Session #66 (part ii)
Round and down they went. Ratchis and Kazrack took the lead while Gunthar took the rear. They risked torches being fairly certain they had left orcs far behind. The clickity-clack sound started and stopped several times, but every time it started again it seemed louder and closer, though once the sound seem to be answered by one further away. It echoed up from below bouncing on the curves walls of the tunnel spiral.
They had gone around about seven or eight times, when the tunnel widened about thirty feet ahead, opening in a cavernous chamber beyond that was devoured by darkness.
Around the corner came a hulking humanoid figure. Kazrack and Ratchis could see it immediately. It was nearly nine feet tall, and had a chitinous insect-like exo-skeleton that vibrated making the clacking noise they had heard before. It had a spindly neck protected by raised areas of the plates that covered it chest and shoulders, atop of which was a drawn and harrowed bird-like head with a cruel-looking curved bony beak. It had no wings, and its two muscled arms ended in bony hooks .
It came slowly towards then, clicking and clacking.
“Whu isha ‘ul uish ‘at!?” Kazrack exclaimed. It came into the light and Gunthar drew his swords, and moved up to support the dwarf and the half-orc. They could now all see the yellowed curved hooks and the pale translucent quality of the armor plates.
Ratchis did not hesitate. Sword in hand he ran right at the thing, ducking one of its horrific hooks, and cracking the shell over its chest. The tone of its click and clacking become lower and was muted, as pink and yellow ichor dribbled from the crack.
It swayed off balance and reached down awkwardly to hook Ratchis, but the half-orc duck and the hooked horror toppled over, ichor pooling beneath it. (1)
Unfortunately, Ratchis backed off right into another of the monsters that appeared from the right. He took a glancing blow to the head, but Kazrack was there to distract the thing, smashing it with his flail. It clicked and clacked angrily, as Ratchis was able to spin into a defensive fighting stance and deliver a blow to one of its muscular legs with his sword. The creatures seemed less armored there.
Martin and Dorn began to load their crossbows, while Gunthar and Bones moved to support the dwarf and half-orc, but it was for naught, as a second resounding blow from Kazrack and the second hooked horror fell. It twitched for half a moment.
“Wow! These friggin’ bug things look worse than the actually are,” Gunthar said, too loudly, kicking at head of one of the dying monsters.
“Hush!” Ratchis chastised. The echo of more clicking and clacking called to them from the darkness of the great chamber.
Ratchis gestured for the others to wait, while he snuck out into the great dark cavern. He could see that it went off behind were the corkscrew tunnel let out way beyond what he could see. From this vantage point, he could see that the curling tunnel was within a huge tapering of earth and stone that touched the ceiling forty-five feet above the cavern floor. Obviously, the mound was in the top left corner of a cavern that he could only compare in size to that on the lowest level of the Necropolis of Doom. (2) Though, unlike that cavern, this one’s ceiling was supported by scattered columns and fused stalactites and stalagmites. He could see the walls of the cavern before him and to the right. While they looked like treacherous climbs, he could tell there were many jagged nooks and outcroppings that would make for good hiding spots.
The wall directly across the opening from the mound had opening about fifteen feet off the cavern floor, accessible by a crude stone ramp. It was a little more than ten feet wide and close to fifteen feet high.
Ratchis hurried back and explained what he had seen. “We should go up the ramp. I don’t want to spend to much time in that big cavern, too easy that we’d be ambushed by something and as far as we know we can be very far from another exit.”
The others agreed, though some grudgingly, but before continuing Ratchis beseeched Nephthys for Bull’s Strength for himself and for Kazrack.
They made their way across the cavern, marching close two by two and keeping alert as the clicking and clacking echoed around them. The light of Gunthar’s lantern threw crazy shadows all around them, especially against the towering columns.
Just as Ratchis and Kazrack, who were both in front reached the bottom of the ramp, they could see another hulking hooked horror appear at the opening at the top. There was at least two more behind it, trying to push their way down.
The monster in front ran down and swung its long arms at Kazrack, but the dwarf knocked the bony hook away and retaliated with two mighty blows of his own. Cracks cascaded up the thing’s exo-skeletal plates.
The thing lurched away from Kazrack and swung both claws at the bigger target, while pecking with its treacherous beak. Ratchis easily avoided all the blows, but landed a few of his own. Kazrack slammed it again and it fell.
However, one of the other hooked horrors had leapt down about halfway down the ramp and had made its way around and clawing at Flora, who took slight blow to the head. Ratchis leapt over to here and with two mighty blows the hooked thing drop to the cavern floor dead.
“Huh?” In the rear guard, Gunthar spun around and raised his lantern in time to see two more of the monsters charging out of the darkness from their right. “There’s more bugs back here! I friggin’ hate bugs!”
He put down the lantern and drew his short sword to accompany his other blade.
