Argus thinks to himself that this is all going to make a hilarious story someday, but at the moment he's finding it somewhat difficult to find the humor. At least his fresh acid burns can't make him any uglier, which cheers him somewhat as he attempts to gut the thing from the inside.
Piercing, Silver
Ray bonks the flower. I wonder if the big guy felt that in there?
Bludgeoning, Adamantine
Song wonders how these people have survived for so long when they just stand there and get chowed on by plants.
Fire, Magical, Piercing
Amanteia can see the plant is barely hanging on. She sends a few missiles its way to finish the job.
The acid in Argus's eyes and ears is too painful and distracting for him to make even a token attempt at freeing himself. It looks like it's going to be up to his companions.
... who come through in spades. Ray's hammer blow spews acid in every direction and Amanteia's missiles finish the job. The crypt flower wilts with Argus still inside.
With the flower dead, the work to restore the town square remains. It is overgrown with weeds and the water in the pool is dark and slimy. Without a green thumb in the group, it seems like it may just take hours of hard labor to achieve the task.
Amanteia looks extremely reluctant to literally dig in the dirt, but at least she has prestidigitation. She sighs, rolls up her sleeves, kneels in the mud, and starts pulling weeds.
Argus touches himself on the chest a couple times, whispering an extended prayer to Shelyn.
He looks helplessly at the newcomer, knowing she has some skill in healing. "Er, c-could you...?"
Song shakes her head bemusedly and strides over to the big paladin, stowing Baxin as she goes. "Alright, c'mere."
Shaking her head, she tries once more.
Seeing a more significant improvement in his wounds, she pats him on the bicep. "There. Now, next time, maybe fight the plant monster from the outside, yeah?"
She then hunkers down next to Amanteia and digs into the work. Where the ground is dry and hard, she casts create water to soften the soil and aid in the pulling of weeds and dead plants.
Argus snorts, a lopsided grin on his face. The scarring is particularly heavy on one side, so it's actually hard to tell if he's smirking or just can't really raise that side of his mouth into a proper smile.
He pulls off his gauntlets and digs his thick, gnarled gray hands into the dirt, reveling in the very particular sensation of burying your hands in soil--the soft shifting of the sod like dry water across his skin, the way it clings to his knuckles and the hair on his forearms. He hasn't played in the dirt since he was a toddler, half-formed memories hazy with the fog of intervening decades. The sensations are almost intoxicating, and he finds words drifting into his mind as he works, almost subconsciously forming lines for a poem as he goes.
Dead and dead the soil be,
Dead of root and dead of leaf,
And yet the death feels not cursed,
But simply cocoon, transforming earth
Happily, the lines linger in his mind. He'll probably be able to remember them long enough to write them down, later. That's not always the case, and it seems to be the case less and less as he gets older.
Ray frowns, poking at the plant creature with the head of the warhammer a few times, ruminating on the fact that their lack of knowledge of the natural world--and preternatural, as often seems to be the case--has been a steady thorn in the party's side.
If we ever get out of this hellhole, I'll be sure to pick up some books on naturalism in Lastwall or something, he thinks absently. Gods, it'd be nice to sleep in a proper bed. He can't even remember the last time--
--Yes he can. He fell asleep at Auranya's place. He'd been doing that more and more. He'd hated it, hated what it meant, because it meant they were getting close. And when people got close to him, they eventually saw the... the thing in him. Curse, or madness, or ill luck. Whatever it was that made his life miserable, that made him a vessel for an uncaring deity's will, that made him lose himself and sense things that weren't there, that made magic drift into mundane objects for him to carry like heavy padlocks on weighty chains across his shoulders. She'd see that, and she'd leave him.
Well, she had left him. Just... not how he thought she would. He feels like he's going to throw up.
After what feels like hours, he finally turns away from the creature's corpse and, with a small pang of guilt, realizes the others are all hard at work while he stands there drifting off into his own misery. His neck suddenly feels uncomfortably warm. He shakes it off, rolls up his sleeves, and gets to work.
