Heady the Sea, Part 2

Log Info

• Title: Heady the Sea, Part 2
• Emitter: Jinks
• Characters: Jay, Jozi, Nemori
• Place: Alexandros Wilderness
• Time: Monday, September 26, 2022, 6:36 PM
• Summary: Mama Bula's kids are in trouble again! Heady wandered off during a job and Kerry-Anne has gone off in search of the neglected wargolem. Git is worried what might happen if she doesn't have backup. Guilt is parlayed into action. Inside what might be a ruined Kulthian airship, Jay, Jozi and Nemori discover an angel incorporated into the controls. Attempting to free it causes a guard entity to attack them. Once that is fought off, the only rescue is to smash the machinery to remove the Angel. A macabre undertaking that results in his death, and possibly dooms Heady as well.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-  Appearing  =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Jay          5'9"     145 Lb     Eaglefolk         Male      A perky male Blue Jay with a discerning eye.
Jozi         5'8"     148 Lb     Half-Orc          Female    A brunette half-orcess with a sunny disposition.
Nemori       4'10"    110 Lb     Mul'niessa        Female    A tall and slender, dark skinned elf.
-=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-  As the GM  =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Jinks        3'4"     39 Lb      Gnome             Male      A gnomish fellow in fancy garb and jewelry.
-=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=

---

So it turns out the hill isn't a hill but rather some variety of Kulthian artifice half-buried into the natural hills of the area. Jay and Nemori observed as much. The egalrin located the keyed entry and manipulated his way through, revealing a heavy metal door with a circular wheel handle. Nemori decided to push inside (probably to get away from the weeping of the insufferable human woman).

And then...

Low clacking echoes from inside the door as the wheel produces a ratcheting turn of internal gears. A release handle sticking out parallel to the ground bounces in sympathy to the left of the heavy wheel. A final, squealing groan punctuates with a thump as bolts withdraw and the door swings inwards with a surprisingly smooth action.

A hiss, a thrum, and the smell of ozone returns. A pulsing electrical blue surges through the spectrum to settle on a sickly, bruised red color that fills the webbed interior of the sphere and spills out through the barred vent above.

The stonework is a facade, apparently, as every surface revealed to you is metallic, crystal, or glassware. The details are lost to the blanketing sheets of webbing that begins to sway as the air pushes in from behind you and through the open portal. Things hang from the domed ceiling.

The floor is flat and a step down from the settled earthen trench of the ravine, the room itself hemispherical and twenty-five foot in diameter. The center of the space is recessed and filled with standing, murky water.

There's a grinding clatter as the artifice continues to come to life. A buzzing noise as blue-black zig-zags dance across the water's surface only to end with a *PAP* as sparks burst harmlessly into the open air. A pump wheezes open and hisses close. Countless smaller mechanisms along the wall shudder as they animate...

The bluejay snorts then sneezes as he inhales the ozone. He coughs off to the side before poking his head in, "It's dark! It's underground. It's not sewers. Red isn't good, is it? There's water too. Dark water, with wires I think."

"Robert told me about Kulthian electricity. It uses dragon glands. Looks like they're still active in here." He hovers around the entrance like an overside hummingbird. An extremely oversized hummingbird. "I don't see Heady's head."

Outside, Kerry Anna is kneeling down next to Heady's remains trying to pull herself together.

Nemori says, "I hear telling people to calm down helps them calm down." She looks at Jozi, "Maybe you should try that."

Nemori's eyes don't exactly glaze as Jay rouses memories of some of Robert's explanations of kulthian technology. Not quite. Her eyes do seem to slightly cross for a moment until she shakes her head, scowling, turning back to gaze inside.. inside at the activity. Her rapier is nearly silent as she pulls it from its place at her hip. "Perhaps it would be best to close this door," she suggests. Suggests without knowing if such a thing can even be done at this point. "We have woken it. Or something within it."

Consoling the mournful, and kinda angry, young woman is a matter of some focus for Jozi. Angry, traumatized, etc, come with a certain weight of experience, though there isn't a small amount of empathy involved.

The half-orc sporadically checked on the other's progress while she quietly did her level best to keep Kerry Ann from being too much a distraction, or per Nemori's fears, dinner bell. A lot of her softly spoken words involved the unknowables of the situation, and how there are still possibilities for her friend, all spoken in a warm, gentle voice. There's even a hanky on offer for young woman to use. All the while, she inwardly prays to the Mother.

As the chamber of secrets is laid bare through Jay's deft craft and Nemori's strength, the green woman quietly advises, "Hold quiet, now, sugar, an keep watch over him. We're gonna see if we can't set this all ta right."

There's a glance to the mounts to guage their mood, and the oruch-blooded woman begins to approach her fellows, affixing another bladed gauntlet to her off hand, "I ain't dealt with a lotta artifice, but danger ain't nothin new ta me. How ya figger we do this? I take point?"

Kerry-Anne's attitude has been withdrawn and gruff, quick to anger, and maybe a little cruel on occasion. At some point there was an ill-fated trip out to an abandoned mining camp as the wights surged through the mountains and countryside. She'd been recovered short one arm and with one foot teasing the entryway into Vardama's halls. Now she's kneeling next to one of her fellows at a loss for how to move forward.

The Eldanari woman has her one good hand flat against the dented and rusted plates of the inert wargolem and tears drip down from the tip of her hawkish nose. She's awash in the red glow spilling out of the barred hole nearby, Jozi and the remains of Heady, too.

Her long, dark, and curly hair sways as she gives the faintest nod and the half-oruch steps away.

<OOC> Jinks says, "Perception checks from you guys, please. Jay, you can use your Urban bonus for the interior here."
GAME: Nemori rolls perception: (3)+10: 13
GAME: Jozi rolls perception: (14)+9: 23
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+5+5+20: (13)+5+5+20: 43
GAME: Jay rolls perception+2: (8)+15+6: 29 (+6 Fav Terrain mastery: Urban)

"It? There's an It?" Integrity caws, his head snapping to look at Nemori, then back inside, once more down at her rapier, then he struggles with his. There's less struggling and an equally silent draw, this time. "We have to look for Heady's Head wisp. Heady might even be this whole things now. It could be friendly!"

