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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Wulf Ratbane" data-source="post: 76954" data-attributes="member: 94">Lord of the Iron Fortress-- Part VIIDorn quickly busied himself with healing their minor wounds, then suddenly announced that he was leaving. “Haela’s business. I’ll send Shorty and Diessa along in the meantime.”“I thought this was Haela’s business,” Wulf grumbled. Losing Dorn for Diessa was a bitter pill, but it went down a bit sweeter when Shorty showed up. The little halfling was eager to get down to business. “Where to?” he asked, as they gathered up just inside the fortress entrance. “Well, let’s keep exploring this floor round the same way we have been,” Wulf suggested. “Counterclockwise.” Keldas nodded in agreement. The next door opened onto a magically darkened room. The party huddled briefly to bicker over how to tackle the room, but their decision was made for them as a toothy steel maw suddenly lunged out of the darkness. Karak was knocked off his feet and dragged into the room. There was a sickening crunch, followed by a shrill and lingering shriek of anguish.Keldas dispelled the darkness so they could move in. A steel predator had pinned Karak under its paws, while a second one nearby munched contentedly on his sundered long sword. A third predator sat nearby with a bemused look on its non-face.Shorty carefully dropped a hemispherical wall of force over two of the predators, while Wulf stepped up to deal savagely with the predator preoccupied with Karak. All things considered, it wasn’t too bad.But the loss of his magic longsword seemed to have shattered Karak’s spine, as well. He activated his helm of teleportation, hoping to teleport just a few feet away and re-enter the fray. Instead, he disappeared completely. The predator hardly missed a beat, switching quickly to focus on Wulf. He too was grappled and pulled into the thing’s embrace. “Gimme a sec, I got it,” Wulf said. He twisted, slipped out of its grasp, and brought Taranak around on it with crushing force. Smoke and flame burst around the wound, and the thing was so grievously wounded that Shorty easily finished it off with a magic missile.Inside the dome of force, the predators lay down to munch on the remains of Karak’s sword. He’d been slowly building up its enchantment, hoping one day that his temple would turn it into a full fledged Holy Avenger. So much for that. Eventually, Karak came shuffling back into the room with them. “The teleport popped me just outside the fortress.”“Forbiddance, I assume,” said Keldas. “Interesting effect.”“We’re leaving, right?” Karak asked.“What the hell for?” Wulf said.Karak tried his best to be condescending. “Well, in case you didn’t notice, I just lost my sword.”“Yer got another weapon, right?” Wulf asked, patting down his own bristling armory. Axe, dagger, hand axe, another dagger, light mace, dagger, darts… Check check check.“Yes, but I like my long sword. That’s my best weapon.”“Cry me a river,” Wulf said. “Next time yer know to diversify. Get out the bastard sword and let’s go.”Shorty pointed at the two predators he’d imprisoned. “What about these? That wall of force won’t last but a few minutes.”Wulf sighed. He really didn’t want to fight steel predators. They weren’t deadly, but those claws were hell on his shins. “Well,” said Shorty, sensing his hesitation. “How about I drop the wall of force and hit them with a prismatic spray? That would be fun…”Keldas arched an eybrow. “Shorty’s got some new tricks,” said the halfling, grinning from ear to ear.“I’d pay to see that,” said Wulf.Shorty prepared himself, dismissed the wall of force, and was just about to let fly with his prismatic spray, when a small boy suddenly appeared between him and his targets. Shorty paused only briefly to decide that small boys who appeared out of the thin Acheronian air in the fortress of an evil half-dragon were probably up to no good, and he let fly anyway.One predator was turned to stone, one was bathed in acid. The small boy was blasted with a ray of poison but it might as well have been a ray of gumdrops and lollipops for as much as he seemed to care.Definitely up to no good.The remaining predator dragged Wulf into its razor-sharp embrace, but Keldas was ready: He turned it into a fish.By now the small boy had started casting a spell. Wulf rolled to his feet and charged him with both hands wrapped around the haft of his axe. If only it could have been a real small boy, Wulf would have lopped his head off from the waist up. As it was, however, the thing had no trouble maintaining its concentration to finish its spell. A fireball exploded into the room. Wulf was unscathed, of course. He watched as Keldas’ own small boy,  now transformed into his natural dragon form, breathed a scorching bolt of lightning across... err... the other small boy.Wulf cursed. Vicious small-boy-on-small-boy action was one thing, but wasting precious time breathing lightning on outsiders was quite another. So he was quite surprised when the boy disappeared in the wake of the blast.“Did yer get him?” Wulf asked, highly skeptical. The dragon ignored him. It was staring over his shoulder to the back of the room, where a cloud giant and its pet hydra had suddenly appeared. The cloud giant was either fast, or it had been preparing for them. It cast a spell almost as soon as it appeared.And just as quickly—faster, actually, to be precise—Keldas countered it. “Abu Dalzim’s Horrid Wilting?” said the frail elf. “Ahh, I think not…”The hydra breathed—a bath of frosty cold. Wulf evaded the blast, but he wasn’t confident of his allies behind him. The blast, apparently, had frozen their brains.For starters, the assmar, unsatisfied with a “mere” Ghost Touch bastard sword, tried casting holy sword on his weapon—though in the cramped confines of the room, he was well within reach of the cloud giant. The giant wasted no time in utterly pasting the paladin with its huge flaming morning star. Karak buckled with the blow.Now it was Shorty’s turn, and he made the best of it by casting cone of cold. Onto the cloud giant. And its cold-breathing cryohydra.