Water created and waterskins filled you set off again. Working like a well oiled machine Brayne helps with the climbing; Bokkah, Kulga, and Garduk help the team avoid hazards. You make quick work of the Bandu Hills. Just a narrow trail which winds its way down out of the Bandu Hills stands between you and a small patch of plains before the jungle ahead. This last bit of hills is tricky though cutting back and forth sinuously across the face of a steep incline.
Thunder crackles in the distance as the sky overhead grows increasingly cloudy as you hustle along hoping to get out of the hills before the rain....
Rocks fall on everyone, Bokkah falls over first, but manages to only take a small amount of damage. Brayne stays on his feet and dodges many of the rocks. Likewise, Garduk stays standing avoiding many of the rocks. But Kulga takes the worst of it, falling prone, a lot of boulders land on her.
But these rocks did not fall by chance Trail Hounds are afoot! Yorke hurls a javelin at Garduk, but misses.
While Drummond fires an atlatl at Brayne, then reloads and does it again, before anyone can react. He hits on the first shot, but misses the second firing it in haste.
The javelin pierces though Garduk's leg, although it was slowed by some rubble and does do that much damage. Yorke calls out, This is what winning looks like Pathfinder!
female tengu warpriest of Lamashtu 2 / ranger 1 (guildbreaker) | HP 24/24, blessings 4/4, fervor 5/5 | AC 18, T 12, FF 16 | F +7, R +5, W +8 | CMB +5, CMD 17 | Spd 20' | Perc +7 | Init +6
Sorry for the delay.
Bokkah stands and withdraws her bow, readying to fire it next round. "Those little sneaks! Pushing rocks down on us. So immature," she snorts.
The javelin striking his leg drives any thoughts of heroics from Garduk's head. He growls in pain and glares at the oaf who caused it, then barks out a phrase of arcane power. A soft white glow appears at his feet, quickly rises to cover his entire body, then fades.
Bokkah and Kulga both get up and draw there bows. While Garduk armors up. Brayne takes a different tactic issuing a command to Yorke's henchmen. Drummond attempts to scurry down the hill toward Brayne's command and makes it down in one piece. Yorke throws another javelin this time at Kulga, which hits.
Celeste appears next to Yorke in a puff of cool, pine-scented air, and immediately attacks with a cry that sounds more like the shriek of a banshee than the call of a bird. Celeste smites, assuming that anyone opposed to the mage who called her must be evil (ignore the +1 to damage from smite if Yorke is not evil), then rips at the Ashen Leaves captain with her beak and slashes with both of her razor-sharp talons.
female tengu warpriest of Lamashtu 2 / ranger 1 (guildbreaker) | HP 24/24, blessings 4/4, fervor 5/5 | AC 18, T 12, FF 16 | F +7, R +5, W +8 | CMB +5, CMD 17 | Spd 20' | Perc +7 | Init +6
Bokkah and Kulga both miss with their bows. Garduk summons Celeste but the eagle is woozy from the summons and misses badly. Brayne again encourages Drummond to pay him a visit. But this time he won't obey and instead draws a terbutje. Rushing forward to engage Kulga, but misses his attack. While Yorke distracted by the eagle draws a dagger and swings it at the bird, cutting the summoned eagle.
With Kulga engaging Drummond, Brayne refocuses his efforts. He turns his eyes towards the Yorke, and continues to force them to come towards him. "You must come!"
Garduk acid splash only finds the rocks; but Celeste manages to hook Yorke with her left talon, and just barely misses with her bite. Brayne invite Yorke to join the party below, he begins to look for a way to climb down.
Kulga's attack slashes Drummond opening up a deep wound that sees the man topple over.
Bokkah is up; Also Yorke will move toward you on his turn and provoke an AOO from Celeste so you may go ahead and roll it.
Brayne closes one eye after witnessing Celeste do the improbable but not impossible, and is likely questioning Garduk's life choices. A single tear rolls down his face out of his deep black eyes.
