissa outside, where the stable boy had Marissa’s war horse saddled and ready.

Janney looked like she was ready to vomit again. “What am I riding?” she asked.

“I own a horse. You do not.” Marissa replied evenly. “I plan on riding five miles down that road over there, and will be stopping to eat the breakfast that the innkeeper packed. You are welcome to join me, assuming you can keep up.”

Without looking back Marissa rode off.

Janney stood there for a long time watching her go. She looked around at the stable boy and innkeeper, both of whom were watching her with a mixture of pity and disgust and seemed to make a decision, and started walking after her.

In a moment she started to jog. She made it a hundred yards before she had to stop and puke again. As soon as she finished she started running again.

A little over half an hour later she reached a wide, gentle stream with a stone bridge spanning it. Marissa was sitting under a tree eating fruit and biscuits while her horse grazed nearby.

As Janney staggered over towards her she tossed her a water skin.

“Don’t drink it too fast…….....or you’ll puke” she added as Janney doubled over and heaved it back up again.

Janney stood there out of breath and looked at her, not sure what to make of all this.

“You obviously f-ed up something” Marissa said. “I don’t want to hear any sad story, any tales of woe and sorrow. I...just...don’t...care.”

Janney just stared at her, then nodded.

Marissa tossed her a second skin and pointed to more fruit, cheese and biscuits that were sitting on a piece of cloth spread on a nearby stone.

“Only thing I want to know is whether the woman I fought a month ago is still in there. You remember the one, don’t you? She knew she was over-matched but kept on fighting anyway?”

Janney had trouble meeting her gaze.

“I had some respect for her, something I can’t say about very many” Marissa said levelly, just a trace of emotion in her voice. “Now if you want to keep wallowing in the mud and acting like a damn fool, I’m not about to stop you...”

Janney still had her head down, so after a few seconds Marissa got to her feet and walked over to her horse, ignoring Janney completely. She got on her horse and looked down at Janney and said “Sorry to hear she’s gone”

“Please wait” Janney said softly as Marissa rode away. She repeated it louder once she realized she hadn’t been heard.

“We’re going to do this my way” Marissa said as she turned around. “No booze for you, nothing but water. You drink, I leave. You give me crap, I leave. You don’t put in the effort, I leave. Your main goal should be to get my respect again, and maybe that will help you respect yourself again.”

Janney nodded, and even managed a slight smile.

After Janney finished eating they continued traveling for another five hours, then stopped for the afternoon and camped out. They kept going to the next day, and continued on for the next two weeks.

For Janney it was rough. Her body was wracked with withdrawal symptoms. She had discovered a drug called Burne a few weeks earlier, and had quickly gotten addicted, and now she was paying the price.

Marissa was completely unsympathetic, and drove her hard. They both ran before breakfast and ran after they stopped each evening. Some days she was so weak and so sick she could barely stand-up, but she continued.

Late one afternoon they reached a small valley in the foothills and stopped at a stronghold surrounded by a few farms. A dozen young men and a few women were training in hand to had combat in the front courtyard under the eye of a middle-aged man. All of them were unarmored, and were fighting without weapons.

When the instructor saw Marissa he dismissed his class for the day, and sent them on a 5 mile run.

After telling Janney to run with them Marissa slid off her horse and greeted the man warmly.

“Trindle you old goat. You look like crap” she said with a grin.

“What a thing to say” he replied with a twinkle in his eye, not offended at all. “Runs in the family I guess”

She laughed, and when she saw that he was watching Janney run after his students she got to why she had come here.

“Wasn’t long at all ago she fought me, for real not sparring, and I knocked her and her two friends around a bit, but she held her own, no weapons, your kind of fighting.…..Then a month later I found her drunk, begging for a drink in a two copper inn. She’s Burne-addicted too.”

He scowled at the mention of the drug and snorted. “Why’d you bring here here then?”

“Hey, old man, weren’t you listening? She held her own… against me!” Janney replied. “How many you know that can do that?”

He shook his head and laughed with approval. “You always did have a high of an opinion of yourself.”

“A well deserved opinion” Marissa agreed, completely serious. “I know she looks like a mess now, but what’s going on now isn’t completely on her. I communed with my God a week a to figure out why she got so messed up. She has been cursed, a very strong, nasty curse”

Trindle groaned. “I don’t want any part of any of that. You know how I feel about your God”

She shook her head. “You don’t understand. She’s not been cursed by Hextor, it was another God. She’s part Orc you know. She made one of their Gods mad, I don’t know why.”

He seemed mollified a bit so she continued.

“And she’s fighting it. I know she doesn’t look like much right now, but you know what Burne is like, it drains you. I think she had a problem with alcohol before this, and the Curse amplified that and weakened her willpower. Its an ugly curse, whoever put it on her knew what they were doing.”

Trindle looked a bit disgusted at this, as much as the hint of admiration in Marissa’s voice as for the results.

Marissa noticed. “I admire effective use of magic” she admitted. “But that doesn’t change that she is fighting her way through this. The curse is way beyond my ability to break. It would require a Miracle at this point, and even then it may not be enough, the drug’s already got her. What she needs is someone to teach her mental discipline, reinforce her sense of self and self confidence. I brought her here because I thought you could give it to her.”

“And then you turn her to your God?” he asked.

“Up to her. You know me, I don’t proselytize, I lead by example” Marissa replied. “I have to be somewhere soon, so I won’t be here. I am not doing this for my God, I am doing this because she’s been screwed, has ability and I think she may be able to beat it.”

They continued arguing about her until the students came back from their run. Janney was the last one back, and she looked like she could barely stand up.

“You win, I’ll see what I can do” Trundle said to Marissa softly as he watched Janney stagger into the courtyard.

“Of course I did” Marissa replied.

Spoiler: Settling down

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Mortheus and Berry married quickly. It was a small quiet ceremony presided over by Lady Gar. The only guests were the Gars and Berry’s parents. Mortheus had no interest in inviting anyone from his former life.
They moved into a small house that Mortheus built himself on the Gar Estate. Almost exactly 9 months later Berry gave birth to a baby girl that they named Nell, after Berry’s late grandmother.

He occasionally wondered what Janney, Perle, Tuuchi and Birringle were all up to, but those moments were rare. He was too happy and invested in the moment to think much about them.

Spoiler: Stirring the Pot

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“WORM!” Gihjantara shouted.

Yandros slinked in. He knew he was on thin ice already. Not only did he miss Perle and the others when they crossed back to the Prime after leaving Waldspiegel, he also did not get the artifact.

“Good morning, your vastness” Yandros grovelled. He kept track of every insult and every time he had to debase himself to his master, and he intended on paying him back one thousand-fold once he completed his plans to overthrow him. In a few millennia things would be quite different, assuming of course he survived that long.

“The woman that managed to overcome the Artifact’s will is loosely associated with various nature-loving fey, and has had a quite interesting life. She is an accomplished thief and con-artist, and I am impressed with how effective she has been at covering her tracks and her end goals. It is a shame that she is no longer working with your puppet “

Gihjantara rolled his eyes at that. “Yes, covering her tracks from you is a major accomplishment”

Yandros ignored the sarcasm. “She has made a few enemies, which seems to be why she spent time on the other Prime world. For her to manage to make her way through Waldspiegel to a second previously unknown Prime world without Gansell’s permission is quite the accomplishment.”

“Unknown to YOU, maybe” Gihjantara blustered.

Yandros wanted to ask questions about this other Prime world, but was smart enough not to. He was pretty sure he was being lied to and asking questions that might make that lie obvious would only be risking his own existence.

“Gansell’s replacement has shut down access completely. While I am sure the wards would not prevent someone of your magnificence of entering Waldspiegel, I suggest we refrain. This Birringle might be a long term ally and asset. He has a strong relationship with some of your puppet’s companions.”

“Speaking of your puppet, he has been looking into what Dreyfus has been up to, and has learned a good bit of his plans, which currently seem to be on hold while Dreyfus tends to other business. I have to admire his persistence. He spent months searching, and is now trying to track down Dreyfus and has been chasing him all over the continent. For someone without access to teleport magics that is impressive.”

“Would be more impressive if he thought to ally with someone with teleportation powers” Gihjantara commented.

“The reason that Dreyfus is moving so much is that his Master has tasked him with finding pieces of an Artifact missing for centuries, a magical Staff called Mhoram’s Lament originally discovered in the ancient Dwarven city of Nekki-Corannatoth that was completely destroyed by an Orcish invasion force 2700 years ago.”

“Pretend I don’t know anything about this Staff” Gihjantara asked, trying to sound like he was testing his servant.

“Mhoram was a human Arcanist who lived about four thousand years ago. He was killed and his soul destroyed on one of the outer planes, Stygia to be precise. How his Staff managed to end up in Nekki-Corannatoth is unknown, but it was there for at least a few months before the invasion began.”

“Oh, that staff” Gihjantara nodded as if he recognized the name.

“According to legend, the staff was sundered intentionally, and its pieces taken from the city to be hidden. One such piece was apparently in the possession of Dreyfus’s church, and it was stolen recently. Dreyfus has been tasked to recover it so that the staff cannot be recreated.”

“And the staff’s powers?” Gihjantara asked.

“No one knows for sure, but according to legend it amplified the wielder's ability with enchantments beyond the known limits of magic and enabled targeting creatures that are normally considered immune to control and influence. It also could punch through Mind Blank spells” Yandros said quietly, making sure he did not look at his master directly in case this would surprise him.

Gihjantara’s eyes bulged. He quickly hid the expression of shock and greed and studied Yandros carefully to make sure he hadn’t noticed. Once he had himself back under his control he said “We can’t let that Idiot succeed.”

“I agree, your Vastness” Yandros said, bowing at this gem of wisdom. “It happens that I know who has that piece now” He paused at this point, savoring the power this information gave him while making sure none of the glee he felt was visible on his face.

“Very good work” Gihjantara replied.

Yandros was so shocked by receiving a compliment that he almost lost his train of thought. He quickly recovered though. “The Wizard Rundmundl arranged to have it stolen. One of the Herald of Hell’s knights was involved.”

Gihjantara thought for a moment. “This is what you will do. We need to stir the pot a bit. Do you remember that Cleric that you ran into a few years ago that worships the Mistress of the Stars?”

Yandros nodded and smiled genuinely. While he hated his master he had to admire his cunning. “Yes. The one they call ‘Mr Sunshine’ “

“That’s the one. He still has some Infernal contacts through family connections. We’ll use one of them to let him know what Rundmundl is doing. He can pass it along to his superiors, and we’ll see if we can lure him to come West to work with my puppet”

“Excellent idea” Yandros said laughing. “His church will want to counter Rundmundl, and your puppet and his friends could use the extra firepower. I bet Dreyfus attacks him the first time they meet due to his heritage, which will drive a wedge between the two faiths.”

“I’ll feed some information to my puppet, get him looking for other pieces of the staff. We should be able to arrange a meeting between him and the Cleric” Gihjantara said. “How about his companions, we need to get them involved too.”

“I’ll find out what is going on with the girl. The monk got married six months ago to that farm girl, who is now a Holy Warrior for the Mediator. She will be giving birth to their first child in a few months, so he may not be available for a while.”

“I know just the person to fill in. He works for a warrior order associated with Sunshine’s church. I think if we apply ourselves we can get him involved too.”

Yandros nodded, knowing that in this case, ‘we’ meant ‘Yandros’

[magwaaf]

... hold my beer... basically was my last character's slogan lol

[Toxic Shaman]

It's just such a great way to play too, trying to top each other. :)

Short update below while I work on a longer one.

Spoiler: Another Gaming System bleeds in

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Mortheus walked around slowly in circles, swaying side to side slightly to calm his colicky daughter, who seemed to only be calm when she was in motion. He was still in awe of this tiny new little creature, and was almost unspeakably happy.

He had slept only a few hours in the past five days, having decided that this was the perfect opportunity to experiment with sleep deprivation and its effects on mental clarity. He suspected he might be close to a breakthrough, and hoped Berry would continue her nap.

Berry was also somewhat sleep deprived, and was gratified he was sharing the load with taking care of Nell. She didn’t know her new husband well enough yet to realize how he would react to a situation like this, and was under the mistaken impression that he was sleeping when she took over.

Instead he was pouring all his mental energy into himself, attempting to keep his mind fresh. He didn’t really remember the last few hours that clearly, but kept pushing on.

All of a sudden he had a vision, a realization of how he could further his own enlightenment. He quickly acted, removing every magical tool and item from his body, managing to do so without waking up Nell, who had fallen asleep a little while ago without him noticing.

He had decided that magic items were crutches, and he was sure they were retarding his progress. He knew he could never use them again, and only by freeing himself could he advance himself properly.

He continued walking completely oblivious to everything going on around him.

“Morpheus, what happened!”

He stopped walking and looked up. Berry was staring at him with a horrified expression. He glanced over at the mirror on the wall and barely recognize the face looking back at him.

He was completely bald, and his eyebrows were also missing. He hadn’t cut his hair in almost a year so seeing his bald head staring back at him was a bit unexpected. He glanced down and saw little bits of hair everywhere on the floor around him.

His skin looked different too. A complex network of markings had appeared across his torso, arms and legs. They looked like tattoos. As he watched, some of them shifted slightly, and one strand expanded to just below his left ear.

He turned around and looked over his shoulder into the mirror, and sure enough his back was covered too, with markings that shifted whenever he tried focusing in on them.

Realizing that Berry was still staring at him he grinned maniacally at her, completely fascinated by what he had managed to do to himself.

“Isn’t it magnificent?” he gushed, misjudging her look of horror for awe.

OOC: We had a long running Ars Magic game years ago, and as this game got going Janney’s player commented that Mortheus reminded her of an Ars Magica Criamon Magi. For those that have ever played that game, Criamon are Magi that most everyone else finds completely crazy, both in how they interact with the world, and what they believe about magic. They have bizarre theories that somehow work for them, but make no sense to anyone else. In the most recent edition of Ars Magica, Criamon are fundamentally wrong in their belief in how Magic really works, but through massive amounts of experimentation they have come up with a way of viewing Magic that somehow allows them to function and do things other Mages can’t, though they walk a narrow path of what is possible. They are described as being simultaneously the most enlightened and most delusional practitioners of Magic.

Mortheus’s player immediately got the connection once Janney’s player mentioned it and jumped all over it. His character took on some Criamon characteristics, including what looked like tattoos covering his body. He also decided to embrace the idea that Mortheus has insights about magic that are extremely insightful and close to being true, but are in fact flawed. Ditching all of his magic items and vowing never to use them again was part of that.

I asked him if he wanted to work on something to replace it, as he was giving up some level of power and he declined, as that would defeat the whole purpose. Since we decided to switch over to Automatic Bonus Progression a few levels earlier it was less of a loss than it would have been otherwise, but was still significant.

Spoiler: Graduation time

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Janney had a lot to think about. She had come a long way in the last four months. Her health had returned, she felt good about herself again and she had found something she never expected to find again:

Hope.

She had come to love her instructor. Marissa's uncle was a lot like Marissa in many ways. He was just as self-confident as she was, and radiated the same aura of being not someone to be messed with.

But unlike his niece, he wasn't interested in intimidating everyone around him. He was extremely sure of himself and his abilities but it didn't come with Marissa's contempt for others.

He had taught her a lot, much of it having nothing to do with fighting, though he had influenced her there too. Mostly he taught her about herself, and helped her rebuild her confidence and to face her problems and do her best to change.

Tonight he had told her something that changed everything, how part of the reason she had fallen apart was due to a curse placed on her by that Orc high priestess.

She was extremely angry, and not just with the priest. She knew herself well enough to recognize that the curse had only amplified a problem she already had. She had been a functioning alcoholic for years after all.

The curse broke her, but it also forced her to face herself, and she intended to come out of this stronger. She knew she would have to fight temptation for the rest of her life, walking a tightrope, where any slip could prove fatal. Only by maintaining an unshakable confidence in herself could she hope to survive.

After telling her the results of Marissa's commune, he had given her a small backpack. Inside it she found most of the gear she had lost when she was under the influence of the drug.

He explained that Marissa had hunted down those who took it from her, recovered it and returned it as a graduation gift. Janney was touched she went to the effort, but was cynical enough to wonder why the Hextor priest had bothered.

Though he didn't say it, Trindle was telling her it was time to leave. He was right. She needed to reconnect with her friends, and then decide what to do about the church that had cursed her. She smiled as she thought of Morty and decided to check on him first.
She left the next morning. It was hard to leave, and she felt a bit hurt that Trindle was almost pushing him out the door until she realized that he was doing it for her sake.

She needed to face temptation and hopefully overcome it, that was the only way she would be able to get on with her life, and it pleased her that he thought she was ready.

Their goodbye was low key. she found that she was eager to get started and after a quick hug she left. She didn't look back, but if she had she would have seen that he stood there watching until she passed out of sight.

She traveled quickly and managed to cover 60 miles the first day. Once she reached a major road she went even faster. She walked 12 hours a day and found it felt wonderful.

She camped out each night until she reached the inn where Marissa found her. She walked inside and found the innkeeper, who didn't recognize her until she apologized for her behavior months earlier and handed him most of the money she had to pay for the damages she had caused.

That evening she ate in the inn's common room. She found she had no desire to drink, but felt uncomfortable being around people who were, so after her meal she went back to her room and slept, leaving at sunrise the next morning.

A few days later she reached the Gar's estate. Lord Gar immediately recognized her and seemed pleased to see her, and sent his gardener to find Mortheus and Berry.

Berry arrived first, carrying a baby in her arms. She rushed over to hug Janney and looked on happily as Janney fussed over the baby.

Mortheus arrived a few minutes later, having been working on building a small addition to the home he had built. He was dressed only in a pair of shorts, and was covered in dust and dirt. Seeing Janney he stopped and stared, while she did the same.

"Hey Morty" she said. Her friend looked very different. He was just as skinny as ever, but he had a wiry strength that he had lacked before. That tattoos were new, as was the completely hairless body, but she fondly recognized the confused look on his face and smiled.

She didn't realize that her appearance had changed almost as much. She was much leaner than she had been but was just as strong. Instead of armor, fine clothes and jewelry she was now dressed in a simple cheap pair of trousers and shirt. She looked much older too, her time under the drug's influence had marked her, as had the weight loss. She no longer looked like a pretty young carefree party girl. She looked 10 years older, and while she carried herself with the same confidence, poise and ntensity, it was combined with much more awareness of what was around her and a feint hint of menace.

Mortheus didn't really notice the physical changes, to him that sort of thing mattered little. But the inner changes were immediately apparent, and he stood there studying her in a manner that most people found creepy and offensive. After a long pause he nodded to himself and looked her in the eye.

"I see you have chosen your path" he said, sounding extremely happy for her. “Come on in, and see my new house”

Some OOC things went on at the time:

Since Perle survived and rejoined the party, his replacement character Tuuchi wandered off to get into trouble on her own. She's not gone and will eventually return, but won't play a major role with the other PCs, at least not for a while.

