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Message: <blockquote data-quote="ilgatto" data-source="post: 9775449" data-attributes="member: 86051">Duergar & Daemons Part XV: Savants & Dragons – ContinuedThe door opens and our noble heroes and Sir Eber’s slaves enter a large hall, all of eighty feet wide and thirty deep, with several doors in it – the double doors to their right, a smaller one to their left, and two sets of double doors again in the opposite wall. All double doors are clad with copper featuring many, many eyes and our noble heroes notice that the walls are unusually thick. The hall is clean and empty, its only feature being a central, lowered section some forty feet wide and ten deep and with steps leading into it along its walls.“Remind you of something?,” Navarre murmurs to Sir Suvali, looking at the copper-clad doors.As if to belie his shrill voice, the duergar the chevalier has been speaking to turns out to be quite muscular, although he seems older than most duergar our noble heroes have seen so far. He is holding a bullseye lantern, something they have not seen on their sojourn in the Underdark so far.“Welcome to Dragon Point,” the duergar says. “I am a servant and I will be your guide. You will leave your slaves and dogs in here and they will be taken care of as befits their status. Now, if you would follow me?”“Is that an arena?,” Sir Eber asks, pointing to the lowered section.The servant nods and walks to one of the double doors in the far wall. He opens them and gestures our noble heroes to proceed. They enter a room some forty feet to a side, which conveys the impression of a cross between the common room of an inn and the grand entrance hall of a castle. It is empty and deserted like the first room and another set of copper-clad double doors with many eyes in them sits in the far wall.“I say,” Navarre addresses their guide. “What’s with the eyes? Is there a religious connotation?”“They are the eyes of Laduguer,” the servant replies. “The good eye and the evil eye. This is the good eye. It protects from evil and offense.”“Do they move?,” Sir Eber asks.“Some priests can see through them,” the servant says.“Are you priests?”“No, no. The priests are insane.”“So what are your books about?,” the ranger continues.“Genealogy for the most part,” the servant says.“Anything on mining? Smithing?”“That, too.”The next set of doors take our noble heroes into a hallway ten feet wide and eighty long. Many doors sit in its walls, all evenly spaced in an orderly manner, while, about halfway down, some steps up lead off of it. Again, there is not a soul in sight.“Why the empty halls?,” Navarre asks the servant.“Dragon Point is sometimes used for special occasions,” the servant says. “The halls are for such occasions.”“So this is a university?,” Sir Eber asks.“A monastery,” the servant says. “It is a retreat for men who exchange duergar society for a life of contemplation.”He takes the company to the steps.“Follow me, gentlemen,” he says, starting up the steps. “I hope you are up for a stiff walk.”After some ten yards the steps level out into another hallway that leads our noble heroes to a spiraling staircase. They follow the servant up the stairs and pass a set of iron double doors to their left after some five ever-widening rotations. It features an extensive relief of weapons, shields, helmets, and similar accouterments of war.“The war room,” the servant says, continuing his ascent.After yet another five, six, ever-widening rotations, our noble heroes pass another door, this one made of wood and clad with iron plates, the whole carved to resemble a bookcase behind a grating. There are no more such features for some time after this.“What is your rank?,” Sir Eber asks, leading the ascent behind the servant.“We have no ranks as savants,” the servant says. “Compared to ranked warriors I am rank seven.”“So you are the head guardian?”The servant seems to consider this for a while.“Hmm….” he says eventually. “We are all equals here. I have been specially selected from a number of applicants.”“How many of you are there?”“Ten.”All of twenty minutes of climbing later, the servant halts at a third door, the stairs continuing past it. This door is also made of wood and it is clad with copper sheeting featuring an abstract, geometric design.“Follow me,” the servant says, opening the door and stepping through.Now, to their considerable surprise, our noble heroes are led, past two more servants, into a small, hall-like room lit by candles. Thick rugs on the floor, wainscoting and paintings on the walls, and a variety of similarly extravagant features all lend the room something of the grandeur of the entrance hall of a grand manor. Pillars and statues in the typical austere, heroic-realistic style of the duergar serve to further enrich the room. More halls, doorways, halls, and yet other doorways like this follow until the servant takes them through a door to their left into what can only be described as a sumptuous refectory, with crystal chandeliers, carved chairs, and a large central table hiding under what appears to be damask adding to the rugs on the floor and the wainscoting and paintings on the walls.“Please be seated,” the servant says, gesturing to the chairs.“I say!,” Navarre finally exclaims in amazement, without sitting down.“Une merveille!,” the chevalier agrees, turning an eager eye to the cloth on the table. “Is that damask?”“It is spidersilk,” the servant says.“Mon Dieu!,” the chevalier exclaims, his hand gliding over the cloth. “Quelle douceur! Is it for sale? Can it be traded for books?”“It is quite an expensive commodity,” the servant says.The chevalier spends several minutes roaming the room, inspecting everything in it to his excited exclamations and appraising touch.