Round 4
As he watches the visous wound he inflicted on the elf heal so quickly he is momentaraly stunned. The wave of negitive energy pulls back into the moment and he grits his teeth as he shrugs off most of the damage.
The fighter seems to be about to charge back in to give anonther go at cutting the women down when he hears Sek's call and stops short.
She's all yours!
Instead Kayluss moves back while sheathing Ixthalos and retreives his spear from the body of the mite.
The alchemist quickly follows up with another bomb to Morilaeth's right blocking her retreat with another fiery explosion that rocks her off balance from the concussive force. She looks disoriented for a second, but not enough to prevent her from driving the hound back with her rapier at the last second. It is consumed in a golden light and vanishes.
Alie continues to move across the ballroom waiting for her opportunity. Kayluss backs off warily at Sekhemre's request and planting one foot on the dead mite's chest, yanks his spear free while another one of your elven scout's blades fly by from the shadows without connecting.
The priestess opens her mouth to invoke her goddess again, but before she has the chance another one of Sekhemre's bombs consume her. The blast knocks her from her feet and the flame leaves her body twisted and smoking. From the tiled floor she manages to lock gaze with Sekhemre just long enough to weakly rasp, "You... you will dream of me..." before she lets out a final wheezing last breath and her scorched head lolls to one side.
The mites and derros in the hall finally roused by the fighting and being ravaged by channeled energy begin stumbling, crawling, or in some cases running naked for the stairs.
Sekhemre shakes his head.
"Kayluss, that is not quite what I had in mind..."
He then shoves a bomb into the Elf's mouth, closes her jaw tightly, and slams it against the ground to set it off.
Reflex Save:
He then stands there, slightly singed and covered in gore, breathing rapidly.
"Whatever she was, she was most certainly *not* natural. I have heard of things called trolls that can regenerate their wounds, but they are at least vulnerable to fire!"
Despite having drawn her last breath a moment earlier, when Sekhemre begins shaking another bomb to activate it her eyes fly open and she quickly rolls to the side, but not fast enough. Yet another fiery explosion envelopes her and as the wave of fire vanishes Kayluss drives in with his spear. She lies still for a moment, but then her eyes fly open and she grasps the haft of the spear snarling like a cornered beast. Sekhemre is unable to get in and force her mouth open to put the bomb in with her thrashing about, but he is able to slam it right down onto her face. The explosion echoes through the ballroom. Incredibly her flesh still seems to be stitching itself back together, fresh muscle tissue spreading out to cover the exposed bone of her skull.
Finally Wadi, Alie, and Khedon close in around her and while Kayluss pins her in place with his spear she is assaulted continuously from all angles with a barrage of acid and fire. Amid the noxious smoke of burned flesh and the caustic fumes hanging in the air you are all eventually confident that she is no longer regenerating. At that point the alchemist shakes one last bomb to activate it, and opens her mouth to place it inside. Her jaw turns out to be hinged like a snake and it falls open easily to accept the clay flask. This time the explosion throws pieces of her in all directions and leaves no doubt as to the finality of her death.
Sekhemre gives a sigh of relief once he is certain that the creature is *definitely* dead.
That was *not* natural!
Still rather unhinged by recent experiences, Sekhemre blanches at Wadi's suggestion that there might be more creatures like the 'Elf' floating around in here.
"By my departed Lord Aroden, I fervently hope that there are not any more creatures like that one in here...
...One was more than enough, thank-you very much!"
Once he recovers his equanimity, Sekhemre will pull out his alchemist's kit, and brew a new mutagen...
"Dakram, do you think you could search the room / what is left of the corpse?"
By now all of the derros and mites capable of moving have staggered down the stairs. Those few remaining lie still with eyes rolled back in their heads, white froth dried on their lips.
As they fled some of the derro opened a secret door. It hangs open on a dark hallway. A more conventional door behind the alabaster throne is still closed.
The human bodies piled in the center of the room are far beyond saving. They were bound and cut to ribbons- slowly by the amount of blood spilled. Three of them were middle aged men and two just on the edge of manhoood.
