[center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][center][color=dimgray][h1][i][b]X2[/b][/i][/h1][/color][/center][center][color=dimgray][i][b]Location:[/b][/i][/color] G14[/center][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center]
[center][img]https://i.ibb.co/pKswWS6/Rat-Golem.jpg[/img][/center]

	The ineffectual attack from the Dragonborn's shortsword was seemingly quite forgotten, were it given notice at all in the first place, allowed the collection of giant, anthropomorphized rat parts given locomotion all of the necessary opportunity to heap a punishing strike upon the prisoner's enclosure once again. The damaged beam splintered inward, showering shards of inexpertly crafted wood upon the occupants therein. A sizeable hole had been opened which one might have been able to wriggle a human-sized torso through, which might have been advantageous were it not loomed over by a grotesque abomination bent on murder. Lea screamed in utter terror while Daisy and the girls from the Honey Barn shrunk back as far as they could from the crude opening, pulling the inconsolable barmaid with them.

	This attack out of the way, the creature quickly swiped at Baronfjord, the closest reachable enemy to it. Its body rotated with the strike, committing a staggering blow to the monk while displaying a lack of passion in the whole affair. It remained where it stood, committed to task.   


[color=red][b]Baronfjord has taken 13 points of bludgeoning damage.[/b][/color]

[center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][center][color=darkgray][h1][i][b]Cavendish[/b][/i][/h1][/color][/center][center][color=darkgray][i][b]Location:[/b][/i][/color] A10 [/center][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center]
[center][img][/img][/center]

	The Constable, if that title really applied to him anymore, could finally be spotted from behind the higher blaze to the north. This was thanks to the one toppled barrel, spilling its flaming contents across the thoroughfare and a bit to either side of the overturned mess. The illumination was such that things were better revealed, if perilous. Point of fact, the trunk of a stout tree nearby got splattered with a good amount of the sticky, burning stuff, promising to turn the tree into a great, greenwood torch in short seconds. 

	While Cavendish could be spotted from certain angles on the battlefield, his Guards could not. Where the might have gone to, none could reliably say in the moment. Instead of crossbow-wielding wererats, there was a multitude of regular sized ones, not unlike the swarms milling about town just out of the radius of light sources, between the Constable and the rest of the battlefield. Not all of them were living; the fire had claimed the lives of several from either direct contact or the inability of some to escape the heat for the presence of others. The great swarm did begin to scatter, though by no means did they yet give unfettered and easy ground to the principle antagonist. 

	A look of surprise could be seen on the Constable's face, as well. The sort of alarm that came from an unexpected but not wholly unfamiliar factor could be seen from the direction of Kathryn and Kosara, which was swiftly replaced with determination. He saw something working up in the situation that he could try to circumvent, and he was eager to do so. [i]First[/i], he whispered a short incantation and pointed at the woman who caused all of this mess, releasing bargained-for power into her. His eyes darkened briefly during this spellwork, with single points of light emanating from the black in a way that only Kathryn could see. A weary heaviness took over her limbs; a slight slouch as if given a burden. 

	[i]Secondly[/i], his words went to the burning creature under his control, though his words did not fully align with a master confidently maintaining something that resembled control, more than one attempting to re-assert it. He spoke with an air of firm persuasiveness, though it was impossible to fix the exact words unless one had a grasp of the [i]Infernal[/i] tongue. Whatever he was saying, it didn't seem to help matters much. 

[color=red][b]Kathryn is now affected by a [i]Hex[/i] spell which is targeting her Strength.[/b][/color]

[center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][center][color=dimgray][h1][i][b]X1[/b][/i][/h1][/color][/center][center][color=dimgray][i][b]Location:[/b][/i][/color] G7 -> E9 [/center][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center]
[center][img]https://i.ibb.co/pKswWS6/Rat-Golem.jpg[/img][/center]

	The creature had a blow lined up to flatten Kosara where she stood. No evil gleamed in its eyes; no malice or thoughts of revenge, but it was coming. This action was paused for just a moment by the sudden appearance of its master floating before it, giving a gesture that it did not recognize any more than a wooden mallet would know which spoon to stir one's tea with. [i]But for whatever reason, it did pause.[/i] This momentary opening was enough to get the Rat Abomination snatched up by Kathryn and shoved into a flaming pitch barrel. It was at this moment that something within the creature snapped. 

	It rose from its position on the ground, covered in the sticky, burning pitch it was deposited into when the barrel toppled. Hundreds, maybe even thousands of squealing rats scattered but were too late to avoid their incoming doom, but this was not the greatest part of the problem. No, this thing was [i]on fire[/i], and for the first time since it rose from the fountain, it looked ANGRY. Attached and unattached nerves in the being's face attempted to move in howls or sneers, alternatively, and blind rage colored this hellish thing with greater coverage than the fire. A dry, raspy roar slipped from long unused, staled vocal cords, and it set its sights upon the first living creature it saw. 

	From its vantage, no, it was not the woman who put it there. It was the rats. Heavy double-fists smashed down upon the cobblestones, obliterating the rodents and smashing some into paste. The beast was reckless with fury, uncontrolled by its master despite what was most likely a harrowing but as yet attempt to bring it back to subservience. It is pissed off and beating to death whatever it can get its hands on.

[color=red][b]Several rats are dead and/or on fire, and the area to the north that is not aflame is considered [i]Difficult Terrain[/i], with appropriate movement penalties.[/b][/color]


[center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][center][color=darkgray][h1][i][b]Guard 2[/b][/i][/h1][/color][/center][center][color=darkgray][i][b]Location:[/b][/i][/color] ? [/center][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center]
[center][img][/img][/center]
	[color=darkgray][i]I shot an arrow into the air,
	It fell to earth, I knew not where;
	For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
	Could not follow it in its flight.[/i][/color]

	The above excerpt from the poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow should serve to highlight the location of Guard 2. That is to say; You don't know, and if he knows, he's not sharing. Best of luck with that. 
 
 
 
 


[@rivaan] [color=f7941d][b]Kosara[/b][/color] is good to go. Please tag me at the end of your post. Map setup and kicking off the next round, etc.