Missionaries of Kalth (IC)

[Sneakystabsalot]

Moonwort


As you desire. I shall summon allies to aid us, while i heal our wounds. A creature of the earth itself may be called upon to free us from this trap.

Moonwort raises his branches and calls upon nature.

Spoiler

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I will summon 5 unicorns(1d4+1maxed) to cure poison and help heal, summon a greater earth elemental if the others agree and sac spells for healing as required till we are all at full.

[Ifni]

Azrien

"Thank you, Moonwort! May your leaves ever be green, and your branches strong. Maybe just a little earth elemental to begin with, to scout around and see if this room is close to the surface on any side?"

As the druid/treant casts his spells, Azrien wanders over to the shards of the destroyed golem and inspects them with her magical sight. I wonder if any residue of whatever caused that explosion remains here?

[mephassovar]

Moonwort's summoned Unicorns, having appeared a moment ago, move amongst you, tending to your wounds. Although their expressions are hard to guage, they seem sad and mournful. On sighting Azrien, however the unicorn sent to heal her becomes chirpy and sweetly nuzzles her with his horn. The rest of you are treated more harshly with the horns thrust towards you almost violently. The unicorn's all seem shirty around Yvette.

The golem has been completely destroyed leaving nothing but dust and shards of rock.

Spoiler

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5 unicorn's worth of healing is about 210 HPs of damage healed. By my reckoning, that brings everyone back to full health

[Ifni]

Azrien

Azrien strokes her unicorn gently and murmurs in Sylvan, "Thank you so much for your blessings, dear one." She takes some trail rations out of her pack, waves her fingers over the dried apple, and feeds the now-juicy piece of apple to the unicorn. She goes over to the other summoned unicorns as well, feeding them treats, stroking them and thanking them.

Once the party is healed, Azrien walks back toward the center of the room and says, "Please gather close, all of you. Yvette, can you make yourself receptive to magic?" A soft breeze swirls around all of you, and you feel lighter on your feet as the sorceress sings a spell of flight. "Now, be careful, you have to stay close to at least one other person for the web-of-magic to keep working - if you go too far from everyone else you'll break your strand, they only stretch to about thirty feet."

Flying up to the ceiling, Azrien calls to Alain, "Alain, where should I drill to minimize the risk of a collapse?" She flies over to the spot indicated by the archivist, rotates to face the ceiling, and begins to chant words of magic.

Her hands shape deceptively simple gestures in the air, pulling coils of green light out of nothingness. A glowing sphere forms above her palms, delineated by sparkling trails of emerald lightning. As Azrien draws on the power of the Metamagic Storm, her eyes blaze with coruscating light in jewel-toned shades of color, and an oddly sweet scent pervades the room, overwhelming the mustiness of the air for a moment.

The sphere grows brighter and brighter, a fragile eggshell of brilliant emerald and star-white fire. Then lines of light leap inward from its surface, focusing to a point in the center, and a hair-thin green-white beam erupts upward. In a circle around the beam, the stone vanishes as if it had never existed.

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Azrien casts Prestidigitation to make some re-hydrated and nicely flavored apple for the pretty unicorns She then casts Mass Fly on the party, first asking Yvette to suppress her SR - she'll share the Mass Fly with her familiar in his airtight Pocket, the SpC version of Familiar Pocket clarifies you can share spells as if the familiar was adjacent. Flying up to the ceiling, she will take 10 on her Spellcraft check and cast Sculpted Disintegrate, her aim being to drill a tunnel as long as possible. If we're using the "replace 10ft cube with Sculpt area", she will get a 120ft long lightning-bolt-shaped tunnel: if we're using "Sculpt plus DC 27 spellcraft lets you reshape the 10ft cube while occupying the same volume", she'll be going out to the maximum range of her spell and making a circular tunnel as wide as possible within the allowed volume. (And yes, the correct visual for the spell is the Death Star laserbeam )

CL is (1d6+14)[15], max range is 100ft + 10ft/CL.

EDIT: Evidently, that was a hard spell! So her range is 250ft - treat it like a 250ft tunnel, 2ft by 2ft, if we're using the "reshape volume of 10ft cube" method.

[mephassovar]

Azrien's spell takes a little time to complete - she evidently has to concentrate very hard to make a success of it - but she does perform the magic. A well sized tunnel (wide enough even for Yvette to magically fly through at a push) has been formed in the ceiling and it seems to come out in daylight.

The air is still horribly clawing and smells awful, but fresh air is not far away.

[Ifni]

Azrien

Azrien looks down at the rest of the group. "I will go up last, so I can featherfall people before they hit the ground, if anything goes wrong with the flight-magic." She floats down a little and spreads her hands wide: she speaks a magical phrase, and a glittering haze descends over the group. "We will look like hawks, I think - I've seen them in the mountains. And I will link us so we can whisper to each other at a distance."

