"Well said Kvit, I just need to be a bit more liberaly with my spell casting I guess."
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Kka opens the northern door. It leads to a small hallway (a "smallway," if you will), then another door.
Kka checks out the next door and hears murmuring on the other side. The door muffles a lot of the sound, but she catches some bits about how tasty (or not) various denizens of the dungeon are.
Weapon racks stand in the northeast and southeast corners of this room. The southeast rack is empty, but the northeast rack holds a hatchet made of dark crystal. Two alcoves between the racks on the eastern wall each have an open hatch and a ladder leading down. Additional exits lead out to the north, west, and south.
However, when you have a clear view of the room, there is nobody inside. The talking has also stopped, but you did hear a quick, "Oh shoot, be silent," as you opened the door.
Fuin slaps his forehead. "Oh, duh! The spy-holes we found. This is some kind of common room for the prisoners, I think. One of them must have figured out their captors were spying on them to make sure they stayed in line." He shudders. "Creepy."
----
Fuin stays out of sight of the doorway, letting the others do the talking.
A mouth forms on the northern weapon rack and on the door to the north.
"Hey Zazz, we can entertain them for one question, right?"
"Yeah, sure, not like we're going anywhere, right," then grins as if he's made some great joke you're not privy to.
"Sure, shoot. In a figurative sense, I mean," the first one says.
They're very slow, so it's possible to outrun them if you're not stuck to them.
Kvit keeps his voice low as he murmurs to the others. "Don't go in yet. They're probably mimics. Don't touch anything in that room until we deal with them. They have a powerful adhesive ability."
"They are intelligent, so we may be able to just convince them it's not worth the trouble and move through."
Kka hears whispers on the other side of the door. "Sounds like there are at least a couple of baad guys on the other side. They're taalking about how tasty the critters down here are, so ready yourselves." She opens the door, and... nothing?
After Lough convinces the disguised creatures to 'show' themselves, Kka nods in approval. "Nice job hiding yourselves there guys. If you weren't such big blaabbermouths we probaably wouldn't haave noticed you. If I were you, I'd answer the big man's questions and not cause any trouble. We've taken out far worst thaan you two today and it isn't even lunchtime yet."
Kka hears Kvit murmur the word mimic. "Ah, that explains it. Now thaat we know where they are, they shouldn't pose much of a problem. I guess it's up to them whether we haave to kill them or not. Lets see whaat Lough can find out."
With a wet schlorping sound, the door and weapon rack turn themselves into chairs, presumably a more relaxed form for them.
You see that behind the door is a supply room, filled mostly with shattered contents. You might find something useful if you could get past the mimics...
"Wow, I'm sorry boss, didn't know you were such a badass," Zazz says.
"Yeah, we didn't mean any harm. It's just, it's been a real long while since we've eaten anything other than rats, spiders, and other bugs. Sometimes Belcorra feeds us the dead gladiators, but that hasn't happened in quite some time. Hey, that leshy over there looks tasty, they carry their own fruit with them. I'm sure you're not gonna miss them, right?" The other licks his lips with a disturbingly big tongue.
"Not that we're forcing you or anything, boss," Zazz says again. "We're just two pieces of furniture nicely asking, see?"
Kvit gives a side eye to Kka who's apparently able to cow even mimics with ease. She is a force to be reckoned with.
"Maybe we can find some other denizens to come by this way..."
"Oh, that's easy. That's the administrator's office. He and Jafaki from a level below had a big beef going on between them. When it suddenly got quiet 500 years ago Jafaki came upstairs and locked him in there. Probably nothing except dust and bones behind that door by now."
"And er... Thanks for keeping the crazy chick in check, boss. We don't want to cause any problems, we swear."
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Crazy indeed...
"Alright alright, we'll leave you all alone - c'mon Kka, these guys got nothing can do, let's leave them be..." he winks at Kka one last time before starting to leave...
