Death and Necromancy

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Mary Mouse and the Big Guy get rid of the skeletons, but then Red nearly kills himself on a ballista bolt trap on the next door. But he gets back up and we run down a bunch more hallways until he stops us. Says there are holes in the walls, and he doesn’t like them. After a while, he sticks a ladder is some of the holes, but then decides we can’t get the Big Guy and Buick across the trap, so we turn back.

Around a bunch of other hallways until we find another big room. This one has a bunch of ugly masks on the walls, and ten skeletons that we have to smash. There are shelves of destroyed books here, so I search the shelves for any that haven’t died yet. Mary Mouse finds a lever to open one of the bookshelves to reveal a big iron-banded door. It takes a couple tries, but the Big Guy and Orange lift it up to get us all through.

We move on down more hallways to a portcullis. The dark room beyond smells like an outhouse full of death. Nevi and Mary Mouse send light in, and we can see piles of bones, dirt, armor, and weapons. Orange and the Big Guy lift this door up, too and we head inside to investigate.

Big dead eye monsters rise up out of the muck. Two of them look like zombies and the other one is made of bones. These are the most awful things I have ever seen. Mary Mouse seems to like the skeletal one, though. It kills Buick and Orange, though, so we destroy it in a rage that would have made him proud. I might have run if I could, but the doors were all closed. I don’t like it here.

Red is furious, and puts Orange in his bag to fix later because the Big Guy can’t fix him right now. We ask if Red wants to leave now, but he insists we go on without Orange. We do divide up some of Orange’s stuff. Catbard lets Gargoyle Lady take control of her, so we give her Orange’s weapons.

We run up and down a lot of hallways then, backtracking and going everywhere but back to that trapped hall. One last dead end, and Red is frustrated. Mary Mouse takes a look, though, and finds a false wall. Red gets it open and we creep in. There is a random armored woman in here, she says she’s from Chult and has been waiting her for a very long time. Her party came in here, but got separated. I don’t trust her. She says her name is Samantha Satessa from near Gold Dwarf Chasm. That sounds fake, I’ll have to ask Catbard later, when she comes back.

There’s no way out of this room, though, so we go all the way back to the beginning. Two pink toads have climbed up the tree. We try to get passed, but Nevi trips and a Redcap and some sort of demon pop out. Red is furious, but we manage to get rid of them. He insists we just shoot them if any more appear, instead of trying to get past them. We all agree and head onward.

We head down some more twisting hallways to a room with strange symbols. We avoid the symbols to get out another door, and down some more hallways. The next door is kind of cold, but we head in. The room is full of cold and spikes and weird swirling decorations.

The Mandolin and the Pyramid

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Everybody’s getting ready to go fight the Mummy Lord. Nevi and Mary Mouse are working on Manshoon’s arm and other weird stuff. The Big Guy’s getting weapons from the Gauntlet. So, naturally, Red wants to go steal something. It’ll be fun, he said. Well, he said dangerous, but that’s the same thing, really.

It’s that Mandolin from the Bard College that Catbard told him no the last time. It’s super special and protected, so Red has to have it. I pull the shadows around us and we get all the way up to the windows. Red says they’re protected by magic though, and he can’t get passed it. We hide for a bit while he comes up with plan B. Then he says we have to climb, so I drink my potion and we climb up the building and hide under the roof near the doors. I don’t like it up here, but the shadows help. And Red, I can’t let him down.

He opens the doors with magic and a big alarm goes off and the whole inside lights up and guards come rushing from everywhere. Red and I stay very still. He stares very intently at one particular man who stays outside while the guards search, and only goes in when they don’t find anything. He says the man is coming back out with magic and I have to get in his bag. So, I take a deep breath and climb in.

It’s dark and empty, and musty in his bag. Well, at least there aren’t any worms. He pulls me out underneath a counter after all the guards and such have gone away. He says the alarm is off now, so we climb along the walls to get all the way around the room to the mandolin. But it’s enclosed in a force bubble, he says.

