Osru looks over the shelves. "How can you tell which ones are valuable?"
"This could explain what had Mersoolian down here so much, if he was studying these tomes," Ven muses. "Anyways, while I don't doubt there's some value to these books, we do have a job to do, and I'm still a little concerned about the alarm spell. Maybe we should just take the ones Zella's got and move along?"
"I'd have to look through them and possibly need a translator to be sure. Of course that would take a while to figure out. We'll have to come back here after we locate the missing."
The other door seems identical to the previous. After checking and finding no traps, the group opens the door and moves in.
Where the other rooms seemed to have a few decorations based on serpents, this whole room seems dedicated to them. A massive snake head is the first thing that catches your eye, the statue reaching from the twenty-foot ceiling all the way to the floor. Two snakes on either side of the room curl around humanoid statues, as though crushing them in the midst of a bloody battle. Carvings litter the walls of snakes of all sorts, some with human heads, others more humanoid with snake heads. Each is brightly lit by the dozens of braziers around the room, set to give an eerie atmosphere, a place unfriendly to those without scales.
Ten columns form a circle in the middle of the room, supporting the ceiling. Inside each column, a small alcove is carved out at the base, forming a seat of sorts in each, with all of these seats facing the center of the room.
Inside one of these columns seats, a young woman lays slumped, looking distressed. Over her, a young man is whispering something to her. Upon your entrance, he quickly turns, a panicked look on his face. However, he relaxes as see other humanoids. In the torch light, you can now clearly see his half-elvish features, with sharp ears and slanted eyes, but otherwise human. A dark tan covers his skin, skin that is weathed from work. With no other person evident, you make the assumption that this is, indeed, Mersoolian.
"My, I thought you were that horrid snake and goblin group," he says, waving you in. "I'm not sure what you're doing down here, but I assume that the snake is gone, yes? I hope so. The battle up there was quite frightening, and we've been stuck here since yesterday."
"I am Mersoolian Threce, an explorer of sorts. I've been studying this site for a while now, but I didn't think a group of goblins would have attacked us. I'm afraid Lucendi here was injured on the way down, but as long as that snake is gone, we can...leave...and..."
Mersoolian trails off, noticing something. At first, you're not sure what he sees, until you realize he is staring at a few of the books that Zella had carefully placed in her book. With the space they took up, a few now poke out a little.
Mersoolian's demeanor starts to change. "Those wouldn't happen to be from the library, would they? Well, well, well. I had thought intruders in the ruins was strange, but now I know I had the right of it! You're filthy, stinking theives is what you are! Stealing my possessions, my items, my precious artifacts! I found these ruins first, you hear me? I did! They're MINE!!!"
Mersoolian's voice works itself into a frenzy as it suddenly grows deep and furious sounding. A clattering behind you catches your attention, and when you look back, a skeleton is suddenly standing in front of the door you just came it, weapon at the ready. You hear a sudden chanting, and turn back to Mersoolian only to see a streak of yellow-white light streak from his palm and blast the ground between the group, shattering the tilework.
The woman in the column chair stirs somewhat, appearing to be in pain, and despite Mersoolian's shouting and the blast from his sudden spell, you hear her whisper, eyes still closed, "Help me, please. Please help me. Somebody, please."
Heroes - 14
"Excellent idea. Let's finish our task for today then tomorrow we can return and spend the time needed to find all the valuable tomes."
"The snake is indeed gone. A number of goblins have left this world as well. Are you ok? Is she wounded?"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa. That's not true at all! We came here to rescue you and we happened to find these tombs on the way. Why are you so possessive of them?"
Osru, while shocked at Mersoolian's violent response, snaps into action instinctively. He advances on the halfelf, trying to catch the man's free hands and hold him down.
Mersoolian doesn't even seem to hear Osru in the midst of his apparent anger. He does appear to be extremely angry about it, though, even as Osru grabs him firmly by the arms to try to stop him.
Blikx listens to the man recount his tale of being trapped inside the ruins, and listens in turn to each of her companions . Something in her mind feels off about the situation, and she scrutinizes the man's words, she not being fully trusting of the stranger.
As the man winds himself up into a maniacal rage, Blikx allows the storm inside her to rumble and toil in response. She hears the clacking of bones behind her and turns to face the skeleton blocking their exit. She moves to a position where she has a clear line of sight to the foul thing extends her hand and unleashes an arc of lightning at it.
Though suspicious, Blikx is unable to determine any hidden motives as the man launches his attack.
