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The Gillmen looks intently at Wheeler as she speaks, thinks for a moment, and then responds, "The cloak belonged to my best friend, Uilo. We didn't expect a pit trap to welcome us on our pilgrimage to these caverns, and sadly Uilo didn't notice it in time and fell in a bad way. He did not survive the fall. I would greatly appreciate it if you could return it to me so that I may place it with Uilo's grave back home."
"In exchange for the cloak, I could give you this wand of Shield of Faith, it has a handful of charges left, but it holds no sentimental value to me compared to the cloak."
He is clearly reading the lips of the people speaking. Odd considering you can hear him quite easily and you believe he should be able to hear you fine as well.
Keandre detects faint traces of divine magic, similar to the walls earlier. The mini-city's magic is like a firefly in its last week of life. Without Aroden to fuel it, the magic is quickly fading.
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Khoda relaxed a bit and sheathed his sword, feeling a little foolish in his hasty action. He made his way across the bridge to stand just inside the glow of the torches.
Khoda eyed the trinkets and coins laying around the model city and offered a guess, "Correct me if I'm wrong, but it looks like some kinda shrine."
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"Ah, well met then, I am Uori. I do not frequently see non-gillmen visit these caves. To see so many people, armed at that too, was quite startling." he says to Huong. "I can tell you that these caves are a sacred site to us Gillmen, we come here on a pilgrimage, once every full moon. This wasn't always the case, I know of the human god, Aroden, and that this was some site of importance to his followers before it was sacred to us. They performed quite a number of strange rituals here, or so the stories of my people go. Sadly, it seems that his presence in the world is fading, as his magic in these caverns. While this has little effect on us Gillmen, it is sad to see the passage of time, especially the loss of a race's deity, which is quite a rare occurrence."
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The Gillmen understands what Wheeler is asking and begins his people's oral history of the location, "My people tell of a time when all twelve carvings were intact, these carvings were the artist, the beggar, the craftsman, the farmer, the fisherman, the hunter, the merchant, the scholar, the shepherd, the soldier, the tailor, and the thief. My people do not worship Aroden, so many of us do not understand the significance of these twelve carvings or their meanings. However, we know of the rituals that connect Aroden to his followers in this cavern, and we learned that the integrity of the carvings is vital to the outcome of the ritual." he says as he walks over to the carvings, looking back to make sure the pathfinders are following.
"As you can see, most of the carvings, like Aroden, are fading or utterly gone, however, four still remain." he says as he walks over to the carving of the Artist. "This is the artist. My people tell a story of humans collecting pigment stones around the cavern and painting one of the many model buildings in the city." he says, gesturing at various colorful stones in the cavern before moving on to the Fisherman.
"This is the Fisherman. As the name suggests, the ritual involved catching one of the blind cavern fish from inside the pool of water. Before you ask, no, I do not mind of you catch, kill, or eat a fish. While we bear similar features to the species, it is as different from us as gorillas are to you humans." he says as he walks over to the next carving.
"This is the Shepherd, one of my personal favorites. My people tell me that the significance of this ritual is about finding a task best suited to an individual's skills. As a deaf oracle, I sympathize with the desire. The ritual involved convincing the many frogs that reside on the model city to jump into the water, assigning them both the task of jumping and swimming, something they are very good at." he says as he walks over to the last carving.
"The last remaining carving is the soldier. My people do not understand this one well, the name implies violence and war, but the ritual is simply to add light to the city." he says as he walks back to the water.
"If you have no further need of me I will leave you to do as you wish since I can tell that you mean no harm to me or my pilgrimage. I will give you a word of warning, be careful exploring the cavern to the east, it is filled with undead, some being lost gillmen, however there is secret passage there that leads out of the caves that we seldom use any longer. If you go to the west, I cannot guess what creatures may be there, as we do not travel or explore that side of the cave." he says as he begins to return to his prayers.
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Khoda made quick notes of the carvings as Uori related their meaning.
As snatches a fish from the waters and Huong casts his cantrip on teh model, Khoda turned to Uori.
"I hate to keep you from your prayers but, you mentioned undead in the eastern caverns. Do you have an idea of their numbers? Perhaps together we could all lay their bodies and spirits to rest?"
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"They are my fallen comrades and friends for the most part, Gillmen that died on their pilgrimage. I couldn't say their number as not all Gillmen that have fallen are likely undead now and I haven't explored the area since their arrival. While I don't consider myself helpless, I have no wish to fight the undead if I can choose not to. Why risk our lives to seek them out?"
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The cave’s damp air becomes increasingly stale as you continue down through this tunnel, and as you approach this area, the stench of decay grows increasingly evident.
The passage turns to the east and opens into a small cavern littered with bits of broken glass, rotting pieces of paper, and other unusable detritus. There is a body that lies facedown toward the back of the cavern.
You can easily hear the sound of rattling bones and various unnatural groaning from a little deeper in the cavern.
The skeletons act first, but don't aren't smart and don't realize combat has started yet, so they just rattle around the cave.
Initiative Order, Bold May Go!
Map Slide
Skeletons
Huong
Waykand
Khoda
Wheeler
Zombies
Keandre
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Khoda moves forward and smashes a skeleton apart.
Huong fires a beam of light at the other skeleton that fries its bones, but leaves it standing.
Waykand surrounds himself with a force field shaped like armor.
The zombie next to Kohda tries to grab hold of him and it hits Khoda with its arms hard.
The skeleton that Houng fried, rattles towards him and swings its broken sword. The sword finds the mark on the unarmored mage, but the claw doesn't manage to connect.
The remaining zombie moves to Keandre and tries to slam him with its arms, but misses horribly.
Keandre fires glob of acid, but doesn't manage to hit any of the undead.
Initiative Order, Bold May Go!
Map Slide
Skeletons
Huong, -5hp
Waykand
Khoda, -6hp
Wheeler,
Zombies
Keandre
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Khoda grimaced at the spot where the zombie had struck, "That's definitely gonna leave a bruise." He crouched into a more defensive stance and struck back at the undead. And missed.
He flashed a grin to Wheeler, "We got this."
Standard action: fighting defensively (-4 attack rolls, +2 dodge to AC)
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Wheeler stabs one of the zombies to the brain, easily killing it. When he moves on the next, however, he finds it doesn't have a brain to stab at!
Khoda swings his longsword wildly to prevent the undead from closing in.
Huong Chan swings his quarterstaff around and lightly bops a skeleton on the head, but it doesn't faze the creature.
The skeleton steps towards Keandre before swinging at him.
The skeleton seems to be pretty confused after the tap from Huong though and doesn't even come close.
The zombie doesn't like being stabbed, even if it was harmless!
But wheeler easily parries the attack.
Initiative Order, Bold May Go!
Map Slide
Skeleton, -1
Huong, -5hp
Waykand
Khoda, -6hp
Wheeler
Zombies
Keandre