Raquel offers Bokken a bottle of moonshine as a gesture of goodwill while the others conduct business.
Glancing over at Tristan with an embarrassed look, Nariel added with a blush "No no, I merely advise; only the Margraf decides what gets built in Thornhold." Pausing a moment, Nariel considers what had been suggested by Bokken before finally adding "Of course, having a proper alchemist in town would be a great boon. It is certainly worth consideration Bokken, we will take your suggestion under advisement."
Moving about Bokken's store, Nariel studied his wares as she spoke "As to the wares we need, Tristan is quite right, fire and acid are required."
3 ARODUS (VIII) 4719
Your business with Bokken concluded, and any future plans of construction consigned to, well, the future, you press on towards the mine.
Even in the hills, this late in the Summer the oppressive heat is inescapable and even the breeze is too warm to bring any comfort. The butterflies and bees that danced among the wildflowers a few short months back have gone, replaced by flies and midges (of both types: biting and stinging) which drift through the heavy, almost oppressively humid, air in swarming clouds. Your horses snort their disapproval and swing their tails, giving you reproachful looks at being out and about when most sensible people would be seeking the shade.
An hour after you set out, you already reek of sweat and horse. That's the worst hour. The second hour, that's the worst, too. After that it gets steadily less enjoyable. It is late in the day, with the sun just disappearing over the horizon, when - hot, sticky, sunbaked - you arrive at the mine. Tying up your horses a safe distance away, you make the rest of the journey on foot. The only good thing about the breeze having died completely is that your scent doesn't travel, giving you the advantage of surprise when you round one more sloping hill and come upon a trio of huge, brutish creatures sitting around a crude pit they have dug in front of the mine entrance. They are chewing on the remains of various unfortunate creatures, including one or two that might - once - have been humanoid. It's a little hard to tell from this distance.
As soon as they see you they jump to their feet, with guttural snarls. A handful of brutish, dog-like creatures rise up too, slavering and growling as they spy their next meal...
Raquel wrinkles her nose at the stench. "Ugh, Aivar! I didn't know your in-laws had come to town!" She says a prayer and touches the paladin's glaive, which is wreathed in flames. "Go get 'em, big guy."
Taking a step back, Nariel snarls her upper lip in revulsion at the sight of the feasting trolls. Shaking her head, Nariel mutters under her breath "Foul creatures. Let us be done with them."
Pulling some gossamer threads from a component belt pouch, Nariel casts a familiar spell in the hopes of slowing down the creatures ahead of them. Within a split second, a tangle of webs suddenly engulfs the entire group of monsters.
Raquel's quip incites no reaction from Aivar. Instead, he recites a hushed prayer to Shelyn and requests her favor in the struggle against the trolls. "Stick together and try to focus on one at a time."
Sasha considers her options for a moment before loosing an arrow at the lead troll. She hadn't fared well in the party's recent fights, nearly dying against the worgs and the undead dwarf. Perhaps it was time to pick her battles.
"And what an excellent job you're doing, Oleksandra," she mutters, watching her arrow sail.
"Hell, there's a lot of 'em," Arianna cursed. She downs an extract to fortify her defenses and moves up, drawing her axe and activating the enchantment on it.
Nariel's spell catches one of the trolls and two of the doglike beasts in a mass of sticky strands that appear between the rock pillars at the mine entrance. The creatures thrash in anger, but are caught for now.
The remaining two beasts move forward, one charging at Arianna but missing with its claw, while the other strikes Aivar solidly. . One doglike beast attacks Arianna but without success, while the other skulks around the edges of the battlefield.
The troll caught in the webbing manages to free itself and moves slowly forward, as does one of the dog-beasts. The other remains stuck.
Aivar 47/52 hp
Raquel moves up behind Aivar and Arianna, ready to heal either one should they become injured. Having previously blessed the party, she now sprinkles some sacred spirits on Aivar's glaive, causing it to ignite!
Tristan is transfixed for a moment by the sheer ugliness of the beasts before him. He'd seen horrible sights in these lands, but at least most of the worst ones had had some element of otherwordlyness to them. The trolls were just... ugly. Horrid, repulsive, void of redeeming quality in their entirety. Truly, it was something to marvel at.
Shaking off his distraction, Tristan prepares to join the battle.
Aivar stands his ground and retaliates with a sun-kissed glaive. The size of his foe is unnerving, even more so the fact there's a total of three of them. But he isn't exactly alone neither. No matter what, Aivar knows Raquel has his back.
