Bell’s dagger thunks solidly into one of the chained library’s tomes, as does Meredith’s arrow, Ffffpp!, both missiles curving mid-air in answer to Rogi’s magic funnel, to hit home hard. The construct launches into a frenzy, swinging Rogi around the room like as a weapon, flailing at Bell, who must duck away, and Meredith, who must jump over her compatriot’s splayed legs as they bump and whoosh in an arc along the floor.
As the bureau’s clawed feet send it scrambling toward you, as Erudisia backpedals away into the next room, Rogi, squeezed tight and buffeted, begins to black out and his funnel starts to dim. But with one last effort, his magic brightens, he looks to Erudisia his eyes fairly shouting, “Help!”
When Erudisia turns at the doorway and casts her spell, the eldritch blast, carrying shuddering thunder, crashes into the chained library like a tornado into a peasant’s shack. The bureau, shaking, curls into itself defensively but it’s too late. It explodes into fragments, its scholarly contents sundered hopelessly, and when you all lower your arms — having raised them instinctively for protection — there is little left of the chained library, save for shredded parchment falling lightly all around you like winter snow.
Running about, she will see if ANYTHING is recoverable... and then, mid scramble, remembers Rogi. Kneeling down, she will try to dribble some water onto his face and in his mouth from her waterskin. "Well done, Rogi. You sure showed that cabinet who was boss."
Muttering to herself as much as nervous energy after the encounter, Bell keeps repeating, "We all need healing spells.... or medicine kits... or potions. Maybe we should learn how to make potions? This is NOT how I thought time in Candlekeep would be!"
"Did we at least get the one book we needed? If Matreus (or Fistandia) find out what we did to her books, we are so going to be expelled."
After a few moments, Erudisia glides by Meredith, patting her on the shoulder. She tentatively toes a piece of the broken library, then steps over it into the room it emerged from to look around the space. Wary for more bookshelves against the other walls.
Once the parchment snowfall ends, you notice the shapes of various pieces of the construct, large and small, smashed against walls or having rebounded against the ceiling to fall near the doorway. All of the books are destroyed. All, that is, except for the one inch-wide volume Meredith pulled to safety in the nick of time. It is a perfect twin to the book you found in the laboratory: empty pages, Mordenkainen bust on the cover, 9x12”. The only difference is the single large letter imprinted on the spine, which is an “L”. Like the other book, whose spine shows the letter “T,” it is vertical when the spine is positioned to point up and down, and it is positioned exactly in the spine’s center.
All of you know enough about arcane protections to theorize the following: The chained library was obviously meant to protect its contents at all costs. Not just guard against theft in general, but insure that these tomes would not fall into the wrong hands. Meaning, Fistandia must have had an enemy. Or enemies.
Erudisia finds nothing else in the chained library room but more dust and cobwebs.
Bell finds Rogi lying straight out on the floor. He groans, slides up to a sitting position, gratefully accepting water from Bell's waterskin.
“Thanks, Bell.” He tests his arms and legs for breaks, and inhales sharply when trying to rotate his arm. “Nah, I’m okay. I’ll be fine. Nothing broken. Just…” his expression turns hard. “Just another example of magic and knowledge being jealously guarded by the elite few.” He shakes his head, then his eyes find Bell's. Bell notices Rogi's eyes are a deep gray with flecks of blue, and his expression is different from what she’s seen before. Kind. Maybe for the first time. But he's not looking her in the eye after all. He's looking slightly to one side.
“You’re hurt,” he says, reaching to touch Bell’s ear. When he draws back his hand, there’s blood on his fingertips where he made contact. “Can I…?” he asks, not really waiting for an answer. His hand goes to the back of Bell’s head. Bell feels something unexpectedly sticky and recoils sharply from Rogi’s touch. “Sorry!,” he says, but when Rogi pulls his hand back, Bell and he both see it is covered in blood. “Oh man. Wait a sec.”
Rogi opens a pouch on his belt, pulls out a tiny oiled leather-wrapped parcel, quickly unwraps it. He removes a length of what looks like tree bark, but isn’t. It’s a thin sheet of metal carved to look like tree bark? Rogi bends it along its length, and it snaps, throwing sparks, then unravels, folding outwards like a spring unfurling. When it stops, it is a six-inch square. He pulls its corners and with a slight click, it falls limp, losing its rigidity.
“Here,” he says, and places it against Bell’s wound, businesslike though not brusque. Bell feels it adhere to the back of her scalp, feels a cooling sensation against the wound. A moment later, Rogi pulls his hand away once again, and Bell watches as blood on this bandage, or whatever it is, vaporizes in cool blue flame. If she now touches the back of her head, it feels completely normal, if in some need of a wash. But Bell is healed for 7HP.
