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Story Hour
The Fall of Civilization
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<blockquote data-quote="the Jester" data-source="post: 4560825" data-attributes="member: 1210"><p>“I wonder what’s taking them so long?” sighs Nixie. </p><p></p><p>“Oi, they have to investigate!” the cook says. “They look all around, all around. Sneaky, very quiet! Take time.”</p><p></p><p>Suddenly a tremendous, loud grinding noise starts to rumble from within the cavern.</p><p></p><p>“Uh-oh,” says Heimall. He readies his glaive. “It sounds like trouble. We had best see what is going on in there. The others might need our help.”</p><p></p><p>The three of them tromp forward. They halt upon sighting the xvart bodies scattered before the barricades, with the immense pendulum boulder swinging to block easy entrance into the room beyond. </p><p></p><p>“We could climb over the barricades,” suggests Heimall. He sets to it immediately, while Nixie looks dubious.</p><p></p><p>“Climbing? I don’t know about that...”</p><p></p><p>Cook scrambles up and over. “Okay, you go through rock trap,” the dwarf answers with a grin. Nixie sighs and does her best to get over. She manages, though it is an awkward process for her. She grumbles as she rights herself within the room- and then gasps. </p><p></p><p>There are dead monsters everywhere- the xvarts, some chagmat, some spiders all curled up on the ground. And blood- blood all over. </p><p></p><p>Spiders and chagmat don’t bleed; they ooze ichor. Nixie’s blood runs cold at the implication.</p><p></p><p>“Look,” says Cook. “Drag marks.” <em>Bloody</em> drag marks, leading from the room. “Ohh, no! Our friends! We have to try to rescue!” </p><p></p><p>The marks lead out the more level of the two exits from the chamber. The party follows as quietly as Heimall’s armor will allow. The passage curves to the right and then splits in a Y. The party stops to listen, and Cook points in one direction. “I hear hissing noise,” he whispers.</p><p></p><p>”These guys are stupid,” Nixie grumbles. </p><p></p><p>Three chagmat hove into view, two of them already wounded. Heimall springs forward, jabbing his glaive into one of them, and the three chagmat draw weapons and begin an attack of their own! Fortunately for him, Heimall’s armor turns most of the initial thrusts and cuts, and he parries one with the shaft of his glaive.</p><p></p><p>Then Cook darts to the front and unleashes a blinding barrage of shuriken, catching two of the chagmat in the eyes and leaving them momentarily unable to see! Nixie takes advantage of the moment to curse the most badly wounded chagmat and hurl an <em>eldritch blast</em> at it. She misses, but a moment later, Heimall slashes into its neck and slays it. Nixie sniffs in disdain at the chagmat and curses the other pre-wounded one. The party presses their advantage; when Nixie blasts the cursed one with <em>witchfire</em> and it dies, she turns to a stream of mist and flows to a position that is further from the chagmat but with a better angle of attack. </p><p></p><p>The chagmat that remains is now wounded, but still standing. It turns to flee, but Heimall wounds it, and a terrific blow from the dwarven cook finishes it off. </p><p></p><p>Quickly, the party backtracks the chagmat. They halt as they enter a chamber with a number of webbing cocoons of various sizes and shapes in it, stuck to the floor, ceiling and walls.</p><p></p><p>“It’s a larder,” Nixie realizes, feeling slightly queasy.</p><p></p><p>“Let’s hope our friends are in some of these cocoons,” says Heimall. Cook is already starting to cut some of the webbing open. In a few moments, they have opened up all the cocoons, and though most of the inhabitants are dead corpses sucked dry of their vital fluids, the rest of the party is still alive!</p><p></p><p>Heimall grasps Torinn by the shoulders. “Torinn,” he says. “Torinn! You can’t go down like this, soldier! You have to get up! Get up and help your companions!”</p><p></p><p>Torinn groans. His eyelids flutter, and slowly they open. “What?” he croaks. His friends help him to his feet. “I thought we were dead,” he groans. “I can barely move. They injected us with some kind of paralytic poison.” He slowly starts to shake out his tingling limbs, and together, he and Heimall start working to revive the other wounded and paralyzed heroes. Meanwhile, Nixie (and the others, as they come around and are able to move and help) starts looting the corpses in the other cocoons. When all is said and done, the party has found 140 gold pieces, three packets of some kind of white, chalky substance and a pact blade. This goes to Nixie once the party has identified it- she is their only warlock, so there isn’t much debate.