Escape from Ironheart (IC)

[MrEdwardNigma]

Victor quickly moved on to the next book.

[Lonna]

Pyrene

"Claire" stared at the guards in confusion as the leader lectured her on the importance of security, her eyes still refusing to focus on the elites for more than a second or two. When Samuel offered her his hand, however, her face cleared somewhat and she lowered her hand from her temple to rest it on his arm as if she were a fine lady and he her escort.

The elite, for his part, looked a little startled by her suddenly formal air, but said nothing as he led her past the others. As they, in turn, began to move forward, her childish voice drifted back to them as she repeated herself to Samuel.

"I'm looking for Ed. Will you help me find him?"

{{OOC: I hate my computer. I posted like three days ago and only just realized it didn't go up. Anyway, Pyrene will want to make her next move as soon as she's out of earshot of all the elites but her two guards.}}

[Inspectre]

The Spires: Ironheart Research

Voth

Very well. Know that the path of redemption is a difficult and unending one. There will always be those who will never forgive you for the monster you once were. But there will be many more who will look past what you once were to see what you have become. In return for your promise to try to walk that difficult path, I will restore a measure of your life to you. Now separated from your body, the demon will not follow you back to the land of the living. But I’m sure he won’t be happy about my interference, and may take steps to try to reclaim your soul. We will talk more on the other side.

Suddenly, you feel a sharp tug upwards, and the thorny vines which had wrapped themselves around you disintegrated in a flash of light. Shadow stops cackling immediately, and even screams in agony as several rays of light strike him. Now free of your imprisonment, you look around to see yourself rising quickly. A short distance below you is a pitch-blank void which writhes and twists, screaming up at you as you begin to ascend. Far above you is a tiny grain of light, which slowly begins to grow as you rush up towards it.

“What is this trickery!? Your soul belongs to me mortal! You can’t escape!” Shadow shouts, by now having recovered from the flash of light. The roiling cloak of shadows that his most recent form begins to climb up after you, but he can’t keep pace and like the black void begins to shrink away.

“Fool! You may have earned a temporary reprieve somehow, but I still own your soul! And I’ll be coming to collect soon enough! Enjoy what few hours of life you have left insect! Azguloth will soon be free and then your entire world shall burn! Raargh!”

Finally, you get high enough that the grain of light has grown to fill the entire sky ahead of you, and a moment later you pass through. An instant after entering it, you snap awake with a shuddering breath. Eyes wide, you look around to find yourself back in the corridor where you began your confrontation with Shadow. The girl is starting to stir, softly moaning as she works a hand up to gently probe at the back of her head. Looking down at yourself, you can see two large bloody holes in your shirt where you had stabbed yourself, but the skin underneath appears intact.

Yes, your wounds have been healed as a result of your soul’s return into its body. Unfortunately the effect is only temporary – at some point in the near future your wounds will reopen and you will die, permanently this time. It is up to you to get down to me before then so I can strengthen your ties to this world. In any case, none of us have more than a few hours of life left anyway as I suspect my captors are planning on releasing the one this fortress was designed to contain. I’m not certain where my current location is beyond that it is a very secure cell down in the darkest depths beneath the fortress. I can, however, sense you. Hopefully I will be able to direct you more precisely once you get closer – right now you’re in one of the towers above the fortress itself, correct? You must find some way down to the tunnels beneath this fortress, and quickly – I suspect my captors intend on sacrificing me as part of their ritual to free The Bringer of Ruin.

The Main Tower

Lonna

“I’m sorry ma’am, but our orders are to take you back to the main group for protection: the fortress is apparently under attack.” Maxwell replies in a firm tone, his crossbow clicking slightly as he shifts his grip up on it.

“Y-Yes. Perhaps we can look for Edward Volesin afterwards. He is a powerful mage – I’m sure he’s just fine.” Samuel says, his voice just slightly quavering with surprise as you lay your hand on his arm like a lady.

Behind you, the rest of the elites move on, and are quickly out of earshot entirely.

The_Snark

(Hehehehe, and now the Ico portion of Mar’s escape begins! )

Spoiler

Show

For those not in the know, ICO is an absolutely fabulous PS2 game made early in the system’s existence by the same team that later did Shadow of the Colossus. Here is one of the opening videos for those interested in such things – given there’s only two characters in it, and one’s a tall shy girl getting dragged around by a “horny” *snicker* kid with a penchant for pummeling things, I think it should be easy to decipher which character corresponds to which.

With his fingers now no longer enclosed by the gauntlets, Julian attacks the rope knotted around your wrists with gusto. As he is busily picking at the knots, you finally overcome your reluctance and give him your name. You were going to be punished regardless, and telling him your name seemed to be very important to him for some reason. After telling him that you were Mar, Julian rewards you with a wide grin. “Mar, that’s a very pretty name! Is it short for something, like Marion, or uhh . . . Martel? Ah, got it! Boy, that was a tough knot – whoever tied that really didn’t want you getting loose!” Julian exclaims, finally managing to pick the knot apart and unwinding the rope from your wrists.

Although a bit stiff and numb at first, your hands started to feel prickly as blood began to freely flow through them again. Both of your wrists are encircled by angry red indentations that the rope had left behind, but that was nothing to really be worried about. Hoping to get a bit more feeling into them, you start to rub your hands. Julian stops you, however, taking one of your own hands into his.

“Here, let me help you.” He begins to gently massage your wrist and the palm of your hand, eventually switching over to your other hand. “We do a lot of training with weapons, so we end up having to take good care of our hands. After our hearts and minds, it’s probably one of the best tools that we have!” Julian idly explains, and then looks at you with a questioning expression. “So what were you training to become? Before you came here I guess, since we’re all just prisoners here. Was there anything you wanted to be?” Julian presses, trying to simplify his question when it became clear that you didn’t really have an answer for him. Eventually, he just smiles and shrugs.

“Alright, well I guess that’s okay. I think we should get out of here now. But, we can talk on the way if you want – it’ll just have to be quiet so we don’t alert any guards.” Julian explained, his own voice quieting to a whisper as if to demonstrate. Tucking the pair of gauntlets under one arm, Julian extends his other hand to you.

“Take my hand, so we won’t get separated!” Taking a firm grip of your hand, Julian nods at you. “Alright, here we go!” He then sets off down the corridor at a fairly intense trot, dragging you along behind him by the hand at first until you get used to his pace.

You only travel a short distance, however, before you reach an intersection which Julian stops at with a worried expression. On the right-hand side the corridor continued to an iron door similar to all the others you had seen here. Down the left corridor, however, you can see a steep stairway of iron leading down.

“Which way should we go? Do you know your way around here at all?” Julian asked, turning to face you.

The Mines

Burrito

(It is indeed the same storage room.)

Although the room beyond the door does not contain any actual treasure, its contents are nonetheless priceless for a man in your condition. After a celebratory jig by Tattoos, the two of you quickly scour the room for equipment. And said equipment is certainly plentiful, holding enough gear for easily a hundred men if not more. Yet, the collected dust on the floor is such that you can see what the two individuals before you took: weapons, armor, and supplies just like you.

Deciding that this place was as safe as any from the walking dead, you both decide to rest here for the moment, painfully aware that you wouldn’t be able to remain for more than a few hours before risking succumbing to thirst and hunger. Still, any amount of rest was sure to be helpful, and you volunteer to take the first watch while Tattoos sleeps.

In the event of any unwelcome visitors, you shift a few barrels around such that they are positioned in a line between you and the door: not a particularly sturdy obstacle but a barrier to intruders nonetheless. Settling down behind your makeshift wall, you keep just one lantern on, enough to see your immediate surroundings and the door but hopefully not enough to flare brightly out under the door and give your position away. You weren’t even sure if any more zombies that wandered by would even notice the light, but it was best not to take any chances. Waiting silently for Tattoos to wake up and take his turn keeping watch, you begin to quietly pray to the gods once more.

You are perhaps half of the way through the third prayer when Tattoos suddenly begins chuckling quietly behind you. His laughter has lost its typical jolly nature however, and is harsh and mocking, which quickly grows louder behind you. By the time you have managed to turn around to see what could be causing him to act so strangely, his laughter has reached a maniacal crescendo. From where Tattoos was lying, you can only see a dark shadow, which moves with preternatural quickness as it slithers from Tattoos bed to the edge of the light – and yet all you can really see of Tattoos is a pair of bloodshot eyes glittering malevolently in the darkness.

“Ha! Do you really think your impotent gods care about you? Do you even think that they can hear your feeble prayers down here?” In a blur of motion, the eyes are gone, and you whirl to face them again as they reappear a second later in the darkness behind you. Beside you, the lantern begins to flicker erratically, the light it gave beginning to dim steadily until it probably only the barest illumination. The pair of eyes then moved closer, and in the dim light you could only see a dark outline that could not be Tattoos – this new companion of yours was tall and muscular, with large bat-like wings trailing behind it and sharp horns jutting from the back of its head . . . and a pair of large fangs now glittered in the faint light just below the gleaming, hateful eyes.

“Laugh, cry, scream! Your gods won’t answer your prayers no matter how much your plead with them to save you. It is time for the light to fall to darkness, and for your world to be extinguished beneath a tide of glorious destruction! Know that the Herald of Azguloth is no longer a dark figment in the minds of man, but has once again been given flesh! Despair before the might of your new god, mortal, and die!”

As the shadowy creature creeps closer to you, you are filled with an overwhelming desire to run, to flee screaming out into the hallway, but find that your body will not obey. You are literally frozen to the spot with fear, unable to move as the creature reaches out to grab you. The fangs flash down, and pain fills your right shoulder as the Herald tears your shoulder open like a beast, greedily sucking your lifeblood out of your paralyzed body.

But before you can come even close to passing out from the loss of blood, the Herald pulls away, spitting a mouthful of warm liquid into your face that you were sure was your own blood. “Pray to your pathetic god mortal! Scream out to them! Beg them to save you! I want you to understand beyond any doubt before you die that only the cold nothingness of death awaits you!”

And yet, as the Herald moved in for another bite, the room is filled with brilliant light. Glancing over the Herald’s shoulder, you can see a beautiful woman with shoulder-length golden hair and ocean blue eyes raise a shining longsword, the source of the brilliant light, over her head. She is wearing a suit of high-quality plate mail that seems to glow slightly with its own inner light, and thrown over that armor is the same tabard as those you found. She brings the sword down upon the Herald’s back, and he shrieks as the sword’s brilliant light burns him away like dew before the sun.

The danger now apparently past, the sword’s light fades to a faint gleam as your lantern snaps back to its regular level of illumination. And with the fading of the sword so too does the woman seem to fade in magnificence: you can now see the scars marring her face and arms, the dark shackles dangling from her wrists and ankles with chains that snake back into darkness, her dark welcoming eyes fading away into empty sockets, and how her facial features in general are deeply drawn with exhaustion. As her shoulders slump, a dark crimson line appears down the middle of her tabard, and rapidly begins to spread, quickly covering her entire torso in a curtain of dripping blood.

“Wake up, proud servant of the gods. There is much work to be done yet before the End. You are needed – wake up!”

A moment later, your eyes flash open as you snap awake with a quiet gasp. Looking around, you see that Tattoos is still lying where he curled up to sleep, and that he is also now awake, looking around sharply with a confused expression. Locking eyes with you as he absentmindedly pats his chest, Tattoos frowns. “Askov, what the hell was that? It was like that . . . vision . . . or whatever, I had back in the tunnels, where you murdered me. Only it was . . . well, far worse this time. And then there was some chick there . . . and she told me to wake up. I don’t think I want to sleep anymore.”

Looking around the room, you notice something else that is new, and just as disturbing as your dream: a faint green glow coming from the back of the room. As you focus your attention on the wall, you see that the glow is coming from three patches of malevolent green light, which as you watch brightens sharply a moment before something drifts into the room through the wall.

Skeletal in appearance with ragged clothes, the three semi-transparent green figures are instantly given a name by you, despite much like the zombies only being heard of by you in myth: ghosts. And they don’t look particularly happy to see either you or Tattoos.

Intruders . . . must . . . die!

(No rest of the wicked as they say. You and Tattoos each got about twenty minutes of sleep or so.)

Torture Chambers

Dorizzit

Having placated Calcifer, at least temporarily, the flames covering your arm subside, leaving all of you standing in pure darkness. “Glad to hear it. I believe I have a torch somewhere in here if you would prefer not to strain yourself further by providing light.” Seraph says from somewhere off to your immediate left. Before you can answer, Calcifer whispers in your mind once more.

Oh, your fellow humans want [b]light do they? Heeheehee – by the way, since you now have full access to my powers, and I’m no longer constrained to just within your arm, I think a demonstrate is in order.[/i]

Blinding, searing pain suddenly rips through your body as every square inch of your flesh spontaneously ignites. Dimly, you’re aware that despite the intense flames, none of your clothing or hair is burning away – a very small comfort given the sensation of your skin melting, much like how your arm felt when Calcifer was first bound into it. As the flames blink out of existence as quickly as they had come, you fall to your knees gasping for the air to scream. But the pain fades almost as quickly as the flames, and as you look down at your scorched arms you watch in amazement as the flesh seems to regenerate – even the traditionally blackened flesh of your fire arm.

Another of my many gifts. I think the guards will find it most difficult to restrain you now that you can produce flame from any part of your body. Of course, unlike your arm, the rest of your body hasn’t gotten used to it yet so I imagine the process will be quite painful. Fortunately I can limit the damage to your weak flesh now that I don’t have a bunch of your filthy magic in the way.

Looking down at your arms as their regeneration slows, you can see that the skin is still red and blistered in a few places, but even your fire arm now looks relatively human compared to the charred hunk of flesh it had been previously.