“Some refreshments?,” the servant asks, when the others have taken seats as indicated by him.Not expecting much despite his surroundings, Navarre proposes a balanced selection of the various meats, cheeses, pastries, and sauces he has had occasion to taste before, and some gnome blood to wash them down with. Moments later, a fourth servant brings in the food and drink and our noble heroes spend some time discussing the room, with Navarre being just about the only one to partake of the refreshments as usual.Ten minutes later, the doors open and four duergar enter the room. They are unlike any other duergar our noble heroes have seen so far, both in appearance and demeanor. Clad in sober, gray robes, they have white hair, beards, and bushy eyebrows, and they shuffle about in all modesty, their hands folded into their robes and their eyes averted as they join our noble heroes at the table.“Messires!,” the chevalier starts. “I have to speak up! Quelle hospitalité! It is unmatched, on par even with the grandeur of Sarazin! And it is only in the rarest of instances that I allow myself to make such a compliment!”“Sarazin?,” one of the robed duergar says.“Ma famille,” the chevalier explains. “Ma… clan!”Some nodding of white heads.“We represent the last vestiges of civilization in a society that has fallen to barbarism,” one of the savants says.“An unfortunate state of affairs,” Navarre says grimly. “And one that has been noted.”“A-ha-ha-ha!,” the chevalier interjects, gesturing at the chandeliers overhead. “Merveilleux! Les lustres! Crystal in the kingdom of the duergar!”“Eh, bien,” he suddenly changes his tune. “We are looking for a way back to the surface.”In the ensuing conversation, the duergar savants, although well-spoken, prove to be the epitome of arch-conservatism, frowning even upon the presence of our noble heroes in their hallowed halls and quite unwilling to divulge just about anything about the duergar empire or, indeed, the Underdark in general. They show no interest at all in the surface world and its affairs, let alone in ways to get to it, which they repeatedly say do not exist anywhere within their tower. In fact, their disinterest in the surface world seems to be so profound that, in the end, some of our noble heroes actually start wondering whether some compelling force may be at work to ensure exactly that.When, after some time, Sir Suvali procures his notes on the strange egg our noble heroes have found, Navarre suggests an exchange of information regarding the nature of the pillar. But even this mentioning of the egg only leads to some apprehensive looks from the savants.“The cambion duergar was interested in exactly such an exchange,” one of them says. “It led to nothing good.”“Surely there is a difference between now and then,” Navarre says. “I would argue there is a definite need to learn as much about each other as possible at this specific moment in time.”“Doubt and uncertainty is of all times,” the savant says. “It makes little difference to those who live in them.”“Just so,” Navarre says, seeing the savant’s point. “But surely there is at least some difference? Does one not learn from the mistakes of the past? Consider and forgive the transgressions of one against the other?”“Time and time again, the past teaches us that it repeats itself,” the savant says. “Increasing contact between our species will only take us closer to the inevitable consequence. It cannot bring an escape from it.”“You may be interested in this,” Sir Suvali barges in as he procures the spell book he found in the egg.“Ah-a-a!,” the savant exclaims, apparently finally presented with something that does have the interest of the assembly. But when he does not seem inclined to touch the volume at all, the sorcerer decides to put all of his cards on the table and he presently procures the folio he retrieved from Loremaster Fist’s cottage.“We will pay you two hundred and fifty gold to copy these pages,” the savant says after he has paged through the latter volume and handed it to one of his colleagues.“Grant me a visit to your library and it is yours,” the sorcerer says.“That is not an option,” the savant says. “You must ask for something else.”“Such as? A guided visit?”Has the sorcerer just made a joke?“The use of your way to the surface could be a good start,” Navarre suggests.“Dragon Point has lain in splendid isolation since times immemorial,” the savant says.Some time before this, the chevalier has been trying to convince two of the other savants of the advantages of a trade deal between their two peoples and he has learned that their interests lie in history, crafts, architecture, and engineering.“Then I see nothing to prevent a profitable exchange!,” he exclaims. “We have galleries and halls full of all that on the surface.”“Evidently, a caravan of books would be very well received,” one of the savants says.“Évidemment! Anything is possible if you assist us on our way to the surface!”“The best exit is via the tin mine you mentioned in this respect,” the savant says. “Other exits do exist but these are in private hands.”“Would one of these be owned by the raiders?”“Very likely.”“How many raiders lurk in their lair?,” Sir Eber comes in. “Able men?”“A hundred and fifty?,” the savant suggests.“And their ranks? On average?”“Raiders are more capable than their ranks would suggest,” the savant says. “Raiders of the fifth rank are many times more powerful than other duergar of the same rank.”Which is the DM’s way of explaining that most of the raiders are multi-classed duergar.Eventually, both conversations become one and then the savant Sir Suvali has been speaking with proposes that the monastery will pay fifty gold per spell level for spell books in general.“Do you have any books like it?,” the sorcerer asks.“No.”“Now look here, old sport,” Navarre says, growing tired of the savants constantly speaking of money instead of something more useful in exchange for what must surely be a unique opportunity. “Coin is not the issue and there will be plenty of it when the trade caravan arrives. What we require is information. Information about the pillar, about what lies beyond The Forest, about ‛dimensions’!”“Yes,” one of the savants says pensively, apparently more to himself than anyone else. “We may have books about these subjects.”“I propose that we remain your guests for a ten-day,” Sir Suvali says. “You will copy my notes on the egg in my presence and answer any questions I might have about what I have written. I will add Loremaster Fist’s folio to the deal.”