Voren describes what he sees to Aravashnial. He's amazed by the elf's knowledge, especially in the tale of the First Crusaders. 'Could there really be others down here like me?'
Those thoughts end, however, when he sees the monster come down from the ceiling. He can only stare as the tentacles wrap around him. He screams out before all turns black...
His vision returns as he begins breathing deeply. He opens his eyes to the sight of the monster still wrapped around him. He screams out. "Get it off of me! Get it off!" His eyes then suddenly glow a demonic red, a sudden scowl forming on his face, becoming closer looking to the demons that attacked yesterday. He hisses, "I curse you, creature. You shall suffer for this transgression. Now, I command you to release me!"
His vision returns as he begins breathing deeply. He opens his eyes to the sight of the monster still wrapped around him. He screams out. "Get it off of me! Get it off!" His eyes once again glow as a feeling of drowsiness affects the monster.
-------------
Initiative: Monsters | Jens | Flynn | Voren | Osric | Aurica | Reknar
Status
Reknar: actually an orc! (darkvision, +2 Str)
Voren: 4 damage (2/8)Darkmantle (green): 5 damage; unconscious (1 round)
Darkmantle (yellow): 6 damage
Flynn backs out from the darkness, holding his shield up in a mirror of the crusaders etched in stone behind him. He feels himself trapped in a bizarre bubble, the one illuminated spot between two bubbles of darkness.
Aurica shouts out a warning even as her fingers move on her bowstring, firing an arrow into the fleshy 'body' of the octopus-like creature. It flinches from the pain, a few of its beady red eyes turning her way and meeting her own.
... Strangely enough, Aurica senses fear from the shadow-cloaked beast, much more than the usual level of wariness one would expect out of a battling monster. It seems to be gathering up its tentacles not currently involved in grasping its new prey (i.e., Voren) and inching as far away from her as possible. Come to think of it--the other one that is busy trying to make a meal out of Reknar is doing much the same thing, wary eyes locked on her form. They don't appear to be as scared of your companions as they do of you, for some reason...
Reknar moves away in the darkness, drawing out his scale of Terendelev and summoning to mind a being he once fought during his days on the road--an orc, with hide as tough as leather. Only Aurica can see his physique bulking up and taking on a rather greenish colouration, at least until Reknar's own pupils widen--and suddenly, he can see perfectly in the shadows. Indeed, the first thing he spies is Jens charging in, uncaring of the darkness that envelops his form and slicing his sword through the fleshy webbing of the tentacled monster.
Osric stumbles into the darkness, silvery holy energy dancing across his fingertips, trusting on his goddesses' grace that he could find Voren. He feels the bizarre sensation of a cold and rubbery tentacle gently caressing his cheek as he bends down to administer the healing energies, returning Voren to his senses with a cough and splutter.
In the instant that Voren awakens, he realises that the enemy that looms before him is none other than a darkmantle! They are bizarre, squid-like subterranean predators that disguise themselves as stalactites and drop down onto their prey. As you've noticed up close and personally, their primary means of attack is to swoop down and grab up prey in their tentacles to drag back to their nest to consume. In the instance of a failed attack, they then typically swoop back up to the roof to try again.
The tiefling screams in fear, allowing his innate powers to wash over the darkmantle. Its eight red, glowing eyes blink slowly before the creature suddenly drops to the ground beside him, unconscious. But Voren knows well that it would not be long before it awoke once more...
Following Aurica's orders, Anevia grabs Horgus by the arm (he's already loudly wailing and blubbering about how he's gonna die... of course) and drags him back to the far wall where she herself can see. She grits her teeth, trying to ignore his tears and fires an arrow blindly into the darkness. It goes nowhere near hitting, of course - it sails harmlessly over Reknar's head.
Aravashnial does his best to stumble back, reaching out for the wall and following it along until he bumps into Flynn. "Wh-What is going on?!"
Voren's attacker slumbers away, but it is already halfway to stirring. Meanwhile, the other weakly attempts to wrap its tentacles around Jens' neck, but the attempt is easily pulled away from. The Ulfen man feels a strange gust of wind as the darkmantle pushes itself into the air. It ascends maybe halfway towards the roof of the cavern, but leaves itself open to counterattack from those who can see it!
" I'm not sure Aravashnial. I cannot see, but I hear sounds of combat. Somewhere in the darkness..."
Flynn tries to place himself between Aravashnial and the sounds of combat.
