Delemental
First Post
I suppose it is, Kristyan said. He opened his eyes, which were glowing the same green as the crystal over his head. The two acolytes also opened their eyes, and a shimmering emerald filed suddenly sprang up around Kristyan’s throne and the triangular crystal. At the same time, an invisible shape manifested itself in the center of the chamber, which to those with the ability to see it appeared as a massive, spiky, four-limbed monstrosity composed entirely of ectoplasm. Another pair of half-giant guards moved out from behind the throne and took up positions next to the two acolytes.
The Legacy also flew into motion. Kyle uttered a few short words, and suddenly a flurry of magic exploded all around him as several contingent spells activated and a time stop went into effect. After enhancing himself and the party with defensive spells, Kyle attempted to entrap the astral construct in a resilient sphere, but was unable to contain it, and then attempted to channel a dispelling through his staff to bring down the force field. To his surprise, Kyle realized that Kristyan was tracking his movements, even during the effects of the time stop, and when he attempted to dispel the barrier, a moment’s concentration from the psion disrupted his effort. Kyle staggered a step, overwhelmed by the massive amount of magic he had just channeled in a short time.
Yuri leapt to engage the male acolyte before the half-giant could get into position, burying her spear into his shoulder and sending a pulse of electrical and sonic energy into him. Though the head of the spear bit into flesh, Yuri saw that the elemental energy dissipated harmlessly. She jumped back to avoid the sweep of the guard’s glaive.
The astral construct swept its huge claws at Autumn, barely missing the sentinel. Nidru attempted an invisibility purge, but the construct was apparently immune to the spell and its location was not revealed. Unfortunately, Nidru’s spell did reveal Osborn, who was attempting to move up stealthily to the female acolyte. Uttering a curse, Nidru ended the spell. Meanwhile, her sister invoked Krüsh’s power to bolster the party’s fighting prowess. Tolly attempted to summon an earth monolith to join the battle, but his spell was disrupted when a strange, four-armed insectoid creature leapt out from its hiding place and slashed at him with a longspear. The insectoid’s chitin-like shell shifted colors as it moved, blending in with its surroundings.
Autumn and the astral construct continued to exchange blows, though Autumn seemed to be getting the worse end of the deal until a timely mass heal from Nidru. The half-giant guards attacked Yuri and Osborn, and Arrie went after the insectoid while Tolly bolstered himself with iron body. Kyle unleashed a glitterdust on both the insectoid and the construct when they moved close to each other, which blinded neither but revealed their location to everyone. Arrie’s greatspear bit into the side of the insectoid, but she herself recoiled in pain as the creature’s psionic power manifested, sending painful feedback up her weapon and into the warrior. Gritting her teeth, Arrie put everything she had into disrupting the power, and barely succeeded. Lajila summoned up a miniature volcanic eruption which peppered the male acolyte and his guard with lava, but the spell bounced off Kristyan’s shield without effect. The psion looked around the room, and the crystal over his head pulsed. Cries of pain echoed throughout the chamber as everyone in the Legacy felt their life-force forcibly ripped from them.
The male acolyte attempted to target Lajila with a psionic power intended to induce panic in her, but the priestess ignored it, having been bolstered by Tolly’s heroes’ feast before they’d entered the citadel. His female counterpart invoked a bolt of chilling cold against Yuri, numbing her joints as she leapt back and forth to attack. As the Sargian dragoon moved in again, she was caught in Kristyan’s gaze. Everyone watched in horror as a double of Yuri seemed to pull out of her body, formed from shadow and blood, until there were two Yuris standing there, nearly identical in appearance. The real Yuri could only stare, drained by the ordeal, but then gripped her longspear tightly, and with a yell of rage, she leapt into the air and came down upon the prone half-giant, impaling him. At almost the same time, the false Yuri leapt at Nidru, barely missing her.
Kyle gestured at the female acolyte, who promptly vanished into a maze. He then summoned up a mass of black tentacles with a quick word, which enveloped the male acolyte, his guard, and the astral construct, though the tentacles were unable to restrain the huge beast. He finally flew over to the field enveloping Kristyan, and erected a prismatic sphere around himself. Though the sphere’s radius didn’t pass beyond the psychic barrier, it did enclose the wizard in a deadly barrier from all other directions.
