Hell is hell when one is soloing. Pericat's played, off and on, with some fine fellow travellers, but much of her time has been spent trudging into the maw of death all by her lonesome. Lately, of course, it's been her and her faithful cannon fodder Heremod. And sometimes the umpty-umpth iteration of her Personal Heavenly Companion. Neither of these two is long on conversation, stash space or even life spans, conditions which can be characterized as anywhere from "mildly annoying" to "blisteringly expensive".
Pericat had no idea that Heremod was such a purple junkie, and rather felt Qual-Kek hadn't been completely upfront when she first approached him so many levels ago, looking to retire Telash, Bubbleboy (IQ of a Carver and attention span to match) in favour of a merc who would fend off dangerous monsters, who would indeed not shirk from sacrificing his very person to the cause of keeping Pericat alive and in the game. That Heremod did not shrink from even this last was indisputable; rather did he fling himself into the very thick of danger and destruction, time and again. And time and again did Pericat find herself scuffing her toes in the dirt before Kashya's icy glare, dropping gold by the 50K fistfuls into the Rogue captain's coffers, just to keep Heremod frisking about.
And all because he wanted those purple potions.
She tried feeding him on reds, of course, but several million gold later was forced to admit that only purples, and fat purples at that, would do. Even so, he died often enough to send her, impoverished and limping, back to Nightmare Harrogath to rebuild her stores. She tried everything—Goldskins, a fancy circlet with DR +13, a high damage two-hander (in hopes he'd kill faster than he could be killed) but it was at best a holding pattern. The last straw was when, deep in the Jail of Act 1, she fed him most of her belt (and still had to resurrect him twice) through one battle of stone-skinned LEBs, only to round the corner into an MSLEB pack sporting the fanaticism aura. Into which that purple-slurping fool, in the manner of an ardent salmon spotting a particularly tasty sandbar just beyond six ravenous grizzly bears, dove.
After paying her own death duties, she had just enough left over to reclaim Heremod and retire, once more, to NM Harrogath.
Now having reached the venerable height of level 68, she re-entered Hell and twinkled through the Jail Level One waypoint. Two boss pack skellie archers met her (and Heremod, and the Valk, but not the Valk for long) in the first hallway, but they weathered that challenge with only minimal losses. One of the bosses dropped an extremely nice circlet, +1 to Assassin Skills, +14 to Resist All, and +This & That to That & The Other, and Pericat bethought herself of a way to improve the odds: borrow armour and such from her cousin, st_roch. St_roch's resists were quite healthy even in Hell, and once the trade was done, so were Pericat's. The difference in fire resist alone was quite gratifying, from -5 to +38 or so.
With that, Pericat eased down through the Jail levels and on up into the Inner Cloister. For once she was lucky with her layouts, and found the stairs fairly expeditiously.
A Message From Beyond appeared on the screen just as she activated the IC waypoint and cleared the Cathedral, from SvH's Madruka offering cool goodies and more—to hold her game open while she sent in a mule to store the toys. Slapping the Undead Crown Crown on Heremod's thick head (he had no life steal and complained of it), Pericat teamed up with Madruka to wipe out the Catacombs and flush Andariel from her hiding place.
Madruka's a most accomplished Barbarian, whirling and shouting his way through pack after pack of badly behaved beasties. LEBs barely ruffled the feathers in the wings of his helm. Heremod worshipped him as a god, and ceased his querulous demands for "da purple juice, boss, gimme purple, gimme purplarrrgh!" at least while in Madruka's hearing, anyway.
Madruka's instincts concerning stairway locations could not be bettered, and without very much fuss at all they were mixing it up with one, no, two, no, three boss packs in Andariel's throne room. Andariel, bless her demonic heart, had the grace to wait till these were disposed of before quick-stepping down the carpet and into oblivion.
On to Lut Gholein! Burning skellies are mere bagatelles after the varied and often hair-tearing combinations of nasties in the Monastery. Pericat strafed and Madruka twirled. Heremod bounced back and forth between them, his life bar (mostly) in the green. The Valk got poisoned and occasionally slunk off to expire quietly in a corner, and then sprang to life whenever Pericat remembered to recast.
Radament, when they deigned to notice him, stood smack in the middle of a gallery at one end of a corridor. Freezing Arrow made short work of his skellie minions, and then there was naught left but to beat him down. Afterward, Pericat read her skill book and called it a night, marvelling anew how much of a difference it can make to have company sometimes.