Metamorphosis: From Dretch to Demon Lord - Ascension Released!
- Thread starter BLACKDIRGE
- Start date
BLACKDIRGE
Adventurer
It's update time! Sorry for the delay, I had a product release I needed to get out (details are in my sig if you're interested).
A lot of the last updates have been really talky, so I thought it was time for some serious, fiendish whup-ass. So this one has all the blood and guts you could ask for.
This update was getting pretty long, so I cut it into two parts. I should have the second part done in a week or so.
Enjoy the carnage.
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Part XXII
Hedrenatherax felt the oppressive weight of betrayal the moment he set foot in Yaghur Hod’s audience chamber. He felt it in every cell and fiber of his being, smelled its ripe stench like flatulence in a closed chamber. The archfiend turned his gaze upon Gemnez, but the rotund baatezu avoided his master’s eyes as they entered Yaghur Hod’s presence. If anything goes awry here, I’ll skewer that fat slug first. Hedrenatherax thought, savoring the image of Gemnez twitching out his death throes on the end of Dreadskewer.
Yaghur Hod stood upon a raised dais in the center of a massive domed chamber, which contained nothing but bone-white walls and a startling array of fiends. The former Oinodaemon wore his true form, that of a gaunt, faceless fiend with massive, bulbous eyes. The great yugoloth leaned upon his infamous weapon, the great scythe Blightrazor, his face and body language as impassive and gray as the bleak monotony of Hades itself. Beside the yugoloth lord stood a monstrous four-armed brute that Hedrenatherax recognized instantly as a nycodaemon, although it was by far the largest example of that particular type of yugoloth he had ever seen. The nycodaemon was obviously a trusted associate, and by the look of the four great axes that hung from the fiend’s war harness, was probably more bodyguard than servant.
“Careful of that one, my lord,” Gemnez whispered to Hedrenatherax as they approached the dais, nodding towards the nycodaemon. “Dyzag is a fearsome foe. Some say more fearsome than Yaghur Hod himself.”
“Mercenary scum,” Hedrenatherax spat under his breath, naming the most common occupation for yugoloths, and especially nycodaemons in the great blood war between the Abyss and the Nine Hells. “I’ve gutted hundreds of his kind. The fact that he has become bloated with age does not concern me.”
How the mighty have fallen, Hedrenatherax thought as he surveyed the motley state of Yaghur Hod’s “court”. Clustered about their master’s dais stood an assortment of fiends and other planar scum. Dull-witted mezzodaemons comprised the bulk of Yaghur Hod’s minions, although the former Oinodaemon had managed to obtain the services of a handful of barghests, which crouched at the foot of his dais like a pack of great, mangy dogs. Beyond Dyzag, only a single fox-headed arcanodaemon represented the upper tier of daemonic life, although the daemon’s threadbare robes and greasy fur marked it as a fiend that had seen better fortunes.
“How exactly is this pack of dretch feces supposed to aid me?” Hedrenatherax whispered fiercely, pulling Gemnez close with the butt of Dreadskewer. “I’ve never seen a more pathetic band of wretches.”
“My lord, Yaghur Hod, like you, is attempting to build his empire. Surely you both can come to some common agreement to that end,” Gemnez began diplomatically. “The magnetism of such an alliance would certainly bring all manner of desirable minions flocking to your combined banner, thus hastening the fruition of your separate goals.”
“It doesn’t smell right, toad,” Hedrenatherax rumbled in reply. “Something is wrong.” The archfiend fixed his baatezu major domo with the twin suns of his baleful red eyes, his meaning unmistakable.
Hedrenatherax and Gemnez had reached Yaghur Hod’s dais, and the great yugoloth stared down at them, his great lidless eyes betraying nothing. “This is the “lord” of Vrack?” The former Oinodaemon asked, his voice issuing from the empty air, disembodied yet filled with regal indifference. “I had expected something more…formidable.”
Hedrenatherax chuckled, the thick bass rumbling of his voice filling the cavernous chamber. “Formidable, you say, “Hedrenatherax said, his bestial features creased in a feral grin. “You speak of strength, or should I say call to attention to the dearth of my own power, yet there you stand, humbled, broken, a great turd on the multiverse’s biggest pile of dung and offal.” A collective hiss of rage rose from the assembled fiends, but Hedrenatherax was unfazed. “Look at this rabble, how can you call yourself “Oinodaemon” when no one but you, and maybe that brute beside you, believe it is true?”
Dyzag bristled at Hedrenatherax’s words, his weapons clattering together as his reared up to his full height and glowered down at the archfiend. “Let me slay this one for you, my lord,” he said, turning to Yaghur Hod. “We need nothing from the likes of this one.”
“Yes, let your mercenary there step down and add steel to his bold words,” Hedrenatherax said. “Allow me to make you more of a pauper than you already are.”
Gemnez placed one flabby hand upon Hedrenatherax's scythe-arm. “My lord, although I am thrilled at your sudden eloquence, this may not be the best negotiation tactic,” Gemnez whispered. “Perhaps more humility would be in order.”
“Silence, toad!” Hedrenatherax spat, and shoved the great baatezu away from him. “Your betters are speaking.”
