"Hmm hmm" Jhaelwyn's eyes bounced between Gork and the tunnel entrance and back, no doubt also finding the problem Drekisal had noticed. "Can we - hmm - shrink you Gork?"
A red light flashes deep within Gorks eyes upon mentioning 'getting shrunk' and he growls.
"No one belittl's an Ogre!
We be mighty giants, no scrawny bugsys!"
As frightening as the outburst is, as short-lived it is.
A bright golden light flashes from Gorks holy icon and he closes his eyes and lets go a hieving breath.
"Gork be sorry.
Not be feared of him, pleasy.
I will follow in, of course.
And if dire timesy comes ...
... I'd like to get down-scaled.
To better fight bugsies."
Drekisal is unfazed by Gork's outburst, instead simply nodding slightly at his apology. He turns again to Jhaelwyn.
"Scout ahead until you can determine how bad this blockage is. If the passageway is fully sealed only a little ahead, there is no reason to worry about who can fit. If not, we will want to know the size of the corridor."
Jhaelwyn recoils with a hiss and reaches for her spear. Though since the moment is fleeting she let's it go again. "Hmrhm."
"I can take a look. A quick little look yes!"
The weather-bitten elf pulls her cloak closer to herself and cautiously approaches the cave. Her soft steps are barely audible, though that can't be said about her muttering. "Dumb mantids, where are you?"
Jhaelwyn can tell she has spent too long above-ground - she can actually feel her eyes adjust to the dimness of the tunnel as she climbs over the bits of wreckage and into the mine. She explores a ways down the tunnel - there are a couple branches that are boarded up, but they look like long-abandoned side-tunnels and haven't been disturbed in decades. The primary passageway continues at a steady decline into the earth, with support timbers every ten yards. Whoever was in charge of the mineworks here was a consummate professional.
Here and there are marks of the mantids passing - a gouge in the wall where there happens to be earth instead of stone, the pockmarks of their 'footsteps' on the floor - but Jhaelwyn cannot tell how old they are in the otherwise unused passage. They could be from years ago, or last week. They are certainly older than a day.
Just before the tunnel takes a sharp bend about a hundred yards in, Jhaelwyn decides to return and report.
"No mantids here now. You can tell by the lack of screeching vermin... They certainly have been here, but the dirt and rock is unhelpful..." Jhaelwyn reported and glared at the pesky sun.
"The mine looks to be in good shape. Except no miners of course ..."
Drekisal nods. "Then we shall all go in, save for our rearguard."
He orders the ordinary soldiers to stay behind and stand guard, seeing no need for numbers in cramped quarters.
"Jhaelwyn, you will take point, unless we find need to douse our lights," he commands. "Gork, you will be in the rear. The rest of us shall be in between."
"Yes." Jhaelwyn quickly turns back to the familiar comfort of the tunnel.
Gork nods at Dreksials order.
"A-huh"
Then, he proceeds to shoulder-force himself into the narrow tunnel.
Pieces of rock come loose and fall down in his wake, dust soon covers the well-cared for equipment of the Ogre and his sweat-covered face.
Despite him being most certainly a few sizes to big for the tunnel, he follows the group in - by virtue of sheer brute strength.
And ne thing is sure: if there is any kind of life remaining in these tunnels - they sure will know something is coming by now...
Gork's rearranging of the tunnel entrance actually shoves one of the fallen supports back into position, and save for the debris makes the mine shaft look almost normal.
With Gork following awkwardly behind in the confined space, the group moves down the tunnel. You come to the point where Jhaelwyn had scouted to and continue around the corner. Shortly on the tunnel slopes downwards somewhat more, and you notice that the temperature is rising. At last you come to a widened area where the tunnel abruptly ends - part of this is a natural crevasse, and in the far corner you see a patch of partially congealed tar, with the occasional bubble still rising up and lazily bursting.
On the ground you can see a couple long-abandoned pieces of steel. It looks like the pitted remains of a pair of shovels, and a pickaxe, dropped and forgotten decades ago.
The tar pits available in the area were supposed to be fairly substantial - far more than this one tiny vent.
There is the tiniest, low whistle coming from another corner of the space - it appears that there is some manner of hidden door in the rock wall.
