"If we could fix this armor up, Ruka, Lor-Sinn, would it help either of you?"
"Ruka, are you alright? What was that thing?"
The young wizard looked to the now noticeably paler Ruka with gloomy sympathy. No, he didn't think she was alright at all, and he thought this because he also believed he had actually recognized the creature. And if his assessment was correct, then there was little any one of them could do to help.
Rustling through an inner pocket Sam retrieved a small vial, dabbed a spot of dark muck onto a finger, and approached the younger Kaijitsu. "Sorry," he said in advance, not wanting be responsible for any false hope. "This isn't actually going to help much."
Touching the substance to her and muttering a brief incantation saw the young woman's numerous cuts and bruises alleviate themselves, wounds swiftly stitching themselves together. And yet the spell offered no reprieve from that cold something - whether presence or absence - she felt within, imparted by the undead horror. That remained.
"I, uh, think I know what that was. Go by a hundred names, but the most commonly recognized one is a 'wight'. They're sort of the halfway point between a ghoul and a specter, an inanimate spirit occupying and twisting a physical body... Though I guess that's not really relevant right now, sorry." Samton felt the need to apologize. He knew he was veering into academic curiosity to avoid an uncomfortable topic, coward that he was. "But that, um, discomfort you're feeling right now, Ms Kaijitsu... You should know that it's not necessarily going away."
"Which is not to say that it won't!" he hastened to add. "It might. There are totally cases of people recovering. And if not, I know there's powerful magic that can treat it. B-but be prepared for it taking some time. Like, at least a day. That was... well, powerful stuff you got hit with. Not even dark magic, really, just pure... anti-life. So take it easy, yeah? Don't push yourself or think yourself feeble for this. Anyone lesser could have died."
It was somehow important for the cartographer that Ruka hear this, that she understand that her body and spirit had just withstood severe trauma, and that any lingering weakness was not her own. Over the past weeks he had noted just how deep the young woman's sense of duty and responsibility ran, how she tended to strain herself. He had always known her as an extraordinarily devoted person back in Sandpoint, albeit only at a distance. This had inspired much respect in him even then - and some envy too, given that he in turn considered himself something of a wimp. Her being some months younger than him as well didn't help matters.
But that was precisely why he didn't want her blaming herself for any perceived failings now. Because he knew that a wimp like him was only alive right now because of strong people like Ruka and the others.
Ruka stands over the dead creature, panting slightly. It's dead. Deader. Whatever the vocabulary is to describe a creature that refused to die the first time it was killed.
For a long moment she simply stares at it, Murasamemaru still in her hands. The sword's been quiet since Ameiko fell, perhaps sensing she wasn't in the mood for conversation. Now however she feels them stirring briefly.
('Anger or fear, don't let either consume you. That was the mistake Tsuto made, and I would not see you fall to it.')
("I didn't run!")
('No. But fear consumed you nonetheless. You were simply more afraid of being seen as weak than you were of your own death.') Murasamemaru hesitates. ('Samton was right. You should have backed away. It was a small room, and Asuka could have taken a blow without being put in too much danger. Whereas had it struck you again, you might have been worse than dead. You could have...')
Ruka roughly shoves Murasamemaru back into the sheathe before they can finish. She's still in no mood to be lectured by a talking sword.
She starts as Sam touches her with an odd substance. She'd barely paid attention to what the others were doing, too lost in conversation with someone they couldn't hear, and hadn't even noticed his approach. Careless. But whatever he's doing makes the ache in her chest fade, and she starts to relax...until she realizes that the spreading cold isn't going away. From what Sam's saying, it might not for another day. Or two. Or never.
What's done is done. That's not important right now.
Is it?
She's far too distracted to pay attention to the armor Kajiwara points to. "It...it might. I don't know. It probably wouldn't fit me anyway. The uh, the sword. Looks good though. Sharp, even if it wasn't used. Or maybe because it wasn't used."
'...more afraid of being seen as weak than you were of your own death...'
...So take it easy, yeah? Don't push yourself...
"I, um." She swallows hard. "I can keep going. Thanks to Sam's healing. But I, um...I'm still not feeling very well. So I, I..." She pauses, closing her eyes briefly. Just say it! "I might need some help. If we get into any more tough fights."
All of Ruka's internal struggle had gone right over Lor-Sinn's head, but the direct call for help gets through.
"Of course! I can take the front line with Asuka, use that fancy sword instead of my bow. Let's see how these wights like the taste of demon blood, heh heh."
