Ellanise turns, attempting to use momentum to plunge the blade of her dagger into the metal hide of the automaton (attack: 22, damage: 10, sneak attack: 6). She then pulls her arm down, dragging the weapon to damage it further (attack: nat 20 for 26 — of course on the nick attack and not the attack with sneak attack — damage: 13).
Balling her other hand into a fist, she attempts to punch it, but it turns, and her attack glances off its shoulder (attack: 10).
The dagger plunges into the automaton’s side with a metallic crunch, slipping between a fractured plate. As you yank downward, the edge carves a deep furrow through the exposed inner mechanisms. It shudders as your follow-up carves clean through a cable beneath its collar joint. Something inside snaps with a high-pitched whine, as it lurches unnaturally, one arm momentarily locking at the elbow. Your punch comes in swift, but it rotates just in time. Your knuckles strike the brass plating and skid harmlessly off with a dull clang.
The automaton staggers back a step, sparks and blue-white vapor pouring from ruptured seams. The glow from its core pulses rapidly and then flares, blinding for a second. Every plate along its frame locks tight. Then, with a violent snapping hiss, the outer armor segments detach, falling away like broken shell casings and exposing the reinforced, rune-inscribed endoskeleton beneath. The air hums with a low, angry frequency as dozens of small arcane circuits across its limbs ignite in sync.
“PRIMARY FUNCTION OVERRIDDEN. ROGUE PROTOCOL ENGAGED.”
Its eye flares to a searing white. The hum now becomes more of a scream. It rears back. It's movement is no longer smooth or methodical, instead, it appears fast, erratic, and somehow, more lethal than before.
Rogue Protocol at 25% HP. It stops attempting to destabilize and restrain and begins attacking with lethal force. Gains multiattack, damage increases, loses Arcane Relay Core, but gains vulnerability to lightning damage.
The impact came sudden, like a invisible hammer hitting his whole body. He felt a sharp pain from the chest and the metallic taste of blood in his mouth. As the automaton escaped, he stood, hair over face. Käinen, liftied his head slowly. Quietly. His hair parted, revealing a manic blue eye and an unhinged red smile. That’s how it gotta be, he thought jumped back into the fray. He didn’t like pain or hardship but he did enjoy a good fight.
Swift like the wind the goliath moved, first catching his chain then the enemy’s arm. Understanding its structure better he found an easier time turning it, pressuring the enemy into another grapple. His hand moved even faster, pulling the chain in sequence. Once again the machine escapes.
It was selfish of him, but Käinen felt, if for a moment, that the creature stood there for him. A challenge to constrain. If only he would try grappling back, it would be like his days in the monastery. Adrenaline’s speaking too loud, said the voice of his mind making he realize that for a moment his reason for being there disappeared. For a moment there was no mission and a deadly, arcane security mechanism, brought him fun. In the end he wasn’t that different from the warriors of his homeland.
Notes: Käinen will try grappling again - DM, please roll a Str/Dex save (your choice) for the automaton. If the automaton succeeds, Käinen will tray a second time. If the automaton fails, Käinen will use the chain to restrain the automaton and keep his grapple. For brevity's sake I rolled Käinen's athletics check to use the chain.
The automaton surges forward with pure killing instinct, raw energy behind its every move, but you're already in position. You meet its charge, catching an arm mid-swing and twisting hard. The chain loops tight around the exposed frame, locking just beneath a key joint. The construct bucks violently, howling in defiance. It lurches and pulls, hard enough that the chain rings out like struck iron, but you maintain your hold.
The automaton’s optical core flickers wildly now, caught in an internal loop between attack directive and movement override. Its arms flail but lack leverage, limbs overpowered by your hold.
Teryn’s eyes flick to Käinen holding the writhing construct in check like some mythic beast-tamer. It’s enough. The perfect opening.
The high elf lifts one hand, fingers splayed like a conjurer pulling threads from unseen winds. Glimmering greenish light pools at his palm, spiraling with thorny sigils and the faint scent of crushed jasmine. “Let’s see how you like this,” he murmurs. The eldritch blast arcs out in a jagged line of fae-born force, its edges bristling like antlers of light.
Action: eldritch blast to hit with advantage 18, damage 3
Rowan’s giant frame looms over the thrashing construct like a threshing tower. Seeing Käinen’s chain bite deep but the automaton still bucking, he sheaths the shortsword with a metallic hiss and reaches out his newly titanic hand. “Hold ’im steady, big fella—let’s truss this mule for good.”
