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Wing Three
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<blockquote data-quote="Richards" data-source="post: 6166434" data-attributes="member: 508"><p><strong>ADVENTURE 71 - BAPTISM OF FIRE</strong></p><p></p><p>PC Roster: <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 style="margin-left: 20px"> Telgrane, human conjurer/archmage</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Thunderwolf, human fighter</p><p></p><p>NPC Roster: <p style="margin-left: 20px">Aerik Battershield, dwarven fighter/dwarven defender</p><p></p><p></p><p>"This should do the trick," said Dr. Greymantle, handing over a small gem of the same style as the one that Ambrosia Black wore on her forehead when controlling the automatons in the <em>Planar Scout</em>. "Just place it on your forehead; it contains my memory of standing on the island where my colleague, <strong>the Archmage Pandulio</strong>, has set up his research lab. It will allow you to teleport there as if you've been there yourself. Now if you'll excuse me," he said with a smile, "I have other matters which require my attention." And with the utterance of an arcane syllable, he vanished from the room.</p><p></p><p>Telgrane held the small stone in his hand for a moment, then shrugged and placed it on his forehead. It immediately glowed with an inner light. "Whoa!" he exclaimed, his memories suddenly filling with experiences he had never dealt with firsthand before. He closed his eyes for a moment to steady the sudden dizzy sensation, then opened them again and grinned. "Got it!" he exclaimed. "Everybody ready to teleport over to Pandulio's island?"</p><p></p><p>The others gathered around him and he said the words to a <em>teleport</em> spell he had prepared for this very occasion. The familiar confines of the Wing Three common living area gave way to a white, sandy beach at the edge a steaming jungle, the caws of colorful parrots and the shrieks of monkeys competing with the ever-present crash of waves on the beach behind them. Ahead of the group, a curving path cut through the heavy jungle growths, leading to a cave opening in the side of a rocky cliffside. "This way," called Telgrane, leading the others up the path.</p><p></p><p>Just inside the cave's shadowy entrance stood a statue of an elegant sylph. A <em>magic mouth</em> spell activated upon the group's entry, causing the statue to appear to ask, "Is Pandulio expecting you?" Telgrane looked at the others, shrugged, and said "Yes," assuming that Greymantle would probably have mentioned that the group was coming to pay him a visit. The statue gave no response, and the group looked around in confusion, unsure of what they were supposed to do now.</p><p></p><p>"According to Dr. Greymantle's memories," Telgrane reported, "Pandulio would usually enter the cave from a secret passage in the back, there." He pointed to the back of the cave, while Galrich tried having a conversation with the statue. "Hey, is Pandulio even home?" he asked the carved image, but the sylph gave no reply.</p><p></p><p>"Got something!" said Cal, having examined the back of the cave in the illumination cast by Infernia, who was still in her 9-foot-tall form, the better to assist her master in combat. The cleric pointed out a crack in the wall, no doubt the seam where a door opened up. He followed the crack, marking off a section easily large enough to be a door, probably one of those that swiveled in the middle. He pushed tentatively on either edge, to no avail. "I can probably force it open," he suggested, ready to channel one of Kord's feats of strength through his willing limbs.</p><p></p><p>"Let's not break down the door of the guy we're here to visit," suggested Telgrane. "There should be a latch or something hidden around here that opens it up." The group spread out, seeking a hidden button, lever, or switch. Cal found it, hidden on the back of the neck of the sylph statue, underneath her flowing hair. Delphyne gave him a sidelong glance, as if to point out she had noticed that in a cave of fairly considerable size he had somehow managed to focus his search on the nearly-nude statue of a beautiful sylph, but the cleric of Kord refused to be embarrassed. He had, after all, been the one to look in the right place. Cal pushed in the button, there was a click from the back of the cave, and the secret door swiveled open.</p><p></p><p>Telgrane was the first to enter, followed by his large fire elemental familiar. The passageway beyond the door was narrow enough to force the group to move single file, and after a few twists it opened up into a hemispherical room with three other corridors leading in different directions. The one directly ahead gave off a soft, red illumination, but the archmage was more interested in the circular floor, for his arcane vision had picked up a series of delicately-carved glyphs radiating an aura of conjuration magic of the type associated with teleportation effects. They seemed to be centered on the middle of the room. "Stick close to the outer wall," suggested Telgrane, as he scooted around to the right, taking the corridor that first presented itself. It turned a corner, went up a few steps, and then ended in a small room shaped like a narrow "T." The far wall of the "T" was made of some transparent material, and overlooked a small, circular island rising up out of a pool of magma, with a short set of stairs leading down into the bubbling lava. Given the fact that the island's circumference seemed to be the same diameter as the room he had just left, he suspected he had just seen where those who stepped on the teleport trap were likely to end up, which made sense if you thought of this T-shaped room as an observation port to see who had just entered your lair surreptitiously.</p><p></p><p>The group doubled back to the first room and took the next passage. It opened out into a large magma pool, inside an irregularly-shaped cave. Rising up from the magma ahead was a six-sided island shaped like a large rectangle with its two closest corners cut off diagonally. The passageway continued on above the magma and aimed at one of the diagonal sections, but it was a good 20 feet away. Telgrane, in the lead, could see that the back of the island held an upright section centered around a disk, while off to the side was a series of glass lenses, like those that might be found in a telescope but on a much larger scale, suspended by metal poles connected to a central shaft. The narrowest section of the island held a tall, curved wall, like half of an upright cylinder. Capering around and doing somersaults on this island was a small, humanoid figure sheathed in flames; Telgrane recognized it at once as a magmin. To the right of the island was a much taller one, this one some 20 feet away and at least the same amount higher than the one upon which the magmin pranced around. To the left, Telgrane could see a bridge made of metal plates heading off to the side of the cavern into a room beyond.</p><p></p><p>The young archmage called out to the magmin. "Hello! Is the Archmage Pandulio here by any chance?"</p><p></p><p>The magmin whirled around in mid-somersault, a goofy grin plastered on its face, and turned to face Telgrane. "Who? Oh, you mean the Great Wizard? No, he isn't here."</p><p></p><p>"Where is he, and is he expected back soon?"</p><p></p><p>"He's out exploring the Elemental Plane of Fire," the magmin reported back. "He might not be back for a while. Maybe even a long time."</p><p></p><p>"Who are you?" asked Telgrane.</p><p></p><p>"I'm <strong>Pyro</strong>," said the magmin, pulling himself up to an unimpressive height. "I'm the Great Wizard's familiar. I'm looking after the place while he's gone."</p><p></p><p>"Do you mind if we come over there to talk to you?" asked Telgrane.</p><p></p><p>"Sure, sure, fine-fine-fine!" replied the magmin, jumping up and down in excitement, eager to have some company.