I need a private space to work in, Kyle said over the telepathic link.
Nidru blasted Shadow Yuri with a sound lance followed by another earth reaver, and Lajila matched her sister’s sonic attack and then followed it with hypothermia. Moments later the female acolyte reappeared from the maze, and the two psionic acolytes retaliated with bolts of fire and electricity. Meanwhile, the thri-kreen leapt at Tolly, invoking a power as it moved in that gave its carapace the same dull metallic sheen that Tolly’s iron body had given the Ardaran. Narrowly avoiding an attempt by Tolly to implode the four-armed being, its claws raked Tolly’s chest. It then reeled as it was struck by Arrie’s enormous sword, which had been altered to allow her to penetrate the thri-kreen’s iron skin.
Kristyan gave Osborn an imperious glare, causing his brain to swell painfully inside his skull. The hin was able to break free of the power moments before his brain liquefied entirely, but his vision still swam and was tinged with red, and he felt a warm fluid dripping from both ears.
Yuri prepared herself for another charge, pausing only momentarily when she thought she heard some sort of commotion coming from the floors below. As she leapt into the air after the male acolyte, she saw her shadowy counterpart going after Lajila, who invoked another mass healing spell a split second before she was struck. Yuri came down upon the acolyte, taking a blast of psychic power as she landed and thrust her spear into the psion’s chest, killing her. As the acolyte collapsed, everyone saw the field surrounding Kristyan flicker and weaken. On the other side of the chamber, Osborn nimbly made his way through the field of tentacles and hurled several daggers into the remaining half-giant guard, dropping him.
Autumn was raked by the construct’s huge claws again, crying out in pain. She was receiving the worst of the ongoing exchange between the sentinel and the construct, and wasn’t sure how long she could endure. Fortunately, both Osborn and Arrie came to her aid, and between them managed to bring down the construct. Finally free to move about, Autumn made he way over to the male acolyte, who had just used his powers to free himself from the tentacles, and casually lopped off his head.
With a cry of surprise, Kristyan dove to one side as the field surrounding him collapsed, and Kyle’s prismatic sphere snapped closed, neatly bisecting the throne where the psion had once sat. Kyle quickly moved out of the sphere to block Kristyan’s movement, trapping him between the rainbow-colored globe and the field of black tentacles. Invoking quickened spells to help his aim, Kyle reached out with a hand charged with necrotic power and transferred a large portion of Kristyan’s life force into himself, and then struck him with bolts of negative energy that further sapped his life energy. A moment later, Tolly appeared behind Kristyan and slammed into the psion with his soulsteel hammer. Beset, and with nowhere to turn, Kristyan invoked the power he’d used against Yuri on Tolly, pulling a duplicate out of the priest to help defend him. The duplicate, however, was unarmed – despite Kristyan’s prodigious power, he could not replicate a holy relic of Ardara.
The floor at the far end of the chamber erupted, leaving a gaping, rubble-strewn hole where the entry had once been. Climbing up into the chapel came a pair of huge trolls, with crystals embedded in their flesh, and four more half-giant guards. These six were in a pitched battle with a pair of figures that the Legacy recognized as Herion and Lanara. The party immediately turned to aid them, with Lajila enhancing their weapons with brilliant energy, and Yuri leaping in to relieve the embattled bard. Arrie used her magical cloak to exchange places with her husband after he received a vicious series of attacks from the half-giants, allowing him to receive healing while she engaged Kristyan’s minions.
Autumn flew up to join the battle against Kristyan as Tolly exchanged dispellings with his shadowy counterpart, both of them losing valuable defensive spells. Kristyan tried to destroy Kyle’s mind, but he resisted the power and kept fighting, hitting the psion with a dispelling channeled through his staff that removed one of his defensive powers. Snarling, Kristyan called upon the crystal overhead, drawing emerald green energy into himself and then sending it out in an explosive blast that tore at the flesh of everyone around him.
