Alric sighs in apparent relief and leans against the wall, lowering the lantern a little and relaxing his grip on his staff.

After closing the door, Norel quietly moves away from the doorway and over to his companions.

Addressing Bryce's question, Norel says quietly, "that room is the bear's den, and its bedding are some old codices and scrolls.  There is a natural opening in the wall that the bear enters and exits through, and I could feel cool air from the outside flowing into the bear's den."

Bryce looks at the door barring the way to the bear's lair with a pained, longing look.  "Scrolls and codices, your say?  Those could be quite useful..."

Sighing, the young sorcerer pauses for a moment before continuing, "But perhaps we should try that room again later, when perhaps the bear will be away?"

Quote from: Akrasia;452487Bryce looks at the door barring the way to the bear's lair with a pained, longing look.  "Scrolls and codices, your say?  Those could be quite useful..."

Sighing, the young sorcerer pauses for a moment before continuing, "But perhaps we should try that room again later, when perhaps the bear will be away?"

"Agreed. The bear obviously leaves from time to time, perhaps we can retrieve some information while the beast is out hunting." Alric says thoughtfully.

Just to give you an idea on space and scope:

You're about halfway up the left hand side (the western side) of the temple, but you've only explored a narrow slice of it so far, a slice about 5m thick out of 50m. Every room you've been in so far, including the bear room, had doors leading to the right / east further into the temple, but all have been closed so far. So if you're looking for directions to explore it, that's probably your best bet.

"Well gentlemen, shall we head into the heart of this temple?" Bryce asks, gesturing to the door on the eastern wall with his crossbow.

"Precisely my thoughts as well," Norel says in response to Bryce's and Alric's exchange.

In response to Bryce's suggestion of moving on, Norel nods in agreement and says, "aye, it's time to move away and not provoke our dining friend any further."

Norel moves up to the Bryce indicates with his crossbow and slowly pushes it open into the room.

The door opens into the central chamber of the temple. It's a massive room with pillars carved to look like temple guardians holding up the ceiling, and intricate friezes on either wall. The floor, lit here and there by beams of light coming through holes in the ceiling, is a mosaic pattern in black and white that curls around each pillar. It smells fresher in here than the other rooms, and you can see flowers growing up here and there between the tiles.

At the back of the room is a dais with an altar of carved alabaster, atop which sits a gleaming array of silver plate - cups, bowls, platters, braziers - all neatly arrayed on orange silk cloth. A skylight lets sunlight shine on the plate and the altar while keeping the area around it dark. There's a low droning noise in the air, like the buzzing of bees.

Norel will glance above his head and around to see if he can spot any bees, wasps, or other flying creatures.

OOC: Norel succeeds his Perception check.

The roof is honeycombed with hives of wasps. No doubt for the old wood up there. They seem pretty docile right now.

Alric follows behind with the lantern, watching for signals and attempting to make sure his comrades have the light when they need it without disturbing the insects.

Norel stops momentarily, and turns to his companions.  He points up toward the wasp nests with his weapon to warn them of their presence and location.  He will then continue to move forward through the room to the dais and altar.

I'm going on vacay from the 23rd to the 29th. I'm hoping to be able to continue to get online during that, but if I vanish for a few days, blame it on the hotel.

For now, the wasps seem more occupied with other matters. Fortunately, the distance overhead to the nests is enough that you don't risk disturbing them through an accidental brush or tap.

Everything's smooth as you advance to the altar, Norrel, until you pass a white line in the mosaic floor that circumscribes the dais at a distance of about 3m. As you do, the pillars carved to resemble temple guardians rotate smoothly on hidden tracks. No poison sprays, no rain of darts springs forth, no blocks fall from the ceiling. But the closest four pillars to the dais all have their faces and bodies pointed directly at you. Massive stone eyes gaze impassively at you.

Hotel wireless is crappy but functional.

Amra, Llum, Alric, Bryce>

You can see the pillars rotate. What appears to be going on is that a carved outer casing is rotating, while an inner shaft is remaining stationary. The inner cores each have multiple small grooves and shafts in them that the sheathing exposes as it rotates. It's unclear what they're for, unless you'd like to make a closer examination...