PDA

View Full Version : Glimpse into a Twisted Mind



Yami
2007-12-10, 10:07 AM
There were three of us when we found the place.

The cleric who started us on this damned fool quest sat slowly rotting within our magic bag. Took the easy way out and we couldn’t call her back.

We had a map of course, some large tapestry to a trumped up god. Granted, the Weejas lady has some sweet loot in her temples, and I have to respect that she didn’t seem to mind us taking it, so she’s not that bad. But I digress. We were pretty much groping blindly in the dark without our divine conduit. … Save that goblins don’t grope blindly, seeing as how we can see in-

Screw it. You get the idea.

Anyways, we found this place still standing amidst the ruins of what had been a city but months ago. Better yet it looked preeetty close to where this next artifact was supposed to be. (Artistic tapestries are not known for their spot on accuracy.)

We had to go in through the front doors, just like the last place. I knew I should have sprung for the adamantine shovel. As it was, we were forced to take the expected route. Fortunately the foyer was empty. Just some macabre pictures and a bunch of geometric patterns.

The Shade told us this was probably the mansion of some necromancer, and was afraid their might be some undead still about. Little chance of that really, as the demons would no doubt have killed them as well. Really the cleric was the expert on this sort of thing. Still, I seem to recall the goddess being one of death and magic, so it looked like we were on the right track.

The pictures were too large and unbending to fit in our magic bag, so the cleric had to do without the decoration and we moved on into the hallway, which proceeded to split. The fiend just had to go right when all common sense and adventuring wisdom demanded that you always turn left, so the three of us ended up divided like the last time. The shade came with me, probably because he knew the monsters always went after me, so he’d be safe. I wasn’t so sure of the wisdom in this, since that meant that any monsters would probably get found by me, but of course I never pointed this out. He is almost as skilled as I am, and is handy for dealing with these blasted doors.

The first room we barged into was nothing much, just one of those pointless desks and stacks of papers humanoids seem to love. The shade found them just as boring as I did for once (this of course is excepting my picture book with all the maps, or that gaudy one with the gems. That went for a pretty penny.)

Whoever built this must have been mad, for there was a rather pointless turn in the next hallway. And a room between two hallways!? Mad I tell you. A layout like that prevents all sorts of charges, bringing the fights into a much closer perspective. Not something I liked. As it was though, the next room was just as empty as the first, just a bunch of books jammed all over the walls. I found one with a bit of silverwork on it, but the shade didn’t seem to think it was of much consequence. We went left again when the opportunity presented itself and found yet another hallway, with a turn, leading into some sleeping room. And what sort of madman doesn’t keep his loot in his bedroom, and only one way in? These magic-users sure were an odd sort.

We traveled back through the book room into another hallway, where we met up the fiend again. The hallway was full of doors on the far side, mostly closed save for the one by the fiend with the little human-child corpse near it. The fiend was standing over its mangled form, blade over one shoulder while it admonished the body for its foolishness. It wasn’t an actual man-child though, because real ones bleed. We argued of course, and as always it couldn’t understand the wisdom of my words.

I figured we should stick together then, since this place did seem to be the right one, despite the lack of awe and grandeur the last temple held. I mean, why else have these guards? I wasn’t happy about going against standard procedure, but it looked like fights, and in that case, there was strength in numbers.

We two, the devil-fiend and I were still arguing when we opened the next cell.

It held nothing but a large jar with a pickled brain in it. Probably not much, Without my cleric, I had no way of knowing if it was magical or worthwhile. (Wizards, who knows what they’ll buy?)

The shade seemed to feel threatened by it though, so we broke the jar and smashed the gray matter about. Seemed pointless, but who was I to argue.

Again the next room was just as worthless. Nothing but some errant skin someone left lying about, so we moved onto the fourth. That held a real undead creature. Some shambling thing that kept trying to pound us in. Well, pounding the fiend in. The shade is almost unnoticeable in the dark, and I’m quick enough to keep away from most things. We tore it to shreds without a sweat. I was almost feeling bored. I mean, with these enclosed spaces I never really had enough room to build up a good charge, and when I did, when I finally got a good running start… *Piff* like extra momentum had no effect. And these crystals I’d gotten for my blades? Worthless. Demon hunting my precious little foot, we had to chew through that thing’s flesh bit by bit.

Well, as I said, it died. We moved on.

Then the last of the little cells. There was another door, bigger looking and definitely banded with iron after that, the kind that always seem to taunt you with their smug superior build and their sturdy resistance to my ever nifty little foot. Yeah that punk was going to come later, but first the last little cell.

The body in that one had obviously not been properly treated. Now I’m no expert, but even our cleric looked fresh compared to that mess, and the stench, ugh. I have no idea how I was able to stand it that long. Anyways, we went at it like usual and after a few weak attempts at clawing us it just walked out to door. It went to that oaken punk next to us. We gave chase of course, couldn’t have that thing stinking up our treasures, not that I’d found anything worthwhile yet.

