Longest Road
Contents
Description
Continuation of Alpha-Bravo, under new GMship. What exactly is going on? So far, who knows. There's some sort of objects, or maybe objects, that some fiends have. And they grant them some kind of control over dragons. The dragons were a bit vague on it . But being brave and intrepid adventurers, they're off to the Abyss to save the day.
The Longest Road (as one might guess from the name) is a Planes-trekking adventure with our dear old friends from Alpha-Bravo. Characters are beginning at 14th level, with ECL figured into that. And what a crazy assortment of characters they are...
- Game Master
- Zahnnie
Characters
- Jeralyn
- Morrigu
- Mia (Portrait)
- Kit (when she comes home)
- Michael (Portrait)
- Nybble
- Sil (Portrait)
- Aurora
- Ezel
- Chadius
- Ellowyn
- Ratri
- Querca
- Rykilde
NPCs
- Oraine
- Zahnnie's old PC before she took over GMship.
- Thame
- Oraine's incredibly good looking brother, a ranger type of some sort.
- The Old Man
- A very old elf, more than a little crazy.
- Evathyth
- The party's guide to the planes. A (previously) retired raptoran Guide.
- Saula
- A mercane merchant in the Plane of Air. He has a cousin, too.
- The Bariaurs
- Goat-taur warriors of GOOD, who champion and defend against EVIL! And make songs.
- Silara
- Sil's mom. A gold dragon of some renown.
- Mirenuth and Seth
- A mated pair of silver dragons who recently had their egg stolen (and returned).
- The Lillend
- Possibly the only creature prettier than Ellowyn.
- The Inevitables
- Clockwork creatures that could pwnz Ezel.
- Armatt
- Michael's Mom.
- Neth
- A curious plane of existence that doesn't like to be chopped to bits.
- Leon-Hai
- Son of Obad-hai, a tiger-like demigod of hunting and posing awesomely.
- Rose
- The cutest little baby succubus.
- Pazuzu
- WAY cooler than the other guy. Way.
- Graz'zt
- Fine, but HE has three levels of the Abyss.
Run Notes
Someone should keep notes! Fine, I guess I will!
Run 1 -- 3/19/2005
The run opened with a slight jump in time: the party spoke to the Queen, who had no idea what to do with Michael's mom. She sent them to see That Old Man, who evidently knew about researching odd things. The party did a little shopping and was on their way out of the capital when they saw two people approaching on the back of a phantom steed. What a coincidence! And that was when a glowing green square dropped a living holocaust on their heads.
After battling the raging fiery doom, which actually wasn't that bad except it picked up the mages and tossed them about 200 ft in the air, they heroically rescued some children from a burning building. Possibly a boxful of kittens was involved. Remarkably, the two magely types just happened to be looking for them! Sent by the Old Man! The party returned to the capital to spend the night, as Ezel would be able to teleport them there in the morning.
And so he did, with no problems. The party entered TOM's hut (which was bigger on the inside, strangely) and saw a giant spinning cube. Being smart adventurers they didn't even touch it a little, but when TOM waltzed into the room he certainly did, accidentally setting off a trap that sucked the whole party inside the cube. They dodged some spikes and played in zero gravity before punching their way out (a surefire winning solution). TOM was muchly embarrassed, for a few minutes until he forgot about it.
The Old Man sent the party to go speak to a lady in the mountains above where Ellowyn grew up with elves. There was an object she wished to have retrieved, but TOM was very vague about the details. That rascally old fellow! Since the teleport machine hadn't been there before they had to travel. On the way they encountered and smacked down a horned devil, which had half the party fleeing in terror and the other half either invisible, kanchoing, or both. What a lark! And onwards they went to the elven village.
