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Aftermath - Campaign after the War
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<blockquote data-quote="Rybaer" data-source="post: 1098" data-attributes="member: 118"><p>Session #4.2 – Divide (Ourselves) and (Be) Conquered</p><p></p><p></p><p>With things quieting down, Rurik tended to Boaz’s considerable wounds. Zalman watched the trapdoor for more surprises, and Amblin played with the magical waterfall near the tower (concluding that the mid-air waterfall was supplied by the whirlpool at the other end of the courtyard stream. In the meantime, Nigel and Kisty took to following the perimeter of the courtyard in a counterclockwise fashion - inspecting the golden dome first of all.</p><p></p><p>The dome, to all appearances, was made of pure gold. Kisty, however, noted that it would not dent under pressure from her dagger as gold ordinarily would. Additionally, when she tapped her dagger against it, rather than ringing as metal on metal, it sounded more like the click of hitting stone. They could find no sign of an entrance or of any footprints.</p><p></p><p>Continuing on to the next building, a five-story rectangular one with two ground level doors and lots of windows, they finally found footprints. Most of them were boot prints, larger than human. Most of them would appear or disappear abruptly about fifteen feet away from the two doors. Near one of the doors, the ranger also spotted a pair of small booted footprints, about the size of an elf or smaller human. As this was supposed to have been a school of magic, they guessed (correctly) that this building looked like something of a dormitory. They left these doors alone and proceeded to the next building, one connected to this.</p><p></p><p>This roughly “T”-shaped building had two larger doors on opposite sides of a main double-doored entrance. They tried opening one of the large doors and found it locked. Posing little challenge to Kisty, they were soon inside a short hallway that led to another large door. This one was set in a gently curved wall, as if it led into a large circular room. The door was surrounded by magic looking runes. Deciding discretion was in order, they left them alone until Zalman could be brought to inspect them. They next found that the other large door led opposite the main entrance led to an identical hallway and rune inscribed door. Leaving this one alone as well, the pair headed off to the main entrance.</p><p></p><p>In the meantime, Rurik finished healing the fighter and decided to start inspecting the nearby and more ornate tower while the Boaz and Amblin headed off to join up with Nigel and Kisty. Zalman, not realizing where everyone else had gone, decided to go join Rurik in inspecting the tallest tower. The two of them let themselves in the unlocked front door where they found a few rotting pieces of furniture, a small broom closet, and a spiral staircase leading up. They ascended the staircase to a platform - the inner diameter of the hollowed out tower - which itself had a staircase that wrapped around the inside up another forty feet to a door.</p><p></p><p>Without hesitation, the pair went up the stairs and checked the door. Locked. They tried using the rust monster antennae on the hinges but found that they had lost their potency. So, they resorted to using a wand of Knock to open it. Inside, they found that they were in the remains of a destroyed laboratory. Benches, cabinets, and glassware were broken everywhere. Half the ceiling and a quarter of the wall were missing and open to the outside. Suspended in air directly above them was a perfectly mirrored sphere about ten feet in diameter. Before they had much of a chance to explore, though, a swarm of half a dozen stirges attacked from their resting place further back in the room.</p><p></p><p>Unprepared for such a quick attack, each immediately had two or three of the ruthless blood-suckers attached to him. Their efforts to fight back were mostly in vain as they lost blood too quickly to remain conscious. Luckily for them, they had just enough blood left in them when the stirges became sated and released their hold. (DM note: both were forced to use fate points to survive this encounter, leaving Rurik with none and Zalman with one.)</p><p></p><p>The rest of the group, blissfully ignorant of the plight of their spell-slinging comrades, was exploring the main entrance hall in the southernmost building. It was a tall room with giant tapestries depicting pastoral scenes of gnomish communities on either side. Directly across from the doors was a huge statue of some older gnomish gentleman. To either side of the statue were a series of metal bars, much like a cylindrical cage, running from floor to ceiling in front of two higher levels of balconies. Some experimentation revealed that within the bars was an area with no gravity. They used the bars, some more successfully than others, to guide themselves from the main floor to the second. </p><p></p><p>From the second floor, a couple of the group could hear the faintest hint of music playing off in the distance. The first door they checked on lead to a balcony part of a great library. The balcony level looked relatively untouched, but the lower level had clearly been the scene of some sort of struggle that left books, shelves, and tables strewn about. They also spotted a small little hand brush, sweeping the floor under its own power. The monk saw great potential in this item for his master's cleanliness fetish. While they immediately recognized this library to be an invaluable resource, Zalman would be the one to get the most use of it. The rest were more interested in continuing their exploration.