Shalelu's first arrow misses and the attacker deflects the second one away. The poison begins to weaken her body, spreading into her bloodstream.
Ahreni scampers up the rungs to the rafters just as Relisha's scimitar critically injures the ceiling bound ninja. Between the shifter and the weapon next to her, she is forced to abandon her hiding spot up above. Dropping to the ground, she envelopes herself in multiple copies of herself that make it difficult to determine which one is the real foe.
Shalelu can feel the poison coursing through her veins as it begins to sap her vitality. She looks to Relisha "Have anything to help with poison by chance?"
Without waiting for a response she pulls out more arrows to help the others, not wanting anyone else to get poisoned.
Relisha steps up closer to the magically protected woman and slashes at her with the katana while directing her spell to attack as well.
Ahreni 36/43
Olaff 46/49
Relisha 10/53
Shalelu 43/47
Thanara 27/27
Ahreni simply drops from the ceiling behind the ninja before lashing out with her teeth.
As the ninja lands, Olaff steps forward to attack.
He then continues to attack.
Ahreni fails to gracefully fall from the ceiling like the ninja did, instead hitting the ground hard as she comes up behind the ninja. Her injuries show themselves when she fails to strike the ninja
Shalelu's first arrow misses and the ninja swipes the second one away as if it were nothing more than a fly.
Both of Relisha's attacks miss as does Thanara's ray.
Olaff's attack finds the correct target and he buries his longsword into the female assassin's chest. Ignoring the heavily armored warrior, she dives into a somersault and rolls past everyone, coming up on the other side of the room. When she comes to her feet, she fires another dart that sinks into Ahreni's neck.
Rivulets of blood begin to seep out through the tiefling's armor as she closes with the red-clad woman to strike with Suishen, her spiritual blade following along.
Ahreni 41/43
Olaff 46/49
Relisha 5/53
Shalelu 43/47
Thanara 27/27
Olaff moves once again towards the ninja, but his attack is too clumsy this time.
Ahreni ignores the poison, anger coursing through her veins instead.
She circles around the ninja to block her exit and then dives in with a hefty bite.
Shalelu is looking a bit pale as the poison continues to ravage her, but for now at least there is a brief glimpse of her regaining some vigor as she fights off the poison. She lines up more shots as she continues to fire arrows at the enemy.
Thanara manages to land another blast of electricity on the poisoner.
Frustrated that neither of her victims are dropping due to the poison, the female ninja drops her blowgun and pulls out a blue metal blade, turning towards Relisha. In a blur of movement, the oracle watches the attacker mutter a few words and a dark substance materializes on the blade of her dagger as she approaches. As she closes the distance, she lunches at Relisha and whispers in her ear in Tien "A deadly kiss for you." and plunges the dagger into her belly twice. The oracle can't avoid the first attack, but manages to just move out of the way before the second stab comes.
The tiefling stumbles back and drops her links to her friends. One hand continues to grasp the katana with strained fingers while the other hand moves to cover the poisoned wound. As her spiritual scimitar fades out, she casts of spell of healing upon herself.
Ahreni 41/43
Olaff 46/49
Relisha 9/53
Shalelu 43/47
Thanara 27/27
Olaff tries to take advantage of the flanking Relisha but his slashes hits only air. He then switch positions to give Ahreni a flanking opportunity. "Drrop yerr veapons orr die!"
Shalelu seems to shake off the effects of the posion that had weakened her, but sees her friends aren't doing all that great either. Even so, there's not much else she can do other than try and take the enemy down with her bow.
Ahreni keeps biting and tearing as Olaff distracts the ninja.
Thanara fires off another blast of lightning, but this time she misses.
Shalelu once again has an arrow knocked away and hits the last image, leaving only the real assassin for Ahreni to strike, though not critically.
Frustrated her images are gone. Frustrated despite hitting three people with poison, none of them are showing ill effects. Frustrated all of the incompetent others are dying on the floor, the woman throws her dagger into the ground and instead unleashes a flurry of blows on Relisha.
Through three quick jabs, she only manages to hit the oradin once due to Olaff's intimidation tactics. She side steps to the side of Relisha, looking to put her down next round.