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Casting Veil and Message on the group. We will look like hawks, unless somebody proposes a different and unobtrusive form. If anyone really doesn't want to be part of the Veil, they can negate it with a DC 24 Will save.

[imperialspectre]

Alain

Alain smiles tightly at the sight of daylight and cooperates completely with Azrien's suggestions. Once into the light, he breathes deeply, enjoying the fresh air and the view. Time to figure out what exactly is going on here.

[C12H22O11]

The Guardian

The Guardian regards the quintet of unicorns with what you suspect is curiosity, although its attempt to pet one of the unicorns succeeds only in scaring the woodland creature off. After this, the Guardian waits patiently by itself until Azrien blasts the hole in the ceiling.
After surveying the once-sealed room a final time, the Guardian moves to stand close to the rest of the party, hovering almost protectively over Azrien while everyone floats up and out.

[Ifni]

Azrien

Azrien smiles up at the Guardian and whispers, "I'll teach you how to make friends with unicorns later. They like apples." Through the Message spell she whispers, "Alain, let me know what you see up there." After the rest of the party has ascended the shaft, assuming nothing horrible happens to them, she will fly up, staying close to the Guardian.

[mephassovar]

Flying up through the shaft (about 80') you find yourself on a grassy hillside. It is sunny, but bitterly cold and your field of vision is small at first. Flying higher, you can see that you are about 400' away from the edge of a cliff. Below this precipace, you can see for many miles - wide valleys, frosty ground and many mountains. in the other direction, the ground slopes up as part of a horizon-spanning mountain ridge. This certainly seems like the eastern mountains of Stlarivir, as Iaseiveran promised.

You are reminded of the maps that Iaseiveran gave you and where the entrance to the fortress might be. Yvette volunteers to do a little scouting and she finds the great iron door (ajar) to the fortress about a mile away, built into the face of the same cliffs. There are some of Barum's tribe riding around the entrance of the fortress, and three Rullivites are emplaced at the top of the cliffside. Yvette flies back to relay this information - you are still on the hillside, by Azrien's disintegration hole.

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I know I'm taking a few liberties here, but you're in no danger when you emerge from the teleportation chamber. The map has squiggly lines to show the extent of scryable space.

OOOC: Found my original custom avatar! Meet Lothar Falken, halfling paladin.

[Tishlin]

Tomlin

Tomlin shrugs off the stone as he breaks out into the air and his flight movement becomes far more natural. Cold clean air rushes to fill his lungs. The chill stings like the first breath of life and an immense sensation of freedom and opportunity washes over him. He falls to the rear of the troupe and turns to watch as Yvette peels away, now flapping, toward the fortress.

Battlegrounds, soldiers as children covering their eyes with gods to make the world go away. And gods all too willing to oblige. Belief for trust. Field and farmer in harmony. And with us comes the blight of doubt to spoil the harvest of the soul.


Underneath the glamer Tomlin smiles to himself. He whispers out to the others

This is our land of opportunity... what a delight. Beautiful isnt it? So fresh and ripe.

[C12H22O11]

the Guardian

The Guardian floats gently to the ground, sinking several inches into the soft soil of the hillside, and scans the horizon intently while Yvette scouts ahead.

>Regional topography consistent with projected arrival location.
>Objective: Locate and retain Gem of Falarni.
>Loading expected regional languages... complete.
>Dialect analysis and translator subroutines loaded.
>Free memory: 19%.

When Yvette reports back, the Guardian listens to her report and waits for Tomlin to finish speaking before adding its own comments.
"Suggest non-hostile approach. Illusion should enable stealth to within close proximity of encampment, but recent experience suggests high degree of magical proficiency by at least some members of tribe. Negotiation is preferrable to frontal assault for initial contact."

[belladonna]

Yvette

Following the Guardian's comments, Yvette ventures the following stratagems:

One would strategically assume, that any acts of aggression, within a corridor entrance, guarded by an iron door, a futile act of idiocy!
The tribal cave dwelling seemed defensively organised and although primitive, one should presume, the inhabitants jealous of their territory. I strongly doubt that the before magics are controlled by these nomadic people; coincidental geography but nothing more.

I personally recommend that we engineer a natural disaster, exhibiting ourselves as 'Angelic Saviours', of those 'blessed by the mercy of Kalth!'

With a Sudden, second brief jerk, the fiend's powerful wings carcess the air in a forward motion, simultaneously, a muffled chuckle of measured warm huffs escape a tense toothful jaw.

Instantly, Yvette lowers her wings, and in her naturally rehearsed stance, coolly finishes:
I do not think magic beyond the comprehension of these peoples, in fact, from my experience it would be naive to imagine them without some skill.

