"I will be with you in a moment," Raven Six promises Donnell while calmly walking past him and the splattered stirge that tried to feast on Thod.
The slender Alchemist calmly takes up position, aims her crossbow at the Derro, and squeezes off another arrow. Regardless of the result, she then turns her attention back to the Halfling. "I am available for you now," she announces.
Sevenspawn pushes open the secret door, peering inside with the Light from his shield.
Thod moves in and swings down, crunching his lucern hammer into the floor as he bellows madly. Raven Six proves an odd counterpoint as she idly chats to Donnell while completely missing her target with her crossbow.
Back in the other room, Sevenspawn opens the secret door, revealing a passage heading eastwards.
Aghast to see the stirge on him, Donnell passes his crossbow to his off hand and yanks out his shortsword, stabbing it. The stirge manages to hang on!
The stirge attached to Donnell starts to drink happily, and immediately the little halfling goes pale and weak. The derro simply leaps at Thod, trying to break his face. Thod easily parries the weak attack.
Donnell (-4)
Raven (-4)
---
Derro
Stirges:
Red (attached to Donnell)
Blue
Green
---
Thod (-1)
Sevenspawn
"HOLD STILL!"
Raven Six calmly snaps the bayonet onto her crossbow and aims a vicious slash at the stirge feasting on Donnell. "Perhaps I should mix some insect repellant," she muses....
The derro laughs maniacally as it zigs and zags. However, Thod spots a moment when it hesitates, and he takes advantage. With a squish he slams his glaive into the derro before hoisting it in the air and slamming it on the ground behind him! He repeats this a couple of more times to make sure it's dead.
Raven stabs the derro on Donnell, mildly injuring it but not quite knocking it off.
Donnell finishes the job, however, as he jams his dagger right into the stirge's back before levering it off of himself. The remaining two stirge continue to ignore the fight.
End of Combat
Sevenspawn continues to look down the passage, which leads to a room between him and the rest of the group that smells funny.
Sevenspawn, having hoped this passage would lead in the northeasterly direction of his friends, sees that it does not. He backs out slowly, and looks to rejoin his team by going the same way they went. Upon arrival, he uses the wand to cure the wounds of his team, the scrolls of Lesser Restoration as required, and informs them about the door he has found - and the foul smell within.
Thod gives a celebratory holler before visibly slumping, breathing a bit heavily.
He sees the two little flying things still feasting on the corpse. He considers squashing them here and now, but decides he'd rather not miss and really piss them off. He settles for walking around and retrieving his weapons.
As he reunites with the group, he sees Sevenspawn pull out his wands and scrolls.
"Whoa, there! Make sure people need it before you use it."
He says this while taking a celebratory swig from one of his many flasks.
"I am fairly certain that the Fox could do with some restorative magic," Raven Six notes. "Stirges may not be the most fearsome creatures out there, but they are nothing to make light of, either."
You check over the room the derro was squashed in while Thod catches his breath. The body the two stiregs are feasting on looks like a vagrant, not quite that of a Shoanti warrior.
The three derros had repeating light crossbows, complicated auto-loading crossbows that required some specialized training to use. Three aklys, which are hooked clubs on ropes for tripping people at a distance, and short swords.
Passages lead to the east and southwest. To the southwest, there's a bit of a smell.
Donnell retrieves the thrown silver dagger, replenishes his supply of crossbow bolts, and suggests taking a look through the secret door that Sevenspawn discovered.
Raven Six likewise refills her quiver. She gives the repeater crossbows an appraising look and stows one in her pack.
"Yes, indeed," she agrees. "We still need to find those bodyparts, do we not?"
Also because of the Harrow reading, Raven Six would make her first attempt at automatic writing during the week of downtime to ask an important question: will working for the queen help the group save Korvosa? Linguistics check:
Sevenspawn sighs quietly through his nose before settling in to work on Donnell with his own, original wand.
Turning to Raven Six, he offers the same.
"That should do it. Are we all restored?" He produces one of his scrolls, looking back to the halfling. "We should use one of these now, I think, before moving forward. The stirge has drained you."
