Tinier Problems pt4
The strange, ethereal spiderish creature has been defeated.
That's good, right? At any rate, it was a strange thing to see in the first place and it's absolutely stood in the way here, for whatever reason.
A doorway leads deeper into this location, though it's hard to say what lays beyond it. Clearly, strange things are afoot here.
Iskandar heads over to the doorway and places his ear against it, listening. Then he steps back and inspects the door itself, looking for signs if a trap. After a moment he ventures, "Ah...does anyone know what a trap would look like?"
Elin has dug out a cloth and is trying to clean ethereal spider bits and blood off her sword. This is giving her a problem since, well, it was only half-physical and there's not a lot to clean, but she's giving it a shot.
"Probably it would be hidden," she says. "Like a... catch? But small."
Tamrielo gasps for breath, slightly raggedly. Whatever the spider did with its phantom limb wounded him badly, and he's working to catch his breath and stand back upright. The vaguely faraway look he'd gotten during the fight and while he was intoning is entirely gone, and his eyes are a haze of pain.
After a moment, he laboriously gets to his feet and tries to look capable, but his habit of hiding in his hood when nervous or uncertain is in full effect here, he's pulled himself into his tunic.
"I can check for them? I'm not /that/ bad at finding things out of place." Says the Mul with the bright eyes, who seems perfectly happy in the dark as he looks around at the mess that the spider and the strange device made.
He pokes at a spider bit a bit. "How did this thing get here anyway?" His voice holding a quiet curiousity. "Though it would indeed explain the bugs. It doesn't explain the machine though."
A draw of a deep breath. "So! Who needs a bit of healing?"
GAME: Lorik casts Cure Light Wounds. Caster Level: 3 DC: 14
GAME: Lorik casts Cure Light Wounds. Caster Level: 3 DC: 14
GAME: Lorik rolls 2d8+6: (11)+6: 17
Tamrielo shivers and closes his eyes as the healing spells take hold. After a moment, he opens his eyes again and they're clearer, calmer, and his usual brightness is back. He smiles. "Thank you. That was... worse than I expected."
GAME: Tamrielo refreshes spells.
Azra mounts her bird and they ride off into the farm. The bird climbs up atop the farmhouse and ucrls up there while the cavalier seemsw most content with a bedorll not too far away. She sits there with her bow unstrung beside her, silent.
Elin is perfectly happy to lead the way in whatever direction people are going; in this particular case it happens to be back out. "I have had enough bugs for one day," she declares halfway there, though it's not clear that tomorrow will have any fewer.
GAME: Lorik refreshes spells.
Iskandar sleeps on the floor at the farmhouse. He's not above helping himself to breakfast from the kitchen, although he leaves a wineskin in trade. Then he collects his gear and gets ready to head for the barn again.
Tamrielo follows the rest of the group out of the cave after spending some time sketching the dead phantom spider. He finds a bedroll in the farmhouse and helps himself to a rest inside, tucked into a quiet, dark corner. He's up early, doing some random tidying around the farmhouse before sketching landscapes as he waits for the others to wake up.
Fortunately, Elin doesn't snore.
"So!" she says, somewhat later. "Everybody ready?"
Lorik curls up only having to spend half the night 'sleeping' and the rest in thoughtful reading among the stars. When Elin asks her question though, the shadow elf just nods as he slips his book shut with a soft /thump/.
"As ready as I'll ever be when delving back into the darkness." He says cheerfully. "Still no idea what put that there in the first place though."
"That's what we're going to find out." Elin pauses. "Maybe. Or maybe we just get rid of it. We'll see."
Good news, everyone!
You're able to return to the next door without so much as a horrible bug attacking you to eat yoyr flesh. You still wind up crunching some under foot. this job has been hell on your soles.
GAME: Elin rolls Perception: (5)+8: 13
GAME: Tamrielo rolls Perception: (1)+9: 10 (EPIC FAIL)
GAME: Lorik rolls perception: (16)+10: 26
GAME: Azra rolls perception: (9)+1: 10
Azra stares at the door, sqquinting slightly while she does. "I don't see anything," she muses as she reaches for her lance. "Guyes?" The griffon screeches loudly. "Perhaps it is best that we take up the rear. Guyes is not sure about enclosed spaces..."
Tamrielo didn't get much of a chance to make sketches of the inside of the cave earlier, and takes the opportunity now, using a torch to light the darkness. He's not paying as much attention as he probably should be, despite looking around quite a lot.
