Nicat sighs in frustration and says, "Well I'm not undecided. Unless Conner climbs down in that hole, he's not going to be able to reach the zombies. So let's go get Father Zantus to zap 'em!"
He heads back the way they've come, looking over his shoulder to see if anyone is joining him.
Eostre roughly grabs her glaive back from Evelyn and follows after Nicat, grumbling to herself.
"Ohhh... Yeah, the pits are a bit too deep, aren't they?"
Evelyn quietly follows after Nicat and Eostre.
Dumb! Dumb, dumb, dumb, dumb, DUMB!
"Lantern oil, just saying." Conner carefully puts each lid firmly over the holes, just in case.
"Irreparable smoke damage to irreplaceable ancient artwork and architecture, just saying," Eostre snaps without even bothering to look behind her.
Leaving the zombie pits behind, the party walks back through the prison and the rest of the catacombs to find Father Zantus and Brodert Quink huddled around the dormant runewell.
"...oh, come on now, Zantus--I'm almost finished here! I just need to get the rubbings just right--"
"--and that's well and good, but don't you think you should take a break? I mean, you've been at those engravings for what feels like hours."
"Nonsense! I doubt we've been down here for that long. I'll take a break when I'm good and ready."
"Well, for Desna's sake, Brodert, at least eat something! Your hands are shaking!"
"That sounds like a good idea as a matter of fact. Father Zantus, we've encountered something we may need your assistance with. Specifically a gaggle of trapped zombies. They're relatively harmless as they're in deep pits and are too literally braindead to try climbing, but we figured we should put the poor sods out of their misery. Evelyn's spent her holy wrath of Desna, so we were wondering if you might have a little extra to help finish the job..." Eostre begins rummaging around in her pack for her provisions.
Nicat watches the exchange between the scholar and the priest for a moment, then steps forward, "Eostre's right, Brodert, as weird as that sounds. You should take a break, and we need Father Zantus' help to take care of a bunch of zombies - not something you want to leave lying around, you know?'
He turns to Evelyn and says, "Quink doesn't look too good to me, but I don't know much about this stuff. Could you maybe take a look at him, see if he's okay? I know my uncle used to get shaky when he was off the drop too long, but I don't think that's what's got Brodert."
Zombies travel in gaggles? Ekan muses over the wording.
"If you could use a couple of channels to set them free, Father, that'd be much appreciated. I'm positive Desna wants us to set their souls free."
Evelyn moves over to Brodert and places a hand on his forehead. "You feel a bit warm. Let me inspect you, you may be ill."
Father Zantus stands as the party offers Brodert some food. After taking a nibble, the old sage suddenly realizes just how famished he is and starts greedily chowing down on the offered provisions.
"Zombies, then? Very well--lead the way." The priest fingers his holy symbol of Desna.
Eostre begins chowing down with Brodert when she sees the group leaving with Father Zantus and rushes after them, hurriedly munching the last of it.
"Here they are, Father," Evelyn says as they enter the room with the zombies again.
"I didn't have enough energy to set them free, but I'm positive you'll be able to properly do what I'd intended to do."
Ekan stays near the good father ready to leap into the way should somehow a zombie develop the power of flight. Frankly, having seen so much strangeness, it wouldn't be as surprising as it should be.
Father Zantus looks into the pits, noting the deplorable state of the undead within. "I believe I can... you've done a great deal for them already."
He steps into the centre of the pits and bows his head, holding his holy symbol of Desna. "Sacred Desna, Song of the Spheres, let your light carry these poor souls to their final rest."
A bright glow of moonlight erupts from his holy symbol...
The moonlight reaches into the zombie pits and scours them of negative energy. The weight of ages presses down on the undead beings before their bodies crumble into dust.
"It is done."
”Good work, everyone! Thanks, Father!” Nicat exclaims. ”We took care of the zombies without having to climb down into the pit with them, or lower Conner on a rope so he could swing Eostre’s knave at them.” Looking to the hallway leading south, he says, ”Let’s see what’s down there, finish checking this place out, eh?”
He peers down the hallway for any surprises, then waves grandly for Conner to lead the way.
"What a relief. Yes, thank you, Father Zantus," Ekan says gratefully.
"Godsdammit Nicat, glaive! GLAIVE! *gulp* It's NOT that hard a word! ONE SODDING SYLLABLE! *burp* Seriously, it might have been charming once but now I swear you're just doing this on purpose to annoy me!" Eostre says in between bites of waybread.
”Now why would I do that, Eostre?” Nicat asks, all innocence. ”You said it yourself just now, I’m charming! That’s a much better way to be with folks than annoying them! I would never annoy anyone, you all know that.” With a shrug he adds, ”Anyway, I can’t help it if you carry around a weapon with a funny name. Though it could be worse. At least it’s not a falchiard or a ranguisarmeur, right?”
"GAH!" Eostre replies with a facepalm.
Evelyn smiles brightly when Father Zantus mentions she already did a great deal to relinquish the zombies. "Thank you, Father!"
She seems hesitant to follow the others. "Father, will you stay with us or do you wish for us to escort you back to the room with the well?"
"GAH!" Eostre replies with a facepalm.
"You know, I'm starting to think he does it on purpose... So, shall we continue and finish this place off?"
"GAH!" Eostre replies with a facepalm."You know, I'm starting to think he does it on purpose... So, shall we continue and finish this place off?"
