Yrja makes a disgusted face as she loads a stone in her sling. Undead were so yucky! For a moment, she has an image of her sling stone clattering harmlessly through a skeleton's ribs, but she can't think of much else to do. Most of her spells and curses slide off them, and she doesn't want to get in stabbing range of them.
Imendri's voice becomes distant as he begins muttering in his half-words, but with the cadence that suggests an incantation.
After his moment, he pretends to be quiet, pantomiming what the rest of his group do, while whispering "I can just run at dem if yuu want me to. Skeletons are easy to smash apart."
"Those last few did fall apart easily.", Caelum says to Imendri. "I can call upon Torag to bless us though we may not need his assistance.", he says quietly to the group.
Caelum readies his war hammer.
"Tcha, undead?" Chiquq says. "Let us simply pelt them from here-- I would rather they stagger out towards us in the snow, wading through it thickly, than we have to struggle to them."
She leans her spear against a tree and draws her bow again, sighting to where the others have indicated.
"Sounds good," Braegan whispers back, [b]"We'll be ready for surprises."
He and Asks continue watching the deathly-quiet forest.
Wow. My idea was accepted? This really is a foreign land. Or it's a matter of probability. Eventually I'll say something people agree with, haha
Imendri smiles to himself as much as to the rest of you, and draws his sword, setting his pack on the ground to lighten his load.
Chiquq's arrow drops the frost skeleton in one shot, causing it to spray its companions harmlessly with an icy burst.
At the same time, two creatures that resemble animated fir trees stand up from within the grove of trees near the red stain, and lumber toward you on two towering trunk-like legs. Snow shakes off of their upper limbs, which resemble tree branches.
One of them strides toward you, dripping sap from its mouth.
Round 1!
Tree 1
Caelum
Braegan
Skellie 1
Tree 2
Skellie 2
Imendri
Dez
Yrja
Chiquq
Bold may post!
That's a frost fir. It has a sticky resin that enables it to grab and grapple and stick to things or people quite well.
Frost Firs are vulnerable to fire.
Frost Firs resist blunt and piercing weapons and are immune to cold. They often use dead people or animals as fertilizer...that explains the snow scraped away around their bases. They buried something or someone.
Caelum's jaw drops when he see's the trees moving. "Torag, protect us." he says as he whispers a prayer.
"All the gods protect us... these are frost firs! Don't let them touch you! Braegan, fry them!"
Braegan stays put, ready to help as opportunities present themselves.
The frost firs and skeletons move toward you, unspeaking, the only sound the slight crackling of ice rimed bones and bark covered limbs.
Round 1!
Tree 1
Caelum
Braegan <--delaying, can act
Skellie 1
Tree 2
Skellie 2
Imendri
Dez
Yrja
Chiquq
Bold may post!
Imendri trudges forward, cold iron sword in hand, shield on arm, staying in the trees more out of slow movement than choice. He looks over at the moving tree creatures and squints his eyes.
...and shakes his head, making a strange face.
"Nope. I don't know what dey are!" he calls back, confident that at least his sword will cut into them.
Yrja shoots Imendri a puzzled look. "I told you, they are frost firs! Mind their sticky sap."
Circling around, she moves behind the cover of trees, hoping that Imendri will attract their attention. She whirls her sling a few times, the weapon whistling in the icy air, then lets fly towards the closest skeleton.
Chiquq has never run into these before and must rely only on Yrja's warning. Seeing that her first arrow actually sufficed to destroy one of the undead, to her mild surprise, she nocks and looses another.
As Chiquq sights, she thinks of the great snowcats of her northern homeland, and the speed through which they pad through the snow. Ila makes a rumbling noise as her mistress's meditations reach her too.
Chiquq's arrow goes wide but her mammoth lumbers forward through the snow at her urging, barreling towards the abominations.
Dez surveys the scene and silently moves into action, firing his borrowed bow at the tree on the left.
He then replaces his bow and moves forward, drawing his sword.
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Both Dez' and Chiquq's shots go wide. Imendri advances on the enemy, failing to listen to Yrja, whose sling stone also fails to hit its mark.
The first frost fir moves up, its beady eyes assessing you.
Round 2
Tree 1
Caelum
Braegan
Skellie 1
Tree 2
Skellie 2
Imendri
Dez
Yrja
Chiquq
bold may post!
Caelum moves forward behind Imendri and Dez. Warhammer at the ready, he places his free hand on his symbol of Torag and begins a prayer.
Braegan slogs forward through the snow, trying to stay close enough to the group to help if necessary as he finds cover.
A wave of divine energy emanates from Caelum, sweeping into the two frost skeletons. It rocks them back, blasting ice and bits of bone from them, but does not destroy them--probably fortunate for Ila.
The two skeletons swing their broken scimitars at Ila. At this range, you can see that they wear ancient Qadiran martial finery.
