Sam follows along into the next chamber and, seeing the dead humanoid, a small tear slides down her cheek. She wipes it away and sniffs. "Another one. That's too bad. We really should get out of this place. I almost think this isn't just a little prank someone's pulling on us anymore..."
She nods to Aralah. "Yeah I guess we shouldn't mess with them..."
"I dare you to lick it," whispers the invisible voice in Rose's ear.
"I'm not licking that thing," says Rose in a very confusing non sequitur the rest of the group hears.
"I'm not an experienced adventurer, but I can't see anything good coming of messing with a magical crystal surrounded by binding runes at the base of which lies a dried husk of a creature. Only if it were somehow a good creature bound within would it seem worth it. Can anyone detect evil or good?"
Do I have any idea what sort of magical effect would turn a living mite into a "husk" (that sounds like a dried-out, withered, or otherwise dessicated corpse)?
Rose doesn't know what magic is at play here on the dead mite, but can tell that this creature has been blasted with strong negative energy that likely contributed to its demise.
While the others debat the room that appears to be a death trap she moves up to the door on the northern wall and make sure it is safe before peaking inside.
"Indeed, certainly no prank. But if their intent was to kill us, why leave us alive at all?" He ponders aloud.
Laurel gives a confused look to Rose. He steps closer, lowering his voice. "Rose...are you alright?"
"No need to deal with it, then," Mithralline -- now clad in her namesake breastplate -- agrees. "Let's keep our distance. Whatever left us here, it's hard to think it was some mere joke by the villagers. They clearly don't seem to have made their way down here to have left us, so it must have been something else..."
Sam laughs out loud when Rose mentions licking the crystal. "Gosh that's hilarious Miss Rose!" She wipes tears from her eyes. "You sure do know how to liven things up!"
She does agree, however, that leaving the crystal alone seems like the right call. She moves up behind Aralah to be ready to support her if necessary.
Aralah doesn't detect any traps or signs of danger on the northwest door, so she opens it up to peer inside. She only opens the door a little bit, but it flies the rest of the way open as another creature yanks it the rest of the way. A voice from inside shouts in common "Foul beasts defile Roslar's crypt, will you?!? Not on my watch! DIE!!!"
A short sword blade comes from somewhere on the west side of the room that wasn't previously visible and embeds itself in her abdomen. Looking over at her attacker, she sees a metallic sculpture of an idealized humanoid figure sparkles with divine luster. You previously encountered a melted one of these creatures, celedons, in the larger room on the previous floor.
As the thing cuts into her she grabs at the wound that nearly drops her to the floor "Ugh!!"
She steps back to allow the others to get in it's face while she lets off a parting shot.
Out of the way of the creature she notes to the others "Careful, looks like someone tried to close the other door to the east without being noticed. Watch your flanks."
Sarela moves to where she can see the celedon, and calls out, "We did not come here to defile Roslar's tomb! We don't know how we got here! Will you please help us find the way out?"
HP 8/13
AC 18, touch 12, flat-footed 16, CMD 16 (+1 dodge bonus against Large creatures; +2 vs. Huge or bigger creatures)
Fort +4, Ref +2, Will +0
Challenge: 0/1; Tactician (4 rounds): 0/1
Effects: Charge (-2 AC)
"We're trying to get out of the tomb!" Mithralline declares, charging forward with her lance to take the automaton out of action quickly.
Maybe Sarela's words would have made a different, maybe not. The celedon seems to contemplate what she says but never gets a chance to respond.
Mithralline charges forward and plunges the lance into the body of the celedon. Looking down at its damaged seems only to reinforce the earlier statement. "Defilers, robbers AND MURDERERS!" it exclaims.
HP 8/13
AC 18, touch 12, flat-footed 16, CMD 16 (+1 dodge bonus against Large creatures; +2 vs. Huge or bigger creatures)
Fort +4, Ref +2, Will +0
Challenge: 0/1; Tactician (4 rounds): 0/1
Effects: Charge (-2 AC)
Sam looks downright upset at this. "Mithralline! We didn't have to to that! Sarela was trying to talk to it!" She steps back somewhat and casts a spell on Aralah. "Stay safe!"
