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Wing Three
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<blockquote data-quote="Richards" data-source="post: 6092167" data-attributes="member: 508"><p><strong>ADVENTURE 58 - BAD BLOOD</strong></p><p></p><p>PC Roster: </p><p style="margin-left: 20px">Akari, elven paladin of Hieroneous</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Cal Trop, human cleric of Kord</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Delphyne Babelberi, human witch (wizard)</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Galrich Slayer, half-orc barbarian</p><p> </p><p>NPC Roster:</p><p style="margin-left: 20px">Aerik Battershield, dwarven fighter</p><p></p><p>When I wrote "Rescue from Afar," I intended it to be the first of a three-part story, with the second story involving finding out who hired the four female assassins to steal the <em>Planar Scout</em> from Dr. Greymantle, and the third one being an exploration of that person's lair. However, I couldn't resist the opportunity to sneak this adventure in here, when my players wouldn't be expecting it. As is usually the case when I have an adventure crafted for a specific individual, I recommended to Logan that he'd probably want to run Akari for this adventure, only I coached it in such a way that I made it seem just that Akari would be more useful on this adventure than Telgrane, as there would be some fiend-fighting going on. I let the other players decide who they'd be running.</p><p></p><p> - - -</p><p></p><p>A Guild page entered the Wing Three living quarters with a small box in his hand. "This came for you," he said. "I was told it was fragile, and that you should open it right away."</p><p></p><p>"Who brought it?" asked Cal.</p><p></p><p>"One of the local courier services," replied the Guild page, handing the box to Akari. "I didn't catch the kid's name, but I've seen him around before." Cal nodded, apparently satisfied, and the page departed.</p><p></p><p>Akari looked the box over. It had no markings; it appeared to be just a simple wooden box with a hinged lid and a metal clasp holding it closed. Opening it carefully, he saw an egg marked with various magical runes and glyphs lying nestled in a pile of soft grasses, and a hastily-scribbled note. It read:</p><p></p><p>"Greymantle must have the <em>Planar Scout</em> ready to go!" piped in Delphyne. "Fiend hunting, huh? I'm in!"</p><p></p><p>"As am I!" agreed Akari, eager to test out the <em>fiend bane</em> properties he'd recently had added to <em>Hoardmaster</em>'s magical attributes.</p><p></p><p>"I'm in, too!" added Cal. "I could go for some devil-bashing!"</p><p></p><p>"Same here!" agreed Galrich, gathering up a small arsenal of weapons and strapping them to his back, his belt, his boots, his forearms, and anywhere else he could find a spot.</p><p></p><p>"I'll go get m'gear," muttered Aerik to himself, seeing that the half-orc he was duty-bound to keep alive was about to voluntarily go to the Lower Planes to go pick a fight with some demons or devils. "Don't be leavin' without me!"</p><p></p><p>Once everyone was ready, they stood in a small circle and Akari raised the egg above his head, then threw it down to the floor between them. There was a sudden disconcerting <em>twist</em> to reality as space warped all around them, and then the five heroes were no longer in their living quarters in the Greyhawk City Adventurers Guild Headquarters. They eagerly looked around, expecting to see Dr. Greymantle loading up the <em>Planar Scout</em>, but they were nowhere to be seen, either.</p><p></p><p>No, this was decidedly different.</p><p></p><p>The group found themselves standing in a large, open room with the hulking presence of a shaggy creature combining the worst features of an ape and a boar, with ridiculously small feathered wings sprouting from his broad shoulders, standing before them. He stood three times the height of a man, but raised a hand in a welcoming gesture and fixed its grotesque mockery of a mouth into the approximation of a smile. His other hand held a white flag with the word "TRUCE" written upon it in the language of the Common tongue. "Welcome, mortals, to Castle Shatterhope, on the 119th layer of the Abyss, the Muckmire Fens. I am your host, <strong>Grottlepox the Puppeteer</strong>." Extending his hand in a sweeping gesture that encompassed the entire room, the group looked around and saw dozens if not hundreds of people lining the walls of the chamber, hanging from bones and sinews piercing their limbs. They moaned as if in constant pain.</p><p></p><p>"I mean you no harm," smiled the demon. "In fact, I have a proposition for you. Shall we talk?" Then, looking straight at Akari, the huge demon said, "You must be Akari. I must tell you, it amuses me to no end to discover that I have a great-great-grandson who has devoted himself to the life of a Hieronean paladin!" And with this, the demon wiped his eyes with a fat, clawed finger as his enormous belly shook with mirth and a gobbet of snot dribbled out of one of his piggish nostrils.</p><p></p><p>"<em>WHAT?</em>" demanded Akari, thunderstruck at the news that the nalfeshnee demon standing before him was his great-great-grandfather. The hulking brute stood in the center of a magical circle inscribed on the floor, by all looks a <em>magic circle against good</em>. Cal raised his mace and looked ready to put the circle's protective measures to the test.</p><p></p><p>But the nalfeshnee was ready for such antics. "Akari!" he cried out. "Unsheathe your sword and hold it to your throat!" To everyone's astonishment - not least of all Akari's - the paladin did exactly that. Sweat beaded down the elf's temple as he struggled to pull <em>Hoardmaster</em> away from his own jugular, to no avail.</p><p></p><p>"Now, everybody settle down, or be prepared to watch your friend carve his way through his own neck!" admonished Grottlepox. "I would also like to point out my little friends above," he smirked, directing the group's attention to the ceiling above him, where four large batlike creatures hung motionless, but with red eyes glaring. "These are my soul vultures," he crooned. "They can grab the soul of any mortal slain on the Abyss and drag it screaming to me for eternal torment, regardless of where it might otherwise have gone. So don’t be thinking you can just grab his body and run, to <em>resurrect</em> him later. Any of you who dies here gets to be my guest on a <em>permanent</em> basis. Now then, if I have your attention, shall we get back to our friendly chat?"</p><p></p><p>Cal gritted his teeth and swore an oath under his breath. Aerik stepped in front of Galrich, to prevent him from rushing the nalfeshnee demon who, for now at least, held all of the cards. Delphyne looked nervously around the room at the human "puppets" dangling from hooks along the ceiling and shivered, suddenly glad she had left Iggy back home.</p><p></p><p>"Much better," smiled Grottlepox. He then began his narrative by explaining Akari's lineage. Akari's great-great-grandmother, a wizard named <strong>Jaziria</strong>, summoned Grottlepox in an attempt to increase her personal power by forcing him to instruct her in advanced magic from the lower planes. While explaining this, Grottlepox motioned to one of his dangling puppets, and a 90-year-old woman came floating down from where she had been hung along the ceiling. Like the other "puppets," she was completely naked, and had bone spikes piercing through her feet, hands, scalp, lower jaw, and neck. She dangled by sinews from a handle of crossed bones; the effect was that of a marionette being made to move by a pair of invisible hands.