But then things took a turn for the worse. You see, there were two more of these things in here. Chained at first, but there was some lever in the back that released them, and course the one just had to go pull it.

Well, my shade couldn’t do anything with his arrows, and actually just left to recheck that empty bedroom. Seemed these things really weren’t demons, so his fancy shmancy expensive bow was pretty worthless, and the devil wasn’t showing a huge amount of skill with its blade either. Or maybe it was? It wasn’t enough if it was. There were also my blades, as weak as the rest. The daggers were useless, both the silver and the nifty iron ones. In the end I had to use my kukri to do anything, and that was just wasn’t enough.

The things kept trying to claw at us, but the real problem though was the stench. I mean, it was bad at first, but these things were constantly expelling clouds of vapor that just started getting too much. It literally sapped the strength from my arms. Fortunately, I am a master at running away.

Sadly, I was too nauseated at first to get very far, and soon my mail and my gear became too much for me. Gave them the chance to follow and the stench with them. It ended up slowing me down, which could have been bad. It didn’t slow me enough of course, as I said I'm a master at the art of running.

Well, I was passing through that first room we’d checked, the one just the shade and I did, with the desk, when something tried to drop on me from the ceiling. I slid under it of course, and kept on going until I was safely outside. Neither the two pursuing stench corpses, nor the fleshy skin cloth followed me out. Which of course didn’t bode well for the other two.

Not that I was going back in there any time soon.

So I waited a bit before I realized the devil had the magic sack, and within the magic sack was our large artifact gem. The one we needed for this whole demon banishing thing. Fortunately around this time the shade came running out.

Granted, he didn’t have the magic sack, but he did have the cleric’s old resurgence stick. Even claimed he could use it, which was the only reason I hadn’t traded it way for something useful. Of course, his idea of 'using' apparently meant dancing around for a full minute before the thing even sparkled a bit, and then it did nothing, the worthless piece of trash. In the mean time I used my trusty belt (well, magic belt, and we all know magic’s a temperamental and inherently untrustworthy thing, but it works for the most part.) In my mad dash one of the things had managed to claw me pretty bad, but like I said, belt. No dancing and shaking like the stupid stick, and it actually worked, fixed my wounds right up.

Since we were both masters at the skulking arts, we figured we’d sneak back in, grab the bag off the fiend’s body and sneak away. I mean, I wasn’t really hurt any, just weak. There was still the problem of the shade’s bow being worthless, but as luck would have it, I’d dropped my scythe when we went in, rather than putting it in the sack o’ holding.

Now, you may be asking yourself why a little goblin like me would be carrying a large human sized scythe around, but really, the question you should be asking is why not? I mean, it’s a style thing, and no one else we met seems to get it, but why, since I’m already forced to slow myself to the rest of the party, shouldn’t I look good doing it. Got a pouch oft dyed in my own blood even to sit upon my head, but alas, the effect seems wasted on these large folk.

Anyways, as I was saying, the thing is heavy, so I always drop it when things get interesting and gather it again when we're done. Don’t know why I don’t drop it in the magic bag though. Force of habit I suppose.

We skulked back inside, keeping a look out for the flesh blanket but found the place empty again. Carefully we circumvented the two undead things pretty easily, but of course that meant the third one was probably munching on our poor devil and stinking up the magic sack. I just hoped the magicalness of the thing kept it clean. Odd thing was, that room, the one with the big thick door, yeah it was closed. Must be something valuable in there though I didn’t notice anything during the fight. Anyways, it was one of those tough doors that you’d need the Shade’s skill to unlock, only there didn’t seem to be a lock. We didn’t want to make a ruckus, being as we were trying to go unnoticed, so we went further down the hallway. Down another twist as it were.

Here we found the fiend’s blade, as well as our sack. Now, this was rather confusing, as I would have figured to have found them with the fiend, but I wasn’t about to question my luck. ‘Specially not with the noise coming from inside the room at the end here. Still, it wouldn’t be right to leave the devil to be mauled by these creatures, not while we were able to move about unnoticed, so rather than doing the smart thing and booking it, we went to investigate.

I almost wish the monster’d been munching on the devil, just so we’d have known to leave. Although… Wouldn’t they go back from whence they came when they died? I don’t presume to know how this stuff works, that was the cleric’s job, I just expected a lot more gore and less confusion.

Anyways, the third of the things was just standing there, looking for all the world like the devil had put up a good fight. It occasionally looked about and wandered within the room, but for the most part, it just stood there. Now, we’d still not searched the whole complex, just the half of it, and we didn’t have an artifact yet. At least hadn’t noticed one. I’m sure we would have known it though; I mean the last one was a gem the size of my head.

