Lirotha will move to the corner quietly and look around carefully.
With a silent prayer to Desna, Lirotha draws a card and infuses it with magic, then she will turn the corner and throw it, then duck back around the corner before she's noticed!
Eallos moves towards the sound of the guard, his crossbow loaded and at the ready.
Kurglunn sees the magical card burst upon impact. The flash of light stuns him momentarily, then wails with a terrible howl.
"So much for the subtle approach," Rocco mutters before moving toward the screaming phantom.
Lirotha will continue to hide and wait to see what the guard does. If he come up to the corner,
she will attempt a surprise attack on him with her starknife. If he tries to leave through the
door he guards, she will attempt to stop him on her next action.
Rocco moves over to stand beside Veccio, pulling a single sling bullet from the simple leather pouch he wears strapped to his belt. He tosses the bullet up and catches in as he moves, but the bullet suddenly stops in mid-air, hovering an inch above his palm. "Let's be quick about this, eh? I don't much feel like being carried outta here in a barrel if ya know what I mean."
As Rocco moves into position, ready to launch an attack, Kurglunn moves forcefully around the unfamiliar woman standing between him and the man he could tell his friend wanted him to face, even if he felt consumed by fear. If he could not overcome his own fear, he thought, he would make the man feel his fear.
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Kurglunn manifests in all of his ectoplasmic dread near the guard but his attack actually misses the man of a wide margin and the ghostly creature ends up being more ridicolous than terryfing.
Rocco on the otehr hand prepares to release his strange magic on any upcoming servants of Thrune.
Meanwhile Meliandri starts intoning a song about courage and strength of arms in the face of uncountable hordes of bloodthirsty orcs...
Round 01 - Bold may post
Rocco
Kurglunn
Meliandri
Eallos
Veccio
Guard
Lirotha
Eallos fires his crossbow in the complete wrong direction and quickly reloads,
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Eallos' aim leaves much to be desidred as his bolt hit's the room's ceiling instead of its intended target. Meanwhile Veccio jumps in and tries to stab the hapless guard to death before he can react...
->
...Wounding him deeply but not enough to kill the poor bastard outright.
Startled and fearful, the man tries to flee but in his haste he gives Veccio the opening he needs to attack again...
->
... and he suceeds, dropping the man on the floor drowning in his own blood, before he can alert his companions.
Surprisingly enough no one seems to have heard a thing.
Shaking her fist in the air with joy at the killing blow, Lirotha will whisper to the others.
"Let's dump 'im behind those barrels in the corner for now so he's out of direct sight. Quickly my toughling ducklings! M'lady Melandri?
Could you do the honors of a quick magical clean up of the blood? Gotta get a wand with that spell..."
As her whispers trail off in obvious random thoughts, Lirotha will wait patiently then suddenly move to the first door on the left
of the hall and listen at it as soon as the way is clear enough.
With the guard safely dispatched, Rocco sighs with relief and allows the bullet hovering above his palm to drop harmlessly into his hand. He moves toward the others and, seeing the guard lying in the pool of blood, he silently motions for Kurglunn to move the body like Lirotha had suggested.
Once the phantom had finished its task, Rocco silently moved to the southern door and followed the witch's lead, placing an ear near the door and listening for any voices or other noises on the other side.
Kurglunn watched with dread and awe as Veccio moved up beside him and, with two swift blows, disposed of the scary man who had been standing by the door. He instantly decides that he likes this new friend, and would like to give him a hug, but Rocco shows up just before he is able to work up the courage, and directs him to move the bad man away. Kurglunn trusts that Rocco knows best, so he does what Rocco says, then comes back and follows after his small friend to another door, where they try to hear what is on the other side.
Panting heavily and somewhat amazed at his own luck, Veccio quickly cleans his rapier before moving to hide the body. At Rocco's signal, Kurglunn gets there first, and the young daredevil opts to stand back and allow the... thing to do its work alone.
Unable to reach the crowded doors, he instead tries to work a worrisome pebble out of his left boot.
Mels nods quickly, silently thanking her goddess that no one seems to have noticed any of this. "Zis 'as not been zee most...subtle...assault so far. Eet reminds me of zee opera Zee Siege of Corentyn. Does eet remind you of zat as well, Veccio? Zee part where zee 'eroes break into zee armory?"
