Alrinkiri follows the cat as it pounces at Akoril, trying to take advantage of it's inattention.
Akoril nervously stands his ground for now, first protecting himself with a shield spell before entering his stance and kicking at the tiger, trying to knock it out.
Tiger two is looking badly off. It pounces the magus, trying again.
Maybe it should try some other target.
The other tiger pounces Chimwemwe and has better luck, grabbing its prey in its jaws and wrestling him to the ground!
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BOLD IS UP!:
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Tiger 2
Tiger 1
➤ Soomdevi
➤ Alrinkiri
➤ Wisps
➤ Akoril
➤ Chimwemwe
"Hold on Chimwemwe!" Their previous target having pounced away from them, Alrinkiri scrambles around to the far side of the tiger holding Chimwemwe, hoping to draw it away.
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Wisps tries to keep her friends' spirits up!
"Don't fear! We can beat these tigers!"
She tries to pull Chimwemwe to safety.
Alrinkiri moves to Tiger 2 and slashes the beast!
Wisps fires strands from her palms, pulling Chimwemwe free!
Soomdevi and Blinks have an effective turn as well.
The cat yowls in frustration.
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BOLD IS UP!:
──────────
Tiger 2
Tiger 1
Soomdevi
Alrinkiri
Wisps
➤ Akoril
➤ Chimwemwe
Chimwemwe, bloody and mangled, slides out from under the tiger and across the dirt. "Thank you, Wisps!" he says hoarsely as he stands back to his feet. "R = ρL/A," he speaks and draws a diagram in the air with the whip in his hand, which generates a thin bolt of electricity and sends it toward the tiger that just had him.
The cat avoids the worst of the damage.
Akoril tries to shock the cat into unconsciousness before it eats him.
Akoril then follows up with another shield spell.
Akoril knocks out his target!
Cat 1 circles around and attacks the other cat.
and Grabbed
It grabs onto them with its jaws but the claws miss by a hair's breadth.
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BOLD IS UP!:
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Tiger 1
➤ Soomdevi
➤ Alrinkiri
➤ Wisps
➤ Akoril
➤ Chimwemwe
Akoril concentrates for a moment, making sure to take the tiger down before the situation gets out of hand.
Alrinkiri tries to wriggle free of the big cat!
Unable to get loose, they instead try to drive the beast away by opening a panel on their chest and unleashing a sudden gout of flame!
Unfortunately, the hatch jams against the tiger's thick fur, and their spell fizzles.
Once Akoril knocks out the tiger, Chimwemwe hustles around the hut. Finding the other tiger mauling Alrinkiri, he dashes, still wounded, around to the hind end of the great cat and slams his bronze shield down toward it's flank. "Alrinkiri!"
"We will soon prevail!"
Wisps moves for a better shot.
Wisps's arrow plunks against the tiger's forehead, dropping the cat. Its eyes cross as it drops.
Oba shouts from the gate: Calamaty heaped upon calamity! At least you did not kill these expensive beasts. Put them inside the cage; do not drag their beautiful hides through too much mud.
She doesn't enter the zoo area. You can still hear the elephant birds squeaking in agitation from time to time.
Please, check on the rest of my merchandise. The griffon cages were a bit further in. I will reward you if you do competent work.
While you heal, you can pick up your investigation where it left off ((inspect the meat and inspect the canvas tent using nature or survival, or perception, respectively).
Wisps investigates the meat.
Wisps discovers that the meat is of inferior quality, and had started to rot even while in the tent. Being left in the sun has hastened it spoilage, but Oba had essentially been feeding the tigers bad meat.
No wonder they attacked. Perhaps this also explains why they were so much less effective in combat as well… they were hungry.
The rest of you inspect the canvas. It wasn’t torn by animal claws; someone cut it with several knife strokes. Soomdevi knows this was done within the past day! The vandals must have struck after you headed home last night! Perhaps if you had come directly here, you could have confronted them.
Oba lingers. What do you say? Will you students protect my merchandise? It will take me too long to get my typical help.
"Mistress Oba, how many tigers did you have? The sign said three," Chimwemwe asks as he surveys the shadows around them. He holds out his hand over Alrinkiri and then moves it in a careful pattern before placing it upon them, restoring their body to wholeness. "We brought down two. Is there a third? Maybe that is what has upset the elephant bird."
Calamity after calamity! And now a missing tiger!
Akoril nods nervously wondering how many other loose animals will try and eat them today.
"Unless the tiger is what they meant to steal," he says. "I'm not sure we have time for me to tend to my own wounds."
What!? Stolen!? I put so many resources into feeding that tiger, and not it's gone!? I haden't even found a buyer yet! Oba howls.
