OOC: Remind me whose portal this is :)  My memory isn't anywhere near as good as it used to be, and it wasn't that good to start with!

OOC: You do not know who or what might lie beneath this portal - the prophecy is remarkably unclear and unhelpful on that point.  Thus far, though, your breaking of the portals has resulted in the release of Seker and The Great Serpent, which lessened the hold that the Dark Gods have upon the world.  See link to a message in this game for a summary of what little you have been able to glean.   :>

The chamber shudders once more and the whole mountain seems to lurch, leaving the floor with a noticeable slope.

The demon within the rune-scribed circle does not appear to be affected, though you have the feeling that perhaps it is smiling.

OOC: DC12 Reflex check to keep your footing

Stumbling, Hamin almost loses his balance as the floor bucks under him, but tries to focus his mind on Brugar’s statement.

”We must be missing something, but what? We dealt with Rhiannon’s seal on the cold North, where we lost ...  so much.  Arawn’s seal was beneath the city of the undead.  That leaves Math the Trickster and The Morrigan.  Math’s seal is said to be ‘High in a tower, unsurpassed’, well this is as high as we can get and it was guarded by a mage of some sort -  even though he claimed to be after the powers so guarded.  We knew we needed a pearl and a life freely given for the previous seals, but what do we know of this one?”

”We don’t know that Ezoran conjured and trapped this thing.  We don’t even know that he was ever real, or even if that girl we met in the basement was real?  She told us that Ezoran had taken this castle from a cloud giant …  but this seal has been here for a very, very long time.  Centuries?  Millenia? Perhaps there was no Ezoran, just an illusion?  Perhaps he was part of the seal, and we have somehow solved part of the riddle already?  That would fit for the Dark Savant.

Maybe the bird cage is another part of the illusion or another part of the key.  But if we are to destroy the circle, how do we do it?  I hoped that the shards from Rhianon’s Seal would do so, but apparently not.  However, there appeared to pass through the binding circle.    Perhaps we should just shoot at the demon …”

Then he gulps slightly, ”Or perhaps one of us just walks in …”

The elf has no trouble whatsoever maintaining her footing, but elects to use the magic in her boots to set herself floating above the floor.

"That's only going to get worse," Alasha'an notes. "Not troubling him at all, though, is it?" she gestures to the ugly demon with the point of her blade.

"Suspect we just need to damage the pretty runes, which shouldn't be too hard. Things have a tendency to break when we're about," despite the circumstances, she manages a grin. "And tough as he undoubtedly is, I'll bet the circle is the only thing keeping something that big and clumsy-looking on its toes. Bit more tilt, add a flask of oil to help him on his way, and just keep out of his path."

She allows herself to touch the floor so that she can walk over to the up-slope side of the circle. "You're right, if this is the real deal then we must have done something right to get this far, or maybe the idiot in the hood was telling the truth about wanting to steal all that power for himself."

"But now we're here, the dwarf's axe and my blade can get through the seal.. how about I keep Brugar steady and guard his back while he breaks the circle then the stone and finally whatever's behind it, while the rest of you keep our playmate busy?"

"Once the floor gets even steeper, of course.. and assuming anyone brought some oil?" she asks hopefully. "Though we can do without that if we have to."

Hamin nods his approval of the plan.

The young mage shakes his head at Alasha'an's request. "I've barely the clothes on my back," Ayas tells her, "and had no intention of delving in dark places when I set out, so had little need for a lantern!"

"I don't know what good they might do, but I will  use what spells I have to distract the demon."

The Elf turns to Brugar. "My apologies, master Dwarf, but I can detect no dweomer upon the birdcage - though that may just mean that it is simply beyond me." Ayas admits this last with no ill grace.

"I've got oil," Yetta fishes a flask from her bag. "Someone always taught me to be prepared. Say when.."

Plan set, you maneuver carefully into position ...

Hamin moves to one side of the central magic circle, the demon eyeing him hungrily, its gaze never shifting, while Yetta joins Alasha'an and Brugar on the upslope side, her flask of oil at the ready.  Ayas remains in the doorway for the moment, the young mage watching carefully, reckoning what best use he can make of the spell components available to him.

At a nod from the Dwarf, Yetta throws her flask of oil at the demon's feet just as her father scrapes one end of his double bladed polearm across the engraved runes, chipping the stone ...

Instantly the demon lurches for the one-eyed warrior, but is frustrated in its attempt to rend and tear his flesh as its feet go out from under it, just as the tower shudders anew and the floor tilts still further, causing Alasha'an to grab Yetta and Brugar by their collars and leaving Hamin and Ayas struggling to keep their footing as the demon begins to slide away, revealing the fourth portal.

This one is square and larger than the round plugs of stone that you encountered before, and much older by the look of it, the plaster stained with marks of Ages gone, yet like them still bound with chains embedded in a seal of plaster at its centre, albeit they too are ancient, marked and pitted.

OOC: Map of the proceedings updated ...

Hamin steps backwards, moving into a defensive stance as the Demon starts to move towards him, then stumbles slightly as the floor shudders again and the demon starts to slide away from him.

"WHEN!" he shouts at his daughter.

Then he waits for as long as he dares, to see if the demon will continue sliding or finish up against one of the walls, before acting.