The audience chamber had gone silent, the collected rabble of Yaghur Hod’s court waiting to see how their lord would respond to Hedrenatherax’s insolence. All watched and waited except a single impetuous barghest, one of a group that had been fawning at the foot of Yaghur Hod’s dais. The large hairy, goblin-like creature had foolishly decided to “prove” itself in the eyes of its master, hoping to gain Yaghur Hod’s favor by slaying the upstart demon lord that dared insult him.
Thinking itself a cunning and stealthy beast, the barghest leapt at Hedrenatherax just as Gemnez was desperately trying to quell his lord’s outburst. Assured that the demon lord was momentarily distracted by the bloated devil beside him, the barghest’s surprise at Hedrenatherax’s speed and brutal response to its attack was near complete. Dreadskewer shot out like a great spiked piston, propelled by the unfathomable strength of Hedrenatherax’s left arm. The spear’s massive, barbed head struck the barghest in the center of its hairy chest, impaling the beast as it reached the terminus of its leap. The creature’s body weight and the momentum of its fall further hastened its transfixion, and it coughed and spluttered in rage and agony as it slid down Dreadskewer’s shaft. When the barghest reached the midway point of its descent along the spears 15-foot length, Hedrenatherax’s scythe-arm slashed out, removing the barghest’s head in a gout of black ichor.
Hedrenatherax held the decapitated barghest off the floor, still impaled by Dreadskewer, grinning as the corpse quaked violently in its death throes and loosed its bowels in a torrent of foulness upon the white stone of Yaghur Hod’s audience chamber before finally quieting to stillness. The archfiend then upended his weapon, and pushed the corpse off of Dreadskewer with one taloned foot, much like a man might scrape a bit of mud or a crushed insect from his boot.
The remaining barghests growled menacingly at Hedrenatherax, but none were foolish enough to follow their companion’s ultimately futile and very lethal example. The rest of the assembled fiends in the audience chamber grumbled and hissed, but many of them had taken a step back, or erected what magical defenses they could, lest Hedrenatherax turn his ire upon the entire room.
Yaghur Hod watched the barghest’s death unfold impassively, placing one slim, long-fingered hand on one of Dyzag’s forearms, restraining the massive fiend, who was quivering with rage, from leaping into battle with Hedrenatherax. The ultrodaemon’s form suddenly shifted and blurred, heralding a change in form and drawing Hedrenatherax’s attention away from the shattered corpse of the barghest at his feet.
“You dare spill blood without my leave?” Yaghur Hod asked, his words flowing from the elegant mouth of a slim, young human girl with raven-black hair, the form he had chosen for the moment. “I assure you, your words and actions here do not embolden me to aid you in your plight.”
“Aid me?” Hedrenatherax asked. “You never had any intention of aiding me in anything. I knew that the moment I walked into this room,” the massive demon said, returning Dreadskewer to its former position across his broad, scaled shoulders.
“Nonsense,” Yaghur Hod replied, although the wan smile that crossed his now human lips told the real truth. “We have mutual interests, you and I.”
“Nonsense,” Hedrenatherax repeated. “Then why can I not teleport away from this damnable place? And why have you assembled this pathetic mob of clingers-on to greet me?” The demon lord indicated Yaghur Hod’s court with a sweep of Dreadskewer.
“Why would you wish to leave before our “negotiations” have even commenced?” The girl-daemon asked, its lilting voice mock innocent. “None may leave Oin Drok without my leave. I assure you there is no skullduggery on my part. As for my court, they were eager to attend this momentous occasion, the cementing of an alliance between Hades and the Abyss.”
“Enough!” Hedrenatherax suddenly shouted, his voice careening about the audience chamber in a cacophonous roar. “Enough of your posturing, daemon! Tell me why I am here and what it is you want or gods help me I will bring this tower down upon your head!”
“Fair enough,” Yaghur Hod said, unmoved by Hedrenatherax’s outburst. “Tell him Gemnez.” The girl-daemon commanded, waving one delicate hand at the baatezu, who had, despite his immense bulk, stealthily slipped away from Hedrenatherax and stood behind the ranks of lesser fiends filling the room.
Hedrenatherax laughed mirthlessly. “Yes, fat one, tell me, who is the bigger fool? Me for believing your lies, or you for believing his?”
The great baatezu smiled, his gaudy lips painting a crimson smear of blood and teeth across his ghastly face. “Oh, I have no doubt that our esteemed host would betray me just as I have betrayed you, but one thing differs,” Gemnez said smoothly.
“And what, pray tell, is that, fat one?” Hedrenatherax returned casually.
“Why leverage, you brainless simpleton,” Gemnez replied. “We both have something Yaghur Hod wants, although you have made the colossal blunder of bringing that something with you today. I, on the other hand, have secreted the desired object in a place well-guarded with loyal, and powerful, allies.”
Hedrenatherax turned back to Yaghur Hod, who had again changed forms, appearing as a gray-robed man of advancing years. “It’s the spear, isn’t it?”
“Bravo, my dear demon,” Yaghur Hod said. “Yes, Dreadskewer is what I want.”
