Larraz looks a little concerned about the mixed messages regarding Desert Wind, but his face falls when he learns about Gibb.
"Ah, Gibb. A lot of people don't trust goblins, but she was my mentor. I'm sure she went down blasting zombies to protect the town--but I guess I already knew that. If anyone was left alive we would've found each other.
"Yes. I can fight. If you can get me out of here, I'll do anything."
He looks at the notebook Bee presents to him, but shakes his head. "No, I didn't come to this building until after the attack. I didn't know anyone who worked here."
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"If you don't have a weapon, take this," Bee says, offering her sickle to Larraz. "And Desert Wind is okay - he wasn't hurt when we found him, just hungry. But we found some feed that was still good inside what's left of the general store so now he's not as hungry. We found a wagon and got it repaired and our plan was to hitch Desert Wind to it to help us get what remains and artifacts we can out of here."
She looks around, still wary. "We've got a little more time before we have to leave this place. Stick with us while we finish looking around, it's safer that way."
Assuming there's nothing else to be found in the lounge and knowing that time is short, Bee heads back down the short hallway to the next set of doors that she can see. After looking it over for a moment for any obvious dangers (or waiting for anyone else who wants to check it out), she cautiously attempts to open the door.
"I'm a spellcaster," says Larraz, "but I do have some weaponry..."
From under the sofa, he retrieves a staff. Stowed in the small closet, a shield and a sling and... three stones. "Though if any of you have any sling bullets, I'm pretty low on ammunition," he adds sheepishly as he readies his shield.
Bee opens a door. A dusty sofa and small chairs are the only furnishings that remain in this modest room. Two small windows to the east look out over the front lawn, and doors exit to the north, west, and south. A reception area?
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"No. No bullets. I'm a caster too." Macondi pokes his head into the other room and notices Qen there. "If you are searching the muck under the floor, I can help. And clean us both off again with magic."
Then noticing Bee heading further into the building, Macondi follows. Keeping his shield in hand in case it is needed.
But how do our heroes approach the hole, given that Qen has already identified the instability of the floor?
[ooc]And after that, a Perception check.
"Are any of you hurt? I should ask that. I can heal," Larraz offers.
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"It is too bad Stabilize doesn't work on the floor," Macondi quips as he takes the end of the rope from Qen and starts out. He tries to stay along the outside wall of the room and climbs over the furniture when needed. "If the furniture hasn't fallen, maybe my weight won't be enough either. And if I do fall through, at least the furniture will break the fall."
Most of what Macondi finds in the pit is detritus from the broken floor, and things one might expect to have found in a classroom that are now below it. But among those things is an ornate, ceremonial longsword with a golden, wire-wrapped hilt and a pommel set with large rubies.
[ooc]The sword counts as one relic.
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Macondi grabs the sword and one of the books that look like they are in better shape than the others. He leaves the scraps of paper once he checks them all for any intact magical writing.
Finding nothing else of interest, he climbs his way back out of the hole in the floor and carefully picks his way back across the furniture to rejoin the others. He cleans the muck off of himself as best as he can with magic.
"Ceremonial sword. It probably counts as artwork. In addition to being a usable sword - because Iomedae. And this book. Which may be able to be cleaned well enough to be read. Not sure on that."
Macondi heads over to where Bee is in the main room. "So, upstairs next? Or check out the lower rooms down here first?"
"Those rooms have really been through it," says Larraz, "I haven't been through there much. Upstairs is mostly residential, dean quarters and dormitories for a few students who lived here."
Dirty rugs, shattered desks, and smashed-in doors are what remains of these small offices. Papers and long-dried inkwells are scattered among the detritus.
Nothing moves in these small offices and classrooms--nothing larger than vermin, anyway. There is an item of some interest in the north-westernmost space, however--a body.
Heavy claw marks and deep rips mar this corpse, which lies sprawled and partially covered by the broken desk in the northwest corner. The desiccated flesh of zombies litters the floor around it. Scraps of cloth hang tattered around its mangled hands, which even now are locked into fists.
The Pathfinders might try...
...identifying the tattered cloth ,
...examining the body , or
...searching the offices .
Or something else?
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With his only basic First Aid training, Barak isn't great at being a forensic scientist, but he's perfectly willing to try. He kneels down and examines the body with great care, checking to see what he can find. Once he's examined the full crime scene and sketched some of the details, he takes a moment to move the broken desk out of the way.
"Someone should search this too."
