Tide of Shadows

[rhoenix]

Hearing Father Bartel call down from a ways away, Fehl walked a few steps closer to the entrance and called back to be heard relatively well through the echoes. "Yeah, I think I found out where marble-ass came from, along with some other shit. And if you have a 'situation,' tell her you've never heard of her and would never compromise your morals like that."

With that, he walked back into the newly-discovered rooms, intent on exploring.

[Academia Nut]

Within the construction room, there were little patches of dust, and it seemed unusually dry in here. Perhaps some faint glimmer of magic remained in the air that had been used for preservation at one point. In any case, when Fehl reached the trunk it became obvious that it was not as well preserved as his initial estimate. Still quite good, but the bronze lock on it had decayed away ages ago into a green scrap that suggested it had once been whole.

At the lightest touch the whole lock crumbled and the lid popped open slightly. Within the trunk was packed with desert dry sand. Near the top was a small tan bag and a set of bronze bracers still as shiny as the day they had been made, which suggested magic of some sort. At the bottom however were two objects covered in grease that had turned to a wax-like substance in the interceding centuries. Still, no moisture or air had breached the barrier and somehow, miraculously, there was a pair of beautifully crafted bastard swords preserved within the trunk.

[Charon]

The construct paused for a moment as though trying to remember. "She was getting chased by some sort of ghost and fell down the well. Neck snapped. Least that's how the little fleshbag said it happened." Eight began to climb out of the hole now, towering over the halflings.

[rhoenix]

Shrugging, Fehl collected all the items within the trunk, and carefully put them all inside the magical mag he'd bought a while back, which has already proven very useful for such things.

From there, he moved onto the second room, the one with an altar in it, and began to explore.

[Academia Nut]

The altar room was no where near as dry as the workshop, but it also wasn't as crowded. All there was in there was the idol, a small thing made of some sort of greenish stone, possibly jade, possibly something less rare, with gold foil applied in a few places. The item was an odd one, depicting an ambiguous figure of indeterminant sex or race that, if looked at one way, seemed to be clutching its bulbous head in pain, but at a different angle it seemed to be sleeping soundly.

Most peculiar of all though was the way Fehl's spell to detect magic responded. When he looked at it, he detected magic and the presence of one very faint effect in the area, but he could not pin down the source to any one location, while if he positioned his spell such that the idol was not included, he detected no magic at all.

[rhoenix]

Looking carefully around the entire altar room and being now somewhat confused about it, Fehl then shrugged and walked back up to the rope leading to the surface, and called upward. "Alright, I'm done with a preliminary look around. I found a room where I think they made marble-ass down here that had some nifty shit in it, but there's some weird altar room down here that doesn't look or feel right at all. Want to see?"

[Academia Nut]

As Eight climbed out of the hole, the halfling asked sadly, "You said that her neck snapped and yet you speak as if she told you herself? Tell us what happened."

[Charon]

Eight looked down at the halfling. "It was a ghost, as I already pointed out. How would I know what happened here? Or care? You want the body it's down the wishing well. Now if you'll excuse me I have a church to burn so I can convince the other idiots that we're done here before things get out of hand."

[Academia Nut]

There was some whispering amongst the halflings before one of them ran off, while another said, "We have forces at the church, someone else was getting ready to burn it down."

[Comrade Tortoise]

"Well, the priest was clearly mad. His second to last journal entry was calm and rational and was three days ago. His last, one was... a garbled mess. Considering the noose, he possibly became an Allip upon death. But an Allip probably is not what caused the mass death. As for your scout, depending on when she got here, I did not see a halfling among the dead in here, but it is possible she met with some... Allip-madness induced accident or is comatose somewhere, her sense having abandoned her." He thought for a second

"Alternatively she was in a different part of town and was struck dead somewhere else. Again, of course, all dependent upon her timing. The group you have apparently found at the well might know more. In any case, might we proceed to burn this church? No one wants all of those people rising as undead, I do not have the spells necessary to vanquish them all. "

[Academia Nut]

The halflings talked amongst themselves for a moment before the leader asked, "What was the last entry about? Because we are fairly certain our caravan was destroyed three days ago, which would put its loss before the destruction of this village."

The last entry was a simple note about how there was a new well being dug with St. Cuthbert's blessing, as all things in the village seemed to require from the pious population, along with a note about how in the early morning mists a few people had reported seeing a figure in the distance in their peripheral vision.

Meanwhile at the well the halflings tensed up again when they heard Fehl's voice echoing up from the well and they asked, "How many of there are you down there?"

[Comrade Tortoise]

"It is a note about a well being dug with St. Cuthberts blessing. The population was apparently very devout. After that occured, there was a figure seen in the morning mists in their peripheral vision. In the next entry, the priest goes mad." He thought for a second.

"They might have awoken something when they dug the well. Some as of yet unknown battle-grave or ancient tomb or temple. That sort of thing happens sometimes when people delve too deep. We would have to ask the people who are down there to know for sure, or better yet, I would like to examine it myself"

[Charon]

Eight had looked in the direction of the church as the miniature fleshbags mentioned another person. "Curiouser and curiouser..."

When the halflings asked their next question Eight looked back at them. "Three and a dragon."

With that the construct began to move towards the church.

[Academia Nut]

Nodding to two of the bowman, the halfling leader says, "Guard the church, don't let anything happen to it yet, we all need to go have a look at the well."

Meanwhile back at the well a halfling was already descending to look into recovering their fallen comrade.

[Comrade Tortoise]

Without further invitation Ophidia and Naja started toward the well, the later moving at a rather quick pace in spite of his lack of legs, seeming to glide along the ground. The rather thin and lithe wizard walking beside him with a very similar glide which belied the fact that he did indeed have legs which were clearly moving.

