The Age of Wurms – an Iron Kingdom setting

[Karl Green]

OK first – two house rules that I am using…
1. Greatcoats and Armor – first the DR for Greatcoats is only vs. Firearms. Also, all Masterwork armor can have a DR vs. Armor (but this can not be stacked with a greatcoat). Light Armor the DR is = to 1/3 round down the base AC; Medium Armor the DR is = to 1/2 round down the base AC; Heavy Armor the DR is = to 1/2 round up the base AC. This DR is ONLY vs. Firearms
2. Creature Lore & Tall-tales – first Creature Lore does NOT require you to spend hours in a library, and the base DC is 15 to know ‘basic’ knowledge of a ‘common’ monster. This can go up to 25 for unknown creatures and then you need to beat the DC by 5 to 10 to gain ‘rare’ knowledge etc. NOTE that if you have Creature Lore you can use that skill to make your Tall-Tales rolls also (instead of just your INT). If you do research info in a library etc, then the DC is lowered by 5, and the DC for extra knowledge might also be lowered.

So what’s going on? Spoilers ON…

[sblock]As I mentioned in an earlier Spoiler, instead of trying to create a new ‘over-god’ the three groups of the Ebon Triad wish to awaken the Devour Wurm… or in this cause they wish to awaken the four Gorgandurs. From the ‘Hooks’ in the Monsternomicon, I LOVE the idea that for the past 40 or so years, these creatures have been asleep as it were, spawning hundreds of the juv’s that will one day awaken.

A mad Cult of Cyriss (whom are replacing the followers of Vecna) has discovered this and they are working to herald this ‘Age of Wurms’ and unleash the creatures onto the world. In the second adventure instead of finding and Aspect of the Over-God, they will find a prematurely hatched Gorgandurs! The Faceless One is perfecting a treatment that will allow them to awaken them.

The Skorne (whom are replacing the worshipers of Hextor) are very militant and looking to punish the Iron Kingdoms as much as anything else. They are part of a splinter group that was abandoned by Vinter Raelthrone during the retreat from Corvis. They pretty much hate everyone… but are very militant – to the extreme and will eventually be working with their ‘master’ Victor again very soon.

The last group will be a cannibal cult dedicated to the Devour (replacing the mad Erythnul). At first this will be Human Barbarians and Dreggs (I Love these dudes) and later it will involve some other – BUT they are backed by the Dragon King of Cryx, Lord Toruk, and there will be dragonspawn and Blighted creatures for sure! I want to lead to the idea that the Dragon Lord is behind this cult, maybe the whole thing, as the release of the Gorgandurs onto the world would fill him with a great deal of joy indeed.

Now as I only have the first 3 installments of the Age of Worms Adventure Path so far, I think I am going to add in some of the Witchfire Trilogy part 2 into the mix in or around the third part… the party will be going into a big swamp and maybe finding some HUGE temple to Cyriss, that looks like some big clock or machine would be cool. Also during their ‘adventures’ in the swamp they will be running into a large tribe of Pygmy Trolls! And Gatormen… and maybe some other swamp monsters (depending on their level).

After the 4th or 5th issue from Dungeon I will more then likely HAVE to deviate into my own direction for the game. SOME of the other explanations for things for things like the “unkillable” Zombies, I am going to make them advanced Husks, that have little worm like things in them. The Cult of Cyriss have been experimenting on some of the Gorgandurs’s eggs and have figure out a way to ‘create’ hundreds upon hundreds of these little worms from just one egg, that will hold the Husk together and regenerate almost any damage back before the creature can fall apart. Of course if the cults can awaken the Gorgandurs and their eggs… there will be a WHOLE mess of them running around doing untold damage.

SOME of the later adventure ideas are a trip into the Thronewood, where they have to avoid military patrols from both Cygnar and Khador, whom think they are spies. They will then face some Trollkin and some of those primitive Cat-Berserker People (don’t have my book right now, can’t remember their names) to try and find they location of stone circle dedicated to the Devour. Here they will fight some dragonspawn and/or Blighted and find a big cave system underneath… fighting past a group of more mad Dreggs, they will come to an area where the cult has been collecting a number of the Gorgandurs’s eggs. They have to destroy these eggs before they can be hatched or awakened.

