theworldofdreams.com

*transcribed from interviews and a set of images from Brayzin/Bruce Revol*

We were standing in front of the bank when the explosive sound of wind sounded and a large puff of smoke appeared at the edge of the bank's roof. When it cleared we saw a red skinned figure astride an equally red horse. It was Corona, whom you all have heard about before.

Corona was blue and shouted down that he would not attack but wanted to speak. We all motioned him down and suddenly he was among us. His skin was a burnt looking red color and his hands and feet were black mixed with sparkly colors. Very eerie. This is what Corona told us:

I was not always like this. One I was named Jahren Celendil. I was a scholar, an astronomer. I was working in my Moonglow lab one day when I felt the most horrible feeling. It was as if something was reaching into my mind with grasping, tearing fingers. I somehow had the knowledge that it was a being called Xanderbaric who was trying to control my mind.

I fought against his machinations and eventually he withdrew with a mental snarl of anger. Then, an evil clone of my own self formed in my room. Before I could take another breath it attacked me! As we struggled, we bumped my large telescope and it pivoted slowly until it was pointed directly upward at the noonday sun. An intense beam of sunlight poured from the lower aperture of the scope, causing the stones below to smoke with the incredible, focused heat.

The magically created evil clone saw this and shoved me off balance, expecting me to fall and be destroyed by the beam of light. But, I held onto him and pulled him over me as I fell, as a shield. I cannot describe the agonies that followed but somehow I retained consciousness. I did not die, but then, neither did the evil clone. Somehow, the composition of his evil magic form was fused into my own human one.

Now, I am who you see before you. Corona. I am filled with a burning venom, with eternal hate towards this Xanderbaric. Now I have two sides constantly struggling for dominancy. The real me, the scholar, and the evil one who just wants to burn and hate and destroy.

I hate X and will hunt him down and kill him. I will burn him in fires of hate until his blood boils out of his skin, I HATE X and will kill him! KILL HATE...I HATE....BURN!!....HATE...BURN...HATE YOU, ALL OF YOU!!! MUST BURNN BURN!!!!

Corona shifted from blue to red and someone attacked him. Corona then howled and fire elementals began to appear in front of the bank, hissing and spitting flames and offensive spells.

We thought we might be able to defeat Corona anyway but he was so tough. Poison and damage may have done it anyway but he suddenly vanished with maniacal laughter in a puff of smoke and we just had the elementals to finish off.

After this, we heard his voice echoing through the very air. He had given a "Bolt of Burning" to a daemon lord in the depths of Hythloth. Corona's fire elementals were much tougher than the usual ones and the thought of Daemons becoming the same way made us pause and gulp. The only thing to do was seek out this lord of daemons and take the "Bolt of Burning" from him.

I, your transcriber, did not hear details of this quest so perhaps another can describe it?


OOC: Below are just a few of the many images that Brayzin/Bruce Revol sent to me along with one someone else sent to me. Rather than insert them into the post, I have them set as links to avoid clobbering the bandwidth.

http://home.insightbb.com/~ssalter/wod-boltburning/UO0020.jpg

http://home.insightbb.com/~ssalter/wod-boltburning/UO0060.jpg

http://home.insightbb.com/~ssalter/wod-boltburning/UO0061.jpg

http://home.insightbb.com/~ssalter/wod-boltburning/UO0062.jpg

http://home.insightbb.com/~ssalter/wod-boltburning/lordofdaemons.jpg

Man, I wish I could be on more, or even just at the right time to catch these things. The normal stuff I do anymore is getting repeatative.

Some day I will be in the right place at the right time again. (Or as I used to say in regards to the Branubians, wrong place wrong time. )

Aye, I was there when Corona announced his origins, and then turned on us, as the evil clone seemed to take control. We had been in the bank discussing the earlier attack on us by Xandebaric's controlled undead minions, and Corona suddenly appeared atop the bank. We all rushed outside, thinking we would be attacked, but to our surprise, no attack came. He then related to us the above tale. As he started to burn with hate, I asked him if there was any way to reverse the process, and he stated 'When he dies, I will be free'. He then attacked us as Bayn has told so eloquently.

A few minutes later, we heard a voice saying to us 'AAHAAHAhahaaaa, in the depths of Hythloth, I have given the Bolt of Burning to the Daemon Lord. He will make legions of fiery death dealers!'

