(Homebrew) Heroes of Bardstown

Aubrey swiftly curses the aberration (Hex, dex) and then unleashes another beam of golden crackling force towards it.
Eldritch blast: 22 Force: 11 Necrotic: 5

Grugga clears his eyes and tears across the floor, his head just barely under the smoke. He lunges into a thrust, hoping to skewer the disgusting creature like a fish on a harpoon.

Attack: 15 Damage: 11

Zip: Attack: 19 Damage: 5

While Rohuzar struggles to resist the corrupting gaze of the aberration, Leelan enters the room and plants an arrow in its large green eye.  Aubrey follows up with a blast of his own necrotic energy, connecting with the arrow and turning the eye into a smoking wreck.  The creature stumbles and falls. 

His eyes still blurry from the smoke, Grugga slashes at where the creature had been standing with his awesome sword and Zip dutifully blasts its corpse.

[We are out of initiative!  Well done.  You have killed everything there is to kill here!]

The room is still dominated by a bonfire, though much of the smoke is rushing out to spread into the halls and other rooms.  Inside, you also can see the far wall beyond the fire.  There is a circle chalked on the floor and marked with powdered silver and overlapping five and six pointed stars.

Arcana DC 16:

Arcana: 11

Arcana: 7

Grugga pours his waterskin onto a spot on his cloak and holds that over his mouth - a trick taught by Gel-Nagev to protect against particulate matter. Knowing that they don't have much time before the smoke potentially kills them, Grugga tells his compatriots to wet their cloaks and breathe through it, then he does a quick survey of the room. He points to a chalk circle in the back of the room, "A teleportation circle," he states. He then kneels down by the corpse that spilled out out of the chair to try to identify it. The cultist? Or was the cultist able to flee...? He also looks around for any important looking documents either on the shelves or on the desks.

(3 things he wants to know: Can you easily destroy a teleportation circle? Who was the corpse? Any important looking documents on the desk or on the shelves that he can identify in a split second?)

Investigation: 6
Perception: 12

Rohuzar looks for anything of value (informative) that he can retrieve before running to get to their captives and get out before the whole place goes up in flames

Investigation 22 and another for disadvantage in case of smoke or speed 19 

Aubrey quickly follows Grugga´s instructions and then tries to help out with searching for anything of value before retreating out of the hidden temple.
Investigation: 20

[Nice rolls.]

Searching the smoke filled library, you find the following:

• Most of the books and papers tossed into the bonfire have been destroyed.  A few were salvageable:
  • There is a mostly destroyed copy of a geneology of the Falcone family tree.
  • There is a list of squad leaders in the 2nd legion... their place of origin, next of kin, and in some cases more particular details like gambling habits or the names of their pets.
  • A partially burned map with the locations of Church of Ord shrines and temples, as well as taverns and other locations where the church holds worship or services.
• Additional books in the library left out of the fire are mundane works on magical theory, seafaring, and the occult.

• There are two corpses.  
  • One of the corpses (the one left in the fire) is burned beyond recognition.
  • The other corpse (the one knocked out of the fire when Aubrey pushed the Nothic in) is that of Judex Caius Spezza.  The cause of death seems to be a deep, necrotized would just below the left collarbone.

Medicine DC 12:

 Arcana DC 14:

•  You also find three stone discs.  Two are familiar, but one is new to all of you.

Grugga:

Medicine: 19
Arcana: 20

.

Medicine: 12

Arcana: 18

After catching his breath for a few seconds, Leelan tries to help salvage what they can from the fire. As an academic, he is saddened by the lost of these tomes of knowledge, though he tries to draw connections between the nature of the documents and the cult.

When his companions discover the corpse of the Judex, he gasps aloud. "My word! What was he doing here?"

He turns to their leader. "What are we to do? We have the body of an official government representative on our hands. Oh dear, this investigation has taken quite the turn."

Guilim looks around the room, not knowledgeable enough with magic outside of the divine spells he could call upon in battle. To be safe he makes sure to slash and stab at the corpse of the creature a few more times.

Rohuzar grabs the judexi corpse. "Bring the books. And the prisoners upstairs. He must regroup."

