Nicolette shatters another skeleton into splinters. Bohrs' club does find its mark, but clangs off the skeleton's old armor. If he had just put a little more into that swing, he feels like he might have brought the skeleton down. They both step back, leaving the way clearer
Kayle and Owens
Calaithes
Bohrs: -4
Red, Blue, & Orange: dead
Green & Purple: -3
Yellow: -6
Nicolette: -4
Map
Kayle felt his nerves as Nicolette and Bohrs stepped back. Suddenly nothing between the advancing undead and himself. He hastily spun another sling bullet and fired at the nearest skeleton.
"I hope this works!" he cried before quickly peeking behind him and considering backing off. Noting Owens still rooted in place snarling he tries to get through to the dog. Placing his hand on his shoulder and trying to push the dog through it's fear.
"Owens!" he shouts, "Rip and tear!"
Owens was fighting between two different natures. Snarling at the abominable undead that threatened his people, but also feeling every instinct telling him to run from the unnatural threat. Then, in a moment, the scales were pushed as Nicolette had to back off with her wound and Kayle pressed softly at his flank.
Owens rushed forward, all fear abandoned as he went for the nearest skeleton. One quick indignant woof that echoed off the stone was the only warning the skeleton got before Owens was leaping up at it's collarbone. No one threatened his people!
Kayle's sling bullet whizzes past the skeleton, smashing against some bit of uncarved stone beyond, while Owens rushes forward all bark and no bite. This unnatural things are just a bit too unnerving, a bit too unpredictable compared to living opponents.
Kayle and Owens
Calaithes
Bohrs: -4
Red, Blue, & Orange: dead
Green & Purple: -3
Yellow: -6
Nicolette: -4
Map
Calaithes hears Nicolette's direction but apparently it wasn't clear to everyone. Regardless, he had a clear shot to one of the skeletons. Maybe he could distract it and get the thing to try and reach him?
"No!" she calls out as she sees the signal for Owens to rush in. Perhaps it was her fault for not communicating better. Now they were in combat again, not able to sling their bullets at the enemies. No enemy would rush forward, provoking an attack by the heroes. Instead, Owens would get hit for everything. She can't abide that.
Nicolette will attempt to grab Owens by the flank and hurl him back 5ft.
However, the dog is in bite mode, and very hard to grab hold of. Hopefully, if he does get hurt, he'll withdraw back to his master. She gets ready for if and when that does happen.
With a well-placed swing and throw, Calaithes lets fly a small metallic sphere that pierces through one skeleton's spine, sending its skull clattering behind it. The rest of the bones follow suit, fragmenting as the last threads of negative energy animating and holding them together dissipate.
As Nicolette fears, both remaining skeletons advance and swing their blades and claws at Owens.
But this dog is protective of his people! One blade passes narrowly over his ears just as he ducks his head, and then Owens stands his ground, unharmed. Even as Nicolette tries to pull him back, he remains stalwart and unmoved, growling at the two animated piles of bones threatening him.
Kayle and Owens
Calaithes
Bohrs: -4
Green & Purple: -3
Red, Blue, Orange, & Yellow: re-dead
Nicolette: -4
Map
Bohrs stands with his club cocked back and ready to strike as soon as the skeleton steps into sight.
Calaithes wonders if the skeletons had any way to actually think.... They didn't have any flesh so how could they have brains? He steps forward and spins another sling bullet at the bones directly ahead of him. Even if it misses maybe it would make the thing step toward him?
Owens flinched when he ducked his head, but then was back up snapping and trying to tear down the skeleton in front of him. He paid absolutely no attention to Nicolette reaching out for him. There would be time for pets later!
Balked at his poor aim and quickly readied another shot to try and help Owens.
While neither Kayle nor Calaithes can manage to land additional hits with their slings, Owens chomps down on exposed bone and shakes like mad. The sheer force of the wagging sends bones flying, as the dog claims his personal trinket from the combat.
As Calaithes was wondering whether or not the skeletons could think, its movements suggest that it cannot. It steps into a precarious position between Owens and Bohrs. Bohrs was waiting for just such a moment! He swings--but his club bounces off of the skeleton's armor.
The finals standing skeleton flashes blade and claw at the rogue. While the half-elf twists his way out of the path of bony fingers, the old scimitar strikes a hard blow!
Kayle and Owens
Calaithes: -4
Bohrs: -4
Purple: -3
Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, & Blue: re-dead
Nicolette: -4
Map
Kayle and Owens
Calaithes: -4
Bohrs: -4
Purple: -3
Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, & Blue: re-dead
Nicolette: -4
Seeing her opportunity, Nicolette decides to let the good boy fight valiantly and instead moves to go around him. As she does, the skeleton from the back moves up.
"Leave him alone!" she orders as it tears into Calaithes. She attempts to bring her hammer down hard upon it.
