Talca was happy to get the rest. As much as his nerves were pushing him to move onward, for he remembered what had happened to the Twins in their supposed safe room while resting, he wanted a chance to regain his spells. And the spells came to him, after so many years apparently, he was still blessed to receive them. This, at least, was a good sign.

As the others spoke of moving out, he could only nod his head to his new companions. Yes, it was time to go. the corpse on the floor was a constant reminder of the dangers of this place. Skandrik had not been weak. Foolish, perhaps, and arrogant, but not weak. And yet here he was frozen to the floor. Talca did not wish to return to such a condition himself. They needed to move - he was ready to move out. He just hoped his new companions were as competent as they seemed to be, especially the big warrior, who seemed particularly wise.

Completing her prayers to the Seldarine, Rayne stood and joined the others as they made ready to journey forth. They had been given a much needed moment of respite, but would it be enough? The elven warrior gripped Andurile's Blood and prayed that the God's would be with them.

The party once again rested and full of spells, thanks to the clocks time quickening ability, again set out moving deeper into the depths of the tower. The next few rooms were of no interest full of ice and decayed frozen useless items. With no light lamps on the walls the only way to see in the ever increasing darkness came from inherent gifted sight or those magically enhanced. Slowly as they found themselves approaching the hallways end, two more hallways could be seen branching off to the right and left.

However as they came closer to the spilt they suddenly found before them a beholder type creature unlike they had seen before . Without hesitation, as if it had been waiting for them, the blue haired clown like face attacked. The party feeling a wave of cold hit them for a moment stood frozen however that brief minute was gone quickly. Thanks to their saves and spells of protection the party as a whole each only took a quarter of damage. All of the party found, unlike Talca before them, that with the spells of endure heat/cold they had avoided being frozen as he had.

With the creatures sneak attack it was now the parties turn to fight back.

(DM OOC: Ok new post and 1st round of combat. Below of course is what you all face. Good Luck)

Cor shuddered as the cold hit him. Now he understood what happened to the last party. "So ye want ta clown around do ye beastie? Lets see how ye like this." Calling upon the magic of his Ring of Deathly Night, Cor casts magic missile aimed at the central eye.

OOC: 16th level Magic Missile

Siréne
The bitter bite of cold rushed into her, boring deep into her bones. It sought to claim her, seeping her life and her very will away. Yet the warmth of the Goddess remained, holding back the chill of death. For a moment Siréne could feel the humid warmth of a midsummer night caressing her skin. Life beat back the call of death.

An old rage rose up within the witch, a divine wrath that called for retribution. The Goddess would not be denied the blood she called for. Siréne spared a moments glance to Talca. The elf would soon learn that she could wield darker magics than those known in their fey homeland. It was a forbidden power, but in this war there had been a need. The Goddess they served was both dark and light, mother and destroyer of all. Siréne would be the same.

Returning her cerulean gaze to the aberrant beholder, Siréne gripped the fallen wizards staff tightly, her knuckles whitening with pressure. Divine rage poured through her awakening the wrathful power of the staff. They coursed through her and she screamed her fury into a deadly word of power. Crackling with faerie magic, the witch threw out her hand releasing a tiny bead of light. It sped outward, just above the monster's hideous form to blossom into a conflagration of white hot flame.

If the creature so loved the arctic freeze, let them all see how well it endured the inferno.

((OOC: Casting Fireball to target just above the Beholder's head. Using a charge from the Staff of Fury to power the spell. That means a die increase in addition to the double damage for Sirene's attack spells.))

Rayne
The ranger bit back against the frozen sting, shaking off the numbing pain. There was not time for hesitation, she too would call the flames. Priestess and warrior, she called out to the Seldarine and through their divine favor found the light of the sun. Rayne spoke the holy word and pointed to the wretched beast, calling forth gouts of heavenly fire to rain down upon it.

((OOC: Flame Strike))

Lothor moved to the right side of the hall - to spread out the party a bit. He gripped his hand axe of hurling and flung it with all of his might at the beasts central eye. Even such creatures as this were vulnerable to good old steel. Let it feel the bite of his axe. And then the axe would return to him to be thrown again.

