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<blockquote data-quote="NCSUCodeMonkey" data-source="post: 576930" data-attributes="member: 2047"><p><strong>Prelude: A Trek in the Dark -- Session II</strong></p><p></p><p><a href="http://fr.mattkendall.net/phpBB/album_view.php?id=16" target="_blank">Meree's Pictoral History for Prelude Session 2</a></p><p></p><p><em>Our second session got underway immediately. I drew out the map of the exterior and told the party which direction they were approaching from.</em></p><p></p><p>Everyone raced across the frosted ground, altering their course slightly when they saw what appeared to be an exterior door that had been ripped off its hinges. The party pulled up about 20 feet short of the door and approached a little more cautiously. The entrance the party chose was originally a set of double doors, which now lay shattered and broken, apparently by a creature with claws. Devan confirmed that they were left by the gargoyle.</p><p></p><p>As the group readies to go in, everyone is surprised by the sudden appearance of a human along the edge of the woods. The newcomer is instantly the focus of Devan's bow, and Antonius turns his sword towards the stranger. A voice of reason comes from Thorongil, "Hold, your weapons. I know this man. I don't know what he's doing here, but his name is Melkor."</p><p></p><p>Antonius and Devan were not convinced. "Why should we trust him?" Devan asked over her taunt bow-arm.</p><p></p><p>Meanwhile, Melkor was approaching the group open handed, offering no sign of attacking. When he got within speaking distance he explained himself, "I arrived at Olostin's Hold a few hours after you left. I found out that Thorongil was getting paid to track something through the forest and figured there should be room for me. So here I am."</p><p></p><p>"Throrongil?" asked Antonius, who was still pointing his sword at Melkor.</p><p>"I'll vouch for him. He's a good man."</p><p></p><p>"Allright," replied the paladin, "I hope you know what you're doing."</p><p></p><p>Shifting slightly to allow the newcomer into their midst, the party turned their attention back to the shattered doorway. The fighters, Eon, Thorongil, and Antonius, moved forward into the building. The large double doors opened into a medium sized chamber that filled the entire "pod." Inside were several stables and a large cistern. There was an opening in the roof above the cistern to allow precipitation to fall into the vessel. As the party took all this in they were attacked by a large, undead, northern cow. The shaggy beast's throat had been opened by a vicious dagger wound, and it still gushed blood as it tried to slam in to party members. Everyone quickly scrambled in and dispatched the beast. Further inspection of the room revealed that the cistern was actually opened onto an area below the current floor, but the passage was blocked by a grate. They also found a door in the corner of the room.</p><p></p><p>The door lead down a large connective hallway to the central pod. The central area seemed to be some sort of cutting area. Large stacks of wood and partially cut logs lay around the floor. Several doors led away from the area, including one at the bottom of a short stairwell leading down. This area seemed to double as meat storage, as jerked meat was hung from the ceiling. Large areas of the room, including the stairway and the meat, was blocked off by hastily installed steel bars. In the middle of the room, rocking back and forth was a small child. As the party entered the room, she stood and turned to face them, her head lolling to the side from the vicious stab wounds across her neck and chest. She began to chant and wail, "You cannot stop him, she knows all! You cannot stop her! Jerimiar! Jerimiar! Jerimiar! Jerimiar!" As the girl chanted the name, the party felt a chill prickle their spines, as if some evil force had taken notice of them.</p><p></p><p>Thoroughly freaked out, the party charged into action, slinging spells and blades at the undead child. As they reached the center of the room, they also saw a second group of enemies: undead chickens charging across the floor. The battle was rather anti-climatic, with the undead child going down in the first round quickly followed by the chickens. One chicken did manage to clock Thorongil in the forehead before being cleaved in two by his scimitar.</p><p></p><p><em>I'd like to take a moment to thank one of my best DMs ever for the idea of the undead farm animals. It is such a wonderful trick and adds flavor to the normal low level zombie battles that so many first level adventurers wade through. There's nothing quite like fighting a swirling cloud of undead chickens :-D. It also helped to lighten the mood of an encounter with a child stab-wound victim.</em></p><p></p><p>After searching around for several minutes, the party is eventually drawn to the encaged stairwell. Melkor takes a few attempts at the lock before giving up and letting Thorongil bash it throughly with his morningstar. Everyone tromps down the steps, with Devan and Thorongil in the lead. Devan pauses at the bottom of the stairs and places an ear up against the door. She faintly hears distant yelling. Certain they are hot on the trail of their quarry, she yanks on the doorknob which, much to her horror, comes off in her hand and causes a portcullis to crash down onto her and Thorngil. Both the ranger and the barbarian failed to leap out of the way, and get nasty cuts on their legs from the closing gate. Shaken, the party does some quick healing and lifts the gate passing into the area beyond.