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Tales of the Legacy - Concluded
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<blockquote data-quote="Delemental" data-source="post: 2676590" data-attributes="member: 5203"><p>They arrived in the district they sought, which was a middle-class neighborhood close to the ‘medicinal’ district. It consisted of a large open-air market, surrounded by rows of townhouses. The party split into groups of two and spread out to try and find rumors of Neville’s whereabouts. With the effort coordinated by Lanara, they were able to pinpoint the townhouse within a couple of hours. Part of their success was due to Maddie contacting some of the prostitutes in the area and spreading the word that she was looking for a partner who was “big, pale, and rough-looking”.</p><p></p><p> “A word of caution,” Tolly said on hearing of Maddie’s strategy. “If Erito is as thorough in her reshaping as Ardara is on her forge, there may be ramifications should you actually engage in the activities you have been advertising.”</p><p></p><p> “First of all, I have no intention of sleeping with The Brute,” Maddie said. “Other than that, Tolly, you’re being far too obtuse for me to understand what you’re getting at.”</p><p></p><p> “Don’t forget that you can get pregnant now,” he said tersely.</p><p></p><p> “Oh,” she replied. “Of course, that’s true.”</p><p></p><p> The party arrived outside the gates of Neville’s home. Lanara had cast a <em>change self</em> spell on herself, trying to look more nondescript. She reasoned that if rumors of her questions about Neville had gotten back to him, she best not look like “a pink-haired cansin with a purple leather outfit.”</p><p></p><p> The house was a long, narrow two-story building, which at first glance looked like every other house on the block. After fifteen minutes of observation, the party noted that there was no activity of servants either inside or outside, unlike the neighboring houses. A strong odor emanated from the house, a smell that seemed to bother Rupert greatly. Kyle sniffed, and wrinkled his nose.</p><p></p><p> “If we can smell it from out here, then it’s going to be really foul inside,” he said.</p><p></p><p> “Perhaps one of us should retrieve the necklace I gave to Arrie and wear it,” suggested Tolly. “There is enough air inside the portable hole to last several minutes anyway.”</p><p></p><p> Before anyone could respond, they heard Osborn sour sarcastically “Hey, that’s fun!”</p><p></p><p> “What?” Autumn asked.</p><p></p><p> “There was a real ugly orc-touched at that window, and he was looking down at us,” Osborn said, pointing.</p><p></p><p> “Great,” Lanara said.</p><p></p><p> “Looks like we’re expected,” Kyle said.</p><p></p><p> “Then we should let ourselves in,” Togusa said. He and Autumn began to head for the house, followed closely by the others, who scrambled to make what preparations they could in the short walk to the front door.</p><p></p><p> “Do we bother knocking?” Lanara asked.</p><p></p><p> “Sure,” said Autumn, who proceeded to kick the door down. Inside the townhouse, they saw two sets of stairs going up to the second floor, one to each side, and a long hallway down the middle leading to various rooms. Autumn immediately went to the stairs on the right, followed by Tolly. Togusa and Maddie went to the left, and the others spread out in the entryway.</p><p></p><p> There was a commotion upstairs, and the sound of people running. At the top of the stairs, a group of five humans with glassy-eyed expressions came charging down toward Autumn, brandishing small sticks. They shoved and stumbled into each other heading down the narrow stairs. Autumn paused, and then balled her hands into fists and plowed into them, hoping to knock them aside. But their combined weight pressing forward was too much, and Autumn was knocked back sprawling on the stairs. The drug-zombie in the lead flailed at her wildly with his stick, but it clanged uselessly off her plate armor.</p><p></p><p> Togusa and Maddie prepared to charge up their stairs and go around the landing to help Autumn and Tolly. But Maddie’s sharp elven ears heard more shouting from a room upstairs, toward the back of the house.</p><p></p><p> “There are people heading out the back of the house!” she shouted.</p><p></p><p> Kyle immediately turned around and cast a <em>fly</em> spell on himself, heading out the front door and flying up and over the house toward the back. Osborn, mounted atop Rupert, began to run down the central hall toward the back as well. Lanara spent a moment to activate one of the many magical instruments she carried, and soon she was surrounded by several identical images of herself that vanished and reappeared at random.