"Gremlin? Cut filthy thing's head off before it wakes."
Thüm moves to the side to let Kayla pass, then moves in behind her and Ozy.
[ooc]Ordinarily I would wait until we were told about the tripwire before reacting to it, but no need to hold things up.[/b]
Kayla successfully disables the tripwire. She can hear other tripwires clicking at the other entrances to this particular cave .
Within this second chamber, Kayla, OZ and Adrien can see exits to the northeast and southeast; neither of them connects, at least in an obvious way, to the cave containing the gremlin.
The gremlin stirs back to life, slightly dazed by the effects of the hex.
Kayla moves forward into the cavern, looking into both new passages, her shortswords in hand.
@Kayla: you reach another junction, with corridors to the north and to the south; both are narrow and dark - it isn't obvious what's beyond.
"Pssst. Preli! Can you hear me? Do these passages connect?" she calls into the northern passage...Kayla will wait for the rest of the group to catch up before heading to the north.
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Preli calls over his shoulder, still keeping his eyes and gun trained on the passage in front of him,
"Are we killing vermin or singing them lullabies?!"
He hops up and down once or twice...
Kayla moves forward along the northern passage to see if it's connected to where Preli stands...
Arkady, at the insistence of both Preli and Thum, will step up to the little gremlin creature and attack it with a powerful swing down at the creature.
Kayla emerges onto another small chamber, at the end of which she can see another gremlin, readying an attack.
As a light begins to illuminate the tunnel ahead of Preli, approaching from the right, another gremlin is revealed.
With a strange yell that comes out more like a chirp Preli fires...
And dropping the torch he is carrying at his feet, reaches to reload his gun.
There's a flash of light in the tunnel at the gun's loud report. The bullet hits the gremlin directly, and it falls, dead.
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Somewhat surprised by the failure of her companions to take advantage of her sleep spell, Onna whispers a couple of words to her skunk companion, who, for the second time this day, fires a spray of musk at the gremlin.
The gremlin, only just awoken from its magical slumber and further taken by surprise by this turn of events, stares at the skunk for a second, then wretches violently, a number of times. Onna takes the opportunity to drive home her own attack ...
...
... which, given the gremlin's small size, fails to connect.
Kayla sees a gremlin pop up in front of her, and then a hole suddenly appears in its head and it falls over dead. Looking around the corner she sees Preli with the smoling gun, and calls out, "Nice shot, little one! Let's keep this group moving and clear the passages out!"
She then checks out the body for anything interesting and the passage beyond it for traps...
The passageway follows onto a narrow ledge overlooking a rubble-filled cavern. The far wall is made of a smooth, dark grey metal. A single circular door, tightly closed, sits on the metal wall just above the upper level of the rubble. At the centre of a pile of metal sits a gremlin, larger than the others you've encountered but obviously of the same type.
The gremlin notices Kayla on the ledge, just as she notices the gremlin, and it moves up the ledge and round it to engage her with its little short sword.
Moving swiftly on his long legs, Thüm keeps pace with the thief as as she moves through the tunnels. When the gremlin attacks Kayla, the barbarian raises his shortspear. "Move, frail one, behind me if you can!" he barks.
Onna once more strikes at the still incapacitated gremlin, but misses.
Preli moves cautiously forward...
Preli moves cautiously forward...
Preli moves cautiously forward
taking a branching tunnel to try and flank the gremlin. Spotting the gremlin ahead he fires of a shot
But, concentrating too hard on not hitting he's friend Kayla, the shot flies well wide.
As he moves into the branching tunnel, Preli notices another tripwire, slung across the entrance.
"Miss Kayla!" Adrien says, both he and Ozzy moving behind her position. "If you fall back, Ozymandias can lend a hand as well! He can likely weather that blade a bit better than you can, too." Adrien then backs away, keeping the large automaton between him and the gremlin. Ozzy, for his part, rears back his one, heavy fist and lies in wait, ready to attack the creature if it moves into his range.
Round 4(?) - Initiative 20
Arkady growls at the little creature and begins to unleash his rage. His eyes begin to glow with a sickly green backlight and glowing cracks begin to form in the creases of his hands. The dwarf roars and grips the longsword with both hands, and swings at the nasty little beast in the hopes of cleaving it in two.
But her footing is not quite secure on the edge of the cavern and she swings too short to connect with the large gremlin.
