Bleep will scout down the west hallway and take note of what he finds.

Perception: 7

Still out in the front yard, the two dwarves of the group preoccupy themselves with other matters. Ghee makes sure to collect his mug before making his way to the front entrance, while Darrik becomes curious about the cellar doors he spotted a moment ago. The druid behaves as aloof as usual, but is attentive enough to notice that the padlock responsible for keeping the cellar doors shut is actually undone. Opening the doors and going down the cellar should be quite a simple task, Darrik concludes.

Inside the manor, the grungs continue to explore.

Bleep looks down the first floor's west hall and also spots two doors. The closed door midway down the hall is much simpler than the double doors at the end of it. Bleep can hear the slight sound of clinking porcelain on the other side of the double doors.

Khan perches on the second floor banister and pays close attention to her surroundings. She can hear or see no disturbance coming from the first floor other than those caused by her companions. She is sure that this means that Mez Kara is not among them anymore. With that conclusion in mind, the orange grung then leaps her way onto the third floor landing, searching for a damaged window. The landing itself is quite small and featureless, and it opens up immediately into a larger hall. Khan spots a series of paintings hanging on the walls of what can only be described as a Gallery Hall. These large life-like paintings fill the hall, each depicting different monsters that Khan recognizes from her familiarity with the jungles of Chult. The paintings include: a flail snail, a girallon, a chuul, and a minotaur. One creature Khan does not recognize simply looks like a disembodied human skull which is aflame. Khan does not spot the broken window, but instead sees four doors behind which said window could be: two doors on the east wall and two doors on the west wall. They are all closed. (OOC: The group has now lost sight of Khan and vice versa.)

Ang continues to stare down the east hall in the first floor. She wonders if the rooms behind either the closed door or the ajar one are worth exploring.

Meanwhile, Saros and Omen stand by the manor's entrance. The gnome seems curious about the abode but does not want to leave his fellow Watcher behind.

EXPLORATION LIST (I put it in the spoiler below in case you do not want to look at it.)

Upon entering the house Ghee takes a moment to admire his surroundings. Spotting B'leep looking down the hall to the west, he decides to head east.

Knocking on the closed door, he will either attempt to open the door for a gander inside or enter if invited.

Saros will choose to remain in the move up to the second floor landing, asking Darrik to stay close, figuring that having at least one person central is not a bad idea.  That said, he does send Omen off to follow Khan, telling the raven to Help if the Grung manages to get herself into any trouble.

As the duo reach the landing Saros asks "What do you make of all this, are they just trying to weaken us? And what do you make of this house?"

Bleep, curious about the sounds coming from the double doors, slowly opens the door to take a peek inside.

Stealth: 28

Perception: 17

Darrik attempts to pull/push the cellar doors open, very proud of his astute observation.

Regardless of whether she actually recognize the skull to be of a familiar creature or not, Khan found herself staring hard at it, as it gave off vibes of some ghastly undead thing. The very sort of things she had adapted Ghee's teachings in order to better combat alongside the other natural threats within her homeland. Thankfully before she can give in to the temptation to tear down the painting, the flapping of wings draws her attention to Omen.

Scowling, she turns to give the hall and its doors and its paintings one last look, before then manuevering so that she swung down onto the second landing as only a monk can, joining those there. "No signs. None at all. Most strange. Most.. Peculiar." She folds her arms and sighs. "Would think better business sense. But no sense. None at all. Even Khan have better followers. Tch. And poor maintenance too. Opulent third floor hall, but busted bars third floor." She complained, shaking her head. A few second later, she starts as if realizing who she'd been talking to, and with an inward scowl, she marched her way down the eastern hall for a look around.

Ghee finally enters the manor and notices his companions have scattered and are each investigating a separate area. Thinking no one is looking down the immediate eastern hallway at first, the dwarf advances in that direction. He then finally sees Ang, who is staring at the closed door halfway down this path, pondering on whether it would be polite for her to open it. Ghee makes a decision for her by knocking on the door first and then pushing it open after they receive no answer. He reveals a large and well lit room with books lining the walls. A set of comfortable reading chairs, and a nice fire place. Taking a look inside this Library, Ang and Ghee notice it is filled with interestingly titled but seeming mundane books. Examples include: "Lord of the Earrings," "The Sword of Sahara," "Shame of the Wind," "The Dark Flower", and "The Wheel of Thyme: A Story of Herbs and Other Flavors."

