Session 110: Day 27 of Goodmonth, in the Barrowmaze

As we prepared to engage the rats in battle, Ronan and Calbach materialized alongside us. The rats charged and attacked Feno and Chalkboi, but of course they both avoided their attacks and Feno continued to taunt them. With their attention on Feno, Lhoss cast magic missile at one, exploding it in a ball of fire, and I jumped on the two nearest me, killing them both instantly. Kyro ran up and shot an arrow, but it flew poorly and broke on the Barrowmaze wall. Feno swung his longsword, Icing Death, instantly killing three and nearly killing a fourth. Filthfang then raised his dirty little paws and cast a spell. Instantly, Kyro, Zraith, Ronan, Feno, and myself felt like we were covered in biting rats and collapsed to the floor, screaming and writhing! Nikki tried to drag Kyro out of the way and was stabbed by one of the arrows he was holding.

One of the giant rats moved forward and bit me as I was incapacitated on the barrowmaze floor. Lhoss attacked and killed another, but Filthfang again raised his nasty paws and cast an incantation, summoning six additional rats behind us. Niki then turned and killed three of them and as another rat tried to attack her, suddenly Jack started meowing and the rat was raised up into the air! Calbach shot an arrow through another, killing it as another rat took a biog bite out of Chalkboi’s side. At that point, the spell cast by Filthfang wore off and those of us who had been affected jumped up, angry and ready to do some damage to the rats.

Lhoss then cast continual light, blinding Filthfang, and Feno swung and connected with the evil sorcerer rat, who suddenly disappeared in a poof of purple smoke, leaving only the smell of brimstone. It was as if he wasn’t even there at all! I began to suspect that there was some advanced illusion magic going on. Feno angrily screamed, “Coward!” as Kyro swung and killed another rat. I angrily lashed out at the first rat I could see and killed it instantly, and Feno swept his sword across the remaining rats, obliterating them.

Lhoss had the sudden urge to open some doors so I followed behind her in an attempt to keep her from getting hurt. Feno declared he actually wanted to kick down some doors, so Lhoss checked the first door in the hallway for traps and (finding none) Feno kicked it down, revealing a pair of carnivorous flies. One of them immediately flew at me and bit me with a nasty bite. Seeing the flies coming at us, Zraith began to sing a strange little song of penguin courage. It seemed to be mostly about fish, but it still filled us all with courage to fight. The other fly tried to bite Feno but couldn’t get past his armor and Feno immediately squished it. Lhoss then smashed the other one with her staff.

Feno and Nikki went into the room, sweeping the floor as they went. At that moment, Zraith heard a commotion down the hall and called it to our attention. Chalkboi used lay on hands to heal me and I snuck quietly down the hall, hiding in shadows, and peered around the corner. I could see two mongrelmen torturing a giant rat. Going back to the others, I suggested we go down and investigate further, but the group decided instead they wanted to open the door at the other side of the room Feno and Nikki just entered. I was going to sneak back down and watch the mongrelmen from the shadows, but Kyro insisted he was going to go with me. Not trusting his ranger skills to keep him hidden like a thief, I decided not to go. Kyro was a little put out by that, as he wanted to tell the mongrelmen to just kill the thing, but he came into the room with us and I closed the door.

Lhoss then picked the lock on the other door on the south wall and Ronan and Feno went in. They reported that room was filled with burial alcoves on the west and east walls, but the entire east wall was also covered in nasty and dangerous yellow mold. The rest of us who had previously encountered yellow mold refused to even go in at that point. Lhoss decided instead to re-memorize her spells. (Armatzi tried also but was too exhausted and nodded off for 15 minutes instead.) Her memorization complete, Lhoss then entered the room and cast continual light on the mold, turning it to a pale grey. We then began to search the alcoves. Someone found a pouch of gold, Lhoss found a finely-crafted holy symbol of Narul (made of silver) and a diamond ring, and I found a platinum cloak clasp. We divided the coin between us.

Session 109: Adventures Great and Small

Previously, the Saviors of Orlane had pulled an ambush on a group of the Band of the Black Hand and were ambushed in turn by a group of undead.  Things looked grim for our heroes for a time, but their might won out in the end.  Gnorcia, always looking out for her pocket, decided to search the remains for treasure.  Most of the group joined her, and some items were found.  Usually, undead are a waste of time when it comes to loot, but this time, Zraith lucked out.  One of the Juju (enhanced zombies) was wearing a pair of sandals that weren't the usual junk.  In fact, they looked like exactly what the poor little penguin needed to protect her bare, recently burned, feet.  Before she put them on, Niki cast a "detect magic" spell on the gathered treasures, and to everyone's surprise, the sandals were indeed magical in nature, as were a pile of arrows Feno found around the second Juju.  Zraith put them on her feet and they (amazingly) fit her (decidedly non-humanoid) feet.  She hopped up and started walking around in the magical sandals, proving one of their powers by confidently walking up the wall as if it were the floor.  Someone remembered that the Juju had been likewise walking on the walls, and it was agreed that Zraith was blessed indeed to get such a useful item.

