While Korynne investigates the northern door, Gwl will cross to the far door and open it.
"We s-should get you as far from the drowned men as pos-sible."
Jym, there are handles, but they're rusty enough that you don't really trust them to hold. Korynne probably opened the other door by banging it with her hip. Iron spikes hammered in under the doors might be more useful.
Gwlybwr opens the far door and notices that the sloshing sound was coming from the churning waters of a sea cave. There's a sandy slope leading down to the water's edge. Fueled by what must be powerful submerged currents, the water laps and splashes against the walls of a twisting natural cavern that leads to the west. Dozens of purple and red sea urchins glisten in the shallow divots along the ground and lower walls, their spines glittering with water. Gwl estimates that the depth of the water ranges from 0 (near the door) to 8 or 10 feet deep.
Returning to the collapsed room, Gwl will again convey his observations.
"Another s-sea cave here. Not good for not-swimmers. Hope the last door is lucky."
Gwlybwr thinks there's probably some distance before the bay. Without swimming a ways into it, he's not certain if the twisty cavern has another shore in another air-filled room, or dead-ends into a wall, or just continues the whole way to the bay.
The remaining intact door opens into what appears to have been a small closet. Likewise for the broken door hanging on its hinges.
The moaning outside the door to the east, and the frequency with which the zombies seem to be bumping into it, appear to be increasing.
"Let's go through Korynne's door! We can't take Gwlybwr's route, and that broken door won't hold back the dead guys! Korynne's door can be closed, at least!
"Also, we should hurry because I really need to pee!"
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"You should have gone before we encountered a flooded labyrinth full of renovated corpses," Korynne quietly scolds. "But I agree. Let's slip through here while they're trying to break through and see what non-swimming exits there are."
She then walks through the door to see what's in the other room.
Once everyone is through, Uro will hold the door shut until the next way out is determined.
The other room is empty except for the column holding up the ceiling. As noted previously, there's another door in the west wall, directly opposite the one you entered.
"Well, I'm sorry, but I'm a little nervous!"
Jym helps Korynne inspect the room. He'll start with the support column.
It's made from very heavy timber, wet from the sea air. There's some kind of mold growing on it. It holds up an equally stout wooden beam in the ceiling.
"Are you all familiar with the game 'Hunt the Wumpus?' I think we've ended up playing it." Korynne looks briefly around the room but finds nothing particularly interesting. "If we can keep a set of doors between us and those things, I think we'll be okay. If it comes down to it, perhaps we can bait them back into that pool room and use that broken door to guide or push them into the water. I can't imagine they float very well. I wish I had thought of that before we came in here..." she mutters.
She shrugs and examines the west door for traps before going through.
It's devoid of traps, and opens into a short hallway. At the other end of that hallway, open to it, is the big room that the other zombies were in. There are three of them still there, and they begin shambling in your direction as the door opens. You're guessing there were maybe four of them clustered outside the door to the crab room, and you killed three, which makes ten zombies in all.
"Cripes!"
Jym throws one of his two remaining magic stones at a zombie.
He misses terribly.
The short hall is 15 ft. long. Assume the zombies were 15 ft. into the room, meaning they need to move 25 ft. to get close enough to swing at you. They do so, and of course are too slow to attack afterwards.
"Eep!" Korynne squeaks. She looks around the empty room, knocking on a in an attempt to find secret doors to escape through.
"Eep!" Korynne squeaks. She looks around the empty room, knocking on a in an attempt to find secret doors to escape through.
No secret doors.
A burst spell affects whatever it catches in its area, including creatures that you can't see. It can't affect creatures with total cover from its point of origin (in other words, its effects don't extend around corners).
A spread spell extends out like a burst but can turn corners. You select the point of origin, and the spell spreads out a given distance in all directions. Figure the area the spell effect fills by taking into account any turns the spell effect takes.
Gwl slinks forward, hoping to stay unwounded and keep Uro standing long enough to cut the drowned men down. His attacks are intended to draw one drowned man's attention, but defense is definitely the priority.
"Cut them, Uro. Cut them fas-st."