A group of us then gated to Hythloth. This group included me, Scott Myr, Byouki, Mark Sinch, Rroucu, and Crozius Eisengrim. We prepared ourselves as best we could, and then entered Hythloth to do battle with evil.

The first level was unprotected, and we soon found out why. As we came around a corner, we spotted in front of us a chap named Bruce Revol, who had cleared the way in front of us. We joined forces, now 8 strong (including my best friend, Rendar the Great, whom had accompanied us), and started fighting our way to what awaited us below.

We passed an area where it looked like blood sacrifices had occurred, and that is where we first started to encounter some of Corona's minions. Fire elementals, darkspawn, and various other enemies assailed us, but our valiant group prevailed. After regrouping, and refreshing ourselves a bit, we continued onward.

We ran into another group of defenders, which now included flaming gargoyles in their number, as well as fire elementals and hell hounds. All of these monsters were stronger than I had ever encountered before, but with time and careful strategy, we prevailed again.

We again rested and regrouped, and made plans for as soon as we stepped down the stairwell. The plan was to wait a minute, while the mages gathered themselves to be able to heal all of the others, and then start attacking. Well, you know the proverb about best laid plans of mice and men? It applied double here. As soon as we went down the dark stairwell, we saw a room full of Fire Daemons, flaming gargoyles, hell hounds, rock lizards. It seemed that anything that thrived on fire was there in that room awaiting our descent. Rendar immediately took it upon himself to go chasing one of the monsters off into the distance, and subsequently died a quick death. Scott quietly mentioned that running back up the steps might be a good idea, so we took his advice, after killing a few of the closer defenders.

After a few forays into the room, and rests to heal in between, we were victorious again. But that was not all that occupied the room. We went over the bridge, fighting for every step we gained, and saw in the distance, a Lord of the Daemons, with a skin that seemed translucent, and that seemed to reflect starlight, though how he could have ever seen starlight this deep in a dungeon was a mystery to me.

We then fought for quite a bit longer, until the area we were in was free of opposition. The Lord was peeking his head above the walls in the distance, trying to attack us from there, but luckily for our rest, he could not reach us yet. We decided we might need some more help in this engagement, so I summoned Ki'Anna Stydoran through a druid gate to us. She stepped through, and joined our party to help in what we thought would be the final battle.

We then ventured into the room, where the Lord of the Daemons was holed up with quite a few minions in the room, including several Fire Daemons. Ki'Anna tried to convince one of the Daemons to attack the Lord. and was partly successful I thought, but in the process, she fell. We then started attacking the Lord in earnest. I stepped through the door, trying to keep everyone healed, when suddenly I saw only some power words, then I fell to the ground dead. I came to a few moments later, just as Rroucu joined me in that grey world I inhabited.

Everyone retreated through the door, and slammed it shut behind us, and we withdrew to heal once again, and attempt to resurrect our fallen party members. Once this was accomplished, we then braved the minions again, with a better idea of their strengths, so we moved a bit more cautiously (like a few inches at a time). After a long, hard fought battle, we again were victorious.

After searching the bodies, we found a 'Bolt of Burning', which appeared to be a fire bolt captured. We know not what it is, but we have captured it from the Fire Daemons, and they will no longer have its use.

We then found a portal behind the alter in the room, and found out that it led to the Fire Temple. We quickly decided to step through, to make sure that the Temple had not been taken over.

Well, it appeared that the Fire temple was under the control of the evil half of Corona, for as soon as we stepped through the portal, we were attacked by more Fire elementals and other minions of his. We fought through the defenders, with at least one of the fire elementals shouting 'This, at least, is ours!! Leave or BURN!' Well, of course we couldn't leave it at that, so we tried burning the defenders up. They were quite steamed about it, I can tell ya. We kept firing magic at them, and finally won through to the bottom of the Temple itself. At the top of the steps were a few more of the Fire Daemons, who must have really packed a wallop, as Scott fell with only a few blows. We retreated again, and got Scott back in shape, then advanced as a tightly knit fighting force we had become. We swept through the defenders this time, quickly finding ourselves wading through the remains of any who got in our way.

We finally defeated all of the defenders, and then gated back to Britain with a feeling that the day had been saved once again from the evil side of Corona's plans for mayhem. But beware, I am sure he is still bent on destroying this world with his hate filled heart.