'I'm worried if we wait around too much longer that angry man will come back with friends. Nothing attacked me out of the darkness when I fled down the hallway. Let's check where the crabs come from and press on?' Perfire has been eyeing the hallway suspiciously the entire rest, never quite at ease.
Lilika keeps a watchful eye on the nearby halls while Wymond and Frizz recuperate.
Once they're done, she nods along with Perfire. "Ready?"
"I'll be right behind ya!"
Frizz will stay close behind Lilika, whip in hand, and keep an eye out.
You're moving into the crab room? Please move your tokens accordingly.
Wymond nods at Lilika's question.
"Let's get goin'."
Perfire follow Wymond down the submerged hallway, struggling at times to keep his mouth above water.
"Ye...ye wanna ride on my shoulder's Perry?"
'Thank you for the offer, but I'd rather not be in the way if we get ambushed again. I'll make do.'
The silty water in this flooded room reeks of shellfish. Bones and other refuse are piled up in the southwest corner. The toad-sized crabs avoid you after your confrontation, but there are still more than a hundred of them.
"Maybe if we get hungry we can come back here for dinner?" She chuckles to herself.
Frizz keeps her eyes peeled down the hallway with her crossbow loaded and ready.
"Lilika, didya want to go with me to peek around that corner?"
Frizz gestures further down the hall to where Perfire had taken cover.
"If'n yer sure, Perry. Long as ye can work yer magic, should be fine."
Perfire will wade in next to Wymond and take a moment to scan the room for sources of magic.
Lilika moves forward and looks down both hallways with Frizz.
The party breaks up. As the girls wade forward into the unknown through water waist-deep to the gnome and knee-deep to the half-elf, the boys go search the crab room. The smell is sharp, especially in the crab room.
Perfire, you detect no magic. Wymond, you eye the pile of shells, bone and refuse, wondering what's in there.
Meanwhile, to the east, Frizz and Lilika arrive at an intersection. The flooded passage continues east before taking a right turn twenty feet farther on. Meanwhile, another corridor branches south. You can see that it reaches a larger chamber there. The brackish water in this directionis mostly clear and smells clean. A gentle current flows south, where a waterfall can be heard.
Wymond pokes the pile with the end of his bardiche, to see if there was something to dig out.
Wymond, that doesn't reveal anything immediately obvious. I dunno. Maybe if you dig through that pile of refuse for ten or twenty minutes there could be something? Or not?
"Mind if I take a closer look a' this?" Wymond calls to the others. "Might be some treasure in the trash."
'I think they wandered down the hallway, I'll see if I can get their attention.' Perfire sloshes back out to hallway and calls out quietly to Lilika and Frizz. 'I think Wymond may have found something!'
Tugging on Lilika's clothes, Frizz gestures back toward the crab room, whispering.
"Might as well go see what it is."
Back at the crab room, Wymond is poking through the pile of refuse with his bardiche. This could take awhile. What's everyone else doing?
Wymond begins digging into the pile in earnest. Triath, now trundling through the water and keeping his snout above it, joins in. His newly-formed tusks help him immensely as he roots into the pile.
Curiosity getting the better of herself, Frizz will peek over Wymond's shoulder as he digs.
"Did ya know that there are more than 4,500 species of crabs? IWonderWhatKindOfCrabsTheseAre. And some scholars think crabs have been around before Earthfall! SoWeirdThatSomethingAroundForSoLongCanOnlyWalkSideways..."
Frizz will continue to pepper the group with random crab facts that she's read up on.
Perfire stands near the room's entrance, keeping watch, and an ear cocked, down the hallway for signs of anyone approaching.
Frizz will continue to pepper the group with random crab facts that she's read up on.
After ten minutes of sifting and pushing away curious crabs, Wymond discovers two slimy objects he can't quite identify. They're curved tubes with an open hole at one end and a strange opening with knobs at the other end.
"Oh my gods! I bet those are Azlanti flutes! PleasePleasePleaseLetMeKeepOne!"
Frizz sloshes about with joy at Wymonds discovery.
Lilika examines the objects for a minute each, and attempts to identify any that are magical.
Wymond raises an eyebrow, but hands one off to Frizz as she requests.
"Probl'y gonna need te clean it. Who knows how long it's been sittin' in that pile?"
The objects are nonmagical, though they seem well crafted. They must've been something the crabs found and shoved into their refuse heap.
Lilika, your luck and expertise in nature gives you a clue. The knobs could be held in the teeth and you could draw breath through the tube. But all that would do would be to breathe from behind you.
