Mighty Magic

This blog is dedicated to the life of my DnD character (Zorr) and the adventures he has with whatever band of followers he comes across. Updated whenever we play a campaign session.

[theadventuresofzorr]

A Race Against Orcus

Our party knew that we wanted to get rid of the Staff of Orcus, by taking it to Mount Celestia, but we had no idea how we were going to do it. I decided to try and contact the Raven Queen, and see if she could offer us any assistance. I started a ritual spell in the vain hope of making contact with her, as Slagathor stayed by my side and kept the room quiet.

I had just finished the incantation, when suddenly the air became colder. A fine thin mist, started emanating from our raven pendants. The medallions themselves became increasingly cold. The mist kept billowing out filling the cabin of the airship, pouring out of the portholes. Faal, Dexter and Targ were on deck, and looking over the side of the airship, they too could see the mist pouring out, filling the valley until the whole airship was covered.

Then the image of the Raven Queen, laying on a chaise lounge type sofa appeared in front of us. But it wasn’t a visual image, she was almost actually there. We knew we were on the boat, yet we knew we were somewhere else at the same time.

The Raven Queen smiled as Slagathor took to one knee, and she welcomed our presence. Slagathor and I both asked the Raven Queen if she could assist us in our quest to dispose of the staff of Orcus. She looked over at something and raised an eyebrow, exclaiming that she was happy to see that our quest was half complete. She told us that our path would be dangerous, but the quickest way to Mount Celestia is through Everlost and straight in to The Elemental Chaos. The Raven Queen sadly said that she is not allowed to interfere in matters such as this, however she will see what she can do. All that she asked was that we sent a signal high in the sky to indicate where we were.

Slowly the Raven Queen faded away, and along with it, most of the mist in the air ship. Faal then shifted in to an eagle, and I cast Light on him to make him glow brightly. He shot up in the air as high as he could go, and hovered in wait. He did not have to wait long, for the sound of beating wings could be heard shortly after. Dexter was able to discern that the sound was coming from a flying creature in the distance. As it approached, it turned out to be a dragon. but this was a familiar dragon. I turned to Slagathor and we both said the name.

Umba! Except instead of the fiery red, it was more of a black dragon. Umba landed and told us that the Raven Queen had asked for him to be our “assistance” in getting to Mount Celestia. Without further ado, we fired the engines up, and headed straight for Everlost. Suddenly behind us, the flapping of wings. Faal looked in the distance to see a hydra behind us, with it’s third head carrying a death knight!! We put full power to the airship and proceeded to make our way as fast as we could. Umba flew behind us and headed straight for the hydra. They exchanged glancing blow, Umba getting the upper hand and hitting the hydra backwards. But the hydra regained it’s speed again. Very quickly. Then suddenly we saw it. Flying down from up high was a creature of such evil energy, it almost sucked the life from you just by looking at it. It’s long horns, and large dark wings made it instantly recognisable.

It was Orcus.

He had give then hydra a hand after Umba had hit it, and now he was joining in the battle! All three of them threw bolts of energy both normal and necrotic at one another. Umba got hit quite badly, but then struck a devastating blow on the hydra, and it plummeted down from the sky, taking the death knight with it. It was now Orcus and an injured Umba. If Umba failed to protect us, we would have no hope. We all crossed our fingers as we sped up to Everlost, getting closer and closer. Orcus and Umba were still battling behind us, as the glooming fortress came in to sight. The quickest way to the Elemental Chaos was straight under the fortress, through the chasm. The airship should fit through.....SHOULD fit through. I aligned the ship as best I could as we raced towards the gap. We all took a deep breath as the airship whistled cleanly through the gap, and breached the edge of the Elemental Chaos. 

Inside, things started getting weird. We were seeing images of people and creatures we’d encountered before. High Priests, Merchants, Callarel, Beholders. Lots of different images fading in and out of sight, then all of a sudden....blackness.

