"I fear that Vix'thra might discover our presence and escape or fortify himself were we to wait any longer," Jojo says apologetically. "Our only real advantage against this threat is the element of surprise."

"Yup. Not more vulnerable to death than I was last month."

Deekin casts Invisibility on himself, then Haste on the party.

Lavoera casts Communal Energy Resistance.

And Jojo inserts the sphere into the gate. It opens, revealing a tunnel leading into a massive, unworked cave.

He heads in, followed by the others.

Vix'thra is enormous, and black as night, and looking at Jojo with disgust. "A paladin. Of Tyr, no less. Will your kind never cease hunting me?"

"I will not suffer you to live, monster," Jojo spits. "I know the atrocities you committed to attain that form."

In response, the dracolich opens his jaws and spits a blast of acid at him. For once, Jojo doesn't evade perfectly; droplets of acid hiss on his skin, and he squeaks in agony. It doesn't stop him from charging, and striking at the dragon's underbelly.

Belmarniss hits the dracolich with magic missiles. She's up to five of those, so this doesn't reveal her admittedly inadequate level, although it does reveal that she's resorting to first level spells right off the bat. She shadow steps across the room, quickened, so he can't use the missiles to derive her location and might waste time melting the empty space where she was, and gets ready to attempt a counterspell of anything he tries spellwise if he does that instead.

The missiles fizzle, and Vix'thra's head whips around to look for whoever cast them. His eyes narrow at the location where Belmarniss was standing.

Garrus lines up a few shots, but they plink off the dracolich's thick scales. He swears fluently.

The sound of Deekin's singing fills the cavern, never seeming to come from the same place two seconds in a row.

Lavoera flies up to Vix'thra's head and casts Heal, laying one glowing hand on the dragon's face. The dracolich shrugs it off and snaps at her, forcing her to take evasive maneuvers.

And Jojo continues hammering his fists against Vix'thra's scales, not managing to penetrate.

Then, the dracolich's front claw swipes down and grasps him firmly, lifting him into the air. He squeaks in distress.

"Maximized Scorching Ray."

The rays sizzle as they burn the dracolich's hide. At the same time, Garrus gets a single arrow between two of Vix'thra's scales, and Lavoera casts Mass Cure Moderate Wounds. He roars, but doesn't drop his prey.

Vix'thra tosses Jojo up and, with a snap of his jaws, bites him out of the air and swallows him whole.

Well, fuck.

She has more than one fireball if he gets out of there. As long as nobody's in external melee with the enemy she maximizes one and drops it right on the dracolich, aimed carefully so it won't spill over to anyone else.

The flames scorch his hide. Garrus fires a few more arrows that clatter against Vix'thra's thick scales. Lavoera casts Cure Serious Wounds, burning a handprint into the dracolich's snout.

Vix'thra, snarling, snaps his teeth shut around the planetar's leg. She shrieks and wrenches her limb free, blood streaming from the wound, and flutters to a safer distance.

She casts Scorching Ray again but doesn't maximize it, still hoping Jojo will get out of there and do his thing and she'll have a good fireball opportunity later.

One of the rays fizzles, but the other strikes true.

Vix'thra is actually acting somewhat oddly; he's making a strange heaving motion with his body every few seconds. In between heaves, he spits acid at Garrus, who takes a sizable gout of it to the face and starts screaming. Lavoera casts Cure Critical Wounds on herself, staunching the blood from her leg.

Belmarniss gets over to Garrus and casts Celestial Healing on him in case Lavoera is busy, then gets out of the way in case Vix'thra hits him again.

Shortly after she does so, Vix'thra lurches forward, and shudders, and collapses to the ground.

After a few seconds, Jojo clambers out the dracolich's maw, soaked in foul-smelling draconic bile. "Is everyone alright out here?" he asks urgently. "I tried to kill him as fast as I could."

"We're okayish," she says, rather than asking what took him so long.

"Speak for yourself," Garrus groans. "-thanks for the heal, Belmarniss, you're a pal, but ow."

Jojo runs over to him and Lays on Hands.

The half-melted scales split and fall from Garrus's face, revealing shiny new scales beneath. "Thanks. Ugh. I guess we have to find the phylactery now?"

"Detect Magic," she says, not really expecting this to help.

Nope! There's a pile of gold and various other riches over towards that wall, though, maybe they should investigate. That's where Garrus is headed, anyway, checking for traps as he goes.

A reasonable intermediate stop.

There are in fact a couple of pretty sophisticated traps in the way, which Garrus makes sure to disable. Once the traps are done with, they're at the riches.

Garrus whistles. "Good thing we've got that Bag of Holding. Wouldn't want to have to haul this out with an oxcart. Wonder which of these gems has the bastard's soul in it?"

...there's a patch of dirt a few dozen feet away from the pile of riches. It doesn't look freshly disturbed, and it isn't radiating magic, but... there's something off about it. Like she doesn't want to look at this particular patch of dirt. Why would she be looking at a patch of dirt, anyway. Objectively, it's ridiculous, when there's a big pile of treasure right there drawing the eye.