[imperialspectre]

Alain

Alain scowls. "If these people have magical capability, and the presence of a golem with a sophisticated teleportation trap makes that capability clear, a "disaster" that directly harms them would be a terrible idea. We can potentially demonstrate power with an earthquake in a nearby mountain or some sort, but we might be better off starting by talking with them."

[belladonna]

Yvette

As Iaseiveran informed us prior to departure, the stronghold is far older than Barum's possesion of it. Kalth seemed to think it was an ancient Giant settlement and that it had been the home of some dwarves more recently. I don't deny that these people may possess some magics, but I think we can outrightly discount the Golem and the teleport trap as the work of a primitive tribe!

[Tishlin]

Tomlin

Also, Alain my dear, it's simply not becoming of a new diety to forgo the fire and brimstone in the early days. "Behold the first coming of Kalth. Cower before our impeccable manners. See how we inconvenience mountain goats at a single stroke. Make way. Make way!" See it will simply not do, lad...

Tomlin slips between honeyed counsel and earsplitting oratory deftly, bringing to bear every ounce of condescention in his being and handing it to the Archivist.

Let's give em a belt of what my old man used to call "killing lots of people to get their attention" Yvey, any wells left carelessly lying out in the open where anybody might accidentally drop poison?

[Ifni]

Azrien

Azrien looks over at Tishlin, and her hawk's eyes darken to a murky, roiling blackened silver. When she speaks her voice is like chimes on the cold wind, oddly emotionless.

"Poison the wells? No, Tishlin, that would be vile. Many people would die, innocents who have no say in what their leaders do, the very powerless who might flock to the word of Kalth. We are here to obtain the gem and to make early converts if we can, not for senseless slaughter."

She turns to the others. "I would suggest that Yvette go perch near the entrance and listen to their conversations for a while, if she agrees: the hawk illusion will last all day, but the flight spell is shorter-lived. Perhaps we can learn something of their routines and some additional clues as to their culture."

[Tishlin]

Tomlin

They might even have a regular indigenous craft fare. We can pick up a few bargains. Eyes aglow with vigorous enthusiasm Tom pipes in. So let me sum up for my own quietude of mind. Yvette goes into the barbarian settlment and tries to find leverage for negotiation. When she finds out that they would like a few dwarves gutted, stuffed and mounted we'll offer to oblige. We can ask for Kalth to be quoted as sponsor on the souvenir skull trophies. We can even make some cash while we're at it.With an encouraging guffaw Tom beams at Azrien
I like your thinking girl. You're an opportunist and yet a people person.
Delightful.

[C12H22O11]

the Guardian

"Suggestion: Entire party should relocate to vantage point near stronghold while flight spell remains active. Yvette can perform aerial reconnaissance once spell has expired, while the remainder of the party is protected by the hawk illusion." The Guardian then turns to Tishlin and, tilting its head slightly to one side, says (with the faintest flicker of green in its eyes), "No dwarves have been detected in this area. Finding a dwarf suitable for stuffing may not be feasible at this time."

[Sneakystabsalot]

Moonwort


In the form of a man again Moonwort has stood silent, listening to all that has been said, his calm face betraying no emotion.

If we are to achieve kalths deification we will need worshippers. Petty acts of brutality and clever deals will not inspire worship. They must love us or fear us. If we cannot subdue one tribe then there is little hope for this mission. I propose that we approach in the open and demand their subjugation. If they refuse we must crush them. I do no seek death and destruction for its own sake. Perhaps a strong display of divine power will be enough?

Moonwort takes the form of a hawk and begins to rise rise through the air, he flutters, weaves around the party with a nervous energy. .

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wildshape hawk

[Tishlin]

Tomlin

"kill lots of people until we get their attention" is catchier

Outwardly Tomlin nods once in stern approval, hands in his pockets.

Agreed

Tomlin looks to the others for their approval, his eyes finally coming to rest on Alain with an air of kind resignation. Without breaking his gaze he addresses the fiend.

Yvey, keep an eye out for any men of the cloth. Me and the bookworm here might need to do a little shopping before the day is out.

[belladonna]

Yvette

Yvette decisively announces her departure:

Closer observation of these peoples would be beneficial. I will fly back to reconoitre. I like the Guardian's suggestion - the more eyes the better! Further, relocating to a forward position would provide the opportunity for surprise.

Must make sure to ask Dispater how he deals with prattling...

With a strident jump, Yvette takes to the air. She discreetly observes the movements around the fortress whilst waiting for the others to make up their minds.

Spoiler

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Spot d20+14=25

[Ifni]

Azrien

"Agreed. Yvette, if you find you do not understand their language, come back to the group and I will cast a spell so you can speak and comprehend all tongues."

Azrien flies after Yvette, seeking an unobtrusive perch not too far from the fortress, where the party can wait once her flight magic runs out. She delights in the cold wind rushing past her, and the panoramic view of the mountains. How do people live, who can never learn to fly?