A pulsating red light and the crackling pop of sparks suggests otherwise.

"Maybe it closes from the inside." Or when they're inside. "Well, I could look for things that might be dangerous."

He peers.

Nemori helpfully suggests, "Kerry Ann should go inside and see if there's a door switch in there."

The sounds decrease in volume as they increase in pitch, falling outside of a perceptible range but leaving a busyness and sense of agitation behind in the air. Other things begin to glow and shed different colored lights that mingle with the bruised red: bright blues, dark greens, and a brilliant, golden yellow halo all from different parts of the interior.

The standing water is still and lifeless now beneath draped webbing that sways in the breeze between door and vent above. "It.. the sphere.." Nemori sighs, shaking her head. Her eyes manage to never leave the going ons inside, though, even as Jozi steps up. To which Nemori steps back and to the side, gesturing; she is not one to argue when someone wishes to take the lead. Particularly someone larger than her.

Fewer people to have to get around if she needs to flee.

Nothing can be seen. Something can be heard moving along the top of the roof. It's almost imperceptible beneath the artifice coming to life.

Jozi bows her head and steps around Nemori with a little smile. As she gets closer, however, she brings a hand up with a soft, short hiss between her teeth. A pause, and the half-orc glances above to several directions, cocking her head, then whispers, "Something's movin up there. Independent of the rest."

...

"Hear it?"

"Yes, I do. I can't see it." Jay says, staring upwards. He wonders if it's close enough to poke at.

"I could throw something at it, or cover you when you go in." He suggests further, then steps in after Jozi.

The webbing is everywhere; stretching from floor to ceiling, obscuring the various devices and shelves fixed to the curved walls, and dangling over the waters. The ceiling is mostly hidden and what you can see of it is cloaked in shifting, muddled shadows.

The water is shallow but its exact depth is hard to tell in the half-light of the various mechanisms. Perhaps knee-deep on a gobber. Perhaps chest-high.

Nemori stands guard at the door, frowning and attempting to pierce the gloom with her elf-eyes.

As Jozi enters with Jay behind a rasping voice coughs from above, nestled deep in the webbing. It's a foreign tongue, certainly, and no less foreign when the sounds are repeated.

GAME: Jozi rolls sense motive: (17)+9: 26
GAME: Jay rolls sense motive: (11)+11: 22

Hmmm....

Jozi's head cants a little, glaning back to her fellows as the voice issues forth, "Some... kinda challenge....?"

"Mebbe?"

She considers the Elgarin and mul'niessa, shrugging, "I got nothin', how bout y'all?"

GAME: Jay rolls bluff: (11)+8: 19
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+3: (13)+3: 16

Jay's beak opens, about to voice something, likely 'yes', when he decides he should save noise for the challange. He nods instead, inhales and swallows a few times. He listens carefully to the rasping voice, the way sounds are formed, accents and phrasing.

Heady said something, his last words to Kerry-Anne. The bluejay thinks, something like 'Chung-kang, pray-till'. No...

Closer to 'Cruel-dah, Pray-tarr', at least what Kerry-Anne said. One layer of misinterpretation. He tries to reconstruct what it might have been, or at least say the phrase with a similar accent as whatever is hidden above.

A ragged sound not unlike a sigh issues as the egalrin responds to the challenge with the unknown phrase. The shadows overhead shift and something moves, pushing through the webs and causing debris to fall from its dark nest. Bones. Bone of rodents and birds fall down to snare in the web, splash quietly into the shallow waters, and bounce off the higher floors around the outside of the room.

The sigh comes again as the creature pauses. Deliberately, it wheezes in a breath and repeats the words back at Jay with a different emphasis.

"Khroel'da Pratart," it rasps, followed by a clk-clk-clk. A grunt and falls down heavily, a dark blob splashing down into the water next to the egalrin. Integrity and Jozi are buffetted with cold, murky water that tastes of metal and rust and smells a similar brand of stale.

The animal that inspects Integrity now may once have been a humanoid but is now equal parts metal and arachnid. A bulbous, dark purple, and hairy abdomen is half-submerged in the water beneath a cephalothorax that's easily half-torso and patched in bolted bronze. Six long legs end in metal-tipped hands and two front arms are short, gangling and wring worriedly.

The head is bald, with pale flesh taut perilously tight over a pronounced skull. With three jeweled, haphazardly set eyes. Two curved fangs stretch out of an otherwise human mouth. The spider-thing is horrible and easily outweighs Jay or Jozi with its bulk.

"... Khroel?" The spinnerets churn the water behind it.

The half-orc's arm comes up to a warding posture as the movement topside start to rain detritus, lowering some as their host starts to descend after.

"The sight of it twists something within Jozi, and she swallows it back down.

Since things are civil just yet, she opens her hands and holds thems, palms forward (don't mind the claws) and whispers an aside to Jay, "Yer doin great...!"

"da Pratart." Jay adds on the end of the creature's line, then repeats it fully, "Khroel'da Pratart" On impulse he attempts to duplicate the clk-clk-clk as only birds can, mimicing carefully.

He stares back as it inspects him, human skulls are unsettling. It's the non-existent beaks. The metal plates are disturbing also. Perhaps he was supposed to repeat it a third time? He looks between the jeweled eyes.

"Thanks." He whispers to Jozi, "It could be asking anything."

GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+3: (2)+3: 5
GAME: Jay rolls bluff: (15)+8: 23
GAME: Jay rolls sense motive: (14)+11: 25
GAME: Jozi rolls sense motive: (9)+9: 18
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d100: (17): 17, "91+ is bad." So Good!

The creature considers Jay at length with its eyes blinking out of sequence-- two remain open at all times. Its mouth is slack as it breathes in and out, the pincered fangs opening and closing. It pivots in place, looking at Jozi, then, and back to the egalrin. The small forearms extend tentatively with hands cupped into a bowl before the creature seems to think better of it, pulls the hands back, and shrinks down.

It opens its mouth as if to speak but decides against that, too, and shrinks back behind the closest sheet of dangled webbing with its head bowed low. It remains dubious of the unfamiliar pair (and the third lurking outside) but retreats both cowed and satisfied.

