Hello,
It seemed that Sir Menekeyil presided over events that unfolded, injecting some of his characteristic quips now and then. That brightened the mood.
You face down the hideous walking lumps of metal and flesh, whose arms end in cruel bladed hooks. Bog takes one look at them, thinking he saw iron throughout their bodies and formed into those hooks, and adopts a tactical retreat; they are “not worth his time”. Shrett creeps in as he did, but Fraud engages off with Boamund. The things are dreadfully slow and no match for your skills, and outnumbered 3-to-1, but they are durable and it seems that they make magic around them trickier to use (maybe it is the amount of iron in their thick bodies?). They do not harm you though; you just have to wear them down and so you do, emerging victorious.
Boamund looks up the ladder, thinking that the music-like sounds are louder there, and sees a mezzanine floor and then the shaft continuing upwards; and looking down, he sees that the ladder ends one floor down. On the middle floor, he sees a wreckage, probably of a former residence, strewn all over with bits of bone here and there. But as he peeks his head into the room, a terrible wail erupts from it and echoes down to the others. Saint Avlor's blessing keeps the terror of this cry from shaking you, though.
You come up and Shrett casts Sense Sorcery, seeing abundant sorcerous energies around the walls and less everywhere else. Boamund goes further up the ladder, coming into the upper level where he beholds an awful sight: The shaft and ladder end at a 3m domed chamber, with a central ritual circle embossed with Undeath and Law runes. At three corners by the walls rise 1m diameter bronze pillars, made like jointed arms end in hands posed as if they hold up the ceiling. An iron crib squatting atop four jointed iron legs sits in the middle of the circle, swaying to the jolly song it emits. Tittering laughter comes from within. A mecha-magical woman with elongate, blue-glowing body parts, and a two-headed, eight-limbed pustulent zombie-dog (whose anatomy soon leaves Fraud greatly troubled, although perhaps titillated too) keep it company.
The Chuckling Babe Sylbi'in lazily raises its head. It is a deep black-skinned, withered skeletal husk of a child with a wide lipless mouth that quivers with a bush of long, needle-like fangs. Then it calls for them gleefully, “Come, suckle for me, it is feeding time. I thirst for your essence, hee hee! Fetch, Spot, fetch flesh for me, so I can grow big and strong! Skinny Nurse, keep them here with me, I've been lonely, hee hee!” And it blasts at Boamund with a ray of flesh-rotting energy, leaving his abdomen rent with wicked necrotic wounds. He falls downwards and is caught by Shrett, who pulls him away from falling down to the bottom level. Boamund is laid down on the floor there, alive but in great pain. You cast spells and brace yourselves, hoping that the enemies come to you, but they do not. Shrett sends his Shade upwards and it engulfs the dog-thing, starting to freeze it, but is then banished by the 'Babe. Fraud comes up to take them on. The iron crib keeps kicking at him, and the 'Babe throws spells, while the “Skinny Nurse” avoids blows from Shrett, who has come up. Bog, too, comes up hoping to help aid Fraud. The 'Babe is wounded before Bog then is cursed to have his INT dropped to 1, and frightened off by the iron crib and leaps back down, hiding under the remains of a bed. Shrett conjures more Shades, each banished as they come, but they crush and freeze the dog to pieces before it does any further harm, and now you outnumber your enemies.
Fraud trips the crib, causing it to fall and the 'Babe rolls out in furious surprise, still giggling but murderously. Boamund manages to climb up and aid Fraud to smash apart the crib. The Babe, now flying up away from the main combat, throws multiple rays of death magic at once, knocking out Boamund and gravely wounding Fraud's right leg. The Skinny Nurse opens her glowing maw wide, emitting a cone of eerie blue energy that covers Boamund and Fraud, burning them all over. Shrett then takes her out. The 'Babe keeps blasting at you, and you do your best to avoid it, but the fight is desperate. At last, Shrett pins the 'Babe through the mouth with a powerful sword-stab. Then Fraud gets in a great slash across the 'Babe's neck and hews its head off. The Chuckling Babe Sylbi'in lets out a final gurgling scream as black fluid bubbles out of its mouth while the head rolls across the floor. An acrid blast of wind comes forth from it. The wind scrapes across Fraud's wounded leg, seeping in and leaving some bubbling black fluid in it. You regroup down in the middle level, finding the cowering Bog, and heal yourselves, contemplating your next move.
And so it ends. The 'Babe was down to 2 MP so it couldn't do much more. I confess I didn't like the whole Umbrodriith subplot, it came from earlier GMing thoughts that have moved on, so I was happy to tie it up. It was not bad, though, to have a secondary villain and some tie-in to Quick Sister and other things.
We will move forth in 2 Fridays! -John
© Copyright - 2000-2024 - John Hutchinson, Tim Evans, Pete Nash, Colin Driver and Gordon Alford