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Alzar checks out some of the buildings in the exterior courtyard, and they are abandoned, and as expected – blacksmith, stables, storehouses, stuff like that. After making his Necrology proficiency check, It looks like the place was taken by undead, and there are old necrotic marks that appear here and there from things like ghouls.
He enters the main keep, with its simple four towers, two floors, and a small dungeon below. They enter into a great hall, with banners, wall candles, hangings, and expensive carpets adorning it. There was a huge battle here, and skeletons and corpses line the area.
There is a large wooden throne at the end of the great hall, and seated on it is as man dressed in plate armor and ten men in leather arrayed around it. They begin to march stiffly, towards Alzar. The man at the end is Baron Fharo. Alzar backs up, flanked by his golem, and begins to cast another spell. He isn’t feeling anything necrotic from the ten dead looking individuals, but he is from the live looking Baron. So he casts Time Stop.
The first turn he uses the Star/Gem to figure out what is what. The Baron is possessed by a ghost, and the ten men are actually form-shifting creatures from another plane of existence he is unfamiliar with (he failed his Sage Knowledge proficiency - they are called Death Leeches).
The next round he smiles. You see, he ran out of good spells to memorize when he hit level 21, so he chose a spell that banishes creatures back to their home plane – called Banishment, 7th level spell. It has no save, will work on all summoned creatures in a 60’ foot radius, and will work on 2xspell level HD of creatures. Now, with the Imp, his spell level is 22, for 44 hd of creatures are affected. That’s…5 of them (They are 8 HD each). Now that spell won’t trigger, (since it’s against someone else) until the Time Stop ends. And….that’s it, he just got two free rounds.
Banishment hits, and half of the Death Leeches are gone. Roll for initiative…
2 vs 5. Alzar casts Black Tentacles and drops 25 tentacles in the mass of creatures coming his way. They are stopped, every one is grabbed by a lot of tentacles. They begin to try shifting their form and such, but little will happen. The possessed ghost, sensing trouble, frees the Baron, and fades away.
Over the next few turns, the tentacles will kill the Death Leeches (they take damage every turn they are captured).
Alzar gains 12000 XP from the leeches
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