[rhoenix]

The halfling descending the rope didn't escape Fehl's attention, despite the whispers in the back of his mind kept reminding him of the wonders of alcohol, and how it could be used for health, healing, and violence.

His question was sharply asked, with narrowed eyes, and his greatsword clearing his sheath to be ready. "Hey! Who the hell are you?"

[Academia Nut]

The halfling ignored Fehl once he looked down and saw the body in the water. He cried out "Amelie!" before adroitly sliding down to splash into the water and grasp at his comrade's cold, dead body. He then cried up to the top of the well, "It is Amelie! Get some more rope and we can get her out of this horrible place."

[rhoenix]

Blinking once as he was utterly ignored in favor of a dead body, Fehl slowly re-sheathed his greatsword as he saw the halfling embracing his fallen companion with grief.

Reaching into his backpack, Fehl withdrew his rope, and tossed it to the halfling. "There you go."

With that, his hand still glowing, he walked back toward the rooms, intending on exploring a bit more.

[Charon]

The enormous hulking, clanking, construct was hard to miss on the way to the well. Eight came to a stop as he saw the halflings and the tall skinny fleshbag among them. The construct was silent as the group approached.

[Comrade Tortoise]

Getting to the well, the wizard looked down and noticed all the fussing going on at the bottom and realized they would probably make a fuss if he climbed down. Climbing up he could do, but it was best for him to either wait, or use his own special skills.

"Naja, you go down second. I dont know how the people down there will respond to a snake your size coming down the well." The snake nodded in response before Ophidia climbed the side of the well.

"flugzeugefallen" he said, then jumped down, floating gently to the ground next to the halflings.

The others who were down there would see a very lithe and trim man in gray skin tight, supple leathers, a skirt that went down to his knees mercifully concealed the skin-tightness in places people wouldnt want to see. His face was obscured by a graphite colored snake-mask that with his hooded cloak made him look very much like the 18 foot long snake that was coming down the hole, climbing along the walls of the well behind him.

"So... is there anything interesting in here besides an unfortunately slain halfling scout?" he asked to no one in particular

[rhoenix]

Stopping as he heard yet another figure drop into the well, Fehl turned around to see the...masked and cloaked figure in the distance, and caught a glimpse of a big snake, too.

Narrowing his eyes and shaking his head at the same time, Fehl remarked to himself before continuing. "...Mages."

A few moments later, he stopped again, realizing a mage would, in fact, come in handy. Turning around, he called to the newcomer. "Hey, you a caster?"

[Comrade Tortoise]

"Ophidia Phagus, at your..." he paused, looking the individual over before continuing "Well, I wont say service, but yes. I am indeed a wizard. Am I to assume that you have found something of interest that might help in deducing why the entire town and a halfling caravan mysteriously died and the priest went mad, killed himself, presumably turning into an Allip upon his death?" the wizard said, summarizing everything he knew so far very rapidly.

[rhoenix]

Blinking once at the rather breathless way in which this wizard, Ophidia, replied, Fehl sighed. "Yeah, all of that and it probably is someone's illegitimate father, too. I'm Fehl Inzeti - nice to meet you. Come on,"

And with that, his right hand still softly illuminating the cavern around them, Fehl walked directly back to the altar room, turning around to wait for the wizard once he reached it.

"There, it's that statue," Fehl said. "That's the only thing down here that might possibly have done this - I didn't see much else."

[LadyTevar]

>>Great Bahumet, heal this hatchling of his wounds.<< Ceridwen prayed in the language of Dragons. From the armor she wore, with the SilverStar family crest embossed upon it, Ophidia could tell she was a noble and seemingly a cleric or holy warrior. The silvery hair and brilliant eyes, as well as her healthy appearance, gave credence to the SilverStar's claim of a non-human bloodline

What proved that claimwas what she was doing: holding something in her hand as her other was on the head of a silver dragon, who looked small enough to be newly hatched. A faint glow came from her hand as she healed the small dragon of his wounds. ((Lay On Hands, 4pts))

"There... Better?"

[Comrade Tortoise]

The wizard noted the Paladin, Silver Dragon, and the fact that the Paladin not only worshiped Bahamut, as he spoke fluent draconic, but was also not entirely human. He would deal with that later.

It was this statue he was interested in.

"Alright, this particular ruin is from one of the older pre-Eastwind kingdoms, from the late period judging from the architecture. I dont know exactly which one, but this room is part of either a fortress chapel or one of their temples. It is not uncommon for such things to get buried by a volcanic eruption only to be rediscovered years later. Interesting though... "

He examined the statue, and so did his familiar. He systematically examined every aspect of it for around two minutes. Bouncing his Detect Magic spell off it like sonar

"The aura you see when you see this under your Mage-Sight, it is a reflection. You are seeing your own spell reflect off the statue, which is itself very cleverly carved. See? The way it is carved it forces your eyes to switch between two different frames of reference, and gives the appearance of two different images from the same carving, one a peaceful sleeper, the other a man clutching his head in madness."

The wizard slid his mask over his head to reveal a man with very aquiline features, a sharp beak for a nose, gray eyes and naturally slate-gray hair. His brow was furrowed as if he was lost in thought.

"I think it might be a depiction of the God Noxeus, a god of dreams, traveling secrets. The only text I ever found that mentions him indicates that could be invoked for mental protection. The two images you see here depict the ambiguity... of dream interpretation. Now, this last bit is me going out on a limb. I do not know whether this god was good, evil, apathetic, or... whether like his statue his allegiances to light and dark were... shifting. But you know how if you talk to someone about your dreams there is enough ambiguity that you will be perceived as perfectly normal, or stark raving mad? That is what this carving represents. That... unknowing. Without knowing more, I would have to take the statue to a major city with a library to confirm much of anything... and I am not even sure that would be safe"