Venetia shoots a slight smile in Leaves’ direction. For a brief moment the worry lines that seemed deeply engraved between her eyes and at the corners of her mouth vanish leaving a smooth, homely face.
“Thanks.”
She turns quickly to the doorway and scowls at the opening before slipping through.
Investigation 8
Leaves cocked her head-human expressions being somewhat difficult for her to read. As she noticed the reaction, she made a pleased clicking noise in the back of her throat.
"...your welcome. But we're all going the same direction anyway, it was just self interest. Hmmph. We'll work together at least until we get out of here.
Anyway, my name..."
'Leaves-Falling-In-The-Sea' didn't say any specific word, but recreated the sound that her current identity was based around-a rattling branch, a swift wind, the soft sigh of an ocean wave, a few chaotic plinks. It was eerily close to reality, floating from her beak as if from a ghostly source. She usually left it up to the person in question to assign some meaning to that sound, as it didn't really matter to her what they called her.
"...Your true name isn't for me to know, so do have something you prefer to be labeled?" She continued, conversationally. "Skinny? Scratchy? Pointy ears is a bit...on the nose..."
This post has potentially manipulated dice roll results.
Jevyn taps the door behind him before continuing further down the hallway, leaving a small blue light on it. "Seabeak, be polite. Last time I heard someone call an elf 'pointy-ears,' they were face down in a ditch the next morning." Jevyn gingerly stepped down the hallway, his eyes adjusting to the dim light in record time. For extra light, he pulled his orb out of his robes and illuminated it with a brighter, pale blue light. Following Tak, he scanned the area for any further passages.
"I meant no insult. If I had wanted to insult her I would have called her a 'dagger eared wood chewing leaf loving squirrel snuggling half-blooded woods witch'.
Really, your peoples names are meaningless to me-you just take random sounds and stick them together, so I don't care what sounds you prefer. I mean, I could call her 'functionally aesthetic female', but that doesn't roll smoothly out of the break. Maybe we should go with Faffle."
Erich raises his eyebrows at the birds rambling "Call me Erich or whatever you like, that is my sounds that were put together by my parents and my preferred sounds"
Still...they gave you a name, 'Erich'. Sort of like labeling a crate-"Sour Apple Ale"." She replied sourly. "You put your sense of self around something that someone else gave you. That is not who you are. In life a Kenku finds a name-our parents do not name us like cargo-instead, we spend our lives listening for a perfect sound, that encompasses who we are and what we want to be.We take it as our own.
You heard a perfect sound too...a true name. You once heard something that defined your existence, didn't you? A pity! Since you are not Kenku, no one will know but you will ever recall the exact sound. You must be happy with a label."
"I find your naming conventions mercurial," the half-elf joined the conversation after a moment. "At age 8, I might have named myself 'Princess Glitter Moonbeam' for my love of slipping away at night and playing in the moon-dappled garden," she clipped. "A month ago, 'Quietus of a Trammeled Soul' might have taken its place." She scowled and added, "Perhaps, the gods will send another tempest into my life causing another string of discordant noises to be the perfect reflection of my existence."
"In the meantime, to make things easier for the others, my feathered companion," she let the lower tip of her quarterstaff grate along the stone floor for a moment. "Let's just use 'Venetia'. It means 'blessed upon returning'. I tend to understand it as 'if you make it back, there's your blessing' - a back-handed blessing if you ask me."
Venetia's speech seems to vacillate between the clipped, well-enunciated voice of a well-educated young woman and the surly, coarse lilt of a dock hand.
Leaves own voice was a smooth and cultured female cadence (Kenku have no noticeable physical gender differences aside from size), almost Bardic in enunciation-but it was subtly off-putting for one who listened closely. The words flowed smoothly, but the cadence didn't match entirely perfectly, as if each word had been cut from another sentence. Two of the same words were always spoken in exact duplication, never with a slight variation.
In its own way, it was an entirely inhuman voice. She responded to Venetia.
"There's always another tempest! That's life. Only in the storm do you find out who you really are, right?
...Anyway, now that we've had this fascinating linguistic lesson, we should concentrate on escaping. Seems there's only one way out."
As the group moves along the lit corridor, Venetia falls into line near the other outsider, Erich. Her eyes rove about her surroundings, her vision crawling along the walls and ceiling, though periodically darting back to the others in the group with decreasing suspicion.
This post has potentially manipulated dice roll results.
The oppressive silence is broken only by a steady drip. drip. drip. echoing from the room behind the statue.
