Dweeble followed behind Bram a few feet away with her much shorter, bounding strides.  Her fingers still idly twirled and spun the dagger in her hand but her attention had been drawn to the floating object in the center of the room for the moment.

Unlike Bram, she didn't move to test it or touch it, she simply watched him begin to question the floating rock.  After he'd slid his hands through the air around the stone, she gave a cry of dissatisfaction and tossed her own hands into the air.  "Ugh!  Rocks, rocks, rocks!  Heavy rocks, blanket rocks, and now floatin' rocks!  How boring."  She turned away and walked towards the only other exit she saw from the room.  Ever cautious, she approached it carefully and did her best to peer out into whatever lay beyond.

---

OOC:  Dweeble is going to head BP 10, assuming that's where the door/end of the room is.  Just looking out to see if anyone/thing is there that's more interesting than another rock.

22:51, Today: Dweeble rolled 8 using 1d20+3 with rolls of 5.  Perception.
22:51, Today: Dweeble rolled 20 using 1d20+9 with rolls of 11.  Stealth.

"This just keeps getting weirder and weirder." Mayon commented, shaking his head with a faint smile as he walked into the room, examining the rock along with Bram.

"Some sort of levitation spell? No, I don't think that would be strong enough for something of this size..."

Jak watched Dweeble curiously. She was....well, he couldn't really say she was acting strange, since he hadn't know her that long. For all he knew that was completely normal behavior for her! But it did bear watching. Who knows, perhaps the magic dagger was influencing her.

He walked in to the next room and paused. "Huh. That's somethin' y'don't see every day." He circled the stone and looked above it and below it (without sticking himself at all underneath the rock) to see if it was the rock that was interesting and magical or something else or was it hiding something.

The group examines the floating stone, and discovers no hidden strings or apparent forces. The rock seems entirely ordinary, aside from the fact that it is floating several feet in the air.

Dwee sees that the opposite corridor continues into darkness.

---

Map updated.
This message was last edited by the GM at 01:51, Sat 24 June 2017.

Dweeble turned away from the dark hallway with a sigh of annoyance and a mumble of, "Blasted special eyes."  She turned back and noticed that Bram had been joined by more of the group.  Her eyes narrowed into slits as she watched them play around with and test the stone.  Even so, the impatient little halfling simply didn't have a care for something so utterly not shiny.

Walking back to the others, she gave a 'hrmph' of annoyance and slid between the others to get to the stone.  "It's not even shiny!  It's just a rock, see!?"  Bending her knees for a moment, she sprang into the air.  Her jump propelled her up above the stone, her feet aiming to come down on the rock and stand on it.  Floating or not, a stone was a stone as far as Dweeble was concerned.

OOC:  Sorry, guys.  I couldn't resist.  Here's hoping the boulder waiting to crush us all is small...

10:02, Today: Dweeble rolled 10 using 1d20+7 with rolls of 3.  Acrobatics.

Dwee perches on the stone lightly. The stone wobbles a bit, but remains aloft.

"Didn't the human boy say something about bad things happening if the moving stones moved?" Morg says, watching Bram and Dwee. Despite it not seeming like the kind of thing that belongs in dwarven built area, he walks closer to inspect it, and the roof above it.

---

01:57, Today: Morg Danforge rolled 7 using 1d20+4 with rolls of 3. Stonecunning check on origin of any stonework on hovering stone.
01:57, Today: Morg Danforge rolled 7 using 1d20+3 with rolls of 4.  Perception check at roof.

Morg can't really tell if the stone was carved by dwarves or not - it looks to be made of the same type of rock as the stone from the room with the cage-dropping chains however.

The ceiling above the rock looks indistinguishable from the rest of the ceiling in the room.

---

Any other experimentation/examination of the rock, or move on/back to another room??

Asano follows through the room, his gaze captured by the floating stone. "Curiouser and curiouser," he mutters, walking around the rock as Dweeble clambers over it.


OOC:
Arcana- 22
Anything spark a memory about such a phenomena?

Asano doesn't remember anything specific about floating stones, though he intuits that such levitation magic might be useful to miners moving rocks during excavations.

Sounds of skittering movement echo from the dark corridor ahead, perhaps from some sort of animal's claws on stone.

Dweeble's eyes shot up from the observers around her and towards the dark hallway she'd previously failed to pierce.  A second dagger was in her free hand a moment later as she slid off of the floating stone.  With nothing to hide behind, she quickly ducked behind Bram, straightening herself to hide her tiny profile behind his stature.  Her mouth formed frantic, whispered words from behind him as she did her best to hide herself.  "Maybe you should be watching the shadows, Spectacles.  Dweeble's only got two eyes and they don't see in the dark!"  She quickly tightened her lips and did her best to peer from around Bram's side at whatever was coming towards them.

---

Moving to BS 12 (??  I think that's the square that's behind Bram from the way the skittering sounds are coming from.)  Dweeble is going to tail Bram should he move towards the door.  She'll hide behind him from whatever comes through.

16:02, Today: Dweeble rolled 19 using 1d20+9 with rolls of 10.  Stealth - Hide.
This message was last edited by the player at 23:09, Mon 26 June 2017.

Asano gazes down the corridor where the noises were coming from, but they abruptly stop. He can see nothing coming around the bend in the corridor.

