Storage Barn - Round 7 - continued
27 Iovia (unluck)
24 Yellow Pugwampi (8hp dmg)
23 M'Baba (unluck; 13/17hp)
19 Za Minyahil (15/19hp)
18 Nyandra (unluck)
16 Green Pugwampi
15 Ntuni (12/22hp; unluck)
11 Ikto (unluck; 9/16hp remain)
Za Minyahil dives again at one of the pugwampis, but again comes up short. They remain prone on the deck.
M'Baba spends his round make several attacks at the central gremlin, but he cannot score a hit against his foe in any of those attempts.
Nyandra continues her inspiring anthem, but also casts a stunning spell on the pugwampi, but the magical creature seems to fend off the spell, taking minor mental damage but not stunned.
Ntuni slams the flanked pugwampi and then some to deal with the last one. "How about you surrender and avoid a bump in the head? You are all alone now..."
Ikto moves towards the latest fallen gremlin, and picks it up
Ready to hand it over to Iovia if she asks, he also focuses his attention on the last gremlin saying in kholo
Storage Barn - Round 7 - concluded
Ntuni is able to mash the Yellow Pugwampi again, felling it this time. But her other attacks on the remaining foe cannot land successfully.
Ikto scoops up the downed gremlin and hands it off to Iovia. the druid then scolds the last pugwampi speaking kholo, but the effect seems quite limited.
End of Round 7
Storage Barn - Round 8
27 Iovia (unluck)
23 M'Baba (unluck; 13/17hp)
19 Za Minyahil (15/19hp)
18 Nyandra (unluck)
16 Green Pugwampi
15 Ntuni (12/22hp; unluck)
11 Ikto (unluck; 9/16hp remain)
Za Minyahil stands back up and turns towards the remaining gremlin.
Then, annoyed beyond belief they lash out with their shield trying to club it on the head with the boss.
Then they hold the shield up to fend it off, fully expecting it to go after them.
Iovia takes the gremlin from Ikto and drops it in the cage.
Then, she focuses the power of Tlehal to close at least some of Ikto's wounds.
M'baba decides he'll be more useful making sure the felled pugwampi is in a cage. He picks it up, walks to the cage on the floor and puts it in.
Storage Barn - Round 8 - continued
27 Iovia (unluck)
23 M'Baba (unluck; 13/17hp)
19 Za Minyahil (15/19hp)
18 Nyandra (unluck)
16 Green Pugwampi
15 Ntuni (12/22hp; unluck)
11 Ikto (unluck; 9/16hp remain)
Iovia scoops up the next fallen pugwampi and drops into the a cage then turns her healing magic on the most wounded of her band, Ikto, closing some of his wounds with her divine power.
Za Minyahil stands up, and uses his shield as weapon, trying to slam it into the last gremlin, but of course, he misses. He keeps his shield raised to counter any return attacks.
M'baba decides he'll be more useful making sure the felled pugwampi is in a cage. He picks it up, walks to the cage on the floor and puts it in.
Finding that spells, however weak, have proven consistently useful despite the bad luck facing the group, Nyandra continues her courageous anthem and turns to cast daze on the remaining pugwampi.
Storage Barn - Round 8 - concluded
M'Baba circles around the last gremlin, and actually succeeds on a thumping the creature on the head. Not enough damage to knock it cold, but certainly teaches it a harsh lesson.
Nyandra causes it a bit more pain with her mental attack which does not stun the pugwampi, but causes to grab its head in pain for a moment.
Seeing itself surrounded and along, the last pugwampi decides to call it quits. It throws down its sword and bow, and puts it small dog-like hands in the air surrendering.
End of Combat finally
Ikto talks to the one surrendering after all of them are secured,
He also looks to his peers, "Thank you for the healing. Shall I return the favor by using it on us all?"
Za Minyahil mutters a curse in Osiriani before turning to the rest of the group.
"I will not say no to such charity, even if my pride is more bruised than my body."
Iovia gathers the other cage, carrying both of them, while Ikto heals the injured. "We are not done yet. We still have to get them outside of Nantambu." she reminds the group.
