Vethorm makes a disgusted noise at hearing the noise of Wild's weapon, only to jump back with a yelp when his swing turns him towards Vethorm behind him.
"WATCH WHERE YOU'RE SWINGING THAT BLOODY THING!"
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Robin and Vethrom each react to the last snake fleeing and between them they spill enough of it’s blood to keep it from escaping.
Robin moves forward and reaches out with his glaive, cutting a bloody gash into the snake’s belly as it prepares for another strike. Vethorm and Hilde close further to back up both Robin and Wild. Purg approaches and provides cover from the doorway.
Ranhild moves closer but the snake is just out of reach, so she recites a quick incantation and summons a small ball of dripping liquid. She launches the ball at the snake but misses. The wall where it hit hisses and smokes as the acid leaves a mark on the stone. Wild howls as the blood fills his face but his anger gets the better of him and his attack misses the snake.
The snake reacts to Robin’s attack and snaps at him. The snakes fangs come close but Robin manages to block the strike with the shaft of his glaive.
"Augh!" Robin ducks away from Wild's wild swings "The snake's that way!" The small gnome is by far the most reckless fighter Robin's ever seen. He tries to watch both his giant snake foe and his supposed ally at the same time as he makes another swing at the snake.
He steps back afterward, giving the others more room to approach.
Purg moves in, oblivious to the fact he has put himself at the bottom of the stairs and in prime ambush position. He sees the much larger snake and is momentarily shaken, but brings his crossbow back into firing position and tries to help his friends.
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Ranhild conjures another ball of acid, sending it past the amassed combatants ahead of her.
A flash of clarity and despair appears on Wild's face as he recognizes his companions. Thanks to Vethorm and Robin's words of warning, Wild reverts his stance toward the enemy and strikes.
It is clear that his wounds and the poison coursing through his veins are beginning to take their toll. He steps back toward the rock wall to brace himself after an off-balance attack. His rage fades...
Hilde catches up with the retreating gnome and claps him on the shoulder. "Stay with us!"
"Cover me!" Vethorm barks as he makes a break for the wall and approaches the snake, muttering foul words from several languages as he does.
Then his sword darts out, seeking to get between and under the creature's scales!
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After the snake tries to bite Robin, Ranhild and Purg take shots at it. Ranhild’s spell strikes the snake and it’s scales sizzle from the acid. Purg’s shot also finds it’s mark but fails to penetrate the tough armor those same scales provide.
Wild once again brings the blade of his weapon around to strike but snake is too quick. His anger begins to subside as the poison takes it’s toll. He grits his teeth and powers through the pain of it and steps back to collect himself.
Vethorm moves forward to engage the snake and he drives his blade into the beast’s side, but as with Purg’s bolt, the scales turn the blade aside. Hilde seeing Wild suffering from his effort, says a quick prayer and rests her hand on his shoulder. With a warm glow, the weight seems to lift from him and he stands taller as if ready to continue the battle.
The snake still remains active but it’s wounded and it’s blood falls as it rears to strike at Vethorm. The fangs sink into his neck and blood comes gushing out. Vethorm is nearly driven to his knees from the blow but somehow remains standing, though his vision blurs momentarily. The snake eyes his prey and backs off slightly.
With the way finally clear Ranhild swiftly calls upon her inner magic, an enhancement runes flaring to life around the rim of her shield as she charges forward, hammer glowing as she strikes.
Purg reloads his crossbow and fires at the snake once more, carefully avoiding his friends.
Robin flows back into closer contact with the snake, then, while it's busy fending off Ranhild, he sweeps a slash at its head.
Vethorm howls as the snake goes for a killing blow. His vision swims as he realizes that despite the pain, despite the life ebbing from him at this very moment, he's somehow still standing.
He draws his hopeknife from the sheath around his neck and stabs at the serpent again with a wordless roar of defiance. If he was going down, he was going to take this monster with him!
Hilde steps up behind Vethorm and casts a healing spell on the rogue.
Feeling reinvigorated, Wild steps back into the fray alongside his companions but with far less fervor than before.
The blade of his weapon churns to a halt as it fetches nothing but air.
Vethorm feels his wound close and the sense of fading into darkness stop. Looking back and seeing Hilde behind him, he mouths a 'Thank you," before returning his attention to the snake that could still kill him.
