Game Session Twenty Two

The game session started the evening of Harvester 4, 3080 YE. With the party back again inside the hidden crypt of the dead ghast. No healing has taken place and no spell have been recovered. the party is pretty badly beat up, except for Ulfgar, though the damage is mostly ability damage.

The party settled into the hidden crypt, knowing they had several days of rest and recovery ahead of them. On the third day of their rest though they were surprised when their packs and pouches suddenly burst open and six of the green gargoyles they had fought at the entrance to Rappan Athuk attacked them.

During the attack Moss was magically held and Ulfgar managed to also magically hold one. Rhino got lucky and killed one almost immediately. As they continued the fighting Flairian managed to get beat up pretty badly and actually took off running down the secret passage to escape death. After Flairian took off two of the green gargoyles picked up Moss and started heading towards the exit. Knowing that Moss was almost at full strength Flairian took the chance and sent a fireball at the two gargoyles (and Moss). The two gargoyles dropped Moss and ran past Flairian, who wisely stood out of their way and opened the secret door, the gargoyles took off down the corridor. Flairian then started singing a brave song to bolster the spirits of Rhino and Ulfgar as they finished off the remaining gargoyles.

In the aftermath of the battle they decided that it had to be the eyes of the gargoyles that reanimated. They decided to not dig out the eyes of the dead gargoyles and just through the dead bodies out into the corridor. After this battle the party had to spend four more days resting before they were fully healed.

After spelling back up the group decided to head back down to the lower level again. They first checked out the western two door, finding them locked. They tried to break them down unsuccessfully and also were unable to pick them. They next went to the southern door, where Rhino managed to pick the lock. They went down to the where the corridor "T'd" and Moss discovered the secret door in the western end of the corridor. They opened the secret door and looked down the passage but did not venture down it. They instead headed east down the corridor.

The first doorway they came to, and looked in, was filled with rat nests and was home to three female dire rats with a bunch of baby dire rats. With Moss cheering him on Flairian sent a fireball into the room and blasted the whole bunch of them. Searching the smoking ruins afterward they found only a bloody doll that had 2 platinum pieces sewed into its dress and a handful of copper pieces. The room also had several rat tunnels that they party didn't explore.

The next room was piled high with wood and tools, all neatly stacked. Looking it over Ulfgar figured that the wood and tools were for the making of caskets. In the center of the room was a large iron chest that was filled with thousands of rusty nails.

The next door along the same wall had a "shooshing" sound coming from inside it. None of the party could figure out what kind of monster would make such a sound, so they decided to come back to this room later.

Across the hallway was another door. Since the door was unlocked they decided to just kick it in and surprise whatever may be inside. After they kicked the door in they saw several large ogres, two of which looked to be stacking some sort of coins. Flairian, acting first sent in a fireball that caught two of the ogres in its blast. Next both Rhino and Moss rushed into the room while Ulfgar summoned a flaming sphere to harass the huge ogres. ra1_ogre.gif (25736 bytes)

Even with the advantage of surprise and Flairian's fireball the party ended up being badly beaten when the fight was over. Rhino had dropped to zero hit points and went down and both Flairian and Moss ended up being badly hurt. Flairian did manage to finish off one ogre with his javelin though.

The party, after doing as much immediate healing as they could, spent a considerable amount of time puzzling over the coins the ogres had been stacking. What they found was three rows of coins, 100 copper pieces in each row. In the first row the coins were all heads, the second row was all tails, and the third row was all heads again. Ulfgar and Moss investigated the arrangement from every angle, they broke the pattern and waited for something to happen, they checked out every stack to verify they were all heads or tails. Finally, unable to figure out what the coins were for, they carefully put them back in the same order as they found them. Three rows of 100 copper pieces each, first row heads, second row tails, third row heads again. While this was going on the rest of the party looted the bodies of the ogres of miscellaneous coinage.

Meanwhile they also checked out the rest of the room, finding another room that seemed to be a den, filled with piles of skins and hides. Among this they found a bearskin in good shape that Moss claimed and a silver-edged master work two-handed sword that was claimed by Rhino. They also found a bottle of brandy, claimed by Flairian, and a magical potion of unknown worth, claimed by Ulfgar. They also investigated a passageway that lead to a large cave. The floor, walls and ceiling of the cave were all made of packed dirt. As they went through it trickles of loose dirt fell constantly from the ceiling. In this cave were two large passages, one leading upward and one leading downward. Both of these passages were at very steep angles, almost vertical. They decided to attempt neither of the passages.

Back in the ogres den they spent another two days resting and healing. After resting back up they decided to investigate the room across the hallway where the "shooshing" sound could still be heard. Opening the unlocked door they could see that everything in the room was smashed and swept into a large pile in the center of the room. There was an animated broom still sweeping every bit of duct into this large pile. Rhino, guessing, commanded the broom to "stop sweeping" and the broom stopped!, Next he commanded it to "sweep" and it started back up again. Feeling good about it Rhino packed up his new toy into his backpack.

