Both Goliath and Charlie don't see the flaming sphere's coming their way as they are badly burned. Charlie begins to retreat, looking for any possible way away from the flames. "We are s..s..surrounded!" Goliath keeps on the priest as Charlie hunts for him in the madness.
HP 30/41
AC 20 (22 w/ shield)
Wooden Shield 12/12; [AC Bonus +2: [Hardness 3] [HP/BT 12(6)]
Focus 1/1
Hero Points 1/3
Goliath
HP 15/32)
AC 17
The flames do their job and then some! Goliath's teeth sink in. The priest yelps in pain, and nearly drops.
Round 3:
Priests: ATK
Tiny: Go
Charlie: Hit
Dendillion: Go
Chark: Go
Haldan: Go
Black: 44 (Barkskin, Flaming Sphere)
Red: 29 (Barkskin: dismissed, Flaming Sphere)
Tiny follows up with another step into many claws at the retreating priest.
Tiny keeps the pressure up, nailing the retreating priest twice!
The flames do their job and then some! Goliath's teeth sink in. The priest yelps in pain, and nearly drops.
Round 3:
Priests: ATK
Tiny: Hits
Charlie: Hit
Dendillion: Go
Chark: Go
Haldan: Go
Black: 44 (Barkskin, Flaming Sphere)
Red: 43 (Barkskin: dismissed, Flaming Sphere)
Action 1: Stride
Action 2-3: Telekinetic Projectile
"Go help Tiny! I'll make sure Goliath is okay!" the bard says before moving around the flaming sphere to get behind the bear. He strums his lute, the magic evident in each note as he launches a nearby decoration at the priest.
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Haldan's card bounces off the wall and strikes the priest! It is then that Goliath's jaws close on the priest, snuffing out his life.
Dendillion comes in from the west and he hurls a wall hanging at the priest, striking him in the face and dropping him too!
Chark uncharacteristically watches the priest burn for a long while as Goliath retreats. Heathen, indeed, she thinks to herself, before turning away and giving tender ministrations to the bear.
Tiny shouts back "Everybody okay back there?' as he searches the priest beneath his feet.
Charlie's pants are singed badly as his leg begins to blister. "I think we're a..a..alright." He looks around. "Where d..d.did they come from?"
"This lot? I can't help but feel like each one is a rat coming out of its warren. They are like so much diseased vermin. And I tire of this already."
He stops, then leans against a wall by Chark while she tends to Goliath. Lute in hand, he strums a few chords. "There may be a song in this..."
The party takes 10 minutes to refocus and catch their breath.
Tiny waves his companions "Lets keep making the loop and see if we can figure out where those priests came from."
"Makes sense. Lead on."
Tiny opens the nearby door only to find a privy. It's less than heroic.
The party rounds the corner to see the door to this room has been opened.
The door leads to a suite; an office with a bedroom beyond. The office includes a small desk and a few chairs, and it is lined with bookcases that hold an impressive library. The bedroom is furnished with a double bed, armoire, and metal bathtub.
"They pro..pro..prob..likely heard us and set up an ambush." Charlie pokes around the room for anything of importance. "Almost b..b..burned the whole place down." Charlie stumbles upon his words a bit more in the last few years. He never had in the past, but more and more a bit recently.
Charlie looks through the room a bit. The desk contains a recent letter from a distant Gozren abbey discussing rare spells. Included with this letter are a trio of magical scrolls. A small cash box in one of the desk drawers contains 29 gp.
Other than that, there's little of interest.
Trusting the floor to finally cleared, half the party checks out the final room in the Hermitage.
Far from exciting, it's just a pantry. This pantry contains large bins to hold vegetables and fruit, and racks for all sorts of dry goods, such as salt, farro, and spices. The supply of fresh foods is starting to run low, but there’s still sufficient goods to feed a few people simple rations for weeks.
The party joins back up in the Grand Hall
Back here again, Chark says, looking about the colorful room. Well, should we try these doors again? At least we'll know if we've found all the corruption, no?
Charlie holds up the trio of magical scrolls. "Here, what are these?" He hands them off to someone a bit more informed on them than he is.
Back at the main hall Charlie looks up at the strange doors. "But, we never found a k..k..key."
Dendillion takes a scroll, and hands the others to Haldan and Chark. "Let's take a few minutes and see if the magic here will help us."
Dendillion begins the process of deciphering and finds that they really are rare spells. He's never heard of them. They seem pretty interesting too:
Scroll of personal rain cloud
Scroll of sea surge
Scroll of sudden bolt
Tiny looks over Dendillion's shoulder, not really having any clue what's going on.