Looking up as the last of the fire disappears into your body again, you see sparks fly momentarily before a torch catches alight to reveal Seraph. “Well, I don’t know what has happened to you Korram, but you said you have it under control and I believe you. Now we must hurry to continue downward – I’ve heard most of the rituals in this place occur below the deepest level of cells.” Without waiting for either you or Katrina, Seraph pushes on down the hallway, threatening to leave you both behind in the dark.

“Guy’s kinda obsessed, isn’t he?” Katrina whispers to you, offering you a hand up before pausing and retracting her hand. “You aren’t going to burn my hand if I touch you now, are you? Because I could have sworn I just saw your entire body ignite there for a couple seconds.”

Now that things had returned to more or less normal and your mind had a moment of peace, you noticed something disturbing. In all of your time down here in the third level of cells, what little time you spent in between torture sessions anyway, everything was maddeningly quiet. No prisoners were allowed to talk or make sounds above the softest clatter of chains, or a patrol of torch-bearing guards would eventually descend upon them with an excessive level of fury. Now, however, you can hear numerous sounds echoing out of the darkness at you: the clash of weapons, shouts of alarm, screams. Most of these atypical sounds seem to be coming from distant sources, although a few piercing cries sound as if they’re just a few feet out into the darkness behind you.

The Cells: Maximum Security

Baerdog7

Having gotten all the information you likely were going to get out of the dead elite, you allow the man’s spirit to rest before helping yourself to his equipment. The black chainmail, while heavy, is clearly of superb craftsmanship, and fits you well after tightening the belt a few extra notches. The golden pauldrons appear to also be of sturdy construction, and are quickly buckled on over your shoulders, along with the red sash running diagonally across your chest – likely more a symbol of rank than a protective device. The black iron helmet slides down over your head next, and finally you slide his well-balanced longsword into the scabbard connected to your belt. The man’s silk tunic feels strange against your skin after years of burlap, but is a welcome cushion between your body and the chainmail. Your legs, and arms, and neck are also protected by a thinner layer of fine chainmail, and only a lucky blow to your face or just below the chin would not have to deal with passing through the armor first. Even the elite’s iron-studded leather boots fit you fairly well, although they prove a little tight around the instep. Looking down at the by-now completely naked elite, you afford the corpse a little dignity by draping your own clothes over the remains before turning and dashing up back the winding passageway.

At your running speed, your invisible companion seems hard put to keep up, sputtering out half-profanities and demands as it struggles to follow you. You quickly come to the remains of Katashiko’s first battle against the guards, a section of the tunnel where the walls and floor were slick with blood and the bodies were scattered about in various pieces, some of which were actually partially embedded in the walls.

Moving further down the hallway, you come to the short flight of stairs that the elite told you about, which you quickly dash up before moving rapidly down the short hallway above. At the end of the hallway you discover the remains of a thick adamantite door, slick with blood in some parts where it is heavily dented, but torn completely off the hinges of the doorframe and lying a short distance down the hallway in a twisted heap of broken metal all the same. Within the room beyond the doorway, however, you can see that the carnage is not quite as intense, as roughly two dozen elites are milling uncertainly about the room, several of which are clustered around two prone elites with clearly shattered limbs.

As one the elites tense and whirl to face you, although they all mostly relax when they see “your” uniform. One of the elites nearest to you approaches, snapping off a hastily salute. “Have you brought news from the Warden? Is he letting anymore of those horrible monsters out of their cells? Because you can plainly see what the last one did here – it was all we could do to convince it to leave and continue on with whatever damned mission the Warden offered it in exchange for freedom.”

The Labs

Iethloc

Using magic to turn the glass of water into a scrying portal, you look through to see where you would end up upon destroying the room’s enchantments. For a moment the portal turns pitch black, suggesting nothing more than an endless void, but as you concentrate upon the portal the image ripples. For a moment reality seems to rip itself apart within the confines of the water glass, and then a new image solidifies that makes your blood run cold.

Although similar to the office in décor, the room you were now seeing had a much different purpose. Numerous beds line the back wall of the room, most of which are occupied by a wide variety of races and genders. All of them are bound to the bed with heavy leather straps, but none seem concerned by their captivity as they emptily stare up at the ceiling. A few, however, do seem to thrash mindlessly in their catatonia, gnashing their teeth against the leather strap holding their jaws apart. Even more horrifying, you notice yourself and Omega amongst these people.

Having seen that this whole “trapped in a room outside of time” seemed to be nothing more than a deception, you turn the glass of water from a scrying portal into a font of magic-dispelling energy. The room seems to fight back as tendrils from your spell lash out, the walls and ceiling twisting and shifting wildly as it attempts to reform despite your countermagic. Eventually however, your magic proves triumphant and the room is ripped apart into endless blackness all around you. And then, you wake up.

As your scrying portal revealed, you wake to find yourself helplessly bound in a low-quality but nonetheless sturdy bed. Your hands are bound together at the waist, held there by a thick strap that goes over your waist and hands to hold you down to the bed. Three similar sets of straps are looped around your legs at the ankles, shins, and thighs, pinioning them together and tightly holding them down to the bed. Another thick strap runs across your chest. Judging by the limited mobility of your head, there’s also a leather collar around your neck that is connected to the headboard of your bed. Finally you can feel a thin leather strap locked in between your teeth.

With a bit of a strain you manage to look around the room, seeing that Omega is similarly bound in the bed to your immediate left, and is likewise awake. Unfortunately before you can begin trying to figure out how to get free of this next layer of annoyance, the door at the far end of the room opens and the man responsible for all this rushes into the room.

Although his movements are hurried and his expression seems eager as he enters, he quickly frowns as he notices that both yourself and Omega are awake. “I see. I had been hoping one of my other patients was cured and had been ready for the next step of treatment but now I see that it’s just you two. Managed to dispel my illusion did you? Well I have ways of fixing that.”

A moment later the man freezes halfway across the room in confusion, apparently receiving the same message in his own mind that Omega sends to you.

No, you will not.

A moment later the man screams in agony as he spontaneously bursts into fire. The starting small flicks of flame running up and down his body quickly expand into towering sheets of flame as he flails around blindly. Looking over at Omega, you can see her staring intently at the man, wincing only slightly as blood begins to trickle down her nose. Your nemesis tries to save himself, of course, but all of his attempts to put out the flames now covering his body fail – even the column of water that he calls down onto himself that is heavy enough to drive him down prone on the floor only decreases the flames by perhaps half. Finally, he lies still, but the flames leap ever higher until finally only charred bones and dust remain. Only then do the flames wink out of existence as quickly as they had come.

That . . . should ensure he . . . stays dead. Although the cost . . . was high.

Looking over at Omega, you can now see that blood is flowing freely out of her nose, and she appears to be weeping blood as well.

Think I have enough . . . for one last . . . trick.

The strap tightly looped around your wrists begins to quiver and shake, and a moment later loosens about your hands considerably as the buckle slips loose.

Free yourself . . . then help . . . me.

Sanctuary of the Prophets

WhiteKnight777/MrEdwardNigma

The dragon’s reaction to the news of his host’s apparent death is predictably sorrowful.

WHAT!?? He did WHAT!? Sacrifice . . . himself!? How dare he, selfish to the last! Well I guess he’s had the last laugh after all with his death, for now I’ll never be able to have solid form again! Do you have any idea how many decades of abuse and torment it took to break him done until he consented to relinquishing control over his body? And even then, it took the appearance of those foul, miserable, egg-stench piles of shambling FILTH to get him to fully give in to my will! You idiot! Why didn’t you stop him, you worthless leech of a human!

For a moment, it seems as if the dragon was going to keep up his verbal assault, but he stopped a moment, reigning in the worst of his fury before continuing.

I am not happy, my ally. Not happy at all. So far about all you have managed to accomplish is keeping your blood-addicted associate from eating everything and everyone in sight. I am seriously starting to doubt the veracity of your claims that you will be able to find me a new body to inhabit. I hope for your sake that you show some results soon, or those ugly and twisted mockeries of humanity will leave you nothing more than a smear of blood on the floor, as my previous host apparently now is! And that would not be good for any of us.

Abandoning the mental connection, the dragon seems to settle down into a far corner of its soul prison to sulk. As the book Victor is currently engaged with abruptly breaks its disturbing connection with him with a quick flailing of each tentacle out of the sensory organ that they were embedded in, Cassandra turns to answer Umber’s shocked question.

“Yeah, I think that must be how these guys store their knowledge. Victor examined one of the books from here earlier and it did the same thing. He didn’t seem to have any ill effects from it afterwards though, so I guess it’ll be alright . . . “ Cassandra explains with a helpless shrug, followed by a disgusted shiver as the book oozes shut for Victor to set it back onto the bookshelf. Without a word spoken Victor picks up the next book, thumbing it open and allowing the tentacles to shoot out into his eyes and ears again.

As fortune would have it, it would seem that the next book you had randomly picked up turned out to be the middle book in the series. Once again your perspective was the part of an invisible observer to the events going on around you.

With the Master imprisoned, eventually the other gods relaxed and left the mortal shells of the Puppet and Harlot behind to fend for themselves. They, along with the remaining mortals who were members of the accursed Order of the New Dawn, were to guard the Master’s prison from interference by outside forces. But of course, the real threat to their precious plan was from within. Shortly after the gods abandoned their tools, the essence that the Master implanted into each took effect.

Only the Harlot’s mind was influence by the Master’s essence, but the results were no less useful than the physical changes that swept over the Puppet. She was given the “gift” of foresight, seeing every event that would come to pass over the following millennia. She saw her brother’s descent into servitude to the Master, the erasure of all the gods’ work as the fortress was converted into a secret base for the new Order that would seek the Master’s release, and finally the destruction of the world following the Master’s release. With no control over her new ability, the Harlot quickly went mad, which only helped the Puppet achieve his own goals.

With the fragment of the Master inside of him, the Puppet’s changes were both mental and physical. In reality, only the one pulling the Puppet’s strings changed, and in time he came to identify himself as a servant of the Master. Physically he evolved into a being far above even the empty shell of an avatar, and became the father of an entirely new race of beings.

These Children of the Master were a special gift entrusted to the Puppet, and much like him when attached to a human host gave it an abundance of physical and magical improvements. Discretely the Puppet approached those members of the Order of the New Dawn who were weakest in faith, and used the Children produced by his own body to create the first generation of new servants.

Using his sister’s growing madness and confusion as justification, and backed by those knights he had already merged with Children, the Puppet assumed control of the Order. Eventually, he was “forced” to restrain his sister in her own quarters for her own safety, and then his control was virtually absolute. Those few knights who dared question his authority were swiftly silenced by their peers, although the Puppet yet hesitated to assassinate them. The time was not yet quite right for civil war. But the Puppet’s power rapidly grew as more knights were converted to the cause by introduction to Children, and soon the time for meek deception would be over.

There was a problem, however: the winged menace known as dragons. A blessed creation of Mirim, for all their flaws dragons were immune to corruption by Children, and reacted violently and fatally when introduced to one. A number of them were close allies of the Order, roosting inside the mountain in order to help maintain the seal keeping their Master imprisoned. Naturally, that which could not be corrupted must be destroyed, and the dragons were no exception. Through clever lies and manipulations, however, a few of the greediest dragons were convinced to temporarily turn against their fellows, although the Puppet had no intention of leaving anyone that would not swear loyalty to the cause alive.

Finally, the time to finish the death of the Order of the New Dawn had come. The Puppet visited his sister one morning, ritualistically cutting the Harlot’s eyes out and carefully preserving them – through her eyes the Puppet would be able to see the exact plan the Master had devised for destroying the seal keeping him prisoner. With her usefulness now at an end, the Puppet used her own sword to stab her through the heart, killing her. The Harlot’s death was the signal for the slaughter to begin, and those corrupted knights turned on their ignorant fellows with vicious enthusiasm. But even with the advantage of surprise and numbers, the Puppet’s Children were still hard-pressed to overcome the grim tenacity of the Order of the New Dawn and their remaining dragon allies. Unexpectedly, the purifying dragon breath of the dragons proved overwhelmingly effective against the Children and their hosts, and whole squads of the Puppet’s followers were wiped up in this way. But in the end the desired outcome came up, and the Order of the New Dawn was wiped out to virtually a man. Although no dragons survived the uprising, given their unexpected effectiveness against the Children it was determined that the dragon race would have to be exterminated before the plan could reach fruition.

With any considerable active resistance having been quashed, the Puppet studied the visions provided by the Harlot’s eyes, learning the steps to the Master’s plan that he would need to complete over the coming ages in order to finally release him. The first such step was binding the souls of all those slaughtered in the uprising to the fortress, preventing their souls from leaving and ensuring a ready supply of energy for the Master. Some souls returned to their bodies to shamble about in the darkest tunnels as zombies, while most were condemned to wander the fortress’s halls as restless spirits.

In memory of their decisive victory against those who would seek to stop the Master’s liberation, the Puppet chose a new name for himself. Henceforth, he would be referred to as the Hierarch, the leader of a new Order, if such could be called that. And so, the Prophets of the New Age were born. Dedicated only to the release of the Master from his prison and to the elimination of all who stood against that, the ranks of the Prophets of the New Age swelled rapidly as the Master continued to discretely collect new converts, this time from beyond the confines of the fortress. New aspects of the plan were set into motion, and step by step the Hierarch followed the Master’s plan towards His own freedom.

Here the book ends with another theoretical vision of the Master’s escape form Ironheart.

As the book’s tendrils withdraw from your eyes and ears, however, this time you can tell that something has gone wrong. Your vision goes red as a number of blood vessels within your eye burst, and even after the redness fades you notice that everything now has an indistinct and hazy look to it, as if you were looking at everything through several feet of water. Furthermore, everything sounded soft and distant, your hearing as obscured as your visions currently was. You didn’t think you had done anything wrong this time, and it seemed unlikely that the book was malfunctioning. Perhaps you had merely overdone it, or the books weren’t quite designed to operate with human physiology? In any case, without further risk to your senses you had probably learned all you could from the books for the moment.