With the last skeleton falling Calaithes holds his wound and moves into the room, searching for his bullets that missed. "Give me a moment to search for traps, or whatever...."
Bohrs puts a staying hand on Calithes. "May the Drunken Hero bless our endeavor and reward our courage!" He raises his silver tankard in a toast, and divine energy sweeps over the party.
"There, now! No sense exploring a crypt filled with undead with a seeping gut wound!"
It is finished. She watches Calaithes head a little closer into the room, but she takes a moment to rest. The others can easily see that these bonebreaking moves of hers can consume her energy quite easily. In a few moments, she stands tall once more and begins to search the skeletons. She is unaware of any magic that can repair or clean their armor, or make their blades less jagged, but perhaps there are some spells that exist. Being that they were dead, perhaps one of them bears a locket or a ring from before they were risen?
When a wave of healing washes over her, she grins ever so slightly as she feels truly restored.
"Blessed be Cayden and his gracious attendant! I believe you turned the tide for us in there, my friend. And Owens of course."
As waves of Cayden's blessing wash over the party, their injuries fully heal. The same, however, cannot be said for the two bodies that still lie in the center of the room, whose bloody wounds match those of the horses outside. They are badly mauled and difficult to recognize.
Stepping around and picking up some scattered sling bullets, Calaithes finds a pair of backpacks. One contains a large pillow and two quivers of 10 blunt arrows. The other has two days' worth of rations, a full waterskin, and a pair of smokesticks. Thankfully, he finds no traps.
In addition to the six skeletons that you destroyed, you see two other piles of discombobulated bones. They each carry broken scimitars and are wearing broken chain shirts--although the state of some of them are a bit more dire than merely broken after the power of Nicolette's mighty blows. The bones, or what is left of them, all look extremely old. Nicolette does not find any further keepsakes, identifying or otherwise, among the bones.
As you examine the bodies and the packs, you hear that echoing wail again, faint but pealing. It sounds like someone crying, far off.
There are doors leading out of this room on either side, one to the west and the other to the east.
"Thanks for the healing Bohrs! I feel like a fully healed man!"
Calaithes examines the recently killed bodies, but doesn't recognize them. "Not sure who these are, but I think the skeletons killed them. Something has obviously gone terribly wrong here. I'm guessing these guys were supposed to set up fake traps and such to test us and get us to work as a team. Well, maybe we need to work as a real team now and figure out what happened."
Nicolette grasps her hammer tighter as she hears the crying. In this place, it is unsettling; especially since the wail rose up the bodies earlier. Is this some sort of necromancer? Could one have caused the dead to come back to life here?
"Where is that coming from?" she thinks.
"You are probably right, Calaithes. They deserve as much. And perhaps we can see what can be done about laying them to rest after we are done. My only concern right now is that creepy crying. Do you hear it? It sounds like it is far away. It is possible there is a survivor, isn't it? I mean...he would have had rations and traps. Maybe he survived?...Maybe..."
As Cal moves to the door to the west, she also moves there and readies to move in. She whispers to him, "Open it stealthily if you can. See what is in there and close the door if there is something alive. Then I'll go in first. If you don't see anything, you go in and I'll follow you when you give the signal to come in."
Bohrs, seeing Calaithes and Nicolette having chosen a path, follows them to the door. waits patiently for them to examine the door for traps.
"One you know it is not trapped, allow me to examine the door before you open it. I may be able to give us an advantage over anything lurking on the other side."
Listening carefully and trying to filter out the echoes, Nicolette places the sound as coming from the east.
Neither door appears to be trapped to Calaithes, nor locked. Bohrs doesn't hear anything behind either door, other than those faint sounds of wailing off in the distance. Yes, they're definitely coming from the east.
"Oh ho! It's definitely coming from behind that door. Let's check this one first and make sure nothing comes up on us from behind."
She nods for Bohrs and Calaithes to check the inside of the door as to whether there were monsters or people inside. If it is secure, she will enter with them.
Bohrs places his hand on the East door, closes his eyes and concentrates.
Although the room beyond is dark, Bohrs is blessed with limited vision of what is to come.
This large chamber contains a maze of pillars that obscure the far side of the room. Next to the door is a pile of saddlebags and three brooms.
Bohrs relays this information to the rest of the group. "I can look through the other door, too, if ya want," he offers, referring to the West door.
"Is there a limit to how often you can use that? If so, maybe we should only use it if we hear something?"
Having detected no dangers Calaithes takes a position behind the others with his sling ready.
With Bohrs relaying what is beyond at the eastern door, Nicolette takes charge, particularly because she does hear crying beyond and Bohrs doesn't see it. She swings open the door without hesitation and marches inside.
