Shaserai points to the door before Ragna. "From the citadel floor plan, I'd say this is some kind of storage room. I propose we search it and then maybe take a peek inside the summoning chamber from there."
”Sounds like a plan.” Ragna says says, heading to the first door. She throws a nervous glance back at Highness, worried about what he might do with the flammable dummies while unsupervised. ”Why don’t you come up here with me, Highness. In case there are more skeletons.”
"I agree. And I for one am quite interested in taking a look at that summoning chamber," Irenaeus concurs.
Shaserai points to the door before Ragna. "From the citadel floor plan, I'd say this is some kind of storage room. I propose we search it and then maybe take a peek inside the summoning chamber from there."
Ragna opens the door to reveal what looks to have served as a pantry when the citadel was in use. Shelves against the walls still hold a few rotted provisions and cooking utensils, though the room is disastrously filthy and has clearly been ransacked at some point since the Hellknights departed. Doors lead east and west.
Shaserai surveys the wreck of what was the citadel pantry. "Well, this was expected and yet oddly disappointing." He says as he prods one of the shelves with his foot. "I suppose we can do a thorough search later, after we investigate the summoning chamber."
”Onto the demons, then.” Ragna says, moving to the next door. Twenty-four hours ago she would have though the idea of devils remaining so long after the hellknights had vacated the premises to be ridiculous, but it seems like they had left something attracting monsters behind. She turns the handle, pushing the door open just enough to prevent it from re-latching when she released it, raises her shield, and kicks the door open.
The stone walls and floor of this sprawling and irregularly shaped room are painted entirely black, with the exception of a huge crimson pentagram in a circle inscribed on the floor. Narrow slits in the far wall are the only other decoration. Overhead, rafters disappear in gloom and shadow against the black-painted ceiling.
Irenaeus speaks a quick incantation to allow him to discern if there is any magic present in the room or the pentagram before cautiously approaching it to take a better look.
Jonagher flinches when Ragna violently kicks the door in. Though he inwardly admires the lady's eagerness to face danger head on, he also recognizes that it might get her in over her head...and if she were to fall, where would that leave the rest of them? The half-elf allows Ren to proceed him, especially when he notices the wizard is casting a spell...hopefully something to ward off demons. He then follows close behind.
"Is...ummm...anything there?" he asks aloud, "I mean...uhhhh...aren't devils or demons supposed to be all fire and brimstone...and something? Or, are they more like ghosts...unseen and hidden...until they start possessing you and taking over your mind?" He looks back at Alak, half-expecting the Hellknight to educate them.
Highness wiggles next to Ragnhild to look in the room as well. "Wonder if there is some reason someone painted the floor black? It wasn't evil enough with the symbol painted on the floor?" he muses, making no effort to actually enter the room.
"Well...I suppose black would help mask any scorch marks left behind by devil-fire...and possibly the dried blood stains of any Hellknights who failed the test," Jonagher muses in answer to the goblin's question. "Can you imagine how much worse...and blinding...it would be if they painted it celestial white? That'd be impossible to keep clean!
Not expecting the young human's exhuberance, Shaserai is suprised at the method used for gaining entrance to the summoning chamber. "If anything it would be devils." He remarks at Ragna's words. He looks around the room, noting the black walls and ceiling. He steps into the room, and seeing Ren scan for magic, he goes to the far side of the room, trying not to step on the pentagram and does the same.
As he walks he tries to elaborate on Jonagher's answer to Highness's question "Those are good reasons for a black room. These," he points to the red pentagram and black walls "are also Asmodeus's colors, which i suppose would be appealing to an organization called Hellknights." He looks at Alak for his opinion.
Alak seems on the verge of responding when he suddenly tenses. "Listen! Do you hear that?" Drawing his greatsword, he pushes past Ragna into the test arena, straining his eyes to gaze into the darkness.
"Uhhh...I don't hear anything..." Jonagher replies, but draws his blade just in case the Hellknight's senses are better attuned than his own in this kind of environment. Of course, some part of his brain also wonders if there could be a malign influence in this chamber...something that might play upon Alak's affiliation with the Order...and unduly affect their ally by preying upon his fears and imagination. Jonagher's eyes stray towards Ren and Shaserai to see if either spellcasters have identified anything with their spells to warrant such a thing.
Ragna follows Alak, drawing an axe and bringing her lighted shield to bear.
Ragna sees nothing but the light and the dark...