...and turns around right before fully exiting "One more thing: How might one gain entry to the administrator's office? I mean, locks, magic, reinforcements - what's the trick?"
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Zazz forms an eye, purely so he can raise an eyebrow. "The normal way? Remove the pitons or bash in the door? There's no trick to it, honest."
Fuin peeks in, sees the eye-chair, and immediately wishes he hadn't.
"Yeah," he mumbles, "that's not leaving my brain any time soon."
Kka gives the two 'chairs' a menacing beady red glare in case they try anything funny. She does the whole split-fingers pointed to her eyes and then to the mimics thing for extra emphasis.
When Lough winks at her and tells her to leave them alone, she gives him a snappy salute and says, "Yes, boss maan, Whatever you say, boss maan," then gives the mimics one last evil glare with a fake head-lunge motion, followed by a "Waatch yourselves. We might be baack soon." Satisfied, she follows Lough out of the room.
Once outside the room again, she turns to the others. "So are we going to call on the administrator now? Dust and bones, they said. Haa! Given whaat we've seen down here, my guess is that we'll be dealing with another ghost."
"And the magic?" Lough mirrors by raising the same eyebrow "And does this perished administrator have a name?"
"Well, a magically fortified door doesn't help much if you pick its lock, right," the other produces two pseudopods and raises them in a shrugging motion.
"I'm not sure what you want the answer to be. 'The magic keeps the nurgles out'? Anyway, his name's Chafkhem. He sounded like a real bossy-boss, but pretty pleasant to work with when he got his way. Though that was 500 years ago, I don't think the intervening time did wonders for his mood."
The both of them grin again.
"500 years trapped in a room wouldn't do anything good to anyone's mood, I would think." Cherry says and shivers. "Being away from the sun for that long..."
After the door is closed, Fuin shudders. "Do we actually need to face this administrator guy? If he's still in there, he's probably a ghost. I hate fighting ghosts." He scowls. "Meat makes a much more satisfying noise when I hit it with the hammer. Ghosts are so... spongey. It's like slapping flan."
"If he is in there, yes, he's either dead or undead. Perhaps he may be grateful to be let out. Plus, if Belcorra was trapping someone, that leads me to believe they might be useful. Though remember, the enemy of my enemy is still my enemy."
Kvit investigates the door to see he can figure out how to disable the wards if the group chooses to do so.
Kvit examines the warded door. The magic on it only strengthens the wood, it does not actually help with keeping people inside or anything. It's also definitely not magically trapped, you would've noticed that. You'd need a third-level Dispel Magic to get rid of the magic strengthening, in case you want to bash in the door.
You do notice that on the other side of the door, other powerful magic is present. It's some sort of effect that prevents ethereal travel or teleportation effects from going into (or out of) the room. This has a different energy signature from the door, that was definitely placed by someone else.
Kvit spends a few minutes seemingly staring at the door. He takes a small piece of red glass, as if from a stained glass window and peers through it. Nothing in particular keeping that door closed, it's just the wood that's warded from decay. I think it is just mechanically shut. As for what's inside. I'm not sure. Whatever it is, someone has specifically made sure to prevent teleporting or ethereal travel in and out of that room. I still can't say it's safe to open though... I think... We should come back to this. Perhaps we can find more information on this administrator before we decide to have a chat."
Fuin rubs his chin. "Mm. That's probably not a bad idea. There's gotta be info about this 'administrator' around here somewhere. Shouldn't be too hard to open once we choose to do so. Take out those pitons and Lough can probably make short work of the wood, even with magic on it. So it doesn't hurt to let this lie for a minute and see if we can find out more about what's inside before opening." He shrugs. "All that said, if everyone else outvotes us, I'm fine with that. I'll have the ol' ball and chain ready just in case." He pats the chain of his meteor hammer wrapped around his forearm.
"He might have keys we need." Cherry posits, "But maybe not right now."
The administrator's door isn't locked, just physically held shut by the pitons.
