Birth corpses? They need us for birth corpses!
Sneek looks at the plant men in disgust. Time to do some gardening and trim those hedges!
Seeing Astra in distress once again Sneek steps beside her to attack the pygmie who is attacking her with his sword.
Can I hit them where it hurts the most? Are the vulnerable to my special attacks? Sneek asks Astra while seeing bits of crumpet oozing down her chin.
Astra recoils from the weedwhip as it springs into action, and manages to stumble back enough so that it only grazes her for 1 hp of damage. She grimaces and steels herself, leaping back into the fray with the stun baton crackling with blue lightning as she tries to strike the remaining vegepygmy. She tries to take a five foot step to put herself in a flanking position with Sneek so that the vegepygmy is between them.
Elizabeth blasts the plant with her crossbow. It stabs into the blue bulb of its body. Light green liquid spurts from the wound.
Sneek gains some presence, moves by the vegepygmy (and is not flanking) and stabs at it with his rapier. The small plant man turns around and grins. It says something in grunts and noises.
Astra makes another spectacular arc with her zapper wand, missing the vegepygmy as she feels the room spin slightly.
Argug turns his attention to the weedwhip. He charges at the blue creature and swings his greataxe.
The weedwhip shifts its tentacles slightly to avoid being hit.
The vegepygmy drops its longspear and tries to claw at Astra, who it thinks would make a much better birth corpse than Sneek.
Shifting closer to Astra, the weedwhip swings a single tentacle at Astra.
Astra will take a second five foot step if necessary to get into flanking position on the other side of the vegepygmy.
"Finally! Die!"
HP 20/20
AC 11/11/10
Effects:
Hand of Apprentice:7/7
Liz reloads and shoots any Vegepygmy in range or the plant again
Astra saps the vegepygmy with her zapper wand knocking it unconscious. Then the lightning from the wand electrocutes the creature to death. Liz's bolt stabs into the plant again. Light green ichor bleeds from the weedwhip, its tendrils flop to the ground.
Astra wheezes and coughs, trying to get the vomit from her face and cheeks. She takes swigs from her waterskin and spits out, coughing some more. "Ugh...the *smell*" she manages to say weakly, cupping a scarf against her face after she's washed up, to filter out the stench of the plant growth. Reluctantly, she starts to examine the four corpses in the room, trying to determine if they were indeed infected by russet mold and used to incubate vegepygmies, and also trying to find out if this is the Brighites or Khonnir's party.
We were just way too close to nature. Give me a nice warm lab anyday.
"Nature is the world's biggest and best laboratory", Astra smiles a little as she digs through the molded over remains and plant growth all over the floor. "This is the party of Brigh", she reports, digging out some holy symbols of the deity and showing them off to demonstrate. "Like Gerrol, they had all been infected by russet mold... Unfortunately for them, we weren't present to disinfect their bodies, and they gave birth to these vegepygmies." The Kellid woman puts her hands in one of the burst open ribcages and pulls it apart a little, demonstrating a vegepygmy's exit route. She looks disturbingly excited with her hands digging into the rotted mass. "They would have been long dead by the time their chests ruptured. The fungal mass incubating in their chests would have caused a massive heart attack as cause of death, and they would have also found it exceedingly difficult to breathe." Astra picks up one of the bones that the creatures used as weapons -- a leg bone -- tapping it against the rotted and deboned mass that used to be one of the Brighites' leg. "See how it's missing this bone? The vegepygmies would have seen their incubators as little more than sources of tools, as evidenced by their crudely fashioning these bones into weapons." She looks thoughtful. "No ancestral worship tendency. Interesting."
During her examination, she removes a number of items and puts them in a pile at one of the less overgrown corners of the room. In total, she piles up 60gp, four holy symbols, four masterwork light hammers, a suit of masterwork chainmail, three potions and one ring, of which she says, "This one has a magical aura."
Liz curls her lips at the announcement that the remains are of the Brigh worshipers. Pfui. She then casts Detect Magic over the potions and ring.
"Who is hurt? And any objections to my putting in the chain mail and taking a hammer? A bludgeoning weapon can be useful."
Astra does not offer any objections.
The potions are potions of cure moderate wounds. Elizabeth cannot discern what magic is surrounding the ring.
There are no rooms in this big room.
I have no objections to Chakos taking the chainmail and hammer and I feel fine. I think Astra was hurt though.
Astra will take a look at the ring, too.
"I'll be fine...once we get out of this stench", she wrinkles her nose.
It is a ring of protection +1.