Moving up the stairs, the conditions of the room do not improve much from below. Judging from the blood and gouges marring the walls, a terrific battle once took place in this guard room.
As you reach the landing above, ghostly faces suddenly animate on the walls, unleashing nerve-wracking shrieks.
There are two side rooms which are broken and destroy that once were armories, but they now stand empty. There is another closed door to the south.
It's not the ghostly apparitions, it's the shrieks. They startle Lor-Sinn so badly that the tiefling is halfway down the staircase before they realize they're running away.
"Oh, heh, hehe. They got me too, Ruka. They are really very scary when they surprise you like that." Lor-Sinn chuckles self-deprecatingly once they regroup with the others.
"Oh come on!" a wholly shocked and halfway irate Samton called to a bit of wall that had been a disembodied, shrieking face only a second ago. He was clutching at his racing heart. "Just hopping out to startle people? Honestly now, it's like a child's prank..."
Once again the young wizard's understanding of the paranormal phenomena - to the best of his knowledge - took the brunt off the spooks. There was no malevolent intelligence here, or at least so he thought; just ghastly echoes of the still ghastlier downfall of the castle.
But the soft scratches and squawks behind this one door? Those were very real, present and represented a more immediate threat. "Uh, guys?" he whispered, pointing to the door. "More corbies, I think."
Kajiwara looks at Ruka with concern, but says, "Well, the helmet looks intact, at any rate. Perhaps you should wear it, if only to help protect you from a fatal blow to the head." Kaji takes the helmet and holds it out to Ruka.
Kajiwara was not prepared for the ghostly faces or supernatural fear that filled him after they appeared. Running down the stairs ahead of Lor-Sinn, he stops when he reaches the bottom and the fear subsides. Rejoining the others, he sheepishly says to Ruka, "It appears, cousin, that I jump at shadows easily, as well."
Kaji looks at Sam and says, "The same ones we saw before, by the sound of it."
Ruka's nerves might have held, but seeing Lor-Sinn and Kajiwara also fleeing spurred her into running down the stairs as well. For a few seconds at least.
The effect is easier to shake this time though, and she (sheepishly) trudges back up the stairs with the others. "They are...startling. That's for certain. Hopefully there aren't too many more of those 'negatively charged energy' things in the castle."
"If there the same ones we saw before, there shouldn't be a problem. Should there? They seemed to like Asuka, and were willing to listen to us at least." Well, not really us since she hadn't talked, but close enough. "Maybe we could just ask them if they've seen the oni?"
"Great idea. I'll go talk to them again." Lor-Sinn strides to the closed door and knocks.
"Hello there! Good to hear that you are still alive! This place is quite something, I tell ya... Anyway, we were wondering if you had seen your former, um, boss." The tiefling thinks for a moment if there was anything else to say. "Thanks in advance!"
Once again, Asuka's unobservant nature comes to her rescue. She is a bit out of sorts as she sees everyone briefly go running for...some reason. She actually runs after them, assuming that they must know what they are doing.
Once everyone has regrouped, Asuka goes along with Lor-Sinn to help speak with the Corbies. "Hey, buddies! It's the great hero Asuka the Thunder God here. This is my friend. She's cool with birdy people like us."
Lor-Sinn and Asuka push into the room to the south and immiedrately are met with the smell of rotten food and bird droppings. A long dining table sits in the middle of the room, heaped with partially eaten animal carcasses and several thick eggshells. Three corbies sit at the table squabbling and bickering over the choichest cuts of wild animals.
They stop talking when they take note of your presence, rising from table. They squint their eyes at them and look at each other before shaking their heads no. "Thunder God? No. No see Kikonu. He downstairs doing acting play with others." one says through a mouth full of food.
They move their food away from you, as if you intended to take it from them. "None for you." another says. For now it would appear they are not engaging you in combat, but are still on their guard.
"Ah, no, thank you." Lor-Sinn waves away the food, as if the corbies had offered some. "That is all yours."
The tiefling scratches the side of their nose thoughtfully. "We've already been downstairs, and Kikonu ran away in a hurry. Any idea where he might get to when he's not downstairs? Also, did you know there's creepy ghosts coming out of the walls? And this weird undead person who sucks the life out of people, we killed him just now by the way, you're welcome."
One of the corbies just goes back to eating, ignoring the newcomers. Another continues to stare at you, uneasy with your presence. The third says "Likely in study with all the books or," he points to the southeast where a double door rests closed, "Or in there."
"What you want with him?" he asks, curious.