The tables are covered with the remains of a banquet of the bizarre. Sek clears out a space to set up his lab amid platters of boiled spiders the size of rabbits, spider caviar, silver trays of some kind of sliced meat, stuffed and glazed bats, salads of ropey fungus tendrils, and goblets filled with a black liquid and white foam.
A skeleton yellowed with age still wearing an ancient pair of workman's coveralls slouches in a chair in one corner of the Gallery. A tool satchel of stone carving gear fitted to a wide belt lies at the feet of his chair. An iron signet ring on one finger bears Barek Trigonner's personal rune- the same one you've seen on Torvic's scrolls and tablets. The thick rusty iron bracelet on his wrist makes a rattling sound when moved. Something is sliding around inside the hollow loop of the bracelet.
Guided by the auras Alie picks out one vial and the scrollcase on the remains of Morilaeth as the only sources of magic in the room.
When the vials are brought to his attention, Sekhemre will inspect them.
Pouring the contents of one vial into a glass-bottomed flask ,he will hold it up to the light to inspect the color, and then sniff it speculatively to try to identify the odor...
Craft(Alchemy)
When he notes that Alie is having difficulty identifying the 'magical' potion, Sekhemre will attempt the same procedure to identify it as well!
Craft(Alchemy)
Dakram circles the room looking for anything out of place while Sekhemre works. By knocking on walls with the butt of his dagger he eventually finds a hollow section. It takes him some time to find it but there is a pressure plate a little above head level. When depressed a wide section on the wall ascends into a hollow groove revealing a shallow empty room ten feet wide but only five deep. Intrigued he discovers the same maneuver opens a second door into a dark shaft. The ruined remains of a pulley system dangle just inside the shaft which must drop down to the foundry you took shelter in.
Waiting until Sek was through with his experiments, Alie asks him if she could borrow a vial, so that she might get a smaple of the glowing moss/fungus on the way out.
"I think I want to learn a bit about alchemy. You seemed to have a gereat deal of fun making all those bombs and throwing them around. I think that would be really interesting."
Once he realizes where the shaft leads Dakram is satisfied and moves on to the door behind the alabaster throne. The master suite beyond mist have been Master Barek's personal quarters when the Gallery was founded but it has obviously been repurposed now. An oversized bed with a sturdy iron frame dominates the room. It has been fitted with a new if crude mattress and a tangle of makeshift sheets cut from a bolt of quality fabric which leans in the corner. An oversized wooden wardrobe holds a set of robes fit for a noblewoman, clerical vestments, and several thin linen shifts.
One of the nightstands holds a scattered collection of cosmetics in tiny jars like stark white facepaint, as well as some bloodred lip balm. And a small brush for a dark blue pigment.
The other nightstand has been pushed into the corner and converted into a personal shrine. In one corner a collection of eyeballs float In a jar filled with brine, in the other a pile of severed talons are stacked up. Between them stands a blackened silver icon to the demon mother with teeth and fangs mounded up around the base. In the drawer Dakram finds a set of four scrolls detailing specific religious ceremonies in honor of Lamashtu.
A fresco on the Northern wall depicts a mountain top partially leveled and built into a settlement. The architecture is distinctly similar to the ruins of ancient Osirion. After taking in the initial image, Kayluss realizes this fresco is actually depicting a peak in the Aspodell mountains known as the Forlorn Peak. He had pointed it out in the distance on your journey here, but it was very far away.
Dakram sets to work obsessively in this room intent on hidden treasures. With time he finds another secret door, but it opens out onto a massive cavern dominated by a glowing fungal forest. Here and there you make out the shadowy forms of giant ants harvesting for their colony. A set of disguised handholds lead down into the cavern. From this side the secret door was left as rough stone to blend into the wall, but the remains of a glyph of power are visible in the stone where it has been blasted away upon discharge.
If Sek has any extra vials, Alie fearlessly attempts to collect a sample for Wadi and herself.
