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Keeper Myre starts to babble faster and faster.
"Whatdoweknowoftheworldandtheuniverseaboutus? Ourmeansofreceivingimpressionsareabsurdlyfew, andournotionsofsurroundingobjectsinfinitelynarrow."
Then he tries to casts a spell again.
He manages to do it this time and tries to touch Leastrie.
He manages to do it and Leastrie feels like the madman is siphoning the life out of him.
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Issac arrives behind the curtain to see Sorin and Leastrie both hit the mad necromancer. But it's Merisiel's rapier, thrust into his chest, which makes him fall to his knees.
You are not sure how much tears or blood is what suppurates from his empty eye sockets, as he speaks, with what you can only recognize as sanity in his tone of voice:
"We see things only as we are constructed to see them, and can gain no idea of their absolute nature. With five feeble senses we pretend to comprehend the boundlessly complex cosmos, yet other beings with wider, stronger, or different range of senses might not only see very differently the things we see, but might see and study whole worlds of matter, energy, and life which lie close at hand yet can never be detected with the senses we have."
He smiles, and dies.
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Carrion Hill’s asylum is a brooding structure that looms at the edge of the hill’s eastern cliffs. Crove Asylum is an oddity this low on the hill’s slopes, for it is made entirely out of stone. The doors are all of iron, walls are bare and painted a dingy pale green, and floors are of smooth stone. There are no windows in the one-story building, leaving it gloomy inside as a result, with rooms lit by candles in sconces providing an almost uniform dim light inside. A grim home for violent criminals, homeless lunatics, or other insane folk that the city has deemed “unfit” for the streets.
As you entered the foyer, the true nature of the madness this place conceals became evident. Three lunatics well bound and straight-jacketed were placed in the entry chamber, wild eyed and frothing at the mouth, their insane murmurs and screams placing you immediately on edge. You continued on moving through the upper floor, where you encountered several macabre scenes;
In the toilets you found two inmates who had recently murdered a third and were playing imaginary cards over his body, using various parts of him as chits.
A lecture room held Five lunatics - one stood at a podium, whispering nonsense and gibberish to the other four who sat in rapt attention in the audience – your momentary disturbance caused all five lunatics shriek and rise to attack with homemade shanks made from broken chair legs and sharpened bones.
In the Library you found another lunatic hiding under a table ogling a well illustrated book that catalogued vicious applications of torture.
All encounters with the lunatics went the same – their unshakeable madness and single bloody-mindedness meant conversations were in vain and you simply had to resort to controlling and subduing them as kindly as you could.
Then there were the wardens. Several able bodied thugs in studded leather armour with cage like helmets rushed to engage you with their crushing cudgels, and although they put up a determined fight, they were not well suited to fighting more able and well equipped adventurers who were less predictable and more capable than the inmates they were used to rough housing. Strangely, the wardens also resisted any real attempts at reason and discussion, being fairly brutal and single-mindedly adhering to trying to apprehend and subdue you. After removing a cage-mask you noted the telltale scars of some kind of surgery – a puckered scar near the front of their skull.
By the time you had explored the Asylum, you were in no doubt that the only thing differentiating the inmates from their keepers was which side had the keys.
Steeling yourselves for what horrors might lay beneath this place, you pushed downstairs into the basement, a damp, grim place. At the foot of the stairs you encountered several lunatics chained at the base of each flight of stairs, and after subduing them you spied another small group who had broken up furniture and were threatening each other with clubs and knives crafted from its remnants. Once you had restored some semblance of order, you paused to consider your surroundings.
The stone tiles on the floor here are of a deep green. Maniacal laughter, cries of pain, screams, and off-key singing echo from the north and south hallways. To the west, the hall ends in a large pair of massive iron doors, while to the east the hall opens into a room containing a round table and a few chairs.
An iron door in the southern wall of the eastern room hangs wide open. The walls, ceilings, and floors are made of stone. The doors are iron, but many are spotted with rust.
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Heading South leads you through a series of cell blocks, each cell is cramped and contains a straw mattress, a scratchy sheet and a bucket for a toilet – if the inmate is particularly lucky. wardens were imprisoned down here, one with a botched lobotomy.
