"Now I lay me down in Dreamland. I know perfect's not for real. I thought we might get closer, but I'm willing to make a deal..." Ci Ci whispers the words to some song all but lost with the rest of her memories.
Voonith twirls around in a dizzying display and it pays no heed to Allegra's foul countenance.
Voonith seems to instinctively recognize Vixen's rhyming and taps its wee but wicked claws, which make a awful tapping sound.
Saiya grins, genuinely amused by Voonith's idea of what makes great poetry.
She does not translate those couple sentences for the rest of the group.
"Voonith is still looking for 'home,' aka the Dreamlands. They say this place smells like it, which makes sense if Count Lowls was responsible for what happened to the asylum. Doesn't help us any though." She looks contemplative, (and also oddly hesitant). "Is there...do we know of any way to send someone back to the Dreamlands? I'm starting to feel bad for them. Is there any chance Wrentz would know?"
Allegra nods stiffly at Saiya's comments to Voonith. "It absolutely could." As the kayal continues in common, Allegra examines her gauntleted fist thoughtfully before looking back over at the creature. "Maybe if it went to sleep....?"
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Saiya paradoxically knows that it is rather difficult and easy to travel to the Dreamlands. Mortals minds, when they sleep, can travel to the Dimension of Dreams but not necessarily the Dreamlands. Powerful spellcasters can directly travel to other planes but this requires a tuning fork struck on that plane.
One method Saiya has at her disposal currently would be to use the release nightmare ritual from the Chain of Nights and intentionally corrupt it, like the Tatterman, to create a number of Oneirogens. This would draw the Dimension of Dreams closer to Golarion and possibly allow Voonith through. It would also mean effectively murdering a number of people and release other nightmares that strayed too close.
Voonith scampers up to Vixen and licks her knee,
He then turns to Saiya and says,
Voonith jumps through a closed window shattering the glass outward, Voonith balls up and rolls a little bit on the landing apparently unharmed. He runs through the nearby hedge.
Vix isn’t sure what to make of the boot-licking, but noting the positive tone, she says, “Heh. She likes me…”
She is momentarily speechless as Voonith makes the best exit ever. Although, after watching ‘her’ scamper from the roll, Vix gets a glimpse of what’s under the tail.
“I mean, ‘he.’”
"I'm not comfortable with that thing loose. It might get hurt."
She'll start to look around the room for anything else interesting, preferably things that don't bring to mind the only (naughty) limerick she knows.
"If the smelly milk-drinking lizard-thing isn't dangerous, and it wasn't interested in helping us, was there any reason for us to keep chatting with it?" Ci Ci asks, briefly glancing out the window as the strange creature bounds off into the night. "Shouldn't we continue clearing this house of things that want to kill us?
“Well, yes. He jumped through a closed window, which is just awesome. I won’t underestimate Voonith next time. I think he’ll be alright.”
Unless he accidentally swallowed a shard of broken glass, but Vix doesn’t want to overshare.
“But, yeah, point taken. We got a compound full o’ villains to clear.”
Ci Ci points to the West door. ”May as well clear one side of the hallway before we go looking at the others.”
She looks to the others. Who wants to do the honors?”
This bedroom looks like it once belonged to a child, it looks tightly made and hasn't been slept in for years. Thick dust covers most of the furniture in the room, aside from a single wooden chair. A half-empty clay mug of water sits next to the chair.
Allegra will do a scan with detect magic while the others search.
Allegra finds no magic in this room.
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"There's one room in this house that isn't inhabited by something freakish, dangerous or both? That seems suspicious..." Ci Ci muses.
The spectral image of an old woman in a decaying funeral dress suddenly appears in the hallway as you begin to toss the room. It takes a second to comprehend what you see. Half of her face is human but the other has been twisted, gray flesh surrounds a yellow eye with a handle bar pupil. A suckered tentacle that sprouts from her side writhes erratically. The ghost-like woman turns to you with clear anger in a far away voice, "What are you doing in my son's room?!"
Allegra holds up a hand to the ghostly woman to forestall her anger. "Countess Lowls, it's me, Allegra, we met yesterday. We were just checking this room to make sure there was nothing dangerous in here. We haven't disturbed anything, and I'm confident we can be on our way now."
“So ye two know each other. Huh.” Vix doesn’t exactly let her guard down, but runs with the assumption that the dead tentacle-faced lady is willing to talk things over. So… “Assuming yer son’s the count, who’s out o’ town far’s I know, we ain’t here for him.
“It’s Melissen we’re after. If ye happen to know where she is, then I guess we came here to ask directions.”