</p><p></p><p>Cal wasn't sure about any of them leaping across the magma pools. "Is there a better way across?" he asked. Pyro pointed toward the metal bridge, and replied, "You can go that way, if you like." Cal started backtracking to the hemispherical room, eager to try the last way out of there, and the fact that the untraveled corridor pointed in roughly the correct direction to hook up to the bridge gave him confidence that that was the way to go. Delphyne, Thunderwolf, Galrich, and Aerik followed him, while Infernia stayed with her master. Telgrane shrugged off the drow floatdisk he'd had strapped to his back, activated it, and flew it over the magma pool, his 9-foot-tall familiar standing behind him and hanging onto his shoulders; despite her great size, she was made of living fire and weighed practically nothing. They landed on the platform where Pyro awaited and the archmage introduced himself and Infernia to the magmin.</p><p></p><p>The others, meanwhile, soon found themselves in a large room whose far exit was flanked by two metallic statues, one of a coiled serpent and one of a humanoid figure covered in glowing runes. Sensing that these were guards against intruders, Cal decided for the group that they'd go back the way they had come and follow Telgrane's example; they had taken 13 of the floatdisks from the drow they had slain in their last adventure, so each of the heroes had appropriated one and spent some time getting proficient at riding them. Cal was not thrilled with the thought of riding a floatdisk over a pool of bubbling magma, but the group made it over to the six-sided island without mishap.</p><p></p><p>Once there, however, Pyro scanned each of the others, visibly disheartened to see almost everyone wearing metal armor. Then his face brightened at the sight of Delphyne, and he dropped the hem of Telgrane's <em>robes of the archmage</em>, which he'd been fondling, to go grab the hem of Delphyne's traveling cloak, setting it ablaze. The young witch shrieked and stamped out the blaze, only to have the grinning magmin make a grab for her equally-flammable dress. Delphyne jumped back onto her floatdisk, sitting on it and pulling her legs and dress up, and hovered up out of reach.</p><p></p><p>Telgrane was making the introductions when a sudden shriek behind him warned of an imminent attack. Fortunately, the attacker was just a monkey up on the higher ledge above them, and his weapon of choice was a piece of fruit, which he hurled with deadly accuracy, smacking Pyro in the side of the head. The magmin spun and snarled up at the monkey, then focused his attention on the fruit, fondling it in his flaming hands until it began to burn. The monkey scampered back away from the edge of the higher ledge, out of view.</p><p></p><p>"Who was that?" Galrich asked.</p><p></p><p>"Oh, he's just a crazy monkey," replied the magmin with disgust, still concentrating on setting the fruit on fire. "Hey, you guys can kill him if you want!"</p><p></p><p>"No, that's okay," replied Telgrane. "So, I assume that Pandulio was successful in becoming a half-fire elemental?"</p><p></p><p>"Oh, yeah, it worked just fine," replied Pyro. "I helped him with the procedure. It was easy--hey!" The magmin's outburst was the result of another piece of fruit being hurled at him, this one narrowly missing his feet. The monkey shrieked in anger, and this time the group got a better look at him - he had flames erupting out of where his eyes would normally be. "He's been through the process as well!" exclaimed Telgrane.</p><p></p><p>"Yeah, the Great Wizard tested it on a stupid monkey first, to make sure it would work. He's just a stupid monkey, though. Hey, do you guys want me to do the procedure on you? I know how to do it!" At this, the monkey shrieked even louder, then scampered away again, no doubt to go get another piece of fruit.</p><p></p><p>I think we should go check that monkey out," suggested Delphyne, raising the floating disk she was sitting upon to reach the higher level. Telgrane agreed, and activated his floatdisk as well, but Pyro called back to him. "Hey! Take me up there, too! I want to see what's up there!"</p><p></p><p>"I thought you lived here," queried Telgrane. "Don't you already know what's up there?"</p><p></p><p>"Uh, yeah, but I just want to see if everything's okay," countered the magmin. "Pandukio left me in charge, after all."</p><p></p><p>"'Pandukio?' Don't you mean 'Pandulio?'" asked Telgrane.</p><p></p><p>"Yeah, Pandulio, that's what I said," replied Pyro, reaching up to be pulled onto Telgrane's floatdisk.</p><p></p><p>"I think you'd better stay here," suggested Cal, using his "I'm a large, musclebound guy and I'm not in the mood for any backtalk" voice. Pyro backed off and changed the subject. "Hey, do you guys have anything you need burned?" he called to the others as they floated up to the upper level, receiving no answer in response and sullenly refocusing his attention on the burning fruit.</p><p></p><p>Delphyne, on the upper level, had intercepted the flaming-eyed monkey on its way back to the edge of the upper level, this time brandishing what looked to be a species of thorn-covered pear. "Hello there," she said, crouching down to its level so as to pose less of a threat. "Can you understand me?"</p><p></p><p>The monkey nodded its head vigorously and chattered away excitedly in some monkey language. Delphyne looked to the other spellcasters. "Does anybody have a <em>speak with animals</em> spell prepared?" she asked. Nobody had, but she played a hunch and asked the monkey if he was Pandulio's familiar, to which he nodded emphatically while jumping up and down in excitement. It was evident that the monkey understood the Common tongue, and since the familiars of powerful wizards develop their own unique language with their masters - as indeed, Delphyne had done with Ignacious, her raven familiar, whom she had left safe back at Headquarters - she cast a <em>comprehend languages</em> spell. Instantly, the monkey-gibberish became understandable. At the same time, Telgrane cast a <em>Rary's telepathic bond</em> spell that mentally linked all of the adventurers together, so they could "talk" telepathically between themselves.</p><p></p><p>"I can understand you now," Delphyne told the monkey. "My name is Delphyne; what's yours?"</p><p></p><p>"<strong>Chee-Chee</strong>," responded the monkey.</p><p></p><p>"Doctor Greymantle sent us. Do you know him?" The monkey nodded in affirmation, mentioning that he liked Dr. Greymantle, who occasionally brought him peanuts as a treat when he visited. The monkey visibly relaxed a bit upon the mention of Dr. Greymantle's name; apparently if the heroes were Greymantle's friends, they were welcome here in Pandulio's lair.</p><p></p><p>"We're here to visit your master, Pandulio," the witch said. "Do you know where he is?"</p><p></p><p>"He's dead," replied Chee-Chee with a definite sadness in his voice. "At least, I'm pretty sure he has to be. Sometimes, it seems like the link I shared with him is still there, very faintly...but I think that's just wishful thinking on my part."</p><p></p><p>"What happened?"</p><p></p><p>"We were performing the ritual, and everything was going well, when that magmin" - and here the flames erupted even more fiercely through the monkey's eye-sockets - "came through the portal and dropped all of the remaining focusing lenses into place. Pandulio erupted into flames, screaming, and fell over the side of the platform and into the magma pool. There's no way he could have survived."</p><p></p><p>Delphyne had been mentally translating Chee-Chee's responses over the <em>telepathic bond</em> for the benefit of the others. Having heard enough, Telgrane flew back to the lower island and approached Pyro. "Hey, did you want to come up to the upper level with me?" he asked. "There's a bunch of stuff up there that looks like it should burn." The magmin's eyes lit up and he leapt into Telgrane's outstretched arms. However, Telgrane had prepared a <em>shocking grasp</em> spell and altered the energy from electrical to cold damage, using one of the powers he had learned in his development as an archmage. Pyro's flaming body took the full blast of the cold as soon as Telgrane touched him, and he convulsed once, his flames instantly going out. The archmage pitched his corpse contemptuously into the pool of magma, where he sunk like a stone. Then the archmage returned to the upper level with the others.</p><p></p><p>Chee-Chee informed the group that his master's notes on the transformation process were in the archmage's bedroom, and took them there. Pandulio lived without extravagance, his bedroom containing a simple cot, nightstand, and freestanding closet. On the nightstand, Telgrane found an empty glass and a simple parchment. He picked up the latter and read:</p><p></p><p>"Aw, poor guy," remarked Telgrane. "It looks like even if we resurrect him, Pandulio won't be able to become a half-elemental after all. This says the human frame only gets one shot at it. Say, who's Isprienza?" he asked Chee-Chee.