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Celceor, arrow notched in his
bow, veered off the path and cut across the tall grass toward the ancient
structure leaving the party behind. Eggo had mention
that it resembled some sort of temple but he was unable to tell them any more about
it. Celceor moved quickly and rather stealthily as he plowed a path through the
dying grass, but he
would never admit that to either of the thieves, though being raised in a
jungle environment, such quite movements just came naturally. Though if truth be told, he would have much rather been standing in
the back of the party lobbing spells then trotting through the brush.
But that was a sore subject, as Celceor did not have any spells to lob nor his
treasured spell book from which to learn any .....
*three
nights earlier*
Celceor had grown accustomed
to the now familiar swaying of ship having been on board the Ocean’s Majesty
for almost a week now. He was a little leery at first. The Lagoldurna
Jungles were a long way from the coast. Through the sea sickness faded quickly
the first day, and he was soon able to get to back to his much need studies. He
pulled his spell book close and blew the ink dry of his latest achievement. It
had taken some time and a lot of research, but he had finally finished it. His
latest spell, ‘Fireball’ was now complete.
Suddenly there was a cry from
the deck somewhere above. ‘Ah, we must be coming into port’, he thought. He had
finished just in time. Celceor, putting his cap on his ink, and closing his
spell book, rose and headed up to the deck to watch
Though as he arrived
amidships there were concerning shouts from the captain, and looking over
toward the shore, Celceor could see that flames were billowing from many
buildings of the port. This was not a good sign. Fafnir
was not even in town yet, and there was already trouble. Suddenly there were
shouts from the crows nest and the seaman pointed toward the
lighthouse were an Iron League flag now flew. Numerous figures started
taking up positions on the forts battlements and hail of fiery arrows streak
across the black sky. ‘Definitely not a good sign. Had
the Iron League learned of our arrival and were waiting for us, or was this
something else?’. In any case, the ship was still to far out and the volley of arrows fell harmlessly into the
sea. As the captain ordered the ship to come about and to head for Breakshore, Celceor considered counter bombing the archers,
but resisted. He figured even if he killed a few it would be for naught.
Letting the ship withdrawal into the night without drawing attention was likely
the best course of action. The wind
seemed to be picking up, and it appeared that they would be in Breakshore soon enough. With the danger quickly subsiding
behind them and nothing more to do on deck, Celceor retired to galley to grab
something to eat. He had so immersed himself in his studies he had totally
missed the evening meal.
Just as he was finishing
wiping the last of the crumbs from his mouth and setting his napkin down, the
ship jolted hard to starboard sending all the items not bolted down on the
table hurling towards the floor. Scurrying topside to see what was going on, Celceor emerged into the face a raging storm. The
pounding rain stung his face as he made his way across the deck. The old crazy
loon on board, the so called ‘weather man’, had mentioned that they were in for
a rough ride. But Celceor thought nothing of it. He was just a crazy loon, as
who can really tell the weather by the pain in ones anus? Though as it turned
out, it appears that one actually can.
Suddenly a large wave came
over the deck as the ship lurched starboard again. The captain, trying
franticly to secure the main mast he had just lowered, pointed and shouted over the high
winds that the foremast likewise needed to be lowered. Otherwise the ship would
be taken right over. Celceor hesitated a moment, not wanting to climb the
rigging even in calm weather more or less in this hellish torrent, started
pulling out the components for a summon spell. This just might be just the
trick for Mr. Chips he thought. Though as he was about to start his
incantation, Bane, followed by Beck took to the riggings and started their
ascent. ‘Well’, he chuckled,
‘why use a monkey when you have a Bane around’, and put his
components back in the pouch.
Bane quickly ascended the
rigging to the foremast with cat like agility despite the raging storm about
him. Catching sight of Beck at his heels he doubled his effort, not wanting to
be out done by the lowly seamen, particularly one who had cheated him out of
some money. (Or at least, so Bane had
claimed.) Having reached the mast first, Bane managed, while holding on with
one hand, to successfully cut the lines with his dagger and the water logged
mast dropped to the deck.
