SanjMerchant
Explorer
You know, not waiting for answer there. Sorry for being an ass.
ZEITGEIST [ZEITGEIST] The Continuing Adventures of Korrigan & Co.
You know, not waiting for answer there. Sorry for being an ass.
gideonpepys
Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.
Session 255, Part Two
Emmanuel of the Planes
With the solo missions over, it still remained for Korrigan to free Slate. Lauryn Cyneburg suggested she take him to Shale too. Gale went along to broadcast his words, as did a squad of ‘battleminds’ trained by Orum Dwist and Throgmorton at the behest of Sebastian Harlock. (They had laid low since the Ob took over; now their job was to counter and disperse resistant pockets of hiveminds.) These endeavours took time, but involved little or no peril. Korrigan freed Viscount Price-Hill and addressed the people of Slate, then freed Duchess Ethelyn and did likewise in Shale. Price-Hill offered to resign his post; Korrigan said it would not be necessary. Ethelyn knelt when she was freed and re-pledged allegiance.
On their journey, Korrigan told Gale and Cyneburg about Sor Daeron, whom he’d had the chance to talk to just before leaving Seobriga. It was a sad tale. Though physically hale, the eladrin general was evidently senile, locked in the past and convinced that his true enemy was Kasvarina – that he needed to face her in order to defeat the Ob.
Korrigan also made telepathic contact with Naz Duchamps, his contact in Cherage. Naz replied that he and his allies were ready to take advantage of Han Jierre’s absence, and establish a new Republic of Danor.
Out of sheer curiosity, Leon visited his Dream Palace to see if it might be possible to meet himself (as his sundered self had access to the Palace too). Nothing untoward occurred and he left. (Shortly after he’d gone, his other self came out from behind a large pot-plant, where he had hid to avoid confusion.)
They also received a message from Bishop Antonescu, who had been visited by his friend Malthusius in a dream. The old deva had asked him to help King Baldrey. So he invited them all to the clergy cathedral in North Shore, where they found Bendick and many other Family bravuras, hiding from the hiveminds. They asked the unit to help bring Morgan Cippiano back from Alais Primos, to which they agreed. Antonescu then opened up his vault for the second time and gave them a scroll of heroes feast.
Before departing Flint, they gathered what they needed for the Sacrament of Apotheosis: Linia fetched the entrails of an eagle; dockers were easily able to provide the innards of a whale from a whaling station in the newly industrialised Ayres; Harkover Lee peformed his ‘last service to the nation’ in posthumously donating his guts.
They gathered on the Coaltongue, already on its way to Axis Island. Matunaaga’s wife, Ayesha, provided healing for the whole team. Then they teleported to Pemberton’s lair.
Once repairs to the Coaltongue were underway, they gathered with their allies to discuss their plans, and Linia told them what icons they could expect to receive (as and when Uriel was able to send them to Kai). After much discussion over many hours, their sundered selves had chosen the following planes:
LIFE – Jiese, keeping the trait of clever technology, but shifting away from the fires of industry
DEATH – Av, to maintain their allegiance with the Dreaming
TIME – Ascetia, a plane that made people more aware of the lessons of history
SPACE – Urim, to provide some security against teleportation
EARTH – Mojang, to enable bio-technology, boosted by the cunning of Jeise; industry will be less of an anathema to the fey
AIR – Caeloon, a plane that made people more resilient in the face of tragedy (and also helped out their allies)
FIRE – Etheax, making people more patient, and fire magic (and therefore life and technology) easier.
WATER – Ostea, to keep the trait of healing.
Linia explained that they had discovered certain planes that could be conjoined with others, just as the Ob had added Baden. Each such addition was increasingly difficult, but they had chosen to risk adding three minor planes, in the following order of importance:
None of the unit was hugely attached to Urim in the Space slot, and they agreed. (Though Korrigan wondered all the while just how dangerous it would be to cross Pemberton. His flash of ire, though suppressed, was a reminder of his true nature. Rumdoom was glowering too. But he’d been doing so much of that lately, that everyone ignored him.)
Once they had discussed the planar alignments, they turned their attention to the sacrament, and decided how they would divide the power they absorbed from their global network of supporters.
Conquo told them he would be able to grow big enough to move the stone pillars on the island, but hey decided he needed back-up: Rumdoom would generate substantial support in any case, from his cult, if he channelled even more, he would be able to move the stone pillars too. Uru would take on the divine power to create – to mend the Coaltongue he she was damaged again. Quratulain chose plentitude, all the better to wield her many weapons. Korrigan would become unstoppable as he and Kai would need to implant the icons when they received them. (When would that be?!?) Gupta already drew enough power from the eladrin; she would need no more. Leon said he would decide later.
Now Pemberton made the suggestion that they create an illusory decoy of the Coaltongue approaching from the south, to augment their subterfuge. Leon could create such an illusion well enough to defy all but the closest scrutiny; Linia could bear him aloft from the south to distract the Ob.
They made final preparations and had some time to themselves. There was enough time for Uru to enter a fey trance and wake refreshed. When he did, a small, sealed scroll had been placed in his lap. Opening it, he found a contract for the assassination of Sovereign Han Jierre. “He will be found aboard his flagship on the Island of Axis. Approach unseen and ingress will be provided.” Uru excitedly skipped to the end, to find out what payment would be due and to his astonishment found that his mystery patron knew his deepest, dearest wish: to establish a new, secure vault under the Anthras mountains to replace the Vault of Heresies. His reward for killing Han Jierre would be “the provision of materials and arcane expertise, as well as the ideal location for the planned Crypta Damnatorum”. Excitedly, Uru showed it to Korrigan, wondering if he could trust the anonymous sender. Korrigan pointed out that the sender had in fact signed the contract, shortly before appending payment details in a postscript (a detail Uru had missed, in his haste). The ‘mystery patron’ was none other than El Extrano
(Do not be impressed.)
And so, once prepared, they boarded the Coaltongue, and set off for Axis Island on their final mission.
Elsewhere, their other selves were approaching Reida and their confrontation Voice of Rot. The winds of the Gyre howled about them, causing the very hull of their vessel to shudder. They manoeuvred the ship as carefully as they could, hoping to get a shot at the titan with the Coaltongue’s brand.
All of a sudden, a terrible noise issued from the engine room. They began to lose power! The ship listed and banked, in the grip of the terrible vortex.
“Sabotage!” Uru declared and at once he realised the culprits: the gremlins of Metarie had somehow stolen on board.
“The stone discs!” thought Uriel. If only he hadn’t summoned them back to him, perhaps they would have known they had been compromised.
But there was no time for regret, only action: the unit needed to get onto Reida, and their crew (if possible) needed to be rescued.
Tune in next time for the penultimate episode of… ZEITGEIST
Emmanuel of the Planes
With the solo missions over, it still remained for Korrigan to free Slate. Lauryn Cyneburg suggested she take him to Shale too. Gale went along to broadcast his words, as did a squad of ‘battleminds’ trained by Orum Dwist and Throgmorton at the behest of Sebastian Harlock. (They had laid low since the Ob took over; now their job was to counter and disperse resistant pockets of hiveminds.) These endeavours took time, but involved little or no peril. Korrigan freed Viscount Price-Hill and addressed the people of Slate, then freed Duchess Ethelyn and did likewise in Shale. Price-Hill offered to resign his post; Korrigan said it would not be necessary. Ethelyn knelt when she was freed and re-pledged allegiance.
