The Gates Open
Dramatis Personae:
Aurora Isilime, the Valley Elf Bard of Valor, Bae'qeshel of Lolth, and Lore Wizard, the Silver Tongued Siren, Knight of Summer
Charlotte, Aurora's violet Faerie Dragon familiar
Aurora Isilime, the Valley Elf Bard of Valor, Bae'qeshel of Lolth, and Lore Wizard, the Silver Tongued Siren, Knight of Summer
Charlotte, Aurora's violet Faerie Dragon familiar
Dervish, the Kasathe Brass Dragon Fighter and Dragon Blood Sorcerer, Knight of the Erl King
"Shadewing" Corvis Cairunis Umbrusalarim, the Shadow Elf Hexblade Warlock of the Raven Queen
Cloak, Shadewing's Empty Cloak familiar
Alfred, Shadewing's Raven familiar
Zorack, the Elftaur Ranger Bounty Hunter and Knight of Winter
Gewnter, the Falcon Monk and Zorack's companion
Alucard, the ancient all powerful wizard; formerly Oryn Talus, the ancient and mysterious halfling who has employed the party; also know as Cinder, the ancient power that is said to destroy every world
Cloak, Shadewing's Empty Cloak familiar
Alfred, Shadewing's Raven familiar
Zorack, the Elftaur Ranger Bounty Hunter and Knight of Winter
Gewnter, the Falcon Monk and Zorack's companion
Alucard, the ancient all powerful wizard; formerly Oryn Talus, the ancient and mysterious halfling who has employed the party; also know as Cinder, the ancient power that is said to destroy every world
Lan El'Mandragoran, the Human Paladin of Pelor
Aerathema, the Wood Elf Druid
Narg, there's really no way to describe Narg, Narg is just Narg
Sil'ilos'anon Braz'Dracon, the "Drow" Warlock Blood Mage of Lolth, and the new DEATH
Ralliakkan, the Drow Rogue, Knight of Fall
Mara Nemestk, the Human Champion who serves as Aurora's Knight
Comrades we have lost:
Elder Vish, Dervish's friend and mentor from his world, Knight of Spring- soul taken by the Knight of Y'Chuk
Ceidil Rein, the Human Champion who serves as Eurydice's Knight- taken by the outside, then killed by party
Eurydice, the Faerie Dragon Feylock, formerly Aurora's familiar- taken by the outside, then killed by party
Pharin Braz'Dracon, the Brass Dragon-Drow Conjurationist Wizard and Priest of Lolth- returned to Faerun
Andolin Braz'Dracon, the Brass Dragon-Drow Fighter/Beast Master- returned to Faerun
Lothar, the Sovani Smith and semi-Cleric of Moradin, High Priest of Lolth, Cleric of Istus, forced Cleric of Asmodeus; Kas Reincarnated - sacrificed to resurrect Alucard
Oryn Talus, the ancient and mysterious halfling who has employed the party- fractured himself into 4 parts to prevent cult from taking his soul
Willow Liadon, the Eladrin Arcane Trickster- sent to Elysium through a trap and was never heard from again
Sil'ilos'anon Braz'Dracon, the "Drow" Warlock Blood Mage of Lolth, and the new DEATH
Ralliakkan, the Drow Rogue, Knight of Fall
Mara Nemestk, the Human Champion who serves as Aurora's Knight
Comrades we have lost:
Elder Vish, Dervish's friend and mentor from his world, Knight of Spring- soul taken by the Knight of Y'Chuk
Ceidil Rein, the Human Champion who serves as Eurydice's Knight- taken by the outside, then killed by party
Eurydice, the Faerie Dragon Feylock, formerly Aurora's familiar- taken by the outside, then killed by party
Pharin Braz'Dracon, the Brass Dragon-Drow Conjurationist Wizard and Priest of Lolth- returned to Faerun
Andolin Braz'Dracon, the Brass Dragon-Drow Fighter/Beast Master- returned to Faerun
Lothar, the Sovani Smith and semi-Cleric of Moradin, High Priest of Lolth, Cleric of Istus, forced Cleric of Asmodeus; Kas Reincarnated - sacrificed to resurrect Alucard
Oryn Talus, the ancient and mysterious halfling who has employed the party- fractured himself into 4 parts to prevent cult from taking his soul
Willow Liadon, the Eladrin Arcane Trickster- sent to Elysium through a trap and was never heard from again
NOTE: Things will be mostly from Aurora's perspective. Anything in italics is from a third person, since the bard can't be everywhere at once.
