The Age of Worms / The Champion's Belt pt. 12 / Von the 16th, 3593 CE / 6-6-22

Not by Choice is beneath the Free City Arena, in an area normally inaccessible to gladiators and specatators alike. They have just fought off a horde of undead, and now face the monsters' master, an evil tiefling cleric named Bozal. Bozal has prepared for the party's assault by using his fiendish powers to cast the room he occupies into darkness. As River cautiously approaches the room, trident ready, she finds herself unable to enter, stopped by some magical compulsion. Moments later, Bozal summons monsters to assault the team, as the brave halfling stands her ground, shielding them from the creatures' approach. Meanwhile, a drow has just appeared from a previously hidden secret door. She is Nataliya of House Cantri, and she snuck into the arena understructure for reasons of her own. Seeing the party under assault, she jumps in to aid them, hoping to procure allies for her own agendas. With her strange psychic powers she fills Bozal's altar room with webs and begins a psychic assault on the cleric himself. With the aid of Lulu's plague magic, Hush destroys one of the summoned monsters, an evil creature from the elemental plane of air called a belker, but as the party pushes forward, they find they cannot get close to Bozal due to the strange compulsion, all that is, except Nataliya. As Bozal assaults them with negative energy, he attempts to dominate Nataliya, but she resists, and sends the tiefling into a psychic spiral that makes him an easy target for River and Hush to finish off with ranged assaults, With Bozal dead, the party turns its attention to introductions and then to investigating the focus of the altar room, the infamous Apostolic Scrolls. Lulu and Nataliya manage to glean some insight into the scrolls, revealing that they are protecting and empowering the ulgurstasta at the end of a long dark corridor. Now the party must make a choice, attempt to destroy the protective barrier around the ulgurstasta in order to attack it, or avoid the risk of freeing the undead creation engine.