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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 3282107" data-attributes="member: 143">Chapter 82A DIABOLICAL PREDICAMENT“Take cover!” Talen yelled, an instant before the Duke drew back his arm, and hurled a fireball into the midst of the attackers. The blast scorched the entry to the room, ravaging the heavy doors, and transforming several tapestries into blazing pyres.  It also killed three of Talen’s soldiers outright, and inflicted terrible wounds on nearly all of the others.  Only a few that had either leapt forward or managed to dart back behind the threshold of the chamber entry were able to escape the full force of the blast.  Baraka Suhn was one of those who had darted ahead, and he came up into a roll as the Duke’s half-fiend lords rushed to engage the intruders.  He had drawn out a pair of heavy sickles, one of adamantine, the other of alchemical silver, and as two of the false nobles charged him, swords lifted to strike, he raked both weapons across the torso of the first.  The half-fiend snarled, but absorbed cuts that would have disembowled a mortal fighter without further reaction.  As Suhn darted back to avoid the immediate counterattack, he saw that his foe wore a suit of fine mail links under his expensive clothes.  “They’re armored!” he yelled in warning to his companions. The clash of metal on metal sounded loudly through the chamber as the two sides met in a violent melee in its center.  Talen’s soldiers fought well, but most of them were young, and already bore serious wounds from the fireball.  And it quickly became clear that the half-fiends were more than just good fighters, as they darted into flanking positions, opening up devastating sneak attacks that tore through the humans’ defenses.  One soldier went down as a fiend sliced through his hamstring, while a second turned an initial attack only to take a thrust through his back that pierced his heart, killing him almost instantly. Only Talen kept the line from buckling at once, holding his ground at the center of the melee.  He exorted his men and women to hold, deflecting one attack with his shield, and turning to stab a second attacker in the chest before it could follow-up to its advantage.  The half-fiend staggered back, but wasn’t seriously hurt; the fiendish durability possessed by the monstrous half-breeds turned serious injuries into minor scrapes.  They were also completely immune to the toxins that Alucinor had given them.  Without magical weapons, there was little that the soldiers could do to hurt them, short of a lucky critical hit.  Still, they fought on, and bled. Dar hit the right edge of the line hard and kept going.  A half-fiend swung at him with its sword; he took the hit and countered with a power attack that cut under its arms, ripping through its armor and biting deep into its torso.  The diabolic warrior staggered back and lifted its sword for a counterattack, but Dar was already surging past it, driving his sword around into a backswing that clipped it hard on the back of its neck.  The fiend fell forward, collapsing in a bloody heap.  Dar met the Duke’s gaze for an instant.  The mercenary lifted his sword in challenge, but was forced to suddenly defend himself as two of the half-fiend warriors surged forward to intercept him.  On the opposite flank, Suhn had taken a glancing hit to his shoulder that had torn open an old wound.  But he’d kept his injured opponent at bay, and even managed a lucky hit that had snagged deep into the foe’s hip, laying his pelvis open to the bone.  The other half-fiend whipped around the ranger, coming at him from behind, but an arrow thudded into his chest, piercing his mail and the thick hide beneath.  Despite its immunity to the poison covering the arrowhead, it was clear that Pella’s shot had hurt it nevertheless.Suhn shifted to try and keep both enemies ahead of him, but as he lifted his scythes to strike again, he felt a cold chill fall over him.  He turned to see Lord Sobol—the narzugon—looking at him with a cold smile.  The veteran ranger tried to fight off the cloying power of Sobol’s spell, but he could not resist as the hold person froze his limbs. Helpless, he could do nothing to stop the two half-fiends as they drove their swords deep into his body. One of his scouts had moved to his aid, but now found herself fighting for her life as Suhn’s killers turned their attentions to her. “Pella, the Duke!” Talen yelled, dodging a thrust that still managed to draw a red line across his right bicep.  Thus far, he’d been able to avoid being flanked, but the soldiers to either side were being hard pressed, and neither had inflicted much damage on the enemies facing them.  A scout fell to the ground, clutching his throat as blood exploded from between his fingers.  A few seconds later, a young soldier fell to the ground as a sword pierced his left thigh.  His opponent lunged forward, snapping its jaws around the man’s neck.  Blood splashed out from their evil embrace, and the soldier abruptly fell limp.  The odds, roughly even to begin with, were turning steadily against the attackers.  Pella drew and fired, sending another arrow at the Duke.  This time, the shot actually stuck in his arm, but as the overlord of Camar looked down at the wound, he seemed more annoyed than hurt.  Plucking the arrow out, he extended his arm toward the archer.  A lightning bolt shot from his hand, streaking across the room.  It hit one of his own nobles in the back, tore through the soldier facing it, and then continued, blasting into Pella’s chest.  The archer was knocked back into the outer room, landing hard on the ground.  She didn’t get up.  The soldier likewise went down, while the half-fiend, naturally resistant to the electrical energies of the blast, was just moderately singed. “Aarrgh!” Talen yelled as he took another hit.  The soldier behind him was fighting off a half-fiend with courageous desperation, but as the man to his right was taken down by the Duke’s lightning bolt, the captain could no longer protect his flanks.  A half-fiend he’d already hit twice surged forward to finish him, but Talen proved he was still dangerous, spinning around, clipping the tip of his sword through the fiend’s skull.  The precise strike took out its left eye, and blood exploded into the air from the vicious wound.  The infernal creature screamed and fell to the ground, clawing at the bloody socket. Dar, meanwhile, had been pushed back, forced to defend himself against two skilled foes.  They were wary of his sword, having seen what it had done to their comrade, but they also knew that their fiendish hides were resistant to his non-magical weapons.  They spread out, keeping their distance as the three exchanged a series of non-damaging blows, giving him no way to escape, save through them.  They were moving to flank him, and without an ally or a barrier to block them, there was nothing he could do to stop it. Dar snarled, drawing his lips back to bare his teeth.  They were... pointed. The mercenary’s body had already begun to change.  He lowered his body into a crouch, as his back bent, his bones shifting to accommodate a new form.  His fingers grew longer, and claws emerged from their tips.  His face experienced the most jarring transformation, elongating and exploding with coarse hair that quickly covered his entire features. Within just a few seconds, a wererat faced the two half-fiends.</blockquote>

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