Elren'dor smiles as the cat becomes free, the white cat flinging itself into his arms. The elf feels a sense of peace for a moment, holding the animal against him.
Something clicks in Helena's mind as she observes Elren'dor and the scrawny filthy cat. The book, the robes... "You're a wizard." She does her best not to sound accusatory in her statement, but given their surroundings, she can't quiet hide the sneer in her voice.
You feel fine for now, but in days you will need to make a second Fortitude save or take Dex damage and Con damage. If you pass the save, you will need to make it again the next day to be completely cured of the disease.
Campre walks out of the room, sees the pile of corpses, and his eyes bulge as he drops to his knees just inside the room and dry heaves. "Oh gods!" he moans. "Clarence... Dr. Greely... What did they do to you?"
Eventually he stands, looking over the bodies and finding one of the orderlies who is about his size. "I'm sorry, friend, but I need your clothes." he says, stripping the outfit from the body.
He eventually gets dressed, though the clothes are dirty and smeared with blood, he seems to feel better wearing his work uniform. "Things are way worse than I thought!" he exclaims, gesturing to the bodies. "There are patients here as well as orderlies. What's going on up there?"
Elren'dor will take some of the rags and clean off the feline that purrs and nuzzles in, as if meeting a long-lost friend once more. His eyes flicker over towards the Helena as he stands up, letting the cat move up and balance upon his shoulders.
"I am a wizard. I can remember training when I was young, learning the intricacies of arcane lore. I seem to still have much to learn though, my power is little more than mere tricks for now...at least until I have time to rest and study" He doesn't respond to the derisive tone in her voice, he knows what he is capable of and what he could someday do as well.
The elf's attention is turned to the orderly now, whose seems to be in shock for a moment as he looks over the dead here. Elren'dor lets him take his moment to compose himself and get dressed before speaking to him.
"I am sorry for the loss of your friends. How many people do you think may still be alive up above us?" As he listens, he whispers softly and begins to look over the dead for any valuable as well as look over his friends.
Orderly Campre shakes his head in response to Elren'dor's query. "I don't know, many of the orderlies had started changing too. There was a lot of staff here-I never really did a head count, you know? Briarstone's probably the biggest asylum in all of Ustalav... at least, it was one of the best."
He straightens his back and squares his shoulders. "Near a town, but on an island, and built out of an old half-constructed fort! Briarstone's got a high success rate for curing mental illnesses." he says proudly. "Probably why you all had been sent here."
He looks you four over and frowns sadly. "I mean, I'm sure the doctors would be glad for your sudden and may I add quite timely breakthroughs in your condition, but you guys picked a terrible time to come to. Unless we can find a way out of here, we're going to be stuck here a while." He scratches his head. "The rubble in the room and the furnace room made me remember that right when all this stuff happened, there were these tremors. Briarstone's tough, but with as bad as it was I would bet we'd need massive repairs before we can take patients again."
Helena will poke thru the bodies with her sword, just to see if anything useful manifests by moving a few around, but she won't be digging thru in depth. Also trying to get a count of bodies.
"Ustalav? What in the Nine Hells was I doing.....?" Helena's voice drifts off as she tries to spark any memory of her time in Ustalav.
"How many residents? Patients and staff, you said you never counted, but if you had to guess? 50? 100? 500?"
A few of the orderlies have a few coins in their pockets, and a few of the bodies have cheap jewelry on them. 15 GP in total. (added to loot list)
"Uhh... I dunno, more than 50? Way less than 500 though." Campre guesses. "Are you four sure you're feeling all right? I know this is confusing. Hells, I'm confused."
"I don't think any of us are alright, Campre, but we are coherent enough to try and get out of here. Whatever is happening above...we need to work together to get out."
Ustalav. Not terribly far from home but the circumstances makes the memories of those happier times feel ancient and far away. Elren'dor steps out of the room and looks around for a moment, before speaking to the others.
"Shall we continue up the staircase, see what horrors remain above? This place seems secure enough that we could rest here perhaps. I would be more effective if given time to study and relearn my spells once more."
Attempting to climb the stairs reveals that while they are quite sturdy and capable of taking your weight, the room above has collapsed, and too much solid rock blocks off the portal upstairs. It looks like the only two ways up that you have discovered are to take the corpse chute or climb the vent in the furnace room.
