Part 6>>>The Shadow of Love (an LoF adventure)

[Morgeruat]

Yevaud

There, disappearing into the swamp was the dark elf, spawn of Lolth, creature of darkness most hated. Bile began to rise in Yevauds throat as he caught sight of the creature he had been taught to hate since birth, trained to destroy since his enrollment at the bladesinger academy. He could feel the heat rising in his cheeks, turning the tattooed flesh red as he went through his options. The creature was fleeing, and had already travelled beyond the range of the ensnarement spells he had prepared, and so Yevaud began to chant a spell that would wound the drow, it would likely not be fatal, but the sting would remind him of those whom he fled from.

An ancient language arose from the throat of the elf, a droning chant in a carefully controlled monotone. Hands and arms move in a blur, accompanying the chant emphasizing words in a way that inflection of voice does not. And then... release. The spell is cast, and three cerulean darts emerged from the stretched forth finger tips, flying so quickly they leave visual trails through the air as they converge on the fleeing drow.

[Larry_OHF]

PvP role-play of elf vs. drow.

First, let's all remember that the time of day is mid-morning. The supportive posts to this have been written. That leaves a poor drow in some trouble with the bright morning sun.
Three magic missles were fired at target drow. Sunlight makes any magic resistance void and the full affect of those missles are felt.

Damage to Kynnen by Magic Missle = 11 dmg.


Kynnen needs to find true shelter from the sun as fast as possible, or he'll continue to suffer problems. Maybe supplicating your master for help again might not be a bad idea.

[Elif Godson]

Vincent Pathfinder 98/98

" Thank you for the offer Sir Marcos, it is good to know my name is cleared with Inquisitor. I may take you up on that horse some day, but right now is not the time. If that drow is still a foot then he need's to be brought to pay for his dark way's. The fonkin will not live much longer if I have any luck this morning. Silt, we will talk later. with a nod to those in the room, Vincent went out to follow Yevaud, almost as soon as he sit foot in the hall he almost collided with a mud covered guardsman. Paying him no real attention other then to make sure he hadnt infringed the mans movement, Vincent headed down the hall. He could Yevaud chanting. As he reached the door way and broke through to the damp cool air of the bog. He saw several darts shoot from Yevaud's hand. Following there direction he quickly knocked to arrows and prepared to shoot them at the missles target. Barely seeing there target he decided to shoot several volley's in the general direction. The drow was just far enough into the swamp to make it hard to catch him. " Let the bog and its slithering dwellers have the night crawler. Worst case scenario, I will meet him again, it will not be hard to miss a one eared dark elf in our midst and I will be more then happy to take more then an ear next time.".

[Morgeruat]

Yevaud 45/45

Yevaud listened to Vincent, the newly returned man was correct. Spitting rudely at the ground in the direction the drow had fled Yevaud uttered an obsenity, then looked to Vincent "You are right of course, the swamp will in all likelihood swallow him up. I've heard no tales of drow operating during daylight, and I would not like to bet on his chances of leaving the swamp alive, travelling through the day." Spitting once more Yevaud turned sharply and began pacing back towards the guards and other adventurers. Perhaps the elf he had encountered upstairs would have information to share.

[Cyril Darkcloud]

The Treehouse

Myron Epimetheus

A lie has been told. And not merely told – it has rooted itself deeply within the very fabric of those posts whose turning is the very life of these forums. Within the hollow sockets which at one time housed the little man’s eyes an intense light burns. Whatever fear had taken hold of him is quickly forgotten in the building of his indignation. “This will not do,” he intones firmly. “No, it absolutely will not do.” His movements are focused and deliberate as he gathers tools and spell components from the hundreds of jars and boxes scattered about this strangely spacious room, muttering to himself all the while of the need to end this disgraceful state of affairs.

Having found space for those things he will need within the many pockets of his robe, he pauses. He is cold and taking something warm to drink is just the thing to do when one is cold. As he prepares a mug of steaming liquid a change in the protective magics about the great diamond catches his attention. Such a shift can mean only one thing – that whatever barrier had separated the avatar of the Mage from this thread has been removed. Sipping from his mug, the little man peers intently through the haze of magics and once more he shivers. This shivering, however, is neither of chill nor of fear, but of excitement for the being of shadow has gathered his power and focused his attention upon that most unruly fellow who simply cannot seem to do anything that does not involve miserable weather conditions. The animosity between the two is so great he can almost feel it even here within this makeshift study. Each commands the full attention of the other. A rare and splendid opportunity this is! For here and now one might study each of them, and both of them .......

