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 Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 7:21 pm
Aella cringed. Uh, how could you put that tihng in your mouth? It smelled aweful!
"You know, I tihnk I can get it back home without having to...touch it like that. I don't know about you, but I can fight it, I can get covered in it's blood, but I can't touch it." She shivered. "I don't like looking at it." She bent down, tugged the hide form eliot's mouth. "I'll just get some of my birds to transport it out."
Meilikki was thankful, for taking off her petticoats. She had little time for trying to find a split riding skirt. Outside, she foudn her dragon, whcih was not difficult, since he was a very large creature. She bent his head, appologizing for not being able to do anything, and she rubbed his muzzle, telling him it was all right. There were soem things that he couldn't stop. She climbed onto his back, and Tanudnra flew off into the dark.
A laugh rang out through the stone hallways of the Corn Field Keep. Lab coats loooked up from their work, some scribbling on clib boards, some counting the heads of new arrivles, others making sure that those new arrivles "responded," throwing those that didn't into smallish rooms to be examed later.
One in particual, with thick glasses and mousy hair, smiled. "Is it time already?"
"Oh yes. Get the front lines out there. Throw in some of those new hybrids too."
"The c-"
He held a and up to his assistant, and nodded. "Oh yes, those will do nicely."
Soon, an army (who was clawing and biting at each toher, or locking lips in a sick perversion of passion) stood waiting for a signal.
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Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 7:26 pm
Eliot let the hide go, she was already covered in its blood and she would eventually be eating it wouldn;t she? sisn't bother her if it was in her mouth. At least not as a wolf as a human she might think differently.
She danced a little towards the way back out of the cave. Well lets go then! Warren is going to need some food shoved down his throat!
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Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 7:31 pm
The portal opened, and the unhappy brothers watched as their soldiers, or Zak's and Din's soldiers, walked into the large gap in time and space to find themselves on an open plain, which was more like the bottom of a cavren. Vierna pulled the memories from Tarathiel's mind, and placed them into Ad'non using a simple transfurrence copy and paste, then used her prayers to bring a handmaiden of lolth to the site of the gate, and tore open the passageway to the valley. The army marched into the field, and imidiately completed defensive lines, two box formations with Tarathiel and Vierna in the centre of the left flank, and the right flank remained 'leaderless'.
"Now, where is that lich that so troubles you..." Vierna purred, her voice filled with the malicious intent of her kin. Tarathiel's skin crawled every time he heard her voice, but that sound simply made him regret being alive.
"He's here."
"How do you know? Are you sure you are not mistaken and have created this little trade just to see how far I was willing to go to have you all to myself, now away from your allies and in a place where I control all the angles..." SHe crackled.
Tarathiel tried to bring some of his wits to the front of his mind, "Yeah." What a response.
"You know you'll love, again and again..." The sound of that promise was probably more tortureous than any other noise on this planet. Tarathiel slowly began to see that he was probably going to have to kill her many times, Lolth would hate for him to lose such a... thing.
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Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 7:42 pm
Aella made a face. Dear god, that looked quite disgusting. She held her staff in front of her, looked to be doing no more than thinking. Soon, the air was filled with those small wind birds, each with a streaming tail. They filled the room with sweet air, and cooled it down some too. Each bird swooped on the dead carcus, grabbed a chnuk, and flew off with it.
"They'll put it back together at the Keep." She waved an arm, "come on, I needa bath."
Everything had gone dead still, quite litteraly so. The caverns were as dark as they could be, because this army needed no light, not even the remarkable heat vision that many underdark creatures possesed. They hunted by feel alone. They knew where live flesh was, where live souls were. They knew that some were comming now.
Hiding away, leaveing each other alone as they decided as one to persue prey that seemed more...yielding. There as not a corner that did not have a mass of bodies behind it, or a cavern that was not full, and in this case, most of the pathways before th Corn Fields were stocked with corpse flesh.
