"That looks like real blood I think. Groog is right, this has moved. Maybe if we put blood on it, it will open?"
"I only have two flasks of holy water. Hmm, if the poison's inert, maybe we don't need to use it?"
Kallie looks a little uncomfortable at the thought of putting more blood on the statue. "Maybe brute force could be tried first?"
Jaya gives the altar and the statues a quick scan with detect magic. This would be a perfect place to place traps for wary unbelievers...
"I agree, let's avoid blood sacrifice unless we're quite certain it's necessary. You say this statue moved though Groog? Aurealia, can you find any sort of counterweight? It's plausible this is simply a mechanical device."
Aurealia studies the statue and its surrounding area. She quickly discovers that it can be pushed north. After verifying that there are no traps, Kelhuud and the Andosana Sisters move the statue and discover a flight of stairs going downward.
"Perhaps your foes are down there?" Kelhuud ponders. "Besides them, Groog and I haven't see anyone else around here lately."
Groog ambles on down the stairs, blissfully pleased to be out doing something.
"Yes, I definitely hear puppies down there. Hurry!" Aurealia is hot on the orc's tail, ready for a fight.
The "gore" on the alter definitely detects as magical. The material on the statues, however, does not!
When you catch up with Groog, you find him scanning around a large chamber for those aforementioned puppies. Sadly, there do not appear to be any within immediate view. Like many Thassilonian ruins, the chamber itself is made of sturdy stone. The ceiling appears to be about thirty feet tall, and it is supported by thick stone columns.
There is yet another mosaic on the floor: one of faded yellow rays of sunshine. It is largely covered in dust. However, you can see several sets of footprints all over the floor. Some of them look very recent; others are just barely visible...
Aurealia looks around the room for hidden foes, and goes to sniff at the more recent looking tracks.
"Oh, one moment. The statue isn't trapped that's... probably actual blood."
Kallie's eyes are drawn to the old tracks. "Hey! Hoofprints! Looks like a full-sized horse or centaur... with almost no cracks or signs of age... that's gotta be Ryli; she was only a few weeks a centaur at this point! Whoa! This is where the original Rangers went!"
Jaya flashes Kallie a distracted smile, but what strikes her is "That probably means there's nothing traditionally living waiting for us down here. Dust is very easily disturbed, and they would presumably have no reason to preserve those tracks."
"Incoming! Dusty bone-shard people!" Aurealia says as she spots the stealthy creatures. She activates her wand of long arm, and then sticks it back into its loop on her belt, gripping her horsechopper with both hands.
Thanks to Aurealia's warning, you all notice two humanoid figures rapidly approaching the group's position from the south. They appear to be made of dust and bone shards. These creatures definitely seem hostile...
One of the creatures rushes Aurealia. The other targets Galatea. Gali screams in pain when her opponent simply brushes its "hand" against her arm. The whole experience seems to leave Galatea rather shaken...
Despite being obviously scared of these strange creatures, Galatea's scream of pain is enough to spur Cheshire to fight the monster attacking her handler.
Meanwhile, Galatea vanishes from sight.
Something wasn't right about this dirt men. They looked and smelled and moved funny. And were mean. They were hurting Strange Don't Want Huggy Puppy.
Nobody. Hurts. Groog's. Puppies.
He rushes forward and slashes his blade through one as he roars out "LEAVE PUPPIES ALONE STUPID DUST MAN THINGIES!" the nervousness of his lack of understanding obvious in his voice.
Kallie shudders, but still moves out and around the column to get a better shot at the dust shards.
Aurealia steps back from the dust being who touched her, and stabs at it again.
Jaya moves further into the room, making careful observations while she selects a spell...
Whuuuuggghh!
A shiver runs through Croq's scaly body as she sees the horrifying things.
Despite her fear, she steps forward pounding her drum and--trying to reassure herself--she sing-hollers ♫♫ All they are is dust in the wind! ♫♫
"If you're frightened back away to at least 10 paces' distance! While their fear holds you they can seize control of your lungs and choke you to death!
"They're undead, Kallie, so their minds will be hard to seize, and incorporeal, so most other spells won't be at their best either.
She sends a spray of force bolts to harry Groog's Shade, tearing away chunks from its dusty form.
Seeing Groog in distress, Kelhuud rushes into combat to help his friend.
Despite taking an opportunistic hit, he nonetheless attacks the undead monstrosity.
Seemingly surprised by how much damage it's taken, the westernmost creature tries to choke Groog just as Jaya warned!
It proves to be about as effective as trying to choke a stone pillar.
Similarly, the eastern one fails to choke the fairly hardy Cheshire.
Cheshire continues to attack her opponent. Going her chanting, Galatea casts a spell on her companion. Knowing her, you suspect that Gali relocates soon afterward.
Groog’ s focus grows and his teeth begin to clench as he swings harder at the dust man...
__________
"What do you think I'm doing, Jaya? Singing to them?"
Croq's eyes go wide at Jaya's warning about choking. She glances to her side, sees that Aurelia is still right there, and that gives her the courage to swing.
Aurealia tries to finish the most badly damaged shade.
Jaya coolly judges the deteriorating condition of the battered shades and judiciously apportions her arcane might!
Groog and Croq actually destroy the weakened shade before Aurealia and Jaya can strike it, so they instead direct their attacks against the foe fighting Cheshire.
With one enemy down, Kelhuud advances on the surviving undead monstrosity and attacks it.
However, his obvious fear of the monster impairs his aim.
The creature tries to choke Cheshire again. The tigress seems surprised that it would make a second attempt so soon, and she is thus nearly caught by surprise this time! However, Galatea's earlier spell and Croq's inspiration music ultimately help her prevail.