“Then come and take it, daemon. Come and take it, if you can,” Hedrenatherax said, taking Dreadskewer in an overhand grip, cocking the mighty weapon over his left shoulder.
“Ah, the brash predictability of the tanar’ri. So much easier to manipulate than the inscrutable madness of your Obyrith predecessors,” Yaghur Hod said, naming the ancient race of demons that had ruled the abyss long before the rise of sentient life on the Prime Material plane. “Hear me, my subjects,” the ultrodaemon shouted. “If any among your number can bring me this demon’s spear, he shall find great favor in my eyes, and be rewarded with the stewardship of this tower.”
A low rumble passed through the collected fiends in the audience chamber, and the air suddenly filled with a thick clamoring of spells and weapons being readied.
“Finally, we get down to business,” Hedrenatherax said as a wall of fiends advanced upon him from all directions. “Well, come on then, here I am, and here is your prize!”
The archfiend suddenly opened his mouth and spewed forth a great gout of steaming, green bile, splattering the first rank of advancing fiends, a group of ten insect-like mezzodaemons gripping cold iron tridents, with the noxious fluid. The caustic substance elicited a chorus of buzz-like screams, as it began to eat through the protective chitin and then the flesh of the lesser daemons.
The fiendish advance halted, unnerved by Hedrenatherax’s horrific attack and the terrible injuries inflicted on the mezzodaemons. The archfiend, however, was just getting started, and his lips, still dripping with caustic green bile, formed the syllables of a dire arcane spell. The air danced and twisted as Hedrenatherax’s spell smote reality with its terrible magic, creating a cloud of baleful black energy in the midst of the now uncertain group of fiends. The cloud roiled hideously, convulsing with vile energies, before taking on a foul material substance and twisting into a wild vortex of giant, disembodied teeth. The fiends in the immediate area were quickly snatched up and ground into paste beneath the gnashing onslaught of the toothy vortex. Others attempted to flee, but were sucked in by the vile winds of the spell, and dragged screaming to their doom.
When Hedrenatherax’s swirling whirlwind of destruction finally dissipated, all that was left of Yaghur Hod’s horde of fiends was the lone arcanodaemon, who had erected enough magical defenses to ward of the worst of the spell’s effects, and the four remaining barghests, cowed and mewling at the foot of their master’s dais. Gemnez, also unscathed, had simply moved further away from the carnage, his great, flabby body dripping with slimy sweat at the effort it had taken him to move so quickly.
The arcanodaemon, perhaps thinking it had weathered the worst Hedrenatherax had to offer, attempted to cast a spell of its own. The fox-headed fiend uttered the short, grating syllables of an attack spell, and Hedrenatherax was suddenly immolated in a column of green flame. The fire licked harmlessly against the demon lord’s scaly integument, unable to pierce his considerable resistance to heat, and eliciting a savage grin from the archfiend.
“Fire?” Hedrenatherax asked mockingly as the arcanodaemon’s attack sputtered and dissipated, having been absolutely ineffective. “And here I thought you arcanodaemons were smart.” The demon lord shortened his grip on Dreadskewer and hurled the massive spear at the arcanodaemon. The great spear hissed through the air, as if flung from a ballista, catching the arcanodaemon in the back as it turned to flee. Dreadskewer punched through the fox-headed fiend’s body with a spray of black, viscous blood without slowing, continuing its flight to strike the far wall of the chamber some thirty yards distant, burying its cold-iron head in the stone. It lingered there for a fraction of an instant, quivering like a great arrow, and then disappeared with a faint whiff of sulfur to appear again in Hedrenatherax’s gloved left hand.
The arcanodaemon, despite the rather large hole in its midsection, attempted to cast another spell, but managed to utter only a single, blood-flecked cough before collapsing in a ragged, furry heap on the cold stone of the audience chamber.
The death of the arcanodaemon left only the four barghests, which wanted no part of Hedrenatherax’s ire and were attempting to creep up Yaghur Hod’s dais, closer to their master and his hulking his bodyguard Dyzag. They were halted with a single cool glance from the great ultrodaemon. “Well?” Yaghur Hod asked. “There is your glory,” he said pointing to Hedrenatherax. “Go and take it.”
The barghests, with no other choice, slunk down the steps of the dais to face their doom. Hedrenatherax was waiting for them, grinning with feral delight at yet more creatures to slay. The barghests split into pairs when they reached the foot of the dais, attempting to come at the demon lord from two directions. Hedrenatherax let them move around him, still grinning, Dreadskewer perched over his left shoulder again.
The two barghests to Hedrenatherax’s suddenly dropped to all fours and called upon their natural shapechanging abilities. The fiends’ bodies writhed nastily, bones and muscle convulsed, joints popped and then were grindingly reconfigured for quadrupedal locomotion. Finally, two massive wolf-like creatures stood where the barghests had before, and baying like great hellish wolves, they surged forward. Hedrenatherax met the barghests’ charge with a sweeping strike of Dreadskewer’s shaft, striking one of the fiends flush on the side of its fanged skull and knocking it senseless to the ground. The demon lord followed this attack by swiveling his body to one side, letting the second barghest charge by, its jaws closing on empty air with a drool-splattering snap. Hedrenatherax brought his scythe-arm down in a vicious overhand chop as the barghest sprinted past, cleaving the creatures completely in twain just behind the thick muscles of its shoulders. The barghest came apart in a spray of blood, adding a slick of ropy entrails and black fiendish ichor to the already gore-soaked floor.
