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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Pielorinho" data-source="post: 51513" data-attributes="member: 259">Burning DemonsThe companions were talking amongst themselves, with Korythis flying behind them invisible, as they walked through the sparsely populated streets of Southspur.  As they walked, Korythis noticed that a trio of unsavory-looking characters, wearing the plain robes of city workers, were following the companions a few blocks back.  She decided to wait and watch them, in case they made any move.Soon enough, they did.  When no one else was on the street, they glanced at one another and then, in unison, pulled out crossbows.  Korythis didn’t even have a chance to call out a warning before three bolts whizzed toward her companions.Two of the three shots went wide, thunking into the façade of a house.  The third sank into Afet’s shoulder.  She yelled out.“You can take this message back to those gray f---ers you work for,” the skinny woman shouted as she reloaded her crossbow.  You kill Squim, you get war!”The companions had only a vague guess as to who the “gray f---ers” were, but they knew all about war.  They charged forward, unsheathing their weapons.As they charged, the figures dropped their crossbows and began a hideous transformation.  As before, coarse hairs sprouted from their limbs; their faces lengthened into toothy snouts; and their fingers grew thin and claw-tipped.  Moments later, naked pink tails lashed out from behind them, the rat-demons drew scimitars and licked their blades –and the fight was on.Heluk sliced deeply into one of the creatures, a blow that should have severed its arm. Again, however, the blade left the demon’s flesh unharmed.  Lum’s mace was similarly ineffective against the skull of another demon; Ozgun’s scimitar left the third demon unscathed.  Afet pulled a wand from her belt and shot a thin ray of emerald light at one of the creatures, to no apparent effect.And then they attacked.  Two of the demons spun around Heluk, swirling their blades at him.  He parried one attack, but the other one caught him unawares across his back, and he felt his blood oozing from the wound.  The third one knocked Ozgun’s scimitar wide and then came in low, sinking steel into the Captain’s belly.  Ozgun moaned and fell to his knees, clutching his stomach.Then Heluk felt a tap on his shoulder.  He whirled around:  no one was there, but something cold and hard was pressed against his hand.  “Take this,” Korythis whispered.  He withdrew his hand, and there was an ornamented silver dagger in it.  He grinned, turned to the demon who had drawn blood, and plunged his knife into its shoulder.  This time, the wound stayed, and the rat screamed.Lum, realizing his blows were ineffectual against demonflesh, struck instead at his foe’s scimitar.  It clattered on the pavement; the creature bared its fangs and raised its claws.Alas, it wasn’t paying attention to the teenaged boy with the wand.  Afet stepped forward and raised her hands, and fire shot forth from her fingertips, bathing the rat.  He screamed as his fur burned.Afet had moved closer to the combat, and one of the demons attacking Heluk turned to her instead, whistling his scimitar at her outstretched arms.  She felt the metal scrape against bone; as he pulled it back, blood sprang forth.  The other demon swung again at Heluk, but without the distraction provided by the other demon, the burly man easily dodged the blow.  The burning demon, seeing that her attacker was nearly dead, turned back to Lum and scratched at his face, leaving a long gash down Lum’s cheek.Korythis spoke words of power, and again Heluk felt unnatural speed course through his body.  He stabbed at the wounded rat-demon twice, nearly killing it. Afet, realizing that another blow would kill her, tried to buy some time:  she rolled her eyes back in her head and collapsed to the ground.Her assailant was not easily fooled, and he raised his scimitar above him for a finishing blow.  Afet screwed her eyes shut, waiting for the end – but instead, she heard Lum’s voice.  “Mithras, shine your holy light on the darkness in this demon!”  A brilliant light flashed through her eyelids, and she felt something heavy fall on her.When she opened her eyes, she saw the rat-demon’s corpse draped across her, a gaping, smoking hole where its chest had been.  “Uh…thanks,” she stammered to Lum.The rat demons stared at their fallen companions and then split, one in each direction.  As they ran, their bodies lengthened and shrank, and their clothes and scimitars melted into their flesh, until they appeared as rats.  Each scurried up the wall of a building and vanished onto the roof.“Here!” said Korythis’ voice, followed by a few arcane syllables.  “Heluk, you can climb the wall now.  Lum, get over here!”  Lum looked up from Ozgun, who was still moaning piteously.  “A moment,” she said.  “Mithras, this protector of men has guided us well.  Make whole the wound in his side.”  Ozgun cried out in sudden pain, then lifted his hands away from a nasty pink scar where the wound had been.  He looked wonderingly at the cleric.Heluk sheathed his axe and leapt onto a wall, scurrying up to the roof even faster than the rat had.  He saw one of the rats racing across the roofs of the connected buildings and sprinted after it; as he reached it, he threw himself down, silver-dagger-blade-first, and skewered the creature.Meanwhile, Korythis granted the same boon to the ghulkin Cleric; she, however, was unable to find the other rat.“Got one!”  Heluk shouted, coming back over the edge of the roof on the opposite side of the street.  He cradled something in one arm as he climbed.  “Lum, do you have any healing magic on you?”“I do,” said Lum.  “First, let’s get off the street.”</blockquote>

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