<span style="font-weight: bold">Library Battle</span><br/><br/>Caronna's lays her hands on herself, and immediately feels divine power flowing through her, healing her wounds...<span style="font-style: italic">and</span>causing the bleeding from the chain-wielder's slashing to stop.<br/><br/>Once again, the Blood of Vol disciples flail at her, but she easily steps aside from their blows... but the chain-wielder, experienced and deadly, she's not-so-successful at dodging, and nor does her armor protect her from the slash... it's minor, but of course, it too starts to bleed... [5 damage, 1 ongoing].<br/><br/>Almost simultaneously, Valeani bursts through the window... much surprising the Emerald-Claw soldier approaching it, dagger-drawn, clearly ready to cut Misha's rope through, and his comrade, ready with her crossbow in case the harpy was just waiting to swoop down on them once more.<br/><br/>Instead, she shoots Valeani... the bolt only whistling past her cheek, close enough to feel, gentle enough that for a moment in her rage she doesn't even realise its drawn blood [1 damage]<br/><br/>New round, everyone can act again.<br/>Valeani, 1 damage<br/>Caronna, 5 damage, 1 ongoing<br/><br/><span style="font-weight: bold">Entranceway/Exhibit Hall Battle</span><br/><br/>The wounded ogress can do little more than whimper, as she's unceremoniously lifted and dumped down Linda's insatiable throat. In seconds she's gulped down, her weak twitches making significant bulges in Linda's throat, setting the naga's breasts jiggling and dancing. With Linda's snake-tail full of gradually-digesting life already, its her human belly the ogress slips into... leaving it stretched and distended... there's more prey in Linda than predator now, both her tail and human half doubled by the sheer mass she's consumed. It's only with the aid of her magic that she can move at all, aside from weak writhing as her meals squirm and twitch their way into a sloppy mush...<br/><br/>Luckily for Linda, eastern room is accessed by a pair of substantial doors that encompass the naga with room to spare... and a moment later she sees<span style="font-style: italic">why</span>.<br/><br/>Dangling on steel cables is an impressive display of alchemical taxidermy – a well-preserved giant squid, or even a kraken, easily the<span style="font-style: italic">Swiftwind's</span>equal in size. The cephalopod is framed by a glorious stained-glass mural above, depicting couatl's locked in furious battle with rakshasa and other fiends.<br/><br/>Archaic suits of armor stand like silent sentinels along the landing, some adorned with massive helms or feathered headdresses, whilst others feature hideous war-masks to frighten foes. Some sixty feet ahead, a staircase descends to a lower level, and its above this gallery that the kraken hangs, presumably to allow fine viewing around the beastie.<br/><br/>Below it, you glimpse the exhibit-cases of the lower level, containing many trinkets and relics – a Sarlonan funery mask, shards of Xen'drik pottery, a scorpion bracelt of ancient drow design, a Dhakaani hobgoblins dagger-axe, and a Riedran adze.... and those are merely the ones you can see and identify from the doorway.<br/><br/>At the top of the stairs stands Dura, flanked by a quartet of human figures, two long-dead and dessicated, their gender lost to time, and two far more recently murdered, fresh and dripping blood from the fatal rents in their maid's uniforms.<br/><br/>Knowledge religion, history, geography or nobility DC12<div style="padding: 3px; background-color: #FFFFFF; border: 1px solid #d8d8d8; font-size: 1em;"><div style="text-transform: uppercase; border-bottom: 1px solid #CCCCCC; margin-bottom: 3px; font-size: 0.8em; font-weight: bold; display: block;"><span onclick="if (this.parentNode.parentNode.getElementsByTagName('div')[1].getElementsByTagName('div')[0].style.display != '') {  this.parentNode.parentNode.getElementsByTagName('div')[1].getElementsByTagName('div')[0].style.display = ''; this.innerHTML = '&lt;b&gt;Spoiler: &lt;/b&gt;&lt;a href=\'#\' onClick=\'return false;\'&gt;hide&lt;/a&gt;'; } else { this.parentNode.parentNode.getElementsByTagName('div')[1].getElementsByTagName('div')[0].style.display = 'none'; this.innerHTML = '&lt;b&gt;Spoiler: &lt;/b&gt;&lt;a href=\'#\' onClick=\'return false;\'&gt;show&lt;/a&gt;'; }"><b>Spoiler: </b><a href="#" onclick="return false;">show</a></span></div><div class="quotecontent"><div style="display: none;">The two long-dead zombies are Karnathi zombies, a mainstay of their armies, raised and empowered through arcane rituals and much faster and more dangerous that the usual shambling undead. Since Vorgaard was a Karnathi wizard, its reasonable to assume these were his retainers or guards, apparently wrested from his control by Dura, before or after his death...</div></div></div><br/><br/>“Hah,” she scoffs, as her eyes settle upon you. “No necromancer is mighter than Dura!”<br/><br/>So saying, she turns and lobs, with perfect accuracy, a small black gem that lands within the kraken's beak. Immediately, the kraken begins to twitch and writhe, dancing like a puppet on her strings, beak snapping, long tentacles uncoiling in their leathery way. “Crush her, my pretty,” Dura laughs, tinged with mania, “tear her to pieces!”<br/><br/>OOC: Since Dura has wasted the surprise round showboating/took a prepared action, the library 'intruders' can act first...<br/><br/>[No-one has yet acted in this portion of the battle...]<br/>Current participants<br/>Linda... super-overstuffed<br/>Kraken... undead<br/>First Maid... undead<br/>Second Maid... undead<br/>First Karnathi Zombie... long undead<br/>Second Karnathi Zombie... long undead<br/>Dura... manic<br/><br/><span style="font-weight: bold">Cliff-foot</span><br/><br/>Misha's battered, half-broken form lies at the foot of the cliff, amidst the jumbled rocks and already washed by sea-spray,  the brightly-lit library towering overhead. She's clearly at the brink of death... from one side or the other. It's difficult to tell, in that moment, whether Xarces and Ryla's prayers have been answered, whether his healing spells will bind together the wounds of a live body or be wasted upon a dead one. Both can only watch, and hope...<br/><br/>OOC: ...I'll leave this here at this stage for Sansuki to respond to, if they wish. Needless to say, I'd be delighted if they stayed in the game. Sansuki is wonderful to roleplay with, as are you all, and I think the group is sometimes able to generate a lovely dynamic (sometimes, of course, we hit a rough patch and that is normal and to be expected...). At the moment, I'm trying to add some individuality to your meals... ah, opponents... and have more intimate interactions with them, since I think this has been a bit lost recently...