Capricia is at a loss for words at the magical nature of the...what exactly? Safe house? Nobles' hideaway? As the number of keys begins to grow, she nominates Bimble to be the custodian of all the keys and other weird trinkets the party finds in the place. She also suggests locking up the crystal ball cabinet again, just in case someone or something else beats them in finding the rectangular piece likely needed to make it operational.
She nods when the gnome suggests moving to the next room. Falcata at the ready, she moves to the door and tries to open it only after Marcus has done his thing: checking for traps and the like.
"That's a good idea" Sara agrees about locking up the cabinet until they have the other piece. Then will follow Capricia once they are ready to enter the next room. "A dining room, bedroom, bunk house, and bath... wonder what it next."
"Maybe it's some sort of communication device between the noble and the bartender?" Rossana suggests as they move on.
Marcus looks things over, then gives Capricia the all clear. Opening the door it leads into a hallway, much like the other doors you've opened.
Marcus checks this door as well and not finding anything lets Capricia proceed ahead. In this lit room, stacked wooden crates cover the southern wall, and more crates occupy the northwestern corner. Wooden shelves fill much of the eastern half of the room, each tier filled with dust-coated bottles, crockery, and glass jars. There is a brass and glass plate on the wall near the western door.
Based on the rough sizes of the rooms you assume the western door connects back to where you started and confirm that is the case.
Bimble quickly gives the room a look over for magic and can't detect anything. Sara goes to work using her magic to quickly search the room.
However with so many crates of stuff, most of it old and worthless, it is hard to pick out the good from the bad. A more thorough look may be required.
Taking some time to go through the rooms and flick the switches it is a bit of a confusing mess. The rooms all turn on and off different lights in other rooms aside from where the panel is located.
"So this could be a literal safe house, then," Rossana says, a bit excited at the thought. Seeing Bimble's idea of getting all the lights on, Rossana assists.
With the area fully lit for everyone, Rossana will search the storage room, specifically for keys, secret doors, and/or something to go into the crystal ball. "We might check the bookshelf to see if it moves or opens like a door. Maybe there's a hidden switch like the ones on the walls."
Capricia helps Rossana search the storeroom.
"The gold key opens something, I wonder what." with Rossana and Capricia searching the store room, Sara moves back in the luxurious bedroom, concentrating on the bookshelfs. Reading the titles, flipping through the books for notes like in the scroll.
A routine check of the chamber reveals changes of clothes, condiments, pickled vegetables, preserved delicacies, salted meats, and a well-stocked toolkit. The room is obviously a storage area. While all the foodstuff here has long since rotted, the toolkit is well stocked and in excellent shape, counting as a masterwork tool for Craft checks related to carpentry, metalworking, or stonework.
The stack of boxes to the south takes 30 minutes for one person to rearrange into something less hectic. Doing so reveals a beautiful fresco painted on the southern wall, depicting Galitian Maramaxus, hero of the Fourth Army of Exploration, battling the dwarves of the Five Kings Mountains. A brass plate identifies the fresco as “Noble Galitian Maramaxus, hero of the Fourth Army of Exploration, champion of Taldor.”
After sorting through the crates you find a few things of worth or utility, including three daggers, two longswords, a halberd, a masterwork rapier, 12 masterwork darts, and a masterwork suit of studded leather armor.
Sara heads back into the master bedroom and gives it a more in depth look. Looking through the various books on the shelf, she eventually finds a collection of false books near the area Bimble identified as having a magical aura. Moving the false books aside she finds a circular, coin-sized niche on the wall behind the shelf, but it connects to no obvious mechanisms. Additionally, there is a small, curved piece of rectangular glass sitting on the shelf.
Bimble doesn't find anything of interest in the bathroom, but he is very thorough in his search.
"There seems to be some expensive equipment in the storage room for the more combat trained," Rossana informs the others as she enters the noble's quarters. "Oh, a piece of glass. Wonder if that's the missing piece to the crystal ball."
Rossana takes the piece of glass that Sara found and inserts it into the crystal ball. As she holds the ball, now complete and smooth, she gets a vision of the recently discovered fresco in the storage room. It almost looks like one part of the freso is a little bit lighter than the rest, but it is really hard to tell which piece specifically with the lights glaring down on the painting.
