"OhMyGods!!WhatWasThatThing!??!?DidYouSeeThoseCats?!?ICan'tWaitToDrawThisSc eneAndTheSandstormAndTheMephit."
Frizz exclaims as she bounces around with adrenalin.
"Oooooo... I bet this thing has some sweet magical items!"
She ducks under Lilika's arm and begins rummaging in the creatures clothing, largely ignoring the gaping chest wound.
Frizz finds a small pouch in the creature's robes. In it he finds eight small yellow gemstones.
Looking around the room, you see the ruin of a clockwork automaton. There is the fountain emitting steam. To the west there is the Emerald Spire and a wooden door. To the east there is a large double door and affixed to eastern wall there is a large lever with a red handle. Finally there is a wooden door to the south.
You also become Frightened 2, but that wears off in a few seconds.
STATUS
Wymond - 42/64 hp
Triath - 30/40 hp
Perfire - Outcast's Curse
Frizz - 44/48 hp
Lilika -
Slaagh -
Wymond breathes a sigh of relief as he recovers his wits and the fight comes to a close, then raises his bardiche and whoops.
"HAH! Battled me first demon and came out on top! I'm a TRUE paladin now! Great work all...now, we wanna take some time to recover or check one o' the doors?"
He then looks at Perfire and his brow furrows.
"Perry, everything alright? Looks like that thing put you more off-kilter than the rest of us."
Perfire sputters and spits sand out of his mouth as the storm dies down around them. As the adrenaline of combat wears off an odd feeling finally settles over him. He feels not himself and tries to put his finger on what's changed.
'I don't know. I think it did something to me but I can't quite tell what.' He sighs and changes the subject. 'At least we survived the transport... and landing.'
"That thing did a lot of things to all of us, but it's dead now so you should be fine."
Frizz comments offhandedly as she bounces the pouch of loot in her hand, eyes fixed to it.
"And even if you don't feel right as rain, all the cool stuff we can buy with these gems will make you feel..."
She pauses as her eyes move from the gem to focus on Perfire, and then see the big red lever beyond him. Almost in a trance, she glides over to stand right in front of the lever.
"What. Is. This?!..."
Frizz's head is bent completely back as she looks up to this lever with mouth agape. Her hand slowly begins to raise toward the lever...
Lilika strides over to the small gnome and grabs her by the wrist before she can touch the lever.
"No."
She gives a stern look to the small gnome.
"Rest first. Then lever."
Lilika channels her remaining primal energy into the room.
Then focusses solely on Wymond.
She begins to inspect Perfire for magical maladies.
Glancing over at the red haired gnome bouncing with excitement, she comments to the group.
"I'm fine with her pulling it now if you both are."
Wymond is about to say something before Lilika stops Frizz.
"Thank ye kindly."
Now completely healed, he turns to the others.
"Anyone else need any healing before we pull this mystery lever?"
Triath responds by trotting up and giving a snort.
"I know ye do, mate, I meant the others."
Frizz doesn't move from staring at the lever, but there is an obvious cat scratch wound still bleeding across her upper back that Wymond can see.
"Right, Frizz first. Then you."
Wymond rubs his hands together and lays them on the scratch.
Then he kneels to pray.
"Erastil, distant deadly archer, yer loyal servant has suffered harsh blows helpin' me work yer will. Please give me the power to see him restored to good fightin' trim so we can continue to cleanse this Spire of evil together. So let it be."
After the prayer , he lays hands on Triath, who bows his head reverently to accept.
STATUS
Wymond - 64/64 hp
Triath - 39/40 hp
Perfire - Outcast's Curse
Frizz - 48/48 hp
Lilika -
Slaagh -
'Well, if that's everyone ready, Frizz go ahead and pull that lever.' Perfire says with a bit of trepidation in his voice.
The gnome jumps off the ground and hangs from the level with two hands.
Wymond grimaces as he watches Frizz pull the lever, ready for her curiosity to bite her in the backside...
The lever engages and you feel a rumbling in the floor. Soon you can hear in a rumbling against the south wall. Then, with an audible thunk, the noise stops. A second later, there is a click from the southern door. It opens, and there in a short hallway stands a somewhat bedraggled man with several days of heavy beard stubble.
Enter Lukas!
Lukas whirls around to face the noise. Hand on his sword hilt, he calls out a challenge, or starts to, stopping himself when he sees people.