Shaserai tenses at Alak's warning. The priest utters a protective prayer and a floating screen of force appears before him. He scans the room with his keen elven sight, hoping to see what the human has heard hiding in the penumbra.
Ragna follows Alak, not sure what she's getting ready for.
Down from the shadowy rafters above, a tiny winged figure flutters. Its tail twists and strikes at Ragna with a sharp barb at the end before it flies back up toward the rafters.
Ragna reflexively strikes out at the shadow that swoops down at her, landing a solid blow on it as it retreats to the rafters. ”Another bat!’ She shouts, hardly feeling the sting from the creature...
Ragna barely notices the sting, but a moment later, pain and stiffness flow down her arm from the barely-noticeable puncture wound. Her consolation is that she badly injured the thing that stung her, which flutters back up to the rafters laboriously and dripping ichorous blood.
"That is no bat," Irenaeus warns as he seizes the chance to take a better look at the creature as it attacks Ragna.
Casting a protective spell much like Shaserai's, for a brief moment a rune-decorated round shield of translucent blue light appears in front of him before almost vanishing. Then, at the very least somewhat better protected than a moment ago, he tries to recall what he knows of the flying foe, drawing from both his background as a Chelish mage and anything he may have managed to see in the devil bestiary they found earlier and now carry with them.
And last but not least, he opts to actually trying speaking to the winged creature, simply saying "wait" and "stop" in Common, Draconic and Infernal with as much authority as he can muster.
Ren conjures an arcane shield, then tries to remember the pages he recently flipped through. He commands the creature to stand down in various languages.
Another of the creatures flutters over the party's heads and perches on a rafter above Ren. "'Stop?' 'Wait?'" it demands indignantly. "Who are you to give us orders?" With a gesture and an incantation, it casts some sort of spell on itself.
Highness' eyes narrow at the small creatures, well out of reach of the group.
"Ragna. I am going to need a boost up if you are willing to toss me." Highness says, getting ready to run at the warrior.
"Is it a devil?" Jonagher asks aloud, "It looks like a devil..." He sheathes his blade and readies his bow, still standing close to the door and unsure if he should attack or prepare to run. "Alak? Didn't you say they used silver weapons to fight such things? You might want to use that longsword we found..." The half-elf looks at the rather plain, iron-tipped arrow he's nocked. "Why couldn't they have had any silver-tipped arrows?" he mutters.
Highness calls to Ragna to set up a reckless maneuver.
Jonagher sheathes his sword and readies his bow, setting his back to the wall so there's at least one direction from which an attack oughtn't to come.
"Alak? Didn't you say they used silver weapons to fight such things? You might want to use that longsword we found..."
Alak smirks and brandishes his greatsword. "Trust me. If it gets in range, this blade's big enough, the hell-monkey won't notice it's not made of silver." Holding his sword in one hand, he draws a javelin with another and throws it at the devil Ragna wounded before repositioning his grip to have his sword ready. The badly-injured fiend sways on its perch but does not drop.
"Very well..." the half-elf responds, "You're the expert..." He glances around at the rest of the team, all intent on defeating the devil-bat-thing. "You know, if we survive this..." Jonagher jokes aloud to everyone, "I fully expect us all to become honorary Hellknights for passing the test. You'll vouch for us, right, Alak?"
Shaserai nearly starts the chants to attack the devils with his fire, but remembering that it would not hurt such creatures, he switches to a defensive strategy. Seeing that the winged fiends have no problem swooping in and out to attack, decides to protect himself and the chelaxian mage. The priest intones the protective prayer that will guard Ren from the devil that had used a spell of some sort and then with a quick incantation he renews his mystical shield.
Shaserai casts protective spells on himself and Ren, as Highness waits for Ragna's signal that she is ready...
Feeling woozy, Ragnhild squats down taking a powerful lifting stance, her axe and shield clattering to the stone floor to either side of her. She interlaces her fingers, cupping her hands into a makeshift stirrup. As the goblin jump-steps onto her hand, she powers to a standing position, simultaneously lifting her hand-step to launch the goblin into the air.
In a sudden burst of speed the goblin dashed toward Ragnhild, placed his foot in the provided stirrup-step and as she surged upwards, jumped towards the ceiling and the imps above.
Ragna drops her axe and shield and crouches, her fingers interlaced, waiting for the goblin.
Highness dashes forward and steps into the provided stirrup. The maneuver was more bold than well-thought-through, however; the goblin is flung ceiling-ward but not near enough the devil to seize it. Fortunately, however, Highness manages to grab hold of one of the rafters before plummeting back to the stone floor. From there, it's a simple matter for him to scramble atop the rafter.