"What do they say?" asks Tiny being supportive of his friend.
"Well now... this is a lot of very interesting arcana," Dendillion says, taking a moment to describe the magic. "Haldan, you like to scribble bits of magick in that book of yours, right? I think you'll find these to be right up your alley."
Charlie ties to push and pull the doors open now that the cultists have been evicted. "How do you think it o..oo.oo.opens?"
Well, the chorus interrupted us before we could even try before, Chark says, examining the set of double doors for hinges or the like. I would think, without it this time, maybe we've accomplished what they wanted? I dunno.
Charlie ties to push and pull the doors open now that the cultists have been evicted. "How do you think it o..oo.oo.opens?"
Charlie's initial push immediately works! Beyond the door is a large and resplendent shrine to Gozreh, the Wind and the Waves. The floor, which bears a mosaic depicting Gozreh’s battle against Rovagug in the defense of all creation, is broken by two narrow moats, one filled with churning water and the other with shrieking winds. Four slender bridges cross these moats, which appear bottomless. At the far end of the chamber is a raised dais with an altar in front of two massive statues. One depicts a bearded storm elemental holding aloft a bolt of lightning; the other is a stern woman wearing clothing of sea foam and wearing an ornate coral crown. The magical moats cross one another, yet the water remains in one moat and the wind remains in the other.
A corrupted priest is currently shouting at the crumpled form of another priest, attempting in vain to convince the man that "Demon worship is sanctioned by Gozreh and the only path to protecting the wild lands on the Isle of Erran!"
The loud priest is accompanied by a pugnacious looking retainer. She holds metal leashes to two giant monitor lizards infused with some kind of demonic power. The lizards have a shimmering, nacreous green skin. Acid drips from the lizards’ jaws, dissolving small holes in the stone floor.
When the door opens, the berating stops. The man on the floor gives a cry of hope, and the aggressors drop their weight into ready stances!
"Intruders! Kill them! Enkrisha!"
Round 1:
Haldan: Go
Tiny: Go
Chark: Go
Dendillion: Go
Charlie: Go
Hostiles: TBD
(Scout)
(Search)
(Detect Magic)
(Seek, Keen Eyes)
(Search)
Tiny moves up to the door and fires his crossbow at the corrupted priest.
Before dropping into his wolf stance.
Tiny's shot is clean, wounding the priest. He then drops down in the 80%/20% stance of the wolf.
Round 1:
Haldan: Go
Tiny: Hit
Chark: Go
Dendillion: Go
Charlie: Go
Hostiles: TBD
Priest: 3
Goliath bounds into the room as Charlie quickly draws his bow. "Get off of him!"
HP 30/41
AC 20 (22 w/ shield)
Wooden Shield 12/12; [AC Bonus +2: [Hardness 3] [HP/BT 12(6)]
Focus 1/1
Hero Points 1/3
Goliath
HP 23/32)
AC 17
With clear speach and singular purpose, Charlie and Goliath prepare to back up the imperative with action.
Round 1:
Haldan: Go
Tiny: Hit
Chark: Go
Dendillion: Go
Charlie: Draw and close.
Hostiles: TBD
Priest: 3
Action 1: Stride
Action 2: Stride
Action 3: Inspire Courage
Dendillion moves up behind Charlie, strumming and singing as he does so. The melodious music carries the familiar, inspirational magic for the group. After a few seconds he adds a flourish, letting the music ring out.
Chark shakes her head. They never learn...
She moves up alongside Tiny, bestowing a bit of divine insight into Tiny.
Afterward, she moves across the doorway to get a good look inside, ending up adjacent to Charlie. I count two, plus the pair of reptiles. Did I miss anyone?
Haldan saps the energy from Hermann in order to remember a spell from earlier, strides forward, points his joy buzzer forward and casts sudden bolt on the monitor lizard closest to the bear.
Dendillion's composition is impressive, and the party feels ever ready for this fight!
Round 1:
Haldan: Go
Tiny: Hit
Dendillion: Bard!
Chark: Go
Charlie: Draw and close.
Hostiles: TBD
Priest: 3
Hand of the Apprentice.
Haldan's spell is off target as Chark tries to give some magical guidance.
The lizard wrangler lets go of the leashes and steps up to block one of the bridges. The northern one gnashes at Goliath twice with wicked teeth:
MISS
MISS
But the bear is the faster!
