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Forbidden Temple of the Great Falls

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<forgive me, i did not mean to offend in anyway>

Jacob wakes up upon a pallet, in a room he is not familiar with. His head is pounding, and the force in his chest grows impatient at his lack of a master.
He does not know how he got here, and his splitting headache gives him no chance to recover. He decides to sleep some more, hoping the rest will soothe his pain.
 
"Strike them down with all your might!" he shouted at his charges as he cleaved another of the monstrosities apart "Righteousness will not be barred by evil today!"

The lines were barely holding, fresh recruits without any real prior battle experience they were, a fact he was not capable of realizing in its entirety. Still, with his towering presence, they did not break, emboldened by his never-ending chant for goodness and justice that had to defeat all that was evil, truly evil like the monstrosities and their minions that rained down upon them.

There was a man barely of eighteen summers torn in half by the bulging arms of a fiend, there another, his head half-swallowed by a barely-humanoid shaped mass of ever-changing maws.

This he understood, the death the beasts caused, the death his charges caused. He also understood the need for a decisive strike, something that would take creature's lust for battle, for their numbers would, in the end, overwhelm them.
Striking down another monstrosity, its flesh sizzling where his white-glowing blade was struck through its skin, he scanned the hordes for the master that aimed their need for mindless slaughter.

There!
Something that was close to what could have been called a man, clad in blemished white and black, shouting and gesturing, its words lost over the chaos of the battle.

"Hold fast, brothers! I shall bring down the arch-fiend!" He shouted at the men nearest to him, some of whom stared back at him with a mix of unbelief, horror and hope, as he charged through the enemy lines, his gargantuan figure barreling through anything that tried to intercept.

He did not look back, did not care to in his single-minded pursuit of what he thought would win them the battle.
 
Brother Vernasus nods to the huge gentleman and the masked man, then hands mary another small piece of fresh honeycomb before taking his leave. He walks through the temple for some time, before hearing familiar voices and deciding to follow them to their source. As he enters the room with the demonic relic, he gasps at the bloody sight before him.

...What in the name of the beesiah is going on in here!?! Korsarro, I can spot your work a mile away, what have you done you wretched little man?

Brother Vernasus notices the mirror stood in the corner, completely uncovered.

What... WHAT IS THIS UNHOLY OBJECT DOING OUTSIDE OF THE RELIQUARY!?!

He quickly unwraps and tears off large portion of the orange robe that envelops him, before carefully tossing it over the face of the mirror without stepping into it's demonic reflection.

Someone had better have a damn good explanation for this!
 
Korsarro waves Zatos arm at Vernasus "I was helpin'!" Korsarro grins and points the arm at the knight on the ground "See? He lost all his meat. So I put more in. Then wrapped 'em up all good and proper. But I had no bandages... So I used more meat" Korsarro nods, closing his eyes. Admiring the genius of his own plan he scratches the underside of his chin with Zatos arm. "Some things went a little iffy Brother Vernasus, where have you been?" He tilts his head as he asks.
 
Brother Vernasus stares solemnly at the small man.

I was... meditating.

Vernasus shakes his head, attempting to dislodge a particularly persistent thought from his mind.

Regardless, I'm sure we've had this conversation before, Korsarro... not all problems can be solved by shoving meat into them. Now kindly cease waving that arm in front of me, lest I take it from you and beat you with it.
 
Korsarro frowns "No fair, I have permission for this one and everything, Zato said I could have it." he points it towards the monk in question and then to the the injured knight "You always tell me I can't solve my problem with meat... or flesh. Or blades. Well... that last one not so much" Korsarro thinks back to a distant memory, smiling slightly "How are you anyway Brother? You seem like there's something bothering you, normally you'd have taken the arm and smacked me around with it already." He looks to Vernasus "Are you alright?"
 
Zato stood up, clutching his new stump and the bandages on his stomach.
"What a day it has been. I think I'll get cleaned up and make dinner for us."
He picked up his scabbard from the ground, then retrieved his sword, flicking the blood away. With some difficulty, he had it sheathed and it resembled a cane once more.
"If you need me, I'll be headed to the kitchen in a minute."
 
