We all meet at an inn:
Lilarcor has a point there. Since I have such a nice sword now, why don't I put it to good use?
Yeah, why not? But first, a few reminders.
The Codex' current XP. We still have a long way to go until the next level up.
Mencar Pebblecrusher was the strongets of 140 foes we've slain so far.
He should've known better than calling me 'puny'.
It seems we've left some a unlooted before.
Sacrilege!
Indeed, we correct this error right away.
We meet Anomen, the angry
gay warrior priest of Helm.
A priest? You better take some two steps back, ok?
Is the Codex a force of evil or a force of good? I think this is a very interesting question.
I am no weak-willed good two-shoes. I take what I want, when I want!
Well, yes, but You do fight for the incline, meaning You are ultimately a force of good, even though your methods can be a bit... extreme. Right?
I guess, if you put it that way... Although I still think we should kill the priest. Just in case.
Maybe later. Besides, he's a joinable NPC, so no XP for him. And no good loot.
Meh.
Scram, You are not worth my time.
The Codex' fighting prowess' is challenged by a local patron.
These people never learn.
Surly? His parents must have really hated him when he was born.
Maybe it's a nickname?
So, it's his friends who hate him. Hardly better, if you ask me.
We're fighting for money? That kind of came out of nowhere. Whatever, though.
The Codex and Amalas step into the arena. Our foe seems unarmed.
Well, they did not ask me to disarm myself, so I am going to assume I can use my two-handed +3 sword of bloody dismemberment in this friendly and non-lethal arena match.
Hell yeah!
Ha! Die! Good job, sword!
Thanks!
Despite being unarmed (or was he?) Amalas, managed to inflict some serious wounds to our hero. The Codex, however, prevails in the end. It also seems that Amalas' arena career has come to an abrupt end.
Accidents happen, you know. He knew the risks, etc.
We get some modest XP for this mini-quest.
Basilisks from the previous game would like to have a word with you about those XP being 'modest'.
Tell her, she's gonna need... Nah, too easy.
We move on, to the back of the Copper Coronet.
Oh, sweet. I always wanted to see
other people die horribly while fighting wildlife.
You tend to hold your grudges long, don't You?
Remember to repeat this question if we meet that Irenicus guy again.
Risking your life to amuse people. Gotta respect that. Except, I do this all the time and nobody respects me.
Because we can load the game if You die?
It still hurts!
Slaves! That changes... nothing?
Oh, I will definitely enjoy.
Damn spoilsport.
Yeah! Hit him where it hurts!
Twice!
Ok, that was seriously disappointing. I want my money back.
You did not pay anything.
That is beside the point. I'm going to have a word with the manager.
He's probably in the back. Let's go there.
Smooth diplomacy there. I think he called security.
He
is the security here.
He called more security, then.
Never the easy way, huh?
Five Four guards stand in our way.
Die!
I love the taste of blood in the morning!
Three guards are down, but the remaining two are spellcasters and have protected themselves from normal missiles.
Pity, as shooting a lot of normal arrows is my preferred way of dealing with spellcasters.
I do have magic arrows too, though.
Shit, I've run out.
Eat lightning, fuc-!
And not a moment too soon. Good thing we had that Wand of Lightning ready. The Codex manages to fire it at the guard just as Hold Person kicks in and paralyzes him.
Some lightning bolts bounce back and hurt our hero. No biggie.
-ktard! Ha! Now, I want to see the manager.
There's omeone non-hostile here.
Maybe that's him.
The Codex is not aligned with anyone. I work alone.
A self-proclaimed proud warrior. This is going to be good.
Wow. Five seconds from being proud to begging. I knew it would not last long, but still.
Wrong? I don't see anything wrong in that.
Yeah ok, I agree, if that will shut you up already.
Finally, End Dialogue. I was starting to lose hope there.
Why am I not surprised? Also: bullshit. A cell door without a conventional lock. ...Right...
We are almost out of spells, so it would be nice to rest first. We meet another hostile guard on our way.