If the beast advanced, perhaps he would use his blade, but for now, he wanted to give the casters their space.

Talca saw the thing that had killed him appear in the hall. However long had he had been frozen to the wall, this thing had laid in wait in these halls. And it looked as bizarre and terrible as ever.

He felt the blast of the beast's cold hit him, just as it had so many years before. But this time he was not stuck to a wall and he did not succumb. This time he was not alone. Those who had found him, his new companions and hopefully friends, had a magic that foiled the beast's cold. Still, he felt it in his bones. And his bones remembered that cold.

He would not let the creature defeat him again! This time he would have a chance to return fire. Even as he saw Sirene next to him raise her hand and speak words of power, he grabbed an arrow from his quiver and in one smooth, practiced motion, drew his bow, aimed and fired at the evil beast's central eye. Let it feel his sting this time!

Peri:

As the party had neared the end of the hall it intersected another hall a strange create entered their hall and attacked. This odd Beholder creature had clown heads on it stalks instead of just eyes. One head released a cone of cold which would have surely destroyed the entire party had they not been protected by Cor and Sirene's spells. The blast had hurt the Faerie Dragon deeply and angered her.

"They are not funny, they are nasty." Peri frowned, "Well it would harder to hurt what they cannot see."

With that Peri cast "Blindness" on the beholder , made herself invisible as she fluttered and hid behind the big human Lothor.


Ulthok:


As the party had near the end of the where it intersected another hall a strange create entered their hall and attacked. This odd Beholder creature had clown heads on it stalks instead of just eyes. One head released a cone of cold which would have surely destroyed the entire party had they not been protected by Cor and Sirene's spells. The blast had hurt the Halfling angered him.

The mage was surprised that Beholder's spell worked in front of the creature where usually the antimagic ray protect adventures from the creature magic, only exposing them to its vicious bite. Sensing that the creature had relied so often on the freezing cold to stop or kill any intruder it had exposed itself now to their magic attacks. They would need act quickly and with great force. Ulthok had to rely on the experience of the party to choose wisely.

So the mage chose to damage the creature in these closer confines with a bolt of lightning; he sent a searing Lightening Bolt down the hall to the creature. When the bolt had left his fingers he passed a bit of will into his ring and vanished. Moving carefully he pressed himself to the wall to avoid any actions from his party members.

With the hybrid-beholders surprise attack a failure other then to damage the party it was now a matter of initiative. The first of the party to attack was Sirene launching a Staff of Fury enhanced fireball to just above the creatures head where it exploding punching the hybrid-beholder down into the hallways floor. Next to slam in were Cor's a series of magic-missiles launched from his ring of deathly might slamming into it's main body pushing it backwards into the intersections wall.

Then it was the creatures turn to attack as it came charging back towards the party in as if a childish rage. The party could see that of it's six clown faces, blue, green, purple, and yellow were gone and pink was hanging limp. Though clearly hurt and bleeding a foul smelling black colored blood, it still had enough weapons to attack three times. The last of the clown faces left, orange, let loose a cry and a rust colored ray engulfed the party doing very little damage. However the party knew they were in trouble as within seconds, items of magic that could not with stand the ray's effect, turned to rust.

The second of it's three allowable attacks per round came from it's mouth as the party found out first hand that this hybrid-Beholder had not only clown face attacks and a possible eye attack but a breath weapon also. Spraying from its mouth the party was hit by a cone of dazzling crystal shards of thin ice, acting almost as if metal blades, that tore into the bodies of the entire group cutting deep wounds into their flesh. However once more thanks to the saving throws of all, the lethal damage was halved.

It was here that before it could use it's last existing weapon, it's eye, that the rest of the party's attacks hit the creature full force. First to hit was Ulthok's bolt of lightning slamming into its center eye, then Rayne's flame strike slamming into the orange clown face destroying it. Peri's spell of blindness, blinding the remains of the hybrids eye, and Lother's axe of hurling cutting a deep wound in the creatures side. Yet still it lived and sought to physically attack but a single arrow was it's doom. As Talca calmed his rage he carefully aimed and fired and watched as it flew straight and true into the creatures wide open fanged mouth.