Birringle's sacrifice with Gansell changed his status to an NPC. While either he or Tuuchi could have taken up Gansell's role, it made more sense IC for him to do it and he accepted so quickly that Tuchi's player didn't even have a chance to think about it. Birringle's player will be bringing in a new PC, the character that Gihjantara mentioned in the last post. (Mr. Sunshine)

Mortheus's player decided that Mortheus needed to take a break for a while since he just became a father. He brought in a new PC, also hinted at by Gihjantara in the last post. He had a hard time keeping Mortheus on the sideline though, as will be apparent in the next few posts.

[Toxic Shaman]

Spoiler: Perle makes new friends

Show

Perle woke up slowly, and resisted the urge to groan, suspecting that if his tormentors realized he was awake again they would just torture him some more.

Hearing the sounds of a lot people chanting in unison he realized that they had moved him. He risked opening his eyes and saw that he was laying on what looked like an altar. His arms and legs were tied to ropes, each one looped through separate iron rings on the floor and held by large men who pulled them tight, preventing him from moving.

Over a dozen people surrounded him, chanting at the direction of a fearsome looking man dressed in priest’s robes at the head of the altar. The rest of the participants were robed as well in similar but less ostentatious attire and were watching him eagerly, obviously waiting for something to happen.

Behind then stood more men dressed in black armor and armed with a variety of ugly looking weapons. He couldn’t tell how many, the light was terrible and he couldn’t lift his head high enough to see much, but it looked like there a lot of them.

With nothing else to do but think about escape he explored his options. All he needed to do was to get the men holding the ropes restraining each limb to drop them so he could stand up, then fight his way through a room full of armed men.

He thought to himself he must have been in worse situations, though none came to mind. Getting reincarnated and then charmed by a coven of powerful evil witches who kept him trapped in an undersea cave complex was probably the closest situation to this, but on reflection had not been as bad as this.

The volume and pace of the chanting began to increase, and he felt a painful pressure start to build in his chest, gradually reaching the point where he couldn’t help but scream, which only made him hurt even more.

Just as he felt like he couldn’t take it anymore he heard the chanting falter, followed by shouts, screams and the clashing of arms.

“Keep chanting you fools!” an elf he hadn’t noticed yet shouted from behind the priest. “Once the Demon Nezzoranal breaks through He will defend us!”

Strongly suspecting that this Demon was likely to break through his chest Perle began to struggle feebly while shouting for help from whoever the new arrivals were.

As he watched an enormous cloaked figure rush into the middle of the crowd. He knocked a few of them down and started attacking everyone in range with a Lucerne Hammer. As he fought the hood of his cloak fell down showing a dark reddish complexion with sharp pointed teeth and small curved horns on his forehead.

One of the men that fell was holding onto the rope that restrained his left arm, and Perle redoubled his efforts to get loose. Suddenly the ropes holding his legs both relaxed as the men holding the ropes panicked and let go when a crossbow bolt blew a hole through both one’s cheek, passing through it to impact in the middle of the second man’s chest.

Perle pulled his legs inward and shot to his feet, rushing towards the man holding the last rope. The man looked terrified and let go and he managed to get free.

Seeing that one of the armed men nearby had fallen to his knees with a crossbow bolt through his throat Perle rushed over. Ignoring the man’s Greatsword he reached down instead and grabbed the dagger the man had tucked in his belt and slashed his throat.

A war hammer slammed into his side in a glancing blow and he turned and tumbled in underneath the next attack and stabbed the man wielding it multiple times, then dove through his legs before be could fall.

By this time the Devil-man that rescued him was bleeding profusely from multiple wounds but was still holding his own fighting multiple men at the same time. Perle briefly thought of assisting him, but saw that the enemy priest and the elf wizard were both casting spells and decided that taking them out would be more prudent.

He raced across the room, managing to avoid getting hit by three different attackers who took a swipe at him as he went by, ending up adjacent to the priest, who was cackling maniacally as the spell took effect somewhere across the room.

The cleric suddenly stopped laughing when Perle leaped up and slashed him in the face, having figured out on the way in that the man was wearing armor underneath his robes.

As the cleric stumbled backwards Perle kept slashing, giving him no time to cast a spell. As they both fell to the ground Perle landed on top and glanced up to see the elf wizard slump to the ground with four crossbow bolts embedded in his chest.

Once Perle finished stabbing the cleric he rolled to his feet to avoid two more armed men, who rushed in through a door in the back of the room. They went right by him to attack the Devil-man and his accomplices, of which there were not many left standing.

With no armor and only a small knife to defend himself he decided that maybe it would be a good idea to leave with the people who rescued him.

On the other hand, he wanted his stuff, so he raced in through the door, right into two more arriving warriors. He managed to kill them both and find a better dagger, and ran down the hall, checking doors as he went. In the second room he found a shelf with his gear stacked on it, so he slammed the door and got dressed and then ran back into the altar room.

His rescuers were gone, as was everyone else, some pursuing them, some fleeing. So he followed, and as he caught up with the pursuers he took them out one at a time, and eventually reached the party that rescued him.

They were moving slowly. Devil man had put his cloak hood back up, but Perle recognized him by his huge frame and by the Pole Arm he was carrying. He was covered in blood, and had an unconscious man thrown over his shoulder. Another young lightly armored man stood nearby. He was also covered in blood and his armor was rent in multiple places but he seemed unwounded. The only one that looked like they hadn’t been in a fight was the halfling woman aiming the crossbow at his face.

Having seen her work inside, Perle shoved his dagger in his belt and held up both hands. “Thanks for saving me back there. Need help?”

The woman nodded coolly at him. “The priest dead?”

“Oh yeah, he is done, unless someone Raises him” Perle replied, slightly offended at the implication that he would let the man that tried to summon a Demon to inhabit his body live.

“That probably won’t happen” she replied, lowering the bow slightly. “His God does not accept failure very well.”

She turned to follow her friends, who hadn’t stopped. “We’re going to hunker down, heal as best we can, and try to avoid pursuit. You are welcome to join us.”

He nodded. “How about I take rear guard then.”

She agreed and went forward to walk the point. They traveled another two miles and reached a small farm house, avoiding multiple patrols looking for them on the way. They bypassed the house and went into the barn, where they went into a trap door leading into a small basement dug out underneath.

Everyone went inside except for the halfling, who stayed outside to take first watch.

Perle and the other warrior helped the large devil-man man carry his unconscious companion down the ladder into the basement and set him gently on the floor. The wounded man was stable, but his right arm had been severed near the shoulder.

While the two men tended to their unconscious companion, Perle healed himself, checked out his gear and watched his new allies.

The larger of the two men was an accomplished healer. Perle recognized the spell he cast on the unconscious man. It was a minor healing spell, but it restored the man far more effectively than Perle would have expected, and the wounded man woke up.

After casting two more spells on the man on the floor and one on himself, the healer got to his feet. His abyssal heritage was still visible, but not overly so. The horns were gone and he looked human, except for his eyes, which were a deep red color that was a bit unsettling to look at.

He walked over to talk to Perle while the other still ambulatory warrior went up the ladder and outside.

Perle made a point not to react to the priest’s appearance and looked him in the eye. “Thank you for the rescue.”

“You were not our primary objective, which was the disruption of the ritual” the man said in a deep voice void of emotion. “I give thanks to Pulura that we were able to rescue you. Your help may have allowed us to prevail and escape.” From his tone of voice it was hard to tell whether he meant what he said or not.

Perle decided to take him at face value. He bowed his slightly as a sign of respect when the man mentioned his deity. He had no idea who Pulura was but did not want to ask, suspecting that the Priest might take offense.

“I am certainly glad they weren’t able to complete the ritual” he said dryly, and then there was an uncomfortable silence when the Pulara cleric didn’t react at his attempt at a joke.

He was saved by the arrival of the halfling, and noticed that the cleric he was talking to seemed relieved to see her too.

She walked over to the one armed man and gave him a big smile. “I knew you wouldn’t let yourself die."

He sat up gracefully, despite the missing arm. Perle noticed he was really young, only a teenager, and had a lopsided face with really bad acne. “What, from this?” he scoffed. “It’s just a scratch, I’ll be be good as new in the morning.”

She smiled and offered him a hand if he wanted to get up. The man gave her a look of mock offense. “Please, I am not an invalid” and sprung to his feet. He looked at her with a grave look on his face. “I have an important question to ask.”

She nodded, reached into her pack and pulled out a rapier that was far too long to fit into the pack. “I recovered it after I killed the demon.”

The man took the weapon gratefully. “Thank you, but I was referring to something far more important...” His tone was grave.

“My face, that thing didn’t ruin my face, did it? I fear what that would do to the ladies of the court if I returned with a scar!” He sounded horrified.

The woman rolled her eyes and laughed. “No, your face is just as pretty as it was before” in a tone of voice implying she didn’t hold as high an opinion of his appearance as he did, which made him grin even more.

She turned to Perle. “We never had a chance to introduce ourselves earlier. I’m Lyora, my vain friend here is Fredillio, and I see you have already meant the big fella.” She nodded towards the cleric, adding “and the man keeping watch for us outside is Nigel.”

Perle introduced himself in return, hoping at some point he would learn the cleric’s name. He and Lyora chatted a bit and Perle explained how he had been captured by cultists.

He told her he had arrived a week earlier to investigate rumors that a strike team had raided a major church of St Cuthbert, killed the Bishop and a number of other priests and taken a Holy Relic.

By the time he arrived the church had not announced anything publicly and the Bishop conducted services normally, but Perle learned that two Paladins had arrived only hours after the attack, and had been escorting the Bishop ever since.

Lyora asked why this mattered to him, and Perle explained that there were multiple reasons:

The rumored attack was supposedly done by a strike team that included a female War Priest of Hextor.

He and some of his friends had been accosted a year earlier by a strike team that included two female Hextor Priests looking for a Cursed Artifact they had in their possession. Trithereon’s Chosen had shown up too and a three way battle ensued.

Shortly thereafter, Trithereon’s Chosen had spent most of the past year trying to chase down someone, and there were rumors that his church had lost something very important to them.

Lyora asked him for pause at this point and looked over at the Cleric, who was knelt in prayer in a corner of the room. “Suusheen, you need to hear this”

The big man got to his feet and walked over,

Perle repeated what he had told Lyora so far. Suusheen listened impassively and when Perle was finished asked Perle a question.

“Did your Artifact have mind controlling abilities?”

Perle nodded. “Definitely. We rescued the woman who had it. The device took over her mind. Under its influence she did horrible things that she would not have done without it. It either amplified a latent magical ability she didn’t know she had, or granted it to her, I don’t know which, but while under its influence she went from being a simple uneducated farm girl to a formidable spellcaster. She was impersonating a noblewoman when we found her, and was fooling everyone.”

Susheen glanced over at Lyora who nodded. He seemed to think for a moment, and then decided to say something.

“You have surely noticed that I have Infernal blood. While I reject that part of my heritage completely, that does not mean that they ignore me. A message was sent to me recently that might relate to what you are describing.”

“Can you trust any message from that quarter?” Perle blurted out without thinking.

“I do not doubt the content of the message” Susheen said. “Only the motivation of He who arranged for its delivery. It was sent with the knowledge that I would check its veracity via communing with Pulara.”

He stopped and looked a little frustrated, the first emotion Perle had seen from him. He seemed to realize this and continued.

“When dealing with Devils of his caliber it is difficult to determine their motivations. The message could have been delivered so that if I act on it I am working to further the goals of Hell….Or it could have been delivered with the expectation that I would discount it because of where the message came from and act differently than I would have otherwise. It is impossible to say, and it is not worth even trying to determine why it was sent, only to act as the situation warrents.”

Most of this went over Perle’s head, so he just waited for the big man to continue.

“What I learned was that there is someone associated with Hextor stole an artifact that had strong enchantment abilities from Trithereon’s main temple. I was warned that more thefts were planned, and that these artifacts are all pieces of a terrible weapon that was sundered millennia ago. If they were all ever recovered and recombined the weapon would be viable again.”

Perle nodded excitedly. “That makes sense. Before we caught up with her, the woman bearing the Artifact had become close to Trithereon’s chosen. She only had the Artifact for a short time and did not know him before hand. Maybe it was trying to learn where Trithereon’s church kept their Artifact.”

Susheen agreed. “That is plausible. I suggest we join forces and look into this.”

Perle was pleased. “I have a few other leads. I think there are at least two other pieces of the original artifact still out there that have not been stolen. It stands to reason that they may be held by some other Good-aligned church.”

“What about the Artifact that you have” Lyora interjected.

Perle looked pained. “Had, we no longer have it. But I am pretty sure that whoever has been stealing this doesn’t have it either. I have sworn an oath that prevents me from discussing it, but I can say that whoever is stealing these things would have a very hard time getting to it.”

Lyora did not appear thrilled with that explanation but she glanced over at Susheen and seemed to detect something in his expression that caused her to accept it.

“Ok then. Let’s get going.”

[Toxic Shaman]

Spoiler: Berry gets pissed

Show

Janney couldn't help but smile when she saw Berry and Mortheus together. Her friend was truly happy, and she was happy for him. Seeing him made her change her plans. He had a family now, and she couldnt ask him to go with her to convince the Orcs there to remove the curse. She would have to find the cave by herself.

She found she wasnt in a hurry to start though. Being around friends gave her strength, and helped quell the cravings that she fought daily. One day turned into two, and then into a week, then two. She sparred each morning with Berry and Mortheus and found they had both changed. Berry was no longer a helpless farm girl, Lord Gar had trained her well in the military arts and she approached learning how to fight with a quiet determinination that impressed Janney.

Berry's motovation was simple. She and her family had barely survived being attacked a year ago at the family farm. She remembered how helpless she felt and was going to make sure that she could defend herself and her family.

Mortheus was also much better in hand to hand combat than he used to be too. His weapon of choice was unusual, being a length of compressed air that behaved much like a whip. Janney helped him some with his technique, and learned something herself about how to combat an opponent with a much larger reach.

When Berry and Mortheus decided to take baby Nell to visit her grandparents for her 6 month birthday Janney went too. They had a big party and she and Mortheus did some work fixing up the barn and fencing for the family. After a week they packed up for the journey home and were only an hour from the Gar estate when the attack came.

Berry and Janney were walking along the road, laughing at something Mortheus had said when arrows appeared in Janney's side in an instant and there was the sound of someone chanting a spell in the woods nearby.

Janney reacted first, and ignoring the pain from the arrows charged the archer, who became visible as he fired.

Berry turned towards Mortheus, screamed his name, and he watched wided-eyed as she *tossed* Nell at him and then drew her longsword. Immediately realizing what she had in mind he caught his daughter and absorbed her into his body to protect her from harm. Nell was lucky her parents reacted so quickly, as two balls of flame burst over her parents burning them badly.

Janney reached the archer and leapt into the air, kicked him in the face and followed up with three punches. He was dead before he hit the ground.

As Berry charged into the trees there was a great shriek as Mortheus concentrated and forced air into an extremely compressed form. His blast blew a hole through the leg of one of the two human sorcerers standing behind the dwarf, disrupting her spell.

Berry slammed her longsword into the young heavily armored dwarf she found guarding the sorcerers, and Smited him with the power of her God. He grunted as the sword sheared through his armor, but managed to retaliate with a swing of his axe that cut deeply into Berry's arm.

The other sorcerer got her spell off and Mortheus felt it try to take effect on him but managed to shake it off. He wound up and blasted his original target again and she crumpled to the ground.

Berry was completely enraged that someone would try to fireball her baby, and though she was completely overmatched by the dwarf she fought on. Her religous fervor partially compensated for her lack of experience and her next attack wounded him badly.

His counterattack knocked her to her knees, but before he could finish her off Janney took him down with a quick combination of punches that shattered his cheekbone and drove his nose into his brain, killing him instantly.

The remaining sorcerer tried to get to her twin sister to Dimension Door away, but Mortheus's next blast hit her right between the eyes, killing her instantly. He immediately retrieved Nell from inside his chest, and was relieved when she gurgled happily upon seeing him.

Berry's first thoughts were also about her daughter and she almost collapsed with relief when she saw she was ok.

While Mortheus and Berry healed themselves Janney searched the bodies. She came back with a grim look and piece of paper in her hands.

Seing her expression the other two looked at the paper she showed them. It was a wanted poster with images of Janney, Mortheus and Perle on the front. Someone was willing to pay 4,000 each for their capture of proof of their deaths.

The rest of the trip home was a quiet one. The Gars were not home when they arrived, they were visiting their neice in Southpointe. After they changed out of their burnt clothing and cleamed up they got together again and discussed how to handle their problem. They had reached no conclusions when they were interrupted.

The gardener/butler announced that a Dame Crouther had arrived to see Lady Gar, and asked Berry if she would be willing to meet with her in her absence. The woman was elderly and seemed a bit confused and the Gar's servant was worried she might be offended that the Lady of the house was not there to greet her. She did not have an appointment, but thought she did, something that the gardener thought likely came from the infirmities of age.

Berry immediately agreed, and Janney amd Mortheus went with her in case this was some sort of trick. They met her in the Gar's garden room, a glass enclosed sun porch filled with potted plants. Dame Crouther tottered in with the assistance of her coachman and was soon seated in the most comfortable seat, exchanging pleasantries with Berry.

Once the gardener left, her expression changed. "Mortheus, be a dear and close those drapes, would you please?" she asked.

Puzzled, he got up and closed them.

"I apologize for the deception Berry" Dame Crouther began, seeming much more lucid than she had moments earlier. "But your husband and his friends are in a spot of danger, and i needed to make sure they were aware of it"

Berry tensed at this, the memory of the attack a few hours earlier still fresh in her mind.

The old woman ignored her distress and turned towards Mortheus. "She is even more beautiful and poised than you said"

As she spoke her form shifted into a middle aged gnome. She held up both hands to Berry, who looked ready to jump out of her chair. "Peace young lady, I am not here to harm you."

"Tuuchie!" Mortheus said, looking a little confused. What are you doing here, and in disguise?"

"To warn you" Tuuchi said. "There is a bounty on you, and assassins and bounty hunters will be arriving shortly."

She looked at them and added "I see my warning has come a bit late?"

They explained what had happened earlier. Tuuchi recognized who had attacked them, they were bounty hunters, minor leaguers trying to make a name for themselves.

"The next ones will be more dangerous" Tuuchi said. "Who have you offended?"

They came up with a number of possibilities, and Mortheus suggested it might make sense to go the local sherrif.

Tuuchi explained that going to the authorities would be futile, and that they had two options. They could either kill every bounty hunter amd assassin that came after them hoping to scare them off and hope that whoever wanted them dead would not raise the bounty enough to keep interest. Or they could find out who set the bounty and convince them to withdraw it.

