Follow the Priest (Part 2)
The priest, who looks much the worse for wear after his encounter with the vampire, seems nonetheless now determined to continue. "I've sent a message back to the temple to warn them about the vampires, and they've sent a group of adventurers to deal with them directly. That's not to say that the vampires won't keep sending people after us though."
He looks at all of you seriously, he isn't injured anymore thanks to the healing he received, but he looks horribly pale and like he might fall over at any moment. "So if you want to turn back, I'll give up this task. It might all be in vain in any case." He sighs and scrubs a hand over his face.
"We should /probably/ have a rest, Father. Let you recover your strength and all that jazz, particularly because it is night." He quirks a lip before tilting his head, Gareth looking about for a moment, before shrugging. "I'm willing to continue on, but I won't take you alone. One little ol' wizardling ain't going to be enough to protect you, Father. So its the others choice if we continue on or not."
Dorne says, "We should rest, I am not quitting on you , but we should all sleep.""
Nels nods about resting, and says, "Yeah, you've had it kind of rough. I'll take first watch, unless someone else wants it?"
Dorne glances over his shoulder at Nels, "Good , I will sleep a few hours and take mid watch , I will pray at night"
"I'll be up anyways, reading for a couple hours, so I might as well take the first watch." Gareth offers, looking to Nels for a moment, before glancing towards Dorne. "That is, of course, assuming you don't want me to take final watch instead?"
Dorne says, "gareth , would you mind watching during my prayer time its around midnight.""
The priest holds up his hands. "Wait, wait. I agree with you that we all need a rest, but each of the shrines must be prayed to within a certain time frame for the blessing to be bestowed. I must reach the next one before sunrise or I will have to begin again from Alexandria. We can find rest at the next shrine, but we have no time to waste at this one."
Dorne glances over to the priest with a smile of brotherhood, "Well then, we press onward," returning a sheepish grin.
With a glance towards the priest, Gareth frowns for a heartbeat before looking at Dorne. "You're in the middle with the priest. Me and Nels will be on the outside, because we have sharper senses and some other... Advantages." He states, looking towards Nels, raising an eyebrow as he remarks quietly, "I /really/ should of learned to be a better sneak thief, I imagine, but we'll both just have to be quiet, won't we?" And he gives a final look to the Priest. "However, what we need to learn is... How best to proceed. Father, where is the next shrine located?"
Nels ughs at the news that we'll be travelling all night. "It's gonna be a long one," he says, but re-shoulders his pack to be on his way. "How long will it take us to get to the next shrine, then?" he wonders curiously as he gets ready to head out. "We'll have to keep a sharp lookout."
The priest considers the question, but takes up the position in the middle that he's been told to stand in. "The road goes up a ways and then makes a sharp turn to the left. I was worried there might be a ambush there since it's a popular place for bandits. I didn't expect to be attacked so soon." He sighs. "Anyways, after that it's a straight shot up the road to where the shrine is. We should be able to reach it by midnight or just a bit past depending on how long the trip takes us."
Nels nods to the priest, and says, "Hopefully the bandits are taking the night off. Or we can shoot them," he offers as an alternative. But either way, he's ready to go now, and will head out when the party is ready to go, eyes on the road, and alert for possible ambushes, since this is bandit country.
Dorne agrees with Nels, as he is determined to solider Onward! Ambush ? check…
Frowning for a moment, Gareth glances from Dorne to Nels and back again, cocking his head before leaning onto his back foot and then remarking quietly, "Shouldn't we wait for Zapolklnex?" his tone calm and quiet as he frowns towards the Priest, quiet for a long moment, before nodding, once, to himself. "Just remember, Father, no running off. Else you will die this night." He then readies his staff and himself, standing up straight, and waiting for the priest to lead the way
GAME: Nels rolls perception: (20)+8: 28 GAME: Gareth rolls perception: (11)+6: 17 GAME: Dorne rolls perception: (12)+7: 19
The smell of blood rises from ahead of you, the scent of it thick enough on the air to warn you that /something/ is wrong up ahead before you reach your destination. Even the cleric you're guarding slows to a stop at the smell.