"It is a ring of protection...it will shield one against attacks. I suggest Chakos takes it, as of us, he is the one most often in combat. Speaking of which...it might have been possible to communicate with the vegepygmies..." Astra squints a little at the drow.
Liz sighs. Well no sense crying over spilt milk. From what Sneek said, they wanted to use us as fertilizer
"Shall I always wait until instructed to attack?"
I believe holding back until we are sure it will be a hostile situation is wise, we did just barge in on them.
Liz looks around for any other exits.
"Gotcha"
"Shall I always wait until instructed to attack?"
"Unless attacked first, obviously", Astra points out a bit autistically, having to account for every possibility *just in case* so there won't be a misunderstanding...
Magical ring? Protection? Sneek wants one also! Sneek starts searching the room for more clues/items.
Astra and Liz. Can you teach me the weird language you all use?
But of course. Liz lets out a string of sounds that sound like a cat being strangled .That means 'Hello.'
Sneek tries to make the same sound. He puts one hand on his throat, covering his scar. He looks in pain. Learning a new language, especially a guttural one like yours, makes my throat hurt, irritates my scar. No worries, will be ok once I practice more. He awkwardly smiles at Liz.
"Sneek is welcome to the ring you know."
Sneek searches the room and finds broken bones, fungus and machinery parts that are clearly of no use. Scattered about the room are rotten seeds and rusted gardening tools.
Where is the garden? I found some rusted gardening equipment, but I haven’t seen a garden.
Sneek leaves the room and searches for any tracks.
Umm..I think they were cultivating birth corpses like those Brighites.
After searching for tracks in the hallway, Sneek listens at the door to the east.
Sneek sees small footprints on the ground moving in all directions, but keeping in this general vicinity. You believe they are vegepygmy tracks. Sneeks hears more guttural Undercommon through the door.
Taking a few steps away from the door, Sneek turns to the others I hear more pygmy talking while pointing at the eastern door. Looking for more birth corpses.
He takes out both his short swords, ready for action.
So do we want to fight them? Liz take sout her crossbow.
"We'll need to at least enter the room to know whether Khonnir's party is there or not."
You open the door. Behind it is a hallway with two single doors to the north and south, double doors to the southeast and double doors to the northeast.
North
"Onward!"
This room reeks of stagnant water and decaying vegetation. A long trough of water runs along the walls of this room; a layer of brown scum and algae grows on the water's surface and on the walls. A single workstation sits in the middle of the room connected to a large machine made of tubes and bubbling tanks of water.
You see two vegepygmies looking at their vegepygmy leader. He holds a glowing light hammer. He grunts in Undercommon.
The other vegepygmies begin to shout and yell.
1. Chakos, Sneek
2. Vegepygmies
3. Astra, Liz, Argug
"So, let me know," Chakos says glancing at the ladies.
I'll delay.
Unfortunately, I don't know what it is saying.
"Me neither. Sneek?"
Attack! We are the birth corpses they were looking for. Me and Chakos take the leader, rest take the others. Sneek charges the leader with swords in hand.
I'll charge the leader with Sneek. With the chainmail my AC is 1 better, not sure who ended with the ring. Charging will drop it of course.
Power attack:
Sneek cuts into the vegepygmy leader with his short sword, cutting off a small chunk of green plant-fungus. It snarls.
The plant leader swings his glowing light hammer at Sneek, then swings its green claws at the ratfolk.
The glowing hammer strikes Sneek in the stomach. He can feel a rib being cracked. Then a small claw cuts the rat across the cheek. Vrilledt grins.
The two vegepygmies move to block the door, leaving Sneek alone with Vrilledt, the plant-man leader. One pokes at Chakos with his longspear, the other uses its claw instead.
The door to the south bursts open and five more vegepygmies enter the narrow hallway.
[ooc]Argug, Liz, Chakos and Astra's turn. The veggie people are near Astra and Liz. I had Argug guarding the rear.
In which case, Life Link gives me 5 damage and heals Sneek for 5, and I will LOH myself.
Argug charges at the vegepygmies near Liz and Astra, blocking them off from the intruders. He swings his greataxe in a crazy arc, nearly cutting into the wall.
He chops the vegepygmy in half and hurls its body a few feet away from its lower half.
Quick stats
HP 20/20
AC 11/11/10
Effects:
Hand of Apprentice:7/7
Liz casts Glitterdust on the 4 remaining Pygmys that attacked them, makign sure not to get her friends.
DC 16 in a 10' burst or be blinded and outlined in glowing dust
Hurting from the hammer to the chest Sneek goes all out on the pygmy leader.
But the blow had done more than hurt him physically as his aim was completely off on both his attacks. Breathing heavily he takes a step back towards the others.
