Crystal Quest Aftermath, Part 17
8-27-05
Once combat has ended, Sarai pokes around a corner, and runs into Atheele, who is ransacking an armory. After they stock up, Oy-aht finishes her transformation into her cloud form, and scouts off to find where Salorvin might be. After a few moments, she returns, and takes the form of a large arrow, telling them of what she found. The group charges down the hall, Sarai in the lead, and then she stops, halting everyone else.
The party plans their attack for a few moments, ensuring that no one gets too close to Salorvin when they encouter him - not, at least, until the casters finish unleasing their magics. Once that's agreed and understood, the party moves on. They know that there's only a room between them and the altar Oy-aht found, so Andune takes the lead, being the hardest to hit in the party.
They all enter into a large circular chamber, about 40' in diameter, packed with 13 Slavaakian soldiers. Sarai is first up to bat, using another one of her scrolls of Fireball, creating a burst of fire the very size of the room. The soldiers are nice and toasty, and Sarai fortunately manages to exclude the mist-form of Oy-aht, who was first within the room and very near to the edge of the fireball's effect. All of the soldiers are KO'd.
Andune heads towards the next corridor towards the altar chamber, and slyly peeks down the hall. She sees a line of soldiers, going back into the dark rear of the hall. Seizing the moment, she fires an arrow down the hall, pegging a guard. Atheele dashes into the room, and fires another shot, killing the injured guard. Akili moves up into the chamber's entrance, next to Sarai, not wanting to enter too far into the room.
That caution is proved to be well-founded, as more soldiers pour into the chamber. More combat ensues. Sarai unleashes another fireball scroll, emptying the room again. The soldiers are beginning to have morale problems, but they leap around a corner and ambush Sarai, also incidentally drawing up to Akili. He uses his Rod of Chaos to fling a Prismatic Spray at the group in front, wiping out all but two, and turning one to stone.
More guys abruptly pile up behind Akili and Sarai, but they fortunately have terrible aim. Akili loses a few hairs when one arrow whizzes right by his ear. Out in the chamber, two large golems emerge from other corridors, followed by a Very Large one, which has a small guy on top of it. Akili uses his Rod of Chaos again, casting Wild Strike. He abruptly has a Mighty Sword in his hand, which he flings at the largest golem. It does considerable damage upon impact, and vanishes, but the golem is not quite killed.
Oy-aht, still turning into solid form, finds the room where Salorvin is currently situated, and has a row of men in front of him. Atheele and Andune fight more guards, and Akili flings his all four of his seeds of growing at the largest golem, quickly entangling it.
The other smaller golems move up to Akili and Sarai, as well as the remaining guards that had tried to sneak up behind him and Sarai (whom is now next to Akili). The two of them are heavily on the defensive, trying to avoid blows from everyone, while the large golem breaks free of half of its bindings.
A lightning bolt flies down the corridor, tagging Atheele and some of his own guards, and the golem that's in front of Akili. Atheele drinks a healing potion after suffering massive damage; Andune is also caught in the blast, but avoids the brunt of it. When Akili has an opportunity, he retreats a short ways towards the corridor and peeks down the hall. Spotting Salorvin at the far end, and within range, he gathers his power and shouts: "Chaos ATTACK!" There is a tremendous burst of magic, and Salorvin is immediately incased in a block of some kind of base element that's similar to stone, but determining what it is will require closer inspection. While that is somewhat anticlimatic, it is without a doubt quite effective, as it appears to instantly kill him. Akili is eminently satisfied, having finally mastered one of the strongest offensive effects, on an absolute scale, known to chaos mages.
Oy-aht, having to still deal with the rest of the guards that had been protecting Salorvin, summons her handy Hound Archon again to assist, and the pair of them start hacking their foes apart.
Back in the large chamber, Sarai now uses her own fire spell to try to destroy the golems. She kills a few other guards, and destroys one of the three, but the largest one is still standing.
Atheele, finishing off the guard he was tangling with, and seeing that Oy-aht has the rest of them well in hand (or more appropriately, fist and foot), now moves up the hall back to the chamber, and fires at largest golem several times, until it finally topples. The little guy who had been riding it manages to jump off, but is now rather exposed.
Akili takes the opportunity to Wild Strike the little guy with a 26 sharpened, pointed sticks (pencils!), which go straight through his plate mail armor, but he's surprisingly still standing.
More fighting goes on, with all of the golems finally destroyed, and the party works on mopping up the remainders. The little guy just manages to throw off a Polymorph effect, and flees for his life. The rest are killed.
Sarai goes to check out the petrified soldier, while Akili makes a beeline for Salorvin. After verifying that he is extremely dead, Akili asks if Sarai can store the pillar in her Super Bag of Holding. Sarai is happy to oblige, and it is thus done. Also, now that there is a pause, Akili finally checks out the portable hole he found earlier, which ends up being a portable Dimension Door spell - that is, the far end is fixed in space to an area near a temple, apparently to Koron, in Slavaak. The only people he sees, however, are a bunch of peons carting dirt away - as the hole is about five feet above a small mountain of dirt, which is certainly from creating these underground caverns.
Oy-aht dispenses healing, as everyone is fairly injured, while there's some spare time.
The game is paused here, with the altar still needing to be checked out, and Akili still wishes to converse with Eldar.