Session Sixty-Six: Gray Plumed Mountain Part 6.

 

Note: For those unfamiliar with Dark Sun, psionics are called the Will for wild talents and the Way for trained psionicists.

The tentacles randomly attacked whomever was within range of them. The group fought strategically, attacking a single target and then moving on to the next target. It did not take too long for the group to slay the small black silt horrors that were attacking them.
The group thought about trying to attack the scorpions with ranged weapons, but the angle of the attack would have made it extremely difficult. Shade leapt over the silt and landed in the desert area, ready to engage one of the giant scorpions. Alaxander opened a dimension door, with the way, in the watery area and started emptying the water into the desert area, creating a lot of mud. The scorpions fled from the moisture.

As one of the scorpions engaged Shade, Kiara and Kalino leapt into the enclosure and began fighting the monstrous arachnid. Alaxander opened another doorway and started flooding the desert enclosure from another position, trying to trap some of the scorpions with the mud. The scorpions obviously did not like the mud and moved away from it.
The rest of the group joined Shade, Kiara, and Kalino and began fighting the scorpion. Just as the first one fell, one of the other scorpions braved the mud to get at the group. It was obviously hungry.
Alaxander kept flooding the enclosure, which was keeping the other scorpions at bay. The scorpion was most interested in Kalino and grabbed him with its pincer and stung him with its tail. Luckily, Kalino resisted the poison and was able to stab it with bone khopesh. Shade, Kiara, Julius, and even Vashti were all striking the scorpion with their weapons.
As the water was drained, six bog warders were exposed. They were very upset and raced toward the group. Their strong legs allowed them to leap to the higher tier and attack Shade, Kiara, and Vashti. They were an annoyance, while the scorpion was the real threat.
The group managed to kill the scorpion and then turned their attention to the bog warders. With the groups full attention, the bog warders did not stand much of chance and quickly fell. A couple of them tried to flee, but Alaxander and Julius killed them with the way.
After some quick magical healing, the group dropped to the bottom tier. There was a tunnel that lead to a set of large stone doors. The group walked into the tunnel, but were reluctant to open the doors. The group decided to take a rest and laid down in the tunnel. Two hours later, when Shade was keeping watch, a scorpion appeared, teleported with magic or the way, in the bottom tier of the large room. It rushed forward to attack the group and Shade yelled out, to wake his companions.
Shade shot the scorpion with his bow, as everyone else rose and gathered their weapons. Julius woke and pointed a finger at the scorpion. Using the way, he turned the scorpion into a fine dust. He then rolled over and went back to sleep.

Day 6, Week 1, Macro, Friend's Vengeance, 190th King's Age, Sun Descending

The group decided that Keraptis was not going to let them sleep, so they got up and readied themselves to open the double stone doors.

The most famous hookah in literature.

The doors opened easily into a nicely furnished room, with rugs, tapestries, a large four-poster bed, and a six foot glass hookah. Also in the room was a human man dressed in a loincloth. He was tied to the wall with giant hair rope. He looked in a miserable state, with obvious marks of abuse and dry, cracked lips.
He quietly begged for water, which Vashti provided. He said that Keraptis had imprisoned him in the room and had been torturing him for fun. Shade cut the man's bonds and he fell to the ground.
The man thanked the group and said they should leave as soon as they could. Julius didn't believe the man and said so. The man frowned and his illusion fell away, revealing a perfectly healthy man in a clean robe.
The man reached a hand toward Vashti, made a comment about how much this was going to hurt, and drew energy from her body. Vashti screamed in pain, as part of her body was defiled. He then cast a spell, which caused a great cone of ice and cold to envelop most of the group. Only Julius was spared icy wounds.
The group wasted no time, Kalino used magic of his own to send bolts of magical energy at the defiler and Shade slashed and stabbed him with his alhulak and dagger. Kiara rushed forward and slashed with her copper wrist razor and Vashti hit him with her club. Alaxander and Julius used the way, Alaxander hit the defiler with a wave of mental force and Julius shot a stone at him. These combined attacks overwhelmed the defiler and he was quickly defeated.
They searched the room and found the leather-shelled egg under the bed, as well as a sack of coins. They took both and headed for the door. Alaxander liked the look of the hookah, but decided that it was too large to move out of the volcanic lair.

As the group was leaving, Kearpis' voice rang out around them. He told them that they had killed most of his minions, so they would become the next guardians of his underground labyrinth. Two efreet magically appeared in the hall.
Julius quickly disintegrated one of the efreet with the way. The efreeti who remained used his magic to summon a wall of fire, which sent waves of scorching heat into the room. The furniture and the group were being burned badly and the group had to think quickly to escape.
Julius leapt through the wall of fire, being badly burned, but discovering that the waves of heat did not extend to the opposite side of the wall. Alaxander ran to the rear of the room and used the way to open a dimensional doorway. He shouted for everyone to go through it.
Everyone dashed through the dimension door and appeared in the lowest tier of the inverted pyramid room. They were disoriented from the journey through the dimensional rift. Julius tried to jump on the efreeti's back, but grabbed on to his waist sash instead and started stabbing him with his finely crafted bone longsword. The efreeti punched at Julius, but Julius let go of the efreeti's sash and nimbly dodged out of the way.
The disorientation effect quickly faded and Kiara called on her master, Hamanu, for the magic to defeat the efreeti. The dead b'rohg's skeleton tore from the dead flesh that encased it and stood ready to attack on his mistresses command. Kiara gave it that command.

Join us in two weeks for another exciting session of Adventures Under the Dark Sun. 
2nd edition AD&D Dark Sun Cast of Player Characters 
Julius: Human male psychokinetic. 22 years old. Played by Dave. Speaks Balican, Tyrian, and Giant. 
Alaxander: Human male psychokinetic. 19 years old. Played by Ben. Speaks Balican, Tyrian, and Elf. 
Vashti: Human female clairsentient/water cleric. 20 years old. Played by my wife. Speaks Nibnese, Gith, Tyrian, Balican, and Urikite. 
Shade: Half-Elf male ranger/thief, 18 years old. Played by Chad. Speaks Balican, Elf and Tyrian. 
Kalino: Human male fighter/preserver. 20 years old. Party NPC. Speaks Rammin, Tyrian, and Balican.
Kiara: Human female fighter/templar: 19 years old. Party NPC. Speaks Urikite, Tyrian, and Raamin.