Thank you for your votes. Luck will be used to reduce the damage that our hero takes.
The fight, continued:
[spoiler]Round 13: Kurakil Attack Strength: 19, Player Attack Strength: 15;
Luck Roll: 3, Player is Lucky and only takes 1 Stamina damage
Tail Roll: 3;
Kurakil Stamina: 2, Player Stamina: 4, Player Luck: 9
Round 14: Kurakil Attack Strength: 17, Player Attack Strength: 21;
Tail Roll: 1;
Kurakil Stamina: 0, Player Stamina: 4[/spoiler]
The Kurakil lands another blow on Ariel Faust Constantine, who gets Lucky and only loses 1 Stamina. She then deals the finishing blow to the Kurakil.
283
With all the force you can muster, you drive Deliverer between the scales of the Demon’s chest and into its diabolical heart. Blue flames race along the length of the sword, bathing you and the Demon in their cool light. At once the body of the Kurakil starts to burn with the fires of Hell as its spirit is banished to the Outer Planes.
With the Infernal Beast destroyed, you can turn your attention to Nazek. He is holding the
Black Grimoire in front of him. Too late you realize that he is casting yet another spell! Materializing all over your body are dozens of small, hairy, black bodies. Desperately you try to brush the spiders off, but some manage to crawl inside your clothes and bite you with their venomous fangs. If you have the potion called Venom’s Bane, turn to the paragraph with the same number as that of the page containing the recipe for this potion in Sam’s book. If you do not have this potion, turn to 209.
[spoiler]
[/spoiler]
Ariel Faust Constantine does have the Venom’s Bane potion, so we will turn to paragraph 331 after eating a Provision, as there was a request to do so.
331
With shaking hands you take the potion from your pack and gulp it down. The antidote takes immediate effect and the spiders drop from you, repelled by the Venom’s Bane. As Nazek begins another incantation you rush at him, knocking the book from his hands. The Warlock pulls a long, sacrificial knife from under his robes and prepares to finish you off. At last you have a chance to exact your revenge on the evil Warlock.
NAZEK SKILL 10 STAMINA 9
If you reduce Nazek’s STAMINA to 2 points or less, turn at once to 258.
The fight:
[spoiler]Round 1: Nazek Attack Strength: 18, Player Attack Strength: 20;
Nazek Stamina: 7, Player Stamina: 8
Round 2: Nazek Attack Strength: 16, Player Attack Strength: 19;
Nazek Stamina: 5, Player Stamina: 8
Round 3: Nazek Attack Strength: 18, Player Attack Strength: 19;
Nazek Stamina: 3, Player Stamina: 8
Round 4: Nazek Attack Strength: 15, Player Attack Strength: 16;
Nazek Stamina: 1, Player Stamina: 8
Nazek’s Stamina is reduced to 1[/spoiler]
Ariel Faust Constantine manages to reduce Nazek’s Stamina to 1 point without taking a single hit in the process.
258
Nazek stumbles, falling backwards to the ground. You raise Deliverer above your head to deal the death-blow when a thunderclap reverberates round the crypt. You are frozen to the spot in fear as a terrible, evil sentience, millennia old, tries to force its way into your mind. The night of Shekka’s Moon is the time when the dark goddess’s influence is at its greatest in the world, and at this moment she is using her own powers directly against you. Roll one die and add 7. If the total rolled is less than, or equal to, your FAITH, turn to 400. If it is greater, turn to 169.
Rolling the die and applying the appropriate modification yielded a 10, which is less than Ariel Faust Constantine’s Faith.
400
The evil of Shekka is strong, but your faith is stronger. You feel the dark goddess’s grip as your mind begins to fail. With every fibre of your being you force yourself to move again. With one hand you manage to trace the Rune of Good in the air. Suddenly your mind and body are free of all tension and restraint. Yelling, you bring the Blessed Blade down with such force that it goes straight through Nazek’s body into the plinth beneath. The Warlock’s body suddenly goes limp. Nazek is dead. The rest of the fighting is soon over and the Cauldron of Midnight is no more.
Dawn comes and you see that the heavy, grey clouds of the last week have given way to clear skies. The month of Close is almost upon the land and there is a sharp chill in the air, but the oppressive atmosphere of evil has lifted. Lying beside Nazek’s immobile body is the object of your whole quest: the
Black Grimoire. When you have rested for a few days at Claybury, you will return the evil book to Rassin Abbey, and never again will it threaten the safety of your homeland. As you think of the abbey, you can just imagine the scene: Brother Calamus is illuminating a text narrating the story of a truly heroic adventurer who overcame the forces of evil to bring peace to the land. The story of the Spellbreaker. Your story.