Elin is taking up a lot of space, and since it's kind of tight quarters she's trying to not turn around and bonk someone in the forehead with her falchion hilt or something.
"Just make sure he is not right behind /me/," Elin says to Azra, "because I don't want a scared bird there."
"...um...." Lorik is peering at the door. "...is...anyone good with magic? Or artifice? There are...runes here..." He doesn't touch, but he points them out carved into the frame of the wood. "...and II can't make heads or tails of them. I know they aren't divine in origin...but I'm guessing they do something bad if we mess with them."
"I can take a look," Elin volunteers, perhaps surprisingly, as she shifts her way forward.
GAME: Tamrielo casts Detect Magic. Caster Level: 2 DC: 13
GAME: Tamrielo rolls spellcraft: (5)+2: 7
GAME: Tamrielo rolls Perception: (13)+9: 22
Tamrielo leans forward, coming back to the present. "Er, I can take a look at it. I have a bit of magical background." He gets a view of the runes and begins sketching them. He's got a number of colored inks in his calligraphy set and uses them to try to replicate the colors he sees as best as possible. He's a surprisingly dab hand at replicating magic runes, almost as if he's spent a lot of time doing it.
After a moment, he laughs. "Okay, I'm not familiar enough with artifice to know what these actually do, but the aura isn't that strong. Also, I used to draw runes like this in class. Someone wanted to make these look like much more powerful elven runes. It's like doodling scary-looking runes in the margins of my spellbook, except they're actually serious."
He pauses for a moment. "Uh, maybe it was just me who did that."
"Does that mean it's safe to just go in? Oh, and I never did that," Elin says.
A few moments later, she confides, "I don't have a spellbook either." You don't say.
"If the runes are not strong then perhaps if we can't go through the door there is another way," Azra offers quietly. She lowers her bag to the ground and kneels beside it, withdrawing an engineer's trowel. "We could be going around the door easily enough. Most spells extend around the doorway, but if it is a weak enchantment..." Azra looks around. "What do you think? Is it safe to simply step through?"
Tamrielo thinks for a moment. "I mean, whatever they do will probably go off. I'm not entirely sure what that is, but it doesn't seem terribly dangerous."
"If we get a pole or a long piece of wood from upstairs we can just shove the door open, if its not that dangerous a bit of distance might give us the range to keep out of trouble." Lorik suggests as he peers suspiciously towards the door.
He hates setting off traps.
GAME: Azra takes ten on Knowledge/Engineering: (10)+8: 18
GAME: Azra rolls knowledge/engineering: (16)+8: 24
Azra begins to dig around the doorway. She excavates a channel on either side and the nwhistles sharply. Her bird comes trotting over and screeches before he too digs, excavating a large hole between the channels to either side of the door. Soon enough they have a pit behind the opening. The walls to either side are reinforced but Azra avoids the supports to open up a new passage into the room below. It's just a matter of persistent scraping with her field tools in the end.
... it works.
The earth here is soft. While there are walls, there is not a polished /floor/. Azra is able to dig down through the floor and then up through into the next room.
Quite seriously, it worked. The door has been bypassed. THE DOOR HAS BEEN BYPASSED!
All that remains is for the rest of you to go through the dug tunnel, which is not exactly /fun/ and a bit dirty, emerging to the other side.
Emerging carefully, you find yourself in a wider chamber that looks like it was once some kind of living space. There's tables with notes scattered across them, faded with age and a lot of gold coins sitting on one in particular. They don't look like the modern Alexandrian coin, that's for sure.
There's an iamge of a woman, stern-faced, on each one. She has an aura of power to her personage even in this small, minted form.
There are plates and bowls stacked in one corner, overgrown with mold that's logn since stopped growing and died several times over. A handful of diagrams are stretched out across a wall, but they took are ancient and faded, overgrown with moss. Sketches are much the same way. There is, on the oppsoite side of the room here, another door.
Iskandar climbs through the impromptu tunnel and then stands, moving far enough into the room to not block the others. He starts to dust himself off. The motions slow as he takes in the room, peering around.
Tamrielo frowns at the dust on his own and everyone else's clothes. A quick gesture cleans his tunic and pants, and he starts cleaning up everyone else as well, one by one. This ends as he takes in the room, and he immediately pulls out his sketchbook. The nice one.
