Sunreturn takes the rope and wraps it around his waist, and sticks the hammer and pitons on it.
"They might be useful."[b], he muses out loud.
[b]"How about we carry on?"
"No big. That is something any good healer in my home can do."
Lenna shrugs as she puts her wand away and let the symbol with the needle string together to her neck falls back to the usual level. She looks at the direction that the kobolds previously run off too as Mira questions the identity of the perpetrators.
Lenna recalls that Kobolds are known to live in the northern parts of Andoran typically in smaller bands. She also remembers that Kobolds normally flee if they feel outmatched instead of standing their ground and fighting to the last drop.
She shrugs at Mira's question.
"Dunno. Maybe they are the lackeys of the big bad that runs this place. Either way, we can go our way or follow the direction they ran off to. Maybe it will lead us to their lair or somewhere exciting like a waterfall."
Lenna takes her place behind Zoltan again.
"So if we are done here, where to?"
Mira frowns down at the corpses with the dark sheen, looking between them and their ordinary companion. "See how those scales look all oily? Kind of reminds me of those trees we saw. If this is part of the curse, could mean we're getting closer. I say we continue." She whistles to Liz, who emerges from her hiding place beyond the riverbank, and they take their place at the lead.
"I agree. We should continue. The sooner the curse is lifted, the better things will be."
Zoltan verifies that everyone will live, and then takes a look at the wood carving.
This is a rough wooden holy symbol of Gaknulak, the kobolds deity of traps and stealth. He teaches the Kobolds that traps and ambushes are the only way to level the playing ground against other races.
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"It is an obscure item, known only to a few great... um, what's that Sun? Of course, of course... that's what I was just about to say!"
"Is everyone ok? Any broken bones?"
Lenna's cheeks puff into a cute annoyed face at Zoltan's remark.
"Yeah."
Lenna eyes close and she gives a normal smile at first. Then, her face morphs. Her mouth line opens to a grin. Her eyebrows slant. Both of her eyes open but only one is whole while the other is half-lid. Their pupils dart to the side where Zoltan is.
"Riggggght..."
She points to herself.
"It is ten years too earlier to think you can fool me, Zozo. You're like an open book to me. If you are going to sell your wishmaking services, you are going to have to practice making our face more believable. We can practice them on the way."
Lenna looks at the dead corpse of the dinosaurs and then back to him.
"After we get rid of the curse from this forest."
Then, her face morph back to her cheery self and puffing her chest in pride.
"Broken bones? I think everyone is fine. I made sure to patch everyone to perfect condition. You can't get much better healing from anything other than my healery hands."
She looks at Mira.
"Lead the way, Mimi."
Sunreturn slowly raises a petal eyebrow at the sight of Lenna's face but does not openly comment, before walking on after the party.
You move along, following the bend of the river. The river bank grows steeper and steeper and you find yourselves walking higher and higher above the water level. The river bends to the left for a while, leading you to believe that the lighter-scaled kobolds who fled may have taken a shorter route to wherever you are going. You continue moving through the forest and reach an area with a dozen or so shrubs, which you haven't seen yet in the forest. Up ahead, you can see there is a clearing but you can't quite make out anything in the clearing from here.
Lenna squints and keeps her ears peeled for any details in the clearing.
Sunreturn keeps an eye out for kobolds.
You don't see any Kobolds right here but you don't have a good view of the clearing without moving closer to the edge of it.
"No kobolds in sight here. Let us move closer. I hope they learned their lesson earlier. If not, we will teach them another."
Zoltan bursts into a heartfelt laugh at Lenna's observations. "Yes, yes... I should know better than to try my tricks on you!"
As they approach the clearing, Zoltan says, to no one in particular, "What do you see? Do you suspect a trap?"
As you move forward, you see sharpened wooden stakes with 15 Kobolds lined up behind them lining the path to a stone walkway that leads down the cliffside. The Kobolds look prepared to fight and you see some of the Kobolds who fled earlier among them. In the middle of the Kobold ranks, you see a huge quadruped wearing heavy barding. The nearest Kobold is about 80 feet away across the clearing and they don't seem to have spotted you yet.
It is a triceratops. It's most dangerous when charging.
It's fortitude is astounding and it's reflexes are significant. It's strength of will, however, is nothing particularly impressive.
Lenna eyes roll up as her head slants upwards after seeing the quadruple creature.
Mira advances alongside the others, and her eyes widen at the sight of the defenses. "Looks like another fight," she whispers, not even trying to supress her grin. "So, what's the plan?"
She squints forward, trying to make out how many of these new opponents have that dark luster.
Mira picks out 8 dark-lustered Kobolds as well as the deep sheen on the great beast's scales.
