Devon yowls in pain as the bug nearly rips her arm off. Despite her wounds, she strikes back!
Devon tears into the elephantine corpse, no doubt relieving her feelings but not accomplishing much else.
Eli's mouth drops wide open as he witnesses Devon enter a purrimal rage. "De-devon, it's already dead ... gosh, are you ok? That thing, wow, its poison must be strong enough to flatline an Isgerian moose!"
Devon looks at Eliyajah with narrowed eyes. "No, I am not okay! Feels like my arm is hanging on by its tendons!" She cradles the wounded appendage to her chest.
Devon grunts in agreement.
"Already on it" says Ashira as she begins to channel energy. It is a paltry sum.
"I have one channel left. If you need more healing just ask and I can use a proper spell."
"Thank you, Ashira. I feel much better now." Working out the last few kinks in her arm, Devon searches the door before opening it.
Devon doesn't find any traps. The rectangular stone building sits apart from the rest of the house. At each corner stand columns carved to resemble men and women with their arms crossed over their chests. A set of stone doors stands in the southern face of the building, carved with bas-relief faces of two men. The faces match those on the statues outside the main gate.
Hieroglyphs are carved into the doors just beneath the faces.
The stone doors are heavy, but open easily. Inside, a wide stairway descends 15 feet to a large square room, shrouded in darkness.
Devon peers down into the gloom. "Should we descend, or explore the upper levels of the manor first?"
|
"If its open we can explore but I expect we'll find a locked door pretty soon." Say'ri opinions. "Leaving the crypts of your ancestors unlocked would have been a huge no-no in ancient Osirian. House Pentheru would never forgive the person who was foolish enough to forget the key. Might as well look while we're here though."
Devon nods. Assuming somebody strikes a light, she proceeds cautiously and quietly down the stairs.
"Clear the top first so we got a safe escape route? Y'know, if there's a darn big bug creeping about in the front, there might be even bigger creeps about in the main building."
"You're welcome." Ashira responds with a slightly doubtful gratefulness. I mean, I already spent almost everything for one fight...
Ashira doesn't really have an opinion about heading above or below. She just follows alongside Eli.
Devon's torchlight illuminates a square room, some 25 feet on all sides. The air is dank, but breathable, although there is a sour stink of decay. A limestone altar, carved with the spiral of Pharasma, sits upon a raised platform in the center of this square room. Caryatid columns carved in the likenesses of male and female figures with their arms crossed over their chests and khopeshes or ankhs in their hands stand at each corner of the platform; carved of sandstone, their expressions are stern as the day they were first chiselled into being. Empty torch holders are built in all four of the room’s corners. Another stairway exits the room directly ahead of you to the north.
You don't have much time to look around, as something jumps out of the darkness and springs at Devon! A pallid humanoid creature, wrapped in wispy bits of cloth, it bares its mouth back in anticipation of a fine meal, leaving itself temporarily open to a strike...
Devon waits for Say'ri to step around the creature before stepping into a flank and slashing it!
"Ahhh!", yells Eli as the sudden appearance of a rather ghastly individual scares the living daylights out of him.
Ashira recoils at the sudden scare, but realizes that this might very well be an undead. Pharasma will favour her getting rid of it! She moves over to it and her hand emits a dull, silver light. With a little hesitancy, she tries to touch the vile thing and channel compassion and sadness.
Gentle Rest (Sp): Your touch can fill a creature with lethargy, causing a living creature to become staggered for 1 round as a melee touch attack. If you touch a staggered living creature, that creature falls asleep for 1 round instead. Undead creatures touched are staggered for a number of rounds equal to your Wisdom modifier. You can use this ability a number of times per day equal to 3 + your Wisdom modifier.
The thing lashes out as Say'ri moves to flank it, catching her with one sticky claw.
Devon's claws slash at it, and almost snag in sticky gloop but the rogue manages to retract them at the last second. Say'ri is not so fortunate: her flail lands a mighty blow in the thing, but then sticks fast to it!
Ashira touches it with a hand, and suffers the same fate as her palm encounters a glue-like substance on the creature's skin - but her magic is effective, rendering the beast temporarily staggered! It hisses in anger but cannot do much more than that.
This thing isn't a mummy, but an Adherer: they look vaguely like embalmed and mummified corpses wrapped in dirty linen, but they are in fact otherworldly beings of an entirely different nature. Transformed by hideous processes on the Ethereal Plane, their bodies are riddled with tiny, adhesive strands that can stick to anything, allowing adherers to bind their enemies’ weapons and capture living creatures for their depraved rituals.
Though once human, adherers have forgotten all traces of humanity, and now hunt their former kindred with gleeful abandon. Adherers digest food unusually slowly, and as such can feed on a single creature (humans are their favorite meal) for days or even weeks, taking only one or two bites a day and forcing their living captives to endure a hellish, drawn-out death.
Say'ri 20/24, Adhered
Ashira 20/20, Adhered
Thing - 11 damage
Ashira grimaces a bit, but decides instead of trying to pry her hand off to continue the assault of staggering the thing. Since her hand is already on, she figures her attack should automatically succeed.
Not wanting to get stuck to the monster, Devon draws her spear and jabs at it ineffectually.
"Aw yuck, what is this thing?! Doesn't seem to be undead, no!" And so, Eli launches a glob of sticky goo at it with all the skill and expertise that he is known for.
The thing yowls in annoyance as Ashira's lethargic magic deprives it of a perfect opportunity to go on a feeding frenzy. Instead, it slams one arm into her.
Say'ri 20/24, Adhered
Ashira 15/20, Adhered
Thing - 11 damage
Devon tries to stab it again, to no avail.
Eli whistles a haunting tune which causes coarse sand to fill up the room. It doesn't stop filling up the room until the accursed creature finds himself stranded in the corner, surrounded by walls of sand on all sides. For those inside the heaps of sand, it is readily apparent that all of it is fake: its outlines shimmer and you can see right through it. It's an illusion!
The creature initially recoils from the sand, but on closer inspection it realises it is illusory, and presses its attack. Only Ashira's strange magic prevents it from doing more damage.
Say'ri 15/24, Adhered
Ashira 15/20, Adhered
Thing - 12 damage
Devon finally scores a good hit, yanking the spear back before it can get stuck!
"C'mon, overwhelm the darned thing! We gaw'tis!"
Devon's spear hits, and she manages to pull it back for another strike. Say'ri misses, but Eli's spell hits, burning through the thing's skin and making it growl in pain.
Still hampered by Ashira's strange magic, it lashes out at Devon, but the blow lacks much force.
Devon 17/20
Say'ri 15/24, Adhered
Ashira 15/20, Adhered
Thing - 15 damage
The pain from the blow throws off Devon's aim again.
Ashira starts getting frustrated and tries to move the creature she's stuck to into Devon's spear.
...and manages to prevent her weapon getting stuck to her opponent!
Okay, maybe the thing wasn't that inclined to go down. Seeing the creature survive blow after blow manages to discourage Eli, who - perhaps coincidentally? - completely whiffs his next attack.
Sayri's attack doesn't do as much damage as she might expect from such a solid hit, but the thing nevertheless focuses its retaliation on her. Freed from Ashira's weird lethargy, it strikes at the swordswoman twice, missing both times.
Devon 17/20
Say'ri 15/24, Adhered
Ashira 15/20, Adhered
Thing - 18 damage
Ashira is startled that she was having such a strong effect as she was, so she goes back to inducing lethargy in the creature.
*SPLORTCH!*