Dragon quickstep

[Anastasia]

It's a chamber full of metal scrap, heaping and overflowing. Nothing too unusual besides the massive piles of metal, at least to a casual look.

[Corwin]

To get a more detailed look, Seira drains the metal scrap into the portable hole!

[Anastasia]

As you go to - footsteps. You can hear footsteps back from the stairs going up. Is someone coming? No, three someones, you can tell.

[Corwin]

Even as she allows the hole to clear the room, Seira listens closely for a few moments for better details.

Are they actually going down the stairs? If so, how far do they sound?

[Anastasia]

They're going down and maybe 50ft away and coming on down by the moment.

[Corwin]

Seira closes the doors but the one she originally used to enter the chamber with the stairs, and waits in her Veil of the azer she had subdued for the descending trio.

Stay out of sight for now, she requests of her companions.

Goal is to see who comes here. If they actually descend all the way, they should see their friend and give me a chance to act before they wise up to it.

[Anastasia]

They come down - three more azer. "Hurry up," One of them calls, "The faster in, faster out."

"Oh, there he is," Another calls as they come down, each carrying a large sack, "Still not done?"

[Corwin]

In lieu of an answer, Seira stops time! She makes sure to cast a Veil and Silence on the stairs above and below the group to prevent word of the coming beating from escaping, and then makes sure to appear in their midst when time resumes. Before they can even think about reacting, she strikes at the three azer with intent of a swift take down!

Going nonlethal again. Do I need to roll my full attack to beat them up into unconsciousness?

[Anastasia]

No.

Down they go, easily enough subdued - mere mortals against you is never a fair fight.

[Corwin]

Seira binds their limbs and gags them the same way she had the other azers, and after dispelling the magic obscuring perception drops them off with their friends. She'll need to head up as soon as she's done with the room of scrapped metal, she reflects, or more might come down.

[Anastasia]

You move and take the scrap metal. There's a few skeletons here, long since forgotten. There's also a stairway going down, too.

[Corwin]

Seira takes a quick peek down the stairway, just half a flight of stairs's worth! Might be worthwhile knowing where it leads and whether anything or anyone is down there.

[Anastasia]

Looking down, you see that it leads to more half cooled magma, stopping abruptly after a landing to go deeper, blocked off.

[Corwin]

Makes sense-- oh! That's why the warning about not going further below! It's just common sense and not operational security, so turns out Seira underestimated Imix.

Gathering the others, she ventures forth up the stairway! She has enough local azer now to show all of her companions under a proper Veil, too, so it should buy her a moment to act when she runs into opposition.

[Anastasia]

As you begin to go up, you detect there's a spell deeper in here. A spell to notice and send an alarm if good creatures pass by.