Persistence of Lehtinan's employees' is much higher than their skill level, by the way.
Just like in
Chocolate.
Lehtinan is the owner, but he does not do any actual work, it seems. To rest, we need to talk to Bernard.
16 hours later The Codex is all ready to rock and roll.
We enter the arena area, hidden in shadows.
Did I just sneak up on a wolf? Damn, I'm awesome.
No challenge for our hero.
Mmmm... tastes like chicken!
We cast some spells to prepare ourselves against the beastmaster.
We are going to need them if he indeed is
The Beastmaster.
Well, he does have a panther, but not a black one. Impostor!
A horde of animals attacks The Codex.
I knew it. He's actually
Ace Ventura!
Anyway, we cast Cloud Kill and retreat.
You've got some balls, to oppose me! Here, have another. One made of fire!
Ah, nothing like the smell of burning bear fur.
You've got some weird taste, I'll tell You that.
We also send a Stinking Cloud into the fray. One can never be too careful.
I bet he's not even going to notice stinking cloud, with all the animals living there anyway.
The two cloud spells working together are pretty deadly. Stinking Cloud knocks enemies unconscious while Cloud Kill slowly suffocates those, who were not killed right away.
Soon, everything is dead.
Almost everything, it seems.
I think You can handle a gibberling, even a mutated one?
Sure can.
The fuck? Where did this leopard come from?
Ah, whatever. nice job sword!
Yeeeehaw!
Oh, and there's the black panther.
Was he The Beastmaster after all? Confused now.
Awesome. I love you, sword! No homo.
That's nice, but I have a name, you know.
Right.
There is some cool stuff on the beastmaster's corpse.
Like this nice bow.
Four attacks @ THAC0 5 =
We probably won't be using this spell. If The Codex gets stoned, it is game over for us.
I bet you've been dying to make that pun.
We still learn it, though. Easy XP for the win.
A minotaur? Does that even count as a beast?
We manage to shoot him three times before he closes in to melee.
I like this bow.
That concludes the beast slaying. Now on to freeing the slaves.
I have a better idea first.
Wait, are you going to betray the slaves?
Just watch.
Why would I fuck up Lehtinan for free if I can make him pay me for it first?
I probably won't be using this armor. Oh well, I can always sell it.
Key? You shouldn't have...
...I already have one.
This is the easier way of obtaining the key, but I think it makes the beastmaster disappear (meaning no Tuigan Bow and much less XP), so it is better to talk to Lehtinan after killing him. I'm not sure what kind of armor Lehtinan gave us for the information, but obviously it was either a plate mail or a full plate mail (probably the former).
We have the option of killing Hendak instead of helping him, but it pays off more to be the good guys.
Luckily for him.
Suit yourself. Just let me get some popcorn.
Hendak and his friends do not really need any help here, but we still killsteal some XP from them.
Hardly a challenge, but at least some target practice.
Hold still!
No mercy!
Well, at least the unemployment rate in the slums should go down a bit.
Actually, I pride myself to be the agent of chaos in this case. Uh, don't let me interrupt you.
We missed a bouncer.
Already on it.
Done. Hendak, stop lagging behind.
That's better.
Wow, that's a lot of XP! I'm glad I helped you.
Freeing slaves? Do I look like
Daenerys Targaryen to you?
I bet he wishes You did.
'Items of value'? You have my limited attention.
Sewers again? *sigh*
Lehtinan had the decency to drop some nice loot.
This spell is cool because it insta-kills all summoned creatures. There is however a huge competition for level 6 spell slots, so I don't think we will be using it a lot.
Nishruu(s?) are very annoying to spellcasters, because they destroy memorized spells (as if they were used) with each hit. If I remember correctly, they are also immune to spells and magical weapon damage. Which reminds me, we should get a normal sword, just in case.
We of course learn both spells.
Helping Hendak has granted us a discount at Bernard's store.
I am The Codex and this is my favourite store in the Copper Coronet.
I don't remember this item from my previous playthroughs. Must be a mod thing? Anyway, anything that allows us to carry more stuff is
.
