Maybe exploring this abandoned citadel wasn't such a good idea after all.Filled with animated shadows and ancient guardians it doesn't look like the architects of this deathtrap wanted anyone disturbing it after they left. And judging from some of the scenes chisled into the walls, they weren't too friendly when they were here either.
Who created this awful place? And why?
Ever since you entered this citadel you've had the feeling that something was lurking just out of the corner of your eye, that you were being watched. Now you are being deafened by the sound of that damn golem pounding the walls of the pit he fell into.
Part of you thinks you should leave now while you still have your sanity and your life. But another part of you is still curious to learn more about this shadowy citadel and the treasures still here.
Was it greed or curiousity that killed the kitten?
Miriel rushes over to heal and restore Telryn with a lesser restoration. We can hear the golem pounding at the pit, very loud. Telryn tells us that the stone tablets have a lot of magical writing on them, this one contains an arcane spell, and there are more in there. Miriel suggests opening room, just one person goes in, she cures them after. Paks and stone say the trap will reset itself, so we agree to go elsewhere.
Stone and Chuck go to examine the big double doors; they are made of stone and swing inward. Chuck carefully looks for traps on the doors and doesn't find any. Stone tries to push them open. He can't, and calls for help. Paks tries to stop them so we can rest and finish healing Telryn.
Stone goes to the pit to look in at the golem. Paks follows. Stone uses his pole to open the trapdoor a bit. We finally decide to rest. Stone says we should check on GP. Telryn asks Chester. Rain has stopped, thick fog. Theyr'e on an island in the middle of the water.
We rest for an hour, but with the racket, we just can't concentrate. We go back towards the entrance, but it's still too loud. We go to look at the crystal door. Chuck attempts to disable it and get it open, but he can't find the mechanism. Stone and Telryn grab some rubble to wedge it open with. We all work to open it, and lift it a bit. We feel a litle sick, Telryn feels very sick, and we close it and move away. Paks suggests going outside. Miriel suggests killing the golem. We discuss various options, miriel says fill pit so it can't move, but stone says it can climb out. Telryn goes back to pedestal to read writing, but he doesn't recognize the writing. Miriel says put it back on the pedestal, move away, rest, put golem back in pit.
Paks checks the crystal door room again and the gas seems to have dissipated. Telryn reads a scroll of comprehend languages to see if he can read the pedestal. The script is very confusing; it takes a force of will to keep his sanity while reading it. It talks about shadows and master and he can't quite make it out, it doesn't really make sense, just repeating words.
Paks slowly lifts the crystal door, but can't really get it all the way up, just about a foot. Telryn tries to pronounce the words on the pedestal. Paks and Telryn look odd, and Telryn tries to speak, but we can't understand him. Paks turns and tries to explain, but we can't understand her either. Chuck suddenly understands them too, but Miriel and Stone look confusedly at each other and Stone asks her if she's gone insane. Miriel pantomimes don't talk to them and they stay quiet. Telryn can read the pedestal now. This is the citadel of the Slarican Guardian, do not disturb, go away. Chuck tries to see if he can get under the door. Paks pantomies to Miriel to leave. Miriel tells Stone to follow her back to the area by the crevasse.
Chuck says to Telryn maybe you can command the golem now. Paks says we need remove curse. Chuck says maybe the curse is good. He wants to try to make the golem be quiet. They go to talk to the golem. Paks slices through the shadows. Telyrn: "as your master, I commandyou to stop." It ignores him and keeps pounding.
Back to crystal door. Chuck tries to slide under the door. He succeeds in crawling in. Telryn asks him to disable the trap. It's still sprung, Paks says to look for more, but he can't find any. They tell him to walk around and get the rest of the tablets. Chuck carefully slides the tablets off, and nothing happens. He slides them under the door. Telryn asks Chuck to carry the tablets for him. He can't understand them at all. Paks asks Telryn to write something to see if he can understand it. It blunts the dagger, but looks like gibberish. She tells him he must have written in common, and they can go back to Miriel and write a note. Stone gets out some wood and makes a fire and makes some tea. The whole room is made of crystal; it's very cool. Chuck squeezes out. T & C go back to Miriel to see if she can cure them, warning each other not to speak.