Nidru invoked a field of blistering radiance in the corner of the room where Yuri and Arrie fought, knowing that both had been rendered immune to fire before the battle. The half-giants and trolls, scorched by the divine power, were forced to abandon their positions, pursued by the two warrior women. The thri-kreen, who had tried to engage Lanara to silence her inspiring song, suddenly changed direction and leapt at Kyle, raking his claws into the wizard’s back. Herion, who was moving up to aid the battle against Kristyan, cast a telekinesis spell and shoved the thri-kreen into the prismatic sphere, frying the insect warrior.
Slowly, the tide of battle swung in favor of the Legacy. Yuri managed to take down the two trolls, injuring them so badly that it would take them hours to regenerate, while Arrie carved her way through the half-giants. Osborn attacked Tolly’s shadowy duplicate, finally killing it and restoring Tolly to full strength, while Kyle stunned Kristyan himself with an electrical ray. As Osborn moved in to join the battle against Kristyan, and Lanara and the two priestesses of Krüsh went to help finish off the guards, Herion stepped back and cast a shatter spell on the green crystal.
The crystal exploded, as did the roof above their heads. As did the sky above that.
Green energy blasted skyward, pulled out of Kristyan as he screamed in uncomprehending rage. The sky whirled with a nearly infinite combination of colors, including some impossible colors. Rents opened in the sky, and through them they could see places in the material world; some were familiar parts of their home continent, some were of a blasted wasteland they assumed was the Tauric Empire, and some of a foreign land that could have been the lands of the Xhintai, or even some unexplored continent. They all felt a rumbling through their feet as the power holding the Crystal Citadel together began to dissipate.
The Legacy looked down at Kristyan, who had dropped to his knees, appearing nearly comatose. Autumn stepped forward, her blade in hand.
“For those who have suffered and died for your ambitions,” she said, and brought her blade down.
The Legacy stood in silent contemplation of all that had come to pass, until the trembling of the citadel forced them out of their reverie. Rising up into the air by the power of will alone, they made their way toward the rents in the sky, passing through one into the real world, even as the essence of the Dream Realm poured through.
-------------------------------------
And there it is, the last tabletop session of the campaign. I'll wrap this all up at some point in the near future with an epilogue.
The Legacy also flew into motion. Kyle uttered a few short words, and suddenly a flurry of magic exploded all around him as several contingent spells activated and a time stop went into effect. After enhancing himself and the party with defensive spells, Kyle attempted to entrap the astral construct in a resilient sphere, but was unable to contain it, and then attempted to channel a dispelling through his staff to bring down the force field. To his surprise, Kyle realized that Kristyan was tracking his movements, even during the effects of the time stop, and when he attempted to dispel the barrier, a moment’s concentration from the psion disrupted his effort. Kyle staggered a step, overwhelmed by the massive amount of magic he had just channeled in a short time.
Yuri leapt to engage the male acolyte before the half-giant could get into position, burying her spear into his shoulder and sending a pulse of electrical and sonic energy into him. Though the head of the spear bit into flesh, Yuri saw that the elemental energy dissipated harmlessly. She jumped back to avoid the sweep of the guard’s glaive.
The astral construct swept its huge claws at Autumn, barely missing the sentinel. Nidru attempted an invisibility purge, but the construct was apparently immune to the spell and its location was not revealed. Unfortunately, Nidru’s spell did reveal Osborn, who was attempting to move up stealthily to the female acolyte. Uttering a curse, Nidru ended the spell. Meanwhile, her sister invoked Krüsh’s power to bolster the party’s fighting prowess. Tolly attempted to summon an earth monolith to join the battle, but his spell was disrupted when a strange, four-armed insectoid creature leapt out from its hiding place and slashed at him with a longspear. The insectoid’s chitin-like shell shifted colors as it moved, blending in with its surroundings.
