"Um... This might be the illusionary wall part?" Elise mumbles and grasps at the walls. "Either that or a hidden portal ?"
"I sensed some magic beyond the wall. It may be that now, with the wall moved, I can sense more."
"It reminds me of an old system from the Azlanti days. Two doors, linked so only one can open at a time. I wonder what we might see if we close that door again. Amelia, would you mind?"
A little bit worried to be locked inside the small windowless room, Elise nevertheless complies and steps inside. "Uhm. I hope you are sure about this ..."
Alþórel detects again trying to discern it better now that he's right in front of him.
Alþórel, unfortunately still can't tell what it is. Though the group try his idea about the two doors. Amelia closes the door and Alþórel's suspicions ring true. As the door closes whatever was blocking them off from moving forward is dispelled. They find themselves in a large antechamber The group hears something from the next room ahead. They hear muttering in Elven before they then hear a shout asking in Elven: "State the password!"
Alþórel freezes, then starts to move forward
"Which password? The new one or the old one?" he asks, nudging Amelia as he goes past.
Nethan helps along the way when he could.
As Nethan hears the challenge for the password, he gets ready to put them to sleep since fireballs are a bit louder than sleep psionic powers.
Nethan looks at Al and speaks in a low voice, "I still have the means to put them to sleep if you don't know the password."
With anticipation Elise moves forward. She wouldn't mind giving the guards her password in the shape of a battle cry!
Nethan manifests inertial armor just in case this turns into a battle especially since Elise looks revved up eagerly waiting to give them her version of a password.
The forward passage is open, the mages who are still invisible can move forward to investigate. As they do they spot 3 Eldred who are in the room ahead which looks to be a simple guard post. They are huddled around the wall peering down the corridor at the group. They seem to be unsure about the group's intentions, likely lots of random people come down here so the guards aren't always up to date about who comes down. It's probably why the password exists.
Al nods to Nethan
Nethan looks at the (3) Eldred to make a guess of how powerful a Slumber power he has to manifest to make all or most fall asleep.
Nethan feels that the strongest Slumber power he has will knock out all 3 of them.
Using a Mythic Power point, he uses the memorized Slumber 5 HD power on the Eldred.
Two of the guards collapse to the ground with the third one confused at what's going on, giving the group a chance to react before the guard gets a chance.
Amelia runs in and smacks the guard about a bit, he reels back hitting the wall before falling unconscious along with his friends. So at least the initial alert group is down. Thankfully now it is likely that no-one can hear them down here from the mansion. All that's left is now to find Atenzuki. There are 3 exits in total connected to the two rooms the group has explored, which way would they like to go?
The room to the left of the guard post is a store room, with a few supplies of rations and some meagre weaponry. There is a small chest with sets of empty vials. Lastly there is some rolled up leather carrying pouches, inside of them are some grisly looking spikes.
"Splendid!" Elise whispers as the last guard hits the floor. "I'll find something to tie them up with.."
She look, finding the storage closet/soon-to-be prison cell. Vial and spikes? That reminds me of some old story ... With a grim but invisible look, Elise carries out the weaponry, vials and spikes from the little room. The weapons she dumps in the corner of the room, but the rest goes into the middle of the room.
"We can tie and gag the guards, then throw them in there and bar the door. I found these *things* in there... There is an old legend in which a displeased king nailed a dissident to a wall and drained his blood. Please tell me that anyone can think of another use for these!"
Nethan celebrates with the one arm celebration gesture with his 66% success. Nethan looks at the vial and spikes and replies in a low tone, "Not sure, let me see if they are magical or anything else in the general location for that matter."
While Nethan scans the room, he over hears Amelia, and replies softly "Unless it was the lead guard, probably not and even if he did, he is going to be out for a while. We can always coup de grace him but that will probably make matters worse. One thing to knock everyone out and take the girl. It's another when you wipe out the whole guard to do the same and the potentate may take it more personally."
Nethan nods, "I agree, let's move North once I figure out there is a magical dweomer present or not."
The group ventures north.
Inside they find themselves in a large chamber with 2 sets of columns side by side. The chamber appears to be a very large ritual chamber there are murals with drawings of Eldred with many colours similar to the head of the outpost you remember before coming here. There are basins with what looks like colour paints in the room though far more viscous. At the north side of the room is the yellow coloured basin, next to it however there is blood littered about the floor and drag marks on the ground. The marks lead to the NE door. Above the blood are two chains with shackles on the ends of the chains.