The Not Quite Afterlife

Pwenet

At your questions, Miriam shakes her head sadly. “I am afraid that Sara is likely cursed to suffer regardless of the outcome. Her very existence is an insult to her blasphemous parents, and only their wicked arrogance and ignorance has prevented them from killing her outright. Even then, you know the circumstances under which the two of you met. There is great potential hidden within her, but evil men will sense this and constantly seek to twist that potential to their own ends. Without a just protector to watch over her, her future even beyond the confines of Ironheart is bleak.”

Miriam shakes her head sadly, and then smiles wistfully at your second question. “As to whether or not all of this is worth it, none can truly say. And yet even despite all the perversion and corruption that exists on the face of your world, there is still the occasional work of beauty. It is those precious, rare points of light shining out against the darkness surrounding them that continue to justify your world’s existence to me, and make it worth fighting for.”

Nodding at your final comment, Miriam raises a now once again whole hand to you in farewell. “Good-bye, Incom Morgan. I know that you will fight well against the encroaching darkness, and perhaps we may yet manage to save your world from certain destruction.”

The peaceful meadow suddenly winks of existence, and you find yourself seemingly floating at the bottom of a deep, black pit. Yet far above you is a tiny pinprick of light, and you determinedly swim up through the blackness towards it. As you reach the light, your vision goes completely white, and then gradually fades back into color as you force your eyes open. Groggily, you come out of your near-death slumber, and numbly re-enter the world of the living.

You find yourself lying on what feels like a heavy wooden table, unable to move or indeed feel much of your body save for your head. Thankfully, this also means that you do not feel any pain, as your mind slowly plays back the last few seconds of your memory, where you most definitely did lose an arm and leg. Inclining your head slightly, you can see that you appear to be in a small alchemical lab, and three men in brown robes with the emblem of the dragon cultists emblazoned on the back are here with you. They all seem to be clustered around a nearby table working on something, although you are only able to get a few glimpses of it through the tangle of bodies – something like a helmet?

Noticing that you are now awake, one of the cultists bows humbly at you before rushing over to stand by the right side of your head. “Ah Lord Akor, excellent! We had been deathly afraid that you were to pass beyond this world, but fortunately the Armor seems to have kept your essence tied to this plane of existence.” The man smiles for a moment, although it quickly falters back into an apologetic frown. “Our deepest apologies for not arriving at your side sooner, but we were unable to locate you before now. Not even the infamous Malevolent Seven were able to track you quickly enough after your escape from our chambers. And well, with the foul Heretics everywhere now that their plan is finally nearing completion –“

The man grimaces and shakes his head. “I am sorry Lord Akor, I know that you do not like hearing excuses. The fact is that we failed to adequately protect you, and now we have been forced to a desperate contingency plan in order to save your life.”

Producing a scroll from within his robes, the cultist unfurls it and turns it so that you can see the diagram carefully scratched onto it. It appears to be a picture of a dragon, walking upright, and with none of the sleek curves of flesh but rather than the hard lines and sharp corners of metal. “A suit of magical armor that we were considering equipping you with until such time as you were able to return to your fully and magnificent form. I’m afraid now that, well, with the extensive damage now done to your body . . . and the apparent inability for you to regenerate said damage . . . the armor . . . has become a . . . permanent addition?” The man winces at this last bit, no doubt by now familiar with Akor’s wrath upon things going unexpectedly wrong.

[ubersquid]

Elkwin - Catacombs

He throws Marv a reassuring smile and wearily motions him to follow.

(common) "Apparently Elandra ...that lass we met just before... had... has some friends in here. And although they lack proper bodies and food supply that guys seems quite friendly so far, don't you think?"

Elkwin doesn't make a secret of his exhaustion now and demonstratively slouches towards the offered seat.

(ghosts language) "Well we accidentally met her when we where on the run from some not-so-friendly zombies. Gave us quite a scare at first. She said something about bringing the Sword to the right hero, and who could deny a request from such a fine damsel. She gave me her journal as well, didn't have time to read it yet though, or what's left of it."

He carefully pulls out the tabard with the enclosed book and flips it away.

(ghosts language) "I'm sure it's full off momentous stories."

He looks back at the ghost with a tired smile.

(ghosts language) "So that black thing we encountered there, was actually her brother?"

Spoiler

Show

sorry, forums acting up again for me the last few days, hope it will get better soon

[Baerdog7]

Ander Windrivver

Ander returns the salute and replies to the Elites in his "command" voice.

You let her do what? Never mind, it's not important now if the Warden's plan succeeds. He' s heading down to the lowest levels to begin the final phase of his plan. You should have received your evacuation orders from Captain Delran. Take one last look around the level and make sure we don't have any other escapees running amok and then head to your evac zones. Now, I have to go upstairs and make sure all the other levels know.

By assuming command of the situation, Ander hopes to deflect suspicion off of himself. Besides, who wouldn't be relieved to hear that they've just gotten orders to evacuate? He pushes through the room past the Elites (presumably up any other stairs or such to reach the next level).

[Iethloc]

Sohssal

Sohssal chuckled a little as his irritating enemy died horribly. Then, once his hands were free enough to weave magic, he went to work. Bah...how troublesome...but I can't let someone with such valuable information perish... he thought to himself as a low hum radiated all around him. Soon, any metal nearby began rattling and moving towards him slightly. Just a moment later, a blast of electricity covered Sohssal. Thankfully, most of his spells were made to be highly precise, so the blast was concentrated solely on the leather binding him, most likely completely disintegrating them.

"Good new for you then, Omega. I am very familiar with demonic anatomy...but I've never encountered a case like yours. Thankfully, I've developed several spells to deal with demons...like putting them in stasis..." he said as he got up from the horrid bed. Then he walked over to Omega as he weaved his arms about elaborately, black energy trailing from them right before he flicked both hands at Omega. Then the black energy covered her, slowing down her metabolism to a near-stop and holding together her flesh. "I could never extract information from a dead demon, so I made this little spell to preserve them. I've no clue whether you could still communicate like this, though...but you probably won't die..." he explained.

He didn't waste any time after explaining, and quickly searched for any surgical tools, or anything else that could cut. If Omega was put together using parts from existing demons, I could probably figure out how to put her back together... he reasoned. Then he turned towards Omega, sighing with frustration at how hard this might turn out to be. "Well, unless you happen to know any healing spells adapted to work on demons, I'll have to see what makes you tick before I can repair you..." Sohssal said as if demons were like watches. He wasn't a skilled surgeon, but the spell kept flesh from falling apart, and most demons were tough and good healers, so he rarely killed them when he tried to put them back together.

[Burrito]

Askov

"I don't think we have the time to discuss our dreams Tattoos." I say this rather quickly as I scramble to grab up the backpack of supplies and the lantern. The lantern I adjust to full brightness. "I think we need to get out of here!"

In the 20 minutes of rest I had, my wounds had a bit of time to stiffen up and get sore, but the brief rest also breathed a new life into me. How long it would last, I had no idea. And at this juncture, I didn't care.

I hop over the barrels and shoulder open the door, just as Tattoos catches up. "Follow me!" I hear Tattos say as he rushes past. He slows briefly as he quickly scan the ground. After only a second or two he starts off down the tunnels, I follow as close behind as I can, glancing back over my shoulder to see that sickly green glow come streaming through the main doors. As we run I see that Tattoos is again following the tracks that had lead us to the supply room.

Hopefully they would not lead us wrong....

(ooc) Askov isn't even going to try and fight the ghosts. If they can pass through a wall, they will pass through any weapon he has, is his reasoning. We are going to try and run as fast as we can while still following the tracks, but if the pace needed to follow the tracks is too slow to outrun the ghosts, we will probably speed up and just hope for the best, and keep in the same direction the tracks were headed.

Basically we will try and end up wherever the plot needs us.....

[WhiteKnight777]

Umber

Umber looked around warily after the dragon fell silent. He thought about responding to the creature's somewhat juvenile temper tantrum, not to mention the insults, but he decided, given the fragile pride of dragons, that it would be better to remain silent. He simply sighed a little to himself and continued to watch as Victor once more subjected himself to the strange intrusion of the book-symbiote.... creatures. After he finished with the latest one, he spoke up.

So, Master von Ravenstein... what have you divined from these... things? And is there any way we might transport some of them with us? I feel that it would be wise to evacuate this place as quickly as possible.

[Voth]

Voth

What of the girl? I can't just leave her here. Who knows what may happen to her if she is found here. Voth thinks, hoping the link is still there.

[MrEdwardNigma]

Victor von Ravenstein
"The books are heavy and they bite, but they seem to be full of useless jibberish anyways. Still, what I'm looking for must be in here somewhere..."

Victor gazed upon the shelves and shelves of books.

"I can't take 'em all, and reading them all might kill me... But is it worth it escaping without this knowledge?"

A single tear slowly wobbled down Victor's scarred cheek. It wasn't clear wether this was because of the damage the books had done or because of his sadness about not finding what he wanted. Victor sighed and turned to Umber.

"Friend Vampire... When you sent me your dreams you promised many riches, but I asked for none of these in trade for my help. Worldly goods are not my trade. All I wish for is a single vail of your blood, as my payment. I'll give you anything you wish in return. I'll show you the way up"

Another tear made it's way down Victor's cheek.

"Please, I need this, for my work"

[Pwenet]

Incom Morgan

Listening to Miriam answer his final questions Incom can’t but help to shake his head at the answer. Part of him wants to scream at his, demand she do something yet another understands that she is bound, trapped as he is in a no-win situation. Here she was throwing her dice at him which meant that the situation was dire to trust one such as him. With her final words reality shifts around him and the peaceful meadow vanishes.

Opening his eye slowly and painfully Incom feels numb and tired. Unable to move he simply watches the cultists. The knowledge given to him gives way to swells of pity for the poor deluded fools, yet they now were most likely his sole hope for surviving and saving the world.

Yeah right, me saving the world! HaH! Maybe they might be willing to loan me some shoes.

Listening to the cultist explain what happened then winced Incom eyes narrow. He knew that his assault should have led to his death, yet now it seems that the last of the dragon essence has faded forcing him to be dependent on this “armor” that the cultists wrapped him in. Looking at the cowering cultist Incom clears his throat and does his best imitation of Akor.

”Tell me before I send you to the next world, what does this armor do? Did you get my limbs that the fool lost? And what is the status of the plan?”

[Lonna]

Pyrene

The hand on Samuel's arm suddenly shifted, tightening its grip to yank him sideways and a little downward, even as Pyrene pivoted to put him between herself and Maxwell. As she did so, she raised her head and kissed Samuel full on the mouth.

Samuel toppled sideways, his sword falling from his hand, but this had little to do with the kiss, and far more to do with the crossbow bolt embedded in his back. Maxwell, poised to take immediate action the instant Pyrene made a false move, had pulled the trigger before he realized his partner was in the way. Chainmaile was little use against arrows in the best of circumstances, and at point blank range the bolt had passed through it like a hot knife through butter.

"I knew you couldn't be so innocent as you seemed!" said Maxwell angrily.

"I only kissed him," answered Pyrene, still using the voice she had adopted for "Claire".

Maxwell didn't waste time trying to reload the crossbow but dropped it and drew his sword instead. Instantly Pyrene darted forward, trying to get inside his guard. Tripping over Samuel's legs, she heard the blade whistle past her ear as she fell.

A second sooner and he would have removed my head from my shoulders. The thought flashed through her mind and was gone, reflection on her good luck quickly replaced by the more pressing need to continue surviving. For she was now lying prone, while Maxwell was turning back, mere seconds away from delivering a finishing blow. With one hand she could feel the wall blocking her retreat and knew she could never rise before he reached her. Instead she met his eyes, summoning an expression of terror (not entirely feigned) to her face and a tremor to "Claire's" voice.

"W-Why? You shot him!" Maxwell hesitated for just an instant, glancing at Samuel's prone form. It was all Pyrene needed. Pushing against the floor to gain a little extra speed, Pyrene rolled into Maxwell's legs, causing him to topple forward over her and trapping his sword under him. Another half roll in the same direction freed her from his legs, then she rolled back before he had a chance to get up, further pinning him. A moment of scrambling positioned her so that when Maxwell began to push himself up despite the combined weight of his armor and his opponent, she was able to render him unconscious with a swift blow to the jugular vein from the side of her hand. {{Judo chop - she was trained in martial arts from the age of five.}}

Listening hard, Pyrene could hear no sounds of approaching guards; apparently the fight had gone undetected, for now. Quickly she checked Samuel to see if he still lived. Since Maxwell was aiming at a smaller target than the one he hit, it was possible the bolt wasn't fatal.

{{If he's dead or unconscious, she'll search both guards. If he's conscious, I'll work with what I'm given.}}

[Inspectre]

The Spires: Ironheart Research

Voth

Take her with you then, if you don’t think she will slow you down greatly. I do not wish to be cruel, but time is in short supply and we are all in terrible danger. You will fail utterly in protecting her if you cannot get down here in time. But perhaps she would be useful if she can keep up.

While you continue holding an inner dialogue with your savior, the girl manages to push herself up enough to look behind her. Seeing you, and more importantly that you’re awake and still whole, she gasps and begins to weakly crawl further away from you. Apparently she either didn’t get a good look at you or didn’t trust the fact that you were fully human again to feel safe around you.

The Main Tower

Lonna

Once out of sight of the other elite guards, you swiftly put your plan into action. Pivoting Samuel around by the hand, you spin him around to between yourself and Maxwell as you plant a kiss on his lips. A moment later his confused expression stiffens as the crossbow bolt enters his back – apparently even a normally-unflappable elite like Maxwell was more than a bit jumpy on the trigger right now.

