The rest of the gang easily team up to dispatch the 'guard lizard', as Sasha puts it, and the oracle's smart use of her silence spell eliminates any sort of potential for it to call out to any alarm system.
So far, so good on the infiltration plan.
Shaggar glances around. The body would be noticed, probably soon, which meant they had limited time to achieve their objective. ”Let’s go.” He slinks up the corridor that should lead to their target.
Sahalya slithers forward as well.
Ari takes her part in avenging the acid attack she caught full on and the combined weight of the group's attacks brings its life to an abrupt and bloody end. She coughs violently, once more glad of the magical silence, before wiping her daggers and resheathing them.
Swaying on her feet slightly, she moves carefully until she can hear own breath and knows she is outside the enchantment's effect. The tiefling prudently avoids touching her face or clothing where the spittle still clings. "A bath in the mould of the Friendly Arm is probably wishful thinking but if you've got a cleaning spell up your impeccably turned-out sleeves I'd appreciate it," she whispers to Rutilux. "Maybe I could bearhug a trog and wipe this stuff off on them but I'm not sure I'd come out of it smelling any better and they're not really my type," she quips, trying to make light of how hurt she is.
Then, somewhat grudgingly, "I could probably use a little patching up," she admits. "That stung like a m–" Quite what Ari was about to say is unclear as she begins to cough again, though you're as certain as you can be that it was not going to be pretty. She muffles the sound immediately, looking down at the saliva she's coated with in disgust.
Sasha dismisses her spell, allowing Shaggar's words to be heard and approaches the deceased lizard. Shaking her head sadly at the killing she gives Pheliks' a thorough scratching before asking, "Before we go, who needs healing?" and preparing to cast some healing magic on her allies.
After everyone is healthy she follows again, doing her best to stay quiet.
Rutilux says "Have to be careful about wiping off our protective oinment but i can clear up a bit of that saliva I think." He offers his prestidigitation
Kiley nods, replacing her sword with her bow and follows along behind Shaggar and Sahalya.
"Appreciate it," Ari replies as Rutilux is able to conjure a little light magical scrubbing to remove the worst of the acidic remnants.
She then takes the wand, rolling it around in her hand to get a feel for it. Somewhat to her surprise, its magic seems easy to both understand and access, and she lightly touches it to her wounds. As they fade, she inspects them, before offering the curative device to Shaggar.
Ready to go again, she tries to keep to the shadows.
Healing done and ready to move on, the party moves ever closer to their goal, the feast hall. And straight up ahead through a small corridor in this maze of buildings is one of the entrances to said feast hall. There aren't any visible guards, and neither Shaggar or Kiley's exceptional senses pick up any sound beyond the normal cavern sounds you have experienced so far. Strange.
The building ahead on the right has a sign depicting a large tankard of what appears to be some sort of beverage, likely ale, while the building directly to your right is the one that looks like a chapel. As you take in the sight of the empty hallway, however, you get the strange feeling that things are too quiet, even outside of Sasha's silence spell.
Shaggar advances quietly, but in the unnatural stillness, his footsteps seem loud.
The gallerok follows along.
Rutilux follows somewhere in the middle.
Shaggar sees a maze of side streets off to his left, and the feast hall ahead. Still no noticeable sounds or any troglodytes. Something isn't right here.
Sasha and Pheliks pad along behind, now having applied the salve underneath their noses in the moments while the others were healing. They both look around, with Pheliks smelling the air too, just to be sure they aren't about to be ambushed...
Kiley silently move along beside Shaggar, her eyes and ears straining to pick up anything that may provide a clue as to what is going on here. The fur on her tail stands on end and the tip twitches in small, nervous arcs.
Shaggar pauses briefly. ”It is too quiet. Perhaps, it is a trap… or perhaps the bodies we saw strung up were just the beginning. I will look ahead a bit. If things remain the same, we will check the feast hall.”
The ranger switches sides of the corridor (to get a better look in both directions) and moves quietly up to the junction. He looks for any activity or strange indicators but also the signs of bodies being moved or other prints in the stone floor.
With a curt hand motion from the gnoll, the serpentine creature proceeds more cautiously.
Briefly holding up a hand to acknowledge Shaggar's comment, Ari keeps pace with Kiley.
Now that Shaggar is closer, he can hear the muffled sounds of what seems to be someone talking in a language that none of you can understand even if you were to clearly hear the words . The sounds of speech don't sound anything like the full tribe of troglodytes you were expecting to be in the hall but nevertheless are coming from the other side of that door right in front of you.
The door on the building next to the statue appears to be some sort of museum, as the sign displays a variety of interesting but mostly worthless artifacts.
Rutilux looks at the others for their ideas of how to proceed.
Kiley quietly moves up, keeping an ear and an eye out for danger.
As Shaggar beckons Ari forward, the tiefling sighs inwardly but steps up and begins a silent inspection of the door and surrounding area.
Ari barely taps the door with her tools before it gently swings open just a tad, just enough for her to peek through and get a glance at the inside. What she sees inside is just about what she expected to see from a dwarven feast hall: large tables fit for holding many a dwarf with pillars holding up the ceiling at regular intervals. Directly ahead is the bar, a wooden affair with a ring of stools sat in front of it and a stone building that looks to be the storage space in the large feast hall, separating the feasters from the supply. Barrels sit in the wall between the inside storage and the bar outside, taps set in them to allow for distribution.
The entire place is much neater and put together than you'd expect from a troglodyte lair, giving the impression that maybe this is not their main sleeping area. The quiet words you heard through the door are coming from a group of trogs sitting at one of the tables sharing what looks to be some sort of game animal. Even though you can't understand their language you can tell they're nervous about something, as they are speaking under their breath. They haven't noticed Ari opening the door, absorbed with their meal and conversation as they are.