Ruka's nose is decidedly wrinkled, and she chooses to stay in the guard room. It's not like she'd be talking to the corbies anyway, so she might as well spare herself the nausea. She can get there quickly in the unlikely event she's needed.
Kajiwara scans the room and glances at the double doors when the corby points. He hopes Lor-Sinn and Asuka can talk the corbies into not fighting - it would be easier to deal with the oni without his helpers.
"The study, or that room there, got it! Thank you, and enjoy your meal!"
Lor-Sinn tilts their head towards the double doors with a questioning look to the others.
"Uhm..." A speculative Samton raised some speculative shoulders at Lor-Sinn's questioning look. He had refrained from saying anything at all as the tengu and paladin breezily negotiated with the corbies, fearful and somewhat convinced that anything he said wouldn't help the situation. Avoiding combat was always preferable.
That said, something seemed off here, even more so than the food. "Why would they say the oni's likely to be in there?" he whispered, nodding to the same double doors Lor-Sinn was eyeing. "Shouldn't they know that? He would have had to pass by them to reach those doors."
For that matter, why not secure these corbies' aid while here? Okay, maybe Kikonu passed them all by whilst invisible and maybe he managed to push open some relatively heavy doors without his subjects noticing, but then this prompted the question of why he would do so at all? The wizard's wit was formidable and yet he had trouble imaging a scenario where any of this made much sense.
Unfortunately, he was unable to read the corbies' avian features for lies, alien as they were to him. "I mean, I guess we could try those doors."
Ruka reluctantly enters the room. (Trying her best not to gag.) "So are we going in there? I'm..." She briefly ducks out for a breath of fresh air, then pokes her head back through. "...Okay with that."
How can they not notice that smell?!
The corbies to not entirely ignore your party, taking care to watch you as you edge your way around the room to the double doors on in the south eastern corner. Pushing them open reveals that you are on a ten-foot wide balcony winds around an ancient ballroom below. A rickety-looking railing runs along the balcony’s edge.
Standing on the ground below is your target, Kikonu and he looks quite pisses. Furiously stomping about, he is kicking furniture and generally raging about in anger. When he spots you entering the room, he screams in furty and points his finger at you "YOU! You are no longer welcome in my home! Be gone or die! This is your final warning!"
Casting a spell, he disappears from sight, vanishing.
Kajiwara looks for a way down to the floor where Kikonu was.
There is a set of spiraling stairs that lead down from the balcony down into a ballroom. Traversing the steps brings you into a large circular room features a ring of pillars that support a balcony just over fifteen feet above. A flight of stairs winds up to the balcony along the southern wall. Faded paintings of dancing elves decorate the walls, spattered here and there with ancient bloodstains. A set of steps lead down into a level below.
Like elsewhere in the castle, signs of a terrible battle took place here long ago, but also that at least one of the aggressors in the fight possessed prodigious strength, judging from the deep gouges in the walls near the largest bloodstains (the gouges appear to have been created by an enormous axe or similar weapon in several places).
"Ah, damn it, he's doing the disappearing trick again!" Lor-Sinn exclaims in frustration while hurrying down the stairs after Kajiwara.
Once in the ballroom, the paladin sniffs around, trying to find Kikonu's trail.
"YOU! You are no longer welcome in my home! Be gone or die! This is your final warning!"
Oh. Well, this was good, Samton told himself even as some part of him wanted to cower at the threat. This presumably meant that the oni was done running and would now fight them. And fighting him on his lonesome was definitely preferable.
Now the pertinent question shifted to how one fought an invisible opponent. As it happened, the young wizard thought he had an answer to this. Probably not the best answer, he considered in retrieving a tuft of coarse dark hair from his spell pouch, but an answer nonetheless.
The incantation was brief and easy. The effect of the spell was less so. The sound of bones squeaking and shifting was an uncomfortable one, and infinitely more so when it was your own skeleton transforming itself from within, and yet this was nothing compared to the sensation. Sam thanked every god there was that the magic immured him against the pain that would otherwise no doubt come with such a complete bodily metamorphosis, as his unexceptional frame suddenly shot up to tower over the others. Then he reminded himself that he owed nothing to any deity; this was wizardry and he had designed the spell himself. Pale skin toughened and was covered in hair, the back hunched forward, fingers grew long and predatory, whilst the face rippled as it reshaped itself. Samton Verro the utterly unremarkable youth was gone. In mere seconds he had transformed into something bestial and oppressive. Disturbingly large milky eyes now looked down at the party, a bristly spiderweb of needle-teeth on display as the bugbear spoke.