His magic isn't much help in basic labor, but he uses the blasting rod on occasion to burn away particularly dense patches of dead growth to make it easier to pull away.
As the rest of the party toils in the soil , Jando suddenly seems to remember something. He jumps to his feet, mutters "I'll be right back," and heads out of the town square.
Meanwhile, the hard work continues. Ray's idea to burn away the old, rotted vegetation does help, but the party's general inexperience with this sort of thing makes it slow, drudging work. After about an hour and a half, Jando returns from his sojourn. He is carrying a large box that he must have scavenged from one of the less damaged houses at the perimeter of the town. He sets it down near the flowerbed, a big grin on his face. Inside, the party can see that he has somehow managed to find living flowers. He carefully extracted them, with roots intact, from wherever he found them.
The work continues. Jando naturally takes the lead, directing the others in what to do and how to do it. His guidance helps, but it is still dirty, tedious, exhausting work. By the time it is starting to look like a proper flowerbed again, the sun is low in the sky (or, you assume it is, since you can't actually see it through the green mist). Every last one of the party is covered head to toe in a nasty mixture of sweat, soil, and dead vegetation, but, with the flowers Jando retrieved planted, the work is finally done.
As you sit back to rest your sore backs, one of the indistinct ghostly watchers speaks, "Ah, we can rest easily with that good work done. It's reassuring to know there are still helpful people here. We knew we wouldn't get any help from that strange purple woman with the long tongue. All she ever did is come by and pick through the ruins with a sour look on her face."
The other spirit interjects as they both start to fade away, "Except when she saw the corpse of that cat; she tore into that like she hadn't eaten in months. So very desperate. Always hungry and distracted by an easy meal, I'd wager. Thanks again, friends!"
You've heard about this purple, long-tongued woman several times. She is most likely a ghoul, and if she is resorting to eating non-humanoid corpses, she must be particularly hungry or desperate. (And probably pretty grumpy.)
As the figures on the porch fade away, you hear two clinks on the ground beneath where they stood. If you investigate, you find two magical rings. Amanteia determines that they are a ring of protection +1 and a ring of feather falling.
Also... through the grime and achiness, you all feel... stronger.
Amanteia rests for a few minutes, then stands, stretches her back, and takes a few minutes to prestidigitate everyone's nastiness away.
"Mm. Ghoul, I'd guess. Possibly a ghast, but maybe not. It sounds hungry. If we meet it, it'll probably try to eat us. Maybe we can distract it, but honestly, I have no qualms about putting an undead out of its misery."
He examines the rings, tracing his fingers across them as he focuses, trying to find any psychic residue. He finds none, but does discover the items' uses.
He holds out the ring of protection +1 to Argus. "Since you're in the front, usually. Makes you harder to hit."
He holds up the other. "Lets you fall from a long ways up without being harmed. I'd say... 60 feet or so? Higher than that and you'll fall the rest of the way. Anybody want it?"
Argus marvels at the flowers Jando found, helping to plant them at the ranger's direction with utmost care. He's already busily composing an additional verse to take in the new life in his hands.
Afterward, he quietly thanks Amanteia for cleaning him off, then awkwardly accepts the ring from the occultist. "Th-thank you, R...Raybin. This w-will help." He claps him heartily on the back, nearly sending the old man sprawling. "Er--s-sorry."
Song considers the second ring, then nods to Amanteia. "I think you should take it. Meaning no offense, but you're the least sturdy of us. Argus or I might be able to survive a tumble off a ledge, provided it's not a terribly high one. Maybe even Ray. But you could take some serious damage from it. We need you up and blasting our enemies' brains with that magic of yours."
She politely declines the offer to get clean, rinsing her hands off with a create water spell but leaving her armor dirty. It was already dirty, after all, with many, many days of dust--much of it from the Dead Roads. She feels a strangely nostalgic draw to it, and isn't ready to part with her keepsake of those strange days just yet.