Later they will be going into the Bloodstone Lands, and will have to sneak their way into one of the main citadels of the Skorne that is located deep in the desert and upon a huge plateau. Here they may have to face Vinter Raelthrone and more Skorne champions, who also have their own collection of eggs that they have been experimenting on in order to ‘control’ them. They can’t of course, but that does not stop them from trying!

Next to the last part of the adventure is going to be seeking another one of Cyriss’s huge machine temples where they have a legion of these unkillable Zombies that they have created.

The last part of the adventure (as I have it tentatively planned right now) is going to the Island of Cryx and sneaking into the Dragon Lord Toruk’s lair to find the last of the Gorgandurs’s eggs. Undead galore here!

Anyway I am still tying all of this together and working out some of the details. Any suggestions would be KEWL![/sblock]

 

[Karl Green]

And now some of the “history” – my IK re-working of the Elementals of Law verses the Forces of Chaos and the forming of the Rod of Law in the final battle.

[sblock]Sometime around 4,000 B.R. (before rebellion) and some 1,500 years after the Canons of the True Law were said to have been handed down to Humankind, in and around the Time of the Burning Skies a war was being rage in both Cean and Urcean…between the forces of Law and Chaos… between Menoth and the Devour Wurm… between civilization and barbarism. It is told by some scholars that even the Infernal were involved, trading in souls to both sides, in an ever escalating war that threatened to destroy everything.

So it was that seven of the holist, most devote disciplines of Menoth traveled over all of Western Immoren and then beyond, seeking a weapon that they could use to stop the war and end the threat of the Devour’s destruction. With divine guidance, and years of seeking and work, they forge a great staff which they called the Stave of Law and with it they fought one of the Wurm’s most powerful warriors – the Wolf-Head Spider daemon.

The battle shattered the landscape and killed most of the armies of both sides, and the Stave of Law was shattered into seven parts, never to be re-assembled. It is said that the Devour Wurm either was placed into a state of Torpor or slumber, or that it pasted through into Urcean where is awaits to return.

Many of the Tombs and Cairns in and around Diamond Lake are the tombs created from this last battle. The ‘Air-Duke’ is not an elemental so much as a powerful Warrior of Menoth who was granted powers to harness the Element of Air by Menoth. In those dark days, Menoth created a special brand of Holy-Warriors, who were granted powers of one of the primal elements as these were ‘true’ or ‘pure’ forces of Cean – primal forces of the world that could hurt and face the forces of Chaos. The Orgoth shaked many of these tombs AND then burried many of their dead here also - especially some important Blood-Witches and Generals.

I am also thinking that along with Infernals, some of the blood-gods of the Orgoth where also involved with this war, and that part of the reason of the invasion of Western Immoren was to seek and gain revenges against the peoples that stopped their gods oh those many thousands of years ago.

I am still devolving part of this BUT this is the basic idea that I have come up with. Any extra items and help would again be cool
[/sblock]

 

[Karl Green]

PART #2 (9-6-05)
2.0 ‘Into the Whispering Cairn’
(occ so we got too played a week early, the other night, and now will be bi-weekly. It was a lot of fun. A basic run down (with some spoiler notes hidden along the way to explain some of my conversions and thoughts /occ)

A maw of darkness opens before the party and sends a chill down Pog’s spine – a cold ‘wet’ breeze that blew out through the opening and over the group as they examined the entrance. The morning sun was still rising when they started figuring out who would go first. Then they noticed that only one of their party, Armen, had bothered to bring a torch – and he only had one! So for the next twenty minutes or so, Jaktal fashioned make-shift torches from rags and some of the dry sagebrush that grew thick around the entrance.

Now armed with two burning firebrands, Armen led the way into the tunnel. Almost twenty feet wide and fifteen feet high, the tomb’s entryway was large indeed. Jaktal came next with his lynx by his side and Jack Autumn followed close by. Pog and Nalu brought up the rear, with the Orgun holding another torch high to cast long shadows into the hall. As they moved farther in a breeze coming from deep within the tomb picked up and a chorus of almost human sounds rose around the party.

Just inside the darkened tomb, the hallway branched into shallow alcoves to the east and west. Here the walls bore the most significant damage, with dozens of clumsy etchings marring the once beautiful ancient masonry like graffiti on a city wall. In the western alcove Armen discovered some soiled and moldy clothing and old bedroll. The cloth fell apart in his hands and the group moved on.