Autumn and the astral construct continued to exchange blows, though Autumn seemed to be getting the worse end of the deal until a timely mass heal from Nidru. The half-giant guards attacked Yuri and Osborn, and Arrie went after the insectoid while Tolly bolstered himself with iron body. Kyle unleashed a glitterdust on both the insectoid and the construct when they moved close to each other, which blinded neither but revealed their location to everyone. Arrie’s greatspear bit into the side of the insectoid, but she herself recoiled in pain as the creature’s psionic power manifested, sending painful feedback up her weapon and into the warrior. Gritting her teeth, Arrie put everything she had into disrupting the power, and barely succeeded. Lajila summoned up a miniature volcanic eruption which peppered the male acolyte and his guard with lava, but the spell bounced off Kristyan’s shield without effect. The psion looked around the room, and the crystal over his head pulsed. Cries of pain echoed throughout the chamber as everyone in the Legacy felt their life-force forcibly ripped from them.
The male acolyte attempted to target Lajila with a psionic power intended to induce panic in her, but the priestess ignored it, having been bolstered by Tolly’s heroes’ feast before they’d entered the citadel. His female counterpart invoked a bolt of chilling cold against Yuri, numbing her joints as she leapt back and forth to attack. As the Sargian dragoon moved in again, she was caught in Kristyan’s gaze. Everyone watched in horror as a double of Yuri seemed to pull out of her body, formed from shadow and blood, until there were two Yuris standing there, nearly identical in appearance. The real Yuri could only stare, drained by the ordeal, but then gripped her longspear tightly, and with a yell of rage, she leapt into the air and came down upon the prone half-giant, impaling him. At almost the same time, the false Yuri leapt at Nidru, barely missing her.
Kyle gestured at the female acolyte, who promptly vanished into a maze. He then summoned up a mass of black tentacles with a quick word, which enveloped the male acolyte, his guard, and the astral construct, though the tentacles were unable to restrain the huge beast. He finally flew over to the field enveloping Kristyan, and erected a prismatic sphere around himself. Though the sphere’s radius didn’t pass beyond the psychic barrier, it did enclose the wizard in a deadly barrier from all other directions.
I need a private space to work in, Kyle said over the telepathic link.
Nidru blasted Shadow Yuri with a sound lance followed by another earth reaver, and Lajila matched her sister’s sonic attack and then followed it with hypothermia. Moments later the female acolyte reappeared from the maze, and the two psionic acolytes retaliated with bolts of fire and electricity. Meanwhile, the thri-kreen leapt at Tolly, invoking a power as it moved in that gave its carapace the same dull metallic sheen that Tolly’s iron body had given the Ardaran. Narrowly avoiding an attempt by Tolly to implode the four-armed being, its claws raked Tolly’s chest. It then reeled as it was struck by Arrie’s enormous sword, which had been altered to allow her to penetrate the thri-kreen’s iron skin.
Kristyan gave Osborn an imperious glare, causing his brain to swell painfully inside his skull. The hin was able to break free of the power moments before his brain liquefied entirely, but his vision still swam and was tinged with red, and he felt a warm fluid dripping from both ears.
Yuri prepared herself for another charge, pausing only momentarily when she thought she heard some sort of commotion coming from the floors below. As she leapt into the air after the male acolyte, she saw her shadowy counterpart going after Lajila, who invoked another mass healing spell a split second before she was struck. Yuri came down upon the acolyte, taking a blast of psychic power as she landed and thrust her spear into the psion’s chest, killing her. As the acolyte collapsed, everyone saw the field surrounding Kristyan flicker and weaken. On the other side of the chamber, Osborn nimbly made his way through the field of tentacles and hurled several daggers into the remaining half-giant guard, dropping him.
Autumn was raked by the construct’s huge claws again, crying out in pain. She was receiving the worst of the ongoing exchange between the sentinel and the construct, and wasn’t sure how long she could endure. Fortunately, both Osborn and Arrie came to her aid, and between them managed to bring down the construct. Finally free to move about, Autumn made he way over to the male acolyte, who had just used his powers to free himself from the tentacles, and casually lopped off his head.
