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The Kordovian Adventurers Guild
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<blockquote data-quote="Richards" data-source="post: 6752487" data-attributes="member: 508"><p><strong>ADVENTURE 7: MALATERMINUS</strong></p><p></p><p>Game Session Date: 1 November 2015</p><p></p><p> - - - </p><p></p><p>"Hey!" called a voice from the ground near the heroes. "Is anybody up there?"</p><p></p><p>The six adventurers had set up camp for the night among the ruins of several buildings just off the road they'd been traversing all day. Despite the darkening clouds overhead that threatened a downpour of rain within the next hour or so, there was still enough light left to see the adventurers were all alone among the ruins - which made the sudden voice all that much more unnerving.</p><p></p><p>"Can anybody hear me?" the voice added.</p><p></p><p>Looking among themselves to see if answering was a good idea, Finoula finally called back, "We can hear you!"</p><p></p><p>"Hey up there!" the voice responded. By this time, Binkadink had traced the sound as coming from a two-inch-tall slot along the bottom of a stone wall.</p><p></p><p>"My name's <strong>Thomas</strong>," the voice continued. "Me and my band was exploring this underground dungeon we found, but we run into a bit of trouble. <strong>Fiddrick</strong> an' <strong>Jonesy</strong>, I think they're both dead, an' I got separated from <strong>Paulkin</strong>, so he might be as well, for all I know. But there's treasure down here, more'n I ever seen all at once before! You come on down here and help me get back out, I'll split it with you, okay? Even-Steven across the board, equal shares, no problems."</p><p></p><p>The heroes again exchanged looks without saying a word. Castillan's greedy expression clearly said he'd focused in on the bit about a whole lot of treasure, while Gilbert's displayed his suspicion that this might all be just a set-up to lure gullible victims into a trap. But unable to see the heroes' actual expressions, Thomas continued on with his tale.</p><p></p><p>"There's this obelisk-thing out back, away from the road a pace – at least, that's what Fiddrick called it. He found a way to open it up, and there's stairs inside it, what lead to down here. Only watch out for the biters! They’re pretty nasty!</p><p></p><p>"At the end of the first long hallway, you’ll see a-—<em>urggh!</em>" Just as abruptly as Thomas's voice had risen up from what Binkadink guessed was an air shaft from an underground dungeon, it suddenly cut off, to be replaced by strangling sounds, and then ominous silence.</p><p></p><p>"What you think?" Gilbert asked the others. "This a trap?"</p><p></p><p>"One way to find out!" suggested Castillan, buckling his sword belt back on and grabbing up his shortbow. "Let's go find that obelisk!"</p><p></p><p>"The pull of treasure's strong in that one," observed Ingebold.</p><p></p><p>"Wait! We not leave our own treasure unguarded while we go off on fool's mission!" exclaimed Gilbert.</p><p></p><p>"We can have Obvious guard it," suggested Binkadink. "I mean, it's not like he'll be coming along on a dungeon excursion."</p><p></p><p>"I think we protect it with more than bunny rabbit," replied the wizard, grabbing up a shovel. "We bury it under wagon, where nobody see it."</p><p></p><p>"Sounds like a good plan," admitted Darrien, patting Gilbert on the arm. "While you deal with that, we'll go check out that obelisk, see if we can find out how it opens." Then he and the others scrambled off, heading further away from the road, leaving a grumbling Gilbert Fung to do the chore he'd come up with but had been hoping to foist off on somebody else.</p><p></p><p>Many minutes later, the wizard - now sweaty and in a rather foul mood - wandered back to find the others. They had found the stone obelisk easily enough, but as it stood 25 feet tall with a 10-foot-by-10-foot cross-section, sitting in the back of an overgrown graveyard surrounded by a weed-choked fence, it was somewhat difficult to miss. The entire surface of the obelisk was covered in some sort of runic language unfamiliar to the heroes.</p><p></p><p>"Well?" demanded Gilbert. "You find way in yet?"</p><p></p><p>"Kind of," replied Castillan. "We found a hairline crack that looks like there's a door here, on the southern side. But we can't get it open. Now we're trying to figure out what these runes mean. Maybe there's a command word or something."</p><p></p><p>"The language uses the same runes as the dwarven alphabet," pointed out Ingebold. "But there're additional runes not present in Dwarven."</p><p></p><p>"Any of them magic?" Gilbert pressed. The others shrugged.</p><p></p><p>"Pah!" scoffed the wizard in disgust, following up with a <em>detect magic</em> spell. Focusing his concentration he circled the obelisk, looking up and down at each of the four sides. "Nothing!" he concluded. "If there secret way in, it not magical!"</p><p></p><p>"Then it has to be mechanical," surmised Binkadink. He'd given the bottom four rows or so - all that he could reach, even while wearing his <em>gnomish stilt boots</em> - a thorough examination. Each rune was carved into the stone about an inch deep, offering plenty of hand- and footholds.</p><p></p><p>"Up you go, Castillan," suggested the gnome.</p><p></p><p>"Yeah, sure," agreed the elven bounder. In no time at all, he had scampered up the side of the obelisk, as sure-footed as a lizard. "This is easy!" he called back down to the gnome. "I'll bet even you could climb these!" Accepting the challenge, Binkadink lowered himself to his normal height and started climbing the side opposite Castillan. Together, they poked their fingers into every rune they could reach - and then Binkadink cried out in sudden triumph. "How's this?" he called down from 20 feet up, after having found what looked suspiciously like an activation switch hidden inside one of the carved runes and pressing it in.</p><p></p><p>"That it all right," confirmed Gilbert, peering into the opening of the hollow obelisk through the doorway that had suddenly opened up after Binkadink's manipulations. He lit up a torch and poked his head inside, noting the southwestern corner of the obelisk's interior consisted of a set of stone steps leading down into darkness. After waiting for Castillan and Binkadink to climb back down from the obelisk, passing out light sources to those who needed them, and deciding their party order, the group entered the obelisk in single file and started down the stairs.</p><p></p><p>"I hope Thomas is okay," noted Finoula.</p><p></p><p>"Pfff!" scoffed Gilbert from the fifth position in line. "He long dead by now. There nothing we could have done for him." The elven ranger just frowned her disappointment.</p><p></p><p>At the bottom of the stairs, the passageway made a left turn and continued on in a straight path for as far as the group's illumination reached. "This must be the 'first long hallway' that Thomas referred to," pointed out Finoula. She had both her swords out and trailed immediately behind Binkadink, who had lodged a sunrod into the antlers of his helmet. Because of his small stature - and his need for extra room to wield his gnomish glaive - he was in the front of the party order. And as long as he had his glaive out in front of him he put it to good use, occasionally tapping on the ground to hopefully trigger any pit traps before they fell into them.</p><p></p><p>"Watch out for biters," called Darrien from the rear position. He had the <em>Arachnibow</em> out with an arrow already in place, should he need it.</p><p></p><p>"What do you think a 'biter' is?" asked Finoula.</p><p></p><p>"Probably zombie," suggested Gilbert. He was wrong, as the group found out almost immediately thereafter.