The second pair of barghests, noting their companions failed efforts, resorted to what natural magic they commanded, and suddenly grew to twice their normal size. Nearly the same size as their opponent, the two enlarged barghests moved in warily, careful of Hedrenatherax’s extended reach with Dreadskewer.
Hedrenatherax watched the two barghests circle him, holding Dreadskewer braced against one foot like a pikeman preparing for a cavalry charge. When they had flanked him, Hedrenatherax suddenly lurched forward, throwing his weight towards the barghest in front of him, causing it to recoil away from an expected thrust with Dreadskewer. Sensing an opening, the second barghest moved in, hoping to gain a tactical advantage while Hedrenatherax’s momentum carried him away from the attack. The demon lord felt the barghest behind him and grinned, knowing that the beast had fallen for his ruse. In response to the threat from behind, Hedrenatherax slammed his left arm backwards, the joint twisting in a manner that was wholly unnatural, propelling Dreadskewer’s iron butt cap with brutal force into the barghest’s bestial face. Bone crunched, and the beast fell over backwards, clutching the ruins of its face and howling in agony. In the flash of an instant, Hedrenatherax reversed the motion of his weapon, and pistoned his great arm forward, leaning his whole body into the strike to add nearly ten feet of reach to Dreadskewer’s fifteen-foot length. The barghest in front of the demon lord had moved a single step closer, preparing to aid its companion’s attack from the rear. This turned out to be a fatal mistake, as the mere ten feet it had moved, which it perceived to be well out of Hedrenatherax’s range, brought it just close enough for Dreadskewer’s razored tip to puncture it’s right eye socket, piercing the eye and the brain behind it. The barghest shuddered once as Hedrenatherax withdrew his weapon, and then collapsed to the ground.
Hedrenatherax silenced the cries of the downed barghest behind him with a casual thrust of Dreadskewer, while the barghest that had been felled with the spear’s shaft, was dispatched by the demon lord’s great calloused foot thundering down upon it skull, splattering bone fragments and brain matter in all directions.
“Well done,” Yaghur Hod said coolly, glancing around at the shattered ruins of his court.
Hedrenatherax shrugged. “I’ve had bowel movements that required more effort,” he said sarcastically, returning Dreadskewer to its place across his shoulders.
“Then you should find Dyzag here to be a most fulfilling challenge,” Yaghur Hod said, patting the great nycodaemon on his shoulder. “Bring me the spear, old friend.”
“Gladly,” Dyzag said, removing the four great axes from his weapon harness with a harsh clattering of enchanted steel. The massive nycodaemon then leaped from the dais, his elephantine bulk crashing down like the hammer of doom fifteen feet from the waiting Hedrenatherax.
In response to Dyzag’s movement, Hedrenatherax brought Dreadskewer into an overhand grip, cocked over his left shoulder, and held his scythe arm low, poised to deliver a brutal underhanded slash. The casual grace with which he had fought the barghests and the rest of Yaghur Hod’s lesser fiends, disappeared, replaced with the icy calm of a creature that had seen a thousand battles and had slain countless creatures, both mighty and insignificant.
“Are you ready to bleed, demon lord?” Dyzag asked, clashing all four of his axes together with an ear-shattering crash, and moving forward slowly, deliberately.
“As ready as you are, I suspect,” Hedrenatherax returned, moving to his left, circling away from the great nycodaemon to keep the advantage of Dreadskewer’s reach.
Gemnez, who had watched the slaughter of Yaghur Hod’s court from a safe distance, was grinning and rubbing his fat, eager hands together. He stood some fifty yards from Hedrenatherax and Dyzag as they slowly circled each other, wondering how such powerful creatures could be so easily manipulated.
A lot of the last updates have been really talky, so I thought it was time for some serious, fiendish whup-ass. So this one has all the blood and guts you could ask for.
This update was getting pretty long, so I cut it into two parts. I should have the second part done in a week or so.
Enjoy the carnage.
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Part XXII
Hedrenatherax felt the oppressive weight of betrayal the moment he set foot in Yaghur Hod’s audience chamber. He felt it in every cell and fiber of his being, smelled its ripe stench like flatulence in a closed chamber. The archfiend turned his gaze upon Gemnez, but the rotund baatezu avoided his master’s eyes as they entered Yaghur Hod’s presence. If anything goes awry here, I’ll skewer that fat slug first. Hedrenatherax thought, savoring the image of Gemnez twitching out his death throes on the end of Dreadskewer.
