"Are you unharmed?" - Heldar questions his companions - "What happened in there?"
Javi rolls up onto his feet , taking a few moments to dust off his raggedy clothes with a comical level of thoroughness before he looks back through the opening. ”Unharmed,” he responds, ”and only a little disappointed. I think we could still take that room.”
"Not that I don't appreciate the help. If that thing got ahold of me, it likely wouldn't have been much fun." He looks over at Shaggar, ”As I said, you were right about a counterweight, but it’s the floor itself. Seems the floor pivots on a line that runs under the invisible wall. Our hostess seemed to be waiting for that big cat-headed construct to smash us … which means there’s a way of getting past the wall. I was going to see how it did it, then slip past and see if I could use her little wall switch to re-open this door, possibly block out cat-head, and possibly still give us access to her royal butt-achin' highness.”
He shrugs, ”As it stands, Im guessing we could figure a way to deal with that room if we can manage not to be separated.” He stoops a bit to look under the gap under the door, ”And until we can raise the door further or cat-head in there reshuffles the weights on the floor, we’ll just have to wait.”
"In all likelihood, every chamber within the tomb presents a dangerous challenge. Certainly those which contain any important artifacts. By all means, if we can arrive at a good solution for this room, let's go back in. At least now we can think about it in relative safety."
"Any ideas?"
Shaggar pants, trying to bleed off the heat from his strenuous efforts. He looks tiredly at Javi and hitches a clawed thumb in the direction of the room. "Don't stop because of me... I was just lifting half a ton of stone to get you out." He looks at the propped open door, trying to understand the nature of the trap. "I suppose we could try to lift the block more then move the shims up. If our strength doesn't fail, perhaps we could get it to open almost fully." He pulls at his ear, "But I fail to understand this trap. How must the weights be shifted and do we wish to go up or down?"
Javi looks to Shaggar, ”Forgive me. I can get caught up in the challenge, sometimes. I do appreciate you keeping my skinny butt from becoming so much pulpified halfling.” He takes a moment to revisualize his few moments of observing the different mechanisms at play in the room before detailing what he can to the group.
Javi finishes outlining everything and looks up with a shrug, ”At this point, though … do we have the tools to destroy this door and then we can take the mosaic room, the construct, and Ankana in a more relaxed timeframe … as Lyrian suggested?”
"So perhaps Javi and I can set about pinning the floor in place while the three of you engage the construct?" says Lyrian.
"And needless to say we all push forward to get off the trapped floor as soon as possible."
Rosalia puts Rook down (well, really, Rook squirms free). "Well, as I see it, we can keep trying things here, we could take the lift higher, we could take back to the floor we came in at and deal with that 'traitor' room, or... the shaft kept going further down, so there may be more rooms down yet, too."
Javi considers, then looks over at Heldar, Lyrian, and Rosalia. "I'm inclined to move on and try our hand at some this place's other tests. But if we leave this open, do we risk letting our hostess here out? Somehow the idea of leaving her free at our backs makes me cringe. If we can block her in, though..."
Shaggar stalks in front of the partially opened hatch. "It appears this door is hers to control. Perhaps we could jam it shut, but that stone monster may have the strength to open it. I see this river as having two directions - either we force the door now and fight this monster in its lair... or we go elsewhere and know the threat may stalk us later." The gnoll gives a broken tooth grin. "If they emerge from this trapped lair to seek us that plays to our strength, I think."
Javi nods along. ”Much as I love a challenge, I say we wait an hour. Out here. Quietly. Shaggar’s right … we may learn a thing or two about the mechanisms in there. Hells, we may luck into them coming out to us. If not, I say we shim it closed and move on. We can always come back later.”
He gets a mischievous gleam in his eye, ”Plus, nothing gets under a pretty girl’s skin like ignoring her.” He winks at Rosalia, ”Am I right?”
