Nikolay Deund "The Lucky Gunslinger"

Nikolay in his infinite curiosity on the Arrival square portals started to look further into the way they worked. He started with the arrival stone, a large piece of granite brought to the surface and covered in arcane runes. These runes appear to be nothing but gibberish even to the mages that study them, but this circle serves as the location that all who come to Aurelian appear in. He eventually found out a horrifying secret of all the portals of Aur. They are corrupted hellmouths that seek out those who need to come to the prison plane. This is the closest anyone has figured out how to return to their home plane.

  Still his investigations were cut short due to fear effects when he attempted to bribe one of the hellmouth guardians for more information.

With the problems in Azoa growing ever stronger, and the chaos of the situation between the resistance and the remaining government forces, the resistance turned towards a reputable source of additional forces - adventurers from Aurelia, transported aboard the Windsong and the Walpurgisnacht.

Early waves were generally successful, with significant damage to the White cloak forces at the site of the landing, and a skirmish against the Azoan air forces seeing fireballs and flammable dirigibles being an exciting combination.

The third wave was the first to encounter some issues, with Demis of Wyrm’s Rest going down during the fight against several significant robot units which seemed to have an unusual, infernal power source, but the machines were successfully decommissioned.

With the final push, the old hands of Mel, Carnival, Geeg, Ein, Khors and Jed, joined by Revan and Nikolay for the attack on the two main objectives, with brief side trip to the house of Baba Yaga, where Oros and Sam were waiting. Carnival and Khors had been preparing for some time and were able to remove the device keeping Sam in his mind, with Khors removing it in real life and Carnival taking it out in his mind. It wasn’t easy, and the man was reticent to return, but it was eventually done.

The group rallied and headed to their first target, the military high command of Azoa. Guarded by a significant number of very large mechs, the party chose to sneak in while disguised, breaking into a slave auction, and causing quite a lot of chaos. Nikolai opened and closed the roof, several times, drawing the attention of the mechs outside. Geeg animated the cages of the slaves' doors, making them rips themselves down and protect the former occupants as they used a Gate spell to get them out. Revan used his shadow magic to assassinate, as an invisible Carnival sniped. Mel summoned a massive storm, and Khors used fire and light spells to bring attention to himself and cause havoc.

As the Azoan high command and their bodyguards fell, the arena began to fill with water, and eventually the party left what was left of the place to flood, their images captured by the strange devices in the building.

Revan decided that he’d had enough, and Shadow Walked back to the ship, but the rest pressed on. An encounter with Azoan mimics was…educational. Sam was acting very oddly, as well, even by his standards.

The party reached the capital, and found it guarded by the latest in Azoan tech, war machines and air ships. With all due consideration, the party decided to steal one of the two large airships, turning its advanced weapons on the other ship, war dirigibles and annihilators on the ground, causing havoc - but the ship was rapidly torn apart. In addition, it was crewed by slaves, and it was a struggle to overcome them and get them off before the ship came apart, but they did.

The other ships were…less fortunate.

And Sam, in a strange new form, was crushed to death as he brought down one of the other vessels.
Nikolay was reunited with his daughter, The Countess. Jed courted her in the aftermath of the war.

When the dust settled, the machines were defeated and the resistance took the city, with Oros left to mourn. Ein was crowned as the new king of Azoa. And Oros mourned.

It was common knowledge, among those in the know, that the Countess Dorothy Faen Tlabbar is one of the finest fleshwarpers the drow have ever produced.

Unfortunately, some unsavory types took notice as well - the worst of which was Zepar, and Infernal Duke of, among other things, Transformation. Given his fortay, it seemed...unlikely that he would court the countess in traditional style.

When Nikolay became aware of the situation, he made moves to protect the woman - astranged as they were, she was his daughter.

First, he called in his favours. He'd fought in Azoa, and knew people there, so he asked some of the people who owed him one to keep an eye on her. Given she was a leading member of the resistance, this was a little awkward...but they were able to help block some devilish interests.

Next, he pulled in the chits owed from his shenanigans during the war between heaven and hell, so that she had an angelic bodyguard. This...did not entirely end well, when the countess caught the bodyguard, but her modfiications did make it a more effective as a guard.

With her protected, at least for a time, Nikolay began to plan to stop the threat more permanently. It would not come as a shock that the lord of Transformation occasionally liked to do some work on himself, helping to keep his foes and allies guessing as to what, exactly, he could do.

Calling in the last of his favours, Nikolay was able to sneak into Zepar's inner workshop during one of his bouts of self-augmentation. Although he was almost caught, and had to shoot his way out, Nikolay made off with a prize - one of Zepar's hearts. While he could live perfectly well without it, the infernal duke knew full well that if it ended up in the hands of one of his equals, it could mean his doom. Nikolay made it clear: the countess was off limits.

And then, he vanished. There was no where he could hide the heart, or himself, forever. But he could run through the planes of the multiverse for a very, very long time before Zepar could find him. And until he wa found, his daughter was safe.