"A well-earned reward, I think," Aria nodded, "The giantess's big bag of holding may be useful for this as well..."<br/><br/>At the stone-table-cum-desk, a charcoal pen and the mathematician's tools of a straightedge and protractor would be found near the map. It was in some old language but from the contours of coast, rivers, and mountains it was evidently the Mulhorandi region. A circle had been traced with the pen and protractor, showing the same area Kass and Aria had seen with their own eyes encompassed by the soundwave.<br/><br/>The tomes were old but not ancient, certainly not like the tomb itself, in Draconic or Common; one of the latter and most contemporary-looking a survey of lore, tales (some probably tall) and rumors on relics and artifacts all around the Moonsea region; a page marked with a folded corner even spoke of the statue of Adon (showing the book to be at most a few decades old).<br/><br/>Aria was advancing slowly into the next room, inspecting her surroundings as she went. The second chamber had about the same horizontal dimensions, but its higher ceiling gave it a grander feel. Near the rear of the chamber, behind the impressive 'bed' of the dragon's hoard (in which the tiefling informed Kass she sensed some magical auras) was an oblong plinth and a shattered-apart sarcophagus; it seemed indeed as Kass surmised that all the original treasures had been plundered, probably many generations before Kass and Aria had even been born...but the dragon treasure would certainly make up for that!<br/><br/>Even the back wall itself and rear sections of floor seemed sundered and cracked, with unworked stone behind. The dragon appeared to've even filled in some floor-cracks with cheaper coinage.<br/><br/>Aria followed the compass towards a point near the hoard's left edge, and then exclaimed, "I think I've found the other compass - I see it just sitting on the treasure..."<br/><br/>The center of the treasure pile, near its highest point, erupted suddenly in a short-lived geyser of coins and sandy soil. A long shaft of bronze had thrust up through it - a shaft which curled, suddenly. It was tree-thick and segmented and moved flexibly, and the end was like a great snake head. The fangs and eyes danced with electric-blue sparks; a construct creature, and it seemed to silently hiss and prepare to strike at Aria.<br/><br/>For a large construct, it was surprisingly swift; far more so than the wicker man. It struck out as eyeblink-fast as the organic snakes the thing had clearly been constructed in likeness of; Aria screamed as it chomped down around her body, and coils of electricity twisted around its fangs and into her. The creature kept tis firm bite, crunching down even harder, until Aria hissed the command word for her ring.<br/><br/>The tiefling phased faint green for a split second, then into the invisibility of etherealness. She blinked back in a few moments later, already rolling across coins away from the creature and then leaping into the air to fly through the archway. "Big bronze snake!" she cried. "It's fast and when it bites it doesn't let go!" She hooked around the nearer corner, out of direct line of sight from the beast, wincing and panting.<br/><br/><br/><br/>(EDIT: I might've made a mistake: Aria's Ring of the Darkhidden makes her invisible to darkvision - in other words creatures need to be able to see her by some other means, like regular vision or blindsight, to 'see; her...so I guess I'll assume that during this attack, Aria was in the area illumatined by Kass's sunrod, which is possible from the slices of the first room from which Kass would have line of sight to Aria.)<br/><br/>bronze serpent init 31<br/>Aria init 29<br/>Kass init 25<br/><br/>serpent:<br/>bite at Aria<br/>atk 45 dmg 17 + 21 electric (-5 elec resisted)<br/>improved grab: grapple check 73<br/>(Aria has no chance)<br/>constrict dmg 31<br/>total 64<br/>Aria at 100 HP exactly.<br/><br/>Aria:<br/>activate blink ring<br/>(I always presumed that other creatures can't maintain a grapple against an ethereal foe. Although they could still initiative one and cause 'instantaneous' effects such as the constrict damage, assuming they pass the 50% miss chance if the blink is already active. I almost gave Aria a ring of freedom of movement but figured it'd be semi-redundant with blink.)<br/>move away, through archway into first room, use door for total cover; make a hide check as part of the movement<br/>(total cover satisfies the conditions for 'not being observed': 33 + 12r - 5 (movement)<br/><br/>DnD art gallery of recent monsters:<br/>Blue dragon (http://umbrarumregnum.110mb.com/the-den/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/blue-1024x679.jpg)<br/>Wicker man (http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/ff_gallery/50142.jpg)<br/>Bronze serpent (http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/mm2_gallery/88268_620_13.jpg)<br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: courier;"><br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . S S S S . . .<br/>. . S S S S . . .<br/>. . S S S S . . .<br/>. . S S S S . . .<br/>. A . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>      . . .<br/>      . . .<br/>. . A . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>. . . . . . . . .<br/>      . . .<br/>      . . .<br/>      . . .<br/>      <br/></span>