"It's fine, guys," the rough, raspy voice that was decidedly not that of the young man said. "Just a transmutation. I'm hoping that..."
The bugbear shook its head, long ears flopping about, and took a deep breath through the piggish snout. "... hoping that the oni can't hide from us like this."
Lor-Sinn's eyes go wide as Sam begins to transform, but then breathes in relief as the wizard reveals that the change is intentional. How amazing would it be if Lor-Sinn could also change shape! Although, what would they change to?
"I would definitely be like Asuka if I could transform like this. Asuka is cool."
The paladin's smell is that of someone who has spent an entire day in armour while trudging up an down a half-ruined castle: sweat, dust, metal and leather.
"Did anyone see a door open?" Ruka hurries down after the others. "Even when he's invisible he'd still have to actually open the door, right? So he must either be in this room or downstairs."
She nearly jumps out of her skin when Sam starts changing into...something. He'd said something magical first, so presumably he'd meant to do this? Which he confirms as soon as the transformation finishes.
"Maybe warn us next time? That was really unsettling."
Lor-Sinn has her ability to sense evil. Sam can apparently smell people now. All Ruka has is her ears, but she still strains to try and hear which way the oni has gone.
Kaji takes an involuntary step back as Sam changes into a bugbear. His hand moves towards his quiver before stopping himself as Sam explains. "I agree with Ruka. If you're going to change into something like a bugbear, a warning would be appreciated."
Once down on the main floor, Kajiwara looks about the room, trying to see if there is any trace of a disturbance showing which way the Oni went.
Thinking back, no one recalls a door opening. Scanning the room with a keen eye, Ruka can't say that she spots anyone hiding in the room nor any smells that seem out of place.
Sam's transformation has given him an expert ability to sniff out foes hiding among them, but all that he can pick up is the lingering scent of... onions? Do Oni's smell like onions? Whatever it is, it is gone now though and only trace amounts of whatever it was remain in the air.
Kajiwara examines tracks and the room thoroughly, also concluding that whatever here abruptly vanished without taking additional steps out of here.
Asuka beams at Lor-Sinn. "Thank you so much! I try really, really hard, so I'm glad it's paying off!"
Asuka tries to scan the room as best she can, but her mind is just too caught up in conjuring possibilities for how the oni could have escaped.
"Maybe there's a secret door covered with an illusion of a door so we wouldn't see it open. Or he can turn incorporeal briefly as he goes invisible and just move through walls. Or maybe he turned invisible and then teleported. He could have just teleported--I guess--but that's kinda boring."
"Doesn't magic require some sort of fancy words? Sam always says them." Ruka inclines her head to the door leading downstairs. "I don't know how he avoided leaving tracks, but I doubt he teleported or went incorporeal or anything magic like that. If he's not in here, which it seems he isn't, then downstairs seems like the most likely bet."
"I agree with Ruka. If you're going to change into something like a bugbear, a warning would be appreciated."
"Sorry." The inhuman voice was rough as a grating iron, yet no doubt more sheepish than any true bugbear could ever had said to have been. It'd take much more than a beastly guise to hide timid Samton. Though speaking of hiding, the oni had apparently done a runner on the party. And this after giving them a big, boisterous ultimatum. Man. What a blowhard.
Sam took a few deep whiffs through his new nose. Nope, he couldn't smell anything fiendish nearby. Well, maybe he could. Because beneath the sweat and blood that marked all of them, Lor-Sinn definitely smelled different. Was that fiend-blood he could smell? Heck if he knew. While the young wizard had of course tested the spell before, this was his first time experiencing the world as a bugbear. And boy, was it weird. Having your sense of smell be so keen was... well, it wasn't like having an all new perspective, really. It was more like having a pair of horse blinders you had no idea you were wearing removed: you could just take in so much more. It was frankly disorienting. And the dust in the room! Bleh, so cloying!
"Eh, not necessarily," he said in answer to Ruka's comment on magic requiring some incantation or formula, purposefully distracting himself. "That's true of worked spellcraft, but the oni's magic is probably all innate. Not so much spells as spell-like. Maybe he did teleport."
Actually, if that was the case he could probably find out, Samton realized. Twirling his new clawed fingers through the air, he opened his mind to all latent arcane emanations, such as those left behind by a fiend's magic.
"Or he's flying." Kajiwara knew that their ability to detect a flying, invisible enemy was nonexistent, to say the least. "We could always circle back to the throne room."
