With that in mind, please do not hesitate to call for a check as often as you like, or remind me to make one if you think I have been lax.
@Graxzos
The body in front of the doors is mostly skeletal, with a thin layer of desiccated tissue. Scraps of decayed and rotting cloth and leather cover it's back.
Edit: and resolved.
As the desiccated remains shift you can see both of the body's legs are obviously broken, likely from a fall from a great height, and the unfortunate man apparently crawled to the doors before he expired.
Orcen takes the knotted rope down cautiously, lowering himself down slowly until he's reached the bottom, picking up his torch. "Well, let's not dally - we don't want to wait until it's dark outside to finish up in here," He comments to the others.
"Rough way to go..." Zanac mutters as Graxzos drags the dessicated body over. He turns a smile towards Orcen at his comment. "So says the one who had us knot up the rope for him. We're not in a major rush here. Sunlight won't have any affect on us while we're down here anyways." He then steps over the dead body and makes his way towards the door to see if it's locked and what it would take to open it.
Rasim also climbs down the rope, after its been knotted. "Yo, if we need mo' rope latah, I got 50' too," he comments once in the new chamber.
Seeing that the dead man probably wasn't killed by a trap, Rasim joins Zanac in searching the embossed door for traps or means of entrance. "I'll go right, you go left," he suggests to the cat man before carefully examining the right half of the door.
Graxzos eyes the moldy skeleton as his ax draws it in reach, then he stows the ax on his belt. "What d'you suppose happened to this'n, making him fall like that? Seems like he might'a run afoul of some of his companions..." The dwarf stares at the corpse for a moment, lost in reverie, then shrugs and begins investigating the desiccated corpse for anything useful or valuable.
Sebti watches Rasim make his careful way down the rope with no expression. She tosses a quick glance toward Byron and his mother, then looks back at the shaft.
Even through her blank expression, Byron can see an internal conversation roil through her head. She is obviously conflicted. Her hand drifts to a knife at her side, and he can see her gaze riveted on the rope tied securely to the piton marring the plain stone - the rope that serves as the only known escape from the tomb below.
The hand stops and falls back to her side as the tension in her face finally fades.
She turns and looks at Byron. "I must still observe." She moves to the rope and carefully lowers herself down into the lower chamber.
@Graxzos
The corpse’s gear has suffered decades of rot and rust and is mostly unusable, though a thorough search yields a couple of metal pitons and a usable hammer, as well as two thin glass jugs of milky fluid sealed with a heavy coating of beeswax which miraculously survived the fall.
As Satinder drops to the ground he considers the body, but leaves Graxzos to inspecting it further. He immediately drops his pack off of his shoulders and brings out his chain shirt, donning it once again. After shouldering his pack, he unsheaths his falcata, bathing the room in even more light. He watches Rasim and Zanac’s back as they inspect the door, assisting as needed.
Orcen glances over at the tomb raider's body, walking over with his torch held in one hand. "Interesting bottles - wonder what's in them?" He comments, casting his detection spell again to determine if the jugs or their contents were in fact magical. Some potions here would be quite nice.
Byron follows behind Sebti with a worried look. He quickly takes a length of his own rope wrapping it though loops in his belt and quickly attaching an open ended slip knot to fasting around the rope. He loosens the slip-knot to make it over the main ropes knots and tightens it again so he wont fall abruptly if his slips.
He tries to make his way behind Sebti. On the way down, he comments on the dead man at the bottom. "Poor soul has joined the very thing he came here to rob. Ironic in a way."
Upon reaching the bottom Byron faces a decision. He could choose to tell the others what he saw, though he doubted they could handle the information very well. There is a school of thought that says that there is always something going on underneath a persons actions... and on the other hand there were his companions. If he told them then they might ambush Sebti.
Byron couldn't have that on his conscious. He had to understand. Byron tried to catch her before she caught up to the rest, his magic could be subtle but sharp enough ears could still prove problematic.
Byron paused. He had the words ready in his throat, he knew it was right, but the words clung to him begging not to be let free.
"Sebti, you seem angered that we are not honoring the dead, but that is exactly what I am here to do. My mother was an archeologist, who loved this land. She wrote in her dairies about how she wanted to explore this city but never could, probably because she had too much respect for your people to do that. I'm here to honor her, if she is watching then she will finally be able to see. She gave her life for me, this is the least I could do as tribute."
"They say the only real difference between us and the dead is that we still have choices. A dead man has long since made all of theirs, so their lives are like stories already written. If we fall into the trap of being driven by emotions or rules then we have given up our choices and might as well be dead already. Fate may dictate what happens, but what if fate is counting on us being clever and coming up with new options?"
