Jocasta burst into the room, Steel and determination.
The purple robed Tiefling moves up further putting more door and wall space between him and Lorena.
The yellow Robed one stabs out at Terry
Shanked as she passes through, Jocasta almost falls unconscious. The hit is nearly invisible: There's no opening, her defense is perfect, but she gets stabbed right in the guts anyway.
The red robed Tiefling Stabs at Khaz hoping to bring the heavily armored Dwarf down.
Terry's eyes go wide for an instant as the blade skitters across his armor, and then the tighten down into a glare. "No, YOU're supposed to fall down. Not us!" His blade reaches out in a more fluid response than his words.
In the unlikely event that fells Yellow, Terry will hug the wall and move clockwise around to Red.
Firinn meanwhile keeps shooting, trying to take down yellow.
Terry does fell the yellow robed Cultist, Both of Firinn's shots land on the Red robed Cultist, leaving wounds upon him but not dropping him.
”Death by a thousand cuts only works when ye don’t have a mace in your head!”
Badly mauled, Jocasta nevertheless focuses on supporting Khaz in his fight.
With the cultist by the door retreating, Lorena moves into the room, quickly casting a spell to keep Jocasta up before turning towards the other cultist, spear at the ready.
Khaz turns and drops the Purple Robed Tiefling closing in on his back, the other one Jocasta turns and swings at but proves to nimble for the wounded Magus.
Seeing that Jocasta is wounded despite Lorena's healing, the Cultist focuses on her.
Agily working his way opposite Khaz, Terry looks to end the fight now, if possible.
With a daring flourish, a clean roll, Terry ends the fight in the entrance hall. Cards and drinks are spilled on the table with the rough housing that took place.
Once the cultists were all put down, Khaz knelt and prayed.
No other doors exit this room, the cultist have nothing of value on them, leather armor, short swords around 34 gold between the lot and on the table.
Some noises can be heard further on into the facility.
Firinn moves quickly to sweep the gold into a bag and recover his arrows where he can.
"We should move quickly." He says, "They know we're coming now."
Firinn moves to the next room.
”The bastar-...” Khaz shook his head in anger. ”Got that spell? Prestigi-whatever? These befouling cannot stand.”
"I can create water and do this the old fashioned way." Firinn offers. "We'd best clear the bottom floor at least before we do anything else. No point getting ambushed half way through."
"Don't let them steal your resolve, Khaz. Shrines can be cleaned later just as much as chests can be opened later. Elbow grease isn't what we're here to provide. Make them pay for it. THEN clean it."
”I can do it. Just give me a few moments,” says Jocasta. With a few mystic passes she makes quick work of the filth that plagues the altar.
”As a devotee of Iomedae, I don’t much care to see her shrines defiled.”
"Let's come back later and do it properly." Firinn agrees with terry. "Clear the worshipers now and their filth later."
Please make a Perception check as you kneel down to pray at the shrine.
A door to the north and a door to the east lead out of this room. Both doors are closed, the room has been cleaned of the worst of the filth, many hours to restore this room to it's former glory will still be needed.
Lorena isn't fazed at all by the defiled shrine. In fact, she doesn't even acknowledge it, going straight to the closed doors. She looks and listens, but doesn't touch, waiting while the others finish up whatever they're doing.
Once the shrine is cleaned, Jocasta hesitates for a moment, then she pauses and kneels at the bench.
"Iomedae, I'm not one of your priests or paladins, but this city needs them now. Needs you now. More than ever. Maybe people will remember what happened here and some day give thanks. Or maybe this horror will go on. But people need to believe in something, because there's precious little hope to go around right now."
She bows her head and closes her eyes a moment, then finally pushes herself back up to her feet.
"I don't pray much but I suppose if you're going to do it, a time like this... is the time."
Khaz stood behind Jocasta, pleased with the display of piety. It was this, he reflected, that the crusade needed. For when pragmatism failed and all was ruin, faith would be all that was left to rely on.
You see in a blurry text "Let us inherit thine arms, Iomedae"
You can hear high pitched voices talking in Celestial, it is difficult to make it out through the thick door to the east. The door to the north you hear nothing
Once Jocasta's done, Lorena comes back to the group with a report. Speaking softly, she says: "I didn't hear anything behind the north door, but there's someone behind the east door. High-pitched voices, but I don't know what language they're speaking, if it's a language at all."
Firinn heads over to the door Lorena indicated and listens carefully.
it sounds like someone is talking to someone else, the voices are shrill, the talking doesn't make a lot of sense.
Terry looks back and forth between Loren and Firinn. "So, we gotta check that room out eventually, right? What does it sound like is going on?"
”This is a den of cultists. Whatever they are doing we should put a stop to it.” He began stomping forward.
"They're speaking nonsense." Firinn reports. "Let's go!"
He strings an arrow and steps back so that the wrecking ball paladin can go first.
Terry will also take up a position, bow ready. Unless the door proves to need unlocking . . ..
With righteous fury and murderous intent, the paladin strode forth.
The Two Creatures in this room turn to regard the Party, each has the head of a Human stuffed onto their hands. The hands able to move the jaw up and down as if they were talking. Both Creatures Squeel at the sight of the party moving to attack.
Already prepared for the possibility of enemies, Firinn sends two cold iron arrows humming across the room.
Lorena peeks into the room behind Khaz to see what they're dealing with, but doesn't enter the cramped space yet. Instead, she casts a spell, fading into the darkness in the corner of the room.
The Demon that Firinn placed ever so gently two arrows into moves forward, Biting and Clawing at him, one of the hands has what looks like a human skull on it.
Firinn is able to dodge two of the blows but a Claw hits him leaving an ugly looking wound.
Khaz rushed to Firinn’s aid
”Ye dare defile the honorable dead? I’ll hit ye so hard yer ancestors will feel it!” He didn’t know how demons reproduced, or even if they did. But he was angry and didn’t care.
Hoping for the best outcome possible, Terry tries to loose a shaft through the doorway, and into the creature which has not yet responded . . ..
Khaz smashes the demon in front of him wounding it almost fatally, Terry sends a single arrow between Khaz and Firinn's heads with deadly accuracy. The Arrow clips the demon not inflicting maximum damage.
The Red hued demon moves forward to bite at the Shiny Paladin.
\
Only a claw makes it through Khaz;s defenses
Jocasta moves quickly to step up by Khaz and Firinn, and swings her cold iron sword at the strange puppeteering demon.
1. what sin are they associated with, and why/how?
2. what defenses/weaknesses do they have (DR, SR, food allergy, etc.)?
3. how well can they see in the dark?
Jocasta dances up, swinging her sword at Green Killing it
With one demon down, Khaz strode over to the second and brought his mace around in an arc, striking the creature in the arm.
Terry steps into the open doorway and looses another arrow at Red.
Looking at the situation, he then drops the bow and draws his rapier . . ..
Lorena's delay allows everyone else to crowd into the room, leaving her with no space to do anything. Instead, she sits unseen by the doorway, hoping this fight finishes before the magic wears off so that it'll still be useful for the next room.