"uhh... Has anyone else noticed this?"
oozula points to the large footprints.
ying real attention in fact. Let see can we track these and follow them home. I am going for a rematch with that giant wolf.
Arthur looks at the chest with a 'wtf just happened' face and begins looking it over, being all sciency about it with tape measures and detect magic and whatnot.
Arthur, your instruments track a powerful divine magic at work in this chest. Your clothing changes as you near it - your robes gain an ethereal runic overcoat that hangs loosely on your body, and Arwen notices an enormous sleeping dragon's face on the back of your clothes where it wasn't before.
smiling Deputies please form a line and head over for inspection of the magic Chest !
Suny perks up at Arwen's comment,
Whut? Does it sparkle?" She asks inquisitively as she skips over and peers inside...
Suny, ethereal wristwraps with fine writing on them manifest around your arms, as well as loose but un-restrictive martial arts clothing. Finally, an ethereal headband appears on your brow, with a regal lion's face painted on the front.
I was kind of hoping for 'mystical tattoos' which I could invest feats in and do interesting things with at some future date? How is that for an idea?
If you really want to 'boost' a weapon, though in Suny';s case it's a 'pair' of weapons. Her Tonfa will be getting more of a work out than the temple sword. Purchased the temple sword because I felt Suny needed at least one thing which was metal, sharp and pointy.
Very much cheers to you and yours, Master DM Frogfoot, Sir. (^_^)
Caln joins Arwen at the chest.
Strange, intricate designs made of burnished copper work their way around Suny's two tonfa like living snakes before resting in place and solidifying into a "solid" (it's still ethereal) form, coalescing into legendary sea serpents.
Small tendrils made of light crawl out of the chest, and move toward the kobold Oozula. She can't resist a small gasp of surprise when it encircles her clothing, bathing her in light. When the tendrils fade away, they left behind beautifully woven images of golden dragons and her crossbow has a golden dragon's maw open and aligned with the business end. Also, her horns are inscribed with glowing blue runes that resemble the runes on Arwen's weapon in appearance.
Caln, the deputy of the party most in tune with the divine, feels something special when he approaches the chest. All of you lean backward reflexively in surprise when the chest begins to glow a bright white light. Caln himself falls to his knees without even realizing it. The cleric's mind has always been more attuned to matters of the gods than most mortals', and Caln catches the merest glimpse in his mind's eye of a divine presence, bathed in white light so bright that it can't be looked at directly. It's not the Lady of Graves. That much is clear. But the same aura of power and awe surrounds the figure. Caln only witnesses the figure for a moment before shadows engulf the divine creature and swallow it into a thin point of blackness.
The vision is over in a flash. When it subsides, Caln, kneeling on the ground, is now wrapped in an ethereal steel overcoat of gold and scarlet, his holy symbol emblazoned on the chest. From his mace, a distant female voice can just barely be heard singing for a few moments, the sound crescendoing and decrescendoing as Caln returns to himself. The mace feels light and electric in his palm.
Suny stares in amazement at her gear's transformation, before blinking and taking in the changes that have come over her friends as well.
"Well..." She says rather breathlessly, "This were right unexpected!" She looks around at her friends and then the surrounding landscape,
"RIGHT! Lets find tha' people's we is here ta' rescue!"
(^_^)
"Well, this is odd... But seems like it doesn't hold any negatives for us."
oozula spends some time using detect magic to find out that the objects are now +1 weapons
Suny moves/leans over and peers intently at the pretty colours/designs on Oozula's horns.
(^_^)
Arwen just smiles as he sees all the deputies touch by the light. There are still wizard to rescue lets move and he will starts following the tracks
Caln says a quick prayer of thanks to both the Lady and his unknown benefactor. Hefting his suddenly lightened morningstar he sets off after Arwen.
Arthur is inspecting his new clothes. As effective as it was, he always made everything cheaper than need be. Nice new things were always welcome.
His eyes go wide when Caln's transformation is so loud, and he whips his glasses off to keep from being blinded by the aura.
Come on deputies we are moving forward.
Arwen leads the deputies around the corner of the castle, taking them along a thin, rocky path that presses tightly up against the ethereal stone walls. The wolf's footprint can be found every twenty feet or so in the dirt. Finally, your path leads you to a small wooden door that hangs off of its hinges inward. It appears to have been blasted - there are scorch marks along the inside. You also see what appears to be a large, opened portcullis further down along the wall - perhaps a main or auxiliary entrance. You hear voices coming from that direction, but cannot see them from where you are.
The servant's quarters entrance, or the portcullis entrance?
making a Shh sign arwen will lead the deputies trough the servant's quarters entrance
Suny can't suppress a giggle, even as the group attempts to sneak back into the building.
It's dark inside the servant's quarters. You can't see a thing, even with your darkvision, Arwen.
All of you hear: this.
O_O
Arthur holds his science gun up, his glasses being back on now.
You can't see either, Arthur...not with your eyes, anyway. Chillingly, you can still see through Detect Magic.