As they penetrated farther into the tomb, Jack’s sharp eyes detected a light greenish glow coming from farther down the tunnel – it was to faint to extinguish their torches so they keep moving in. Again the main tunnel was branched by two alcoves to the east and west, but the eastern tunnel ended quickly in a huge pile of collapsed rubble that Pog wanted to try and dig out but whom Nalu (the only one with any mining experience in the group) said “Dat would a take a week at least iffin’ we had a team of Orgun to do it with… leave it be”

Now in the western alcove the hall extended perhaps forty feet and ended in a small marble platform that rose about six inches off the floor. A strange, shattered arcane apparatus rested on the platform, its’ curved ovular frame appearing like a noble’s dressing room minor. Only a third of the frame remained, and a unusual arcane glyph about the size of a man’s head had been carved into the baseplate of the support platform.

Jack and Jaktal both thought that this rune might have something to do with the Old Faiths, when barbarians often worshipped the land, sun and moons and the very elements – air, earth, fire and water. It also looked to Jack as if it might be some form of transportation rune, but from his arcane studies he knew that this was dangerous and forbidden for most modern academic studies…

Pog, wandering around the alcove, found a number of shards of black non-reflective glass that might once had been a part of the apparatus and he collected them up and shoved them into a big bag he wore over his shoulder.

After a few minutes the group decided to move on deeper into the tomb again and investigate the what other mysteries might the tomb hold. Moving another forty or fifty feet down the hallway it opened into a large chamber with wings leading to the east and west again. Across this chamber to the north yawned a twenty foot wide open arch draped from top to bottom with translucent cobwebs, where the eerie green light seemed to be coming from. Casting strange shadows throughout the chamber, all noted the smells of animal spores and wet fur.

Armen saw a rubble pile and a large number of bones in the eastern wing of the chamber and went to investigate while the rest remained in the central part “to back him up in-case something was there” (or in Pog’s case, to run away if there was anything over there). He found that within the bone pile, many were of different types of humanoids, so with his long-hafted axe he dug around a bit in the pile to see if he could deduce any identifying items. He quickly turned up an old leather backpack, that upon opening he discovered a elaborate lantern of indigo metal insets and indigo glass panes.

“Was dat Churchie?” Pog asked with a bit of trill in his voice (Pog seem to enjoy pocking fun at the Paladin from the northlands as often as he could; often referring to him as either Churchie or Metalbottem)

“Some kind a lantern it would appear” Armen replied. He kept looking through the bone-pile and after another moment or two he found a silver armband that appeared to be a silver and gold left. Never seeing anything like it before he held it out to the rest of the group, and Jack instantly recognized it as an Iossen Elven design, but covered his shock quickly and remained silent. Nalu took it and looking it over said “Might bring a pretty pence in Diamond Lake I think”

With that the group moved into the western wing of the chamber, where a wide dais spanning the back half of the hall called attention to a faded fresco upon the south, west, and northern walls. From the vantage point at the center of the dais Jack noticed that the wall painted gave the appears that he was standing with a larger, massive chamber with seven short hallways radiated outward from the center. A chain dangled from the ceiling at the end of each of the hallways and each chain bore a gleaming colored lantern that seemed to glow in the torchlight. Clockwise, the colors were red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet.

Armen noted that the lantern that he had found in the backpack looked like the reparation on the wall and they all wondered at what clues it might hold. Jack and Jaktal quickly noted that the colors were of the rainbow and that again this might tie into those ancient religions where the rainbow was considered a holy sign.

After some consideration, it was decided to find out what was past the spider webs, Pog commenting “I’sa hate spiders… Ah I will watch our backs, you go first Churchie”

Using his torch to burn a way through them, Armen and Jaktal show discovered that behind the spider webs was a wide but steep stairwell leading down deeper into the earth. The spider webs were thick for almost thirty feet but eventually they burn enough away to reveal that the stairs continued down for another hundred feet and that the eerie greenish light was shining out from some chamber entrance below. Moving slowly down the stairs, Armen was first to come through this entrance that lead into an immense domed chamber. Seven short tunnels branched from the room in all directions, extending some thirty feet before ending in rounded walls. At the terminus of each passage, a thick chain dangled from the unseen high ceiling. Five of the chains bore colorful lanterns, but two held nothing at all. Opposite the entry stairs, a brightly glowing green lantern cast weird, murky light about the room.