One scimitar cuts Ila deep in her flank. Fortunately, the resulting chillblains around the cut are not severe.
The frost fir, wary of its not-exactly-allies, skirts around them, oozing sap and menace.
Round 2!
Round 2
Tree 1
Caelum
Braegan
Skellie 1 -3 HP
Tree 2
Skellie 2 -3 HP
Imendri
Dez
Yrja
Chiquq (Ila -7 HP)
bold may post!
Dezső yells out: "Watch out -- those skeletons explode and spray ice when they are destroyed! I don't think my sword is much use against them, but perhaps we can destroy them from a distance."
Dez will move around to engage with one of the wicked trees. He attacks with his sword.
Chiquq hisses as her faithful friend is struck, but Ila is hardy, so for now, she focuses on the tree creatures. She jogs forward in the snow to have a clearer shot at the one engaged with Dezso, and looses an arrow at it.
Ila slams instinctively back at the sting of pain from the scimitars, little knowing of the possible cold that may result. Chiquq hears Dezso's warning of the frost skeletons, but sees no alternative to letting Ila attack-- they cannot simply run from the skeletons and not try and destroy them, so better Ila hold the line.
Imendri moves behind the tree facing Dez and lunges his sword deep into it's bark.
Imendri moves behind the tree facing Dez and lunges his sword deep into it's bark.
[dice=Cold Iron Longsword]1d20+2+3
[dice=DMG if I hit]1d8+2
...plunges* his sword deep into its* bark.
-_-
Yrja takes a step forward, filled with trepidation for Dezső. The frost firs looked terrible and she feared for the other tiefling. "Leave my friend alone, you walking tree!"
Imendri swipes at the frost fir, leaving a gooey stripe of flensed bark hanging off of the plant. It bellows in pain. Resinous, orange-yellow sap oozes from the wound. Dez also strikes true with his sword, causing less damage but rocking the tree and knocking some snow off its extremities.
Yrja meets the fir's rheumy eyes with her own.
It snarls at Yrja, and she can tell that the hex did not take effect.
The fir sprouts an arrow on one arm, thanks to Chiquq, and it bellows again.
Ila smashes the frost skeleton to smithereens, and it sprays her with flinders of ice and bone.
---
The wounded frost fir lunges at Imendri, eyes glaring.
It misses the wily Northerner by a good country mile, its resinous branches whooshing over his head. The tree takes a step back, attempting to assess.
Round 3!
Tree 1 -10 HP
Caelum
Braegan
Tree 2
Skellie 2 -3 HP
Imendri
Dez
Yrja
Chiquq (Ila -9 or -11 HP)
bold may post!
"Caelum!" Braegan shouts as he rushes forward, "There's a tree moving around our left!"
Behind Ila, he turns on the flanking tree, scrambling for ways to be helpful. "Screw it," he mutters, pushing the sensation of overwhelming flames into the mind of the tree ... if it has one.
Caelum follows quickly behind Braegan and moves in front of Ila.
Ila dodges much of the ice, but not all of it.
The fir is unaffected by Braegan's spell.
The other tree-thing advances on the dwarf. It swings a branch at Caelum...
...and misses the dwarf, merely dusting him with snow.
The remaining skeleton swings its scimitar at poor Ila.
The scimitar glances off her wooly hide. Making a strange gakking sound, the skeleton drops its curved Qadiran blade and displays frost covered claws. Could there be a spark of intelligence left in the damnable thing?
Round 3 Continued!
Tree 1 -10 HP
Caelum
Braegan
Tree 2
Skellie 2 -3 HP
Imendri
Dez
Yrja
Chiquq (Ila -9 HP)
Bold may post!
Worried over her furry friend, Chiquq starts pushing closer through the snow, but looses another arrow at the frost fir between Dez and Imendri.
Ila bellows hoarsely at the freezing cold, but reacts with animal fury, lowering her big head and slamming at the other skeleton as well.
Dez will circle the tree cautiously and move in for another attack, nodding to Imendri in approval at their coordinated assault.
Yrja takes two more steps, now shoulder to shoulder with Chiquq, and looses another stone. The frozen skeleton seemed on its last bones, so she aims to finish it off.
The odd barbarian smirks and gives a nod back, definitely on the same page as Dezsö. Hearing the *thok* of his sword against the fir's bark, Imendri leans in with another slash, glad to be taking down this animated terror.
The beleaguered frost fir, harried on all sides, expires with a creaking groan as Chiquq's arrow pierces it's head...area...part. It falls to the snow, releasing cones about its corpse.
Ila smashes the final frost skeleton to flinders, causing another explosion of bits to erupt at the enraged mammoth.
Yrja's sling shot goes wide of the other frost fir.
Imendri is able to move to the other fir and slashes at the fir. He lops many small branches off the bellowing tree-thing.
Dez is also able to strike true and hit the fir.