</p><p></p><p>"He agreed," croaked Jaziria, "but the price was my body: he mated with me, siring a half-fiend human male named <strong>Excrezial</strong>, your great-grandfather." Excrezial sired a tiefling on an unwilling commoner woman. The resulting offspring, named <strong>Malechus</strong>, was Akari's grandfather. In turn, Malechus begot <strong>Rezuma</strong>, Akari's mother, a tiefling as well. She was not proud of her fiendish ancestry, and took on the surname <strong>Naruchi</strong>, which meant "Curse-Blood." When Akari was born, the only physical manifestations of his fiendish blood were his red-colored eyes. "However," reassured Grottlepox, mentally causing Jaziria to float back up to storage on her hook at the top of the wall, "there is enough of my blood running through your veins for me to control your every action while here on my Abyssal plane, the Muckmire Fens. Here, allow me to demonstrate." And without saying another word, the nalfeshnee caused the elf paladin to dance around in a little jig, do a little soft-shoe, and then pound his mailed fist into his own groin.</p><p></p><p>"Stop it!" cried out Delphyne. "You've made your point!"</p><p></p><p>"Indeed I have," grinned Grottlepox, and allowed Akari to resume his stance with his sword poised at his throat. "Perhaps we should get on with why you're all here. The Muckmire Fens is a desolate place, mostly filled with shallow swamps and sucking bogs. There's very little in the way of protruding solid ground through this infinite plane, and Castle Shatterhope occupies one of the few such areas to be found for scores of miles in all directions. As might be expected, that makes this some prime real estate for other demons of the realm, eager to take this fortified dwelling over for themselves. I have a rival of sorts, a nalfeshnee like myself, who covets my fine castle. But what can he do about it? The fetid swamps surrounding my grand abode are swarming with all manner of fearsome creatures, making a slog through the swamplands to attack from the ground a dangerous proposition. Likewise, those who would attack from above must contend with the roiling clouds above, which distort directions and distances, throwing airborne travelers miles off course. No, to attack this place, the only real option is to slog through the swamps and hope for the best.</p><p></p><p>"I have spies, though, who inform me that one of my competitors on this plane has built himself some sort of superweapon, a transport guaranteed to get his troops close enough to my castle to make a decent attempt at overcoming my defenses.</p><p></p><p>"This I will not allow! I want you to go find this superweapon and either destroy it, or better yet, bring it back to me for my own use. In return, you will all be allowed to leave this plane alive – and without harm – and go about your brief and pointless mortal lives. Your other option, of course, is to remain here as my playthings for all eternity – my soul vultures haven't had much of a chance of late to do what they do best, and I'm always looking for more soul puppets to amuse me. So, what do you say? Do we have ourselves a deal?"</p><p></p><p>Cal was hesitant to do the bidding of a demon, but he didn't really see as if there was much of a choice. Grottlepox pointed out that doing his bidding allowed them to slay demons on their home plane – how could they object to that? It resulted in an overall decrease in the number of demons on the Abyss, which was surely something in the best interests of good-aligned mortals like themselves. But the real argument lay in the fact that while the rest of them might well escape, he could force Akari to kill himself on the Abyss and grab up his soul for all of eternity, and there was no way for them to get his soul back away from the Abyss. So reluctantly, they agreed.</p><p></p><p>"Excellent!" beamed Grottlepox. "Then I have just one more thing to do before I send you on your way!" He summoned a succubus underling, <strong>Maladomnia</strong>, to fetch him his eye patch, and while she was off doing that he dug a cracked claw under his left eye and popped it out of its socket, ripping it out entirely in a spray of blood and gore. Then he reached over his massive shoulders and plucked several feathers from his undersized wings. Holding his severed eye in one hand, he concentrated and forced it to expand in size, then attached wing-feathers to it, creating a flying eyeball in the process. It fluttered about just above his gore-drenched hand, as the succubus returned and handed the nalfeshnee a black eye patch, which he placed over his empty socket.</p><p></p><p>"I don’t want you thinking you can sneak out of here and go <em>plane shifting</em> home on me without finishing your task," the demon snarled. "I'll be watching you at all times, and I can control my little mortal descendant from any distance on this plane." To prove his point, he had Akari slap himself upside his own head. Then he smiled a crooked smile and said, "My little soul vultures will of course be accompanying you as well. Good luck!" Maladomnia guided them out of his chamber to the sounds of his booming laughter.</p><p></p><p>The alluring succubus led the group down a hallway flanked with mirrors on each wall, her beautiful appearance a stark contrast to that of her beastlike master. She smiled coquettishly over her shoulder at the men of the party, flirting shamelessly as she explained her orders. "I'm to take you outside to the boathouse if you don't have transport of your own," she breathed huskily, hips swaying rhythmically as she sashayed down the hall. Unnoticed by the group, as they passed by the mirrors, one by one their reflections disappeared from view, until by the end of the hallway only Maladomnia was appearing in any of the reflective panes.</p><p></p><p>Stepping outside of Castle Shatterhope, the succubus opened the doors to a rickety-looking boathouse made of bones tied together with sinew. She waved the group into a foul-smelling boat made of the dried skins of several Abyssal beasts. The oars were fashioned from leg bones tied to a shoulder blade from some large creature of vaguely humanoid build. "The superweapon should be in that direction, several miles away," Maladomnia offered, pointing directly away from Castle Shatterhope.</p><p></p><p>The group piled into the boat. Aerik and Galrich offered to man the oars. Trailing behind them was Grottlepox's flying eyeball, and keeping within striking distance were the four batlike soul vultures. Not liking their present circumstances, the group paddled on in silence. Akari felt the worst of all, knowing that his friends' lives were in danger because of him, and although he had had no idea of his specific demonic bloodline, he had been aware that there was a demonic ancestor somewhere back in his family tree. His red eyes had even carried through in his transformation from human to elf, when he had been <em>reincarnated</em> into his present form. Now he wished for his friends to escape and be free of the Abyss, while at the same time harboring hopes that with their help he might escape a fate worse than any he could think of at present.</p><p></p><p>The Muckmire Fens were an unpleasant place, as would be expected of an Abyssal layer. The smells were of various styles of rot and decay, interspersed with the occasional whiff of a more fecal or sulfurous nature. Gnats and mosquitoes buzzed incessantly, flying into faces and buzzing around ears. The depth of the fens seemed to vary from between two and ten feet, with occasional sand bars, scrub-brushes, or small trees rising up out of the fetid swamp from time to time. Overhead, an orange-black sky hung oppressively low; Delphyne dared not use her <em>broom of flying</em> for fear of falling victim to the teleporting effects of the low-hanging clouds.