Jinkin Boss - Round 5
27 Red Jinkin (8hp dmg)
25 Ba'hahk (16/23 hp remain, shield 12/20)
20 Karina (7/15hp remain)
19 Zaria (19/21hp)
16 Alpha 47 (10/17hp)
The remaining jinkin, already a bit hurt, leaps forward, making a stab attack at Alpha-47 before scampering off into the warren of low tunnels, jumping off the higher ledge onto the floor below.
hit
1 minimum
Alpha-47 will give chase to the creature, sending one more string of needles after it.
"Come back and be exterminated" He says calmly to the creature.
Jinkin Boss - Round 5 - concluded
Alpha gives chase to the fleeing jinkin, and then release another barrage of steel darts. Instead of missing, this time the spell eviscerates the target, slaying the last jinkin before he could escape.
End of Combat
Zaria will stand guard while the others tend to injuries and/or search the fallen.
Karina gathers all the bodies in roughly one area. She can feel the urge to just let Luther float, but wisely decides against doing that. Once the bodies are gathered and subsequently searched, she goes to tell this to the leader.
"That should do it for the Jinkins. Their bodies have been piled up, if you have any use for them."
Understanding that they are pressed for time, Alpha-47 will gather his allies and raise his holy symbol to Brigh, asking for her help to heal not just the inanimate but the animate too.
"“Brigh, innovator and guide,” they intoned, their voice steady but imbued with a hint of reverence, “lend your restorative touch not only to the constructs of our world but to those who walk it.”
Alpha casts a healing spell that covers the entire group, which allows Zaria and Ba'hahk to be fully restored, while the cleric and bard are nearly so.
Karina goes back to speak to Sef, the leader of the strangely-colored humanoids. Sef is quiet grateful to the group for clearing out the gremlins. "Now, we can live in peace for a bit, while we try to keep our tribe together. I promised you a reward, and a reward you shall have."
She hands you a small sack filled with strange silvery metallic disks. Karina and Zaria, at least, recognize these as silverdisks, unidentifiable alien metal "coins" that pass for gold crowns in Numeria and the surrounding lands. There are 8 silverdisks in the bag. In addition to the coin, there are 5 strange cards made of a flexible, smooth material. Each card bears a brown stripe.
"I don't know what those cards are," she says with a shrug, But the purple-haired woman asked if we had any when she first passed through. We did not have any then, but since she thought them valuable, we started collecting them from inside."
The cloaked orc thanks them sincerely
"It has been good dealing with you. You have been kind and true to your words. Rather refreshing to me" he adds the last part with a bit of an embarrassed tone
"And again, thank you for the reward, It is much appreciated. I do hope we get to converse again in the future"
"Honor is a necessity when you don't have good choices," says Sef coldly. "Our former leaders believed in sneaking and backstabbing, and look where it has gotten us. I might prefer to take you unawares, but we are not enough to overcome you. And we can't afford more losses." she sighs knowing they are likely hopeless over time regardless of what they do now.
"We do have some other items that might interest you, collected from other surface dwellers who did not fare so well in the caves. Would you like to buy or trade?" Sef drags a chest from her abode and unlocks it.
Inside are several suits of studded leather, a buckler, a short bow with arrows, a rapier, 2 shortswords, 2 small vials of pale green liquid, a sap, a sunrod, 2 sets of thieves' tools, a repair kit, 2 scrolls, and a bag of coins that seems heavier than the purse you just received.
"We might part with any of these things, if the price is right." she says.
Zaria lets the others handle the talking. Sef's words, especially when she talks about the former leaders, reinforces her feelings that they were used as assassins to end a conflict that Sef's people may have started.
However, they have a mission of their own, and getting into a fight here would be counterproductive, so she stays quiet.
Karina examines the flexible material, trying to discern what it is.
After spending time in Torch and all of Numeria, Karina has seen some strange, possibly alien, things in her time. This fits that bill. It appears to by synthetic but she is not sure how its made or what its purpose is.
Nodding to the creature, taking one of the strange square devices as well. ”Thank you. We will proceed further into the cave structure looking for the others now. This purple haired women was like me, yes? We are searching for her, can you show us which way she went?”
Alpha-47 will place a light orb on his allies, ensuring everyone has light just in case we get separated.
Karina hands the item to Alpha, "Do you have any idea what this is, Alpha?"
Shaking his head, "It is unfamiliar, maybe when I see more of what's down here it will come to me in a brilliant insipration from Brigh, for now though, my knowledge of this. . .thing is clouded,"
Sef nods and points towards the metal wall with a circular opening on the edge of the skulk's lair. "She and her followers went in there. They have not come back out, at least not this way, that we have seen. First them, then the others."
Remembering something from the fight with the Jinken boss, Alpha-47 backtracks to examine the single circular door, tightly closed, sits on the metal wall just above the level of the rubble.
"In the combat, I missed this door here. How strange to find a door in the rock, I doubt the Jinkens made this. We should look for a way to open it"
The door in the rubble-strewn room once occupied by the jinkin chief looks much like the one in the metal wall in the skulk's lair, but this circular portal is tightly closed with spiral-like sheets of metal that lock together. Though he's fairly confident in his examination, Alpha-47 cannot find any means to open the circular portal. It seems there is no handle, switch, button or other means easily visible.
The orc nods at the observation, inside he seems to feel an anxiety that came with excitement. Would this lead to why he was pulled here? One could only guess
"Let me know if you need something from me. I'd be happy to assist"
"We could just go through the door where Sef's people are. I mean, that is why we killed these Jinkins, and it's reasonable to assume that they know how to open their door." Zaria says.
