NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="JollyDoc" data-source="post: 4108496" data-attributes="member: 9546">A QUEEN DENIEDIt didn’t take long for the Legionnaires to discover who Crimson was.  On their way back to reclaim their clothing from the Sea Wyvern, passersby were only too willing to tell them that she was one of the Radiant Sisters.  The Sisters were comprised of thirteen lilitus who served as Malcanthet’s favored minions, functioning as slavers, singers, assassins, generals, and lovers.  Their manors were modeled after churches devoted to the gods of Good and Law.  Crimson’s chosen deity was Lathander, the patron of Light.  When the six companions reached the manor, however, they found it in shambles.  The narthex and sanctuary were strewn with rubble and no roof covered the building.  It didn’t appear that anyone had lived there in quite some time.  Yet Mandi’s instincts told her differently, and when she pulled a slim wand from her cloak and spoke a command word, it pointed her towards a pile of debris in a far corner.  Once Tower Cleaver had effortlessly cleared away the heavy stones, a trap door was revealed beneath.  A stone staircase led down on the opposite side, and the group proceeded with caution.The stair opened into a long, low room that contained seven stone biers, each of which bore a shroud-wrapped shape.  Six individuals stood around the biers.  They were men and women dressed in white robes and wearing the symbol of Lathander around their necks, though the medallions had lost their luster and seemed caked with some sort of brown substance.“Are you pilgrims?” one of the men asked as the Legionnaires entered.  “It has been long since we’ve had visitors here.”“Who are you?”  Mandi inquired.  “Where is Crimson?”“Crimson?” the man looked puzzled.  “We know of no such person.  As for us, we are missionaries, here to bring Lathander’s light to the darkest of souls.”“You’re lying,” Daelric interrupted.  “I can see the taint of evil upon you.”  His eyes flared with golden light.“I’m afraid we’ve been too long upon this plane,” the priest said, shaking his head.  “Its foul nature all but smothers us, yet our work here is vital, and we are called to remain.”“Whatever,” Sepoto said impatiently.  “We’re looking for someone, and if you can’t give us any information, then you won’t mind us looking around a bit.”“Of course not,” the priest said, gesturing towards a door on the far side of the room.  “Be our guests.”The company made their way across the chamber, keeping watchful eyes upon the priests, who smiled and bowed as they passed.  It was only when Mandi, bringing up the rear, was almost to the far side that she caught a faint glint from the mouth of a nearby priestess.  When she looked again she saw that the woman’s eyes had turned blood-red and fangs protruded over her bottom lip.  Suddenly, all six of the vampiric priests were in motion, and dark shadows swirled around them.  The shadows quickly condensed and coalesced into humanoid shapes, which then reached their incorporeal talons out for the Legionnaires.  Mandi smiled, knowing full well that they were safe from the deadly touch of the undead, thanks to Daelric’s forethought in warding them all against such tactics.  But that wasn’t the extent of Daelric’s ingenuity.  Once he saw the shadows, he quickly uttered a prayer, and the ephemeral forms of the creatures suddenly became solid as his magic forced them completely into the material world.Sepoto and Octurus ignored the shadows completely, instead moving towards the vampires.  Their weapons swept before them, but the steel did not bite deep when it struck the pale, white flesh of the blood suckers, and the wounds began to close as soon as they were inflicted.  Then, from the center of the chamber, light flared as bright as the sun.  There, Tower Cleaver stood like a monument, whirling his axe above his head where it flared with white fire.  Instinctively, the vampires hissed and cowered from the burning light, fleeing for the shadowed corners of the chamber.  Suddenly, Mandi stepped into the ring of Cleaver’s light, where she began summoning her own magic.  As she chanted, a sphere of pure darkness formed between her hands, and she hurled it towards the nearest priest.  When it struck the vampire, the creature simply ceased to exist, vanishing in a puff of smoke.  At Mandi’s command, the sphere then sped towards a second vampire, snuffing it out as well, before moving on to a third.Meanwhile, the combined efforts of Sepoto and Octurus finally overcame the unholy toughness of the vampire’s flesh, and the creature dissolved into mist which rapidly seeped beneath the far door.  The final two vampires shrieked in rage, then vanished within clouds of shadow.  Tower Cleaver stopped his spinning axe and moved to the center of the room, and waited.  When the six shadows came for him, as he knew they would, he spun his axe once more, but this time it was a deadly whirlwind that cleaved through each of the undead one after the other, leaving nothing but piles of ash in its wake.“Someone’s coming,” Mandi announced as the group surveyed the scene.  Her interdiction ward told her when anyone was attempting to teleport into her vicinity, and so she was not caught by surprise when Crimson materialized in the center of the chamber.  At first glance, the demon was beautiful, her beauty enhanced by the scarlet halo that surrounded her red hair.  But then the eye was drawn to the charred stumps of wings that protruded from her back, the cloven hooves that served as her feet, and to the four writhing, stinger tipped tails that sprouted from her back.  Mandi took it all in with bored disdain.“Malcanthet wants to see you,” she said, but before Crimson could reply, the sorceress spoke another spell, transforming the lilitu into a wooden doll.</blockquote>

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