GAME: Gareth rolls stealth: (4)+6: 10
The scent of blood disturbs the air, and Gareth grunts, before shaking his head and lifting a hand, before he goes to move with surprising stealth... For a Wizard. For a regular guy, he is making some noise, but Wizards are normally considered... Uncoordinated, so he does them some pride, even if his harsh whisper is loud enough to be heard in the night as he gesticulates whilst attempting to sneak towards the source of bloodshed.
GAME: {*} Gareth casts Mage Armor. Caster Level: 3 DC: 15
Nels will pause as we proceed, and hssst. "There's a body laying up ahead, mostly buried under the brush." He's yanking out a paper cartridge and pouring powder and ball into his thunderbelcher as fast as he can now.
Dorne makes a go ahead and continue to 'check it ' out head nod to Nels. Brown eyes then find a fellow priest he smiles.
The scene that Gareth finds is not a pleasant one. There /had/ been some bandits here. Now they are all dead. Torn limb from limb and drained of their blood. They lay scattered through the underbrush half-hidden but a bad job has been done of it.
GAME: Gareth rolls fortitude: (19)+3: 22 GAME: Nels rolls 1d20+10: (4)+10: 14
Looking with the detachment that is needed so that he can keep his wizardly dignity by not tossing cookies, Gareth looks the bodies over before nodding, once, to himself, and then moving back quietly, to hurry towards the group once more to tell them about the bloodless, torn remains of what looked to be former bandits.
Nels doesn't really have time to call a warning to Gareth when he sees what he sees, all he can do is fire off a ... well, call it a warning shot, fire erupting from his weapon towards a thing, some kind of dark figure moving quickly in the brush.
Dorne grips the other man of the cloths shoulder for a moment before stepping in front of him. Dorne's dark eyes scanning the underbrush with a quick glance behind them as well.
GAME: Aftershock rolls 1d20+7: (2)+7: 9
The figure behind Gareth resolves into the figure of a vampire, teeth already flashing out long and dangerous. Fingers encircling like claws to grab the man from behind, but the vampire's movement is too fast for itself, and instead of tackling Gareth the vampire hits the tree right beside him instead full-tilt. The resulting thud and /snap/ sound... painful.
Dorne eyes grow cold, he steps forward two steps. A small navy rose is pushed forward, his arm spins in a whirlpool motion, he mutters something softly.
GAME: Dorne casts Marid's Mastery. Caster Level: 3 DC: 14 GAME: Gareth rolls melee: (11)+2: 13
Jumping a mile because of startlement and fast reactions, Gareth inadvertently shifts ever so slightly out of the way of the vampire that flies past him... And into a tree. With surprise, he shifts and doesn't really register Dorne's touch to his shoulder or anything, instead stepping forward and attempting to smash the vampire in the head with his staff.... And misses.
GAME: Nels rolls 1d20+11: (20)+11: 31
GAME: Nels rolls 1d20+11: (7)+11: 18
GAME: Nels rolls 4d10+20: (24)+20: 44
GAME: {*} Zapolklnex rolls perception: (12)+5: 17
Nels frantically reloads as he sees what we're facing, and grumbles about his earlier missed shot. He takes more care, this time, moving up into better position and letting out his breath, drawing a bead, and letting it out slowly. He pulls the trigger, and there's the explosion of the thunderbelcher, and his ball hits cleanly, tap dead center in the vampire's chest. It's hard to say who's more surprised, Nels or the vampire. Nels as never seen anything take a hit like that and survive. This may be a problem.
GAME: Zapolklnex casts Charm Person. Caster Level: 4 DC: 16 GAME: Aftershock rolls 1d20+12: (9)+12: 21
Zapolklnex sends Crax off of his head, so that he can remove his hood. Then gesturing arcanely, and muttering, he stares at a being - child-sized to a human, nearly fully grown to a Mul'niessa - and attempt to Charm it. Since, well, preemptively attacking a child, who might even be a victim, seems bad.
GAME: Aftershock rolls 1d20+3: (10)+3: 13
With a lunge the vampire tries to grab Gareth again, but the vampire seems off-balance with part of its chest missing. So it grabs air rather than person. As it does this, a child no more than eight or nine toddles into the road, their white clothing stained crimson with blood. Horrified the priest moves toward the kid. "I'll tend the child!"
-TBC