Nodding, ”Affirmative Zaria, I did not want to leave a door un investigated. Though I do not see any way to open it. It is possible it is one sided only. I will follow the rest of you back to Sef’s village, let’s see about getting through their door.”
Karina will try to investigate as well.
The door in the skulk lair is open, the circular passage allowing admittance to whatever is beyond the strange metal wall.
Back in the jinkin debris-filled chamber, Karina also peers at the closed portal, but cannot determine any reasonable means to open it.
Waiting for the group to gather, Alpha-47 will ponder what may be beyond this door, "We are pushing our frames to the limit, the desire to find Khonnir quickly is going to quickly stress our bodies. We may need to slow down, and think of this less as a sprint and more of a long distance run,"
Once the party is gathered, Alpha-47 will step into the circular passage beyond the strange metal wall.
Iron Gods, Book 1: Fires of Creation Part 3: The Buried World.
Alpha-47, with his light spell still active, steps through the open circular doorway into whatever lies beyond. Inside the environment changes from the natural stone of the caverns under Black Hill to something altogether different. The floors, walls, and ceilings of this slightly curved hall are made of some smooth dark metal alloy. Panels of lighter materials run along the ceiling about eight feet above. To the north and south, the tunnel is blocked by walls of metal junk and rubble, while to the west, another open doorway, this one about 10' wide with no visible door, yawns.
[ooc]Please note, you can see the chamber on the existing map, but I also added another map on the top margin that is a higher resolution version of the same space; we will use that map for now and save the cavern map for if you return to those spaces.
Alpha-47 will lead the group inside, "Come on, we must not delay for too long, it is imperative we continue our exploration,"
Ba'hahk quickly falls in behind 47, not wanting to miss the opportunity to explore this new and strange place. His hands forming fists as he does so
"Right behind you" he confirms
Moving inside the first chamber, Alpha-47 leads the group to the rectangular doorway which opens into a second room. The walls, ceilings, and floors are made of the same metal alloy. The doorway at the end of this hallway is closed. Standing just in front of the door is a familiar-looking three-legged figure. A metal-hulled creature that is the same as the one you saw at Khonnir Baine's home, stands silent and still blocking the doorway.
Note: the "door" appears to have no handle or hinges or usual means of egress. A grey panel, about the size of large book, is in the wall near the door.
With nowhere else to go except back, Ba'hahk will carefully approach the seemingly inert creature and the door
"I wonder if it even works at all. If it does, how did the others get past it without destroying it?" muses Zaria.
As the Ba'hahk approaches there is no movement from the inert drone; he can even get right up to the door without the denizen moving at al.
After he was certain the creature wasnt about to try and rip his face open, he begins to examine the door up close
Alpha-47 will tentatively walk up behind Ba'hahk to examine the inert drone, poking it a couple times before looking at the door.
"Strange, I wonder why the other one came to life but this one has not, perhaps it has been rendered inert as we did with the other one, through force,"
"Don't robots" Karina says as she inserts one of the few Androffan words she knows while pointing to the thing, "basically operate like non-magical golems? Could base your reasoning off of what you know for them. Why would a golem not activate when approached?"
Ba'hahk can't find any visible or hidden means to open the door, at least not usual means. No hidden areas reveal themselves either. As far as the drone -- it does not seem to be damaged (at least from the outside) like the one back in Torch was. It seems to be mostly constructed of the same metal that the walls and floors are here inside the hatch.
Alpha and Karina come to inspect the available things more closely. Alpha-47 has seen this strange metal on the walls and drone exterior before. It's called glaucite, and seems to be an alloy from these strange technological relics and ruins. It's usually found in bits and pieces, not whole walls and floors though, at least in his experience.
Karina thinks the tome-sized metal grey panel might be the way to open the door, which must raise up into the ceiling, rather than swing on hinges, if the ones you already entered are any indication. She manipulates, presses, pulls, and pokes at the grey panel, but nothing seems to work so far. She suspects you could lift the door up, if someone was strong enough, that is.
"At least one other group has come through here." Zaria points out. "If it had been hostile, they would have had to deal with it. Maybe they knew some way to deactivate it without damaging it." Zaria is, of course, just musing, and she stays on guard while the others examine things.
Karina checks her belongings for anything that'd fit into the indentation. "Is anyone here strong enough to lift this as a backup if we can't find a way to open this?"
"When Sef gave us those cards with brown stripes, she mentioned her people had started to gather them from inside. That would indicate that they know how to get in, and did not provide us with that information. Perhaps they do not want us to go inside and are hoping that we leave in frustration. We might want to ask them to show us how to open the door."
"Wait." Karina says. She then tries inserting the card with the brown stripe into the indentation.
It looks like the card fits into the slot, as if it were meant for it, but when Karina inserts it, nothing happens.
"I can try to lift it. You might want to remove that square first to make sure it does not get accidentally broken." Zaria stows her crossbow, and once Karina removes the card, or indicates that she's going to leave it in place, Zaria will try and lift the door.
Zaria can feel the door give, but it doesn't free, and she cannot get it opened on first effort.
Alpha-47 will look around, willing to give it a go, rolling his sleeves to his robes up past his elbows, he'll grip the door as well and attempt to lift.
He groans, and creaks, "I can safely say I am not the strong type," Looking to Ba'hahk, "Maybe you can try too?"
Karina tries and fails.
"Perhaps we should try as one instead? he offers a suggestion
Alpha-47 will agree to help Ba'hahk when he tries to lift it. Looking around for something that could act as a crowbar to provide some leverage or catch the bottom of it to help.
"I am ready to prop the door open if you can lift it enough, Ba'hahk"