</p><p></p><p>Paddling through what seemed like endless swamplands, the boat suddenly bumped as if hitting a shallow sandbar – something they'd already experienced several times during this ill-fated expedition. However, probing around with their bone-oars, Aerik and Galrich determined there was about five or six feet of water underneath the boat on all sides. Delphyne pointed out that the boat was hanging much lower in the water than it had been a moment before - and then the whole thing started tipping over to one side. Fearing a plunge into the swamplands, the young witch activated her broom and jumped on, keeping it just above the level of the water. The others leaned over toward the opposite side of the boat, leveling it out as best they could. And in doing so, Delphyne was able to see what the trouble was - a squat, rubbery fiendish leech nearly as long as the boat had adhered to the vessel's bottom, and was now crawling its way over to one side. Akari gave it a good slicing with <em>Hoardmaster</em>, and the thing died a silent death, sinking to the muck at the bottom of the endless swamp. The boat righted itself, Delphyne reluctantly resumed her place in the vessel, and the group moved on, trailed by their flying entourage.</p><p></p><p>After an unknown time spent in the mindless rhythm of paddling, the group was suddenly alerted to the presence of a threat ahead by the sounds of trees being brushed aside. Without further warning, several gnarled trees toppled forward towards the boat, splashing everyone with brackish swamp water, and then standing ahead was a beast several stories tall. It was in the general shape of a snapping turtle, but a stone structure had been built on its rugged shell, upon which were seen several mounted catapults and an oversized ballista. Rows of archers protruded along the sides of the beast's upper fortifications, and they let fly with their arrows as they become aware of the little boat's presence.</p><p></p><p>Aerik and Galrich steered their boat to face the massive beast, the better to present the smallest profile as possible towards the archers. Then an apish face peered over the side of the fiendish zaratan's walls, only to disappear in a flash - and the entire bar-lgura demon suddenly appeared in the boat with the heroes. It made a grab at Delphyne, who leapt overboard and only avoided falling into the water by grabbing and activating her <em>broom of flying</em>; she wasn't riding it so much as hanging onto it under one armpit, but it got the job done. And it kept the bar-lgura's attention focused on her long enough for Galrich to slice deep into the demon's side with his greatsword. The bar-lgura spun towards Galrich, snatched at him with one clawed hand, and then thought better of it and <em>teleported</em> away as quickly as he had appeared. And once he was gone, the hail of arrows, which had been put on hold while the demon was in the boat, rapidly resumed.</p><p></p><p>"We're dead if we stay here!" called out Akari. "Delphyne -- can you get us up to the turtle?"</p><p></p><p>Delphyne ran over her spell inventory, and found a <em>greater teleport</em> prepared and ready to go. Ironically, she regretted not having the less powerful <em>teleport</em> spell available, for while the greater version didn't allow for failure to plant the travelers exactly where she intended, she could only go somewhere she had seen, and she didn't want to chance flying up higher on her broom to get a better look at the top of the massive beast. She could see a platform rising up from the top of the turtle's shell; it would have to do.</p><p></p><p>Intoning the words to the spell, Delphyne <em>teleported</em> all five adventurers to the top of the platform. They found two other demons already there: <strong>Callista</strong>, a succubus sitting on a thronelike chair at the rear of the elevated platform, and her vrock bodyguard, <strong>Ironbeak</strong>. Combat broke out immediately.</p><p></p><p>From up on the raised platform, the adventurers had a better view of the top of the fiendish zaratan. Teams of manes demons manned the twin catapults and the massive ballista, which was aimed towards the front of the zaratan and shot enormous bolts some 50 feet in length. There were eight outcroppings of the zaratan's fortifications, with a four-armed arrow demon manning each station, each creature able to fire arrows with both of its longbows. There was a hezrou sergeant, <strong>Blorrk</strong>, in charge of the manes, and four bar-lguras scampering around fetching small boulders for the catapults.</p><p></p><p>Once the demons below noticed the adventurers were up on the platform - warned by some telepathic means, no doubt - Blorrk and one of the bar-lguras <em>teleported</em> up to the raised platform to give assistance to Callista and Ironbeak. The hezrou's stench overpowered all of the ambient stenches of the Muckmire Fens, and Delphyne began violently dry-heaving, falling to her knees. Callista decided to allow the combatants to have at it, and leapt backwards off the platform, flying down to a landing on the zaratan's shell.</p><p></p><p>Akari, Aerik, and Galrich were in their element, attacking the demons with their blades. Cal was about to try a <em>banishment</em> spell, then cursed himself for his own foolishness - you can't banish a demon from his home plane! Instead, he had at it with his trusty mace. The bar-lgura made a grab for the nearly-helpless Delphyne, and Cal bashed the side of its simian head in. It flopped over the side of the platform, nearly crushing a manes demon.</p><p></p><p>There wasn't a whole lot of room on the platform, so fighting was a dangerous proposition, especially those who stood near the edges, for there was no wall or railing preventing one from toppling over the edge, and the arrow demons below could shoot at those along the edges. Callista decided to use that to her advantage, and telepathically commanded the fiendish zaratan to rock its shell from side to side, in an effort to dislodge one or more of the invaders. It worked; with a cry of fear, Aerik toppled over the edge of the platform and only just made it back on his feet on the zaratan's shell below before he was surrounded and swarmed by manes demons.</p><p></p><p>Galrich and Akari had been dual-teaming Ironbeak, and the vrock finally decided he'd had enough; with a flap of his wings, he flew over to Callista down below. Cal looked down at the two of them, and decided to try to even the odds a bit; casting a <em>summon monster</em> spell, he called forth a pair of celestial hippogriffs and set them against the succubus and vrock. They complied with their orders with equine glee.</p><p></p><p>Blorrk now found himself the sole opponent against three hardened warriors. He did his best against them, but was fast being cut apart, despite the occasional bar-lgura <em>teleporting</em> up to do battle with the trio. However, when arriving and seeing a choice between battling three heroes with weapons or trying to grab Delphyne, they invariably went for the easy target. Delphyne could do little but try to roll out of their way, her stomach still trying to heave up contents that were no longer there. Cal split his attention between fighting Blorrk and jumping to Delphyne's assistance when necessary.</p><p></p><p>Finally slaying Blorrk was the turning point of the battle. Akari kicked the squat toad-thing off the side of the platform, getting it far enough away from Delphyne that the young witch could gain her composure and actually contribute to the fight. Galrich leapt off the platform and into the crowd of manes that were swarming Aerik, and together they finished the little demons off. By this point, the celestial hippogriffs had made quick work of Callista and Ironbeak, and only one of the four bar-lguras was still standing. He took a quick look around at the remaining forces - which at this point consisted of the arrow demons and a small handful of manes - and gave serious thoughts about fleeing.