"Thank you kindly," Raven says, politely.
Yes, history books on Korvosa aren't hard to come by. Let me know what in specific you're researching and if there's a specific point in time in its history you're interested in.
Before heading out to the Dead Warrens you spent an hour in an automatic writing trance, focusing on the question of your employment with the queen. When you come out of the trance, you find you have written the following phrase.
A river is required to reach your destination. Use it, but do not tarry overlong, lest you plunge over the waterfall.
You decipher the vague response as both 'weal and woe'.
You can continue east, or head southwest to whatever room the secret passage Sevenspawn found leads to.
As usual, Donnell looks skeptical as Sevenspawn begins the prayer ritual inscribed on the scroll; and, also as per usual, is pleasantly surprised as the divine power heals him.
Pointing out that the passage to the southwest likely opens into the same room as the secret passage, Donnell suggests approaching from both sides again, as that tactic worked the last time. Without waiting for a response, he heads off to the secret passage.
"Uhh... 'Kay, I guess."
Thod takes a moment to catch his breath, moves carefully through the lab to avoid disturbing the stirges, and moves towards the obvious SW passage, not entirely concerned if anybody backs him up.
Donnell creeps down the passageway Sevenspawn found, and with Sevenspawn behind him approaches the door. He listens for a moment, nad hears a kind of chewing noise. Finally, he peeks.
The majority of this room contains a nasty-looking stretch of mud - a partially collapsed sinkhole - kept damp by rivulets of water seeping from the walls. A patch of solid ground extends into the mud to form an island, on which is heaped a reeking pile of body parts. To the north, a rickety wheelbarrow sits on its side against the wall.
There is a creature in here as well, enjoying the hell out of itself as it munches some body parts.
This three-legged freak is mostly mouth. Three tentacles, two tipped with barbs and one with eyes, extend from its sides.
It also spots Donnell. As he peers through the door, it lets out a joyous cry in a delighted, slobbery voice.
"WARM FOOD!"
Donnell recognizes this creature as an otyugh. Vile, horrid creatures that lurk where saner species avoid. They are filth-eaters, gorging on the castoffs of civilized society.
Donnell
---
Otyugh
---
Sevenspawn
Thod
Raven
Donnell will five-foot-step his way into the chamber to make room for Sevenspawn. While searching his memories for otyugh weaknesses, he brings his crossbow to bear on the vile creature.
"This warm food has fangs, you filth"
Donnell looses his crossbow bolt which slams into the oytugh. It rushes, squealing with joy for Donnell, and pauses as its eyes cross. It plucks out the crossbow bolt to stare stupidly at it before keeling over maw-first into the garbage.
End of Combat
The otyugh snores contentedly as you move in to look over the corpse dump. Various bodies and body parts litter the area, and lord knows what else.
"Thod, would you mind terribly dispatching that wretched thing before it awakens?"
Donnell starts poking around in the filth and corpses, mainly moving things around with the tip of his short sword. He's not fastidious about it, but he also has no wish to be bitten by something hiding under the corpses.
Thod hustles into the room holding his lucerne hammer, right when the large smelly... thing... collapses.
"Thod, would you mind terribly dispatching that wretched thing before it awakens?"
"Uhh... 'Kay."
Finding it a little cumbersome to try and slay it with a lucerne hammer with skill, he swaps out for his halberd again, raising it up to bring it down on... whatever looks like a weak point or piece of vital anatomy on this thing.
Thod cleans the blood and less pleasant substances off his halberd, and looks at Donnell weirdly.
"Why ya' rootin' round in there? Looks smelly. Smells ugly."
Before the blade comes down, Raven Six speaks up: "Is that strictly necessary? It is a creature that talks, yes? Might we use it as a source of information, if properly placated or intimidated? Was it immediately hostile, as the Derro?"
Frowning slightly, Donnell glances at Raven: "Well, its reaction to seeing me to consider its next meal. I don't think you're likely to get more from it than slaver."
With that, he turns back to poking in the muck. If Raven wants to deal with the otyugh, that's her business.
