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For the most part, the party relaxes and enjoys the morning as best they can prior to departing for the fungus covered island. Dereje spends tje morning working with Ishirou and is able to pick the majority of what the Tien is trying to teach, but still needs a little work. Unable to relax like the others, Lawdrak and Sharpmaw survey the area surrounding Aycenia's tree and hill, but fortunately finds little in terms of anything resembling a threat.
As the time for departure arrives, the party says their goodbyes to those staying behind and the trip north begins. With Hana's help you cross the first of the two causeways and reach the second just as the sun begins to set.
Setting up camp you are able to catch a few small crabs to supplement the food that you have brought with you on the trip. Beyond being hot and damp, and the occasional stench of the fungus covered island wafting over, the night is rather uneventful.
The morning arrives and you cross the second causeway with Hana's help and make your way toward the Nightvoice.
The ancient wreck lies wedged between a pair of rocks here, yet despite its age, the ruined sailing ship at first seems in relatively good condition. The ship has no color to its lines, and is completely covered in a layer of soft gray mold. Even its sails appear fully intact, although what hangs from the spars is not canvas but sheets of thick, pale fungus. Several thick ropes of fungus connect the ship’s upper deck to the island almost like crude rope bridges.
Gelik looks out at the scene and asks, "This is it?" obviously disgusted, disturbed or both at the appearance of the ship.
Though slippery the party is able to carefully and slowly make their way across the thick fungus ropes to the deck of the ship.
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As you get your feet back under you as you reach the fungus and mold covered deck of the Nightvoice you hear a low rumble and the sound of feet shambling up from the galley below. Looking over toward the stairwell, you see small, green, spear-wielding plant creatures, similar to the creatures you faced on the island before, coming up from below.
Initiative Order:
Adara
Gelik
?
Dereje
Estietre
?
Hana
Lawdrak and Sharpmaw
Estietre slips past Gelik "Here we go...", and positions closer to the other side of the ship. She raises a finger toward the visible foe, murmurs a phrase, and fires a thin icy bolt.
Unsurprised by the attack, the oracle's face appears set with determination. Adara raises her hands and calls out a chant towards the powerful sun. A beam of sunlight suddenly coalesces visibly as if connecting the suli's hand to the fiery orb in the sky.
Adara lowers her gaze, her eyes full of fire, and touches the katana Hana carries with a light finger. The blade begins to glow and suddenly bursts into fire. Despite any initial shock or concern, Hana quickly understands the fire causes her no injury.
SUN METAL
School transmutation [fire]; Level cleric 1, paladin 1, ranger 1
Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V, S
Range touch
Target one melee weapon
Duration 1 round/level (see text)
Saving Throw Fortitude negates (object); Spell Resistance yes (object)The target weapon ignites into flame that does not hurt the weapon or the wielder, but damages those hit by the weapon. When the weapon's wielder hits with this weapon, it deals an additional 1d4 points of fire damage. This damage is not multiplied in the case of a critical hit. This effect immediately ends if the weapon is submerged in water. This effect does not stack with the flaming or flaming burst weapon special ability or any other effect that grants the weapon extra fire damage. It does not function on weapons with the frost or icy burst weapon special ability or any other effect that grants a weapon extra cold damage.
Dereje whips out his pistol and loads it, ramming a lead ball and a charge of black powder down its barrel. He takes a one step forward, takes aim, and then pulls the trigger. Unfortunately, despite the comforting familiarity of the motions, the shot is a clear miss.
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Vegeypygmies pour out of the stairwell following Dereje's ill aimed shot. Each carries a long spear as they spread out to attack the invaders to their homes, with two of the plant creatures landing successful strikes against Estietre and Hana.
Just behind the swarm of vegepygmies, a larger, grayish plant creature makes its way up the stairs. It too carries a long spear.
- potential crit!
vs. FF AC
- no
Initiative Order:
Adara
Gelik
Dereje
Estietre
Vegypygmies + Boss
Hana
Lawdrak and Sharpmaw
Hana flinches slightly as one of the creatures rushes her and attacks before she has her sword in hand. She whips the katana from its scabbard and lashes it upward at the offending vegepygmy, with fire trailing from the blade.