Even so, one elite was potentially more than enough to kill you, and Maxwell nearly did so several times with his sword before you managed to render him unconscious with a hand chop to the throat. He wasn’t dead quite yet, but you could easily make that so if that was your wish, at least until he woke back up. You would need to be sure to be gone by then unless you wanted another death on your conscious.

Of course, there was a second elite that you needed to ensure was no longer a threat – Samuel. He was lying where he had fallen, partially on his side to prevent the crossbow bolt from being driven further into him by his own weight. At such close range, however, the crossbow bolt was already in deep, having punched through even the elite’s quality chainmail without a great deal of difficulty. Blood slowly flows down the bolt’s shaft to dip down onto the floor as part of a growing pool, but that wasn’t evidence enough for you to risk turning your back on Samuel’s body.

Carefully, you approach the body, growing closer by degrees to try and see whether or not he was still alive. This was made more difficult by the fact that when he fell and twisted over onto his side, he turned away from you, so you couldn’t get a really good look at his chest, neck, or face. Samuel is lying very still, however, and this ultimately gives you the courage to kneel down beside him and check for a pulse.

You are quite surprised, then, when this still “corpse” suddenly jerks to life, twisting around with surprising speed to snap a manacle around your outstretched wrist. A manacle which was connected to a chain that led down to the elite’s own wrist where the other manacle was locked around.

“Surprise, bitch.” The elite snarled, raising his other hand in a backhand that stung your jaw and send you sprawling away from him. But not too far, as the chain connecting your wrist to the elite’s pulls taut.

With a loud groan, the elite attempts to push himself up onto his knees, eventually succeeding with a slight wobble. Although a bit thick with pain, the elite’s voice is still filled with triumph as he starts to crawl the short distance between you. “Ugh, do you have any idea how hard it is to lie perfectly still with a crossbow bolt in your back? Still, you should see what we have to do for endurance training. Maybe I’ll show you a few of the simpler exercises right now!”

The_Snark Theater

(While The_Snark is on vacation, we’ll be trying to regularly exchange PMs so The_Snark can keep up. In the interests of keeping you informed of what’s going on with Mar, I’ll be posting The_Snark’s replies and my own DMs under this space, thenceforth known as The_Snark Theater.

The_Snark

She shook her head blankly as he asked about her name. ”No. Just Mar,” she said. She couldn’t remember any more of it, but it wasn’t Marion. That was a nicer name than Mar, so it was too bad. But Daddy had never told her about a longer name, so she supposed Mar was all there was of it.

Julian thought it was pretty, though. She hadn’t ever thought that, and no-one else had ever told her so, but the thought cheered her a little, and she tried to smile back a little. It was something to focus on other than what she was and (more importantly) wasn’t supposed to be doing—”this, this! They’ll find us, and hurt us—”

The next question receives a blank stare in response; she didn’t know what he meant. She was Mar, and Daddy had brought her here a long time ago to try to teach her how to be good. That didn’t seem like the right thing to say and she was trying not to think too much about that, so she just shook her head. A hesitant ”I don’t…” trailed off into silence, and thankfully he moved on. Moved on quite literally, actually.

She stumbled after him at first, lengthening her stride further than she’d done in a long time—aside from when she was running earlier—to keep up. Oh, it was much better to not have the ropes binding her hands—Julian was holding onto one of them still, of course, but it wasn’t nearly as uncomfortable. She stopped quickly when he did, both relieved and uneasy not to be running through the empty corridors.

She shook her head no again. ” I’m not supposed to go up here. I don’t know where anyone is...” She looked towards the right-hand door, which probably led to another of these rooms. Maybe one with guards in it, though. The stairs down might take them closer to the living armor and the guards fighting it, though. Bad either way. She wished Julian would just stay with her in one of the rooms out of the way and hide. ”Left goes down,” she finally says, edging away from that junction as she does. ”There’s cells down the stairs. And guards. Right probably goes to another room, I don’t know…”[/QUOTE]

DM

Julian frowns and nods his head sadly as you explain that you really had little better idea than him where each path would lead you. You knew that the cells full of bad people were down below however, and at this Julian’s face brightens again. “Hey, maybe Sir Renault is locked up down below then! We were split up as soon as we arrived here, and while I was brought up here for that statue experiment, Sir Renault was taken elsewhere. We have to find him! He’ll know what to do to get out of here.”

Julian looks uncertainly at the two options available and then back at you. “So, down, right?”

Before he can confirm that decision for you both, however, a hideous racket begins making its way up the steps. You can hear the rough scraping of bone on the iron steps as something comes racing up the steps, grunting and squealing. Before it manages to turn the corner of the stairwell twisting down to the next floor, Julian drags you in the opposite direction: right, towards the iron door.

“We gotta hide, quick!” Julian hisses, bounding towards the door ahead and nearly pulling your arm out of its socket once more. His own half-melted boots clang loudly off the iron floor as he moves, and you hope that nobody can hear the racket over the one that the creature was making as it charged up the steps. Almost as soon as he had dragged you both into motion, he stopped, having already reached the door. Flailing out for the handle, Julian nearly stumbles back as he yanks the door open and then charges inside the room with you in tow.

Once inside the room he releases his grip on you, whirling to move back behind you and quickly – but quietly! – shut the door. Only a few seconds later the loud scraping of bone on iron outside stops as the creature presumably reaches the hallway. A loud, piercing shriek of rage comes from the hallway beyond the door a few moments later, followed by more scraping as the creature moves off – thankfully towards the room where you found Julian and not towards you.

Julian shudders and winces at the sound of the shriek, taking several deep breathes with his eyes closed before opening them again to regard you. “W-what was th-that?”

“I believe . . . I know. It was . . . a demon.” A voice gasped from further in the room, causing you both to jump at the unexpected sound. Turning to locate the source of the voice which was further in the room, you and Julian finally get your first good look at where you had dashed into.

The room was similar to all rooms in Ironheart with its iron floor, walls, and ceiling. It was about the same size as the room in which you met Julian, and appeared to be designed with a similar purpose in mind. In one corner of the room a large furnace burned at a low ebb, the lead contents of the cauldron suspended above it still bubbling. A short distance away from that, a large slab of stone several feet thick lay on the floor. Carved into that slab was the rough shape of a man, the carvings deep enough to serve as the bottom half of a man-sized mold. Suspended above this slab was a second similar slab, and the humanoid-shaped carving on that one’s surface suggest that it would be the top half of the mold. Thick chains connect both the top slab and the cauldron of bubbling lead to a series of tracks running along the bottom of an iron catwalk positioned near the top of the room, and the chains themselves snake down to a heavy wooden podium with a number of levers and cranks.

It is this podium that is the source of the voice, or rather the pale man slumped down on the floor against it. The chainmail armor on his left side is stained a dark crimson, and his hands sit loosely on his lap. Yet his feverish eyes appear clear for the moment, as they stare at the two of you while a mixture of fear and . . . pity? Despite the sudden paleness of his skin, you recognize the man as one of the two guards who had dragged you before Daddy earlier today.

“A d-demon? Here?” Julian asked, still unable to keep a slight tremble out of his voice. The guard chuckles weakly, wincing as he does so.

“Yes . . . a demon. All teeth and . . . claws. Like the one that did this.” The guard raises a hand to limply gesture down at his side, then makes an effort to push himself up into a straighter position. He gives up after a moment of feeble effort, relaxing once more with a weary sigh. His eyes drift over to you, and narrow slightly in recognition.

“Ah . . . I know you. Naughty Little Mar. Did your Daddy give you a firm spanking? Or did this shining knight save you?” The guard starts to chuckle again, but this time descends into wracking coughs. As the guard recovers Julian moves to position himself in between you and the guard, glancing back over his shoulder at you. “He can’t hurt us now.”

“Quite right. Were I . . . stronger right now, I might be tempted . . . to fulfill my duty as a guard. As it is . . .” The guard weakly shrugs, wincing as the movement puts stress on his wound.

“So, what brings you here? Trying . . . to hide . . . from your own inevitable deaths?”

The Cells: Third Floor

Baerdog7

The assembled elites listen intently to your words, and although they are too disciplined to relax fully, they at least nod in acknowledgement of your words. “Understood.” The spokesman of the group replies. “We will make a quick sweep of the level and then attempt to link up with the others at the Evacuation Point. However, are you sure that you would not like an escort up to the higher levels? We’ve gotten reports of demons running amok above, attacking guard and prisoner alike. Which seems like an appropriate cue to initiate the planned evacuation.”

At a motion from the spokesman, two elites step forward out of the crowd. “I can spare you these two men as an escort if you require it.”

(Regardless of whether you take the two elites or not, you can proceed on.)

After going up several short flights of stairs and through a couple of iron doors that thankfully are not barred against your progress, you arrive at what was presumably the next level of cells. As with your own previous home, the tunnels here are still pitch-black, although the hallways seem to be laid out with considerably more planning. Unlike the warren of tunnels below, however, these hallways are filled with uncharacteristic noise – distant screams, the clash of fighting, and the sounds of ripping flesh and chewing.

Actually, the sound of flesh being ripped apart was coming from quite nearby, and as you turn to look down the hallway to your right your light moves just enough to illuminate the source. A short distance away from you a hulking figure with long whip-like arms crouches over a body, it’s face buried in the former man’s internals. Noticing your light, the creature stops immediately and its blood-covered face snaps up to regard you with its murky grey eyes. The thing gives an angry hiss and then leaps straight up, the claws adorning each of its limbs connecting to the ceiling through some foul magic to allow it to simply hang there silently. With a flash of its long-armed limbs, the creature is gone in the darkness, but probably not for long.

You recognized the beast as a Grafner demon, a nasty and sadistic hunter of the Hells. They particularly enjoyed stalking prey, deliberately revealing themselves momentary from time to time to keep the prey’s fear high. When it grew bored of this sport, the Grafner pounced, often attacking from above where it could take advantage of its long limbs to attack from where retaliation could not reach. Nasty creatures, but with a cowardly streak that made them annoying to fight as they would frequently run away whenever the fight turned against them, only to renew the cycle of stalking until the odds seemed to be in their favor again. And now you had one of them stalking you down here, in pitch-blackness.

The Catacombs

Burrito

(Good deduction! )

“Great, now we’ve got ghosts too!?” Tattoos shouts as he moves up beside you as the two of you crash out through the door. Behind you the ghosts shriek in irritation, but thankfully seem unable to keep up for the moment as you both dash off down the hallway. Tattoos runs nearly doubled-over, staring intently at the floor and trusting you to prevent him from crashing head-on into any upcoming walls.

When you come to an intersection Tattoos curses, looking both left and right, where tracks seem to be visible traveling in both directions. “They must have went right first, and then left, and they seemed to be running from the right hallway. Which means they probably ran into something scary down that way? Scarier than the ghosts? Okay, right, let’s go – left!” Tattoos monologues, shaking his head back and forth over the tracks before twisting and starting to take off at a run down the left hallway.

A few seconds down your choice of destinations, however, more ghosts appear in front of you from through the walls. A few steps ahead of you, Tattoos slides to a wild stop in front of them, nimbly dodging one as it sweeps in to claw at him.

“Right, let’s go right instead!” Tattoos said, turning to start running back towards you and past you. Skittering to a halt as he had done, you turn and chase after your companion, crossing over the intersection just moments before your pursuers from the supply closet can reach it to block you in.

Behind you, the ghosts continue to pursue, shrieking angrily and gradually managing to gain on you both despite your best efforts to flee. As you approach the somewhat ajar door at the end of the hallway, however, the ghosts recoil with a final shriek, following you no further as you cross through the doorway.

Of course, what you find on the other side of the door is hardly more comforting than the screaming horde of ghosts behind you was. The room you have entered is in shambles, pieces of armor and bits of wood from a nightstand scattered all about the floor. You absent-mindedly notice the presence of a few personal articles in the midst of the wreckage, including a silver and ivory comb.

Most of your attention, however, is on the blood-soaked bed where another ghost was lying. Her appearance was no-less than disturbing than the other ghosts’, and perhaps more so for her features at least retained a close approximation of humanity. However, her eyes were merely empty sockets now, and a large chest wound continued to bubble up blood that flowed down to cover the bed in a fresh coating of intangible blood. Several fresher cuts also marred her form with bright red lines, including one that ran along her right cheekbone, down and around along her jawline, and back her to her left cheekbone to give the perverse appearance of a second smile. These wounds paled in comparison to her other ones, however, and it seemed fairly obvious how she died. But the ghost was clearly not dead, as she shifted uncomfortably to lift her empty eyes to seemingly stare at you.

“Hey, that looks like the chick from our dream!” Tattoos whispers with a note of either respect or sheer terror in his voice as he shot occasional glances at the ghost but clearly kept his focus on other objects in the room.

“Hello heroes. You’re early – I would have thought the curtain was not yet ready to fall.”

“Okay, so now she’s crazy. This day keeps getting better and better.”

ubersquid

Marv returns your smile as he pushes himself up onto his feet, stopping to brush himself off before moving to settle in on the pew across the aisle from you. “Well, they’re certainly a lot friendlier than most of the stuff we’ve run into today, at the very least!”

While Marv slumps further down into the pew and relaxes, you explain yourself further to the ghost in his own native tongue. The ghost seems mournful even for a ghost, not that you had any personal experience with ghosts before today.

“Yes, the Dawnblade was forged by Miriam herself. It is a very powerful weapon in the right hands, and one of the few that can draw the blood of an avatar. I can see why she would want you to take it, although judging by your words I must assume that you are not skilled with the sword.”

The ghost seems to give a very human sigh, although no sound comes from his lips.

“Would that I were still alive, so that I could take the weapon in hand and plunge it into Daecian’s black heart! He has become something far less than human and far worse than a demon.”

The ghost shakes his head before hanging it in shame.