</p><p></p><p>"Isprienza is the fire weird who lives in the magma pools," replied the monkey. "She's a sort of extraplanar oracle; it's the reason Pandulio set up shop in this volcanic cliff in the first place: the barriers between the mortal world and the Elemental Plane of Fire are weaker here, allowing him to set up his <em>gate</em>, and Isprienza's been lairing here for centuries. She was the one who told him of the sequence needed to infuse himself - and me - with the flames of the Elemental Plane of Fire in the first place."</p><p></p><p>The group decided to go see Isprienza the fire weird for themselves. Chee-Chee led the way, down a set of stairs and onto a ledge that jutted out over a section of the magma pool. One section seemed to glow hotter than the rest; upon their approach, it bubbled and boiled, and a column of lava gushed upwards, taking on the form of a woman's upper torso that merged into the magma pool below the waist. "My name is Isprienza," she said in a voice like that of a crackling blaze. "What question do you have for me?"</p><p></p><p>Telgrane noted the use of the singular "question," and suggested over the link that they should each ask a single question. He went first. "Will the transformation process work on me?" he asked.</p><p></p><p>"Future events cannot be guaranteed, merely glimpsed between the dancing flames of possibility," replied Isprienza. "But the kindling of success has been laid out; you have but to apply the spark to give birth to the fire."</p><p></p><p>"Do we have everything we need to perform the ritual successfully?" asked Delphyne.</p><p></p><p>"Follow the instructions as given to Pandulio, recorded by his hand, with exactness; stray not from the prescribed path," intoned the fire weird.</p><p></p><p>Cal had a pretty good idea of the way the ritual was to be performed; Telgrane would stand in the apex of the parabolic mirror, while Chee-Chee deployed the lenses in sequence, and he and the others ensured that no denizens of the Elemental Plane of Fire entered through the planar gate to interrupt the ritual as Pyro had done to Pandulio. He had considered setting up a <em>wall of force</em> in front of the gate on the Elemental Plane of Fire side, to prevent entry through the gate, but was concerned that this might have disastrous effects on the ritual itself. "Would a <em>wall of force</em>, or similar spell, set up to prevent anyone from entering through the gate affect the ritual?" he asked.</p><p></p><p>"Water flows through a sieve at a slower rate," replied the fire weird, somewhat obliquely. Cal took it to mean that it wouldn't be a good idea.</p><p></p><p>Aerik cut to the chase with his question. "Is there anything we should do to give us the best chances of making sure the ritual works like it's supposed to?"</p><p></p><p>"Prevent the curious from investigating; stop the destructive from entering; have allies cross the boundary to prevent the boundary from being crossed." This settled one argument as to whether it was better to station the defenders on the Prime Material Plane side of the <em>gate</em> or on the Elemental Plane of Fire; although Telgrane had argued that cold spells - which would be more damaging to denizens of the fiery plane - were easier to cast on this plane, it looked like the better idea was to station the defenders on the far side of the gate.</p><p></p><p>"Any last questions?" Telgrane asked over the link.</p><p></p><p>"I have one," replied Delphyne. "Should we resurrect Pandulio before attempting the ritual?"</p><p></p><p>"That is not an option at this time," replied Isprienza. "You must press on without him." Then, sensing that there were no further questions from either Thunderwolf, Galrich, or Infernia, the fire weird sunk back into her pool of liquid magma, and the group retreated back to the six-sided island where the transformation ritual would take place.</p><p></p><p>Telgrane used a <em>prestidigitation</em> spell to clean the parabolic mirror, buffing it to a sparkling shine. There was a small circle inscribed on the floor just before it, apparently the bounds from which Telgrane could not move once the ritual began. The group cast their various buffing spells, with Galrich, Cal, and Delphyne receiving <em>stoneskin</em> spells, Galrich also receiving a <em>resist energy</em> spell that would protect him from fire, and Thunderwolf gaining a <em>protection from energy</em> that would do likewise. Telgrane cast a <em>flame arrow</em> spell on Thunderwolf's arrows, using his archmage abilities to grant the arrows cold damage instead of flames, the better to fight off whatever might await the defenders on the Elemental Plane of Fire. Finally, Cal cast <em>enlarge person</em> spells upon Galrich and Aerik, who had volunteered to be on the front lines, and Delphyne had an <em>attune form</em> spell ready to go as soon as they all entered the planar gate. It was decided that Infernia would stay on the six-sided island right by the gate, a final defense against anything that might make it through, while Chee-Chee manned the lens apparatus. The heroes were warned not to stand directly in front of the gate once they entered, so as not to block the energy flow being focused on Telgrane, and then, with a ready nod, Telgrane activated the planar gate, which had its command word, "Infiernus," inscribed on the floor just before it. Instantly, the center of the volcanic stone structure, which had been a pitch-black circle, roared into life as a sheet of yellowish flames, and the "defense team" jumped through, Delphyne already starting the words of her <em>attune form</em> spell as she did so.</p><p></p><p>One thing they had forgotten to take into account became immediately apparent - once the "defense team" was on the other side of the planar gate, Telgrane dropped from the <em>Rary's telepathic bond</em> spell, its magical energies unable to work across different planes of existence.</p><p></p><p>"I'm ready!" called Telgrane to the fire-eyed monkey. "Deploy the first screen!"</p><p></p><p>Chee-Chee did so, and the largest of four lenses dropped into place. Telgrane felt the heat of the fiery energies of the plane focusing upon his body, and cast the first of the four spells of the ritual, <em>endure elements</em>, upon himself. He could actually feel his body attuning itself to its new reality, and once he was sure all was well, he had Chee-Chee deploy the second screen.</p><p></p><p>Meanwhile, on the other side of the planar gate, the adventurers were in a world ablaze. Great sheets of flame rose up from the very ground, which itself seemed to consist of ashes and burning embers. Black, billowing clouds of smoke rose up from the flames to coalesce into a dark mass that passed for the sky in this strange plane. Thanks to Delphyne's <em>attune form</em> spell, the heroes were aware of the intense heat without being affected by it, but they had all been warned that the spell protected them only from the ambient heat of the Elemental Plane itself, not from the intense flames of the fire elementals and associated creatures they were liable to encounter here.</p><p></p><p>It didn't take long for such an encounter to take place. A small flock of fire bats were the first to spot the adventurers - or, more likely, the open hole to another plane behind them - and move in to investigate. Thunderwolf shot several out of the sky with his <em>frost arrows</em> before they had a chance to get close to him, and Delphyne, already having determined that her best bet on this plane was her <em>wand of magic missiles</em>, dropped a few more. A couple made it to Cal, though, and a couple more flitted around the double-sized Aerik and Galrich, who had positioned themselves as the vanguard of the defensive formation. Still, the fire bats turned out to be little more than mere nuisances compared to the following waves.