Guaril Karela's Six (Inactive)

Game Master Thrawn007

The creature manages to get past everyone without too much injury, but this quickly results in it falling into a pit trap in the floor, where you had just walked through not more than 20 seconds ago. You can see a second creature is already stuck in the pit, trying to struggle to get out now that it's open again.

Lunevi grimaces at the sight, exclaiming at the second creature. In order to prevent the two from climbing out of the pit, she casts create water over the pit, trying to wet the sides to keep them slippery.

Fate waits a moment to see what the trapped creatures do. He starts to unconsciously grind his clay into small bits of dust.

"Not sure if I can ready a spell, but if so, I would like to ready Sleep if either of them make it halfway up the wall.

Urah will pull his longspear and finish off one of the creatures. He will keep the other alive for any questioning the group wants to do.

Just give it up. There's no win for you here. Surrender and you don't get stabbed.

The creatures try to quickly climb their way out of the pit quickly, but it reseals itself, trapping them under the floor, when the dose of water knocks them back in off of the pit wall. The creature that had been previously been trapped shouts "No, not again!" in common as the pit seals.

Surprisingly, you had just walked over the pit previously, with no issues as you approached the vault. Several seconds after the pit closes, Gate and Gilli hear a barely audible click from inside the vault.

"Well," Lunevi says, blinking at the now closed pit. That had... certainly been interesting. "Do you, um. Do you think they'll be okay for a while down there?"

If I had to guess that's just rearmed again. But lets go ahead and take a minute to look around, we can unseal the top without too much difficulty, I'd imagine.

”Let’s do it then,” the ifrit calls out, still keeping his eye on the pit.

The shaman takes the opportunity to look around the vault.

perception: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (20) + 7 = 27

2 eaten posts again the past couple days. Update: now 3 with one today

Fate immediately notices that a few paces into the vault, there the floor has a built in pressure plate (a trap). He is able to steer Ella clear of it before she manages to step on it.

”Fine, stay away from the trap. Let’s keep looking around this place. There has to be something to make this interesting.”

Beyond the heavy steel door, this darkened chamber is lined with shelves, including freestanding shelving in the center. There is ample room in the vault, but labeled boxes, bags, weapons, and armor are spread throughout.

A secret panel in one of the shelves (found on Fate's perception check) hides a hidden lever, which likely disables the trap.

The vault contains the Walder family’s better collection of items, gems and jewelry, and masterwork weapons and armor when not on display, as well as coins minted in Korvosa, Magnimar, and neighboring countries. There are even a few boxes marked as belonging to Ilsurian citizens who likely pay a fee to have belongings stored securely.

Seeing far more wealth in one spot than she'd ever seen before, Lunevi gulped. "Um. What do you think they were looking for?" she asked as she began to very carefully poke around. "And do you think they got it, whatever it was?"

Perception: 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (15) + 1 = 16

Do we have a manifest or anything?

There is no manifest, and although most of the vault seems to have been rummaged through, with how many valuables are still seen on the shelves, it is unlikely that much if anything has been stolen. It seems the traps did their job in detaining the thieves and preventing their escape.

"I would imagine that it would be far too easy to assume we have caught the murderers. Still, we should speak to them before turning them over to the sheriff."

Yep, lets see if we can't lever open that trap. You up for some encouragement to be friendly and cooperative, Fate?

The shaman contemplates Ella's question for a moment. "Yes, I believe I am."

"I'll wash 'em back down if they're looking to be a problem," Lunevi affirmed the plan, preparing to cast create water again as necessary.

After some experimenting, you find that the hidden latch deactivates the trap, and the floor panel activates it. This explains why you were able to walk through the hall the first time, as someone has to step on the floor panel to activate it again. The second skulk must have tripped it in her attempt to get past everyone and make a getaway.

The skulks quickly concede they are beaten, and don't wish to die in the pit, offering (in common) to trade information for release.

Well, let's start with why did you break in? What were you looking for?

"So we have a deal? We tell you what we know, and we get out of here to go back to our tribe?"

