"Crap..." Erasmo curses as he also looks around for the woman.
From a bush below, two more rays of flame erupt and head straight towards Marcus, blasting him in the legs with tremendous force.
Marcus is very badly burned again by the bolts of flame. Contrary to normal expectations about the cauterizing nature of fire, somehow the damage causes Marcus to start bleeding , in addition his legs seem even more badly injured, with a hampering, debilitating injury
The party hears from outside, "there's an old proverb - Make a man a fire, and he’ll stay warm all day long. Set a man on fire, and he’ll be warm for the rest of his life." There's a snort and a chuckle.
You see her move carefully off to the west, and out of sight around the edge of the building.
The zombies blink and look confused, then mill about downstairs, with no enemies in sight.
Magda hurries to follow Marcus, sending out healing energy as she gets nearer.
Yaziyah follows closely behind Magda, stepping around the corpses and gore on the floor, and shaking her head at the sight of Marcus. "If you wanted to have a barbecue outside, I don't think this is the way to do it." She strides up to him, the first syllables of a prayer to the ancestors on her lips.
Vera heads on upstairs invisibly, trying to catch up to the rest of the party!
Marcus chokes and splutters at the burst of fire and starts falling to the ground. But a flash of light from underneath his armor and he lands on a knee, gritting his teeth as blood runs through them and remains on his feet. The man's stubbornness seemed to know no bounds. "She moved west...around the building." He calls through red teeth. "I can't keep on her, next one will kill me." He limps back inside for cover from any more ranged attacks.
Erasmo follows Marcus. "She is playing with us, but we do not have to play at all... let her be. We need to find someone, lets focus on that and if she returns, we'll deal with her."
Yazi looks around outside, and can hear the sounds of the city, quietly going about its business. The district is wealthy, so the noise is even more muffled.
Of the woman, there is no sign at the moment. There is shuffling from downstairs, obviously of the zombie, but it doesn't seem that the zombies have much of an instinct for following the party, and they simply mill about downstairs.
Marcus holds his position, staying in cover and full defense, keeping his ears sharp for any direction from his allies or sounds from their enemies.
After running up the stairs it is time to, "Hurry up and wait." Magda says, but with a toothy grin and not a mutter. While listening for attacking elves, she continues her descriptions of the city to keep up the fortunes.
Yaziyah gets to work healing Marcus again, muttering in a tone of concern. "She really did a number on you, now. I don't think I've ever seen such bad burns, I don't know how you're not screaming in agony right now."
Marcus grits his teeth. "Screaming doesn't help." From his quickened pulse and shaky voice, it was clear the onslaught had indeed left it's mark though.
Vera decides that another spell might be appropriate in this situation, and prepares her mind for new magics (while taking a 5-foot step away from the party).
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
"When I was a kid, my father used to say that if screaming would help with anything, pigs would never die." He says, agreeing to Marcus and instinctively massaging his butt cheek at the memory of his father.
Wherever the woman is, she is moving incredibly quietly. Even Magda's magically assisted, outlandishly astute hearing cannot pick up anything other than the shuffling of the undead.
The only other things of interest on this floor are doors to the north.
Marcus moves over to the stairs, clearly favoring one leg over the other. He cautiously peers down to keep an eye out.
"Stay still, I'm not done!"
Yaziyah admonishes Marcus as she follows closely behind him with another healing spell. If the elf ambushed them again, she wasn't sure that Marcus could withstand another one of her fiery attacks.
Magda keeps an ear and an eye out while chanting about the city, how cobbles are shaped and gutters smell like the leavings of life.
Vera just waits for an opportunity to blast a sneaky elf with a ton of glitter!
Much like Marcus, Erasmo keeps looking around, expecting the elf to spring on them at any moment.
A screaming bolt blasts from the western ledge area towards Vera, embedding itself into her leg as she screams out in pain. Somehow the bolt is able to cut through tendon and artery with one blast, and the young arcanist is hobbled.