</p><p></p><p>The next to appear was a noble salamander, whose first act upon encountering strangers from another world was to summon a Huge fire elemental. The massive beast immediately attacked Galrich, freeing up the salamander to lob some <em>fireballs</em> at the group, who were still clustered closely enough that he managed to get all but Cal within the spell's blast radius. The group hadn't finished with these two natives before another two creatures entered the scene, this time a pair of efreet, who started their attacks by causing <em>walls of fire</em> to rise up around both Cal and Galrich. The half-orc barbarian ignored the spell's effects, protected as he was by Delphyne's <em>resist energy</em> spell, and simply walked right through it to attack the fire elemental with his greataxe. Cal was not so protected, so he escaped by leaping upon his drow floatdisk and levitating up and over the magical wall, much to the surprise and consternation of the efreeti who had moved up to stab at him. That efreeti was even less thrilled when he was blinded and deafened by a retaliatory <em>holy word</em> spell cast by Cal, and he was cut down shortly thereafter.</p><p></p><p>Back on the Prime Material Plane, Chee-Chee was about to deploy the third lens at Telgrane's order when his erstwhile master made a sudden and unexpected return to the scene. A flaming skeleton rose up out of the magma pool, a ragged scream torn from a throat that no longer had functioning vocal cords. The burning remains of the Archmage Pandulio crawled up and stood once more upon the stone island where he had met his death - or, more properly, his undeath - and staggered over to Telgrane with claws outstretched. Infernia gave a gasp of surprise and made to move to intercept, but Telgrane told her to hold her ground and guard the portal. She only obeyed her master when she saw him summoning another means of protection: a lillend, equal parts woman, serpent, and brightly-winged bird, who manifested immediately between Telgrane and the undead monstrosity. Pandulio grabbed at the outsider, and his burning touch visibly drained life energy out of the startled lillend.</p><p></p><p>Chee-Chee was visibly disturbed by the sudden appearance of his horribly-changed master, but he held his ground at the third lens, ready to deploy it when commanded, understanding that Telgrane's attention had to remain on Pandulio before he progressed any further in the transformation ritual - and furthermore, Telgrane would have to deal with Pandulio without moving from his spot, or ruin his one shot at being successfully transformed. The burning undead was an all-too-real reminder of just how horribly wrong this ritual could go.</p><p></p><p>Amazingly, Pandulio took down the lillend in just a few brief moments, and Telgrane summoned another protector to keep the effigy away from him. This time it was a Huge fire elemental, which manifested in the magma pool at the very edge of the stone island and swiped at the burning effigy of Pandulio - but, miraculously, the stumbling form of the undead archmage evaded the elemental's outstretched arms as it tried grappling him. Pandulio stepped up to Telgrane and grabbed him by the shoulders, and the young archmage could feel the heat emanating from the constantly-burning monstrosity, could feel the very life-force being leeched from his body - and then Pandulio was grabbed around the arms and yanked back away from Telgrane, Infernia having abandoned her post to save her master from the effigy. She grappled it away from Telgrane, and practically threw Pandulio into the arms of the Huge fire elemental, who hugged the undead form to its chest and submerged back into the magma pool.</p><p></p><p>Telgrane wasted no time getting the ritual back on track - he had Chee-Chee deploy the third lens immediately, cast the <em>protection from energy</em> spell upon himself, ensured that all was well thus far, and then pressed on with the fourth lens and the final spell, <em>attune form</em>. At the end of the casting of this final spell, Telgrane's eyes exploded outwards, and vast sheets of flame gushed forth from his now-empty eye sockets. These flame-geysers soon diminished into smaller jets, and Telgrane gave Infernia his first smile as a half-fire elemental. His 9-foot-tall familiar bent down to look at him and declared, "You look very handsome this way, master!"</p><p></p><p>Even though the excitement of the ritual was winding down, the defensive team on the Elemental Plane of Fire was still in full combat mode. Galrich had managed to kill both the noble salamander and the Huge fire elemental (with some assistance in the form of spells and arrows by Delphyne and Thunderwolf), while Cal and Aerik had finished off the efreet and the remaining fire bats, when the final round of combatants reached the scene: a foursome of magma brutes. As they had approached in a rough line, side by side, Cal cast a <em>blade barrier</em> in their midst that cut three of them down to near-death immediately, leaving the fourth for Aerik to cut down with his axe. Then Infernia popped her head through the planar gate and called to the others that the ritual was complete, her master was fine, and the defensive team could return through the portal. The group hightailed it back through the gate before anything else showed up.</p><p></p><p>Once everyone was back in Pandulio's lair, Telgrane deactivated the gate and thanked Chee-Chee for his help. Now that Pandulio had been destroyed as an undead effigy, it was likely that he could be resurrected back to life; Telgrane informed the monkey that while they were currently unable to do so - Cal not having that spell prepared - they would pass news of Pandulio's passing to Dr. Greymantle and his associates, and they were sure that Pinwhistle would be able to return Pandulio to life if that was the archmage's wishes. Chee-Chee thanked the group in turn for having rescued his master from his undead state, so that he could either be returned to life or enjoy a richly-deserved afterlife. He also thanked Telgrane for having killed his master's killer, the hated Pyro, and both Chee-Chee's and Telgrane's eye-flames burned hotter and brighter at the thought of the evil magmin. Then the group said their goodbyes, and Telgrane teleported everyone back to Greyhawk City.</p><p></p><p> - - - </p><p></p><p>We had a good time with this one. Logan had been sweating bullets, especially once I had made it clear that this was a one-shot attempt for Telgrane that couldn't be duplicated if anything went wrong, and that could end up with him permanently dead. (Part of that was because I didn't want him failing the ritual - for whatever reason - and wanting to replay the same adventure over and over until he got it right.) I used sheets of orange construction paper for the sections of magma pool in this adventure, cardboard geomorphs for the "islands" in the magma pool, and desk-calendar-paper geomorphs for the other rooms. To represent the Elemental Plane of Fire, I used Google Images to find a decent full-shot screen of flames, put that into PowerPoint, stretched it to cover the slide, and then superimposed a 1" grid over the whole thing. I ended up with 8 squares across and 10-1/2 squares down centered on the sheet of paper, printed out four sheets, and configured them into a 16" by 21" sheet of flames for use as a battle mat. For the planar gate, I made a suitable structure out of cardboard, cut out a circle on the front side, and built a two-sided circle out of paper to slide into the top of it to fill the cardboard circle cutout: one side was all black (construction paper again) and the other was a sheet of flames. I started the gate on the black side and then flipped it over once the gate had been opened. And now I can always reuse the gate in other adventures by replacing the "flame" side with a different image - clouds for the Elemental Plane of Air, for instance, or a bunch of gears for Mechanus, or whatever.</p><p></p><p>I actually am glad the events of this campaign worked out this way, instead of Telgrane merging with Infernia back in "The Magma Mage." This way he gets to be a half-fire elemental and still have his (now Large) fire elemental familiar, who has turned into quite the combat weapon of late. We've also decided that Telgrane's <em>ring of fire resistance</em> - which he no longer needs, now that he's immune to fire - will be given to Infernia, since we've decided that such a ring being worn by a creature actually made of fire will allow her to cause sections of her flames to be nonflammable while she concentrates on the effect, which in turn will allow her to do such things as pick up a spellbook without having it burst immediately into flames. It's not anything that's written in the ring's <em>DMG</em> description, but it works for us.