The Ninth check over the dead angel. Yvainne quickly cuts out the heart and puts it in her chalice, a gift for her vampire ally. And grabs the angel's morning-star hefting the magical weapon with delight. Then Emmerick strides forward. And desecrates the last flame of Mtira. Seeing the magic struggle to overcome the flame, Mardus, Yvainne & Wasyli hurl vials of unholy water. The flames sputter and go out. The faith of Mitra is plunged into darkness, even though many of the faithful don't realize it yet.
Their wicked deed done, the Ninth rejoices and the Cathedral trembles. The pocket plane continues it's shifting from divine to infernal. The heavens turn blood red, infernal cackling is faintly heard through the halls. The floor starts to crack in places, heat & fire flaring up through the cracks.
Then the Ninth are staggered by a piercing noise.
They shake it off & see the Cathedral shake more, statues of saint's start losing their heads as stone & debris drop around them.
Then another piercing noise. This time some of the Ninth spot a comt of black cut through the blood red sky as the sound pierces their heads.
The Infernal chatter dies down.
Silence grips the Cathedral.
Then a bolt of black streaks in through the broken cathedral window, slamming into the spot where the flames were. Splashing out, the gooy black substance quickly filled the space between two of the massive stone columns that flanked the flame, reaching up to the rafters above.
It shimmered until it showed a glossy black portal. Walking through it were two Hounds of Tindalos. Emmerick stood dumb-founded for a moment, then combat was joined.
Brother Summit & Emmerick were closest and they both rushed to lock in combat with the Hounds.
Mardus, staring blankly into the horrible void had a thought. He quickly engulfed the area in a roaring blinding fire. It obscured Emmerick & Brother Summit from their allies, but also saved all the Ninth from staring at the horrible void...
Soon more Hounds rushed through the portal, some spilling out of the fire to engage the other Knot members. But they were by far the least of the Ninth's worries. For far above, at the top of the portal, near the rafters, came a hideous purple bulging spider of a truly horrifying visage.
The Spider of Leng scurried along the rafters, trying to spread insanity and confusion amongst the Knot as it fended off ranged assaults.
Meanwhile, the battle ranging below, Brother Summit did something odd. He pinned & dragged off one of the Hounds, another Hound nipping at his heels. There in a secluded spot, Brother Summit pulled out an odd arcane collar, applied it to the Hound and then subdued it to unconsciousness.
Meanwhile, back at the portal, the fight carried on. More hounds poured forth. The Ninth struggling to stem the tide. Emmerick started ignoring the Hounds and instead focusing on the columns supporting the portal while Mardus & Wasyli tried to dispel the magic of the portal. Emmerick's mace smashed chunks loose, but as he did that, black tendrils of the portal reached out & filled the void. Protecting the column. With arcane magic not dispelling, Wasyli took a different approach and shattered massive sections of the columns. While Mardus bathed the area in acid. The black goo of the portal reaching out as tendrils held the shattered fragments together, but it weakened, exposing the cracks in the foundation laid by Emmerick. Adamantine Mace in hand, hounds biting & clawing at him, the anti-paladin struck true, shattering the column & bringing down a rain of stone & debris. The portal stretched in an unnatural way and a massive purple tentacle from some unknown creature reached out, grasping blindly near Emmerick and nearly touching the anti-paladin, before it was sucked back in and the portal collapsed.
That is when the spider dropped down among the Knot & caused devastation.
The Spider of Leng relying on it blistering hallucination poison to cause confusion and agony in the ranks of the Ninth. Its massive reach and combat reflexes allowing it to catch many Knot members by surprise as casters tried to flee & melee types tried to rush forward.
A horrible battle was waged. The spider flinging about a man-sized object wrapped in web as its poisoned stinger slams into Knot member after Knot member. Yvainne and Mardus tried to keep the Knot up. And Wasyli unloaded all his arcane might. But the spider shrugs it off continuing to down combatant after combatant.
Brother Summit eventually returning to the group, having dispatched the other Hound that was on him only to find half his allies unconscious or dying.
His arrival did do one thing, it pulled the spider's attention off of the others. In a savage assault, unleashing all it's might on Brother Summit. The monk crumples under the blows. Dead in a matter of seconds.
In a fit of madness brought on by poison, Yvainne beats to death the unconscious Emmerick with her recently acquired magical morning-star from the fallen angel. Agents of Mitra watching from the celestial plane simply sighing at the irony.