Bellagain gingerly touches the back of her head. She had barely noticed anything was wrong with all the excitement and terror of 'the moment'. Without thinking she lunges forward and hugs Rogi. No words come out though she may have been silently crying into the hug. A very long moment and she lets go and steps back.
She gives a very formal bow to Rogi, "Thank you..." there was probably more to be said but she can not form the words.
As you think about what to do next, you notice a rustling movement under the parchment confetti in a corner behind one of the telescopes. If you approach it, it stops rustling and begins to shiver slightly under the small leaves of paper.
When Erudisia clears the confetti away, she finds that not everything from the chained library has lost its enchantment. One of its chains lies in the corner, and it is still animate. It is coiled lightly against the floor under exploded papers, and a loop like a bowl-sized snake head rises slowly to face the warlock, perhaps 18 inches above the ground, with a pair of links in the middle offering the exact appearance of big, sad, drooping puppy eyes. It shivers in fear, shrinking into the corner away from Erudisia submissively.
This is a magic item you can keep if you wish. It acts as both a Rope of Climbing and Flail +1.
Bell automatically goes and touches the back of her head. "I did not realize just how hard untilRogi ministered to it. I can barely tell it is there; except for the blood." She glances shyly at Rogi and then back to Meredith. "I gaveRogisome water but I don't have any healing kits or spells. I don't know how much pain he is covering up, being stoically brave helping me."
Erudisia gives a shriek at uncovering the animate chain.
“What in the spider-queen’s web are you?”
The Auran syllables of her Eldritch Blast rest at the tip of her tongue, wary of a trap.
Erudisia crouches down to be closer to level with the chain. “Come here, little thing,” she says.
The chain, though apparently hypnotized by Erudisia’s attention, seems to shrug in answer to her question. When she beckons to it, its loop face glares for a moment, mistrustful, the memory of its recent aggression mirrored in its posture. But only for a moment. It seems to shake its head, leaving its past circumstances behind once and for all, then, with one steel link lolling under its face, slides warily forward to stop at Erudisia’s feet. Then suddenly it slithers quickly up her leg and loops itself around her arm, cold steel darting up all the way to snuggle her cheek.
(Erudisia could wear the chain as a belt or chunky necklace, or keep it in a pack.)
" All Hail Rogi The Brave!", said Meredith as if recalling a passage from a book.
Rogi pulls himself to his feet, brushing off help. “I’m fine, I’m good to go,” he says, but his arm and shoulder hang stiff at his side, and lines on his face betray the pain he tries to hide. (OOC: Down to ½ HP.) After standing long enough to wince deeply then slowly exhale, he squats down on his haunches, looking again ready to tip over. “Maybe we could… just catch a breath for a few minutes?” You hear from downstairs the slight clinking of the old clock in the parlor striking midnight. That means, you have 18 hours before the next sunset. 18 hours, you believe, of life left to Matreus.
"Short rest?" Belllooks at everyone as she asks. "I know it won't fix everything but we really do not have time for a long rest and..." she throws up her hands.
"I know it is unwise -- I mean, I've read all the action adventures in my village... but, maybe a couple of us can go look for more books while the worst cases take that hour rest?"
The half-elf moves Loopy so that he is tucked under one armpit like a sash, ignoring the disquiet that giving him unfettered access to her neck engenders (fetters, to not put too fine a point in it).
As she returns to the center of the room, she listens to Bell. A short rest is a grand idea, and she more than anyone knows that the magic of her dragonchess focus — for all the shallowness of its reserves when compared to a true wizard — drinks quickly of the magic of the world compared to most.
“I think a short rest is permissible, and I appreciate that fear of losing even a single minute, but our poor avowed guide is on death’s door, and we have been attacked twice in this magical place already. I fear the consequences of splitting up. Perhaps this might be the only rest we get, but if everyone of these strange books that bear the face of the Mordenkainen has some relevance to that original book that trapped us here, I fear each will be sorely won or dearly fought for.”
" Well.....we have two letters so far....so theres likely a word we're looking for....once we have a few more we can start guessing...... A command word to get out? Maybe?", Meredith mused.
" I'm happy to rest a wee bit."
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( Reroll- Attack: 4 Damage: 4 )
Bell’s dagger thunks solidly into one of the chained library’s tomes, as does Meredith’s arrow, Ffffpp!, both missiles curving mid-air in answer to Rogi’s magic funnel, to hit home hard. The construct launches into a frenzy, swinging Rogi around the room like as a weapon, flailing at Bell, who must duck away, and Meredith, who must jump over her compatriot’s splayed legs as they bump and whoosh in an arc along the floor.