A peaceful and boring village however... Sil and Michael got smashed with some elves, Sil told some wild lies, information was drunkenly gathered, and some people actually slept. (Bah!) In the morning they headed up the cliff with some helpful fly spells and entered a Big Mysterious Caverny Tunnel. It went down and down and at the bottom was a very unnaturally smooth wall. Michael knocked on it before Ezel pointed out that it was an illusion, and was actually gold scaled flesh. Much to Michael's embarrassment... The "wall" rumbled, pulled away, and a very large dragon face looked at them with irritation.
The dragon took on the form of an elven woman to converse with the party and it eventually came about that this was Sil's mother. Though it took some people longer to get it than others. She told the party about the Wailing Night and the way the planes "broke" in a way, and how the fiends had gained control of several items important to dragon-kind, artifacts with the power to control them. She quizzed them to see if she could trust them, then took most of a day to ponder it. Finally she made up her mind and told them that the sphere was located in the Abyss, somewhere on the first five levels. She then asked them if there was anything they needed that she could supply them with for their quest (omg hoard) and thus the run ended.
Run 2 -- 12/12/2005
Run summary, anyone?
- Presents from Sil's mom
- Zip back to Capitol
- Start travel towards raptoran village (for guide)
- Meet Thame, who was waiting for Oraine
- Side-trip- find Oraine & Querca battling a shator
- BATTLE! (Michael gets hilariously snotted)
- Introduction of peoples, Thame leaves after heated debate (someone raises an eyebrow!)
- On to next town (dark), Oraine & Sil stay up drinking as per usual
- In morning, Sil goes to get her kama identified - hilarious episode of unwise sorcerer!
- Continue on to raptoran village, through orchard, when - DEATH FROM THE SKY!
- El's SUPER AWESOME DIPLOMACY BOMB saves the day
- Taken to village, where people (nocturnal) are asleep, Sunspeaker Gararae and little brother show around village while Michael plays with the Storm Talons
- Run ends as evening falls
I suppose I should write this, I have all night anyway. Unlike those sleepers...
Sil's mother gave us gifts to help prepare for our journey. Sil received a kama that works well on evil creatures (oh great, another weapon for Sil to slice with) and a ring (an even better way for Sil to implode the universe.) The others mainly got more instruments of destruction of some sort, and I received a staff that would protect us from scrying during the night. Good, I don't have to cast that spell every night. Sil couldn't think of much to say to her mother, so we left early. I don't really understand the mother-child relationship, but it's just like how I don't understand scent.
Anyway, I teleport people to the capital and we head out towards the raptoran village. There is a guide who can get us to the place we need to go to get the item we need.
Part-way up the road, we meet a panther of some sort. Well, more like a Mhunntir. It was actually Thame, Oraine's brother. He was looking for her for over a day, and seemed quite worried about it. Brother-Sister love, now THAT I understand. We decided to help him.
And then I saw the problem. A shator was attacking Oraine, and what looked like a tree with armor on. A shator, of all things. Disgust incarnate. Its tiny wings cannot support its hide, and it likes to summon Faratsus (more filth!) and spit slime on everyone. The spit is paralytic, and it weighed Michael down to the ground. It also nailed Ellowyn, but he was OK.
Once Sil, Jer, and the rest of the Murder Brigade arrived, we cleaned things up rather quickly. Hmmm.... why are so many powerful demons and devils appearing across the land?
The tree's name is Querca. She likes to curse in Sylvan (tied in wussiness with Celestial) very slowly. She is also one of those druid types, who believes in the forces of nature, hates arcane studies, and hugs cute puppies. Her grove was under attack by demons, and she is coming with us to study them. Ah, the search for intelligence: THAT we can agree upon. Thame and Oraine had a rather heated argument before Thame left. Hell breaks loose when a Mhunntir raises an eyebrow.
We reached a town by nightfall and spent the night there. I sat next to Querca (she planted herself in the courtyard...interesting) and I read my books. Sil came back from the mage guild, excited about having her new shiny weapon identified. She was halfway up the stairs before she ran back down, mad as a hornet. The mage tried to cheat her out of her weapon. First he lied and claimed it was cursed. Sil, naturally, relied on brute force to squeeze the truth out of him. When she stormed back in, she demanded...you know, she was real bossy. Luckily the sorcerer was a fool, so he got what he deserved.
