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="the Jester" data-source="post: 1074381" data-attributes="member: 1210">Kobolds on the WingOur resourceful heroes quickly and magically ascertain that the creature they seek is in "the Cells of Urthgor, within the Cube of Drakos."  Drakos, Malford tells them instantly, is one of the elven gods of Gorel- an oppressive, iron-fisted deity of an island with two elven peoples, constantly trying to destroy each other.  Glancing around at the myriad cubes of all different sizes in the sky, Orbius announces that they seem to be on the plane of Acheron.  It's one of the Outer Planes, he informs them; a plane of endless, pointless war.  Our heroes fly about under a mass fly for a time, not sure which way to go at first, looking for an inhabitant.  They find two orcs sitting at a cook fire.  In the conversation that ensues, they claim to have gotten separated from their unit, which has now moved on to another cube.  When Malford offers them a lift up to their people, the two orcs gladly accept, and soon the captain of the orcish forces has pointed the way to Drakos' Cube.  "You'll know it; it's littered with war machines," he tells them, and thanking the orcs for their unusually good behavior, the group camps for a rest period, and then Lester creates an airboat and they head off in the direction they've been told that the Cube of Drakos lies in.For several hours they travel without event.  There are small bits of misshaped metal that float in the void around them, an occasional arrow or bolt, even once or twice large rocks or boulders.  And bodies- most especially bones; they are commonplace.As our heroes move along, Sybele reflects on glad she is that she sent Jezebel away.  This place is not good.  In fact- what's that?  "Look!" she calls, pointing.In the distance, a zone of blackness is moving across the sky, obscuring objects and cubes as it passes before them.Orbius casts clairvoyance, and hears a voice in Draconic.  "Send in the flyers," it growls arrogantly, and an instant later small winged-looking specks pop from the darkness.  "Kobolds!  Kobolds on glider wings of some kind!" cries the sharp-eyed wizard.  And they're coming in fast, moving with the kind of great speed that allows only a moment's preparation.Rushing up onto the deck of the ship of clouds, Thrush prepares for battle.  Sybele follows him up, manifesting an extended displacement.  Malford's already up there, casting haste and blink.  Then, from within the darkness comes a deep intoning voice, and an eyeblink later a chain lightning shoots out at the three of them.  Several of the kobolds pull out wands and hurl a multitude of fireballs at the ship.  Fortunately for our heroes, Malford's gauntlets of absorbtion suck them away, glowing red with power, and start fuelling the gnome-king's strength."These guys mean business!" Horbin shouts as he clambers up on deck.  Thrush nods fiercely as he stands ready to break their charge when they arrive, probably only seconds away.  Malford fires a pair of flame arrows at the kobolds, dividing up his shots between two of them; but to his surprise, none of the targeted kobolds fall.  Their gliders do catch fire, however.  Sybele fires arrows out at them, and one of them jerks and goes still, his form still plummeting towards the deck of their airboat.Then, from the darkness, now some 50' away, a cone of shadowy darkness shoots out, catching everyone in the ship.  There are a chorus of screams as enervating negative energy settles in on them- delivering a telling five negative levels to those who failed their saving throw (which was everyone the first time around).  Suddenly bereft of their most powerful spells and at a profound disadvantage, our heroes are shocked by this unexpectedly deadly attack.  They need to get it together and fast, but before they can there's a cone of cold from within the darkness.  Terrible damage is inflicted on everyone save Angelfire, who's still below decks activating buffing powers.  The same voice that Orbius heard booms out from the darkness, delighted.  "Malford!  What a splendid prize!  Father will be so pleased!"Not good! thinks Malford, casting a mass flight on the party and then throwing a dispel magic at the darkness.  Success reveals-A dragon.  A dragon towing some sort of... war platform.  With catapults, and kobolds, and glider wings... and a dozen of the kobolds are en route to the airboat but there are a few more on the platform; and, of course, the dragon himself.  This horror is almost translucent, covered in indistinct midnight-blue or black scales.  Its long, sinuous neck has short horns on it, as well as a pair of spiny rows running down to its dark wings.  The thing seems to blend with the darkness around it, losing distinction in the darkness.  Its chest is a sapphire color so dark as to be almost black.  With a grin, he hastes himself, then brings up mirror images.  Two of the kobolds are down, now, but several of them have slowed their charge and turned invisible, though their glider wings remain visible.  More- a half dozen- have landed on the deck and shrugged out of their gliders.  They rush forward, several attacking Angelfire as he emerges on deck, and one of them- he looks kinda funny, seems to have a longer neck and horns- belches out a cone of shadow!  Angelfire resists this one, and thanks to his ring of evasion suffers no negative levels from it.Then Angelfire and Thrush both are hacking around them.  Thrush moves forward and hews one of the kobold's head from his shoulders; Angelfire, seriously beset himself, has four arms thanks to his cloak of embrace and he uses them to great effect, with both his falchion and his scythe working in deadly tandem.  There's a hail of blows at all the kobolds around him, and they drop in numbers.  Sybele continues to fire her bow.  She's directing punishing-looking shots at a sorcerer-looking kobold- though she doesn't know it, his name is Maxxor- and she drops him.  Then the dragon flexes its great wings and descends on Angelfire, smashing him with a wing, a claw and his tail.  The blows deal terrible wounds to the Coilite, but when has Angelfire ever fled from a fight?Then a catapult shot fires past our heroes, missing the airboat by perhaps a dozen paces.  The shot whistles past them, but after a moment it explodes!  Sybele determines to get to work on the problem of the catapults posthaste.  She flies up towards the arm of the v-shaped platform that the catapult shot came from and mind blasts the crew, stunning them.  On the deck, Thrush has gotten into the middle of the enemy that's set down, and in a single motion he kills all of them but one.  Once again even our heroes are impressed by his deadliness.  Angelfire tries to use a lesser restoration to fix the huge negative levels sitting on his shoulders, but it doesn't seem to work.  He strikes at the dragon, hitting one image and dispelling it; with his scythe he misses entirely, and since he's hasted he dimension doors to the lower deck so as to deny the dragon its attack on him.Malford casts true strike on his sun blade, then flies in, rolling, diving, and dodging to avoid the dragon's threatening teeth.  Then he burns all the power in his gauntlets, boosting his strength for a moment to truly ludicrous levels, and he attacks, using his sun blade to great effect.  He strikes a blow that deals a wound to the great beast- the first damage our heroes have inflicted upon him.In reply, Sautix (for that is the dragon's name) snaps his teeth at Malford, snatches him, and with a great pumping of the wings, flies off with him.Next Time: The rest of the battle against Sautix, and we'll check in with an old enemy!</blockquote>

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