"I think this is pointing toward a clue. Flip the switch in the bedroom real quick," Rossana says. Once the light is out in the storage room, Rossana tries to memorize the location of the glowing piece.
Capricia nods and does as Rossana instructs.
When Capricia flips the switch in the master bedroom the lights in the storage room and the dining room go out. As soon as the light goes out in the dining room, and before Rossana can see in her vision, her vision ends and the crystal ball no longer seems to function in the dark.
Rossana enchants her dagger once more with light, and, should it not work, has someone go for the switch in the storage room. "This seems needlessly complicated. Why have such a puzzle to get out of the secret base?"
Hitting the switch in the storage turns on the lights in the dinning room while turning off the lights in the bunk room. As soon as the lights go on in the dinning room and Rossana places her hands on the crystal ball she sees the vision again. This time she clearly sees that a small gem in the pommel of Maramaxus sword is lit up in her vision of the fresco. However, anyone looking at the painting does not see the portion of the fresco lit up.
Otavio left the bewildered bartender behind together with four pieces of silver and a part of his dignity and fled into the crowd armed with his one drink. Theoretically, Otavio knew he was sticking to his promise - for now. Technically, no sane person would pick his side in this matter unless that person happened to be a rather persistent contrarian. Enough thinking, you got a job to do!
A simple enough job, or so the woman had told him. "Have a drink and then recite some poetry to a particular group of young gentlemen. Be sure to stick it to them that having a male reproductive organ doesn't mean you ought to act like one - that nobility is found in doing what's right, no matter how hard." Otavio's ensuing chuckle had resulted in her giving him a harsh look. "This isn't a game. Do this. Take this opportunity to make a name for yourself and do what's right. The Gods know Taldor needs change. Be a part of this change!" Perhaps the woman's harsh tone was more so the fact his breath smelled of alcohol, alcohol that had caused him to miss the meeting she had invited him to. Those eyes, they were alight with the same disappointment she had shown him. "I apologize, my lady. You can count on me, so I swear."
And a promise is a promise. Equal parts ambition and anxiety drove him to the group of gentlemen. Being part of their booked entertainment, Otavio only had to show up and do what he did best: put a vulgar twist on great literary and so, preach the profane. The gentlemen roared with laughter as the poet spun a tale of a man chased by his own failures, failures either inspired or caused by the rather unfortunate proportions of his manliness, bestowed upon him after a foolish prayer. And truly, had he asked for so much? Sons! All he wanted was one son, two sons, a never-ending amount of sons to come rolling out of the women he slept with! To be the man who could, a man only capable of bringing forth men! In the end, his folly was shown mercy by the realization he had been blessed all along. Blessed, with a daughter. Poetry or propaganda? On a night like this, does the distinction even matter?
Apparently, it does. What happened next made Otavio feel like the Gods were punishing him for breaking his word. After all, he had failed to stick to the spirit of his promise. Everywhere people died, people who had taken the side of the princess and people who happened to be unfortunate enough to be here tonight. The tide of violence knew no innocents and Otavio fended off blade and dagger with a silver platter and a broken bottle of brandy.
And just like that, it was over. He was gone, somewhere else. Otavio blinks, trying to discern what's real and what's not. "Am I dead?", he asks the darkness. "Oh Gods, am I dead?! This sinner begs forgiveness, only after the fact, t'is true, but surely that means something nonetheless!" Yet no one answered. Otavio makes an attempt to scramble to his feet and realizes all his possessions are still there: an old sword with a battered and worn-down hilt and a dented buckler plus his emergency kit, a leather satchel containing a flask of alchemist fire, a pair of sunrods and a small holy symbol of Cayden in the form of a flask which just so happens to contain some 'holy water'.
"Excellent!" Sara exclaims to Rossana's discovery with the ball. "Hmmm... a gem, I wonder if it can be removed or pressed. The bookcase has a small circular niche in the wall. I wonder... "
Once they turn the lights back on she'll go look at the pommel of the sword in the fresco, based on Rossana's directions.
Looking at the gem on the fresco itself it is simply a part of the painting and does not detect as magical.
"Try to see if it will come out," Rossana says, taking her dagger to the spot and trying to pry it out or in. "Or maybe we need to find a real gem just like this one in here."
