Orne stands.
Ghur groaned, a wave of guilt rushing over him. He had convinced the group not to just kill the orcs and to try and use the traps against them. It didn't work. He also convinced the group to siege the orcs out, and now the orcs had gotten free and were using the same traps he tried to weaponize. If he had just resorted to violence, then they might well have already been heading home with prize in hand. He got to his feet, his axe gripped tight. He would not make the same mistake twice. The orcs would die, diplomacy be damned. (un)fortunately, violence came quite easily.
Orne picks up on Ghur's change in demeanor. Body language.
Whether his time at the monastery or the farm helped more in this instance, he was unsure.
We do our best, Ghur. What matters is that we do not quit. Free your mind from the shackles of the past, be that past 5 years ago or merely 5 minutes ago.
Ghur closed his eyes and tried to calm himself. His nostrils flared and his muscles tensed as he fought a losing battle against the anger bubbling inside. "Later." He managed. "The orcs are resetting the traps and they *must* die."
How to you set your selves up at the outside door?
Fortunately, the orcs seem not to be in much of a hurry, and Ruisxys is down the passage without fear of being trapped. Instead, it looks like she and her friends might be able to set up a shield wall - or a gauntlet, since shields seem not to be much favoured here.
She rather regrets that she doesn't have a polearm to set, but then again, it looks like it might be a bit of an amble, or at worst a brisk stroll, rather than a headlong charge at full speed. She takes up position to meet whatever it is that's coming straight-on, anyway.
"Ghur, Ayla, either side? Maybe a step back, if you want to run in, build some momentum? Maybe give them enough room for the first one or two to get past..."
She turns to Orne, with his unusual bladed chain, "...and that will give you room to trip them or pick them off as you please, Orne?"
I like it, Ruisxys... good plan. He moves into position.
Ayla nods, and the Doors open with the orcs coming at you.
"Get ready!" Ruisxys calls, "Here they come!"
She tries to take her own advice, and braces herself behind her shield, keeping her sword-arm relaxed but in position to take a slash when an opening presents itself, hoping to slow the onset of the orcs long enough for Orne and Ghur to find an advantage of their own, either by maneuver or by counter-charge.
The Orcs rush the party but the hall restricts them
One orc nearly gets Ayla a wound
It seemed that the orcs would only listen to orcish diplomacy. Luckily, Ghur’s axe was large enough for the task.
Being outside Ayla bring her full blade to bare
and misses
Even having braced for it, it's rather unsettling to face down a bunch of howling brutes intending to do one harm, and Ruisxys tries to take comfort and keep focused on finding the right moment.
The moment the one that will be "her" orc steps into reach, her sword flickers out...
...but she's misjudged the timing and it's an easy blow to parry. She prepares for a bit of a proper mess as everyone gets stuck in.
Orne just stands there
One Orc falls by Ghur's hands and another steps in to take their place
these Orcs miss badly
Despite herself, Ruisxys feels the thrill of adrenaline spiking higher in the clash of steel upon steel as both sides vie for an elusive advantage.
Ghur let himself go, savaging the orcs with both axe and horn. One unfortunate found itself battered by the blade, only to be lifted bodily into the air by Ghur's horns and tossed unceremoniously to the side.
Two more Orcs fall, with one being toss and doing the Wilhelm Scream as they fly like team rocket.
two more move into place and attack
they also miss badly, likely due to the lack of sleep, or what ever was smoked in that room....
The scream sounded familiar, somehow. As if though he had heard it before? Regardless, Ghur brought his axe down upon the nearest orc, catching it where the shoulder and neck met.
"For the Halimad!" Ruisxys lets loose a battle-cry in her mother tongue as she strikes back against the tide of attackers.
Her aim is keen, but she doesn't manage to put as much force behind her blow as she would like, as she keeps an eye open for the crowding orcs, trying to get a feel for for their numbers. How many more of them are there?
Two more Orcs fall, and the last 2 orcs take there place on the front lines
they also miss badly, likely due to the lack of sleep, or what ever was smoked in that room...
One Orc fails to injure Ayla, and the other just misses.
His axe slick with blood and viscera, and with the same running down his horns, it was not much of a surprise that Ghur's accuracy was soon comprised.
Ayla swings her fullblade
She cuts one in half from neck to groin.
In her rush to finish the job as the last orc comes within reach, Ruisxys badly over-extends herself. She lunges forward so far and so fast that she nearly drops her sword and topples over. The blasted fellow doesn't even need to dodge.
One Orc remains
The Orc Manages to really injure Ayla.
Ayla counter attacks with her fullblade
Her injury makes her swing wider then she expected.
Ghur moved into position, coming up behind the last orc. It was so focused on Ayla that it completely missed Ghur, whose axe hit with devastating result. Coming down directly upon its head, the axe cut clean through from skull to groin, causing the orc to come apart in two halves.
Looking at Ayla, whose wounds were already rapidly healing, he snorted as he tried to get his bloodlust under control. Part of him wanted to keep going. To keep fighting. What helped him calm down, though, was knowing how he stood no chance against the warrior in front of him. If he continued he knew that he would die, and that alone was a great source of calm.
Breathing deeply he looked around. He wanted to say something encouraging to the group, but words failed him. All he could do was close his eyes and take deep breaths, which slowly went back to normal.
With the last orc dead, you now have quite the mess before you, and it is getting quite stinky as well given the loss of control over body functions of the now dead orcs.
The stink is getting strong enough to water one's eyes, which asks the question what the heck were these orcs eating...
Unfortunately for Ghur his stronger sense of smell is working against him.
