Andakos, flustered knowing the trouble this creature will most assuredly cause, flings the tanglefoot bag at a bad angle; it bursts on the ground directly next to the derro.
Berta's hammer slams home on the necrophidius and takes several huge chunks off it, but it's constructed surprisingly well, and still stands.
The second necrophidius slides forward five feet and begins swaying rhythmically. Berta can't help but draw her eyes toward its percussive hissing cadence...
She shakes off the effects, just in time to bat away the other necrophidius' bite.
ROUND 1
[color=green]
Necrophidius 1 (14 dmg)
Andakos (20/23 hp)
Golloriel (32/33 hp)
Berta (39/39 hp)
Caladaer (21/23 hp)
Derro (0 dmg)
Necrophidius 2 (0 dmg)
[/color]
Andakos pulls an alchemist's fire from his bandolier and tosses it at the derro.
Golloriel sees Berta taking on the snake-things by herself. That won't do. She rushes back into the corridor. While keeping her eyes squarely on Berta, she touches the dwarf's shoulder. Berta feels a flash of protective energy.
Caladear touches Thúlae and whispers a quick incantation. Thúlae's tiny bird eyes turn fiery red and he turns his gaze on the derro.
The derro screams, casts darkness, and backs away, drawing her crossbow as she goes.
Then her day gets worse when alchemist's fire smashes against her leg and lights it on fire.
Then her day gets worse when a particularly angry magic bird glares at her and she lights even more on fire. And now she is indefinitely on fire.
The derro does her best to study her opponents while on fire, , and decides the elf looks like the flimsiest target, so she fires her repeating crossbow at Cal, but she finds being on fire to be surprisingly distracting and the shot sails wide.
Outside, the second necrophidius, sensing its dance did not work, slithers forward to start biting instead. It slides into a flanking position with its friend and buries its fangs deep in Berta's thigh . She feels her limbs begin to seize...
The dwarf freezes in place as all her muscles seize from the horrid supernatural toxins in the necrophidius' bite.
"Get out here! Berta needs help!"
Golloriel's spear skips harmlessly off the necrophidius as it approaches Berta.
Pros from round 1: the derro is basically melting at this point.
Cons from round 1: Berta is paralyzed and basically a fish in a barrel for the necrophidii.
Necro 1 takes advantage to bite the crap out of the helpless Berta. However, despite having an effective Dexterity of ZERO, the necrophidius still manages to bounce its fangs off her armor instead of literally any blatantly open vital areas.
ROUND 2
[color=green]
Necrophidius 1 (14 dmg)
Andakos (20/23 hp)
Golloriel (32/33 hp)
Berta (27/39 hp, paralyzed 4 rounds)
Caladaer (21/23 hp)
Derro (19 dmg, super ultra on fire)
Necrophidius 2 (10 dmg)
[/color]
Andakos reluctantly turns his back to the derro and enters the doorway. He sees Berta standing stock still and knows exactly what happened. He punches #2.
Thúlae continues to stare at the derro, listening to her screams and not wanting to like it but kind of liking it.
Caladaer flicks his wrist and a wand appears in his hand. He points it at #1 and two orbs of force erupt from it and slam into the necrophidius.
Golloriel drops her spear and draws her mace. She wants to attack the one that looks like it's closer to death, but she'd have to maneuver around a corner and she wants to be sure she hits. She targets #2.
Cal slams his force missiles home into the necrophidius, blasting off chunks of bone, but the creature is still up.
This time the derro manages to resist the deathbird's dread gaze, but she is still very much on fire.
The necrophidius easily ducks Andakos' clumsy blow--hey, it's been like a week since he's had to punch anybody with it!--which puts the creature at an awkward angle for Golloriel's mace, which strikes at an odd angle and simply skips harmlessly away.
The derro continues to burn; most of her flesh has blackened and bubbled, and she screams in horrific agony as she fires once with her crossbow before trying to stumble-flee down the tunnel behind her.
She stumbles even harder as her natural grace and agility melts with her fat and muscle tissue.
The necrophidius that is slowly finding itself surrounded bites out at Andakos and digs into his abdomen , as his limbs begin to seize up.
Thankfully he fights through it.
The necrophidius in front of Berta, seeing new delectable targets to entrance, begins its Dance of Death.
Golloriel can't quite pull her eyes away from the creature's writhing form, and finds her limbs refuse to answer her call for a brief moment, but then she fights back against it and her body once again answers her mind's commands.