We awoke slowly. We appeared to be on a beach of some description. The airship behind us, the balloon deflated and the engines cold. Everyone was accounted for, and we assessed the situation. Behind us, was a great big mountain. Mount Celestia. In front of us was an ocean, but not of water. An Ocean Of Positive Energy. This was it. This was the staff’s final resting place. Targ casted Hallow on the ground, creating a sacred area for me to stand. I reached my hand in the to bag of holding and gripped he handle of the staff. I could feel the staff trying to corrupt me, but the sacred circle battled it off. I looked towards the ocean, and with all my energy I flung the staff towards it. The staff curved, and flew in an arched motion, dropping in to the ocean. Where it dropped in the ocean, bubbles started appearing, slowly becoming more and more vicious. Lights of purple, shot out from the water, burning the sky. Then slowly, the water once again became calm. The chain holding the medallions around our necks vanished, and the medallions themselves appeared to sink in to our bodies. The sigil of the Raven Queen then marked us, almost like a tattoo. Then suddenly we heard a voice in our heads.

You have completed the task I set you. As promised, you are no longer able to be brought back from the dead. You have my blessings.

And with that, the voice quietened, and we finally heaved a huge sigh of relief.

Fin   

[theadventuresofzorr]

For some reason we couldn’t get the portal out of Orcus’s Tower to open!

[theadventuresofzorr]

That Was... Easy?

As we set off towards Everlost, we tried to think of the best way to approach Orcus’s fortress. It was built right over the elemental chasm, so an option would have been to fly the airship right up to it, hop out, whack Orcus, grab the staff and head off in to the elemental chasm to try and destroy it. However, I managed to recall from my readings of the scrolls of Orcus, that there was a teleportation circle inside his tower!

We flew the airship close to Lacrimosa, and landed it surrounded in the hills far from the city. Everybody gathered on board at the teleportation circle on the air ship, and I concentrated my energies to open up the circle to the one inside Orcus’s tower. A small pip of light appeared, and grew in the circle, as the opening emerged from the middle of the circle. We all double checked our inventory, and headed in to the tower...

We arrived in a really large room. The corridors leading off from the room were equally as large, almost as though they were used by a creature of giant proportions. On the walls were lots and lots of shelves, containing various trophies of creatures that Orcus had slain. Skulls of various shapes and sizes littered the room, with inscriptions on the inside detailing the date and location of each kill.

I decided to consult my  readings for any useful information I had about Orcus, anything that we could use against him. My teachings led me to understand that Orcus himself fears looking the fool in front of people. He also strongly fears the King of the Undead, Venka. Whilst also fearing, but not as much, he fears The Raven Queen herself, the one who sent us on this quest. I pondered over this knowledge as we headed in to the next room.

In the centre, was a raised section of the floor, which appeared to be a very shallow well. We could see inside it was filled with water, however this water was infused with a deathly sense. It was indeed necrotic energy. However, we could see at the bottom of the water, was a long staff. The column was structured out of a large spine, and the head was indeed a big green skull.

We immediately cast mage hand together, to grab the staff out of the water. As it came out, the water running off of it, turned almost viscous as it streamed off the staff. I investigated the staff and came to the surprising conclusion that this wasn’t a fake, it was (as far as I could tell) The Staff of Orcus!

We put the staff in the bag of holding, and then made a bee line for the teleportation circle to get back out. However, when we got there, the circle had gone dim. I tried to open up the circle again, however for some reason my spell was being blocked or prevented from opening it. Suddenly, 4 Lichs emerged from round the corner and spotted us! We had no time to try and get the circle open again, we needed to get out now! I grabbed the boat from the Robe Of Useful Items, and threw it in the Elemental Chasm, and we all jumped in. We took to the oars and rowed out as fast as we could. The Lichs didn’t give chase, but ran back in to the tower. We can only assume they were looking for Orcus. We kept rowing until we finally found a place to get out of the river. After mooring the boat, we rested ourselves as we conjured up a plan. Now that I was rested, and we were out of the tower, I created a circle of teleportation using some rocks and sticks, and tried to open a portal to the airship. This time it worked, and the tiny bead of light slowly emerged in to the portal back to the airship. Since we couldn’t shrink the boat back, we opted to carry it through the portal and bring it on the airship with us. We fired up the engines and headed away from Everlost.

We’d finally managed to get the Staff of Orcus. All that was left now, was to destroy it, by finding our way to Mount Celestia.

[theadventuresofzorr]

Because if we all stand in a line we’re safe from attacks. :|

[theadventuresofzorr]

Get to da Choppa!

After recovering from our previous battle we decided to explore the rest of this floor and then decide where to head to next. Dexter peeked in to the final room of the floor, and could only see more manacles and shackles on the wall, but his vision was partially obscured by a misty fog. He slowly opened the door to see if he could get a better view, only to find the mist formed itself in to three spectres. 

