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<blockquote data-quote="Cafu" data-source="post: 6457224" data-attributes="member: 6692807"><p>I opened my eyes to pain; not just pain from the blows which I had suffered, but something else. I was lying on a bramble bush! And there were a lot more of these all around me! Bushes and small trees with incredibly sharp thorns; not just any old thorns either, but huge dagger like things; or that’s what they felt like to me anyway as I shifted slightly. They were well and truly embedded, so much so that I felt blood leaking out of my side onto the cavern floor. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw John with a wand in his hand, making motions with his hands to stay still. I did and the pain eased slightly. I was fairly certain that this bramble field had not been present in the cave before I went unconscious so it must have been some sort of odd magic at work; probably druidic; they were into brambles and plants and things.</p><p></p><p>I could still hear the noise of battle around me but due to the brambles, I couldn’t really look around. Every time I moved was like another set of daggers stabbing me…..well everywhere. Just then, I heard a spell from nearby, a spell of defence and protection; and that was Felix’s voice. There were more sounds of battle but again, frustratingly, I could not see what was going on. Finally, John managed to tap me with a wand again and I felt a little stronger. So, I decided that it was time to get out of here. </p><p></p><p>I ignored the pain; in comparison to what Agony had done to us in the oubliette of Koren’s Obelisk, this was child’s play. Now there was an expert on pain and he had taught us much, in his strange way; his legacy was our ability to ignore pain in certain circumstances and concentrate on what was important, such as getting out of here. I managed to do so with one of my magical transport spells and made sure I finished behind the large column, out of sight of almost everyone, especially the enemy. </p><p></p><p>Behind the column, I managed to put a few spells on myself, including a spell which made me unseen as well as a defensive one which helped against weapons; I also drank a couple of my healing potions, which at least staunched the worst of the blood loss. Then, cautiously, I stuck out my head; I was still badly hurt but at least I felt a little safer. I saw that the area of brambles had moved slightly and was now surrounding Drudge, John, Victor and Longhelim. I could not see Felix anywhere. </p><p></p><p>More importantly, I did not see the creature that seemed to be made out of shadows. Hopefully, it had perished. However, the one that looked like a tree and the one that resembled a swarm of beetles were still there. My apologies for this quite bizarre description but that is literally what they looked like; this place was nonsensical but we were actually in a plane created by a golden dragon’s dream. I am not sure how else to explain it. I am also not sure what these dreams or nightmares were supposed to be. </p><p></p><p>Be that as it may, these creatures obviously decided that it was time for a frontal assault. The fire giant was also there and in the darkness outside, there were also to further patches of shadows, the wraiths, which curiously were just floating outside, watching. The creatures all advanced through the wall of knives which Felix had laid across the opening. The giant did the same thing. She seemed unaffected but the other things had certainly felt the effects. I could see them staggering slightly as they pushed through.</p><p></p><p>Felix was still out of sight. </p><p></p><p>Suddenly, I saw the priest magically appearing behind the warriors and a moment later, he touched Victor, who immediately began moving through the brambles as if they weren’t there. The warrior confronted one of the advancing creatures while the other one and the giant went around the other side of the column. I moved to keep them in sight, flying around the column. As I turned the corner, I saw the fire giant moving around towards me, obviously aware of my presence in spite of my magical spell. Unfortunately, this prevented me from casting my spells as I was very aware that trying to confront a fire giant in direct physical combat was a very bad idea; and I had a suspicion that this was certainly not just a normal fire giant. So, I stepped back a little and cast a spell at it.</p><p></p><p>Since we were so close, I decided to use one of my more powerful spells; despite its natural defences against magic, I was able to affect it; it disappeared, locked briefly in a pocket dimension. Rapidly I moved back and cast another spell; the length of the giant’s confinement was a little unpredictable although it was usually at least several moments; it was fortunate that I did as well since she reappeared almost immediately. She probably had some sort of magical aid; that spell was normally highly effective. </p><p></p><p>Thankfully, I had managed to scurry back to Felix by that point: </p><p></p><p>“Felix, a little help here if you can; oh, and I put a magical wall between us and the fire giant. If she wants to come and get us, she’ll have to do it from this direction.”