A weapon by choice

 

A personal diary - By Saunte

 

Who am I? Why am I here? What is the purpose of my existence? Is there a purpose?
Those questions have haunted intelligent beings for an eternity, but most beings at least know what they are.
Such is not my destiny. I do not know what my true form is, but I do know my purpose.
I was created, and have since been cultivated and primed as a weapon against a mighty red dragon.
But as a weapon I have one important flaw. I have free will. I will not accept a pre-ordained destiny.
If I choose to become the weapon my creators intended, it will be my own decision.
This is my story.

 

Chapter 1

Childhood and early adventures

 

I was born a human in the village of WeltMitte in Germania. My “parents” were simple tanners. I was born at exactly the same time as five other male children. We were born at midnight, but even though this was of cause seen as a sign from the gods, we were brought up normally.
Our hero was Fugl, the older brother twins Jaxe and Simba, and his squire Brutus. They were templars in The Holy Land, but lived a while in the village before going back.

When we received word about the death of Brutus, we tried to perform a memorial service in his honor. Shortly afterwards the first sign of our different nature appeared. I was very religious as a kid and thought we might have angered the gods by botching up the ritual.
We sought out a wise woman in the forest called Maren, but she could tell us very little about, what we thought was a curse. On our way back, we were repeatedly attacked by animals of the forest. The youngest of the twins was killed, but returned from the dead after one day. He was now able to transform into a small viper.

This caused the villagers to grow suspicious of “The Midnight Children”, as we were called.
The first signs of our affliction were rather subtle. My skin a transparent light grey, and I suffered some minor problems with sunlight. The other boys had other symptoms along the same pattern. We learned much from the elven druid Maren, but she had no explanation of our condition, though she did believe Simba was developing into an elf.

At the end of our 11th year, the village was suddenly attack by a mighty red dragon, and totally destroyed. Jaxe, Simba, and I escaped the destruction because we were playing in the forest.
We didn´t find any survivors, so we tried to find our way to the nearest town, where the local merchant and his son were. When we reached it however it too had been destroyed. Again we found no survivors, but we did find some provisions and equipment.
At this point I began to loose my faith in the gods. I have never regained my trust in the gods.
Without religious guidance I often feel uncertain of my beliefs, but I find, that I prefer to be unsure on my own, to being a slave of petty gods.
We started travelling south in the hope of finding other humans. We travelled south for almost three years without meeting other intelligent settlements. The only intelligent life we encountered were the pegasus, whose cave we shared the second winter. The first winter we sheltered in a wolf´s den, after killing the she-wolf, and adopting her cub. During our stay with the pagasus, we were joined by another of  “The Midnight Children”, Løvering, who had befriended another pegasus. His pegasus had brought him here in the hopes, that our pegasus knew the location of a human settlement.
In the spring we continued our journey south, and our afflictions developed further.
Jaxe became more dexterous, developed snake-eyes and a forked snake-tongue.
Løvering, more blessed than cursed, became larger than normal boys his age and a lot more handsome.
Simba also became more handsome, though darker, and my problems with daylight became much worse, but I regenerated at an unnatural rate.
On our way we came across a statue of an elven warrior, which became alive as we approached it.
Together we travelled further south, and came to the magical land of Fantasia, which was suffering from a curse. The land had been hidden by an impenetrable illusion of a barren land, while in truth it was a sylvan forest. On our way there we met up with the last of “the midnight children”, Matt and Tin. The had both developed incorporeal natures. They both faded in and out of existence at random.

Lifting the curse of Fantasia was the first of our many adventures, but it deserves a special attention due to several strange “coincidences”. The short version is that the land was under a curse, that could become permanent if the wrong ruler succeeded in eliminating her contester. The two contesters were confined in two identical fortresses. They both tried to persuade us to kill the other one. One of them looked like a medusa, and called herself Medusa. The other princess looked like a true princess. After a long investigation, during which, we were temporarily exiled from Fantasia, and had to promise an old priest to save his homeland Egypt from an undead infestation, we finally chose to support, the princess looking like a medusa. After a difficult battle, we killed the “false” princess. The curse of Fantasia was lifted.
More importantly Medusa knew much about us, especially the Brewer-brothers. There was a prophecy in Fantasia, that foretold, that they would save Fantasia. She also recognized those of us with alternate forms, as though the alternate form, was our true form. Simba for instance was recognized as a spider-elf.

After this adventure we continued south, and finally arrived in the human city of ?????.
Here we had our first encounters with the Christian church, as it was practiced by the inquisition.
I also had my first encounter with magic, and learned a few spells.

We also fought a thieves guild called “The Dark Traders”, who consisted of wererats. Jaxe and Matt was infected, which seemed to drive out their previous curses.
We had several run-ins with the inquisition, and was eventually arrested and accused of witchcraft. We were saved by Joan of Arc, who sacrificed herself for us. We tried to rescue her, but for some reason stopped the attempt to break in to the cathedral. I am not certain why this happened, as I was attacked by an assassin, and rendered helpless for an extended period of time, by a debilitating poison.

During my weakness, the rest of “The Midnight Children”, abandoned the attempt to break into the cathedral, and for some reason found themselves in a strange conflict in a  small village.
A demon was holding some 50 children hostage, and asked us to give up 13 years of our lives in order to save them. The heroes of the group decided, that we (including me) was prepared to pay such a ransom. We were immediately aged 13 years, and those 13 years actually passed in the world around us. Thus Joan of Arc had already been burned as a witch 13 years earlier, when we returned to the world.

The group decided to travel to “The Holy Land” in order to find the elder brother of Simba and Jaxe. During a stay in Rome, I was revived, but I was of cause thoroughly shaken by the turn of events. Through Matt I was introduced to a very sympathetic crook in Subura. Through this contact we were cured from our curses. Before receiving the cure however, the guild master asked me to bite him. It seemed my curse was some strange type of vampirism, that did not completely bar activity in daylight. I also got my first contacts to the heretic group of mystics know as ur-priests.

In “The Holy Land”, Simba left us for an unknown period of time in order to train as a templar. As this could take several years Matt, Tin, and I travelled north in order to find a special group of druids, that followed a doctrine, that appealed to Tin. When we reached Esbjerg, we were met by Jaxe, and Løvering, and heard of the fall of Jerusalem. Fearing for the destiny of Simba, we booked a ship sailing south. Løvering insisted, that he could not travel in the company of evil creatures such as my familiar, and Tin´s companion wasp. Tin dismissed his wasp, but I refused to have my actions dictated by a religion, I did not support. Løvering left the group.

Before we sailed south towards Rome and Jerusalem, Simba himself arrived. After some discussion Løvering accepted to return to the group.

Simba had much to tell about the war in “The Holy Land”. He had actually met Saladin, who knew more about the prophesy about “The Midnight Children”. He had a rather interesting way of testing, that Simba was indeed one of “the children”. He simply killed him. If Simba was a “Midnight Child”, he would return to life, which he did. After that Saladin was very helpful, and told Simba, that we were supposed to rid the world of a great evil – believed to be the great red dragon.
Saladin himself was a dragon hunter (contrary to Christian propaganda, that claimed, that Saladin was a red dragon). Simba joined Saladin in a hunt for the great red, but was intercepted, or rather tricked into an ambush, by the great black dragon and the great blue dragon. Saladin was almost killed, and had his eyes gauged out. Thanks to a high priest in Saladin´s retinue, they all escaped with their lives. Re-reading the prophecy, they decided, that “The Midnight Children”, had to be together, and apparently had to go through a lot before the encounter with the dragon. Thus the high priest sent Simba on a magical journey to the location of the rest of  “The Midnight Children”,

 

Chapter 2

The Missing Druid

 

We boarded another ship sailing towards England, where the druid order were supposed to be based. England is mostly Christian, but in some of the more distant areas the old religions still thrive. On our way towards one such area, we were accosted by a succubus, which claimed to have been sent back in time by our own future selves. Apparently we had failed in our task the first time even though we had reached almost divine power. Having failed a 100 years from now, with terrible results for the world, we had decided to send ourselves back in time, and try again, this time guided by our future selves. The demon claimed, that it had been division in the group, which had caused the failure the first time.

