"Words fail!" the man says, with seeming frustration as Heinrich picks futilely at the locks.
"Zandalus" doesn't ring any bells in the mind of the man from the cell with the starting corner.
Belzoni scowls at the clumsy lock picking and shoulders his way forward to complete the task properly.
Tenebrynn shakes her head at the chained man and sighs, "'Words fail.' 'Zandalus sees.' Repetition of phrases not helpful."
Heinrich sighs as his attempts to undo the manacles fail. He starts searching about to see if he can locate a key anywhere nearby.
Tristain waits, not knowing how long it takes to pick a lock.
Tenebrynn sidles up next to Belzoni as he fiddles with the shackles. "How do you know this 'words fail' man is safe? What if he and the ghoul were chained for good reason? You missed that tumbler there. You can hear it. Didn't click."
The man nods his head at the gnome girl's words, sighing sadly and repeating, "Words fail."
The lock seems to be too difficult to pick and you suspect you'll need the key -- or maybe that despite your initial thought that you knew how to pick locks, maybe you don't.
Confusius, you don't notice any keys, though there is another door to the south.
"I don't think this guy is dangerous," Kyffin suggests, "We should take him back to the nurse if we can get him free."
He moves toward the south door, and opens it. "Perhaps we'll find keys." he hopes.
If the room is empty of hostiles, he'll begin searching it - one handed as he keeps his scimitar out, fiddling with it nervously.
Several wide tables and gigantic washbasins fill a laundry equipped to service hundreds. The place looks as though it were repurposed as a failed surgery, though, with at least one table heaped with remains while corpses lie discarded in corners. A stained sheet hangs between two of the basins, dividing the room roughly in half. A lantern shines on the far side, illuminating the silhouette of a doppelganger on the sheet.
Tenebrynn asks simply, "Why? Why do you think or not think that?", when Kyffin expresses his belief the man is no threat. Even as she does, she plucks the thieves' tools from Belzoni as the man turns away and she starts exploring the locks herself. "Could be bad. Could be good. No evidence either way. Maybe flip a coin?"
Tristain picks up his hammer (the one he's been tossing at bad things that exist above the room with the starting corner).
Tristain shakes his head, trying to find and understand the madness in which he finds himself trapped.
Tristain uses the power of his mind to move the sheet from afar.
The gnome girl doesn't seem any more able to undo the locks -- as the man excitedly calls out "praise!" -- than the men.
The doppelganger appeared to be looking into one of the vats -- but as the man from the cell with the starting corner moves the sheet, nothing appears behind it, the silhouette moving with the sheet.
Heinrich begins to swear in a strange tongue (Varisian), and checks both sides of the sheet as he stares at the strange apparition in it. He moves over to the basin the shadow was looking into and peers in it.
Still not trusting his eyes, or thoughts, or his new found companions/inmates, or the other prisoners/ghouls, Belzoni peers about the makeshift surgery center for lurking creatures of both the undead and living variety.
Kyffin looks for documents and keys, spending some time carefully looking about the room.
He is, in a real sense, searching for his own history, so he takes his time and checks both rooms.
Tristain waits to see if others find anything, but is otherwise ready to move on. He gently bonks his head against the wall while he waits, the tension causing him to act out.
*bonk*
*bonk*
*bonk*
*bonk*
*bonk*
*bonk*
As the head bonking from Tristain continues, Belzoni looks expectantly at Kyffin. Why hasn't he stopped it by now? Then his expression turns to shock. Why did I expect him to stop the head bonking? Do I know these people, do we know each other? His expression quickly shifts to a suspicious frown and he looks away from the half-orc.
Tenebrynn, seeing the silhouette shift with the sheet, widens her eyes in interest. "Oh! What's that?" She then slips over to the sheet to examine it, absently returning another of Kyffin's scarves as she passes him.
As you begin to explore, you discover another ghoul in the southernmost vat, though it seems nearly insensate, barely clinging to consciousness. It gazes pitifully up at you from the bottom of the high-walled basin.
Also in the room, you find a key next to a lantern to the far south of the room. A set of reasonably well-kept surgeon’s tools rests on the table nearby, along with a backpack made of finely tanned leather.
A 6-foot-tall standing mirror also leans against the wall, and six 10-foot poles sit propped in the washtubs, two in each.
As for the sheet, the image seems almost printed on it, though at the same time not.
On closer examination, it seems obvious it's an illusion.
"This is simply an illusory image, a trick of the eye. Nothing more than magic and poppycock!"
Will Save
"Kyffin, is that another ghoul? Should we get it?" Tristain asks, stopping his bonking to ready his hammer of mighty smiling for flight.
to hit;
damage.
"And what are those poles for? Why?"
Int check - those poles, what for?
"Illusions? Dopplegangers and illusions and yellow-mist-filled-dreams? Getting harder to trust eyes and ears. Very disconcerting." She shrugs, then throws the glamered sheet around her neck and wears it like a toga. Looking then at Tristain, she adds, "I like you. You ask good questions."
Kyffin nods, "Damn undead filth." and coupe de graces the ghoul with his scimitar.
He agrees with the gnome, "This place is confusing enough without my mind already altered. Makes me wonder what sorts of things they were doing here - to us."
"Hmmm. What could be done? Make normal people look like ghouls, perhaps?" Her gaze drifts to Kyffin's dripping blade then back to his eyes before she offers a simple shrug.
"I like you. You ask good questions."
Tristain smiles, then blushes, then smiles more, then blushes more.
It's clear that in his deepest core, he's not used to being praised or thought of as a liked person. Such things embarrass him, but he liked the compliment.
"Thank you, Gnome from the cell near the starting corner," Tristain replies when he gathers his wits again. "You have been a welcome friend as we explore this new and old world together."