GAME: Lorik rolls knowledge/Religion: (16)+6: 22
Ara drops down through the hole easily, no hesitation whatsoever. he has her slender, flexible lance under her arm leading the way. She shortens it by tucking it back for easier use in closer quarters but doesn't seem to hesitate.
Lorik pokes his head out of the new tunnel like some kind of small ground animal. Covered in dirt as he pulls himself out, the shadow elf doesn't seem to be too bothered by it as he blinks around at the contents of the room.
"This is odd. It doesn't look like anyone has been here for quite awhile..."
He walks over to the pile of coins, rubbing one thumb over the tarnished surface of one. "Huh." He says unhelpfully for a moment. "Well isn't that intresting. They...are coins from the former ruler of Alexandria. The Witch Queen. So that would place this...decades old. And I'd say no one made it to this lab since then." A pause. "Do you think someone could have activated a device left here that long and that drew the spider?"
"Could they have simply bred here the whole time?" Azra asks as she begins to look around as well. She is squinting slightly, resisting the urge to touch anything while she roams.
Florp.
Florp.
It's a sound. COming from the walls.
Tamrielo sketches the room, looking like nothing less than a kid in candy store. Possibly no one has SEEN this place in decades, and now he gets to DRAW it! This ends when he hears the sound from the walls. "Uh. What's that?"
Iskandar tilts his head to the side and listens. "I don't know," he admits. "Sounds almost like...a 'florp'." He steps further into the room, giving himself some room to move and if necessary dive for cover.
"...I..." Lorik turns his head towards the nearest wall. "...I...well yes. I hear it." His hand starts to reach for his crossbow. "But I really don't like it...anyone see anything moving?"
Fabris is a dwarf, he's no stranger to holes, whether he's got stylish threads or not. He pops up, clears the entrance, and nods to Lorik, rapier out. "Yes, I hear it, but I don't see anything either."
...florp. Florpflorp.
It's the mold. On the bowls and what not. And in the earthen walls. It's beginning to ooze out of cracks and more. It's not hard to identify the source because IT IS FRIGGING MOVING MOLD.
There are three horrible seperate collections of mold.
They are moving out of the walls, out of the cracks and out of the bowl. It's rather horrifying. Mold doesn't MOVE, dang it. It spreads! This mold? Totally moving.
GAME: Lorik rolls weapon9-2+1: (14)+8+-2+1: 21
GAME: Lorik rolls weapon9-2+1: (16)+8+-2+1: 23
GAME: Lorik rolls 1d10+3: (8)+3: 11
GAME: Lorik rolls 1d10+3: (5)+3: 8
Well /this/ isn't what he expected, but Lorik is glad he reached for his weapon anyway. He snaps his crossbow up with a practiced ease, working the reload as a /THOCK/ echos though the chamber.
"Mold?! First spiders now animated mold?! How is this even a thing!" He calls as he shuffles away from the nearest one, both the quarrels of the crossbow slamming home into the creature.
GAME: Tamrielo spends ONE use of BARDIC PERFORMANCE.
GAME: Floppypool rolls 1d20+6: (1)+6: 7 (EPIC FAIL)
GAME: Fabris rolls 1d20+8: (7)+8: 15
GAME: Fabris rolls 1d6+4: (1)+4: 5
One of the other mo9lds moves to3wards Lorik -- as he had backed up quickly after his initial flurry of attacks. It rises up, like actually rises up, and attempts to carpet him. It fails. Somehow, it jurt sort of..falls..short of him.]
Fabris lunges, "Taste cold steel, unwelcome embracer!" The rapier pokes the mold, at least, to uncertain effect.
Tamrielo steps gingerly as far from the moving molds as he can get. Almost dreamily, he begins intoning, and if you let them, his words sink into you. It's probably starting to feel familiar now, that gentle sense of focus and clarity.
" Now coming right out of the floor, And there, oozing out of the drawer, It's animate mold. Quite gross, all told. We'll clear it before we get more."
GAME: Iskandar rolls ranged-5: (18)+7+-5: 20
GAME: Iskandar rolls 1d6+1: (3)+1: 4
Iskandar plucks his remaining flask of acid off of his belt and moves towards one of the moving, living molds. He crouches slightly, ready to dodge, and then hurls the flask, lobbing it just right so that it smashes and sprays the mold with acid.
