Ruby Phoenix Tournament - Day 1 & 2

The party had won their first match of the Ruby Phoenix Tournament fairly easily, but they knew there were harder challenges to come. Since theirs had been the first match of the day, they settled in to watch the other matches and get a handle on their competition.

As the Tournament staff worked to erect an elaborate fight stage in the arena for the next match, the Emissary rose from his seat. “During this intermission, we invite the contestants to amuse the audience with demonstrations of their strength.” As he spoke, his staff set up a series of pedestals around the arena, and placed objects on each of them. Each team would have one minute to attempt to break each item – but using only their bare hands, feet, heads, or other body parts. Only one person per team could attempt each item, and they could make only one attack against it, or else attempt to break it though sheer strength.

Shinjiro and Sawyer elected to represent Team Hongal in this exhibition, and their friends cast Bull’s Strength on them, and gave them the Luckstone they’d won a few minutes earlier. They went down to the arena, and waited for the Emissary’s signal. As soon as he gave it, they ran to the first pedestal, where a coconut waited to be broken with only bare hands. Shinjiro pummeled it with a quick Flurry of Blows and coconut milk sprayed everywhere [DM Note – I debated whether a “single attack” was one blow, or one full round attack, and opted for the latter when hands or feet could be used.] Next up was a block of ice that had to be broken with only your arms. Sawyer gripped it to his chest and squeezed until it shattered.

The next item was a metal bar, secured between two supports. Breaking it would be hard enough, but contestants could only use their heads. Sawyer rested his forehead against the cool metal, took a deep breath, and then head-butted the iron bar, which snapped cleanly in two. The crowd cheered as Shinjiro led the somewhat staggered Sawyer to the next item. It was a quarterstaff, to be broken with your feet, and a quick double-kick from Shinjiro snapped it like a twig. Next was a fist-sized river stone, to be broken using only your fingers. Sawyer (after Shinjiro helped him figure out which of the two stones he saw was the one to grab), gripped the smooth stone in both hands. Straining mightily, he broke it neatly in two like a loaf of bread.

The last three challenges were stacks of successively harder items: a stack of boards, one of clay tiles, and one of bricks. For Shinjiro, this was like being back under his grandfather’s tutelage, and his fists smashed them one after the other. As the crowd cheered, they realized that they were the only team to have successfully broken all the items. The Emissary awarded them a high level Potion of Stoneskin as their prize.

They spent most of the rest of the day observing the other contestants’ matches. There was an unbelievable diversity in the races and skill sets represented, and the intensity of the combat was impressive – and frightening. Nicki also noticed a fair amount of money changing hands between matches, and he made a note to find out more about the gambling going on; maybe there was an opportunity to make some quick cash out of this.

But before he could investigate further, a pair of Tournament officials approached, and summoned the party to take part in an exhibition match. As they followed them out of the pavilion, they recalled that Marthysan had told them that these exhibitions had no impact on your ability to advance in the Tournament – unless, of course, you got yourself killed. However, the crowd considered it a sign of cowardice to refuse to participate. Sometimes the exhibitions were against other teams of contestants, but often they were against captured monsters or non-competing creatures brought in just for this purpose.

They were led to a large ring at the edge of the tournament grounds. They’d noticed several of these rings as they arrived at the pavilion this morning, but hadn’t known what they were for. Bleachers were erected around the rings, and were now filled with spectators. They could hear blood-curdling screams coming from one of the nearby rings, but the bleachers blocked their view of the action.

On their way to the ring, they’d discussed who should compete. After all their exertions this morning, Sawyer and Shinjiro begged to sit this one out, so Nicki, Bella, Zhustin, and Marie elected to participate. There was little time to prepare, but Marie was able to cast a Prayer, Bless, and a Fly on Bella, while Zhustin cast Haste, and Sandoval contributed Heroism. Nicki cast a quick Mage Armor on himself as they stepped into the ring.

The Tiefling, Kiang Zhen, stood in the ring, holding a tattered cloth sack with flies buzzing around it. No other opponent was visible as she motioned the party into the ring. When they were in place, she opened the sack, chanted something softly into it, then hustled her way out of the ring.

Immediately, a massive, headless form came stomping out of the nearby woods. It carried a pair of fearsome axes, and had a necklace of rotting heads around its neck. At the sight of it, Bella took off 30’ into the air, wanting to be well out of reach of those axes, Marie cast Shield of Faith, and Nicki summoned one of his all-purpose Flaming Spheres, much to the crowd’s delight.