On their journey, Korrigan told Gale and Cyneburg about Sor Daeron, whom he’d had the chance to talk to just before leaving Seobriga. It was a sad tale. Though physically hale, the eladrin general was evidently senile, locked in the past and convinced that his true enemy was Kasvarina – that he needed to face her in order to defeat the Ob.
Korrigan also made telepathic contact with Naz Duchamps, his contact in Cherage. Naz replied that he and his allies were ready to take advantage of Han Jierre’s absence, and establish a new Republic of Danor.
Out of sheer curiosity, Leon visited his Dream Palace to see if it might be possible to meet himself (as his sundered self had access to the Palace too). Nothing untoward occurred and he left. (Shortly after he’d gone, his other self came out from behind a large pot-plant, where he had hid to avoid confusion.)
They also received a message from Bishop Antonescu, who had been visited by his friend Malthusius in a dream. The old deva had asked him to help King Baldrey. So he invited them all to the clergy cathedral in North Shore, where they found Bendick and many other Family bravuras, hiding from the hiveminds. They asked the unit to help bring Morgan Cippiano back from Alais Primos, to which they agreed. Antonescu then opened up his vault for the second time and gave them a scroll of heroes feast.
Before departing Flint, they gathered what they needed for the Sacrament of Apotheosis: Linia fetched the entrails of an eagle; dockers were easily able to provide the innards of a whale from a whaling station in the newly industrialised Ayres; Harkover Lee peformed his ‘last service to the nation’ in posthumously donating his guts.
They gathered on the Coaltongue, already on its way to Axis Island. Matunaaga’s wife, Ayesha, provided healing for the whole team. Then they teleported to Pemberton’s lair.
Once repairs to the Coaltongue were underway, they gathered with their allies to discuss their plans, and Linia told them what icons they could expect to receive (as and when Uriel was able to send them to Kai). After much discussion over many hours, their sundered selves had chosen the following planes:
LIFE – Jiese, keeping the trait of clever technology, but shifting away from the fires of industry
DEATH – Av, to maintain their allegiance with the Dreaming
TIME – Ascetia, a plane that made people more aware of the lessons of history
SPACE – Urim, to provide some security against teleportation
EARTH – Mojang, to enable bio-technology, boosted by the cunning of Jeise; industry will be less of an anathema to the fey
AIR – Caeloon, a plane that made people more resilient in the face of tragedy (and also helped out their allies)
FIRE – Etheax, making people more patient, and fire magic (and therefore life and technology) easier.
WATER – Ostea, to keep the trait of healing.
Linia explained that they had discovered certain planes that could be conjoined with others, just as the Ob had added Baden. Each such addition was increasingly difficult, but they had chosen to risk adding three minor planes, in the following order of importance:
- Dunkelweiss – a dwarven pocket-plane that made alcohol healthy. Added to Mojang.
- Iratha Ket – people would become more altruistic and inclined to burst into spontaneous song. This would not be a place, but a people – a celebration of death that passed through the night like a musical Great Hunt. Added to Av.
- Teykfa – an eternal clock that allowed the manipulation of time. To be joined with Ascetia.
None of the unit was hugely attached to Urim in the Space slot, and they agreed. (Though Korrigan wondered all the while just how dangerous it would be to cross Pemberton. His flash of ire, though suppressed, was a reminder of his true nature. Rumdoom was glowering too. But he’d been doing so much of that lately, that everyone ignored him.)
Once they had discussed the planar alignments, they turned their attention to the sacrament, and decided how they would divide the power they absorbed from their global network of supporters.
Conquo told them he would be able to grow big enough to move the stone pillars on the island, but hey decided he needed back-up: Rumdoom would generate substantial support in any case, from his cult, if he channelled even more, he would be able to move the stone pillars too. Uru would take on the divine power to create – to mend the Coaltongue he she was damaged again. Quratulain chose plentitude, all the better to wield her many weapons. Korrigan would become unstoppable as he and Kai would need to implant the icons when they received them. (When would that be?!?) Gupta already drew enough power from the eladrin; she would need no more. Leon said he would decide later.
Now Pemberton made the suggestion that they create an illusory decoy of the Coaltongue approaching from the south, to augment their subterfuge. Leon could create such an illusion well enough to defy all but the closest scrutiny; Linia could bear him aloft from the south to distract the Ob.
They made final preparations and had some time to themselves. There was enough time for Uru to enter a fey trance and wake refreshed. When he did, a small, sealed scroll had been placed in his lap. Opening it, he found a contract for the assassination of Sovereign Han Jierre. “He will be found aboard his flagship on the Island of Axis. Approach unseen and ingress will be provided.” Uru excitedly skipped to the end, to find out what payment would be due and to his astonishment found that his mystery patron knew his deepest, dearest wish: to establish a new, secure vault under the Anthras mountains to replace the Vault of Heresies. His reward for killing Han Jierre would be “the provision of materials and arcane expertise, as well as the ideal location for the planned Crypta Damnatorum”. Excitedly, Uru showed it to Korrigan, wondering if he could trust the anonymous sender. Korrigan pointed out that the sender had in fact signed the contract, shortly before appending payment details in a postscript (a detail Uru had missed, in his haste). The ‘mystery patron’ was none other than El Extrano
(Do not be impressed.)
*
And so, once prepared, they boarded the Coaltongue, and set off for Axis Island on their final mission.
Elsewhere, their other selves were approaching Reida and their confrontation Voice of Rot. The winds of the Gyre howled about them, causing the very hull of their vessel to shudder. They manoeuvred the ship as carefully as they could, hoping to get a shot at the titan with the Coaltongue’s brand.
All of a sudden, a terrible noise issued from the engine room. They began to lose power! The ship listed and banked, in the grip of the terrible vortex.
“Sabotage!” Uru declared and at once he realised the culprits: the gremlins of Metarie had somehow stolen on board.
“The stone discs!” thought Uriel. If only he hadn’t summoned them back to him, perhaps they would have known they had been compromised.
But there was no time for regret, only action: the unit needed to get onto Reida, and their crew (if possible) needed to be rescued.
Tune in next time for the penultimate episode of… ZEITGEIST
gideonpepys
Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.
DM's Notes:
There are always things you wish you had handled differently or better. For me, in the last session, it was this bit:
The metagame urge to provide the players with the means to make useful, strategic decisions, trumped any attempt to attribute a sense of magic and wonder to the whole process of the sacrament. Maybe the handout contributed to that, I don't know. After introducing Gupta's divine aspect so organically and narratively, I wish I'd been able to figure out a compromise here.
Having dropped the ball, I made no attempt to pick it up, and just proceeded with the powers active and in play during the final session. There were already enough things to worry about. (The write-up stands at around 23 pages of typed A4 and it isn't even finished...)
To make up for this, as well as the sacrament powers, I gave each of the main characters something special for the finale, some of which don't feature in the write-up, so I might as well list them here:
There are always things you wish you had handled differently or better. For me, in the last session, it was this bit:
The metagame urge to provide the players with the means to make useful, strategic decisions, trumped any attempt to attribute a sense of magic and wonder to the whole process of the sacrament. Maybe the handout contributed to that, I don't know. After introducing Gupta's divine aspect so organically and narratively, I wish I'd been able to figure out a compromise here.