Lawdrak casts magic fang on Sharpmaw, gives the attack command, and moves toward the green enemies.
Lawdrak barks a harsh, reptilian command, pointing at the plant-people. Sharpmaw, remembering the taste, shoots his human a look of deep disgust, but rushes forward, nearly barrelling into Adara to avoid the spears, and bites at the first one in his reach.
(Going through Adara's square, I think he can avoid AoO's by all but #2, whom he will bite.)
Adara steps to the side and continues channeling the sun's power. A torrent of flame blasts from her outstretched hand somehow missing all of her allies to burn two of the plantfolk.
Dereje frowns at his shoddy fortune, but quickly loads another shot. He takes aim and fires at the nearest vegepygmy, but only manages to disappoint himself once more; in his attempt to keep Mizu out of his line of fire, he ends up missing the small plant creature completely.
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Flames rush over two of the vegypygmies, once the flames cease to rush from Adara's hand all that remains are a pair of burnt out husks where the plant creatures once stood.
Dereje reload and fires again, but again misses wildly...thinking perhaps the latest batch of ammunition he crafted is flawed.
In purely uncharacteristic fashion, Gelik makes his way up toward the front line, next to Hana, while he continues his inspirational song. Perhaps it is just the thought of claiming from the Nightvoice what will put him back in the Pathfinder Society's good graces, but the bard hacks away at the plant creature before him, cutting it down.
(inspire)
(inspire)
Estietre steps away a few feet, and levels her finger toward the remaining foe. She fires another icy bolt.
Hana maneuvers her way across the slippery deck, apparently without any trouble at all, and dives past the spear of the gray fungus creature to slash at it with her katana.
Her ducking and weaving seem to give her a poor position and she never manages to secure a good opening.
The young druid circles around Mum's other side, leveling his own spear at the grey creature, and lunges.
Trailing his human, Sharpmaw sees an opening while the creature is dodging Hana's stroke, and snaps at the back of its legs.
Wincing from pain as she moves, Estietre backs up to the mast. She works her fingers - palm up, until a ball of mud materializes. She then hurls it toward the grey plant creature.
Adara draws a javelin and hurls it at the monstrous plant.
Wearing a frustrated scowl, Dereje reloads his pistol once more and steps in front of Gelik. Once again he takes aim, taking care not to put Mizu or Sharpmaw into his line of fire - it was harder than it looked.
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Dereje blasts a hole in the creature, finally adjusting to this newest batch of ammunition.
Gelik moves over, while continuing his song, and slashes at the gray plant creature, hacking through a significant portion of the creature.
The creature steps away and stabs at Gelik with its spear, but misses.
Hana steps up at the creature and slashes again with a fast cut of her katana!
Wiffff!
Lawdrak steps in and stabs.
...and Sharpmaw follows, biting.
Sharpmaw steps back, hissing and spitting out chunks of plant-creature, eventually rolling on to her side and picking at her oversized teeth with one long toe-claw.
"Disgusting creatures," Adara says with a twist of her lips. Eyeing the fungus coating the Nightvoice, the suli gestures to the portal leading to the ghost ship's cabins and hold.
"I cannot imagine the air will be very healthy down there. We should take precautions."
Even as she speaks, Adara draws her veil across her features as well as her once elegant scarf over her nose and mouth.
She notices Hana once again attempting to remain stoic with her pain. She signals to the paladin Dereje.
"Would you be willing to lend her your power? I would like to conserve my own in case more offensive requirements are necessary if you believe holy Abadar would allow you to share."
"Of course," Dereje says as he holsters his pistol, feeling more satisfied with himself now that he actually managed to hit something. Nodding to the samurai-ko, he reaches out and lightly touches her shoulder. Seeing that Mum is similarly injured, he offers the same power to her.
Under his breath he murmurs something along the lines of "Payment for services rendered."
"I can help as well, if anyone is in need, but I'm fairly limited."