Pulling herself back to where she is, she waves a hand a mutters "Debilus Mens", quickly cleaning up the worst of the blood before fixing a few of the smaller details. "Eet eez not perfect, but eet should do until we are finished 'ere."
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After a short while listening to the door Lirotha is able to hear some sort of ragged breath coming from the room.
Meanwhile Rocco and Kurglunn do the same with the southern door but all they're able to hear are some muffled voices, and possibly the sound of something burning.
Veccio keeps his own consuel while Mel helps Lirotha clean the "scene".
Thumb pointing at the door, Lirotha will smile.
"Got some rather heavy breathing in this one. Could be our first rescuin', or our first actually sleeping guard?"
"Clank!"
With a swear word only sailors use, Lirotha frowns.
"Drats! Locked. Anybody able to open locks? Can Kurglunn pass though the door and open it from the inside?"
Suddenly a wicked smile appears on Lirotha's face.
"Maybe I should just knock?"
"We got some voices in here," Rocco reports to the others, "maybe a fire of some kind too." He looks back at the others. "Kurglunn could definitely check things out for us, but which door should he check first? I don't want him getting trapped by himself in some room with a bunch of sadistic Thrune cronies y'know?!"
He looks up at the perpetually frightened expression on Kurglunn's face and ponders their options for a while. Kurglunn stares back down at him, and the two seem to have a wordless conversation to decide what they should do... what they can do. Finally, Rocco folds his arms across his chest and sets his face in a stern look as he turns back toward Lirotha. "We're gonna check out your room first. Kurglunn's the only one who's got any way to scout stuff like this out for us, and if we're gonna be a part of this gang, we're gonna put everything on the line to do our part. Come on, Greenie, get to shamblin'"
Kurglunn nods once to acknowledge his friends order, then moves without further delay toward Lirotha. He pauses next to her for just a moment before he moves ahead, forcing his strange, ethereal from into seemingly nonexistent cracks and crevices in the wall. As he enters the room, he quickly tries to conceal himself behind any furniture that might provide cover from watchful eyes inside.
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Korglunn head sticks into a room with 3 ramshackle desks and notices a man is currently chained to one. The man sports a long black beard, is obviously wounded and seems to be in pain, hyperventilating and moaning.
Then, as if registering something out of the ordinary happened he opens his eyes and notices Kurglunn back, mouth agape as if trying to scream but not finding the strength to.
Feeling as if she's been pushing her luck already, Lirotha will go ahead and cast her Mage Armor spell on herself as the apparition moves through the door. (2 hour duration)
Eallos reloads his crossbow as he waits for Korglunn to return.
Rocco stands by the wall that Kurglunn had just moved through, his eyes closed and a look of deep concentration on his face. Suddenly, his head snaps up and his eyes fly open. "There's someone inside. Let's get inside."
Inside the room, Kurglunn stares back at the haggard man, matching the look of surprise and fear growing on the other's face. Before the man can call out, though, Kurglunn raises a grey-fleshed, faintly glowing hand to show that he means no harm and offers a comforting whisper, "Do...not...worry. We...do...not...want...to...hurt...you. I...will...let...friends...in...now." Kurglunn turns to the door and tries to unlock and open the door from the inside.
Meliandri nods at the halfling and takes a few steps away from the door. She squares up, then looks at Veccio. "Zis always works een zee operas."
Taking a running start, she lowers her shoulder just before she slams into the door.
Lirotha winces as the slight bard bounces off the solid door, but smiles at the bard's dramatic approach.
"Ouch. That's gotta' hurt. Let's let the big guys do the heavy lifting m'dearie."
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Mel crashes on the door with her full weight... and the door doesn't even creak in answer. Mel on the other hand ends sprawled on the floor for her efforts.
Meanwhile the prisoner starts screaming at Kurglunn's attempt to reassure him about its intentions. Luckily enough the door and walls are thick and besides that, the party reasons, it's quite possible Thrune's guards expect their prisoners to scream.
Pursing her lips, Lirotha sighs.
"If Kurglunn can't open the door from the inside, we may need to just find the key. W'ever it 'tis."
Pointing at the other door that Rocco listened to, she queries the halfling.
"What did yo hear in there? Fire? Maybe a Kitchen then? These blokes gotta eat right? Cooks gotta a have a key right? They gotta' feed the prisoner!"
