"No, I am not that stoic," replied Amaldaris with a forced smile as he indicated the wound he had received.  "I could do with some healing myself if that is available.  It's bite was bad and it's gaze was worse.  I was unable to attack or even defend myself after it looked into my eyes.  We should be careful of them.  If there are more that are avoiding us rather than choosing to engage then I suggest that we let them go.  We do not need to pick unnecessary fights."

He glanced again at the umberhulk.  "Besides that feels like an innocent denizen of this cave complex rather than the root of all evil emanating from here, if you see the distinction I make."

"Just make sure that if you kill one you are standing downwind of me at the time." Jenna says to Nicolai when he mentions holding a dagger above his head. "They stink." Her lips then curl into a grin. "And should you annoy the Goddess you would likely need more healing than that -" she nods towards the poultice "- will provide." She's working on her sense of humour but there's probably still a way to go. And besides, she thinks, looking over at Corros, her own slate was not exactly clean when it came to annoying Arma.

Pushing those thoughts to one side for now, Jenna walks over to Amaldaris. "Hold out your arm." She instructs the High Elf. When he has done so she places her hands on his bare flesh, her lips moving in prayer to the Goddess, her eyes briefly going milky white as Arma's energy flows from her hands, knitting the Elven monk's flesh together again.

Cast Cure Wounds, Level 2, Amaldaris +18 HP
17:53, Today: Jenna Drax rolled 18 using 2d8+5.  Cure Wounds, Level 2.

After a brief respite, the party bypasses the hole in the floor and advances deeper into the cave complex. Around a slight curve, behind a tall column of natural rock, the party encounters a strange device. Made of metal, it resembles an octopus, sitting upright, its eight arms held aloft, close to its body. The ends of several of the arms hold metal balls, about the size of a crabapple. The three arms facing south, southwest, west, and due north (facing the elevator shaft) do not. The arms are slightly convex on their inner faces, forming chutes that run from the tip, where the balls are situated, into holes in the body. A metal plate at the base of the device reads is inscribed with Forgotten Script. It reads:


The high-ceilinged chamber narrows at its southern end, forking right and left. The faint sound of metal ringing against rock seems to be coming from the western branch. An unpleasant aroma wafts forth from the eastern tunnel.


Your Turn.

-

"My thanks for the healing Priestess Jenna," Amaldaris said with a friendly smile and a slight bow of gratitude as the flesh on his arm closed up completely, her magic healing his wound fully, leaving no sign of a scar at all.  He flexed his hand, grasping the shaft of his spear, confirming in his own mind that his combat capabilities, particularly his speed of striking, had not been diminished.  The sleeve of his shirt still showed signs of the injury however, both torn and ripped in several places and marked with both his blood and the umberhulk's saliva.  The High Elf paid those marks no heed however.

Proceeding forward he studied the strange metal device with the eight arms, confusion on his face as to its purpose.  As others studied the script on the metal plate on its base, Amaldaris made his ways towards the southern end of the chamber where it split into two.  Stopping short of the actual fork he concentrated on what he could hear and smell from the respective tunnels, trying to work out what the unpleasant aroma was and whether there was any rhythm to the echos of metal striking rock.  Whether it was the sound of a miner at work or something else.

Nicolai leans forward to examine the device without touching it.  "More of the ancient script," he says, probably unnecessarily.  "If we keep doing this, I'm going to ask you for lessons, Corros."

Jenna walks around the metal structure, circling it, her eyes on it, studying it though in truth she knows not what it is, what function it serves, so even if something were amiss about it she would be unlikely to spot it. Still, perhaps logic might aid her efforts to make sense of it. "Perhaps those balls -" she points to the ones still atop the various arms "- are meant to roll down at some point, join those ones." Now she gestures to the three that nestle in the body of the metal beast. "Perhaps when all eight have fallen something significant might occur?"

The blond haired Priestess shrugs, continues to circle around the structure. Or perhaps the balls have no significance whatsoever. Even although her gaze keeps flicking back to the ones that are still mounted on top of the arms, curiosity flickering in her eyes.

"What is the name of this ancient script?" enquired Amaldaris quietly.

"I don't know that I can teach you to read this," Corros says to Nic slowly.  "I'm not sure I really read it, and I certainly don't know what it's called.  It's more accurate to say the Library translates it, puts the knowledge in my brain.  And even then..." the warlock pauses and peers at the machine. "'Seismography Station Number 2,'" he quotes.  "Even with the words, I don't always get the meaning."

Corros looks at the machine, trying to parse the meaning of the device.  A moment later, he shrugs and his eyes move to the hallways.