***** Diamondice 2, CY 711, somewhere in the ocean
Almost instantly after the new Deck of Many Things appeared in Dervish's hand we were whisked away. Suddenly we were all under water, and the pressure was getting to us. I was able to cast something quickly to protect us from that. Alyssandra lit up the area around us and there were several colossal shapes floating in the icy waters around us. We both attempted to teleport away from wherever the fuck we were, but neither Alyssandra or I were able to.
A large eye opened in front of us as we tried to teleport... the eye was bigger than a fucking carriage. Scottie cast a spell to stop time to try to get us out of there, while Shade got closer to the eye, which narrowed at his approach. The spell hadn't frozen that thing. I attempted to teleport again to no avail. Then I felt my Mantle tug on me and we were all standing at the Stone Table, surrounded by the Queens.
The first member of the caravan who'd drawn from Dervish's Deck of Many Things had been sent to that creature by the Void card. He used his wishes to force the party to come rescue him. Luckily for him, Alfred saw the gem and grabbed it before the Queens whisked the party away.
At the table, Mab introduced us to a centaur named Zorack, who would be replacing Tsorig as her Knight of Winter. Shade tossed a soul gem at Syndall, suggesting she make the guy in there her new Knight of Autumn; this one had the oh so imaginative name of Myself. What the fuck is with these people's stupid names? With Vish dead, we needed a new Knight for Spring, and I suggested Scottie.
The final lock had broken, so we were being sent to the Gates to try to keep the Outsiders out. Scottie accepted the offer of the Spring Mantle once I explained to him that he couldn't be corrupted as long as he had it. While we needed Alyssandra, we couldn't risk her becoming evil, so she left to help the army. As soon as we were ready, the Erl King sent us to the battlefield.
Coming toward us was a hulking behemoth of a creature. It was at least fifty feet tall, and while humanoid in shape, that was where all similarities ended. This thing was related to the outside, so we had to destroy it no matter what. I was thirsty for blood anyways, so this should be fun. I enhanced Dervish's voice once we got there so he could call the Wild Hunt to aid us.
Shadewing began pounding on the big fucker, but didn't seem to be hurting him too much. The big guy flicked his hand at Shade, narrowly missing. It decided it didn't like him, and seemed to be actively working on smashing him. I summoned my Twin and we hit it with two meteor swarms, which it seemed to just absorb. That wasn't good...
Zorack had the thought that we should try to blow its fucking head off, so I pulled out my Twin's bombs- so mine would still be there. As we readied to hit it with the bombs, Scottie ran up to us, grabbed the bag, and hurled it at this thing. Myself pulled out that Alabaster Sword Tsorig had been running around with, turned into a fucking solar, and ran forward to engage. The big guy was focused entirely on Shade, swatting fruitlessly at him, it couldn't even so much as graze him.
We got everything set for when we set off the bomb, and as soon as it was about to go off, I popped to paradise with Zorack. I'm not sure what the others did, I couldn't reach them with my spell, but when we emerged a minute later, everyone was still alive... including the big guy.
Myself ran over to me and collapsed in exhaustion- I guess surviving that blast, plus being a solar takes a lot out of someone. I revived him quickly. We had one more bomb that was stronger than the last one. Rikkle had called it a nuke I think. I grabbed it from Dervish and hopped on Zorack's back so we could get it near the fucker's head. A blast behind me grabbed my attention, I turned to see Scottie crumple to the ground- he'd been blown up by his own magic.
The thing was still focused pretty much solely on Shadewing, and it still couldn't lay a finger on him. It was honestly a little pathetic. Then it unleashed a wave of force, knocking everyone away from it- Zorack twisted himself around to shield me from some of the blast. It had decided that it shouldn't focus completely on Shade anymore, and it twisted around to grab Zorack, holding both of it in its massive hand. I used a dimension door to get us out of its grasp.
Shadewing kept slashing at it, while it lashed out as Dervish, Zorack, and I, and I felt myself slip into unconsciousness. Charlotte revived me right away though. Once I was up, Zorack dropped the heavy duty bomb, and Dervish pulled everyone except Shade into his paradise- Shade went to the ethereal plane, apparently the dude wasn't fond of extradimensional spaces.
Shadewing took it on by himself, and managed to banish it moments before everyone exited Dervish's paradise.
There was this nasty looking trail of goo leading away from where we'd dropped the bomb, so I teleported us all to the end of it. We all began preparing a new trap for when it came back from Shade's banishment. When it returned it began screaming, hurting everyone's heads except mine. A huge boom followed it and a chunk of its shoulder was blown off. Lan had arrived just in time.