It was also explained, that our so-called curses were a necessity, and that we could chose to embrace them once again. Seduced by the thought of our future power, I decided to embrace my vampiric curse again. The rest of “The Midnight Children”, chose to do likewise. Immediately afterwards we were attacked, and found ourselves in each others bodies. Simba and I traded bodies, and apparently some mental capabilities as well. I was able to channel divine Christian energy, and Simba drew from my ur-priest powers as well as my magical knowledge. With some difficulty we survived the test our future selves had made for us. If we chose to believe that rather fantastical tale.

Unsure about our status, we tried to figure out how to proceed. As we were very different in moral and temperament, continuing our own careers in another body might be immoral, as it might force, the owner of the body into an unsolvable dilemma. In the end Løvering decided, that we would have to accept our new bodies as our own and thus proceed according to our individual moral.
Jaxe, Simba, Tin, and I disagreed, and chose to await further development.
In time we discovered that we switched bodies randomly in stressed situations. I was later put into the body of Matt, while Simba continued to occupy my body. Løvering was the first to return to his own body, at which time he felt a sense of being stabilized.

We succeeded in tracking down a arch druid, but unfortunately he seemed to have met with some misfortune. His niece informed us, that she was worried about his sudden disappearance, and we decided to look into the matter.
As we approached his house, we were caught in an ambush. I charged thoughtlessly into the fray, but unable to use my own fighting style in the body and armor of Matt, I suffered a stupid death.. This was the first time I found out, that the curse of immortality does not confer invulnerability. As I rose from the dead, I was permanently weakened from the experience.
Somewhat more cautiously we gained access to the house of the druid/wizard Londar.
It seemed to have been attacked by humans. There were dead bodies in several rooms on the ground floor. In the hall there were a heavily trapped figurine of a dragon with ruby eyes. In one of the rooms we accidently activated a couple of wooden golems. Unused to our present bodies we fought inefficiently, and were almost defeated. Heavily wounded we retreated from the house to rest.
When we recovered, we found ourselves in our own bodies again, except that my vampiric infliction seemed to have found a more suitable host in Simba, who now bore aspects of both drow and vampire. The occupation of each-other´s bodies were not without consequences however.
The presence of Løvering in Matt’s body had left Matt with a strange and unnatural connection to Bahamut. He seemed to have been forced into servitude as a priest of Bahamut. I of cause saw this as yet another proof of the evil and oppressive nature of our controllers/creators. The object was presumably to influence the independent Matt towards the narrow-minded view of Bahamut, whose strict doctrine would demand the death of the red dragon regardless of the consequences.
We re-entered the house, but avoided the two rooms with wooden golems, partly due to the danger, but also because the druid would hardly thank us for destroying such valuable property.
Suddenly we were attacked by three adventurers, a lady wizard, a rogue, and a warrior. They attacked without warning and with great skill. Hard pressed we had no choice, but to try to kill them in return. The warrior and rogue died, but the wizard surrendered. When questioned, she told us her name was Salanthar, and claimed to have been hired by the niece of the druid. We expressed our regret as to the deaths of her associates, but insisted that she would remain our prisoner until her story could be verified.
Thanks to the skill of Matt we were able to bypass the rather nasty traps, and difficult locks barring the way to the druid tower. The tower contained some rather curious rooms, one of which seemed to be a living room with invisible furniture. On the top of the tower, there was summoning circles, and what appeared to be scrying devices, among other things an incredibly magic mirror. Several of the rooms had strange runes inscribed on the walls. I deciphered the runes with a comprehend languages spell, but they offered no clue to the whereabouts of the druid or on how to operate the mirror. When going through his papers however, we discovered a letter addressed to an L (presumably the druid named Londar). The letter seemed to divide the surrounding lands between him and someone financing his search for some ruins and pieces of an artifact. The author of the letter pointed out that even with the remaining pieces of the artifact some pyramid would be necessary to make it work. The letter was not signed, but there was a wax sigil resembling that of the local baron. A map had the notification “Arns Hollow/Temple” by a place called Bartreis´ Fall. We assumed that this would be where the druid could be found.
We decided to search that area for the druid, but first we would have to verify the truth of Salanthars claim. As we left the area we were attacked by four ogre zombies. Simba quickly dispatched the first two with his greater turning ability, but as the remaining two pressed on a couple of drow warriors attacked us from inside the house. Simba destroyed the remaining zombies with a second greater turning, and guarded the door against whoever had controlled them. Matt engaged one of the drow warriors in the hallway blocking his way, and Jaxe engaged the other one in a small room. Matt’s opponent seemed to be regenerating his wounds, so I used an invisibility purge spell to reveal a drow priestess healing the warrior from behind. Suddenly Jaxe began to behave strangely. Though hard pressed against the other warrior, he stopped fighting all the while mumbling incoherently to himself. I used the Divine Power spell to make me into a competent warrior for about half a minute in order to assist Jaxe. Simba however had the same idea, left the door to me, and engaged the drow fighting Jaxe. I tried to enter the fray, but there was no room in the cramped quarters, so I returned to heal the wounds of Matt before closing the door, as Simba had ordered. The drow priestess seemed to have inexhaustible resources of healing, so I decided to try to attack her from behind. I opened the door and ran around the house to climb through a window into the room with the priestess. Matt had also realized, that he had to attack the priestess in order to defeat the warrior. With his amazing acrobatic skills, he tumbled past the warrior, and attacked the priestess. The priestess was annoyed by this development, but continued casting spells. As I crawled through the window, Simba finished of the other drow, and attacked the last warrior from the other side. When Matt pressed the attack against the priestess, again drawing blood, she decided to flee past me. I tried to grapple her, but she succeeded in jumping through the window. Once outside she levitated out of reach of my invisibility purge, and disappeared. During the fight Salanthar had succeeded in escaping. Without Tin, we were unable to track her down.

Before searching Bartreis´ Fall for the ruins, we travelled back to the village to clear the Salanthar story with the druid´s niece. She denied all knowledge of Salanthar. She could not confirm that her uncle were searching for ruins, and was surprised, that we had succeeded in entering the tower. Matt did a bit of information gathering in the village. As he brought back an example of the barons sigil it became clear, that though very close in appearance it was not the same as that of the mysterious writer of the letter.

At Bartreis ´Fall, we were attacked by an uncommonly large and ferocious tiger, that killed Jaxe.
We had some difficulties in finding the ruins. In the end however we found a crack in a cliff leading into a vast underground cave with a light quite similar to sunlight streaming down from it´s ceiling. The cave floor was 100¢ below the entrance, so we had to float down using a feather fall scroll. Some distance from the entrance was a stair pyramid surrounded by dense shrubbery and trees. We heard the roar of a tiger in the jungle. Reminded by the fearful tiger we encountered on our way here, we decided to do some reconnaissance. We camped while Matt searched the area from the air. He noticed a small cave entrance high on a wall. When he entered he found an amazing treasure. He returned to our camp for our bag of holding. I stayed to guard the body of Jaxe, while Simba and Matt returned to the cave. The treasure was centered around a massive chest beneath a holy symbol. Matt found a yellow feather a blue scale close to the chest, but didn´t give it much thought at the time. Simba recognized the symbol of the ancient sun god Arn. Once he recalled the sun god, Simba also remembered that his temple was supposedly destroyed by his rival Horgrim.
Once he realized that the treasure belonged to a good god, Simba refused to desecrate the site by theft. Thus they returned to camp empty-handed. I disagreed with Simba, but in respect of his creed, I suggested to cast an augury in the cave in order to determine wether we should use the treasure for the sake of goodness or let it be. When Jaxe had risen from the dead, we all returned to the cave.
This time however an azer were guarding the treasure, and were rather threatening. After some explanations however he decided, that we were a force of good and revealed his true form. He was an Couatl. The couatl was the guardian of the treasure of Arn, and would not permit us to use any of it. He were prepared to trade other magical items of equal value. We could also prove ourselves worthy by cleansing the pyramid of evil or returning with evil items. He also told us that the druid had not been here.