As soon as the Shenzuzhou set foot in the ring, it snatched one of the festering heads off its necklace and threw it at the party. When it hit the ground, it burst into a noxious, disgusting cloud of stench. All three combatants on the ground found themselves gagging, but managed to avoid being overcome by the stench – for now. Zhustin hustled out of the cloud and tried casting Chill Touch; he knew the spell would do no damage against the undead opponent, but hoped to panic it into fleeing the ring for a quick disqualification. But unfortunately, the spell had no effect on the headless giant.

Bella was providing air cover, shooting arrows, but the thing’s tough hide meant they did little damage. Nicki stayed put in the cloud, counting on his natural resistance to poison to keep him safe, and moved his Flaming Sphere to begin burning the thing’s legs. Then he followed up with a trio of Scorching Rays. Not only did he severely injure the Shenzuzhou, but the crowd loved the flashy display, stomping their feet and making the bleachers shake. Marie tried to hit it with a Flame Strike of her own, but the thing’s natural Spell Resistance caused the spell to fizzle.

The Shenzuzhou was hurt, but not out, and it trundled towards Marie. It hit her once with each of its two axes, and the combined one-two punch was devastating indeed. But his other swings were such clumsy misses that the crowd began to boo loudly. Zhustin blasted it with another pair of Scorching Rays, and then Bella flew directly overhead and fired a trio of arrows at point-blank range directly down the neck hole where his missing head had once been. That was more than enough, and it crumpled to the ground, to the cheers of the crowd.

By the time the party returned to the pavilion, the day’s matches were over. 64 teams had competed in 32 matches, along with many exhibition fights and tests of skill, and only half would be moving on to the next day’s events. To celebrate the close of the first day, the Tournament staff had prepared a great feast for the contestants and honored guests. Long tables were set up around the pavilion grounds, while entertainers filled the air with music and drumming. After sunset, the Emissary’s monks put on an impressive fireworks display over the waters of the cove.

Servants hustled busily among the tables, bringing dishes of meat, cheese, rice, and fruit and making sure everyone’s wine glasses remained full. Marthysan sat at a place of honor next to the Emissary. As the party began to hungrily dig into their meal, Nicki scanned the grounds for “Zhustin’s girlfriend”, the mysterious Risha. He spotted her sitting at an isolated table with the rest of her team. They’d watched that team compete today, and they’d been impressive. Sitting with them was an intimidating and scar-covered hobgoblin. His name was Gomwai,  and he and his team of thugs had also competed today, and had been quick and brutal in eliminating their opponents.

Risha and her friends were talking quietly among themselves, and Nicki noticed they were all drinking from their own wineskins, rudely shooing away the servants who tried to fill their glasses. All sorts of alarm bells went off for the sorcerer, and he cast a quick Detect Poison on his own cup. Sure enough, the drink was poisoned, although he didn’t recognize the type. “Don’t drink that!” he snapped, knocking the cup away from Sawyer’s lips. Marie did her own Detect Poison, and confirmed that all their wine was poisoned. Since the servants were pouring from the same jugs into everyone’s cups, the plot didn’t seem to be aimed just at them. Nicki’s first reaction was to just keep his mouth shut; after all, if some of the competition ended up sick or dead from poison, it would just make their path through the Tournament that much easier. But Marie hurried off to the kitchen to inform the staff. With a sigh, Nicki decided to play the hero, and hurried to tell Marthysan.

As soon as Nicki told him what he’d found, the paladin cast a Detect Poison of his own, and his face went white. He whispered something to the Emissary, who immediately stood and called for silence. “I am afraid that some of the wine has been … tainted,” he announced to the crowd, and dozens of glasses of wine were dashed to the ground at once. “Please refrain from drinking until we can tap from … fresh wine.” Nicki quietly pointed out Risha and her friends, and told Marthysan how their suspicious behavior was what had first alerted him to the poison. Marthysan had a quiet word with the Tiefling, and then told Nicki, “They will be closely watched.” He expressed his gratitude to Nicki for preventing a “great embarrassment” to the tournament. Nicki knew he’d won points with the paladin and the Emissary, but still wasn’t sure it had been the smart thing to do.

There’s nothing like a little poison in the wine to put a damper on a party, and the feast broke up rather quickly after that, as everyone returned to their beds to rest up for the next day’s challenges. At dawn, the Emissary’s monks provided a breakfast of hot tea and bowls of rice porridge sweetened with sticks of sugarcane. When the party arrived at the pavilion, new flags flew above the arena. Most of the contestants who’d been eliminated the day before (and survived) now sat in the grandstands, swelling the crowd to standing room only. The party got their chit from the officials showing which match they’d be in. It was not until mid-afternoon, so they settled in to watch.

