Sagiro's Story Hour: The FINAL Adventures of Abernathy's Company (FINISHED 7/3/14)

[Sagiro]

The cat was named by a small child in Djaw who loved the sport of Farangi (Sport of Emperors, played by his parents), but who hadn't yet learned to pronounce it properly. Thus, "Frungycat."

And, yeah, I totally cribbed it from Star Control 2, the greatest video game ever made.

 

[Sagiro]

A short but eventful update.

Sagiro’s Story Hour, Part 309
Maybe Not the Destiny He Would Have Chosen

After the Company has left the Feline Conclave behind, winding their way down the misty forest path until they emerge into trackless forest, Aravis shares Inkspot's private opinions with the others.

“What disturbs me the most,” says Morningstar, “is that you died, were brought back to life, and are still tainted from the Black Goo.”

“And that a wish wasn't enough to fully get rid of it the first time,” Kibi adds.

Ernie squirms a bit.

“Hey, maybe a miracle would work,' Dranko offers consolingly. “Divine magic could work where arcane stuff didn't.”

Aravis sighs. “I was really hoping that Destiny was done with me. I guess not.”

Dranko lights up a cigar. “You know, not all of us can be big deals. I've never had a Big Honking Destiny. And it's kind of boring. So you be happy that you're making a difference.”

A tentacle erupts from Dranko's chest.

Another bursts from his neck, then two more from his left leg, then another through his stomach. His friends are splattered with gore, rendered speechless with horror. The nausea of Cleaners is emanating from Dranko's twitching form in waves.

More and more tentacles come wriggling from all over Dranko's body until almost a dozen are protruding outward, waving grotesquely in the air. Finally one more pokes out of his left eye-socket, bursting his eyeball as it does so. This last tentacle holds a small glass vial in its suckered tip, and the others can see a small folded piece of paper inside the vial.

Dranko is no longer responding over the mind-link. Aravis reacts first, stepping forward and casting temporal stasis on his ravaged friend. Dranko goes rigid, and the tentacles, while still flailing around, are no longer tearing larger holes in the half-orc's body. Morningstar casts dismissal on the tentacles themselves but this has no effect.

“Dranko!” she screams. “Talk to us! Dranko!”

Dranko doesn't talk.

But he is listening.

Oh, to be sure, he feels pain. It's excruciating, bringing to mind the feeling of being stretched apart by Lord Tapheon. But foremost in his thoughts is not the physical agony, or the distant cries of his friends. No, what Dranko is listening to is the Voice. It speaks directly in his mind, an ancient and unknowable intelligence from an unfathomable realm. Its thoughts are deep and gurgling.

“Dranko, I have answered your summons, and I have brought what you so desperately want. As is written in the ancient laws of the Void, I offer you a bargain. What I offer can bring you a victory greater than any your kind has ever known. Its lack will doom you to ruin. In return, I desire something of yours that you value greatly. Its import to you is its value to me – it must be something the loss of which you will feel keenly every remaining day of your tiny life. Perhaps the love of your wife, or the forgiveness of your grandfather. Perhaps your name, or your face. Your faith. Your swagger. The trust of your friends. You decide. I will return, and you may make your offer to me, and if I am pleased, I will give you your salvation, a thing whose value cannot be measured by the mere wealth of kingdoms. If I am not pleased, or if you have no offer, I will take you instead, a plaything in the darkness.”

Seconds after bursting out of Dranko, all of the tentacles retract and vanish. The glass vial is scraped off on Dranko's now-empty eye-socket. Dranko himself falls to the ground, rigid and unconscious. He should by rights be dead; only Aravis's temporal stasis is keeping him in the land of the living.

Simultaneously, Aravis dispels the stasis and Morningstar casts heal. Dranko's eyes snap open, and he screams.

“Dranko,” Morningstar implores. “Please, please talk to me.”

“Oh,” says Dranko, looking up the face of his betrothed. “So that wasn't all just in my head.”

“Among other places,” says Flicker, trying to make light, although he, like everyone else, is trembling.

“This is officially the worst week of my life,” Dranko croaks.

Grey Wolf has plucked the bloody vial from the ground and removed the piece of paper inside.

“'Dranko was here,'” he reads aloud.

Dranko pales. “Oh. Yeah. That.”