As finding the druid was our main concern, we decided to leave the pyramid for later, and return to the druid´s residence.
In the druid´s house we decided, that we would have to get past the wooden golems in order to search the last two rooms for clues. After defeating the golems, we found a secret staircase into the ground. The tunnel was guarded by a quite deadly repetitive trap, and blocked by a force further down. In the area of the trap, we found a man in a green cloak. Obviously a victim of the trap. Matt disabled the trap. In front of the magical barrier there was a column with the imprint of a palm. We tried placing a hand in the imprint, but nothing happened. We bypassed the magical barrier with a stone shape spell, and a bit of digging. Further down the tunnel split up, and was again blocked by magical barriers. This time we figured out, that the barriers could be removed by placing a hand in the imprints and turning them. One of the tunnels lead to a large underground jungle. We checked the perimeter of the cave, and found another door, but didn´t open it. The other tunnel lead to a lake with slim paths along each side and an exit tunnel on the other side. Simba proceeded along the left side of the lake and I proceeded along the right one. Though the paths looked dry we both felt that we were ankle deep in water. Suddenly a scared elven maiden ran out from the exit tunnel. She stopped bewildered at the sight of us, and seemed torn between running from some horror behind us, and running from us. We tried in several languages to calm her down, but in the end she chose to jump into the lake. Suddenly she was attacked by something in the water. Simba also felt something attacking him, but never the less decided to rescue the elven maid. He jumped into the water and fought something in the lake. Fighting in heavy mail in water seemed suicidal, but quite in character with noble knights. Reluctantly I decided to help, and cast my Divine Power spell and jumped in. I did a lot of damage against the huge tentacle fish, that was down there.
Jaxe jumped changed to his serpent form, and jumped in, while Matt levitated over the lake shooting arrows. Both these attacks proved ineffective and in the water the beast now used one or more of it´s tentacles against me. I considered retreating, but could not do so without offering the beast a free opportunity. My only hope was to kill it before it killed me. I did a lot more damage, but still the beast didn´t die. Then suddenly a tentacle struck me and everything went dark. Simba used his levitation ability to lift me out of the water, and cured the worst of my damage. While I regained consciousness, the others were finally able to defeat the creature. As I was busy healing my wounds, I never noticed if it actually died or just disappeared like the maiden, who were obviously an illusionary bait.

We found an amazingly beautiful cave with fragile crystal formations illuminated from unseen sources.
But just as I was being captivated by the sheer beauty of the place, small crystalline creatures attacked us. At first we were unimpressed by our diminutive opponents, but they soon showed their true potential. First one of them created a marvelous display of colors closely resembling the spell color spray. Jaxe was paralyzed by the display. It was their other ability, that truly impressed however. With a scream they were able to shatter our weapons. I had cast a shillelagh, but as that was shattered, I attacked with my fists, and realized, that they resisted non-magical attacks. Around me we were fast losing our weapons. I yelled for retreat, but could not leave the path open to the paralyzed Jaxe. I could not lift Jaxe´s serpentine form by my self, so I tried to hold the fort with the magical staff given me by Santa, while Simba carried Jaxe to safety behind the magical barrier. Before I could follow, I was surrounded, and my staff was shattered. Desperately I tried to make an opening by grappling, but in vain. The last I saw as I fell to the small creatures was Simba in the doorway, desperately trying to change shape or something.

I awoke entombed in a crystal formation to the terrible sensation of suffocation, and died within 1½ minute. Obviously I must have died before. Even though I had escaped the curse of vampirism it seemed I was still subject to the immortality imbued by the curse of the Midnight Children.
In my present situation it would truly be a curse to awake for every day in eternity just to die from suffocation 1½ minute later. Next time I regained consciousness Tin contacted me by a message spell. I must admit, that I´m not sure how much sense I made, as I was panicked from the suffocation, but next time I awoke, I was actually able to breathe. In a message I was later told that Matt had made a hole in my coffin and that they were making a tunnel beneath me. Even though I knew help was coming, it took all my self control, not to go insane from being buried alive.
Finally they succeeded in digging their way up beneath me, and I was saved. I immediately escaped to the surface. It was only partly acting, that I needed to leave the claustrophobic tunnels, but of cause I also needed to renew my undetectable alignment spell.
While I had been buried, Matt had searched the complex, and could direct us to the inner sanctum of Londar. Summoning a earth mephit to help Tin with the soften earth spells needed, we tunneled beneath the crystal chamber to the inner sanctum. Here we found a Londar in his rainbow cloak. He seemed to have died from some sort of poison. He was carrying an antidote, but obviously didn´t have enough time to use it. Tracking the area revealed, that he had teleported here and then died after taking a single stumbling step.

We found a prisoner in a summoning circle. He claimed to be a victim of kidnapping. He claimed that Londar would demand ransom from his family in Waterdeep. Løvering revealed that the man calling himself Deepwater was in fact evil. After defeating several more of Londar´s golems, we gained access to his library, which was quite impressive, but badly cataloged. It would take a lifetime to find anything in this place with ordinary means. Luckily we´re anything but ordinary. Tin was able to track the way to recently used books. By revealing the latest research of Londar, we confirmed that the pyramid, defended by the couatl was indeed the object of his research.
Londar had recently studied an ancient book written in arcane magic called Horrigan´s Pyramid.
Once subjected to read magic and comprehend languages, it yielded it´s secrets readily enough.
It seems, that the pyramid was originally a temple of Horgrim, and was only later conquered and sanctified by the followers of Arn. Though the followers of Horgrim did retake the pyramid it was never reactivated, presumably because the parts of the artifact necessary was lost. The three parts were a replica of the pyramid, a special ruby, and “The White Eye”. Apparently activating the pyramid would create a 1 square mile area of darkness protected from sunlight.
Why Londar would seek to reactivate the pyramid seems a mystery. The only logical purpose seems to be to allow the evil in the pyramid to escape through the area currently protected by the artificial daylight of Arn. But why would a druid wish to release evil, that cannot abide sunlight?
Surely even a druid respecting magic and magical creatures would still consider undeads and their like as abominations.
Continuing our research, we found a lot of treasure, but no further clues. We hid the gold and jewels in the invisible furniture, but took the magical items and books with us back to the town.

On our way back, we realized, that one of the books would give Tin the knowledge necessary to pursue a career as an “arcane hierophant” (the same type of druid/wizard as Londar).
Since we no longer had need of Londar and his associates I found it unnecessary to return the treasure of Londar to his niece. Not only was I unable to convince the rest of the group, but succeeded in alienating myself, by pushing the point a bit to far. Thus we did return the loot to his niece, but she was fair enough to reward us handsomely for our efforts. Deepwater was turned over to the authorities, who would look into his story of kidnapping.

 

Chapter 3

Horgrim´s Temple

We considered returning to investigate the pyramid, but Tin needed time to study the book of arcane hierophants, and we decided that now was as good a time as any. As usual Tin was ready to set aside his own ambitions, but as I felt the need to recuperate after being buried alive, he gave in and settled into studying.

While staying in the inn, matt revealed, that he had indeed procured a few items in the expedition, that the knight need not know about. I agreed to identify them for him. Two of them were actually the replica of the pyramid and the ruby from the book about Horrigan´s Pyramid.
Matt needed to be initiated into the society of Nightsong and disappeared for a while. He had however assured us, that he would be ready on the tenth day, when we had decided to leave for the pyramid. I tried to cover for him, but I was even less trusted by the knights than he was, so it didn´t help much. During our stay we heard about a robber baron attacking scholars in search of “The White Eye”. Presumably he worked for the mysterious funder of Londar´s research.

Matt returned in time for our travel towards the pyramid. On our way suddenly Løvering sensed evil emanations from me. As I was protected by a undetectable alignment spell, I presumed that the evil pyramid must be the source. I admitted to have kept the rest of the group in the dark about the pyramid and presented it to them. I claimed that I expected them to give it up as freely as they had the rest of the loot. However even though I removed the pyramid from myself, Løvering still found evil on both the pyramid and me. Even when I had the time to renew my undetectable alignment spell away from the pyramid, he could still detect evil on me. As even angels would have to reveal the spell and then dispel it to see through it, I presumed, that he was detecting a different source of evil. I began to fear, that I had been possessed by the pyramid, that would explain his detection.
Of cause my presumed evil caused quite a stir in the group, but we continued our journey to the temple of Arn.
As we presented the artifacts to the couatl, we were presented with the choice of three magic items from his treasure. Unfortunately my present status as suspect, made it impossible for me to bid in.