Suddenly, that insight, combined with the two feet of water you're standing in gives you an idea - if you were swimming, you could breathe through these tubes.
This waterproof wooden tube has a curved end with a mouthpiece. When you hold the mouthpiece in your mouth, the tube extends past your face and toward the back of your head, allowing you to breathe indefinitely when swimming facedown or barely submerged. If you submerge the tip of the snorkel, it floods with water and can’t be used to breathe until you clear the water from it (requiring a move action and full access to air). A typical snorkel’s length is about 15 inches; any shorter than this and it tends to fill with water when you swim, but any longer and you’re not moving enough fresh air through the snorkel to be effective.
Masterwork Snorkel: This snorkel has a valve at the top to keep out of the water, keeping it from being flooded from splashes or when you submerge. It also has a sump and valve near your mouth, preventing water from reaching your mouth and automatically draining excess water when you surface.
"So...shall we move on?" Wymond asks.
Lilika passes the snorkels back to Frizz after explaining their purpose. Then she heads to the end of the hall to peek around the corner.
As Lilika sloshes east, she stumbles and nearly falls. Hidden under the murky water is a staircase. At the bottom, she is neck deep in water. The roof continues at the same height, thus disguising the fact of the plunging floor. Now more cautious, Lilika continues on to the intersection. She can see that the corridor extends south to a wall. She can feel with her foot that there is another staircase. To proceed down this hallway in search of a possible door, she'll have to swim.
On seeing Lilika tread into neck deep water, she'll wait and peer down the other hall.
"Perfire, watch out over here. Can you swim?"
Wymond grimaces as Lilika takes the plunge, and begins following after, looking around carefully.
"Now might be a good time te get on me shoulders. Triath can swim just fine, but I don't want either of you wee ones tuckerin' yerselves out needin' te swim instead of walk. An' I may be needin' one of them fancy things ye just found, as I'll sink like a rock in this bloody armor."
'Not very well!' Perfire manages to gasp as he dog paddles desperatley to keep his head above water.
'I appreciate your kindness' Perfire says, sputtering water as he dog paddles over to latch on to his friend's shoulder. Once his attention isn't devoted solely to keeping himself above the water line, Perfire begins scanning the area for signs of magic.
Before diving into the water, Frizz will dump the contents of her waterskin and puff it full of air to help with flotation.
With the inflated bladder in one hand and shortsword in the other, she'll follow along.
Frizz swims up to Lilika.
"Lead the way!"
In order to follow the eastern hallway, you'll have to either swim or tramp along the bottom. How do you proceed? You can see that the far wall is just a blank at the surface.
Frizz begins swimming down the hallway, using her inflated waterskin as a floaty with her snorkel in her mouth.
Frizz, you can see a dim dark opening below - you think there must be a doorway down there, but you're going to have to dive to reach it, and it's about 15' down.
Wymond stands glumly in the water, waiting for Frizz to return and report.
Frizz paddles back to the group. Plops the snorkel out of her mouth and says.
”Uhhhh... there’s a door. But it’s... uhhh... underwater. Maybe we should go down that other hall first? I don’t think we’re ready to go dungeon diving.”
Perfire pushes up a little higher on Wymond's shoulder to peek his head over. 'That sounds prudent. I'm not to keen on diving down there at all. Our masters didn't spend much time teaching us to swim, mostly to work.'
"Aye, let's do that." Wymond says, slowly abouting-face and trudging back up the steps to higher ground.
As Lilika previously saw, there is a grate towards the southern end of this room with a lot of flotsam and junk over it. Water is moving towards the grate and you can hear a waterfall roaring beyond it, as if the water flows through the grate and out into some tall space. To the east there is a passageway.
Suddenly the water itself rears up and attacks! A shape like a shark made of water erupts from the water itself and bites at Lilika!
STATUS
Lilika
Wymond
Brine Shark
Frizz
Perfire
Lilika instinctively snaps her shield in front of her, lobbing a ball of acid over top of it at the shark.
k
"BLASTIT! BIG FISH!" Wymond bellows as he sees the water-shark appear, having never seen a shark in his life and not knowing what else to call it. He swings his bardiche at it trying to drive it off.
Lilika tosses acid at the shark, but misses. The acid splashes the shark, Lilika, Wymond and Perfire. Wymond then slashes wildly at the shark, but the beast dodges and darts, avoiding the paladin's bardiche.
STATUS
Lilika - 32/48 hp
Wymond - 63/64 hp
Brine Shark - 1 damage
Frizz
Perfire - 29/30 hp