“Took them a while to find you,” says Grey Wolf.

Ernie does a complete examination of Dranko, and concludes that after Morningstar's heal, everything is fine. “Looks like there was no permanent harm,” he says.

Everyone looks at one another. No permanent harm.

“So the Cleaners can even control my cigar smoke,” says Dranko with disgust. “Charming.”

Morningstar casts detect evil and Dranko checks out clean.

Aravis sits down and shakes his head. “This is what happens when you play around in the Far Realms.”

“I didn't!” Dranko protests. “I threw one little bottle.”

Everyone just looks at him.

“So,” Dranko says. “Our options are, I get something and give something up, or I get dragged away and we're doomed to lose. That's the suckiest bargain I've ever heard!”

“And you shouldn't have to make it,” says Aravis. “We should destroy that Cleaner instead.”

“No, we can't” says Dranko dismally. “Because if it's correct, and I don't make a trade with it, we lose.”

“I don't think I believe that,” says Aravis.

“Me neither,” adds Morningstar. “We've chosen 'water.'”

“Look,” says Dranko. “There are things that make me what I am, that I would miss terribly, but that I would give up for the rest of you, and what we do. We've all made sacrifices.”

“You love your eye-patch,” Flicker suggests. “You could give that up!”

Morningstar glowers. “I don't trust the Cleaner to keep any bargain.”

“It doesn't matter if we trust it or not!” Dranko exclaims angrily. “The thing can rip through me out of nowhere and tear me to pieces!”

Aravis stays calm. “It just means we have to destroy it, or find a way to prevent it from harming you.”

Morningstar nods. “And how do we know it's done, if you give it what it's asking for?”

“Exactly,” Aravis agrees. “'...and here's another thing I want, and I'll kill you if you don't make a another bargain...'”

“You could give me up,” offers Flicker. “And then, when I was dead, Morningstar could bring me back to life.”

“ I think if you were the terms of the bargain, we could never bring you back,” says Aravis.

“Oh.” Flicker ponders a moment. “Then let's think of something else.”

After a moment of quiet frustration, Dranko throws up his hands. “It seemed like such a good idea at the time! Who else has thrown a bottle into the Far Realms?”

“Maybe there's a reason,” says Aravis. “When you go fishing in the Void, sometimes you latch onto the big one.”

Dranko hangs his head. “Yeah. I just wish this one was the one that got away.”


* *

The party has plenty of questions now about several topics; time for a commune! Morningstar prays to Ell, and soon a holy presence is with her.

Is miracle sufficient to remove the taint that's on Ernie or Aravis, as detected by the cats?”

NO

Do we have the means at our disposal to remove the taint from Aravis and Ernie?

YES

Is the information about those means currently in our basement?

NO

Is everything the tentacle monster said to Dranko true?

IT STRONGLY BELIEVES SO

Is there an upcoming battle we cannot win without its help?

I DON'T KNOW

“The future is written in water,” Aravis mutters.

If Dranko doesn't pay the monster's price, will it drag him into the Far Realms?

UNDOUBTEDLY

Do we have the means to prevent that, other than Dranko paying his part?

NO

Does the means at our disposal to cleanse Ernie and Aravis involve a Black Circle item or ritual?

NO

Kibi suggests asking: Would a wish cast simultaneously with miracle cleanse Aravis and Ernie?

YES

If Ernie or Aravis were to stand in an area while a series of hallows were cast, would that be sufficient?

NO

Will the tentacle monster come back for Dranko within the next month?

YES

Within a week?

YES

Within three days?

NO

Will hallow and miracle together be sufficient to remove the taint of the Black Goo?

NO. IT MUST BE ARCANE AND DIVINE TOGETHER.

(Which makes sense, given the nature of the Black Circle)

“Arcane and divine together,” says Ernie. He looks pointedly at Aravis. “Who else do we know that fits that description? Hey, maybe Aravis is the only one who can fight the deity behind the Black Circle.”

“Huh,” says Dranko, as Aravis gulps. “You know, suddenly spending eternity in the Far Realms doesn't seem so bad.”

Will casting the Ritual of the Fourth Derivation cause the target to become aware that the Ritual has been performed?

NO

Did the tentacles cause the 'no permanent harm' message?