As the bureau’s clawed feet send it scrambling toward you, as Erudisia backpedals away into the next room, Rogi, squeezed tight and buffeted, begins to black out and his funnel starts to dim. But with one last effort, his magic brightens, he looks to Erudisia his eyes fairly shouting, “Help!”
When Erudisia turns at the doorway and casts her spell, the eldritch blast, carrying shuddering thunder, crashes into the chained library like a tornado into a peasant’s shack. The bureau, shaking, curls into itself defensively but it’s too late. It explodes into fragments, its scholarly contents sundered hopelessly, and when you all lower your arms — having raised them instinctively for protection — there is little left of the chained library, save for shredded parchment falling lightly all around you like winter snow.
DM for Candlekeep Mysteries // Dev Hornd in Curious Critters // Eclipse Faraway in Gallows Dancer
“Oh drat,” says Erudisia.
Bell cries out, "We killed the books!"
Running about, she will see if ANYTHING is recoverable... and then, mid scramble, remembers Rogi.
Kneeling down, she will try to dribble some water onto his face and in his mouth from her waterskin. "Well done, Rogi. You sure showed that cabinet who was boss."
Muttering to herself as much as nervous energy after the encounter, Bell keeps repeating, "We all need healing spells.... or medicine kits... or potions. Maybe we should learn how to make potions? This is NOT how I thought time in Candlekeep would be!"
"Did we at least get the one book we needed? If Matreus (or Fistandia) find out what we did to her books, we are so going to be expelled."
Meredith sat on the ground hyperventilating.....
After a few moments, Erudisia glides by Meredith, patting her on the shoulder. She tentatively toes a piece of the broken library, then steps over it into the room it emerged from to look around the space. Wary for more bookshelves against the other walls.
Once the parchment snowfall ends, you notice the shapes of various pieces of the construct, large and small, smashed against walls or having rebounded against the ceiling to fall near the doorway. All of the books are destroyed. All, that is, except for the one inch-wide volume Meredith pulled to safety in the nick of time. It is a perfect twin to the book you found in the laboratory: empty pages, Mordenkainen bust on the cover, 9x12”. The only difference is the single large letter imprinted on the spine, which is an “L”. Like the other book, whose spine shows the letter “T,” it is vertical when the spine is positioned to point up and down, and it is positioned exactly in the spine’s center.
All of you know enough about arcane protections to theorize the following: The chained library was obviously meant to protect its contents at all costs. Not just guard against theft in general, but insure that these tomes would not fall into the wrong hands. Meaning, Fistandia must have had an enemy. Or enemies.
Erudisia finds nothing else in the chained library room but more dust and cobwebs.
Bell finds Rogi lying straight out on the floor. He groans, slides up to a sitting position, gratefully accepting water from Bell's waterskin.
“Thanks, Bell.” He tests his arms and legs for breaks, and inhales sharply when trying to rotate his arm. “Nah, I’m okay. I’ll be fine. Nothing broken. Just…” his expression turns hard. “Just another example of magic and knowledge being jealously guarded by the elite few.” He shakes his head, then his eyes find Bell's. Bell notices Rogi's eyes are a deep gray with flecks of blue, and his expression is different from what she’s seen before. Kind. Maybe for the first time. But he's not looking her in the eye after all. He's looking slightly to one side.
“You’re hurt,” he says, reaching to touch Bell’s ear. When he draws back his hand, there’s blood on his fingertips where he made contact. “Can I…?” he asks, not really waiting for an answer. His hand goes to the back of Bell’s head. Bell feels something unexpectedly sticky and recoils sharply from Rogi’s touch. “Sorry!,” he says, but when Rogi pulls his hand back, Bell and he both see it is covered in blood. “Oh man. Wait a sec.”
Rogi opens a pouch on his belt, pulls out a tiny oiled leather-wrapped parcel, quickly unwraps it. He removes a length of what looks like tree bark, but isn’t. It’s a thin sheet of metal carved to look like tree bark? Rogi bends it along its length, and it snaps, throwing sparks, then unravels, folding outwards like a spring unfurling. When it stops, it is a six-inch square. He pulls its corners and with a slight click, it falls limp, losing its rigidity.
“Here,” he says, and places it against Bell’s wound, businesslike though not brusque. Bell feels it adhere to the back of her scalp, feels a cooling sensation against the wound. A moment later, Rogi pulls his hand away once again, and Bell watches as blood on this bandage, or whatever it is, vaporizes in cool blue flame. If she now touches the back of her head, it feels completely normal, if in some need of a wash. But Bell is healed for 7HP.
DM for Candlekeep Mysteries // Dev Hornd in Curious Critters // Eclipse Faraway in Gallows Dancer
Bell again gingerly touches the back of her head. She had barely noticed anything was wrong with all the excitement and terror of 'the moment'. Without thinking she lunges forward and hugs Rogi. No words come out though she may have been silently crying into the hug. A very long moment and she lets go and steps back.
