ooc - Sorry to lose ya, Mirth. Good luck wrapping up that degree. I'll autopilot Ys-Baddaden for now in hopes we'll see you at the end of the summer...just in time for this game's one year anniversary.
*****
<Stealth group>
Once in position, Danwyn hurls a length of heavy branch over the hill toward the others, cuing them to enter. With torches blazing, Danwyn, Aurial, and Pyior slip through the brush and into the small cave entrance.
The reek of decay is nearly enough to trigger gag reflexes, but there are no bodies in the immediate vicinity. The passage is narrow and winds snake-like back some fifty feet before opening into a large chamber nearly fifty feet in diameter. Several rhodin bodies litter the room, though they have been gnawed down to the bones by scavengers. A centipede almost two feet in length scuttles out from one of the skull casings at the party's approach and hurries off into a hole in the wall.
One section of the floor and wall shows signs of scorching. As the scouts had suggested yesterday, Pyior concludes that it was likely caused by a magical source. Perhaps to hammer home the point, scratched into the soot on the wall is an arcane symbol that Pyior recognizes as meaning "obscure."
Another passage leaves this chamber through the opposite side from which the party entered.
*****
<Noisy group>
With torches and weapons at the ready, the giant brothers and Runther move into the cave with careful deliberation after the branch crashes into the brush nearby.
The reek of decay is palpable and three picked over rhodin bodies litter the first thirty feet of twisting passageway. The passage then branches off in multiple directions - four to the right, one to the left, and one straight ahead. If the two cave entrances connect, the stealthy group would likely be coming in from somewhere off to the right.
Runther squats down and carefully studies the dirt floor for tracks. He pauses before each of the paths.
"The tracks are difficult to see through the layers of traffic this cave has seen," he whispers. "It looks as through the troll or trolls have been down all of the passages. If I had to guess, I'd say the traffic was heaviest down the third passage on the right and the one that goes straight ahead."
