With a tremendous duck, bob, and weave Sendi avoids the worst of the flames and turns her momentum back against the beast...slaying it in a fell swoop of claws.
Philacris drops her stealthy act and fires an array of colorful ribbons at the opponents still standing. Though the hellish beast is quite obviously unconcerned, Nox's eyes go wide and her glaive clatters to the ground at her feet.
Pakuzzo rushes left and fires off an arrow...alas his off-balance shot goes wide. Vinz gets a mouthful of the blob, but fails to do any damage.
Crady thwacks the amorphous blob, slushing off part of the beasts globulous form.
The goddess answers Titus' call and sends healing warmth over him and his companions.
The devil presses the assault on Crady, catching him with two claws. It cackles unintelligibly at the sight of red fluid oozing out of the wounds.
Sendi
Philacris
Pakuzzo
Crady
Titus
Nox
Sendi, seeing an opening, rushed forward at the Unarmed Nox and tackled her.
”Get the glaive! Don’t let her have it! Deal with the demon and let’s tie her up!”
Titus jumps into motion at Sendi's call, and rushes along the north end of the room to slam down his morningstar at the disgusting summoned creature.
Sendi struggled with Nox. Through gritted teeth she yelled ”The Glaive! Someone grab it!”
Vinz stays on the attack, trying to hit something vital in the blob-creature's corpulent body.
"I'm going for it!" Pakuzzo yells back.
He dodges around the tables and sees the lemure thrashing at his teammates in front of Nox. He hesitates briefly, then attempts to tumble next to the Thrune agent.
If he manage to make it, he tries to reach for the glaive that Nox has dropped.
"That... worked? That worked!" Phila blinks in surprise at her magic proving effective against the almost-legendary Nox.
With Pakuzzo, Titus and Sendi drawing the lemure's attention, Philacris dashes past the tengu and squeezes past the stunned Nox. Once behind her, Phila reaches down and picks up the glaive she dropped into her square. She holds the glaive out in front of her, ready to jab it at Nox if the woman slips free from Sendi's grasp.
"OW!" Crady whinces from the claw marks. "You think that's funny? Laugh this off!"
Rushing forward, Sendi grabs hold of the immobile woman.
Following Sendi's lead, Titus, Crady, and Vinz converge on the blob of evil...though only Vinz connects. The beast seems more amused than anything by the situation.
Pakuzzo rushes towards the fray as Philacris steps in and snags the long, unwieldy weapon.
The devil lashes out at Crady again, though its eyes take in all the tasty options around it...the unfocused attacks miss the sage.
Coming to her sense, Nox growls. "Release me heathen!" Twisting and turning, desperate to pull herself free...Sendi holds fast! "Lemme GO!" she shrieks.
Sendi
Philacris
Pakuzzo
Crady
Titus
Nox
A grappled creature is restrained by a creature, trap, or effect. Grappled creatures cannot move and take a –4 penalty to Dexterity. A grappled creature takes a –2 penalty on all attack rolls and combat maneuver checks, except those made to grapple or escape a grapple. In addition, grappled creatures can take no action that requires two hands to perform. A grappled character who attempts to cast a spell or use a spell-like ability must make a concentration check (DC 10 + grappler’s CMB + spell level, see Concentration), or lose the spell. Grappled creatures cannot make attacks of opportunity.
A grappled creature cannot use Stealth to hide from the creature grappling it, even if a special ability, such as hide in plain sight, would normally allow it to do so. If a grappled creature becomes invisible, through a spell or other ability, it gains a +2 circumstance bonus on its CMD to avoid being grappled, but receives no other benefit.
You have the Grappled Condition (See above spoiler)
With your goals such as they have been stated, this round you would need to maintain the grapple.
This means, you need to make another CMB check vs her CMD but you get +5 to maintain the grapple. If you succeed vs CMD 19, she is pinned.
Next round, you would be able to try and tie her up with more CMB checks...if she fails to get away. :-P
Now, if she becomes pinned - she will gain the pinned condition while you only maintain the grappled condition. You would lose your Dex to AC though
Sendi gritted her teeth as she tried to force Nox down.
”Pakuzzo! Tie her up! Crady, Titus, hold off the Lemure. Phi, gag her so she can’t cast any spells!”
Vinz was getting visibly agitated. No matter what he tried, he couldn't seem to do any lasting damage to the creature. It was maddening!
