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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 2459125" data-attributes="member: 143">Chapter 433“Dana, we don’t know that for certain,” Cal said.  “We’ll take him back with us, we can try again when we return to the Prime…”He trailed off as she saw that she wasn’t listening; she’d turned her attention toward the two doors in the far wall, an odd look of concentration on her face.“There is one more matter that we must deal with, ere we depart,” Beorna said. Lok nodded.  “Adimarchus.”“Whoever or whatever still wards this place, it no doubt knows we’re here, and is prepared for our coming,” Dannel said.  “We must be cautious,” Arun said.  “Whatever happens, we do not wish to facilitate the imprisoned godling’s release from his bonds.”“I thought we were here to destroy him?” Beorna asked. “It may come to that… but at the moment we do not know if such a thing is even possible,” Dannel said. “If he is bound, his powers may be weakened,” Lok said.  “Cal, what say you?”But the gnome was turned away.  While the others talked, Dana had started toward the left door.  “What is it, Dana?” Cal asked her. “Benzan’s ring… the focus for my locate object spell… it is beyond that door.”“Careful,” the gnome said.  He and the others moved quickly into ready positions near the door.  Dana barely waited for them to prepare before she reached out and pulled the heavy door open.  The chamber beyond was square and almost thirty feet across, but it seemed much smaller due to the utter blackness that filled it, seeming to resist the light shed by their magical items like some living thing.  But nothing stirred in the room, which was dominated by three tables fashioned out of some sort of black resin, glistening as the illumination finally reached it.  The tables had been crafted to resemble great mushrooms with their tops flattened.  Laid out upon those surfaces were an assortment of grim artifacts, including black-bound grimoires, scrolls manufactured from flayed skin, vials and jars of rare powders and condensates, and other objects of indeterminable use and function.  The most dominating item was an intricately fashioned pair of metal claws.  The sculpture, set on the nearest table facing the door, had been arranged so that one of the claws clutched a dull metal bottle, while the second had its long nails dug into the bottle’s stopper.  Behind the tables they could just make out what looked like an iron chest, close against the far wall.  The entire place was infused with a subtle odor; not the familiar and ferocious stink of demodands, but a charnel smell that was reminiscent of graveyards and decay. They all paled as they looked into the room’s interior, but Cal was especially grim.  “The magical auras in this place,” he breathed.  “Gods, the level of power… it makes my own spells seem cantrips in comparison…”“There is evil present as well,” Arun agreed.Dana had been looking for one thing, and as she saw it—a familiar ring, left almost casually on one of the tables—she stepped forward into the room. And as she did, the metal hands shifted, drawing the stopper from the iron bottle atop the near table.  Almost immediately a gout of green smoke was disgorged from within the container, swirling and growing rapidly into a substantial being.  “An iron flask!” Cal exclaimed, too late. It took only a few seconds for the prisoner of the flask to appear in full form.  It was huge, looming over them, its head nearly brushing the ceiling fifteen feet above.  Its body was lean and skeletal, with ugly green flesh clinging to its bones.  Its ribs formed a cage around an empty hollow in the center of its body, a hollow that was occupied by a small, terrible remnant of a being, trapped within the prison of the monster’s body.  That figure opened its mouth in a silent scream, mockingly echoed by the gaping jaws of the devourer as it eagerly regarded the living foes that had released it with a hungry look burning in the twin pinpoints of life deep within the sockets of its skull.</blockquote>

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