</p><p></p><p>The basement level of the complex is obviously living quarters for three men and a small girl. After the initial faint noises heard by Devan, no one hears any more screaming. Rooting through the property of the now, obviously deceased, occupants, the group uncovers a healing kit, some rations, a bear-skin rug, and a journal (included below). Meree, while playing dressup in the child's closet, also discovers something: a slightly ajar door with a faint tinge of green light seeping in from the far side. She can also finally hear the screaming that Devan detected earlier.</p><p></p><p>Meree quickly alerts the rest of the party, and everyone files through the door in the back of the girl's closet. The door opens into a natural cavern area, and Redival quickly realizes that the entire living space is built inside of a natural cavern. This coincides with the journal entries. With weapons drawn and spells readied, everyone advances down the corridor, heading towards the green light and the source of the babbled screaming. The party rounds a corner, and perched on the rim of a large, natural, cistern is their quarry. He is grasping the dagger tightly in his fist, and it is radiating a large aura of sickly green light. The gargoyle was a quite talkative opponent.</p><p></p><p><em>Before the session, I had everyone turn in "secrets" for their character. I told them this could be a huge secret, or a small one -- anything their character would not want to be general knowledge.</em></p><p></p><p>Throughout the entire combat, the gargoyle shouted streams of gibberish followed by laments such as "Where is the chest? Where have you taken it? It should be here! She says it is here, where is it!", etc. His voice seemed to be two-tonal, with a deep guttural growl overlaid by a feminine screech of sorts. Whenever anyone got close to the creature he would look at them and spit an insult that seemed to be intensely personalized. For example, the beast snarled, "Am I to fear the drunkard who's sword is as dull as his wits?" at Antonius, hinting to some past the paladin would have probably best left off of the table.</p><p></p><p>The battle with the gargoyle was satisfyingly difficult. The party got an early lead by nicking the beast with a few ranged attacks, but he responded by using Ray of Enfeeblement on Melkor and his negative energy touch on Antonius. In the end, however, mob tactics and missile fire won out, and the dagger fell from the gargoyle's slack grip.</p><p></p><p>Antonius carefully scooped the dagger up in a sheet from the living quarters, and Meree did a quick detect magic on the gargoyle. He seemed to be wearing a magical headband, which changed into a hat when removed from his head. Curious, the gnome packed it away for further study. Redival, in for more gruesome trophies, hacked the gargoyle's head free, and wedged it into her pack -- earning a few startled looks from several party members.</p><p></p><p><em>I'm still waiting for the party to have a discussion with Redival about her "collection." She has become quite fond of celtic-style trophies of late, but the subject hasn't come up for group discussion.</em></p><p></p><p>Operating on the ranting of the gargoyle, and clues found in the journal, the party felt that there was something more to be found in the cistern. After searching for a bit, they found a circular joint in the bottom of the cistern that had been caulked several times. By carefully wedging and pulling, they were able to remove a large plug from the bottom of the cistern, which promptly drained all the water into a small room below.</p><p></p><p>Curiosity overcame the group, and they all hopped down through the cistern into the pool of murky water below. Quite unexpectedly, everyone instantly felt an invasive force grip their mind out of the darkness. After a few moments of hanging mid-air, paralyzed, the party heard a voice telepathically within their minds.</p><p>"Why are you here?" Asked the voice, which sounds like one voice imposed upon a multitude of whispering voices, is definitely feminine.</p><p></p><p>"We came to stop a murder...who are you?" <em>This is a summary of the general babble that followed the voice's question.</em></p><p></p><p>"My name is...Kihmet. I...died. I do not know how I came to be imprisoned here, but I am bound to protect a great treasure that lies in this room. My power is waning, and soon I will not have the ability to protect it." There is a pause before the spirit continues, "I must do everything that I can to ensure that this treasure does not fall in to evil hands. Therefore, I must test you. If I find you worthy, I will relinquish the treasure into your protection. If you are not worthy, I will slay you in the hopes that the next group to discover this place are of good intent. The test is simple. I will ask you three questions. These are not riddles, there is no single right answer, but the wrong answer will mean your death. I will ask for your consensus and then ask you individually if you agree. You will be compelled to speak the truth, I would not suggest lying. I will not listen to your deliberation, only your final answers. Do you understand?"</p><p></p><p>Having little choice but to agree to the spirit's terms, they each agreed mentally.</p><p></p><p>"Good. I wish to know: What is the embodiment of truth? What is the heart of love? What is the purpose of honor? I will return in ten minutes."</p><p></p><p><em>At this point I left the room, so I really have no idea what actually passed between the characters in the deliberations. Perhaps I can coerce one of them into posting what was said.</em></p><p>After ten minutes, the spirit returned to collect the party's answers. The group selected Meree as the spokesperson, since she had recorded the answers.