</p><p></p><p>As the priest was preparing a healing spell, he also whispered: </p><p></p><p>“That fire giant is also some sort of undead; probably a vampire; the cloud and the compulsion were a give away.”</p><p></p><p>Quickly I asked: </p><p></p><p>“Compulsion? What compulsion?”</p><p></p><p>John replied at this point, as Felix was casting he spell: </p><p></p><p>“You were unconscious; you didn’t see. Longhelim nearly killed Felix!”</p><p></p><p>I looked and I could see that the priest had quite dent in his armour. </p><p></p><p>As Felix finished his magic, we were looking carefully at the gap between the rock column and the wall; Felix managed to heal me. </p><p></p><p>Nothing happened; the giant had did not re-appear. So Felix, John and I took the opportunity to cast several spells; when nothing happened still, the warriors moved forward to beard the vampire. Victor moved in one direction around the large stone column while Longhelim moved in the other; I had to take down my magical wall but the giant was there, waiting for us. </p><p></p><p>As soon as Victor poked his head around a corner, a flying boulder nearly took it off. Felix stepped up and cast a spell; a beam of intense light hit the giant in the chest, making her recoil. This gave the warrior a chance to get near her; Drudge let loose his usual barrage but unfortunately, his arrows individually did not seem to be as effective as usual. She was a truly fearful opponent; as soon as she was able, she struck Longhelim with her fists. Not only was that truly painful, but every time she struck, it seemed to take something out of the paladin; he would stagger and his blows seemed to lack their usual force and venom.</p><p></p><p>Victor then managed to get near and slashed into her with his usual grace and power; whirling around, for the first time, we saw her open her mouth and flash her long fangs in a grimace; this time, she struck at Victor with the same deadly results. Drudge was firing silver tipped arrows at her but it seemed odd as for some reason she led a very charmed life against them; somehow, she was dodging them with uncanny speed and agility. </p><p></p><p>The situation was getting quite frustrating; the strikes of the warriors were getting weaker and weaker and she, to the contrary, seemed to be recovering every time she struck; then Felix stepped forward again and this time an intense beam of light, almost a sun beam struck the vampire; she wailed as smoke rose from the place where it touched her; it was not a direct hit as she managed to dodge that but it was obviously still extremely painful. </p><p></p><p>Now, in desperation, she turned to the paladin and struck him again; Felix continued with his beams and the result was the same. Next, the giant struck Victor, who finally fell over. I was also shooting my force missiles at her but they were fairly minor in comparison to Felix’s beams. He shot her again and this time it was the last straw as with another wail which rose into a shriek, she collapsed. </p><p></p><p>The priest looked pale as he muttered: </p><p></p><p>“Thank the gods for that! That was the last one of those I had!”</p><p></p><p>Longhelim in the meantime was rapidly searching through is back pack until he found a wooden tent peg: </p><p></p><p>“Felix, will this be enough?”</p><p></p><p>The priest ran forward and hurriedly he made some hand gestures over the peg:</p><p></p><p>“Blessed be in the name of the Traveller! Blessed be in the name of Farlanghn! Let this holy wood stop the beast from awakening!”</p><p></p><p>As soon as he said that, he then took out a vial and poured a little water over the wood; Longhelim then rammed the wood into the chest of the giant, where it began to smoke and the injury it created immediately began to get larger and larger until it destroyed most of her torso. </p><p></p><p>Felix then shouted: </p><p></p><p>“Now chop her head off!”</p><p></p><p>Longhelim obliged. </p><p></p><p>As soon as he did that, the body crumbled into dust in a most satisfying way, leaving only some quite valuable equipment behind. Next, John quickly grasped a wand and tapped both Victor and Longhelim. I assumed that the wand would repair the damage done to their spirit and indeed, they quickly shed the ghastly pallor that they suffered as they fought the vampire. </p><p></p><p>While John was helping the warriors, I was looking with interest at the pile of equipment she had left behind. I cast a small divination cantrip and called out: </p><p></p><p>“Well, whoever she was, she was certainly well equipped; look at this, armour, full plate armour in fact and mithril at that; a ring, a vest, a cloak, all magical……I wonder what they do?”</p><p></p><p>Suddenly a thought occurred to me and I whirled around:</p><p></p><p>“The wraiths! Where are they?”</p><p></p><p>Drudge called back from the entrance: </p><p></p><p>“They’re gone! I have been watching for them to make a move but they just flew away as soon as the vampire was killed.”</p><p></p><p>I was puzzled and spoke to quietly to myself: </p><p></p><p>“I wonder what that was about? Why didn’t they attack?”</p><p></p><p>Victor just smiled grimly: </p><p></p><p>“They were scouts; their job was to watch and see what we did, how we fought, what our strengths and weaknesses were. The vampire giant and her cohorts were only a scouting party; more like a probe at our abilities. There is something else out there; something that commands vampiric fire giants. We’ll have to rest here tonight; we can’t go anywhere in our current state but we will need to be very vigilant. Another group like that and we will not be here for much longer.”