Garduk watches Celeste flail ineffectually at the Ashen Leaves captain and wonders whether he should summon more creatures from the other team in the future.
female tengu warpriest of Lamashtu 2 / ranger 1 (guildbreaker) | HP 24/24, blessings 4/4, fervor 5/5 | AC 18, T 12, FF 16 | F +7, R +5, W +8 | CMB +5, CMD 17 | Spd 20' | Perc +7 | Init +6
Bokkah throws down her bow and charges at Yorke! "Thanks for climbing down to see us!" she taunts.
Bokkah readies for Yorke to come down the hill, and sure enough she soon attempts to run down toward you. Celeste misses as Yorke moves past. As she reaches the bottom Bokkah charges over to her, do some serious damage with her claw.
"Hah! Finally you've come to meet us." Smirks Brayne as he steps forward to Yorke, transforming himself into his monster half, towering over her. "Death plagues..."
Brayne and Kulga combined to utterly destroy Yorke, there is little left but a pool of blood. The two trail hounds are down, there are no signs of the others. The jungle lies only a short way away, but you have been tested by the competition.
Let me know if you want to use any healing or just press on.
female tengu warpriest of Lamashtu 2 / ranger 1 (guildbreaker) | HP 24/24, blessings 4/4, fervor 5/5 | AC 18, T 12, FF 16 | F +7, R +5, W +8 | CMB +5, CMD 17 | Spd 20' | Perc +7 | Init +6
Bokkah surveys her own wounds. "I'm ok for a bit. Better than some of you."
I can give up the potion of CLW I picked up and/or I have one CLW prepared today if Kulga or Brayne need it. Just speak up.
She picks over the Trail Hounds' corpses, then looking up at the sun, says, "Let's get to the cover of the jungle. Not too much further to the Chalice, it seems. We will likely face more assaults like this as we get closer."
I take it that neither Yorke nor Drummond are carrying any supplies? Do the javelins appear to have been made on the trail, or did they find another weapons cache somewhere?
Garduk considers for a moment, then drinks the healing potion he picked up from the Ashen Leaves’ supply cache.
I’m not so hardy as my friends here. I doubt I could survive another javelin if I don’t do something about this wound now.
Potion of CLW:1d8 + 1 ⇒ (2) + 1 = 3
Once healed, he checks the traveling spellbook and spell component pouch to make sure they are securely tied or tucked into his borrowed robes before they move on.
Similarly, Brayne nods at Bokkah's suggestion. "I agree, we've been too exposed in the mountain tops. I've only taken a minor scratch, my dark magic is dwindling, will need to save it I suppose, just in case?"
He happily helps Garduk search the bodies of the fallen and continues on off towards the Jungle. Not being one that is very good in the art of survival, he opts to walk behind the group. "Garduk, you should stay in the middle, just in case you know?"
"Given our different upbringings, who would have guessed that you would have to worry about me?"
Aside from the Old Bastard, of course. I can hear him now: "Complaining about a walk in the woods, are you? What d'you have to worry about - you're protected by a dwarf who thinks she's a princess, a bird, and a dandy! All tougher than you, ya book-reading, blasphemous, mewling scarecrow!"
Female Dwarf LN Slayer 7| HP 67/67 | AC 25(26), T 13, FF 24 CMD 25 | F +9(12), R +8(11), W +5(8) | Init +3 | Perc +12 | SM +12 |
Excuse me! Kulga is an Uncrowned Queen, good sir! :p
And since the javelins were obsidian tipped, I assumed they were fashioned en route
Kulga snorts, Maybe both of you should just stay in the middle.
She then sets the hard years of her youth to work and concentrates on the jungle. [i]Not terrain I'm familiar with, but danger's the same no matter what mask it wears.
All the Trail Hound gear looks fashioned from the surroundings and includes bone studded leather, obsidian dagger, 3 obsidian javelins, hide armor, atlatl, 9 obsidian atlatl darts, terbutje.