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"I know it's more complicated than I make it sound but the ones we've run into here? They're empty. Their spirits have gone and all that's left are the empty vessels they used to call home," Bee remarks quietly as they come across yet another body. "Sometimes the vessels return to the earth like they're meant and other times...something else moves in and uses what's left behind. Something dark."
As the others examine the body and clothing, Bee joins Macondi in looking around the room itself.
Aztryx and Quadennillia recognize the tatters to be the remains of ruined hand wraps, such as those used by brawlers.
Barak doesn't notice any clues on the body, but Heather takes note that the mouth has large, broken-off tusk stumps.
Macondi finds an amulet of some kind behind the collapsed cabinet after Barak moves it out of the way, along with a pair of gloves. They're both fine items, and surprisingly free of dust.
He and Heather also both spot a glint of metal in the caved-in portion of the room. A wayfinder! Perhaps dropped as someone retreated into this room, someone who was unable to retrieve it later...
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"These look suspiciously clean." Macondi meditates over the gloves and amulet for a couple of minutes, casting Read Aura on both of them.
Macondi determines that both items are indeed magical--the amulet abjuration and the gloves necromancy.
The wayfinder isn't particularly out of reach, and retrieving it isn't dangerous or difficult. It's engraved to Bryrigar Hassen.
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"Where else here have we not examined?"
"Upstairs," Macondi answers simply. He hands Aztryx the amulet. "When we get a few minutes, can you see if you can identify that better? I'll take the gloves here. Both are magic."
Macondi cleans Bee off with magic if needed after delving down under the floor on this side of the building. "Ready to see what is upstairs?"
This room is lined with bookshelves and sitting mats. Two smaller rooms branch from the main hallway, serving as private study nooks. There could be some valuable books here if someone wanted to take the time to look...
Ahead, the hallway opens to the left and right. Directly across from the stud area is a set of double doors that have been knocked off their hinges, and the dark space beyond them.
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"Thanks," Bee smiles at Macondi as he uses a bit of magic to get the dirt and cobwebs off of her. She dutifully follows everyone else as they carefully head up the spiral staircase to the second floor. As Aztryx begins nosing through the books, she takes a few steps ahead into the hallway and looks around before moving up to the space where the double doors once stood. Sword in hand, she peers into the darkness...
The double door to this suite has been knocked off its hinges and shattered, leaving the exit open to the hallway outside. A broken four-post bed stands against the eastern wall. A circular table and an accompanying chair occupy a nook in the southwest. A large statue depicting a marble chariot wheel sporting flames of gold occupies the northeast corner.
Aztryx begins looking through the books, but identifying anything worth keeping might take some time.
The statue certainly looks hefty, though its large size also means several people could work together to carry it.
The wagon can certainly hold it, thanks to Quadennillia's expert repairs.
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"I wonder what ripped these door up so well," Macondi muses. He thinks for a moment more. "Actually, I probably don't want to know."
"It seems that this statue is really well known. Larraz thought of it first when I mentioned a famous statue being here." He looks at it for a moment. "Maybe we can take it out after we finish searching the rest of this building. It hasn't gone anywhere for a while, a few more minutes won't change that."
The other rooms in this hallway look smaller--student dormitories, most likely. Searching them should be relatively quick. Someone could probably search two of them in the time it would take someone to go through the books in the study area.
These small rooms seem to have housed students who elected to not live in separate residences. Much of the furniture has fallen to disrepair over time.
Heather finds that most of the personal effects are gone from the rooms she searches, but she does find a drawer filled with dusty jewelry. None of the pieces look especially valuable, but the entire set should be worth a bit.
Macondi determines that they are a set of healer's gloves.
Qen finds a dirty vial of holy water in one of the small chests.
Aztryx finds an antique copy of [i]The Acts of Iomedae, the religious text of the faith. This aging and beautifully illustrated tome should certainly satisfy the Venture-Captain.
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As the group splits off a bit to search and to investigate some of the things they've already found, Bee decides to remain in the dean's room and help look around there.
"Be careful to stay in hearing or eyeshot of someone else," she advises. "The building seems clear for now but someone could still fall down a hole or something."
While Bee doesn't notice anything, Barak spots a few hints that something is amiss. The ceiling over the dean's room has a bare spot with exposed, damaged boards. They almost seem to quiver, as though something is moving above them.
Disturbing this room might risk bringing it down on one's head.
If the Pathfinders still want to safely search this room or claim the statue, they could try to reinforce the ceiling with some of the boards from the broken door . Or they could just hit it with something, let it crash down when nobody is inside...