But before the Caption could
grab hold of it and secure it, a huge wave swallowed the deck. Celceor, his
footing being swept from under him, grabbed hold the nearest item to keep from
being dragged across the deck. Though unfortunately, the captain was not so
lucky and being hit
hard by the deluge of water was swept over the ships railing. Beck shouted from
the rigging ‘Man over board’, as Fafnir, strangely having been put in charge of the wheel for some unknown
reason, gave it a hard fast spin, forcing the ship to lunge and start to come
about. Celceor struggling to his feet ran over to the side of the railing. Down
below a dark figure struggled in the ragging rolling water. Pulling out his
component he was about to cast a summon spell and call forth a few purposes to
rescue the captain. Though before he could get the spell off
another large wave hit the ship broadside. Bane and Beck were
immediately catapulted from the rigging into the ragging sea below as the ship
lurched heavily to it side. Celceor, being hit by a large wall of water rolling
across the deck, likewise was carried over the railing, and with a loud splash
plummeted into the ragging sea below.
Celceor immediately popped
back to the surface like a cork, but to his horror saw the ship, now listing a
good 45 degrees, being relentless battered by the waves. It was only a matter
of a few moments before the ships mast reluctantly dipped into the water, and
the ship slowly and silently started slipping below the ragging waves. ‘It
would appear that one should always sail into the incoming waves least your hit
broadside and run the risk of capsizing. Turning the ship in the middle of a
storm was likely not the wisest course of action’, he thought
Celceor quickly scanned the
area and heard the shouts of someone on a small outcropping of rock a short
distance away. Swimming against the swelling waves, Celceor managed to secure
himself on the rocks were Bane also clung for safety. Fearing for the others,
Celceor immediately cast his summon spell and sent forth a number of porpoises
to find and help his likely fledging comrades. The silly dwarf loved to sleep
in his armor and Celceor feared such a thing would surely be the death of him.
After a few rounds the intelligent aquatic mammals returned, all comrades in
tow, with the exception of Nick. Who being a resourceful little lad used his
new water breathing helm and eventually showed up sometime the next day,
magical bag in hand. Though remembering his spell book, Celceor quickly cast
another summon spell and sent a lone porpoise down to the sinking ship to try
to retrieve his goods. As he watched the remainder of the ship slip below the
surface he started getting anxious as the beast had not returned. Though
finally after some time, the porpoise triumphantly emerged from the dark water,
spell book securely in its snout. But as Celceor reached for his book, the
creature waned, then vanish from view, as the duration of the spell expired. In
total horror, Celceor could only watched his spell book hit the swelling water
and with a ever so slight splash slip forever into the deep dark oblivion of
Davie Jone’s looker.
‘NOOOO!!!!! ‘
Taken over by total shock,
and being buffeted by the raging storm against the rocks he and his comrades
were clinging to, Celceor started to lose consciousness. He latched hold of
some of the nearby floating debris from the ship before he was pummeled to
death and made a break for shore.
In the morning he awoke.
Battered and soaking wet he lay on a torn piece of planking, the wave gently
caressing his body against the shoreline. Gaining his senses he pulled himself
to his feet and scoured the entire beach in hopes that his lost book might have
washed up on shore during the night. While all of his comrades seemed to have
made it, along with one seamen, Beck of all people,
nothing else could be found of the ship nor the party’s supplies. It was if the
sea had just opened up and swallowed it whole.
Celceor, unable to loss his
life’s work, lunged back into the surf and started swimming back out to sea.
Though after what seemed like hours and being unable to break through the heavy
surf at the shoreline due to near exhaustion, his body was finally washed back upon the beach,
utterly spent.
*
Celceor heard someone behind
him. It was fafnir. Not even
on a good day could he hope to outpace the quick barbarian. Though, fafnir had actually offered to
head back out to sea looking for the spell book that morning they all awoke on
the beach. But the truth of the matter was that it was gone. Even if they did
manage to somehow find their sunken ship out in that big ocean, the storm would
have tossed all of its contents to the four corners of the earth and likely
buried it under tons of sand. True Celceor could get a new book and start
again, though he could not bear to handle such a thought. That book represented
a lifetime of work and thousands of gold of hard earned cash. No, that part of
his life was over. Maybe there was something bigger drawing him toward
something more important. He had been interested in learning more of the Order
of the Stryders in cauldron and had actually looked a
little into the Hermes religion. Maybe this was some strange calling and the lose of his book was no mere accident. While he did
reluctantly pick up a new spell book and some ink while in Breakshore,
his heart was just not in trying to recreate his previous studies. No,
something was pushing him toward something greater. It had to be. Something so
terrible could not be mere coincidence. So with that he turned to Eggo who promised to teach him a few things about the order
of Pelor and the divine arts. While Eggo was no
priest of Hermes, the religion Celceor really wanted to follow, he figured it
was close enough, at lest for the initial basic training. Once he returned to
Cauldron he could then finish his true training under a Priest of Hermes and be
on his way in his new devotion.