</p><p></p><p>Having waited until the rest of the group passed by, the two jermlaine sentries each tugged on their end of the rope they had placed in a groove across the tunnel the heroes traversed, rising it up just in time to catch Darrien's foot on it. The half-elven ranger went falling forward, and that was the signal the rest of the ambushers had been waiting for. Behind him, two jermlaine popped out from their hidden cavern entrance and hurled their darts at the prone half-elf, while one of their osquips stuck his head out of a low tunnel to bite Darrien's leg. At the same time, another osquip leaped off of his perch high up the southern wall to land on Gilbert's head, and another of the multi-legged rodents went scampering down the tunnel towards Binkadink. And while all this was going on, yet another jermlaine from yet another low tunnel threw a bola at Castillan's ankles, the line wrapping tight around them and sending the bounder sprawling. Then a tug had him being dragged feet-first seemingly through the southern wall.</p><p></p><p>From his low position on the tunnel's floor, Darrien could see the walls of the long tunnel they'd been traversing didn't always go directly all the way to the ground - in patches, they bent further away from the tunnel, making low entrances into side caverns that the foot-tall, wrinkly-skinned jermlaine had to duck their heads to enter. These entrances were generally hidden from view by the shadows formed by the adventurers' own light sources. But the half-elf had little time for sightseeing; dropping his bow, he grabbed a <em>potion of gaseous form</em> and tried to guzzle it down, thinking that would be an easy way to extract himself from the grip the osquip had on his leg. But that proved to be problematic, for Winkidew's shortcuts had made the potion not so much a liquid as a vapor that needed to be inhaled; as soon as it was unstoppered, it dissipated into the air around Darrien's head and was gone. Cursing, the ranger grabbed up his sword and swung it at the osquip chewing on his leg.</p><p></p><p>Right beside him, Gilbert managed to flip his own osquip foe off of his face and onto the floor between himself and Darrien, then blasted it with a charge from one of his <em>wands of magic missiles</em>. Ingebold was wedged in the middle of the group and was unable to reach any of the numerous enemies, so she busied herself healing Gilbert's wounds with a quick spell.</p><p></p><p>Finoula found herself creeped out by these little creatures that seemed to come straight out of the walls; she quickly unstoppered one of the <em>potions of spider climb</em> she wore at her belt. And it was at that precise moment that she learned which particular shortcut Binkadink's Uncle Winkidew had made when crafting this potion, for the liquid not only tasted nasty but had particulate matter floating around in it. With mounting horror, she realized it was bits of spider bodies that hadn't been sufficiently ground up. On the bright side, they still worked and she was able to scamper up the north wall of the tunnel, putting herself temporarily out of harm's way. On the down side, she found herself picking spider legs out from between her teeth and shuddered involuntarily.</p><p></p><p>Binkadink brought his glaive down upon the head of the osquip racing toward him, bringing it to a screeching halt as he nearly cut it in twain. Behind the six-legged rodent, a jermlaine stepped out seemingly from the wall and threw a dart at the gnome. It hit, to little effect, and Binkadink elevated himself in his magic boots, the better to chase down the little creature.</p><p></p><p>Behind him, Castillan snapped his fingers and his short sword appeared in his hand. He used it to cut the rope around his ankles, then, finding himself in a section of narrow cave too low for him to even sit up in, started scrambling around on his elbows and heels, backpedaling his way back to the central tunnel. Once there, he flipped onto his stomach and poked his sword into the narrow cavern he'd been being dragged into, skewering the osquip who he now saw had been attached to the other end of the rope around his ankles, and which had been dragging him into a larger cavern beyond.</p><p></p><p>Binkadink slew the wrinkly-skinned jermlaine in the front at about the same time Darrien killed the osquip that had been biting him and turned his attention to the jermlaine back by the stairs leading back to the surface. Gilbert finished off the osquip he'd been fighting with another blast of <em>magic missiles</em>, and then the remaining forces decided that these particular trespassers were more trouble than they were worth. With a call from the jermlaine that had initially caught Castillan with his bola-cord, the remaining jermlaine and osquips went dashing back into their hidden tunnels.</p><p></p><p>Looking around, Gilbert called up to Finoula, "It safe to come down now."</p><p></p><p>"I'm fine where I am," replied the elf from near the ceiling. "Where to next?"</p><p></p><p>The tunnel continued on for a bit, until it dead-ended in an unusual way. There was an upright cylinder at the end of the tunnel, inside which was a metal pole with four metal spokes sticking out at the 3-foot-high mark. After Castillan examined it closely for traps and finding nothing unusual, the group stepped inside and noted the curved wall of the cylinder interior was also of metal. Experimentation showed that this was a revolving door of sorts, requiring a bit of muscle-power to rotate. Once they had turned the metal cylinder away from the open doorway to the long tunnel they'd just left, Ingebold took the opportunity to cast a few healing spells on those who needed them.</p><p></p><p>Eventually, the heroes moved the "rotating door opening" from facing west to facing south, which spilled them into another tunnel. This one branched off to the west, offering them two different rooms to explore. The one to the south looked empty, but there were crunching sounds coming from the room to the west. Peeking in, the heroes found the first of the bodies of Thomas's ill-fated party, for a leather-clad corpse lay in the corner of the room and a large, grublike creature was noisily ripping off chunks of flesh from his body and devouring them. It turned at the sound of the group's approach, and the heroes got their first look at a carrion crawler. It whipped its body around, its eight facial tentacles writhing in fury at the thought of scavengers trying to steal its recent kill. It raced across the room at the adventurers, but Darrien got in a good shot at it with the <em>Arachnibow</em> and Binkadink's glaive carved it up before it could get its tentacles within range of being dangerous.</p><p></p><p>Moving past the slain beast, the group checked out Fiddrick's body - although they had no idea which of Thomas's companions the slain rogue might be. But they did recover his sword, a healing potion from his belt, and even a small pouch of coins. Ingebold bristled a bit at removing the belongings of a slain adventurer, but as Gilbert wisely pointed out, "It not do him any good no more." The group moved on.</p><p></p><p>They were a bit surprised to see a normal wooden door in the side of the tunnel leading south from the carrion crawler's den. Castillan checked it out, found no traps, and was further surprised to see it wasn't even locked. Opening it, he saw a set of stairs leading down into a pit, inside which two undead forms were bent over yet another recently-slain body - this one completely bald. Upon their sudden arrival, the two human zombies looked up and growled at the heroes. They both lurched to their feet and started shambling towards the heroes, hands held out in front of them as if they wished to grab the adventurers but hadn't the brainpower to determine they were still out of reach. Darrien and Castillan stood on the steps and shot arrows at the shambling zombies, while Ingebold held out her holy symbol of Moradin and channeled positive energy at the creatures. It had an immediate effect, causing the zombies to flinch away and try to flee, hugging the far wall. The two archers continued peppering them with arrows, and Binkadink and Finoula approached cautiously and started carving them up with their blades which proved to be much more effective. In the meantime, Gilbert recognized that he'd be of little use in this particular combat and stayed at the top of the stairs, ensuring nothing else crept up on them. Once the zombies had been destroyed, the group gave the bald corpse a quick pat-down, but any valuable items had apparently already been stripped from him. There was a sloping chute halfway up the northern wall, and Castillan reckoned its top would be right about where the cavern the osquip and jermlaine had tried dragging him into had been located. He quickly surmised the chamber above was likely where the jermlaines' victims were shaved of their hair, stripped of valuables, and then dumped down the chute for the zombies to dispose of. Not wishing to go jermlaine hunting by climbing up the chute, the group returned up the stairs and joined back up with Gilbert.