Look_a_Unicorn
First Post
I don't think I've ever seen this done for this Story Hour before- mostly because updates are so frequent (when you're playing!) but.... BUMP! 
-
NOW LIVE! Into the Woods--new character species, eerie monsters, and haunting villains to populate the woodlands of your D&D games.
(Cydra) Great Conflicts
- Thread starter the Jester
- Start date
the Jester
Legend
Okay, here's another interlude post since we haven't played this group again yet. 
Interlude the Second
8/7/371 O.L.G., the Elemental Plane of Fire
While Horbin contemplates Prayzose’s proposal, we will take just a moment to look elsewhere. For instance, here we have a realm of pure flame. The entire world is a furnace. The ground is nothing but flaming coal. The clouds are infernos.
Streaking overhead, a significant force of efreeti patrols the burning sky. Below them, on fields burning an incandescent scarlet, the elementals and mephits dance a for victory. Rank after rank of enslaved elemental throws themselves against the walls of the glowing city before them.
The City of Brass is quite a prize, if it can be gained. Pasha Amhari Ifroobil sighs. It seems as though it is holding out forever.
Well, there’s no helping it, he thinks testily. Without Imix’s killers to prove myself against, this is the only way. Foolish mortals- they always seem to get themselves killed just before they can get involved in the really important stuff.
The Pasha turns back to his tent and enters it. It is full of the perfume of exotic burning forests. The most beautiful of the efreet women languidly display themselves for him. He is not in the mood for them. With a snarl he dismisses them, and then he summons his new minister.
“Yes, my lord?” the shadowed figure says softly once he arrives.
“Ah, my mysterious friend, I am glad you come to my call so quickly.”
“Of course I do, my lord. Are you not the lord of all efreeti? Are you not master of the Elemental Plane of Fire?”
“You mock me,” Amhari Ifroobil states, but without conviction.
“Never, my lord.” The other’s voice is a purr. “Have I not done you nothing but good? Indeed, I have offered to do you more good than you will allow.”
“I am not certain that I want your weapons,” the Pasha muses. “Your price is high.”
“Is it, my lord? Or is it merely extremely advantageous to us both?” The figure smiles. “Think on it. I offer you weapons that will aid you in overcoming your foes forever. I offer to aid you in displacing the pretenders that have prevented you from seating yourself on the obsidian throne of Archomental Evil. I can help you, and all I want is one... small... thing. Just one. Just a little tiny portal.”
“Why?” demands Amhari. “Your goals are transparent but your motives remain dark.”
“As it should be,” breathes the advisor.
“And how did you know that El-Remmen would try to assassinate me?” The Pasha glares suspicously at the tall figure, who merely bows.
“I hear many things,” he replies opaquely.
“Pah!” the efreet lord snorts. “Begone! You offer me nothing!”
“As you wish, my lord. Only...” The figure pauses.
“Only what?”
“Twice now have I made my offer to you, my lord. There will be only one more time that I shall make my offer... to you.”
With another bow, the figure departs, leaving Pasha Amhari unsettled. “And what does that mean, eh?” he snarls to himself. Then he curses long and loud. “Only one more time ‘to me!’ He means to turn on me if I don’t accept! How dare he!” he roars. For a moment he considers dispatching hunters against him, but he knows what they will find: nothing. This new ‘advisor’ of his knows how to cover his tracks.
Amhari paces for a time, then storms out to the Oasis of Burning Liquor. There he spends almost two hours drinking the fiery liquid and blasting anyone that comes to near to his solitude. When at last he staggers back to his tent, he finds one of his trusted advisors there.
“My lord, I have news,” declares Salel al-Quar without preamble. “Imix’ killers are alive.”
“What!” the Pasha roars.
Salel nods sagely. “I heard word of them in Sigil. They must be mind blanked at most, if not all, times. They...” He licks his lips. “My lord, they are the ones that slew Asmodeus.” They may be beyond you, is what goes unsaid, but the meaning is plain behind his eyes.
Pasha Amhari Ifroobil is thunderstruck. “The slayers of Asmodeus!” He swears mightily, then guffaws. “Well, it seems that my new friend is useful after all.” He bellows out a summons, and five impatient minutes later the advisor has returned to him.