Miriel casts remove curse on Telryn. He looks odd for a minute. Stone offers him soup. Telryn asks for his backpack. Miriel starts to cast on Chuck, but he gestures for chalk to write maybe we should remain cursed, but no one can understand it. Stone offers him tea. Chuck throws up his hands. Miriel tries to uncurse Chuck, but fails. He gestures down the hall, then goes to fetch Paks. He tells her Telryn is cured, she asks for help to climb the rubble. He helps her. Miriel succeeds in curing Paks. Chuck looks confused.
We try to go outside to rest. Stone takes Chuck's climbing rope and throws it across the chasm to try to connect with something. The rope ties itself, but he falls a bit. He is unhurt, and he climbs up the rope. He calls for the other rope with a grappling hook. Paks tosses it down, and it lands by Stone's feet. He secures the rope and tosses the climbing rope back. He tells Paks to put her armor in the bag, which she does; Telryn rushes to help her. Stone pulls up the bag of holding. Throws the climbing rope back. Stone explains how to get everyone across, with multiple ropes. Paks has to swing across alone. She skins her knee, but is otherwise okay.
Paks throws the rope up and Stone climbs up. Goldpetal is meditating. Stone arranges the ropes to get people up. Chuck scrambles up like a monkey. Paks and Miriel climb up. Telryn asks to be pulled up. Stone sets up a tent. We rest, while Stone marches the perimeter of our little island watching for orcs. Miriel sleeps for two hours, then restores Telryn. She goes back to sleep.
Chuck sleeps a little, then gets some fabric to make a gag so he doesn't talk. It takes Miriel three tries, but she manages to uncurse Chuck. Paks trades off with Stone for guarding. Miriel goes back to sleep. When she's done sleeping, it's morning, but still gloomy and foggy.
Iooun stone +2 wisdom, pink ioun +2 constitution, gargoyle horn was only magic for the gargoyle. Miriel takes the wisdom stone, chuck takes the constitution one. The tablets are a divine spell dismissal, and reshape shadow.
Stone says go back down - army of orcs up here, maybe a way out down there. Paks tries to convince GP to come down but he refuses.
Stone lowers the bag, then climbs down, dropping down the last 30 feet. The rest of us climb down more carefully. Chuck makes a harness for Telryn with the climbing rope. Chuck takes the rope back and stows it in his pack. Paks examines Telryn's map and suggests a new route, but Telryn points out that we can't get through there past the gargoyle, but we agree to try to go around. We follow Paks.
We run into the crevasse again. Stone jumps across the pit and looks around the corner. He finds another room with a lot of bas-reliefs, and a mirror across from the door. We all cross the crevasse on the rope; Chuck drives in a piton to anchor the rope. Still noisy from golem pounding. We stand outside of room, looking suspiciously at mirror. Chuck starts to check for traps, but as soon as Stone enters the room, looking at the mirror, his reflection steps out of the mirror and starts fighting him.
The "evil" Stone attempts to punch Stone, and hits twice. Stone yells ow! Paks draws her bow and shoots at the "evil" stone. It bounces off of him. Telryn steps up and magic missiles him, but it does not seem to have any effect, it just dissipates as it hits him. Miriel runs around the corner and heals Stone. Chuck steps up next to Miriel, grabs a spare mace out of his bag, and throws it at the mirror, but misses and hits the wall. Stone punches the evil stone, but misses.
The evil Stone punches and hits Stone again, who says "oof". Paks tells everyone to back up so we can hit it with melee weapons. Telryn backs down the hallway, as does Miriel. Chuck pulls out a pound lump of copper and throws it at the mirror, but misses again. Stone backs up past Chuck.