"I'm more likely to push one of these balls down the ramp than want to explore that smell.  The sound...another machine?"
This message was last edited by the player at 01:57, Sat 24 June 2017.

"Hmm."  Nicolai frowns in thought.  "Yeah, that's not exactly how I've learned any tongue before.  Seismography," he repeats, rolling the unfamiliar word around his brain.  "No idea.  But it's a numbered station, so presumably this is one of several.  And if those are like guard stations or way stations, each one is at a location that has some significance and value.  Not just placed randomly."

He shrugs.  "So what's valuable or significant here?"  He turns in place, slowly scanning the walls.

Nicolai's careful visual inspection of the cavern chamber yields no valuable insights. The "Seismography Station #2" device is the only man-made object in the room. The rest of the cavern appears completely natural and unremarkable. There are a few stalactites hanging from the ceiling. These do not appear to be the disguised ambush predators that dropped on Jenna, Corros, and Deepdelver during the fight with the Umberhulk.

The tink, tink, tinking continues, seeming to come from the right-hand tunnel. To Amaldaris' pointy ears, it sounds like metal picks striking rock. Deepdelver, a man with much more digging experience, shares this opinion. The smell emanating from the opposite tunnel is a mélange of death and stale excrement.

-
This message was last edited by the GM at 16:42, Thu 06 July 2017.

Amaldaris retreated a few paces away from the tunnel junction so that he could speak with his companions and report what he had observed.

"The sound of mining comes from the right hand corridor.  The scent of death and a meat eater's excrement comes from the left hand corridor.  Which would you rather investigate first?  I would vote for the right hand corridor as there is something moving down there.  Or do we wish to do something with this machine first?"

"Let's see who's mining down here," Nicolai suggests.  "After all, we are here to stop miners from digging up things best left untouched, yes?"

"Lead on, my friend," Corros says, "before they find something else we don't want to deal with.". Even the theoretical knowledge of the sleeper is enough to give the warlock pause.  And to cause a level of nervousness that makes him eager to prove the mining has been stopped.

"Stay behind me." Jenna says to Corros with a smile, moving to stand in front of him as they begin to make their way down the right hand tunnel, her eyes occasionally glancing upwards, just in case there are any more unpleasant surprises lurking above their heads.

The party takes the right fork, entering a fairly narrow, slightly down-sloping tunnel. It gradually curls left, then opens up a bit, before entering a large chamber. Stalactites and stalagmites reach towards one another from ceiling and floor respectively. The sound is definitely louder, more defined; it seems to be originating from deeper in this chamber. The adventurers creep forward, using the stalagmites to conceal their approach. They reach a sort of windowed ledge, where a gap in the rock allows them to look down on a lower level of the chamber. It appears that if the party continues forward, they'll eventually come to a sharp, descending bend, which will take them to the area they are now observing from above.

An odd assortment of creatures, each chained to another, is digging a shaft into the wall of the chamber below, supervised by half-a-dozen grey dwarves, one wielding a bullwhip with sadistic enthusiasm. The cracked exoskeleton of a dead Umberhulk, like a discarded suit of plate mail, lies near the excavation. Among the motley crew of diggers, a dark-skinned gnomish creature, a white-haired drow, a nearly naked, twisted mannish creature, and a grey, vaguely reptilian creature. They are clearly digging against their will.


Your Turn.

-

I don't see anyone who looks like a Yonder's Hole captive, Nicolai sends to Corros, but this is definitely undesirable mining.  Those dwarves - some kind of subterranean breed like the drow?

Perhaps, Corros replies to Nic.  They've the same bad skin and worse attitude.  I'm going to pull the others in so we can figure out what to do.  Let's see what our new friends make of this.

A smile crosses the warlock's lips, one that is half amusement, half pain at the shock of what is about to happen.  His mind dances across his friends, caressing Jenna with a rush of affection, drawing Gronk in with friendly pat on the "back."  Then he reaches out, carefully, almost quietly, to Amaldaris.  The warlock's "voice" is calm and reassuring.

Don't panic.  This is how we communicate in difficult situations.  I can't read your mind, I can only hear what you send me.  The others are here, too.  I'm going to reach out to our dwarven friend next.  We need to plan and I'm curious what he knows about these dwarves below us.

Corros waits patiently, then reaches out to Deepdelver as well.  His mind reels at so many contacts, so many bridges.  It takes more seconds than he would like to become the calm center of a storm, pulling at threads and weaving a "conversation" together.

He'd like someone to be proud of him for doing it and is left feeling hollow when he realizes that there's no one left to impress.