You all work together to easily destroy the remaining enemy.
As you defeat your final foe, the ruins go quiet and still...
"Well, those things were awful. Is everybody okay?" Aurealia asks as she dusts herself off. "If so I'd say we keep moving before our spells run out of energy."
Kallie shakes off the fear, a little annoyed by her performance but at least she didn't waste any resources that might be useful elsewhere. Something tugs at her memory. "The Rangers fought these things before. Ryli told me a little about some dust-and-bone things that they wiped out. Apparently, there's some way that these things can respawn."
"Interesting, judging by their particular patterning, they seemed to be Strangled Shades, which aren't given to reoccurring without outside interference. They also typically require violent deaths in their creation, which would likely require ongoing cult involvement..."
"Then let's go kill them before my arms shrink."
"Groog, the puppies need us. Tally ho!" Aurealia leads the way further into the complex, turning north when she sees a passage. After going a short way she comes to another corner and stops to check things out before entering the hallway.
Croq nods and stays right beside her sister...ready to sing at a moment's notice.
Before reaching the northern hallway, Aurealia, Croq, and anyone else who accompanies them spot a metal construct of some sort sitting at a desk. It is completely still. In fact, the construct likely has not moved in hundreds of years.
As for the northern hallway, the area is illuminated by light shining from a glass globe on the ceiling. As such, you have no trouble searching the area. You soon find the telltale signs of battle. Specifically, you see the remains of three recently destroyed skeletons scattered on the ground.
There are four heavy wooden doors on each side of the hallway. Four of them are slightly opened. The others are closed. Looking inside, Aurealia quickly concludes that these side rooms were most likely reading rooms.
At the very end of the hallway is a large sculpture of a human man's face. One of his eyes is cover by a blindfold, and his mouth is open, seemingly as part of a bewildered expression. Going by the chipped stone around the man's visible eye, it seems that something was recently removed from here. Thanks to her keen senses, Aurealia is able to determine that this carving is actually a secret door. However, the mechanisms to open it seem to be very complex...
Otherwise, there is nothing of interest in this hallway or the reading rooms.
"This seems to be a secret door, but I can't figure out how to open it," Aurealia says, pointing at the carving. She leads back around the corner and to the south, when she comes to a four way split, she heads west into the large room there.
Groog looks at the strange looking puppy as it talks. He looks at the face and says, ”No. Not door. Face. Face not door! Silly puppy,” he mutters the last words as he shakes his head.
You follow the tracks to the south, and after traveling through a wooden door, you reach an intersection. To the east and west, there are two more wooden doors. They are both currently closed. There is yet another hallway to the south, but going by Ryli's faded hoofprints, no one seems to have traveled that way in years.
At this intersection, you once again discover the telltale signs of battle. This time, you see the remains of a construct scattered across yet another mosaic on the floor, which is covered in blood. The mosaic itself is just an abstract circle pattern of some kind. While slightly faded in a few places, its colors are still quite radiant.
As for the construct, it appears to have been a large humanoid with four arms. It was built from iron gears and bronze plating. In one of its broken hands, you see that it holds a bright red fabric of some sort.
After checking the door for traps and spotting nothing of concern, Aurealia leads the group into the western room. You discover what must have been a magnificent library. The walls are made of high quality marble and decorated with small traces of gold. The ceiling is formed by two domes that intersect, and the floor is covered by fine green frescos. At one time, hundreds of books might have been housed here. However...
"...It appears that this room was recently ransacked," Kelhuud notes, studying the various papers and such on the ground.
Aurealia's nostrils flare. "The eastern door...They went that way."
"I just checked and it's absolutely most definitely not trapped. Groog, the puppy killers are in there!"
Assuming Groog goes to open the door, Croq starts to sing just as he does so.
Kallie pulls the piece of red fabric from the fist of the destroyed construct and studies it.
The prospect of a great library excites her, but is crestfallen to see it in such disarray. She still casts detect magic and sweeps the room, looking for magical auras.
Jaya's brows knit in dismay as she sees the careless work of their rivals, idly noting some of the characteristics of the destroyed construct
"I do hope we're able to recover some of these artifacts, when we aren't racing the clock that is."
When lizard-girl-man-pup-thing says me a men behind that door, Groog narrowed his eyes at it and gripped his blade in both hands, tightening his grip. Rather than open it, he does what he thinks is the most direct way to hurt the men behind the door. Which is hurt the door.
Groog easily destroys the wooden door with his adamantine weapon.
"Uh... Hira! We have a problem!" a man's voice calls out. Seconds later, two more of those clockwork constructs begin advancing toward your group. Since he is the most obvious threat, they appear ready to attack Groog...
Going by Cheshire's movements, you determine that the invisible Galatea has likely relocated herself to get a better view of the action...
A man wearing a blue breastplate quickly shuffles to the back of the room and starts blocking what appears to be another door.
"We have a problem, Hira!" he repeats as he knocks on the door.
Galatea suddenly reappears. Going by her chanting, it seems that she tried casting a spell on the man! Alas, it doesn't seem to take hold...
"Constructs! I hate constructs!"
Groog grits his teeth when the Blue Man steps away. Lizard-Girl-Man-Thing said he hurt nice puppies. That makes Groog mad.
Very mad.
”You hurt puppies,” he snarls as he tightens his grip on his blade. ”Groog no like that.”
He then roars out and begins hacking into the metal man in front of him. Groog didn’t like metal men either. Metal men always bad, he seemed to recall.
__________
"Drat! They're immune to electricity, and most damage! Groog has the best weapon against them, as far as I can tell. Hopefully he can reduce them to rubble before we need to waste spells on them."
Kallie brings up a defensive ward.