Kka listens impatiently to all the hemming and hawing about whether to let the administrator loose. "Look. If we aren't going to visit with the old guy right now, then let's keep moving, right? How about we go see where the other door in the mimic room leads. I'm pretty sure that Zaazz and company won't cause us any trouble."
Fuin shrugs. "Sounds good to me."
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Hero Point to Lough for solving this nonviolently!
When you go back into the mimic room, the door and weapon rack are gone, replaced by two signs that say, "Please don't hurt us."
Kka opens the remaining door in the mimic room and sees that it leads to a long hallway that connects back to the main room. There's also a door to the north.
The floor of this room contains several open square pits: one in each of the three alcoves to the north and two larger pits in the middle of the room. A dais at the room’s west end contains a stone throne with two rusty levers jutting from the floor next to it.
Also inside this room are two purple spheres with legs, five eyes, and a big mouth with way too many sharp teeth. They croak excitedly as they see you and make ready to attack.
Red hops forward, clears its throat, then lobs a loogie at Lough. It then hops back to its original place.
Lough snaps his shield in place, preventing it from critically hitting him, but he still takes some damage.
Some acidic droplets splash past Lough onto Fuìn. They both take acid splash damage.
The loogie sticks to Lough and continues to eat away at his body.
Then Blue does exactly the same as Red.
Some acidic droplets splash past Lough onto Fuìn. They both take acid splash damage.
Red
Blue
Fuìn, 9 damage
Kka
Kvit
Cherry Berry
Lough, 10 damage, 1d6 persistent
Everyone is up!
It's an Occultism to figure out what these things are.
Kvit has no idea what these things are. They're very bouncy, but that's about it. Lough knows more though. These things are Gibtas Bounders, called that because they jump so much. Two important things that jump out in Lough's mind are that since they're so rubbery they resist bludgeoning damage, and that they can jump into you and shove you back - very dangerous with the pits in this room.
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Lough squints his eyes while the loogie burns his skin...
↺) Shield Block
◆) Recall Knowledge
◆) Life Boost
◆) Stride
+
↺) Attack of Opportunity
...he calls forth the friendly spiders which knit his wounds with webbing, and cautiously enters the room, away from any adjacent pits.
Cherry moves into the room and quickly steps to the side. While moving through Funin's square, they tap him with their staff to boost their defenses while also raising their own.
◆Guardian Staff
◆Stride
◆Shield
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Kvit has no idea what these are, but can tell they count on bouncing around to their advantage. He moves into the room carefully and lobs a ball of silken adhesive strands that cover the east part of the room.
Critical Success The creature is unaffected, and it doesn't need to attempt further Athletics checks or saving throws against the web this turn. If it used an Athletics check, it clears the web from every square it leaves after leaving the square.
Success The creature is unaffected during its action. If it used an Athletics check, it clears the web from every square it leaves after leaving the square.
Failure The creature takes a –10-foot circumstance penalty to its Speeds until the start of its next turn.
Critical Failure The creature is immobilized until the start of its next turn, after which it takes a –10-foot circumstance penalty to its Speeds for 1 round. It can attempt to Escape to remove its immobilized condition.
Fuin hisses in pain, but doesn't spend any of his healing just yet. He considers Lough's warning about their resistances but considering how much more powerful his hammer is, he decides to go for the old adage of "overcome resistances by hitting it harder."
However, getting into an advantageous position for Kka to do her thing will be tricky, and maneuvering around these pits will take some time. He mutters "Usk'ryat", and his whole body tenses like a spring before he leaps into motion, darting around the pit to get behind the bouncing... thing in a matter of a few seconds.
♦ Activate bracelet of dashing. +10 Speed for 1 minute.
♦♦ Stride 65 ft.
↺ Protector's sacrifice if anyone in 30 ft takes a direct hit.
Kka sees the droplets of acid splash on Lough and Fuìn and is glad that she isn't in her usual place directly behind the big man. She then waits for the fighters to do their thing and looks for an opening where she can sneak up behind a distracted bounder. Like a champ, Fuìn provides just such an opportunity and Kka quickly moves to take advantage of it and claim a little Gibtas flesh for herself.