“Dexter, back away, very slowly and close the door” We whispered to him. Dexter slowly did thus, and backed out, closing the door behind him. As we breathed a sigh of relief and about to decide where to go next, the spectres passed through the door and out in to the corridor!! (Because they have no physical form! Duh!!)

We turned round, and high tailed it out of there. Luckily as we were approaching the room, we discovered a secret passage way, so as we ran from the spectres, we quickly darted in the passageway, which lead us to the exterior of the ziggurat. 

So we now had to decide if we were just going to hightail it out of there, or we should explore the higher levels of the ziggurat. We decided to head up to the top of the ziggurat and explore the top level going down to the second level, as we didn’t get the opportunity to last time, due to the beholder getting us to come to the bottom.

We proceeded to the top level from the outside, and found a way in to the top level. The entrance way lead in to a short corridor, leading to a large room. Closest to us was an ice sculpture of the priest of orcus himself, Dorisian. It appeared this was a simulcrum/effigy of Dorisain himself. As we neared the simulcrum, it started to turn towards us, its mouth wide open, and it’s eyes seemed to have almost a shine to them. It pointed at the party, whilst it’s other hand grasped a staff, and struck the floor. “Thud, thud thud thud, thud” Then to our horror, a sound from below us replied “THUD THUD”

Then we noticed at the other end of the room was a large circle, inscribed with various sigils and markings. It took me seconds to realise that it was a teleportation circle... and it was being activated!!! “Errr guys, I think we should..” but before I could finish my sentence, an aspect of Orcus appeared through the circle! He approached the party, and attacked Tilida with his Mace. Tildia failed to dodge and got hit by a nasty amount of necrotic energy. I was amazed she was still standing!

“EVERYONE GET BACK TO THE AIRSHIP!!”

We quickly withdrew from the battle and made our way to the airship. The aspect of Orcus got slowed down by the fact that he had to squeeze through the small corridors to get out. We clambered aboard the airship, lit the engines and were able to get ourselves airborne before the aspect had got out of the ziggurat. 

We aimed directly South, and proceeded to...

*SMASH* The sound of Mortar and brick breaking was heard behind us. We could see the aspect had finally broke out of the ziggurat, and was shaking the dust and debris off of himself. However, he then proceeded to arch his back, and a black set of wings emerged from behind him, as he let out a ferocious roar, leaping up in the air as his wings lifted him higher and higher, until he was level with the ship. He gave an evil glare to us as he then started to give chase!

I took the helm of the air ship, whilst everyone else manned their stations. Due to the nature of the engine, we wanted a heat differential to make the engines work most efficiently, so Dexter and Frai cast Ray of Frost, and Firebolt on the two part of the engine. Slagathor manned the rear crossbow as Tildia and Targ cast ranged spells at the aspect to slow him down. We had a goof 150ft lead on him to start with, and we were around 120ft in the air, so we were in a good starting position. Targ and Tildia both cast their longest ranged spells and managed to distract him enough so we could gain another 50ft. I managed to position us in an air current that gained us another 100ft. We were now out of range of many of our attacks, so it was down to the ship and my driving ability to finish this. With one final boost of the engines, we shot ahead by another 100ft, leaving the aspect in the dust.

We all breathed a huge sigh of relief, and rejoiced, though we all knew deep down, the worst was yet to come, and our only other destination was the lair of Orcus himself. Everlost.

[theadventuresofzorr]

We waited in the safety of the other room whilst Dexter filled the other room with a raining hail of ice and snow!

[theadventuresofzorr]

Welcome Back!

As we rested up in the safety of the lower level room, we heard a weird noise coming from the corridor outside. The sound was almost meat like as if a limb were being dragged along the floor.

The threat of zombies was a possibility, so Dexter peered through the door opening to see that it was in fact none other than Frai!! She was limping along the floor all bloodied and battered. Slagathor quickly reached in to the bag of holding and grabbed a potion of greater healing, giving it to Frai, who instantly became rejuvenated. Apparently she had been attacked by thieves and bandits and thrown in to the pyramid. We were all just glad she was ok. After re-aquatinting herself with her items from the bag of holding, a large impact tremor could be heard from the floor above.

The group decided that it might be wise to explore this level of the pyramid fully to ensure there is nothing that could assist with whatever was upstairs making the tremors.

