"We're already here and being through all the surprises this house has thrown at us. Might as well seek out this crying." Drasven points out.
Karmid opens the door to a bedroom that features a child-sized bed, a chair next to a toy box, and a looming stone fireplace big enough for a child to get lost in.
The room has shuttered windows, but no other obvious exits.
Looking sad, Karmid exits letting the others take a look.
"I think this one is safe. I'm going to go check out the next door."
Karmid moves to the next door over looking for problems/traps.
Drasven examines the shuttered windows.
Drasven moves over to the shuttered windows, sure that they open to the Lost Coast cliffs at the back of the manor home. He looks at the them for a moment and concludes that they seem functional, if very, very dusty as if they hadn't been touched in years. He glances around the room and concludes that the child's bedroom is in a similar condition.
Back outside the room, Lia turns around at the sound of a small child crying and notices a small girl sitting hunched over with her hands over her face in the hallway behind her her. She looks strangely familiar, and Lia cautiously approaches her to check on her and make sure she's okay. When Lia touches her shoulder, the girl turns around and with a shock Lia sees that it is her as a child, eyes wide with fear and tears streaking her red face. Young Lia points down the northern hallway and silently mouths "make mommy and daddy stop fighting". Lia looks up and sees her mother and father facing off against each other. Her father's entire body is covered in wicked boils and tumors and he holds a knife and is grinning wickedly at his mother, who holds up a lit torch defensively. Then her father charges as her mother falls back and he plunges the long knife hilt-deep into her stomach, which causes her to spasm and buckle.
Seconds later the vision vanishes and Lia sits on the ground screaming incoherently.
"I told you not to touch that scarf!"
Dropping his hammer, Karmid attempts to grapple/restrain Lia.
"Hu, Karmid? Thanks for the hug?", Lia seems surprised when Karmid rushes at her and grapples her.
She opens her mouth once, yet a plethora of words overlapping come forth:
"The green reed which bends in the wind...",
and she easily slips from Karmids grasp, seeking refuge behind Drasven.
"But I'm good now. No more hugging needed. Not with so much strength. It's a bit scary. Like that vision just now."
She seems ready to cast something again if Karmid makes a move towards her, her gaze unusually focused on the large Shoanti.
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Jili jumps in between Lia, Drasven and Kharmid. She holds her hands out defensively. She tries several times to get words out in Common. It first comes out in Infernal, and then Celestial, and then finally, finally calms herself down enough to speak in common. "It's ok. It's ok. I think it was another haunt. She's fine. He's fine. Everyone's fine." She starts to cry. "Nobodies fine. This isn't fine. Nothing is fine."
Suddenly awkward and obviously worried, Karmid tries reaching out to Jili, but suddenly pulls back and grabs his hammer and moves on angrily.
"I HATE this house."
Ro puts her arm around Jili's shoulders and draws her into a sort of half-hug.
"We'll all be fine." she tells everyone, although her voice doesn't sound terribly confident of it.
"Let's just keep going and get this done so we can leave."
Drasven freezes as Lia suddenly falls to the ground and screams. His hand twitches on the trigger for his crossbow as his eyes dart around.
Suddenly he finds Lia hiding behind him as the Mountain known as Karmid barrels across towards him. A Hairsbreath from loosing a bolt when Jilli jumps in to block the big shoanti.
Forcing his arms to remain still takes a lot of willpower for the aged dwarf as his heart pounds within his chest.
He croaks out. Finding his throat dry, he swallows to moisten it.
"Which room is left?"
"Plenty of doors still to go old man. Hold onto your bolts."
Karmid opens the next door in the series once it looks clear.
Edgar keeps up a defensive position to the rear, at least nothing would be sneaking up on them... he hopes.
Lia relaxes when Karmid does not attempt to grapple her any more.
Still opting to keep Drasven between her and him, she looks at Jil and Ro: "That's the kind of friendly hug one should do. See, she does not use all her strenght!"
Ro sighs. "Come here sweetie."
Ro gives Lia a nice hug as well.
Karmid moves north and opens the next door to the east. This large room features two padded chairs and a long couch facing a wide alcove lined with stained-glass windows. These windows depict a diverse array of animals and plants—from north to south are a large pale and ghostly scorpion, a gaunt man holding out his arms as a dozen bats hang from him, a moth with a strange skull-like pattern on its wings, a tangle of dull green plants with bell- shaped flowers, and a young maiden sitting astride a well in a forest while a spindly spider the size of a dog descends along a string of webbing above her.
The room has no other exits.
"Nice windows" Ro snarks. "Just imagine having friends over for drinks. 'Oh? the view? It was alright I suppose, but nothing can compare to these beautiful works of art. Now who wants to hear a joke?'. But then, a person who'd install these things probably doesn't have friends."
The painter for these was definitely inspired though I feel it in my gut that like the other objects in this house, It holds another meaning."
"I agree, it's on the tip of my tongue." Edgar supplies, racking his brain for the knowledge.