"Smart thinking, Reknar!" Aurica cries at his transformation. "Jens, you hit it, but it's flown up out of your reach now!"
Her eyes race over the battlefield as she runs forward, trying to figure out how best to give directions when half of them are still blind. Her voice comes from a closer position now.
"Horgus, Aravashnial-- stay put, let Flynn guard you! Flynn, they come from above! Voren, back away from that thing while it's grounded, and guide Osric to hit it 'fore it wakes and grabs you again! Osric, it's past Voren on the ground!"
She judges the conscious one, flying above them all, a bigger risk, and nocks and looses a second arrow its direction.
Osric hears Aurica's strong voice calling in the darkness. He draws his dagger and swipes at the place he felt the tentacles.
Heeding Aurica's suggestion, he moves back near Flynn. He calls out, "Everyone, these are darkmantles! They disguise themselves as stalactites and drop down on prey. Their main form of attack its to swoop and grapple. If they miss, they go back to the roof and try again." Passing Osric, he turns the inquisitor's body in the direction of his old spot and says, "Walk forward and the darkmantle will be to your right! Be quick and careful"
He calls out to Flynn. "I put one of them to sleep over their. The other is 15 feet in the air by Jens." Seeing the one in the air, Voren sees if he can put it to sleep as well. His eyes glow and from within his robes, Ayne glows as well.
Initiative: Monsters | Jens | Flynn | Voren | Osric | Aurica | Reknar
Status
Reknar: actually an orc! (darkvision, +2 Str)
Voren: 4 damage (2/8)Darkmantle (green): 11 damage; prone
Darkmantle (yellow): 16 damage; prone
Aurica sends an arrow into the steadily ascending darkmantle, making it shudder as the projectile forces its way into one of its many red eyes. Poor little thing. It just wanted a meal!
Osric, meanwhile, stumbles his way forwards in the dark and stabs his dagger right through the soft yet flexible tissue of the other's squid-like body, receiving in return a spray of icky blood that he can't see but can feel dripping all over his hands. Awoken from the pain, the tentacle monster writhes around on the ground, flapping its giant sail-like wings in pain!
The darkmantle in the air suddenly feels sleep overtake it! It crashes to the ground with a splat.
... of course, that's a rather rude awakening for it indeed! Its beady red eyes spring open, looking around confused at how it wound up back down on the ground somehow, its tentacles splayed out all over the place.
"Horgus, quit your blubbering!" Jens bellows, trying to shut out the noble's distracting blather as the darkmantle's tentacles brush against his neck. He jerks blindly backwards, feeling a rush of air against his face as the creature presumably takes flight again. He swings out blindly at it, but the air movement isn't even enough for him to work with.
"Where did you go, Reknar?" he growls in annoyance, no longer able to use the younger man's position to get his bearings. Then he hears a loud, visceral splat come from his right, and he spins around, swinging his blade down in a powerful arc at the prone creature.
Unfortunately for Jens, his old ears are failing him, for he misjudges the location of the fallen darkmantle. His sword clatters harmlessly on the stone, sending a bone-jarring jolt up his arm and setting his teeth on edge. He curses loudly in the tongue of his forebears, the rough syllables accented by his own shaken jaw.
Reknar smiles as his sight adapts to the darkness "I am right here Jens - that thing was trying to get back up and away to the ceiling, but Aurica shot it back down to the same spot" - he informs the Ulfen, swinging once as the creature went up, and another as it came crashing down.
Initiative: Monsters | Jens | Flynn | Voren | Osric | Aurica | Reknar
Status
Reknar: actually an orc! (darkvision, +2 Str)
Voren: 4 damage (2/8)Darkmantle (green): 11 damage
Darkmantle (yellow): skewered
Going uuup... aaaand going doooown... the movement is so fast that it's hard to tell, but at some point the darkmantle is summarily executed with a longspear thrust right through its fleshy body. Octopus skewers, anyone? Alas, its corpse continues to radiate the darkness field that is so frustrating the non-human (slash non-able-to-become-an-orc) members of the party.
Osric feels yet another gentle tentacle slide down his arm and wrap around his wrist, but he pulls away from the sensation and breaks whatever deep and meaningful contact the remaining darkmantle might have been trying to form. Those with the ability to see in darkness watch as the octopode billows itself upwards with... well, with very little grace whatsoever; it obviously struggles to gain much altitude.