The next room contained some sort of illusionary image of Orcus. It was a sending. Something that can be used to see and hear whatever the image can see and hear. To prove our strength and courage, and that Orcus was not a threat, we decided to moon the image. The image was not pleased...

The next room contained a giant snail, that we believed to be a Flail Snail. After investigating the possibility of collecting its slimey waste, we decided to press on.

A few rooms pass, and then Frai opens a door to reveal 2 Bodoks!! Combat began and Frai was immiediately targeted by their gaze attack. It hit her hard, and she instantly fell to the floor. Slagathor summoned a mighty steed, a Dire Wolf, called Grey Wind, which he climbed aboard and charged to Frais aid, picking her up and carrying her away from danger, where he cast Lay on Hands on her, pulling her back from the door of death.

Targ thought we should try and get them and the Flail Snail to Attack each other, so I cast an illusion of myself to draw them out of the room. It worked and they started making their way towards us.

Then as a flash of inspiration, from the shininess of the snails shell, I conjured up a large mirror that I held in front of me. As the Bodok came towards me, they saw their own reflection in the mirror and cast gaze on themselves!! Frai then cast magic missile on one of them, and my own magic middle finished him off.

Dexter then got us all to get out of the room, as he cast Ice Storm, making the remaining Bodok slip and fall prone. This have Slagathor the chance he needed to ride in with Grey Wind and put a sword through the fiend, and watch as it turned to dust.

[theadventuresofzorr]

Looking back, we were very lucky the knights didn’t cast some form of lightening bolt spell!

[theadventuresofzorr]

Never Split The Party

As we finished our long rest, we started gathering our equipment together, but were startled by a faint scratching noise coming from outside the door. A moments thought led us to believe that it was another undead corpses hand, crawling away at the floor.

Dexter went to grab the hand, but it managed to wriggle free. Tildia then went for it, and grabbed it by the wrist. Me and Targ then managed to successfully wrap the hand in hempen rope, to keep it from escaping. We decided to let Tildia hold on to it for safe keeping.

Before we headed off, we decided that it was time for Tildia’s initiation ceremony, and so we offered him the option to pick a card from the Deck Of Many things.He picked the Gem card, and 3 large gems appeared at his feet, worth a lot of gold. He was very lucky! As we surveyed the corridor we could see more rooms coming off to the side, and a staircase leading upwards. Seeing as we wanted to get to the temple on the top floor, we decided to head up the stairs.

When we got to the top, we heard a panicked cry and 3 figures to our left. One of the figures cried and ran away in to another room. The other 2 turned towards us. Slagathor and I recalled from when we read the scrolls of Orcus, that these figures were Death Knights. They did not look the talkative type, and as they readied their weapons, the party began to start combat.

Xemmet went first, and tried to attack one of the Death Knights, but sadly his attack was ineffective, as it was necrotic. Dexter was next, and he aimed an Acid Splash at them, but his attack missed. As did my ray of frost, as did Tildia’s eldritch blast. Targ instead cast a protective aura round Slagathor, who charged in casting Divine Smite on the Death knight. He hit him fair and true, but it appeared to have little effect. Suddenly the knight made a hand motion that appeared to be almost mocking Slagathor. Then suddenly his sword was lifted and sliced across Slagathor’s chest. His armour took the brunt of the force, but he was still hit. The knight behind, raised his hand up to the ceiling, and swiftly pulled his hand downwards. Suddenly, appearing from nowhere, was a gigantic ball of fire, that crashed down ontop of most of the party. I managed to dive out the way to avoid most of it’s damage, but Tildia was not as lucky. We needed Slagathor to help, but we needed him to keep the knights distracted!

Targ then came to the rescue, and cast a wall of fire across the corridor, separating us from the knights. They took damage from the wall, but they were still standing. Slagathor came back and helped up Tildia, whilst the rest of the spell casters readied their spells waiting for the Knights to walk through the wall of fire. We could just about see the knights through the flames. One of them raised his hand at the fire, and the wall slowly fizzled down to nothing.

We unleashed HELL on them! We threw our biggest and best spells we could at them, and eventually one of the knights fell down, and their whole body disintegrated in to dust. We slowly started chipping away at the other knight, and we could see he was starting to lose his pace.