When the plan was agreed Brugar had put away the blunt and rusty battleaxe that served him so well in battle and instead gripped the dwarven war axe he had forged himself in a previous age.

As soon as the demon was out of the circle, Brugar launched himself toward the plaster seal, aiming to use the chains that bind the stone portal to halt his slide across the floor.

As soon as he is in position he will swing a mighty blow at the seal itself.

"There goes the plan !" Alasha'an complains as Brugar wriggles out of her grasp.

"Sorry," the elf apologises to Yetta as she releases her grip on the young woman. "His fault. Go help your father." She allows herself to drop to the floor, deliberately running forward to get in front of the sliding dwarf before rising up once more, ready to grab Brugar if he starts to slide past.

"We've got this."

As the floor tilts further, Ayas goes down hard. The elf tries to grab the edge of the opening as he slides past, but since he refuses to loose his grip on his staff, that proves a futile effort and he goes sprawling on the floor.

Hamin watches dispassionately as the Demon slides down the sloping floor to fetch up against the south wall.  Immediately the fiend slams its great paws into the stone, digging in its claws to right itself.

As Ayas tries to regain his footing, Brugar dives towards the portal.  Alasha'an releases her hold on Yetta with a mumbled apology and leaps forwards, throwing herself past the Dwarf, ready to catch him.   Yetta drops lightly to the floor, untroubled by the angle, even as Brugar's feet reach the binding chains, stopping his slide, exactly as he intended.

With a bellow, the Dwarf brings his ancient axe down upon the seal, the blade of Skullsplitter slamming into the plaster.  A noise like the sound of a thousand hammers striking anvils in unison assails your ears as the seal bursts asunder, the chain dropping away as a hole is revealed, and within a globe that glows with a soft yellow radiance.

Brugar teeters on the edge the hole as the Demon howls, launching itself into the air, its tiny wings somehow able to support the creature in flight as it heads towards you.

OOC: Map of the proceedings updated ...

With few tricks up his sleeve, Hamin moves across to Alasha'an and prepares for combat.

In the aftermath of the shaking of the tower and the subsequent cacophony as Brugar smashed the seal, Ayas manages to regain his feet, a look of fear crossing his face as he sees that the demon is loosed.. and the realisation strikes him that none of his spells can bridge the distance that lies between them.

Taking his example from Hamin, the elf starts moving, albeit unsteadily, towards Alasha'an seeking both safety in numbers and to close the gap that he might prove of some use.

As the floor opens beneath his feet Brugar lunges for the edge of the hole and grabs hold, bouncing once against the side of the hole before hauling himself up over the edge to sprawl on the floor at the edge of the hole.

Brugar Armbuster rolled 22 using 1d20+6.  Reflex save to grab edge of hole.

Surprised but relieved that Brugar managed to avoid falling in, Alasha'an looks first at the approaching demon then at the glowing globe far below.

"Looks like a job for.. me," the elf surmises wryly, launching herself over the edge aiming to drop down to the globe and relying on her magic boots to stop her thence.

"If I were you, I would leave." Hamin says to the Demon, smiling as he sees Alasha'an drop into the hole. "You are no longer bound, and you won't like what come out of that hole ...  It will sweep you away, perhaps to a place that you cannot ever leave.  You have a brief moment of freedom.  Use it wisely ...".
This message was last edited by the player at 08:04, Sun 12 Dec 2021.

As Alasha'an leaps into the hole, your eyes turn towards the Demon as it draws nearer.

If it hears Hamin's words, it shows no sign, its eyes burning like bright embers, a hoarse snuffling sound escaping past its fangs as it summons a nimbus of unholy light, a nauseating rainbow of color that play around its grotesque body ...

... then the chamber lurches once more, the floor now at an impossible angle, and your stomachs lurch as you picture the entire mountain plummeting towards the ground below.

Below you, Alasha'an slams into the stone wall, though you barely have time to register her plight before you are thrown to the ground, sliding along the rough stone.

Ayas and Yetta skirts the edge of the hole, but Brugar heads right for it, while Hamin's path takes him towards the Demon, its puny wings supporting it as it continues to work its foul spell ...



OOC: Map of the proceedings updated ... the floor is now at about a 45 degree angle tilted towards the south west, and the tower and the mountain it stands upon seem to be descending rapidly.

Rather ironically, when the rotund dwarf hits the floor he bounces back up in one swift movement, skirts around the hole in the floor and races across the slope straight at the demon.

OOC: Brugar Armbuster rolled 26 using 1d20+6.  Reflex save to avoid falling.

As the floor tilts and Hamin starts to fall and slide, he hooks one end of his polearm over the lip of the hole and stays his slide across the floor.

15:03, Today: Hamin Carmine rolled 18 using 1d20+8.  reflex.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:06, Sun 19 Dec 2021.

If he has time, Hamin pulls himself  forwards to sit astride the, now canted, top of the hole.

The elf grunts in pain as she crashes into the wall that didn't stay where it was supposed to, then kicks off from it, launching herself and her blade towards the glowing sphere.

"Here we go.. again!" Alasha'an mutters, sparing a glance upwards~ish in the hope of seeing how her friends are faring.

Already sporting impressive bruises from his last plummeting to the hard stone flags, Ayas is unable to stop himself from his headlong slide across the floor and only adds to his collection, helpless to do anything about either the glowing orb or the more imminent threat of the advancing demon!