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Bellisir exhales upon seeing Annilda, not realizing that he was holding his breath. He's not sure who grabbed him and pushed him out the kitchen door, but had they not, he'd be buried under tons of stone, wood, and glass. "She is safe," Bellisir says. "Is everyone else ok?" he asks, noting that he can see that some of his friends are sporting some scratches and bruises. For that matter, the half-elf himself is feeling quite sore. He makes a half turn to look at the collapsed structure, hearing the groan of wood as the remains begin to settle. Then he turns back to his friends and Annilda. "We did it," he says and for the first time since arriving in Saringallow and becoming a part of the search for the missing youths, his placid expression changes into a weary smile. "The source of the bile has been eliminated. Saringallow is safe."
As the group makes the kitchen, Bellisir suddenly remembers something. He and his friends aren't the only one in danger of the house falling around them. "Annilda. We have to make sure she is able to get out of this house," he says, calm on the outside but worried for her and her 'baby' on the inside. The monk calls out for her, trying to make his way through the rat swarm not to get outside but to get back to the stairs going up.
"Everyone out. Quickly!" Bellisir stands on the landing, making sure that everyone else is safe before he attempts to extricate himself from the basement before everything collapses. Doing his best not to rush despite the danger, the monk treads carefully, trying to watch to see which stairs look the most sturdy and which ones are warped or look as if they could snap under his weight (a very bad situation given he's carrying so little on his person).
The monk brings up the rear out of the web-filled room and back to the landing and the waterlogged cellar full of water and floating barrels. He watches most of the others duck nimbly aroud the side of the barrels, their movements cause the barrels to cut off his path through the room. Once more, the words of Uncle Fu rise in Bellisir's thoughts. "A wise man once said, 'If you cannot go over or around an obstable, go under it.'" Bellisir steps back as far as he dares in the direction of the altar room and then sprints forward. Waiting until the last possible moment, he leaps forward and spreads his arms, executing a swan dive into an opening in the water amid the barrels.
He feels his stomach and upper legs scrape the bottom, but at the same time he uses his toes to push off and continue his forward momentum before arcing up and breaking the surface of the water.
Bellisir plants his feet in order to keep his balance as he feels the basement floor begin to quake. Seeing lots of dust and parts of the walls and the ceiling begin to fall and collapse, he quickly realizes the peril he and his companions are in. "We have to get out of this house lest we be buried alive," he says, a small modicum of calmness in contrast to the impending destruction. As that last word escapes from his lips, he turns to see a cabinet toppling straight toward him.
Nimbly, the monk sidesteps the cabinet as it hits the floor with a resounding crash, breaking into huge jagged pieces.
Bellisir staggers to his feet. Although Annea's hex has closed the worst of his wounds, blood still seeps from several others. His right hand closes around the wand he was able to acquire from his reputation as a fledgling Pathfinder Society agent. "If either one of you know how to use this," he says, his gaze shifting between Annea and Soddy Daisy. "Then you have my blessing to use it as many times as necessary to speed my recovery along." The monk places the wand of cure light wounds down and pulls the cold iron dagger from his belt. With grim determination, he begins working on clearing the web of demon bile from the altar room and stairwell.
Oddly enough, Bellisir doesn't seem to feel the pain of the wounds he's taken, possibly due to the adrenaline that is coursing through his body. However, he does feel light-headed from the loss of blood he can't help but notice soaking through his clothes. And he noticed that the creature didn't seem adversely affected when he struck it. "I hit the monster as hard as I could and barely hurt it, Quinn. And Gervase has the right of it. I am of no use to any of you if I am struck down."
With some of the webbing adjacent to him vaporized by the blasts from Boom Sticks's gun, Bellisir looks to see Gervase taking aim at the creature directly in front of him. Heeding her warning, he does a slide step to get out of the way and toward the door that Wormgnash and his minions came through. "Heard, Gervase!" he acknowledges. Seeing that the monster that attacked him looks more worse for the wear than the other one, the monk swings his arm in a horizontal chop and leaps up, trying to catch his opponent with a jumping knee to where he thinks its breadbasket would be.
