"Umm, OK, everyone... Magic abounds in this room; potions & scrolls mainly, but that chest - it has the same magic aura as the lock to the door, so it is trapped also - need to be opened to be disarmed I'd imagine. Our job is to make the place safe first, inventory and category the place second for auction after everything is safe."
The library has a ladder going up.
And don't forget that the spiral staircase connecting the Parlor on the first floor and the Library on the second floor also goes down into a basement.
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Once the door is open, Edo moves to step into the room only to find little lamb blocking the way, concentrating. Edo pauses and peers into the room, thinking it wise he not interrupt his work. He steps back and waits patiently.
Once given the clear-with-caveats, he enters and takes a casual look around the room, looking for immediate threats.
He eyes the potions, brow furrowed, he lowers his gaze and brings his face close to a couple of dust-covered glass vials. A moment later, his nose twitching, he jerks away just in time to rip a violent sneeze without visibly disturbing anything.
He draws a cloth from somewhere between his armor and his body and rubs his nose with it. "Aye, that one's to scare the spirits away."
Brandor steps in to take a look. "We need to be cataloging these, right? I suppose that means identifying them."
Brandor starts casting detect magic as well, with an eye for identifying stuff.
Jayla heads for the chest. She carefully looks it over to see if maybe one of the keys on the key ring will fit this lock.
If I one of these keys doesn't work. I suggest we clear everything out that has value, and let me try to disarm the trap. When all the good stuff won't get blown up." She grins.
Five flasks rest on the eastern tables: two vials of oil of keen edge, a potion of undetectable alignment, a potion of protection from acid, and a potion of protection from fire.
Atop the writing desk are four scrolls containing spells that Hunclay never got around to adding to his spellbook: a scroll of campfire wallAPG, a scroll of excruciating deformationUM, a scroll of haunting mistsUM, and a scroll of magic circle against chaos.
Jayla, you're not sure which key is the right one. It looks like it could be any one of three.
Brandor gathers up the potions and scrolls. "Might as well hold these close. If we need to use them, I would consider that part of the estate."
"All right. Out all of you with the good stuff. I'm going to try the second key in this thing. I hope I choose correctly."
After everyone leaves the room, she chooses the second key on the ring, and tries to unlock the box.
Brandor casts guidance and resistance on Jayla for good measure. "Good luck, miss elf."
Then he does as asked, and leaves the room.
The padlock opens quietly and Jayla quietly sets it aside. Opening the chest, she finds it filled with treasure - the paper kind. There sit Hunclay's spell books, all six of them, filled with all kinds of esoteric writing.
"Yay! No explosion! There are six spellbooks here. He was quite the wizard. Anyone want to look through them or should I lock them back up for safety?"
Liam calls out from the other room, "Nice - wizards should have spellbooks after all. I say leave 'em. Just weigh us down and they don't serve a purpose for us. No need to lock, though, Jayla -- we'll catalog everything like we are supposed to after we make the place safe. Now about this ladder..."
"Yah, I don't have much need for wiz spells, but they should fetch a pretty coin at auction. Good job! Did I hear there was another level to check out?"
"Let's try up." Jayla heads to the spiral staircase and begins to climb.
Jayla climbs the ladder to the trap door, opens it and climbs up in.
Within this glass-domed chamber is an enormous telescope that sits upon a platform over a veritable sea of metal gears. An angled metal chair sits below the device, within reach of a cluster of pedals and levers that enable its occupant to perform adjustments to the telescope’s orientation. Tables covered in books and charts occupy the southeast corner. The view of the surrounding skies afforded by the glass dome is breathtaking in its expanse.
Liam follows, "Wow... all the clockwork. Must be to move that viewing tube." Liam goes over to the easternmost area of the observatory, "And that's where the tower was that he knocked over. Still, as high as we are, that tower would not cover much of this expansive view. I don't know... Hunclay had to be super arrogant to want absolute command of the entire view."
He turns to look at whomever else came up the ladder by then, "I mean, think about it... why would Hunclay NOT build his place and observatory on top of a mountain instead of here? Unless there is something else going on."
Liam scratches his head, perplexed.
