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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 877024" data-attributes="member: 143">We are approaching the end...* * * * * Book VIII, Part 27Cal lifted his hand reflexively, ignoring the pain that swam through his injured skull at the sudden movement.  The gnome’s gesture seemed a pathetic effort to deny the death diving down toward him, but on his hand he bore a ring, and that ring possessed a power that he called upon now.  The first demon cried out in surprise as the force of the ring latched onto it, penetrating its inherent resistance and driving it roughly into its fellow.  The two demons tumbled awkwardly back in a jumble, landing hard toward the mouth of the alley a good ten paces behind the furious melee between Lok and his adversaries.  The impact shook the flagstones, but the demons were not injured seriously; even as Cal slumped back, barely clinging to consciousness, they thrashed apart and rose quickly to charge back into the battle.  Had they taken Lok four to one, the might have overrun even the durable genasi.  But Lok had not spent those moments idly.  One of his foes, its body savaged by two heavy blows from the axe, drew back a pace from the reach of that axe, calling upon its dark magic to overwhelm its foe with demonfear.  But Lok, bolstered by Dana’s earlier spell, shook off that cold touch of incipient terror, and when the demon’s fellow hurled itself at him with another sequence of attacks, Lok met the fiend’s charge with another powerful stroke from his axe.  Demon and genasi exchanged a fierce series of blows, ending with an incredible overhand stroke that clove deeply into the demon’s shoulder at the point where it joined with its neck.  Black blood fountained into the air, and the demon fell back, its limbs flailing.  He barely had a chance to lift his axe again before the pair that Cal had cast down leapt into the fray, joined by the injured one frustrated by the failure of its magic.  Two of the three leapt at the genasi, trying once more to overcome him with raw ferocity, while the last, the one that Cal had hit with his telekinesis, launched itself up over the melee with a powerful heave of its thick legs, coming down just a pace from where Cal was leaning against the alley wall, staring up at the vicious brute that loomed over him with death shining in its eyes. Just a few steps away, Dana and Benzan were still fighting for their lives against their own adversaries.  Realizing that they could not rely on help from their companions, each fought on with a fury borne of desperation, with the understanding that these foes would not cease or retreat until they were made unable to continue their attacks.  Dana, her speed enhanced by her magical boots, had been able to draw her foe further down the alley, trying to give herself some space to use her spear effectively.  The demon, incredibly quick for its size, responded swiftly, pressing her as it hopped forward in great bounds, slashing out with its deadly claws.  She was already bleeding from several cuts and gashes, and her face was pale.  Thus far, she had not managed to hurt the demon at all.  She could outrun it, perhaps, or draw away far enough to summon the power to fly away from it.  But she knew that if she did manage to get away, the demon would just turn on her companions, on Benzan, whom she could sense fighting for his life against his own foe...Stand fast, daughter...The voice was just a whisper, a message from very far, but it fortified her as the demon rushed in at her again, claws sweeping.  She met its charge with a short leap, and the claws swept empty space under her.  Dana snapped her leg around, connecting with the demon’s face with a sharp, solid kick.  The blow did no damage to the demon, but the exchange of momentum drove her backward.  She landed in a smooth roll and came back up into a defensive position, her spear set to receive the demon’s next charge.  The demon reared back and roared a challenge, pausing only a moment before coming at her again.  But in that moment, Dana opened her mind to the sweet flood of power that had been inherent in that simple whispered message, drawing the divine power of Selûne across the planes into her physical body.  She seemed to shimmer as that energy filled her muscles, and guided her shaft as she plunged the spear deep into the body of the charging demon.  The bar-lgura twisted and tore itself off of the spearhead, ignoring the blood that erupted from the wound, but Dana did not hesitate, thrusting again and again before the demon could recover and launch another attack.  The demon staggered, the three penetrating thrusts pouring its lifesblood out upon the stones.  