'I interact with the paintings'
#Error - target: 'paintings' not recognized!
'I interact with the murals'
#Error - operation 'interact' is invalid!
'I look at the murals'
#Error - operation 'look at' is invalid!
'I examine the murals'
You see painted stone
*Sigh*
Elise eyes narrow dangerously when they enter the next chamber and she sees the blood. And the shackles. Her grip on her weapon hardened and her muscles tensed. My kin - drained like some damn With so very few humans in this world - every one felt precious. Seething, which very obviously tainted her voice, she spoke.
"What say you? We should find whomever did this and let him/her have a turn!"
Walking over to one of the murals at random, she spits in disdain into the fluid basin. 'Colour'. Blech. All this for some paint?
"It seems obvious where they took her - but these cursed paintings might provide some clue as to what they are doing."
With a spiteful grin she added -
"We should destroy them if we have the time..."
"Hmm... There is magic in color here. Mean anything?" he says, looking at the party mages.
Nethan nods and casts the Detect Magic cantrip, "Let me see what the dweomers reveal, if anything?"
Nethan inspects the spikes, although there is nothing inherently magical about them he does notice that there are some very fine etchings marked into the spikes. With his knowledge on rituals he realises that these etchings are small furrows that can be magically enchanted but only with a liquid that is magical in nature, say blood from a Unicorn or tears of a dryad or something similar.
In the ritual chamber Nethan looks at the colours, he sees indeed these are distilled colour magic. Usually he could tell what school each aura represents however the paints themselves are just magic. It would be similar to a pure burst of energy, it isn't a spell yet as it has not been shaped into one of the schools. It's fascinating to Nethan that people have managed to turn this energy into some sort of stable chemical. Nethan and Al do wonder if they can somehow manipulate the colour at this base level without knowing colour magic themselves.
"Didn't they say something about gathering *all* the colours? To 'regain ancient power' or something? Hmm" Magic eh? Feeling just a tad bit poetic, Elise empties one of water canteens and fills it with Red Magic. "This sorta had my name on it, so I'm just going to go ahead and borrow a bit ..."
Having no luck finding any new clues (except the trail of blood!) Elise feels that they should go with that one. But first, she walks in a circle around the room, taking a look at each and every one of the murals. Perhaps they provided some clue - or insight - into this whole thing!
Nethan explains his findings on the spike, and what Al and him are contemplating in the ritual chamber, "Al, perhaps the spike has something to do with the colors? In addition, we have to determine which color matches which school or something like a school. Maybe red is evocation/invocation? What spells seemed to be cast when the Eldred were casting yellow magic? Was it everything or a specific school?"
"maybe the local knows something about it."
Amelia and Elise probably knows that there are more tracks in this room to something but the blood keeps drawing them away. Something to do with how much of it there is just puts a whole dour tone on their search.
Shrugging it off Elise looks at the murals for a bit. There doesn't seem to be much on them however she does notice something interesting. Despite all the Eldred looking alike in the drawings the one thing that is different is the colour patterns. They all have the same colour but the appear in different orders on the coats the Eldred are wearing. This could be a stylistic choice by the designer but even a cursory glance at religions in Golarion show that depictions mostly have some sort of deliberate portrayal on them. The most notable thing about the colour order is that each of the coats has a different colour closest to the Eldred's body.
Spook pipes up at the vocal cue from Dreyyn "I'm not entirely certain about all the colour schools but at least I know yellow and white. Yellow is mostly about fluidity. Most of the spells you can do with yellow is about how to move things about, how to get yourself soaring, how to use movement to your advantage. For example it is what let's the guards of our city float on their bone spears. Mages who use more magic can make sand shift and change, often fast enough to make reverberating sand armour.
White is the polar opposite to yellow in terms of intent. White is all about stopping power. It has the ability to absorb and halt impacts, both magical and physical. It has a strong foundation and has a sturdy order to its casting. We are taught to be careful of it as it is the most dangerous counter to Yellow since our local magic relies on that movement to be successful, especially in war.
He sees Elise take some red paint. "I don't know enough about red to give you too many details other than it's about growth. Much of house Dearganach use it on plants, it likely has other applications though.
