You travel onward, and find a number of battle sights. It appears that the abberantly marked adventurers who proceeded you have had a number of combats, mostly with twisted vermin and kobolds. At least, it seems reasonable to assume that those are the parties responsible for the dead creatures, though there is no way of knowing for sure. There are half a dozen low quality short spears and suits of leather armor left here after the fight, all sized for small humanoids, should anyone be industrious enough to gather them up.
[sblock=For Judge, should we someday have one]At this point, I'm going to mostly abandon the adventure notes. Having to consult them is slowing me down, and looking over the upcoming encounters I've noted a monster with a hit die entry of "cannot be killed" which I find somewhat alarming, and also with an entry for DR on that same monster. The one would seem to render the other obsolete. I feel better winging it, and while I'll try to maintain the feel of the original I'm going to alter the details.[/sblock]
You come to a part of the cavern complex where the tunnel begins to slope steeply down.
[sblock=Listen DC 10]Voices seem to be coming from the area down the slope.[sblock=If prior check beat listen DC 14]The voices seem to be engaged in an argument, something about a machine.[sblock=If prior listen check beat DC 18]Someone is saying heatedly "I don't think he even knows what the damn machine will really do! Whatever 'Capturing the energy of the great mark' means, the whole thing might just explode in his face and bring this cavern crashing down on top of us all."[/sblock][/sblock][/sblock]
