Game Night March 11 - Tartarus the disgraced pit fiend and his wicked love

With a click the door swung inwards under the pressure of Poppys delicate fingers. A red glow issued from beyond the door, and as Thokk shouldered the door wide, the party was greeted with a view straight out of hell, literally. Before a gaping maw of flames strood an immense hulking figure, smoking and crackling with flames. He stood 15 feet tall and his metallic horms grazed the ceiling of the wizards laboratory. “WHO DARES INTRUDE THE DOMAIN OF TARTARUS?!” the captain of hell, the pit fiend roared, turning his glaring eyes towards the doorway. One of his wings flapped angrily behind him, the other was no more than a savagely hacked stump, forever oozing black tar. In one hand he held a silver longsword, wreathed in the flames forever surrounding the pit fiend, in its other hand, Tartarus held two silver chains, each stabbing into two victims kneeling before him.

One of the victims kneeling before the pit fiend with a spike in his neck was Shalazar Shackleton, an insane explorer whom they had a run-in with earlier. Next to him was his love who he had come to try and save, the third daughter of Obitello Amber, Ismelda, whose pleading eyes did not match the puppet-like jerking of her limbs. Her chest was gaping blackness where her heart should be. Instead her heart was locked fluttering inside a golden cage embedded in the succubus who flapped near the ceiling behind Tartarus. She crooned in a voice not unlike Catherine Hepburn “It was this bunch, lord, who cast me down from the world above!” With a roar Tartarus prepares to attack.

Thokk and Hex charged. They braved his flames to hack away at the devil, while the rest of the party targetted the succubus, whose charm abilities were well known to them. (Aside, it is worth noting that the first time I used this succubus, her charming kiss ability was not limited to a single target, and was therefore a much greater threat to the party. This time, a clearer reading of the particular power, led to the charming kiss being limited to 1 target at a time. Explained by the fact that she was less powerful since she had been slain once already.) Ria blasted the succubus with a blinding curse, rendering the seductress nearly useless until its affects wore off. She cringed in the air above her lord.

Poppy moved into the room and sent her divine energy bolt at Tartarus, and Felipe buzzed into the room like a hoard of stinging butterflies to mightily annoy the pi fiend to the point where he was wishing he had sprayed down in OFF before trying to invade the mortal realm. With a flick of his wrist the devil was able to control his two subjects, and he forced the apprentice Isolda to fire magic missiles, while the explorer Shazzy Shack hurled his daggers from a rabbit-skin vest with a seemingly endless supply. Sharia tried to hack through the chain but it was difficult to target with its incessant weaving.

With a crack of lightning, the devil would teleport from one side of the room to the other, keeping the party moving and within his wreathe of flames. On and on the battle went. At some point Hex was charmed by the Succubus kiss. He retaliated by making the devil re-target his stinger attack against the succubus, injecting her with a massive dose. She was nearly killed when the pt fiends poison reacted with her devilish icor, but the flashing blade of Hex made sure of the deed. She turned to black ash, and within the ash was a maggot-like creature with her face known as a lemure. It started squirming towards the open gate to hell, but Sharia was sore tempted to reach down and scoop the devil and its ash into a jar. Hex, however, made a grab for the heart of Isolda who dropped free to land in the pile of ash next to the succubus true form. Hepicked up the quivering, oozing organ and looked over to its owner, who was turning paler and paler, but contiuing to act under the devils direction.

The party was getting low on resources and the huge devil Tartarus was hard to take down. He soaked up everything the party threw at him, but when the succubus died he howled in rage so the walls shook and swore an oath to destroy the destroyer of his wicked love. Pointing his stolen githyankee sword at the one whose race were the only ones permitted to hold such powerful weapons, he ignored the pin pricks of the sword-locks allies as he unleashed his entire arsenal in a single great wafve of five attacks. One hit, the poisonous stinger. The devil knew fear then. Soon he was hacked down to his knees and toppled to the ground where Thokk stepped forward with his world famous headsman chop. With an explosion of soot and a wave of evil the disgraced pit fiends head rolled free then truned to ash. In its place was an0other maggot-like lemure with the face of the slain devil. In a tiny squeaking voice Thokk just heard him squeal “YOU WILL RUE THE DAY YOU DEFEATED THE IMMORTAL TARTARUS!” bwfore scooting off towards hell.

The power of the slain pit fiend passed through Thokk like a wave of evil and with a roar, two huge horns burst forth from the half-orcs brow, knocking his horned helm askew.

The wizard was awake at the door to meet his saved children, and promised the heroes anything and everything he had. He mentioned he was a geat enchanter, anc could magically enchant any item they had.