He stares at it for awhile. Then digs through his other bag and comes out with a potion, and talks to his ring some. Tells me to get ready to grab the instrument, and then rubs the potion all over the orb of force. The mandolin falls free! I grab it and he stuffs it in his bag. We climb quickly over to the opposite window from where we started. I have to back away, he’s going to set off the lightning trap to get us out. I pull out a healing potion, but he manages to keep standing after two lightning bolts zap through the entire room and quite a ways outside, too. We duck out in the aftermath of the flash and run, as the guards come charging the building again. He tells me to go home, he has to get the mandolin off the street before they come looking. He was right, that was fun, and dangerous!

Since the Doom Raiders are babysitting me anyway, I pester them about the pyramid. One tells me to hire folk to walk ahead of us, cannon fodder. Another tells me about how they fought the undead when they rescued us. Another one tells me a story about his favorite tomb robbing adventure and their poor rogue who died setting off one too many traps.

Finally, everyone is all set. I hand out potions to everyone, and help Catbard buy some extras. We’re going to need all the healing we can get, I’m afraid. Madeline, still stationed at the base of the towers, is bored out of her mind, and wishes us luck. Up in the first tower, we discover that there are still a pink toad or two. This one turns into an ugly Troll and we have to put it down before we can get to the pyramid. Nevi’s tree actually pierced right through the bottom of the building, so we climb right on up.

Library Time

On By ravonlockeIn Journal, Quill1 Comment

Spy Master,

Just a quick note. I spent a lot of time reading at the Tower this tenday. It’s very strange when a book helps you get more nimble. But I also went to the Font of Knowledge. The Oghma priests are really nice. Have to learn about these weird groups my flock belong to before the Blackstaff gets any madder at us. She really doesn’t like Red.

Nevi says his bag worms have built a whole city and are traveling between planes. They might help us find Fistandia! He brought one back to the Cabaret and it was Awful! Invaded my mind all slippery and smooth. I do not like her!

Orange got a broom and a license for it. That sounds dangerous, too.

Red says we have to go take care of that pyramid on top of the towers. Even the Blackstaff is scared of it. The Big Guy is getting a special sword to find the dead guys inside. I think I need to go shopping for potions at least. Istrid told me where to go. I’ll let you know how it goes.

~QS

Undead Invasion

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We’re back in the teleport room. Big Guy helped Page sit up. The ceiling is black now and we’re sitting in a massive pile of Things. Everyone starts grabbing things, but there’s skeletons coming up the stairs. Blackstaff pops a little wall of force over the door. There’s a tree in here, with magic fruit, and some pick toads hopping about. What even happened?

Orange grabs a toad, but it turns into a panther. Like his brother, he makes friends with it. Mary grabs one and it turns into a big demon bird that we have to put down. The skeletons are pounding on the door. The Big Guy grabs a big metal brazier to brace it, but slipped and dropped it on top of himself. The skeletons start breaking through all the barriers. Then help arrived. Ziraj and a few other Doom Raiders, by the look of them. They escort us down the tower and out, through and around more undead, and some Grey Hand. Ziraj isn’t very subtle in keeping me safe, but I’m so near dead, that I can’t complain.

Once outside, we can see a giant black pyramid atop the two towers, like it just landed there. What in Faerûn has happened here? Was that in the mansion, too? Ziraj gets us to the edge of the combat and tells the Blackhand that the Doom Raiders will call in the debt someday. Very subtle friend, very subtle. Catbard starts singing a song about The Lost Undercrypt of someone named Ulfang the Black as we head away from the mess at the towers. Leaving the Blackstaff to rally her forces.

Back at the cabaret, I grab a drink and stew and head up to the kitties for bed. I don’t know what to say if they ask about the rescue, yet. I hope no one noticed he was protecting me. I head out in the morning to send a note, but Ziraj is there again. He says they’re going to keep an eye on things for a few days, so I hand him my report to deliver on the Towers.