Pakuzzo realizes that he left his rope in his pack back at the hideout, and frantically pats down his outfit for something he can use. Fortunately, tengu clothing has a tendency to be more scavenged than tailored, and he's able to produce a cord of tough weave he'd been using as one of his belts, which he then attempts to use to tie Nox's hands behind her back.
”I have rope, take it.”
Titus, seeing no way to move around Sending to help with the situation there, instead tries to batter the demon into a slightly more disgusting pile of goo.
Philacris draws out a coil of silk rope and tosses it to Pakuzzo one-handed. "Having her tied up is all well and good, but..." but what then? This is Nox we have on our hands!
Sendi quickly pins the woman as she fights to pull away as Philacris digs through her pack. Holding a rope out to Pakuzzo, she keeps an eye on the devil beast.
Quickly grabbing the rope, Pakuzzo binds the woman with Sendi's help as the others try to finish of the bulbous foe. While both Vinz and Titus connect, only Titus does any detectable damage to the beast.
In return, the devil turns to the holy man and lashes out with both claws. One connects, ripping a long wound open in his arm.
Still pleading for her release, Nox struggles against the bindings...but fails to break free. "Let me go. Keep the bloody blade...just let me out of here and I'll leave!"
Sendi
Philacris
Pakuzzo
Crady
Titus
Nox
Sendi turned on the Lemure. Her claws opened it up cutting through any otherworldly resilience it had. She then turned on Nox, pointing a single clawed finger. ”You don’t seem to understand the situation you are in. We are going to be asking you some question and you will answer.”
Philacris looks at the glaive in her hand, tries moving it, almost drops it, and then immediately passes the weapon over to Titus to use or store as he sees fit. Once she's gotten it off her hands, she returns her attention to Nox.
"What do you want to do with her, Sendi?"
”Usually I’d kill you for saying my name, but I suppose it doesn’t matter this time. Seeing as how Nox can take it to the grave. I’m SO glad I can finally drop this Irorian cover.” She smiled nastily at Nox. ”You didn’t think you’d get away with it, did you? Betraying the Lord-Mayor? Seriously, what were you thinking? We’ve been paid quite a lot of gold, you see. To kill you without causing a stir. Now, you are going to die here. With the choice being...” she showed her claws ”...how painful it is going to be. Now then, let’s start with an easy one. Tell us everything you know about your Silver Ravens.”
Titus breathes a sigh of relief at the disappearance of the disgusting demon, but quickly tries to cover it so as not to show weakness in front of Nox. He takes a moment to catch up to Sendi, but when he does, opts for complete silence in an attempt to not thwart any attempt by his powerful ally.
Considering your words, she looks over the group and grants you a sinister smile. "You mean to trick me? You lot don't deserve to breathe the same air as the all-mighty Lord-Mayor THRUNE!" she spits out. Stifling a cackle, she continues "He sent me himself to this place to guard it from your kind. I am his right hand!"
Continuing to struggle against the bindings, she sighs. "Perhaps we can make a deal? Would you stand me up and grant me my hands back? The ropes bite my wrists something fierce."
”Damn.” Sendi whispered, annoyed with herself at having failed in her ruse. She then looked at Nox. ”No, and no. What do you think that you could offer us?”
In truth Sendi didn’t quite know what to do. Interrogation was something entirely new to her. The only way she could see this ending was by throwing Nox into the water to down. She deserved as much. But how to get her to talk first? Sendi really didn’t want to have to resort to torture. She hoped that one of her companions had an idea.
Considering the potentials of Sendi's question she slowly nods...looking from side to side slowly. She struggles to lean forward, though fails due to the bindings.
"I can tell you His plans for this place... just stand me up and unbind my hands. That is all I ask. Do with me what you will after you have the information."
"I will not tell you anything without being granted my dignity."
"Unbind your hands? You must think us stupid. So what? You can summon more demons? Perhaps go invisible and flee? I think not."
Spell Like Ability: Dimension Door
"I can only summon those things once per day." she scoffs. With a loud grunt, she mumbles a few arcane words...aside from a colorful display of sparks, nothing happens. "You outnumber me and have my preferred weapon. I am not one of them pathetic casters...I prefer to feel the blood of my foes! Release me."
You don't believe she'll tell you anything
Pakuzzo shrugged.
"If we're taking votes, I'd rather just see her tarred and feathered and then dropped on Barzillai's doorstep with a pithy note attached, but I'm open to new ideas."
When the lemure had suddenly dissapeared, Vinz had looked around frantically for where his opponent must has escaped to, then let out an avian croak of annoyance. Presently he was standing off to one side busying himself with preening his feathers, which had been ruffled into a mess during the fight.
