Player Characters
Dangar Stonekleaver - male dwarf from the Northern Dwarven Kingdom
Mikal Torvaldsson - human male, of the Uplander Clans
Darian Kyle - human male, formerly of the Imperial 7th Legion [deserter]
Begins June 17, 17 IC
Beyond the entry way was a long series of wide steps leading down. The walls of the stairs down were covered with frescos showing tall, nearly giant, individuals wearing Assyrian garb in various scenes. The individuals were shown in a variety of war scenes: leading armies of smaller minions against foes wearing Egyptian-style clothing and wielding bent swords, fighting magical duels with cruel-looking, staff-wielding foes with animal heads, destroying cities by calling down fire from the sky, and many other scenes. There was also a scene showing an Assyrian causing a mountain to flow like water. The adventurers noted that the flow was the same color as the dust in the Great Nef.
[To clarify: Use of "Egyptian" and "Assyrian" is shorthand for the style the figures resembled, not actual place or culture names.]
After spending some time looking at the murals, Tim finally realized that the small, evil looking figures were actually Sorcerer‑Kings and the giant, heroic figures were the legendary Enemy. Further, the armies of the Enemy bore a striking resemblance to dwarves!
After digesting this surprising information, the party proceeded down the wide steps into some sort of underground complex, using torches for light. The archway directly over the end of the stairs was covered in a mosaic in which a huge eye figured prominently and appeared to look down at anyone standing underneath it. The mosaic extended into the room beyond the end of the stairs. Dangar was the first to pass the Eye [unknowingly making the way safe for the rest of the party]. Tim passed the Eye with his shield spell running, which seemed to awaken some of the sigils on the ceiling in the main chamber. [The presence of Sorcerer-style magic brought the Vault to a higher state of alert, energizing the power nexii.]
Glowing stones set in the ceiling mosaic partially lit the entry room. The ceiling mosaic was full of intricate patterns surrounding arcane sigils of unknown origin. The floor was highly polished and smooth and made up of extremely intricate mosaics that seem to be focused on twenty equally spaced sections of bare earth. Inlaid into the floor surface was a large circle that had one, very large, symbol inside it and was ringed with smaller sigils. The party noticed traces of blood on the floor and interpreted it as the signs of a fight leading out an open door to their left, with some of the losers being dragged away through a different door on the right.
The party decided to investigate the open door first. They found further signs of combat, including the remains of a camp and several dead ogres. Following the trail further, they entered a storeroom and discovered that the room was broken into from the outside. Following a tunnel on the other side of the wall, they found a dying dwarven priest who was talking into his holy symbol.
In a surprise move, Mikal grabbed the dwarf's axe and then used the healing stone on the dwarf. This stopped the priest from dying, but just barely. The dwarven priest told them he was tracking the ogres to prevent them from entering this complex. The adventurers decided to accept his story. [The priest was stringing the adventurers along until he could eliminate them, especially the wizard.]
The group returned to the main room and started investigating one of the doors. Mikal and Dangar investigated a door in the same corner as the open door while Tim and the priest observed them. At the same time, Darian investigated the large sigil in the center of the room. Egged on by Tim, Darian walked out onto it. This caused light to start crawling across the ceiling and the walls and the sigils to start illuminating on the ceiling. Slowly, and with great effort, giant humanoid forms started rising from the patches of earth on the floor.
At this point the dwarf priest stabbed Tim in the back, literally, and attempted to keep the adventurers from escaping the room to allow the forming earth elementals time to kill them. The priest claimed his order would “find the True Word first” and the adventurers would die horrible deaths. In the ensuing scramble, Mikal staved in the skull of the priest so that he (Mikal) and Tim could escape out the back of the complex while Dangar and Darian ran up the stairs to exit out the front. With 10 earth elementals chasing each pair, the party made best speed out of the complex. The party discovered that the elementals would not leave the complex, merely sealing it behind them. It took the party the next two days to reconnect with each other.
Once the party reconnected, they set up camp at the head of the stairs and reinvestigated the complex. Over the next two days they discovered that the doors were extremely heavy and trying to open the doors reactivated the elementals. They also discovered that a dwarf can stand on the sigil in the center of the room without causing the elementals to appear. On the third day, they discovered that the defenses react hostilely to magic being used inside the main room. Deciding that they had learned all they could and realizing no one else appeared to be arriving anytime soon, the party chose to head back to Freegate to get more information and warn people.
The party spent four days getting to the McTaggart clan stronghold, where they found the rest of the MacAuley clan. Once Maclyn told his story of what happened, the party was treated as heroes and a feast was held in their honor. Tim, Dangar, and Darian got into a drinking competition. After a point, none of them really remembers what happened or who won. While this was happening, Mikal made friends with some of the MacAuley women. The next morning, the party left the MacTaggart clan stronghold and started the trip back to Freegate.
The party arrived at the 4th Legion's Citadel after three days of travel. They found that their horses and cart were apparently scheduled for auction five days later. They confronted the stable keeper who was surprised to see them alive and charged them late fees (2sp per day for 9 days plus 5sp to re-shoe the horses and 1sp for axle grease. The party also spent 8sp on lodgings for the night.
It took the party 27 days to get back to Freegate. They heard stories about the Imperial 7th Legion pushing south into the Kingdom of Silverloc to stop the rebellion happening there. They also heard many rumors about a goblinoid horde that came out of the Great Swamp and was marauding through the Plains of Syrak. The stories ranged from "it’s a scam to keep the commoners down" to "the horde has already been defeated by the Imperial 6th Legion" to "the Horde is fighting the Imperial 6th Legion" to "the horde beat the Imperial Legion". They could not get any firm information while travelling.
Arriving in Freegate on July 28th, the adventurers spent some time contacting various people. They spent half the day trying to re-find the dwarven temple. Once there, they contacted the priest they talked to the previous time and told him what they found. He arranged a meeting later that night at the Screaming Shrieker.
Tim then went to the University to report what the party found. He went to the Department of Antiquities and talked to the Director. On the way, he noticed that the Antiquities Building had suffered some sort of damage recently and that had just finished being repaired. He told the Director and the Dean of HET what he found and observed. Tim was told to return the next day.
Game Session Ends.
Happening Off-Stage
The University has a Farseer attempt to verify the location Tim has reported on, hoping to verify the quantity of power stones he reported. This will take some time as the Vault is invisible to any Detection spell. When they fall back to visually checking the location via magic, one of the defensive spells on the Vault is triggered, sending a massive energy discharge back to the source of the magical probe. The resulting explosion kills the Farseer and destroys all the surrounding rooms, heavily damaging one wing of the Natural Philosophy building. This suddenly makes everyone at the University a lot more cautious.
The cache was designed using magic of a higher caliber than any practiced in the world now. Even Those Who Watch only know the basics and treat it as black box technology.
- The Greater Earth Elementals are summoned by an emplaced spell powered by a series of power stones.
- The spells are all triggered and pre-programmed to eliminate intruders and reset.
- A proper badge of authority with the correct code words will allow people to get past. Having only the badge will not.
Those Who Watch are ransacking their libraries trying to find the True Word to get past the defenses of the Vault. They start at their hidden temple and gradually expand the search to other temples. They eventually discover they have no less than eight Words that could be the correct one and only one way of testing them.
Dangar’s armor is finished.
The adventuring duo that Montiflurio hired is Tarkin the Mad and Rary the Red. They have pinpointed several of the landmarks in the diary. They are scheduled to return to Freegate in the afternoon one day after the adventurers do (July 29) and report back to Montiflurio.