Yaghur Hod stood upon a raised dais in the center of a massive domed chamber, which contained nothing but bone-white walls and a startling array of fiends. The former Oinodaemon wore his true form, that of a gaunt, faceless fiend with massive, bulbous eyes. The great yugoloth leaned upon his infamous weapon, the great scythe Blightrazor, his face and body language as impassive and gray as the bleak monotony of Hades itself. Beside the yugoloth lord stood a monstrous four-armed brute that Hedrenatherax recognized instantly as a nycodaemon, although it was by far the largest example of that particular type of yugoloth he had ever seen. The nycodaemon was obviously a trusted associate, and by the look of the four great axes that hung from the fiend’s war harness, was probably more bodyguard than servant.
“Careful of that one, my lord,” Gemnez whispered to Hedrenatherax as they approached the dais, nodding towards the nycodaemon. “Dyzag is a fearsome foe. Some say more fearsome than Yaghur Hod himself.”
“Mercenary scum,” Hedrenatherax spat under his breath, naming the most common occupation for yugoloths, and especially nycodaemons in the great blood war between the Abyss and the Nine Hells. “I’ve gutted hundreds of his kind. The fact that he has become bloated with age does not concern me.”
How the mighty have fallen, Hedrenatherax thought as he surveyed the motley state of Yaghur Hod’s “court”. Clustered about their master’s dais stood an assortment of fiends and other planar scum. Dull-witted mezzodaemons comprised the bulk of Yaghur Hod’s minions, although the former Oinodaemon had managed to obtain the services of a handful of barghests, which crouched at the foot of his dais like a pack of great, mangy dogs. Beyond Dyzag, only a single fox-headed arcanodaemon represented the upper tier of daemonic life, although the daemon’s threadbare robes and greasy fur marked it as a fiend that had seen better fortunes.
“How exactly is this pack of dretch feces supposed to aid me?” Hedrenatherax whispered fiercely, pulling Gemnez close with the butt of Dreadskewer. “I’ve never seen a more pathetic band of wretches.”
“My lord, Yaghur Hod, like you, is attempting to build his empire. Surely you both can come to some common agreement to that end,” Gemnez began diplomatically. “The magnetism of such an alliance would certainly bring all manner of desirable minions flocking to your combined banner, thus hastening the fruition of your separate goals.”
“It doesn’t smell right, toad,” Hedrenatherax rumbled in reply. “Something is wrong.” The archfiend fixed his baatezu major domo with the twin suns of his baleful red eyes, his meaning unmistakable.
Hedrenatherax and Gemnez had reached Yaghur Hod’s dais, and the great yugoloth stared down at them, his great lidless eyes betraying nothing. “This is the “lord” of Vrack?” The former Oinodaemon asked, his voice issuing from the empty air, disembodied yet filled with regal indifference. “I had expected something more…formidable.”
Hedrenatherax chuckled, the thick bass rumbling of his voice filling the cavernous chamber. “Formidable, you say, “Hedrenatherax said, his bestial features creased in a feral grin. “You speak of strength, or should I say call to attention to the dearth of my own power, yet there you stand, humbled, broken, a great turd on the multiverse’s biggest pile of dung and offal.” A collective hiss of rage rose from the assembled fiends, but Hedrenatherax was unfazed. “Look at this rabble, how can you call yourself “Oinodaemon” when no one but you, and maybe that brute beside you, believe it is true?”
Dyzag bristled at Hedrenatherax’s words, his weapons clattering together as his reared up to his full height and glowered down at the archfiend. “Let me slay this one for you, my lord,” he said, turning to Yaghur Hod. “We need nothing from the likes of this one.”
“Yes, let your mercenary there step down and add steel to his bold words,” Hedrenatherax said. “Allow me to make you more of a pauper than you already are.”
Gemnez placed one flabby hand upon Hedrenatherax's scythe-arm. “My lord, although I am thrilled at your sudden eloquence, this may not be the best negotiation tactic,” Gemnez whispered. “Perhaps more humility would be in order.”
“Silence, toad!” Hedrenatherax spat, and shoved the great baatezu away from him. “Your betters are speaking.”
The audience chamber had gone silent, the collected rabble of Yaghur Hod’s court waiting to see how their lord would respond to Hedrenatherax’s insolence. All watched and waited except a single impetuous barghest, one of a group that had been fawning at the foot of Yaghur Hod’s dais. The large hairy, goblin-like creature had foolishly decided to “prove” itself in the eyes of its master, hoping to gain Yaghur Hod’s favor by slaying the upstart demon lord that dared insult him.
Thinking itself a cunning and stealthy beast, the barghest leapt at Hedrenatherax just as Gemnez was desperately trying to quell his lord’s outburst. Assured that the demon lord was momentarily distracted by the bloated devil beside him, the barghest’s surprise at Hedrenatherax’s speed and brutal response to its attack was near complete. Dreadskewer shot out like a great spiked piston, propelled by the unfathomable strength of Hedrenatherax’s left arm. The spear’s massive, barbed head struck the barghest in the center of its hairy chest, impaling the beast as it reached the terminus of its leap. The creature’s body weight and the momentum of its fall further hastened its transfixion, and it coughed and spluttered in rage and agony as it slid down Dreadskewer’s shaft. When the barghest reached the midway point of its descent along the spears 15-foot length, Hedrenatherax’s scythe-arm slashed out, removing the barghest’s head in a gout of black ichor.