</p><p></p><p>The only remaining corridor they had yet to explore led to another of those revolving doors, so everybody entered and they pushed it counterclockwise, exposing another corridor leading west. There was a large room at the end of it, and two niches just outside that entrance. Each niche contained a suit of plate mail armor holding a longsword in front of it.</p><p></p><p>"Bet they come to life if we pass by," predicted Gilbert. "You go try, Binkadink."</p><p></p><p>"Certainly," agreed the gnome. "I'm not afraid." He walked boldly to the end of the corridor, gnomish glaive held before him, and gave the one on the right a deft tap with his blade. Gilbert was right; the two dread guards animated immediately and began the attack.</p><p></p><p>Fortunately, one of the advantages of sending the gnome ahead into danger meant the archers had no problem targeting any human-sized enemy he might be fighting, even when they shot their arrows from directly behind him. They fell into their new pattern, shooting an arrow and then sliding over to the left to let those behind them shoot. Gilbert let fly with another blast from his <em>wand of magic missiles</em> and was pleased to see that it seemed to have an effect.</p><p></p><p>Ingebold didn't have much in the way of ranged attacks and so made do with a <em>bless</em> spell, and while Finoula's preferred weapons were her swords, the fact that Winkidew's potion was still in her system meant she could do something unexpected about getting within range. Tucking the end of her ponytail into the back of her cloak - she didn't want it presenting itself as an easy-to-tug target - she walked up the side of the corridor's wall, stepped onto the ceiling, and crouched down to traverse the length of the corridor. Once at the open doorway right before the larger chamber beyond, she had intended to swing around and attack the second dread guard from behind, but was caught off guard by what she saw.</p><p></p><p>The chamber beyond had six sides, rather like a rectangle with its closest corners chopped off. It was filled with an acrid-smelling liquid, with a mere inch-wide ledge running along the circumference of the room. On the far wall was a small alcove containing a cross-shaped opening on the far wall. But it wasn't the room that caught her attention so much as the words being thrust directly into her mind.</p><p></p><p>"Finoula Cloudshadow!" said the voice, a masculine tone sounding like a man at the prime of his health. "It is you, at long last, as the prophecies have foretold! I am <strong>Malaterminus</strong> – 'Slayer of Evil' – an enchanted longsword placed here by those who would keep me away from you, the elven woman destined to wield me to great effect in the unending battle against evil. I am in the cross-shaped crevice in the far wall. You must retrieve me, but take care, for the pool before you is filled with a deadly, corrosive acid.</p><p></p><p>"Save me, Finoula!" the sword continued. "Release me from this prison, that we may forge our destinies together, and strike out at the evils that plague our world!" The elf could tell from watching the others that they did not hear any of what she had just heard - apparently the sword could only telepathically talk with her?</p><p></p><p>"What up with that elf?" griped Gilbert as the first of the dread guards crashed to the ground. "She in this fight or no?"</p><p></p><p>But Finoula had left the corridor, running along the ceiling above the pool of acid to check out the cruciform shape in the far wall. The alcove was slanted backwards, and once she got close enough she could see the cross-shaped slit in the wall was a good eighteen inches deep. Furthermore, it was too narrow for her to stick her arm into it.</p><p></p><p>"How am I supposed to get you out of there?" asked Finoula with a sense of frustration.</p><p></p><p>"I am unsure," replied Malaterminus. "Do you have something you could slide into the opening?" Finoula tried putting her longsword into one of the cross-slits, but couldn't get it underneath Malaterminus's own crosspiece. By this time, it was getting hard to breathe from the acidic fumes, so the elven ranger ran back to the corridor to catch her breath. By then, the others had finished off the second dread guard, and seeing Darrien the solution to her problem came immediately to mind.</p><p></p><p>"Darrien!" she said. "Can I borrow your bow?"</p><p></p><p>"Um, no," replied the half-elf. "It's attuned to me, remember? If I give it to you, it'll turn into a giant spider and try to kill you."</p><p></p><p>"Oh. Yeah. Right," muttered Finoula. "Well then, see that cross-shaped hole? Think you could shoot the inside of it with one of your web-lines?" Darrien squinted at the target, readied his bow, took a deep breath, and let fly. Mentally, he commanded the arrow to transform into a line of spider silk during its flight.</p><p></p><p>Darrien's shot was true. Running across the ceiling back to the alcove, Finoula carefully pulled Malaterminus out of his prison. "Who put you here in the first place?" she asked aloud.</p><p></p><p>As usual, his reply was telepathic. "I was created centuries ago by a diviner who studied the future. He saw that one day, long after his death, the fate of the entire world would rest upon your shoulders. To aid you, he created me as a sentient tool to help guide you. But just as there are those who would do what they can to ensure your success in saving the world, there are those who would prevent you from fulfilling your destiny. Fearing I could not be permanently destroyed, these forces thought to hide me away. But as you can see, our destinies are stronger than their machinations. We are united at long last, you and I!"</p><p></p><p>"She crazy," Gilbert theorized, for the others could only see that Finoula was talking to her sword - not that it was answering her back.</p><p></p><p>"I heard that," Finoula said, returning to the others with Malaterminus in hand. "And no, I'm not." She then proceeded to fill them in on the history of her new sentient longsword.</p><p></p><p>"That's quite a story," said Binkadink. "Did it say how soon you'll need to be saving the world?"</p><p></p><p>"I gather it's a while yet," she replied after conferring with Malaterminus. "He says we'll have time for him to get used to my fighting style, so he can learn to anticipate my swings. In time, he'll be able to guide my hand and help me to strike true. And he was built specifically to fight fiends, so I imagine the threat will come from the Lower Planes."</p><p></p><p>"Great," muttered Ingebold.</p><p></p><p>"Let's move on," suggested Castillan. "There may still be more to see in this dungeon." He was secretly hoping there might be yet another cool bit of sentient treasure he could claim for himself. Returning to the cylindrical revolving door, they positioned it directly south and found another passageway. There was a locked wooden door to the east and an open room to the west. After determining the door was locked but not trapped, the group decided to save that way for later and checked out the open room. It was filled with various instruments of torture - racks, an iron maiden, and the like, all rusted and looking like they hadn't seen any recent use.</p><p></p><p>"This dungeon's becomin' a bit more literal than I'd be likin'," commented Ingebold.