It would take a little bit of time to travel back to shore and to the Ascendant Court, which is where the city's most powerful healers would all be, but you certainly can if you desire.
The axe is well-made, and suited a captain of the guard-- a +2 adamantine battleaxe.
Unfortunately, after extensive thinking about it, nobody can think of anything else relevant to Valais' current condition. It seems like it was connected to the golem, and golems are solidly the province of arcane knowledge.
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"One of my kin? I would be honored to call Venture Captain Hestram one of my kin, but normally dwarves aren't his size"
The giant Deaglan smiles while he says this, to show that he is not offended by Valais's outburst.
"Let's bite the bullet and get you back to a healer quickly. After all 'cooperate' says that we need to act as a team"
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Valais lets go of Deaglan as suddenly as she grabbed him. She retracts, clutching her upper arms as though chill had come over her.
"I'm sorry, Mr. Deaglan. Blue doesn't like being stuck with me very much, and dwarves bring back bad memories...."
She sits down next to the side of the boat starts and starts softly rocking back and forth.
"Don't want to know...time to go...don't want to know...time to go...don't want to know...time to go...don't want to know...time to go...."
The guards nod mournfully at Kris's words regarding their fallen comrade; they set to gathering the badly-damaged bodies of the fallen, lowering them with care to the deck of the sloop. Their air is subdued, and none of them are eager to stay on deck on the site of such carnage. The lieutenant says that they will certainly keep the cordon going, and prevent anyone else from boarding during your absence, but to please make haste...
Valais is coaxed aboard the sloop as well, and a short carriage ride later takes her, and any who go with her, to the Seventh Church, the temple of Iomedae in the Ascendant Court.
Finally, a very old, frail-seeming man with white hair, assisted by two acolytes helping him walk, comes into the room where Valais is waiting and peers at her with eyes that still seem shrewd despite his years.
"Ah, what a hard road for you," he murmurs, and comes to inspect the injury. "Let's just see here, shall we..."
The old priest sits in concentration, eyes closed, a withered hand resting on Valais's injury. Even if Valais's other... roommates hiss and snarl at his close proximity, or spit obscenities, he is unmoved and unbothered. Lines of concentration appear on the old man's deeply wrinkled face, and his hand trembles as with palsy.... but after a few minutes, Valais feels the damaged flesh partially knitting back together. The white crystals appear to be gone when she looks down.
"There," the old man sighs, sagging against one of the young acolytes. "That was... a test of faith. Forgive me, the spirit is willing but the flesh... is weak. Go your way in peace, child... whatever peace your curse will let you find..."
Valais is able to return to the ship!
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While within the Iomedaean church, Blue and Red stay hidden underneath, being smart enough to know that they do not want attention and that they both benefit from their shared "vessel" being healed.
She allows herself to be shuffled around up the food chain of the church without much comment more than her constant apologies.
Valais somehow manages to make a kind smile appear on her babau jaw as Genedair finally cures her wounds.
"Thank you so much, kind sir. I hope I wasn't too much trouble for you."
Darro and Blackthorn join Deaglan in the lower compartment. The wolf is uneasy with the place, sniffing around with an occasional low growl but staying close to his master's leg.
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Feeling more at home on the deck of the ship, Kris will help the guards with their fallen comrades, careful not to be touched by the living sailors. He treats the fallen with utmost care and attention. Any sailors with wounds he will heal with his hex, not taking no for an answer as it is not a finite resource.
"Sorry I couldn't be there sooner to help fellas, i'm sure they were all fine fellows, have a drink or three and remember the folks they were." he looks at the guard eho spoke up earlier, assuming he has taken charge, "Request for ya fella, mind if we borrow the axe? It may be useful on out explorations, promise I will return it."
...Kris will help the guards with their fallen comrades, careful not to be touched by the living sailors. He treats the fallen with utmost care and attention. Any sailors with wounds he will heal with his hex...
Between Deaglan's channel and Kris's hex, the guards are all healed as they work to clear the deck of the fallen. They murmur quiet thanks to Kris for his help. The lieutenant answers his request: "Aye, feel free. Krall would want these things cut down, if I know him. And he has no kin in the city to pass it on to, so..."
You may use the axe with the guards' blessing.
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Valais waits at the entrance deeper into the boat, turning back towards the others.
"Come on, everyone! It's time to Explore! Report! Cooperate!" Such a rallying cry--combined with her earnest, childish tone--certainly has a sickeningly saccharine taste, but it takes on another more melancholic aspect coming from the poor girl.
When the others have gathered down below, or--alternatively--she has been told to do so, she will try to do what she used to do much better back before her so-called "accident"--find traps on doors.
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Kris picks up the captain's axe with thanks and hands it over to Darro, a grim smile on his face marred by the scars. "Sure, you take it mate, no good to me and big D has his hammer. Val uses her fists? And Luc and Nagh don't seem that way inclined."
He follows below deck and has a look at the portal that the captain had futilely tried to open.
When Valais and Deaglan come near to the door-- ten feet away from it, in fact-- the opaque white crystal abruptly ripples, like a pond with a pebble tossed in. It stays that way-- still opaque, still seemingly made of white crystal-- but the crystal shivers with antici...
...pation.
If Valais or Deaglan move more than ten feet from it, it abruptly stops, becoming quiescent white stone once more.
Valais detects no traps on it. A cursory check for magic reveals multiple powerful auras entwined with the door's structure, though they are only visible when it is in its 'active' state.
The wall of white crystal trembles slightly, as if waiting for something, anything, to break the tension of its surface.
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Lucija rubs her temples idly as she walks up to the door and contemplates it at a slightly leisurely pace.
