Re: Incarnation

The party got to the final floor only to immediately be met by an immense cold. Mari and Krys are unaffected, but Ariagoria definitely feels it more than Davy and Racknar. “Jeezus, it's like hell froze over.” Ariagoria states, followed by Racknar responding with a matter of fact tone. “The ninth circle of hell is in fact frozen over. The center of the circle is a frozen lake.” Ariagoria rolled her eyes “okay, so now what?”

Racknar looked around the area. It was dark but the area looked like an ice rink with four entrances. “Those must be the doors. Looks like we were simply dropped into the center of the rink so none of those doors are the one we came in. Technically the ninth circle is divided into four parts but that's not relevant here since there isn't really a big difference between the four sections geographically speaking. So it's more likely that the four doors are like levels of difficulty. One door will likely give us shades, the hardest door would be something like a hellknight.”

Ariagoria lets out a sigh “let's avoid that door. What one is what?” Racknar looks around at the doors, spinning in a circle. “I… have no clue. There's no clear indicator as to what door is what from what I can tell. No markings, no nothing.” Davy lets out a groan “I guess we'll just have to pick at random and hope for the best.” Racknar does one more spin before picking a door. “This one.”

The group entered the door and were transported to a large snowy area. In the distance was a wall of ice that was so tall the top vanished into the darkness above them. Out from beneath the snow underfoot came ten figures. Humanoid in shape, wearing thick icy blue masks, and wearing icy white robes. In the hands of the figures were icicles, and the ten figures shambled their way to the party, moving in an unnatural looking manner like one would see from a horror movie.

They twitched and popped suddenly from one disturbing pose to another. Racknar readied his weapons. “These guys may not look that strong but as you can probably tell they aren't shades meaning they're definitely not the weakest thing of the circle. Just don't try to remove the masks, okay.” Mari pulled out her blades and shadow-ports behind one of the robed demons, attacking it from behind. Although it looked like her attacks connected, there were no obvious injuries on the creature.

Racknar followed that up by slamming both chainsaw swords at its sides. When the two swords impact the one side the creature bends at the point of impact and robes are chipped away like ice in the hot spot and the creature is pushed back. Although it's uninjured, the side is now exposed. Racknar swings the two normal swords at the open area and puts two deep gashes into it.

Krys fires three arrows as per usual at the injured creature with one landing in the shoulder and the second sinking into its forehead. The thick mask must have prevented the attack from being fatal however as it was still standing. Davy hits the same target with his basic cantrip he's been using almost exclusively, then Ariagoria comes in with the holy mace and blows a chunk out of its side, dropping it.

The remaining nine take their icicles and toss them at the party. Racknar gets hit by two right in the gaps in his chitin from the previous fight. After they impale him, they explode causing frost to spread on his body and the cold even covers an area around him hitting Ariagoria with it. Krys managed to dodge the attack and Mari avoided it by using the whisper blade. Ariagoria took one icicle to the leg before it exploded with the ice affecting Racknar and Davy cast a barrier spell to block the ice knives going after him.

Mari noticed Racknar wasn't exactly doing so hot after that. “You okay Racknar? You got hit really hard.” Racknar grunted as he downed a health potion. “I'll be fine, don't worry about me.” Mari decided to focus on taking out the enemies. She shifts herself behind one and slashes at it three times. All three hit the robe with the third cracking it and exposing an opening. Ariagoria rushed in and took advantage of the opening to slam a chunk out of the thing, killing it. Krys and Davy are then able to start hitting a third target. Attacks land but the damage seemed minimal.

Racknar ran in at it with his weapons and made four attacks with his four swords, he managed to kill the monster on his final hit. Three down, seven to go. “I feel like I'm doing a lot more damage on average to these Coyotus Acolytes than I should be.” Racknar commented out loud before the seven demons fired at ice knives at the party again. Davy, Krys, and Mari were once again able to easily avoid the attacks with Krys using their shard movement to damage three of the demons. Ariagoria managed to dodge the ones after her and Racknar took a hit to his armor before the thing exploded as per normal. “This is really pissing me off now!” He growled.

Racknar rushed an Acolyte and slashed into it savagely, killing it after several attacks. Ariagoria smashes in the skull of a second one with her holy mace. Davy, Krys, and Mari all team up on one and Mari got the killing blow taking its head off. The remaining four Acolytes focus fire on Racknar but miss him, he's still hit by the explosions. He dropped to one knee before popping another health potion and getting back up. “I've only got one more of those left.”

Mari, Davy, and Krys once again team up to kill an Acolyte. Ariagoria takes out one by herself with a holy magic powered smash to the ribs, then Racknar takes out one of them himself. The last remaining demon turns around and starts running away. Krys shoots it in the back of the head while it was running, killing it. Racknar checks the Acolytes and finds several daggers made of ice on their person. “I thought they were casting the ice knife spell, but it looks like it was an item. There's forty of them, I guess I'll hand these to Mari to stash in her satchel. It'll hold them like a bag of holding would but it won't replicate them. I don't think the ice daggers will get the plus three from the bag though.”