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Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 8:00 pm
Tarathiel looked about, rather nervously. Mostly, because he did not trust his sister, and secondly, because they had been standing here for a few minutes and nothing happened. He was not affraid of the undead, not even the lich phased him. But between having his soul eaten by one of those things Gil told him about, and his sister... He was pretty torn between which fate would be worse. Maybe, the underdark would simply collapse again, killing everyone but him again, like that time five hundred years before when he first left the Drow and Elves behind...
The Forces began to adjust their lines, and the second ranks loaded their hand crossbows with special darts used to waylay the first line of almost any army. The bolts were enchanted to explode into lightning bolts, a rather common enchantment in the city of the drow, and the only thing that really stopped these bolts were rock fiends. They could take the bolt and ground it rather quickly with little loss of heart. That is why each drow had a second type of magical arrow, the fire bolts. They didn't explode, but the fires would weaken stone minions. The third type of arrow, which made up the rest of the twenty bolts, carried the common drow sleeping poison or the less common paralysis poison. Either way, soldiers hit by these were usually out of the fight.
Unlike most armies, the drow forces used as much magic and trickery as they could to out match their opponents. Even tthe Stone Giants of the southen Emerald Caves were sundered by this drow empire. Actually, as far back as any drow could feasibly remember, they had never truly lost to anyone, not even the high elves who put up the biggest fight, holding the drow back for five centries. But, in the end, the drow won.
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Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 8:20 pm
"Are we ready then?"
"Oh yes, quite." What the man with the glasses did, Dimitri did no see. It did not matter, since he knew what was bieing done. That is what mattered. Ah the glorious sound of battle would soon ring out over this dark place, the screams of the dieing and the dead would welome the newest crop as they fell from their husks.
Soon,blood, red and vicouse and oh so pleasing to behold would stain the rocks for eternity, giving the Lich's home a much needed touch of gore that it had not seen in a long time. It was like his battle with his brother oh so long ago, but this time,e verytihng would go his way. How ill prepared he had been then, how foolish! Well, now he had had centuries to prepare.
Dear brother's worst fears would soon come to light, or dark, for the second time. How truly dreaful it was that he was dead, unable to leave his little gas pot of a sancturary. He woudls o dearly love to see that man's face again...as it had been...then....
Back to the present. Outside, the horde surged forward was one collective group, thier eyes glowing slightly red. It seemed as if the very ground itself moved, there were so many of them.
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Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 8:31 pm
Tarathiel openly yawned as the swarm manifested before the arranged drow army. The Prince shrugged when his sister glared at him like he was a fool. The moment the swarm began to charge, she waved her hands and shouted out to Lloth, and covered both small contingents, small in comparrisson to the mass, with a strange dark light. That light actually enhanced the drow's hand and eye coordination, and increased the amount of damage they were able to inflict upon their enemies. The two leagons were swarmed by the onslaught of vicious and cruel creatures, but they held their lines firmly and kept their formations nice and tightly. The enemy bodies piled high on the ground, as the lightning arrows and spears did their nasty work. By the time the leagons were surrounded and fighting on all four sides, Tarathiel managed another yawn and Vierna called out to Lloth and summoned a small firestorm over the thickest part of the swarm.
A few drow died here and there, but for the most part, they held strong. The shield wall seemed impenitrable to the humaniods, and the drow armour seemed to absorb most of the attacks with ease. After a few minutes of fighting, the numbers of dead on the drow side might have reached four. The enemy did not fare so well against such well armed foes.
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Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 8:45 pm
She fixed a mask to her face, covering nose to chin, feeling uncomfortable behind it as she knew Malik and Piper had. But it was neccesary. Tanundra had exceuted a lot or risky magics and manuevers to get them here so quickly, and the poor dragon was utterly exaughsted in his physical body by the time they reached the grave site. Ever one to serve his mistress, Tanny guided his blind charge to the statue, where Eca and Ton would find them.
They will not like being awoken so soon after their last. Are you certain..
"I need to know more about Dimitri. If you know a btter way, I'll gladly listen." Her voice sounded mechanical form behind the mask.