</p><p></p><p>Of course, now that Telgrane has all of his half-fire elemental powers, in the next adventure I'm going to have Logan run Akari, so he won't get to play with Telgrane's new abilities for a while. But that should be fine with him, as in the next adventure the PCs are going to get a shot at restoring their reflections currently captured in the magic mirrors in Grottlepox's Castle Shatterhope on the Muckmire Fens level of the Abyss.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Richards, post: 6166434, member: 508"] [b]ADVENTURE 71 - BAPTISM OF FIRE[/b] PC Roster: [INDENT]Cal Trop, human cleric of Kord Delphyne Babelberi, human witch (wizard) Galrich Slayer, half-orc barbarian Telgrane, human conjurer/archmage Thunderwolf, human fighter[/INDENT] NPC Roster: [INDENT]Aerik Battershield, dwarven fighter/dwarven defender[/INDENT] "This should do the trick," said Dr. Greymantle, handing over a small gem of the same style as the one that Ambrosia Black wore on her forehead when controlling the automatons in the [i]Planar Scout[/i]. "Just place it on your forehead; it contains my memory of standing on the island where my colleague, [b]the Archmage Pandulio[/b], has set up his research lab. It will allow you to teleport there as if you've been there yourself. Now if you'll excuse me," he said with a smile, "I have other matters which require my attention." And with the utterance of an arcane syllable, he vanished from the room. Telgrane held the small stone in his hand for a moment, then shrugged and placed it on his forehead. It immediately glowed with an inner light. "Whoa!" he exclaimed, his memories suddenly filling with experiences he had never dealt with firsthand before. He closed his eyes for a moment to steady the sudden dizzy sensation, then opened them again and grinned. "Got it!" he exclaimed. "Everybody ready to teleport over to Pandulio's island?" The others gathered around him and he said the words to a [i]teleport[/i] spell he had prepared for this very occasion. The familiar confines of the Wing Three common living area gave way to a white, sandy beach at the edge a steaming jungle, the caws of colorful parrots and the shrieks of monkeys competing with the ever-present crash of waves on the beach behind them. Ahead of the group, a curving path cut through the heavy jungle growths, leading to a cave opening in the side of a rocky cliffside. "This way," called Telgrane, leading the others up the path. Just inside the cave's shadowy entrance stood a statue of an elegant sylph. A [i]magic mouth[/i] spell activated upon the group's entry, causing the statue to appear to ask, "Is Pandulio expecting you?" Telgrane looked at the others, shrugged, and said "Yes," assuming that Greymantle would probably have mentioned that the group was coming to pay him a visit. The statue gave no response, and the group looked around in confusion, unsure of what they were supposed to do now. "According to Dr. Greymantle's memories," Telgrane reported, "Pandulio would usually enter the cave from a secret passage in the back, there." He pointed to the back of the cave, while Galrich tried having a conversation with the statue. "Hey, is Pandulio even home?" he asked the carved image, but the sylph gave no reply. "Got something!" said Cal, having examined the back of the cave in the illumination cast by Infernia, who was still in her 9-foot-tall form, the better to assist her master in combat. The cleric pointed out a crack in the wall, no doubt the seam where a door opened up. He followed the crack, marking off a section easily large enough to be a door, probably one of those that swiveled in the middle. He pushed tentatively on either edge, to no avail. "I can probably force it open," he suggested, ready to channel one of Kord's feats of strength through his willing limbs. "Let's not break down the door of the guy we're here to visit," suggested Telgrane. "There should be a latch or something hidden around here that opens it up." The group spread out, seeking a hidden button, lever, or switch. Cal found it, hidden on the back of the neck of the sylph statue, underneath her flowing hair. Delphyne gave him a sidelong glance, as if to point out she had noticed that in a cave of fairly considerable size he had somehow managed to focus his search on the nearly-nude statue of a beautiful sylph, but the cleric of Kord refused to be embarrassed. He had, after all, been the one to look in the right place. Cal pushed in the button, there was a click from the back of the cave, and the secret door swiveled open. Telgrane was the first to enter, followed by his large fire elemental familiar. The passageway beyond the door was narrow enough to force the group to move single file, and after a few twists it opened up into a hemispherical room with three other corridors leading in different directions. The one directly ahead gave off a soft, red illumination, but the archmage was more interested in the circular floor, for his arcane vision had picked up a series of delicately-carved glyphs radiating an aura of conjuration magic of the type associated with teleportation effects. They seemed to be centered on the middle of the room. "Stick close to the outer wall," suggested Telgrane, as he scooted around to the right, taking the corridor that first presented itself. It turned a corner, went up a few steps, and then ended in a small room shaped like a narrow "T." The far wall of the "T" was made of some transparent material, and overlooked a small, circular island rising up out of a pool of magma, with a short set of stairs leading down into the bubbling lava. Given the fact that the island's circumference seemed to be the same diameter as the room he had just left, he suspected he had just seen where those who stepped on the teleport trap were likely to end up, which made sense if you thought of this T-shaped room as an observation port to see who had just entered your lair surreptitiously. The group doubled back to the first room and took the next passage. It opened out into a large magma pool, inside an irregularly-shaped cave. Rising up from the magma ahead was a six-sided island shaped like a large rectangle with its two closest corners cut off diagonally. The passageway continued on above the magma and aimed at one of the diagonal sections, but it was a good 20 feet away. Telgrane, in the lead, could see that the back of the island held an upright section centered around a disk, while off to the side was a series of glass lenses, like those that might be found in a telescope but on a much larger scale, suspended by metal poles connected to a central shaft. The narrowest section of the island held a tall, curved wall, like half of an upright cylinder. Capering around and doing somersaults on this island was a small, humanoid figure sheathed in flames; Telgrane recognized it at once as a magmin. To the right of the island was a much taller one, this one some 20 feet away and at least the same amount higher than the one upon which the magmin pranced around. To the left, Telgrane could see a bridge made of metal plates heading off to the side of the cavern into a room beyond. The young archmage called out to the magmin. "Hello! Is the Archmage Pandulio here by any chance?" The magmin whirled around in mid-somersault, a goofy grin plastered on its face, and turned to face Telgrane. "Who? Oh, you mean the Great Wizard? No, he isn't here." "Where is he, and is he expected back soon?" "He's out exploring the Elemental Plane of Fire," the magmin reported back. "He might not be back for a while. Maybe even a long time." "Who are you?" asked Telgrane. "I'm [b]Pyro[/b]," said the magmin, pulling himself up to an unimpressive height. "I'm the Great Wizard's familiar. I'm looking after the place while he's gone." "Do you mind if we come over there to talk to you?" asked Telgrane. "Sure, sure, fine-fine-fine!" replied the magmin, jumping up and down in excitement, eager to have some company. Cal wasn't sure about any of them leaping across the magma pools. "Is there a better way across?" he asked. Pyro pointed toward the metal bridge, and replied, "You can go that way, if you like." Cal started backtracking to the hemispherical room, eager to try the last way out of there, and