Shaggar joins Javi at the block along with Hatyah. He looks to Rosalia, "Be ready to slide in a shim if we manage to move this, sayyidah." At a nod the halfing, gnoll, and hyena try to wrench the block upwards.
Leaving Javi to spike the door open at the right moment, Lyrian grabs the door and attempts to help.
Grunting, Shaggar sets to work trying to heft the stone slab higher, but it's harder when he doesn't have the pumping adrenaline of knowing that two of his friends are trapped on the other side of the stone. Even with Lyrian and Javi's assistance, it's rough going with the dead weight. After a few struggled inches, Shaggar lets the slab settle back down onto the spikes that Lyrian drove in.
The section of floor you can see through the one foot gap appears to have stopped moving. It must be at least one foot thick to fully block that gap, however.
Rosalia frowns a bit. "Well... we could wait, like Javi says, but I have a few minutes left during which I can still fly. Part of me wants to try to see how far the elevator shaft goes up while that lasts."
After a mad, fruitless scrabble against the tomb's floor and stone door, Javi stands back up rubbing his lower back and knees. "It's a good use of the spell, but I hate to send you flying off into the darkness when we have no way of reaching you should you run into problems."
"Risk nothing Rosalia, please" - the Oracle smiles at her.
"Alright," Rosalia says, putting Rook down. "I'll go up and take a quick look, just to get an idea what might be up at the top, assuming I reach the top. Anyone coming to watch from the elevator shaft in case I plummet to my death?"
She only snifs at Heldar's well-meant warning. "We're Pathfinders."
Rosalia moves back down the hall to the elevator shaft...
Those of you who wind up staying at the jammed-open door: nothing seems to happen. The glimpse of the floor that you can see through the foot-high gap remains a solid and unmoving big ol' block of stone. You hear no noises from within the chamber.
Those of you who follow Rosalia: You watch her ascend into the pitch-black of the shaft ahead, and then you see a small light wink into being as she conjures magical illumination to let herself see. The light rises a bit, then stops moving.
The light starts descending again. In short order, Rosalia is flying back at your level, rubbing at her eyes irritably.
"Well, I found the next circled rune," she says shortly.
Javi grimaces, "Sorry about that, Rosalia. Anything else worth exploring up there? Or dead end?"
"How do you feel, Rosalia" asks Lyrian with concern.
"And what else did you see?"
"A little headachy," Rosalia answers Lyrian's question, "but otherwise alright.
"The shaft goes up another seventy feet and ends in a small landing with a single shut door. I didn't see anything dangerous, so... I cast a spell to detect magic," she says with a snort.
"They'd done an invisible arcane mark of one of the runes on the door there. Waiting for someone to use exactly my tactic," Rosalia says in tones of disgusted admiration, or admiring disgust, or something.
"Anyway, I didn't hear anything moving on the other side of the door up there. If we don't want to wait another hour for that platform to come back up, I could fly two knotted rope up there?"
"Climbing is not something I excel at, but with some assistance I believe I can make it" - Heldar nods in agreement - "But tell me Rosalia, what is the effect of this Arcane Mark?"
Shaggar pulls out his spider-silk rope and begins throwing climbing knots into it, silently agreeing with the idea of heading up sans elevator. "Who else carries rope? Even knotted, two lengths should be enough. Is there a landing of any sort sayyidah or must we defeat the door?"
"My grandmother could probably climb a knotted rope," Rosalia says dismissively. At Heldar's question, she hovers a few feet above the floor, clearly eager to head back up as quick as she can. Flying is exhilarating!
"Arcane mark is an apprentice's cheap trick," she says, also dismissively. "One of the first spells you learn-- you can stamp your personal rune or your name or whatever on your spellbook, or your door, or the face of somebody you don't like, although it fades on people. Stays forever on objects, though. Doesn't DO anything, it's just a way to leave a mark. You can make it be visible, or not. If it's invisible, it doesn't show up until, you know, someone does a spell to look for invisibility. Or to detect magic," she adds with dry sarcasm.