At Thod's question, Donnell wrinkles his nose "Well, it's certainly not pretty, but it's not uncommon to find something pretty in the garbage." Grinning brightly: "That's where they found me, after all."
"The creature might know best which pieces are most recent," Raven Six points out, "thus negating the necessity for you to root around in this biological mire. Shall I make the attempt to question it?"
Thod puts a messy end to the otyugh while Donnell ponders the merits of its kind.
Most sentient races avoid otyughs, although their delight in cleaning up garbage has lead them to form some alliances of convenience with those who need to dispose of a large amount of carrion. Considering their horrific nature, they are sentient - not very bright - but sentient creatures with no particular agendas. They just want a steady supply of tasty things to eat.
Donnell not-so-happily rifles through the corpse dump while Thod puts a messy end to the oytugh. Thankfully, he finds something of interest fairly quickly.
More recently on top of the pile - where the otyugh had not gotten to yet, are the broken legs and hips of a human, which are decorated with bold Shoanti tattoos. You see nothing else that looks vaguely Shoanti in the corpse dump. It looks like the body you've come here for... er, part of it.
Donnell also finds some interesting trinkets left over by the otyugh's messy meals:
- an amber necklace which looks valuable
- a silver dagger
- a wax-sealed potion
- a wand
- a ring
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Thod raises his halberd in two hands, point forward, ready to drive it into the softest, squishiest part he can find.
"Is that strictly necessary? It is a creature that talks, yes? Might we use it as a source of information, if properly placated or intimidated? Was it immediately hostile, as the Derro?"
Thod freezes, his muscles still tensed, looking at Raven Six in confusion.
"Well, its reaction to seeing me to consider its next meal. I don't think you're likely to get more from it than slaver."
Thod continues to stand, halberd held over the otyugh, looking back and fourth at Donnell and Raven, still confused.
"The creature might know best which pieces are most recent," Raven Six points out, "thus negating the necessity for you to root around in this biological mire. Shall I make the attempt to question it?"
"Right!"
Thod sticks his halberd in the beast a few more times.
"Uhh... That is what you said, right? Couldn't make out your big words, but I think you agreed to kill it?"
He looks confused some more, as he retroactively tries to figure out what Raven Six said.
"Well, it's certainly not pretty, but it's not uncommon to find something pretty in the garbage." Grinning brightly: "That's where they found me, after all."
Thod now looks at Donnell in confusion.
"Why were you in the trash? And, uh, you're pretty? Or is this a halfling thing? Like, you're a stud to halfling women?"
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Raven Six purses her lips as she looks at the dead otyugh -- and then shrugs, clearly banishing it from her thoughts. Instead, she turns to give Donnell a politely curious look before she addresses him a strange language:
Sevenspawn lowers his crossbow and his hood, and enters the cave once the otyugh has been slain. He has eyed Raven Six a moment during the discussion, his inward curiosity about who or what she is having grown steadily, but says nothing. Looking about, he sighs outwardly through his nose.
Kneeling on one knee, he unshoulders his pack and brings out a large sack once Donnell has found some of the bones. "Fox. Here. I will carry the remains as we go... the rest of you are far greater fighters than I."
He stands up, slinging his weapon. "We should press on. We must find the rest of the remains."
Donnell snorts and begins to chuckle uncontrollably
then freezes as a number of thoughts occur to him simultaneously:
- Are his new friends genuinely curious? are they joking? or maybe flirting with him?
- Is this half-Shoanti corpse Gaekhen? Will their rituals be satisfied with only half of his body? Is the rest of the Shoanti inside the otyugh?
- Where the hell are all the undead that are supposed to be down here?
to identify the Shoanti body (or, failing that, at least whether the tattoos are from the Skull Clan).
Taking his cue from Sevenspawn, Donnell motions that the party proceed to the passage to the west. "As before, I will take the secret passage with whoever would like to accompany me ; the other two can proceed through the main corridor"
Donnell looks at the body, now recalling that he never actually asked what Gaekhen looked like. However, he does recognize the tattoos as Clan of the Skull, and this is obviously a young Shoanti man from the colouring.