“Stupid sons of…” Wulf’s knuckles cracked in frustration. “Ach!”Keldas, at least, had his wits about him. He cast mass haste.“Now we’re talkin’.” Wulf twisted the ring of invisibility on his finger and disappeared. One short step brought the hydra within reach, and pulling his dagger into his off-hand, Wulf proceeded to dismantle the thing with grisly precision. When he reappeared, there wasn’t much left of the hydra.Wulf had hoped to lure the giant, confident of his inborn giant-slayin’ abilities, but the giant was simply having too much fun with the paladin. It heaved about with its morning star, slamming the assmar twice more despite his best defenses.Karak stumbled back into the corner, trying to escape the thing, but he’d clearly learned nothing from his previous mistake. Once again he dropped his defenses and turned his attention to his wounds, trying to lay on hands. The giant laughed—truth be told, Wulf couldn’t stifle his own chuckle—as the giant took advantage of the opportunity to knock the paladin to death’s door.Shorty picked up the slack, first casting slow on the giant and then hold monster for good measure.Against his better judgement, and with hands shaking from barely suppressed laughter, Wulf bound the paladin’s wounds… just in time.Wulf rolled the gargantuan morningstar into his portable hole as the others looked on in disbelief. Wulf just shrugged. “Ach… maybe Verachus will buy it. I’m not in this for my health, yer know.”After healing up they adventured on. Following their inward spiral of the tower, they opened onto a room with two of the blade-handed iron golems. The golems stood inert, but waiting. They decided to backtrack before triggering the golems.Spiraling out to the outside of the tower, they found what appeared to be the cloud giant’s bedroom. Wulf snuck in, needlessly wary of traps, and looted the room for the few gems he could find. And that was it. They’d seen everything there was to see, so it was back to the iron golems. Wulf sighed. “I’m looking forward to tangling with these about as much as having my pants full of steel predators.” Without Dorn, and knowing the paladin’s backup weapon wouldn’t so much as scratch the finish on them, Wulf knew he’d be handling the brunt of the combat.Shorty tugged Wulf back by his belt. “Pardon…” he said, as he cast a wall of force that trapped the two golems safely into the corner. “Moving right along,” he said. “Quickly though.” He wagged his stumpy finger in warning. His spell wouldn’t last forever.The golems guarded a short, narrow passage that led out of the room and ended in two doors.  They could feel heat emanating from the doors. Wulf turned and hustled everyone back out of the room so he could work them over for traps.Grand adventures call for grand heroes, Wulf thought. He looked around the corner at his comrades, who waited patiently for him to detect any traps the doors might hold. Wulf knew full well that his skills—though often tested—were useless. He gritted his teeth and just yanked the bloody doors open.Wulf was never quite certain what the two symbols were that he triggered that day, but he could tell from the queasiness in his guts that only his epic fortitude and dwarven resilience to magic saved him from an unexpected date with Haela. Or Moradin. Or whoever the hell was runnin’ the show.The doors opened onto two staircases: one up, one down. Wulf called the party over and gestured at the staircases. “Decisions, decisions,” he mused.“I think we should retreat and regroup,” suggested the paladin.A tiny, mocking voice piped up from behind. “Aww, does Karak miss his wittle sword?” Shorty was uncharacteristically bitter. Wulf was liking him more by the minute.“Up we go,” Wulf said.The stairs at the top ended in a door that resisted all their attempts to open it. Shorty tried to dispel it, to no avail. “Are yer sure yer usin’ that spell right?” Wulf asked. Shorty ignored him and tried again. And again. And again. Four times, no luck.While Wulf was busy both admiring the halfling’s tenacity and bemoaning his general ineptitude, and Shorty was trying to curse his way through the door, Keldas glided past to think his way around the problem. He disintegrated the wall beside the door. He stepped aside to give everyone a clear view of the room inside. The room was dark—not so much magically dark as rather supernaturally so—but they could make out rows and rows of dark, tattered hangings. It was like a side-show haunted house, divided up by curtains to screen the deeper portions of the room. They were unanimous in their suspicions. Even the most optimistic adventurer couldn’t help a sense of paranoia at the creepy décor.“Who’s going in?” asked Karak, trying unsuccessfully to keep the tone in his voice from betraying the answer he already knew. “Well,” said Wulf, “I have an idea for starters. Diessa, cast a divine storm in there—about head height—and shred those hangings to pieces. Then we can talk about who’s goin’ in.”Diessa complied and in moments, the curtains were shredded around the room. Though the room was darker than it should be, they could see into it. There was lots of dust, and… were there bits of bone here and there?Wulf looked at Karak.