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Message: <blockquote data-quote="the Jester" data-source="post: 2986193" data-attributes="member: 1210">The Bastion of LawVeil knows full well that she is risking everything, but if she can pull it off... what a coup!  Fierce pride at her ability to infiltrate runs through her veins.She is inside.  It took a great deal of work, and it entails incredible risk... but she has infiltrated the Bastion of Law.  Disguised as one of the warriors from outside, she joined a troop of men and entered the fortress.  The main building is well-fortified and has multiple layers of defense.  She has not yet been able to gain ingress into the towers of the Bastion.For a moment, she half-cocks her head as if listening.  It’s almost as if her shield- the Shield of Graz’zt- is whispering advice to her.  Well, she has had help cloaking it in illusion and artifice, and so far it has helped her a great deal.  So long as she can keep it hidden, she can remain infiltrated. It is very dangerous, but she has a plan.  She is going to find out the identity of the nominated Arrow of Law, and she is going to do it by impersonating Cluma.  ***Bile MountainTwang!  Twang!  Arrows shoot into another of the terrible death snappers, the first penetrating its shell with punishing ease.  The second snaps off away from the thick protection the turtle has.  Sybele shouts with glee at the wound she managed to inflict, and then Chakar springs up next to it.  His fists and feet are a blur as he smashes, strikes, kicks and crushes it!  Blood squirts from under the thing’s shell and its mouth gapes open in a gasp.  Chakar’s foot smashes directly into the death snapper’s beak, shattering the forward part of its head!  The thing collapses, unmoving.Then one of the ooze octopi lashes out at him, thrashing him soundly with disruptive blows, inflicting massive damage.  Chakar can feel vile, unholy energy rip through his wounds and he screams in pain.*  He staggers and starts to fall; but Horbin casts a mass cure critical wounds just then, and Chakar snaps back to awareness.  Gritting his teeth, the monk inflicts a weakening touch on the octopus and then leaps back out of the way as a maximized flame strike from Lester whooshes down.  Horbin glances at the water, where yet more enemies seem to be swimming swiftly closer.  Though he can make out their forms, he cannot see them clearly; but clearly, more bad guys arriving in an instant is not in our heroes’ best interests.  So Horbin utters a prayer to Dexter and the water’s level lowers dramatically, revealing the other monsters: masses of tentacles seemingly without any other parts attached!  They begin climbing the now-exposed slope that is normally the bottom of the pool in the cavernous belly of Bile Mountain, churning towards our heroes across the slimy stones.  As they come, they fade into greater invisibility, but between the party members’ various see invisibilities, steadfast perception and true seeing and the synesthetic link that Sybele had established between the party members, the tactic is essentially irrelevant.  Lester and Orbius begin flinging spells at the monsters, but they seem surprisingly resistant to magic. Inoke carefully measures the strange tentacled beasts’ progress.  Now that they are on the ground, rather than in the water, they’re moving much slower, his schismed brain notes, and his normal mind responds, Yes- let’s take out those octopi!His body suddenly morphs and shifts.  Tentacles burst from his back; he grows horrible and ominous.  Inoke assumes the form of doom, and then he roars and unleashes a powerful Inoke special: a heedless charge mixed with a powerful psionic lion’s charge and his chain of overwhelming force!  Finally, one of the octopi falls, crashing into the wall and going limp in a spray of mud!  But to Inoke’s chagrin, he can see that it is regenerating.  He roars again, in frustration, but there’s no point in dwelling on it; there are still multiple, and very dangerous, enemies around.  He turns to face the other ooze octopus just as it snaps Chakar’s neck with a mighty blow.  The dwarven monk flies back and lands near the edge of the staircase, dead!“Nooo!” cries Horbin.  Another mass cure spell brings Thrush around and helps the cleric’s own wounds, but it’s too late for Chakar.  “Don’t worry, I’ve got dwarf monk guy!” Sybele exclaims, leaping to the ground next to his corpse.  Her mind suddenly charges with psychic energy and a spark seems to leap from her to him.  His body goes stiff for an instant, as if electrified, and then his eyes flicker open!  Chakar groans, but is too injured to move. Meanwhile, Lillamere has turned his attentions to the oncoming tentacled things.  A maximized disintegrate sloughs off the thing’s considerable spell resistance, and the baron grows somewhat annoyed.  He shape changes into a dragon and a laugh rumbles within his vast chest.  “Let’s see, now,” he roars, flames beginning to lick at the corners of his mouth. Inoke, meanwhile, has charged the nearest enemy- one of the tentacles things.  His blows pound it mercilessly, and in a single set of attacks he slays it!  Then he turns to the other one- which Gerontius is currently hitting with a blast from his ring of radiance- and does something very similar to it.  Suddenly, the only remaining enemy is the last of the ooze octopi.As tough as it is, with all of our heroes focusing on it, it doesn’t last long at all.  The combination of overwhelming force and magic destroys it in a few minutes, and Lillamere’s flaming breath proves to be the proper remedy for the issue of the regenerating one, too.  Soon the battle is over.“Now what?” asks Inoke.“Retreat,” suggests Horbin.  “I just used up most of my resources, and I suspect that I am not the only one.”  Lester, Orbius and Inoke all nod confirmation.“And I died,” Chakar notes.  “We never even got inside!” Gerontius complains.  “And Wankerman is dead as well!  Ahh, what a waste!”“Well, look,” Lester opines, “we can just come back tomorrow-”“No!” Baron Lillamere rumbles.  “We have a deal, and we’re keeping it.  Even if I have to go alone, I will keep my word to Chaos.  Tomorrow, we storm the bastion.”“I’m telling you,” Inoke says glumly, “you guys are making a mistake.  Do you really want to fight Marius?  And Prayzose?”“No, but if we have to, we will,” snaps Lillamere.“And I agree that we have expended too many resources to really go on here for now,” says Orbius. “Then we are agreed,” nods Horbin.  The party starts walking back towards the distant entrance to the cave beneath Bile Mountain.  But as they near it, they come to a halt, for arrayed against them are a group of inevitables scribed with the arrow glyph of Law and a flickering thing that seems to slide in and out of time.“Oh <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />,” says Thrush. Next Time: Whoops!  Well, our heroes have survived the Bile Lords’ surprise ambush for them in the foyer- but can they survive the ambush set by the forces of Law that blocks the exit??*Ouch, the ooze octopus just added 30 points of vile damage to Chakar’s tally.  Vile damage, described in the BoVD, needs consecrated or hallowed ground to be healed. :wince:</blockquote>

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