</p><p></p><p></p><p>I thought about what the warrior had said and tried to remember what spells I had cast in sight of the wraiths; thankfully, I still had my most powerful spells and come to think of it, another one of my powerful spells was cast behind the stone column, out of their sight. Well, we would have to see if anything would come after us during our rest period. </p><p></p><p>Once we healed everyone and disposed of the corpses, we settled down to sleep again. This was a little strange as there was no real day or night in this realm but we did manage to rest; after all this time, I knew instinctively when I had had enough rest to learn new spells and both Felix and John were the same. Thankfully nothing came to disturb us.</p><p></p><p>Finishing our rest, we learned our spells as the warriors watched. Then we ate our breakfast provided by Felix as usual. Fortunately, the plane did not interfere with the magic endemic to his food. Then I cast a divination spell which told me the properties of the various items we had managed to obtain so far from the vampire and the crystal dragons from the entrance cave. Then we all cast various long lasting spells and finally decided to exit the cave. </p><p></p><p>As per Sagrimar’s instructions, we all concentrated on a sorrowful aspect of our lives. Personally, I thought of my father and brother, turned into wraiths by Gabal. Amazingly, something or someone prodded me; it was as if I was being pointed a particular way. There was no visible path or trail; just a very strong feeling that this was the way to go. Everyone else was looking in the same direction. We could not explain the feeling but somehow our Path of Sorrow must have resonated with Trilla’s dream. </p><p></p><p>We launched ourselves into the air and used Flight’s boon. </p><p></p><p>The sun shone, the sky was a brilliant blue and there were faint wisps of cloud in the distance. Again, there was a thick cover of pristine, white fog or cloud beneath us that looked almost solid. Peaks jutted out of this cover and attracted wisps of cloud by their presence. </p><p></p><p>It was into this skyscape that we launched ourselves. The path seemed straight as we flew but glancing back behind me, I noticed that it did curve and vary over distance, often taking us very close to the clouds and peaks, if not sometimes right over them. It was one of these clouds that provided the first unusual occurrence of our journey. As we approached, we could see the sides of the cloud glinting and the closer we flew, we began to see a shower or curtain of gold coins cascading down the side of the cloud, like a waterfall. Even in the dreamworld, we were immediately on our guard. While it would have been nice to fill up our sacks with gold, all my instincts were screaming that this was a trap of some sort.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Cafu, post: 6457224, member: 6692807"] I opened my eyes to pain; not just pain from the blows which I had suffered, but something else. I was lying on a bramble bush! And there were a lot more of these all around me! Bushes and small trees with incredibly sharp thorns; not just any old thorns either, but huge dagger like things; or that’s what they felt like to me anyway as I shifted slightly. They were well and truly embedded, so much so that I felt blood leaking out of my side onto the cavern floor. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw John with a wand in his hand, making motions with his hands to stay still. I did and the pain eased slightly. I was fairly certain that this bramble field had not been present in the cave before I went unconscious so it must have been some sort of odd magic at work; probably druidic; they were into brambles and plants and things. I could still hear the noise of battle around me but due to the brambles, I couldn’t really look around. Every time I moved was like another set of daggers stabbing me…..well everywhere. Just then, I heard a spell from nearby, a spell of defence and protection; and that was Felix’s voice. There were more sounds of battle but again, frustratingly, I could not see what was going on. Finally, John managed to tap me with a wand again and I felt a little stronger. So, I decided that it was time to get out of here. I ignored the pain; in comparison to what Agony had done to us in the oubliette of Koren’s Obelisk, this was child’s play. Now there was an expert on pain and he had taught us much, in his strange way; his legacy was our ability to ignore pain in certain circumstances and concentrate on what was important, such as getting out of here. I managed to do so with one of my magical transport spells and made sure I finished behind the large column, out of sight of almost everyone, especially the enemy. Behind the column, I managed to put a few spells on myself, including a spell which made me unseen as well as a defensive one which helped against weapons; I also drank a couple of my healing potions, which at least staunched the worst of the blood loss. Then, cautiously, I stuck out my head; I was still badly hurt but at least I felt a little safer. I saw that the area of