Nathadriel stows his shield and readies his bow, nocking an arrow as he moves to the entrance.
Layali and Leifa drop down into the chamber on the fourth tier, Nathadriel gets into a covered position by the entryway, and Gordon puts an arrow into the flying spear-wielder!
The caster swoops down to the small room you're all in, puts his hands together, and sprays a cone of flame that fills most of the room!
The spearman's eyes lock on the one who shot him. While his ally fills the room with flame, he pulls the arrow out of his shoulder with a look of stern resolve in his eyes.
Looking none the worse for wear, the warrior then swoops down through the hole in the ceiling with an expert grace, and swings his blade not at Gordon, but at his bow!
,
Gordon's bow is chopped in half!
Badly wounded by the magic attacks, Layali removes the chromatic scepter and points it at the spellcaster and shouts "ACID!" as she activates the device with her own arcane surge of power!
Nathadriel releases his arrow at the spellcaster, remaining out of reach of the two flying creatures.
,
An orb of acid hurtles from the end of the scepter and crashes into the winged spellcaster! Nathadriel steps back and looses an arrow, but bumps his elbow on the wall and fumbles his shot, bouncing an arrow off the ceiling!
Gordon drops the halves of his bow, draws his swords, and retaliates!
extra damage on whichever hit first.
Leifa will also attack the spearman with all she has. Spending a ki point.
,
,
,
If one of the flurry of blows attacks hit: str save or push back 15ft (into the brazier)
Gordon switches to sword-mode! The spearman barely swats the first swing aside and the second catches him solidly in the leg!
Leifa then cuts loose against the same target, giving him a solid whack with her staff and then following up with a roundhouse kick to the face! He spins end-over-end in the air, but flaps his wings hard to keep from being sent backwards into one of the braziers!
The caster shrieks a couple of syllables and nods toward Nathadriel, and the fighter calls back something over his shoulder as he jabs his spear toward Leifa.
,
Leifa spins her staff and sweeps the strike aside!
The mage makes a noise that might have been an expletive, then fires three rays of fire at Nathadriel!
,
,
,
Only the center beam hits its target, and the caster makes another loud noise before fluttering backwards about 15ft out into the sky.
You wonder if maybe the caster was telling the fighter to sunder the other bow in the room, but the fighter couldn't get there because he's surrounded.
Gordon unleashes another pair of sword blows!
Layali disengages from the warrior, moves closer toward the doorway leading outside and stands to the side of the opening.
Leifa will attack the fighter again, using another ki point.
,
,
,
Way of the open hand:can't make reactions until end of his next turn
Gordon and Leifa each manage to hit the fighter once, and he looks to be barely hanging on, beating his wings rapidly just to stay in place!
Layali moves to a safer position!
Nathadriel fires an arrow at the caster outside.
,
Nathadriel fires an arrow, but seems to be more focused on keeping cover himself than on hitting his target!
The warrior looks desperate and (nearly) surrounded, and tries to finish off Leifa!
,
The monk goes down!
The caster then makes a wave of his taloned hand and vanishes into thin air!
You hear the sound of wingbeats come from outside and move toward the fighter.
Damage tracker:
Fighter 34
Caster 17
Scowling as the caster disappears from view, Nathadriel hurries over to Leifa's side and casts cure wounds.
Gordon continues his attack on the warrior!
"He went invisible! I think he flew back in near that one!" Layali points to the warrior!
Layali clenches her hand into a twisted fist while chanting and then extends forcefully toward the attackers releasing an orange-black nimbus of light that explodes into a small cloud of poison!
"Thanks Nathadriel. Everything went dark for a moment there."
Leifa will stand back up.
Attack the fighter or the other dude if he's close by and visible now.
,
,
Nathadriel revives Leifa!
Gordon stabs the fighter, who falls!
Layali sends a spell where she thinks the caster might be!
You hear a slight grunt, suggesting the spell was a success!
Leifa lashes out at that same general area, hoping to hit!
Her staff hits only air, but her foot catches something solid, and a thud can be heard on the floor as though an invisible body just collapsed. (You also see a potion of extra healing pop out of nowhere and go rolling across the floor.)
Layali feels around trying to find the invisible body, attempting to search it by touch.
Poof! The mage is visible on the floor.
