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<blockquote data-quote="Richards" data-source="post: 8898797" data-attributes="member: 508"><p><strong>ADVENTURE 42: DEAD MAN'S PARTY</strong></p><p></p><p>PC Roster:</p><p style="margin-left: 20px">Alewyth Putterpye, dwarf priestess of Aerik 9</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Thurloe Pulver, human fighter 3/wizard 3/spellsword 3</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Wakuren, half-orc cleric of Cal 5/paladin 4</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Xandro Silverstrings, human bard 6/rogue 3</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"> Zander Quilson, elf sorcerer 9</p><p></p><p>Game Session Date: 7 January 2023</p><p></p><p> - - -</p><p></p><p>"So, this is Billingsway," commented Thurloe as they entered the little village. "Gotta say: not entirely impressed. Still, a town this size, it ought to be easy to find our dreamer."</p><p></p><p>That indeed proved to be the case. There were two taverns in town, and when the group stopped in the first they were immediately given directions to the home of one <strong>Jerrick Consuelo</strong>, who had been sleeping now for about three weeks. "Drink up now if you're interested," recommended the barman. "We'll be closing up an hour or so before twilight."</p><p></p><p>"Really?" asked Thurloe. "I'd have though that's when you'd do your most business."</p><p></p><p>"Ordinarily, yes. But tonight there's going to be a big party in the village square; maybe you saw them setting up for it?" When Wakuren admitted they had seen some folks putting up streamers and moving tables and benches around, the barman continued, "Local wizard died a few days ago. This is some kind of party wake, or something. I dunno. But the guy in charge of it, <strong>Alabard Ducresni</strong>, he hired all my servers for the evening. Did the same with the girls at the other tavern, too, so the whole town could participate. You're all welcome to come, too, if you've a mind - everybody's welcome. Free beer and ale, I'm told."</p><p></p><p>"We'll keep it in mind," Wakuren promised.</p><p></p><p>The group found the Consuelo house easy enough, but when Alewyth knocked on the door there was no answer. "You folks looking for the Consuelos?" called a voice from across the street.</p><p></p><p>"We are," Alewyth answered back.</p><p></p><p>"Well, you're out of luck, I'm afraid. <strong>Thelma</strong>'s out in the fields, and poor Jerrick's asleep and can't nobody seem to awaken him."</p><p></p><p>"That's actually why we're here," the dwarven priestess replied.</p><p></p><p>"Well, Thelma should be back in the next hour or so, more'n likely. Come on over and you can wait here on my porch. I'll make us some tea." That seemed as good of a plan as any, so before long the five heroes found themselves sitting on the porch of <strong>Edna Tallywack</strong>, who was somewhat of a nosy neighbor and a neighborhood gossip. It seemed Jerrick had gone to bed one night three weeks ago and had been asleep since, with nobody able to wake him back up, not even a group of traveling druids. "'Course, small town like us, we don't have a lot of high-powered clerics like they do in the big cities," Edna mused. But since Jerrick's coma, his wife Thelma had been doing his work in his stead out in the vineyards.</p><p></p><p>Edna also filled the group in about the night's planned festivities. "The wizard who died - Volossio is his name - nobody in town can recall ever seeing him. He's one of those - well, he <em>was</em> one of those 'stay in his keep all day studying new spells' kinds of wizards, I reckon. His apprentice, though, Alabard Ducresni, he's a real nice sort. Everybody in town knows Alabard; he's the one who'd come into town and buy groceries and whatnot for old Volossio. He's the one made all the plans for the festivities tonight, too - there's going to be free beer and ale, and I've heard he's got the two taverns in town agreed to shut down for the night and he's even hired the serving girls for the evening! It sounds like it's going to be a good time. Oh, here comes Thelma now!"</p><p></p><p>Looking down the street to where Edna was pointing, the group saw a bedraggled-looking young woman with bare feet and stains up to her knees - no doubt after a day spent crushing grapes. Thelma Consuelo had strands of blond hair sticking out from underneath her head-scarf, and she looked up at the strangers on her neighbor's porch with curiosity. The expression on her face became even more puzzled when they approached her as she reached her front door.</p><p></p><p>"Mrs. Consuelo?" asked Alewyth. "We've come to try to wake your husband up. He's suffering from a dream plague that's been affecting others all across the continent. We've had some success in waking most of them up." She went on to give a brief description of the things they planned to do to awaken Jerrick.</p><p></p><p>"By all means," agreed Thelma at once. "Please, come right this way." She led them inside her house, and to a bedroom in the back where her husband lay sleeping. She stood back, out of the way, as the five heroes pulled the bed into the middle of the room and tied a leather headband around Jerrick's temple. Then, as they put their own headbands into place - they all had a strange stone in the middle, Thelma noticed - and sat in a circle around the bed, Edna wandered in, not wanting to miss out on all of the action. "They do this all the time," she reassured Thelma, as if she'd known them for ages and was one of their closest confidants - an assumption she was all too willing for Thelma to make.</p><p></p><p>"Do you need us to do anything?" Thelma asked.</p><p></p><p>"Just stay quiet enough so we aren't disturbed," Xandro replied with a smile. "It's not going to be very exciting from this angle, I'm afraid; all of the action will be taking place in your husband's dream."</p><p></p><p>"You're going inside his dream?" Thelma asked, wanting to make sure she had heard correctly.</p><p></p><p>"That's the plan," Thurloe replied. "Now it's quiet time." He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and released it slowly. Around the bed, the other four did the same, and within a few minutes they had all made it to sleep and were transferring their consciousnesses to the Dreamlands.</p><p></p><p>"Hey, kupo!" called out their respective moogle dream guides, before leading them to the Corridor of Dreams where Mogo, the lead dream instructor, was waiting for them. His little wings were flapping furiously to keep him at head height with the five dreamwalkers, as the little kitten-thing was only about two feet tall. "Have fun with this one, kupo!" he said, opening a particular door and ushering his students inside.</p><p></p><p>Walking into the dreamscape, the five dreamwalkers found themselves in a field of grass abutting a dark forest. There was a path leading into the forest, which hit upon a clearing at the intersection of another path, this one perpendicular to the one coming from the field. It was on this second path that a group of figures ambled by. At first look, it seemed to be four adult humans with three children walking beside them, two of the former balancing a large, oblong box. But as they entered the clearing and could be seen more clearly, the group noticed the four adults were all dressed as clowns and the three "children" were merely goblin-sized harlequins, complete with pointy hats and ruffles along the edges of their collars and sleeves. Each of the seven wore clown makeup, no two quite the same - although their leering visages and sharp teeth gave off a distinctively creepy vibe. Without even a word of encouragement from Thurloe, Wakuren examined their auras and was not in the least bit surprised to see very distinct evil emanations coming off from each of the seven figures.</p><p></p><p>Of course, the caption "KIDS TO EAT" scrawled upon the box being lugged by the second clown in line and the six-year-old boy peering fearfully out of the top of the box were both good indicators as well.</p><p></p><p>However, as soon as Wakuren had determined the seven figures were as evil as anything he'd ever seen before, they all stopped their progression and stood stock still, moving only their heads, which swiveled in the heroes' direction. Painted smiles grew in size, the harlequins absolutely giddy with delight as they hooted and howled and broke ranks to race toward the heroes, exposed fingers sporting claws and their teeth all filed down to points.</p><p></p><p>"Get ready," cautioned Thurloe, holding his bastard sword <em>Spellslicer</em> in a defensive posture as he waited for the evil little harlequins to arrive.</p><p></p><p>"Yeah, brilliant idea," replied Zander, calling to mind the words to a <em>lightning bolt</em> spell. "Good thinking there, Thurloe!" At his side, Alewyth held her dwarven warhammer <em>Sjondra</em> at the ready; Xandro likewise had pulled his <em>frost short sword</em> out of its scabbard and held it up, blade pointed at the incoming terrors in their pointy little hats.</p><p></p><p>But Thurloe wasn't just spouting out obvious advice - he was also consciously attempting to reshape a bit of the dreamscape. The three harlequins ran side by side, and with pure effort of will - and his dreamwalker training - the spellsword managed to conjure up a patch of thick, gloppy mud immediately before the rightmost harlequin. The little menace sank into it almost up to his knees, dropping behind the other two who failed to even notice his predicament. That pair ran forward, and Wakuren smashed the leftmost one smack-dab in the face with his <em>shield of Cal</em>. But the half-orc saw, behind the cannibalistic harlequins, the clowns carefully set down the box and then join their smaller companions in running toward the heroes, their faces showing an eagerness at the opportunity to inflict pain. One wore a tiny little hat at the top of his head, and Wakuren idly wondered how it stayed in place while the clown dashed forward at full speed.</p><p></p><p>Alewyth cast a summoning spell and a dire wolf suddenly manifested behind the clowns. It leaped forward, clamping its jaws around one clown's arm, dragging him down to the ground. Behind the dwarven priestess, Xandro stabbed the point of his short sword into the soft ground beside him and pulled out his lute, beginning the chords to his song of inspirational courage. The path into the forest only allowed three people side by side, and the bard had no problem being one of the ones in the back row, unable (for the moment) to engage in hand-to-hand combat with these fiendish freaks.</p><p></p><p>Zander took a step to the side and cast his <em>lightning bolt</em> spell, which arced diagonally towards the rushing harlequins and blasted the second one into a burned corpse. But the first harlequin on the scene continued his attacks upon Wakuren, while the one Thurloe had slowed in a mud puddle made his way to Alewyth, biting and clawing for all he was worth. "Nasty little buggers!" the priestess swore.</p><p></p><p>Thurloe continued using his lucid dreaming training to alter the battle area: concentrating fiercely, he caused a tree to uproot and topple over, falling just in front of the three clowns not currently under attack by Alewyth's summoned dire wolf. It hadn't landed on any of the clowns, but maybe it would slow down their approach a bit.</p><p></p><p>Wakuren was more in a mood to get this battle over and done with, however; he swung his shield into the harlequin before him a second time and crushed the vile little thing's skull. It collapsed to the forest trail floor in a boneless heap. The clowns, in the meantime, all demonstrated that the flowers they wore at their lapels were more than mere decoration: each also squirted out a stream of acid. The dire wolf was the only foe currently in range, so he got the brunt of the attacks.</p><p></p><p>Alewyth clobbered the last remaining harlequin with her warhammer, eliciting a high-pitched cry of pain from the little freak. Xandro grabbed up his sword and ran up to it, skewering it through the heart; it died, leaking an oily, black substance instead of blood from the puncture mark in its chest. Zander moved into position and sent a <em>lightning bolt</em> spell crashing through the three full-size clowns that <em>weren't</em> currently grappling with Alewyth's summoned dire wolf; the electricity caused the clown's goofy-looking hair to stand on end, but it failed to drop any of them, and the looks of gleefully evil determination to pay back the elven sorcerer for his effrontery caused Zander to shudder uncontrollably a bit.