Aralah shrugs to Sam's comment to Mithralline and notes "It was trying to attack us first..." She points at the large slash across her chest for emphasis.
Rose moves to line up a shot on the Celedon, "I wish it was intelligent and able to communicate rather than just mindlessly attack everything irregardless of the facts of the situation. We killed the things defiling this holy ground, now it defiles the ground by spilling innocent blood, well by its own 'reasoning' it needs to die. Goodbye celedon you corrupted creation."
Rose somehow finds a clear firing lane and lets her arrow fly. A well-aimed shot allows her arrow to strike the celedon, adding to the existing injury.
Pressing its attack, it steps up 5' and thrusts its longsword that has already been stained with Aralah's blood into her body once more. "Intelligent! Says the talking invaders who mysteriously show up here and continue their attack on me! If you are innocent, lay down your weapons and surrender to me now!"
"Aralah, Mithralline, Rose, stand down! We are willing to speak with you if you cease your attacks, celedon! We will even lay down arms, but you must swear in the name of the deity you serve that you will not attack us while we are unarmed!"
"Peace, we are not here by our own consent, we are only trying to leave."
Rose replies, ”If you were intelligent, you would realize we can easily destroy you. You will fail in your duty and, if you killed one of us, desecrate these hallowed grounds by spilling the blood of a good creature. However, if you are willing to talk like a reasonable being you may find out that we killed the creatures that destroyed the other celedon and we eliminated the little blue mites that were looting this tomb under your inattentive nose. Go, look and verify my words. We awoke here via some divine magic in the coffins of the Red Shrikes, whose remains are missing, and have been attempting to leave. I will not fight you unless you decide to harm another of my companions instead of talk. In that case, I will kill you myself.”
Rose points her bow at the ground but does not disarm.
Sam nods vigorously. "Yes! We didn't come here on purpose at all! Just talk for a moment!"
Aralah takes another slice from the creatures weapon and she holds the open wounds stepping back away from the fight, looking like she is about to pass out.
The celedon raises its sword, ready to step up and strike Aralah down. It raises its voice and repeats "Drop your weapons. Put your hands behind your head. Fall to your knees. Do this now and surrender to me or you leave me no choice but to eliminate your threat to my charge."
Aralah does exactly as the celedon says not wanting to get cut again.
Rose gestures towards the door that closed while we were in here, "If I put down my weapon, the creatures hiding in that room, which you have left roaming around plundering the tomb, will attack us."
"Why are you so insistent on annoying that creature?" asks the invisible voice to Rose.
She continues, "If you wish to see what we have done to protect the tomb that you were unable to handle, follow me." She turns her back on the creature, pointedly making certain she cannot see it, and walks back to the room with the mites.
"Now you're turning your back on it? Are you crazy?" the voice continues to ask even more despondently.
She tosses a small blue body back into the room with the party without looking back in and calls out as she walks towards the stairs, "You can see the other mites' bodies in here then we can go see the bodies of the evil extraplanar demon bugs that killed your compatriot. Your choice, you can kill a helpless, dying good creature, spilling her blood on hallowed ground, desecrating this tomb dedicated to good and righteous warriors who fought against murderers like you are about to become, and fail in your duty in multiple horrible ways. Or you can come investigate with me and we can determine a way to help you defend the tomb better. Possibly plug up those holes they keep coming through. Maybe we can even figure out who stole the Red Shrike bodies that were in your care."
Alivia chuckles, "Father was right, you are a brat. All you want it to do is leave them alone."
Rose whispers, "Now let's see if it's duty and good outweigh its desire to murder good creatures. Hopefully, it won't choose killing the unconscious bleeding Aralah or harming the creatures that surrendered to it and will decide it doesn't want an annoying elf that it can no longer see wandering around its tomb doing who knows what. It's certainly emotional for a construct and I've had a lot of practice pissing off self-righteous jerks."
Sam watches and listens uncertainly, ready to throw out her healing force of will again if necessary.