"What about Berry and Nell?" Mortheus asked. "This endangers them"

"Nell?" Tuuchi asked.

"My daughter" he repied proudly. "She's napping now"

Tuuchi smiled brightly at that momentarily, then got serious again. "Again, two options. Either stay here and protect them, and risk having them near when trouble arrives, or keep them distant to prevent them from getting caught in the crossfire, which leaves them at risk if someone decides to use them as leverage on you."

None of them seemed fond of either option.

Berry had been listening quietly, and at this asked "Why should we trust your advice here?"

Tuuchi looked at her with approval. "You shouldn't. You need to do what *you* think makes sense."

She turned towards Mortheus momentarily. "Thank the Gods you found this one." before turning back to Berry, evidently deciding that she was the only one worth discusding this with.

"Your average bounty hunter/assassin is going to view this as a job, and will likely take whatever approach has the best chance of success. You saw that today. From what you said, the team that attacked you correctly feared they were overmatched and would have no chance at capture, so when they took their shot they did not worry about collateral damage."

Berry frowned at how detached Tuuchi seemed when desrcribing this, but nodded for her to continue.

"The best way to protect you and your baby is to make sure that there are more effective ways to collect the bounty than to involve you. Moral and ethical concerns do not matter to these people, so they will use you if they can. You make it hard enough to do that they will probably try something else."

She glanced at Janney and Mortheus. "If you want to turtle up here, do it and I will try to find out who is after you and once I do we can come up with a plan."

"Or, you can go somewhere safe" she said to Berry "and these two can make a lot of noise somewhere else to draw them off."

Berry immediately replied. "The High Temple of Rao. I have been meaning to go there anyway, and I will be safe."

From her tone she was not going to take no for an answer.

"Mortheus, message Lady Gar and alert her to this, and ask her to send help. Once they arrive and we are gone, you two go with her and resolve this."

Spoiler: Someone new tries to kill Perle

Show

They escaped the area relatively easily, and reached a temple of Pulura two days later.

During their journey Perle continued his explanation on how he ended up being the intended host for a demon in a depraved ritual.

His search for information led him to look into a small cult venerating Vecna that was operating in the city despite the best efforts of the church of St Cuthbert. He had no reason to believe the cult was involved with the attack on the St Cuthbert Bishop, but thought they might knkw something from keeping a close eye on their enemy faith.

He was captured by cultists after he asked a few too many questions that made them consider him a threat. They took him, but he killed at least five before they got him. After torturing him for three days they used him for their ritual.

He thought the Vecna cult was likely unaware of the theft, and was ready to pursue other leads. He had two left. The first involved two dwarves that he kept seeing wherever he went. He had seen them four times now in the last eight months in four seperate cities hundreds of miles apart. They were both young, one male and one female and dressed like merchants. It could be coincidence, but he was suspicious.

The second lead involved rumors of a battle that took place recently between two very high powered adventuring groups at the deserted ruins of an ancient underground city 350 miles away in the Stoneshield mountains.

Lyora listened to him speak, not really sure whether he was on to something or just obsessed and likely crazy. She eventually concluded that it was possible that both options were correct. She would feel better once Susheen Communed about all of this. Her friend was a bit grim in his demeanor, but had a good head on his shoulders.

Once back at the temple Susheen reported in to his superior Porthus, who was able to regenrate Fredillio’s arm. Susheen wasted little time, and as soon as he was able he communed with Pulura. When he was finished, he made a point to find Lyora before rejoining Perle.

“I was able to confirm much of what he said” he told Lyora. “I believe he is not intending to deceive us.”

“So let’s go talk to him then” she responded.

“I also learned a bit more about him” he began, seeming a bit unsure o himself. “but not as much as I should have been able to find out. You must have noticed that he has some abilities normally found in a Priest, and he is one, but...”

Lyora was used to her friend’s unwillingness to express himself until he had decided exactly what he want to say and waited while he collected his thoughts.

“I was told not to press him about it.” he said finally.

Lyora blinked. “What does that mean? Why would Porthus say that?”

“It wasn’t Porthus” Susheen replied and Lyora realized the instruction must came from his God directly.

“I was told that I could trust his intentions” he said. “but that discussing his Deity would be bad.”

“That’s...unusual?” Lyora offered. “What do you think it means?”

“I don’t know” he admitted. “but I don’t like it.”

She nodded, knowing that his opinion would not prevent him from working with Perle since Pulara had recommended it. But she worried how this was going to work out.

With nothing more to say they returned to where Perle was waiting with Fedillio and Nigel. Susheen told them the following from his commune with Pulura:

Agents worjking for Tritherion’s chosen were wiped out by an adenturing party that included the Hextor Priest Marissa. Lord Dreyfus was not present at the battle.

Letting the Artifacts be recombined would be very bad. The indivisual pieces are not capable of being located magically, but at some point the churches of Pelor, Moradin, St Cuthburt, Heironeous, Ehlonna and Trithereon all had one, as did one unknown organization.

Information about Dreyfus’s current activities and information about the two dwarves that Perle noticed is not available.

“What does that mean, not available?” Perle asked.

“I suspect something is blocking Pulura” Susheen replied. ”which makes it likely that something significant is going on here. Finding out what is going on here is my top priority now. Pulura directed me to make sure that these Artifacts do not get recombined. My superior Porthus is making official inquiries to some of the other churches.”

“Porthus also suggested to me that it might prove fruitful to travel to Muren’s Wood. Ehlonna has a minor shrine there, and there is a local priest there that is a historian and an old friend of his. He is too weak to travel himself, but will send us with a letter of introduction. If Ehlonna has or had an Artifact related to this she might know and be willing to tell us about it.”

Once she was sure Susheen was done, Lyora stepped in. “OK, I suggest we approach this on multiple fronts. Nigel, you have the two dwarves. Use your contacts in Marshall, see if anyone remembers seeing them before Perle here got abucted, and in what capacity.”

“Fredillio, go talk to those two sneaky bastards you used to run around with. Your goal is to shadow us. We’re going to Muren’s Wood, you are to see if anyone is following us. You leave tomorrow, get to the area first and go to ground and when we arrive, see if anyone is following us.”

The journey to Muren's Wood took them almost a week. The last sixty miles were through old growth forest untouched by man. No axe or saw had ever touched this Wood.

Perle got to know Lyora pretty well over this time. She was quite personable and easy to talk to and he found himself unwinding a bit and enjoying her company. He had been traveling alone for far foo long. Susheen was more of an enigma. He never spoke unless there was something important to say and said little the entire journey.

There really wasn't a road through the Wood, just a path that wound past enormous trees. For the first time in a while Perle thought of Mortheus. He could easily picture his friend meditating high in one of these trees.

The area near the shrine was mostly uninhabited, except for a town of a few hundred people that lived along the shore of a large lake fed by streams that flowed from the large mountain ranging overlooking the Wood. The town of Muren had two inns, and a few shops catering to religous pilgrims that came to visit the shrine nearby.

The shrine itself was a few miles outside of town and was nothing more than an opening under an outcropping of stone in the side of a cliff. The opening was large enough that four or five people could stand inside. The floor was packed earth, and the only indication that this was a Holy place was the unicorn horn symbol of Ehlonna carved in the stone wall, and the sense of peace and tranquility they all felt as they approached it.

Susheen had explained its history as they approached it. The site was the birthplace of a Ehlonna warrior cleric who lived millenia ago. Muren was found crying in her dead mother’s arms shortly after her birth here by a local hunter, who took the child, and raised as his own.

Little was known about her life other than that she worshipped Ehlonna but did not get along well with Ehlonna’s church heirarchy. The power of the site was only realized after she was long dead.

Members of Ehlonna’s faithful that visited and tended the shrine tended to be rebels and malcontents and she became a symbol of opposition by those who wanted to reform the church. What that reformation entailed changed periodically based on the opinions of those who used her as a symbol for change at the time. More than once in the church’s history a reformer who venerated Muren overthrew a High Priestess who had also venerated Muren for conflicting reasons. No one really knew who Muren really was like at this point except for Ehlonna, who saw no reason to give an opinion about the matter.

The person they were there to see was an elderly elf woman who had spent the last few years tending the shrine, having decided it was time to retire. Milithecitant was her name, and she was pretty spry for someone born almost 400 years ago.

After asking around town they found her sitting under a tree near the lake, chatting with some small village children who were playing nearby.

She was happy to talk to them, even before Susheen brought out his letter from his superior, but knew nothing about any Artifacts going missing, and had no idea if Ehlonna had anything like that tucked away somewhere, hidden for safety.

She was enjoying the conversation so much that they hated to leave, and listened to her talk about some of her earlier experiences. They humored her as she was having so much fun, and no one thought anything about it until she mentioned tangling with a scary outsider a few hundred years ago.

When Pearle heard the name Gihjantara, he paid much closer attention. Milithecitant described him as a dangerous outsider who reveled in tricking mortals, a chaotic monster she had only escaped, not overcome.

Perle kept a straight face, but internally he was screaming. What she described sounded suspiciously plausible, and he struggled to avoid believing her. After all, what are the odds that an extremely powerful chaotic trickster outsider named Gihjantara that loved to fool mortals had the same name as an angel that told him that he was a holy assassin sanctioned by Heironeous to the do the neccessary Evil that his Paladins and Clerics could not do.

He barely resisted the urge to pull a dagger out and kill the elderly elf, Lyora and Susheen, and then every single child playing a few yards away. As he struggled to contain himself he realized that what he desperately refused to believe was almost certainly true, and that he had been living a lie his entire life. He had known that it all along, but believing it meant he didn’t have to face the fact that he just loved violence and bloodshed and was only really happy when he was causing other people pain. With a sob, he pulled out his dagger, slit his own throat and slammed the dagger into his right eye.

As the others looked on in shock he toppled to the ground.

[Babaji]

Enjoying this. Love the multiple parallel plots.

[Toxic Shaman]

Spoiler: Tuuchi shows why you don't want to get on her bad side.

Show

The church of Rao is generally thought of as a bunch of timid priests that prefer meditation over conflict and avoid fighting because deep down they are afraid.

Much of this is correct. They prefer peace and meditate a lot, seem timid, but the cowardly part generally is not true. Its more that they view violence as something to pull out of your toolbox when there aren’t other ways that solve problems that aren’t more effective.

Tuuchi already knew this, and quietly explained it to Janney and Mortheus while Berry was in the other room taking care of Nell.

Janney liked Tuuchi because she explained things in a way that instantly made sense to her. She thought the toolbox analogy was quite appropriate once Berry’s escorts to the temple showed up, as they looked quite battle-ready and certainly fit into the category of ‘tools’.

Five hours after Morthes sent Berry’s message, Lady Gar wind-walked in, escorted by two very tough looking Paladins, a Monk and two church wizards. All of them made it quite obvious they thought Mortheus was complete garbage for bringing this trouble on Berry. He took their contempt in stride. He truly didn’t care what they thought of him, which infuriated them even more.

Janney quietly seethed and if Tuuchi hadn’t headed her off she probably would have given them a piece of her mind.

Berry was still extremely angry and her goodbye to Mortheus was a little strained.

After she left with the Rao contingent Mortheus just stood there for a few minutes, looking a bit lost, as the only person whose opinion mattered to him was upset. He was used to compartmentaling things though, and by the time he turned his attention back to the two women he seemed fine.

Tuuchi suggested that the two of them should escort her to her carriage and wave as she left in case anyone was watching the estate, and then leave themselves two hours later. She would meet them outside the nearest village in four hours, and they could make their way to Southepoint.

They put that plan into effect, and didn’t see any signs that anyone was paying attention to them at all. Once they got to Southpoint Tuuchi had them wait in a house she had access to while she did some digging. She came back the next day and seemed almost bursting with energy.

“Well, I think we have an intrigue here!” she began. “Someone has made it look like Lord Dreyfus has placed the price on your heads.”

“Looked like he placed it?” Mortheus asked, as Dreyfus was high on his list.

“Yes, the funds were transfered anonymously, but I was able to trace them back to two of his cronies, a wizard that works for him, and a Cleric of Fharlanghn” she replied, sounding pleased. “It was a crude gambit, Tritheron’s Chosen would never allow that sort of thing, if it was revenge he wanted, he would never pay to have someone do it, he is much more direct than that.”

“If its the wizard and cleric I’m thinking of, I wouldn’t be so sure” Janney responded. “We’ve killed them both a couple of times, and they seemed to take it personally”

Tuuchide laughed. “I can understand why that might make it personal, and why they may not want to gain revenge themselves. Why don’t we pay them a visit?”

They decided to visit the cleric first. They found Rev. Faleinders sitting in an upscale outdoor cafe having coffee by himself. While Mortheus and Janney waited a block away, Tuuchi went and sat down at a nearby table. She was disguised in her Dame Crouther persona and told the waiter loudly that she would like some tea.

The waiter, sensing he was in the presence of someone of importance rushed back into the kitchen to get what she asked for.

She was about to turn and begin talking to the cleric when Mortheus sent her a telapathic message:

*The wizard Jankins is approaching *

In an instant she changed her plans, and seeing that no one else was looking cast an illusion that made her look like Mortheus. *About to try something different. Stay out of this* she replied back.

Jankins turned the corner and saw his nemesis sitting casually at a table behind his cleric friend. He fliched and almost turned the other way, but saw that the monk wasn’t looking at him, and decided to take his shot. Enraged, he chanted momentarily and a bolt of lightning leapt from his fingers.

Tuuchi screamed and let the bolt of lightning knock her backwards out of her chair, dropping the illusion. “Help, help” she cried out feebly.

Rev. Faleinders looked at Jankins in disbelief and jumped to his feet as a waiter screamed. He bent down and cast a spell that healed most of Tuuchie’s wounds and helped her to her feet as she looked around fearfully.

Jankins blinked in confusion, and seeing everyone staring at him in fear and anger he decided to flee. He turned and ran around the corner, running right by Janney without seeing her.

She tripped him as he went by and he stumbled and fell. She followed the attack up with a kick that broke his leg. As he struggled to move she grabbed his head and slammed it into the ground three times, then stepped back as a shopkeeper who had seen Jankins attack the old lady rushed in and started kicking him.

Janney stepped backwards as another bystander moved in and soon Jankins was unconcscious. He would probably have died had the city watch not shown up and arrested him.

Back in the cafe Tuuchi sat at her table and allowed everyone around her to comfort her. Rev. Faleinders looked confused as he watched a guard stuff a rag in Jankins mouth, blindfold him and tie his hands so he couldn’t cast spells. Tuuchi thanked the cleric profusely and then called for her servant to come get her.

Her coachman appeared and hustled her out of the cafe, and they managed to disappear into the crowd. As soon as they were clear Tuuchi changed her appearance to look like a young dwarf girl, while the coachman shifted into his fey looking monkey form, as it was actually her familiat. Tuuchie cast an invisibility spell on him and he clambered up the building and backtracked to keep an eye on the cafe.

“What just happened” Janney hissed quietly at Tuuchi when they met at the apartment a few minutes later.

Tuuchi smile was a little scary. “Jankins is in jail for the unprovoked on a sweet elderly woman....That was a nice touch beating him up. Did he see you?”

“No, he probably thinks the crowd did it.” she replied.

“Now what?” Mortheus added, totally confused by this. “How do we convince him to retract the bounty?”

“Be patient dear, we have sown dissension between wizard and priest. His credibility is badly damaged, and we can build on that. My familiar will keep an eye on Faleinders , maybe we can do something there too.”

Mortheus just nodded, realizing he understood nothing that was going on, and that it was probably best to leave it to Tuuchi since she appeared to know what she was doing.

“Now you two get out of town. I heard about a slavery ring operating in Delbucher. I’ll give you some leads. Go break up the ring and make a lot of noise doing so. We need to make sure you aren’t connected to this at all.”

She left a few minutes later, to an upscale hotel where she had checked in the day before. She arranged for the hotel to deliver a message to a government official she had met at a party in her Dame Crouther persona a few months earlier. The man arrived shortly after.

Tuuchi greeted him in yet another identity, that of Dame Crouther’s pretty young neice and personal secretary. She explained that her aunt was extremely embarrased about this whole episode, and that she had already left the city accompanied by her personal physician, and that she hoped that this matter could be resolved without her name being brought into such an unpleasant matter.

The man immediately agreed, horrified that someone of Dame Crouther’s stature would be sullied by something like this and vowed to take care of it. Jankins spent the night in jail, and was released the next morning in the custody of a cleric of Trithereon.

Two days later Jankins had his dinner at a nice restaurant. It was an enjoyable meal and he didn’t notice that his food was drugged. On the way home he had his pocket picked and his spell component pouch taken while walking down the street.

He didn’t notice until he was passing a bar where some mercenaries were drinking. Tuuchi was nearby and arranged for a voice that sounded remarkably like Jankins to insult the drunken men.

Jankins, feeling cocky, responded arrogantly when the men turned to face him. He reached for his spell components but by the time he realized they were gone one of the men had already punched him in the face. As beatings go it was pretty mild. He wasn’t able to put up much of a struggle and they got boted and dumped him in a trash heap in the alley, took his jewelry, money and magic items and decided to hit another bar.

By the time the watch found him he was semiconcious, and was clutching a bottle of expensive brandy in each hand. One bottle was empty and the other half full and he smelled of brandy, vomit and urine. They threw him in jail again for the night, not realizing he was a wizard.

Later that evening he woke up and made such a fuss the other inhabitants of his cell beat him up yet again.

The next day he was released again in the custody of a mid level Tritheron cleric, who was starting to get tired of this. When they reached the temple they interrupted an extremely angry merchant who was on a tirade. He swore than Jankins had run up a tab in his bar drinking expensive brandy and had assured him that the temple would pay. The local cleric who had been trying to appease him cast a spell and confirmed that the man believed what he was telling him.

The next day Jankins looked out of the window of his room and saw Mortheus walk by with a cat perched on his shoulder. The cat looked exactly like his old familiar that he lost the last time he died. The cat appeared to be talking to Mortheus and as they rounded the corner the Monk laughed at something the cat said.

By the time Jankins reached the street the Monk was far ahead. He watched as Mortheus walked into a house. Totally enraged and still under the effect of the drug, Jankins cast two spells to boost his defenses, and then he crept over to the open window of the house. He saw motion inside and dumped a fireball into the room while cackling madly. He peered inside and when he saw that none of the burning bodies inside were Mortheus he fled. The building and the two adjacent buildings burnt to the ground.

His actions were witnessed, and he was arrested again. The men that he had killed were off duty guardsmen. In killing them he had earned the enmity of both the local government and the local criminal organization that they worked for.

Stories started to appear in local newspapers talking about his actions. The Trithereon church publicly disavowed him as did everyone else that knew him. The church also discovered that there was a bounty put out on three adventurers by the disgraced wizard and one of his friends, one that could be viewed as being sanctioned by the church. The bounty was revoked.