There doesn't seem to be anyone else in the feast hall judging from the lack of sound.
Freezing as the door moves even as she barely touches it, Ari waits for a change in the chatter but none is forthcoming. Assuming that she has not been heard, the tiefling sneaks a look through the gap and takes in a large hall set up for eating, drinking and making merry. In different circumstances, she can easily see how a fun night of revelry might lay ahead of them. As it stands, however, the handful of troglodytes sat huddled round a table and talking quietly do not look in a party mood.
Ari ducks back and inches over to Shaggar, stretching up on tiptoes so she can whisper directly into the gnoll's furry ear - once he's lowered his head, anyway. "Trogs," she confirms, then asks "Ambush?" She holds up five fingers and points at the hall to indicate the number, then at the potential hiding places either side of the feasting hall door, should they be able to lure the troglodytes out. She then moves out of the way and indicates that Shaggar can look for himself should he care to.
Sasha watches in silence, noting Ari's five finger count of enemies and considering her options. She waves and holds a finger to her lips in the universal symbol of "quiet," hoping they realize she is offering to cast Silence again...
Shaggar looks into the room briefly then closes the door.
Ari ducks back and inches over to Shaggar, stretching up on tiptoes so she can whisper directly into the gnoll's furry ear - once he's lowered his head, anyway. "Trogs," she confirms, then asks "Ambush?"
The gnoll shakes his furry head. ”Too many unknowns. Too many things that could go wrong. We sneak closer, see more, and then strike fast and hard. Let’s go.” The gnoll leads west around the building.
Rutilux follows the big furry ranger's lead Embarrassing how much better at sneaking than I am some of these huge folk are.
Shaggar takes a glance around the western corner of the feast hall, and reveals quite the sight. An overgrown and seemingly neglected garden is growing all on its own, full of strange bluish-green mushrooms of various sizes ranging from hand-sized all the way up to as big as baskets. Further beyond the garden is a massive gate carved out of the same stone as the rest of the city, although even from here you can see the faded gold leaf embellishing the gate.
Half a dozen statues carved from that same deep emerald-colored mineral stand on either side of the gate, but the real attraction is ahead: two nearly floor to ceiling gargantuan grey marble statues of regal looking dwarven soldiers. The only thing detracting from the inspirational sight are the dozens of age-cracked skeletons hanging from pitons drilled into the statues and walls surrounding the golden gilded gate.
You'd have to get closer to see any more on them, though.
Shaggar ignores the tableau of horror and continues creeping along the edge of the feast hall.
Kiley follows Shagger with her bow out and an arrow nocked.
More sneaking? well, so far... so good.
I MAY have jinxed myself.
Lovely, thinks Ari, taking in both the faded glory of the architecture and the impressive collection of bleached bones. She keeps an eye out for anything showing signs of life, though can't help but check that the skeletons are just that.
The party moves into the courtyard before the large golden door, revealing just how big the overgrown mushroom plots are. The building directly to your south is labeled 'city hall', while the two to the north are some sort of combined legal building.
Ari takes a look at the hanging skeletons before moving over to do the usual at the door and decides that even if they are undead, they are pitoned and hung from the wall too securely to make their way down to you.
Shaggar cracks the door open and is immediately hit with the nearly overwhelming stench of troglodyte, and is only able to hold onto whatever he ate for breakfast thanks to the gnome's ointment. It seems as if you have found the place where the majority of the trog tribe sleeps; the floor is covered in sleeping bags and mats of various colors and skin types as well as various bags of discarded gear. Just at a quick glance, there looks to be sleeping spaces for somewhere between 30-40 trogs. A pitched tent strung out of a strange green leather sits up against the northern wall, separate from the rest of the sleeping places.
From the middle of the party Sasha gets Shaggar's attention and mouths, "Now? Silence spell?" to see if it is time to use her magic to best effect...
Shaggar almost takes a step back, nearly bowled over by the stink. He has a guess about the unusual tent… Likely lizardman or trog skins. He quietly shuts the door and moves on toward the north-side corridor to complete their sweep.
He speaks quietly, ”Bedding for 30 to 40 trogs. A tent for their leader, I think. Looks like only the ones at the table are here. Keep moving.”
Ari doesn't need to be told twice, almost bouncing on the balls of her padded feet as she follows along behind Shaggar. The smell is overpowering and if the circumstances were less dire she would probably make a show of mock retching. She remains silent, however, and is far from unhappy to hurry past. It's not really in keeping with the subtlety of her patron but once they have dealt with the trogs, the tiefling would be quite happy to set this whole room ablaze - from a safe distance, as fumigating the place would most likely be a nightmare.
As Shaggar, Ari, and Sahalya round the corner to take a look at the northern side of the feast hall, the trio catch a glimpse of something they weren't quite expecting. Well, at least two of them weren't expecting to see something like this.
A glowing ball of soft blue light floats aimlessly in the hall next to another one of those strange green mineral statues. It almost seems to pause as if noticing you when you see it, before slowly floating over to the wall and disappearing through it.
Beyond that strangeness, nothing 'jumps out at you'.
Rutilux tries his luck to catch up..
Sasha looks a bit disappointed when no one takes up her offer of magic, still, but follows quietly with Pheliks padding along beside her. She sees the reaction of her companions as they see something around the corner, but not whatever it was...
Shaggar doesn’t know what to make of the light ball, but their mission is still the same. He moves forward cautiously toward the statue the creature was hovering around and the northern door.
slither
Noticing Sasha's downcast look, Kiley nudges her with an elbow.
"We just don't want to waste it," she whispers as softly as she can manage before following Shaggar, Sahalya, and Ari.