"Or, if you're a dick of a pharaoh, a cursed rune, apparently. Javi, I bet I could carry you up... and yeah, there's a landing."
Rosalia pulls out her own knotted rope, coiling it over one shoulder and preparing to take Javi up as well.
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The gnoll yips in amusement at Rosalia's assessment. "Hatyah also likes to make her presence known with an arcane mark. It seems wizards and hyenas are much the same." He glances over at the hyena who is sniffing at the juncture of a wall and floor behind them and angling to 'mark' her territory.
Javi holds up the (already knotted) 50 feet of silk rope (also already) tied around his waist. "How would this do?" He grins over at Rosalia, "And I can't think of anything so fun as a twilight flight with the Northern Delight."
He can't help but bust out laughing at his own rhyme. He wipes his eyes, recovering from the jest as he continues, "I'm assuming there's a place up there to secure the rope? I mean, I'm strong, but Shaggar looks like he weighs a ton."
The gnoll frowns and looks at his middle - poking it with a claw. "I've got weighty bones."
"I can help anchor him if I go first," suggests Lyrian. "I can put in a few pitons to help anchor the rope.
If no one disagrees, he does that very thing, his superstitiously avoiding even glancing at the door even though he knows he won't be able to see the invisible mark.
"Why don't I go, Lyrian? Cause Rosalia can actually carry me. The pitons are a good idea, though."
Rosalia makes a huff noise at Javi's designation of her, obviously trying to decide whether to be offended or not. She eyes Lyrian for a moment, judging his weight.
"Yes, I'll carry Javi up-- we can get pitons in, I think-- if we have trouble you can come up next to help us with the pitons. Then the rest of you can climb. Come on, Javi," she says, and half-crouches for the Wasp to climb on her back, like she were giving a kid a piggy-back ride.
Rosalia's a little wobbly when she takes off, but manages to zip up the shaft into the blackness.
As soon as they're out of range, Rosalia turns evil and drops Javi down the elevator shaft...!
No, kidding. Kidding. Though that would have been funny. Ahem, no, it's as Rosalia said, there's a small landing, ten feet by ten feet, and a single door beyond it. Javi sees no mark on the door, of course, as it is invisible.
Rosalia whistles twice like a hoot owl to signal the others to climb up. In short order the rope is pitoned on the landing above by Lyrian and Javi's fingers, and everyone is able to ascend, even Shaggar and Heldar-- a knotted rope is not a challenging climb, even for Heldar in his armor.
The landing is tight quarters, much like the lift itself had been. A single door stands before you. Neither Lyrian nor Javi detect any traps on it, other than their knowledge of the invisible rune, which, as long as people don't have ways to see invisibility, should be fairly safe.
Rosalia says, "This one is the rune associated with the Pharaoh of Numbers," with a gesture at the door and its invisible rune.
You're elbow to elbow with each other on a small landing next to the door. Who's opening the door, and are you doing anything else first?
Shaggar climbs up last, giving Hatyah a parting pat and some simple instructions. "Kill what comes. Flee if the fight looks bad."
Hatyah whines and sulks and stays put on the level where she is at...
After checking it over, Javi and Lyrian pronounce the door free of traps (aside from that rune). One of them gives it a nudge and it swings open as easily and silently as if it were on oiled hinges...
The room behind is not faced with the green veinstone that has covered most surfaces you have seen so far. Instead, the walls, floor, and ceiling all seem to be made, or at least surfaced, with sheets of glassy black obsidian. Heldar's light reflects in a glittering swath along the walls, shifting with every movement he makes.
The room contains three things of interest: the far wall is covered with more dense hieroglyphic script, though even a cursory glance reveals that every symbol you can see is actually a number, rather than a word.
