"WHAT THE HELL ARE THEY!?" jemali shouted over the buzzing din of the midges that surrounded our bodies. "MY WEAPON IS USELESS!"
"I DONT KNOW!" i screamed back, "BUT THEY ITCH LIKE MAD!"
"ITCHES?!" he questioned, his voice distorted by the agitated throng,"I DONT LIKE 'EM!"
i couldnt argue with him there, but we managed to take them all down, once again it was jemali's expedient amp damage that turned the battle our way.
a little further on and we were met by three swarms of them, including a boss pack.
"running is good for us!" i called to jemali who was keeping pace with me, "it keeps us fit!"
he shot me the look he had learned from akara.
we found an old building entrance and, ever curious and glad of some shade, we ventured inside. it was full of skeletons and every time we killed one, it got up again! after a while discovered that lurking in the background were bosses who could revive skeletons. once we knew that the battle went much easier. this place had several levels and, on level two, we found an ancient and dusty waypoint. it looked as though it had never been used.
---
"i dont want to go in there", jemali looked nervous as we stood before the small round hole in the desert floor and, peering into the cool darkness i admit i felt similer trepidations.
"look on the bright side," i replied, remembering that, as leader, it was my job to maintain morale,"they wont have to dig holes for us if we die underground"
jemali silently followed me into the gloom.
--
"This is disgusting!" jemali expressed himself, drawing handfuls of gunge from his face and body "what made it explode like that?!"
it was pretty bad in that room. green goo was hanging in long sticky threads from the ceiling and the walls ran with slime. the floor was 2 feet deep with maggot corpses and green entrails quivered and wrapped themselves around our legs, not yet convinced the battle was done.
i popped a glittering box in the corner and the staff that cain had mentioned flew up into the air under some exotic power and landed with a dull plop into the sea of guts, rapidly sinking to the bottom. i cast a portal and just before i stepped through i called back to jemali, who was still trying to rid himself of the remains soaking into his clothes, "grab the staff would you mate, i'll get the beers in" and with that i stepped into lut gholein.
---
we returned to NM lower kurast for a change of scene and filled up on gold and rejuv potions.
--
gambling results for another 2.64 million gold. (noticed typo in first gambling update, total gold i can carry is 2.64 million)
57 useless war axes 4 rare
29 useless nagas 3 rare
0 beserker axes
damn it.
---
"what happened?" jemali was lying on a bed in atmas back room.
"you got your butt kicked old chap," i told him, "but we got the
amulet! "
"great" he whispered, without much conviction, before passing out again.
"want to talk about what happened down there blue?" atma's soothing voice washed over me and i shuddered as i recalled the events.
"we entered the second level of the claw viper temple", i began to recount the story for her, allowing my aching body to sink into the soft bed. "we were cautious, hugging the wall and moving slowly. we rounded the top corner, the opposite side to the known boss pack that guards the alter, and then, then.."
i lapsed into silence for a moment and let atma wipe the blood leaking from the bandage on my forehead.
"they were so fast! the boss was extra fast, extra strong and they all had an orange aura! we were surrounded in a second and jemali.. " i glanced across at my unconscious friend, "didnt stand a chance. he went down in a heart beat and i was alone. i swallowed potion after potion but i couldnt strike them back! they hit so fast and every hit knocked me into the next one, i was dazed, confused, unable to respond"
the tears of fear and rage mingled with the blood on my face and my whole body trembled without control.
"i knew i was going to die down there, all was lost... then, by pure chance one of the vipers moved round to try to hit me, leaving a gap in their circle. at that moment another one smashed into me again and i was knocked back into the gap. i saw my chance and, dodging and weaving i pelted up the altar steps and with my last remaining strength i smashed it open, grabbed the amulet and cast a portal.
during my escape, jemali had regained consciousness and crawled, bleeding and broken on his belly to the alter where he collapsed. i grabbed hold of his armour and fell back through the portal into town. my life ball was at 87 and i had no potions left, we didnt manage to kill even one of them"
Atma looked at me for a moment, and, as i slipped into a disquiet sleep i heard her say "this town owes you a debt that cannot be repaid"
---
major equipment change. the helm that norm baal dropped and that i used a socket quest on, has been replaced with this one...
Berserker's Assault Helmet
Defense: 31
Durability: 50 of 50
(Barbarian Only)
Required Strength: 55
Required Level: 42
Item Version: 1.10 Expansion
Item Level: 79
Fingerprint: 0xbe848bbe
+2 to Barbarian Skill Levels
i sacrificed 158 life and +1 to battle orders (aggregate) but i gained resistances, much more def, faster r/w, better damage, faster attack speed, improved battle cry, and most importantly...
this... great new look..
---
it took us several days to recover sufficiently to get out and about again. but it wasnt the physical damage that weighed us down, warriors are proud of external scars and wear them as badges of honour.
it was the way we had been routed by those vipers, and the fact that pure luck, simple chance was responsible for our survival.
something happened though that snapped us out of our mental mire, a piece of news that came from jerhyn himself. news so horrible that, for a moment or two after i relayed it to jemali i wondered if he had understood, such was his silent demeanour..
the harem had been slaughtered to a girl as they hid in the palace.
jemali's face blackened and his eyes hardend to slits of rage as the news filtered home to him. taking his bec-de-corbin in his mighty grasp he sloughed off his bandages and made like a man possessed toward the palace, with fire burning in his soul...
---
we cut them all down, even the pi spectors that came upon us were no match for jemali's rage.
we found ourselves in a bizzare maze and twice went the wrong way before we fell upon the summoner and tore him to the ground.
we made our way directly to the tomb indicated by the symbols as being the right one, determined to cut our vengance for the harem girls from the hide of durial.
when we stepped inside however we were greeted by waves of pi apparitions. they slowed us down to a crawl.
deciding that revenge is a dish best served cold, we returned to town to rest and await a new dawn.
---
trying to kill all the pi/undead monsters on the way to durial was taking too long, so we adopted a strategy of running past them to unlock the map, then tp'ing to town and taking the wp back and trying a different route until we finally found the staff chamber.
durial took a while because of his freeze aura but wasnt dangerous at all.
the harem girls were avenged.
---
the sea voyage to kurast was uneventful. as the days past we reflected on our past achievments and our wounds healed. we sang shanty songs and listened to the ocean. we arrived in kurast refreshed, healed and ready to do battle with evil once again.
---
found a nice sc..
Shimmering Small Charm of Balance
All Resistances +3
5% Faster Hit Recovery
dont have room for any more so when i find a nice one it is always a hard choice which to drop.
--
points.
96 for norm
96 for NM
43 for hell so far
-75 for clvl= 160
--
More than half of the LIs can't be broken by the low level curse, even quite normal skeletons stay immune.