"Tar? Yes, it is supposed to be here. Nasty black tar. Don't touch. Or do. I have bandages and a knife. But there's supposed to be more... Somewhere. Or, hah, did the mantids eat it?" Jhaelwyn muses and takes careful steps, never moving closer to the tar then absolutely necessary. She had head that dragonfire was exceedingly painful - but boiling tar was probably pretty close.
Histrok examines the chamber methodically, and puts his ear to a couple of points in the wall. Then he takes a splinter, lights in one of the torches, and holds it up to the wall. The wisps of smoke stray from it, blown by a breeze from an unseen passage.
"This isn't a wall," he says. He plucks a chunk free, revealing it to be held on by some manner of clay-like material. "It's a door. Or a plug, perhaps. Made by the mantids?"
Drekisal narrows his eyes. "If it is the mantids, the sheer fact of its construction is of interest. If not, then who made it? Either way, we must open it. Is there a hidden catch?"
Jhaelwyn's eyes narrowed and her lips curled into a small smile. She did love a good mystery. "I don't think mantids build hidden doors. But walls? Like bees? Te-he. Imagine that."
She sobered up and started looking over her spears, selecting one that could serve as a drill. "We should be careful. It *could* be full of mantids on the other side. Nasty blighters..."
After a bit more study, you are unsure what the origin of it is and you cannot find any kind of latch. There seems to be a seam around the outside of it, and it might run all the way around the (roughly circular) artificial barrier.
Barring any other option you can think up, maybe Gork can simply smash through it?
"Hmmm, odd," Drekisal comments. He considers the oddity for a moment longer, then looks up to Gork.
"Gork, remove it."
A wide grin appears on the (disputable ugly) face of the Ogre.
"Gork thinkin', small'uns neva ask.
Gim'me sum room a' cover yer tiny eyesy."
Groaning annoyed by the lack of room, Gork batters the barrier with his large axe, employing a lot of strength in doing so.
Gork's mighty blow strikes a cascade of detritus from the wall, and beneath some of the rock you begin to see more of the other substance - itself almost mineral in composition, but when exposed the different is clear.
A few more strikes and two halves of the 'plug' come crashing apart - indeed, it was just a plug, apparently large slabs of rock and rubble sealed together to form a fake wall. Behind it is another mining passage, hewn with tools and supported with timbers just like the one you came from.
"Jhaelwyn. Histrok. Can you determine anything unusual about the passageway beyond? Perhaps mantid tracks?"
"It was hidden behind a fake wall? Oh you meant *other* then that?" The elf snarks but peers into the tunnel with a frown. She touches her preserved Mantid claw and sniffs the air, looking for any resonance (Using Seek Prey which is basically Detect Undead but Mantids instead).
"It's ... Strange. We should have a closer look. Carefully though ..."
Jhaelwyn detects no signs of living mantids. there are faint marks of their passage in some looser parts of the tunnel surface, but all appear quite old.
"No mantids right here and now. Other horrors? Can't say ... Oh surely a delightful surprise!" The elf carefully steps forward with her spears ready.
Gork speaks up.
You notice that he tries to keep his booming voice down - which barely suceeds to bring his powerful voice down to that of a mere human.
"Shall Gork stay back 'gain, while ya go sneaky-sneak?"
Drekisal gives Gork a short nod. "We go forward," he half-states, half-commands to the group.
Jhaelwyn nods and mumbles only to herself for once. With spear and blade in hand she carefully creeps forward. She didn't expect any mantids to be still around - but they were sneaky blighters.
The group creeps down the hallways - and creeps, and creeps. It extends for a sizable distance, sometimes growing wide enough for Gork to stand upright, but generally remaining human-sized. It has a constant downward slope.
This tunnel obviously followed a rich seam of anthracite - highly coveted coal fuel, hard as a rock and easily transportable. It burns hot and long.
By the time the tunnel comes to an end, you must be nearly a hundred feet underground. It has grown very hot, nearly to the point of discomfort. It opens into a large chamber, large enough that your torches do not illuminate the far wall from standing in the opening. After a brief moment, you determine that there are no sounds within, and enter. The sound of bubbling and the faint smell of sulphur eke out of the rock itself - you have found the tar pits. And whats more, the ground is covered in jagged shards: eggshells.