On the opposing hallway in this first floor, Bleep skips the closed door and reaches the double doors at the end. He quietly pushes them open and peeks inside. He sees two humans, a female and a male, working hurriedly to set a large dinner table in what is obviously the manor's Dining Hall. The woman wears a maid's outfit, while the man a chef's (Bleep has heard tales of such human occupations.) More specifically, the dining hall is a long room with an oversized dining table long enough to seat six on each side. Above the table is a large crystal chandelier. There is also a door in the corner of the room. The maid and the chef are coming in an out of it, bringing plates, silverware, and food. Bleep sees that this corner door leads to a small room connecting the dining hall to the Kitchen, a sort of Servants' Landing if you will. This service area has simple and unadorned stairs leading downward into a basement and upward to somewhere in the second floor. Beyond this servants' landing area, Bleep can also see that the large, well stocked kitchen sports wood stoves, ovens, and a full pantry.

Finally, Bleep picks up something else. Though their movements are not hindered in any way, both the maid and the chef also have several marks and scars on their heads and necks.

Less interested in exploring the manor himself, Saros yells at Darrik to not go too far and moves upward to the second floor's landing. He stays there for now, serving as a linking point between those exploring the first floor and Khan, who is in the third floor. Saros in the only one who can see Khan now, and he sends Omen to go check on the orange grung.

Khan is interrupted by Omen's arrival and thinks twice about engaging in some vandalism. Not wanting to go too far without the rest of the party, she drops back to the second floor's landing to find Saros. The gnome and the grung exchange some words about how strange the entire scene seems before Khan decides to explore this floor's eastern hall. This path leads to a hallway with five doors, four of which are open. By simply walking past these four open doors, Khan sees that they each house a luxurious bed, a heavy chest of drawers, and an elegant vanity. Khan concludes that since these rooms look unused, they must be Guest Rooms. The fifth door down this eastern hallway remains closed but unlocked.

The last member of the party, Darrik, is a bit isolated from everyone else. Outside the manor, he pulls the cellar doors open and descends the stairs. A large stone-lined cellar spans the manor. Most of the cellar is taken by rows of wine racks, but near the backwall Darrik can see iron cages. The walls of the cellar look different from what Darrik imagines those of the manor above him look like. Not only are they made out of stone, but some still have old hieroglyphs depicting chultan dwarves, who sort of resemble Ghee in their choice of attire. Finally, there is also a set of stairs leading upward into the manor.

A voice catches Darrik's attention before he can investigate these walls, wine racks, or stairs. He looks back at the iron cages by the backwall and sees three figures. One is, without a doubt, Mez Kara, the elven apprentice who invited them into the manor by way of a test. She is talking to two other figures, each inside their own iron cage. The first of these prisoners is a Kobold who stinks horribly. He seems to be covered in feces and moving erratically. The second is a shorter creature, who is silently stabbing the air with an imaginary dagger. Its silhouette reminds Darrik of Bleep.

Mez Kara turns to face Darrik: "Oh... shouldn't you be up above, behaving properly like an honored guest? You shouldn't bother yourself with the cellar. You are not a servant, but a guest. Please go back upstairs. The lord of the manor will want to meet all of you, I'm sure."

(OOC: Reminder that Darrik is alone in the cellar and none of the other party members can see him.) 

EXPLORATION LIST (I put it in the spoiler below in case you do not want to look at it.)

Darrik blinks sleepily.

"Oh?  That’s me bad.  I’ll be goin’ then."

He quickly retreats back to Saros, and tells him what he saw.

Bleep takes note of the strange marks in the kitchen help.

Bleep will double back and check the closed door down the hallway and take a look inside.

Stealth: 14

Pereption: 14

Too curious for own good, and frankly still miffed at the lack of decorum for one such as her, she would pay the Lord of the house in kind continue her 'innocent' exploration. To that end, she only hesitated in opening the final door by putting her head to it and listening in at the very least for any signs of movement at least. But once she deemed that much to be safe, only then would open it fully for a peek inside. If nothing immediately catches her attention as something of interest within the first look around, she'll scoff, step in long enough to reconfirm nothing around the bend was of interest, then return to the land fully intent on marching onward to check out the other hallway.

Perception: 8.

Glad to have Ghee at her side, Ang silently enters the librairy. Staying as much as she can in the shadows, she scans rapidly the room for potential danger and starts looking around interresting things.

