From the diary of Silvan the Dryad
Session date: 22.8.2004

29.4.

The meeting began to come to an end. Abrahm had one more thing he wanted to take
 up. He said he was to give in a little with regard to the Godly Artifacts. He'd
 come to the decision that he could try to free one of them, and he said he'd
 found a suitable one.

Angela entered the room, and Abrahm said that Tamaol was the one to be freed. The
 Queen commented that as far as she knew, Tamaol didn't need a bastion. Abrahm
 said this was true, but in that case Tamaol would only run away. But if Angela,
 who'd practiced for this transformation for a long time, would become the
 bastion, Tamaol might actually join the battle against them. The Queen was
 against this, but Abrahm said it was his decision.

Angela held the Leaf of Tamaol in her hand. She sat down on a chair and took hold
 of the leaf. It looked like she was reading something off the leaf. The Queen
 gave some sort of signal, and more guards entered the room. Abrahm thought they
 weren't necessary, but the Queen said she wasn't taking any chances.

Eventually the leaf vanished, and Angela rose up. She seemed a little confused,
 but after a while she spoke, saying she was the new Tamaol. She felt a little
 confused, but said it felt like her old personality was equally strong as
 Tamaol's.

The Queen said it was time to talk about tactics, and asked all those not needed
 to leave. We did.

I left the others to think about what I'd do now. Tamaol as I knew him was no
 more, but part of what was Tamaol still remained. For all of my "adventuring
 career", I'd been striving to find Tamaol again - now, when my goal should've
 been completed, it'd become a horrible perversion of it, Tamaol being turned into
 a puppet of the Master.

All of my hopes having been shattered time and time again, I considered just
 fleeing from it all, finding some remote forest where nobody could ever find me
 again and live the rest of my life protecting it. I imagined spending centuries
 just refining my magical skills, unleashing them against anybody who'd threaten
 the forest.

But then again, I'd grown somewhat attached to my adventuring fellows, especially
 the demon. If I left now, I couldn't say if I wouldn't regret it later, if I
 wouldn't just spend those centuries wondering what all had happened while I was
 gone. Part of me was reluctant to leave, and my longing for the serenity of the
 forest wasn't strong enough to overcome my curiosity of what was going to happe
n while I was gone.

Curiosity, curiosity and some worry as well. Abrahm had already done an untold
 number of despicable deeds, and there was no telling of what he'd still do. Could 
 I leave now, leave now and return hundreds of years later to find a world with no
 more gods, a world where the last vestiges of their power had been destroyed
 forever? Could I face such a world, knowing that I'd had the potential to do
 something to stop it from coming into existence?

Having pondered all those things, weighing them from every angle I could think of,
 my mind was set. I'd return to the company of my adventuring fellows, but
 stopping Abrahm would always be my primary goal. If killing him would cost me my
 life, so be it - it'd have been worth it.

The sun was already setting by the time I returned to the company of my fellows.

Abrahm talked to us and said that we could be promoted to the next Angel rank if
 we performed well.

Longfoot had encountered some sort of mercenaries who were curious about Abrahm.
 He told about this to Abrahm, and Abrahm wanted to know more about them. The
 leader of the mercenaries apparently had a sword that belonged to Abrahm.
 However, A said that they probably were the delayed diplomats from the human city
 of Dalandor, and enjoyed diplomatic immunity. We were instructed to not tell them
 anything not publically known, and find out what we could about them.

I was given our maps of the world. We made plans about going to spy on the
 mercenaries.

30.4.

We ate breakfast and one by one scattered to spy on the mercenaries.

While waiting for the mercenaries, we noticed that there seemed to be a fire
 somewhere. Firemages were heading towards that direction. I went to look.

The chaos restaurant seemed to be on fire. Everything that was made of stone was
 burning, but nothing that was of wood did. There was no smoke, and the fire
 didn't seem to be very hot.

The firemages seemed to be discussing the situation among themselves, and a man
 was telling them to do something. They didn't seem to be able to do anything.
 After a while, the place had burnt all down, and its owner was crushed.

We saw a note saying Radius was hiring mercenaries and adventurers.

Nathan, the mercenary leader, showed up to meet Longfoot together with an older
 man, who looked like a mage. His name was Diron Sunfall, and he'd also wanted to
 talk to Longfoot.

Longfoot led them to a tavern to drink. They tried to milk each other for
 information, but with rather amusing results. The operation was rather
 unsuccessful.

I followed the mercenaries after they left the tavern. They made a sign to some
 woman when they passed her. I tried to avoid her, but wasn't sure if I succeeded.