The other lizard approaches, then lets loose a gout of acid! It covers Charlie, Tiny, and Dendillion:
the priest stops the beating long enough to summon forth an earth mephit to guard another bridge!
Round 2:
Haldan: Go
Tiny: Go
Dendillion: Go
Chark: Go
Charlie: Go
Hostiles: TBD
Priest: 3
Dark Green
Tiny grunts as his 3rd favorite shirt disintegrates before his eyes as the acid is belched all over him.
Tiny then stays low as he moves to the back side of Goliath's new scaly friend and unleashes a flurry plus one of claws.
Charlie whistles sharply and Goliath pounces into the chest of the monitor lizard.
Charlie ignores the lizard stumbling it's way towards him for just a moment as he realizes he is all that stands between it and the people behind him. He fires a pair of arrows into the lizard biting at Goliath. "Back here!"
HP 24/41
AC 20 (22 w/ shield)
Wooden Shield 12/12; [AC Bonus +2: [Hardness 3] [HP/BT 12(6)]
Focus 1/1
Hero Points 1/3
Goliath
HP 23/32)
AC 17
Dendillion dodges the acid as best he can, but it's not enough to thoroughly ruin his shirt. From all the fighting, it's probably a lost cause anyhow.
Action 1: Bon Mot
Action 2-3: Blistering Invective
"You there! The one with the facial hair! I can't help but feel like you need to see a barber..."
Bon Mot: -2 to Will saves if that succeeded
"... because if you can't even get that f@%~ing right, what good are you? You look like a satyr who wipes his ass with tree bark," Dendillion laces magic into these last few words, turning the insult into fire!
Tiny doesn't mess around. He quickly moves into a flanking position. Tiny and Goliath quickly overwhelm the lizard, leaving a corpse on the floor. Charlie can't connect, but the early upper hand is decidedly the heroes'.
Dendillion ensnares the wrangler's attention, and stabs his whit into the armor of the man's confidence. . The death of his pet bolsters him, and the fire isn't quite as blistering as hoped.
Round 2:
Haldan: Go
Tiny: Crit and hits
Dendillion: The ol'one-two
Chark: Go
Charlie: Kill and miss
Hostiles: TBD
Wrangler: (0.5 x 2d6+1 Persistent fire damage.)
Priest: 3
Light Green: 23
Dark Green: (Breath on Round 5)
Chark sees an opening and fires a searing ray of holy fire at the animal wrangler.
Shark then takes cover behind the door
Chark's ray burns a noticeable hole in the man's chest, though he doesn't catch fire.... any more than he already has.
Round 2:
Haldan: Go
Tiny: Crit and hits
Dendillion: The ol'one-two
Chark: Burn
Charlie: Kill and miss
Hostiles: TBD
Wrangler: 13 (0.5 x 2d6+1 Persistent fire damage.)
Priest: 3
Light Green: 23
Dark Green: (Breath on Round 5)
Stride with the joy buzzer is out for an Electric Arc spell between the two bottom creatures.
Haldan unleashes a jolt between the lizard and the mephit.
Both of them are clearly jolted, smoking a bit after the spell clears!
The remaining lizard closes to Haldan and tries to chomp him to death. , but misses then redoubles and misses again!
The mephit closes in, making an awful ruckus in its lungs, like a broken wheel spinning on gravel. It then disgorges a spray of pebbles on the grew outside of the room!
The flaming retainer closes with Tiny and tries to stab him with a trident for He then swats at the flames as he raises his shield . The flames goe out as he grunts confidently. "Ha! See the truth of our power!"
Finally, the priest casts a spell of Barkskin and closes slightly.
Round 3:
Haldan: Go
Tiny: Go
Dendillion: Go
Chark: Go
Charlie: Go
Hostiles: TBD
Wrangler: 16 (0.5 x 2d6+1 Persistent fire damage.)
Mephit: 7
Priest: 3
Light Green: 23
Dark Green: 7 (Breath on Round 5)
Tiny takes a moment to staunch his bleeding.
Tiny then flurries the retainer.
Tiny then draws out the cook's shield from earlier.
Charlie slides beside the door as the pebbles strike his leg. Goliath continues to swipe into the backside of the oversized lizard as Charlie tries to take the beast down quickly.
HP 20/41
AC 20 (22 w/ shield)
Wooden Shield 12/12; [AC Bonus +2: [Hardness 3] [HP/BT 12(6)]
Focus 1/1
Hero Points 1/3
Goliath
HP 23/32)
AC 17