Fafnir, quickly caught up, and lightly taped his sword
against his shield as he looked about with a big grin of anticipation. Seemed
he was egging for a good fight. So much the better, if this was indeed an evil
temple, having a barbarian by ones side is never a bad thing. Celceor looked
around and spied a flock of black birds loitering about the cliffs in the
distance. He had noticed them before on the road and just assumed they were
feeding on some rotten carcass, but he was beginning to think otherwise now.
‘Were they some sort of familiars or spies of the Iron league? or mayhaps of this evil temple?’
He didn’t like the answers to either of those questions.
As the two approached the
remains of the crumbling building they noticed a dark opening in the ground
with some old stone steps leading down into the darkness. Celceor paused. ’What
exactly were they doing?’, he thought. It seemed that some more stupid humans had
lost their kids and wanted the party to go out and find them. Like the group
was not already looking for a missing kid of some human already. Some sort of
Prince or something. Like Celceor had NOT been looking for missing kids since
he first arrived in Caldron weeks ago. What was he? some
sort of Expert Child Hunter? All he wanted to do was to study at the university
in Cauldron, and somehow he got suckered into helping out finding the kids. Though Eggo did say that this was a good
thing and would be looked upon favorably by the gods. So if Eggo, his new mentor believes in it, then Celceor figured
he would too. Besides, it was a nice diversion to keep his
mind of his current lose.
Celceor paused at the top of
the stone steps and look down into the darkness. Off to his left, Bane paused
momentarily at another dark hole and then silently disappeared down stone steps
there. Not wanting to get separated, Celceor motioned to Fafnir
and they headed over to the second set of stone steps. It would appear that
there were two entrances down into this structure for some strange reason.
Peering down, they saw Bane at the bottom examining the latch of an old wooden
door. The door was blackened at the bottom and the steps and walls had a
blanket of moss covering them, evidence of some previous standing water. Seems
this was not the ideal place to build a temple, he thought. As the others
arrived, Fafnir held out his shield, and with a wave of Eggo's hand, the shield began to radiated with a bright
white light. With the new illumination, the party started descending the
crumbling stone stairs. Nick, having a bad feeling about the distance birds who seemed to be watching them, decided he would stay on top
and keep an eye on things, warning the party if trouble arose.
The party pressed on and got
held up at the bottom landing and along the steps waiting on the thief who was
meticulously working the rusty lock of the large door. The air had the foul
smell of musty mold about it. ‘Damn!’ Bane let out in frustration as he backed
away from the still bared door, pondering his next move. The
party now pressing in on each other in the small landing started getting
anxious, particularly the barbarian who began to immediately size up the
thickness of the door. Celceor,
sensing this situation was going nowhere, shouted sarcastically up the stairs,
‘Hey, call Nick!’. This was immediately followed by
another shout from the party. ‘Yeah, let the boy try!!’.
Not wanting to be outdone by a kid, Bane cracked his knuckles and went to work
again on the stubborn rusty lock. With a satisfying ‘click’ and smirk on the
thief’s face, the lock came free and Bane slowly and quietly swung open the
large wooden door of the ancient temple.
The door creaked open
revealing a dark damp hallway leading to the north. Directly across was a large
wooden door similar to the one they had just opened indicating it was likely
the other passage down. Why they needed two passages down within a few feet was
still something of a puzzle to Celceor. Having studied a bit of architecture
before heading out to Cauldron, he still could not figure this one out. Though
he admitted he had seen stranger things and the group pressed forward. The
ground was damp and sticky and air smelt musty as if this place had been sealed
up for quit some time. The only illumination came from Fafnir
shield. All was still.
Fafnir and Bane proceeded down the hall and on arriving at
the first door went into their ‘Dynamic Duo Tag Team Routine’ at least, that’s
what Celceor referred to is as. This consisted of Fafnir
listening intently against the wood door for something beyond, while Bane
searched meticulous for traps and then determined if the door was lock. If a
lock was found, Bane would make quick work of it and then Fafnir , egger to fly into a
rage and crush something, would burst open the door and charge into the room
weapon drawn. The rest of the party would just sit back and watch the two work, checking gear, sharpening weapons, and carrying on
quite conversations. Though they were always ready to lunge forward and help
out the two when and if they really did find something of interest.
