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Story Hour
Shemeska's Planescape Storyhour - (Updated 14February2024)
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<blockquote data-quote="Shemeska" data-source="post: 6264694" data-attributes="member: 11697"><p>Cilret Leobtav stopped and smiled up at the figure seated on his shoulder. The blotch of darkness said nothing, but returned the smile with one like a darker rift torn in a starless sky.</p><p></p><p>"Fools..." The once-Guvner whispered as he looked up at a hillock a few hundred yards ahead of himself. He stood in the middle of gentle depression in the Outlands. If he were to be ambushed, this would be a perfect place as it obscured the landscape all around, allowing a force to assemble all around him if they wished.</p><p></p><p>"Whatever your intent, you will not proceed further." A single figure stood atop the ridge, looking down at the mortal and his silent companion. She gleamed silver in the sunlight.</p><p></p><p>"Your desires are worthless, rilmani nuisance." Leobtav sneered, stretching his fingers in preparation for what would come.</p><p></p><p>Atop the ridge, encircling the single mortal, space distorted and a veil lifted, revealing more than a hundred armored ferrumach. The first rank of many more, they stood at attention, spears and axes at the ready in the sunlight.</p><p></p><p>"Say what you will about our desires mortal," The argenach frowned. "But you will not proceed. The god of the tiere will remain imprisoned as his betrayed believers left him till they and only they return to unlock his chains with their forgiveness, requited or not."</p><p></p><p>"You cannot stop me from doing as I am commanded." Leobtav closed his eyes and called to mind the first of dozens of spells. As he did so, a dozen more emerged fresh in his mind, drawn from the endless well in which his master dwelled. He trembled and gasped at the pain it brought. Another grain of sand fell through the hourglass containing his soul, swallowed by that same void that swirled and hungered at the bottom.</p><p></p><p>The argenach laughed and drew her blade. "Look around you mortal. You have one final chance to turn around and leave with your life. What do you say?"</p><p></p><p>"Rilmani," Leobtav called out as his feet lifted off of the ground and crackles of energy surrounded his frail body, "I feel His touch carried on the wind. I see Him in every drop of blood I spill. I hear Him in every scream for mercy, and echoing in every death rattle when I give no quarter. The Waste itself spoke to me and I opened my soul to it. Now He whispers, I listen, and I obey."</p><p></p><p>The argenach blinked, confused at the mortal's reaction in the face of overwhelming numbers. She motioned and the ferrumachs began their suicidal charge.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p style="text-align: center">****</p><p></p><p></p><p>- PCs pursue Leobtav, taking Ficklebarb with them, leaving Doran, Settys, and Frollis behind.</p><p></p><p></p><p>The relatively mundane, terrestrial landscape and temperate biome faded away over the next several hours, replaced by a wasteland of withered scrub, dead or dying trees, and periodic swampland that forced them to divert their course in order to avoid the miasma of decaying organic matter and clouds of biting, stinging insects. Such was the nature of the Outlands as the plane mirrored the aspects of those planes it touched in tangent, metaphysically speaking, at the gates located in each of the 16 Gatetowns.</p><p></p><p>Flying as they were, they were able to avoid much of the difficulty posed by the harsher terrain as the Outlands took upon aspects of both Carceri and the Abyss. That stroke of good luck would not would not last indefinitely however.</p><p></p><p>"Does anyone else see that?" Fyrehowl stopped and looked hard into the distance, ears flickering ahead in an unconscious posture of alertness.</p><p></p><p>Tristol squinted his eyes, "See what?"</p><p></p><p>Fyrehowl pointed out on the horizon, out somewhere much closer to the Gatetown ring. "Out there on the horizon. Can't you see them?"</p><p></p><p>Something was out there. A lot of things in fact. Moving. Marching.</p><p></p><p>"I can't say I do." The aasimar squinted more and shook his head.</p><p></p><p>"I do." Toras frowned as he watched what looked at first like a line of ants moving on the horizon. "That's an army."</p><p></p><p>That it was. Beyond the range of most of their vision, excepting the celestial and half-celestial, a massive army marched in the direction of Plague-Mort. Forty thousand baatezu in orderly ranks, flying the banners of the Hag Countess of Maladomini, and beside them a second column of troops marched with smaller numbers and less rigid organization: 'loths, some ten thousand strong.</p><p></p><p>"That's odd..." Fyrehowl remarked as her ears lay back against her head. "Devils and 'loths. A bunch of them."</p><p></p><p>Clueless held his hands up warily, "They can keep on moving wherever they're going as long as it isn't the way that we're headed."</p><p></p><p>Toras squinted further, wishing that he had a spyglass. "I can't make out the baatezu much since they're marching in formation. But there's a bunch of mezzoloths, canoloths, yeah pretty much all of the lesser ones and cr*p..."