Having dropped the ball, I made no attempt to pick it up, and just proceeded with the powers active and in play during the final session. There were already enough things to worry about. (The write-up stands at around 23 pages of typed A4 and it isn't even finished...)
To make up for this, as well as the sacrament powers, I gave each of the main characters something special for the finale, some of which don't feature in the write-up, so I might as well list them here:
- Korrigan's telepathic network went global. Their supporters could see what was happening during the final combat. (Led to jokes about heart and thumbs down emojis rising from the rift at certain points.) Korrigan could use his leadership powers without line of sight, at any distance.
- Quratulain got the jet boots.
- Leon had access to all the martial scientist technqiues (as per the AP).
- Uru gained regeneration, like a true titan.
- Gupta would discover a new aspect, tranforming her divine form into a huge tiger.
- Conquo could grow to 150 feet!
- Rumdoom was granted total immunity to all forms of damage. When the unit first saw this in action, they thought it was a good thing...
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RangerWickett
Legend
Yeah, maintaining the magic in a big complex scene is a challenge.
I recall a game where my GM wanted a battle with a strange artificer to be spooky, but he had so many gizmos in the arena that he got distracted, and when the big reveal of the artificer's masterpiece came, he fumbled.
Instead of saying "it was a behemoth of black metal, tall as the highest tree, shaped like a knight in plated armor that had been not hammered, but draped across its emaciated frame like the steely flesh of a skinned demon, with eyes that shimmered with eldritch red flames, and a howl so unnatural as to drive inanimate matter to flee from it in terror," he said, "It looks like an Eva from that anime, with a force field."
I recall a game where my GM wanted a battle with a strange artificer to be spooky, but he had so many gizmos in the arena that he got distracted, and when the big reveal of the artificer's masterpiece came, he fumbled.
Instead of saying "it was a behemoth of black metal, tall as the highest tree, shaped like a knight in plated armor that had been not hammered, but draped across its emaciated frame like the steely flesh of a skinned demon, with eyes that shimmered with eldritch red flames, and a howl so unnatural as to drive inanimate matter to flee from it in terror," he said, "It looks like an Eva from that anime, with a force field."
gideonpepys
Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.
You should check out my set-up for the finale, for truly immersive magic.
Maybe I’ll post some pics later.Session 255 was our last regular three-hour Monday night session. And so began a week of holding my breath, with fingers and toes crossed for everything to work out fine.
When I pitched the idea of an ‘away weekend’ for the finale a year earlier, I was pleasantly surprised by the positive reception from my players. As the campaign came to a close, and I was able to better estimate its running time, just before Christmas (after the players sped through the latter part of the Gyre) I was even more surprised when we managed to find a suitable pair of weekends when everyone said they were free, without having to stall things, or truncate them in any way. (Having initially intended to run both the final encounters in the ‘Climax Double-Helix’ on that same weekend, I realised some distance out that this was a mistake. So we decided to run Rough Beast over six hours at a player’s house one Sunday, saving Axis of Revolution for the Friday/Saturday RPG sleepover.)
Though it would have been a lovely surprise for me to reveal my plans for the finale without any spoilers, I also realised that I wouldn’t be able to source all the props required without driving myself crazy. I sent the players a list for them to check off what they could handle, and this process also went very smoothly. If anything, I think the gonzo prop list whetted their appetite. And the fact that we needed an eight-foot diameter playing surface was the icing on the cake. Another bonus was that one of the players also volunteered to organise the venue, which was a huge load off my mind.
All that remained was to hope that real life didn’t get in the way and prevent any of us from turning up.
It nearly happened! On the last Monday (Session 255), Rumdoom’s player told us he’d come within a hair’s breadth of being sent to New York for the week by his workplace. He still wasn’t 100% sure he was in the clear. I told him if that happened we’d have to rely on my long-term back-up plan to have Rumdoom die on the toilet just before the finale – an idea that was christened by Uru’s player, “The Spicy End of the World”.
gideonpepys
Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.
Session 256, Part One
The Rough Beast
Sabotage!
Gupta tried to calm the crew, but their morale had only been bolstered by the thought that they might help to defeat the serpent. Now as the ship began to list, their suppressed fear was given full vent.
From the engine room, Uru announced that the damage was catastrophic – it would take hours to fix. Quratulain looked over the side and saw more gremlins scampering round the arcane levitationals. She began to pick them off, one by one, for all the good it would do.
Rumdoom was so keen to engage the titan he kept his feet planted firmly at the prow and didn’t budge even as the deck tilted beneath him.
Leon looked to Korrigan. “Evacuate?” he asked.
Korrigan gave a single arcane command, activating the fey portal pad.
A moment later, instead of falling towards the Gyre, the ship was falling through the shattered glass debris of Av. It would do so for another minute or so, before it was drawn back to Reida. The king had bought them time to consider their options.
Calm was restored, but urgency was maintained. They divided the crew into those who had been on the Coaltongue when she was reflected, and those who had joined since and would die if they fell into the Gyre. The latter group was evacuated by Leon to Dunkelweiss, whence they could either wend their way, or remain until Dunkelweiss was joined to Lanjyr – then Leon would come to fetch them.
This done, the unit – and only the unit – gathered round Leon. No one else would be powerful enough to harm the titan. (Not even Amielle, who was loath to remain behind.) Uriel blessed them all with the Staff of the Hierophant; Leon bathed those who would benefit in the invigorating light of the lantern; Rumdoom grew to giant size; Gupta focused on enacting Vekeshi revenge.
Then Leon took them back to Reida.
They reappeared on the plane’s glassy surface. Beneath their feet, images of the centuries between the clergy’s two victories played out; not far off, beyond the the vision of the fall, they saw the rise of Danor and Risur and the smog of industrialisation; further still, a huge gap, where the plane had been shattered.
“Good of you to return,” said an unmistakable voice, a simultaneous growl and hiss, audible over the howling storm. They saw now that the titan had moved from there it had been before they vanished, and now slithered on the far side of the plane, heading towards them at speed. “Five ages have I glimpsed, my honoured foes. Lo from the Golden Dawn, to First Crown, from the High Demonocracy, through the Malicious Victory, and now to the Obscuring Steam. Long did I await the end of this, a beautiful and dying world. I ask that you challenge me, that I may smother the last high hope. If it be yours, then I will kill and you shall rot. If it be mine, you will return home and I shall despair. Either way, I shall be appeased.”
With that, he issued forth an almost subsonic growl and a piercing hiss, and the whole ring of Reida shuddered. Cracks appeared across the surface of plane beneath his head. Another flick of his forked tongue, and comets began to fall from the sky; he tried to direct one towards Leon, but the Book of Kelland protected him. Leon was also protected from the rotting arms that writhed up from the plane beneath their feet – centuries of the dead awakened by their master’s call. Rumdoom and Korrigan were grabbed.
Gupta shifted into hybrid form and leapt away from the grasping limbs, then she studied the serpent closely, searching for weaknesses, as it slithered inevitably towards them.
Uru shadow-stepped upwards, took flight on Little Jack and licked the Sword of the Black Needles threateningly. He had long harboured the ambition (once a mere pipe-dream, now an imminent possibility) that he would one day slay the Voice of Rot and bring its tyranny over the dead to an end. He could never have imagined that he would do so as a titan himself, now possessed of the power to command spirits – a power lost by the Voice of Rot. Uru could hear the spirits of the centuries clamouring to come to his aid.
“I will form a cadre of spirits to rival the ghost council,” Uru had said, not long ago. That effort would start here.