</p><p></p><p>The other half of the second floor led to a balcony overlooking a massive laboratory, again in a state of disarray. Between the library and the laboratory, both wings of the first and second floors were accounted for except for the circular chamber in the heart of the building. Aside from the heavy and rune inscribed doors outside the building, they had seen no entrance to this circular core. </p><p></p><p>From the third floor, the sound of distantly playing music became a bit more pronounced, and a bit more disturbing. It was horribly distorted and out of tune. Starting on the wing opposite the direction of the sound, they found most of this floor to be comprised of empty classrooms and small laboratories in various states of disarray. While Kisty and Nigel gave one particular lab a closer inspection, Boaz and Amblin wandered off to investigate the music.</p><p></p><p>(DM note: Yes, the group had now managed to split themselves up into three pairs in the dangerously unexplored remains of a magic school. Not a shining example of brilliant tactics.)</p><p></p><p>The monk and fighter found the door leading to the source of the music rather easily. They listened at it and, aside from the impression that all the instruments were broken, they could hear no other sounds. They pushed the door open and were confronted with a rather disturbing scene. The room was a large slice-of-pie-shaped affair with three tiers leading down toward a massive curved window that had a view of the forest and the western horizon. On the upper tier with them was another door and a half dozen instruments trying desperately to play themselves in spite of their obvious state of disrepair. The second and third tiers down had numerous round dinner tables, chairs, and china. Most were tipped over and scattered about, as if a great conflict had occurred here. Despite all the evidence of a struggle they’d seen in the other rooms of the complex, this was the first one in which they had found any bodies…and there were many of them. Blood stains marred the walls, the grand window, and the floors, though it had the black color of great age. The bodies, strewn carelessly amongst the broken furniture and china, were also many years deceased.</p><p></p><p>Boaz and Amblin, shocked by the scene, moved into the room to take a closer look at things. Amblin primarily inspected the instruments and upper tier while Boaz went down to the lower levels to investigate the carnage. Not half a minute into their inspection, the temperature in the room suddenly plummeted and the door they had opened slammed shut of its own accord. Amblin jumped over to it but found he couldn’t force it back open. Boaz was just starting back up the stairs when a flickering blue light leapt out of one of the corpses and entered his body. Amblin witnessed this and saw the half-orc go rigid with eyes bulging out. For lack of any other options, the monk held his ground and watched Boaz stand motionless.</p><p></p><p>Boaz, while in his frozen state, became unaware of the room about him. Or, rather, his awareness was shifted for him to another time. He caught hazy images of this very room, full of people scattering every direction. The images were broken and frantic, but he could make out people casting the same magic that he had seen Zalman perform in the past. Then Boaz caught fragmented glimpses of the target for those spells. A man of some sort dressed in red armor with a flowing cape was swirling about with a massive sword. Blood and bodies flew in every direction. There was an overwhelming sense of panic. And then, the man in red turned to Boaz, grinned broadly, and dropped his sword through his skull.</p><p></p><p>Amblin watched as Boaz staggered and pitched forward. The temperature in the room was returning to normal and the fighter regained his feet, looking at Amblin with a confused look. Nigel and Kisty, having heard the door slam shut, were opening in back up now that it no longer seemed stuck. Amblin didn’t bother explaining what had just happened, he simply ordered everyone out of the room. The tone of his voice and look in his eyes, not to mention Boaz’s pale color, kept anyone from arguing. While on the way out, Amblin never took his eyes off of Boaz…who he was convinced was still possessed because he hadn’t seen the bluish light leave the half-orc’s body.</p><p></p><p>Just as they left the building’s main entrance into the courtyard, they caught a brief glimpse of movement from the ruined top of the tower opposite them…up near the mirrored sphere. Boaz and Amblin had seen Rurik poking around near that building, so they quickly headed over to its base. Just as they were about to reach the door, the sound of flapping overhead caused them to look up. Two large, brutish humanoid sporting gigantic bat-wings and reddish-brown skin were flying from the top of the tower they were about to enter. One was carrying an unconscious Zalman, the other an unconscious Rurik. The pair glided across the courtyard and landed at the base of the dormitory, entered one of the doors with their load, and shut it behind them without ever noticing the stunned group outside.