You move out of the hills and pass through some plains, the trees begin to grow thicker as you go. A small stand of trees mars the otherwise featureless expanse of tall grass that stretches out in all directions. The trees are draped by wispy white threads that flutter and drift in the breeze. Mountains rise far to the north, while in the distance to the south the plains give way to thick, verdant forest. The trees here are approximately 15 feet tall and are draped in strands of caterpillar silk. Three caterpillars messily devour cocooned pray, they turn to attack when you arrive, but are distracted enough by their meal that you get the jump.
"Hah! Food!" Brayne says, clearly he becomes a little delusional, likely from having to ration his foods, not being used to a lifestyle that is less than luxurious.
As his body does the talking, he forces himself into the monstrous form once again.
"Gah! These are worse than those giant ants in Bloodcove!"
Garduk quickly decides to give the celestial eagle another chance and summons back Celeste, then holds his quarterstaff in front of him, ready to bring it down onto any oversized vermin that might come in reach.
Shrieking in annoyance, Celeste appears among the trees behind the farthest of the centipedes. She immediately attacks, not bothering to smite the dumb insect.
female tengu warpriest of Lamashtu 2 / ranger 1 (guildbreaker) | HP 24/24, blessings 4/4, fervor 5/5 | AC 18, T 12, FF 16 | F +7, R +5, W +8 | CMB +5, CMD 17 | Spd 20' | Perc +7 | Init +6
Bokkah takes Kulga under her wing.
clw:1d8 + 2 ⇒ (1) + 2 = 3
"Oh dear. I'm just not motherly I suppose. Would you care for this potion then?"
****
She lumbers forward and helps out Brayne with his bug.
Web v. Brayne:1d20 + 4 ⇒ (2) + 4 = 6 Web v. Celeste:1d20 + 4 ⇒ (8) + 4 = 12
Bokkah's claw misses the Caterpillar, as the claw waves by it touches the bristles of the caterpillar, but Bokkah quickly pulls away from them.
Kulga barrels by and slashes one of the caterpillars right in half; some of the caterpillars bristles fly by Kulga and she ducks away from them.
Garduk summons Celeste this time she's ready for action seeing a tasty treat in front of her. All her attacks hit carefully avoiding the bristles as if she had made a meal on one of these before.
Brayne moves in and takes a big bite, ripping bug goo spraying it all over the ground. Bristles fill his mouth, stinging it, he begins spitting the foul taste and goo from his mouth.
The caterpillars retreat firing webs at Brayne and Celeste, but both the noble and the eagle elude the attacks.
Garduk sees that the others and Celeste have the centipedes well in hand, and walks over to see what he can discover about the cocooned victim of the green centipede. He pokes at it with his quarterstaff and peers at it closely, but avoids touching it at first.
Maintaining his rage like state, Brayne continues to finish the centipede. Clearly out of his mind, he doesn't realise the icky taste in his mouth yet.
female tengu warpriest of Lamashtu 2 / ranger 1 (guildbreaker) | HP 24/24, blessings 4/4, fervor 5/5 | AC 18, T 12, FF 16 | F +7, R +5, W +8 | CMB +5, CMD 17 | Spd 20' | Perc +7 | Init +6
Bokkah scoots around Brayne and claws at whichever caterpillar is still up. probably neither actually
Bokkah misses her attack, Kulga splatters another caterpillar into about a million pieces, they both avoid the prickly bristles.
As Garduk pushes on the cocooned victim it begins to squirm, whatever it is, is still alive.
Celeste misses her attack, as Brayne bites the caterpillar after just having a bad taste moments before. He tears it to bits, but once more gets bristles in his mouth, as does, Celeste in her wing.
The caterpillars die!
The eagle flops around picking at the bristles before vanishing.
combat over - Brayne 7 dmg, Celeste 4 dmg
Garduk soon discovers that not one but two of the Ebansi halfling are still alive within the cocoons.
Tensa’i, the leader is one of them and speaks up. Thank you Trailfinders, thank thank you. We and other Ebansi's got separated just before the caterpillars attacked, thought I was food. Not sure whether they’re now ahead or behind her? You see?
Ebansi knows jungle, we help work together help, since you save us. We help yes?
