Dungeon Raiders: The Wolf's Den

[Jimmy Disco T]

Having rested and regained his strength, Tock rejoins the group as they discuss where next to explore. It never ceased to amaze him how his artificial body would repair itself with enough time, new wood growing over the wound and fresh rivets and screws appearing.

"We all look alike?" asks Tock, puzzled. "What a strange thing to say. I'm quite sure we all look very different. Why, I myself am quite distinct from any Elf or Dwarf..."

Feeling the mildly bemused gazes of his colleagues as he over-thinks Bartleby's comment, he changes the subject.

"Ah, I mean... what direction should we head in next? Is there more treasure and valuable items lurking deeper within?"

[OOC: Would it be possible for our all powerful DM to quickly recap the exits available?]

 

[Kobold Stew]

[OOC: Would it be possible for our all powerful DM to quickly recap the exits available?]

OOC: Check out posts 339 and 343, where there are details. (plus any secret doors, or whatever, which we haven't really checked for).

 

[tuxgeo]

[OOC0: Going back to pick up on a point I had missed earlier.]

The hole is large enough for you to easily get to the other side. You find youself inside a room that clearly looks like it was built by carving directly into the hill's bedrock. The room is clearly a tomb: rectangular, about 15ft x 30 ft (you are entering it from the short edge on the East), and features three beautifully (albeit of dubious taste...) carved stone sarcophagi. Around the walls are plenty of small alcoves, some with objects inside but many have been apparently smashed to the ground. Some damaged tapestry and the remains of black silk curtains are also visible. The sarcophagi themselves look undisturbed.

Bartleby's expertise with rock constructions also suggests you that the bricks section of the wall (where you came in from) was likely added because during the construction of this room, a whole was accidentally opened towards the natural caves. More loose bricks and rubbles are scattered near the whole, to the inner side: clearly the whole in the bricks was opened from the outside.

At the other end of the room, you can see two exits: a door is opened to the West, and another (closed) leads to the South.

[Emphasis added.]

[OOC1: We only opened two of the three sealed sarcophagi, including the one in the middle, finding the remains of a girl and a woman? Do we still need to open one more sealed sarcophagus?]

[OOC2: Here's what I think it looks like:

Room containing three (3) sarcophagi, formerly undisturbed:

"NORTH" AT TOP:
<- - 30 ft. - ->

.--------------.
|              |
 _(=open door) : <== entered through hole from East 
|              |
`------xx------'

(closed ^ door at South)

[OOC3: The open door on the west leads to a room containing the opened sarcophagus, which contains remains in cleric vestments, and sandals.]

Aeiyan tries again to encourage some sort of further conversation in lieu of striking ahead without any shared plan. "Bartleby," he asks, "does your dwarven stone-knowledge tell you where we are in relation to the fortress?"* Then he adds, "Anybody? Have we examined the third sarcophagus yet? And what about the alcoves? Perhaps there is more treasure here in this room than we have found so far."

*[OOC4: I'm not sure the druid voiced this information aloud to the party yet.]

 

[Kobold Stew]

[OOC0: Going back to pick up on a point I had missed earlier.]


[OOC1: We only opened two of the three sealed sarcophagi, including the one in the middle, finding the remains of a girl and a woman? Do we still need to open one more sealed sarcophagus?]

Yes we do; good catch.

Aeiyan tries again to encourage some sort of further conversation in lieu of striking ahead without any shared plan. "Bartleby," he asks, "does your dwarven stone-knowledge tell you where we are in relation to the fortress?"* Then he adds, "Anybody? Have we examined the third sarcophagus yet? And what about the alcoves? Perhaps there is more treasure here in this room than we have found so far."

"That's a good point," says Bartleby. "There's still one sarcophagus left to examine."

The dwarf presses his hands against the stone floor, and senses the position they are underground. "I'm pretty certain I know," he begins, and then describes their relative position underground, and any other trelevan details.

OOC: 1d20+ double proficiency= 24 (natural 20+2+2).

 

[tuxgeo]

[OOC: Our DM has already given at least part of the answer in post #353. Shall we deem Bartleby to have said the following out loud?]

< snip > . . . [OoC: The watchtower is actually a small fortress or keep. If you ask Bartleby, his stonecunning will tell that you are very much directly under the keep at the moment.] . . .

 

[Shayuri]

Sulannus looks up, imagining the fort hulking over their heads for a moment, then nods.

"Fine, yes," she says irritably. "We'll open the last one then. And my Common is perfect," she added with a spiteful look at Bartleby. "I was just assuming that one of you had taken that role, and would know what I meant. Did I give you too much credit?"

 

[Kobold Stew]

"I stand corrected," acknowledges Bartleby to Sulanus' comment.
"It seems you are choosing to be rude and uncollegial to those who are fighting alongside you. I have given you too much credit up to now. Kindly in the future treat us with the respect we deserve."

 

[Li Shenron]

[OoC: I'm not 100% sure but I assume you decided not to leave the last tomb unopened]

The third and last sarcophagus contains the remains of a young boy. His corpse was laid to rest in cloths of very fine manufacture but of very dubious taste as well. Black silk shirt with unusually high collar, black leather pants, black leather belt with a silver buckle shaped as a wolf's head. To the right of the body there are three small weapons of fine but unusual craft: they look like scimitars or short swords, but have wickedly edged blades, somewhat unwieldy and perhaps unsuitable for battle, but delivering the feeling they could cause a lot of pain. To the other side, the skeleton of a small canine animal: as a druid, Bartleby can instantaneously identify it as a wolf puppy.

 

[Shayuri]

Sulannus opens her mouth to shoot something back at Bartleby, or to demand how he dared to speak to her that way...but the words don't come. Infuriated, she looks away and folds her arms instead. It was all incredibly unfair, of course. He'd attacked HER first!

She sullenly watches the third sarcophagus open, but her mind is on other things. Everything seemed like it was going so well...so why did she feel like she was failing?

"Anything valuable?" the elf asked, unwilling to get closer to see for herself.

 

[tuxgeo]

[OOC: Since Kobold Stew is away from keyboard until Saturday, and he did say we should treat Bartleby as being very cooperative, I'll run that bit of druid information into this post.]

"What's that you say, Bartleby?* The animal skeleton by the boy's side appears to be a wolf pup?" Aeiyan asks, putting voice to the thought.

He turns to address Sulannus: "There is a small human skeleton dressed as a young boy, but in rather stylized--though not stylish--black clothing. His silver belt buckle might be worth something. Aside from that, the weapons by his side might be interesting, though they look more intimidating than functional to me."

He works the belt off the skeleton in the third coffin, and shows the buckle to the others. "A wolf's head. If this is Lord Wolf, I estimate that his mother was the real power here; however, I would prefer to believe that these are the remains of Wolf Junior." He also shows them the strange weapons and asks, "Magic?" He stores those items in his pack; then by torchlight he starts examining the intact items in the alcoves, with short glances at the shards or remains of the broken items on the floor near them.


* obligatory border collie: "Timmy fell down the well?"