Cynehelm's two waking archon allies fire their bolts of light.
Cynehelm conserves his spells.
Seeing his opponent climb away, Orgar shouts at him:
« Pysy silti, sinä rasvainen pikku paska! »
He then climbs up after his opponent and balances himself before trying to strike:
He then casts the same spell again …
« შოკისმომგვრელი » . .
… and then slashes at his cowardly climbing foe:
Cynehelm' archons fire their rays at the evil nymph's debased offspring with 2 of them hitting the creature. This is followed up by a precise shot from Jetro. Duardlara joins in the action casting a cantrip that still burns its way into the creatures skin.
Venja pulls some fancy magic out as she teleports both Helgash and Greta (thought this would work for you since Orgar posted successes) on top of the racks to finish the fey creatures.
Orgar smiles grimly as the fey backpedals. Climbing up the racks and balancing delicately he slashes once again and hits finishing the job he started the round before.
Helgash and Greta bots
Helgash attacks the last standing fey bringing it down while Greta easily coup de grace the sleeping fey.
The fight was quick and brutal but for all of that the group seemed quite healthy. Orgar shook off the worst of the poisoned darts. Venja put 1 to sleep and got Helgash and Greta into position. Orgar's archons provided fire support to accompany JEtro's arrows and Duardlara was moving into a position to flank.
Venja sighs and smiles slightly, finally feeling useful for a change. She casts 'detect magic' and starts searching the fey bodies.
"Well done my friends" - Helgash looks around at his companions - "They died by the fate and path they chose to take" - the paladin's eyes still flared at the pain these curs had inflicted on the captive animals - "And we fought as a team - better than ever"
The golden hue made itself visible again, as without another word, an aura of healing washed over all, healing the injured ones further.
Well ok, maybe they have something that we can use to find the hut. Jetro starts searching the corpses.
Orgar will search the room as well to see if he can find anything useful as well.
Each of the forlarren have 4 doses of enhanced shadow essence poison remaining along with mundane gear of leather armor, blowgun and 4 blowdarts each. They also have alchemist kits and the room is enough to resupply all alchemy labs and spell component pouches. Venja is able to detect 3 magic potions of remove blindness/deafness (which they use sparingly when they visited their mother the debased nymph). Other than that nothing else of note.
Venja takes the three potions.... and offers them to others with an explanation of what they are. "So who wants one of these? There are three to go around, and might be useful inthe future.. never know what we might run into."
"Distributing them to more mobile members of the party makes sense. Just so they can get them to the afflicted."
"I guess I should take one, then. I like to think I'm nimble."
I pretty much stand back and pincushion everyone. That poison I dunno how to use. I'd just end up poisoning myself
"Poison is an evil. Smash them, I say."
"Smash the poison if you will, I've no great skill or affinity for the stuff myself, Just don't touch the 3 magic potions, as they could be quite useful."
Cynehelm smiles at the lovely aasimar. "The thought never crossed my mind, dear lady. It could easily be me who needs one of them!"
"Actually", Orgar chimes in, I'll take those doses of poison.
"Waste not, want not. Use evil to fight evil, and all that."
"Might be handy for my own arrows."
"And if I do poison myself, I'll have only myself to blame."
I think our paladin here might have an objection or two.
Orgar just shrugs.
"I just don't like anything going to waste."
There will be no ramifications if others use poison as long as you do not. The case can be made that poison is a tool after all just like your weapon. As long as it is used for good...
"The Abyss is a slippery slope, Orgar. It never looks deep or dangerous at the edges and therein lies its true seduction and danger. Beware if you start down that path. Sometimes the path does not permit a return journey."
"Thanks for the warning, Cynehelm."
"I probably won't use them."
So where to now?
"Let's check that door yonder", says Orgar as he points to the door on the West wall.
"Looks like the only other way in and out."
"Just a quick look to see if it has any magic."
He casts a spell at the door: « აღმოაჩინე ჯადოსნური » . .
Looking for signs of traps, listening for noises, etc, etc
If the door actually radiates any magic, Orgar will concentrate to see what kind and how strong.
If he's satisfied is just a plain old door, he'll just go ahead and open it.
The door is a normal doow that you have seen throughout the complex. It is not magical and in this case is unlocked.
