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[Weirdsound]

+1
Though i would say Your second Last Paragraph about the temptations ist highly likely to fail. So -1 to that Part.
Besides that good plan...

We were told there are both non-monks and weaker monks at the temple. It is worth a try.

[Urist Mc Dwarf]

I will wait to see if this debate is resolved, at least until morning.

In the meantime, anyone who writes up a good description of the temple gets a point.

[Urist Mc Dwarf]

Battle will come, but not yet. Naming your child Firstborn until it earns something better, you leave it with the Lord and Lady of Southbend, instructing it to raise the child like it is their own, and you let it have its own diet of nightmares, feeding off the traumatized soldiers within Southbend Castle, especially the former mercenaries and legionaries scattered among your troops.

And Lurrothel is sent north, to Avendor, with instructions to finalize your control over it. The Foxcrow King is sent with her, and she promises to have the city be fully yours within the year. She trembles a little at the prospect of your disappointment, and makes more promises, sounding a little more frantic this time.

You dismiss her, and order the construction of weapons throughout your realm. Axes and swords and spears are forged and shipped south, although most of the tribesmen who will fight with you in exchange for promises of safe passage are hesitant to accept, even if their own weapons aren’t quite as well forged. Apparently having a reputation like yours does not make people inclined to trust your gifts.

However, they prove much more comfortable when you deliver them in the guise of a man, and personally assure them that they are simply good steel weapons. Marriage discussions don’t go as well, however, since part of the ritual for it involves an honor duel, and no one wants to fight a demon. Everyone passes responsibility for several hours, and you barely manage to restrain yourself from ripping several people's heads off.

Your spying attempt goes much better, although there is a cost. Several Greshspawn are sent above the temple, circling above it. You see a monk climb to the roof and then…it is difficult to describe or comprehend, and several people who happened to be glancing in the general direction of it have been blinded. It was a star, on the edge of a knife, and then it glowed with power. Four of the Greshspawn were reduced to ash, and two more had huge portions of their body vaporized. They drifted to the ground and were hacked apart by furious tribesmen, the broken corpses thrown outside the slowly growing island.

Lurrothel arrives in Avendor, and immediately she begins driving the cult harder, as she infiltrates the mage’s college with the help of several lower-ranking members. The Civil Guard seizes full power in Avendor, the two remaining members of the Council who have not joined are executed or assassinated, and several guild leaders are forced into service using binding magic.

Using stolen ingredients and tomes of forbidden lore, she begins preparing a ritual of incredible power to truly make the city yours.

Meanwhile, Kreth resumes his efforts at corrupting the land, pouring power into it. Your presence makes his efforts much easier and the ground moans in agony as it is reshaped, the soil poisoned, the forests darkened. The island of purity the monks have established wavers in the face of this taint, but they manage to maintain it, constructing all manner of sacred wards and blessed runes.

Name: Klx-Dryklfx

Time: 10.75 months

Physical Might: 195 +6 ( -12 leakage, +40 worship)

Mental Might: 195 +6 ( -12 leakage, +40 worship)

Cults

The Ceaseless Consumption
  Members: 7 seducers, 1 high seducer, 3 Shapers, 578 peons, 3 members of the city council in Avendor, 1534 Civil Guardsmen, 6 priests, 117 merchants, 37 mercenaries, 299 beggars, 29 thieves, 7 mages
  Resources: 15( -20 ritual)
  Power: 51 (15 spent recruiting, 5 spent training, 15 spent worshipping, 10 spent keeping order, 5 spent on ritual preparations)

The Avar Society
 Members: 1 seducer, 27 peons, 27 merchants, 22 artisans
Resources: 12
Power: 8 (4 spent throwing parties, 4 spent dedicating temple)

17 mutated spies, 15 Voices of Change

Fortresses

Canord
   Strong walls (45), Deep moat (25), Thorn Wall (25), Wards (20), Traps (25), Demonic crops, plentiful mines, Strong aura of domination.