Veins corded with giant might, Rowan clamps a broad palm across the automaton’s plated shoulder and drives his other forearm behind its head-ring, locking the machine in an iron vise of flesh and rune-bright muscle. Sparks spit where metal grinds against his bracer, but he leans in, boots digging grooves in the ward-etched floor, adding his weight to Käinen’s chain to pin the construct fast and rob it of leverage for its lethal swing.
Action: stow short sword, grapple the automaton with DC 14
(I'm unsure if the automaton freed itself from the chain's restrained or the grappled, but if either is still active the automaton would have disadvantage with all attacks.)
Sorry, I'm beginning to enter a vacation period and while I will try to check-in at least daily, I cannot promise that I will always be able to do so. From September 1, I should be back to normal.
It thrashes like a wild engine trying to shake loose from its own frame, but Käinen holds, and with Rowan joining, it is secured even more. With a grunt and a heavy slam of boot against stone, your massive arms close in. Your bracer digs beneath the construct’s head-ring and locks it down, the sheer weight of your frame crushes its leverage. Its mechanical insides wail as it spasms, restrained beyond combat effectiveness.
Its limbs jerk, disconnected from any clear function. The glow in its eye fluctuates, flickering in time with the unstable hum rising from its exposed chest core. Then Teryn’s spell lands. The blast of force strikes low, catching the automaton in the center of its chassis. Not the most powerful strike, but just enough to tilt it ever so slightly against the locked arms holding it down. A loose plate rattles free and clangs to the floor, smoking.
It appears as though almost all of its energy is spent.
Dancing around the two restraining the metal guardian, Ellanise (attack at advantage: dirty 20, damage: 5, sneak attack: 2) jabs her knife into its chassis again. She then pushes the blade sideways (nick attack at advantage: 23, damage: 3), trying to sever everything she can. Finally, leaning in, she thrusts an elbow into it for good measure (attack at advantage: 25, damage: 8).
“With pleasure.” He answered Rowan, using the free hand to pull the chain around the automaton one more time. By this time the goliath was already used to the machine and found it hardly challenging to wrap it.
Worked finished and for the first time not only in that particular battle but since he had met that particular group of misfits, he attacked. A spiral punch, fast, precise, unnatural. Pure force, magical instead of physical, flowed as his knuckles hit the steel. The reason was known only to him at that point. The black cloth around his forearms were far from mundane. Wraps of Unarmed Power, the Wardens called it. One of the few magic items made for martial artists. Käinen always thought that whoever named it had the aesthetic sense of a child, trying too hard to be cool. Saelric? It was the only one the goliath knew that fitted the criteria, though the item seemed too old to be the wizard’s creation. Besides, with his ego it was hard to think he wouldn’t have added his own name in any work of his.
“Tell me you have chains of your own.”He spoke to the automaton, convinced enemies capable of breaking the steel he carried wouldn’t be rare from that point onward.
Notes: Käinen uses his Quick Hands feature to spend his bonus action using the chain (athletics check rolled in the campaign log: 17), once again restrained the enemy. He then uses his action to punch the automaton (17 to hit) and as per the Wraps of Unarmed Power the resulting damage will be force damage.
The automaton jolts as Ellanise’s blade slips in beneath a fractured plate, biting deep enough to draw sparks and loose a hiss of escaping pressure. You rip the knife sideways, severing a cable. The machine jerks under the repeated impacts, its internal hum sputtering out of rhythm.
Käinen wastes no moment capitalizing, your chain loops once more around the construct. This time, the motion is practiced, nearly effortless. The machine’s movements slow, its frame locked in an awkward half-turn as you draw back his fist. Your punch lands with a hollow boom, the arcane wraps flashing once on contact. Force ripples through the automaton’s frame, distorting the glow of its chest crystal.
"Integrity loss critical. Target classification: PRIMARY."
It surges suddenly, servos screaming, the whole machine straining violently against the chain. Its eye flares blinding white as both arms swing up toward Käinen—wild, brutal arcs of brass and rune-scribed plating aimed to break the one holding it still. The blows land with clang after clang, raw torque rattling through the chain links. Steam erupts with each strike, filling the air with a bitter metallic tang. The automaton no longer wishes to free itself anymore as it blindly tries to crush Käinen where he stands.
Multiattack. Normally 2 melee attacks, Rogue Protocol (25% HP threshold): 3 attacks. Melee Weapon: +7 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: (2d6 + 4) bludgeoning damage (plus 1d6 extra under Rogue Protocol). Damage: Käinen takes 14+18 (32) bludgeoning damage.