Though you have had some combat, you *have* recently awoken from your catatonic state. You are capable of spending an hour to recover your spells, should you wish. Smallest Sun and Elren'dor will be significantly more helpful with their 1st level spells recovered.
"I don't think we're going to make it that way." Smallest Sun observes. "We shouldn't have a hard time climbing, though."
He looks over the group. "I will do what I can to help, though I do not remember any formal medical training. I get the feeling my skills were more bent towards Iomedae's martial side of things."
He gives his longsword a spin, and Helena's instincts tell him that he's skilled, though perhaps not as good as she is. Still, it's enough to have a healer who can support himself in battle.
Elren'dor will nod, though he frowns a little bit at the prospect of having to try and climb up through the vents.
"I suggest the vent in the furnace room rather than this one. Who knows what macabre scene awaits us at the top and perhaps, once we're on the outside, we can get a better idea of how to get out of here." He looks down for a moment though, his voice getting smaller as he spoke. "I will likely need help getting up the vent as well...
He will head back into the room with the furnace, settling against the wall and beginning to take the time needed to memorize his spells once more if the party lets him have his hour.
Helena gives the old holy man a smile when she sees his easily practiced motions with the sword.
"While you two are studying your books and saying prayers, Narcisa and I can take stock of whats in these bags, perhaps we have items that can aid us."
"I'm sure the furnace vent should at least be cleaner, who knows what kind of filth is in the corpse chute. But if one is less steep, it would be easier to climb.
As described before, the furnace has long since gone cold. Looking inside, you find the remains of several incinerated bodies. Perhaps the creature here had been responsible for disposing of bodies and got distracted with Campre?
The furnace vent will he a squeeze for you all, but that tightness will work in your favor. The ridges in the vent and close proximity means you will have little trouble climbing up.
The chute is not too difficult to get to, but it is 8 feet up. The pile of corpses can be climbed up to it, however.
-Posted with Wayfinder
Helena pokes in the ashes of the furnace, seeing if anything didn't quite burn up.
"Narcisa, looks like the corpse chute is an easier climb, but has more drawbacks. One, we don't know what kind of disease or filth might be in it. Two, if someone upstairs tries to use it we may be seen or have to deal with falling bodies."
Helena gestures towards the furnace, "The furnace isn't really much steeper, and no one will be expecting someone climbing up it."
Lowering her voice as to not disturb the casters, "It will probably be best of either you or I go up first, and connect one of these hooks for a rope. Will allow the old man and the elf to climb up easier."
She looks thoughtful for a moment, "Do you think you could scout up to next opening? You are lighter and have quieter armor than I do. Would be good to know what we are up against before we go up all together."
The furnace does its job well; there's nothing of note left inside, though the ashes would do well to help restart the thing, should you desire to warm the place up again.
Smallest Sun and Elren'dor are able to prepare their spells for the day, though the rest of the party will notice that while the cleric is praying, tears are streaming down his face.
Elren'dor feels a sense of completion from cuddling with his familiar, and the relief helps ease his mind enough to prepare his spells.
While you rest, a tremor hits the room, shaking it enough that the people preparing spells notice, but aren't disturbed. Dust and pebbles drop from the ceiling as it shakes. And Campre whimpers unintentionally, huddling in a corner with his eyes closed and his hands tucked under his armpits.
"I hope we can get out of here soon." he mutters. "I would rather be above ground if things start collapsing again."
Narcisa nods to Helena, "I agree. I doubt anyone would be able to handle being hit by a body and a chain of falling people back onto more bodies." She shutters at the thought, "I'll go take a peek now."
She grabs at the table at the tremors hit the room. She frowns, "The sooner the better." She takes the rope, coils it around her shoulder, then gets into the furnace.
Elren'dor's hand slips over the cat's fur idly, more like muscle memory than conscious thought as he looks through his spells and silently incants the words of power until they burn into his mind once more. Once enough time has been spent, he would close the book and smile down at the gently purring feline that has settled on his lap. He would've likely stayed in such a position if it wasn't for the tremor that shakes the earth and unsettles the dust and pebbles from up above. Keymys starts up, growling protectively as the elf looks around.
He smiles at the cleric, letting the man have his moment between him and his Goddess. Rising up though, his attention turns to the orderly and he watches him for a moment before nodding. "I concur with Campre. Let us get ready to go. Do you have something to protect yourself with, Campre? I have a spare dagger, if you need." He quietly judges the man, watching him for any signs of breaking. After all, he has suffered moreso than they have at the moment and their amnesia is more likely a blessing than a curse.
