Well, according to the Thyatians (and the Baronies people, who use the same calendar), it is now the new year.
The party last night was much like any other party, plus a few guns being shot in the air. I only drink a little, as I don't think I'll be able to properly relax until at least half of our enemies are dead. How strange. Before joining this group, I didn't have any enemies. It's a shame I can't say that anymore. We know of at least six groups that are hostile towards us, one of which just happens to be a deity. Sigh.
At any rate, we have ended up staying all of new years day in Porto Preto. I believe Nemon said something about recovering - he no doubt partied hard last night. Indeed, several of us needed this day to recover from last night as well. Sometime this evening we expect Nemon to teleport us back to The Horn.
Ah. Before I forget, I need to note that, having spoken to an inheritor, we have been assured that time spent in areas cursed by the vermeil is not cumulative over separate occasions, although what constitutes a separate occasion is uncertain. To be safe, I imagine that waiting a while outside the cursed region, of say several weeks, is probably a good starting point. One does not wish to accidentally end up cursed for life. Besides, I don't think I'd look good red.
After a pleasant rest in nice comfortable beds last night, we are again on the road, this time heading to Wallara (after being teleported back to the colony of the horn).
We are vaguely following the outskirts of trident bay. The region we are traversing at this moment is really very sandy.
Well, we we are all expecting a long, uneventful, and wet journey. Either that or a short, possibly very dangerous, journey in the falcon in the middle of winter. Safety does seem more important than time. At least I did press the others into actually trying to find this focus for the star device. A number of people were all for going their own separate ways for the next three months, but given recent world events, maybe it is more prudent rough it a bit instead. We aren't children, so I'm sure we can cope.
Yep, I got the boring part pretty accurate. Today was sandy, and boring.
Expectations for tomorrow are: sandy, boring, and maybe a little wet.
--
Ok, so I _didn't_ get the boring part right. In fact, turning back and heading to the colony seems like it might be a good idea.
Well, we have just been attacked by three black things. One flying black thing, which kind of just hovered there throwing nasty spells our way, and two humanoid shaped black things, with (predictably) glowing red eyes. I say predictably since the people who make these sorts of things seems to have a flair for the dramatic.
But I am making light of a bad situations. Fortunately, no-one was hurt in this incident. The two black creatures on the ground with glowing red eyes were destroyed by Safranna's sword (both with only a single blow). Quite thoroughly destroyed by the looks of it. Not even a hair was left. It was if they never existed. Either that sword is destroying the undead, or sending them off to another plane. Either way, they are a problem no more.
The same cannot be said of the flying creature (which later we disovered looked somewhat like a bat). For a start, it was much larger, and larger things tend to be nastier things. This evidently holds true in this situation. This thing was very nasty indeed. Firstly, we were awoken by the effects of a confusion spell being dropped on us. It did affect some of us, but clearly the creature did not think it was effective enough.
So it chose to drop a dispel magic on us. Bye bye all potions we had, as well as our continual light stones, and several other things, like Melany's pre-prepared salves.
As if that wasn't enough, it drops a cloudkill on top of us, but fortunately no-one was really hurt.
Fine. By this stage, Roland had gotten up there, and was starting to take a few swings at it. To no effect mind you. Roland later commented it's skin is like steel.
Several of us spellcasters tossed a number of spells its way, also to absolutely no effect.
During the meanwhile, the creature decides to take a few shots at Roland. It looked like Roland was getting hammered up there. In fact, Roland indicated that the thing was poisonous, as evidenced bny a kind of green ichor that could be seen around Roland's wounds. It's amazing that Roland somehow managed to avoid being poisoned. I guess luck was on his side.
Oh, Roland also said that he felt his heart skip a beat. That would presumably be some sort of death spell. Not good at all.
We know it is some sort of undead. Lani started singing her song of wake. The one which even seems to make vampires run away. Unfortunately for Lani, all it did was anger this creature, who then started flying (very fast) after her.
However, this creature seemed to fear Safranna's sword, as when she went near it, it decided to fly away with all haste. Either it is very cautious, or it knew that the risk from Safranna's sword was not worth it.