"Whatever he's doing, he's a coward. Hear that, Kikonu? " Lor-Sinn shouts in frustration. "Let's go to the throne room, put Ruka on the throne and claim the castle for ourselves. Since Kikonu doesn't seem interested in defending it."
Samton checks around the room with his own magic, seeking to identify or at least help understand better what had happened. While he detects no active auras in this room, there is a lingering aura of conjuration down in the area where the oni was last seen.
"Hm. Yeah, feels like the Conjuration school... Probably really did teleport then," Sam said, feeling out the rapidly fading latent magical emanations in the area. "Gotta agree," he went on in support of Lor-Sinn's take. "Not exactly of a man of action, this fiend."
Emboldened by Lor-Sinn's volume, Asuka shouts out as well.
She throws out a thumbs up and follows after to the throne room.
"Let's go to the throne room, put Ruka on the throne and claim the castle for ourselves. Since Kikonu doesn't seem interested in defending it."
Ruka does a double-take at this. "Wait, put me...what? We don't want this castle. Do we?" She's sore, annoyed, and very confused. "Although...will me sitting on the throne summon the oni? I mean, I guess it's worth a try?"
If he has any pride at all, he'll probably show up just to try to kill Lor-Sinn and Asuka for their insults. Which might work? At least maybe it would make him actually fight instead of constantly going invisible and teleporting away.
"So long as he tells us what's wrong with Ameiko and how to fix her, he can have this stupid castle."
Returning to the diving hall, you find the corbies at the table continuing to eat. They look at you and watch you as you enter, but do not speak or make further movements. Leaving them be, you return to the spiral stairs where you encountered the ghostly manifestations earlier, but none of them return on your trip downstairs to the throne room.
Upon entering the room, the corbies that had left earlier remain gone and the long rectangular room remains quiet.
The front doors to the room remain open into the courtyard and a pair of double doors on the east remain closed along with regular doors south, southeast. Stairs lead up to what you assume is likely the dining hall with the corbies above.
There is no sign of Kikonu the Coward.
Feeling extremely foolish, Ruka seats herself onto the throne. "Um, yes. Kikonu, we hereby claim this castle?"
She waits for a minute, shifting uncomfortably, then gets up while shaking her head. "I don't think he's here. Let's just keep exploring, we'll find him eventually. We haven't checked out that room to the southeast, have we?"
Lor-Sinn sighs. "Truly a coward. Let's explore the rest of this place. We can't rest until Ameiko is safe and this place free of evil influences."
"We haven't. Seems like as good a place to search as any."
The double doors in the southeast open up to the ballroom below the balcony you were standing on. This is where Kikonu stood before he vanished. Looking around, you recognize that you took the "long way around".
In addition to the doorway you entered and the winding staircase leading up to the balcony, there are two additional exits from this room. There is another double door leading east and a set of steps that descend down below.
Lor-Sinn huffs in frustration. "Maybe he went downstairs. Fitting, for a worm like him."
The tiefling takes a few steps down the stairs, peering into the darkness. "There's probably a dungeon down there. All castles have a dungeon. Oh! perhaps some of the people who came in the ships are being held prisoner there and we can rescue them!"
"Let's see what's behind this double door first."
"Oof, sorry..."
The bugbear muttered an apology as he stumbled into the corbies' dining table, clutching at his nose. It wasn't just the newly elongated legs that had Samton on unsteady footing; it was also the sensitive snout. The organ was unexpectedly distracting. The rot of the avians' feast was almost more than it could bear, every breath a new assault of putrefied reek on his poor nose. And that wasn't even the worst of it. No, the worst was a certain newfound knowledge gained through the new sense. He now thought he knew where those thick eggs whose innards the corbies suckled down came from. The smell - it was the same. It matched. The realization made the young man gag more so than the rot.
Following the others down the stairs, into the throne chamber and back to the ballroom, Sam had no suggestion on how to proceed. If the oni really could vanish into the ether, then he honestly could be anywhere. Sniffing at the air, he checked if he could find that peculiar smell of onions again, the only trace of Kikonu they had.
Ruka rubs her forehead. "Going up and down stairs has just led us in circles. I feel like Kikonu would have gone downstairs, but right now I think we should just pick a floor and stick with it." Pinching the bridge of her nose in an attempt to ward off a growing headache, she pushes her way through the double-doors.
Opening the doors to the east, you move into a 10'x15' vestibule that connects with another pair of double doors to the east and a single door both leading north and south.
Asuka and Kajiwara both discover secret doors in this room as well, leading both south and north five feet west of the other single doors.
"Perhaps we should see what's behind this door first?"