Two of the items would have been of great benefit to me, a pair of boots of levitation, and a cloak of the bat. At the time however I was suspect, and even the couatl was suddenly aware of my evil nature. At first this was rather disturbing, as I feared my powers didn´t work, but as none of my other spells malfunctioned, I presumed that it had simply deduced the fact from our conversation. Couatls are after all quite intelligent. It actually proceeded to harass me, and I returned the favor in kind, with a barely hidden threat. One that I definitely intended to make good upon. In time I would return and kill the creature. At the time being however I left them to the task of taking care of the evil artifacts. Løvering followed the couatl to it´s altar, and saw it dispatch of the ruby, and the pyramid. Later however the couatl claimed that the artifacts were still there even if invisible.
We decided to find the last artifact in order to stop the threat from the pyramid.

The couatl wanted to perform further investigation of the now invisible artifacts, and the knights decided to guard it, while it did so. The rest of us moved towards Horrigan´s Pyramid.
On our way there, we saw a griffon with a rider. It seemed to land on the other side, and as we approached, we saw a Viking warrior standing ready by one of the entrances. He did seem cautious, but not threatening. Tin persuaded him to put his pearl of speaking Persian on his tongue, and we were thus able to communicate. His name was Balder, and he was there to recover a magical hammer, that had been stolen from him by a giant. Actually he called the giant a Jætte, which is a giant of mythology often fighting the gods of the Vikings. He was from Denmark, and when he heard, that we were also in opposition to the evil of the pyramid, he agreed to join forces.
There were three entrances per side in the pyramid. As we had no information

    about how to enter the pyramid, we proceeded by taking one door at a time. Løvering arrived just as we were about to enter an entrance with stone double doors adorned with hawks and eagles. This led through a short hallway into a foggy area. As we entered it became clear that the fog was toxic. In the fog we were attacked by four mummies. I tried to make Løvering turn them, as I thought he was also a priest of Bahamut, which he is not. Balder and I were poisoned by the vapors, and had to pull out.

Jaxe, Løvering, and Matt defeated the mummies, but when Tin examined us afterwards Balder was infected by mummy rot. Løvering used his power of cure disease and I immediately cast a remove curse spell. Curiously enough it seemed the disease was cured by the cure disease ability. Mummy rot being the most famous curse in the world, I was in no doubt, that this was just a local phenomenon, probably caused by Bahamut trying to reduce my influence by making Balder beholden to Løvering instead of me. In general it would be unwise to reject millennia of research, and treat mummy rot as anything but a curse in the future. I had to admit, that the uncanny interest of Bahamut in my person was beginning to grind on my nerves. Being a god, obviously it would actually be less bother for him to simply remove me, than persisting in these – not so subtle – attempts of undermining me. Thus I probably didn´t need to worry about him erasing my existence, and if I played my cards right I might actually be able to use his godly powers, by tempting him to use his powers against me, while actually assisting me. After all mythology teaches us, that the intelligence of the gods may be incredible, but their capacity for stupidity is even more insane. Anyway Balder was cured, and the effects of the toxic vapors wore of, so we continued our search of a way in. Matt found out that the fog came from two statues in the room, and disabled the trap. He also found secret doors behind the statues. Løvering was to big to pass behind the statues, so Balder had to destroy them. Luckily Matt was still capable of disabling the gas/fog in the destroyed statues. In one room there was eight magical shields, one shield on a plinth in the middle of the room, and seven more shields hanging on the walls. As Matt searched the plinth a pack of hell hounds were released. Initially we were dismayed by their fiery breath, but their bites were not fiery, and they were no match for our brave warriors.
In another room stood a statue of a woman in ornate plate and an expression of bewilderment, pain and rage on her face. She seemed thoroughly misplaced in a room with dust covered velvet chairs and cushions, so we decided to investigate further. Tin deduced that she was the victim of petrification. Though we could not place the only symbol upon her ( a ring with the face of a badger), we decided to try and help her. We dragged the statue outside and Løvering flew up to the couatl to see if it could help. I would be greatly surprised if the creature had that kind of magic at it´s disposal, but I kept my reservations to myself. As expected Løvering returned without any promises of help, but Simba agreed to keep an eye on the statue from the mouth of the cage.

A stone door with strange animals upon it also had a lion with a movable tail, that allowed us entrance. As Matt proceeded down the hallway it collapsed upon him. The hallway didn´t lead us anywhere. We found no secret doors or anything. It was probably designed as a trap from the beginning.
In a room with hexagonal tiles free of dust, we found a secret door by a blood stain on the floor.

Through this door we found a curiously designed door, fashioned from the scales of a blue dragon.
When Matt searched it for traps the scales flew from the door, and slashed at Matt, who succumbed to the onslaught. Jaxe reacted quickly, and stabilized him before he died, but as I had no more inflict spells memorized, we could not get him conscious. Jaxe took over the responsibility of finding traps and opening doors. One highly polished obsidian door showed no signs of age even though the walls around it were ancient. Taking this as a sign, that it was probably build by the latest conquerors (Horgrimm worshippers), we decided to try it out. Jaxe had declared the door safe from traps and locks, and Løvering opened it.

It opened into a large hall filled with skeletons. Løvering and Balder attacked furiously, while avoiding a green smoke emanating from a fountain in the middle of the room. Tin created a flaming sphere to deal with the skeletons closest to the fountain, but almost immediately realized that the skeletons did not fight back. At this point Simba arrived. He had been set free from his guard duty and quickly dealt with the rest of the skeletons.  Jaxe searched the fountain. He could not turn the smoke of, but it appeared to be quite harmless. No further progress was possible, this way, so we concentrated on the next door. This massive door was dominated by the head of a roaring lion in bas relief. We guessed that the door could only be opened from inside the lion´s mouth, but none of us were to keen on sticking our hand in there. I tried to use a mage hand, but without visual contact with the trigger, I could not open the door this way. Now Balder braved the task, and using his left hand he found the trigger, and opened the door. Inside there was a very large hall with two rows of statues in a strange type of stone. They resembled various arch-types of warriors (tall male human in plate mail carrying a greatsword – thin elven bowman etc.). They were very well made and quite life-like. Tin deduced that the stone was volcanic just like the stone of the pyramid itself.
A large hallway to the left led down to a throne room with engraved skeletons in the floor tiles.
An equally large hallway to the right ended in a wall with the inscription:
Put faith in Horgrimm´s darkest night
And pass through solid rock

A hallway leading further in to the pyramid made a right and a left before ending in an oaken double door. This door lead to an ancient armory with masterwork greatswords and daggers, but more interestingly a sinewy undead (actually undying warder, but Saunte doesn´t know that), was guarding the room. He was tremendously powerful, with heavy damage reduction even against magical weapons. It could also cast magic spells while fighting. It opened with a Unholy blight. When it was not casting defensive spells such as stoneskin or buffing spells such as haste, it would use a kind of scream with the power to stun it´s opponents. Balder couldn´t damage it, and took a lot of damage. I gave him my fathers hand axe, and it proved only slightly more effective. Simba fell to the mighty spear-thrusts of the undead guardian, and even Løvering was grievously wounded. I used my most powerful summoning to place three hell-hounds behind the creature, but it was also immune to fire, so all they could do was flank a bit. Tin and I used our wands of magic missiles to at least do some damage, when I was not summoning creatures or being stunned by the creatures screams. Simba regenerated enough to regain consciousness, pulled back for a few seconds to heal himself, and re-entered the fight. The creature turned it´s attention towards Simba, probably because he had no healer backing him. Once more Simba fell to the mighty undead. I summoned a fiendish dire wolf behind the creature, but the creature evaded it´s first attacks. Tin was doing a great job of keeping Løvering standing, but in the end even Løvering succumbed to the spear of the undead. Just as he fell however the wolf succeeded in tripping the undead, thereby probably saving my life, as nothing stood between me and the creature with Løvering down. Tin got Løvering back on his feet and Simba had regenerated enough to enter the fray again after a few seconds of healing. In the end it fell to the very last magic missile in my wand. Tin´s wand had already disintegrated, which meant that the creature had received 48 magic missiles apart from a lot of physical damage before falling.