Avar
  Basic Walls (25), Living Ward (15), Demonic Mud Moat (20)

Castle Southbend
  Strong Walls (35), Strong Wards (30), Moat (20), Gargoyle Guards (15), aura of reanimation (-4 slaves/week)

Henord Crossing
  Basic Walls (15), Moat (5), weak aura of domination, desecrated ground

Demonic Realm
2200 Peons
1 Doom-Seer, 2 Doom-Seekers, 276 Slaves, 4 Dark Priests, 446 zombies
405 Light Cavalry
235 resources (-50 weapons)
+28 power/week, + 40 resources/week (farms, mines, mills), -10 resources/week (upkeep)
Mild corruption, Road Network, Demonic Shrines
Island of Purity

Demonic Armies

11 Reavers, 2 Doom-Seekers, 250 thralls, 100 zombies in Canord

100 zombies, 100 skeletons, 30 weeping sores, 100 Spear-Thralls, 1 Spear-Thrallherd, 50 Archer-Thralls, 100 deathless knights, 43 Greshspawn, 90 rangers, 6 desert drakes in Canord/the south

The Broken – 791 chaff (243 thralls, 343 zombies, 128 skeletons, 17 wisp wights, 59 weeping sores), 675 light infantry (300 Spear-Thralls, 1 Spear-Thrallherds, 372 Sword-Thralls, 2 Sword-Thrallherds), 273 heavy infantry (27 Demon-Touched , 1 Demon-Touched Thrallherd, 199 wisp-wretches, 46 heavy swordsman), 279 ranged (272 Archer-Thralls, 2 Archer-Thrallherds, 17 slingers), 31 mages (3 Doom-Seers, 31 Doom-Seekers), 215 heavy cavalry( 5 mounted god-slayers, 210 deathless knights), 23 Infiltrators (18 Hunters, 5 Night-Stalkers), 28 support (15 Dark Priests, 1 Dread Priest, 12 Shapers), 10 siege (8 armored brutes, 2 crushers), 17 incorporeal(17 specters), 90 scouts (rangers)
Barrow Bows – 183 scouts (rangers), 67 light infantry (bandits) in between Avar and Southbend

Champions

Kreth Woemaker
   Physical might: 27 (+11 worship, - 8 corruption, -2 corruption)
   Mental might: 27(+11 worship, - 8 corruption, -2 corruption)
   Other: Magic Cloak, worshipped by the Barrow Bows

Duthrax Soul-Render, First of the Thrall-Herds
  Physical might: 9 + 1
  Mental might: 5+ 1
  Other: Duelist, skilled commander, zombie horse, Herald

Lurrothel, Weaver of Nightmares
  Physical might: 3
  Mental might: 8
  Other: Necromancer, skilled at wards and dream magic

Caliwick the Arch-Necromancer
   Physical might: 2
   Mental might: 11
   Other: Necromancer, Soulbond, Living Legend

Firstborn
  Physical might: 0
  Mental might: 0
  Other: Baby, living nightmare

Artifacts

Desecrator
  +6 physical, +6 mental
  Bringer of unholy rot, Reanimator, Focus of Power

Magic Cloak
  Unknown properties

Herald
  +2 physical, + 2 mental
    Inspiring song, crimson regeneration

[Weirdsound]

Idea: The Monks are surrounded by our corruption on all sides... almost all sides. Work with Kreth to raise a dome of corrupted earth that completely encompass their holy bubble, trapping the Monks in and cutting them off from the sun. We will either starve them to death, or force them to use earth powers, dig out, and abandon their fortified position. Have the tribesmen and perhaps some monsters in position to run them down if they choose option B.

As for the duel for honor, ask if we might use a Human Champion to fight in our stead if they would (wisely) rather not cross swords with a demon. We can pull one of our most talented light infantrymen from the Barrow Bows. Perhaps kill our champion and raise it to a non-obvious state of undeath first to make it more durable.

[King Zultan]

Idea: The Monks are surrounded by our corruption on all sides... almost all sides. Work with Kreth to raise a dome of corrupted earth that completely encompass their holy bubble, trapping the Monks in and cutting them off from the sun. We will either starve them to death, or force them to use earth powers, dig out, and abandon their fortified position. Have the tribesmen and perhaps some monsters in position to run them down if they choose option B.