“Don’t worry,” he said. “One o’ them curtains drops down an’ surrounds yer, I promise to come in and hack on yer. Ach, it, rather.”After much coaxing, Karak took the first tentative steps into the room. “What exactly do you want me to do here, Wulf?”Wulf kept a safe, respectable distance from the room, and called in. “Yer know. The usual. Kick some o’ them bones around. Disturb things. If there’s an altar, lick it!”The paladin shuffled around in the scraps. Ere long he discovered a small black pouch. He picked it up and came trotting out of the room. Wulf retreated from the paladin’s proffered pouch. Grabbing Keldas, he hustled him forward. “Looks like magic, elf. Check ‘er out.”Keldas took the pouch. “Hmm… Conjuration magic.” He opened the pouch. A huge, cat-like, ghostly figure suddenly appeared and attacked the wizard. Karak acted so quickly Wulf barely had time to be impressed. The ghost-touch bastard sword whistled out and sliced the hellish, hissing creature in half quicker than you could say, “Fras!”The pouch contained a valuable black pearl, and as the room had no other methods of entry or exit, and the party was otherwise stymied, Wulf amused himself by arguing with the paladin over the pearl. “Can I have that pearl for my dragon?” “No.” “Please?” “Hell no.”“Quiet, you two,” Keldas said. “The tower is obviously larger than just this single room. I am thinking of a way past these walls.”“Just disintegrate it again,” suggested Shorty.“I have used my only disintegration for the day.”“Tee hee!” snorted Shorty.Keldas snapped his fingers. “Polymorph Any Object,” he said. And like that, he turned a large section of the iron wall into mud.Wulf stared at the oozing slop. “Mud? MUD? Yer can turn it into anything yer want, anything in the world, and that’s the best yer come up with? How about diamond dust? Or a nekkid woman?”Diessa rolled her eyes and folded her arms across her chest. “Please, can we move along?”“Nice rack!” Wulf exclaimed, pushing past the priestess.The gap opened onto a vast chamber—definitely giant-sized, Wulf thought—with a large table, chairs, and a long curtain that served as the western wall. But it was the weapons rack on the southern wall, full of masterwork blades, that lured Wulf into the room. Most of the weapons were giant-sized, but Wulf studied them briefly with a craftsman’s curiosity. They bore Imperagon’s maker’s mark.“Wulf, come check out this desk,” said Shorty. Wulf stumped his way over to the east side of the room and gave the desk a cursory once-over before coming across a metal box. Like the door they had experienced earlier, the box somehow “resisted” being opened.Wulf now moved to the door next to the weapons rack. Though the party was still mulling about in the room behind him, the lack of enemies on the upper floor had lulled Wulf into a false sense of security. He tugged open the door.The door opened immediately onto the corner of an L-shaped balcony that overlooked a deeper chamber below—an area of the lower level they had not previously uncovered. Wulf spotted two giants standing on the lower level—even with his limited powers of observation he could hardly miss them, especially as they were staring right at him and reaching for hefty boulders.“Sorry, wrong room,” Wulf said, speaking Giantish. He hadn’t found much use for it since Halma died, but he was glad to have it handy. He casually slammed the door.“SHORTY!” he hissed. “Get up here and chain lightning them-- again and again!”“No way,” Shorty said. “Maybe you guys get in front, gimme some cover first, I’ll do it.”“For goodness sake!” Keldas moaned. “All these demands, you’d think he was a teamster or something.”It took them far too long to get themselves organized and open the door again. The scene was a little different when they yanked the door open again.Two steel predators. Two fire giants. The duergar monk. An old woman-- with Keldas’ staff. A gelugon, no doubt summoned from that staff. The evil “trumpet archon,” aka, small boy #2. Helkitren. And Imperagon.Wulf drew his weapons. “Let’s roll.”Wulf was jostled out of the way as Keldas and the dragon plowed into the room. An unexpected move, Wulf thought, but the element of surprise was already lost to Imperagon and his allies. Imperagon cast a spell and a ghostly warhammer appeared in the air above Keldas.“Oooh! Watch out,” Keldas sneered. “He’s a low-level cleric!”True enough, Wulf thought. Is that the best he’s got?Wulf could hear Shorty’s incantations behind him. The hair on the back of his neck stood up, in anticipation of the chain lightning that would blast their enemies apart—but nothing happened. Shorty’s spell fizzled, countered by some unholy aura that protected all their enemies. He tried again, but his second spell fared no better.Shorty cut loose with a blast of profanity that turned even Wulf’s ears red. “This sucks! I’m useless! I’m teleporting home!”“Nooooo!” Keldas shouted. His eye was on the prize: the staff carried by the old woman.From somewhere ahead Keldas heard an infernal cackle and the sound of spellcasting. An invisible devil—clearly, a very powerful devil at that—cut loose with a meteor swarm, with Shorty at ground zero. Shorty’s skin flared, red and scaly, and he counted himself lucky that he’d prepared a dragonskin spell earlier.“Impressive,” said the fallen archon. “Now try this.”Shorty resisted the destruction spell—barely. “And this…” Shorty lit up like a lightning rod at the center of a chain lightning.“They’ve got a hard-on for Shorty today…” Wulf couldn’t defend the halfling against spells. There was nothing he could do but hold the door.Two steel predators crept up in front of Wulf and roared. Shorty was completely shredded by the sonic blast. Dead and gone—but at least the roaring drowned out the tiny whimper.Keldas knew he’d be next. He cast power word stun on the old woman, to no effect, followed by maze, with similar, unsatisfactory results.