Good!Party: The Fall of Cardinal Cyrus.

 Martini slips out into the room, and Marshall drops Holy Aura on himself and Ruin. Martini takes to the ceiling unseen, studying the cardinal, and Marshall casts Divine Power and quickened Divine Favor on himself.

Martini drops from the ceiling into the throne behind Cardinal Cyrus, and immediately stands up and makes a death attack against Cardinal Cyrus… and succeeds. He dies, and Martini has essentially just won the battle for us. She turns to the priest beside her and perforates him; he falls. She remains sitting on the throne. 

Ruin slips into the room while priests are dying, and cuts down another priest – gaining some temporary hit points in exchange. He positions himself to be flanking a priest as two of the devils move in on Martini; then one of the Horned Devils smacks her with its chain and stuns her. The Barbed Devils move in, but only one of them can attack Martini. It claws her twice, but fails to poison her. 

The remaining bishop between Martini and Ruin (there’s one other on the far side of Martini) casts Divine Favor and a quickened Divine Power – they both do. Marshall sees the situation unfolding around Martini, and starts Imploding demons. He follows up with a quickened Dismissal, removing another. 

Ruin bull rushes the priest to get past him to the demon, but gets pushed back by the priest’s feat of strength. The horned devil that Ruin couldn’t get to tears into Martini but fails to kill her. Two more horned devils go after Ruin, and miss; the barbed devils move in, and might manage to connect just through sheer weight of numbers. The nearest one tries to start a grapple, and fails. 

The barbed devil on the other side hits Martini with a coup de grace; she dies. The two bishops cast Righteous Might, making themselves all big and strong. Marshall casts his own Righteous Might. He tries to implode a priest, but fails. 

A couple of elite guards push through the drapes at the far end of the room. They’re wearing full plate and wielding dire flails. Ruin is pretty sure he’s about to be dogpiled by devils. He kills the bishop beside him and steps up onto the platform. The devils move up onto the stairs and attempt to grapple. One of them manages to grab Ruin. 

The remaining bishop steps up onto the platform and takes a shot at Ruin, but only damages his temporary hit points. Marshall implodes the devil that was grappling Ruin. Marshall: “Oops, wrong one.”

Marshall then swings his scythe and just buries it in the nearest horned devil. He wrenches it loose and attacks again, hitting again. 

Ruin attacks the barbed devil in front of him, cutting it up but not killing it. 

The horned devil turns to Marshall and makes the “Bring it” gesture. He tries to bite and claw Marshall, but misses. The devils drop a bunch of fireballs, none of which get through Ruin’s spell resistance; one of them gets through Marshall’s, but he avoids the worst of it. 

The barbed devils try to grapple Ruin, but he shakes them off. Two more barbed devils move in on Marshall, who attacks each of them on the way in and hits them both. The bishop attacks Ruin with his feat of strength, but misses. He looks at his flail like it’s just betrayed him. Marshall implodes another Barbed Devil, then drops a blade barrier in front of the steps, wall to wall, to hold them back. 

Three of the four horned devils take damage from the blades, and one of the two elite guards charges up to Ruin. He swings, but misses; the other one throws himself through the blade barrier, heroically taking some damage on the way in. Ruin finishes a horned devil, then hits the elite soldier a couple of times. 

The horned devils move in, which is going to be a problem. The horned devil tries to attack Marshall, but misses. Another horned devil tries to grab Ruin, but fails; the barbed devil manages to grab him, though. The bishop swings at Ruin again, and misses. 

Marshall lays into the horned devil with his scythe, but doesn’t take him down. He hits the devil that’s grappling Ruin, damaging it. The elite guard tries to help grapple Ruin, but fails. The other elite guard moves to engage Marshall. 

Again, Ruin realizes that his opponents are all going to try to pin him. He breaks loose of the grapple and throws himself off the platform; his various opponents try to attack him on the way out, but miss. The horned devil tries to grapple Ruin, and Ruin takes a slice at it; they both miss. 

Marshall shakes off the two who try to grapple him, but one of the barbed devils manages to grab him. The bishop tries to Flame Strike, but fails to get through either of their spell resistance. Marshall hits the Horned Devil with his scythe again, then drops quickened Freedom of Movement on both himself and Ruin. There will be no more grappling. The royal guard tries to attack Marshall, but misses. 