The serpent hurled a comet at him; it missed.
Uriel levitated into the air and weaved the titan’s fate, enabling him to predict its movements and its attack.
Quratulain shot at the head; a sizable hole appeared in its left cheek – first blood (if there had been any blood inside the desiccated titan).
Ignoring the grasping arms, Rumdoom decided that it would be a good idea to help the Voice of Rot destroy the plane beneath them: When it came apart, they would rejoin their other selves; the Voice of Rot would perish. Without sharing this idea with anyone, he brought the Stone of Not down hard on the surface of Reida, cracking this section too. At once Uriel cried out in alarm, and implored him not to do so again. “If Reida is destroyed, our world will cease to exist!” said the deva.
Leon sought to give Rumdoom something better to do and teleported him into the path of the titan. He whisked Korrigan out of the grasping arms as well. Korrigan then flew into the air and issued orders to support his team. Now he could see that the section of the plane the Voice was on was the thousand-year era of the Demonocracy.
The Voice of Rot caught sight of the king and thanked him for bringing his son. “I knew that if you thought I wanted him, you would bring him to me.” This made no sense, thought Korrigan, but then, here he was, with Kai strapped to his back. Fey logic was infectious, it seemed.
The titan chuckled with amusement, and the gaping wound Quratulain had made closed up, to their horror. Then the Voice susurrated again and the era of the Demonocracy began to shear apart.
Ever forwards the serpent surged, knocking Leon aside. When it came close enough, the stench from its rotting head was so powerful it nauseated even Rumdoom. Then it clamped its jaws down on the dwarf and sought to affect him with the same soul rot poison that had killed Kasvarina; Rumdoom was made of tougher stuff and struck the rough beast on the snout with his hammer. The blow was enfeebled by the titan’s stench, so he kicked off the Icy End of the World, to encourage it to let go.
Seeking answers to the serpent’s regeneration, Gupta Stood in Wonder. She realised that he had bonded to the plane to such an extent that his mere presence carried the weight of eternity. This fey titan had survived millennia. They could only harm him if they struck him in two eras of time at once. So she used her icon of Apet to teleport to the far side of the plane, and found that to be the period of humanity’s rise and the decline of the Ancient Orcs.
“I’ll take his ass; you take the head,” said Uru, speeding along on Little Jack to get into position, hiding in his own portable cloud of shadow. While he lined up his shot, he heard Amielle’s echoing cry, “Me first! Me first! Pick me!” He did so, and they both opened fire on the titan.
Leon whisked Rumdoom out of the titan’s jaws, then created a pair of linked portals to ease movement across the plane.
The Voice cracked another era with his decaying susurrus – the period of clergy ascendancy between the two victories; it hurled another comet at Uriel and raised more grasping arms to stop the unit moving away from him. Uriel dodged the comet and studied the susurrus. “We need to defend the plane with our own vigour!” he announced. “Someone must be standing on the section of the plane he’s trying to destroy!”
Quratulain had previously jetted over the huge, jagged gash onto the Ancient Orcish side. Now she jumped back again, before taking a shot at the serpent’s body. The hide was thick, but she managed to punch through. She invoked her icon of Nem and stood firm, hoping to thwart the titan if it tried to crack the modern era.
Rumdoom used his tyrant’s teeth necklace to bite down on its flank, tearing out a sizable chunk, before he was pushed aside and fell close to the edge of the plane. The serpent fired a comet at him, and chipped off the edge where he had been lying; he barely clung on.
Leon teleported right up to the face of the serpent, stabbed at it with his Dreaming Blade, then teleported away again. Now the Book of Kelland would not prevent the titan from attacking him!
The titan tried its susurrus again, but now it had no effect on Reida itself, though it harmed those who stood firm with necrotic rot. The Voice summoned more grasping arms around Gupta, who was still on the far side of the plane; then it crawled off the jagged edge where the ‘modern era’ ended and began to loop back under itself.
Gupta took on tiger form and tore free of the rotting limbs, then caught up with the serpent in a few bounds and mauled its tail. The arms caught her again, and dragged her down, clawing at her.
Now in the era of the Ancient Orcs, Uru was inspired to summon Toteth Topec to their aid. Toteth shrugged and said “I’m not much of a fighter” but both he and Amielle found themselves empowered by Uru’s dominion over the spirits. They and their new master attacked the titan to great effect.
Doing his best not to succumb to the whirling winds of the Gyre, Uriel flew over the edge of the plane and fired a lance of radiance at the titan’s head. The titan cried out in pain and pleasure. “This battle fulfills me,” it rumbled. “Let us reminisce upon battles past.” The surface of the arc of Reida shuddered, and soldiers from across time clawed their ways out of ancient graves. Modern Danoran battalions, their uniforms and faces decayed, hefted rifles and fired wildly, while a few hundred feet away, eladrin and Clergy crossed swords and spears, and beyond them orcish skeletons swiped stone clubs at stampedes of zombified beasts. Every open space on this plane was consumed with war.
Time itself seemed to speed up for the titan and it looped back under the plane at double speed and now rose up on the other side, to descend upon Quratulain, who had previously been behind him. She leapt out of harm’s way, fired back into his open mouth and then used her jet boots to get completely clear.
Frustrated, the Voice of Rot said, “A little help from my friends, perhaps? Jenny, you promised me a battle.”
At that, in the centre of the ring of Reida, an undead whale appeared. Upon its back stood Jenny Greenteeth and her foul cabal, all of whom should have been dead.
The Rough Beast
Sabotage!
Gupta tried to calm the crew, but their morale had only been bolstered by the thought that they might help to defeat the serpent. Now as the ship began to list, their suppressed fear was given full vent.
From the engine room, Uru announced that the damage was catastrophic – it would take hours to fix. Quratulain looked over the side and saw more gremlins scampering round the arcane levitationals. She began to pick them off, one by one, for all the good it would do.
Rumdoom was so keen to engage the titan he kept his feet planted firmly at the prow and didn’t budge even as the deck tilted beneath him.
Leon looked to Korrigan. “Evacuate?” he asked.
Korrigan gave a single arcane command, activating the fey portal pad.
A moment later, instead of falling towards the Gyre, the ship was falling through the shattered glass debris of Av. It would do so for another minute or so, before it was drawn back to Reida. The king had bought them time to consider their options.
Calm was restored, but urgency was maintained. They divided the crew into those who had been on the Coaltongue when she was reflected, and those who had joined since and would die if they fell into the Gyre. The latter group was evacuated by Leon to Dunkelweiss, whence they could either wend their way, or remain until Dunkelweiss was joined to Lanjyr – then Leon would come to fetch them.
This done, the unit – and only the unit – gathered round Leon. No one else would be powerful enough to harm the titan. (Not even Amielle, who was loath to remain behind.) Uriel blessed them all with the Staff of the Hierophant; Leon bathed those who would benefit in the invigorating light of the lantern; Rumdoom grew to giant size; Gupta focused on enacting Vekeshi revenge.
Then Leon took them back to Reida.
They reappeared on the plane’s glassy surface. Beneath their feet, images of the centuries between the clergy’s two victories played out; not far off, beyond the the vision of the fall, they saw the rise of Danor and Risur and the smog of industrialisation; further still, a huge gap, where the plane had been shattered.