Our trap was 13 bombs, a delayed blast fireball, 50 flasks of radiant alchemical fire, a couple powerful magic items, and 100 mithril ingots. We all went to paradise when it was set off; but Lan and Shade stayed behind. They continued peppering it with cannon blasts while we were gone.
The Knight of Y'Chuk appeared, furious that the party had nearly killed his Juggernaut. Shade continued attacking the Juggernaut, until a red light enveloped it, and it stood completely still and erect. The Knight managed to disconnect Shadewing from his Mantle's power, so Shade's Cloak hit the Knight with six beads of force, in rapid succession. Lan shot the bead he was trapped in with the cannon and the Knight went flying.
The Juggernaut self-destructed, and its blast was so powerful that it nearly broke Zorack's rod of security- and Aurora accidentally made it sentient by wishing it couldn't have been broken by the blast.
I sent Shade three fucking sendings, but he didn't reply to any of them. I tried Lan next and all I got in response from him was his cannon blasts. So we decided to see what the fuck was going on out there. There was a peculiar energy in the air now, it was similar to radiant energy, but more insidious and poisonous. I think that was our fault.
I managed to reach Shade finally, apparently he'd gone back to the Stone Table to report in. I asked Lan to come back with us, but the odd energy wasn't hurting him, so he stayed and continued playing with his cannon.
I attempted to teleport us back to the Table, and of course things went awry. We ended up fucking Elysium. I instantly set up a plane shift, and the assholes nearby counterspelled it. The guards hit us all with dimensional anchors. I thought telling them we're Knights of the Fae would get them to let us leave- turns out I was wrong, they were now taking us all prisoner. I began fantasizing about how to kill these fuckers, I was up to 31 when Shade appeared.
Shade told them that he'd been sent to apprehend us... they didn't buy it. He was told to surrender and come peacefully. He told them it was a hostile act to to detain the envoy of the Raven Queen. As he spoke, a shadow began killing the guards. Narg had come to help. I made a new song for Narg up on the spot as he slaughtered these douchey Olympians, while Zorack picked the locks on everyone's shackles. As soon as Narg finished slaughtering them, Zorack dropped a well of many worlds and we all hopped in- more guards were coming.
Almost instantly after the new Deck of Many Things appeared in Dervish's hand we were whisked away. Suddenly we were all under water, and the pressure was getting to us. I was able to cast something quickly to protect us from that. Alyssandra lit up the area around us and there were several colossal shapes floating in the icy waters around us. We both attempted to teleport away from wherever the fuck we were, but neither Alyssandra or I were able to.
A large eye opened in front of us as we tried to teleport... the eye was bigger than a fucking carriage. Scottie cast a spell to stop time to try to get us out of there, while Shade got closer to the eye, which narrowed at his approach. The spell hadn't frozen that thing. I attempted to teleport again to no avail. Then I felt my Mantle tug on me and we were all standing at the Stone Table, surrounded by the Queens.
The first member of the caravan who'd drawn from Dervish's Deck of Many Things had been sent to that creature by the Void card. He used his wishes to force the party to come rescue him. Luckily for him, Alfred saw the gem and grabbed it before the Queens whisked the party away.
At the table, Mab introduced us to a centaur named Zorack, who would be replacing Tsorig as her Knight of Winter. Shade tossed a soul gem at Syndall, suggesting she make the guy in there her new Knight of Autumn; this one had the oh so imaginative name of Myself. What the fuck is with these people's stupid names? With Vish dead, we needed a new Knight for Spring, and I suggested Scottie.
The final lock had broken, so we were being sent to the Gates to try to keep the Outsiders out. Scottie accepted the offer of the Spring Mantle once I explained to him that he couldn't be corrupted as long as he had it. While we needed Alyssandra, we couldn't risk her becoming evil, so she left to help the army. As soon as we were ready, the Erl King sent us to the battlefield.
Coming toward us was a hulking behemoth of a creature. It was at least fifty feet tall, and while humanoid in shape, that was where all similarities ended. This thing was related to the outside, so we had to destroy it no matter what. I was thirsty for blood anyways, so this should be fun. I enhanced Dervish's voice once we got there so he could call the Wild Hunt to aid us.
Shadewing began pounding on the big fucker, but didn't seem to be hurting him too much. The big guy flicked his hand at Shade, narrowly missing. It decided it didn't like him, and seemed to be actively working on smashing him. I summoned my Twin and we hit it with two meteor swarms, which it seemed to just absorb. That wasn't good...
