Sagiro
Rodent of Uncertain Parentage
Quick answer to coyote6's question: yes, Kay's player has moved two hours' drive away, and just had a beautiful baby daughter. As such, her attendance will be sporadic at best for a while.
Sagiro’s Story Hour, Part 153
Saturday, July 28
Ernie wakes early and starts cooking. By the time the others wake, a savory breakfast awaits them, spread nicely on the table by Eddings. Conversation is clipped and businesslike, devoid of its typical irreverent humor. By mid-morning the dishes have been cleaned and the Company is sitting nervously in the living room, half-heartedly discussing what laboratory equipment they’ll still need for their impending projects. Skorg, having slept late, comes groggily down the steps, heads for the Icebox, and does a doubletake. He stares for a moment at the Company, sitting quietly around the living room table – fully armed, fully armored, festooned with wands and scroll cases and brimming quivers.
Skorg grunts and motions toward the Icebox. “Do you mind?” he asks of no one in particular. Eddings nods his head.
“Thanks!” Skorg says. “Black-lizard pie. A fresh one.”
As he reaches for the Icebox door, everyone jumps up at the sound of an explosion – from outside on the street! The Company rushes to the front windows and beholds the horrible sight of a smoking body in the middle of the road. It’s a woman dressed as a commoner who has barely survived a fireball, lying prone and moving her arm feebly. Ernie says some uncharacteristically bad words. Flicker states the obvious.
“He’s trying to draw us out.”
“He could be waiting right outside the door,” says Kibi.
“Flicker!” Dranko barks. “I’m going to heal her from here. When I’ve been casting for about four seconds, I want you to open the window. As soon as I’m done, close it again. Understand?”
“Got it.”
Dranko calls upon his limited Delioch-granted ability to cast healing spells at range, and casts a curative spell out the window at the woman. To his dismay, he feels the healing energies dissipate uselessly. The woman looks no better, though she still stirs.
“It didn’t work,” he frowns. “Maybe something blocked the spell. Or… she could be an illusion.”
“If it’s an illusion,” says Aravis, “it means he’s out there, somewhere, concentrating on it. Let’s go.”
Kibi casts improved invisibility on Dranko, which starts a brief flurry of buffing spells. Grey Wolf casts see invisibility and peers out the window, scanning the street and the air above. Aravis then grabs Dranko and dimension doors the two of them to a rooftop across the street. Both start looking around, but see no sign of the simulacrum. Kibi casts a second improved invisibility, this time on Morningstar, who uses a word of recall set to the street outside to leave the Greenhouse without opening the door. Finally Kibi casts see invisibility on himself before dimension dooring himself, Ernie and Grey Wolf out into the street. Flicker and Once Certain Step stay inside to safeguard the Greenhouse, while Edghar, Scree and Pewter all scan the streets from various windows.
Kibi, Ernie and Grey Wolf are greeted rudely by an empowered lightning bolt from somewhere above. When the smoke clears the three of them are suffering from horrific burns, and no one can find any sign of the attacking wizard. Ernie immediately heals Kibi, who took the worst of the blast, before curing his own wounds. Grey Wolf and Kibi, realizing that they should have done it earlier, make themselves invisible. Aravis casts fly on Dranko, who starts flying around the skies above the Greenhouse, straining his eyes and ears to detect the simulacrum. Aravis thinks he hears the sound of an invisible spellcaster, but so faintly that he can’t even discern the direction. Grey Wolf runs around to the back of the Greenhouse, communicating with Edghar and instructing his monkey familiar to lead Step to the back window. Once there, Grey Wolf gets healed by Step, reaching out the window to lay on hands. Step also gives him his wand of cure serious wounds to take to a cleric (after some fumbling, since Grey Wolf is still invisible).
All of the Company are looking around everywhere, frantically. Somewhere Dranko thinks he hears another spell being cast, but like Aravis he cannot pinpoint the location. Seconds later Morningstar, despite being invisible, is struck blind by a spell from P’s servant.
