003 - Delve 1 - Beyond the Door

Nym follows the footprints to the back of the cavern. It seems like the creatures must have left through the tunnel that Calvas had dismissed as empty.

"Nothing here? Are you certain, Calvas?" he says, with a frown. "The footprints seem to lead this way..." He points at the footprints leading toward the back of the cavern with his scimitar.

Vinny laughs at the joke and retorts "Well it would’ve been just as sweet!" he laughs at himself, not to be outdone. Stands up and hollers at the group searching, "Did you all find anything or should we consider heading back?"

"Uh… I’m not sure…" Nym peers into the tunnel as he responds to Vinny’s question, watching closely for any sign of the creatures' return. "There’s not much up here but if we leave, the creatures might follow and attack us as we retreat. If we stay here and prepare for them, perhaps we could stage our own ambush…" Nym glances over his shoulder at the three of his friends still huddled in the boat. "What would you guys prefer we do?"

Lieria glances right back at Nymril, answering in a flat voice. "I would prefer we leave, potentially before we are besieged again without any means of recovery."

"G-guys?" Vinny says nervously, which would be unusual for the man who loves the spotlight. "I don't think they're setting up a ball room dance. We should go."

Ishmee's blood rose again at the sound of the drums. The handle of the black blade vibrated in her hand as she thought about what might come out of that cave. She took a step toward the cave. Her foot came down on one of the skulls in the pile and it crushed under her weight.

"We should fight," she said before she knew what she was saying.

Lieria gives Ishmee an incredulous look, or as much of her as she can from the current position. "If we fight, we could die. Our current intel on these creatures is far too limited, we could be walking into dozens of enemy combatants."

"I agree with Lieria, we should go. Come back when we aren't known to be around, scout, get to know things, use the element of surprise, if we even should fight them at all."

We don't know much about these creatures but I think we could defeat them. The only access point to this cavern is this tunnel. If we fight them right at the entrance they won't be able to outnumber us and Ishmee can chop them down one by one. They'll also hardly be able to use their bows from the tunnel. I think it's worth the risk

Nym begins to back away from the tunnel, eyes wide. "…N-no, I agree with the others. That sounds bad. We should go."

Calvas scratches his chin and says in a bored voice *Sigh* If you all insist on leaving I'm coming with you. But we'll have to fight them sooner or later if we want to explore this part of the cavern
Calvas points at the tunnel and continues And if we fight them it's better if WE dictate the place and we could do this now. Otherwise we'll have to fight while sitting in the boat against an enemy with high ground. And this will be as pleasurable as it was a few minutes ago

Nym hurries down the stairs and gets back into the boat. He picks up an oar, ready to leave as soon as everyone else is.

Calvas gaze follows Nym down to the boat. He looks down and rubs his forehand with his left hand
Well... Ishmee I think our friends don't understand much about tactics. It's of no use to fight alone. Let's leave...
He begins to walk towards the boat but not without exercising his favourite activity: Telling other's that they are wrong
You know... he begins to say while stepping into the boat ... when we are back upstairs I will show you the works of general Silkard. A famous human commander whos works are only freely accesible in these times because he preferred the peaceful solution over a militaristic one...
Calvas raises his left index finger like a teacher ...if possible. He always sought to concentrate his enemies at points HE choose and defeated them with superior tactics. I can really recommend his report on the Battle of the Cubin Pass
He slumps down on his seat and grabs an oar.
Really, read it. A bit of tactical knowledge will surely help us in our future endeavours down here

Alissia sits next to Nym, staring daggers at Calvas. "We are basically out of healing with no intel and literally only five of us. For all we know, they outnumber us 100 to 1 and all they'd have to do is shoot us from afar, which they've proven they can do. So how about we leave for now and follow the works of famous people blindly instead of applying it to our current situation, always trying to do the heroic thing instead of the smart and arguably better thing."

"I...agree with Alice." Lieria picks up an oar as she stares at Alissa with wide eyes, not expecting her to snap.

Nym nods in agreement. "Well said, Alissia."