</p><p></p><p>Moving south from the torture chamber down the only other remaining corridor, the group ran into a similar-sized room containing three empty cells along the entire western wall. Yet another corridor led from this room to the east, only to be blocked by a closed wooden door. But before the group had a chance to go very far into the room and investigate the door, the northeastern corner of the room moved, splorching directly into Binkadink's path.</p><p></p><p>"Whoa!" yelled the gnome, leaping to the south. The patch of wall now occupied the space he had just left, cutting him off from the others. It looked like an ambulatory section of the wall, taking up a five-foot square and brushing against the 10-foot-tall ceiling of the room. The pseudoslab oozed toward the others, completely absorbing Ingebold into its body mass. It would have done the same to Finoula, but unlike the dwarf Finoula had plenty of room to maneuver on the ceiling, and she backed off, standing upside-down directly above Castillan.</p><p></p><p>"That's somewhat disturbing," commented the elven bounder, readying his shortbow.</p><p></p><p>Inside the pseudoslab, Ingebold could feel acid starting to eat away at the exposed portions of her skin. The creature's secretion's also had a paralytic effect, but the dwarf was able to shrug off the paralysis and push her way all the way through the stone-mimicking tower of gelatinous protoplasm. Binkadink, hacking away at the side of the pseudoslab, was surprised to see it suddenly bulge toward him and expel Ingebold, covered in slime. Binkadink grabbed her by the hand and helped pull her free, then stepped between the cleric and the pseudoslab in case it had any ideas about trying to engulf her again. This gave Ingebold a chance to heal herself of the acid burns, but the gnome needn't have worried, as the pseudoslab's primitive sensory organs told it a greater mass of potential food stood to the north and it headed that way, forcing the others to back up into the torture chamber again. But concentrated fire, both of the arrow and the spell variety, was enough to destroy the pseudoslab. As it died it lost control of its form, and it slowly leaked into a thick pool of goop that flooded both the torture chamber and the corridor to the south.</p><p></p><p>"Ick," remarked Finoula, glad she was safely on the ceiling and away from the decaying mass.</p><p></p><p>"Let's check out the door," suggested Binkadink. It was unlocked, and he whipped it open and stepped back, ready for action. But the chamber beyond was mostly empty, containing only a corpse on the ground before a fireplace. The body had a dark sack or something on his head, or so it looked at first; it was only when a tentacle twitched that Binkadink realized this was some sort of creature with a strangle-hold on what the gnome belatedly realized was Thomas, the poor soul who had called up to them through the chimney shaft. If only he had known his words would awaken the darkmantle resting within the chimney! Binkadink and his glaive made quick work of the darkmantle, and then he and Ingebold rejoined the others in the torture chamber.</p><p></p><p>By the time they had retraced their steps, Castillan had worked open the locked door just outside the revolving door section. Inside was a treasure chamber, with a large chest against the far wall and a suit of plate mail armor standing over it as if guarding it. The bounder crept closely to the armor, examining it closely, and then the chest, before announcing that both seemed safe. Gilbert cast another <em>detect magic</em> spell and saw that neither radiated any magical auras.</p><p></p><p>"Here goes!" said Castillan, flipping the lid to the chest open and stepping back. Inside, the chest was close to overflowing with coins - but closer examination showed them all to be copper pieces. The bounder did some quick figures in his head, and determined there was probably only the equivalent of 20 gold pieces in the chest - but 100 times the weight and bulk of 20 gold coins. He swore in Elven; only Finoula and Darrien understood exactly what he said.</p><p></p><p>"Maybe there's a hidden bottom to it, where they hid the good stuff?" suggested Darrien.</p><p></p><p>"I doubt it," grumbled Castillan, flipping the lid closed again and lifting up a corner of the chest to look underneath it - and inadvertently exposing the opening in the floor directly beneath the chest. A set of narrow steps led down to a lower level.</p><p></p><p>"Give me a hand with this!" he ordered the others and they lugged it aside, fully exposing the hidden stairs. "This is more like it!" he enthused, practically leaping into the hole.</p><p></p><p>The entirety of this lower level was a single room, about half the size as the false treasure room above. This one also had a similarly-sized chest against the far wall, and on the wall above it hung a finely-crafted steel shield. A smaller box sat beside the chest. This chest was both trapped and locked, and while Castillan was unable to bypass the <em>fire trap</em> successfully, he had much better luck with the lock. And the treasure inside the chest was much better than the copper pieces in the previous chest, for this one held gold coins and glittering gems - all to a combined total of about 12,000 gold, after the bounder had time to go through its contents. The box contained four potions - all of them more than likely crafted with a bit more care than Winkidew Dundernoggin typically gave.</p><p></p><p>"This will buy Kordovia quite a lot of armor and weapons," said Ingebold proudly. "Methinks King Galrich had the right idea about forming up an Adventurers Guild after all." The others all agreed.</p><p></p><p>Only Gilbert Fung found the downside. "Now we have to lug it back up to surface," he complained. "And past biters and wrinkly-men."</p><p></p><p>Fortunately, the jermlaine and osquips had taken enough losses from their initial encounter with the Kordovian Adventurers Guild that they stayed far away in their hidden caves while the heroes lugged their hard-fought treasure back up to the surface.</p><p></p><p>"I think we'd best start back for home in the morning," suggested Darrien as the exhausted group finally finished making their camp among the ruins. They let Obvious take the first guard shift.</p><p></p><p> - - - </p><p></p><p>This was a fun adventure for all of us. I usually give the players a generic idea of what the next adventure's going to be about, and "dungeon crawl" was all Dan needed to hear to start champing at the bit. Vicki, while initially suspecting that something bad would happen if she pulled Malaterminus from its crevice (apparently life with Dan has helped his paranoia to rub off on her), was ecstatic to learn she's a "chosen one" who will one day save the world. I reminded her that the divination didn't say that she'd save the world, merely that the fate of the world would one day be on her shoulders. (In other words, success is not guaranteed.) In any case, I explained Malaterminus was currently a <em>+1 fiendbane longsword</em> but would increase in power (and abilities) as Finoula reached higher levels. Right now, Malaterminus has a continuous <em>detect evil</em> ability and the ability to communicate with Finoula telepathically. It can also shield both its alignment and Finoula's so the demons and devils they'll be fighting in the future won't get a heads-up on their good alignments. Vicki's eager to gain levels and see what else Malaterminus can do, and I can't wait for his future abilities to manifest, either. But all in good time.