Reflections

Chapter 31 - The Guardian

The party continued their journey through hell. A run-in with six fire giants was ended very shortly when Xej and Gexbat teleported to them and Gexbat let out a devestating Cone of Cold. The giants fled immediatly but three were still felled before they could get away. Ke'rik in particular took offense to the flaming rocks they had thrown at him.

Over the next few hours the caravan continued and the land around them began to change as they passed across the threshold between layers of the Abyss. The sky became grey and the land dark dirt with tufts of weeds and grass. Ahead the group spotted a massive stretch of ruins across the landscape that they're road passed through. Sitting in the road was a Gargantuan Goristro, a demon that looked like a huge minatour. It's flesh was covered in blue material that seemd to flow around his flesh. They approached.

When they got within 100 feet the thing mentally projected into their minds, "halt, and prepared to be searched." The group panicked for a second before Finsent assured them this always happens. White skinned rat like humanoids emerged from holes in the landscape and began scrambling across the three caravans and sniffing and smelling. The Goristro asked Finsent's trading name that he gave as "Thar of Sigil".

The Guardian

Then things went bad. The guardian made a "huff" and starting sniffing at Xej. The rat demons all took notice and fled immediatly. Then the guardian sniffed some more and glared at Xej, his blue liquid clearing from his eyes so he could see Xej with his beady red eyes. Then he let out a howl of rage and charged.

In the resulting combat the group used some of their most powerful spells. Disintegration rays bounced off of the demon, blades that would sever limbs slammed into his hard blue shell, and a massive concerted attack bolstered took place. Kory and Xej's spells were less effective than usual, bouncing and spraying off of the demon doing small amounts of damage but not destroying him outright. Kory's healing likewise was less effective as noone could stand to be in melee combat with the gargantuan thing for more than a few seconds before being ripped asunder. As the combat proceeded the thing used a powerful stomp ability to prevent anyone near him that was on the ground from moving or attacking.

The party somehow managed to start wearing him down, but a withdrawl by Kale was ill timed as the things claws ripped into him crushing his entire rip cage and spine and slaying him. An melee advance by Xej was also short lived as the creature survived Xej's initial fury and responding in kind forcing Xej to flee. The combined might of the party eventually made the guardian take pause and widthdraw, but only enough to call out the white skinned rat creatures that blanked the area in darkness. Thorling and Kory were beset immediatly by a swarm of them that unleashed waves of unholy blight on them. Thorling collapsed under the diseased waves of evil. By then, the retreat had already begun.

Uridzu's

Gexbat was able to teleport Kory and Thorlin's body to safety, while Ke'rik was able to grab Kale and his swords and fly off in dragon form. Falc did a final check for allies before being swamped by white rat demons and also flying off to safety. The party, a kilometer away, met up and Kory planeshifted them to the safety of Toril.

They rested on Toril for a couple days, bringing both Kale and Thorlin back to life, before deciding to go to Sigil and do a little more research on Grazzt's triple realms guardian.

Chapter 32 - Mighty Cormyr

The party took some time discussing strategies for battling the massive guardian before heading off to sigil. They arrived at the portal in the Shining plains and tried to use an already used door, but it didn't work. Xej went off to Arabel to get a door but instead found an cold wet early spring morning. Rain and mud accented the destruction of Arabel surrounding him.

He grabbed a few doors and returned to the shining plains.

The party discussed. Weighing the value of an imprisoned god against that of an orc army invading Cormyr, the group struggled breifly with odd values and concepts that they were not familiar with. What was more real? So what if this god was never rescued, or it took a few more hundred years? What did it matter? Was this strange multi-verse struggle more important than the lives of a few tens of thousands of people in some small human country? What was another orc army invading a country when weighed against other needs? For that matter, though it wasn't raised, what were the plottings of some Lord in Acheron and some sword? What could he possibly do?

In the end, they decided that the people here and this fight was a little more real to them, at least worth checking out. Besides, it might give the Guardian time to cool down and not be "waiting" for their quick return. They spent the night on the cold, snow crusted plains and in the morning journeyed to Arabel.

The group crept through the muddy rainy streets towards the mostly intact castle. They attempted a sneaky entrance but that ended quickly into a full scale assault. While group members ran this way and that trying to stop fleeing Drow and orcs, Xej summoned a massive 36 foot tall elemental that shook the ground with it's approach as it squeezed into the courtyard and began pounding on the castle walls.

A running battle in many directions resulted and in the end most of the group was passing through the main throne room when a man dressed in black and silver, sportin black skin and red spikey hair appeared. Before anything else could happen Thorlin leapt forward and his magical sword ripped through the man's leg severing it. The man screamed in pain and fell backwards. An arrow slammed into him just before he managed to release a chained demon and then teleport away.

Screaming in rage, the Minatour charged the demon laying into it with his blade. Arrows from Kale seemed to finish the beast off as it collapsed backwards, but it awoke and teleported away before Thorlin could finish him off. The group searched the castle and found some more Drow and orcs. Thorling pounced on one while Kale dropped two more with arrows. The group took care of the rest of the drow and orcs within the castle and questioned one. The drow spoke of a deal with the elven woman who was with the king of the orcs, Gray. Gray apparently was sent by the orcish gods to slay down the human races and seemed to be doing a good job.