Looking up Armen and Jack noticed that what they guessed must be chipped glass or shiny metal that was inserted into the ceiling reflected this greenish light and gave the impression of starlight or falling snow. It appeared that the ceiling doom must be thirty or forty feet about the central of the room – and below this doomed peak, a long dais held what appeared to be a marble sarcophagus. Pog slipped by the others and ran excitedly to it, ready to pry off the lid with his favorite wrench, but quickly Armen and Jack warned him quickly to hold.

“Ye will kill us all ye gobber fool, iffin’ ye don’t take yer time with it” Armen scolded, while Jack almost whispered “One never knows what – security – these old builders might have installed here. Let us use our brains for a moment if we could” The elf also noticed that for the first time sense entering the tomb, that this room was silent – the strange whispering that has been the consent companion throughout the passages had suddenly been stilled.

As the rest of the party moved into chamber and notice that under each of where the chain hang down from the ceiling they notice a five foot diameter circle craved into the floor and painted in the seven different colors of the rainbow – as the painting about represented. The group then examined the milky white bas-relief figure that had been carved into the top of the sarcophagus – mayhap a human, resting passively. Nalu started examining it with her keen eye for detail while the other party member spread out and started looking over the room.

Pog noticed that the figure relief was missing the index finger from its right hand and started searching the room for it. Jack and Armen hung the indigo lantern that they had found above onto the chain to see what might happen, while Jaktal and his cat moved about the room looking for the spores of any other resent tomb raiders.

“Why a looky here” Nalu spoke up after a few minutes “This here burial thing is likes a big arrow a pointed at that there orange a hallway. It looks likes it can be a pushed a this a way also… shoulds I push it? Da next one would be da yellow colored one ands I think ya can only push its one way”

“Clockwise” Jack added as he noticed the scratch marks now on the floor where Nalu indicated. After a bit of debate, Nalu and Armen push the sarcophagus and with a loud audible ‘click’ it moves to point towards the next hallway. A rumble started deep within the floor of the chamber, shaking everyone slightly. Looking around the group is not overly confident and started looking at each other while reading weapons – or in Pog’s case, edging towards the door ready to make a mad dash out of there.

(occ Ok will continue and finish Part 2 later tonight or tomorrow… must return to work for now /occ)

 

[Karl Green]

continuing of the Whispering Cairn, Part 2

Looking around with more then a little fear, the party tried to identify the source of the rumbling when suddenly the yellow colored stone circle under that lantern peeled back into the stone-floor and a tall brass looking tube rose up out of the ground! It rose up to stand eight feet tall and was three feet wide, and with an audible click a small door on one side opened to reveal an empty space inside.

Jack thought that it looked something like a device called an ‘elevator’; something he had seen at the Corvis University some years ago. After some debating it was decided to push the sarcophagus toward the next hallway – green. The only lantern that was lit within the room. Grunting a bit, Nalu and Armen pushed it over to the next space, with another ‘click’ the ground again started to rumble; but this time it was far stronger shaking and the sounds coming from underground were louder – like metal scrapping on stone. First the brass tube under the yellow lantern sank into the ground, and then the green stone circle under that lantern space split and slide into the sides of the stone floor and another brass tube rose up out of the ground with a door opening as soon as it stopped.

This time Jaktal was too curious to just move on and said “I want to go check it out… anyone else want to go?”

No one was willing to go down first, in fact it was instead agreed upon that Jaktal would go down with his lynx first and see what would happen. If it was an elevator, and it went somewhere, and if Jaktal did not return in five minutes, then Armen would try and call it back and follow the druid wherever.

Jaktal and his lynx stepped into the cramped space of the brass tube and the door instantly shut and started lowering into the ground. After a moment – in which Jaktal and his cat were shaken quite violently at times – the tube stopped and the door opened. Peering out, the druid was somewhat surprised to note that it was not pure darkness as he expected. While his torch reveals a small entryway, with an large number of stone relief carved into the wall, he also saw that there was a hallway about thirty feet away that split into two hallways and that there was a eerily, reddish glow coming from the right hand hallway and a strange clicking sound coming from that area also.

Moving slowly and quietly down the hallway, Jaktal peered around the corner into the hallway with the strange glow and noticed a huge mass of large, fat cockroaches that glowed a bit around their heads. Hundreds of thousands of them were massed around in the room where the hallway ended, maybe fifty feet away from him… and suddenly the clicking became far louder as a group of them swarmed around the corner straight at him.