Which raises the question of what is Safranna's sword capable of?
Well, hopefully this event was purely random, although that seems quite unlikely. We'll concern ourselves about it in the morning.
Unfortunately, last nights encounter was definitely not by chance. We asked Leo to find out for us and the response is not encouraging. The creature is the aerial form of a night giant. It was sent by an aget of Thasmodean.
Now, an agent really does need to be defined. An agent is not a priest, but rather someone who works directly for the deity. The way I envisage this is someone who is on personal terms with the deity. Maybe they drop in to share a cup of tea every so often (maybe not with Thasmodean). Now, hopefully this agent is not Vermissa. Actually, I suspect it to be more likely that this act implies that Vermissa is still imprisoned.
Now, when did we become important enough that they started sending night giant variants after us??? This really is quite heavy handed. Maybe they've tried to have us killed in the past using lesser means, and this is just the first that has managed to catch up with us?
Why now of all times? I wonder if it could be due to our recent acquisition of the targeting device. Maybe this creature's job was twofold - kill some of us and take the targeting device? Or maybe it just wanted to kill us all? The only reason it didn't succeed is because Safranna has that sword.
Oh I just don't know. With luck, it won't try attacking again. Ha ha. That's almost funny.
We're going to head back to the horn now. I managed to convince the others that travelling at night is probably better. If this this has a predisposition to attacking at night, then we would be more prepared that way.
It attacked again early in the morning. At around 2am or so. It's tactics were much the same. Throw a few spells our way, namely confusion, dispel magic, cloudkill, and some sort of death spell. Apparently, it also has some sort of charm spell. Not nice.
This time Lani and I threw a few lower resistances its way, to no apparent effect. Maybe it dispelled them?
Well, Safranna did manage to hurt it this time. She hit it once, wounding it. It then flew away at ridiculous speed.
A pity really. As soon as we start to accomplish something, it runs away again. Well, I'm all out of ideas about how we could hurt this thing. All we seem to have that effects it is Safranna's sword.
At least the other two ground based creatures didn't attack again.
During the day I memorised a sending, so that I could ask if T'saz could find anything useful on such a creature. Unfortunately not. She did find some information, but only that it is the third type of night giant (land, sea, air?), it's bite turns victims to bats, and it has no known weaknesses. It can be summoned by very powerful mages.
Unfortunately, this information does little to help.
We arrived back at the colony this morning, after travelling (for a second time) through the night. Fortunately, we were not attacked again. Hopefully the creature will not attack us in populated areas. This should give us some time to prepare. In other words, ask Leo what this creature can be hurt by.
So now we wait until Leo is able to ask another question.
We have been fortunate in that the night flyer (as we are quaintly referring to it as) has not ventured into town to attack us.
Today we asked Leo about what it is susceptible to. It turns out that they are immune to all spells of the first through sixth levels of power. In other words, only spells of seventh or greater level can affect this creature! I cannot even cast spells of sixth level, let alone seventh!
This really is bad.
Zim played around with the scrying device. She saw a bit of Rosaline and Aden adventuring together. Interestingly, she also tried scrying on Kazerabet, and ended up getting a sending telling her to stop. I wonder how Kazerabet knew it was Zim? Must be an enhanced version of the spell that protects from scrying. Well, evidently after a little interaction, Kazerabet ended up offering help (in the way of information) for the mild fee of a permanent magic item.
Thanks, but no thanks. Besides, Leo has already been quite helpful.
On the other hand, Lyril has been quite generous. I did a sending to her, asking if she could help (after explaining the situation). Lyril was kind enough to teleport in and drop off a scroll for us. Very generous, considering what was on the scroll. It included two seventh level spells (both Malec-keth's Flame Fist), and two eighth level spells (Gunther's Keleidoscope Strike, and Bigby's Clenched Fist). Very nice. With the added boon/curse that they are scribed at a level of power that I am not nearly familiar with. I estimate my chances of success when trying to use these scrolls to be about 50/50.