</p><p></p><p>The spirit formally intoned, "What is the embodiment of truth?"</p><p></p><p>Meree responded, "Truth is Nature, because in Nature there are no lies."</p><p></p><p>Solemnly, the spirit asked each member if they agreed with the response. Each person answered a resounding yes...until the voice reached the last person and asked Meree. "No," she replied, "the embodiment of truth is knowledge. Only through learning can the truth be obtained."</p><p></p><p><em>The players all held their breath when Meree disagreed with the consensus. No one was really sure what the spirit would do if they did not all agree.</em></p><p></p><p>A tense moment of silence followed Meree's answer before the spirit continued, "What is the heart of Love?"</p><p></p><p><em>Collective exhale</em></p><p></p><p>Meree calmly replied, "Motherhood is the heart of love. There is no love greater or more fulfilling that a mother's care."</p><p></p><p>This time the party unanimously agreed on the answer, and the spirit continued, "What is the purpose of honor?"</p><p></p><p>"To govern actions between yourself and others to uphold a standard."</p><p></p><p>The first hiccup came from Antonius, who insisted, "Honor is meant to protect the weak. That is its purpose." This disagreement was immediately followed by Eon, who said, "Honor is system of beliefs used to justify one's actions." The rest of the group agreed with the consensus.</p><p></p><p>After a long pause, the spirit spoke again. "I find your words to be well spoken. I am heartened by the fact that you to not blindly follow the crowd if it conflicts with your true feelings, this speaks volumes of your judgment. I deem each of you worthy of this gift, and I have one of my own to impart. But beware, the items within the chest are not yours to give away. The gold and gems you may sell, but the items you must keep -- or fall under a dark curse. Farewell."</p><p></p><p><em>I accidentally left out the qualifying remark about being able to sell the gold and gems initially and had to make a quick correction. What good is gold if you can't spend it?</em></p><p></p><p>As the Kihmet's presence left their minds, their paralysis fell away and some of them finished the fall into the pit. In the center of the room, a spinning cube of force appeared and suddenly shattered, sending bright sparks of energy, and what appeared to be souls, in all directions. Several sparks hit the members of the party, and they felt slightly altered. Shaking slightly from the weirdness of the experience, everyone eventually began to explore the room.</p><p></p><p>They quickly found a chest in a low niche on the floor of the pit. It appeared that over the course of time, water had seeped from the cistern above and flowed around the chest into a crack at the back of the niche. The party popped open the lid and found their treasure to be quite wet. The bottom of the chest was mostly rotted away and was filled with rotten and destroyed papers. The information on the papers was indecipherable. They also discovered two vials of blue liquid, a scroll case containing a unique spell Jerimar's Retroactive Ward, a carved wooden token, and assorted gold and gems.</p><p></p><p>Meree quickly determined that the unique ward spell was what had been cast on the pit, but was unsure as to why it had broken down. The token appeared to be a token to a ward, but Meree was able to determine that it was not a key to the ward they had just set off. It apparently belonged to one of the other thousands of wards in the Silver Marches. Carved into one side of the token is a woman's head wreathed in snakes with snakes pouring out of her mouth. The other side is carved with a sailing vessel.</p><p></p><p>Satisfied that they have found all the loot, the party decides that they should begin the return journey as soon as possible. The dagger makes everyone a bit edgy, and they would like to get it back to Borstad as quickly as possible. The party doesn't get very far before bedding down for the night, still exhausted from their battles during the day.</p><p></p><p>During the first night of their rest, a dire rat approaches the camp but is spotted by the watch and flees into the night without attacking. The night was bitterly cold, and for the first time several of the party members succumb to the grip of the ice. Meree falls unconscious from subdual damage, and Thorongil has a rough night of it as well. They are both healed by Redival, and travel continues towards the Hold.</p><p></p><p>The second day of travel is uneventful, and so is the night, until Redival takes over watch from Thorongil. As she walks by Antonius, she notices that his pack is open and it's contents are strewn out across the ground. Cursing, she wakes up Antonious and goes over to chew out Thorongil, only to find the barbarian half frozen from the cold. Infuriated, the party begins to search their belongings for what is missing. They come up only one item short: the dagger.</p><p></p><p>The party makes the decision to quickly search for the thieves. Devan finds some faint tracks heading deeper into the forest, away from the Hold. She also finds dire rat tracks. The party quickly agrees that the small creatures that stole their rations before have returned. The set out in pursuit, but are delayed by the difficulty of the tracking.</p><p></p><p>After about an hour of travel, Devan finds a pit trap the hard way. She has her nose to the ground when it suddenly opens out from under her and she takes a hard fall. The party quickly pulls her out with some rope, and Melkor is placed in the lead to find any more traps. Antonius finds the next trap before Melkor can spot it, falling in a crash of armor. Sensing a pattern, they fashion a rope safety-line to keep anyone else from falling. They "find" several more pit traps, but their rope system keeps them out of harm's way.