"The rats told me they wern't hungery, but were running away from your master." Krackle would say as he tucks himself behind the leg of the hulking dragonborn. "They were scared and thought we were like your master." The kobold would add as he glanced down to the rat corpse nearby. "What kind if research is your master doing?" He would ask from behind his friend.

The boy answers is a slightly nervous voice. “No sir... I‘m sure they weren’t hungry, because we feed them. They get lots of food. We care for them. We don’t hurt them. My master is a good person, he would never hurt anobody. Well... not a little animal. I guess he’d hurt a goblin if he had to, but not a rat.”

”His research is magic related... He’s a mage, so he’s always learning and practicing spells and creating potions and things like that. He uses them to test the magic, but it’s never harmful. Sometimes he turns them into frogs or other animals, and sometimes he makes them bigger or smaller, but he always turns them back.”

”So, are you guys adventurers?”

When the boy offers this explanation of the absentminded mage master who experiments on giant rats, Lumen just laughs to himself, sitting down on the street, elbows on knees and hands clasped, head down.

Chrys purses her lips.  "I ain't never been one for magic... that there's more Vesper or Lumen's line o' work, see?  But if ya ask me, I don't think I'd be too happy to be turned into a frog every few days or so 'gainst my will, just to see if your master had the chops ta do it right."  She glares at the boy sternly as she wipes her hammer down; it's a messy job, and she gives up after a moment, deciding there are more important issues to address than personal cleanliness.  "If ya ask me, it was irresponsible of your master t'be undertakin' such a thing right near the middle of town anyhow.  An' on a festival, too!"  Approaching the boy, she takes him by the crook of his elbow - gently, but very firmly, to ensure he doesn't run off.  "I think you'd better come along with us, boy, and have a chat with the town guards 'bout the mess your boss caused here tonight. What's yer name, son, and who's your master?"

Looking over her shoulder, she surveys the frightened townpeople, still gathered around the scene of the rat massacre, and raises her voice loudly.  "Anybody else here got some serious injuries from them rats?  We can try our best to help ya if that's the case."

Seeing Chrys attempt to clean her hammer only to give up after a few moments, Krackle would quickly move towards the weapon and begin scrubbing it as she continued to talk to the boy. Pulling out an old scrap of cloth, he would continue to wipe away blood and use his claws to pull off any bits of intestine and hair. The kobold works on cleaning the weapon without hesitation and you get the feeling that he has probably cleaned up much much worse.

As she's turning to survey the crowd, Chrys spots Krackle and frowns in dismay.  "Krackle?  Ya don't have to do that... it's a warrior's job to tend to her weapon, and any warrior too lazy to do it herself is disrespectin' the craft," she says.  "I saw what ya did for Lumen, there.  Your talents don't lay in doin' this kinda gruntwork, lil' one. If ya wanna be a helper, ya gotta go out there and make good things happen!  That way you give the people out there," she nods her head towards the frightened bystanders, "what they really need, which is hope, and that's a much greater gift for us than a clean hammer."

"OK... " Krackle would say with a smile. "But.. I did a good job cleaning the hammer right?" He would add looking up as he squeezes his filthy cloth with both hands. 

Vesper shrugs at all of the talk at turning rats into other things. "I mean, if I was a rat, I wouldn't be too upset about being turned into a frog or something else. I'd probably be glad, actually. Who wants to be a rat?"

"Who wants to be a kobold" Krackle would ask still clutching the dirty cloth while looking up to vesper. "I like being a kobold.. but I don't any one else would want to be one." He would say with a small frown. "I wouldn't want to get turned into stuff...  I would want people to like me the way i am." The tiny kobold would smile to Vesper and then look back to Chrys. "I think we should talk to the wizard too." He would say with a nod.

"You sure did," Chrys says to Krackle with a smile.  "Thank ye."

They boy shudders a little bit when Chrys grabs hold of his arm, but it appears to be more out of surprise. "My name is Nicolas, and my master is Master Dundragon. That's how people know 'im. He runs the magic shop, and I know he'd be very sorry when he learns what happened here tonight. He would never wish anyone to get hurt."

He then gets a very downtrodden and sad look on his face. "Of course, it's my fault that they got out. I caused all this...I'm so sorry, I have caused a terrible mess"

By now, much of the crowd has dispersed, but a few people come over to you and offer their thanks and gratitude to you for saving them. A handful of them have minor scrapes and scratches, and four people have more serious injuries; deeper punctures and claw marks that have drawn a fair amount of blood. Nobody has been hurt as badly as Lumen was, though. 

Releasing Nicholas's arm, Chrys nods slightly.  "I can see ya don't mean no harm, Nicolas, but evenso, harm was caused.  We'll have t'have a talk with your Master Dundragon just as soon as we're done with these good folk here.  I'll have ta ask ya to wait for a bit while we help the injured, please."

Giving a terse nod to those offering their gratitude, Chrys makes her way swiftly to the four badly injured individuals.  "I'm sorry you folks had to end your day this way," she says to them, "But let's see if we can make things a lil' better, eh?"   With a short prayer of supplication to the Duin, she reaches out and touches each of them, trying to channel the god's divinity through her as she was taught by the clerics.