</p><p></p><p> Togusa decided on a more direct route to the back. Running to the top of the stairs, he activated his speed-enhancing boots and charged full bore down the long corridor on the second floor, heading for a tall, narrow window on the back wall. He hurled himself through the window, sending wood and glass flying, and landed in the back yard on his feet. Maddie, right on his heels, came out the window right behind him, though her landing was less graceful.</p><p></p><p> Only Autumn, Tolly, and Lanara were left to deal with the crazed addicts on the stairs. As Autumn struggled to her feet, Tolly invoked Ardara’s power, and grew to enormous size. Reaching over Autumn, he was able to keep Neville’s minions at bay with his long arms, giving the sentinel time to regain her feet. But one of the men managed to get his ‘weapon’ through her armor. Though the wound was superficial, it was enough; the man vanished instantly, banished for violating Paccë’s peace. Tolly and Autumn looked at each other. “Can you handle this?” Tolly asked.</p><p></p><p> “Oh yes,” she replied. With that, Tolly launched himself up the stairs, past Autumn, and barreled through the pack of drug-zombies up the stairs. For her part, Autumn lowered her arms and stood still, beckoning her enemies to strike her. Autumn smiled as the men came at her, too crazed from the drugs in their systems to realize what she was doing. The makeshift weapons they had were too flimsy to cause any significant damage, and within a few seconds Autumn was the only one left on the stairs. As she heard Tolly charging down the upstairs hallway, she looked back at Lanara. “Go help the others,” she said to the bard. “I’m searching the house.”</p><p></p><p> Kyle flew into the back yard as Togusa helped Maddie to her feet, and Osborn was emerging from out the back door. In the far corner of the yard was a carriage house, its doors thrown open. Inside Kyle could hear movement. He flew down to the doors quickly, hoping to catch whoever was inside. Instead, he was thrown back as a large, furry animal launched itself at him. The creature looked like a dire weasel, but protruding from the side of its head were two large, beetle-like mandibles. The creature sank its teeth into Kyle’s thigh, locking itself in with the mandibles. Kyle screamed in pain as blood began to flow freely down his leg. A second mutated weasel leapt out of the carriage house and launched itself at Maddie. Togusa ran forward and stabbed at the weasel creature attached to Kyle, wounding it but unable to finish it off.</p><p></p><p> Osborn wheeled Rupert around, hoping to get in close to Maddie to help her out. But then he heard a strange noise behind him, a sort of wet, squelching slap against wood. He turned to see a set of cellar doors burst open, and a mass of… something burst out. It looked like nothing less than the bloody intestines of hundreds of creatures, wriggling and swarming out of the ground in a putrescent mass.</p><p></p><p> “Oh, great,” Osborn said, as he pulled Rupert around and moved to the far side of the yard. Daggers would be of little use against something like that. But the disgusting mass moved surprisingly swiftly, and enveloped Osborn and Maddie. Nearly overwhelmed by the horrific odor of decaying flesh and fluids, they were unable to ward off the sucking, grasping tubes that struck at them like dozens of enormous leeches.</p><p></p><p> Kyle pulled out a wand, and launched <em>magic missiles</em> at the weasel attacking him, killing it. Unfortunately, the mandibles did not release, and the animal was still firmly attached to his leg. He looked around, and saw the grotesque mass envelop Osborn and Maddie. At the same time, he saw a giant-sized Tolly burst out of another window on the second floor and land solidly on the ground. Then he heard a few screams and commotion from the street behind him, on the other side of the wall surrounding the back yard. Kyle quickly rose up into the air, trailing the dead creature. Clearing the wall, he saw people scattering in the street behind him as a lone cloaked figure rode out of the back of the carriage house on a strange horse. The horse had jagged, sharp teeth, and six legs, and a pair of extra limbs tucked to its side that ended in long claws. Wincing in disgust, Kyle pointed at the fleeing rider and intoned a spell. Instantly, a bank of fog rose up all around the horse and rider. Though the fog obscured them from sight, Kyle knew the vapors were so thick that the horse-thing would be slowed to a crawl. <em>That’ll buy us some time</em>, he thought, then wheeled in midair to observe the scene below.