Chimi shakes her head as the chained creature gives you an evil smile. "I'm known as the Mistress of Pain, and I very much want to show you both what I've learned..." As she speaks, the chains hanging from the ceiling begin to move.
"Get back and watch, Chimi. I want you to remember this one."
Iris chanted briefly under her breath, and a shimmering field appeared around her, ready to push back the darkness and help her do what needed to be done. Indeed, this creature didn't need to continue being around - best to remove her before she could hurt anyone else.
Chimi quickly steps backward, just as the chains on the ceiling lengthen and spout razor-sharp barbs before lashing out at you. Chimi begins to chant, and you can tell that she's fighting to maintain control of herself. It's possible that using magic isn't what triggers her amnesia.
The creature barked out a curse in what sounded like Infernal as you vanished. A moment later, Chimi pointed at her, and the chains began to glow. That provided the distraction you needed to invisibly slip into the room and unleash a furious flurry of strikes. The first missed, but the other two blows managed to barely slip past your opponent's defenses and connect. They weren't as effective as you would have expected, but definitely hurt.
With a snarl, she lashed out with more chains...
.. but your protective spell sufficed to fend them off. As you prepared your next plan of attack, Chimi tossed a glowing copper piece into the room. When it hit the ground, tendrils of light stretched out and wrapped around the creature. "רשתות הן לא כל כך נקשר"
"Chains aren't all that binds."
Well, that was a nice spell - one which Iris found herself fully approving of. Without hesitating, she danced into another combat routine, warding away the chains and thrusting out with both ends of her staff. Holy light continued to flash from each end that she managed to hit the evil creature with - and she had no problem at all with striking it while it was trapped.
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The creature deflects your first strike with a chain, but your second attack hits hard. Chimi's binding lights severely restrict your opponent's movement, and she's only able to send a single chain your way.
Iris' head whipped to the side slightly as the chain struck it, and she responded by striking the chain away with one end of her staff, then sliding her hands down together before twisting into a full-on heavy blow. Her style was all about versatility, after all, and with the Mistress of Pain as entangled as she was, Iris wanted to hit both harder and more accurately.
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Your powerful blow is narrowly deflected by a whirling chain. Chimi's lights pulse, but this time, the Mistress of Pain manages to avoid the worst of the entanglement. She sends another quartet of barbed chains your way, trying to batter you into submission.
...Feh.
"...You honestly believe you're going to win, don't you?" Iris asked, placing no particular emphasis into the words as she switched back to a wider grip and stance. Sometimes, quantity was an excellent substitute for quality...
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Your first strike missed, but the creature's block opened her to your rapid second blow - bringing her to the ground in a bloody heap.
Chimi breathed heavily as she struggled to maintain control. After several seconds, she managed to calm herself. "Yes, thank you. I'm all right. I think I stayed present this time, too. That's unusual for me - especially since there were chains. I don't like things that can be used to tie someone down."
Iris smiled slightly. "Nor do I. Help me search?" With that, she turned her gaze to the room, occasionally pushing aside some of the chains with her staff (she didn't want to touch them directly) as she examined the area for anything relevant.
Only when she was finished did she channel a few bursts of healing energy. Best to be on the safe side, and ensure she was ready for whatever lay ahead.
Before you begin your search, Chimi extends a hand. "First, let me ease the pain that creature caused you."
There's not much in the room, which appears to have been used as some sort of torture chamber. The only items of value are the two robes hanging on the wall. They're very old but are incredibly well-preserved. "Those show the sigil of the Therassic Order," remarks your companion.
Iris quietly took the cloaks, packing them into her bag. "They may be useful further in." she said. "...Ah, let me know if you want to wear either yourself. It's always good to have a few defenses up." Admittedly, most of her protection was simple willpower - weakened as she was, it was imperfect, but her aura could push away quite a lot of harm.
Regardless of what Chimi wore, though, Iris headed back to the hallway and (carefully) deeper into the area. "Can you tell me anything about that order? I don't think I'm very familiar with them."
...She, er, hadn't generally kept track of individual organizations unless they were supportive or in opposition to her interests. Most deities hadn't.
Clearly excited to share what she knows, Chimi responds with enthusiasm. "Of course! The Therassic Order was a group of scholarly wizard-monks dating back to the time of Thassilon. Even though their organization died out when Thassilon fell, their legacy lives on through the great libraries here and in Jorgenfist to the north. Even today, we're still probing the depths of their knowledge."
The hallway continues through a clockwise curve that reveals a pair of doors to the north and south. Farther on, you see a third doorway along the north wall.
"And what did that knowledge focus on?" Iris inquired, checking the closest door for any traps or other troubles before nudging it open with her staff. "You can tell a lot about organizations by the kinds of things they're most interested in."
"Oh, they dabbled in a little bit of everything. The Order believed that knowledge was power, and the more one knew, the more powerful they could become. Some studied the nature of time, some studied the various planets in the universe, some studied the workings of the body... you get the idea. There are even rumors that the Runelords had ties to the Order."