</p><p></p><p>Finally, once everyone feels ready to go on, the party assesses their options. The chagmat larder has another exit out of it, and the passage that led to it continues beyond the chamber as well. They decide to head that way first, since the other exit leads back in the direction that they came from- perhaps, they speculate, to the other branch of the Y. </p><p></p><p>Forward it is, lit by a sunrod, through the natural caverns that the chagmat have claimed as their own. After only about 20’, the passageway ends abruptly at a precipitous drop. A bridge of thick strands of webbing leads away across the chasm. It is narrow enough that passing by one another on the bridge would be tricky. The chasm is 30’ deep and about 50’ across, and at the bottom the adventurers can see the discarded husks of creatures sucked dry of their fluids by these spider-like monsters, along with a few pieces of trash and debris. At the far end of the cave, across the web bridge, is another passageway.</p><p> </p><p>“Well, what do you guys think?” asks Vann-La after a moment. </p><p></p><p>“This place looks like an ambush to me,” replies Nixie.</p><p></p><p>“Well, if it’s a trap, we’d better spring it,” says Torinn. </p><p></p><p>“Oi, I look it over for traps first,” Cook interrupts him, stepping in the way. “Hold on.” Torinn moves back, and Nixie moves up to help examine the bridge. It looks sturdy, doesn’t seem sticky, doesn’t seem trapped...</p><p></p><p>And then a hairy spider the size of a desk crawls up from underneath it. Before they have a chance to move, it sprays a blast of venom at Cook and Nixie. The two of them scream in pain, but Torinn has already invoked <em>divine aid</em> to help Nixie, and Cook, as a dwarf, is highly resistant to toxins. The party attacks, pressing the spider, but two chagmat warriors emerge from the passage on the far side of the bridge and begin to make their way forward. One of them stops long enough to make gross, wet, hissing noises back in the direction from which it came.</p><p></p><p>”Great,” grumbles Vann-La, “we’re gonna have more of these things coming soon!”</p><p></p><p>The party and the spider-folk clash, but when the spider itself manages to bite Vann-La, things get weird. Suddenly the Kree, with gritted teeth, begins to dance madly. “I can’t stop!” she yells. “Help!”</p><p></p><p>Kratos rushes forward and tries, but there doesn’t seem to be much he can do. Meanwhile, the cook duels one of the chagmat, while Heimall and Torinn deal with the other. In a few moments, Heimall’s glaive takes that one own, while the spider keeps trying to bite the dancing elf, whose erratic movements don’t much help her defend herself. Poison is burning in her body, ravaging her; “Help!” she cries again. </p><p></p><p>Cook finally finishes the second chagmat warrior with a sly flourish, but the spider scurries back to the far side of the bridge. And another chagmat emerges. </p><p></p><p>This one looks different, however; he is dressed in armor made from spider hide studded with stone and bone. A weird headdress in upon his head. A strange symbol that Torinn recognizes as being the unholy symbol of the spider god Chag-Ma, a bloodthirsty god of captivity, helplessness and horror is clutched in his hand. As he appears, he gestures and utters a hissing prayer to his dark god- and a mass of poisonous webbing explodes all over the heroes!</p><p></p><p>Vann-La struggles valiantly against the web as the spider dashes forward to bite her again. Meanwhile, her limbs keep jerking about uncontrollably. The spider scampers back out of reach again, just as she finally manages to throw off the poison dance! With a mighty effort, the Kree warrior heaves her way free of the web and charges forward. The chagmat priest turns and flees back into the tunnel, with the deadly spider following on its heels. </p><p></p><p>Our heroes break through the poison web and push further in, following Vann-La who is herself in hot pursuit of the chagmat. She catches up long enough to cleave on the two, but they continue to flee. Then Torinn and Nixie rush past Vann-La.