“I accept your offer, Glaisig,” Ifroobil snarls.
***
6 p.m., far out at sea
The sea boils and churns, as it has for quite some time. The boat swings to, turning the tiller against the slow whirlpool that threatens to drag her in. The officers are formidable- men of many years of experience, travelers of thousands of miles, spellslingers and slayers of many monsters. Their boat- whose name, translated from their tongue, is the Swift Rapier- is highly enchanted and more than a match for most natural phenomena.
This is different.
The crew are the followers of the officers, salty veterans of many years at sea. They have hacked through the tentacles of krakens, slain dragon turtles, fought off the weird ships of sahuagin and even traversed the black waters of the Underdark.
But nothing they have faced before has prepared them for this.
Almost as if it has been waiting for someone to approach, something starts to rise from within the waters. It seems to grow from the size of a man to something that almost fills the entire sky. Six massively muscled arms... a huge, raw, seeping crater in its chest... a collection of weapons and spiked bucklers are held in its massive hands. If it weren’t for the six arms and the immense size- and the terrible wounds that criss-cross its body- the thing might almost be human.
The heroes on the Swift Rapier cry out in fear as the thing looms over them. It laughs. They feel an aura of palpable power smother them, choking them with fear and awe.
What is it?
As if in answer, the monstrous being’s thoughts suddenly blast into the minds of the crew of the ship. “YOU ARE NOTHING TO ME!!”
On the Rapier, there are screams of fear.
[/B]“YOU WILL ALL DIE!! SERVE ME WELL AND YOU WILL SURVIVE TO THE END OF THINGS! MY MASTER WILL COME ONCE I HAVE OPENED THE PASSAGE, AND OPEN IT I SHALL! AND THEN ALL THINGS WILL DIE!”[/B]
There is a crash of bloody light, and a massive portal opens in the sky.
“BEHOLD MY MOUNT!”
The screams of terror grow as a horrifying creature of black blood and blue-white fire, shaped like some nightmare of a horse, blasts through the dimensions and into the skies of Cydra. Its screaming neigh explodes all the glass on board the ship.
The great six-armed figure laughs with delight as the fell beast that he has chosen to ride breathes a great billowing cloud of disease and death out. Men are throwing themselves into the sea from sheer terror, only to be swept into the boiling maelstrom.
On board the ship, the officers gather quickly. Only the fact that they consumed a heroes’ feast for breakfast keeps them from utterly breaking down and weeping.
“We have to get out of here!” one of them, the hero Borilus, shouts. “I’ll go for the tiller!” He sprints across the deck to grab the tiller, but even with all his strength he cannot turn it. He gives a cry of despair.
“FOOLISH LITTLE MAN! YOU ARE NOTHING TO ME! I COULD LET YOU FLEE AND YOU COULD DO ME NO HARM! BUT KNOW THIS...”
The figure plucks Borilus from the deck with one immense hand. The man shouts in fear as the hand dangles his high above the sea..
“YOUR FRIENDS WILL SERVE ME UNTIL THE END OF TIME! AND THAT COMES SOONER THAN YOU KNOW!!”
Borilus screams and screams as the fear bears down on him like the mouth of a shark. Then he is being thrown, and he loses consciousness. The last words he hears echo through the tormented nightmares of drowning he falls into.
“I WILL TEAR A HOLE IN THIS UNIVERSE!!”
End Interlude
Interlude the Second
8/7/371 O.L.G., the Elemental Plane of Fire
While Horbin contemplates Prayzose’s proposal, we will take just a moment to look elsewhere. For instance, here we have a realm of pure flame. The entire world is a furnace. The ground is nothing but flaming coal. The clouds are infernos.
Streaking overhead, a significant force of efreeti patrols the burning sky. Below them, on fields burning an incandescent scarlet, the elementals and mephits dance a for victory. Rank after rank of enslaved elemental throws themselves against the walls of the glowing city before them.
The City of Brass is quite a prize, if it can be gained. Pasha Amhari Ifroobil sighs. It seems as though it is holding out forever.
Well, there’s no helping it, he thinks testily. Without Imix’s killers to prove myself against, this is the only way. Foolish mortals- they always seem to get themselves killed just before they can get involved in the really important stuff.