It becomes a silhouette splashing through the water, turns, and retreats back up the wall. Metal-on-metal mixes with the slap of meaty palms grabbing hold until the indistinguishable dark blood disappears entirely into the shadows above. There's a final rasping sigh as it stills and settles.

The lights continue their play from the walls.

The bluejay watches through this, standing still as the creature examines them further, performs the little ritual. It may have been asking for a present, or for Integrity to cup his hands over its.

He follows the creature as it retreats away, becomes a silhouette and then part of the ceiling again. "I missed something. That's not the best resolution but it is an ok one. Go forward some more?"

The arachnoid's postures and.... curtailed gestures furrow a frown on Jozi's features.

As the being retreats, she glances back to Jay with a quiet, "We oughta.... see if'n we can do somethin..."

She nods to Jay as they follow after, "I think mebbe it's thirsty, or wantin a tip of some kind."

She slowly reaches to the canteen on her belt, uncorks it, and makes a fair show of taking a sloshy swig, then carefully sets the receptacle nearby.

The webs are bad enough to act like an obscuring mist but not magical or strong, so won't impede your progress."

The critter splashing through the standing water revealed that it wasn't particularly deep, too. Likely rainwater that collected through the vent above.

Jay looks over the dim interior, "I guess go left?"

Jozi says, "sounds good"

Pushing along to the left, you're forced to brush aside and dislodge no small amount of webbing. Occasionally, ossified remains crumble or fall free, clattering down onto the metal flooring to bounce away or crunch down to powder underfoot. The green light pulses, soft and welcoming as you near.

This section is fitted with something akin to a metal cabinet, bronze in appearance with few dents and scratches and the faint dotting of patina that's more intense near the top and outside edges. Three crystal tubes are graduated with etched horizontal lines and all three have a cork ball sitting at their base. A hemispherical depression hosts a glass bulb suspended by tight leather straps. It's half-full of a dark liquid.

Beneath that, a glass plate has shattered and the parchment behind it gone to yellowed rot with only the faintest hint of inked drawings remaining. Then the cabinet slants out like a lectern but hosts no tome or writings-- but a thin chain dangles off to one side.

At the base of the cabinet is a hatch with a broken latch. It pries open easily to reveal nothing but cobwebs and pulped parchment debris.

The green light flashes in the recess behind the suspended glass bulb of dark liquid.

Jay keeps his wings tucked in, avoiding errant flutter as he edges around the room, trying not to add more dislodged debris. "This looks a lot like some of Bob's artifice. Especially the tubes, like some kind of balance trap, or keeping the flow proportional."

"Can you tell what the fluid is? It looks like blood, but not quite."

He glances at the other lights, "Is green good, or the yellow, or the two blue? Is it something like that spider's eyes, were we supposed to match some of its flickering."

<OOC> Jinks says, "Could do a Kn.Engineering untrained here. DC10."
<OOC> Jinks says, "Or Profession/Airman"
GAME: Jay rolls intelligence: (15)+3: 18
GAME: Jozi rolls int: (1)+int: 1 (EPIC FAIL)

These don't look like controls. There are no levers or knobs. Corks could float in the tubes and they're graduated to provide some variety of info on levels of... something? The liquid in the bulb is also parallel with the ground, so maybe it has something to do with attitude.

Akin to the altitude/attitude readouts in a plane. Not that a bird would understand those, while also completely understanding it.

Jozi carefully touches something under the collar of her armour, whispering in yrch-speak before she considers the tubes and fluids. She shakes her head, looking to Jay as she releases whatever spell she had invoked, "Not poisonous, but I ain't sure what it is."

She leans a little closer. Hmmm.

Hmmm. Jay also leans closer, examining them further. "They don't look like controls. There's no knobs or levers. Those corks float by almost anything, water, alcohol, air, it depends. Those marks, those are gradations, for... something."

His wings pop a little and he leans to one side, then the other. Hmm... It looks like airship controls. Not sure for what." He looks at the other two lighted areas, crouching to see from different angles. "Maybe you control it by standing in the water? I don't see where Heady's wisp could have gone."

"So, weeee...." Jozi hangs on the word for a moment, then advances the thought, "got us a crashed airship, then?"

There's a look about the room, and she gently claps a hand on Jay's shoulder for a moment, "Let's see what all else is under all these webs, might find us a log or something."

Not that any of them could read it, most likely, but....

"Yes, let's keep looking." His head bobs.

The next section of the sphere's interior is as elaborate as it is horrific. The centerpiece and source of the steady glow is the mutilated and limbless torso of a gold-skinned humanoid fixed to the wall. Its face is in profile, eyes and pate secured within a runed, metal cap while its mouth is held open by a wire frame and filled with tubes. Exposed gearworks run down along its neck, powering a series of miniature paddles along the throat.

One massive, near-perfect, feathered wing stretches to the right to held flared by cruel bolts. The left portion of its back is wingless and fixed with a contraption instead where elaborate clockworks make sporadic turns to adjust along with the flexing of muscles in the tormented creature's back. Every inch of skin not obscured by artifice is afflicted with wicked, deep runes cut with a craftman's precision. Each and every one glistens damp as if freshly made.

If not alive, the creature is animate; a macabre thing kept fixed to the wall and this realm of the living.

Everywhere around and below the creature are the trappings of artifice. Bulbs, beakers, cylinders, tubes, and wires mingle with switches, cranks, and levers. A wheel like the mast on a ship sits dusty, the finery beneath unmistakable: darkwood and adamantine. Pipes, tubes, and trenches of fine wiring run out from this middle section, to the brass cabinet on the left and into the webbings and the soft blue glow to your right.

The half orc nods to Jay, and proceeds further on, leaving the canteen where it lay for the sake of their host, then gives the new environs a lookover.

"Star Mother's mercy...!" Jozi gasps upon sight of the reconfigured soul embedded in the wall, a hand coming up over her mouth. Her other hand, claws glinting in the light, is faintly atreble as the display does something she'd foolishly allowed herself to be convinced she was beyond:

It shakes her.