As Tak approaches the titanic statue, it's jaw slams open and releases the shambling, skeletal remains of what appear to be crocodiles. The undead reptiles fall to the stone floor and begin to lumber towards you, spitting and whipping their tails.
The Battlefield: The corridor is fifty feet long and ten feet wide, with stone walls and a high ceiling. Leaves, Erich, Jevyn, and Venetia are assembled at one end of the corridor, while the undead crocodiles, Tak, and the statue are located on the opposite end, thirty feet distant.
Leaves sprung back, her feathers fluttering with unseen wind-her hands blurred, sending an arrow toward the undead gators before they could react. And somehow a 2nd arrow arched in from an unseen direction, cloaked in a writhing darkness...
"Aim for the base of the neck. Sever the spine." She said calmly, as if guiding her arrows in. "...Lets see you match those shots, chicken-feathers!"
Action: Scoot to 50 ft range from the melee (20 ft back) and fire the longbow twice at the closest gator threatening Tak!
The crocodile lurches forward, unshaken by it's various wounds, followed by two of its companions. (They all take the [Tooltip Not Found] to reach you.)
The remaining undead crocodile clambers up the imposing statue in an attempt to reach Tak. Athletics: 21
It slips on the stone and slams onto the stone floor, jarring loose several decaying bones. (1 falling damage.)
Leaves cocked her head-human expressions being somewhat difficult for her to read. As she noticed the reaction, she made a pleased clicking noise in the back of her throat.
"...your welcome. But we're all going the same direction anyway, it was just self interest. Hmmph. We'll work together at least until we get out of here.
Anyway, my name..."
'Leaves-Falling-In-The-Sea' didn't say any specific word, but recreated the sound that her current identity was based around-a rattling branch, a swift wind, the soft sigh of an ocean wave, a few chaotic plinks. It was eerily close to reality, floating from her beak as if from a ghostly source. She usually left it up to the person in question to assign some meaning to that sound, as it didn't really matter to her what they called her.
"...Your true name isn't for me to know, so do have something you prefer to be labeled?" She continued, conversationally. "Skinny? Scratchy? Pointy ears is a bit...on the nose..."
Jevyn taps the door behind him before continuing further down the hallway, leaving a small blue light on it. "Seabeak, be polite. Last time I heard someone call an elf 'pointy-ears,' they were face down in a ditch the next morning." Jevyn gingerly stepped down the hallway, his eyes adjusting to the dim light in record time. For extra light, he pulled his orb out of his robes and illuminated it with a brighter, pale blue light. Following Tak, he scanned the area for any further passages.
Perception: 10
"I meant no insult. If I had wanted to insult her I would have called her a 'dagger eared wood chewing leaf loving squirrel snuggling half-blooded woods witch'.
Really, your peoples names are meaningless to me-you just take random sounds and stick them together, so I don't care what sounds you prefer. I mean, I could call her 'functionally aesthetic female', but that doesn't roll smoothly out of the break. Maybe we should go with Faffle."
Erich raises his eyebrows at the birds rambling "Call me Erich or whatever you like, that is my sounds that were put together by my parents and my preferred sounds"
"Right. I will call you that.
Still...they gave you a name, 'Erich'. Sort of like labeling a crate-"Sour Apple Ale"." She replied sourly. "You put your sense of self around something that someone else gave you. That is not who you are. In life a Kenku finds a name-our parents do not name us like cargo-instead, we spend our lives listening for a perfect sound, that encompasses who we are and what we want to be.We take it as our own.
You heard a perfect sound too...a true name. You once heard something that defined your existence, didn't you? A pity! Since you are not Kenku, no one will know but you will ever recall the exact sound. You must be happy with a label."
"I have two names, the one I recieved and the one I forged"
"I find your naming conventions mercurial," the half-elf joined the conversation after a moment. "At age 8, I might have named myself 'Princess Glitter Moonbeam' for my love of slipping away at night and playing in the moon-dappled garden," she clipped. "A month ago, 'Quietus of a Trammeled Soul' might have taken its place." She scowled and added, "Perhaps, the gods will send another tempest into my life causing another string of discordant noises to be the perfect reflection of my existence."
"In the meantime, to make things easier for the others, my feathered companion," she let the lower tip of her quarterstaff grate along the stone floor for a moment. "Let's just use 'Venetia'. It means 'blessed upon returning'. I tend to understand it as 'if you make it back, there's your blessing' - a back-handed blessing if you ask me."