“It is to my everlasting humiliation that I was fooled by his lies before he revealed his true nature. I allowed my fear of Elandra’s descent into madness to cloud my judgment, and in so doing I allowed myself to betray her. I believed Daecian when he said that she was out of control and a danger to us all, and I led the effort to restrain her. Me, Knight-Captain of the Order of the New Dawn, who had sworn an oath to defend her as surely as I had sworn to never allow the Harbinger of Decay to escape this place. And thanks to me, Daecian slaughtered her like a lamb and is now surely hours away from unleashing Doom upon our world.”

The ghostly knight seems to shake himself, and then looks back up at you.

“But enough self-pity, for we do not have time for it now. I have lamented over my mistakes for the countless millennium since my death at Daecian’s hands, and it shall have to be enough. Now we must find someone capable of wielding the Dawnblade and determine Daecian’s exact plan to release the Lord of Destruction. Elandra’s journal may, indeed, be able to reveal this plan for she certainly saw much and recorded at least some of it in her journal.”

The ghost floats over to hover in the pew behind yours, essentially looking over your shoulder as you carefully unwrap the journal and gently pull the leather cover open. The first entry is neatly written in the ancient language, but as you concentrate upon the script it shifts and twists before your eyes, morphing into neatly written language which you can easily read.

Day 1 of the First Year of the New Age

Today is the first day of a new era for our world. With the avatar of Azguloth imprisoned beneath this fortress and His armies scattered, peace may finally come upon the land. Miriam has seen fit to leave this humble shell behind to return to the heavens with Her Husband, and now it is up to us to ensure that our work was not in vain.

Eternal vigilance against those who would seek to free the Great Beast is required, and I can only hope that future generations will be inspired by our example to maintain this fortress. If it is the will of the Valkyrie, this journal will become a source of advice and strength for those children and children’s children of ours.

As such it may seem strange to give voice to my doubts within these pages, but perhaps a future reader will be able to draw a modicum of strength from my own weakness by means of shared uncertainty. It seems that to be human is to be uncertain of the future, and fearful of its possible courses as a result. Since the Valkyrie’s departure, even I have come to understand this feeling as I gradually lose the unshakeable sense of purpose that Her presence granted me.

Or perhaps it is the dreams that I have experienced since Her departure. I am unable to remember the details, but I awake each night in a cold sweat and know that my dreams of late have been dark and terrible. This does not bode well for the fulfillment of our Duty, but it would be foolish to allow a few bad, half-remembered dreams to shake my resolve to accomplish the task set forth by Miriam. I shall continue this journal tomorrow with further news of my doubts and dark dreams, along with my hopes for the immediate future.

The Labs

Iethloc

With your hands free, you manage to free yourself easily from the rest of your bindings. Fulfilling Omega’s request for aid, you cast a spell to put her in stasis until you could find something sharp to cut her free and perform surgery. The stasis spell seemed to work in slowing her metabolism and putting a hold on the blood rushing down her face, but thankfully she still seemed aware of her surroundings. As you begin to walk around the room, looking for something suitable for use in cutting, Omega’s mind reaches out to yours, still sounding as distant and weak as it had a few moments ago.

My body was . . . created to be resilient. There are still human parts, however . . . which are weak. And I seem . . . to have overused my psychic abilities. I may . . . be able to recover on . . . my own. But perhaps not.

Looking around for a bladed implement was proving to be a more difficult task than you had imagined. There did not appear to be a knife of any sort in the room, nor anything with a sharp enough edge to cut paper like alone flesh. You imagined that if you could get back to the man’s office, he would have a letter opener or a glass bottle to break apart, but even that was a poor substitute for what you would need to perform something as delicate as brain surgery.

Sanctuary of the Prophets

WhiteKnight777/MrEdwardNigma

“I agree. We should leave here as quickly as possible.” Mellita chimed in at Umber’s mention of leaving the library behind.

Looking at her relative equal, at least in the hierarchy of your little band, Cassandra reluctantly nods. “For once I agree. And perhaps you should lay off the books for a while, Victor – not only is it disgusting to watch, but you don’t look so good right now.”

“But where will we go?” Sara interrupts, looking up from her huddled position against the far wall. “Those . . . things are everywhere, and –“

and they’ve already picked off one of us. Sara doesn’t conclude, but then she didn’t have to.

“Who cares. Away from here and out of Ironheart once we reach the secret tunnel.” Mellita retorts. Turning to Victor, she adds, “If you want to take some of these macabre books with you, alchemist, then we could probably convert one of the creature’s black cloaks into a sack, assuming we can find one that isn’t completely shredded amongst the bodies outside. No guarantee that they wouldn’t simply gnaw their way through the cloak, however.”

The Dragon (Cultists) Lair

Pwenet

The cultist continues to cower, clearly fooled by your impression of the dragon. “Of course, Lord Akor. The suit is designed to give you the physical strength of a dozen men, although of course you had that already. It also protects you with an adamantite shell similar in strength to the armored hide that you would have once you have achieved your full glory once more. And, unfortunately, due to your apparent inability to regenerate now, well . . . it’s the only thing keeping you alive?” The cultist shudders and waits in nervous anticipation to see if you were able to somehow sit up and strike his head from his shoulders, but breathes a sigh of relief and continues when no such blow is forthcoming.

“In any case, we were unable to retrieve your missing limbs. Instead we filled the inside of the suit for your missing arm and leg with a magical sand. It can expand or contract according to your mental commands, loosely mimicking the movements of your flesh and blood limbs. You won’t have the fine motor control of the suit that you do with your actual limbs, of course, but at least you’ll be able to walk and move around without significant impairment. Hopefully your lost limbs will eventually regenerate and make the need for such a crude magical trick unnecessary.” The cultist adds with a nervous laugh. He continues laughing at your question as to what the plan was now.

“Well, of course Lord Akor, the only plan has always been to serve you and ensure that you acquire a new body so that your full draconic glory may once more be present in the world.”

“Enough. He deserves to know the truth, the whole truth now. We don’t have time for anything else.” Another cultist interrupts, approaching the table you were lying on with a low bow. The lead cultist shoots him a black look, but withdraws as the cultist comes to stand beside him, looking down at the floor and refusing to meet your gaze.

“Lord Akor, I’m afraid we haven’t been entirely honest with you, even from the beginning. Yes, it’s true that we wished to restore your kind to its full physical glory, but we have been trying to do so for far longer than when we met you.” The man shifts uncomfortably, his face taking on a disgusted look.

“I believe you have encountered the foul abominations that call this fortress of pain and death their home. As you have undoubtedly discovered, their greatest weakness is your purifying flame. Although we have tried countless times, we have been unable to reproduce your special fire exactly, and we have long since lost the strength to combat these abominations directly. And so it was on you, a reborn dragon, that we placed all of our hopes.”

The man shakes his head mournfully.

“It was these same abominations that arranged for the death of your brood, and perhaps indeed even your entire species: their damned heritage stretches back to time immemorial. It was our hope that we could bring you back to life for your revenge and our salvation. But the human was too stubborn, and we had to try to break his will for you. We dared not explain the situation to either him or you, for fear that the abominations would come to understand our full objective and kill us all. In fact, our lack of progress only helped assure the abominations that we were no longer a threat.”

The cultist sighs and finally looks up to meet your eyes with a wistful smile.

“And perhaps we never were a threat, for the abominations’ goals are nearly complete, and here you are Lord Akor, battered and torn. There are only a few of us now, for we have been steadily in decline between sacrificing ourselves to your human host and being picked off by the abominations all around us. I know that we no longer have the strength to oppose the abominations, and perhaps we never have. I do not know if even you have that strength, but I beg you Lord Akor, for all we have done for you please indulge this request for your aid. The abominations’ plans must be stopped or the world itself will die!”

[Dorizzit]

You're just a wonderful guy. It must be your shining personality, Korram mentally grumbles sarcastically at Calcifer. Still, he is quite impressed, flexing his arm a few times in amazement. "Never expected to see that again," he mutters. He shakes his head, putting such thoughts out of his head. Before Seraph goes off, Korram says: "Wait a second. Both of you, listen carefully. My current situation is...precarious. I'm currently at peace with Calcifer, but that could easily change. If I say run, you both need to do it immediately, and without question. Alright, let's move." He walks with Katrina while Seraph leads, and listens to her comment about obsession. "True, he is obsessed. But you should have seen me before I found you. Having a loved one in here..." Korram shudders. "It's horrible." Katrina inquires about Korram burning her. "Don't worry. Despite my earlier comment about instability, I won't hurt you. Ever." He mentally says to Calcifer: Let's make one thing clear: If you ever hurt my daughter, I will kill myself just to make you pay. You can see through my mind, you know I'm not exagerrating. Got it?

[Burrito]

Askov

The sight of this ghost was so totally different from the vision of Light and Power that drove away the deamon of my creams, that it almost seemed absurd to think they were one and the same. But the truth was undeniable. I knew in my heart it was the same woman.

“Yes Tattoos, whe is the same one from the dream.” I said quietly. “The one who saved us. Who saved me.” The last sentence I said at a mere whisper.

I took a moment to look about the room some more. Stopping to bend down and pick up the comb. “I don’t know what we can do for her Tattoos.”

I’m just a simple man. I have no great powers, no wonderous magic to help heal….or whatever….this ghost. If she can be healed. I wondered to myself.

I make my way through the debris of the room to stand next to the bed. Not knowing what to do, but knowing that I had to do something, I reach down and touch her hand. There was an odd, almost sureal, sensation of feeling the skeleton underneath the form of her ghost hand. I could feel the cold manacle on her wrist. Much like the one I had worn so recently…. although it seemed like a thousand years ago.

"I don’t think I am a hero. But I will do what I can for you." What little I can…

I began the prayers to Athelion, and Miriam. This time I recite the whole prayer, at least as much as I had learned of it, looking into the “eyes” of the ghost before me.

"Athelion, Bringer of Light, Bringer of Life.
Help us, your humble Servants,
In our time of Darkness.
So that we may Bring Forth the Light,
And drive out the Shadows from our Hearts.

Miriam, Hand of Justice, Protector of the Meek,
Help me, your faithful servant,
In my time of Darkness,
To guide my hand with Righteousness,
So that I may drive Evil from the Land

Miriam, Hand of Justice, Protector of the Meek,
Hear me, your faithful servant,
The Time of Darkness draws near,
The Light of Justice must shine brightly,
So that a New Dawn, may banish the Night.

Athelion, Bringer of Light, Bringer of Life.
Hear us, your humble servants.
Receive these souls of Your Children.
Guide them out of the Darkness,
And to Your Light Eternal.

Athelion, Bringer of Light, Bringer of Life.
Miriam, Hand of Justice, Protector of the Meek,
The Sun. The Valkyrie.
The Hope. The Salvation.
We your Children. I your Servant.
Forever in the Light.”

Once done, I just stood there. Holding the hand of a dead woman, who was still dying it seemed...

(ooc) don’t know why but I seem to be in a somber mood tonight.

[Lonna]

{{Dagnabit, another set of manacles to escape from.}}

Pyrene

At Samuel's threats, Pyrene cowered back as far as the manacles would allow and burst into noisy tears, silently thanking her lucky stars that she had remained in character even during her fight with Maxwell.

"H-he sh-shot y-you!" "Claire" sobbed as Samuel raised his free hand to strike her again. The blow fell, snapping her head back and forcing "Claire" to try, only partially successfully, to stop her crying.

"I only w-wanted to thank you and he sh-shot you and then he attacked m-me!" Claire gabbled this out and cringed, expecting another slap to her already bruising face. When none came, she looked up and saw Samuel attempting to climb to his feet. She scrambled over to help, only to flinch back when he barked at her to "stay the hell away."

After another minute or two of panting and pained grunting, he got up by using his sword as a crutch. Once standing, he raised the sword off the ground and used it to indicate that Claire should also stand. She did so, looking terrified and staying as far away from Samuel and his sword as the chain connecting them would allow.

Right about then Maxwell started to regain consciousness, groaning with what probably felt a great deal like a bad hangover. Samuel whirled around, jerking "Claire" with him.

{{OOC: And here is where I realized I don't know how the elites will interact with each other, much less what they'll try to do to Pyrene. So I think I'll leave it to the DM from here }}

[Pwenet]

Incom Morgan

”Akor is gone.”

Those words are spoken simply without hate or gloating, just a simple statement of fact. Listening to the figure of the lead cultist Incom thinks back to the words that were spoken to him by Miriam. The cultists history as defenders against the great evil, to have fallen so far to resort to torture and manipulation. One might say it was Karma that because of their fall everything failed, but Incom struggles to force himself into a sitting position and starts trying to flex his “replacement” limbs. Unable to move he turns towards each of the cultists with his good eye and gazes into their faces, watching their expressions as he speaks.

”I was dead, were it not for you. You wonder why I am not regenerating, it is because Akor was banished from me. Because you were clouded with suspicions and told neither one of us what was happened we fought a unneeded war for over FORTY against each other.

Pushing his hatred for them back Incom breaths deeply and continues.

”I was told of your noble beginnings, and how far you have fallen. I was told about the threat that we face, and how we may be the only chance to save this Earth, for if we fail the gods will burn this planet as they fight with their full powers. I suspect you know this and that is why we can not waste any more time or energy fighting against each other.”

“I am not forgiving you, but I can understand why you all did what you did. Nor do I suspect you forgive me for banishing your savior and not giving in, but for now that is all in the past. I retain a small part of Akor within me, maybe that will be enough, or not it does not matter for we have to at the very least TRY to stop the gods final battle on this planet.”

“Now will you help me or will you kill me? Choose quickly and if you decide to kill me, make it permanent, it is annoying to keep crossing the realms.”

Incom gazes into each of the cultists as he finishes his speech and watches them.

[Baerdog7]

Ander Windrivver

Ander declines the escort and continues up to the next floor. It's not long, however, before he spots the grafnir demon.