Anyway, we travelled and saw a cliffside village. As we approached, we were attacked by raptorans. More specifically, it seems we came at the worst time possible: The village military was on training exercises, and they thought Michael (the winged one, sheesh. Don't they have good eyesight or something?) was under attack. They also don't like werewolves, so Jer received the blunt of the war chief's opening charge (quite impressive, really.) At any rate, El, Michael, and I managed to call out for a ceasefire (Ellowyn really. He's quite the speaker. Sorcerers...)
The raptorans are a nocturnal race, so we spent the day with their sunspeaker, Gararae. He was an excellent tour guide, and I learned many things about the raptorans. His little brother was poking around (almost knocked my hat off...) but El managed to entertain him (*sigh* sorcerers...)
We are currently resting in the waiting room. We can speak to the guide later tonight. I really don't know how we're going to survive in the Abyss. This group enjoys to smash first and ask questions later. And I'm sure Michael will blend right in with the demons.
Run 3 -- 2/2006
This time I shall be keeping notes on our travels, as opposed to lich-boy. This group needs more of a non-animal-centric view anyway. Ahem.
Well, another exciting outing with my new allies. This time I was mercifully not covered in demon excretions. No, we just decided to take a merry jaunt across the planes.
Perhaps I should go back a bit.
We spent a day with the raptorans. They sure do have nice orchards and groves. Very decent people. After a short rest the guide we'd been sent to find met us. We managed to convince him to lead us to the infernal plane where we may find this whatchamacallit that the dragons have misplaced.
Well, at least I shall be able to gather the knowledge I need while there.
Anyway. Evatheef or whatever his name is pulled out this twirly shiny thing with many rings and used it to plan our route. Ezel looked like a bee spying an apple blossom. Magi. I ask you. After deducing the best path, we set out and soon were on the Astral Plane. The lich (did I mention Ezel is a lich?! Because he is. At least he hasn't tried to...do any lichy stuff..yet.) and the sorcerer were having a grand old time zipping around like bloody dragonflies, until this great big pirate ship came out of the clouds. A Githyanki pirate ship.
The ensuing battle was unremarkable, but I feel I must mention a handful of things:
- Do not bother Sil if she ever seems overly grumpy. Well, more grumpy than usual.
- The same goes for Jeralyn.
- Liches are good for herding.
- I love spell-casting in the astral plane!
- Next time I summon an ally in the astral plane, it should be smarter and therefore more than a glorified burning target for siege weaponry.
And of course Evatheef spent the whole time hovering at a safe distance, with those red-and-gray dyed wings of his spread wide. I suppose that guides have inter-planar neutrality... Must be nice.
So now we had ourselves transport. Ellowyn used his charm on the ship, which is actually some semi-intelligent construct, and took over as its captain. He's named the ship 'Kevin'. Despite that, his mind must be something amazing, because we just sped along to the next portal. I spent the journey healing us all, then trying my best to repair the wounds of battle with my woodcarving kit. The rest of these people went exploring in the hold and found some valuables. Sil was very excited about the gold, and Ezel had himself a nice time with a bat cloak. We parked the ship in this... thing... I am not sure what it was, exactly. A mass of three rocky bodies in repose. Evatheef says that they are the remains of dead gods. Creepy as anything, but the ship'll be safe.
And with that we entered the plane of air. Leaf and bud, I hate this place. There is no down, and nothing growing, practically! I think I was nauseous the whole trip to this... little blob of dirt and rock. Thankfully, it had grass. Lovely lovely grass. I hugged it.
You know... if all the planes are going to be like this, my spells to call nature to our aid are not going to be of much use. What a pity...