</p><p></p><p>Deeper in the cave, the chagmat priest chitters gleefully. As Nixie and Torinn run after him, they get a look at the monstrous, spider-like idol before him. </p><p></p><p>Its eyes suddenly blaze with a sullen, sickly glow. And both Nixie and Torinn are blown back and off the edge of the cliff, into the chasm.</p><p></p><p><em><strong>Next Time:</strong></em> The final battle against the servants of Chag-Ma!</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="the Jester, post: 4560825, member: 1210"] “I wonder what’s taking them so long?” sighs Nixie. “Oi, they have to investigate!” the cook says. “They look all around, all around. Sneaky, very quiet! Take time.” Suddenly a tremendous, loud grinding noise starts to rumble from within the cavern. “Uh-oh,” says Heimall. He readies his glaive. “It sounds like trouble. We had best see what is going on in there. The others might need our help.” The three of them tromp forward. They halt upon sighting the xvart bodies scattered before the barricades, with the immense pendulum boulder swinging to block easy entrance into the room beyond. “We could climb over the barricades,” suggests Heimall. He sets to it immediately, while Nixie looks dubious. “Climbing? I don’t know about that...” Cook scrambles up and over. “Okay, you go through rock trap,” the dwarf answers with a grin. Nixie sighs and does her best to get over. She manages, though it is an awkward process for her. She grumbles as she rights herself within the room- and then gasps. There are dead monsters everywhere- the xvarts, some chagmat, some spiders all curled up on the ground. And blood- blood all over. Spiders and chagmat don’t bleed; they ooze ichor. Nixie’s blood runs cold at the implication. “Look,” says Cook. “Drag marks.” [i]Bloody[/i] drag marks, leading from the room. “Ohh, no! Our friends! We have to try to rescue!” The marks lead out the more level of the two exits from the chamber. The party follows as quietly as Heimall’s armor will allow. The passage curves to the right and then splits in a Y. The party stops to listen, and Cook points in one direction. “I hear hissing noise,” he whispers. ”These guys are stupid,” Nixie grumbles. Three chagmat hove into view, two of them already wounded. Heimall springs forward, jabbing his glaive into one of them, and the three chagmat draw weapons and begin an attack of their own! Fortunately for him, Heimall’s armor turns most of the initial thrusts and cuts, and he parries one with the shaft of his glaive. Then Cook darts to the front and unleashes a blinding barrage of shuriken, catching two of the chagmat in the eyes and leaving them momentarily unable to see! Nixie takes advantage of the moment to curse the most badly wounded chagmat and hurl an [i]eldritch blast[/i] at it. She misses, but a moment later, Heimall slashes into its neck and slays it. Nixie sniffs in disdain at the chagmat and curses the other pre-wounded one. The party presses their advantage; when Nixie blasts the cursed one with [i]witchfire[/i] and it dies, she turns to a stream of mist and flows to a position that is further from the chagmat but with a better angle of attack. The chagmat that remains is now wounded, but still standing. It turns to flee, but Heimall wounds it, and a terrific blow from the dwarven cook finishes it off. Quickly, the party backtracks the chagmat. They halt as they enter a chamber with a number of webbing cocoons of various sizes and shapes in it, stuck to the floor, ceiling and walls. “It’s a larder,” Nixie realizes, feeling slightly queasy. “Let’s hope our friends are in some of these cocoons,” says Heimall. Cook is already starting to cut some of the webbing open. In a few moments, they have opened up all the cocoons, and though most of the inhabitants are dead corpses sucked dry of their vital fluids, the rest of the party is still alive! Heimall grasps Torinn by the shoulders. “Torinn,” he says. “Torinn! You can’t go down like this, soldier! You have to get up! Get up and help your companions!” Torinn groans. His eyelids flutter, and slowly they open. “What?” he croaks. His friends help him to his feet. “I thought we were dead,” he groans. “I can barely move. They injected us with some kind of paralytic poison.” He slowly starts to shake out his tingling limbs, and together, he and Heimall start working to revive the other wounded and paralyzed heroes. Meanwhile, Nixie (and the others, as they come around and are able to move and help) starts looting the corpses in the other cocoons. When all is said and done, the party has found 140 gold pieces, three packets of some kind of white, chalky