Hmm, friend of yours? I wonder what he's doing here... Ander muses as the grafnir swings away into the darkness. Seemingly unfazed, Ander unsheathes his sword and holds his lantern high. The sword begins to glow with a faint light as Ander charges is with holy energy (ready to smite a hungry grafnir) and summons a golden shield of holy energy around himself.

Prepared now against a grafnir ambush, Ander continues down the hallway, in (hopefully) the direction of the next guard outpost.

OK Ander, let's see how well we remember this place after who-knows-how-long. The guard station shouldn't be too far...

[Iethloc]

Sohssal

"There don't appear to be any sophisticated cutting implements here. For your sake, most of your brain had better be of a resilient demonic nature..." he commented as he began walking into the deceased man's office. On the way, he flexed one hand, and immediately it was surrounded by electricity. Finally getting the hang of this again... he momentarily thought. Before long, he snorted derisively to himself. "I'm not really surprised this guy didn't have anything sharp at hand...he seemed far too idealistic to be that pragmatic...or at least that useful. At least I can resort to spells if there's no knife...although all the spells I know that can cut things are made to kill people...or at least make very, very large holes," he said to no one in particular.

[ubersquid]

Elkwin - Catacombs

Elkwin squints and sways his head back and forth as he opens the book. Even as the symbols change into readable letters they are hard to make out in the damp light.

"Hey Marv you gotta see this... It says there is some kind of ancient monster imprisoned below Ironheart... Apparently from the time before it was an actual prison..."

He looks over to Marv expecting a response but only looks into empty and tired eyes. As Elkwin reads on, he more and more feels his body pressing against the pew. Every bone in his body aches and his lids grow heavy. Considering the circumstances, the stone seat feels like a feather bed. Elkwin forces himself to read on for a bit but feeling no immediate danger considers more and more to give in to his exhaustion.

[Inspectre]

The Main Tower

Lonna

(You can say that again! Also, feel free to step in at any time during the following DM with your next action. You can also just wait until things have moved along to the end of the post before making your next move, if any. I have a set of plans if you manage to escape and a set of plans if you don’t, so either way doesn’t lead to certain death short of you throwing yourself on a sword. )

Your tears failed to move Samuel, although that might just be because he wasn’t in the mood to hear it with a crossbow bolt in his back. After receiving a no-nonsense slap and a growled “shut it!”, you turned down the waterworks, desperately trying to come up with a way out of this while the guard painfully climbed to his feet. Unfortunately your options become even more limited as Maxwell wakes up with a groan.

“Bitch knocked me out!” Maxwell grumbled, his words partially slurred as he shook his head in an attempt to clear it.

“Max! Wake up! We have unsecured prisoner!” Samuel barked, wincing as he belted out the words. But these words seemed to send a jolt through Maxwell, and his eyes snapped open a degree more as he stared down the corridor at the two of you.

“Wha – oh. Her. Damn sow hits like a battering ram.” With a fair bit of effort on his part as well, Maxwell manages to regain his footing, although he half stumbles into the wall next to him, leaning against it to support his weight.

“Come on! Toss me your manacles and go get your damn crossbow!” Samuel snarls, beckoning at Maxwell.

Numbly, Maxwell nods, pulling a similar set of manacles off his belt and tossing them underhanded towards the two of you. They land a few feet short to a curse from both elites. Dragging you along behind him, Samuel moves over to the manacles and bends down with a hiss of agony. He comes back up with the manacles dangling from his free hand.

“Now then – face the wall!” Samuel shouts as he turns back to you, grabbing the chain in between your wrist and his and jerking your arm around behind your back. He presses you forward against the wall, leaning a shoulder into your back to try and hold you still. He then snaps one manacle around your already entrapped wrist, and then temporarily abandons the manacles while reaching around with his free hand to grab your other wrist, wrenching your previously free arm around behind your back. Switching his grip on your free wrist from his own free hand to the one manacled, the elite then picks up the unused end of Maxwell’s manacles and snaps it closed around your other wrist. Your hands were now shackled behind you, although the connecting chain was a couple feet long – about enough to allow your hands to come forward and around your back to about either side of your waist. By now Maxwell has collected his crossbow and reloaded it, and has moved forward a step to cover the two of you.

“Prisoner secure! Now searching!” Samuel grunted, grasping the middle length of chain between your wrists and pulling up and twisting until your hands were painfully held together at the small of your back. With his free hand then Samuel began to roughly search you, stopping several times to wheeze and catch his breath.

He finds the collar still snapped around your neck almost immediately, fumbling with the scarf before finally pulling it away and tossing it onto the floor. Both elites recognize its significance immediately.

“Well, isn’t that a surprise! Looks like we’ve got ourselves an escaped prisoner! You’ve got any other secrets you’d like to reveal to us, “Claire”?” Maxwell snarls, but Samuel remains oddly silent as he moves his search on down from your neck. He likewise discovers the shackles and chains which you had tied to your shins after another minute of searching.

“Well, aren’t you just the clever little harlot? Pity you weren’t smart enough. Maybe we’ll just lock you in one of the rooms we pass by, leave you for the demons to find. How’d that be, think you can convince a demon not to eat you? Come on, let’s go.”

Maxwell gestures down the hallway with his crossbow, and Samuel leans back off of you. He manages to take a single step forward down the hallway again before he collapses, dragging you down with him. With your hands chained behind your back as well as falling mostly straight back, you aren’t able to really catch yourself as you fall. Thankfully, Samuel takes most of the impact as you land on top of him. He manages to weakly push you off of him, and then coughs up blood: the impact had shoved the bolt even deeper into him.

“Can’t . . . make it. You go . . . on ahead.” Samuel groans, reaching down to his belt with his free hand. He fumbles with a small pouch on it for a second, and then produces a key which he uses to unlock the manacle around his wrist. “Glad . . . they give us . . . keys for these . . . unlike the . . . others.” Dropping the key, Samuel picks up the manacle freshly released from his wrist. He wrestles with you for a minute, but then manages to swing the chain around the front of your waist and lock the manacle around your wrist on the other side. Your wrists are now loosely pinioned down to your sides by two sets of manacles, one with the chain running around your back and one with the chain running across your front.

Samuel then rolls off of you, weekly crawling over to the wall to prop himself up against it. “Get . . . help.”

Maxwell nods and then turns back to cover you with the crossbow. “Alright, get up! I don’t care how hard it is, you get up onto your feet by the time I count to ten or I’ll pin you to the floor with a couple of bolts and leave you for the demons!”

The_Snark Theater

The_Snark

She jumped back as the guard spoke, heart already racing from running from the monster on the stairs. Guard—yes, he was a guard, one who knew her. Not a comforting thing; he might not be in the cells with the bad people, but most of the guards made her uneasy. And just now, he might confirm her uneasy certainty that she was disobeying horribly.

Then what he said sunk in. "Demons?" she said uncertainly, moving further behind Julian and ducking her head a little to make herself harder to see. The monster on the stairs, it was true, had not sounded like the one chasing her. That one had been all metal. Maybe others had followed it in. "How… what…" The guard was wounded, she realized. She had seen that before, but now it struck her as wrong, terrifyingly wrong. Guards were not supposed to be hurt. If they were hurt, something was very wrong in Ironheart. Unwillingly, she remembers a flash of the vision earlier.

"… why are they here?" she finishes in a small voice, since Julian wasn’t asking it for her. She couldn’t see his face, so she couldn’t be sure if he was afraid, or surprised, or angry.

DM

Everything was wrong today: you had gotten the nice man Joseph killed, you had escaped punishment, Daddy might be gone, monsters of all shapes and sizes were running amok, and now a guard was lying here dying before you. Was it all somehow your fault? As you shrink back behind Julian, part of your vision from earlier comes back to you.

However, this time after the replayed vision comes to an end, more follows it. Or perhaps not more, exactly: it jumps to another place and time. You can’t tell if this one was supposed to be after or before . . . wait, it must be before! “You” still had your wings, which had been cut off at the end.

Although these visions seemed to be consistently from the viewpoint of this person with wings, that person certainly wasn’t you. You’ve never had an exceptional memory, but you are sure that you would remember events as horrifying as these. So if these weren’t your memories, then where are these visions coming from!?

You lie crumpled on the floor where you had fallen. You may have been unable to resist the urge to curl up into a protective ball, but thankfully a number of the chains locked around you had already gone taut. You do manage to resist the urge to whimper as residual pain from your injuries washes over you.

They had used brands with unholy runes carved into them, pressing them against your skin until the flesh had blackened. They had not stopped until your whole body was covered in the marks, a meshwork of unholy burns. You had fought many terrible battles, but never had you felt this much pain.

What was worse was the fact that there didn’t seem to be any point to the pain beyond simple sadism. Your previous captors had used pain as necessary to control you or draw blood. But these . . . demons in human flesh only wanted to see you suffer. They had taunted you as they struck, feinting several times with the brands before pressing them against your skin, and stopping only when you finally couldn’t control yourself any longer and screamed. They stopped for a moment then, as if enjoying the sound, before continuing with renewed ferocity.

You screamed several more times during the remainder of your torment, but this time your tormentors didn’t stop until you collapsed to the floor. Then they had finally, mercifully, withdrawn to the corners of the room, whispering and laughing amongst themselves. Although your skin was still aflame, you could see the brands slowly starting to fade.

In time they would heal fully and it would be as they had never been there: you had regenerated from worse injuries. But now you were starting to realize that such was not necessarily a blessing: unless they were truly reckless your captors would never actually kill you. Which meant that the freedom of death would be denied to you, and you would be trapped here until you managed to break free or were rescued.

Your despairing thoughts are interrupted as the door to the room swings open and the six torturers snap to attention. Into the room walk four men, three of whom you recognize and the fourth who is in the lead. The three that you recognize are members of the cult that call themselves the Seekers of Life: your previous captors. The fourth, a tall, wiry young man with the scruffy beginnings of a beard and an unruly head of black hair is apparently your new captor and some sort of noble amongst this group of humans. Other than that you know nothing about him, but looking into his smug expression and shining green eyes now you can see that he is also a figurative demon in human flesh.

Meeting your gaze the man smirks and gives an elegant bow. “Ah, Marisiel the Protector! What an honor it is to meet in this way! I am the Baron of Gast, your new owner.”

You might have been able to come up with a retort to this man if you were still not so weak from your injuries, but it wouldn’t have matter anyway: a moment after his proclamation the Baron turns his attention away from you, ignoring you entirely as he turns back to the Seekers of Life.

“She’s prettier than I expected. A pity you brought her here now instead of a few years ago. Alas, now I’m married and my wife has certain expectations.”

The Seekers of Life seem taken aback, although more so by his claim of ownership over you. Apparently a transfer of “ownership” hadn’t been mentioned previously.

“Umm, your Lordship. We were given to understand that we would be renting out a small section of your prison in order to contain her while we ran our own experiments. But the agreement was never that you would own her.”

The Baron adopts a predatory smile as he nods. “Quite right. That was the original agreement. One which I have now seen fit to change.” The Baron makes a small gesture with his right hand, and a trio of guardsmen appears in the doorway. They are each armed with crossbows, and do not hesitate to use them to fire a bolt into the back of each cultist. The Baron gives a bark of a laugh as he pulls a boot back to kick the fallen body of the leader in the face. With a muttered “idiot”, the Baron then turns back to you, bowing again while sweeping his hand back at the dying cultists as the crossbowmen reload and enter the room.

“And here is my welcoming gift to you, o great angel! The deaths of every single one of your previous captors, leaving only myself to inherit their most treasured possession: you.”

Behind him the Baron’s crossbowmen move to stand over the fallen cultists, firing a second bolt into the back of their heads as a killing blow. Still grinning like a cat before a cornered mouse, the Baron moves over to kneel down directly in front of you. Reaching out a forefinger, he idly begins to trace the brands burned into your face and neck while he continues. If you had had the strength or the slack in your chains, you’d have broken the horrid man’s neck, and undoubtedly spared yourself and more importantly the rest of the world a great deal of suffering in the years to come.

“You’ve arrived at the perfect moment Marisiel. Your kind can exist on our world for millennia, while we fragile humans live but a handful of decades. Of course there are ways around it, but most of those methods tend to involve unpleasant complications. Fortunately my wife discovered a new path to eternal life, but it involved the blood of an angel. Now where were we going to get one of those? And then bless their hearts, the Seekers of Life practically showed up on our doorstep with you. I certainly couldn’t pass a chance like that up, and so I’m afraid despite changing hands your life is really going to stay much the same. You’ll be restrained, and bled, until I no longer have need of you. Assuming my wife’s plan works, that might take centuries or even millennia, but what’s a few thousand years between a master and his property? Of course, you don’t see yourself as property, do you? I blame the Seekers for that, as I suspect somewhere in their naïve little brains they still respected you as a servant of the gods. I’ll tell you now that I have no such respect for you: you’re just a pretty-faced bag of vital blood to me. And I will break you until you see yourself the same way. Unfortunately, my responsibilities as Baron prevent me from personally overseeing your education, but I’ve found the perfect surrogate.” His grin growing even more predatory, the Baron leans back and turns to call over his shoulder, “Brother, please come in here and introduce yourself!”

As the crossbow-bearing guards prepare to drag the corpses of the Seekers of Life out of the room, a new man steps into the room. Like the Baron he seems fairly young, with short-cropped red hair. The thing that you perhaps notice most about him, however, is that he is dressed in the robes common to a priest.

“Athelion and Miriam bless you, child.” He says with a sneer as he moves to stand behind the Baron and off to one side. Turning back to you, the Baron removes his hand from your face to gesture at the priest.

“Brother Corwin here is a priest from the Church of Light, one of the largest and most organized churches that worship your previous masters. Typically they’ve been a force for truth and justice in the world, blah blah blah. Recently however, it seems a number of them have seen the light, if you’ll forgive the expression, and come to realize that this world of ours is shaped only by those strong enough.”

