Lucija is able to tell that the xill's armor is splint mail +3.
As the night hag had said, the creatures from other planes seem locked in a kind of stasis, showing no reaction to Lucija's interest-- not even so much as a twitch of a muscle or tendril. If the night hag's words are true, these are prisoner-specimens collected by the original crew of the King Xeros, and have been held in their cells for a very, very, very, very long time.
For his part, Kai turns to the cutting free of the souls trapped within the creeper itself. A foul stench permeates the air as he cuts, and slick, viscous sap oozes from the creeper's bulk. Tendrils twitch throughout the room, but not in any coherent or organized fashion.
The first individual he cuts free gasps for air when the adamantine blade gives him enough space to do so-- it's a dark-skinned man, human, probably no older than twenty, wearing little save a loincloth and a necklace made of seashells. He seems obviously weak and struggles feebly to wrench himself from the innards of the creeper. There are several obvious bite marks on his body.
He babbles in a tongue other than Taldane, his words broken up by blood-flecked coughing.
Several more forms remain engulfed in the plant-matter of the creeper, still.
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"Ermm, guys, this man here seems to be coughing up blood and I haven't got the foggiest idea. Any help? Also, Darro mate, you said you're good with the lingos, any idea what he is saying?"
Kris will reverse his blade and offer the man a hand out of his tendril prison, casting Healing Hex should he take the offer.
The obvious injuries and scratches on the man heal at Kai's hex, and he eagerly takes Kai's hand to get out, but continues to cough bloodily and appears very weak. He rubs at his chest and abdomen with one hand and gestures with the other at the tree and the forms still trapped within.
The man nods fervently at Deaglan's pointing at his chest, but doesn't really seem to understand what is being said. He rubs at the protrusions unhappily, and coughs a little more blood.
There is no poison or magic evident on the man. Deaglan thinks that he's not necessarily suffering from damage that restoration might heal, but clearly something is inside him that shouldn't be. Possibly it could be cut out, with care and with tools of the trade, but it would be a time-consuming process and the man at least seems capable of standing and moving on his own, albeit weakly.
The man does point at Kleetus and his locked-up limbs, and says more words in his own tongue, before he moves to try and free the next body from inside the creeper, tugging at a woman who looks similar to him-- dark skin, short black curly hair, little in the way of clothing.
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"Oh no..."
Seeing so many people being held prisoner, subjected to the invasive violations of mad creatures, Valais begins shaking, halfway between trembling and convulsing. She grips her claws against her head and falls to her knees, her breathing somehow both heavy and shallow.
"Don't want to know, time to go...don't want to know, time to go...don't want to know...."
She feels all the memories come again, just as though she was in the green water again, just as though she still felt the squish of matted blood and flesh on the floor, just as though she could hear his voice outside the tank.
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Deaglan puts his thumbs up and starts hacking away at the vines with gusto to free the other human captives.
"These humans have been caught in their village, they are either related or friends. Also; there is something inside that man. I can't remove it easily, it will take some major healing skills and time. I might be able to do that, but I prefer to do that after someone has explained to him what will happen."
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Kris nods towards Deaglan and continues to hack at the vines with his enchanted adamantine blade, concerned with freeing the others caught in the strange creeper.
"Nice work Deaglan, we'll get him help at the port, am sure someone speaks Mwangi is it? Oi Darro mate, you still got the captain's axe?"
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All told, there are eleven humans tangled in the foul guts of the creeper-- all appearing of Garundi stock, similarly dressed. The tree's bole also reveals a number of gems and coins, perhaps taken from previous captives.
The captives all appear to have something present in their chest and abdomen cavities. However, further investigation of that might be temporarily put on hold...
As you hack apart at the tree to free the captives, the tree itself shudders and twitches. You begin to see some of the tendrils starting to fade from existence, throughout the room. By the time the last captive is cut free, the strange xenophage creeper has nearly dispersed entirely from the cargo hold, leaving only the bole left, and a large, slick puddle of the foul-smelling sap from its interior.
Darro, who had previously noted a tremor from the ship, has been staying alert to further such sensations. As the creeper seems to wither down into a husk of itself, he feels another lurch in the crystal beneath his feet.
A few seconds later, blue-hued lights flicker into existence around each of the force-wall doors that hold the otherworldly specimen-prisoners. A calm, otherworldly voice resonates from everywhere and nowhere.
The freed Garundi people look around quizzically, leaning on each other for support as they are all still obviously weak, and then looking to you for guidance.
Valais is on the floor having a slight crisis; Kleetus is still standing, locked in place.
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"'Shift?' As in...planeshift???"
Lucija's wide-eyed surprise quickly shifts to fanatical elation.
"Do you know what this means!?!" She turns to the group. "Who needs the Pathfinder Society - Hells, who needs Golarion The Cage - when we could have A SHIP THAT CAN SAIL THE PLANES, with us as its crew?!? Think of it...to explore strange new planes...to seek out new life and new, far grander civilizations...to boldly go where few mortals, if any have gone before!!!"