DRANKO'S CIGARS ARE OCCASIONALLY PROPHETIC.

Morningstar laughs, and says faintly, “You have prophetic cigars?”

Dranko laughs also, lights up, and blows some smoke. Kibi is incredibly intelligent.

“Remember,” says Aravis. “Ell said 'occasionally.'”

...to be continued...

 

[blargney the second]

Awesome.

 

[coyote6]

I'm not sure, but that may be the Best Update Ever.

 

[Innocent Bystander]

Awesome! So we finally get to hear about that in the story hour. I remember PirateCat making a mention of this a long time ago and was wondering when we'd get to read about it. Simply awesome!

 

[Piratecat]

Dranko threw the bottle into the void - in retrospect, probably not the best choice I've ever made - while we were trapped in Het Brannoi. It's in post #1262 of this thread, written by Sagiro in February '05.

 

[Sagiro]

Sagiro’s Story Hour, Part 310
Holy Jelly!

Eddings greets the Company upon their return to the Greenhouse.

“Welcome back. I trust your journeys were exciting as always?”

Dranko rolls down his sleeve. “Look at this!”

“It's your arm,” Eddings observes.

“But no scars!”

“Ah. Had that cleaned up a bit then, did you?”

“My arm was bitten off by a giant rat.”

Eddings blinks. “I'm sorry to hear that sir. But you appear to have gotten better.”

“And worse,” says Morningstar.

Dranko sighs. “Yeah, and worse. I also had a horrible tentacled being from the Far Realms burst out of me.”

Eddings shakes his head. “Far Realms?”

“The bad place beyond time and space,” Dranko explains.

“If you see Dranko with more tentacles coming out of him,” Morningstar says, “Let us know.”

“I trust I'll have the presence of mind to scream in that event. Are you expecting a... recurrence?”

“Not in the next three days, no.”

“Very good sir.”

Ernie comes in from the kitchen, munching on a muffin. “Whatever Ozilinsh is paying you, it's not enough.”

Eddings bows his head. “That's kind of you to say, but I assure you I'm quite adequately taken care of.”

“Did you ever think your life would reach the point where you regularly talk about tentacles?” asks Ernie.

“And where you magically appear in the middle of hostile armies?” adds Grey Wolf.

“And know what Black Lizard pie smells like?” adds Dranko.

Eddings smiles. “Often, when you're gone, I have time to reflect on just how boring my life would be had it gone the way I expected.” He puts his hand in one of his his illusionary eyes and rubs the socket. “Now, would you like anything?”

“A good dinner,” says Kibi.

“And tonight,” says Dranko, “I'd like to get very, very drunk.”

Eddings produces a fine meal from Icebox, supplemented with his own cooking and an excellent wine. The Company gets to talking about past adventures, and how things had changed upon their return from the distant past. On the topic of Turlus/Turlissa, the evil baker-turned-beautiful spy, Eddings says, “I'm still not quite comfortable with that particular... transformation.”

“I miss Turlus,” says Aravis.

“I don't!” Dranko exclaims.

Flicker takes a sip of wine. “Yeah... remember that time he went out of his way to find out we hadn't been paying our taxes?”

Dranko smiles. “Remind me to write a thank-you note to the universe for erasing him.”

Morningstar looks pointedly at her husband. “Just be careful where you drop it.”

Before going to bed, Ernie sends a mushy sending to Yoba. Her reply: If I have to look at one more map today, I'm going to scream. Miss you terribly. Love, Yoba.

* *


July 25, 1832

Dranko wakes the next morning with feeling of dread and a nasty hangover. He and some of the others had gone out drinking at Flicker's parents' place after dinner, though Dranko's recollection of how much he had imbibed is a bit hazy.

“Good morning!” calls Aravis cheerily at breakfast.

Dranko mutters incoherently at him, something about tentacles.

“Stop worrying,” Aravis suggests. “Or at least, worry about something you can actually affect.”

Dranko lights a cigar, hoping for guidance.

Earth magic is the best magic.

“It sure is!” Kibi agrees.

Morningstar issues a sending to Snokas, just to check up on him. How are you? Aravis? Sort of divine. Aravis and Ernie? Sort of evil-tainted. Dranko? Chased by tentacles. Really, we're about normal. Your turn. Morningstar.

