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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Nebulous" data-source="post: 4766028" data-attributes="member: 31465">Adventure #6:  Shar-shazaluk’s LairPART ONE<img src="http://www.zikadik.com/silverymoon/shar1.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />The heroes linger in the prison area, and after interrogating the fat goblin named Balgron (who continues begging for freedom) they turn to the female human prisoner.  She is dirty and scantily clad in rags as if her clothes have been ripped away.  She is barely conscious as well and seems to be under the influence of drugs. Eventually, with gentle coaxing and prodding, she is awakened and removed from the cell.  They find that her name is Raven, and she is a druidic follower of Chauntea the Earth Mother.  She lives in the forest outside of Everlund, but just yesterday (she thinks it was yesterday, she’s not sure anymore) she was viciously attacked in her home by a squad of goblins of the Skull Cleaver tribe.  Overwhelmed, she was subdued, blindfolded, and led into this dark, dank place.   She remembers very little, other than that the goblins talked about sacrificing her to their dark god, Maglubiyet.  She also remembers the stink of wet dog fur, wolves exactly.  Many, many wolves, as she was led through some sort of den.  After that she fell unconscious.<img src="http://www.zikadik.com/silverymoon/raven.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />She has no idea where she is, or how to get out.  Fortunately, when the goblins kidnapped her, they also razed her home and stole all of her belongings. The group finds her clothes and gear in the adjacent Winch Room. Ravenous, she accepts their offerings of dried fruit and water since the goblins had not exactly been the kindest of hosts. While she eats, the others explain what they’re doing here.In short, a wizard named Balthazar has hired them to capture ten living goblins.  Originally, the wizard said the goblins were part of a magical ritual where he turned them into pigs at the behest of the mayor of Everlund, Mayor Horace Burger.  Balthazar’s assistant, the scarred pig-keeper Blackjack, has sneeringly told them otherwise.<img src="http://www.zikadik.com/silverymoon/blackjack.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />Balthazar is a devious illusionist, and he is actually cooking the goblins into a stew and using the stew to magically subdue a local, bloodthirsty colony of bugbears.  Because of their racial familiarity, the enchanted goblin stew can be bewitched to incite different emotions in their relatives, the bugbears.  In this case, lethargy and hunger. [GM Note: I don’t know if you guys remember, but in the first adventure with the ogres and hill giant, they had some bugbear slaves on chains that were acting very strange]. Any leftovers are mixed with pig meat and sold to Burger’s Palace in Everlund, where the mildly addictive food is bringing in customers by the droves. Balthazar uses disguises to portray different people. Between money paid by Mayor Horace for fixing the bugbear problem, and money made from Burger’s Palace, Balthazar has been raking in a large amount of gold every month.  BUT…he needs many goblins to keep up the pace, and Blackjack failed this month to meet the quota.<img src="http://www.zikadik.com/silverymoon/baltha.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />The group has seen Balthazar in action and knows that he is a powerful adversary, so they rather not tangle with him.  But ultimately they need to find proof of his activities and bring that information to Merple the Moneylender in Silverymoon……but right now they have bigger problems.   This goblin warren which is turning out to be much larger than they originally thought and is riddled with deadly traps. And about then, the deep, deep throb of DRUMS begins again.  The goblins apparently haven’t forgotten about their presence. “LEMME OUTTA HERE!” the fat goblin shouts, rattling the bars of his cage.  “Grishog will tear ya to pieces!”<img src="http://www.zikadik.com/silverymoon/bal.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />“And why should we let you out?” asks Nari-lana, but the goblin has no good answer.  They leave him be to his ranting.Altogether they have 5 goblins captured for Balthazar the wizard, including Balgron (Boss Fatty, who is more dangerous than he appears). The other four are locked up in the centipede cages above the portcullis room, and furthermore, the group has found a small goblin door leading southward from the tunnel.  Merric volunteers to investigate. He finds that the tunnel extends only twenty or thirty feet to a dead end wall.  Two vertical slots are carved through the rock, and attached to the wall on either side of the tunnel rest two long gaff hooks.  Light from the sunrod reveals a strange room on the other side of the slots.  There is a large wooden cage to the left, dangling above a floor that Merric can’t see, although he hears sloshing water.  