An Act of Hubris or Guile

Yes everyone got a short rest and yes you can go around the cat and head to the northwest

“What’s with the crazy animals here?!” Duncan says quietly. “We need to free those families… they seem afraid. Putting his glaive aside for a moment he pulls out the quarterstaff and shield, saying, “Should we?”

“I think that is a distraction, meant to slow us down.  I think we should go around it and follow the instructions that were imparted from the rune.  He said “Join me in the northeast.”  I think we should do just that.  I wonder, was that Viscount Marish’s voice that we heard?”

Kasbis tries to recall if he ever heard the voice before, or if he could recognize it through the transmission.  

“Let’s get a move on then,” Duncan says, ready to keep trekking.

The party continues into the early hours of the morning. A few more steps and you see the cave entrance with light pouring from somewhere within.

You see heavy footsteps stamped in the mud leading into the cave.

What do you do?

Aisha pauses looking around at the surroundings before whispering, "I think this is the right place." indicating her chainmail she adds "I'm not that quiet and I'm pretty spent on my casting abilities for the day so we need to be smart about this. Do either of you have any skill in sneaking?"

Kasbis says “I’m likely the quietest of the bunch.   I can check it out, if you would like.”  He prepares himself, hiding his face in his cloak and getting ready to creep inside the cave…. Gaz stays in his hiding place, head sticking out of the corner of his shirt, another set of eyes on the passageway ahead.  

Stealth : 19 

Perception (Kasbis) : 20 

Perception (Gaz) : 6 

Kasbis creeps stealthily into the cave and the rough cave wall gives way to a circular room with grate to the side of a hole that leads straight down. You are not sure how deep it is. The light in the cave comes from 4 burning braziers around the hole.

Kasbis sends a message to Aisha and Duncan, describing what he sees.  “Four braziers supplying light, I feel that someone powerful is down here, a spell caster.  Perhaps the Viscount.  How are you both?  Ready to take them on, or should I come up for you to rest for a while?”

He sends a repeated set of messages, “I could extinguish the fires and keep exploring, I can see in the dark.  You could follow 20-30 feet behind.  What do you think?”  He awaits their reply before proceeding further.

Aisha responds to the message, "I'm feeling pretty good, but tapped for power. The only way I'm getting that back is if I get more than just a quick rest though. I don't know that we can afford to wait long though, on the other hand I only have one time I'll be able to restore health to us when we get hurt."

Waiting for Duncan

“I’m ready to fight again,” Duncan says, adding, “If we follow behind I’ll need to light a torch though.”

“Ok, light your torch, quietly, and follow behind me, 30 feet or so.  I’m going to extinguish these braziers…”. Kasbis sends by message.  He moves close enough very slowly, then uses prestidigitation to extinguish them, relying on his darkvision to look through the cave.  He stops and listens, looking around.  Sending back again, “I’ll let you know what I see, and when it is safe to move forward.”

The fires are extinguished and there is nothing more to to the room beyond the hole in the ground. With darkvision you discern that the hole is beyond 60 ft deep as Kasbis cannot see the bottom.

Aisha looks into the pit, "It's important in life to learn how to fall. I'm good at falling, with me here we can all jump in and fall like a feather."

Kasbis looks at Aisha, after he comes back from finding it, and whispers “That would be great, let’s float down.  But, how to get back up?  Anything that you can see to secure a rope to?  I don’t want to pound in a stake or piton, maybe there’s a large rock we can tie the rope to…”

There are some pebbles, but no rock large enough to hold a persons weight.

((Kasbis has the mold earth cantrip, can he use that to create a stone/weight/clump that is heavy enough to hold a rope?))

(No. Its moving earth feature is for loose dirt and not stone.)