“I guess if he was going to blind someone,” Morningstar thinks, “I’m glad he picked me. But still…”
Realizing that extraordinary measures might be needed to spot their attacker, Aravis sits down on his rooftop and enters the Crosser’s Maze. His mind slides back into its vast depths and he begins to focus inward and downward toward the Greenhouse. The others continue to spread and search, but it seems hopeless. The next sign of the simulacrum is when a growling Fiendish dire bear appears a block to the west, roars, and charges. Before it can reach the Company (Morningstar most specifically), Kibi casts wall of force, effectively containing it within a transparent enclosure with 10’ high walls. The bear scrabbles at the hidden barrier and roars in frustration.
Ernie, realizing that a) even with their own spells they cannot see their enemy, and that b) their enemy can see the invisible members of the Company just fine, rummages in the bag of holding and withdraws the divination sink gem. Assuming it’s working as before, all divination spells for hundreds of feet should now be defunct. That leaves Ernie and Aravis as the only visible targets, and so it’s they who are caught in a ferocious empowered ice storm. Huge chunks of ice pummel them both, and Aravis’s consciousness is forced violently out of the Maze by the pounding to his body. Oof! Morningstar, realizing that (blind-fighting notwithstanding) she needs to see what was going on, casts heal on herself, and her vision is instantly restored.
Grey Wolf sees that the Fiendish dire bear is trying to climb the wall of force, and summons a celestial badger above the bear to distract it. But the bear makes short and gruesome work of the small creature and continues to work toward its escape. Unable to get purchase on the frictionless force wall, it takes a small running start and leaps. Whoomf! It fails spectacularly, getting only the front half of its body over, and catching the very middle of its fiery abdomen on the top of the wall. It ends up balanced there, comically, all four paws scrabbling but unable to reach the ground. It roars again, in rage, embarrassment or both. Kibi takes the opportunity to fire magic missiles at the bear, but they are reflected harmlessly away by the target’s spell resistance.
Dranko, realizing that Ernie and Aravis are still easy prey for the simulacrum, casts obscuring mist above them, shielding them from sight. And then Kibi has a splendid idea. He summons a Fiendish dire bat, up in the air and as far away from the bear as possible. A bat should be able to spot something invisible just fine! Alas, the bat appears, and immediately swoops back down toward the dire bear, that being the closest enemy it can discern. Morningstar, eyes back to normal, sees this and figures out what to do next. She summons another pair of dire bats, and as they go to harass the bear, she follows it up with a Rary’s Telepathic Bond. Over the mind link she instructs them to ignore the bear and look for the flying wizard. Oh, and tell that third bat to leave the bear alone and join you.
The bats fly around for a few seconds, and suddenly take off in a deliberate upward climb. A ha! Dranko immediately starts to fly after them. Aravis casts levitate on himself and starts to rise through the mist, while Grey Wolf casts fly on Ernie and Morningstar casts air walk. Ernie and Morningstar fly over to join the ascending Aravis while the bats continue to chase their invisible prey.
Magic missiles appear from nowhere and slam into the foremost bat. In a red flash it vanishes, but the other two continue undaunted. At Morningstar’s telepathic command the bats are relaying how far away they are (measured in bat-wing lengths) from their enemy. She relays this to Ernie, who casts invisibility purge on himself before reaching out to hold on to her and Aravis.
“Eight wingspans, and a bit to the left… now higher up by three spans… he’s banking left… okay, now he’s 10 spans, directly ahead of them…”
Ernie activates his ring of dimension door, taking himself, Morningstar and Aravis up into the sky, as close as he can get to where the bats are telling Morningstar their target is. They reappear high above the wooden city of Tal Hae…and there is Parthol’s double, revealed by the nearby invisibility purge!.
To his great delight, Dranko sees that he himself is not with range of Ernie’s spell. Invisible, he fires off a searing light as a sneak attack from range. The ray of white hot light goes right through the ice-and-snow body of the simulacrum, dissolving away the fake flesh where it hits. Morningstar follows it up by lobbing a massively damaging chill seed, which tears away chunks of the enemy wizard’s body. Somehow, Parthol’s servant is still alive, still flying, threatening to escape… until Kibi’s dire bat finally swoops in and plunges its fangs into the simulacrum’s head. In a white flash the adversary’s body melts away, sending droplets of harmlessly enchanted rain down to the rooftops below. The flying, levitating, and air-walking members of the Company can hardly believe the success of their coordinated attack, and are soon all grinning ear to ear.
