Zoreck shouts in pain and anger. "Ow! You f**ker!!" With a roar of fury, the Kellid draws his sword and attacks in fury.
The moss troll, dangling from it's tree, is very quickly surrounded... and, with a brutal swing from Zoreck's sword, one of Rikkan's flaming bombs and a flung rock from Drancis, the creature has little chance. Locke's blade, swung with venom, ends the combat almost as quickly as it started...
...the crows which had flown from the tree return as peace returns - looking down atthe friends within the ruins of the great hall, they caw disinterestedly...
There are two doors to the west, one in the northern end of the western wall and one at the southern end... both are heavy doors yet they hang slightly loose from rusted hinges...
Drancis takes a ragged breath as the combat noises subside. He looks over at the doors and says softly, "I'll bet that staircase is where we need to go. But we should check the south door just to be sure it is clear."
He waits for the others to heal Zoreck before taking his place behind the others.
Illonna uses her new found powers to heal both herself and Zoreck while the others search.
Locke's chanting falls as the beast falls in turn. He takes a deep breath and cleans his blade methodically. I am usually not this hot headed but... what has happened in this town has made my blade heavy with rage.
"I agree that it is best we check all possible avenues. We do not want to be attacked from behind as we try to deal with Vuelib after all." Locke inspects the southern room with the others.
The room towards the south western corner of the manor proves to be the remnants of a kitchen. Empty except for a few scattered bits of rubble and a large fireplace in the southwest corner, the room shows no sign of having been occupied in recent years. Broken windows in the walls, as well as a handful of small cracks in the mortar, emit a chill breeze, creating an eerie whistle. A single wooden door leads to the north...
Locke cautiously moves to the northern door in the kitchen and opens it slowly, peaking inside.
Startled by the sudden appearance of the troll, Astraea had wracked her brain for a way to meaningfully contribute to the fight, but then... it was over. She sighes in relief as the creature stops moving, and wonders if it was somehow different from the ferocious trolls she has always heard stories about.
Following Locke into the kitchen, Astraea grimaces at the state of the place and takes a moment to poke around, muttering a quick prayer to herself as she goes.
Rikkan helps scan the area for any traps he might find.
Perception
* * *
After troll fight...
Zoreck ponders what he knows of trolls...
Calming after the fight, he also takes a moment to clean his blade and reload his pistol.
* * *
Inn the kitchen...
The Kellid looks around the room cautiously, pistol drawn.
The ruined kitchen proves to have nothing of value within it – it seems that, over the many years since the decline of the noble family that once resided here, the manor has been repeatedly ransacked. When Locke pushes the door to the north open, he sees a half-eroded, wooden rack tracing the edge of a large room’s north eastern wall and, next to the open door a small, cobweb-filled storage closet. Near the middle of the south wall – as previously seen from outside the building, a set of stairs spirals upwards… and down…
Again, this room – partially reclaimed by nature with moss thriving near the windows - tells of faded glory…
"This room seems clear. There was that other door in the room where we killed the troll. Let's make sure there's nothing nasty in there before we head downstairs. I don't want any surprises if we have to run out of here quick."
Drancis looks behind the others towards the great hall. "Yeah we can peek in that one door we passed by."
Retracing their steps, the friends move back into the Great Hall... past the corpse of the moss troll and to the door that they haven't yet explored. Pulling it open, Drancis dislodges a blanket of webbing and, with it, a skeletal hand reaches out...
"AAAHHHHH...!" With a yelp Drancis jerks his hand back in surprise.
Rikkan jumps back when the hand jumps out at the group. "watch out," he screams.
Locke's blade is in his hand within moments of hearing Drancis scream.
Zorek draws and points his pistol at whatever's in the closet.
With the friends immediately alert to possible danger, the skeletal hand is aimed at by pistol… and also by blade. Moments pass like aeons, the friends ready to strike… yet, when the door creaks open further, the bony hand simply falls from the webs - falling apart as it strikes the flagstones.
Reassured that they are not about to encounter more undead, the door is opened and the remains of three skeletons, draped in rotting leather armour, are discovered within the web-filled room – a further examination finds that one of the skeletons is still gripping a dagger and is resting against a near-decayed leather satchel. The satchel, upon investigation, turns out to contain 58gp, an onyx statuette of the Arvarenhode raven and a single stoppered vial,
Drancis uses his telekinetic abilities to remove the valuables from the room. "No need to risk any spider bites right?" Once the items have been divvied out he motions to the kitchen. "We need to find the Sheriff now."
"Back to the stairs then, click? Nothing else to sneak up behind us?". If the group agrees, Rikkan will lead them back and head downstairs.
Perception
With a sigh of relief, Zoreck lowers and then holsters his pistol. Looking through the itemd in the dead men's satchel, he says, "Well, let's keep this stuff. This dagger looks very well-made. I could certainly put it to use as a holdout weapon, but I prefer to fight with Bessie," he pats the pistol at his hip, "And Sally." He then pats the hilt of his sword.
When the others look at him questioningly, he snaps, "What? You don't name your weapons?"
Locke lowers his blade and pats Drancis on the shoulder, "Nice scream kid," his tone obviously joking. "Split the gold?" he asks, while motioning that he would like to take the statuette for safe keeping.