Fleeing quickly, Jaktal reentered the tube hoping the door would close quickly as the cockroaches emerged around the corner. In their strange red glow – just before the door shut – the druid noticed something else. A strange metallic looking spider attached to the hallway ceiling just behind the cockroaches. It looked to be maybe three or four feet across, with eight metallic legs that ended in needle-like points, and its body almost looked like a large glass ball, filled with a clear liquid and a large eyeball foaling within.
(occ [sblock]Instead of a Mad Slasher/Aberration, I wanted a bit more of an IK feel, so I changed it from an Aberration to a Construct and called it an Animated Slasher[/sblock] /occ)
Before he could be sure, the brass door slammed shut and the tube started to rise again. Again shaking quite violently and making far more noise than it did before, the tube rose up from the ground in the main room where the rest of the party awaited him.

Explaining what he had seen, it was decided to again move the sarcophagus toward the next hallway – this time towards the blue space. When the sarcophagus was pushed towards this hallway, it seemed for a moment that the hallway got longer! A hidden space past the 30ft length of the other hallways was revealed.

Investigating the group found a skeleton here in a heap on the floor. There was also a chain hanging from the ceiling above, but the ceiling was actually forty feet up and Nalu thought she saw a hallway at the top. Climbing quickly she made it to the hallway and peered down it – with only a candle she could not see very far though, so she started moving slowly down it.

Down below, Jaktal said that it looked as if the skeleton had fallen from a great height, more then likely from the hallway above.

Perhaps seventy feet down the thin hallway, Nalu started noticing some strange long scratch marks in the floor that she thought looked like they might have been made by daggers or something similar. As the passageway ended shortly thereafter in a bowl like room in what looked like an enormous stone human face, its mouth open in an angry scream.

Suddenly rainbow like beams of color spilled from eyes of the stone statue, and Nalu’s bones feel like they are freezing up on her. With a reserve of will that surprised even her she was able to shake up the affects when she noted that there seemed to be a slight breeze coming from the hallway. Thinking this might not be the best place to be, she turned and fled down the hallway towards the hanging chain. As she got close she noticed that the wind was getting stronger, blowing against her back hard, each second it seemed the force continued to grow!

Climbing down as fast as she could, partially slide down the chain to the floor below, she made the bottom as the other shattered to get out of her way (so as not be crushed by her 300+ lb half-falling frame).

After a few minutes the winds issuing from the hallway ended, and now Jack was feeling brave and curious and he decided to climb up the chain to have a look. Not as strong or as skilled in the art of climbing as Nalu, he had a great deal of difficulty making it to the top, but eventually he did. After resting his arms a moment, he made his way down the tunnel – until he also saw the half-formed face carved another the wall – and also suffered the strange rainbow hypnotic pattern of light spilling from the stone eyes. He was able to shake off the affects of whatever ancient spell washed over him and he then started to feel the breeze begin to blow down the hallway. Retreating fast, he made the chain and tried to climb down quickly but instead almost fell! Catching himself at the last possible second, he wretch his shoulder out of its socket but held fast and did not fall. (occ two failed climb checks in a row! I gave him ONE last chance, which he made but he took damage from half the distances instead of the full forty feet. Enough to knock him to ONE HP /occ)

After the winds died down, Nalu climbed up and helped the wizard down as he could not climb himself. The druid treated his wounds, and the party decided that they were not getting past that face any time soon.

Return back to the main room, they turned the sarcophagus toward the next hallway now – where the indigo lantern they had found in the Argus’s den had been discovered. With a slight rumbling within the floor, another metal brass elevator like tube arose from the floor and its door opened. Looking inside, Armen saw that there were some bones shattered on the floor of this tube – and they looked crushed and shattered. Not trusting the tube, he dug around in the bones and moldy clothing a bit and found a small leather pouch. Pulling it out with his axe, he found some coin, minted in Khador about 40 years ago, and a small red ruby.

Pocketing them, with no one wanting to trust this tube, they pushed the sarcophagus toward the violet hallway – and nothing happened.

After a minute or two of waiting they pushed it again, past the hallway they had entered through and towards the red hallway – the one where there was no lantern. And again, nothing happened. So they pushed it toward the orange hallway, and again nothing happened.

Frustrated now, they pushed it towards the yellow tunnel and when the brass tube elevator returned, Armen and his small dog got inside. “If I be mer then a minute, I be a suggestin’ dat one of yus a fellow me down.” he said before stepping inside and the door slamming shut on him before any more discussion took place.

