The Swordsman of Faerûn

On Eagle Mouth Rock there is a high altar platform where rituals are laid out, but if anyone wants to interfere with the soul vortex, this is the best place.

Although William knew that he had found his destination, he still asked the old mage, "Are you sure this is our destination?"

Elminster pretended to be hesitant and said: "It should be, after all, it's my first time here. But in the safe period, we'd better borrow the identity of the shadow spirit, otherwise, we may go directly to the real face, and there may be unforeseen circumstances." A question of foreknowledge."

Dove next to him interjected and said, "The sickle and hoe were sunned early, and the goblins were frightened."

The sickle and hoe were exposed early, which shocked the goblins.It's a Faerun proverb, which means to startle the snake.

Goblins like to take advantage of the opportunity to plunder when farmers are harvesting. Some smart goblins will even foresee the arrival of the harvest season when farmers are fiddling with farm tools, and then gather tribes in advance to prepare for plunder.

William nodded, but he also very much agreed with the old mage and Dove's idea.However, if one wanted to borrow the identity of a shadow spirit, one had to rely on the power of the shadow spirit.The three of them turned their heads to look at the army of shadow spirits behind them, only to see that little Crow Daughter stomping on Foxis' face with her little feet, even though Foxes could pinch this little thing with just a wave of his hand. Turned into meat, but he had no intention of resisting, just covered his face with his palm, allowing the other party to humiliate him.

William walked slowly to the two who seemed to be enemies but were in fact brothers and sisters, and said, "We are brothers and sisters of the same blood, so why bother to be mean to each other! Little girl, you are actually hurting your own brother by being mean to your elder brother." Prestige."

The Crow Daughter stared wide-eyed and replied: "I want you to take care of it!" But after all, she let go of the trick on Foxis.

The Crow Daughter was like a little adult, and she said to William arrogantly: "Human! You and your people have done a great job in saving me, and I want to reward you. Tell me, what kind of reward do you want?"

William shook his head and said, "Saving you is just a matter of convenience. We came here for our own purpose, but we don't need your so-called reward."

The crow girl was so angry that her little face swelled into a bun, Da Sheng shouted: "Bad human beings! Are you looking down on me? I am the daughter of the Crow Queen, the proud daughter of heaven who has won the righteousness of fate! No People can refuse my reward!"

Although William didn't want to play house with this vexatious little girl, he was also willing to adapt.

He said: "In this case, let me lend you some of our available identities. I am waiting for a group of people who need to disguise themselves as shadow spirits and sneak into another plane to save people. Please find some reliable shadow spirits and lend them to us." Copy it."

The Crow's Daughter was like a child in October, she would change as soon as she said something, and she immediately replied happily: "That's right! Well, since you have sincerely asked, I will be generous." Promise you. Hey! Stupid Foxy, help me prepare rewards for them, remember! Ask for the best!"

Although the Daughter of the Crow seems a little unreliable, Foxis is very good at handling things. He is very conscientious and helps William and his party select a few ghosts to imitate, and then bring them to William and the others. around.

This imitative shady infiltration into an ethereal skinchanger's lair is unlike polymorph infiltration anywhere else, since ethereal skinchangers themselves are masters of polymorph infiltration, so their defenses against this are the ultimate.

If you want to transform into the lair of the skinchangers in the spirit world, the most important point is to ensure that the pretender and the disguised object are in the same place, and you must ensure that the disguised object is real, including not being a dead body.

Failure to do so triggers the final defense mechanism of the ethereal skinchanger lair - ethereal leaping.

William's solution is to use the power of spells to disguise themselves as corresponding shadow spirits, and then go to the etheric world in a team with the disguised prototype shadow spirits. Deceive the guards of those clever skinchanger lairs, but can conceal the true identity of the infiltrator to the greatest extent.

With the old mage Elminster around, it was not so difficult to change their appearance, and they were soon ready to sneak into the ether world.

However, to the surprise of William and the others, Foxis actually joined their team. Of course, he was the leader of all the shadow spirits on the surface, which also made their infiltration plan more rigorous.

William looked back at the Crow Daughter, only to find that Foxis was also secretly looking back at the Crow Daughter, but his eyes were full of helplessness and pain.

William sighed, and didn't touch the crow queen's thoughts of family disputes, but jumped into the soul vortex, and the partners behind him jumped off one after another.