“Good of you to return,” said an unmistakable voice, a simultaneous growl and hiss, audible over the howling storm. They saw now that the titan had moved from there it had been before they vanished, and now slithered on the far side of the plane, heading towards them at speed. “Five ages have I glimpsed, my honoured foes. Lo from the Golden Dawn, to First Crown, from the High Demonocracy, through the Malicious Victory, and now to the Obscuring Steam. Long did I await the end of this, a beautiful and dying world. I ask that you challenge me, that I may smother the last high hope. If it be yours, then I will kill and you shall rot. If it be mine, you will return home and I shall despair. Either way, I shall be appeased.”
With that, he issued forth an almost subsonic growl and a piercing hiss, and the whole ring of Reida shuddered. Cracks appeared across the surface of plane beneath his head. Another flick of his forked tongue, and comets began to fall from the sky; he tried to direct one towards Leon, but the Book of Kelland protected him. Leon was also protected from the rotting arms that writhed up from the plane beneath their feet – centuries of the dead awakened by their master’s call. Rumdoom and Korrigan were grabbed.
Gupta shifted into hybrid form and leapt away from the grasping limbs, then she studied the serpent closely, searching for weaknesses, as it slithered inevitably towards them.
Uru shadow-stepped upwards, took flight on Little Jack and licked the Sword of the Black Needles threateningly. He had long harboured the ambition (once a mere pipe-dream, now an imminent possibility) that he would one day slay the Voice of Rot and bring its tyranny over the dead to an end. He could never have imagined that he would do so as a titan himself, now possessed of the power to command spirits – a power lost by the Voice of Rot. Uru could hear the spirits of the centuries clamouring to come to his aid.
“I will form a cadre of spirits to rival the ghost council,” Uru had said, not long ago. That effort would start here.
The serpent hurled a comet at him; it missed.
Uriel levitated into the air and weaved the titan’s fate, enabling him to predict its movements and its attack.
Quratulain shot at the head; a sizable hole appeared in its left cheek – first blood (if there had been any blood inside the desiccated titan).
Ignoring the grasping arms, Rumdoom decided that it would be a good idea to help the Voice of Rot destroy the plane beneath them: When it came apart, they would rejoin their other selves; the Voice of Rot would perish. Without sharing this idea with anyone, he brought the Stone of Not down hard on the surface of Reida, cracking this section too. At once Uriel cried out in alarm, and implored him not to do so again. “If Reida is destroyed, our world will cease to exist!” said the deva.
Leon sought to give Rumdoom something better to do and teleported him into the path of the titan. He whisked Korrigan out of the grasping arms as well. Korrigan then flew into the air and issued orders to support his team. Now he could see that the section of the plane the Voice was on was the thousand-year era of the Demonocracy.
The Voice of Rot caught sight of the king and thanked him for bringing his son. “I knew that if you thought I wanted him, you would bring him to me.” This made no sense, thought Korrigan, but then, here he was, with Kai strapped to his back. Fey logic was infectious, it seemed.
The titan chuckled with amusement, and the gaping wound Quratulain had made closed up, to their horror. Then the Voice susurrated again and the era of the Demonocracy began to shear apart.
Ever forwards the serpent surged, knocking Leon aside. When it came close enough, the stench from its rotting head was so powerful it nauseated even Rumdoom. Then it clamped its jaws down on the dwarf and sought to affect him with the same soul rot poison that had killed Kasvarina; Rumdoom was made of tougher stuff and struck the rough beast on the snout with his hammer. The blow was enfeebled by the titan’s stench, so he kicked off the Icy End of the World, to encourage it to let go.
Seeking answers to the serpent’s regeneration, Gupta Stood in Wonder. She realised that he had bonded to the plane to such an extent that his mere presence carried the weight of eternity. This fey titan had survived millennia. They could only harm him if they struck him in two eras of time at once. So she used her icon of Apet to teleport to the far side of the plane, and found that to be the period of humanity’s rise and the decline of the Ancient Orcs.
“I’ll take his ass; you take the head,” said Uru, speeding along on Little Jack to get into position, hiding in his own portable cloud of shadow. While he lined up his shot, he heard Amielle’s echoing cry, “Me first! Me first! Pick me!” He did so, and they both opened fire on the titan.
Leon whisked Rumdoom out of the titan’s jaws, then created a pair of linked portals to ease movement across the plane.
The Voice cracked another era with his decaying susurrus – the period of clergy ascendancy between the two victories; it hurled another comet at Uriel and raised more grasping arms to stop the unit moving away from him. Uriel dodged the comet and studied the susurrus. “We need to defend the plane with our own vigour!” he announced. “Someone must be standing on the section of the plane he’s trying to destroy!”
Quratulain had previously jetted over the huge, jagged gash onto the Ancient Orcish side. Now she jumped back again, before taking a shot at the serpent’s body. The hide was thick, but she managed to punch through. She invoked her icon of Nem and stood firm, hoping to thwart the titan if it tried to crack the modern era.
Rumdoom used his tyrant’s teeth necklace to bite down on its flank, tearing out a sizable chunk, before he was pushed aside and fell close to the edge of the plane. The serpent fired a comet at him, and chipped off the edge where he had been lying; he barely clung on.
Leon teleported right up to the face of the serpent, stabbed at it with his Dreaming Blade, then teleported away again. Now the Book of Kelland would not prevent the titan from attacking him!
The titan tried its susurrus again, but now it had no effect on Reida itself, though it harmed those who stood firm with necrotic rot. The Voice summoned more grasping arms around Gupta, who was still on the far side of the plane; then it crawled off the jagged edge where the ‘modern era’ ended and began to loop back under itself.
Gupta took on tiger form and tore free of the rotting limbs, then caught up with the serpent in a few bounds and mauled its tail. The arms caught her again, and dragged her down, clawing at her.
Now in the era of the Ancient Orcs, Uru was inspired to summon Toteth Topec to their aid. Toteth shrugged and said “I’m not much of a fighter” but both he and Amielle found themselves empowered by Uru’s dominion over the spirits. They and their new master attacked the titan to great effect.
Doing his best not to succumb to the whirling winds of the Gyre, Uriel flew over the edge of the plane and fired a lance of radiance at the titan’s head. The titan cried out in pain and pleasure. “This battle fulfills me,” it rumbled. “Let us reminisce upon battles past.” The surface of the arc of Reida shuddered, and soldiers from across time clawed their ways out of ancient graves. Modern Danoran battalions, their uniforms and faces decayed, hefted rifles and fired wildly, while a few hundred feet away, eladrin and Clergy crossed swords and spears, and beyond them orcish skeletons swiped stone clubs at stampedes of zombified beasts. Every open space on this plane was consumed with war.
Time itself seemed to speed up for the titan and it looped back under the plane at double speed and now rose up on the other side, to descend upon Quratulain, who had previously been behind him. She leapt out of harm’s way, fired back into his open mouth and then used her jet boots to get completely clear.
Frustrated, the Voice of Rot said, “A little help from my friends, perhaps? Jenny, you promised me a battle.”
At that, in the centre of the ring of Reida, an undead whale appeared. Upon its back stood Jenny Greenteeth and her foul cabal, all of whom should have been dead.
gideonpepys
Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.
Session 256, Part Two
“Time Travel, Kids: Not Even Once”
How was it possible for Jenny and her cabal to come here? Once, they had been pursued by Leon through the Dreaming and had used the ancient icons of time and space to escape. Leon had tried to thwart them multiple times, in multiple timelines. Was this one of them?