Feeling like he was going down, the door opened again in less then ten seconds. Peering out Armen found himself in another entry room similar to the one that Jaktal had described. Again the walls were covered in bas-relief images of slender androgynous, hairless figures in posses of deference; almost as if they were paying homage to the viewer. The hallway in front of the elevator door extended into the darkness but then ended in a large stone block.

Approaching this block, Armen noticed there was a large niche carved into the top of the block. Climbing up, and peering through this niche, his torchlight revealed a hallway beyond. Taking out his pick-axe he started clipping away at the crumbling rock of the stone over the block and was well on his way through it, when Jack emerged from the tube – the tube had returned to the surface after a bit and the wizard decided to come down and have a look first.

Handing Armen’s dog up to him, the paladin and canine mutt crawled through the opening he had made and into the tunnel beyond. Jack noticed that the tube was about ready to return to the surface, so he wrote a quick “COME DOWN” note onto a piece of parchment and throw it into the tube before it closed. He then climbed up the side of the stone block (not easily but he finally made it) and peered down after the Khadorian holy warrior, who was about forty feet down the long darkened tunnel by now.

As Armen had passed slowly down the hallway passage, he had noticed curious carvings of what seemed to be a shirring tempest covered the walls. At ten-foot intervals, small alcoves flanked the passage, and each alcove contained an androgynous humanoid figure with cupped hands. The statues were seven feet tall, and the paladin also noticed that there was a slight breeze in the hallway, that seemed to come from the figures or the alcoves… he could not tell.

Nearing one-hundred feet down the tunnel, Armen noticed that the hallway opened into a large room and he could just make out dull gray pillars within the room when his dog started barking about something behind them. Turning quickly a horrible aberration came into his view – looking something like a three-foot hoop or ring of intestines and muscle connected to two floating eyeballs!

Crying out a warning to Jack, Armen reached for his axe as two beams seemed to come from the eyeballs to strike out at him! The first that washed over him sent his blood to freeze with fear, but he is able to overcome it quickly. The other stuck his dog, but it only managed to make the animal angry as it barked at the thing.

Armen and the dog rushed down the hallway to attack the thing, while Jack pulled out his bow. About that time, Jaktal appeared at the tube and Jack yelled to him “Cr@p! something is down here, get the other two down here!” so the druid added “Cr@p” to the note and threw it back into the tube, hoping that the other would understand and come down right away.

Meanwhile the eyeball, intestinal hoop ring floated up towards the ceiling (some twelve feet) and shot its eye-beams at the dog and paladin again. This time the Paladin felt very sleepy and fell to the ground while the dog was almost overcome with fear, but is was able too overcome it as it started to bark at its master who was now on the ground sleeping!

Jack took desperate measures and shot an arrow into Armen’s foot, causing the Northman to sit up in pain “Ow what got me!?” he cried. He then noticed the circle of flesh descending down at him, but as he started to rise it shot back up towards the ceiling.

Again it shot a beam of sleepiness at the paladin but it also shot one of fear at the elf still standing on the stone slab. Both overcame the creature’s attacks easily and Armen swung at it with his axe, while Jack tried to fire an arrow at it. Jack’s arrow went wide as Armen cut into the creature, and spilled some blackish blood. Jaktal then climbed to the top of the stone slab and started crawling through the gap that had been made, his lynx still on the ground.

Moving a bit away from Armen, the eyebeams again assaulted the pair – this time fear washed over the paladin that he could not resist! Almost dropping his axe he turned and fled down the tunnel, disappeared from Jack’s and Jaktal’s view. The eye beam that struck Jack had no affect against the elf; his heritage protecting him from all forms of sleep.

Jack shot an arrow at the creature again, but again his shot was wide and did not come close to the creature. Jaktal leaped down off the stone slab and ran at the floating creature, his long spear at the ready.

Meanwhile, above in the main room, Nalu and Pog noticed the returning tube and the ‘revised’ note. Pog ask “Ye think’ they wants us to gos to the bathroom or somethin’?” to which Nalu’s only reply was to grab him and squeeze the both of them into the tube. Pog of course yelled in protest as the two of them barely crammed into the small space inside.

Down below, the eyeball creature turned its eyes on the druid and elven mage, striking each of them with different affects but neither paid any attention to it. Jack fired a third arrow and again missed (muttering that he had only ever hit a comrade so far with the stinking thing) while Jaktal tried to stab it and also failed.

