"Fascinating. I'd never guess that it was being used by insane cultists." Duraelo looks around at everyone, checking to see if all of them are ready, and positions himself towards the back of the group. "Lead on," he tells Kyra with a gesture of his hand toward the cavern and a polite smile.
Sjora looks to Kyra curiously, wondering if she was indeed going to stay with them, or leave them here at the entrance to the caverns to make their own way and investigate on their own.
Etienne strings his bow but waits for a group consensus before proceeding.
Rufon readies his scimitar and shield, hoping against hope for no more zombies.
"You comin' with us Kyra?"
"I said I'd show you where it was," she says, looking a bit pale at the thought of going inside. Then she takes a deep breath and lights a torch. Holding her sword in one hand and the torch in the other, she proceeds into the entrance of the cave.
Though the entrance to the cave is low, once inside, it is easily high enough to stand in. A passage winds back into the hillside, roughly 10' wide, the walls glistening with damp and the air filled with a thin mist. The steaming brook tumbles along the left-hand side of the passage. On the right side, the path is unnaturally even and covered with white sand.
Roughly 20 feet in, out of sight from outside, but immediately visible once you've cleared the entrance, a fat red candle flickers, shedding a warm light and giving the mist a pleasant glow. It is set in a niche in the wall, about shoulder height for a human female.
Sjora will follow someone more martial so she can be ready to heal, or fight by their side. Perhaps behind Etienne?
I may have been unclear. The passage is 10' wide, but 5' of that width is a stream of water hot enough that steam is billowing off. You have a 5' wide path beside the stream. I think what I'm seeing is:
Thrace
Rufon
Kyra (with torch)
Etienne
Sjora
Duraelo
Duraelo makes sure all his gear is secure and that his morning star and dagger are within their proper holding places as he stays towards the back of the group. He looks around at his surroundings, taking in the scenery. He knows that they might run into some sort of center of evil here, but it doesn't take away from his enjoyment.
Thrace prowls ahead of the group, sniffing around to pick up a scent when his eyes see nothing yet.
Rufon follows closely behind him with shield and scimitar at the ready. Careful with his steps to not slip as he sees the steam rise from the water.
Well that looks quite warm. First a fire and now a sweat lodge... I'll be glad if we can cool down after this.
As you advance along the passage, the warm steam from the stream swirls around you, and every 20 feet or so, another candle is set in a niche in the wall.
About 40 feet along, Kyra pauses.
"Do you hear that?" she asks. When none of you do, she shakes her head. "It sounds like someone laughing." All you hear is the sound of the stream and the noise you make yourselves.
A bit further on (60 feet, altogether) you come to a door, on the right side of the hall. One of the candles is placed in a niche directly opposite it. While the tunnel you've been travelling appears the natural work of water and time, the door opens into a brick wall that seems to have been built to block a passage.
Above the handle is a brass circle, wrought to form a pentagram with an eye in the center.
Ahead of you, the passage continues straight.
Sjora scowls at the sight of the pentagram with the eye... it doesn't look familiar, but it doesn't look particularly friendly either. She draws her dagger as the group approaches the door, not for any particular reason, just a dull sense of unease.
Etienne stays alert for any sign of trouble. Feeling uneasy, but unable to figure out why, he nocks an arrow - just in case.
Duraelo seems to almost feel the rest of the group's unease. He sees the door and is almost tempted to knock on it just to see if someone would answer it. "So, shall we check to see if someone's home?" he asks, motioning to the door. "Or just keep going past?"
Rufon looks at the door, with the same unease as everyone else, knowing that finding Susanna might include fighting zombies again. He sighs at the thought alone.
"We might just open it to look what's behind it. if we want to catch Susanna or whatever lives here, we need to check everything. Perhaps the door is simply unlocked."
He looks to the others, "Shall we press on?"
"Aye, let's open the door and find out what lies beyond."
The brass eye above the door handle seems to stare at you. In the flickering torchlight, it seems almost alive.
"Alright then, that sounds like a majority vote." Duraelo moves a bit closer to inspect the door properly. Nothing about seems dangerous, but it does look immensely creepy. He looks around at the group and touches the handle, simply checking if it's unlocked or not.