GAME: Azra rolls weapon1-2+1+1: (9)+8+-2+1+1: 17
GAME: Azra rolls weapon1-2+1+1: (16)+8+-2+1+1: 24
GAME: Azra rolls 1d8+strength+2+1+1: (5)+3+2+1+1: 12
GAME: Azra rolls 1d8+strength+2+1+1: (6)+3+2+1+1: 13
GAME: Floppypool rolls 1d20+6: (16)+6: 22
GAME: Floppypool rolls 1d20+6: (14)+6: 20
GAME: Floppypool rolls 1d6+4: (3)+4: 7
GAME: Azra rolls ride+4: (16)+7+4: 27
GAME: Fabris rolls ref: (19)+6: 25
For his part, Fabris is assaulted by another damnable mold. It slinks towards him and slams into him with surprising force before dropping over hiom. He's able to sliup out from it, however.
GAME: Lorik rolls weapon9-2+1: (11)+8+-2+1: 18
GAME: Lorik rolls weapon9-2+1: (16)+8+-2+1: 23
GAME: Lorik rolls 1d10+3: (5)+3: 8
GAME: Lorik rolls 1d10+3: (10)+3: 13
GAME: Tamrielo casts Cure Light Wounds. Caster Level: 2 DC: 14
GAME: Tamrielo rolls 1d8+2: (6)+2: 8
GAME: Floppypool rolls 1d20+6: (13)+6: 19
GAME: Floppypool rolls 1d6+4: (2)+4: 6
GAME: Tamrielo rolls Reflex: (11)+6: 17
It's not like these things re intelligent. Really, they just seem to go over who's near them and moving. It slams into Tamrielo adfter his movement towards Fabris and attempts to overwhelm him, to no avail.
GAME: Floppypool rolls 1d20+7: (14)+7: 21
GAME: Floppypool rolls 1d6+3: (6)+3: 9
Tamrielo steps forward and touches Fabris on the shoulder, hand glowing faintly. Bruises and contusions mend and heal under his spell.
" Careful, that was a nasty fall. Those awful molds do more than crawl! Perhaps give some, but not your all, Defeat here'd be quite a pall. "
GAME: Iskandar rolls weapon2-5: (9)+8+-5: 12
Iskandar stomps over to the mold fighting with Tamrielo and Fabris. He launches a wild punch, twisting at the waist from his own momentum...but somehow misses completely, just catching himself before falling into the mold.
GAME: Azra rolls weapon1+1+1-2-1: (7)+8+1+1+-2+-1: 14
GAME: Azra rolls weapon1+1+1-2-1: (1)+8+1+1+-2+-1: 8 (EPIC FAIL)
GAME: Azra rolls +5: (16)++5: 21
GAME: Azra rolls +5: (19)++5: 24
GAME: Azra rolls +5: (1)++5: 6 (EPIC FAIL)
GAME: Azra rolls 1d6+4: (1)+4: 5
GAME: Azra rolls 1d4+3: (2)+3: 5
GAME: Azra rolls 1d8+strength+2+1+1: (8)+3+2+1+1: 15
AHHH IT IS GETTING CLOSER!!
Lorik doesn't let that thought /show/ as he carefully backs up, aiming down the magazine of his weapon before fireing twice from the hip, his hands fly over the reloading bar. Cranking the second quarrel into place before he lets fly...
...and is relieved to see the fuzzy mess of ugly stop moving.
GAME: Floppypool rolls 1d20+6: (16)+6: 22
GAME: Floppypool rolls 1d6+3: (6)+3: 9
GAME: Floppypool rolls 1d6+4: (5)+4: 9
GAME: Azra rolls reflex: (17)+4: 21
GAME: Tamrielo rolls melee: (13)+1: 14
GAME: Tamrielo rolls weapon1: (17)+5: 22
GAME: Tamrielo rolls 1d6: (3): 3
GAME: Iskandar rolls weapon2-5: (8)+8+-5: 11
Iskandar runs to the remaining mold and swings again. Only this time he misses even more badly than the first time. Iskandar turns slightly red - and wonders if it's time to pick up an actual weapon for melee combat.
Tamrielo looks a little uncertain as he draws his rapier. Is it really effective to stab these things? Is it going to be a pain to clean this blade when this is all over? Does he think he's some kind of fighter, standing here hitting things with a weapon? Didn't he go to school specifically not to do this kind of thing?
No matter. Stab. Poke. Something. The blade sinks in a bit. Hard to tell if it did much, if anything. Oh well.
"There once was a man from Selentia, A thief and a mage in potentia. But now here he stands, A blade in his hands. Perhaps the poor soul's got dementia."