They were all here – Jenny herself, and the sea-hag Weary Enid, both slain very recently (and the former subsumed by Lavanya); Blue Meg, the swamp witch, whom Unit B had killed the foot of an ancient ziggurat; Ambertain the Black, who had met his end in the palace of the blighted dragon, Tatzel; and Gorago, the annis hag, whom Leon had killed in the Vault of Heresies, in the process of retrieving the bloodstone ape.
Joined together in a cabal like this, their magical powers were fearsome: Blue Meg summoned vipers to beset Korrigan; Jenny tried and failed to betwitch Quratulain; Ambertain sought to implant false memories in Uriel; Weary Enid summoned a squadron of ghouls. Gorago drew a great sword, ran along the length of the whale and prepared to leap the gap to bring the fight to Rumdoom.
The unit was flagging; this new set of foes, plus the complication of hundreds of battling undead, sorely tested their morale.
Rumdoom struggled up, fighting off cadavers. Leon created another portal, from the clergy ascendancy to the age of the Ancients, and teleported Korrigan to the modern era to defend that region from the susurrus. The susurrus failed, but caused Korrigan to flag, having absorbed its necrotic energy. The serpent threw another comet at Uriel, raised even more grasping arms, then slithered back under the plane through the gap, creating a figure-of-eight, and crushing Korrigan between his contra-flowing coils
Gupta fought her way out of the grasping arms, and did her best to pursue the serpent, despite the battling dead. Uru summoned El Perro to join his squad of spirits. Their old friend was much more himself than he had been on Nem and said how much he enjoyed the chance to fight alongside them again.
Uriel was about to turn his attention to the cabal, when a portal began to appear on the back of the whale. Not more enemies, surely? Leon recognised the arcane signature. “I think it’s one of mine!” he said, baffled.
When the portal opened, his Dream Team leaped through: Ascodel, the irrepressible bralani; Redcoat the drunken and foul-mouthed bear; Nbed, the vampiric satyr; and their two recent companions, Etiotek Ekiokiet and the Huldregarl. They had caught up with Jenny and her cabal at long last, and made the most of the element of surprise: Redcoat charged at Gorago and seized her from behind; Ascodel unleashed lightning at the other four, declaiming all the while; Nbed attacked Ambertain and almost killed him with a single blow; Etiotek played a tune that seemed to mould or direct the Huldregarl, which crashed like a wave onto Weary Enid’s ghouls.
Another figure still stood silhouetted in the portal. It was Leon! He gave a smart salute to himself, then stepped out of sight to avoid confusion (leaving the portal open).
With the cabal distracted, Uriel instead invoked his monster slaying incarnation, Jannick, formed the arsenal of Dhebisu into a broadsword, and carved a chunk out of the Voice of Rot. Quratulain carried on shooting at its head, shrugging off zombie attacks from all sides.
Weary Enid muttered a spell and Ascodel began to drown. The sea-hag cackled, pleased to have shut him up.
Rumdoom stepped through one of Leon’s portals to the era of the Ancient Orcs, where the titan’s head was now, and threw his last Icy End of World Grenade. It created a freezing sphere, which the whole of the serpent would now have to pass through.
“Ah! You are using time against me!” said the Voice. “Truly, you may be the greatest of all of us. Zubov, Morkanstall, Komanov, all of my servants slain by your hands; all of my greatest treasures in your hands: The Skull, the Stone, the Eye. If you strike me down, you will worthy of the title, Champion of the End, and thus you will continue my great work. Finish it, Rumdoom. Finish it!”
Grabbed again, Leon teleported free, then began to set up more portals. By now, he had created a complex network, making it easier for his allies to defend the plane, and get around without fighting through hordes of zombies.
The serpent had moved far enough that its coils released Korrigan. Now able to see one of Leon’s portals, he transformed into a lightning bolt and shot through it, appearing as far away as he could, on the lip of the Rise of Humanity. The Voice of Rot could still see him, though, and summoned more grasping arms to beset him, then threw a comet at him, smashing a hole in the plane as he dodged aside. Then the serpent surged forward to susurrate, causing Korrigan to flag again and cracking the era of the Rise in the process. This onslaught greatly amused the Voice of Rot and it began to laugh.
Gupta was nowhere near the Voice. She switched to hybrid form and levelled Reason at Gorago, to help out the Dream Team. Her shot rang out and Gorago fell into the abyss. Freed from his struggle, the raging, drunken Redcoat turned to charge at Enid, who was forced to break concentration and defend herself. Ascodel was freed from her spell instantly.
Uru kept up his attacks on the serpent and added Lorcan Kell to his roster of spirit warriors. The crime boss might have been wicked in life, but he did not wish to see all life destroyed, and hurled a swarm of knives at the titan.
Uriel landed where he could. “Get the king to me!” he said to Leon.
Quratulain jetted into the Icy End aura (as the closest clear space), expecting that the cold would not affect her, but felt the painful chill – the first she had felt in centuries. Nothing could resist the Icy End of the World, she learned. Still, she found it invigorating!
By now, Rumdoom had been grabbed by more arms, and couldn’t pull himself free. He used a destructive cold blast rune to freeze the arms solid, then drew his blunderbuss.
Leon added more portals, then teleported to Korrigan, and sent him to Uriel, where he was fully healed. But this manoeuvre left Leon exposed, right next to the head of the serpent! The titan snapped at him, but missed, knocking him aside.
Gupta shot at the serpent with Reason, to distract him from Leon. This wound caused the serpent to surge towards her at an incredible speed.
“Would you desire songs of your deeds?” asked the Voice “Would you be paintings? Statues? Even if you win this day, the time that you live will be dwarfed by your misremembered history.”
Across the whole plane, all the serpent’s foes began to retch. Some were able to resist the urge, but the others – the Dream Team, Uru, Quratulain – were forced to vomit up a white that pulsed with their heartbeat. Quratulain had to pull off her mask to release hers. They slithered towards the Voice of Rot and were absorbed. As it bore down on Gupta, the titan continued his diatribe. “I seek to fulfill my purpose, for I was created to witness death!”
He sank his fangs into Gupta, injecting her with Soul Rot poison – a death sentence, for this body of hers. She fell to the ground.
Uru summoned Olivert Boone, whom they had recently encountered on Nem. Uru's phantom posse continued to attack the serpent on his behalf, while he caught his breath.
Quratulain wiped her mouth, then took steady, careful aim…
Rumdoom fired his blunderbuss. It didn’t do much good.
Leon teleported himself and Gupta to Uriel. Uriel was waiting for them and healed Leon instantly. Gupta saved him the bother, thrashing about in sudden paroxysms, restoring herself.
On the back of the whale, the fight had tipped against the Dream Team, as they had been crippled by the White Worm spell.
Korrigan gave orders. He moved to cover the Demonocracy; Leon moved the Clergy Ascendancy. Uru, by now very weak could see what was coming, and flitted out of the way: the Voice of Rot aimed for Leon, moving as fast as it could, calling down a comet that struck him squarely and susurrating as it came. Though freshly restored, Leon felt himself flag already, but grasped the hilt of his Dreaming Blade and bravely stood his ground as the serpent came on, mouth agape.
Behind him, another portal opened. Not one of his!