</p><p></p><p>On the cusp of mentioning that the 'loths were accompanied by a cloud of flying slasraths, each of them carrying one or two robed figures each -arcanaloths- one of the flyers broke away from the main force and then vanished in the brilliant flicker of a teleport.</p><p></p><p>Clueless unsheathed Razor, "I don't know what that flash of light was, but that I saw."</p><p></p><p>"Someone saw us." Toras drew his blade as well. "Everyone get ready."</p><p></p><p>Mirroring the first burst of light from afar, a second series of teleportation flashes erupted all around them, causing them all to squint. When the light faded, they were surrounded by an assortment of fiends, in all comprising 3 cornugons, 10 mezzoloths, 2 osyluths, and nearly a dozen abishai of assorted colors. Each of the fiends snarled or chittered, hefting their weapons at the ready, but otherwise they stood their ground and briefly glanced up to the single figure sitting cross-legged atop a blue-black slasrath that hovered directly above and ahead of the party.</p><p></p><p>Looking down from his cushioned seat, an arcanaloth yawned and levitated a logbook and pen into his hands. "In the name of her infernal majesty the Hag Countess, Lord of the 5th, state your business for your transit in the region bordering Plague-Mort and Curst." Sneering at the party that garnered his primary attention, the greater yugoloth seemed distinctly bored and uninterested in his job, playing over glorified secretary and also marshal for what he clearly considered lesser beings.</p><p></p><p>Toras adjusted his stance, obscuring Fyrehowl as much as possible from the 'loth, lest her presence bring about more malice than disinterest.</p><p></p><p>"Speak now or I incinerate the lot of you." The 'loth's lip curled up, revealing a row of pearlescent fangs. "At least it would provide me with some amusement for today."</p><p></p><p>"No need to be hasty." Clueless replied, giving a slight bow. "We're here only in transit, seeking a criminal that passed this way a day ahead of us."</p><p></p><p>"A criminal?" The 'loth asked, barely sounding as if he honestly cared one way or the other. The baatezu below him however seemed at least marginally less hostile at the response.</p><p></p><p>Clueless recalled Leobtav's original association with the Guvner's, and his time in Hopeless. "Wanted for crimes against Thingol the Mocking, and for crimes against the Fraternity of Order..."</p><p></p><p>The arcanaloth held up his other hand, indicating Clueless to be silent. "So be it." He shrugged in as noncommittal way as he could. "No need to finish. I just need something to write. I really don't care as I said before. Kill this criminal if you wish, collect your bounty, or die at the hands of a pack of leomarshes. What happens to you is what happens. I on the other hand, I have a city to sack."</p><p></p><p>The fiend actually smiled at the last moment and then vanished along with his underlings in another brilliant flash of light.</p><p></p><p>Toras smiled and put away his sword, "Well that went a lot better than it could have. Saves us the time spent killing them all."</p><p></p><p>It went completely unsaid that had conflict broken out, the distant army would likely have set upon them en masse. It had indeed been most opportune that the fiend hadn't really cared about them.</p><p></p><p>"City to sack?" Florian looked troubled. "Which one and where?"</p><p></p><p>They would find out, but it would be a number of days still.</p><p></p><p></p><p style="text-align: center">****</p><p></p><p></p><p>Many hours later, having followed Doran's map from point to point across the landscape, most of them worn down or nearly unrecognizable by the passage of millennia, they finally came across a point both not on the map at all, and one immediately recognizable.</p><p></p><p>"What the hell happened here?" Fyrehowl gazed across a field of smoking ruins.</p><p></p><p>No birds sang. No insects buzzed. At the edge of the village a great circle of dead grass demarcated the boundary of something terrible that had touched, and where it had touched, killed. Twenty buildings of stone, wood, and thatch had been reduced to ashes, while a stone watchtower lay on its side, toppled over with its lower half melted by magic or acid, ultimately having collapsed atop a cluster of tents which still issued periodic gouts of flame and smoke.</p><p></p><p>"He's been here." Ficklebarb's eyes enlarged and he choked back a wail at what he, or a shattered part of him had done.</p><p></p><p>Dozens of bodies littered the ground, unmarked but unmoving, along with half as many black smears of greasy ashes, the latter killed by something much more destructive, but equally effective.</p><p></p><p>"This was a khaasta village." Toras glanced down at the corpse of an adult, lizard-like humanoid. He'd died with a spear in one hand and slaver's chains in the other. "They didn't have a clue who he was or what he could do."</p><p></p><p>"Just how powerful is he?" Tristol peered at the spell effects Leobtav had unleashed, all of them profound, all of them loosed wantonly. "This was like killing an ant with a fireball."</p><p></p><p>"Let's search the ruins." Toras suggested "If anyone is left, we need to talk to them and find out what happened."