Zorack had the thought that we should try to blow its fucking head off, so I pulled out my Twin's bombs- so mine would still be there. As we readied to hit it with the bombs, Scottie ran up to us, grabbed the bag, and hurled it at this thing. Myself pulled out that Alabaster Sword Tsorig had been running around with, turned into a fucking solar, and ran forward to engage. The big guy was focused entirely on Shade, swatting fruitlessly at him, it couldn't even so much as graze him.
We got everything set for when we set off the bomb, and as soon as it was about to go off, I popped to paradise with Zorack. I'm not sure what the others did, I couldn't reach them with my spell, but when we emerged a minute later, everyone was still alive... including the big guy.
Myself ran over to me and collapsed in exhaustion- I guess surviving that blast, plus being a solar takes a lot out of someone. I revived him quickly. We had one more bomb that was stronger than the last one. Rikkle had called it a nuke I think. I grabbed it from Dervish and hopped on Zorack's back so we could get it near the fucker's head. A blast behind me grabbed my attention, I turned to see Scottie crumple to the ground- he'd been blown up by his own magic.
The thing was still focused pretty much solely on Shadewing, and it still couldn't lay a finger on him. It was honestly a little pathetic. Then it unleashed a wave of force, knocking everyone away from it- Zorack twisted himself around to shield me from some of the blast. It had decided that it shouldn't focus completely on Shade anymore, and it twisted around to grab Zorack, holding both of it in its massive hand. I used a dimension door to get us out of its grasp.
Shadewing kept slashing at it, while it lashed out as Dervish, Zorack, and I, and I felt myself slip into unconsciousness. Charlotte revived me right away though. Once I was up, Zorack dropped the heavy duty bomb, and Dervish pulled everyone except Shade into his paradise- Shade went to the ethereal plane, apparently the dude wasn't fond of extradimensional spaces.
Shadewing took it on by himself, and managed to banish it moments before everyone exited Dervish's paradise.
There was this nasty looking trail of goo leading away from where we'd dropped the bomb, so I teleported us all to the end of it. We all began preparing a new trap for when it came back from Shade's banishment. When it returned it began screaming, hurting everyone's heads except mine. A huge boom followed it and a chunk of its shoulder was blown off. Lan had arrived just in time.
Our trap was 13 bombs, a delayed blast fireball, 50 flasks of radiant alchemical fire, a couple powerful magic items, and 100 mithril ingots. We all went to paradise when it was set off; but Lan and Shade stayed behind. They continued peppering it with cannon blasts while we were gone.
The Knight of Y'Chuk appeared, furious that the party had nearly killed his Juggernaut. Shade continued attacking the Juggernaut, until a red light enveloped it, and it stood completely still and erect. The Knight managed to disconnect Shadewing from his Mantle's power, so Shade's Cloak hit the Knight with six beads of force, in rapid succession. Lan shot the bead he was trapped in with the cannon and the Knight went flying.
The Juggernaut self-destructed, and its blast was so powerful that it nearly broke Zorack's rod of security- and Aurora accidentally made it sentient by wishing it couldn't have been broken by the blast.
I sent Shade three fucking sendings, but he didn't reply to any of them. I tried Lan next and all I got in response from him was his cannon blasts. So we decided to see what the fuck was going on out there. There was a peculiar energy in the air now, it was similar to radiant energy, but more insidious and poisonous. I think that was our fault.
I managed to reach Shade finally, apparently he'd gone back to the Stone Table to report in. I asked Lan to come back with us, but the odd energy wasn't hurting him, so he stayed and continued playing with his cannon.
I attempted to teleport us back to the Table, and of course things went awry. We ended up fucking Elysium. I instantly set up a plane shift, and the assholes nearby counterspelled it. The guards hit us all with dimensional anchors. I thought telling them we're Knights of the Fae would get them to let us leave- turns out I was wrong, they were now taking us all prisoner. I began fantasizing about how to kill these fuckers, I was up to 31 when Shade appeared.
Shade told them that he'd been sent to apprehend us... they didn't buy it. He was told to surrender and come peacefully. He told them it was a hostile act to to detain the envoy of the Raven Queen. As he spoke, a shadow began killing the guards. Narg had come to help. I made a new song for Narg up on the spot as he slaughtered these douchey Olympians, while Zorack picked the locks on everyone's shackles. As soon as Narg finished slaughtering them, Zorack dropped a well of many worlds and we all hopped in- more guards were coming.
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