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Message: <blockquote data-quote="the Jester" data-source="post: 2857137" data-attributes="member: 1210">Lester is already chanting, throwing his head back as he invokes a miracle to cast Marius’ deconstruction.  In a flash of rust-colored light, Axel-6 falls into useless pieces.“Get ‘em!” shouts Thrush, brandishing his sword and stepping menacingly towards the enemy.  Gerontius tumbles away from them.  They’re constructs, he reasons, I can’t hurt them very much with my weapons.  Then he grins.  But I can use my ring of radiance to hit them with sunrays!  And he proceeds to do so.  While it is less effective than his customary skill with daggers, Diplomacy and Gerontius, it is certainly better than nothing.Meanwhile, Orbius casts a spell, and it seems as though a prismatic sphere appears instantly above the nimblewrights, and they tumble upwards in the area of a reverse gravity.  The truth, of course, is that he magically halted time for a moment in order to effect these spells; and now, as four of the nimblewrights- all of the Axars, in fact- impact the deadly sphere and turn to stone, the Eye hits another one of them with a Marius’ deconstruction and Axel-8 explodes into tangled wire and metal plates!The Axons and Axels that remain hurry forward, dancing and tumbling adroitly.  They mob Thrush and Lester, stabbing and pricking them multiple times.  The two heroes groan with pain, but they are among the toughest mortals on Cydra.  A few flesh wounds won’t even slow them down!  Even less so, once Horbin casts a mass heal to restore them both to health.With burgeoning confidence, our heroes continue to tear into the nimblewrights.  Baron Lillamere disintegrates one, while Lester invokes his wrath of the elements against the constructs.  More of them fall, and the party pours it on.  The constructs are mostly defeated, but then more foes issue forth suddenly!  Another of the bile thorciasids scuttles in across the ceiling, followed quickly by a scowling dwarf in full plate and a shield, with a wicked-looking axe.  Behind him, a sick-looking man steps into the chamber, and both Horbin and Alcar gasp, for the man bears the trappings of a cleric of Bleak, the arch-enemy of the Light!And then, a horrid reek presages the coming of Tamult the Bile Lord.  He enters the room, ten feet tal, withered with age.  His skin is yellow and drips disgusting yellow bile like sweat.  Only small patches of hair remain on his head, and he looks almost skeletally thin.  The hideous creature is surrounded by a cloud of noxious yellow gas.   “Kill them, my minions!” he rasps, and with a snarl on his withered lips, he casts the epic spell Tamult’s assault.Nobody even sees the halfling.***DarkholdIn a place beyond time and space- a place outside of Nature itself- three or five (depending on how you count them) beings of extraordinary power meet.  They are all quite concerned.  Once, all three (or five) of them were mortals.  Now, they are gods.  It has been eons since things changed, but they still all have poignant memories of a time before.  They remember things even the very god of knowledge himself cannot recall.  As mortals, they dwelt in a time so long past that there are no records remaining (save perhaps within Darkhold itself), a time before the very multiverse that Cydra is but a part of. “I’m telling you,” the first one says, “something is terribly wrong.  The Master is concerned.”  He appears to be an elf, with eyes o’ gold and hair o’ silver.  He smiles, or rather smirks, constantly.  He is accompanied by a pair of red-eyed, depressed-looking brownies.  His name is Froth, and he is a god of things most foul: necrophilia, rape, cowardice.  Redeeming features?  What are those?  Well, he is a god nonetheless, empowered by Darkhold as are the other two (or four).The Master he speaks of is not his master, of course.  Froth admits to no master.  No, he speaks of the very architect of Cydra itself- the Master of Darkhold.“Have you seen him lately?” asks the second.  “I haven’t been able to find him for quite a while.”  Zelman is his name, and he is lord of illusions, called the Emerald Mage.  He looks like a man with emerald skin and blue hair.  He in thin of build and wears a black cloak behind rich clothing of blue and green.  The jewels decorating him are mostly emeralds.  He is circled by nearly a dozen ioun stones.  His staff, he has let out to Thimbleton, an adventurer to whom all three (or five) of these deities owe their freedom.  He glances at the third member- or, perhaps, members- of their group.  “Have even you seen him lately?”“No,” the first of the triplet Garnet sisters answers.  “But I have a feeling I know what he’s up to.”  Her face wears a tragic look.  She has golden hair and violet eyes.  A silver rose clasps her cloak closed at her breast.  She is dressed in fine silver armor and is well-armed.  Her two sisters bear less armor and weaponry; one of them, in fact, wears only simple robes clasped with a silver rose and carries nothing else.“This has everything to do with that damned Scytale, doesn’t it?” Froth groans.  “He did something that let one of them through.”“Not exactly,” the second Garnet- the one lightly armored- answers.  Her name is Sabine.  Like her sister Amethyst, she wears a cloak clasped with a silver rose.  “Scytale didn’t do it directly.”“What did he do?” asks Zelman.“He taught one of the Cydrans a little bit more than was... wise.  This human, naturally enough, used what he had learned.  He tried to go back in time.  I don’t know whether Scytale tricked him or he just got ambitious, but...”“Didn’t the Master set it up so that time travel was impossible on Cydra?”Froth interjects, “Yeah, but we are talking about Scytale here.”“We are also,” the armored Garnet- named Amethyst- points out, “talking about the Master of Darkhold.”“Well, we know that something came through from the very end of the old universe,” sighs Froth.  “So it looks like Scytale managed to win that round.”“There is really only one thing that could have come through,” Zelman says grimly.  “We all know that.  At the end- just before Tharizdun ate Nature- there were only a few surviving things.  And we know what they were.”A silence descends upon them for a few moments.  A sense of dread grows.  They  all hesitate to name it, but finally, reluctantly, Froth whispers, “The Angels of the Apocalypse.”***Bile MountainAlcar reels back from Tamult’s assault.  He feels many of the spells and wards on him dissipate in an instant, and then the spell blasts him with furious energy!  Fortunately, his innate spell resistance protects him from the damage, and then he feels a swift ego whip slap off of the mind blank that Orbius cast upon him earlier in the day.Thrush cuts down another Axel, shouting, “Come on, take them!”  There is just a hint of fear in his voice at the sight of one of his former masters.  Still, he does not hesitate; he just moves in as quickly as he can towards the Bile Lord.Orbius, meanwhile, is using time stop and Marius’ double actions to try to maximize his efficiency.  He uses both some new spells that he developed with Bile Mountain specifically in mind (such as anti-bile cloud) as well as some old favorites (such as meteor swarm).Alcar moves to intercept the priest of Bleak, filled with righteous rage at the very sight of him.  A quickened flame strike on him reveals that he is protected from fire (although the divine half of the damage gets through).  The evil cleric grins wickedly and brandishes his mace.  “I’m going to take you apart!” he barks.  Suddenly Lester passes up out of the earth behind him and blasts him with a polar ray modified by his rod of energy substitution to fire lightning instead.  The beam catches Melgin Lostway squarely in the back, and the Bleakist looks surprised for a moment as brilliant blue arcs of electricity sizzle through him- and then, without a word, he dies.“Oh yeah!” exclaims Lester.  “I got him!”  He grins and gives Alcar a thumbs-up.Suddenly the halfling becomes visible, with her knife stuck in Lester.  But because of his fortification, it barely hurts him!  His would-be assassin gives a cry of dismay.  Our heroes gape for a split second.She has two heads.Sybele, meanwhile, uses control sound to try to prevent Tamult the Bile Lord from casting spells.  Sonja casts a reverse gravity, sending him to the ceiling.  Simultaneously, Lillamere begins pitting his spells against the dwarven warrior coming to slay him.  Then the thorciasid bursts forth from the anti-bile cloud and touches Gerontius, siphoning his life force.  The invisible blade cries out in pain and anger and then begins a whirling array of cuts and stabs.  Horbin glares at Tamult.  “We’re going to kill you again, in the name of Dexter!” he cries.  Tamult only sneers.  But then Horbin casts a quickened lower resistance and Tamult’s sneer falters.  Alcar and Lester, meanwhile, are dueling with the two-headed halfling.  Their dance ends abruptly, however, when Alcar swings his mace into her chest hard enough that he bursts her heart.  She collapses, dead.  “I think things are going against you, Bile Lord!” Thrush calls from where he has moved to engage the dwarf. “Traitor,” Tamult growls from the ceiling.  “You’ll get yours, never fear.”“I think not,” retorts Orbius, and he unloads on Tamult.  A quickened puncture, and empowered bile ray, and another anti-bile cloud blast out (thanks to Marius’ double actions).  It is more than the Bile Lord can take.  He falls!Then it is just a matter of mopping up.  Thrush finishes the dwarf in short order- he is the foremost swordsman of his age, after all- and a combined magical and physical array finally slays the bile thorciasid as well.Our heroes remain tense for a few minutes, expecting more attackers at any moment, but none come.  While several party members keep watch, the others begins stripping the valuables from the battle site.  Almost immediately, Horbin exclaims, “That’s my helmet!”   He grabs the helm in question and stares at it in shock.  “I’m keeping it.”“You lost it when you all died in here?” asks Chakar.  He nods.“Hmm.  Well, we’ll count that as your first treasure pick,” suggests Lester.  “Well, we’re pretty wounded.  Let’s gather the loot and go away- maybe back to Sigil- and rest, identify and split up loot.”  Baron Lillamere glances at the others.  None of them naysay him.  Therefore they gather their treasure and any other sundry objects they choose and head downstairs to exit the mountain for a time.But they will be back fairly shortly.  Next Time: A week in Sigil!</blockquote>

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