Philacris crosses her arms. "Send a message to Barzillai? I do like the sound of that. But whatever we do, maybe we should knock her out first, I don't like the way she's trying to cast something. It may be failing for now, but the fact that she's trying means she thinks it'd help her." She raises her nose and frowns at Nox. "Isn't that right, you little imp? You think you're still going to escape."
"Since her half-devil body can heal itself, don't hold back. Calistria knows she deserves it."
”Is there a point keeping her alive? I don’t trust a word she says, and the longer we keep her the greater the chance of her success. I hate to say it, but we might well drown her now and hang her body from the building. It’d send a powerful message.”
Titus furrows his brows, then shakes his head. I've no idea what she's trying to do, but I do know that if we let her go, she will be a problem sometime in the future...possibly a big problem. He looks up, as if consulting a higher power, then looks Nox in the eyes. She shouldn't be allowed to live.
”Agreed.”
If nobody stops her, Sendi will drag the bound Nox to the water and will drown her. Sendi sees it as a fitting end and the easiest way to get around Nox’s regenerative powers. At the protests it was said that Nox shrugged off a knife to the throat. Killing her would probably be a very messy affair indeed if done the usual way.
The urban druid cringes at the disposal of the evil wizard, but does not press the issue.
Despite her bluster, Philacris is deeply uneasy at the way Sendi drags Nox to the pond. "Ah, yes. If she heals that would be the best way. And if we can't get any information from her there's little sense in risking otherwise..."
She steels herself and watches. This was an enemy of the free and good folk of Kintargo, and a servant of Barzillai and hell itself. She wouldn't be the first person these Silver Ravens might execute before the city would be free.
Pakuzzo crosses his arms and watches impassively as Sendi drags Nox toward the water.
"I wouldn't waste your breath," he says to Philacris. "She's a dog of Thrune and a thrall of Hell, headed straight for the Pit no matter what we do. Best to send her there now than put up with the grief she'll cause later."
As you drag her to the water, she continues struggling against the bindings. Just as she's about to be plunged beneath the liquid, she tries to cast again...but to no avail.
The monk holds her beneath the waves until the bubbles stop...a moment later they start up again and....then stop...and start and...stop. This occurs several times before they fail to start back up again...holding the limp body down for a rather long time to be sure...Sendi becomes confident she is completely dead.
Magical Chainmail armor, throwning axes (4), magical cloak, bedroll, waterskin, diamond dust (worth 500gp), 9 pp, 70gp, and a mithral key
You find dozens of books near the 'Throne' that seem to be scattered thoughts and histories
+1 Glaive
+1 Chainshirt
+1 Cloak of Resistance
These are Soul Tomes.
They don't actually harm or hurt the souls, they simply store the knowledge the souls once held.
They grant you +4 to K Local/History checks if used as a resource to make the checks. They weigh 20lbs and are worth 1600g
Sendi closed her eyes as she held the captive down. It was one thing to kill in the heat of battle, but it was another to execute in cold blood. And this execution took a long time. But she steeled herself. These were the Silver Ravens that she had joined, and they were watching. She couldn’t show weakness in front of them. This had to be done.
When she was finally sure that Nox was dead she hauled the body back.
”We-“ She already knew that her face and voice gave it away. It had been a very long day. This place had truly tested her. The spiders. Having her knowledge ripped out of her head. The execution. Dropping the act she instead smiled sadly.
”We did what had to be done. The question now is what next? With the body we could increase our name a hundred fold. But then Thrune would have no choice but to really come down on us. Are we ready for this?”
Philacris distracts herself by checking the magic on each of the items extracted from Nox.
She speaks in a flat, dry voice. "Ah, the glaive and chain shirt are magically enhanced. We should... make use of them. The cloak is magical as well, but I can't quite concentrate right now."
When Sendi voices her question, Philacris says "I- I don't know if I'm ready. We just killed Nox. And despite that, I don't even really know what you're all trying to do as the Silver Ravens. Other than paint a target on your heads." She stares blankly at the room. "Thrune has been an absolute nightmare for Kintargo. For people I care about. But even if we somehow managed to face down Nox and win, how could we do anything more than that? We're just five people and a giant raven. Thrune has the weight of Cheliax behind him."
She turns to Pakuzzo "You're the leader of this little group, right? Tell me you've got a plan." Despite her words, her tone becomes gradually more determined as she speaks. She probably hasn't admitted it to herself yet, but she's already mentally committed to this path.