</p><p></p><p>Initially their efforts were for naught. Bodies within the ruins had been charred to lumps of charcoal, or withered husks drained of life. Leobtav had either been thorough in his cleansing of the village, or else the khaasta had been zealous in their assault. Spreading out though, further from the putative center of the circle of dead grass, they had better luck.</p><p></p><p>"I found someone!" Fyrehowl called out as her ears picked up on motion within the rubble of one of the cottages. A whimper and a swift hush, followed by a hand clamping shut over a muzzle.</p><p></p><p>The others gathered behind the lupinal where she stood next to a pile of fallen debris and a partially collapsed tent.</p><p></p><p>"Hs'kzik! Dzu'hathissim!" A wary, terrified cry emerged from the debris; part terror, part bravado.</p><p></p><p>"We're not the one who did this." Toras looked at the others, none of whom spoke khaasta. "You're safe. You can come out. We won't hurt you."</p><p></p><p>A hand covered in dusty brown scales lifted part of the tent wall and two pairs of reptilian eyes gazed out at the party. Tentatively they both stepped out and warily looked around, seemingly expecting their original attacker to return at any minute.</p><p></p><p>"We're friends." Fyrehowl asked, immediately drawing a spark of comprehension on the lizard-folk's faces. "You're safe."</p><p></p><p>The two khaasta were covered in dust and ash, and each was wounded in some capacity from fallen debris and fire. The first was an elderly female, mostly blind from cataract's that clouded her eyes, but she stood more erect and with more bravery than her companion, a young, terrified male whose posture and red, swollen eyes spoke of an inability to cope with loss. She had seen every shade of joy and loss in her long life, but he was young, and what he had witnessed had broken his spirit. Tears stained his cheeks, and clutched hard to his chest, he held a scorched, severed hand, probably all that remained of his fallen wife.</p><p></p><p>"Fyrehowl?" Clueless glanced at the lupinal. "They don't speak planar common, but you can speak to them regardless. So if you could translate that would be awesome."</p><p></p><p>Fyrehowl nodded and began speaking to the two frightened survivors. Despite speaking in planar common, they understood her regardless, hearing her words in their own tongue as soon as she spoke. Hearing the celestial calmed their nerves, as much as they could be calmed, having survived the destruction of their village, and having witnessed the deaths of their families, spouses, and children.</p><p></p><p>"What happened here?" Clueless looked at the wildly gesticulating khaasta, trying to parse meaning before Fyrehowl translated for them.</p><p></p><p>"Leobtav." The lupinal explained. "The village just happened to have been built here since the time that the map was written down. They weren't important. They were just in the way."</p><p></p><p>The khaasta male sat down and began sobbing once again, holding the wife's severed hand to his cheek.</p><p></p><p>"Their chief demanded to know who he was, and when he ignored them, they tried to take him captive. The commotion drew a crowd, which was when these two briefly saw him. They describe him as having "a demon upon his shoulder" that was whispering to him, telling him what to do."</p><p></p><p>Perched on Toras's shoulder, Ficklebarb whimpered at the mention of his master's companion, whatever it was. He'd felt its touch before, but never physically. As Leobtav's soul withered, whatever had latched onto him in Gehenna grew ever more potent, and now seemed able to physically manifest.</p><p></p><p>Fyrehowl gave the manifest conscience a look of pity before she continued her translation of the khaasta, "They say that he laughed as he destroyed the village building by building, slaying their warriors, slaying gravid mothers, and even the young and elderly. They also say that when he left, he took almost a score of the town with him, male and female alike, bending them to his will as if they were marionettes."</p><p></p><p></p><p>- fight with undead khaasta. Surviving khaasta are given food and what supplies can be spared. Party continues onwards, following Doran's map, following in Leobtav's footsteps.</p><p></p><p>- fight with possessed khaasta in the Outlands.</p><p></p><p></p><p>Another day passed without incident, but the landscape around them seemed bizarrely empty. Wildlife had fled, and wherever intelligent creatures had been present, they'd scattered or been slaughtered in Leobtav's wake. Most disturbing though was the aftermath of Leobtav's conflict with the rilmani.</p><p></p><p>Two times they came across battlegrounds, each of them strewn with the remnants of rilmani armor and weapons. The Outlands had swallowed the fallen rilmanis' essence, dissolving their corpses as they merged with the plane of their birth, leaving behind only the bizarre scattering of equipment. Each battlefield was ravaged by flames, acid, and the lingering reek of lightning generated ozone, as well as numerous instances of what could only be described as the aftereffects of wanton bursts of negative energy.</p><p></p><p>"The rilmani are hurling themselves at him by the hundreds," Tristol looked up from where he crouched over a pile of rilmani weapons and armor welded together by a combination of extreme heat and magnetism.