Assuming no one else is doing anything, Breldo and Cladmir note they no longer feel as naoseus from the poison as they did before. 

Sylvera seems a bit annoyed that Rick is off doing something else first, but shrugs it off. 

"Do you need help, or?" 

"Rick thinks this place is a death trap, so Rick would very much like help, yes!"

Rick says invitingly.

He'll drag Khond back in to help shoot stuff as well.

"Friend Khond, focus now. Rick knows Khond is having an oil crisis. Rick understands, Rick has been there. Rick just needs Khond to shoot anything that pops up on stage after friend Sylvia does whatever Sylvia needs to do."

(What do Cladmir and Breldo wish to do if anything? And Khond too obviously, depending on how important he finds the oil crisis.)

Cladmir is clearly torn from the argument between his old captain and new oily leader.  Normally the bark from his old captain would have snapped him back to his old senses, but the weird and confusing vision of his past has scrambled what he thought he knew.

"I was only trying to prevent needless loss of life..." was the best he could managed, and very quietly at that.

Cladmir looks toward Rick dragging Khond.  He knew magic was dangerous -- but he felt that it may answer questions he never knew he had as well, and he would gladly follow Rick to make sure nothing really dangerous would happen... that's right.  He's a trained guard of the king.  If anything else he should be trying to protect the king's subjects from accidentally hurting themselves... too much.  And what if he learned a few things on way, that would be fine, right?

((Sorry about my very extended absence.  It seems like the summer weather change has started having some heavy hits on my health))

For the short rest, Khond uses his one remaining hit die, healing for 10hp (roll is on his character sheet)

"All sorts of things 'might' lead to terrible things.  Harnessing fire could have destroyed civilisation, but it was necessary for development.  Vague mindless fear holds no meaning."

Dragging himself along with Rick, Khond checks his bow.  "You'd best make sure whatever happens doesn't touch me.  That nap helped, but I'm still shakey." 

Rick gives Khond's flank what is probably an overly friendly pat.

"Rick will be back here with Friend Khond. Not Bandit will be up front."

Rick points at Cladmir,

"Not Bandit, nothing gets past to friend Khond."

He shakes his long, slightly bent finger menacingly at Cladmir to make his point. 

"Whenever Friend Sylvia is ready."

Rick has a dagger held and ready to throw.

Cladmir takes the indicated position to make sure to protect these people from harm that only he was qualified to deal with (although he has no idea what is going on and what to do really).

(Only one hit dice? I think this is the first short rest since a long rest, or were you previously fully out?)

Cladmir stumbles awkwardly, so weak that his previous leader barely even offers a response. Maybe he was just torn by old memories, or holding some ulterior motives. Right now it didn't matter that much, given how he's been "recruited" to help and the reverberations of the truth of how he even ended up in this order not having fully hit yet.

"Needless loss?! If these fools succeed who knows what kind of needless loss might happen?!"

Khond offers his own brief thoughts on the matter of the tied up man being very insistent on things being bad, while seeming to have no clue what this bad would even be. The man gives it a thought for only half a second.

"Maybe. But this is one fire that they looked at, then locked it in here and threw away the key! Why else all the warnings?"

Leaving Nuria and Asimi to keep watch over the irate man and his silent, maybe still unconscious cohort, the group turns to... Whatever Sylvia's thing she "needs" to do is. Though once out of earshot out of the captain (albeit not seeming to care too much if Cladmir overhears) she seems to theorize at least a bit.

"Supposedly, whatever this whole 'magic' thing is would help with the wasting... And humans don't suffer from that. So it makes sense that they don't care about it."

Rick shrugs to Sylvia's suggestion of racism/speciesism being behind the bandit captain's indifference.

"Rick already knows that humans are bad."

He waves her forward, but pauses to give Cladmir the new shield,

"Not Bandit stops everything from getting past. Rick is clear, Not Bandit?"

Quote from M0rtimer7 >>

(Only one hit dice? I think this is the first short rest since a long rest, or were you previously fully out?)

 

 (Honestly at this point I have no clue, I'm pretty sure it is the first short rest, but the sheet only had one die free, so I assume I'd used two and got the typical half recovered?  Khond gets seems to get real badly beaten up pretty consistently, so it wouldn't surprise me if I'd used both dice already)

Wasting?  What?

Cladmir's thought was cut short as he took the shield and his automated defer-to-authority response triggered.  "Certainly," he said to Rick as he move closer to the group, ready to intervene.

(( For some reason I thought we were level 1 when I saw only 1 hd was rolled.  If you do not mind here is the other roll: 6

Also -- does this new shield count as a regular shield for now? ))

(Definitely counts at least as a normal shield!)

Cladmir presumably equips his fancy new decorated shield. It has a bit of an odd weight... Rick and Sylvera both nod together about how bad humans are, though the haughty elf takes half a second to glance back toward Nuria... Albeit doesn't quite vocalize "most of them".