The reply comes back: You're making me miss the adventuring life. Still in Kallor library. Who knew there were so many books in the world? You're a topic of...

Ernie laughs. “You'd think Snokas would remember the '25 words' rule.'”

* *

After breakfast the Company heads across town to the Ellish temple. The grounds are sleepy and quiet in the late afternoon; Morningstar shoos a few acolytes out of the main chapel and closes the doors.

Standing before the altar, she casts a miracle while Aravis simultaneously casts the following wish: “I wish that all remaining taint and side-effects resulting from contact with the evil black goo be forever removed from Aravis and Ernie.” The others pray silently that this will work.

For a moment nothing seems to happen. Then, all at once, Ernie and Aravis both experience an extraordinary feeling. They feel as though they have just woken from an unremembered nightmare, to find themselves in a beautiful meadow beneath a shining sun. A spring fragrance fills their nostrils. They had no idea of the weight that had been squatting on their souls, so long present that it had become an unrecognized part of their beings. But now that weight is lifted.

A cloud of dark smoke hangs in the air above them for a second, before a ripple of Ellish power disperses it.

Ernie shudders and takes a deep breath. “I didn't even know...” He is brought to mind of every ugly thought or bitter word spoken in the past year, and wonders at its source. “Thank you, Morningstar. Aravis.”

“I'm glad it worked!” Morningstar exclaims.

“Me too,” says Aravis. “Now, let's go destroy the Black Circle.”


* *



They teleport directly from the temple to the Ellish holy city of Kallor, though their specific destination is their captured underground Black Circle complex beneath the Cosnor Estate. At Kibi's previous instruction, the Ritual Chamber has been repaired and prepped for the Ritual of the Fourth Derivation.

Casting the ritual will only take half an hour, and requires three people. Some of it involves the invoking of questionable powers, but it's a low-level undertaking that should have no lasting effects on the perpetrators.

Dranko casts augury just be on the safe side, which returns: MOSTLY WEAL.

Mostly?

The wizards check everything one last time, but it all seems in order. They chant, wave, read scrolls and burn various components in a small iron cauldron. Half an hour later it's done. They all feel a bit down in the soul, but it's nothing a bless can't take care of.

“That's stage one down,” says Aravis.

Next up is the much more involved Ritual of the Seven Stars, which among other things will require a more elaborate arrangement of the ritual room, as well as “moontears steeped in Dustwine” and, of course, Mokad himself. The next stop will be the town of West Greydust in the Kivian country of Bederen. Morningstar asks Dranko if he'd rather wait until the tentacles come back, so that they don't interrupt the party at some inopportune moment, but Dranko just wants to get going. A standard collect-the-thingamabob quest will be just the thing to take his mind off the Cleaner's impending return.


* *


According to their map of Kivia, West Greydust is a small town near the border between Bederen and Delfir. The closest they've been to it is probably “hookbat pass” to the south-east of the Delfirian Arch, but they opt to teleport somewhere safer. The Company is soon standing outside the town of Lav-Set in Tev, about 250 miles from their destination. The time has jumped from mid-morning to early afternoon.

“Time for wind walk,” says Grey Wolf.

Dranko perks up. “We should get the genie to cast it!”

“We always make him cranky,” Ernie warns.

“No we don't,” Aravis replies. “He comes out cranky!”

“Come on,” Dranko urges. “It's been a long time since we've talked to the guy.”

Aravis assents and rubs the ring. A blue smoke issues forth and there is the impressive azure-skinned Al Tarqoz. The genie lays down a hand of cards with a triumphant expression, but his face darkens as the cards flutter to the ground. Dranko can see that all of the cards are of the same suit.

Al Tarqoz assembles his composure, effects a smile, and bows before Aravis. “And how may I serve my most beneficent master today?”

“Say,” Dranko interrupts. “How much money were you going to win on that hand?”

“Assuming that I won – which seemed highly likely – there were over four thousand dirham riding on that hand. Which I will not now be able to claim, because they will accuse me of cheating.”

“We were worried that you were going to miss us,” says Dranko.

“Please, never worry again on my account.”

“Dranko, you are not making it better,” Ernie hisses.

Aravis smiles at the genie. “A straight flush was going to win that hand, so I wouldn't worry about it.”