The last pugwampi slowly clambers inside the cage looking mournful. When Ikto asks about why they are there, it only looks at him mournfully and does not answer.
Ikto sighs "He won't say why they came here in the first place." He sounds almost apologetic. He motions his friends a distance from their prisoners ... it is not that he is cruel but they don't need ALL the pugawumpus awakened by his healing and trying to break free.
Closing his eyes, there is a soft rumble around him, a feeling of rain without any actual rain, and he and his allies receive some healing.
Alas, it is not much.
"I fear the curse of ill luck hits me still." A shake of his head.
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M'baba gets up and says "Now that they're in cages, it should be straightforward. Maybe convince them not to come back." He is so exhausted from the effort that he can barely string coherent thoughts together, and wants to get out of this storage area immediately. However, he musters the strength to check out the storage for anything that shouldn't be there, maybe something to draw in the pugwampi.
Ikto casts his one healing spell and it fills the room with the smell of rain and damp earth, but the actual healing property is very minor. He is careful not to include the pugwampis in the healing process.
M'Baba looks around the room, but the places is a literal shambles and nothing reveals itself upon his investigation. He does see the small trap door that the vandal gremlins were making for, and when he opens the flap, he finds a very narrow chute leading downwards. It does not appear to be large enough for any Medium-sized creature to fit down, and there is no ladder or means of climbing up or down visible.
"This is pretty strange indeed. Have them digging around and enter through a whole in the floor is one thing, but a full-functioning hatch begs more investigation." She agrees with M'baba.
"And good work, guys." The work wasn't actually that good. Granted, they were here to study and not to brawl, but in the end Ntuni basically had to knock down every single of the pugwampies.
"Feel free to investigate if you want to. We won't need six people to carry the two cages. But, we need to get them off campus, out of the city, and report back as well."
Iovia starts to walk off with the cages, though she will hand one of them off to someone else if anyone comes with her.
Ikto looks at Ntuni, "Your skill was greater than the unluck, Ntuni.Though yes, we all gave great effort. For now, I suggest we cover the hatch with objects too heavy for a puguwumpis to lift, then we take these out , and tell the teachers of the hatch." He gathers up a cage ready to follow Iovia.
Iovia and Ikto carry a cage full of pugwampis, most unconscious, out of the Storage Barn and towards the gate of the Magaambya.
"This has been very embarassing, Za Minyahil mutters as they pick up one of the cages as well.
"I agree...it's not enough to simply take them out of the school, lest they make trouble for someone else. The only question is how we ensure that once we DO that we ensure they don't follow us back into the city..."
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M'baba says to Za "We need to entertain them somehow. Maybe we do something very interesting facing the back of the cage. As they're entertained, we unlock the cages, then quietly leave. They'll eventually figure out how to get out, but we'll be long gone by then. I think outside the city is safest. If we put them in someone else's home, the residents might try using lethal force, and the whole exercise will be for nothing."
"This has been very embarassing, Za Minyahil mutters as they pick up one of the cages as well.
"I agree...it's not enough to simply take them out of the school, lest they make trouble for someone else. The only question is how we ensure that once we DO that we ensure they don't follow us back into the city..."
"There is no way to ensure that, barring killing them, and that is not a permissible tactic. The task was to get them off school grounds, preferably outside of Nantambu, and release them. That is what we should do."
"Perhaps we should talk to Esi or a teacher on our way out." Ikto thinks about it as they move and talk. He cranes his neck and looks about for one as they do
"Why?" Iovia asks. "The task was simple. Remove the pugwampi first from the storeroom. We have done that. Then, remove them from the campus, or if possible, the city. We can easily do that thanks to the cages."
Iovia will not prevent anyone from following Ikto's suggestion. She just doesn't see the point to it, and would prefer to get the pugwampi out of the city before they start to wake up and possibly find a way to escape.
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Despite Iovia's aggressive stance, M'baba sees himself agreeing with her. He says, a little more diplomatically, "Maybe we take the most direct route out, but if we meet Esi on the way, we make a quick stop to mention we'd like to talk to her afterwards."