Deeply. <yrch-speak>

It takes her a moment before she clenches her eyes and shakes her head, trying to reestablish the ingrained discipline of her order. A slow breath out, then, she steps forward to try and see what she can figure of the being's status.

"Jay..." her voice mostly on-note, then more fully, "Have and ideaas on this, sugar...?"

GAME: Nemori rolls knowledge/the planes: (7)+6: 13

The sight halts the bluejay, his beak drops open and then he closes it quickly when the angle of it matched the mouth of the profile. "People, even. That's..." He has no words. Especially once he sees the naked wing. His own tighten against his back. Those bolts. He watches the clockwork turn, the motion of muscles, the runes, "Is that... what is that...

The more he looks, the more the sight starts to pull at his mind. He follows a tube to another tube, mesmerized by how they interlock, cross, the wires, the dust. His beak opens and closes. It seems darker, smaller; he can't see the sky; there's a dangerous thing in here. It's dusty and hard to breath. His heart starts to race.

He focuses on the question, something to answer. "I think he's a control, like the wheel, and his wings, those control something outside, maybe? Wherever the wires go. I think it's still active, that's why we have lights."

GAME: Jozi rolls heal: (4)+7: 11
GAME: Nemori rolls heal: (14)+4: 18

Nemori is not always supportive of venturing into danger. She isn't a coward. She simply has a healthy amount of respect for survival. So when Jozi and Jay decided to venture within, Nemori opted to remain outside. There are lengths she will go to for her friends, but there are limits as well...

Unfortunately, this left her outside with Kerry-Anne and Heady's empty husk. And when the eldanar woman started to struggle with the inanimate armour to carry it back down the hill... well, Nemori went to her. Imagining how pleasant a sight it would be to see the larger woman tumble ass over tea kettle down to the bottom, perhaps breaking something important. All it would take is a little push....

By the time the shadow elf had helped Kerry-Anne and her burden down to the bottom, Nemori was certainly regretting not having gone with her first impulse. THen, unable to bear remaining within the presence of the other's mewling, Nemori decided venturing into the strange orb and possibly dying would be a far preferable fate to walking back to town with the broken, one-armed adoptee of Mama Bula.

Thus she finally reaches the exploring pair in the latest macabre room. Her lips curl a little bit, more in distaste than horror, and she says, "An angel. I think." Her announcement of her arrival. "It is likely still alive. In a manner of speaking."

"Nemori!" Jay jumps! The increasing gloom was not his imagination, she was getting closer. She was closing in. A dark and ominous presence sneaking up on him. "Ah, you're here. I was just wishing you were here."

She would have appropriate advice in this situation, "Can we kill him? Should we kill him? Is there magic that can heal him from that? Should we try breaking him out?"

A slow exhale, then, "There's... movement, yeah...." Jozi replies, looking back toward her companions, "I think yer right, they're alive."

Whether they like it, or not.

The half orc considers them anew, then back to the artifice that's so violated this being's form, "Might be a mercy, there, but..."

Stepping even closer, she addresses the victim, specifically, "Hello, can ya hear me....?"

The tormented creature doesn't react to Jozi's words.

Nemori doesn't step quite fully into the room; she's seen some places, after all, and while this may not exactly be a laboratory or a torture chamber, it manages to give her the same kind of feeling. But the other two are inside, and haven't yet seemed to suffer any mishap... so when Jay poses the moral dilemma and Jozi takes a closer look at the imprisoned and tortured being, Nemori fully enters the chamber.. then approaches the creature to have a better look herself.

"Yes. It is alive. Creatures like this.. when they die, they normally return to their homes. I suspect something about... this.." she gestures vaguely at the room? The devices? ".. is somehow keeping it alive. I could not tell you why... though your guesses seemed well enough, Integrity."

Nothing to it, then. Nemori steps closer. "Step back. I do not know what this might do." In for a copper, in for a gold, as they say. She pulls out her Ceinaran token, then invokes the power of her goddess. Just a little bit.

<OOC> Nemori says, "Converting a spell to a CLW And hitting the angel with it."
GAME: Nemori casts Murderous Command. Caster Level: 6 DC: 15
GAME: Nemori rolls 1d8+5: (2)+5: 7

The mul'niessa steps forward, offering her prayer and laying hands on the trapped and mutilated thing mounted into the artifice of the room. The runes nearest her hand begin to heal, flesh knitting beneath the blessed touch of Ceinara. Muscles shift and begin to push some of the brutal clockwork from where it's dug into the skin of the supposed-angel. Its golden glow surges...

Then..?

A buzzing complaint and expulsion of steam. Two tracked rods come to life, pulling along a scalpel with a black-finished metal where they intersect. Like some sort of automated quill, it locates the marred runes and begins to carve them fresh. The angel's jaw strained in its harness.

The buzzing continues.

A raspy snarl issues from the ceiling above and a shower of small bones hits the floor.

GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10+2: (6)+10+2: 18 (Shrie Guy's turn!)
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d6+3: (2)+3: 5
GAME: Nemori rolls fortitude: (11)+6: 17

Just behind the shower of bones comes the spider-creature, splashing down into the water with its paper-thin lips pulled back from teeth and fangs. All three eyes burn with rage as it snarls unintelligible, hate-filled words. Small hands reach out, gropping for a hold on Nemori's top as it bites her shoulder, the fangs pinching down to inject a stinging fluid...

<OOC> Jozi says, "move in, take a swipe at the spider, two if i don't have to do more than a 5' move"
<OOC> Jozi says, "and judgment as a swift, smiting, so my weapons count as magic vs damage reduction"
GAME: Jozi spends ONE use of JUDGMENT.
GAME: Jozi rolls weapon2-2: (12)+8+-2: 18
GAME: Jozi rolls weapon4-2: (13)+7+-2: 18
<OOC> Jozi says, "ok, because i have double slice, i apply full strength to offhand damage"
GAME: Jozi rolls 1d6+5: (1)+5: 6 (main hand)
GAME: Jozi rolls 1d6+4: (3)+4: 7 (off hand)

"Nem!" Jozi cries as their host has taken quiet the exception to their altruism. She moves even as she speaks, and her affixed talons come up in a crossed one-two offensive against the figure that had, not long before, had inspired some pity.

