DCC DotSK: Act 1-3

Ty's tight-lipped smirk of triumph transmutes to a horrified gape as some sort of... serpent surges up from the broken corpse and fixes its fangs upon Aldric's throat.

A serpent?! Inside the cadaverous tomb guardian? Has the snake couched in the creature's chest like some loathsome parasite? Or has it worn the man-thing like fleshly armor, steering its motions from within? Ty's mind reels between the possibilities, each as mad and gruesome as the other.

The elf staggers across the room toward Aldric, trailing blood from his injured foot. He thrusts the reddened point of his javelin at the serpent. Perhaps he can torment the thing enough to make it loosen its jaws.

Aiming to rid Aldric of one of his plights, Dufgal pulls his garotte from his pocket and maneuvers to sneak it around the snake. A quick and fierce squeeze should do it.

Aiming a sword strike neatly at the place where the serpent was trying to burst free, Anora hopes to decapitate the thing while it’s still within the foul body!

She brings the sword up and then down in a great arc! Great… for a wizardess in any case!

Anora's blow sends the bony serpent tumbling across the floor, but it rapidly slithers into an angry coil -- ready to strike!

😂

As blood drips down Aldric's squeaky leather armour, he raises his shield and oar, both inscribed with the holy symbol of Pelagia. "Tremble, crawling things of the earth! Your reckoning is upon you!"

Aldric feels the serpent’s fangs pierce his flesh, fire and poison coursing through his veins as his lifeblood spills onto the earth! His vision wavers, but his voice rises like the roar of the tempest, defiant against the abyss. "O Pelagia, Keeper of the Endless Depths, hear thy servant’s cry! With the weight of the ocean, cast down this wickedness! Let thy wrath be as the storm, and thy mercy be our salvation!"

Pelagia hears Aldric's plea. She acknowledges his want, his impassioned appeal -- and the Briny Bitch does not listen! No, when the priest redoubles his efforts, he is in the middle of his prayer when he begins to choke, when the vile vipers begins making its way into his throat!

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ROUND 3
Init Order: Ty, Dufgal, Ghoul Serpents (2), Aldric, Anora

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Assuming that the beleaguered cleric was facing a mortal threat, Dufgal again attempts to encircle the Stygian throat with his lethal filament. If not successful, at least he may give the foul beast another target.The thief imagines the wire being a tiny metal snake and it’s the underdog in a righteous fight. He digs deep into his emotional bank and wills his efforts to find purchase.

Anora rolls her eyes as her words go unheeded. Once again, the cleric calls out to his deity, and once again nothing happens.

It would surely be the man’s end, and not before long…

More and more blood flies from Aldric’s mouth and flows from his wounded, brutalized neck as the loathsome serpent tries again to puncture flesh so it can squirm and slide into the man’s throat, seeking the warmth of his belly. It is about to succeed when Dufgal looms up from behind, his garrote tight between his meaty hands. Quick as a cobra himself, he loops the deadly weapon around the monster and yanks, pulling it off of the ailing cleric.

So hard does Dufgal loop and strain with his line that the snake-thing comes immediately apart, falling to piece in his grasp. Putrid, jellied bits of serpent meat spray as the creature’s rotten, slimy bones go tumbling, vertebrae ratting and clunking down onto the tomb floor!

The second guardian rises, unconcerned by the demise of its fellow…

Trust Dufgal to rise to the occasion when something positively must be mangled. Ty is about to congratulate the burly human on his triumph when he catches sight of the second snake, coiled to leap back into the fray.

There's another one of the damned things?! Was Tyravasiel's brilliant display of magic-- not to mention his punctured foot-- all for naught?

Curling his lip, the elf throws out his hands as if casting eldritch glitter upon the serpent. As he does so, Ty curses, "Damn your eyes, thou thrice-fucked thing! Thou rotting prick of some grubby human god long and well forgotten! Bow down thy foul cockhead, beast!"

Once more, Tyravasiel wills the kaleidoscopic spell to tumble down upon his foe! But from the lean tips of his fingers, from the dank air, nothing comes. Nothing but the silent laughter of the Fates...

Rather than talk the thing to death, like Aldric and Ty had tried to do, Anora instead swings her sword at the leaping snake thing! She hopes to catch the thing mid-spring!

Blood drips from his mouth as Aldric staggers back, but he doesn’t fall. He watches as Dufgal wrings the thing’s gods-damned neck, experiencing a touch of satisfaction. But it doesn't last long as another snake strikes at Ty—the elf who had come through for him more than Pelagia ever had. Aldric grips his oar, rage surging through the pain. With a snarl, he charges forward, ready to smash the fucking snake into the stone floor.