Interestingly, the body looks to have been cut surgically, not bitten off by an otyugh. It was also in a pile of corpses which the otyugh had not touched yet. The other pieces may still be in the dungeon.
---
Donnell and Raven Six split off to the north with Raven Six crawling through the tunnell behind Donnell, Majenko keeping close to her. Thod and Sevenspawn then look into the next room as Donnell peers through the secret door.
The walls and ceiling of this tall hallway are encrusted with dozens of yawning skulls, their mouths open into dark holes in the walls.
There doesn't appear to be anyone in here. An exit is in the northeastern corner of the room.
Taking a quick look around the room
Donnell indicates Thod should precede him to the west. Loading a poisoned quarrel into his bow, he follows closely on the dwarf's heels, hoping for a quick shot at whomever or whatever they might encounter next.
Donnell looks around carefully and lifts a foot to enter the room, but hesitates. There's a strange shimmering on the floor. He inspects it a little closer and indeed; there's a magical trap to set off the moment anyone enters the room.
There are a couple of little skull-shaped runes carved on the wall. Perhaps if he could just scratch it so, it would disable the trap. It also looks like there's a short delay between trigger and activation - probably six seconds or so.
"Thod! The room is trapped - stay where you are!"
Taking a steadying breath, Donnell balances on his toes, trying to time his movements just so...
and stumbles on his way through the door, landing hard on his side and staring in mute horror at the skulls around him.
Several things happen. Although Donnell would normally be able to get out of the room in time, he messes up disarming the trap so profoundly that he manages to set it off. Two little blobs of acid whizz down onto him as he gets up from the floor. The acid also seems to alert some creatures in the room.
Two of the skulls suddenly lunge out of the wall, surprising the entire group. A long skeletal spin is attached to each skull. One rushes over to Thod, while the other springs out of the wall, biting viciously onto Donnell. The halfling screams and the combined trap and bite send him into unconsciousness.
These creatures are known as necrophidius. They are mindless magical constructs, created from the skeletons of snakes. Like skeletons, they are resistant to damage unless it is from blunt weapons.
Donnell
Raven
Thod
Sevenspawn
---
Necrophidius
"Blunt weapons!" Raven Six calls out to the others. "They'll shrug off all else!"
Having given her warning, the Alchemist hefts her silver mace and steps forward to cover Donnell, swinging at the construct still hovering over him.
Thod was already suspicious of the room when he saw it, and didn't want to enter, and so waited for Donnell to do his stuff.
Though 'activating the trap and getting acid splashed on you while bone snakes attack' didn't seem like the most effective way to do things.
Either way, he's caught by surprise as one of the bone snakes slithers/rattles closer, up and under from Thod's weapon. With Sevenspawn behind him, and the snake blocking the way into the room, there isn't much space for Thod to maneuver.
So he makes some space, rushing forward, attempting to push the snake back.
Barking out an arcane plea to his deity from his place in the doorway, Sevenspawn casts Divine Favour before stepping forward to face it with shield and hammer.
The necrophidius bites at Thod, but it just bounces off of his armour.
WHAM!
It goes absolutely flying as he hammers a shoulder into it, splattering it against the far wall. Thod and Sevenspawn then move into the room. Raven Six attacks the necrophidius near her, missing badly. The two necrophidiuses attack Sevenspawn and Raven Six, but both manage to avoid attacks from the wildly snapping skulls.
Donnell bleeds out.
Donnell (-20, dying)
Raven
Thod
Sevenspawn
---
Necrophidius:
Plain
Blue
"Thod! You need to take care of this thing! Donnell is in a bad way! I need space to heal him, or else Sevenspawn needs to do something!" Raven Six shouts while she swipes her mace at the remaining necrophidius again.
"On it!"
Thod swings at the thing, rather cumbersomely from around Sevenspawn.
The cover is still appreciated, though.
Either way, after his swing, he disengages and heads over to attack the other one and give Raven some breathing space, since Sevenspawn seems to have this one in hand.
Sevenspawn swings with his hammer, his deity's divine power flowing through his arm, and moves back to the west five feet while remaining engaged.