Aekon trudges over the rocky ground into the room and fires off a shot at the furthest goblin while continuing to give tactical advice.
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Eko looses a crossbow bolt at a goblin at the far side of the room. The missile strikes true, striking the creature directly in the throat and erupting from the opposite side. The goblin collapses instantly.
Bubbles maneuvers through the two goblins surrounding her, and they desperately swing their doglsicers at the hippo as she ambles through them...
...but her thick hide proves too resilient for their shoddy blades.
Once Bubbles finishes repositioning, she opens her maw and chomps down on the previously wounded goblin with all her might. The sickening snap of bone echoes through the din of battle as the goblin is crushed by her mighty jaws, it's body dropping from he mouth like a rag doll.
Aekon's crossbow bolt strikes the remaining goblin on the far opposite end of the room. The bolt lodges firmly in the creature's chest, though it misses it's heart and the small terror is able to keep itself standing, furious bloodlust burning in it's eyes.
"Kill the fat dog!", the wounded goblin screams, as he and his panicked allies focus all of their remaining fury on Bubbles.
Arrows and blade bounce harmlessly off of Bubbles' rubbery hide as she awaits Eko's next orders.
Silvash steps up to help the hungry hungry hippo but misses the goblin.
"To Hell with you!"
Khathi swings her red hot mace down at the goblin next to her.
It smashes into the green glass at her feet.
She frowns a bit as the goblin falls, glancing around the chaos of the room. Carefully picking her way through the scattered rock and glass, she approached the goblin Khathi failed to hit, and swung her blade yet again.
The tide of battle is a chaotic thing, and sometimes chance defies skill, strategy, and advantage.
Witnessing the flurry of failed attacks emboldens the goblins. The wounded goblin drops his shortbow, then draws his dogslicer in a fluid movement while approaching Bubbles.
The goblin between Bubbles and Liedae deftly repositions into flanking position around Bubbles...
...and takes a swing at the hippo with his dogslicer.
The blow hits home, and the goblin mustered enough strength to penetrate Bubbles' thick hide, leaving a short, shallow gash along her right flank.
Lastly, the goblin adjacent to Silvash drops his shortbow, draws his dogslicer, and swings the crude weapon at the elf's knees...
...but the nimble elf easily backsteps out of harm's way.
Eko will shoot the Goblin straight ahead of him, while Bubs makes a bite at the goblin she's flanking
Eko fires a bolt from his crossbow at the goblin engaging Silvash, but the ongoing melee makes targeting somewhat difficult and the shot goes wide.
Bubs slowly ambles around to bite at the goblin between her and Liedae, but her attack is so telegraphed that the goblin easily sidesteps the hippo's large maw.
Aekon shoots at the furthest goblin with his crossbow.
After Eko and Aekon's bolts go wide, the Goblins redouble their efforts in a last-ditch offensive, though they're still quite disorganized.
The wounded goblin drops it's shortbow, draws it's dogslicer, and nimbly steps towards Bubbles, swinging it's crude weapon menacingly...
...and managing to land a blow the hippo's think hide is unable to completely repel.
The goblin between Bubbles and Liedae screams an unintelligible obscenity and stabs wildly at Liedae...
The point of the blade finds home and digs deep into Liedae's right flank, leaving a nasty stab wound.
The goblin engaged with Silvash, emboldened by his allies' success, takes a quick slash at the elf's midsection...
...but thankfully Silvash proves quick on his feet, sidestepping away from the blade and sparing himself his comrades' fate.
She wasn't expecting them to actually hit. The blade finding its way past her armor and into her flank surprised her. Letting out a roar of angry pain, she turned her eyes onto the goblin that hit her. She lashed out with her blade, teeth gnashing as she fully intended to see it dead.
Silvash steps forward and attacks the goblin next to him.
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Khathi moves up next to Silvash and bashes.
Silvash's thrust fails to connect, but in evading the elf's rapier the goblin steps directly into the path of Khathi's flame-engulfed mace. Skull cracks and flesh chars and peels away as the goblin is struck down by Asmodeus' borrowed might.
The goblin that stabbed Liedae only had moments to revel in victory. The ranger set upon her opponent in a whirling, gnashing fury that -while it lasted mere seconds- left the remains of the goblin indistinguishable from the sea of refuse and clutter blanketing the room.
Seeing that the battle is mostly in hand, Aekon stops with the tactical advice as he loads a crossbow bolt and fires at the last goblin standing.
Aekon dispenses with tactical advice and opts instead for a practical demonstration. Lining up a shot with his crossbow and compensating as best he can for Bubbles' obstructing his line of sight to the goblin, he looses a bolt.
The bolt flies true and hits home, catching the goblin directly between the eyes. The small, furious warrior drops to the ground, stone dead.
The room goes quiet almost as suddenly as it had erupted into carnage a few minutes earlier. The party stands victorious, if a bit bloodied, over the first opponents of their quest.
Spitting to the side to get the taste of Goblin out of her mouth, she let out a small hiss of pain at the wound. Reaching down to gently prod at the area, she grumbled to herself. Carefully making her way over to one of the goblin's makeshift beds, she sat herself down, pulling out her waterskin as she set about cleaning the wound.
"Good work!" exclaims Khathi. She does a once over of the room, sees Liedae nursing a nasty gash, and Aekon at the door.
"Aekon, make sure no one is coming up behind us."
She will likewise secure the door to the north.
Silvash nods in satisfaction of the dead goblins and live allies. He says "Well done all. I'll look around for anything useful on them. Could someone tend to Liedae's wounds.
Khathi listens carefully at the door, but nothing.