Talking about 50/50, we concluded our deal with Jose and Martin today. In their initial survey, they have concluded that there is at least five tonnes of cynnabryl in the deposit. Five tonnes isn't very much, but it must be hard to tell from the surface. The deal we suggested was we would pay 15000 gp of the initial 20000 gp setup costs, and receive a 50% share of the mine. Jose and Martin found this an acceptable arrangement.
We had to pay an additional 1000 gp in order to teleport the funds there (two teleports, using Nemon, of course).
It is nice to have some good news every so often. The mine should bring each of us at least a couple of thousand gold each, over the next several years.
Now we just have to mkae sure we'll live long enough to enjoy it.
After some discussion, it is agreed that we will wait another week, so we can ask Leo for some more weaknesses.
The wait has been quite boring really.
Unfortunately, it probably wasn't worth it. One suspects this creature is near invulnerable. It's next main weakness is that it is somewhat susceptible to dragon breath. That really doesn't help us too much, unfortunately.
Well, on a better note, our dinner was quite nice. It consisted of a most exquisite selection of foods, such as greeen curry, mixed with just the right proportion of steamed rice.
If only the deities were clearly susceptible to bribes of tasty food. Sigh.
We will leave in several days, closer to when Leo can again ask a question. This time, we will fly in the falcon, with the hope that it cannot catch us.
Lani is going to go to Del's place, with Zhi. An unecessary risk really, using a teleport, rather than a teleport without error. But it is for her to do as she wishes.
I should mention to Zhi that the particular spell Lani used to go there and back does carry with it the possibility of dying.
We are presently flying to Wallara. Hopefully the creature will not attack us, but if it can, perhaps we will be able to ask Leo a question tomorrow, such as where it lairs during the day, so that we may choose to hunt it.
Lani said she had a good tikme with Del. Frankly I'm surprised Del wasn't annoyed, but what do I know about dragons anyway? Del did comment that the lost city referred to in the parchment we found with the mirror is called ``Wizulvar, or something like that.'' It is a city in the lands of Wallara.
To there we head... if we can survive both weather and the odd night flyer or two...
--
Aha! It attacked. I guess it could catch up to the falcon then. Maybe we should consider jets or something? I don't know much about engineering, but I wonder if they can just be added on to the current frame?
Well, soon the creature will, with luck, be dead! After some combat, and Zim's careful piloting, we managed to wound it enough that it could no longer fly. Amazing. It would not be possible were it not for a combined effort. The fact that the falcons guns (both on the wings and as fired by Turia) could damage it was useful. Moreover, the air elemental summoned by Lani helped (before it was destroyed somehow by the creature - the death spell?). In addition, I helped cause some more damage with the Bigby's Clenched Fist spell from Lyril. Furthermore, after I failed, Gurzurk tossed a successful dispel magic at it, removing the haste spell that it had evidently cast on itself.
All these things at once clearly proved too much for it. Unfortunately, it managed to haste itself again. It would have gotten away, except we just managed to do enough damage so that it could not longer fly. As it started to glide to the ground, it turned invisible, or returned to its home plane. Time will tell though. In the morning, we ask Leo where the creature has gone.
Eat your heart out Thasmodean!
Leo told us exactly where the creature was (still invisible). Once we knew where it was, we started to see the tellale shimmerings of an invisible object. It didn't stand a chance.
Zim started a few strafing runs. Lani summoned a bunch of large constrictor snakes that the night flyer deemed worthy of a cloudkill. I went down and used the flaming fist spell on it (unfortunately not to full effect). It actually hit me a few times, and I very nearly succumbed to the poison. Umm, actually it hit me all three times it tried.
But, in the end, it died. The fact its head was blown apart by a particularly well aimed shot from the falcon no doubt did not help it. Then Lani inserted Safranna's sword into it, and it disappeared completely.
Well, no more problem from this creature. I wonder if the sword utterly destroys undead?
Ahh, the feeling of satisfaction. We certainly all felt that something was impressed by our actions. We all felt that our respective deities were impressed, and pleased at our achievment. I know that my standing with the Pantheon is slightly higher now.
Well, this is a wonderful achievment... Unfortunately, a lot was to do with luck. Next time, they may decide to send something against us which is even tougher. They may think of us as being part of the big league now...