Jebediah is out of tricks, at least new ones but sometimes as a halfling you just have to press your luck and thus he attempts to wash another rain of color of the creature.
Jebidiah and Lukas each attack in their own respective ways, but, while their attacks land, they fail to affect the creature. Falzeal has a bit more luck, landing a minor hit on the creature as the creature lashes out as Celes as she moves in.
The creature brutally bites Celes as it follows up with another strike, rending her flesh with its teeth once more.
Initiative:
1st: Lukas; Celes @ 17/44 HP; Falzeal; Jeb
2nd: Neh-thalggu @ 30
"Perhaps you should try another spell." Falzeal comments to Jeb as he circles north to get into the open.
Casting a spell, he launches two missiles of force at the creature.
Celes, getting bit twice, angers her to no end. She begins to foam, her muscles bulge and her right eye twitches slightly as the teeth dig into her shoulder then her arm. She digs in, and takes a mighty swing with her scimitar.
Her swing is too erratic as she nearly hits her ally.
She then tries to intimidate the large creature.
Lukas sees the monstrous thing tear savagely into Celes, at the same moment he realizes his fists are not hurting it at all. Hoping a weapon will be more effective, he pulls a his short, curved blade from his belt and swings it at the thing!
Jebediah curses himself for his stubbornness and unleashes a gout of flame at the magical beast in the hopes that flames will affect it in some way.
Burning hands
All of the Bold Striders have landed their attacks on the creature and it staggers around, but most of the fire seems to dissipate before it reaches the beast.
As a last ditch attempt, the neh-thalggu lashes out at Celes one more time.
Falzeal's Magic Missiles blast into the beast, knocking it side to side as Lukas' kama cuts straight down through the creature's maw. Celes falls to the ground, but Falzeal and Lukas easily dispatch the beast as it disintegrates into nothingness.
Status:
Lukas; Celes @ -2/44 HP; Falzeal; Jeb
---
Four locked iron chests rest on the eastern side of this cavern. All of them detect as magical and all have very sturdy locks on them.
[spoiler=Spellcraft DC 19] Arcane Lock on all of them.[/ooc]
As the beast falls, Falzeal brushes his hands together and moves toward the chests and detects for magic.
"I detect magic. The chests are locked with magic, arcane locks in the academic parlance."
Jebediah is more interested in the well being of his fellow halfling then in any treasure chest and touches her in the hopes he can bring her back from his ladies clutches.
CLW
Falzeal analyzes the chests as Jeb heals Celes.
Status:
Lukas; Celes @ 7/44 HP; Falzeal; Jeb
"Doesn't sound like you have the trick to opening them, eh, Falzeal?" Lukas asks. "I wonder if Hunclay's keys would be of use here? Anyway, since there were so many traps in his house, I bet there are some doozies here."
He carefully studies all the chests, taking as long as necessary, to be sure there aren't any nasty surprises.
Lukas doesn't notice any traps as he investigates the chests.
Falzeal shrugs at Lukas's suggestion. "If they're not trapped, might as well try the keys."
With yet another fatalistic shrug as he approaches one of Hunclay's treasures, Lukas attempts to open the first of the chests with the keys from Hunclay's key ring.
Three of the keys on the keyring seem to open the smaller chests. Within these chests is a total of 11,000 cp, 7,200 sp, 1,800 gp, and 60 pp, all in small cloth pouches of 100 coins each.
The fourth chest is twice the size of the others and is of very fine manufacture. The brass key found on Hunclay's body under the cave-in opens the chest, which Hunclay never had a chance to protect further with a trap.
Inside this chest are Hunclay's greatest treasures. Sitting atop an exquisite darkwood case are four packets of enhanced dust of darkness and a scroll of permanency (CL 12th) in a mithral scroll tube, itself worth 300 gp. The darkwood case is worth 250 gp, and contains five books. Four of these are rare antique tomes on astronomy written in Ancient Osiriani; each is worth 1,000 gp. The fifth tome is a tattered volume called Secrets of the Dreaming Dark.
Jebediah digs through the chest curious as always when he stumbles over the Secrets of the Dreaming Dark his interest is piked.
Ohhh....thais sounds fun... the halfling mumbles as he begins to turn the pages.
Falzeal peers into the chests, then glances at the party. "I would posit that these items, as they are not, technically, in Huclay's manor, would not, per se, qualify as part of his estate, don't you think? I mean, granted Hunclay mentioned the caves in his journal, but who says these things are his? I haven't seen any sort of deed for this cave. How does one claim ownership of a cave, squatter's rights? What I'm getting at is, what the mayor doesn't know won't hurt her, in this case, agreed?"