She gives a very formal bow to Rogi, "Thank you..." there was probably more to be said but she can not form the words.
As you think about what to do next, you notice a rustling movement under the parchment confetti in a corner behind one of the telescopes. If you approach it, it stops rustling and begins to shiver slightly under the small leaves of paper.
DM for Candlekeep Mysteries // Dev Hornd in Curious Critters // Eclipse Faraway in Gallows Dancer
Erudisia leaves the room that the bookshelf emerged from and heads towards the shivering pieces of paper looking beneath.
When Erudisia clears the confetti away, she finds that not everything from the chained library has lost its enchantment. One of its chains lies in the corner, and it is still animate. It is coiled lightly against the floor under exploded papers, and a loop like a bowl-sized snake head rises slowly to face the warlock, perhaps 18 inches above the ground, with a pair of links in the middle offering the exact appearance of big, sad, drooping puppy eyes. It shivers in fear, shrinking into the corner away from Erudisia submissively.
This is a magic item you can keep if you wish. It acts as both a Rope of Climbing and Flail +1.
DM for Candlekeep Mysteries // Dev Hornd in Curious Critters // Eclipse Faraway in Gallows Dancer
Meredith smiles at Erudisia then moves across to see if Rogi's ministrations on Bell have been successful.
" You took quite a walloping there."
Bell automatically goes and touches the back of her head. "I did not realize just how hard until Rogi ministered to it. I can barely tell it is there; except for the blood." She glances shyly at Rogi and then back to Meredith. "I gave Rogi some water but I don't have any healing kits or spells. I don't know how much pain he is covering up, being stoically brave helping me."
Erudisia gives a shriek at uncovering the animate chain.
“What in the spider-queen’s web are you?”
The Auran syllables of her Eldritch Blast rest at the tip of her tongue, wary of a trap.
Erudisia crouches down to be closer to level with the chain. “Come here, little thing,” she says.
" All Hail Rogi The Brave!", said Meredith as if recalling a passage from a book.
" I'm afraid my skills are more research focused than healing focused..."
The chain, though apparently hypnotized by Erudisia’s attention, seems to shrug in answer to her question. When she beckons to it, its loop face glares for a moment, mistrustful, the memory of its recent aggression mirrored in its posture. But only for a moment. It seems to shake its head, leaving its past circumstances behind once and for all, then, with one steel link lolling under its face, slides warily forward to stop at Erudisia’s feet. Then suddenly it slithers quickly up her leg and loops itself around her arm, cold steel darting up all the way to snuggle her cheek.
(Erudisia could wear the chain as a belt or chunky necklace, or keep it in a pack.)
DM for Candlekeep Mysteries // Dev Hornd in Curious Critters // Eclipse Faraway in Gallows Dancer
Rogi pulls himself to his feet, brushing off help. “I’m fine, I’m good to go,” he says, but his arm and shoulder hang stiff at his side, and lines on his face betray the pain he tries to hide. (OOC: Down to ½ HP.) After standing long enough to wince deeply then slowly exhale, he squats down on his haunches, looking again ready to tip over. “Maybe we could… just catch a breath for a few minutes?” You hear from downstairs the slight clinking of the old clock in the parlor striking midnight. That means, you have 18 hours before the next sunset. 18 hours, you believe, of life left to Matreus.
DM for Candlekeep Mysteries // Dev Hornd in Curious Critters // Eclipse Faraway in Gallows Dancer
"Short rest?" Bell looks at everyone as she asks. "I know it won't fix everything but we really do not have time for a long rest and..." she throws up her hands.
"I know it is unwise -- I mean, I've read all the action adventures in my village... but, maybe a couple of us can go look for more books while the worst cases take that hour rest?"
The half-elf moves Loopy so that he is tucked under one armpit like a sash, ignoring the disquiet that giving him unfettered access to her neck engenders (fetters, to not put too fine a point in it).
As she returns to the center of the room, she listens to Bell. A short rest is a grand idea, and she more than anyone knows that the magic of her dragonchess focus — for all the shallowness of its reserves when compared to a true wizard — drinks quickly of the magic of the world compared to most.
“I think a short rest is permissible, and I appreciate that fear of losing even a single minute, but our poor avowed guide is on death’s door, and we have been attacked twice in this magical place already. I fear the consequences of splitting up. Perhaps this might be the only rest we get, but if everyone of these strange books that bear the face of the Mordenkainen has some relevance to that original book that trapped us here, I fear each will be sorely won or dearly fought for.”
" Well.....we have two letters so far....so theres likely a word we're looking for....once we have a few more we can start guessing...... A command word to get out? Maybe?", Meredith mused.
" I'm happy to rest a wee bit."