“That is something we can agree to,” the savant says. “The arrangement shall remain limited to these conditions.”And so Sir Suvali and the savants repair to some other room where the copying and questioning will begin.“Right,” Sir Eber says, addressing one of the servants when the savants and the sorcerer are gone. “How’s about you and me have at it for a bit in the arena below?”Night 143-153: As is often the case in situations like these, everything that follows is dealt with in a bit of a haphazard fashion. First, our noble heroes are assigned quarters off some hallway somewhere in the complex, where they have the use of a sauna, bedrooms, and a kitchen. Each can only be accessed through a single door and then exited by way of another, which turns out to apply to most other rooms in the complex. Right across the hallway from their quarters a staircase leads to what will presumably be the upper reaches of the tower.When they ask a servant, our noble heroes are told that they share (this part of?) the complex with some thirty to forty duergar, very few of which they will see in the next ten-day, if any at all.One day, Navarre suggests an expedition up the stairs across the hallway, upon which Sir Suvali says that he will ask the savants for permission when he sees them next. On this occasion, the sorcerer is informed that “nobody ever goes there” because it is a “scary place.” When he explicitly asks them for their permission to climb the stairs and whether he would have to face any guards or traps on his way, the savants shrug. They do not seem interested in the subject at all and the sorcerer concludes that the place is unlikely to be guarded.And so, late one morning, up the stairs it is. These are over ten feet wide, with the ceiling at some six feet, and it takes our noble heroes twenty minutes of climbing (“two kilometers, twice the height of the Domtoren”) before they notice the faintest of lights coming from somewhere up ahead. The light grows brighter and brighter as they continue their ascent until it actually hurts their eyes and then, when the temperature also starts to drop, our noble heroes can only conclude that they must be approaching a space with an open connection to the surface world!And sure enough, minutes later and still shielding their eyes, our noble heroes emerge in the corner of a large, natural, circular, cavern-like room sixty feet in diameter and with a domed ceiling all of thirty feet overhead. Daylight comes streaming in through eight huge windows, each fifteen feet tall and some four and a half wide and located at one of the eight points of the compass. A construct in the form of a large upright “X” is anchored to the floor in front of each window. A fierce, cold wind blows through the room and each window seems large enough to provide access for a small dragon, which our noble heroes do not actually realize because they have not thought about dragons for the best part of their lives but which they sort of still do.Marveling at where they are, our noble heroes have to continue shielding their eyes for some time until they can finally look outside – and are presented with a breathtaking view of all of The Forest. Below them, under a bright, sunny sky, the trees stretch far, far rimward to the mountains in the distance. Other windows reveal vistas along the coast, across the ocean, and to the Isle of Bread. Our noble heroes take in the views overcome by feelings of awe and wonder, some in stunned silence, others to excited cries, still others to both.With our noble heroes now able to see most of The Forest, the DM reveals that his map is based on a sketch for the second campaign he based his story on and there is a moment of contemplating absent friends.Sir Suvali (who else?) is the first to get going again and he presently jumps out of the rimward window, unfolding the wings of his flying contraption as he does so. He soon soars high and above and estimates that room he just left is actually the hollowed-out top of a tall mountain that rises about a kilometer above the trees and that, if dragons do exist, this would have to be their ultimate lair.Ah, and yes, back in the room, one of our noble heroes discovers the skeleton of a duergar on one of the cross-like constructs. Quite a way to go in more than one respect.As to the copying and questioning, the savants inform Sir Suvali that the priest of Lost Yerichor was a ‛true-blood’ duergar and the half-brother of the ‛cambion’ duergar; that the latter was born of a succubus in a time when the mad priests began establishing contact with some of the various planes of existence; that the cambion was delivered to one of the mad priests as a baby and that he developed wizardly powers when he grew up; that Lost Yerichor was probably built by the White Wizard, a female, spell-using white dragon – a rare occurrence; that the duergar first came to the pillar as servants and/or allies of a family of white dragons; that, in principle, duergar priests can contact the Elemental Plane of Earth, allowing them to summon earth elementals; that this leads to contact with other planes of existence on occasion.As the days pass and the copying proceeds, Sir Suvali, in an attempt to learn as much of the duergar tongue as possible, does his best to try and understand what the savants are saying when they converse among themselves, to their considerable displeasure when they realize what he is doing. The sorcerer is usually in the company of two of savants, one servant, and a scribe – all with the same strange, all-encompassing blind spot for anything and everything not pertaining to the Underdark.And Sir Eber? Sir Eber manages to bring his opponent to his knees and -9 hit points in but three rounds, inflicting 53 hp damage in the first two rounds while suffering 29 himself. He announces that he is somewhat startled by the result and then two servants pick up their fallen colleague and drag him out of the hall.</blockquote>

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