"*Cough*" Jhaelwyn moves to cover her mouth with a strip of cloth. Then she glares at the eggs. "Did those blasted things hatch from here? Dumb minders; digging too deep and greedily. Or just moved here to incubate in the heat? Do they need warmth? What if we froze them all ..."
Gorks heavy breaths stop for a moment as they reach the tar pits.
His face turns into a disgusted grimace - although probably only another Ogryn would notice any difference...
"Bah, smelly place. Not gud stay'in long here."
Drekisal arranges his robes to cover his snout awkwardly. He speaks loudly to be heard through the muffling cloth. "While unpleasant, we should search here quickly. If this was a former mantid nest, there may be clues here to as yet undiscovered portions of their nature or weaknesses we could use to our advantage."
True to his word, he begins looking around himself.
"Scorching heat and noxious fumes can be scratched from that list." Jhaelwyn notes with a coughing laugh.
Now that you think of it, you remember reports from the winter months that mantid activity drops of rather sharply when it is cold. Then again, so does most other activity, so you hadn't given it much thought before. But this place - if this is where the mantids retreated during some ancient long winter, they did it to keep warm.
Furthermore, given that the foul air has likely been omnipresent for as long as the cavern existed, it seems the mantids are not sensitive to it. Who knows how long they hibernated here before emerging again?
Searching about, you also discovered another of the crude ‘trap doors’ disguised as natural rock wall. It seems that the mantids are indeed behind them. They are formed from rubble stuck together by some form of chitin or resin.
There are three passages out of the chamber other than the one you came in by. One of them was covered by the trap door.
"Any sign of recent tracks on any of the passageways?"
"Yes we should probably freeze them. Chase the warmth from the land ..." The elf first mulls things over with herself then shares her conclusions (spoiler above).
"Let me look for tracks. But I don't think so. Far too old, they aren't here now, just saving it for a freezing day..."
Looking for tracks, you notice that none of them are recent - but it is obvious the most trafficked passage was to the West, however long ago these caverns were still used by the Mantids.
"If the mantids traveled mostly to the west, so shall we," Drekisal says. "Let us see what else they may have left behind."
"Eggshells and misery..." The sour elf mumbles and leads the way west.
Down the western tunnel, you find what could only have been some sort of mantid larger. Even after decades, the slightly-rancid scent of death remains - and the floor is littered with bones. Most of the bones belong to various beasts, but some of them are recognizably humanoid. Furthermore, some items from the unfortunate victims have survived, including belt buckles, a few rusted knives. In one corner you find the remains of old mining tools - this must have been where the initial miners were first 'stored'. The tools are hardy - in the dry air, little rust has grown on them. The maker's marks are still evident on a pair of pickaxes.
From your time hunting the mantids you know they use their paralyzing venom to 'store' their victims while still alive, keeping the meat fresh as long as possible.
The mark's on the pickaxes are familiar - you've seen them before, and recently, on tools out of Hafton. Whoever made them is still around and still working their trade.
Jhaelwyn sniffs the air and looks around at the bones. "Welcome to the pantry. Nothing alive? Good sign. The mantids idea of animal husbandry is that of a sailor; keep the dinner alive and fresh..."
She picks up one of the preserved pickaxes and inspects it. Her wild gaze lingers on the makers mark for a long while before she passes it around for the others to look. "These marks were on tools out of Hafton. Good quality too. Worth keeping in mind if we need craftsmanship."
"But let's look a bit closer. The mantids don't value gold or trinkets and other looters wouldn't have come before us. Maybe for dinner. *snicker*"
Drekisal gives the area a disdainful glance.
"I doubt there is aught of use to be seen here. Search quickly, then go through the other passage not closed by one of their doors."
A cursory search into the bones of the assumed miners reveals the remains of a fine leather purse. It has cracked and broken with age, but you gather up the coins it once held.
The group searches the rest of the chambers, though there are no obvious marks as to what their purposes are, nor do they bear much in the way of unique features. The final passage leads to a what appears to be a natural crevice widened by the mantids, leading upwards at a steep angle through the rock.
There is the hint of air movement near the opening of the crevice - somewhere at the end of this tunnel there is likely an opening to the outside.