Evil Stone moves forward and attacks Chuck. He swings three times, hits twice and misses once. Paks steps back and tells everyone to move back more. Telryn scrabbles through his backpack and casts greater magic weapon on Paks' sword. Miriel moves over behind stone and hands him her sling and some sling bullets. Chuck backs up 5 feet, pulls out his bow, and shoots at the mirror, shattering it. The evil stone goes away. Stone says I can't use this, and hands it back to miriel. Paks to chuck: Oh my goddess, you did the right thing! Chuck retrieves his mace and copper lump. The rest of us follow him into the room.
Chuck looks at a mirror fragment (nothing happens), then searches the room. Paks searches, too. We search for secret doors, but don't find anything. Paks retrieves her silver arrow.
We go to look at the room Stone found earlier full of urns that Telryn might be interested in. Part of the wall appaears to have collapsed, opening into a natural cavern.
Chuck goes in and checks for traps. Sees a large pile of earthy material in the corner. As he walks in, it opens an eye, another eye, another, until there are many eyes staring at him. Then fanged drooling mouths open and start babbling at the party in a cacaphony of languages. It's a gibbering mouther. Chuck starts wandering around randomly. Paks stands slack-jawed.
Telryn steps in and fires off a magic missile at the mouther. Stone comes in and punches the mouther. Chuck wanders over and looks at the wall. Searches for traps. Paks freaks out. Miriel moves up and casts a Searing Light at it. It spits flame out of one of its mouths. Paks is blinded. It bites at Stone and gets him with one mouth.
Stone punches it; it dissipates. Paks yells "help I'm blind," but she quickly feels better, and Chuck is also less confused. We go in and look around.
6 vials, big earthenware urn. Telryn detects magic; they're all magic. Paks detects evil; the urn is evil, but the little ones are not. Telryn says not to touch the amphora until he can research it. Stone steps through the wall into the cavern. Chuck follows. Paks tells Telryn there are traps on the urn, but she doesn't know about the vials.
Chuck suddenly can't talk. Chuck has an odd feeling that something is attacking him. He feels his magical energy drain away. He sees two black worms, about 2 feet long, one in front of him, one further away. Stone looks away, but doesn't see anything. He asks Chuck if they should get out of here.
The worms try to hit Stone and Chuck with spines. They both hit. Both of their ioun stones drop to the floor. Chuck picks up his ioun stone and stabs one of the worms with hoarfrost, but he can't speak so he can't activate it. Stone picks up his ioun stone and moves away. He goes back to Miriel and tells her that there are magic-sucking worms down the corridor. Miriel calls for Paks, who wanders that way confusedly.
The worms attack Chuck. His dagger goes out. He tumbled around the worms towards the light of Miriel's torch. Chuck is no longer silenced. Stone moves past chuck and miriel to stomp on the worms, but misses. Telryn calls out that he'll come if needed, but doesn't want his magic sucked. Miriel tries to give her torch to chuck, but he won't take it. She backs up. Paks asks Chuck what the deal is with these things, why isn't his dagger glowing, etc.
The worm in front of stone starts going incorporeal. Chuck pulls out a torch and lights it. He moves towards the worms. Stone stomps on the worm that's going incorporeal and squishes it to death. Chuck's dagger goes back on. Miriel backs up further.
The worm disappears into the wall. Stone rns over and kicks the wall. Paks comes in and looks for it, but sees nothing. Chuck comes in and asks where they are. Paks asks chuck to toss her the dagger, and walks in with dagger and sword drawn.
Stone asks for the dagger and waves it near where the worm disappeared. Nothing happens. Paks sticks it on the ground near the spot and backs up. We all wait awhile for the worms. Telryn says that they may not be attracted to magic. Paks starts blessing her weapon. Chuck goes back and jumps over the trap where the golem is. Telryn drags Pak's pack out of the way. Chuck tries to disable the pit trap door and succeeds, then walks back.