</p><p></p><p> - - - </p><p></p><p>T-Shirt Worn: I have a white T-shirt that I made into a very specific D&D shirt many years ago. On the back of it are the nine members of the Monster Hunters Association, the protagonists of a series of "Ecology" articles I wrote back in the AD&D 2nd Edition and D&D 3.X days. But more importantly, on the left side of the shirt's front is a picture of Ozzie the osquip, the familiar of Buntleby of the Western Grove, one of the Monster Hunter wizards. The pictures of Ozzie and the Monster Hunters are taken from various issues of Dragon Magazine, using a scan-onto-an-iron-on sheet system my wife picked up. This shirt seemed like the perfect shirt to wear for this adventure, and I figured I could bluff my way past the players (who have learned that the T-shirt I wear to a game session often contains a clue to that session's adventure) by claiming it was just a "generic D&D shirt" of the type I wear when I don't have anything thematically appropriate to wear. No such luck; Logan's first words upon seeing me in my Monster Hunters shirt was, "We're fighting osquips, aren't we?" Sometimes I'm too clever for my own good.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Richards, post: 6752487, member: 508"] [b]ADVENTURE 7: MALATERMINUS[/b] Game Session Date: 1 November 2015 - - - "Hey!" called a voice from the ground near the heroes. "Is anybody up there?" The six adventurers had set up camp for the night among the ruins of several buildings just off the road they'd been traversing all day. Despite the darkening clouds overhead that threatened a downpour of rain within the next hour or so, there was still enough light left to see the adventurers were all alone among the ruins - which made the sudden voice all that much more unnerving. "Can anybody hear me?" the voice added. Looking among themselves to see if answering was a good idea, Finoula finally called back, "We can hear you!" "Hey up there!" the voice responded. By this time, Binkadink had traced the sound as coming from a two-inch-tall slot along the bottom of a stone wall. "My name's [b]Thomas[/b]," the voice continued. "Me and my band was exploring this underground dungeon we found, but we run into a bit of trouble. [b]Fiddrick[/b] an' [b]Jonesy[/b], I think they're both dead, an' I got separated from [b]Paulkin[/b], so he might be as well, for all I know. But there's treasure down here, more'n I ever seen all at once before! You come on down here and help me get back out, I'll split it with you, okay? Even-Steven across the board, equal shares, no problems." The heroes again exchanged looks without saying a word. Castillan's greedy expression clearly said he'd focused in on the bit about a whole lot of treasure, while Gilbert's displayed his suspicion that this might all be just a set-up to lure gullible victims into a trap. But unable to see the heroes' actual expressions, Thomas continued on with his tale. "There's this obelisk-thing out back, away from the road a pace – at least, that's what Fiddrick called it. He found a way to open it up, and there's stairs inside it, what lead to down here. Only watch out for the biters! They’re pretty nasty! "At the end of the first long hallway, you’ll see a-—[i]urggh![/i]" Just as abruptly as Thomas's voice had risen up from what Binkadink guessed was an air shaft from an underground dungeon, it suddenly cut off, to be replaced by strangling sounds, and then ominous silence. "What you think?" Gilbert asked the others. "This a trap?" "One way to find out!" suggested Castillan, buckling his sword belt back on and grabbing up his shortbow. "Let's go find that obelisk!" "The pull of treasure's strong in that one," observed Ingebold. "Wait! We not leave our own treasure unguarded while we go off on fool's mission!" exclaimed Gilbert. "We can have Obvious guard it," suggested Binkadink. "I mean, it's not like he'll be coming along on a dungeon excursion." "I think we protect it with more than bunny rabbit," replied the wizard, grabbing up a shovel. "We bury it under wagon, where nobody see it." "Sounds like a good plan," admitted Darrien, patting Gilbert on the arm. "While you deal with that, we'll go check out that obelisk, see if we can find out how it opens." Then he and the others scrambled off, heading further away from the road, leaving a grumbling Gilbert Fung to do the chore he'd come up with but had been hoping to foist off on somebody else. Many minutes later, the wizard - now sweaty and in a rather foul mood - wandered back to find the others. They had found the stone obelisk easily enough, but as it stood 25 feet tall with a 10-foot-by-10-foot cross-section, sitting in the back of an overgrown graveyard surrounded by a weed-choked fence, it was somewhat difficult to miss. The entire surface of the obelisk was covered in some sort of runic language unfamiliar to the heroes. "Well?" demanded Gilbert. "You find way in yet?" "Kind of," replied Castillan. "We found a hairline crack that looks like there's a door here, on the southern side. But we can't get it open. Now we're trying to figure out what these runes mean. Maybe there's a command word or something." "The language uses the same runes as the dwarven alphabet," pointed out Ingebold. "But there're additional runes not present in Dwarven." "Any of them magic?" Gilbert pressed. The others shrugged. "Pah!" scoffed the wizard in disgust, following up with a [i]detect magic[/i] spell. Focusing his concentration he circled the obelisk, looking up and down at each of the four sides. "Nothing!" he concluded. "If there secret way in, it not magical!" "Then it has to be mechanical," surmised Binkadink. He'd given the bottom four rows or so - all that he could reach, even while wearing his [i]gnomish stilt boots[/i] - a thorough examination. Each rune was carved into the stone about an inch deep, offering plenty of hand- and footholds. "Up you go, Castillan," suggested the gnome. "Yeah, sure," agreed the elven bounder. In no time at all, he had scampered up the side of the obelisk, as sure-footed as a lizard. "This is easy!" he called back down to the gnome. "I'll bet even you could climb these!" Accepting the challenge, Binkadink lowered himself to his normal height and started climbing the side opposite Castillan. Together, they poked their fingers into every rune they could reach - and then Binkadink cried out in sudden triumph. "How's this?" he called down from 20 feet up, after having found what looked suspiciously like an activation switch hidden inside one of the carved runes and pressing it in. "That it all right," confirmed Gilbert, peering into the opening of the hollow obelisk through the doorway that had suddenly opened up after Binkadink's manipulations. He lit up a torch and poked his head inside, noting the southwestern corner of the obelisk's interior consisted of a set of stone steps leading down into darkness. After waiting for Castillan and Binkadink to climb back down from the obelisk, passing out light sources to those who needed them, and deciding their party order, the group entered the obelisk in single file and started down the stairs. "I hope Thomas is okay," noted Finoula. "Pfff!" scoffed Gilbert from the fifth position in line. "He long dead by now. There nothing we could have done for him." The elven ranger just frowned her disappointment. At the bottom of the stairs, the passageway made a left turn and continued on in a straight path for as far as the group's illumination reached. "This must be the 'first long hallway' that Thomas referred to," pointed out Finoula. She had both her swords out and trailed immediately behind Binkadink, who had lodged a sunrod into the antlers of his helmet. Because of his small stature - and his need for extra room to wield his gnomish glaive - he was in the front of the party order. And as long as he had his glaive out in front of him he put it to good use, occasionally tapping on the ground to hopefully trigger any pit traps before they fell into them. "Watch out for biters," called Darrien from the rear position. He had the [i]Arachnibow[/i] out with an arrow already in place, should he need it. "What do you think a 'biter' is?" asked Finoula. "Probably zombie," suggested Gilbert. He was wrong, as the group found out almost immediately thereafter. Having waited until the rest of the group passed by, the two jermlaine sentries each tugged on their end of the rope they had placed in a groove across the tunnel the heroes traversed, rising it up just in time to catch Darrien's foot on it. The half-elven ranger went