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"You got it, Stali!" Gallix nimbly squeezes past Uesugi and sets up beside the naga. "Sorry for this, but you're not in your right mind. We'll do what we can to keep your eggs safe at least." He throws a punch at the naga, his civil words matched by his attempt to avoid killing the naga as much as possible.
AC25 from Outslug this turn.
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Mr Peppers sucks the 5 missiles back into his fingers like nothing happened. "Please do not kill the naga, just knock her silly so she is no longer a threat. Maybe we can relocate her eggs or something." Mr Peppers shrugs a bit, going over to check out the rugs.
"I believe these are flying carpets... which would be incredibly helpful here to deal with all this... fire." He unrolls one and attempts to activate its magic.
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"Please rest, at least briefly." She looks up to Stali. "We have about a minute before she wakes up naturally. Did you hear her? Moukadeem's power took hold of her mind. We must eradicate his presence from here. For her sake. And her children."
She pauses. "Let us take these carpets, quickly. They will prove useful."
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Several of the eggs are still intact. What will Stali do with them?
Mr. Peppers rolls out the darker, black carpet with purple arcane symbols sewn into its design. It spans about a 5 foot by 5 foot area, incidentally like the dust patches from earlier. With a snap of his fingers, the carpet levitates above the ground, ready for the arcanist to hop aboard.
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After a quick prestidigitation and the white glove test, the carpet passes the 'no fleas and no bed bugs' test so Mr Peppers hops on. "There are enough for all of us, pick yours and get acclimated." This one is stunning, almost like it was made for me. I believe I'll keep it.
He tests it out over the safety of the stone walkways. "It seems my swapping in the fly spell was premature."
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Sirettis secures a carpet, although her hair seems hesitant to take it. Oh calm down. I cannot fly as quickly as the carpet can move.
She takes a look at the eggs.
"We cannot leave them here." Sirettis uses her prehensile hair hex to carry them onto her carpet. "One naga is dead and the other is incapable."
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“Right, take the eggs now and worry about details later!”
Stali quickly grabs one of the other rugs and places his bedroll on it. Using the bedroll to keep them in place, he begins quickly and delicately moving the intact eggs on to the rug.
“How do I make this rug fly?”
After getting his answer, he mentions “The creature isn’t beyond hope. We will need to find a way to help it later.” It is obvious from his actions that he considers protecting the remaining eggs the more immediate concern.
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If Stali and Sirettis don't grab up all the intact eggs, Gallix grabs one himself and cradles it as he clicks his fingers just like Mr. Peppers and steps aboard his flying carpet. "Right. Let's get outta here before mama wakes up and flips her wig. I'm trying to go one mission without getting diseased, poisoned, nauseated, or Cayden knows what else and she looks like a big old pile of poisonous death to me!"
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“Do we stay or go?” Stali asks as he continues to delicately load eggs on his rug.
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If the group decides to try and knock the Naga out, Stali gives a sigh of resignation and says “If we must.” He obviously doesn’t like the idea of striking a defenseless foe like that. He leaves the eggs he had already gathered on the magic rug.
Getting on the opposite side of Gallix, he waits for a signal or the creature to awake and then uses his sap on her.
Hampered
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Mr. Peppers had noted that while six of the rugs were Carpets of Flying, the other dozen lacked any magical auras. After carefully weighing your options on what to do with the guardian naga, you decided that using the leftover rugs to gift wrap the big snake. It takes only a few minutes before the guardian naga is bound in rugs, her neck wrapped in a lovely red bow.
Afterwards, you all unravel and board a magic carpet and take off down the lava flows. The tunnel turns and weaves deep into the underground furnace, the lava becoming more volatile with large bubbles spraying hot liquid up above. A burning river of molten magma bubbles and churns, surging ever forward, smoldering the edges of its obsidian shores. Globs of molten rock shoot skyward, only to splatter against the ceiling some 40 feet above. The resulting impact causes globules of magma and sharp debris fragments to cascade into the magma stream below. Two small beaches rest to the east and west of this section of the underground flow.
Basking on one of the obsidian beaches is an enormous fire elemental. It's quickly alerted to the presence of six adventurers on flying carpets, and turns to block your way.
-- Bold is up --
D., Mr. Peppers
Furnace Master
Stali, Sirettis, Uesugi, Gallix
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Mr Peppers smiles as he sees the fire elemental Ahh, I finally get to test out some of my new advances in arcane mastery.. watch this.
Tall, dark and Lordly, his face getting a serious tan from this glowing hot magma, pulls the tassles on his rug to fly up slightly, giving him a clear line of fire at the oversized elemental. He pauses, chanting a simple spell. He pours his power into it, bending, stretching and warping a simple snowball into an oversized snow bolder.
With a flick of his wrist he lobs it at the creatures face. "Catch."
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This is a huge fire elemental, but its flames seem to burn even brighter than the fire elementals Mr. Peppers had read about. It has no resistances of note.