Reknar skewers the one that already has her arrow sticking from it-- Aurica breathes out in relief.
"One down! The other's flying above Osric! If you can't see, stay put, hold steady, and guard your heads!"
She looses a third arrow in the blackness.
"Missed it! It's still up there!"
Raising his shield up over his head, Flynn remains defensive, trying to help cover Aravashnial as well.
Gotta keep quiet and listen for it, if it comes near. Really hate being unable to see...
Jens nods at Aurica's words. "Aye, lass," he calls back, keeping his shield up. "How wounded is it?" he calls out to whoever might be able to see, as much to keep his position known as anything else.
Voren cheers as the darkmantle dies. He turns to the airborne when with a frown on his face. He shouts to Jens, "It seems to be on its last legs!" His eyes then suddenly glow a demonic red, a sudden scowl forming on his face, becoming closer looking to the demons that attacked yesterday. He hisses, "I curse you, creature. You shall suffer for the transgression of harming me!" He then begins talking in Abyssal. "तळही दिसणार नाही असे खोल विवर च्या सैन्याने! तुझ्या शत्रू दुर्बल! त्याच्या लहान जीवन मध्ये अनर्थ आणा!"
Seeing as the other creature is way too high up for him to target efficiently, Reknar changes his tactic, spewing encouraging words to bolster Aurica's resolve.
"No chance in hell that one is going to make it - Master Firehand is already laying waste to it with arrows. I'll be damned if we're dying in darkness against a freaking flying octopus! Ah! Give them hell Aurica!"
In the meantime, he drops his longspear, and grabs his sling.
Voren cheers as the darkmantle dies. He turns to the airborne when with a frown on his face. He shouts to Jens, "It seems to be on its last legs!" His eyes then suddenly glow a demonic red, a sudden scowl forming on his face, becoming closer looking to the demons that attacked yesterday. He hisses, "I curse you, creature. You shall suffer for the transgression of harming me!" He then begins talking in Abyssal. "तळही दिसणार नाही असे खोल विवर च्या सैन्याने! तुझ्या शत्रू दुर्बल! त्याच्या लहान जीवन मध्ये अनर्थ आणा!"
** spoiler omitted **
Initiative: Monsters | Jens | Flynn | Voren | Osric | Aurica | Reknar
Status
Reknar: actually an orc! (darkvision, +2 Str)
Voren: 4 damage (2/8)
Darkmantle (green): 11 damage
Darkmantle (yellow): skewered
Osric, Jens and Flynn hang back, their weak, human eyes unable to pierce the magical darkness. Aurica's arrow flies wide, even with the buoying presence of Reknar's words of encouragement. Voren inflicts a not-so-demonic curse upon the flying tentacle monster, which seems to do some good, maybe--after gaining a little bit of altitude, it abruptly drops down upon Osric, but misses its trajectory completely and instead lands next to him. If he could see, he would be seeing eye-to-eye with an eight-eyed octopus... not exactly pleasant.
Listening in vain, Flynn grits his teeth in frustration as he cannot quite identify where the creature landed by sound alone.
Osric steels himself in the darkness. He readies his dagger in case the creature should happen to get close enough to strike at again.
Aurica grimaces at seeing it's low enough for Osric to possibly get hit if her arrow flies awry. She shifts her bow to her off-hand, running forward to stand shoulder-by-shoulder with Osric. She snatches the warhammer from her belt as she goes-- and prays she strikes true with the old weapon.
"It's about head height, Osric!" she yells to Osric as she swings the hammer. "Just to your right and forward, and try not to hit me, eh?"
Reknar keeps bolstering his companions with harsh words, as he moves towards what seems to be their last opponent for the time being - "We haven't travelled halfway across the land to die in this gods forsaken hole, I can guarantee you all that!" - he roars - "It seems there is only one more to go, and that's that! Keep it up Aurica! Stand fast boys! Lemme see if I can make a snack out of this one!"
Poor, poor mama darkmantle. She just wanted to get some food for her and her mate's newborns. Now she's a shishkabob. It is the saddest of fates, truly...
"All down!" Aurica cries out as soon as the squid-thing drops. "It's safe-- stay put, those of us who can see will lead you out of the darkness."
She takes a deep breath of relief... that could have gone.... much worse.
She keeps an eye on the darkmantles to make sure they're truly no longer a threat, then helps leads people by touch back to the half of the cavern where their light sources will work.
"Dunno how long that dark's gonna stay... Everyone alright?"