“I'll find out on my return,” says Al Tarqoz.

At Aravis's request the genie casts wind walk upon the assemblage, then hovers in front of the wizard with just the tiniest trace of impatience marring his calm demeanor.

Aravis can't help but look a bit guilty. “It's been about two years since we've called you!”

“Yes, I know.”

“Would you be happier if we just unmade the ring?”

Al Tarqoz doesn't seem to hear the question.

“I am always pleased beyond words to be of whatever assistance I can, my master. Is there anything else you require?”

“No. You can go.”

The genie scoops up his cards and vanishes back into the ring.


* *

The Company hovers a hundred feet above the town of West Greydust; to the west, the sun is starting to set behind the mountains. Dranko sees some of the locals here and there, mostly farmers in their fields. Nothing seems suspicious or dangerous, so they land outside of town and walk in via the eastern road. As a group of armed and well-dressed strangers, they elicit many curious stares. One farmer near the road puts down a large basket and walks over to them.

“Greetings, travelers. Are you lost?”

Aravis bows. “We're not lost if this is West Greydust.”

“It is,” confirms the farmer.

“We've come from a long ways away,” says Ernie, “looking for something that will save the life of a friend.”

“And you think to find it here?”

Aravis nods. “We hope.”

The farmer directs them to the house of Seppet, the town healer. Aravis is delighted to see the holy symbol of Quarrol, God of Nature, prominently displayed above the door. He knocks.

The voice of a middle-aged man comes from the house, speaking (like the farmer) in a thickly-accented Kivian Common.

“Come in!”

Leaving their weapons outside the door, they enter Seppet's small hut.

Seppet is a gaunt man with a bushy black beard and thinning hair. He regards them curiously.

“May I help you with something?”

Aravis nods. “The first thing I'd like to do is make an offering to Quarrol.” So saying, he hands over a small bag with 200 miracs.

“You are very generous!” Seppet exclaims.

Aravis bows his head. “I have recently had good reason to be very thankful to Quarrol.”

“Then you are always welcome in my house.”

Ernie gets right to the point. “We are looking for a substance, to help a friend who is in great danger.”

“I have a number of salves and curatives,” says Seppet. “I can also cast healing spells on my own. Is your friend with you?”

“We're set with divine magic,” says Ernie. “We're looking for something we can find only in this town. Something called 'Dustwine.'”

“Ah, yes. I am familiar with the legend of Dustwine. It is said to be in a pool in the mountains, but no one has been up there for several hundred years.”

Ernie sighs. “And no one who went up there before ever came back alive?”

“According to the legends, some did not come back, and others said there was horrible creature who lived there. So people stopped going. And soon, no one knew for sure what was really there.”

“There's always a horrible monster,” says Grey Wolf, entirely unsurprised.

Ernie presses. “Can you tell us where the Dustwine was said to be?”

“Of course.” He points out the window to where a tall mountain is silhouetted by the setting sun. “If you walk up the pass, I gather there is a cave some ways up. I have never been there myself, having no desire to be killed by a horrible monster.”

“Neither do we,” says Ernie.

Seppet excuses himself briefly and returns with on old book. He flips through its crackling pages for moment.

“Here we go. Dustwine. Which would 'drive out the evil spirit.' Go up the trail of Mt. Temun. You should see a cave. I don't know how high up. But the mountain is not a difficult climb this time of year. But, yes, a cave, and a... here it is... a pool dripping from a stalactite.”

He flips through another few pages before closing the book. “That is all I can tell you, I'm afraid.”

He turns to regard Kibi. “I am not familiar with your kind. If you don't mind me asking... what manner of creature are you?”

“I'm a dwarf,” answers Kibi. “A free dwarf. Kibilhathur Bimson, at your service.”

“And where do you hail from, Mr. Bim-son?”

“From the Kalkas Peaks, and a town called Eggemoggin.”

“I am not familiar with that place. Where in Kivia is that?”

“We are from across the Uncrossable Sea?,” says Ernie.

“Ooooh!” says Seppet. “Everyone had the same crazy dream. I have heard that your land is very dangerous....and magnificent. And that there are great riches and terrible monsters.”

“It's very much like Kivia in that respect, says Aravis. “Places with riches, places with monsters, but mostly places with small towns like this one.”