The web had delayed some, but left a number of the trolls free to move. Cursing the advancing trolls under her breath, she muttered "They do not like fire, do they? Let us give them fire then." Taking a step north, Nariel starts conjuring up some allies to help aid in the battle.
Arianna adjusts her stance to focus on offense and attacks the doglike creature in front of her. "Come on, ugly, you're gonna have to work harder than that!"
Aivar's glaive opens a searing wound on his opponent, who roars in fury, flecking the paladin's armour with spittle. It retaliates, biting him ferociously and catching him with one of its rending claws.
Arianna badly hurts the dog-thing attacking her, but even as she watches, some of its wound starts to close up. It slips to one side of her, biting at her viciously but failing to get past her magical protection. The troll behind it lashes out at her, opening a gash in her face with a claw and biting her shoulder.
Two of the dog-things converge on Tristan, although one of them unwittingly gets too close to Aivar's glaive. . They bite at him savagely, with an insatiable hunger; but the bard escapes with nothing more than torn breeches.
The two remaining creatures stuck in Nariel's web break free and rush forward, eager to get a bite at the food that has so obligingly wandered into their path.
Aivar 32/52
Arianna 25/41
Green troll 20 damage
Yellow trollhound 14 damage
Raquel raises her holy symbol and calls on Cayden's power to try to paralyze the troll near Arianna.
Completing her spell, Nariel summons a fire elemental to attack the troll on Aivar. Fire would be need to prevent it from regenerating, and so that would be its intent.
Realizing the potential for danger, Nariel makes a quick incantation that summons forth multiple reflections of herself.
"Focus one foe at a time! C'mon!!!", the paladin yells with more than a sprinkling of frustration. He heaves and hews, showing the troll that's trying to carve him up zero clemency.
Tristan's strike goes somewhat awry as he occupies himself with staying out of the beasts' jaws.
"I have no idea if you can understand me," Tristan says to the trolls, "But you are truly a marvel of repulsiveness."
With the party caught up in melee with the trolls and their hounds, Sasha tosses her bow to the ground. She draws her blade and rushes towards Tristian, hoping to help the overwhelmed bard. The rogue takes a defensive posture, thrusting warily towards the disgusting beast.
"The damn dogs regenerate, too!" Arianna shouts, and she steps up and strikes the one Aivar is carving up, restraining herself to keep from showing any openings.
Meh. Sorry Raquel. One day your spell will stick :/
Raquel's spell is ineffective as the troll resists the power of Cayden; Tristan's words don't affect the trollhounds, but the trolls have enough command of the language to hear what he has to say - and they don't appreciate his criticisms.
Aivar's fire-blessed glaive carves another searing stripe into the enemy he's fighting, but it still stands, even as Arianna strikes at it as well; although it looks decidedly groggy.
In return, two of the trolls combine their efforts in an attempt to mangle Arianna - her magical defenses protect her from the worst of it and she remains standing, although bloodied and ripped from their claws. As she reels back from the assault, the lesser doglike beasts manage to get past her guard, dragging the redhead to the floor. The trollhounds slaver in anticipation of their next feast...
The other troll focuses its ire on the paladin with the flaming brand.
At the other side of the battlefield, Tristan faces two of the snarling brutish trollhounds; he evades the jaws of the first, but the second one catches him on the hip.
Aivar 29/52
Arianna -6/41
Tristan 24/32
Green troll 68 damage
Yellow trollhound 11 damage
Alarmed at how tough these creatures are, Nariel quickly goes about summoning additional help. Taking out an additional candle from her belt pouch, Nariel urgently begins casting as she says quietly "Hang on everyone, hang on..."
Meanwhile, the fire elemental continues to keep the heat up on the troll.
"No! Arianna!" Raquel cries as her friend falls. Seeing Aivar and Tristan injured as well, the cleric steps away from the slavering trollhound and calls upon Cayden Cailean to conjure a burst of blinding radiance!
While Aivar has a somewhat troubled relationship with fear, in as much as that he doesn't 'feel' it the way he once used to, the unfolding situation does throw a mite-infestation of worry and doubt into his mind. Did they mess up thinking they could deal with this troll problem on their own?
Tristan manages to keep from yelping as the beast sinks its teeth in. I ought to start keeping a list of all the kinds of creatures that have bitten me, Tristan thinks as he wrestles it off of him. He retreats a step and makes use of a recently-learned spell.