Silvash thoroughly searches the refuse-filled barracks. Under the pillow of one cot he finds... possibly the most rancid hunk of cheese on all of Golarion. It's stench so foul it begins to overpower the stink of garbage already present in the room. Silvash quickly shoves it back under the pillow to spare himself and the rest of the party from any further exposure to the stench.
A second, much more interesting discovery is made under the cot Liedae is sitting at while tending to her wound. Wrapped in a tattered and dirty rag is a heavy, metallic object shaped like a humanoid arm. It has articulated joints at the elbow, wrist, and expected locations on the fingers. At the shoulder, where it was removed from whatever it belonged to you can see copper wires protruding from the joint. The majority of the appendage is colored green, and at Silvash's best estimation it appears to be made of iron.
The arm clearly belongs to a golem of some kind. The make is fairly standard (though the copper wiring is is unusual), though the style is unlike anything you've ever seen or read about. You estimate that as a curio or raw materials, it could fetch 20gp from an interested buyer.
Ejo begins trying to make the room into a makeshift base of operations to rest. Moving around rubble and checking entrances and exits to see if there are any more enemies lurking about
Aekon nods to Silvash, "Let me see that, it could use some further study."
He takes a look at each of it's components and then says, "It's the arm of some sort of golem or construct, has to be. It's odd though, the copper wiring is unlike any golem I've read about, and the style is utterly unique, unsurprisingly. We could get about 20 gold for it, unless we try to upsell it." A sly grin spreads across his face as he looks at Khathi and then Liedae, "Would either of you muscly types mind carrying this?"
For the moment, the room appears to be secure and there are no sounds of anyone approaching from either door.
Khathi looks to the injured Liedae, then motions for the arm, "I'll take it."
Then to Liedae, "You should hang back for the next fight if you can, until we have a chance to tend to those wounds properly."
"We're secure here, but we ought to keep moving while we still have the element of surprise. Where there's one goblin, there are many."
"It's not my arm, it's my side." She gave Khathi a deadpan expression before wincing, moving her hand aside, covered in blood. A cut in the meat of her flank, the bleeding has stopped already but it is matted with dry blood. "I got a few chakram, but after throwing them I'll have to get into melee. Sure you don't got some magical healing or something for me?"
I have not learned magical healing, although i can start trying to in the future Eko says staying alert
Khathi shakes her head, "Unfortunately, not today."
Aekon waves the rest of the party away as he walks towards Liedae. His right hand begins to glow with a soothing light as he says with a mirthful edge, "Gods, seems I've always got to step up here." He kneels down next to Liedae and says calmly, "Now, if you've never been magically healed without the help of gods before, it can feel disconcerting. Quite literally feels like being stabbed in reverse. Brace yourself...and," he waves his hand over the worst of Liedae's wounds and says, "There. Feeling a bit better now?"
She didn't flinch as he healed her, simply just flexing the now mostly healed area. Letting her chain shirt drop, she nodded her head before getting up. "Mother healed me a few times like that, so it's not something I haven't felt. Ready to keep going now, let's get that next door." Grabbing her sword, she set off marching towards the next part of the Spire.
Khathi stows the strange green arm in her pack.
After Aekon's healing, Liedae is back on her feet and the party is ready to go.
Which direction will the party be heading? West into the unknown, or back out the North door and into one of the other doors in the previous room?
Silvash looks around at the group and sees everyone is ready and says "Why don't we try that door there?" as he points west. He then examines the door for any traps and to see if it is locked.
Silvash finds the door to be both un-trapped and unlocked. Additionally, his sharp elven ears detect detect distant whispering on from the other side of the door. As best he can surmise, it would seem that the room is rather large and there appears to be at least two beings talking to each other in curt whispers, likely quite far from the door.
Liedae looks at that door and nods her head. Resting her katana on her shoulder, she simply waits for Silvash to finish his inspection of it. "Should clean place up after done. Sweep all the rubbish into piles."
By now Khathi’s mace has lost its red hot glow. Well, at least she got one good hit in. She places her shield ahead of her and holds the mace at ready. "Hell be with me," she utters, then meets Silvash’s eyes to let him know she’s ready.
Silvash waves at the group to get their attention and then puts up two fingers and points at the door. He then takes his hands and moves them further apart to show distance.
Silvash opens the door for Khathi and the others to move through.
We know what to expect now...Goblins for now anyway. What do we know about the little monsters?
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She nods at Silvash, a frown forming on her face. She'd gotten hurt, but her getting hurt kept the others from getting hurt. So, as the door is opened by Silvash, she proceeds to march through. "They die like anything else."
Very True! However if one can exploit a foe's weaknesses to assure victory then it makes the process far easier and more worth while Eko calls out in his usual boisterous heroic sounding voice, this seems to be his default tone of speech.
”Goblins? I’d say I know quite a bit. Rather nasty little creatures, though when push comes to shove they’ve got a rather wickedly inventive streak. Where there are a few goblins, there are inevitably many others. Mob tactics are a favorite of theirs, of course.”
As the door opens and Eko's knightly tone carries his voice, you hear one of the goblin voices on the far side continue to babble, but the second stops for a moment. When it speaks again:
"Shut up idiot!" The first, still babbling voice comes to a stop.
"Did you hear that!? It don't sound like no goblin. I think we've got some sneakers - longshanks I bet!"
You here some shuffling and rustling echoing down the hallway that leads to the other half of the room.
Liedae glances over at Khathi for a moment before getting idea. She motions for the woman to get out of sigh, as well as the rest of the party, before sliding up to the wall. "Ambush them."
Khathi lets the sneakier members of the group through the door first.
Aekon loads his crossbow and nods, whispering, "I'll move in once the fighting gets started."
Silvash moves forward.