“I'm afraid to say I find that disappointing,” says Seppet. “I was hoping for something more exotic. Not that I am ever likely to go there.”

For another hour the Company regales the healer of West Greydust with tales from Charagan. After the sun has been fully set for an hour, Seppet offers to put them up in his barn.

“Is there anything more we can do?” Dranko asks.

“Your friend donated 200 miracs to Quarrol, and you have delighted me with tales of your homeland. Also, you are extremely curious to look at. No, there is nothing more.”

The Company wakes early the next morning and takes a hike. It's a lovely summer day and the views from the switchback trail up Mt. Temun grow ever more breathtaking. Three hours up the path forks, with the main trail continuing up the side of the mountain toward the peak. A smaller track leads into a wide crack in the mountainside, where old and crude stairs lead into the shadows.

“We always take the dark, narrow path,” observes Grey Wolf.

“Let's see who else may have,” says Morningstar. She casts a thought capture at the first stair. She receives an old thought of someone who hoped that Dustwine would be as useful as the legends indicated.

“That's promising,” she says.

The narrow stair leads up and around, then descends again and opens into a extremely wide cave with a step-stone path leading down into it. With the sun now blocked, most of the party relies on a mass darkvision from Aravis to see.

“Wait!” says Ernie, as the others start to descend. “Can you sense that?”

“Sense what?” asks Dranko.

“Yondalla!” says Ernie excitedly. “Something down there is holy to Yondalla.”

As they descend further, Ernie's sense of the divine grows stronger. The way steepens, then opens at once into a truly enormous cavern. It extends both back and upward farther than they can see with their darkvision. A reddish fungus on the walls gives a very faint, ruddy glow, but not enough to see.

They can see, in the center of the cavern, an enormous stalactite poking downward from the darkness, ending about twenty feet above the rocky ground. It's made of a reddish crystal, or possibly stained ice. Directly below the stalactite is a stone basin, about three feet in diameter and raised several feet off the ground. A slow plinking drip of liquid falls from the tip of the stalactite into the basin. A worn pathway of stone slabs takes a meandering path to the basin's foot.

Ernie's feeling of a divine presence has grown even stronger. There is no sign of a horrible monster, so he starts down the path toward the basin and (presumably) the Dustwine.

Shklup! A cow-sized blob of greenish-brown jelly drops down from the darkness above and lands on him. A truly nauseating smell fills Ernie's nostrils, and if being borne to the ground by an oozy blob wasn't bad enough, the thing extends a glistening pseudopod and smacks him in the head.

A second blob falls onto Kibi, and Aravis barely leaps out of the way of a third.

Morningstar wrinkles her nose as the putrid smell fills more of the cave, but she has the presence of mind to bring down a flame strike upon two of the jellies. They are scorched and quivering but not entirely destroyed. Grey Wolf extends his hand and disintegrates the third one into dust.

Dranko manifests a spiritual weapon which takes a swipe at one of the blobs, and Flicker takes a stab with his dagger, but neither attack has much effect. Aravis has more success with a chain lightning, which causes one of the jelly blobs to explode all over Flicker.

“Augh!” Flicker yells. “Gross! Was that entirely necessary?”

Kibi casts Bigby's clenched fist. A fist of force appears, but its punch only glances off the nearest blob. The dwarf moves and quickens an earthbolt which causes a second of the things to burst. Ernie finishes off the third one with a flame strike of his own.

Dranko peers upward into dark. “Why do I think these aren't the real threat?”

Grey Wolf agrees. “They're probably the sweat from the actual threat.”

No sooner do these words escape his lips than he is proven correct. A gigantic blob the size of a barn falls from above and lands directly on Ernie, who is lost from sight. They can barely hear his muffled cries. The acrid, nauseating smell from the giant jelly is nearly overpowering and sets everyone to gagging.

Ernie is experiencing a bizarre dichotomy. On the one hand he is partially crushed and being digested by a hideous blob of goo. On the other hand, the feeling of holiness to Yondalla has suddenly grown much, much stronger. Could this horrible thing somehow be blessed by the Goddess? He shares this with his friends over the mind-link.

“Should I hold off attacking then?” thinks Morningstar.

“Give me a second!” Ernie answers. “And pray to Yondalla!”