</p><p></p><p>"That's not what bothers me." Clueless shook his head. "It's the fact that so far it looks like they've failed, and there's only six of us, not counting Ficklebarb."</p><p></p><p>"Let's worry about that later." Florian frowned, looking to the east where on the far horizon they could see a rising cloud of dark, heavy smoke forming - likely another battle between Leobtav and the neutral outsiders. "We can pray that they do stop him before we catch up, or if not, that they weaken him enough that we can do the deed ourselves."</p><p></p><p></p><p style="text-align: center">****</p><p></p><p></p><p>They moved on and flew for several more hours before the Outlands' light waned and drew to the first hours of darkness, forcing them to land and hastily prepare camp. None of them however could sleep, both from knowing what awaited them, and from the unknowns that surrounded that looming confrontation. What would Leobtav do if he found the tiere deity? Free it? Kill it? What consequences would either bring? What had touched him years ago in the frozen lower reaches of Gehenna?</p><p></p><p>These questions and more filtered through Tristol's mind as he sat in his tent, staring down at his spellbook, rememorizing his spells for the next day. Nisha sat next to him, curled up close and periodically tapping his toes with the tip of her tail.</p><p></p><p>"You shouldn't worry so much." Nisha pulled down on Tristol's spellbook with the tip of her nose, smiling as she looked up over the level of the pages.</p><p></p><p>"I can't help it." Tristol poked her nose. "There's a lot at stake tomorrow."</p><p></p><p>"You're being too serious." Nisha giggled. "Delightfully so."</p><p></p><p>"Delightfully serious? That's an odd thing for you to be saying."Tristol looked at her askance. "And besides, technically you've got a spellbook as well. I've seen you study it."</p><p></p><p>"I can be serious at times." Nisha shrugged as her eyes wandered over the formulae diagrams in Tristol's book. "Occasionally. Maybe. From time to time. About as often as I have my nose in a spellbook."</p><p></p><p>"You should do that more." Tristol smiled. "It'd be fun to see you develop more as a wizard."</p><p></p><p>"I don't need to study much."</p><p></p><p>"I didn't mean to downplay your ability as a wizard." Tristol hoped he hadn't offended her. "You've just got fewer spells at the moment. But we can work on that. I'd love to help you there."</p><p></p><p>"No need." Nisha held up a finger and the tip of her tail. "Archmages don't need to study as much."</p><p></p><p>"Archmages?" Tristol cocked his head to side quizzically.</p><p></p><p>"Like me." Nisha quipped. "The Great Archmage Nisha."</p><p></p><p>Tristol had the sudden mental image of just such a thing: Nisha with the power of a Netherese archmage of old, but with precisely her current level of whimsy.</p><p></p><p>"Hey!" Nisha waved her tail in front of his face. "Tristol?"</p><p></p><p>"Hmm?"</p><p></p><p>"You looked a bit spaced out there for a second."</p><p></p><p>"I'm sure you'd make a great archmage." He tried to smile without looking terrified at the idea. "You're cute."</p><p></p><p>"So are you." She batted at his tail with her own.</p><p></p><p>"Awww…" Tristol put his spellbook down and wrapped an arm around the tiefling. The two of them hugged, he kissed her forehead and she his chin. If only for a moment they were both smiling and the recent and ongoing horror that had begun in Pandemonium for them seemed distant, at least until a quick series of taps on the tent brought them out of their introspective snuggle.</p><p></p><p>"You both should get up and take a look at this." Clueless called to them from outside. "This is something to see."</p><p></p><p>Nisha looked at Tristol and shrugged. The aasimar got to his feet and extended a hand. Smiling, she gave it a quick kiss and let him help her to her feet. Together they walked outside and looked around. All of the others were up and awake, all staring off towards the east.</p><p></p><p>"What do you make of that?" The bladesinger asked Tristol.</p><p></p><p>In the distance, only a dozen hours away, the horizon was illuminated with the ruddy glow of raging flames and frequent bursts and crackles of light.</p><p></p><p>"That's a battle." Florian unconsciously rubbed the holy symbol of Tempus between her thumb and forefinger. "That's a huge, huge battle."</p><p></p><p>"Go rilmani!" Toras pumped his fists in the air.</p><p></p><p>Clueless grinned and looked at the map. "Regardless of how that battle goes, it looks like we can probably catch up with Leobtav in fairly short order tomorrow. At least that's my take on the map. Distance has been odd out here, and it might be longer once we get started."</p><p></p><p>Brilliant blue bursts of lightning erupted in the distance, followed minutes later by rolling crashes of thunder.</p><p></p><p>"We should try to rest though." Clueless sighed. "If the rilmani can't stop him, we'll need to be at our best."</p><p></p><p>"Agreed," Fyrehowl's ears twitched at the thunderclaps.</p><p></p><p></p><p style="text-align: center">****</p><p></p><p></p><p>Five hours later the distant sounds of battle waned, the crackle and roar of spells faded, silence retook its throne, and the horizon grew still but for the lingering glow of small fires. The battle was over.