A truly magnificent opponent. Upon him we found a evilly aligned short spear, that we traded with the couatl for a stone to flesh scroll. We used the scroll on the lady warrior from the velvet room.
She awoke somewhat disorientated. She thought she was still fighting a battle from a thousand years ago. As we started interrogating her, I signaled Løvering to detect evil upon her.

When she was revealed as a Horgrimm supporter she immediately attacked us. After a short battle however she was persuaded to surrender. Most of her equipment was magical, and her amulet was evilly aligned. In spite of my protests, that it might be needed to enter the pyramid. Løvering flew of to give the amulet to the couatl. When he returned he was quickly followed by the couatl, which made a single pass over the captured female warrior, and destroyed her. It was obviously both more ruthless and more powerful, than I had anticipated.
This behavior of cause confirmed my belief, that many so-called good creatures know nothing of good or evil. Did this lady-warrior receive fair judgment? Is the taking of life without just cause not an evil act, when performed by so-called good against so-called evil. These so-called good beings seem to think that good and evil is some kind of sport with blue team against red team.
That is not the case, as I should know better than most. At this point of my life I was considered evil. Not because of my actions or deepest convictions, but precisely because I was ready to perform great evil for the greater good (preventing my creators from obtaining their objective).
The destruction of both warrior and amulet before we had a chance to gain any information from either, led to yet another quarrel between Løvering and I. I considered it foolish not to obtain all the information possible to achieve our objective. Somewhat incautious I actually asked if I should be destroyed as well, just because he could see me as evil with his detect evil power.
I was actually satisfied, when he did not answer that question. At this point, I was dabbling with being evil in earnest. Since being revealed by the god, I saw no reason to hide it. Also I tried to distance myself from the rest of “The Midnight Children”. After all, I knew how hard it would be to stop them from killing the red dragon. I might have to do worse than kill them. A task, that would be difficult enough, even if I didn´t love them.
After having rested, we re-entered the hall of statues, and tried the stone door to the left. Inside there was a room of mirrors, and swift moving shadows hardly discernable in the bright light from a ball hanging in the center of the room. As the first three of us entered, we were attacked by duplicates of ourselves. Simba yelled for us to retreat, and pull the opposition out of the room.
As I have few combat abilities, and the only aggressive spells I had memorized were summoning, I had little trouble evading myself, and fleeing the room. Balder pulled out too, but Løvering chose to fight. Actually he fought quite wisely, attacking the mirrors instead of the duplicates.
When Balder and I left the room, the duplicates changed into mercury golems, that had little chance of passing the masterful defenses of Løvering. We all yelled to make him pull the golems out, but they didn´t follow him out. Balder tried to destroy the ball of light, by repeatedly throwing his hammer against it. Now something truly frightening happened. Løvering used his head for the second time in a combat, and covered the ball with his cloak. Without light the mercury golems disappeared. Balder however continued to strike the ball of light beneath Løvering´s cloak.
Jaxe searched the room of mirrors, and found a trapped door looking like a broken mirror. He could not remove the magical trap, so we decided to investigate the eastern door from the hall of statues.
This stone door was not trapped and lead into a kind of barracks. Ancient bedding and clothing were scattered in the room as if by a whirlwind. The were private chests at the foot of each bed.

Jaxe started to search the room, and called the alert when he saw some fairly big spiders. After teasing him for overreacting, Løvering persuaded Jaxe to search the door before finishing searching the room. As soon as the door was declared safe, Løvering opened it, and started a conversation with someone inside. I believe the language they used were celestial, but I can´t be certain, as I didn´t master that language at this time. I entered with my continual flame, and could now see, that the room was some kind of bathing area with a pool, and that it was a female angel, who were engaging Løvering in conversation. As the conversation was in celestial, I wasn´t able to follow it exactly, and Løvering did not translate. Sometimes however the female would switch to Persian. Her name was Lochintus (or something similar, she was talking celestial, when presenting herself).
She was some kind of prisoner, and would only be able to leave if someone else took responsibility for her, and swore an unholy oath to Horgrimm about bringing her back. She seemed to expect a creature from her own plane to help her regardless, but declared herself willing to reward the rest of us. Actually the oath was not very specific about what was supposed to be returned. As far as I could gather from the incomplete translations of Løvering, the oath was something along the lines of, that we should swear to return to Horgrimm, what he desires most. In my ears that sounded more like swearing to bring back his artifacts, presently in the keeping of the couatl, than bringing him back his celestial prisoner. I advised caution against the oath, but predictably, Løvering did not listen, and swore the necessary oath. Balder also swore the oath, but I did not. Even though I didn´t swear, the angel still bestowed a kiss of gratitude upon both me and Balder.

Returning to the barracks, Løvering was attacked by the spiders Jaxe had mentioned, and we found Jaxe himself dead from blood-loss. Løvering defeats the spiders, that disappears when hit, but without Jaxe or Matt, we were unable to explore further into the pyramid. We decides to wait for Jaxe to be revived as per our immortality. While before settling down to wait, I cast a detect secret doors spell, and we went through those parts of the pyramid, that we considered safe. We found a secret door in the room with the green fog fountain (I believe).
Still without Matt or Jaxe to investigate the door, we returned to the barracks to wait for Jaxe to return to us. While I was on guard duty, I suddenly noticed, that Jaxe had disappeared. Casting a deathwatch spell, and revealed three undeads in the bed, where Jaxe had been. Løvering turned them, which made them disappear. After that Løvering suddenly began to act very strangely. He refused to talk to any of us, and sat down to meditate for a couple of hours. After this he suddenly told Lochintus, that she was released from her promise to help us. When Balder and I tried to enquire why, he would condemn the angel to resume her imprisonment, he actually attacked her. Balder and I tried to intervene. Balder by grappling as Løvering flew past, and I by summoning a Yeth hound to trip him. Apparently Løvering was either quite insane or possessed. He actually attacked Balder. Admittedly using the flat of his blade, but in his case, that is almost as dangerous as, when he uses the edge of the blade. As Balder went down I dismissed the yeth hound, and tried to grapple Løvering myself. In the meantime Lochintus had fled back to the room with the pool, and had blocked the door. To prevent Løvering from killing her I cast a wall of stone, blocking his path. Enraged Løvering demanded that I removed the wall. I tried several times to explain, that it was not possible with the spells I had memorized, but he attacked me again and again repeating his impossible request. My only possible defense was to try and reason with him, and that was not possible. He beat me to death with the flat of his sword.

When I returned to life, Balder, Løvering, and I were all prisoners of the couatl, who now had two other couatls with him. Apparently Løvering had sought help from the couatl, and was now suffering the consequences of their fanatism. It seemed, that Balder and Løvering had changed alignment to evil, when swearing the Horgrimm oath. The couatls immediately cast detect evil and then killed us again.
The second time I awoke, I had an epiphany. Though I was fairly comfortable with my own demise, I could not accept the death of Løvering. Considering that I had planned to destroy the group in order to stop us from removing the red dragon, this had a severe impact upon my disposition. For months I had tried with some degree of success to distance myself from the others in order to make it easier to destroy them if necessary. Now however I realized that I could never do that anyway.

This revelation seemed to remove the evil taint from my aura, so this time the couatls did not kill me. They still didn´t trust me though.
When I tried to explain the ability of prime material beings to change our alignments, it claimed hat it too had that ability. When I tried to use it as leverage towards releasing Løvering however, the couatl was insulted, because I evidently thought to teach it what it was supposed to be.
It was quite correct in that regard. I am still very disappointed in the couatls of Arn´s Temple.
Couatls are supposed to be the very epitome of chaotic good, but these behave like lawful neutrals.
They pull rank as if hierarchy means anything, they summarily execute beings who are guilty of no crimes except their alignment, and the force others to submit to their will without considering the free will of others. They obviously have no idea of what chaotic good is all about, and I fear that they never will, even if they live to be 10.000 years old.
Anyway they released us on the condition that we removed the evil of the pyramid, and reported back to them every 20th hour. Balder was also released though he suffered the same curse as Løvering, but Løvering was considered too dangerous, and was kept as a hostage.
I would of cause rather die, than let anyone make a slave out of me, but for Løvering´s sake I had to agree.
Balder told us, that his true name was Thor, but did neither confirm nor deny, that he was the northern god of thunder, but named Valhalla as his home. He hinted that he may have been exiled from Valhalla. I decided to keep calling him Balder as I believe we are periodically watched by our creators/controllers.
A pupil of the couatls came with us. He had strange translucent wings. I was not sure if he was there to keep an eye on us or to help, but he seemed OK. After freeing the angel Lochintus from behind my wall of stone, we tried to press deeper into the pyramid through the secret door I found earlier, but it was trapped.