"Your hideous faces make me want to up the tempo a bit - get this over with more quickly, hmm?"
Moving quickly enough to avoid any incidental blows or bites, Sasha slips behind the pair of brutish hounds, their attention apparently focused on Tristian. Inside the guard of the closest troll, the rogue jabs her rapier towards its exposed side.
rounds
EDIT: missed Aivar's Aoo, he didn't roll for damage
Nariel's summoned elemental is ineffective in its attacks for the moment, but Raquel's spell is devastating: one of the trolls keels over, dead beyond its powers of regeneration, and one of the others paws furiously at its eyes as the light temporarily overloads its minuscule brain.
With one troll down, Aivar focuses his attacks on one of the smaller opponents, wounding it severely. Sasha's assistance allows him another attack, which lands on the trollhound menacing Raquel.
Tristan moves back to temporary safety, and Arianna ceases to bleed out but is far from what could be described as safe.
With the bard absconding from the fight, the two trollhounds focus their attention (and their hungry jaws) on Sasha - the young rogue dodges one bite but the other tears into her.
The other two trollhounds combine to attack Aivar, but the paladin's faith and his armour are impervious. The dazed troll lumbers forward and most of its attacks miss, but a stray claw catches Aivar across the face.
Aivar 27/52
Arianna -6/41
Tristan 24/32
Sasha 27/36
Green troll DEAD
Red troll 4 damage, blinded 2 rounds
Cyan troll 4 damage, dazzled 2 rounds
Pink trollhound 25 damage, dazzled 2 rounds
Yellow trollhound 29 damage
"Focus these two hounds!" With all of Aivar's attention being claimed by the two hounds dogging Raquel, it isn't hard to figure out which exact couple of quadrupeds he means. But, against his own instructions, Aivar strikes the troll that's hoovering over Arianna's body.
"Stand firm, friends! In Cayden's name!" Raquel says as she steps away from the hounds. She lays healing hands upon Aivar.
Summoning up her second elemental, Nariel follows Aivar's instructions and calls it up to engage the yellow trollhound. The other elemental she orders in to flank the troll opposite Aivar and Arianna.
Rushing forward a few steps, Nariel takes some multi-colored sand from her belt pouch and flings it at the trollhounds engaged with with Tristan and Sasha. The sand appears a brilliant hue, and engulfs the hounds in sea of color. Immediately afterward, Nariel suddenly disappears only to reappear where she had started from.
Ignoring the pain of her wound and not waiting to see the effects of Nariel's spell, Sasha throws herself into the middle of the fray.
So much for picking my battles, she muses.
She thrusts the point of her rapier near where she assumes the troll's kidney is. She's not experienced with trolls, but stabbing kidneys is a different matter entirely.
Aivar's glaive again leaves searing burning wounds on the troll's hide, which stubbornly refuse to heal, for now. Shelyn's grace and Raquel's healing aid bind some of the paladin's own wounds.
The fire elementals leave burning wounds on their victims, but fail to catch anything on fire this time around, although one of the trollhounds keels over, its system overloaded by the damage it has suffered. The flash of Nariel's spell temporarily blinds the two trollhounds fighting Sasha, leaving them briefly at the rogue's mercy.
The troll ignores its wounds and focuses its wrath on the flame-bearing paladin, biting and clawing at him savagely. The nearby trollhound moves in search of easier prey: it doesn't seem to find Raquel particularly adorable, but it clearly considers her to be tasty: the cleric is badly bitten as long canines sink into the artery in her thigh.
Aivar 27/52
Arianna -6/41
Raquel 21/36
Tristan 24/32
Sasha 27/36
Green troll DEAD
Red troll 0 damage, blinded 1 round
Cyan troll 30 damage, dazzled 1 round
Pink trollhound 19 damage, dazzled 1 round
Yellow trollhound DEAD
Orange trollhound 16 damage blinded, stunned 1 round
Purple trollhound blinded, stunned 1 round
Raquel yelps in pain as the trolhound bites her. With everybody injured and her spells running low, the cleric channels healing energies. Unfortunately, one of the hounds is healed as well.
Music throbbing in his skull, Tristan steps and stabs to the rhythm.
The paladin does what he can to keep the troll at bay, but the wooden pole of his glaive obviously wasn't designed and crafted with the intent to fend off troll claws. The troll, however, is made to sustain damage and then recover. Try to regenerate this!