</p><p></p><p>Sitting atop a cushion in Toras's tent, Ficklebarb's eyes stared off into space, looking past the horizon, looking past the battle, directed to where Leobtav stood. The professor's manifest, severed conscience whimpered as he felt an echo of his greater self's exultation. The rilmani had failed.</p><p></p><p>"Please." He whispered, shedding a tear that rolled down the ruddy scales of his face. "Please don't listen to it. Please don't do what it says. Please, please don't open the door..."</p><p></p><p>The sky was still swathed in darkness; the morning light had yet to begin its ascent into the sky. Just before dawn, the night's reverie was shattered by a thunderous roar from the east.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Shemeska, post: 6264694, member: 11697"] Cilret Leobtav stopped and smiled up at the figure seated on his shoulder. The blotch of darkness said nothing, but returned the smile with one like a darker rift torn in a starless sky. "Fools..." The once-Guvner whispered as he looked up at a hillock a few hundred yards ahead of himself. He stood in the middle of gentle depression in the Outlands. If he were to be ambushed, this would be a perfect place as it obscured the landscape all around, allowing a force to assemble all around him if they wished. "Whatever your intent, you will not proceed further." A single figure stood atop the ridge, looking down at the mortal and his silent companion. She gleamed silver in the sunlight. "Your desires are worthless, rilmani nuisance." Leobtav sneered, stretching his fingers in preparation for what would come. Atop the ridge, encircling the single mortal, space distorted and a veil lifted, revealing more than a hundred armored ferrumach. The first rank of many more, they stood at attention, spears and axes at the ready in the sunlight. "Say what you will about our desires mortal," The argenach frowned. "But you will not proceed. The god of the tiere will remain imprisoned as his betrayed believers left him till they and only they return to unlock his chains with their forgiveness, requited or not." "You cannot stop me from doing as I am commanded." Leobtav closed his eyes and called to mind the first of dozens of spells. As he did so, a dozen more emerged fresh in his mind, drawn from the endless well in which his master dwelled. He trembled and gasped at the pain it brought. Another grain of sand fell through the hourglass containing his soul, swallowed by that same void that swirled and hungered at the bottom. The argenach laughed and drew her blade. "Look around you mortal. You have one final chance to turn around and leave with your life. What do you say?" "Rilmani," Leobtav called out as his feet lifted off of the ground and crackles of energy surrounded his frail body, "I feel His touch carried on the wind. I see Him in every drop of blood I spill. I hear Him in every scream for mercy, and echoing in every death rattle when I give no quarter. The Waste itself spoke to me and I opened my soul to it. Now He whispers, I listen, and I obey." The argenach blinked, confused at the mortal's reaction in the face of overwhelming numbers. She motioned and the ferrumachs began their suicidal charge. [center]****[/center] - PCs pursue Leobtav, taking Ficklebarb with them, leaving Doran, Settys, and Frollis behind. The relatively mundane, terrestrial landscape and temperate biome faded away over the next several hours, replaced by a wasteland of withered scrub, dead or dying trees, and periodic swampland that forced them to divert their course in order to avoid the miasma of decaying organic matter and clouds of biting, stinging insects. Such was the nature of the Outlands as the plane mirrored the aspects of those planes it touched in tangent, metaphysically speaking, at the gates located in each of the 16 Gatetowns. Flying as they were, they were able to avoid much of the difficulty posed by the harsher terrain as the Outlands took upon aspects of both Carceri and the Abyss. That stroke of good luck would not would not last indefinitely however. "Does anyone else see that?" Fyrehowl stopped and looked hard into the distance, ears flickering ahead in an unconscious posture of alertness. Tristol squinted his eyes, "See what?" Fyrehowl pointed out on the horizon, out somewhere much closer to the Gatetown ring. "Out there on the horizon. Can't you see them?" Something was out there. A lot of things in fact. Moving. Marching. "I can't say I do." The aasimar squinted more and shook his head. "I do." Toras frowned as he watched what looked at first like a line of ants moving on the horizon. "That's an army." That it was. Beyond the range of most of their vision, excepting the celestial and half-celestial, a massive army marched in the direction of Plague-Mort. Forty thousand baatezu in orderly ranks, flying the banners of the Hag Countess of Maladomini, and beside them a second column of troops marched with smaller numbers and less rigid organization: 'loths, some ten thousand strong. "That's odd..." Fyrehowl remarked as her ears lay back against her head. "Devils and 'loths. A bunch of them." Clueless held his hands up warily, "They can keep on moving wherever they're going as long as it isn't the way that we're