Bellisir draws out the cold iron dagger to begin clearing webs from the room when the door opposite the one the group came through opens and he recognizes Armas Sapiro, or Wormgnash as he likes to now call himself. The monk takes a deep breath to calm himself and get his emotions in check, which is difficult underneath a calm that belies his anger and anxiousness. This was the creature that tainted Gellion and caused him to kidnap his friends and to leave his parents to die. This was the creature that had infected the bugbear and goblins and instigated their raids and attacks on the farmers outside Saringallow. This was the creature who would not rest until he'd infected the town and its people with his demonic substance and turn them into warped Abyssal caricatures of themselves. "To speak of messes, Armas," Bellisir says in a voice of calm but one that promises justice. "We have been cleaning up yours, a task we will finish when we send you back to the Abyss where you belong."
The half elf moves past his friends, leaping over the corner of the stairs before the bloated creatures in front of Wormgnash can react. Ducking into the webbing of bile, he launches an open handed palm strike at the monster he just went around.
Using the webs for cover works to Bellisir's disadvantage as his strike misses his foe with room to spare.
"I will be ineffective against these mites," Bellisir says, stepping up next to Quinn. "But I can be a barrier to keep them from reaching the others." The monk moves up to stand astride the body of a fallen mite. Planting his feet in places where there is no blood, Bellisir envisions himself as a tree with strong roots deep within the earth being caressed by a strong breeze.
"I am ineffective against mites, but I can help Quinn create a choke point," Bellisir says as he quickly moves into the room and leaps over the webbing to stand beside Quinn.
The monk enters the stairwell and handsprings over one of the strands of web bile and his momentum carries him between two more strands as he lands in a standing position next to the shifter.
Bellisir wades through the flooded cellar, pushing barrels out of the way as needed and helping others who are smaller than he is nagivate the watery obstacles. Once he climbs out of the water and onto the landing, he puts away his siangham and strides forward to get into a ready position at the door. "I am ready. Let us move forward and find Wormgnash." Once the door is open and the monk can see through into the room and the horrific Abyssal mockery of a spider's web, Bellisir's eyes widen in shock, a huge departure from his normally deadpan composure, especially when the mites start freeing themselves from the sacs attached to it. "Holy-" is all Bellisir has time to get out before all hell breaks loose.
Bellisir watches from up top as Quinn jumps into the water in the basement and sees lots of roiling and splashing as he does battle with the giant leech. As Boom Sticks moves to engage the fiendish parasite from the stairs below the water's surface, the monk moves onto the stairs. Placing one hand on the edge of a stair above the water's surface, Bellisir drops over the side into the water. As the leech is occupied with Quinn, the half-elf grasps his siangham in both hands and thrusts it point first toward the misshapen blob underneath the water's churning surface.
"I have my siangham," Bellisir says as he readies what appears to be an arrow with a grip designed for fighting in close quarters. "If your polearm does not encourge whatever is beneath the water to surface," the monk says to Gervase in a matter-of-fact tone. "I will volunteer to leap onto one of the barrels in an attempt to draw it out."
Bellisir listens with attention as the nukkefeen tells the sordid tale of Armas Sapiro and his evolution into the vermlek known as Wormgnash. His eyebrows raise sharply when Annilda speaks of his murder of the merchant Marcuccio Bravoni and the self discovery of creating the demonic bile that has been responsible for a majority of the problems in Saringallow. When Annilda mentions the vermlek in relation to the voices Boom Sticks heard, Bellisir's mouth forms in a straight line. "Then Wormgnash knows we are here. And he will be ready for us when we find him," the monk surmises. "But we must find him. Until we stop him, the citizens of Saringallow and the outlying areas are in imminent danger as long as he can produce that bile." When Annilda mentions the music box being a small replica of one in the ballroom, he speaks once more with his usual placid demeanor. "The map of the house that we found in the locked room. I remember it had a musical note marked on it where the ballroom is. If the music box is a replica of one in the ballroom, we should play it there."
Bellisir attempts a little jig as the music box plays. He has rhythm, but despite his body grace, his dance moves aren't much to write home about. When the music stops playing, he is alert and ready for action. "Soddy, we will help you if you cannot see. Also, you have senses other than your sight. Trust in them and they will help you, too," the monk advises the leshy. The half-elf then turns his gaze to the nukkefeen. "Thank you for not betraying us to Wormgnash. When our mission is done here, we will help you and Brittney find a way to get home if you will let us."