"THAT'S WHAT I JUST SAID!!!" Eostre replies.
"Father, will you stay with us or do you wish for us to escort you back to the room with the well?"
Father Zantus raises a hand. "That will not be necessary, Evelyn--nothing attacked Brodert and I while you were off clearing the rest of this complex. I'm fairly certain I can make it back to Brodert without getting mauled."
He's about to continue when Nicat's chattering causes Eostre to have a conniption.
”You said it yourself just now, I’m charming! That’s a much better way to be with folks than annoying them! I would never annoy anyone, you all know that.”
"I think you mean you would never intentionally annoy anyone." He pinches the bridge of his nose--it appears even he's approaching the limits of his patience.
---------------------With Conner leading the way, the party discovers two things down the hallway--the first of which is a side passage leading to stairs that descend further into the earth. The stairs are choked with massive chunks of rubble, precluding further exploration down that path.
The second discovery is a new room...
This strange room is a fifteen-foot-diameter sphere. Several objects float in the room, spinning lazily in space-a ragged book, a scroll, a bottle of wine, a dead raven surrounded by a halo of floatingand writhing maggots, and a twisted iron wand with a forked tip. Yet perhaps the most unnerving aspect of the room is the walls, for they are plated in sheets of strange red metal that ripple every once in a while with silent black electricity that seems to coalesce into strange runes or even words far too often for the effect to be chance.
"Yeah, I don't do the weird rooms, someone else can go first."
Eostre scoffs.
"Then get outta my way, ya shivering junkyard."
She barges past Conner and approaches the entrance, focusing her arcane senses on the sphere.
"I shouldn't let you go in alone," Ekan says and joins Eostre looking about as he does so.
"Nothing to be afraid of. Looks like the room has a levitation enchantment. Won't hurt if you walk in the room. You'll just float. Watch."
Eostre demonstrates by stepping into the room and bounding into the air, making a swimming motion as she makes her way towards the forked wand to identify it.
Ekan joins her, "mmm, how very interesting. I wonder..." He assumes a lotus position and hovers there.
"This could greatly aid in meditation."
Evelyn stays just outside the room and looks at the levitating Eostre and Ekan. "So what's the black electricity stuff? It does look dangerous... Is it just for show, or part of the spell?"
I'd rather not touch it... I hope they won't either.
"What?!" Nicat exclaims at Eostre's description of the room. "No way!" He darts into the room, laughing giddily as he floats off the floor. He tucks himself into a ball, then suddenly uncoils, causing some unexpected rotation and a couple of minor collisions with floating items in the room. "Hey, I'm upside down! Or did the room spin around? This place is great!"
He manages to partially right himself, becoming distracted by Evelyn's question. "Yeah, what is that stuff, Eostre? And, also, what is this place? Why does a place dedicated to horrible suffering need a room where you don't have to worry about something breaking when you drop it?"
He reaches for the bottle of wine as it floats past and senses whether it is magical. On discovering it is merely mundane wine, he says, "Well, that's convenient, that that just floated by..." On opening it, he soon discovers that drinking wine that wants to float away is more of a challenge than he expected, but his natural dexterity aids him greatly. Holding the bottle below his hovering form, he tips it sideways, allowing the wine to pour up to him. It's a slightly messy operation, but no end of fun. "Conner, you've got to try this!" he cries out, as a dribble of wine runs out of the side of his mouth, slides up his cheek and disappears into his dark hair.
Eostre grabs the various items apart from the dead raven and the wine Nicat's helped himself to. There'd be time to attempt translating the text later, since it seemed an incomprehensible mess at the moment. She turns her attention to the flickering runes and oily black lightning, trying to see if she can read them.
"Yeah, no, that's not happening. I'm fine right here."
Father Zantus calls down the passageway: "Er--is everything alright down there?"
"It's fine, Father! We found a magic levitation chamber. Nicat's having the time of his life!"
Evelyn sends a concerned look Father Zantus's way. "It's some kind of weird room with undecipherable runes and black electricity..."
Ekan extracts himself from the levitation, "I do wish we could translate them."
As he floats about in his new favorite room, Nicat calls out, ”Maybe Quink or Zantus can read the writing, Eostre?”
"Gimme a minute, dammit! I can read Thassilonian just fine!"
She turns her attention back to the flickering runes and lightning to see if they mean anything.
The runes shift and writhe, forming many different shapes and snatches of words as you read them.
anger
hate
vengeance
A spear through a man's heart that morphs into a stream of blood.
And so on--the words appear to be almost entirely incoherent with each other, reflecting rage and a need for revenge, but little else.
Eostre sighs.
"More about wrath. It's random words like hate or vengeance and some disturbing images but that's it. Just more of the master of this place saying "MINE!" basically. Shall we press on? I think Nicat's aerial antics are spooking our combat specialist. And share some of that wine, would you?!"
"Hmm, yeah... We've been stuck here for some time, let's move on."
Evelyn moves over to the staircase the party passed not too long ago. "I think we should go here, though maybe someone else should take the lead."
Eostre racks her brain trying to figure out what purpose a room with a permanent levitating spell like this could serve.
"I'm not spooked, I'm uncomfortable..."
"Semantics."
Eostre floats down out of the room and follows after Evelyn.
"I suppose you could prove your bravery by taking point. Nethys knows squishy girls like us need SOMETHING between us and the scary monsters."