Although there was still much debate on whether that thing we just killed was made out of wax or flesh, it was agreed that it was indeed a golem and we were gonna leave it at that. Got better things than arguing about the specifics of the things we kill-- for instance, more killing! I will say I do like knowing how we kill things though, wish we could spend more time discussing that.
Speaking of extremely inefficient ways of spending our time, these two buggers that joined our group to look for their zombified family have proven to be more than just extremely irritating. They also happen to be outstandingly bad adventurers, though I should stop being surprised of that by now.
Suffice to say that they keep going in different directions shouting the names of their lost family members-- do they not realize we're in a zombie infested dungeon?? And they have the gall of calling -me- stupid. Well, if it gets them killed no skin off my bones, I ain't getting paid to baby sit. That I end up doing that anyway most of the time is another matter.
As the two wankers go in another corridor, Mira, Bertah and I trek northward whilst Oscric and Casimir cover the rear as a proper military unit ought to do. We encounter a lever that opens a secret entrance by causing the stone wall to spin like a revolving door. Unfortunately, no one decided to jump into the revolving entrance and now the lever is stuck in place. Well, I never said we were a good or even effective military unit.
Deciding to sod that mess, we move back and catch up with the two blighters that are still wandering about the darkness shouting names. I take point because if anyone's gonna die here is gonna be because their own stupidity and not because I failed at protecting them. You know, like it normally happens whenever someone bites the dust around here.
Scouting ahead, I run into a crossroads that lead to the left and right. After peering over a wall I spot a group of zombies lumbering about and I'm quick to inform my group that we're about to make contact. Unfortunately, I keep forgetting that no one here besides Bertha and I have military training and the two rookies take my hand gestures as a sign of moving forward.
As expected they immediately get jumped by zombies and chomped on, forcing the rest of us to engage the undead and try to pry them off. I have to give credit to the bloke looking for his family though. He makes an effort to not hurt the zombies even as they are attacking him and his cohort on the off chance they are members of his family. Wish he put that level of dedication on more useful things like surviving.
Bertha, Mira and I chop the front line of zombies whilst Osric and Casmir back us up. To my surprise, the bloke orders his cohort Rabina to do something useful for a change and controls a large portion of the zombies and makes them hold still. I have to wonder what kind of relation that human and elf have since I can't imagine anyone complying to that bloke's orders unless they are getting their jollies outta it.
Leaving that as it may, the spell proves very effective. The immobilized zombies are disposed off in short order and the bloke finds his zombified father among them. Kudos to that.
Rabina ties dad zombie up with a suspicious amount of skill, making me wonder even more about what kind of stuff these blighters are into.
Nothing else in this room. We leave dad zombie tied up and we move forward.
There's an oddly shaped room up ahead. And by oddly shaped I mean it looks like there's boobs everywhere.
Boobs..
(The next page of the journal consists of badly, scratched out, doodles that oddly resemble Bertha)
Crud! I need to conserve paper!
As we go into the room we run head straight into what appears to be a monster stitched out from parts of other monsters. With several pairs of arms, legs, eyes and mouths everywhere and heads coming out from different places in his body. Very cute.
Casimir has the brilliant idea of baiting the beastie back into the other room were we can properly circle it and use our superior numbers to our advantage. That would have been great, where it not for the fact that Rabina and her boss were way too overextended as usual and got grappled by the beast. Hopefully, Casimir now understands how I feel every day working with these fools.
Moral obligation compels us to save our party members, no matter how utterly obnoxious, bossy and egocentric they may be so rather than leave them to their fate Mira, Bertha and I make a mad dash to try and pry them off the monster's several arms. Mira grabs hold of Rabina, whilst Bertha and I both try to yank out the bloke.
They are really stuck in there.
Yeah, that didn't work. Beast grabbed them good and squeezed them to death.
Bah. Just.. bah.
Having taking a few casualties, Casimir's idea of falling back and fighting the beast in our terms is starting to look really good. For some reason though, Bertha took great offense at that thing killing our two rookies -- I guess she wanted to kill them herself -- and charged the beast.
Sod it, I know its a bad idea, but I'm never opposed to killing stuff. Might as well go out with a bang.
Bertha and I engage first and I start parrying the blows thrown at me though Bertha takes a few stray blows. Mira comes in on the oblique angle and starts hacking it apart with her axe while we keep it occupied. Under normal circumstances I'd say we are doing pretty well but these thing has like four arms which evens out the odds by quite a bit.
In a stroke of pure tactical genius -- which no doubt comes from hanging out with me for such a long time -- Osric masterfully summons a pack of hyenas to flank the beast. They immediately assail its rear and trip it up giving us a few precious moments to whack at it while it regains its balance. I would have gone out of my way to congratulate him where it not for him casting grease soon after and making the daft move of reminding me of Bay'wynn. Now I'm gonna pretend like I didn't notice.
After a solid axe chop, Mira manages to finish the thing off and it collapses, vanquished at our feet.
Eh, its Bay'wynn's loss for missing out on that battle. A song about this epic would have earned her more than a pretty penny.