Upon entering the first room,
a great depressing sigh from the barbarian was Celceor’s
indicator that it was empty and safe to enter. The room was an old small
dinning area with an old small wooden table in the center. As the rest of the
party moved into the room the duo started on a small door on the northern wall.
Beck hung in the doorway in the rear with his bow ,
keeping watch down the hallway making sure nothing snuck up behind the party.
The wood in the structure was all old and moldy, though the table seemed to
have a few new pieces of wood supporting it, indicating that this room had been
used fairly recently.
As the rest of the party
lumbered about the dinning area, Celceor found a small silver fork
lying on the table. While this may come in handy if the party
were to deal with Were Creatures, Celceor had a dagger for that sort
thing, but he pocketed the fork anyways. You never. know. As the Dynamic Duo re-emerged back into the dining
hall from the newly opened doorway, Fafnir signed in
a depressed voice. “Pantry”. While Bane moved off to
the second set of doors leading off of the dinning room, Fafnir, paused and went back
inside the pantry and started searching along the walls. Celceor thought this
was odd, but paid it no mind, as he eyed a cooking pot hanging in a fireplace.
Examining it, he found that the pot was empty, though the ashes in the pit,
while cool, were still strangely fresh. Someone HAD been here and just
recently.
Just then, Bane shouted, ‘Ha, got it’ and the door he was working on opened,
revealing another long hallway to the north. Bane peered down the hallway, as Fafnir, seeing Bane moving on without him gave up his
search in the pantry and headed out of the dinning hall and down the new
hallway. Celceor, figuring the Duo had it under control, entered the pantry
looking for some possible reagents. He as well as Eggo
and Werkle started searching the dusty shelves for anything of interest. While
there was unfortunately no garlic to be found, (good for chasing off Vampiric toads and the such), he
did find a small container of salt, which he pocketed. ‘This is always useful for either reagents,
preserving meats, or adding that little extra something to that bland stew Eggo has been cooking up’, he thought. Werkle and Eggo having found some new food rations,
stowed then in their packs and then moved on. Celceor on leaving with the others, paused at the section of wall the barbarian had been
searchin and gave it a quick once over, but came up
empty. If there was a secrete door there, he didn’t see anything. And rare were
those times, as Celceor’s Elven
upbringing gave him an uncanny knack for finding such things.
Out in the hall Celceor could
hear the Duo bickering about some really bad gas. Bane argued that Fafnir should give him warning next time, and that that was
real ripe one. With Fafnir, countering that he had
done no such thing but if he had, Bane would have surely have heard it first.
Figuring he could not leave these two alone, Celceor moved out into the hall to
see what the hold up was. Though as he entered the hallway, he heard a strange
‘click…..tick…tick…screech’ as the floor abruptly opened up before him. Unable
to react in time, Celceor plummeted down into the darkness and impaled his arm
and leg through awaiting spikes embedded in the floor at the bottom of the dark
shaft. Pulling his blooded limbs free and trying to right himself he suddenly
realized where he was as he looked up and saw the opening of the dark shaft he
was standing in some 20 feet overhead. Due to both the lose
of blood and his childhood phobia starting to take hold, the opening above
began to spin and close in on him. As a young child he had fallen down a
similar natural shaft, and left for dead, broken and trapped. If not for the
timely arrival of a
huntsmen and the strange magic of the elders of his tribe, he would have surely
died. Ever since he has had a problem with going down dark
holes or long deep shafts. He
really must find a feather fall spell, or it will be the end of him for sure.
Suddenly a rope appeared dangling before him. Not wanting to spend another
second in that hole, he grabbed hold the rope and began to ascend it quickly,
only to find that he was being pulled up at a fast rate. Upon reaching the top
he flopped on floor and was pulled to the side just as the shaft closed back up
underneath him. Celceor lay there staring at the ceiling attempting to regain
his senses as
Bane looked at Fafnir in bewilderment pointing to the
section of floor in front of the doorway, “Didn’t we just walk across that?”.
While totally shaken now,
Celceor slowly regained his footing and expressed his new desire to leave.
“There’s nothing in this dark hole, I say we get the
hell out of here while we can!” He did not like this new turn of events, he did
not like them at all. Not only had they found nothing of real value, he just
about got killed by a stupid mindless trap. The reason he normally stood in the
back was to avoid just tramatic things. No, kids or
not, the party needed to leave, and now!
