Startled - and realizing that their element of surprise was shot - Morvena quickly switches tactics and begins to conjure an ally to help them out...
_______
Geoffrey sees the ambush falling apart and softly curses to himself. Seeing Morvena casting a spell, he decides to move in and help the ambushers out. "Need more light please!"
[color=Blue]Move inside the room to position on map.
Ready action to attack any Fairy moving into threatened area.
; [/color]
Victor watches in slow motion as Issil steps on the glass ball Shoot! Best get in there. He ducks through the doorway with sap in hand, he looks around "There are a LOT of them!" He keeps his pearly whites hidden behind his lips from now on.
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Issil shoots a plume of flames from her palms, frying two of the tooth fairies into an ashen crisp. As the smoke clears, their corpses suddenly explode into clouds of sparkling white fairy dust.
Geoffrey readies his weapon while Padraig begins an encouraging song. Morvena starts gesturing arcanely.
The tooth fairies take to the air, the green one closing the distance with the intruders. The pink, yellow, and white winged ones all disappear from sight, while the green moves above Geoffrey. He misses his readied strike, but the fairy is left open to an attack.
It cackles happily as it darts towards his mouth with its pliers primed...
Green, Pink (invis), Yellow (invis), White (invis)
-->
Black
Issil, Morvena, Geoffrey
Orange
Victor frantically looks around for a fairy that seems to be slow on the draw, hoping to catch it vulnerable. He heads over and peeks into the other room and spots his prey... a faerie with orange socks is yawning and just getting up.
Target acquired... He thinks as he tries slinging a gob at acid at it.
Geoffrey curses as his initial blow is wide, yet reacts quickly to the fairies' approach...
;
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Before the tooth fairy can rip a tooth from Geoffrey's mouth, he throws his sword up and out expertly, impaling the creature on his blade.
It explodes, spraying a cloud of stinking white fairy dust into his mouth. Some of the dust splashes onto Issil.
Victor's spell fizzles, and then a black-winged tooth fairy descends upon him, a vicious grin on its face...
Pink (invis), Yellow (invis), White (invis)
Padraig, Victor
Black
Orange
Victor swings his sap reflexively as the evil dental assistant closes in for his chompers "Die scum!" He squeaks as his sap connects solidly.
"Reminds me of this one lady. Obviously her first day on the job. Her perfume was so strong it could kill a rhino at 50 paces."
Issil wipes off the fairy dust off her face.
Issil ducks past Victor, into the room and sees a fairy with an orange picker. She grins and blows flame right at it. She doesn't know where the other two are, but they're around here somewhere...
Geoffrey manages to dodge the fairy dust and, not seeing any more fairies, decides to follow Issil into the other room, readying to guard her back.
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Victor smacks the tooth fairy in its head with his sap. The tiny, evil fey buckles its wings to stay afloat, and manages to get its pliers into Victor's mouth, ripping out one of his molars. The pain is excruciating!
The tooth fairy then glides to the ground and falls unconscious, Victor's tooth rolling across the floor.
Issil burns the orange tooth fairy badly, and a second painful shriek comes from further into the kitchen area as well.
Pink (invis, -2), Yellow (invis), White (invis)
Padraig, Victor (bleed 1, missing tooth)
Black
Issil, --> Geoffrey
Orange (-5)
"Sounds like I found oneeee!"
Issil does a quick jig before realizing her dagger is emitting light for the party.
"I don't know where the others are though."
Morvena's summon finishes and Helios appears just outside the building. He swoops inside, looking for a target, and finds one just inside the kitchen!
"Screeee!"
Helios flutters over towards Orange and rakes at it with a sharp talon...
Morvena follows right behind Helios and into what looks to be a rundown kitchen area. Seeing only one immediate target, she attempts to fling a bolt of acid at it!
"Ugh! These things are hideous!"
"Don't you wish your girlfriend was hot... like... me?"
"Don't your wish your girlfriend was a freak like me?"
"Don't you...?"