</p><p></p><p>Grottlepox helped him with his decision. Watching the battle through his own flying eyeball, he decided it was now safe to enter the fray himself, and <em>teleported</em> from the safety of Castle Shatterhope. That was all the remaining bar-lgura needed to see; he <em>teleported</em> away to parts unknown in the wink of an eye. The arrow demons, seeing the situation, quickly followed suit.</p><p></p><p>"Excellent, excellent!" beamed Grottlepox, looking around at his new superweapon as Maladomnia <em>teleported</em> in and sat up on the vacated throne. After verifying that she had taken control of the fiendish zaratan, he <em>teleported</em> his mortal allies, the soul vultures, and his own flying eyeball with him back to the room in which the heroes had first met him. The celestial hippogriffs returned to their own heavenly realms, their surprisingly enjoyable task having been completed.</p><p></p><p>"I'm very pleased with your performance, mortals," oozed Grottlepox, a broken grin on his face. "I believe I had said if you did this little task for me, I would allow you to return to your own dreary mortal lives. I'm sure you've no doubt heard of the general worthlessness of a demonic promise..." and here the great demon chuckled loudly to himself, "...but in this case, I’m eager to play with my new toy, so I won't bother to renege on our deal. You are free to go, if you have the means to do so.</p><p></p><p>"Oh, but Akari," he said as an afterthought, "one last thing before you leave me: how about a hug for your great-great-grandfather?" And the nalfeshnee spread his arms open wide, eager for an embrace.</p><p></p><p>Akari did his best to resist, but as usual it was for naught; Grottlepox the Puppeteer walked the paladin over to him and there was nothing Akari could do to resist him.</p><p></p><p>"That's it, my little mortal offspring, give your beloved ancestor a big hug." As the paladin stepped towards the demon on shaking legs, the demon addressed the group as a whole. "I know you <em>adventurers</em>" – he spit the word out like a curse – "generally like to earn treasure for your heroic deeds, but I'm afraid your pathetic lives will just have to do this time around. Except for my little paladin here; I've got something special for him!" And as he squatted down to receive Akari's unwilling hug, he ripped a gash across his left nipple with a ragged claw and whispered to Akari, out of earshot of the others, "Suckle deep, little mortal. Fill your mouth with Grampa's tasty demon blood, and drink it down!" He shielded his actions behind Akari's body, so the others couldn't see exactly what was occurring. Then, after Akari had been forced to comply, the demon stood upright again and flicked a hand at them. "Begone!" he commanded imperiously, then chortled with glee.</p><p></p><p>Cal didn't wait any longer than necessary - indeed, he had begun the words to his <em>plane shift</em> spell as Akari was still stumbling backwards to the rest of the group, a strangled cry stuck in his throat. The spell took effect, and in the blink of an eye the group stood in a field of wheat somewhere on Oerth.</p><p></p><p>Akari fell to the ground and writhed in sudden pain, grabbing his face in both hands. Delphyne was the first to spot the blood that had spilled down the front of the paladin's armor and called out, "He's hurt!" Cal knelt down to cast a healing spell on Akari, and then gasped in shock as Akari's convulsions pulled his hands from his face.</p><p></p><p>Four narrow horns had burst forth from the paladin's forehead, just above his eyebrows. Another pair had sprouted downwards from either side of his jaw, and two of his lower teeth had transformed into a small pair of wicked tusks. Blood trickled down where these new protrusions had burst forth through his skin.</p><p></p><p>"What's wrong?" asked Akari, seeing the sudden fear in his friends' eyes, and looking uncomprehendingly at Cal as the cleric quickly voiced the words to a <em>detect evil</em> spell. "He's okay," he said quietly.</p><p></p><p>Akari touched his forehead and found the horns; his quaking hands traced the downthrust spikes jutting from his jaw. "A mirror," he croaked, his voice breaking. "Get me a mirror."</p><p></p><p>Delphyne reached into her pack and wordlessly passed over a small hand mirror. Akari looked into it with a look of puzzlement. "It's...it's not that bad..." began Cal.</p><p></p><p>Akari just shook his head. "There's nothing there," he said. "I don't reflect an image."</p><p></p><p>Cal stepped behind the paladin and verified for himself. It was true; Akari no longer reflected an image in the mirror. And neither did Cal. Or Galrich, or Aerik, or Delphyne.</p><p></p><p>"This can't be good," Cal said, with more than a trace of worry in his voice.</p><p></p><p> - - -</p><p></p><p>This adventure didn't work out at all like I had envisioned. I had made a double-sized battlemat, outlining the fiendish zaratan and his battlements, with a raised octagonal structure I made out of cardboard to represent where Callista and Ironbeak sat. I anticipated a rollicking battle on top of the fiendish zaratan, as the PCs raced around fighting the various demons at their stations. And then Delphyne <em>teleported</em> everybody to the top of the raised platform, and once Blorrk joined them, that was pretty much it. I had prepared a battlespace that took over the majority of a kitchen table with seating for six people, and the majority of the battle took place on a 4-inch-by-4-inch structure. I felt bad for Vicki, too, because Delphyne succumbed to Blorrk's stench effect and didn't do much but puke the whole adventure. She had apparently thought (prompted an incorrect metagaming comment from Logan) that the stench effect only lasted "X number of rounds," and thus she thought she could just wait it out, when in reality it was "while in the vicinity of the hezrou and for X rounds thereafter." As long as she and Blorrk stayed up there on the platform, she wasn't going to escape the stench effects, ever. Of course, she could have simply rolled over the side of the platform and escaped that way, but it didn't occur to her (and the fact that rolling over to the edge made her susceptible to arrow demon attacks at range probably didn't make that too appealing an option, either).</p><p></p><p>As a result of being force-fed Grottlepox's demonic blood, Akari's fiendish dormant (and mostly recessive) nature was "jump-started" and he became a tiefling. I thought it was a particularly evil thing for Grottlepox to do, and perfectly in character for a demon with the opportunity to do so. In talking with Logan after the adventure, I told him that there was no need for the change in Akari's appearance to be permanent, but he thought it was a cool event and embraced Akari's new tiefling status (after ensuring that it wouldn't preclude him from being a paladin). So Akari now holds this campaign's record for the number of "permanent" transformations of race: he was born a human, died, was <em>reincarnated</em> as an elf, and later transformed into a tiefling.</p><p></p><p>Backstage between adventures, we decided the Church of Hieroneous would ensure that Akari was still as good at heart as he had been as an elf (and as a human), and decide that if it was okay with Hieroneous (which it obviously was, as Akari's paladin abilities were still functioning), who were they to say otherwise? So Akari probably made the record books again as being the only lawful good tiefling paladin among the Church of Hieroneous.</p><p></p><p>The transformation to a tiefling caused me to make up a new initiative card for Akari. I opened the "Akari" image in the Paint program, copied a portion of his elven ears, trimmed them down to horn size, and grafted them onto his forehead and jaw. I was going to do the same for his tusks, but I didn't like the way they looked, so I decided his tusks are small enough to not be seen when his mouth is closed. The back of his new initiative card reads "AKARI - TRANSFORMED."