[ooc]I have 2 CLWs prepared.[/occ]
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Following your preparations, you head down into the hold of the Nightvoice. The Nightvoice’s cargo hold is a hideous scene—the skeletal remains of the ship’s crew lie enshrined here. In all there are 19 bodies here, each consisting of a mound of bones caked over with mold; each sits amid a small circle of personal objects, teeth, coins, bits of jewelry, and other objects that the crewmember valued in life.
The vegepygmies honor these bodies as their “birth corpses” in a crude form of ancestor worship. While many of the objects scattered around the skeletons have long since rotted or rusted away, a search of the hold reveals a total of 432 cp, 284 sp, 123 gp, and some jewelry amid the bones, along with a pair of bracers and wand that radiate magic.
Continuing to search the remains of the ship, you enter what remains of the captain's cabin. Search thoroughly, you eventually find a moldy ship’s log. The pages are badly damaged by mold.
Mum smiles and nods in appreciation.
Estietre takes some time with the wand and bracers. She tsks and frowns... "Their functions are beyond my understanding. Not sure what they might be."
"Perhaps I'll have more luck with the journal. I'll try to clean it up a bit if I can.. regardless I'll do my best to decipher what's written within these moldy pages."
Adara gives the jewelry a critical glance.
But her cursory examination reveals little.
Adara raises a finger which begins to glow slightly as if with sunlight. She moves it above the surface of the journal to make sure it's moldy pages do not contain anything poisonous.
Then whispers more prayers to Sarenrae and her whole hand takes on the glow. If there is enough of the journal left, her new spell may restore it allowing their research to be improved.
Dereje grimaces as he steps lightly through the corpses, collecting any valuables that catch his eye. Sorting them out from all of the teeth and bones proves to be more difficult than expected, muddling his attempt to discern their exact worth. He keeps them packed away for the time being; it was not as though figuring out how wealthy they were going to become was a priority.
"That log might well have the answers Gelik seeks," Dereje nods in agreement, looking to the gnome. He then looks back to the corpses with a frown. "Though, I think it is already abundantly clear that they won't be pleasant ones."
Hana slowly sheathes her katana and stands watch as the magicians do their business.
"A wand of mirror images...but the bracers are beyond me. Not many charges left, though. Five, maybe." He offers the stick to Mum.
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Adara attempts to magically mend the journal, and the spell does help a bit, but most of the damage is physical mold attached to the pages.
Gelik approaches the book. "This...this can get me back in the good graces of the Society." Turning his attention specifically to Mum, he says, "We must be careful with the journal, but if we work together we may be able to piece together what exactly happened to the Nightvoice and her crew."
Lawdrak pokes around, looking at the dead vegepygmy leader and the hold of the ship, trying to determine the source of the infestation, and if it is indeed here.
"Should we rest before we move to tackle whatever evil awaits on the small island to the north? Aside from our own previous investigation, Aycenia confirmed we should be alert for the source of this infection between this ship and there."
"I feel reasonably confident. We can rest if anyone else need it, but I wouldn't wait here on this rotting hulk. Or we can try to hunt down the source and end it immediately. Either one is fine with me," says Hana.
** spoiler omitted **
Lawdrak will share his conclusions
"Getting across that fungus will be a chore... and Sharpmaw was not able to join us the last time, if I remember correctly," Dereje remarks, looking to the dinosaur. "Still, I believe we are in a reasonable enough condition to handle whatever might lurk in the cave."
He then looks to Gelik, looking slightly concerned. "Will you be joining us still? We could escort you back to camp, if you would rather start working on deciphering that book."
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Gelik shakes his head. "No need to escort me back to camp, I'll go with you." He lets out a small unsure laugh, "Even if this journal gets me back in the good graces of the Pathfinders, I still need to get off this damned island first. If we can complete Aycenia's task, just maybe that gets us closer to that goal."
"Certainly, her help aids us in having a secure campsite. Once we deal with the fungus and the Thrunefangs, it seems we will have the island in some semblance of safety," says Hana.