Issil is having lots of fun as she lights up the place.
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Morvena's trusty summoned eagle nearly shreds the tooth fairy's wing with its talon, but the little fey shields itself with its pliers. Morvena puts a hole in the building's wooden wall with a missed acid splash.
It then moves towards the eagle, trying to grab the talon it just evaded in its pliers!
Exhausted of energy, the orange fairy passes out.
The three invisible tooth fairies fold back into visible light above Geoffrey, Issil, and Padraig, their pliers primed for what they hope is their latest bone extraction. Geoffrey misses with his readied attack.
Pink (-2), Yellow, White
--> Padraig, Victor (-1, bleed 1, missing tooth)
--> Issil, Morvena + Summon, Geoffrey
Geoffrey reacts quickly as the fairies reveal themselves...
;
;
He will attempt to finish off the fairy that still is flying...
;
Victor screams as the tooth is ripped out of his mouth "You little sadistic bastard! That hurts!" He watches the fey crash to the ground unconscious.
Before he can do much more another one appears trying to get at Padraig's pearly whites "Oh I got something for you... coming through!" He squeezes past the singing halfling and tries to cold conk the yellow faerie.
Issil grins, knowing she's got this in the bag. Suddenly one of the fairies goes for her teeth!
"Nnnnope!" Issil picks into the critter with her dagger.
She grins, so full of herself... until the fairy expertly digs in and plucks out one of her front teeth! "H-hey! I need perfect teeth. It's the first sign of good quality entertainment!"
Issil continues to jab away, as her allies are too close to avoid burning.
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Inspiring his friends, Pádraig Henry enters the Lair of the Tooth Fairies, and readies his rapier to strike any of the fey killers that reveals itself within his reach.
Readied Attack, Inspire Courage; Damage: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (12) + 4 = 16; 1d4 + 2 ⇒ (1) + 2 = 3
Ever ready to seize another opportunity, the halfling tries to pierce the clever, vindictive tooth fairy.
As the Orange fairy makes a last stand and dives for one of Helios' talons, the eagle attempts a preemptive strike!
"SCREEEEEE!"
Hands off the talons!
Then, with his attacker down, Helios flaps towards Purple as it tries to assault Geoffrey and slashes and snaps furiously at the little pest!
Morvena quickly takes a step back as two more fairies appear out of nowhere and instinctively flings another bolt of acid at the one pestering Issil!
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Geoffrey is quick to react, and destroys the pink-eyed tooth fairy with his blade as it fades into view. It doesn't get the chance to extract his tooth. It does, however, explode, spraying Issil, Morvena, and Geoffrey with fairy dust.
Padraig's also prepared, and slashes at the Tooth Fairy, severing it vertically through its tiny body. More fairy dust sprays from its corpse. He loses no teeth.
Following this, Issil hits the white tooth fairy with her dagger, but the creature remains airborne and alive. It manages to get into her face, stealing her tooth in its pliers. Padraig sees Issil in torturous pain, and steps ahead to finish the battle with one more precise strike.
Step One: Pick up tooth.
Step Two: Cast Cure Light Wounds on herself.
Issil feels her tooth shake until the magic does its thing.
"See? All better." She turns to Victor. "Find your tooth so I can put it back in place."
Issil casts Cure Light Wounds again, rubbing Victor's mouth slowly and carefully.
"Feeling better? Let's look for clues."
Victor drops his sap to the ground and quickly heads back to the knocked out faerie and his tooth. "I've got it, I've got it!" He says through a mouthful of blood. "Quick fix it, quick!" He pleads as Issil rubs his tooth pain away.
After some cursing at the bodies on the floor he starts to look around with everyone else. "We can question the knocked out one if we want. I can speak Sylvan." He says as he lifts up a small and gross bedroll.
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After reattaching your teeth and rubbing your sore gums, an investigation of the tooth fairies' den reveals a chamber slowly being decorated with teeth of all sorts. It looks like that the intention was to wallpaper the entire area with teeth. In the center of one of these walls is a gold tooth.