Remembering the centipedes at the stable, Bellisir sighs. He does not want to say what he has to say, but saying nothing or a falsehood would not do the nukkefeen any good if his friends have to do something they wouldn't like. Or at least that he wouldn't like. "I do not believe you are aware of this," Bellisir says. "But in the course of our business in the area, we have had to face both people and creatures that have been infected by a bile that is Abyssal in nature." The half-elf quickly describes what the bile looks like to the nukkefeen. "My friends had to put down two huge centipedes in the stables because they had it on them and were infected by it. If you got the egg from the stables, Brittney could be infected, too. But Soddy said that you like to fix things with sharp objects. Maybe if we could find something for you, you could help Brittney, just like a mother would help her baby."
Bellisir listens as his friends speak with the nukkefeen and learn more about why she's here and the questions she asks. Trying not to draw its attention, he makes a slight gesture to Gervase, indicating that she should sheath her weapon. The monk notices the attention that Annilda pays to Soddy's story and nods in satisfaction at Annea's spoken aid she gives to the leshy during pauses in the conversation. But then, the nukkefeen says something that gets Bellisir's attention in a hurry. "No," he replies truthfully. "We have not seen your baby." The half-elf wracks his brain, trying to think if the group has fought anything that would bear a resemblance to the nukkefeen and can only think of the centipedes, mites, and the ugly monstrosity that was hiding in the bushes just inside the manor gates. "Can we help you find her? And if we can, can you tell us what she looks like?"
Upon hearing said noise, Bellisir looks around at everyone, putting a finger up to his lips in a shushing motion. Then he uses his right index and middle finger to pantomime a pair of scissors 'cutting' his left hand as he nods toward the door. "Be wary," he mouths silently to the group. Once the group prepares and is ready for any trouble they might encounter, Bellisir quietly opens the door to the room.
"Well done, everyone," Bellisir comments as he steps into the room, making sure to avoid the areas where the traps are. "It is interesting that you speak of tigers, Soddy. Some of my martial studies involve harnessing the aspect of tigers." "I will also take an alchemist fire and a healing potion if no one has any objections or if they can be used to greater effect in someone else's hands," the monk says.
"I do not see a problem with having Tyndyn get whatever it is as long as Annea is in agreement. After all, he is her friend and it should be up to her to decide if getting it could pose a risk for him," Bellisir says serenely. The monk moves over to stand next to Quinn in case the shifter decides to open the other door leading out.
"I think we should start at the top and work our way down," Bellisir says. "The landing was safe when I had to circle it fighting the mite. No one attacked me and there were no traps." "And if this is the only way to reach the basement," the half-elf says, an idea forming in his mind. "We should block the kitchen door. Enemies in the basement would be unable to surprise us as we search upstairs."
The monk silently observes Boom Sticks as he carries on his one-sided conversation. While he is concerned, Bellisir understands that sometimes a communion between the living and the dead can occur but it is a rare happenstance and one he's never experienced. As such, he is at a loss as to what to do. "Boom Sticks," he says to the leshy. "Does the spirit seem interested in talking to any of us?"
"It is interesting," Bellisir says as he looks at the books the party has acquired. "The trapped book," he trails off in thought. "It might be of advantage to read through it, despite the contents that are written there. Why would someone go to the trouble to trap it if it was not important?" The monk approaches the door to the left of where the group entered the library. "Are we ready to press on?"
Bellisir stands silently by as the others discover the hollowed out cache with scrolls. When Soddy mentions looking through the books for information on devils and demons, Bellisir suddenly perks up. "We could also find something on the origin of this bile we've been finding in and around Saringallow, perhaps. Either way, I do not think it would be a waste of time to see. I will help look through these books." Slowly, the monk picks his way through the shelves. He searches for tomes that could possibly shed light on the bile, demons, or devils as well as anything of interest that happens to catch his eye.
"What is this?" the monk asks rhetorically as he picks up a stained, rolled up scroll. He unrolls it and finds a flowing script in Common on the paper. "Ode To A Small Green Lump Of Putty I Found In My Armpit One Midsummer Morning," Bellisir's voice trails off as he begins to silently read. Suddenly, he throws the scroll as far away from him as he can, his face turning white as paste. "You don't want to read that. Burn it."