Aubrey is disturbed by seeing the fresh corpse of Judex Caius Spezza. "Yes we need to tread very carefully now." He mutters.
He nods to Rohuzar and tries to help out with getting things upstairs as quickly as possible.
He sends Furvus up ahead to scout for threats, staying etheral for now.
Furvus perception: 6

Hacking at the body of the Nothic, Guilim manages to dislodge its eye, which rolls onto the floor.  Green, and about the size of an apple, it is solid like a gemstone and doesn't appear to have been anchored to the skull by anything like an optic nerve or other mundane anatomy.

There is no strange occurrence when these stone discs are handled.  The judexi's corpse is lifted by Rohuzar while the others collect the books.  Thick black smoke continues to spread throughout the complex.

Climbing the stairs again, you emerge in the guard room inside the warehouse.  Furvus alerted you to a minor problem.  One of the guards is awake, and is trying to chop the forearm off his unconscious companion to get himself free of the bedframe.  He looks at you with the sword, seemingly weighing whether or not to try to fight you while one-handed and chained to a bed... but he loses the last of his nerve when he sees Rohuzar has a slightly charred corpse slung over his shoulders.  "You... you all are madmen...".

Grugga cradles the singed documents in his arms and ascends the stairs, coughing lightly from the smoke. When he sees the guard trying to lop the arm off his companion, he frowns. "We are madmen? You are the ones sacrificing yourselves for an evil hag. Count yourself lucky that you still live, because your priests and your companions do not."

Grugga addresses his companions: "This smoke is going to alert the scourges and the cultists alike; we need to move fast. Clearly, the 'Judex Spezza' we met earlier was not the real one." He nods to the corpse in Rohuzar's arms. "It stands to reason that we actually met with a cultist in disguise and told them what we knew... As far as we know, the fake Spezza thinks we left for Fidelis. That might give us a small window of opportunity to surprise him. I think our next move should be to find him and take him out." He taps his meaty thumb on his stubbly chin while thinking, "We need to find that Scourge that gave Aubrey that message earlier - he might be the only one we can trust. Anyone else - anyone - might be a disguised cultist."

The Orc looks solemnly at his companions. "Until we get this sorted, we don't trust anyone until we test them. Remember when the Judexi first interrogated us? The asked us things only we could know. We should do that for anyone we confide in."

"You are coming vith us. Ve need secure place. Temple Ordo must do for now, as they are confirmed enemy of our enemy." Rohuzar nods to Grugga and gestures for him to lead. He then gestures at the captives. "Separate them, ve have another set of manacles. Quick, ve must leave before soldiers arrive."

The conscious man is not in any condition to resist.  He lays down the shortsword and consents to being manacled.  The other man is still unconscious.

At this moment, you are all gathered in the small guard room, at the top of the stairs, inside the warehouse.  There is a strong odor of smoke, but once you close the door down, very little of the smoke from below is able to pass through.  It seems unlikely that anyone outside would understand what has happened below unless they come in to inspect.

It is about an hour after midnight.  If your goal is to reach the Temple of Ord, you will need to pass through the Port and Market District.  You have one bound and bloodied man following, and you are carrying a bound unconscious man who's hand has nearly been cut off, and a naked and partially burned corpse of one of the Emperor's secret police.  Shall we proceed?

Here is a map of the city with a few of the prominent places you have visited added in...

Aubrey, you suspect finding the Scourge who passed you the note may be difficult.  He gave you a way to contact him, but it is through a spy all the way in Fidelis, which isn't much help here tonight.  It would be easy to reach him through official channels, but at this time you know him only as a Scourge working directly for Judex Spezza.  Inquiring after him with the government would be hard to accomplish without word getting back to 'Spezza'.

Grugga steps out into the early morning air and sighs. "This won't be easy." He looks sideways at the prisoners. "Maybe we should gag them to limit any problems they can cause." He pauses. "So, what route should we take? I'm worried about guards, or worse: cultists. The water is their turf... but maybe we can walk along the water's edge? It should be quiet this early and it'll deliver us right to the lighthouse temple." He looks to his group for affirmation.