The creature decided that it had had enough and tried to flee down the hallway after the retreating paladin, but this time, both Jack and Jaktal scored hits, causing the creature to almost explode in blackish blood and intestine like fluid!

Nalu and Pog emerged from the tube, a bit cramped but otherwise ok, when Armen’s dog, still barking ran down the hallway and disappeared from sight. Inquiring about ‘Churchy’, Pog quickly climbed the slab and down to other side. Nalu had a bit more difficulty squeezing through the jab but also made it after scooping up the lynx as she came.

With still no sign of Armen, the group made their way down the hallway and into the large room with a number of pillars – something like a stone and rock garden in the center of the room. There were hallway on the right and left sides of the chamber, although the right hand hallway seemed to have a large amount of brownish mold growing over it entirely. Near the middle of the room there was a large stone block resting on the floor with a thick chain running up into the ceiling.

Looking into the left side hallway opened into a wide chamber that might once had been living quarters to an important figure. There was a large stone slab that looked very much like a bed – and there sleeping upon it was Armen with his dog sleeping soundly at its master’s feet! Calling out to him, Armen continued to snore, a look of peace on his face.

Pog decided that “Now woulds be a goods time to pretty up Churchy’s face” and ran into the room with some charcoal to do just then. But as he neared the bed his was overcome with such a powerful desire to sleep that he could not resist and so climbed onto the bed and curled up next to Armen, whom put a protective arm over him.

While the others giggled, they were not sure what to do. The sleepers were not responding to their cries. Nalu refused to approach the bed also, so Jack went to it with some rope (occ as he felt he had not chance to push Armen off with his big 8 strength /occ) that he tired around Armen’s armored arm. He then pulled Pog out from under him and grabbed the dog also to bring them to the edge of the room. The both awoke restfully as Nalu pulled Armen off the bed.

Shaking his head, Armen felt better now and could not seem to remember running in terror from the eye-creature, but he was glad to hear that it had been destroyed. Much to his surprise, he also noticed that the arrow wound that Jack had inflected onto him to wake him the first time had also healed.
(occ [sblock]I decided to make the bed a bit better to help them through the dungeon – basically once per day they could rest on it for 2 rounds and it would act as if they had gained a full nights rest, along with healing. Of course, an elf would not benefit from this [/sblock] /occ)

The rest of the room looked as though it had been ransacked long ago, and so they left to look over the moldy part of the room and the large stone slab. Nalu and Pog examined the mold, while the others looked over the stone slab. Pog remembered hearing something about these mold spores before in some tavern or another – something about the fact that they did not like ‘cold’.

The others could figure out nothing about the stab or why it was there, they came over to the other two members looking at the mold. Jack had a minor cantrip that cause a minor ray of cold so he tried it out on the mold… instantly killing it! Rolling into itself, the mold disappeared quickly as if it were on fire and soon only blackened soot covered the floor.

Passing over this soot a glow of what appeared to be natural sunlight started to come from within the large chamber as they approached it, growing brighter the closer they got. Inside the chamber were a series of worktables, vises, spinning wheels, and blocks of unfinished marble – a sculptor’s workshop it appeared. A huge unfinished statue of an imposing bare-chested warrior wielding a staff-like rod in its left hand dominated the right hand wall. The hairless figure appeared similar to the bas-relief on the sarcophagus upstairs but was clearly a different person. Against the left hand wall stood a short red pedestal with what appeared to be a jet-black egg the size of a small boulder. A golden glyph – an equilateral triangle with a short hash mark through each ‘leg’ – marked the face of this egg.

Armen when to examine the egg, while Jack went to the statue. Pog and Nalu stayed outside in the larger chamber while Jaktal started searching through the work benches and other tools within the room.

