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Library: Tales of Adventure III (Part I) - Kech Lektar
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Author: Shadowjack
Date:Feb 21 1996
Transcribed: Sun Jun 11 13:16:57 EDT 1995
Folly, Faith and Friendship Part I
Kech Lektar
By The Shadowjack
It was the world of Bat's fourth incarnation, and not all the
lands had been reconquered. There were even those who muttered that
the great necromancer Kech Lektar himself had not survived the
cataclysm which brought about the current incarnation of Bat.
It was during this time that an adventuring party, full of the
energy that comes from youth, banded together: Elric was a mighty
cyclops, and although he was young in years, he had great vitality and
a true heart of courage. Noah was a shrewd mage who, despite being a
lowly kobold, was a grandmaster psionicist of much wisdom. Seaside
was a friendly, well-liked thrikhren mage who joined our party for the
camaraderie. Latexi was a young thrikhren mage who possessed both
boundless ambition and energy. I myself was a newly converted
defender of the faith; a paladin of Faerwon. I had recently laid down
my Mace of the Manta Ray and my Maul of the Titans in order to follow
the holy paths of righteousness.
This adventuring party heard the rumors that claimed Kech Lektar
had not survived the great conversion; but we refused to believe such
tales were true, for Kech Lektar had possessed great and fearsome
power. Our party was determined to see for ourselves if Kech Lektar
had truly been destroyed in the cataclysm -- or if indeed he still
worked his fiendish experiments in his vile underground laboratory.
So with this goal in mind, our brave party scoured the lands of
Bat in search of Kech Lektar's lair. We searched deserts and plains;
forests and valleys; hills and mountains; cities and ruins; rivers and
lakes; but still no sign of Kech Lektar's necromantic influence could
be found.
We had all but given up and believed the rumors of Kech's death --
when Noah stumbled across a gloomy, familiar-looking graveyard. Could
this be the hideout that Kech Lektar had established in this new
world? Without any doubt, our party plunged into the depths of this
dungeon -- and indeed, horrific undead creatures and mighty golems
attacked us at every corner.
Finally, only one door remained unopened in this dark dungeon, and
we stood before it with our breaths' held. All was deathly quiet, but
a faint unearthly glow crept through from under the door's crack. Our
party made our final preparations -- and burst through the door!
"Kech Lektar!!!" Latexi exclaimed in both surprise and outrage at
the intimidating necromancer who, indeed, stood before us without any
signs of his decades of age.
"That's Mr. Lektar to you!" the powerful necromancer snarled, and,
as a display of his demonic power, he summoned a horde of turbo
zombies which zoomed to Kech's aid.
(These turbo zombies were created before today's age of fuel
injectors and emissions tests: They ran on leaded gasoline and were
powered by dual quad carburetors, monstrous 427 cubic inch V8 engines,
nitrous oxide systems and twin turbine turbos. Compared to the
sluggish zombies of today, these turbo zombies were speed demons.
They could go from Shadowkeep to Lorenchia in nearly four seconds!
Only Kech Lektar could afford to maintain these gas-guzzling beauties,
and that made him the envy of every stoplight necromancer.)
Our party did not flinch from these overwhelming odds, and we
braved this turn of events and pressed the fight. Elric took the
brunt of their vicious attacks, but not once did shirk from his duty
of keeping the rest of us alive.
"You ain't shit!" Elric taunted Kech and his horde of zombies.
"Slip's feet smell worse than your killing clouds! Hey, zombie,
zombie, zombie -- swing!"
Despite the trash talking and bravado Elric displayed, my prayers
to Faerwon were barely keeping Elric alive. Our mages, too, were
growing weary with lack of energy, so with one last rally the mages
poured their final mind disruption, golden arrow and electrocution at
our foes, and Kech and his zombies -- to our relief -- finally fell to
the ground, vanquished.
(Unbeknownst to us, Kech had foreseen the possibility of his
defeat, and, being the unparalleled necromancer that he was, he had
prepared a means to escape death itself. Although we gloated over his
corpse on that day, Kech would rise again later, after the divine
event known as The Reboot.)
As we stood there, panting heavily from exhaustion, attempting to
keep from slipping in the pools of our own blood, Noah smiled at us
with a knowing gleam in his eye.
"Although we had some blunders in the course of this adventure we
are all alive here to tell the tale; we have proven our worth as a
party.
"So let's kill Lord Narcuul Deathcut!"
(to be continued...)
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