gorge of fire, part 2

[cellio]

April 28 (Saturday)

This is not how I wanted to spend my birthday. Oh well.

There is more smoke and ash in the air today than yesterday. The sun is at times obscured; the differences between day and night are less pronounced than they ought to be. It's hotter and grittier, too. The rocks have become more solid -- enough that the burrowing trick did not work for tonight's shelter -- and the slope more steep.

This morning we were attacked by a creature that very nearly took out our group. Had I not been flying we might all have fallen. That's scary! It was a huge obsidian thing that sprayed black ooze whenever anyone slashed or thrust at it.

The worst part, though, was that it reached out with "spikes" and harpooned people, effectively pinning them. At one point it had Kyle, Turok, and Liandra. Liandra was a bear and all of them were fighting it, and I poured empowered magical missiles into it. Kyle managed to break free and it engulfed Turok, but he bit and clawed his way out, killing it.

Not much later the first storm of the day came -- there had been storms overnight but we were protected in our burrow -- and just before it, a dragon-like creature with many heads. This one was not flying, at least, but my initial coldballs did little damage and it actually regenerated from lightning. I gave Turok the ability to fly and made Kyle invisible, and the two of them did quite a bit of damage. I must remember that Kyle is very, very effective when his opponents can't see him.

While the storm was rolling through I flew up above the smoke, looking to see what would be following and attacking us this time. Sure enough, there was a dragon-like creature that was on fire. I shouted for the others to join me -- Turok carried Kyle and Liandra flew up on her own -- and I fired missiles at it. It moved very quickly, and before I could react it was on top of Liandra. I tried to use the smoke and fire to blind it but failed; I guess I haven't figured out that spell yet after all. Unfortunately, I hit Kyle and he chewed me out over it later.

[Smudge]

Turok charged it and it, carrying Liandra, dove into the smoke. It was hard to see, but Liandra summoned some lightning bolts and Turok followed them down, charging the creature and killing it. He said it bowed to him before winking out.

As long as we were flying anyway, we decided to just fly over the fire-blooms until the spells ran out, avoiding the tendrils.

Toward the end of the day, as we were trying to figure out what to do about shelter, we saw a huge burning eagle-shaped creature riding the thermals from a storm. This time my coldballs were effective, and it charged at us before I could get too many off. Liandra hit it with a quenching spell that was very effective, and it grabbed her and began to dive. I hit it with missiles and Turok flew after it, killing it in the air. It crashed to the ground, still carrying Liandra; fortunately, she was ok, though we all had to work together to lift the huge carcass away. It has to have an 80' wingspan, at least!

This creature did not dissipate (or bow), and its hide is very thick and (obviously) fire-resistant. I don't know if it will ever prove useful for anything, but I took a largish chunk of hide for possible use in armor or fire protection later. Turok ate some of the meat but did not recommend it for the rest of us.

The ground here is too hard for Liandra's burrowing trick to work, but Liandra pointed out that we had a huge fire-resistant carcass, most of which is wings, and that we ought to be able to fabricate shelter from that. This was an excellent idea. I never thought I'd be writing a journal entry from beneath the wings of a phoenix, but life is full of surprises.

Tonight's sunset was even stranger than yesterday's -- the red sun and fire was filtered through the heavy curtain of smoke and ash, making it not at all obvious when the sun had actually set. I imagine that sunrise will be equally murky.

I think we are most of the way to the end of the gorge, so with luck tomorrow we will be able to get there, and Turok will plunge Kotara-nar into the lava or fire or whatever, and we will carry an enhanced weapon home. I have a scroll of teleportation, but I think I've almost worked out how to do it, so maybe we won't need the scroll. I'm really looking forward to seeing Hrolf and having a nice, long bath.

Of course, there are more monsters between us and that goal, and it's obvious that some of them are being guided toward us. Who would take sport in such things? I don't think it's Garrett; if he were here he would have killed us overnight. And I don't think it's someone working for Garrett; it's an independant force, I think. For good or ill I know not.

Comments

[ralphmelton.livejournal.com]

I actually went back and checked whether it had been mentioned in previous journal entries.

No cake for Larissa, but lots of fires for her to blow out. :-)

[cellio]

but lots of fires for her to blow out. :-)

Or cultivate -- when will she again get such a safe test lab? :-)