</p><p></p><p>Thurloe raced up by the tree he had downed, casting a <em>scorching ray</em> at one of the clowns as he did so. Wakuren paced the spellsword, his shield at the ready as a weapon to take these jokesters down. Thurloe had no shield, and thus was forced to try to block the incoming streams of acid shot his way by a pair of the giggling clowns with his left arm, protecting his eyes as best he could. The clown being savaged by the dire wolf managed to regain his feet momentarily, before the giant lupine clamped down on an arm again and pulled him back to the ground.</p><p></p><p>Alewyth ran up to the downed clown to help her summoned wolf deal with him, but by the time she got close enough it had ripped out the clown's throat and he died drowning in his own black ichor. Xandro ran up behind the dwarven priestess, lute swung back into place over his shoulder and sword out for action. Zander, realizing Thurloe was in the way of his shot but also recognizing that this was just a dream and Thurloe couldn't really be slain as a result, cast a <em>lightning bolt</em> spell that blasted right through the spellsword to hit the three remaining cannibalistic clowns. Thurloe didn't even acknowledge the pain of the lightning blast; rather, he took advantage of the confusion to slay the clown immediately before him, taking his head off with a sideways swipe of his bastard sword. The clown's head came to a stop over by one of the trees of the forest, its goofy little hat still in place and its sightless eyes focused on its slayer as its painted-on smile never once wavered.</p><p></p><p>Wakuren slew another clown, bringing the bottom, pointed tip of his <em>shield of Cal</em> crushing the top of the clown's skull before him. That left only one more clown still in play, and he focused his attacks on the half-orc cleric/paladin before him, apparently already having long since forgotten the "kid to eat" in the box on the forest floor. But another <em>lightning bolt</em> spell from Zander - this time after scrambling to the side to make sure none of his friends was in the line of the blast - took down the last clown.</p><p></p><p>Seeing the threat was apparently over, Thurloe spun around and cast a <em>lightning bolt</em> spell of his own directly at the elven sorcerer, giving him a taste of his own medicine. But then a tentative voice whispered, "Is it safe to come out?"</p><p></p><p>Looking back over at the box on the forest floor, there was a pair of hands and the top half of a six-year-old child's head peeking out over the rim of the open box. "Are they all dead?" young Jerrick Consuelo asked.</p><p></p><p>"They'll not be troubling you any more," Alewyth promised the young lad. And then, with a sigh of relief, Jerrick started to climb out of the box - and the dreamscape started fading around him. As a young child, Jerrick had been taken to a traveling carnival, where he got his first look at a group of clowns. The experience had been a terrifying one for the young boy, no doubt the reason behind him having this particular dream. But now Jerrick, a young man in his early twenties, sat up in bed and looked around him in puzzlement, for a group of strangers (who looked somewhat familiar somehow) sat around his bed. Thelma shrieked in delight and hugged him fiercely, explaining how much time had elapsed since he'd last fallen asleep.</p><p></p><p>"We can't pay you much," apologized Thelma, and before Alewyth could even start to denounce any need for payment, the young woman added, "But you should come to the party! I wasn't going to go, but now that Jerrick's awake we have a reason to celebrate - and we can show the rest of the town that he's awake!"</p><p></p><p>It took little convincing to get the five heroes (and Scarlie, who had been waiting outside the Consuelo home with the wagon and riding mounts) to agree to head over to the village's gathering. There had been a few enhancements since the group had seen the area still being set up earlier that afternoon: now the two platforms were in place; at the front was a podium and a tarpaulin draped over some sort of blocky statue or something, with a canvas tent erected behind and to the side, while the platform in the back held a row of seats, upon which a group of merry bards was playing a merry tune. There had to be at least two hundred people mingling in the areas between the two platforms, some sitting at the 13 tables and benches, some sitting on the two curved rows of additional benches marking the edges of the gathering, and others standing and chatting in the areas between. Of important note were the six automatons scattered throughout the area: four of these were the size of a human and had a large beer barrel as a body, from which extended metallic arms and legs and a simple head formed from a much smaller barrel; the two larger ones - each close to eight feet tall - had multiple barrels making up their bodies, and were filled with ale while the smaller units were filled with beer. Eight serving girls, hired for the night from the two village taverns, made themselves busy bustling back and forth between the barrel automatons and the various revelers, passing out mugs of free beer and ale.</p><p></p><p>Wakuren gave a heavy sigh and, activating his <em>ring of invisibility</em>, faded from view. He wasn't sure what this revelry was all about, and it saddened him to think that Thurloe's suspiciousness was rubbing off on him, but he focused his attention on the auras of the people arrayed before him. The crowd was much too tight for him to be able to wander throughout unnoticed, so he contented himself with walking around the perimeter, seeking out auras which showed the taint of evil. And sure enough, as might be expected in a crowd this size there were a few "pings" to his paladin senses, but Wakuren comforted himself that the levels of evil he was detecting were more in the "shopkeeper willing to short-change a customer" range and not the "willing to sacrifice babies to a demon lord" level. He also noted, as he made his rounds, in the back by the bards' platform there was a row of outhouses and a pile of three large barrels, no doubt refills for the barrel automatons when their beverages started to run low.</p><p></p><p>Once he had satisfied himself that there wasn't any great evil about, Wakuren - still invisible - cast a <em>detect magic</em> spell to see if there were any magical auras jumping out at him. Again, he wasn't surprised to see a hit now and again, for a few of the wealthier townsfolk wore rings or amulets of a low-level magical nature, likely anything from minor protections or "lucky" pendants. He noted a few but not all of the serving girls wore necklaces with a magical aura, but made nothing of the fact. He did make note that there weren't any magical weapons about; in fact, hardly anybody wore any weapons more powerful than a dagger. Other than the heroes, that is: they were being introduced to the various townsfolk by the Consuelos, and once Edna Tallywack saw them, she made sure to insinuate herself into their group and give the appearance that she and the heroes went way back.</p><p></p><p>Making sure nobody was looking his way, Wakuren deactivated his ring and reappeared in the visible spectrum. He made his way over to the others, noting none of them had any drinks in their hands. "What, nobody drinking?" he asked them.</p><p></p><p>"Haven't had the time," Alewyth replied, giving a sideways glance over at Edna.</p><p></p><p>"Probably best to stay ready for anything that might come up, anyway," added Thurloe, ever suspicious. He also looked up at the full moon overhead, wondering if there might be any werebeasts about.</p><p></p><p>"Well, I'm going to get one," Wakuren said. "Anybody else want me to bring them something?" But the others turned them down; apparently Thurloe's suspiciousness was contagious. (Scarlie, however, was on his third or fourth mug by that time.)</p><p></p><p>Suddenly, a thin man in wizard's robes stepped up to the front platform and stood behind the podium. "If I could have everyone's attention please?" he called out to the crowd, and the bards, seeing him, brought their tune to a halt. All around the area, the crowd took notice and gave the man their full attention.</p><p></p><p>"Good evening, everyone," began the young man at the podium. "For those of you who don't know me, my name is Alabard Ducresni, and up until last week it was my privilege to be the apprentice to the man we're here to honor tonight: <strong>Seamus Volossio</strong>. Now, most of you know that name but not many here have ever met the man, and that was something that Seamus regretted deeply. However, it wasn't due to a lack of desire to be neighborly; it was due to a lifelong, crippling shyness. In fact, among his wizardly peers – among the few people he was willing to meet in person, and that due only to the occasional necessity – Seamus was often referred to as 'Shy-Mouse.'</p><p></p><p>"Besides his inherent shyness, Seamus Volossio also suffered from a weak heart, and it was this which finally took his life at a rather young age. But in the days before his passing, Seamus made plans for his own funeral; he wanted not a dire ceremony filled with sadness – indeed, he was well aware there would be few people willing to attend the services of someone they knew only by name and by reputation – but rather a celebration, a festive party of the type he desperately wished he could throw and actually attend himself. In fact, he took his love of magical automatons and designed these ale and beer golems specifically for this party, working feverishly to ensure they were completed on time."</p><p></p><p>Alabard moved over to the tarpaulin at his side and gathered it in his hands. "Now, please do not be frightened, but as per Seamus Volossio's wishes, I have his glass-covered coffin here on stage with me, with him lying in repose. His overwhelming shyness prevented him from ever attending any get-togethers like this during his life; it was his fondest desire that he be able to attend this gathering with the people in town upon his passing. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you Seamus Volossio, the host of tonight's festivities." And with that, the apprentice pulled back the tarpaulin to reveal the body of a young man with a mop of red hair and somewhat oversize spectacles, lying back in his propped-up coffin, giving him the appearance of standing beside his apprentice and looking down upon the crowd before him. Although the wizard's eyes were closed, he wore a shy smile on his face.</p><p></p><p>Alabard returned to the podium and from behind it pulled out his own mug of ale. Raising it toward the coffin, he called, "To my mentor, Seamus Volossio: we party in your honor!" before drinking up. In the crowd before him, the townsfolk did likewise.</p><p></p><p>The next few hours were spent in vigorous drinking. Alabard stood by the coffin, smiling and answering questions to the revelers who approached to raise a glass to the body of Seamus Volossio. Wakuren made himself a quite popular figure; the town was mostly human with a few elves and half-elves, but for many of them he and Scarlie were the first half-orcs they'd ever seen. Wakuren saw it as an opportunity to show them that half-orcs weren't to be feared, and his joviality and drinking prowess soon earned him the friendly nicknames of "Beastman" and "Chugger." He stopped worrying about the others' reticence to drink any of the free alcohol being offered; it was their loss, as far as he was concerned. Zander, however, was worried about more than the beer and ale; he was in frantic telepathic communication with the nibish-riule embedded in his body, worried that the extraplanar entity would extend any of the tendrils growing throughout the elf's frame to have a look-see for itself. Zander didn't want any of the drunken revelers panicking at the elf being a "tentacle monster" or anything.