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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Nail" data-source="post: 1383837" data-attributes="member: 224">I *think* my job has something to do with posting messages......Session #25: "The Source Strikes"RL evening of Jan 7th, 2004The adventurers spent the rest of that day, and all of the next, recouping from their trials.  They had completed one of the tests, and they knew there were many more.....9? 18?....Mor ‘Elandi was especially confused at the number of mysteries.“I don’t understand,” complained Mor’Elandi,  “That naga said ‘9’, then she said ‘each a pair of mysteries’.  Does that mean there are 18?  Two times nine, right?”Tieran shrugged.While they rested, they talked about the meaning of the tests, and the quality of their “guide”, the ghostly naga Slythia.  Thaile voiced the concern that in following a ghost, a spirit of a restless dead, they were ignoring many of the tenets of their churches and the Gods.  Namely, that All Undead Are Evil, and Must Be Destroyed.  Rowan pointed out that this ghost had done no evil (at which point Mor’Elandi grumbled it had not done much good either).To try to settle the debate, Thaile called upon her god, Darmon the Wayfarer.  Using a tiny portion of the power He had bestowed upon her, Thaile cast a spell that would detect the presence of Evil in the ghostly serpent woman.....and the spell failed.  It simply failed to function....almost as if it had been disrupted as it was being used.  (That had never happened before.....)  Disgruntled, Thaile returned to the group and settled down in her spot.After their respite, the adventurers gathered themselves together and approached the naga’s ghost.  The naga stood (or is that “floated”?) in the great stair-hall, blocking the way down, the way the adventurers knew they must descend to reach their goal of the kobold city.  Her face was placid, clam, soothing.....and yet the adventurers could almost see through her translucent form.  As the party approached, Slythia smiled and nodded to them, “You are ready?”“We’re ready fer th’ next test,” said Riva, fingering his axe.  “I hope this one has a bit more excitement than th’ last.  I don’t like mazes.”“What can you tell us about the Mystery of Purity?” asked Thaile.“I can say many things.  But I will start with this: Before you is the Mystery of Purity.  Without Purity, there can be no form.  But hear me, the font of all things is purest.”The ghostly naga stopped.  The adventurers looked from one to another.  All were silent.“That’s it??” Mor’Elandi finally asked, incredulously.The ghostly naga said nothing, a smile on her beatific face.“Right.  Well, in we go then,” said Riva, as he strode into the steam filled passage, the rest falling in behind him.  Mor’Elandi, as usual, took up the rear of the line.The steam here was especially thick and hot.  Rowan felt they must be getting closer to its source.  The short, smooth passage opened up into a small room, its wall and ceiling partially collapsed and lying strewn about on the floor.  The floor was also covered with an inch deep pool of warm water, flowing in from under the rocks of the collapsed ceiling in front of them, flowing out onto the great stair-hall behind them.  The adventurers couldn’t see farther than they could reach, all the while bathed in thick steam, so it took them quite a while to pick their way around the room until they found an exit.  At the top of the pile of rubble was an opening.  It was more like a space between giant ceiling blocks than a passage, but it wound its way deeper into the area, so....the adventurers followed it.  (What?  Wouldn’t you do the same?)Beyond was another collapsed room, its partially intact walls showing it was once circular and 20 feet in diameter.  The slope of rubble down to the room’s floor was loose and treacherous; Riva, in the lead, slipped and tumbled down a short distance.  At the base of the slope the water was deeper, perhaps a foot or so, and lined with loose rocks.  Piercing the wall in front of them was a carved narrow archway.As Rowan helped Riva to his feet, she could see some sort of light beyond the arch.  And then both heard a voice, deep and commanding.  It spoke to them in draconic:“Come no closer.  Or I will strike you.”The rest of the party squeezed through the passage Riva and Rowan had, and picked their way down the pile of rubble.  Only Thaile missed her footing on the way down.The deep bass voice spoke again:”Leave.     Now.”Rowan stepped toward the door, and shouted “No!”Thaile grabbed her shoulder, then spoke to the fiery light, “Why should we leave?  Why are you here?””I bear the god’s will, and they will this place cursed.  The Sar-thak-con is closed.”“But we are here for the mystery of Purity,” Thaile pleaded, “We were sent here by Slythia to take the test of Purity.””Slythia is dead.  I know this to be true.  The tests are no more.  Such is the god’s will.”“Well,” continued Thaile, in a hopeful voice, “maybe you could just tell us about the mystery of Purity instead?”Silence answered.“Right,” grumbled Riva, “he’s not going t’be helpful.  Let’s get this Mystery over with.” Riva stepped into the steam filled room, just as Tieran magically enlarged him.  The steam was lesser here, although the heat was more intense.  Riva saw standing in the middle of the circular room a dwarf-sized figure in bronze armor with an old design, its head wreathed in flames.  In its hands it whirled a red-hot spiked chain, which lashed out at Riva the moment he stepped into the archway.  In a moment, Riva’s magical greatsword lay somewhere under the murky water, and Riva himself lay prone.  Riva rose, drawing a dagger, and this too was instantly snatched from his grasp, and his feet again yanked from under him.  In between these strikes the fiery figure lashed Riva with his razor-sharp chain, once, twice, thrice.  Riva’s blood flowed freely.Behind him, Riva’s companions were trying to jockey into position.  They could not enter the room themselves, as Riva, enlarged as he was, blocked their path through the arch.  They also could not see Riva’s attacker, just the red glow of his flaming head.  Mor-Enandi’s bow was useless; Kytum-up’s sword as well.  The spell casters tried spell after spell – Magic Missile, Call Lightning, Summon Monster – and all failed to do any damage to the chain-weilding creature.Riva, hit innumerable times by the spiked chain, lay in the pool, near death.  Thaile reached out to him with a cure spell.  Riva’s eyes fluttered open.  He glanced up, and saw the fiery dwarf standing over him, whirling his chain.  Riva’s eyes hardened.Riva struggled to rise, and Thaile reached out to pull him to safety.The spiked chain struck.  There was a snap of bone and the wet sound of soft flesh tearing.........Riva collapsed to the floor.Hurriedly, Thaile and Rowan pulled him from the room.  Riva was no longer enlarged; Tieran had dismissed the spell.  Thaile readied a healing spell, and applied it to Riva’s most grievous wounds.No effect.Thaile looked up at her friends, crowding around.  She paused, then spoke.  “He’s dead," a tear fell from her cheek as she spoke.  "Riva’s dead.” More to come......</blockquote>

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