So, we had a problem. We still needed to scour the place, and that thing and its cohorts were in our way. Well, we talked it over, the shade and I, and figured we’d give it another go. The slaying I mean. Sure the two of us were both finesse style warrior, and these things seemed impervious to most our know-how, but we had superior maneuverability. And we could run.

But most importantly, we had the drop on this thing.

Never underestimate a stubborn goblin with a purpose. Especially one you can’t catch.

I struck first, like I always do. A nice good charge with a running start; would have slaughtered a demon, or even another living thing. As it was I managed another few pitiful tears in it’s already falling apart body. The shade of course, missed.

Well, true to the plan I darted in again and got out of there before the thing started stinking up the place again, but it seem the shade wasn’t so lucky. He stumbled out into the hallway gasping and choking.

Can’t leave an ally alone now could I? At least, not twice in such a quick succession, looks bad. So in I charge again and wouldn’t you know it…

As I came back around that stupid hallway corner, what do I see but the fiend; head poking out of the doorway, the large oaken door wide open. Well, suffice it to say I always keep a nifty little trinket about my neck for just such an occasion. (Well, not really, normally I just use it to back up for another good running start at someone.) So, I spend its meager amount of magic and zip, into the door I go, screaming for the devil to close it after me.

He complied the moment he saw the plague-wight. Well, there we two were, staring at each other just inches from the door when we heard our friend pounding on it, and the whoosh of some expired undead tainting the air. I could tell what the devil was going to do; I could see it in his eyes. Being as horribly team minded as their type were it was going to open the damned door, so got ready to reach out and tag the monster, being as that I can retreat faster than it can move.

Luckily, the shade was still alive, and we briefly swapped places as I tried to sever one of the injured limbs, but luck was not with me today, and I barely managed to make it back inside before we slammed it shut on another eerie whoosh, the lock bar slamming down as the things started trying to get in.

Now, I understand that doors might serve a purpose at times, and I do hate them, because often that purpose is to deny me access to things, but I will say this for that door, it saved my hide. … Well, I probably could have dodged around the thing and run off, but I’d have had to leave… no wait, the shade’s pretty good at that too, though he is slower.

The devil then, we’d have had to leave the devil. And we still had the other two to contend with. No way I was going to blindly charge into them. So, we just kinda sat there, counting our rations and looking at the door. In the end, we only waited a day before trying to leave. Our fiend friend wanted to wait for weeks. Weeks!

As it was, we must have gone over that room a hundred times. Even found some pretty nice magical gear, though I didn’t get any of it. Comes from being too well equipped I suppose. Still, the only thing worth not was the vest-shirt thing. Supposed to keep the undead from noticing you, and it seemed to work for the devil we found out. Before then we were just going off of what the shade’s monocle said.

Anyways, we were all decked out, ready to leave; sure we could sneak by the undead this time. So yeah, we opened the door and there they were. Undead. It’s horrible, but they really do have nothing better to do than wait outside a door all day.

So we panic of course and one of them wrenches the door all the way open. Now, I swear by the Plains that shade is a genius, but while I tried to grab the door from the obviously larger and tougher undead creation, he just touched his little circlet and thought death at the one holding the door.

I had completely forgotten about that thing, probably the best thing we’d found our whole time together. Even better than the carpet that could fly and pull our wagon (back when we had a wagon, before the magic bag. And come to think of it, the wagon was pretty much unused too.)

Anyways, we’d had a huge row about the thing when we’d finally found an unravaged town. The devil wanted to sell it for more gear, and the shade had wanted to keep it. Since I’d already gotten the items I wanted from this town (well the ones they had at least,) I threw in with the shade. So glad I did too.

Well, there we were, back on the other side of the door, locked in this room with the undead right out side. So we did the only thing we could do, cut up one of the books we’d taken and make a deck of cards.

When the shade finally announce the circlet was charged again we yanked open the door, blasted the one creature, and pulled it shut again, the lock bar sounded our victory thud. We were actually in good spirits, aside from the cabin fever. And we were slowing gaining our strength back.

Things went wrong on the third day though. We’d gotten a pattern going, I open, shade blasts, and devil closes. It worked. But then there was no creature to blast when I flung open the door. Now, I know there were three, and we’d only gotten the two, it was a given that that third was out there somewhere, waiting.

But we’d managed to sneak past these things before, so we all slunk out into the hallway, paranoid as can be. And then we went to check the rest of the place. The other two wanted nothing more than to quietly leave the way we came, but I persisted. We were on a bit of a clock, at least I figured as much. I mean, there could only be so many places un touched by demon-kind, and the longer we dawdled, the better the chance that they had nothing better to do than hunt us down individually, and I wasn’t going to let that happen.