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Ranhild calls forth her will, sending it into her shield as she charges towards the snake. She swings her hammer in a forceful strike, but the snake is quick and the blow strikes the stone mere inches from the beast. Purg reloads and fires again, striking the snake and lodging his bolt in it’s hide. Robin follows Ranhild’s lead, taking advantage of the snake’s focus on the dwarf. Robin’s glaive cleaves into the snake’s head and the snake slumps to the floor, bleeding heavily from it’s head wound.
Vethrom draws his hopeknife but the effort to do so turns out to be too much. He staggers and falls to his knees as his vision begins to darken. The Hilde steps forward to heal him. His eyes flutter open again as his wounds begin to close and his strength returns. Unfortunately, the snakes venom takes hold and he feels his joints stiffening.
The group takes a breath but Vethrom is not doing well yet. The venom continues to course through him.
Those that are not attending to Vethrom take the moment to look around. The support beams and walls here are burnt and crumbling, but stable. The large stone which the plague house was built against is exposed and red, jagged runes are painted onto the rock. On the northeast side of the stone leans a bookshelf, and to the southeast stands a cabinet.
Ranhild spots a glint of steel from a shelf on the bookshelf. When she approaches she notes that a hopeknife lies abandoned here. Wild follows her and discovers a false back to the shelves while she examines the hopeknife. Within the revealed space is found an ornate gold coffer. It is empty but itself is of decent value.
Robin seeing that Ranhild and Wild have the bookshelf under examination, heads over to the cabinet. After rummaging through the rotted boards he discovers a cache of supplies. There are two small iron flasks, a beat up steel scroll tube containing two scrolls, and two vials of milky liquid. With a quick incantation, most of the items glow to his eyes.
Hilde drops to one knee beside the collapsing half-orc, pulling a healer's kit from her pack with practiced haste and tending to the poisoned rogue. "Stay with me, Vethorm."
Robin hovers around the injured Vethorm, not skilled enough to help with addressing the venom, but worried nevertheless for the intrepid half-orc. Spotting the Hopeknife however draws his attention away for a brief moment. He turns the knife over and gasps "It's the other one! Brinya's knife for Rodrick. What is it doing here if it went missing?"
Robin looks over to Vethorm to see if the rogue is doing any better after treatment. "I suppose if the missing knife is here, maybe its thief is here. We should be on the lookout."
While Vethorm recovers, Robin tries to identify the two scrolls.
Turning the knife over in her hands after reading the inscription, Ranhild frowns. "So at the very least, the person who took Rodrick's original knife was here, and could be the person responsible for his death."
Wild adds to the conversation with Robin and Ranhild's speculations.
"Yes! The killer thief is here waiting to be killed. We must bring to them the End. Take the knife. Take the life..."
He sort of rambles off to himself, then sits down near the rock wall covered in jagged runes and begins to tend to his bizarre, mechanical weapon.
"Eat the snakes. Eat the poison. Poison the weapon. Poison the killer..."
Hilde looks puzzled. "I thought he was investigating a threat to the community here, and lost his hopeknife. Where did he say it was stolen?" She peers around, frowning. "And it was something he thought was too dangerous to even hint at to Brinya...he just said it was an investigation, and didn't say where."
"More a guess than anything else. He lost his hopeknife and now we find it here where the danger is." Robin answers Hilde "Maybe the half-orc that orchestrated this all tried to lure him here, but ended up killing him in the inn instead." He purses his lips as he ponders "It MUST have been here that he was investigating. Or was planning to. Before it happened..."
Vethorm breathes easier as Hilde tends to him.
"Thank you," he says quietly. Then he hisses as the venom surges again. "AGH! Sorry! Sorry."
He looks over the hopeknife they'd found.
"Rodrik's true hopeknife," he says sadly. He takes out the substitute, the ostensible murder weapon, and holds the two up to compare them. "At the very least, we should return this to Brinya."
"Of course." Robin smiles at Vethorm's suggestion to return the hopeknife. "Once we get to the bottom of this place."
Robin's attention is drawn to the jagged red runes on the rock nearby "I can't imagine these were original to this place. I wonder who put them here..."
Handing over the Hopeknife, Ranhild takes a moment to study the other scroll, but the notation is unlike anything she's ever seen before, she might as well be holding the scroll upside down.