And then, with no further distractions does the ragtag little group enter the "Tragedy" room once again, this time to allow Sylvia to set foot on the stage for... Whatever reason. Here now, it almost looks as if she's hesitating to the point that maybe she is going to dip out after all and say to not worry about any of this. But eventually, her fluttering wings set herself down upon the stage, and things once again begin to shift.

"Oh, you poor girl..."

The walls shift to lush, dreamlike greenery and forest, although there are some hues of blue and purple that are quite unlike anything the group would know. In the midst of the stage some kind of weird illusion of a plant takes hold, like reeds that bend with ripe, glowing fruits at the end. And as the fae stands there, now completely frozen, there is a voice, and then another.

"Sylvia, come on already, sit down!"

"The fruit is gonna go stale if you don't eat it fast!"

Sylvia instead remains frozen, feeling more like she's in a trance when she does eventually step forward to sit down around the strange plant. There she's joined by two of her kin, lauging and chomping on berries that are almost as big as they themselves are. One with beautiful blue wings and hair covering her eyes, the other one with far more muted colors and beige colors cascading down her back.

"Do you think we're going to be losing this kind of stuff when this big move is going to happen?"

"Nah, he wouldn't make us lose on our favorite treats! What do you think?" the colorful one asks, directing herself to the one fae there who looks completely out of place in the moment. Perhaps once long ago, she had given a proper answer to that question. Now, instead, there began a sniffle. And then, hysterics.

"No! No, I don't want it to be like this! Why me?! Why not any of you?!"

For a long moment, everything seemed to freeze, as if cruel reality would force Sylvia to relive whatever was to follow. Her two companions staring with wide eyes, right up until...

"No... I don't think that's what you said back then, was it?" the colorful one speaks, before the more muted adds in.

"Yeah, I think she said something about how she should keep the seeds?"

"Smart! Feels like something I should have thought of at the time," the blue-haired sprite responds, before the auburn one turned back toward Sylvia.

"And then, you wondered how things on the outside are going, and I said who cares about that, and then,"

The two illusions on the stage now seem to hesitate themselves, while Sylvia speaks again through streaming tears. 

"It's not fair. Why... How? Why is it me that's here, and not either of you two? You're smarter, you're braver. All I did was run, and,"

"...Yeah," the auburn pixie spoke, before the bluenette finished.

"We did all die, didn't we? Got me by surprise, leaping out while we were sitting here, and then took out Gallica, then you."

"How... What even am I to be back like this? How are we even talking?" the fairy companion questioned, for once the two illusions seeming just as uncertain, the blue one answering first.

"I'm not sure I have any idea myself..."

"Being completely honest, we're probably just a part of your subconsious made manifest by the magic in this place," the auburn one chimed in, and promptly gets a punch by her compatriot to the shoulder in an effort to say "shut up".

"...Look. It seems like things are all kinds of messed up and wrong, and this isn't going to give you any answers to that. But..."

"Back then, when things were so scary and dark and it felt like we would drown. I... We?", the muted fairy glances over toward her friend to confirm, before continuing.

"We heard you call out and. And we helped. I'm not even sure how to better explain it than that, but just know the short version is..."

"We would have wanted nothing else than for you to have this chance right now."

Sylvia's former friends reach out, and for a moment hands are all shared. It is hard to say whether or not Sylvia even truly feels said touch.

"...Doing this was really stupid though!"

"Yeah! What made you think reliving the moment you DIED was going to pay off?!"

"Better rewrite history sis, or you'll never hear the end of it!"

With that, the two arrivals vanish.

And from the corner of the stage, something all the more imposing starts to form, as if the form of some large predator stalking the bushes.

(Initiative rolls!)

Rick watches with far most interest to Sylvia's backstory, wiping away a stray tear. His attention is quickly taken by the absolute unit of cat meat that appears on the corner of the stage.

His eyes are drawn across the magnificent feline form, from rippling thighs, broad, muscular shoulders and back. Oh and ALL THE BICEPS, SO MANY.

He casts a glance down at his own skinny frame and involuntarily flexes his gluts and thighs. He looks around at his friends and then to Breldo and Cladmir and makes his decision, turning on this new feline before he can be replaced as the top feline example in their minds,

"Kill Incredibly Ripped Panther!"

Initiative: 20

He chucks a dagger as he yells,

To hit: 24
Damage: 6

Cladmir was simply flabbergasted.  Too confused to follow what he saw, too astonished to comprehend the words, utterly overwhelmed by scene to even see Rick wiping away a stray tear, the only thing that snapped him to attention was Rick's command.

Kill Incredibly Ripped Panther!

In the back of his mind Cladmir recalls the other of Rick's command.

Not Bandit, nothing gets past to friend Khond.

So Cladmir will move with shield raise to stand between Khond and the incredibly ripped panther.

Init: 17