the fact that the untraveled corridor pointed in roughly the correct direction to hook up to the bridge gave him confidence that that was the way to go. Delphyne, Thunderwolf, Galrich, and Aerik followed him, while Infernia stayed with her master. Telgrane shrugged off the drow floatdisk he'd had strapped to his back, activated it, and flew it over the magma pool, his 9-foot-tall familiar standing behind him and hanging onto his shoulders; despite her great size, she was made of living fire and weighed practically nothing. They landed on the platform where Pyro awaited and the archmage introduced himself and Infernia to the magmin. The others, meanwhile, soon found themselves in a large room whose far exit was flanked by two metallic statues, one of a coiled serpent and one of a humanoid figure covered in glowing runes. Sensing that these were guards against intruders, Cal decided for the group that they'd go back the way they had come and follow Telgrane's example; they had taken 13 of the floatdisks from the drow they had slain in their last adventure, so each of the heroes had appropriated one and spent some time getting proficient at riding them. Cal was not thrilled with the thought of riding a floatdisk over a pool of bubbling magma, but the group made it over to the six-sided island without mishap. Once there, however, Pyro scanned each of the others, visibly disheartened to see almost everyone wearing metal armor. Then his face brightened at the sight of Delphyne, and he dropped the hem of Telgrane's [i]robes of the archmage[/i], which he'd been fondling, to go grab the hem of Delphyne's traveling cloak, setting it ablaze. The young witch shrieked and stamped out the blaze, only to have the grinning magmin make a grab for her equally-flammable dress. Delphyne jumped back onto her floatdisk, sitting on it and pulling her legs and dress up, and hovered up out of reach. Telgrane was making the introductions when a sudden shriek behind him warned of an imminent attack. Fortunately, the attacker was just a monkey up on the higher ledge above them, and his weapon of choice was a piece of fruit, which he hurled with deadly accuracy, smacking Pyro in the side of the head. The magmin spun and snarled up at the monkey, then focused his attention on the fruit, fondling it in his flaming hands until it began to burn. The monkey scampered back away from the edge of the higher ledge, out of view. "Who was that?" Galrich asked. "Oh, he's just a crazy monkey," replied the magmin with disgust, still concentrating on setting the fruit on fire. "Hey, you guys can kill him if you want!" "No, that's okay," replied Telgrane. "So, I assume that Pandulio was successful in becoming a half-fire elemental?" "Oh, yeah, it worked just fine," replied Pyro. "I helped him with the procedure. It was easy--hey!" The magmin's outburst was the result of another piece of fruit being hurled at him, this one narrowly missing his feet. The monkey shrieked in anger, and this time the group got a better look at him - he had flames erupting out of where his eyes would normally be. "He's been through the process as well!" exclaimed Telgrane. "Yeah, the Great Wizard tested it on a stupid monkey first, to make sure it would work. He's just a stupid monkey, though. Hey, do you guys want me to do the procedure on you? I know how to do it!" At this, the monkey shrieked even louder, then scampered away again, no doubt to go get another piece of fruit. I think we should go check that monkey out," suggested Delphyne, raising the floating disk she was sitting upon to reach the higher level. Telgrane agreed, and activated his floatdisk as well, but Pyro called back to him. "Hey! Take me up there, too! I want to see what's up there!" "I thought you lived here," queried Telgrane. "Don't you already know what's up there?" "Uh, yeah, but I just want to see if everything's okay," countered the magmin. "Pandukio left me in charge, after all." "'Pandukio?' Don't you mean 'Pandulio?'" asked Telgrane. "Yeah, Pandulio, that's what I said," replied Pyro, reaching up to be pulled onto Telgrane's floatdisk. "I think you'd better stay here," suggested Cal, using his "I'm a large, musclebound guy and I'm not in the mood for any backtalk" voice. Pyro backed off and changed the subject. "Hey, do you guys have anything you need burned?" he called to the others as they floated up to the upper level, receiving no answer in response and sullenly refocusing his attention on the burning fruit. Delphyne, on the upper level, had intercepted the flaming-eyed monkey on its way back to the edge of the upper level, this time brandishing what looked to be a species of thorn-covered pear. "Hello there," she said, crouching down to its level so as to pose less of a threat. "Can you understand me?" The monkey nodded its head vigorously and chattered away excitedly in some monkey language. Delphyne looked to the other spellcasters. "Does anybody have a [i]speak with animals[/i] spell prepared?" she asked. Nobody had, but she played a hunch and asked the monkey if he was Pandulio's familiar, to which he nodded emphatically while jumping up and down in excitement. It was evident that the monkey understood the Common tongue, and since the familiars of powerful wizards develop their own unique language with their masters - as indeed, Delphyne had done with Ignacious, her raven familiar, whom she had left safe back at Headquarters - she cast a [i]comprehend languages[/i] spell. Instantly, the monkey-gibberish became understandable. At the same time, Telgrane cast a [i]Rary's telepathic bond[/i] spell that mentally linked all of the adventurers together, so they could "talk" telepathically between themselves. "I can understand you now," Delphyne told the monkey. "My name is Delphyne; what's yours?" "[b]Chee-Chee[/b]," responded the monkey. "Doctor Greymantle sent us. Do you know him?" The monkey nodded in affirmation, mentioning that he liked Dr. Greymantle, who occasionally brought him peanuts as a treat when he visited. The monkey visibly relaxed a bit upon the mention of Dr. Greymantle's name; apparently if the heroes were Greymantle's friends, they were welcome here in Pandulio's lair. "We're here to visit your master, Pandulio," the witch said. "Do you know where he is?" "He's dead," replied Chee-Chee with a definite sadness in his voice. "At least, I'm pretty sure he has to be. Sometimes, it seems like the link I shared with him is still there, very faintly...but I think that's just wishful thinking on my part." "What happened?" "We were performing the ritual, and everything was going well, when that magmin" - and here the flames erupted even more fiercely through the monkey's eye-sockets - "came through the portal and dropped all of the remaining focusing lenses into place. Pandulio erupted into flames, screaming, and fell over the side of the platform and into the magma pool. There's no way he could have survived." Delphyne had been mentally translating Chee-Chee's responses over the [i]telepathic bond[/i] for the benefit of the others. Having heard enough, Telgrane flew back to the lower island and approached Pyro. "Hey, did you want to come up to the upper level with me?" he asked. "There's a bunch of stuff up there that looks like it should burn." The magmin's eyes lit up and he leapt into Telgrane's outstretched arms. However, Telgrane had prepared a [i]shocking grasp[/i] spell and altered the energy from electrical to cold damage, using one of the powers he had learned in his development as an archmage. Pyro's flaming body took the full blast of the cold as soon as Telgrane touched him, and he convulsed once, his flames instantly going out. The archmage pitched his corpse contemptuously into the pool of magma, where he sunk like a stone. Then the archmage returned to the upper level with the others. Chee-Chee informed the group that his master's notes on the transformation process were in the archmage's bedroom, and took them there. Pandulio lived without extravagance, his bedroom containing a simple cot, nightstand, and freestanding closet. On the nightstand, Telgrane found an empty glass and a simple parchment. He picked up the latter and read: "Aw, poor guy," remarked Telgrane. "It looks like even if we resurrect him, Pandulio won't be able to become a half-elemental after all. This says the human frame only gets one shot at it. Say, who's Isprienza?" he