The skeleton opens its mouth wide and an eerie, strange sound eminates from where its throat used to be. A half-hiss, half-scream, the skeleton stops the noise when Blikx's electrical blast flies right through its open maw and against the now closed stone door behind it.
"We aren't thieves, we were sent by the mayor to find you! Stars, what's wrong with him?"
Ven moves around Osru and Mersoolian to Lucendi's left side and tries to check for any apparent wounds. "Lucendi? Lucendi, can you hear me? Did something happen, Mersoolian is acting like a lunatic!"
Unable to figure Mersoolian out, Ven tries to get to Lucendi while Osru distracts the man. However, upon reaching her, you realize that she really is in bad shape. A long cut down her side is still bleeding, while several large spots on that side of her figure seem bruised and battered, as though she were almost crushed by something heavy and brutal.
She is unresponsive as you try to speak with her. It seems she still wavering in and out of conscionuness right now. You try to help, but you've never had to treat something so bad before and am not sure how even bind such a long cut.
"Perhaps the shock of the goblins attacking him have caused him to lose his mind? I say knock him out and let others in the village deal with later."
Seeing the skeleton, Zella will channel positive energy at it, hoping to damage it.
Zella's blast of positive energy literally turns into dust that blows away from the gentle flow of the energy. Mersoolian starts to panic even more when he realizes he is alone.
Mersoolian goes mad as the tiefling continues to hold him back. With a scream, he tries to bite Osru, but fails to connect with all his thrashing. "You won't take my treasure! You won't take my secrets!" he yells angrily.
After dusting the skeleton, Zella leaves wrestling the crazy man to those stronger than she and moves over to where Lucendi is and casts a healing spell upon her.
"Did the goblins do this her or did Mersoolian?"
Lucendi starts to come to as the healing magic flows into her. The long, slashed wound starts to seal up, though it is not fully gone. Some of the bruises seem to fade as well. Opening her eyes lightly, Lucendi whispers, "What...what's going...on?"
The bruises appear as though she ran into a stone wall...hard...repeatedly.
Ven whirls around and tries to knock Mersoolian in the head with the pommel; the unwieldy motion fails, and she drops her bag and pulls out a length of rope.
Blikx takes a shot at the held man with a clenched fist.
Osru tries to take the hysterical man to the ground.
Blikx manages to knock Mersoolian in the side of the head, but he uses Ven's wild strike to force the tielfling to let go of him. Taking a quick step back, he pulls out a dagger and grabs a small symbol that had been hanging around his neck. With a strong chant, he starts the beginning of a spell.
Dammit! Gotta spend more time reading about spells!
Blikx takes another swing at him, hoping her punch will break his concentration.
Mersoolian brings his arm up and takes her punch on the arm, seemingly not feeling it as he continues to chant in a deep, even voice. "Si relgr shafaer thee, o versel nethys. fehlim ve wer..."
Ven is briefly conflicted but when he's free and about to maybe cast something bad she doesn't see much of a choice, and strikes with killer intent.
Ven's blow, despite being much more of a lethal attempt, does not seem to faze Mersoolian as he continues to chant, taking the wound on his left forearm.
Zella would have moved up with her morningstar and taken a swing at him.
"Don't worry. I will heal whatever damage I cause after he's unconscious and tied up."
Zella moves forward and swings hard. Mersoolian looks up in time to see it come down on his face, bloodying his nose and forcing him back a step. He grabs his face with a scream, his chanting ended. However, the fire of combat has not left his eyes yet.
Osru tries to take a bite out of Mersoolian's soft flesh, where it won't permanently wound him.
Osru advances on Mersoolian, but the man slashes wildly with his dagger, drawing blood along a thin line on Osru's face. Now almost fully surrounded, Mersoolian's eyes flicker to the door, and his flight overcomes his anger. Barging past the group, he goes for the door as fast as he can.
Blikx takes advantage of his focus on Osru to throw another punch. This time, she doesn't hold back, and attempts to break his ribs.
Zella swings at the crazy man again. "We can't let him get away. He is so far gone that he will either get himself killed or cause others harm."
Osru bites back in anger.
Ven makes a restrained attack...
...Just kind of flailing ineffectively.
"Take care of Lucendi, I'll make sure he doesn't fall in acid," Ven calls as she goes running after Mersoolian to do just that.
"Oh no you don't!" Blikx screams as she unleashes a bolt of electricity at the fleeing man's back.