"Quiet yourself with your belly aching you mangy cur! Gods but you would think you were stepped on by a Hill Giant!"
"Come here, Garm. Let me check you out."
Zigil uses detect poison and a to see how badly Garm is hurt.
He ruffles the fur and says "It's only a scratch, dear. You're fine."
Garm wags his tail and sits on his hind legs.
Eldan's light helps to illuminate the dim corners, but the general sights of the room are visible without it. There are gaping holes where the roof has collapsed. The loft above is all that remains of the upper floor of the building.
Though the timbers of the loft are scorched, and somewhat warped from exposure to the weather, Zepfina tells the group that she believes it is still structurally sound. A statue stands at one end of the loft, but the details are unclear from the lower level.
Past the stairs to the loft, a hall leads further into the building.
"Alright let's check out this here statue."
Giles leads the way up the stairs to have a look around.
The platform is rickety, filled with sooty debris, and exposed to the elements. The brass statue standing precariously at one end of the platform is also covered in soot, and depicts a goddess with a longsword in one hand and a kite shield in the other. All of the group have seen this depiction enough recently to recognize her as Iomedae the Inheritor.
"Oooh, I don't think we want to go too close to that statue."
Zigil looks around for any signs of recent (or current) activity. [dice=Perception]d20 + 5[dice].
Zigil sees signs that the centipedes have been up here, as well as rats and other vermin, but nothing humanoid has ventured up here recently. It also appears that the statue is shored up from below, and it should be safe enough for one or two people to venture out towards it, but probably not the entire group.
"Hrmph... I'm sure I can go if none of you tall-folk want to take a closer look at it."
"Aye, have a look then."
Slei ventures out towards the statue and inspects it.
Although the soot and tarnish obscure it a bit, Slei can see that the statue is a beautiful piece of art. It's probably too heavy to remove, however. The statue is one piece of brass, including the sword and shield.
Just the process of closely examining the statue makes Slei feel braver about exploring this creepy building. It must have been very inspiring to the worshipers of Iomedae.
"You're very brave Slei! Let's search this floor now!"
Nope I think we need to move on downstairs. Giles will move downstairs and look around the corner.
"Bring the light will ya?"
"I agree with Master de Hammo, let's search the rest of the building for adversaries first. We can do this other stuff later."
Follows Eldan and Giles.
Slei follows the group around the corner.
The short hallway leads to a weathered wooden door.
However, the keen eyes of this particular group of adventurers are also able to pick out a concealed door at the northeast end of the hall.
After a quick search and assuming it is safe, Giles will open the door.
(Meaning the concealed door.)
The secret door opens up underneath a ruined staircase which once led to the missing second floor. The floor ahead has collapsed, leaving a gaping hole in the middle. To the north of the hole the outer wall has collapsed, leaving a large mound of rubble. There is a door in the outer wall to the northeast, but it appears jammed by rubble. Off to the right is a larger room, and signs of the immense rock face the chapel is built against.
Does the staircase look stable enough to walk down?
If so I will go down to explore the room.
The floor around the hole seems unstable, especially to the south. Giles may be able to skirt the worst of it by cutting through the web-filled area under the stairs.
Eldan whispers, "Is it safe? Should we bring the light up?"
"Might be more' none way to get in there. Bring up the light."
Giles proceeds down the corridor and opens the door at the end of the hall.
The door opens into the main hall of the chapel. The support walls and pillars that once connected the Plague House to the huge boulder behind it have burnt and crumbled in this ruined chamber, revealing nearly the entire face of the monolithic stone as well as much of the sky above. Jagged red runes have been painted onto the rock in long, broad strokes that reach from top to bottom. The dim light also shows a couple of shelves or cabinets at the far end of the room. Debris and cobwebs are everywhere.
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"What did you see behind the secret door, Giles? Was it blocked?"
Anything interesting about the runes?
"I suppose we should search the shelves and cabinets, on the off chance they have not already been looted."
Looking for dangers in the debris and cobwebs
When the party goes to the other side of the room:
(if needed)
The runes are hard to make out in the dim light without getting closer.
Eldan whispers again, "We should be careful again in case there is another ambush."
Eldan takes a second to listen as well as examin the runes.
The group makes their way into the room, and get closer to the stone (which Giles and Eldan know is sometimes referred to as "The Freestone"). Eldan can recognize the orcish characters, which spell out the word "Skreed".
There is a sudden, startling movement at the far end of the room, and an enormous spider bursts out of its hiding place and launches a web at Zigil!
Zigil is entangled by the sticky web. Is this spider a threat or a menace??
Seeing a threat, Garm growls and moves in to attack.
Garm's fangs pierce the spider's chitin, but he is unable to establish a firm hold.
Eldan moves up, drawing something from some pockets in his cloak, chanting as he goes. Upon reaching his designated spot he casts some red, blue, and yellow powder at the spider.
Clour Spray: DC Will 20 negates
On his turn, Giles will set down his loaded blunderbuss and then move in next to the spider, drawing his sword.
"Hold on damned fool dog. Liable to get yerself killed."
Burning Hands it is!
Reflex 1/2 DC15
Gouts of flame shoot from Eldan's hands, but the spider nimbly gets out of the way.
Slei moves up in front of Giles and fires her sling staff while muttering "Yuck, the beastie's bigger than I am!"
Slei's stone hits the spider with mighty thunk, as Giles moves in towards it.
The spider snaps at Garm, who barely squirms aside with a yelp.
On her turn, Ziggy will draw his sword and move up to engage the spider.
Zepfina moves up behind Giles and strikes out with her langaxt, putting a gouge in the floorboards.
Tarakona moves up behind Garm and launches a fire bolt at the spider, singeing the arachnid.
Two smaller spiders, perhaps offspring of the one the party has been battling, emerge from the ruined stairway and close on Slei!
One spider strikes well wide, but Slei barely squirms out of the way of the other one.
Garm barks and strikes again at the larger spider, but cannot get through its shell this time.
Magic Missle on the biggun.
Slei swings her sword clumsily at one of the smaller spiders.
The large spider is oozing ichor from many cracks in its shell.
On his turn, Ziggy tries to burst free of the web:
Giles will 5' step next to Garm and swing his bastard sword at the spider.
Giles' blow fells the great spider.
Zepfina steps back to aid Slei, swings her axe, and chops another hole in the floorboards.
Zigil manages to free himself from the sticky webbing.
Tarakona gets a better vantage and flings another fire bolt and strikes true yet again.
The fire attack is enough to unnerve the spiders, and they scuttle away and down the hole out of sight.
Now that the beasties are run off, Eldan will move to the Freestone for a better look.
The word "Skreed" does not translate into anything that Eldan knows, nor does he recognize it as somebody particularly significant. It is, however, used regularly enough as an orc name.