As the heroes were readying to leave the barrow maze, an eerie green eyeball appeared from the wall and glared at them menacingly, followed by a mouth.  The grating voice that emitted from the mouth announced itself as belonging to Naynor, the main foe that they have been searching the maze for.  The evil being taunts the heroes by name, referring to them specifically as "The Heroes of Orlane", calling their deeds unimpressive and claiming that they will soon fall to his warriors and join his army of undead against their will.

Lhoss and Gnorcia attack the apparition, but as it is some sort of illusion, they have no effect.  Feno quickly turned and mooned the pseudo-face, which then faded away to the sound of echoing laughter. The strength of the magical spell was proven by the laughter lingering for some minutes.

Approaching the stairs chosen to exit the barrow maze, Lhoss is hit again by the wretched smell from a nearby room.  "I want to try to get rid of that smell," she said.  Her proposal was to gather the rotting remains from the room in the tarp that was in the bag of holding and then dump them in the charnel pit further into the maze that the adventurers had previously thrown bodies into, followed by a vial of green slime.  The slime had effectively consumed the biologicals, neutralizing the smell of them.  This sounded like a reasonable idea, since the smell of decomposition is truly horrible, so Kyro and Gnorcia agree to accompany Lhoss into the tainted room.  Unfortunately, before even entering the room, Lhoss was overcome by the stench and began vomiting.  

Gnorcia and Kyro felt a bit green, but persevered and started gathering the remains into a pile.  Gnorcia changed the plan since she didn't want to damage the tarp. "I like this tarp," she said, "so how about we just burn the mess and be done with it?"  

Kyro wasn't so sure, and asked, "What about noxious smoke?"  

"It hasn't been a problem before," Gnorcia responded.  "We've been tossing burning oil around in here all over the place."  Kyro was still doubtful, remembering the time Tatania had set fire to some frescoes honoring Narul, and all the smoke from that, but didn't feel it was worth arguing about.  Neither of the two noticed that the door to the room had closed behind them, so when Gnorcia tossed the lit oil onto the pile of rotting corpses, the room quickly filled with thick, dark smoke.  That was enough to overcome Gnorcia, who collapsed and began vomiting as much as Lhoss had earlier.  Kyro picked Gnorcia up by the back of her tunic, carrying her as he tried to find the door and get it open, but he passed out from smoke inhalation.  Gnorcia crawled over and got the door open enough for her to drag Kyro from the room before they would both have perished.    Feno suggested that Niki use her stone shaping spell to just completely seal that room off, but she was unable to because she didn't have the clay component available.  The fresher air was enough to revive all three of the group that had been incapacitated, and everyone tromped back to Orlane under their own power.

Due to the time taken to deal with the stinky room, our adventurers arrive back to base too late for supper.  The kitchen at the Foaming Mug had been closed down for the night and there was nothing available to eat.  Zraith, perhaps feeling generous because of her good fortune in gaining magical sandals, offered to cook up some fish for the whole group instead of just Armatzi like she usually confined her largess to.  Most of the group happily agreed, once Lhoss had convinced Zraith to demonstrate her fishing talents, thus ensuring the fish was fresh and not the day-old catch that Zraith had in her bag.  Zraith had offered one of those fish to Niki, but even Jack turned up his nose at it.  It seems that gaining the powers of the Lesser Ring of Jack has turned the cat into even more of a snob than cats are usually considered to be.  Jack claimed that he just has better taste now.  The sole abstainer to the meal was Feno, since he has a particular dislike for Zraith, even though she has been traveling with the group for a while now.  Perhaps this is understandable, since the penguin can be rather brisk when talking to anyone except Armatzi, whom she idolizes, and elves are a proud race that don't forgive perceived slights particularly easily.

On the morning of day 14 of Good Month, the group sold the non-magical treasures collected on the journey.  The magically enhanced small shield was identified as a +1 shield, so since Kyro was the only one who could carry a shield that didn't have one, he was allowed to claim it.  It greatly enhanced his armor rating.  The arrows Feno had gathered proved to be +1 as well, which says a lot about the skill of the Juju that lost them since he injured more of his own side than the heroes.