Hedrenatherax held the decapitated barghest off the floor, still impaled by Dreadskewer, grinning as the corpse quaked violently in its death throes and loosed its bowels in a torrent of foulness upon the white stone of Yaghur Hod’s audience chamber before finally quieting to stillness. The archfiend then upended his weapon, and pushed the corpse off of Dreadskewer with one taloned foot, much like a man might scrape a bit of mud or a crushed insect from his boot.
The remaining barghests growled menacingly at Hedrenatherax, but none were foolish enough to follow their companion’s ultimately futile and very lethal example. The rest of the assembled fiends in the audience chamber grumbled and hissed, but many of them had taken a step back, or erected what magical defenses they could, lest Hedrenatherax turn his ire upon the entire room.
Yaghur Hod watched the barghest’s death unfold impassively, placing one slim, long-fingered hand on one of Dyzag’s forearms, restraining the massive fiend, who was quivering with rage, from leaping into battle with Hedrenatherax. The ultrodaemon’s form suddenly shifted and blurred, heralding a change in form and drawing Hedrenatherax’s attention away from the shattered corpse of the barghest at his feet.
“You dare spill blood without my leave?” Yaghur Hod asked, his words flowing from the elegant mouth of a slim, young human girl with raven-black hair, the form he had chosen for the moment. “I assure you, your words and actions here do not embolden me to aid you in your plight.”
“Aid me?” Hedrenatherax asked. “You never had any intention of aiding me in anything. I knew that the moment I walked into this room,” the massive demon said, returning Dreadskewer to its former position across his broad, scaled shoulders.
“Nonsense,” Yaghur Hod replied, although the wan smile that crossed his now human lips told the real truth. “We have mutual interests, you and I.”
“Nonsense,” Hedrenatherax repeated. “Then why can I not teleport away from this damnable place? And why have you assembled this pathetic mob of clingers-on to greet me?” The demon lord indicated Yaghur Hod’s court with a sweep of Dreadskewer.
“Why would you wish to leave before our “negotiations” have even commenced?” The girl-daemon asked, its lilting voice mock innocent. “None may leave Oin Drok without my leave. I assure you there is no skullduggery on my part. As for my court, they were eager to attend this momentous occasion, the cementing of an alliance between Hades and the Abyss.”
“Enough!” Hedrenatherax suddenly shouted, his voice careening about the audience chamber in a cacophonous roar. “Enough of your posturing, daemon! Tell me why I am here and what it is you want or gods help me I will bring this tower down upon your head!”
“Fair enough,” Yaghur Hod said, unmoved by Hedrenatherax’s outburst. “Tell him Gemnez.” The girl-daemon commanded, waving one delicate hand at the baatezu, who had, despite his immense bulk, stealthily slipped away from Hedrenatherax and stood behind the ranks of lesser fiends filling the room.
Hedrenatherax laughed mirthlessly. “Yes, fat one, tell me, who is the bigger fool? Me for believing your lies, or you for believing his?”
The great baatezu smiled, his gaudy lips painting a crimson smear of blood and teeth across his ghastly face. “Oh, I have no doubt that our esteemed host would betray me just as I have betrayed you, but one thing differs,” Gemnez said smoothly.
“And what, pray tell, is that, fat one?” Hedrenatherax returned casually.
“Why leverage, you brainless simpleton,” Gemnez replied. “We both have something Yaghur Hod wants, although you have made the colossal blunder of bringing that something with you today. I, on the other hand, have secreted the desired object in a place well-guarded with loyal, and powerful, allies.”
Hedrenatherax turned back to Yaghur Hod, who had again changed forms, appearing as a gray-robed man of advancing years. “It’s the spear, isn’t it?”
“Bravo, my dear demon,” Yaghur Hod said. “Yes, Dreadskewer is what I want.”
“Then come and take it, daemon. Come and take it, if you can,” Hedrenatherax said, taking Dreadskewer in an overhand grip, cocking the mighty weapon over his left shoulder.
“Ah, the brash predictability of the tanar’ri. So much easier to manipulate than the inscrutable madness of your Obyrith predecessors,” Yaghur Hod said, naming the ancient race of demons that had ruled the abyss long before the rise of sentient life on the Prime Material plane. “Hear me, my subjects,” the ultrodaemon shouted. “If any among your number can bring me this demon’s spear, he shall find great favor in my eyes, and be rewarded with the stewardship of this tower.”
A low rumble passed through the collected fiends in the audience chamber, and the air suddenly filled with a thick clamoring of spells and weapons being readied.
“Finally, we get down to business,” Hedrenatherax said as a wall of fiends advanced upon him from all directions. “Well, come on then, here I am, and here is your prize!”
The archfiend suddenly opened his mouth and spewed forth a great gout of steaming, green bile, splattering the first rank of advancing fiends, a group of ten insect-like mezzodaemons gripping cold iron tridents, with the noxious fluid. The caustic substance elicited a chorus of buzz-like screams, as it began to eat through the protective chitin and then the flesh of the lesser daemons.