With a cry of surprise, Kristyan dove to one side as the field surrounding him collapsed, and Kyle’s prismatic sphere snapped closed, neatly bisecting the throne where the psion had once sat. Kyle quickly moved out of the sphere to block Kristyan’s movement, trapping him between the rainbow-colored globe and the field of black tentacles. Invoking quickened spells to help his aim, Kyle reached out with a hand charged with necrotic power and transferred a large portion of Kristyan’s life force into himself, and then struck him with bolts of negative energy that further sapped his life energy. A moment later, Tolly appeared behind Kristyan and slammed into the psion with his soulsteel hammer. Beset, and with nowhere to turn, Kristyan invoked the power he’d used against Yuri on Tolly, pulling a duplicate out of the priest to help defend him. The duplicate, however, was unarmed – despite Kristyan’s prodigious power, he could not replicate a holy relic of Ardara.
The floor at the far end of the chamber erupted, leaving a gaping, rubble-strewn hole where the entry had once been. Climbing up into the chapel came a pair of huge trolls, with crystals embedded in their flesh, and four more half-giant guards. These six were in a pitched battle with a pair of figures that the Legacy recognized as Herion and Lanara. The party immediately turned to aid them, with Lajila enhancing their weapons with brilliant energy, and Yuri leaping in to relieve the embattled bard. Arrie used her magical cloak to exchange places with her husband after he received a vicious series of attacks from the half-giants, allowing him to receive healing while she engaged Kristyan’s minions.
Autumn flew up to join the battle against Kristyan as Tolly exchanged dispellings with his shadowy counterpart, both of them losing valuable defensive spells. Kristyan tried to destroy Kyle’s mind, but he resisted the power and kept fighting, hitting the psion with a dispelling channeled through his staff that removed one of his defensive powers. Snarling, Kristyan called upon the crystal overhead, drawing emerald green energy into himself and then sending it out in an explosive blast that tore at the flesh of everyone around him.
Nidru invoked a field of blistering radiance in the corner of the room where Yuri and Arrie fought, knowing that both had been rendered immune to fire before the battle. The half-giants and trolls, scorched by the divine power, were forced to abandon their positions, pursued by the two warrior women. The thri-kreen, who had tried to engage Lanara to silence her inspiring song, suddenly changed direction and leapt at Kyle, raking his claws into the wizard’s back. Herion, who was moving up to aid the battle against Kristyan, cast a telekinesis spell and shoved the thri-kreen into the prismatic sphere, frying the insect warrior.
Slowly, the tide of battle swung in favor of the Legacy. Yuri managed to take down the two trolls, injuring them so badly that it would take them hours to regenerate, while Arrie carved her way through the half-giants. Osborn attacked Tolly’s shadowy duplicate, finally killing it and restoring Tolly to full strength, while Kyle stunned Kristyan himself with an electrical ray. As Osborn moved in to join the battle against Kristyan, and Lanara and the two priestesses of Krüsh went to help finish off the guards, Herion stepped back and cast a shatter spell on the green crystal.
The crystal exploded, as did the roof above their heads. As did the sky above that.
Green energy blasted skyward, pulled out of Kristyan as he screamed in uncomprehending rage. The sky whirled with a nearly infinite combination of colors, including some impossible colors. Rents opened in the sky, and through them they could see places in the material world; some were familiar parts of their home continent, some were of a blasted wasteland they assumed was the Tauric Empire, and some of a foreign land that could have been the lands of the Xhintai, or even some unexplored continent. They all felt a rumbling through their feet as the power holding the Crystal Citadel together began to dissipate.
The Legacy looked down at Kristyan, who had dropped to his knees, appearing nearly comatose. Autumn stepped forward, her blade in hand.
“For those who have suffered and died for your ambitions,” she said, and brought her blade down.
The Legacy stood in silent contemplation of all that had come to pass, until the trembling of the citadel forced them out of their reverie. Rising up into the air by the power of will alone, they made their way toward the rents in the sky, passing through one into the real world, even as the essence of the Dream Realm poured through.
-------------------------------------
And there it is, the last tabletop session of the campaign. I'll wrap this all up at some point in the near future with an epilogue.