Teryn's eyes widen slightly as the automaton's blunt metallic blows know the goliath unconscious. The construct seems to be in its death throes; they must put an end to it quickly and tend to Käinen. The warlock fires another eldritch blast at the enemy's nearly-shattered core.
Rowan’s fury boils over, a thunderhead in boots. He releases the grapple and wrenches the shortsword free with a rasp like a scythe leaving stone. Towering now—storm-tall, barn-broad—he squares his stance and whips the rune-bright scimitar in a savage crosscut, shoulder to hip, a harvest-hook meant to reap iron. Without a breath between, he pivots on a heel, belt-runes pulsing, and drives the shortsword in from the opposite line—short, brutal, a threshing stroke meant to split seams. He fights like a field in gale, heedless and relentless, every swing a promise: end the work, mend the row, get our man back on his feet.
Action: let go of the restraint construct and draw short sword for an attack: hits 22 for 9 damage Nick: attack with scimitar, hits 21 for 9 magical damage
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Sorry, I'm beginning to enter a vacation period and while I will try to check-in at least daily, I cannot promise that I will always be able to do so. From September 1, I should be back to normal.
The construct thrashes, steam hissing in bursts, its voice spitting fractured syllables. Käinen’s chain still binds it low, locking its feet, but its arms swing in lethal arcs until Rowan steps in.
In one smooth motion, you release the hold, drawing your shortsword with a hiss of steel on leather. The scimitar gleams in your other hand, runes flaring like embers. The first crosscut lands with a thunderous clang, biting from shoulder to hip. Brass plating splits wide with blue-white light bursting out in a spray of sparks. The automaton jerks sideways. Before it can stabilize, you pivot on one massive heel, the scimitar whistles low, hooks in, and rips. Cables snap, pistons shatter, the core exposed in a final flash of blinding light.
For an instant, the machine freezes mid-strike, caught in a perfect stillness. Then the light dies, its body collapsing inward with a heavy crash. The sound echoes through the antechamber like the fall of a great gate. Steam spills out across the floor in curling grey clouds. The only movement now is the slow sway of the chain between Käinen’s hands and the automaton’s lifeless carcass settling in the cold glow of the wardlights dotting the walls.
Silence rushes in as the whine of the automaton’s core fades into nothing, leaving only the faint drip of condensed steam from the high arches above. The smell of scorched brass and hot oil hangs heavy in the air, mingling with the cold, dry scent of the archive halls. Käinen lies amid the curling fog at the automaton’s feet, the chain still wound around one massive forearm. His chest rises, shallow, but steady. Every few seconds, the glow of the wardlight glints off a bead of sweat along his temple.
Teryn exhales slowly, the tension bleeding from his shoulders as the last hiss of escaping steam dies away. He steps over the fallen construct, eyes sweeping over its brass frame, the warped plating, the fractured core. Up close, the detailing is truly exquisite. “Humanoid,” he murmurs with a small, crooked smirk, the glimmer of a thought already taking shape. Calling on his Patron’s gift, he lets the magic ripple over him, his form replaced with that of the Archival Retrieval Automaton. The flicker of blue light in the eye recess completes the illusion. “Well...this should make some elements of our task simpler.”
He glances over to where Käinen lies slumped, the chain still coiled around his arm like some stubborn serpent. The goliath’s breathing is steady, but the bruising already blooming along his jaw and ribs tells Teryn the fight took more out of him than he’d like to admit. He looks back toward Rowan and Ellanise, the blue glow from his false automaton eye casting a sharp glint. “He'll be out for a while without healing. Should one of us escort him to safety, or...?"
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Ellanise turns, attempting to use momentum to plunge the blade of her dagger into the metal hide of the automaton (attack: 22, damage: 10, sneak attack: 6). She then pulls her arm down, dragging the weapon to damage it further (attack: nat 20 for 26 — of course on the nick attack and not the attack with sneak attack — damage: 13).
Balling her other hand into a fist, she attempts to punch it, but it turns, and her attack glances off its shoulder (attack: 10).
The dagger plunges into the automaton’s side with a metallic crunch, slipping between a fractured plate. As you yank downward, the edge carves a deep furrow through the exposed inner mechanisms. It shudders as your follow-up carves clean through a cable beneath its collar joint. Something inside snaps with a high-pitched whine, as it lurches unnaturally, one arm momentarily locking at the elbow. Your punch comes in swift, but it rotates just in time. Your knuckles strike the brass plating and skid harmlessly off with a dull clang.
