Marlon is till hurting badly and follows his companions slowly through the hallway.
You leave Muthilda behind and head to the other side of the throne room.
As you open the door a strong stench floods your senses.
Inside the room you see 6 Troglodyte currently arguing in Draconic about a dead Giant Tick laying on the table. On the far side you see stairs leading down.
Once noticing you they cease their argument and one steps forward.
"You're new? You're not allowed in here, go back. Basement off limit."
Sunny smiles, skips forwards a step and offers a hand to shake in greeting,
"Aye, that we is." (^_^) Then she point to the archway.
"Whut's that say?" She asks politely, but obviously intrigued.
"Boss. Now OUT."
Ok, we go.
After closing the door.
When I look around, I have the feeling, that we should make a rest somewhere. We all are wounded and our magic potential is nearly exhausted.
Maybe the gatehouse would be the safest place
Sunny nods at Gorag's suggestion.
"Them critters weren't tha' friendliest, wus they?" She notes of the Troglodytes demeanor.
Cerana nods "I wonder if there is empty room about this place or a safe area of some kind."
If there's a safe way out maybe that would be a good idea... Marlon adds as he holds his rib cage.
Sunny moves to aid Marlon, offering an arm to help support the still wounded fellow.
"Dun't worry none. Tha' place near tha' front has bin cleared out of any nasties." She reassures Marlon.
"Though, tha' place where that spidey come from might also be vacant?" She offers the alternative to the group as a destination in which to take rest for the evening.
I think, that the gate house would be better to defend. Additionally there it is more difficult to hinder our potential retreat.
Considering it's, well, the gate, you are not sure if Kikonu hasn't replaced the guards there yet. And you doubt that he would like it if you just kept slaughtering his corbies, at least in a situation where he wont get entertainment out of it...
As you arrive at the gatehouse you see two still crudely bandaged up corbies sitting inside. They glare at you, it seems they didn't like being beaten up in the play after all. Someone also removed the corpses you left behind, though not the bloodstains.
Sunny smiles and waves to/at the new residents,
"You fella's are doin' a bang up job!" She assures them, even as she helps turn Marlon around.
"Looks like we's bunkin' in'a spidey place..." She says to her friends and begins to head in that direction, though before she goes she looks over her shoulder and calls to the Corbies.
"Ya missed a spot!" She calls before making her way to where every one will probably be bunking down for the night.
"Where ever we do sleep in this place would it be wise to keep a watch rotation?" Cerana asks.
Well, you've still only discovered that much about this place, for all you know the other rooms could hold swarms of eldrich horrors.
You know that the room where you cleared out the spirit would be quite easy to defend and the corbies probably wouldn't go in unless forced. On the other hand, it would kinda also trap you, being in the very middle of the castle and all (through forcing your way through the commons hall and then jumping of the wall could be possible...).
The stable on the other hand would be easier to escape, though also harder to defend as wooden roofs and heaps of straw have the uncanny ability to catch fire. A quick check out also shows that it does stink in there. A lot. The ettercap didn't seem to hold to a high hygiene standard.
There's also always the possibility to leave the castle and rest in the village below or with the caravan. Though that runs the risk that Kikono wont let you back in if he decides that you are to dangerous.
Hm, it looks like thhat we don't have much selection. I don't have problems with bad bad smell. My laboratory isn't a lovely smelling place too. After a few minutes we won't smelll it anymore.
Marlon seems a but frustrated at the indicision.
Whatever we do we should do so quickly...
"I'm fine with staying in the barn. Maybe someone with magic can use some prestidigitations to clean the place up a little and improve the smell? BUt if not, I'm sure we'll get used to it."
You decide to rest in the barn. After cleaning it out as well as possible you decide on a watch schedule and then go to sleep.
The night starts out peaceful until about 1, when the currently awake hear some noise from the far side of the castle. Considering the inhabitants, it is probably nothing.... At least it doesn't seem to be in direct correlation to you and the noise isn't moving towards you.
You believe to hear a few screams and metal scraping on stone, but you aren't sure.
[ooc]Go check out or continue resting?
Marlon hears odd noises but decides it is not wise to wake everybody for no reason know and he doesn't want to go out on his own and leave his watch so he just waits it out. Sure to pass the information on to the next at watch.
