Seline will do her best slicing at the tubes to permanently disable the incredibly cruel device

Gasping for breath, Cole silently thanks the gods for his feet finally finding purchase. Rubbing his sore neck, he quickly collects himself, whips the bow from his back and aims an arrow at the creature who had recently marked him for death.

The frog hisses evilly, then spits a glob of black phlegm at Cole and launches itself at Anthony.

Cole might have dodged out of the way of the foul-looking spittle, but he is caught a bit off guard as he negotiates pulling out his bow and lining up a shot.  The black phlegm smacks onto his neck and he can immediately hear a sizzling sound and smells something like burning leather.  2 points of damage to Cole.

The frog barrels into Anthony and smashes the wizard into the floor.  The frog then bites into the wizard's neck and begins to shake its head like a pit bull.  7 points of damage to Anthony from the tackle and the bite.  The wizard shrieks, then goes limp and quiet from blood loss and tissue damage.  At times like this, it really stinks to only have 7 hit points.

Elwood hurls a hammer at the frog, catching it in the head.  There is a sickening crunch as its skull caves in and the frog collapses with a surprised look in its beady eyes.  Flyspamon will be pleased.

Jack and Cole fire their bows, but their aims are unworthy of the task.  No matter, since the frog is dead now.

Seline slices and dices her way through the tubing on the machine.  Liquids of various colors begin to spray out of the tubes.  The machine immediately begins making loud clanking and grinding noises.  With a final clank, the machine falls silent and a partially formed flesh cube drops out of the exit shoot.  Unlike the fully formed flesh cubes you have seen so far, this cube is misshapen and made up of recognizable body parts.  You can make out a face and various limbs.  It hits the ground with a squishy sound and does not move.

Dreya blinks and takes in the scene through the doorway.  Things have gotten messy while she was "away".

---

Spoiler text: (Highlight or hover over the text to view)
17:16, Today: Castle Keeper, on behalf of Cole Hiller, rolled 12 using 1d20+4.  Shoot frog with flank bonus.
17:15, Today: Castle Keeper, on behalf of Jack, rolled 8 using 1d20+5.  Shoot frog with flank bonus.
17:15, Today: Castle Keeper, on behalf of Elwood, rolled 2 using 1d4+1.  Hammer damage.
17:12, Today: Castle Keeper, on behalf of Elwood, rolled 19 using 1d20+2.  Throw hammer with flank bonus.
17:05, Today: Castle Keeper, for the NPC Frog, rolled 7 using d4+d4.  Damage to Anthony.
17:05, Today: Castle Keeper, for the NPC Frog, rolled 12 using 1d20+5.  Attack Anthony.
17:01, Today: Castle Keeper, on behalf of Cole Hiller, rolled 2 using 1d6.  Damage from spittle.
17:01, Today: Castle Keeper, on behalf of Cole Hiller, rolled 11 using 1d20+4.  Dex check to avoid spittle.
17:00, Today: Castle Keeper, for the NPC Frog, rolled 6 using 1d6.  Initiative.
17:00, Today: Castle Keeper, for the NPC Party, rolled 5 using 1d6.  Initiative.

---

Startled, Dreya spins left, then right, strange black hair whipping around as she looks for the flickering fireplace and the smooth walls of the rock interior. With a gasp, her gaze flies toward her missmatched booted feet, lifting one and then the other, yet no ornate rug covered the floor.

A strangled shriek catches her attention, and she turns her eyes flick up, seeing the chaos spewn about that was not there moments ago. Then she sees the wizard lying on the hard stone floor. Pointing, she shrieks "Only Anthony! What happened to Only Anthony?! Simply Elwood, can you heal him? If not, I might have something..." Her voice trails off as she starts patting herself down, looking for goodberries stashed in pouches.

[OOC - meaning I have to consult Dreya's character journal to see if she has any goodberries in stock.]

Anthony gurgles and drools as he bleeds...

Elwood rushes over to Anthony, and intoned "In nomine Flyspamon,  IV ringers lactate" [casts Cure Light Wounds]

[OOC:  Add my two remaining luck points to my toll]

With a mighty gurgle, Anthony is dragged back to consciousness.  6 points of healing from CLW.

---

Spoiler text: (Highlight or hover over the text to view)
07:27, Today: Castle Keeper, on behalf of Elwood, rolled 6 using 1d8+2.  Cast CLW on Anthony.

---

Seline looks at that party "There is a startling amount of coincidences lining up here. We are going to have to deal with the Orcs that we found under the, what was it again, hunting lodge? It almost seems like there is some grand design being implemented by the Gods or a supreme being that we are destined to get to the bottom and hopefully with fate on our side, succeed at the stopping of this" pausing for a brief moment not knowing what word she wants to use to describe what is going on she just makes a general motion with her hands to show she means everything.
"I'm thinking after we take the kids we have back to town we purchase some explosives and bring this temple down upon it's foundation, also and this is more just making a mental note verbally, we are going to need to do some research and follow up with the self proclaimed queen of the forest."

Anthony sits up, coughing violently. He blinks and then shakes Elwood's hand. "Thank you, Elwood. And thank Flyspannon. Much appreciated. What did we learn?"

Seeing Anthony doing better relieves a small amount of the tension. "Well, we learned that this place is disgusting. Apparently they are turning children into food for who knows what. I...I...I've never seen anything so vile. We need to destroy this room and everything in it. I'd really like to put an end to Oswald quickly and then be done with this place."

Nodding in agreement with Seline, "Yeah, there's definitely a lot more going on here under the surface and a lot of leads to follow up on. I definitely would like to see this whole temple razed to the ground. I just want to be sure Oswald is dealt with so we don't see him pop up again somewhere else."