Chalkboi counted up his funds and decided that if he borrowed a bit from the bag of holding, he would be able to level up.  This left the rest of the group without the paladin for a week, so it was decided that a short trip to Hochoch was in order.  Armaziti needed to report in to the Temple of St. Cuthbert, several of the others wished to renew their adventurer's badges, and Lhoss wanted to revisit the grove within the city.  These tasks were easily accomplished, with Armatzi being lectured about the undead and their strengths and weaknesses.  The information he received may be of great benefit while clearing the barrow maze.  The badges were renewed on day 18 of Good Month and will be valid for another 30 days.

Upon returning to Orlane on the 21st, the bounty on the killed Black Hand members was collected and the newly trained Chalkboi rejoined the group.  The morning of the 22nd of Good Month saw the heroes returning to the barrow maze, grateful that the long heatwave had finally broken.  Instead of being oppressive, the weather was comfortable, and the countryside was beautiful.  

The good mood from travel was slightly dampened when the group entered the barrow maze and discovered that it appeared Naynor had been watching for them.  Naynor's eye and mouth again manifested on the wall within the barrow maze, and he tried to intimidate and taunt the heroes. He wasn't anywhere near as scary as he believed himself to be, and Lhoss and Gnorcia followed Feno's example from last time and mooned the apparition. A black smoke flowed from the false mouth, carrying a mild curse, "essentially a reverse blessing," Armatzi said, that wore off before the group encountered anyone or anything.  Returning to where the undead had ambushed them earlier, the rooms in that hallway were searched.  Niki happened to spot a lever that opened a hidden door, that lead to a hallway with a second hidden door and then a third hidden door.  This third door opened into the hallway that the Band of the Black Hand had approached the ambush from.  All that remained from them was a burned out campfire in the room at the east end of the hall, but there were multiple burial alcoves around the room which were searched for treasure.  A closed portcullis was discovered on the south wall of the room and the members of the group took turns attempting to raise it individually.  None were successful.  Before a group effort could be organized, Chalkboi raised the alarm from where he'd been guarding the hallway entrance.  Giant rats were approaching, and the Rat King himself, Filth Fang, called out to have Jack surrendered to him.  "No way," Niki called back.  Feno then yelled back his own challenge, "You've got a date with my sword, Rat King!"  One might get the feeling that Feno dislikes the Rat King, and who could blame him?

Session 108: Swinging Swords and Adventuring Assassins

 Day 108 Goodmonth (Continued):

The party, which consisted of Kyro, Niki, Chalkboi, Lhoss, Feno, Gnorcia, Armatzi, and Zraith, continued to explore the Barrowmaze, looking for the Font of Law: an artifact whose purpose was outline by the ghost knight Sir Guy.  Heading in a south/southwest direction, Kyro noticed a hidden latch on a wall, and called Lhoss to investigate. Normally, it is the elves Feno or Lhoss who make such a discovery. Lhoss confirms that it is indeed a hidden door, Feno undoes the latch, and being the impulsive elf that he is, enters the room. As the room starts unfolding before his eyes, he inadvertently triggers a trap by snagging a hidden tripwire. Sharp spikes suddenly jut forth from the floor. Due to quick reflexes, he dodges most of the spikes, though a couple of them hurt his leg. Seeing the chaos from another activated trap, Niki thought it wise to travel closer to Feno, and utilize the 10 ft pole the party had, and check ahead of Feno for any future traps. 

They proceed cautiously into the new room and see many burial alcoves. With a thorough searching, the group finds a number of electrum pieces, a pearl, and a gold signet ring. While the group was actively searching, Feno stood guard by the doorway. He hears the flapping of wings, as well as squeaks of an enemy just outside the room. He informs the group to get ready. Upon seeing that they are sufficiently braced for combat, he opens the door ready for anything. 

Four stirges (which look like giant mosquito creatures) rush into the room. They first set their sights on Feno, the death bringing elf. He sidesteps each stirge attack with relative ease. The penguin Zraith attempts to attack one stirge, but is unable to connect with his two hammers. Feno looks and sees the formation of the flying blood suckers and formulates an attack plan. He spins his body off the ball of his foot, and attacks the four stirges in the room, and kills all four in one fail swoop. Their bodies, or what remains of them, clang to the dungeon floor. Seeing an opening, the last remaining stirge flies into the room, ready to attack. Niki, sneaks behind it, and deals a killing blow to the last stirge. The group gathers their newfound treasure and continue to press on southward. 