Rufon readies his scimitar, looks at the eye "Unnatural abominations, I've had enough of these undead and their vile tricks."
He stabs the eye out of the door with his scimitar, then cleans it off and gets ready for combat.
Simply touching the handle tells Duraelo nothing, but attempting to turn it reveals that the door is locked, as nothing happens.
When Rufon stabs the eye, however, things happen. The eye, being brass, does not make a mess that needs to be wiped off. It does sink in about a quarter of an inch and flames explode outward from it.
= Kyra.
= Sjora.
For the rest:
Everyone makes their saves and takes half = 2hps of damage.
Everyone except Sjora and Kyra are caught in the fiery blast, and take 2 points of damage.
"SON OF A B****! AHH!" Duraelo screams in surprise and pain from the trap being triggered. The fire burns him and everyone else. When he finally has a chance to regain his senses, he notices that Sjora and Kyra appear to be fine, but everyoneelse seems to have gotten caught in the blast.
"What the hell did you DO that for?!?!" He shouts at Rufon. "Were you TRYING to get us all killed? Have you never heard of caution? Good gods, that was idiotic!" He takes the time to lean against the cave wall and catch his breath. "I don't suppose anyone's decided that maybe we should leave that door alone, now? Besides me?"
"Well now the trap's been triggered, perhaps it's safe to try to open it now?
Isabeau squawks angrily as the fire burns her and flies to a safer location.
Etienne grimaces as he gets burned again. "Thanks Rufon, I was wondering how many times I could get set on fire tonight. What's our next brilliant plan?" He then backs up another 5ft from the door - in case the trap goes off again.
"Are any of us facile with locks or traps? If not, we could try knocking it down but that would certainly make a lot of noise."
"If you want to barge in, Sjora, lead the charge. Hopefully there's something behind there that's worth getting burnt over."
"Me? I was thinking perhaps one of the stronger men might be able to force the door open."
Sjora looks to Etienne and Rufon, then sighs... holds out her hands and from them grows a huge battering weapon. She shrugs with a little smile and beats on the door with the Earthbreaker.
She whispers softly, as if she didn't just make a frightful noise, "Sorry about the noise, boys."
Rufon helps Sjora batter down the door, grabbing his club and casting shillelagh on it, then helping her if the door is not down yet.
hp/8/14
"Sorry about that guys, I've had enough of these surprise and want to get it over with." He sighs heavily "Guess my focus is a bit off this late at night."
There is a crack and then a splintering sound as Sjora hits the door a second time, and then Rufon's blow sweeps it away entirely. The chunk with the brass eye flies satisfyingly far into the room and bounces off a wall out of sight.
The room behind is a natural cavern, expanded and supported in places by the work of unknown hands. The floors are covered with the same white sand as the hallway is, except for a roughly 15 foot circle in the center of the room, where the floor of the cavern is swept clean. This section is too flat to be natural, and a pentagram is drawn on the floor in a yellow powder that glitters in the light of the five candles set in the points of the star.
Against the west wall is a high table (just the right height for Rufon to rest his elbows on if he stood and leaned down just a little) with a massive and ancient book on it. The pages are parchment turned brown with age and the cover is bound with gold. On the page it is open to is a diagram that is unmistakably that of the pentagram on the floor, along with many notations in a script that none of you recognize. To the east, the room narrows to a passage that quickly ends at a T, with branches going north and south.
In just a brief minute, the earthbreaker in Sjora's hands seems to reabsorb into her body and is gone. She slips into the cavern and looks around. She examines the book but has no knowledge of such things like the arcane and makes the assumption that it is either religious or arcane in nature.
"Can any of you make any sense of this book? Should we destroy it?"
Duraelo cautiously stays as far away as he can from the circle in the center of the room, then offers to take a look at the book. "I'm not...entirely sure, but I suppose I could take a look. Destroying it might be a safe bet, but let's not do anything too hasty. After all, given what happened last time someone thought just shoving a sword into something was a good idea..." He glares at Rufon, and makes his way over to the book to investigate.
Knowledge: Arcana:
Spellcraft:
"This room appears to be set up for some kind of ritual. Since we've already announced our presence, maybe we should try to disrupt whatever's going on? Blow out the candles or something? I'm afraid I know nothing of the arcane arts, so I don't think I'll be much help here."