Amanteia smiles at Song and holds up her left hand to show the identical ring on her pointer finger. "I already have one, dear. One of you take it."
Then she walks over to Ray. "Do you understand your magic? I never have. I just ... know ... how to make things that shouldn't be possible happen. And every once in a long while, I just know new spells. Like right now, for instance. I don't think I can cast them today, but I know that I know how. My parents are... were... noble, but otherwise just regular people. I don't think I got it from them. I am grateful for it, but I scare myself sometimes." In a rare display of vulnerability, she gives Ray a look that screams "please explain it to me".
Ray, sensing her unease, frowns. How the Hells is he supposed to comfort her? If he's not interrogating someone, he doesn't know how to interact. Never has.
"I dunno a lot about sorcery. Innate magic, you know. Mine is... weird. I draw magic out of objects." He holds up the blasting rod and shakes the shield bracelet on his wrist. "Takes a lot of study, but I've learned a few ways to manipulate the latent magic in them. To be perfectly honest, I don't entirely understand how my magic works, and I've been at it for a couple decades now."
He sighs, placing his hands on his hips. "I do know that bloodborne magic like yours can skip generations. Several, in fact. I knew a guy in the Varlokkur who swears his great-great-great grandmother had a tryst with a dragon, and that's why he can grow silver-scaled claws from his fingers." He drops his gaze to the dirt and shrugs. "Magic is hard to pin down by its very nature. I could study magic for forty years and never figure out how to do... this." He looks back up, gesturing at the ruined town covered in a murder-dome. "I never would have even thought this was possible if I hadn't seen it with my own two eyes."
He puts a hand on her arm in a gesture he hopes is reassuring. "All we can do is try to use the tools we were given the best we know how. Now, personally, I'd like to take these tools, find who did this to Roslar's Coffer, shove my blasting rod so far up his ass he tastes cedar, and melt his guts from the inside out. Might not bring back the people we love, but it should make me feel a little better." He grins cheerfully (a horrifying sight on the half-crazed man) and strides over to the others to make ready to leave this desecrated ruin.
Argus glances up curiously when Ray walks over to where he and Song are getting ready to leave, then glances at Amanteia. What's that all about?
He shrugs it off and goes back to adjusting the straps on his pack. Probably magic stuff. That's not a topic he has or wants any knowledge on. His gifts from Shelyn and his halberd are more than enough for him.
Song stood for a good minute staring at the magic ring Ray put in her hands. Her brain immediately thought OH GOD HE'S PROPOSING and for some reason the fact that he didn't short-circuited something.
She finally blinks, shakes it off, and gets back to putting her stuff together. After a few moments, she has Bǎxīn resting on her hip, ready to get going and (hopefully) get out of this horrible place.
Amanteia listens to Ray. He says a lot of words, but none of them are the explanation she wants to hear. If she is honest with herself, she didn't expect him to know -- his magic is clearly wildly different from hers -- but she allowed herself to hope for some insight.
She gives herself five seconds to wallow, then shakes her head, straightens her spine, and assumes her customary haughty demeanor.
"That is all three fragments, right? Should we return to the spirit?"
Argus nods. "T-time we b... be off."
He looks to Jando, Ray, Amanteia, and Song to see if they're ready, then begins making his way back toward the loci spirit.
You leave the town square and begin heading back to the cemetery. When you are about halfway there, Ray, Bob, and Song simultaneously raise their hands (and wing) to stop the party. You quickly leave the road and get behind cover to wait for whatever is coming. After less than a minute, the source of the noise becomes apparent: two cultists dressed identically to the ones you encountered at the jeweler and a gaunt, purple-skinned creature that is certainly the ghoul that you have been hearing about come around a corner and walk down the road toward you.