substance and a pact blade. This goes to Nixie once the party has identified it- she is their only warlock, so there isn’t much debate. Finally, once everyone feels ready to go on, the party assesses their options. The chagmat larder has another exit out of it, and the passage that led to it continues beyond the chamber as well. They decide to head that way first, since the other exit leads back in the direction that they came from- perhaps, they speculate, to the other branch of the Y. Forward it is, lit by a sunrod, through the natural caverns that the chagmat have claimed as their own. After only about 20’, the passageway ends abruptly at a precipitous drop. A bridge of thick strands of webbing leads away across the chasm. It is narrow enough that passing by one another on the bridge would be tricky. The chasm is 30’ deep and about 50’ across, and at the bottom the adventurers can see the discarded husks of creatures sucked dry of their fluids by these spider-like monsters, along with a few pieces of trash and debris. At the far end of the cave, across the web bridge, is another passageway. “Well, what do you guys think?” asks Vann-La after a moment. “This place looks like an ambush to me,” replies Nixie. “Well, if it’s a trap, we’d better spring it,” says Torinn. “Oi, I look it over for traps first,” Cook interrupts him, stepping in the way. “Hold on.” Torinn moves back, and Nixie moves up to help examine the bridge. It looks sturdy, doesn’t seem sticky, doesn’t seem trapped... And then a hairy spider the size of a desk crawls up from underneath it. Before they have a chance to move, it sprays a blast of venom at Cook and Nixie. The two of them scream in pain, but Torinn has already invoked [i]divine aid[/i] to help Nixie, and Cook, as a dwarf, is highly resistant to toxins. The party attacks, pressing the spider, but two chagmat warriors emerge from the passage on the far side of the bridge and begin to make their way forward. One of them stops long enough to make gross, wet, hissing noises back in the direction from which it came. ”Great,” grumbles Vann-La, “we’re gonna have more of these things coming soon!” The party and the spider-folk clash, but when the spider itself manages to bite Vann-La, things get weird. Suddenly the Kree, with gritted teeth, begins to dance madly. “I can’t stop!” she yells. “Help!” Kratos rushes forward and tries, but there doesn’t seem to be much he can do. Meanwhile, the cook duels one of the chagmat, while Heimall and Torinn deal with the other. In a few moments, Heimall’s glaive takes that one own, while the spider keeps trying to bite the dancing elf, whose erratic movements don’t much help her defend herself. Poison is burning in her body, ravaging her; “Help!” she cries again. Cook finally finishes the second chagmat warrior with a sly flourish, but the spider scurries back to the far side of the bridge. And another chagmat emerges. This one looks different, however; he is dressed in armor made from spider hide studded with stone and bone. A weird headdress in upon his head. A strange symbol that Torinn recognizes as being the unholy symbol of the spider god Chag-Ma, a bloodthirsty god of captivity, helplessness and horror is clutched in his hand. As he appears, he gestures and utters a hissing prayer to his dark god- and a mass of poisonous webbing explodes all over the heroes! Vann-La struggles valiantly against the web as the spider dashes forward to bite her again. Meanwhile, her limbs keep jerking about uncontrollably. The spider scampers back out of reach again, just as she finally manages to throw off the poison dance! With a mighty effort, the Kree warrior heaves her way free of the web and charges forward. The chagmat priest turns and flees back into the tunnel, with the deadly spider following on its heels. Our heroes break through the poison web and push further in, following Vann-La who is herself in hot pursuit of the chagmat. She catches up long enough to cleave on the two, but they continue to flee. Then Torinn and Nixie rush past Vann-La. Deeper in the cave, the chagmat priest chitters gleefully. As Nixie and Torinn run after him, they get a look at the monstrous, spider-like idol before him. Its eyes suddenly blaze with a sullen, sickly glow. And both Nixie and Torinn are blown back and off the edge of the cliff, into the chasm. [i][b]Next Time:[/b][/i][b][/b] The final battle against the servants of Chag-Ma! [/QUOTE]
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