Izra looked up at the temple, her glowing blue eyes taking in the carvings, searching for any clues that the ancients might have left.
While she looked, she also smacked Koshu (very lightly) on the nose with her wand of healing. She very carefully did not say "bad kitty!" when she did so, though she was tempted mightily when the catfolk's wounds didn't close fully, and she had to tap him a second time.
No doors block the grand entrance to this building—a wide flight of steps leads directly up into the temple’s interior. Two humanoid statues flank the stairs, wearing black-and-white masks and holding quarterstaves. Just inside the entry, two rows of columns lead toward an archway in the north wall. Two smaller passages open to the east and west.
The ceiling in this entryway is 15 feet high. There is some ambient light from outside in this room, but it is otherwise dark.
Sanctum of the Erudite Eye Map
You notice that the building appears to be in remarkably good condition for its age, especially compared to the other structures in the necropolis.
You identify the statues flanking the stairs as images of Nethys himself.
The wind has deposited a layer of dust and sand on the floor in this room, but you can find humanoid footprints in the dust. The tracks are fresh, less than 24 hours old, and it appears that at least four creatures passed this way.
Kwin gave Izra a sideward glance as she scanned the upper portion of the temple. "Looking for more assailants?" he asked with a grin.
Then he frowned. "Torin, is it just my imagination or does this building look... newer? better tended?... than the others so far?"
Koshu nodded in agreement with Kwin, looking to their dwarf for answers as a matter of course. He placed a large paw on one of the statues. "Nethys!" he proclaimed brightly, just a bit proud of having identified the deity depicted. "Perhaps this god watches over his property more vigilantly than others?"
"Bloody human eyes." Ahmed mumbles to himself as the group approaches the structure. He sticks near Koshu and his torch as Izra, Suri, and Torin scout ahead.
Suri stares closely at the ground as they begin to enter into the Sanctum. "I don't think so." She calls back softly to Koshu. As the others approach, she points to the tracks in the dust. "Four humanoids, less than a day ago. Perhaps the group we ran into outside?"
Koshukhep crouched to examine the tracks, ears laid back in embarrassment at having missed them while gawking at the statues.
"Why would they come here, only to attack us later? Our plot was not known to anyone but the Church until we received it ourselves, was it?" Now Koshu had joined Izra in looking around more actively, but more for the reason Kwin had surmised than her true purpose.
Rising to loom in a general fashion, his lips pulled back from his teeth, wrinkling his muzzle just a little. "I do not like it. I think maybe those goons were hired by another of our rivals. Perhaps they are the ones that have been here already. Bah, supposition! Let us root them out, whoever they are, and tear them apart." He made a helpful clawing motion with his long black claws.
Djehuti gestures absently and a quartet of glowing globes, each as bright as a torch but casting pale blue, pink, greenish, and silver light, swirl into existence, orbiting a few feet over his head. He points at one of the statues and the silver light darts over to it, lighting its face clearly enough for him to sketch it in his notebook.
"If they did already come in here, they had no success. We found nothing of value in their things." After a few moments sketching he points again and sends the globes after the tracks, illuminating the hallway so they could see how far they went.
"You're presuming they'd have their loot on them," Kwin says as he looks from place to place near Djehuti's floating globes, taking advantage of the additional light to get a feel for the area. "They might have stashed any valuables. Though I think you're right regardless; they seemed too incompetent for anything demanding."
"But if they didn't come in here," he says while looking down again, "then whose footprints are these?"
"Do any of these tracks actually lead out again?" Izra was still looking up, rather than down at the tracks.
Djehuti sends out his lights into the temple, and almost immediately it illuminates some sort of quadrupedal animated skeletons. The ravening creatures hiss at the light and approach the Band with intent to kill.
+4 w/o panache
Skeletons: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (20) + 7 = 27
Suri: 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (20) + 1 = 21
Izra: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (19) + 2 = 21
Kwin: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (13) + 6 = 19
Djehuti: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (10) + 8 = 18
Koshukhep: 1d20 + 3 ⇒ (2) + 3 = 5
Ahmed: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (1) + 2 = 3
Torin: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (1) + 2 = 3
The undead creatures are incredibly fast. The dash forward and rip into the heroes. Suri and Koshukhep manage to avoid getting hurt. But Kwin and Torin aren't so lucky.