Within only seconds the creature seemed to almost as if a balloon begin to deflate, then without warning the creature exploded! The force of the explosion strong most of the party kept their feet yet took blunt damage from the concussion of the blast. Then the hallway was quiet once more this ghastly hybrid of a beholder finally destroyed,..


(DM OOC: Ok big ugly destroyed I must say you guys did a good job killing it faster then I thought you would. Ok sometime this week I will post a list of what magic items were lost by each of you due to its rust monster like ray after I make the saving throws.
Now a little good news, sad news of course first the good news. Though the party could have taken enough damage to have all been killed, being bunched up in the hallway, thanks to your protections and saving throws you each only took 44 points total so no player character died, though Valene is at -1. That's the good news.
However the same cannot be said for Peri, she just took too much damage and was killed. Ody, Ulthok made his system shock roll when a familiar dies and as such he did not die but he did lose 1 point of constitution dropping him to a con of 15. Normally in the rules you lose the HP's also but with the high level of this campaign I don't use that rule. Sorry my friend. Ok next post next Sunday the 24th.)

The beholder drew its last breath and slumped to the floor. Cor was surprised at its quick demise but paused for a moment of thanks to Odin. The battle was quick but not without cost. Valene lay motionless but breathing on the floor, Ulthok barely managed to remain conscious and Peri no longer lived. Cor felt the pain in his own body and knew he had sustained more than minor injury. Furthermore, he understood that it could have been much worse.

A quick check of his belongings revealed that one of the rays had destroyed some o the magic items he carried but none that were vital. Others did not appear to be as lucky. Cor knew that tending to Valene was of utmost importance. He moved to her side and called upon the power of Odin and laid hands of her. As she opened her eyes he spoke "Rest easy lass. Yer still in rough shape. In a moment we will set ta healing everyone." Cor cast his eyes upon Peri. "If one of ye could gather Peri's body we will take her with us. The wee one has saved us more than once and has proven ta be a great friend. Once we are clear of these foul beasts I will see if we can bring her back. For now we need ta focus on healing ourselves before another one of those things finds us."

Lothor was pleased to see his axe slice into the clownish beholder. The things was looked crazy and that was being nice. It's attacks were brutal. The blast of cold was bad, although the spells protecting them helped a lot. But the other weapons were brutal and all in the group felt their sting, some worse than others. In a battle that seemed to last forever, but in fact took only a few seconds, the final blow was Talca's arrow burying itself in the crazy things maw. It was the last real blow struck, but the beast knew dealt damage even in its dying throws blasting itself apart and scattering bits of beholder all over.

Pulling a bit of clown hair out of his armor, Lothor quickly surveyed the group. The two halflings were down, but not out. The little dragon, was gone. One of these beholders had been bad, and if there were more around, they could hardly have failed to hear the sounds of its dying blast. He saw Cor kneel by Valene to lay on hands. It was time for healing to begin, but someone needed to stand guard as well, and he knew well what his job in this group was.

He reached out a hand to Talca who seemed to be staring befixed at the remains of the beast that had previously been his doom. "Great shot Talca, right in its kisser." Now that was an image he didn't like! "He reached in his bag and pulled out a potion of healing. "Here. Give this to Ulthok to get him up. Then stand guard looking back the way we came. We need to give the healers a chance to do their job. I'm going up by the crossing."

As he moved up by the tunnel he noticed his feet for the first time. They were bare. Blast it! His boots were gone. Once he was up he'd have to check with Ulthok - he was pretty sure there were boots in that bag of his. When he reached the crossing he used his mirror to peek around the corner looking both ways. Once sure nobody was coming right away he positioned himself where he could see both ways as best he could while leaving himself concealed as much as possible - this was to try to avoid being seen and to give him some protection from breath weapons.

OOC:
***Lothor will be very careful of the area of effect for the temperature control spell. He will not go to the crossing if it would take him out of the spells safe zone.
*I'm not quite sure what the crossing looks like - I'm sort of envisioning a 4-way meeting of halls.
*As soon as others are able to respond, he will get the boots of floating or whatever they are from Ulthok's bag.
*He will also hopefully be getting some healing from the cleric types. If not I will add to the post on that subject.