The party paused and deliberated a few minutes
of what to do next, but decided to continue on , citing that they had to still
find the children and would not head back without them. Celceor reluctantly
gave in. With that, Beck wanting to join
the other party members in the hallway took a running start and attempted to jump across the
section of the floor which had opened up a few moments before. Though hitting a
slick spot as he ran,
he faltered and fell face first onto the very slab of stone he
was attempting to jump over. To everyone surprise nothing happened. Bane, not
wanting to wait to see if the floor would swallow Beck up as well, exclaimed that he might want to
move his ass, and reached over and
grabbed the seemingly uncoordinated sailor by the shirt and yanked him over to
the secure section of floor. “That’s two you owe me now…..Beck!’
Celceor not wanting to temp
fate by heading back across the pit, pulled his bow and although still bleeding
from the leg, hobbled down the hall bypassing the Duo which were still working on two of the
unopened doors in the hallway. Peering around the corner, Celceor saw it led to
another long dark hall with a number of single doors and one large double doors in the middle of the hall adorned with two dimly lit
torches. Suddenly there was a ghastly smell of death omitting from behind him.
Celceor turned and eyed Fafnir, but noticed Bane
quickly closing the door he had just open, indicating it was some sort of privy
or something similar. Figuring there was not anything of value in the privy, or
if there was, he had no desire to enter that room to find out, Celceor stayed
right where he was. With an arrow notched, he kept grounded to the spot,
keeping an ever watchful eye down the hall with the double doors. He dared not
venture any further without the Duo who still had one door that needed to be
checked, and he dared not head back least the floor open up again underneath
him.
Listening and hearing
nothing, Fafnir opened the last door in the hallway.
But before he could rush into the room a number of large flailing tentacle lashed out at him from the darkness. Hearing the
rage of the barbarian behind him, Celceor spun, and saw Fafnir
engaged with a large insectoid with many flailing
tentacles engaged in the doorway. Taking aim, Celceor let loose the notched
arrow, which just buzzed Fafnir ear, and struck true
deep into the strange creature. Fafnir dodging
flailing limbs, swung hard, and managed to cleave off one of the many tentacle
flailing abut him, causing a strange grey ooze to gosh
out of the severed limb. The creature recoiled, but then lashed out again in
full furry, catching the barbarian across the arm with one of its many
appendages. Fafnir slowed for a second, then with a
slight shake, regained
his footing, steadied his shield, and swung again. Celceor, shooting at almost point
blank range, shot hurriedly as Farnir sword came
alarming close, with both attacks missing. The insect creature flailed again
with multiple hits against the barbarian, but only a doing minor abrasion
damage. Though again, Fafnir slowed, but shrugged it
off. Though as Celceor
pulled and started to notch another arrow he heard a loud bombing sound coming
from down the empty hall around the corner. “This isn’t good’, he
thought, ‘ did we happened to awaking the guard?”.
Trying to keep one eye on the corridor, as well as the battle before him, he
fired again into the fray but missed horribly. Fafnir,
getting tied of messing with the strange bug, pulled his sword back high above
his head and with a mighty roar drove it down into the midst of the creature. The
mighty blow struck deep into the beast’s body causing a
eerie shriek to echo through the hallway as it collapsed to the floor in puddle
of goo. Fafnir heaved the limp beast’s body to the
side as he entered the room triumphantly. With another ‘Boom’, Celceor spun
around but still did not see anything down the hall.
As Fafnir
investigated the room and the strange creature, Bane moved up quietly and
started checking out the picture which was hanging in the main hallway. For now
the booming had stopped but Celceor could still detect faint sounds
beyond. As he was about to start down
the hall, Bane singled to him to hold his position. Celceor nodded and watched
as the thief moved up cautiously along the wall and pressed the picture forward
with his sword. Noticing something behind he gave the
sword a good tug and sent the picture flying to the ground. Getting closer he could discern the indention
of a small hole in the wall where the picture once hung and indicated to Celceor it looked like some sort of trap.