Lough casts a spell that accelerates his healing, then moves into the room. Fuìn also moves in through magical means. Cherry Berry protects themselves and Fuìn. Kvit casts a magical web that considerably slows down Blue's bouncing. Kka goes to flank with Fuìn and strikes twice. The first attack is a crit, the second is a hit! Her shortsword penetrates the rubbery skin easily and blood sprays everywhere.
Red, heavily wounded, lashes back out at Kka. It readies itself, then launches itself at Kka.
The bounder hits Kka straight in the chest, pushing her back from the force. It then lunges at her legs in an attempt to trip her up.
It fails, but undeterred, it keeps chomping away at her.
The acidic saliva remains on her as well, eating away at feathers and flesh.
Satisfied after that flurry of attacks, it hops away.
Blue is stuck in a web. He starts chomping on the web that's restraining him. But, since its bites only do piercing damage, it isn't able to get itself free. It croaks in frustration at its companion, who is having its own problems.
Red, 59 damage, heavily damaged
Blue
Fuìn, 9 damage
Kka, 20 damage, 2d6 persistent
Kvit
Cherry Berry
Lough, 6 damage, 1d6 persistent, fast healing 1/4
Everyone is up! Lough heals a considerable amount of damage.
Lough can make an attack of opportunity against Red, and Fuìn can either make an attack of opportunity or use Protector's Sacrifice, in that order.
Lough quickly catches Red as it bounces away, and crits! Red is dead.
Kvit holds his staff out and sends several bolts of force towards the more damaged creature.
The missiles make a sudden last minute 90° turn and head towards the other creature!
Kka cuts a good chunk out of the bounder, but not enough to take it out. "Bugger!" She knows what comes next and sure enough the critter decides to take out its rage on her. Bounce, Chomp, Fizz. "Arrgh! That hurt! Why you little... You'll pay for thaat!" And sure enough, no sooner does she say this that Lough takes it out. "See, I told you so."
She looks at the remaining bounder stuck in Kvit's sticky mess. She considers using her bow, but her arrows would only do minimal damage. Instead, she decides to try and work her way through the web to reach the creature.
She manages to push her way through the goo and with a quick "Boo!" unleashes her shortsword.
The first bounder's acid starts to eat through her feathers...
...and apparently will continue to do so.
Fuin barks a word in a strange language that makes his teeth vibrate as he speaks it, then he hisses in pain as acid burns open up on his skin seemingly from nowhere.
Frustrated he can't get into a more advantageous position, he decides to swing from as far away as he can. Of course, that still means he has to go into the webs...
He manages to get up next to Kka, then pummels the thing in the legs with his meteor hammer, hoping to overcome its damage reduction by way of the age-old adage of "just hit it harder."
♦ Stride 35 ft.
♦♦
◇
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Lough slashes the bounder out of the air as it escapes, and it falls into the pit. It makes a big splash as it hits the water below. You hear a surprised noise from down in the pit, some chomping noises, and you see the water down below (about 55 feet) turn red.
Kvit throws three darts of pure energy at Blue and Lough pierces it with a flying bit of his own beard. Kka moves up to the creature in the web, scares it to near-death, and follows it up with a big stab. The creature drops dead, stuck in the web.
The acid continues to burn for a few seconds, but without hoppy frogs demanding your attention, you have time to get rid of the saliva.
Next to the stone throne to the west are two rusty levers. They're rusted in place.
Cherry Berry, Kvit, and Sneakers all notice a secret compartment in the throne. When you open it, you find a climbing bolt, a dragon turtle scale, and 31 gold pieces.
Kvit looks over the found items with some interest. "Hopefully there is no need for swimming down here, but this could be useful if we do."
He moves to inspect the levers and looks between them and the open pits. "I assume these were to dispose of guests."