brambles had moved slightly and was now surrounding Drudge, John, Victor and Longhelim. I could not see Felix anywhere. More importantly, I did not see the creature that seemed to be made out of shadows. Hopefully, it had perished. However, the one that looked like a tree and the one that resembled a swarm of beetles were still there. My apologies for this quite bizarre description but that is literally what they looked like; this place was nonsensical but we were actually in a plane created by a golden dragon’s dream. I am not sure how else to explain it. I am also not sure what these dreams or nightmares were supposed to be. Be that as it may, these creatures obviously decided that it was time for a frontal assault. The fire giant was also there and in the darkness outside, there were also to further patches of shadows, the wraiths, which curiously were just floating outside, watching. The creatures all advanced through the wall of knives which Felix had laid across the opening. The giant did the same thing. She seemed unaffected but the other things had certainly felt the effects. I could see them staggering slightly as they pushed through. Felix was still out of sight. Suddenly, I saw the priest magically appearing behind the warriors and a moment later, he touched Victor, who immediately began moving through the brambles as if they weren’t there. The warrior confronted one of the advancing creatures while the other one and the giant went around the other side of the column. I moved to keep them in sight, flying around the column. As I turned the corner, I saw the fire giant moving around towards me, obviously aware of my presence in spite of my magical spell. Unfortunately, this prevented me from casting my spells as I was very aware that trying to confront a fire giant in direct physical combat was a very bad idea; and I had a suspicion that this was certainly not just a normal fire giant. So, I stepped back a little and cast a spell at it. Since we were so close, I decided to use one of my more powerful spells; despite its natural defences against magic, I was able to affect it; it disappeared, locked briefly in a pocket dimension. Rapidly I moved back and cast another spell; the length of the giant’s confinement was a little unpredictable although it was usually at least several moments; it was fortunate that I did as well since she reappeared almost immediately. She probably had some sort of magical aid; that spell was normally highly effective. Thankfully, I had managed to scurry back to Felix by that point: “Felix, a little help here if you can; oh, and I put a magical wall between us and the fire giant. If she wants to come and get us, she’ll have to do it from this direction.” As the priest was preparing a healing spell, he also whispered: “That fire giant is also some sort of undead; probably a vampire; the cloud and the compulsion were a give away.” Quickly I asked: “Compulsion? What compulsion?” John replied at this point, as Felix was casting he spell: “You were unconscious; you didn’t see. Longhelim nearly killed Felix!” I looked and I could see that the priest had quite dent in his armour. As Felix finished his magic, we were looking carefully at the gap between the rock column and the wall; Felix managed to heal me. Nothing happened; the giant had did not re-appear. So Felix, John and I took the opportunity to cast several spells; when nothing happened still, the warriors moved forward to beard the vampire. Victor moved in one direction around the large stone column while Longhelim moved in the other; I had to take down my magical wall but the giant was there, waiting for us. As soon as Victor poked his head around a corner, a flying boulder nearly took it off. Felix stepped up and cast a spell; a beam of intense light hit the giant in the chest, making her recoil. This gave the warrior a chance to get near her; Drudge let loose his usual barrage but unfortunately, his arrows individually did not seem to be as effective as usual. She was a truly fearful opponent; as soon as she was able, she struck Longhelim with her fists. Not only was that truly painful, but every time she struck, it seemed to take something out of the paladin; he would stagger and his blows seemed to lack their usual force and venom. Victor then managed to get near and slashed into her with his usual grace and power; whirling around, for the first time, we saw her open her mouth and flash her long fangs in a grimace; this time, she struck at Victor with the same deadly results. Drudge was firing silver tipped arrows at her but it seemed odd as for some reason she led a very charmed life against them; somehow, she was dodging them with uncanny speed and agility. The situation was getting quite frustrating; the strikes of the warriors were getting weaker and weaker and she, to the contrary, seemed to be recovering every time she struck; then Felix stepped forward again and this time an intense beam of light, almost a sun beam struck the vampire; she wailed as smoke rose from the place where it touched her; it was not a direct hit as she managed to dodge that but it was obviously still extremely painful. Now, in desperation, she turned to the paladin and struck him again; Felix continued with his beams and the result was the same. Next, the giant struck Victor, who finally fell over. I