Incendiary Lass: The Amulet of Tal'ythar (Part 2)

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I was a bit tipsy when the cab finally dropped me off at my condo. I had said goodbye to Virginia thirty minutes early at Inferno. Well, to be honest, I only managed the barest of waves as she nabbed a gorgeous blond-haired guy and headed back out to the dance floor.

Paul, the late morning doorman, wished me a good morning as he buzzed me in. Relieving me of the embarassment of having to hunt for the right key. I even managed to hit 32 on the first try after i stumbled into the elevator.

I'm not sure how i managed to unlock the door to my condo, which requires a few fairly complicated spells, but I somehow made my way inside. I had left the living room drapes open, and the moon shone brightly into the room past the foyer. However, the moon wasn't the only light source visible in the room. On the coffee table on the middle of the room sat a tome, glowing with a faint bluish tinge.

My condo is protected by some of the most powerful magic i know. I don't mean to brag, but as Randy commented, my family is one of the most powerful magical families in Paragon. Many of the spells were cast with the help of my mother and some of her friends. And yet, somebody had managed to leave me a surprise. It was quite literally a sobering realization.

I activated the amulet's First and Second circles of protection. Pulsing bars of white light sprung up in a circle around me and a rainbow-hued glow began to shine from my skin. I called forth the Fires of Avaleth to fashion a sword of flame and proceeded into the living room.

The living room was quiet. Nobody appeared to be in the room. blah blah blah ... add more here or skip the whole paragraph

There was a note sitting on top of the tome.

Strange Dream

I had a strange dream last night. I was in Steel Canyon near the green line when suddenly i noticed a crowd of heroes gathering beneath the ramp. As I drew closer, I began to recognize many of the heroes from the newpapers ... including many of my idols.


Apparently some of the heroes more closely tied to the mystical have been privy to a premonition of grave change they expect will ripple through the world, in some cases having dramatic effect on out super powers. The group was discussing the possibility with grave concern, forumating a plan they hoped to return to a group of extraordinarily powerful magicians only known as The Devs.

After a time, the group moved to the Paragon Dance Party. While talk was still fairly serious, there was some dancing and socialization.





I have no idea what's going to happen, but i certainly won't worry too much for the future with such great heroes on the case!

Incendiary Lass: The Amulet of Tal'ythar

I mentioned earlier Virginia is a sculptor, but I hadn't realized her interest in art extended beyond that. One of Virginia's side interests is how magic influences art. In fact, she's something of an art historian when it comes to magic-related artwork.

As we talked over coffee at the Super Perk near the Steel Canyon yellow line, she told me when we first met, my amulet, the Amulet of Tal'ythar, sparked an old memory. It took her a while to pinpoint where she had seen it before, but she had finally remembered seeing it in a painting a few years back. She described the painting as being very dark, showing a powerful sorceress surrounded by minions of darkness. She didn't recall much else about the painting, but she said it had been hanging in the Rengrave Museum in Talos Island. She said she was good friends with a docent at that museum and she'd be happy to arrange a meeting.

A couple of evenings later, Virginia introduced me to Randy Ulstrom over drinks at Club Azure in Talos. Randy is a short bookish young man - I'd say in his early twenties. Randy had stringy black hair, which really wasn't becoming at the length he kept it, and a sharply pointed nose supporting a pair of spectacles. Looks aside, he seemed like a very nice person. Upon being introduced to Randy as a magical practitioner, Randy immediate dove into alternatingly peppering me with questions and firing off anecdotes about spells he had been researching.

Virginia watched from the sidelines with a bemused expression for a few minutes before she dove into the conversation to wrest control.

"I'm sure Kate would love to hear more about the Lesser and Greater Incantations for instilling various qualities of water in different types of dirt, but we were hoping you could tell us more about the painting."

Randy stopped for second, looking a bit hurt, but quickly recovered. "Oh, yes, Virginia, I nearly forgot!" He brushed a strand of hair from his glasses. "The painting you remember is called The Seventh Banishing of Baphomet. Its about five hundred years old. It clearly represents a woman in the act of closing a magical portal from which are flowing hordes of spectral demons and behemoths. Oddly enough, Baphomet does not appear to be shown in the painting. I did some quick research and the identity of the sorceress is not known for certain, but there's some speculation she may have been Paragon's Guardian of the Tenth Circle around that time."