This guy just won't shut the hell up. Are we going to ease his pain?
Eventually.
As we explored the sewers in the previous update, the way to the slavers' compound is free.
In an unusual influx of sharp wits, we decide to hide in shadows before entering.
This proves to be a good idea.
So much hostility around.
'Reasons don't matter to the dead.' I like it.
We are heavily outnumbered so, we try to cast... well, something. I forgot. Anyway, it fails.
Man, you suck.
You failed to cast the spell, though.
Damn, there are a lot of them.
Have some horror, people!
Three of eight are affected. Could be worse.
Could be better.
The Codex is receiving a lot of damage, so we cast Mirror Image to save ourselves.
One down!
Seven to go.
Ow! Fuck!
This is going badly. I have an idea.
Wand of lightning?
Wand of lightning.
Revenge of The Codex: Electric Boogaloo!
We killed at least one more slaver, but their cleric summoned some skeletons.
Ok, time out. There's a door back to the sewers nearby, let's use it.
We're resorting to cheese then? Fine by me.
Let's rest for a mo- Wait, who the fuck...
Did You forget that enemies in this game can switch areas too? Ah, You died.
Death count: 12
Load autosave.
I forgot that enemies in this game can switch locations too.
Shit happens.
Loading the autosave puts us in roughly the same situation as we were seconds before death. But this time no one follows The Codex into the sewers. We heal up.
Upon re-entering we immediately give everyone Horror treatment.
Fear me!
And follow up with some more lightning.
You are all dead men walking!
Well, the two skeletons were definitely dead men walking, at least.
Death count: 13
Load game.
It seems the the lightning bolts backfired a bit. We should aim more carefully next time.
Agreed.
Entering AGAIN, we take care of the nearest slaver first.
DIE!
HA!
Special effects made by this wand look very impressive, but I'm starting to believe we are using it wrong.
How come?
It seems each lightning deals 1d6 damage, so the wand deals 6d6 in total, providing all the bolts hit the same target.
Oh. Well, that's still pretty cool, but not as awesome as I thought.
Bleed!
HAHA!
Five slavers plus two skeletons to go.
Oh yeah, come to daddy!
HAHAHA!
4+2.
HAHAHAHA!
You want a piece of me?
I've never pictured You as a Britney Spears fan.
I've never pictured you as a chunks of meat scattered around. Oh, wait. I have.
HERE HAVE SOME WAND!
2+2 left.
I kill you!
Do you know what's better than a dead priest?
No, what?
No idea. A dead priest is pretty fucking neat!
Right... It seems the last slaver panicked.
Oh yeah!? If I were him I would commit suicide, to save myself some pain!
46 damage! Good job, Lilarcor!
At your service, boss!
Don't you turn your back on me!
And done. We actually survived.
you seem surprised.
Well, yes. I don't see how we did something right this time, comparing to previous attempts.
Who cares, let's loot.
One of the slavers had a pretty nice bow.
Composite long bow +1. I had one of these back in the previous game. Next!
Oh, look, we missed Captain Haegan.
Yeah, there were so many of these slavers, I've lost my count.
The good captain packs quite a punch.
Nah, no problem. Give me a minute.
Sure, no hurry...
...
...
...
...
Are you done already?
...
Codex?
Oh.
Death count: 14
Good thing we saved in between fighting the slavers and Captain Haegan.
Loading.
Wait what just happened?
Captain Haegan killed You?
No, I don't think that was the case.
This thing killed me.
You must have stepped on it while running away from the captain.
I was only repositioning myself!
Ok, disarmed. Should be easy now.
OUCH! Mother fucker.
The Codex engages in a shootout, which does not initially go our way.
DAMNIT! FUCK! SHIT!
Captain Haegan is not to be trifled with, it seems.
We manage to heal ourselves just in time. Also, Captain Haegan loses his composure after being hit in the head with Lilarcor's blade one too many time.
I've tasted his brain. It was rather bland.
HELL YEAH!