</p><p></p><p>As for the lack of reflections, that had the group worried enough that Cal did some divinations to find out what was going on, and he learned that their reflections are trapped in various mirrors back in Castle Shatterhope. It's not causing them any harm (other than making it harder for them to shave and comb their hair!), but it is making them nervous, especially since the divinations foretold that the effect was likely tied in to a summoning effect. They didn't much appreciate it when Balama Theron created that one-shot magic item that <em>teleported</em> them to the <em>Starchaser</em>; now it looks like Grottlepox the Puppeteer has a similar hold on them!</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Richards, post: 6092167, member: 508"] [B]ADVENTURE 58 - BAD BLOOD[/B] PC Roster: [INDENT]Akari, elven paladin of Hieroneous[/INDENT] [INDENT] Cal Trop, human cleric of Kord[/INDENT] [INDENT] Delphyne Babelberi, human witch (wizard)[/INDENT] [INDENT] Galrich Slayer, half-orc barbarian[/INDENT] NPC Roster: [INDENT]Aerik Battershield, dwarven fighter[/INDENT] When I wrote "Rescue from Afar," I intended it to be the first of a three-part story, with the second story involving finding out who hired the four female assassins to steal the [I]Planar Scout[/I] from Dr. Greymantle, and the third one being an exploration of that person's lair. However, I couldn't resist the opportunity to sneak this adventure in here, when my players wouldn't be expecting it. As is usually the case when I have an adventure crafted for a specific individual, I recommended to Logan that he'd probably want to run Akari for this adventure, only I coached it in such a way that I made it seem just that Akari would be more useful on this adventure than Telgrane, as there would be some fiend-fighting going on. I let the other players decide who they'd be running. - - - A Guild page entered the Wing Three living quarters with a small box in his hand. "This came for you," he said. "I was told it was fragile, and that you should open it right away." "Who brought it?" asked Cal. "One of the local courier services," replied the Guild page, handing the box to Akari. "I didn't catch the kid's name, but I've seen him around before." Cal nodded, apparently satisfied, and the page departed. Akari looked the box over. It had no markings; it appeared to be just a simple wooden box with a hinged lid and a metal clasp holding it closed. Opening it carefully, he saw an egg marked with various magical runes and glyphs lying nestled in a pile of soft grasses, and a hastily-scribbled note. It read: "Greymantle must have the [I]Planar Scout[/I] ready to go!" piped in Delphyne. "Fiend hunting, huh? I'm in!" "As am I!" agreed Akari, eager to test out the [I]fiend bane[/I] properties he'd recently had added to [I]Hoardmaster[/I]'s magical attributes. "I'm in, too!" added Cal. "I could go for some devil-bashing!" "Same here!" agreed Galrich, gathering up a small arsenal of weapons and strapping them to his back, his belt, his boots, his forearms, and anywhere else he could find a spot. "I'll go get m'gear," muttered Aerik to himself, seeing that the half-orc he was duty-bound to keep alive was about to voluntarily go to the Lower Planes to go pick a fight with some demons or devils. "Don't be leavin' without me!" Once everyone was ready, they stood in a small circle and Akari raised the egg above his head, then threw it down to the floor between them. There was a sudden disconcerting [I]twist[/I] to reality as space warped all around them, and then the five heroes were no longer in their living quarters in the Greyhawk City Adventurers Guild Headquarters. They eagerly looked around, expecting to see Dr. Greymantle loading up the [I]Planar Scout[/I], but they were nowhere to be seen, either. No, this was decidedly different. The group found themselves standing in a large, open room with the hulking presence of a shaggy creature combining the worst features of an ape and a boar, with ridiculously small feathered wings sprouting from his broad shoulders, standing before them. He stood three times the height of a man, but raised a hand in a welcoming gesture and fixed its grotesque mockery of a mouth into the approximation of a smile. His other hand held a white flag with the word "TRUCE" written upon it in the language of the Common tongue. "Welcome, mortals, to Castle Shatterhope, on the 119th layer of the Abyss, the Muckmire Fens. I am your host, [B]Grottlepox the Puppeteer[/B]." Extending his hand in a sweeping gesture that encompassed the entire room, the group looked around and saw dozens if not hundreds of people lining the walls of the chamber, hanging from bones and sinews piercing their limbs. They moaned as if in constant pain. "I mean you no harm," smiled the demon. "In fact, I have a proposition for you. Shall we talk?" Then, looking straight at Akari, the huge demon said, "You must be Akari. I must tell you, it amuses me to no end to discover that I have a great-great-grandson who has devoted himself to the life of a Hieronean paladin!" And with this, the demon wiped his eyes with a fat, clawed finger as his enormous belly shook with mirth and a gobbet of snot dribbled out of one of his piggish nostrils. "[I]WHAT?[/I]" demanded Akari, thunderstruck at the news that the nalfeshnee demon standing before him was his great-great-grandfather. The hulking brute stood in the center of a magical circle inscribed on the floor, by all looks a [I]magic circle against good[/I]. Cal raised his mace and looked ready to put the circle's protective measures to the test. But the nalfeshnee was ready for such antics. "Akari!" he cried out. "Unsheathe your sword and hold it to your throat!" To everyone's astonishment - not least of all Akari's - the paladin did exactly that. Sweat beaded down the elf's temple as he struggled to pull [I]Hoardmaster[/I] away from his own jugular, to no avail. "Now, everybody settle down, or be prepared to watch your friend carve his way through his own neck!" admonished Grottlepox. "I would also like to point out my little friends above," he smirked, directing the group's attention to the ceiling above him, where four large batlike creatures hung motionless, but with red eyes glaring. "These are my soul vultures," he crooned. "They can grab the soul of any mortal slain on the Abyss and drag it screaming to me for eternal torment, regardless of where it might otherwise have gone. So don’t be thinking you can just grab his body and run, to [I]resurrect[/I] him later. Any of you who dies here gets to be my guest on a [I]permanent[/I] basis. Now then, if I have your attention, shall we get back to our friendly chat?" Cal gritted his teeth and swore an oath under his breath. Aerik stepped in front of Galrich, to prevent him from rushing the nalfeshnee demon who, for now at least, held all of the cards. Delphyne looked nervously around the room at the human "puppets" dangling from hooks along the ceiling and shivered, suddenly glad she had left Iggy back home. "Much better," smiled Grottlepox. He then began his narrative by explaining Akari's lineage. Akari's great-great-grandmother, a wizard named [B]Jaziria[/B], summoned Grottlepox in an attempt to increase her personal power by forcing him to instruct her in advanced magic from the lower planes. While explaining this, Grottlepox motioned to one of his dangling puppets, and a 90-year-old woman came floating down from where she had been hung along the ceiling. Like the other "puppets," she was completely naked, and had bone spikes piercing through her feet, hands, scalp, lower jaw, and neck. She dangled by sinews from a handle of crossed bones; the effect was that of a marionette being made to move by a pair of invisible hands. "He agreed," croaked Jaziria, "but the price was my body: he mated with me, siring a half-fiend human male named [B]Excrezial[/B], your great-grandfather." Excrezial sired a tiefling on an