There may be a time for mercy yet in this endeavor, but for now, she needs to get the creature's attention off of her compatriots.

<OOC> Nemori heals the angel again.
<OOC> Jinks says, "Nemori! Do-gooding has made you another friend."
<OOC> Jay says, "clearly the wrong approach"
<OOC> Nemori says, "Sorry. Worksafe is calling. I will delay to after Jay, sorry."
<OOC> Jay says, "I was going to try to distract it, get it off Nemori, I guess?"
GAME: Jay rolls sense motive: (6)+11: 17 (for insight on the critter)
GAME: Jay rolls knowledge/dungeoneering: (18)+11: 29

It's a guard dog. An aberration called a Shriezyx. Intelligent, but not very so that explains how the Egalrin was able to confuse it with the phrase initially. Now that people are interfering with stuff in here it's violent. They have a remarkable fear of fire, are venomous, also immune to mind-affecting abilities and will fight until dead-dead. They're built for murder.

<OOC> Jay says, "still feint, that will be useful next turn, try to draw it off nemori"
GAME: Jay rolls bluff: (1)+8: 9 (EPIC FAIL) (vs 10+BAB+WIS)
<OOC> Jay says, "move to 2,20"

"Oh! Wait. I know what this is. I've seen it in a property damage case. The basement. It's an aberration called a Shriezyx." The bluejay chirps quickly, speaking a little faster and higher, "We were able to confuse it earlier with the phrase, but now it's decided we're threats. It's like a guard dog, I forgot to say it's like a guard dog."

"They're venomous!" He stares at Nemori's shoulder, not thinking venomous like she is. Not a all. It was the biting that made him look, "As you can tell. They also have a remarkable fear of fire and are built for murder. It's... probably immune, you can't charm it, and it will fight until it's dead-dead! I don't think we can be friends now."

"Hey! Hey!" He flaps his wings, dislodging detritus and raising dust. He waves his rapier, except it gets rather tied up in hanging threads, "Over... here. here!"

GAME: Nemori rolls knowledge/dungeoneering: (16)+3: 19
<OOC> Nemori says, "ALright, I am casting Grace (it's a swift action) which will allow me to move without provoking an AoO."
<OOC> Nemori says, "I will move to 1,21. Then I will cast spiritual weapon on it."
GAME: Nemori rolls 1d20+8: (10)+8: 18
GAME: Nemori rolls 1d8+2: (1)+2: 3
GAME: Nemori casts Grace. Caster Level: 6 DC: 16
GAME: Nemori casts Spiritual Weapon. Caster Level: 6 DC: 16

Nemori staggers back a step, one hand brandishing her rapier before her, the other clasping at her shoulder. The sting and the immediate heat from the poison is familiar... hey, she's had a lot of years to experience alot of unpleasant things, alright? She glares at Jay.. not that it was his fault. "I figured the venomous part out, thank you," she says, teeth slightly gritted. She casts a quick charm, then, and moves. She's not exactly heavy footed, but the blessing seems to lend a barely perceptible grace to her steps, a movement that defies any opening for the 'guard dog' to strike at her. Once she's taken up position behind the egalrin, she summons her phantom rapier to strike at the creature. "Jozi! Becareful of its webbing.. you likely saw some of it earlier. And do not bother to try and knock it over!"

<OOC> Jinks says, "Alright. Between Jay's squawking and Nemori flitting away it'll FA Jay."
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10: (14)+10: 24
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10: (18)+10: 28
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10: (19)+10: 29
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10: (13)+10: 23
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10: (16)+10: 26
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d6+3: (1)+3: 4
GAME: Jinks rolls 4d4+12: (12)+12: 24
GAME: Jinks damaged you for 28 points. 14 HP remaining.
GAME: Jay rolls fortitude: (6)+3: 9
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d2: (2): 2
GAME: Jinks damaged your Strength for 2 points. 2 total damage.
<OOC> Jinks says, "Jay gets punished for trying to be a nice guy. :("

The creature tracks Nemori, eyes pulled wide open and teeth bared as she manages to flit between Jay and the curved walls of the room to stop out of reach. The egalrin had been flapping and cawing, so it pivots its attentions and springs up onto its back set of legs.

The front two hands latch onto his coat and the fangs find purchase on Integrity's neck. Venom pumps freely, making the bird-man's limbs feel leaden. Then, in a blinding flash, the four middle lets come up one after the other, splashing and stabbing before dropping back to the floor.

The creature continues to glower menacingly as it growls out another unknown phrase.

<OOC> Jozi says, "i'm going to wail on shrie"
<OOC> Jozi says, "if i can 5' to flank, i'll do that, otherwise continue to wail away, trying to draw agg"
<OOC> Jinks says, "5' flank is go!"
GAME: Jozi rolls weapon2: (17)+8: 25
GAME: Jozi rolls weapon4: (11)+7: 18 (miss)
GAME: Jozi rolls 1d6+5: (4)+5: 9

Seeing the elgarin going above and beyond in drawing the creature's attention, and eating the consequences, Jozi growls and shifts her position to close a pincer around the aberration, her claws lashing out, though only that of her dominant hand strikes true, "Hey, over HERE!" she barks.

So much for being nice.

GAME: Jay rolls weapon2+2: (10)+8+2: 20
GAME: Jay rolls damage2+3d6: aliased to 1d6+0+3d6: (6)+0+(7): 13

"Ow. Ow!" Jay shudders, pulling away from the mouth of the Shriezyx, attempting to, but he's held. Everything is getting a little harder, he's feeling a growing numbness. Definitely more venomous. Then the middle legs hit, "OW! OW!"

He's red, white and blue, and black now. "I'm bleeding. Bleeding!" He stabs.

<OOC> Nemori says, "SW attack, and healing jay. Converting a spell to CSW."
GAME: Nemori rolls 1d20+8: (15)+8: 23
GAME: Nemori rolls 1d8+2: (5)+2: 7
GAME: Nemori casts Water Walk. Caster Level: 6 DC: 17
GAME: Nemori rolls 3d8+6: (16)+6: 22
GAME: Jinks damaged you for -22 points. 36 HP remaining.

