Slain by Elf

We have fought our way to the depths of the Keep on the Shadowfell, taking care to map as we go lest we forfeit our payment due, and finally the portal to hell is revealed to us. With Iago's falling in to a pool of blood announcing our arrival the cultist leader and cleric of Orcus turns from his chanting. 'You foolish cretins.' He has obviously been expecting us. 'You will pay for your impotence!'

'Who told you?!' shouts back Adran, which explains why he failed to seduce the elf back in town.

'Incompetence. I meant, incompetence.' But Kawakami has already had enough of this monologue and charges in to action, closing the gap between him and the cleric in seconds, raising his blade as he does so. Our warlord brings down his longsword with a mighty strike, although the cleric appears remarkably unconcerned. All is made clear as an amulet he is wearing around his neck glows with the hit and he vanishes!

This doesn't look good and any moment I am expecting a harsh voice to announce, 'Subcreatures! Gozer the Gozerian, Gozer the Destructor, Volguus Zildrohar, The Traveller has come. Choose and perish.' But luckily instead he has only teleported to a different side of the room. He now stands on a circle evidently emitting magical energy, mere feet away from the portal to hell. A foul beast can be seen straining against the still-present forces binding the portal that prevent his entry to this plane of existence.

We enter battle with our foe, his minion staying at some distance and trying to immobilise each of us in turn. There is enough bloodshed that our warlord feels some envigorating words will rouse us to glory. He lets Adran spend a healing surge and adds D6 to the healing done. With the die roll ending up giving a single extra point of healing Adran thanks Kawakami a little too sarcastically for someone who just let him gain back a healthy chunk of hit points out-of-turn. 'Next time, I'll come over and see if you are more appreciative of a kick in the leg.'

With concentrated effort and a bit of clever footwork to keep the cleric flanked we are able to defeat him, his body crumpling lifeless to the stone floor. On seeing his master perish the minion jumps in to a pit to escape our wrath and in no way because it was both late and the last fight of the written adventure.

As we bask in our victory, the channeling of energy to open the portal to hell interrupted, huge claws erupt from portal! It looks like they are trying to tear the fabric that holds the two planes apart, but instead reach down and drag the cleric's fallen body back through to the other side. We can only look on, powerless and unnerved.

'Wait', declares Adran, 'we didn't loot the body, he's still got that magic rod. Let's go after him!'

This entry was posted on 2nd April 2009 at 10.49 pm and is filed under Dungeons & Dragons. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.