unwilling commoner woman. The resulting offspring, named [B]Malechus[/B], was Akari's grandfather. In turn, Malechus begot [B]Rezuma[/B], Akari's mother, a tiefling as well. She was not proud of her fiendish ancestry, and took on the surname [B]Naruchi[/B], which meant "Curse-Blood." When Akari was born, the only physical manifestations of his fiendish blood were his red-colored eyes. "However," reassured Grottlepox, mentally causing Jaziria to float back up to storage on her hook at the top of the wall, "there is enough of my blood running through your veins for me to control your every action while here on my Abyssal plane, the Muckmire Fens. Here, allow me to demonstrate." And without saying another word, the nalfeshnee caused the elf paladin to dance around in a little jig, do a little soft-shoe, and then pound his mailed fist into his own groin. "Stop it!" cried out Delphyne. "You've made your point!" "Indeed I have," grinned Grottlepox, and allowed Akari to resume his stance with his sword poised at his throat. "Perhaps we should get on with why you're all here. The Muckmire Fens is a desolate place, mostly filled with shallow swamps and sucking bogs. There's very little in the way of protruding solid ground through this infinite plane, and Castle Shatterhope occupies one of the few such areas to be found for scores of miles in all directions. As might be expected, that makes this some prime real estate for other demons of the realm, eager to take this fortified dwelling over for themselves. I have a rival of sorts, a nalfeshnee like myself, who covets my fine castle. But what can he do about it? The fetid swamps surrounding my grand abode are swarming with all manner of fearsome creatures, making a slog through the swamplands to attack from the ground a dangerous proposition. Likewise, those who would attack from above must contend with the roiling clouds above, which distort directions and distances, throwing airborne travelers miles off course. No, to attack this place, the only real option is to slog through the swamps and hope for the best. "I have spies, though, who inform me that one of my competitors on this plane has built himself some sort of superweapon, a transport guaranteed to get his troops close enough to my castle to make a decent attempt at overcoming my defenses. "This I will not allow! I want you to go find this superweapon and either destroy it, or better yet, bring it back to me for my own use. In return, you will all be allowed to leave this plane alive – and without harm – and go about your brief and pointless mortal lives. Your other option, of course, is to remain here as my playthings for all eternity – my soul vultures haven't had much of a chance of late to do what they do best, and I'm always looking for more soul puppets to amuse me. So, what do you say? Do we have ourselves a deal?" Cal was hesitant to do the bidding of a demon, but he didn't really see as if there was much of a choice. Grottlepox pointed out that doing his bidding allowed them to slay demons on their home plane – how could they object to that? It resulted in an overall decrease in the number of demons on the Abyss, which was surely something in the best interests of good-aligned mortals like themselves. But the real argument lay in the fact that while the rest of them might well escape, he could force Akari to kill himself on the Abyss and grab up his soul for all of eternity, and there was no way for them to get his soul back away from the Abyss. So reluctantly, they agreed. "Excellent!" beamed Grottlepox. "Then I have just one more thing to do before I send you on your way!" He summoned a succubus underling, [B]Maladomnia[/B], to fetch him his eye patch, and while she was off doing that he dug a cracked claw under his left eye and popped it out of its socket, ripping it out entirely in a spray of blood and gore. Then he reached over his massive shoulders and plucked several feathers from his undersized wings. Holding his severed eye in one hand, he concentrated and forced it to expand in size, then attached wing-feathers to it, creating a flying eyeball in the process. It fluttered about just above his gore-drenched hand, as the succubus returned and handed the nalfeshnee a black eye patch, which he placed over his empty socket. "I don’t want you thinking you can sneak out of here and go [I]plane shifting[/I] home on me without finishing your task," the demon snarled. "I'll be watching you at all times, and I can control my little mortal descendant from any distance on this plane." To prove his point, he had Akari slap himself upside his own head. Then he smiled a crooked smile and said, "My little soul vultures will of course be accompanying you as well. Good luck!" Maladomnia guided them out of his chamber to the sounds of his booming laughter. The alluring succubus led the group down a hallway flanked with mirrors on each wall, her beautiful appearance a stark contrast to that of her beastlike master. She smiled coquettishly over her shoulder at the men of the party, flirting shamelessly as she explained her orders. "I'm to take you outside to the boathouse if you don't have transport of your own," she breathed huskily, hips swaying rhythmically as she sashayed down the hall. Unnoticed by the group, as they passed by the mirrors, one by one their reflections disappeared from view, until by the end of the hallway only Maladomnia was appearing in any of the reflective panes. Stepping outside of Castle Shatterhope, the succubus opened the doors to a rickety-looking boathouse made of bones tied together with sinew. She waved the group into a foul-smelling boat made of the dried skins of several Abyssal beasts. The oars were fashioned from leg bones tied to a shoulder blade from some large creature of vaguely humanoid build. "The superweapon should be in that direction, several miles away," Maladomnia offered, pointing directly away from Castle Shatterhope. The group piled into the boat. Aerik and Galrich offered to man the oars. Trailing behind them was Grottlepox's flying eyeball, and keeping within striking distance were the four batlike soul vultures. Not liking their present circumstances, the group paddled on in silence. Akari felt the worst of all, knowing that his friends' lives were in danger because of him, and although he had had no idea of his specific demonic bloodline, he had been aware that there was a demonic ancestor somewhere back in his family tree. His red eyes had even carried through in his transformation from human to elf, when he had been [I]reincarnated[/I] into his present form. Now he wished for his friends to escape and be free of the Abyss, while at the same time harboring hopes that with their help he might escape a fate worse than any he could think of at present. The Muckmire Fens were an unpleasant place, as would be expected of an Abyssal layer. The smells were of various styles of rot and decay, interspersed with the occasional whiff of a more fecal or sulfurous nature. Gnats and mosquitoes buzzed incessantly, flying into faces and buzzing around ears. The depth of the fens seemed to vary from between two and ten feet, with occasional sand bars, scrub-brushes, or small trees rising up out of the fetid swamp from time to time. Overhead, an orange-black sky hung oppressively low; Delphyne dared not use her [I]broom of flying[/I] for fear of falling victim to the teleporting effects of the low-hanging clouds. Paddling through what seemed like endless swamplands, the boat suddenly bumped as if hitting a shallow sandbar – something they'd already experienced several times during this ill-fated expedition. However, probing around with their bone-oars, Aerik and Galrich determined there was about five or six feet of water underneath the boat on all sides. Delphyne pointed out that the boat was hanging much lower in the water than it had been a moment before - and then the