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!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 2816886" data-attributes="member: 143">Thanks! Glad I could be of service.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> * * * * * Chapter 588A flood of demons appeared around the bend, rolling and charging and crashing forward in a disorganized but overwhelming surge.  They were vicious, alien things.  Foremost among them were dozens of bulbous orbs about six feet across, with stubby legs and four thick arms, and huge jaws that literally erupted jagged teeth.  Sleek, nimble demons that vagely resembled emaciated apes—a semblance that instantly vanished when one got close enough to see their ugly hairless bodies or the heads that sprouted a snapping maw that ran from the top of their foreheads to the tips of their snouts.  And within the dense center of the horde, huge hyena-like things the size of ponies, with greasy, matted brown fur broken by random black spikes, and a long tail that lifted high over their bodies, culminating in a nasty hooked stinger. The abyssal creatures filled the tunnel, crowding together in a chaotic mass that actually hindered their advance.  A number of the creatures stumbled and were instantly overrun by the horde, the demons idly trampling their brethren in their lust for blood and violence.  The screams of the creatures redoubled as they spotted foes ahead, filling the chamber with an echoing roar that was enough to cause pain to the defending companions. The warriors, however, were calm as they set their shields and weapons, established their stances, and met the onrushing horde.  A terrible sound erupted as the front line hit, trying to simply overwhelm the defenders—and failing.  The line held, and demons died as the warriors unleashed counterattacks with their deadly weapons.  Arun and Lok, at the center of the line, held demons back with their shields held high even as they hewed and smashed below at the bodies behind the grabbing claws, the snapping teeth.  The abyssal maws tried to seize limbs with their huge jaws, but none of them were able to get a grip on the armored bodies of the defenders in that initial surge.But the demonic mass continued to press forward even as their van was obliterated.  Demons piled atop their slain fellows, and others piled atop them, so that in a few cases the defenders faced attacks at their legs from below, and at their heads and arms from a second demon stacked above.  This hindered the demons greatly, but they seemed not to care, simply focusing on the attack.  The second rank of defenders unleashed their own attacks into the mass.  Arrows from Callendes and Dannel sliced past the warriors and plunged deep into the bodies of demons.  Umbar thrust Alakast over Arun’s shoulder, toppling an abyssal maw that was trying to leap over its fellows and come down upon the paladin.  The Voice invoked a prayer that fortified them, while sapping the will of their foes.  Cal spotted an abyssal stalker crawling up over the wall, poised to leap, and hit it with a ray of exhaustion from a wand that caused it to stagger and drop back into the second rank, knocking down an abyssal maw as it fell. A wall of fallen demons built up in front of the defenders, as more of the creatures leapt into the carnage.  Beorna on the left and Avellos on the right swept deadly arcs with their weapons, holding the surge at bay for the moment.  One of the maws had gotten a grip on the hound archon’s leg, tearing with its teeth, opening a vicious wound and threatening to bring down the celestial.  But the Voice struck, driving its insubstantial sword through the body of the fiend, giving Avellos a chance to break free and regain his position as two more maws trampled the still-struggling body of their kin in an effort to get to the enemy.  Their efforts only tangled them up with each other, leaving them open to blows from Avellos’s axe, but neither was willing to withdraw, instead offering ineffective bites that the hound easily avoided. In the center, Arun and Lok now had to focus most of their efforts upward, although they had to be careful of the occasional grabbing claw from the bottom of the mass of dying fiends in front of them.  At least a dozen demons were now bleeding out their last upon the stone, their blood forming a slippery trail that ran down the slope of the corridor, staining the boots of the companions, splashing on their legs as they moved.  Still the creatures came on, and still they died.  The warriors hewed at the fiends almost mechanically, holding nothing back even as they dug deep into their reserves of strength and endurance.  “Look out!” came a warning from someone, and both Lok and Arun shifted their shields slightly to look up at the demonic wall. The heap of abyssal maws rose almost up to the tunnel roof now, as the creatures piled atop the bodies of their kin both dead and living alike.  Behind that line, the tunnel was packed with struggling demons, with the weakest or unluckiest crushed by the weight of their fellows.  A few maws at the bottom of the pile apparently decided to eat their way out, and angry cries of pain emerged form the press, accompanied by the occasional spray of black demonic blood. But the warning was directed at the center of the crowd, where a phalanx of fiends larger than the rest were pushing through.  Even as Lok and Arun tensed, a quartet of abyssal ravagers leapt from the pack, piling hard into the front rank of attacking demons from behind.  Their weight toppled that wall forward; Arun and Lok vanished beneath a half-dozen bloated maws, and Beorna and Avellos were cut off as the surge spilled forward around them.  The ravagers, flying forward with the rest, leapt again as the pile fell, and landed in the midst of the defenders in the second rank.  Callendes took a stinger through the chest and was knocked back ten feet by the impact, while to his left Dannel had to dive to the side to avoid a similar fate.  Umbar lifted Alakast to strike, only to be taken down under the weight of another ravager, while the last spun as it landed, thrusting its stinger toward the back of the Voice.  With the defense now completely collapsed, the demons now surged eagerly forward to finish the job.</blockquote>

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