"There, something ahead, some kind of ooze... careful with bladed weapons!"
Unsure specifically what kind of ooze it is but knowing that it's liable to multiply if sliced apart, Trina instead opts to put the creature down from range if she can. She draws her pistol as she approaches and fires a bullet into the liquid mass.
Fortunately, they are not known for splitting or dividing.
Trina's bullet strikes the creeping pseudopod with a sickly splat. The ooze responds by advancing on your positions.
Rhodes
Trina
Sylvia
Ooze
Smitty
Caladrel
Jerry
"Scratch that, this one shouldn't divide," she corrects, exchanging the gun for the glaive gripped in her tail. She takes a step back as she does so, then brings the blade down toward the gooey mass.
"I hope it can't charm me." Rhodes moves to F5 and fights defensively, in case the ooze comes charging into the area next round.
And he draws his rapier as he goes, though he looks at Trina with some concern at his choice.
"Oh, guh! I think I saw one of these in the bottom of an old icebox at University. We burned it. To be honest, we burned 'most everything."
Sylvia dashes clear of the lioness and her rider, whips a vial from her bandolier, and hucks it at the ooze.
for
Trina's glaive strikes the ooze with a splat. Sylvia's bomb strikes true, but the ooze does not seem to harmed by the fire.
The puddle of ooze morphs up and reaches out at Jerry with great speed, trying to envelop him.
Jerry dodges smartly out of the way.
Smitty
Caladrel
Jerry
Rhodes
Trina
Sylvia
Ooze
Jerry slides low to the back of the big-cat, the weight of the viscous goo smacks into the back of his armour - taking all the power from the blow. However the knight recognises the danger, even the flaming explosives seem to do no harm to it.
'Can I cut it to ribbons?' he ponders momentarily as his gauntlet grasps the hilt of his sword.
From his supine position across Luces spine, he whispers in her ear. "Come on dearie, slice this jelly up. Show them what a predator can do...."
Luce rears up, just as Jerry brings his sword down in a vicious arc.
'Hah, yucky goo....it'll taste bad like bark girl.' Luce thinks as she rears up, seeing if Jerry is worthy of her aid or even to ride her. Whispers flick the edge of the goo and weigh heavy upon her muzzle, the feline is obviously upset.
"Ach! What is that gooey beastie?!" Smitty exclaims as he levels Bessie at the creature in the hope that his gun will be effective against it.
Caladrel holds out his hand and begins to chant in Druidic. His hand begins to glow and an animal begins to take shape.
"I believe my dwarven friend, that mayhaps it be an ooze." Jeremiah replies with a hint of joviality; "It certainly packs a punch... as does your companion Bessie."
"Yes, an ooze," Trina clarifies, "a grey ooze to be precise. I don't just mean in coloration, but composition as well. Subterranean, likes the damp and dark, and...," she winces at the scorchmarks left around it where Sylvia's bomb struck, "I didn't know this before but apparently fireproof. It's probably made its way up following the forest's taint from whatever pit below it once called home."
While the fire has not damaged the malicious goo, your physical attacks seem to be wearing it down. It recoils from Jerry's swing and Smitty's shot.
Trina makes another overhand swing, hoping to finish the job in a single deft blow.
The attack uses a bit too much force and goes wide, cutting instead into the foliage. Trina curses under her breath, a few words of Abyssal quietly slipping into her grumbling.
Sylvia glares at the slimy thing. "Fireproof? The nerve! Good thing I have other stuff." She rummages through her belt pouch, pulls a bottle that crackles with blue light, takes a step to the right, and opens the bottle, pointing it at the ooze.
"What a cracking science!" Jerry says loudly the ringing still in is ears from the gun shots and lightning bottle. Luce bucks underneath him, ill-at-ease in the environment.
The ooze seems to have lost much of its oomph after the blast of lightning, still, it flails at Jerry, trying to latch onto him.
plus
Jerry is struck by the corrosive goo, but manages to avoid being seized by the gelatinous mass.
Smitty
Caladrel
Jerry
Rhodes
Trina
Sylvia
Ooze
Caladrel completes his chant and a small earth elemental appears behind the ooze and flanks with Luce. The elemental tries to slam the ooze.
,
"Ha! Can't resist everything, can you, slimeball?!" Sylvia crows, "Get it, guys!"
The earth elemental slams into the ooze with a mighty blow and your foe expires with a splatter. The spray of goo no longer moves.
With a whoomph Jerry is lifted from his saddle by the blow, then deposited back upon it at an uncomfortable angle. Luce whines at the weigh, as Caladrel finishes the creature and it loses coherency.
The knight slips from the saddle and reaches over to grasp his companions mane reassuringly, she backs up from the combat not happy with the acidic hue to the atmosphere. Still gasping, Jerry moves over to the turgid and stagnant stream and splashes water all over his armour where the glob had thumped him.
"What a gape Sylvia, have you acted in the halls?" Jerry asks, "I wonder if this is a guardian or just a mindless consequence of the Evil below." He looks to the sink-hole and contemplates their descent.
The noble man surveys the immediate area around the hole looking for a sturdy anchor point for his rope; "Caladrel, do you spy an appropriate tree that may take our weight if we descend?"
From out of a saddle bag, Jerry produces some silken cord to help with the climb.
"I know enough to watch out for spatter," Sylvia replies tartly, kneeling to examine the goo and using a stick to poke a little bit into her empty lightning bottle. She frowns at the bottle. "I was saving that for a special occasion. Let's hope anything else we meet is a little more persuaded by fire.