We were having a nice rest on the grass when Sil and Oraine ran up and informed us there was a green dragon with many shiny things. Well, of course there are shiny things, it's a dragon. At any rate, we all got ourselves together and destroyed this evil creature. There were shiny things to divvy up, which was nice I guess. I however was mighty pleased with some delightful scrolls... Mmm... Ahem! Sil found an silver egg in amongst the green dragon's clutch. If I didn't know better, I'd say her maternal instincts just became active.
And after all this excitement, we set off for whatever passes as a proper settlement in this benighted plane. I hope we can finally get some decent rest there.
Run 4 -- 4/16/2006
Everyone needs to know this: Dragon eggs are cute. Like, really cute. Shiny and cuddly and just cute! They're just the right size to hold in your arms and feel like there's nothing else in the world that matters ... I guess that'd be my maternal instinct waking up. Freaky. Dad never mentioned how cute I was as an egg. I guess I had to stay in the fire, being all fire based and stuff, so he didn't get to cuddle me until I hatched, but still! I expect that when I have kids, I won't have eggs. Damn. Eggs don't scream and cry and eat and poop. I think humanoids get screwed in this regard.
Anyway, away from what was once the green dragon's clutch (those eggs were not nearly so cute or shiny) and on to a trading post. Merchants everywhere! But no shopping just yet. We had a couple of immediate concerns: little Silvery's parents. I know we should find them--they're probably worried sick about this little one--but I also want to hold on to her (I think it's a her, but maybe I'm just projecting) for a little bit longer. So, to the inn! Seriously, most of the fun of coming back to civilization is right in front of a nice bar. Again with the bonus points for having eggs! No mixing of the circulatory system. I'm not sure I can picture how much I'll have to cut back on drinking if I ever decide to have a little one. Bah.
So Ezel went to hide with his books, Quirky took root in the courtyard, Jir tucked himself into a corner (duh) and Oraine drank with me. Also, Mikey and Ell went out to hit the town, hopefully not literally. Much drinking ensued, as is our wont. I kept the little one with me. Eventually the two pretty boys came back with a bunch of singing goat-taurs who were happy to join us in our attempt to run the bar dry. It was awesome. I told them some great story about single-handedly defeating a set of five chromatic dragons and rescuing a whole slew of gold and silver eggs. They set it to song. I wish I'd taken the time to write it down. Huh. Maybe Ezel did.
Also, Evath knows Draconic drinking songs and taught me some. He rules.
The next day, I tucked little Silvery into bed with a big pile of gold coins to keep her company and we all went off to try to barter some new stuff and information. Apparently we have some big sword that's awesome but no one wants to use. Meh. But fear not--I kept careful track of how much is in our party treasure pot and who gets what share. It's good.
Saula, the tall merchant guy, spoke Celestial and Draconic but not Common, so Jir was moody ... but then again. Yeah. Anyway, he had so many awesome shiny things! Damn I want to spend my share of the pot... maybe on the way back. Oh, so shiny. Ezel and Quirky got some scrolls, and then the concept of "protection from evil" came up. You know, 'cause we're going to the Infernal Plane (woooOOOoooo.) Yeah. What a thing. But really, I got a sweet prot-from-evil ring. Saula was pushing the dragon stuff at me, but damn can I not resist anything shiny with a dragon theme. It's sad.
So we start putting all this stuff together and he pulls out this deck of cards with a "wanna play? 100 gold a pull." I drink--I don't gamble. I know what a deck of many things is, and I'm not taking the risk. Mikey and most of the others were similarly not tempted. Jir pulled a card--whoops. Maybe we should've told him what was going on, but he moves fast too. It didn't really seem to hurt him, though. He still looked grumpy, but handed over 100 gold when it was done, no argument. I guess that was kinda weird.
And then, Oraine. Oh, that fool. She pulled a card, and POOF! No more magic stuff. Wow, that sucked. I smacked her one for that. There went her share of the treasure, re-equipping her. I swear, sometimes... at least she looks guilty, knowing she's costing so much cash.
