Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Enchanted Trinkets Complete--a hardcover book containing over 500 magic items for your D&D games!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 1804763" data-attributes="member: 143">Chapter 241Dannel stood in the center of the ring of stones that circled the summit of the tor, watching as more orcs filtered in between the gaps in the looming boulders.  There were at least twenty now, and they drew courage from their numbers, for despite the death he’d already unleashed upon them, ultimately he was only one enemy.  And Dannel had no illusions about his fighting prowess, even with Alakast at hand and his defenses augmented with the lizardfolk form he’d borrowed with his alter self spell.  So he had to even the odds a bit. He reached up and grasped the necklace he’d worn since they’d found it in the hag lair in Vaprak’s Voice in the Demonskar, snapping one of the golden globes from its setting.  He hurled the tiny sphere at the largest group of orcs, six of them standing in a cluster around one of the openings in the boulder ring.  Even as the sphere exploded into a blazing fireball, incinerating all six orcs, he charged at the survivors nearest to the blast, laying about him with Alakast.  The orcs, caught off guard by the fireball and the suddenness of his assault, drew back.  A few thrust at him with their spears or swung their swords and axes at him, but his armor turned most of the blows, and the one blade that gashed across his exposed bicep failed to penetrate his thick new hide.  In turn that orc’s sword went flying a moment later as Alakast crushed its arm, snapping the bone, and even as another tried to attack him from behind the staff swept around in a deadly arc that collided powerfully with its head, knocking it off its feet.  Dannel had taken the initiative, but the remaining orcs were not craven goblins, to run screaming when confronted with a tough foe.  They still had numbers on him, and as they rushed at the darting and spinning elf, attacking from all directions, their attacks began to have an effect.  It took all of his effort just to keep them at bay, but even as he continued to land violent blows with Alakast, soon runnels of bright red blood decorated his arms and legs, and a spreading splotch appeared on his left shoulder, where a spearhead had torn through his defenses. And still more orcs trickled into the melee, as the creatures continued to press the flanks.  Not so far away at that same moment, Mole was finding her own situation growing equally grim.  She’d stuck that head shaman good earlier, and by the continued exclamations she heard from the below she figured he was finding the poison she’d swiped from that follower of “Wee Jas” in Occipitus to be most unpleasant.  But the orc commander had seen her, and now a half-dozen orcs were pursuing her.  Her arm hurt where another arrow had hit her... stupid dumb luck!  She muttered a curse she’d picked up from Hodge.  The arrow had been doubly unfortunate for her in that she’d been carrying her potion in that hand, and when hit she’d dropped it to shatter on the rocks at her feet.  So her holdout was gone, and her hiding place revealed.  Now she was running along the ridgeline at the summit of the cliffs, six orcs chasing her, and arrows still knifing past her from the other surviving archers back near the defile.  Luckily they were too far away to have much of a chance of hitting her, but as she’d already proven, luck was a fickle ally...Proven again as she leapt over a slight rise to reveal that the ridge came to an abrupt end just ahead, with nothing but a sheer fifty-foot drop to a rocky ground below.  She skittered to a halt, inches from the edge.  Her magical boots and nimbleness had allowed her to gain a lead over the pursuing orcs, but as they saw her suddenly stop they redoubled their efforts, clearly eager to do unpleasant things to her with those various weapons they carried. Great swords smashed stone and clattered against magical armor plate as a huge melee raged at the summit of the rocky slope.  Less than thirty seconds had passed since Zenna had called down the darkness, and yet each tick seemed an eternity in the chaos of the melee.  Hodge cried out as a ogre sword crunched into his side, and he fell back, nearly finished.  Zenna, standing just a few feet behind him, almost within the the ogre’s reach herself, calmly blasted the already wounded ogre with a second scorching ray, and it fell, its face charred and blackened.   And Arun.  Arun Goldenshield, Divine Champion of Moradin, stood his ground as two ogres laid into him with all of their considerable strength behind the blows.  He took hits, and narrowly dodged others, but throughout it he did not falter, and when his blade swept it brought Death.  The first ogre was already bleeding from a deep gash in its thigh, and as it lifted its sword to strike again Arun lunged in and sank three feet of blessed steel into its body, stabbing up through its gut into the vital organs above.  The ogre spat blood and crumpled, falling across the body of the first ogre he’d killed earlier.  The second ogre shouted a cry of frustration and disbelief and drove its sword down two-handed into the paladin’s back, hoping to somehow defeat this little creature that would just not die.  The ogre had killed armored men before, but somehow the metal plates held and the sword slid off, slamming into the ground with enough force to split the stone.  The paladin turned, and the ogre saw the promise of death in the dark eyes beneath that silvered helm.  Arun stepped forward and unleashed a full attack.Seconds later, the last ogre went down.  Zenna was quick to reach Hodge’s side, pouring healing energy into the stricken dwarf.  More shapes were materializing within the darkness, smaller forms, but many, many more.  Knowing that the orcs would be worse off in the light, she dismissed the spell and stood, looking down the slope. There had to be at least sixty orcs there, with a huge brute at their forefront, a giant of an orc with a massive axe with a head surrounded with flame.  The orcs did not charge forward; shielding their light-sensitive eyes from the last rays of the setting sun, they looked with dismay at the hacked and burned corpses of their mighty ogres, and the three foes that yet stood before them.  Four foes, as Clinger rose from the rocks behind them, a limp orc still dangling from his jaws. Arun stepped onto the pile of ogres he’d killed, standing on the top creature’s chest.  He was injured, but he channeled Moradin’s power into himself, and his sword did not tremble as he swept it over the gathered orcs, before it settled on their leader.  “If it is blood and destruction you seek, orcs, then you shall find it here!”Kavorek stepped forward.  He’d lost here today, he knew.  Even if his orcs could still prove victorious, the base of his power had been sundered, and the tribe had been decimated.  If that idiot Uk’bek survived—and his kind usually did—then his shamans would no doubt make arrangements that would see him quietly killed at some point when he wasn’t expecting it.  So he basically had two choices.  He could retreat, lose face, and depart this particular band of orcs, striking out to seek a new opportunity elsewhere.  He’d had to do that before, and while there were always risks involved, he was confident that he would survive and adapt. On the other hand, there was personal honor, and defeat of this foe.  The dwarves had to be injured, and that spellcasting woman had clearly used up some of her resources already.  And there were more of his orcs atop the tor behind them; he could hear the ongoing sounds of battle. Kavorek was an unusual creature, part orc, part ogre, gifted with an intelligence unusual among either race. But ultimately, he was what he was.  Lifting his axe, he roared a challenge, and charged. Behind him, his orcs came on in a wave.</blockquote>

Verification