Unsure as to what she's done to engender so much focused aggression, Relisha takes another step back and hopes to stem the flow of her blood with more healing magic.
Ahreni 41/43
Olaff 46/49
Relisha 15/53
Shalelu 43/47
Thanara 27/27
Ahreni does her best to draw the ninja's ire herself by landing two solid blows.
Olaff moves with the ninja, always trying to flank with Ahreni.
Shalelu sends more arrows into the fray.
Relisha tends to her wounds while the others continue to attack the poisoner. Shalelu's first attack misses badly while her second is knocked out of the air before it could strike the ninja. Both of Ahreni's attacks draw blood as does Olaff's blade. Thanara's magic hits its mark, but barely seems to injure her.
The ninja unleashes another series of blows upon Ahreni, hitting her twice before backing up.
With the woman in red occupied, Relisha sends out a pulse of healing energy, excluding their enemy from the effects.
Ahreni 39/43
Olaff 49/49
Relisha 20/53
Shalelu 47/47
Thanara 27/27
Thanara narrows her eyes at this ninja's persistence. Her hands crackle with blue/black lightning as she steps forward and attempts to grasp the woman around the neck. Unfortunately, she misses and instead just stands there the energy still crackling around her hands.
Ahreni shakes off the blows and keeps biting and clawing.
Shalelu curses as the stupid ninja keeps knocking away her arrows. "Someone grab her arms so she stops swatting away my arrows!"
"I'll trry to cut herr hands off!" Olaff exclaims as he continues to attack.
Shalelu's first shot misses and once again the ninaj swats away the second arrow. While her hand is extended to knock the arrow down, Olaff's blade slices clean through her forearm, cleaving it from her body and sending it flying across the room and rolling on the floor. The ninja screams out loud for the first time, blood spurting from her body. She makes the mistake of turning her back to Ahreni who leaps on top of her and uses her sharp teeth to rip the flesh from her neck before driving her claws deep into her ribs. The ninja drops to her knees and tries to struggle briefly before succumbing and falling to the ground underneath the shifter's weight.
Searching the room you come up with thunderstones (2), masterwork spear (3), amulet of natural armor +1 (3), potion of shield of faith (+2), black lotus extract (1 dose), deathblade (1 doses), +1 dagger with 'Deadly Kiss' etched in Tian on it's blade, earthfire shuriken (1), +1 flaming burst shuriken (1), blowgun and 6 darts, shuriken (5), shozoku of the night wind and masterwork thieves’ tools.
Ahreni makes sure that the ninja is dead, possibly a little too efficiently, before looting the bodies with her customary thoroughness. She tries to bodysuit on for size and nods approvingly at how it avoids hindering her movements.
"Want this. Please." She offers.
Shalelu goes about collecting all her arrows that are still good letting out an exasperated sigh as she notes "That was ridiculous! Plus, as far as I can tell we aren't any closer to finding Ameiko yet..."
Olaff shrugs at Shalelu's comment. "If she is herre and not bein' moved avay, ve arre also not any farrtherr." He then turns to Relisha. "Rrelisha, please ask the talkin' svorrd if he is feelin' Ameiko's prresence."
Relisha nods as she stands with one hand on the wall and the other holding the katana limply.
While she waits for his response, she busies herself with her healing wand. First on Ahreni and then on herself.
Ahreni 39/43
Olaff 49/49
Relisha 20/53
Shalelu 47/47
Thanara 27/27
Ahreni 43/43
Olaff 49/49
Relisha 43/53
Shalelu 47/47
Thanara 27/27
Suishen responds "No. They are not immediately nearby."
There are four doors to the north and two to the west. Starting in the northeast most corner and working your way west, you search them.
The first four are each nondescript cells that contain a simple sleeping pallet, water cup, and small shrine of some kind with a blood-soaked shuriken.
Each room contains the personal effects of the men you initially fought in here, including three jade raven statuette (worth 50 gp each).
The northwest room is an austere room that contains a simple pallet and clay drinking bowl. Its only nod to ostentation is a beautifully painted lacquered screen bearing the images of clouds and mountains
rendered in a fanciful style.