(Chrys will take 4 uses of Lay on Hands to heal each of the severely injured townspeople.)

Lumen, with the little mental capacity he has available to himself, tries to get a good sense of who might be most grievously injured in the crowd, and looks at the last of his magical reserves to see if he'd be able to help them get closer to whole.

But he's mostly dazed. He's amazed at how easily those rats took him down and nearly killed him, and then amazed at how he found the resolve to stave off death, and then further amazed at how easily Krackle was able to heal him almost to whole. So he's basically still sitting there in the street, barely taking in the talk about the rats and the mage and the boy.

"Magic rewards?" Lumen blurts out of nowhere. There's a long pause, and then he realizes he has to explain more. "He owns a magic shop. He caused problems with rats that hurt people. We stopped them from hurting people. He can thank us with some merchandise." 

Still not looking at anyone, Lumen goes back to blinking.

(Belatedly seeing  Chrys' laying on hands, Lumen will see if he can cast healing word on someone who's really hurt.)

"Yes ma'am." Nicholas nods with approval and agrees to take you to meet Master Dundragon. "And I can help" he adds. 

As you tend to the task of healing the four injured townsfolk with your divine powers, Nicolas comes over and crouches down in front of one of them, a slightly older man. Speaking a few strange words under his breath, he makes a quick hand gesture, and you watch as the soiled, bloody dirt on the leg of the man's trousers suddenly disappears. The fabric instantly takes on the look of brand new clothing, save for the punctures and tears in the cloth. 

He then reaches into a small pouch at his waist, pulls out a tiny piece of grayish rock and casts another quick spell. This time, the damage to the fabric is instantly fixed. There are no more holes or rips in the clothing anymore.

The man expresses his gratitude to both Chrys and Nicolas, and the boy moves over to repeat his cleaning/mending tricks on the next person.

Between Chrys and Lumen, all four of the injured townsfolk are completely healed, which brings heartfelt appreciation from those who were injured, and also from some of the bystanders.

Chrys grins at Lumen appreciatively.  "Good work... with the rats, too.  I can see by the look on yer face that you're surprised they took ya down so hard an' fast.  But lemmie tell ya, anyone would've had trouble if those creatures ganged up on 'em like they did ta you.  Team tactics can take down near anythin'... goes for the rats as much as it does for us adventurers.  Good thing ta remember, if we ever have to face somethin' bigger than us, right?"

Straightening, she nods to Nicolas similarly in compliment.  "If everyone's done cleanin' up here, maybe we should go visit this Dundragon fella.  Shall we?"

"Ok, warrior Ma'am. I can take you to his shop."

As you finish cleaning up and tending to the injured townsfolk, the crowd begins to thin out in front the Golden Eagle and everyone resumes their regular festival partying. Soon, and with the help of a few drinks, most people forget about what just happened, at least for now, and the general good cheer returns.

Nicolas leads you down the street, weaving through the crowds, then turns a corner and heads left. You follow along for a few hundred feet, then turn another corner and find yourselves in the merchant quarter of town, at least one of them. There are a few people hanging around, but far fewer than what you saw in the main square and in the street where the tavern was located.

He brings you to a small, but well-kept building, opens the door and leads you inside the shop. It's quite well kept, and adorned with a variety of trinkets that hang from the ceiling and are mounted on the walls. 

He calls out, "Master Dundragon..."

A few moments later, a tall man with long jet black hair and a silver goatee emerges from a back room. He's wearing a red robe of similar color to the one Nicholas is wearing, but with much nicer adornments, and a few rings on his fingers. He looks at you all with a quizzical stare.

"Master Dundragon," Nicolas says, "I am sorry..."

With a concerned and slightly stern look, the man responds to the boy, "Nicolas... what is it? Who are these people?" He then looks at you all. "Do tell me what is going on. Has the boy done something?"

"Uh.. Well a bunch of scared rats were attacking the townsfolk" The kobold would say while tucking behind Chrys. "They said they were trying to get away from the big thing that was hurting them" He would add as he clutched the dwarfs leg tightly with one hand and his staff-like wand in the other.

"We're the Pie Pals," Chrys say, gesturing to the group that's gathered inside the shop.  "Simple adventurers lookin' to share a good time together.  Couple o' giant rats menacing the townfolk put a bump in that plan, though," she adds.  "Your boy Nicolas here says it was all an accident, but lots o' people could've been hurt real bad tonight."  She glances at Lumen.  "'Fact, some actually were."  She puts a hand on Krackle's head and knuckles it affectionately.  "Fortunately, we got us some healers in here, too.  Still, middle of a city ain't no place to be runnin' dangerous magical experiments like that."

"Lots were hurt, Master Dundragon," Lumen says with a grunt. "Seems about half a dozen were injured before we could put ourselves between them. Then a few ganged up on me and nearly took my," COUGH "life, and if I hadn't seen worse in the Spine of the World before, it might have. Also some friends who healed me up. And then we healed up the townsfolk. And this one, who talked to the rats, healed up me."

He pauses. "What were you really doing with those rats? And what's it worth it to you that we made your bad problem into a less bad problem?"