We entered from the doors on the west side of the pyramid, and found ourselves attacked by green slaads in a hallway. After a ferocious battle we were victorious. Lochintus had fallen. We now entered a strange dark room with a strange line at the entrance. From the outside the room was visible, but as we entered an unusually powerful magical darkness shrouded the room. As Balder searched a chest, we had seen from the outside, he was attacked by a powerful being. As I hear him being attacked I enter the room, and try to heal him. We retreat from the darkened room, to heal our wounds. Then our brave warrior Simba enters, and fight the creature in the dark, while Balder searches the chests. In the wooden chest he found an ornate lead key, shaped like an eagle with a split tail. Evidently, the key unlocked the second chest, but Balder was unable to lift the lid of the chest, that was made out of lead. Also as he tries to do so very powerful chain lightning bounce back and forth in the room, severely wounding Balder. Temporarily defeated we were forced to let it be.
Entering through a double door, made of mysterious black metal, in the west wall of the pyramid, we encounter a room filled with thick grey smoke. The smoke comes from a fountain in the middle of the room, and I put my robe over it. We found a secret door leading into a silver room. Old flaking silver paint covered the walls, and we are attacked by five silver golems.
In this room we find five different magical amulets carrying the symbol of Horgrimm.
Matt returned from his scouting expedition, enabling us to bypass the trap on the secret door, we had encountered earlier. Behind this there was a luxurious room with a crystal chandelier and red velvet carpeting. The room was dominated by a glass coffin on a raised stone platform. An extremely tall and beautiful elven woman with angel wings lay naked in the coffin. Glowing letters on the side read;
Huvarial famed champion
Even the brightest light
Learns the power of the night.

I insisted that we tried to free this mighty champion, and after some discussion, we decided to do so.  As the lid rose, the elven maiden opened her eyes, and tried to cover herself with her wings. After some confusion, we found some clothing for her. She claimed to have been a champion on the side of Arn in the great battle 1000 years ago. We gave her the armor and sword of the presumably evil warrior, we had cured of petrification.
For some strange reason I had been unable to bring the angel Lochintus back to consciousness by healing her. It was considered possible, that the couatls would be able to solve that problem. Huvarial did not remember the name Suref from the battle, but said that there were several couatls present on the side of Arn. She agreed to bring Lochintus to the couatls. Simba asked her to use her influence to intervene with the couatls on behalf of our friend Løvering.
I tried to detect good, and found that only Simba, Sentalial (the pupil of the couatls) and I registered as good. Huvarial explained that the temple of Horgrimm could have forced a change of alignment. Though she considered herself a champion of good, her aura might be very different indeed. She graciously accepted, that Simba cast an zone of truth spell. Under the influence of the zone of truth it seemed she was telling the truth. I explained that meeting the couatls without knowing if she registered as evil would be a bad idea. With some vehemence, I damned the inflexibility of the couatls and warned Huvarial, that if she registered as evil, the couatls would attack, probably forcing her to kill them. In my anger I forgot about Sentalial, who opposed my claim, that the couatls were fanatical to the point of insanity. Maybe I was unfair in my rage against the couatls. Maybe the scriptures are wrong, and couatls are not restricted to support the side of chaotic good.
If so I should be able to accept our differences, just as I respect the right of other non-chaotic good people, to disagree with my ideals. Anyway until I could memorize a detect evil spell, it would be stupid for Huvarial to meet the couatls. Huvarial told us that the main entrance to the upper levels of the pyramid was through the central door on the northern side..

When we searched the coffin, we had noticed something below the glass coffin. It took the combined strength of our strongest warriors to shift the coffin aside. Below it was the equipment of Huvarial. She returned the equipment, we had given her, and donned her own armor bearing the sun-symbol of Arn. We were unwilling to leave Lochintus without some protection, so Huvarial stayed behind to guard the fallen angel.
Balder had a feeling, that the lead chest contained a vital clue to the whereabouts of his hammer.
The room with the two chests, were clearly visible, when we were all standing outside, but as soon as anything, even a thrown stone, entered the room the magical darkness filled the room. From the doorway, we could also see a ghostly figure guarding the lead chest. We were unsure if it was an illusion or not, but either way something certainly attacked the first person to enter every time.
Searching the immediate area in front of the door, The walls of the room was covered in lead, making it impossible for Matt to walk through them in incorporeal form. Matt found a permanent trap of some kind on the floor, and residue of a trap on the door itself. The trap on the door was probably the one, who had summoned the salads attacking us, the first time we came here.

Simba entered the room, drawing the attacks of the guardian, while Matt went for the chest. As Matt searched the chest for traps, the guardian changed targets, and attacked him. The chain lightning was also released, but it posed no threat to Simba, who is very resistant to lightning, and Matt himself have an uncanny ability to dodge that kind of attacks. We made several attempts to open the chest without success. We even tried to combine our strength to drag the chest out of the room, using a rope. All to no avail. Even though we trusted the intuition of Balder, we had to give up against the lead chest again.
Returning to the outside we decided to clear as much as possible of the lower levels before braving the main entrance on the northern side. The northern door on the western side opened to a room with 5¢ by 5¢ squares in red or grey stone. The squares were positioned so you could pass through the room touching only grey stone or red stone if you so chose. Both the northern and southern walls were covered with small holes. Matt searched the areas immediately in front of the door, and revealed that the red squares were connected in a way to suggest some mechanical effect if they were trod upon. Simba levitated through the room and landed on a grey area, immediately releasing a swarm of darts. Luckily they were unable to penetrate his resistance to such attacks. He now tested a red area, and discovered that walking on red stone did not release any darts.

