Belated Aspectations

Livia is dead.

The Shield Guardian is destroyed.

Malakar and others cheated death by a slim margin, and I nearly died myself, scorched by acid and fire, tainted by an indefinite vile corruption.

It could have been much worse.

I believe the killing blow was Durthen's, but my memory of those scant seconds before the Aspect exploded is hazy. It was certainly his axe, wielded with superhuman precision and no small amount of luck, which brought it to the brink of disruption.

With the Shield Guardian aiding and flanking, Durthen, Erson, and Borrow all together had hacked and poked away at it's disgusting tentacles for what seemed like ages. It was, predictably, proof against nearly all my magic, though the ancient artifact spells I gained from Oleanth made a minor dent. So I helped Malakar to heal and protect the fighters as best I could, summoning short-lived Eladrin at opportune moments.

Livia and I should have been fine -- she was blasting away from well outside the Aspect's reach, and I was safely ensconced behind a small ridge. But the Aspect had one final surprise for us in defeat, exploding in a nigh-unresistable torrent of elemental evil. I survived only because the Shield Guardian gave up the last of his animating energy to absorb half of my wounds; Livia had no such protection and was charred beyond recognition. I have some hope, with the resources now at our disposal, that we can return her to life; Malakar will know more about that possibility.

Things looked grim from the very beginning of the battle: before assuming its true form, the Aspect called down a shower of meteors, burning us undiscriminately and smashing the terrain into unstable rubble. I haven't seen magical power exercised on that scale since the raising of the Arak Spire shield, and never by a single entity.

The Aspect was heralded by a pair of Chaos Dragons, who proved a minor challenge. A little bit of disintegrate, many sparks from Erson's energetic will-o-the-wisp form, the usual axes and swords and eldritch blasts, and they were history.

The skies now appear clear, and I believe we have succeeded in the mission Oleanth gave us. I expect that one of him will be here to retrieve us soon. For now, we can carefully collect Livia, and cautiously search our immediate surroundings. I hope we don't find any more big surprises.