Jonagher moves up with Ragna and motions for her to hold steady as the sound of her armor is silenced. "Let me take a look, so we at least know what we're dealing with...and then we can talk about how to prepare for it...or avoid it for the time being."
He reaches for one of the shutters and carefully opens it to peer at what lies on the other side.
Highness and Jonagher approach the heavy double doors. Carefully opening one of the shutters, Jonagher looks out onto a daylit cobblestoned courtyard with errant milkweeds and tufts of crabgrass growing up in the cracks between the stones.
To the north, directly opposite the doors, the inner wall of the citadel has partially collapsed into a huge mound of rubble, which a large black-blue reptilian quadruped with blood-red spikes is clawing at ferociously, seemingly trying to climb the pile of debris. Above its reach, a set of stairs climbing up to the battlements above dangles, its lower reaches now part of the pile of rubble the beast is displacing.
Jonagher slowly closes the shutter and stands quietly for a moment, before deciding exactly how to describe what lies on the other side of the door.
"Well, guys...you know how we've been saying every chamber in this citadel seems to have yet another monstrous beast ready to eat us? I guess we finally found the apex predator. There's a...ummm, really big lizard in there...like, about the size of a dragon, maybe? But without the wings. It's got black-and-blue scales and some blood-red spikes on it...and it's clawing at a big pile of rubble on the far side of the courtyard like it wants to climb up for some reason. So, maybe it's trapped in there? And...maybe we should leave it that way until we're fully ready to take it on?"
He steps back from the door, keeping an eye on their impulsive goblin-king in case Highness gets any crazy ideas to throw open the doors and charge inside.
"You know, I feel no shame in admitting that this beast is beyond us right now," he tells everyone, "Let's check out the rest of the citadel. And who knows? If we find the goblin tribe, maybe we can rally them to take down the lizard together?"
"A dragon, hmm?" Ragna says, her interest piqued. "I happen to be something of an expert on dragons..." She pushes off the wall she had been leaning against to take a look for herself, forgetting their need for stealth in her excitement.
"Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope." Highness says, motioning everyone back away from the doors. He stood fast in front of Ragna and then when she seemed far too curious, he grabbed her arm and drug her away from the shutter, exerting a surprising amount of force for such a small person.
Once everyone was backed to the opposite end of the room, he squared himself up and looked at the group.
"Going out there is a terrible idea. That creature looks like someone took a wagon, rolled it around in ugly and stuck armor, spikes and claws on it. Now that I think about it, I am sure that creature's claws had claws." he says, speaking very fast, and gesticulating wildly.
"We need to find someone else stupid enough to fight that thing for us, or drop a tower on it, or blow it up somehow."
"Hence, my suggestion that we find the goblin tribe and rally them to assist us in slaying it..." Jonagher offers, "Assuming, of course, it didn't eat them already...but, either way, we can't let it escape the courtyard. Imagine what devastation it could wreak on Breachill if it got out. Speaking of which, how did it even get in...?"
Ragna lets the goblin lead her away, lost in though. "It's not a real dragon." She says after Highness has his say. "It's more like a crocodile. It's native to tropical biomes. It must have escaped or been released from a caravan hauling exotic pets or something to find itself here. Unless the hellknights keep exotic pets?"
"I wouldn't put it past them," Jonagher offers, "And, of course, we know they're into summoning things. Devils, yes. For training and initiation rites. But...maybe crocodile-dragon-lizards, too, yeah?" The half-elf tests the tension on his bow and walks towards the next door. "Who's for checking out the barracks and saving that thing for later?"
"Hmm." Ragna stands pondering, tapping her battleaxe against her thigh, her plan to clear the rest of the citadel first already forgotten. "Those red spikes would make for a fine trophy..."
"A draconic creature? It might be a sign." Mutters the priest.
He positons himself behind the half-elf, holy symbol at the ready. "I concur. Fighting that creature is bound to be a noisy affair and we wouldn't want to attract any opportunistic foe that might try to finish us off.
Jonagher opens the next door before Ragna can change her mind. He reveals a dark room lit only by shafts of light filtering through the arrow slits. This was once a barrack, but most of the bunk beds that filled it are now toppled and broken. In the room's center, the more intact bedframes are clustered together, filty and ripped bedding draped over them to form a sort of fort. There is a musky funk in the air mixed with the rancid smell of rotting meat.
Jonagher makes a face at the smell coming from the next room, turning back to the rest of the team to wave his hand as if to stir the air a bit. "Something foul in here...maybe recent..." he murmurs low in case another predator is lairing in the citadel. "At least we've got decent light from the outer wall's arrow slits," he whispers, "Might be a decent spot from which to shoot that dragon-lizard, too..."
The half-elf cautiously leads the way inside, making room for everyone else to join him. As a precaution, he also readies an arrow with his bow in case he needs to quickly target something. It's clear that he plans on hanging back and covering anyone else who chooses to explore the chamber. And he looks for a spot to linger in the shadows rather than highlight himself in one of the sunbeams from outside.
Not particularly eager to enter the room, his taking his time to do so a combination of caution and revulsion, Irenaeus more or less follows 1jonagher's example as he makes a sweeping motion with his free hand as if to usher Ragna and Highness into the room.