headed." Toras squinted further, wishing that he had a spyglass. "I can't make out the baatezu much since they're marching in formation. But there's a bunch of mezzoloths, canoloths, yeah pretty much all of the lesser ones and cr*p..." On the cusp of mentioning that the 'loths were accompanied by a cloud of flying slasraths, each of them carrying one or two robed figures each -arcanaloths- one of the flyers broke away from the main force and then vanished in the brilliant flicker of a teleport. Clueless unsheathed Razor, "I don't know what that flash of light was, but that I saw." "Someone saw us." Toras drew his blade as well. "Everyone get ready." Mirroring the first burst of light from afar, a second series of teleportation flashes erupted all around them, causing them all to squint. When the light faded, they were surrounded by an assortment of fiends, in all comprising 3 cornugons, 10 mezzoloths, 2 osyluths, and nearly a dozen abishai of assorted colors. Each of the fiends snarled or chittered, hefting their weapons at the ready, but otherwise they stood their ground and briefly glanced up to the single figure sitting cross-legged atop a blue-black slasrath that hovered directly above and ahead of the party. Looking down from his cushioned seat, an arcanaloth yawned and levitated a logbook and pen into his hands. "In the name of her infernal majesty the Hag Countess, Lord of the 5th, state your business for your transit in the region bordering Plague-Mort and Curst." Sneering at the party that garnered his primary attention, the greater yugoloth seemed distinctly bored and uninterested in his job, playing over glorified secretary and also marshal for what he clearly considered lesser beings. Toras adjusted his stance, obscuring Fyrehowl as much as possible from the 'loth, lest her presence bring about more malice than disinterest. "Speak now or I incinerate the lot of you." The 'loth's lip curled up, revealing a row of pearlescent fangs. "At least it would provide me with some amusement for today." "No need to be hasty." Clueless replied, giving a slight bow. "We're here only in transit, seeking a criminal that passed this way a day ahead of us." "A criminal?" The 'loth asked, barely sounding as if he honestly cared one way or the other. The baatezu below him however seemed at least marginally less hostile at the response. Clueless recalled Leobtav's original association with the Guvner's, and his time in Hopeless. "Wanted for crimes against Thingol the Mocking, and for crimes against the Fraternity of Order..." The arcanaloth held up his other hand, indicating Clueless to be silent. "So be it." He shrugged in as noncommittal way as he could. "No need to finish. I just need something to write. I really don't care as I said before. Kill this criminal if you wish, collect your bounty, or die at the hands of a pack of leomarshes. What happens to you is what happens. I on the other hand, I have a city to sack." The fiend actually smiled at the last moment and then vanished along with his underlings in another brilliant flash of light. Toras smiled and put away his sword, "Well that went a lot better than it could have. Saves us the time spent killing them all." It went completely unsaid that had conflict broken out, the distant army would likely have set upon them en masse. It had indeed been most opportune that the fiend hadn't really cared about them. "City to sack?" Florian looked troubled. "Which one and where?" They would find out, but it would be a number of days still. [center]****[/center] Many hours later, having followed Doran's map from point to point across the landscape, most of them worn down or nearly unrecognizable by the passage of millennia, they finally came across a point both not on the map at all, and one immediately recognizable. "What the hell happened here?" Fyrehowl gazed across a field of smoking ruins. No birds sang. No insects buzzed. At the edge of the village a great circle of dead grass demarcated the boundary of something terrible that had touched, and where it had touched, killed. Twenty buildings of stone, wood, and thatch had been reduced to ashes, while a stone watchtower lay on its side, toppled over with its lower half melted by magic or acid, ultimately having collapsed atop a cluster of tents which still issued periodic gouts of flame and smoke. "He's been here." Ficklebarb's eyes enlarged and he choked back a wail at what he, or a shattered part of him had done. Dozens of bodies littered the ground, unmarked but unmoving, along with half as many black smears of greasy ashes, the latter killed by something much more destructive, but equally effective. "This was a khaasta village." Toras glanced down at the corpse of an adult, lizard-like humanoid. He'd died with a spear in one hand and slaver's chains in the other. "They didn't have a clue who he was or what he could do." "Just how powerful is he?" Tristol peered at the spell effects Leobtav had unleashed, all of them profound, all of them loosed wantonly. "This was like killing an ant with a fireball." "Let's search the ruins." Toras suggested "If anyone is left, we need to talk to them and find out what happened." Initially their efforts were for naught. Bodies within the ruins had been charred to lumps of charcoal, or withered husks drained of life. Leobtav