Venetia's speech seems to vacillate between the clipped, well-enunciated voice of a well-educated young woman and the surly, coarse lilt of a dock hand.
Ivolyn Brun, human wizard in Lost Mine of Phandelver
Leaves own voice was a smooth and cultured female cadence (Kenku have no noticeable physical gender differences aside from size), almost Bardic in enunciation-but it was subtly off-putting for one who listened closely. The words flowed smoothly, but the cadence didn't match entirely perfectly, as if each word had been cut from another sentence. Two of the same words were always spoken in exact duplication, never with a slight variation.
In its own way, it was an entirely inhuman voice. She responded to Venetia.
"There's always another tempest! That's life. Only in the storm do you find out who you really are, right?
...Anyway, now that we've had this fascinating linguistic lesson, we should concentrate on escaping. Seems there's only one way out."
As the group moves along the lit corridor, Venetia falls into line near the other outsider, Erich. Her eyes rove about her surroundings, her vision crawling along the walls and ceiling, though periodically darting back to the others in the group with decreasing suspicion.
Perception: 20
Ivolyn Brun, human wizard in Lost Mine of Phandelver
The oppressive silence is broken only by a steady drip. drip. drip. echoing from the room behind the statue.
As Tak approaches the titanic statue, it's jaw slams open and releases the shambling, skeletal remains of what appear to be crocodiles. The undead reptiles fall to the stone floor and begin to lumber towards you, spitting and whipping their tails.
Initiative: 17
Flayr Flameseeker | Genasi/Fire | Wizard/School of Evocation | Level 2 | Custom Campaign: Cold Cash
Initiative: 15
"Not good.."
9
Leaves reacted with lightning speed, nocking an arrow faster than the eye could follow.
"Someone forgot to leash their pets," Venetia steadies her stance, one hand gripping her quarterstaff and the other poised before her.
Initiative: 19
Ivolyn Brun, human wizard in Lost Mine of Phandelver
Pulling the longbow off his back "Finally some fun"
Initiative: 18
Jevyn merely let out an annoyed tsk before preparing to deal with the threat.
Initiative: 15
Esme's Initiative: 7 [Apparently, I've been doing this wrong.]
Initiative Order: Leaves (26) Erich (18) Undead Crocodiles (17) Jevyn/Tak (15) Venetia (13) Esme (7)
The Battlefield: The corridor is fifty feet long and ten feet wide, with stone walls and a high ceiling. Leaves, Erich, Jevyn, and Venetia are assembled at one end of the corridor, while the undead crocodiles, Tak, and the statue are located on the opposite end, thirty feet distant.
Leaves is up!
Flayr Flameseeker | Genasi/Fire | Wizard/School of Evocation | Level 2 | Custom Campaign: Cold Cash
Leaves sprung back, her feathers fluttering with unseen wind-her hands blurred, sending an arrow toward the undead gators before they could react. And somehow a 2nd arrow arched in from an unseen direction, cloaked in a writhing darkness...
"Aim for the base of the neck. Sever the spine." She said calmly, as if guiding her arrows in. "...Lets see you match those shots, chicken-feathers!"
Action: Scoot to 50 ft range from the melee (20 ft back) and fire the longbow twice at the closest gator threatening Tak!
1st Attack Roll 27
1st Damage Roll 13
Dread Ambusher Procs!
2nd Attack Roll 10
2nd Damage Roll 9
DA bonus damage 7
Whispering a quick incantation Erich fires an arrow wreathed in shadows at one of the other Crocs
Longbow: To Hit 10 Damage 7
(If hits) Shadow shot 9 Psychic WIS ST DC13
(Sorry for the delay, everyone. I had several all-day commitments last week.)
Wisdom Save: 12
A rain of arrows descends onto one of the four undead crocodiles, burying deep in rotting scraps of flesh and lodging in dirty yellow bones.
Death Save: 23
Flayr Flameseeker | Genasi/Fire | Wizard/School of Evocation | Level 2 | Custom Campaign: Cold Cash
The crocodile lurches forward, unshaken by it's various wounds, followed by two of its companions. (They all take the [Tooltip Not Found] to reach you.)
The remaining undead crocodile clambers up the imposing statue in an attempt to reach Tak. Athletics: 21
It slips on the stone and slams onto the stone floor, jarring loose several decaying bones. (1 falling damage.)
Jevyn and Tak!
Flayr Flameseeker | Genasi/Fire | Wizard/School of Evocation | Level 2 | Custom Campaign: Cold Cash