"By all means, be my guest. I, or we, will be right behind you, I assure you," he quips with a little smile. Even if the room smelled of roses, he would still not find it particularly wise to enter it in front of his more melee-oriented friends rather than behind.
Shaserai recoils at the foul smell emanating from the room, clearly coming from some rotting carcass. As he steps in, following behind Ren, he can distinguish a certain odour that strikes him as somewhat beastly. He tries to remember if any of his church's treatises described something similar.
Ragna reluctantly follows the others, making for the strangely arrayed beds.
Her shield raised defensively, Ragna advances slowly toward the beds clustered in the middle of the room, Highness at her heels.
Cautiousl following Ragna and Highness, Alak suddenly stops, his eyes flashing alarm. Glancing around at the others, he points with his sword toward the bed-fortress as he circles out around it to the east.
Cautiously following Ragna and Highness, Alak suddenly stops, his eyes flashing alarm. Glancing around at the others, he points with his sword toward the bed-fortress as he circles out around it to the east.
Jonagher nods and quietly moves up () to a better position so he can cover all of the beds. Positioning himself between the two arrow slits in the outer wall, he crouches down in an attempt to hide within the shadows closer to the floor. Bow drawn, he prepares to shoot anything dangerous that might appear.
Casting a quick spell to protect himself in the event of an attack, Irenaeus holds his staff in front of himself, ready to magically fling it at any enemy that might appear with but a gesture.
Shaserai hesitates for a moment, but instead of following Jonagher he stays with Ren, alert and ready to react to any movement inside the bunk bed fort.
Ragna strides to the fort and kicks one of the beds to scare out whatever is under it.
Tired of the caution, Ragna boldly appraches the hornet's nest and kicks it, raising her shield.
Highness simply grinned as Ragna took the straightforward approach to the problem. Spying the hallway on the far side of the room as a potential escape route for whatever was in the nest, Highness set off to block that possibility...maybe.
Highness circles around to cut off any means of escape.
A moment later, a goblinoid creature the size of a human emerges from the fortress. Jonagher releases a well-aimed arrow, and Ren sends his staff flying through the air to strike the creature, but she still punches at Revka with a powerful fist.
Alak circles around the structure and slashes the goblinoid with his greatsword.
Revka quickly maneuvers her shield to intercept the blow from the goblin, but the creatures fist does a surprising amount of damage to both her and her shield, the force of the punch rippling through Revka’s body as it lands.
"Get off her, you ugly beast!" Jonagher shouts, stepping closer to Ren so he can get off a clean shot on Ragna's attacker ().
He then draws his shortsword with his free hand, ready to wade into the melee if the beast is still attacking.
Jonagher's arrow takes the creature clean through the eye. She twitches for a brief moment, then collapses to the floor.
The priest looks around and seeing that there are no more imminent threats he relaxes a little. "Well, that was certainly fast." He switches to elvish to praise the half-elf "Your shot was great Jonagher."
Shaserai lowers his holy symbol, approaches Ragna and gingerly touches her shoulder. "That punch seemed painful. How's your arm feeling? I can take a look and treat it if you want."
The priest looks around and seeing that there are no more imminent threats he relaxes a little. "Well, that was certainly fast." He switches to elvish to praise the half-elf "Your shot was great Jonagher."
"It's all in the draw," Jonagher explains, "Clean, quick, and without hesitation. That'll help you hit the mark every time. Also, aiming. Careful aiming helps, too."
He sheathes his blade again now that he sees no need for it, but moves around the beds with another arrow nocked in case any more targets present themselves. Once satisfied the danger is over, he circles back to watch Shaserai tend to Ragna.
"That was a bold move," he says to the warrior-woman, "The direct approach isn't normally my style, but it works well for you. You flushed that thing out straight away. Hopefully, it didn't rattle you too much. Looked like it landed a heavy blow...and, judging by the size of those arms and claws...that might have dropped someone with less skill than you with that shield. Nicely done."
Jonagher then looks over to Highness. "That thing have any goblin-blood to it? I hope we didn't inadvertently slay an ally of your tribe..."
"Goblin blood? Maybe...let me check." Highness said, looking over at the corpse.
Highness wandered over and nudged the body with a toe, flipping it over onto its back, then bent over and started moving the mouth.
"It looks like you got a bit of splinter in your eye. Does it hurt?"
"Nah it just tickles a bit, makes me want to sneeze. Hey why did you mess up my fort, Mr. NumNums?" he said in a raspy low voice as he moved the jaw.
"It looked a bit of a mess, we just wanted to kick it over to see what was inside."
"I was inside Mr. NumNums! That was my place...and now its ruined. Makes me want to bite your face off for it...a bit...and maybe chew on an arm."
"That seems a bit aggressive, and don't call me NumNums." Highness said angrily shaking the head by the arrow shaft. "My name is Highness!" he said, standing up and brushing off his hands.
"I don't think we will get any information out of this one...its decided to bite its tongue."
