[While on a rescue mission gone crazed, a holy warrior and a rogue fight bandits, demons, and the urge to rip each other's clothes off.]
The mission, rescuing a princess, could be going better.
Séa is an earnest paladin, honest and gullible. Tash is...
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Tash snatched her bow from her back and knocked an arrow. As she quested for a target, Séa drew her warbow. But whatever had spoken defeated her half-elven eyes and she discerned no hint of movement. The mucous-laden voice scoffed, "Only three of you? And already bloodied, if my nose doesn't deceive me. How disappointing. I had hoped the mortal kings would send a company, at least."
The massive-sounding voice seemed to emanate from near the center of the room, but it modulated as if its source paced back and forth.
"It's invisible," Tash hissed.
"I will cast," Ghomarck muttered. "Do not charge forward."
"Wizards are the best." Séa nocked an arrow and drew on her war bow as her eyes roved, seeking something, anything, to aim at. The bowstring creaked under the strain.
"Pitiful and stupid," rattled the invisible voice. "Die, then, puny mortals."
The old wizard commanded, "Araneomorphae!" as he flared his fingers toward the voice. Gray streaks sprayed outward from his hands in a fan of magical fibers. In a heartbeat, the silvery strands rooted over a wide swath of the chamber floor. The conjured fibers grew from the floor like ghostly grass, but in two places they climbed higher, up into the air, surrounding two pillars shaped like monstrous legs. So tightly did they cling that the shape of the invisible calves, knees, and knotted thighs became outlined in shimmering silver gray. The spell tugged downwards, tying the unseen feet to the floor.
Twin twangs sounded as twin arrows flew. The impacts sounded less like arrows and more like gravel-filled socks smashing against granite. The slender missiles skittered off to the corners of the room. But the strikes rippled the air above the creature's legs, peeling back the magical concealment to reveal a brawny torso the color of stale oatmeal.
Tash's fingers flew to her quiver to pluck a fresh missile. "Ogre? Giant?"
Hampered but not halted by Ghomarck's sticky spell, the legs powered toward the trio. The congested basso boomed, "A web spell? How rustic. How second circle."
"Need a disjunction hex," the wizard muttered. "One moment."
Séa tossed her bow behind her and unlimbered her mace. "Not ogre. Worse."
Tash let fly an arrow toward the presumed location of the giant's head. That arrow, too, ricocheted away and clattered to the stone floor, but its impact disturbed the invisibility field. The creature's hook-nosed face sank beneath heavy brows that sprouted curly horns. A maw bristling with fangs yawned in a permanent grimace of rage. Most disturbing, though, was the dead-oatmeal color that coated every part visible, including the surfaces of his eyes. The rogue muttered, "Whoa. Ugly."
The paladin's left hand folded upon the pewter hammer that hung from her neck. "Torugg, I call for thy aid. Endurer, hear me." The paladin took a step forward, to the edge of the tangle spell, and a blue white glow enveloped her body.
