Relia wakes up with Arma shaking her. "What happened?" She looks over and sees the dead goblins. "Wow that was was fast. All I remember is them hitting me. Did I faint?" She stands up and moves away from the goblins, and channels energy to heal herself and her companions.
She looks around detecting magic. She studies the buckler.
Relia is unable to identify the buckler at this time. There are no more magic auras here.
You have explored all the buildings in the palisade. There is still an area of pitted ground to the north, but after that, you will have completed your survey of the colony.
Tessa also tries her hand at identifying the buckler, "Yeah....." she sheepishly replies to Relia, "Sorry about that. I panicked, cast a spell, forgot you were in the way.... Could you give me a few minutes, by the way?"
Tessa pulls out her spellbook, and spends a few minutes reading it before she nods that she's ready to move on.
Arma removes the bodies of the monkey goblins from the building and drags them a good twenty feet away, and loots the daggers off of them.
She returns to the smithy and examines the chain shirt, and compares it to her sweat-soaked armor. "Ey, uh, anybody else want to wear this? Just in case we run into anything else nasty, otherwise, I'd like to borrow it."
"Take the buckler Abigail. You will make good use of it."
Relia gives Tessa a long look. "At least your forgetting didn't involve fire. Just fainting. I can live with that. When you are finished we should take a look at that piece of ground to the north."
North of the colony, but well within sight, is a small field. Inundating the meadow is a series of large holes dug in at an angle. Piles of dirt surround each hole. A large copse of trees grows due east of this location.
Azil detects a faint magic aura within one of the holes.
Tessa first mutters a short incantation, preparing her for whatever might spring out of the holes, and cautiously ventures into the field, looking for the magical aura Azil noticed. "Be careful. I wouldn't be surprised if there were more Ankhegs here," she says, keeping her crossbow at the ready and Azil at her shoulder.
You cautiously approach the holes, but don't get too far before a fully grown ankheg emerges from the largest one. Big as a horse, it clacks its drooling mandibles and moves towards you!
Before she even fully realizes why, Tessa hefts her crossbow and fires it, the bolt streaking through the air just as the ankheg even surfaces.
Her shot going wide, Tessa turns and runs, getting out of the immediate vicinity.
"That's a big one. I really hope that's the last of them." she mutters.
Relina sqeeks when the Ankheg climbs out from under the ground. That think is huge." She fires an icicle at the creature.
Relia's icicle strikes the ankheg, and it chitters angrily as it leaves behind an icy wound.
Tessa's crossbow bolt breaks against the big bug's carapace.
The ankheg rushes forward and bites at Abigail. Its mandibles close around the druid, crushing bones as its acidic spittle scours her flesh. It holds her tight, lifting her off the ground!
Arma starts at the appearance of the ankheg but pushes down her fear to advance and attack.
"Damn it--oi, you oversized vermin!"
Tessa reloads her crossbow and fires again. While the shot flies true, it's only a glancing wound and does little beyond aggravating the creature.
Relia runs up and stabs at the ankheg with her trident.
Abigail stabs the beast in the head with her machete. It chitters angrily at the wound, thrashing the druid back and forth.
Arma and Relia move to flank the ankheg with one another, but neither lands a good hit. Tessa manages to graze it with a crossbow bolt, but it doesn't do much harm.
The ankheg crushes Abigail in its mandibles, dropping the druid as she goes limp.
Tessa, mindful of the last time she got too close to a threat, keeps her distance, sighting carefully down her crossbow to avoid hitting Abigail, "Hold on Abigail! Even though you likely can't hear me...."
It's just logical, helping Abigail would expose her back and risk the ankheg coming after Arma next, but it still felt wrong.
Arma attacks desperately and inflicts glancing hits. "Damn you! Relia, help Abigail!"
"I am!" She casts stabilize on Abigail. "That will keep her stable until I can get her healed. Be careful."
Arma stabs the ankheg with a dagger, leaving a light puncture wound behind. Relia takes a step back to stabilize the dying Abigail, keeping her alive for now. Tessa fires a crossbow bolt, but the beast's hard carapace protects it from the projectile.
The ankheg turns on Arma and spits forth a line of acid at the alchemist!
Arma jerks away, avoiding the worst of the acid. She takes a step back and draws and drinks her extract of Cure Light Wounds.