had either been thorough in his cleansing of the village, or else the khaasta had been zealous in their assault. Spreading out though, further from the putative center of the circle of dead grass, they had better luck. "I found someone!" Fyrehowl called out as her ears picked up on motion within the rubble of one of the cottages. A whimper and a swift hush, followed by a hand clamping shut over a muzzle. The others gathered behind the lupinal where she stood next to a pile of fallen debris and a partially collapsed tent. "Hs'kzik! Dzu'hathissim!" A wary, terrified cry emerged from the debris; part terror, part bravado. "We're not the one who did this." Toras looked at the others, none of whom spoke khaasta. "You're safe. You can come out. We won't hurt you." A hand covered in dusty brown scales lifted part of the tent wall and two pairs of reptilian eyes gazed out at the party. Tentatively they both stepped out and warily looked around, seemingly expecting their original attacker to return at any minute. "We're friends." Fyrehowl asked, immediately drawing a spark of comprehension on the lizard-folk's faces. "You're safe." The two khaasta were covered in dust and ash, and each was wounded in some capacity from fallen debris and fire. The first was an elderly female, mostly blind from cataract's that clouded her eyes, but she stood more erect and with more bravery than her companion, a young, terrified male whose posture and red, swollen eyes spoke of an inability to cope with loss. She had seen every shade of joy and loss in her long life, but he was young, and what he had witnessed had broken his spirit. Tears stained his cheeks, and clutched hard to his chest, he held a scorched, severed hand, probably all that remained of his fallen wife. "Fyrehowl?" Clueless glanced at the lupinal. "They don't speak planar common, but you can speak to them regardless. So if you could translate that would be awesome." Fyrehowl nodded and began speaking to the two frightened survivors. Despite speaking in planar common, they understood her regardless, hearing her words in their own tongue as soon as she spoke. Hearing the celestial calmed their nerves, as much as they could be calmed, having survived the destruction of their village, and having witnessed the deaths of their families, spouses, and children. "What happened here?" Clueless looked at the wildly gesticulating khaasta, trying to parse meaning before Fyrehowl translated for them. "Leobtav." The lupinal explained. "The village just happened to have been built here since the time that the map was written down. They weren't important. They were just in the way." The khaasta male sat down and began sobbing once again, holding the wife's severed hand to his cheek. "Their chief demanded to know who he was, and when he ignored them, they tried to take him captive. The commotion drew a crowd, which was when these two briefly saw him. They describe him as having "a demon upon his shoulder" that was whispering to him, telling him what to do." Perched on Toras's shoulder, Ficklebarb whimpered at the mention of his master's companion, whatever it was. He'd felt its touch before, but never physically. As Leobtav's soul withered, whatever had latched onto him in Gehenna grew ever more potent, and now seemed able to physically manifest. Fyrehowl gave the manifest conscience a look of pity before she continued her translation of the khaasta, "They say that he laughed as he destroyed the village building by building, slaying their warriors, slaying gravid mothers, and even the young and elderly. They also say that when he left, he took almost a score of the town with him, male and female alike, bending them to his will as if they were marionettes." - fight with undead khaasta. Surviving khaasta are given food and what supplies can be spared. Party continues onwards, following Doran's map, following in Leobtav's footsteps. - fight with possessed khaasta in the Outlands. Another day passed without incident, but the landscape around them seemed bizarrely empty. Wildlife had fled, and wherever intelligent creatures had been present, they'd scattered or been slaughtered in Leobtav's wake. Most disturbing though was the aftermath of Leobtav's conflict with the rilmani. Two times they came across battlegrounds, each of them strewn with the remnants of rilmani armor and weapons. The Outlands had swallowed the fallen rilmanis' essence, dissolving their corpses as they merged with the plane of their birth, leaving behind only the bizarre scattering of equipment. Each battlefield was ravaged by flames, acid, and the lingering reek of lightning generated ozone, as well as numerous instances of what could only be described as the aftereffects of wanton bursts of negative energy. "The rilmani are hurling themselves at him by the hundreds," Tristol looked up from where he crouched over a pile of rilmani weapons and armor welded together by a combination of extreme heat and magnetism. "That's not what bothers me." Clueless shook his head. "It's the fact that so far it looks like they've failed, and there's only six of us, not counting Ficklebarb." "Let's worry about that later." Florian frowned, looking to the east where on the far horizon they could see a rising cloud of dark, heavy smoke forming - likely another battle between Leobtav