Etienne moves to the east passage and looks around, but tries to stay out of sight.
Perception
Stealth
Kyra will join you with the torch, if you wish, but that will obviously have an effect on your stealth.
Rufon feels offended at the remark Duraelo made, but keeps his mouth shut, knowing far too well that he is right, it was a dumb move. Feeling tired himself, he sends Thrace along with Etienne, Thrace trodding 5 feet after the ranger.
Rufon walks over to the book at a slow pace and looks over the pages in the book to see if there are some pictures in it to find what this pentagram might be used for.
If he sees nothing he asks Duraelo
"You know anything what such circles are used for? spell enhancement? summoning? At least something magical, but what?"
The book refuses to give up its secrets.
The page that was open is the only page that seems to refer to the circle that lays on the floor here. While other pages have diagrams of other circles and sigils, the only illustrations are of the circles themselves. Whatever the books may say about the purpose and use of what they diagram must be contained in the text.
"All right, I have NEVER seen anything like this. Can't make heads or tails of it, it's written in some...thing that I think is supposed to be a language." He slams the book closed and quickly walks away from it. "So I say we forget this creepy center of evil and start moving on out. It can't be a ritual since no one's in here. Let's just follow Etienne out."
He makes his way towards Etienne, staying safely behind the bow-wielding ranger. "Lead on, good sir. Unless anyone else has a better idea?"
"Before we go, I had a thought about that circle thing. It looks like whoever was here either just finished something or was getting ready start some kind of ritual. Do we want to attempt to disrupt it? Maybe blow out a candle or scuff part of the sand circle? Something subtle. Besides, it's not like they won't know we were hear, what with the busted door. Thoughts?"
"I think breaking the circle up, as you say scuffing the sand, might be a good idea."
"That sounds like a good idea Etienne, if they don't know their spell might backfire right?"
Sjora moves over to the circle and moves some of the sand around to deface the circle, breaking some of the lines, trying to do so without making a total mess, so it doesn't LOOK too terribly defaced. When she's done she looks up at Etienne and RUfon with a little smile. "Shall we move on, then?"
Except that when Sjora looks up at Etienne and Rufon, she can't see them.
This should come as no surprise, because as soon as she disturbed the design, the candles were immediately extinguished. As was the torch Kyra carried. The darkness is absolute. You hear a fascinating string of curses from Kyra, and a moment later, you hear her rummaging through her belt pouch, possibly for a flint and steel.
The hawk shrieks and the wolf growls.
"Light help us," Kyra whispers. "There it is again. They're laughing at us."
Am I right that you have no supernatural means of communication with your animals?
You hear it. It definitely sounds like laughter. Not the sinister kind, but the having a good time kind. Possibly coming from the passage you left?
"Someone is laughing at us... I'm afraid maybe disturbing the circle was a mistake? Well, what's done is done...Does anyone have a light spell?"
When the lights go out, Etinne quickly puts up his bow and draws a longsword. "Isabeau, to me! What's wrong?"
Handle Animal EDIT:
He then quietly backs into the room with the others and waits, senses alert.
Stealth
Perception
Why am I not surprised? Duraelo decides to speak up. "Just hand me the torch, will you? I can't see a damn thing, but I think I've got just the spell to light it back up. Let's all just stay calm, everyone. We can handle some simple darkness."
Duraelo tries to reach for a nearby candle. Once he has one in his hands, he casts Spark, attemtping to light it, and tries to listen for anything in the dark besides the group.
Perception:
"Steady now Thrace, be careful and alert us if it gets too close."
Rufon is ready to strike out with his scimitar if a light goes on again.
Isabeau lets out another scream, and you hear fluttering wings in the darkness. Wings that batter Etienne's head a bit before she is able to find her perch on his shoulder.
A few seconds later, Duraelo gets the candle lit. The light it sheds is thin and leaves much of the room in darkness, but a moment later, Kyra touches the torch to the candle flame and as it flares up, most of the room is revealed. It takes a moment for you to recognize what has changed, but once you realize, it is obvious. All the sand on the floor has been blown away from the center of the room, piling up against the walls, leaving most of the stone floor bare and glistening with damp.