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Valais rears up and roars in Lucija's face.
"STAY IF YOU WISH. WE SHALL NOT LEAVE THIS PLANE WITHOUT FREEING OURSELVES FROM THIS FLESH VESSEL."
She pauses as she sees the summoner's mark on her forehead. She sniffs and wrinkles her nose up, fuming with her eyes burning into the gnome.
"YOU ARE MARKED AS THE SIGILED ONE. THANK THIS GIRL FOR NOT ALLOWING ME TO REND YOU AND YOUR PET TO PIECES AND SEWING THEM TOGETHER."
Valais picks up Kleetus, hefting the paralyzed inquisitor over her shoulder, she rushes over to the Mwangi prisoners, trying to shuffle them along.
"Let's...let's get out of here."
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Kris helps the last of the people out of the Xenophage and checks them for obvious wounds. Quickly, he grasps the items left in the bole of the tree like creature before joining the others. With the translation of the message he looks torn for a broef moment.
"To stay or... No we best get these poor souls outta here and fix their condition. I muxh prefer the fresh salt air on my ships ta!"
Not to mention what the Talons would do to me if i deserted. the though sobers him as he starts gesturing to the captives to leave the ship back the way they came
Several of the group begin to hurry for the door by which they came in! Kleetus is an unwieldy sack of... half-orc... atop Valais' shoulder, but she runs up the stairs after the others. The Mwangi captives understand the gestures plain enough, if not the language, and they hurry along as well, helping the weaker members of their group.
Lights are flickering into being through the crystal structure as you go. In the helm-room, you see the brass cube spinning at an accelerated rate, tiny bolts of lightning flickering over its surface and individual glyphs lighting up. The air is filled with a blue light that wasn't there before. The plinth itself seems to have replenished its captive-- there is another form inside its depths, powering the ship's functions-- if the hag's words were to be believed. Letters and diagrams of Azlanti script hang in midair, flashing and changing too fast to be read.
The voice continues to speak.
Running to the portal stones, those who are choosing to flee the ship make it back to the entrance level-- and realize that the doorway which formerly blocked them is currently open and translucent. The exit is clear!
Lucija, are you staying on board...? The adventure of a lifetime.... maybe...
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"Fire..." Lucija breathes, her eyes gleaming....
Naghamadi coils gently around her. "Dear Lucy, though it pains me to say this, you're not yet powerful enough to survive the Eternal Flame...." And he coils tightly around her, then zooms off with the others like a shot.
"No matter what happens, we'll always have Xeros!"
The Pathfinders run through the ghost ship in a race against the clock, the freed captives staggering and running with them. One after another they dash through the portal and out onto the white crystal deck, still marked with blood and scorch marks from earlier.
The obelisk spike at the bow of the ship is crackling with visible energy, an intense, azure-blue lighting up all sixty visible feet of it. The air smells of ozone. The boat by which you arrived is still here-- the harbor guards who are aboard it white-faced and hurriedly maneuvering their tug away from the King Xeros itself. There's already a twenty-foot gap between the tug and the edge of the white crystal gap...
As you run, the deck begins to become soft and impermeable under your feet...
The Mwangis look at each other, and promptly jump overboard, preferring to take their choices in the harbor water than risk going with the ship as it goes.
The King Xeros, ghost ship of a lost empire, shifts...
*
The harbor guards would talk of it for weeks, the sight of the massive white vessel becoming suffused with a blue so pure as to leave afterimages on their eyes for weeks. The light had built to a blindingly intense hue-- against it, briefly silhouetted, were the forms of the Pathfinders, leaping clear-- and then the ship vanished from the harbor as if it had never been. The water rushed into the displacement gap with a thunderous splash...
The guards were able to fish out a motley crew from the harbor-- a paralyzed half-orc, kept from drowning by the strong arms of the disfigured demon-woman; an enormous wolf and his archer companion; a doughty dwarf and a sailor elf, and eleven weak Mwangi villagers. (They hadn't needed to pick out the gnome, of course, her strange serpent baring her aloft.)
In the aftermath, the Pathinders made a full report to the Society of the unusual ship and its cargo. The sages and scholars of the city were brokenhearted that the ship had passed on to other worlds, but the Harbormaster was just as happy to have it gone from his harbor.
Deaglan saw to it that the Mwangi villagers were taken to the healers of the Ascendant Court. There, he was able to assist with the removal of what turned out to be xill eggs implanted in each of the poor wretches. With appropriate translators found, the villagers told a tale of having originally been from an island settlement off the coast of the Mwangi Expanse-- abducted by xill a day earlier, when the strange ship had materialized near their home.
Adril Hestram treats you all to a drink in his study, after the debriefing's been managed. "Well, sounds like a damned odd experience!" he says, clapping the no-longer-paralyzed Kleetus on the shoulder. "Glad you all came out in one piece. If we ever see that ship again, I'll know who to call, eh? Take the next few days off, Pathfinders-- you've earned it!"