"Aye, a mountain may be closer to the sky, but the heavens move in specific if not mysterious ways. Could be this location had a special significance... perhaps something in all those writings would shed some light. But for our purposes, let's document it and move on?"
"Yea... First things first, I really do not think this area is trapped, but gotta be sure."
While Brandor checks out the papers, Liam points himself to different areas of the observatory, casting detect magic in turn until the whole place has been checked. If there are any "hits," he stays to concentrate and get more information on what piqued the interest.
The chair and the apparatus around it are definitely magical.
More important, you're not alone. There is a creature sitting on a high ledge that runs around the upper part of the dome. It looks like a fat baby with fangs, horns, four wings and a dirty, mottled skin. When you spot it, the creature leers at you.
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Edo climbs up the stairs into the observatory with the others and stands, staring at the huge spyglass. He listens to the speculation from others but can only think of the tactical advantage surrendered by not building on a mountain.
He tears his gaze away from the landscape and looks into the room when he sees the movement up above.
"Oiya! Wassat?" Edo points with his unarmed hand, thinking it best not to point with his weapon. "Is... that a devil baby?" He whistles at it, enticing it to come down. "Well, he ain't attacked us yet."
The silent creature gestures towards the chair beneath the telescope, inviting you to take a seat.
Looks like a fancy ol' chair for sittin' in and looking at the stars. To Edo...
"Hey cute little guy. Why don't you come down here? We've got snacks." She pats around in her pouch for some rations or left over bread from last night. "We won't hurt you, unless you try to hurt us."
"I'm not sitting in that chair until somebody tells me what magic it does."
Brandor immediately casts a detect evil spell on the creature, and the chair as well.
When Liam sees the chair and scope give off an aura, he concentrates further on it to try and discern what type of magic it may hold.
The little monster simply grins at you, gesturing towards the chair.
"Edo! Stop! The chair has a magic trap on it. It's the same type of magic that was on the door and chest from earlier but more powerful. Brandon, that thing up there is inviting us to set off the trap and get hurt or killed in the process, cannot have our best interests in mind."
If it is evil, the evil is too faint for your spell to sense.
The creature pulls a wand out from behind its back, points it you, Edo and shrieks something unintelligible. Nothing happens. It looks at the wand again and shakes it, the tries again. Nothing happens. It snarls at you.
That's the start of combat and its your turn. Everyone go!
Brandor holds out his holy symbol and mutters a prayer in dwarven.
Jayla studies the creature, and pulls out her bow.
Liam casts magic missile at the offensive creature.
Injured by the magic missile, the creature swoops down to attack Liam! Screaming, it bares its dirty fangs and tries to sink them into his arm. Liam twists away, avoiding the bite.
STATUS
Homonculus - 14 damage
Brandor -
Jayla -
Edo -
Liam -
Seeing that the creature came in close, Brandor steps forward and smacks it with his morningstar.
The creatures flits up, just avoiding Brandor's swing.
Jayla moves closer to try to get the creatures attention from Liam on to her. She drops her bow, and pulls her kukri's on the way."Hey you ugly thing. Pick on someone bigger than you."
Takign advantage of Jayla's repositioning, Liam retreats to what he would consider to be a safer area of the observatory, and with both hands outstretched activates his bloodline power, summoning a rain of small black motes to cascade in increasing power down upon the homonculus, after a scant few seconds, the black motes disappear.
The team piles on, injuring the homonculus badly. It turns, shrieks in a high-pitched voice and hurls itself with a mad intensity at Edo, but the warrior easily bats it away
STATUS
Homonculus - 28 damage
Brandor -
Jayla -
Edo -
Liam -
The wiry little devil-baby dodges out of the way of Edo's cumbersome strike, laughing insanely.
Emboldened by the seeing the motes had an effect, Liam switches to spells, casting the cantrip ray of frost, and an icy blue line of cold splays out from his hand at the homunculus.
Jayla slashes out toward the baby devil's belly.
Aware that its opponents are dangerous, the homonculus dashes, dodges and dives out of the way, avoiding attacks by Edo, Liam and Jayla.