Shara aims her bow at the Gui she missed earlier and fires another shot.
She holds her tiger on the defensive in case anything gets too close.
A swift advance by the group cuts down one of the Gui and severely wounds the second one.
The Gui advances and attempts to spear Huan.
Unfortunately the attack is blocked. The Gui looks quite frustrated. Meanwhile the other one simply takes cover under the table.
Tashi moves and stabs at the frustrated gui. He is finding the buckler to be something of a hinderance to his fighting style.
Bō deflects the attack with his lucky shield and counterstrikes again with his nine ring broadsword. The blade jangles as it whistles through the air in a casual arc.
...but lazily misses.
Shara moves a step and fires at the Gui attacking Huan.
She sends her tiger over to guard the cowering Gui.
If the Gui that is hiding moves to attack or flee Shara's tiger will bite it.
A final shot from Shara lays low the Gui. The last remaining member of the band still cowers beneath the table.
Bō points his sword at the last remaining gui. "All right, you," he says, striking a dramatic pose, "Talk! What happened here?"
Then he looks sheepishly back at the rest of the team.
"Uh... do they have their own language? I've never had to talk to a gui before."
The Gui babbles incoherently before switching to broken common.
"Monster... very bad..." He gesticulates upwards, indicating the upper floors.
"We didn't want to hurt. Just take tea."
He seems to be telling the truth about his intentions and what happened to him.
Xiang studies the gui closely as the fellow speaks, studying his body language.
"I think he's telling the truth."
At this point the Gui makes no move to leave or attack and if left alone retreats to under the table for safety. You still have a few places left to explore of course, and a new mystery on your hands:
What happened to the Gui? And where are all the Jade Tea Palace workers?
The priest sheathes his sword and taps his helmet and says, "Sooo... I guess we check upstairs?" He looks a bit sheepish about having stabbed the gui, then says, "But you shouldn't have been stealing tea in the first place!"
The Gui replies, still under the table.
"Zhang Haidai our chief. He order attack on palace. Says very important tea is here."
You recognize the word Zhang as being the Gui's word for a chieftain or king.
"And where is this Haidai now" Shara says intentionally leaving of Zhang to further show her distaste for the Gui.
Meanwhile her tiger is still menacingly close to the Gui, close enough that the creature can feel the tigers hot breath on it's skin and smell the stench of her last meal.
"Zhang Haidai already leave with other Gui. We all alone here."
"Alone except for the monster upstairs, you mean?" Asks Tashi.
The Gui gulps and nods.
As if on cue, a loud thump from upstairs followed by the sound of smashing ceramic resonates through the ceiling.
A young man's voice is heard over the din followed by the sound of screaming upstairs.
"It's flowing under the door! Someone find a way to stop it!"
"Shall we see to it then?" Tashi heads off, in search of a stairway to the upper floor.
He tries to stay alert for danger.
"Right!" says Bō. "Let's see what this is really about." He moves to follow Tashi and says, "C'mon Peony - I can take the front if you'd rather use your bow."
As far as you can tell, after searching the hallway, eastern and western rooms, the only way left to go is north into the inner courtyard.
Assuming you go through, you exit into a small garden courtyard, delicately maintained. Signs of trampled plants and flowers show that the Gui obviously passed through here as well.
Two stone staircases curve upwards back towards the building, connecting at the top into an entrance into the second floor.
As well, another large wooden door opens into a large warehouse looking building at the northern end of the courtyard.
"The noises came from above; should we head straight for it?"
"Yes Huan, I think that is a most excellent idea give me a moment with my tiger and we will be ready." Shara stoops down to her animal companion and pours one of the teas that they had found into her gaping mouth.
While Shara tends to her tiger, Tashi removes his buckler from his arm and hangs it from his belt. The small shield was interfering with his sword-play.
He follows along when the others are ready.
The group heads upstairs and comes face to face with a large open room.
An animate body of steaming greenish water appears to be trying to squeeze its way through the cracks of a sliding door built into the western wall.
The shouting seems to be coming from the other side of the door.
As you enter the room, the creature turns its attention towards you and it stops trying to squeeze away and instead forms into a small creature, slightly resembling a Gui.
Judging by the steam coming off its body, the creature, albeit liquid, must be quite hot to the touch.
Bō carefully interposes his lucky shield and says, "Ehhh... anyone seen anything like this before? Can it even be hurt with swords if it's made of scalding water?"
Tashi tries to remember what, if anything, he might know about the living tea creature.
Xiang tries to identify the creature but without success. For all you can tell, it is a humanoid looking mass of scalding green water.
A faint odor of herbs and spices wafts from it however.
It stands by the now drenched doorway but makes no menacing move towards you.
"Is that some kind of... tea elemental?"
"I don't know." Tashi replies. "Hey hot and green, who, or what, are you?" This question is directed at the humanoid mass of aromatic hot water.
The creature does not respond. Since none of you has made any hostile moves, it slowly moves back to squeezing itself through the doorway. Screams from the other side start again.
Tashi surmises that arrows, or his stabbing sword may not do too much to a liquid creature. He quickly looks around for a chair or something blunt to throw at the tea beast.
Shara nocks an arrow but doesn't fire. I've never seen the likes of this... Should I shoot it? she looks to her companion with but the Tiger only takes a step back.
She looks at her companions and draws the bow. "should I? " she asks nervously.
-Posted with Wayfinder
Apply your Initiative modifiers to the Team Roll. This will save us some time for now.
The Tea Elemental is roughly 15 ft. away from you.
"Well, I was going to take the risky position of maybe we shouldn't start rash violence, but that's so out of character for me that I'm just gonna say we should blow it up before it hurts anyone else," says Bō. "So uh, yeah! Hit it!"