Purg sees everyone doing helpful things like identifying scrolls and potions and healing Vethorm who doesn't look to be getting better, but maybe it's just because he was green to begin with, and Purg just feels a little less useful. He reloads his crossbow and watches the group's backs while they tend to the other things which are probably important.
Robin ponders the runes for a little longer but eventually shrugs "If its an art piece, it's hardly an inspired one. Lets keep going." He waits until Vethorm has recovered and then leads the way to the south to check the first room there.
"No. No. No. Runes are not art." Pointing at the wall. "Runes are messages. This one says "Skreed". Probably a great big orc... or a tribe... or a warning... or a latrine. Orcs use words for all kinds of things. Whatever it is, we should still eat their snakes."
Wild stands up and collects the serpentine remains as best he can. He hands the juiciest morsels to Purg. "You can cook these, yes? Meat makes might."
"Yes, Purg can cook, but must cook very long or get very sick. Purg not think this good time to be sick, with people trying to kill and people killing and people stealing." He puts the snake pieces back on the ground to come back for later after they've leaked out more juices because his pack should smell nice and not get wet and stinky from snake guts.
As Robin relates the sounds behind the door, Ranhild takes up a spot 15ft from the door, settling into a defensive position with her shield in front of her. ”I need someone to open the door, then run past me to get to shelter with the others.” she says, a look of focus in her eyes.
Not particularly excited to open a door to a room likely teeming with gross rats, Robin considers the alternatives. "If they're trapped in there, I'd prefer to leave it that way." He considers whether the room has any holes or windows to the outside that might allow the group to inspect what lies within without opening the door.
If he doesn't find anything of the sort, he suggests "Lets try the next door instead, and come back to see what's behind these rats later."
Anyone that speaks Orc can read the runes. They spell out "Skreed", but nothing beyond that can be determined.
Vethorm grimaces as he reads the scroll.
"Yep. That says Skreed alright," he says. At the comment about rats, he grimaces even further.
"Gods, are we just going to run into ALL the critters I've got tattoos of in this place?!" he comments, exasperated. "If they've stowed a nest of rockwasps somewhere I'll be convinced my hag b+~#@ of a grandmother really COULD see the future!"
Also unwilling to face lots of rats, Hilde nods. "Good plan, Robin." She steps forward and listens at the door across the hall.
Ranhild shrugs, turning to follow the others.
Purg moves and takes up a position covering Hilde, as she looks like she might open a door, which may or may not have danger behind it. Purg is definitely in favor of there not being any more danger. His poor goblin heart can't take much more excitement of this type. This is not happy excitement. Why was there never a surplus of happy excitement? The party had been fun. Why could it not be like that every day? Purg needed to find the god of parties and happiness, there were too many gods of fighting and drinking and being mean to other people. He wanted to ask Hilde about if there was a god of parties and happiness but she was listening to that door very carefully and it didn't seem like the time to ask her that sort of question.
"Psst, Robin or other someone smart, is there a god of parties and happy things?"
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The group decides caution is best when dealing with rats, and turns to other doors. Hilde steps up and listens at the door just west of where the party entered and Robin to the door just west of the giant snake. Unfortunately, the areas beyond both doors are as quiet as the dead that are rumored to wander this ruin. Deeming it safe to open the door, the group may proceeds, with Wild and Vethorm in the leads and Purg bringing up the rear.
Hilde murmurs to the goblin, "Lots of them...depending on what sorts of parties and things make you happy. We can talk about it later."
Happy to have a distraction, Robin also answers "Purg, you can bet on there being plenty of gods and goddesses that enjoy a nice party or two. A little drink, some feasting, enjoying life... Would be nice right about now."
Looking at the doors, he awaits Wild or Vethorm taking the lead. He holds his glaive in a relaxed grip.
Along with the groups' festive musings, Wild smiles when he remembers the bottle of healing liquid hidden away in his dirty kilt pockets. He takes it out and quaffs it sloppily. "A little drink. A drink. A drink to help me think."
A moment later, he steps up to where Robin is positioned and sniffs the air.
"Smells like a good door to me."
He opens the door casually...
Vethorm takes up position behind Wild and watches Wild open the door, his expression dejected.
"Here we go again," he says as he draws his sword again.
Hilde backs up to join the rest of the party as Wild opens the door.