"I missed that," He admits a touch chagrined. He looks around again as Eostre brings up they may have missed more.
Conner stays by by the door, keeping watch.
"You were wise to insist we keep looking," Ekan says as he pulls a large iron key from under the seat of the padded chair.
Eostre smirks.
"I tend to be."
"The goblins are probably still running for it, that just leaves the dogs. We should try to get rid of them before we run into Tsuto."
"Or we leave the dogs be and keep exploring this place," Nicat offers, "let's check out this other door."
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The door beyond leads to a hallway with a doorway to the north. It's locked, but one of the keys on Ripnugget's keyring fits the lock. A rancid smell is coming from beyond the door...
This foul-smelling butchery is a horrifying affront to all the senses. Haunches of poorly smoked meat hang from hooks along the ceiling or lie heaped in and atop crates. In some cases, the meat seems to be dog or horse, but in many other cases, the meat has all-too-recognizable features, like feet, hands, or grimacing faces.
The hallway continues onward to another watchtower. This one seems empty...
The sight is too much for Eostre's delicate constitution. She vomits on the floor nearby.
Evelyn has trouble keeping her food inside when Eostre vomits, and only manages to do so by quickly looking away.
"Dear Desna..."
"Easy there..." Ekan will help hold Eostre's hair back to keep it out of her face (And the way) if needed.
"Okay, that's gross," Nicat says, his face squinched up in distaste, though it's not clear if he's referring to the butchered bodies or Eostre's reaction to them. "Let's get out of here."
He gestures down the hallway and moves to the bottom of the stairs, indicating with a tip of his head that they should check upstairs in the tower.
Conner has no comment, he merely backs out of the room and makes sure the door is firmly closed. "At least they'll have a pyre when we leave."
Thankfully, Eostre's thick braid makes keeping it out of her face easy. She wipes her mouth and coughs a bit.
"Agreed, Nicat. Lead the way."
The upstairs of the watchtower contains several dead seagulls and rocks. It appears the tower has been recently vacated.
Eostre taps her foot.
"Well? Anyone going to scout it out? You've got sharper eyes than I am."
"Nothing up here, guys," Nicat says, "Let's see what's through that door."
Evelyn places a hand on Ekan's wound and a green glow emits from the palm of her hand.
Ekan's wound fully closes. "There! Feel better?"
"We cannot stop now, guys. I notice some are getting tired, but this is no place to rest and coming back tomorrow isn't an option... We have to press on."
"I think Evelyn's right, gang," Nicat weighs in. "If the gobbers come looking for us and find us in the tower, we'll be trapped like rats in a basement..." His voice trails off and his face gets a bit dreamy, as he recalls his first time alone with Shayliss, in a basement (with a large dead rat).
Giving his head a good shake, he says, "Concentrate, guys! Let's keep moving!" Blade in hand, he heads for the door on the western wall.
"Don't expect me to be much help in a fight, then. I'm almost out of spells, and I can only do that trick I used on Ripnugget a few more times."
Eostre glowers a bit, mostly to herself.
"More than, I thank you." He says to Evelyn.
He nods at Eostre, "Understood, and no shame to you for it. One cannot blame an archer who only has so many arrrows."
"We've already broken them, this is just clean up." He claps Eostre on the shoulder and climbs back down out of the tower.
Nicat waits for the others by the door, muttering at Conner's comment, "We've killed a bunch of gobbers, but we still haven't found the guys we're looking for, who will be the real fight..."
Eostre slaps her forehead, suddenly remembering something.
"What if we just went back to Shalelu? She's keepin' an eye on the bridge already, and I'm sure she'd shoot anyone trying to mess with it while we recovered. We've only broken the first line of defenses, Conner. We've still got Bruthazmus probably lurking below, and if he's anything like Shalelu's told us he is, we don't want to face him at half-strength. Or get caught by surprise by Tsuto again like what happened in the Glassworks. I won't let that bastard get away again!"
Nicat rolls his eyes at Eostre's suggestion, but his expression changes as he actually appears to be thinking about it. "That's not a bad idea, sis," he replies, "and we're right around the corner from the front door. I'm up for it."
"Then unless Evelyn or Conner object, let's do that. Besides, she did ask us to keep her informed if I recall."
"Okay then," Evelyn says as she nods in agreement. "Let's go to Shalelu."
Unless Conner objects, Ekan turns to head that way along with the others
Conner shrugs and follows behind the group to test that awful bridge again.
Eostre lets Nicat take the lead.
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As the party returns to the entrance hall and the bridge leading into the fort, they notice several goblin corpses strewn about the bridge. Each of them has an arrow sticking out of them--at least two of them have one in their necks, one has an arrow through the gut, and another has two in both eyes.
Crossing the bridge, the party is greeted by Shalelu. Her quiver is a little emptier than before. "Well, that alarm sounded pretty loud. How'd you guys do?"
Conner plucks the arrows from the goblins, then realizing he can't keep them reluctantly gives them to Shalelu. "We killed the goblin leader and I think most of his followers, then we came back here for campfire songs while Tsuto escapes in a boat."
"Um, well, not exactly," Nicat weighs in. "But it's true, we killed Ripnugget and a bunch of his goons. We need a little time to regroup and rest, and we thought it would be a bad idea to do that in the gobbers' fort, you know?"
Looking around, then putting on his 'I'm-a-master-tracker-too' face, he says, "I bet there's a good safe place to rest around here, right, Shalelu? Have you found a spot like that?"
Ekan sits down in a lotus position as they talk
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"I killed Ripnugget!" Eostre says.
"Knocked the wretch onto his own spiked architecture. Impaled him in the damn throat, and good riddance too, considering how mouthy he was!"
She puffs out her prodigious chest a little, trying to reclaim some dignity after all they'd been through that day.
Shalelu listens with a small smile breaking out on her face. "Heh. Glad to hear it--maybe now those goblins will start thinking twice about raising trouble."
"I bet there's a good safe place to rest around here, right, Shalelu? Have you found a spot like that?"
"The closest spot I could find was in old Gugmurt's den, if you can believe that." The ranger points down a dirt passageway to the southeast of the goblin tunnels. "It's a lot roomier than I thought it'd be--also rather typical of goblin behaviour, with the strongest one in the area taking up the biggest personal living space they can."
Eostre follows Shalelu's pointed finger towards the room.
"I gotta rest if I'm gonna be more useful than I was today."
"Well, if you think it's safe," Nicat says to Shalelu, "then we'll get some rest there, Eostre can get her Ripnugget-killin' spells back, and we'll go finish the job."
As they walk towards Gugmurt's den, he says in a barely-whispered aside, "I whacked Ripnugget with a couple of sling stones, that's how she managed to kill him."
"Thank you, Shaleu," Ekan says