"I agree with Gervase and Quinn," Bellisir says in a calm demeanor and not looking the least bit winded as he steps over the fallen mite's body to descend the stairs to his companions. "We should make sure the bottom floor is safe before we explore upstairs. But we should destroy the bile before we do anything else." "It was clear, Soddy," the monk replies to the leshy. "I distracted the mite but my decision to do it was risky. I did not stop to think about the possibility of other threats. I will also admit that I did not think myself able to move as quickly as I did. In the studies of my monastic journey, my master taught me an exercise known as 'Striding With The Wind'. In order to walk with it, one first has to unburden themselves of all the physical and mental anchors of life. Until today, I had never mastered this technique. Perhaps that is why I did not think of anything else other than to close the distance to the mite the long way around so quickly."
Bellisir moves up the first flight of stairs to the landing. He starts to push past Quinn and Gervase to get within striking distance of the mite, but then sees that the stairwell is tight quarters. Moving to engage in combat would hamper Gervase's attacks with her longspear and while he could hit the creature, his strikes might not be as effective as Quinn's claws have proven to be against mites. The monk looks to see if he can get around behind it by going up the other stairwell to the landing.
Bellisir peeks around the corner and over Quinn's shoulder to see the giant centipede in the ballroom. Unlike the stables, Gervase had already initiated a fight with this over-sized vermin. Also, there was no nest to be seen (though it didn't mean the centipede didn't have one somewhere, such as the fireplace chimney). All of this went through the monk's mind in the space of two seconds before he moved into the room and past Gervase to execute a back thrust kick against the centipede.
Bellisir walks into the room. He silently takes in the portraits of the Sarinis and the landscapes as Soddy Daisy and Boom Sticks expand on their inspirations. He notices that Gervase has moved over to the double doors to the right of where he entered the hall and takes up a defensive position beside the left door.
"One should not smoke," Bellisir says, now having come within earshot of Soddy and Boom and catching their conversation. "Because where there is smoke, there is fire," he says in a voice of deadpan calm. The half-elf moves up behind Quinn and Gervase. Seeing no obvious threat, Bellisir steps into the room. Wary of any danger, the monk moves to the nearest closed door leading out of the kitchen and listens , wary of possible danger that might lie on the other side.
"When I was little," Bellisir says, '"my father told me the story of a group of inept mercenaries who stumbled upon a gazebo while drunk and attacked it, believing it to be a monster. They managed to set it on fire, but while celebrating their 'victory', the gazebo collapsed, killing one of them. I think his name was El Revishing or The Revenger, something like that." The monk turns and looks at the manor, as if seeing it for the first time. "I do not think it would be wise to enter through the front doors. I would look for another door, or if it comes to it, an unlocked window."
As Soddy, Quinn, Gervase and Boom Sticks keep the giant frog occupied, Bellisir glides around to the left of the frog, passing in front of Gervase. He moves along the path to where he can see the frog in the bushes. The monk quickly scans the foilage for an opening. He finds a spot where he can see the wet amphibious skin through the cover of leaves. Leaning forward, his arm pistons out into an open palm strike through the bush.
Bellisir steps into the tomb and surveys the area. His eyes widen, but not in terror. With an amazed look on his face, he seems transfixed by the golden symbol on the coffin of Luca. "Uncle Fu told me of people who'd worshiped the Last Azlanti, but this is the first time I've seen anyone have Aroden's holy symbol displayed to show their faith in him," he says, his normal demeanor sounding oddly awestruck.
Bellisir's mouth twitches just a little as he watches Soddy and Quinn throw rocks at the door. The monk is not being secretive and anyone looking at him gets the feeling that he's amused by the casting of stones at the door. "A good effort to avoid the trap," he says to both of them in his standard demeanor. "But Boom Sticks did say that opening the door would cause the trap to spring. Perhaps tying a rope to the door handle and pulling the rope would activate the trap."
"Then do what you must," Bellisir says, stepping aside so that others may enter the stable. "I will not stop you, but my teachings forbid me from knowingly provoking anyone or anything that does not wish to fight, tainted or otherwise. I will stand watch out here to make sure no one surprises us." With that, the monk walks over to stand on the pathway just inside the gate to better observe all avenues of access to the stable doors.
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