Some of the cells you passed were still occupied; a couple of former wardens occupied some of the cells, with a crazed morlock imprisoned within another – at this stage you urged the saner inmates to stay calm and promised to return for them.
Pushing onwards to the south eventually leads you to a rather significant door – stout and firm, and most certainly well locked by a heavy oaken timber. There is a peephole, which reveals a corridor with a door at the far end. Moments after you look through the door, you are barely missed by some crazed hooked horror trying to lash out through the grate, seeking to rend you to pieces as it smashes up against the door heavily, dropping dust from the ceiling and making a racket.
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Kuraishimo will ready to warp touch the creature once he can see it.
(Fort Save DC 18 or be dazed for 1 round)
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Everyone gets ready to strike via their various methods.
Sorin snaps home the blade of his katana the creature shrieks and howls, chasing him into the hall as he steps back.
As it rounds the corner, a range of effects ring out..
Kuraishimo
Overcome SR
Creature Save
/Dazed.
Leastrie lets and arrow fly, but the arrow goes wide.
Isaac opens fire.
Shot 1:
Damage 1:
Shot 2:
Damage 2:
/creature immune to crits.
Two hits.
Merisiel hurls a dagger on the off chance...
Attack:
Damage:
The creature shrieks and thrashes under the weight of blows, but its moment of confusion causes it to miss its opportunity to lash back.
R2
Kuraishimo
Leastrie
Merisiel
Sorin
Isaac
ENEMY
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on my turn, Sorin'll stop raging, think about what he knows about the creature.
any special attacks, special defenses, resistances, weaknesses, or immunities it might have in that order of importance. Then Sorin'll try casting Ill Omen on it. no save, just SR, so it has to roll twice on the next 5 rolls. if its smart can has spellcraft it can burn a reroll.
n then i'm fatigued.
A target who can speak and has at least one free hand and who is aware of the spell and its effects (such as from a Spellcraft check to identify the spell as it is cast) can negate one reroll by spending a move action to utter a brief prayer or good luck charm to appease the spirits of ill fortune.
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As we rounded the corner, we saw a huge mass of slimy tentacles. Looked almost like there was an explosion at a spaghetti factory. Fantastic. Even worse - it was too small to have done all that damage to those buildings, so this clearly wasn't going to be the end of it all. The work of a PI is never done.
To go off on my initiative spot, a full attack:
Double Barreled Shot 1:
Reload using paper cartridge and rapid reload.
Double Barreled Shot 2:
Reload using paper cartridge and rapid reload. Fire a third shot using Rapid Shot.
If that didn't kill it, I don't know what will.
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R2
Kuraishimo continues trying to daze the creature, but this time is not so effective (SR not overcome)
Leastrie unleashes an arrow, but firing into combat past his friends fouls his shot.
Merisiel throws another dagger which rattles off the wall.
Sorin cuts to a moment of clarity, racking his mind for clues as he unleashes a spell upon the creature before it regains its wits.
Special attacks:
Corporeal Instability (Su)Claw—contact; saveFort DC 17; effect
amorphous body and 1 Wisdom drain per round (see below); cure
corporeal instability can only be cured with magic (such as greater
restoration, heal, remove curse, restoration, or heal). Corporeal
instability is a curse effect. The save DC is Constitution-based.
A blow from a chaos beast against a living creature can
cause a terrible transformation. The creature must succeed
on a Fortitude save or become a spongy, amorphous mass.
Isaac lets forth a rapid series of bangs (remember your -4 for firing through cover) and four shots strike the creature, inflicting horrible wounds.
ENEMY the creature now responds, tearing at Sorin with glee.
Claw = 23
Damage
Claw = 29
Damage
Both claws strike Sorin, the physical wounds not as terrifying as what he knows is about to happen...
Sorin - two DC 17 Fort saves please.
R3
Kuraishimo
Leastrie
Merisiel
Sorin
Isaac
ENEMY
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Dammit. What is this thing? No choice other than to try a bit more lead, hopefully before it makes Sorin into the blue plate special.
To go off on my initiative spot, a full attack:
Double Barreled Shot 1:
Reload using paper cartridge and rapid reload.
Double Barreled Shot 2:
Reload using paper cartridge and rapid reload. Fire a third shot using Rapid Shot.
If it's not dead soon, we may have to consider alternative tactics. Ugh.