Although the Ether Realm also belongs to the Transitional Plane, its characteristics are completely different from the Shadow Plane and the Astral Plane. The Ether Realm looks like a copy of the Main Material Plane. There is no difference, but most of these landscapes and plants have their appearances, and the insides are generally the same. They are more like models made of soft wax, and you only need to poke them gently with your hands to find the difference.

Life in the ether world is not as diverse as the main material plane, but there are also a few of them. Among them, the largest number and the most widespread distribution are small alien creatures called spirit beetles.

The spirit beetles are the real natives of the etheric world. They are at the bottom of the etheric food chain. All predators living in the etheric world will basically feed on the etheric beetles, even the spirit skinchangers. .

William and the others encountered this alien creature as soon as they entered the ether world.

They were the size of a basketball, with six tentacled legs and a carapace with amethyst-like veins in a swirling pattern. The carapace had gorgeous color patterns, which made the spirit beetle look extraordinarily dazzling.

But if someone underestimated the attack power of the spirit beetle because of this, it would be a big mistake.

These timid spirit beetles always try to escape trouble, but they have a pair of very vicious jaws that can be used to tear the boundaries of the planes, and when the spirit beetles use these jaws to attack enemies, they will cause similar Bleeding effect.

In the ether world, wherever there are a lot of spirit world beetles, there will always be some real physical buildings, and these places are also areas frequented or even occupied by those spirit world predators.

Through the positioning of the soul vortex, William and the others almost directly approached the lair of the targeted spirit world skinchangers.Here is a landform of towering snow peaks, severe cold, snow, and ice and snow trails circling between the peaks.

Of course, most of the scenery here is actually fake. William tried to touch the snow and rock walls around him with his hands, but found that they were all liquid substances, the so-called etheric substances, the intermediate state of elements.

But the severe cold is real, but it is not the severe cold of the etheric plane, but the low temperature from the ice plane. As we have said, the etheric plane connects the main material plane and the elemental plane.William and the others are in the junction area between the ether world and the ice plane.

The low temperature made the shadow spirits quite uncomfortable, and William and the others were also affected. Of course, it was Selena who had the most difficulty adapting to the climate here. After all, the scorching hell she lived in before was a plane where high temperature prevailed. In a place of severe cold, this little girl almost collapsed on the spot.

Fortunately, William and the others prepared sufficient supplies in advance, and heavy winter clothes soon became standard equipment for everyone.

A group of 11 people, William, the old mage, Dove, Selina, Brunhilde, and Foxes and five real shadow spirits, of course, except for Foxis, everyone is a shadow spirit They seem to be walking hard on the ice and snow path full of snow and ice cones, step by step towards the depths of the snow peak.

And there is the lair of the spirit world skinchangers who make deals with Phinea.

As the ostensible leader of the group, Foxis walked in the front without hesitation, and behind him was William who had turned into a ghost.

While walking, Foxis whispered: "Your Excellency, thank you for saving my mother."

William said "hmm" and didn't speak.

Foxis asked in surprise: "Aren't you curious that I actually call my sister my mother?"

William said: "There is nothing to be curious about. The gods came to the world, and the saints came to the world. I have seen this kind of thing... a lot. Your sister is a saint. When I saw her, I was shocked Confirmed. I think that apart from the Queen of Crows, no one else would choose the Daughter of Crows as the carrier of the Saint."

Foxis was speechless.

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The ice and snow path is not only difficult to walk, but also full of dangers, because there are not only countless hidden or obvious traps, but also many monsters living in the ether world hidden in it.

Originally, this time was the time for William, who possessed the ability of spiritual perception, to show his talents, but due to the intention of temporarily hiding his strength, he did not stand up immediately.

It was Selina and a ghost thief who were in charge of opening the way for the big guys, and they often ran around in the underground pipelines of the crawling city (the underground pipeline system of the crawling city is like a living one, always changing its path at any time) Selena has a wealth of experience in exploring mazes, while the shadow thief is a professional expert in trap exploration.

They cooperated with each other to find many deadly traps along the way, allowing William and his party to walk safely on the ice and snow trail.Of course, it doesn't mean that these two pathfinders didn't encounter fatal dangers. There have been many times when they used their own lives to get out of the trap.

However, thanks to the security measures arranged by William in advance, such as equipping the two road-finding heroes with safety ropes, even if they fall or are attacked, they still have the opportunity to obtain a security guarantee.

In fact, it basically depends on William's efforts to save the two female warriors who have been wandering on the edge of the death scythe. Whenever they are about to encounter disaster, William, who has already sensed it, always pulls the safety rope in advance to almost The slightest difference dragged them away from the dangerous place.