The cleric rises after his prayers are finished, wiping off his face as he does so.
"Was that another tremor I felt?" he asks, sighing. "We should get out of here... Where did Narcisa go?"
"She is traveling up the furnace, Smallest Sun. Seeing if it is safe for us to emerge out that way." Elren'dor said, pacing impatiently at the furnace for her return. "She seems to be a quiet type, freed Keymys with no trouble at all with those tools of hers. I am sure she will be fine."
The elf speaks as if he is trying to convince himself of his words moreso than the cleric, as he looks back towards the furnace. The cat sleeps draped over his shoulder, though one eye remains opened just in case.
Campre looks to Elren'dor and shakes his head. "I'm just an orderly, I'm not very good with anything. I guess I'll have to stay near the back, huh?" he realizes, his face downcast.
Narcisa, you find that the vent goes up into a strange iron chamber too small to be a room. After a moment of searching around, you realize that you're inside one of the boilers. Fortunately for you, the door of the boiler is halfway open. You push the door the rest of the way open, hook your grappling hook to the lip of the boiler itself, and drop the rope down the vent.
"Just make sure to help guide us then. You know this place better than any of us, alright?" Elren'dor tried to say comfortingly, taking the offered dagger he held in his hand and slipping it back down into his cloak. It was just then that the rope came clattering down the vent, seemingly a sign that the coast is clear. "Who shall be next?" Elren'dor asked, hoping not to be the one offered quite yet.
"You should go first, then, Helena." Smallest Sun says. "This area is secured, and I'll go last."
Narcisa very cautiously examines the room from inside the broiler.
If upon seeing something, Narcisa will start to come back down the shaft quietly.
Helena pulls her head out of the furnace vent when she hears Elren'dor explaining where Narcisa went, "She is also securing a rope to make climbing easier. I can not see her anymore, so she should be near the next opening soon."
She will nod slowly at Smallest Sun, remembering his skill with the blade, "Yes, that sounds like a good plan."
Looking back into into the vent, "Ahh, there is the rope now. Shouldn't be long now.
Helena will poke her head back into the vent, listening and watching for signs of Narcisa, either returning, trouble, or the 'all clear' signal of bouncing rope.
Mighty iron boilers crowd here, their pipes piercing the walls and ceiling. Shadows and rust fill the narrow gaps between the cold tanks.
Narcisa, you do not see much, but a strange glowing light coming from under some of the boilers in the back of the room. A single door leads out of the boiler room.
Narcisa gently taps the side of the vent twice, intending to let them know it was okay to come up. She slips out of the vent, hand on her rapier, looking about some more.
"All clear. Careful now." Helena will head up the rope.
Elren'dor, for a moment, considers advising that anything can tap on the side of a vent to pull them into a false sense of security. He keeps his fears to himself, thinking better at the moment of adding more stress to their environment. He looks up the vents, watching Helena's progress until she reaches the top.
"Onwards and upwards, right?" He says nervously, taking a hold of the rope before making his own way up the claustrophobically tight vent.
Campre climbs up after Elren'dor. The arrangement of boilers and pipes in this room makes it hard to run around freely, but you should be able to get through the room all right.
As Elren'dor climbs out of the boiler, Keymys suddenly tenses, her fur standing up on end and her claws digging into her master's shoulder as she hisses. The light coming from under the boilers moves, and you catch a glimpse of glowing eyes and a mole-like snout surrounded by fleshy tendrils as it rushes out at the wizard, snarling.
This creature is a Zoog. It likes to eat sentient creatures and hates cats with great zeal. Its natural attacks affect incorporeal creatures as if he had Ghost Touch and the light emitted from its eyes cause magical effects to glow visibly.
This creature is a Zoog. It likes to eat sentient creatures and hates cats with great zeal. Its natural attacks affect incorporeal creatures as if he had Ghost Touch and the light emitted from its eyes cause magical effects to glow visibly. It's about as tough as a wild dog and does not have any kind of damage reduction or resistances to magic.
Fortunately, the thing misses biting Keymys by just a whisker's length, it's disgusting-smelling jaws snapping closed right in Elren'dor's face. Two Dire Rats rush out after the first creature, going after the rogue and the fighter in equal measure, but don't get to attack during the surprise round.