Right opposite the entrance to the room there was a large double door. Beyond this flickering lights revealed a beautifully decorated lounge with a soft carpet covering the floor, and rich tapestries depicting battle scenes covering the walls. Behind one of the tapestries to the south we found five evenly spaced holes, that we blocked. Directly opposite this obvious trap were a door leading into a collapsed room with five ancient corpses.
The eastern door on the northern wall seemed to be just another trap, so it was time to brave the main entrance. The double doors were made of lead, and the ornate lead key worked here as well as on the lead chest. The room beyond were enshrouded in an ominously glowing dark rolling mist. Simba and Matt entered the mist in order to investigate. They found a fountain, that was probably the source of the mist. Matt disabled it but the mist persisted. Balder entered the mist. As I called to him he seemed alright even though he is not immune to poison. Thus I considered it safe to enter as well. We found a great cobber door leading further into the pyramid, and deduced, that it would probably need a cobber key to enter. This lead us back to the lead chest, that had so far defeated us twice. Balder decided to brave the wall from the hall of statues bearing the inscription;
Put faith in Horgrimm´s darkest night
And pass through solid rock
None of us had tried to enter before. I suggested that he should be wearing one of the amulets of Horgrimm, but he flatly refused. He passed through the wall without incident, and so did the rest of us. A hallway ended in a cobber door bearing the inscription;
In the end only the darkness is real
Beneath the inscription there was a depiction of Horgrimm with a short spear in his hand. Somehow Matt deducted, that the letters had to be pressed in a specific order, and he even figured out the right sequence. Behind the door was a large red hall, dominated by an insect like statue with eight razor-sharp legs standing above a cobber chest. The statue came to life and attacked with deadly efficiency. Simba met the creatures advance, but even though he concentrated on defending his position, the creature was capably of wounding him. I summoned a celestial Lion behind it, but it was immune to the damage it delivered. Even the eldritch blasts of Sentalial had no effect. Realizing we needed heavier offense, Balder joined the attack while Matt forced his way behind it. I summoned a lantern archon to at least inflict some damage upon the creature. The light rays of the lantern archon are fairly weak, but they do bypass all resistances. As Matt fell to the dread creature, Tin changed form to a black bear, and entered the fray. He inflicted serious wounds, but in the end succumbed to the creature as well. As Simba was being seriously wounded, I tried to help him with an inflict serious wounds. In order to do so however, I had to step closer to the creature, who immediately turned it´s attention towards me. I was cut down, but my summoned creatures continued to assist, and in the end we were victorious. The survivors encountered a mirror image of the undying guarding the storage room and found an amulet of the dark. They pulled back and petitioned the couatls for help. The couatls agreed to  raise Balder, and gave us a couple of potions, that dispelled some enchantment, that would otherwise have affected us, should we fail to return to them after 20 hours. So I had not been unfair in my estimation of the couatls.
Not only did they force their will upon us. They also used magic to ensure our compliance.  
Returning to the pyramid we were attacked by a dire tiger. Tin was felled by the great cat, which carried him of while we were still recovering from our surprise. Remembering the incident with Jaxe, I cast Locate object upon the magical bracers of Tin, before moving of in pursuit. I also tried to stop it by placing a wall of stone in front of it, but it easily evaded it.
We followed the cat to a lonely cliff, were it was joined by it´s mate, who were carrying a collar.  Sentalial was doing a lot of damage with his eldritch blasts while flying beyond their reach. I later learned that he was not a psionicist, as I presumed. He was a warlock, which seemed to be some kind of specialized sorcerer. The cat had dropped Tin in order to confront us. I tried to recover his body by sending in a summoned giant owl, but it was immediately “killed” when it landed close to the dire tiger. I summoned a giant eagle to try the same if a better opportunity presented itself, but it never did. Having no defense against the bolts of Sentalial, the cats retreated into their cave. We followed them in.
Simba blocked their way towards us while Sentalial blasted them, which seems to be a very efficient tactic. Of cause this also prevented the cats from escaping, which made them fight all the harder. When the male fell, even the cubs entered the fray. Both Simba and Balder was grappled and Sentalial did not appreciate the chances of hitting a friend, when firing into a grapple situation. Thus Matt, Tin, and I had to join the melee. One of the cubs tried to escape, which we permitted, but the rest of the cats had to be put down. After the battle we tried to save the animals. The mother and the two remaining cubs could be healed, but the male was quite dead. We pulled back and reported to the couatls, who had expressed some care for the cats. They accepted, that we had no choice, but to defend ourselves, and told us that the female had once been a companion of a druid. Her collar allowed her to shrink in size, so she could hunt outside the cave.
When Tin had recovered, he talked to the surviving female, and expressed his regret regarding the demise of her mate. When she heard, that he was a druid, she promised him to let one of her cubs follow him, if he were able to bring her mate back to life. I told him, that I was able to cast a raise dead spell, but that we didn´t have the necessary diamonds.
When we tried to buy the diamonds from the couatls, they graciously donated the stones for the purpose. After I had raised the dire cat, one of the cubs attached itself willingly to Tin.
Tin stayed with the animal, partly to familiarize himself with the cat, but I suspect, that he also needed some time to digest my revelation of my secret intention of destroying “the midnight children”. At this point I had not had time to explain my reasons properly. I had merely explained, that, that was the reason why, I had earlier been detected as evil. The ordinarily calm Tin was obviously shocked, and now considered me a dangerous psychopath.
          Author´s note: The rest of the tale of Horgrim´s Temple may not be strictly accurate, as I
          didn´t write it until well after my arrival in Rome still somewhat traumatized from dying
          twice. At this time I was still immortal, but even so, dying is a very taxing experience.
Returning to the pyramid Simba, Sentalial and I tried a different approach. Instead of trying to recover the necessary keys, we tried tunneling our way through the complex.
In the lounge with the concealed holes behind a tapestry, we used a stone shape to see what was behind them. It was only a small niche, which had presumably contained some snakes or the like.
The next passage we opened placed us face to face with a small bone-dragon of amazing strength. It´s first attack almost destroyed Sentalial and me, but Simba was able to withstand the blast, and blocked it´s path. Sentalial found his eldritch blasts useless against the undead dragon so he and I withdrew. Naturally we stayed close enough to observe the fight, as even the mighty Simba fell to the power of the beast. Immediately I rushed forward, and inflicted wounds on the fallen hero. Luckily the bone dragon was more interested in finishing of Simba. It did not use it´s breath or move against me, thereby giving me time to withdraw again. I had used most of my inflict spells to heal Matt, so if Simba fell again, nothing could save Sentalial or me from the dragon. Realizing this I ran out of the pyramid in search of Tin and Matt. Having found them we returned to the fight in time to see Simba defeat the dragon. We found an old map of the lower level of the pyramid.
Following the map, we tunneled our way to two more locations using the soften earth ability of summoned earth mephits. One of the locations were no longer present, so we realized that our map was inaccurate. In the other position however we found a room behind the blue dragon door. The room was furnished with dragon bones and dragon skin. We found a key in a bottle, but never found out what it was for.
From the map we deduced, that we could bypass the cobber door by making a stone shape into the hall behind it. As I breached the wall acid poured out on us quickly submerging the hallway. I was covered in acid, but escaped being submerged, by making a 3¢ by 3¢ pedestal using a second stone shape. The acid continued to wreak havoc even after I drenched myself with a create water spell. We lost a lot of magic items (mostly scrolls and potions), but no lives. In order to escape the acid however I had to revert to summoning evil creatures. The only creature I knew I could summon, that was immune to acid, was a bearded devil. So I summoned one to carry me away. Having exhausted my spells, we rested outside.
Next day I summoned a mephit to soften earth on the remaining wall, making it slowly collapse, and thereby draining the hall for most of the acid.
Unfortunately the opposite end of the hallway was blocked by a silver double door closely resembling the cobber double door in the other end. A magic mouth asked us for a password, that we could not guess. Once again we were stuck, and forced to review our options. After our experience with the acid, we decided to try avoiding tunneling except if no other way was open.
We remembered, that though it had been suggested, that we wear amulets of darkness in the
lead room of lightning with the lead chest it had never been tried. Mostly due to religious reluctance from Balder, Løvering, and Simba. Matt did not have any qualms about wearing the amulet, so we decided to try it out. When he entered wearing the amulet, the room stayed lit, and the chest opened.
Unfortunately there were no new clues or keys in the lead chest.
Sentalial examined the amulets, and discovered that the amulets from the silver room could be combined to form a silver key. Using this we were finally able to gain access to the second level of the pyramid. We were almost immediately attacked by two undying wardens. As before Tin and I were constantly stunned by the creatures screams. Matt tried fighting them, but was seriously wounded, and had to change to his incorporeal form. He wisely withdrew into a nearby wall. The warlock Sentalial fired blast after blast into the creatures, but paid for his bravery with his life. Simba, tried to protect Tin and I, but without success, and we both fell to the undying wardens. This however freed Simba to position himself better, so they could not flank him. In that position he was able to defeat them. Matt returned, and assisted in dragging our bodies out of the pyramid. After 24 hours Tin and I returned to life, and I raised Sentalial.
In his incorporeal form Matt scouted the area, and found out that two path´s lead to the rest of the level. One was guarded by a fire elemental, the other by an ice elemental. The rooms behind the ice elemental were completely ransacked, so we decided to go through the fire elemental instead. Returning to the room with the ice elemental, we were surprised by a rather friendly reception. The creature explained that it was bound to protect the room and a key from anyone entering, but that it did nor wish to do so. It could be freed without conflict if we gave it an amulet of darkness.
While trying to find the entrance to the top level of the pyramid, we found our way barred by a barbed devil. Unlike most of it´s kind, this one was able to use unholy blight constantly. Trying to avoid to much damage by keeping distance, so it couldn´t hit all of us with the unholy blight, proved only partially successful. Matt and Sentalial had to pull back, but Tin and I didn´t dare as he was doing some damage with a wand of magic missiles, and I were assisting Simba with a summoned hound archon. In the end Tin decided he had had enough, dropped the wand, and retreated. The hound archon offered his greatsword to Simba, but was refused, and I had overestimated my own resilience. I thought I could take one more unholy blight. Knowing, that it would prevent me from escaping the devil´s reach completely, I picked up the wand of magic missiles and used it on the devil before retreating. It reacted by releasing an unholy blight that surprised me with it´s magnitude. In the end we were victorious, but another unholy blight, had struck down Sentalial. We retreated again. When I returned to life, I felt different. Slowly I realized that I was no longer immortal. I was finally free of the curse of the midnight children.
I raised Sentalial, but his second death had convinced him, that he was not yet capable of adventuring on our level. The couatls agreed, and took him back for further training.
Huvarial joined our group as we pressed on. We arrived at an antechamber, where we were surprised by a couple of ghostly apparitions. As Matt attacked with his ghost touch dagger, they turned their attention to him, and forced him to retreat into a wall. As they were severely wounded by the rest of us they too retreated into the walls. Now we entered a church-like room. Backed by a priestess of Horgrim, two mighty skeleton warriors attacked us. I summoned a celestial lion, and samba held back the skeletons, while Tin prepared. During the fight Matt observed a person rise from one of several coffins in a neighboring room. Assuming it to be an enemy, he attacked, causing it to change to a gaseous form, and flee. At the same time Matt was surprised by the apparitions from earlier, and had to exit the walls in order to gain the assistance of the rest of us.
The fight went on for some time, and as we emerged victoriously, the person from the next room presented himself. He was a psionic wizard caught by agents of Horgrim. After testing his story, he joined our company. Finally arriving at the entrance to the top level, we hesitated before two grim guardians. If you tried to enter the stairway behind them, they closed ranks, and seemed quite dangerous. After some persuasion I agreed to try while wearing the amulet of darkness. The guardians let me pass, but in my new and fragile state (no longer immortal), I did not wish to proceed on my own. The wizard told us, that he could make a dimension door if I would just find a landing zone. He would even be able to observe me while I did so. When I refused we decided to try the dimension door to the stairs behind the guardians, and hope they didn´t react. It worked.
Huvarial and Matt scouted ahead, but never returned. As we continued we arrived to a large hall with a throne with a wizard-like person, who rose to greet us. In front of the throne was a plinth with a pearly white shimmering sphere, witch we recognized as “the white eye” The sphere was surrounded by obviously magical pillars. “Let he who is pure of heart, take the white eye” said the wizard. Under influence of a zone of truth, he claimed to be chained to the room until a worthy contender was able to remove the eye. Immediately I strode forward claiming, that I was pure of heart. Simba too volunteered, but decided to trust me. Something I will never forget.
I felt the need to redeem myself from my earlier treason, or planned treason. Also I found it crucial, to prove the worth of chaotic good above lawful good. I could not allow the knights to claim monopoly on purity, even if it meant I had to perform an act of bravery. As my hands clasped the orb, the illusion was revealed. We were actually standing over a deep well, and immediately began to fall. Flight was impossible with both mundane and magical means. The fall almost killed me, and at the bottom we found Huvarial and Matt. We were still in an anti-magic zone, so we had no way of healing our wounds. We proceeded down a hallway to a large room. The room was occupied by a large giant with a mighty hammer. The type of giant was unknown to me, but as it started to taunt Thor, I realized that this must be the “jætte”, that stole his hammer. Wounded as we were, there were no choice, but to fight. Luckily our magic worked as we entered the room. Simba tried to block the giant´s attacks. Taunted by the giant Thor charged, and was quickly struck down.
Simba knelt beside the fallen Viking and prayed to his christian god to intercede on Thor´s behalf. Simba´s prayer´s were answered but at the price of one of his highest spells pr. Day. Simba willingly paid the price to bring Thor back from the dead. In the end we defeated the giant, but it was a very close call. Just as we had done so however something mysterious happened.
The hammer flew to the hand of the fallen Thor, and suddenly a new giant appeared holding the hammer. Just as I was about to attempt to trap it in a wall of stone, I recognized Thor, who had regained much of his godly strength, by being reunited with his hammer Mjølner.
In chests around the room we found various treasures, and the true “white eye”. A stairway allowed us to gain access to the pyramid again.
As we delivered the eye to the couatls, they proved true to their word, and released Løvering.
I had made it clear, that I would accept no reward from them except to have Jaxe returned. I would not accept, that they could free themselves from the responsibility of their actions against us, by rewarding us afterwards. As Simba asked however, they willingly agreed to try and find Jaxe.
I must admit that they did try, but in the end we ourselves found the answer to the mystery of his disappearance. We stayed for a month combing over every part of the pyramid again and again. We also released the ice elemental in return for it´s key. In the end we noticed that one of the phase spiders kept coming back, when we killed it. It seemed that the draining affect of the spiders had turned Jaxe into one of them.
As the temple had been cleansed, Simba wished to consecrate it in the name of the christian god. Even though his god had intervened on behalf of Thor, I´m still opposed to all gods including the christian one. When the couatls offered their assistance however, I relented.
I do not wish for any of us to be beholden to those tyrants.
As I cast a hallow spell on the temple in the name of the christian god, I felt some effect from the god or his agents. I may regret channeling of his divine energy later on.