ROUND 3
[color=green]
Necrophidius 1 (23 dmg)
Andakos (20/23 hp)
Golloriel (32/33 hp)
Berta (27/39 hp, paralyzed 3 rounds)
Caladaer (21/23 hp)
Derro (24 dmg, on fire)
Necrophidius 2 (10 dmg)
[/color]
Andakos cries out in frustration. What is wrong with him today? He tries to distract the necrophidius to make it easier for Golloriel to hit it.
Then he punches it.
Golloriel continues to try to kill #2.
Thúlae feels the spell wearing off but stares extra hard to put the derro down for good.
Two more missiles at #1.
The derro somehow manages to resist the Eagle of Death Metal's final fire stare, but it's probably not going to matter in a moment.
Cal's magic missiles continue slamming into the necrophidius unerringly. It looks in rough shape, but is still up.
The derro screams as she's consumed in flames, and collapses to the floor, cooking as the flames lick over her body.
The second necrophidius lashes out at Golloriel, who managed to almost do something to it. The fangs dig into her arm, leaving two hideous punctures , and Golloriel can feel their withering magic coursing out from the wound.
Fortunately she's too tough for the supernatural venom, and shakes it off, but the party has suffered some grievous wounds now.
The first necrophidius lashes out at the paralyzed barbarian again.
Fortunately the only adjacent opponent is Berta and she's paralyzed. The necrophidius glances around, trying to play it cool, nonchalantly checking to see if anyone saw that. (Literally everyone did.)
ROUND 4
[color=green]
Necrophidius 1 (29 dmg)
Andakos (8/23 hp)
Golloriel (26/33 hp)
Berta (27/39 hp, paralyzed 2 rounds)
Caladaer (21/23 hp)
Derro (24 dmg)
Necrophidius 2 (10 dmg)
[/color]
Andakos is seething with anger and frustration. Why can't he hit this damn thing? With Cal directly behind him, his options are pretty limited, so he takes the actions of a crazy person, continuing to do the thing that continues to not work.
Golloriel is tired of prose.
Cal's third bombardment of force missiles does the trick, and the first necrophidius finally crumbles into a heap of inanimate bones.
The second necrophidius seems confused as to what Andakos is doing; despite his own attacks being ineffectual, he is constantly setting Golloriel up for solid hits, and were it not for having her eyes squinted against the potential Death Dance, she'd have already hit it twice.
Second time is a charm however, as her mace slams home and smashes several chunks of bone away. It retaliates by burying its fangs in her leg, tearing at the meat and very nearly nicking the femoral artery. By now she knows what's coming next.
There's no way she's letting this evil little bastard's magic get the better of her!
ROUND 5
[color=green]
Necrophidius 1 (39 dmg, dead)
Andakos (8/23 hp)
Golloriel (15/33 hp)
Berta (27/39 hp, paralyzed 1 rounds)
Caladaer (21/23 hp)
Derro (24 dmg)
Necrophidius 2 (16 dmg)
[/color]
This is ridiculous. Berta could have killed this thing in two hits.
Seeing how beat up Golloriel is getting, Andakos aims to protect her from another attack over helping her hit.
That last bite hurt. Somehow Golloriel feels like she is getting lucky, though. She grabs her holy symbol and says a quick prayer to Sarenrae, who responds with a burst of healing energy.
Things aren't going well. Caladaer looks down at the wand. He wanted a more potent version of the spell so that he wouldn't need to memorize it every day, but that pushed the price so high that he could only afford a handful of charges. And now they are about to consume them all in a single fight. Damn that barbarian for getting paralyzed!
The necrophidius hisses as it's bombarded with magic and the investigator's gauntleted fist. Andakos may have failed to help boost Golloriel's defenses, but he did succeed in taking its attention. The bony construct lashes out at him with its viciously sharp fangs but the investigator dodges it easily.
Berta feels her limbs slowly awaken and return to her, and she can finally move once again.
ROUND 6
[color=green]
Necrophidius 1 (39 dmg, dead)
Andakos (8/23 hp)
Golloriel (26/33 hp)
Berta (27/39 hp)
Caladaer (21/23 hp)
Derro (40 dmg, cooking)
Necrophidius 2 (27 dmg)
[/color]
Andakos is relieved to see Berta moving again, but can't quite suppress the disappointment that she missed the necrophidius.
Hoping to kill this thing now, he again tries to increase Golloriel's chances of hitting. With the end in sight, he takes the risk of looking directly at the creature.
Golloriel also looks directly at the snake.