Whip in hand, Belzoni prepares for more ghouls and dopplies to block their way. "Stay close, stay alert, this place is a living nightmare."
As the half-orc dispatches the second ghoul, the man from the cell with the starting corner comes to the realization that the poles are probably to stir the laundry in the vats, though no clothing currently fills them and stirring a living (or undead, rather) ghoul is probably far more difficult.
As you go to leave, the remaining bound man strains again at his bonds.
"Praise? Praise?" he calls out to you.
Kyffin looks at the man in bonds and shrugs. Can't help you now crazy man... you'll need to wait.
He moves back to the half buries corpse and tries to determine if it's undead.
Tristain takes one of the 10' poles, because who knows if there is anything that will need prodding or poking from a distance. Tristain has very little actual knowledge of this place and there might be more half-buried or half-dead that need poking.
[b]"We should go back to that other corpse, I think."[b]
Tristain will poke it with his pole that he found above the cell with the starting corner.
Also in the room, you find a key next to a lantern to the far south of the room. A set of reasonably well-kept surgeon’s tools rests on the table nearby, along with a backpack made of finely tanned leather.
Belzoni points out the key, then slips it into his pocket. After sniffing for magic , he uses the fine backpack to store the surgeon's tools and slings it over his shoulder. Grabbing the lantern, he joins the group as they return to the rubble trapped ghoul.
As Belzoni pockets the key, Tenebrynn plucks it from his pocket as he turns back for the surgeon's kit and tests it on the crazy man's manacles.
The backpack does indeed radiate magic, and even better is apparently not empty. The seemingly copious space -- more than you think it should have -- holds a pouch with three platinum coins, a pearl that glitters opalescently, and a tiny box affixed to a leather cord. The latter two items also radiate magic.
The backpack is a handy haversack.
The pearl is a pearl of power (1st level).
The box is a phylactery of faithfulness.
The key works on the man's manacles and he sags as he's released, breathing out a sighed "Praise!" as he smiles at the gnome girl.
Heinrich seems to come to himself after studying the sheet, then notices the gnome releasing the prisoner. "Well it seems his vocabulary was not shackled as well. More's the pity."
Tristain, as long as others are not lollygagging around the backpack, takes a moment to adjust his mind to read magical auras. For some reason, this doesn't seem too hard for him, but something he knows he can do.
He examines the auras, each in turn, and explains what he realizes.
Spellcraft - backpack
Spellcraft - pearl
Spellcraft - box
And Tristain fails at most of the things he attempts, nothing too new to him.
"This is a nice box. Someone might want it."
* * *
Tristain approaches the freed prisoner.
"Do you have a name? Or should I call you the crazy man from the floor above the cell with the starting corner?"
Tenebrynn smiles at the man's relief. "You're welcome. Are you Zandalus or is someone else Zandalus?"
Belzoni investigates the magical curiosities, but has no answers to what they might be or do. He's about the shoulder the light backpack, then considers the small gnome woman and her tendency to pilfer everything including other people's clothes. "This pack may be more suitable for you, little one, but take care as I've put the surgeon's tools in there. We might be able to trade them for a few coins if we can escape this place."
Tristain looks a little shocked when Belzoni takes the magic items from his hands.
"Hey...I was...looking at those..." Tristain's voice trails off as he won't be confronting the huge, giant man.
Given time, I could have unlocked those. I know it.
Tristain sulks as the magics are given to Tenebrynn, the gnome from the cell near the starting corner. He doesn't complain lest the big man decide to eat him, his minimal sense of safety and security lost.
Kyffin casts Detect Magic and also examines the items. "I'm not very good at this, but I have gotten lucky in the past."
He shrugs, handing it back, "I have no idea. Might try to learn a bit of something so I can help out in the future."
He follows the others.
"Words fail," the man says, shaking his head at the gnome girl's question and rubbing his wrists as the grandmotherly woman approaches him to inspect them. "Words fail."
"Praise, Zandalus, Words Fail." Belzoni agrees with the man, then gestures for him to follow as the party moves onward.
Tristain ignores the crazy man who, unlike himself, speaks of crazy things.
"Maybe we just leave him here for now. Not sure what to do, yet."
"Yes. 'Words fail.' Repetition of phrase still not helpful. Maybe we can help recover your vocabulary with our memories?" She looks at the others hopefully then realizes she has a been handed several items. The gnome opens the backpack, sticks her head fully instead, then emerges and gasps, "It's bigger on the inside!"
"Let's introduce him to the nurse. Perhaps she knows him, or can help him." he suggests.
"I don't think we want him following us around. This place is not safe and he doesn't look all that good in a fight."
If the party agrees, he'll guide the poor demented man back down the hall and ask the nurse if she could look after him a little while. Try to help him - keep him calm.
"Nurse is a good idea." Tenebrynn pops her head back out of the magical backpack, her voice now no longer echoing as if in a cave, and she nods at Kyffin. "That's a good idea. Not sure about his fighting prowess, however. Could be amazing. Who knows? Probably best to keep from danger as best we can though. Do we have enough doppleganger corpses for the suspicious guards now?"
The older woman nods. "Yes, that makes sense. I'll stay here and keep an eye on the man. Clearly, he's addled."
The man looks frustrated -- "Words fail!" he says through clenched teeth -- but nods nervously.
You head back out, toward the twitching corpse. As the man from the cell with the starting corner pokes them, Lucky, Confusious and Walter notice something writhing within the corpse!
"Curses, there's a thing wriggling inside the corpse, take care" Belzoni spits as he uncoils his whip and snaps it at the foul thing.
Heinrich lets out a word of surprise, "ARGH!" and points at the corpse. Without thinking, he pulls a bomb from his pocket and mixes it, flinging it at the corpse!
for fire damage! Splash 4 damage, Reflex DC 13 for half,