During one of the intermissions in the morning, the Emissary announced another test of skill, this time an archery competition. All eyes turned to Bella, and she made her way down to the arena floor, having had Cat’s Grace cast on her, and carrying the Luckstone in her pocket. Sandoval went with her, to use his singing to inspire her to greatness.

Three targets were set up, 50 paces away. The first was a normal target, but the second was difficult to see well, having had a Blur spell cast on it. The third made you almost cross-eyed to look at; it was under a Displacement spell. Each archer would get 10 arrows to fire at the target of their choice, with more points being awarded for hitting the magically protected targets.

Bella drew her bow and confidently took aim at the Displaced target; she loosed, and the arrow struck the center of the bull’s eye! Feeling cocky, she fired at the same target again, but the arrow flew wide of the real target. Aiming at that target one more time, she managed to strike the inside ring.

Thinking that maybe she was pushing her luck, she switched to the Blurred target. Her first arrow struck the next to last ring, and the next missed entirely. Deciding this target was cursed, she went back to the Displaced target and promptly scored two successive bull’s eyes. Her next shot missed entirely, but her last two arrows found the inside ring. The Tournament officials tallied up the scores, and Bella had outshot everyone else. In reward, she was given an assortment of five Slaying Arrows and Lesser Bracers of Archery.

Immediately after lunch, the party was told that they were to compete in another exhibition match. They followed the officials out of the pavilion, but this time they didn’t go to the fighting rings. Instead they were led back down the path towards town. There the road skirted a bluff known as the Wall of Seven Winds, a 120’ vertical cliff. The wind whipped across the curved, sheer cliff, roiling the deep water below into a white-capped froth. Several dozen boats bobbed on the rough water, their decks crowded with eager spectators focused on the cliff top. Another, smaller, crowd was gathered at the top of the cliff, and Marthysan waited for them there.

He smiled when he saw the party. “This should be fun. You’ve been chosen to be in the Spider Fight. You’ll be fighting on the face of the cliff itself. Here – these should make things a little easier.” He handed the party four pairs of silk slippers – Slippers of Spider Climbing. He then waved his arms to the boats in the cove below. “If you do fall, there are a pair of sorcerers on the boats down there whose job is to cast Feather Fall on you before you hit the water. Hopefully you can stay afloat long enough for a rescue boat to pluck you out of the water.” He gave them a wink, then introduced their opponents. They were led by a stoic Tian-Min woman named Orometsu Yasi, also known as the White Warrior, and her band of monks. Each monk was armed with a Shang Gou, an odd sword tipped with a curved hook. It was obvious they were designed for tripping and disarming, perfect weapons for this fight. Orometsu bowed formally to the party, then she and her team scampered halfway down the cliff to await the start of the fight.

Shang Gou

Nicki was supremely distrustful of the whole Feather Fall safety net, and made no secret of his concerns. For this event, they’d decided the team would be Shinjiro, Sawyer, Bella, and Sandoval. Marie cast a Fly on Bella and Sawyer activated Suishen’s Air Walk ability, although he planned to keep it secret until needed. Zhustin cast a quick Haste as they pulled on their slippers and began to climb down the cliff face. The slippers enabled them to stand on the vertical cliff as though it were a floor, although the sensation was very disorienting. When they were in place, they signaled to Marthysan and he shouted for the match to begin.

Orometsu immediately quaffed a potion, and dashed with inhuman speed towards Shinjiro. Bella attempted to shoot the enemy fighter with her bow. The first arrow hit. But disoriented from the odd sensation of standing on a wall, Bella’s next two shots were embarrassing misses; one struck the ground directly at her feet and the other somehow shot off at a right angle, narrowly missing Marthysan peering over the edge of the cliff above. The crowd began to boo and jeer, and Bella felt the sting of humiliation.

Sandoval made up for Bella’s whiffs by scoring a pair of solid hits on Orometsu with his own arrows. Sawyer charged to intercept her, and slashed her before she could reach Shinjiro. Seeing their mistress in trouble, two of the monks engaged Sawyer, trying to trip him with their shang gous (and not realizing that he would not fall even if he was tripped). The third moved to head off Shinjiro. Shinjiro responded by attempting a Stunning Fist, but he too was still getting used to fighting sideways, and missed badly; luckily the crowd was already so disgusted by Bella’s display that their mood couldn’t get any worse.