“We can’t get spells through!” he groaned.The old woman flashed a toothy grin and blasted Keldas with a spell from the staff. Wulf didn’t recognize the spell, but he could recognize the effects from the vapid stare on Keldas’ face. A fate worse than death: feeblemind. With rocks from the giants raining down around them, Wulf grabbed Shorty’s remains, Diessa cast plane shift, and they all returned home. Well, almost home.Wulf and Diessa compared notes. At a conservative estimate, they were several hundreds of miles from the Forge, with no easy way to teleport home besides the paladin’s helm.Wulf unrolled the portable hole. “Not again,” said Karak.“It’s all right,” Wulf said. “Keldas, get in the hole!”With all the happy obedience of a lobotomized puppy, Keldas obliged. Wulf tossed Shorty’s remains in after him. Wulf stared at the dragon. “Yer turn, boy.”The dragon transformed and hopped into the hole. He stood looking at Shorty’s remains, and seemed genuinely touched. They rolled up the hole, and Karak teleported back to the Forge with the two dwarves. The Old Man was waiting for them.“You’ve failed again?” he asked.“Sarcasm noted,” Wulf said. “Just get busy with the feeb-healin’ and peck-ressurectin’.”Karak sat down with a pathetic sigh.“And get somebody to fix his bleedin’ sword!” Wulf stomped off to make his own preparations.***Soon enough, as usual, they were ready to try again. Imperagon had beefed up his front gate security: Two giants, a golem, and—if the dragon was to be believed—some kind of invisible bird now guarded the front door.One of the giants turned to run for help and was immediately disintegrated by Keldas. Playing tit-for-tat, the bird somehow attempted to disintegrate Keldas, but the unusually hearty elf resisted its effects. The battle was soon in full swing; with Shorty and Keldas lending magical support, Wulf and Karak took care of the golem and the dragon tangled with the invisible bird. Two concussions and an inertial barrier later, they realized the bird was some kind of psion. Little help against the jaws of the dragon, however. Soon enough, Imperagon’s guards were dispatched, and they stepped to the front doors. They were locked—and the password had apparently been changed.“Yeah,” Wulf said. “That’ll stop me.” Taranak blazed to life in Wulf’s hands and he started hacking his way through the front doors. After a moment of disbelief, Karak stepped up to lend a hand with his reforged sword.“Remind me,” said Shorty. “Why are doing this, again? Other than HIS quest?” He pointed an accusatory finger at the paladin.“Well, there are some dwarven souls trapped here,” said Keldas, clearly struggling with it himself.“Oh, so NOW there’s a point,” said Shorty. Wulf was through the doors and in the sudden silence overheard their conversation. “Ey! Don’t look at me. I’m here for adamantium, and if I’m not mistaken, there’s the little matter of yer staff…”Wulf booted his way through the remains of the doors and led the charge up the stairs. The dragon bounded alongside, his keen eyes, ears, and nose on the look-out for invisible enemies. “Mephit,” he announced. “Running off to warn them, no doubt…”“This is suicide… again,” groused Shorty.“It’s all right, I got a plan,” Wulf said.“Now?” asked the dragon.“Not yet. When yer see two out o’ three bad-asses,” Wulf said. He handed a scroll to the dragon. “Wait a second, what’s up?” asked Karak.“Anti-magic shell.” Wulf shrugged. “But that will remove all his protections…”Wulf tried hard to contain his exasperation, hoping there was a chance that logic would persuade the paladin. “Yer see anybody else standin’ here as good in the buff as yer dragon?”“Keep that thing away from me,” Shorty said.“Seconded,” said Keldas.“I don’t mind,” said the dragon. “It’s a chance…”Karak was unconvinced.“He’s a friggin’ dragon,” said Wulf. “Not a horse. Not a boy. Grow a pair already.”“Maybe he should read it now, then,” said Karak. He was slowly warming to the idea.“Two out o’ three,” said Wulf. “Old woman and Imperagon,”“Imperagon’s a low-level cleric,” Keldas reminded him.“… Trumpet archon and pit fiend,” Wulf continued. “Yer get the idea, right?”Diessa was wasting no time with conversation. She cast freedom of movement on Wulf and silence on a small stone. That would reduce the impact of the steel predators. She gestured to the door. The spellcasters backed up and Wulf booted the door. A gelugon stood ready on the balcony, towering over the doorway, but he was too slow to handle Wulf. Taranak blossomed in his right hand and his chaos mace found its way into his other. His helm of protection from evil would protect him, but with a rousing cry of “Ferkit!” Wulf was committed to action. Mere seconds later the gelugon was nearly out of the fight. Wulf’s wide stance left no doubt that they’d have to go through him if they wanted to hassle his friends behind him.Diessa cast recitation and invisibility purge while giants from the floor below the balcony hurled rocks. Wulf held his ground until he heard the dragon reading the scroll behind him. Wulf crossed his fingers, well aware that there was some chance the dragon would flub the powerful magic. Soon, however, he felt his magic items wane, and he stepped aside long enough for the dragon to slink through the door and charge the old woman. The pit fiend appeared, and proving himself a creature of habit, he sent another meteor swarm Shorty’s way. Once again, red dragonskin made the difference between life and death for the little sorcerer.Now wrapped in an anti-magic field and faced with the powerful jaws of a dragon, the old woman took the better part of valor, tucked up her