whole thing started tipping over to one side. Fearing a plunge into the swamplands, the young witch activated her broom and jumped on, keeping it just above the level of the water. The others leaned over toward the opposite side of the boat, leveling it out as best they could. And in doing so, Delphyne was able to see what the trouble was - a squat, rubbery fiendish leech nearly as long as the boat had adhered to the vessel's bottom, and was now crawling its way over to one side. Akari gave it a good slicing with [I]Hoardmaster[/I], and the thing died a silent death, sinking to the muck at the bottom of the endless swamp. The boat righted itself, Delphyne reluctantly resumed her place in the vessel, and the group moved on, trailed by their flying entourage. After an unknown time spent in the mindless rhythm of paddling, the group was suddenly alerted to the presence of a threat ahead by the sounds of trees being brushed aside. Without further warning, several gnarled trees toppled forward towards the boat, splashing everyone with brackish swamp water, and then standing ahead was a beast several stories tall. It was in the general shape of a snapping turtle, but a stone structure had been built on its rugged shell, upon which were seen several mounted catapults and an oversized ballista. Rows of archers protruded along the sides of the beast's upper fortifications, and they let fly with their arrows as they become aware of the little boat's presence. Aerik and Galrich steered their boat to face the massive beast, the better to present the smallest profile as possible towards the archers. Then an apish face peered over the side of the fiendish zaratan's walls, only to disappear in a flash - and the entire bar-lgura demon suddenly appeared in the boat with the heroes. It made a grab at Delphyne, who leapt overboard and only avoided falling into the water by grabbing and activating her [I]broom of flying[/I]; she wasn't riding it so much as hanging onto it under one armpit, but it got the job done. And it kept the bar-lgura's attention focused on her long enough for Galrich to slice deep into the demon's side with his greatsword. The bar-lgura spun towards Galrich, snatched at him with one clawed hand, and then thought better of it and [I]teleported[/I] away as quickly as he had appeared. And once he was gone, the hail of arrows, which had been put on hold while the demon was in the boat, rapidly resumed. "We're dead if we stay here!" called out Akari. "Delphyne -- can you get us up to the turtle?" Delphyne ran over her spell inventory, and found a [I]greater teleport[/I] prepared and ready to go. Ironically, she regretted not having the less powerful [I]teleport[/I] spell available, for while the greater version didn't allow for failure to plant the travelers exactly where she intended, she could only go somewhere she had seen, and she didn't want to chance flying up higher on her broom to get a better look at the top of the massive beast. She could see a platform rising up from the top of the turtle's shell; it would have to do. Intoning the words to the spell, Delphyne [I]teleported[/I] all five adventurers to the top of the platform. They found two other demons already there: [B]Callista[/B], a succubus sitting on a thronelike chair at the rear of the elevated platform, and her vrock bodyguard, [B]Ironbeak[/B]. Combat broke out immediately. From up on the raised platform, the adventurers had a better view of the top of the fiendish zaratan. Teams of manes demons manned the twin catapults and the massive ballista, which was aimed towards the front of the zaratan and shot enormous bolts some 50 feet in length. There were eight outcroppings of the zaratan's fortifications, with a four-armed arrow demon manning each station, each creature able to fire arrows with both of its longbows. There was a hezrou sergeant, [B]Blorrk[/B], in charge of the manes, and four bar-lguras scampering around fetching small boulders for the catapults. Once the demons below noticed the adventurers were up on the platform - warned by some telepathic means, no doubt - Blorrk and one of the bar-lguras [I]teleported[/I] up to the raised platform to give assistance to Callista and Ironbeak. The hezrou's stench overpowered all of the ambient stenches of the Muckmire Fens, and Delphyne began violently dry-heaving, falling to her knees. Callista decided to allow the combatants to have at it, and leapt backwards off the platform, flying down to a landing on the zaratan's shell. Akari, Aerik, and Galrich were in their element, attacking the demons with their blades. Cal was about to try a [I]banishment[/I] spell, then cursed himself for his own foolishness - you can't banish a demon from his home plane! Instead, he had at it with his trusty mace. The bar-lgura made a grab for the nearly-helpless Delphyne, and Cal bashed the side of its simian head in. It flopped over the side of the platform, nearly crushing a manes demon. There wasn't a whole lot of room on the platform, so fighting was a dangerous proposition, especially those who stood near the edges, for there was no wall or railing preventing one from toppling over the edge, and the arrow demons below could shoot at those along the edges. Callista decided to use that to her advantage, and telepathically commanded the fiendish zaratan to rock its shell from side to side, in an effort to dislodge one or more of the invaders. It worked; with a cry of fear, Aerik toppled over the edge of the platform and only just made it back on his feet on the zaratan's shell below before he was surrounded and swarmed by manes demons. Galrich and Akari had been dual-teaming Ironbeak, and the vrock finally decided he'd had enough; with a flap of his wings, he flew over to Callista down below. Cal looked down at the two of them, and decided to try to even the odds a bit; casting a [I]summon monster[/I] spell, he called forth a pair of celestial hippogriffs and set them against the succubus and vrock. They complied with their orders with equine glee. Blorrk now found himself the sole opponent against three hardened warriors. He did his best against them, but was fast being cut apart, despite the occasional bar-lgura [I]teleporting[/I] up to do battle with the trio. However, when arriving and seeing a choice between battling three heroes with weapons or trying to grab Delphyne, they invariably went for the easy target. Delphyne could do little but try to roll out of their way, her stomach still trying to heave up contents that were no longer there. Cal split his attention between fighting Blorrk and jumping to Delphyne's assistance when necessary. Finally slaying Blorrk was the turning point of the battle. Akari kicked the squat toad-thing off the side of the platform, getting it far enough away from Delphyne that the young witch could gain her composure and actually contribute to the fight. Galrich leapt off the platform and into the crowd of manes that were swarming Aerik, and together they finished the little demons off. By this point, the celestial hippogriffs had made quick work of Callista and Ironbeak, and only one of the four bar-lguras was still standing. He took a quick look around at the remaining forces - which at this point consisted of the arrow demons and a small handful of manes - and gave serious thoughts about fleeing. Grottlepox helped him with his decision. Watching the battle through his own flying eyeball, he decided it was now safe to enter the fray himself, and [I]teleported[/I] from the safety of Castle Shatterhope. That was all the remaining bar-lgura needed to see; he [I]teleported[/I] away to parts unknown in the wink of an eye. The arrow demons, seeing the situation, quickly followed suit. "Excellent, excellent!" beamed Grottlepox, looking around at his new superweapon as Maladomnia [I]teleported[/I] in and sat up on the vacated throne. After verifying that she had taken