All of a sudden... IMPACT TREMOR! Something large and heavy had hit the ground somewhere in the pyramid. From the feelings in our chest and the noise of the tremor, we believed that whatever caused the noise was on this level.

We needed to break and recover ourselves. Slagathor was in dire need of healing, a lot of us had used up our spell slots. We knew that once we had dispatched this knight, we could get back downstairs again to rest in the room.

Then, without any prior warning or notice, Dexter runs up to the door where the third knight went, and opens the door to go through it. When he gets in the room, he sees a magic circle in the centre, along with the last Death Knight kneeling at the circle, and chanting. in the middle of the circle was an aspect of Orcus himself!! Dexter ran back to the party. What a fool! Now the other Death knight knew about us, we needed to finish this battle off quickly and escape. Tildia cast shatter, and the armour that the Knight was wearing, exploded, along with the knight disintegrating as the previous one did. Slagathor noticed on the floor that there was a great dane figurine, and a wand of wonders. But we’d seen these before, for they were FRAI’S possessions!!!

We didn’t have time to think about it as we needed to get out of there. We all bolted back down the stairs, trying to put as much distance between us and the other knight as possible...

[theadventuresofzorr]

They keep coming!!

[theadventuresofzorr]

As we proceeded down the side of the pyramid with the beholder Xemmet as our guide, we came across the south side of the pyramid floor. One of the steps leading up, was slightly discoloured from the rest. We decided to inspect the step and on further investigation, pressing the step made a loud grinding sound come from the side of the steps, and a large portion of the pyramid reseeded in to itself, leaving a doorway. Xemmet walked inside, and at the end of the corridor was a wall. To one side was a level that controlled something. I pulled down on the lever, and another grinding sound started, this time from the wall in front, as it opened like a door.

In the next chamber, were various urns on a shelf. I cast detect magic on them, and there was indeed magic present. Targ then examined the urns but could only see ash inside. Suddenly, light smokey whisps emerged from the urns, manifesting themselves into small ball shaped wisps hovering above the urn they came from. Dexter reacted quickly and tried to fire a ray of frost at the closest one, but missed in his hurry. I took my time and conjured a poisonous splash, aiming directly at the wisp nearest me... only for it to pass straight through it. Targ then fired an eldritch blast at one, and it seemed to work! Xemmet claimed a kill count of one, as he disintegrated one of the wisps. Sadly a one off ability. Tildia took a page from Targ’s book and also cast an eldritch blast at a wisp. They tried to attack us, but we managed to avoid them as they got close to us. Slagathor came up behind me and casted a spell that provided me better protection, and he hit the wisp by me, causing it to suffer force damage. Dexter then tried a magic missile attack, to replicate the force damage assault by Slagathor and it proved very effective. I then also proceeded to cast the same, and a short time later, the wisps were no more.

The door opposite where we came in, looked ornate and intricate. I examined the handle and noticed that it had pressure pads on it, most likely a trap. Xemmet reaches out a tentacle to open the door as we all stood back.

Unfortunately, we failed to notice the small holes in the floor, and as the handle was grabbed, a noxious gas billowed our from the holes, filling the room. We quickly ran in to the next room.

This room was similar to the one previous, with urns on shelves. Targ cast detect magic, and we confirmed these were also magical, and imbued with undead magic. Before I could turn to Slagathor and warn him not to do anything stupid, he picked up one of the urns and smashed it on the floor. :|

A light appeared from another urn, and it slowly manifested itself in to a creature we believed to be a Whyte. As Slagathor protected us and stood opposing the whyte, 2 more lights appeared each side, and began manifesting themselves just as this one had done.

We quickly turned our attention to the lights and tried to destroy them in time, but we were too late, and two more whytes manifested themselves. As we fought the whytes, they occasionally were able to create another light, and we were constantly playing catch up with them. Eventually Slagathor was able to use his great sword to great advantage and managed to destroy the majority of whytes, and the rest of the party were finally able to finish off the remainders.

Our party was exhausted, and so after searching the room to ensure it was safe, and barricading the doors, taking it in turns to watch out, we readied ourselves for a long rest.

[theadventuresofzorr]

Meeting the beholder

[theadventuresofzorr]

Friendly Fire!

As we travelled towards the White Kingdom, Dexter (who was positioned atop the crowsnest) spotted 4 humanoid shapes running across the desert, chasing another humanoid creature. Slagathor manned the helm, and charged straight towards them, landing the ship on top of the 4 humanoids, squashing them under the airship’s heavy weight.