Jenna’s eyes close briefly, a mere second or so, as she feels Corros’ mind brush over her own. Different thoughts dance through her head momentarily, ones of love, tenderness, lasting for but a fleeting moment, a moment of fleeting intimacy before the others are each drawn into the mental web.

The Priestess’s right hand grasps the shaft of Arma’s Blessing tightly as she awaits Deepdelver’s response. The tenets of Arma’s faith seldom allowed for shades of grey, preferred to deal in black and white. Evil was afoot here, whoever they are or wherever they came from the workers were being treated harshly, cruelly, so Jenna’s immediate instinct is that they should intervene, strike down these grey dwarves.
This message had punctuation tweaked by the player at 10:21, Wed 19 July 2017.

Corros senses Deepdelver startle at his unexpected telepathic presence. The dwarf starts to speak, then stops, thinking his reply instead. Clearly unused to such thing, the old dwarf's lips work silently beneath his grey, almost white moustache.

Duergar- dark dwarves. Fallen brethren. Greedy. Good fighters. Don't usually do their own dirty work- slavers, as you can see. I doubt they're digging for platinum.

-
This message was last edited by the GM at 21:13, Sat 29 July 2017.

So we're going to do this.  Nic's mental tone is as carefully uninflected as his speech would be.  It's laundry, or perhaps market day.  We don't have a lot of options for subtlety.  Open with a volley on the one with the whip, then Gronk, Amaldaris, and I close with them?

Yeah, volley of spells on the slave master, then let them come to us if they will, if not, try to herd them.  When they mass, even if they don't fall for the bait, I'll cast something nasty.. It's not the most original of plans.  It will, Corros hopes, do in a pinch.

Corros
61/61 HP, AC 13
Two Eldritch blasts at the dude with the whip.  +8 to attack, d10+5 damage each

Right.  Whose idea was this expedition, again? Nicolai asks rhetorically as he checks the string on his seldom-used bow.

Nicolai
AC 15; HP 61/61; Superiority Dice 4/4
Attack x2: Shortbow on whip-wielding dwarf (attack +6, damage 1d6+3)
Bonus: Master of Tactics Help on Corros' attack
This message was last edited by the player at 00:13, Thu 27 July 2017.

Jenna moves to try and get in to a position where she has a clear view of the dwarf with the whip, takes a deep breath as she feels the Goddess's power begin to course through her, the ends of her blonde tresses starting to stand on end as she becomes a conduit for Arma's power, raising her hand and pointing at the whip wielding slave master, ready to channel that power, unleash it at him.

Jenna
AC: 21, HP 56/56
Casting Guiding Bolt (Level 4) at duergar with whip
Spell slots expended (including this one): 1 x Lvl 4, 2 x Lvl 3, 1 x Lvl 2

Concentrating hard Amaldaris tried to send back his thoughts, hoping that he was doing this correctly.  He had experienced something similar once before while studying in the cloister and, though it was something that made sense to him, it did not come easily to him.  Communication with one's allies in a combat was something that had been drilled into him during his training and thinking like this felt wrong.

I, Amaldaris understand, he focused in his mind, trying his best.

He then looked to Nicolai and waited for him to launch his arrow, initiating the assault.  When that happened he planned to move quickly to engage the dark dwarf with the whip, flanking and turning him if possible so that others could attack his rear.  His attacks were his usual pattern for an opponent who's strengths he did not know, two quick slashes with his spear and then a pair of off hand jabs with his fist after first summoning up his inner Ki power and releasing a little of it.


Amaldaris
AC: 18, HP 63/63, Ki Points: 8/8
Move: Use is 45' move speed to try to get behind or flanking the dwarf with the whip so that others can use Sneak Attack on him
Attack#1: Normal Strike with Spear: +7 to Hit, 1d8+4 damage
Attack#2: Normal Strike with Spear: +7 to Hit, 1d8+4 damage
Bonus Action - Spend 1 Ki point for a Flurry of Blows
Attack#3: Normal Unarmed Strike: +7 to Hit, 1d6+4 damage
Attack#4: Normal Unarmed Strike: +7 to Hit, 1d6+4 damage

Gronk flashes Corros & co. an enthusiastic thumbs-up and pantomimes charging the grey dwarf slavers. His meaning is clear. As soon as his companions' ranged attacks are away, the half-Orc gladiator is going to close with the enemy and do his thing, up close and personal like.

Gronk
AC 19; HP 88/88
Move to nearest enemy
Dash action to get into position; CE die on tap just in case

-
This message was last edited by the player at 21:22, Sat 29 July 2017.