Mari puts the daggers in her bag and the party is transported back to the ice rink and only three doors remain. Racknar then walks over to the door to the left of where the previous door used to be. “Left to right, easiest to hardest? At least that's how I'm hoping this is set up.” The group enter the door and find themselves in an area that looks nearly identical to the last room. A snowy area with a cliff of ice in the distance. Only this time instead of something crawling out of the snow the enemy was standing there waiting.

There were only three of them, but they were large creatures. Humanoids that reached well over ten feet tall. They had ice blue skin, icy white hair and beards, icy white eyes, and wire simple clothes. The Giants had small stubby horns on their heads and were holding weapons. One was holding a proportionally sized two handed sword, the second a two sided ax, the third massive club.

“Crap” Racknar blurted out “Demonized frost giants. I think I'd rather fight a hellknight than three of these guys.” Drvy cursed under his breath “Considering how you and Ariagoria talked about the Hellknights, I'm guessing that's definitely not good.” Ariagoria let out a nervous chuckle “Yeah, this'll be rough. Especially since Racknar has taken quite the beating so far.”

Racknar readied his weapons “We've not much choice but to fight unfortunately, I doubt these guys will be willing to talk it out.” The group readied themselves and nodded. Mari is the first to jump into action. She shifts behind the one with the club and makes three slashes at its back. Although they definitely land, the cuts are shallow. Ariagoria, Krys, and Davy fired at it from a range to similarly low effect. Even when Racknar came in for his four attacks the giant managed to block them with its club.

The giant lifted up and swung its massive club down at Racknar who managed to dodge roll away. The one with the ax tried to attack Ariagoria but missed by quite a bit. The one with the sword went after Krys who shard moved out of the way of the attack. Mari started a second set of attacks with one of the cuts being deeper than the other two causing the giant to groan in pain. Not giving it time to retaliate both Krys and Davy fired on it again. Ariagoria switches to melee as she runs on with her mace for a holy magic swing.

Ariagoria does the first bit of real damage as a small chunk of the giant's side explodes on impact leaving a softball sized hole in his side causing the monster to roar. Racknar takes this opening and sends his attacks right for the wound. The chainsaw swords bite into the wound to the sound of more roaring and the regular swords chop a good way in as well. The giant kicks Racknar away and grabs its wound while the other two move to try and attack Racknar.

This left them wide open to attacks from Mari, Ariagoria, and Krys who fired ranged attacks. Racknar is able to dodge the giants as they strike at him. Mari, Krys, and Davy then start going after the wounded giant. Mari cuts into the wound after arrows andagic strike it. The giant hits the floor hard, having bled a lot. With one target down the group could focus on the other two. Racknar tried to slice into the ax holding giant, but like before there was little effect.

The two giants swing at Racknar who was flanked between them, but not only did he roll but the two behemoths struck one another with their weapons dealing huge damage. Mari, Davy, and Ariagoria took this opening to slam as many attacks as they could into the axe giant with Racknar going after the sword giant. The axe giant falls after a holy light smash from Ariagoria and the sword giant being nearly cut in half by Racknar who rages before slashing at it with five consecutive attacks.

Racknar huffs and puffs as the group gets a short breather before being sent back to the rink, now with two doors. “Let's take a short rest, I don't think we have to worry about being attacked while in this room. Though if we take too long, who knows what'll happen.” Racknar walked over and sat on the bench where reserve players would sit.

Mari walked over and sat next to him. “You okay Racknar?” Racknar groans “I've got extra holes in my body and I stopped trying to keep track of damage. Everything hurts. I just want to go home and take a nap.” Ariagoria then asks “Aren't you homeless?” Davy responded with “Aren't we all? Except Mari and yourself, most of us have spent most of our time sleeping in tents or caves.” Racknar laid down on the bench. “You know what I mean. Though a nice warm bed sounds nice. I don't think I can settle for Lisa’s couch.”

The rest of the party sat on the bench or floor on the bench area. Davy decided now would be a good time to tease Racknar. “I'm sure Lady Lisa would let you share her bed.” He paused for effect “For the small price of a sperm sample.” He grinned like an adult idiot at Racknar who playfully punched his arm. “Shut up. Lisa and I are not in a sexual relationship.” Davy shrugged “With how she acts towards you, I think you should go for it. She acts like she is playing games but you never know.”

Racknar groaned “Not interested. I'm not the casual hookup type.” Mari eyeballs the floor “It makes one wonder, what kind of woman you would go for. If Lisa isn't your type-” Racknar interrupts her “That's not the problem. The problem is I'm not interested in a fling. I'd rather have something long term.” Ariagoria points out “You still never actually answered the question as to what you wanted in a partner.”