Nemori hisses, "Stop fooling around!" she demands, laying a quick hand with a more powerful healing magic upon the egalrin's back before stepping away so as not to impede his movement. Her rose hued summon rapier continues to stab at the creature, joining Jay's silvered and Jozi's heritage weapons. "Focus!"

<OOC> Jinks says, "KA arrives at the doorway and can't do anything else cuz Fatigue."
<OOC> Jinks says, "Perception checks from Jay and Jozi (not NemorI)"
GAME: Jozi rolls perception: (4)+9: 13
<pre><OOC> Jinks says, "Jozi doesn't notice anything with her Perception."
<OOC> Jinks says, "Continuing to attack Jay since he's doing the most damage at the moment."
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10: (3)+10: 13
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10: (18)+10: 28
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10: (7)+10: 17
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10: (18)+10: 28
<OOC> Jinks says, "So only two hits."
GAME: Jinks rolls 2d4+6: (8)+6: 14
GAME: Jinks damaged you for 14 points. 22 HP remaining.
<OOC> Jinks says, "It's gonna 5' away from the pain sandwich, too."

"Th' fuck is all the noi..?!" Kerry-Anne's voice falls from her lips at the sound of the battle joined. She's arrived just in time to see Jay subjected to another barrage of attacks.

The monstrosity of a guard dog grimaces from its many wounds, scurrying low to splash through the water away from Jozi and stand again next to the priestess and l'eagalrin. The adjustment cost it somewhat, however, and the quick movement spoiled its aim. Only two of the large claws land-- but that's still enough to draw more of Integrity's blood and darken the murky waters they fight in.

<OOC> Jozi says, "5' opposite nemori if i can, slashy slashy"
GAME: Jozi rolls weapon2: (12)+8: 20
GAME: Jozi rolls weapon4: (2)+7: 9
<OOC> Jozi says, "..."
<OOC> Jinks says, "Hit/miss"

She hates it when people/things/abberations don't listen to her....

The half orc, full of concern for, "Jay! Damnit!" continues to press the abominated creature, even as it repositions out of the original pincer.

As previously, her dominant hand scores the blighted figure with it's talons, though the other whistles through open air, "Get behind me!"

<OOC> Jay says, "yes, stab then move behind Jozi, acrobatics to get there to avoid the AOO"
GAME: Jay rolls weapon2: (20)+8: 28 (THREAT)
GAME: Jay rolls weapon2: (12)+8: 20 (Confirmed)
<OOC> Jay says, "so, 3x1d6+ oh no sneak attack damage this time."
GAME: Jay rolls damage2: aliased to 1d6+0: (1)+0: 1
GAME: Jay rolls damage2: aliased to 1d6+0: (3)+0: 3
GAME: Jay rolls acrobatics: (19)+12: 31
GAME: Jay rolls fortitude: (16)+3: 19

A reassuring feeling fills the Egalrin. Oh, that's Nemori's healing. Then there's more slicing. He chirps in pain. There are spiders that eat birds, there ARE spiders that eat birds.

He thrusts! A damaging attack that slides in a crease beside one of the eyes and plunges deep. It seems like it should hurt more than it did.

Immediately after he heed's Jozi's warning, and with a duck and dive he's behind her as she ordered.

<OOC> Nemori will channel a heal, and SW attack.
GAME: Nemori spends ONE use of CHANNEL ENERGY.
<OOC> Nemori says, "Selective channeling, excluding the spider dog. including the angel. for reasons."
GAME: Nemori rolls 3d6: (7): 7
GAME: Jinks damaged you for -7 points. 29 HP remaining.
GAME: Nemori rolls 1d20+8: (9)+8: 17 (miss)
<OOC> Jay says, "it's her sympathetic catharsis. When Nemori is depressed she cuts... others."

Aaaaand there goes her body shield. Finding herself face to face with the monstrosity again, Nemori recoils a little bit... keeping her sword between her and it at all times. For all her wielding of the blade, however.. she has yet to ever try to stab anything or anyone with it. Besides Jay. A thought has her summoned rapier follow the spider dog, continuing to lend its effort to Jozi and Jay's attempts to dismantle it while she grips her coin, sending out a burst of healing, positive energy that manages to warp around the creature.. while including the imprisoned angel.

<OOC> Jinks says, "Alright, KA will move in and bop."
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+9+1-1: (2)+9+1+-1: 11
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d2: (1): 1, "1 Jozi, 2 Nemori"
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10: (1)+10: 11 (EPIC FAIL)
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10: (14)+10: 24
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10: (15)+10: 25
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10: (14)+10: 24
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+10: (17)+10: 27
GAME: Jinks rolls 4d4+12: (12)+12: 24
<OOC> Jinks says, "And it 5' out of the sammich again."
 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 |     Name      |  CHP (T) |  HP  |
 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 | Jay...........|   29     |  42  |
 | Jozi..........|    7     |  31  |
 | Nemori........|   41     |  41  |
 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Kerry-Anne sucks in a breath, trying to stop herself from panting after rushing over to the opening in her current state. She sets her jaw and her temper rises at the sight of the abomination-- something she suspects is responsible for Heady's condition. She stomps forward, folding her hand into a fist tight enough that the plating reinforcement of the cestus strains against the leather. She stomps forward and goes for a haymaker blow but flinches when the creature regards her; horrified by the monstrosity to the point of issuing a shout.

The abomination is amused, turning to giggle at the terrified Eldanari girl. Then the barrage finds Jozi: the bite misses but the claws savaged her flank. They stab, rip, and tear, and then the creature splashes through the water to the edge of the shallow pool and crouches low.

<OOC> Jozi says, "alright i'll 5' to 2, 20, full attack"
GAME: Jozi rolls weapon2-2: (16)+8+-2: 22
GAME: Jozi rolls weapon4-2: (19)+7+-2: 24 (THREAT)
GAME: Jozi rolls weapon4-2: (13)+7+-2: 18 (not Confirmed)
<OOC> Jinks says, "Hit/hit (no crit)"
GAME: Jozi rolls 1d6+5: (1)+5: 6
GAME: Jozi rolls 1d6+4: (5)+4: 9

Wow, she hasn't taken that hasty a mauling since the manticore...

not a highlight of her career, that.