Motioning to the party, he
indicated that he needed something to possibly block it up, as he was unable to
disarm it in its current position without setting it off. Fafnir,
coming out with a large chuck of tentacle in his hands, threw it to Bane who
then cautiously stuff the octopus like limb deep into the hole. Celceor, seeing
the dangling limb and remembering that this creature may hold some unique
abilities, entered
the room and cut free a tentacle of his own. Though just as he is about to extract
some of the venom from the severed limb, he realized he no longer had any empty
flasks which he usually carried on him for just such purposes. He cursed the
ship wreck once again in both common as well as Elvish,
and reluctantly stuffed the tentacle whole into his backpack. Hopefully it will
keep for a few days until he can actually purchase some sort of vial or flask.
Finishing up, Celceor headed
back out into the hallway to regroup with the others. The party had continued
down the hall with the double doors and had run into Werkle and Eggo coming down a hall on the other side. It seemed it was
actually them which were causing all the noise, as Werkle, not wanting to jump
the pit, had gone the other way and was forced to smash his way through a lock door
to get here. This was a big relief to Celceor. Maybe this place was indeed
abandoned after all.
As he hobbled down the hall
Celceor noticed Bane checking another picture on the far end of the hall
similar to the one he had just found the trap under. And sure enough, he
singled that he had likewise found another trap. As the party lumbered about
looking for something to fill the new hole, Celceor decided to check the
section of floor just in front of the two double doors as it appeared that
would be the spot which both traps would likely be trigged from. Though finding
nothing, and with the second trap being sealed with a piece of wood, the party
decided to check the rest of the complex before heading through the main doors.
As the Dynamic Duo continued
doing there thing on the remaining doors, Celceor hobbled over to Eggo suggesting a little healing would be nice. With a
quick prayer and a slight touch on the shoulder, Celceor wounds were
immediately sealed, and he began to feel much better about their situation. So
far they had found nothing.
The next room opened appeared
to be a real old barracks and apparently had not been used in quit some time.
Celceor gave it a good looking over but only found some rotten trunks and moth
eaten clothes. Strangely though a freshly cut wood wall had recent been built
into the north corner or the room, look strangely out of place. Looking it over
Celceor could not detect any secrete doors or compartments. looking over the map
he was sketching as they explored, Celceor sensing an area of dead space in the
architecture, not necessarily behind the wood wall, but to the south of the
barracks. As Celceor started searching
the old crumbing wall for a secrete door a loud crash rumbled through the
complex. Heading back out into the hall to see what had happened he saw Fafnir
stumble out of one of the doors down the hall rubbing his head. Fafnir pointed to the room and went on to explain that the
ceiling had collapsed, but that he was okay because it landed on his hard head..
Celceor only shook his head, as he could only imagine was sort of trouble this
barbarian was going to get us into. Early he had tripped across a similar trap
and buried himself along with a few other party members under an avalanche of
stones. Lucky the big lug had a hard head and just shrugged these sort of things off.
Celceor seeing all was well,
or at least as well as it could be, went back to his work confident that there
had to be a door somewhere on that wall into that empty space. Though after a
few minutes of unsuccessful results, he concluded he must have made a mistake
with the measurements on his map and headed back out toward the rest of the
group. As he was catching back up with
the party, a strange billow of purple smoke poured from one of the newly opened
doors. Bane leaned next to the door cleaning his fingernails with his dagger
and shaking his head. Suddenly Fafnir appeared from
the cloudy room, coughing and wheezing and indicated to Bane that he had gotten
that locked box open. He went on saying that he had noticed something inside
just as the trap went off. Wiping his
watering eyes and catching his breath, he headed back into the room, determined
that a little smoke was not going to stop him. A few minutes later he emerged
with some coins in hand as well as a strange book which he handed to
Celceor. “Maybe it’s a spell book “ he suggested with a big grin as he headed off toward the
big double doors. Though as Celceor
thumbed through it, he did not recognize any of the strange writing but knew
from the format that it was not likely a spell book of any kind.
Having opened all the other
doors, Bane and Fafnir finally assembled before the
main double doors. Though as Bane went to check for traps, there was a ‘click” then “twap..twap…twap” as the traps in the hole at each end of the hallway
tried to fired, but got caught up in all the debris stuffed in the holes.
Looking up from the book, Celceor analyzed the situation. It would appear that
he had somehow missed the trigger stone in front of the door he had
specifically looked for. It would seem he was losing his touch. He shrugged. No harm done
Werkle, infuriated by these
traps or maybe just looking for something to crush, headed back into the
barracks room and begun bashing at the
wooded wall in the corner. Celceor followed in puzzlement, and watch in
amazement as the dwarf laid into the wall with his large axe as if it were some
sort of tree he was looking to bring down. Within moments, a large gapping hole
in the splintered wood revealed a small space beyond where a large repeater
crossbow was set up to fire at the main double door down the hall. Checking the
device out, Werkle noticed that the clip of bolts was empty and that it was
likely safe to continue on without further risk from this trap. Werkle paused
and debated taking the large weapon, but figured it would be hard to get out
and that he would possibly be back later for it.