Al mutters - mostly to himself, but with his head bent near Nethan he can be heard
"It seems as if they've used an entirely different taxonomic classification system. Fascinating. Excepting the Elemental Schools, the use of the Thassilonian Schools spread so widely after..." he trails off and looks to Nethan "It's a whole new way of categorising magic, if I understand Spook."
In a more normal, but still quiet tone, he turns to their new companion "Spook - is this liquid what powers Eldred magic? Do you have any idea what these spikes might be for?"
Finally he sighs and speaks to the group as a whole
"While this is curious, we have more pressing concerns. Let us follow Elise's example and fill our canteens, then move on."
He looks apologetically at Nethan "We can hope to return on our way out."
Elise glances briefly at the clothes of the eldred murals and the closest pools.
"I think this pictures represent the different eldred peoples and their associated colour of magic. Look!"
Elise points out the disparities in the murals clothing styles, and if it exists, the correlation to the pool of magic. With a fascinated look on her face she continues to admire it all for a few moments more before shaking her head.
"All right, let's get a move on!"
Dreyyn isn't keen on dumping out his water, so he looks around for any containers already present in the room instead.
Dreyyn looks around and finds some small leather pouches near one of the pillars, it has a few coins in it. Possibly a purse left behind by someone, it isn't water tight like his water skin is but as long as it isn't tipped upside down he thinks it should suffice.
Elise then making sure everyone is ready kicks the door open. There is a small corridor that she rushes around, revealing a lab of four alchemists tending to several large pools of blood. Each of them having various tools and are covered from head to toe in protective gear, including a mask with tinted yellow eye covers. Elise's guess is that these are Eldred but she has no idea since they don't show any skin or distinctive features other than that they are humanoid. Between the three rooms there is a glass window separating each of them. There are several workbenches strewn about the place, there is no sign of the heart here. The Alchemists peer over and see the tall woman all ready for battle. Each of them raises their hands over the head as a form of surrender. Though they do not drop their tools they are holding. The tools range from spoons, to long metal sticks, to a pair of forceps. They look to each other warily, though it is very hard to tell what they are thinking behind their masks.
Elise glares at the 'scientists' for a moment, briefly contemplating forcefully adding their fluids to those in the pools. However, they seem to have yielded - so she ignored them for now. Bah. Pawns ... The amount of blood in the pools worried her a bit - for if it all came from one person, surely that one could not have much left! She looked around, trying to find traces or something that could hint on where the Heart was taken/kept.
Nethan does not dump out his water as well, asks for one of the pouches that Dreyyn found. If Dreyyn gives Nethan a pouch, he pours red liquid color magic into it. If not, he does not get any liquid magic.
Upon arrival into the alchemist lab or what appears to be an alchemist lab, "Now there may be something in here to pour the liquid magic into for more safe keeping than canteens and coin purses?!" Nethan looks around the room for a clean beaker or something to pour the red liquid magic into for better safe keeping. He wants to make sure a dirty beaker does not create a reaction with the liquid magic. "Hmm, Spook, is blood one of the ingredients for Eldred liquid magic in this realm?"
Dreyyn will hand over the pouch, which he had not filled yet.
Spook looks at Nethan in shock with his question. "I might deal with some crazy otherwordly despots but blood ... no...this is a realm beyond me or our magic." He looks at the blood warily just like the rest of the group.
Nethan does find some vials and beakers and the like. They aren't completely clean but a little bit of wiping or some water never hurt to get out what grim there is.
Elise looks around to try and find some tracks or anything that could lead do where this body was lying. Whatever drag marks ends here from what she can see though there are several drag marks on the ground of parallel large trails, out the two doors to the south and one to the north.
Amelia tears off one of the masks and sees an Eldred underneath, or at least most of one. Part of the face of this alchemist seems mangled beyond all recognition, or melted, or battered. Hard to tell, though the mess of skin and folds that makes up the side of the face still moves and wriggles with some sort of muscle spasms. The Eldred seems more afraid that you are looking at his naked face than your presence in the room.
Every so often when the group is looking around at the Vats or looking for tracks, Dreyyn notices that the group of Alchemists give each other a brief look, or signal. One of them has shifted slightly further towards a door now that Dreyyn things about it. Sometimes a small light flashes from one of their masks, he wouldn't have caught it if he wasn't looking for it.
"Hey, those guys are plotting something. Signaling each other, and that one moved towards that door." Dreyyn says, in common. "We should restrain them." he says, speaking to Elise.
"Reeeeeeeeeally ?" *cracks knuckles*