Talca calmed himself and fired his arrow straight into the evil creatures wide open maw. As he expected, the arrow flew true and buried itself somewhere inside the beast. His pleasure swelled even as the beat itself seemed to shrivel. And then it exploded! He felt the concussion of the blast push him backwards. Even in death the foul thing was dangerous!

he looked around at his new-found friends and surveyed the damage. They were a powerful lot - they had launched attacks even Skandrik would have been proud of. They had taken down a beast that had caused even the cyclops wizard to flee. And yet they had not done so without taking damage of their own. The two little ones were on the ground.

Even as he noticed these things Lothor, the big warrior, grabbed his arm and thrust a potion into his hands. 'Revive Ulthok' he was told. Then go on guard. He pulled himself from his momentary reverie and, recognizing the wisdom of the words, moved to execute the order. The small male halfing was Ulthok, and it was his little dragon that lay dead a little way away. He gently turned the Halfling and quietly spoke while pouring some of the potion into him. "Easy Ulthok, we shall have you on your feet in no-time."

As the potion went down the halflings throat his eyes grew brighter and strength seemed to return. Ulthok quickly pulled himself to his feet and looked to Valene, the other Halfling. Talca, his first task complete, moved to finish the second. He moved just past the edge of the party and put an arrow to his bow, staring down the long passage the had traveled. The beast's death had made a great boom and if there was anything out there to hear it, they could hardly avoid doing so.

As he moved into a position to stand guard he spoke up. "We must heal quickly and move on. With the noise of that thing's demise we do not want to stay here for long!"

OOC: Talca also needs healing and this post will be changed slightly once the healing distribution is figured out.

The creature's icy shard breath ripped into Ulthok and the other but it here the weakened party's attacks against the beholder struck. Fire and lightening engulfed the thing as melee missiles crashed into it. The force of the attack was devastating and the horror began to collapse. Though dying the creature had one last revenge, it exploded dealing heavy force blow against the group.

The force knocked Ulthok to the ground, consciousness was floated in and out. Pain wracked his body, his head pounded; but there was more, something wasn't right. Laying motionless nothing made sense. Then there was something pouring down his throat, healing started to course through his body as the potion took effect. Looking up he saw the new party member step back with the empty flask. His mind started to clear and suddenly he felt the loss. The comforting little presents in his mind was silent..no not silent,gone. He heard Cor from across the the room, "If one of ye could gather Peri's body we will take her with us. The wee one has saved us more than once and has proven ta be a great friend. Once we are clear of these foul beasts I will see if we can bring her back. For now we need ta focus on healing ourselves before another one of those things finds us." Ulthok watched as the small bundle was stored safely to protect her body from aging if they should be whisked away back to their own time.

As the full realization gripped him the mage cried out, "Noooooooooo,,," Jumping up he ran to where Peri's lifeless body was being lovingly wrapped in bundling cloth. Someone reached out and pulled him close. Valene still weak from her own healing hugged Ulthok and held him. Tears streamed down his face as he shook with despair. Dropping to his knees he wept unashamed. Valene gently rocked him until he stopped shacking.

Finally Ulthok look up into Valene's eye. Taking her face in his hands he kissed firmly on the mouth, "Thank you,. You of all know the pain of this and I must suppose you feel it nearly as much me,. She'd want us to see to the others so we'd best starting healing everyone..and then we must more on."

Sadly but determined the party began passing out potions and casting spells of hearing.

Aliya gets a Heal from Sirene.

Cor drinks his 2 potion and cast a cure light wounds on himself.

Rayne uses a heal on herself.

Valene drinks her potion uses a Cure Critial and gets a cure Critical from Sirene.

Ulthok had gotten a potion from Lothor, gets Cure Critical Wounds from Sirene and a Cure Moderate from Cor.

Talca drinks his two potion and gets a gets Cure Moderate Wounds from Rayne.

Lothor gets a Heal from Valene.