 

Chapter 4

Egypt

Now we were ready to pursue our destiny. We decided to go to Rome first, as I hoped, that the guild-master there could take care of Jaxe´s condition as he did mine.
Travelling had become a lot easier. Thor summoned his goat-cart. He and Simba rode in the cart, Løvering flew, and I brought the rest along in a wind walk spell.
When we arrived I discovered that the guild master had turned his whole gang into vampires.
He was not pleased to see me again, but agreed to my request on two conditions. One I forgot he existed. Two I swore to fulfill one request made by him at any time. I agreed on the condition, that if the request was too much against my convictions, I could choose to commit suicide instead of complying. Still the process of returning Jaxe to his original form, was difficult, and I was obliged to wait a couple of days without contacting the others. This of cause did not prevent me from finding fresh spell-components, writing a few scrolls, and doing a bit of summoning to familiarize myself with the types of creatures I could summon.
One day Matt visited me. He had thought long and hard about my theories regarding our destiny. He agreed that we were being used and claimed to have discovered the truth. We were involved in a power struggle between dragons. He had decided to enter the service of the great red in order to learn more. I wished him well, but I believed that both of us knew that we might meet again as enemies.
Later that evening I told the others about Matt´s decision, but as I mentioned our possible enmity, he suddenly appeared behind me. Matt did not believe, that we would become enemies, just because he entered the service of the res dragon. We all expressed our hopes, that it would not come to that, but the both Løvering, Simba, and I considered it likely.
We stayed in Rome for six weeks while Jaxe received some tactical training allowing him to direct our combats more efficiently. Most of the time we used to increase our skills, but we also had time to find a few items, write a few scrolls, enchant items, and of cause some very needed R&R.
Tin and I became more fluent in Danish (both drunken and sober) and I discovered, that I was no match for a viking god, when it came to drinking bouts.
I also started studying egyptian, but was far from fluent, when we left Rome for Damaskus.
Løvering used a lot of time trying to find a way to lift the curse of Horgrim. His innocence seemed to grant him some protection against the effects of becoming evil. He was less corrupted, than I would have expected, and still actively trying to regain his former alignment. More suspicious minds might suggest that it was his ambition more than a desire to be good, that drove him. Unless he regained his alignment, he would not be able to advance as a vassal of Bahamut. He also asked if my contact in the underworld could help him. I told him that I was prepared to try, but that the guild master would probably kill me, if I tried to contact him again. One of the conditions of curing Jaxe, was that I forgot that the guild even existed. Løvering decided, that he would not ask me to take that chance. He did hesitate though, so maybe the effects of being evil had started to corrupt him a bit.
In Damascus, we were received by Saladin, but I stayed in the background. I still did not trust this man, and did not want to be noticed.
Løvering seemed to be persuaded by Saladin, to pursue our quest against the red dragon. Of cause, he has always wanted us to go that way, and maybe Saladin could help him with a cure for the curse of Horgrim. Even so we decided, that it was not time to confront the great wyrm yet.
We decided to keep our promise to the priest from Fantasia and travelled to Egypt in order to cleanse the undead infestation from the his pyramid.