Dolora's phantom slowly fades into an ethereal version of herself and floats sadly above the mucky ground.
The much more solid halfling proves she is not one to be taken lightly and swings a scythe in a viscious cut. The blade slashes cleanly through armor and into the meaty gut of the Boggard who collapses into the mud, bleeding and unconscious.
Round 3 & 4
Gack Blooth (fatigued)
Avasir (fatigued)
Blue Boggard (-7 HP)
Dolora (no penalties) & Phantom (-1 HP, Feared 1/2)
Red Boggard (-20 HP, Down)
Dark Schnyder (no penalties)
Danicka (fatigued) & Prickles (no penalties)
Bold May Act
Dark and Avasir team up on the remaining Boggard. Without his flanking partner and having already used up their croaking tactic, the little creature falls to a hail of sword slashes. Thudding into the mud his blood is slowly turning the area around him a darker shade.
Combat Summary
Gack Blooth (-1 HP, fatigued)
Avasir (fatigued)
Blue Boggard (-22 HP, Down)
Dolora (no penalties) & Phantom (-1 HP)
Red Boggard (-21 HP, Down)
Dark Schnyder (no penalties)
Danicka (fatigued) & Prickles (no penalties)
From inside the southern ruin that appears to still have most of its walls remaining, you hear a male voice yelling in Common. "HEY! I'M STILL ALIVE! THANKS FOR COMING BACK! I REALLY OWE YOU ALL! HURRY UP PLEASE I'M STILL TRAPPED!"
As the group moved up past the open entrance earlier, you saw the outer doors opened to a small foyer with two closed doors to the sides. There did appear to be a pile of rubble in between the doors that might allow an easy bypass.
The phantom somehow manages to look like it's slinking along sadly as it floats to the building's doors and heads inside to take a look around. (now in incorporeal form)
The phantom sees two closed doors and a pile of rubble in between the two. The rubble prevents anyone from seeing over it (I'm assuming the phantom is currently ground level).
To its left (east), the phantom sees a lot of rubble from a collapsed ceiling. A stone table lies against the north wall, an iron cage stands in the northeast, and a decayed wooden desk rests in the southwest.
To its right (west), the phantom sees a large chamber encircled with bookcases filled with moldering works of all sorts. A silver channel is set into the floor, resembling an inner and outer ring divided into equal quadrants, unknown runes at the heart of each.
It can't see anything else from that vantage point but you all hear the same voice echoing out from the west room, "hello guys? Don't do this to me again. I just need a little help here."
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The phantom slinks back to Dolora's side and whispers to her. She then passes on information to the group.
"It looks like there's two rooms in there. The east side seems empty but has a cage in it..odd. The west side where that voice is coming from is filled with bookcases and a strange silver double circle with runes pattern set into the floor which might be decoration or might be some kind of protection or summoning circle. She couldn't see the source of the voice. I'd say we move carefully because of that unknown circle.
I'm ready whenever you guys are.
The door seems jammed shut, but Avasir clambers up the rubble to get a view of the circle. Casting a quick cantrip, his eyes glow and he looks for signs of magic. The entire runed set of circles glows in his sight, but other than knowing that there are two spells in effect he cannot determine what either of them might be.
The voice continues from around the west room corner with a bit of tired sarcasm, "naw it's cool, take your time. I ain't going anywhere."
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As the boggards fan unconscious Danicka lets out a quiet shriek. Then her eyes widen. "Oh! They're not dead, are they?"
She hurries over to the unconscious boggards and uses her magic to stabilize them. Then she tries her best to drag them someplace safe, and props them up so they can recover without drowning. Unfortunately, Danicka's clumsy at the best of times. By the time she gets the boggards up onto the nearby rubble she's slipped and fallen twice, got mud in her hair, and lost one of her floppy, cotton shoes. She sifts around for a bit, but is unable to find it. "Oh, dear..."
She rejoins the others and can hear someone calling for help. Seeing her companions just standing there, debating the danger, Danicka gasps. "Can't you hear that? Someone's in trouble! We have to help them!" Danicka heads into the building, her one wet shoe making a squelching sound, and her other bare foot slipping on the stones. She clambers over the rubble -- a sad sight -- and hurries over to the sound of the voice.
"H-h-hello?" she asks, suddenly nervous. "Who is it? What do you need?"
Prickles sticks close to his mistress, growling ferociously at the voice!