"Yeah, could be they'd have the key. It occurs to me to wonder if we checked to see if this poor sod had it though?" Rocco gestures toward the guard lying unconscious in the hall between them. He stoops over and begins rummaging through the guard's pockets, checking to see if a key might be found.
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Rocco's intuition proves true as the dead guard's body holds a set of keys working perfectly for the door's lock and opening it with ease. Rocco also notes how there's a number of other smaller keys attached to the set.
The prisoner, very frightened still, screams again as they enter but quickly realizes something isn't right:"Wh... who are you? N... new guards?" he asks "I... I can work again! Just don't let me here... there's a MONSTER roaming the place!"
Kurglunn turns to the man, "Kurglunn...not...monster..."
Stepping in quickly after Roscoe opens the door, Lirotha will survey the room.
"Relax dearie! Kurglunn is technically more frightened of you than you are of his ectoplasmic buttocks.
Oh...and we are here to rescue you and the other prisoners. We may have forgotten to mention that at first..."
Obviously an office, she quickly begins searching for anything useful, including incriminating/useful
documents, information, money, or the like.
Rocco shoves his way into the room and stands beside the phantom. "You are too, you nasty dead thing. Don't worry about it, though. Just go stand out in the hall. You're gonna give this poor sod a fit." The phantom makes his way back into the hall, passing through any walls (or friends) who might be in the way.
Rocco turns to the man and makes his way over, sorting through the keys to see if he can find one matching the chains he is wearing. "I oughta slug you one for thinking we're part of that devil-worshipping bunch o' ninnies, but I'll let it slide. S'pose I can't blame you fer being a bit on edge. No, we're with the Silver Ravens, and, like the nice unwashed lady said, we're here to bust you and the others out."
Lirotha looks up at the halfling's comment then goes back to her search.
"UN-washed? I'll have you know that's thems called AHM-BeeANCE...or some such similar thing. As a harrow reader, you have to give your audience what they expects, or they won't believe the reading is true. If I was all clean and proper, they wouldn't think I'm a real Varisian fortuneteller at all."
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Lirotha finds nothing noteworthy. Seems like Thrune's lapdogs have eptied the room in order to transform it in some sort of impromptu jail cell.
The man seems unconvinced at first, especially as Rocco mentions the Silver Ravens:"Is this some sort of unusual and cruel punishment? Everyone knows the Silver ravens are no more! But if by any chance you are telling the truth... free me and then the others, please! They are working us to the death in here! I took 50 lashes only because I dared leave my post to ask for water! And Kossrani... oh... he's a bad piece of work that one, he is! He likes to inflict pain, he likes to see people suffer! But he knows how to use that mace that's for sure and his minions are all in awe of him"
Smiling, Lirotha touches the obviously hurt prisoner with her healing Hex.
"By the Hammers and d'Keys, I free you of your pain...Somewhat."
Turning her head askance at the man she maintains a straight face as she blinks at him like an owl in the night.
"His 'mace' you say? A dwarf wielding a mace...that's odd isn't it? They usually prefer hammers and axes and such-not,
correct? Is this mace obviously magical or something?"
Looking at the halfling fumbling with all the keys, she smiles and comments again.
"Hurry up and help the man out of his bondage Rocco! I thought your kind were supposedly good with locks and keys?"
"Whatever he uses, we'll have to stop him from... using it any more," Veccio finishes lamely, eyeing the prisoner with only mild suspicion.
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The man looks surprised and relieved as Lirotha's magic helps closing his wounds:"Uh? Are you really here to save us then? Thank you my lady... thank you! I was fully expecting to die in this place of torment... instead you bring hope of salvation!"
After that the man is much friendlier and answers Lirotha's question without esitation:"He carries a mace. Don't know about any special abilities or magic but I know for sure he knows how to use it to break bones. I've seen him do it. As for why he favors it over a warhammer I cannot say. Maybe because he makes an effort of letting everyone know how much of a devoted Asmodite he truly is?"
Lirotha nodding sagely, taking on her normal 'reader' persona when dealing with customers.
"No problem. We are here to teach the Ass-Modes a thing or two about personal freedom!"
She then winks knowingly and obviously at the man as Rocco finishes unshackling him.
"Now! Can you give us a quick rundown of what we are facing here? We took out the two screws on patrol
and the one on your door already. Also, can you tell us what's beyond the next couple of doors? Any hazards
or traps we need to worry about that you know of?"