It is amusing to think that, just perhaps, the droplets land upon the helpless dire bear, a final annoyance before it returns to its infernal home.
…to be continued…
Sagiro’s Story Hour, Part 153
Saturday, July 28
Ernie wakes early and starts cooking. By the time the others wake, a savory breakfast awaits them, spread nicely on the table by Eddings. Conversation is clipped and businesslike, devoid of its typical irreverent humor. By mid-morning the dishes have been cleaned and the Company is sitting nervously in the living room, half-heartedly discussing what laboratory equipment they’ll still need for their impending projects. Skorg, having slept late, comes groggily down the steps, heads for the Icebox, and does a doubletake. He stares for a moment at the Company, sitting quietly around the living room table – fully armed, fully armored, festooned with wands and scroll cases and brimming quivers.
Skorg grunts and motions toward the Icebox. “Do you mind?” he asks of no one in particular. Eddings nods his head.
“Thanks!” Skorg says. “Black-lizard pie. A fresh one.”
As he reaches for the Icebox door, everyone jumps up at the sound of an explosion – from outside on the street! The Company rushes to the front windows and beholds the horrible sight of a smoking body in the middle of the road. It’s a woman dressed as a commoner who has barely survived a fireball, lying prone and moving her arm feebly. Ernie says some uncharacteristically bad words. Flicker states the obvious.
“He’s trying to draw us out.”
“He could be waiting right outside the door,” says Kibi.
“Flicker!” Dranko barks. “I’m going to heal her from here. When I’ve been casting for about four seconds, I want you to open the window. As soon as I’m done, close it again. Understand?”
“Got it.”
Dranko calls upon his limited Delioch-granted ability to cast healing spells at range, and casts a curative spell out the window at the woman. To his dismay, he feels the healing energies dissipate uselessly. The woman looks no better, though she still stirs.
“It didn’t work,” he frowns. “Maybe something blocked the spell. Or… she could be an illusion.”
“If it’s an illusion,” says Aravis, “it means he’s out there, somewhere, concentrating on it. Let’s go.”
Kibi casts improved invisibility on Dranko, which starts a brief flurry of buffing spells. Grey Wolf casts see invisibility and peers out the window, scanning the street and the air above. Aravis then grabs Dranko and dimension doors the two of them to a rooftop across the street. Both start looking around, but see no sign of the simulacrum. Kibi casts a second improved invisibility, this time on Morningstar, who uses a word of recall set to the street outside to leave the Greenhouse without opening the door. Finally Kibi casts see invisibility on himself before dimension dooring himself, Ernie and Grey Wolf out into the street. Flicker and Once Certain Step stay inside to safeguard the Greenhouse, while Edghar, Scree and Pewter all scan the streets from various windows.
Kibi, Ernie and Grey Wolf are greeted rudely by an empowered lightning bolt from somewhere above. When the smoke clears the three of them are suffering from horrific burns, and no one can find any sign of the attacking wizard. Ernie immediately heals Kibi, who took the worst of the blast, before curing his own wounds. Grey Wolf and Kibi, realizing that they should have done it earlier, make themselves invisible. Aravis casts fly on Dranko, who starts flying around the skies above the Greenhouse, straining his eyes and ears to detect the simulacrum. Aravis thinks he hears the sound of an invisible spellcaster, but so faintly that he can’t even discern the direction. Grey Wolf runs around to the back of the Greenhouse, communicating with Edghar and instructing his monkey familiar to lead Step to the back window. Once there, Grey Wolf gets healed by Step, reaching out the window to lay on hands. Step also gives him his wand of cure serious wounds to take to a cleric (after some fumbling, since Grey Wolf is still invisible).
All of the Company are looking around everywhere, frantically. Somewhere Dranko thinks he hears another spell being cast, but like Aravis he cannot pinpoint the location. Seconds later Morningstar, despite being invisible, is struck blind by a spell from P’s servant.
“I guess if he was going to blind someone,” Morningstar thinks, “I’m glad he picked me. But still…”
Realizing that extraordinary measures might be needed to spot their attacker, Aravis sits down on his rooftop and enters the Crosser’s Maze. His mind slides back into its vast depths and he begins to focus inward and downward toward the Greenhouse. The others continue to spread and search, but it seems hopeless. The next sign of the simulacrum is when a growling Fiendish dire bear appears a block to the west, roars, and charges. Before it can reach the Company (Morningstar most specifically), Kibi casts wall of force, effectively containing it within a transparent enclosure with 10’ high walls. The bear scrabbles at the hidden barrier and roars in frustration.