Eventually some big man headed towards me. I managed to avoid him, and went around
 the block to spy on the mercenaries some more. They were walking so slowly that I
 suspected they were just waiting for me to be trapped. I decided to call off the
 chase, at which point somebody put a bag over me.

The bag had been sound-dampened, so I couldn't even use any magics. They brought
 me into somewhere where I was interrogated, after which I was dumped into a
 potato field.

I returned to report the situation to the others. Abrahm looked very angry, and he
 mindwalked me a bit. Then he looked less angry and told us to come see him
 tomorrow, for he had a project for us.

Longfoot made a drawing of the mercenaries, and we made deal with some shady
 characters to find out their location. They wanted 200 silver for the job, so we
 ended up splitting the cost, each of us paying 50 silvers. I only had 30, so I
 was left owing Buran 20 silvers. After getting some information, like where that
 bunch of mercenaries was staying, we returned to the palace.

1.5.

We woke up early in the morning to go find out what Radius' recruiting note was
 all about. There was quite a bunch of people at the palace. Some guards showed up 
 and escorted the whole crowd inside.

Radius entered. He said everybody was probably aware of what the situation with
 the demons was, and said that there were lots of missions that they needed extra
 people for. He suggested everybody'd start out with introducing themselves and
 their talents so they could give the right people the right jobs.

"I know you're from my old home city and are part of the Soulkeepers," he said to
 the mercenaries. Nathan rose up and admitted this, introducing his company. At
 the moment they were taking care of other business here, but if there were some
 jobs where they could make some gold or silver pieces, they might even consider
 it.

Nathan asked Radius if he was one of Marlin's apprentices. Radius indicated yes,
 and the two talked for a moment in private, after which the introduction round
 went on.

Battle mages, members of a mercenary guild and a mercenary group by the name of
 Manticores introduced themselves. Buran said we weren't particularly after this
 job, but just in general looking what was going on here. Somebody shouted that
 obviously we couldn't handle tasks like this, and that was what he'd thought.

After talking for a bit, Radius said that the job Abrham was probably going to
 give us wasn't contradictory with the job he'd give us. Buran said we were just
 here to spy on the mercenaries, and after a bunch of talking, we left, much to
 the amusement of the other people in the room.

We decided to go break in to the mercenaries' inn room. While I was in watch, Hêrâ
 and Longfoot used a charmed worker to retrieve important things from the
 mercenaries' room. They then escaped (apparently) unnoticed, thus avoiding any
 sort of Inngate scandal that might've been caused by our bungling.

I went to report to the Master what had happened. He was rather dissatisfied, but
 said he had to appreciate our initiative. He warned us not to do something like
 this again, however.

He identified our loot for us. One was a One Ring, one gave telescopic vision, and
 one was something he couldn't identify. The amulet, when placed on somebody's
 neck, made its bearer forget the fact that it had ever been placed on him and
 take any commands anybody would give him.

The Master had a project that he thought we were the best suited for. The demons
 were building a fortress on the hole Wealhtheow had dug to the Great Burning
 Hollow, a fortress which was becoming a real nuisance. Using demonic magic, we
 were supposed to go melt down the whole fortress. The Master was sending five
 channelers to assist us in this operation, as well as other people who'd divert
 the demon's attention by attacking while we were on it.

This would be a night-time mission. We'd fly low, following roads, then rise
 higher when we approached our destination. Somebody else would deal with the
 dragon. In case one of us would fall, our orders would be to proceed with the
 mission nonetheless.

After preparing the necessary spells, we headed out to carry out our mission.

We landed near our destination, and Samuel, the latest leader of the Angels, gave
 us our final instructions. First Ornon the Necromancer would eliminate the
 dragon. We were to lead the dragon to Ornon. Buran was made the dragon's bait.

Buran approached the dragon, which woke to life. At the same moment, a huge cloud
 of demons begin rising from the fortress. Buran started running. When the dragon
 got close enough to Ornon, Ornon destroyed it.

Meanwhile, we'd been flying towards the demonic tower. We got ourselves where we
 were needed. A lookout shouted that a cloud of succubi was coming in, but we
 failed to cast our spell succesfully. For some reason they turned away, however,
 giving us a chance to cast the spell a second time. I failed, but Longfoot and
 Hêrâ succeeded. The channelers magnified the effect of the spell, making the
 ground under the fortress melt and it collapsed into the magma. Then we were
 under attack.

We slew the ones attacking us. One of them turned and chose to help us. We didn't
slay him.

Session close: 19:37 22.8.2004