With the traps sprung, Fafnir leaned into the heavy double doors and pushed them
open revealing a large atrium which lead down some
steps into a larger room below. Suddenly a loud bombing voice rang out right
next to the barbarian ‘let the children be!’. As Fafnir, Eggo, and Bane advanced
into the atrium another voice echoed out, this time from a different location.
Celceor was suspicious. He knew of magic that could bellow out phrases when
triggered by certain events, like opening a door. Maybe the ‘Magic Mouths’, as
they were called, had been here for some time. He could only hope.
Celceor, on entering the
doorway motioned to Fafnir to continue as it was just
likely a spell , Fafnir
looked back, somewhat blanked faced but continued on down the steps. As the
party slowly advanced down the steps, a somewhat well lit room came into
view. It appeared to be some sort of
sacrificial chamber with strange black candles flickering all about the room.
The air was cold and stale. In center of the chamber were three stone slabs
with two unconscious children laid bond upon two of them. Blood from the
children trickled down into a large bronze chalice at the foot of all stone
slabs with the third slab, strangely empty.
Seeing the kids, both Eggo and Fafnir rushed to the
slabs in an attempt to free the children. As they did so, another voice boomed
out again from the seemingly abandoned room. “ "I
am prepared to do what none of you would against the Alidians…”.
The strange voice continued on at length, but Celceor payed
it no mind, and he focused on something else. Seeing
the empty slab and all that was missing was a lone child, Celceor paused for a
moment and was immediately struck with an epiphany . “Hey, Where’s Nick” Celceor inquired
sarcastically, motioning toward the empty slab. The voice continued on. Could
he really bind Nick to the cold slab. And what if he
did? What great beast was about to be summoned here?,
he wondered. He had heard tells of great daemons from the abyss being called
forth and bowing before their masters. He himself was only able to summon small
natural creatures like dogs and bugs. If he did summoned
such a monster, could HE control such a beast?!! Could he bend it to his will? Could Celceor Rule the…
Suddenly his delusions of
grandeur were shattered as the room suddenly lit up as a long flash of lighting darted across the
room. Fafnir, instincts taking over, quickly tumbled
to the side managing to avoid most of the blast, though still getting a bit
singed by the passing blast of energy. Though unfortunately Eggo, preoccupied
with trying to release the kids, was not so lucky. Getting caught up in the midst of the
streaking bolts of energy, Eggo shuddered violent in
the energy stream and then immediately collapsed to the floor. Flopping about
the ground violently as sparks jumped about his armor, he twitched and
convulsed one last time and then finally went limp. Though, the streaking blue
bolt not satisfied and still seeking victims, bounded strangely about the walls
and shot toward the rest of the party descending the stairs. Bane, being
uncannily quick on his feet, leapt out of the way as the bolt passed harmlessly
between him and Celceor.
Seeing his mentor just go
down and sensing that this invisible mage was not screwing around and could be
the end of the party Celceor decided it was time to get back to what he does
best. He pulled the wand from his belt and unleashed a small ball that flew
swiftly across the room to where the lighting had originated and then exploded
into a huge ball of flame. This set ablaze most everything in the corner of the
room, invisible mage included. Sure he had other tricks up his sleeves he might
have used, but
he was pissed and figured nuking the whole room was the only way to be sure
Beside he to make sure to hit the mage and let him now that HE also was no
longer screwing around.
The others entered the room
quickly and begin in earnest looking for a target for which to crush. Beck sensing some usually smoldering of smoke
shifting about in the corner of the room, pulled an
arrow and shot. The arrow struck something in mid air and impaled itself, drawing a slight
stream of blood. Celceor not wanting to
blast the room a second time for fear of hitting his companions,
turned his attention toward Eggo who was no longer
moving. Unhooking a bluish potion from his belt, Celceor moved quickly over to Eggos side. As he did, Fafnir
took a running start and with a mighty roar leapt over the table and into the
empty space where the arrow had been stuck. Catching only air, the barbarian
landed hard onto the ground. Werkle also noticing the arrow, leapt up onto the
now burning table with a mighty thud, to get a better vantage point. Seeing the
arrow, now blooded just
laying on the ground and no sign of the mage, he started kicking
about the items on the table rambling on about a spell book.
