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Message: <blockquote data-quote="ThirdWizard" data-source="post: 6231684" data-attributes="member: 12037">On the top of the tower the cultists stood in a long circle around the sides, the smoke from multiple bright red fires rising into the open sky above. They chanted, low and steady, their voices as one with no discernable difference in cadence between any two members. They wore gray cloaks, hoods pushed back to expose shaved and tattooed heads. At their sides were curved daggers, but they stood with their eyes closed and their arms extended in front of them, their hands closed in fists. Their eyes were closed and they sweated despite the cold dry air around them, the sun beginning to set in the far distance.Their leader stood in the center, near a stone slab that looked to have been built into the stone of the tower itself. Dark red blood stained its surface despite the stone’s long exposure to the elements, the remains of long forgotten sacrifices. Now chained to the stone was an elf, shackled and unmoving. His eyes were open, staring into the sky. He was not pleading nor crying, only lying quietly. Patiently.On the far side of the scene there stood four, unmoving, human skeletons. Each wore no armor but carried swords. They could have been museum pieces, save for the pinpoint of red in their otherwise black eye sockets. They stood at attention, as if they were soldiers standing at their posts, living their lives despite their lives no longer existing.This is the scene Nohnee came to find at the top of the tower, peeking out of an overhead hatch she had found on the top floor of the tower. This is what she came for, to stop the ritual that the cultists would be performing. Squinting, she could see some kind of force connecting the cult leader to the skeletons. It looked like the waves of heat given off by a fire, the distortion making everything on the other side of a fire look wavy as if through the ripples in a pond. That same look carried from the cult leader to the skeletons. It had to be important. They were his guardians, but they relied on him, too. Stop him, and she might just stop the skeletons as well. She decided the leader would be the focal point. Stop the cult leader, stop the skeletons, stop the sacrifice, and stop the ritual. As far as plans went, it was easy in its simplicity if not in execution. Slowly and quietly she readied her bow, drawing an arrow to fire on the cult leader. The others waited behind her, anticipation building, to burst out as soon as that first shot was fired. Malrock gripped his two handed sword, his knuckles turning white. Pup lowered his head, the hair on the back of his neck standing up.Nohnee took a deep breath, held it, then burst upward, bow ready, and loosed her arrow. She caught the group completely unprepared, the cult leader unable to react to the unexpected ambush in their own tower. The arrow caught him in the forehead, almost slicing through his brain, blood spurting out of the wound. The man grabbed at the gash, blood pouring over his eyes.The chanting stopped.“We are under siege by outsiders, enemies of the Gates! KILL THEM!”The cultists’ eyes widened. Only three went clumsily for their daggers, the others looking wildly about and moving in a mass away from the combatants now emerging from the tower below. A murmur went over the previously unified group, the conformity of the previous chanting giving way to a mass of solitary individuals pushing their way through each other in fear of combat except for the few who, despite the fear on their faces, stood their ground with daggers in hand.The scene the cultists were making was in stark contrast to that of the skeletal soldiers. Their heads snapped back, the pinpoints of glowing red in the eye sockets converging on the enemies now standing before them. As one, they lifted their swords and began a marching advance on the attackers at the command of their master, who himself was unable to do anything himself at the moment.The top of the tower was a mad house, and Nohnee had to change positions to get a good shot at the cult leader again. With the advancing skeletons, their movements directed toward her, she knew they would be on her any second now. For now she still had a clear shot. She took it, grazing the cult leader, but not dropping him. She cursed, pulling another arrow, but by this time the skeletons had quickened their march and were almost directly on top of her. Behind her she could see Malrock had moved to intercept the cultists and was making short work of them. Not short enough, however, and she tried to get away from the skeletons, which were much faster than she had anticipated.As they descended upon her, she tried to find some escape route, but the mass of fleeing cultists with nowhere to go were forming a human blockade, even if they didn’t realize they were doing so. Dodging a swing from a skeletal soldier, she lost her balance, and another swing came down aimed directly at her neck. Throwing herself to the side, she managed to move out of the way, but she lost her balance and fell to the ground, the skeletons forming a circle around her to keep her from escaping.As they closed in on her, Pup came to her rescue, jumping in beside her and snapping at them to keep them back. Gripping her bow, she tried to get out from the middle of the group. If only she could drop the leader, the one controlling them, then the skeletons might be defeated that way. She rolled left, trying to regain her feet, but found the skeletons too fast. Two were on top of her. Before they landed their blow, however, Pup intercepted the attacks, jumping in and grabbing one of the attackers by the arm. Nohnee was able to slide out with the momentary distraction, but Pup took a mean blow from the other skeleton, and the four converged on her wolf.Pup valiantly fought back, snapping, circling, and moving, but he was surrounded. One blow would finish off her beloved companion. Looking back, Malrock finished off the last cultist who was fighting back, but he was blocked from her by the cultists, who now were staring to sit and lay down. “We surrender!” “Please don’t kill us!” they were calling out. Nohnee sneered in disgust at these people. She would handle them later.The prostrate cultists now meant she had a clearer shot at the cult leader, who by now was beginning to regain his composure. He held the blood back from his eyes and looked at her through the circle of skeletons, a scowl on his face, an expression of pure hate. Nohnee moved left to get a clearer shot and fired her bow as the skeletons made their final moves toward Pup.The arrow pierced the leader’s chest. His last expression did not change. There was no remorse. No surprise. No sadness. Only hate. He fell forward, grasping the arrow buried in him, but his eyes never left hers until his face was planted on the ground, his eyes now dead and looking at nothing. The shimmering leading from him to the skeletons ceased and they collapsed around Pup, the wolf growling and pawing at the piles of human bones now surrounding him.With their leader dead, if the cultists were going to offer any kind of struggle they did not now. Malrock proceeded to tie them with rope in a long line. Nohnee approached the elf on the stone slab and freed him from the manacles holding him tight.“Easy… we’ll take you back to your village.”The elf said nothing. He merely smiled and cried.[sblock]This was an awesome combat. There were several failed rolls and success but… rolls, so even though the combat itself didn’t last long it was very tense.The encounter started off with Nohnee attempting to see if there was anything she could use to her advantage in the scene. This was a Discern Realities roll which she only got one question for. That question was “What here is useful or valuable to me?” Before that I hadn’t really considered the question, but I thought for a moment, and I realized the skeletons were fairly strong for her to take on by herself, so I added the stipulation that they were being controlled by the leader. I decided to let her know that if she killed him, then they would lose their tenuous grip on the magic animating them.When the combat actually started, her opening move was to try and go for a head shot on the cult leader. This was the second time, I think, she tried to do a Called Shot. This time it worked with a 7-9 result. She didn’t do damage but she stunned the cult leader for a little while. A little while was all she ended up needed, and he remained stunned through the entire combat, short as it was. That was a huge help, as he was a spell caster and would have been a ranged foil against her.Finally, she kept getting success but… (7-9) and failure (6-) rolls when she tried to get away from the skeletons to get a clear shot at the cult leader. So, they were buying time for the cult leader to recover and I put Pup into danger to keep things moving along. On the 6- I decided dealing damage would be too nice. Instead I gave her a worse outcome. She got out from being surrounded by the skeletons, but Pup was trapped. And they were going to kill him. If she had not dropped the cult leader right then and there, Pup would have been killed or maimed. Like I said, very tense!Luckily she rolled well (finally!) and dropped the leader, making the skeletons fall to the ground, the magic that animated them being linked through the cult leader to them.[/sblock]</blockquote>

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