At Philacris' question he corners of mouth at the end of Pakuzzo's beak turn up in a smile. He didn't seem much affected by Nox's execution beyond a palpable air of satisfaction. It was hard to tell if his attitude was due more to professionalism or fanaticism.
"I'm flattered that you consider me so important to the cause, but for this revolution to work, we can't really rely on just one person being the leader. Leaders can be captured or killed; a dedicated group needs to be exterminated to the last in order to truly defeat it. We work through collective leadership and democratic action.
"In any event, the plan is to undertake as many actions as possible to destabilize the Thrune regime and return Kintargo to self-rule. We stay hidden, work to undermine the occupation, give the people hope and the means to rise up, free prisoners, recruit allies, and look for any opportunity to eliminate or capture the heads of the regime, up to and including Barzillai himself. The ultimate goal is a free and self-governing Kintargo, however long that takes."
With a hard stare at the body of Nox, Titus murmurs. I'd say this is a strong destabilizing action... He looks away from the body and quickly conceals a faint look of remorse or guilt. Well said, Pakuzzo. I fear we may need to weather some scrutiny after this; Thrune will likely go door to door looking for Nox's killers...if they see the body, that is. I wonder if we instead were to take the body or destroy it...would the ensuing confusion lessen the response by them? Either way, we should gather up what we've found and return to Rex to regroup.
Phila's eyes widen as Pakuzzo speaks. "You really think you can do that? The Silver Ravens can do that? We can do that?" She raises an eyebrow, grins "Ah the confidence of youth!"
"Now, what you said is all well and good birdie, but it's hardly a plan for right now. Titus is right. Nox getting killed will turn the heat up on the whole town. We'll have to-" She stops mid-sentence.
An impish smile crosses her face. "Oh. I have quite the idea. Something to turn Nox's disappearance to our favor." She heads over to the drowned Nox and rolls her over to start inspecting her features.
"Here's an idea. What if Nox herself appeared to turn against Barzillai? I could take on her face... we have her glaive and equipment as well. I could go to the gates leaving the city, make a big speech calling out Thrune as not worth following. Announce that I- as Nox- am abandoning him, and then leave the city?" Phila's eyes narrow. "Make sure the Dottari get a good look at me, and then leave, never to be seen again."
"One of Thrune's strongest supporters leaves him... maybe some of the Dottari will lose interest as well. And it covers up why Nox is no more."
Philacris' eyes shine with childish mischief, for once entirely matching her childlike appearance. "How about it?"
Pakuzzo arched an eyebrow at the elf. Talk about bold!
"Sounds like a fun time, but how are your bluffing skills? That's going to take some big brass ones to pull off, not to mention that you're going to need to leg it it fast afterwards and find a place to hide before they try to capture or kill you for insubordination."
"In the meantime, we should probably do as Titus suggested and head back. We're going to need to hide the body, though. It's way too risky to bring it back to the hideout with us, and I don't know of a quick way to dispose of here and now, do any of you?"
”It’s a good plan. If we can get you out safely. Which I’m not sure of. But...we could leave the body hanging from the window. Word will spread that Thrune isn’t as untouchable as they are made out to be. Yes, the heat will go up. But that’s the point, isn’t it? To show everyone that it can be done.”
"Show everyone what could be done, and then start a hunt for the culprits." Phila comments as she casts her glance around the room. "Pakuzzo, I'm confident I could pull a good Nox off and slip away. These are just Dottari after all. A touch of invisibility and they'll be none the wiser."
Phila takes a closer look at the items that Nox had on her, pocketing the diamond dust, coins and then raising the key up to inspect in more detail. "Very strange to see a key made of mithril. Not much point to that normally. Unless this has some ceremonial significance?" She thinks to what she knows of Kintargo in case this is some important stolen key.
While she ponders the source of the key, her gaze is drawn to the books piled up. She leans over them and begins flipping through the first one.
"Ah. I think I've heard of these! Soul tomes... ones that likely store the memories and legacy of the archivists that once worked down here. Little Rex would probably want to see these."
Titus furrows his brow, unsure of the best way to proceed. On one hand, Philacris had proven to be incredibly capable, so he had no worry that she'd be able to pull off what she said. However, to leave her out there by herself and unprotected was inexcusable.
I'm not sure how to dispose of it, no. Though...you're right, it can't be left here. I think, to keep doubt for Philacris's plan, we'll need to take it away...in pieces.
Crady wracks his brain to think of a place or way to despose of the evil wizard's body.