And then Raquel's blessing of fire fades away.
Seeing an opportunity to even up the odds once and for all, Nariel holds her ground and summons up one last elemental to aid in the battle.
Meanwhile, the fire elementals continue aiding in the assault on the trolls.
With the influence of Raquel's healing magic, Arianna jolts awake. Her first instinct is to move, only to register that there is a troll standing right over her. Though it is focused on Aivar, that could easily change.
She curls up to protect her vitals and forces herself to keep her eyes open, that she can try to roll away, but stays as still as she can.
The aftereffects of Nariel's spell linger and prevent two of the trollhounds from doing much. Tristan intervenes decisively to put another of the trollhounds down for now, although its wounds start to close even as it thrashes in its apparent death throes. Sasha and Aivar combine their attacks to bring the wounded troll closer to the point of death, although as Aivar's glaive flames out the wounds start to close.
That's the good news.
The bad news is that the other troll has recovered. With a bellow of hungry rage, it lumbers forward to join the wounded troll in attacking Aivar - although Tristan's weird, creepy mockery has its effect again and the paladin escapes unscathed.
Aivar 52/52
Arianna 5/41
Raquel 32/36
Tristan 32/32
Sasha 36/36
Green troll DEAD
Red troll 0 damage
Cyan troll 64 damage
Pink trollhound 40 damage, DEAD for now but regenerating.
Yellow trollhound DEAD
Orange trollhound 5 damage stunned 1 round
Purple trollhound stunned 1 round
"Nariel! Have your elemental burn this hound!" Raquel shouts. Seeing an opening, th cleric casts a healing spell and moves to Arianna's side, laying hands on her wounds.
Suddenly, Aivar can feel that victory is within reach. Only moments ago everything felt lost. The sum of Arianna going down and the enemy not just outnumbering them, but also having the advantage of brute strength and regenerative powers, made defeat seem inevitable. Yet here they stand, with many of their trollish foes beaten and battered. "This is where it ends!"
"Right!" With a quick nod towards Raquel, Nariel acknowledges fallen trollhound and instructs the fire elemental nearest her to simply smother the beast and set it ablaze, while the other opposite Arianna tries to get the beasts attention with an attack.
Summoning up the last of the elementals, the ground suddenly erupts behind the troll now engaged with Aivar. As the Paladin tears into the monster with a vicious glaive attack, the earth elemental flanks and pummels it simultaneously.
With the trollhounds nearest Sasha still dazed, Nariel sought to help ensure the trolls were no more and quickly drew her wand, firing two missile as the troll threatening Arianna.
Fairly confident that the troll was going down after Aivar's mighty swing, Sasha turns her attention to the stunned trollhounds behind her.
Arianna stays low still, protecting herself, and murmurs, somewhere between a mantra, a prayer, and fear-induced madness, "Please don't notice I'm alive, please don't notice I'm alive, please don't--"
Still moving at high speed, Tristan engages the stunned trollhounds, but achieves very little beyond annoying them. Raquel heals Arianna, although the redhead is still badly hurt and wisely opts to remain a noncombatant. One of the fire elementals burns the downed trollhound to cinders, while the other one strikes at the injured troll, preventing it from healing. It clings to life, just about, until Nariel's spell shatters its skull. Burned beyond its ability to heal, it falls, dead at last.
Sasha takes advantage of the opening to badly injure one of the remaining trollhounds.
Empowered by valiant anger, Aivar cripples the troll that just made it into combat; it bellows in fury but is still standing - just. Then Nariel's earth elemental clubs it from behind, and it goes down, although its regenerative abilities mean it will be up again at some point.
The two trollhounds focus their attention on the annoying dancing humming bard. One of them savages him, tearing open a gaping wound in Tristan's belly (and, worse, his shirt).
Aivar 52/52
Arianna 16/41
Raquel 32/36
Tristan 12/32
Sasha 36/36
Green troll DEAD
Red troll 71 damage, DEAD for now but regenerating
Cyan troll DEAD
Pink trollhound DEAD
Yellow trollhound DEAD
Orange trollhound 23 damage
Purple trollhound
Shelyn's favored weapon once again inflicts major trauma as it strikes one of the trollhounds menacing Tristan. "Fall back to me, Tristan!"
The tide now turning, Nariel orchestrates her elementals to re-engage the remaining trollhounds, but leaves the one behind to torch the regenerating troll.
Nariel continues her attack with her wand, attacking the other remaining trollhound.