A God, a Curse, and a Wish

Second Ptolus Campaign Journal, #62

Session CXVII: 24th of Rain -- Performance Night (cont'd)

Round 2

The Sorn sorcerers complete a spell and there's a great rumbling as -- Holy Mother Teun! -- two enormous purple worms burst up through the floor of the theater. Where did they come from? Each of them seems to have been fitted with an artificial tooth. One of them is emanating a yellow glow. One hits Feruch, who just barely manages to wriggle out of its grasp.

Two assassins on the balcony slide toward the door the giants bashed open in the Balacazar box.

Killraven and her mount kill another guard with four blows. Tharn goes in to slash at a Sorn wizard, a guy who seems tougher than your average spellcaster. Sercian drags Fesamere Balacazar over to the trapdoor onstage, which is about a 15-foot drop to the ground below. There's no ladder. Diethan jumps down the trapdoor with his sister and one of the other musicians in tow.

The mind flayer tries to mind blast some of us, and the beholder turns its antimatter eyebeam on the back of the house. Arkhall Vaugn takes out one of the assassins with his magic from the Balacazar box. Serai gathers his allies around on the stage, getting ready to teleport the group to safety. But alas, his spell fails, and he looks around for another escape. The trapdoor looks good....

Zophas unloads on the Covenant vampire, turning him into a cloud of gas -- but not before it managed to get off a lightning bolt that accidentally hit Urlenius. Meanwhile, Tellian strikes another series of wicked blows on the beholder. The creature ignored the elf archer at its peril, for it falls dead to the benches of the theater under the arrows of Navashtrom's cleric.

Finally freed from the beholder's antimagic effect, the rest of us step up. Sister Mara sends down flames from the heavens that kill the mind flayer and many minions and hurt the giants, Sorn, and troll (but not a bit of damage against the worms or Killraven -- or the theater itself, strangely). Feruch goes up against a purple worm, and the battle rages on backstage.

The Cobbled Man, everpresent ally of Barbatos, finds himself up against two assassins, while Barbatos blasts the Sorn. Urlenius lobs a cone of cold at Killraven and her mount. The giants, though hurt, whoomp on a couple more innocent spectators on the balcony. A few bystanders on the floor make it backstage, where safety eludes them as they come upon the massive battle between two hezrou and a mind worm.

Killraven points at Mara and cries: "A extra ten thousand for the one who brings me that Lothianite's head!" The cleric momentarily appears about to turn her into a small snake, but I guess the power of Lothian helps her shake off the effect.

Hero points used this round: 3
Current death toll: 23

Battle rages in the back of the house (top) and the front of the house (bottom) at the Cloud Theater.

Round 3

Aliya leaps up to the Balacazar box and confronts the man himself. He doesn't seem the least bit concerned about it as she attempts to strike him with her mighty fists. Strangely, at the key moment, she slips on the floor and misses his big ugly mug and instead drives her fist into the arm of his chair. She notices in passing that the crimelord's wearing a black pearl on the end of a chain around his neck, and hanging from a loop is a small humanoid figure about five or six inches tall. This figure is grasping the bottom of the black pearl. How odd. Using his boots of flying, Zophas zooms up to the Balacazar box to aid Aliya, and Arkhall Vaugn slings a noneffectual spell at the paladin.

Canabulum manages to dominate the giant troll in the vestibule to do his will. He sends it up against the Sorn. Killraven moves to launch a cone of cold from a ring at Mara and those near her. Tharn, still flying, pounds further on one of the Sorn. Tellian puts some arrows into another Sorn, but that wizard is quite tough and remains standing.

Diethan picks himself up off the ground beneath the trapdoor and urges Serai and Sercian to follow him to a secret sewer exit he knows of. Tabaras the vampire in gaseous form oozes through the floorboards to the area beneath the stage with them.

Meanwhile, a purple worm attacks me from behind and picks me up in its horrid mouth. There's an antimagic field around this thing too (I discover to my dismay), emanating from its fitted tooth. I see Sir Feruch across the theater stuck in the maw of the other one. He tries to break the artificial tooth that generates the field, to no avail. It's a good idea though... I try the same thing, and on the second blow I manage to bust the tooth with my mailed fist. Thankfully the magical emanation goes away.

Sister Mara casts a holy aura in the center of the room and almost immediately finds herself attacked by a blue Killraven minion. He hits her but is instantly blinded by the power of her god. Urlenius strikes a couple good blows against the blinded minion.

Barbatos makes it out to the vestibule, where he sees that there's not one but two mountain trolls to worry about.

