More Eberron!
Ok, here's part two of the battle I posted last week. Same rules as last time, you're free to click the link but it's kinda nerdy, etc. For those of you that were there, I did take some small poetic licenses to help with flow. But if I missed anything major please let me know.
“Why aren’t you dead? Oh crap.” I twisted my head around and stared disbelievingly at the mortally wounded figure grappling me to the table. “Shen? A little help?”
“Neega, remember that I’m the one not wearing a belt,” Shen then appeared next to the table and punched evil-Semtash, who finally let go and fell to the floor. “Don’t worry,” he said reassuringly, “I marked the evil Shen for you.”
Evil Shen? I sat up, and sure enough there were two of them. I glanced back and forth between Shen here at the table and Shen at the tent entrance, and unlike the two Semtashs they looked exactly alike. Except Shen at the tent entrance had blood smeared onto his forehead. From this distance I couldn’t even tell which if either of them had on Shen’s signature monk belt.
I heaved a sigh. Out of the frying pan and all that. I wasn’t about to potentially kill a friend based on a bloody fingerprint. The sounds of battle had commenced outside, and I heard at least one voice calling for a medic. I’m the medic. I stood up from the table on the opposite side from Shen version A while Shen version B began to advance towards him. A few moments of concentration later and I had woven together threads of magic that healed the gash on my hand from my brief tussle with Semtash.
“Ok, I don’t have time for this. Shen, I know I’ve told you I don’t need a bodyguard. But just this once, I’m going to let you. Keep the other you busy while I check what’s going on outside.” Apparently this upset Shen A’s plans to stall me, since he unexpectedly kicked me hard in the ribs and nearly knocked me down. Really, it was a pretty good if painful way to root out which was the evil Shen. Wish I’d actually thought of it ahead of time so I could have braced for the impact.
I straighten up and glared at my attacker, the battle outside forgotten momentarily. “Well, that makes identification a lot easier.” With a whistle and a gesture, my animal companions snarled and jumped to protect me. Shen used the distraction of the giant rats to step in close and start his own attack on evil-Shen.
I had to get outside, which meant taking evil-Shen down as quick as possible. With my spear and my summoned scimitar laying on the floor under the Shens’ feet, my only other option was to risk casting an offensive spell. I chose an easy spell that summons a ball of flame to my hand, mainly because I didn’t have to concentrate on it very hard and could dodge attacks while casting. Also, if being in opposite land made it fail in a spectacular fashion, maybe it wouldn’t do as much damage.
While Shen fought Shen with my giant rats making opportunistic attacks from the sides, I mentally tugged and coaxed the threads of magic around me. The spell seemed to work, but instead of a ball of flame I held… something else. I stared, fascinated, as the air rushed around my hand, being pulled into an almost transparent globe that floated above my fingers. Evil-Shen noticed my distraction and kicked me in the exact same place in the ribs, again. Ye gods, that hurt! If not for my breastplate I think that would have cracked a rib.
I shook it off and snapped my hand out to touch evil-Shen, catching him on the arm as he tried to deflect me. Air whooshed past me for a moment, then imploded with a loud thunderclap. He didn’t seem to be visibly injured, but evil-Shen now had his hands over his ears and was shaking his head slowly. “Go,” Shen turned to me and said, “Your rats and I can finish this.” I nodded my thanks and stepped out of the tent.
Directly ahead of me in a clearing surrounded by tents the gnome Tiberius was facing off against what I assume to be the evil Mivaral. Our Miv didn’t have nearly as many tiny fetishes tied in her hair and hanging off her armor. Tiberius was pointing something at her and she looked thoroughly scorched and very angry. He also looked like one more good swing from her ax would finish him off.
It was starting to get hard to take a deep breath when every movement that pressed my left ribs against the inside of my armor caused intense pain. Running over there was out of the question. “Hey!” I shouted out. “Why don’t you pick on someone that wears armor?” Evil-Miv focused her angry eyes on me, giving Tiberius a chance to scramble away. I couldn’t believe that worked. I prepared a call lightning spell as she crossed the distance between us. If this worked the way the hair stick did I’ll be summoning rocks instead of lightning, but that’s ok. Rocks falling from the sky can still do a lot of hurt.
Evil-Miv reached me just as I finished weaving the spell. I took a few steps back out of the way of her first swings and called upon the powers I had summoned. Sure enough, a large rock fell from the sunny skies and clunked her in the head, knocking her out cold.
In the next few moments I heard a sickening crunch from behind the tent directly across the clearing. There was a soft cry, and Miv fell backwards from behind it. A hulking humanoid form of wood and metal stepped over Miv’s prone form and poked her with its foot. This could only be the evil version of Ziggurat. Seemingly satisfied with its work, it hefted its very large ax, strode into the center of the clearing and looked around.
