Linna hands a torch to Milosh, that Nurten jumps in to light.
Thus seeing better, you start exploring...
You go down the passage , and peek around the corner--
--seeing a long passage that has an opening to your left, then to your right, then that ends in some sort of T, with corridors going both left and right.
You then keep on moving a bit, and explore some more , seeing that the first side corridor comes to another T junction, that you move to.
You see that the corridor to the East, seems to dead end.
While the one to the West joins most probably with the other part of the T junction way to the West.
You backtrack a bit , and check out the other opening in the original corridor you saw.
This one dead ends too.
But there is a stone urn in the corner.
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Linna hands a torch to Milosh, that Nurten jumps in to light.
"Should be a torch in my backpack, and some flint and steel in the side pocket next to the sausage. If you hit the wheel of cheese, you've gone too far!"
Linna sniffs. "I think our priority is going to be finding the boss for now, and we'll poke through every urn and pile of bodies later?" she asks.
Skipping the examination of objects you find, for now, the group follows Nurten along.
He leads the team down to where the corridor does actually hook up with the one behind them, to the South.
There, they see that to the North is a set of double doors, also made of stone.
A small stone vase sits in the corner.
The corridor does continue to the West, before seemingly turning back to the South again.
The torch-light dances on the walls, your shadows sometimes seeming small, sometimes .
Which way does Nurten wish to go to find the "boss"?
As you all shuffle your feet in the slightly sandy corridor, with the torch light projecting ominous shapes on the walls, you know you must decide at one moment as to which way you go: open the double-doors, or continue down the corridor?
Linna sees no traps, and gives Nurten the go ahead.
He swings the doors open, revealing a long corridor, ending with what seems to be a pair of double doors, and corridors heading both sides like a T.
In that corridor, illuminated by metal braziers roaring away, filled with coal, and nestled in alcoves, you first see a couple stone tables, then an opening to the right, that leads back to the entrance room, and, facing it, to your left in the corridor, a third set of double doors, made of stone.
Nurten spots nothing moving, or seemingly dangerous.
|
|
"Hmm, with lit Braziers it seems a safe bet that our 'Boss' still remains here." Vargir ponders aloud, before stepping forth into the corridor beyond. "I shall press on and see what awaits"
The Ulfen Ranger passes through the doors and into the corridor beyond, keeping their footfalls as soft as possible as they step carefully forwards.
As MJ moves away from the brazier, for fear of setting more things on fire, or getting set on fire, you know not which--
--Vargjr moves quietly past the doors and into the corridor.
|
Half-orc pats Vargir at his back as he moves forward saying:
"We got your back Northman. Do great deeds and I will sing of them."
Thinking that for now, they are moving from room to room without any adventures. He understands more and more why certain story-tellers instead of adventures describe fiction. Apparently sometimes missions are about walking around through the empty corridors...
As you talk at the end of the short maze-like series of corridors, Vargir moves quietly past the first set of double doors, down the illuminated corridor, moving past the two stone tables, the metal brazier to his right, and coming up to the set of double doors.
Listening to the doors, Vargir is quite sure that, given the echoes, there is a big room behind the stone doors. Probably the size of the entry-way that is now behind him.
He notices a good deal of light in the cracks of the door-siides, and is confident someone is burning several torches or such on the other side.
Concentrating, he also hears the faint sound of someone writing with a quill pen on some coarse parchment... what an ear Vargir possesses!
Prepared, and once the others have approached, Xun opens the door.
It is a big room
Well illuminated by several braziers, one beside each of the four main pillars, and two up on the raised part of the chamber.
Two elaborate sarcophagi before the raised part.
And some pots on one side, and a metal chandelier thing lying down on the other side.
Then, on the raised part, after a few steps, there are two pillars, a half a dozen smaller statues, and the centerpiece of some elaborate shrine: a 10-foot-tall statue, holding a brazier of lit coals.
There are some other stone objects and such above.
Also, a man is writing away, in a frenzy, on some parchment, up near the statue.
He nearly jumps out of his skin when you open the door:
|
|
"Lucky" Linna strides into the room, waving at the man. "Howdy, Boss! So good to see you; the guards outside didn't seem to know where you'd be, so we've been all over the... building, I guess it is? At any rate, so good to see a fellow Pathfinder! Where do you need us?"