</p><p></p><p> Togusa had gone to Maddie’s aid, killing the second mandibled weasel that had dogged her. The favored soul just managed to get off a <em>recitation </em> spell when the gut-swarm enveloped her again, and she was overcome by the putrid stench. As she was about to be buried in a mass of intestines, Tolly ran up and picked the elven woman up, carrying her to the shelter of the carriage house.</p><p></p><p> “Thank you, Tolly,” she said, quickly recovering, “you can put me down now.”</p><p></p><p> As he set Maddie down, Togusa went running past them into the alley. He tried to plow his way through the <em>solid fog</em>, but backed out when he realized it would be impossible to get through it fast enough. The cloud filled the entire street, and people all around were shouting at the sudden disruption in traffic. Inside the cloud, Togusa could hear the horse-creature screaming in anger, and the terrified, pain stricken cries of a pedestrian that had been too close and stumbled into the horse’s grasp. No other noises came out of the cloud. Running back inside, Togusa went around and began trying to scale the outer wall of Neville’s townhouse, hoping to get high enough that he could jump into the center of the fog and catch the rider unaware.</p><p></p><p> Back in the yard, Osborn and Rupert were the only ones left in the open to face the gut-swarm. It surged forward and tried to envelop the hin, but he just as quickly moved away. Suddenly the mass seemed to lurch and recoil, and Osborn felt the concussion wave of a <em>sound burst</em> spell going off. Looking around, he saw Lanara standing in the doorway of the house, pointing a wand at the mass.</p><p></p><p> The putrescent swarm began to lurch toward Lanara, and Osborn wheeled around, determined to keep the creature away from the bard even though he knew he couldn’t defeat it. But then Kyle’s voice rang out above him.</p><p></p><p> “Back away from the pile of guts!”</p><p></p><p> Osborn pulled up on Rupert’s reins, stopping him just as a ball of flames landed in the yard in the midst of the instestinal mass. The air was filled with the smell of burning flesh and boiling intestinal fluids. A second <em>fireball </em> came down, followed by a third. Lanara also blasted the swarm with few more <em>sound bursts</em>, and within moments nothing remained but wet, bloody ash.</p><p></p><p> “Come on!” Kyle said. “I’ve got The Brute pinned down!” He flew over the solid fog and waited for the others to surround the bank. A few minutes ticked by as they waited for the vapors to disperse. When they finally lifted, they saw the horse-creature standing there, the shredded remains of the bystander at its hooves. The cloaked rider was nowhere to be seen.</p><p></p><p> The party dispatched the mutated horse quickly. As it fell over, Kyle landed and walked up to the carcass, still dragging the dire weasel behind him, and kicked at the horse, blood splashing onto his boots.</p><p></p><p> “Dammit!” he swore. “Damn you! Son of a bitch!”</p><p></p><p> Maddie ran up and pulled Kyle back by the shoulders. “Kyle, relax, its all right.”</p><p></p><p> “I had him…” Kyle said angrily. “I thought I had him for sure.”</p><p></p><p> “What do you think happened?” Tolly asked him.</p><p></p><p> “He could have <em>teleported</em>, or <em>dimension doored</em>,” Kyle said, “or turned invisible and walked right past us. I assumed that The Brute was nothing but a meat-head; I didn’t stop to think he might be clever enough to escape.”</p><p></p><p> “Let’s search the house,” Maddie suggested. “Maybe we’ll find something in there.”</p><p></p><p> By the time they walked into Neville’s townhouse, most of the bookshelves and desks in the various rooms were bare. Autumn had opened her <em>portable hole</em> on the floor of the upstairs hallway, and was busy filling it with every scrap of paper she could find.</p><p></p><p> “The cure may be in here,” was all she said.</p><p></p><p> A further search turned up a hidden lab in the basement. Going in, they found an elaborate alchemists lab, stocked with supplies. Rows of shelves held finished products, everything from highly addictive street drugs to vile poisons. In a separate room, they found a wall of cages containing animals in various stages of transformation. These were quickly dispatched, but more problematic was the next room, which held similar cages filled with people in similar states of experimentation. Unable to give them a merciful death due to Miracle’s magical effect, the party decided they would inform the church of Paccë of Neville’s lab immediately and let the priests of the god of peace deal with the matter.</p><p></p><p> Unfortunately, nothing in the house revealed the whereabouts of Neville or The Brute. The party gathered in the back yard when the last book had been packed away.</p><p></p><p> “Now what?” Lanara asked.