Getting there!
Nat discovered the reason for those hose-mouths soon enough. “Damn!” he shouted as a stream of gray filth splattered across his shield, befouling it with a quickly-hardening slime. He smashed the shield in the foul attacker’s face, wincing at the fresh screeching. “Don’t let it get on your skin, right?”
“As little as possible!” yelled the Monsignor, his face a snarl of hate as the tip of his staff glittered an evil green. It trailed a brief green mist, too; but when the mist met flesh, the flesh bubbled. “They overwhelm their victims, trapping them in… their spray…”
He stopped in surprise, and perhaps mild dismay. Maddox and Nat had paired up, back to back, and around them was now piled a heap of stinking spider-things. Even as he watched, one monster spouted at Maddox’s head, only to have it intercepted by Nat’s now-encrusted shield. One quick stab later, and it was shuddering in death on the floor.
Nat fumbled with his shield. “Disgusting!” he rasped, and looked wildly for the doors. “We must move. Do these things ‘know their place,’ too?” he asked the Monsignor.
“They do,” the Monsignor admitted. “And they are deadlier than this. I wonder if the spells are failing.”“Maybe they are, maybe they’re not,” Maddox spit. His face and beard had streaks of the spider-thing’s spew smeared across it; but if they hurt, he showed no sign of it. “Either way, run!”