As she speaks, she approaches, weapons in hand but held casually-- fork resting across her shoulder, knife dangling limply from her wrist.
Linna is hoping to feel him out and see how legitimate he may or may not be; hedging her bets on the assumption that he is not a Pathfinder, she is naturally being deceitful in pretending to accept him at face value.
"Pathfinders?! Great! Come, come... I am Nefaram Subeli."
The man stops writing, and motions you over.
"I am recording things, and have been all over the crypt too, and--", he looks up at the statue, --"I am a bit creeped out.
It went all dark in here before, all black.
Come, come, it is good to have fellow workers to help...and maybe guard against whatever is in the shadows."
"Oh, I have found many things! I am cataloguing all. It will be wonderful!
I follow the Motto: 'Explore, Report, Corroborate!', do I not?!
But I have felt the shadows..."
»Oh, I am not a Captain...
So, you have not seen darkness down here? »
»Then you are lucky indeed!
Because it does go all dark... ink black! »
He shivers...
»Come in, come all in... best to be in numbers! »
Nefarm looks at Nurten: "A GOBLIN! IS IT DANGEROUS... oh, hello, you... am I a longshank? Yes, yes, protect me!
Good, good... come in, come in!"
|
|
Xun walks in and eyes the Nefaram Subeli when he talks with Nurten and Linna.
"Tell me Mr. Subeli how did you get a permit to dig and uncover those ruins? And why is it a year old permit, if only lately the government allowed pathfinders to explore it? Are you truly a pathfinder? "
He takes few steps into the room keeping himself next to a wall and asks:
"Corroborate huh? That is not the motto. The one that you were thinking of is: Explore, report, and cooperate. Tell us who you are, and we will protect you from the shadows Mr. Subeli."
Nurten moved up to the door to be able to see and address Nefaram Subeli.
As Xun walks in and talks to him, Nefaram starts to become even more pale: "Permit? It... it is a valid permit, of course-- a year old? Well, the government allowed it when it was allowed, not before, but not later!"
Nefaram stands up straight, and fully turns to you, his back to the statue: "Of course I am a Fathpinder... Pathfinder! I... trained under Norden Balentiir who is the Commanding Officer of Osirion's Pathfinders!"
When Xun suddenly lashes out at Nefaram Subeli, the man starts to shake: "Corroborate, cooperate, coordinate... whatever, who cares! It is dangerous down here!"
Intimidated, he keeps on shivering: "Okay, okay, I am a clerk, in Osirion’s permit office, but we are so badly paid! It is not my fault... I... I took advantage of the shifting bureaucracy to reach the site ahead of the you, there true representatives. I posed as an agent of the Pathfinder Society, and hired a team of laborers to take over clearing the sand from the location. Now that I made it inside the ruin, was planning to engage in archaeology, in order to st... help you! Yes, to help you! I would pass my report to the Osiriani government and that would help Pathfinders.
But that is not important!
Something corrupt still lurks within this place!
It went all pitch-black earlier, and there was an eerie moaning sound in the walls. ".
He looks around, obviously seeing how he can make it out the door...
Linna does not sense deception in what the man is saying, and he does seem quite nervous and on the verge of panic...
The man, ever jittery and hyper, overhears Linna: "An idiot? ME?!"
And he tries to step, wary of Linna--
--but bumps into the statue against which he was standing.
EVERYTHING GOES BLACK.
Totally.
You cannot see any lights.
Even Nurten cannot see the tip of his nose to pick at it!
ALL IS BLACK.
Then, suddenly, the braziers are back, burning away, and you can see.
But you do not want to see.
Because the statue suddenly animates, and swings its cobra-headed sceptre down in a vicious blow, CRACKING Nefaram Subeli's skull open, most probably killing him on the spot.
Nefaram's brain, crushed and mushy, slips to the floor, as his body falls to the ground.
The dark statue's eyes seem to come alive as they glow red, and he raises a leg, about to step down from his pedestal!
At the same time, both lids of the two sarcophagi crash to the ground, and two mummies sit up in the stone tombs, and also get ready to step out.
