Korin tenses as he sees Neo pause, fully alert and ready to charge into battle.

Neo returns to the group. "It goes about 30 feet...to the left another 20 feet, then a door. To the right, it goes beyond 50 feet.

I suggest the door."

"A door?" Aendyr asked with a look of puzzlement.

"I'm rather flummoxed on this door my own self.  If they can build doors in a cave why didn't they put one near the entrance?  You know, to keep animals, or monsters, or...  us out.  OK, could be they want chaps like you and I to fall in their fancy pit with all its spikes and trap door with a lever and everything, but the proots could slap a door in after the pit, right?  A door's not going to keep the rat princess and her loyal subjects from coming and going.  Those buggers can squeeze under damned near any door, so what on Corellon Larethian's green earth is that door for?"

"You know what it could be?"

It was Aendyr's strong belief that thinking out loud was the best kind of thinking, and once again it had yielded results.

"Maybe there's something what shares these caves with the kobolds and doesn't want proots poking their noses in all the time.  That could be who built the door.  I sure know if I had to sleep and eat next cave over from a bunch of manky little plonkers I'd put in about the thickest door I could find and lock it good."

"So there, I said it.  I'll bet that door is locked, and don't go expecting the proots to have a key either.  I will give a shot at kicking it in, though.  I'm one aces door kicker, locked or not.  If that goes sideways, I brought a hatchet."

Aendyr nodded several times.  This door did not stand a chance.  He was confident they were going to see what was past the door, one way or the other.
This message was last edited by the player at 07:09, Thu 24 Feb 2022.

"Just how big is the door? How tall is it? Is it proot sized or is it larger," Korin growls. "What's it made of?"

They would learn a lot about the door from its composition and size. Wood would deteriorate over time in the damp cave unless it was maintained but it was fair easier and cheaper to construct. Stone, on the other hand, required much more skill and effort but would last a very long time. A larger door would obviously not be made by proots.

Will the party go the direction Neo went, or down the hall straight ahead?

"Oy! I didn't take the time to measure the door, Korin! It was wood...not particularly large...and it was closed...that's about all I noticed.

Aendyr might have a point, amongst all that prattle...might be the leader's quarters...remember there's belief that the humanoids are directed by others."

Neo pauses for a moment and a smile crosses his face, "Or it might be the latrine! Ready to move?"

Aendyr nodded, no longer even looking down the tunnel ahead of them.  He had an arrow in one hand and the bow in the other, but neither particularly ready.

"Right.  Let's go kick in this door!" he said enthusiastically.

He followed Neo to the door in their single file marching order.  Along the way, he planned to stuff the arrow back into his quiver.  He could stow the bow when they got to the door.

"Well let's move on and take a closer look!" Korin says with a scowl.

Qrox moves near the magician.

"Morveya.  Deeper we go, more this seems like we're meant to go, drawn in, mild resistance, success, move deeper...I am not comfortable here."

Morveya arched a brow at the priest's insight, which served to expand on the sense of it that she had.

"I agree fully, Qrox. I keep expecting devious traps, not any sort of fair fight.  And it makes me uncomfortable too. Very. I can think of no way I less want to end, than speared or broken in a Prootish pit trap."   

Making their way down the short passage and to the left, they came quite quickly to the closed wooden door.  The only metal seemed to be a few bands holding it together and a lock.

Neo approaches the door and carefully checks to see if it is locked. If so he will attempt to pick the lock.

While the door had been locked, the lock was of such a crude nature that it barely slowed Neo in opening the door.

Within, they found what must be the food stores for the kobolds.  Although the kobolds had plead starvation when caught on the raid, what was within gave lie to the claim--there were a number of barrels, boxes, and sacks filled with a number of sorts of food and wine.  There were also hanging large pieces of meat, including what looked like about half the corpse of a human.

"Say Neo, that's some first rate infiltration right there.  Though I have to admit I'm less impressed with the contents than your mechanical skills.  What does it say about the kobolds that they don't have a front door, but they lock up their larder?  There was probably this one gluttonous proot who ate up everything they had all the time, but instead of killing him they hired a carpenter to come put in a door and lock up the food.  'Oh while you're here, Mr. Carpenter, can you put a trap door on this hole we dug?'"

Aendyr tapped at a couple of barrels with the toe of his boot.

"We can take their booze on the way out.  I'll bet that's worth something, but it's no good carrying armloads of barrels with little crossbow bastards still lurking out there just waiting to shoot you in your favorite lung, or jab a spear in ya 'til there's more blood on the floor than inside."

He spun around and peered away from the door.  There wasn't a whole lot you'd call noteworthy in this cave.

"Is this the 'beyond 50 feet to the right' place you were talking about?" Aendyr asked Neo, pointing down a tunnel they might or might not have walked down already.

"If so, let's go that way."

Now in a stabbing mood, Aendyr put his bow away and drew his swords.

"When we're done, we need to bury that poor chap as well," pointing to the corpse.

"I'd wager most of this stuff was stolen from the farmers living outside and around the fort," Korin comments. "We should dump anything we're not taking outside before we leave just in case any that elude us. Scavengers should take care of most of it in a few weeks."


"Seems like the only remaining option," Korin says agreeing.

Morveya nodded about the bit pertaining to burying the man.  She looked away from the corpse, and breathed only shallowly, not wishing to be confronted with it.