We sold one of the Githyanki swords in the back room in trade for a bunch of stuff--Saula was impressed with it. Didn't tell him there were two more--no ones business but ours, right?--and he sent us off to his cousin to get weapons and armor. Wait, first we asked him about silver dragons that might be missing eggs. He took a small down-payment and said he'd find me the information. I took that out of my share of the treasure. Silvery is my responsibility for now.
More shopping. I like shopping, even if it is for stuff I'll never use. The big awesome sword of awesome got traded in for a few holy weapons and new armor for Oraine. We saw the goat-taurs again. They're heading out for some grand adventure, slaying evil, something like that. They said they wouldn't be able to party too much that night, and I was a bit let down, until they affirmed that it would be just like the night before. Good enough for me! With luck I'll be meeting silvery's (real) parents tomorrow so I might want to be mostly sober. So, back to the inn for a nap on my treasure and then more drinking that evening. I like those guys.
Saula came through the next day. He gave us directions to a pair of silver dragons that had lost an egg and were close by. We traveled most of the morning and got there with almost no interruptions. There was one little air elemental, but Mikey gave it some feathers and it went away. Mikey's really liking this plane of air thing. He zips around like a hummingbird. It's kind of cute, actually. Quirky is not liking it so much, but then again, she's a tree. I can't really blame her on this one.
The silver dragons live in this big castle. One quick flash of the egg to the front guards and they came bounding up, loudly. It was their egg. They're young adults and she's their first (they think it's a girl too, though they'd be just as happy with a boy) so they were weeping with joy when we gave her back. It made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Then they fed us. Oh, dragon feast. Meat, booze, more meat, more booze... it was good. Very good. So we got to talking about our quest...
Turns out that the orb we're after is not the only one missing. There are 10 of them--one for each chromatic and metallic dragon kind--and they're all missing. Yipes. We're after the gold one (thanks, mom) but you can use that to find the other one. Mirenuth and Seth (Mommy and Daddy Silver Dragon, respectively) mentioned something about an expansive library and Ezel was so gone. I didn't realize that undead mages could move so fast. One would think the combination of being both a skeleton and a wussy little mage would equal "slow" but apparently not when there are musty books involved. Reminded me of Zahn for a minute.
Back on track, though. Apparently, Mom was the one guarding the gold orb about 200 years ago. I'm guessing that the big war that landed her on dad's doorstep was what lost it. Each orb can be used to control dragons of the corresponding type, and the holders of the orbs can communicate with each other. We're not sure yet what it'll do to half-dragons or other dragon relations, but I'm pretty sure we're going to find out.
We had a mildly amusing discussion about what would happen if I were being controlled by some fiend through the orb and turned on the party. I suppose it would be more amusing if it were purely hypothetical. This is probably why Mom sent me instead of going on her own--she knows that she can be controlled by it, but doesn't know if I will. I really hope not. With the weapons she gave me, there's a decent chance I could chop someone's head off, and then I'd feel horrible. Well, except for Ezel. He could just put it back.
Actually, he's undead. I'd just smash him into fine dust with my fists. Eeesh...
I really need to get these disturbing thoughts under control. Maybe more meditation ... on top of the big pile of treasure! Mir and Seth gave it to us as a reward for bringing little Silvery back to them. I wouldn't have asked for it, but it would be rude to turn it down. I really hope that we come back this way when we're coming home and that she's hatched by then. I want to see what she looks like.
Run 5 -- 8/20/2006
The following is an excerpt from Michael's Journal:
Today I decided that it was time to move on. I have devoted much time to trying to improve myself so that I may better serve Virton without being a hinderance to those around me and to my god. I feel that I may finally be able to serve as his instrument of justice once more. I made an oath to him in front of my companions and our hosts, the silver dragons, that I would find the gold dragon orb and return it to its rightful place.
I have placed more confidence in my adamantite katana over the last few years. I feel that it has become an extension of my self. My other swords do not seem to share the same bond with me. I shall not part with them due to their usefulness, but they shall never be able to replace "name of katana."