; Hit!
; Hit!
These are skeletons of hyenas.
Skeletons: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (20) + 7 = 27
Suri: 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (20) + 1 = 21
Izra: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (19) + 2 = 21
Kwin: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (13) + 6 = 19
Djehuti: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (10) + 8 = 18
Koshukhep: 1d20 + 3 ⇒ (2) + 3 = 5
Ahmed: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (1) + 2 = 3
Torin: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (1) + 2 = 3
Kwin 5 damage
Torin 5 damage
After sidestepping one of the skeletons as it rushes towards her, Suri swings towards it's head, trying to catch it with a powerful hit before it regains its footing.
Ahmed places a hand on Koshu's shoulder. "Nethys has kept his home intact for this long. We must honour him with our own vigilance." If Koshu lets him, Ahmed will attempt to take the torch from him, freeing up the Catfolk's arms to attack the skeletons.
"What the blazes! Get off of me you filthy things!"
Djehuti quickly stows his notebook and pulls his bow from his back to nock a blunt arrow. "Interesting choice of animal to craft guardians from."
The skeletons managed to get Izra's attention, where the footprints had not.
Frowning at the attackers, she reached forth and placed her hand on Torin's shoulder, letting Pharasma's blessings flow forth.
Kwin's eyes widen as the bone creatures spring to life and charge with astonishing speed. Crouching in preparation, muscles tensed, he leaps back five feet at the precise moment the skeleton attacks, causing its teeth to slam shut on thin air.
Immediately reaching over his shoulder and pulling forth his quarterstaff, the kitsune steps forward again and spins it in an overhand attack.
Handing his torch off to Ahmed with a nod of thanks, his golden eyes fastened on the skeletons, Koshukhep drew his flail.
"Bonemeal," he rumbled as he swung at the nearest monster.
"The gods hear you!" Koshu exclaimed, with perhaps a touch more surprise than was strictly polite.
Suri, Torin, Koshukhep, and Kwin all manage to destroy a skeleton with their opening attacks. Djehuti strikes one of the remaining creatures but doesn't destroy it.
The last two skeletons move in to attack Kwin and Torin. And their jaws manage to find their flesh.
; Hit! Potentially.
; Hit!
Skeletons: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (20) + 7 = 27
Suri: 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (20) + 1 = 21
Izra: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (19) + 2 = 21
Kwin: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (13) + 6 = 19
Djehuti: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (10) + 8 = 18
Koshukhep: 1d20 + 3 ⇒ (2) + 3 = 5
Ahmed: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (1) + 2 = 3
Torin: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (1) + 2 = 3
skeleton A
skeleton B 2
Suri moves towards the skeletal abomination fighting Kwin, and makes a sharp attack against its skull, finding that to have been effective the first time.
Seeing Suri move towards Kwin to assist, he goes the other way, getting alongside the Hyena biting Torin, and slashes into it with his sickle.
Izra, waiting to see where she would be of most use, saw the damage done to Torin, removed her healing wand from its sheath at her belt, and tapped Torin with it, while whispering a word of magic.
Interestingly, she did not tap Torin on the nose. Apparently, Dwarven physiology did not require such a specific application point.
Koshu brought his polished flail down on the skeleton by Torin (not without a suspicious glance at the manner in which the dwarf was healed).
The glance aside was enough to foil his attack, and he refocused with a growl.
Kwin grumbles and again swings at the skeleton.
"Stick fighting isn't really my thing," he admits.
"Stupid things, get off me!"
Suri's claws can't quite find purchase in the monster's bones. But Ahmed and Koshukhep crush their target, leaving Torin the perfect opportunity to destroy the last skeleton.
Izra stepped over to Kwin, and tapped the kitsune on the nose with her want, releasing its healing energy.
Torin gives the lifeless bones a kick, and then pokes around the atrium, if he doesn't find anything out of sorts, he'll head towards the corridor on the right hand side. If he finds more signs of people, he'll follow those tracks instead.