Caladaer doesn't want to use any more charges on the wand. He tries to find a gap around Andakos to fire an acid dart.
Thanks to the combined efforts of Andakos and Golloriel, Berta's awkward swing doesn't matter. The two blindside the remaining necrophidius and smash it into powder between their mace and gauntlet.
COMBAT OVER!
Final HP Count
Andakos 12/23 hp
Berta 31/39 hp
Caladaer 23/23 hp
Golloriel 19/33 hp
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Berta drops the earth-breaker to the ground with a loud, dull thud, letting it sit upside-down as she leans on the haft. "Those were awful. Still better than the derros. Bone-snakes I see, yes. Necromancer. Bones. Okay. Why derros though? What does this Lamm do with them? Apprentices, maybe?"
She takes one last sour glance at the skull hallway and moves into the next room. "Also the acid. That was unexpected."
"Gather around," Golloriel says, clutching her holy symbol. She closes her eyes and beseeches Sarenrae to heal herself and her companions.
She keeps her eyes closed a few more seconds, basking in the warm glow of Sarenrae's light.
"Derros are sadistic deep dwellers that abduct surface folk to perform experiments. Seems to me they would make perfect company for a necromancer." He doesn't wait for a response, instead searching the derro's room.
Andakos leans against the door jamb while he hacks up half a lung. Golloriel's healing hurts like the dickens but clears up his cough right away. "Thank you, Golloriel," he says, reaching out to touch her shoulder. "You fought well. Now, let's see what's in this room."
+1 traps
The north table is a surprisingly high-quality alchemical lab, but it is far too large and cumbersome to bring with you.
The southern table contains a plethora of broken and shattered detritus, but a careful and thorough search reveals some undamaged items among the trash that could prove useful (or at least valuable).
- 3 doses of vermin repellant
- 2 tanglefoot bags
- 4 doses of poison
- a strange glass funnel emanating magic
- 2 doses of silversheen
- a large satchel emanating magic; whether it comes from the bag or what is in it, you are uncertain
The satchel is a handy haversack. Inside are several vials and scrolls:
- 3 potions of cure moderate wounds
- a potion of lesser restoration
- a potion of invisibility
- 2 scrolls of false life
- a scroll of dispel magic
As well, you are able to cobble together enough random bits of unbroken beakers and small pouches of alchemical reagents to make a portable alchemist lab.
As you finish identifying the items and sorting them out to the party, you take a look around the room. There is a narrow tunnel to the south leading to a boarded-over door, and a tunnel to the southeast leading out.
"This is a hybridization funnel, but I'm not sure about this bag." He opens it and looks inside.
"Ah, yep, I have one of these back at the Citadel. I just bought it and haven't had a chance to use it yet."
He holds a vial of the poison gingerly with the tips of his fingers. "Black adder venom. Nasty stuff, drains the life right out of you." He shakes his head, wraps the vials in a cloth, and stows them in the pack.
Andakos checks out the southeast tunnel.
+1 traps
Inside the satchel are several vials and scrolls. Interestingly, when Caladaer looks into the bag, the inside appears to have significantly more space than it seems to on the outside.
That should come in... handy.
Andakos steps into the tunnel and peers in. Some 25 feet down the narrow tunnel, it splits to the north and south, winding drunkenly in either direction.
For her part, Berta finds herself wandering toward the southern tunnel, peering at the door at the end intently.
Caladaer scoffs. "Wrong? The body was sold to a necromancer. What did you expect was going to happen?"
Golloriel holds her hand up. "Dad, stop it." She turns to Berta. "We don't know that anything terrible has happened to the body yet. Let's go see."
Andakos groans inwardly. This f&#*in' guy. He moves to quickly inspect the boarded door.
You approach the south door. It's boarded from top to bottom, but the job looks rushed and haphazard. It would probably take an impressive feat of strength to pry them off in one go, but you could take a minute or two and go slowly to pull them loose with little trouble.
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Berta's jaw clenches at Cal. "Yes. You are more in line with the rest of this city. Callous, rude, and with no respect for the dead. I pray those around you have more reverence for your body when you pass."
She storms off down the southern hallway, which would make much more of an impact, perhaps, if she didn't have such short, stubby legs. She immediately goes to work prying off boards, grumbling in Shoanti under her breath the whole time.
The process of taking off the boards takes minutes. It would probably go faster if two could work on it together, but the hall is just a little too narrow. As Berta starts work on the last board, something slams hard against the door with impressive force, filling the room with a that reverberates through the whole room. Something in there wants out. Something powerful...