Sick of being hit by these things, Uro lets loose with his full fury!
"Waaaagh!" Translation: Raging!
"We didn't hit any of them! Come on, guys! There's only three of them!"
Jym throws his last remaining magic stone at a zombie.
The stone sinks into a zombie's torso with a squishy "thunk," but doesn't otherwise seem to have any effect. Jym then bravely darts back behind the meleers.
Even with Uro raging and Gwl helping guard him, the big orc takes two very nasty bites.
One of the zombies manages to clamp its filthy jaws shut on Uro's shoulder; his desperate thrashings throw the other one off.
"No no no no no!" Korynne whispers frantically. She fumbles for her holy symbol, then starts to mumble a prayer for a blast of positive energy.
"Get off him!"
Gwl slashes with determined strokes, desperate to free Uro.
Uro will fight defensively for -2 to attack, +1 to AC, putting his AC at 20.
Uro's axe head whizzes right by the zombie, missing by millimeters. Ruefully, Uro thinks that sometimes the best defense is a better offense.
Gwlybwr's slashing is so far ineffective.
"Fall back, to the water. Dive as far out into the pool as you can, s-since there are many s-spiny s-sea urchins on the floor and you do not want to s-step on them. It is deep enough and I do not think the drowned men can s-swim. They will s-sink and you will be s-safe. Lie flat, s-so they cannot grab at your feet, and I will pull each of you through the tunnel. It is a deep s-swim, but it is better than being dinner."
Uro is grappled and can only move at half speed, by dragging the biting zombie with him. He'll also take automatic bite damage each round until he's free of the thing's jaws.
"Got to get Uro free! Help me pull him away."
Gwl drops his weapons and yanks on Uro with all the force he can muster, trying desperately to pull him free from the drowned man's bite.
"We can also run for the far room, but I don't know where that pool leads."
The wave of positive energy washes over you and the zombies; the latter are slightly damaged, but still on the rampage.
Meanwhile, Gwl, with a frantic motion that comes out of nowhere, somehow yanks Uro free from the zombie's teeth.
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Disengage it is! Let's get out of here!
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Jym's gaze flicks around the room. He's none too thrilled about trying to jump into a deep pool full of poisonous urchins, surging surf, and who knows what else. He notes the collapsed ceiling, rubble, broken pier, and so on, and nods to himself -- there are any number of hiding places, some of them much more dry than a deep pool! However, a part of his brain nags him that, if the zombies somehow detect him anyway, he'll be eaten for sure.
Not wanting to contend with both the zombies and the sea urchins beneath a possible undertow, Jym opts to hide in the rubble, hoping that the zombies will impale themselves on the sea urchins, wander off, or some other solution will present itself.
Two of the zombies, seeing a bunch of movement as Uro disengages, mindlessly shamble after him; seeing Korynne, one of them veers in her direction instead. The zombie that Gwlybwr ripped off of Uro settles for trying to bite Gwl instead:
Korynne bolts, obviously terrified. I can't swim! There's got to be some other way... Seeing Jym scurry off to hide in the rubble, Korynne decides that hiding on dry land is definitely going to give her a better chance. Back in the pool room, she opens the intact closet door and ducks inside, trying to be as quiet as possible.
Uro will swim out into the pool. Once he is able to float above any spiny urchins, he''l splash around and make a scene, hoping to draw the zombies into the water.
Here's hoping Uro can out swim them.
Dodging back from the dead man, Gwl turns and sprints after the others. As the Uro wades into the pool, he repeats his earlier warning.
"Watch out for the s-spines in the s-shallows!"
Gwl executes a running dive into the pool and splashes profusely, following the orc's thinking. He bellows a taunt he's heard before, courtesy of the Shadowshore garrison's holding cells, hoping to draw in the drowned men and distract them from his hiding companions.
"Fres-sh fis-sh! Fres-sh fis-sh! Fres-sh fis-sh!"
Korynne shuts the door as quietly as possible, and retreats to the far corner of the little closet. She loads her crossbow and keeps her holy symbol in one hand, then dismisses her light spell to wait anxiously in the dark.