and the neutral outsiders. "We can pray that they do stop him before we catch up, or if not, that they weaken him enough that we can do the deed ourselves." [center]****[/center] They moved on and flew for several more hours before the Outlands' light waned and drew to the first hours of darkness, forcing them to land and hastily prepare camp. None of them however could sleep, both from knowing what awaited them, and from the unknowns that surrounded that looming confrontation. What would Leobtav do if he found the tiere deity? Free it? Kill it? What consequences would either bring? What had touched him years ago in the frozen lower reaches of Gehenna? These questions and more filtered through Tristol's mind as he sat in his tent, staring down at his spellbook, rememorizing his spells for the next day. Nisha sat next to him, curled up close and periodically tapping his toes with the tip of her tail. "You shouldn't worry so much." Nisha pulled down on Tristol's spellbook with the tip of her nose, smiling as she looked up over the level of the pages. "I can't help it." Tristol poked her nose. "There's a lot at stake tomorrow." "You're being too serious." Nisha giggled. "Delightfully so." "Delightfully serious? That's an odd thing for you to be saying."Tristol looked at her askance. "And besides, technically you've got a spellbook as well. I've seen you study it." "I can be serious at times." Nisha shrugged as her eyes wandered over the formulae diagrams in Tristol's book. "Occasionally. Maybe. From time to time. About as often as I have my nose in a spellbook." "You should do that more." Tristol smiled. "It'd be fun to see you develop more as a wizard." "I don't need to study much." "I didn't mean to downplay your ability as a wizard." Tristol hoped he hadn't offended her. "You've just got fewer spells at the moment. But we can work on that. I'd love to help you there." "No need." Nisha held up a finger and the tip of her tail. "Archmages don't need to study as much." "Archmages?" Tristol cocked his head to side quizzically. "Like me." Nisha quipped. "The Great Archmage Nisha." Tristol had the sudden mental image of just such a thing: Nisha with the power of a Netherese archmage of old, but with precisely her current level of whimsy. "Hey!" Nisha waved her tail in front of his face. "Tristol?" "Hmm?" "You looked a bit spaced out there for a second." "I'm sure you'd make a great archmage." He tried to smile without looking terrified at the idea. "You're cute." "So are you." She batted at his tail with her own. "Awww…" Tristol put his spellbook down and wrapped an arm around the tiefling. The two of them hugged, he kissed her forehead and she his chin. If only for a moment they were both smiling and the recent and ongoing horror that had begun in Pandemonium for them seemed distant, at least until a quick series of taps on the tent brought them out of their introspective snuggle. "You both should get up and take a look at this." Clueless called to them from outside. "This is something to see." Nisha looked at Tristol and shrugged. The aasimar got to his feet and extended a hand. Smiling, she gave it a quick kiss and let him help her to her feet. Together they walked outside and looked around. All of the others were up and awake, all staring off towards the east. "What do you make of that?" The bladesinger asked Tristol. In the distance, only a dozen hours away, the horizon was illuminated with the ruddy glow of raging flames and frequent bursts and crackles of light. "That's a battle." Florian unconsciously rubbed the holy symbol of Tempus between her thumb and forefinger. "That's a huge, huge battle." "Go rilmani!" Toras pumped his fists in the air. Clueless grinned and looked at the map. "Regardless of how that battle goes, it looks like we can probably catch up with Leobtav in fairly short order tomorrow. At least that's my take on the map. Distance has been odd out here, and it might be longer once we get started." Brilliant blue bursts of lightning erupted in the distance, followed minutes later by rolling crashes of thunder. "We should try to rest though." Clueless sighed. "If the rilmani can't stop him, we'll need to be at our best." "Agreed," Fyrehowl's ears twitched at the thunderclaps. [center]****[/center] Five hours later the distant sounds of battle waned, the crackle and roar of spells faded, silence retook its throne, and the horizon grew still but for the lingering glow of small fires. The battle was over. Sitting atop a cushion in Toras's tent, Ficklebarb's eyes stared off into space, looking past the horizon, looking past the battle, directed to where Leobtav stood. The professor's manifest, severed conscience whimpered as he felt an echo of his greater self's exultation. The rilmani had failed. "Please." He whispered, shedding a tear that rolled down the ruddy scales of his face. "Please don't listen to it. Please don't do what it says. Please, please don't open the door..." The sky was still swathed in darkness; the morning light had yet to begin its ascent into the sky. Just before dawn, the night's reverie was shattered by a thunderous roar from the east. [/QUOTE]
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Shemeska's Planescape Storyhour - (Updated 14February2024)
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