Overcome with curiosity, Armen touched the golden glyph on the egg – and much to his horror it suddenly started to break apart and crumble before his eyes! Within moments though it started to collect in on itself and grow – growing into the vague shape of a humanoid made of dirk, rock and stone. It stood for a moment staring at the paladin while the rest of the party pulled back and away from it. Armen tried speaking to it, in some different tongues that he had picked up in his travels but the earth man simple stared as if waiting for something. Then Jack yelled out in a number of tongues but had similar results – the creature only stared at Armen…

When suddenly it lashed out at Armen with a long stone and earthen arm, slamming its fist into the paladin’s chest and almost knocking him down!
(occ [sblock]Medium Sized Earth Elemental BUT I changed some stuff to fit into the IK; first elementals don’t come from other planes and are not really sentient in any way – they are created by wizards and druids for specific propose out of the primal elemental forces for specific jobs and then crumble apart. I figured that in ancient days, Menoth had granted his ‘elemental’ warriors certain powers of the elements to help him fight against the Devour and Chaos. The Architect, being one of Menoth’s elemental controls had a way to create them and ‘fix’ them to a place, which is what he did here. The elementals found in the Cairn do not speak, and are very basic, but if not given instructions within a certain amount of time, they act as security system and attack intruders![/sblock] /occ)
Shocked Armen tried to speak to the creature to convey the idea the he meant it no harm, but it ignored his pleas and struck at him, this time deflecting off of his shield. The other members of the party were not sure what to do – not wanting to attack it if Armen could somehow make peace with it.

“I think we need to seal da chamber Nalu; can ye cave in the door?” Pog asked Nalu as he started backing away from the door. Nalu just shook her head and change into the room – intent on grappling the creature within her strong arms. Rushing forward with her arms wide, Nalu was almost upon the creature when it lashed out and struck her hard against the nose. A loud crack echoed through the chamber and Nalu dropped at the creature’s feet as if her legs had been chopped out from under her! (occ crit, knocking her to -7 hit points! Man and she had 15 hit points to start! /occ)

Jaktal rushed up and stabbed at the creature with his longspear, and holding his lynx back “Don’t be a coming up here – stay!” he had shouted as his spear defected off the creature’s stony hide. Jack standing far back, near the door fired an arrow at the creature also but it simply broke when it hit the creature. Pog, seeing his ‘big woman’ fall in one blow, decided “Da beastie is a go’an die!” and loaded up his pistol with one of his few incendiary rounds…Armen meanwhile, not sure that he could take another blow from the creature stepped back and with his god-like powers, healed some of the wounds simply by touching it.

The stone and earth creature, making no sound at all, stepped forward and tried to again strike the paladin, but again his shield saved him as the creature’s fist simply defected off of it. Jaktal succeeded in stabbing his spear into the creature’s flank but it ignored him as it pursued Armen. Jack fired another arrow that missed everyone this time, striking the wall behind the creature, while Armen lashed out with his axe, only bouncing off a stony thigh. Pog, taking careful aim, cried out “Step back der Churchy, I gots it lined up fer a shot!”

But before he could shot it, the creature lashed out at Armen, but the paladin’s armor saved him again as it absorbed the blow and only cause the paladin back a step. Jaktal stepped back a bit to give Pog and Jack clear shots, as did Armen. They both fired their weapons simultaneously – Jack’s arrow defected off the stony hide, but Pog’s shot sticking the creature straight on and knocking out a chunk of rock and dirt from its shoulder.

Still in came on… only the Paladin was to hard to harm, wrapped in his iron suit of armor, and its blow failed to harm Armen. Jack quickly fired another arrow, but again it failed to do any harm to the creature, but Jaktal and Armen moved in to press their attacks, and both scored minor wounds onto the creature. Pog meanwhile reloaded his pistol, yelling at Nalu to get up – but her still body worried them all.

Then the creatures rock like fist slams into Armen, making his left arm go numb and he almost drops his axe, as Jaktal stabs it for a slight wound into its flank again (as it continues to press its attack against the paladin, ignoring all others). Armen continues to retreat back as Pog yells for them to “Gets out of da way… ere comes anoth’der one!” as another shot cracks through the chamber and slams into the creature – again knocking great clumps of dirt and rock out the creature’s back. The last shot it too much and creatures seems to lose cohesion and breaks about – turning into an inert pile of dirt!

Jaktal raced forward and touched Nalu and poured his ‘power’ of healing into her body. Exhausting all of his gifts and strength for the day, he finally brought the young Orgun back to consciousness and the land of the living. She sat up rubbing her still broken nose and asked what happened to which Pog said “I saved ye there girl, dat Paladin just runned around and distracted it whiles I plugged it with two shot and it feel a’part it did!”

(occ And that is where we ended for the night. Next game 9-21-05 /occ)

 

[Son_of_Thunder]

Nice job!

Ah Iron Kingdoms. I am a new convert. I'll be reading.

 

[Son_of_Thunder]

Up ya go

Oh no you don't languish at the bottom. Up ya go.