Anthony turns a shade of green and staggers back. "The...the monster! We must destroy him and all who help him. We must!" He steadies himself on the wall, trying to keep his lunch down.

Dreya looks up as Seline speaks. "There you all are! One of those frog men grabbed me and took me to this really nice room inside a rock and even though he said he would take me back to you all, I kind of doubted him." The Druid takes a huge breath before rushing the next string of words out in one rush. "Anyway, he said if you all would walk away now, no more harm will come to any of our party and things would not escalate. He also said something about some of my sisters being held somewhere, but I didn't get any more...oh what is it called...oh yeah! Information! I didn't get anymore information on that because I was trying not to laugh at the notion that any of you would even consider walking away from what is happening here, and I didn't even know I had sisters!" Dreya takes another huge lungful of air. "And believe me, I tried convincing the frog man that humans are apex predators which IS the natural order of nature, as there are always more powerful predators, but I don't think he was going to listen to anything I had to say, so I just asked to be brought back to you guys."

At that point, she looks around the group. "I do have healing if anyone needs it?"
This message was last edited by the player at 03:21, Fri 04 Aug 2017.

"You were missing!"  Cole shouts, clearly upset by this declaration of the druid's.  Rushing to her side, he puts away bow and arrow. Quickly his eyes dart and scan over the druid, assessing her injuries. Seeing she is unscathed, relief flashes across his face.   Scanning the rest of the room, Cole nods to his other comrades.  "Yes, the evil that is going on in this temple...to these children...is atrocious and I readily agree we need to destroy it in any way we can. But we need to find Oswald first and get those children safely out of here before we start blowing things up.  Perhaps, we just prevent this machine from working?  It looks as though Seline may have already done that."  The Ranger eyes the smoking wires and machine bits caused by the thief's slashing.  Extricating a spare scrap of cloth, Cole attempts to wipe the black gunk the frogman spit at him. "Also, I could probably use a bit of healing myself.  I could go on if none is available or needs to be saved."

Anthony waves his hand. "Let's get the children out and get help. This may require even more of us." He looks rather piqued and is clearly trying to put on a good face.
This message was last edited by the player at 20:50, Fri 04 Aug 2017.

With Anthony showing signs of a healthy recovery, Elwood heads back over to the toad and recovers his hammer, wiping off the creature's ichor with a nearby rag.

"Part of me wants to push on while we have surprise and momentum, but if things go a little south in the next encounter, we probably would have to high tail it out of there and leave the children behind.  I'm confident that if we leave now with the children, my temple will provide some sort of assistance.  Anyone else have any thoughts?"

He looks over at the cage with the balls that were once children and does his best to hold himself together.  He gets a large empty sack from his pack.

"We should probably bring one of these back for others to examine.  If a couple of you could hold this sack open, I can try to scoop up one of these with my shield and put it in the sack like we did back at the hunting lodge."

Dreya nods enthusiastically at the Ranger. "Yes! I was gone! Though maybe only in my mind? Ugg, that creepy frog guy was even saying how this," and her arm sweeps the room of human kids and flesh cubes, "is all normal. The natural order of things because humans eat their eggs, and keep...animals...in cages,  so like a tit for tat kind of thing."

"Well, I'd hate to leave with Oswald still alive, but we need to be near full strength to take him on. I suppose we can leave now with the children and come back later. At least we'll be able to help some of these poor kids."

"I...have no idea what to do with these child cubes. Maybe we could at least see them properly buried."

With that, Jack sets about trying to open the cages and free the children in this room before gathering the party and venturing back the way they came.

"It is probably best that we leave now, the price we paid to make it just this far was far too high, I'm not sure we could afford to go any deeper or dwell with the scourge of Oswald." Seline walks over to Dreya, dropping her voice to a whisper meant to to be lower than any eavesdropper could hear but not trying to hide it from the party "Did the frog that abducted you say anything else about us leaving and taking him up on his deal, it is important that if we want that ruse to work that we make sure to meet his caveats so they think we given up"

Dreya turns toward the elven rogue...illusionist...illusiogue? With a puzzled look on her face, she eventually gives a shrug and replies, "I have no idea. I just told him I had no interest in power and would tell you all he asked you to leave if he brought me back to...here. And then I was here. Tada!" Dreya beams at Seline with a huge smile.

"We can gather these children, then go out the way we came in with the other children.  We just have to figure how to get past those statues with all of them, some of them deaf and blind."

"I have entangle...that worked last time," Dreya replies, adressing the Cleric.

Seline blinks watching Dreya as she jumps to the next subject without even a bat of an eye. Clearing a throat a bit more for herself than any other reason Seline adds "Entangle works, I like the idea of not destroying them in case any of these deplorables decides to find and follow the path."

Anthony nods. "Complete concurrence. That is a very solid plan."

He helps the others as needed to help get the children out...

"Yeah, that tanglement worked well before. Let's gather up these kinds and get out!"

Sounds like the party is snagging the flesh cubes and the kids, then hightailing it back to town.  No problem.  In the interest of moving things along, assume the plan goes off without a hitch and you make it back to the Temple of Flyspamon in one piece.

The priests take in the children and agree to make arrangements for their care.  They doubt there is anything they can do with the flesh cubes, but they will try.

The priests are deeply disturbed by what you found beneath the Pain God's temple.  They suspected evil was afoot based on what the party had previously reported, but demonic possession, child maiming, and machinery converting children into bouncing food cubes represents a far greater evil than they feared.

The head priest on duty suggests you rest up and then return to the Temple (Flyspamon's) in two days.  The priests will discuss your report and no doubt provide additional resources should you decide to return to the Temple of Pain.

Assuming that is agreeable to the party, let me know what (if anything) your PCs want to do in town for the next couple days.  I will have XP awards posted ASAP (probably tomorrow).  Levels will be gained.