It appears that the one being chased was a young Tiefling Warlock, who goes by the name Tilida. Tilida couldn’t remember why the ghouls were chasing him, he claimed that he went to sleep one night and woke up being chased down and hunted.

The party agreed to spare him and allowed him to come with us so he could find out more about what had happened to him. I took the helm of the airship, and started ascending  upwards, only to hear scratching and clawing at the underside of the ship. The ghouls hadn’t been crushed by the ship, they had merely grabbed on to it, and now they were trying to climb aboard!!

Slagathor rushed to the edge, and got his great sword ready. Dexter swung down from the crows nest, and readied his spell. I kept the ship on a steady course, whilst keeping a watchful eye on the surroundings for further threats. Up in the sky, a lone bird...almost looking like a duck, was flying away... Targ got to the side with Slagathor and cast Chilling Touch on one of the ghouls. Tilida fired his crossbow down the other side of the ship alongside Dexter.

The ghouls climbed up to the edge of the ship.

Slagathor let loose a mighty barrage of blows with his sword, critically wounding the ghoul nearest him, cutting off his hands, and watched as his helpless body fell off the boat and burst in to a cloud of dust. Dexter let loose a flurry of magic at his target, but the ghoul stood firm. Tilida fired again, damaging but not killing the ghoul. Unfortunately as the ghoul retaliated, Tilida didn’t react in time and as the ghoul swiped his hands at him, Tilida became paralysed by the ghouls magic touch. Slagathor charged at the ghoul nearest Targ, swiping at him and finishing him off quickly. Targ then focused his attention across the ship and fired bolts of energy at the ghoul nearest Dexter. The ghoul exploded in a cloud of dust, leaving one more. Tilida, still paralysed, was helpless, and so Dexter slid up next to the ghoul and with one last spell, finished off the ghoul.

As we regained ourselves, the destination appeared on the horizon. The White Kingdom. We could see the tall stepped pyramid looming closer, and after a quick debate, decided to land near the top, where there was what appeared to be a temple of some description. Unfortunately, our landing wasn’t exactly.... precise. We undershot the top, and the airship ended up two steps from the top of the pyramid. We disembarked from The Red Baron, and once we stepped on to the pyramid, we noticed we were not alone...

4 humanoid shapes, wrapped in bandages, looked at us with an evil glare. Dexter fired a bolt of necrotic energy at them, only for it to pass right through their bodies. He then ran up the next level of the pyramid. Targ then cast a wall of fire, encasing the mummies within, burning them as they remained inside. I readied my spell, only to see Slagathor rush up to the mummies. As they slowly walked through the wall of flame to attack Slagathor, he whirled his great sword above his head and cracked it down through the middle of one of the mummies. Alas, I did not see this, but I had already begun casting fireball! The great big ball of fire, hurled towards the mummy on the left, exploding on impact, causing an immense amount of fire damage to the rest of the mummies, and poor Slagathor. Slagathor looked hurt and bruised, but the Mummies were a lot worse for wear. (Well, they were burnt to a crisp to put it lightly) After we all had a quick rest, so Slagathor could heal his wounds, we headed up to the temple at the top.

Once we were level with the temple, we turned a corner to see.... a zombie beholder...AGAIN! Only this one seemed VERY familiar. It was in fact the same one we had freed from his spell, back when we fought Callarell. He spoke to us and told us that our quests were the same, and we should follow him to find another way in to the temple. He proceeded to head down some stairs to the right. We looked at each other, took a big breath, and walked behind him...

[theadventuresofzorr]

The duck!

[theadventuresofzorr]

I Hate Ducks

So we arrived at what appeared to be a very desolate village. There were a few buildings scattered round, and a large building in the centre, that appeared to be used as some form of permanent structure for something. Out of the corner of our eyes, we spotted a humanoid shape, shifting to the back of the building. Dexter snuck up ahead to see if he could find him. Footprints led him to the back of the building, with 2 big swing doors that gave passage to the inside.

We entered to find the floor empty, bar 2 ladders at each side. The ladders led up to the floor above, and from our position, we could see more ladders leading to another floor which held the arched roof above it. Targ called out to see if the humanoid responded, but there was silence. He tried again, louder this time, and although no response was heard, a scratching sound, like sharp objects on wood, was heard. We realised that wasn’t the sound of a humanoid, but something with more legs. As we braced ourselves for a possible encounter, we noticed an outline of a square on the floor. Almost as if it could be lifted up. And lifted it could be, for it turned out to be a trap door! We descended down and at the bottom was a passage way under the building, heading lower underground.