Two days before Jankin’s trial he was found dead in his cell, having managed to hang himself using a bed sheet. If anyone noticed that his neck was almost broken in half or that he had defensive wounds on his hands no one thought it was odd.

Reverand Faleinders died in a brothel two weeks later of an apparent heart attack. His fellow priests were shocked, apparently he had been a regular there for years. There was a cursury investigation, but there was no signs that there was any foul play. He had been acting strangely ever since his best friend Jankins had died, and no one in his church wanted any attention drawn so the whole affair was hushed up, people paid off and the investigation closed.

Spoiler: Making new friends and enemies

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Lyora reacted first. Seeing motion nearby, she turned saw a dwarf woman crouched down in the brush about 10 yards away, looking at the group in shock. As Lyora brought her crossbow up to shoot her the woman chanted and disappeared from view. Lyora shot anyway, and could tell that at least one of her bolts struck her.

Susheen seemed stunned, and by the time he thought to move Milithecitant had already knelt down by Perle and laid her hand on his forehead.

“Go, I got this” she told him, and he turned and charged where Lyora had shot.
Milithecitant stabilized Perle, and then with a gesture, both of them disappeared.

Perle woke up a short time later, completely healed and saw that Milithecitant was watching him a few feet away. He didn’t recognize where they were. The lake was gone and they were standing in the middle of a grass covered field that seemed to stretch on forever.

“You going to try to kill yourself again?” she asked.

Perle didn’t respond.

“You wear Gihjantara’s mark you know” she continued. “From the way you reacted when I mentioned him I figure he’s been pulling one of his tricks on you”

Perle nodded and laughed bitterly. “You could say that.”

“You aren’t the first, and won’t be the last” she said with little sympathy. “Though killing yourself just means he wins....You want him to win?”

Perle grimaced. “No, I want to kill him.”

“That is understandable, but its unlikely something you can do” she replied. “unless of course you have some help. Why don’t we sit down and chat.” She gestured and two rocking chairs appeared, along with a small table with a glass and two pitchers.




Meanwhile, back by the lake, Susheen was trying to deal with three traumatized children. Not only did they see Perle try to kill himself in a pretty gruesome fashion, they had seen the follow-up.

Susheen tried to calm them down, which was difficult because his devlish heritage was quite visible at the moment. Behind him, the children could see Lyora dragging the semi-conscious dwarf woman by her hair over to where her partner lay dead. One of the boys whimpered as Lyora let the dwarf fall to the ground, then stepped on her chest and took careful aim with her bow.

“Where are they?” she snarled. The dwarf looked confused, but not afraid.

“You’ll get nothing from me, whore” the woman replied. Her attempt at casting a spell failed when Lyora detected it and shot her. The first shot killed her, but Lyora was nothing if not thorough and shot her two more times.

The halfling woman turned and saw the three children huddled together with Susheen towering over them. His attempt at calming them was not going well. She sighed and started over to help, which caused the kids to run screaming back towards the village.

“You see what happened with Perle and the Ehlonna cleric?” she asked Susheen.

“No” he replied tersely. “Fredillio was supposed to be watching for these two. I am worried about him too. One of these two must have been quite good at enchantments to force Perle to stab himself, I hope Fredillio didn’t try to tangle with them.”

“Not much we can do about that. Let’s take the bodies and get out of here before the locals show up.”

They stuck both dwarves in a portable hole, and headed back towards town. On the way they ran into Fredillio and his two friends, who had not seen any signs of the dwarves at all.

Lyora quickly instructed them to keep an eye out for Perle and the elven cleric, and if they didn’t find them in a week to head home. She and Susheen kept going, and found a quiet spot where they could look at the bodies of the dwarves. The woman had multiple holy symbols of Moradin in her cloak and pockets. The man was unarmored and had a spell component pouch.

Susheen prayed briefly and then cast a spell that allowed him to speak with the dead. He tried it on the woman first. The spell took effect but she refused to answer and questions.

They were more successful with the man.

“Why were you falling us” Susheen asked.

“not following you” the corpse responded, emphasizing “you” slightly.

“Why were you following the human with us” Susheen tried again,

“To see what he discovers”

“Why him?”

“I don’t know” the corpse replied.

“Who do you work for” Susheen asked.

“Myself” it replied.

“What is your name”

“Bob” it replied, then the intelligence in his eyes faded.

Susheen was a bit frustrated. “That was useless”

“Let’s bury them here and get out of here” Lyora suggested. “Then I’ll teleport us back to your temple.”

[Babaji]

I enjoyed that post and have a few questions:

How did you work it out with Perle's player that his deity was a fraud? That seems like it could cause hard feelings if they weren't in on it up front

Did Susheen and Lyora's players really think someone enchanted Perle? Or did I misunderstand and Perle actually was under control of one of the dwarves when he stabbed himself?

Classes for Susheen and Lyora?

Is Berry a PC or NPC?

How far behind current game events is the story?

[Toxic Shaman]

I enjoyed that post and have a few questions:

How did you work it out with Perle's player that his deity was a fraud? That seems like it could cause hard feelings if they weren't in on it up front

Did Susheen and Lyora's players really think someone enchanted Perle? Or did I misunderstand and Perle actually was under control of one of the dwarves when he stabbed himself?

Classes for Susheen and Lyora?

Is Berry a PC or NPC?

How far behind current game events is the story?

The concept that Perle's player had was that his character was lying to himself, pretending that he was serving a deity when in reality he was using that deity to excuse doing some pretty awful things that he really enjoyed doing, mainly being your typical D&D murder-hobo. He told me that he wanted the character to be living a lie, but he as a player did not want to define the extent of that lie, he wanted me to take the idea and run with it. I was a little nervous about what I came up with, because it will have some serious consequences, but in the end he loved it, thankfully.

The player figured out almost immediately that his deity was a sham, but the character didn't figure it out for a very long time, and neither the player or character learned exactly what Gihjantara was up to until a long time after this point in the story. The other players had no idea what was going on. Perle never discussed his abilities or deity at all. The players assumed he worshipped some dark deity they were better off not knowing about.

When Perle stabbed himself in the face, everyone immediately assumed he must have been compelled somehow, I think I was the only one at the table who was actually surprised by his actions. :)

They didn't realize at the time that the two dwarves they killed had nothing to do with Perle's attempt to kill himself, and I am not sure they've figured it out yet.

Susheen is a Tiefling Cleric/Stargazer // Warlord, and Lyora is a Bolt Ace/Hawkguard Warder // Sorcerer using Words of Power.

We really love the Art of War system by Dreamscarred Press, particularly for ranged builds. Pathfinder Archers are extremely powerful, but can be boring to play since your action each round tend to boil down to trying to put as many arrows into the air as possible. Lyora has a lot more options, most of them slightly less powerful than a well optimized volley archer, but a lot more flexible. Couple that with the Sorcerer side of the Gestalt makes her a really versatile character.

Berry (Human Paladin) is Mortheus's cohort. As the old joke goes, he had to take a feat to get the girl.

Fredillio (Human Magus) is Lyora's cohort and Nigel (Human Slayer) is Susheen's cohort. Tuuchi doesn't have a cohort, but her improved familiar is in some ways just as strong as one. Only Perle and Janney don't have cohorts.

The game has slowed down, we don't play as often as we used to. The characters that are still alive are 18th level at this point, while they are 10th level here.

[Toxic Shaman]

A short update. I'll have a longer one later this week:

Spoiler: Taking out the trash

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Janney was happy to get out of Southpoint, and she and Mortheus had little trouble finding the slavers Tuuchi had sent them to destroy. It took them a week to reach Delbucher, and upon arrival they staked out a building along the river that Tuuchi had told them was likely were the slaves were being kept captive until they were taken out via boat.

They saw the first boat leave with a dozen slaves onboard, along with four guards. They followed it downstream for two days until they reached the port city of Samluk. There, the slaves were offloaded into a warehouse. While Janney kept watch on the warehouse Mortheus followed the board back as the guards used a horse team harnessed to the boat using a long rope to pull it back upstream using a trail along side the river bank.

Once it was outside of town it was a simple matter for him to telekinetically pick up a huge boulder and drop it from a great height onto the boat. It crashed through the deck, causing it to sink quickly.

As it went down the horses panicked, so Mortheus’s next act was to blast a hole through the rope connecting the boat to the team. Once it seperated the horses stampeded, running over the guard leading them. The guards in the water were easy targets, and never made it to shore.

He got back to the warehouse later that evening. Janney wasn’t there, but she showed up an hour later, and reported she had followed two men from the warehouse, who boarded a large ship docked there.

The next morning multiple teams of horses showed up pulling huge wagons, and began slowly loading large crates onto the wagons. Mortheus was able to see through the open door of the warehouse that men were loading uncoconsious slaves into the crates.

He came up with a plan, which they quickly implemented. Janney kept an eye on the warehouse while Mortheus made his way down to the waterfront. He slipped into the water and shifted his form a bit, extending his feet and hands to form fins so he could swim better, and shrinking himself down so that he would be less noticable in the water.

He managed to make his way through the harbor unoticed, and telepathically communicated with Janney. They waited until the first wagons reached the harbor and were about to be loaded before acting.

The ship was tied off in three spots along the dock. Mortheus managed to telekinetically slip the first ropes off without anyone noticing. When he got the second set off the alarm was raised as the back end of the ship started to pull away from the dock. Sailors began cursing as they raced to try to relash the ship,

Seeing that they were about to suceed Mortheus telekinetically pushed on the side of the ship, swinging the stern out into the channel. A sailor managed to toss a rope to a second sailor on the dock, but before he could lash it down the roped pulled him into the water.

With all the attention at the stern no one was paying attention to the bow lines, so he unraveled them telepathically and the ship was now free.

This had drawn a crowd on the dock and everyone was watching the ship, giving Janney enough of a distraction that she was able to climb up on top of one of the wagons carry a crate full of slaves without being noticed.

She kicked the lock on the crate, shattering it, and yanked the door open and pulled out an unconcious boy out of the crate.

“Oh my Gods, what is that” a nearby man shouted, seeing this.

“Slavers!” Janney shouted back. “There are children in the crates.”

The teamsters tried to flee, but the crowd turned on them and they were quickly pulled from their wagons and beaten. Other bystanders started breaking open locked crates and freeing slaves.

Seeing this the sailors on board stopped trying to get the ship back to the dock and instead tried to get out to sea.

Mortheus was not about to let the happen, and slammed multiple kinetic blasts into it, eventually breaching the hull. It quickly settled in the water and began to sink while the crowd cheered. Someone on the dock threw a lit lantern and it landed on deck, catching it on fire. Sailors jumped overboard and made it to the dock where they were assaulted by the gathering crowd.

By the time Mortheus and Janney made their escape the ship was sinking in a position that blocked the channel and was burning out of control . The city watch were trying to calm things down and the chaos was slowly subsiding. They went back to the warehouse, which was now empty and as the neighbors watched. Mortheus slammed kinetic blasts into critical spots until the structure collapsed.

Hours later, back in Southpoint:

McCaerney was sitting in his office, trying to come up with a plan. A month ago he had been on top of the world, running the city’s most powerful criminal organization. Now he was beset on multiple fronts.

Some idiot wizard killed four of his top men in the city watch. His smuggling operations were down too, with two shipments missing in the last two weeks. His cash flow situation was getting tight, and he was counting on his recent foray into the slave trade to bring in some revenue to keep him going.

Plus, multiple smaller gangs seemed to have decided to take him on. He couldn’t figure it out, none of them were strong enough to do much but annoy him, and they did not seem to be cooperating with each other. One of them must be running this attack on him, but which one?

His second in command walked into his office with a grim look on his face. McCaerney knew it was bad news before he said one word.

“The operation is Samluk is gone. Somebody screwed up and the locals saw the cargo and rioted. Grange’s ship is a burnt out hulk sitting at the bottom of the bay, and most of our people are dead.”

McCaerney sat there for a long time and said nothing.

“What are we going to tell Grange” his second asked, trying unsuccessfully to hide his fear.

“Nothing we say will change anything” McCaerney replied. “Get out of town now while you can. If I’m still alive in a week, you can come back.”

Spoiler: Perle just can't catch a break

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Milithecitant slowly got to her feet. “It is time I get going.”

Perle got up to help the old elf. “You have given me a lot to think about. I am grateful.”

She smiled at him. “Anything to help taking down that monster.” She reached out and touched his shoulder, and they both plane shifted back to the Prime.

When they reappeared she looked around with confusion. “This isn’t where I intended to take us?”

Perle relaxed as soon as he realized where they were. “Don’t worry, its OK, I know where we are. Luck is with us, I know this place.”

She seemed relieved. “OK, good. I’ll leave you here then”

She chanted briefly and disappeared, reappearing in a small room cluttered with scrolls and other papers. She was only there seconds before she was noticed.

“Get in here you lazy WORM”

With a sigh she shifted forms and became a he. “Certainly your Vastness, I will be there immediately”

[Toxic Shaman]

Spoiler: Janney and Mortheus just pawns in game of life

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Janney ducked down behind the wall and tried to hold her intestines inside her stomach with one hand while she searched for a potion with the other and tried to catch her breath. She wasn’t sure where Mortheus was and she hoped he was still alive. She couldn’t worry about that right now, she was far too busy trying to survive herself.

A few minutes earlier Mortheus had finished collapsing the slaver’s warehouse when they were ambushed. She still wasn’t sure what it was that attacked her.

Whatever it was had blended into the walls of the building behind it so well that she couldn’t tell what the heck it was. She sure felt it though as its claws sliced through her left calf, slicing her three times in as many seconds before retreating.

She heard the sounds of Mortheus fighting nearby and the building wall next to her collapsed, bowling over both her and whatever it was that was attacking her. That turned out to be a good thing as she had been losing badly.

Janney didn’t have much time to heal though, but at least this time she heard it coming. She jumped over the wall and found herself facing a huge woolly animal with a large tusk on its head. She realized it was probably meant to distract her, but that wouldn’t help her if the 1000 pound animal trampled her, so she leaped up into the air and kicked it in the snout and, using its head as a springboard, jumped right back over the wall, barely avoiding the claws of her original attacker, who had dropped whatever illusion she was using to camoflauge herself. It was a young human girl who looked like she might be 17 years old and probably weighed only about 90 pounds, even with the two clawed tentacles sprouting from her shoulders.

The girl giggled upon seeing how much blood Janney was drenched in, and she stepped in to attack. Janney missed with a kick and got shredded in return with three quick claw attacks.

As the two of them fought the rhino charged through the wall, knocking debris in every direction. It trampled her, wounding her badly, but this forced her opponent to tumbled backward to avoid getting trampled herself.

Janney thought this would be a good time to flee. She thought she was probably fast enough to escape and knew she couldn’t take much more damage. But she could hear the shrill shrieks that accompanied Mortheus’s kinetic blasts and she knew her friend was still in the fight and didn’t want to leave him, particularly because she knew he was facing at least three opponents to her one.

So instead she charged in and tripped the girl, who was still trying to get back to her feet. By the time the rhino was able to turn around Janney had kicked the girl in the face, picked her up by a tentacle and slammed her into the ground a few times. As the Rhino charged one last time Jannie weilded the girl as a flail, impaling her on the Rhino’s horn, killing her and the rhino.

Janney let go and raced towards the sound of Mortheus fighting. She managed to chug her last major healing potion and got to where she suspected he was, inside a building about a block away from the warehouse they had destroyed.

As she ran towards it the building abruptly collapsed on top of him. A few seconds later she heard a shriek and a huge piece of debris rolled off the top and he crawled out of the ruins, covered in blood and bleeding profusely.

He gestured and a bolt of super-compressed air shot out and slammed into something perched on the roof of a nearby building. She couldn’t see what he had targeted, but she heard the thump as whatever it was fell off the roof and landed nearby.

By the time she got there his target was visible, a frail looking old man. He was unconscious and bleeding from the attack. She stabilized him, tied his hands and feet, blindfolded him and shoved a gag in his mouth, then searched him.

He had a spell component pouch, and was armed only with a small knife, but two rings, a belt, a set of goggles and a number of scrolls and wands made her suspect that this was likely the one that summoned the rhino.

Janney went back to search the girl who had attacker her, but she was gone, as was the rhino. They left town as soon as they could, while fearful town’s people hid nearby, wondering what was going on.

They stopped a few miles outside of town and Janney slapped the man until he woke up while Mortheus telekinetically held him upside down with his head at eye level with Janney.

The man tried to pretend he was still out but they could tell he was faking.

“I’m going to be remove your gag, and if you try to do anything other than answer our questions my friend here is rip your head off” Janney began menacingly.

“Doesn’t really matter” the old man said simply. “I already sent word, Grange’ll get you eventually. You two are marked.”

“You a bounty hunter?” she asked. “That bounty is about to be rescinded.”

The old man laughed. “After what you did today you think Grange’s gonna hire bounty hunters?”

Mortheus and Janney looked at each other.

“So this isn’t about the bounty on us?” Janney asked.

The man’s only reply was to say a word and disappear. They heard a puff of displaced air as the man teleported away, and a scream of pain as he reappeared nearby, partially inside a tree.

They found him less than a minute later, conscious but still blindfolded and unable to get free from the ropes they had used to bind him.

“So who is Grange?” Janney asked.

“You idiots did this, and you didn’t even know who you were messing with?” the man asked in disbelief. He started to laugh, and tears rolled down his face.

Frustrated, Janney lashed out with one leg without even thinking and caved in his skull.

Mortheus sent a message to Tuuchi. *Slavers stopped, slaves free, their ship destroyed. Attacked afterward, who is Grange?*

As he waited for her answer he thought he felt an emotion back through the link, a combination of surprise, then fear and maybe excitement.

*He’s very bad news dearie, but I will take care of it. Your bounty has been removed, but you had probably stay away from home for another week.*

“Let’s go” Mortheus said to Janney with a sigh. “I think we are in more trouble.”

Spoiler: Susheen goes to War

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"So she plane shifted you somewhere else to heal you..." Lyora asked skeptically.

"Yes" Perle replied. "After which she and I discussed a few things she did not feel comfortable saying around you."

Lyora glanced at Susheen to see how he was taking this.

"I can see why you asked him to cast a Zone of Truth Perle" Lyora muttered.

Perle leaned forward in his chair. "I will not discuss that conversation."

Lyora frowned. "I think it best if we part ways then."

"If that is the way you want it" Perle said.

"I'm not ready to say that yet" Susheen added, getting looks of surprise from both Lyora and Perle. “Too much is happening right now. While I don’t trust you fully, I am willing to work with you for now.”

Perle nodded. “We barely know each other. I need allies, I don’t have the luxury of only working with people I trust right now. My allies are hundreds of miles away so while I will work alone if I have to, I am willing to work with you now”

Lyora looked unhappy with the way the conversation was going but kept her mouth shut.

Susheen switched topics abruptly, apparantly considering the matter closed.