skirts, and raced for the back of the room. The trumpet archon scoffed at this turn of events, and it soon became clear that he had his own agenda. He cast greater dispelling on Karak and started making his way along the balcony to get to grips with his hated foe. Shorty cast slow on a group of villains that had assembled in front of the door. Among the predator, gelugon, the duergar monk, and the smoke mephit, only the mephit seemed affected. Keldas was puzzling over the insane amount of spell resistance that all of Imperagon’s allies seemed to share, and he finally figured out that it was due to an unholy aura that protected them all. He had little time to act on his knowledge, however, as the gelugon suddenly disappeared from Wulf’s reach and teleported itself into the room behind him. Shorty, Keldas, and Diessa were all within reach of its wicked claws. Imperagon appeared suddenly as he stepped within range of the invisibility purge and he took a swipe at Wulf. “Bring it!” Wulf grinned as he easily dodged the blow. Wulf’s attention was diverted from the huge fire elemental that suddenly appeared on the balcony. Unable to attack Wulf directly due to his protection from evil, the creature took a swipe over his head at Karak. Wulf felt the heat wave pass over his head but didn’t give the creature a second thought.Helkitren, Lord of the Salamanders, stepped out from the room below and showered the group with lightning. That bastard is three or four adventures overdue for his ass-kickin’, Wulf thought. What with Imperagon, Helkitren, and the sight of the dragon down below, absolutely freaking out on one of the giants with jaws, claws, and wings, Wulf didn’t see the steel predators leaping at him. The first dragged him down with its jaws and the second clamped down on Taranak. Its teeth glanced harmlessly off the shaft.“Greater magic weapon…” Wulf growled. “No go.”The female duergar stepped up to Wulf and rained blows on him with fists and feet. “That would work better with an axe,” Wulf said, still struggling in the jaws of the steel predator. “Gimme just one second, I’ll show yer…”“Enough boasting,” said the archon. He cast destruction, and once again Wulf felt the now-familiar calling of Haela Bright-axe. Bad luck now could kill him. I’ll take my chances, he thought. He brushed away thoughts of Haela and steeled himself against the spell. It hurt—but he wasn’t dead. Beneath the claws of the gelugon, Keldas bent his concentration on dispelling the unholy aura. Twice he tried greater dispelling, twice he failed. Shorty, too, failed with his own greater dispelling. He wasn’t willing to waste a second action, however; he cast confusion into the room—but it was countered by the unholy aura! The gelugon chuckled and created a wall of ice to separate the three spellcasters from Wulf, Karak, and the dragon.It began to dawn on the group that they were losing… again.Karak stepped up to lend aid to Wulf, landing blow after blow and wounding the steel predator just enough for Wulf to finish it off and regain his feet. Wulf’s mace swept out and landed two powerful blows into Imperagon’s ribs. Imperagon staggered back and Wulf took a quick step of his own back through the doorway, putting the wall of ice at his back.Diessa cast dispel evil and with one touch, the gelugon’s wall of ice was gone. They could see into the room again, but it wasn’t a pretty sight: The giants had surrounded the dragon and were dismantling it limb from limb. Its duty unfulfilled, the dragon was forced to flee—and was nearly killed in the fleeing. “To the side door!” shouted Karak. A door to their left led off the balcony and (if they were lucky) should join up with the others in the back room. The dragon limped and bounded towards the door, well aware that the slinking mephit was on its heels. The dragon knew it was near enough death that the mephit might actually finish it off. But it was the evil archon on the balcony that was the prime concern.All of Karak’s focus was suddenly on his dragon and he just barely pulled his sword out of the snapping jaws of the last predator. Their enemies, sensing weakness, converged on the paladin. The duergar monk tumbled past Wulf, hoping to strike Karak with a stunning blow, but the paladin’s growing determination was not to be deterred so simply. Imperagon stepped over to block the paladin’s path. Summoning his will, Karak twice tried to smite Imperagon, but his determination had given way to desperation, and he missed wildly. Imperagon’s own hammer struck true, however, and Karak was pressed back. He could only watch in frustration as the giants hurled boulders at the retreating dragon, determined to bring it down. By the narrowest of margins, the dragon somehow cheated death and escaped into the side door—with the archon in hot pursuit.Back in the room behind them, Keldas attempted to disintegrate the gelugon, and failing that, followed with a power word stun. This time, at last, his magic was true. And while the gelugon stood reeling, Shorty was finally able to dispel the unholy aura!A second gelugon, summoned by the old woman—more precisely, summoned by Keldas’ staff—suddenly appeared in their midst, cackled wildly, and created a new unholy aura. A third gelugon created a wall of ice across the main doorway. They were right back in the frying pan. The laughter of their foes was drowned out by Wulf’s howl of frustration. “Sons o’ bitches!” Wulf stepped back into the room and, in one swift stroke, crushed the skull of the stunned gelugon.The old woman was non-plussed. A fireball streaked from the tip of Keldas’ staff and detonated in the room, blasting friend and foe alike. Among her allies, only the duergar monk was harmed—and neither the old woman