The harlequin fumbles as she hides behind the doorjam, just enough that you can both see her hidden. She looks like she intends to escape soon enough.
"THERE! She is There!" the half orc lass yells, after what seems like a month of listening in hopes to hear something. Magda rushes forward, hoping something can be done. But she is too slow, she knows this, so she TRIES to get the city to help.
It looks like she stumbles a bit as the assault on her luck begins.
Yaziyah rushes to Vera's side to heal the girl while glancing towards the area that Magda is running towards. They were definitely on the back foot here, being harassed from the shadows with bolt and spell - they needed to regroup and come up with a plan.
"I can't see her. Where is she?" she mutters as she tends to Vera's leg.
Vera doesn't see the foe either--but Marcus does, and so does Magda. It's enough to clue Vera in. She sends her Dancing Lights to the window to see, and then conjure glitterdust to burst over her!
Erasmos simply runs as fast as he can towards the a%#&&$~ elf.
Magda looks back at Marcus with a wide-eyed, shouldn't you start running, stare, all while continuing her chant.
:)
The joking elf shrieks, almost in delight, at Vera's cleverness, and though she she seemingly is unable to shake the effect of the dust out of her eyes "well, it looks like I was right to hit you girlie. That's powerful magic." Shaking her head in distress, she shrugs, "well, I suppose you were a good audience, but, the show must go on, and you have the best of me." She sticks her tongue out and flips over the railing onto the pavement below, her faint outline from the glitterdust moving incredibly swiftly away from the manor, to the north on the narrow streets.
Marcus reaches out his long leg and plants it right in front of her ankle as she starts moving!
She tumbles away and off of the 15' balcony after standing up from Marcus' trip.
Yaziyah strides to the window, taking out her crossbow. "Where is she?" She looks down, spotting the fleeing woman. "What is your problem, lady? Who are you?"
She wasn't hoping for a response, of course, but the whole thing was just too bizarre. Was she an entertainer whose mind had snapped from witnessing the horrors that had happened here? Had she orchestrated the whole thing? Yaziyah makes a mental note to check the bodies of the guests for burns.
Magda moves with her group to the balcony but has to maintain her cities focus on the funny elf, so can do little else.
"Oh no, is she getting away?". Vera hobbles over and can't get too far--she certainly can't see the fleeing elf.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Erasmo follows the elf, jumping off the balcony and landing besides her. As he does so, he grabs the woman's pants and pull them down to entangle her feet!
Marcus wastes no time and leaps off after her, getting a surprisingly long distance, unceremoniously crashing to the ground but making a semi-decent roll and getting to his feet again!
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
The woman, her makeup a little mussed at this point, shakes he head, blinking, and recovers from the effect of the glitterdust. She notices her pants down around her ankles, laughs "cheeky!" and chuckles, kicking them off. "I didn't expect you to jump as far as the street - but then again... streets can't jump at all ..." She winks at Marcus and does a cartwheel in her underwear away from Erasmo, dodging the halfling's attempts to grab at her and gets even further away, weaving around corners to prevent the halfling from following easily. She's blows him a kiss, and wiggles her bottom at the halfling as she turns a corner down an alley.
Mags stops her chanting. She stares after where the woman ran to, and looks like she wants to say something, but in the end she shakes her head. "We need to search the house now, I guess, find the source of this sickness. Take care of the rest of the shambling moaning guys too."
Marcus growls, working around his leg where he landed on a knee. "Can't keep up with her...I expect we'll meet again." He growls unhappily. He turns back to the house with a frown, then bends over to Erasmo. "Not the worst way I've seen a woman in her underwear leave."
"Have you seen how easily she removed them?" Erasmo asks, amused. "Girah could learn some tricks..."
Vera hobbles the rest of the way over to the window, in time to see Erasmo holding a pair of pants. "Well then! If you boys are done with your fun, you'd better get back up here. Let's hope that crazy elf lady is gone for good."