“A force of almost nine thousand dwarves invaded the Stoneshield mountains yesterday, and are in the process of expelling the Orcs and Giants that had occupied the area for hundreds of years. ” Susheen told them.

“Is this at all related to this artifact?” Lyora asked.

“I am not sure.” Susheen replied. “But this seems to have been building for longer than that. No one knew the dwarves had that many troops nearby. They must have been planning the attack for months, if not years.”

“What are you proposing?” Perle asked.

“There is a small temple to Pulura in the mountains. We would go check on the priests there and see to their safety. Once we verify the situation is in hand we investigate what is going on there. My superior has given me a Wind Walk scroll, we could be there this afternoon.”

The three of them reached the temple a little after mid day. The temple was located a few thousand feet above the plains below, on one of the smaller peaks in the mountain chain. There was no sign of any invading army yet.

The temple was very small and was devoted to work on studying the heavens. Only five scholar-priests lived there. The priests were a little surprised to see them, having not yet heard about the invasion.

While Susheen and Lyora discussed things with the priests, Perle took a look around on his Carpet of Flying and scouted invisibly from above. He reported back about an hour later, having seen no army nearby.

They spent the night there, and in the morning Perle searched again, this time finding a force of about twenty five dwarves heading towards the temple. Worse yet, one of them noticed him even though he was invisible, and Perle put the carpet into a deep dive to get out of their line of sight.

By the time the dwarves arrived they were waiting on them.

Susheen stood in front of the main door of the temple while his fellow priests watched nervously from the windows. Lyora stood on the roof of the church and watched as the dwarves marched up, stopping about 100 feet away. After a brief conversation four dwarves approached the temple. Three of the four were heavily armed and armored soldiers, and the fourth a heavily armored priest.

“We are here to take possession of this keep for your own protection” the lead soldier announced. “You will be allowed to stay if you lay down arms and holy symbols and give us a vow of peace.”

“This temple is a Holy place of Pulura” Susheen replied evenly. “You are tresspassing, and cannot come on temple grounds armed. Leave now, or drop you weapons”

The soldier bristled at this, but before he could reply the dwarf priest touched him on the shoulder and he backed down.

“There are Orc and Giants in the area. We do this for your protection” the cleric said, taking over the discussion from the angry soldier.

“We do not need protection” Susheen said in his normal level voice. Only Lyora could tell how angry her friend was, and she started picking out targets. She had no idea where Perle was. He had told them he would get behind the others on foot, and wherever he was, she could not detect him.

“I claim this temple in the name of Moradin” the priest announced loudly, holding his holy symbol high, just managing to finish his statement before Susheen crashed into all four dwarves, knocking three of the four to the ground, and managing to slice two of them to pieces with his weapon as he overran them.

Lyora responded immediately, casting a spell that caused a wall of fog to appear between Susheen and the main mass of dwarves, who started to charge when they saw the fight break out.

Most of the dwarves went around the wall, but some tried to go through it.

By this time Susheen had already killed the Cleric and was battling the three soldiers. He let them surround him and then cut them all down in one quick series of strokes.

Perle made his presence known, tumbling into a small group of dwarves protecting an older looking unarmored dwarf in the back who was beginning to cast a spell. The spell never went off and the dwarf spellcaster collapsed in a puddle of blood as his bodyguards futily tried to protect him.

Susheen cast a spell that caused him to double in size, and he roared and charged into a mass of onrushing dwarves.

Lyora hopped down from the roof of the temple and cast another spell that created an icy fog bank that enveloped another group of dwarves.

In less than a minute it was over. A small group of survivors fled.

Perle followed them and killed the first two easily. The last three turned to face him. They looked terrified, which made Perle angy.

“Go back and tell whatever idiot is in charge what happened here. Just a suggestion, but maybe next time try a little diplomacy first? Coming into someone’s temple and claiming it for your own is not really the way to make friends....”

This seemed to make one of them mad enough to overcome his fear. He charged, and Perle casually sidestepped the blow and stabbed him three times, letting him crash to the ground just in time to spin and stab a second charging dwarf in the face.

He paused a moment to clean his knife on one of the dead dwarf’s beards while staring at the final wounded dwarf. “Do I have to kill you too, or are you going to show a little intelligence and take a hike”

The dwarf trembled and with a cry turned and ran as fast as his stubby legs could carry him.

Perle walked back to the temple, where he found Lyora and Susheen talking.

“At least two escaped. I let one of them go, and told him that maybe his superiors should try a little diplomacy next time, something that I think you may want to consider too.” Perle said, being a bit unused to being in the position of being the voice of reason.

Lyora sighed. “Yeah, that ship has sailed.”

“Ya think?” Perle responded. “They will be back, but they won’t bring their greenest troops next time. They obviously thought this would be a cake walk, and it would have been if we hadn’t been here.”

Susheen’s devilsh ancestry was still very apparent, but he seemed to have calmed down. “You are correct, but I will not apologize for my actions. I could not let that insult to my Deity stand”

“So what now?” Lyora asked.

“Don’t hide from this, own it” Perle said. “Make a big stink. Tell your superior what happened and have him express outrage on the assault on your temple through church channels.”

“I like it” Susheen replied. He prayed for 15 minutes for a spell, and then sent a message to the Bishop.

Afterward they dragged all the dwarves together and Susheen summoned an earth elemental to bury them.

Two hours later they felt the ground shake, and the main temple building collapsed. Within seconds the entire complex was nothing rubble. When the dust cleared, all but one of the Pulura priests were dead, and everyone else except Lyora was wounded.

“That was an f-ing 8th Sphere spell” Lyora said as she dragged the only priest they could find clear of the debris. “Susheen we are leaving, NOW”

The big man ignored her as he dug through the rubble, trying to get to the rest of the priests.

“I mean it” the halfling woman continued. “You can’t fight whoever did this, they will take us out as easily as we killed the earlier force. Think about it. There is an enormous army invading this entire mountain range, and we managed to piss them off enough that they diverted one of their strongest spellcasters just to destroy this temple. We CANNOT stand against whoever has the power to do this.”

“I agree” Susheen replied. “You and Perle take the wounded priest and get clear.”

“If they wanted us dead they would probably be here by now.” Perle added softly to Lyora. “I’m going to take a look out there and see if anyone is watching until you two figure this out.”

Perle’s theory was evidently correct, for they did not get attacked by anyone else. Susheen dug out the bodies of the four dead priests, wrapped them in cloth and put them in a Portable Hole. Susheen said a short prayer, and then he and Perle climbed into a Bag of holding, along with the surviving priest and Lyora teleported them all back to Susheen’s home temple.

[Toxic Shaman]

These three posts wrap up most of the various side quests and gets a core team of four PCs back together again.

I didn't really expect the game to go the direction it did , which is half the fun of being a DM. I enjoy winging it when the PCs do something I don't expect. It's their game after all. What I intended originally will still go on in the background, just not with their direct involvement. It will still affect them, but not for a while.

Spoiler: Berry makes a decision

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Berry sat in an achingly beautiful inner courtyard of the temple of Rao while Nell slept in a small cradle nearby. She was trying to meditate and was failing badly, her mind full of worry for her husband.

She regretted how she had behaved. At the time she was full of anger and fear for her baby, and had taken it out on him without even knowing whether or not he had done anything at all to deserve it. She was still haunted by the memory of the look in his eyes and just wished he would contact her so they could talk about it. It had been over a week and there was no word from him.

She heard footsteps approaching and saw Lady Gar standing nearby. “We’ve learned that the bounty on your husband and his two friends was revoked a week ago.”

“Thank Rao” Berry said with relief. “Has anyone heard from them?”

“Someone matching the description of Mortheus and Janney broke up a previously unknown slaving ring in Samluk the same day their bounty was revoked. They freed 36 slaves, many of them kidnapped peasants from the area around Delbucher.”

Berry smiled proudly. “I’ve family that lives not that far from there, People have been going missing for a couple of years now, this explains why.”

“They freed the slaves on a crowded waterfront, causing a riot. In the resulting mayhen, most of the slavers were killed, but also at least four innocent bystanders died too” Lady Gar, the disapproval apparent in her voice. “They sank the slaver’s ship, burned it down to the waterline, blocking the channel so no other ships can pass. After freeing the slaves they got into a fight in the warehouse district. At least three buildings were destroyed.”

Berry noted her mentor’s tone. “They freed 36 vicitms and probably prevented an untold number of future kidnappings. It is unfortunate that innocent people died as a result, but without their actions, many more would have been harmed.”

“They should have gone to the local authorities” Lady Gar responded.

“I think there is a high probability the local authorites already knew about it” Berry said with a little heat. “Why else would they be able to operate in that city that brazenly without fear of being detected?”

Lady Gar was about to say something but Berry didn’t give her a chance.

“Involving them would risk the slavers escaping with the slaves! And even if the authorities were honest” she said in a tone clearly implying that she thought that highly improbable. “would they believe two people with a bounty on them?”

“You are young and foolish” Lady Gar responded, losing her patience. “ I will grant you that the man you married means well. But he is also careless and thinks little of how is actions affect others. He is dangerous to himself, to you and to Nell, and to everyone else around him. His companions are just as bad.”

Berry stood up. “If there is any truth to what you say, then coming here was a big mistake. Almost everything he’s done since I’ve known him has been for my sake. I have to leave.”

“I am your superior in the church. I don’t grant you permission” she replied.

Berry said “I only need permission if I am a member of the order.”

“Don’t threaten me” Lady Gar warned, shocked that things had escalated this far.

“I’m not threatening you, and I’m sorry.” Berry teared up a bit. “You have been so good to us, and I will always be grateful. But I have to go. Mortheus needs me.”

Spoiler: Tuuchi plays her hand.

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Tuuchi watched impassively as Rollins and his men walked out the front door of McCaerney’s home. It had not been to difficult to manipulate events to get him to act. McCaeney was vulnerable, deeply in debt, his organization ripe for the picking. A few rumors spread here and there, and it wasn’t long until Rollin’s greed overtook whatever limited good sense he had.

He was the perfect patsy, and she just hoped her actions would be enough to divert Grange’s attention from Mortheus and Janney, and put it where she wanted, on Rollins, the Elf who had just taken out Grange’s local man.

She thought she must be slipping in her old age. She had missed that McCaerney was not his own man. That was an embarassing error, one that might get her friends killed if she didn’t handle this right.

She was about to do something either brilliant and daring, or suicidally stupid, take your pick. It had cost her most of her cash reserve to arrange and used up three months worth of favors she had accrued.

She hoped her hand in this was hidden, but she couldn’t be sure. She hadn’t planned on moving on Rollins until much later, but she didn’t have time to wait now.

Rollins had not won without a fight. McCaerney’s men did not realize their boss was overextended and fought back hard, so while Rollins had won, he was weakened.

She had given Oakes an enormous amount of information in the last few days. He was smart and cautious, and didn’t act until Rollins made his move. He waited to make sure Rollins was going to win, and was vulnerable.

When he acted, he acted decisively. Tuuchi watched as his men wiped out Rollins’ crew before they made it back to their headquarters.

This wasn’t what Tuuchi wanted originally. She would have much preferred Rollins running thing than Oakes. But someone had to take the fall here, and it was easier for her to frame Rollins than Oakes.

So now Oakes was in charge, and had already sent a message to Grange. Now all she had to do was convince Mortheus he needed to retire from the adventuring life, and convince Janney that a long journey out of town was a good idea.

She sighed, so many plans, so little time.....

A week later, Mortheus and Berry were reunited, and Mortheus told his wife he would really just like to build a small house and raise a family with her.

At Tuuchi’s prompting, he mentally contacted Perle, who was overjoyed to hear from him. He and a few friends had just fought a bunch of dwarves, and might have to tangle with an entire dwarven army and maybe an archbishop or two of Moradin and their associates, and he would love to have her help.

When Mortheus relayed this information to Janney, she was more than willing to go, as she thought that cave complex might be somewhere in that same mountain chain.

Lyora and Perle arrived in Southpoint a few hours later, staying just long enough to grab Janney and go. They were on a tight schedule.

Spoiler: A Declaration of War

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Once Lyora and Perle returned with Janney, they met with Susheen again and discussed their options. His superior had formally complained to the church of Moradin about the attack and had been completly ignored. The dwarves had not even bothered to respond so now Susheen was insisting on going back.

Lyora was concerned that Susheen’s main motivation on going back to the mountains was to get revenge for the destruction of a significant temple of his faith.

Susheen readily admitted that the thought had crossed his mind, but that was not it. He wanted to see what they were planning. Nine thousand troops was a major projection of force.

Janney was blunt with her explanation that the main reason she was here was to see if this was the location of the cave where her troubles with the Orcish deity Luthic, and how she got cursed. She was quite willing to accompany them, and to back them up in any conflict as long as they were willing to do the same for her if she found the cave complex.

Lyora got nervous the more everyone talked. She already knew Susheen was likely going to be trouble when they ran into more dwarves, and now they had a new member of the team that was looking to pick a fight with an entire Orcish religon. When she found herself thinking that Perle was likely going to be the most level-headed ally she had going forward she knew things were bad.

They telported in about half a mile from the destroyed temple so they could approach it cautiously. This turned out to be a good idea, for the ruined site was occupied by a significnt number of dwarves, who had set up camp just adjacent to the shattered remains of the main temple.

While the others waited, Perle quietly approached the site to get a closer look. He returned a few minutes later to report that some sort of ritual seemed to be going on. Someone was chanting where the temple previously stood. The temple roof was gone and all the debris moved out of the way, leaving walls that were roughly 6' high, with three openings into the central area. There was a large sheet of canvas set up as a temporary roof, making it impossible to see who was inside. Whoever was chanting was guarded by 8 heavily armed dwarves stationed around the building.

The dwarves had four guard posts set up farther out from the temple covering the appraches. The guard posts were set up so that each one was visible to two other stations, and each on was manned by four dwarves.

As soon as Perle finished describing the situation Susheen began casting spells to improve his defenses. Lyora looked at him and saw that her friend was going to do this whether she helped or not, so she didn't try to talk them out of it.

"OK, if we want to disrupt this, we need to use hit them fast. I'll pound the temple area with area of effect spells, keep that central force busy. Perle, you take out the North-East guard post, Janney you hit the one to the South East. Susheen you take the one to the Southwest. The goal is to hit them fast."

"You think taking on 30 dwarves at once is a good idea?" Janney asked skeptically.

"The outer guard posts are just early warning, the real threat is in the center. We hit them fast enough we can take out all but one of the guard posts and cause confusion. If things look bad, we withdraw and meet back here." Lyora replied.

"I like it" Perle said. "I bet we are probably faster than they are, once I take out my post I'll move in, get the attention of some of those heavies guarding the temple and see if I can draw them off."

"They have to be expecting this" Janney pointed out. "Two days ago you wiped out the last force they sent, and they retaliated by destroying the temple with a single spell, one that you aren't even close to being able to cast."

"You have a point." Susheen added. "Instead of attacking the guard post, I’ll drop a Flame Strike on the temple site at the same time Lyora casts her spell. Most of the threat is likely inside. As soon the spell goes off I’llcharge the temple while Lyora hits the area again. By the time I get there the survivors inside should be heavily wounded and I will drive my way through the warriors outside and go into the temple and stop that ritual."


"Not a good plan, big guy" Lyora said as she reached up to smack Susheen in the chest. "Guerrilla tactics are our best bet. We hit them hard, we retreat just as quickly and hit them again later. Wearing them down is probably a better bet than trying a direct assault."

"They destroyed a site Holy to my God, murdered four priests and are now peforming a Divine ritual to their own filthy god on the site" Susheen explained matter of factly. " I will not let them finish this ritual if I can help it."

"No, he's right" Perle added. "If we try to pick off a few of them at a time, when we do come back in they are ready for us, and even have time to call from help. I agree that attacking them could be a really bad idea, but if we are going to do it we should hit them hard and fast and try to finish this now."

They cast a number of preparatory spells and then moved into position. Perle made Susheen invisible, and when they got closer he let Susheen use his Silent Metamagic Rod to cast Silence so that he could get even closer.

The signal to attack was hard to miss. Once Susheen’s silence spell lapsed he chanted momentarily and a blue cylinder of flames enveloped the center of the temple and destroyed the tent acting as a roof. Lyora used her ability to see invisible to watch him start to cast, and timed her spell to go off a half second later, and a 20’ radius ball of lightning impacted inside the temple.

As soon as the spells went off Janney raced in and kicked the nearest dwarf in the face. As he staggered backward she punched him twice, and dodged the ineffective counterattacks of the other three guards.

She grabbed the nearest dwarf by his long beard and pulled. He screamed in outrage, dropped his axe and tried to grab her hand. She used the distraction to kick him in the groin, and as he bent over, she slammed her hand into his nose, driving into his brain. The last two dwarves survived long enough to shoot her twice with their bows, but that wasn’t enough to save them.

Perle was even faster, and within seconds two dwarves were down. The remaining two dwarves tried to grapple him and learned one final lesson in life: If you are going to grapple a knife fighter you had better make sure you grab both hands or you’ll end up getting cut to ribbons.

As Susheen roared “For Pulura!” and charged in Lyora cast another lightning ball, hitting most of the insides of the temple just as four more heavily armored dwarves stumbled out.

Susheen had to charge through a hail of arrows, but only two hit, and he crashed into the hastily assembled line of dwarves armed with Halbards. He endured their attacks and tried to ovverun them. The first dwarf went down and got crushed, but the second managed to keep his feet and Susheen soon found himself surrounded.

Lyora cast her next spell, dropping a ball of lightning directly on top of Susheen and the dwarves surrounding him. Susheen withstood most of the damage due to his Resist Energy Spell, but the dwarves were not so lucky.

As Susheen attacked every dwarf within reach Lyora began to think that they might actually pull this off.

Unfortunately for her, someone else had a different plan. Lyora screamed as she was shot four times with a shortbow, disrupting her next spell and wounding her badly. She frantically looked around for whoever shot her and found her, just as the wiry dwarf archer fired again, killing her.

With the dwarves in his guard post dead, Perle charged the next guard post and began slaughtering them. They fought on grimly even though they knew they were overmatched. Twice he felt a spell try to take effect on him, but each time he managed to shrug it off.

Janney decided to rush the temple, and reached it just as Susheen was battling the remaining dwarves guarding it. She ran right by him and bypassing the opening, leaped up and over the wall. She couldn’t see what was on the other side until she was in the air, and crashed into a table and chairs set up inside. As she got to her feet she saw five dead dwarves slumped on the ground.

Before she could get to her feet she was hit three times with arrows fired through one of the openings into the temple. She rolled out of the line of fire and pulled a potion out and quickly drank it to try to counter the damage she had taken, the arrows had been powerfully enchanted and had almost killed her.

She stood up and peeked over the wall and took an arrow in her right eye, knocking her backward. As she tried to roll out of the way she was hit two more times and collapsed.