Racknar thought about it for a bit. “A good sense of humor, someone I can feel at ease and chat with to the point I lose track of time. Someone kind who puts others first, but isn't afraid to stand up for themselves. I'd like to have shared interests with them, and feel comfortable around them. As far as appearance, I consider it secondary. There are however preferences I have, I can let them go.” Racknar stands up. “We should get back to clearing this floor. We can talk casually once we are out “ Racknar picks a door and leads the party through it.

The party is transported to a new area, they are standing on a small dock outside a log cabin at a lake. The lake itself is frozen solid and there is snow on the ground. Racknar looks around “Oh… damn. That's concerning” Mari was the first to ask “What is?” Racknar grunted “You probably noticed the more modern imagery here, yet none of the warlocks seemed to be reborns. Except the prison, every floor looked too modern. Then we have this cabin.”

Mari tilted her head “What about it? It's just a log cabin. They've existed for ages.” Racknar sighed “Yeah, but I know this exact cabin. I know this lake. So either this last person is a reborn from the same area I am or this place is using our memories to shape the environment. Both are equally problematic.” Ariagoria then starts looking around then walks over to a tree. “Hehe, oh damn. Hey Racknar, were you from Wisconsin in your previous life?” Racknar nods “The Texas of Canada heh. Most people are really polite but they are also strapped. Fuck around and find out, or be friendly and get invited to a grill out in winter while it's snowing.”

Ariagoria chuckled “Yeah, I think I know this cabin too. I was baptized in that lake. I didn't recognize it at first. This tree even has my old initials carved into it. I'd say the tower is pulling from memory because I doubt a reborn would remember such a small detail besides myself.” Racknar nodded, then walked to the cabin. “Let's see what's inside this cabin then.” The group enters the large cabin and they find themselves inside a large living room with a rug and a fireplace. This one room must have been as big as the entire building.

A female voice comes from somewhere unseen. “Oh look, I've got visitors in this cozy little place the tower has given me.” There is then a low humming “And one of you smells really really good. Why don't you make yourselves at home and I can do a fortune reading.” Racknar shook his head. “No thanks, I think we'll just clear this final floor and move on.” He moved a bit and walked through a spider's web and paused “Oh… please no. Just this once let my instincts be wrong.”

There is an echo of an inhale “You~ you are the one that smells so good~ This aura~ Yeeesssss~ You are blessed~ But what's this, you are also cursed equally. Hmmm…. Yes. Through your aura, your take is told. You'll never have kids, you'll never grow old. By the tip of a blade, you'll meet your end. Held by the hand, of one you call friend. By the gang of the snake, your body goes cold. For betrayal like vengeance is a dish best served cold.”

Racknar growled “Just come out of hiding and show yourself already. I tire of this game.” There was quick clacking and tapping on the wood and from.the darkness of another room entered the Warlock of the final floor. She wasn't human, but rather a member of the dokkalfar. A dark or “drow” elf. But not a normal member of the race, no. From the waist down she had the body of a spider like some twisted centaur. Racknar was the first to react. “It's a Drider. Here I thought the demonblood orc would be the only unusual non human we encountered.”

The Drider wore purple robes with spider imagery on them and was holding a bow that looked like it was made of ice with an ice arrow magically manifesting when she drew back the string. “Yes, and I'd bet out of all the possibilities you never considered a high priest of Lolith as an infernal patron warlock.” Racknar did a hand wave “Actually if I considered an infernal patron for a follower of Lolith, Dis would've been my first guess. You know, because Lolith betrayed her goddess and pretended to be the spider goddess that saved her people in order to control them.”

The Drider hummed “You know your stuff kiddo. But I… betrayed her. I made it my mission to find and restore the original spider goddess Arachne. However… in order to do that I have to fight the church. The best way to do that is to align with the biggest enemy of Celestia. Unfortunately I still had to honor my deal with the demon. Dis has some sort of plan, though I know not the deeper details. I know now that I'll never complete my mission. If I did then I wouldn't need him, and that's not how it works. It's the demon who reaches their goal then tosses you aside rather than fulfill their end. They always make sure there is a loophole so only they get what they want.”

Racknar let out a sigh “I promise to finish your mission.” He removed his ring of illusion to let the Drider see his true form. A smile creeped across her face. “Ah, that's why you smelled so good. Blessed by Arachne. I'll trust my mission to you. However I won't hold back in fighting you.” Racknar nodded “Then we'll both give it our all.”

The party and the Drider readied themselves for combat. The final battle of the tower was set in motion. With an oath now made to locate Arachne, Racknar has no idea he has just opened a new door. He does however feel a strange sensation as he activates his chainsaw swords, the feeling of something being etched on his soul.