EPILOGUE
Oeister was attempting a summons of a particularly nasty Goroth Demon when he heard a muffled ringing. “You have got to be kidding me,” he said under his breath. He released the spell slowly to prevent any psychic whiplash that might occur from canceling his spell prematurely. He walked to his desk and sat down before opening the drawer where the offending bell was located. He brought out a small mahogany box and set it down in front of him. He lifted the lid to reveal a small bell that was about the size of a quarter floating within. It rang more loudly now that it was unmuffled. He grabbed the bell, which arrested its movement.
He shook his head in annoyance and wondered at how that group of low-level noobs had managed to defeat the Occultist. “It had to be them,” he said, but he brought out his divination tools anyway. He focused his mana and began to scry the inside of the Temple of Chanwoal. Once his spell was complete, the inside of the temple slowly came into focus. He viewed the platform from above, as if he were floating within the temple itself. The view was clear, albeit cast in a greenish hue from the light poles positioned in each corner of the room. The Occultist lay on his stomach and was apparently dead next to the door, but the containment lines no longer showed on the doorway, so the Font of Power must truly have left the temple. The broken bodies of the undead denizens of the temple were mostly concentrated on one side of the platform. Most of the zombies that he could see were not damaged enough to have been defeated. The Owlbear zombies should have been able to withstand far more damage as well. He didn’t know how the zombies had been defeated so easily, so he continued to search for answers.
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The Boneclaws had been broken as well; this was something else that should not be possible. The bones were magically held together, and no amount of force could break them apart once animated—at least not without high-level magic. The Occultist was the easiest combatant to kill. He amended his thought: easiest to defeat. The man had had defenses; his barrier should have been sufficient to prevent attacks from anywhere other than from directly behind him. The large burned hole in his back gave Oeister the impression that that was exactly what had happened.
Oeister shook his head as he wondered at the carnage. A group of six people who were level ten or lower should not have been able to put up much of a fight in this temple of death. A few of them did have some nice powers—the Berserker was a true hulk and their Wizard had a knack for learning—but even with these talents, no one should have been able to survive.
He had spent nearly eight months doing research on every aspect of this encounter, and he knew that he himself had no chance of success without making a very dangerous summons, and then the danger would have far outweighed the reward. If he had thought for a moment that a group of newbies could have tackled the encounter by themselves, then he would have asked to join them. Ah well, no matter—he would just have to see if he could locate another Font of Power.
He was on the verge of dismissing his spell when something emerged from the passage on the opposite side of the platform. It looked like the Ranger. That area had previously defied every divination spell he’d attempted, but now, with the fountain gone, he could finally view it. He watched as the party entered the room. One of the females pointed at the platform, noticing that the doorway was no longer glowing, and they began discussing the change. The last to file out of the corridor was the Korak, who was wearing a stunning set of armor that shone even in this hazy light. His armor, while amazing, was not the most spectacular feature that the Berserker possessed; riding on his shoulder was a Dracon. Now, where in the hell had they found that?