</p><p></p><p>Soon after the zone of pit traps, they finally track the footprints back to an earthen mound. One of the small creatures is standing guard outside and sees them before they can act. He quickly runs into the mound screaming what the characters assume to be an alarm.</p><p></p><p>The party makes a few smart decisions at the door. First, they place Redival in the lead. Her darkvision and size are a great asset in the dark, cramped space of the mound. Melkor also scouts around the mound for other entrances, but finds none. They sort out their light sources and begin their infiltration of the mound.</p><p></p><p>Inside they find a warren of tunnels, and are pelted on a regular basis by darts and spears. Redival managed to find another pit trap, and Thorongil got bit (and infected) by a dire rat. They experimented with splitting up, and quickly found the advantages and disadvantages of that tactic.</p><p></p><p>Most of the party was on the other end of the complex when Thorongil rounded a corner and saw a really big version of the little guys they had been fighting so far, with the dagger stuck through his belt. The larger critter cast some sort of spell and Thorongil got scared out of his wits, and ran for the nearest exit, which just happened to be an opening in the mound that Melkor had missed on his scouting run. Antonius, who was just around the corner, only sees Thorongil turn and then run screaming out of the mound. He shouts for the rest of the party and approaches cautiously.</p><p></p><p>The characters arrive in two's and three's over the next several rounds. The basic setup was the large nasty flanked by two of the normal sized critters in a rounded room about twenty feet in diameter. Antonius and Eon reach the scene immediately after Thorongil "exits," using most of their movement to get into position. The fear spell cast by the nasty cleric only lasts for a single round on Thorongil, so he starts to run back immediately after he runs away. The rest of the party was either on their way or helping Redival out of a pit, and the cleric finishes out the round by casting an unidentified spell.</p><p></p><p>The first blow was actually landed by Thorongil, who comes charging in through the hillside opening raging, blows past both of the smaller bad guys (provoking two AoAs), and slams full force into the cleric. Eon and Antonius work on the smaller opponents trying to get to the boss, but lacking the room to do so, while Meree, Devan, and Melkor work on the boss at range. A raging Thorongil, Meree's magic missile, and Devan's crack shot made quick work of the cleric, who fell to the ground and morphed into the acolyte from Olostin's Hold (the one who had been backhanded for his insolence).</p><p><em>Well...that was unexpected. <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite1" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":)" /> On a side note, Thorongil charging back into the mix was absolutely beautiful. Through pure accident, this nice corridor was established between the doorway and the cleric. He hit the guy like a sack of bricks.</em></p><p></p><p>The party should have made short work of the remaining nasties, but a series of pathetic misses let them hang on for another few seconds, until they were finally put down. A quick search of the cleric's body revealed that he carried two holy symbols: one to Lathlander and one to Shar. Redival examined the Lathlander holy symbol and noticed that it carried just enough minor flaws to be invalid. The party also discovered a temple to Shar in the warren of tunnels. Shaken, they left the mound and continued travel back to Olostin's Hold.</p><p></p><p><em>The attempt to kill the remaining enemies was really quite sad. I've never seen such a poor series of rolls. Thorongil, Eon, and Antonius ganged up on the last nasty and attacked: 1...1...1. Three 1's in a row.</em></p><p></p><p>There was some concern, especially on Redival's part, that Borstad might be involved in the plot to take the dagger. But Antonius pointed out that the cleric had not registered as evil in the Detect Evil-dar, and it was also mentioned that Borstad could have easily sent the acolyte to reclaim the dagger without involving the party. Confident that they were still doing the right thing, the party continued onward.</p><p></p><p>They got extremely lucky on their return trip and encountered no monsters in the forest. They arrived safe, and relatively sound at Olostin's Hold. Redival helped Thorongil and Eon to overcome their diseased wounds, aided by her new healing kit, and the party received the rewards and thanks of Borstad. He was terribly shaken by the news that his own acolyte was apparently a spy of Shar and began an investigation into the matter immediately.</p><p></p><p>Meanwhile, the party relaxed and began the process of leveling, their first adventure now a thing of the past.</p><p></p><p><em>At the end of this first adven I was pleasantly surprised. Everyone really puts me to the test as a DM, especially in the area of prepared material: they blast through situations like John Wayne on steroids. I am also impressed by the amount of participation and roleplaying, although I don't remember the specifics of what passes between the party members, they are constantly chatting in character around that table, and everyone synergizes really well when making decisions. I can tell this is going to be a lot of fun.