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Well I have to admire her willingness to help, but her lack of caution is a bit concerning. I guess I'd better go with her in case of trouble.
Snapping back into her usual self, Dolora prances after Danicka.
"Who is that? Is it a new friend? Maybe he has exciting stories to tell us!"
She bounces in next to Danicka, a big smile lighting her face up, but makes sure to keep a little distance from Danicka and her "doggy".
The phantom floats in and stands just behind Dolora to provide support if needed, sinking partway into the edge of the rubble so as to stay as hidden as possible behind her.
Danicka climbs over the rubble and steps around the corner, Prickles following closely growling at Avasir as they pass. As she enters the room she sees a male human in quite a predicament. His lower legs appear to be completely fused with the floor and his upper arms are... jammed into the inner workings of some sort of spiked iron trap. It appears on initial viewing his arms are currently keeping the trap from completing its action of making him quite holey.
The room appears like this. This large chamber is encircled with bookcases filled with moldering works of all sorts. A single bookcase lies flat upon the floor to the southeast, revealing a hidden vault beyond, where a spiked iron contraption remains partially triggered
Dolora and her apparition wander in after the muddy but courageous human.
A silver channel is set into the floor, resembling an inner and outer ring divided into equal quadrants, runes at the heart of each.
The man looks quite surprised to see you, he thinks for a second then deadpans, "ah... the name is Gideon Wren. Welcome to my pending tomb."
He gives an attempt at a smile, "as you can see, I managed to trigger a nice little trap. Fortunately or maybe... unfortunately, it hasn't finished the job yet. I don't recognize you though, who might you be?" Sweat pours down his face, he looks quite haggard.
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Coming around the corner and realizing she's right next to Gideon...and knows nothing about traps...Dolora feels out of her element and backs up a bit to make room.
"Um. Hi! I'm Dolora. I don't know if there's anything I can do to help you out here, but maybe one of my friends can?"
She casts Detect Magic to see if she can understand what is going on with this man sinking into the stone, as this trap seems pretty darn magical.
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Paying no attention to her surroundings, Danicka has eyes only for the poor man in the trap!
"Oh, no! You poor man!" Danicka shrieks. "I'm Danicka, and -- Oh! Never mind that for now. We have to get you out of there!"
Danicka gets as close to the trap as she safely can and examines it...
"Are any of you good with traps?" she calls out behind her -- surprisingly loud. "Hurry!"
His eyes go wide at the muddy human lady inspecting the trap closely and he pleads, "woah there! You know what you are doing, right? I mean I'm happy for the help but I don't want to be removed from this thing in pieces."
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Danicka blushes as the man scolds her. "I'm... I'm sorry! I'm j-j-just looking. I wouldn't touch it if I wasn't sure it was safe." She looks down at the ground sadly and backs up. "I'll get someone to help you."
Danicka backs away from Gideon and starts urging her companions to hurry and see if they can help poor Gideon!
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Gack swaggers in and looks at the man, barely glancing at the circle of runes on the ground.
"Hmm... Cyclops. Interesting, but not as interesting as you!" He goes up to the man and starts hopping up and down. "Oooh, this is so neat! A magical fusion, as well as a mechanical marvel! What a luck day!" He looks down at the man, utterly caught up in the moment. "Tell me, how did you get your legs stuck?"
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Joining the others, he ignores the man trapped in a trap for now. He focuses on the magical circle, casting detect magic as he examines it.
While still examining, he thinks on how stupid his companions are. Not even looking at the man trapped, he speaks to him. "Tell me. Why are you here?" Already suspecting the man is part of the Aspis group.
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The elf's eyes widen with surprise as the waif'ish lady and her dog pass him by and precariously venture into the room.
Oh wow Danicka, we haven't even fully checked for traps yet. We want to help him too, but caution please!
He steps down from the rubble, into the room and stands next to the silver-lined circle, continuing to attempt to discern its function.
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Dolora switches back into serious mode. "For now, stopping that trap from crushing him is a good idea, but before we help him get out of the floor we should find out who he is and what he was doing here..."[b]
Dolora looks over at the man. [b]"Now that my friends are here to help, they'll work on that first part. While they are figuring it out, why don't you tell us why you were here and what you were up to when you got yourself into this predicament."
She listens carefully to any answer that he might give, looking for evidence of a lie.