"Have at you, fie- uh, hmm." Quickly reassessing, he uses a less confrontational tone. "Hello there. Are you folks the reason I'm finally free? If so, much appreciated." He composes himself a moment, then, standing up straight, gives everyone a little more than a nod, but much less than a bow. "I'm Lukas Vanivek, a Dutiful Blade of the Inheritor."
Perfire instinctively ducks behind Wymond's leg as the strange new man is revealed at calls out but the halfling relaxes slightly as Lukas' tone changes. 'Perfire Ridal.' He returns from behind his more sturdy companion.
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"Whooooaaaaa!!!"
The small orange haired gnome rushes down to the newly exposed doorway, ignoring the bedraggled man.
"DidYaHearThatSound?!IBetThatWasContraptionInsideOfThisPlaceClickingAndClan king.IBetWeCanSeeWhatHappenedInsideThere."
She begins to thoroughly inspect the doorway and newly exposed hallway, but then freezes. Her head slowly turns to look at Lukas with a big grin.
"Hi."
She says sheepishly, slinking backward from the awkward situation.
"I'm Frizz."
Lilika stares on with mild amusement but remains quiet.
"Hello Perfire," he begins to address the halfling as the gnome woman practically climbs over him to examine the corridor. "Oh, whoa, I'll just get out of your way there," Lukas says, slightly flustered but nonetheless grinning.
"Hi. I'm Frizz."
"Good afternoon, Miss Frizz. A pleasure to meet you." He stops, as if considering something for a moment. "If it is afternoon, anyway. I think I was stuck in here for a few days. Kind of lose track of time when there's no day or night cues. So, would you fine folks be kind enough to take on some more company? I clearly can't be tromping around here unsupervised," he says with what he hopes is a self-deprecating smile.
Wymond raises his bardiche for a moment as Lukas barks out a challenge, before blinking at the sudden change in tone and lowering it.
"Um...Well met, Sir Lukas. Name's Wymond. Wymond Dwerryhouse."
Triath trots up to Lukas and snuffles at his boots for a bit before turning back to Wymond and giving a vigorous nod.
"This here's Triath, Erastil's messenger and my best friend. Looks like he thinks yer alright."
Wymond scratches his head.
"Kinda funny we keep findin' folk down here. First Lili, then Frizz, now you. Dutiful Blade, eh? You one of them paladins like me? Erastil's given me the power to protect people and bless'em in his name, but I ain't been proper knighted or anything."
Triath, meanwhile, turns back and looks up at Lukas with what appears to be a smile, in his eyes if not his face.
"Oh! And this is Slaagh. He's our official torchbearer!"
Frizz leans in a bit closer, putting a hand to the side of her mouth.
"And that smell ain't burning sulphur."
She says with a wink.
"How'd you get down here, mister?"
Lukas holds out his hand for Triath to get a smell, the same way one might do for a hound. Sure, it felt weird to be doing this for a boar, but the way Sister Ursula had told it to him, far stranger things are out in the world.
Addressing Wymond, Lukas replies, "No, I am not knighted, I am but a fully ordained priest of Iomedae. Sister Ursula, the priestess that trained me, used to say, 'Faith is a fine armor. But so is armor.'" Lukas smiles, recalling days now gone. "Some are suited to going out into the world with just a cassock and a copy of The Acts. Some of us, well, the tools of the faith are many and varied," he then smiles, patting the hilt of his sword.
Lukas scrunches up his nose and shakes his head a bit when he catches wind of Slaagh. Getting back to Frizz's question, he says, "Entirely by accident, I'm afraid I must confess. I came to this place seeking the counsel of a pair of wizards; the head of their order told me they had come here. I snuck my way through a few levels; I must have followed in your wake. But eventually I triggered some magic, whether a deliberate trap or originally for some other purpose. It teleported me into that corridor with no way out. Fortunately, you rescued me before my food, water, and sanity started to run out. Very much in your debt for that, it turns out I think I'm terrible company," Lukas quips.
Changing the subject, Lukas then asks, "If I may, what of you folks? What brings you here?"
Wymond shrugs.
"We got a bunch of different reasons bringing us here. I got started cuz Triath told me a great evil was stirrin' down here and Erastil wanted me to fight it to protect the surrounding towns like Fort Inevitable and Thornkeep. Also, a scholar in Fort Inevitable's payin' us to map the Spire's levels, an' we're lookin' for some fancy relic for him too. He called it 'no-kwall' or somethin'. Plus, the Goldenfire Order wants us to look into the dungeon's portals and find a couple of 'em what went missing down here."
