The little green goblin walks up to Zinar. He offers his hand.
Mees Tindertwig. Dis be Dirtbag.
He points a thumb at the toad perched on his head.
Da boss lady says wees be looking fer little blues guys and dat wees be protections.
Tindertwig begins to crouch down searching the ground.
Shhhushes! Wees huntsings rabbit!
Rippit!
Little blue guys!
"Gudleifr Hervardr. I have no mount. But we do have a job to do, and it is through that sewer for now."
Zinar takes the goblin's hand and smiles.
All those years on how to kill them, no one ever said that you might be taking orders from one, just keep smiling everything will be ok.
"Little blue guys? Little to us or them?"
Pointing to the others in the party
Tindertwig wonders about for a few minutes, before ending at the entrance to the sewers.
Tracks lead in dere!
Dirtbag winks at the gnome...
The goblin searches the area.
He then enters it's depths--quietly.
Gudleifr is fine with entering straight after Tindertwig, unless anyone else wants second position.
Zardu shakes his head "Leader might not be the best way to interpret his words, on point... taking the physical lead, scouting are a little more accurate."
Taking his place in front of Zardu
"So your saying Zardu, that Tindertwig leads by example like any great leader would?"
Kelisa shakes her head at her allies, but is glad that some made it. If this is how the silver shields often had happen after training, no wonder you never saw any elder members often.
"He's surprisingly good at some parts of scouting, the not being seen bit."
The sewers are suprisingly less... foul than you would have thought, however that doesnt mean they dont stink. Trying to track the xvarts is very difficult considering the terrain, but everytime you think you have lost the trail, a four toed footprint appears, or some other minor detail that has you believing you are still there.
The problem arises when you reach a T intersection... and a very low buzz tickles your ears... then it seems to grow louder and louder.
Initiatives please.
Just at the edge of the light you all could see several fat ugly flying insects that were easily as large as a man's fist with long wicked looking needle like probiscus closing torwards you lazily.
When they get to 25', Zinar make a motion with his right hand and points his index finger to one of the flying insects and says
"jedark missle ixen"
EDIT: sorry force missile auto hits.
Gudleifr holds until a stirge is inside the range of his longspear. He then draws back the spear - and drives it through the stirge.
Zardu draws his scimitar and casts guidance on himself.
Kelisa says something to Untari and the big cat growls menacing, and stays near her. Before long she takes aim with her bow and lets an arrow fly
Shouting with glee, the goblin unshoulders his bow, taking aim at Orange.
Birds! Mees hungry fer chicken!
The insects... giant looking mosquito's began buzzing in agitation the moment the party began to react to their presence. They buzzed forward, one of them dropping to an arrow from Kelisa that smushed its head in, another pratically disentigrated to a spear thrust from Gudleifr. A missle of magic energy struck a third stirge but despite stopping in place for a moment from the force it moved closer.
Though being the smallest of the targets two of the stirges in their dull insect intelligence moved to drain poor Tindertwig dry while a third moved for Gudleifr. The fourth surviving bug hovered back torwards Kelisa.
Tindertwig is too fast for the two hovering around him to even begin to attach and bite him and Gudleifr easily steps back when his lurches torwards him.
"Hay, stop poking the short guys"
Zinar move his right hand in a pattern and points his index finger at the RED one
"jedark missle ixen"
As another missile of energy strikes an insect that is attached to Tinderwig
Kelisa takes aim at another stirge, aiming for the one on Tindertwig
The arrow aims true, striking the stirge with some measure of force
Between Zinar's Missle of magic and Kelisa's more standard one the bug explodes in a mess of goo atop the hapless goblin.
Laughing and dancing with pure joy, Tindertwig shouts,
Dis bees da fun times! Yummy!
Dirtbag greedily licks the goo off of the goblin.
The little ranger drops his bow, drawing a crowbar from his belt. The goblin violently thrashed at the other bird.
I forgot to emphasise this, but Gudleifr does have combat reflexes and Dex 17, so he should have gotten attacks of opportunity versus those three who flew within his reach. I'll roll for his aoo from their turn, then his attack if aoo were unsuccessful.
As the remaining stirges get inside his guard, Gudleifr drops his spear and draws his longsword, slashing immediately.
Zardu frustrated by not being able to close puts his scimitar away and pulls a javelin from his back.
The new member of the team promptly displayed his skills. As the bugs moved to close and attack his spear quickly batted two of them down with their insides spilling out. The third stirge was shot and them splattered by a hefty iron bar... the droning sounds stopped.
Gudleifr puts away his sword and picks up his spear.
"Onwards then?"
"Is everyone ok?"
Looking at the remains
"What a waste, not even good for spell components."
Zinar carefully walks around the gore to keep his boot clean.
After harvesting some of the claws, and having Untari poke around the bodies, Kelisa looks about and states " I believe so. There are hidden dangers, be wise as the leopard my friends. "
"I will just have to keep my javelin in hand, the ledge is too narrow for me to close properly. I am not keen on wadding through the filth. Good work, let us go onwards as Gudleifr says." Zardu adjusts his stance to cast light on his buckler.
Tindertwig immediately jumps into the mess. The goblin begins shoveling the carcasses into a sack.
Wees bees eatings biggest tonight!
Rippit!, comes an affirmative from Dirtbag.
As far as you all can tell, the Xvarts may have went up the ladder there back to aboveground . . . then again it could have been other folk. The tracks you had been trying to follow have disapeared . . . unless you want to trudge further on to another sewer junction.
"Tindertwig, Dirtbag, can you check up that ladder for the Xvarts?"
Still bleeding stirge stuffed in his mouth, the small goblin gives Gudleifr a thumbs up.
Before the little goblin heads up Zardu says another prayer for him.
"Here is a little something to help with traps Tinderwig."
"resistance ui mrith persvek wux"
Scrambling up the ladder Tindertwig you carefully peer our into the alleyway above... you see squickly mud, some refuse tossed to the side... a dull peice of copper half buried in the dirt near the alleys edge... and there a good distance away from the alley but within vision still what looked to be a large crowd of people gathered around .. something... you couldnt really see from your angle.
Placing a finger on his mouth, the goblin indicates that he will go up to check things out.
Dirtbag gives them a thumbs up...
Gudleifr stands waiting with spear at the ready. Should anyone but Tindertwig or a blue Xvart try to get down the ladder, he will show them the business end - very closely.
Zinar keeps a look out down the tunnels to make sure there are no more bugs or worse sneaking up on them.