nor Wulf and his allies gave her a second thought as she fled the battlefield.There was no doubt that Keldas was the more experienced caster as he managed to fire off spell after spell. However, though he seemed able to overcome the unholy aura, he couldn’t seem to best his enemies’ natural resistance. The second gelugon easily resisted both a polymorph any object and a hold monster. Karak raced across the back room and threw wide the door into the hallway where his dragon had retreated. He cast heal mount and the dragon was back in the fight. Unfortunately, Karak had wounds of his own to worry about, and the archon was eager for his blood. The archon’s trumpet transformed into a huge sword.Wulf suddenly burst past Karak into the hallway, and together with the dragon assailed the archon. The creature’s defenses were nigh impenetrable—its natural armor, its supernatural reflexes, and its skill at arms were too much. The archon sneered at Karak and turned to stab its sword into the dragon’s chest.Back on the balcony, their foes suddenly realized that the battle lines had completely shifted. Helkitren fireballed the wall of ice and a giant and a steel predator charged through. The pit fiend stepped through a dimension door and attempted an aura of fear, but the group had come together around Karak and the paladin’s courageousness carried them all through.Karak cast Holy Sword on his weapon. Clearly, he was pissed.He stepped up to strike the archon, one!  two! three blows!—or was it four? Truthfully, Wulf lost count in the deafening whiff-whiff-whiff of unsuccessful strikes. Shorty cast cone of cold at the enemies pouring into the room. His first attempt, in a nod to the traditional uselessness of halflings, failed utterly to beat the spell resistance of their foes. But the second attempt! A wave of cold washed over the giant and the predator in the room, killing the giant dead and wounding the predator severely. The spell picked up momentum as it passed through the chilling breach in the wall of ice, and spilled out again onto the balcony, where it blasted the fire elemental, Helkitren, and Imperagon.“To hell with this!” shouted Helkitren, his wiry beard still steaming. “Imperagon, the deal is broken!” And with a puff of sulfur, the salamander was gone!“Well done, Shorty!” shouted Keldas. “One down is good enough for me-- retreat!”Keldas heard a low dwarven growl from the next room. “We are not leaving without your staff.”“I have almost no sp—““WE ARE NOT LEAVING WITHOUT YOUR STAFF.”“You may not leave at all, mortal!” screeched a gelugon, as yet another wall of ice sprang up—this time, inside the room and across the side door. Wulf, Karak, and the dragon were once again separated from the spellcasters. A second gelugon entered the room and hissed at Shorty. “I suggest you drop all your magical protections…” Shorty’s will was weak, but among his various spells, only his mage armor could be dismissed at will. On the other side of the wall of ice, the hallway was blasted with heat as the huge fire elemental flowed towards them. It moved past Wulf, still ignoring him, and put a fiery fist into the face of the dragon. “Enough of this bullsh--,” Wulf grumbled. He dashed down the hallway, past the archon and the elemental, and hurled  himself off the balcony. He flipped, rolled to his feet, and continued his headong charge right into the old woman. Taranak flashed eagerly as he swung it overhead, right down the center of the old woman’s forehead. Her wide-eyed, startled look gave way to an evil sneer as Wulf’s blow struck empty air. “Displacement,” he said. “Oh, yer sneaky whore…”Back in the hallway Karak had his hands full with the archon, who had finally decided to focus his attacks on the paladin. The dragon did his best, breathing lightning across the archon, elemental, and even the mephit, but for the most part their other-wordly foes were unimpressed. Keldas struck and struck again at the archon with his holy sword, missing repeatedly. With a burst of hasted action, he finally struck true, and the sword bit deeply into the evil heart of the archon. The spellcasters were not having a good day. Imperagon walked into the room and breathed fire across them, the pit fiend cast a fireball, and the predator was snapping relentlessly at Diessa’s warhammer. Keldas managed to summon a dire bear to deal with the predator, while Shorty’s fingertips flashed with two prismatic sprays in a row. Unfortunately, among the various rays that struck, their infernal enemies had little trouble with fire, electricity, and poison. The gelugon responded with a cone of cold that struck them all—including the steel predator. The second gelugon did the same, striking even Imperagon. The gelugon’s gaffes were little consolation: when the frost and steam cleared, Diessa lay dead.On the floor below, Wulf fought alone against the old woman. She skipped back several paces and cast a charm monster on Wulf, and he was tempted once again to call for Haela’s luck. Not today, he thought. By his own will, the spell failed. The old woman saw the determination in Wulf’s eyes and thought better of the direct approach. She conjured a crackling blue fire shield to protect her. Wulf charged up and pushed her roughly against the wall. If he was going to strike through her displacement, he needed time to bring all his weapons to bear. Another giant had entered the hall with Karak and the dragon. Sensing that the archon was a lost cause, the dragon unleashed its fury on the giant. His jaws struck a telling blow, followed by two claws and a rake with its wingtips. Feeling a rising confidence, his tail lashed out behind and struck the archon!