</em></p><p></p><p><em>Almost forgot. Kihmet gave each of the party members a gift when she broke the ward. She gave each of them a spell-like ability, useable once per day. Here's the breakdown: Antonius->Inkling (Psi-Handbook), Devan->Know Direction, Eon->Guidance, Melkor->Mage Hand, Meree->Trinket (Psi-Handbook), Redival->Missive (Psi-Handbook), Thorongil->Lesser Natural Armor (Psi Handbook). Some of the spells were altered from their original text, but the gist is the same.</em></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="NCSUCodeMonkey, post: 576930, member: 2047"] [b]Prelude: A Trek in the Dark -- Session II[/b] [url=http://fr.mattkendall.net/phpBB/album_view.php?id=16]Meree's Pictoral History for Prelude Session 2[/url] [i]Our second session got underway immediately. I drew out the map of the exterior and told the party which direction they were approaching from.[/i] Everyone raced across the frosted ground, altering their course slightly when they saw what appeared to be an exterior door that had been ripped off its hinges. The party pulled up about 20 feet short of the door and approached a little more cautiously. The entrance the party chose was originally a set of double doors, which now lay shattered and broken, apparently by a creature with claws. Devan confirmed that they were left by the gargoyle. As the group readies to go in, everyone is surprised by the sudden appearance of a human along the edge of the woods. The newcomer is instantly the focus of Devan's bow, and Antonius turns his sword towards the stranger. A voice of reason comes from Thorongil, "Hold, your weapons. I know this man. I don't know what he's doing here, but his name is Melkor." Antonius and Devan were not convinced. "Why should we trust him?" Devan asked over her taunt bow-arm. Meanwhile, Melkor was approaching the group open handed, offering no sign of attacking. When he got within speaking distance he explained himself, "I arrived at Olostin's Hold a few hours after you left. I found out that Thorongil was getting paid to track something through the forest and figured there should be room for me. So here I am." "Throrongil?" asked Antonius, who was still pointing his sword at Melkor. "I'll vouch for him. He's a good man." "Allright," replied the paladin, "I hope you know what you're doing." Shifting slightly to allow the newcomer into their midst, the party turned their attention back to the shattered doorway. The fighters, Eon, Thorongil, and Antonius, moved forward into the building. The large double doors opened into a medium sized chamber that filled the entire "pod." Inside were several stables and a large cistern. There was an opening in the roof above the cistern to allow precipitation to fall into the vessel. As the party took all this in they were attacked by a large, undead, northern cow. The shaggy beast's throat had been opened by a vicious dagger wound, and it still gushed blood as it tried to slam in to party members. Everyone quickly scrambled in and dispatched the beast. Further inspection of the room revealed that the cistern was actually opened onto an area below the current floor, but the passage was blocked by a grate. They also found a door in the corner of the room. The door lead down a large connective hallway to the central pod. The central area seemed to be some sort of cutting area. Large stacks of wood and partially cut logs lay around the floor. Several doors led away from the area, including one at the bottom of a short stairwell leading down. This area seemed to double as meat storage, as jerked meat was hung from the ceiling. Large areas of the room, including the stairway and the meat, was blocked off by hastily installed steel bars. In the middle of the room, rocking back and forth was a small child. As the party entered the room, she stood and turned to face them, her head lolling to the side from the vicious stab wounds across her neck and chest. She began to chant and wail, "You cannot stop him, she knows all! You cannot stop her! Jerimiar! Jerimiar! Jerimiar! Jerimiar!" As the girl chanted the name, the party felt a chill prickle their spines, as if some evil force had taken notice of them. Thoroughly freaked out, the party charged into action, slinging spells and blades at the undead child. As they reached the center of the room, they also saw a second group of enemies: undead chickens charging across the floor. The battle was rather anti-climatic, with the undead child going down in the first round quickly followed by the chickens. One chicken did manage to clock Thorongil in the forehead before being cleaved in two by his scimitar. [i]I'd like to take a moment to thank one of my best DMs ever for the idea of the undead farm animals. It is such a wonderful trick and adds flavor to the normal low level zombie battles that so many first level adventurers wade through. There's nothing quite like fighting a swirling cloud of undead chickens :-D. It also helped to lighten the mood of an encounter with a child stab-wound victim.