Tessa runs up closer, staying just outside of the creature's reach as she sends forth another blast of color, taking extra care to not hit any of her allies.
Relia stabs at the creature with her trident.
Arma steps back to drink a healing extract, soothing her acid burns. Relia stabs at the creature but fails to pierce its carapace. Tessa moves in and unleashes a color spray at the ankheg, and it reels about, blinded and stunned!
You focus your attacks on the beast to try to take it down before it can recover. Arma stabs it two more times, and it collapses to the ground, ichor oozing out of its myriad wounds.
When you get the chance to examine the holes in the field, you discover fragments of leather eggshells in a few of them. One hole contains a human skeleton bereft of clothing or equipment. The bones are pitted by acid, but one finger still wears a magical copper-colored ring engraved with arcane symbols.
Having survived numerous ordeals in your exploration of Talmandor's Bounty, you feel ready to face even greater challenges.
Arma kicks the dead ankheg, and curses, "And your mother!"
She wipes off her knives and stows them, and immediately turns around and starts muttering to herself. "Wait, wait, if I add a dose of--and a little bit of--oh, that'll taste absolutely disgusting but it shouldn't be toxic, per se..."
She wipes off her hands, although she still has a lot of ankheg gore on her, pulls out a flask and her formula book, and mixes an infusion of Cure Light Wounds. It's gray and fizzing, and she pours it in Abigail's mouth. "Usually these have only ever worked on myself, they may as well be smelly water to anyone else, but I think I've just had a breakthrough and it should work now..."
Arma throws her hands up. "Good news, nobody's dead yet! But that was hell of a rough time, and I'm completely tapped out on extracts now. I'm thinkin' hole up somewhere for a good few hours, then do whatever else needs done here, then head for the rendezvous."
Relia channels positive energy again to help heal everyone's wounds a wee little bit. "I'm really tired." she says in explination of the tiny little bit of healing she is able to do. "I agree we should find a place to rest before heading to meet the ship. The bunkhouse maybe? Certainly a building that has a door we can keep closed."
Tessa shakes her head, "I'm almost tapped out. If we were to run into anything else, I'd be running severely short on magic. The ship will wait for us, and even if we were to set out now, we wouldn't arrive until nightfall. I say we spend the night in one of the buildings, and set out in the morning. Besides, we still haven't investigated the dock, and the sunken canoe. We need to make sure we aren't missing anything there before we move on. Could you toss me the ring, though? I want to try my hand at identifying it."
Arma looks over at the grave and grimaces at the skeleton. "Poor bastard. Anything on that ring give a clue who that was?"
There doesn't seem to be anything to indicate who the unfortunate person might have been.
You set up camp inside the abandoned government house to rest and recover. The sun sets after a few hours, and the sounds of nocturnal insects breaks the eerie silence of the abandoned colony. The night passes without event, and you awake refreshed and ready to march north to rejoin the other colonists.
As they wake and prepare to head out, Arma says, "Righto, I believe we wanted to look at the sunken canoe and then head for the ship? Before that, anybody want me to prepare any particular extracts for them?"
Arma flips through her formula book. "Hmm, there's one that makes you grow bigger, you get more perceptive, ooh, right, the one that makes you a much better swimmer, a magic shield protects you, or healing. There's one other, but it's not very useful, but that swimming one may be useful to investigate the docks."
Relia rises with the others, and looks out at the ocean while praying to Gozreth for her spells for the day. Thank you for your safety yesterday. Guide us on the best way to clear the sanctuary, and solve this mystery.
She gets up after her prayer time, and packs her things. "Let's head to the docks. The swimming one sounds like it would be a good idea, Arma. I have asked for divine favoer today, and protection from evil."
5/day—icicle (1d6+1 cold)
Cleric (Stoic Caregiver) Spells Prepared (CL 2nd; concentration +4)
1st—bless, divine favor, obscuring mist[D], protection from evil
0 (at will)—create water, detect magic, light, stabilize
D Domain spell; Domain Water
Returning to the dock, you see the canoe on the sea floor at a depth of ten feet. You'll have to swim down if you want a closer look at it.
Tessa, after a decent night's sleep, woke up more ready than ever, and managed to prepare more magic than ever. When they reach the boat, Tessa tells the others, "Oh, I have something that might help. Let me see..." she traces a small circle in the air with her fingertips, and motes of light dance in the air, brightening and enlarging as they spiral down to the canoe.