The Pasha turns back to his tent and enters it. It is full of the perfume of exotic burning forests. The most beautiful of the efreet women languidly display themselves for him. He is not in the mood for them. With a snarl he dismisses them, and then he summons his new minister.
“Yes, my lord?” the shadowed figure says softly once he arrives.
“Ah, my mysterious friend, I am glad you come to my call so quickly.”
“Of course I do, my lord. Are you not the lord of all efreeti? Are you not master of the Elemental Plane of Fire?”
“You mock me,” Amhari Ifroobil states, but without conviction.
“Never, my lord.” The other’s voice is a purr. “Have I not done you nothing but good? Indeed, I have offered to do you more good than you will allow.”
“I am not certain that I want your weapons,” the Pasha muses. “Your price is high.”
“Is it, my lord? Or is it merely extremely advantageous to us both?” The figure smiles. “Think on it. I offer you weapons that will aid you in overcoming your foes forever. I offer to aid you in displacing the pretenders that have prevented you from seating yourself on the obsidian throne of Archomental Evil. I can help you, and all I want is one... small... thing. Just one. Just a little tiny portal.”
“Why?” demands Amhari. “Your goals are transparent but your motives remain dark.”
“As it should be,” breathes the advisor.
“And how did you know that El-Remmen would try to assassinate me?” The Pasha glares suspicously at the tall figure, who merely bows.
“I hear many things,” he replies opaquely.
“Pah!” the efreet lord snorts. “Begone! You offer me nothing!”
“As you wish, my lord. Only...” The figure pauses.
“Only what?”
“Twice now have I made my offer to you, my lord. There will be only one more time that I shall make my offer... to you.”
With another bow, the figure departs, leaving Pasha Amhari unsettled. “And what does that mean, eh?” he snarls to himself. Then he curses long and loud. “Only one more time ‘to me!’ He means to turn on me if I don’t accept! How dare he!” he roars. For a moment he considers dispatching hunters against him, but he knows what they will find: nothing. This new ‘advisor’ of his knows how to cover his tracks.
Amhari paces for a time, then storms out to the Oasis of Burning Liquor. There he spends almost two hours drinking the fiery liquid and blasting anyone that comes to near to his solitude. When at last he staggers back to his tent, he finds one of his trusted advisors there.
“My lord, I have news,” declares Salel al-Quar without preamble. “Imix’ killers are alive.”
“What!” the Pasha roars.
Salel nods sagely. “I heard word of them in Sigil. They must be mind blanked at most, if not all, times. They...” He licks his lips. “My lord, they are the ones that slew Asmodeus.” They may be beyond you, is what goes unsaid, but the meaning is plain behind his eyes.
Pasha Amhari Ifroobil is thunderstruck. “The slayers of Asmodeus!” He swears mightily, then guffaws. “Well, it seems that my new friend is useful after all.” He bellows out a summons, and five impatient minutes later the advisor has returned to him.
“I accept your offer, Glaisig,” Ifroobil snarls.
***
6 p.m., far out at sea
The sea boils and churns, as it has for quite some time. The boat swings to, turning the tiller against the slow whirlpool that threatens to drag her in. The officers are formidable- men of many years of experience, travelers of thousands of miles, spellslingers and slayers of many monsters. Their boat- whose name, translated from their tongue, is the Swift Rapier- is highly enchanted and more than a match for most natural phenomena.
This is different.
The crew are the followers of the officers, salty veterans of many years at sea. They have hacked through the tentacles of krakens, slain dragon turtles, fought off the weird ships of sahuagin and even traversed the black waters of the Underdark.
But nothing they have faced before has prepared them for this.
Almost as if it has been waiting for someone to approach, something starts to rise from within the waters. It seems to grow from the size of a man to something that almost fills the entire sky. Six massively muscled arms... a huge, raw, seeping crater in its chest... a collection of weapons and spiked bucklers are held in its massive hands. If it weren’t for the six arms and the immense size- and the terrible wounds that criss-cross its body- the thing might almost be human.
The heroes on the Swift Rapier cry out in fear as the thing looms over them. It laughs. They feel an aura of palpable power smother them, choking them with fear and awe.
What is it?
As if in answer, the monstrous being’s thoughts suddenly blast into the minds of the crew of the ship. “YOU ARE NOTHING TO ME!!”