Flora, Dorn, Bones and Martin all got their missile weapons ready, as two more hooked horrors appeared at the opening and hurried down, as Kazrack and Ratchis positioned themselves to block their path. Again one came barreling down at Kazrack, as bolts and arrows bounced off it, a few finding tender spots between plates. The dwarf ducked and spun around out the way to his left, but did not see that the second horror had used the other as a screen and had come down unseen. Kazrack grunted as his armor did little to dull the blow. Kazrack swung his flail furiously, sending bony chips flying. Ratchis took up the spot Kazrack had been in and went head to head with the first hooked horror, grunting with each satisfying crunching blow of his long sword into the thing.
Gunthar did his best from keeping the two hooked horrors that approached from the rear, but one distracted him with a fierce blow to the chest, while the other batted the curved end of its hook across Martin’s chin.
“Isis help me!” the watch-mage cried and withdrew, fumbling to reload his crossbow.
Flora turned and fired an arrow into a weak point near its groin, to keep it from persuing.
Gunthar put himself between the two hulking monstrosities and flicked his swords in both directions trying to draw them off from the others.
”By Horus’ huge swollen hawk-headed c*ck! U could use some help over here!” he said, as the two hooked horrors spun and flanked him. His arms stung as he parried the blows and he felt himself go numb for a second and he collapsed to the ground.
Ratchis also felt the weight of a blow that drove him down onto his rear, but he sprung back up and cracked the thing’s chest shell and it fell backward, and tumbled off the ramp.
The hooked horror that had attacked Martin now saw Dorn open and swung wildly at the brown-haired warrior. He withdrew and fired at it point blank, but the bolt shattered harmlessly against its chest. Flora and Martin’s missiles reacted similarly.
“Fuhwuh meh!” Kazrack cried, crushing the skull of the falling hooked horror before him and charging up the ramp. “Wuh uh fuh muh comin’ ish aeh!”
Ratchis sighed, and turned away from the ramp charging at the one lumbering towards Dorn and the others. It swung out, catching him across the table, cleaving into its hip. It let out a long trill of clicks.
Gunthar scrambled to his feet and spun as the hooked horror hovered over him, about to come down with all three of its attacks. Instead, it stumbled and its right foot rolled. Gunthar hopped back, and the hooked horror hobbled after him, leaving itself open to a cruel blow from his long sword across the face.
It reared and came down on him again, and against he slashed across its face with the long sword and this time followed it with a jab from his short sword. It fell over.
Gunthar slipped away his short sword an scooped up the lantern.
Ratchis suffered cuts to his face from the hooked horror’s blows, but managed to slam it backward into the on-coming Kazrack, who had charged back down the ramp when he saw that no one had followed him. It slammed him as it fell to his blows.
More were now coming down the ramp, even as more emerged from the darkness beyond the mound behind them.
Gunthar walked over to Bones and put the lantern down by him.
”Carry this, snotling!” Gunthar said and kicked the halfling in the rear, knocking him down. Bones spun and around and tried to punch Gunthar in the groin, but he had already moved on to meet the approached hooked horrors.
Two came rushing at him, clicking madly as bolts flew from both Dorn and Martin. Ratchis stepped up to form a line, but one of the hooked horrors went around clawing at Bones. The halfing let an arrow loose straight into its head, but it did not slow. The other clawed at Ratchis, but met the flat of his blade instead, and was driven back by a thrust into a space between plates that spurted the pinkish ichor. Kazrack slammed it as well.
One of the hooked horrors coming down the ram leapt a Bones, who barely got off the way and then scurried away from the melee. The first hooked horror seemed obsessed with the halfling and clawed after him, sending the halfling flying to the cold cavern floor.
Dorn shot it with his crossbow.
Kazrack turned to the monsters that had come down the ramp while Gunthar and Ratchis beat the one between then down, cracking its plates and smashing one of its legs clear in half. The dwarf spun with all his might and knocked one on its side, bashing a huge ichor-oozing scrap in its thigh, and crushed its skull with a follow up blow.
Martin picked up the lantern and moved clear of the fight, closing ranks with Dorn. Bones scrambled to his feet and ran behind Dorn as the warrior provided cover. The hooked horror came running at Dorn as if still determined to get at the halfling behind him. Dorn cried out as the heavy hook clubbed him on the side of the head, knocking him from his feet.
Gunthar spun around and charged at the last hook horror to come down the ramp. He ducked the wide swinging hook and slammed the pommel of his sword between the thing’s legs and then thrusting upward to strike it under the beak. He fought in close to avoid the hooks.
He shoved his short sword into the gaping wound and thrust with all his might, moving it around, as Ratchis grunted with satisfaction as he cut down the hooked horror attacking Dorn.
The last hook horror fell.
“Do you think perhaps that more and more of these things keep coming from that opening might mean we shouldn’t go that way?’ Martin inquired, sarcastically.
“Duh yah think dish lids tuh air lur?” Kazrack asked eagerly.
“Whatever. Who cares? Let’s go kill all of them,” Gunthar nodded.
“Fer once Uh agruh,” Kazrack replied. He combed the drool from his beard with his fingers.
End of Session #66
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Notes:
(1) DM’s Note: Ratchis scored a critical hit on his charge, dropping the hook horror to zero hit point with one shot. By attacking while disabled, the monster dropped to negative hit points.
(2) See Session #45
![:]](http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/devious.png "Devious :]")
