The Crystal Dominion - Session 08 Summary

[avisarr]

The Crystal Dominion – Session 8 Summary

The party had just returned to the Swordtongue Guild House. It was very early morning and the sun had not risen yet. The party rested for most of the day. N'sahd wanted to get a full 8 hours of sleep and restudy his spells.

Alan had recovered from the spider's poison and was feeling well enough to join the party on their next outing.

The house wizard recharged some of their items as best he could. RedEye went in to town and purchased some more poison for his blades.

Alan, feeling much better, decided to take a look at the magical helmet that RedEye had been carrying around for weeks. This helmet granted a crude type of magical vision that allowed one to peer through walls and see the shapes, but not details, of the next room. It had a range of about 50 feet. Alan thought he could improve that. He spent many hours pouring over the helmet, mumbling, casting spells and tinkering with the helmet's enchantment. In the end, he got a slight increase in the range, but not nearly as much as he had hoped for. The range was increased to 61 feet.

When evening came again, the party went back out into the night and walked to the cave entrance that led to the caverns beneath Vorgan's estate. The bars of the locked gate were still down from their last visit. This gave them hope. It seemed that this entrance was rarely used and no one had become aware of the previous night's visit.

The party began to sneak past the garbage cave and heard the garbage monster inside rattling its chain. RedEye was the last in line. When he walked by, a long tongue shot out from the darkness and snagged his ankle and began dragging him into the dark. He immediately used his "shadow walk" ability to become insubstantial and got loose from the tongue. The creature charged and attacked the rest of the party. It was a hulking quadruped with a rough, grey stone-hard hide. It's four legs ended in curved claws. It had no discernible head or eyes, but did have a gaping toothy maw and a long tongue-like appendage. The tongue next shot out at N'sahd and struck him center chest and started to drag him in. The tongue seemed to be coated in a very sticky slime coating. Tristan swing his sword and severed the tongue with a well aimed blow. The tongue stayed glued to his front and wriggled wildly like a worm. N'sahd grabbed the thrashing thing with both hands and attempted to wrench it from from his robes, but only managed to get his hands glued to his chest.

Alan aimed the fire staff at the beast and let loose with a burst of flame which enveloped the creature. The beast did not like the fire at all and quickly retreated back into the garbage cave. The party quickly moved past the garbage cave and entered the main cavern.

N'sahd's hands were firmly glued together and to his chest with the sticky severed tongue. He would be unable to cast spells without his hands. The party tried various things to free his hands. They suspected that alcohol might dissolve the glue, but they had none – not a single drop of wine or mead. Eventually, the tongue stopped thrashing about and bled out and went limp. RedEye focused his mind and used his "ethereal strike" ability to phase the tongue and ethereally wrench it loose from the mage. This worked and N'sahd had use of his hands again.

The party advanced in to the main cave and arrived at the doors beyond which they knew were the stairs. RedEye checked the door for traps and locks. There were none. He used ethereal sight to see through the door and saw someone coming down the stairs. The party quickly arranged themselves around the door ready to attack.

A split second before the door opened, the party saw one of the skeletal creatures from before appear out of the shadows at the far end of the cavern.

The door pushed open and a rotund human male in dark robes and with a mace stepped down onto the muddy cavern floor. He wore a holy symbol of some type that the party did not immediately recognize. He wielded a golden skull tipped mace. The party lashed out with blades and spells at the startled priest who was taken by surprise. Very quickly battle was joined and blades and spells were being traded back and forth fiercely. The priest barked out a spell and struck back with his heavy mace. The mace struck Tristan and absorbed some of his strength. Meanwhile, the skeleton rushed up through the cavern and began hacking away at the knight and N'Sahd with a heavy rusted blade.

The priest managed to cast a spell which apparently affected his robes. Each time a blade came crashing down on his robes, his robes would change to stone for a split second to absorb the strike and then change back to cloth. This protected him from some attacks. The knight, wielding a heavier blade with greater strength, was able to smash through the stone on most strikes. Eventually Alan, wielding the red iron staff of flame, managed to squarely hit the priest with the dragon's breath – a streaming cone of fire. The priest was engulfed in flame, burned badly and coughing and choking from smoke. Blinded and on fire, the priest ran out of combat and fled into an adjoining chamber. As the chamber was lit up by the flames of the priest's robes, N'sahd could see that the chamber was a dead end. In it was some kind of altar to a dark deity. This altar bore the same holy symbol that the priest wore around his neck. N'sahd threw a fireball into the chamber. The fireball exploded with a dull whoosh and flame filled the room. They could hear the death scream of the priest. When the fireball cleared, they could see the priest was dead, on the ground, and on fire, as was much of the chamber. Another skeletal creature had been in the altar area. It walked out of the altar chamber and joined the first undead in attacking the party.

The battle continued against the two undead creatures. But now that the altar was destroyed the green glow had left the eyesockets of the undead creatures and there seemed somehow diminished. The two undead creatures were quickly defeated. The party guessed that perhaps the altar had been a source of power for the undead.

The altar was still on fire. Great tapestries covered the wall and carpet covered the ground. There were several tables filled with things. The altar and tapestries were all ablaze. Many bottles and potions had exploded on the table. There were also three tables with body parts, half assembled zombies, skeletal pieces, etc. This macabre display was burning as well.

The fires eventually died down and then the party went into the check out the room. Everything was destroyed except for some goblets, plates and one bottle of wine. (Most of the other bottles had been destroyed).

Annoyed with what had happened with the sticky tongue, N'sahd took gloves off of the dead priest although they were too large for him.

The party took the "Death Mace" off of the priest as well. This weapon was tipped with a gold covered skull from some nether beast. An almost palpable aura of magic and evil emanated from the weapon.

From the priest's body, the party also took 37 gold Drakkellian coins, a golden ring and a silver and onyx bracelet. Everything else on him had been destroyed by the fire.

We ended Session 8 here. The party is still in the cavern level. The altar chamber has been destroyed by a fireball. A priest and two undead skeletal creatures have been killed. Although the combat was a bit noisy, the party feels that they have not yet alerted anyone in the mansion above.