NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 1755894" data-attributes="member: 143">It's rumble time!* * * * * Chapter 220The giant rounded the corner first.  Even though she knew what was coming, Zenna felt a stab of anxiety despite herself. This creature made the hill giants and ettins they’d faced earlier seem puny by comparison.  It was only—only!—about twelve feet tall, but by the way the corridor shook with its steps it had to weigh many thousands of pounds.  Unlike the ungainly forms of the hill giants its body was broad and powerful, and it wore actual armor, black steel half-plate that covered its body like a second skin.  It carried a huge sword half again as tall as she was, and its visage was fierce, its bright red hair flowing around its skull like a burning flame.  Even without a detect magic, Zenna could sense the power radiating from it, recognized the signs in the way it carried itself, the unnatural speed with which it moved toward them.  The warriors stepped forward to meet it, forming a line to block the corridor against its rush.  Zenna knew that her scorching ray would have no effect upon it, and she’d already conjured her wards and protections.  Dannel had her crossbow, and the elf snapped off a shot at the giant’s first appearance, the quarrel sticking almost pathetically in its arm, little more than a splinter.  The other missiles that struck it—a javelin, a hammer, another bolt from Mole—either bounced off its armor or grazed its skin, doing little in the way of real damage. And then there was no time for anything else, as it charged straight at them. Zenna glanced over at Kaurophon, not surprised to see that the sorcerer had taken shelter again in invisibility.  A good idea, she thought, but before she could cast the spell, the giant struck their line with a loud crash of clashing arms.  Hodge’s spear, set against its charge, stabbed through the plates covering its side, finally drawing blood, but the force of its rush knocked the dwarf backward roughly.  Zenna saw a pale nimbus flare about the giant, and immediately saw its movements slow slightly, and she knew that Kaurophon had kept his unspoken promise to slice away the spells that bolstered the giant’s power.  But the loss of its magical enhancements seemed not to hinder it in the least as it continued its charge.  Morgan stepped forward to bar its path, but the giant simply strode through the knight, his holy sword glancing harmlessly off one of the giant’s greaves as it knocked him prone with enough force to blast the air from his lungs.  And then, before she could react, he was right there, looming over her, his huge sword already beginning its inescapable downward path.  She could not even manage a scream as the sword clove through her, striking the ground with enough force to tear a huge gash in the soft stone.</blockquote>

Verification