The automaton staggers back a step, sparks and blue-white vapor pouring from ruptured seams. The glow from its core pulses rapidly and then flares, blinding for a second. Every plate along its frame locks tight. Then, with a violent snapping hiss, the outer armor segments detach, falling away like broken shell casings and exposing the reinforced, rune-inscribed endoskeleton beneath. The air hums with a low, angry frequency as dozens of small arcane circuits across its limbs ignite in sync.
“PRIMARY FUNCTION OVERRIDDEN. ROGUE PROTOCOL ENGAGED.”
Its eye flares to a searing white. The hum now becomes more of a scream. It rears back. It's movement is no longer smooth or methodical, instead, it appears fast, erratic, and somehow, more lethal than before.
Rogue Protocol at 25% HP.
It stops attempting to destabilize and restrain and begins attacking with lethal force.
Gains multiattack, damage increases, loses Arcane Relay Core, but gains vulnerability to lightning damage.
- Ellanise (20)
- Käinen (10)
- Archival Retrieval Automaton (10)
- Rowan (9)
- Teryn (7)
DM : The Shade Over Runewarren | Vaelen Gravesong : Shadow of Eternal Night
"Fear is the weight we carry, love is the treasure we bury."
The impact came sudden, like a invisible hammer hitting his whole body. He felt a sharp pain from the chest and the metallic taste of blood in his mouth. As the automaton escaped, he stood, hair over face. Käinen, liftied his head slowly. Quietly. His hair parted, revealing a manic blue eye and an unhinged red smile. That’s how it gotta be, he thought jumped back into the fray. He didn’t like pain or hardship but he did enjoy a good fight.
Swift like the wind the goliath moved, first catching his chain then the enemy’s arm. Understanding its structure better he found an easier time turning it, pressuring the enemy into another grapple. His hand moved even faster, pulling the chain in sequence. Once again the machine escapes.
It was selfish of him, but Käinen felt, if for a moment, that the creature stood there for him. A challenge to constrain. If only he would try grappling back, it would be like his days in the monastery. Adrenaline’s speaking too loud, said the voice of his mind making he realize that for a moment his reason for being there disappeared. For a moment there was no mission and a deadly, arcane security mechanism, brought him fun. In the end he wasn’t that different from the warriors of his homeland.
Notes: Käinen will try grappling again - DM, please roll a Str/Dex save (your choice) for the automaton. If the automaton succeeds, Käinen will tray a second time. If the automaton fails, Käinen will use the chain to restrain the automaton and keep his grapple. For brevity's sake I rolled Käinen's athletics check to use the chain.
The automaton surges forward with pure killing instinct, raw energy behind its every move, but you're already in position. You meet its charge, catching an arm mid-swing and twisting hard. The chain loops tight around the exposed frame, locking just beneath a key joint. The construct bucks violently, howling in defiance. It lurches and pulls, hard enough that the chain rings out like struck iron, but you maintain your hold.
The automaton’s optical core flickers wildly now, caught in an internal loop between attack directive and movement override. Its arms flail but lack leverage, limbs overpowered by your hold.
DM : The Shade Over Runewarren | Vaelen Gravesong : Shadow of Eternal Night
"Fear is the weight we carry, love is the treasure we bury."
Teryn’s eyes flick to Käinen holding the writhing construct in check like some mythic beast-tamer. It’s enough. The perfect opening.
The high elf lifts one hand, fingers splayed like a conjurer pulling threads from unseen winds. Glimmering greenish light pools at his palm, spiraling with thorny sigils and the faint scent of crushed jasmine. “Let’s see how you like this,” he murmurs. The eldritch blast arcs out in a jagged line of fae-born force, its edges bristling like antlers of light.
Action: eldritch blast to hit with advantage 18, damage 3
Rowan’s giant frame looms over the thrashing construct like a threshing tower. Seeing Käinen’s chain bite deep but the automaton still bucking, he sheaths the shortsword with a metallic hiss and reaches out his newly titanic hand. “Hold ’im steady, big fella—let’s truss this mule for good.”
Veins corded with giant might, Rowan clamps a broad palm across the automaton’s plated shoulder and drives his other forearm behind its head-ring, locking the machine in an iron vise of flesh and rune-bright muscle. Sparks spit where metal grinds against his bracer, but he leans in, boots digging grooves in the ward-etched floor, adding his weight to Käinen’s chain to pin the construct fast and rob it of leverage for its lethal swing.