0042B, makes its way down the rope with surprising agility. Only making a slight clank as it reaches the bottom. It pats Byron on the head as it makes its way to the front of the group.
Zanac, Rasim and Tinder go over the doors carefully and find no sign of traps or locks. Though heavy the doors should swing freely for anyone without a strength penalty.
The bottles reveal no magic aura.
Sebti, Byron and 0042B reach the ground, all without incident. Everyone is together again.
Sebti drops to the stone floor and takes a position in one of the corners opposite the doors. She does not speak, and she studiously avoids looking at the gnome. The party as a whole is too wrapped up in their investigations to notice any awkwardness.
Zanac finished checking the doorway and looked over at Rasim for confirmation that he hadn't found anything either before nodding and bracing against the door. "Well, as near as I can tell that trap warning up there doesn't apply to here so lets get moving," he said and shoved on the doors. As the doorway creaked protest at the unaccustomed movement Zanac peered into the darkness as the light from the various torches extended through the now open doors and into the next area.
No, nor Byron because you were already aware of the awkwardness.
"Yep," Rasim says, joining Zanac in pushing open the doors.
Graxzos snorts in disgust over his findings. "You want these, princess? You can have 'em. See if you can figure out what the hells they are." He passes the jars to Orcen, pockets the two pitons he found, and tosses the hammer from hand to hand. "Anyone need a decent hammer? I found one here. Poor bastard's gear rotted away, the rest of it--must've been here a long time. I still think 'e was probably buggered by his acquaintances."
Watching Zanac and Rasim push open the double doors, Graxzos takes a few steps forward and squints into the darkness, one hand on his pistol.
Working together you easily pull the doors open; no mechanism prevents you. The door shift slowly, but smoothly, revealing a promenade of sorts.
The walls of this 30-40ft ten-foot-wide corridor feature bas-relief carvings of great battles. Armies with spears and shields clash at the direction of generals, while other leaders direct troops from chariots that are ruthlessly overrunning their enemies. Another set of engraved stone double doors stands at the opposite end of the hallway.
The engravings on the insides of both sets of doors resemble those in the room you are in, except that The warrior is older man and riding in a chariot. He carries the same scarab shield, but his other arm points at his own reflected depiction on the opposite door.
"Quite fascinating, really. You know what I've never really gotten? The point of such intricate artwork and craftsmanship in something that, in its very nature, is not supposed to be appreciated by the living," Orcen comments, looking back at Sebti in his filter hood. "I mean, why build a monument that no one will ever see? This necropolis is full of such places that are rife with history and knowledge. And so long as we take care not to disturb the rest of the dead, we should be permitted to come and see for ourselves. Perhaps that's part of what the Ruby Prince intended - well, that and filling his country's coffers.
Orcen takes a moment to examine the bas-reliefs, seeing if he can't determine which battles are being depicted - as well as some history on the scarab shield the guard captain seemed to favor.
Zanac steps into the room, examining the various depictions along the walls. For once he agrees with Orcen and is also unable to understand why people make such wonderful works of art and then hide them far underground never to be seen again. However, as attractive as the various murals are Zanac is more interested in what lay ahead and makes his way towards the next set of doors, examining his surroundings for traps and the like including anything on the door itself.
"Mmmmmmm." Graxzos proceeds down the hallway with the others, lips pursed, nodding sagely. "Feller on those doors is older--mayhap we're movin' toward his death, eh? Let's hope so...looks like they were a warlike bunch, these ancient Osiriani."
Rasim stays with Zanac and Graxos, his hand hovering near his pouch of hidden shuriken.
Satinder cautiously proceeds down the hallway with the others lighting the way with his sword, examining the walls in passing, but not paying them too much mind. He was here for one thing, and one thing only. He cared not for the ancient culture of these Orsiriani. His dealings with them up to this point had not gone well, so he'd prefer to avoid getting tangled in their affairs if possible.
Byron takes notes of the art along the walls. Trying his best to crudely draw it all down in his notebook, adding additional notes where his art skills fail him.
0042B scans the walls for anything that may be hidden within the art, making a point to apply pressure to the images of the shields, a likely spot for a hidden switch.
Byron comments "Well, what a mixed blessing. He grew old. Most warriors I know prefer to die in the glory of battle. Those worriers that don't tend to have a hard time fitting into a time of peace."