Chuck suggests leaving and resting, then Telryn can identify the jars. Telryn says he's going to take the vials. We all want to leave. We pick up the dagger, Paks' stuff. Chuck checks for traps around the vials again. Paks climbs up the 10 foot ledge.
Telryn tries to move a vial, but it falls and shatters and dust spills out. He tries again and fails again. Stone grabs his shoulder - do you have to concentrate to do that? Get off of me! He gets the third one to float towards him. Stone opens the bag. Telryn gets it into the bag.
Paks asks Stone if any of the vials broke. Yes. What was in them? Dust. Paks to Miriel: What about consecrating it? Can't do it.
Chuck wants to go back to the double doors. We head back that way. Stone takes a run at the doors. OOOOOWWWWW! We all go to help open the doors. BOOM! The door opens. Big crystal cavern, crystal stairway going down. Paks wants to go after teh other gargoyle, but the rest of us object. Stone goes to the top of the stairs and looks down. He doesn't see much, as it's a spiral, carved out of quartz. He heads down the stairs, with Chuck right behind him. Miriel follows more slowly. Chuck checks for traps as he goes.
They come to a door. Stone pushes at it with the help of Chuck and Paks, but can't get it open. They call for more help, but we fail again, tripping over each other. We keep trying. After several tries, we finally get them open. The noise from the golem banging is finally muffled. It's extremely dark. Paks pokes into the darkness with the shadow sword, but nothing happens.
Miriel activates the daylight spell in her spear and the darkness is dispelled, but the spear goes out again and we see just by our regular torches and lighted dagger.
We move on and find a large room with 4 rows of 4 large granite tables each. The room is granite as well. Stone walks up to a table and taps it; it's solid granite. Telyrn steps in to take a look. Almost all of the tables have one long chain attached in the center. Can't see the ceiling, ask stone to look and see if there are spots where the chains could be attached - he says no. Chuck searches the room. Telryn walks around the outside of the room to the opposite doors. Paks asks someone to touch a chain. Miriel and Telyrn say NO! Chuck says sure! Paks looks to see if anything is evil, but it's not. Stone touches the chain, but nothing happens. Chuck searches for traps on the door, there aren't any. We help Stone burst them open.
We're in a giant quartz crystal again. As we go in, we hear a low-pitched hum, and there is a dim light coming from all the walls around us. In the center is a big smoky crystal cylinder, about the size of a football, spinning in the center of the room. Tleyrn: Do you think this whole place will come crashing down if we touch it? paks doesn't think it's evil.
Paks and Telryn push Chuck into the room. He looks for traps, but doesn't find any. Telryn detects magic; it's VERY powerful, and radiates mind-affecting and shadow magic. telryn and miriel examine it very very carefully; they've never seen anything like it. Miriel tells stone to push it. He goes over and pushes it and it starts to fall over. He gets under it and catches it. Chuck says put it in the bag and let's go. The noise and light stop. Stone slides it into the bag of holding.
Paks asks us to follow her. As we pass through the golem room, we hear a voice, "Give it back, Thief, Thief!" Black worm comes rushing towards him.
"give it back, thief, thief" in lots of different languages, sonically and psionicly.
The small black worm flies toward Stone and shoots a beam at him. He resists the silence affect. Chuck rushes into the room. Shoots the worm with a bow. It goes right through him. Paks moves into room and casts divine favor. Telryn moves through and shoots a magic missile at it, hiting it.
It starts going corpereal. Chuck shoots it and it goes right through it, he moves up next to it. Stone swings and goes through it. Paks steps up swings twice and slices through it with his crystal sword.
Screaming comes from the crevace as we setup to cross it. Stone yells down "Do you need help?". No response. We argue about who goes first. He pounds a piton on this side to tie the rope to. As he begins to cross he is struck on the side by a sticky tendril. He is pulled off the rope and slammed against the side of the crevace. He sees a giant lobster like creature with it's tongue stuck to him.