Suddenly there was a mumble
of words and a flash of light as a number of Magic Missiles sailed across the
room impacting on both Werkle and Fafnir for minor
damage. Strangely these came from the other corner of the room. Either this
mage was really quick, or there were two of them. Celceor did not like the idea
of the later. Pouring the bluish healing
potion into eggs mouth to help his friend, the priest slowly started to regain
consciousness, his armor now blackened and charred. The others seeing this new
threat changed directions and started swinging wildly through the air with
their blades in hopes of connecting with the invisible threat. Celceor had
heard of invisibility spells before though none which would keep one concealed
after engaging an enemy. This was something new and beyond Celceor
understanding.
.Bane’s keen senses detected some movement and
he lunged forward with a quick thrust of his blade into the empty air. This
connected and impaled his slim blade deep into something soft. The mage, now
turning visible and hold his stomach now red and bleeding from a gapping hole. He
dropped his staff and collapsed onto the floor, cursing in a trembling voice,
“you fools…you don’t know what you have done!”
with the threat now over, Eggo
regaining his footing, hurried over to the kids and started to free them.
Though finding that the minor healing he had left strangely could not revive
them, he went to explain that he felt that there was dark magic yet at work on
the children causing them to remain asleep. Figuring Eggo
had things in hand with the children, Celceor headed
over to the mage and started searching the bloody corpse. He discovered both a
staff the mage appeared to be carrying as well as mage guild certificate of
membership made out to one "Conjurer Vormoth". Not
much of a conjurer he thought and as he dropped the lifeless body back to the
ground having finished looting it.
Searching the place the party
turned up a magic chalice ( which Bane threw to Beck
for all his help with the party so far), as well as some gold, a box of gems, 2
potions, and cloak . In addition Werkle turned up a spell book from the table which for
some strange reason escaped being incinerated by Celceor’s
fireball.
Being mostly crushed the
party decided to bed down for the night to get some rest and regained much
needed healing and spells. Celceor looked over at the two sleeping kids as he
went about trying to identify some of the items. Seemed the party had two more dependents they now had
to baby sit. Strangely, this seemed kind of familiar somehow. It seemed this is
all he had been doing since he arrived in Caldron. After tasting the potions
and recalling the strange mixture from his alchemy days, he concluded that
these were some form of end Sleep Potion. Likely which could
be used to revive the kids or in the case of Vormoth,
if something went wrong. Celceor pulled an indentification
scroll from his belt and read the inscription while holding the staff. It
immediately became known that this was a summon staff, not one that could summon
cool creatures, but one that could be summoned if needed. Bah, what junk, he
thought. A nice staff of the Magi would have been nice. Though
this may still come in handy. The scroll the mage held was some sort
Mage Guild certificate to one "Conjurer Vormoth",
maybe this could come in handy he pondered.
Putty the stick aside he came to the books, Eggo
had translated the one Fafnir had found in the cloud
room, indicating
it was some sort of book on sacrifices. The other was the mages spell
book. Celceor hesitated.
Looking over at the strange
cryptic Tome of the Mines he had been working on since the temple, he became
agitated. Last night he had translated more of the Conquest of the Mines and
discovered that the dwarfs had killed all the peace faring elves who originally lived on the mountain in order to dig mines
and pull riches from the peaceful mountain. Celceor was infuriated that they
had killed off every last elf and dumped their bodies carelessly down a long
chasm on the mountain.. Celceor debated translating
more of the Tome, but turned his focus elsewhere. For it was time to get back
to doing what he does best. He did not see any reason for not following both
the divine as well as the arcane tracks of magic. Besides, with these latest
pages from the text of the conquest of the mountain, he had a new sense of
purpose and of urgency. Things needed to be done and he needed to get busy putting his plan
into motion, the elves needed to be avenged….should he tell the others? He
paused. ….no, they would not understand anyway.
Figuring it was at least time, he pulled out his empty spell book and drew out his
special vial of ink. He had not used all of his spells, as the others had come
to believe. He still had a few kept hidden away in the back of his mind in case
of emergencies or as in this case, if he decided to put them back down on paper. With a steady
and determined hand Celceor applied a steady stream of ink to paper and began
to scribe in Elven …
Acid Splash.........