Moving onward the group comes to a strange room. Part of it looks refined and the other like a natural cavern. The air is still and rancid in this cavern, permeated with the scent of rotting flesh. At first glance, the floor and walls appear curiously wrinkled, but closer inspection reveals they have been carpeted with some sort of dried flesh. In the center of the chamber, five wooden totem poles hold aloft a macabre canopy crafted from an untold number of poorly preserved skins
crudely stitched together. The poles supporting the canopy are carved with the leering faces of old women. Each of the carved faces is slightly different, though all are hideous and disfigured, with hooked noses, oversized warts, snaggletoothed maws, and other exaggerated features.
The air is still and rancid as it is suffused with an evil aura akin to unhallow.
You see a number of desiccated hoarpanthers strewn about the room. They number 8 in all.
As above plus you see a porcupine looking creature next to one of the hoarpanthers. It is licking rotting flesh from its quills much like how birds preen themselves. It does not seem to have noticed you yet while it is doing it ablations.
Duardlara holds up a hand to halt the party. She motions the back through the entry so she can share what she noticed, hopefully without sorting the residents.
Once back outside with a little distance, she offers, "I counted eight hoarpanthers spread among the room along with a large porcupine-like creature that seemed to be cleaning dead flesh from its quills. Also, the air fairly crawls with evil - I believe there is an unhallow spell in effect, a sign of an adversary that can wield unholy power."
So we might have a buncha undead in there, along with some nasty porcupine. Anyone have an idea if these things are more than mere animals?
This is an advanced pukwudgie. The vile pukwudgie is a small, hunchbacked humanoid covered with long, sharp quills. These quills, like those of a porcupine, help protect the small creature but are also dangerous offensive weapons, for the quills hold a deadly poison that animates those it slays as zombies. This necromantic nature, along with their penchant for torment and sadistic ways, makes pukwudgies evil to the core. A pukwudgie stands 3-1/2 feet tall and weighs a little more than 30 pounds.
Pukwudgies are frequently found in the company of undead. This retinue usually consists of zombies and skeletons created via their poisonous quills ability or their ability to animate dead bodies. They have a strong preference for animating the bodies of dead animals over other creatures, and often use undead animals as mounts.
A pukwudgie usually stays away from well-traveled areas and humanoid settlements, but may sometimes slip into small villages in the night to steal children. The little horrors enjoy the tender flesh of newborn babies immensely, and are often willing to go through great personal risk to secure infantile repasts when they are available. Their delight in arson only further makes them a bane of small villages.
Duardlara you try to recall just what those creatures might be but it is beyond you right now.
Venja nods at 'Lara's information... scowls as she tries to recall what she knows of pukwudgie's, but nothing comes to mind.
"I don't have much to fight incorporeal or undead creatures in particular."
"But I do have other tricks up my sleeve."
"Of course, Cynelhelm should have something to help us against some unholy powers."
"He's good at that, he is!"
If they are just walken corpses, I can pincushion them.
Duardlara's frustration at her poor showing of memory is evident. "The spell probably strengthens the creatures or makes them more resilient. A benefit of fighting on their home battlefield, if you will. If we can draw them out of that room, that will probably be in our favor, especially with so many of them, it will behoove us to get them into a chokepoint, not let them surround us."
"We could try to get them to attack us while in the entrance, where they can't surround us."
"A narrow defile like that would be more to our advantage, I should think."
Works for me
Perception ...
So we going to clean house on this thing? No sense having our thumbs up our noses.
"I'm as ready as I can be."
Orgar
Cynehelm
Helgash
Jetro
Duardlara
Venja
porcupine thing
zombie
Overhearing you conversation the porcupine thing reacts with a sharp whistle alerting the hoarpanthers. The creatures lumber to their feet. The porcupine thingy then disappears without a trace!
"Saranrae's holy channel energy!" shouts Cynehelm as he unleashes an explosion of heat and light.
Holy sheeeeeeeet! Get the BBQ sauce ready.
5 zombies go up in a cloud of ash as nothing is left of them but a sickly smell.
"Well done, Cynelhelm!"
"I guess I should try my archery skills now."
"Even though I'm sure Jetro is better with a bow than I am."
Orgar stays where he is and shoots at one of the nasties (Green) with Olchur):
Orgar you hit with both of your shots but the creature is still up with undead saliva drooling from its mouth.
Duardlara studies the space where the porcupine had been, hoping for an indication of whether it was invisible (and where it might have moved) or whether some other magic was in play.