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A Sword Without a Hilt: A Song of Ice and Fire/D&D 3.5 Crossover

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DragonParadox said:
By Veiled Paths ​

Twenty-Fifth Day of the Tenth Month 293 AC

You reach out along spell-forged links until you feel the familiar quicksilver light of Lya's mind. "The archfiend is dead..." Very, very dead, you think in satisfaction looking over the bloody floor. "Where do you need us?" Valyrian steel and the bound fiend within slips into the folds of your cloak to join the corpse of its master.

"Zherys found where some of the stronger magics on the ship are. That should draw the mage out of hiding, though he might not do so face to face," she replies, going on to explain how the mage had worked his spells through one of his burning skulls, trying to enthrall Yrten after cutting through his protections with a spell.

"Lady Melisandre witnessed the ritual or something like it once before, and she says the skulls would have to be prepared well in advance and they are not something a wise mage leaves unguarded for obvious reasons, so he would only have five more now," she concludes. From the undertone of the thought, you suspect Lya has wanted to question the priestess about her past and lore for a long time, though perhaps not knowing how to begin. Hopefully, having fought side by side will bridge that gap.

"Where are you heading then?" you ask as the others prepare to move on through the belly of the ship. Ser Richard wipes Oathkeeper's blade off with one of the torn silk cushions while Siduri eyes a ornate necklace wrought of gold and black pearls wistfully. Good to see she had taken the rule about looting to heart, but you make a note to see she gets it anyway once the spoils are divided.

Lya's reply comes in the form of a rough plan of the ship. Your friends are towards the front of the mid-deck, after having just cleared the mess hall quite far from the aft castle where you you are now. Zherys' divinations show strong arcane signatures at the other end of this deck, but there is also something down in the bilges where no efreeti would think to dwell, no matter how paranoid.

After considering the matter a long moment you decide against re-treading Lya's passage, through a window and down to the mid-deck. Instead you and your company fly back into sight of the main battle, glad to see things mostly going to plan, keeping the efreeti ships from leveraging the full weight of their weapons against the shaitan boarding ships. Thankfully, you do not need a ship to cut your way in. Narrowly dodging a bolt of deadly green spellfire, you circle the ship to roughly where Lya had said said the cabin of interest is and then you cut your way into the hull.

What you find within is not a cabin appointed to the mage's needs. Indeed, if there is a cabin at all you do not see it. Formless grey mist billows out into the scorching air of Valyria, carrying with it a faint acrid scent with an undertone of sweetness like a field of lilies set alight.

"An area of warped space, like a pseudo-demiplane maybe?" Dany offers. "Depending on how he set the limits of the spell, breaking the ship could have caused it to rupture."

"It could just be a trap." Siduri cautions. "The strategy we are employing would not precisely be novel," she motioned to three of the shaitan ships converging on the fourth ship in the efreeti line like sharks on wounded prey.

What do you do?

[] Fly into the mist, hands linked to keep from getting lost

[] Try to part the mist to find what is behind it

[] Go back inside the ship and meet up with Lya and the others

[] Write in

OOC: I was tempted to have a break point deciding the route, but then we would have had a 300 odd words update, you guys can still go back through the ship now, only you have the option of a direct approach too.
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Made some edits to the chapter, DP.
 
I'm wracking my brain trying to come up with explanations for the mist. Portal to the Astral Plane? Byproduct of the ship's propulsion system? Trap?

Wonder what would happen if Viserys breathed some Dispelling Fire Breath through the hole?
 
[X] Warn everyone of your choice and have them prepare to defend against any adverse reactions or flee the immediate area should it be necessary, then assume True Dragon form and breath a cone of Maximized Dispelling Fire Breath through the hole in the ship.
 
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das_slash said:
This mage specializes in hiding and shell games, he is not in the mist or the part we see is not the real entrance.
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I mean that's what I would do when I'm being chased by multiple dragons, spell casters, and god only knows what else all following the Turtler of all people.

There are some things you fight only in a position of strength, and not to sound to boastful we're one of them.

At some point you need to cut your losses or at the very least take stock and reorganize. Leaving a big glowing door that says "Here I am come get me" is not something a high level spell caster fleeing to a position of safety would do.

At the bare minimum I expect this shit to be trapped to the highest degree this asshole could manage, more so if he set this up ahead of time just in case. (which he probably did because high level spellcasters are paranoid as they are proud)

Heading straight in would be, well, silly.

Does anyone think we have time to send in a raven or two, just to see what the hell the portal is? Even if it's only a distraction it'll be good to see just what kind of trap our enemy is capable of.

Edit:
Goldfish said:
[X] Warn everyone of your choice, then assume True Dragon form and breath a cone of Dispelling Fire Breath through the hole in the ship.
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Or we could just say fuck it and do our best big bad wolf impression.

Either way if it works it works.

[X] Goldfish
 
Goldfish said:
[X] Warn everyone of your choice and have them prepare to defend against any adverse reactions or flee the immediate area should it be necessary, then assume True Dragon form and breath a cone of Maximized Dispelling Fire Breath through the hole in the ship.
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DP just said it feels more Su than like a spell.
We can't Dispel that.

Maybe move through with AMF?
 
If that thing is just intended to buy the caster time, it worked.
There's a really big 'if' here ...
 
[X] Use Anti Magic Field to go through the mist without being affected

I think this might be the easiest way.
If it's just a trap we walk through without triggering it, if not we haven't dispelled the portal we need to go through yet.
 
Artemis1992 said:
[X] Use Anti Magic Field to go through the mist without being affected

I think this might be the easiest way.
If it's just a trap we walk through without triggering it, if not we haven't dispelled the portal we need to go through yet.
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If the mist is poisonous and not suppressed by the AMF, we would be exposing ourselves to it while negating our defenses against such dangers.
 
Goldfish said:
If the mist is poisonous and not suppressed by the AMF, we would be exposing ourselves to it while negating our defenses against such dangers.
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True, but few poisons are dangerous to Viserys due to high fort-saves and if it turns out to merely a conjured mist we can just cancel the AMF.
One instance of poison-damage is nothing we can't heal in a moment.

If, on the other hand, this is a portal to the mage's personal Demiplane, then we have lost access by dispelling it and will find neither him nor his loot until he decides to attack us the next time.
 
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