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The Lemure begins to claw at Jack hoping to drop him down.
But the creature misses both attacks not even connecting with Jack's armor. The pit Meliora created has gone strangely silent since Nox was cursing the wizard to high heavens as she fell into it.
Combat Round 1 end, start round 2
Meliora, Jack
Nox (Dmg 3)
Canacha, Micheria, Lena
Lemure (Dmg 7)
Jack hops into the shallow stream, all the better to flank opposite Mic, jabbing at the fiend with his silver weapon.
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Meliora summons up one of her feelings to try and get a sense of her luck.
Bleh, it doesn't feel like she's got a particularly nice chance of anything right now. Middle of the road-ish. Might as well let the fighters finish fighting. Nox'll be out of that pit in a couple rounds at worst, and she needs to have a plan for it.
She takes a step back, preps her crossbow, and fires at the Lemure.
Yep. Fate's not on her side today. That's fine, wizards don't much care about fate anyways. "Once we've got the demon down, rush the pit. She's got a reach weapon, so she'll want to hold us on this side of the bridge."
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What ever Meliora was trying to do with her crossbow didn't seem to actually do anything. As she calls out to the rest of the party she hears a very colorful oath coming from Lena behind them all, one which Jack also seems to register. You both glance in her appearance and sees none other then Nox hitting Lena with her glaive.
Thinking that one enemy at a time must be defeated mic lashes out two more times with her gold iron gauntlet while yelling to Jack.
"Go help Lena, I will finish this up."
"Wha... how... shes behind us?"
She began completely flabbergasted for a moment. She hurriedly began to reload her pistol. She moved forward to support Lena more than anything. She had doubts she could get a good shot off before Nox tried to gut Lena again.
"Lena! behind me!"
She began with a feral growl glaring at Nox and snarling.
Jack winces when he sees Lena get savaged by Nox and he realizes their foe's reach weapon and positioning is going to make fighting the woman a nightmare. Sucking it up, he goes full defense and moves up to engage the devil woman (+4 to AC).
Lena curses as the attack hits her. She steps back, and heals herself with Fervor.
"You have teleportation magic, and you use it to not run away?"
Meliora spins another spell, and points her hand at Nox.
"That fall she took's probably healed off. If any of you have tricks you wanna add, now is definitely the time!"
Lena casts Fervor on herself again.
"Tch!!" Meliora whips a scroll out of her bag.
"Okay, get in close and use it right this time."
The dhampir yelped in pain, the sound only amplified as creepier due to the effects of the mutagen coursing through her veins. Thankfully Meliora came through with a fog.
She took aim where she thought Nox had been and fired before retreating back into the fog. The cut of that fiendish womans glaive had been way to deep for her comfort.
"Oh that hurt so bad!"
She began to no one in particular shaking as she leaned back against the wall. She was glad she had her potions handy.
Mic quickly wipes her gauntlet on her pants as she moves to help the others. The sudden mist is a surprise but she can skirt the edge and close on Nox.
As she moves she changes her fighting style a little, to be more defensive.
"How about you try that on me cupcake?"
Jack's not certain how to make good use of the fog unless the group can lure Nox into it. He stabs at the devil-woman once before taking a 5-foot step back deeper into the fog.
"We don't need to kill her--just keep her at bay!" he shouts to the others. "That minor artifact we're seeking should be somewhere in this garden!" Jack hopes Nox takes the bait and pursues them into the fog.
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Nox laughs at Jack's ruse. "All you'll find in ther eis a few dusty tomes, the redactors have already scoured every nock and cranny." She says shifting her grip on the glaive and starts to swing after Jack.
Combat Round 4 end, start round 5
Meliora, Jack
Nox (Dmg 2)
Canacha (17), Micheria (18), Lena
"They missed a few spots! not that it matters cause they are all dead!"
She hollered back sounding quite angry. She pulled out the potion of inflict wounds they had found, prefering to use the liberated goods before her own stash first.
Lena hears Jack's voice and steps forward. She puts her hand on his weapon hilt and gives it Holy Strike.
Mic winces in pain at the strike but does not let up. She steps in tight and tries to deliver two stiff knees, keeping her hands up the whole time.
Knowing her strikes are poorly done she lets out an exasperated sigh.
Without any real options left for how to affect the battle itself at the moment, Meliora changes tactics slightly. She heads over to where Nox was first standing now that the pit has closed up to check for any useful books.
Rexus's mom isn't down here. She's prolly ded, yo. There's also a nonzero chance that Nox gets lucky and wins despite everything. That stupid Grease should have worked, she saw how clumsy Nox was as she went right down that hole, but... Well, better to be lucky than skilled. If that happens, Meliora figures she can at least try getting something useful out of here.
Jack gives a nod of thanks to Lena for whatever she's just done to his weapon and concentrates hard on actually hitting Nox so whatever effect there is won't be wasted.
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Mic keeps swinging but something feels off, very very off.
Her frustration builds and she lets out a bellow of frustration that turns into a roar.
"GahhhhRRRRRRR. Give it up before you get hurt lady!"
Meliora is going to just continue with her plan and start looting the room of any important-looking books and whatnot from where Nox was hanging out.
Lena casts Bless. "Hopefully this will help."
There isn't much I can do that won't get Nox attacking me outside the fog.
Jack feels a new blessing from Lena trying to nudge him on to greater valor...or at least a modicum of success in his battle against the devil woman.
I can't keep letting these good people down! he thinks as he again jabs.
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In that case, she'll look at two of them this turn to get a sense of if she should grab 'em or not.