Elren'dor climbs out of the boiler, the claws in his shoulder making his skin sting painfully as the thing from underneath the nearby boiler comes out in an angry rush and tries to attack Keymys.
"It's a zoog!" Elren'dor cries out, stepping back away from the beast. Keymys continues to his upon his should, swatting aggressively at the thing. There is another miasma of green forming within Elren'dor's hand, as the acid dart coalesces and is launched out at the strange beast.
The Zoog screeches as it's burned by acid, clinging to the pipes around you with strangely simian limbs.
"What's going on out there!?" Campre shouts from within the boiler. "Are you fighting?"
"Vermin problem, be a moment." Helena will call to Campre.
Helena will step to reach Zoog if needed, she doesn't care about an AoO, she doesn't like how it rushed the wizard.
Narcisa draws her rapier, lashing out at the nearest vermin.
She frowns at her glancing blow to the creature.
I should be better at this.
Elren'dor's quick thinking and Helena's swift sword put the Zoog down in an instant, the light dying from its eyes as Narcisa lunges in and draws first blood from the first of the two rats.
Both rats try to gang up on the rogue, but their jumping and biting is easily thwarted as she finds her body doing most of the work without her thinking about it.
From the boiler, you hear Smallest Sun asking Campre what's going on, and the orderly responding.
After dispatching the odd creature attacking Elren'dor, Helena spins back around to strike at the rat that was originally headed her way but chose to attack Narcisa.
The rat seems to have moved farther away from where she last saw it than she realized.
"One down, two to go", she updates to Compre.
Narcisa strikes out at the rat again!
She looks a little less frustrated as her strike lands more true this time.
Elren'dor gives a nod of thanks, taking out his dagger and moving now to the other side of one of the rats to strike at it and try to corral it into one of Narcisa's blades.
The second dire rat dies in a horribly loud and messy fasion, impaled on Narcisa's rapier.
The other one, trapped like a dire rat in a boiler room surrounded by adventurers, attacks the softest looking one there.
Elren'dor finds for the second time this night that something ratlike goes flying at him, but this time he's ready to avoid it.
There's just one dire rat left. Everyone's up!
Watching the rapier skewer the rat like a kabob, Helena calls out to Compre once more, "One rat to go!"
Advancing on the remaining rat, she swings.
And curses the squirming, squeaking beast in a strange tongue, "жин айбан".
Narcisa will to flank and engage the rat, swinging at it.
The last of the rats fall, leaving the room suddenly silent again.
Campre comes out of the boiler, and you can hear Smallest Sun climbing up the rope after him. He looks around the dark room, puzzled. "It's too dark in here, how can you see anything?" he asks, stumbling around.
As smallest sun enters the boiler room, you can see that his eyes do indeed burn like embers. "I see just fine... but there's no color." he observes. "A torch or something would be good here."
Narcisa squints in the darkness, "I don't have any."
"I got it." Helena grabs a quick item out of her pack, having only just a few minutes ago repacked the bag so it was easy to find. She lights the sunrod and attaches it to her shield.
She points to the dead thing Elren'dor called a Zoog, "That thing's eyes glowed, lit the place up light a torch."
In the light of the sunrod, Helena catches a glint of gold from under one of the boilers in the far corner of the room from the door. Getting down on her knees and lowering her head nearly to the ground, you see a pair of completely unused sunrods that have rolled under there, but they're out of reach and space is too tight to try to get your arm in there anyways. Another means to get at them might be necessary. With your longsword, you're able to roll them close enough to reach.
"Hey, I know where we are!" Campre says. "We're right next to the laundry facility and the chapel in the southwest corner of Briarstone!"
He moves to the door. "This way!" he says, perspiration beading his forehead as he is obviously stressed out. "We can get out the front door if we just go past the chapel!"
He pries the door open, looks outside carefully, and nods his head, looking back. "I think someone put a barricade up, but it's not really high, we could climb over it!"
As the door opens, you can hear the sounds of heavy rainfall, muted by possibly some windows or from the source being around the corner.
Helena quickly stashes the new sunrods with her others, but before she can even get off the floor she hears Campre's sudden manifestation of testicular fortitude as he opens the door without defensive cover. She sighs.
"You said there should be records of who brought us here and when, probably our diagnosis and treatment records also. Where would those be?"
As much as Helena would like out of here, any remote possibility to gain insight into her lost memories overrides any need to escape.