Session 36: Battle at the Yuan-Ti fort

General Summary

The party had just rushed the stone wall side of the fort, climbed (or jumped) up the side and made a surprise attack on the couple Yuan-Ti on the first floor roof, killing one. Making a power stance, the party readied themselves for battle against many more.
At first, only a couple on the wooden palisade surrounding the courtyard took notice and started firing arrows, one of which had an ability to cause their arrows to explode in a wave of arcane force on impact. It was enough to hurt 3 of the party and destroy Akoop.
The party moved forward, Pooka rushing ahead along the wooden palisade to attack directly with the lash (of which he continually felt disappointment), while Atreena and Eglantina threw arrows and eldritch blasts from afar. Brother Les moved up along the stone walkway of the main structure and attempted to ring the Yuan-Ti's bells, preserving his spells.
Another archer appeared in the far corner and after the first couple were downed nearby, Eglantina and this Yuan-Ti archer took turns exchanging fire.
From somewhere in the courtyard, however, a Yuan-Ti that looked mostly human, but with snakes for arms, appeared. It looked up at Pooka, Eglantina and Atreena and wiggled its arms in a hypnotic fashion, causing them all to feel sleepy. It only ended up affected Atreena though and she fell to the ground fast asleep.
After a rude awakening, Atreena ran up the side to get close enough to this snake-arm magic user, then called upon her recently found allegiance with the Raven Queen to corrupt the Yuan-Ti to be vulnerable to all kinds of magic and damage. She then threw one of her necrotic balls of energy hitting it square in the face. Between the corruption and the excellent targeting, the creature had no chance and hte necrotic energy crackled through it, causing it to decay at an alarmingly quick rate until it dropped dead seconds later.
More human-like Yuan-Ti came out of the doors on the first floor and started firing up at the party on the roof and palisade walkway. They exchanged fire back down and quickly killed them, with one running back insde. Pooka reached down and activated some recently etched arcane runes on his shoes to allow him to run faster and he rushed along the palisade to the other end to finish off the last archer.
It was quiet, for the moment. They knew one more was inside someplace, but not sure where.
While some of the party went up to the second floor roof, Eglantina was on the ladder heading up when the last Yuan-Ti appeared at the door right next to her and attempted to attack her. They finished her off quickly, including Brother Les's attempt to jump on her but he missed and rolled into the hallway.
They searched the second floor and found barracks and a small armory with 2 healing potions in a chest. Downstairs, on the first floor, they found a common room with tables, fireplace, kegs of ale and the like. Beyond a door was the kitchen and a pantry. All of which were actually edible and fresh food. They moved out into the courtyard and found boxes of common items, a couple stables, a small forge and targeting practice dummies. Seeing another entrance to the keep that did not have a door from the inside, they moved in.
It was a small office with mostly empty shelves, a small holding cell at one end and stairs heading downwards underground. They went down the stairs.
They found a narrow short hallway with a door at the end and a door at about the middle. They opened the middle door and found a storage room with a pair of hideous snake-human abominations here. They attacked immediately and were cut down pretty quickly as well. During this fight though, the door at the end of the hall opened with a human-like Yuan-Ti who tried to tell Eglantina to go upstairs, but Eglantina was having none of that charming kind of magic, and the yuan-ti closed the door and hid.
The party, after finishing off the monstrous yuan-ti, went to that door, tried to talk to the humanoid, and when it wouldn't give, they killed it. In this room it appeared ot be another small office kind of place with a ring of keys. Another door exited the room. They opened it and found a short hallway with cell doors along one wall and at the end. People were in these cells and seeing that the party wasn't the Yuan-Ti, got excited about being rescued. In here included the missing man, Sieb, that the lead originated with.
The party opened the cells and led them upstairs to teh common room, had them ransack the pantry and feed themselves. The party learned that various different people seduced the prisoners to leave the city and then be captured and brought to the fort. The party split up the search the rest of the fort and recovered some coins and Pooka found a small quiver of 6 arrows that were completely black, including the arrowheads.
Downstairs, Pooka and Eglantina found in the storage room what appeared to be a fake wall between two shelves. Brother Les came down to inspect it then promptly used his divine powers from Pelor to block the door from opening by shaping the stone in front of it to prevent it from opening. Then they went upstairs to take a rest. They let the former prisoners take the beds.
After the rest, the party went downstairs and prepared themselves to open the door and find out what was inside.
What will they find inside? What more does the Yuan-Ti have in store for Port Damali?

Report Date

02 Nov 2021