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Message: <blockquote data-quote="JollyDoc" data-source="post: 4148672" data-attributes="member: 9546">Wide wooden gates, moldy with age and banded with corroded strips of metal, did little to bar entrance into the complex.  They stood unsecured beneath a stone arch, looking as though an errant breeze could push them open.  Beyond could be seen a short entry tunnel that passed through the gatehouse before opening into a courtyard beyond.  Red tiles covered the gatehouse exterior as well as the walls stretching to either side, though in many places individual tiles had fallen away to reveal the stone beneath.  A steep roof of green clay tiles rising in a series of ragged points topped the gatehouse.  While the courtyard beyond seemed at first do be open to the air, a glance upward created an unsettling sense of vertigo, for forty feet above, the contents of the room were reflected, down to the smallest pebble, as if the ceiling were an immense and perfect mirror twenty feet above.  The main entrance to the building, a corroded door of beaten bronze, sat in the wall opposite the gatehouse.  Squatting on a ledge above the ten-foot tall doors was a horrific statue of a creature not quite eel or shark or octopus…Dagon himself.  A wooden frame holding a large copper bell stood to the left of the entrance.  A smaller frame held a suspended log to serve as a striker for sounding the bell.  At either end of the courtyard were tall, circular towers with conical golden domes.  Archways, five feet off the ground, opened along the walls to provide access to the chamber within.  Just to the side of the gatehouse sat a small, ornamental pond overgrown with deformed lily pads and algae.  A statue of a fat frog-like demon sat cross-legged at the closest edge of the pool.  Finally, collapsed in a corner of the yard was an immense spider-like carcass the size of an elephant.  It showed signs of heavy damage and deterioration to due exposure.“Well, well,” a familiar voice said.  “I’ve been waiting patiently.  What took you so long?”To the shock and astonishment of each of the Legionnaires, an equally familiar figure stepped from the shadows of one of the small towers.  It was none other than Lavinia Vanderboren.“You are all naïve fools!”  Lavinia mocked.  “Are you so blind that you cannot see that I have orchestrated events from the start so that I might witness Vanthus’s humiliating defeat and aid the Prince of Demons in achieving his goal?  Through my machinations, you have been kept distracted with events in Farshore, and by pretending to be captured, I also kept you from where you were truly needed…in civilization, seeking out the shadow pearls and preventing them from spreading as far as they did.”Mandi’s face burned and her eyes flashed red.  As she blinked for a moment, her surroundings came into clear focus, and she immediately saw that it was not Lavinia at all who addressed them, but another glabrezu who wore a semblance of her form.“I see you for what you are demon, so you may drop this pretense,” she commanded.‘Lavinia’ shrugged, and with a gut-churning blurring of her features, assumed the hulking, four-armed shape of a glabrezu.“I’m frankly shocked that it took you this long to see through my little disguise,” General Ghorvash chuckled.  “Still, do not let my charade blind you to the truth.  It was I who was responsible for corrupting young Vanthus Vanderboren so many years ago, and it is I who has been impersonating his sister for quite some time now.  Yes, the real Lavinia Vanderboren is dead, and has been for awhile.”“Liar!”  Mandi spat, her heart growing cold at the possibility.“Is it?”  Ghorvash asked.  “Why don’t you ask Vanthus yourself?”He gestured, and from the tower door floated a writhing, worm-like creature that bore the face of none-other-than Vanthus Vanderboren.“Help me!  Please!” the pitiable wretch squealed.“That proves nothing!”  Mandi screamed.  “So you’ve managed to harvest Vanthus’s damned soul?  What of it?  Someone was bound to.  That fact gives no credence to your false claims!”“I do not need for you to believe me,” Ghorvash growled.  “All I need is for you to die!”The demon raised his hands, wreathing them in black flames, but before he could strike, Sepoto, Octurus and Tower Cleaver rushed across the courtyard in a blur of motion.  As one they struck, and nothing short of Demogorgon himself could have stood before that onslaught.  With bone-crunching finality, General Ghorvash collapsed soundlessly to the ground.‘Lavinia,’ Mandi sent her thoughts across the multiverse.  ‘It’s Mandi.  Just checking in to see if the funds I promised have been made available, and to see how ship construction is coming.’For a moment, there was nothing, and Mandi’s blood ran chill.  Then, a voice called back.‘Everything is fine here.  Why would you worry?  I hope that you are safe.’Strain dropped from Mandi’s features like a weight, and then she turned to the thing that had once been Vanthus Vanderboren.“Do you regret the evil you have done?” she asked him, tonelessly.“Yes!  Please!  Anything!  I’m sorry!  Forgive me!” he wailed.Mandi lifted one finger, and a thin, emerald beam struck Vanthus, turning him to dust.“Apology accepted,” she said.</blockquote>

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