</p><p></p><p> “I will tell you,” Togusa said. “I will return to the church of Tor to retrieve my battle armor and my horse. In fifteen minutes I will return here, and begin tracking The Brute to whatever hiding place he has found. If you wish to find Neville, and save Ariadne, I suggest you be here then.” With that he turned and walked away, heading down the street back toward the church.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Delemental, post: 2676590, member: 5203"] They arrived in the district they sought, which was a middle-class neighborhood close to the ‘medicinal’ district. It consisted of a large open-air market, surrounded by rows of townhouses. The party split into groups of two and spread out to try and find rumors of Neville’s whereabouts. With the effort coordinated by Lanara, they were able to pinpoint the townhouse within a couple of hours. Part of their success was due to Maddie contacting some of the prostitutes in the area and spreading the word that she was looking for a partner who was “big, pale, and rough-looking”. “A word of caution,” Tolly said on hearing of Maddie’s strategy. “If Erito is as thorough in her reshaping as Ardara is on her forge, there may be ramifications should you actually engage in the activities you have been advertising.” “First of all, I have no intention of sleeping with The Brute,” Maddie said. “Other than that, Tolly, you’re being far too obtuse for me to understand what you’re getting at.” “Don’t forget that you can get pregnant now,” he said tersely. “Oh,” she replied. “Of course, that’s true.” The party arrived outside the gates of Neville’s home. Lanara had cast a [I]change self[/I] spell on herself, trying to look more nondescript. She reasoned that if rumors of her questions about Neville had gotten back to him, she best not look like “a pink-haired cansin with a purple leather outfit.” The house was a long, narrow two-story building, which at first glance looked like every other house on the block. After fifteen minutes of observation, the party noted that there was no activity of servants either inside or outside, unlike the neighboring houses. A strong odor emanated from the house, a smell that seemed to bother Rupert greatly. Kyle sniffed, and wrinkled his nose. “If we can smell it from out here, then it’s going to be really foul inside,” he said. “Perhaps one of us should retrieve the necklace I gave to Arrie and wear it,” suggested Tolly. “There is enough air inside the portable hole to last several minutes anyway.” Before anyone could respond, they heard Osborn sour sarcastically “Hey, that’s fun!” “What?” Autumn asked. “There was a real ugly orc-touched at that window, and he was looking down at us,” Osborn said, pointing. “Great,” Lanara said. “Looks like we’re expected,” Kyle said. “Then we should let ourselves in,” Togusa said. He and Autumn began to head for the house, followed closely by the others, who scrambled to make what preparations they could in the short walk to the front door. “Do we bother knocking?” Lanara asked. “Sure,” said Autumn, who proceeded to kick the door down. Inside the townhouse, they saw two sets of stairs going up to the second floor, one to each side, and a long hallway down the middle leading to various rooms. Autumn immediately went to the stairs on the right, followed by Tolly. Togusa and Maddie went to the left, and the others spread out in the entryway. There was a commotion upstairs, and the sound of people running. At the top of the stairs, a group of five humans with glassy-eyed expressions came charging down toward Autumn, brandishing small sticks. They shoved and stumbled into each other heading down the narrow stairs. Autumn paused, and then balled her hands into fists and plowed into them, hoping to knock them aside. But their combined weight pressing forward was too much, and Autumn was knocked back sprawling on the stairs. The drug-zombie in the lead flailed at her wildly with his stick, but it clanged uselessly off her plate armor. Togusa and Maddie prepared to charge up their stairs and go around the landing to help Autumn and Tolly. But Maddie’s sharp elven ears heard more shouting from a room upstairs, toward the back of the house. “There are people heading out the back of the house!” she shouted. Kyle immediately turned around and cast a [I]fly[/I] spell on himself, heading out the front door and flying up and over the house toward the back. Osborn, mounted atop Rupert, began to run down the central hall toward the back as well. Lanara spent a moment to activate one of the many magical instruments she carried, and soon she was surrounded by several identical images of herself that vanished and reappeared at random. Togusa decided on a more direct route to the