You have a few seconds to prepare before they are upon you. You could probably escape down the alley behind you if you decide to avoid this encounter for now, or you can prepare an ambush.
Argus isn't one for ambushes. He always gives his opponents an opportunity to avoid the fight--his edicts demand it, in fact--but his allies will certainly be less than enthused about it. Perhaps it would be best to avoid the battle altogether and continue their exodus from the corpse of Roslar's Coffer; after all, there is no point in picking a fight if they don't need to, and the chances of gaining any intel from lackeys or monsters seems low.
He turns to the others, shakes his head, and points at the alley, making his way forward as quietly as he can.
Ray grimaces, his fingers twitching at the opportunity to lash out at the bastards who did all this, but in the end he supposes the paladin is right. Not like they could ambush them anyway; the fool half-orc's damnable code wouldn't allow it. Might as well hold off if they can. He slips down the alley after Argus.
Song watches them leave with a small, almost imperceptible sigh of relief. The last thing she wants is to be in this place any longer than necessary. She has no doubt they can handle the enemies without too much issue, but why fight if it's not necessary?
She motions to Jando and Amanteia to follow the other two, and quietly brings up the rear, bow ready just in case.
Fortunately, you are hidden well enough that you can wait for the patrol to pass before slinking away; no one in the party can move particularly quietly on the best of days, so waiting until the patrol is out of earshot before continuing on to the cemetery ensures you aren't found out.
A few short minutes later, you arrive back at the entrance to the graveyard. When you approach the gate, the loci spirit appears again, and you could swear that it is brighter now than it was when you first encountered it. It begins speaking immediately, though, again, you hear the voice in your heads rather than with your ears. "Thank you, travelers of the Dead Roads, we are whole once again. You have proven yourselves to be friends of Roslar's Coffer, and so you can step inside to honor its dead. We must warn you, though: the dead are restless within our cemetery. They have congregated within the edifice known as Roslar's Tomb. Perhaps they somehow know of the hidden passage between the tomb and the Bastion of Light and seek to assault that noble edifice."
Anyone from Roslar's Coffer knows that the Bastion of Light is an abandoned fortified temple to Sarenrae outside of the town limits.
The spirit continues, "Before you go, we can provide you with a boon if two of you perform my ceremony. The first celebrant must recite a list of the dead from Roslar's Coffer, and the second celebrant must request that the dead rest easily and travel well to the afterlife that awaits them. If the ceremony is performed with reverence and heartfelt effort, we can be at rest, and all of you will receive a boon that will last one full day."
Ray swallows hard. He doesn't want to list the names. He doesn't want to list one name in particular. But the kid would kick their asses for not doing this, and if Dellan's sacrifice earned him anything, it's this.
He reluctantly nods, then looks pleadingly to Amanteia. "I uh... I might need... help... with some of the names. Could you...?"
He tries his best to keep the desperation from his voice, but he's not particularly successful. He only hopes she doesn't judge him too harshly for it.
Ray closes his eyes and does his best to list every name of every soul in Roslar's Coffer. Every time he is about to hesitate, or his conviction wavers, he remembers Dellan and redoubles his efforts.
Bob hears Ray struggling, but doesn't understand the full context of it because he's speaking that gobbledygook again. But Ray explained his role earlier anyway, so he knows what he's doing here. Fragments of memory flit in and out as he recites litanies for the dead, an inherent drive that laid buried for so long...
Song softly chants a funeral hymn as Argus recites his litanies, hoping to help him concentrate enough to overcome his stutter.
Argus closes his eyes, focusing on the steady, rhythmic syllables of Bob's Celestial recitation, along with the soothing cadence of Song's voice, and focuses. Death is not really something the Church of Shelyn likes to dwell on, but he spent enough time at Dellan's side to pick up a few things, including basic funeral rites.