More interesting than the treasure, behind a false wall in the kitchen, Issil finds the broken, toothless body of a young tiefling child placed into a niche of the wall.
The child’s body has been tightly wrapped with thick preserved sinews, its wrists and ankles shattered and bound with cold iron chains. All but one of its teeth have been knocked from its jaws.
An examination of the grisly find reveals dozens of phrases that have been inscribed in Aklo in very fine writing along the sinews.
Victor gets to work on the value of that tooth, hoping he does that it'll bring in a fortune. He pulls out his eye piece and his merchants scale as he starts eyeballing it.
Afterwards he takes a look at the phrases "I wonder how long that's been in there? Those fey were speaking Sylvan, not this..." Not quite sure what this... is.
"There's some weird stuff going on there.. those chains don't look normal and who wraps up a child in sinew? Creepy."
Issil inspects the tooth. It's obviously valuable, but she can't fully verify it.
Turning around the corner, she sees the child.
"...damn. I can heal the kid, but I don't know what to do about those restraints."
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"If we can sell it, this gold tooth's worth 250gp!"
When Issil discovers the body of the tiefling child, Pádraig Henry is filled with sorrow. "I'm certain this poor child is beyond our ability to raise from the dead."
He kneels down to bless the tiefling's departed soul and to take a closer look for clues.
The halfling looks up at the others, "We should ask our new friend Zea about what we should do with the child. She said cremation is their custom; however, the decision ought to be hers or the child's family's."
"We should first preserve these sinews used as restraints. If we cannot decipher these words scrawled on them now, we should do our best to research them later."
Geoffrey watches the outside of the hostle, making sure no dottari or any others took notice of the brief melee. When the child's body is displayed to him a look of anger flashes over his face. "Whoever would do such a thing needs to be punished! This sounds like the work of, if not Thrune agents, then close allies of them to me!" He declares forcefully, "Still Padraig is right. We need to find out who did this, and WHY."
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Morvena swallows hard at the discovery of the tiefling child's body but quickly turns her attention to examining the strange phrases scrawled on the wall. As her eyes follow the words, she slowly clenches her fists, nails digging into the palms.
"The tooth fairies were created using a ritual," she explains, her voice eerily calm but with a seething anger beginning to bubble just beneath the surface. "This child's life energies were used to form a link with the First World and give them form."
"This was not just a murder. This was a sacrifice...deliberate, most likely to...to g-gain..." Morvena continues, or tries to, as she grows more and more agitated. Suddenly, without warning, she spins around and flings an acid dart into a nearby wall. As the acid sizzle and burns into the wood, Morvena turns and walks back out into the old common room without a word.
"Let's try to preserve the sinews, and then we can give the body to Zea. She can determine the best way to take care of it."
Issil knows when to keep her mouth shut, and Morvena's outburst only confirms it.
"This is the kind of stuff grandma warned me about."
Victor's mood drops as Morvena translates the words "That's awful. But at least we've stopped it. Let me help release the bonds and we can bring the child to be put to rest."
"Do we want to question the unconscious faerie or just put it down?" He asks the others.
"Squish it. I don't want that thing to get a chance to escape. Or to hurt anyone else."
Pavanna flutters in and out of the kitchen area, as if trying to keep an eye on Morvena as well as the rest of the group all at once.
"Squish it! Squish it good!" she chirps in agreement with Issil. "Those things are too scary to keep around!"
Geoffrey nods grimly, "Consider it Squished." He then proceeds to slice the fairy in two.
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The halfling gives the Rebellion's spymaster a hard look. "Well there goes one potential source of intelligence about our foes. Foes with significant but as yet unidentified power and resources, as this macabre ritual indicates."
Pádraig Henry frowns. "These fey earned their deaths, but in the future, let's consider interrogating our prisoners. Before we execute them."
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Pádraig isn't able to determine much more about the writing or the bound child. With the threat of the tooth fairies eliminated, Victor carefully pulls the corpse out of the niche. Geoffrey wraps the body in a blanket so as not to rouse the wrong kind of attention.
