The party cautiously approached the ruins of Dragonspear Castle, and discovered the remains of a campsite on the outskirts of its outer walls. Judging from the scattered bones and tattered, shredded canvas remains of the tents, it looked like an adventuring company had come to grief there some time ago, likely ambushed in their sleep by raiders, or worse. “Perhaps they failed to set a watch,” Grandur said, gingering toeing a jawbone that lay half-buried in the muck. “They never do,” Siegfried observed. He conjured the portal his Sequestered Sanctuary and ushered his friends in for a rest before the party got down to business. Several hours later, the adventurers emerged, ready for anything. They crept up the steep, sloping pathway towards the main gates. The main entrance to the inner bailey had seen many battles over the years, as evidenced by the damaged turrets and missing gate. Although the northern tower retained much of its roof, nothing of the southern tower above the wall remained. In front of the gate were bristling walls of sharpened wooden stakes and rotting mantlets—large, freestanding wooden shields—with broken arrows sticking out of them. Sometime after the gate was breached, 7-foot-high wooden palisades were built to fortify the entrance and limit the flow of traffic through the gate, but time had obviously gotten the better of them as well. Beyond that, however, the party’s attention was drawn to the sprawled skeleton of an ancient dragon that lay entangled in the roof of the castle’s main keep. “I’m sure that’s just a skeleton and not a dracolich,” Varien declared with a confidence he didn’t entirely feel. Everywhere the party members looked, the ground was littered with bones, bits of rusted armor, and forsaken weapons. Varien’s eyes caught sight of a construction of much newer vintage than the castle proper. Standing between the castle barbican and the main keep was the crumbled shell of a stone temple, its gateway arch carved with the symbol of Tempus, a blazing sword held upright against a shield, though time and vandalism had taken its toll on this ruin within a ruin. “That’ll be the Hold of the Battle Lions, then,” Varien said. “A holy garrison stationed here to keep the evil below at bay. They failed to contain the threat.” Varien turned to his friends. “Draw your swords,” he said, pulling Fiendsbane from its scabbard and lighting it up. “This place isn’t going to be as quiet as it looks.” He manifested his protective aura of spirit guardians and began to walk towards the Hold of the Battle Lions. “Remind me of the name of the fiend we’re here to murder?” Siegfried asked. “Baazka,” Varien replied resolutely. “And none of us care about the element of surprise?” Siegfried asked. “Not particularly,” Varien said, his shoulder pauldrons emphasizing his shrug. Siegfried cleared his throat. “BAAZKA! COME BRING YOUR BITCH ASS OUT HERE! OR FOREVER WIN THE CONTEMPT OF THOSE WHO HAVE COME TO CLAIM YOUR HEAD!” The half-orc’s roar reverberated against the ruined walls of the castle, echoing until there were many overlapping shouts. “Siegfried,” Varien said quietly but intently. “Perhaps you’d consider this out of character for me, but I would like to warn you, in case you’ve somehow forgotten, that there is a portal to the Nine Hells somewhere beneath this castle, so if we were to make, say, too much of a ruckus, we might bite off more than we can chew very quickly here.” “Are you saying we don’t want to fight an infernal army today?” Bob quipped. Siegfried took another breath and hollered operatically. “I AM JEERING AT BAAZKA THE COWARD WHO HAS FAILED TO SHOW UP TO THIS CHALLENGE! BAAZKA IS A LILY-LIVERED, LEMURED SIMP! LESSER THAN ANY LEMURE, ACTUALLY, INSTEAD BEING SO CHICKENSHIT SCARED OF A PISSANT MORTAL THAT HE WOULDN’T SHOW WHEN PEOPLE CAME TO BURN DOWN HIS HOUSE!” The deathly silence of the castle ruin was peeled back by Siegfried’s oratory, which seemed to stir the very mists that obscured its derelict halls as his echoing taunts reached every nook and cranny. But the deathly quiet returned all too quickly. Siegfried cast mind blank and protection from evil and good on himself. The fog continued to roil. “LET IT BE KNOWN THAT BAAZKA SENDS CLOUDS TO FIGHT HIS BATTLES!” Siegfried shouted. “HONESTLY BELAPHOSS PUT UP A BETTER FIGHT! AND HE DID IT WHILE CRYING!” “Siegfried, I don’t know if you’re getting your devils and demons mixed up here,” Varien said. “I’m relying on the systemic hatred between devils and demons to work in our favour here,” Siegfried replied. “So he’s like “how dare he call me worse than a demon,” that sort of thing.” “This makes you hardly better than them,” Varien observed. “I’m better than them because I don’t eat people,” Siegfried replied. “Yeah, but you’re still being a bitch about it,” Varien said. “No Varien, I’m being a bully,” Siegfried corrected. “Yes, a bully is a powerful bitch!” Varien said. “No, the bitch is the one getting bitched upon,” Siegfried said. “I might turn you into a little bitch,” Varien muttered. “You probably could,” Siegfried said. “I have full faith in your ability to make anyone your bitch. But as excellent as you are at turning demons, devils and undead into strawberry jam, I’m even better at doing that to people’s self-esteem, so please, let me jeer.” “They aren’t people, Siegfried,” Varien said. “Not with that attitude,” Siegfried said. Bob began to limber up and looked for any available cover. The dilapidated mantlets would likely suffice. “Baazka’s a pit fiend, Siegfried,” Varien said. “A pit fiend?” Siegfried sputtered. “Why didn’t you say so? Pit fiends are scary!” “Yes, he’s still going to fall down, but he’s scary,” Varien said. “More like a ‘piss your pants fiend!’” Siegfried shouted. As their conversation continued, high above on the ramparts of the ruined castle towers, there was a sound like the cracking of rock and the shifting of stone as several sculpted objects began to break free from their moorings as if awakening from a deep slumber. Statues along the parapets began to lunge forward on leathering wings, spiraling down towards the heroes, their grinning jaws opening ever