The fiendish advance halted, unnerved by Hedrenatherax’s horrific attack and the terrible injuries inflicted on the mezzodaemons. The archfiend, however, was just getting started, and his lips, still dripping with caustic green bile, formed the syllables of a dire arcane spell. The air danced and twisted as Hedrenatherax’s spell smote reality with its terrible magic, creating a cloud of baleful black energy in the midst of the now uncertain group of fiends. The cloud roiled hideously, convulsing with vile energies, before taking on a foul material substance and twisting into a wild vortex of giant, disembodied teeth. The fiends in the immediate area were quickly snatched up and ground into paste beneath the gnashing onslaught of the toothy vortex. Others attempted to flee, but were sucked in by the vile winds of the spell, and dragged screaming to their doom.
When Hedrenatherax’s swirling whirlwind of destruction finally dissipated, all that was left of Yaghur Hod’s horde of fiends was the lone arcanodaemon, who had erected enough magical defenses to ward of the worst of the spell’s effects, and the four remaining barghests, cowed and mewling at the foot of their master’s dais. Gemnez, also unscathed, had simply moved further away from the carnage, his great, flabby body dripping with slimy sweat at the effort it had taken him to move so quickly.
The arcanodaemon, perhaps thinking it had weathered the worst Hedrenatherax had to offer, attempted to cast a spell of its own. The fox-headed fiend uttered the short, grating syllables of an attack spell, and Hedrenatherax was suddenly immolated in a column of green flame. The fire licked harmlessly against the demon lord’s scaly integument, unable to pierce his considerable resistance to heat, and eliciting a savage grin from the archfiend.
“Fire?” Hedrenatherax asked mockingly as the arcanodaemon’s attack sputtered and dissipated, having been absolutely ineffective. “And here I thought you arcanodaemons were smart.” The demon lord shortened his grip on Dreadskewer and hurled the massive spear at the arcanodaemon. The great spear hissed through the air, as if flung from a ballista, catching the arcanodaemon in the back as it turned to flee. Dreadskewer punched through the fox-headed fiend’s body with a spray of black, viscous blood without slowing, continuing its flight to strike the far wall of the chamber some thirty yards distant, burying its cold-iron head in the stone. It lingered there for a fraction of an instant, quivering like a great arrow, and then disappeared with a faint whiff of sulfur to appear again in Hedrenatherax’s gloved left hand.
The arcanodaemon, despite the rather large hole in its midsection, attempted to cast another spell, but managed to utter only a single, blood-flecked cough before collapsing in a ragged, furry heap on the cold stone of the audience chamber.
The death of the arcanodaemon left only the four barghests, which wanted no part of Hedrenatherax’s ire and were attempting to creep up Yaghur Hod’s dais, closer to their master and his hulking his bodyguard Dyzag. They were halted with a single cool glance from the great ultrodaemon. “Well?” Yaghur Hod asked. “There is your glory,” he said pointing to Hedrenatherax. “Go and take it.”
The barghests, with no other choice, slunk down the steps of the dais to face their doom. Hedrenatherax was waiting for them, grinning with feral delight at yet more creatures to slay. The barghests split into pairs when they reached the foot of the dais, attempting to come at the demon lord from two directions. Hedrenatherax let them move around him, still grinning, Dreadskewer perched over his left shoulder again.
The two barghests to Hedrenatherax’s suddenly dropped to all fours and called upon their natural shapechanging abilities. The fiends’ bodies writhed nastily, bones and muscle convulsed, joints popped and then were grindingly reconfigured for quadrupedal locomotion. Finally, two massive wolf-like creatures stood where the barghests had before, and baying like great hellish wolves, they surged forward. Hedrenatherax met the barghests’ charge with a sweeping strike of Dreadskewer’s shaft, striking one of the fiends flush on the side of its fanged skull and knocking it senseless to the ground. The demon lord followed this attack by swiveling his body to one side, letting the second barghest charge by, its jaws closing on empty air with a drool-splattering snap. Hedrenatherax brought his scythe-arm down in a vicious overhand chop as the barghest sprinted past, cleaving the creatures completely in twain just behind the thick muscles of its shoulders. The barghest came apart in a spray of blood, adding a slick of ropy entrails and black fiendish ichor to the already gore-soaked floor.
The second pair of barghests, noting their companions failed efforts, resorted to what natural magic they commanded, and suddenly grew to twice their normal size. Nearly the same size as their opponent, the two enlarged barghests moved in warily, careful of Hedrenatherax’s extended reach with Dreadskewer.