The dead were cut down, so much so that they crawled over hills and valleys of their own, and yet they kept comming. One would fall and two would take it's place, every time. Though they seemed to be making little headway as of yet. But they were mindless, and would do as they were commanded to do. If a dead man were to fin in his claws a live peice of drwo flesh,m he ate greedly, fedning off his fellows. If a drow were to fall victum o the soulless, it was not without five others trying for the same soul.
They simply kept comming. The death of their..commrades...did notihng to slow them.
Hulking shapes could be seen through the masses of dead, dark things with bat like wings, large fangs. They lumbered about, knwoing where they were going, having some kind of method to their approach.
Dimitri would have smiled to himself, if he could have. All was going quite well.
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Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 8:55 pm
Tarathiel yawned again, bored with this little escapad. He was probably going to die, which didn't bother him overly much, since he really did have little to live for. Fighting and fighting, after all, he was a fighter.
He watched his sister weave her hands, calling out more power from Lloth, which of course, was granted. Being the lover of a false demi-god didn't effect your standing with the real one, he mused. Then chocked, he didn't like that thought at all.
The hands waved over the crowds of undead, which simply stopped moving within a one hundred metre radius, and seemed to be stuck in some private battle. For a brief moment, it appeared as though Vierna really did take control of them, but their creaters will was far stronger than a mere cleric's. The undead seemed to continue their relentless attacks, and soon the two squards became one as the two boxes united to form a large rectangle. The shapes amongst the numbers did not go unnoticed, and Tarathiel conceded to fight. He pulled up his two hand crossbows, and fired a quick ten missile barrage at the lumbering hulks. The missiles were deadly accurate, and each carried with it a small explosion as the bolts of impact connected with the fiendish creatures. The drow smirked at his sister as his handy work came to light, then she retored by calling forth a pillar of fire which stormed about the lines, incinerating the ranks of foes by the score. She smirked, as she out-did the male. "Yeah, but you are a spellcaster."
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Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 9:02 pm
The hulking forms, which seemed now to appear as half mutated dragon-men, had many tricks up their sleeves. One was the mannor of their death. Struck with bolts of different varietes did not much amtter. When the life had left a body, which only happened when a botld got underneath the tough scales in the hide, they would turn to stone. Then, shatter like class, thrwoing red hot, shapr shards of rock in every direction.
The underdark was riddled with pathways, and thus the dragon mena pproached the drow from behind, their speed unnatural, their keen eyes earily speaking of equally keen brains.
Small things started happening then. Dirt fell from the carvern ceiling, as if something were dislodging the debris up there. Small eath tremors, odd little bursts of light, and pockets of fire, It was getting...distinctly warm in the caverns as well, covereing even the dead in a thick shine of sweat.
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Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 9:06 pm
A necromancer came in and waited until he was noticed, not daring to interrupt a conversation between his master and the new woman. however after a moment Malik nodded to him, and he took a few step forward.
"the skin of that surface elf has been a great tool in scrying the dead. however, you asked for any deaths of Drow near us. we have seen the souls of four at least. soldiers of some degree."
Malik nodded lightly.
"Tarathiel struck out at the Lich first. probably brought his priestess sister with him. Ill timed, Tarathiel. you don't know what your dealing with in it's full extent. a priestess of Lloth is not goign to be able to command or destroy a demi-god in power of a lich. Especially not one who was so well versed in magics in life."
Then a slight chuckle.
"But what does he care. a thorn in his side to be removed."
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Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 9:10 pm
Tarathiel had to dodge the spiting evil flying about each way, as the rear of the line was attacked by the hulking masses as well. He easily tumbled to his feet and looked over at his sister who's out held hand seemed to stop any oncoming barrage. "Telekinesis is a wizard spell?" He laughed as he said it, she was his sister after all, and there was no spell cast to cause that effect. The half-wyrms were waylaying the lines still, causing a bit of destruction, but they were beaten back by drow warriors who unintentionally got themselves killed by the explosions. The Drow lines were begining to look rather ravished, but Tarathiel did not loose his confidence in the lines just yet.