Gideon smiles wryly at Dolora, "ain't no reason to beat around the bush ma'am. I came here with an Aspis Consortium crew and I don't recognize any of you. So either you are backups for us, which is unlikely or you are someone else. Frankly, I don't care. My crew abandoned me to die here and those little s*!%bag frogs tortured me for the last couple hours."
His smile becomes a tad desperate, "I'm at the end of my rope here. I'll do whatever it takes to get outta this jam..." he looks up at his arms jammed into the workings of the trap and chuckles, "so what can I do for you today?"
Dolora senses no deceit being attempted.
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Looking at the Aspis gentleman, "I appreciate your honesty. You're right, we aren't with the Consortium, but that's all you really need to know. Let's see what we can do about keeping this thing from crushing you, but I think there might be some more chatting before we can get you out of the floor."
At the group, "Hey guys...I'm not the best with traps. Is anyone able to disable this thing or get a rock jammed in there so we can continue to ... "chat" ... with this nice man?"
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Danicka waves her broom at her companions. "You're all HORRIBLE! It doesn't matter who he is or was. When someone's in trouble you help them! And that's that." She seems to be positively FUMING.
"You're worse than Brock! she mutters to herself.
She stalks over to Dark and says pointedly, "NO. He can't."
Danicka carries over some nice big rocks to help jam the trap. Then she begins to chant and cast a spell on Gideon.
Danicka examines the trap again and points at the parts that need to be broken. She starts explaining to Prickles that he's going to tear it to shreds! Then she gets ready to try to break the trap herself, muttering the whole time about the big meanies she's been partnered with, and apologizing to Gideon for their callousness!
"Oh, if only Yaiho were here..."
She looks very nervous...
If STILL no one comes to help her Danicka looks on the verge of tears. She will attempt to save the man anyway. Placing her strength check in a spoiler.
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Gack looks down at the guy and shakes his head. "Psh. I've been stuck in worse." He puts a gentle hand on Danicka's shoulder and shakes his head. "When my... uh, body part, was stuck in a mechanical bull, I mean, trap, a dog certainly would not have helped. This will take some good old fashioned lubricant." He smirks at the memory and dumps some alchemical grease on the guy's arms. Then, he tries to pull him out quickly!
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"Thank you Gack. I was hoping someone had an idea of how to help him out, I probably would have done more harm than good."
Looking at the man trapped in the stone, "OK. While those guys check out this place let's have a little chat. You say you were with the Aspis, that your crew abandoned you, and that you'd do anything to get out of this. I believe you...so far.
Despite that, I think we need to know more before we get your lower half out of the stone. Tell us about this crew. How many people were with you and what were you sent here to do? Anything that you can share, especially involving your leaders and orders, will increase the chance of you getting out of here.
Her phantom comes up behind her and slowly fades into her while she speaks, returning to its home in her head.
We'll be listening carefully, and I'll know if you're lying...or if you're leaving something out...and if that happens, just know we can leave you in a much worse situation than the one you were in when we found you..."
Upon very close inspection by Gack, it appears that Gideon's gauntlet and left arm are the main source of both his entanglement and the jamming of the pointy death trap. He looks around both rooms and settles on a leg from the desk chair that appears to have avoided rotting. Returning to the captured Aspis agent, he squeezes his tube of alchemical grease into three spots around the jam, picks up a rock and while using the chair leg he jams it into the trap.
Looking at the Aspis intently he says, "ready? On 3, pull out your left arm." The agent nods and the countdown begins. Right as he gets to 3, Gack torques the leg down, releasing the greased arm from its entrapment. At the very same second, the green haired gnome jams a rock up into the gauntlet, preventing the trap from releasing it's kinetic energy and piercing Mr. Wren's organs.
Meanwhile, back at the hall of the other room.
Dark and Avasir are poking around the table and the cage. Avasir notices that the table has odd channels carved into it with similar runes to the circle in the other room. Dark notices that the cage is made of cold iron and lined with alchemical silver. Combining what they saw, they can attempt to come up with what exactly the items and room might have been used for way back in the day.
In addition, both of them notice that there is a locked drawer in the desk.
Gideon is now currently embedded in a large solid chunk of floor. How do you propose to get him out of that? It appears that it would take at least a couple hours to chisel him out without any sort of specialized tools or magic.
With a big smile, Gideon pulls his injured arms out of the gears. It appears that his left is likely broken. "Oh wow, that was... impressive. Thank you."