We all tied ourselves together again to travel so that we would not be separated. I think I would have been fine on my own since I seem to be able to fly really well in the plane of air. I suppose that with us tied together, I could help the others get to where they wanted.
While we were flying along, I suddenly realized that we were being sucked into a storm. No matter how much I pulled at the rope against it, I could not pull us out of it. As we are being sucked in, Sil said that we were being watched. I briefly blacked out, and awoke floating in an icky liquid. After looking around a bit, I felt like the walls were made out of something living. Ezel said that it was probably a sentient plane being named Neth. I'm not really sure how something could live where there is nothing to contain it, but I've learned not to think about these things too much. Ezel warned us not to attack it.
We noticed that there seems to be another group of people further up a bend in the fleshy corridor that we are in. Sil then asked "What if they attack it?" Unfortunately, it seems that they chose to attack the walls at that moment. There was a bunch of loud noise, the walls pulsed wildly, and we were sloshed around in the fluid.
We began swimming furiously to avoid being pulled down the corridor. We then encountered several "cleaners" coming down the corridor with their arms spread wide like nets. There was no way around them, so we split up with two separate spell groups. Ezel teleported with Jeralyn, Oraine, and me. Ellowyn dim-doored with Sil, Querca, and Evathyth. We reappeared on the other side of the cleaner. I was glad that we managed to avoid the cleaners, but it was slightly challenging to continue swimming properly during the teleport.
We waited around until things calmed down and for Ezel to tell us that it was safe to move again. At that point we swam towards the head. As we got closer to the head, the current began to pick up again, carrying us to the head faster. Soon we encountered a huge cavern with a giant wall of faces that we were being pulled towards.
"Are you here to hurt Neth too?" one of the faces asked. There was a brief pause where no one was speaking, so I answered, "I don't know why we're here. We just got sucked in."
Ellowyn began speaking to Neth about what we were doing. I think that he may have been trying to convince Neth to help us without making us seem too interesting. We said that we did not know the people that had hurt him, but Neth said that they knew us. He showed us their faces in the wall. I did not recognize two of them, but the third was a half-dragon named Zahn that Sil, Jeralyn, Oraine, and I saw before. It seemed that Zahn had got away from Neth, but the other two were caught.
Neth agreed to send us to the abyss if we would escort one of his children there. He had been interested in learning about the abyss, but all of his children that he sent there failed to return.
Sil, Evathyth, and I barely escaped from the clashing armies. Sil was running the gauntlet while Evathyth and I dodged thrown weapons. We continued to flee until we were no longer in danger from the warring armies. We decided that we needed to find a different pit since that one was now blocked by the war. Evathyth knew of another nearby pit that would take us further down in the abyss. We would then be able to find another pit down there that would bring us up to the levels that we wanted to search.
As we journeyed on, we noticed that we were being chased by the big Klurishir that was in the battle (actually I think that I heard that Neth's child spotted it first. He was always asking "What's that?" about everything).
Anyway, Ezel flew off chasing after some little quasit that was watching us fight the Klurishir. There were actually two, but it Ezel could only chase one of them, and I couldn't see them to chase the other. He caught the one that he was chasing and brought it back for questioning.
Evidently it was observing things for his lord who was the leader of one of the two warring armies. This means that the other one was probably a spy for the other leader. After some debate about what to do with it, we decided to leave it unconscious?
Once we reached the pit we discovered to our dismay that there was now a river flowing into the pit. Ezel informed us that it was actually the River Styx and that if any of us touched it, we would lose our memories. I don't know how we are going to be able to deal with this newest problem. Maybe we should check to see if the first pit we were headed to is no longer blocked by the war. But that might take some time.
Run 6 -- 11/12/2006
The deeper we go into the Abyss, the more I worry about you. I haven't scried on you in a few weeks, need to make sure you're alright. Stay focused, Ezel. The sooner we get out, the better.