Action: stow short sword, grapple the automaton with DC 14
(I'm unsure if the automaton freed itself from the chain's restrained or the grappled, but if either is still active the automaton would have disadvantage with all attacks.)
Sorry, I'm beginning to enter a vacation period and while I will try to check-in at least daily, I cannot promise that I will always be able to do so. From September 1, I should be back to normal.
|| Oriace - Halfling Bard - Dragon Heist || Valerian - Elf Rogue - Wildnis || Rowan - Halfling Giant - Runewarren || Khazela - Spiritfarer Dervish - Tribute || Arista - Frost Sorcerer - Old Keep || Marasatra - Blood Mage - Avernus ||
It thrashes like a wild engine trying to shake loose from its own frame, but Käinen holds, and with Rowan joining, it is secured even more. With a grunt and a heavy slam of boot against stone, your massive arms close in. Your bracer digs beneath the construct’s head-ring and locks it down, the sheer weight of your frame crushes its leverage. Its mechanical insides wail as it spasms, restrained beyond combat effectiveness.
Its limbs jerk, disconnected from any clear function. The glow in its eye fluctuates, flickering in time with the unstable hum rising from its exposed chest core. Then Teryn’s spell lands. The blast of force strikes low, catching the automaton in the center of its chassis. Not the most powerful strike, but just enough to tilt it ever so slightly against the locked arms holding it down. A loose plate rattles free and clangs to the floor, smoking.
It appears as though almost all of its energy is spent.
- Ellanise (20)
- Käinen (10)
- Archival Retrieval Automaton (10)
- Rowan (9)
- Teryn (7)
DM : The Shade Over Runewarren | Vaelen Gravesong : Shadow of Eternal Night
"Fear is the weight we carry, love is the treasure we bury."
Dancing around the two restraining the metal guardian, Ellanise (attack at advantage: dirty 20, damage: 5, sneak attack: 2) jabs her knife into its chassis again. She then pushes the blade sideways (nick attack at advantage: 23, damage: 3), trying to sever everything she can. Finally, leaning in, she thrusts an elbow into it for good measure (attack at advantage: 25, damage: 8).
“With pleasure.” He answered Rowan, using the free hand to pull the chain around the automaton one more time. By this time the goliath was already used to the machine and found it hardly challenging to wrap it.
Worked finished and for the first time not only in that particular battle but since he had met that particular group of misfits, he attacked. A spiral punch, fast, precise, unnatural. Pure force, magical instead of physical, flowed as his knuckles hit the steel. The reason was known only to him at that point. The black cloth around his forearms were far from mundane. Wraps of Unarmed Power, the Wardens called it. One of the few magic items made for martial artists. Käinen always thought that whoever named it had the aesthetic sense of a child, trying too hard to be cool. Saelric? It was the only one the goliath knew that fitted the criteria, though the item seemed too old to be the wizard’s creation. Besides, with his ego it was hard to think he wouldn’t have added his own name in any work of his.
“Tell me you have chains of your own.” He spoke to the automaton, convinced enemies capable of breaking the steel he carried wouldn’t be rare from that point onward.
Notes: Käinen uses his Quick Hands feature to spend his bonus action using the chain (athletics check rolled in the campaign log: 17), once again restrained the enemy. He then uses his action to punch the automaton (17 to hit) and as per the Wraps of Unarmed Power the resulting damage will be force damage.
The automaton jolts as Ellanise’s blade slips in beneath a fractured plate, biting deep enough to draw sparks and loose a hiss of escaping pressure. You rip the knife sideways, severing a cable. The machine jerks under the repeated impacts, its internal hum sputtering out of rhythm.
Käinen wastes no moment capitalizing, your chain loops once more around the construct. This time, the motion is practiced, nearly effortless. The machine’s movements slow, its frame locked in an awkward half-turn as you draw back his fist. Your punch lands with a hollow boom, the arcane wraps flashing once on contact. Force ripples through the automaton’s frame, distorting the glow of its chest crystal.
"Integrity loss critical. Target classification: PRIMARY."
It surges suddenly, servos screaming, the whole machine straining violently against the chain. Its eye flares blinding white as both arms swing up toward Käinen—wild, brutal arcs of brass and rune-scribed plating aimed to break the one holding it still. The blows land with clang after clang, raw torque rattling through the chain links. Steam erupts with each strike, filling the air with a bitter metallic tang. The automaton no longer wishes to free itself anymore as it blindly tries to crush Käinen where he stands.
Multiattack. Normally 2 melee attacks, Rogue Protocol (25% HP threshold): 3 attacks.