</p><p></p><p>Thurloe, for his part, decided to try to pump Alabard for information. He accepted a mug of beer and held it, faking a toast to Volossio (and making sure not to actually imbibe any of the liquid), before hitting Alabard up with questions. He learned that Alabard would be remaining in Volossio's tower keep at the edge of the town, since he was the dead man's sole heir. He explained Volossio had been intrigued by mechanisms, experimenting in various types of golems and automatons like the animated barrel constructs serving beer and ale to the villagers. But after several hours of partying, and with the full moon high in the sky, Alabard once again approached the podium and called for everyone's attention. It took a lot longer this time for the crowd to quiet down - many of them were, by now, quite heavily drunk - but Wakuren pounding on his <em>shield of Cal</em> with his <em>gauntlet of Cal</em> helped get everyone's attention.</p><p></p><p>"If I could have your attention once more, please," Alabard called out to the crowd, and the laughter and merriment quieted down somewhat as the revelers listened to what he had to say. "Thank you. On behalf of my former master, Seamus Volossio, I would just like to say thank you, for allowing his final wishes to be played out. I'm sure he would have liked to have been able to thank you all in person..." and, saying that, the wizard's apprentice took a step back from the podium, "and perhaps, in a moment, he'll get his chance!"</p><p></p><p>Suddenly, a few flashes of light erupted in the crowd as four of the serving girls gasped in surprise and were whisked away. Standing in their place were four beautiful women, each with angelic wings sprouting from their backs and wielding longswords and coils of rope, with flaming composite longbows strapped on their backs, between the wings. As one, they started swinging their swords into the crowd, cutting down as many revelers as they could while their animated ropes shot out and found necks to strangle. Within mere seconds, eight dead bodies lay on the ground between the partygoers. As if that had been a signal, the six barrel-shaped automatons likewise turned on the crowd, no longer serving beverages but swinging fists of metal and wood into unsuspecting faces and unyielding fingers crushing windpipes. Worse yet, the booze-befuddled brains of those around them spent valuable seconds trying to figure out what was going on.</p><p></p><p>But the heroes weren't as slow to respond. Xandro already had his <em>Dardolian lute</em> out since he'd been playing tunes for the crowd, seeing the attacks, he immediately switched to playing his song of inspirational courage. Unfortunately, spread out as they were and with the screams of the victims and roars of befuddled confusion coming from the drunken revelers nearby, the bard knew he'd only be able to affect Zander and Alewyth for now, as Thurloe and Wakuren were too far away.</p><p></p><p>The elf followed suit with a <em>haste</em> spell cast upon himself, Alewyth, and Xandro, having to make do for now - the crowds were too thick for him to try to maneuver through at any speed to try to get the other two heroes within range. Alewyth cast a <em>magic circle against evil</em> spell on herself and started pushing her way through the crowd, headed for the nearest of these deadly "angels" - which, she was fully aware, were no angels at all but rather erinyes devils.</p><p></p><p>Thurloe was over by the front stage, and he saw Alabard leap off the side of the stage, casting what sounded to the spellsword's practiced ears as the words to a <em>protection against good</em> spell. That was all the proof Thurloe needed; rather than try to push his way past the crowd, he leaped up onto the stage, ran across it, and leaped down at Alabard, his bastard sword swinging in a deadly arc as he hit the ground. He caught Alabard across the back, slicing through the wizard's spine as he practically cut the man in two. Whatever horrific events Alabard Ducresni had set in motion, he wasn't going to be able to personally see them through, as he was dead before his body hit the ground.</p><p></p><p>Back in the crowd, the erinyes devils and the automatons continued their assaults upon the mostly weaponless and defenseless partygoers. The drunken townsfolk had no real chance against either threat, for the erinyes had sharp longswords and strangling ropes that seemed to move of their own accord, and the barrel golems were much stronger than mere flesh and bone and had no moral compunctions against slaying those they had been serving just moments before.</p><p></p><p>Wakuren saw the pointlessness of trying to push his way through the crowd and took a different path; casting an <em>air walk</em> spell upon himself, he rose up above the heads of the panicked revelers and started running through the air towards the nearest erinyes. The townsfolk were pushing against each other, looking for a safe path to freedom, but the party area had been laid out such that the automatons were along the outer edges of the crowd while the four erinyes were in their midst. Xandro happened to be at the edge of the crowd and ran along its outer perimeter, then dashed in between the panicked townsfolk on his way to the nearest automaton.</p><p></p><p>Zander, however, had become suspicious of the tent and was fairly sure there was a backup automaton or something in there - whatever it was, Alabard had wanted it kept a secret, for the tent flaps were all tied up in heavy knots. Rather than messing with the knots, the elf decided to burn it down with a <em>burning hands</em> spell and reveal its contents to the crowd. However, when the flames of his spell hit the tent it rippled and flexed, then retaliated with a rubbery pseudopod forming from the side of the canvas and striking the surprised sorcerer - it was no real tent, but a mimic in league with Alabard, no doubt to prevent anyone from exiting the field of fire from that direction. Fortunately, the mimic's adhesive failed to catch up the sorcerer in time and he managed to back away; the mimic followed, but slowly.</p><p></p><p>"Move it!" cried Thurloe, pushing his way past several drunks in an attempt to reach the nearest ale barrel automaton. Alewyth, in the meantime, followed Xandro's lead and ran along the edge of the crowd, approaching the nearest erinyes. She cast a <em>dispel evil</em> spell at her, hoping to banish her back to the Hell from which she came, but the female devil's resistance to spell energy protected her. Worse, she ignored the dwarf's attempt at banishment and continued her attacks upon the local townsfolk, cutting down one poor fellow while her animated rope strangled the life from another. Looking about, Alewyth saw the other erinyes were doing likewise, adding up to a higher body count than she would have thought possible in such a short time. The barrel golems followed suit, crushing skulls and throats while the drink-befuddled villagers ran this way and that, looking for a way out.</p><p></p><p>Wakuren cast a <em>summon monster</em> spell as he raced over the crowds and a dire wolf appeared beside one of the erinyes. Unlike the "standard model" Alewyth had summoned in Jerrick's dreamscape, this wolf was from the Elemental Plane of Air - one of Cal's realms - and was made up of swirling wind. It attacked the erinyes, bringing her down to the ground as the winds making up its head flayed at her skin as sharply as any real wolf's teeth could do.</p><p></p><p>Xandro caught up to a beer barrel golem and slashed at it with his <em>frost short sword</em>, scoring a groove in the wooden slats of its torso. Zander backed away from the tent-mimic, firing a <em>scorching ray</em> spell at it. The rays struck true and the mimic's form started losing cohesion, looking less and less like a canvas tent with every passing second. But, unable to catch up with the retreating elf, it lashed out at an older woman, snapping her neck and causing her lifeless body to fall to the ground before it. Its pliant body ran over her corpse, and likely absorbed her into itself, for she did not appear after the shapeshifting beast passed on from where she had been.</p><p></p><p>Thurloe swung his bastard sword at the ale barrel automaton before him, careful to ensure there weren't any revelers in the path of his blade. Alewyth tried using a <em>dismissal</em> spell on the erinyes and flashed a grin as the beautiful devil flashed in a bright light and was suddenly gone. That was one erinyes that had been sent back to Hell...but at the time, the dwarf hadn't yet realized that the serving girl who had been unwittingly wearing the magical amulet containing the body of an erinyes devil (which had been given to her by Alabard to wear at the night's festivities) was now trapped inside the extradimensional prison of that very same amulet, and thus she had also been sent to Hell....</p><p></p><p>Two other erinyes continued their ongoing slaughter, while the third tried getting back up to a standing position. The air element dire wolf was having none of that, however, grabbing up the erinyes' sword arm in its windswept teeth and dragging her back down to the ground, chewing on her arm for good measure. Wakuren finally reached the erinyes he'd been running toward and brought his <em>shield of Cal</em> slamming into her. But as he was doing his best to bring her down, all around him erinyes devils and barrel automatons of various sizes (to say nothing of a vaguely tentlike thing swinging a writhing tentacle of particular thickness) were still slaughtering the villagers. Xandro kept up his attacks against the beer barrel golem he was fighting, but the thing seemed programmed to take out the easier targets first, for it ignored the bard's sword-strikes and slew another panicked commoner as he stumbled past.</p><p></p><p>Zander stepped up onto a bench at the edge of the party area and fired another <em>scorching ray</em> at the tent-mimic, finally killing it. Thurloe and Xandro kept up their own attacks against their automaton foes, striking again and again with their respective sword-blades. But Alewyth decided to help the townsfolk escape as best she could, by picking up one of the benches on the border of the party area and flinging it angrily away. "This way!" she called as she moved over to the next bench, to send it flying away as well. There was now a rather large gap in the outer ring of benches along the eastern side of the park, and grateful townsfolk started staggering over that way.</p><p></p><p>"Alewick!" cried Edna Tallywack, exposing the fraud that she knew these visiting heroes that well. "What's going on?"</p><p></p><p>"Just run - get to safety!" Alewyth called back. "We'll take care of these monsters!" Edna wasted no time in following the advice of the dwarven priestess.</p><p></p><p>The erinyes managed to regain her footing and sent her rope lashing out to kill another villager before the air element dire wolf could do anything to stop her. But it chased her down, leaping upon her back before she could take flight and slamming her back down to the ground, snapping at her neck all the while. Wakuren pressed the attack against the erinyes he was battling, slamming her with his shield.</p><p></p><p>Xandro kept slashing at the beer barrel golem with his sword, while Zander, still standing on a bench, sent a <em>scorching ray</em> spell over the heads of the villagers following Alewyth's calls to escape, to strike the ale barrel automaton at the southern end of the party area. Thurloe broke off his attack against the northernmost ale barrel golem, but only because the erinyes Wakuren was fighting had wandered close enough for him to get in a strike against her; despite the size disparity, the winged devil-women were much deadlier than the automatons, slaying a lot more innocents between them.</p><p></p><p>Now that she had a flow of villagers making their escape, Alewyth's focus returned to the battle at hand. Not wanting to fight against the surge of pressing bodies, she cast a <em>spiritual weapon</em> and sent the warhammer of force energy flying over to the ale barrel golem Zander was shooting with his <em>scorching ray</em> spells, as its greater height made it an easier target.</p><p></p><p>But still the erinyes devils were ignoring the heroes and going after the easier-to-kill prey. Wakuren got the distinct idea they were going after a specific number of victims, piling up a body count high enough to fulfill some sort of devilish ritual. Then he recalled what Alabard had said in his second speech about the possibility Volossio could thank the townsfolk himself, and realized this was all an attempt to bring the dead wizard back to some semblance of unholy life. Flying into a rage at the very thought, Wakuren slammed the side of his shield into the face of the erinyes he was squared off against. His summoned air element dire wolf was likewise pressing the attack against his own erinyes target, and this one was starting to look a bit harried by the incessant attacks.