Stories of my brain

Adaly wakes up in the morning and goes to feed the wyverns. She can see Amara already doing her morning exercises. Adaly hugs glimmer, and the wyverns all appreciate the food she provides. A few minutes in Livia joins her, petting the wyverns “I’m sorry about last night, but Sam is right, this is just a mission” Adaly looks up at the strange woman and smiles kindly at her before replying “I don’t think that is your opinion, but sure, let the man decide what we do”

Livia sighs “You are right, I would like us to be friendly, but Sam is also right. There are dangers surrounding you and us, we should not make that worse.” Adaly just lifts her shoulders “I guess, I just… I like you Livia, I don’t want Sam’s cautions making it impossible for us to work together.”

Livia kindly smiles back, but at that moment Sam and Heskeni both walk in, and breakfast is being brought in, so they go to the breakfast table.

“This is going to be a boring couple of days, we should arrange something for a sparring session, to not get rusty” Amara comments while filling her plate with all meats while Adaly just grabs an apple takes a bite and considers while Sam replies “Yeah that sounds nice, tonight, maybe we can ask one of the curators to set up an arena?”

Adaly observes them and says “Could be good to ask if we can fight some gargoyles, so that we get a feeling what we are up against if shit hits the fan” Amara nods in agreement.

Heskeni quickly grabs some food and starts leaving while Adaly quickly goes to stand in front of the halfling. “Heskeni, do remember to eat and sleep on time. We have time take care of yourself” “Sure” Heskeni just replies and quickly walks down to the library. Adaly rubs her head and mumbles “That halfling is going to be death of us”.

Soon after breakfast they continue walking around the library. Amara is going off to talk to some skeletons about setting up a practice area. They find more information on the layout of the citadel, but nothing that excites Adaly yet, when it is time for lunch.

During lunch Adaly just goes to sit down, and cast devil’s eye, spying on her brother. She can see him in a cabin in the woods. Cages filled with rats, squirrels and other small animals surround him. He is standing in front of a massive cauldron in the room, a few imps steering the black liquid that is boiling inside of it. Valziar is in the middle of an incantation. The imps dump a squirrel in the black liquid and the incantations continue. It must be a massive spell because the devil’s eyes ends before Adaly can tell its purpose.

Immediately when Adaly gets back she hears from the sending stone ‘Acquired auction item list. Will poke around for guestlist. Auctioneer very selective about guests, can attempt to arrange pseudonymous invitation. Should I?’ in Jeremy’s voice. Adaly replies ‘Yes please, interested in list, but we shall speak soon. Sold my soul, will spend five more days here. Love Adaly.’

They continue their investigations until dinner. Heskeni nowhere to be found, Adaly goes to one of the skeletons “Could you please fetch Heskeni?” and they take their leave. Adaly once more goes to spy on her brother, and he is just eating some kind of meat drenched in dark colored sauce. She tries others, and to her surprise her vision shifts to Es-Vahelieth. She didn’t know the devil was on the prime material and she feels a fear filling her core.

Es-Vahelieth is sitting on a stone throne in front of a flaming ellipse that appears to be a portal to one of the hells. Multiple devils and demons are slowly passing through the gateway, while Es-Vahelieth just watches them. Adaly knows he normally has his hounds close, however she cannot see them anywhere which concerns her.

Adaly comes back to when Heskeni enters. So, she chooses to keep it to herself, but she does send a quiet message to Amara ‘one of my uncles is back in the prime material. That could become problematic’ ‘Understood’ Amara just replies and nods in thanks for letting her know.

Adaly barely touches her food, but none of the party seems to notice, which she appreciates, knowing Amara will force her to eat.

One of the skeletons comes to collect them and they move outside the head curator standing in an improvised arena consisting of a cage and a sitting area. A small cage is linked to the bigger one and in the smaller case are a large number of gargoyles frozen in place.

“I hope the arena is to your liking, if there is anything we can improve, just let us know. We shall make the alterations. For now, how many would you like to fight?” The head curator asks, and Amara and Adaly look at each other before Adaly answers “Let’s start with 5”. The head curator nods and 5 of the gargoyles start moving.

The party walks into the big cage, Livia gets onto Flutter, and they take off high in the cage. Adaly turns invisible, the higher level variant, which ensures she will stay invisible the entire time, while Amara and Sam go to stand in the middle of the arena.

The 5 gargoyles rush out towards Sam and Amara, while Livia shoots them with arrows and Adaly flings spells at them. Amara and Sam try to hack away at the gargoyles, but their stone bodies seem to have some resistance. They move rapidly and Amara just tosses her halberd to the side, going into a rage and attacking with her fist.

After some time, they finish and Amara yells 5 more. Immediately 5 more Gargoyles get activated and Amara stands in front of the small cage opening, blocking most of them from entering the bigger cage. She rips off one of the arms of a gargoyle and slams it into another one, doing more damage than with her bare fist. Amara clearly enjoying herself, but Adaly does ask “Amara, are you okay with calling it a day, and fighting more tomorrow?”

Adaly can hear her friend having some heavy breaths, calming herself “Sure, that was fun. Curator, please leave this area here. We will want to repeat this tomorrow.” Adaly drops her invisibility and walks up to Amara smiling at her friend. It was nice to get some physical exercise in the midst of all the researching.