"Very good, sir knight." the voice was sultry and intimidating at the same time from a steel-fanged grinning visage.
A red lightning bolt darted past Morr, hitting one of the monstrosities that tried to hold him instead, followed by a row of sickening crunches as the beast was literally turned from the inside out.
"Would have almost thought it wouldn't be worth the effort of a little faster battle, but here-" lithe legs easily evaded the charging knight "- it is..." before spindly fingers of one hand gestured to throw another red bolt, while the other commanded the troops to ignore the foolish knight.

The former he noticed, the latter not.

Morr threw himself to the side, rose quickly and again charged, this time with more caution for the enemy's inhuman speed.

The fiend just stayed calm as he threw several bolts at once at the knight, too many too close to evade. Morr, seeing his end close, rose his sword and struck in defiance, his arm going almost numb as his sword clashed with the red lightning, resulting in an eye-blinding flash as the purity of the sword prevailed before the sorceror's might.

"Not bad, though I wouldn't have expected any-" again easily evading the Knight, the figure moving like a lightning himself, appearing directly behind him again "- less." before his hands directly grabbed on Morr's armored back, preparing to directly strike his foul witchcraft into the knight.

Morr reacted immediately by throwing himself backwards, the sorceror distracted for the fraction of a second while building up his might again, taking the figure down with him, burying the lithe figure under his plated gargantuan frame, but not before the sorceror was able to redirect the barest of his power into him, letting flesh break open under constant spasms, Morr screaming in unending pain, keeping him barely conscious as he could not do anything but lay there and feel how his body was almost tearing itself apart, the wards of his armor glowing in a searing light as they desperately tried to evaporate the foul magic.
 
Devlin got up from finishing healing the old man's stump. while he was finishing and going over to heal the armored man wounds, a man in orange robes ran in yelling at Korsarro about shoving meat into open wounds while also tearing off a part of his robes to cover a mirror in the room. Devlin did not understand why the mirror was covered, but then again he was in unfamiliar territory so he just shrugged and continued healing the armored man's wounds
 
Zato headed to his bedroom and changed out of his old robe, leaving it in a hamper for Valetni. He reached into a drawer and pulled out a fresh set of robes, the golden color of honey, as was the standard at the temple. He felt his stump over the sleeve; it draped past to where his wrist would be. He wondered if he could hide this from Mary for very long......
In any case, he headed towards the kitchen, it was time to make a stew.
 
Brother Vernasus sighs impatiently as he looks the psychotic dwarf up and down.

I'm fine, my brother... merely distracted. And believe me, the only thing delaying me from beating you around the head right now, is my extreme confusion regarding just exactly who left an unholy relic of this magnitude sitting out where anyone could have stumbled across it.


What if little mary had wandered in here while playing hide and seek, hmm? What then?
 
Zato went into the kitchen, grabbing a large bucket. There was a large statue of a pig in one corner of the kitchen. Zato whispered into its ear and cranked the tail, and a large number of potatoes spewed out. He brought the bucket of potatoes and some various meats to the table and began to chop as best as he could with one hand, using one of the few knives Korsarro wasn't able to carry..
"This may take a while...." he said to himself.
 
It took several minutes before the pain began to recede, allowing Morr, breathing heavily, bleeding from several cracks in his skin all over his body, to slowly stand up again, looking back at where had lain, seeing now that, ironically, his constant spasms applicating the rough edges of his armor had turned the arch-fiend to a barely recognisable mess of brutally torn flesh while his massive weight had done the rest.

Beaten and battered, Morr nevertheless turned around to retreat to his men to see-

A brutal massacre almost at its end, the recruits he had left to hold the lines having broken into a mindless panic without him to reeinforce their will. Staring in utter shock, Morr recovered as best he could, raised his sword and charged to where the butchery seemed thickest.
 
Mary sucked happily on the honeycomb she had been given, now free of the huge man's arms she wandered again...

a loud "shchlurp-shchlurp" noise revealing her presence long before she got there.

"Mighstar Zaptow!" she verbalized through the comb as she entered the kitchen.

shuffling over to the old monk as best she could in the oversized robes which dragged a little behind her

"Whaght chu doaing?"
 