Fort save DC: 13 for Ghur to not add to the mess.
Ayla asks "Ahh, what did Orcs eat to cause stinky on death...."
As her friends cut down the last orcs in singularly brutal fashion, Ruisxys doesn’t even want to think about what it will take for everyone to get clean again.
As something approaching near silence falls again, disturbed mainly by Ghur’s heaving breaths, an alarming fire in his eyes, Ruisxys tries to get his attention.
“Ghur!” she barks, then, again, more gently, “Ghur? It’s over, for now. You got the last one. We’re all safe.”
Again, for now. Looking about at the carnage, and seeing Ayla’s serious wound, Ruisxys tracks down the potions the group had found earlier, and hands one over.
“Let’s get out of this mess, shall we?” she says with a tight smile, trying not to breathe in too deeply. She moves cautiously ahead to where the orcs came from, out of the cold and hopefully into someplace that reeks less of blood and shattered organs.
Ayla heals up in moments so doesn't need the potion.
with all the dead orcs defecating, it has become very stinky at the doorway
and it only making his eyes water.
The doorway is also now a mess with bodies making for a bit of an obstacle to get into the place.....
Ayla sighs "Guess we should clear stinky orcs from door. Do not want monsters attracted to stinky while we check inside, or need to run outside...."
Ruisxys' efforts to just slip into the ruin prove abortive, as she slips instead on the pooling blood and viscera, and narrowly avoids stumbling into the heaped-up bodies.
It appears she is being encouraged to consider the necessity of humility for a paladin of the Wise. She's not going to like it, but she tries to accept the idea, sheathes her weapons, and stoops to start dragging the bodies away.
"If we do that, then we just cover ourselves in the gore. It would just attract them to us." Ghur said, as he gave a slight nod of his head to Rui. He appreciated having her there, to keep him grounded. The smell of blood and viscera spoke to something primal deep within him. Something wrong. Something that he wanted to be better than. She helped keep him on that path.
He put a hand on Rui's shoulder. "Let me help." He said, as he used his large axe to hook onto the corpses and pull them out of the way, so they could proceed.
You all manage to clean up the mess before a storm decides to roll on in.
Do you hunker down in the small side room, or go into the ruin?
“Let’s press on,” Ruisxys says, one eye on the stormy sky. “That way, if anything else is out here, we won’t have to dislodge it along with whatever else might have been inside with the orcs, once the weather improves.”
With that, she matches actions to words, and moves to explore deeper into the ruins.
"Rushing in, and storm coming in.... Is it wise..."
Ayla tilts her head thinking on what to do or voice.
”Nothing here is wise.” Ghur said. ”We do not have endless supplies, lest we consider eating orc. And we don’t even have any proof that what we have come for is here.” He stopped a moment, and turned to Rui. ”If we find something truly valuable, we could just leave the Hollow.” He suggested, continuing ”This is a false debt. Designed to get us killed or to give profit to those who wish us harm. Even if we succeed now, they will simply attack us again and stack more profitable ventures onto our shoulders. Why should we bleed and die for murderous cowards, if we can profit off of our own labor?”
Ruisxys straightens her shoulders even more determinedly than usual and lifts her chin. “Let’s not give them the satisfaction either way. We can not die here, and we can leave the Hollow once we can throw down something that will undercut any backbiting whispers that might want to chase us otherwise. We can be the better people, in more ways than one. Maybe we’ll even find something more interesting to us than to the town, when we're ready to go, hmm?”
She offers Ghur a smile that she hopes is encouraging, and shows that she isn’t actually that cynical, though she really does have no intention of letting anyone die here. Into the ruins it is, nonetheless. She adds, piously, though with self-deprecating modesty, “Well, if we have no native wisdom on which to rely, we’ll have to trust that Yuelral is with us. Let's go.”
You all walk into Room E, and see bedding on the floor for many along with a warm stove and a barrel on it's side ready to server drink.
There is a double door on the other side.
Against her better judgment, Ruisxys pauses to check what the orcs were drinking, before continuing on to the next set of doors.
Ruisxys takes a nearby ?glass? cup and pours out the drink into it;
it is yellow, bubbly with a fizzing sound, and a sweet somewhat citrus scent.
Most of her is sure she's going to regret it, but paladins are meant to show no fear, so Ruisxys takes as bold a sip as she can before moving on. If nothing else, it will confirm the extent of the previous inhabitants' barbarism.
The drink has a sweet and citrus flavour, though the bubbles in the drink feel like it's burning the tongue some.
Ayla asks "Ah, so, has does that drink taste?"
Ruisxys considers the question with surprising seriousness. Or perhaps not - paladin, and all that, so straightforwardness is to be expected.
"Lemony," she says briefly, and then, "Fizzy. Probably not too kind to the stomach, in the long run. I shudder to think how much sugar is in it to counter the tart."
"You're welcome to try it, if you like," she offers, her rueful grin warning that she likely considers it an acquired taste.
Once another victim relieves her of the cup, or she tosses back what's left of the drink herself, Ruisxys marches over to the doors deeper into the ruins to see what's behind them.
poke poke for Ghur and Orne
Ghur shook his head. "Drinking strange potions found in dungeons is not wise." He looked at the unhealthy concoction with a wary eye.
Ayla tries some
"Tastes like strong Bubbly Honey lemon water..."
When Ruisxys opens the doors to go further in, she sees a spike pit in the center of the room with safe passage along the edges.
The ceiling and walls look smooth with no seams, while the safe parts of the floor look like clean polished tiles.