Blackstaff shows up about midmorning, as we’re discussing what to do with all the books we took from the tower. She asks if the pyramid was our fault. How? What? No. That’s a weird question. She agrees with Catbard that it’s Ulfang. She says that it happened just as we entered Manshoon’s mansion. She won’t tell us not to go exploring, but he’s really dangerous, and she’s not coming with us. She says Madeline is researching, and Nevi will go talk with her. The conversation goes in a few random directions at this point, Nim and the Gargoyle and then Blackstaff asks for Manshoon’s robe.

Red really wants to keep it, if only to sell it since we can’t use it. He asks for a trade, some secret knowledge in her tower. He seems to be talking about something specific, two particular tomes that can only be read once a century. How strange, but she agrees. Once she leaves, he says I should read one of them, and the Big Guy should read the other one. I’m just happy I get to go to her Library.

To The Top

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The apprentices all had rings, too, so I got a new one, but so did Red. We head upstairs, and Orange has to shove the door open cuz it has broken things in front of it. Looks like a workshop of body parts, but stone ones. There’s a whole one, though, and when we go in, it attacks. Just as we are about to put it down, it runs over to a lever on the floor. Then we’re suddenly slamming into the ceiling. The golem stopped moving though, at that. We all scramble up to the door before the floor goes back down, and Blackstaff levitates up to us once she can get back in the room.

The next floor is just a hallway with a flesh golem in front of the far door. We argue about what to do about it, until Red walks up to it and it steps off a pressure plate. This closes Blackstaff behind some bars, and starts filling the hall with gas. I try to go stand on the plate, but too late. Orange takes down the golem, and Red disarms the trap.

The other room on this level is dim, dusty, and full of boxes. There’s a sigil pulsing on the wall, and once the mages get a look at it, they say it’s powering the force wall outside. Maybe I can take it down when everyone else goes on. I copied down the sigil work as best I can. They had been talking about one for the Cabaret. There’s a secret door in the center of the room, and Red shoos us all back to the hall way because there’s a magic trap. He used his invisible hand to open it and it exploded out the wall where the sigil was. Well, that’s that then. There’s a little flaming skull inside that we have to smash back to pieces. There some books and a wand that we loot from in there, but now there’s nowhere else to go.

Back to the smaller tower, and up to the teleportation circle we go. Blackstaff leads us all through the teleport and we land on a platform in front of a mansion, just like Fistandia’s was, surrounded by purple mists. Only this one is covered in Zhentarim symbols. We head inside and Red sets off a huge loud gong right in the entryway. My ears hurt, but I think there was a voice after that, but not sure. Then he steals a mask from the wall and checks all the doors. None of them are locked or trapped.

The first thing we find is another one of those snow-mages, but it isn’t awake, so we smash it right quick. Then a reading room and a library. We snag some more books, but on the way out a voice calls Green Flame, and the funny green fire brazier explodes all over us. Next we find an empty lab, which disappoints Nevi and Mary Mouse. Then a summoning circle, but it’s also empty. Orange messes it up some, for something to do. Next we find an empty guard station. What’s the point of that? Then a waiting room, like they have at important houses and castles. Then we find the receiving room, with a long walkway and big chair at one end.

Here we finally find the people. Urstal Floxin, the half orc Red chased after our house nearly exploded. Vivette Blackwater, another lady Red chased over rooftops. And two halflings, who seemed to move with the ease of my teacher, Whistler. We’re pretty tired from all the fights up to this point, so Red tries to convince them they are supporting the wrong guy and to just leave and get a new job. Then a mage tries to kill him where we can’t see her, so it does not work, so we have to fight.

It does not go well. Urstal’s got some pretty nasty poison on his sword and the halflings are hitting pretty hard. The mage is nasty, so she has to go down first. Everyone’s falling down and I don’t have potions left, and then Manshoon arrives and Orange chokes out Catbard! It’s all going so badly, that the Blackstaff steps in. I have to get Orange off of Catbard, and then finish off the last of the fighters with Red. Blackstaff makes Manshoon disappear and we get up Mary Mouse to help the others. Then gather around where he went poof. When he comes back, Blackstaff grabs him up, just like Orange because she made magic go away in the area. Then we stab and hit him to death. WOW! Blackstaff must be really strong to hold him like that while Red cut his spine right out of his body!

Then everything went white.