The cage is big enough to fit five or six human-sized people, and it is attached to a rope and pulley system.  It looks like the cage can be maneuvered across the room to an exit on the far side. However, the two gaff hooks are exactly long enough to reach through the gaps in the wall to the rope and pulley. After long deliberation, Merric surmises that he’s looking at a trap from the goblin’s perspective. There must be another way to reach the cage, and once victims are partway across, the goblins must reach out with the hooks and somehow cause the cage to fall.And there’s something down there in the water, he can hear it sloshing about, but the angle of the little windows is insufficient to reveal the floor. For now, they decide to leave the room alone, but they have no idea how to get inside, or if it’s even necessary. They discuss their options, realizing that they could have missed a secret door somewhere and will probably never find it. There is one door they skipped, a small goblin door with the engraved words “Head Takers, Skin Rakers, Knee Breakers…” a goblin warning for “Don’t Go In There!” They decided to leave it alone previously.  If there are no goblins there, then it probably doesn’t lead anywhere useful. That leaves just the watery spiked trap room with the narrow ledges, so that’s where they head next. <img src="http://www.zikadik.com/silverymoon/shar2.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />Crossing this chamber might be a problem though.  Fortunately, the group finds that their new companion, Raven the Druid, has some excellent skills.  With a click of her fingers, she instantly transforms into a rat and scampers across the narrow walkway to the far side.  Any goblins watching through the murder holes ignore her passage. She finds that the tunnel turns east and ends immediately, but there is a brick wall here, with a loose brick lying on the floor.  Written on the wall in goblin are the words: “Head Takers, Skin Rakers. Knee Breakers.”  Another warning. Her little mousy nose detects the whiff of fish, so scampering up the wall, she sits in the hole.  She sees a natural cavern beyond, and a limestone staircase leading down into darkness and water. A cool breeze ruffles her fur. There’s not much more she can do in rat form, so Raven transforms back to human.  Well, the rest of the party needs to cross the water spike trap, so anchoring ropes at either end of the tunnel for hand support, Nari-lana the genasi swordmage goes first.And, as suspected, the goblins jab spears out, giggling hideously the whole time.  She is painfully impaled by five hits, but with support from the rope, the goblins can’t push her into the spikes.  Douvan and Jolen cross next and are likewise stabbed repeatedly, but Merric and Blackjack are able to rush by relatively unscathed [GM Note: the group suffered about 50 total points of damage from the spears].  They search the entire short hallway but find no other exit, and no way to reach the enemies behind the walls.  The only other option is to knock down the brick wall, so they begin hammering into it with a morning star.Before long the bricks are bashed apart and they find themselves looking down into a natural cavern.For Jolen the cleric and Douvan the ranger, this place feels eerily familiar.  They were attacked by throngs of goblin-fish monsters in a cavern much like this one. <img src="http://www.zikadik.com/silverymoon/shar3.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />Apparently, the cavern descends beneath the river trap tunnel, and they suspect that it reaches the subterranean lake.  Well, the party is at six members now, so they feel well equipped to handle whatever problems might emerge.  They decide to investigate. And that’s when Nari-lana, Jolen and Douvan all slip and tumble down the slick limestone stairs, piling atop each other at the bottom in a bruised heap in ankle-deep water. [That was hilarious].<img src="http://www.zikadik.com/silverymoon/shar4.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />They pick themselves up and look around.  The cavern extends into a tunnel, but the frigid water gradually gets deeper and deeper. Soon they’re sloshing up to their thighs and Merric the Halfling has to leap on Douvan’s back.  The bitterly cold water also forces Endurance checks that could have sapped Douvan and Jolen’s final Healing Surge, but everyone manages to endure the pain and press onward.And then they see the blue glow. Jolen and Douvan saw it before, when they were being attacked by the fishy goblins under the Basin room. They advance very, very carefully, listening to the sound of sloshing water as something besides them is moving out there.  And turning the corner around a clump of stalagmites, Nari-lana sees something hideous.<img src="http://www.zikadik.com/silverymoon/shar5.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" /></blockquote>

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