As for the duel for honor, ask if we might use a Human Champion to fight in our stead if they would (wisely) rather not cross swords with a demon. We can pull one of our most talented light infantrymen from the Barrow Bows. Perhaps kill our champion and raise it to a non-obvious state of undeath first to make it more durable.

+1

[WyrdByrd]

Idea: The Monks are surrounded by our corruption on all sides... almost all sides. Work with Kreth to raise a dome of corrupted earth that completely encompass their holy bubble, trapping the Monks in and cutting them off from the sun. We will either starve them to death, or force them to use earth powers, dig out, and abandon their fortified position. Have the tribesmen and perhaps some monsters in position to run them down if they choose option B.

As for the duel for honor, ask if we might use a Human Champion to fight in our stead if they would (wisely) rather not cross swords with a demon. We can pull one of our most talented light infantrymen from the Barrow Bows. Perhaps kill our champion and raise it to a non-obvious state of undeath first to make it more durable.

+1

+1, but no reanimation.  We should reward  reverence with preferential treatment, and the Barrow Bows worship us.

[Detoxicated]

Idea: The Monks are surrounded by our corruption on all sides... almost all sides. Work with Kreth to raise a dome of corrupted earth that completely encompass their holy bubble, trapping the Monks in and cutting them off from the sun. We will either starve them to death, or force them to use earth powers, dig out, and abandon their fortified position. Have the tribesmen and perhaps some monsters in position to run them down if they choose option B.

As for the duel for honor, ask if we might use a Human Champion to fight in our stead if they would (wisely) rather not cross swords with a demon. We can pull one of our most talented light infantrymen from the Barrow Bows. Perhaps kill our champion and raise it to a non-obvious state of undeath first to make it more durable.

+1

+1, but no reanimation.  We should reward  reverence with preferential treatment, and the Barrow Bows worship us.

+1

[Urist Mc Dwarf]

So...reanimation, no reanimation, who wants to break the tie?

If no one does by tonight, I will flip a coin to decide.

And the "What does the temple look like?" challenge is still open.

[Haspen]

REANIMATE!

[Urist Mc Dwarf]

Update will be coming soon, right now reanimation is winning.

[KitRougard]

No reanimate, because we can simply watch over the fight and stitch together their wounds!

Or semi-reanimate them, for instance, if their arm takes a nasty blow, we simply make that part of them a zombie under their control.

Ooh... Can we apply necromantic magic to a still-living human? So they're still human, but can ignore blows that would bring others to their deaths?

Grant this man the title of "The Line's Guardian" if so. He stands firmly in both the realms of life and death, sending his chosen to the afterlife, and the rest to the limbo of Undeath.

[Weirdsound]

Actually. I'll change my vote to no-reanimate.

If our undead champion takes a blow that would stop a living man and keeps fighting, our necromancy will be exposed, and may damage our relationship with the tribes, a risk we cannot take until the Monks are dealt with.

[Urist Mc Dwarf]

Update will come in the morning, homework sucks, I need to sleep.

[Urist Mc Dwarf]

Negotiations continue with the various tribesmen. You play the kindly, understanding fellow, even as such…simpering boils your blood. You didn’t even kill anyone of them, or transform them into horrible necromantic abominations for the fun of it! You are glad you are the only true demon on this world, because if another saw you, they would surely die laughing. Of course, you would then get to feast upon their essence, but it’s the principle of the thing!

Fortunately, although the tribes are wary of closer ties with a demon, they are also wary of offending one, and when you offer them a mortal champion to fight the honor duel in your stead, none of them are willing to refuse. And so a bandit from the Barrow Bows who has already killed four men in duels steps forth, wielding a heavy steel mace and a buckler painted with your sigil and a large skull.
The other champion is a brother of one of the women you asked to marry, a deadly warrior in his own right. He stands confident and relaxed, seemingly the only person – besides you – who is unconcerned by this duel. This is just part of the ceremony, and one of little consequence. Everyone else seems utterly terrified. They watch with quiet intensity.