As we approached the end of the tunnel, we could see.... a duck. Yes, a duck. Sitting in the middle of the tunnel. Slagathor picked up the duck, and instantly was charmed by it, and couldn’t put it down. After a quick detect magic spell, the duck was revealed to be enchanted. Putting the duck aside (Well, metaphorically. He couldn’t let go of him!) we went to the end of the passage and opened out to a wide hall, with hexagonal tiles lining the floor. Opposite, a giant statue gazed down at us.

Slagathor took one step on the tile, and suddenly a giant voice boomed out:

“You move. I move. I cannot enter a tile you occupy. If you enter my tile, you are mine. Leave and I will not follow. Step on this side, and you can select a prize.”

We gambled, and all stepped on our own tile. The statue suddenly came alive, and took one step forward on to a tile. No sooner had this happened, when suddenly the statue vanished! A voice boomed out again.

“Your move.”

We all took another step on to a tile. Suddenly some of the tiles that were coloured red, shot flames up from the middle of the tile. Thankfully, we were all on green or blue tiles. We assumed the statue had moved again, as the voice called out.. “Your move.” We had no idea where he was, but kept moving towards the end. Suddenly after 3 more moves, Targ vanished in a cloud of smoke!

“You are mine.” Said the voice. “Continue”

Suddenly I had a flash of inspiration, and conjured up Mordenkain’s Faithful Hound. An invisible dog, that can see invisible monsters. If he can see one within 30 feet, he will bark loudly. I conjured the dog near us, and he instantly started barking. Then we took one more turn, and the dog then attacked where the statue was. POOF! The hound then vanished in a cloud of smoke like Targ. “Well it was worth a go!” I yelled at the rest of the party.4 turns later, and I had one more step to take. POOF! I vanished in a cloud of smoke.

Suddenly I’m at the other side, with everyone else round me. I asked what had happened, and apparently, Slagathor (still holding the duck) and Dexter had made it across. The statue then granted each of them (including the duck) an option for a prize. There was a statue of me, a statue of Targ, an ornate jug, or a crystal orb. They picked me and Targ, and as soon as we were picked, we turned back to normal. Finally, we decided on the ornate jug, which turned out to be an alchemists jug!

As we proceeded back down the tunnel, the ducks effects wore off of slagathor. I decided to get rid of the duck’s magic, and dispelled him. For some reason he was not happy. I managed to grab him, and calm him down with a bit of a cuddle. As we headed back, I hugged him in my robes, and once we’d left the building, I released him in to the wild. I felt like he deserved to be free.

After gathering ourselves together, we climbed back aboard the Red Baron, and set course for The White Kingdom!

[theadventuresofzorr]

A Fair Trade

As we awakened to the sound of metal clanking against metal, we realised that Targ had been hard at work during the evening modifying the airship. He’d rigged up a rope that ran directly from the crows nest, to the front of the ship, so that we could quickly get back on deck rather than climbing down the rigging. He’d also jerry rigged the dead hydra’s head to the front of the airship, and re-routed one of the furnace pipes through it, so that we could make it fire a plume of fire from the front of the ship.

We set sail with our new upgrades, and headed off for Vadtrian.

As we were sailing along, we noticed varying different wildlife flying by us. Birds, insects, and even a bunch of bats. Suddenly the bats flew on to the airship, and all of them changed shape, and appeared in finely dressed humans. They spoke common, and asked us if we would be interested in trading information for a “small price”. I talked with them for a while but it became apparent from Wilhelm (He joined last adventure. Retconned. Keep up!!) that these guys were full of crap, and just wanted something for nothing.

Slagathor drew his blade across his hand, drawing blood, and using the blood to cast Bane on some of the cretins. They swarmed the helm of the ship where me and Slagathor were, as well as filtering round the rest of the ship to take care of the others. They came up to us, and tried to charm us, however thankfully my wizard background enabled me to shake it off before they took hold of my well being. Slagathor sadly, wasn’t as good as that, and ended up being charmed by them. After Dexter went invisible and snuck up to one of them, I cast Thunderwave where I stood. The vampire nearest Slagathor got pushed over the edge of the ship. The one nearest me got pushed, but didn’t go over board. The other one got pushed in to the middle of the ship. I then cast Dispel on Slagathor to get rid of his charmed affect, and he was back to normal.