So we went into the alchemical labs.

Now, I’m no mage, and neither are the others, but chances are some of the potions and bottles could be useful, but that dratted eye-piece could only see so much, and then it was useless, so we just grabbed what we could. Now, I thought it was common knowledge that really magical bottles never emptied; kinda like that bag of rations I got off the cleric that always had things in it.

So I went about pouring a bit of everything out, just to check.

I forgot that the first rule of magic was to avoid it at all costs.

I was testing what must have been the twelfth beaker or so when there was a flash of purple and I found myself stuck to the ceiling. The worst part was, I knew there was another undead creature walking about, not to mention that flesh suit that seemed to like to walk on the ceiling, and so I was understandably very concerned about my new found helplessness. I’d like to think that it’s a measure of my character that I wasn’t screaming for help until the other two decided to walk off without me.

Of course then the bloody devil had to just wait until then to remind me that I had bought ankle of dislocation or some such, and that they could teleport me out of the weird unmovable encasing. I’d had really just meant that to bounce about on the field of battle, but it worked and we were on our way out.

The last room left. The only place left for the artifact to hide.

You can understand then why I was confused when it just opened into a room with more jars and pickled things. What’s more, just because they weren’t brains, the others thought I shouldn’t break them. I tried anyways, but was still feeling the effects of over exposure to undead stench. We could only assume that we had chosen the wrong ruins, so we headed back to the entrance.

And the moment I started to open the door into that first hallway the stupid stench thing ripped the door open and actually hit me. I really wasn’t expecting that. You tend to forget at times that the undead have no need to move, so not hearing anything doesn’t mean much. Well, as you know these things are putrid. Like, dirty as a child.

I think it infected me with something that time, because this time I could feel my energy dropping. My strength. Not like before though. That was strength like sheer power, the force behind your blows and that sort, but this, this was my inner strength. My stamina, the measure of how long I could outrun my foes. I did the only reasonable thing I could. I panicked and tried to squeeze past the thing to get to the exit. And I failed. In the end I just used up my anklets to get me out shade’s line of fire and started bawling for the useless resurgy stick. It’s a respectably adult respond to feeling your life force ebb away from you.

Shade, true to form, blasted the thing with the circlet while the devil rooted through his pack and grabbed the stick. Then they proceeded to pass it back and forth between each other while chanting and shaking it. Finally worked, so I suppose I shouldn’t condemn the thing.

But we were free! Finally killed off the three remaining guardians, not that it really meant anything for us, but it was a moral victory for me. Then we walked into the foyer and I remembered the flesh sack. I looked up just as it started dropping and I was out the door faster than you could say ‘coward’

The shade was not so lucky. Now, he was a being of shadow, supposedly from another plane of existence, so for the most part things didn’t hit him, but apparently that wasn’t because he was ethereal, just that he was hard to see in the dark, so when the thing snagged him with a luck grab, he was in deep trouble.

He’s been injured before, and I knew for a fact that he couldn’t take a hit well, and the fiend stayed back to help him, so there was nothing for it but to run back and try to help. Not sure if you’ve ever tried to beat on someone while they strangled your friend, but it tends to get messy, so I decided to use my belt instead. The healing one.

Well, at least the lithe little thing was hurt by it because I’ll be damned if my belt didn’t heal the wrong combatant. The fiend just pulled out another stick, a healy one this time, and began shaking it to no effect. He pretty much just kept that up. I suppose he was still feeling the effects of that corpse stench. Fortunately, the shade managed to slip the creature’s grasp, but sadly he couldn’t really run farther than it. I had to do what I do best, stand in front of him. Didn’t go poorly at first, as I am a slippery bastard and hard to catch. But the cursed shade never moved far enough away to be safe, kept trying to kill the thing instead. Not that I wasn’t either, but by the Plains the man has a bow. It wouldn't have hurt him to back up a bit.

Never really took into account that the devil was still wearing that hiding shirt either, so I probably should have just run, but instead I tried to hold the macabre beast off. It eventually got me, wrapping me up and trying to crush me. I may be hard to catch, but once caught, I’ll be the first to admit I’ve no business in a toe-to-toe grapple like that. Not with some empty flesh beast animated by the darkest of magiks and without a real body to cut. And I'd wasted my magical trinkets just getting out of that charnel house. Worst part was the damn shade shot me, and then neither of the two of them could get their heal sticks to work.

Last thing I remember was my flesh being pulled from my body. Not the pleasantest of deaths I’d think.

So... that's how I ended up here. No idea what happened to the other two now. They’re not exactly the type to come here if they bought it.

Yami
2007-12-10, 10:08 AM
Just felt the need to make an homage to a favored character of mine. Didn't know where else to put it.

Inyssius Tor
2007-12-10, 10:18 AM
Cool!
ten characters.