"Let us finish these doors not first." Grey said. "I would prefer not to ever need to return here again."
"Agreed" - Grezzor pipes in.
"Mmmm." Keil's acknowledgement is more a keen to a distracted grunt. The shadowy man returns down the hall, turning north past rooms already inspected to the original oddly shaped room the party first descended into . Remembering he'd already inspected the doors for naughty devices, the fetchling ignores the puddle of slime and carefully depresses the latch to the south eastern door.
Keil finds no traps on this unlocked door and it easily opens to reveal a mostly empty room . This room contains three semicircular alcoves, with a stone shelf in each one. Each shelf holds a small statue made of gold: one is a gargoyle, one is a winged horse, and one is a unicorn.
A cursory check of the room interior shows no obvious traps or dangers.
Keil's eyes light up at the sight of the gold and for a moment forgets all about his latest condition. Bony fingers are about to reach out for the prizes when a sinking feeling suddenly hits, This is too easy. Tapping his fingers nervously on his chin Keil takes another look around but unable to come up with anything, he calls for Grezzor, "Something's not right...what do you see?"
Grezzor steps up beside Keil, and uses his magical powers of detection to scan the alcoves - "We'll soon know"
None of the statues, or anything else in the room, radiates magic.
"I expected differently but... There are no magical auras at all" - Grezzor informs Keil.
"More statue not of Arlok... What mean? Want Arlok grab one?"
Brok is suspicious and looks for a trap.
(+2 for traps)
"Seems like bait for trap...."
Despite the appearances of the statues, Brok sees no signs of traps in any of the alcoves where the statues beckon to be claimed...
Cautiously, Keil reaches for the Gargoyle statue. Taking care not to damage it in any way, the shadowy man wraps it in the portion of blanket he'd earlier used as a mask and places it with care in his pack. Not caring for the unicorn or winged horse, Silly fairy tale ornaments, Keil leaves the others, "Scrap the others. Melt them down."
Next, the shadowy man leaves with his prize, quietly awaiting whatever punishment the room may deal him for his theft.
Nothing happens to the fetchling as he reaches for the gargoyle statue and places it into his pack.
Brok will stretch up on his tiptoes and lift the unicorn from its alcove.
"Gold is gold." Arlok will grab the last one and add it to their things.
As Brok reaches for the unicorn statue, his fingers brush against it a little too hard and it suddenly crumbles to a fine powder. Arlok's claim also crumbles to a fine gold powder.
Arlok holds picks up some of the gold powder and looks to Keil and his prize.
"Gold crumble? Now gold dust. Can use still?"
He asks.
"Trickery!" Brok cries out as he tries to brush the unicorn dust off on his breeches.
For the record, there is still a sizable amount of gold dust piled in the two alcoves that can be gathered up....if you have a container to hold it in.
"I could try and melt it some for ease of transportation" - Grezzor pipes in - "Or we can simply drop the gold dust in a bag and be done with it"
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Brok looks at Arlok and solemnly says "Unicorn dust make Arlok father many children..."
Then he beckons over one of the loot-bearing, servant orcs and takes the magic longsword out of the bundle the porcine load bearer is carrying, trading it for the well worn blade he has carried over his back up until this point in the adventure.
The blade is comically long in the short little goblin's hands, measuring almost a foot longer than he is tall.
Brok slings the sword over his shoulder, fighting to adjust the hang of the blade so that it doesn't drag on the floor behind him.
News of the statues turning to dust draws suspicion across Keil's face. His yellow eyes narrow, the shadowy man stops to check the gargoyle statue carefully wrapped in his pack.
"Gather the dust into a pouch for smelting."
"Arlok no want children, well children to snack on be good. Arlok like gold, Arlok put in bag."
He pulls out a small sack and starts to collect the gold dust.
"Where we go now?"
He ask after the gold is collected.
Brok examines the door in the north wall for traps.
(+2 for traps)
if it seems safe, he puts his ear up to it and listens for signs of danger on the other side.
Brok's examination of the door shows it is safe to open.
An all too familiar stench greets your nostrils as you see there is a pool of the vile pestilential goo in the center of this room . The goo originates from an opening in the east wall, and basically covers the floor of the passage puddling in the center.
The room also contains a shelf with ten large, leather-bound books on it on the west wall, as well as several copying tables. There is also a locked cabinet bolted to the north wall. At the north end of the room’s west wall, there is a bas-relief carving of a left hand.
"More stinky poo rivers" Brok says over his shoulder to the group.
He studies the room for traps, both generally and around the cabinet and left hand.
(+2 for traps)
"Still no lockpicks." he says to Keil.
Tucking away his intact gargoyle statue with some relief, Keil catches up with his goblin cohort. "Let me," nodding his head in the direction of the pool of goo, "steer clear of it." Taking his new and improved tools from within his cloak the shadowy man heads to the northern part of the chamber and the locked cabinets. He selects the bent snake rake and torsion wrench. The tools slip in smoothly and quietly and he's soon in charge of those cabinets.
While the bas relief does not appear to be trapped, the goblin ranger finds a trap around the cabinet lock, a simple needle trap. Keil is able to disarm it with ease.
The cabinet contains 4 scrolls, 3 tied with a blue ribbon and 1 with a red ribbon .
With a subtle twitch of his fingers, Keil thrusts his picks deeper into the mechanism and unhooks the wire trigger, No sense leaving this trap here.
Next the fetchling turns his attention toward the rest of the room. While the magicians ponder the meaning of the bas relief, Keil studies the eastern wall where the vile pool seems to be flowing from.
