Bulldust unfortunately does not have boots, he's barefoot.  The low ceiling means he is hunched over and constantly watching upwards for anything that will bump his head, so his feet are getting an intimate feel for what lurks in the sewer.  "I wonder whos dat wos?" he muses as a particularly fresh lurker oozes between his toes.  He wonders what they're capable of when allowed to congregate in a tunnel like this.  "Can dey make a poo swarm?!"  That thought is alarming.  Grasshoppers can, so why not poo?  He decides its probably true, shudders, mutters "Nurzhan wouldnt have liked it down ere.  E's lucky e's dead."

The bugbear pauses momentarily at the intersection to look up then sniff the air, then looks down to see which way the poo juice is running.  He lurches forward past Riza and into the center of the intersection when pushed.  He dares not look back, fearing it was the dreaded swarm that bumped him.  Instead he straightens his back and stretches as he looks both ways into the darkness, then prods at the grating overhead with his longspear to see if its loose.  "We is only halfway ta da marketplace.  Da norf tunnel goes ta da far end ov da city.  Da west tunnel goes off ta da side ov da city, so we should look in dat one first."  If he notices nothing else in the north tunnel he will edge past Minmorc into the west tunnel and along past the goblin corpse to get a good look at what lies ahead.

In reply to Bulldust (msg # 22):

Oopses waits his turn to get into the intersection, pointedly not looking at the corpses.

The little goblin priest is alarmed at the sight of his dead kinsmen and hurries over to the one in the western sewer, his big boots splattering noisily as he does so.  While not inclined to touch the corpse, he looks over it for a sign¹ as to the cause of its demise.

¹ either physical evidence or whatever portents that Bargrivyek deigns to provide.

Bulldust notes with envy that Dregz is wearing boots ... large boots.  He wonders if Bargrivyek bestowed them, and who he'd have to sacrifice to get some.

OOC: Just need to sacrifice anyone wearing boots your size ... present company excepted.  ;>

Jurz, of course, is excrementally knowledgeable and knows shit - because it is part of druid training.    He knows that bears DO shit in the woods and that if the bluebird of happiness flies overhead, its poo splats in the same way as any other bird poo.  He can tell the difference between rat raisins and the   chocolate-drops that rabbits make, he understands the difference between night soil, meadow muffins, manure and bullshit.  From the odour of the ordure he can identify some species of animals and from lightly squeezing a dropping he can tell you how old is.   Indeed, he has quite a lot of poo down pat.  However, he tries really hard not to think of that now.  Instead he keeps a look out to the rear.

Even when they come to the junction and the splashing and shouting attracts his attention to choice of tunnels and the dead goblins -  he does little more than shiver briefly, before turning his attention rearwards again.

OOC: Ahh!  Such beautifully crafted musings on scatological metaphor to go with Sunday breakfast.  Truely purgative!  Jurz is hereby promoted to the rank of Coprolite.  :-)

OOC  Boys!

Moffdust picks her way carefully along the sewer, avoiding the worst of what it offers. She considers casting Detect Magic as they march along, but decides against it. If anything here seems 'magical' she really does not want to know.

Riza moves carefully through the sewers to the left tunnel, spear ready she gently prods the goblin corpse... And if there is no movement she will spear the corpse just in case.

Once she is sure it is truly dead she will move a bit closer to investigate

The exploratory technique of 'push the front guy forward' proves quite acceptable this time as no traps or ambushes are sprung by Bulldust's sudden entrance. When he jabs at the overhead grill with his longspear an orcish face appears above (but carefully out of reach of the jabbing spearhead).

"Has yous finded anyfing down dere yet?" the orc asks eagerly.

Bulldust can't see anything else of interest down the northern sewer so he starts exploring up the western one. He can't see anything different up the western sewer yet either but it does extent beyond his 60ft darkvision range.

The western goblin corpse receives a lot of attention. It doesn't respond to Minmorc's prodding with his greatspear or Riza's spearing from closer range so Dregz and Riza move up to inspect it more closely. The corpse was evidently hacked about quite mercilessly; far more than would have been required to kill it, and there is a lot more splattering of blood all around it than you have previously seen. Some of the blood had washed away but above the waterline (there are only a couple of inches of sluggishly moving water in these sewers) the blood is already dried. Dregz's inspection shows the goblin's leather armour is hacked open and ruined. A broken wooden shield lies nearby and a rather crude-looking and slightly rusty, small dagger is discarded nearby but whatever other weapon it might have carried has gone missing.

OOC: Main game map updated.

"Yeah!  I found some orc brains."  Bulldust replies to the orc at the grating before he moves on along the west tunnel.  He will follow the west sewer to see where it goes, longspear at the ready.

