Tindertwig gathers his javelins. He looks up at the trap door, but shrugs.
Wees shoulds clearings outs da 1st floors first? That bees whys its bees callings da first floors.
Dirtbag nods sagely with his tactical superior.
Following Dirtbag's advice and your established plan, you open the northern door. For once nothing rushes out to attack you.
This room seems to have been a dining room once. The collapsed ceiling at the middle of the room has left a ragged hole in the wooden roof. Rotten tapestries, their designs completely obscured by mold, hang in tatters on the walls between arrow slits and ruined side tables. The remains of a fancy dining table lie mostly pulverized by the fallen ceiling.
The only visible exit is the eastern door, leading back out into the courtyard.
"Just a moment." When the party returns to the courtyard, Hilde picks up another bundle of darts before checking the westernmost of the northern doors.
Tindertwig takes a look at the collapsed dinning room with a wistful look; before shrugging his shoulders and continuing the route around the courtyard....
Dirtbag follows along without a word; but a smile on his face.
After a mere glance you leave the collapsed dining hall and proceed in your explorations. The left-most northern door seems to be safe enough, but the old rotted wood has swelled and stuck, so you'll need an Athletics 18 check to open it.
"Yeah, I think clearing out everything here will be for the best before trying elsewhere, Tindertwig."
Henry will try his hand at trying to force the door open.
Perhaps even giving it a second good tug.
"Second time's the charm."
On Henry's second attempt the door falls open, literally, since it breaks into pieces and falls to the floor. You find yourself in a circular room which continues upward as far as you are able to see. Clearly you are in the lighthouse proper.
The smooth walls of the room are painted a light gray with no indication of seams between blocks of stone. A set of iron stairs winds upward along the curved walls before terminating at a trap door in the ceiling nearly a hundred feet above. A red bloodstain glistens on the floor at the room’s center, as though a human-sized creature bled to death on the floor very recently, despite there being no body in sight.
There is a door to the left (west) with a small iron grate. That and the stairs are the only visible exits.
Tindertwig and Dirtbag glance inside the Light House chamber. Not seeing anything in there that seems to be immediately hungry, the goblin departs for the next door in the courtyard.
Youses shouldn'ts ov broken da doors.
Tindertwig winks at Henry.
"Before we go up there, we should finish clearing this floor. That last set of mites was talking about getting in trouble if we killed the maggot, so there are more of them around."
"I believe we should take our time in examining these rooms before moving on," says Eddred. "We may be missing valuable information... or even loot."
Eddred takes the time to search the collapsed hall and the lighthouse chamber.
"True, but wouldn't it be better to do that after the area is secured? That way we can take our time with the search."
Tindertwig and Dirtbag turn around to look at both Hilde and Eddred. They both look at Henry.
Shrugging his shoulders, Tindertwig returns to the Light House room to begin picking through the rubble, rubble, rubble....
He whispers
Dis bees un bads ideas mees tink. Da Light Houses monster will wake up!
"I'm with Miss Hilde on this one, I think we should make sure there's no more dangerous things about before looking at stuff in finer detail. There was that one little blue guy that escaped, and if there's more of them abouts then they gotta know we're here by now."
You pull Tindertwig out of the lighthouse room and continue to explore the main building. Going according to plan, you check the next door for traps and then enter.
The ceiling has collapsed in the southwest corner of this room. The walls bear several shelves, but the books and papers once kept here have rotted to ruin long ago, as have the desk and chair in an alcove to the northeast.
There is one visible exit: a door in the opposite end of the room, to the north.
The dwarf points at the northern door and pads quietly over to it, searching it before readying to strike from cover.
Pushing on, you find yourselves in a smaller, oddly shaped room. Nothing stirs here either.
This triangular room might have once seemed comfortable, but after years of rain and exposure to the elements through the two arrow slits in the northwestern wall, the room’s divan, armoire, and tapestries have fallen to decay.
There are no visible exits.
In case you intend to continue exploring before searching, the double doors to the north are largely blocked by rubble. You may be able to climb past it with some difficulty X, but there is no opening the doors.
Tindertwig--and Dirtbag--bring up the rear of the exploration party. The goblin is seen making faces at anyone who isn't looking; while Dirtbag is nudging those that aren't.
"Southeast quadrant, then. The door in the southern wall." Hilde checks the area out before once again finding cover.
This time you actually hear high-pitched squeals and shrieks beyond the door before you even open it, so you may want to prepare yourselves.
Hearing the beautiful sounds of pig noises coming from this next room, Tindertwig does what any always starving goblin would do: He raises his shield and prepares to fillet!
Tindertwig does some deep knee bends.
After preparing yourselves and checking for traps you kick in the door. You find a large room beyond. Almost the entire ceiling of this room has collapsed, while below, the floor has crumbled into a 10-foot-deep sinkhole filled with rubble, mud, and glistening patches of fungus. Evidence of ancient damage—burn scars and acid scorch marks decorate the walls and much of the rubble.
