Arkandru shouts in pain as the roc slashes at him again, then instinctively attempts to grab hold when the talon suddenly releases.
Too high!
Arkandru channels energy to cast Heal on himself.
After the healing sets in, Arkandru lets himself fall to the ground.
Thorax sheathes his dogslicer and attempts to steer the bird into a crash landing.
"Come here! Come here!" Fumbus cries out to the remaining roc as he swings his blade.
Zordox casts Fly on himself, scoops up a handful of small rocks and sets off into the sky.
"I cannot let ze goblin fall to hees death. I shall rescue him from a horrible fall."
Harry will float back down to the ground where he will eventually change back and the fire will go out just before he changes back.
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Arkrandu manages to cling on long enough to heal himself before letting go. Fortunately, Miladistra slows his fall. He and everyone else has time to watch Thorax comically pull his roc to steer it into the ground, ploughing up a massive plume of snow. The goblin doesn't look any worse for wear, nor does his ride, which would be hard-pressed to do so. Without any immediate threats, Arkrandu's roc joins the remaining young one in flying away. They don't look to be heading towards their nest.
Miladistra is reaching for her crossbow when Arkandru plummets from the sky. "Ahh! Winds, heed my call!" Arkandru falls like a feather, landing gently upon the snow.
"I told ya'll we're not food!" Miladistra calls out to the rocs. "If your prey fights back for that long, you gotta let go!" The storm clouds rage around her as Thorax's roc gets the hint and flees.
"How's everyone doin'?" Once the clouds around Miladistra disappear, you see her already pulling out her mistletoe and a collection of leaves. "Do you guys mind spending some time here? I should have enough medicine to heal the immediate bruises."
"Alright, feeling better, now?"
Thorax is, quite literally, the happiest you've ever seen him.
There's so much food he breaks out his master-quality cooking set and sets to work preparing the gargantuan feast for whoever wants it.
He even offers a berry tart to the elf .
Arkandru drifts to the ground, and bows to the druid. "My thanks, Miladistra." Assuming we're staying overnight, he will channel energy as soon as Thorax lands, making sure that Trofimir is in range, then will assist Miladistra with treating wounds once he has healed to full.
When it is clear that the party will be camping, Arkandru starts working his way around the site, looking for signs of more unfriendly creatures or natural hazards.
Once his wounds are healed, Trofimir starts sniffing around the corpses of the dead rocs. As Thorax begins preparations for the feast, the little bear follows the goblin around waiting for him to drop something.
Fumbus is grateful for the healing.
His is even more grateful for the food!
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Miladistra accepts the berries. When the party decides to camp for the night, she begins foraging.
Miladistra can find enough food for herself. Can she find more?
Not a problem. Hopefully someone else doesn't mind nuts and berries.
Zordox says, I am all for camping ze night. I used far too many of my spells in driving off ze rocs. I must needs rest and prepare zem again zo zat ze next foes we face will meet my full powers and not half of zem."
He begins to memorize his spells as quickly as he can.
To Fumbus, "Az elfek így pazarlóak. Tökéletesen jó hús! Ő is segített megölni. De még mindig nem eszik!"
After eating his fill, Thorax eats some more. Then, he spends the evening cleaning the Roc's skull (which doesn't mean much) before strapping it to the outside of his backpack, beak pointing up.
After packing the extradimensional pockets of his backpack with fifty pounds of charred chicken strips, he touches it all off with a few choice feathers.
That night he sleeps soundly in a pile of down.
Rest here in the cold, I guess. I should have learned wall of stone, then we could camp out safely.
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Miladistra keeps everyone's spirits up with a piccolo solo.
It may be one of her best performances yet.
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The team opts for some time to recuperate, full of good music and roc meat for whoever desires. Once spells are prepared and all else is ready, you set forth through the valley. It quickly leads to an old giant's road, several hours down which lies another landmark on Ogthup's map.
The site looks like the remains of an old building, likely a giant watchtower. But it has long since crumbled, leaving only the barest foundations and bits of staircase. Tufts of grass grow here, but most of the surrounding area is covered in a carpet of feathery lichens. Near the center of the ruin lies an irregular pit, 20 feet wide and 30 feet deep. This is the Pushing Hole, it seems.