falling forward, and that was the signal the rest of the ambushers had been waiting for. Behind him, two jermlaine popped out from their hidden cavern entrance and hurled their darts at the prone half-elf, while one of their osquips stuck his head out of a low tunnel to bite Darrien's leg. At the same time, another osquip leaped off of his perch high up the southern wall to land on Gilbert's head, and another of the multi-legged rodents went scampering down the tunnel towards Binkadink. And while all this was going on, yet another jermlaine from yet another low tunnel threw a bola at Castillan's ankles, the line wrapping tight around them and sending the bounder sprawling. Then a tug had him being dragged feet-first seemingly through the southern wall. From his low position on the tunnel's floor, Darrien could see the walls of the long tunnel they'd been traversing didn't always go directly all the way to the ground - in patches, they bent further away from the tunnel, making low entrances into side caverns that the foot-tall, wrinkly-skinned jermlaine had to duck their heads to enter. These entrances were generally hidden from view by the shadows formed by the adventurers' own light sources. But the half-elf had little time for sightseeing; dropping his bow, he grabbed a [i]potion of gaseous form[/i] and tried to guzzle it down, thinking that would be an easy way to extract himself from the grip the osquip had on his leg. But that proved to be problematic, for Winkidew's shortcuts had made the potion not so much a liquid as a vapor that needed to be inhaled; as soon as it was unstoppered, it dissipated into the air around Darrien's head and was gone. Cursing, the ranger grabbed up his sword and swung it at the osquip chewing on his leg. Right beside him, Gilbert managed to flip his own osquip foe off of his face and onto the floor between himself and Darrien, then blasted it with a charge from one of his [i]wands of magic missiles[/i]. Ingebold was wedged in the middle of the group and was unable to reach any of the numerous enemies, so she busied herself healing Gilbert's wounds with a quick spell. Finoula found herself creeped out by these little creatures that seemed to come straight out of the walls; she quickly unstoppered one of the [i]potions of spider climb[/i] she wore at her belt. And it was at that precise moment that she learned which particular shortcut Binkadink's Uncle Winkidew had made when crafting this potion, for the liquid not only tasted nasty but had particulate matter floating around in it. With mounting horror, she realized it was bits of spider bodies that hadn't been sufficiently ground up. On the bright side, they still worked and she was able to scamper up the north wall of the tunnel, putting herself temporarily out of harm's way. On the down side, she found herself picking spider legs out from between her teeth and shuddered involuntarily. Binkadink brought his glaive down upon the head of the osquip racing toward him, bringing it to a screeching halt as he nearly cut it in twain. Behind the six-legged rodent, a jermlaine stepped out seemingly from the wall and threw a dart at the gnome. It hit, to little effect, and Binkadink elevated himself in his magic boots, the better to chase down the little creature. Behind him, Castillan snapped his fingers and his short sword appeared in his hand. He used it to cut the rope around his ankles, then, finding himself in a section of narrow cave too low for him to even sit up in, started scrambling around on his elbows and heels, backpedaling his way back to the central tunnel. Once there, he flipped onto his stomach and poked his sword into the narrow cavern he'd been being dragged into, skewering the osquip who he now saw had been attached to the other end of the rope around his ankles, and which had been dragging him into a larger cavern beyond. Binkadink slew the wrinkly-skinned jermlaine in the front at about the same time Darrien killed the osquip that had been biting him and turned his attention to the jermlaine back by the stairs leading back to the surface. Gilbert finished off the osquip he'd been fighting with another blast of [i]magic missiles[/i], and then the remaining forces decided that these particular trespassers were more trouble than they were worth. With a call from the jermlaine that had initially caught Castillan with his bola-cord, the remaining jermlaine and osquips went dashing back into their hidden tunnels. Looking around, Gilbert called up to Finoula, "It safe to come down now." "I'm fine where I am," replied the elf from near the ceiling. "Where to next?" The tunnel continued on for a bit, until it dead-ended in an unusual way. There was an upright cylinder at the end of the tunnel, inside which was a metal pole with four metal spokes sticking out at the 3-foot-high mark. After Castillan examined it closely for traps and finding nothing unusual, the group stepped inside and noted the curved wall of the cylinder interior was also of metal. Experimentation showed that this was a revolving door of sorts, requiring a bit of muscle-power to rotate. Once they had turned the metal cylinder away from the open doorway to the long tunnel they'd just left, Ingebold took the opportunity to cast a few healing spells on those who needed them. Eventually, the heroes moved the "rotating door opening" from facing west to facing south, which spilled them into another tunnel. This one branched off to the west, offering them two different rooms to explore. The one to the south looked empty, but there were crunching sounds coming from the room to the west. Peeking in, the heroes found the first of the bodies of Thomas's ill-fated party, for a leather-clad corpse lay in the corner of the room and a large, grublike creature was noisily ripping off chunks of flesh from his body and devouring them. It turned at the sound of the group's approach, and the heroes got their first look at a carrion crawler. It whipped its body around, its eight facial tentacles writhing in fury at the thought of scavengers trying to steal its recent kill. It raced across the room at the adventurers, but Darrien got in a good shot at it with the [i]Arachnibow[/i] and Binkadink's glaive carved it up before it could get its tentacles within range of being dangerous. Moving past the slain beast, the group checked out Fiddrick's body - although they had no idea which of Thomas's companions the slain rogue might be. But they did recover his sword, a healing potion from his belt, and even a small pouch of coins. Ingebold bristled a bit at removing the belongings of a slain adventurer, but as Gilbert wisely pointed out, "It not do him any good no more." The group moved on. They were a bit surprised to see a normal wooden door in the side of the tunnel leading south from the carrion crawler's den. Castillan checked it out, found no traps, and was further surprised to see it wasn't even locked. Opening it, he saw a set of stairs leading down into a pit, inside which two undead forms were bent over yet another recently-slain body - this one completely bald. Upon their sudden arrival, the two human zombies looked up and growled at the heroes. They both lurched to their feet and started shambling towards the heroes, hands held out in front of them as if they wished to grab the adventurers but hadn't the brainpower to determine they were still out of reach. Darrien and Castillan stood on the steps and shot arrows at the shambling zombies, while Ingebold held out her holy symbol of Moradin and channeled positive energy at the creatures. It had an immediate effect, causing the zombies to flinch away and try to flee, hugging the far wall. The two archers continued peppering them with arrows, and Binkadink and Finoula approached cautiously and started carving them up with their blades which proved to be much more effective. In the meantime, Gilbert recognized that he'd be of little use in this particular combat and stayed at the top of the stairs, ensuring nothing else crept up on them. Once the zombies had been destroyed, the group gave the bald