Through the new portal stepped an odd assortment of strangers: an olive-skinned warrior in RHC garb, wielding a greatsword; an eladrin weretiger in hybrid form; a dwarven priest in ice-blue armour; a huge metal minotaur; and – strangest of all – an enormous biomechanical flea, the mount for a rangy rider wearing a hooded boiler suit and rebreather, and wielding a aelectronic lance.
“We’ve arrived at the turning point, just as Uncle said we would,” cried the warrior. They rushed forward and interposed themselves between the titan and Leon. The minotaur clapped its hands together and caused a wave of thunder to slow the titan down; the dwarf muttered an incantation and summoned two ice elementals in its path; the warrior and the eladrin moved swiftly to flank it; the gigantic flea leapt high into the air and landed on the back of the serpent, allowing its rider to apply the aelectric lance.
Though their attacks did little to harm the titan, they certainly vexed him. And they saved Leon from being attacked – the serpent smashed into the ice elementals instead.
“We’re from the future,” said the dwarf to Leon. “Please don’t ask us too many questions. We’re not supposed to talk.” Leon noticed that, although the portal had closed, the priest was holding in his hand a fragment of the Arc of Reida (of similar size and shape to the one now possessed by Uriel).
Rumdoom stepped through a nearby portal, attacked the titan with the Stone of Not, and was immediately knocked to the floor again. The frost priest knelt when he saw him. “My lord,” he said, with tears in his eyes.
While the titan was occupied, Quratulain – who had been carefully aiming for a long time – opened fire: right into the serpent’s empty eye-socket. It screeched and raised its head and neck into the air.
Korrigan flew through the air towards the fight, giving orders to Gupta and Rumdoom to get back on their feet. As soon as he saw the newcomers, the Humble Hook told him their names and something of their histories. (He kept them to himself for now.)
Leon saw the terrible struggle going on between the cabal and his Dream Team, and decided to try to turn it for them. He cast mire the mind on Jenny, Enid, Blue Meg and Ambertain; with great effort, he caused all four of them to throw themselves into the Gyre. He watched them go, just to be sure.
Now the Dream Team could leap across the gap and attack the titan, even as the undead whale sagged and fell towards the Gyre itself.
Gupta watched them fall. Behind her, the fight went on. Leon, Quratulain, Rumdoom, Uru, Uru’s ghosts, Leon’s Dream Team, the travellers from the Future – all attacked the titan as it thrashed about trying to harm them. It bit down on Korrigan. As its jaws closed, Kai cried out in fear and instinctively unleashed a blast of Apet energy that caused the itan to reel.
Now they all became aware of a rhythmic beat that had grown in volume for a while, and now could be heard distinctly over the roar of the Gyre. Could it be music? Suddenly, the prow of a golden ship breached the debris field, as the vessel hurtled towards the upreared titan. It crashed squarely into his head and neck, knocking the great beast sideways.
Rock Rackus and his skeleton crew leapt off the Aural Pleasure just before it hit. Rock waved his arms frantically as he ran towards the unit. “Get back! Get back! I rigged that motherfucker to blow!”
It blew, taking the Voice of Rot’s head clean off. The sheer weight of its coils dragged it slowly off the silver disc and downward, into the maelstrom.
“Time Travel, Kids: Not Even Once”
How was it possible for Jenny and her cabal to come here? Once, they had been pursued by Leon through the Dreaming and had used the ancient icons of time and space to escape. Leon had tried to thwart them multiple times, in multiple timelines. Was this one of them?
They were all here – Jenny herself, and the sea-hag Weary Enid, both slain very recently (and the former subsumed by Lavanya); Blue Meg, the swamp witch, whom Unit B had killed the foot of an ancient ziggurat; Ambertain the Black, who had met his end in the palace of the blighted dragon, Tatzel; and Gorago, the annis hag, whom Leon had killed in the Vault of Heresies, in the process of retrieving the bloodstone ape.
Joined together in a cabal like this, their magical powers were fearsome: Blue Meg summoned vipers to beset Korrigan; Jenny tried and failed to betwitch Quratulain; Ambertain sought to implant false memories in Uriel; Weary Enid summoned a squadron of ghouls. Gorago drew a great sword, ran along the length of the whale and prepared to leap the gap to bring the fight to Rumdoom.
The unit was flagging; this new set of foes, plus the complication of hundreds of battling undead, sorely tested their morale.
Rumdoom struggled up, fighting off cadavers. Leon created another portal, from the clergy ascendancy to the age of the Ancients, and teleported Korrigan to the modern era to defend that region from the susurrus. The susurrus failed, but caused Korrigan to flag, having absorbed its necrotic energy. The serpent threw another comet at Uriel, raised even more grasping arms, then slithered back under the plane through the gap, creating a figure-of-eight, and crushing Korrigan between his contra-flowing coils
Gupta fought her way out of the grasping arms, and did her best to pursue the serpent, despite the battling dead. Uru summoned El Perro to join his squad of spirits. Their old friend was much more himself than he had been on Nem and said how much he enjoyed the chance to fight alongside them again.
Uriel was about to turn his attention to the cabal, when a portal began to appear on the back of the whale. Not more enemies, surely? Leon recognised the arcane signature. “I think it’s one of mine!” he said, baffled.
When the portal opened, his Dream Team leaped through: Ascodel, the irrepressible bralani; Redcoat the drunken and foul-mouthed bear; Nbed, the vampiric satyr; and their two recent companions, Etiotek Ekiokiet and the Huldregarl. They had caught up with Jenny and her cabal at long last, and made the most of the element of surprise: Redcoat charged at Gorago and seized her from behind; Ascodel unleashed lightning at the other four, declaiming all the while; Nbed attacked Ambertain and almost killed him with a single blow; Etiotek played a tune that seemed to mould or direct the Huldregarl, which crashed like a wave onto Weary Enid’s ghouls.
Another figure still stood silhouetted in the portal. It was Leon! He gave a smart salute to himself, then stepped out of sight to avoid confusion (leaving the portal open).
With the cabal distracted, Uriel instead invoked his monster slaying incarnation, Jannick, formed the arsenal of Dhebisu into a broadsword, and carved a chunk out of the Voice of Rot. Quratulain carried on shooting at its head, shrugging off zombie attacks from all sides.
Weary Enid muttered a spell and Ascodel began to drown. The sea-hag cackled, pleased to have shut him up.
Rumdoom stepped through one of Leon’s portals to the era of the Ancient Orcs, where the titan’s head was now, and threw his last Icy End of World Grenade. It created a freezing sphere, which the whole of the serpent would now have to pass through.
“Ah! You are using time against me!” said the Voice. “Truly, you may be the greatest of all of us. Zubov, Morkanstall, Komanov, all of my servants slain by your hands; all of my greatest treasures in your hands: The Skull, the Stone, the Eye. If you strike me down, you will worthy of the title, Champion of the End, and thus you will continue my great work. Finish it, Rumdoom. Finish it!”
Grabbed again, Leon teleported free, then began to set up more portals. By now, he had created a complex network, making it easier for his allies to defend the plane, and get around without fighting through hordes of zombies.
The serpent had moved far enough that its coils released Korrigan. Now able to see one of Leon’s portals, he transformed into a lightning bolt and shot through it, appearing as far away as he could, on the lip of the Rise of Humanity. The Voice of Rot could still see him, though, and summoned more grasping arms to beset him, then threw a comet at him, smashing a hole in the plane as he dodged aside. Then the serpent surged forward to susurrate, causing Korrigan to flag again and cracking the era of the Rise in the process. This onslaught greatly amused the Voice of Rot and it began to laugh.