</p><p></p><p></p><p>-Rybaer</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Rybaer, post: 1098, member: 118"] Session #4.2 – Divide (Ourselves) and (Be) Conquered With things quieting down, Rurik tended to Boaz’s considerable wounds. Zalman watched the trapdoor for more surprises, and Amblin played with the magical waterfall near the tower (concluding that the mid-air waterfall was supplied by the whirlpool at the other end of the courtyard stream. In the meantime, Nigel and Kisty took to following the perimeter of the courtyard in a counterclockwise fashion - inspecting the golden dome first of all. The dome, to all appearances, was made of pure gold. Kisty, however, noted that it would not dent under pressure from her dagger as gold ordinarily would. Additionally, when she tapped her dagger against it, rather than ringing as metal on metal, it sounded more like the click of hitting stone. They could find no sign of an entrance or of any footprints. Continuing on to the next building, a five-story rectangular one with two ground level doors and lots of windows, they finally found footprints. Most of them were boot prints, larger than human. Most of them would appear or disappear abruptly about fifteen feet away from the two doors. Near one of the doors, the ranger also spotted a pair of small booted footprints, about the size of an elf or smaller human. As this was supposed to have been a school of magic, they guessed (correctly) that this building looked like something of a dormitory. They left these doors alone and proceeded to the next building, one connected to this. This roughly “T”-shaped building had two larger doors on opposite sides of a main double-doored entrance. They tried opening one of the large doors and found it locked. Posing little challenge to Kisty, they were soon inside a short hallway that led to another large door. This one was set in a gently curved wall, as if it led into a large circular room. The door was surrounded by magic looking runes. Deciding discretion was in order, they left them alone until Zalman could be brought to inspect them. They next found that the other large door led opposite the main entrance led to an identical hallway and rune inscribed door. Leaving this one alone as well, the pair headed off to the main entrance. In the meantime, Rurik finished healing the fighter and decided to start inspecting the nearby and more ornate tower while the Boaz and Amblin headed off to join up with Nigel and Kisty. Zalman, not realizing where everyone else had gone, decided to go join Rurik in inspecting the tallest tower. The two of them let themselves in the unlocked front door where they found a few rotting pieces of furniture, a small broom closet, and a spiral staircase leading up. They ascended the staircase to a platform - the inner diameter of the hollowed out tower - which itself had a staircase that wrapped around the inside up another forty feet to a door. Without hesitation, the pair went up the stairs and checked the door. Locked. They tried using the rust monster antennae on the hinges but found that they had lost their potency. So, they resorted to using a wand of Knock to open it. Inside, they found that they were in the remains of a destroyed laboratory. Benches, cabinets, and glassware were broken everywhere. Half the ceiling and a quarter of the wall were missing and open to the outside. Suspended in air directly above them was a perfectly mirrored sphere about ten feet in diameter. Before they had much of a chance to explore, though, a swarm of half a dozen stirges attacked from their resting place further back in the room. Unprepared for such a quick attack, each immediately had two or three of the ruthless blood-suckers attached to him. Their efforts to fight back were mostly in vain as they lost blood too quickly to remain conscious. Luckily for them, they had just enough blood left in them when the stirges became sated and released their hold. (DM note: both were forced to use fate points to survive this encounter, leaving Rurik with none and Zalman with one.) The rest of the group, blissfully ignorant of the plight of their spell-slinging comrades, was exploring the main entrance hall in the southernmost building. It was a tall room with giant tapestries depicting pastoral scenes of gnomish communities on either side. Directly across from the doors was a huge statue of some older gnomish gentleman. To either side of the statue were a series of metal bars, much like a cylindrical cage, running from floor to ceiling in front of two higher levels of balconies. Some experimentation revealed that within the bars was an area with no gravity. They used the bars, some more successfully than others, to guide themselves from the main floor to the second. From the second floor, a couple of the group could hear the faintest hint of music playing off in the distance. The first door they checked on lead to a balcony part of a great library. The balcony level looked relatively untouched, but the lower level had clearly been the scene of some sort of struggle that left books, shelves, and tables strewn about. They also spotted a small little hand brush, sweeping the floor under its own power. The monk saw great potential