corpse a quick pat-down, but any valuable items had apparently already been stripped from him. There was a sloping chute halfway up the northern wall, and Castillan reckoned its top would be right about where the cavern the osquip and jermlaine had tried dragging him into had been located. He quickly surmised the chamber above was likely where the jermlaines' victims were shaved of their hair, stripped of valuables, and then dumped down the chute for the zombies to dispose of. Not wishing to go jermlaine hunting by climbing up the chute, the group returned up the stairs and joined back up with Gilbert. The only remaining corridor they had yet to explore led to another of those revolving doors, so everybody entered and they pushed it counterclockwise, exposing another corridor leading west. There was a large room at the end of it, and two niches just outside that entrance. Each niche contained a suit of plate mail armor holding a longsword in front of it. "Bet they come to life if we pass by," predicted Gilbert. "You go try, Binkadink." "Certainly," agreed the gnome. "I'm not afraid." He walked boldly to the end of the corridor, gnomish glaive held before him, and gave the one on the right a deft tap with his blade. Gilbert was right; the two dread guards animated immediately and began the attack. Fortunately, one of the advantages of sending the gnome ahead into danger meant the archers had no problem targeting any human-sized enemy he might be fighting, even when they shot their arrows from directly behind him. They fell into their new pattern, shooting an arrow and then sliding over to the left to let those behind them shoot. Gilbert let fly with another blast from his [i]wand of magic missiles[/i] and was pleased to see that it seemed to have an effect. Ingebold didn't have much in the way of ranged attacks and so made do with a [i]bless[/i] spell, and while Finoula's preferred weapons were her swords, the fact that Winkidew's potion was still in her system meant she could do something unexpected about getting within range. Tucking the end of her ponytail into the back of her cloak - she didn't want it presenting itself as an easy-to-tug target - she walked up the side of the corridor's wall, stepped onto the ceiling, and crouched down to traverse the length of the corridor. Once at the open doorway right before the larger chamber beyond, she had intended to swing around and attack the second dread guard from behind, but was caught off guard by what she saw. The chamber beyond had six sides, rather like a rectangle with its closest corners chopped off. It was filled with an acrid-smelling liquid, with a mere inch-wide ledge running along the circumference of the room. On the far wall was a small alcove containing a cross-shaped opening on the far wall. But it wasn't the room that caught her attention so much as the words being thrust directly into her mind. "Finoula Cloudshadow!" said the voice, a masculine tone sounding like a man at the prime of his health. "It is you, at long last, as the prophecies have foretold! I am [b]Malaterminus[/b] – 'Slayer of Evil' – an enchanted longsword placed here by those who would keep me away from you, the elven woman destined to wield me to great effect in the unending battle against evil. I am in the cross-shaped crevice in the far wall. You must retrieve me, but take care, for the pool before you is filled with a deadly, corrosive acid. "Save me, Finoula!" the sword continued. "Release me from this prison, that we may forge our destinies together, and strike out at the evils that plague our world!" The elf could tell from watching the others that they did not hear any of what she had just heard - apparently the sword could only telepathically talk with her? "What up with that elf?" griped Gilbert as the first of the dread guards crashed to the ground. "She in this fight or no?" But Finoula had left the corridor, running along the ceiling above the pool of acid to check out the cruciform shape in the far wall. The alcove was slanted backwards, and once she got close enough she could see the cross-shaped slit in the wall was a good eighteen inches deep. Furthermore, it was too narrow for her to stick her arm into it. "How am I supposed to get you out of there?" asked Finoula with a sense of frustration. "I am unsure," replied Malaterminus. "Do you have something you could slide into the opening?" Finoula tried putting her longsword into one of the cross-slits, but couldn't get it underneath Malaterminus's own crosspiece. By this time, it was getting hard to breathe from the acidic fumes, so the elven ranger ran back to the corridor to catch her breath. By then, the others had finished off the second dread guard, and seeing Darrien the solution to her problem came immediately to mind. "Darrien!" she said. "Can I borrow your bow?" "Um, no," replied the half-elf. "It's attuned to me, remember? If I give it to you, it'll turn into a giant spider and try to kill you." "Oh. Yeah. Right," muttered Finoula. "Well then, see that cross-shaped hole? Think you could shoot the inside of it with one of your web-lines?" Darrien squinted at the target, readied his bow, took a deep breath, and let fly. Mentally, he commanded the arrow to transform into a line of spider silk during its flight. Darrien's shot was true. Running across the ceiling back to the alcove, Finoula carefully pulled Malaterminus out of his prison. "Who put you here in the first place?" she asked aloud. As usual, his reply was telepathic. "I was created centuries ago by a diviner who studied the future. He saw that one day, long after his death, the fate of the entire world would rest upon your shoulders. To aid you, he created me as a sentient tool to help guide you. But just as there are those who would do what they can to ensure your success in saving the world, there are those who would prevent you from fulfilling your destiny. Fearing I could not be permanently destroyed, these forces thought to hide me away. But as you can see, our destinies are stronger than their machinations. We are united at long last, you and I!" "She crazy," Gilbert theorized, for the others could only see that Finoula was talking to her sword - not that it was answering her back. "I heard that," Finoula said, returning to the others with Malaterminus in hand. "And no, I'm not." She then proceeded to fill them in on the history of her new sentient longsword. "That's quite a story," said Binkadink. "Did it say how soon you'll need to be saving the world?" "I gather it's a while yet," she replied after conferring with Malaterminus. "He says we'll have time for him to get used to my fighting style, so he can learn to anticipate my swings. In time, he'll be able to guide my hand and help me to strike true. And he was built specifically to fight fiends, so I imagine the threat will come from the Lower Planes." "Great," muttered Ingebold. "Let's move on," suggested Castillan. "There may still be more to see in this dungeon." He was secretly hoping there might be yet another cool bit of sentient treasure he could claim for himself. Returning to the cylindrical revolving door, they positioned it directly south and found another passageway. There was a locked wooden door to the east and an open room to the west. After determining the door was locked but not trapped, the group decided to save that way for later and checked out the open room. It was filled with various instruments of torture - racks, an iron maiden, and the like, all rusted and looking like they hadn't seen any recent use. "This dungeon's becomin' a bit more literal than I'd be likin'," commented Ingebold. Moving south from the torture chamber down the only other remaining corridor, the group ran into a similar-sized room containing three empty cells along the entire western wall. Yet another corridor led from this room to the east, only to be blocked by a closed wooden door. But before the group had a chance to go very far into the room and investigate the door, the northeastern corner of the room moved, splorching directly into Binkadink's