He turns to Dolora, "well it was a pretty big crew. We came on a decent sized sailing ship with about a crew of 20 sailors. As to anything else, well I really hate to have to put this on the line... but that's the only thing I have right now, information." He takes a deep breath, "so, I'll promise or swear or whatever you need me to do to tell you everything I know about the Aspis and what we were ordered to do here. I'll even spill about where and who is running the show. I hold no allegiance to those a@%&!~@s anymore, but you gotta get me outta here and back to civilization before I'll give you anything else. Heck, you can even hogtie me and drag me out as a prisoner."
He adds quickly, "I mean, look at it from my point of view. If I tell you everything now what would stop you from walking out over that pile of rubble without me?"
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"That's an understandable viewpoint, although it's not my preferred response. When my companions are done checking out the area we'll have a little discussion and see how we want to proceed."
Once Dark and Avasir are done checking out the area, Dolora will pass on what he has given us so far, and his ultimatum, so that we can decide how to deal with it.
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Gack takes Danicka's hug, only a little uncomfortable. "Uh... thanks!" Once the man is freed from the trap, Gack pays him little more attention. "Alrighty, stay there!" Gack looks at his trapped legs rather pointedly and laughs. Then, the gnome goes to look at the trap. "Ooh, excellent design. Could definitely be improved with some gunpowder. OOH! Or a burning hands spell..." After musing over that for a few seconds, he bounces back across the room. "Hey, find anything interesting? This guy's super boring, he can't even move."
The gnome examines the place eagerly. "Ooh, a laboratory! A demon huntin' laboratory! These guys were into some nasty stuff! Yuck!" He looks back to the circle of protection and frowns. "Uh...I wouldn't go in there if I were you guys... There could still be something trapped inside. Waiting..." His eyes get really big and he just stares at it for a while. While staring, he calls out to the Aspis agent. "Hey, Rock-Pants! How did you get stuck in the floor anyway? And are your legs bent, or straight? Asking for a friend." Still keeping his eyes on the circle, Show yourself, little imp... he points to his backpack. "Uh, Danicka? I've got a Reduce Person scroll in my bag. Might help get Rock-Butt out of his hole."
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Listening to Gack talk about the things they are observing, "Makes sense. With the demon-summoning circle in the other room, they would need to keep some demons they summoned in a cage."
With one of the drawers in the chest being locked, he uses his longsword to pry it loose.
"I've almost got this open. Someone give me a hand."
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Showing surprising spine, Danicka looks at Dolora and says, "No. There is no way I will leave a person trapped in a rock for any reason, or any amount of time. If you're scared, or paranoid, or... whatever! Fine. Be scared. But I'm afraid all the time and being scared is NOT a reason to be cruel. To threaten or even contemplate leaving that man in that rock is utterly reprehensible. And you should be ashamed."
She storms around the building looking for a few tools that will work better than her hair brush and umbrella, , and takes the scroll from Gack.
"Thank you."
Then she heads right over to Gideon, unfurls the scroll, and uses it on him.
Prickles stands behind his pet, growling at anyone that gets too close.
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Dolora also has no intention of backing down. "Just so you know, I have no intention of leaving him there permanently, neither will I feel ashamed for making him wait a couple more minutes. The last time I helped someone I was unsure of get free from a trap without having adequate support, the entire group I was with...including my 5 year old brother...was slaughtered. So forgive me for wanting to wait til everyone was nearby before repeating my biggest mistake."
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Ignoring Danicka and her bid to help the Aspis, he looks at the contents of the drawer that Dolora helped open.
"Interesting. The flask with Sarenrae defy the demon summoning stuff. I wonder if the original owners were defeated by the demon summoner."
He pulls out the rest of the items to look at. "Hmmm... a cold iron dagger that is well crafted, a wand, two oils that radiate magic, and then the two flask with Sarenrae."
Using Detect Magic and his knowledge, he tries to identify the magical properties of these items.
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Danicka lets out a little gasp of surprise. She puts a hand to her mouth. "That's... that's so sad!" She looks down for a moment... "I'm sorry..." she stammers. But then she looks up again. "I'm sorry. That's horrible. But... but..."
Be brave!
"But when someone's in trouble, you help them. Otherwise we become just as cold, and callous, and cruel as the people who hurt us in the first place." She shakes her head. "I won't do that. I've seen what happens when people let a whisper of that darkness into their hearts." She shakes her head again. "I choose to do the right thing."