Captain Haegan dropped a prety nice armor, as well as a key of some kind.
I sense potential
in the armor department.
We also got some fire arrows from this fight.
And some gems.
This should open some doors for us. I'm not sure why I did not identify the armor.
My guess would be: because you suck.
Oh, look a troll.
Hmph. I would like to see him try to out-troll The Codex.
There are actually two trolls.
Still not impressive. Any thread here has more trolls than that.
Lucky we found these fire arrows, huh?
Yes. What a fortunate coincidence.
Ok, since you are imprisoned in here and apparently can't leave on your own, I will assume you are not a disguised demon like that Albert lad I met sometime ago.
Don't care. Take this gold and go away.
You certainly have a way with children.
Yeah. Try to avoid churches, though. Trust me on this one.
Not much XP...
Greater doped gangbangers would disagree.
...but the reputation increase is always nice.
Reputation of 12 still does not give us any discounts. We will have to work on it some more.
Moving on through the compound.
Slowly and carefully.
There are two guys here.
Let's kill them.
I like your way of thinking, boss!
I bet I can make the first kill here. I'm not counting on any bonuses from Captain Haegan, though.
There are many more enemies in that room, so we employ our good friend, wand of lightning to help us.
Don't forget about me! I want blood too!
We deprive Slaver Wizard of line of sight required to cast spells, forcing him to come closer.
And die.
Now, that's what I'm talking about!
The other wizard has mirror images on him, so we get rid of them with Magic Missile.
He manages to cast some AOE spell, damaging both The Codex and a nearby Slaver Guard.
You're going to pay for this!
Damn, he recast his spell.
Annoying me will cost you two additional buckets of pain!
Another Magic Missile to the rescue.
And the wizard is down.
What does his liver taste like, Lilarcor?
It's good. GOOD.
I'm not sure if I can work with you poeple.
Who are you calling people!?
Slurp, slurp. Tasty blood, yes!
Haha!
Bleh, this one tastes like dog food.
Yeah, You don't have to make these comments every time, you know.
Damn, how many of them are there?
Kill them all! KILL THEM ALL! KiLl tHEm AlL!
I think Lilarcor has lost it.
Why? He seems fine to me.
Fall before the might of Lilarcor! I am unstoppable!
Hey, I was here too, you know.
Blood!
I'm really glad this fight is over.
We find a mysterious magical cloak.
Oh, come on! That's a Cloak of Protection +1, and you know it.
Could be...
Arrgh!
We find this interesting potion. It only works for one round, though.
There are some containers to loot.
Sweet!
Of course, we search for traps first.
The only interesting things we find are in the trapped chest. A wand of some kind...
Wand of fear. Or was it paralysis?
...and four darts.
Ok, seriously, what the fuck is that?
Yes, I did not expect Yuan-Ti here.
Let's kill it!
HAHAHAHAHA!
But wait, there's more!
Is it an animal or... How should I treat it?
Let's rip its heart out!
Sounds reasonable.
Oh yes, bathe me in blood!
Another trap. These slavers must have been slightly paranoid.
I'll say. They also left their two guard snakes in the room.
Healing potion. Always nice to find one of these.
What. This is just stupid. How are these stairs even usable? Does everybody remember to just hop over the trapped plank?
ARRRRRGGGHHH! IT BURNS!
It seems we failed to find one of the traps.
86 damage! I almost died there!
We save some more enslaved children.
I'm really hoping Hendak makes all this worth my time.
Move on, damn it. Any more oppressed minors around? No? Good!
Finishing the quest nets us another point of reputation.
That's nice, but I want my reward.
Yes, finally!
That's all for today, readers. See You next time, when...
Now just wait a minute! WHAT did we get as the reward?
No idea, I forgot to screenshot it. We'll check it in the next update.
And when will that be? In fucking 2014?
----------
Next time: We explore the rest of the slums and then... well, we will see, I guess.
I remind everyone that You can vote for future quests The Codex should undertake. The list of available ones can be found in the first post of the thread.