</p><p></p><p>Xandro finally killed the beer barrel automaton he'd been fighting, cracking open its barrel torso and causing the remaining beer in its receptacle to leak out onto the ground. It tipped over onto its face and stopped moving. Zander continued his magical onslaught against the ale barrel golem, now joined in the attack by Alewyth's <em>spiritual warhammer</em>.</p><p></p><p>By now, the crowd had thinned considerably, in part by the numbers that made it out of Alewyth's gap in the ring of benches, but sadly also because of the great number of villagers who now lay dead upon the ground. Those remining no longer had to push and shove to try to get where they were going, and as a result many were trying to make a break for it through other gaps along the perimeter. However, the stack of three barrels at the southwestern corner seemingly gave a shudder and lurched into motion, a pseudopod growing out of the front side of one of the barrels to smash in the face of one of the townsfolk seeking to run past this second mimic.</p><p></p><p>Thurloe's bastard sword took out one of the erinyes devils, leaving only two of the angelic-looking devils still in place. Alewyth summoned forth a celestial bison from the Upper Planes, and the great shaggy beast seemed only too willing to add his curving horns to the task of slaying devil-women. The one erinyes finally was forced to stop trying to escape the air element dire wolf and take it on directly; if nothing else, this slowed the speed by which the villagers were being slain, although the other erinyes was still doing her best to get the death-count up to its required number. It was a shame, she mused, that the ritual called for deaths by physical violence only, for she and her sisters had spells that could have been brought to bear....</p><p></p><p>Wakuren slid up behind the erinyes devil fighting off his summoned wind-wolf and swung his <em>shield of Cal</em> at her as the wolf snapped at her from the front. Xandro jumped up onto a table and restarted his song of inspirational courage, aware that his whole group of heroes could now hear his song, for the other bards had either dispersed - or been slain - with the other townspeople. Zander continued his barrage of <em>scorching ray</em> spells at the ale barrel golem.</p><p></p><p>The triple-barrel mimic swung its rubbery limb at another stumbling villager, sticking to him and pulling him in, where a tooth-filled maw that suddenly opened up in the side of the top barrel ripped his flesh to shreds. Thurloe resumed his attack upon the other ale barrel golem he'd been fighting earlier, finding himself joined in battle by Alewyth's celestial bison. Meanwhile, Alewyth added <em>Sjondra</em> to the attacks against the one to the south, striking at the construct's knees while her <em>spiritual weapon</em> struck its head and shoulders.</p><p></p><p>The erinyes under attack by Wakuren and his wind-wolf finally realized she'd have to take care of these two if she wished to continue the ritual - in fact, if she could slay this half-orc, his death would likely be the equivalent of several of these sloshed villagers. But taking him out proved to be more difficult than she'd hoped, and he and the wolf continued their attacks from either side of her.</p><p></p><p>The remaining golems were still trying to kill innocent partygoers, but now they actually had to chase them down, and they weren't quite as fast as a panicked human or elf running for his or her life. Xandro took a moment's respite from his song of inspirational courage to send a blast of sonic energy from his lute shooting at a beer barrel golem walking by.</p><p></p><p>Zander finally took out the southernmost ale barrel golem with a final <em>scorching ray</em>. As it crashed to the ground, Alewyth pivoted and headed over to a nearby beer barrel golem, while redirecting her <em>spiritual warhammer</em> at one of the remaining erinyes devils. The triple-barrel mimic started lumbering in Thurloe's direction, but the spellsword kept up his attacks against the eight-foot-tall automaton he and the celestial bison were whittling down, bit by bit.</p><p></p><p>One of the erinyes devils flapped her wings and went after Alewyth, swinging with her longsword; the dwarf managed to hold <em>Sjondra</em> up just in enough time to redirect the blow. But now she was in a sort of line of combatants: her, an erinyes, Wakuren, the other erinyes, and then the air element dire wolf. Wakuren took a moment to summon forth a celestial bison of his own, sending it at one of the erinyes from the side. Then the wind-wolf blew away to nothing, its time on the Material World having been used up, and the shaggy bison took the wolf's place in the line of combat.</p><p></p><p>The barrel automatons were doing what they could to slay sacrificial victims, but the sole remaining ale barrel golem was now fighting off Alewyth's celestial bison and the beer barrel golems scurried back and forth trying to pick off stragglers. Xandro leaped down from the table he'd been standing on, bringing his <em>frost short sword</em> slashing across one of the beer barrel golems' wooden chests. Zander, still standing on a bench so he could see over the heads of those on the ground, fired another <em>scorching ray</em> across the area to strike the second mimic, which seemed particularly perturbed to have been targeted from so far away. It continued advancing towards Thurloe, unsure of where the sudden blasts of fire had originated. Thurloe, for his part, continued his attacks upon the sole remaining ale barrel construct, as did Alewyth's summoned bison.</p><p></p><p>Alewyth, however, was trading weapon-blows with one of the erinyes, the same one her <em>spiritual warhammer</em> was attacking from the air. The two erinyes devils focused their attacks upon the dwarven priestess and Wakuren, one on each, while the half-orc's own celestial bison stabbed its massive horns at the one attacking the cleric who had summoned it from the Upper Planes. Wakuren finally slew the erinyes he'd been fighting, then whirled around to aid Alewyth in taking down the last remaining devil-woman. The celestial bison likewise moved over to attack her, and the winged devil didn't last long under those odds, Alewyth finally delivering the killing blow with <em>Sjondra</em>.</p><p></p><p>By that time, Xandro had also made short work of the beer barrel construct he'd been fighting, and Zander had slain the second mimic using ranged spells (and without even having to step down off of the bench upon which he'd spent the majority of his time in the fight). Thurloe and Alewyth's summoned bison took out the ale barrel construct, and then there were only the remaining beer barrel golems still in combat. As they'd been programmed to slay people in the "kill zone," the heroes didn't even have to chase them down, for the villagers had all escaped out of the area by then and the heroes were now the only remaining available targets. The constructs didn't last very long at all after that point.</p><p></p><p>"Everybody okay?" Alewyth called out, casting a healing spell to close up the worst of the wounds she'd received from the swords of the erinyes she'd been fighting.</p><p></p><p>"I could use some healing," Xandro offered, and together Alewyth and Wakuren converted some of their prepared spells into healing energy.</p><p></p><p>"What now?" asked Zander.</p><p></p><p>"First off, I wanna check out the dead guy," Thurloe replied, storming off in a bee-line towards the glass-topped coffin of Seamus Volossio. The red-haired wizard showed no difference; none of the victims sacrificed in his honor had done anything to revive him; the ritual likely needed a set amount of life energy to grant him an undead semblance of life, and until that threshold was reached there was no effect. Which meant that all of this slaughter had been for nothing.</p><p></p><p>Thurloe tipped the coffin over on its back and lifted the lid, checking Volossio's corpse for anything that might be storing life energy or such. Wakuren aided him with a <em>detect magic </em>spell and identified the dead wizard had a belt and a ring that had magical auras; without a word Thurloe removed them from the corpse and stuffed them into a pouch at his belt to be examined more thoroughly later.</p><p></p><p>"So now what?" Zander repeated. "Are we done here?"</p><p></p><p>"We're done here at this location," agreed Thurloe, "but we're not done here in Billingsway. Alabard said something about a keep at the edge of town. We'd better check it out, in case these two chuckleheads had any other surprises in store."</p><p></p><p>Edna Tallywack approached; she'd escaped with the help of Alewyth but, nosy as she was, had stayed around in the general area to watch what all transpired. She gave the group directions to Volossio's keep, but after the combat at the funeral party, during which dozens had been slain, the remaining threats in Volossio's keep were hardly worth their time. A pair of zombie servitors stood inside the keep's outer walls, there to open the double doors at their master's command, and a single blast of positive energy from Alewyth, holding her holy symbol of Aerik before her, caused the zombies to explode into dust. Inside the keep, Thurloe quickly demolished a suit of animated armor in the main foyer, and Zander's spells destroyed a metallic cobra construct of some type that had been guarding the wizard's arcane library. The six animated skeletons guarding the rooftop were blasted into dust by Wakuren and Alewyth using turn undead attacks; the biggest threat was down in the basement, where a chain golem had been built into the rooftop of the construct lab (where a third ale golem was partway under construction; apparently Volossio's heart had given out before it had been finished). But the golem was destroyed soon enough, for even though it was immune to most spells, the group managed to take out the supports which held it to the ceiling (and allowed it to lug heavy construct components around the lab); once it came crashing down to the floor, the five heroes made short work of it.</p><p></p><p>In the end, having determined there were no automatons ready to be activated at the failure of the necromantic revival ceremony, the group gathered up the monetary treasure Volossio had had on hand, as well as his spellbook selection (Thurloe noted he already knew a great deal of the lower-level spells, and much of the higher-level spells were from the necromantic school of magic, but there were a few others he was interested in learning), and made their way back to Scarlie and the wagon and their riding mounts. "Let's get out of here," suggested Thurloe. "I know it's the middle of the night and we're all tired, but I don't wanna stay in this creepy little burg any longer than I have to."</p><p></p><p>"You guys head on into the lamp," suggested Scarlie. "I'm awake enough to get us down the road a piece." It sounded like a good idea to the others.</p><p></p><p> - - -</p><p></p><p>After the fight in the "kill zone" - a battle map I'd made on the back of two used desk calendar pages, which took up a good chunk of the game table in my man-cave - we more of less hand-waved the fights in the keep. After all, I had only built the keep as a place for Alabard (or Volossio, had the death count reached 110 HD of slain victims, which would have transformed Volossio into a necropolitan, a sort of "lesser lich") to retreat to, where they'd have some allies if the PCs came after them. But Thurloe took out Alabard with one hit and the death count "only" made it to 82 HD - the morticians and gravediggers in Billingsway are going to be busy for a while! - so the keep didn't really need to come into play, although it was where the majority of the treasure was located, so I didn't want to skip over it completely. Plus, this adventure session had already gone significantly longer than normal, so it seemed safe to bypass a lot of the fights against low-level threats that would be little more than a speed bump to my players' 9th-level PCs.