The two warriors step into the ring, the grass flattening and withering away at your command to allow the duel to take place on even footing. They circle, mace meeting ax meeting shield, each one testing each other. Then, as the desert champion passes you, he darts forwards, smacks your champion across the head with his ax hard enough to knock him off his feet, and darts towards you, drawing a dagger from an engraved sheathe. You can feel a faint spark of power in it, but not enough to truly harm you. With a sneer of contempt, you start to rise from your seat, your true form beginning to appear beneath your flesh.

But your champion throws his mace. Whether by luck or skill it flies true enough to shatter the other man’s shoulder before you can unmake him, and he falls to the ground. Several around the circle let out a shriek of horror. Everything happened far too fast for them to witness, but they can see their champion has lost.

The woman rises from her seat. “The gods have spoken. There shall be a bride-price.” She says woodenly, and a chest is brought out, and opened to reveal several fine sapphires which are offered to you. You accept, and the wedding begins. It’s a long ceremony, invoking many gods and spirits of the desert, with lots of water poured over the two of you. There’s a lot of subtle crying and angry looks, but no more assassination attempts. Finally, it ends, and you prepare for the next step of your war against the monks.

Working with Kreth, the two of you begin to raise an enormous earthen dome over the temple. The power flows easily through you, and you shape it, making the earth ripple before great stones rise out, thickening as they flow like water in response to your will, closing off the temple from light of day and star, the rock hovering above their skulls in oppressive silence. You hear the sounds of people trying to break through the dome.

Sand scours it, and you see the star that is a knife slashing against it, but the stone has withstood wind and root and storm. Only your strength of will could make it bend or move. Mortals, even mortals with magic taught by an angel and holy relics made from its flesh cannot defy it.  And so they begin to suffer and starve, trapped in their dome, and you turn your attention to other matters for the moment.

Tribesmen have begun filtering back into the desert, but many have offered you their aid in exchange for yours, and they will not break their word. So they wait with you for the next battle in this war.
In Avendor, Lurrothel’s ritual preparations continue. The cult has begun to throw all its efforts into it, determined to complete it as soon as possible. And Henord Crossing gives itself more and more to you every day.

Name: Klx-Dryklfx

Time: 11 months

Physical Might: 201 +6 ( -14 leakage, -20 earth moving,  +40 worship)

Mental Might: 201 +6 ( -14 leakage, -20 earth moving,  +40 worship)

Cults

The Ceaseless Consumption
  Members: 7 seducers, 1 high seducer, 3 Shapers, 578 peons, 3 members of the city council in Avendor, 1534 Civil Guardsmen, 6 priests, 117 merchants, 37 mercenaries, 299 beggars, 29 thieves, 7 mages
  Resources: 5( -20 ritual, +10 theft and corruption)
  Power: 51 (15 spent worshipping, 10 spent keeping order, 20 spent on ritual preparations, 5 spent acquiring resources)

The Avar Society
 Members: 1 seducer, 27 peons, 27 merchants, 22 artisans
Resources: 12
Power: 8 (4 spent throwing parties, 4 spent holding services in temple)

17 mutated spies, 15 Voices of Change

Fortresses

Canord
   Strong walls (45), Deep moat (25), Thorn Wall (25), Wards (20), Traps (25), Demonic crops, plentiful mines, Strong aura of domination.

Avar
  Basic Walls (25), Living Ward (15), Demonic Mud Moat (20)

Castle Southbend
  Strong Walls (35), Strong Wards (30), Moat (20), Gargoyle Guards (15), aura of reanimation (-4 slaves/week)

Henord Crossing
  Basic Walls (15), Moat (5), weak aura of domination, desecrated ground

Demonic Realm
2400 Peons
1 Doom-Seer, 2 Doom-Seekers, 273 Slaves, 4 Dark Priests, 446 zombies
405 Light Cavalry
270 resources
+28 power/week, + 45 resources/week (farms, mines, mills, trade), -10 resources/week (upkeep)
Mild corruption(8/50), Road Network, Demonic Shrines
 Domed Island of Purity

Demonic Armies

11 Reavers, 2 Doom-Seekers, 250 thralls, 100 zombies in Canord

100 zombies, 100 skeletons, 30 weeping sores, 100 Spear-Thralls, 1 Spear-Thrallherd, 50 Archer-Thralls, 100 deathless knights, 43 Greshspawn, 90 rangers, 6 desert drakes in Canord/the south

