Between the insult and the spectral hand, the hapless ghast collapses into the webbing, never having managed to free itself.

------------------------------

Out of initiative - for now.

Marrin watches ghast fall with a ghost of a smile before reaching out a hand and giving the rope a tug.

Jan looks around the partially flooded hold.

Perception: 15

"Anything worth our time here, or we heading back up?"

Marrin watches the rope splash down into the water, while she still holds a dry end.

On the ghast hanging in the webbing, Avaria notices a silver bracelet sculpted to look like a twisted tongue (75 gp). Ethel, curious about the ghasts, notices while she's examining one that it has a gem studded belt (400gp)

Jan pays more attention to the cargo hold in general and back towards the aft she spots two things of interest. The first is a ladder leading up to the doorway they spotted in the aft cabin of the deck above and the second is sticking out of the water, the bobbing light of the wooden shard Ethel had made use of just glinting off its surface. A dark blue, almost black, metal box can just be made out. It shows no sign of damage, rust or the decay the rest of the ship is experiencing. 

Ethel looks at the collapsing rope with a tired but not angry sigh, as she waves a hand and dismisses the gossamer spiderwebs.  

Leaning hard on her walking stick in the sloshing water of the hold, she fishes the bedazzled belt off the ghastly, stinking corpse.  She holds it up in the faint, glimmering light.  "My my... this is almost enough to make this boarding party worth the ordeal."

Marrin gives Ula a look and winds up the rope and hands it to her.

She wrinkles her nose as Ethel handles the ghast corpse and pulls off its waterlogged belt. She'll helpful prestidigitate it a few times to improve it's smell and reduce it's water content.

She'll check on Ava,

"You okay? You got hit again, sorry."

After listening she starts looking around for a way up, if Jan points it out or if she finds it on her own, she'll climb up and try to get the hatch open.

She is keen to get out of the filthy water.

Jan gives a whistle to alert the others, pointing to the metal box. 

'Ladder back here."

Ethel recasts light so that it illuminates the end of her walking stick and takes a look at what Jan has found.  "This would appear to be the shiny, blue chest Geffroi described.  Let's fetch it and be out of here.   I'm afraid I won't be much use carrying it.  Those shadows took a toll on me... I will have a hard enough time extricating myself from this leaking hulk."

"Let's check that we can actually get out before we start planning on getting that box out."

((How big is the box? It took two burley sailors to carry it? Will it fit through the hatch or was it lowered in?))

Jan will head up the ladder, crossbow stowed, but blasting hand ready, to see if their way up is clear.

Chest carrying sounds like an Ava and/or Ula job.

((Yes, the party members with positive strength modifiers would be the best choice(s)))

Avaria takes the bracelet from the ghast and shoves it in her bag to look at later.  She turns and smiles at Marrin, "I'm good, just glad no one else was hit."

Hearing the others converse about the chest, Ava sloshes her way over to it.  Grabbing a hold of a handle of some sort, she tests the weight to see if she is able to carry it out while climbing the ladder.  Otherwise she'll try to tie the rope around the handle and pull it up once out of the cargo hold.

Avaria and Ula give the chest a test lift and discover between the two of them they shouldn't have too much trouble navigating ladders and stairs, though they're going to be moving slower (a good 10' per round slower). It will likely fit through the trapdoor in the aft, and will definitely fit through the open cargo hatch.

Jan and Marrin find the ladder easily enough and either one can climb up to the trapdoor. When they push on it though, it feels unlocked but then something blocks the door from opening. Was there something they saw barring the trapdoor from the other side when they were up there?

As Avaria and Ula contemplate tying the rope to the chest and Jan and Marrin wonder about the trapdoor, the whole group feels a wave slam the side of the "Emperor of the Waves" and you hear what sounds like a shrieking roar outside the ship.

Avaria shudders as she hears the roar.  Her eyes widen as she looks to her friends and then to the ghasts they had just defeated.  Dropping the chest at her feet she starts sloshing through the water.  "Get out of the way, I'm opening that door!" she cries to Jan and Marrin if they are in the way to the blocked trap door.

Assuming they move, the shifter heads up the ladder and pushes the door with all her might.  She was not going to be stuck in this ship filled with undead.

Athletics: 16

(If we're still within the 10 min of the bardic inspiration...) add: 5

Jan will drop down when she sees Ava come charging for the ladder, and stands ready in case it's not budging because there's a zombie standing on it.

Ethel freezes at the implications of that roar, a brief wave of thalassophobia passing over her.  She shakes it off with a grimace.  Then, while Ava makes for the trap door, she begins formulating a plan B.

She casts mage hand, and manipulates the hand upward with the rope toward the open cargo hatch.  "I'll see if I can tie it off on something up there," she mutters, to no one in particular.

((How high up is the hatch? Would Ula be able to boost Jan up?))

Marrin gives yelp of surprise as the wave and shriek occur.

Turning in the water she takes a breath and sees Ava working on the trapdoor problem and Ethel the cargo hatch. Deciding she isn't much help on slamming things open, she heads over to the hatch.

She grabs a few boxes along the way to stand on if needed.

"Need any help?"

The trapdoor at first seems to hold tight but summoning up the magic from the inspiration she received earlier, Avaria finds a few extra pounds of strength to apply. She hears creaking then splintering and the trapdoor opens: not because she pushed off what was holding it down, but because she broken open the hinges. A steel bar had been placed through the handholds, as if someone was preventing whatever was in the hold from getting out. Hopefully the party dealt with what that was already.

Another wave rocks the ship and roars can be heard on both sides of the ship through cracks in the hull. One such crack appears to open a little further with the rough waves and water starts pouring in.

Ethel is down by the open cargo hatch trying to tie off the rope, which isn't working out very well. The rest are by the aft hatch that Avaria just cracked through.