Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="the Jester" data-source="post: 2087580" data-attributes="member: 1210">Into Thixil TestaA quick history lesson before we get started: a long time ago, there was a great empire of cat people.  These cat people- we call them tabaxi today- called their realm the Miloxi Empire, and at its height it stretched over 60,000 miles.  They were masters of portals, using them to make such a huge empire function, and of strange technologies relying upon weird crystals that seem to poison those near them today.  Perhaps they had special techniques to defend themselves from the side effects of their crystals; perhaps the tabaxi are less vulnerable to such effects by their very nature.  Who knows.  In any event, the folk of the Miloxi era had no knowledge of today’s magic, though their lore of crystals and the mind was great.Their empire, of course, fell; and it fell disastrously.  Well, that was about 50,000 years ago, if you believe the sages.  Empires falling... hey, these things happen.8/26/370 O.L.G., 10 a.m., the isle of Besta*When they arrive, mass teleporting in cloaked by invisibility, our heroes survey the scene.  As Inoke has told them, the place is a high-walled building without a ceiling, with a large statue of a tabaxi dominating it.  Behind the statue, near the ground, is the top portion of a mostly-buried arch leading out, closed off from ingress by some sort of force field that doesn’t radiate magic.  The place is overrun by a goblin tribe several score strong.  Our heroes move into position near the statue, and then Lillamere conjures a rain of leeches that falls to devastating effect on the goblin tribe.  The sounds of shrieking goblins and screams ring out.  Then the elven head of House Drelvin turns and disintegrates the wall of force blocking ingress in a flare of green light. Our heroes squirm through the hole while Lillamere turns and casts another wall of force behind them, stopping the half-hearted javelins beginning to fly their way.  The goblins are really mostly too busy to deal with our heroes; the leeches are, to put it mildly, a distraction.  Fat, fist-sized bloodsuckers crawl all over the screaming hordes of goblins, many of whom are beginning to falter and collapse to the ground. Leaving the devastated goblins to do whatever they want, the party examines their surroundings.  The metal arch previously sealed by the wall of force is about 16’ high; they had only had about 3’ of clearance above the earthen wall now blocking the lower 13’.  The earth is now packed so tight that it has not shifted at all with the destruction of the force field that it had been packed against.   Now, as our heroes drop into the chamber, a loud voice calls out something sibilant: ”MRISSSSS?”“That can’t be good,” comments Gerontius.  Standing at the far end of the chamber, flanking the only obvious door out, are two cat-headed creatures made out of dark violet crystal that is starting to flicker and glow from within.**  A cold light falls from the ceiling, where pale blue-white tubes glow brightly.“They’re probably asking for a password,” reasons Lillamere, “but we certainly don’t have one.”  He summons forth a handful of celestial monkeys, who advance towards the looming crystalline golems.  ”MRISSSSS?” the other golem asks.Then the monkeys reach the golems, and as soon as one of them touches one of the golems they burst into motion, smashing the monkeys in seconds.  Gerontius and Chakar both leap forward, striking and damaging the first one, but it strikes back, dealing a stupefying blow to the monk.  “All right, enough then!” cries Inoke, and charges forward, barreling into the first of the purple crystal golems and pushing it back to the wall and next to the other golem.  It slams its great hand into him, setting his head to ringing; but Inoke only roars.  Then he swings Deadly Avalanche in a wide, sweeping arc, and smashes both golems to rubble in a single blow.  The rest of the party has hardly even had time to move.“Wow,” says Gerontius. Inoke dusts off his hand and the party examines the room more closely.  The walls, floor and ceiling all are metal.  The exit is locked. “No problem.”  Gerontius grins, producing a set of thieves’ tools, and sets to work opening the lock.  He is startled by how good it is- he doesn’t know if he’s ever faced such a lock before.  But his fingers are nimble, and he is intimately familiar with locks and wards of all kinds.  Soon enough he springs it open, and our heroes advance into an uninhabited chamber.  A series of shower heads are set in the wall here.  In the center of the room, running north-south, is a metal fixture that has strange nozzles coming out of it.   “This place is creepy,” murmurs Gerontius.  Three doors lead out of the chamber.  The first, it turns out, leads to a chamber with four 8’ diameter pads of crystal on the ground, all dark.  The second reveals a few old, brittle smocks on a rack.  When handled, they fall apart almost instantly.  The room is also partitioned- to allow one to change with a modicum of privacy, our heroes surmise.  The third door leads to a 15’ wide metal hallway with one door to the right, one at the end and three to the left.  The doors on the left open first.  What appears to be a great litter box, with a central hole that waste could be dumped down, gives the party a chuckle.  A room of cleaning supplies doesn’t provoke too much interest from the group.  The final room on the left has large  ‘cat trees’ in the corners, as well as a stone table with a metal base bolted to the floor.  There are metal shelves set in the walls.  A lamp lies on the table.“I bet they ate here,” Gerontius comments.  “Hmm, I’m hungry- if only there was some food here!”Suddenly the lamp issues a great cloud of smoke, and in seconds something congeals from it- a tall genie!  The genies bows before the party, who goggle at it: it has the head of a cat!  Nonetheless, a turban is atop it, and its vest and pantaloons give it that look so typical of geniekind.  “Greetings!” it cries telepathically.  “How may I be of service?  Do you need food?”After a moment, Gerontius says, “Well, I’m a halfling.”“Indeed!” cries the genie, and suddenly there is food on the table before the invisible blade.“Well then,” beams Gerontius, and digs in.“Who are you?” Chakar asks.  “What are you doing here?”“I am Djoula Al-Hiwarij,” declares the feline genie.  It turns out he has been here for a very long time, mostly confined to his bottle.  “Please take me with you when you leave,” he begs, “it is so boring here!  I will give you three wishes if you free me from this place!”Sounds great to pretty much the entire party, so they agree to pick up his lamp before they leave.  As they exit the room the genie returns to his bottle, and our heroes move to the next door- the one at the end of the hallway.  It leads to a narrower hallway, and about half way down, illuminated by the same blue-white glowing ceiling rods that light the entire place (at least so far), our heroes see a perfectly immobile elf.  He doesn’t move an inch- he doesn’t even appear to breathe.  Beyond him, another 50’ past him, is another door, this one of some weird white ceramic.The elf, watched for a minute, doesn’t move.  It’s as if he’s caught in mid-step.”This isn’t a trap or anything,” Gerontius says at last, his voice dripping sarcasm.Next Time: Will our heroes fall into the trap?  Will they rescue the elf?  What’s through the door at the end of the hall?  Find out all this and more!*It is not impossible that I might have the specific island that Inoke was from wrong- it’s either Besta or Rolva.  Either way, it’s a small island about 14 miles across in an out of the way island chain called the Parrot Isles that is mostly famous for its kocho.**Think of a fluorescent black light starting up.</blockquote>

Verification