Kayle was a bit shellshocked after their encounter. The bravery of his mighty dog was something he himself doubted he would have had if the skeletons had gotten close to him. Looking at Calaithes and his wounds, at least before Bohrs healed them all, he felt very small in that moment. He was quick to turn his head away, and as he looked back to Nicolette he realized he was being left behind.
Putting his sling away and drawing out his club Kayle was quick to march up behind her. "My senses should be the sharpest." he claimed while falling in behind her. He held his club in a white-knuckled grip, remembering his encounter with the mountain lion and trying to use that to inspire himself. At the same time he held his wooden shield up high near his shoulder.
Owens trotted behind, the dog wondering just why his owner was in such a hurry.
With the others taking the lead Calaithes shrugs. "Actually I'm trained to search out traps. But.... OK, I'll follow." Jiles had told him that he too frequently did something wrong. Something about a mental block....
"You can go ahead of me, if you wish, Calaithes. I don't mind being the rear guard for the moment," Bohrs offers. "One of us should be close to the front, since we are the ones holding the lights, though!"
Calaithes grinned at Bohrs comment. He shrugged, "Kayle cast the light in my hand. If he wants he can shift it to himself, or maybe put it on Owens's head...."
Before she enters, she nods to Cal.
"You enter first when there is not certain danger on the other side. This door...I'm sure there is. Just keep an eye out for traps and warn me if I get close to one."
With that, she moves in, weapon at the ready.
"Don't forget to check the saddlebags," Bohrs says. "There might be something useful in them."
At Bohrs prompting, someone checks the saddlebags as the group begins to move into the dark room. They are unfortunately empty.
Nicolette sees first couple of pillars than Bohrs mentioned would be there, including the first one that blocks a lot of her vision. Her keen vision reveals three possible avenues forward, as far as she can tell. There is a long hallway to the north that appears to end in either another wall or a pillar, although there is at least one turn-off in there. To the east are two possible paths, long halls which again both end in stone. To the south are two alcoves: dead-ends as far as she can tell.
The wailing is much louder in this room. Even with the echoes all around this chamber, Nicolette can tell that it is coming from her right--somewhere to the south.
Nicolette moves and peers around the pillar to the right. As she does, she calls out into the darkness.
"We are here for the Everflame. We are friendly. There is no need to cry anymore...and if you are one of the undead...we will put you to rest with your companions." she threatens in a kind voice as she moves along the southern path, mindful of the north as well. Ultimately, she uses the sounds of the cries to draw her closer.
Bohrs tries to recall any references to wailing spirits in his lessons and readings with Father Prasst. Does it sound like a spirit, or tortured prisoner, a crazy person wailing alone in the dark, or maybe even just the wind?
Kayle follows closely behind Nicolette with Owens at his side the entire time. He silently waves the other two men forward, to follow as closely as they can with their light. Both he and Owens are keeping alert and looking for anything in this place that isn't part of the structure.
Once Calaithes was near enough he would lean in to whisper to him. "I can only cast an orison a few times a day." he clarified.
Calaithes moves along with the group, but around the pillar to the left. The room seemed strange. What was the point of the pillars?
Once he moves around the pillar he starts searching along the floor for any sign of tracks or traps....
Bohrs considers his spiritual lessons as he waits near the entrance to the dark room of pillars. It definitely doesn't sound like the wind to him, and he can't think of a specific spirit that would produce such fearful whimpering. Father Prasst probably mentioned something, but the specifics of the lesson just don't spring to mind. Either way, he supposes that the cry sounds human enough.
Meanwhile the other four creep forward, stepping lightly around pillars and seeing the patchwork of a maze throughout the rest of the room. The light from Bohrs at the room's entrance plays with Calaithes' moving light in interesting ways, illuminating and hiding the columns and their paths.
Kayle notices something in one of the dead-end alcoves, and he walks towards it. There is a wooden lever embedded in the stone wall, angled upward with a small leather handle on it.
Calaithes takes a slightly different path forward, looking around for traps. As he passes by pillars, wondering about the purpose, his eyes dart at the floor between two of the pillars to his right. There's something odd there, something not quite right. Maybe some plants on the ground?
Striding closest to the wailing, Nicolette sees the closest hint towards its source. There's a door, right there! She starts moving towards it...just as the ground beneath her gives way.
The Pale Hammer falls, tumbling down into the darkness below...into a pile of pillows?
It still smarts, but Nicolette has felt far worse. But as she looks up from a ten foot hole, she has to think of a way out of this...
A quick reminder about nonlethal. Track it separately.
As Nicolette moves closer to the door, she is so focused on the crying that she forgets to look where she is going. When the floor falls out from beneath her, there is hardly a scream until she's almost at the bottom landing on pillows. For all she knew, it could have been 200ft down. Fortunately, this was meant to be a positive experience. The ground is littered with pillows to catch her fall. She searches the area briefly, calling up to the area above:
"I'm okay...I think I bruised by butt...but other than that, I'm okay."
