Girian waits for Rhialla to produce her rope and takes the slow but safe path.
Everyone is either across the hanging bridge or on it, except for Bhalur. Bhalur walks out on the hanging bridge, but after just a couple of steps he loses his footing and falls out from the side of the rope and plank bridge. The rope suddenly pulls on everyone else. Bhalur is dangling from the side of the hanging bridge, and you hear a roar as a huge dark silhouette with eyes that glisten in the moonlight appears from the forest. It is the Bherug!
Rhialla rushes to the edge of the fall's cliff side to check on Bhalur and assess the condition of the rope as she readies her bow to defend the party, "Bhalur! Are you alright? Can you climb up? Hurry!
Dangling on the rope and white-grey colours spinning on his vision, Bhalur is disorientiert due to falling and sudden change of perspectives. The roar of Bherug also instills worry on Bhalur as he tries to stop his spinning and begin his climb back up. "Yeeees... urgh, this spinning. Yes, I am fine. Just had a small shock due to dropping. What was that noise I heard just a moment ago? I think I can make it back up"
"Don't worry about the noise, just get back up here... with haste!"
Bhalur makes it up just in time to avoid the snapping maw of the bherug. Realizing that it cannot follow you across the hanging bridge, the bherug grunts and retreats back into the forest.
"Clever bherug! This whole time it's just been waiting for one of us to be vulnerable." Ornthalas says as Bhalur has made it across.
"Come. The entrance to the Shaman's Path isn't far."
Ornthalas leads you to a cave entrance nearby.
"This is it. The Shaman's Path. We better light some torches."
Magnes, halfway through crafting some concoction stops what he is doing as bhalur moves away from the great beast. The shorter humanoid then griping the rope with Rhialla and letting his naturally dense nature ensure the object goes nowhere.
"I'm not surprised, like Girian had said damn thing was following us all day. Fortunately Bhalur is craftier than an overgrown lizard."
The Dhouvar grins as he looks at the immediate path.
"Ah' Don' much have a use fer a light, though I could carry one if'd help tha rest ah ya."
Girian looks at the darkened entrance and then to the group at large.
" I have the lighting well in hand. Though I'd ask if I would be alright to stay to the center of the group as I will be somewhat distracted by maintaining them."
With a wave of the humans hands four ethereal lanterns coalese into the air, floating in a diamond pattern in front Girian.
With a heavy heart she makes her back to the Ghost Bear army. She approaches the chieftain slow, remaining silent for a while, before speaking with a pained voice, "The village has been taken. It is a blood bath there. Plenty dead defenders."
Lifting her head up high, "At least the koroku fought well taking down many of the enemy in the process. Reducing their numbers considerately."
She then goes on giving the numbers on the enemy, plus the few hostages taken.
"I am sorry to hear that, Arukara. Soon, you will get your revenge. The army is ready to attack. Are you ready to guide us through the traps, or do you need a moment?"
"I am fine. Better to stop them from advancing onto the temple."
Arukara leads the Ghost Bears through the traps and then the small army splits up into two halves to attack the Bherugs from two sides.
The Bherugs are caught off guard by the Ghost Bears who comes storming out of the forest from two opposite directions.
Soon, you are in the midst of the battle.
Seeing the bugbear she swings her scimitar at it.
Hawkren assesses the Bherug coming at him. Dual-wielding? That should make him a bit less accurate...
He raises his rapier more as a feint than a threat. He utters fell syllables. Spiders burst from his mouth and swarm over his lips. He spits a gobbet of phlegm that transforms into a sticky knot of webs and eggsac that bursts onto the warrior.
Arukara vs. Bugbear
Round 1:
Damage taken:
Arukara: 7 damage
Bugbear: 2 damage
Hawkren vs. Bherug tribesman
Round 1:
Round 2:
Tell me what you want to do.
You enter the cave entrance and begin your journey through the Shaman's Path.
The first sight you reach is a large cavern with a large hole in the cave roof from where the moon shines in, illuminating a large stone statue of some kind of reptilian monster standing on its hindlegs. There's the entrance to an tunnel half-covered in vines between its legs.
The creature is a graloc.
Seizing the advantage, Hawk charges the captured Bherug yelling, "For the Ghost Bears!" and attempts to drive his rapier through the man's throat.
STAND: Rapier (crit: 18-20/2x)
MODS: MW, charging
Precision DAM
Magnes eyes the statue, examining the craggy lizard mans features." Think thats a Graloc. Don't know much of them outside the name though. So I'm thinkin' we gotta go down there?" the Dhouvarr asks pointing to the root crusted tunnel.
" Ought to be a great time, hopefully we avoid the flaming winged spider nests on the way out."
Magnes keeps his spear in hand as he walks to the depths.
As you descend down the tunnel you see cave paintings on the walls that are lit by the magical lights conjured by Girian. They depict Waeldfolk fighting against the reptilian beings that Magnes said are gralocs, grey-skinned humanoids, and one large grey-skinned troll-like creature.
They show the grey-skinned humanoids bowing in front of a grey-skinned humanoid on a throne of skulls and bones with a golden headdress, and the waeldfolk killing that individual.
You soon reach a large grotto with a waterfall that runs down into a large pool. Another statue of the reptilian-like creature is half-submerged in the water of the pool.
Looking around with an awe and enjoying the sight, Bhalur cant but marvel at the wonders and the beauty of the place as he looks around
Kevroth recognizes the creature from old stories. As they descend, he keeps his eyes alert and occasionally breathes a little deeper to catch any scents the night might bring to him.
Magnes squints as he looks at the ancient paintings.
