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Um'bala feels a sense of trepidation as the Mite King steps forward and issues demand, especially when he starts speaking about missing crowns. Calm your nerves, mage!, he scolds himself inwardly. This thing can't hurt you. And there's almost no chance that this crown is connected to the one that started this whole mess. His heart begins to make its slow descent from his throat back into his chest.
"We can aid you in this, Great King," Um'bala says. "But we would need some way of telling your subjects that we are on a quest for you. Perhaps if you gave us your name, we could let them know you have sent us?"
The mite throws another bewildered look at Um'bala, as if the idea that anyone would NOT know his name is a completely foreign concept. "You say King Zuuga sent you! All bow before King Zuuga! Now go, get sleeping crown, I am getting tired!"
Petronicus grumbles under his breath at the wizard's obsequiousness, but follows him nonetheless.
You'll never see me bowing to one of them little blue faeries!
Mach scratches his head in confusion. "So... where to?"
"Of course, King Zuuga," he replies, bowing and backing away from the throne room. "At once, King Zuuga!"
Milo, interestingly, feels the same as Petronicus, but perhaps for different reasons.
He takes Um'bala's actions into consideration, though, as the wizard has seemed wise to this point, so while he does not bow he does not openly mock or act disrespectfully towards the King.
Rather, before Um'bala leaves the area entirely he nods in agreement with Mach, "Maybe ask him if he knows where this creature is?"
Petronicus throws up his hands in frustration. "What does it matter where the creature is? They little blue guy is clearly a few cards short of a full hand, and the only way to go is down!"
Quintus nods at Krupts words. "True, true. Let's head down and find this clicklylegs."
The group makes its way back to the staircase heading further into the bowls of the Crow. The circular stairs head down about 30 feet as the air becomes thicker and choked with dust. At the bottom of the stairwell there are two passageways: one heads south and is increasingly covered in fresh-looking spider webs, while the other heads west and becomes increasingly less so. The western passageway opens into a room after about 40 feet, while the southern one extends past Mach's darkvision. No sound can be heard from either hallway.
Milo was not certain that not asking the King for more information was not an error, but as junior member of the group he does not push the matter when it is clear that the others want to leave.
When they get to the two passageways he offers, "If Clickylegs is a spider, then webs might be a clue, but given what we know about the number of giant spiders around here, maybe not so much."
Petronicus shudders a bit as he looks down the southern corridor. "What's the hurry, though, eh? Not like Clickylegs is going anywhere."
IhatespidersIhatespidersIhatespidersIhatespidersIhatespidersIhatespidersIha tespidersIhatespiders
"I'm not sure if Clickylegs is a spider or not, but we can see the end of the western corridor, so I think we should explore there first. Then we can come back to the spider infested south side."
Petronicus nods vigorously, "Yes, yes, Quintus that makes a lot of sense."
"Alright then--let me take point again." Mach sighs and leads the way down the western corridor.
The sooner we can get this done and over with the better.
...
...I wonder how Nimt's doing?
With his ancestors with him, he begins to follow them, bringing up the rear.
The group carefully creeps forward with Mach in the lead. He enters an intersection that seems to lead to some kind of storage or prison wings when Milo calls out in shock. All around, a half-dozen spiders suddenly start moving, appearing as if from out of nowhere.
When Milo quickly recovers from the shock of the incoming spiders and moves to a nearby corner to make room for the rest of the party.
As he does so he whips crossbow around with the intention of firing it at the Pink spider.
Moving forward, Standing Bear steps beside the rogue and reaches over and touches him. "May the spirits guide you, as well..." and with that casts Guidance.
Petronicus grits his teeth as he steps in front of Mach and holds out his guisarme in a defensive posture. "Ahhh! I hate spiders!" he screams, "Don't you bastards leave me out here on my own. Get up to the front and smash something!"
Um'bala's bolt is less than precise, and impacts the wall behind the spider.
The spiders advance individually, scrabbling with impressive quickness over the ceilings and walls toward the nearest party member.
The spider closest to Milo scuttles over the ceiling and down the wall next to him. It attempts a lightning-fast bite, but the halfling is faster and easily side-steps it.
The first one that crawls toward Petronicus is splattered by his readied guisarme.
A second spider scrabbles toward the Chelaxian and ducks underneath a sloppy blow. As it attempts to bite him, however, Krupt kicks at the creature with his boot, throwing off its aim.
The next giant arachnid crawls over the ceiling toward Petronicus, but as it tries to drop down on top of him, he slashes with his polearm, inflicting a grievous wound.
Another spider crawls down the wall and jumps at the Chelaxian. He quickly steps back and pins the creature on the ground.
The final spider approaches from the south, but by now Petronicus is overwhelmed and can't react quickly enough. Luckily, while climbing over its brethren, the spider is thrown somewhat off-balance and fails to connect with Krupt.
Realizing that while he has avoided the chance to be flanked he has also underestimated the speed of the creatures and a crossbow attack at close range is probably unwise, Milo drops the crossbow, draws his sword and hacks at it.
Milo's attack is ill-timed, and the spider jumps to the side just as he brings down the temple sword.
"Hey, you guys interested in killing any of these disgusting creatures, or do you want me to do all the work?"
Petronicus steps back and slashes at the more distant of the two spiders while still keeping a close eye on the one next to him. His blow cuts the legs out from under the spider, rendering it harmless.