Upon entering a possible dead-end, Niki discovers a hidden door. They enter and find an unusual, shaped room. Suddenly a flagstone golem is alerted their presence and attacks. Lhoss, channels some of her magic, and sends magic missiles at it, causing some damage to its body. Armatzi is next, and steps forward to attack with his war hammer and hits it, causing further damage. Gnorcia, utilizing her nimble size, decides to jump on his back and attempts to literally stab him in the back. However, due to his stony exterior, Gnorcia is unable to cause much damage to the 7 ft tall creature. Kyro, steps forward and attacks, but the golem deflects the attack. He lumbers forward and attacks Feno. Feno, upon seeing the telegraphed movement of the lumbering giant, easily sidesteps and dodges both attacks. Niki, capitalizing on the golem's focus on Feno, attacks, which causes further damage to the creature. Zraith waddles up to the creature, and swinging both hammers again, attacks. This time, due to the creatures focus on Feno, he connects on his attacks, dealing the killing blow. The flagstone golem crumbles to the ground in defeat. The group notices more burial alcoves in this room. As the majority begins to search and loot the newly discovered alcoves, Feno again gets into a guarding position near the southern door. The group in their searching discover more electrum pieces, a piece of jade, and a small shield. Niki decides to cast a spell, to determine where or not it has magical properties. Her spell causes her to conclude that it indeed does have those properties. Feno hears what sounds like a small adventuring group nearby. He hears their murmuring and muffled talking as they walk near the room the group was in. While listening near the doorway, He also catches a tripwire in the corner of his eye, that is attached to a large stone slab hanging overhead. Presumably, the slap would come down, pushing them into the room with the golem. He informs the group of this, and they disarm the trap. After storing their fresh loot, they proceed forward through the door and further south. They discover a passageway that goes east and west, as well as another passage south. Feno faintly hears the previous group and sees the faint light from their torches from the southern passageway. Lhoss, utilizing her ability for stealth, hands her lantern to Gnorcia for temporary safe keeping. She proceeds to cautiously head down the sides of the passageway, getting closer the other group. After getting close enough to the group to hear their conversation, she learns that they are members of the of the Black Hand. Hearing this her blood boils, and she quietly leaves to inform her party a few paces off. 

On the way back she discovers a hidden trap in the middle of the passageway, that she hadn't seen before. It has a pressure plate, wherein if someone were to step on it, it would cause them to fall into a pit. Upon her return, Lhoss informs the party of all that she learned, and they begin to talk strategy. After talking through a few scenarios, the group decides to lure them and ambush them. 

Lhoss moves down the passageway again, this time putting a bag's worth of marbles along each side of the trap, making it far more treacherous to cross. Gnorcia for her part, decides to use some illusionary magic, and creates a goblin illusion to trick and lead the assassin group towards the trapped trap. The rest of the party gets in position, with each member on opposite sides of the passageway, ready for the ambush. Gnorcia moves the goblin illusion towards the black hand members, and using her goblin language skills, gets the assassin's attention. Seeing the goblin, and potential easy mark for treasure, the group of assassin's sound the verbal alarm and follow the goblin down the passageway. As they proceed down, Lhoss's marble trap works, and 4 members of the black hand immediately fall in.  They hear screaming, and the sounds of battling some creature at the bottom of the pit. Lhoss, seeing the destruction her marbles decides to slink back towards the group. The assassin nearest to the pit, sees her outline briefly and yells to his brethren that they are not alone. They attempt to cross the marble pit area in pursuit. Lhoss, with a wicked grin after seeing a glimmer of fire in the pit, tosses some vials of oil she got from her pack and tosses them in. The vials of oil connect with the open flame and cause a huge explosion that knocks two more assassins into the pit. 

The rest of the assassins are able to make it across the sides of the pit and kick the marbles out of the way. 