Due to William's relatively concealed actions, most people only saw the luck of the two Pathfinders, but few people noticed that he was the one who controlled the situation.

And those hidden monsters are a bit of a headache.

Frost lizards are magical monsters from the ice and snow plane. When they wander into the ether world, they always like to hunt wildly, and then store the frozen prey carcasses as future rations.

The monster has an ice-blue spiral body with six legs, a long tail, and a reptilian head.Of course, this kind of monster is not very difficult to deal with in front of William and others. Although they often disguise themselves as a static snow-covered stone for surprise attacks, their greedy nature makes this kind of monster always unable to calm down.

The truly deadly monsters are those known as spirit predators.

Spiritual predators have extraordinary jumping ability and extremely keen sense of touch. Before William and his party entered their ambush zone, these monsters discovered the traces of the prey that came to their door.

This kind of monster is a natural carnivore. They like to squat in a place where prey is often seen, waiting for targets from other planes to appear, and then cast the [Dimensional Anchor] spell to trap the prey in the ether world, and slowly hunt each other .In case the opponent manages to escape back to the main material plane, the predator will cast [Transfer] to continue hunting.

However, the hunting of predators in the spirit world has been a bit difficult recently, because the spells they are good at are somewhat restricted. Of course, unlike those spellcasters who use magic nets to cast spells, predators in the spirit world have not completely lost their use Magic-like abilities, after all, this is their natural instinctive talent.It's just that [Dimensional Anchor] is always ineffective, and [Transfer] is also difficult to break through the plane barrier. At most, they can only do some short-distance teleportation in the ether plane, which makes their hunting efficiency drop sharply.

Another reason is that the visitors from the alien plane no longer appear, so that these brutal hunters can hardly find suitable prey from the alien plane, so that they have to rely on devouring the beetles from the spirit world to feed their hunger.

This is simply the cruelest torture for predators in the spiritual world. A spirit beetle whose stomach is full of ether, how can it have the fragrance of real flesh and blood?

This situation is naturally more difficult for the ethereal predators who live near the ethereal skinchanger's lair as guards, because they basically rely on the feeding from the ethereal skinchanger to stay safely in the Here, when the spell-like [Dimension Teleportation] cannot be used, these monsters who are used to eating ready-made food will naturally become more dangerous.

They even began hunting down the real guards of the skinchanger stronghold to vent their anger and discontent.

Prey came to the door, and these almost crazy monsters couldn't wait to come out of their hiding places, and the magic-like [Dimensional Anchor] smashed desperately at William and his party as if they didn't want money.

It's a pity that this type of teleportation-restricted spell has almost no impact on William and others, because none of William and the others thought about using [Transportation] to escape, but all brandished their weapons to meet the predators in the spirit world .

The ethereal predator's body is protected by a spiked shell-like armor, with four powerful jaws surrounding a large, drooling mouth.They have two stout, bird-like legs and two claw-shaped arms with vicious, meter-long claws that look like the knife arms of a praying mantis.

Spiritual predators are almost as good at jumping as fleas. They are about the same height as humans and can even jump tens of meters. Tendon is a better material for making strings. It is said that the hand crossbow made from the Achilles tendon of predators in the spirit world has the power to shoot through multiple plate armors.

Of course, what William has to consider now is how to kill the incoming predators of the spirit world without revealing his true identity. After all, it is difficult for ordinary shadow spirits to fight against such fierce monsters.

I have to say that bringing Foxis was indeed a wise choice. Although this big son of the Raven Queen is not William's opponent, it does not mean that his strength is poor. When Foxis swung the giant ax After resisting a predator in the spirit world, everyone will have the "opportunity" to "adjust" their tactics.

The "Shadow Spirits" quickly formed into a battle formation, and took over another predator from the spirit world who rushed forward. Although the enemy's charge was terrifying, "Shadow Spirit" William relied on his true inner strength to defeat the enemy. This momentum was resolved invisibly. Of course, in order to make the performance more reasonable, he took advantage of the trend and turned back three somersaults to show that he was not the opponent of the predator in the spirit world.

Another "Shadow Spirit" Brunhilde swung the Shadow Slashing Sword (a weapon provided by the Shadow Spirit) and slashed at the monster's thigh. After that, other real and fake shadow spirits used the weapons in their hands to make up the knife, so that this reckless predator of the spirit world had to use a shrill scream to relieve the pain in his body.