The party searches the first and second floors, dispatching with some ease the various zombies that remain. Those infested with creatures or disease are avoided and dispatched at a distance, but the party takes no substantial harm from any of them.
North of the main hall, two undead nobles wearing matching lion and lioness masks sit before the empty fireplace, with a third zombie dressed as a peacock and holding a silver serving tray attending them. They attack as soon as the party enters the room just north of the great hall.
To the south of the main hall, is a dining room. Eight corpses sit at a finely set dinner table, looking at one another blankly. Of the eight, four are zombies who mechanically go through the motions of eating the rotten food on the table before them, spooning it back into their mouths after it dribbles out onto the table from their slack jaws. These zombies attack as soon as the party enters the room, but must use a standard action to extricate themselves from their tightly pushed-in chairs and are dispatched easily.
East of the main hall through a hallway, a zombie dressed as a bluewinged angel strums at a large, standing harp, even though all of the harp’s strings are broken. Four costumed corpses—a sea serpent, a castle tower, a swan, and a blue skeleton—look on from chairs. The zombie musician attacks as soon as the party enters the room but is dispatched easily.
South of the recital hall and southeast of main hall, two of the Carowyns’ servants sit at a preparation table here holding dull knives, pantomiming the carving of a corpse on the table dressed as a huge pig. The two zombies attack as soon as the party enters.
The main gallery, where zombies pantomimed appreciating art before being dispatched, stands quiet.
To the north seems to be the master bedroom. A zombie, stands in the center of this room dressed as a Galtan queen, her sprawling pearl-studded gown flowing around her and her elaborate, powdered wig nearly brushing the ceiling. A second zombie—dressed as a Qadiran princess—attends her. The zombies attack 1 round after the party enters the room, but are easily dispatched.
A well-stocked wine rack and several large casks line the walls of this stuffy cellar. A small wooden door squats in the southeastern corner.
By the time they reach the cellar, Yaziyah is seething with rage at this desecration of death and mockery of life, her anger and disgust obvious in her features and body language. "Was it that elf who did all this? Or was she just another part of this macabre spectacle?" She takes a few breaths to try and calm herself, glaring at the wooden door as if it had committed some unspeakable offense. "I don't remember seeing Ruan among the abominations, so perhaps there is still hope for him. Although I shudder to think what it would be like, hiding in a house full of..."
She walks up to the door and raises her hand to knock, glancing at the others in case anyone had other ideas.
Vera looks over at the zombie musician's body. "Ruan was a musician though, right? Do you suppose this zombie playing the harp was Deyanira's brother, Ruan?" asks Vera. "I'm not sure it matters--the only people alive in this place besides us seems to have been that strange elf." Just in case, she looks for a memento from that body, perhaps an article of clothing or a feather from the bluewing angel costume.
"No, I know Ruan, that is not him. Still, whoever that was, and everyone else in this place... what senseless loss of life! This city has been through enough, and if I get my hands on who orchestrated this..." The Shoanti's fists tighten on the grip of her weapon.
Marcus fared much better against these simpler enemies. By the time he was done vanguarding their assault, he was a literal tower of gore, having torn through rotten flesh with brute strength. He removes his helmet briefly to clean the visor, visibly displeased at the level of gore, but letting the rest remain for the time being.
He re-dons his half cleaned helm and moves to the wooden door within the cellar. He listens at the door for a moment, as well as checks for any signs of traps.
Then he tries to open it.
Vera nods, trusting Yazi's knowledge. "Then maybe there's hope after all. I hope he somehow Ruan locked himself in the cellar and survived."
"Let's make sure we're all healed as best as possible before we go."
Mags used her spear repeatedly on the zombies, easily holding them in place while the others dispatched them. "I hope he is alive" she says before helping Marcus listen.
There don't appear to be any traps, but the door does seem to be locked.