Love Is More Thicker Than Water

It all began when the Fighters Guild threw a party in honor of one of their Praefecti, a Fae named Merit. Ever inquisitive, Merit discovered a rabbit hole, and went down it; when he did not emerge after some time, Arao, Kaden, Greg, and several others went down after him. They discovered that the warren was far more than it seemed, and after exploring for some distance encountered columns of crystal that, when touched, activated into a storm of razor-sharp shards intent on butchering anything they encountered. Fortunately, with the use of Merit and Kaden's magic, the crystals were obliterated. However, when the party emerged, they discovered that the exit was actually a giant alabaster stairway leading into the sky; and three clusters of those same, murderous crystals ringed it, so that there was no way off of the stairway except to continue climbing. After finally reaching the top and enduring several more ordeals, they were finally able to return home.

However, the existence of the crystals bothered Arao and Merit; they feared that some innocent soul would come upon them and activate them, with disastrous consequences. Therefore, Merit made some sticky-bombs imbued with his magic, and together with Arao lead a party including Sigarni, a draconian Dragoon named Aelwyn, the amazonian cyborg April Mays, and the noble Knight Ulvric Faircliff. They sought to plant the sticky-bombs on the bases of the crystals, and letting the magic in them create a strong gravitational field that would crush them and render them harmless.

Two out of the three bombs were planted successfully; Ulvric and Aelwyn were able to creep up and secure the bombs with no trouble. Ironically, Sigarni, a trained rogue, stumbled and fell in a rare show of clumsiness, and managed to activate the remaining crystal pillar, instead.

A desperate battle ensued as that one pillar managed to create a maelstrom of crystal shards that managed to slice open everyone in the party to some degree. Arao, who had been shielding Aelwyn personally, suffered a shard of it lodging in his thigh underneath the edge of one cuisse, and Aelwyn lost many scales as the pair beat a hasty retreat back toward the forest. Sigarni and Ulvric were able to shatter a few, as was April with her marksmanship, but Merit was able to contain the most crystals with the use of his magic. The shards finally assembled themselves into a giant golem, which attacked April, Ulvric, and Sigarni with a crystalline whip in one hand, and sent a pulse of sonic energy at Merit, Aelwyn, and Arao. The trees managed to protect the latter three from the pulse, and April and Ulvric managed to be protected from serious harm by their armor, but Siga was laid out and fell unconcious as a result of the strike.

Bravely, Ulvric leapt up and climbed the golem, striking at it at close quarters, while April groped about for the remaining sticky-bomb. She managed to secure it with a hard punch to the golem's leg at about the same moment that Ulvric drove his sword into the creature's head. The paired attacks proved to be the being's death-blow, and it collapsed into a pile of small, jagged rubble. A moment later, the two pillars also finally succumbed to the crushing magic field with which they had been constrained, and also fell.

The resulting shock wave also managed to crack the stairway that had been surrounded by the crystals. Within moments, huge cracks had formed in the alabaster, and the staircase itself collapsed, huge chunks of stone falling hundreds of feet from the sky into the surrounding countryside. Thankfully, this unforeseen result caused little collateral damage, though Siga and Arao had a close call as two particularly large chunks plummeted toward them and, for a moment, appeared to have crushed them both. Thankfully, they managed to emerge unscathed, and after receiving healing from Merit, the party was ready to return back home.

This did not prove to be the end of their adventure, however. As the weary travelers made their way through the forest, they heard a loud scream of distress. They rushed to investigate, and discovered a petite, auburn-haired maiden being menaced by a gang of bandits. The adventurers challenged them, and the bandits fought them, starting off with a cowardly strike at Ulvric's horse, Silverwind, and a side ambush from two archers hidden in the trees. Siga was shot, and grappled in a life-or-death struggle with her attacker until Aelwyn was able to get him off of her. April shot the other archer and came to aid Ulvric as he was swarmed by bandits, though they never presented much threat to the mounted and very skilled Knight. Merit also sought to help, and attacked the leader of the bandits before he could try to strike at Ulvric again, drawing the brigand's attention. The bandit leader wounded Merit sorely before Arao could come to his aid and run his spear through the blackguard's heart.

The remaining archer, seeing that his comrades were slain, tried to flee. Siga, who so far had had no luck at all that day, managed to hamstring him with a thrown dagger, and Aelwyn finished him off.

April, meanwhile, went to aid the maiden. The girl, who called herself Alora, proved effusive in her gratitude, kissing April and praising her highly. Yet something did not seem right about the girl; she looked at the others with a predatory sort of air, and Ulvric, though he was not sure just what was off about her, sensed that some mischief was afoot.

Over the next few days, Alora worked enchanting magic over April, seducing her and convincing her that Alora was to be the love of her life, and that they should go down to Emerald Lake and be secretly married in front of Alora's family. Luckily, Merit, Ulvric, and Aelwyn were all alert enough to see April leave the Guild with Alora, and, sending word to Arao who also came, they followed the pair down to the lake.

There, Alora was introducing April to her family, all right, but they were not comely humans as she appeared. They were, instead, rather repulsive, fanged, froglike beings. It seemed that Alora had been exiled, for eating her future husband the night before her arranged marriage. They had hoped that Alora would die in the world outside the water, but the adventurers had come upon her, and once Alora had been able to gain access to April's canteen of water, she had been able to work her magic and enchant the woman to lure her down to the lake. The creatures' law code dictated that anyone who could bring a willing sacrifice with them could be allowed back into their realm. Therefore, Alora was not going to marry April -- she planned to drown her.

The adventurers ran down to rescue April, attacking both Alora and the frog-people, but they proved much more resilient to attacks than they appeared. Arao threw his spear at Alora and landed a blow that would have run through a normal mortal, but this merely pierced her and seemed to antagonize her, and she plucked the shaft out and used it to try to fight off Ulvric as the Knight attacked. Fortunately, this distracted her from her attempted murder, and April, realizing that she had been deceived, also joined in the fight.

It also appeared that Alora's kind could manipulate water, either hardening it via freezing, or vaporizing it via boiling. Fortunately, before Alora could boil Ulvric and April where they stood, Aelwyn threw his glaive and pierced her through the back of the head, killing her.

The frog-people dove off into the water, though not before the attacks on them had angered one couple to the point that they summoned their pet tentacle monster to attack the party. It managed to slap Merit hard onto dry land, and tried to entangle Ulvric, but the Knight fought off their advances and managed to escape. Aelwyn was not quite so lucky, and was grappled with and possibly molested a little before the creature noticed that its masters had escaped, and retreated into the lake to let the party go at last.

Thus was April enchanted and then rescued, and returned safely to the Fighters Guild, once more.