The other royal guard moves around to try to surround Ruin. Ruin ducks through a doorway behind the throne, runs around, and comes out on the other side, ending up beside Martini’s body. One of the horned devils smacks him on the way out, and winds up blinded by Marshall’s protections. Ruin shrugs off the stunning effect  and keeps going. He also ignores the fireball. The Horned devil on the platform tries to grab Ruin but fails. 

The bishop moves in and heals the horned devil that Marshall’s been fighting; it is no longer blinded or injured. Marshall responds by using Harm on the devil. He follows up with two quickened Searing Lights, and kills it. 

Ruin looks at the Blade Barrier. Then he scoops up Martini, dives through the blade barrier, races across the room, ducks under a Horned Devil’s chain, and dives back through the blade barrier on the other side, arriving beside Marshall with Martini’s body, completely unscathed. 

The various devils that were chasing Ruin stop, dumbfounded, and then reverse direction. The bishop reaches out and grabs the body away from Ruin. Marshall drops Freedom of Moment on her body, then True Resurrection, then adds Searing Light to damage the Bishop. The elite fighter moves up, and the second fighter moves up and hits Marshall, doing some damage but blinding himself in the process. Ruin cuts into the bishop, damaging him noticeably. One of the horned devils notices that Martini is alive again, and tries to attack her but misses. The other one attacks Marshall, hitting him but getting blinded in the process. 

One of the barbed devils manages to claw Martini for a bit of damage. 

Martini kick-flips up to her feet, then starts stabbing the priest. He dies. She steps back into the blade barrier, idly dancing through the blades. 

Marshall casts Inflict Moderate Wounds, Mass – hitting all the devils and both of the elite guards. One of the barbed devils goes down. He follows it up with two more Searing Lights on one of the Barbed Devils in front of him. 

Ruin again foresees the course of battle, and steps in to prevent a horned devil from stunning Martini; he hits it for a bit of damage but fails to get through its magic resistance with his Vampiric Touch. Martini steps into the spot where he was, and takes out one of the two elite guards. Ruin: “Your companion just went down. You should really rethink your career.”

Marshall drops two quickened Inflict Light Wounds spells, and the horned devils take it on the chin; the barbed devils feel it too. The elite warrior takes surprisingly little damage. Marshall then cuts down one of the barbed devils with his scythe. The human warrior swings his flail and just buries it in the wall next to Marshall’s head. He's blind, though, so he thinks he's doing great.

Ruin steps over and takes down a horned devil. Martini tumbles over to flank the elite warrior, and stabs him. A lot. He dies. Marshall steps further into the room and destroys a barbed devil. The one remaining barbed devil is staring at us. 

Ruin crosses to the remaining Horned Devil, which is preparing to go for help, and tackles it to the ground. It tries to break loose, but he holds it there. The barbed devil decides to charge Marshall: “For Baator!”

He hits Marshall for a bit of damage, and is now blinded; Martini steps around behind him and murders him. Marshall flies over to the horned devil and pins him. Martini then just strolls casually over and kills him. 

We mosey back around to the room behind the throne. There were two rogues back there, counting money. After Ruin came through, they tried hiding, but... not well enough: Ruin and Martini see them anyway.
Martini: “Come on down guys. You’re embarrassing yourselves."
Ruin: "I know a perfectly respectable crime family who’d be happy to take you in.”  

One drops to his knees and starts groveling. The other one tries to run, and Martini flings a dagger and kills him. The remaining guy tells us about the king’s body double, and the teleporter room. 

Martini coaxes him a bit, and there are four guards in the teleporter room. There’s also a barracks for off-duty Royal Guards. The money back here is just money that Lamont has squeezed out of the locals. There’s a lot of it, but it’s mostly silver and copper. We decide to leave it here, but expect to redistribute it once we’re done here. 

The low-level rogue who’s now our informant is Archer; he’s decided that he wants to join la resistance. We send him to that inn where Ruin got mistaken for Darvinin, and tell him to hunker down there and wait for either one of us or somebody from the resistance to come get him. We really can't afford to leave now, so that's the best we can do for him. Martini sets Energy Drain traps on the teleportation room doors. 

He also mentioned that without the scepter, we’d need to kill those to megabeasts that they have trapped on the other side of the castle. Which is what we’re going to be doing next time.