Sunreturn looks at the beast and looks at Lenna and then back to the beast, and finally to the party again.
"Try not to get charged by the dinosaur."
A longspear grows from nowhere and into his hands.
"Yeah. It's a triceratops. Don't let it ram you with its horns when it charges. It hurts."
Lenna sniffs.
"Speaking of dinosaurs, where do they get all of them? I don't believe they can breed this much unless it's an Andoran region or forest exclusive thing. This curse shouldn't be able to brought them together. They must have a druid or something."
Zoltan activates his levitation boots, and prepares to float up.
"If anyone would like to go head to head with that beast, I can double your size and give you the strength of a bull! Just make a wish, and I will grant it."
Lenna claps her hand.
"Well, let's make a plan first. Going in there aggressive is one way of getting us all killed. See that dino over there? Knowing how a dino react to another dino makes it easier to control where it will move and we got the tools. How about this? Zozo..."
She pauses and turns to Zoltan.
"...will make an image of a rampaging dino and move it away from those reptiles."
Lenna points to herself.
"I will make it's stomping and angry sounds sound real."
The halfling then looks at Mira and Sunreturn.
"While the dino is chasing our make believe pet, you two, will clean up many of those cheap slingers and then close in on the dino. I will try and buy you time and keep it away with this scroll until you can clean them up."
Lenna rummages from her haversack and unravels a summon monster II scroll.
"At worst, it will distract it for a really short while but it is not really that short that you don't have enough time to take out a lot of them unless they run away again."
She puts the scroll to one side and takes out another scroll.
"If that doesn't work for you, I still got Plan B and C. Plan B is even simpler. It involves..."
Lenna holds the scroll up.
"Me disappearing and close in to use this scroll to create a cloud to scatter their numbers and confuse them for a bit while we take them down. Don't ask me about Plan C. Basically, same as Plan B at first for the disappearing and the moving but I will try to convince the dino to our side when I get close. It is a guarantee no-no from me. Too risky. No way I am going to talk to a cursed dino who will skewer me unless you can stop it from moving."
You spot a dark-scaled kobold riding on top of the triceratops. He has some sort of pack strapped in front of him. You think that, if you want to get closer to the kobolds, you will have to be somewhat stealthy.
Sunreturn listens to and watches Lenna.
He then replies.
"I think your plan is clever. Have the illusion come from the opposite side, or maybe a little off. And I can walk *through* the trees, so the kobolds will not be looking where I come from."
"Zoltan, if you made Mira and I larger and stronger, we could smash the kobolds that much quicker. I have some magic of my own to give too."
Mira shifts around awkwardly as Lenna asks about dinosaur breeders, as though she knows something she'd rather not say.
When they get to the plan, though, Mira nods enthusiastically. "Nice! Once I transform, I should be able to jump those spikes, no problem, and-" Liz nudges her foot, and she looks down. "Oh... oh! Really?" Another nudge. "My kind of crazy. I think Liz here is volunteering to serve as a backup distraction, if that illusion of yours doesn't work. She can grow up to my size to catch the beast's attention, and she's a pretty fast runner." Liz stands proud with a fierce look in her eye.
"Anyway, you were talking about making us stronger? Well, right now I wish I could take on the world."
"I almost forgot that we have Lizzie and the fact that she is a dino, too. Sure, she can help but I need to hitch a ride from her and have her drop me off somewhere into position where I can enhance our imaginary pet and keep track of it. My spell is short range and I walk really slowly because of these trees and brambles. Also, I can help Lizzie escape if she runs into a dead end."
Lenna picks up the other scroll that she left lying.
At Lenna's request, Liz seems to stand even taller - and in fact she does, because she starts to grow. The minuscule dinosaur becomes taller and longer until she's larger than a wolf, and she crouches down to let Lenna climb up.
"Sounds good," Mira replies, picking at her teeth with a piece of copper wire. "I've got a spell of my own," she adds in a whisper that suddenly seems very close to your ear, "that should help us keep in touch."
Sunreturn gets to work on the list of spells that the party had agreed on. His spear and skin both grow harder, and the air around the party grows lighter.
Zoltan bows, and starts casting spells. First bull's strength on both Mira and Sunreturn, and then using his daily enlarge on Sunreturn.
"And remember, Mira, if you wish it, I can provide you a shield in combat, taking some of the heat off of you and direct it to myself. Just shout if you are in trouble."
The Kobolds hear you casting spells and the one on the triceratops starts shouting and pointing at you. They begin drawing and readying their slings.
[ooc]Obscuring mist will buy you one extra round.[/ooc
Lenna attempts to read the scroll to manifest a cloudy mist before the kobolds notice them.
Seeing Lenna draw her scroll, Mira lends her a burst of insight. Then Mira's limbs extend once more.