Zanac carefully makes his way through the corridor, checking each surface with care. Graxzos follows carefully behind. Rasim stays close to both, ready for any danger which might appear, and Tinder tries to catch anything the other three have missed. Byron and Orcen step in behind the others spending extra attention. Byron, Orcan and 0042B keep there attention on the walls and murals finding nothing. The careful procession reaches the second set of double doors, Graxzos stopping short, when a soft click under Zanac's right foot echoes through the silent chamber.
The air in the entire length of the corridor is suddenly full of darts.
Hit!
Hit!
Hit!
Miss . . .
Hit!
Miss . . .
Hit!
It is obvious to Zanac the trap has reset itself. To reach the doors, something must be done.
As soon as the floor beneath his feet gave way Zanac dived for the floor, attempting to call out a warning but it was simply too late and a dart managed to embed itself in his shoulder. With a muttered curse he scrabbles away from the trigger and regroups with the others, checking the more seriously wounded. "Well that hurt a bit. Is everyone ok? Or...mostly ok?" he asks as he notices a few weren't able to dodge the brunt of the attack.
Zanac turns back towards the trap and pulls out his toolkit. "Looks to me like one of us is going to have to figure out how to disarm that damn thing." He turns towards the golem with a dart embedded in its gears. "Think you could give me a hand?" he asked holding up the toolkit.
"Looks like you missed a trap guys," Rasim says drolly. He begins to search around for the mechanism to disable the trap.
You can help someone achieve success on a skill check by making the same kind of skill check in a cooperative effort. If you roll a 10 or higher on your check, the character you're helping gets a +2 bonus on his or her check. (You can't take 10 on a skill check to aid another.) In many cases, a character's help won't be beneficial, or only a limited number of characters can help at once.
"...Well, this seems rather odd," Orcen comments as he looks at the dart that is sticking out of his shoulder, plucking it out with a wince. "So, let's take stock for a moment. I'm quite certain four of you were checking for traps. So how is it that you all missed this?" He asks them. He also doesn't move in case he might trip the trap a second time.
As the trap is sprung Satinder is slow to react, darts piercing his biceps, shoulders, and back. He doesn’t react as one might expect a man of his size to react. As the pain registers he quickly hunches over, raising his hands to cover his face and head. A scrunched look of terror consumes his face, his eyes fill with a wild, frantic look, much like that of a spooked horse. Once he is sure the hail of darts has ended, he grabs the darts with quivering hands, pulling them out, emitting an uncharacteristically high-pitched squeal as he does so. Small rivulets of blood run down his body from the holes punctured in his skin, leaving crimson stains on his “finery”.
Yelling at no one in particular, ”Argh, what happened!? Disable that damned thing!”
0024B pulls the small object from its shoulder.
"-Observation- We should avoid getting hurt. -Injury assessment- Flesh wound."
0042B releases a clasp and part of the frontal compartment of its chest comes open, revealing an assortment of tools.
"-query- What need dismantling?"
Byron wasn't sure weather it was luck or innate gnomish instinct that saved his face from adding an extra hole. but a small shift of his weight and a turn of his head allowed the object to pass by rather then intersect his head.
"Well there can't be an unlimited amount of them. How much pressure do you think it takes to set that thing off?"
"Not much." Zanac says to Byron. "I'm not what you call a heavy weight and just the slightest press set it off." As 0042B pulls out its own set of tools Zanac grins. "Right this way, my good machine," he says and leads the golem back to the pressure plate he had stepped on earlier.
0042B wedges a bit of wire between several of the floor stones, keeping the pressure plate depressed.
"Probability of further perforation estimated at .0023%. Probability of true safely .1573%"
Zanac warned the others in the corridor to take cover and then gingerly pressed a foot on the pressure plate. After no more darts came shooting out of the walls Zanac released the breath he had been holding. "Well that's taken care of now. Just be careful as you come forward this place is certainly not friendly." Zanac waited until Rasim joined him and then stepped towards the door once again, carefully placing his steps in order to avoid triggering any more hidden traps. As he reached the door he nodded towards Rasim and began examining the door for any other nasty surprises.
"Well this does seem to be a bit of a hassle. I don't suppose anyone here has the benefit of being able to heal wounds like this," Orcen comments after the trap is disarmed. He eyes Sebti through the hood's lenses but doesn't ask her - it probably amused her greatly to see them all stumble like that.
For his part, Orcen decided that it would be safer for him to hang back near the priestess than to stay in the middle of the pack for now. "Let's keep going, now. It's a team effort here. Ah, one thing, mind you - we have more rope, yes? Because it just occurred to me that should some other company come in and sever our lifeline back there, we would be effectively stranded in this tomb."
