the brute force approach and smashes and stomps the fire. It takes him a few seconds after smothering all of the fire in the room to realize that it is completely clear.

Linzi, meanwhile, continues to struggle to extinguish her flames, her lack of experience and physicality not aiding her at all. But, with a frustrated growl, she continues her method, unable to come up with another. This time, though, she is successful, able to take out the rest of her room's flames with the pot. With a smile of relief, she moves out into the hall, ready to help with another room, or the fires in the hall, whichever is necessary.

Malkala steps out into the hall and runs for one of the fires there. She quickly takes some of her wet rags and whips them through the fire, quickly extinguishing it without effort. She then continues moving, heading for the last room to be extinguished.

Before she can reach it though, Amiri rushes by, nearly bowling over the dragonborne despite her size and mass. The barbarian woman, no longer caring for holding her breath, lets out a roar of fury as she continues with the barbarian method of slamming limbs and rags into the fires. And yet again, she is successful in completely extinguishing the fires in the room. Despite the smoke entering her mouth and causing her to immediately start coughing, she lets out a roar of triumph that could be heard throughout the manor.

The rest of the fires in the hall are easy to take care of with their source of heat and fuel gone. During that time, it is easy to see that the smoke has already started to affect Amiri, her movements slowed. Yet, her enthusiasm remains as she helps with the hall fires.

With that done, Malkala grabs everyone's attention before motioning for the door on the opposite side of the hall. Linzi quickly runs to the door, opening it and motioning for everyone to run in.

The smoke-filled guest room leaves Zrak desperately holding his breath. His survival instincts has him running not out of the room, but instead to the windows. With a hefty bit of effort, he pulls the glass panels open and releases smoke out. The unbreathable air had to get out of the manor; and if he had to backtrack through here, he'd rather dash through a clear room.

Once done, he skitters back toward Malkala and the other adventurers. His eyes look over Amiri, who now breathes in the air as if it doesn't bother her; and the smoke clearly does. Even he isn't reckless enough to breathe anything that isn't oxygen.

He follow's Linzi's recommendation and charges through the door, glad to get out of the fiery room.

When everyone gets through the threshold of the room, Linzi slams the door shut fast. When the door closes, she lets out her breath, her body trying to recover from holding it. Amiri, meanwhile, tries to boast, but immediately starts coughing, smoke bursting out of her mouth with each one. But, with each cough, she seems to recover from the smoke inhalation.

Once everyone recovers, they are able to look around the room. Drifting coils of smoke waft in the air of this finely furnished room. Padded chairs and side tables are set along the west wall and a thick burgundy carpet covers most of the floor. Oil paintings hang on the walls, and shelves contain statuettes and other small art pieces. Even without looking at the map, it is easy to see that this is the gallery.

But the group's eyes focus on the floor near the door. There, a small body lays, wearing fine robes that have been smoke covered and burned. Linzi rushes over, "It's Tartuccio!"

Malkala steps over as well and pulls out her Healer's Tools. With quick, practiced motions, she checks the body, and nods after a moment, "He is alive." She then grabs a small pouch from the toolbag and holds it over Tartuccio's nose.

The gnome wakes immediately and violently, his body shocked from the sudden consciousness. Once he has a moment to calm down, he looks at the group and says, "Well, finally my loyal henchmen have arrived to save the master! Took you long enough!" He then staggers over to one of the padded chairs and plops down into it, obviously exhausted.

Zrak is still deeply inhaling and exhaling the cleaner air as Malkala heals and awakens the gnome. Shaking his head, Zrak walks over and takes a seat by a chair in talking distance of Tartuccio. The padded material lightly squishes under the Ysoki's body, making for a pleasant seat in this brief moment of calm. His arms slump by his sides, head barely looking up at the others.

"You're damn lucky to be alive," He says to Tartuccio with a sneer, not in the mood to deal with the gnome's attitude. Zrak takes one more deep breath, shaking his ratty head. "We've been dealing with assassins, giants and fires over the night. We could use some more information. What did you know before passing out?"