She screams and the house shudders in response, The light in the room seems to dim a little bit and you can hear distant disconcerting howls from the angles of the room. Smoke begins to cling to the corners of the hall as the expired countess seems intent on tearing you apart.
“Ye’re more royal and accusatory than any of us!”
F*!@ing door, Vix thinks to herself as her initial attack is foiled by the narrow doorway.
Knowing only one spell that she can catch her compatriots in the area of effect without harming them, Ci Ci calls upon her power.
"Flash! Ahhhhh!" she cries, unleashing her power upon the malformed spirit.
Vixen bravely does what she does best and kicks at the door. With that out of the way she maneuvers into a sweep meant to topple the ghost-only to have her leg pass right through the woman with no effect.
Ci Ci follows up by tossing a brilliant and burning light right into the eyes of the half-there aristocrat. Nemira doesn't even flinch, its like she didn't notice.
Allegra pauses a moment at Vix's quip and begins to respond, "Well technically - Oh nevermind." Then she grits her teeth, whispers a brief plea to Torag to strengthen her axe, and gets to swinging.
Then she'll take a step to the side to avoid hogging the door.
Allegra's axe finds nothing to hew.
The monstrous woman enters the room but still blocks the doorway. She mumbles, "My feet gossip at night so now I have to wear shoes to bed." Her hands form a mesmerizing pattern and her lips mouth twisted words. You get the sense that she barely registers her evocation
She's cast shocking grasp.
Vix takes advantage of her flank position...
...and does not waste that opportunity.
“It’s not you, lady. It’s the tentacle thing that’s overtaken ye.”
Vix sinks into dragon stance and strikes again!
Vixen kicks the woman right in her solar plexus and passes right through her with minimal resistances. She tries twice more and her feet and leg pass right through the eldritch woman.
Ci Ci steps back from the approaching spirit and then extends her hand towards it.
"You gonna burrrn, Lady!" she says, unleashing a beam of energy at her.
Countess Nemira Lowls' tentacle stretches unnaturally, luckily Ci Ci has the presence of mind to duck before the electrically charged appendage smashes into the side of her head.
Ci Ci enjoys a bit of success as she gives the ghost-like countess a rather bad sun burn.
And she'll try once again on her turn, keeping her Sacred Weapon bonus up.
Then she'll take a step back.
Allegra's axe passes right through Nemira uselessly. Saiya is at a loss on how to contribute just watches the scene unfold.
Nemira Lowls visage at first seems disinterested and distant but it suddenly changes as she gets a better look at Allegra, "Roderick! You put me living in my tomb!" The tentacle passes through Allegra's armor and enters her body at the stomach. Allegra's abdomen clenches uncontrollably as she's shocked. Allegra feels emotionally drained and useless afterwards.
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Vix says, “Hey, Squiderella! Leave her alone!”
She makes like about to kick—
—but gracefully backflips away from the impossible threat!
She goes on, “And we’ll leave you alone, leave being the operative word.
“Hey, girls! Emergency exit, break glass!”
Vix dives through the window!
“Follow-oh–whoah—f&$%
M
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
E
!”
As she lies on her hopefully-not-broken back, Vix contemplates what hurts most: the shame of cowardice or the landing.
The shards o’ glass, she decides. Voonith made it look so easy.
"Wait! What if we agreed to free you from your living tomb? Would you stop trying to kill us? We don't know who Roderick is, but he sounds like he is really bad!" Ci Ci blurts out, hoping to stay the strange being's onslaught.
Allegra feels her sweat turn cold. She glances from her impotent axe to the monster before her whom she thought could be an ally. Her grip falters on her axe, and her shame-filled gaze turns to Ci Ci, silently pleading for forgiveness for a brief moment as she turns to the window and dives through it after Vix.
Nemira caresses Allegra one more time with a suckered appendage, Allegra's voice shrinks, less commanding, less assured.
The countess faces Ci Ci, "Oh I am free you delightfully silver tongued peasant. Is a canary in a cage next to a window not free? A dog in a kennel with full view of the moon is not trapped."
"We each touch the edges of reality beyond our gilded cage," Ci Ci says conversationally to the madwoman, gesturing with one hand for Saiya to follow the rest of the group out the window. "Or dream of swimming in the lake between the Sun and Moon that no one knows about. Sometimes, we hold the chains of our own invisible shackles, and need only another set of eyes to see them. No sense in gouging out those eyes, is there?"
She adjusts her position, moving closer to the window and away from Madame Lowls.