You depart the Cloven Hoof Society, and find Zea where she was earlier today. Showing her the body, she is just as alarmed as you are at the finding. She waves to call two other tieflings over, and they speak infernally for some time as they attempt to recognize who he might have been. "It appears no one knows who this child is. It's likely he was one of a dozen homeless urchins who prowls the Nursery. And those tooth fairies were no accident. Someone must have had an agenda if they murdered him to summon then." She scowls in anger. "Who would do this, and why?"
She pauses in thought, but no clues point to an explanation. Yet. "I feel myself attributing this to Thrune, but am I just looking for someone to blame it on, or could he and his followers really gone this far?" Zea sighs. "We will hold a proper ceremony for this child this evening. With the tooth fairies eliminated, I feel calm will wash over the others here. I will spread word of your deeds." She offers a handshake, still stoic in demeanor other than ripples in her voice as the gravity of the situation sets in.
Victor gives Padraig a look of annoyance "Maybe we'd gain some info, maybe not. Considering how easily they turn invisible there's a chance it could just give us the slip. Besides, I put it up for a vote and that's what everyone wanted. Chill." He quickly moves on to pulling out the body.
Victor listens in on the conversations between the Tieflings, doing his best to act as if he doesn't understand them, hoping to glean anything useful. .
"Something like this is EXACTLY what Thrune and his allies would do. Subjugate through fear and terror. I can almost assure you they are behind it."
Although Morvena slowly calms down a bit as the remaining tooth fairy is taken care of and Zea and her friends discuss the poor child's identity, there is still some lingering anger in her voice as she agrees, "Yes, Thrune would do something like this - I have no doubt. Or perhaps a supporter or someone else who wished to gain his favor. Such things are...not uncommon...among those who support Thrune and his ilk."
She sighs, suddenly feeling drained. "I suspect we have done all we can here for the time being. Like Padraig I wish we could have learned who is behind this but at least we have stopped the immediate danger for the time being. Is there anything else we've yet to see to while we are here in the Nursery?"
Issil, for the most part, ignores Pádraig. It... didn't feel right. Besides, what was it going to say?
As Zea explains who the boy was, Issil remembers her days in the streets. She was lucky. And she was fast. He wasn't as lucky. It felt good to at least put the boy to rest.
"I'm sorry it had to happen this way, Zea. Thank you for letting us help you. I'll check back for a few weeks to make sure things calmed down. If you don't mind."
Issil takes the woman's hand and shakes it.
"Call upon us if you need any help, alright?"
Issil takes her leave.
"Well, that was... useful. At least it will be better for them, briefly. Where to, now?"
Geoffrey peers outside the window noting the lateness of the evening. "We should return to the Wasp now, looks like we are already past curfew. It would be best for us to travel the sewers again methinks."
"As they do mine," Morvena mutters, clearly not entirely happy or satisfied with the way the day has turned out - but likely for different reasons than Padraig.
"And baaack to the sewers."
Unlike her fellow former debutante and the little man with a voice, Issil is in a good mood. She saved plenty of lives today, made peace with a community she would have scoffed at, and remembered that everyone deserves a chance.
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After giving Zea your best, you step into the sewers to avoid the gaze of the dottari. Unfortunately, it's still rancid and disgusting.
Even worse than that, however, is something stirring as you trek towards Longroads Cofeehouse. The final tunnel and your exit is blocked by something... strange. Rising up out of the fetid water almost simultaneously are two horrific aberrations whose mouths open with silent screams.
Two hunched-over wretches with long, pliable arms like tentacles capped with wide, spiny claws draw near!
-- Bold is up --
Geoffrey
Blue Alien
Padraig, Morvena, Issil
Red Alien
Victor
Geoffrey stares at the abominations with a horrified look in his eyes before his training takes over, drawing his favorite blade. "By the Gods, what are those things?"
Victor stares ahead in disbelief "I have no idea..."