Rising, she examines the area for paths down, safety, etc.
Caladrel searches for a tree with sufficient strength to support Jeremiah.
Caladrel can certainly locate a tree and among your group you could safely harness him and lower him into the gorge. The game trail does continue, and based on the old druid's directions, you are believe it will ultimately descend, but the route is circuitous and uncertain.
Luce moves forward and sniffs at the gorge, with an air of indolence. Jerry grimaces slightly; "Looks as Luce doesn't want to descend - at least not on a rope." He glances at the others and the surface to try and contemplate if there is any way of getting the lion down the gorge.
"I might have to take her the long way around?" He says with a forlorn edge to his voice.
"Yes, let's split up - half on the rope, half on the path. Sounds like a plan," Sylvia snarks, "What other choice do we have?" She sighs noisily as she secures her various empty vials in her pack and ensures her volatile goodies are close at hand. "Of course, if you could get her to climb a rope, you could make good money at Madame Palanchin's Exposition of Wonders back in the city," she remarks absently as her nimble fingers repack and reload her bandolier, voice soft and dreamy.
Jerry looks started at Sylvia's acerbic tones; "Oh, you've been to Madame Palanchin's? I would have thought that it would have been too ....unscientific for you. Or do you prefer to study strange specimens."
Moving to the edge of the gorge, he does look for some way to try and get the feline down despite her size. "Anyone got a reduction spell?" he queries.
'Other than Sylvia's one for the ego.'
"There are plenty of strange specimens everywhere," Sylvia replies, giving Jerry an odd look. "I don't have any way to make your big cat a house cat. Let's keep on down the path, shall we?"
"Afraid not," Trina replies quietly. She doesn't much like the look of the pit down, ropes or no ropes. This is one of those times I wish these bloody wings weren't just for show, she thinks, only a little bitterly. Would make getting down there so much easier.
After a brief glance down the vertiginous abyss, Jerry decides to lead the lioness down. One wrong foot and over the edge he might go, made doubly precarious from a mounted position. Thus instead he puts his hand around Luce's neck and leads her forward.
"I better keep nearer the front, since we wouldn't want Luce to go after your mule, Sylvia." Jerry says softly, an enigmatic look to his face.
Trina follows closely behind, using her glaive as a walking stick and hugging as close as she can to the wall as they descend.
Allowing the rest of the group to pass, Sylvia trails and tugs Chanticleer into motion behind her. He follows but seems confused about why he's moving, as usual. Stupid mule.
The trail winds its way along the edge of the gorge, descending gradually toward the bottom. The path gets narrow at times, with rough rocks to your right and a steep drop to your left. The progress is slow and precarious.
Leading Luce down the rough trail, picking the correct spots despite his lack of armoured finesse and caution for his friend.
With a purring that half-sounds like laughter at the competency of the man leading her down the gorge. Moving with a flowing feline grace, she's still ill at ease with the forest.
Sylvia tugs her nervously prancing beast of burden along the path, both of them helping or hindering one another equally.
Trina and Jerry struggle to keep their footing on the narrow path. Their companions are able to point out sturdy roots protruding from the wall of the gorge, which they are able to hold onto and avoid falling. The trail is lengthy and treacherous. It follows the edge of the gorge and switches back as it descends.
As you approach the bottom of the gorge, near the base of the waterfall, you see a stretch of the stream is shrouded in darkness. It is as if an entire span has swallowed up the light and you can see nothing through it. The anemic light of the sun through the blighted trees does nothing to pierce the inky aura.
"Into the Darkness?" Jerry asks stoically looking upon the depth of the gorge, glad of his companions assistance.
He glances past Luces swishing tail towards Sylvia, "So do you have some alchemical luminance to show our trail?" he keeps any nerves out of his voice in the face of her sarcasm.
"Hmmm," Sylvia muses, rummaging through her bag, "I have this!" She whips out a small cylinder. "Banshee ballerina firework! It'll burn if I throw it. Of course, it will also make a lot of noise," she finishes, deflating somewhat.
"Or there are torches." Sylvia shrugs.
"Audacious!" Jerry replies with a jovial air to the firework comment.
"I guess torches will do, I was just wondering if that's a magical murk." he looks around the group, as he produces flint & steel with a tinder-box. "My arcane knowledge is .....rudimentary."
"Er, yes... I knew you meant that. Well, it could be magic. Like a spell for darkness or something. Or maybe a magical curtain of darkness that we can walk through and see beyond. Wizards and such can do these things, yes." Sylvia tries to figure out what the impenetrable gloom might be without getting too close.
Trina struggles slightly to make her way down, claws and tail clinging to the wall as she descends slowly, at last taking the final few feet in an eager jump to get off that narrow shelf. She arrives just in time to hear the tail end of Jerry and Sylvia's discussion, and after dusting herself off and taking a quick inventory of her belongings to make sure she hasn't dropped or misplaced anything in her decline, turns her attention toward the blackness.
Caladrel emerges from his internal deep musings and looks at the darkness that the others are trying to identify. He chants a few words in a tongue unknown to the others.
Caladrel casts Detect Magic.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The inky darkness is imbued with a faint aura. Unfortunately, you are all pretty incompetent at identifying auras, apart from the fact that they exist.
"I don't trust this...." Jerry says with some consternation, slowly climbing into the saddle. In spite of the precariousness of the trail it seems that Luce's footing is better than the knights.