---

Map updated.

Asano moves deeper into the room at the sound of skittering claws, his focusing wand slowly encrusting over with ice. "Something approaches from the tunnels," he whispers, ducking for a clear view down the hall from behind the floating stone. "Something with claws."

OOC:
Move to BT10.
Ready ray of frost for the first enemy I see.

Morg taps the back of his warhammer on his shield to try and get everyone's attention, and then mimes moving back to the room with the tied up believers. He silently moves his lips.

---

Mayon snaps out of his quiet thoughts at Asano's words and nods at Morg, beginning to creep slowly back along the wall while keeping his eye on the corridor ahead.

Moving to BU12

Bramwell had been absorbed in scribbling down notes and sketches of the hovering stone, but he was roused by the sound of Morg's tapping.  He reluctantly stowed his quill and journal and whispered, "Scrabbling rats ought not be cause to flee this place.  Let's at least have a look?"  The half-elf held the illuminated sphere aloft and cautiously proceeded into the corridor to take a peek around the bend.

---

Perception to check for traps or other dangers on the way to BJ11 to peek around the corner:

• 13:20, Today: Bramwell Caulder rolled 10 using 1d20.  Perception.

As Bram moves cautiously down the corridor ahead he gradually becomes aware of the sickly smell of death. Turning the corner, the tunnel opens into a square room that reeks of decaying flesh.

Three human corpses, reduced to little more than bloody bone and sinew, are sprawled in the room’s center. Two oversized rats root among the bodies, stopping to chew flesh they’ve pulled free. Scuttling noises come from narrow crevices in the walls. Neither of the rats pay Bram much mind as they go about their grisly business.

---

Map updated.

Dweeble turned back to the others as Bram ventured out from the room.  She watched as they had begun inching away, heading back to where the group had come from.  She shrugged her shoulders and mumbled, "Reszur," under her breath before following behind the half-elf by the dim light of her dagger.

She stopped as she came up to Bram's back.  She quickly spoke her daggers command word once more to douse its light before taking up position just to the bespectacled man's side.  "Smells like someone forgot to salt their beef, eh?  Them furry creatures'll probably protect their meal.  Not much for sharin' in Dweeble's 'sperience."  She twirled her daggers anxiously in her hands but kept from creeping forward.

---

Moving to BJ10.

Morg follows Bram, and seeing the rodents says "We can't let the rats get past us to the tied up believers. Seeing your recently dead friends eaten is something even cultists don't deserve."

He looks up at the roof for signs of cages or anything else strange, and then tries to see if he can figure out how the corpses died.

---

Move to BG14 if the rest of the party come west of BL.

12:16, Today: Morg Danforge rolled 9 using 1d20+3 with rolls of 6.  Perception check of roof.
12:16, Today: Morg Danforge rolled 15 using 1d20 with rolls of 15.  Investigate check to try and figure out how the corpses died.

Are these rats slightly bigger than normal ones, or huge Princess Bride-like R.O.U.S.?

Jak followed the party, taking the rearguard spot once more as he was wont to do. He listened to the others, but he had no fear of rats. In fact, the mouse in his pocket took that moment to peek out, whiskers twitching as it sniffed the air. Jak smiled down at his pet. "Twitch, I hear some o'yer friends, perhaps cousins." The mouse made a disapproving squeak and then disappeared back in to his pocket. Jak let out a quiet chuckle.

He looked around from the back and whispered, "Wait, y'think we should kill the rats, Morg??" Jak sounded surprised and disappointed.

"If they're full, and skittish, we can leave 'em. If not, well..."

---

Action: ready attack on rats in case it looks like they'll attack.

If they are very big, use warhammer. If not, take out and light a torch.

Bramwell's face turns grim at the dreadful sight of the huge rats feasting on corpses, and he looks away from it.  After a few moments he forces himself to look again, this time viewing the corpses with his divine sense to check for the telltale necrotic miasmas emitted by the undead.

If no such presence was to be found he will rejoin his comrades and whisper, "Those monstrous vermin seem preoccupied with their grisly meal and disinclined to aggression for now.  I would see them destroyed to ensure they do not spread to Red Larch, but the cultists are a higher priority.  We can return to deal with these creatures later."  He glanced back toward the way they came and suggested, "Shall we check the door behind the old dwarven statue?"

---

Using Divine Sense to detect fiends or undead within 60 feet that aren't behind total cover.  Mainly verifying that those corpses are actually as dead as they look!

If they do turn out to be undead then scratch Bram's suggestion to go elsewhere.  Instead he'd want to wade in and destroy the rats and undead immediately :P

As Morg approaches, the rats look up and growl squeakily but warily return to their meal.

From his current vantage point the dwarf can't tell much about the corpses except that they have been pretty well ripped into by the rats. The ceiling is unremarkable, as in the prior room.

---

Map updated.

The rats are perhaps not quite the size of the ROUS's, but certainly much larger than regular rats. =)

Bram detects no celestial, fiend, or undead in sight.

Morg follows Bram back, and leaves his lit torch on top of another, hoping to discourage the rats from following them.

---

Leave lit torch at BK11 at 90 degrees on top of an unlit one.

"So, back to the cages, or just the previous room?" Asano says, visibly relaxing as the description of the rats is relayed. "Provided they have enough food, they should leave us well enough alone."