“I’ll deal with you in a moment, little gnat…” said the archon, pressing the attack on Karak. Dim explosions rattled the wall of ice behind him and the paladin knew that things were not going well for Keldas and Shorty.Imperagon cast a fireball on the pair of them, while the predator wrestled viciously with the dire bear. Keldas could tell that the bear would not long survive, and neither he nor Shorty could contend with a steel predator. “We’ve done our best,” he said. Grabbing Shorty and Diessa’s remains, Keldas cast plane shift, and they were gone. Fighting defensively, Karak drew on his divine powers to heal himself with one hand even as his other hand wielded holy vengeance. As the giant leaned in to attack him, Karak struck its head clean off its shoulders. So powerful was the blow that it carried straight through into the archon, powering past its defenses and biting deeply into its side once again. There was little time for Karak to enjoy the grim satisfaction, as the gelugons began teleporting into his hallway, looking for new prey. The pit fiend followed close behind, announcing its arrival with a wall of fire that surrounded Karak and the dragon. “Change back,” Karak said. “We need to go!”“But… the others?”“They must already have left,” said Karak.“Wulf?”“I am sure he got out ok,” Karak lied. The paladin grabbed his boy, activated his helm of teleportation, and fled-- abandoning Wulf to his fate.***The old woman ran from Wulf once again, clearly knowing the odds were on her side as long as she kept the dwarf off his game. She tried charm monster again, and failing once again, conjured up a hemispherical wall of force to trap him once and for all. “Cool your heels a bit, dwarf,”Wulf nodded. Taranak and his mace were quickly and coolly stashed on his belt and Wulf reached over his back to draw something from his magic haversack. He brought his arms down and leveled a cocked and loaded crossbow at the old woman. A look of fear and recognition filled her eyes. “That’s right,” Wulf said. He crimped the toe of his boot against the inside of the wall of force so he’d know instantly when it vanished. “I’m on to yer game. Nobody resists a maze, rakshasa.” The pair of gelugons and the pit fiend arrived to surround Wulf, but he never took his eye or his aim off the old woman. Still, it was looking pretty bad. Wulf held the crossbow under one arm and grabbed a scroll of plane shift off his belt. He unrolled the scroll and scanned its contents. Complete jibberish. “Dammit.”The pit fiend stepped forward to demand his surrender. Wulf feigned deafness. “Eh? Can’t hear you through this wall!” “Lower your weapons and perhaps we can come to an… arrangement.” Fiery spittle dropped from its jaws and fell hissing to the floor.“What?” Wulf asked. “You mean… this?” He held out the useless scroll and grinned.An ass to the last, Wulf thought. He gave himself a little thumbs up.Wulf suddenly found himself standing back in his Forge.“I’m saved! It’s a miracle!”“You got that right,” said the Old Man.Wulf had delayed just long enough. Once Keldas had plane shifted back, it was a simple matter for Shorty to teleport them back to the Forge, and thence to the Old Man.The paladin was returned by the same manner.“How did you get back?” he asked Wulf.“Not YOU,” Wulf said. The paladin’s boy spoke up. “I really thought you were better than this…”Karak felt a sudden coldness in his heart. Tyr was not pleased.The party fell to bickering for several minutes. “You left! I couldn’t see you!” the paladin protested. “I assumed you were dead or gone.”“Let me just see if I got this straight,” Wulf said incredulously. “Yer walk around the corner over there, I should just assume yer dead?”“Staying was pointless! What good would more death have served?”“I was pretty much fully healed,” the boy reminded him.“So, Tyr is, like, the God of Valor, right?” asked Keldas, feigning ignorance.“We were surrounded! That’s not valor, that’s suicide!”“Chickensh*t,” Shorty said.“And thank YOU, by the way,” Wulf said, rounding on Keldas. “Thanks for comin’ with me. Yer want that staff or NOT? I tell yer what, we get that thing back, yer better stick it in a friggin’ VAULT.”The Old Man stepped in to intercede. “I think you will need to visit your temple, Karak, to seek an atonement.”“I don’t think I WANT to atone!” yelled Karak.The rest of the group was stunned to silence, but Wulf smiled and pounced on the paladin’s moment of weakness. “Aye, I’m with yer! Screw the gods, right?”The argument continued unabated until the Old Man had heard enough. “I must resurrect Diessa.”“Well, we’re out of cash, yer leech.”The Old Man smiled. “Diessa is a child of Moradin. This one is on me.”“I told you getting rid of Alliane was a good idea,” Keldas deadpanned. “She just saved us eight grand.”***Karak eventually returned from his temple. “How’d it go?” asked Shorty. “There is room for atonement. I must complete my quest—without resorting to any of my divine abilities. I don’t know how they expect me to complete this quest as a…” Karak gulped. The very thought was making him ill. “As a  fighter.”“Interesting,” Shorty said, kicking back and putting his feet up. “We were just thinking about dropping the whole thing.”“Aye,” Wulf said. “So, ahh… good luck with all that.”Karak looked ready to cry.“Oh, cut it out,” Shorty said. “Unlike some people we don’t let our friends down. We’re not done yet.” “Pfft… These paladins today,” Wulf said. “Back in my day yer’d be stripped o’ yer powers, no questions asked. So shut up and count yer blessin’s.”“What’s the plan, then?”“I figure we do the same thing, only this time without all the runnin’ away and abandonin’ yer friends.”“Third time’s the charm,” said Shorty.“Do we try the anti-magic scroll again?” the dragon asked.“Next verse, same as the first!” Shorty sang.