path. "Whoa!" yelled the gnome, leaping to the south. The patch of wall now occupied the space he had just left, cutting him off from the others. It looked like an ambulatory section of the wall, taking up a five-foot square and brushing against the 10-foot-tall ceiling of the room. The pseudoslab oozed toward the others, completely absorbing Ingebold into its body mass. It would have done the same to Finoula, but unlike the dwarf Finoula had plenty of room to maneuver on the ceiling, and she backed off, standing upside-down directly above Castillan. "That's somewhat disturbing," commented the elven bounder, readying his shortbow. Inside the pseudoslab, Ingebold could feel acid starting to eat away at the exposed portions of her skin. The creature's secretion's also had a paralytic effect, but the dwarf was able to shrug off the paralysis and push her way all the way through the stone-mimicking tower of gelatinous protoplasm. Binkadink, hacking away at the side of the pseudoslab, was surprised to see it suddenly bulge toward him and expel Ingebold, covered in slime. Binkadink grabbed her by the hand and helped pull her free, then stepped between the cleric and the pseudoslab in case it had any ideas about trying to engulf her again. This gave Ingebold a chance to heal herself of the acid burns, but the gnome needn't have worried, as the pseudoslab's primitive sensory organs told it a greater mass of potential food stood to the north and it headed that way, forcing the others to back up into the torture chamber again. But concentrated fire, both of the arrow and the spell variety, was enough to destroy the pseudoslab. As it died it lost control of its form, and it slowly leaked into a thick pool of goop that flooded both the torture chamber and the corridor to the south. "Ick," remarked Finoula, glad she was safely on the ceiling and away from the decaying mass. "Let's check out the door," suggested Binkadink. It was unlocked, and he whipped it open and stepped back, ready for action. But the chamber beyond was mostly empty, containing only a corpse on the ground before a fireplace. The body had a dark sack or something on his head, or so it looked at first; it was only when a tentacle twitched that Binkadink realized this was some sort of creature with a strangle-hold on what the gnome belatedly realized was Thomas, the poor soul who had called up to them through the chimney shaft. If only he had known his words would awaken the darkmantle resting within the chimney! Binkadink and his glaive made quick work of the darkmantle, and then he and Ingebold rejoined the others in the torture chamber. By the time they had retraced their steps, Castillan had worked open the locked door just outside the revolving door section. Inside was a treasure chamber, with a large chest against the far wall and a suit of plate mail armor standing over it as if guarding it. The bounder crept closely to the armor, examining it closely, and then the chest, before announcing that both seemed safe. Gilbert cast another [i]detect magic[/i] spell and saw that neither radiated any magical auras. "Here goes!" said Castillan, flipping the lid to the chest open and stepping back. Inside, the chest was close to overflowing with coins - but closer examination showed them all to be copper pieces. The bounder did some quick figures in his head, and determined there was probably only the equivalent of 20 gold pieces in the chest - but 100 times the weight and bulk of 20 gold coins. He swore in Elven; only Finoula and Darrien understood exactly what he said. "Maybe there's a hidden bottom to it, where they hid the good stuff?" suggested Darrien. "I doubt it," grumbled Castillan, flipping the lid closed again and lifting up a corner of the chest to look underneath it - and inadvertently exposing the opening in the floor directly beneath the chest. A set of narrow steps led down to a lower level. "Give me a hand with this!" he ordered the others and they lugged it aside, fully exposing the hidden stairs. "This is more like it!" he enthused, practically leaping into the hole. The entirety of this lower level was a single room, about half the size as the false treasure room above. This one also had a similarly-sized chest against the far wall, and on the wall above it hung a finely-crafted steel shield. A smaller box sat beside the chest. This chest was both trapped and locked, and while Castillan was unable to bypass the [i]fire trap[/i] successfully, he had much better luck with the lock. And the treasure inside the chest was much better than the copper pieces in the previous chest, for this one held gold coins and glittering gems - all to a combined total of about 12,000 gold, after the bounder had time to go through its contents. The box contained four potions - all of them more than likely crafted with a bit more care than Winkidew Dundernoggin typically gave. "This will buy Kordovia quite a lot of armor and weapons," said Ingebold proudly. "Methinks King Galrich had the right idea about forming up an Adventurers Guild after all." The others all agreed. Only Gilbert Fung found the downside. "Now we have to lug it back up to surface," he complained. "And past biters and wrinkly-men." Fortunately, the jermlaine and osquips had taken enough losses from their initial encounter with the Kordovian Adventurers Guild that they stayed far away in their hidden caves while the heroes lugged their hard-fought treasure back up to the surface. "I think we'd best start back for home in the morning," suggested Darrien as the exhausted group finally finished making their camp among the ruins. They let Obvious take the first guard shift. - - - This was a fun adventure for all of us. I usually give the players a generic idea of what the next adventure's going to be about, and "dungeon crawl" was all Dan needed to hear to start champing at the bit. Vicki, while initially suspecting that something bad would happen if she pulled Malaterminus from its crevice (apparently life with Dan has helped his paranoia to rub off on her), was ecstatic to learn she's a "chosen one" who will one day save the world. I reminded her that the divination didn't say that she'd save the world, merely that the fate of the world would one day be on her shoulders. (In other words, success is not guaranteed.) In any case, I explained Malaterminus was currently a [i]+1 fiendbane longsword[/i] but would increase in power (and abilities) as Finoula reached higher levels. Right now, Malaterminus has a continuous [i]detect evil[/i] ability and the ability to communicate with Finoula telepathically. It can also shield both its alignment and Finoula's so the demons and devils they'll be fighting in the future won't get a heads-up on their good alignments. Vicki's eager to gain levels and see what else Malaterminus can do, and I can't wait for his future abilities to manifest, either. But all in good time. - - - T-Shirt Worn: I have a white T-shirt that I made into a very specific D&D shirt many years ago. On the back of it are the nine members of the Monster Hunters Association, the protagonists of a series of "Ecology" articles I wrote back in the AD&D 2nd Edition and D&D 3.X days. But more importantly, on the left side of the shirt's front is a picture of Ozzie the osquip, the familiar of Buntleby of the Western Grove, one of the Monster Hunter wizards. The pictures of Ozzie and the Monster Hunters are taken from various issues of Dragon Magazine, using a scan-onto-an-iron-on sheet system my wife picked up. This shirt seemed like the perfect shirt to wear for this adventure, and I figured I could bluff my way past the players (who have learned that the T-shirt I wear to a game session often contains a clue to that session's adventure) by claiming it was just a "generic D&D shirt" of the type I wear when I don't have anything thematically appropriate to wear. No such luck; Logan's first words upon seeing me in my Monster Hunters shirt was, "We're fighting osquips, aren't we?" Sometimes I'm too clever for my own good. [/QUOTE]
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