On the Rapier, there are screams of fear.
[/B]“YOU WILL ALL DIE!! SERVE ME WELL AND YOU WILL SURVIVE TO THE END OF THINGS! MY MASTER WILL COME ONCE I HAVE OPENED THE PASSAGE, AND OPEN IT I SHALL! AND THEN ALL THINGS WILL DIE!”[/B]
There is a crash of bloody light, and a massive portal opens in the sky.
“BEHOLD MY MOUNT!”
The screams of terror grow as a horrifying creature of black blood and blue-white fire, shaped like some nightmare of a horse, blasts through the dimensions and into the skies of Cydra. Its screaming neigh explodes all the glass on board the ship.
The great six-armed figure laughs with delight as the fell beast that he has chosen to ride breathes a great billowing cloud of disease and death out. Men are throwing themselves into the sea from sheer terror, only to be swept into the boiling maelstrom.
On board the ship, the officers gather quickly. Only the fact that they consumed a heroes’ feast for breakfast keeps them from utterly breaking down and weeping.
“We have to get out of here!” one of them, the hero Borilus, shouts. “I’ll go for the tiller!” He sprints across the deck to grab the tiller, but even with all his strength he cannot turn it. He gives a cry of despair.
“FOOLISH LITTLE MAN! YOU ARE NOTHING TO ME! I COULD LET YOU FLEE AND YOU COULD DO ME NO HARM! BUT KNOW THIS...”
The figure plucks Borilus from the deck with one immense hand. The man shouts in fear as the hand dangles his high above the sea..
“YOUR FRIENDS WILL SERVE ME UNTIL THE END OF TIME! AND THAT COMES SOONER THAN YOU KNOW!!”
Borilus screams and screams as the fear bears down on him like the mouth of a shark. Then he is being thrown, and he loses consciousness. The last words he hears echo through the tormented nightmares of drowning he falls into.
“I WILL TEAR A HOLE IN THIS UNIVERSE!!”
End Interlude
hippiejedi2
First Post
Is it just me or is Glaisig and his master plotting to overthrow/destroy life on the Prime Material Plane. I could have sworn that there was an agreement that they would leave the PMP left alone, at least for a generation. As if taking over Hell is not enough of a task. Anyone up for re-storming Hell? I have those Erath guys phone number in my pocket, no wait I just did my laundry. Damn.
the Jester
Legend
hippiejedi2 said:
Hehehehe... no, no, they wouldn't break an agreement...
Bear in mind that Glaisig was interacting with the efreet Pasha on the Plane of Fire, nowhere mentioning Cydra at all.
Rikandur Azebol
First Post
And if ... by accident Hunting Party of the Efreeti would burn the Cydra down, he certainly would have clean hands. ![:]](http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/devious.png "Devious :]")
the Jester
Legend
Rikandur Azebol said:And if ... by accident Hunting Party of the Efreeti would burn the Cydra down, he certainly would have clean hands.
Well, he certainly didn't tell Amhari Ifroobil to go hunt those Asmodeus-killers.[/innocent look]
Angel of Adventure
First Post
" It seems to grow from the size of a man to something that almost fills the entire sky. Six massively muscled arms... a huge, raw, seeping crater in its chest... a collection of weapons and spiked bucklers are held in its massive hands. If it weren’t for the six arms and the immense size- and the terrible wounds that criss-cross its body- the thing might almost be human. "
Well, I guess its about time everyone meets the final member of the Fulgin, Felenga, and (insert name here)'s 'Let's Bring the Universe Down!" club. (Does his name start with an F, because it should!)
Well, I guess its about time everyone meets the final member of the Fulgin, Felenga, and (insert name here)'s 'Let's Bring the Universe Down!" club. (Does his name start with an F, because it should!)
the Jester
Legend
Angel of Adventure said:
I see somebody remembers the picture.
And no, it starts with an 'H'...
Angel of Adventure
First Post
As I might not be there in game to find out why the heck this guy is back to terrorize Cydra, I look forward to an explaination in the SH. I'm sure it is very interesting, and goes well beyond, "Well, Felenga and Fulgin got to come back and whoop butt! Why can't I?"
the Jester
Legend
Angel of Adventure said:
Look back and you might find an allusion or two already in here.