Aravis casts a reverse gravity which sends the huge ooze bobbing upward ten feet from the ground. Ernie is not revealed beneath. Dranko stoops to peer at the underside of the monster and sees Ernie's foot sticking out from the blob. He sends his whip curling around the halfling's ankle and he pulls with all his might. As Ernie starts to slide out inch by inch, Dranko uses his necklace of bellows to knock the blob upward another few feet. Ernie pops out of the jelly, covered in a slimy film, then falls upward to rest against the bottom of the monster, Dranko's whip still around his leg.

Ernie casts bless, hoping to send a message to the blob that they're on the same team. He gets no feedback from the gesture.

“Fine,” Ernie thinks to the others. “Get it! I'll apologize to Yondalla later.”

In answer, the blob extends a huge pseudopod, grabs him, and stuffs him back into the center of its bulk. Dranko's arm is nearly yanked from its socket. Then it does likewise to both Dranko and Grey Wolf, who join Ernie in the mass of jelly. All three can feel digestive juices starting to dissolve their exposed skin.

Morningstar does as Ernie suggests. She blasts it with a firestorm, then follows up with a quickened flame strike. Whoomph! Those trapped inside feel chilled as Morningstar's cold flames engulf the monster. Kibi follows up with an empowered cone of cold, and bits of the blob are now frozen and flaking away.

But how to rescue their friends trapped inside? For that, Aravis casts maze, and as he hoped, his allies are left behind. They drop to the ground, sticky and foul.

Ernie senses that the holiness is gone.

Aravis assures everyone that a mindless creature stuck in a maze will not find its way out on its own, and they have ten minutes before it returns. They spend the time healing and cleaning themselves off.

Ernie, thoroughly confused, casts divination. He asks, “Is it contrary to Yondalla's will that we destroy this creature?”

The answer comes to him: Slay the foul beast, and become blessed.

“Now that's the kind of answer I like!” he says with satisfaction.

Morningstar places a prismatic sphere directly below the jelly's point of reappearance. Ernie adds a blade barrier at the last minute, for good measure. The huge jelly emerges from the maze and falls into and through both spells.

Basically, it explodes – and it's a good thing that the low-frequency bands of color take their effect first, so that the blob dies before it can be sent to another plane. In its death burst, several objects come flying out of its mass – bone, metal, some clinking coins. One of these objects is the source of the holiness Ernie has been sensing this entire time; he can see it glowing a soft green amidst the goop.

He wades over to it, and arrives in time to see a short sword shedding the last of the putrid ooze. It lies there, pristine, its hilt and handle carved into a cornucopia, its shining blade afire with runes. Blessings of Yondalla radiate outward from it.

“You're free now,” Ernie says to the sword. “You don't have to be inside that awful thing anymore.”

He picks it up. Energy courses down his arm and suffuses him, making his whole body glow green. The sword speaks into his head, a voice soft but powerful:

The time draws near that you will be needed in Appleseed. Tell High Priestess Sunblade that the Crimson Maw is no legend, that her people will drown in a sea of goblin spears if it is left agape. Together, we can close the Maw and end its threat for all time. But beware; Maglubiyet has his champion, just has Yondalla has you.

The voice fades, and a full knowledge comes into his head of the sword and its powers. He holds the legendary blade Tava's Righteous Fury*.

...to be continued...

* +5 short sword, keen, goblinbane. 1/day it casts a 15d6 flame strike that only damages evil creatures. 1/week it can summon the Astral Deva “Tava's Echo.” 1/week it can create a bubble of invisibility that foils both the sight and divinations of goblins.

 

[Everett]

Are there an infinite number of Cleaners in Void? Were the Cleaners that One Certain Step died to kill remarkable in any way, or were they just like all other Cleaners and only happened to be in a mortal dimension? Did his death and the battle beyond the black door affect them in any way? The idea of evil that is infinite and infinitely replenishing is a bit unsettling.

 

[Joshua Randall]

The Far Realm is outside time and space, so I'm not sure asking questions about quantity have any meaning in regards to it.

Hmm. That's rather Kantian, now that I think about it.

 

[SolitonMan]

Thanks Sagiro, this story hour is great! But I have to warn you, if you continue making frequent updates I'm going to start EXPECTING them!