"Praise be to the gods!” Corwin interjects with a laugh.

“In any case, it seems Brother Corwin has some training as an inquisitor, and his studies as a priest have given him some insight into your kind’s weaknesses. So I’m confident that I am leaving you in capable hands. But before I leave you to confess your fears to Brother Corwin, allow me to give you something to remember me by.”

Accepting one of the unholy brands from your previous torturers, the Baron then proceeds to shove it against your right eye. Your mind goes blank from the pain, but you can dimly hear your screams echoing throughout the rest of Ironheart.

You snap back to reality with a gasp, reflexively cupping a hand over your right eye before you realize that what you just experienced wasn’t real, and your eye really wasn’t melting just now. Apparently noticing your discomfort as well as your previous fear of the guard, Julian turns to face you in confusion.

“What’s wrong?”

He seems about to inquire further when he is interrupted by a nasty laugh that quickly turns into a nasty cough from the guard. When he can finally speak again, the guard explains.

“What’s wrong . . . is that girl isn’t right . . . in the head.”

Face contorting in anger, Julian whirls back to confront the guard. “You shut up!”
But his anger is only met with by more merriment from the guard.

“No . . . I’m serious. Most collaborators, they do what . . . we tell them, but grudgingly. Naughty little Mar there . . . she does everything we tell her to . . . no questions asked . . . meek as a lamb. Even loves . . . her so-called Daddy . . . despite his cruel tortures.”

Julian turns back to you in confusion. “Your father tortures you? I remember he told you to run away, but I thought he was a collaborator or something like you.”

Here the guard laughs uproariously – but just for a moment before he nearly chokes to death. “No no no, he’s a big administrator here in Ironheart! The great Brother Roderick Corwin!”

Julian shakes his head, his face completely twisted up in confusion. “I don’t understand, Mar. Your father is an administrator here, yet he abuses you and you are a prisoner? I don’t understand. Please, explain how this can be true.”

Addressing no one in particular, the guard grunts, “Anyway, I have . . . no idea . . . how they got in . . . or why. Heard . . . the Warden was . . . planning . . . big ritual. Thought it was . . . nonsense . . . but I guess others were . . . right. Guess . . . no one told . . . demons . . . we’re on . . .the same . . . side.”[/QUOTE]

The Cells: Third Floor

Dorizzit

Seraph stops momentarily to look back at you, nodding before turning to press on again. Katrina looks a bit nervous, but nods silently as well. As you walk down the corridor, hustling a bit to try and catch up with Seraph, you comment how difficult it was to have a loved one trapped in this awful place. In response Katrina seems to smile wistfully and nods, “You have no idea, and I hope you’re right about not ever hurting me.”

In your mind, Calcifer hisses, but gives the sense of nodding his head. And understand me when I say that if you try to betray me, your daughter will be the first to pay the price.

Before you could respond, another light source cuts into the hallway ahead of you: a single elite (Baerdog7) holding a lantern aloft and carrying a sword glowing with energy. “Elite.” Seraph says simply, dropping the lantern to the ground before dashing towards the elite to close the distance. As he closes, Seraph swings his crossbow around off his shoulder and fires a bolt, which would have struck true were it not for the brilliant shield of light that appears to deflect the shot.

Reaching the elite, Seraph draws his bastard sword in a flash of steel that the man barely manages to sidestep. They exchange several more rapid and ferocious blows, but with the elite only having a single hand to hold his longsword with Seraph has the clear advantage of strength. Forcing the elite’s sword down and away, Seraph spins around inside the elite’s guard, throwing an elbow over his shoulder into the man’s jaw and a boot into the man’s chest to send him crashing back against the wall. Twirling around to face the dazed man again, Seraph leaps in for a finishing stroke, but his blade tastes nothing but wall as the man manages to once again duck out of the way just in time.

It is at about this point that a large shape detaches itself from the ceiling above you, crashing down next to you to snatch Katrina up in one long-armed claw. Then the creature bounds up to the ceiling again, catching hold with its other long-arm and swinging itself rapidly off into the darkness, dragging a screaming Katrina along with it.

Baerdog7

Having fought these beasts on several occasions, you were aware of their tactics and weren’t overly concerned about your ability to beat it – particularly with your holy powers returned. Imbuing your sword with holy energy and summoning a protective shield around yourself, you ready yourself to fight the beast when it dared show its face again. Your devil companion seems aghast at your insinuation, however.

“No, not at all Lord General! Devils and demons barely get along under the best of circumstances . . . all the stupid things want to do is crush and destroy. I . . . uh . . . have no idea, er . . . what he could be doing here!” The devil hastily concludes, muttering to himself, “Gods be damned! I go through all this work and now it’s all going to go to waste with His release.”

Making your way along to the guard post, you make your way down the short corridor to an intersection. You believe that a guard post should be a short distance up the hallway to the left, and start to turn in that direction. Immediately after entering the intersection, however, you fall under attack.

A tall wiry man with black hair and green eyes is dropping a lantern to the ground as you enter the intersection. Behind him are a man with somewhat puffy-looking skin (Dorizzit) and a girl in her late teens with long black hair. “Elite.” The man in the lead says, finished dropping the lantern to the ground and now rushing towards you.

As he comes forward, he produces a crossbow from his back, snapping off a shot that is thankfully deflected away by your holy shield. Dropping the crossbow, the man reaches you, drawing a bastard sword and slashing at you in a single smooth motion. You manage to dodge this first one, but immediately are forced to parry several more blows as the man unleashes a flurry of rapid attacks at you.

Although young, the man was clearly an expert swordsman, as well as strong and fast – nearly as strong as you and perhaps a tad faster, even. Furthermore, he had the additional advantage of having both hands on his sword while you were forced to hold up a lantern in your off hand. This gave him a bit of extra strength to push your blade about, which he took advantage of as he knocks your blade aside and twists inside your guard. His back now to you, the man throws an elbow into your jaw, stunning you momentarily and sending you staggering back. The attack is followed up a moment later by a hard kick to your sternum, sending your crashing back into the wall behind you.

As the man twirls around again to face you and leaps at you, you recover just in time to throw yourself clear, leaving the man to scratch at the wall with his sword. The blade didn’t break upon contact with the hard wall either: clearly a magical blade of some kind as it sliced a thin gash across the wall where you had been a moment before.

As the man turns to face you and prepares to attack yet again, a loud scream catches your attention further up the hallway. Apparently seeing the confusion on the battle below it, the grafner demon had decided now was the time to strike, leaping down to snatch up the teenage girl before retreating off into the darkness with her.

When they wanted to the big demons could move fairly fast swinging along the ceiling, and between that, its significant head start from where you were standing, and the apparent hostility of these people towards you, you doubted you would be able to catch up to it. But then again, were you really going to simply let a young girl be torn apart by that hideous thing somewhere off in the darkness, without at least trying a rescue?

The Catacombs

Burrito

Unsure what to do, you simply move over to beside the ghost, taking one of her hands into yours. You then recite one of your prayers, in its entirety that you can remember. Beside you, the ghost also begins to pray. The phrasing is archaic and in some places nonexistent as the ghost slips back into her own ancient and indecipherable tongue, but you sense that it is similar to your own prayer. Perhaps they are even the same, modified and changed slightly down the millennia between the two of you until at last your version of the prayer came into existence. The prayer at last comes to an end, and the ghost woman seems to lapse back into madness.

“I followed the path of righteousness, and yet all that awaits at the end of the path is ruin and I am dragged towards it by others. Oblivion comes for me, as it comes for us all. The key is in the lock and the hand prepared to open the door. Six rivers of blood form the tide of destruction to wash away the world. Oh gods, why . . .”

The ghost woman seems to mentally shake herself as she turns suddenly towards you, partially revealing the skeleton beneath as her eye sockets focus on your eyes. “Heroes, there is a task for you to undertake. Even as Oblivion marches closer we must struggle against its inevitability for that is the will of the gods.”

Here Tattoos seemed to perk up a bit, having quietly retired to one corner of the room during your joint prayer. “Y-yeah? What sort of t-task?” He nervously asks.

“You must take the sword away from here and place it into the hands of the one who will wield it.”

“Sword! Right . . . sword . . . sword . . . sword.” Tattoos muttered, casting about the room looking for said blade. Not finding it amongst the wreckage, he stoops down and looks under the bed, shaking his head in disgust before exclaiming, “There’s no sword here!”

“Ngh . . . wrong heroes. Someone is already delivering the sword to its wielder. I have a different task for the two of you.”

“Yeah, I bet you do.” Tattoos grumbles, moving in to whisper into your ear, “Look mate. I’m real appreciative to the aid this lady gave us, but I think she’s completely lost it. Take anything she says with a barrel of salt, aye?”

“I require the two of you to take the right hand of my remains into the depths beneath this fortress. And – “

“Gods Askov, do you hear that. She wants –“

“- And because I know you won’t initially believe me, allow me to explain further.” The ghost interrupts, a note of irritation creeping into her voice as she cuts Tattoos off.

When Tattoos quiets, the ghost woman continues, a small hint of amusement creeping into her voice. “Normally desecration of the dead is a sin, but surely for a noble cause your consciences can endure it, particularly when the dead in question asks you to do so. I would not request this of you were the need not great. Only my touch or that of my brother’s can open the final door to the seal on the Great Beast’s prison. Or our designated successors, but it is not possible to do that from here. If you do not agree to do this, the world shall slide into Oblivion much sooner.”

ubersquid

Hearing your comment to Marv, the ghost chimes in. “Yes, the Great Beast, the Harbinger of Ruin, the Lord of Decay, the Forger of Oblivion, the Heart of Corruption, the Devouring Darkness, the Eater of Souls, Azguloth the Destroyer is imprisoned beneath this fortress. And Daecian’s only objective can be His release.”

A chill goes up your chill as the real name of the so-called Great Beast is mentioned, and it’s not just from the damp air. For a moment you feel your skin crawl as if someone or something were watching you, but the feeling quickly passes as you consider the meaning of the ghost’s words. Azguloth the Destroyer . . . everyone who had ever attended church knew who He was. The source of evil in the world, it was His will that stood in direct opposition to that of Miriam and Athelion. But the holy texts had never implied that he had been imprisoned anywhere, let alone beneath the fortress of Ironheart!

You could feel sleep starting to overtake you, and with a loud thump Marv fell over onto the pew. The impact startles him awake, but only long enough to mutter, “Hey Elkwin, I’m taking a nap. Wake me when it’s my turn for watch, yeah?”

The ghost makes a sound of disapproval, but clearly relents. “If you require rest, I suggest that you do it now, and only for a short while. We simply do not have time to delay if we wish to stop Daecian.”

Meanwhile, you flip to the next entry in the journal. Unfortunately, the next few entries have already decayed to unreadable gibberish, either faded away into faint stains on the paper or eaten away by mold. Despite your best effort, you even tear one of the pages apart as you flip it open, the impossible-ancient paper crumbling away into dust between your fingertips. But finally you come to the next legible entry.

Day 18 of the First Year of the New Age

I have now become utterly exhausted beneath the weight of my cursed dreams. They are more vivid than ever and I awake from each with a scream in a cold sweat, more exhausted than I had been when I first closed my eyes. Truly I am now afraid to even attempt sleep for I know that these dark visions lie in wait to ambush me in my dreams. I have even begun to remember them, and am able to recall every horrid detail whenever I close my eyes.

Some visions even haunt me now in my waking hours. I do not know if this is due to my condition growing worse or if I am simply beginning to nod off in the middle of the day. In either circumstance these new visions are really no less horrifying than the ones in my dreams. Have I offended the Valkyrie in some fashion to warrant this terrible punishment? I have received no answer to my prayers but further horrors.

I nearly told Aldren today when he questioned me. He has noticed my general lack of awareness and knows that something is troubling me. I shall have to make attempts to avoid him in the future and only approach him when I am at my best. He is already suspicious and further incidents will only inflame his concern. Despite being the Knight-Captain of my bodyguard, I do not think he would understand. At best he would only become more concerned, and at worst he may begin to have doubts about my capacity to lead. I love him dearly, but his judgment becomes clouded where I am concerned.

You hear a faint sob behind you from the ghost. “You were right not to trust me, Elandra. In the end my concern for you was used to justify betraying you.”

A moment later, the ghost claws at his insubstantial face with a piercing shriek of remorse and anguish. For a moment, Marv is settled awake before dozing back off. As he closes his eyes again, he grumpily mutters, “Gods, keep it down you two. Can’t you see when a man is trying to get some sleep around here? I’ve been worked near to the bone digging a tunnel for a bunch of filthy guards who’d love just to crack my head open, been chased by undead, twice, told by some crazy ghost lady I’d betray the man who’s saved my life half a dozen times, and now am curled up on a pew in a ruined chapel deep in the earth beneath a massive fortress. And all I want after surviving all that is just a few winks of rutting sleep.”

The Labs

Iethloc

How wonderful: the man who relies on magic for everything now finds that he might actually have difficulty in accomplishing a task because, gee, the task at hand can’t simply be solved by waving it away with magic. Does this sound familiar to you?

The acolyte chides you, but falls silent as you enter into the deceased man’s office. It was indeed exactly the same office as the one in the illusionary one, and the one that you saw a few moments before being sucked into his little funhouse. A quick search of it doesn’t reveal much of especial interest, save for a bottle of Donovale in exactly the same spot as that in the illusion, various annoying books of a non-magical nature, the man’s journal, a few pieces of correspondence from associates outside of Ironheart, and a letter opener.

The Lair of the Dragon

Pwenet

All three of the cultists are shocked to hear of Akor’s death, but they all solemnly nod at your question of alliance. “Yes, for all of his importance in the end Lord Akor was merely a tool. I do not know if we will be strong enough without him to defeat the abominations. Nonetheless, we must try for the fate of too many rely on our success not to make the attempt.” Says the cultist that revealed Lord Akor’s true purpose, to the enthused nodding of the other two.