"Neat," she says looking through the glass at the still glowing fungus. "Here you go Wadi, bet we can find out all sorts of interesting things this stuff can do," she chirps happily, placing the vial carefully in her pack.
Wadi takes the proffered vial of stuff and stows it away in his pouch, after wrapping it up tightly so it won't break in his pouch. He gives Alie a quick hug, and says, "Thanks so much for that, I appreciate it!"
Ithuriel
Sekhemre looks up from his work.
"Hmmm? Oh, of course Alie, I am sure we can come-up with something for you to carry a sample of fungus back safely."
Sekhemre will also take the opportunity to 'bleed' the Elf's corpse - a few vials of her 'regenerating' blood could prove useful as a base ingredient for a whole lot of things.
Once he has finished, Sekhemre follows Dakram into the other room, and is so taken with the fresco that he does his best to do a quick sketch of it.
Once everyone is finished, Sekhemre cracks his knuckles, and comments:
"Right. Let's see about cleaning the rest of the mites and derros out of this complex, and getting Torvic and the others back to safety."
The rest of the Gallery turns out to be blessedly free of mites or derro other than a couple more who look like they died from an overdose. Presumably they fled back into the darklands especially once you find another door standing open by the kitchens leading into the same cavern.
Torvic and the others are exceptionally relieved to see you again. The dwarf suggests that you all rest long enough to recover a little and allow the prisoners a little time as well but that you should be on the road by the next morning. Lyrehawk counsels that if you wait too much longer and the heavy snow begins to fall you might not be able to make it through the pass until spring.
While the others rest and Lyrehawk fashions a stretcher for Merisk, Torvic asks if Kayluss would mind taking him to the temple of Torag that you found while clearing out the complex. He would like very much to make an offering to his god for delivering him from certain death and attaining his life long dream.
The journey through the pass is difficult carrying Merrisk on a makeshift stretcher, but a few hours out Lyrehawk suggests you take shelter in the same cave where you found Torvic while she tries to signal the Aspodell rangers. Once you have a fire going she uses a brand from it and some wet leaves to send up an emergency smoke signal every few hours for the rest of the day. Later that day a hawk lands on a tree branch a ways out from the cave and screeches until someone takes notice before stretching its wings wideand taking to the air. A couple of days later a team of three rangers with donkeys a bloodhound and the same hawk arrive with fresh provisions, blankets and enough medical gear to get everyone back on their feet.
From there things fall into place and a few days later you are back at their encampment. The rangers roast a lamb in your honor for saving their friends and the wine flows well into the night.
The next day you all part ways with Torvic heading out to alert the Kjngs of the Five Mountains and the rest of you heading back to Almas. The rangers cover boat fare as one last gift to get you back without any trouble and Lyrehawk insists that you deliver a sealed letter to a man named Ansell Pierce.
Ansell turns out to be an Andoran Eagle Knight and a close friend of Lyrehawk. The Eagle Knights of Almas throw a lavish feast in your honor and spend the evening trying to recruit you as allies on their future missions. In any case when they hear your description of the cavern they offer to outfit you with some fey bane arrows if you are interested.
Things settle down after that though eventually you learn that your reputation is growing alongside Torvic's in the Mountains of the Five Kings. By spring they have reclaimed the Gallery and with it techniques in stone carving, glassblowing, and ceramics that had been lost for so many years.
Back at the lodge things are much more low key. When you have agents all over Golarion it takes a lot to stand out- still you have proven yourselves competent field agents and once you get the expedition written up it may be published in The Chronicles. Telfyr, the librarian, is very excited by your description of Lady Morilaeth. He explains that rarely an elf is born with the ability to dream walk. It is uncertain whether this is simply a hereditary throw back to their fey ancestors or a product of one of the otherworldly beings of faerie slipping into the family tree. If that were the case it stands to reason that there should be creatures of nightmare mingled in as well. Telfyr assures you that this may be the first recorded event of Pathfinders encountering such a nightmare creature and should nearly guarantee inclusion in The Chronicles.
Venture Captain Brackett congratulates you on a job well done and suggests that he may have another field assignment coming up if you are up to it.