back. Running to the top of the stairs, he activated his speed-enhancing boots and charged full bore down the long corridor on the second floor, heading for a tall, narrow window on the back wall. He hurled himself through the window, sending wood and glass flying, and landed in the back yard on his feet. Maddie, right on his heels, came out the window right behind him, though her landing was less graceful. Only Autumn, Tolly, and Lanara were left to deal with the crazed addicts on the stairs. As Autumn struggled to her feet, Tolly invoked Ardara’s power, and grew to enormous size. Reaching over Autumn, he was able to keep Neville’s minions at bay with his long arms, giving the sentinel time to regain her feet. But one of the men managed to get his ‘weapon’ through her armor. Though the wound was superficial, it was enough; the man vanished instantly, banished for violating Paccë’s peace. Tolly and Autumn looked at each other. “Can you handle this?” Tolly asked. “Oh yes,” she replied. With that, Tolly launched himself up the stairs, past Autumn, and barreled through the pack of drug-zombies up the stairs. For her part, Autumn lowered her arms and stood still, beckoning her enemies to strike her. Autumn smiled as the men came at her, too crazed from the drugs in their systems to realize what she was doing. The makeshift weapons they had were too flimsy to cause any significant damage, and within a few seconds Autumn was the only one left on the stairs. As she heard Tolly charging down the upstairs hallway, she looked back at Lanara. “Go help the others,” she said to the bard. “I’m searching the house.” Kyle flew into the back yard as Togusa helped Maddie to her feet, and Osborn was emerging from out the back door. In the far corner of the yard was a carriage house, its doors thrown open. Inside Kyle could hear movement. He flew down to the doors quickly, hoping to catch whoever was inside. Instead, he was thrown back as a large, furry animal launched itself at him. The creature looked like a dire weasel, but protruding from the side of its head were two large, beetle-like mandibles. The creature sank its teeth into Kyle’s thigh, locking itself in with the mandibles. Kyle screamed in pain as blood began to flow freely down his leg. A second mutated weasel leapt out of the carriage house and launched itself at Maddie. Togusa ran forward and stabbed at the weasel creature attached to Kyle, wounding it but unable to finish it off. Osborn wheeled Rupert around, hoping to get in close to Maddie to help her out. But then he heard a strange noise behind him, a sort of wet, squelching slap against wood. He turned to see a set of cellar doors burst open, and a mass of… something burst out. It looked like nothing less than the bloody intestines of hundreds of creatures, wriggling and swarming out of the ground in a putrescent mass. “Oh, great,” Osborn said, as he pulled Rupert around and moved to the far side of the yard. Daggers would be of little use against something like that. But the disgusting mass moved surprisingly swiftly, and enveloped Osborn and Maddie. Nearly overwhelmed by the horrific odor of decaying flesh and fluids, they were unable to ward off the sucking, grasping tubes that struck at them like dozens of enormous leeches. Kyle pulled out a wand, and launched [I]magic missiles[/I] at the weasel attacking him, killing it. Unfortunately, the mandibles did not release, and the animal was still firmly attached to his leg. He looked around, and saw the grotesque mass envelop Osborn and Maddie. At the same time, he saw a giant-sized Tolly burst out of another window on the second floor and land solidly on the ground. Then he heard a few screams and commotion from the street behind him, on the other side of the wall surrounding the back yard. Kyle quickly rose up into the air, trailing the dead creature. Clearing the wall, he saw people scattering in the street behind him as a lone cloaked figure rode out of the back of the carriage house on a strange horse. The horse had jagged, sharp teeth, and six legs, and a pair of extra limbs tucked to its side that ended in long claws. Wincing in disgust, Kyle pointed at the fleeing rider and intoned a spell. Instantly, a bank of fog rose up all around the horse and rider. Though the fog obscured them from sight, Kyle knew the vapors were so thick that the horse-thing would be slowed to a crawl. [I]That’ll buy us some time[/I], he thought, then wheeled in midair to observe the scene below. Togusa had gone to Maddie’s aid, killing the second mandibled weasel that had dogged her. The favored soul just managed to get off a [I]recitation [/I] spell when the gut-swarm enveloped her again, and she was overcome by the putrid stench. As she was about to be