Rossana tries to pry out the gem, but realizes it is in fact painted on the fresco and not an actual gem.
This place exemplifies exactly what's wrong with the nobility - who would spend so much time creating something so complicated? Only those who have the time to do it.
Much more adept at figuring out people than puzzles, Marcus stays with the group, looking around in each room that they come to and helping as directed. He keeps a particular eye out for a ranged weapon of some sort, and asks the group to do the same.
"I know we're trying to get out and all, but I'm afraid of trouble arising. If it does, I'll be much better suited to help if I have a ranged weapon - my bow is sadly sitting at home. Please keep an eye out if you would."
Eventually you light a sunrod and see several other people in a hallway; 3 men and one woman all dressed in their finest and obviously members of the upper class. They cover their eyes a moment to the light and then look to you with questioning eyes.
As you take in your surrounding you find that you are in a hallway that leads north and south then turns to the east at the northern and southern ends. There are two doors in the western wall and one to the south.
Pushing, prodding and using all manner of cantrips on the painted gem doesn't seem to have an apparent effect, at least not one you can see looking directly a the fresco.
"Maybe we need to put a pommel against the niche?" Rossana ventures. Taking one of the longswords and the masterwork rapier, she presses the pommel of each against the niche in the bookcase.
"Or maybe we need to do something to the pommel when the lights are out, since it only shines in the dark? Oh that is a good idea about the sword's Rossana." Sara exclaims and wonders... she'll also go look to see if there are anything in the whiskey bottles they found, swish them around to see if anything is in them.
Then if nothing, she'll go back to look at the paintings in the dinning room. "Bimble you said these had to do with Galitian Maramaxus as well, did you not? I wonder if they have anything in them that would be a clue..."
Rossana tries touching the pommel of different swords against the coin sized niche but nothing seems to happen. Looking back at the paintings in the dining room you see a similar style longsword in the drawings but none of them have a gem in the pommel like in the fresco.
Maybe we need to make the fresco like the ball? Rossana contemplates. Casting her small cantrip once more, Rossana transfers the small firefly's light from her dagger to the gem's spot on the fresco.
It is only then that he realizes he is still holding the silver platter as if it were a shield.
Rossana continues to work on the fresco but her attempts to manuever the light from her spell onto the fresco don't appear to have an effect.
When Bimble goes back to look through the crystal ball he sees a different spot on the fresco lit up, this time one of dwarves beard rings.
Before he finishes his sentence the wall behind him seems to move as if coming to life. The torso of a humanoid figure with jagged claws extends outward from the wall, its features patterned with the texture of the structure around it. The ghastly claws reach out from the wall and grab the man by the throat ripping it open as blood splatters across the ground.
The woman screams in horror and the other man grabs hold of the door he is next to and swings it open as he shouts out "In here hurry!"
You rush into the room with the others to hide from whatever horror is lurking in the wall in the outside hallway. Everyone tries to cram near the center of the room avoiding touching the walls while staring at the sealed door in horror.
Right? Right. Otavio doesn't believe it, but by the Gods, he so wants to.
Rossana moves to the indicated spot and presses her hand against the rings. "Maybe everyone sees something different?"
Capricia looks wholly baffled. She keeps her falcata at the ready and stands guard in case all this crazy finagling actually opens some hidden portal or the like.
"Beard rings! Oh, what all did we do to the gem?" Sara frets, thinking of the pressing, shining, prying, and all the rest, and wonders which one of them caused the success.
Bimble relates the info to the others for them to press the next piece, eventually seeing 6 lit spots in total, one after another. Upon touching the final spot the fresco splits open, revealing a hidden compartment beyond. A small bag lies inside the niche, holding 20 magically charged gold coins, each bearing the Voritas family crest, the same crest that is on your senate aide badges.
Seeing the coins, Rossana picks them up and splits fifteen among the group, three for each. "Might want to leave more in case we end up here again without our stuff. If these even work." More than a bit curious, Rossana heads to the bookshelf and promptly pushes one into the niche.
Marcus shakes his head, impressed, and a smile creeps onto his face.
"Well done all - I never could have figured that out. Perhaps we'll escape here yet."
Capricia nods her agreement with Marcus's words. You get the impression she's more used to solving problems with the falcata she wields....