It managed one more weak swipe that Dana dodged easily, coming back with another thrust that ended it.  Benzan had nowhere to run to, so he traded blows with his foe, scoring deep cuts with his magical sword of the planes while the demon’s punishing counters ripped into him.  His mail kept him from being torn apart, but those mithral links could not save him from the impacts that savaged his insides until he felt like a single massive bruise.  The magic of his gifted blade, however, was having an impact, slicing through the demon’s flesh with startling ease, and the fiend was starting to feel the effects of its several wounds.  With a howl it surged forward again, claws outstretched.  Benzan dodged, expecting another assault against his already battered body, but the demon instead focused its attack upon the hateful weapon that had so hurt it.  Too late the tiefling realized what it was doing; he tried to draw the weapon back, but the demon’s claws clamped roughly on his wrist, twisting and crushing.  The bar-lgura took a nasty cut to one claw as its muscled fingers closed momentarily upon the blade, but then the sword was spinning out of Benzan’s grasp, to clatter noisily upon the flagstones a few paces away.  Benzan was able to break away as the demon roared in triumph.  As it started forward to renew its attack, however, the tiefling shook his head grimly. “Unlucky for you that I’ve got another one, pal.”Even as the demon lunged, Benzan’s bronze sword sliced up out of its scabbard as his waist, and he drew its edge across the demon’s chest as it leapt onto him.  His intelligent sword seemed somehow... diminished, its gleam faded in the strange blue light, but it still cut, the demon’s momentum dragging the blade deeper as it finished its stroke by tearing across its thick neck.  Blood gurgled from the wound as the demon struck Benzan once more before staggering drunkenly against the wall of the alley.  It recovered just in time to receive the killing thrust as Benzan plunged his blade to the hilt in its side.  Cal felt a tremor of fear as the demon hurtled over Lok and landed right in front of him, but having regained his equilibrium, he was far too experienced to give into hesitation.  The demon’s claws reached down for him, but they tore with futility against the just-enacted defense of the gnome’s stoneskin.  Frustrated, the demon’s eyes flared as it called upon its inherent magic, but before it could invoke the power, Cal lifted a wand and fired it into the demon’s face.  Demons have a potent resistance against most forms of energy.  But their weakness is sonics, and Alera’s gift, the sonically-substituted Melf’s arrows stored in the wand, exploited that fact.  The sonic arrow pulsed with energy as it blasted into side of the demon’s head, the vibrations blasting away flesh as the missile bored inward, continuing its work mercilessly.  The demon roared in pain, unleashing its power in an attempt to dispel the penetrating hurt, but it failed.  “You’ve got the violent carnage thing down, demon, but when it comes to magic, you’re an amateur,” Cal said coldly, firing another blast into its torso.Lok, meanwhile, was turning the tide in his own battle as well.  He’d taken several serious blows that had hurt him through his armor, but they were little enough against the terrible wounds he was inflicting with his axe.  He struck down the demon that he’d already injured, and turned to unleash a series of attacks on his remaining foe.  The demon tried a final gambit, trying use its own telekinesis power to knock the genasi down and leave him open to an assault, but it might as well have tried to knock down the city walls as dislodge a dwarven defender in his defensive stance.  Unfortunately for the demon it had not moved out of Lok’s reach before trying its tactic, and it quickly succumbed to a final devastating series of blows.  Quiet returned to the alley as the final demon fell.  None had retreated, and the alley was full of the stench of hot blood and ruined flesh.  Six ruined heaps lay crowded in the narrow space.  A short distance away, at the mouth of the alley where it met another busy avenue, the noise of the city returned, its residents unaware or uncaring about the violence that had just been wrought.  Lok tried to clean his axe, although it was a mostly futile gesture, as all of them were sprayed with the blood of their foes mixed in with their own.  Dana quickly attended to their more serious injuries, but none of them wanted to linger her longer than was necessary. “Let’s get out of here,” Cal said, and the others quickly agreed. With that, they returned to the streets of Zelatar.</blockquote>

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