Snarling in pain as she's so assailed, Jozi doesn't have much time to savor Jay's acquiescence when the situation changes again.

She shifts to ward the healer, now, slashing with her claws, sheering through the skull and dislodging an eye, though the damned creature just won't lie down!

She grits her teeth, even as the things tenacity so closely resembles that of her people, and she barks, "Flank!"

<OOC> Jinks says, "Jozi's pose will indicate it's in baaaad shape."
GAME: Jay rolls weapon2: (12)+8: 20
<OOC> Jay says, "tumble back to 3,23"
GAME: Jay rolls damage2: aliased to 1d6+0: (6)+0: 6
GAME: Jay rolls acrobatics: (19)+12: 31

"Ok!. Ok!" Jay thrusts, the silvery-steely needle of estoc plunges deep into the body. he feels a resistance, then a surge forward, suggesting a cavity. Jozi said 'Flank'. In the bird's muddled mind, he decides she mean to avoid the flank; she just told him to get behind her. Yes, that's it.

He leaps back, out of range and an easy strike. "I think I punctured a Lung, it's still fighting."

He's not chicken, he's just closest to the way out.

<OOC> Nemori says, "Move action to direct the SW again, so it can attack,"
<OOC> Nemori says, "converting another spell to CSW, this one on Jozi."
GAME: Nemori rolls 1d20+8: (4)+8: 12
GAME: Nemori rolls 3d8+6: (21)+6: 27
GAME: Nemori casts Invisibility Purge. Caster Level: 6 DC: 17

Nemori opens her mouth to snap.. then shuts it again with a growl. As the floating rapier continues to follow and harass the spider dog, Nemori inches close enough to touch Jozi and let the gathered positive energy flow into the half-blood. "Why is it not dead yet?" she demands instead.

GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+9+1-1: (19)+9+1+-1: 28 (THREAT)
GAME: Jinks rolls 1d20+9+1-1: (14)+9+1+-1: 23 (Confirmed)
<OOC> Jozi says, "nice"
GAME: Jinks rolls 2d4+10: (5)+10: 15
<OOC> Jozi says, "Knock!"
<OOC> Jinks says, "That'll drop it. Sorry, I didn't mean for her to take the KB like that."

The way Kerry-Anne crooks one arm, it's obvious she usually fights with that crescent-shaped shield. Where it is now is anyone's guess. But she watches each of the others put hits into the thing-- one after another, again and again-- and steels herself for the Job.

Heavy boots slosh through the shallow waters as she takes a curved approach, trying to find an angle opposite Jozi to split the monster's attention. Then she comes in with a cross. A fang breaks and spirals away through the air, the jaw snaps next and half the Shriezy's face turns a quarter-turn. The legs spasm once and it folds dead into the pool.

Kerry-Anne stares down at the corpse, panting.

GAME: Nemori spends ONE use of CHANNEL ENERGY.
GAME: Nemori rolls 3d6: (12): 12
GAME: Jinks damaged you for -12 points. 41 HP remaining.

Nemori lets out a breath. "Finally," she says, brandishing her coin forward again for one last surge of rejuvenation that washes over everyone before she puts it back in her pocket. She looks at Kerry-Anne for a moment... perhaps thinking about how it turned out to be a good thing she didn't push the woman down the hill.. and takes a moment to assess the eldanar's stability before she returns her attention to the Angel. "I do not know what this... place or thing have done to your friend, but I imagine setting this angel free could not hurt. I cannot see how it will help, mind."

Jozi glances sidelong with a momentary incredulousness as Jay....

Alright, now he's over there.

Pushing on as she's still in the thick of things, she feels the healing infusion from Nemori, "Probly the tech!" she guesses, and her vigor restored, squares up anew to-

Watch Kerry Anne roll in with the decisive blow.

She looks down to the collapse abberation a moment, then up to the girl and smiles a warm, "Well struck, girl!"

Ahem's, then, "Nemori, thanks sugar." followed by, "Jay, ya alright?"

"It needed Kerry Anne to hit it. Thanks Kerry Anne." Jay says, still staring. The abominations' appearance didn't improve with the impacts, and dead it is even more gruesome."

The egalrin looks down at his front, his red streaked clothes and feathers, his blood, whatever that liquid on the ground is. Whatever that liquid which sprayed out of the Shriezyx was. "I'm bleeding."

He's bled before, it's almost routine. His hand tightens on his rapier's grip. "I'm ok. Ok."

"And thanks Nemori. I am glad you are here."

"I... I don't understand what th'fuck this is." Kerry-Anne says, looking up dumbly from the metal floor to inspect the metal walls, the pulsing lights, and the strange artifice mechanisms. She takes in a deep breath and chokes when she notices the angel in his half-life prison. "... why... why did Heady come here?"

The Eldanar blinks, looking at each of the three in turn. "How did he know it was here?"

The mechanism hovering over the angel resets. The freshly-cut wounds weeping a little after the damage to the script from Nemori's most-recent healing is undone.

Most of the webs have been torn down by the violent exchange that just concluded. They tangle between your legs like macabre skirts, sully your boots, and bob atop the half-emptied pool at the center of the room. Jozi closes her eyes a moment, sighs, hen, "Mebbe... Heady was..." and trails off, before stepping over to the angel.

"Mebbe this poor soul reached out ta Heady.... or" a shrug, "Was what was driving Heady all along? How long he been around?"

There's a look to those sadistic mechanisms, and she reaches down for her warhammer.

The final source of light is thusly revealed to be an orb-shaped lapis lazuli, tumbled and polished, and suspended in a cut platinum claw. It extends over a series of stacked platinum boxes. Coffins, really. Two are tall, shaped for men to stand and bolted to the wall. Leather straps dangle slack inside the shallow alcoves. Three more are stacked one atop the other, shorter and deeper. Two barred doors are closed and contain the desiccated remains of trapped Shriezyx. The middle cubby has bars hanging ajar and stuck now with rust.