She won't be making that mistake again. After searching down below through the pillows, she will pull out her grapple hook and rope. A moment later, the hook comes up.
"Do me a favor and wrap that around a pillar, please."
If the others help, she will climb out.
Bohrs offers his assistance in getting Nicolette out of the pit by wrapping the rope around the pillar several times and then securing it with his bodyweight.
Seeing that Bohrs is helping Nicolette Calaithes continues searching, trying to identify the pit traps and if possible how to disable them?
"Somebody must have gotten in here at least to make the traps less dangerous, just embarrassing and annoying. But they might not have gotten all of them."
"I think the traps in this tomb were intended to be more of a game than an actual threat. I think this whole journey was intended to be something of a puzzle or contest," Bohrs suggests. "Why else would a wizard send illusory orcs at us, then leave when we beat them? Why would pit traps have pillows in them, if not to prevent one of us from breaking our necks falling in? It seems like something has interrupted this year's game. Something killed those men and animals outside, and something created those skeletons, which were definitely not part of the game. I'm betting we'll see a mixture of threats from here on out, non-lethal ones like this pillow-pit, and ones that could kill us, left by the aforementioned something. Does that make sense, or I have had too much ale today?"
He looks to the others for confirmation.
Calaithes pauses his search for a moment. It wouldn't do to be distracted while searching for traps, deadly or otherwise. "We can ask when we get back home. I think these traps are real, but they pad them so we won't get seriously hurt in this challenge. I mean, at regular times the traps are real to keep out any wandering creatures. The team sent here probably cleans out remains that were killed by them while they put in the safeties. Maybe the skeletons are from something that was too strong and not killed by the traps?"
"Regardless I think you are right. We have to assume that any trap may be deadly and do our best to bypass them. Pity they didn't leave a map and instructions in the saddlebags!"
Just as Nicolette throws the grappling hook up for Kayle to catch, Bohrs finds the ground giving way beneath him in the midst of his pontificating, tumbling into yet another pile of pillows. Maybe he has had too much ale today.
Thankfully, with Kayle and Owens to anchor her, the Pale Hammer rises from the shallow, padded depths. Bohrs manages to hoist himself up as well, even without the benefit of a rope and a grappling hook. Praise the Lucky Drunk. Neither found anything other than pillows at the bottom of their respective traps.
The half-elf rogue pads around carefully with his hanbo, and easily finds another pit trap ahead to the north. Calaithes feels like he is almost able to make the pit safe to cross over without jumping, but isn't quite able to manage it. But it's easy enough to notice now that he has pointed it out.
Still to explore are the door Nicolette saw before her fall, and the lever that Kayle saw. Much of the room remains unexplored, but Calaithes and Bohrs can to pillars beyond.
"It looks real enough to me, minus the pillows," she states as she climbs out of the hole. After recovering her grapple and placing it back on the side of her backpack, she will look to Cal to explain where to step. She does, however, keep an eye out as she advances up next to him. "Do you want me just to strike the ground in front of us? It seems like most of these pits are of the falling variety. I think a good light smack would be more weight than someone stepping on it. What do you think?" she asks the half-elf in front of her.
Kayle was quickly reminded that ego was not a proper reason to go first, and he was thankful he wasn't the one to learn the lesson at the cost of their backside. "To be fair, the wizard left before we found out the extent of his game." he reminded Bohrs with a brief rub between Owen's ears.
He was all too happy to help anchor for Nicolette, and it took little convincing to have Owens play tug of war with her. Though the dog seemed a bit reluctant to release the rope when she rose from the pit.
With Owens at his heel he carefully followed Calaithes now. His gaze fell just ahead of the half elf. Looking for more traps or threats. "Do you suppose the lever is for the door?" he asked, "It would explain why the pits are between the two. That or it is another trap and we can merely open the door."
With the rope offered to him Owens was fine taking it gently in his mouth, but when it was pulled taunt he gave a playful growl and pulled back. As Nicolette climbed the rope pulled and moved, giving the dog a proper tug of war. He leaned back, locked his neck, and tugged whichever way he could. When Nicolette crested the edge Kayle would help her pull herself up that last bit, but in her immediate eyesight would be Owens. Still pulling on the rope and tail wagging.
After taking a moment to realize the game had ended the dog released the rope and moved up to the pair bright eyed and tongue lolled out in a happy smile. Tail still wagging, of course. This earned him a rub between the ears from Kayle.
"Lever? It might disable these pits? Or it might reset things. Everyone get back, maybe outside the room? And I'll pull it to see what it does...."
Calaithes carefully moves over to where the lever is and examines it.
"Everyone away from the traps?"