Randy took a sip of his water. "It was painted by a master, you know. I'm sure you've both heard of Albert Hume?"

Virginia nodded while I tried to hide my ignorance by eating one of my martini olives. Randy gave me a distracted look and continued.

"Hume was commissioned to paint the piece by Victor Malchus, a very wealthy practitioner of the magical arts who also lived at that time."

I tried not to spit out the olive at the mention of my grandfather's name, but I couldn't fully stifle a small cough. Randy turned to look at me again before starting to rummage through the small leather briefcase he had brought.

"The Malchus family, of course, is well-known in Paragon city as being one of the top magical families among the Guardians. While the exact identities of the Guardians are a well-kept secret, its probably safe to assume Victor Malchus knew the woman in the painting."

Randy extracted a glossy piece of paper from his briefcase and handed it to Virginia, putting his briefcase back under his chair . "I took the liberty of printing off a color copy of the painting from our archive."

Virginia examined the painting while Randy continued.

"One thing I find most interesting about the painting is there are three artifacts clearly represented in it; an amulet, a ring, and an earring. The way they are so prominently displayed makes it impossible to assume they are anything but magical."

Virginia handed the photo to me.

The sorceress in the painting stood to one side, arms raised. A ring on her right hand glowed with a reddish hue, while an earring on her left ear glowed with a bluish hue. What was even more striking were the auras that surrounded her.

Two of them were recognizable to me as the First and Second Circles of protection I could activate with the aura. The First Circle had the same characteristic purple-pink hue and the Second Circle was represented by a series of bands of white light surrounding the sorceress. I was struck, however, but another aura I had never seen before, that also surrounded the sorceress.

This third aura was similar in color to the First Circle aura, but where the First Circle simply shrouds its invoker, this aura projected rays of purple-pink energy from the sorceress. Was this the Third Circle power of the amulet?

A sharp kick from Virginia brought me back to the conversation. Randy was still talking about the painting.

"... after Eric Rengrave obtained the painting from an auction in Founders Falls about seven years ago."

Virginia leaned in towards him. "You're a dear for helping me out with this, Randy. One more thing, how might I go about finding more about the painting?"

Randy furrowed his brows. "Well, I tried to access the museum database records on the painting, but aside from a brief summary of the work, the detailed records were locked. My access level is pretty high, so I suppose you'd have to talk to Mr. Rengrave to find out more."

Virginia picked up her purse and smiled. "Its been ages since I spoke with Eric."

Randy looked startled.

"Well, we really need to go Randy, thanks again. I can keep the photo, right?" Virginia asked, dropping $60 on the table and plucking the picture from my hands.

"Well ... of course," Randy stammered.

I muttered a quick goodbye to Randy and quickly followed Virginia out the door of the club.

"It sounds like we might have uncovered an interesting story behind that little trinket of yours, Kate. Now, let's go somewhere fun. Oh and don't let Randy's meek demeanor fool you ... did I tell you he's a member of the Circle of Thorns?" Virginia smiled sharply at me before turning to hail a cab.

Brass Betty

Our team made a new friend last night: Brass Betty.

I was recently introduced to Virginia Hoffman in Steel Canyon. She's a representational sculptor who has created some of the pieces around Paragon City representing its more famous retired heroes.

One of my friends at MAGI had recently related a story to me about a co-worker of hers who had checked a cursed artifact out of the MAGI vaults for some research she was doing. Apparently, late at night, it was stolen from her apartment. Virginia told me this has been going on for a few weeks, various cursed artifacts had gone missing, from Magic Stores, MAGI, and private collectors. Virginia's underground contacts had told her a Tsoo named Shadow Hand was behind the thefts and she asked for my help in recovering the artifacts.

Incendiary Lass and Brass Betty

I called clarence b good, Weather Warrior, and Clara Voyance to see if they'd help. Clara wasn't available, but she put me in touch with Brass Betty who joined us for the expedition.