She felt better but she was still bleeding from that wicked glaive... still she couldnt just hide in a corner and wimper. She fumbled with her belt pouch and pulled out a vial, mixing in another small vial and drinking it, a semi translucent 'shield' projecting from her. She slid around the wall through the smoke until she cleared it, getting a clear view of their adversary. Once she reloaded that dirty Asmodite was going down!
"Hey Melly! Nox must be short for Noxious, which means harmful, poisonous or very unpleasant. Well shes not harmful or full of poison but her face sure is unpleasent and hard to look at eh?"
She taunted as she carefully pulled out her pistol to begin reloading.
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Micheria is utterly useless against Nox but Jack's blade strikes true and the woman hisses in pain as the silvery good weapon strikes her. The wound seems to be closing more sluggish then any of the others she had gotten so far. "You will pay for that rabble. Or perhaps you belong somewhere higher up in Kintargo." She says with a devilish smile at Jack.
She swings her weapon in a wide arc hitting Jack and almost hitting Micheria also before steps back attempting to draw you out of the mist.
Combat Round end 6, start round 7
Meliora, Jack (17)
Nox (Dmg 16)
Canacha (10), Micheria (18), Lena
Meliora will go about picking up both books this round--Oh, wait. She's being invited to banter.
"I dunno! I think I could get into seeing her face on the underside of my boot!"
"Yeah... She isnt much better than dirt underfoot."
She began reloading hurriedly, licking her lips and then taking aim...
"Boom."
She muttered lowly to herself with a wicked smile.
Lena taps Jack and heals some of his wounds. "Get her.
Frustrated and sputtering Mic steps forward and lashes out twice with what she think will at least hit.
Dropping into a defensive crouch , Jack attempts to hook around the table to flank Nox opposite Mic.
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As Jack attempts to get into flanking position, he suddenly is surprise as Nox uses her polearm to stop him from going that last step and he ends up between the two tables and she uses the free space to walk away from the both of you provoking an attack from Micheria.
Nox takes the hit with some grunting, she looked like she was on her last leg when she turns to you all. "Know that you might have beaten me today, but Thrune will know of each of you from now on. I'll be watching you and when you least expect it, I'll come at you again. Remember it's dangerous to go alone in town now!" she says before making gestures with her hand and muttering some words of power, and she disappears into thin air.
Congratulations you send Nox running and enter now level 4
Jack looks around to see if Nox reappears like she did when escaping the conjured pit. When there's no sign of the brute woman, he breathes a sigh of relief. "Good job," he says to Mic. "Nox packed a wallop...but so do you!"
Turning to the others, he offers similar praise. "We should get out of here as fast as possible. Nox is probably getting reinforcements to storm this place as we speak. If one or more of our spellcasters wants to detect for magic auras on the way out--just in case we missed anything, especially in those bedrooms we breezed through earlier--that's all right with me, but otherwise we need to make ourselves scarce pronto!"
"No no no no no "
The Dhampir began as she started to hurriedly load her pistol as the woman began her taunt. Just as her hand was shaking to put the bullet in the woman disappeared and Canacha screeched in annoyance. An evil feral look in her eyes followed by heavy breathing and the repeated clenching of her fists seemed to take the normally cheerful alchemist and black powder aficionado over for a moment before almost as quickly as the temper tantrum took she was checking the load on her pistol and smiling.
"Man that was crazy guys right? She sure is a sneaky one, here i thought we had the perfect plan and were gonna just like shove her in a hole and bury and then man... Great spells Melly your the best! And jeez Jack you keep getting better at hitting things with your shiny swords and you'll make all the girls swoon!"
She giggled, still a bit unearthly as the Mutagen was still pounding through her veins but it sounded par for the Canacha course.
Pulling out some vials, she mixed a few things together and handed the vial over to Mic.
"Drink up, its not much but it should help close up some of those nasty wounds while we get the heck out of here."
When Nox disappears Mic drops to one knee breathing hard. Her look is one of frustration and exhaustion.
"Tough bird that one. As you say, sneaky too." she takes the potion with a nod standing again. "Thanks. She got in a few licks, I hope to see her again though, thought I was to old for new tricks but I think I will have a few surprises next time."
She spends some time stretching and working out soar bits as the others look around.
Lena lets out a huff of frustration. "I had hoped we could end her, but that would be too easy. Milani save us all from her." She looks relieved the battle is over. "Good job everyone. This was supposed to be our new headquarters's wasn't' it? If Nox know's were're here it won't be a good place to hide."
She casts Cure Light on Jack. Just in case we run into someone else down here."
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With time to look over the books Meliora determines that most of the books Nox had stored he are actually soul tomes from the archivists, including Rexus' parents, who were cornered, captured, tortured, and eventually killed.
The contents of these tomes are scattered and incomplete, but nonetheless represent a wealth of knowledge on not only various historical topics, but also on how to successfully found and run a secret society. The knowledge within them can be of great utility, and if used as a resource while attempting a Knowledge (history or local) check, the books grant a +4 competence bonus on the roll. The books weigh 20 pounds in all and, as a collection, are worth 1,600 gp.
Porcia's soul tome contains memories of some dangerous books that had been stored here before moved to the Temple of Asmodeus, one of them was a copy of the diabolic chapters of the Book of the Damned. This book has only be read by one person in many years, a wandering scholar, Trailblazer Huni, was granted an hour to study the book by archivists.
"Trailblazer Huni?" Jack echoes aloud when Meliora explains what the soul tomes are and how they can be used. "Are Trailblazers some heretical offshoot of the Pathfinder Society? I wonder if this Huni character is the one who betrayed the existence of this place...."