Behind the screen is a small leather trunk in which contains washerwoman clothes and other possessions, including a disguise kit, an ornate blowgun fashioned from jade and lapis lazuli (not usable as a weapon but worth 200 gp as an art object), 150 gp in Tian coins, and a writ signed by Sveinn Blood-Eagle that gives the bearer the authority to commandeer any of the Linnorm King’s huscarls within 2 miles of Kalsgard for up to
12 hours.
Finally, the southwest room is identical to those in the north, but no it doesn't contain any personal effects
Thanara’s eyes widened as Ahreni just started changing clothes brazenly in front of everyone, and turned and followed the others as they resumed their search.
She kneels down and rubs her electricity covered hand across the masonry dust on the floor and asks ”This...seems odd...”
Olaff points at the lacquered screen. "That thing is nice. I bet it is vorrth a lot."
As Thanara muses about the masonry dust, Olaff points to a couple gaps in the stone walls, barely perceptible. "Look herre... it looks like therre is secrret passage herre." He then tries to open it.
Olaff pushes the door open and it reveals a thirty foot corridor that has been hewn from the native rock. At the end of the corridor, a long set of steps descends down below.
You also know that this corridor is of much newer construction than the rest of the dungeon level.
"He doesn't sense her," Relisha says, trying to mask her disappointment. When she sees the shrine, her face darkens.
"Yaezhing," she mutters. "He's the Tian-Shu deity of murder, death, and punishment. He and Calistria share a lot of the same views regarding retribution."
Ahreni shows no concern about stripping off her jerkin and shirt so that she can don the bodysuit. Partially transformed as she is much of her body is covered in the short, dark fur that seems to spread every time she morphs.
She does catch Thanara's glance though, and shoots the sorceress a wolfish grin which she misses.
------------------------
All the art objects and other things interest Ahreni little, but the secret passage is more up her street and she heads down it cautiously, sniffing often as she goes.
"This corrridorr is new..." Olaff points out as he follows Ahreni.
Ahreni descends the steps for thirty feet before something catches her eye.
She calls a halt and stops abruptly, detecting a a tripwire strung across the hallway with sleigh bells attached to it. She silently points out the trap to her companions, helping them step over it carefully without triggering the trap.
Once over the tripwire, the group moves into the hallway that widens here into a small chamber with a door exiting to the south. The door is banded with wide straps of iron and bears a large, heavy lock. A single brazier provides dim light to this area.
Staggering about the room are six Ulfen zombies, each dressed in a rusted chain shirt and bearing a notched battleaxe. Sitting before the brazier, warming its hands, is a hulking, green figure in a tattered brown cloak and mud-spattered fur breeches, its tusks polished to a brilliant white shine. A man-sized heavy pick is on its belt, complemented with a well-crafted heavy crossbow and bolts. The smell of alchemical acid fills the room, overpowering the smell of rot coming from the zombies.
Ahreni has one foot into the room when she sense strouble, calling a halt again and telling everyone to back up.
Relisha offers no suggestions to whatever plan the warriors come up with to assault the green-skinned figure. She can offer something to use against the zombies - positive energy.
Ahreni explains the situation in quiet growls.
"Noisemaker and I jump orc." She suggests. "Rest of you take zombies down quick."
If the plan is agreed then Ahreni leads the way, quietly, and then counts down on her fingers. Once she hits zero she races into the room, heading straight towards the orc and attempting to latch onto his back.
Olaff nods to Ahreni, drawing his sword and getting ready for another combat.
Olaff leads the way with Shalelu right behind him. As he moves towards the zombies they all take note and spin to face him. The half-troll speaks up and says "Well it's about time.", rising to his feet as well.
Shalelu, obviously still frustrated over the previous fight, calls out a snide retort to the half-troll "Aw you were waiting for us to come and put you down? How nice of you..." as she pulls out some arrows and takes aim at the one right in front of Olaff hoping to get it down quickly to make room for the others to get in and fight.
Unable to get past Olaff, Ahreni waits for space to open up.
After the ranger's shots, the first zombie drops to the ground creates space between the party and the mob.
The half-troll casts a spell and a zombie moves up to fill the spot of the fallen one that Shalelu just put down.
"If ye vas vaitin', vhy don't ye call yerr dead aside and ye face me in single combat? Arre ye a trrue varriorr orr a covarrd who hides behind otherrs?"