Quintus readies up his magics and creates a puddle of grease underneath the spider in front of Petronicus to make it fall over.
Milo ignores Krupt and centers himself as he takes another swing at the creature before him.
Quintus readies up his magics and creates a puddle of grease underneath the spider in front of Petronicus to make it fall over.
Quintus thoroughly covers the area in front of Krupt with his magical grease, but the spider maintains its balance.
Um'Bala moves up behind Milo to assist in his defense, and is able to momentarily distract the spider facing him.
Stepping forward, sadly, he is trapped shoulder to shoulder with an ally. He fights best when only the spirits are at his side. Regardless, he slams his Earth Breaker on the spider.
Mach, feeling rather ashamed of having been caught off-guard, immediately starts tumbling into a flanking position...
...and stabs at the spider trying to eat Petronicus!
Standing Bear moves up to stand next to Milo, bringing his earthbreaker down on the creature's head, killing it.
Mach carefully moves around the spider, avoiding both its snapping mandibles and the slippery surface of the floor caused by Quintus' grease spell. He then stabs at the arachnid, inflicting a mortal wound.
Now with a chance to look around, you can see that three corridors radiate out from the intersection in which you are standing. Each of these corridors contain iron cell doors on the left side of the hallway, most of which are open. You can hear no further noises down any of these corridors (although you do remember that the spiders you just fought were VERY hard to spot). Mach can see that each of these hallways extends 60'. The northern and southern hallways end in a blank wall, while the hallway to the west seems to open into a larger room beyond the cellblock.
Mumbling, seemingly to himself, but after having dealt with the warrior as the group has, they realize he is probably talking to a spirit.
He, once again, calls on his grandfather's spirit to guide his hand on his weapon, but in the meantime, he begins to look around the room. "If you need my help healing...please let me know. If not, we should press on."
Petronicus looks about him just to make sure that all the spiders are dead. "I really those eight-legged freaks! I don't know what it is about them, but they get under my skin worse than chiggers."
At Standing Bear's question he looks up at the Shoanti, first checking himself. "No, I seem to have gotten through that fight without a scratch. Good thing too, they might have been poisonous. You're a man of nature, Shoanti, ever seen these kinds of animals before?"
"Thanks for your aid, my friend, and because of it and my own feet I do not need any healing!", Milo says to Standing Bear with a grin.
Sheathing his blade and picking up his crossbow he looks about, "It appears as if we're amongst cells of some sort. Should we check them out first?"
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"Crab spiders," Um'bala offers. "They're hunting spiders, the sort that doesn't spin webs. They got the name because they move like crabs. Definitely venomous, though. And I doubt they're alone - if they can't spin webs, then there's also spiders down here that do." The wizard gestures to the copious webs in the current corridors. "I suddenly wish he had brought some antitoxin."
Petronicus shudders as he listens to Um'bala's description. "Yeah, we should start a list of everything we forgot to bring on this expedition. Anyone got paper and pen?"
The Chelaxian looks through his belt pouch. "I've got some chalk, but that's about it."
He then looks up and nods at Milo's suggestion. "Looks like the ones to the north and south are the same. Probably should go there before heading to the connecting room down the western hallway."
"Well, let me take point again, then." Mach steps forward and readies his weapons. "And I'll let you know if there's any more spiders down there."
"I do have some antitoxen, by the way....
"Should you find more of these things," Milo says blandly as Mach moves forward.
The party carefully explores both the northern and the southern cellblock, but fails to find anything of interests other than the nests of the spiders with several egg sacks carefully tucked away in a corner. The cell blocks indeed seem to have been used for imprisoning people, but haven't been used for this purpose since the facility was abandoned over 10,000 years ago. The locks on the metal doors rusted out centuries ago, and even the doors themselves barely hang on their hinges.
"I do have some antitoxen, by the way....
"Should you find more of these things," Milo says blandly as Mach moves forward.
Petronicus throws Milo a quizzical stare. "Just for yourself, or did you bring enough for the group?"
The Chelaxian then addresses the group as a whole. "Anyone mind if I squish these spider eggs? I just hate these things."
"I have only one dose, I'm afraid," Milo responds.
He moves forward to help destroy the spider eggs, "Look at it this way, I shall be able to carry back news of your heroic death by spider poison."
"Really, only one dose?" Petronicus asks, throwing a sarcastic look at the halfling. "I thought you people are supposed to be helpful, at least that's how it is in my homeland."
Petronicus then gleefully destroys the spider eggs with Milo.
As he destroys spider eggs he responds in the same bland tone, "Yes, well, doubtless this is the crux of your problem. Were you back home you would have one of my people as slave compelled to ensure that you have everything you needed to take care of yourself.
"Here you are responsible for this stuff yourself.... "
Pausing he smashes the last un-smashed spider egg with his quarterstaff before completing the statement, "And this seems to be something that you people have lost the capacity to do after so many generations."
Mach does his best to stifle a snicker.
Petronicus seems genuinely taken aback by the halfling's tone and words.
"Well, I never ..." he mumbles, stalking off down the hallway to deal with something very important somewhere else.
He waits sulking at the crossroads of the cell blocks for the rest of the party to catch up with him.
Great, now I have a lippy slip and a smart-assed hellspawn to deal with. It's like we're starting a zoo in here.