[/i] After searching around for several minutes, the party is eventually drawn to the encaged stairwell. Melkor takes a few attempts at the lock before giving up and letting Thorongil bash it throughly with his morningstar. Everyone tromps down the steps, with Devan and Thorongil in the lead. Devan pauses at the bottom of the stairs and places an ear up against the door. She faintly hears distant yelling. Certain they are hot on the trail of their quarry, she yanks on the doorknob which, much to her horror, comes off in her hand and causes a portcullis to crash down onto her and Thorngil. Both the ranger and the barbarian failed to leap out of the way, and get nasty cuts on their legs from the closing gate. Shaken, the party does some quick healing and lifts the gate passing into the area beyond. The basement level of the complex is obviously living quarters for three men and a small girl. After the initial faint noises heard by Devan, no one hears any more screaming. Rooting through the property of the now, obviously deceased, occupants, the group uncovers a healing kit, some rations, a bear-skin rug, and a journal (included below). Meree, while playing dressup in the child's closet, also discovers something: a slightly ajar door with a faint tinge of green light seeping in from the far side. She can also finally hear the screaming that Devan detected earlier. Meree quickly alerts the rest of the party, and everyone files through the door in the back of the girl's closet. The door opens into a natural cavern area, and Redival quickly realizes that the entire living space is built inside of a natural cavern. This coincides with the journal entries. With weapons drawn and spells readied, everyone advances down the corridor, heading towards the green light and the source of the babbled screaming. The party rounds a corner, and perched on the rim of a large, natural, cistern is their quarry. He is grasping the dagger tightly in his fist, and it is radiating a large aura of sickly green light. The gargoyle was a quite talkative opponent. [i]Before the session, I had everyone turn in "secrets" for their character. I told them this could be a huge secret, or a small one -- anything their character would not want to be general knowledge.[/i] Throughout the entire combat, the gargoyle shouted streams of gibberish followed by laments such as "Where is the chest? Where have you taken it? It should be here! She says it is here, where is it!", etc. His voice seemed to be two-tonal, with a deep guttural growl overlaid by a feminine screech of sorts. Whenever anyone got close to the creature he would look at them and spit an insult that seemed to be intensely personalized. For example, the beast snarled, "Am I to fear the drunkard who's sword is as dull as his wits?" at Antonius, hinting to some past the paladin would have probably best left off of the table. The battle with the gargoyle was satisfyingly difficult. The party got an early lead by nicking the beast with a few ranged attacks, but he responded by using Ray of Enfeeblement on Melkor and his negative energy touch on Antonius. In the end, however, mob tactics and missile fire won out, and the dagger fell from the gargoyle's slack grip. Antonius carefully scooped the dagger up in a sheet from the living quarters, and Meree did a quick detect magic on the gargoyle. He seemed to be wearing a magical headband, which changed into a hat when removed from his head. Curious, the gnome packed it away for further study. Redival, in for more gruesome trophies, hacked the gargoyle's head free, and wedged it into her pack -- earning a few startled looks from several party members. [i]I'm still waiting for the party to have a discussion with Redival about her "collection." She has become quite fond of celtic-style trophies of late, but the subject hasn't come up for group discussion.[/i] Operating on the ranting of the gargoyle, and clues found in the journal, the party felt that there was something more to be found in the cistern. After searching for a bit, they found a circular joint in the bottom of the cistern that had been caulked several times. By carefully wedging and pulling, they were able to remove a large plug from the bottom of the cistern, which promptly drained all the water into a small room below. Curiosity overcame the group, and they all hopped down through the cistern into the pool of murky water below. Quite unexpectedly, everyone instantly felt an invasive force grip their mind out of the darkness. After a few moments of hanging mid-air, paralyzed, the party heard a voice telepathically within their minds. "Why are you here?" Asked the voice, which sounds like one voice imposed upon a multitude of whispering voices, is definitely feminine. "We came to stop a murder...who are you?" [i]This is a summary of the general babble that followed the voice's question.[/i] "My name is...Kihmet. I...died. I do not know how I came to be imprisoned here, but I am bound to protect a great treasure that lies in this room. My power is waning, and soon I will not have the ability to protect it." There is a pause before the spirit continues, "I must do everything that I can to ensure that this treasure does not fall in to evil hands. Therefore, I must test you. If I find you worthy, I will relinquish the treasure into your protection. If you are not worthy, I will slay you in the hopes that the next group to discover this place are of good intent. The test is simple. I will ask you three questions. These are not riddles, there is no single right answer, but the wrong answer will mean your death. I will ask for your consensus and then ask you individually if you agree. You will be compelled to speak the truth, I would not suggest lying. I will not listen to your deliberation, only your final answers. Do you understand?" Having little choice but to agree to the spirit's terms, they each agreed mentally. "Good. I wish to know: What is the embodiment of truth? What is the heart of love? What is the purpose of honor? I will return in ten minutes." [i]At this point I left the room, so I really have no idea what actually passed between the characters in the deliberations. Perhaps I can coerce one of them into posting what was said.