Mardus pauses, considering a breath of life for his companions, but opting instead to set up to outflank the massive beast with his rogue ally before Quell falls over from repeated flail blows.
Mardus waits for the flank with Quell, only to have the spider step away as well is wracked with poison. The purple horror drops it's massive flail-like object, picks up the Monk's body & quickly spins it up in webs, giving it a new man-sized flail.
Mardus pushes forward, looking hopefully at his elven ally. Readying an attack. Quell steps forward and the two unleash a torrent of flanking blows. Mardus getting an extra attack from a critical strike from Quell, doing sizable damage with his massive elven curved blade. But it was Quell who saved the day. Landing sneak attack after sneak attack, he downed the massive purple horror.
As the fight ended more Knot members staggered under the ongoing poison somehow surviving until it ended.
Still, the damage was done, two Knot members dead. One nearly taken away by a horror of unknown origin.
As the Ninth surveyed the battle, Quell spotted something odd, one of the Hounds off near a corner was unconscious but alive, an odd looking collar around it's neck. He walked over to finish it off when Mardus bid him stop until they've examined it.
Then the Ninth realize this Hound was saved for some reason by Brother Summit. And the collar, it somehow blocks dimensional travel and has an odd arcane mark. A mark of one Professor Tiberius Feign, arcanist of Ghastenhall.
Questions & concern fill the Knot members as they look on the fallen remains of Brother Summit. Quell argues to end the hound's life immediately. But Mardus urges caution. Consult first with the monk. The conversation goes on, before the Knot settles on Mardus' idea. Quell still looks uneasy.
The Ninth call Trik to help transport them, their fallen companions & the hound... back to Sanctum. When Trik arrives he bears news. Tiadora is waiting for them. Worried, the Ninth use a scroll to bring back Emmerick immediately and they travel to Sanctum on the wings of fiendish hippogriffs.
The conversation is brief if direct. Flanked by two Erinyes, Tiadora actually bows & shows a surprising amount of respect to the Ninth. Her usual haughty sarcasm missing. She gives a boon of treasure from Thorn before grabbing the mayor of Sanctum and heading for the door. Emmerick strides forward and intercedes. Saying the Mayor, along with the rest of the town are under the Ninth Knot's control.
Tiadora gives him an odd look before having an Erinye break the man's leg & throw him at Emmerick's feet. "Suit yourself" she says, and simply walks out. An odd interaction, but the Ninth mostly ignores it. Focused instead on Brother Summit and his secrets.
The Ninth still reluctant opts to use Speak with Death to communicate with their companion. Satisfied with their friends undead answers, they raise him to get the full story.
That's when he finally tells them how he went and researched the creatures. How he spoke with Tiberius Feign. How the Arcanist gave him an odd collar to place on a hound with the mission to return one to him. Alive.
He insisted he didn't know the risk. And that it was an omission of ignorance, not malice. And that other Knot members had their secrets.
There were quite looks shared between some of the other Knot members.
But still there were more grumbles about how Summit's obsession with the creatures and his failure to speak of the risks caused the deaths of two knot members, nearly killing them all. Still, Mardus defended Summit. Insisting Summit originally drew the ire of the hounds at the Horn, where he was doing Knot business, and that he could never have known what would happen. Quell outright stated they should consider expelling Summit from the Knot for gross failure and endangering the rest of the Knot. But Wasyli was quick to point out, doing so was not their decision but Thorn's. The thought of going to the High Cardinal of Asmodeus brought a pause to all members. Mardus pressed on defending Summit, opting to wait on a final verdict until more could be known about these otherworldly creatures and their dark obsession with the Monk. And that only if no satisfactory solution could be achieved would contacting Cardinal Thorn be required.
An open vote was made. And in the end, the Ninth stayed intact, keeping Brother Summit in their ranks for the time being.
With little else to do, the Ninth turned its collective gaze on Ghastenhall and started the cold winter trek back to the city, the bound Hound of Tindalos in tow, eager to resolve the issue of Summit and his dark bond.
As they arrived less than a week later at the doorsteps of the bustling city, Shroud agents around Talengarde was already reporting wide-spread plague symptoms but no fatalities. The general populous was still oblivious to the death that stalked among them.
This winter was going to be a truly wicked one...