"Chim, you should drink that elixir Ignaci gave us. You look like you're in rough shape."
"Right. Especially if that elephant bird sees us as just another predator," Chimwemwe says. He fishes out a couple of vials from the bag of holding.
By the way, the meat we saw there had spoiled and would make the tigers quite sick. I'm sure you want to protect your investment here by giving them safe food."
Oba waves her hand. They should teach business classes at your university — something useful for a change! A businesswoman must carefully mitigate risk while protecting the bottom line. She listens again to the squawking elephant birds. Check on the elephant birds! If they hurt themselves, their golden feathers will be torn, and I shall have to renegotiate with their buyer as they would be damaged goods!
She cocks her head. I hear a customer. I will be back soon. Oba trots back into the shopfront.
☀☀☀
You move on to the center of the zoo. Here a set of three cages has two elephant birds in each. They have shimmering golden plumage and are squawking noisily. A wooden sign reads, “Elephant Birds, Golden: 6. SOLD.”
The beautiful birds are well-fed and groomed, likely because Oba has a buyer lined up for them already. The birds, however, are in a panic. You see tiger claw marks on the cage, as if one of the cats was recently trying to get in. The birds are so agitated that they’re fluttering their wings against the bars and hurling their weight against them, which hurts the birds. It also damages their beautiful golden feathers, which Oba mentioned.
There is a torn sack of bird feed nearby — also cut up with a knife.
You can calm the elephant birds with a DC 19 Nature check to Command an Animal.
Chimwemwe scoops up some of the seed in his hand. He rattles it around as he makes a deep humming sound, trying to calm the spooked birds.
The terror birds react well to Chimwemwe — especially because he offers food.
Most of the feathers are broken, but one large, well-formed feather lies on the ground.
Akoril keeps watch while Chimwemwe calms down the birds.
"At least nothing tried to eat us that time." mumbles Akoril out loud.
"Don't speak too soon," Chmwemwe says as he slowly backs away from the freshly calmed birds.
The cage ahead has low walls erected around its sides. Its door is open. A lifelike statue of a tiger rears just outside the cage's entrance.
There is a shed to your right, and then a final cage beyond that.
Wisps cautiously approaches the statue for a better look.
From here Wisps can see it's a very lifelike statue. She doesn't;t know more than that. She hears something move in the cage beyond but doesn't have line of sight to it as it's behind the wall.
Akoril looks to Wisps "One tiger, two tigel, live tiger, stone tiger..."
"Wisps!" Chimwemwe hisses and gestures for her to return. He then whispers to Alrinkiri, "Alrinkiri, do you think you could sneak around and close the door before whatever she has in there escapes?"
He glances over his shoulder toward Oba's shop. "Or we should find out what she has caged that can turn life to stone."
Alrinkiri worries this may be a basilisk. It would make sense to have a beast such as this here at the zoo, where it might be sold off as a deadly guard somewhere.
"I can try." They carefully and quietly slink the long way around the elephant bird enclosures and to the remaining shed, intending to stay below the level of the low wall until they get to a place where they can push the cage closed without revealing their presence to whatever is inside.
Alrinkiri notices something glinting in the supply shed as they pad by.
A basilisk yawns in the corner of the cage and then turns its hide to face the sun.
Alrinkiri pauses to look into the shed, distracted by something glinting.
Akoril whispers "Can we just make sure it's cage is locked..."
The light is glinting off a lightweight reflective shield.
The shed also contains grooming tools, food, a strange hood that looks like it could be tied to cover the eyes of a lizard-like creature, and a bottle of what looks like blood.
Would that hood stop that basilisk from being a danger?"
Alrinkiri, having ID'd the beast, seen it, and seen the hood would think so.
How to get it on, that's another problem…
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"The blood might be useful if things go badly, too. Anyway, I'm going to try to get the hood on. Someone else grab the shield, it might help reflect the beast's power."
They grab the hood and, continuing on their path, attempt to sneak up on the basilisk.
Alrinkiri pads back to the group and lets everyone know what they've found.
Alrinkiri pads along behind the screens, and squeezes through the bar of the cage in the back. They see another leather hood behind the lazy basilisk — it looks like someone pulled it off the creature's head!
Unfortunately, as they go around the bush, a twig snaps. The beast turns its head…
Being so well-prepared, your two front-liners get the drop on the creature!
Alrinkiri can put the hood on the creature's head with a 2-action thievery check against the Basilisk's fort DC. However you also need to get the cage closed, as putting the hood on the creature's head will only make it run amok.
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BOLD IS UP!:
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➤ Chimwemwe
➤ Alrinkiri
Basilisk
Soomdevi
Wisps
Akoril