Targ had been busy casting Hallow, and with it he managed to knock off all the remaining vampires from the ship. They were all now back in bat form, and giving chase, however Dexter was using ray of frost on the engine to make the temperature difference higher, and enabling us to go faster, eventually leaving them for dust.

We breathed a huge sigh of relief as slowly Vadtrian came in to view.

[theadventuresofzorr]

The Red Baron

As the party stepped through the portal, we came out on to some plains, with what appeared to be a stream of necrotic energy flowing across us. About 60 feet ahead of us, we could see a weird red shaped object. The object seemed to be like a giant blob of material.As we approached and got nearer, we realised that it was in fact some sort of silk, in the form of a deflated balloon. We quickly realised that this was the inflation bag for an AIRSHIP!

Upon seeing this, the idea of heights scared the dwarf Frai, and the concept of fire scared the rogue Rash, so both them and Aufe headed off to find another method of transport, leaving myself, Slagathor, Dexter and Targ. 

RETCON: We met Targ back on the Shadowfell and came with us. It got a bit complicated recently...

Back to the airship! We went to investigate the condition of the ship, and found it to be somewhat abandoned but still working condition. The bow of the ship had a mountain harpoon gun, along with 5 harpoons (1 loaded) and 3 lengths of rope. To the stern of the ship, was two levers that controlled the two propellers. Along with that, was the wheel of the ship, to steer. Pulling the levers also gave rise to the balloon, to increase the altitude of the ship. Behind the wheel, facing backwards was a mounted crossbow.

After scouting the lower decks we found a wooden box that contained a small crystal orb of scrying, along with a few parchments that were loose maps of the local area. We could see four places to possibly travel to. One was The White Kingdom, the realm of another of Orcus’s priests. Lacrimosa, an unknown town, A town that could only be described as a “Ghost Town” on the map, and finally Orcus’s realm. It was decided that Slagathor would Captain the ship, I would be Tactical using the orb as a primitive radar, Dexter would be on the crows nest, keeping a physical eye out, and Targ would man the crossbow.

We started the engines up, and after waiting for the air to heat up, the balloon inflated, and we filled up some bags of ballast to steady the ship, and enable a quick ascension should it be required. Eventually the air was hot enough to lift the ship, and we proceeded south towards the ghost town.

All of sudden, my orb went ‘ping’ and a blue dot appeared on it. It seemed that blue was the colour of undeath, and judging by it’s position on the orb, it was at the same height as us (60 foot high) and moving towards us. I yelled to Slagathor, who quickly steered straight for the unknown object. Dexter was able to see that the creature had wings, and was of dragonkin. As it grew closer he could see the monster had not one, not two, but FIVE heads. It was in fact an undead hydra! “Battlestations!” was cried by Slagathor as we prepared for the hydra to pass over us.

Each of the 5 heads spat out a beam of pure necrotic energy at us as it passed over. Thankfully it missed us all, and we readied to retaliate! One fireball, one acidball and one necrotic blast later, the hydra was down one head. Slagathor then commanded me to take control of the ship, as he used his magic broom to fly over to the hydra and jump on to it and attack. Unfortunately he couldn’t get a good angle and wasn’t very effective. I steered the ship round and aimed at the hydra, giving Targ the command to fire. Sadly the harpoon sailed right past the hydra and left a dangling rope from the ship. The hydra passed by again, throwing necrotic blasts that unfortunately managed to hit me. I held the ship steady, and Slagathor lost his grip as the hydra passed over, landing hard on the ships deck. Another harpoon shot, and missed, and more barrages of fire, necromancy and frost. 4 heads became 3 became 2, became one.

I still had control of the ship, and maneuvered alongside the wounded hydra. Slagathor then jumped from the ship on to the hydra, and drove his sword deep down in to the creatures neck, finishing him off. He was attached to the ship by one of the rops, so as the hydra fell, Slagathor swung around underneath the ship, and we were able to haul him up. We decided in honour of the victory to rename the ship from The Red Baron, but we decided we’d sleep on the name for now. In the mean time, we decided to have a think about what upgrades we could do on the airship....