I needed to get to Miv, but evil-Ziggurat was in the way. I called upon the invisible powers that still swirled around me and summoned a rock over evil-Ziggurat. It barely made a dent in the metal that formed its head. Our Semtash and Ziggurat came out from around the other side of the far tent. Along with Tiberius there was now a half-circle of us surrounding the clearing, with evil-Ziggurat in the center. For a moment it fell quiet, and you could clearly hear that the only fighting still going on was coming from the tent where I left Shen. Ziggurat and Semtash both looked bad, and I could only assume they had already taken care of the evil version of Tiberius and myself. As a warforged, Ziggurat was literally a fighting machine, and evil-Ziggurat didn’t look like it’d taken much damage yet. This could still go very badly.
Probably coming to the same conclusion I just did, Tiberius pulled a wand and launched a force missile at the same time Semtash formed a mental blade and threw it at evil-Ziggurat. Ziggurat raised his ax and yelled a war cry as he charged straight at his evil self.
They met with the screech of metal on metal. With the power of his charge behind it, Ziggurat brought his ax down and cut a deep gash across evil-Ziggurat’s chestplate. At the same time evil-Ziggurat swung at his twin’s unprotected flank and buried its ax deep into his side. The light in Ziggurat’s eye-crystals flickered out and he slumped to the ground, deactivated.
“No!” I growled low in my throat. I called up another rock, which bounced loudly off evil-Ziggurat’s shoulder and left a sizeable dent. It turned to face me then, and I realized with a sinking feeling it was moving into position to perform the same charge maneuver that Ziggurat just did. And if evil-Ziggurat hit me with that ax that was almost as tall as I was, I was going to die. Well, it would be a heroic death, at any rate. I raised my darkwood shield and braced for the charge.
That’s when Shen came running out of the tent. He instantly sized up the situation and ran up to engage evil-Ziggurat in combat, giving the rest of us some breathing room. I have never been so happy to see a monk in my entire life. We all hit evil-Ziggurat with everything we had, and it went down fairly quickly. I immediately started to move towards Mivaral, but noticed she was rolling over and sitting up. She looked at a glance to be hurt pretty bad, but not in any immediate danger. Clever shifter, she must have been playing possum.
So instead I fell to my knees next to Ziggurat, wincing as the movement aggravated where Shen had punished my ribs. “Please don’t be permanently deactivated,” I thought as I wove together the pattern for the strongest healing spell I knew. I laid my hand gently on his chestplate, and his eye-crystals flickered back to light. “I think I’m going to need a few more of those,” he rumbled. I grinned and patted his chestplate. “You got it, just let me heal the rest of us a bit first.”
“Why aren’t you dead? Oh crap.” I twisted my head around and stared disbelievingly at the mortally wounded figure grappling me to the table. “Shen? A little help?”
“Neega, remember that I’m the one not wearing a belt,” Shen then appeared next to the table and punched evil-Semtash, who finally let go and fell to the floor. “Don’t worry,” he said reassuringly, “I marked the evil Shen for you.”
Evil Shen? I sat up, and sure enough there were two of them. I glanced back and forth between Shen here at the table and Shen at the tent entrance, and unlike the two Semtashs they looked exactly alike. Except Shen at the tent entrance had blood smeared onto his forehead. From this distance I couldn’t even tell which if either of them had on Shen’s signature monk belt.
I heaved a sigh. Out of the frying pan and all that. I wasn’t about to potentially kill a friend based on a bloody fingerprint. The sounds of battle had commenced outside, and I heard at least one voice calling for a medic. I’m the medic. I stood up from the table on the opposite side from Shen version A while Shen version B began to advance towards him. A few moments of concentration later and I had woven together threads of magic that healed the gash on my hand from my brief tussle with Semtash.
“Ok, I don’t have time for this. Shen, I know I’ve told you I don’t need a bodyguard. But just this once, I’m going to let you. Keep the other you busy while I check what’s going on outside.” Apparently this upset Shen A’s plans to stall me, since he unexpectedly kicked me hard in the ribs and nearly knocked me down. Really, it was a pretty good if painful way to root out which was the evil Shen. Wish I’d actually thought of it ahead of time so I could have braced for the impact.
I straighten up and glared at my attacker, the battle outside forgotten momentarily. “Well, that makes identification a lot easier.” With a whistle and a gesture, my animal companions snarled and jumped to protect me. Shen used the distraction of the giant rats to step in close and start his own attack on evil-Shen.
I had to get outside, which meant taking evil-Shen down as quick as possible. With my spear and my summoned scimitar laying on the floor under the Shens’ feet, my only other option was to risk casting an offensive spell. I chose an easy spell that summons a ball of flame to my hand, mainly because I didn’t have to concentrate on it very hard and could dodge attacks while casting. Also, if being in opposite land made it fail in a spectacular fashion, maybe it wouldn’t do as much damage.