</p><p></p><p>The metagaming index was pretty high this time, though, with nobody but my son Logan (who plays Wakuren) wanting anything to do with the free ale and beer being offered up; the other players were well aware I wouldn't have put that much effort into a two-desk-calendar-page battle mat if there wasn't going to be a big fight there, and they didn't want their PCs fighting at reduced efficiency (or worse yet, poisoned).</p><p></p><p> - - -</p><p></p><p>T-shirt worn: My "Evil Clown School - Graduate With Honors" T-shirt, because it has a grinning, evil-looking clown that fit in perfectly with the dream sequence that went along with this adventure.</p><p></p><p>[ATTACH=full]272645[/ATTACH]</p><p>This is a drawing by an artist named John Kenn that I discovered on-line. He does a lot of these ink drawings on Post-It notes, and I intend to use a few more of his drawings as nightmare inspiration in this campaign as opportunities allow.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Richards, post: 8898797, member: 508"] [B]ADVENTURE 42: DEAD MAN'S PARTY[/B] PC Roster: [INDENT]Alewyth Putterpye, dwarf priestess of Aerik 9[/INDENT] [INDENT] Thurloe Pulver, human fighter 3/wizard 3/spellsword 3[/INDENT] [INDENT] Wakuren, half-orc cleric of Cal 5/paladin 4[/INDENT] [INDENT] Xandro Silverstrings, human bard 6/rogue 3[/INDENT] [INDENT] Zander Quilson, elf sorcerer 9[/INDENT] Game Session Date: 7 January 2023 - - - "So, this is Billingsway," commented Thurloe as they entered the little village. "Gotta say: not entirely impressed. Still, a town this size, it ought to be easy to find our dreamer." That indeed proved to be the case. There were two taverns in town, and when the group stopped in the first they were immediately given directions to the home of one [B]Jerrick Consuelo[/B], who had been sleeping now for about three weeks. "Drink up now if you're interested," recommended the barman. "We'll be closing up an hour or so before twilight." "Really?" asked Thurloe. "I'd have though that's when you'd do your most business." "Ordinarily, yes. But tonight there's going to be a big party in the village square; maybe you saw them setting up for it?" When Wakuren admitted they had seen some folks putting up streamers and moving tables and benches around, the barman continued, "Local wizard died a few days ago. This is some kind of party wake, or something. I dunno. But the guy in charge of it, [B]Alabard Ducresni[/B], he hired all my servers for the evening. Did the same with the girls at the other tavern, too, so the whole town could participate. You're all welcome to come, too, if you've a mind - everybody's welcome. Free beer and ale, I'm told." "We'll keep it in mind," Wakuren promised. The group found the Consuelo house easy enough, but when Alewyth knocked on the door there was no answer. "You folks looking for the Consuelos?" called a voice from across the street. "We are," Alewyth answered back. "Well, you're out of luck, I'm afraid. [B]Thelma[/B]'s out in the fields, and poor Jerrick's asleep and can't nobody seem to awaken him." "That's actually why we're here," the dwarven priestess replied. "Well, Thelma should be back in the next hour or so, more'n likely. Come on over and you can wait here on my porch. I'll make us some tea." That seemed as good of a plan as any, so before long the five heroes found themselves sitting on the porch of [B]Edna Tallywack[/B], who was somewhat of a nosy neighbor and a neighborhood gossip. It seemed Jerrick had gone to bed one night three weeks ago and had been asleep since, with nobody able to wake him back up, not even a group of traveling druids. "'Course, small town like us, we don't have a lot of high-powered clerics like they do in the big cities," Edna mused. But since Jerrick's coma, his wife Thelma had been doing his work in his stead out in the vineyards. Edna also filled the group in about the night's planned festivities. "The wizard who died - Volossio is his name - nobody in town can recall ever seeing him. He's one of those - well, he [I]was[/I] one of those 'stay in his keep all day studying new spells' kinds of wizards, I reckon. His apprentice, though, Alabard Ducresni, he's a real nice sort. Everybody in town knows Alabard; he's the one who'd come into town and buy groceries and whatnot for old Volossio. He's the one made all the plans for the festivities tonight, too - there's going to be free beer and ale, and I've heard he's got the two taverns in town agreed to shut down for the night and he's even hired the serving girls for the evening! It sounds like it's going to be a good time. Oh, here comes Thelma now!" Looking down the street to where Edna was pointing, the group saw a bedraggled-looking young woman with bare feet and stains up to her knees - no doubt after a day spent crushing grapes. Thelma Consuelo had strands of blond hair sticking out from underneath her head-scarf, and she looked up at the strangers on her neighbor's porch with curiosity. The expression on her face became even more puzzled when they approached her as she reached her front door. "Mrs. Consuelo?" asked Alewyth. "We've come to try to wake your husband up. He's suffering from a dream plague that's been affecting others all across the continent. We've had some success in waking most of them up." She went on to give a brief description of the things they planned to do to awaken Jerrick. "By all means," agreed Thelma at once. "Please, come right this way." She led them inside her house, and to a bedroom in the back where her husband lay sleeping. She stood back, out of the way, as the five heroes pulled the bed into the middle of the room and tied a leather headband around Jerrick's temple. Then, as they put their own headbands into place - they all had a strange stone in the middle, Thelma noticed - and sat in a circle around the bed, Edna wandered in, not wanting to miss out on all of the action. "They do this all the time," she reassured Thelma, as if she'd known them for ages and was one of their closest confidants - an assumption she was all too willing for Thelma to make. "Do you need us to do anything?" Thelma asked. "Just stay quiet enough so we aren't disturbed," Xandro replied with a smile. "It's not going to be very exciting from this angle, I'm afraid; all of the action will be taking place in your husband's dream." "You're going inside his dream?" Thelma asked, wanting to make sure she had heard correctly. "That's the plan," Thurloe replied. "Now it's quiet time." He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and released it slowly. Around the bed, the other four did the same, and within a few minutes they had all made it to sleep and were transferring their consciousnesses to the Dreamlands. "Hey, kupo!" called out their respective moogle dream guides, before leading them to the Corridor of Dreams where Mogo, the lead dream instructor, was waiting for them. His little wings were flapping furiously to keep him at head height with the five dreamwalkers, as the little kitten-thing was only about two feet tall. "Have fun with this one, kupo!" he said, opening a particular door and ushering his students inside. Walking into the dreamscape, the five dreamwalkers found themselves in a field of grass abutting a dark forest. There was a path leading into the forest, which hit upon a clearing at the intersection of another path, this one perpendicular to the one coming from the field. It was on this second path that a group of figures ambled by. At first look, it seemed to be four adult humans with three children walking beside them, two of the former balancing a large, oblong box. But as they entered the clearing and could be seen more clearly, the group noticed the four adults were all dressed as clowns and the three "children" were merely goblin-sized harlequins, complete with pointy hats and ruffles along the edges of their collars and sleeves. Each of the seven wore clown makeup, no two quite the same - although their leering visages and sharp teeth gave off a distinctively creepy vibe. Without even a word of encouragement from Thurloe, Wakuren examined their auras and was not in the least bit surprised to see very distinct evil emanations coming off from each of the seven figures. Of course, the caption "KIDS TO EAT" scrawled upon the box being lugged by the second clown in line and the six-year-old boy peering fearfully out of the top of the box were both good indicators as well. However, as soon as Wakuren had determined the seven figures were as evil as anything he'd ever seen before, they all stopped their progression and stood stock still, moving only their heads, which swiveled in the heroes' direction. Painted smiles grew in size, the harlequins absolutely giddy with delight as they hooted and howled and broke ranks to race toward the heroes, exposed fingers sporting claws and their teeth all filed down to points. "Get ready," cautioned Thurloe, holding his bastard sword [I]Spellslicer[/I] in a defensive posture as he waited for the evil little harlequins to arrive. "Yeah, brilliant idea," replied Zander, calling to mind the words to a [I]lightning bolt[/I] spell. "Good thinking there, Thurloe!" At his side, Alewyth held her dwarven warhammer [I]Sjondra[/I] at the ready; Xandro likewise had pulled his [I]frost short sword[/I] out of its scabbard and held it up, blade pointed at the incoming terrors in their pointy little hats. But Thurloe wasn't just spouting out obvious advice - he was also consciously attempting to reshape a bit of the dreamscape. The three harlequins ran side by side, and with pure effort of will - and his dreamwalker training - the spellsword managed to conjure up a patch of thick, gloppy mud immediately before the rightmost harlequin. The little menace sank into it almost up to his knees, dropping behind the other two who failed to even notice his predicament. That pair ran forward, and Wakuren smashed the leftmost one smack-dab in the face with his [I]shield of Cal[/I]. But the half-orc saw, behind the cannibalistic harlequins, the clowns carefully set down the box and then join their smaller companions in running toward the heroes, their faces showing an eagerness at the opportunity to inflict pain. One wore a tiny little hat at the top of his head, and Wakuren idly wondered how it stayed in place while the clown dashed forward at full speed. Alewyth cast a summoning spell and a dire wolf suddenly manifested behind the clowns. It leaped forward, clamping its jaws around one clown's arm, dragging him down to the ground. Behind the dwarven priestess, Xandro stabbed the point of his short sword into the soft ground beside him and pulled out his lute, beginning the chords to his song of inspirational courage. The path into the forest only allowed three people side by side, and the bard had no problem being one of the ones in the back row, unable (for the moment) to engage in hand-to-hand combat with these fiendish freaks. Zander took a step to the side and cast his [I]lightning bolt[/I] spell, which arced diagonally towards the rushing harlequins and blasted the second one into a burned corpse. But the first harlequin on the scene continued his attacks upon Wakuren, while the one Thurloe had slowed in a mud puddle made his way to Alewyth, biting and clawing for all he was worth. "Nasty little buggers!" the priestess swore. Thurloe continued using his lucid dreaming training to alter the battle area: concentrating fiercely, he caused a tree to uproot and topple over, falling just in front of the three clowns not currently under attack by Alewyth's summoned dire wolf. It hadn't landed on any of the clowns, but maybe it would slow down their approach a bit. Wakuren was more in a mood to get this battle over and done with, however; he swung his shield into the harlequin before him a second time and crushed the vile little thing's skull. It collapsed to the forest trail floor in a boneless heap. The clowns, in the meantime, all demonstrated that the flowers they wore at their lapels were more than mere decoration: each also squirted out a stream of acid. The dire wolf was the only foe currently in range, so he got the brunt of the attacks. Alewyth clobbered the last remaining harlequin with her warhammer, eliciting a high-pitched cry of pain from the little freak. Xandro grabbed up his sword and ran up to it, skewering it through the heart; it died, leaking an oily, black substance instead of blood from the puncture mark in its chest. Zander moved into position and sent a [I]lightning bolt[/I] spell crashing through the three full-size clowns that [I]weren't[/I] currently grappling with Alewyth's