"It's all things used for spell components - for Necromancy I think?"
When Lia suggests the necromancy angle Ro responds.
"Hm, like I said, no friends."
Karmid taps his hammer on the floor.
"That pretty much confirms what we have been wondering: This house was built by or for necromancy or necromantic purposes. It must be destroyed in the end! Regardless. Let's move on."
Next door.
Sigh
"So he's a friend of the undead. He has got to be cleansed." Drasven grumbles.
The group moves on to the next room, leaving the strange chamber with the necromantic stained glass windows behind.
After listening briefly at the corner room and hearing nothing, Karmid opens to door to reveal a terrifying small bedroom. This entire chamber is caked with a thick, spongy layer of dark green, blue, and black mold. It contains a single bed, at least it seems to be a bed beneath the thick layer of mold, and no other exits.
Karmid shakes his head and leaves the door open.
"I'm not going in there."
Next door.
Jili peeks her head in the door and casts Detect Magic before Kharmid has a chance to slam the door closed. "Just in case. You can pull me out if I start screaming."
Ro stares at the room from the doorway.
"Yeah, nothing in there I'm that curious about. Let's keep going."
Casually looking into the room, Ro and Jili find nothing out of the ordinary in the room ... other than all the mold.
Moving on down the corridor, Karmid listens and hears nothing. Opening the door he sees a washroom with a tub in the middle of it. The floorboards around it are sagging from the weight of the tub, but nothing out of the ordinary can be seen here.
Ro continues to support Karmid, watching out for hazards.
"Why is the tub so heavy?", Lia asks, "The floorboards seem to be sagging...and water would have evaporated by now..."
Drasven ponders as the group moves however it is clear that he sticks close to Ro.
The things tend to happen to her and with her around so it stands to reason that being close to her might give them a chance to protect her.
The owner was interested in her anyway.
The group moves on from the dilapidated washroom and opens the door to the corner bedroom. This once fine chamber has been destroyed, but looks to have been more recently lived in than many of the other chambers you have examined. The bed is smashed, mattress torn apart, walls gouged as if by knives, chairs hacked apart, and paintings on the walls torn to pieces—with one exception. A portrait hanging on the northwest wall seems to be untouched, although it hangs backward, its unseen subject facing the wall.
The room has no other visible exits.
Seeing the damage and the odd painting, Karmid speculates out loud.
"I'm both curious and dreading this idea."
He then moves into the room, using the blade of his klar to lift and twist the painting until it is visible...
Karmid's first impression is that unlike the rest of the room, this painting is completely undamaged. Once he has it turned around completely he sees that it is a portrait of a young Varisian woman with long black hair and an intelligent, penetrating gaze. The portrait's background shows a cliff overlooking a blue-green ocean.
The woman in the picture look familiar to Ro, but she can't quite place where she has seen her before. All she knows is that she is gripped with a sudden, intense sense of panic that subsides as quickly as it appeared.
Lia sees the portrait as well and feels a sense of sadness and loss grip her momentarily before it fades away as well.
"I'm assuming this is the young woman who died? This man's ego...what has it led him to do?"
Unless something else happens, Karmid will move on after taking a quick look around...
When she notices the scarf, Ro puts it together. The panic she felt spikes again for a moment. It again feels like her windpipe is being crushed.
She gasps to do it, but Ro tells the others.
"That's Iesha, Foxglove's wife. She's the one I felt being murdered."
Lia raises her hands up protectively, grasping the piece of cloth: "It's my Scarf now.", pausing a moment, then adding:"Unless Iesha wants it back." a moment later.
"I don't think she would have a use for it, being... as she is."
Edgar doesn't seem fazed by Lia's statements, which is also a worrying sign. He'd normally be amused or perhaps disturbed, but given the backdrop of the house, her eccentricities were a welcome break rather than a bother.
"Poor woman. I hope she's resting in peace, and not.." Jili shudders. "Undead. That would be worse than being murdered."
"I think she is. Undead, I mean. I would be. This house is evil, full of malevolent memories and lingering presence. If I got violently murdered here, I could not pass on peacefully. Especially if the one who murdered me was still around.", Lia comments to Jili's thoughts in an all-too-casual tone.
Yes, there it was. "That is an exceedingly unhelpful thought to have at the moment. I prefer not to humanize the undead, or consider the reason they exist. So if she shows up, I shouldn't put an end to her because of a tragic death?" Just like that, the moment of respite from this horrible place is gone.
"Why would you try and put an end to her? That won't work. If her murderers prolonged existance is what keeps her here, it's Aldern you want. That would release Iesha. If she does exist as undead, by all means, we should talk with her. We were wronged by the same person, after all.", Lia shrugged, then pointed back at the portraits:"Necromancy seems part of this places curse - but not all that are unliving are mindless creatures. You should not humanize the undead, but you should not forget many of them once were, and kept their wits about them when passing - best not to underestimate them or act blindly."