[spoiler]
[/spoiler]
Bonus victory entry:
Upon returning to Rassin Abbey, Ariel Faust Constantine is greeted by Abbot Dunstan, Prior Alwyn, and Brother Calamus. Upon seeing the Black Grimoire,
Brother Calamus falls to his knees and cries out “Praise be to Alishanka and to you for delivering us from this evil, Spellbreaker!”
“Please, it is the least I can do after causing the theft of the Grimoire
in the first place, Brother.” Abbot Dunstan replies. “You are forgiven. If there is anything we can do to help you in your next step of your adventure, please let us know.”
“I would just like to have a rest for two days, if that is okay with all of you.”
“Done!” replies Prior Alwyn with a rare enthusiastic smile.
After two days have passed, Ariel Faust Constantine returns to her adventuring days with two weeks’ worth of food on her backpack and 250 Gold Pieces, both of which was supplied by the monks of Rassin Abbey as a sign of eternal gratitude.
As Ariel Faust Constantine disappears into the wilderness for her next adventure, the air is filled with chants and praises from the Monks.
“Long live the Spellbreaker! Long live the Spellbreaker!”
Well, it took a quite a bit of edits and resurrections, but we actually managed to survive this monstrosity of a gamebook! So give yourselves some massive accolades, as we can now say that we conquered the true granddaddy of hardest Fighting Fantasy gamebooks!
Some of the critical slip-ups that needed intervention on my part started with failing the Faith test when sleeping at the Pilgrim’s Rest. We needed to pass that test, which only has a 50% percent of success in order to get a boost of 2 Faith points and the Pilgrim’s Staff, the latter of which was key to getting the Ilithorn Rose later from the High Priest of Gwythain’s Barrow. Missing the boost of 2 Faith points was the game-ender, as that put our hero’s Faith at too low a score to get essential quest items such as the Heal All. The next mistake happened at the Market Square when we decided to look round the stalls instead of heading to the healing well. Due to bad game design, our hero would have had the choice of checking the stalls after visiting the healing well, but not vice versa. After giving a Gold Piece to a beggar to get another Faith point, we needed to pay another 2 Gold Pieces, which would have been the last 2 Gold Pieces that our hero had at this point, to take the waters of the well. We would then be subject to another Faith test with only a 1 in 3 chance of succeeding (at best) in order to get the Heal All that was necessary to survive the plague. As you can see, the Faith mechanic was a primary reason why this gamebook has a microscopic chance at success at its unedited form. The alternate option that I used to provide the necessary quest items and Faith boost at Hemlock and Hogweed’s Apothecaries was not perfect, but I think it as plausible story-wise in order to keep the adventure winnable and improve this adventure’s entertainment factor.
Thank you all for playing, and I hope to see all of you in my next thread, which will be for Knights of Doom, very soon. Now this book is definitely easier than Spellbreaker, but we will still need to be on our toes to have a good chance of surviving that adventure. The storytelling is decent, and I hope that we can have an enjoyable experience as we round out the original Puffin Books series!
Adventure Sheet
[spoiler]Ariel Faust Constantine
SKILL: 13
Initial Skill = 14
STAMINA: 8
Initial Stamina = 24
LUCK: 9
Initial Luck = 12
FAITH: 12
GOLD PIECES: 15
PROVISIONS: 6
INFECTION: 0
Turn to 13 if INFECTION is 15 or more
EQUIPMENT AND TREASURE:
Sword
Lantern
Tinderbox
Backpack
Silver Key With ‘252’ Engraved
Shroud
Falcon
Protective Leather Gauntlet
Ilithorn Rose
Charmed Pipes
Jar of Powder
Golden Sickle
Shield
Deliverer
Necklace of Elven Prayer-Beads
Holy Amulet
Black Grimoire Page 376 With Spell of Locking
Rune-carved Bone Ring
Notes:
Knows Demonic Word of Command
Say ‘One, two, away’ to send a falcon with SKILL 7 STAMINA 5 against an opponent
Reduce any additions to INFECTION by 1 point
Password is ‘The four phases of the moon’
Raven
RESURRECTIONS: 3[/spoiler]