Constantly warping darkness and void surrounded Melkor. He had been suspended in this state of nothingness for ages, or so it felt. Actually it had been mere seconds ago when the purple worm of Alzarseth died and sucked everyone into the void in it's death throes. But suddenly Melkor heard a sound, a distant voice,calling..
Lord of Vision
Xul-Molor in his alien cell. |
Promise of freedom was enough for our heroes, and they soon began executing Xul-Molor's plan. Yig answered the call and as the mighty off-shoot of a demon and a grimlock opened the cell door, soon-to-be-prince Arius plunged on it. They exchanged some blows and eventually the monstrous guard was dead. With Yigs keyring, our brave heroes searched through the rest of the jail-section and witnessed terrible scenes of torture and forced magical mutations. They found only one captive alive and sane, but he charged towards the exit, only to meet his end in the mandibles of terrible UMBER HULK! Our escapees landed their avenging strikes on the huge monstrosity, but it summoned an ally, an another one, precisely as terrible. These creatures gazed confusion into Arius but luck was on our heroes side, once again. They continued to push onward, and after short leaps over abyssal chasms they reached their goal, the lair of Kularqoroth the Seer.
Kularqoroth |
Even Melkor had to use more advanced tactics with his spells, first running out of the antimagic cone projected by beholders central eye, and then firing his own spells at the monster. Finally the bulb was dead, and Xul-Molor was able to recover his delicate apparatuses of planar travel. But before they could escape from the grande chamber, one urgent case of healing magic had to be applied on Douglas, who had turned to stone by Kularqoroths devilish eye ray.
Douglas, looking like he was meant to look. |
Battle for Asbravn
aka
How Melkor cleansed the city of Asbravn
Xul-Molor urged everyone to form a circle, and with quick words of arcane meanings he took them to a trip back to Darnon. The strange wizard brought them to Asbravn, to the chamber where the pair of Soldengraads Rippler had been, where they should have gone upon stepping to the mirror. With swift words of farewell the astral traveller wished luck on their side, and hoped to see them again someday and disappeared, leaving our heroes alone in a closed chamber with half-dozen guards. Well, the guards were nothing that they could not overcome, as within the first seconds of their appearance, Arius launched his sword through the abdomen of one unaware guard sergeant, splitting the poor man in half. As the first blood was drawn, the battle soon escalated into a full scale carnage.
Dacatrin the Sorceress |
our liberators slayed their way to the grand hall of the Keep of Asbravn. There they were delayed by volley of arrows, two Asbravnian noblemen Counts Polewright and Gorlund lead by Brother of the Black Cliff called Anthrop. They were backed by sorceress Dacatrin. Her magicks were almost even with Melkor, as she cast chain lighting and reverse gravity upon our brave party. As the battle ensued and blood was spilled, Lord Protector Gustaf Mornburg, who had been observing the outcome escaped, forcing our heroes after him. The sorceress was eventually defeated by Melkors magic, but she managed to escape. The two poor noblemen serving their lord perished in combat, but brother Anthrop managed to fight off the keen blade of Arius, and proposed an agreement. Thus he was known as Anthrop the Oathbreaker, and he even managed to haggle the title of count for himself by pledging loyalty for his new lords. Well, as the kingdom grows, one needs regents at the time of absence.
Encouraged by their new yet bit shady ally, the freedom fighters began pursuing Lord Protector Mornburg who had escaped to the roofs and walls of the keep. They experienced minor resistance as they purified their way to the rooftop of the keep. There, in the highest watchtower, The Lord Protector of Asbravn, Gustaf Mornburg performed a short obscure ritual with a solid gold pedestal depicting imagery of occult nature. This ritual proved to be a summoning chant, that activated the pedestal (given and instructed to Mornburg by Alzarseth, or so Melkor later reasoned). Flash of light turned the night sky into thunderstorm, and from the maelstrom a huge red dragon descended, puffing it's fiery breath on our heroes. The dragon, Merthoflagrion, began swooping around the keep, performing deadly flyby attacks. Quickly enraged (so quickly that for a blink of an eye he considered the career of barbarian instead of a prince) Arius climbed to the watchtower and slayed Lord Protector Mornburg. Even though the oppressor of Asbravn was dead, that didn't solve the dragon problem, and the massive creature of immense power had to be vanquished in traditional methods. As even Melkor struggled to do any harm on the glorious archaic being, Arius and Douglas challenged the beast on hand to hand combat.
The red dragon tore horrible open wounds with it's mighty claws, smashed men to ground with it's huge tail, knocked it's opponents down with it's wings. But the bite. The bite almost proved to be too much for Arius. Only by sacrificing his trusty spiked small shield "Pinocchio", he managed to escape his ultimate end in the jaws of Merthoflagrion. The dragon was powerful, but even the strong may fall when they're facing an enemy that is fighting for their freedom. And so did Merthoflagrion, as it tried to escape, a final killing blow was landed, and the dragon plunged down from mid-air, crushing the whole entrance to the keep.
Arius battling Merthoflagrion, drawn by one of the surviving guardsmen that witnessed the epic battle. |
Nevertheless, Free Darnon now held two-thirds of the cities of Darnon, although the one that was left, Iriaebor, was nothing like it's two smaller cousins. During the morning as our heroes were inspecting the terrible damages they had done to the city, a messenger arrived with a peculiar note. It had been spotted that the vast mercenary armies camping outside Iriaebor were put on the move, but they weren't coming north towards Asbravn, the armies began their march to west, towards Berdusk. Even Melkor was puzzled by this unexpected turn of events, but more than anything he suspected that the Red Wizard, the One-that-should-not-be-mentioned, Alzarseth, was behind this.
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