summoned dire wolf; the electricity caused the clown's goofy-looking hair to stand on end, but it failed to drop any of them, and the looks of gleefully evil determination to pay back the elven sorcerer for his effrontery caused Zander to shudder uncontrollably a bit. Thurloe raced up by the tree he had downed, casting a [I]scorching ray[/I] at one of the clowns as he did so. Wakuren paced the spellsword, his shield at the ready as a weapon to take these jokesters down. Thurloe had no shield, and thus was forced to try to block the incoming streams of acid shot his way by a pair of the giggling clowns with his left arm, protecting his eyes as best he could. The clown being savaged by the dire wolf managed to regain his feet momentarily, before the giant lupine clamped down on an arm again and pulled him back to the ground. Alewyth ran up to the downed clown to help her summoned wolf deal with him, but by the time she got close enough it had ripped out the clown's throat and he died drowning in his own black ichor. Xandro ran up behind the dwarven priestess, lute swung back into place over his shoulder and sword out for action. Zander, realizing Thurloe was in the way of his shot but also recognizing that this was just a dream and Thurloe couldn't really be slain as a result, cast a [I]lightning bolt[/I] spell that blasted right through the spellsword to hit the three remaining cannibalistic clowns. Thurloe didn't even acknowledge the pain of the lightning blast; rather, he took advantage of the confusion to slay the clown immediately before him, taking his head off with a sideways swipe of his bastard sword. The clown's head came to a stop over by one of the trees of the forest, its goofy little hat still in place and its sightless eyes focused on its slayer as its painted-on smile never once wavered. Wakuren slew another clown, bringing the bottom, pointed tip of his [I]shield of Cal[/I] crushing the top of the clown's skull before him. That left only one more clown still in play, and he focused his attacks on the half-orc cleric/paladin before him, apparently already having long since forgotten the "kid to eat" in the box on the forest floor. But another [I]lightning bolt[/I] spell from Zander - this time after scrambling to the side to make sure none of his friends was in the line of the blast - took down the last clown. Seeing the threat was apparently over, Thurloe spun around and cast a [I]lightning bolt[/I] spell of his own directly at the elven sorcerer, giving him a taste of his own medicine. But then a tentative voice whispered, "Is it safe to come out?" Looking back over at the box on the forest floor, there was a pair of hands and the top half of a six-year-old child's head peeking out over the rim of the open box. "Are they all dead?" young Jerrick Consuelo asked. "They'll not be troubling you any more," Alewyth promised the young lad. And then, with a sigh of relief, Jerrick started to climb out of the box - and the dreamscape started fading around him. As a young child, Jerrick had been taken to a traveling carnival, where he got his first look at a group of clowns. The experience had been a terrifying one for the young boy, no doubt the reason behind him having this particular dream. But now Jerrick, a young man in his early twenties, sat up in bed and looked around him in puzzlement, for a group of strangers (who looked somewhat familiar somehow) sat around his bed. Thelma shrieked in delight and hugged him fiercely, explaining how much time had elapsed since he'd last fallen asleep. "We can't pay you much," apologized Thelma, and before Alewyth could even start to denounce any need for payment, the young woman added, "But you should come to the party! I wasn't going to go, but now that Jerrick's awake we have a reason to celebrate - and we can show the rest of the town that he's awake!" It took little convincing to get the five heroes (and Scarlie, who had been waiting outside the Consuelo home with the wagon and riding mounts) to agree to head over to the village's gathering. There had been a few enhancements since the group had seen the area still being set up earlier that afternoon: now the two platforms were in place; at the front was a podium and a tarpaulin draped over some sort of blocky statue or something, with a canvas tent erected behind and to the side, while the platform in the back held a row of seats, upon which a group of merry bards was playing a merry tune. There had to be at least two hundred people mingling in the areas between the two platforms, some sitting at the 13 tables and benches, some sitting on the two curved rows of additional benches marking the edges of the gathering, and others standing and chatting in the areas between. Of important note were the six automatons scattered throughout the area: four of these were the size of a human and had a large beer barrel as a body, from which extended metallic arms and legs and a simple head formed from a much smaller barrel; the two larger ones - each close to eight feet tall - had multiple barrels making up their bodies, and were filled with ale while the smaller units were filled with beer. Eight serving girls, hired for the night from the two village taverns, made themselves busy bustling back and forth between the barrel automatons and the various revelers, passing out mugs of free beer and ale. Wakuren gave a heavy sigh and, activating his [I]ring of invisibility[/I], faded from view. He wasn't sure what this revelry was all about, and it saddened him to think that Thurloe's suspiciousness was rubbing off on him, but he focused his attention on the auras of the people arrayed before him. The crowd was much too tight for him to be able to wander throughout unnoticed, so he contented himself with walking around the perimeter, seeking out auras which showed the taint of evil. And sure enough, as might be expected in a crowd this size there were a few "pings" to his paladin senses, but Wakuren comforted himself that the levels of evil he was detecting were more in the "shopkeeper willing to short-change a customer" range and not the "willing to sacrifice babies to a demon lord" level. He also noted, as he made his rounds, in the back by the bards' platform there was a row of outhouses and a pile of three large barrels, no doubt refills for the barrel automatons when their beverages started to run low. Once he had satisfied himself that there wasn't any great evil about, Wakuren - still invisible - cast a [I]detect magic[/I] spell to see if there were any magical auras jumping out at him. Again, he wasn't surprised to see a hit now and again, for a few of the wealthier townsfolk wore rings or amulets of a low-level magical nature, likely anything from minor protections or "lucky" pendants. He noted a few but not all of the serving girls wore necklaces with a magical aura, but made nothing of the fact. He did make note that there weren't any magical weapons about; in fact, hardly anybody wore any weapons more powerful than a dagger. Other than the heroes, that is: they were being introduced to the various townsfolk by the Consuelos, and once Edna Tallywack saw them, she made sure to insinuate herself into their group and give the appearance that she and the heroes went way back. Making sure nobody was looking his way, Wakuren deactivated his ring and reappeared in the visible spectrum. He made his way over to the others, noting none of them had any drinks in their hands. "What, nobody drinking?" he asked them. "Haven't had the time," Alewyth replied, giving a sideways glance over at Edna. "Probably best to stay ready for anything that might come up, anyway," added Thurloe, ever suspicious. He also looked up at the full moon overhead, wondering if there might be any werebeasts about. "Well, I'm going to get one," Wakuren said. "Anybody else want me to bring them something?" But the others turned them down; apparently Thurloe's suspiciousness was contagious. (Scarlie, however, was on his third or fourth mug by that time.) Suddenly, a thin man in wizard's robes stepped up to the front platform and stood behind the podium. "If I could have everyone's attention please?" he called out to the crowd, and the bards, seeing him, brought their tune to a halt. All around the area, the crowd took notice and gave the man their full attention. "Good evening, everyone," began the young man at the podium. "For those of you who don't know me, my name is Alabard Ducresni, and up until last week it was my privilege to be the apprentice to the man we're here to honor tonight: [B]Seamus Volossio[/B]. Now, most of you know that name but not many here have ever met the man, and that was something that Seamus regretted deeply. However, it wasn't due to a lack of desire to be neighborly; it was due to a lifelong, crippling shyness. In fact, among his wizardly peers – among the few people he was willing to meet in person, and that due only to the occasional necessity – Seamus was often referred to as 'Shy-Mouse.' "Besides his inherent shyness, Seamus Volossio also suffered from a weak heart, and it was this which finally took his life at a rather young age. But in the days before his passing, Seamus made plans for his own funeral; he wanted not a dire ceremony filled with sadness – indeed, he was well aware there would be few people willing to attend the services of someone they knew only by name and by reputation – but rather a celebration, a festive party of the type he desperately wished he could throw and actually attend himself. In fact, he took his love of magical automatons and designed these ale and beer golems specifically for this party, working feverishly to ensure they were completed on time." Alabard moved over to the tarpaulin at his side and gathered it in his hands. "Now, please do not be frightened, but as per Seamus Volossio's wishes, I have his glass-covered coffin here on stage with me, with him lying in repose. His overwhelming shyness prevented him from ever attending any get-togethers like this during his life; it was his fondest desire that he be able to attend this gathering with the people in town upon his passing. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you Seamus Volossio, the host of tonight's festivities." And with that, the apprentice pulled back the tarpaulin to reveal the body of a young man with a mop of red hair and somewhat oversize spectacles, lying back in his propped-up coffin, giving him the appearance of standing beside his apprentice and looking down upon the crowd before him. Although the wizard's eyes were closed, he wore a shy smile on his face. Alabard returned to the podium and from behind it pulled out his own mug of ale. Raising it toward the coffin, he called, "To my mentor, Seamus Volossio: we party in your honor!" before drinking up. In the crowd before him, the townsfolk did likewise. The next few hours were spent in vigorous drinking. Alabard stood by the coffin, smiling and answering questions to the revelers who approached to raise a glass to the body of Seamus Volossio. Wakuren made himself a quite popular figure; the town was mostly human with a few elves and half-elves, but for many of them he and Scarlie were the first half-orcs they'd ever seen. Wakuren saw it as an opportunity to show them that half-orcs weren't to be feared, and his joviality and drinking prowess soon earned him the friendly nicknames of "Beastman" and "Chugger." He stopped worrying about the others' reticence to drink any of the free alcohol being offered; it was their loss, as far as he was concerned. Zander, however, was worried about more than the beer and ale; he was in frantic telepathic communication with the nibish-riule embedded in his body, worried that the extraplanar entity would extend any of the tendrils growing throughout the elf's frame to have a look-see for itself. Zander didn't want any of the drunken revelers panicking at the elf being a "tentacle monster" or anything. Thurloe, for his part, decided to try to pump Alabard for information. He accepted a mug of beer and held it, faking a toast to Volossio (and making sure not to actually imbibe any of the liquid), before hitting Alabard up with questions. He learned that Alabard would be remaining in Volossio's tower keep at the edge of the town, since he was the dead man's sole heir. He explained Volossio had been intrigued by mechanisms, experimenting in various types of golems and automatons like the animated barrel constructs serving beer and