"Huh. So I guess these things and the Waedfolk don't much get along."
Girian keeps an eye to his spell, though long practice made maintaining the spell quite simple. Still enough to make concentrating on long tasks hard. Phyllis perched on his shoulder makes a few noises at the new smells of the cave.
"Where did these paintings come from Ornthalas?" The human asks as he makes sure to pass one light close enough so he could see the things.
Chingo:
I've got a question. The Sneak Attack damage I got to roll... is that a bonus because I 'surprised' this particular Bherug so it is bonus damage on the first round only? I'm totally fine with that, BTW, as I wasn't expecting a surprise bonus in any case. I just want to make sure if this is a larger rule interpretation (grappled folks can be sneak attacked), something that I can use each round on this guy until he breaks out of the webs, or was a 'one round' bonus because I just surprised him so well?
I know in standard rules grappled doesn't mean that you can get sneak attacked, but I thought it makes sense in this case, the target is webbed and can't really do much to defend himself against a precision attack.
The Shaman's Path:
"The paintings have been made by the Waeldfolk, but they are centuries old. The Shaman's Path used to lead down into Sakrashala, a vrenori city. The Waeldfolk and the Vrenori of Sakrashala waged a war. The Waeldfolk won. In recent centuries the Shaman's Path has primarily been used by Waeldfolk shamans when they have made their Athvajaer - spirit journey."
A spider the size of an elephant hangs in the darkness of the ceiling of the grotto above you. Its legs have spiky joints and its face looks vaguely, but disturbingly, humanoid. It sits completely still, but it is watching you.
~ Round 2 ~
The Bherug tribesman manages to break free from the web. The tribesman begins to rage.
~ Round 3 ~
Tell me what you want to do.
Kevroth starts as he glances around, and his musket comes halfway up to a firing position and his voice is low and tense, "There is a very large spider up by the ceiling. Just watching us for now. What do we do?"
Keeping silent and taking a look at Kevroth as he mentioned spider "yap. Noticed it myself too. As long as it does not make any sudden movements we can leave it but... it is kind of unnerving how it watches us" answering to Kevroth with a wondering voice
Hawk feints left to draw the raging tribesman off balance then drives his blade solidly into the warrior's chest. Unsure if that will be enough to finish the man, Hawk tumbles backward to gain some distance.
STAND: Rapier (crit: 18-20/2x)
MODS: MW
crit?
Feeling the spiked ball hit her side she cringes, yet focussed on her opponent looking for a weak spot as she swings her scimitar.
HP 28
HP 28
Magnes seems unsurprised at the Spider, his attentions having been halfway on it before hearing a warning.
"Aye, some breed of giant spider. Assumin' its size as an indicator there is enough food down here to sustain something like that. Whatever a spider that size eats is still likely to be dangerous to us. Keep close, watch out fer webs. Assumin' it ain't hungry it's not likely to try for us unless we give it an opportunity." The Dhouvar responds as he sighs.
"Why's it always gotta be giant spiders in the caves? What'd we do to them?" Magnes seems to think for a moment before nodding
"I mean we only set... four-ish big ones and a bunch of little spiders on fire before I sealed up that entrance."
Girian, interested in seeing what the others are speaking about swings the nearest mystic lantern until it just barely illuminates the creature in question.
The human restricts his response to a jerk of his shoulders and a muttered swear.
"Alright, well. that's replacing' the whale in me nightmares. Least I think thats how the saying goes. By order of several magnitudes that is the largest spider I've ever seen."
As The human rationalizes Phyllis the feather lizard crouches on the mans shoulder and gives a low hiss.
"I'm not much of a fan of leaving a threat that large behind us. It's just asking for some party of cave monsters to come attack us from the front and have that thing show up to investigate the noise."
Shaman's Path
While the others discuss the spider, Rhialla simply looks up and detects evil with her spell like ability.
Shaman's Path
This is what the spider looks like.
Rhialla: The spider does not detect as evil.
"That's an ogre spider. A fight I'd rather avoid." Ornthalas says, but readies an arrow. "If we're lucky it will ignore us but we better be prepared for the worst. It's a rather large grotto and it could quickly cut us off from the tunnel on the other side."
Bugbear:
Damage taken:
Arukara: 16 damage.
Bugbear: 2 damage.
____________________________________________________________________
Bugbear:
Damage taken:
Arukara: 16 damage.
Bugbear: 5 damage.
____________________________________________________________________
Damage taken:
Bherug tribesman: 13 damage.
Hawkren Hargraves: 9 damage.
____________________________________________________________________
Tell me what you want to do.
Hawk reels sideways from the heavy axe blow. He spins low, raking his blade across tribesman's gut, then dances away again.
STAND: Rapier (crit: 18-20/2x)
MODS: MW
crit?
"Tha'd make the most sense. Killin it will just mean something else comes to take its place."
Magnes shrugs, keeping his spear at the ready as he withdraws along with Ornthalas.
"So any other beasties that hold chunks of the path we are about to travel? Be good to know if there are going to be more of those."
Girian swings the torches back toward the path, walking to follow the elf and the dwarf. Phyllis sits on the mans shoulder and hisses in the spiders direction.
HP 14
Realizing she is in a terrible situation, she decides to give one more swing, before trying to retreat.
Weakened by the blows she received already, she misses the bugbear completely.
Hawk glances across the battlefield to see how his allies are doing, particularly Iggy. The sweep of his eyes fall on the Koroku woman. Her feathers are stained with blood - much of it her own.
Not good.
His mind sorts through possible ways he might help with her large and ferocious opponent.