"Just a scratch," Caine shrugged. "I'm fine."
"You look fine Caine, better than in a long time in fact. Hard work agrees with you."
"Yeah, just a minute." Zirren said, with a nod as he leaned up against a wall.
He closed his eyes and let his mind calm itself. Now that he had time to think, he muttered an incantation quietly.
"hewa litrix."
A force of icy blue armor came into being around him before settling into place around him.
About 3 more of that, I think.
He pushed himself off the wall, still unsteady but a little more confident."I don't think I'll be getting better anytime immediately. But I can still continue."
Caine was feeling better. He was still sore all over, but it was becoming a good kind of sore. He felt... looser somehow, in spite of his angry, overworked muscles. He wasn't sweating constantly anymore and his head wasn't pounding all the time. Rukh was right.
"Huh." was all he said about it.
He tapped Zirren with the healing wand.
Caine begins searching the bodies of the kobolds and finds not much in the way of valuable items beyond the weapons and armor.
"Let's check out that door, shall we?"
Belladonna checks the open doorway and finds no traps within the small room; however, she does hear the sounds of shallow, raspy breathing coming from somewhere within. This dour stone chamber is filled with empty crates and splintered barrels. Stone rafters criss-cross the ceiling above.
Belladonna retrieves a sling and as many bullets as she can carry while saying "Halfling power!"
When she hears the raspy breathing she'll skulk back to her friends and says "Can't see much, but I'll tell ya there's someone breathin' back there. Heavy n raspy."
"Want to go the other way, or go see who has the breathing problem?" Caine asked the group.
"I wanna see who's got the breathin problem. What if it's a slave? What if there's loot? If they're already breathin heavy, it ain't gonna be some tough guy."
Zirren nodded in agreement, his body feeling sluggish but his mind was still clear. "After all the noise we made it isn't likely to be sleeping enemies."
"Sounds good." Caine started moving off toward where Bella had just scouted. "Ruhk, you ain't bleeding yet. You want to take point?"
Belladonna draws and reloads her crossbow
"Good idea," Caine said.
"Aw, thanks for volunteering me Caine, I was beginning to think you didn't care."
Ruhk grins and takes point.
Zirren snapped his fingers and cast his own spell of dancing lights, but his were the 3 colorful spheres which he moved independently of each other. 2 into the western room drifting slightly apart in opposite doorway sides. The other to the northern tunnel.
"Vaerir mitneic."
This will do well, Nathaniel says as he moves forward gripping the new halberd tightly with both hands, Let's see what lies ahead, shall we.
Nathaniel moves straight forward.
Belladonna moves into the darkened room, checking around with her crossbow at the ready... She does not see any figures immediately and begins to quietly search around the crates, suddenly coming across a wounded creature in the far corner, hidden behind a stack of crates with a barbed spear still lodged its back. The body arms are extremely long and the hands end in very large hands whose fingers look more like tentacles than fingers. The creature looks at you with fearful, sad eyes and gurgles as tries to push itself further into the corner, cowering in absolute fear....
Belladonna backs away from the thing and speaks to the group. "I found something. Uhm I dunno what it is, but it's hurt something bad. Uhm. It's got tentacles on its hands."
"It's a choker! Phew, I'm glad I found it before it found me. That coulda been nasty. Are you guys still there? I wouldn't mind an extra pair of eyes! Specially if there's gonna be more of these ambushers."
"I've got your back Bella, you can count on me."
"Then come in here." Belladonna retorts. "See this thing. It's a choker. It wraps around you and squeezes you to death. I think we should put it out of its misery."
Ruhk rubs his chin as he looks at the pathetic creature. Killing someone which looks like it wouldn't be a threat didn't quite sit right with him.
At the same time, Bella seemed to think it might be best.
"You sure? Well...if nobody else have any other ideas..."
Ruhk hesitates long enough for someone else to speak up, but if nobody does, he will steel himself and end the creatures pain.
Caine side-eyed Art, waiting for the inevitable protest.
Poor thing does appear to be suffering. Is it an animal, or should we try to talk with it?
Belladonna would know that chokers either do not, or cannot, talk. You recall hearing a lot of information about them from your gnomish mentor who spent nearly an entire day talking at length about them once.
"I don't think they can talk, they're pretty dumb." Replies Belladonna. "They just feed and mate. It might look humanish, but it ain't. It only hunts people. Better to finish it off rather than letting it bleed to death."
"Choker?"
Zirren's eyes opened more widely as Bella's recounting of her knowledge sparked his own memories of the things he'd studied.
"Bella's description is an apt one. Choker's are not what one could call intelligent creatures, but neither are they strictly animals. By all accounts I've ever read they are innately cruel and are driven by a need to choke other things. Such actions gives them their name.
There are some reports that they can understand the native language of the Underdark, or rather Undercommon as it's more commonly known but speaking intelligibly is generally beyond them. That isn't a language I ever learned to speak however.
There are exceptions to every rule but I don't think this is one. We should remove this Choker as a potential threat."
"I know things."
As Ruhk approaches the downed beast, he decides that this is a task unworthy of Bethany, and instead pulls out a dagger.
We often have to resort to setting traps to keep predators out of the chicken coops. It is terrible, nasty work, but I understand that it must be done. If this creature hunts, kills, and eats, people, it should be put down.
Ruhk walks over to the deathly injured creature that looks up him with large, pleading eyes gurgling pitifully as it spots the dagger and the danger it represents. It tries to push itself away, but is too weak and the merciful man that Ruhk is ends the creature's suffering quickly with a sharp jab of blade into its heart. The creature's last breath escapes in a soft wheeze as it slumps back against the stone wall.
The rest of the room is empty with the crates and barrels either containing only the rotten remnants of old food or simply nothing at all.
"Ugh, that was...unpleasant. When we get back to town, I'm going to have to try and forget those eyes with a fair few tankards let me tell you."
Wiping his dagger clean, Ruhk shudders a bit.
"Let's just find the sources of this kidnapping and be done with it. I'm feeling a lot more...aggressive all of a sudden."
"I'm honestly surprised you did it at all. I thought it was gonna be Caine or Mister Artegal. Anyway, things to hit, right, let's try this way."
Belladonna goes slightly ahead of the group through the north-east tunnel. She's using her ears more than her eyes in the darkness.
Caine watched the whole process unfold without a word. It was nice that Art was coming around, understanding that mercy was a goal to strive for, but not always a luxury that could be afforded. If Art had been able to understand that back when they'd faced the Warg, that situation could have been a lot cleaner and less risky.
Still, Caine couldn't help but feel that the world was a bit bleaker now that Art had embraced a crueler pragmatism. As much as Caine had disagreed with Art's conclusions, he'd respected the good-heartedness behind them. In his own heart, Caine wished the world could be treated the way Art wanted to treat it.
He was starting to feel the need for a drink, so he shook his head to clear it and focused on the job at hand. He followed Bella into the dark, feeling guilty about the fact that he was glad to have such a pressing distraction.
"I said I had your back, and I meant it."
Ruhk hefts Bethany once again, moving after Bella, and now actively looking for someone to take out his dark feelings on.
Bella you begin to move into the northeastern tunnel as the smoothly cut stonework gives way to rough tunnels that look akin to a nature tunnel until you look closer to see several areas of roughly gouged stone like it had been mined. The cramped passageways open to a large cavern filled with rocky overhangs and jutting boulders. As you creep into the room, you suddenly spot movement approximately 30' ahead of you! You see two shadowy figures attempting to hide among the stalagmites and large boulders...