Just when it was about to jump again to get rid of the siege of its prey, a slender shaman scimitar pierced through the lower jaw of the predator in the spirit world without a sound, and then penetrated its skull.

The poor monster immediately lost the strength to struggle, and could only twitch and fall in a pool of blood.

William drew out the slender shadow spirit machete, and said to the shadow spirit companions with a "sincere" face: "This monster is really difficult to deal with!"

Everyone echoed insincerely: "Yes! Yes!"

"Let's go! Let's help Prince Foxis!"

The second predator of the spirit world also fell under the siege of everyone's "combined force", which greatly boosted the morale of the "Shadow Expedition Team", they were more useful in harvesting the predator of the spirit world After obtaining the materials, continue to embark on the journey of exploration with confidence.

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The monsters that appear at any time and the complex and changeable terrain can only be regarded as the supernumerary defense of the lair of the spirit world shapechangers.

The lair of the spirit world's shapechangers, also known as the castle of illusion, is a strange building with the ability to transform and move.When it is invaded by foreign enemies, it will choose different solutions according to the different intruders.

If you encounter unexpected intruders who are not very powerful, the illusion castle will arrange some traps and mazes to deal with the enemies, and then decide whether to kill the enemies or capture them according to the situation.

Of course, if the invading enemy is too strong, the magic castle will start the enemy elimination tactics, use the maze and its own moving ability to confuse the enemy, and take advantage of the situation to escape from the original place, and move the magic castle to an unexpected place.

In this regard, the illusion castle is quite similar to the tower kingdom of the spirit soul.

Of course, there is a third situation, which is like William came to rescue Phinea who made a deal with the spirit world skinchanger. This kind of intruder is the least favorite type of spirit world skinchanger, which represents the spirit world. The skinchanger's deal has gone awry, and it or the guards it left on purpose will not hesitate to launch the ultimate defense plan.

Because of the camouflage plan prepared in advance by William and others, coupled with the disconnection of the magic net, most of the casters' spell abilities have found extremely serious restrictions, allowing them to smoothly come to the real entrance of the illusion castle.

The illusion castle can change into any shape or style of building, but what appeared in front of William and the others was a building complex that was almost like a giant castle.

There are countless creatures living freely in this castle. Although it seems that their races are not the same, and some of them are even enemies, they can live in harmony. For example, the big bad wolf and the little wolf Lambs discuss the difference between grass and meat, dwarves and giants sit together bragging, and so on.

There are also some human-like waiters carrying all kinds of food and sending them to these creatures for them to enjoy.When William and the others appeared at the gate of the castle, two waiters greeted them immediately.

As the one with the best eyesight among the crowd, William could tell at a glance that these two guys were not human at all, but a kind of humanoid existence he had encountered before—little djinn.

As a giant elf with four elemental energies, the appearance of the little dwarf is the most similar to that of human beings.

In fact, for the little giant spirit alone, the most comfortable living environment is the ether world.It's just that the unstable form of the etheric world prevents the small dwarf tribe from developing on a large scale, so most of the little djinn tribes will choose to live in seclusion on the main material plane with the second most comfortable environment.

But there are still many little genies who will choose to venture into the etheric world and find work (at the same time, they are also the most hunted prey by predators in the ether world), and being hired by spirit world shapechangers is undoubtedly popular with many little genies. of a job.

The little dwarf stopped William and his party and asked, "Who are you? Why did you appear in the lair of the Lord of Thousand Faces?"

Everyone looked at each other, and then Foxes stepped forward and replied: "I am the King of Falad Exitis from the Kingdom of Shadows, Foxes. Our lord, the Raven Queen, is missing. Now, I was ordered to come to the spirit world (another name for the ether world) to find the whereabouts of our Lord."

Queen of Crows?The two little giants looked confused. The reputation of the Raven Queen is not well-known in the etheric world, but it does not mean that these two waiters have never heard of the reputation of the raven queen. After all, the etheric world is usually known for being well-informed.

The two little dwarf attendants understood very well how much the shadow spirits attached importance to the Raven Queen, and they didn't show too much vigilance towards the sudden appearance of a shadow spirit search team.After all, their boss didn't tamper with the Raven Queen or some important people around the Raven Queen, so the little giants didn't care why these guys in the shadows came here.

Such a situation of being approached by someone because of the loss of an important person or a shapeshifter incident is a common occurrence for the guardians of the transformed castle of the spirit world shapechanger, as long as it does not involve their own boss's name To remind some guys, the little giant spirits who are guards will not be too worried.