ale to the villagers. But after several hours of partying, and with the full moon high in the sky, Alabard once again approached the podium and called for everyone's attention. It took a lot longer this time for the crowd to quiet down - many of them were, by now, quite heavily drunk - but Wakuren pounding on his [I]shield of Cal[/I] with his [I]gauntlet of Cal[/I] helped get everyone's attention. "If I could have your attention once more, please," Alabard called out to the crowd, and the laughter and merriment quieted down somewhat as the revelers listened to what he had to say. "Thank you. On behalf of my former master, Seamus Volossio, I would just like to say thank you, for allowing his final wishes to be played out. I'm sure he would have liked to have been able to thank you all in person..." and, saying that, the wizard's apprentice took a step back from the podium, "and perhaps, in a moment, he'll get his chance!" Suddenly, a few flashes of light erupted in the crowd as four of the serving girls gasped in surprise and were whisked away. Standing in their place were four beautiful women, each with angelic wings sprouting from their backs and wielding longswords and coils of rope, with flaming composite longbows strapped on their backs, between the wings. As one, they started swinging their swords into the crowd, cutting down as many revelers as they could while their animated ropes shot out and found necks to strangle. Within mere seconds, eight dead bodies lay on the ground between the partygoers. As if that had been a signal, the six barrel-shaped automatons likewise turned on the crowd, no longer serving beverages but swinging fists of metal and wood into unsuspecting faces and unyielding fingers crushing windpipes. Worse yet, the booze-befuddled brains of those around them spent valuable seconds trying to figure out what was going on. But the heroes weren't as slow to respond. Xandro already had his [I]Dardolian lute[/I] out since he'd been playing tunes for the crowd, seeing the attacks, he immediately switched to playing his song of inspirational courage. Unfortunately, spread out as they were and with the screams of the victims and roars of befuddled confusion coming from the drunken revelers nearby, the bard knew he'd only be able to affect Zander and Alewyth for now, as Thurloe and Wakuren were too far away. The elf followed suit with a [I]haste[/I] spell cast upon himself, Alewyth, and Xandro, having to make do for now - the crowds were too thick for him to try to maneuver through at any speed to try to get the other two heroes within range. Alewyth cast a [I]magic circle against evil[/I] spell on herself and started pushing her way through the crowd, headed for the nearest of these deadly "angels" - which, she was fully aware, were no angels at all but rather erinyes devils. Thurloe was over by the front stage, and he saw Alabard leap off the side of the stage, casting what sounded to the spellsword's practiced ears as the words to a [I]protection against good[/I] spell. That was all the proof Thurloe needed; rather than try to push his way past the crowd, he leaped up onto the stage, ran across it, and leaped down at Alabard, his bastard sword swinging in a deadly arc as he hit the ground. He caught Alabard across the back, slicing through the wizard's spine as he practically cut the man in two. Whatever horrific events Alabard Ducresni had set in motion, he wasn't going to be able to personally see them through, as he was dead before his body hit the ground. Back in the crowd, the erinyes devils and the automatons continued their assaults upon the mostly weaponless and defenseless partygoers. The drunken townsfolk had no real chance against either threat, for the erinyes had sharp longswords and strangling ropes that seemed to move of their own accord, and the barrel golems were much stronger than mere flesh and bone and had no moral compunctions against slaying those they had been serving just moments before. Wakuren saw the pointlessness of trying to push his way through the crowd and took a different path; casting an [I]air walk[/I] spell upon himself, he rose up above the heads of the panicked revelers and started running through the air towards the nearest erinyes. The townsfolk were pushing against each other, looking for a safe path to freedom, but the party area had been laid out such that the automatons were along the outer edges of the crowd while the four erinyes were in their midst. Xandro happened to be at the edge of the crowd and ran along its outer perimeter, then dashed in between the panicked townsfolk on his way to the nearest automaton. Zander, however, had become suspicious of the tent and was fairly sure there was a backup automaton or something in there - whatever it was, Alabard had wanted it kept a secret, for the tent flaps were all tied up in heavy knots. Rather than messing with the knots, the elf decided to burn it down with a [I]burning hands[/I] spell and reveal its contents to the crowd. However, when the flames of his spell hit the tent it rippled and flexed, then retaliated with a rubbery pseudopod forming from the side of the canvas and striking the surprised sorcerer - it was no real tent, but a mimic in league with Alabard, no doubt to prevent anyone from exiting the field of fire from that direction. Fortunately, the mimic's adhesive failed to catch up the sorcerer in time and he managed to back away; the mimic followed, but slowly. "Move it!" cried Thurloe, pushing his way past several drunks in an attempt to reach the nearest ale barrel automaton. Alewyth, in the meantime, followed Xandro's lead and ran along the edge of the crowd, approaching the nearest erinyes. She cast a [I]dispel evil[/I] spell at her, hoping to banish her back to the Hell from which she came, but the female devil's resistance to spell energy protected her. Worse, she ignored the dwarf's attempt at banishment and continued her attacks upon the local townsfolk, cutting down one poor fellow while her animated rope strangled the life from another. Looking about, Alewyth saw the other erinyes were doing likewise, adding up to a higher body count than she would have thought possible in such a short time. The barrel golems followed suit, crushing skulls and throats while the drink-befuddled villagers ran this way and that, looking for a way out. Wakuren cast a [I]summon monster[/I] spell as he raced over the crowds and a dire wolf appeared beside one of the erinyes. Unlike the "standard model" Alewyth had summoned in Jerrick's dreamscape, this wolf was from the Elemental Plane of Air - one of Cal's realms - and was made up of swirling wind. It attacked the erinyes, bringing her down to the ground as the winds making up its head flayed at her skin as sharply as any real wolf's teeth could do. Xandro caught up to a beer barrel golem and slashed at it with his [I]frost short sword[/I], scoring a groove in the wooden slats of its torso. Zander backed away from the tent-mimic, firing a [I]scorching ray[/I] spell at it. The rays struck true and the mimic's form started losing cohesion, looking less and less like a canvas tent with every passing second. But, unable to catch up with the retreating elf, it lashed out at an older woman, snapping her neck and causing her lifeless body to fall to the ground before it. Its pliant body ran over her corpse, and likely absorbed her into itself, for she did not appear after the shapeshifting beast passed on from where she had been. Thurloe swung his bastard sword at the ale barrel automaton before him, careful to ensure there weren't any revelers in the path of his blade. Alewyth tried using a [I]dismissal[/I] spell on the erinyes and flashed a grin as the beautiful devil flashed in a bright light and was suddenly gone. That was one erinyes that had been sent back to Hell...but at the time, the dwarf hadn't yet realized that the serving girl who had been unwittingly wearing the magical amulet containing the body of an erinyes devil (which had been given to her by Alabard to wear at the night's festivities) was now trapped inside the extradimensional prison of that very same amulet, and thus she had also been sent to Hell.... Two other erinyes continued their ongoing slaughter, while the third tried getting back up to a standing position. The air element dire wolf was having none of that, however, grabbing up the erinyes' sword arm in its windswept teeth and dragging her back down to the ground, chewing on her arm for good measure. Wakuren finally reached the erinyes he'd been running toward and brought his [I]shield of Cal[/I] slamming into her. But as he was doing his best to bring her down, all around him erinyes devils and barrel automatons of various sizes (to say nothing of a vaguely tentlike thing swinging a writhing tentacle of particular thickness) were still slaughtering the villagers. Xandro kept up his attacks against the beer barrel golem he was fighting, but the thing seemed programmed to take out the easier targets first, for it ignored the bard's sword-strikes and slew another panicked commoner as he stumbled past. Zander stepped up onto a bench at the edge of the party area and fired another [I]scorching ray[/I] at the tent-mimic, finally killing it. Thurloe and Xandro kept up their own attacks against their automaton foes, striking again and again with their respective sword-blades. But Alewyth decided to help the townsfolk escape as best she could, by picking up one of the benches on the border of the party area and flinging it angrily away. "This way!" she called as she moved over to the next bench, to send it flying away as well. There was now a rather large gap in the outer ring of benches along the eastern side of the park, and grateful townsfolk started staggering over that way. "Alewick!" cried Edna Tallywack, exposing the fraud that she knew these visiting heroes that well. "What's going on?" "Just run - get to safety!" Alewyth called back. "We'll take care of these monsters!" Edna wasted no time in following the advice of the dwarven priestess. The erinyes managed to regain her footing and sent her rope lashing out to kill another villager before the air element dire wolf could do anything to stop her. But it chased her down, leaping upon her back before she could take flight and slamming her back down to the ground, snapping at her neck all the while. Wakuren pressed the attack against the erinyes he was battling, slamming her with his shield. Xandro kept slashing at the beer barrel golem with his sword, while Zander, still standing on a bench, sent a [I]scorching ray[/I] spell over the heads of the villagers following Alewyth's calls to escape, to strike the ale barrel automaton at the southern end of the party area. Thurloe broke off his attack against the northernmost ale barrel golem, but only because the erinyes Wakuren was fighting had wandered close enough for him to get in a strike against her; despite the size disparity, the winged devil-women were much deadlier than the automatons, slaying a lot more innocents between them. Now that she had a flow of villagers making their escape, Alewyth's focus returned to the battle at hand. Not wanting to fight against the surge of pressing bodies, she cast a [I]spiritual weapon[/I] and sent the warhammer of force energy flying over to the ale barrel golem Zander was shooting with his [I]scorching ray[/I] spells, as its greater height made it an easier target. But still the erinyes devils were ignoring the heroes and going after the easier-to-kill prey. Wakuren got the distinct idea they were going after a specific number of victims, piling up a body count high enough to fulfill some sort of devilish ritual. Then he recalled what Alabard had said in his second speech about the possibility Volossio could thank the townsfolk himself, and realized this was all an attempt to bring the dead wizard back to some semblance of unholy life. Flying into a rage at the very thought, Wakuren slammed the side of his shield into the face of the erinyes he was squared off against. His summoned air element dire wolf was likewise pressing the attack against his own erinyes target, and this one was starting to look a bit harried by the incessant attacks. Xandro finally killed the beer barrel automaton he'd been fighting, cracking open its barrel torso and causing the remaining beer in its receptacle to leak out onto the ground. It tipped over onto its face and stopped moving. Zander continued his magical