Round 4, Bonus Round!
Caelum
Braegan
Tree -13 HP
everyone else
FINISH HIM!
Caelum swings at the tree.
With a sound like, well, a tree falling in the woods, the frost fir collapses in splinters at Caelum's mighty blow, felled by its ancient enemy.
As it leaks sap into the snow, its cones drop uselessly into the white powder.
The forest is silent once again.
Chiquq exhales as the last monstrous creatures falls under the dwarf's well-swung blow. "Good work," she says simply, and hurries through the snow to Ila's side, touching with worry at the frost that rimes her faithful friend's thick fur. She murmurs expressions concern in Hallit as she touches the injuries, and beseeches the spirits of nature for healing.
"Is anyone else hurt?"
"Not me," Braegan responds brightly, "thanks to you all. Good job, everyone."
He looks over at the strange red stuff in the snow. "I guess we need to check that out next, huh?"
"Ya, I fink so." Imendri's response is more curious than resolute. Looking to Chiquq, he follows "No, I didn't get hurt. Nofing hit me. Det's weird, actually." The big ball of weird brushes off some snow dropped on him by the frost fir as it fell.
"Ya. I fink we can go."
Imendri walks over to the blood stain, keeping his eyes open nonetheless for any potential ambushers.
The stain is indeed blood. There is a boot half-submerged in the snow, which has largely iced over. Under the boughs of the frost firs' former lair, Imendri can see a mangled corpse of a human.
There are also tracks further along the trail that lead to and away from the stain. They look like a large mammal of some sort.
Those would be a giant weasel, something not seen in Taldor.
Yrja trails after the others, avoiding to step in any of the frozen blood. Glimpsing the mangled corpse, she averts her gaze with a hard gulp, casting around for something else to look at.
"Oh dear," she breathes, "that was a *big* weasel." She points at the tracks for the benefit of the others.
You recall that Dryden Kepp was hunting for a giant weasel...
"Say, Braegan. Didn't you tell me something about this? Old Dryden had a sighting of a giant weasel, but nobody believed him." She ponders for a moment. "Come to think of it, Mahb mentioned it as well. He was going to try and trap it." A sudden horrifying thought strikes her and she inhales sharply. "Oh! Suppose that's Dryden?" She points a trembling finger at the mangled corpse.
Worried about what he’ll learn, Braegan stoops down, disdainfully picking at the remains to see if he recognizes anything. ”Hopefully not.” Though he does not, in fact, sound hopeful at all.
”So,” he mutters as he searches, ”are ridiculously big weasels natural creatures? Or more denizens of the north brought by this unnatural cold?”
Dez thinks to himself that he really should have spent more time reading about the natural world. He takes 20 searching the general area, assuming the others have the body covered. Are the only tracks leading away the weasel tracks?
Braegan's and Yrja's fears are confirmed: it is indeed Old Dryden, although he was truly just beginning middle-age, and was a doughty and strong man, one of the finest hunters and trappers in Heldren. Dryden has clearly been mauled by a large beast, presumably the weasel. He had then been dragged by the frost firs to...you presume...provide fertilizer for their cones, several of which have been planted in the ground here.
Braegan finds the following on his person:
A ripped (but still useable) cold weather outfit
Snowshoes, handmade
A shortbow, broken (snapped in half)
Two arrows that radiate magic
Nearby, Brae finds Dryden's backpack. It contains:
3 days trail rations
a half full hip flask of strong applejack
a hunting journal. a lot of it goes like this:
17 Arodus - spoor near Spine Ridge. Did not see w.
18 Arodus - spoor and scat. W. eludes.
However, there's a very interesting entry, with far less shorthand
20 Arodus - No w. Went in Somir Valley for looksee. Very strange hut in Valley, looked foreign. Had legs like chickens! There was a doll inside, looked at me. I retreated, saw the doll moving and talking with ghosts. Very bad magic. Moved fast. Set bear traps at the entrance to Valley, partly for that damned doll. Prayed to Abadar, Erastil, Calistria and anyone who would hear me! No sign of doll...didn't follow...maybe a sentry
20 Arodus later - Weasel sprang trap! Going to look
That is the last entry.
Somir Valley is very close.
"Unfortunate man," Chiquq says with a slow headshake when the corpse is discovered and the grisly purpose revealed. She has no issues with uprooting the cones just to be sure and tossing them onto the barest, rockiest bit of snowy ground she can find, where they are less likely to sprout into man-slaying horrors. Moral dilemma? What moral dilemma?
Chiquq looks over the arrows with interest as Braegan examines the journal, but she cannot tell what enchantments may be on them. "Yrja, you know something of spells, yes? Are these arrows useful?"
When Braegan reads the bit about the chicken-legged house, Chiquq looks up, her brows drawn together. "Irreseni?" she echoes sharply. "This far south??"