"It's not a goblin, but a bugbear. Horrible things, like to sneak into villages and snatch children one at a time. They love torturing their victims, and sometimes keep trophies for themselves...also send bits to the families. The darkest goblin stories have a hobgoblin in it somewhere..."
Highness moved away from the corpse and walked over to the nest, hopped nimbly over the barricade and began searching through the wreckage.
"Charming," Irenaeus remarks in a tone so dry that it might as well be a desert geologically speaking. Though whether he refers to the information about the bugbears' habits or his greenish companion's performance with the corpse he does not make entirely clear.
"I am going to assume that this is probably not the only bugbear we find in this place," the mage thinks out loud. "Or is it? Do they prefer groups or are they more... nomadic?"
Finding himself not all that certain actually, he -quite begrudgingly, to be sure- turns to their resident goblin. Unable to keep a rather heavy sigh from escaping his lips, he more or less asks. "Highness? Anything more you can tells us about these... distant cousins of yours? Are we likely to meet more of them?"
"Owww." Ragna groans, dropping her shield and shaking out the affected arm, numbness already beginning to spread upward from her wrist to her shoulder. She absently lets Shaserai take her bruised arm. "That wasn't a great shot; that was an amazing shot! By everyone, really. That was very clean." She said, impressed by everyone's performance in the ambush. They were getting better at this.
Highness enters the bugbear's lair, the darkness within no hindrance to his goblinoid vision. A filthy pile of sheets and rugs forms a makeshift bed on one side. The stones of the floor in here first appear to be painted a dark rusty brown, a stain which the goblin-king then reconizes as dried blood.
Scattered around the interior are the remains of the bugbear's victims, mostly small animals from the looks of the bones and scraps of fur. There are drifts of dessicated flies with their wings pulled off and of beetles and spiders with their legs removed. The upper reaches of the bunks are festooned with a fetid garland of dead snakes. A bedraggled squirrel, still alive but barely conscious, sprawls dispiritedly on the floor, a nail driven through its tail into the nearest bedframe to keep it captive.
The bugbear's meager belongings are in here as well: a variety of knives, three javelins, a small hammer, and a collection of nails and tacks.
"Sounds like an absolutely murderous beast," Jonagher remarks, "I'm even happier we put it down. Who knows what kind of evil it's been up to here in the citadel. You don't suppose it somehow chased off the goblins, do you? Seems like we've searched all over and haven't found a single one outside of Highness..."
Shaserai takes the blanket from his bedroll and spreads it over one of the beds that make up the bugbear's "fort". He invites Ragna to sit while he organizes some ingredients and tools form his healer's kit.
"Keep in mind we've only searched the main floor of the citadel. Altaerein also has the battlements and that huge basement." He turns to Ragna and hands her a small leaf. "Here, chew this while I work."
He takes several herbs and flowers from their carefully labeled containers and places them in a small mortar. With a little water from his waterskin and working the mixture with a pestle he makes a paste that he spreads on a cloth. He carefully applies the bundle on Ragna's injured arm and makes her hold it in place while he cleans up. Once he thinks the poultice has done it's work he spreads some onintment on the human's arm and bandages it up.
"There. That should be better already. Any discomfort?"
Once Ragna is back on her feet he takes his blanket and after cleaning it with a little magic trick he stuffs it inside his backpack.
Highness poked his head up from the middle of the nest. "Bugbears aren't friends with anyone. They fall into line if something beats them or scares them enough. This one was a young bugbear, and they typically live alone. No fingers or toes or other trophies, but there is..." he said, his voice trailing off.
"Shaserai. Come here for a moment when you are done with Ragna, I have need of your skills" he said, a curious turn in his voice.
After putting his blanket inside his backpack Shaserai turns around and goes to Highness. "Of course, did you get hurt in that kerfuffle..." he trails off as he sees what the goblin is showing him.
"That's ghastly, the poor thing." He takes some nuts from his rations and speaks softly at the squirrel, trying to get it to eat something as he studies how to help the animal.
The long-brutalized squirrel cringes in fear as Shaserai gets close, but the elf's calm and quiet voice and gentle handling quickly win the animal over. It relaxes, trusting this newcomer's intentions.
As soon as the squirrel gets comfortable with Shaserai being near it he takes the pincers from his repair kit and carefully cuts the nail keeping the animal trapped. He gently frees the squirrel.
Once the squirrel is free, even though Shaserai is not totally confident in treating animals, he tries to alleviate some of it's worse injuries so it can return to the forest as soon as possible.
Shaserai's skilled fingers gingerly test the squirrel's limbs for soundess, and he takes the time to apply tiny dollops of salve to the wounds he finds. After several minutes, the squirrel is looking much more comfortable and alert. It chitters happily, twitching its bandaged tail.
"Poor thing indeed," Irenaeus says, genuine interest in the squirrel's wellbeing evident in his tone.
"Perhaps some water as well," he adds as he fetches his waterskin to complement the nuts Shaserai has already offered the tiny animal.
"That beast we slew had to have been a foul, murderous sort to have tortured an animal like that..." Jonagher observes as he leans in among the beds. "I'm feeling all the better for putting an arrow thru its eye." He looks around the rest of the area just to make sure there aren't any other animals on death's door.