asked Chee-Chee. "Isprienza is the fire weird who lives in the magma pools," replied the monkey. "She's a sort of extraplanar oracle; it's the reason Pandulio set up shop in this volcanic cliff in the first place: the barriers between the mortal world and the Elemental Plane of Fire are weaker here, allowing him to set up his [i]gate[/i], and Isprienza's been lairing here for centuries. She was the one who told him of the sequence needed to infuse himself - and me - with the flames of the Elemental Plane of Fire in the first place." The group decided to go see Isprienza the fire weird for themselves. Chee-Chee led the way, down a set of stairs and onto a ledge that jutted out over a section of the magma pool. One section seemed to glow hotter than the rest; upon their approach, it bubbled and boiled, and a column of lava gushed upwards, taking on the form of a woman's upper torso that merged into the magma pool below the waist. "My name is Isprienza," she said in a voice like that of a crackling blaze. "What question do you have for me?" Telgrane noted the use of the singular "question," and suggested over the link that they should each ask a single question. He went first. "Will the transformation process work on me?" he asked. "Future events cannot be guaranteed, merely glimpsed between the dancing flames of possibility," replied Isprienza. "But the kindling of success has been laid out; you have but to apply the spark to give birth to the fire." "Do we have everything we need to perform the ritual successfully?" asked Delphyne. "Follow the instructions as given to Pandulio, recorded by his hand, with exactness; stray not from the prescribed path," intoned the fire weird. Cal had a pretty good idea of the way the ritual was to be performed; Telgrane would stand in the apex of the parabolic mirror, while Chee-Chee deployed the lenses in sequence, and he and the others ensured that no denizens of the Elemental Plane of Fire entered through the planar gate to interrupt the ritual as Pyro had done to Pandulio. He had considered setting up a [i]wall of force[/i] in front of the gate on the Elemental Plane of Fire side, to prevent entry through the gate, but was concerned that this might have disastrous effects on the ritual itself. "Would a [i]wall of force[/i], or similar spell, set up to prevent anyone from entering through the gate affect the ritual?" he asked. "Water flows through a sieve at a slower rate," replied the fire weird, somewhat obliquely. Cal took it to mean that it wouldn't be a good idea. Aerik cut to the chase with his question. "Is there anything we should do to give us the best chances of making sure the ritual works like it's supposed to?" "Prevent the curious from investigating; stop the destructive from entering; have allies cross the boundary to prevent the boundary from being crossed." This settled one argument as to whether it was better to station the defenders on the Prime Material Plane side of the [i]gate[/i] or on the Elemental Plane of Fire; although Telgrane had argued that cold spells - which would be more damaging to denizens of the fiery plane - were easier to cast on this plane, it looked like the better idea was to station the defenders on the far side of the gate. "Any last questions?" Telgrane asked over the link. "I have one," replied Delphyne. "Should we resurrect Pandulio before attempting the ritual?" "That is not an option at this time," replied Isprienza. "You must press on without him." Then, sensing that there were no further questions from either Thunderwolf, Galrich, or Infernia, the fire weird sunk back into her pool of liquid magma, and the group retreated back to the six-sided island where the transformation ritual would take place. Telgrane used a [i]prestidigitation[/i] spell to clean the parabolic mirror, buffing it to a sparkling shine. There was a small circle inscribed on the floor just before it, apparently the bounds from which Telgrane could not move once the ritual began. The group cast their various buffing spells, with Galrich, Cal, and Delphyne receiving [i]stoneskin[/i] spells, Galrich also receiving a [i]resist energy[/i] spell that would protect him from fire, and Thunderwolf gaining a [i]protection from energy[/i] that would do likewise. Telgrane cast a [i]flame arrow[/i] spell on Thunderwolf's arrows, using his archmage abilities to grant the arrows cold damage instead of flames, the better to fight off whatever might await the defenders on the Elemental Plane of Fire. Finally, Cal cast [i]enlarge person[/i] spells upon Galrich and Aerik, who had volunteered to be on the front lines, and Delphyne had an [i]attune form[/i] spell ready to go as soon as they all entered the planar gate. It was decided that Infernia would stay on the six-sided island right by the gate, a final defense against anything that might make it through, while Chee-Chee manned the lens apparatus. The heroes were warned not to stand directly in front of the gate once they entered, so as not to block the energy flow being focused on Telgrane, and then, with a ready nod, Telgrane activated the planar gate, which had its command word, "Infiernus," inscribed on the floor just before it. Instantly, the center of the volcanic stone structure, which had been a pitch-black circle, roared into life as a sheet of yellowish flames, and the "defense team" jumped through, Delphyne already starting the words of her [i]attune form[/i] spell as she did so. One thing they had forgotten to take into account became immediately apparent - once the "defense team" was on the other side of the planar gate, Telgrane dropped from the [i]Rary's telepathic bond[/i] spell, its magical energies unable to work across different planes of existence. "I'm ready!" called Telgrane to the fire-eyed monkey. "Deploy the first screen!" Chee-Chee did so, and the largest of four lenses dropped into place. Telgrane felt the heat of the fiery energies of the plane focusing upon his body, and cast the first of the four spells of the ritual, [i]endure elements[/i], upon himself. He could actually feel his body attuning itself to its new reality, and once he was sure all was well, he had Chee-Chee deploy the second screen. Meanwhile, on the other side of the planar gate, the adventurers were in a world ablaze. Great sheets of flame rose up from the very ground, which itself seemed to consist of ashes and burning embers. Black, billowing clouds of smoke rose up from the flames to coalesce into a dark mass that passed for the sky in this strange plane. Thanks to Delphyne's [i]attune form[/i] spell, the heroes were aware of the intense heat without being affected by it, but they had all been warned that the spell protected them only from the ambient heat of the Elemental Plane itself, not from the intense flames of the fire elementals and associated creatures they were liable to encounter here. It didn't take long for such an encounter to take place. A small flock of fire bats were the first to spot the adventurers - or, more likely, the open hole to another plane behind them - and move in to investigate. Thunderwolf shot several out of the sky with his [i]frost arrows[/i] before they had a chance to get close to him, and Delphyne, already having determined that her best bet on this plane was her [i]wand of magic missiles[/i], dropped a few more. A couple made it to Cal, though, and a couple more flitted around the double-sized Aerik and Galrich, who had positioned themselves as the vanguard of the defensive formation. Still, the fire bats turned out to be little more than mere nuisances compared to the following waves. The next to appear was a noble salamander, whose first act upon encountering strangers from another world was to summon a Huge fire elemental. The massive beast immediately attacked Galrich, freeing up the salamander to lob some [i]fireballs[/i] at the group, who were still clustered closely enough that he managed to get all but Cal within the spell's blast radius. The group hadn't finished with these two natives before another two creatures entered the scene, this time a pair of efreet, who started their attacks by causing [i]walls of fire[/i] to rise up around both Cal and Galrich. The half-orc barbarian ignored the spell's effects, protected as he was by Delphyne's [i]resist energy[/i] spell, and simply walked right through it to attack the fire elemental with his greataxe. Cal was