Suddenly, the doors behind the group burst open, and a large group of undead rush towards party that is laying in ambush for the Black Hand. The ambushers, it would seem, have now become the ambushed. They undead charge, before the party can counter-attack, and attack Lhoss, who had moved next to Feno, thinking it was a good vantage point. As Lhoss was preparing to fire one of her magic missiles, an undead zombie hits her, disrupting her spell casting and causing minor damage. The remaining members of the Black Hand rush forward and attempt to destroy the goblin but are unable to dispel the illusion. Seeing the danger, the party has now been placed in, Feno rushes back to attack and kills one of the Black Hand members, in order to help clear a path for other member's attacks. After both the assassins and undead reposition themselves to get a better angle to attack, Armatzi attempts to use his clerical magic to turn the undead away. Unfortunately, but the spell has no effect, and the undead resume attacking Lhoss, who falls unconscious from the attacks. Gnorcia, trying to at least affect the members of the Black Hand, casts her spell color spray which causes bright colored lights to shoot forth from her hands. The Black Hand becomes blinded, because they looked directly into the light.  Meanwhile, Feno continues to rain death and destruction with every swing of his enchanted sword. As Gnorcia, and Niki methodically attack and kill each member of the Black Hand, Kyro, Feno and Zraith attack the zombie-like creatures. Zraith falls unconscious when a zombie hits the penguin with a hard claw attack.  Niki rushes forward and heals Lhoss before she bleeds out from her wounds. The leader of the Black Hand, sensing their demise, quickly runs away, abandoning his men to their deaths. And death does indeed happen, with each and every one of them falling to the weapons of Gnorcia and Niki. Feno cleans up the remaining zombies with relative ease, side stepping their attacks and inflecting righteous fury upon the walking corpses. Once the leader of the undead falls, the conscious members of the Saviors of Orlane tend to the wounded and unconscious prior to heading back to Orlane to divide the treasures unearthed as well as get proper medical attention. A good meal and good rest is long overdue. 

Session 107: Sir Guy de O'Veargne and the Fount of Law

The sun rose into a clear sky on the morning of Day 13 of Goodmonth and a warm morning quickly turned into a hot day. Chalkboi, Niki, Armatzi, Zraith, Gnorcia, Loss, and Kyro ate a typically delicious Orlanean breakfast before making the trek to the barrow marsh. It was a sweaty journey through the countryside and farmlands, then tempered by the cool, eerie Dim Forest. The brief temperature respite was shattered upon entering the barrow marsh which was hot and humid with a fetid mist that smelled more foul than usual. There was already a noticeable feeling of weariness among the travelers. The group decided to descend into the barrow maze and find a quiet spot to eat their lunchtime meal.

After moving away from an area that had a rotten smell (probably from some decaying corpses of a previous battle), a portion of rations was consumed and adventuring ensued. Armatzi walked headlong into the first room the party explored and was immediately attacked by three crab spiders that fell from the ceiling. As has happened too often of late, he was poisoned and began to froth at the mouth. Niki engaged the spiders and Armatzi was pulled to safety and Chalkboi administered a cure poison potion. Gnorcia quickly slew one and Jack used his yarning spin to hold another. The spiders were all quickly slain and the party beheld a shrouded corpse with a dirty silver circlet. The headpiece was retrieved while Gnorcia and Kyro harvested the poison sacs from the spiders.

In the next room, two disturbed skeletons on stone slabs were present in a room with hunting and fishing frescoes on the walls. There was also a pile of debris where two bracelets were found. Then to everyone's surprise, a mongrel man peered up from the debris. He was a pitiful creature that was part baboon, part cockroach, with a lobster claw for a hand. He called himself Kalen and told a sorrowful tale of being cast out by his kind and seeking refuge in the barrow maze. He went on to share that his people were sacrificed on the alters by necromancers. When asked any information on how to find these necromancers, Kalen cowered in fear and refused to communicate. Gnorcia promised that we were here to destroy the evil presence and would avenge Kalen and his people. The group left him with some rations and a spare water skin. To their amazement, Kalen sunk back into the debris pile and became nearly impossible to spot.

As the party trekked to the east, they collectively felt a sense of doom, danger, and evil. Attentive to the warning, all were hesitant to move forward. Chalkboi and Armatzi then felt a sense of holiness that led the group to retreat to the west. Along the wall, Niki noticed a hidden latch. After Gnorcia checked it for traps, Niki triggered it to reveal a hidden staircase. At the end of the stairs, it appeared to be a dead end. But upon inspection, Lhoss found crack in the wall which revealed a hidden door. Inside, dark peat-colored water dripped from the ceiling and collected in a pool in the center. Surrounding the pool were many burial alcoves lining the walls. Zraith went for a swim in the stinking water, which stirred up three giant leaches. They attacked the party but were easily slain. The group found treasure in the alcoves and also the remains of a knight who wore a winged and visored helm.

Suddenly a human specter appeared and introduced himself as Sir Guy de O'Veargne. He told the tale of his mission to close the pit of chaos, a portal to another realm that was allowing evil and undead creatures to pass into the barrow maze. He was to use the Font of Law, a glowing orb, as a means to sever the connection. Alas, he was betrayed, murdered, and unceremoniously dumped before his quest could be completed. As he began to fade from existence, he bequeathed his helm to Chalkboi as a holy paladin of St. Cuthbert and charged him and Armatzi with finding the orb and closing the portal. Armatzi and Chalkboi then took great care and reverence in properly putting Sir Guy to rest in one of the burial alcoves.