Perception: 9
Investigation: 16

"Nothing here it seems Ghee" Ang says to the dwarf. "This place is awfully empty..."

in the spolier, I'm trying to keep track on where is everybody :)

Deciding to back away lest he risks the house servants noticing him, Bleep closes the double doors to the dining hall and backtracks to the door he had skipped earlier. Quiet as a shadow, he opens it and takes a peek inside. He sees a small tiled room with a short pedestal filled with water near the backwall. Above the pedestal, there is a clear mirror and beside it, a porcelain bowl with trickling water. Bleep looks inside and notices a mystical blue shining glaze the inside of the porcelain bowl. He identifies nothing else of interest in this simple but elegant Wash Room. 

(@Drache: If you'd like to examine the mysterious bowl glaze, please roll an arcana check.)

Curious about the only closed door in her vicinity, Khan tries to listen to any clues coming from the other side. She can hear the fain trickling of water, but nothing that sounds dangerous. She decides to open the door and finds herself in a small tiled room with a short pedestal filled with water near the backwall. There is no way she would know this, but this room is very similar to the one Bleep just unveiled in the floor below, including the mirror and the mysteriously glazed porcelain bowl. However, this room is somewhat larger than the one in the first floor, where the extra space houses a large copper tub that is also glazed inside. Unlike the blue glaze of the porcelain bowl, the tub's glaze is a reddish orange.

(@Ori: If you'd like to examine the mysterious bowl and tub glazes, please roll arcana checks.) 

Busy with this room, Khan ask Saros to peek into the opposing hall in this floor. With Omen's help, the gnome reports that the second floor's west hall also has four identical doors along its length, ending on a fifth door at the very end of the hallway. All doors are closed.

Ghee stands guard at the library's threshold while Ang ventures inside. The purple grung picks a few books, passes her finger over a few pages, examines the reading chairs, but in the end, nothing pops up an being dangerous or unexpected. She does, however, suddenly remember that Saros, Darrik, and their lost companion where originally sent to the Chult area to search for a book, so perhaps they'd be interested in this library.

With that, Ghee and Ang now ponder whether to look into the other door down this hallway (the Cozy Parlor) or backtrack.

Darrik nods in agreement with Mez Kara and decides to leave. Not comfortable with the idea of using the stairs leading to somewhere in the first floor, Darrik simply walks back the way he came. As he leaves, Mez Kara lets out an audible "Hmph", while the imprisoned kobold yells: "I’m Nut Puncher Quinn Quinn!" 

After finding his way through the front yard again, Darrik enters the manor proper for the first time. He sees Saros standing on the second floor landing and walks up the steps, immediately sharing with the wizard what he found in the cellar (wine, dwarvern drawings, Mez Kara, cages, kobold, and an unknown silhouette that looked like Bleep.) Based on the druid's description, Saros surmises that the second captive is most likely a grung.   

(@Shadow: If you'd like to examine the dwarven drawings from memory, please roll a history check. Your Stonecunning racial feature applies. Saros may help you based on the description you gave him.) 

EXPLORATION LIST (I put it in the spoiler below in case you do not want to look at it.)

Saros mulls over the information that Darrik has shared and then decides that Khan should know. Deciding to do it quietly, he points in the direction that he saw Khan go and triggers Message so that only she can hear

 Saros will help with the history check if Darrik chooses to investigate.

Darrik indulges himself in some heavy dwarven chin scratching.

History: 25

Arcana: 11.

Khan was no scholar, no mage, and certainly no Ang. But as Ang was occupied elsewhere, as far as orange was concerned, she would squint and try all the same to discern the purpose of the tub. Though she felt somewhat silly being suspicious, as it couldn't be any more than a -- Her body goes stiff and eyes wide at the latest message. Even before she had fully processed the words, the body is sprinting back to at least the gnome and Derrik.  The former she passes by to try and grab the other by the arm and ask intensely but one word: "Where?"  

While the 'Wheel of Thyme' is likely to be of use in Ghee's campfire cookery, he is a little alarmed at how many volumes there are... Besides he knows he should really be asking permission before borrowing books.

While Ang delves deeper into the room, Ghee waits by the door. After a few minutes he finds his attention drawn to the closed door at the end of the hallway. Catching Ang's eye, he nods in that direction indicating his direction of travel.

Listening at the door for a moment, Ghee knocks, waiting for a response before opening it.

Perception 20

If there is no response, Ghee will open the door and put his head round.

Bleep is curious about this reddish tub and approaches it.

Arcana: 16