Hedrenatherax watched the two barghests circle him, holding Dreadskewer braced against one foot like a pikeman preparing for a cavalry charge. When they had flanked him, Hedrenatherax suddenly lurched forward, throwing his weight towards the barghest in front of him, causing it to recoil away from an expected thrust with Dreadskewer. Sensing an opening, the second barghest moved in, hoping to gain a tactical advantage while Hedrenatherax’s momentum carried him away from the attack. The demon lord felt the barghest behind him and grinned, knowing that the beast had fallen for his ruse. In response to the threat from behind, Hedrenatherax slammed his left arm backwards, the joint twisting in a manner that was wholly unnatural, propelling Dreadskewer’s iron butt cap with brutal force into the barghest’s bestial face. Bone crunched, and the beast fell over backwards, clutching the ruins of its face and howling in agony. In the flash of an instant, Hedrenatherax reversed the motion of his weapon, and pistoned his great arm forward, leaning his whole body into the strike to add nearly ten feet of reach to Dreadskewer’s fifteen-foot length. The barghest in front of the demon lord had moved a single step closer, preparing to aid its companion’s attack from the rear. This turned out to be a fatal mistake, as the mere ten feet it had moved, which it perceived to be well out of Hedrenatherax’s range, brought it just close enough for Dreadskewer’s razored tip to puncture it’s right eye socket, piercing the eye and the brain behind it. The barghest shuddered once as Hedrenatherax withdrew his weapon, and then collapsed to the ground.
Hedrenatherax silenced the cries of the downed barghest behind him with a casual thrust of Dreadskewer, while the barghest that had been felled with the spear’s shaft, was dispatched by the demon lord’s great calloused foot thundering down upon it skull, splattering bone fragments and brain matter in all directions.
“Well done,” Yaghur Hod said coolly, glancing around at the shattered ruins of his court.
Hedrenatherax shrugged. “I’ve had bowel movements that required more effort,” he said sarcastically, returning Dreadskewer to its place across his shoulders.
“Then you should find Dyzag here to be a most fulfilling challenge,” Yaghur Hod said, patting the great nycodaemon on his shoulder. “Bring me the spear, old friend.”
“Gladly,” Dyzag said, removing the four great axes from his weapon harness with a harsh clattering of enchanted steel. The massive nycodaemon then leaped from the dais, his elephantine bulk crashing down like the hammer of doom fifteen feet from the waiting Hedrenatherax.
In response to Dyzag’s movement, Hedrenatherax brought Dreadskewer into an overhand grip, cocked over his left shoulder, and held his scythe arm low, poised to deliver a brutal underhanded slash. The casual grace with which he had fought the barghests and the rest of Yaghur Hod’s lesser fiends, disappeared, replaced with the icy calm of a creature that had seen a thousand battles and had slain countless creatures, both mighty and insignificant.
“Are you ready to bleed, demon lord?” Dyzag asked, clashing all four of his axes together with an ear-shattering crash, and moving forward slowly, deliberately.
“As ready as you are, I suspect,” Hedrenatherax returned, moving to his left, circling away from the great nycodaemon to keep the advantage of Dreadskewer’s reach.
Gemnez, who had watched the slaughter of Yaghur Hod’s court from a safe distance, was grinning and rubbing his fat, eager hands together. He stood some fifty yards from Hedrenatherax and Dyzag as they slowly circled each other, wondering how such powerful creatures could be so easily manipulated.
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![:]](http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/devious.png "Devious :]")
Graywolf-ELM
Explorer
Well worth the wait. I look forward to the second half.
GW
GW
Rikandur Azebol
First Post
Splendid, just splendid. Go, go bad demon !
BD, would Obyriths show up somewhere in the future ?
And Gemmez is a fool thinking he have any advantage. Being him I would flee while fiends fight and continue "alliance" with Yagru trough letters alone. Sent trough intermediates conviced that they wrote it all on their own. Poor stupid frog devil.
BD, would Obyriths show up somewhere in the future ?
And Gemmez is a fool thinking he have any advantage. Being him I would flee while fiends fight and continue "alliance" with Yagru trough letters alone. Sent trough intermediates conviced that they wrote it all on their own. Poor stupid frog devil.
PallidPatience
First Post
Awesome work!
Oh, and I know this is a bit off topic, but have you had any thoughts about a polearm-focussed Master at Arms installment?
Oh, and I know this is a bit off topic, but have you had any thoughts about a polearm-focussed Master at Arms installment?
BLACKDIRGE
Adventurer
PallidPatience said:
Thanks.
You know, I had planned on doing Master at Arms installments for polearms, just not for awhile, but recently I have gotten a lot of feedback about the product, and a number of people have expressed interest in polearm prestige classess. So, I am going to push the polearms classes to the front of the production line, and you should see them in the next couple of months, after the classes that are already finished are released.
Thanks
BD.
BLACKDIRGE
Adventurer
Rikandur Azebol said:BD, would Obyriths show up somewhere in the future ?
Technically, they already have. Pazuzu is, in fact, an Obyrith.
BD
Need_A_Life
First Post
Would you believe I had to read this installment over mail?
It seems my school has blocked ENWorld, which means I can't access it using their connection, so it's only because I'm subsribed to the thread that I was able to read it (God bless Gmail!).
Though people did look at me strangely as I regularly make exclamations such as: "Awesome!", "ah, that's nasty!", "Another one bites the dust, it seems" and "Weee... Yugoloth!"
It seems my school has blocked ENWorld, which means I can't access it using their connection, so it's only because I'm subsribed to the thread that I was able to read it (God bless Gmail!).
Though people did look at me strangely as I regularly make exclamations such as: "Awesome!", "ah, that's nasty!", "Another one bites the dust, it seems" and "Weee... Yugoloth!"
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