They even asked loudly with joy on their faces: "Friends from the shadow world, how did you pass the dead ice road (ice and snow trail)? Didn't you encounter those annoying predators in the spirit world?"

For these little elves guarding Laprous' lair, the predators of the spirit world lurking on the ice and snow paths are like tigers prowling at our door, which makes them always have a deadly depression with a bone in their throat sense.

In fact, this is the restraint that the spirit world skinchanger deliberately left to the little djinn employees, lest these guys who get paid to work go out and wander around when he is not around, thus leaking the secrets of their lair.

Little genies are limited to employment contracts and cannot intentionally harm the spirit world predators that are part of the magic castle's defense system, but when some foreign explorers kill these annoying and dangerous monsters, they will not blame the little Therefore, they always hope that some foreign visitors can "fight tigers" for them.

Foxis didn't know the twists and turns, he hesitated for a moment, he didn't know whether to tell the truth or make up a lie to fool him.

Just when the son of the crow queen was quite struggling, William stepped forward and said, "I'm sorry, the two guards of Laprous' lair. We encountered two terrifying monsters on the way here. They are really serious. Can jump, maybe it is what you call a predator in the spirit world?"

The little giant spirit hurriedly said: "That's right! It's them, what did you do with them?"

William pretended to be anxious and said: "They are very ferocious and difficult to deal with. You have to know that those two terrifying monsters are too powerful. We have no way to keep our hands, so we can only kill them ruthlessly." .”

The two little giant spirits immediately cheered when they heard the words. They smiled happily and said happily: "Really? That's really a pity. Aha! Our Lord of Thousand Faces managed to get the two A predator from the spirit world has been lured to settle at the door of our house. I believe that when he finds out about this, the expression on his face will be very interesting. Oh! We forgot that our boss does not have a face that really belongs to us, and his expressions are all other people's! Hahaha--"

William and his party looked at these two little giant spirits who seemed to be "eating inside and outside" with a confused look, but they were a little confused.

In fact, the logic here is easy to understand. It’s like you work as a security guard in a remote place. In order to prevent you from leaving your post, your boss deliberately put two biting mad dogs at your door. As long as you dare to leave the post and go out, you will be guaranteed It's not negotiable to bite you.

You said you are not angry, are you annoyed?

Then suddenly a few outsiders came to the door. They said that they were afraid of being bitten by a dog, so they had to beat the mad dog to death with a few sticks. Do you think you are surprised or not, are you secretly happy?

It is not easy to meet a group of normal communication partners in the etheric world. The little dwarfs warmly received this group of shadow spirit friends who strayed into this place by mistake, and invited them to sit and rest in the reception area of ​​Laprous' Lair.

Hospitality is a very important part of the traditional customs of the little elves. They will never hesitate to give food and shelter to passers-by in need, although they will also ask for specific forms from those who have helped them at any time after that. s return.

William and the others seemed to refuse, but they couldn't wait to enter the lair of the spirit world skinchangers. They were warmly received by the guards here, and it was a bit flattering. All kinds of fine wine and food were delivered to them as if they were free of charge. , these foods seem a bit extravagant even in the main material plane, let alone in the etheric world where the physical properties are not very stable, their value can be increased by more than ten times.

Even some handsome men and women with curvaceous figures came forward to perform dances, and expressed their willingness to provide some indescribable relaxation services.Of course, everyone knows that these so-called men and women are not real human beings or shadow spirits, but shapeshifters whose nature is not very mature (they are usually produced by spirit world shapechangers when they perform disguise activities. Unexpected harvest) is the existence that is transformed.

They will absorb wisdom and human experience in the process of close communication with visitors, thereby broadening their horizons and enriching their practical experience. When these young shapeshifters have accumulated enough wisdom and qualifications, they will obtain independent qualifications , which is an essential step for them to become new spirit skinchangers.

Originally, this unique way of relaxing was an irresistible temptation and a sweet adventure for most real adventurers, but for William, who used magic to disguise their identities, it was another matter. a situation.If they really failed to control themselves, then it would be a matter of minutes to reveal their identities.

William would not make such a mistake at such a juncture. He rejected the "devotion" of the shapeshifters without hesitation, and said that loyalty to his wife is the first priority of the shadow spirit tribe he was born in. Although Dove and the others were a little moved, they also supported William's remarks very righteously, and said that the five of them came from the same tribe.