....... But a good scholar is a disciplined scholar, and a greater opportunity is to be found in this distraction which shall not last long. Truth has been overturned and buried someplace beneath this great lie that has written itself into the turning of posts. And this truth must be found. His mutterings change in key, and his body sways. There is a great rustling as the pages of his scribbled journals and gathered books move. The little man intones a few syllables in the lost language of the yellow forums and follows them with a few notes sounded in the rude tongue of the blue boards. He hears echoes of these sounds deep within the threads and posts of the brown forums and he falls silent. Still the pages rustle and he listens to their rustling, the rustling of posts that have been catalogued and read and classified. Again he hears it – the matching note of the echo. He smiles. Truth can never be truly lost so long as there are those who have devoted their lives to seeking it. He begins to mutter once more and the air about him shimmers, and then he is gone from this place – but not before he places a small figurine on the table near the gem. After all, a good scholar is not only disciplined, but opportunistic as well.

[dplax]

Ramella Tarina

Waves of terror washed over Ramella and the others in the small house as a stormy sea washes over an unsheltered beach. Unable to resist the terror, the two children hunched under the bed, with Jonas crouching in a corner, his right hand uncontrollably shaking at his side, the left holding his daughter's hand. Ramella sat on one of the chairs as if in shock, unmoving apart of an occasional twitch.

The boxfull of toys in the middle of the room was opened, yet the contents had remained untouched. Presently a howl was heard from not so far away and only a few seconds later the night was pierced by horribly shrieks, echoing amongst the houses.

Even long after the shrieks died away the fear lingered, not willing to let the hearts of the townsfolk go. And when it decided to let go, it was a slow process, and thus by the time that Jonas stood up from the corner the dawn sun had already risen and orangish light was filtering under the curtain.

Running footsteps could be heard outside and then a male voice shouted from the street for all in their houses to hear:

"The Tavern of the One Eyed Wolf has been attacked by hellish creatures! The Tavern..."

His voice faded as he moved towards other houses. Jonas opened the door of his house and peered out. His eyes were bloodshot from the lack of sleep and he was still somewhat pale.

Ramella stood up from her chair and leant down to look under the bed. The two children were peacefully sleeping. When the fear had gone away they had fallen asleep, exhausted, especially Daniel.

[Larry_OHF]

Centuries ago, this marshy wasteland was a beautiful place. Stories have been passed down to those that would have their decendants remember the past, but the youth of the next generation waste the effort away, choosing not to care so much as they were asked to.

When the curse was pronounced, and the swamps began to devour the land...many things became lost and forgotten.

Today, those secrets are being rediscovered. Not only have the humans begun to uncover the secret that holds Castle Lesismoore up from sinking into the unyielding swamps...but a certain drow is destined to discover another secret today, found just North of the Castle.

Where he travels, he will soon begin to see the swamps receding slightly, yet not altogether. He'll come across a thick growth of vile weeds and odd-shaped trees, deformed and rotting, yet bunched tightly together, thorns protruding from their slimy trunks. He'll hack his way through this...and discover a forgotten graveyard. Those that lived in this place before will have finally been found. The grave will be partially submerged in the filthy water of the swamps. Among the drowning stones that barely hold their heads out of the murky submersion, only one thing will catch the drow's eye. A small building of moss and weeds-covered stone, and a door. To a drow in pain from the sunlight, this door promises shelter. One would think.

[ 05-13-2005, 06:23 PM: Message edited by: Larry_OHF ]

[Bozos of Bones]

Kynnen 73/85

The whistling through the air could be nothing other than magic missles, the drow thought, and soon his suspicions were proven when the missles pommeled him int he back. He did not stop runing tho. He ran as fast and as har as he could, jumping from this tree stump to that root, sometimes missing, but never falling. He ran until he was sure noone was behind him, and then ran some more. When he got tired, he tried to find out in what direction he was actually running, but the morning sun made his vision so blurry that he couldn't even make out in what direction a shadow was spreading, and he couldn't bare to look at the sun behind him. It was most likely northwards, but he couldn't be sure. Walking on, he noticed that the swamp trees around him opened into a swampy kind of a clearing, with some stones sticking out. At first he thought nothing of it, the stones could just be resting on tree roots and trunks below, but then he saw something that resembled a building, made of stone. He hurried to it, and probed for a door with his hands. He found the handle, an old wooden thing with iron bolts to hold it. He pressed on it, the door opened and the darkness inside greeted him.

[Larry_OHF]

For Kynnen

Indeed, even as the door was propped open, the sunlight refused to enter into the tomb with the drow, and so the small room remained hidden in darkness. This did not bother Kynnen however as he was now back in his element. His eyes relaxed and began to focus with their dark-sight, and he listened to the sounds of small things scrurrying about at the shock of the doorway opening. Rats were seen scampering away, a small snake slithered by, and various insects took flight and flew down a hole that had been formed in the rear wall behind a statue that had been toppled and lay drowned in the pudrid water. The hole showed signs of being torn open in the brick from this side of the wall. The hole was large enough for a human to fit through.

[Larry_OHF]

For the Castle Group

The men worked hard as the sun was climbing into the sky, glad that night had passed so that they could better see the excevation site. A huge trench had been unearthed in the marsh, outlining a stone structure of some sort that was indeed larger in size than that of the castle Lesismoore. It appeared to be nothing but a flat stone construction on the top, with no markings to denote any historical facts about it, yet the stone it was made of could not have been quarried anywhere nearby.