Oh my!
Thankfully, poor Subeli's warning about darkness made you wary, and you react fast.
|
Nurten looks like he was going to say something, but loses his sight. In the brief moment of darkness, he can be heard yelling incomprehensibly at someone else entirely.
The goblin doesn't seem too fussed about Nefaram's mishap. But he knows that a fight is about to break out. His eyes go blank and in a different voice, he screams, "Shut up, Grandpa, Nurten's gonna kill 'em!" He hurls himself at a mummy, pick swinging.
Nurten rushes in up to the mummy with the Red eyes, entering some kind of spiritual frenzy, but, too busy conversing with grand'pa, the Goblin-- misses!
|
|
When the lights come back up, Linna is in a fencing position, holding her rapier forward and her main-gauche beside herself. She quickly adjusts her stance to face the mummy beside her.
Taking a moment, her eyes focus and dart over the mummy's body, noting weak points and movement patterns.
The moment she's satisfied with herself, she strikes!
Linna sees this mummy as some shank of lamb, and sticks it at the same time with both fork and knife, both hitting, with the fork skewering it right through the neck ripping big chunks off, and the knife slicing off the last part holding the head on!
The mummy's head, sliced off, rolls to the floor, while the rest of the body simply crumples in a pile of useless bandages...
Linna polished this off just like she would a shank of lamb!
As she is about to stick her fork in again, she checks her movement: this is no longer needed.
|
|
When the lights go out Xun reaches out for his drum. When the lights come back he is ready and glances around the room. Using the same rhythm as he used when telling heroic tales to his allies, Xun begins to play with vigor and inspiration. The music does make other agents to be more accurate, attack both with precision and strength.
The room is filled with a melody that seems to last longer than when Xun is playing.
The DC is usually a standard-difficulty DC of a level equal to the highest-level target of your composition, but the GM can assign a different DC based on the circumstances.
The highest level PC is Vargir - lvl 2. I don't know what DC is it, but my 19 probably pass it, making my next composition to last 3 rounds in a 60ft area. That cost my 1 focus point.
1 action: Inspire courage All PC's in 60 ft area get +1 to attack, +1 to damage, +1 to rolls against fear effects.
2 and 3 action: casting Telekinetic Projectile
It seems like there are two drummers in the room as when Xun begins to play different rhythm chanting in a deep but quiet voice the old music still lingers in the air. Suddenly from the wall behind Half-orc a small semi-translucent monkey moves forwards and pulls out a dart attached to a drum and tosses it at the Statue.
Xun's melody does linger in the room, the beat of the drums bouncing off the walls.
You all feel braver, and will hit harder!
The dart tossed by the monkey, hits the statue, but on a glancing blow that has it fall to the side...
With Vargir hesitating as to what to do, the statue strides right off its pedestal, legging it right over the body of the downed clerk, and walks over, down the stairs, and up to Nurten.
The statue raises its lethal scepter to brings it down towards Nurten's head--
--but only manages to snag the cobra-headed scepter on a stone of the ceiling!
It would frown if it could, and then lashes out with its other hand--
--hitting Nurten in the chest, and bashing him hard, nearly knocking him to the ground!
|
|
Milosh quickly gets his hand inside one of the many leather puches of his white jacket, taking out a small phial with a strange gooey green liquid.
If it hits, it would only cause 2 damage (1 acid splash damage on Hit, 1 extra damage because of the buff), plus 1d6 persistant acid damage.
If I'm getting the rules right, I still have 2 actions left. Can I use one of them to try and recall knowledge about the red mummy?
MJ rushes over and does not nock the arrow safely, so it falls to the ground and does not shoot...
Milosh moves so that he is at the door and can see... and then aims at the mummy--
--he yanks out a flask and tosses it, hitting the mummy!
The acid starts to eat away at the bandages...
...and the acid keeps on eating away more and more, digging deep into the mummy, acrid smoke billowing out.
With the acid not seeming to abate, the mummy lashes out at Nurten-- who, because he is in a furious rage, is unable to avoid the blow!
But the fury that made him be hit, enables him to remain standing.
The mummy's blow having hit, it now grabs the wrist of Nurten's main weapon hand, immobilizing it.