Then his eyes widen as he makes the connection.
"Hmm...come to think of it, they may be the same wizards you're lookin' for Lukas. Jharun and Tiawask their names?"
"So I was on my way to go chronicle the world wound when I got turned.."
Until asked to stop, Frizz will relay her story of being a well read chronicler and student of Azlant from Absalom that couldn't pass up an opportunity to see real Azlanti ruins, even though she was supposed to go help the Library of Absalom chronicle the crusade at the World Wound. She'll go on many tangents without rhyme or reason.
Wymond shrugs.
"We got a bunch of different reasons bringing us here. I got started cuz Triath told me a great evil was stirrin' down here and Erastil wanted me to fight it to protect the surrounding towns like Fort Inevitable and Thornkeep. Also, a scholar in Fort Inevitable's payin' us to map the Spire's levels, an' we're lookin' for some fancy relic for him too. He called it 'no-kwall' or somethin'. Plus, the Goldenfire Order wants us to look into the dungeon's portals and find a couple of 'em what went missing down here."
Then his eyes widen as he makes the connection.
"Hmm...come to think of it, they may be the same wizards you're lookin' for Lukas. Jharun and Tiawask their names?"
"Jharun and Tiawask!"
When Wymond mentions the Goldenfire Order, Lukas immediately perks up, and says their names in unison with the other man. "The head of their order, Miss Starcloak, said that Jharun would be able to decipher a riddle Sister Ursula left behind." Lukas nods, frowning a bit, but not angrily, more in concentration than anything else. This turn of events has taken him so thoroughly, he has forgotten to be amused at the idea that the boar told the man what to do. "Yes, this is quite fortunate. Then, let us continue on and find those wizards, eh?"
"Neat! You can be our friend now too. But don't go back in there."
Frizz gestures dramatically to the rotating corridor.
"We should go through this door."
She'll skip over to the NE door and give it a once over, whip in hand with her shortsword sheathed.
You can disable traps that require a proficiency rank of master in Thievery. If you have master proficiency in Thievery, you can disable traps that require a proficiency rank of legendary instead, and your circumstance bonuses against traps increase to +2.
"Neat! You can be our friend now too. But don't go back in there.
We should go through this door."
Lukas nods along, hoping he can keep up with the gnome. "I assure you, Miss Frizz, I'd prefer to never set foot in there again. Lead on."
Frizz, the doors seem unlocked and untrapped. Lukas, you detect no magic about the doors.
"Welcome to the team, Lukas!" Wymond says.
"I recommend we check that door back by the Spire. If only to see where we'll have to go up, make sure it's not got critters in it."
He jerks his thumb towards the single door on the far side of the room.
"Ya see, we tellyported down here from the level above cuz we encountered a beastie we couldn't just take down. Man made of mud, and he was in a room full of water, so we couldn't swim AND fight at the same time, so we used these here Spire Tokens to get us down here, figuring we can approach the things up there from the other side and see if that give us any edge," he explains to Lukas.
To save you a little time. There are three doors out of this room. The one to the west is locked. The one to the east is unlocked. The one to the south leads to a corridor (that Lukas was trapped in) and beyond that a door to the south.
"Very well, let's do this, then," Lukas says.
Frizz moves to open the door she just inspected.
Perfire nods his agreement.
The door opens into a wide, well-kept hallway that turns right. Around that bend is a curved wall of stone.
"Uhhh... this looks like a dead end at another moving corridor like Lukas's. We should find the lever for it."
Frizz will check out the other door in the original room.
It's locked!
Lukas frowns at that development. "Hmph, and me without a prybar." After a moment's pause, he mutters to no one in particular, "The things I find myself saying, never thought it'd come to that."
Frizz pulls a few metal shims from her tangle of hair and sets to work on the lock.
Yeah, no. That lock is high quality and not budging.
A little surprised at Frizz's sudden procurement of her lockpicks, Lukas sees one still stuck halfway in. "Uh, you missed one," he stammers.
When he sees the lock refuses to yield, he asks, "So then I guess we try our luck in the other corridor?"
Wymond nods and tromps over to the other door with Triath in tow, and waits for the others to join him.