Preli, seeing the last gremlin drop, relaxes somewhat, adjusts his hat and casually reloads his gun.
"Pew pew!"
"That's a shiny door there! 'Recon this metal here'd fetch a pretty penny... Whad'ya think Kayla?"
Seeing Kayla fail to open the door Preli sags momentarily
"Aw shucks! There's gotta be a way. Why were we clearing these pests anyway, there a reward or som'ing?"
"Killing gremlins reward enough. Filthy things scatter traps wherever they nest, even where children play. Lök One-Hand we called Lök Quickbow, once." The old man shrugs. "Also, skraelings wanted vermin dead. Now will they open way that Khonnir Baine passed."
Arkady's bloodrage subsides, leaving the dwarf's strength sapped. The glow from his eyes and hands subsides, and after about a half minute he is recovered enough to move. Returning to his companions as they discuss their next move, Arkady sheathes the blade. "We should check the caverns for any other vermin, or treasures that they have left behind should they have died or fled."
"Good idea, there may be more that could have scattered after we attacked... might have been what locked that door, too." Adrien looks around for a moment, before turning back to the others. "Where should we head first? We could check the other tunnels, or head back and see if they'll open the door before we go combing through the passages."
Treasure!
Preli briefly and most inelegantly flaps his arms at the mention of treasure.
"Are there more tunnels? If there are then it is our duty to explore them, duty and honour and a job well done and all that... Mainly for treasure!... Anyhow, if we're killing stuff to get the locals to open a door... Maybe its this one? Or the one down the way there?
"We should definitely clear out the tunnels. I doubt three gremlins make up the entire nest..." Kayla comes back to the NW opening from their current location, checking it for traps before moving ahead.
"I will accompany you; Adrien has optimized my optical sensors for tasks such as this." The large robot follows behind Kayla, looking for any traps or anything else of note, such as other doors similar to the one they found, other gremlins, or any and all objects of interest. "I would suspect that others of their ki-i-i-i-nd are not far away, if they are present." Ozymandias's bright blue light blinks for a moment, his head twitching; likely a technical error. "We will not need to travel far."
The north-western cavern turns out to be empty.
"Thanks, Oz! So this little loop is clear...let's head south and check out that other passage." she says, leading the robot back down to the southern passage.
Arkady will follow along behind the rogue, ready to leap forward at the first sign of an ambush by the odd shadowy people.
Spinning his oversized flintlock round on his index finger, Preli follows behind Kayla in what seems a practiced procession. Keeping clear of the robot however, and peering with a suspiciously appraising eye at it whenever it drew close.
Even just the metal alone... hundreds... thousands?
Thüm scoops Kayla's torch back off the ground and hands it to the scout before following after her.
The southern passage leads to a ledge, above the ledge you can see that it leads back into the torch-illuminated chamber occupied by the remnant of the Gathering.
Kayla follows the walls along the large opening and heads to the remaining area to the west, intent on completely clearing out the warren of tunnels. She wasn't sure what kind of deal the group made before, but her personal sense of exploration and never leaving a potential enemy behind you urged her to explore every place...
Luepel sees Kayla moving along the wall. "Did you clear vermin? Will I take you to Sef?"
"We haven't cleared this passage to the west yet, but if you are certain there are no vermin in it, then you can lead us to this Sef." Kayla starts to ask more, but catches herself and bites off the words as they are forming. Her insatiable curiosity made her want to know all about these people living under the lake, but she wanted to know about the strange metal doors even more...
"No vermin there, but the flesh rust lurks. Sef warned you, no?"
"I... I can't--and won't--speak for the rest of you, but the prospect of this "flesh rust" worries me, and I'd rather investigate it now than later. If it's some sort of disease, Ozymandias could investigate it; I doubt it would bother him much. Until I get more of his sub-systems back on line they might cause some damage to him, but even now it's unlikely." Adrien looks around the rest of the group, hoping to gauge their thoughts on the matter before proceeding. He himself seems conflicted; his adventurous nature offset by the unknown but likely very real danger.
"I agree - I would rather confront the danger of this 'flesh rust' now, before we delve deeper and have to potentially retreat through it, should it spread beyond its area now."
Preli, listening as the group discuss this and that, suddenly stops.
back in the rubble... was that a...
He slips away from the group while they are talking to the gathering and heads back to the rubble strewn cave.
just as I thought, there's another tunnel here...
Preli carefully creeps into the passage, gun poised...
"Exactly; I think they might have been referring to some sort of zombie; I'd hate to see it amass any more numbers before we find it." Adrien stops then, looking to where Prelli was standing, then looks around. "Did anyone see where we lost Prelli? Where did--Prelli! It's dangerous down here, don't venture off by yourself! You could be killed!" Adrien continues to shout, urging the others to help him look for their newest compatriot.
Preli edges down the passage. There's no gremlin here, but he notices another tripwire at the entrance to this chamber.
Preli moves forward, carefully stepping over the obvious tripwire, and slumps, disappointed.
Nothing at all!?