Perception 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (5) + 5 = 10

”If you answer all our questions, I think we could negotiate something that would make everyone happy. Remember though, you are in a pit and are acting quite twitchy for some reason. ”

Perception (take 10): 10 + 7 = 17

"Indeed, you do seem to be reacting to something. If you wish to return to your people, then perhaps you should be honset about what is going on. WE are in no hurry."

Perception: 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (10) + 1 = 11

"It'd be really unfortunate if we had to wash you back down, after all," Lunevi added sweetly. Too sweetly, perhaps.

"Get us out of here, we'll answer your questions, and then we'll go."

The other skulk that had been stuck in the pit longer doesn't do any negotiating, and seems to be drooling slightly.

”What’s wrong with your friend? Can we trust him if he let him out?”

Fine, let's get this over with. Fate calls to the guards and informs them of what is going on. He then asks for them to fetch the sheriff. "To prove that we are 'on the up and up' as they say."

I'm good letting them out and questioning them, especially if we can get the local law enforcement to hear the whole thing from the skulks themselves.

"Who are you two? What are your names?" Lunevi asks. "Since we're waiting on the sheriff anyhow, there's no point in makin' you tell the same story twice."

"I'm Zakhar, and this is Rogi. Do you have any medical supplies? He was injured in the fall." You can quickly see that one of the skulks has some kind of arm injury, with their forearm turning somewhat purplish.

The sheriff and guards arrive after a couple minutes. The questions go back and forth, but it's apparent these two are low on the totem pole and don't know much more. Their tribe was hired to send them to steal goods (not anything in particular) from this vault. They were given a key to the vault just before the heist (by one of their clan mates who works as a go between for work.) They got in using the key, but were unaware of the traps.

In the pit, they have a number of valuables they had grabbed, likely totalling several hundred gold in value. It all seems very random, as if they were trying to just grab some things that looked to be of value.

Where were you going to deliver these goods? This seems like a very oddly planned robbery. Why wouldn't whoever hired you break in themselves?

"Indeed, whomever selected you may have planned for you to be caught. The question remains, who gave their accomplice the key?"

"We've thought about that we might have been set up. We got instructions from our clan member and followed them. We already missed the meeting last night where we were supposed to deliver the goods, so I'm not sure what we'd do with them now. It's not the first time we've been hired for this kind of job. We just never were caught be such elaborate traps in the past. We thought with the key, everything was going to go easy."

The wife seems pretty upset at the key. "My husband and I had the only two copies of the key. The one they had, must have been my husband's."

So whoever killed Mr. Walder hoped we would be distracted by these skulks...

We should take another look at the scene of that crime.

The sheriff interjects. "While you have been looking here, our investigations indicate that creature from the circus was behind it. Witnesses and the evidence both agree. It looks like the circus might have hired these creatures to do the stealing after the murder, possibly to cover it up, but more likely to get out of town with some easy money."

That doesn't gel with the skulks' testimony. How would the Varisians, newcomers to the area, already know about a local tribe of skulks that might do such work for them, and also have the trust of a go-between - and negotiate that within the span of a few hours?

More importantly - what witnesses. From what I've heard, no one saw anything more than two vaguely humanoid shapes?

”Ella is right. With all due respect, that doesn’t make much sense. Unless we’ve not been told everything. We have been told everything, right?”

"While you've been investigating here, we my deputy has been at the murder scene. There are tracks of a large creature that start from nowhere. This would indicate the beast could fly. We've received several reports of a large four legged, winged beast flying around. I'll let you put the pieces together for yourselves."

Ella gives the sheriff a skeptical look, Urah, what say we take a look at these "sphinx tracks." She turns to the sheriff again, Unless whoever looked at these tracks has already made sure they matched up with anything in the carnival?

To the skulks, Lunevi points out, "Shouldn't you be returning them to their rightful owner?" After all, the widow was right there. The bits about the tracks didn't really... Seem right to her, especially since there was apparently, as Ella had already pointed out, a local tribe of skulks around.