Laurel's only gut feeling is that this creature is acting genuinely. Now whether that's genuinely to slaughter your or protect the tomb, that's he's unsure of.
The celedon still holds its blade to strike Aralah, noting several people have not disarmed. If Rose's dialouge is supposed to sway the guardian with her words, it does not seem to be effective. It responds "You have five seconds to comply."
"5. 4..."
Aralah looks around at the others "Do what it says!"
Sam holds up her hands. "I don't have any weapons!" She kneels and puts her hands behind her head but its a little awkward with the shield equipped so she throws it to the ground then puts her hands behind her head.
HP 8/13
AC 18, touch 12, flat-footed 16, CMD 16 (+1 dodge bonus against Large creatures; +2 vs. Huge or bigger creatures)
Fort +4, Ref +2, Will +0
Challenge: 0/1; Tactician (4 rounds): 0/1
Effects: Charge (-2 AC)
Mithralline frowns but drops her lance and withdraws away from the celedon, raising her hands and dropping to her knees. She's not happy, but is willing to wait to see what it does since that's what her companions clearly want.
Laurel slowly goes to a knee, dropping his weapon.
Once all of the weapons are down, the celedon backs off its killing blow of Aralah. While it still keeps its blade in its hand, it relaxes its posture somewhat and examines each of you. "Very well. Now then. Start at the beginning. Why are you here? Why is there a dead mite here. What about-"
It's stream of questions is interrupted when a monstrous caterpillar with dark-scarlet bristles that drip with thick, dangerous-looking venom, emerges from the stairwell. It fires off a web that wraps around the celendon, trapping him. It raises its voice loudly and says "DECEPTION!" as it blames you for the attack.
As soon as combat breaks out again, Laurel swiftly grabs his scimitar. He begins moving towards the caterpillar as he raises his holy symbol to let healing energy wash over the party.
Sarela screams as the giant caterpillar comes from nowhere and attacks the celedon. From her knees, Sarela grabs her crossbow from the ground and fires a shot at the caterpillar.
Sam cries out, extremely concerned "No please no! It wasn't us! I don't even know any giant caterpillars! I'll help you get free while they fight it! Will you let me help you?"
HP 13/13
AC 18, touch 12, flat-footed 16, CMD 16 (+1 dodge bonus against Large creatures; +2 vs. Huge or bigger creatures)
Fort +4, Ref +2, Will +0
Challenge: 0/1; Tactician (4 rounds): 0/1
Effects: Charge (-2 AC)
Pulling out her trident, Mithralline rushes toward the caterpillar, stabbing violently at it, though she does her best to keep shield between her and the celedon.
The celedon doesn't object and just nods to Sam's request for help, making the decision quickly as it determines it is in a bad way between your group and the new threat that has arisen.
Sarela's shot should have hit the caterpillar, but Aralah and the celedon are both in the way and it's too difficult to thread the needle between them. Her arrow just misses the mark as it sails overhead into the wall beyond.
Rose draws her longsword and begins to cut at the webs holding the celedon, "You may be a jerk, but I'm not going to let some overgrown squeaky bug hurt you. We need some guardians of the tomb left alive."
She tries to glance occasionally at the door that closed when we got in here to see if there is a two-pronged attack about to happen.
Seeing the new threat and feeling a bit better from the healing Aralah stands as she picks up her bow and takes aim at the caterpiller.
Sarela stands up and reloads her crossbow, then steps to get a better look at the caterpillar.
Though Sam tries to free the celedon, her efforts are in vain as she can't break through the sticky webs. Rose slides in with her blade and makes short work of them however, the guardian giving her a curious, silent glance while she does so.
Aralah's attack is full of fail, not even remotely coming close to hitting the new enemy.
Laurel offers some healing and Mithrallline repositions closer to the doorway.
The caterpillar emerges from the northern room, slinking towards Mithralline. It moves through the area she threatens with her reach weapon and attempts to bite her, but misses.
Sam casts guidance on the celadon then steps back out of the way, realizing she's just blocking access to the enemy.
Laurel moves up to Mithralline, swinging his scimitar as a distraction to keep the creature off her.