Bastien will use his attack of opportunity.
Targeting the fleeing enemy Tarragon shoots his crossbow again and then reloads it.
Jordy reloads and shoots at the fleeing fish.
Dio manages to stab his fish but the others all fail to connect on the magically hastened fish.
The fish attacks Dio
The badly wounded one flees getting out of range. (over 200 feet away no longer visible underwater)
Your go again.
Bastien moves toward the other in flanking position and stabs again.
"Gods damn you, devil-fish!" Diomedes stabs at the fish repeatedly with his dagger, desperately trying to finish it off.
Deranthil fires agian and loads again.
Dio and Derantil manage to finish off the second fish.
Diomedes summons a bit of healing energy into his hand.
Deranthil recovers the dead fish. Perhaps this is good for something? he asks the group.
Jordy shrugs. "We can see how it tastes. Let's go let the captain know we've fixed the problem with the ship."
You head back to the ship and the crew loads up and you return to the original landing site. The crew disembarks and everyone goes out to explore and see in what condition the settlement is.
"Beware the church, folks. We need to make sure the clerics give it a proper blessing first." Diomedes keeps an eye on the folks as they move around. He's still a bit rattled from their earlier exploration of the site.
Bastien looks around after leaving the water. "That was a strange, but not unpleasant experience!"
Shrugging and shaking the water from his body he looks at the others.
"Well what shall we do now?"
Jordy nods at Diomedes and adds to his warning. "We've marked the buildings that you shouldn't go in. Watch out for danger signs."
He turns to Bastien. "There's still the infested farmland north of the wall. We should check with the head of the expedition to see if they have anything specific they want us to do. Beyond that, I think we should explore the area around the settlement to make sure there aren't any other hidden dangers."
You clean the place up as best you can and barricade the church for now. The colonist get to work making this place into their home.
A few still grumble and claim that it would be best to leave this place but they continue to work for the moment.
The next morning Ramona come to see you.
"A colonist was attacked last night. He claims something tried to choke him in his sleep. He had a weapon under his pillow and defended himself and whatever it was ran away. His description of the attacker seems to match that creature you killed in the house down by the farm. A choker I believe it is called. I'm worried there may be more of them."
Diomedes rubs his chin. "If there's a nest, we need to find it, and take it out. Perhaps that would explain where some of the original colonists went. Maybe even why there was paranoia. They could have turned against each other if they never found out who was killing them at night and everyone blames everyone else."
That does not explain enough. Somehow one or more of these creatures seems to have been in among the colonists; one of them and even trusted. No simple choaker can accomplish that.
Jordy shrugs. "Which house is this colonist in? We should go check it out."
"He was staying in one of the tents (A2)"
"We should look around and see if we can find where they're coming from. Is there anywhere in the settlement we haven't thoroughly searched?"
You ask around and investigate and find that the man who was attacked was in the last tent at the end the one closest to the house A18 were you fought the other chocker.
You look around for tracks and find track coming from the north-east. There is a mountain in that direction and chokers are known to live in underground caves.
Bastien leads the others toward the mountains, hoping to find the caves!
As alert as he can manage Deranthil follows along. Its hot. No one told me it was gonna be hot.
Diomedes claps Derathil on the back with a laugh. "But the humidity does wonders for your hair," he says with a smile.
Jordy laughs as they walk along. "It's not that bad. Hot is the Shackles in Arodus. This is just... warm."
Any good trackers in the group?
Searching around you find tracks that look like the creature you are looking for it must have come down from the mountain last night and you see some older tracks as well this was not the first time.
You follow the trail to the entrance of a large cavern in the hillside.
Diomedes will cast light on Bastien's shield (or whatever other object people are ok having light cast on. We just want to be able to see).
Bastien nods in agreement and slowly enters the cave.
Jordy hangs back, readying his crossbow to shoot.
The passage splits into two tunnels left and right. The faint dripping of water into small pools echoes softly down the cave tunnels. The one on the left seems to go down deeper and the one on the right seems to go into a large open area.
You notice small crystals in the walls of the caverns here.
Oh, pretty crystals. Deranthil moves to check them out.
These gems themselves are not super valuable but they could be worth some money. Their presence however means it's also possible for other more valuable gems to be in the area. If secured this cavern could become a valuable mine.
"Remember to watch the walls and ceilings," Diomedes says. With his weapon raised, he follows the others inside.
Deranthil notes the discovery and shares it with the others.
Bastien nods in favor and leads deeper into the caves!
"Could be a valuable export right there. That's a good find." As they continue deeper into the caves, Jordy keeps his crossbow at the ready.
Digging a few samples from the wall with his dagger Deranthil pockets the stones and rejoins the group.
So large open area or passage downwards? It sounds like you want to go deeper just asking to be sure.
Bastien leads the group further down!