"There!" - the man bellows - "Done and dusted. All clear people - let me drag these out of here since it seems the darkness effect still lingers"
Reknar begins dragging the darkmantle corpses back towards the path from where they arrived at the cave, making sure the darkness is removed from the area.
Once that is done, he will search their immediate surroundings for remains of other victims, and perhaps anything useful that can be salvaged for them.
Moving the darkmantle bodies does not remove the darkness; however, with the octopodes disposed of, the shadow seems to be slowly fading away.
There's nothing of much use in the area, as far as Reknar can see. There's a small... nest, of sorts, hidden behind a half-collapsed statue, made from stone and bone... but unless you're interested in dire rat corpses with their inner fluids drained out... well, yeah, it's not particularly interesting.
"Bah! Dead rats!" - Reknar lets out in frustration, then remembers he is still an orc in shape and form, and turns to the others, with a huge fanged grin - "Pretty handy this scale I've gotta say. Before I realized, it was in my hand - when the first thing I remembered that could see in the dark was an Orc, it just shaped me into one - pretty amazing" - he states, flexing a huge muscular arm - "Besides, I guess these hues of gray and green actually suit me" - he bellows a deep, guttural laugh.
The tide of battle ebbs away, and the darkness begins fading. "I'm fine, lass," he calls in response to Auroca. "No worse than I was yesterday, anyway." Slowly, Jens' old eyes adjust to the dim light, and the sight of an orc startles him - until it speaks, and he realizes it's no more than Reknar.
"Well, that's a useful trick, then!" he laughs, clapping the 'orc' on the back. "Sure helped you make short work of our tentacled friend!" Still chucking, he slings his shield back across his shoulder and gets ready to move on.
Seeing the creature fall, Voren sighs in relief. "Good thinking, Reknar. Really saved our skins there." Voren winces. "I'm still in rough shape, even with Osric's thankful healing. I want to heal myself. But what if one of you get injured? I'm sure I'm well enough to progress."
" Well. We survived, thanks to you Aurica and ...Reknar?"
Flynn glances in askance at the bard.
" Useful scale..."
I was nearly useless. There has to be a way to work around this. I imagine demons might have this ability as well....
Osric breathes in a sigh of relief and looks at the group.
"I sincerely wish that I new more about this place, but right now it probably behooves us more to press onward."
After confirming that Voren was the only one hurt, Aurica nods to the others. "That coulda gone a lot worse," she says, voicing her earlier thoughts. "Glad nobody lost their head."
...well, aside from Gwerm. Sigh.
"...'m sorry I didn't see 'em. Not much of a scout, I guess."
There's a part of her saying she ought to grab those squiddy little bodies for what rubbery meat they might afford (and more importantly, moisture) but... are they that desperate right now? Hrmmn.... probably not... just yet. The idea of eating flying-squid-darkness creatures isn't very appealing.
Maybe fried, Aurica thinks to herself as she shoulders her pack again and checks for her one missed arrow. (It's splintered to uselessness, and she sighs.) Everything is more edible if you fry it. Course, she don't have any butter. Do darkmantles have enough fat to make it worthwhile...?
These are the dark thoughts that plague Aurica's mind as she sets out in point position once more, determined to do a better job at seeing dangers to come, and flicking glances up the cavern ceiling frequently from here on out.
Seeing Aurica beat herself up, Voren warily walks towards her. He makes to place his hand on her shoulder... until he remembers her warning and returns it to his side. "It's okay, Aurica. I... think you're a wonderful scout. You've gotten us out of danger multiple times. And we're thankful for that. You're a lot better than I would be as a scout." He ends it off with a joke about himself, giving the ranger a light smile.
" Your doing fine Aurica. At least you could do something. All I could do was hide behind my shield and squint into the darkness. Not a very fine showing for a soldier of Iomedae."
Frowning he continues
" Though, I think this is something I need to remedy in the future. "
Voren turns to Flynn. "No! No, no, no. Don't say that, Flynn. You've been very helpful, too. If anyone hasn't been useful, it's me. My spells burn up so fast and then there's nothing I can do other than put enemies to sleep. And the vast majority of our foes have been mindless creatures, so even that is ineffective." He looks very downcast at this.
He asks, "Does anyone need healing?"
"We survived, and that is blessing enough in these dark times. I am fine, Voren, but several of our number still bear wounds from earlier fighting. I have a little healing left as well. Shall we restore our strength now, or hold this in reserve?"