Orometsu attacked Sawyer with a flurry of blows, but he neatly dodged them all. Bella, determined to redeem herself, took careful aim and let fly a volley of three arrows. All three struck home, the last burying itself in Orometsu’s throat. Her eyes rolled up into her head, and she fell backwards down the cliff face. Everyone held their breath for the long seconds it took her to fall, waiting for the promised Feather Fall to take hold, but instead she hit the roiling water with a splash.

Bella didn’t hesitate; in a flash, she was flying at full speed down the cliff face, watching for her former foe’s body to surface. Above her, the combat resumed, although everyone was still in shock. Sandoval feathered one of the monks with another arrow, and Sawyer turned on one of those trying to trip him and unleashed Suishen’s full fury on him. Stabbed and hacked by the ancestral sword, he too collapsed unconscious and fell. Like his mistress, his fall went unchecked and he plummeted into the crashing waves.

Having seen two of their number fall to their deaths, the other two monks immediately surrendered. At that moment, Bella emerged dripping from the water below, carrying the lifeless body of Orometsu Yasi. Unfortunately, her comrade had been dashed to pieces on the rocks. Bella flew Orometsu to the top of the cliff, where the Tournament healers immediately sent to fetch someone who could do a Raise Dead. Marthysan was furious. “I don’t understand what happened with those sorcerers. Their only job was to cast Feather Fall if someone fell. Their only job! I’ll get to the bottom of this, I promise you!” Almost as an afterthought, he gave the party a Potion of Feather Fall as their prize, then stormed off looking for Kiang Zhen.

During the match, Nicki had been circulating among the gamblers. Marthysan had noticed his interest, and quietly informed him than any betting by a contestant was grounds for disqualification, news which didn’t make the young noble very happy. But he still kept his eyes and ears open. The people taking the bets and paying out winnings, were the usual type – big, tough, ugly, and mean. As he listened in on snippets of conversation, he heard the phrase “the Golden League” come up repeatedly, as in “the Golden League’s going to make me rich on this match” or “the Golden League broke his legs when he couldn’t pay up”. He also overheard disturbing tales of contestants who came down with strange maladies in the middle of their exhibition matches, including one who lost all muscle control while fighting on a bed of hot coals. In each case, Tournament healers diagnosed the problem as poison, although the type varied from case to case and the method of delivery was unknown.

The party had barely had time to catch their breath after the Spider Fight, when a group of Tournament officials arrived to hustle them back to the pavilion for their official match of the day. This time, Sawyer, Shinjiro, Nicki, and Bella were the competing team. Sandoval managed to cast Heroism before they were isolated in the waiting room. Just before they were brought out, Bella quaffed potions of Fly and Protection from Evil.

They knew from Nicki’s inquiries among the gamblers that their opponent would be a woman named Ganyavesha. They’d seen her fight yesterday; she fought alone, and was an intimidating spellcaster who also wielded a mean kukri. When they emerged into the bright sunlight of the arena, the setting was nothing like they’d fought in the previous day. Instead of an open, uncluttered expanse of sand, there were now three tall scaffolds of wood and metal standing in the arena. Each had two platforms, one at 20’ and another at 40’, and were interconnected by tangles of rope ladders.

Ganjavesha strode through the gate on the opposite side of the arena. Unlike the svelte woman they’d seen fight the day before, she now stood some 10-12 feet tall. The instant the Emissary dropped his hand, she cast a Greater Dispel Magic on the party, and in a flash, Bella’s Fly and everyone else’s Heroism went away. She then swung herself up onto the first level of the far platform, using the floors of all three platforms as cover from her opponents.

Sawyer activated Suishen’s Air Walk ability, and flew up to the first level of the platform nearest him. With a clear shot at Ganyavesha, he fired an arrow, only to see it bounce off her like she was made of stone. Nicki let fly a Fireball, transforming it into acid with his Elemental Spell ability. The acidic spell left the platform and rope ladders smoking, but Ganyavesha didn’t seem badly bothered by it. As he looked closer at her, he could see that she almost seemed to be flickering, and he recalled Sandoval’s Blink spell. Bella, not wanting a little thing like a Dispel Magic to get in the way of her strategy, gulped down another Potion of Fly, and took to the air. The battle was on!

The PCs earned 8,457 XP for the night, putting them at 124.255 XP with 155,000 required for level 11. You also earned one more Victory Point for defeating the Shenzuzhou with a higher crowd rating. Next week we’ll be at Leo’s, and Roger will be on call.