not so protected, so he escaped by leaping upon his drow floatdisk and levitating up and over the magical wall, much to the surprise and consternation of the efreeti who had moved up to stab at him. That efreeti was even less thrilled when he was blinded and deafened by a retaliatory [i]holy word[/i] spell cast by Cal, and he was cut down shortly thereafter. Back on the Prime Material Plane, Chee-Chee was about to deploy the third lens at Telgrane's order when his erstwhile master made a sudden and unexpected return to the scene. A flaming skeleton rose up out of the magma pool, a ragged scream torn from a throat that no longer had functioning vocal cords. The burning remains of the Archmage Pandulio crawled up and stood once more upon the stone island where he had met his death - or, more properly, his undeath - and staggered over to Telgrane with claws outstretched. Infernia gave a gasp of surprise and made to move to intercept, but Telgrane told her to hold her ground and guard the portal. She only obeyed her master when she saw him summoning another means of protection: a lillend, equal parts woman, serpent, and brightly-winged bird, who manifested immediately between Telgrane and the undead monstrosity. Pandulio grabbed at the outsider, and his burning touch visibly drained life energy out of the startled lillend. Chee-Chee was visibly disturbed by the sudden appearance of his horribly-changed master, but he held his ground at the third lens, ready to deploy it when commanded, understanding that Telgrane's attention had to remain on Pandulio before he progressed any further in the transformation ritual - and furthermore, Telgrane would have to deal with Pandulio without moving from his spot, or ruin his one shot at being successfully transformed. The burning undead was an all-too-real reminder of just how horribly wrong this ritual could go. Amazingly, Pandulio took down the lillend in just a few brief moments, and Telgrane summoned another protector to keep the effigy away from him. This time it was a Huge fire elemental, which manifested in the magma pool at the very edge of the stone island and swiped at the burning effigy of Pandulio - but, miraculously, the stumbling form of the undead archmage evaded the elemental's outstretched arms as it tried grappling him. Pandulio stepped up to Telgrane and grabbed him by the shoulders, and the young archmage could feel the heat emanating from the constantly-burning monstrosity, could feel the very life-force being leeched from his body - and then Pandulio was grabbed around the arms and yanked back away from Telgrane, Infernia having abandoned her post to save her master from the effigy. She grappled it away from Telgrane, and practically threw Pandulio into the arms of the Huge fire elemental, who hugged the undead form to its chest and submerged back into the magma pool. Telgrane wasted no time getting the ritual back on track - he had Chee-Chee deploy the third lens immediately, cast the [i]protection from energy[/i] spell upon himself, ensured that all was well thus far, and then pressed on with the fourth lens and the final spell, [i]attune form[/i]. At the end of the casting of this final spell, Telgrane's eyes exploded outwards, and vast sheets of flame gushed forth from his now-empty eye sockets. These flame-geysers soon diminished into smaller jets, and Telgrane gave Infernia his first smile as a half-fire elemental. His 9-foot-tall familiar bent down to look at him and declared, "You look very handsome this way, master!" Even though the excitement of the ritual was winding down, the defensive team on the Elemental Plane of Fire was still in full combat mode. Galrich had managed to kill both the noble salamander and the Huge fire elemental (with some assistance in the form of spells and arrows by Delphyne and Thunderwolf), while Cal and Aerik had finished off the efreet and the remaining fire bats, when the final round of combatants reached the scene: a foursome of magma brutes. As they had approached in a rough line, side by side, Cal cast a [i]blade barrier[/i] in their midst that cut three of them down to near-death immediately, leaving the fourth for Aerik to cut down with his axe. Then Infernia popped her head through the planar gate and called to the others that the ritual was complete, her master was fine, and the defensive team could return through the portal. The group hightailed it back through the gate before anything else showed up. Once everyone was back in Pandulio's lair, Telgrane deactivated the gate and thanked Chee-Chee for his help. Now that Pandulio had been destroyed as an undead effigy, it was likely that he could be resurrected back to life; Telgrane informed the monkey that while they were currently unable to do so - Cal not having that spell prepared - they would pass news of Pandulio's passing to Dr. Greymantle and his associates, and they were sure that Pinwhistle would be able to return Pandulio to life if that was the archmage's wishes. Chee-Chee thanked the group in turn for having rescued his master from his undead state, so that he could either be returned to life or enjoy a richly-deserved afterlife. He also thanked Telgrane for having killed his master's killer, the hated Pyro, and both Chee-Chee's and Telgrane's eye-flames burned hotter and brighter at the thought of the evil magmin. Then the group said their goodbyes, and Telgrane teleported everyone back to Greyhawk City. - - - We had a good time with this one. Logan had been sweating bullets, especially once I had made it clear that this was a one-shot attempt for Telgrane that couldn't be duplicated if anything went wrong, and that could end up with him permanently dead. (Part of that was because I didn't want him failing the ritual - for whatever reason - and wanting to replay the same adventure over and over until he got it right.) I used sheets of orange construction paper for the sections of magma pool in this adventure, cardboard geomorphs for the "islands" in the magma pool, and desk-calendar-paper geomorphs for the other rooms. To represent the Elemental Plane of Fire, I used Google Images to find a decent full-shot screen of flames, put that into PowerPoint, stretched it to cover the slide, and then superimposed a 1" grid over the whole thing. I ended up with 8 squares across and 10-1/2 squares down centered on the sheet of paper, printed out four sheets, and configured them into a 16" by 21" sheet of flames for use as a battle mat. For the planar gate, I made a suitable structure out of cardboard, cut out a circle on the front side, and built a two-sided circle out of paper to slide into the top of it to fill the cardboard circle cutout: one side was all black (construction paper again) and the other was a sheet of flames. I started the gate on the black side and then flipped it over once the gate had been opened. And now I can always reuse the gate in other adventures by replacing the "flame" side with a different image - clouds for the Elemental Plane of Air, for instance, or a bunch of gears for Mechanus, or whatever. I actually am glad the events of this campaign worked out this way, instead of Telgrane merging with Infernia back in "The Magma Mage." This way he gets to be a half-fire elemental and still have his (now Large) fire elemental familiar, who has turned into quite the combat weapon of late. We've also decided that Telgrane's [i]ring of fire resistance[/i] - which he no longer needs, now that he's immune to fire - will be given to Infernia, since we've decided that such a ring being worn by a creature actually made of fire will allow her to cause sections of her flames to be nonflammable while she concentrates on the effect, which in turn will allow her to do such things as pick up a spellbook without having it burst immediately into flames. It's not anything that's written in the ring's [i]DMG[/i] description, but it works for us. Of course, now that Telgrane has all of his half-fire elemental powers, in the next adventure I'm going to have Logan run Akari, so he won't get to play with Telgrane's new abilities for a while. But that should be fine with him, as in the next adventure the PCs are going to get a shot at restoring their reflections currently captured in the magic mirrors in Grottlepox's Castle Shatterhope on the Muckmire Fens level of the Abyss. [/QUOTE]
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