"Remember," she reminded the others, "I'm yet packing two sleep spells.  If there a lot of them, let me act first, and we can end this the sooner."   

She was not eager to spend more time here than needful, remembering Qrox's thoughts, and still agreeing with them.

"Straight out this door, is the unknown tunnel, Aendyr. I think that might be our next choice...or does anyone want to go back to the main tunnel?"

Neo noticed the wizard's discomfort as she put her back to the corpse. He whispered quietly to her, "I always try to remember their spirit has gone to the afterlife...it helps a bit...sometimes."

"The unknown tunnel is the way to go," Aendyr said, nodding with certainty.  "That's where evil's kitchen awaits."

"Many a tale of subterranean adventure wafted to my ears.  So I know where there's meat storage there's bound to be a kitchen nearby with a huge over-muscled kobold...  well, huge as kobolds go, which is still pretty runty...  and this bigger-than-normal cook kobold wears only a thick, bloody smock and he's called 'The Butcher' or 'Cleaver'.  Then seated around a table are a half dozen skeletons shoveling moldy and decaying bits of ancient food into their mouths.  Since they have naught but bones the rotten morsels fall right back onto the messy table.  These horrors are sure to chuck a wobbly when we come barging in and disturb their eternal dinnertime,"

He dramatically pointed his shortsword vaguely in the direction of Drostan, and then Neo and Korin.

"So steel yourselves for the epic battle sure to lurk just around this next corner."

Morveya did feel better, after Neo's soothing and well meant words.  And nodded after, smiling a brief thanks to the Kuduk sword-scout.

And then Aendyr brought them all up to speed on The Butcher, and his grisly, gruesome, nightmare table.

At which Morveya's mouth gaped slightly and she blanched, nearly visible even in this low light.
This message was last edited by the player at 17:50, Sat 19 Mar 2022.

Having made their decision, the group left the larder behind, turning down a long passageway.  As they continued, there were suddenly a flurry of three bolts which Neo and Aendyr were able to dodge, the bolts striking the walls of the passageway.  In the darkness, they could not see if this was from aimed shots or some sort of trap.

"Just three this time?" Aendyr yelled as he charged headlong down the tunnel.  "You guys are slipping."

The darkness didn't bother him in the least.  Thanks to his nifty infravision he could see just fine up to 60 feet away, which would be plenty for putting kobolds to the sword.  What did bother him just a little was the chance of another pit.  His running down the tunnel to where the bolts came from couldn't be described as cautious, but there was at least the thought in Aendyr's head that he might need to spring this way or that to avoid falling into a pit.  Trusting his sharp elven reflexes had not failed him to this point in his life.

"Tell The Butcher to get ready.  Once I slice up you little crossbow punks, I'm coming for him!"

It was Aendyr's intent to attack the first and probably the second kobold he encountered, assuming the bolts didn't come from some distant trap.  That would be a small disappointment.

---

15:51, Today: Aendyr rolled 8 using 1d10.  initiative.
15:51, Today: Aendyr rolled 18 using 1d20+4.  longsword to hit.
15:52, Today: Aendyr rolled 12 using 1d8+6.  longsword damage.
15:53, Today: Aendyr rolled 3 using 1d20+1.  shortsword to hit.

Korin moved forward ready. He wasn't entirely sure it was an enemy rather than a trap. He scanned the area, looking for opponents and, if failing to find any, origins of a trap.

Neo shook his head as Aendyr announced their presence to all that inhabited the cave.

He followed the dullard elf down the tunnel, but kept close to the left wall, trying to remain unseen.

As Aendyr made his way down the hallway, three more bolts flew his direction, one of which made a solid contact with his left thigh (-3hp Aendyr).

Aendyr was surprised to find six kobolds instead of three.  Tricky skivers!

"I've set my peepers on six proots here, chums!" he called out to the trailing Trozians.

"Make that five," Aendyr amended, as the victim of his halting thrust fountained blood and toppled over backwards.

His leg hurt.  He'd been shot in the thigh several times in his lifetime so far.  It was a good place to take an arrow, or in this case a bolt.  There wasn't anything he knew of in the leg that was needed to keep on living and breathing.  If a healer worth her salt treated the wound it would be good as new in less than a week.  He wondered briefly if the big lizard was worth his salt.  But this was no time for idle wondering.  It was time for the spirited and elegant application of lethal violence.

It was his intention to lunge through the gap where the fallen kobold stood seconds ago and put all three of the kobolds with loaded crossbows to the sword.  Sadly, the execution of a plan rarely goes perfectly.  On the whole it went better than average.

"Four...  Three...  Things are looking bleak for the crossbow crankers."

He expected that the more eager fighters among them would already be there to witness the kobolds' quickly declining numbers, but the others in back could use his running tally reports.

---

01:32, Today: Aendyr rolled 5 using 1d10.  initiative.
01:32, Today: Aendyr rolled 20 using 1d20+4.  longsword to hit.
01:33, Today: Aendyr rolled 8 using 1d8+6.  longsword damage.
01:35, Today: Aendyr rolled 2 using 1d20+1.  shortsword to hit.  Fumble?  Drop?
01:34, Today: Aendyr rolled 19 using 1d20+4.  longsword to hit.
01:35, Today: Aendyr rolled 9 using 1d8+6.  longsword damage.