Both creatures wear studded leather armor. There's a potion of extra healing that presumably fell from the mage's grip. The mage also has a component pouch and a Hilvan-style dagger. The warrior has his trapezoid-bladed spear, two similarly geometrical shortswords, and what appear to be a few small, triangular chakrams.
Layali is quite interested in the bodies of the flying creatures and studies them, making some ink drawings on one of her sheets of paper.
"I'd like to see if there is anything interesting up there that caused them to attack us in the first place...but I am a little wounded from their magics. Perhaps a short rest and then we continue?"
"Bugger. Shame about my bow. Anyway, we have here a flying creature wielding the same kind of weapon we found on the body back home. After we rest, I say we keep on. We seem to be on the right track."
"Yes let's take a rest. Maybe by the stoneflame would be less open and we could look at it more while resting."
"I'm fine, but I think the rest of you could use a breather. Anyone remember how far back that stash of weapons was? Or was there a shortbow in it?"
"You can use my crossbow if you'd like." Layali offers before collapsing for a short nap.
"I'm fine, but I think the rest of you could use a breather. Anyone remember how far back that stash of weapons was? Or was there a shortbow in it?"
"Given what happened to the bandits, I think we should see to the bodies first. They seemed very determined to burn the zombies we'd fought. I think we should do the same."
Nathadriel sets fire to the bodies, then you all head down to Tier 3 for a breather.
Gordon, not being as in need of rest as the others, is able to get a better look at the stoneflame. It is most definitely different from normal flame. It's rich, empowered, almost life-giving; one might even describe it as nutritious, in a sense.
By the end of your hour-long rest, Gordon notes that there is now more flame than stone, and that it gives fresh life to those who spend time with it.
"I feel... funny. In a good way."
"I guess we should keep this place in mind if we need another rest later.
As for what to do next. Do we want to explore the inside of the Ziggurat next or go back up and see if the birdmen were protecting anything at the top of the ziggurat. We didn't really get a good look last time. I'm good with either idea."
"Let's return to our original plan. Examine the roof thoroughly and then work our way down."
"Agreed. Top to bottom, let's do this!"
"Sounds good, but this time I want us to be secured onto a rope before going up, in case of any more ariel dive-bombers."
You all clamber up to the rooftop, and the paranoid monk ties herself to one of the columns.
As was seen the first time around, there is a collection of tools up here, which seem to have been used to very carefully clean the moss and lichen off of the area. The hole in the roof is directly over the altar with the incense, and there is no (easy) access to the area for people who aren't flying. Putting it all together, you would say that this is a sacred space of some sort.
Though it's so badly weathered that you didn't notice it before, the surface of the roof bears a large engraving of a stylized sun.
Nothing seems to jump out at you (or swoop down at you).
Layali looks around, spending time examining the tools and the stonework. "This appears to be sacred to those winged creatures that attacked us. I wonder why?"
"Oh, there's an engraving of a sun here on the roof."
"Very interesting." Layali examines the engraving after Leifa points it out. "So they were uncovering this engraving? This entire structure may be some kind of power focus."
Layali reaches out into the surrounding magical energy to see if she can feel any differences in the flow of the energy.
Layali fails to discern any active magics of note, leading her to the conclusion that the sacredness of this rooftop must be of a symbolic, religious, or otherwise non-practicality-based nature.
"Let's do another scan of the fourth level, to see if we missed anything."
"Sounds good."
Clambering back down from the roof, you take another look at the fourth tier.
The interior of this area is the smallest yet, no more than 20ft across. In each of its four corners is a stone brazier, and they are all alight. In the center of the room is an altar upon which some incense slowly burns. The inside walls of this room are lined with images of the sun, flames, and winged humanoids.
There are four entryways to this tier: the one you came in (south), the one Leifa came in after getting knocked off the roof (north), and one each on the east and west. They are all basically open passageways, about 10ft deep (from the edge of the room's interior to the outside wall) with no sign of doors or any such thing.
Small piles of ash lie where Nathadriel burned the bodies of the winged humanoids who attacked you.
"Perhaps we should scatter the ashes to the air.
I find it odd that the hilvans were humans, but so far we have only found evidence of winged humanoids. I wonder what the connection is between the two groups, for we keep finding images of the winged humanoids on the hilvan ruins?"