"While you're poking around, Torin, I know the fight has likely made it difficult, but can you tell if the tracks we found actually lead out of here again? It would be good to know whether these guardians were more recent than the rest of the decor."
Djehuti focuses his quartet of lights on the area where the skeletons had lain until they attacked, trying to see if they had some sort of den there.
Koshu bent his eyes to the tracks as well.
+2 vs humans
As the group begins to recover and start searching out the room, Suri bends down to pick up one of the crushed hyena skulls. "Poor creatures." She says, quietly. Standing up, she turns to Ahmed. "This tomb, more than any others, makes me... uneasy."
He simply nods in agreement, looking less than comfortable himself. "We will be quick."
Kwin pauses in his survey of the area to give Suri an odd look. "Those 'poor creatures' did just try to kill us, you know."
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"No," Izra disagreed, though her tone was gentle, "the creatures died some time ago. What tried to kill us were the abominations created from their corpses and some tortured remnants of their souls. Suri is right to pity the creatures. But they are returned to the Boneyard now."
Kwin snorts. "Alright, I'll allow they might've at one time been perfectly lovely companions for lifting a pint at the pub. But what's here now just tried to kill us!" he reiterates.
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Izra smiled, and gave Kwin a nod, while raising her hand in the traditional fencers' acknowledgement of a point scored.
Then she looked around the room.
"Any clue as to where to go next?"
Suri nods thanks to Izra, with a bright smile along with it, glad to have someone who understood her. "Couple options," she says, before shrugging. "Your guess is as good as mine."
The southern area of this large space contains a long stone table, two benches, and two wooden hutches. Just visible behind a partition wall to the north is a kitchen with tables, cabinets, and a stove in the corner. Around a corner to the south stands a stone enclosure with a rounded top and a hatch set in the front.
+2 fe - DM, are the tracks human enough for this?
+2 fe, +8 scent
Koshukhep padded about what he suspected was a dining hall, his nostrils flaring as he tried to pick up any scents. He approached the southern stone enclosure warily, an unfriendly grin on his face.
Izra looked around the place, trying no to move too much, so as to preserve the tracks they'd seen coming in. She wasn't enough of a tracker to be able to tell if they led out again, but she was still hoping that her companions might be able to salvage the information.
Koshukhep can't quite make out any smells that distinguish themselves from the normal dry, musty smell of the place.
Realizing he had left the others gazing at the tracks while he moved on, Koshu gestured at the trail. "Four, within the last day. They have not left... at least, not this way." His stomach rumbled, and he turned his gaze back to the hatched enclosure. "I will open that and see if the unquiet dead lie within. If so, they are keeping me from my lunch," he huffed.
Drawing his flail, he reached out to open the hatch.
Izra's glowing blue eyes narrowed, and the light within them flared briefly, as her suspicions were confirmed.
"Then they likely set these creatures upon us as a trap. Let us be careful, but follow their tracks swiftly. Those who flaunt the will of the Lady of Graves do so at their peril. These must have compelling reason. We should do what we can to thwart them."
She paused a moment, then added the argument that would likely have more effect on her team.
"Also, they are likely trying to make off with loot that belongs to us - we should discourage such inclinations whenever they occur. If just to maintain precedent, at least."
"Any one else getting the tingly feeling between they shoulders, like someone has got an arrow aimed at yer back? No? Just me then? Great.
Probably just spooks, or maybe one of those flying head things again, but whatever it is, there something about this place that makes my beard itch. "
From what little Djehuti has seen thus far, he concludes that although the Sanctum’s central nave is symmetrical, the rest of the structure does not conform to traditional architecture, with wings and extensions on both sides that, except for the uniformity of the stonework, appear to have been haphazard additions. A large dome over the apse tops the roof at the north end of the temple. The Sanctum is windowless, and the temple’s exterior walls are carved with likenesses of the Nethys and other celestial figures.
Djehuti nods at Torin. "This is the first time we face thinking opposition. It stands to reason they may be more dangerous than simple traps and long-dormant undead guardians."