"I be sure to check fo' traps from now on. Thas what I was doin outside, why I was slow. You stay behind me, help me to look," he says to Zanac and Graxos.
After close examination, Rasim concludes there are no traps on the second set of doors. There is no lock to open, so he sets his shoulder and opens. The doors open into a 20ft square room of the same style of construction as the ones you have seen so far. Visible to all in the trapped corridor is a faded tapestry hanging on a wooden frame on the western wall of the new chamber. Faded and delicate, the tapestry depicts a middle-aged man, accompanied by a woman and two children, with a small estate in the background. Hieroglyphics are embroidered in patches along the left and right edges of the tapestry. To either side of the tapestry are two small pedestals, upon which sit two dead and preserved animals. The floor is plain stone. Unadorned stone double doors exit the chamber to the north and south.
Sebti remains far to the rear of your group, content to allow you to trip any defenses the ancient tomb-builders saw fit to install.
You notice that as you leave each room, Sebti carefully takes something out if her robes and holds it where you cannot see it, then puts it back. She is trying to hide the motions, but is not very good at it.
Rasim moves into the room, keeping one eye on the mummified animals in case the animate suddenly. He moves to the northern door, and begins to examine the ground in front of it, then the door itself for traps. If the door is clear, he will open it.
"Let's keep going, now. It's a team effort here. Ah, one thing, mind you - we have more rope, yes? Because it just occurred to me that should some other company come in and sever our lifeline back there, we would be effectively stranded in this tomb."
It never occurred to Byron that people would do such a thing but it made sense. [b]"Better go take a look at the rope again."[b] Byron moved back to the rope tugging on it, then he gathered a pinch of magic, forming it into an ethereal clock-work eye, which floated up to the top of the rope, turning invisible as it ascended.
Byron then thought to the trap. Mom, can you make sure that if someone tries to reactivate the trap that it will go off instead of rearming?
Orcen notes out of the corner of his eye how the priestess takes something out - curious, but it could be something as simple as her religious symbol. Certainly no need to confront her about it.
The room beyond the trapped hallway was quite interesting, especially the tapestry. Once the others have explored the room first, Orcen will take a few moments to read the hieroglyphics and see what else he can learn. "Right, so, I've always been of the opinion that when choosing a path, always go right first," Orcen comments, pointing to the northern door. "Ah, and Rasim is already checking it out. Good lad."
Zanac walks over to the tapestry and its pedestals, examining them both. "It's that guy again. But he's got a family this time around."
Movement in Sebti's direction caught Satinder's eye. She's trying to hide some sort of object from the party. What is she doing? Should I confront her about it? No, nothing to risk expulsion. I can't leave the tombs without my reward. Without locating the source of The Voice...
As usual, Satinder doesn't pay any mind to the tapestry, instead making his way over to Rasim to assist in checking the door, holding aloft his blade to provide ample light.
"Thanks, Tinder." Rasim says, happy for the bright light while he works. [i]This is so weird, I feel like I'm working a normal job, but then I hear all of them talking over my shoulder."[/b]
@Rasim and Tinder
The door and area in front of the door seem clear of any locks or traps. The construction is identical to the stone doors you came through without the elaborate engravings
@Zanac
The tapestry appears free of any traps; same with the pedestals. The mummified remains appear to be cats, strangled, then stuffed with wood shavings and spices. They do not stir under your investigation.
@Byron
The rope is alarmed. The best way to rearm the trap is just to remove the stoppers holding the pressure plate in place. You might be able to jury rig something to have it go off if someone else tries, but it will be a high DC and you risk setting it off yourself again. Do you try?
@Orcen
The tapestry is a portrait of Akhentepi, his wife, and two children, depicted standing before their family home. You can discern several symbols and hieroglyphs that suggest that Akhentepi’s family befell some tragedy, possibly murder or sickness, and he was left a widower.
The family is probably interred somewhere else and that this tomb was prepared much later, after Akhentepi’s continued successful military career.
Rasim pushes open the northern door.
"Some people are just horrible. Murdering an animal just so they can be a statue in your tomb." Zanac shudders at the thought. He's interrupted by the sound of the north door creaking open and he turns to look, noticing Rasim and Satinder pushing the door open. He walks up next to them and plants his back to the wall adjacent to the opening door, peeking around the corner without revealing himself if at all possible. He has no desire to be filled with more holes.
"As opposed to murdering an animal to skin, pull apart into pieces, cook and then devour?" Orcen comments to the cat. "I'd much prefer this to that."
The wizard will hang back until the others have given the all clear sign for the room.