Finally, she steps back, her eyes wide. "Impressive! Divinatory, illusory, enchantment, necromantic, AND transmutative spells, all quite strong...and...I don't even know what they all are. I've never even heard of dweomers like these. However," She carefully traces her finger across the auras as she speaks. "This one looks similar to a rite of binding...and this should have power over the undead...and here's one for 'judgment of the soul,' or something...and this one is for phasing solid matter...and this creates the illusion of magic...and too many divinatory sensors to mention. There's no telling what this door holds...or could do."
She steps back and speaks words of power, and before her appears a small portal in the air, from which comes a large insect, the same size as Lucija, that permeates the room with the fearsome red glow it generates. It looks at Lucija dispassionately.
Lucija points toward the mysterious door and addresses the beetle in a firm tone. "Enter that door."
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Kleetus stands around patiently, waiting for the others to return from their trip to the ascendant court; upon their return he happily joins them below deck to the chamber with the large shimmering portal.
"Whelp, that's a big piece o' rock. Ah'm not all that certain it's hostile, but it could be; Ah don't speak rock yet. So how're we gonna git through? Maybe it speaks Azlanti?"
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Kris stares at the portal, identifying the different magic schools and staring at them blankly, unsure of what to try. He listens intently to Lucija's explanation and appears none the wiser for her virtual ramblings. "Oh right, so its a portal created using various magic schools bound with certain runic focal points, how odd"
He stands back and awaits the results of the beetle, hoping it doesn't another golem.
The blazing beetle trundles towards the indicated door, leaving tiny sooty marks on the white crystal as it walks. It bumps into the door, and... stops, for it can't go any further. You notice that the section of portal against which the beetle is abutted (abeetled?) seems to have returned to its 'solid' state, and isn't rippling. The beetle seems insufficiently.... whatever-it-is that all those divinatory magics are looking for.
The beetle's smoldering antennae twitch back towards Lucija, in what is probably the beetle equivalent of a shrug.
Agile as a fish in the air, the looping, otherworldly serpent slithers towards the door.... and through. The white crystal ripples with Naghamadi's entrance, like a pool of mercury, and Naghamadi sails through unimpeded.
There's a sensation like passing through a sticky, grasping net, but Naghamadi is an agile creature and twists through without any problem.
Naghamadi finds himself in a chamber made of the same white crystal. More geometric and angular surfaces provide the aesthetic. Though Naghamadi can see in the dark, he does need to, for the hull itself still provides enough dim, diffused daylight through its white walls that vision is not impeded. The chamber he is in has a counter running the length of both walls, of a height that would serve a human or similarly sized creature; one of the counters has a grill of some silvery metal inlaid in it, and a ventilation shaft above this grill. The walls of this chamber are covered with numerous small square and rectangular doors, all shut, none bigger than a foot or two wide.
Ahead of Naghamadi, the chamber narrows further, to about ten feet wide, before expanding into another large open space. Any details of that chamber are probably of secondary interest to the protean, subsumed under the fact that there's... plants growing there? Sort of? It appears that... 'plant life', in a loose sense, has overrun the further chamber, tendrils of it reaching down the ship's length almost to Naghamadi. If they really are plants they are very strange ones: a colorless grey hue, and as Naghamadi observes, the tendrils and creepers that drape over the farther chamber seem to slowly become more solid... and then less, until they are near wisps of smoke, translucent as a mirage... and then more again.
The leaves and clumps of vegetation pulse out of time with one another, drifting in and out of being, it would seem, at random. For one as inherently chaotic in his nature as Naghamadi is, the view is likely not as incredibly surreal and troubling as it would be to a limited mortal. Even as Naghamadi observes, a vine as thick as his own serpentine self phases into visibility ten feet away, appearing to intersect seamlessly with the crystal floor below-- shooting up the whole height of the passage-- and then fading into the ceiling above.
...It's weird as f*&&, essentially.
To be sprouting the number of tendrils and growths you can see infesting these two cabin areas, the source xenophage creeper must be enormous.
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Kris watches the beetle unable to pass, then as the eidolon goes through he gives the party a shrug and saunters towards the doorway. "Well Nag has just made it, I might as well be the first living guinea pig and all that". Uncaring of danger the half elf draws his cutlas and makes to step through the portal.
Kai... steps through as well. He disappears from everyone else's sight.
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With only a bit more effort than it takes one to cross one's eyes, Lucija eagerly opens her senses to Naghamadi's.
"Ecstatic puzzlement" is the term that best describes Lucija and Naghamadi's reaction to what they see. Naghamadi tries to go back to the other side of the door in the highly limb-reaching hope that somebody else can recognize what he and Lucija cannot.
Kris is here as well, having come through scant seconds after Naghamadi.
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Kai looks uneasily at the protean and the weird landscape they find themselves in and cautiously takes a step back. Seeing him unable to pass through the door he decides to cast a cantrip to see if anything shows up. Kris also decides to test the place, first to see if speech is distorted in any way.
"So mate, you alright? You're looking a little off."
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"Off what? FINALLY I find myself somewhere *interesting!*" Naghamadi floats idly around the room like an appreciative patron in an art museum. "That is a bit irritating about the door, but no barrier, when faced with a will to pass it, stands forever." He circles around to look straight at Kai for a moment. "Remember that."
Darro starts to try and walk through the rippling doorway, but he encounters resistance. It feels like trying to walk through a wall of mud that is simply too thick, sticky, and binding for him to be able to twist his way through, even though he's a very agile person. After struggling several seconds trying to push through, the wall solidifies, and Darro is pushed backwards into the room without managing to breach the portal.
Blackthorn whines a little, staying at Darro's thigh-- the order is to come to his master, and he's done so.
Deaglan calls on the divine protection of Trudd.
After noticing Darro's failure to get through, Kleetus attempts to move through the portal...
Kleetus also strides through, disappearing from sight.
...followed a few seconds later by Valais.