"Preli! Come back here...how many times do I have to tell you to stick with the group? If you see something, say something! Then we can all check it out. Going off by yourself will only get you hurt. Or killed. And what am I going to tell your folks then? You know I'd never hear the end of it!" Kayla calls back down the passage where they had come from.
Once they were all together again, Kayla is ok with leading them to the flesh rust area, although she didn't like the sound of it at all. Maybe the big robot would be better going first this time...
Preli jogs back into the main cavern to rejoin the group, shuffling his belt and doffing his hat
"sorry folks, call of nature. Gnome's gotta do what a gnome's gotta do ya know!?"
"sorry folks, call of nature. Gnome's gotta do what a gnome's gotta do ya know!?"
Arkady harrumphs, his moustache twitching with the facial tic. "Best you tell someone where you are off to next time lad, in case you be taken by whatever the gods forsake down here in the depths."
"I didn't see any more pesky pests anyway, I think we're done on that front. What's all this about rust? Not effecting anything valuable I hope."
He casts his greedy eyes over Oz again...
"Adrien, I dislike the way your new compatriot examines me; I request that he stops."
Adrien looks at Prelli and sighs, patting Ozymandias on the arm. "I think it'll be fine. I don't know that he could sell you if he tried, anyway." Shaking his head, Adrien turns to Prelli instead. "We aren't sure what it is, but I think we're going to go and examine it, since it's better to deal with it now rather than later. That was the plan, correct?"
"Rust... Nasty business."
Preli shudders and lovingly holsters his weapon.
"After you..."
He gestures toward the tunnel entrance
...All of you
Thüm frowns. "Strange plagues come from forbidden ruins...this Thüm knows. Axes cannot cut plague, or spears pierce it. This quest is not for him. Will wait here and tell skraelings story of glorious vermin battle."
The party enters the remaining chamber to the south west of the caves, led by Kayla.
The temperature drops noticeably in this passageway, and a rime of white frost lines the walls and floor leading into the cavern. What seems to be a light layer of brown dust carpets the cave floor beyond - a body of some sort sits slumped against the eastern wall.
You recognise the dust on the floor as a particularly large patch of brown mould. It will draw heat from anything around it and the risk you run is that it will freeze a character unconscious, in which state, starving, they will eventually die.
Kayla stops two steps before the brown dust...not being able to identify what it is, and being more than slightly spooked at the concept of a 'flesh rust,' she would rather admire this problem from afar. Hopefully far enough...
She holds her torch a bit higher and looks keenly at the body slumped on the wall...
The body is that of a human male, judging by his armour and equipment another rogue, like Kayla. Obviously dead, cold but not frozen as such, its eyes are open, staring at the blankly frosted walls on the other side of the cavern. Kayla notes strange ribbons and filaments of rust-coloured fibres growing along his spine, throat, and chest.
Kayla also notices that the dust she had noticed on the floor is expanding towards her, notably on the upper walls, apparently attracted by her torch.
Arkady accompanies both Preli and Kayla, peering around the corner of the cavern to see the rusty growth creeping along the walls towards the warmth of the torch.
He frowns as he does not know what the growth is or why it is doing what it is doing. "It doesn't look good. Do we need to ask Ozy to examine the body?"
"Brown Mould!"
Exclaims Preli, peering past the other adventurers
"It feeds on heat, it will suck the heat right out of you and leave you to starve. We should get out of here... I cant remember how to kill it..."
"I could send him in if you want... that does look like rust, doesn't it? I thought perhaps they were superstitious... but I haven't the faintest idea what it could be." Adrien waves Ozymandias forward, towards Kayla in order to watch her back and figure out what this is that they're seeing. "Keep her safe, Ozzy; I can call you back, we can't do that with her." At Prelli's exclamation, Adrien calls for Ozymandias again. "Ozzy, get the two of you out of there! It's dangerous!"
"not a good plan! It'll suck the hea... does that even produce heat?"
Preli gestures at Ozymandias
"I am unsure of my power source, but it does produce heaa-a-a-aaa-a-a-at--" Ozymandias's word processing gives out as he attempts to move both himself and Kayla away from the Brown Mold as quickly as possible, cutting power to that subsystem in the process.
Kayla tosses the torch into the room and quickly backs out, hoping the flames will attract the mold and she can escape...
As the torch leaves Kayla's hand Preli is already running away
"No Kayla! Don't feed the animals!"
Thüm snorts as his companions come running back into the room, but says nothing.
The torch goes out as it hits the mould, as the heat is sucked from the flame directly into what organism is formed by the dust; the brown carpet along the floor immediately doubles in size spreading in both directions along the floor of the cave.
The young half-elf skips and jumps down the passage, avoiding the spreading mold with precise, almost artful, moves. "That didn't go the way I thought it would!" she says a bit shakily...
"Kayla! Are you ok?"
The colourful gnome rushes over to where his friend now stands, checking her over briskly
"Did it touch you? Do you feel cold?
Once it is clear that Kayla is fine Preli lets out a sigh of relief,
"Thank the gods! I thought we'd lost you there, just like that poor fellow in there... although now I come to think about it he didn't look like the mould got him, not starvation niether..."