Voren scratches his cheek in thought. "That's a good question. If we heal now, then we would be at full strength. However, we would be unable to heal if we get injured later. Same works in reverse: heal later and we'll be weaker to start. Hmmm... I'm not too sure on what to do, actually."
-----------------------
Anevia likewise shakes her head and offers Flynn an encouraging smile. "You did your best to put yourself in front of us and protect us, and that's important too. I couldn't shoot these things to save my life, either!"
"Not being in the front lines doesn't mean you're useless. Those in the rear guard are doing just as important a job as any other..." The young woman chuckles to herself, "Gods, I'm channelling Irabeth here. C'mon, let's get going."
Once everyone's injuries have been sorted out (more or less), Aurica resumes her position of scouting maybe twenty or thirty feet ahead of the main group, and the rest close in around their companions, wary for attacks from behind.
A narrow tunnel separates this cave from the adjacent one, dimly illuminated from within by some unknown source. As Aurica makes her way through the narrow gap, she realises why. At the far end of the cavern is a small campfire, burning small and low as a result of the limited kindling afforded to it, surrounded by a ring of ashen stones.
Attempting to hide himself alongside the rocky far wall stands a dirty, greasy-haired dwarf, outfitted in worn clothing that appears long in need of a good scrub--or perhaps replacing and a notched battleaxe. He wears a thick grey cloak that is covered with patchy greenish stains from god-knows-what, and a couple of stoppered potions and other weapons hang around his waist.
The unknown dwarf's eyes widen upon meeting gazes with Aurica, and he gestures wildly at her, shrieking like a man possessed. "YOU'RE HERE!!!" he screams, spittle flying from his lips. "YOU FINALLY CAME FOR ME!!! NO!!!!! I WON'T LET YOU TAKE ME!!!!!"
Initiative: Aurica | Osric | Voren | Dwarf | Jens | Reknar | Flynn
Aurica purses her lips at Voren's attempts to... give her a pep talk? Huh. He is definitely the strangest tiefling she's ever known... though, she has to admit, she's not known many. Not many survive long, in Kenabres.
At Flynn's words, she gives him a shrug. "Can't hit what you can't see. Can't blame yourself for that."
Shrugging, she sets off in the lead once more...
***
Some time later:
"...hell's bells?" Aurica says in utter bemusement. "Some upset fella-- dwarf-- up here!" she yells back over her shoulder to the others, then takes a short step forward-- making sure the others have room to get past her into the room, that's her notion. "He looks awful tired, I bet he could do with a nap--"
The man looks crazed as a cockatrice in her opinion. Aurica highly doubts any words will get through to the dwarf, whom she's never seen in her life... but dammit, he's a fellow dwarf, she's got to at least try.
"I namn av Torag, vara lugn, bror - jag är en vän!
"No! I don't believe you!! You liar!!!" the crazed dwarf shrieks in response, responding in Taldane despite Aurica's question in Dwarven. There's a faint crackle of cyan energy in the air around head as he rambles on; magic of some sort, no doubt. "I know it! You're an agent of the crusade! There's no-one else that would be down here but that!!!"
Osric sees Aurica speaking to someone up ahead. Curious, he moves the front of the group, still a short distance behind the two dwarves. When he sees the deranged figure, he draws back and speaks to the others in hushed tones:
"That dwarf up there. He seems completely deranged. I'm not sure if we can get through to him. I'm not a very smooth talkers. Sure, I've had to put the fear of Iomedae into my share of parishoners, but this one seems beyond preaching or invective. Perhaps Flynn or Reknar would be better suited to try reason first."
After some thought, Voren looks to Orsic and says, "Okay. Let's heal Flynn and Jens now. I can muster for a while as long I'm not in front." He steps to Flynn and places a clawed hand on him. He makes gestures with his other hand and his eyes glow white. Flynn feels his wounds stitching back together. When he's done, he places his hood up.
------------
Voren sees the faint light. 'Could there have been another survivor?' Hearing Aurica's shout, he can't help but be curious. From his shoulder, Ayne projects, 'From the huntress's call, I advise caution, boy.' He moves next to Aurica, taking note of the cyan energy and staying close to the wall. He nods at Aurica's suggestion. "I agree." He stares intently at the male dwarf. Both his eyes and Ayne begin to glow. The dwarf feels a wave of drowsiness wash over him.