Baldar carefully closes the door. The party quietly exits the west door and regroups on the porch. There are no sounds or signs of movement from the kitchen. There is little obvious around the immediate area that could be used to barricade a door – the porch is empty, and the hall contains nothing but an old bench. The doors open inward off the hallway. All remains quiet.

"I mean," Tuuli scratches her head, "Someone could hold it shut. Like a strong someone."

"I don't know if we should leave someone behind to hold the door by themselves while we explore." Baldar thinks a bit more, her brow furrowing and her bald head wrinkling up. "If we cannae bar the door, then maybe we can put some kind of alarm on it, so we get some warning the farmers have left." She reaches into her bag and pulls out the cup from her mess kit. She returns to the door and balances the cup on the doorknob, such that when the door is opened from the inside, the cup will fall off and make a noise. Baldar shrugs and looks at the others, "Sorry I ain't got any better ideas," she whispers.

“I can tie the knob of both doors together. If anyone or anything pulls on the knob from either side they’ll hold against each other.” 

Walt shrugs and pulls out his 50ft of hempen rope. 

Walt ties the two knobs together with Tuuli's help, crossing the hall with rope. (Dex check with advantage for determining knot strength: 19 )

Baldar carefully balances her tin cup atop the knot as an alarm.

All remains very quiet.

Walt gathers up the group and relays his thoughts on the situation.

”Alrighty, I hope those knots will hold in case our friends in the kitchen get a little feisty. If it’s alright with you, I’d like to take a peek into that room there.” Walt points to his left towards the room to the southwest of the structure. “I saw a red smear on the window as I passed by the window. Shall we?”

Walt begins making his way down the hallway and makes a right towards the entrance that Tuuli and Baldar used. Along the way he casts magic stone on three stones in his pouch. He pulls out a heavy magically embued stone and keeps it at the ready. He begins to take note of some streaks of red mud on the floor. He pauses and focuses in on the mud to see if he can see where the smears may lead.

Perception check on the streaks of mud. He’s trying to see where they lead and any details that might explain their source (ie footprints, animal tracks, etc.) 24

Walt stays in the hallway and doesn’t yet enter any doors while he follows the tracks. 

While Walt is studying the red streaks of mud on the floor, Baldar pauses to place an ear first at the northeast door, then at the southwest door, trying to listen for any movement.

Perception: 20

Tuuli again posts up at the corner, where she can see both branches of the T hallway. "Walt," she whispers as he goes by. "If there's something dangerous in there, try to bring it out into the hallway, where we have more room."

Walt stands outside the door to the southwest chamber. The streaks are right outside it. It's an indeterminate smear, together with a partial shoeprint in the same crimson mud. It seems to have been tracked out of the room Walt has expressed interest in through the door he's standing in front of.

Baldar listens at two other doors, but hears nothing. Just the wind outside.

Tuuli positions herself so she can see both hallways.

Tuuli nods at Walt to go ahead, once Baldar and Bendrak are in the lower hallway, too.

Baldar moves into position behind Walt, axe at the ready.

Walt see's that the tracks appear to be leading out from the room to the porch. He thinks to himself "Hmmm...whatever it is that tracked these prints, they seem to have left the building."

Investigation check to discern any clues from the prints. Were the prints from someone walking out under their own power or were they being dragged out?

He looks back towards his friends and gives them a thumbs up indicating an all clear. He points to himself and then towards the closed door to the southwest of the building. Walt waits for his friends to get in position and then he'll slowly open the door and peek in. He'll slowly open the door little by little as he peers inside. IF he see's any threats he'll back out and call out the threat to his friends. 

Stealth check to open the door quitely: 20

Perception check looking into the room: 17

(ooc: I forgot the investigation check roll. Here it is. )

Investigation check: 15

Walt opens the door with an audible creak. It's an old living room.

The furniture is haphazardly arranged and looks close to falling apart. Beneath, the floor is covered in hundreds of handprints painted using crimson mud.

There are no visible occupants.

Walt winces as he hears the door creak. His heart beat quickens and everything slows down as he envisions disembodied feet pouring out from the room stomping and kicking him. He let's out an audible sigh of relief as he see's that the room is empty. He motions his friends to come on in with a hand wave and nod of the head.

Walt will enter into the room heading towards the northwest corner, being careful not to touch the prints on the floor. He'll crouch down and look under the table, chairs and couch looking for anything left behind by the inhabitants or anything that's hidden out of view.

He'll also pull out his small belt knife and scrape up some of the red clay mud. He'll spit on it lightly to moisten it and give it a smell to see if he can pick up any off smells or of it just smells like regular clay.

Perception check to look under the furniture: 9

Nature check for the clay: 7

(ooc: I'm not sure if I messed up or the post had a glitch, but the perception check should have a +5 not +7. So my roll for that should be a 6. Either way, both rolls are low so I doubt this will reveal much.)

If his friends enter the room, they'll see Walt scoping stuff out looking as perplexed as ever.

At Walt's relaxing and waving them on, Tuuli approaches the door, but stays just outside the doorway, surveying the room. She taps a boot lightly on the hallway floorboards beneath her. "Is there a trap door, maybe, the whole place is raised, we had to step up to get onto the porch..."

"And, why are there no footprints? Were they walking on their hands?"

Baldar steps inside the room, and following Tuuli's suggestion, begins looking for a trapdoor or hatch. She also checks to see if the handprints match the pattern they found in the other house. Also, are the handprints all the same size, or do they vary, like they were made from a number of different people, or just one person?

Investigation: 1 (in the campaign log).

Baldar sees nothing. "Well I can't figure out if these handprints are the same as the other house. Maybe someone else should have a look?"

Crouching low to the ground, Walt finds a different painting on the floor, hidden under a chair, in the same red mud. It's hard to see it fully without moving the chair, but it seems to depict two children—one is reaching for the other, who is being dragged into the water by large hands.