was also shooting my force missiles at her but they were fairly minor in comparison to Felix’s beams. He shot her again and this time it was the last straw as with another wail which rose into a shriek, she collapsed. The priest looked pale as he muttered: “Thank the gods for that! That was the last one of those I had!” Longhelim in the meantime was rapidly searching through is back pack until he found a wooden tent peg: “Felix, will this be enough?” The priest ran forward and hurriedly he made some hand gestures over the peg: “Blessed be in the name of the Traveller! Blessed be in the name of Farlanghn! Let this holy wood stop the beast from awakening!” As soon as he said that, he then took out a vial and poured a little water over the wood; Longhelim then rammed the wood into the chest of the giant, where it began to smoke and the injury it created immediately began to get larger and larger until it destroyed most of her torso. Felix then shouted: “Now chop her head off!” Longhelim obliged. As soon as he did that, the body crumbled into dust in a most satisfying way, leaving only some quite valuable equipment behind. Next, John quickly grasped a wand and tapped both Victor and Longhelim. I assumed that the wand would repair the damage done to their spirit and indeed, they quickly shed the ghastly pallor that they suffered as they fought the vampire. While John was helping the warriors, I was looking with interest at the pile of equipment she had left behind. I cast a small divination cantrip and called out: “Well, whoever she was, she was certainly well equipped; look at this, armour, full plate armour in fact and mithril at that; a ring, a vest, a cloak, all magical……I wonder what they do?” Suddenly a thought occurred to me and I whirled around: “The wraiths! Where are they?” Drudge called back from the entrance: “They’re gone! I have been watching for them to make a move but they just flew away as soon as the vampire was killed.” I was puzzled and spoke to quietly to myself: “I wonder what that was about? Why didn’t they attack?” Victor just smiled grimly: “They were scouts; their job was to watch and see what we did, how we fought, what our strengths and weaknesses were. The vampire giant and her cohorts were only a scouting party; more like a probe at our abilities. There is something else out there; something that commands vampiric fire giants. We’ll have to rest here tonight; we can’t go anywhere in our current state but we will need to be very vigilant. Another group like that and we will not be here for much longer.” I thought about what the warrior had said and tried to remember what spells I had cast in sight of the wraiths; thankfully, I still had my most powerful spells and come to think of it, another one of my powerful spells was cast behind the stone column, out of their sight. Well, we would have to see if anything would come after us during our rest period. Once we healed everyone and disposed of the corpses, we settled down to sleep again. This was a little strange as there was no real day or night in this realm but we did manage to rest; after all this time, I knew instinctively when I had had enough rest to learn new spells and both Felix and John were the same. Thankfully nothing came to disturb us. Finishing our rest, we learned our spells as the warriors watched. Then we ate our breakfast provided by Felix as usual. Fortunately, the plane did not interfere with the magic endemic to his food. Then I cast a divination spell which told me the properties of the various items we had managed to obtain so far from the vampire and the crystal dragons from the entrance cave. Then we all cast various long lasting spells and finally decided to exit the cave. As per Sagrimar’s instructions, we all concentrated on a sorrowful aspect of our lives. Personally, I thought of my father and brother, turned into wraiths by Gabal. Amazingly, something or someone prodded me; it was as if I was being pointed a particular way. There was no visible path or trail; just a very strong feeling that this was the way to go. Everyone else was looking in the same direction. We could not explain the feeling but somehow our Path of Sorrow must have resonated with Trilla’s dream. We launched ourselves into the air and used Flight’s boon. The sun shone, the sky was a brilliant blue and there were faint wisps of cloud in the distance. Again, there was a thick cover of pristine, white fog or cloud beneath us that looked almost solid. Peaks jutted out of this cover and attracted wisps of cloud by their presence. It was into this skyscape that we launched ourselves. The path seemed straight as we flew but glancing back behind me, I noticed that it did curve and vary over distance, often taking us very close to the clouds and peaks, if not sometimes right over them. It was one of these clouds that provided the first unusual occurrence of our journey. As we approached, we could see the sides of the cloud glinting and the closer we flew, we began to see a shower or curtain of gold coins cascading down the side of the cloud, like a waterfall. Even in the dreamworld, we were immediately on our guard. While it would have been nice to fill up our sacks with gold, all my instincts were screaming that this was a trap of some sort. [/QUOTE]
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