Tartuccio gives out a bark of laughter, "Ha! At least you weren't locked in your room and almost burned alive. All I know is that I was only able to survive due to my great magical skills and senses. But I took too much smoke and collapsed when I got the door closed. And now, I need to you to escort me to the Great Hall so that your future ruler can stay safe."

Amiri lets out a big snort, "Tiny here can make it on his own. Just need to go through the bathroom."

"But what's the harm in making sure he gets back safe?" Linzi asks, "There's no telling what may happen during this assault."

"At least one of you is thinking straight." Tartuccio mutters, "I can put the blame on Aldori, though. If she had better security we wouldn't have to worry about this."

At that Malkala, who had been at the northern door trying to listen, turns her head to look at the gnome and growls. Tartuccio just shrugs unapologetically.

"You can make it," Malkala says, "Like Amiri said, just go through the bathroom." Her eyes fix on Zrak, "Unless?"

Zrak looks up at Malkala and gives a particularly cruel sneer, not directed at her. "Unless he'd like to stay and pray the assassins don't come to finish him off." The ysoki clearly was not dealing with the gnome's snobby attitude during a life-or-death scenario.

With little interest in arguing, Zrak glances over at Tartuccio and gave him a wide-eyed glare from his damp, ratty head. "We cleared the way back just getting here. That's your escort doing their work." The ysoki plops off the chair, looking at the makeshift map on the napkin. "But we'll take you along if you can fight."

He saves his breath and lets the gnome make his decision. Aldori awaited and Zrak doubts Malkala and Amiri want to wait around. His ratty snout mumbles up and down, quietly grumbling as he gets ready by the door. He almost looks forward to facing assassins and giants again.

"Ha!" The gnome barks again, "Why would I dare walk along side you?" Seeing that the decision has been made, he hops off of the chair, agile for someone who was just unconscious from smoke inhalation. As he walks over to the door to the hallway, he turns back and says, "I will remember this, 'heroes.'" With that, he throws open the door and enters the still smoky hallway, leaving the door open.

Malkala sighs and closes the door again, "That gnome is insufferable." She then moves to the southern door, kneeling down next to it, trying to listen like she did the northern door. After a moment, she shakes her head, "I can't hear anything through either door." She turns to Zrak, "They both lead to the Trophy Hall, which leads to the Dueling Chamber. So, I guess we can go either way."

The ysoki gives a harsh huff, still agitated by the gnome's arrogance even as he walks out to safety. "So we're not far off now." His rat-shaped head holds a narrow glare and a slight twitch, considering what lies ahead. The trophy and dueling hall will show a new side to Lady Aldori, one that Malkala might be more familiar with.

The two doors presents an interesting opportunity as Zrak lines up next to one. "If we got two ways in, why not use both?" He remembers the value of swarm tactics, using as many entrances into battle with as many allies as they can take. "Two of us go through each door and cover as much space as we can. I'll go in quiet and see who's there. Come charging in," he said, now looking at Amiri, "once things start breaking."

With a deep, husky breath, Zrak gently opens the door and sneaks his way into the trophy room.

Malkala nods before looking toward Linzi. The halfling woman locks eyes with the dragonborne before moving right behind her. Amiri takes the cue to follow Zrak, both hands gripping the greatsword tightly. As she was already standing next to the door, Malkala slowly opens the southern door and walks in. Through the doorway, Zrak can see an armory full of armor and weapons set upon racks and mannequin stands. But the two women ignore them as they turn to the right and disappear.

As Zrak enters the northern door, he finds himself within a parlor. It is a large room that contains several padded chairs, a comfortable-looking pair of couches, several side tables, and a finely crafted billiards table. But he and Amiri move past all of that furniture and approach the door to the next room. The door is cracked open slightly, allowing the pair to hear voices on the other side.

"We are going to ask once more," A male voice says before Zrak hears the sound of metal scrapping against leather, "Where does Aldori keep her valuables?"

