Last week we finished off the Siege of Jorvik, with our heroes leading the townsfolk against the last and most fearsome wave of Draconid and otherworldly invaders. The previous week had seen the landing of sahuagin amphibious invaders, backed up by an underwater kraken who was lashing our troops with three huge tentacles. This week Mendas, Oddny, Hermiad, Motull, Varin, Chrym, and Terik continued the fight.
The Vikings had snuffed the last of the aerial wave of invaders consisting of chimera and wyverns and one seed-planting guy, so they turned to face the sea. Mendas charged ahead and found cover, and Oddny followed close behind. Back at the city wall, Hermiad and Motull crash-landed on the back of the one remaining dying chimera (Hermiad dismounting with a graceful slide down the chimera’s neck for an extra soupcon point). They headed inside the wall and everyone prepared to head for the coast.
But before they could, the invading Draconid infantry arrived!
Yes, the ground forces appeared suddenly, using the last of their fast-traveling spell. The invaders weren't expecting Chrym's difficult terrain to block them, so it looked like we'd have a good chance of funneling them through the city doors at a slow and manageable rate. What the party didn't know was that the invaders were buttressed by two fireball-throwing demon hounds, who immediately torched the city walls with giant fireballs!
Motull, Hermiad, and Chrym turned to face this new threat, while Oddny, Mendas, Varin, and Terik stayed to fight the sahuagin.
Oddny and Mendas figured the sahuagin would drop quickly once they reached melee range, but realized they were in for a long fight when a group of lobstermen showed up as well. The sahuagin had acid-coated spears, but the lobstermen were just plain tough. And the tentacles kept dragging everyone into the sea.
While that battle raged, the Draconid ground forces were coming in through the breaches in the city walls and laying waste to the population! Motull, Hermiad, and Chrym mixed it up, but the party was too separated to use the tortilla-pounder technique from the previous week. Fortunately, the troglodyte troops backing the wave were minions; unfortunately, they still hit really hard and were hard to hit. The city population was no match for any of them; even the ballista crews couldn't hit them.
Gradually, though, the tide of battle turned, and only a few enemies remained. Most of the party had been heavily wounded, and almost all our powers, daily, encounter, item, everything, were drained. Then the final, most powerful wave was released!
The seeds that had been planted earlier had suddenly sprouted into a bunch of plant demons, headed by a giant tree-demon! The tree-demon had an array of powerful attacks: besides bashing with its arms and biting with its head, the arms would independently spray thorns at targets. It had a long movement, too, and would charge targets across the battlefield. The first charge ran right over Varin, doing massive damage; after the second charge, it wound up practically on top of Motull, who fought heroically, but dropped after only the second round of the demon's onslaught. Things looked bad for Motull, especially with our cleric Erik out of the action, but Chrym was able to get the remaining Eladrin troops to teleport his body out, and he healed Motull enough to get him back on his feet.
Things looked bad; the tree demon was tearing up the city, the plant demons were everywhere, all the buildings had been destroyed, and the party had already had one fighter go down and the rest were bloodied. Time to evacuate! The party began directing the city's fighters out of combat, and Chrym headed to the magically-secured house to start the teleport ritual that would get the noncombatants out. The rest of the party stayed behind to fight a rearguard action.
In the meantime, Hermiad was left alone with his now-nearly-a-pet Rage Drake on the far side on the battlefield, squaring off against one of the hell hounds, plus a Draconid or two and a host of minions. He directed the Rage Drake to great effect; it kept doing pounce attacks for lots of damage. Finally they killed the hell hound and, heavily wounded, Hermiad headed back inside. Varin, Mendas, and Oddny had wiped out the sea invaders and headed back. Motull staggered back toward the tree demon, and Terik got off the phone and mind-controlled the demon's arm into bashing at its own face! Yes, the arms and body of the tree demon were actually different creatures. Then the arm went for a push attack against one of its own minions and completely tore off from the demon's body. This staggered it, but it was still powerful. Hermiad got a shot off, damaging it, but it fired a volley of thorns at him and he went down! Oddny and Mendas weren't yet able to reach him or the demon, though Mendas got close enough to direct a party of Eladrin to teleport the last remaining minion ten squares up, over a plant demon, and the minion plummeted to his death. Dang, why hadn't we been doing that all along?
The plant demons and the second hell hound would have to wait; the tree demon was the real threat, and the party focused all their remaining power on it. And killed it! It collapsed in a heap of random plant matter, and with its death, all the plant demons died as well! The last remaining hell hound, now alone on the battlefield, decided that it didn't like its chances and headed for the hills. Which was just as well, since the party was so wounded that it actually had pretty good chances.
The party rushed over to the prone figure of Hermiad. Were they in time to save him? Find out next time, on SAVAGE VINLAND!
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