The effect is that you can only see the magic auras. You can see swift, angry red auras - small as housecats - that scurry behind thin walls of some substance that blocks the spell's sight. You can't focus on them long enough to gather any substantive information - your goggles attempt to track them but fail.
"Sure, we're friends. May i ask who you are?"
oozula remains calm and collected, the best she can.
Then... numerous voices chime simultaneously, and from multiple different directions further inside the room. Hello! Friend, many tiny voices cry.
"Ook... Um."
oozula thinks for a moment.
"So, you see me. That's fine. What of that?"
Arwen will let Oozula talk as he obviously has seen something.
he will grab the hand of the person next to him and try to feel his immediate surroundings.
"It seems this is getting nowhere... We can't see and there are wierd things talking to us. Best we just leave."
Hello there yourselves, unfortunatly in this darkness we can't really see. Mind turning it off? We are looking for others that look like us that are probably in this castle could you help us? or tell us who lives here ? he says still moving forward inside the corridor
When Arwen steps forward, his feet cross a threshold. Arwen, you can hear your footsteps' sounds change from metal boots on stone to metal boots on wood. At your first step onto the wood floor, red lights appear in front of you - more than you can count at first glance, but at least 20 of them. You hear a chorus of small voices... there you are... and you are suddenly blasted by lasers emitting from the center of each circle of red. The tiny lasers - no larger than a pencil - impact Arwen all over his armor, just as he was saying ...or tell us who lives here?" and interrupting his speech with an OOF of pain. The force of the many tiny impacts is enough to send Arwen flying backward, causing him to tumble into the rest of the deputies before he lands smack on his butt. Arwen, take damage. Suny, Arwen's flying elbow clocks you in the face by accident in the darkness - take nonlethal.
Arthur and Oozula, the flashes of red light illuminated the room just enough for both of you to catch a glimpse of a panel of some kind of wood, on the wall next to you. You're plunged into darkness again immediately, of course, but with a little groping you think you could find it again blind.
oozula, going against her better judgement, pokes at the wood panel.
"OWIE!" (>_<)
Suny rubs her nose from where she's been planted on her heiny....
Know engineering
Know Arcana
Oozula: it reacts like a piece of wood would. That is, it doesn't.
Arthur, your knowledge of engineering and arcana combine together to tell you of arcane golems, mechanical constructs made with extremely complicated magic spells and designed to any shape or purpose its maker wished. In fact, this form of magical creation is not far off in spirit from your own avenue of research, and as your mind races, desperate for a solution, you experience a brainwave - a memory from your own history, from your youth, when you were but a child in a wealthy household. You recall your mentor, the man who gifted you your mechanical strider, lecturing you on the basics of arcane construction.
"Remember, boy," he said, in his typically raspy voice, "Arcane constructs can come in any shape, perform any purpose, but they have their vulnerabilities!" He gestures sharply at a chalkboard, where a piece of chalk levitated by Mage Hand hovers. You don't recall what was written on the chalkboard, but you do remember what he said next. "Almost all combat-ready arcane constructs - especially those with weaponry beyond mere bludgeoning - require ENERGY! POWER, in some form or another!" he slaps the chalkboard, and you smile to yourself as you imagine the way the dust fell from the flat surface. "Look for the source of this power, if you should run afoul of these constructs! Disable the power source, and switch them off completely!"
oozula feels aroun the wall- is it just a wood panel on it's own, in the middle of a wall of other substances?
It's a wooden panel that's part of a wall, Oozula. You feel a hinge on one side.
Arthur scans around the magic plane, looking for anything different, brighter, or bigger than the red lights.
oozula tires to find a handle on the other side. If none is found, she takes out her crossbow, and tires to shoot it into the side the handle would be, as to give her a place to pull.
Arthur, you can see nothing.
Your point-blank arrow thuds into the wooden panel, surprising everyone. You hear: are you still there? chorusing from the other end of the room. Then, you grope about in the dark for the arrow lodged in the panel, finding it relatively quickly and giving it a sharp yank.
Arthur, you see a new aura revealed as Oozula pulls the wooden panel aside. Everyone can now see by the light source behind the panel - a crackling cord made of some slick black material, suspended in midair and wreathed in ever-shifting lightning.
Focusing on the aura with your Detect Magic spell-gogs, you see that the cord doesn't represent a particular school per se, but rather a tightly-wound collection of ley-lines, unnaturally tied together and in constant battle with their desire to return to their normal positions, like a bunch of positively charged magnets all pressed together.
Suny blinks away the sparkles from behind her eyes even as Oozula reveals sparkles in front of her eyes.
"Here...is that somat we's supposed ta' be gettin' at?" Sunny asks, completely out of her field of knowing things at the moment.
oozula recoils very slightly, just now actually noticing the change to her crossbow. She loads her crossbow again if nothing seems to actively be a threat.
The cords pulse and crackle, but don't actually attack you in any noticeable way. You hear soft metallic clicking coming from your right, in the darkness, but nothing beyond that. The light from the cords is only extended a few feet.
Caln calls forth the power of the Lady to shed light.