The diminutive monarch cackles madly as he is flung through the air toward the rafters. The graceful throw and landing is spoiled somewhat by the goblin as he is laughing so hard that he almost swings himself right off his perch before righting himself, arms flailing, at the last second.
Turning the momentary loss of balance to his advantage Highness reaches out to grab the wing of one of the imps in an attempt to knock it from the air.
Above the party's heads, Highness reaches out and grabs hold of the uninjured devil.
The other devil concentrates a moment, and the worst of its wounds visibly heal. After that, it casts a spell and suddenly disappears from view!
Ren irritably curses the diabolic creature for disappearing at so inopportune a moment. Unable to target both, he settles for crackling electricity at only the devil Highness has a hold of before renewing his protective arcane shield.
Up in the rafters, the tiny devil attempts to twist its wing out of the goblin's grasping hand, to no avail. Unable to escape, it then whips its barbed tail around to sting him but fails to make contact. "Clever little goblin, aren't you?" it sneers with a wink before suddenly transforming into a full-sized boar and, wingless, plummeting floorward where it lands heavily between Ren and Shaserai.
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Jonagher's mouth falls open in disbelief after Highness managed to make it into the rafters, grasp a devil, which then transformed into a wild boar only to subsequently fall down into the fray below. "You don't see that everyday," he mutters and then lets fly as many arrows as he can put into the beast.
Perhaps flummoxed by the strange occurrences going on around him, Jonagher's hands tremble as he wields his bow. Only the second of the three rapid arrows he fires hits the diabolic boar, but even that one appears to do no serious harm to the beast.
Alak steps in front of the half-elf and swings his large blade over his shoulder, neatly severing the boar's head from its body. "If only we had some bays and rosemary...," he mutters before returning his attention to the seemingly empty rafters. "Watch out for the other one," he warns the others. "It's still there somewhere."
"Great bladework Alak. The priest compliments their patron's prowess, honestly impressed. I'm trying to sense the creature."
The death of the fiend breaks the protection he'd placed on Ren, so Shaserai dedicates his efforts to finding the one that has used it's magical invisibility. He listens with attention and scans the vicinity of the spot where the devil vanished, hoping to pinpoint it by the sound of it's wings or catch a glimpse of an imperfection in it's illusion. With a little luck he can direct the others to it's position and defend himself with his shield spell before it attacks again.
Shaserai trains his senses on the rafters. "It's still there," he tells the others. "It hasn't moved; I'm sure of it."
Ragna draws and throws one of her axes into the dark rafters...
Ragna draws a throwing axe and flings it up where the devil used to be, but it arcs through and crashes back to the floor without meeting an obstacle.
Highness grinned maniacally as the devil transformed into a boar in his hands. Then laughing, he continued holding onto the boar, adding his weight and bracing his knees against the creature as they fell toward the ground.
"Its raining bacon!!!" he laughed as they plummeted toward the group below.
The pair slammed to the flagstones with a meaty thunk. Highness rolled away from the boar as he popped to his feet, and then stumbled sideways, a bit dazed, as Alek finished his grisly task.
"Ragna! That was fun. We need to do that again!" he shouted as his red eyes rolled in their sockets, the goblin weaving a bit where he stood.
Highness pops back up from his tumble and prepares for more battle.
Alak swears. "It's gone! Does anyone know where it is?"
Much like Shaserai before him, Irenaeus tries to spot the flying creature or at the very least any signs of its whereabouts. "Show yourself," he calls out in the tongue of devils as he looks for the small fiend. "Surrender lest you meet the same fate as your companion."
Ren may as well be talking to the empty air for all the effect his words have on the invisible devil.
"Sand? Smoke? Sausage slices slung sideways simply seeking silent sneaks?" Highness asks, looking around the room for something suitable to toss in the air.
Jonagher relaxes the draw on his bow. "Yeah...looks like we just drove it off. Maybe it fled back to Hell or wherever it came from...?" His gaze wanders from the rafters and back to the rest of the chamber and very vivid pentagram drawn on the floor. "You say they summoned such things to test a warrior's skill?" he asks Alak, "Are they bound to this chamber? Or are they free to roam the rest of the citadel if they aren't put down?" He looks over to Ren and Shaserai in case either of the spellcasters know anything about such rituals.
Ragna strides to the door they entered through and closes it. She turns towards the center of the room, grimacing and drawing another throwing axe. "It can't stay invisible forever, can it?"