“I’m outta cash,” Wulf said. “I have a little tucked away,” Keldas admitted. “We’ll try it again.”**They returned to Acheron and prepped up about 200 yards off the main gate. “The guards have changed,” said the dragon.“What yer got?” Wulf asked.“A black golem... and a kyton—or so I’d guess from all the chains.”As they approached the gate, the kyton shouted, “Halt, in the name of the Lord of the Iron Fortress! I have been sent to parlay.”“Start parlayin’ then.” Wulf crossed his arms.“Imperagon seeks peace, and is prepared to offer you adamantine and baatorian steel to buy your favor.”Wulf spit. “We’re not leavin’ without the head of Imperagon.”Wulf paused. “Err... How much adamantine are we talkin’ here?”But it was too late. His allies had already begun the attack. Karak and the dragon rushed past in a fury, and it was all Wulf could do to keep up with the dragon.“Gotta protect him till we hit Imperagon!” Wulf said. “He’s my mobile fightin’ platform.”Shorty, Keldas, and Diessa stood in the back and applauded politely at Karak’s efforts—their spells were of no use against their foes. Keldas stepped forward for a moment as if to join the fight.“Hey, what are you doing?” Shorty asked. “Stay clear.”Keldas waved him off. “It’s all right. I’m going to cast rapid strikes on the false paladin.”With that aid and some timely healing from Diessa, they were once more inside the fortress. They paused just long enough for Shorty to dispel the forbiddance that permeated the area. “That might help a little...”Once again they charged up the stairs, threw open the door, and began their third and final assault on Imperagon. They had all learned a thing or two in their last encounter. The dragon flew inside, shielded with anti-magic, and hovered in mid-air for the entire battle, simply doing his part to keep three summoned gelugons suppressed. Shorty made quick work of their enemies with wall of force, seperating them out as best he could, and to counter the forcefields thrown up by their enemies, he used dimension door to keep the party on the offense. The old woman had changed forms for the occasion, this time appearing as a small boy; little did she know if there was one thing the paladin couldn’t resist, it was a chance to tangle with a small boy. Karak pressed the attack on her, striking blow after blow through her displacement, until at last she was forced to withdraw. She threw a wall of force around the paladin and the fallen archon, trapping the two nemeses inside together. Karak held for a moment while Wulf pounded on the outside of his force bubble. “What are yer waitin’ for?”Karak chose retreat over redemption. With the forbiddance wisely taken care of in advance, he was able to use his helm to teleport just outside the bubble, into the healing touch of Diessa. The archon followed quickly with dimension door, but Keldas was ready and sent him off with a maze spell.“That won’t hold him long,” Keldas warned. Indeed, the archon was back in mere moments, having simply used plane shift to escape the demi-plane.Keldas wasn’t finished by half. He cast power word stun on the pit fiend—adequately weakened by Shorty’s repeated blasts—and while Wulf and Karak set about dismantling the devil, Keldas summoned a dire bear to deal with the rakshasa. Thinking back on the number of times he’d been threatened by the grapple of the steel predators, he thought it only fair to give the rakshasa a taste of her own medicine.Huge claws grabbed the rakshasa and pulled it in. The rakshasa struggled for several rounds, using Keldas’ staff to detonate fireball after fireball right into the dire bear’s jaws, with no regard for itself, friend, or foe that might be nearby. But with Diessa standing behind the bear with a wand of healing-- the bear was so big, in fact, its ass protruded a good 10 feet outside the blast of the fireball-- there was no escape. The rakshasa fell, at last.Keldas scooped up his staff. “Let me show you how this is done!”He summoned an angelic deva. The deva casually killed the pit fiend with a backhand stroke and headed for the archon. “You’ve been very naughty, brother...”The archon didn’t stick around for his punishment.One by one, they mopped up their enemies until at last, only Imperagon was left, broken and beaten.Wulf grabbed him roughly. “Who’s yer daddy?”“Ashardalon,” Imperagon said. “Can’t you tell?”“Not really,” Keldas said. “We’d heard Ashardalon was kind of tough...”“Tell me what yer been doin’ with the souls of dwarves,” Wulf asked.“Working to complete an artifact for myself.”“What?”“The Blade of Fiery Might.”“Already got one.” Wulf said, shoving him away.“What else can you tell us about Ashardalon?” Keldas asked.“For the love of god,” Wulf said. “We just got done with one adventure, yer settin’ up the next one. Give it a friggin’ rest already.”Imperagon ignored him. “He has been revitalizing himself!” The dwarf grinned and would have laughed, but wisely choked it off. Keldas’ face didn’t show the slightest tolerance for a sense of humor, let alone megalomaniacal dramatics.“Revitalizing himself?” Keldas asked. His hands tightened on his staff.“He found a... power source. In the Abyss. Something to restore his heart.”“Yer know who destroyed that heart?” Wulf asked. He stood behind Keldas and pointed a silent, accusatory finger at him. HE DID! he mouthed.The deva stepped forward. “Allow me to take Imperagon into custody.”“I’m more the whackin’ persuasion, myself,” Wulf admitted. “He is harmless now,” the deva said. “A proper welcome—and an impenetrable cell—has been prepared for him in the heavens.”“All right, all right. I can agree to that.” Wulf said. “Just after I strip him naked and paint his ass blue.”</blockquote>

Verification