Jay is suddenly aware that the sky is gone! His head darts, he looks outside. Sky. There's sky. His breathing is still quick. The fallen webs add a macabre dress to his suit. Like he's the stenographer of the dead.

"Maybe it called to him." He stares. At the coffins, the straps. Strap. Straps and cages. And jars to gather fluid. Hold fluid. "Bob Bob Bob was talking about glands but I think this runs on people. That it's the true dark tech. It's all sorts of illegal. I think. I'd have to check. I don't know. We should get someone that knows more. Go back to town. Regroup. Delegate."

Far, far away. His head twitches so he can stare out of the mound again. Sky.

"How much do you even know of your friend?" Nemori questions Kerry-Anne says after nodding to both Jay's and Jozi's thanks. She does nothing to stay Jozi's hammer, either.. after all, she did suggest freeing the angel. "Perhaps further investigation of the room may offer us clues about Heady's fate." And it may help keep Jay's focus, too, on the task.

Kerry-Anne blinks at Jozi and then Jay. She opens her mouth to speak only to be distracted by Nemori's question. "Dunny brought him-- Odundik-- or... or he knew about him when Mama Bula found him?" She's not sure, really.

Suddenly, she sucks in a breath, stepping through the webs and water to grab at Jozi's warhammer shaft. "No!" Her gaze is exhausted and manic and she sets her jaw ready for a fight. "You can't. We might need it to fix Heady."

She can't bring herself to look at the suffering creature mounted to the wall.

"Maybe it can help him.."

There are options. Break the Machinery. Worst that can happen is we 'kill' it in which case it returns home. Otherwise we can try to heal it up some after its away from the machinery that keeps messing it up."Leave it alone, go back to town to research and gather materials, discussing it with other Artificers.

The aberrations are just guard dogs. There are kennels/crates for transport. They just were left inside and died.

"I... I don't know." Integrity admits, looking at Kerry-Anne, then Jozi. He focuses on the question at hand. "If it is doing something evil, then healing Heady with it is committing a crime. Allegedly. Depending on the type of Evil. Heady is a wargolem, don't they need special devices to heal them, or repair spells? I don't know how it works for the 'alive' golems versus the 'dead' golems."

"I think, trying to set him free and heal him is the best option. Breaking the scalpules. If that doesn't work, we could try killing him."

"Do you think if we tried killing him, it would fix him up to some equilibrium?" His head turns to the mul'niessa, now he's suggesting her sort of experiments. He looks back, "Maybe it's keeping him alive."

He hops forward, leaning close. "Nemori, can you speak to it? You're closer to the divine. Allegedly."

He just had to add that. He's a lawyer.

Jozi sighs and shakes her head again. Mother, show her the way....

Jozi's grip on the hammer slackens under Kerry Anne's entreaty, and she regards the mechanics anew before, "We could try an break all this junk, and hope ta heal him through what's been done to him."

A beat, "We could, some of us, ride back an grab us a passel of experts ta do this proper."

She's not entirely divorced from putting something out of it's misery, there's been plenty of critters on the farm that's been hurt too bad to let them go on, and once in a while she had to take care of it.

Daddy insisted.

Her new vocation has generally applied such treatment to those in a very different need for release.

The Angel is examined. He's got anchorpoints holding him to the wall and tubes shoved down his throat. Full extraction will be grotesque.

Nemori looks a bit side-ways at Kerry-Anne, then shakes her head. Perhaps unconvinced that they would be able to talk the Eldanar into leaving this place without trying /something/ at least. "Release it," she says, then, in a 'what is the worst that could happen?' kind of tone. "I will be ready." To talk to it, like Jay suggested? "It may be we are releasing it simply for it to beg us to kill it. But perhaps it will know something of Heady."

GAME: Jay rolls disable device: (13)+12: 25

Kerry-Anne is unhappy but too tired to fight the three people she knows are doing the right thing. She grew up in a religious home, knows the prayers, and wears a holy symbol her late mother gave her beneath the simple breastplate. No creature deserves this fate let alone this angelic being. So she steps back, falls to her as on the edge of the pool, and tries to at least cry quietly as things beyond her understanding play out.

The mechanisms the trio sees to are well made of strong metals-- but also fine and intricate with a lot of exposed, moving parts not meant to withstand the blunt impact of a hammer or the clever tools of a lawyer with... interesting hobbies. The mounted scalpel comes away first, smashed and pried. The buzzing alarm returns. Steam escapes from a damage tube and sporadically sputters water near to boiling.

The gears next. Needle-like leads anchor into the exposed flesh of the creature. Old and new wounds alike close as Nemori and Jozi, both, bring to bear the divine energies they've left to muster. Priceless artifacts fit for any museum, college, or library are reduced to piled scrap and junk. Nails, next, that line sockets have to be pried loose. Then the amalgamation of piping, tubes, and threaded wiring pulled from a choking gullet.

The bolts from the creature's wing are stubborn. It's tiring work and the lights in the domed room have begun to fade. But not the angel; he continues to glow his golden glow. The skin shines where it hasn't been cut away to reveal savaged meat, muscle, and bone. The wing falls away from the wall with a flutter, shedding down and feathers as dark blood pools around the holes the anchors made.

Finally, the crown. A bolt is lifted and a latch slid before the half-crown folds up and frees the head. The whole form flops like a half-carved auroch flank, arcs of angry blue-black energy reaching from the wall depression to keep its hold. He's caught and eased to the ground.

Half of his face is missing. Perhaps there are recipe's for angel's eye, the meat of his cheek, or the perfect, pearly teeth. Perhaps it was simply burned away pressed against the cruel trappings of black artifice.

The runes are gone but the worst of the wounds remain. Open cuts larger than your hand where his arms and legs should fit. His one good eye flutters as the light of his form dies quickly. There's a sigh, whisper quiet and full of impossible and infinite relief.

+... rest,+ he exults with all the might of a newborn doormouse. In every language at once.

Then he's gone.

The hemispherical room drops into utter darkness.

Kerry-Anne sobs.

Map
https://www.mipui.net/app/index.html?mid=mkmdcl70s3j
Diamonds are the lights.