Session 39: Loss

Lost in the Second Age...
15 hours, 52 minutes left


Our Heroes
The party took a well-deserved rest, during which time they got better acquainted with the Saviors. Diana chatted with Victoria in her native tongue, divulging a basic primer of the future. Just a few minutes late, Vilthanos warned above all things not to report anything of the future, inspiring a worried look from the sorceress. Kaylan had a little time to admire her predecessor from afar, the cleric Finduilas, as she roamed both parties healing wounds. Matthias, likewise, roamed both parties, admiring the tightness of certain backsides. Tasha kept an eye out for the man's antics and asked whether or not she reclaimed her ancestral homeland in the future, inspiring a lot of side glances and coughs.

Sev quickly turned into a jelly and slithered off to scout. Like father like daughter, Portia did some scouting of her own. Serren spent most of his time studying the open rift after news his former self was in the city.

The most striking aspect of the Saviors of the North, before, during and now after the battle, was the way in which they ruthlessly chided each other. Finduilas was subject to much of the ridicule by Tasha and the imperial Victoria, but she gave it back in spades. Matthias mediated when he felt like it, but his lechery was of higher concern, and it was a wonder if any of them got along with the brooding Serren. Sev often kept his distance, and who could really blame him, but the hermitage seemed more the effect of wrestling with a wild spirit. The Archdruid's savagery had been alarmingly apparent while in giant sloth form.

The young party could only be thankful at how well they got along, despite their diverse races, beliefs and practices. Trust was strong enough that, in a private chat between Diana and Kaylan, the sorceress revealed her darkest secret. It was met with understanding and a vow of confidentiality, inspiring great relief in the young Saspish girl and the galvanizing of a friendship.

When the arguing lulled, the party successfully recruited the Saviors in their struggle to seal the rifts. After some discussion, the Saviors agreed to take on the Black Bishop of Laz and his flying, undead legion up on the tower tops. They wished each others well and parted, leaving the party to seal the ice demon rift in the temple of Raya. There was a sort of walking-into-the-sunset effect as the Saviors left, and whatever character flaws history forgot to mention, there was no denying they were an impressive force.

Infiltrating the Temple
The group traveled a few, ruined city blocks to a hundred-foot-high wall of blue ice circling the entire temple. It was magical in nature and perhaps could be dispelled in small sections, but others noted a manhole that might provide a way under and a leaning tower to help scale over. The manhole was pried off and down they went into the steamy offal tunnels. Most everyone proved agile enough to take a narrow catwalk above the filth, except poor Kaylan and Kriznob, both of whom face-planted in sewage. Selja graciously cleaned them up with two shakes of her wand and they were on their way.

Relic's superior knowledge of dungeons, tunnels and caves allowed him to navigate toward an eventual grate inside the ice wall's perimeter. The grate proved troublesome, though, exiting directly into the temple courtyard. Making too much noise could draw unwanted attention, but how else did one dislodge an embedded iron grate? Portia wiggled her head through the bars, finding a wintry scene scattered with frosty corpses. No demons outside, though Portia's keen ears did pick up on a muted chanting coming from within the building, and not a pleasant sounding one.

Relic ended up kicking out the grate, while Diana used her command of winds to catch it before it clattered. Though there was an unavoidable noise, it wasn't enough to draw attention outside. The party slipped inside the temple, the temperature at about freezing, and the marble and stone of the foyer completely iced over. Strange lights flickered in the main chamber ahead and the grating voices of demons and something else.

Unwanted Attention
On the whole, everyone did a good job sneaking closer to the ritual, still blocked from view because of a bottleneck in the temple architecture. As fate often has it, one poor soul slipped up, in this case Selja. The little druid took a nasty spill on the icy floor and slid right into the threshold of the circular temple proper, drawing the gaze of a being from the frozen pits of the Abyss. A frost demon, looking like a ten foot titan with elephant skin frozen between the cracks turned, revealing icy horns, dripping fangs and eyes that send violent chills up the boggart's spine. Fear froze her, until the monster approached, when its aura froze her, an intense cold that just billowed from its statuesque form.

An intruder drew the attention of two other chanters, stopping the ritual entirely (the group was getting good at this). They cartwheeled, skipped and flipped toward Selja with rag doll skill. The psychophants, as they fashioned themselves, looked like goblins with pallid skin, covered in stitches and missing eyelids, noses, and a few other parts. Unnerving as they looked, the perverse and nonsensical way in which they spoke and acted gave Selja the creeps. Then they attacked.

Cold and Hot
Selja quickly learned the demonic aura gave more than the shivers, painfully icing over her skin. As two other frost demons joined their counterpart, the cold was unearthly, and it looked grim. Suddenly Relic was there, scooping the little one up and laying a suppressive fire, as Kaylan seared with radiant light and Diana with chaotic crackle. Portia sped to the defense of her sister, slashing with the scytheclaws, while Vilthanos cut and cleaved with a surgeon's precision.

The weaknesses of the demons was readily apparent and fire and radiance were focused against them, killing one of their numbers. A terrified Selja joined the fight and it looked as if the party might have gained the upper hand.

Loss
Something beckoned in the icy mists drifting through the temple, a woman who knew the group by name. Selja felt an unexplainable pull deeper into the temple, but managed to fight it. Vilthanos wasn't so lucky, teleporting against his will closer to a pile of dead-and-incapacitated Rayan clergy. Squirming between them was what could only be described as a demon, with overlong limbs and a pallid complexion. She wore a black leather jester's outfit, woven into her very skin, and hooks peeled back whole sections of her flayed flesh. Her name was Loss.

Familiar Faces
The group had little time to react to Loss's appearance, as suddenly the demons and psychophants were replaced with people the group has lost in their lives. Standing before them were Isabella, Filias, Hulda and Thamior. Instead of the demon killed earlier, Kaylan now stood beside Giers' corpse...

Experience: to be determined after the encounter (14,557 total)
Magic: None
Money: None
Loot: None

New NPCs:
Psychophants, perverted goblin fools and victims of demonic surgery; restitched as grotesque mockeries, but with surprising agility; insane supplicants to demons found in the Spelltowern temple of Raya
Loss, a pallid, leather-clad jester with hooks and stitches woven into her skin and overly-long limbs; presumably a demonic entity named after an occurence that has plagued the group since its early beginnings; knows the group by name and the people they've lost; able to teleport enemies against their will and conjure the missing.

New Monsters: Psychophants, Frost Demons

Current Quest: Time Storm (1/9 rifts sealed; 1 cleared; 3 rifts being cleared)