wider. Varien’s gaze flicked upward. “Movement!” he shouted to his friends. He leapt upwards, kicking off against the nearest stone wall, and, drawing upon his sorcerous resources, cast steel wind strike even as his spirit guardians began to shred the creatures. Like a bolt of bloody lightning, Varien’s blade flashed as he struck several of his targets in an instant, ending up on the roof of the southern tower, sword at the ready. He spun about and attacked the nearest creature, slashing it, and followed through with a second strike to another creature nearby. Alec looked up at the northern tower and pointed. “Tower, you don’t need to be this tall,” he said, and cast shatter , causing a cacophonous noise to ring out, cracking stone and elemental flesh alike as three of the creatures were caught up in the radius of the spell. Siegfried brushed off the gravel that pelted down on his armour from the weakened tower that was already developing an alarming-looking lean. He looked up at the approaching flying creatures and girded himself. The first of the creatures unhinged its jaws widely and acid began to burble up from its throat. Siegfried backflipped out of the way as the creature expelled a cone of acid at him and Alec. Alec turned to Bob, saying “Brother, I need flight!” as the wave of slimy acid bowled him over. Alec winced and invoked his absorb elements ability to capture some of the acid’s debilitating effects. There was a hissing sound as his flesh was scourged by the fiery fluid. The winged creatures surrounded Alec and began to bite and claw the barbarian. Alec roared in pain and anger as he began to bleed. The second creature’s bite unleashed a poison into the barbarian’s bloodstream. The creatures cackled as they tore into Alec. “I hate gargoyles,” Bob said as he looked on in horror. The gargoyles on the south tower fought their way through Varien’s spirit guardian perimeter to attack the paladin. Varien cast shield to protect himself from the creatures’ teeth and claws. The worst-off of the gargoyles spat a cone of acid at Varien. The paladin deflected the acid with a well-timed shield block. Bob quick-cast haste on Alec and Varien and used his divine reserves to heal his brother. He moved up shoulder-to-shoulder with his brother to face the gargoyles. Siegfried pulled out the Ettin Axe of Uruth and called out for Krypt. One head of the axe burst into flames as he spun the weapon with a flourish and buried it in the nearest gargoyle. Siegfried followed up with a second strike that staggered the gargoyle. “Nice garden gnomes, Baazka!” Siegfried bellowed. Varien struck the gargoyle to his immediate north with his sword. He turned, hopped into the air and slashed another of the hovering creatures with a downward stroke, turning him into a tumbling mass of rubble that shattered against the flagstone far below. Alec noted with alarm that the gargoyle’s acid was eating away at his magic belt. He frowned and wiped the offending liquid away. He turned about and struck the nearest gargoyle, slashing so deeply into the creature that it remained stuck on his blade as he swung his sword against the next gargoyle. The impaled gargoyle broke apart into dust. Two more swings cut another gargoyle down to size. “Action surge!” Alec shouted to the heavens as he swung Oathtaker recklessly, hammering the hapless creature into rubble. Then he ran up the rickety stairs of the damaged tower and grappled the next gargoyle he encountered, trying to drag it down. The gargoyle flapped its wings in an attempt to stay aloft. It looked down at Alec, opening its mouth, which was filling with acid. Alec’s face fell. “Not again,” he said. There was a vomiting noise as the blast caught Alec full in the face. Below him, Siegfried danced out of the way of the raining acid with a dancer’s grace. One of the gargoyles in Alec’s wake sprang back to life with an unholy scowl on its stony face. Bob saw another gargoyle unhinge its jaw to spray acid at him. He ducked behind the nearest mantlet as the cone of mucous flooded around him. Bob yelped as the acid bit into his exposed flesh. It immediately began to eat into his armour as well. Varien’s spirit guardians continued to erode the gargoyles nearest to him as they moved in for the kill. One of the creatures bit him and poisoned the paladin. The second gargoyle bit as well, and clawed him mercilessly. Bob wiped the acid off his armour and twin-cast guiding bolts at the gargoyles. The one to the north missed, but he struck the second one, blowing it apart in mid-air. Alec plummeted 30 feet to the ground. Siegfried called out “Ur!” and the icy head of the axe was covered in a rime of furious frost. Spinning his axe, he struck the nearest target with a slash, and followed up with another slash that took the gargoyle’s head clean off. “You disappoint me, Baazka! I come here for a fight and you send me furniture? You’re weak!” Siegfried shouted as he strode towards the courtyard. Surely there must be something more challenging beyond these walls , he heard his axe whisper. “You’re boring my axe, Baazka!” Siegfried said again. Varien discombobulated another gargoyle with a strike of his sword, and smote a second gargoyle with a radiant attack. He bashed it with his shield, shoving it away. Alec cleaned off the acid from his body and dashed up the tower’s rickety stairs, high-fiving Varien as he rushed past, wound up with his axe, and cleaved the gargoyle to the ground, stepping atop him like a toboggan, which he rode down the wall of the parapet until the gargoyle was gravel beneath his feet. Silence descended over the castle’s gate. “Is that the best you can do?” Bob asked the castle’s grounds. The silence continued for a second, and was then interrupted by a deep rumbling sound from the southern battlement. Something that looked like a cross between a crocodile and a centipede crawled out from a rent in the tower’s turret and wrapped itself around the structure. It turned its serpentine head towards the adventurers and opened its jaws unnaturally wide, and the party could see a crackling cyclone of electrical energy growing within its maw.