Kersey nods and looks at the egg, curious what was inside but not wanting to shake it and find out. He liked having fingers.
"Okay, ninja that are rich enough to get their own guilds & strongholds generally festoon them with traps & such. But I'm more concerned about the fact that we had to deal with several ninja at once."
"That gives me the impression that someone with a LOT of money is after us. One ninja would likely be enough for just about any job. Two, if the job is REALLY big."
"Either that, or they were looking for something else entirely and we just had the bad luck to run into them."
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"Well they sent five and that wasn't enough for this job," Kersey says before giving off a quick low chuckle.
"...so that means they might send much more next time. People rich enough to afford ninjas generally don't appreciate being told 'no'."
"And ninja guilds probably don't appreciate running out of ninjas to hire out."
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Lyraesel snickers at the comment.
Kelda stays with the camp while the rest of you head to the shrine of Shelyn to see if Uksahkka can find any sign of Ulf. The city is, as usual, a riotous crowd of people pushing and shouting and jostling. You skate around the edge of a herd of pigs running down a street chased by an Ulfen child with a large crooked stick, skip over several piles of horse dung, excuse yourselves from a pair of large arguing men looking for an outsider's perspective to settle their differences, and pass the many low, long houses that are dug partway into the ground to provide a low shelter against the snowy winters.
The shrine to Shelyn is a beautiful structure, of course, complete with stained glass windows and a central spire that reaches to the sky with a crescent shape that evokes the glaive carried by the goddess of beauty. Traffic around the shrine is light, predominantly younger folk looking for advice in love or inspiration in art.
As you approach along a wide city lane (hard-packed muddy dirt with smooth wooden plank buildings on either side), the area opens into a grassy circle with the shrine in the middle, and when you're about 70' away one of the stained glass windows suddenly explodes outward in rainbow fragments. People shout, gawk, or start running. Inside, you can make out a large shape swinging about wildly, but through the narrow window you can't quite tell what it is or what it's doing - just that it's some kind of big creature that may be roughly humanoid? And it seems to be wrecking the place!
Looking in awe at the temple, and smiling at all the youths going on about their lives, Kersey let his thoughts drift for a bit before he heard the explosion.
Cursing letting his mind wander rather than be focused on their objective he takes in and lets out a deep breath through his nostrils. "M&*#~~@&$~** gonna die tonight." he muses as he resumes marching towards the temple, quickly tasking out his wand to tap himself once before putting it away and drawing his axe.
Bernard looks aside at Kersey before pulling out his bow.
"Not if he doesn't make it to the end of the day. I'mma get a better look, see what we're dealing with."
He immediately starts ducking, weaving, and somersaulting through the crowd to get there as quickly as possible and find a vantage point.
Seeing the chaos coming from the temple, Lyraesel growls, breaking into a run, her posture in a low hunting prowl as she races ahead of the others with primal speed.
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Strolling along, keeping an eye out on his coin purse and generally viewing the surroundings. Morgrym is briefly stunned by the shattering glass.
What in Torags Name is that
Bringing his Urgosh across his chest in a battering ram position,
MAKE A HOLE, COMING THROUGH!! He yells.
Morgrym starts to run towards the creature, shouldering people out the way if they are not fast enough to move.
"Oh my!"
Alara, seeing the carnage and the others racing to stop it, follows them in.
An elderly priest lies on the street next to the door, bleeding out. People are shrieking and running out of the shrine as you approach. Inside, a towering rumbling earthen monster smashes the interior.
You also notice a blood-feather raven sitting on a perch high up on a roof nearby, watching.
The spellcasters readily recognize this as an earth elemental. Looks like it's made of rocks and has long, heavy arms that it uses to batter anything in reach!
Bernard spins and shoots the raven, using two of his blunt arrows, assuming he won't get them back.
The raven squawks in alarm and takes wing as Bernard's pair of blunted arrows narrowly miss it.
Seeing Bernard fire at the bird, Lyraesel fires at the fleeing bird before focusing on the temple.
Kersey hustles over to the priest, drawing the wand he just put away to tap the the unconscious man. "Does it look like anyone else is in there?' he calls out as he does so.
Lyraesel's shot hits the bird, which squawks raucously but continues its hurried flight away.
The priest blinks and sits up as Kersey applies magical healing. He takes a breath and says, "Ah, grace of Shelyn, how beautiful to be alive! The elemental - it simply appeared - and started destroying everything!"