Of course, he means to tell her of the short discussion they had about the access hatch into the storage room and the reason why the pugwampi were there in the first place. However, he finds himself excited to talk to Esi, just for the sake of it.
"Because, Za Minyahil has a point when they say we might be followed back. I know that yes, the task is simple in 'we get them out of campus and go' but the spirit of the mission, rather than the law seems to suggest it is best if we don't have to do this all over again tomorrow," Sheepishly he adds, "I think I'll lose my temper with them if I have to do it again."
Despite Iovia's aggressive stance, M'baba sees himself agreeing with her. He says, a little more diplomatically, "Maybe we take the most direct route out, but if we meet Esi on the way, we make a quick stop to mention we'd like to talk to her afterwards."
"That seems a compromise. She'll be alerted of what we did, of the hatch and more after and the school can close off entrances if need be."
"There is also the fact that those pest did take a beating." Ntuni points out, siding with Iovia. "They'd need to be incredibly stupid to rush back after us and risk another round of smacking with my hammer."
"I'm just unsure of how far we need to go outside the city. If it's just outside the gates, they can just sneak back into the city somehow, even if they don't follow us, and then they become some poor citizen's problem who doesn't have the magic and skills we have to deal with them. But on the other leaf, venturing out into the jungle any further than that seems beyond the scope of our task."
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But on the other leaf,
Iovia and Ikto carry the cages full of mostly unconscious gremlins to the gates of the Magaambya with the intention of dumping them beyond the city walls. The way is not hard to find and is commonly traveled.
Ikto listens to Za Minyahil as they go, and when they get to the gates, he looks worried, "How do we convince them to stay away, Iovia? I could try talking to them but how to make the message stick?"
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M'baba goes with Iovia and Ikto to help with anything in case their task goes awry. He likes to see things to completion. On their way, he comments "Well, it doesn't hurt to talk to them. But if we figure out why they came in the first place, it's going to be much easier to prevent future endeavours by them. I think that's a worthwhile question to ask them."
"Well, I tried asking them why they came to the school but that one woulldn't talk. Maybe the others will"
Ikto listens to Za Minyahil as they go, and when they get to the gates, he looks worried, "How do we convince them to stay away, Iovia? I could try talking to them but how to make the message stick?"
"That is not our task, Mr. Banashee. While that goal is very laudable and speaks highly of the group that is being discussed, it is not what we are tasked with doing. If you can garner insights from them then you should, but it might just be in the nature of these pugwampi to cause mischief, and there may be very little that you can do to prevent that from happening in the future."
Ikto ponders this, "You are right that is not our task, but it does feel like that is right to try, and I will. But we shall see how it goes when we let them out I suppose." Resigned at first he looks on the bright side "At least if they attack they start out unarmed, eh?"
He'll move on with delivery duty aside the cleric
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M'baba intervenes and says "Once old man Kat asked me to fix his table, as one of its legs had been wrongly shortened. Now I had a beef with old man Kat at the time, he never gave me any sweets and I love my sweets. So I went ahead and fixed his table, so that it would look ok, but anything heavier than a stack of papers would break it again. You see, technically I did what he asked, but I knew why he asked it, and that's not what I did."
He purses his lips and continues "Then as he had a merchant over to discuss business, the merchant put his expensive glass statue on the table as an example of the wares he could bring, it fell and broke. Old man Kat was well known for facilitating the commerce in that region and my stunt caused my whole village a lot of money and medicine."
After sighing he says "I learned then that doing a task goes far beyond doing what is asked to the letter, but solving the problem in its entirety. If we want to show we are resourceful and capable, we need to solve the pugwampi problem, not just do their request to the letter."
Unless someone stays behind, the team of initiates all make their way to the gates leaving the city. Still daylight, it is easy enough to enter and exit as you wish. Finding a spot away from the wall, and off the beaten path, you see that the some of the once-unconscious gremlins show signs of stirring but they are not all fully active yet.
Iovia opens the cages, then steps back to allow Ikto, and others, to speak to them if they wish.