Next they checked out the long corridor that lead northward. They had went over halfway down it when they came to a door. This door was different from all the others they had seen so far. It was finely crafted of an ebony wood, polished black. It was accented with solid gold hardware and had a lock of obvious quality. The door had runes carved deeply in the surface. No one was able to read what was written but just looking at the writing made everyone feel uneasy. Rhino tried to pick the lock but had no success. The party decided to press onward.

Just a short way down the corridor from the black door Moss discovered another secret door, this one was cold to the touch. They group carefully opened the door and found that it led to a small cave that was bitterly cold. Floating in the center of the cave was a small silver sphere, slowly rotating. They could feel the cold radiating from this sphere. The group made several attempts to "capture" the sphere or even move it in some way, all of which failed. Ulfgar decided to try to grab the sphere with his bare hands and took a large amount of cold damage for his trouble. After that they decided to just leave the thing alone.

Opening the door at the end of the corridor they found another corridor running westward. By this time they think they have figured out that these corridors form a large square. They saw a door at the eastern end of the corridor that they checked out first. This door led to a room of hard-packed dirt and had several rat-sized tunnels branching off of it. To the north of the room was a much larger passageway. As the party looked in the room, clumps of dirt fell from the ceiling. Deciding the room was unstable, they abandoned any further exploration of the room.

Checking the next room down the corridor, they found another door that Rhino could pick the lock on. The room contained the remains of smashed boxes and crates. Looking quickly through the rubble they could see nothing of apparent value so they just kicked the rubble around for a minute then left.

The next room had a much better lock and Rhino was unable to pick it so they smashed the door down. They found another storage room that smelled horrible, mainly from the remains of several dire rats. Inside the room was also a brass spittoon half-filled with a vile looking (and smelling) liquid. Ulfgar knocked the spittoon over and found that it also contained a fine golf chain with a ruby on it. After washing it off with some of Flairian's brandy he claimed the booty for himself. The room also had another door in the back wall that led to a set of stairs leading downward.

As the stairs downward ended they found themselves at the entrance to a huge cavern. They could see dozens of rat tunnels along the walls and ceiling. The roof of the main cavern was too high to see in torchlight but you could see and hear bats fluttering about in the dark. The floor was rocky and you could hear the sound of rushing water somewhere off in the distance. At the entrance to the cavern, carved in luminous green letters above the tunnel exit were an inscription: "Beware of Purple Worms! - Speigle the ArchMage" ra1_spieglewarning.jpg (66939 bytes)

Ignoring the warning left behind by the famous ArchMage the party entered the vast cavern and started off across the middle. They could see that the cavern was filled with stalactites and stalagmites along with large heaps of dung left behind from some enormous creature. Eventually they came to where they could see a fast moving river splitting the cavern in two. As they approached the river they heard a great rumbling from the ground underneath their feet.

As the party stood there the ground 30 feet in front of them opened up revealing a truly gigantic worm of purple coloration, fully five feet in diameter and it's long body coiled in a area 15" wide. Rhino, being the swiftest to react charged the maw of the great beast and hacked with his sword. The rest readied weapons and spells. When the great worm finally attacked, the first thing it did was to grab Rhino in it's mouth.

Seeing Rhino get snatched up like a kibble snack by the monster the rest of the party declined to charge instead Moss fired arrows while Ulfgar and Flairian shot off lighting bolts and fireballs. The beast seemed unfazed by the magical energy that scored it's flanks and on the next round swallowed Rhino whole. As the monster started towards where the rest of the party was they quickly retreated, pausing only to fire off as many more missiles and fireballs as they could while staying out of the beasts reach. Finally they had retreated back to the tunnel entrance to the caverns. Still the beast was following them, even after taking more than a few fireballs, arrows from Moss's mighty bow and assorted magical mayhem from Ulfgar.

There in the greenish glow of the luminous runes that spelled out "Beware of Purple Worms! - Speigle the ArchMage" they finally finished off the monster with it's dead body filling the entrance.

They quickly hacked their way into the beasts body in search of Rhino, but he had already died gruesomely in the acid filled gizzard of the worm. They did manage to find several of the items on his body to loot, especially some of his magical weapons that had not been destroyed. From here the remaining party members retreated to the ogres' lair to rest and recover spells.

The game ended here on the morning of Harvester 14, 3080 YE. The party is mourning the lose of Rhino and resting in the back room of the ogres den. So far there has been no healing or recovery of spells.
Link to next game.

Character Name	Starting Experience	Session Experience	Total Experience	Notes Next Level
Moss	23,422	3,997	27,419	28,000 for next level
Flairian	24,308	3,997	28,305	Now 8th Level
Ulfgar	21,374	3,997	25,371	28,000 for next Level

The Party at the Start	The Party at the End
Moss - Half-Elf (Rng6)	Moss - Half-Elf (Rng7)
Flairian - Half-Elf (Brd7)	Flairian - Half-Elf (Brd7)
Rhino - Human (Clr1/Ftr5)	Rhino - * Dead *
Ulfgar - Human (Mnk1/Wiz5)	Ulfgar - Human (Mnk1/Wiz6)

Current Character Health/Status
Moss	63 hit points (down 8 hit points)
Flairian	52 hit points (down 7 hit points)
Rhino	Dead, killed by Purple Worm
Ulfgar	50 hit points (down 18 hit points)