"May the dead find their way to the river
And safely cross to the farther shore
Lost for them the worst memories
And nary anything more
May the dead find their way to Her tower
And humbly greet Her gaze
May She send them to their Final Reward
To spend the end of their days"
The loci spirit wavers slightly after Ray's recitation of the dead, but comes back into focus as Argus is saying his prayer. The voice echoes through your heads again. "Thank you, celebrants. Unfortunately, the ceremony is not complete, but we must have some further purpose here in Roslar's Coffer. Perhaps we are meant to look over you as you venture into the cemetery and beyond. If your duties do not take you away from here, we would be honored if you would try again tomorrow."
With that, the apparition parts, granting access to the cemetery beyond. The more perceptive among you can just make out Roslar's Tomb in the gloomy distance; it stands in the center of the cemetery and is by far the largest structure within it.
Argus glances at the others. "R-ready?" Once he gets assent from all of them, he readies his halberd. "The s-spirit m...mentioned undead. Be on your g-guard."
He heads slowly toward the entrance to the tomb.
Before they step into the tomb, Ray focuses his psychic energy into his eyes, and they shimmer faintly before returning to normal. He then draws the warhammer and holds it at the ready, nodding curtly to Argus.
Song also pauses to cast a spell, touching each of them in turn before resting her hand on her own chest. There is a faint ripple in the air that drips down each of them like water before vanishing like Ray's shimmer.
Argus glances at Amanteia and Jando, waiting to see if they want to perform any preparatory actions either.
Once everyone is prepared, he pulls open the door to Roslar's Tomb.
As you pass through the graveyard on the way to Roslar's Tomb, you notice that many of the tombstones are toppled and shattered, and more than a few older graves are now empty, their earth broken open from underneath. Fortunately (?), you don't see the graves' former occupants... yet.
As you draw nearer to the tomb, what appeared to be an unorganized pile of bones suddenly lurches up off the ground, rising to a full height of over 10 feet and organizing itself into a vaguely humanoid shape. It opens its mouth as if to unleash a roar at the party, but no sound escapes. Its intent is clear, however; it means to pulverize the party for encroaching on its territory.
This is a bone golem. It has all the usual golem traits, in addition to DR 5/adamantine and 5/bludgeoning. Additionally, it can detach some of its bones and huck them at an enemy. On a hit, the bones form a cage around the victim and squeeze.
Raybin (42/42 hp)
Amanteia (42/42 hp)
Creature (0 damage)
Argus (61/61 hp)
Song (46/46 hp)
Bold may act.
"IT AM A BONER"
Ray then dies of a stroke.
Ray shakes his head to clear it of whatever cobwebs just took root. With no idea what this thing is, he strides up to it with the admantine warhammer and gives it a bonk.
Adamantine, Bludgeoning
No Effects
Bob nopes out before the occultist even finishes taking his first step toward the thing, and lands on Argus' shoulder.
[color=blue]"I always liked you better,"[/color] he says plenty loud enough for Ray to hear, then lightly pecks the half-orc on the head.
No Effects
Amanteia fires off some missiles like a big dummy. Damage doesn't matter because nothing happens.
Ray's hammer bounces off the creature's bony armor, sending painful vibrations up the handle and into Ray's forearms. Amanteia's spell hits unerringly... and doesn't do a damn thing.
The creature steps away from Ray, gathers some bones from itself, and HUCKS them at Ray.
The bones strike Ray and then transform themselves into a cage, surrounding and imprisoning him. Nothing else happens... for now.
Jando steps to the side to give himself a clear shot and puts two arrows into the beast.
Both arrows enter the creature's body, but, perhaps unsurprisingly, they don't seem to do much damage at all.
Raybin (42/42 hp, grappled)
Amanteia (42/42 hp)
Creature (?? damage)
Jando (49/49 hp)
Argus (61/61 hp, guidance [10 rounds but I assume you're about to use it])
Song (46/46 hp)
Bold may act.
Argus curses under his breath. He should have seen this coming. Just walking out of the town through the tomb would have been far, far too easy.
