Fire and Brimstone (Part 5)

GAME: Durrankar rolls perception: (8)+26: 34
GAME: Ga'Elian rolls Percep/Ioun: aliased to Perception+4: (9)+28+4: 41
GAME: Astaren rolls perception: (16)+23: 39
GAME: Sandy rolls Perception: (15)+19: 34

An through examination of the room leaves it clear that there is nothing in it aside from the desk, the quickly closing hole, and a small magical circle inscribed on the floor beside the desk. That's all. Until suddenly there is something else. Someone else. The figure is instantly recognizable, a tall dark-haired man with brilliantly green eyes and pale skin. He grins at you with a flash of fangs and holds up a glass bottle. "A gift for you. From my mistress." He thumbs open the cork of the bottle and drops it on the ground. Then with a wink and a little jaunty wave he disappears.

Immediately a black ichor starts pouring and pouring out of the bottle; too rapidly. It builds on itself in a matter of milliseconds. Becoming a towering black ooze-like thing. It glitters like the one you too-easily defeated and then shimmers. It's still growing, until it reaches the ceiling of the room. There it shimmers again and turns hard.

Ga'Elian asks, "What does it mean when a slime hardens? I mean, other than it blocking the way past itself?"

Astaren shakes his head, "Mistress?" glancing around to the others, "odd... did somebody piss off somebody here recently and not tell the rest of us? I am inclined to leave, cause it really sounds like this guy just goes around pissing people off."

"The hell?" Asks Sandy, her eyes closing for a moment as if she has a mammoth headache. "UGggh." Complaint!

Durrankar says, "Hmmm...." Durrankar grumbles as they face yet another slime. Except it hardens. "Maybe it's compensating for the last slime's inadequacy." he then takes a deep breath. "Well......Lets dehydrate it.""

"Ugh," says Sandy.

"Well, I'll follow your lead," she gives a nod towards the others, seeming fine with letting them take the point on what happens next.

Ga'Elian offers, "I could try cutting through it with my dagger, but maybe Zeheir has left us some other way to get around this place. I mean, shouldn't we try to head upwards to the higher floors?"

Durrankar says, "Just punch through the outer shell. This one will likely be a little harder than the last one."

"Are we sure that's a good idea?" asks Sandy. She's looking at Astaren now. She expects he might know his stuff. A glance to Durrankar too.

Ga'Elian shrugs, then takes off his gloves, rings, bracers, and Ioun stones, and puts them into his haversack, then walks toward the hardened slime, brandishing his bare fist.

Astaren shakes his head, "I honestly don't know much about slimes guys, not my area of study." looking over the slime and considering with a sigh.

GAME: Astaren rolls knowledge/dungeoneering: (8)+13: 21
GAME: Durrankar rolls knowledge/dungeoneering: (6)+5: 11

Astaren shakes his head slowly, "This could be a good idea, or a really bad idea." walking right up to the cube and pressing a finger against it.

Ga'Elian flanks Astaren, ready to start boxing the solid slime if Astaren gets attacked.

Astaren steps back and frowns a moment, "This is just a shell, the thing on the inside, is reading something trasaque level of dangerous. Who the hell did this guy piss off?" glancing back to the party, "Still feels a bit odd. Reads as a terrible monstrosity that destroys all in its path and is the downfall of nations. So could be Sandy having a bad hair day in there, or a really dangerous creature, or something more conceptural. Still best to leave it alone I think."

Durrankar says, "Yeah. I've got a rather good idea. Let's get the slag out of here. AND warn the dragon that something may try to remove itself from the tower."

Ga'Elian says, "Well, at very least I figure he pissed off Eclavdran, who as an Infernal Duke would be a pretty formidable enemy." Then at Durrankar's suggestion he says, "You sound confident. Let’s do it."

The solid ooze remains... solidly in place, blocking the one and only exit out of the room.

Durrankar says, "And....it's blocking our only way......."

Durrankar looks to Astaren. "You and Sandy have teleport spells, don't you? Perhaps tokens of recall?

"You don't say? Let's inform the dragon, then, tell him what we've found. He might have some thoughts on it all." Sandy glances towards the others. "I can get us out, yeah."

Astaren glances to Durrankar, "Teleport, greater teleport, and the all useful Word of Recall, with a recall point set back in Alexandria. I don't always run Durrankar, but damned if I don't know how to really well." Making a light joke as he glances around.

"Well Astaren. In this case I will take the role." Durrankar then MORPHS INTO A CHICKEN AND HOPS INTO ASTAREN'S ARMS!

Durrankar then poops on the slime.

Ga'Elian puts his hand on Astaren's shoulder.

Astaren stops Durrankar from shitting on the slime, "Very fragile there, even the slightest scratch can break the shell. I have seen what comes out of your mouth, not sure what comes out of your ass is any safer. Sandy, want to do the honors and get us out of here?"

GAME: Sandy casts Greater Teleport. Caster Level: 20 DC: 30

Sandy casts her spell, and suddenly all of you are right back to where you began. Before the tower. It only takes a few seconds for the Foo to notice you, scooting through the magma to where you are and taking a deep breath. It grins at you. "Did you speak with my wizard?"

Ga'Elian asks, "Zeheir? Oh yes. And may I say, he doesn't seem to be very much in touch with reality."

Finishing her spell, Sandy takes a single step back, a little woozy. Teleports are always odd.

"...from a certain point of view, I suppose."