Roan get a Cure Serious Valene, a Cure Serious from Rayne, two Cure Moderate from Cor.

Sirene uses her other Heal on herself.


The 9 potions of extra healing left are passed out so each member still has one on them.


As they gained full strength they headed out again, Ulthok ties himself off so as to not loss track of the party as the veil is prepared to hide the party. taking his place in the lead searching ahead and checking carefully for traps and dangers.

Siréne spat a foul curse as she wiped a trail of the creatures blood from her cheek. The loss of the amulet was severe. Even more terrible, Peri had fallen to the beast. Powerful though they might be, they would not last long against a horde of these aberrant beasts. One alone had nearly felled them all.

There was little time to ponder and mourn. This frozen hell might well claim them, but they had to keep on nevertheless. She wondered, for just a moment, what would happen to one of faerie if her flesh failed here. Would dying here mean dying a mortal death? The thread flashed through her mind and buried itself back in the darkness. Philosophy would wait, there were things to do.

Summoning what divine power she could, Siréne let the life-giving warmth of the Goddess flow through her, restoring her vitality. Once her own power was restored, the priestess went to attending the others, until all were healed. It was not a thing she and the other priests could do again, not without rest.

Force would not get them through this, but trickery would. Long before she had donned the mantle of the war witch she had been fey, and there were few who excelled more than faeries at the art of trickery. A sly smile crossed her lips, she had missed subterfuge.

"We will vanish soon," Siréne spoke as she handed the end of a silken rope to Talca. "Tie yourselves in a chain so we may walk hidden but together."

Once all were connected by the shining thread of silk, Siréne began her work. Fey magic danced at her fingertips as she sang her spell, and the dream responded. Light began to shift around them, making a mirror of the real. Arcane thread by arcane thread the faerie wove her web. And when the veil was ready, Siréne laid it upon the world.

Where once many had stood, now appeared a silent, empty hallway, untouched for generations. The ice that would melt in the presence of the magical warmth appeared frozen still. They would move on hidden.

((OOC: Siréne has used to the healing spells as Ody has laid out. Rayne will do the same if I don't get the post in for her today. Siréne is using Veil to make the party invisible/undetectable. The veil will also maintain the appearance of the cold.))

With the parties first encounter with one of the beholder creatures having showed them these creatures were not to be taken lightly, it was time to heal.

With spells, potions, and hands all working quickly the group was once more up to full health. However sadly the group had determined much to Ulthok's grief that for now Peri would remain dead, safely kept in in the Halfling thieves magical pouch of storage. He and Valene would attempt to raise the magical creature once they could do it without being rushed.

With all healed up to full once again the party for a brief moment stood unsure of which way to proceed.

"Well I think we should move West the same way the beholder attacked us from." This from Roan "After all it came this way so perhaps we back track it and see what we find."

After a few more moments of discussion it was agreed to follow the Ranger/Cleric's suggestion. With Ulthok in the lead once more the party tied together in single file, Sirene in the center with her spell control temperature yet active now joined by a second spell this one of veil. As the party continued to move deeper into the darkness Rayne found herself positioned behind Ulthok. Having lost her main weapon to the beholders attack of rust she was now only armed with her bow "Anduril's Blood"

For what seemed to be an hour of searching deserted rooms, all covered in ice and nothing of value within. They finally came upon another hallway spilt, this one to the North and South. As Ulthok carefully looked to the South first he quickly brought his head back into hiding. The Thief/Mage had seen a set of stairs going down, clearly a way deeper into the bowels of this tower. However he had also seen guarding this route down two more of the clown faced tentacle Beholders. Thanks to Sirene's spell of veil he had not been seen and should they attack the party for the moment had the advantage of surprise. This time the first strike would be theirs if taken.


((DM OOC: Ok I sorta fast forwarded you all to this point as only 2-3 rooms had anything interesting in them, nothing that would really help you, and one was a trap so to get the game moving forward once more I dropped them. Sooooooooo,,.

Two Beholders before you.
A set of stairs down
You have surprise thanks to Sirene's spell of veil
Whatcha gonna do?

Next post next Sunday the 22nd))