Shattered Sea Chronicles, Book I: Festival of the Dead

[EvolutionKB]

Redbeard

Redbeard puts his bacon back into his belt pouch while approaching the flame. He clears his throat and spits into the fire. Redbeard tries to notice if the fire can be put out by normal means. "What ye be sayin' Larren, some sorta altar? Can ye be blessin' it to make it go away or somethin'?" After posing his question, Redbeard looks through the crates and clothes for anything of significance. After he and his companions are satisfied Redbeard will cover the corpse with his cloak.

Redbeard looks detached at all the grisly carnage. "This place be reekin' of suffering and loss. We need to find the head maker of carrion, and stop whatever their plans be." He then moves foward once more, following Broderick.

Search +2

 

[pathfinderq1]

Redbeard looks detached at all the grisly carnage. "This place be reekin' of suffering and loss. We need to find the head maker of carrion, and stop whatever their plans be." He then moves foward once more, following Broderick.

"Agreed," Johanna said, with a single quick look at the body and a sad shake of her head. "If this fellow isn't going to get back up, we can say a few words, but our real task lies ahead." With that, she also moved up to join Broderick by the opening- whoever was down there was the leader of this nest of evil, and they had to deal with him...

 

[Imerak]

Larren looks over the fire carefully. He finds it hard to concentrate in this putrid atmosphere, surrounded by death. "It doesn't look like anything special... this is just a place to dump the bodies." He inspects it anyway, searching for any hints as to the fireplace's purpose. Trying not to vomit, Larren then looks over at the dead man plaintively. "And I'll pray for him the same time I pray for the rest of the dead." The fact that he has to economize his prayers stabs at Larren. "Let's... let's keep moving."

[sblock="OOC"]Using Spellcraft (+6) or Knowledge: religion (+1) to see if the fireplace is anything special.[/sblock]

 

[Bloodweaver1]

Pauli 'The Psion'

Pauli is absolutely flabbergasted by the presence of a non-conductive, non-consuming and especially non-psionic floating flame. In addition, like syrup to pancakes is that the flame flares in different hues of obsidian. He simply gauges at the flame and completely ignores the gore that covers the rest of the room. Without a much thought he uses the last of his energy to manifests a simple power and attempts to look deeper into the flame. "Truely fascinating..." Mumbles the mind mage.

OOC: Manifest Detect Psionics/Magic

 

[Blarkon Dragonslayer]

May 3, 1106CR, Afternoon
beneath Stonegate

Johanna and Broderick move to guard the door, Broderick judging that the narrow corridor goes a good 100' east before taking a sharp turn to the south.

Behind them in the room, Redbeard's searching nets very little, other then yet another layer of stench over his normal aroma.

Jillian has more luck though, finding in the northeast corner of the room another secret door of the type found out in the main hall. Luckily for her she also manages to find and disarm another pendulum axe trap, since in her condition the axe would very likely have bisected her neatly.

The trap dealt with, the door is opened, revealing the room that was very likely the one at the end of the trapped secret corridor. It is a long, fairly narrow chamber, it's walls lined with racks. The racks are mostly empty, but a few dwarven waraxes, and some heavy crossbows and longspears, are still there. What is most interesting are the fourteen dwarven and eight human skeletons laid out neatly on the floor. Each one is laid out holding a weapon clasped in bony hands, and wears tattered armor. Most also have a shield nearby.

A heavy chest sits just inside the oaken door that leads to the trapped corridor, and proves to be unlocked. Within are several sacks of dwarven silver coins, a heavy tome, with a small lock on it, and a beautifully crafted dagger, in an ornately inlaid sheathe.

Pauli's senses find that the flame is indeed magical in nature, but he and Larren can tell that it certainly doesn't use fuel to burn. There doesn't seem to be any immediate way to turn it off.

 

[Bloodweaver1]

Pauli 'The Psion'

The sound of stone sliding against stone is enough to pull Pauli’s attention away from the dark flame. And once he spots the composed bodies of dead soldiers, the mysteries of the black flame quickly take a back seat. “Prodigious…” Mumbles mind mage in awe. With his enhanced senses he carefully looks over each piece of gear hoping to gain some kind of insight of what this place might have served and who these people might have been.

OOC: Searches through everything with Detect Magic/Psionics. I take it the Black Flame is from the Illusion school?

 

[Blarkon Dragonslayer]

ooc: Spellcraft and Psicraft aren't the same skill, so I don't think Pauli would be able to tell schools of magic, though of course he can perceive the presence and general strength of magic, using his Detect Psionics power.

Pauli's examination of the skeletal corpses yields no immediate clue as to why or how they came to be in this place,though he is relatively sure they've been here for quite a long time. His psionic senses do detect the presence of magic on an amulet one of the dwarven corpses wears, and on one of the shields held by a human skeleton. He is fairly sure all of these persons died by violence, as some bones are broken, what is left of the armor and shields are much battered, and some old bloodstains are still present.

 

[Bloodweaver1]

Pauli 'The Psion'

"Whatever may have transpired here did so some time ago. And these people did not pass peacefully into the afterlife." Comments the mind mage. "However I do notice that the amulet there and that shield are more than what they appear. Perhaps we can put them to use once again."

 

[EvolutionKB]

Redbeard

After looking over the remains of the humans and dwarves, Redbeard shakes his head. He mutters to himself. "What be happenin' down 'ere?" He looks around, trying to figure out how long these remains have been down here. Specifically he looks at the coins, looking to see if there is date when they were minted. He checks the quality of the weapons and armor, seeing if any is of high quality. After looking over the treasure he decides it is best if they shut the secret doors, and keep it in here until they a leaving for good. He leaves once more, following Broderick and Johanna towards their final goal.

 

[Imerak]

"Well, let's hope it's not the reason they died," Larren chuckles. He picks up the amulet and cautiously tries it on, then ventures after the others.