Finding his voice again, the lead cultist again steps forward. “Lord Ak – er, Prisoner Pri – er, Incom, wasn’t it? We will do our best to aid you, but I fear that the three of us are all that really remains so you will need to do the bulk of the fighting. Fortunately, we decided to equip your armor suit with a number of weapons. Built into the wrists are a series of retractable blades: clenching your fist causes the blades for that hand to emerge or retract. The deployable wings on the back of your armor should enable you to fly for very short periods of time, and bolt launchers have been built into the wingtips. Each launcher has a total of ten bolts available, coated with a compound we’ve created to explode in a very similar fashion to dragonfire upon contact with flesh. Flexing your shoulders should cause the wings to alternatively deploy and retract, and violently thrusting a shoulder forward while the wings are deployed will cause the bolt thrower on that side to launch. The launchers should reload automatically, but remember that you only have ten shots with each, and we would need to open the wings in order to replace the bolts.” There is more than a small note of pride in the cultist’s voice as he describes the suit’s available weapons, and with some effort he picks up the heavy warhammer that had previously been lying on the floor out of your line of sight. You recognize it immediately as Ross’s warhammer.

“We also were able to retrieve your previous weapon for your use as well, should you wish it.” With a relieved sigh the cultist allows the weapon to clatter back down onto the floor.

“In regards to your eye we are unfortunately unable to devise a replacement in the time left to us. However, the helmet that we will also be outfitting you with has magical lenses which will allow you to see in pitch blackness: you will now be on equal footing with the abominations, unlike ourselves. The helmet also will transfer sound through and amplify it as appropriate, so that your hearing is enhanced by its presence rather than dulled.”

With the cultist leader concludes, the other two cultists have lugged a heavy helmet from a nearby worktable over to beside your own. With a loud sigh they set it down just above your own head, preparing to work it down and lock it into place against your breastplate. They stop before dropping the helmet down over your head as their leader concludes.

“I am afraid, however, that we have not had time to fully test all of this equipment. It is all designed to be run from a magical crystal set under the first layer of armor on your breastplate. The crystal works fine and there should not be any jerking movements on the part of the armor, but we haven’t been able to perfect any of the other equipment. Too many other things have demanded our attention over the years, and the preparation of the armor was only a minor effort. I am glad now that we did take the time to at least finish the armor itself, for it has surely saved your life without Lord Akor’s assistance. Once the helmet has been installed, we will set to the crystal to full power and allow you to practice moving around. Do you have anything further to say before we continue?”

[MrEdwardNigma]

Victor von Ravenstein III
"Sure, pack them. it's worth a try" Victor said, never taking his eyes off the vampire.

"So what do you say, friend vampire? A little blood for your friend? A drop is all I need. I'll show you the way upstairs when they packed the books and you've made your donation"

[Dorizzit]

"KATRINA! NOOO!" Korram screams, trying and failing to grab her before she is yanked away. He reacts instinctively, raising a hand and summoning Calcifer's energy into his arm. He then releases the power, a thin, concentrated shot of flame searing down the hallway, which snakes around Katrina and impales the demon. Korram, not finished, then causes the thread of flame to snake around, impaling the demon repeatedly before ripping its body apart with small explosions. Korram runs past Seraph and the dueling elite, getting to his daughter. "Katrina! Are you alright?" He listens to her response, and, if she is well, takes her and walks back to Seraph and the Elite. Taking a running start, he tackles the Elite from behind and bears him to the ground before producing a flame next to his enemy's face. "Keep struggling, and I will shove this ball of fire through your head."

[OverWilliam]

~Tare

Click.

It was barely even audible, felt more than heard. The snapping report of a trap arming itself was subtle, but full of meaning.

Click.

Tare heard it again in his mind. Most traps set against a door were designed in such a way that they were not truly lethal until the door was already being opened. This came about as a result of many traps of that sort being accidentally or spontaneously set off-- a mechanism under pressure is a mechanism that will fail, it is only a matter of time. However, if the trap arms itself as the door opens and then is triggered by the same motion, then the trap is harmless until its intended recipient disturbs it.

All of this academic knowledge sprang into the thief's mind along with realization of the danger it presented. But it was no use. He had been sensing his mind and body numbing with unfortunate rapidity since before the portal, and now he realized just how slow he was dragging. He felt himself take a blink, his eyelids fluttering in front of his eyes for only a split second, but it took forever. He thought that if the world around him slowed down it would merely give him more time to react. But if the world was slowed, he was nearly stopped. The lightning-speed impulses of thought struggled through the lethargic bog of exhaustion, and by the time the thought FINALLY surfaced, he knew it would be to late. There was nothing he could do. He considered the fact that he might be breathing his last breath, but there was nothing he could do. He watched the door swing open. He thought he caught a glimpse of a thin wire behind it. But he couldn't react. All he could do was watch.

[Lonna]

{{I'm going to assume that Pyrene's right hand is shackled to Samuel's left hand, since it hasn't been specified thus far. Makes little difference now, but might in the future.}}

Pyrene

“Max! Wake up! We have an unsecured prisoner!”

As soon as Samuel called her a prisoner, Pyrene knew the game was up. Any chance she had had of salvaging her charade was gone the moment Maxwell woke. I really don't want to kill them. I just want to get out. But they'll try to kill me when I try to escape. I tried to let them live last time but that didn't work. I won't be able to stop them this time. Not without killing them. But killing them would be wrong. But I can't protect Ariella from here. I have to get out, for her. I have to kill them; I have to commit that sin, accept that stain, for her.

As Samuel demanded his partner's manacles, Pyrene straightened up slightly, and the silently flowing tears stopped as abruptly as if she had turned off a faucet. These were the only signs of the fact that she had shed the role of Claire, but the elites didn't seem to notice, more focused on their preparations to subdue the prisoner than on the prisoner herself. Now Samuel had dragged her forward a few paces, and was bending forward to retrieve the manacles Maxwell had tossed at him. As he began to bend Pyrene could see that Maxwell had also come a few paces nearer and was bending to retrieve his crossbow. In that moment, Pyrene struck.

Grabbing the chain that connected her to Samuel, she jerked it up and out, spinning him to face her, and charged into him. Having seen her use a similar tactic on him before, he managed to get his free hand on her throat and tried to choke her. However, her weight forced him back several unsteady steps. Just as he seemed about to regain his balance, his foot slipped on a loose crossbow bolt (lost from one of the elite's quivers during the first fight) and fell backward onto Maxwell, who was just straightening with the unloaded crossbow in one hand and a bolt in the other.

The impact drove the bolt already in Samuel's back deeper still, and with a gasp of agony his grip on Pyrene's neck loostened, allowing her to breath again. Pyrene wasted no time but wriggled further on top of him, increasing the pressure on the embedded bolt and allowing her to reach Maxwell with her free hand.

For his part, Maxwell was less than pleased to be pinned to the floor so soon after the last time. This time, however, he was on his back, able to see his opponent much better, a fact of which he took full advantage. Though his stomach and legs were pinned under Samuel, he used the crossbow as a bludgeon and the bolt as a makeshift dagger to combat Pyrene's inhumanly fast punches. It only took one long, shallow cut down the forearm for Pyrene to realize her disadvantage, so she concentrated on avoiding the bolt while she sought some way to even the odds. Gaining confidence from drawing blood, Maxwell aimed a blow at her face with the crossbow bolt, causing her to jerk back, a movement which put her directly in the path of a blow from the crossbow itself, which struck with punishing force on the back of her shoulder.

Unfortunately for him, she had been waiting for him to try something like that. Next thing he knew she had caught his hand in a painful grip that first forced him to release the crossbow, then with a dull crack set off the firey pain of a badly broken bone in his hand. Lightning quick, she grabbed at his other hand, but he pulled away. Instead, she got hold of the bolt he was holding and jerked it out of his hand. No sooner did she have it but she dropped it again, letting him automatically reach for his best available weapon bofore she lashed out, her fist crushing his trachea almost instantly. He would take a few minutes to die, but only seconds to black out from oxygen deprivation. He was no longer a threat.

Then she screamed as two pains blossomed almost simultaneously, one in her hand and one in her thigh. She barely needed to look to see what had caused them. Maxwell, clearly aware that he was dying, had gotten hold of the crossbow bolt and tried to pin her left hand to his chest, where it lay after their desperate fight. Already severely weakened, he had only gotten it half way through her hand, but it was still very painful.

The pain in her thigh was equally easy to identify. In order to deliver the final blow to Maxwell, she had rocked sideways. Samuel, who could barely move from the agony of the bolt being pushed deeper into his back with every movement of the combatants, had bitten deep into the meat of her thigh when she came in reach with that final blow.

Suppressing more screams, Pyrene tucked her wounded hand to her chest and rolled off of Samuel as well as she could while still manacled to him, feeling her flesh rip as she left a bloody mouthful of muscle in his teeth. Getting her knees under her, Pyrene tensed for his next move, but he seemed to have passed out from the pain at last. He hadn't even spit out the chunk of her leg in his mouth. Bracing herself, Pyrene delivered a killing blow, telling herself it was more merciful than leaving him to die of blood loss or be ripped apart by whatever had killed the first soldiers she saw.

Panting a bit, from her exertions and the effort of not crying out in pain, Pyrene searched the elites for anything useful. {{First priority, get out of that annoying chain. Second priority, bandage wounds, preferrably with something other than her dress, though that will do in a pinch. Third priority, claim any useful items like maps, daggers, waterskins or food rations. Anything else I'll work with when I get it.}}

{{Edit: I wrote this late last night and hadn't looked at it since hitting submit. Now that I am, this is a freaking long post!}}

[WhiteKnight777]

Umber

Umber looked at Victor with a small smile on his face. He almost sympathized with the man's obsession - how he had felt that same driving passion, that burning, unbridled desire for knowledge himself, in the distant past. But that had been a long, long time ago. Other passions ruled him now, and primary among them was a desire to survive.

Rather than going upwards into uncertain danger, I think I will accompany my delightful guide Mellita to the hidden tunnels she knows of... I prefer the way down to the way up. If you wish to come, you are welcome, and perhaps we can discuss a drop or two later - though it will have to be in exchange for something other than your guidance, for I do not find myself in need of that at the moment.

[ubersquid]

Elkwin - Catacombs

Elkwin tries to flip the next page but as it crumbles like so many before he gives up for now with a silent curse and slides the book aside. He wearily looks to the ghost and then to Marv who seems to be sleeping like a log already.

"Are we safe here? ... I mean for the moment?"

He then looks around once more in an attempt to finally spot the overburdened table of food and the kegs of ale he was so much longing for and sighs in disappointment. Leaning back against the stone he closes his eyes.

Spoiler

Show

how fitting... i'll be away on holiday for a week starting tomorrow, give elkwin a few moments rest

[Baerdog7]

Ander Windrivver

Not paying as much attention to his surroundings as he should have been, Ander is blindsided by the strange new swordsman.

Gods damn it! They think I'm a guard!

Ander fights defensively, parrying the swordsman's two handed swings as best he can with one hand. It becomes too much, however, as as the swordsman kicks Ander into the wall. Spinning away from what would certainly have been a finishing blow (for a mortal), Ander drops and sets his lantern on the ground. He spins around and back up around the other side of the swordsman, using the strength of both arms on his sword, and is able to take the offensive, pressing him back into the wall.

Ander's luck didn't hold out for long, though, as just then the grafnir demon decided it would be a good time to show up and make off with the girl.

No!! Don't let that grafnir get away!

The split second distraction is all it takes, however, for the swordsman to once again take the advantage. Before Ander can disengage to run after the demon, he is once again fighting for his life. Facing away from the direction of the demon now, Ander sees what seem to be the reflections of flames on the prison walls. Not thirty seconds later, however, Ander is being tackled to the ground by the second man who is presumably the source of the flames.

Keep struggling, and I will shove this ball of fire through your head.

One of the most important skills for any tactician to learn is when to recognize when he is defeated. Now, with a ball of fire pressed against his head and an enemy swordsman at his throat, Ander knew is was well and truly beaten. He relaxes his body and lets his sword fall to the ground.

Listen to me, I am not an elite. I am Ander Windrivver, former Lord General of the Army of Lightbringer and I am a prisoner here. Check my arm and you will see my number. By the way you two attacked me, I can only assume that you are also working to undermine Ironheart. Let me up and we may be able to help each other.

[Iethloc]

Sohssal

Good thing that I'm extremely familiar with demonic physiology, then, hmm? The only hard part will be dealing with using a butter knife for the surgery or something. There shouldn't be any unsolvable problems as long as the brain isn't all human... he responded to the other inhabitant of the body.

The first thing Sohssal took when he entered the room was the Donovale. Then he picked up the letter opener, and looked it over. "This is it? Well, it's better than a butter knife...I guess..." Sohssal said, rather disappointed. After one quick glance at the cover of the journal, Sohssal took it, and stuffed the correspondences between the cover and the first page. You never know what useful things you can find in the private writings of others... he briefly thought to himself as he began walking back to the room with Omega.

"All right, Omega. I'm ready to begin. Let's just hope that your brain is as resilient as the rest of you..." he said, brandishing the letter opener as he began walking toward her.

[Dorizzit]

Korram listens to Ander, going from incredulous to doubtful to finally curious. "Alright, 'Ander,' we'll see about that." Korram carefully rolls up Ander's sleeve, keeping his flame on hand at all times. When he sees the mark, he pushes off of Ander and plants his feet on the floor in a crouch before flipping off and landing next to Seraph and Katrina. "He's got a prisoner mark. What do you think, Seraph?" (for the sake of speed, I'll assume Seraph's response is something other than "he must be a disguised elite, let's kill him.") Korram nods, then extinguishes his arm. "Alright, Ander, what are you doing here?"