"I have named this blade Avenger." Locke motions to the sword they found in the Sheriff's office, his tone entirely flat, leaving the others to question whether he is joking or not this time.
Returning to the room with the spiral staircase, an examination upwards discovers that the stairs soon reach the rubble and debris of the upper storey’s collapse - completely blocking the way after a 15-foot climb.
...The spiraling descent, however, continues downward into the dark...
With a word and a gesture Locke summons torch like lights to follow Zoreck and Drancis.
Drancis smiles weakly at Locke. "I guess I need to practice this adventuring stuff more right?" He sighs in relief as Locke summons his light to illuminate the way ahead.
I don't like being lit up like this, but what choice do we have?
Illonna goes to take a torch out of her own bag but stops short once Locke casts his spell
"Steel yourself friends, we are entering the creatures domain. It, along with anything else down there, will know better the terrain. Watch your steps - no doubt it has been down here for some time."
Rikkan didn't need a torch, but he'd been with humans enough to realize their eyes weren't as trained as his. He climbed in line behind Zoreck, wordlessly looking around.
In the light of Locke's magical torches, Zoreck keeps his eyes sharp for anything unusual as he leads the group down the stairs.
Astraea giggles nervously at Drancis' girly scream, but she only barely managed to avoid doing so herself.
"Y'know... if nobody else wants that dagger... I could probably hang onto it. I know I'm not much of a fighter, but having a quality weapon might take a bit of the stress off of it..." She shrugs. "Of course, I'd be happy to hand it off to someone else if they have need of it..."
Heading into the darkness, Astraea finds some relief- one of the many quirks of her peculiar sight was that her vision was actually somewhat better in the dark- or perhaps the "cracks" in her eyes simply were not as evident in the absence of light.
"All right... Steeling," she says quietly to herself in response to Illonna's warning.
Perception as we head down the stairs
Descending the first few steps into the depths below the manor, the air immediately feels musty and still – and, somewhere deep below, the sound of gently dripping can be heard echoing up the staircase. The staircase, where sunlight still touches it, is covered with moss – the walls, the steps and even the ceiling is liberally smeared with virulent green growth… and, nestled within the moss, a particularly crimson, oozing growth… as Zoreck leads the way down the stairs, the crimson blobs seem to retract into the moss…
Though carefully studied by healers and naturalists focusing on oozes, living boilborn are dangerous to experiment upon. This is because their death throes can sometimes be triggered accidentally, even when the creatures are handled gently and no harm has been done to them. Some posit that boilborn have only a limited lifespan, and self-destruct when that period ends. Others have labored for years under the hope that the infectious fluids contained within boilborn might somehow be used to find both cures and immunities to any number of diseases that plague the world. Though this experimentation has resulted in certain indicators that boilborn might indeed be put to such positive use, a reliable concoction has yet to be developed.
Zoreck looks at the pulsating red blobs, then puts up his hand to halt the party.
"Look out! I've seen that gross red gunk before: It's an ooze creature the Technic League calls a 'boilborn!' They can burst open voilently and spread disease to any living thing that the goo lands on! The League has been experimenting on that crap for years... and left a long trail of diseased victims in thier wake!"
He looks around at the moss to try to tell how many of the things are there.
- there seem to be two areas of ooze that are actually moving... both on the ceiling whete the stairs start to descend.
Drancis pales at the description of the disgusting ooze. "Could that be what is causing the Holver's Ferry people to get diseased? Did you want me to try to...move it out of the way?"
"Or I could try to burn it..."
"Either way, let's just get it out of the way," Astraea says. "Maybe we should let Drancis try to, uh, do his 'thing' on them first. Don't want to start a fire if we don't have to, right...?"
"Where do you plan on moving it Drancis?" Locke asks, eyeing the ooze with disgust.
"I am not quite sure WHERE to move it too...why I have not done so yet!" Drancis replies with a touch of irritation in his voice. "Also, I don't like the idea of burning it either. No telling what the fumes will do to you!"
He looks around the passage for any alcove or other area to deposit the boilborn ooze.
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- there don't really appear to be any alcoves as such... You could try and push the ooze back into the cracks fom which it appears to be seeping from or maybe bring it out into the room at the top of the stairs...
Drancis shrugs helplessly, "I don't see a place to move it too so I will try to force it back into the cracks. Stand back." He then stretches his mind out to gently squeeze the bubble surrounding the ooze trying to keep it from bursting and then pushing it back into the wall...
The ooze bubbles and pulsates as, concentrating hard, Drancis forces the grotesque pustule into the fissures that are spread across the ceiling... Moving his attention to the other active ooze, he telekinetically grabs it and forces it away... Leaving hideous red patches of mucus where the ooze was but, for now, it doesn't seem to be moving back out into view...
"Quickly, while Drancis has it held back, click, we need to move through!". Rikkan skitters by the nasty creature, hoping Drancis's mental powers keep it contained.
"Thanks kid! This power of yours sure is useful." Locke rushes down the stairs after the others.
Zoreck nods at Drancis' handiwork. "Huh. Good job, kid." With his pistol in hand, he continues to lead the adventurers down the stairs.
Drancis blushes slightly at the praise heaped upon him by the others. "It was nothing, really." As he follows along behind the others he mutters quietly, "I just hope Vuelib is that easy to deal with!"