This was an awkward set of missions for Lass. Had a lot of trouble holding aggro for some reason. Of course, clarence likes to lead into battle but using one of the PB squid-form multi-target blasts, which really gets the villains going, and Weather Warrior likes to use Gale to push the baddies back. I'm not the type of player who tells others not to use their powers, even if it makes my job more difficult. Usually, i just adjust and keep playing ... in fact, it can sometimes make things a bit more interesting. In these missions, however, it really seemed like something was taking aggro away from me, even when i was spamming Taunt.

Betty and Clara are actually both folk i've met through the Tankers global channel. Clara has been great fun to team with and has become one of our regular teammates. I know Betty has lots of other alts around but hopefully we'll see more of her along, too! I'd be thrilled if Lass could take a break from Tanking for the team occassionally so I could bring Wombat Girl or Pale Remedy into the team once in a while.

Incendiary Lass - SecLvl 17

Weather Warrior asked me to help out with a Council mission he had been given. He's becoming a good friend, so of course i said "yes."

Incendiary Lass takes on some Council with Weather Warrior

Incendiary Lass and Weather Warrior again

Lass has really been coming in to power the last few levels. Here's her current build:

Fire Sword really deals a lot of damage right now and around lvl 12+, her resists really started to how. Now she does pretty well in battle. She can take enough of a beating that she can Taunt, tho I really miss Invincibility. With a Peacebringer and a Storm Defender in most of my teams, it seems Taunt is only partially effective. Thanksfully, Invinc comes next level, so i should be better at keeping the villains around me focused.

Positron: Task Force Photon

A couple weeks back, Azuria told me one of the MAGI seers had a premonition about the Book of T'Jer'imakanu, a spell book written by a powerful weather wizard. Apparently the seer's vision included some of my friends and Positron, a famous Paragon City my mother has certainly told me about but whom i've never met.

So it certainly piqued my interest when i received a call recently from Position asking if me and my teammates were interested in investigating the Vahzilok for him.

I quickly grabbed clarence b good, Weather Warrior, and Clara Voyance and we heade to Steel City.


Task Force Photon battling Clockwork

Incendiary Lass

has a new costume! Tiffany loaned her some influence ...

Wombat Girl

Well, Bunny hit 50 and since Tiffany really doesn't like to solo, it looks like Tiffany will largely be retiring at lvl 48. I've promised Muffy and McBain i'll stick around some to help them reach 50, but with Bunny starting a new Peacebringer, i suspect most of my time will be taken by new characters.

Tina introduced me to a new hero in town, Wombat Girl.


Wombat Girl tells me she was given her powers by a Great Wombat Spirit who tasked her with righting the wrongs of evil men. Oooookay .... but apparently Wombat Girl has teamed up with two other heroes: clarence b good and Weather Warrior, to help battle crime in Paragon City, so i'm all for it!

Here's the latest from Wombat Girl:

Hello, Tiffany! I'm trying to get used to battling crime here in Paragon City. Lately, I've been hanging out with clarence and WW. They're both very strong heroes. I had never met a Kheldian before, but clarence seems mostly normal, and he's certainly very powerful! Its been a bit interesting trying to keep those Void Stalkers and Quantums away from him, tho.

Hopefully Wombat Girl will have more to say later, but I'll admit, it hasn't been a great experience. Wombat Girl is a Claws/Regen Scrapper, and, as much as i love the concept, i'm not thrilled with the actual play. Both Weather Warrior (Storm/Elec) and clarence (PB) do more damage. She can't even hold aggro, so most of the time the baddies just run right by her to attack clarence and WW, so she's stuck running around a _lot_. The regen powers are interesting, by the time she got to lvl 12, she was just starting to feel a little more durable, but its just very depressing how little she contributes offensively. By the time her claws come out and she executes Spin, there's usually nobody around to hit. Follow Up just doesn't seem to add a whole lot, other than being an extra attack. I've already tried swapping her out for Incendiary Lass, and it seems the team is much mroe productive with a Tank than with a Scrapper helping out. Which is too bad, because i really like Wombat Girl!