(Adventure) Dwarven Golems and Old Ruins (GaryH Judging)

[Argent Silvermage]

Shariff winks and says We'll both go. and heads into the next room using move silent and hide.

 

[Creamsteak]

The adjacent room is quite large. The entrance is only 40 feet long, but the room expands quickly and has a diameter of at least 200 feet. As you slowly inspect this room, you can tell that there are many "machines" buried in the dirt here. In the very back of the cavernous area are two landmarks. The first is a pool of water that looks clean enough to drink, like a small man-made reservoir. The other landmark is a metal object half buried in the wall, of spherical shape. It provides ambient light throughout the entire cavern, making it easy to see where your going.

Theres something about the room that makes a person feel like they are being watched, but you can't find any real evidence to support this intuition. After a few minutes, you can confirm that the only leftover equipment in this cavern is that of one of the constructs that has been broken apart and spread out over an area of dirt.

 

[Argent Silvermage]

Shariff stays in the room looking at the mechanism that has been opened up and sends Popgoes out to the others. He squeeks to get thier attention and tries to nudge Silvercat towards the room. From the other room he says It's clear here everyone. come on in.

 

[Mithreander]

"What the hell were you doing? Why'd you run? You left us to die, if it wasn't for the ferret I'd have my throat slit by now by that damn elf..."

Gregorian bows his head in acknowledgement, and says "You are right. I'm sorry, I had no idea how much of an adversary that drow would be. I saw you take down the other drow we met with such skill and precision, that I thought you would not need my help... and besides, you are not dead."

Gregorian helps the injored to where they are more confortable, or to the next chamber with the spherical machine/davice in it, if that's what they want to do.

"as it turns out, it's a good thing that I did. I, like the rest of you, did not trust that old explorer any further then I could throw him. He was running. I was able to convince him to give us the amount he had promised before he left, plus some." Gregorian shows the pouch of coins to the group. "There is 600gp there, 100 more then he had promised us. There is more, however. He still wants us to shut down the device that controls the constructs." Gregorian motions with his head towards the glowing spherical shape. "Actually, it seems he knew of the drow that you faced, and thought you all would be dead. He lacked the faith that I had in you, so the task was given to me, in particular. He ofered an extra 4300gp to get that acomplished." Gregorian looks at each of his companions doubting faces and answers the unasked question.

"I know he is gone and we may not be able to find him, much less collect the money if we do actually complete the service he had given us, but I tried to secure it as best I can. He gave me his light stone as a token of his willingness to carry through his side of the bargan. If we complete the task, return the light stone to him, he'll pay the rest of the money to us." Gregorian smiles at the others and continues. "Now, the question is... should we do it? We really do not know what cutting up that sphere will do, or unleash, since he seemed to think it was hollow."

 

[Argent Silvermage]

Shariff walks over to the sphere and starts examining it. he will not touch it until he is sure there are no traps around it. This is the kind of thing I came along for. I'm an armor smith and all of this fascinates me. You all rest. I'll see what I can find out.

 

[Mithreander]

Gregorian smiles. He had hoped that one of the others would have a way of determining what may happen if the sphere was damaged, and it looked like Sharrif was the one.

"If there is anything I can do to help, let me know." Gregorian spies the stuff that came off of the drow and says "We'll have to split that among ourselves once the others are feeling better, but in the meantime, we should keep it all together." He moves to the pile and places the items he had recieved from Sullivan with them. "We should also look into burrying the drow body. It may attract scavengers."

 

[Dungannon]

"I'm not sure burying it is an option, but maybe you could move into the same chamber as Jef, so the corpses are at least contained in one area..." Devlin comments. Now that his wounds are bound, he tries to test his limits by standing, or at least leaning somewhat vertically against the wall.

 

[Uriel]

Staying quiet throughout Gregorian's speech, Silvercat has nothing to add regarding the Sphere, as it is an Enigma to him.

 

[Mithreander]

Gregorian looks at the stone ground and blushes. "Yes, of course! My fault. ALright, I'll move the body by the ogre-giant."

Gregorian then struggles to drag the drow elf to where Jef is, happy that his companions had already stripped most of the heavy things off it's body, and that elves tend to slight.

 

[Creamsteak]

The spherical bronze object is perhaps 3 meters in diameter. It is covered in creases following in straight lines webbing across the the shell of the mechanation. At the base, you can see that at least five bronze pipes are fitted to the device. These pipes have their own warm glow, as if they are full of heat. The orangish gold hue of highly warmed bronze could be a sign of malfunction or usual operation, but it is difficult to really tell with no knowledge of the machine. Any hard knock against the orb creates an echo that leads one to believe the device is hollow.

Three of the pipes have cranks attached, similar to the one that operated the chain-held gate in the connecting section of the labyrinth. There are a handful of markings on each crank, written in Dwarven:

Spoiler

"Cool Aether, Hot Aether, Siphoning."

Shariff:

Spoiler

You sense something magic about the orb, even without any spell. It's so thick in the air that you can taste it, smell it, feel it, and almost eat it.