With her left hand held out before her, the falling rocks and debries was redirected towards the other army, causing more chaos in their ranks, should chaos be able to be caused. The heat in the battlefield seemed to swell up, which caused Tarathiel to feel rather unpleased. This would not be good.
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Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 9:24 pm
Flying rocks and dirt and sand soon began to change form, becoming small, medium, and large scarab beetles, fangs able to eat through the toughest elathers, and even some armor. The smaller ones coulde asily find their way around such things. They did not touch the dead of course, since they also craved living flesh.
The dragon-men were taken down some, and after thier innitial attack there seemd to be no more, a douzen or so of the creatures left standing, and fighting. One could not die though, without taking down some of it's enemies.
The chambers grew hotter and hotter still, until breathing was very difficuly, and the stones around th army seemd to grow brighter with red light. The flesh on the dead was sizzling, popping, driving them on even faster.
Unseen things were crawling along the ceiling, eating away at the mineral deposits that hung like giant stakes, falling ot the ground and eihter impaling drow, or become part of the mass of insects.
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Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 9:41 pm
Tarathiel cursed as the stones and earth turned into an insect plague, this was becoming and interesting battle. The drow seemed little phased by the magical amenties, occassionally a soldier broke rank and was cut down, which was no longer acceptable for the remnents of two legions. The number of drow dead seemd to escalate, but they mostly remained adamant in their posts.
Tarathiel pullled out a little ring, and hastily placed it on his finger and activated the enchantmetn, creating a sphere of fire aroundhimself which instantly killed all the waylaying bugs, he was thankful for this little ring but it only carried one charge. This would not go well, he was hoping to at least cripple the liches forces with this attack so when Malik came, he could get to the lich with little effort.
Well, at least he woudl get to see his sister die. He turned his head to look at the priestess, who seemed to be so deep into a chant that nothing phased her in the least, the little bugs swarmed her, her shield no longer deflecting stones.
The lines began to retreat inwards, and soon only several score of drow were left standing between Tarathiel and the horde. Then, something quasi-meraculas happened. The surviving drow warriors burst into accidicic clouds and summoned forth Driders.
The half-spider drow warriors each wielded two axes capable of cutting stone, but that was not the advantage here. These warriors could take hits that would fell normal drow and stand back up to fight agian. They were pretty powerful, but enough hits would end their lives too. The sudden burst of power drove back the nearest chargers and the flies seemed to swarm over these large bulbs of flesh. The flies devoured the flesh, but the things still stood and continued to fight.
Vierna turned to Tarathiel, "I think we lost."
"Well, what do you know." The drow prince said, "I guess I'll be going." The elf pulled up a statuette of a hippogriff and summoned the creature. He sat on its back, and had it drag him and the statue back onto the plane from which they had come. Vierna looked about for a moment, and then felt a strong burning sensation about her arms and legs and noticed the swarm of horrid little bugs.
She screamed out her word of recall, and was quickly carried back to her chaple where several of her handmaidens were praying. They jumped at her return, and were shocked by what they saw.
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Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 9:56 pm
"Aw, are they going so soon?" He really did seem disappointed. "I had barley started." Indeed, he ahd had much more lined up for the little battle, and it had not been near as climactic as the battle with his brother so long ago.
The man with the glasses said nothing, afraid to say the wrong thing and make Dimitir angry.
"Oh yes, there is always a next time." He waved a hand. "Throw out the jherege, get rid of whoever remains." He brought his boney figners before his hood, steepling them. "And prepare a bedroom."
Meilikki retruned to the keep, about as exaughsted as her companion, who had taken them both through the deep parts of the earth to get back so quickly. She hadn't even botherd to unlcip the maks from around her face yet. Her visit had been unfruitful at best, and mostly just a waist of time. In the Keep, she apused a moment, thinking aobut the mess the place was in from people coming and going, the bedroom with it's toppled beds. She made her way carefully to the firplace, kicking a few overturned things, almsot falling over a chair that was completey turned around. At the fire palce, she bent down and took form the ashes an amythys stone, bounced it in her palm. How had it gotten into the fireplace like that....
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