"Ders sum dead Gobbos wot got hacked up real good." Minmorc will then follow bait, er, Bulldust down the western tunnel.

"Is dem dead gobbos some of yous lot or some of ours?" the orc asks through the sewer grill.

Moffdust gawks at the dead goblin then calls up to the orcs. "Wes all ok. Dey was youse gobbos. Sliceded not bitten. Dese killers has knifeses not teethses." She steps past the corpse and follows Minmorc into the western tunnel.

The western sewer is about 240 feet long and ends at another 15ft diameter pit with another 6ft vertical shaft overhead leading to a grill at ground level above. This time Bulldust and Minmorc see 3 goblin faces peering down at them.

"Who goes dere?" one of the goblin guards shouts down.

The little goblin shakes his head in horror at his kinsman's terrible wounds, muttering a prayer to Bargrivyek over the body.

Bulldust calls up the the goblins "Poo goes dere!  Its Team Arda-Nuf, da shit kickers wot is clearing out dese sewers.  Dis section is OK, so wes goin back now ta where dem orcs are, den wes going in da norf sewer towards da market.  Dere are some of youse gobbos dead back dere, unda where da orcs is. Youse can go get em out if ya wants em."  He uses the height of the chamber at the end of the sewer to stretch his back and turn his longspear around to point back the way they had come, then he heads off back to the junction and turns left (norf) and keeps going.

So Bulldust is (perhaps appropriately) the first one down the northern sewer, too. As he passes the other pair of dead goblins it is obvious they were both hacked about well beyond the point of death and dried blood is again splattered around them. Again the only weapons remaining are a pair of discarded small daggers and an equally crudely-wrought, small morningstar. The latter lies clear of the blood-spatter but bloodstains still clearly show on its spikes.

The northern sewer runs for about 240 feet before it opens out into another big pit. This time the pit is 20ft diameter and has 3 other openings in the sides as well as another 6ft shaft and grill above. The sounds of the marketplace drift down from above. As well as the tunnel that Bulldust enters from on the southern side of the pit there is a 6ft diameter tunnel heading off to the southeast, another 6ft tunnel to the west and a 10ft tunnel to the north.

OOC: Main game map updated with smaller outline of sewer system added to show general layout discovered so far.
This message was last edited by the GM at 14:45, Tue 23 June 2015.

Minmorc will follow along behind Bulldust and will occasionally make comments about how much he likes his new pair of heavy duty iron shod boots that are doing a great job of keeping his feet warm and dry. When they get to the next chamber he'll look over his shoulder at the party and say "we's gots anudder chamber, doz we wanna check out everyfing or doz we wanna go straight an get outta here real fast?"

Jurz has been happy to follow along at the back, keeping his ears and eyes out for anything coming at them from behind.  However, once Minmorc asks for option, he takes some time to look around the new pit.  There are three exits, as well as the shaft above them, so he looks for any signs that might show which way the gobbo slayers went.

He knows there was a lot of blood splattered about at the killing, so he pays particular attention to places where blood (or anything else)  might have scraped from the killers' clothes onto the sewer's sides.

Moffdust frowns and looks impatient to get out of the sewers like Minmorc suggests. "I tink wes must look in all dese sewerses, else de Queens guardses could says wes didnt looks everywhere. Maybe wes should splits up an search dese small passages first. Den wes can gets all togedder ta gos down de big tunnels. Bully and Minmorc could leads de sides teams, an some of usses could stays ere in de middle."

Minmorc will scratch his head. "Err.. Okays, how's bout me, Riza and Oopses goes dats way, Bully, Moffa an Dregz goes dat way an Jurz an Raven in der middle?"

"Dats right!" Moffdust nods emphatically. "Wes goin west. Get goin Bully. We makes it quick, den we meets back ere." She pushes him towards the west tunnel and calls back over her shoulder "An if youse needs our helps, jus scream!"

"Well awright Moffa.  But if we see any killers den we come back fer da ovvers.  Youse got ta share dem around, not kill dem all yerself.  Same goes fer youse Minmorc.  Lets go Dregzie!"  He points his longspear into the west tunnel and stalks off quietly squishing the lurkers as he goes.

"Wese gotta come back wid at least one nasty," Dregz agrees with Moffa.  Splitting the party is a concern for a goblin whose god is hells-bent on getting folk together, but the sewers are not pleasant and he's willing to overlook it just this once in the interests of getting out of here sooner.

Tucking his Holy Book under one arm, the priest pulls a dagger from his boot, holding the point before him as he follows Bully and Moffa into the west tunnel.