Gupta was nowhere near the Voice. She switched to hybrid form and levelled Reason at Gorago, to help out the Dream Team. Her shot rang out and Gorago fell into the abyss. Freed from his struggle, the raging, drunken Redcoat turned to charge at Enid, who was forced to break concentration and defend herself. Ascodel was freed from her spell instantly.
Uru kept up his attacks on the serpent and added Lorcan Kell to his roster of spirit warriors. The crime boss might have been wicked in life, but he did not wish to see all life destroyed, and hurled a swarm of knives at the titan.
Uriel landed where he could. “Get the king to me!” he said to Leon.
Quratulain jetted into the Icy End aura (as the closest clear space), expecting that the cold would not affect her, but felt the painful chill – the first she had felt in centuries. Nothing could resist the Icy End of the World, she learned. Still, she found it invigorating!
By now, Rumdoom had been grabbed by more arms, and couldn’t pull himself free. He used a destructive cold blast rune to freeze the arms solid, then drew his blunderbuss.
Leon added more portals, then teleported to Korrigan, and sent him to Uriel, where he was fully healed. But this manoeuvre left Leon exposed, right next to the head of the serpent! The titan snapped at him, but missed, knocking him aside.
Gupta shot at the serpent with Reason, to distract him from Leon. This wound caused the serpent to surge towards her at an incredible speed.
“Would you desire songs of your deeds?” asked the Voice “Would you be paintings? Statues? Even if you win this day, the time that you live will be dwarfed by your misremembered history.”
Across the whole plane, all the serpent’s foes began to retch. Some were able to resist the urge, but the others – the Dream Team, Uru, Quratulain – were forced to vomit up a white that pulsed with their heartbeat. Quratulain had to pull off her mask to release hers. They slithered towards the Voice of Rot and were absorbed. As it bore down on Gupta, the titan continued his diatribe. “I seek to fulfill my purpose, for I was created to witness death!”
He sank his fangs into Gupta, injecting her with Soul Rot poison – a death sentence, for this body of hers. She fell to the ground.
Uru summoned Olivert Boone, whom they had recently encountered on Nem. Uru's phantom posse continued to attack the serpent on his behalf, while he caught his breath.
Quratulain wiped her mouth, then took steady, careful aim…
Rumdoom fired his blunderbuss. It didn’t do much good.
Leon teleported himself and Gupta to Uriel. Uriel was waiting for them and healed Leon instantly. Gupta saved him the bother, thrashing about in sudden paroxysms, restoring herself.
On the back of the whale, the fight had tipped against the Dream Team, as they had been crippled by the White Worm spell.
Korrigan gave orders. He moved to cover the Demonocracy; Leon moved the Clergy Ascendancy. Uru, by now very weak could see what was coming, and flitted out of the way: the Voice of Rot aimed for Leon, moving as fast as it could, calling down a comet that struck him squarely and susurrating as it came. Though freshly restored, Leon felt himself flag already, but grasped the hilt of his Dreaming Blade and bravely stood his ground as the serpent came on, mouth agape.
Behind him, another portal opened. Not one of his!
Through the new portal stepped an odd assortment of strangers: an olive-skinned warrior in RHC garb, wielding a greatsword; an eladrin weretiger in hybrid form; a dwarven priest in ice-blue armour; a huge metal minotaur; and – strangest of all – an enormous biomechanical flea, the mount for a rangy rider wearing a hooded boiler suit and rebreather, and wielding a aelectronic lance.
“We’ve arrived at the turning point, just as Uncle said we would,” cried the warrior. They rushed forward and interposed themselves between the titan and Leon. The minotaur clapped its hands together and caused a wave of thunder to slow the titan down; the dwarf muttered an incantation and summoned two ice elementals in its path; the warrior and the eladrin moved swiftly to flank it; the gigantic flea leapt high into the air and landed on the back of the serpent, allowing its rider to apply the aelectric lance.
Though their attacks did little to harm the titan, they certainly vexed him. And they saved Leon from being attacked – the serpent smashed into the ice elementals instead.
“We’re from the future,” said the dwarf to Leon. “Please don’t ask us too many questions. We’re not supposed to talk.” Leon noticed that, although the portal had closed, the priest was holding in his hand a fragment of the Arc of Reida (of similar size and shape to the one now possessed by Uriel).
Rumdoom stepped through a nearby portal, attacked the titan with the Stone of Not, and was immediately knocked to the floor again. The frost priest knelt when he saw him. “My lord,” he said, with tears in his eyes.
While the titan was occupied, Quratulain – who had been carefully aiming for a long time – opened fire: right into the serpent’s empty eye-socket. It screeched and raised its head and neck into the air.
Korrigan flew through the air towards the fight, giving orders to Gupta and Rumdoom to get back on their feet. As soon as he saw the newcomers, the Humble Hook told him their names and something of their histories. (He kept them to himself for now.)
Leon saw the terrible struggle going on between the cabal and his Dream Team, and decided to try to turn it for them. He cast mire the mind on Jenny, Enid, Blue Meg and Ambertain; with great effort, he caused all four of them to throw themselves into the Gyre. He watched them go, just to be sure.
Now the Dream Team could leap across the gap and attack the titan, even as the undead whale sagged and fell towards the Gyre itself.
Gupta watched them fall. Behind her, the fight went on. Leon, Quratulain, Rumdoom, Uru, Uru’s ghosts, Leon’s Dream Team, the travellers from the Future – all attacked the titan as it thrashed about trying to harm them. It bit down on Korrigan. As its jaws closed, Kai cried out in fear and instinctively unleashed a blast of Apet energy that caused the itan to reel.
Now they all became aware of a rhythmic beat that had grown in volume for a while, and now could be heard distinctly over the roar of the Gyre. Could it be music? Suddenly, the prow of a golden ship breached the debris field, as the vessel hurtled towards the upreared titan. It crashed squarely into his head and neck, knocking the great beast sideways.
Rock Rackus and his skeleton crew leapt off the Aural Pleasure just before it hit. Rock waved his arms frantically as he ran towards the unit. “Get back! Get back! I rigged that motherfucker to blow!”
It blew, taking the Voice of Rot’s head clean off. The sheer weight of its coils dragged it slowly off the silver disc and downward, into the maelstrom.
RangerWickett
Legend
That was a lot of people, man.
gideonpepys
Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.
It was! But it was fun, and more for colour than anything else. I knew Leon would make defending the arc a cinch and turn the battle into a HP grind, so I decided to inject some gonzo into the proceedings.
SanjMerchant
Explorer
"In our moment of triumph!?"
I kinda love how Rumdoom thinks he's found the Gordian Knot solution and winds up actually advancing his foe's cause. Was that only in character or was the player caught off guard by that as well?
Are these a reference to something in the campaign I've forgotten, or is it just one of those things like they do in the comics involving such things where the character design team is allowed to go nuts and the reader is just left to imagine the rationale?
EDIT: The last guy sounds like a Darth Vader reference, but the mount doesn't fit that. If the others are pop culture references, I guess the Rumschatology priest (I'm assuming he's a follower of Rumdoom's teachings, given the comments he makes) is Sub-Zero, of Mortal Kombat fame? I never played those games, so all I really know of him is "wears blue, has ice powers."
On a scale of 1 to Donald Duck Gif, how angry is Uru that he didn't get the killing blow?
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