Ernie, realizing that a) even with their own spells they cannot see their enemy, and that b) their enemy can see the invisible members of the Company just fine, rummages in the bag of holding and withdraws the divination sink gem. Assuming it’s working as before, all divination spells for hundreds of feet should now be defunct. That leaves Ernie and Aravis as the only visible targets, and so it’s they who are caught in a ferocious empowered ice storm. Huge chunks of ice pummel them both, and Aravis’s consciousness is forced violently out of the Maze by the pounding to his body. Oof! Morningstar, realizing that (blind-fighting notwithstanding) she needs to see what was going on, casts heal on herself, and her vision is instantly restored.
Grey Wolf sees that the Fiendish dire bear is trying to climb the wall of force, and summons a celestial badger above the bear to distract it. But the bear makes short and gruesome work of the small creature and continues to work toward its escape. Unable to get purchase on the frictionless force wall, it takes a small running start and leaps. Whoomf! It fails spectacularly, getting only the front half of its body over, and catching the very middle of its fiery abdomen on the top of the wall. It ends up balanced there, comically, all four paws scrabbling but unable to reach the ground. It roars again, in rage, embarrassment or both. Kibi takes the opportunity to fire magic missiles at the bear, but they are reflected harmlessly away by the target’s spell resistance.
Dranko, realizing that Ernie and Aravis are still easy prey for the simulacrum, casts obscuring mist above them, shielding them from sight. And then Kibi has a splendid idea. He summons a Fiendish dire bat, up in the air and as far away from the bear as possible. A bat should be able to spot something invisible just fine! Alas, the bat appears, and immediately swoops back down toward the dire bear, that being the closest enemy it can discern. Morningstar, eyes back to normal, sees this and figures out what to do next. She summons another pair of dire bats, and as they go to harass the bear, she follows it up with a Rary’s Telepathic Bond. Over the mind link she instructs them to ignore the bear and look for the flying wizard. Oh, and tell that third bat to leave the bear alone and join you.
The bats fly around for a few seconds, and suddenly take off in a deliberate upward climb. A ha! Dranko immediately starts to fly after them. Aravis casts levitate on himself and starts to rise through the mist, while Grey Wolf casts fly on Ernie and Morningstar casts air walk. Ernie and Morningstar fly over to join the ascending Aravis while the bats continue to chase their invisible prey.
Magic missiles appear from nowhere and slam into the foremost bat. In a red flash it vanishes, but the other two continue undaunted. At Morningstar’s telepathic command the bats are relaying how far away they are (measured in bat-wing lengths) from their enemy. She relays this to Ernie, who casts invisibility purge on himself before reaching out to hold on to her and Aravis.
“Eight wingspans, and a bit to the left… now higher up by three spans… he’s banking left… okay, now he’s 10 spans, directly ahead of them…”
Ernie activates his ring of dimension door, taking himself, Morningstar and Aravis up into the sky, as close as he can get to where the bats are telling Morningstar their target is. They reappear high above the wooden city of Tal Hae…and there is Parthol’s double, revealed by the nearby invisibility purge!.
To his great delight, Dranko sees that he himself is not with range of Ernie’s spell. Invisible, he fires off a searing light as a sneak attack from range. The ray of white hot light goes right through the ice-and-snow body of the simulacrum, dissolving away the fake flesh where it hits. Morningstar follows it up by lobbing a massively damaging chill seed, which tears away chunks of the enemy wizard’s body. Somehow, Parthol’s servant is still alive, still flying, threatening to escape… until Kibi’s dire bat finally swoops in and plunges its fangs into the simulacrum’s head. In a white flash the adversary’s body melts away, sending droplets of harmlessly enchanted rain down to the rooftops below. The flying, levitating, and air-walking members of the Company can hardly believe the success of their coordinated attack, and are soon all grinning ear to ear.
It is amusing to think that, just perhaps, the droplets land upon the helpless dire bear, a final annoyance before it returns to its infernal home.
…to be continued…