The gremlin in the room with Onna and Arkady continues to retch and cannot act. Onna grits her teeth in an effort to close with the creature - her android tattoos surge with light, illuminating the chamber. She jabs her spear at the gremlin.
Meanwhile, the gremlin leader, cackling, jabs his own shortsword at Kayla ...
... again only managing to bruise her slightly
Kayla's returning swing misses, and as she moves out of the creature's way to clear the way for the others, the gremlin takes another swing, giving her yet another bruise.
Round: 4 - Initiative: 6
Preli, having noticed the tripwire, reconsiders his rash exploration. Hopping back into the main tunnel he hears that Onna and Arkady are still having trouble with the original gremlin, leaning past the android he fires a shot at the pest.
Thum's spear flies past Kayla and catches the cackling gremlin square, taking it down. Preli, meanwhile, misses his own target.
Watching the gremlin attacking Kayla be speared by Thüm's throw, Adrien and Ozzy opt to move up and around another of the cave's routes, seeing as the automaton is too large to move comfortably around his comrades. "We'll make sure there aren't more of them to contend with, so we don't get pinned down," he calls, ushering Ozymandias to go ahead of him. "They're nasty little creatures, but we should be able to deal with them together."
The tripwire does indeed disable. An identical one at the other side of the same cavern also falls loose.
Round 5, initiative 20
His blood boiling further, the dwarf turns his backlit gaze to Onna. "Help me by distracting it, if you would," he requests as he flings his buckler to the ground and grips his sword in a tight two-handed grip once again. The fissures in his knuckles glowing a sickly green-yellow, he swings the blade at the irritating little creature once more.
Arkady misses.
The gremlin finishes wretching and groggily pokes its shortsword at Arkady ...
... but without strength or aim it misses completely.
Melee bite +4 (1d3-4), 2 claws +4 (1d2-4)
Onna, deeply exasperated, jabs at the creature with her spear "Just. Die. Damn you!". Oka, sensing his mistress' frustration, scampers down her arm and bites and claws at the gremlin.
Thüm grips his poleaxe and strides forward to where Kayla's dropped her torch, tensed to dispatch any other vermin that pop up.
Round: 5 - Initiative: 6
Preli, chirping more and more irately now, quickly reloads his gun, pulls his hat forward in a way that he thinks makes him look cool, and fires off another round...
The gremlin finally goes down, and lies twitching on the floor of the cave.
When no further threats materialize, Thüm retrieves his shortspear from the dead gremlin, cleans it, and then ties the body to his belt like a hunter carrying a partridge home. He picks up the torch and moves around the caverns, thrusting it into every hole and corner looking for hidden vermin, adding the other gremlin bodies to his trophies as he goes.
Kayla stares at the human barbarian as he ties the dead bodies to his belt with an odd, disgusted look on her face. Eventually she tears her gaze away and investigates the room, finally ending up under the double doors in the metal wall.
She estimates how far above her head the metal doors are, and how tall her new colleagues are. Doing some quick calculations in her head, she calls Adrien and OZY over, proposing to climb up on the robot so that she can reach the doors, check it for traps, and either disarm the trap and/or pick the lock so that they can get in...
Ozymandias moves over to the rubble, before setting his massive hand on the ground, fingers outstretched. "Kayla, step onto my hand; I will raise you to help examine this passagewaa-aaa-y, and potentially aid in disarming any trap we encounter." While he waits for the rogue to step into his grasp, his head swivels in its socket to scan the doorway for anything unsavory, casting a light blue glow over the entire wall.
Kayla lightly steps onto his hand, maintaining her balance as the eidolon lifts her into the air. The pair look like a circus act - the huge mechanical construct using one hand to lift the lithe half-elf girl, delicately balanced in the air.
Kayla inspects the door, aided by Ozy's blue light and its own visual scanning.
The door isn't trapped. But it's been closed and locked in place from the other side. It's impossible to pick from this side; additionally the door's made from glaucite and therefore very probably beyond the abilities of any of the party - including OZ - to break down.
"I do not believe it likely that I could compromise this door to the point that any could reliably pass through it. As an alternative course of action, I suggest we search for a door of similar type, and attempt to gain access." Ozymandias lowers Kayla from her perch, waiting for her to move before picking his hand up from the ground again. "Adrien, I have spotted no sign of the body their leader mentioned; the one who had contracted 'flesh rot'. It is likely in this area as well, I suggest caution."
"Additionally, I will need to scan and document our newer traveling companions in the near future; otherwise it will be detrimental to my ability to perform vital functions."