While Shen fought Shen with my giant rats making opportunistic attacks from the sides, I mentally tugged and coaxed the threads of magic around me. The spell seemed to work, but instead of a ball of flame I held… something else. I stared, fascinated, as the air rushed around my hand, being pulled into an almost transparent globe that floated above my fingers. Evil-Shen noticed my distraction and kicked me in the exact same place in the ribs, again. Ye gods, that hurt! If not for my breastplate I think that would have cracked a rib.
I shook it off and snapped my hand out to touch evil-Shen, catching him on the arm as he tried to deflect me. Air whooshed past me for a moment, then imploded with a loud thunderclap. He didn’t seem to be visibly injured, but evil-Shen now had his hands over his ears and was shaking his head slowly. “Go,” Shen turned to me and said, “Your rats and I can finish this.” I nodded my thanks and stepped out of the tent.
Directly ahead of me in a clearing surrounded by tents the gnome Tiberius was facing off against what I assume to be the evil Mivaral. Our Miv didn’t have nearly as many tiny fetishes tied in her hair and hanging off her armor. Tiberius was pointing something at her and she looked thoroughly scorched and very angry. He also looked like one more good swing from her ax would finish him off.
It was starting to get hard to take a deep breath when every movement that pressed my left ribs against the inside of my armor caused intense pain. Running over there was out of the question. “Hey!” I shouted out. “Why don’t you pick on someone that wears armor?” Evil-Miv focused her angry eyes on me, giving Tiberius a chance to scramble away. I couldn’t believe that worked. I prepared a call lightning spell as she crossed the distance between us. If this worked the way the hair stick did I’ll be summoning rocks instead of lightning, but that’s ok. Rocks falling from the sky can still do a lot of hurt.
Evil-Miv reached me just as I finished weaving the spell. I took a few steps back out of the way of her first swings and called upon the powers I had summoned. Sure enough, a large rock fell from the sunny skies and clunked her in the head, knocking her out cold.
In the next few moments I heard a sickening crunch from behind the tent directly across the clearing. There was a soft cry, and Miv fell backwards from behind it. A hulking humanoid form of wood and metal stepped over Miv’s prone form and poked her with its foot. This could only be the evil version of Ziggurat. Seemingly satisfied with its work, it hefted its very large ax, strode into the center of the clearing and looked around.
I needed to get to Miv, but evil-Ziggurat was in the way. I called upon the invisible powers that still swirled around me and summoned a rock over evil-Ziggurat. It barely made a dent in the metal that formed its head. Our Semtash and Ziggurat came out from around the other side of the far tent. Along with Tiberius there was now a half-circle of us surrounding the clearing, with evil-Ziggurat in the center. For a moment it fell quiet, and you could clearly hear that the only fighting still going on was coming from the tent where I left Shen. Ziggurat and Semtash both looked bad, and I could only assume they had already taken care of the evil version of Tiberius and myself. As a warforged, Ziggurat was literally a fighting machine, and evil-Ziggurat didn’t look like it’d taken much damage yet. This could still go very badly.
Probably coming to the same conclusion I just did, Tiberius pulled a wand and launched a force missile at the same time Semtash formed a mental blade and threw it at evil-Ziggurat. Ziggurat raised his ax and yelled a war cry as he charged straight at his evil self.
They met with the screech of metal on metal. With the power of his charge behind it, Ziggurat brought his ax down and cut a deep gash across evil-Ziggurat’s chestplate. At the same time evil-Ziggurat swung at his twin’s unprotected flank and buried its ax deep into his side. The light in Ziggurat’s eye-crystals flickered out and he slumped to the ground, deactivated.
“No!” I growled low in my throat. I called up another rock, which bounced loudly off evil-Ziggurat’s shoulder and left a sizeable dent. It turned to face me then, and I realized with a sinking feeling it was moving into position to perform the same charge maneuver that Ziggurat just did. And if evil-Ziggurat hit me with that ax that was almost as tall as I was, I was going to die. Well, it would be a heroic death, at any rate. I raised my darkwood shield and braced for the charge.
That’s when Shen came running out of the tent. He instantly sized up the situation and ran up to engage evil-Ziggurat in combat, giving the rest of us some breathing room. I have never been so happy to see a monk in my entire life. We all hit evil-Ziggurat with everything we had, and it went down fairly quickly. I immediately started to move towards Mivaral, but noticed she was rolling over and sitting up. She looked at a glance to be hurt pretty bad, but not in any immediate danger. Clever shifter, she must have been playing possum.
So instead I fell to my knees next to Ziggurat, wincing as the movement aggravated where Shen had punished my ribs. “Please don’t be permanently deactivated,” I thought as I wove together the pattern for the strongest healing spell I knew. I laid my hand gently on his chestplate, and his eye-crystals flickered back to light. “I think I’m going to need a few more of those,” he rumbled. I grinned and patted his chestplate. “You got it, just let me heal the rest of us a bit first.”