In the center of the room is a large disc of hammered metal, facing the ceiling, supported on a small stand. The workmanship seems crude in comparison to the masterful pieces of artwork and statuary you have seen so far-- the disk seems to have been roughly beaten into shape, with dings and dents still visible. The disc is mildly concave, dipping in the center, and its color is a sort of dull gray-purple. It has a sheen to it as though it were oily.
Finally, there is a door to the north, and a door to the south, interruptions of green veinstone in the otherwise smooth, black, reflective surface of the walls and ceilings. Your own reflections, though blurry and fragmented, stare back at you from the walls.
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Javi gets to work as the team is getting in place in the small landing. He pulls his goggles back away from his eyes, holding his wayfinder up and peering into the room in front of him.
he moves quietly into the room, his soft boots making little noise as he makes a circuit of the strange, obsidian-wrapped room.
Javi waves the group into the room, making his way first to the northern door, then the southern … pressing his ear to both.
From the doorway, Javi glances around the room. He sees no traps, but he does notice something slightly odd after a few seconds: on the far wall, with all the hieroglyphics of numbers, the numbers are... changing. Every few seconds, one of the hundreds of symbols on the wall shifts and rearranges itself, changing the value of the numbers thus displayed.
(The symbols for numbers have not changed appreciably from Ancient Osiriani to modern Osiriani; if you can read the current form of the tongue, you can tell that these are numbers and you can read them.)
Javi steps into the room, intending to make a careful and quiet circuit of the wall. He doesn't get very far, though. He finds his feet veering inward into the large, shallow-curved disk, until he stands right next to it, peering down at the slightly-oily surface.
Javi stands there ... an uncharacteristically dull look on his downcast features.
Everyone sees Javi slowly draw his scimitar. Or perhaps he already had it drawn; either way he seems to be moving his hand to the blade.
Shaggar, Heldar, and Lyrian: Javi is standing before you, drawing his sword, and gazing fixedly at the disc. What would you like to do?
Shaggar watches the halfling with growing concern, fearing some strange witchery in the room. He looks at Heldar and Lyrian anxiously.
"Javi? Is there a threat?" - Heldar comments as his companion draws steel - "Do you see anything?"
Without understanding exactly what may be going on, Heldar casts a spell to detect magical auras, observing the disc in front of Javi.
Heldar detects that, yes, there is magic somewhere within a cone sixty feet in front of him. Of course, this cone also includes Javi, and Javi certainly has magical items upon his person. Heldar would need to focus longer, as per the rules for Detect Magic, to tell if the disc itself is also magical.
Lyrian, any actions?
Lyrian's brows arch. "Javi?" he says. When there's no response, the Pathfinder steps forward with a hand raised to shake Javi's shoulder.
...save that Lyrian's hand falls away limply to his side, and he too starts staring fixedly at the hammered metal disc.
Lyrian slowly draws his dagger...
Meanwhile, Javi presses the palm of his hand to the blade of his scimitar and opens a line of crimson along it-- and drips the blood into the shallow basin.
Rosalia hisses. "Okay, this is bad," she growls, and steps forward, grabbing Lyrian by the collar of his shirt and trying to haul him backwards out of the room.
She has no trouble dragging the barely-resisting man back out into the hallway. Lyrian blinks, and looks around dazedly. "...what was I doing?"
Heldar..... something disquieting. Your bond with Javi's life force doesn't seem to be able to do anything about the blood he just lost into the bowl.
Hackles up, the gnoll tries to grab the stupefied and likely suicidal halfling and drag him from the room
Shaggar steps in to grab Javi and feels... fine, really. He resolutely avoids looking at the disc (now with a bit of Javi's blood pooling down at the center of it) and grabs for the scruff of Javi's neck. Despite the fact that Javi is standing still and seems oblivious to his approach, Javi is still somehow able to avoid his grab. Thiefly habit, maybe. He doesn't like being collared. ...get it? :D
Ahem.
Javi, the pain is a dull, vague throb from your hand. You watch your blood collecting in the basin and think that it's not quite enough...
Lyrian and Heldar, you are free to act.