There is silence. A long silence.

The male voice snorts, "Well, I guess she likes taking the fist."

Cloth rustles, then the loud, unmistakable sound of a punch. A scratchy female voice cries out in pain. As the woman lets out a few heavy breaths, the metal on leather sound continues scraping.

That is, until, almost simultaneously, Amiri lets out a growl and metal clatters on the other side of the next room. Everyone freezes for a moment, then the male voice snarls, "Damnit. Get them!"

This is not how Zrak wants this to go down. He didn't expect a torture session in the middle of a partly-burning building, though it fits the many other measures taken by these assassins. He smells a peculiar lack of blood, though it is going to flow one way or another.

Amiri's growls synchronize with Zrak's own, quieter one. It isn't the torture that gets him so riled up, but the desire to tear one asunder for tonight's events.

So just as the man snarls, a frenzied, skittering, raging ratfolk charges through. His ratty head twitches in nerve-wracking motions, with his row of sharp teeth wide open. The metal ball of his combat lure flickers in his wild-moving hands, lethally spinning again and again.

"Finally," Zrak sneers with rampant breathing. "Someone I can SMASH!" He leaps to the wall on the right, kicking off it as if to pincer his foe while swinging his weapon at the male enemy!

The ball of the combat lure flies forward, wind whistling as it tries to strike with great force. But the white haired man which was the first in Zrak's line of sight is fast as he ducks to the side. The lure ball cracks against the stone floor before slinging back to Zrak for his next strike.

As Zrak lands from his attack, the second man in the room becomes a blur as he steps toward the ratfolk. Zrak barely has time to react before the man, taking a stance low to the ground resembling a four-legged predator, lunges for him with both hands as if trying to take a bite out of the ratfolk's shoulder. The hands grip tight on the shoulder, nails digging in like the fangs of a wolf. The leather clad man then wrenches like a dog attempting to pull Zrak to the ground. Surviving in the wilds of Numeria taught Zrak how to handle beasts and their strength, however, and the ratfolk stands firm and unwavering.

Linzi is the next to move, her lute out and ready. She starts strumming, the tune coming out one of inspiration, grand story, and heroism. The music seems to sing without words, dance without limbs, telling of the courage of adventurers. As she plays, she hits a chord that sounds like it doesn't belong and takes a step to the side. At the sound of the chord, one of the daggers from the armory flings past her shoulder, Malkala's shoulder, and toward the man currently harrying Zrak. However, the halfling bard mistimed her music and the flung dagger sailed past the man as he attempted to pull Zrak down, missing his head completely and sparking against the stone wall.

The white haired man turned to see the source of the dagger, and sees Malkala standing at the door, still slow to join the battle. He smirks, slinks toward her, his movements smooth and slithering like a snake, and strikes with both daggers, one after another. The first dagger grazes the dragonborne's lower arm, not leaving much of a wound. However, the brief distraction it caused allows the man to dig the second dagger right into her chest right to the hilt. Malkala growls, but does not falter as she flashes her teeth.

A roar of such ferocity is let loose from the parlor that everyone stops for a brief moment. Then, a bull of a woman charges forward, her massive blade not slowing her down as she stops right behind the foe attacking Zrak. Amiri's blade catches the light from the torches as it comes down upon the man's head as if from a giant. But the weakness of wielding such a large blade is how slow it is, which is proven as the man easily slides out of its way. This does not seem to deter Amiri as she pulls the blade out of the stone floor and gets ready for another attack.

Malkala, still with a dagger in her chest, opens her mouth. The acid dripping from it surprises the white-haired man for a moment, but instead of letting loose with her breath, she stands firm, becoming a wall between the assassin and Linzi. Her blade slashes upward, her quick flick from years of training. Metal strikes armor, leaving a large gash that manages to also cut skin. The assassin stumbles back from the force of the attack, and Malkala debates pressing it. However, she uses her off-hand to pull a potion from her bag and chug it as the assassin recovers. He