They questioned him some more, getting some vague information before Falc slew him. The group had some discussions, and a bit of a arguing match over killing the drow in cold blood, before they decided to wind walk off to the south towards Suzail. On the way, they spotted a wagon train of twenty wagons and perhaps a hundred and fifty soldiers. Thorlin descended but was spotted. He went back up, then back down, but upon his return lighting slammed into him. He withdrew as the party scanned the area, and then a fireball singed the group and sent them on their way.

A few miles away they landed and argued for a time. Xej was not ready to fight an army, and Thorlin wanted blood. They discussed it and finding out about the greater battle was more important than wrecking a single supply train, so they flew off again towards Suzail.

Chapter 33 - The Finger of Blame

The group continued on to Suzail but before they got too far they were spotted by a dragon. They all shot up in the clouds but the dragon followed, they then descended back down into the clouds and all went in random directions. Some of them made into the city without being spotted, but Xej was spotted teleporting in and was immediatly chased by guards. He managed to flee quickly and teleported back to his stronghold.

With messages from Xej via Elric, the others managed to meet up in an Inn. During the interesting night they encountered the strong spirit of Cormyrians as they sang and danced the night away despite the fact a huge army sat outside the city ready to crush them. Some of the hero's heard songs of their allies, the Keepers of the realms and people cheered the loudest for these stories of victory in the face of death.

The next morning Xej joined them and the group of them went with a large gaurd escort up to the castle to meet the Regent Thalus. There they learned that the orc army that had originally been troubling Cormyr was crushed when their leader, Gray, was slain some months ago by Zendrak. The winter was quite and the army mainly stamped out any resistance. Then large groups began to disappear and with spring came this new, larger, more powerful orc and goblin army bolstered by dragons and drow.

Lining up the timelines, the group figured that was near the time they had finished disposing of Miska, and around the time they destroyed the staff. The group discussed the options, and decided to go get more information. They would raid one of the supply trains and capture a leader.

They took some time to plan an attack and then flew off in search of a caravan. North near found a small town with two full wagon trains camped in it, spending their days packing food and loading up wagosn with supplies. The party quickly planned and attack and went forth.

After Ke'rik scouted the town and provided the intelligence, Xej and Falc were the main strikers and appeared in a bar room where the leaders were hanging out. Xej sheilded himself and Falc and let off a fireball, but one dashed upstairs just out of touch of the licking flames. Falc finished off the more powerful soldier. The orcish cleric dressedin black robes stepped forward and swung at Falc, his unholy energy ripping into Falc, but not slaying him as the touch had meant to. Then the Shaman grabbed the cleric and the two of the vanished with a teleport.

The group spent a little while cleaning up the rest of the troops. They chopped and exploded their way through about seventy troops and a couple more mages before being done for the day. The spent a short time questioning a mage they had captured. The orc was intelligent and provided them with a few answers. Orcs had been drawn magically from distant lands to form this new army. They person organizing this was the red haird man Achile but he wasn't commanding anyone. The more powerful shamans had a small council and commanded magical resources, while the war leaders commanded their own troops. The dragons seemed to organize themselves as well, doing what they please when they please but always helping the war.

The group decided Achile was their target and began making plans to hunt him down.

Chapter 34 - Closed Doors

The battle against good and evil took a particularly poor turn. The group left the destroyed supply train and then made efforts to track down Achile. Kory's asked Lathander for his location and Lathander described it as, "Lathiosos' temporary lair, deep underground beneath Thesk, upon the continent of Faerun, on the world of Toril, on the prime material plane." The party then spend a day windwalking to Thesk.

The next day the used "find the path" to shoot across Thesk in search of his lair, It led them deep underground through a maze of underground waterways, and tiny forgotten passages. Then the reached a solid wall and Kory said, "we have to dig, that way." Ke'rik, in ghost form, was able to scout ahead and found two rooms connected by a 30 foot passage (though the passage was blocked off by solid rock at each end). One was a room with summoning circles and pillars, the other was made to look exactly like an Inn's room. In fact, there was even a window looking out upon the port town of Samra in Chondath.

He returned and the group tried to teleport into the room but appeared in Samra instead. They left Samra and returned to rest for a day. Ke'rik, as a Umber Hulk, dug a large pocket room nearby the other rooms so that the party could teleport into it and dig only a short way, rather than the 1/2 mile that they would have to dig from the natural cavern.

The next day the entered the place and encountered Achile. He wanted to speak with them coridally, but they were quite An-tag-onistic, and so he retreated to another room. There the party approached and prepared for battle while they tried to speak with him. He revealed that he was an agent of the Chaos queen with orders to "ruin the rest of their lives" type of deal. Then Falc summoned a swarm of creatures on him and a battle ensued.

Achile was able to teleport at will to a new location, doing so each round. This kept the party running to and fro trying to catch him. Xej's teleport lock failed to affect him. Meanwhile, he unleashed two firestorms in succession as the group ran back and forth trying to attack him. The firestorms came suddenly and Kory's charred body fell to the ground while Thorlin's very charred body managed to still stand. Gexbat took Kory's body and Thorlin out of the cave. Falc continued to try and press him, with Kale and Ke'rik also hounding him, but he used a powerful dispel to banish most of Falc's magic.

Reduced in numbers and with their major abilities hindered or nullified, the group quickly withdrew.

The party met and Xej was able to raise Kory back to life. They then discussed options and what they wanted to do. A short visit to the Vale of Aqua revealed that their enemy's real name was Lathiosus and that he was a Hellfire Wyrm, a potent agent of the Chaos Queen. The group decided defeating him was probably not going to happen so they best try and rescue the goddess.

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