"Don't change into cloud again," Thorax warns Harry. "Might get blown apart."
He sets to work searching the area for traps, perhaps the most focused you've seen him yet.
Fumbus looks around, hoping not to spot the tablets that Ogthup had mentioned had been dropped here by the Pushing Hole. He then looks at the weather to see if a windstorm may be on the horizon or why the wind may have been particularly strong here such as to blow the prior party about.
Harry moves up stopping 15 feet from the hole to let his allies catch up in case something bad happens.
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Per Fumbus's knowledge, the weather is as fine as it gets around here, and has been for a while - certainly no severe winds.
Thorax looks around, and immediately notices something strange about the hole. It appears normal to the untrained eye, a sinkhole with walls made up of numerous crumbling components. However, he sees a faint, yet surprisingly visible air current moving around the pit's inside. This likely signifies the presence of air-based magic or a similar creature, which currently lies dormant. At the very bottom lie three more stones, like the one Ogthup managed to bring back.
"I has idea. Anybody have pet weasel?"
Arkandru raises an eyebrow at Thorax, carefully pats down his pockets, shakes his head and shrugs.
"Sorry. No veasel."
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"Fumbus' left his pets back home" replies the goblin. "And in a pit."
Fumbus then adds, "And half-eaten."
Zordox casts Detect Magic and tries to use either his Arcana skill to deduce more about the hole and possibly its magical abilities or rather the nature of its guardian.
"I could summon an animal of some kind." Miladistra offers. "Any particular reason?"
Miladistra holds her mistletoe and tries to understand what kind of natural event could explain the wind patterns.
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"Everyone hates weasels. They're like long dogs. Drop one in pit, and angry wind get distracted. Then grab tablets!"
"Well, this is strange!" Miladistra looks on. "An air elemental lives here! Now, what do I remember about air elementals?"
"Should we just talk to it? I wish I spoke Auran."
"Air elemental?" Fumbus muses, then his face turns a bit downcast. "Those are hard to burn."
"Should we just talk to it? I wish it spoke goblin."
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"Seriously," Thorax rolls his beady little eyes, "This 48th century. Who not speak Goblin?"
Zordox turns and looks at Fumbus with a smile. "Mon ami, I zink zat ees exactly what we should do. Ze question is how do we zo zis? Uzing another elemental might work, but zat ees not my academic area. Does anyone know of a way to communicate weeth ze aerial type creatures?"
He gives a Gallic shrug of the shoulders and ponders what could be done.
"If we were hunting weasels, we'd smoke them out."
"I could summon a minor air elemental, but that doesn't really help- I can't talk to the elemental. Let me see if someone else can talk to it..."
"Nope. I could summon a dryad but that's about it. Let's hope this one is multilingual."
The big man gives Trofimir an absent-minded pat on the head. "Ve could vait until tomorrow morning. I could ask the Lady of Graves for the spell of Tongues. Only for ten minutes, but it should be enough."
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"Enough?! Hardly!" Fumbus states emphatically. "There is no way you can teach an air elemental how to speak goblin in only ten minutes!"
Thorax nods sagely.
"Yes. Difficult language. Even took me many years."
Miladistra giggles. "Maybe we should spend another day asking for the power of tongues. I don't think the elemental can learn goblin that quickly!"
Miladistra carefully approaches the air anomaly. "Hello there. Air elemental? We were hopin' you could answer a few questions for us about this cavern. Do- do you have a moment?"
"Maybe eet speaks een a language wheech we know? Who knows? Let us try, eh?"
"Well I know Sylvan. Makes it easy to talk to faeries and the like. Oh, and Elven of course, buy you could guess that already."
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"Fumbus speaks pain." remarks the goblin, clutching a vial of some alchemical substance. Nevertheless, the smaller Pathfinder keeps his distance as the longshanks approach the elemental.
That thing is putting messages in our mind to murder someone, and you all want to talk to it. We should get rid of that thing.
After the group attempts talking, and nothing happens, Thorax turns around and heads to the nearby bushes.
*Those* bushes.
He carries back a *very* smelly sack, , and quickly empties the contents below before jumping back and drawing his dogslicer.
"Works every time."