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Message: <blockquote data-quote="the Jester" data-source="post: 2191830" data-attributes="member: 1210">Egg of the Phoenix11/15/370 O.L.G., 11:20 a.m., the Stinking PitGuided by Orbius’ divination, our heroes begin searching for the phoenix egg of the Stinking Pit of Blendorag.  Despite the overthrow of the pit fiend Thizli, the foul, choking smoke still wafts up from the lake of lava below.  Visibility is extremely limited, so our heroes, affected by a mass overland flight, have to search very carefully and thoroughly.  Orbius keeps a piercing clarity up on himself in order to increase his own effectiveness.  The stench of brimstone requires all of our heroes to periodically retreat in order to get some fresh air. Hours pass in slow examination of every crack, ledge and little hole in the walls of the vast pit.  Finally, the Eye calls out, “I have found something!”  The others fly over to Orbius, and there is a flurry of buffing magic as our heroes prepare for trouble.  Then Gerontius finds the secret door’s mechanism as trips it; and our heroes enter a 60’ long stone hall.  Within it are four horrifying monsters that seem like some sort of ghastly half-humanoid, half-slug.  Their skin is a clammy looking blue color.  Each bears a wicked-looking falchion.  Behind them is a large bright orange egg.  As Orbius spies it, symbols flare to life on it!  Death magic and fear wash over our heroes like ocean water over one’s feet on the beach, tingling but not actually slowing anyone down more than half an instant.Orbius casts Mordenkainen’s disjunction at the egg, and the symbols crackle and wither, the spells that maintain them dissipating like smoke in a strong wind, and Alcar rushes forward, smiting evil, and Chakar is at his side.  The devils react instantly, with one of them trying to confuse Lester and another fading from view.  The third targets Inoke with a greater dispel magic, reducing his considerable magical and psionic enhancements significantly, while the fourth immediately enters melee with Chakar, trying to sweep the monk’s feet, but he leaps over the devil’s strike nimbly, then adroitly taps the monster in the face with his foot.  Though it looks gentle, like the merest touch, the devil grunts as its nose and cheek shatter.  It groans, then reels back as Alcar pounds it in the side with his mace.   Chakar reaches up and grasps the monster’s shoulder, then suddenly somehow pulls it down and into a grapple!  Lester, meanwhile, uses the ol’ horrid wilting and quickened flame strike combination, focusing on the bad guy that tried to confuse him (though the horrid wilting naturally wounds all the devils).  Orbius then adds a quickend true strike and a disintegrate to the action, and the devil explodes in fine spray of dust!Inoke, stripped of most of his enhancements, expands to huge size again.  His shrugs mentally; he needn’t spend more time getting ready, the fight is already here and he’s convinced the party can win it.  One of the monsters is down, one is grappled by the dwarven monk, one is moving to try to persuade Chakar to let him go and one of them is still standing off a little ways.  So he unleashes a sweeping strike at Chakar’s victim and the devil rushing to his aid, crushing and killing both of them and then cleaving onto the remaining devil, who has just unleashed a frigid cone of cold that hurt our heroes a good deal. “It’s over, devil!” Chakar announces to the last surviving xerfilstyx, flying up to eye level with the monster.  In a flurry of blows, Chakar pounds the monstrous half-slug in the head, splits its skull, reaches in and removes its brain!  It falls, dead, and he casts the organ aside.“Wow, that was a good move!  If you hadn’t before, your worth you’d have proved!” Lester cries, impressed.Alcar gestures.  “The egg is ours.”***Deciding what to do about hatching the egg- which really means safeguarding it for a year and a day and then getting a wish- is next on the to do list.  “Wait,” suggests Gerontius.  “That’s all we have to do.”“That’ll take forever,” Lester argues.  “That’s not very clever.  Perhaps a fast time plane would not be our bane.”So the party returns to Sigil, to the Eyebrary as they have taken to calling it.  They know the Eyebrarian has access to a demiplane wherein time flows quickly; he allowed them to use it to study his books.  He is willing to allow them to use it again in return for a magical tome, which they purchase on the streets of Sigil.  Then they prepare to spend a subjective year and a day in the demiplane, which should be about four months of time on Cydra.  The scrystrikes continue while they are within the demiplane, and very soon the party makes the grim decision to mind blank everyone all the time.  “We have to stay on our guard constantly,” Orbius insists, and he’s right.  Anything else would leave them open to constant magical attack.  It is more than worrisome that Asmodeus has taken an interest in them.  What did we do? Orbius wonders.  If only he knew- it is not what they have done, it is what they are about to do.Inoke’s genie eventually issues forth from its bottle and grants him his third wish, finally able to be freed.  There is great rejoicing, and the genie thanks Inoke for his kind and dignified treatment.   Inoke uses the wish to refocus all the weapon training he has had in the greatclub to apply instead to the heavy mace.  He is not certain whether it will work; but it does, much to his relief.Over the year and a day, subjective, that the party spends in the demiplane, Inoke listens faithfully to the preaching of the Mace of St. John day after day.  Soon he has turned to Law as an ideal, though he certainly opposes Law in conjunction with Evil.  Indeed, Inoke comes to realize that only through the perfect union of Law and Good can the greatest good for the greatest number be achieved.About midway through the period the party spends on the demiplane, a series of sendings come from the Delphinate, apparently being sent out to all of the most powersful spellcasters known on Cydra.  Lillamere, Orbius, Lester and Horbin are all on that list.  The gist of the message is that the Delphin wishes to summon a great conclave of spellcasters to discuss the establishment of a ‘Law of Magical War’.  All of our heroes are intrigued.  Our heroes will hear more about this later, they are certain.Finally the phoenix egg begins to smoke and shake, and about a day later, it begins to crack until it suddenly bursts free in a blaze of glory.Awed by the spectacular radiance before them, Orbius goes down on one knee and cries, “Oh glorious phoenix, welcome back from your long exile!  We have rescued your egg and hatched you over a year and a day, as-“The phoenix gives out a loud anguished cry.  “You fools!” he cries.  “You utter fools!  You have broken the bargain!  Now the prison will not hold him!  Now the One Who Came Before is free to return!”“God dammit,” curses Sybele, “we’ve made another enemy, haven’t we?”Next Time: Who is the One Who Came Before? Who did he ‘come before’?  What does all this have to do with our hereos’ current rash of problems?  And what about their wish??</blockquote>

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