Susheen finished off the last dwarves guarding him and charged into the temple to see everyone inside dead, inclduing Janney. He was worried about Lyora, he hadn’t seen any more of her spells. He took a second to cast a spell to heal some of the damage he had taken, then rushed back outside to help Perle and see what happened to Lyora.

Meanwhile, Perle had killed the last dwarf in the third guard post and was starting to hunt down the spellcaster he had felt trying to mess with his mind. He saw her running towards the last remaining guard post and followed. By the time he caught up with her and killed her and the four guards he realized that all signs of battle had ceased.

He used his wand to heal himself a bit and then quietly approached the temple, stopping about thirty yards out. Looking around carefully he saw Lyora sprawled on the ground with multiple arrows sticking out of her chest and back. Inside the temple Janney was laid out with an arrow sticking out of her face.

Moving carefully he circled the temple and saw an enraged Susheen charge through the high grass. Thye enormous cleric had multiple arrows sticking out of his arms and chest and as Perle raced into help he saw the big man fall.

Perle managed to get to the dwarven woman before she could turn to face him and managed to stab her once. She tried to tumble backwards to shoot him but he kept close and slashed her again.

She calmly dropped the bow and drew her own short sword. They fought silently. She was just as fast as he was and far stronger and unwounded, but he was the more accomplished fighter, and his skill eventually won out.

Perle raced over to Susheen and used his curing wand. The big man was fortunately still alive, and after he was awake healed himelf somewhat while Perle went back to stabilize and bind and gag the dwarven woman. Once he was sure she couldn’t escape he went around and made sure the rest of the dwarves were dead while Susheen went to check on Lyora and Janney,

“We need to get out of here, they had spellcasters, and may have been able to get a warning out. Somehow I don’t think they will stop with an Earthquake.” Perle said as he dragged Janney and Lyora into his portable hole.

Susheen looked like he was going to object, but then looked down at Lyora’s broken body and just nodded.

They stayed just long enough for Perle and Susheen to drag the dead dwarves out of the former temple.

Susheen almost changed his mind to stay and wait for someone to show up when he saw that the dwarves had smashed every single holy symbol of Pulura in the former temple and replaced them with symbols of Moradin. He managed to keep his head enough to realize that would probably just be a form of suicide, and instead satisfied himself with smashing Moradin’s marks wherever he saw them.

They were about two miles away when they felt the wind pick up and saw five misty white figures flying at high speed towards the temple remains on the wind.

They ducked down until they passed and kept going, hoping they hasn’t been seen and couldn’t be tracked.

[Toxic Shaman]

Spoiler: Trouble in Paradise

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They made good time and stopped for the night in a small valley about six miles away. If there was anyone pursuing them they couldn’t detect them.

Once they stopped Perle pulled out a small pouch and tossed it to Susheen. “Diamonds and some diamond dust” he said.

“Can’t bring them back today, but first thing in the morning.” the big cleric replied. “Let’s see what our captive has to say.”

He reached down and pulled out the rag preventing her from speaking. “Scream and I kill you. Try to cast a spell, I kill you. Lie to me, I kill you” he started.

The dwarven looked up him stoicly. “Can I ask for water, or do I die from that too?”

The big man pulled out a waterskin and squirted some in her mouth. “What happened back there” he asked.

“You mean other than you slaughtering 30 of my people?” she sneered back at him. If she was hoping to provoke him she was disappointed.

“This started when your people assaulted my temple” he replied levelly. “and destroyed it, killing the priests inside. And then I come here and find you using it for your own foul ritual.”

She said nothing and just stared at him.

“So I ask again, what happened back there?”

“No idea” she replied with a shrug. “Above my pay grade. I was just there to help out in case the soldiers were assaulted by something they couldn’t handle. You saw how well that worked out.” She sounded a little bitter.

“You got two of us” Perle said. “Not many around capable of that.”

“Stick around a while, I’m sure someone will show up that is more than capable of finishing the job” she shot back.

Susheen reached down and gripped her face in one huge hand and forced her to look at him. “Forget about that. Who assigned you this role?”

“I volunteered” she laughed. “Stupid move I know, last thing you want to do as a soldier, but I did it. These mountains are dangerous and I thought I could help”

“Why is there an army here at all?” Susheen asked.

“Again, above my pay grade” she repeated. “Look, I don’t know much about the overall situation here, and you have to know that even if I did I wouldn’t tell you.”

“I admire your dedication” Susheen said with his typical lack of emotion. “But I have to know what is going on here, and you are the only one here who can give me the information I need.”

He stood up. “At this point I consider our two faiths to be at war. I am an extremely devout priest, and am willing to do whatever it takes to protect my faith. You think about that for a while and we’ll chat again.” He walked off to go stand watch.

She looked over at Perle. “Is that guy for real? “ she asked. “His little godling isn’t a pimple on the ass of the All Father, and her clergy is going to holy war with Him?”

Perle sat down nearby. “I believe him. He is that angry. I don’t know why your church decided to assault his, but he is not going to back down.”

He pulled out an apple from his pack, sliced it in half and offered her half with a gesture. When she shook her head no he took a bite and continued talking to her.

“I’m not going to lie, I don’t see how you are getting out of this alive. Wish it were different, but we both know it can’t be.” He tossed the apple core into the dirt. “If I let him do this it will scar him permanently and make your last hours really ugly. I don’t want that for either of you. If things were different you might have taken all four of us out and I respect that.”

She nodded while at the knife in his hand and even managed to smile. “I don’t think this is how good cop, bad cop is supposed to work.”

He looked back sadly. “Unfortunately this isn’t a ploy.”

She lost the smile. “I know it’s not. My suggestion to you is to run like hell as soon as you finish this. I wasn’t kidding when I said I don’t know what is going on, but obviously something big is. Get clear, or it will get you too.”

He nodded and reached out and slashed her throat.



The next morning Susheen raised both Lyora and Janney and restored them to health as best he could. It would be a week before he could fully restore them completely. Afterwards he filled them in on what had happend while they were dead.

“What’s buried there?” Lyora asked. She noticed that Perle and Susheen seemed pretty tense.

“The dwarf that killed you both” Susheen replied, glaring at Perle. “I intended on interrogating her for information but Perle killed her while I was on watch.”

“Torture is the word you are looking for Susheen” Perle responded mildly. “You tried interrogation and it didn’t work. I just prevented you from doing something more that you would have regretted later.”

“I would not have regretted it” Susheen insisted, his voice mild but his posture indicating that he was angry.

“OK, then I would have regretted it” Perle responded.

“Stop it, both of you” Lyora said, moving to stand between the two of them. “What’s done is done. Did you speak with her corpse before burying her?”

“Yes” Susheen answered. “She was working for the church of Moradin to defend the army contingent we attacked, and knew nothing about their overall strategic intentions.”

She looked up at Perle and shook her finger at him. “Don’t act on your own like that again. It didn’t cause any harm this time, but I’m not putting up with it.”

Perle got very quiet as he stared at her. “You seem to be under the delusion that you are in charge here.”

Lyora froze and in her peripheral vision noticed that Janney had moved into a position to back her friend up and cut off Susheen, who looked like he was ready to attack him.

Perle hadn’t reached for a weapon, but Lyora had seen him fight before and knew that meant nothing. He could draw a knife and attack long before either she or Susheen could react.

“Better we get this out in the open now” Perle continued, staring at her, his eyes hard. “You made a serious mistake just now, but one that we can revover from. Or we can go our seperate ways.”

Lyora resisted the urge to take a step back and instead stared back at him. In truth, she was glad Perle had prevented Susheen from torturing the woman. She knew Susheen was having trouble handling what had happened to his temple and was not behaving rationally. Criticizing Perle was meant to convince Susheen she had his back and hopefully calm him down, but instead it had only made the situation worse.

She could tell that Susheen was barely holding onto his own anger and feared that if she didn’t say something to defuse things this would spiral out of control. But that was not to be as she got angry herself. “Don’t threaten me” she warned.

“I haven’t” Perle said calmly. “but I can see this isn’t going to work.”

He took a step back and turned to Janney. “Sorry J, can’t do this anymore.”

Janney kept her eyes on Susheen. “I know, me either. I’m coming with you.”

Susheen watched them walk away. “Good riddence” he said to Lyora.

“Shut up, Susheen” Lyora snapped. She turned and walked away and crouched down with her back to him and started rearranging the contents of her pack.

[Babaji]

“You got two of us” Perle said. “Not many around capable of that.”

“Stick around a while, I’m sure someone will show up that is more than capable of finishing the job” she shot back.

Really liked the female dwarf antagonist, sorry to see her go.

Perle has become an interesting character. How did this conflict play out? Was it between characters only, or did the players get into it too?

I have to say that splitting the party when you are deep in enemy territory is not a good idea...

[Toxic Shaman]

Yeah, she was fun. I didn't expect her to live long enough to show any personality at all, but she quickly became one of my favorite NPCs.

The argument was mostly in character. I left out a good bit of dialogue about it. Once Susheen realized what Perle did he was livid. He spent a good bit of time yelling at Perle and appeared to be trying to goad him into a fight, which was not a very smart move on his part. Susheen is an extremely capable combatant, but relies on time to cast buff spells.

We've had inter-party conflict before in our games and we usually can leave it in character. Susheen's player understood that Perle really was trying to prevent Susheen from becoming like Perle, and that much of how his behaves is driven by how he loathes himself.

Perle's player realized that Susheen's player was playing him as out of control due to the attack on his faith by the church of Moradin, and that Susheen's actions were appropriate in character.

Lyora's player's actions in this episode are one of the examples of why I named this story Hold my Beer. Her player knew things had become really tense between the two characters while Lyrora and Janney were dead, and decided to have Lyora act in a way to stir the pot rather than diffuse the situation. Lyora's actions upon being raised made sense, but it made a bad situation worse.

Yeah, splitting the party while hanging out only a few miles away from where you just killed almost three dozen dwarves is not an intelligent move. I was a bit surprised they didn't keep moving, particularly when they saw dwarven reinforcements wind walk in hours earlier....

I had already worked out how the dwarves would react to this, and you'll see how that plays out in the next post, but with the party split up. I didn't cut back on their adversaries just because each set of PCs was less powerful split up...

[Toxic Shaman]

Spoiler: Splitting up and dithering has its consequences

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“What a mess” Janney muttered to Perle after they had walked a few hundred yards.

“I know” Perle replied. “What do you want to do? We can look around, see what else is going on, or hike out of here.”

“Let’s just put some distance between us and that temple and then decide. The dwarves have to be searching the area” Janney said, picking up her pace a bit.

They kept walking and about 20 minutes later Perle looked up and then grabbed Janney and ducked down.

Five dwarves were riding ponies at high speed in the general direction of where they had left Susheen and Lyora. The ponies were obviously conjured, they ran in complete silence and their outline seemed blurry. Three of the five dwarves were heavily armed and armored. Real ponies would have struggled with the weight but these mounts seemed to have no problem keeping up with the other two.

The fourth dwarf was wearing chain mail and had a warhammer strapped to his back. The fifth was unarmored and carried a staff in one hand. All of them were under some sort of chameleon effect. While they were visible their coloring tended to blend in relatively well with their surroundings, even while in motion, making them a little hard to see.

Fortunately for Janney and Perle they were approaching Susheen and Lyora from a different direction, and would never pass closer than a few hundred yards to their position.

As they passed Perle looked around to see if there were any stragglers following them. Seeing none, he started to jog back towards where they had left the other two.

Janney watched him go for a few seconds, and then sighed and ran after him.

“We have a plan?” she asked him when she caught up.

“Um, kill some dwarves and save those two idiots…..You?” Perle replied between breaths.

She shook her head, laughed and kept running.

The dwarves stopped a few hundred yards away from last night’s camp. The dwarf with the staff cast a spell and the rest of the dwarves got off their ponies. They were all facing the other direction, either watching the wizard, or were looking towards where the team had camped the night before, which allowed Janney and Perle to keep running.

When Perle and Janney were still hundred yards away the wizard nodded and he and the chain mail wearing dwarf cleric started casting spells. This didn’t take long, and the dwarves spread out and crept up to the top of the hill, with the wizard still riding his pony.

Janney and Perle sprinted even faster, but could only watch helplessly as the dwarf cleric cast a Flame Strike and the wizard cast something else.

They could hear Susheen roar out a challenge, and the three heavily armed dwarves and the cleric charged over the hill.

A few seconds later they saw a singed Lyora running away. She wasn’t heading directly towards them, but it would be quicker to get to her than it would be to Susheen, so Janney immediately changed directions to intercept her. From the way Lyora was running it was clear she was completely out of it.

Janney quickly caught up with her while Perle headed closer to the hill to see what was going on.

Janney had to tackle her to get her to stop, but once she did Lyora came to her senses and fought off the enchantment that had been placed on her.

By the time Perle got to where he could see what was going on Susheen was down, as was one of the armored dwarves. The cleric was wounded but seemed to have come out of the fight relatively intact, and he limped over and healed the unconscious dwarf.

“Go get the other one” the cleric told the two unwounded dwarves and the wizard.

Perle backed off quietly and ran back, signaling to Lyora and Janney with his hands, indicating the number of dwarves and what they were about to do. Neither one had any idea what information he was trying to convey.

Convinced the other two were warned now and ready Perle ducked down and waited, and within seconds the two heavily armored dwarves raced by, moving slightly faster than plate mail wearing dwarves should have been able to move.

A few seconds later their wizard followed, riding on his Phantom Pony.

As he went by Perle stepped up and threw a dagger at the Pony, causing it to dissipate. The dwarf wizard fell awkwardly and Perle was on him before he could get to his feet. He tried to cast but failed from all the blood filling his lungs.

Lyora had lost her crossbow so she cast a ball of lightning at the charging dwarves, catching both of them. One of them slammed into her and knocked her to the ground, knocking her unconscious.

Janney rushed into attack the other one, and kicked him in the chest, which didn’t seem to bother him at all. He retaliated by slamming her in the shoulder with a blow from his Axe that rocked her backwards.

Perle had initially thought to head back to the camp to take on the cleric and other warrior, but changed his mind when he saw Lyora down and Janney wounded.

He rushed in to help, but Janney had to face both of them for a few seconds until he got there. She managed to punch one of them, but the other hit her multiple times, and she looked like she couldn’t take much more abuse.

Perle raced in, and slipped his knife into a gap in the wounded dwarf’s armor. The dwarf roared his outrage and turned to face him, but Perle ducked the blow and his counterattack hurt the dwarf badly.

His next attack finished off his opponent, and he turned to see the third armored dwarf running towards him screaming obscenities at the top of his lungs. Behind him the cleric chanted momentarily, and then grew to almost 9’ tall.

“We’re leaving” Perle shouted to Janney as he picked up Lyora and stuffed her into a Portable Hole and then cast a spell to increase his speed.

Janney fought all out offensively, and rocked her opponent back with a series of blows that knocked him to his knees. “Got it” she replied as she finished off the warrior with a kick to the face.

They both raced away and quickly outdistanced the remaining two dwarves, who stopped to heal their wounded companions.

After running for a few minutes they stopped long enough to pull Lyora out and see that she was dead. They kept running until Perle’s spell wore out and then went to ground to hide.

Fifteen minutes later they saw four dwarves ride away on their Phantom Ponies. There was no sign of the wizard, but each warrior had a large body sized bundle strapped behind him.

“They’ll be back” Janney managed to say as she struggled to catch her breath.

Perle nodded and got to his feet. He pulled his flying carpet out. “Let’s fly a bit to eliminate our trail in case they bring back a tracker.”

He pulled out the portable hole and got in. “Pull me out in 9 minutes please”

Janney rode the carpet for almost 10 minutes, not in the same direction they had come already and then let Perle out. Then he rode the carpet while she jogged along side. After another 10 minutes they repeated the ‘Perle in the Hole’ trick in a somewhat different direction.

After that they assumed they had done enough to fool anyone tracking them without magic and then just concentrated on making time.

It was early evening when they stopped, with Perle having detected the presence of another encampment up ahead.

Exhausted they stopped for the night and rested.

[Toxic Shaman]

Spoiler: A new arrival

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The next morning they got a closer look at the camp. This one looked much like the one they attacked at the ruined Pulura temple. There were four guard posts surrounding a tent in the center, all of it sitting on top of a small hill that had a commanding view of the valley below.

They decided to keep going. They suspected that the three bodies on the back of the Phantom Ponies were Susheen, the dwarf wizard, and the dwarf archer Perle had killed. They couldn’t be sure, but they thought it likely, and it was too risky to go back and check to see if they hadn’t taken him with them.

It took most of the morning for them to get around the dwarf camp. They backtracked to get farther away, then circled it from a distance of well over a mile. They ended up heading slightly deeper into the mountain chain as that was the direction with the most cover and moved slowly, careful not to do anything that would make them easier to detect.

That evening they camped again, and the next morning began to try to work their way down out of the mountains. As they were heading down a narrow pass that opened up onto a small meadow they heard the sounds of shouting, and crept forward carefully.

Nine dwarves, two of them on horseback, were chasing two exhausted looking Orc warriors. The Orcs were stumbling and barely keeping ahead of their pursuers.

Janney shouted “Friend” in Orcish to get their attention, much to the dismay of Perle. The orcs looked up and changed direction and put on a final burst of speed towards them.

As the Orcs staggered closer Janney raced out and dropped the lead dwarf with a flurry of kicks and punches that left him bleeding on the ground.

Perle was not far behind her and moved in. He slashed the nearest dwarf, and sidestepped an attack by a second dwarf and stabbed him too.

The weary Orcs turned to help, and within seconds all but one of the dwarves was down. The last dwarf on horseback tried to flee but Janney easily outpaced the horse and took him out too.

While Janney talked to the Orcs Perle went around and made sure all the dwarves were dead. On one of the horses he found a wrapped bundle, and pulled it apart to reveal an elegantly dressed gnome tied up and gagged.

He cut the gnome loose and helped him to his feet. The gnome chanted for a moment, and the dirt fell from his clothing, face and hands.

“My thanks” he said as he rubbed his wrists, seeming rather composed. He limped over to the pony and retrieved an ornate gnome-sized walking stick, a small backpack and a very expensive looking hat. His gray beard and hair were neatly trimmed except for his mustaches, which seemed far too large for such a small face. It is difficult to guess age in a gnome, but from the way he moved, he appeared to be far from the bloom of youth.

In all, he was much better dressed than a really wealthy noble, but didn’t act like one, he seemed much more approachable. “Does anyone require healing?” he asked politely.

Janney and the Orcs were still trying to communicate with limited success at this point. Janney’s Orcish was terrible and the Orcs did not speak Common, but it turned out the gnome was fluent in both.

The gnome introduced himself as Jebidal Deetz, and healed the wounded Orcs as he translated.