onslaught against the ale barrel golem, now joined in the attack by Alewyth's [I]spiritual warhammer[/I]. By now, the crowd had thinned considerably, in part by the numbers that made it out of Alewyth's gap in the ring of benches, but sadly also because of the great number of villagers who now lay dead upon the ground. Those remining no longer had to push and shove to try to get where they were going, and as a result many were trying to make a break for it through other gaps along the perimeter. However, the stack of three barrels at the southwestern corner seemingly gave a shudder and lurched into motion, a pseudopod growing out of the front side of one of the barrels to smash in the face of one of the townsfolk seeking to run past this second mimic. Thurloe's bastard sword took out one of the erinyes devils, leaving only two of the angelic-looking devils still in place. Alewyth summoned forth a celestial bison from the Upper Planes, and the great shaggy beast seemed only too willing to add his curving horns to the task of slaying devil-women. The one erinyes finally was forced to stop trying to escape the air element dire wolf and take it on directly; if nothing else, this slowed the speed by which the villagers were being slain, although the other erinyes was still doing her best to get the death-count up to its required number. It was a shame, she mused, that the ritual called for deaths by physical violence only, for she and her sisters had spells that could have been brought to bear.... Wakuren slid up behind the erinyes devil fighting off his summoned wind-wolf and swung his [I]shield of Cal[/I] at her as the wolf snapped at her from the front. Xandro jumped up onto a table and restarted his song of inspirational courage, aware that his whole group of heroes could now hear his song, for the other bards had either dispersed - or been slain - with the other townspeople. Zander continued his barrage of [I]scorching ray[/I] spells at the ale barrel golem. The triple-barrel mimic swung its rubbery limb at another stumbling villager, sticking to him and pulling him in, where a tooth-filled maw that suddenly opened up in the side of the top barrel ripped his flesh to shreds. Thurloe resumed his attack upon the other ale barrel golem he'd been fighting earlier, finding himself joined in battle by Alewyth's celestial bison. Meanwhile, Alewyth added [I]Sjondra[/I] to the attacks against the one to the south, striking at the construct's knees while her [I]spiritual weapon[/I] struck its head and shoulders. The erinyes under attack by Wakuren and his wind-wolf finally realized she'd have to take care of these two if she wished to continue the ritual - in fact, if she could slay this half-orc, his death would likely be the equivalent of several of these sloshed villagers. But taking him out proved to be more difficult than she'd hoped, and he and the wolf continued their attacks from either side of her. The remaining golems were still trying to kill innocent partygoers, but now they actually had to chase them down, and they weren't quite as fast as a panicked human or elf running for his or her life. Xandro took a moment's respite from his song of inspirational courage to send a blast of sonic energy from his lute shooting at a beer barrel golem walking by. Zander finally took out the southernmost ale barrel golem with a final [I]scorching ray[/I]. As it crashed to the ground, Alewyth pivoted and headed over to a nearby beer barrel golem, while redirecting her [I]spiritual warhammer[/I] at one of the remaining erinyes devils. The triple-barrel mimic started lumbering in Thurloe's direction, but the spellsword kept up his attacks against the eight-foot-tall automaton he and the celestial bison were whittling down, bit by bit. One of the erinyes devils flapped her wings and went after Alewyth, swinging with her longsword; the dwarf managed to hold [I]Sjondra[/I] up just in enough time to redirect the blow. But now she was in a sort of line of combatants: her, an erinyes, Wakuren, the other erinyes, and then the air element dire wolf. Wakuren took a moment to summon forth a celestial bison of his own, sending it at one of the erinyes from the side. Then the wind-wolf blew away to nothing, its time on the Material World having been used up, and the shaggy bison took the wolf's place in the line of combat. The barrel automatons were doing what they could to slay sacrificial victims, but the sole remaining ale barrel golem was now fighting off Alewyth's celestial bison and the beer barrel golems scurried back and forth trying to pick off stragglers. Xandro leaped down from the table he'd been standing on, bringing his [I]frost short sword[/I] slashing across one of the beer barrel golems' wooden chests. Zander, still standing on a bench so he could see over the heads of those on the ground, fired another [I]scorching ray[/I] across the area to strike the second mimic, which seemed particularly perturbed to have been targeted from so far away. It continued advancing towards Thurloe, unsure of where the sudden blasts of fire had originated. Thurloe, for his part, continued his attacks upon the sole remaining ale barrel construct, as did Alewyth's summoned bison. Alewyth, however, was trading weapon-blows with one of the erinyes, the same one her [I]spiritual warhammer[/I] was attacking from the air. The two erinyes devils focused their attacks upon the dwarven priestess and Wakuren, one on each, while the half-orc's own celestial bison stabbed its massive horns at the one attacking the cleric who had summoned it from the Upper Planes. Wakuren finally slew the erinyes he'd been fighting, then whirled around to aid Alewyth in taking down the last remaining devil-woman. The celestial bison likewise moved over to attack her, and the winged devil didn't last long under those odds, Alewyth finally delivering the killing blow with [I]Sjondra[/I]. By that time, Xandro had also made short work of the beer barrel construct he'd been fighting, and Zander had slain the second mimic using ranged spells (and without even having to step down off of the bench upon which he'd spent the majority of his time in the fight). Thurloe and Alewyth's summoned bison took out the ale barrel construct, and then there were only the remaining beer barrel golems still in combat. As they'd been programmed to slay people in the "kill zone," the heroes didn't even have to chase them down, for the villagers had all escaped out of the area by then and the heroes were now the only remaining available targets. The constructs didn't last very long at all after that point. "Everybody okay?" Alewyth called out, casting a healing spell to close up the worst of the wounds she'd received from the swords of the erinyes she'd been fighting. "I could use some healing," Xandro offered, and together Alewyth and Wakuren converted some of their prepared spells into healing energy. "What now?" asked Zander. "First off, I wanna check out the dead guy," Thurloe replied, storming off in a bee-line towards the glass-topped coffin of Seamus Volossio. The red-haired wizard showed no difference; none of the victims sacrificed in his honor had done anything to revive him; the ritual likely needed a set amount of life energy to grant him an undead semblance of life, and until that threshold was reached there was no effect. Which meant that all of this slaughter had been for nothing. Thurloe tipped the coffin over on its back and lifted the lid, checking Volossio's corpse for anything that might be storing life energy or such. Wakuren aided him with a [I]detect magic [/I]spell and identified the dead wizard had a belt and a ring that had magical auras; without a word Thurloe removed them from the corpse and stuffed them into a pouch at his belt to be examined more thoroughly later. "So now what?" Zander repeated. "Are we done here?" "We're done here at this location," agreed Thurloe, "but we're not done here in Billingsway. Alabard said something about a keep at the edge of town. We'd better check it out, in case these two chuckleheads had any other surprises in store." Edna Tallywack approached; she'd escaped with the help of Alewyth but, nosy as she was, had stayed around in the general area to watch what all transpired. She gave the group directions to Volossio's keep, but after the combat at the funeral party, during which dozens had been slain, the remaining threats in Volossio's keep were hardly worth their time. A pair of zombie servitors stood inside the keep's outer walls, there to open the double doors at their master's command, and a single blast of positive energy from Alewyth, holding her holy symbol of Aerik before her, caused the zombies to explode into dust. Inside the keep, Thurloe quickly demolished a suit of animated armor in the main foyer, and Zander's spells destroyed a metallic cobra construct of some type that had been guarding the wizard's arcane library. The six animated skeletons guarding the rooftop were blasted into dust by Wakuren and Alewyth using turn undead attacks; the biggest threat was down in the basement, where a chain golem had been built into the rooftop of the construct lab (where a third ale golem was partway under construction; apparently Volossio's heart had given out before it had been finished). But the golem was destroyed soon enough, for even though it was immune to most spells, the group managed to take out the supports which held it to the ceiling (and allowed it to lug heavy construct components around the lab); once it came crashing down to the floor, the five heroes made short work of it. In the end, having determined there were no automatons ready to be activated at the failure of the necromantic revival ceremony, the group gathered up the monetary treasure Volossio had had on hand, as well as his spellbook selection (Thurloe noted he already knew a great deal of the lower-level spells, and much of the higher-level spells were from the necromantic school of magic, but there were a few others he was interested in learning), and made their way back to Scarlie and the wagon and their riding mounts. "Let's get out of here," suggested Thurloe. "I know it's the middle of the night and we're all tired, but I don't wanna stay in this creepy little burg any longer than I have to." "You guys head on into the lamp," suggested Scarlie. "I'm awake enough to get us down the road a piece." It sounded like a good idea to the others. - - - After the fight in the "kill zone" - a battle map I'd made on the back of two used desk calendar pages, which took up a good chunk of the game table in my man-cave - we more of less hand-waved the fights in the keep. After all, I had only built the keep as a place for Alabard (or Volossio, had the death count reached 110 HD of slain victims, which would have transformed Volossio into a necropolitan, a sort of "lesser lich") to retreat to, where they'd have some allies if the PCs came after them. But Thurloe took out Alabard with one hit and the death count "only" made it to 82 HD - the morticians and gravediggers in Billingsway are going to be busy for a while! - so the keep didn't really need to come into play, although it was where the majority of the treasure was located, so I didn't want to skip over it completely. Plus, this adventure session had already gone significantly longer than normal, so it seemed safe to bypass a lot of the fights against low-level threats that would be little more than a speed bump to my players' 9th-level PCs. The metagaming index was pretty high this time, though, with nobody but my son Logan (who plays Wakuren) wanting anything to do with the free ale and beer being offered up; the other players were well aware I wouldn't have put that much effort into a two-desk-calendar-page battle mat if there wasn't going to be a big fight there, and they didn't want their PCs fighting at reduced efficiency (or worse yet, poisoned). - - - T-shirt worn: My "Evil Clown School - Graduate With Honors" T-shirt, because it has a grinning, evil-looking clown that fit in perfectly with the dream sequence that went along with this adventure. [ATTACH type="full" alt="Creepy Nightmare Image 14.jpg"]272645[/ATTACH] This is a drawing by an artist named John Kenn that I discovered on-line. He does a lot of these ink drawings on Post-It notes, and I intend to use a few more of his drawings as nightmare inspiration in this campaign as opportunities allow. [/QUOTE]
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