[mephassovar]

With Yvette flying out to observe the area, the remaining five of you fly to a point in the cliffs above the entrance to the fortress. You all see the vast iron doors which are flush against the cliffside, closed to all enemies. The reason for this defensive measure is clear; marching along the road that leads to the stronghold is a column of armoured dwarves. They halt at around the same time as you arrive.

About sixty in number and flying a chequered banner of blue and purple, the dwarves are about three hundred feet away from the door. From your elevated viewpoint, you can see that there is one dwarf being carried on a litter at the rear of the column. The dwarves wear tabards, but their tall shields and visible steel armour suggest that they are well armed. There are no Rullivites in sight.

[Ifni]

Azrien

Through the Message spell, Azrien murmurs, "Most interesting - and hopefully, fortuitous for our cause. It seems we have the opportunity to pick a side here. The dwarves are unlikely to ever convert to Kalth, but if we can secure their alliance or even neutrality toward our cause, that might be helpful in the future. Or we could win the Rullivites' favor and perhaps induce them to worship Kalth as a savior, by helping them vanquish their foes. I do wonder whether either side knows about the gem we seek - it might be more difficult to obtain it from people who hold it sacred."

She peers down at the column of dwarves. "I wonder if we can learn if they have any purpose here beyond reclaiming their long-lost fortress?" She leans forward, the hawk illusion mantling its wings, as she waits to see if the two sides will send out messengers for a parley of any sort.

[Tishlin]

Tomlin

As an aside to the Guardian

Kalth branded skull souvenirs all round, eh Tin Man? Better clean out those detectorators of yours. Or get yourself a nose. You can smell the filthy little buggers a mile off.

Tomlin puffs out his chest, which makes him near spherical. Swaying the tides of battle in a siege, that sounds most godly to me. We wait for the column to halt and for them to start talking. Devious little shortarses will be on the lookout for any Rullivite jiggery pokery, so we're likey to be spotted if we try anything sooner. Let's deal them a crushing and decisive blow when their backs are turned.

Let's not have a good day out be spoiled. If this is a messenger of peace....

[C12H22O11]

the Guardian

The Guardian steps forward, peering over the edge of the cliff to watch for any signs of the metal gates being opened. It then surveys the troupe of dwarves before backing up a few steps and turning to address the party. "Insufficient information regarding military and political situation of region to plot course of action at this juncture. Suggestion: Wait to see how encounter develops. If both parties engage in combat, intervention will be less hazardous once casualties have accumulated. If both parties engage in diplomatic relations, combat intervention will not be necessary, and negotiations may be attempted."

[mephassovar]

A phenomenally loud voice shouts out from the Iron door in the giant tongue,

We know not why you come to our gates, Dwarves, but do not presume that we are unprepared. Leave now or face fell magic beyond your ken!

The dwarf that was being carried has been taken to the front and helped onto his feet. He seems very old, with long white hair and beard. He wears emerald green robes and bears no arms. In a surpisingly clear voice for his age, he shouts (also in Giant),

We did not come here to besiege you, Faloo. This day has been prophesied as the end of Barum's possession of this site. We have marched many miles to witness his demise, but it will not be made by dwarven hands. We came to tell you this and to watch from the entrance of the valley. We have lived here before without disturbing the ancient ones, have you had the same restraint?

With that, the elderly dwarf is raised back onto his litter and the column about turns, ready to march off.

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If you have to cast tongues, then you only catch the dwarf's speech. As I understand, only Yvette can speak Giant.

[belladonna]

Yvette

Understanding the vast giant words, Yvette flys to Azrien's position, relaying all information.

I suggest that in light of this development, we swifly decide whether force or diplomacy be the party's favoured action. Personally, I find they warm to and trust the personal touch; very sentimental very predictable, I think their threat of dangerous magic a giant bluff! We should seek to enter the fortress undetected, then to appear in their grandest hall as Saviours - the peaceful messangers of Klath. With enough magical drama, low military presence, and possibly shape changing spells, for myself and the Guardian, we can also enter their hearts and limited intellects; thus gaining our first converts to Klath. I put it to the group... what have I done? I will try flying closer, making more detailed observations. Please alert me when a conclusion is reached.

Yvette hastely but skillfully takes to the air. After discreetly circling the area, Yvette settles on a closer position.

[mephassovar]

The dwarves seem to have said their piece and are marching away from the door. There is nothing else to observe - even the sentries from the top of the cliff have gone. The Rullivites have no apparent means of interacting with those outside of their fortress (no spy holes or arrow slits) but they did seem aware of the dwarves.

Time spent observing the dwarves also yields little. They march steadily and without speaking. They are clearly a well disciplined military group and are armed with waraxe and tower shield. Some of the dwarves have crossbows strapped to their backs and they all appear to be wearing heavy armour (with the exception of their elderly spokesperson).