In the midst of the rubble four gremlins are engaged in a vigorous tug-of-war about a bright blue grub. As they hear the noise of the door they look up in surprise, drop the grub (except one, who profits by the occasion to stuff it into its face) and draw their weapons.
The gremlins go on 7 so Hilde, Henry and Eddred (necessarily) beat them and can act. If you want to reach the gremlins you need to either climb or jump down.
Henry doesn't hesitate to run into the room and slide down into the pit with the gremlins. Thinking he looks pretty cool but in reality is just doing something impractical, he flourishes his blade at the first gremlin he reaches as part of his landing.
Okay, maybe it was a little cool.
Alone, in a ditch, and easily surrounded, Henry raises his shield.
Henry stumbles dangerously on the loose rocks, but he regains his footing and cleaves one gremlin into two.
Who wants to live forever? Hilde silently follows the fighter down, sure-footed on the rubble, and slashes at one of the gremlins.
Not wanting to be outdone, Hilde expertly steps down the rubble and silently cuts the throat of one gremlin, then calmly throws a dart into the gaping mouth of its startled companion.
Eddred is up, then the remaining gremlin.
Eddred fires his crossbow, hitting the remaining gremlin for 7 points of damage, causing it to spit out a mouthful of blue grub. He tut-tuts, reloads and fires again, killing it.
End of combat. Everyone gets 80 xp.
There is one visible exit: a pair of double doors on the other side of the room.
Hilde reaches out to give Henry a fist bump. "Well struck! I would have stayed up there and sniped, but after you charged I couldn't leave you alone with three of them. I'm not that good at healing."
Tindertwig and Dirtbag watch (both munching on popcorn with too much butter) the quick beat down by his companions.
Tindertwig hands over 1sp to Dirtbag.
Bests ov fives?
They both continue to Search around for shineys!
Henry awkwardly puts his sword under his arm and goes for a handshake, noticing it was a fist bump halfway through and adjusted accordingly. "Thanks. I just didn't want the little buggers to clamber up the other side or nothing. And no worries, I got my trusty shield with me, it'll protect me when the going gets rough but I appreciate the concern, Miss Hilde. You did a fantastic job, yourself."
Henry will try to climb out of the pit and help Hilde up if she needs it."Double doors, then?" He'll ask as he gestured towards them.
"Indeed. Lead on, Master Shepard," says Eddred, reloading his crossbow.
As you find the time to look around the room, you may notice something about it:
No shinies though, so far. The double doors seem safe enough so you proceed.
A 15-foot stone walkway spans a narrow stretch of swamp water, connecting the ruined keep to a large stone outbuilding. Double doors block each end of the walkway. Standing before the southeast door is a seven-foot-tall skeleton dressed in armor made of gnarled roots, bones,
and rusted metal. The skeleton clenches a morningstar in one weathered hand with the weapon’s heavy, spiked tip resting on the walkway at the skeleton’s feet.
There is one visible exit (unless you fancy wading) and that is the pair of double doors opposite. Alas, it is behind the skeleton. On the other hand it makes no move to attack you.
Hilde whistles and points at the walls. "Those look like spell damage. There must have been quite a fight here." She steps back and lets Henry take the lead to the double doors.
If you want to enter, you'll have to push the skeleton aside.
Tindertwig and Dirtbag bring up the rear as the group enters the Wet Skeleton room.
Dirtbag looks at the swampy waters with a bit of a smile.
Nope, Dirtbag, not untils wees kens makes everythings safes.
They both continue on up to the Skeleton. They both look it over for a bit, before the goblin digs into his bandolier to retrieve some tools.
Wees nots tink'n it bees safe.
The goblin begins tinkering with it to make certain.
Tindertwig quickly discerns several interesting facts about the skeleton. To start with it is neither animated nor trapped. In fact it is not a skeleton at all but rather a collection of bones, and not very well put together at that. Secondly, its morningstar (which is an integral part of the construction) sports a magic rune of some kind.
"Wait a minute..." Henry started as Tindertwig strode past him into perceived danger.
He stopped as he noticed the skeleton wasn't moving at all. "So it's... okay? Or... I'm confused, did the little blue fellas build this or something?"
Hilde shrugs. "I don't know. Probably; it's not very well made. I don't know how they attached the morningstar, though." She searches the door and prepares for a fight, drawing a dart.
Since I guess you are about to open the door (which seems perfectly safe), you may as well roll for initiative and state your actions.
Eddred will decide his action when he sees what's behind the door. But for now, he's got a loaded crossbow ready.
Tindertwig points out the morningstar to the group.
It bees magicks, mees heards.
The goblin doesn't take it. He thinks morningstars are only available to use in the morning....
Henry eyes the Morningstar upon hearing that it might be magical, but focuses on the doors ahead of them.