After a few minutes everything grows silent again and the rest of the night passes peacefully.
With the coming of the morn Sunny rises, yawns and stretches before wriggling into a shirt and thence setting about sprinkling 'magic' over herself as she prepares to greet the new day. Some of her morning ritual involves pondering the contents of a small, leather bound book she has been carrying.
Thence she skips about offering said spells for any one else's comfort/benefit before moving some of her gear into the 'center' of their camp and helping prepare breakfast.
"So. Where da we go ta' day? Try an' find a way right up ta' tha' top of tha' place an' work our way down?" She asks conversationally.
We have 3 possibilities:
The rooms behind the ballroom
The rooms behind the throneroom
or the room we where the Troglodytes were.
"Well, we're fresh and rested, we could deal with the Trogs now probably, but why fight if we don't have to. There are other rooms on this level we haven't checked... why don't we finish what we started here, before taking any stairs."
With a smile Sunny says "Why not try up? That way we can have a look see about tha' place when we get ta' tha' roof, hey?" She offers her thoughts.
Why not? Marlon replies to Sunny with a shrug. She seems nice and smart. Smart people tend to have good ideas.
"Yea upstairs sounds good." Cerana says as she stretches a little after reading up on her spells for the day. Closing the spellbook and putting the quill away.
Hijiro shrugs. "Up is as good as any other way, I guess... Let's do it."
"I'm all for it." Zeema replies, readying herself.
Once finished with breakfast and other morning chores Sunny takes a torch from their makeshift fire-place and thoroughly checks the walls, floor and ceiling for nay other doors, hatches or other signs of egress.
At all times she leads with the torch. Being careful not to set any of the mouldering straw or wood alight while using it to keep the shadows and cobwebs at bay.
Sunny finds nothing.
You move out of your shelter and back into the main castle.
Upstairs you come about the corbies during their breakfast, eating great amounts of grilled meat. Their glances tell you that they still don't like you, though they for sure don't sem to have any intention of getting clubbed to pulp by you again.
Sunny waves cheerfully to the big feathered fellers as she skips through.
Gorag follows Sunny into the room they found the Attic Whisperer
You search the room but find nothing else than they wall paintings you saw earlier.
Hijiro looks around curiously in the room, since this is his first time in it. "Seems like you've all been here before... "
Sunny nods,
"Aye....Does seem like only yesterday..." She says wistfully, then casts a glance towards Hijiro...before a burble of laughter escapes her self.
"Actually, t'was only yesterday that we wus here. Lookin' an' pokin' about. Tha' critter did give Gorag a nasty bite.' Ans Sunny momentarily pats the Half-orc's arm in comfort/sympathy.
"Least...I think it were yesterday..." She mutters with a slight shake of her blond mops.
"Yes it was yesterday, though let us move on from here there is little else. Why don't we enter the adjacent room?"
Zeema, tiring of Sunny's tomfoolery, will barge into U13 with scythe in hand.
Marlon does not know what was going on here yesterday and so for now can only follow along wordlessly.
Hijiro, also unsure of yesterday's events, follows along. When he sees Zeema burst into another room, weapon at the ready, he draws his rapier and readies for trouble, just in case.
Sunny's eye grow a little wider as Zeema barrels past and into the room in question. As the rest of the group moves to cover what ever might be stirred up by said entrance, Sunny also shifts so as to both try and get a glimpse of what's inside as well as possibly help Zeema with what ever she might find.
You notice that the paintings on the wall near the childs skeleton actually seem to be more than mindless scribble.
He seems to have painted a crude collection of ninjas sporting throwing stars, terrible bird headed men and giant ogres wielding giant, shining magical axes and the bodies of dead men strewn everywhere.
As Zeema wants to go into the room in front of her, she hears a voice in her head "I wouldn't go in there if I were you, Kikono doesn't like people snuffling through his study."
At the same time a winged and taloned women comes into sight, mustering the group and walking towards them.
Sunny continues to ponder over the images from the previous room. Though at the sight of this new person she smiles as they come closer.
Though she does open her mouth to say something, at Yix's call she closes it again and waits to see what happens.