As if to underscore the priest's words, the elemental smashes the altar service and continues its rampage.
Luckily, the elemental seems more interested in destroying the building than in hurting people; folk flock around across the street to see what's happening, but there doesn't appear to be anyone left inside the temple. (Or what is inside for the next few seconds, anyway.)
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Alara gives the blood-feathered raven only the briefest of glances, especially when Bernard takes a potshot at it.
Alara's eyes widen when she sees just how big the elemental trashing the shrine is.
"Th-that's a big elemental! Hit it as hard as you can--if you feel like you're not doing enough damage, that's normal! Just keep hitting it until it falls apart!"
"That, and as long as it's in contact with earth, it's going to be stronger! Watch out for its long arms!"
She focuses on the massive mound of earth, imagining all manner of terrible things happening to it...
First, they're gonna hack you up until you look like a mound of dirt instead of a big hill. You're gonna get turned into mud. And then, with how cold it is up here, you're gonna freeze. You picked the wrong part of the world to wreck!
"We're gonna ERODE your sorry ass!" The elf yells at the walking mound of earth. She probably didn't mean to say that last bit out loud.
Morgrym looks with worry at the creature wrecking the place.
He sees 2 of the archers send arrows off into the wild blue yonder. . .
Why did you waste those arrows, we may need them for that.
He then looks at the creature as he continues to close.
Torag, grant me your blessing, so I may assist with sending this creature back to your realm.
The tremendous elemental turns its ire toward Morgrym as the dwarf closes in, and raises a pair of mighty earthen fists, which it brings down with a resounding BOOM.
CRUNCH.
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Looking up at the massive elemental, Lyraesel growls, knowing that there was little she could do to harm it. Racing forward to aid Morgrym, the druidess' arm snaps forward in a punching motion as a ripple of force, reminiscent of a ram's head projecting beyond her fist as it slams into the elemental with enough impact to send dirt and debris flying.
Putting away the wand Kersey begins advancing on the elemental.
Lyraesel's blast of force does only cosmetic damage to the elemental, but shoves it back into the wall of the shrine, which buckles from the weight of the rock-creature.
Reeling from the solid impacts and partially blinded by flying rock and rubble Morgrym staggers back a step or two.
Morgrym steps into a defensive roll in an attempt to not get hit again as he closes in.
Bernard is very sick of fighting enemies too big and tough for him to shoot effectively and sighs as he zips off his shots.
Bernard's arrows glance off the rocky exterior (AC 18).
The elf winces as Morgrym is practically buried under a pile of rubble and invokes another episode of bad luck on the rock monster...
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The earth elemental turns toward Kersey as a new challenger arrives. Perhaps it thinks that Morgrym has had enough? It clearly doesn't really know you...
By some miracle, the huge stone fists of the elemental come down to either side of the once-paladin, leaving smashed holes in the ground but Kersey intact!
Being that it was a giant angry rock Kersey forewent using words on it and instead simply used his giant angry axe.
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Quickly assessing that arrows are not going to be much more helpful here than against the giant crab, Bernard puts away his bow and moves into melee with the creature, hoping he's strong enough to at least be able to hurt it with brute strength.
Kersey slams the axe into the elemental, and its force is somewhat blunted by the elemental's stony body but it does send some rocks and chips flying.
Bernard does what he does best - with a perfect acrobatic roll he dives under the elemental's swinging arms and rolls, then comes up inside its reach. Unfortunately he forgets that the entire thing is made of rock as it tries to check him with its "shoulder."
WIFF! As if anticipating that movement, Bernard twists aside and then splays back into a battle-ready stance a moment later.
Realizing that there isn't much she could do to harm the elemental much, the druidess focuses on keeping those more capable in the fight, drawing her wand to heal more of Morgrym's wounds.
Alara musters up the last of her minor reserves and throws one more bad luck spell at the walking mound of earth.
Feeling the healing energies course over his body, and slightly more rejuvenated, Morgrym steps in and attempts a line drive using his Urgosh as a bat.
Only to have his attack go wild.
The big angry rock slams at Kersey once more...
One fist whizzes by while the other hammers the warrior.
"Grah!" Kersey lets out as the big angry rock clobbers him before triying to swing back at it.
Bernard joins in the melee, forgoing his usual finesse and flair in favor of just hacking at the elemental's legs.
"We really are much better at killing things that aren't covered in armor."
Lyraesel dashes forward, once again invoking her ring to call forth the power of a charging ram.