in this item for his master's cleanliness fetish. While they immediately recognized this library to be an invaluable resource, Zalman would be the one to get the most use of it. The rest were more interested in continuing their exploration. The other half of the second floor led to a balcony overlooking a massive laboratory, again in a state of disarray. Between the library and the laboratory, both wings of the first and second floors were accounted for except for the circular chamber in the heart of the building. Aside from the heavy and rune inscribed doors outside the building, they had seen no entrance to this circular core. From the third floor, the sound of distantly playing music became a bit more pronounced, and a bit more disturbing. It was horribly distorted and out of tune. Starting on the wing opposite the direction of the sound, they found most of this floor to be comprised of empty classrooms and small laboratories in various states of disarray. While Kisty and Nigel gave one particular lab a closer inspection, Boaz and Amblin wandered off to investigate the music. (DM note: Yes, the group had now managed to split themselves up into three pairs in the dangerously unexplored remains of a magic school. Not a shining example of brilliant tactics.) The monk and fighter found the door leading to the source of the music rather easily. They listened at it and, aside from the impression that all the instruments were broken, they could hear no other sounds. They pushed the door open and were confronted with a rather disturbing scene. The room was a large slice-of-pie-shaped affair with three tiers leading down toward a massive curved window that had a view of the forest and the western horizon. On the upper tier with them was another door and a half dozen instruments trying desperately to play themselves in spite of their obvious state of disrepair. The second and third tiers down had numerous round dinner tables, chairs, and china. Most were tipped over and scattered about, as if a great conflict had occurred here. Despite all the evidence of a struggle they’d seen in the other rooms of the complex, this was the first one in which they had found any bodies…and there were many of them. Blood stains marred the walls, the grand window, and the floors, though it had the black color of great age. The bodies, strewn carelessly amongst the broken furniture and china, were also many years deceased. Boaz and Amblin, shocked by the scene, moved into the room to take a closer look at things. Amblin primarily inspected the instruments and upper tier while Boaz went down to the lower levels to investigate the carnage. Not half a minute into their inspection, the temperature in the room suddenly plummeted and the door they had opened slammed shut of its own accord. Amblin jumped over to it but found he couldn’t force it back open. Boaz was just starting back up the stairs when a flickering blue light leapt out of one of the corpses and entered his body. Amblin witnessed this and saw the half-orc go rigid with eyes bulging out. For lack of any other options, the monk held his ground and watched Boaz stand motionless. Boaz, while in his frozen state, became unaware of the room about him. Or, rather, his awareness was shifted for him to another time. He caught hazy images of this very room, full of people scattering every direction. The images were broken and frantic, but he could make out people casting the same magic that he had seen Zalman perform in the past. Then Boaz caught fragmented glimpses of the target for those spells. A man of some sort dressed in red armor with a flowing cape was swirling about with a massive sword. Blood and bodies flew in every direction. There was an overwhelming sense of panic. And then, the man in red turned to Boaz, grinned broadly, and dropped his sword through his skull. Amblin watched as Boaz staggered and pitched forward. The temperature in the room was returning to normal and the fighter regained his feet, looking at Amblin with a confused look. Nigel and Kisty, having heard the door slam shut, were opening in back up now that it no longer seemed stuck. Amblin didn’t bother explaining what had just happened, he simply ordered everyone out of the room. The tone of his voice and look in his eyes, not to mention Boaz’s pale color, kept anyone from arguing. While on the way out, Amblin never took his eyes off of Boaz…who he was convinced was still possessed because he hadn’t seen the bluish light leave the half-orc’s body. Just as they left the building’s main entrance into the courtyard, they caught a brief glimpse of movement from the ruined top of the tower opposite them…up near the mirrored sphere. Boaz and Amblin had seen Rurik poking around near that building, so they quickly headed over to its base. Just as they were about to reach the door, the sound of flapping overhead caused them to look up. Two large, brutish humanoid sporting gigantic bat-wings and reddish-brown skin were flying from the top of the tower they were about to enter. One was carrying an unconscious Zalman, the other an unconscious Rurik. The pair glided across the courtyard and landed at the base of the dormitory, entered one of the doors with their load, and shut it behind them without ever noticing the stunned group outside. -Rybaer [/QUOTE]
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