The door is unlocked and opens easily at your touch.
Almost every angle in this roughly circular chamber is smooth and curved. Though its walls and 20ft-high ceiling are flat, the flat planes all curl to meet each other - even the doors are curved, making a total lack of hard edges or corners, save for two broken sections on the western and eastern walls where long cracks have marred the perfect surface. In the center of the room rests an elaborate clockwork construct of spheres. At its heart is a barrel-sized representation of the sun, while around it, metal struts suspend much smaller metal balls. Just north of it, a smooth four-foot-tall podium rises like a stalagmite, its top bearing a small brass wheel and a lever.
On the floor, you can see tracks in the dust that reveal multiple people have passed through this room recently.
"Hmm... sounds like something Thoth would have enjoyed. Irori was always a little more... focused... in his pursuit of knowledge." Iris mused thoughtfully, crouching down and looking at the prints in the dust. "Let's go." she carefully moved forward, following the tracks and occasionally glancing up through the rest of the room as she made her way to the other door. She left the device alone - as old as it was, the scholars would probably appreciate it being untouched so they could investigate it at their leisure, and she had no reason to take that away from them.
The far door leads to a stone chamber partially covered in a strange, organic-looking honeycomb of papery material. Chimi gives a surprised gasp as she sees the corpse of a Halfling at the far end of the room. It's twitching unnaturally. Of more pressing interest, however, is the ponytailed woman charging angrily toward you, whistling insanely through her stitched-shut lips. The iconography on her robes indicates she's a member of the Brothers of the Seal.
Mindful of the damage she'd already taken in this place, Iris brought up the bottom of her staff and took a defensive position. As she did so, a bolt of energy shot out of the end of her beloved tool, aiming straight for the wild woman's chest. It wasn't a perfect spell by any means, but if it took hold, it would almost certainly disrupt the woman's attack somewhat. "...I would strongly prefer it if we could resolve this peacefully." she noted, her tone just slightly sad.
The woman dodges your energy bolt and continues her headlong charge toward you. Chimi, slower to react, begins to glow brightly, and the woman slows slightly as she enters the lighted area. "That's one of the expedition members - Hasari. The body to the south looks like another one. Something must have happened to them!" Meanwhile, Hasari throws a powerful punch at your midsection as soon as she closer into range.
Your first strike is batted aside, but your second strikes the woman squarely in the chest, knocking her out of Chimi's light. It pulses, and as the woman charges back toward you, she rebounds as if she'd hit a wall. Chimi lets out a relieved breath. "As long as you stay in the light, she won't be able to hurt you. It wards off humans. Hasari's a member of the Brothers of the Seal. It's completely out-of-character for her to attack without provocation. Plus, she's met me before, and I definitely don't think I made THAT bad of an impression."
Iris nodded slightly, then raised a hand and pointed at Hasari. A burst of light erupted in the air around the woman, designed to blind her (and damage her, if she was truly evil). Either way, it ought to further degrade the woman's ability to attack (and hopefully her ability to dodge), which would allow Iris to put an end to this.
Your spell hits the monk directly in the face, and she staggers backward, bleeding from her eyes.
Without so much as pausing, Iris stepped forward and whirled out with both ends of her weapon again, aiming to take advantage of the mad woman's inability to see.
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"...So, what are the Brothers of the Seal?" Iris asked as she moved through her combat routine.
Your first blow drops your opponent bleeding to the ground. Chimi's light fades as she moves up and touches the unconscious woman's forehead. "She's not going to wake up anytime soon, but she'll live. The Brothers of the Seal have been around for centuries but aren't too well-known outside of the city. They're supposed to be guarding a secret of some kind, but that's all I know about them. Their order's pretty reclusive."
Iris nodded slightly, looking around for anything she could use to tie the woman up. Perhaps she wasn't so far gone she couldn't be saved - though the fact that her Burst of Radiance had actually hurt the woman wasn't optimistic. "When you get down to it, most secrets are better off revealed." she mused as she searched. "The good rarely have need to hide, the evil ought to be exposed anyway."
...Obviously, there were plenty of exceptions, like the passwords to one's personal things. Those were broadly assumed to not count, though.
As she worked, she did keep an eye on the halfling's corpse, concerned about the twitching.
There's some rope on the halfling's corpse.
Moving carefully, Iris approached the halfling's corpse, not yet certain it was safe - twitching bodies were usually a bad sign, after all.
Your caution is well-founded as a cloud of droning insects burst from the halfling's corpse. The sound of their wings almost seems to form speech.
You recognize this as a Hellwasp Swarm - insidious vermin that possess a rudimentary hive mind and inhabit the bodies of their unlucky victims.
Iris didn't waste even a moment in bringing up her staff and triggering the magic within it. Swarms were surprisingly dangerous foes, and she only had so many blasts to hit them with - best to go all-out from the very beginning. A burst of light erupted in the air where the swarming creatures were - and, hopefully, it would at least slow them down a little.