To add to the ongoing conversation, she added, "Besides, is it not possible for there to be some sort of shape-shifting creature about, not unlike our, ah, friends here?" She shrugs. "Anyhow, let's not jump to conclusions and see what other evidence there might be."

More directly to the Sheriff, she asks, "Do you have someone that can handle that injury or is it okay if I give it a quick look?"

After all, if they had someone that could garner evidence or clues from it, she didn't want to mess it up. She was operating under the assumption that they were telling the truth and the injury had come from the trap, but, well. Who knew, right?

If she gains the Sheriff's permission, she'll eyeball the wound as soon as the skulks are out and either give it some first aid or, if she can't quite tell or it looks bad enough, give the poor thing some reprieve with cure light wounds.
Heal: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (1) + 5 = 6
CLW: 1d8 + 1 ⇒ (2) + 1 = 3
(Apologies on the delay! Had the power knocked out for a bit because of the high winds. @_@

One of the skulks speaks up, "We aren't shapeshifters. We just, well, blend in with surroundings. We had nothing to do with any murders." Both skulks seem to be rather shaky, and you notice they are sweating a lot.

The sheriff replies, "We aren't in the business of manufacturing evidence. I just follow where it leads." She then gives Lunevi a nod of approval in curing the skulk. First aid can do little more than bandage, but the wounds heal with the magical assistance. "I'll have the deputy lead you to the crime scene to take a look for yourself."

High winds and power surges hit here too. I just replaced all my network components with temp replacements, and have comcast coming out to get more permanent replacements in place...but they couldn't schedule until all the way into next week.

Upon reaching the scene where the body was found, you start your investigations.

Sense Motive: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (3) + 6 = 9 For why the skulks seem 'shakey'.

*** AT THE MURDER SCENE***
Fate takes a moment and sprinkles clay upon his eyes and those of his teammates before looking around.
Guidance anyone?

Survival: 1d20 + 8 + 1 ⇒ (19) + 8 + 1 = 28

"While there are clear signs of a clawed creature who's tracks suddenly disappear, I would venture to say that these tack are not near deep enough. I would venture the sphinx is near 40 stone or so. She also has feet similar to that of a lion. The imprints here are the wrong shape as well as too shallow. Plus, if you look here, there are clear indications of humanoid boot prints that someone tried to brush away.

This is... elaborate.

She turns to the hapless deputy, Now do you understand that there is something going on here more complicated that blaming the outlanders?!

Urah nodded. ”Something sketchy is certainly going on here. I’m not sure what the boot prints mean. I’d wager we are looking for some type of humanoids.”

The deputy looks at the prints and back and forth to Fate before turning to Ella. "Yeah, it seems there is something more going on here. Someone worked really hard on setting this scene up. Still doesn't mean it wasn't the circus freaks though... still some kind of strange creature that was making the prints here. Those ain't human. I'm sure Sister Woodmere will get to the bottom of it though. She's going to talk to that vicious beast they have caged."

Lunevi looked around, dubious of what little she saw. Truly, she though the strange paw-like prints were damning. She was just as impressed as the poor deputies when Fate, Ella, and Urah were able to easily pinpoint the differences in the circus creature's prints and the prints displayed here.

"I never would've noticed," she admitted sheepishly. To be fair, tracking and prints weren't exactly her strong point.

At the deputy's response, though, she couldn't help but frown. She really didn't like the way that the official spoke of the animal.

Then, a bit confused, she paused. "Sister Woodmere? Have we heard of her?" She couldn't quite think of whether the name ought to be known to her or not -- but all the same, she asked. Better to look foolish and learn than be choose to be willfully ignorant, right?

First time the name came up. So OOC you aren't forgetting anything.

"Sister Woodmere is our local priest...from the temple of Erastil. When word came out of the death of such a prominent person in town, she said she'd do her part to get to the bottom of it, using her god's blessings to compel the truth from that beast. She should already be there if I had to guess."