Durrankar looks over to the Foo and waves. "Yes we met with him." he says in Draconic. "He teleported out of the tower because one of his experiments alarmed him, and became a massive hardened slime. We removed ourselves from the tower, and the experiment is going to remove itself from the tower. We think you should stop it from getting anywhere...."

The Foo looks understandably confused. It looks toward the tower. Then back at you. "I am certain my wizard will take care of it." It sounds very certain of this but gives you a comfortang expression. "If not; if it tries to disturb the tower I will destroy it."

Durrankar says, "The wizard has left, I fear." He conveniently leaves out that it was the wizard who left the 'slime' there in the first place.

Astaren glances to Durrankar, shrugs his shoulders and turns to start on his way, 'We may be back to see him again, for now our business is done. Thank you for your time."

Ga'Elian puts his Ioun stones back in orbit and his bracers, rings, and gloves back on. He says, "Do the multiverse a favor and do destroy that ooze if you please. At any rate, it seems to be dissolving the tower faster than it can repair itself."

"Were you not going to take care of that?" The Foo worriedly leans down toward you, whiskers drooping.

Durrankar stares at Ga'Elian.....then looks back to the Foo. "That particular slime has been taken care of. However, there is another in there that.....we cannot do anything about, But -YOU- can, Great One...."

Astaren goes a bit pale, "No no no no." glancing to the Foo, "Sorry for the confusion, the slime was taken care of inside and a lot of the damage fixed. If you attack the slime on the outside here, it will help as well. As for the inside, we need to do some research, hence why we may be back."

"We could try. But we'd like your help. It's a bit... much for just us on our own. Powerful as we are, the danger emanating from it was rather great." She wrinkles her nose. "But as he says, we are not quite ready yet." A nod towards Astaren.

Ga'Elian says, "Our commission was to explore and report back to out employers. We told you that we would not remove anything from the Tower. I figure that means that removing the slime would be contrary to the charge you laid on us as a condition of entry. But you seem quite eager to preserve the Tower. I welcome you to deal with the slime, as I doubt you gave /it/ permission to pass."

The Foo looks at you with it's brow furrowed. "So you will be back. To help me deal with the ooze." It smiles toothily. "I can wait." It begins to sink back down into the magma slowly.

Astaren glances to Ga'Elian, "That slime in there, would destroy the Foo my friend. Encouraging it to attack it, is a death sentence. For the Foo, and for any nearby innocents. We will need to research what that thing is... and research who that wizard was. We have a name now."

Durrankar nods to the Foo. "Thank you for allowing us to return, Great one." he says with a bow.....then as the Foo sinks into the magma, Durrankar whirls around, CLAPS his hand over Ga'Elian's mouth and looks to Astaren. "Get us out of here."

Ga'Elian looks at Astaren with amazement and wonder. He says, "mm fmm hm mmm."

Astaren looks to about snap his fingers, then frowns, "Wait. Wrong plane. Let me fix that." Pulling out a small fold up table from his haversack, a bunch of scribing materials and sits down right there to start scribing a scroll into his spell book.

Durrankar just...quietly waits...with his hand over Ga'elian's mouth.

Ga'Elian says, "Mmmph mmm."

Astaren takes a good hour to finish his transcribing. WIth a smile he closes his spell book and reattaches it to his belt. Picks up the folding table and puts it away carefully. The touches one of his rings to the spellbook and starts to change quietly as the ring glows and reaches out to touch everybody, and with a blur you find yourself, in middle of a sand storm in middle of the desolation.

"Oh yea, forgot. Plane shift puts you roughly 5 feet to 500 miles away from your target." Then says a word in eldritch and you all find yourselves in a nice cozy room, with a warm file. A round table is set with several cups, and steaming tea pot. "Here we go."

Durrankar GLARES at Ga'Elian. "How often do I lie, Elian? I try not to! So when I tell a dragon a lie....you don't tell him something that is completely the opposite of what I say." he then takes a deep breath. "I don't....want...to fight....a dragon....if I don't have to! This means I will lie to a dragon to prevent a fight." It's only THEN does he release Elian's face. He then shakes his head.....

Ga'Elian says, "I didn't see the lie in what you said. And, isn't one shiny black slime the same as all others? I mean, sure the different slimes we've encountered are variously strong, perhaps in proportion to the magic they'd consumed, but aren't they all basically the same thing?”

Durrankar says, "yes, Elian....and if you noticed, in our group, we had a lot of magic users? We'll be back to the tower."

Astaren shakes his head, 'No, not all oozes are the same. Ever hear of Oblivion? It is an ooze that annihilates anything it touches, unmaking it and sending it to the void. Though I doubt that was what was in there, something really really bad was in that shell. Something we do not want to let out, until we properly identify it, and know how to handle it."

Durrankar gestures to Astaren. "There." He then lets out some steam from his nose. "We may need to ask the Foo for his help against it."

Ga'Elian says, "Ah. And no, I hadn't heard of this Oblivion, but whatever cousin of its that appeared in that room, do you think its own shell will keep it contained until we return?"

Astaren nods slowly as he sits down and has some tea, "I think it will actually. I think it was put there to be a insult and a trap. We leave we know it sits there, grating at us as good adventurers that a great danger lies there, if we broke it we die because it was something nasty. We were given no good alternatives, and the demon that put it there, knew it. I am sure it will break down in time, but I hope we have some time. Zeheir, and that thing, we need to research both."

Ga'Elian asks, "What or who is Zepher?"

Astaren frowns, "Err Zeheir I mean.' Writing down the name to make a quick note of it.

-End-