Current death toll: 27
Hero points used this round: 1

Round 4

Suddenly finding themselves facing a giant mountain troll, the Sorn turn some flamepower on the mind-controlled creature and bring it down. At the same time, Aliya turns her wrath on Arkhall Vaugn and Canabulum turns his against one of the Sorn. Killraven seems amused at this last. "Ah, necromancy," she says. "I love necromancy."

With that she pulls a handful of bones from her cloak and throws them onto the ground. The bones grow very large before our eyes and form themselves into a Huge skeleton, as big as one of the mountain trolls. When I catch a glimpse of it, I'm horrified to realize that it looks like the skeleton of one of my Charad Titan ancestors!

Calista looks upon the threat to Feruch with real concern. She passes off to Tharn a mote of time, which she got from the bottom of a chaos well during our search for Tharn. Then she casts another quick spell to distract the purple worm that still has me in its jaws. Tharn's time-stopped attacks lay the purple worm low: dead after ten blows from the litorian!

Down in the basement, Diethan and Sercian work together to get the door into the sewers open. Opening it, they're immediately accosted by a mind flayer and a draconic creature that were waiting for them. Diethan and one of the musicians are immediately stunned. It's up to Serai and Sercian to take care of this new threat... So Serai advances and casts prismatic spray against the foes. Under this assault, the mind flayer suddenly turns to stone and then immediately gets electrocuted to boot. But the bad news is that the draconic creature breathes a blast of fire at the group. This is especially unfortunate for the stunned Diethan. Luckily, he manages to snap out of his stunned state just in time to take all the damage meant for his sister Alivia. The elf musician goes down, but both Balacazar sisters manage to duck aside from the flames entirely. "Sercian! Go kill that thing!" Fesamere cries. "Maybe if you can manage that, I'll believe you actually went to Jabel Shammar."

The players of the Ptolus finale (from left): Monte Cook, Erik Mona, Bruce Cordell, Sue Cook (behind the camera), Jesse Decker, Chris Perkins, and Michele Carter.

Out in the front of the house, the skeletal titan quivers and shakes under the assault of a mass heal from Tellian, which spell also does a lot of good to all the elf's allies nearby (not me, sadly). Killraven points at Tellian. "This! This is why I've been trying to rid the city of clerics for so many years!" she curses.

Sister Mara doesn't seem to like this remark too much, so she begins casting a spell with Kevris in her sights. Sir Feruch advances to challenge the titan undead.

Zophas flies up to join Aliya in the Balacazar box and attempts to smite the crimelord himself. But his ankh of justice passes right through Menon. Zophas notices the little man clinging to the pearl around the crimelord's neck. "I hate paladins," the figure murmurs, "especially Lothianites." Zophas feels as though he recognizes the figure as someone made to look like a divine being he saw in a book once.... And then Zophas notices the shadowy assassins entering the box and making for Menon. The old man doesn't even turn but reaches around to scratch his back at the very moment that they are trying to strike. The little man holding the black pearl makes a small gesture as this is happening; the pearl glows a moment, and the two only manage to stab each other. Aha, the small figure must be Destor, god of ill luck! (If only Archinemus were here to tangle once again with the god he betrayed!)

The blue Urlenius continues to battle the equally blue minion and finally slays him, and the troll out in the vestibule smashes another theatergoer to pulp. But I'm still stuck in the mouth of a distracted purple worm.

Barbatos enters the vestibule and uses a mote of time to cast a wall of force to separate him from the troll, then he chants a magical spell of great power from a scroll. He speaks: "I wish for the entity inside my mind to take physical form and attack Kevris Killraven until she is dead, dead, dead."

What is he talking about? What entity inside his mind?

We're about to find out. A huge hulking demon-creature bristling with weapons suddenly appears next to Kevris Killraven. "What the hell?!" she blurts. The creature (a dark elf-demon that has been inside Barbatos' head ever since he kissed that statue in the elven city of Caelist*) mutters, "I will gut you for this, Barbatos" as it attacks the annis hag.

The two giants jump/fall down from the balcony to enter the fray on the main level and the remaining Sorn retreats to recover. Meanwhile, the assassins on the right-hand balcony use grappling hooks to lower themselves to the ground.

Hero points used this round: 1
Current death toll: 33

To be continued...

* Apparently when we took Barbatos to the elven sanctuary to banish the demon that had briefly dominated him, the creature whispered to the wizard, "Barbatos, if you let me burrow in so deep that they think I'm gone, I will give you tremendous power." Little did we know at the time, our friend agreed! Later we learn that this creature was the amalgam essence of the many sacrificed elves who were killed in their own woodland home by the dark elf invaders.

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