Paks walked up to the ledge. Telryn cast fly on himself and dives over the edge, he flies level with the creature and is attacked by another one on a different ledge, it misses. Creature 1 pulls chuck closer. Stone climbs down the crevasse onto it's ledge and punches it. Chuck readys his sword. Madriel blesses us. Paks tries to climb across the rope and slips. She falls.
Telryn dives down and catches her. He can't hold her, so he is able to slow her decent. The land in a pile of mushrooms. Creature pulls Chuck forward, he gets a swing in at it's tongue. He misses. The creature snaps at him with two claws. It hit's with one claw. Stone attacks it, hits twice, nailing it really good and killing it. Miriel yells down to see if they are ok. Paks lays on hands to Telryn.
Telryn says "I'll be right back" and flys back up. Chuck tries to pry the tongue off and can't. Stone starts cutting the tongue off and does. Holds on. Telryn shoots a lightning bolt at the second one, it partly evades it. It shoots it's tongue at Telryn, and misses. Stone climbs across and punches the other one. Paks yells for a torch.
Telryn kills the lobster with magic missiles.
Miriel tosses a torch down to Paks. Telryn searches the ledges and finds a silver comb.
The whole party makes it's way down to the bottom of the crevasse. We wander towards the screaming that Chuck believes are shriekers. We encounter an area that has a huge pool of water. There are many mushrooms that have grown as large as 9 feet in this section. There is a faint redish glow coming from that area.
Telryn flys over the area, the redish glowing things are crawling around, 3-5 of them.
There are 4 fire beetles, two feet long, glowing red. Chuck asks Miriel to heal him and she does.
Telryn pins one of them to the floor, then he shoots again and knocks himself off balance. The beetles rush Chuck. He kills one with an AoO. Chuck gets hits twice. Paks swings twice and misses. Miriel waits it out. Chuck swings at two of them and kills them both. Stone crushes the last one. Stone takes one apart and eats it. Also discovering that the glands can be used as a 10' light source.
Continuing on down the crevasse we come to a fork, go right. The encounter 5' tall mushrooms with 4 branches. There are a bunch of smaller glowing fungus things below them.
Paks, Chuck and telryn shoot at the mushrooms. Telryn shoots and hits. Stone does nothing. Paks shoots and hits and shreds the larger one. Chuck shoots two arrows and hits with one at a shrieker.
Telryn shoots and shreds the shrieker. Paks fires her bow and hits the other shrieker. Chuck fires two arrows into it, killing it.
As soon as that happens. A skeleton with purple fungus and stuff growing throughout it comes shambing down the crevasse with two giant ants that also have fungus growing throughout them.
Miriel attempts a turn and they ignore her. Telryn shoots an ant with a crossbow. Stone walks up and swings, smacking it into a pile of mold. Paks steps up and kills the other. Chuck charges forward at the skeleton, swings his sword and hits. The skeleton explodes in a cloud of spores. Chuck looks very sickened and weak.
We all decide to head back up. Two walking mushrooms wander up hearding smaller mushrooms.
Chuck decides to try and greet them, being as diplomatic as possible. Tylren flys up 30' and readys an action. Paks readies an action on whether or not they cross a line. Miriel moves behind stone. The mushrooms move forward and spray a cloud at those on the ground.
In Chucks mind he here's a voice asking why he attacked the other mushrooms.
Telryn shoots him with magic missiles. The other mushroom man responds with another cloud of spores. Chuck backs up saying to Telryn to stop attacking. Telryn flys upwards another 30'. Paks moves and detects evil (doesn't detect any). Miriel backs up. Stone doesn't feel like attacking.
THe undamaged mushroom runs away. Chuck trys to talk to them some more. Telryn asks what's going on. Paks readies an action. Miriel tells everyone to back up with her. The mushroom says just leave. Telryn fly's down and back. Paks grabs Stone and pulls him backward. We decide to retreat and climb up and out.
Paks says they weren't evil. Chuck says they just wanted us to leave. Telryn apologizes for shooting them, but it looked like the were being aggressive. Telryn has about 10 minutes left on his fly.