The Orcs thanked them for the help. They lived in a small village nearby that had been wiped out by the dwarven army the day before. They had managed to escape and were trying to get to another nearby village to warn them, but had been seen and chased.

Janney told them they had also fought the dwarves twice, and when they mentioned they had Lyora’s body still, Jebidal immediately offered to reincarnate her the following morning.

The Orcs knew the area, and agreed to lead them to a relatively safe place to rest. They traveled another five hours and then stopped for the night.

Jebidal told them he was an herbalist, and was looking for some rare herbs in the area. His first inkling that the dwarves had invaded in force was when he woke up to find himself surrounded. They tied him up and were taking him back to their camp when they discovered the Orcs and gave chase.

As he spoke a tiny rabbit peaked out from under his suit and began eating greens Jebidal pulled out of his pockets,

Janney asked the dwarves if they knew were she could find Luthic’s Cave, but neither of them had any ideas. They had a Luthic Cleric in their village but she had died in the assault. They left a few hours later, and promised to put in a good word with any other Orcs they ran into about the party.

The next morning Jebidal performed a brief ritual using a scroll, and Lyora was alive again, albeit in a different body.

“Your are beautiful!” he swooned when she sat up, feeling a bit disoriented. “I have not seen a gnome lass as comely as you in many a year!”

He bowed and reached down and grabbed her hand and kissed it. “ Jebidal Deetz at your service!”

Lyora did look attractive, at least to gnomes. Some of her halfling features remained, but her nose had grown by an enormous amount and took up almost 1/3 of her face.

“Unfortunately I cannot help with a Restoration yet” Jebidal added apologetically, appearing smitten with Lyora, much to her dismay. “Not enough time has passed”

“Susheen?” she asked, desperately trying to ignore Jebidal’s interest.

“He’s gone. We managed to get away and kill their wizard, but the rest survived, and appeared to take his body with them.” Perle responded.

“My bow?” she asked Janney.

“You must have dropped it” Janney replied. “You didn’t have it when we caught up with you”

She nodded and looked down, and appeared about ready to cry momentarily, but then she got to her feet.

“Thank you” she said to Jebidal. “And thank you too” she added awkwardly to Janney and Perle. “I’m glad you came back”

“Let’s start over” Perle suggested, feeling a bit awkward too. “We’re going to need to stick together for a while I think”

She shook her head, wanting to put the past behind her too. “Teleportation is not an option I’m afraid. “I need a few restorations to get me back to where I was.”

“We can walk” Perle said. “What should we do next?”

They filled in Lyora what they had done and seen since she died. Lyora and Perle were both interested in taking a closer look at the nearest dwarven camp to see what they were doing.

Upon hearing about it Jebidal also expressed interest. The idea of multiple dwarven clerics performing rituals at the same time in different places was intriguing to him, and he told the others that if he got to close enough he could get an invisible magical sensor to scout the area invisibly.

They backtracked and approached the camp and Jebidal sent in his sensor. He concentrated and sent his invisible sensor in and reported that there were three clerics of Moradin in the tent in the center. One was chanting continuously and the rest appeared to be resting.

They decided to leave the camp alone, and headed back the way they had come before. When they got to within a few hundred yards of where they left the bodies they stopped and Jebidal sent his sensor to check the area out.

His sensor showed five dwarves looking at the area, all of them accompanied by Phantom Ponies.

Perle sneaked forward to get a closer look and realized he recognized them. One of them was the wizard in the party that had killed Susheen a few days earlier, another was the dwarven archer that had killed Janney and Lyora days earlier. They were accompanies by the three warriors from the last fight.

He watched for a few minutes as they discussed what to do. It looked like the dwarven woman had picked up the party’s trail from when they left it.

He hurried back to the others, and they decided to intercept them and plan an ambush.

About an hour later they were in place a few hundred yards from where they had camped after rescuing the Orcs and Jebidal.

Jebidal cast an Etherics Shards spell covering the area where they would likely approach.

Perle waited about 100 yards in front of the rest of the party along with Jebidal, and once he saw the approaching dwarves he moved to where he could see Lyora and Janney waiting and waved to them to let them know. Everyone started buffing themselves, and then waited.

The female dwarf was in the lead, tracking them on foot while two of the armored dwarves followed closely behind on Phantom ponies. The wizard was about 10 yards further back while the last armored dwarf road rear guard.

Lyora started things off with a Ball of Lightning centered on the archer and front two warriors to get their attention, disrupting their ponies and damaging all of them except the woman, who somehow rolled free. The two heavily armored warriors got up and charged through the invisible Etheric Shards, taking a considerable amount of damage along the way.

As soon as the spell went off, Jebidal dropped another Etheric Shards covering the wizard, archer and rear guard warrior, while Perle threw daggers at the wizard.

Lyora could do nothing to prevent getting shot three times by the dwarven woman further down the trail, and if wasn’t for drinking a protection from arrows extract that Jebidal earlier she would likely have died.

Janney stepped to the edge of the field of Shards and attacked just as the first warrior exited the deadly area. She took a good bit of damage, but gave almost as good as she got, and in a few seconds her opponent was down. She tried to intercept the second dwarf and got in one good punch as he went by but could not prevent him from reaching Lyora.

The charging dwarf swung once and his buried his axe in her chest, killing her instantly.

Meanwhile, the last armored warrior stumbled as his Phantom Pony was disrupted when he tried to charge Perle, who ignored him and threw three more daggers at the wizard, who was levitating out of the field. The wizard fell back into the shards and did not move again.

As Jebidal reached out with one hand and a tiny ball of acid formed, and he flicked it towards the downed warrior, burning him badly.

The archer turned towards Jebidal and fired three arrows at him. One of them hit, but his Protection from Arrows extract helped lessen the damage somewhat.

Meanwhile, Janney finished off the warrior that killed Lyora and then knelt down to check if there was anything she could do for her friend. Seeing that she was past healing she got up and raced around the edge of the Etheric Shards field.

Perle could avoid the last warrior no longer, but it didn’t take more than a few seconds for him to kill the determined dwarf.

The last remaining dwarf looked around at Perle, Janney and Jebidal and sighed and dropped her bow and stuck her hands in the air.

“So we meet again” Perle said. “Glad to hear someone valued you enough to Raise you”

Janney walked over to where Perle and Jebidal were standing. “Lyora’s dead” she said softly.

Perle swore under his breath. Jebidal looked crushed, and rushed up the hill towards her.

“What happened to our cleric friend?” he asked the woman.

“You mean the one that was going to torture me?” she said. “What do you think happened to him...”

“He’s dead then” Perle asked.

“I’m not sure” she replied. “I think he may be alive. I know they talked to him”

Perle nodded, but before he could ask another question the woman reached down, grabbed her bow and ran through the remains of the Etheric Shard, eating the damage in an attempt to escape.

Janney and Perle took chase, but had to circle around the Shards field before chasing her.

Janney caught up with her first, and by the time Perle arrived the woman was down, and Janney had her head in both hands. She squeezed, then twisted until the woman’s neck cracked.

They managed to drag the wizard’s body out of the shards and looted it, along with the rest of the dwarves, then walked up the hill towards where Jebidal sat on the ground next to Lyora.

He pulled out a scroll and cast Graceful Repose on her body, then watched as Perle gently put her into a portable hole.

“Let’s go, we got their attention now, this is going to get escalated to someone more powerful probably, lets put some distance on us.”

Spoiler: OOC:

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Lyora had a really bad string of luck, dying three times in quick succession, without having enough time in between to get restorations to recover the level loss. She started at level 10, and a few days later was dead again at level 7, and would have been level 5 if raised again.

Jebidal Deetz is the new PC for Susheen's character. He's a middle aged gnome Mindchemist Vivisectionist Alchemist 10 // Silksworn Occultist 10, and a really good utility character that can do a little of everything.

The players planned the ambush pretty well. They knew they were facing some pretty tough opposition, with two of their own not at full strength, and Lyora without a crossbow, nullifying half of her abilities. They played it off pretty well, but Lyora's unfortunate tendency to draw crits against her doomed her again. Her player decided to try to get the character returned to life, but planned on retiring her once she did. She decided to not bring Mortheus back yet, as it didn't make sense IC for him to leave Berry alone again, so a new character joins the team soon.

[Toxic Shaman]

Spoiler: More arrivals, more death

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Two days later they found another mysterious dwarven camp, and bypassed it like they had the others and kept going.

Late the following day Perle’s sharp eyes noticed five Wind-walking dwarves pass by almost overhead. The group managed to take cover and avoid being seen. Three hours later they arrived at where they suspected the dwarves had come from.

There were nineteen dead Orcs left to lay where they had fallen. Many had died from fire magics, while others had wounds from melee weapons. From a careful examination of the bodies Perle concluded that the attackers had looted the bodies, but had not been very thorough. A few minor magic items were missed, and what was left was at least masterwork quality.

They kept going, and two days later they could see a pass up ahead that led to the foothills, which would allow them to leave the mountain chain. The pass dipped down into a small fog filled valley, and there was a large dwarven garrison located on the other side after the elevation rose enough to get out of the fog.

The outpost was much larger than what they had seen so far. The peaks surrounding the pass were steep and devoid of cover and while it looked like it might be possible to fly over them, they would likely be seen.

They decided to settle in and watch it for a full day to see what was going on. The next morning they saw a team of five wind-walking dwarves take off from the garrison and head out further into the mountain chain. The fog never lifted fully, but it dissipated enough that they were able to see that there was something moving in the fog, something huge. A few hours later four of the five wind-walking dwarves returned.

The next morning enough time had passed since Janney’s last restoration for her to have another one, and Jebidal was able to restore her to full strength. While they were talking quietly about what to do, Perle noticed something.

Three men were carefully approaching in their general direction, but none of them were that stealthy. One was a middle aged Half Orc dressed in leather armor and a chain shirt, and armed with a Fauchard. He had feathers braided into his gray hair and his armor was festooned with all sorts of charms made of fur and feathers.

The second was a large young Half Orc wearing chain mail and carrying a Falchion. Trailing the other two was a slender elf wearing no armor and carrying a small wand in one hand.

Janney realized that she recognized the young elf, having once been arrested in South Point with him after they tore up a bar in a dispute over cards. She whispered this info to Perle, and then stepped out so the new arrivals could see her.

They stopped and appeared ready to attack, but after a word from the elf Milothiopolus they relaxed a little and approached her.

Milo and Janney introduced everyone. The Orc with the Fauchard was called Kreene and was some sort of shamanic spellcaster. He was traveling with his son Orzstic, a warrior from the same tribe. They were not from around here originally, and the three of them had emerged from a three week investigation of an abandoned dungeon to find dwarven army units everywhere.

They were traveling her now attempting to meet up with a band of warriors they had heard about who were intent on assaulting this garrison.

Perle described the bodies they had found three days earlier, and why they suspected a strike team from the garrison as being the ones that killed them. Kreene wasn’t sure, but suspected that the dead Orcs were the group they were attempting to find.

They discussed their options. Kreene said that he could reincarnate Lyora if provided the appropriate material components. Half an hour later Lyora was back, and restored, this time in the body of a young female Half Orc. She was happy to be alive again, and relieved to no longer be a gnome, but she was even weaker than she was the last time she was alive,as she was down four levels compared to the rest of the party.

They then discussed how to address the garrison. They all agreed that it would be better to hit them while the wind-walking dwarves were away if possible. Kreene informed the party that Teleporting in was not an option, that there seemed to be a Dimensional Anchor effect active in the entire mountain range, and he suspected that the dwarves had somehow been involved with creating it.

Jebidal was keen on using his invisible floating sensor to scout the area first before they decided what to do, in order to get a better impression of what they were up against. Perle went with him to get closer before using the sensor. While Jebidal had little natural abilities at moving without being detected, his small size and ability to alchemically change his skin and clothing to blend in with his surroundings made him almost as hard to detect as the stealthy Perle.

They first stopped near the edge of the fog bank, and Jebidal sent his invisible sensor out. There were two outposts on the hills overlooking the garrison a few hundred yards out in front, each manned by four dwarves with bows. The camp was full of activity with dwarves digging trenches and building fortifications. There were at least 100 dwarves present here, and they appeared to be digging in for a long occupation.

The walls of the pass were narrow, only a few hundred feet wide at the base, and hundreds of feet high on either side. Climbing would be impossible without being seen unless invisibility magic was involved.

Jebidal then sent his sensor into the valley through the fog. The sensor lasted about a minute before Jebidal detected sudden motion and the sensor was destroyed.

He conjured up another one, and sent it across the valley about 15’ above the fog, and when it was about a third of the way across there was a huge roar, and an enormous reptilian head and body leaped up and snapped at the sensor, destroying it again. It looked like some huge lizard, at least 30’ long, but it could have been even larger as it never came entirely out of the fog.

The lizard’s roar and appearance got the attention of the camp, and a dwarf in each of the two forward outposts blew whistles and began signaling to dwarves in the main camp with flags. After about 30 seconds 20 dwarves armed with bows moved into position to threaten the valley, along with three dwarves standing a bit further back that looked like spellcasters.

Jebidal started to move to step back, but Perle grabbed him by the arm and pulled him down to wait. Movement would be much easier to detect than if they just kept their heads down and tried to wait them out.

Unfortunately, the lizard’s roar also got the attention of the rest of the party, who feared something had happened to Perle and Jebidal and decided to investigate. They were noticed by a keen eyed sentry and the activity level in the camp ratcheted up another notch.

Realizing this, Perle cast invisibility on himself and Jebidal, and they retreated back the way they had come. They caught up with the rest of the party and decided that if the dwarves went on the offensive they would be hemmed in by the mountains on either side, but there was nowhere they could retreat too quickly.

While the party started preparing for battle, Perle and Janney returned to where he could watch the camp to see if there was pursuit, and cast a See Invisible Spell in case the dwarves tried an invisible assault.

The dwarves stayed at a heightened state of alert and 15 minutes later, five invisible dwarves wind-walked up into the air and took off. They went almost straight up until they were out of sight.

While Perle continued to watch, Janney raced back to report to the others. When she got there she saw what looked like an enormous Djinn standing next to Kreene. It was at least 9’ tall, and was wielding a greatsword almost as tall.

“Is this one of the varlets bothering you, my master?” it rumbled to Kreene in a deep voice.

“No, she is a friend” Kreene reassured it.

Janney noticed that there was a glowing rune in the center of the huge Djinn’s bare chest, and a corresponding rune in the center of Kreene’s right eye.

Meanwhile Perle saw eight more flying dwarves rise up into the air at high speed. Seven of the eight were visible, and all eight rose until they were over one hundred feet above the fog before heading across the valley at high speed. Most of them looked like warriors of some sort, heavily armored and carrying axes and shields. Two were more lightly armored and bore short bows, and the invisible dwarf was unarmored and looked like some sort of spellcaster.

Perle swore and started running back towards the others. Behind him he heard a scream and turned to see two enormous Rocs diving in. Each one grabbed a dwarf in its talons and then immediately pulled up. The remaining dwarves reflexively dove closer to the fog, and one of them got swallowed whole by the big lizard, which leaped up a full 100’ into the air to grab it.

The five surviving dwarves kept going as Perle raced back towards the rest of the group. Seeing him coming and the dwarves coming right behind him, Kreene, his genie Eidolon, Janney and Orzstic flew towards him. As he flew forward Kreene sang a song about how dwarves had invaded these mountains, slaughtering everyone they found and how they should all be killed. The song had a magical component, and the entire party took strength from it.

Kreene, the Eidolon and Orzstic each slammed into an axe wielding dwarf, while Perle kept going, looking for where the wind walking dwarves had gone, as he was sure they would be arriving at any moment.

Milo and Jebidal took on the spellcaster. Jebidal’s Dispel Magic did not work, but Milo managed to catch the last archer and the spellcaster with an Acid Spray just before Lyora’s Lightning bolt hit the archer, and the weakened dwarf was taken out easily by Janney with one kick to the head. The wizard responded with an Enervation that weakened Milo considerably.

The first wave of dwarves were in serious trouble, but had done their jobs in occupying almost everyone. Kreene and the Eidolon both finished off the dwarves they were fighting and Orzstic had his opponent on the ropes when they heard Perle scream “INCOMING”

A blast of lightning hit the Eidolon in the back, and arced to Lyora, Janney, Perle, Jebidal, Milo, Orzstic and Kreene. At the same time, everyone except Milo was hit by a Greater Dispel magic, losing one of their buff spells. Janney and Perle managed to dodge the spell completely, and Orzstic. Jebidal and Keane both took minimal damage, but Milo, Lyora and the Eidolon were all heavily wounded.

Unfortunately for the spellcaster that had arrived with the first wave, Fly wasn’t one of the spells Janney lost, and she managed to kick him twice, slam her knee into his face and punch him in the kidneys as the force of her attacks spun him around. He was dead before he hit the ground.

Kreene lost his Haste spell, but was still able to fly. He kept up his song that was keeping everyone enraged, and began describing in a cheerful ditty how dwarves were dirty, ugly, loathsome creatures with lice-filled beards and that was just their women.

This enraged the dwarves, but they did not get the magical benefits that Kreene’s allies did. As he watched three dwarven warriors charge towards the party he gripped his Pole arm in one hand and cast a Greater Path of Glory spell, healing himself, Orzstic, and Jebidal, who were the only ones currently close enough to benefit from it.

Perle raced into engage one of the charging warriors from the second wave, and it did not go well. He missed with his first attack and took an Axe to the throat than rocked him backwards. The dwarf continued by bashing him with his shield, and then following it up with two more shots from the Axe. Perle fell to the ground and did not move,

A second warrior slammed into Milo, and dropped him to the ground with a single blow from his axe.

The Eidolon Djinn managed to get between Kreene and the last charging dwarf. They both exchanged a series of blows, with the Eidolon taking the worst of it.

Though Orzstic charged the dwarven wizard that had hit them all with lightning, he couldn’t get there in time to stop him from casting a Cone of Cold spell that caught Kreene, Lyora, Orzstic and the Eidolon. Lyora fell to the ground, and the rest didn’t look much better. Orzstic had the initial satisfaction of smacking the wizard around, but could tell that the wizard had done something to blunt much of his efforts. The wizard’s smug look disappeared when the burly Half Orc dropped his weapon and grappled him.

Jebidal conjured up a Shadow Beast Dire Tiger, and used it to slow down the warrior that took out Perle. He kept summoning more, hoping to keep the warrior occupied long enough so someone else could finish him off.

Kreene fought with the warrior that had killed Milo, while his Eidolon continued to battle the last dwarven warrior. With a cry of frustration, the Eidolon dissipated, as Kreene could no longer spare the life force needed to repair its damage.

Janney arrived and took the Eidolon’s place. Behind the dwarves, Perle woke up, revitalized somewhat by the healing energy provided by Kreene’s raging song and spell. He managed to get to his feet and slip a dagger into the neck of the dwarf Janney was fighting.