Mr. Peppers throws a massive boulder of ice and snow across the pit. It slams into the fire elemental, releasing an excessive amount of steam. After the steam (and your pores) clear, the Furnace Master's flames are visibly less volatile. D. uses sand to smother more flames, and the elemental seems as though it will sputter out at any moment.
The creature floats ahead, reaching out with its 15-foot long arms to punch Uesugi.
-- Bold is up --
D., Mr. Peppers
Furnace Master (-87)
Stali, Sirettis, Uesugi (-21), Gallix
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The fire elemental begins to wildly pummel at the air in front of it as its world goes dark. The speed at which the carpet moves along the river of lava causes Stali to fumble with his blade, nearly dropping it below.
-- Bold is up --
D., Mr. Peppers
Furnace Master (-87, blind)
Stali, Sirettis, Uesugi (-21), Gallix
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Mr Peppers flies up and back a touch more for an even better angle, preparing to launch another snowball if the fire elemental tries to strike again. "Finish it off so I can save my spellpower." States the Elf calmly, cloak billowing out behind him in the heat.
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Uesugi's crown of swords slices and dices most of the elemental, and the rest of the creature is vaporized by D's burst of sand.
With the Furnace Master no longer blocking the way, the path forward is clear. You continue riding your flying carpets about fifty feet down the river of lava, and soon come to a ledge, entering a room that resembles the room you had originally descended into from above!
A mosaic covers the upper half of the iron hall. The mosaic depicts a sad scene, for several Qadirans lie dead and burning before a mighty temple and their families weep nearby. The scene flows toward the south wall, where a man garbed in white silk robes embroidered with gold thread looks to the west with hopeful eyes. On the hall’s south wall, a set of ornamental double door seems incomplete; its center is devoid of decorations in a six-foot-diameter circle. Flanking this door, four additional cast iron doors, two on the east wall and two on the west, stand closed.
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“I wonder if there are more hidden doors.” Stali says as he lands the carpet. He takes a moment to check that all the eggs are safe, then moves over to the double doors so he can examine them more closely.
Gesturing towards the Mosiac, he asks “Any religious connotations to that? Everything else seemed to have some for what seems to be a strange mixture of gods.”
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Sirettis takes the opportunity to heal Sir Uesugi's burn wounds.
"That should handle it. Now, let's see what these doors contain..."
Sirettis casts Perceive Cues and takes a look at the doors, scanning for any suspicious details.
"I will look for any relations to the outer planes."
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The four cast iron doors all look the same, and are all void of traps. There doesn't seem to be any relation to planar creatures here, and you can't quite seem to place what religious significance the mosaic has.
However, Stali notices the double doors are odd in that they aren't really doors at all. Instead, they appear to be a decoy, within which is a cleverly concealed trap. A strong-smelling oil lines a panel behind the ornamental doors, and a flint and steel are aligned such that if the recesses were filled with pieces that fit, a massive blast of flames would billow forth.
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Stali points at the double doors and announces “There are not doors, but rather a trap that would likely cause the whole area to be engulfed in flames.”
Nodding at Tall, Dark and Practical, he says “Yes, I wish that I had the amulet we were given to protect us on one of my other missions.”
“Since there is nothing behind there, I see no reason to mess with it.” With that, he turns to deal with one of the real doors.
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Stali takes his time inspecting the four doors, and after he's certain they lack any traps, he opens each of them. The first three are identical and all contain a mosaic piece resting on a clay shelf on the far wall opposite each door. Smelted from solid brass and adorned with Toragdan iconography, each piece weighs approximately 15 pounds.
The fourth room is a little different: although it also holds a mosaic piece, it has a familiar hexagonal mosaic piece protruding slightly from the east wall.
Stali senses are sharp, and he find the outline of a secret door leading further east. The door is locked.
You have four mosaic pieces, a hexagonal tile (like the one that earlier required the lamp), and a locked secret door. What will you do?
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Have you seen his lock picking skills? He's not on this channel right...
"As good a time as any to give them a try. Be sure to check for any poison traps, we know how you love them." Tall, dark and smiling says with his best straight face.
"Does our lamp fit that facet as well? Or are we looking for a 'lamp look alike' now?" Mr Peppers says as he double checks for magical goodness.
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Heating on of the mosaic pieces, Stali notes “These are rather heavy for just decorations.”
He takes it over to the south wall and inspects the open area. Being the careful sort, he double checks that the section he has wouldn’t unlock some sort of trap. Once satisfied, he places it in the blank area.
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Stali holds up his hand, “Give me just a moment here.”
Sheathing his sword, he gets out his tools and uses them to deactivate the pressure plate. He then sticks some sticky substance over the holes where the poison gas would have come out.
As he is disabling the trap, he sends a message over the mental link. Should I mention the poisonous gas trap to Gallix?
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He is asking, so I guess we best tell him,
As he finished blocking the poison gas trap, he says “Some sort of poisonous gas trap. I couldn’t tell you what sort of poison beyond that.”
“I wonder where the undine went, last sign of her was taking a carpet. I would think she would have to disable the trap to get past here. It is more of a kill everyone than an allow authorized people through sort of trap.”