As to the depth of the construction, it was unknown, but most of the workers had decided that this was nothing more than a flooring made into the marshy ground so as to help the castle stay above the watery mud that surrounded the castle. Others were not too sure. These were they that had been lucky enough to have grandfathers tell them the old stories as best as could be remembered about this place not always being a land of marsh wetlands. There would have therefore been no reason to create an anti-sinking floor into the ground they reasoned. While some gave up at battling against the marsh hiding its secret, a few others were a bit more greedy for an adventure and so continued to clear the muddy land away from the stone, digging deeper and deeper still.

================================================

"Hey! I think I found something! Its like a hole...a window! I think its a window!"

A man cried from the ditch that had been dug around the strange stone constuction that continued to remain hidden under the earth except for its crown, a flat square of stone that extended past the outer walls of the Lesismoore castle. People went to go see this so-called window into the side of the wall that had up until now been nothing in appearance except for a stone under-flooring for the castle. Now a window had been discovered?

Men gathered around and gasped at the sight in front of them. A window in the wall of this thing had clearly been uncovered, but what was even more strange was that one could peer inside the window and see that the marsh had not entered the otherwise open hole in the wall. In fact, a light-blue coloration was in place of where one might find glass, yet this was magical in appearance. A man poked a stick at it, and the stick passed through unhindered. He pulled the stick back out and felt the tip. Normal.
It did not take the observers long to assume that some sort of enchantment had been placed on the window so that the marshy mud would not intrude the open window as it lay under the earth. But who and why?

It had been a long time since the messenger had gone to find Sir Marcos. They needed him more than ever now. The word was fast spreading to everyone outside the castle that they had discovered a secret building that lay under the castle, and that it had magical history to it. many people were already wondering if they could get into this building and find treasures that probably lay hidden all this time. Greed and desire began to work its way around the men. They were eager to learn more of this building, and this "window" was their best lead right now.

=================================================

The problem with uncovering ancient secrets, especially if magic is involved, is that there can always be assumed a danger that many will ignore until too late. Once the greed of prospect enters the heart of a man, wisdom quickly departeth. It had not taken long for a man to decide that he'd be the first to enter into the "open" window, after probing it with various objects and analyzing their outcome. It appeared that the window was only to keep out the earth while this building lay underground. Nothing else was stopped from coming in or out. Prompted by the opportunity to have first rites of the treasures to be found, Edgar jumped through the window and was inside, waving back at his friends to let them know he'd made it alive. He was saying something but they could not hear him. They tried telling him this, but he appeared to not hear what they were saying either. So...sound did not pass through the magic window. Fine. So...now what?

The man turned his back on his friends and walked a ways into the room, disappearing into the gloom only to come back and stick his head out the window and a hand.

"Hand me a torch or something. Its darker than death in here!"

A friend handed him a lit torch and Edgar went back inside the room. They could see him now with his torch walk into the room, and all eyes were peeled that they might glimpse some artifact of power with Edgar's torch as he walked around in the room. Edgar came to a door that was bolted from his side. He lifted the bar, and set it aside, then gave a jerk on the door. It did not budge. People outside seeing this became restless, and Joab decided to leap in to give Edgar a hand. He went in and together they yanked on the door, and it gave way about an inch. Getting excited, they yanked with even more entusiasm, cheering themselves on while the spectators outside cheered on as well, but they could not hear one another. The magic prevented sound from being heard through the window.

The door was open, and the outside viewers could see Edgar and Joab slapping their hands about as though clearing the air from flies or a stench or even cobwebs. Edgar began coughing, and Joab patted him on the back. They then both turned around and waved at the people on the other side, letting them know that they were okay. That is when two more people decided that they wanted to be in the room. They pushed and shoved each other to be the first through the window. When they made it inside, the ran into the open doorway with their own torches, right past Edgar and Joab, who then ran right behind those two. Then there was nothing for the space of a few minutes. People became restless outside and another guy, Shane, decided to go in and see what was going on. He leaped through the window, and ran toward the door...but before he ran into the darkness on the other side of the doorway, he stopped short, turned and began running back, his face contorted in such fear as nobody had ever seen before. He tried climbing through the window, reaching for somebody to help him and when his head was out of the magical barrier, he was screaming horribly. Something moved closer behind him and grabbed him, but the onlookers outside were already backing away and did not care to stay long enough to see what was happening. The began running and screaming themselves, fueled by the sound of the fear of Shane turn into the sound of a dying man who was in tremendous pain. Nobody stayed long enough to see what his attacker looked like, nor to see Shane's final moments alive. They had abandoned the window for fear of their own lives. People were running everywhere, knowing that they had now unearthed a terrible secret that was meant to stay hidden.

[ 05-27-2005, 10:41 AM: Message edited by: Larry_OHF ]