The cleric’s sculpted Flame Strike enveloped the area where Kreene, Janney and Perle were fighting the two dwarves. Janney and Perle managed to dodge it completely, but Kreene was barely standing when the smoke cleared. With all three still alive they made short work of the two dwarven warriors.

The cleric, realizing he was in trouble, tried to Command Orzstic to let go of the wizard, but the Half Orc managed to fight off the impulse.

As Kreene, Jebidal and Perle took out the last warrior Janney raced towards the Air-Walking Cleric, who started to flee and transition into wind-walking form. She caught him and slowed him down long enough for the rest to help, and he fell too.

The battered survivors looked around to see who was still alive. Milo and Lyora were both dead and the Eidolon gone, but the rest had survived.

Spoiler: OOC:

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Kreene is the new PC played by the player of Mortheus and Lyora. He is a Half Orc Skald // Spirit Unchained Summoner with a Genie Eidolon.

He took the Leadership Feat, and his Half Orc Son is a Fighter.

Milo is an Elven Wizard and is Janney's Cohort.

Lyora promptly died yet again, prompting jokes around the table about how she had the life expectancy of a drummer in Spinal Tap.

[Endarire]

Why's this called "Hold My Beer?"

[Toxic Shaman]

The title came from my group's tendency to anti-metagame, by which I mean to sometimes taking OOC knowledge and using it to make the situation worse or more complex for their character or party. As in "You thought what you had your character do was really stupid? Hah! I can top that, hold my beer"

A few examples:
* Janney the party girl/emerging alcoholic, gets bored with surveillance and heads to the local inn and gets drunk, passes out in a horse trough right around the corner from the estate they were watching, even though she knew she had been seen by the people she was supposed to be watching out for.
* Mortheus decides to get rid of all his magic items in order to make himself more powerful.
* Lyora's player knows there was a very serious IC argument that took place while her character was dead, and as soon as the character was raised, says something that makes sense IC, knowing that it will inflame the argument.

The players do this in ways that make sense IC for the characters to act, but also in ways they know will make things more "interesting".

I've been working on the next update, hoping to have it out in the next 24 hours.

[Toxic Shaman]

Spoiler: Death from above?

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There was some disagreement about what to do next. Perle argued that trying to assault the camp at this point would be tough. They were down two people and one Eidolon, and the few people who could still fly only had a few minutes coverage left. Their only method of flying left was Perle’s Flying Carpet, which would be rough for everyone to use.

After making sure the dwarves were all dead, they retreated. Once they found a spot where the surrounding mountains were gently sloped enough to support some vegetation Jebidal cast a Rope Trick about 50’ up the slope with a small tree between where the opening was and where the rope hung down, giving the rope some cover. Perle ferried everyone up using the Carpet and they called it quits for the day.

They made it through the night without being disturbed. Reincarnating Milo or Lyora was not an option, they lacked the necessary oils needed for Kreene to cast the spell. Kreene looked at the items they took off the dead cleric and wizard and found that one of them was a Raise Dead scroll. They used that on Milo, and then Jebidal used an extract to Restore one of his lost levels.

Kreene then summoned his Eidolon again, and the Djinn appeared. It immediately got down on both knees and bowed at the waist.

“Oh Master, I am so sorry that I could not defeat them. I am thankful that you survived!”

“I survived with your help Ijargor” Kreene reassured him, and then introduced him to the others, something that he had not time to do the day before.

Rather than attempt to take on the camp directly, they used Perle’s Flying carpet to ascend to a nearby peak. Everyone except Perle and Kreene’s Eidolon Ijargor rode inside bags of holding and they ascended invisibly almost 2100 feet until they reached the peak, about half a mile from the camp.

There were numerous higher peaks nearby, but it looked like they could make their way above the camp by climbing if they were careful. It took them almost an hour to get into position, but they managed to do so without mishap. There was no sign of the Rocs that Perle had seen the day before.

Looking down they could see that after the camp the pass widened considerably and the terrain dropped down into a much larger valley, with more rolling hills than mountains. Seeing the camp was difficult from their vantage point. They would need to climb down the mountain to get to a point where the drop was more sheer, the slope was enough that it blocked their view.

Navigating that took a few hours, and during that time a Roc came by to check them out. It swooped in to try to grab the Eidolon Ijargor, who saw it coming and used his enormous Greatsword to chop a huge chunk of flesh from its chest. In pain, it grabbed the Djinn and pulled up, taking a slash from Orzstic and Kreene which caused it to drop the Eidolon. It feebly flew away, deciding that maybe there was easier prey.

When they reached the point that they could see the camp they cast a number of buff spells, and when everyone was ready, Jebidal cast an Invisibility Sphere spell, and then they flew out and dove down towards it.

Spoiler: A view from the other side

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Captain Donal Ironhair was concerned. His best wizard and seven of his best soldiers were missing in action since yesterday, along with part of the elite church Strike Team operating out of the base he was building. He still had a lot of good troops, but he was light on magical support, and the fortifications his men were building would only be effective if he was facing non-magically augmented opponents.

Still, he had his orders, and would do his best to obey them. He still had little understanding of the strategic goals of this whole invasion. The tactics the army had been forced to employ in this campaign were far from ideal. Splitting up an army into small self-supporting groups was in his view a terrible idea, but apparently necessary in order to keep the ritual going.

It also bothered him that he did not have overall command. He was responsible for the army troops, but the three clerics had their own bodyguards, a dozen elite warriors that listened only to the clerics, and looked down on the army troops. The friction between the small church force and the much larger army garrison was considerable, and had been growing worse over the last week. It didn't help that at least half of his troops were not elite, many were conscripts with limited training, brought in for constructing fortifications. If it came to a fight they would be of limited use.

He was out inspecting the progress of the construction on the foothills side of the pass when it happened. He was talking to his chief engineer, complimenting him on how quickly things were progressing when he heard a whistle blowing. He turned around to see a ball of water 10' in diameter rolling across the wall, picking up guards as it rolled through. Two seconds later a small number of attackers appeared, and began attacking any troops they found.

Donal shouted orders to the nearby dwarves to grab their weapons and attack, and then started running towards the fighting. He saw a number of his off duty troops run out of their tents and try to form up. Most weren't wearing armor, and some had only light weapons. He screamed for them to spread out, that there was a mage among the enemy attackers. He was too far away for them to hear him over the battle, and he watched in despair as a ball of flame rolled over them.

His army wasn’t giving up without a fight, but he could see it wasn't going to be enough.

Nearby Sgt Labrhainn was trying to get a group of archers into position, but that proved to be a mistake, as the ground suddenly erupted with tentacles, grappling most of them.

As he ran Donal glanced over towards the church troops and was furious when he saw that they weren't helping yet. One of the two off duty clerics were there, casting buff spells on them, but they seemed to be setting up for a defensive battle.

In less than 30 seconds his army was in shambles, with at least 40 dwarves dead or out of commission. Behind him, many of the conscripts had fled, seeing the army troops falling to far more accomplished fighters.

Donal reached the fighting and tried calling out commands, but the situation was far too chaotic. His troops were getting slaughtered and almost none of them listened too him until one of his sergeants noticed him, and started shouting at the soldiers. He managed to get a row of dwarves armed with pikes in position to take on a huge Djinn and a middle aged Half Orc that were mowing down soldiers armed with axe and shield before they even git close enough to attack.

The phalanx slowed down the assault, but it did not stop their advance. He drew his own short sword and prepared to take them on, and didn't notice that there was another foe within range until he felt someone disembowel him. The last thing he saw before he fell was a blood soaked human tumble away from him to slash another soldier.

Spoiler: The end of the fight

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Janney dove down with the rest of them, relishing the feeling of the wind roaring past her face. Flying was new to her and she loved it, even though she and her friends were hurtling down at high speed towards an army that outnumbered them almost 20:1.

She felt more confident when Jebidal and Milo helped improve their odds with a couple of spells. Jebdial used Etheric Shards, and created an invisible field of razor sharp shards that isolated the dwarves building fortifications on the foggy side of the pass from the rest of the camp. Milo used an Aqeous Orb to roll through groups of soldiers along the wall while alternating Fireballs and Black Tentacle Spells to great effect.

When they landed Janney fought near Kreene, his song making her feel invincible. She carved a path through a line of dwarves, leaving dead and broken bodies behind her. She had never felt stronger, and her punches and kicks shattered armor, bones and shields and soon the soldiers were starting to avoid her and the rest of her party as well. Kreene was a marvel. Not only was he boosting all of them with his song and a summoned Djinn, he fought almost as well as she did. Orzstic stayed close to his father, covering his right side while the Djinn covered his left, and they were killing anything that came into their reach. Perle was everywhere, doing his own thing as usual, tumbling in and out, slashing a tendon here and a throat there, paying particular attention to the two dwarven wizards trying in vain to take out Milo and Jebidal.

She was beginning to think they actually were going to survive this. The soldiers were in disarray. The two groups of dwarves that had been building fortifications were out of the fight, on one side trapped behind a field of Etheric Shards, on the other, fleeing into the valley. Eight armored dwarves and a dwarven cleric were guarding a small building likely containing a cleric performing a ritual and had not entered the fight yet. The army was down to about fifteen soldiers in the fight, with another five or so looking for a place to run.

That confidence all changed when a short elderly female dwarf came out of the building. She was dressed in mithril plate armor and carried a war hammer that looked far too heavy for someone so small to weild. Upon seeing her six of the eight dwarven guards immediately charged the party. She followed right behind them, and just before they got there she spoke a single Word of Power that rocked everyone.

Janney and Jebidal felt its effects but it did not bother them and Milo was out of range, but it rocked Perle, Kreen and Orzstic back and banished the Djinn Ijargor, who seemed stunned to be leaving again so soon. Two of the remaining dwarven soldiers died immediately and four more fell over paralyzed, just as the six warriors hit the line.

With a quick flurry of punches and kicks Janney took out the one closest to her, and absorbed a glancing Axe blow from a second dwarf. She saw Kreene cast a spell, and the healing she was getting from his raging song ratcheted up considerably. Two dwarves moved in to attack him, and he managed to slash both of them but could not prevent them from getting inside his guard.

Perle took another attacker and was having trouble retaliating as he was still reeling from the priest’s Dictum spell. Orzstic was in the most trouble, he was not only staggered, but deafened, and could no longer hear his father’s song. That didn’t prevent him from fighting, but he was slower and weaker than he was just seconds earlier.

The dwarven cleric followed up her Dictum with a Blade Barrier, trying to catch Orsztic, Kreene and Janney in its area. Kreene and Janney managed to avoid it, but Orzstic was heavily wounded.

Jebidal conjured up a Shadow Beast Dire Tiger and it attacked the Dwarven cleric, forcing her to stop casting and attend to it.

Janney and Perle both managed to take out the dwarves facing them, while Kreene struggled against the two opponents he faced as his son Orzstic kept fighting the opponent in front of him. Another Shadow Beast Dire tiger appeared to keep the cleric busy, and this was too much for the remaining two dwarven warriors and cleric still not in the fight and they rushed in too. Behind her Janney heard a boom as another of Milo’s Fireballs incinerated some soldiers that were trying to sneak their way into position to charge the party.

Kreene got some help from Janney, who took out one of his two opponents, while Perle turned to face the two onrushing soldiers. He took out one of them, but fell to the second.

Yet another Dire Tiger appeared and took on the elderly cleric, who seemed more annoyed than distressed by the tigers.

Janney had to shift to take on the warrior that took out Perle and found that he was much tougher than the ones she had killed so far. She held her own, but he was fresh and she was wounded, so she knew she was in trouble.

Kreene finished off the dwarf in front of him, and moved to attack the dwarf attacking his son. He wasn't fast enough to stop the dwarf from finishing off the wounded Half Orc, but he did force him to face him instead of ensuring the fallen Half Orc was dead.

Jebidal sent in one final Shadow Beast tiger, and had it attack the onrushing younger cleric, since the elderly cleric was still busy with the last Dire Tiger. It pounced on the young man, and started ripping him apart.

Within seconds it was over. Kreene’s raging song revived Perle, who rolled to his feet and helped Janney survive and eventually finish off the warrior she was facing. Kreene killed the dwarf in front of him and moved to attack the elderly cleric, while Milo dumped a potion into the unconscious Orzstic, who was not healing because he was deafened and could not hear Kreene’s song.

Between all of them they managed to take out the cleric, who while an accomplished spellcaster, wasn’t as good a warrior as she would have been in her prime decades earlier.

As the battle ended they looked around. There were dead dwarves everywhere, and the few survivors dropped their weapons and stuck their hands in the air. All told there were 25 survivors, 19 of which were trapped between the foggy valley with the huge lizard and Jebidal’s Etheric Shards. Another dozen or so dwarves were still fleeing into the valley on the foothills side of the camp. The four dwarves in one of the forward outposts also surrendered, the four in the other were dead from one of Milo’s fireballs.

Perle went into the building with Janney while Kreene’s song kept healing everyone else, and returned with a young dwarf cleric in tow. He was bleeding heavily, but was still alive.

They ignored the trapped dwarves behind the Etheric Field and gathered the rest into the middle of the camp and disarmed them. While the rest guarded them, Perle and Janney searched the rest of the camp and found two more dwarves hiding. There was no sign of Susheen.

They spent about half an hour searching the camp and looting the bodies. While this was going on Kreene interrogated the cleric.

He was initially defiant, but after seeing the carnage around him he became willing to talk. He was a low level cleric and did not know what the purpose of the ritual was, and was barely powerful enough to participate in it. He only knew that not doing the ritual would be bad, only the Bishop knew what was going on.

The army troops knew nothing, they had marched here and were fortifying this position to guard the most approachable point to the mountain range in the area.

After some discussion, Kreene took the body of the elderly cleric and cast a Speak with Dead on it, but could not get it to talk. Perle took his Flying Carpet and carried her corpse up in the air and dumped her in the middle of the foggy valley where the huge lizard was located.

He also dumped all the weapons and armor he could find left in the camp into the valley too, leaving the prisoners completely unarmed. He then took the few prisoners not trapped between the lizard’s valley and the Etheric Shards and forced them to get on the carpet with him, and then dropped them into the area with the rest of the prisoners, along with a number of water skins and some food.

Jebidal told the prisoners they should leave the mountain range as soon as his spell dissipated in roughly twelve hours, and then they left, taking the wounded young cleric with them. They used much of their remaining spell casting ability to enhance their speed and hiked into the foothills, stopping nine hours later, where they spent the night in a Rope Trick.

The next morning they kept going, and late that afternoon Jebidal tried casting Dimension Door and it worked. After cutting the young dwarf cleric loose and a quick teleport by Milo later they were only an hour from Susheen’s temple. They arrived their around dinner time and met with Susheen’s Bishop, filling him in on what had happened. The Bishop agreed to raise Lyora in the morning

[Toxic Shaman]

I've been working a lot recently and haven't had the time to post as much as I'd like. A short update is below, and I hope to have another in a few days.

Spoiler: Interlude

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The Outsider Gihjantara was irritated at not getting an update. “WORM” he shouted, calling his lazy assistant.

Yandros walked in and groveled a bit, more to make his boss feel better than from actual fear for his continued existence, though he knew Gihjantara could destroy him easily if he wanted to.

“Good day, your Vastness” he said to his boss. “I have been diligently looking into the matters that you asked me to check into. As you know, a major section of the Stoneshield mountain chain has been locked down by priests of the Dwarven All-Father.”

Gihjantara scowled. “Why must you always tell me what I already know instead of what I don’t know. Did you find out why those bearded little cretins have spent weeks on a magic ritual of that magnitude?”

“Yes of course your magnificence” Yandros nodded. “I checked out the area involved, and it is roughly centered around the remains of an ancient dwarven city. As you recall, there was a major battle there recently between agents of the Herald of Hell and those of the Summoner. I have not been able to ascertain who won that fight, or if the Summoner’s Chosen One was there too, but it is suspicious that shortly after that fight an army of over 10,000 dwarves annexed the area.”

Gihjantara stared at him. “Sounds like someone entered the city, and they are there to make sure that whoever came in, can’t get back out. So tell me about my puppet, I have heard nothing from him in weeks.”

“He is still running around with that Half-Orc party girl, but she has changed a good bit since she was cursed. That Tiefling priest and halfling they were traveling with are gone, both dead apparently, but they have picked up four new allies, an Elven wizard, a Half Orc warrior-mage, a Half Orc Warrior and some sort of gnome” From his tone it was apparent that Yandros did not think much of the last member of the party.

Seeing that his boss was waiting for more he continued.

“They have been busy attacking Dwarven outposts. They have taken out four so far in the last three days since they re-entered the mountains after destroying the large dwarven camp. So far there has been no retaliation from the All-Father’s Priests. From that I surmise that they are spread pretty thin. Their Ritual seems to have put in place two effects. There is a dimensional anchor effect, but also a divination as well. I suspect that it is there to sense when anyone attempts to teleport, and that the major higher power forces the Dwarves have are being held in reserve to take on whoever tries to teleport out.”

“That does seem plausible” the large outsider said reluctantly. “But what strategic goals are my puppet and his minions trying to achieve?”

Yandros laughed. “I am not sure they have any. They are just running around killing dwarves. Maybe they are trying to kill enough to force the hand of the higher level priests. The dwarves have hundreds of camps spread out through the mountains, so it will take them a while to make a dent in the overall forces.”

Gihjantara seemed disgusted that Perle and ‘his minions’ were not acting in a manner that he would like. He was beginning to rethink his decision to grant Perle spells, but he had made an agreement, and at least at this point still felt bound by it.

Yandros suspected what his master might be thinking, and thought it prudent to change the subject, as he had his own plans for Perle and did not want his master dwelling on why his puppet was behaving differently recently.

“I have also kept track of that crazy monk your puppet used to travel with. He and his Paladin wife and their child have moved to a small town in the Dells, where she is assigned to help assist the local priest. He is crazier than ever, and has sworn off the use of all magical implements. Apparently he thinks that will enhance his own power.”

“The borders of Waldspiegel are still closed, and from what I can discern from the power of the wards, the new guardian’s powers have grown significantly. Of all of your puppet’s friends, I suspect that the Shaman is likely now far more powerful than any of the rest of them. I have someone keeping watch there full time.”

“That other gnome, the fey druidical one, is rapidly consolidating power in Southpoint. She is almost as smart as she thinks she is, and seems to be manipulating multiple local criminal organizations into doing her bidding, and has now moved on into more of a regional approach. In the future she will have to be watched further, she is pretty good. She managed to notice a Pelagastr while it was inhabiting a local thief in her organization. I was impressed. She is cocky though, and tends to overreach, so she may shortly be in over her head.”

“Leave them all alone” Gihjantara said. “If they survive we can pull them in later if we need to. Leave my puppet and his team alone too. They can fend for themselves. I want you to focus on finding out which of the two high powered teams survived the initial fight in the mountains in the abandoned city, and if either of them are in there now.”