"Chimi, if you don't have a spell like mine, get back as far as you can!"
As soon as that was done, Iris darted backwards, looking to stay out of the swarm's reach as best she could.
The bite of a hellwasp is quite painful and carries a poison that dulls the reflexes. Those afflicted need to possess great fortitude to withstand it .
You're almost twice as fast as the insects, and once your light manages to blind them, you're easily able to stay out of their way. Eventually, your spells destroy them.
As the swarm dispersed, Iris nodded firmly. That hadn't gone as easily as she would have liked. One of these days, she was going to find a better way to deal with such things... and she advanced back towards the halfling's body, fully intending to take whatever she could to tie up the unconscious woman before she woke. ...And be sure about the knots, too, so it couldn't be broken too easily...
"So, Chimi, what do you think about that swarm's presence?" Iris inquired, curious about how perceptive the girl was.
In addition to the rope, the halfling's body carries quite a few well-annotated books on Thassalonian lore. You can also tell that his armor and boots are magical. While you tie up the unconscious monk, Chimi thinks about what you've asked before responding in a questioning tone. "Well, the other rooms we've seen contained extraplanar creatures that attacked us. Maybe the bugs were doing the same? Like sentries?"
"Indeed." Iris noted, taking a moment to carefully examine the items with Detect Magic before storing them in her bag. "One extraplanar creature is interesting. When you've got many of them, then either someone's actively calling them or they're unable to leave. Either way is trouble, because anyone who can call up various types of them and keep them here is clearly no ordinary practitioner. I do hope your companions were wise enough to retreat if things became bad." She nudged open the next door with her staff.
Across the hall from you is another door, although the path of footprints continues past it. Still, in the interest of thoroughness, you check out the closest door first. On the other side, you find a large chamber with a sand-covered floor and littered with weapons and bits of armor. Halfway up the eastern wall is a small balcony with a railing and a single ornate chair, like a box seat at a theater. A small, empty metal cage hangs by a chain from the ceiling, just a few feet below the twenty-foot-high ceiling.
Iris carefully glanced through the room, checking for signs of the people they'd come here to find. Only if she saw them did she enter the chamber - otherwise, it was up and through the hallway. She was here to help people, not explore and document all by herself.
The chamber at the end of the hall is a squat cylinder with perfectly smooth walls, ceilings, and floors. In the center rises a stepped dais like a five-foot-high ziggurat, with a flat platform at its top. Standing in the center of the platform is an incredibly-obese Gnome. "That's Luonim, one of the adventurers," whispers Chimi as the Gnome smiles madly. As the two of you enter, he pulls a lever atop the platform, and the door closes flush with the wall.
...Ah. He was completely mad, then. Whatever had happened in this place was... less than pleasant. "Prove it. Stop them in their tracks." she said calmly, striding forward and facing him with her head held high.
You feel a force attempting to press you against the wall of the chamber, but it's easily resisted.
"Never! If I cease their movement, all of life will be flung off their surfaces into the endless void! It is my sacred duty to protect them. Nothing goes extinct on my watch!"
"So all of this power is located on a mortal world? On the Cage of Rovagug, no less?" Iris asked, about halfway into the room and easily resisting the force trying to push her away. "Gods need no levers to manipulate all of reality. If you truly claim to be divine, then show a miracle none can deny."
The Gnome chants and gesticulates as the force continues to try to push you back against the wall of the chamber.
After several seconds , a Lantern Archon appears. "See! The agents of the divine are mine to command!"
The clearly-delusional Gnome doesn't even seem to realize that he cast a summoning spell.
Iris blinked. Well, those who could summon good creatures at all generally weren't evil... and that force was getting pretty strong, but she kept moving. <"I fear your caller is not in his right mind."> she told the lantern archon, speaking in Celestial. <"Would you be so kind as to help me get him to settle down?">
The archon blinks its lights in response. <"Unless commanded otherwise by my caller, I am required to attack his enemies. However, he has yet to specify anyone who fits that description. For now, I will not hinder you, but if you make any hostile action, I am obligated to attack you to the best of my abilities.">
Luonim looks delighted. "That's right, my faithful servant. Spread the word about my marvelous deeds to all!" Clearly, he doesn't speak Celestial.
Iris simply blinked - the similarity to the Archon's actions was not lost on her. More importantly, it probably wouldn't be here for very long. That was the truly important bit, and she was more than content to wait it out as she continued trying to talk the man down.
(And while she was no Lady of Heaven, she'd always adored Lantern Archons. They literally brought light! How could she not?)
<"You heard him."> she said, smiling slightly. <"He'd like you to tell me whatever you can about his deeds."> Then, in Common, "I'm sure your summoned friend would be happy to, and I'd like to hear him out. ...Would you mind stopping what you did to this room, though? It'll be much easier to hear your servant's tales." And that ought to run out the time on the summoning, too...