First problem: The portal in the River Styx. If any water splashes on you, you forget everything. I don't know if it works on me, and I don't want to know. We slept overnight and planned a strategy. I formed a magical funnel around the portal and channeled it up to the surface. Then Sil threw a fireball down to evaporate the water. We casted flight spells and jumped through. It was like a slide. We made it to the next level without a problem.
Note: I could sell this idea for entertainment, the Super Happy Fun Slide. With the profits, I could buy every scroll I ever wanted to!
This plane was a jungle. The air was yellow and thick; must have been hard to breathe. Before Evathyth could figure out where to go, Querca headed off. She saw one of her stupid religious signs and simply had to go. We followed, of course.
We passed by a ripped-open Century Worm. Something tore its way out from the inside. I wonder if it's that holy symbol. Surrounded by three Bloodthorns (they like to drink blood, who knew?) and several Maurezhi. These demons are scavengers, feeding on corpses. The man is quite wounded, and Querca wants to save him. Sure, why not?
I learned a new spell, Demon Dirge. Demons, especially those from the Tanar'ri, love it. And by love it, I mean the Maurezhi spent a bit of time spasming on the ground. Gave me plenty of time to destroy it. Michael usually handles this, but he plowed into a tree. He scared the other three, too. Hah!
Looks like Ellowyn enjoyed his new spell, Baleful Polymorph. Turned one of the Bloodthorns into a four-leaf clover. Jeralyn held the other two at bay while Sil carried the wounded man away.
I had to kneel. No, not because I wanted to. Because it was a demigod. We rescued one of Obad-Hai's seedspawn. This one was named Laon-Hai. Yet another , desperate to do something glorious to gain a shred recognition from his much too busy father. You were saved by a group of mortals, weakling.
Truth: Gods produce thousands of demigods every year. “Blessed” with immortality, demigods spend their cursed lives trying to gain some sort of achievement. An eternal rat race, ha.
Why was he in the Abyss? Apparently this demon war reached new heights. The fight between Garsht and Pazuzu even got the gods' attention. They've sent their lackeys, like this sack of flesh, to investigate. We're caught in the middle of something big. The dragon orbs are only a part of it.
Anyway, Jeralyn and Laon-Hai run off and clear a path. He is on the lookout for an Armanite that would pass through soon, possibly with a passenger. The Armanite demons are bull-like but with huge fists, like a gorilla. And guess what? Because Laon-Hai is a wimp wants to see us perform, he will let us fight it all by ourself! Thanks!
We waited in ambush, and yes it did come. He had a girl tied to his back who screamed and cried and had red wings on her back. Although it saw us first (can see through invisibility, I didn't expect that) we handled it fairly quickly.
As for the girl. Michael detected her as evil, but the rest of the party found her to be oh so cute. She pulled the innocent girl routine quite well. Now that is “cute:” a young succubus. Her name is “Rose” and she's the daughter of Bera, one of Lord Pazuzu's flunkies. Pazuzu is apparently really cool and has tons of treasure and green dragons, and he's totally awesome. Green dragons? He has control over them, probably. I wonder if we can get those orbs.
And now a dilemma: How do we handle “Rose?” I wanted to kill her immediately, but we needed to reduce casualties (the civil war must continue.) Also the group would crush me if I couldn't prove she was evil. Ugh, lousy moral-ridden murder brigade. Okay, if I could dispel her transformation and show her true form – I'm out of spells, and Querca couldn't do it. Our best bet at this point is to hold onto her until tomorrow, when I can try stronger dispel powers.
Fun Fact: Succubi are masters at anything except combat. They are fantastic liars, very nimble escape artists, and are trademark seducers. Never trust anything inherently evil - um, besides me of course.
Succubi are very resourceful, unfortunately. If you don't kill them instantly, they'll find a way out. Case in point: Rose managed to relax enough to teleport away. I heard a rustle, but I couldn't break my concentration, learning spells. This might come back to bite us later. She has not learned our big plan, but we did drop many clues. Subtlety isn't our strong suit. *sigh* Just one more day and we can get out of here, Aezma. I can't wait to see you again.