The Broken – 793 chaff (245 thralls, 343 zombies, 128 skeletons, 17 wisp wights, 59 weeping sores), 676 light infantry (301 Spear-Thralls, 1 Spear-Thrallherds, 372 Sword-Thralls, 2 Sword-Thrallherds), 273 heavy infantry (27 Demon-Touched , 1 Demon-Touched Thrallherd, 199 wisp-wretches, 46 heavy swordsman), 282 ranged (274 Archer-Thralls, 2 Archer-Thrallherds, 18 slingers), 31 mages (3 Doom-Seers, 31 Doom-Seekers), 215 heavy cavalry( 5 mounted god-slayers, 210 deathless knights), 23 Infiltrators (18 Hunters, 5 Night-Stalkers), 28 support (15 Dark Priests, 1 Dread Priest, 12 Shapers), 10 siege (8 armored brutes, 2 crushers), 17 incorporeal(17 specters), 90 scouts (rangers)
Barrow Bows – 183 scouts (rangers), 67 light infantry (bandits) in between Avar and Southbend

Champions

Kreth Woemaker
   Physical might: 27 (+11 worship, - 8 corruption, -2 corruption)
   Mental might: 27(+11 worship, - 8 corruption, -2 corruption)
   Other: Magic Cloak, worshipped by the Barrow Bows

Duthrax Soul-Render, First of the Thrall-Herds
  Physical might: 9 + 1
  Mental might: 5+ 1
  Other: Duelist, skilled commander, zombie horse, Herald

Lurrothel, Weaver of Nightmares
  Physical might: 3
  Mental might: 8
  Other: Necromancer, skilled at wards and dream magic

Caliwick the Arch-Necromancer
   Physical might: 2
   Mental might: 11
   Other: Necromancer, Soulbond, Living Legend

Firstborn
  Physical might: 0
  Mental might: 0
  Other: Baby, living nightmare

Artifacts

Desecrator
  +6 physical, +6 mental
  Bringer of unholy rot, Reanimator, Focus of Power

Magic Cloak
  Unknown properties

Herald
  +2 physical, + 2 mental
    Inspiring song, crimson regeneration

[Weirdsound]

Investigate the effects of the wedding ceremony. Did it give either ourselves or our new wife any sort of connection to the 'gods and spirits of the desert'? If so our next project may be hunting down and subjugating such beings.

Get to know our new wife. What talents does she have? What are her likes and dislikes? What are her vices? If she is too sweet and pure, make her some beautiful jewlery cursed to amplify her wicked thoughts and habits. We do not want to impregnate her (thus giving her an appetite for human flesh) while her family is around, but we could find other ways to make her useful or amusing in the meantime.

Let us reward our champion's efforts with an artifact. He seems skilled at throwing things, so let us make him a terrible bladed boomerang. The arch and angle of the weapon can be controled mentally by wielder who worshipers us. The blades on the weapon drink the blood and soul of any mortal being pierced, so that even a small scratch from the Boomerang is instantly lethal. The boomerang slowly corrupts the souls it consumes, and attunes them to its wielder. This allow the wielder to meditate on the object to obtain knowlege from the captive souls, and should also allow us, in time, to safely mutate and corrupt our champion using the very souls he has claimed as fuel. It should also have a slight mind of its own, and will go out of its way to eventually prick and kill anybody other than its rightful owner who tries to use it.

Return to tormenting the Monks dreams while they starve. Once they are days, if not hours, from death open a portal in the rock dome, and send in our new tribal friends to finish them off. Tell the tribe that the temple, and everything in it except the bodies of the enemy and the magnificent holy weapon (both of which we claim), will be theirs if they can take it. If the tribesmen win, we honor our word, and even offer to buy the temple from them with some of our cursed-vice-enhancing wealth (I doubt a nomadic raiding people would have any strong desire to keep it). If the monks are strong enough, even at the brink of starvation, to gain the upper hand on our tribesmen, seal the dome and do not open it until everything inside has died by battle or starvation. If our raiders win, we continue to play the long game to win them over. If they lose, they can be our undead slaves.