[/i] After ten minutes, the spirit returned to collect the party's answers. The group selected Meree as the spokesperson, since she had recorded the answers. The spirit formally intoned, "What is the embodiment of truth?" Meree responded, "Truth is Nature, because in Nature there are no lies." Solemnly, the spirit asked each member if they agreed with the response. Each person answered a resounding yes...until the voice reached the last person and asked Meree. "No," she replied, "the embodiment of truth is knowledge. Only through learning can the truth be obtained." [i]The players all held their breath when Meree disagreed with the consensus. No one was really sure what the spirit would do if they did not all agree.[/i] A tense moment of silence followed Meree's answer before the spirit continued, "What is the heart of Love?" [i]Collective exhale[/i] Meree calmly replied, "Motherhood is the heart of love. There is no love greater or more fulfilling that a mother's care." This time the party unanimously agreed on the answer, and the spirit continued, "What is the purpose of honor?" "To govern actions between yourself and others to uphold a standard." The first hiccup came from Antonius, who insisted, "Honor is meant to protect the weak. That is its purpose." This disagreement was immediately followed by Eon, who said, "Honor is system of beliefs used to justify one's actions." The rest of the group agreed with the consensus. After a long pause, the spirit spoke again. "I find your words to be well spoken. I am heartened by the fact that you to not blindly follow the crowd if it conflicts with your true feelings, this speaks volumes of your judgment. I deem each of you worthy of this gift, and I have one of my own to impart. But beware, the items within the chest are not yours to give away. The gold and gems you may sell, but the items you must keep -- or fall under a dark curse. Farewell." [i]I accidentally left out the qualifying remark about being able to sell the gold and gems initially and had to make a quick correction. What good is gold if you can't spend it?[/i] As the Kihmet's presence left their minds, their paralysis fell away and some of them finished the fall into the pit. In the center of the room, a spinning cube of force appeared and suddenly shattered, sending bright sparks of energy, and what appeared to be souls, in all directions. Several sparks hit the members of the party, and they felt slightly altered. Shaking slightly from the weirdness of the experience, everyone eventually began to explore the room. They quickly found a chest in a low niche on the floor of the pit. It appeared that over the course of time, water had seeped from the cistern above and flowed around the chest into a crack at the back of the niche. The party popped open the lid and found their treasure to be quite wet. The bottom of the chest was mostly rotted away and was filled with rotten and destroyed papers. The information on the papers was indecipherable. They also discovered two vials of blue liquid, a scroll case containing a unique spell Jerimar's Retroactive Ward, a carved wooden token, and assorted gold and gems. Meree quickly determined that the unique ward spell was what had been cast on the pit, but was unsure as to why it had broken down. The token appeared to be a token to a ward, but Meree was able to determine that it was not a key to the ward they had just set off. It apparently belonged to one of the other thousands of wards in the Silver Marches. Carved into one side of the token is a woman's head wreathed in snakes with snakes pouring out of her mouth. The other side is carved with a sailing vessel. Satisfied that they have found all the loot, the party decides that they should begin the return journey as soon as possible. The dagger makes everyone a bit edgy, and they would like to get it back to Borstad as quickly as possible. The party doesn't get very far before bedding down for the night, still exhausted from their battles during the day. During the first night of their rest, a dire rat approaches the camp but is spotted by the watch and flees into the night without attacking. The night was bitterly cold, and for the first time several of the party members succumb to the grip of the ice. Meree falls unconscious from subdual damage, and Thorongil has a rough night of it as well. They are both healed by Redival, and travel continues towards the Hold. The second day of travel is uneventful, and so is the night, until Redival takes over watch from Thorongil. As she walks by Antonius, she notices that his pack is open and it's contents are strewn out across the ground. Cursing, she wakes up Antonious and goes over to chew out Thorongil, only to find the barbarian half frozen from the cold. Infuriated, the party begins to search their belongings for what is missing. They come up only one item short: the dagger. The party makes the decision to quickly search for the thieves. Devan finds some faint tracks heading deeper into the forest, away from the Hold. She also finds dire rat tracks. The party quickly agrees that the small creatures that stole their rations before have returned. The set out in pursuit, but are delayed by the difficulty of the tracking. After about an hour of travel, Devan finds a pit trap the hard way. She has her nose to the ground when it suddenly opens out from under her and she takes a hard fall. The party quickly pulls her out with some rope, and Melkor is placed in the lead to find any more traps. Antonius finds the next trap before Melkor can spot it, falling in a crash of armor. Sensing a pattern, they fashion a rope safety-line to keep anyone else from falling. They "find" several more pit traps, but their rope system keeps them out of harm's way. Soon