"Oh, hello dear!" Zato responded cheerily.
"I was just getting started on a stew for tonight." He laid down the knife, and turned towards her voice.
"Did you need anything? Perhaps I can help you."
 
"Noargho" she mumbles, using her long sleeves to rub at her eyes

"Ighm juhgst Schleehpy"

the small girl moves to snuggle up against the monks robes
 
Zato gave her a hug with his good arm.
"Well if that's the case, why don't you go take a nap, and I'll get you when dinner's ready?" he asked.
 
"Yeghs, ohk"

Mary brings her arms up in a hug squeezing through where the monk's hand should be...

she blinks

and squeezes again, it should be there, but isn't...

her small hands follow the empty cloth until she reaches his arm, and squeezes it gently to make sure it's really in there

the small honeycomb falls from her mouth with a plop

"Mister Zato?"
 
"Whup, dropped your honeycomb!" Zato said, hoping to the Beesiah she didn't notice.
He picked it up and put on his best poker face.
 
She looks up at him with wide eyes and tilts her head slightly

"your hand..."

she pulls at the sleeve, bringing it closer to her and looks up at the monk again...

"I hope it gets better soon" she gives his arm a small kiss through the sleeve and retrieves the honeycomb

"Cohgme ohn Quaghcks" she calls to the small feathered procession still following her and shuffles off once more into the hallways of the monastery.
 
As she left, Zato breathed a sigh of relief.
"That was close.... such a sweet girl."
He turned a few times, found the table, and resumed awkwardly cutting the potatoes into chunks.
 
Striking another, and another, and another again again again again

Morr didn't know how much time had been gone, he had charged in and simply struck. Again and again and again. Nothing else mattered anymore, not the lack of feeling he had in his left arm, not the fact that his right foot was almost cut off, forcing him to perpetually kneel, not the fact that he was 'standing' atop a mountain of the corpses that had been his charges.

Not even the fact that there was nothing left to strike.

Just kneeling there, attacking nothing but air, his eyes glazed over in blind nothingness.

That was how he was found, atop a mountain of corpses, still attacking enemies that were not there, the beasts, without a leader to aim their foul desires, having slaughtered eachother in a mindless berserk-rampage after having butchered the remaining soldiers, ignoring the single remaining knight except for a few.
 
Wolfram appears lost in thought as Brother Vernasus enters the room, having moved to the side and begun thumbing through a tome he pulled from his robes. Scanning and flipping through several pages, he eventully stops, reading while events unfold. Nodding to himself, he closes the book wth a dull thud as he puts it back in its inner pocket. He gives a little start at the sight of Vernasus, before bowing.

"My apologies, brother, I did not see you enter. I was just confirming the mirror's identity in the listings. Quite an interesting artifact. It is known as Xezzak's Reflection, and its only property -aside from being incredibly resistant to physical damage- is that should somone look at their reflection in it it spawns an unholy copy of that individual, though it can seemingly only produce one copy at a time. Truly fascinating. I assume Brother Johnson was studying whether or not it could create copies of lesser creatures than men for some reason. Likely to give those who come to the temple an example of a weak demon to study their qualities. A curious idea in itself and completely against doctrine but not without-"

Thankfully the man's long winded explanation is halted by a heavy gong reverberating throughout the temple. "Ah, the dinner bell. Brother Devlin, might I entrust these wounded men to your care to be seen to the hospice? And Brother Vernasus, could I trust you to round up the various travellers and Brothers who were involved in todays events to join me at my table in the hall? I would wish to speak to them. Oh, and before you go Mr Korasso, if you would be kind enough to send word to the guard for the securing of this artifact. I myself will remain behind to ensure its protection in the interim." He nods to himself as he talks, speaking with the air of a man holding no doubts his instructions will be followed. Almost absentmindedly he shifts his stance to put his misshapen arm behind his back as he moves to stand by the mirror.
 
Anticipating that the others would arrive soon, Zato walked around the great round table, scooping portions of stew into bowls. After this he started placing several bottles of wine and mead around the table. They shouldn't have been poison, he fetched them from his booze closet, where the temple stored its alcoholic delights.
 
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