The Eternal Rose sure does love to test me, he thinks wryly, then steps toward the bone fiend. No demands of surrender against this thing. If it's alive, it's alive in a wholly unnatural way, and it's doing... things... to his friends.
He's about to move in, but Amanteia's spell failing to so much as dent it makes him pause. He knows, sometimes, that strange creatures are difficult to harm without specially-crafted weapons. The halberd is silver. Perhaps that will do it?
Well, he has a cold iron glaive to try next, if it doesn't.
He rushes the fiend and slashes at it with the halberd.
Silver, Slashing
AC 16 | T 10 | FF 14
(Penalty from charging)
Song curses in Tien under her breath. She should have cast her spell before entering the graveyard. Now some great undead abomination has jumped them before they--
Hmm... This doesn't look like any undead she's ever heard of, and she's at least modestly informed on the subject. Some constructs are made from bone. But what does she know? It's not like she has a damn catalog of every undead on Golarion!
Then, of course, the big brave dummy goes rushing in and blocking her shot.
Well, she decides, seeing how badly Crazy McHammer missed earlier, she might as well do something else to help.
"Desna, the future is dark with worry. Bless us with your confidence."
She spreads her open hand to the sky, and a blanket of warmth and courage coats her and her allies.
She then moves around to the south, so that when she does finally get her shots in, she's not blocking Jando in turn.
The creature swats at Argus as he ducks under its reach, but the paladin is surprisingly spry and the huge bony fist misses completely. It recovers quickly, though, and uses its own momentum to step to the side of Argus's halberd thrust.
Desna, through Song, blesses the party.
Raybin (42/42 hp, grappled, blessed)
Amanteia (42/42 hp, blessed)
Creature (?? damage)
Jando (49/49 hp, blessed)
Argus (61/61 hp, blessed)
Song (46/46 hp, blessed)
Bold may act.
Ray irritably starts bashing at the bone cage to get out.
Adamantine, Bludgeoning
Amanteia blinks when her spell does nothing to the creature. But magic missile hurts everything! That's why it's magic!
... wait. This must be a golem. Which means she just officially became useless in this fight.
Dammit.
Okay. What to do here? She can't do magic to the golem, but a hole opening up underneath the golem isn't doing magic to it, right? Well. Worth a shot.
But Argus is right there. Him falling in the pit with the golem would be ... bad.
"Argus! My magic won't hurt it but I can drop it in a pit! That might make it hard for us to kill it, though. Tell me what to do!"
Ray can't quite get the angle right to swing the hammer in such a cramped space, and all it does is scrape along the inside of the bones. As if in retaliation, the bones start to squeeze. By the time they relent, Ray is positive that he has cracked at least a few ribs .
The golem then turns its ire on Argus, slamming him so hard that Argus very nearly collapses straight to the ground. Then it does it again . This thing is powerful.
Jando knows his arrows aren't doing much, but when he reaches to his hip, he remembers that the only other weapon he has is his broken longsword. Watching their two damage dealers get obliterated in the blink of an eye makes up his mind: "I vote for the pit!"
Then, because there is literally nothing else he can do, he fires two shots.
This time his first arrow hits but does f@++-all and the second flies wide.
Raybin (31/42 hp, grappled, blessed)
Amanteia (42/42 hp, blessed)
Creature (?? damage)
Jando (49/49 hp, blessed)
Argus (39/61 hp, blessed)
Song (46/46 hp, blessed)
Bold may act.
Argus drops the halberd, plucks out the glaive, and steps back to make room to swing. "Nothing for it! This thing hits like an angry hill giant! Pit!"
He swings hard with the cold iron glaive, but suspects it will do nothing.
Cold Iron, Slashing
Cold Iron, Slashing
Song grumbles and fires off an arrow at the thing. "And will that actually stop it?"
Magical, Piercing
She sighs. "Not that I've got any better ideas."