after the zone of pit traps, they finally track the footprints back to an earthen mound. One of the small creatures is standing guard outside and sees them before they can act. He quickly runs into the mound screaming what the characters assume to be an alarm. The party makes a few smart decisions at the door. First, they place Redival in the lead. Her darkvision and size are a great asset in the dark, cramped space of the mound. Melkor also scouts around the mound for other entrances, but finds none. They sort out their light sources and begin their infiltration of the mound. Inside they find a warren of tunnels, and are pelted on a regular basis by darts and spears. Redival managed to find another pit trap, and Thorongil got bit (and infected) by a dire rat. They experimented with splitting up, and quickly found the advantages and disadvantages of that tactic. Most of the party was on the other end of the complex when Thorongil rounded a corner and saw a really big version of the little guys they had been fighting so far, with the dagger stuck through his belt. The larger critter cast some sort of spell and Thorongil got scared out of his wits, and ran for the nearest exit, which just happened to be an opening in the mound that Melkor had missed on his scouting run. Antonius, who was just around the corner, only sees Thorongil turn and then run screaming out of the mound. He shouts for the rest of the party and approaches cautiously. The characters arrive in two's and three's over the next several rounds. The basic setup was the large nasty flanked by two of the normal sized critters in a rounded room about twenty feet in diameter. Antonius and Eon reach the scene immediately after Thorongil "exits," using most of their movement to get into position. The fear spell cast by the nasty cleric only lasts for a single round on Thorongil, so he starts to run back immediately after he runs away. The rest of the party was either on their way or helping Redival out of a pit, and the cleric finishes out the round by casting an unidentified spell. The first blow was actually landed by Thorongil, who comes charging in through the hillside opening raging, blows past both of the smaller bad guys (provoking two AoAs), and slams full force into the cleric. Eon and Antonius work on the smaller opponents trying to get to the boss, but lacking the room to do so, while Meree, Devan, and Melkor work on the boss at range. A raging Thorongil, Meree's magic missile, and Devan's crack shot made quick work of the cleric, who fell to the ground and morphed into the acolyte from Olostin's Hold (the one who had been backhanded for his insolence). [i]Well...that was unexpected. :) On a side note, Thorongil charging back into the mix was absolutely beautiful. Through pure accident, this nice corridor was established between the doorway and the cleric. He hit the guy like a sack of bricks.[/i] The party should have made short work of the remaining nasties, but a series of pathetic misses let them hang on for another few seconds, until they were finally put down. A quick search of the cleric's body revealed that he carried two holy symbols: one to Lathlander and one to Shar. Redival examined the Lathlander holy symbol and noticed that it carried just enough minor flaws to be invalid. The party also discovered a temple to Shar in the warren of tunnels. Shaken, they left the mound and continued travel back to Olostin's Hold. [i]The attempt to kill the remaining enemies was really quite sad. I've never seen such a poor series of rolls. Thorongil, Eon, and Antonius ganged up on the last nasty and attacked: 1...1...1. Three 1's in a row.[/i] There was some concern, especially on Redival's part, that Borstad might be involved in the plot to take the dagger. But Antonius pointed out that the cleric had not registered as evil in the Detect Evil-dar, and it was also mentioned that Borstad could have easily sent the acolyte to reclaim the dagger without involving the party. Confident that they were still doing the right thing, the party continued onward. They got extremely lucky on their return trip and encountered no monsters in the forest. They arrived safe, and relatively sound at Olostin's Hold. Redival helped Thorongil and Eon to overcome their diseased wounds, aided by her new healing kit, and the party received the rewards and thanks of Borstad. He was terribly shaken by the news that his own acolyte was apparently a spy of Shar and began an investigation into the matter immediately. Meanwhile, the party relaxed and began the process of leveling, their first adventure now a thing of the past. [i]At the end of this first adven I was pleasantly surprised. Everyone really puts me to the test as a DM, especially in the area of prepared material: they blast through situations like John Wayne on steroids. I am also impressed by the amount of participation and roleplaying, although I don't remember the specifics of what passes between the party members, they are constantly chatting in character around that table, and everyone synergizes really well when making decisions. I can tell this is going to be a lot of fun.[/i] [i]Almost forgot. Kihmet gave each of the party members a gift when she broke the ward. She gave each of them a spell-like ability, useable once per day. Here's the breakdown: Antonius->Inkling (Psi-Handbook), Devan->Know Direction, Eon->Guidance, Melkor->Mage Hand, Meree->Trinket (Psi-Handbook), Redival->Missive (Psi-Handbook), Thorongil->Lesser Natural Armor (Psi Handbook). Some of the spells were altered from their original text, but the gist is the same.[/i] [/QUOTE]
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