Melee Weapon: +7 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target.
Hit: (2d6 + 4) bludgeoning damage (plus 1d6 extra under Rogue Protocol).
Damage: Käinen takes 14+18 (32) bludgeoning damage.
DM : The Shade Over Runewarren | Vaelen Gravesong : Shadow of Eternal Night
"Fear is the weight we carry, love is the treasure we bury."
Teryn's eyes widen slightly as the automaton's blunt metallic blows know the goliath unconscious. The construct seems to be in its death throes; they must put an end to it quickly and tend to Käinen. The warlock fires another eldritch blast at the enemy's nearly-shattered core.
Action: eldritch blast to hit 11 -.-, damage 1 -.-;;
Rowan’s fury boils over, a thunderhead in boots. He releases the grapple and wrenches the shortsword free with a rasp like a scythe leaving stone. Towering now—storm-tall, barn-broad—he squares his stance and whips the rune-bright scimitar in a savage crosscut, shoulder to hip, a harvest-hook meant to reap iron. Without a breath between, he pivots on a heel, belt-runes pulsing, and drives the shortsword in from the opposite line—short, brutal, a threshing stroke meant to split seams. He fights like a field in gale, heedless and relentless, every swing a promise: end the work, mend the row, get our man back on his feet.
Action: let go of the restraint construct and draw short sword for an attack: hits 22 for 9 damage
Nick: attack with scimitar, hits 21 for 9 magical damage
Sorry, I'm beginning to enter a vacation period and while I will try to check-in at least daily, I cannot promise that I will always be able to do so. From September 1, I should be back to normal.
|| Oriace - Halfling Bard - Dragon Heist || Valerian - Elf Rogue - Wildnis || Rowan - Halfling Giant - Runewarren || Khazela - Spiritfarer Dervish - Tribute || Arista - Frost Sorcerer - Old Keep || Marasatra - Blood Mage - Avernus ||
The construct thrashes, steam hissing in bursts, its voice spitting fractured syllables. Käinen’s chain still binds it low, locking its feet, but its arms swing in lethal arcs until Rowan steps in.
In one smooth motion, you release the hold, drawing your shortsword with a hiss of steel on leather. The scimitar gleams in your other hand, runes flaring like embers. The first crosscut lands with a thunderous clang, biting from shoulder to hip. Brass plating splits wide with blue-white light bursting out in a spray of sparks. The automaton jerks sideways. Before it can stabilize, you pivot on one massive heel, the scimitar whistles low, hooks in, and rips. Cables snap, pistons shatter, the core exposed in a final flash of blinding light.
For an instant, the machine freezes mid-strike, caught in a perfect stillness. Then the light dies, its body collapsing inward with a heavy crash. The sound echoes through the antechamber like the fall of a great gate. Steam spills out across the floor in curling grey clouds. The only movement now is the slow sway of the chain between Käinen’s hands and the automaton’s lifeless carcass settling in the cold glow of the wardlights dotting the walls.
Silence rushes in as the whine of the automaton’s core fades into nothing, leaving only the faint drip of condensed steam from the high arches above. The smell of scorched brass and hot oil hangs heavy in the air, mingling with the cold, dry scent of the archive halls. Käinen lies amid the curling fog at the automaton’s feet, the chain still wound around one massive forearm. His chest rises, shallow, but steady. Every few seconds, the glow of the wardlight glints off a bead of sweat along his temple.
DM : The Shade Over Runewarren | Vaelen Gravesong : Shadow of Eternal Night
"Fear is the weight we carry, love is the treasure we bury."
Teryn exhales slowly, the tension bleeding from his shoulders as the last hiss of escaping steam dies away. He steps over the fallen construct, eyes sweeping over its brass frame, the warped plating, the fractured core. Up close, the detailing is truly exquisite. “Humanoid,” he murmurs with a small, crooked smirk, the glimmer of a thought already taking shape. Calling on his Patron’s gift, he lets the magic ripple over him, his form replaced with that of the Archival Retrieval Automaton. The flicker of blue light in the eye recess completes the illusion. “Well...this should make some elements of our task simpler.”
He glances over to where Käinen lies slumped, the chain still coiled around his arm like some stubborn serpent. The goliath’s breathing is steady, but the bruising already blooming along his jaw and ribs tells Teryn the fight took more out of him than he’d like to admit. He looks back toward Rowan and Ellanise, the blue glow from his false automaton eye casting a sharp glint. “He'll be out for a while without healing. Should one of us escort him to safety, or...?"