control of the fiendish zaratan, he [I]teleported[/I] his mortal allies, the soul vultures, and his own flying eyeball with him back to the room in which the heroes had first met him. The celestial hippogriffs returned to their own heavenly realms, their surprisingly enjoyable task having been completed. "I'm very pleased with your performance, mortals," oozed Grottlepox, a broken grin on his face. "I believe I had said if you did this little task for me, I would allow you to return to your own dreary mortal lives. I'm sure you've no doubt heard of the general worthlessness of a demonic promise..." and here the great demon chuckled loudly to himself, "...but in this case, I’m eager to play with my new toy, so I won't bother to renege on our deal. You are free to go, if you have the means to do so. "Oh, but Akari," he said as an afterthought, "one last thing before you leave me: how about a hug for your great-great-grandfather?" And the nalfeshnee spread his arms open wide, eager for an embrace. Akari did his best to resist, but as usual it was for naught; Grottlepox the Puppeteer walked the paladin over to him and there was nothing Akari could do to resist him. "That's it, my little mortal offspring, give your beloved ancestor a big hug." As the paladin stepped towards the demon on shaking legs, the demon addressed the group as a whole. "I know you [I]adventurers[/I]" – he spit the word out like a curse – "generally like to earn treasure for your heroic deeds, but I'm afraid your pathetic lives will just have to do this time around. Except for my little paladin here; I've got something special for him!" And as he squatted down to receive Akari's unwilling hug, he ripped a gash across his left nipple with a ragged claw and whispered to Akari, out of earshot of the others, "Suckle deep, little mortal. Fill your mouth with Grampa's tasty demon blood, and drink it down!" He shielded his actions behind Akari's body, so the others couldn't see exactly what was occurring. Then, after Akari had been forced to comply, the demon stood upright again and flicked a hand at them. "Begone!" he commanded imperiously, then chortled with glee. Cal didn't wait any longer than necessary - indeed, he had begun the words to his [I]plane shift[/I] spell as Akari was still stumbling backwards to the rest of the group, a strangled cry stuck in his throat. The spell took effect, and in the blink of an eye the group stood in a field of wheat somewhere on Oerth. Akari fell to the ground and writhed in sudden pain, grabbing his face in both hands. Delphyne was the first to spot the blood that had spilled down the front of the paladin's armor and called out, "He's hurt!" Cal knelt down to cast a healing spell on Akari, and then gasped in shock as Akari's convulsions pulled his hands from his face. Four narrow horns had burst forth from the paladin's forehead, just above his eyebrows. Another pair had sprouted downwards from either side of his jaw, and two of his lower teeth had transformed into a small pair of wicked tusks. Blood trickled down where these new protrusions had burst forth through his skin. "What's wrong?" asked Akari, seeing the sudden fear in his friends' eyes, and looking uncomprehendingly at Cal as the cleric quickly voiced the words to a [I]detect evil[/I] spell. "He's okay," he said quietly. Akari touched his forehead and found the horns; his quaking hands traced the downthrust spikes jutting from his jaw. "A mirror," he croaked, his voice breaking. "Get me a mirror." Delphyne reached into her pack and wordlessly passed over a small hand mirror. Akari looked into it with a look of puzzlement. "It's...it's not that bad..." began Cal. Akari just shook his head. "There's nothing there," he said. "I don't reflect an image." Cal stepped behind the paladin and verified for himself. It was true; Akari no longer reflected an image in the mirror. And neither did Cal. Or Galrich, or Aerik, or Delphyne. "This can't be good," Cal said, with more than a trace of worry in his voice. - - - This adventure didn't work out at all like I had envisioned. I had made a double-sized battlemat, outlining the fiendish zaratan and his battlements, with a raised octagonal structure I made out of cardboard to represent where Callista and Ironbeak sat. I anticipated a rollicking battle on top of the fiendish zaratan, as the PCs raced around fighting the various demons at their stations. And then Delphyne [I]teleported[/I] everybody to the top of the raised platform, and once Blorrk joined them, that was pretty much it. I had prepared a battlespace that took over the majority of a kitchen table with seating for six people, and the majority of the battle took place on a 4-inch-by-4-inch structure. I felt bad for Vicki, too, because Delphyne succumbed to Blorrk's stench effect and didn't do much but puke the whole adventure. She had apparently thought (prompted an incorrect metagaming comment from Logan) that the stench effect only lasted "X number of rounds," and thus she thought she could just wait it out, when in reality it was "while in the vicinity of the hezrou and for X rounds thereafter." As long as she and Blorrk stayed up there on the platform, she wasn't going to escape the stench effects, ever. Of course, she could have simply rolled over the side of the platform and escaped that way, but it didn't occur to her (and the fact that rolling over to the edge made her susceptible to arrow demon attacks at range probably didn't make that too appealing an option, either). As a result of being force-fed Grottlepox's demonic blood, Akari's fiendish dormant (and mostly recessive) nature was "jump-started" and he became a tiefling. I thought it was a particularly evil thing for Grottlepox to do, and perfectly in character for a demon with the opportunity to do so. In talking with Logan after the adventure, I told him that there was no need for the change in Akari's appearance to be permanent, but he thought it was a cool event and embraced Akari's new tiefling status (after ensuring that it wouldn't preclude him from being a paladin). So Akari now holds this campaign's record for the number of "permanent" transformations of race: he was born a human, died, was [I]reincarnated[/I] as an elf, and later transformed into a tiefling. Backstage between adventures, we decided the Church of Hieroneous would ensure that Akari was still as good at heart as he had been as an elf (and as a human), and decide that if it was okay with Hieroneous (which it obviously was, as Akari's paladin abilities were still functioning), who were they to say otherwise? So Akari probably made the record books again as being the only lawful good tiefling paladin among the Church of Hieroneous. The transformation to a tiefling caused me to make up a new initiative card for Akari. I opened the "Akari" image in the Paint program, copied a portion of his elven ears, trimmed them down to horn size, and grafted them onto his forehead and jaw. I was going to do the same for his tusks, but I didn't like the way they looked, so I decided his tusks are small enough to not be seen when his mouth is closed. The back of his new initiative card reads "AKARI - TRANSFORMED." As for the lack of reflections, that had the group worried enough that Cal did some divinations to find out what was going on, and he learned that their reflections are trapped in various mirrors back in Castle Shatterhope. It's not causing them any harm (other than making it harder for them to shave and comb their hair!), but it is making them nervous, especially since the divinations foretold that the effect was likely tied in to a summoning effect. They didn't much appreciate it when Balama Theron created that one-shot magic item that [I]teleported[/I] them to the [I]Starchaser[/I]; now it looks like Grottlepox the Puppeteer has a similar hold on them! [/QUOTE]
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