Lukas frowns as Falzeal makes his suggestion, saying in reply, "I don't feel very good about that, Falzeal. We're being paid to do a job, and getting all of Hunclay's stuff identified was part of that job."
He scratches his head a moment, then says, "What exactly was our agreement with the Baroness? I don't remember exactly what she said."
Look, the baroness wanted the home cleared, and we did. She saaid nothing about anything else, and this I view as anything else. I say we keep it...we had to risk our own necks killing that damned thing just now!, Celes says with a spit at the dead body behind her.
I agree with Celes. We had a deal with the Baroness and she only ever mentioned the mansion. However as she likely didn't know about the cave best not to tell her about it...
Jebediah offers with a bit of Halfling prgmatism.
Lukas shakes his head, clearly reconsidering what he's said. "I don't feel right about it," he tells the others, "we had a deal with her, and she paid us well for it. And she may have other work for us yet, but if we rip her off, she's gonna be pissed when she finds out - and sure won't hire us again. Back on the docks of Cassomir, there were porters who were known for their honesty, and they could always find work. And there were others who skimmed a bit off the top here and there, and they got by, but most captains would only hire 'em if no one else was available."
Falzeal shakes his head. "Bah! Nonsense. How'd she ever find out? What if this wasn't Hunclay's, but he was watching the monies for someone else?"
"Okay, okay," Lukas replies, "if you guys really feel strongly about this, I'll go with it. We won't tell the baroness about this...I hope she doesn't find out."
"I guess that darkness dust we just found will let us put out the light that's trapping the shae," Lukas observes. "Let's go free her, and that'll be the last of the threats in the manor house."
You make your way back to the basement of the manor and the shae looks happy to see you, though she does let a flicker of suspicion arise as she sees her weapons strapped to the side of Celes.
"You have come to free me?" she asks, hopefully.
Falzeal nods in response. "Just throw this dark powder on the wall there?" He asks. If that seems the way to go, Falzeal does so.
Lukas waits to see how the magical darkness and light will interact, and how the shae will behave if they manage to free her. Not a lot of cause to trust anything in this place...
Celes will smirk at the Shae, Tou weren't using them at the time
Falzeal throws the dust at the wall and the light flickers before becoming extinguished immediately. As the room is plunged in darkness, Celes feels things taken from her as you see a burst light from the lighting of a torch. The shae, clad in her leather armor and swords, hands Falzeal the torch. "Thank you for freeing me. Is there anyway that I can repay this debt? You appear to be adventurers. I'm sure my talents may be of some use..."
Well us being such a curious nunch... Jebediah pipes up abit intimdated by the Shae What can you tell us of the dreaming dark?
"Not this again..." says the shae in a frustrated tone. "Shae come from the Plane of Shadow. Yes, it is dark, but it is not the Dreaming Dark. Hunclay made that same mistake. Are you all so simple on this plane? "
-Posted with Wayfinder
Indeed we are...so do you know anything of this dreaming dark?
"I wouldn't call Jeb simple, so much as single-minded," Lukas says, trying to ease the shae's frustration. "And I don't know a thing about the Dreaming Dark or the Plane of Shadow - so I guess you'd probably call me simple too, but I'm okay with that."
"Anyway, yes, we're adventurers, hired to clear out the traps and hazards of Hunclay's place so it can be sold off, now that he's dead. We're, um, sort of between jobs at the moment, but I'm sure your talents would be very useful, and I'd be happy to have any help we can get."
The shae sighs and ignores Jeb, figuring that it is too much trouble to keep at it.
"I guess we should go tell the Baroness the job's all done," Lukas says. "Though we might want to keep our shae friend out of sight, who knows what the folks in town will think."
Falzeal nods to the shae. "Aye, a companion such as yourself would be most welcome!"
To his companions, he says. "Let's go report in, aye?"
You head back up through the manor and just inside the foyer, the shae turns to you. "I will be waiting in the forest to the northeast. I do not wish to go into 'town'. I will find you when you need me." she states before disappearing in a puff of shadows.
---
You move to meet the Baroness and the woman strides out of her office to meet you. "You have cleared Hunclay's manor of all traps and evil things?" she asks, holding out here hand for your catalog of fineries within the mansion.
Lukas, still a bit conflicted, responds carefully, "Yes, we've cleared the manor of all hazards, and it wasn't easy."
Falzeal nods. "The team was very....industrious in setting off all the traps we found. There were a few unsavory creatures, but those were dealt with as well. The manor is now safe for an inventory to be taken for the auction."