Keil heads over to the east corridor, which is nearly filled by the vile putrescence. He can see the source of the bubbling liquid: An overwhelming miasma that rises from a huge central pool of pus and filth located in a large chamber about 20 feet away. At the middle of the pool, the horrid liquids fountains upward to a height of five feet. Five large rivulets of the fluid trickle away from the fountain, threading their way across the floor to disappear down corridors (of which this is one) or through gaps in the walls and out of sight.
"Hmmm." Keil rests an arm on a portion of the east wall as his eyes assess what seems like the next step. Shaking his head the fetchling makes his way back to the group to report what he's seen. Splitting up is risky..
"The source might be through there," Keil points a bony thumb down the east corridor, "a fountain five feet high." Spitting to let this information sink in he continues, "I'll go in. Anyone coming will get infected." Keil's eyes narrow as they fall on Raaz. "I'll take Shade." Without waiting for anyone else to volunteer, Keil waves Shade to follow behind him then trudges off down the vial corridor.
To Shade, the fetchling whispers, "Take care of anything living when I'm in there," adding as an after thought, "Not me."
.
Fountain acts on Init count of 0.
Raaz unexpectedly joins in, "I shall also join you." He takes a position behind the shadow servant.
The fetchling manages to make his way through the corridor without getting any of the goo upon him by hugging the edge of the corridor, mindful of its disease-carrying properties. The smell is nearly enough to make you gag however.
After a short distance the two of you make it into this room. The room itself was obviously once used as a temple: a huge alcove in the northern part of the room contains a ten-foot-tall statue of a benevolent-looking figure wearing white-painted robes. However, the statue is splashed with blood and filth, and a grisly necklace made of human hands has been draped around the statue’s neck like some sort of psychopathic offering. All of these are left hands, and they all look like they have been freshly severed from whatever arms they were attached to.
Choking down his lunch, which thinking about it, would have made most humanoid's gag considering its origin, Keil quietly surveys the room. Motioning for Raaz to wait at the entrance, Keil does the same, picking a spot with an good vantage. He takes note of the hands strung around the neck of the statue and snaps his fingers at Raaz then points toward the statue's necklace. The shadowy man gestures for Raaz to open his eyes to the arcane whispering, "What meaning does that hold?" The fetchling rubs his chin in thought and wonders, This place is old, those hands should have decayed...
"Shade, check the other side of the fountain, then return."
"Arlok no fear stupid goat. Arlok have blood of stronger God. Arlok not hurt by smell."
He ventures forward with the others to see the source of all this.
Noticing Keil being sneaky Arlok too will step lightly and make little sound.
While all the tall people seem set on following the stream to poo mountain, Brok heads over to the bookshelf to look for anything of value.
(+2 for traps)
"Grezzor, help Brok with nasty books. Brok not have wizardy skills to keep soul safe from evil magic."
If it seems safe (aside from the chance his soul might be stolen by the writing), he climbs up the wall to reach the shelf and starts pitching the books down, one-by-one to Grezzor.
Brok and Grezzor examine the books, of which there are ten of them. They appear to be a collection of various medical texts, titled as follows:
Mystical Diagnostics (200 gp)
Introversions of Toxins (100 gp)
Orminiod’s Essays on Medicine] (100 gp)
Kariloodian’s Second Treatise on Anatomy (100 gp)
Modr’s Incomprehensiblium (5 gp)
Yraric’s Surgical Guidelines (50 gp)
Jamalli’s Robusto *
Thryn’s Book of Medicines (50 gp)
Kormon’s Catalogue of Internal Organs (25 gp)
Redrallion’s Investigations Into Natural Philosophy (100 gp)
While none of the books are magical in nature, Brok see one of them is coated in a contact poison, the book titled Robusto.
Round 1:
Fountain begins forming ??
Meanwhile in the other room Arlok joins Keil and Raaz in the Fountain room, where Raaz shakes his head. "The statue carries no magical auras, though the hands upon them carry a minor one. The fountain on the other hand..." Indeed as you all turn to face the fountain, you see four large lumps of matter forming on the outside of the Fountain...and they are rapidly growing larger...
Brok doesn't toss the contact poison covered book to Grezzor.
"Who traps book in healing room? Weird doctors."
"We find suckers who don't know writing words is dangerous to buy other books so we can pay for feast!"
"Out room now." Arlok motions to the two before moving back into the other room.
Not knowing what is forming Arlok braces his glaive to receive them upon a charge.
"Poop monsters coming."
Arlok's deep voice draw's Keil's attention away from the fountain. Quickly deciding to head the godling's advice, the fetchling retreats down the corridor to the safety of numbers. "Anything coming out of there can't be good."
Grey was very interested int he books, but was not about to handle them until they had been thoroughly disinfected. Removing contagions without water was difficult, but he thought he might be able to come up with a few solutions.
Then Arlok's warning pulled him from his contemplation.
"Kill those things." Grey said to Shade as he moved behind Arlok and readied his long skull-staff.
Grezzor takes the necessary care to stay away from the pool of putrescence, but eagerly grabs each book Brok tosses him - "This is a veritable find" - he offers his usual, big, toothy smile - "I will need to peruse them carefully"
At Arlok's warning however, he backs out from the room.
As he tosses the last (unpoisoned) book down to Grezzor, Brok hears the rest of the party excitedly talking about the poo monsters.
He looks down to see Grezzor already dragging away the books to a more defensible position.
He calls out some tactical advice to the other goblin: "Weezard Grezzor! Let orc-slaves carry loot. You need-make fire magic to burn away the poo!"
With that, the bandy-legged little goblin leaps down from the bookshelf and starts across the room to see if he can help defend the corridor.
Back in the rectangular chamber, Keil readies his bow.