buried in a mass of intestines, Tolly ran up and picked the elven woman up, carrying her to the shelter of the carriage house. “Thank you, Tolly,” she said, quickly recovering, “you can put me down now.” As he set Maddie down, Togusa went running past them into the alley. He tried to plow his way through the [I]solid fog[/I], but backed out when he realized it would be impossible to get through it fast enough. The cloud filled the entire street, and people all around were shouting at the sudden disruption in traffic. Inside the cloud, Togusa could hear the horse-creature screaming in anger, and the terrified, pain stricken cries of a pedestrian that had been too close and stumbled into the horse’s grasp. No other noises came out of the cloud. Running back inside, Togusa went around and began trying to scale the outer wall of Neville’s townhouse, hoping to get high enough that he could jump into the center of the fog and catch the rider unaware. Back in the yard, Osborn and Rupert were the only ones left in the open to face the gut-swarm. It surged forward and tried to envelop the hin, but he just as quickly moved away. Suddenly the mass seemed to lurch and recoil, and Osborn felt the concussion wave of a [I]sound burst[/I] spell going off. Looking around, he saw Lanara standing in the doorway of the house, pointing a wand at the mass. The putrescent swarm began to lurch toward Lanara, and Osborn wheeled around, determined to keep the creature away from the bard even though he knew he couldn’t defeat it. But then Kyle’s voice rang out above him. “Back away from the pile of guts!” Osborn pulled up on Rupert’s reins, stopping him just as a ball of flames landed in the yard in the midst of the instestinal mass. The air was filled with the smell of burning flesh and boiling intestinal fluids. A second [I]fireball [/I] came down, followed by a third. Lanara also blasted the swarm with few more [I]sound bursts[/I], and within moments nothing remained but wet, bloody ash. “Come on!” Kyle said. “I’ve got The Brute pinned down!” He flew over the solid fog and waited for the others to surround the bank. A few minutes ticked by as they waited for the vapors to disperse. When they finally lifted, they saw the horse-creature standing there, the shredded remains of the bystander at its hooves. The cloaked rider was nowhere to be seen. The party dispatched the mutated horse quickly. As it fell over, Kyle landed and walked up to the carcass, still dragging the dire weasel behind him, and kicked at the horse, blood splashing onto his boots. “Dammit!” he swore. “Damn you! Son of a bitch!” Maddie ran up and pulled Kyle back by the shoulders. “Kyle, relax, its all right.” “I had him…” Kyle said angrily. “I thought I had him for sure.” “What do you think happened?” Tolly asked him. “He could have [I]teleported[/I], or [I]dimension doored[/I],” Kyle said, “or turned invisible and walked right past us. I assumed that The Brute was nothing but a meat-head; I didn’t stop to think he might be clever enough to escape.” “Let’s search the house,” Maddie suggested. “Maybe we’ll find something in there.” By the time they walked into Neville’s townhouse, most of the bookshelves and desks in the various rooms were bare. Autumn had opened her [I]portable hole[/I] on the floor of the upstairs hallway, and was busy filling it with every scrap of paper she could find. “The cure may be in here,” was all she said. A further search turned up a hidden lab in the basement. Going in, they found an elaborate alchemists lab, stocked with supplies. Rows of shelves held finished products, everything from highly addictive street drugs to vile poisons. In a separate room, they found a wall of cages containing animals in various stages of transformation. These were quickly dispatched, but more problematic was the next room, which held similar cages filled with people in similar states of experimentation. Unable to give them a merciful death due to Miracle’s magical effect, the party decided they would inform the church of Paccë of Neville’s lab immediately and let the priests of the god of peace deal with the matter. Unfortunately, nothing in the house revealed the whereabouts of Neville or The Brute. The party gathered in the back yard when the last book had been packed away. “Now what?” Lanara asked. “I will tell you,” Togusa said. “I will return to the church of Tor to retrieve my battle armor and my horse. In fifteen minutes I will return here, and begin tracking The Brute to whatever hiding place he has found. If you wish to find Neville, and save Ariadne, I suggest you be here then.” With that he turned and walked away, heading down the street back toward the church. [/QUOTE]
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