Ok, so I don't update when I say I will. So sue me.
Back to the Story.
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The party talked among themselves.
"Those vamps are long-gone by now," Serena said, "and I feel there is no clear way to pursue them."
"And they will regenerate their physical forms in an hour," muttered Canter, "I vote we follow our Find the Path spell and take out the Dimensional Anchor. No vampire is going to keep a follower of Fharlanghn from traveling where he wills."
"I second that," agreed Cloudtoucher, "We don't want to waste the spell, and nothing else looks as promising."
Glim, Fjorda, and the bat-form of Kellen also indicated agreement. The party returned to the open pit.
"The spells are still active," Serena reminded them, "Let's fly!"
They went down. This time, no vampires accosted them.
"Here goes nothing," muttered Glim as Serena raised her arms to try Dispelling the purple screen again.
She completed the spell and the field vanished. The party continued down.
And down.
And down.
Finally Fjorda snorted in disgust, "I know the ways of wizards are strange, and vampires even stranger, but this is a lot of excavation for very little purpose. It must have taken years to complete this shaft alone, let alone this entire complex," she paused, "Wait, I think I see the bottom. It's not stone. I can't tell what it is. Blasted darkvision."
Soon the others could see to what Fjorda had been referring.
"It's green," commented Glim.
"It's slimy," observed Canter.
"It's green slime!" everybody said together.
Glances were exchanged.
"This would have been bad for anybody who had their fly magic dispelled by that Screen," Serena mused.
The room was not too extensive, shaped like a slightly larger version of the hallway that formed its ceiling, far above.
"Which way?" Cloudtoucher asked Canter.
"Over there," the cleric pointed, "There's a door."
Indeed there was: in the wall mere inches above the level of the green slime was a perfectly ordinary-looking door.
They passed through it, still flying. It opened into a
somewhat oddly shaped, plain, empty room. There was another door to the right.
"That way," Canter pointed, unnecessarily.
The door opened onto another perfectly plain, empty, oddly-shaped room.
"A lot of wasted space," commented Glim dryly, "I at least expected to be able to poke fun at the decor. The undead don't seem to bother with it at all, though."
They passed through another door.
This room was not oddly shaped. Nor was it empty. It was square, forty feet on a side. A large iron ring was set into the exact center of the room. Attached to the ring was a large, iron chain. At the terminus of the chain was what made the party come to a screeching halt just inside the room.
"Is that... an ogre?..." asked Cloudtoucher, "it seems... Odd."
"It's too big," said Glim, "far too big."
It was indeed. Not only did it stand a full three feet taller than a normal ogre, its eyes burned with a dull red glow. Its face was twisted in an expression of incredible hatred. It did not move.
"The chain!" shouted Serena, "It's glowing green!"
She was right. The iron of the chain and ring set in the floor was glowing a dull green. The party knew, of course, that anything that glowed green couldn't possibly be good.
"Bah!" spat Fjorda, "We took on ogres when we were green, at Myrtolo Keep. We can take this one, no problem." She hefted her axe and flew forward.
"Wait!" cried Serena, "We don't know what we're up against!"
But it was too late. The fray commenced.
Fjorda swung her axe as the rest of the party scrambled to get into position. It struck true, leaving a large gash in the ogre's arm. It growled in animalistic fury and lifted a huge iron club, bashing at the flying dwarf. It scored, and Fjorda screamed in pain.
Serena stood back and flung a magic missile. Against unknown opponents, it was something she knew would work. The darts slammed into the ogre, leaving oozing bruises where they struck.
Cloudtoucher leaped nimbly into the melee, making contact with a rapid jab under the ogre's snout. Something snapped, and everybody hoped it was the ogre's face instead of the monk's fist.
Glim circled, hoping to find an opening to dart in with a precise thrust, but stayed out of range of the dangerously swinging club.
Kellen, still in bat form, began flying around the room, searching for anything else that might be amiss.
Canter looked at their foe, trying to decide whether to cast a spell or not, and decided to strike at it with his ensorceled staff. He missed by a wide margin.
The melee fighters continued hacking on the ogre, but its club was devastating. Fjorda took the brunt of it, but Cloudtoucher was forced to withdraw for healing. Glim managed to sneak up behind it, but barely scratched it with his dagger thrust.
Just when it seemed the battle was going well, the ogre lifted its club and shouted something incomprehensible. A wave of total darkness roiled out, engulfing the entire room. Suddenly blind, the party faltered.
Then there was a sickening crunch-slice noise, and just as quickly as it had been summoned, the darkness fled. Fjorda's battle axe was deep in the ogre's skull, and it lay on the floor, dead. The chain was no longer glowing.
"Nobody blinds a dwarf," she explained, pulling her magical axe free and examining it for nicks, of which, of course, there were none, "It is not polite."
"You look pretty beat up," commented Canter, touching Fjorda lightly. Instantly, her wounds healed until she looked barely injured at all.
"Thanks," she grunted, "Which way now?"
Canter took a deep breath, clearing his mind from the distraction of combat, "There," he pointed at a door.
"Good enough," shrugged Fjorda, flying over and flinging the door open before anybody could stop her.
"All clear!" she called, "Come on, let's find the Dimensional Anchor before your spell wears off."
The others panted, their hearts still pounding from the intensity of the combat. In a few moments, they gathered themselves together and followed the dwarf.
Serena glanced back at the dead ogre, wondering. Why had the chain been glowing? Why did it stop? Why had this ogre been so hard to kill? She could only presume the chain must have been enhancing it in some way, making it stronger than it should be. But why chain it in place, instead of enchanting some item the ogre could carry around? Did the vampires not trust their own minions?
The path led them through several more rooms, tending generally north. All of the rooms were unnaturally empty - devoid of any sort of identifying features, furniture, or items, with the exception of several plain doors leading out of each. At some point during the trek, the flying magic wore off, and the party was walking again, except for Kellen, who persisted in bat form.
"This is starting to creep me out," muttered Glim, "What is the purpose of all these rooms? Is this supposed to be a maze?"
"I hate to express faith in the reasoning of a vampire," commented Cloudtoucher, "But I have a feeling nothing is done here for no purpose. It is just not apparent to us."
Just then, they opened another door into a room slightly larger than most they had seen. It was shaped like a fat cross, and in the northern arm stood another ogre, identical to the first except that it was half again as large. It was similarly chained, and the chain similarly glowed. It stood looking at the group, but made no movement.
"I had hoped that they only had one of those," commented Serena mildly.
"We killed the last one without much effort," shrugged Fjorda, "What are we waiting for?"
Moments later, as was the norm when Fjorda was leading, the melee ensued. The batter was much tougher than the first. The ogre attacked the instant Fjorda charged into range, its iron club doing terrible damage before she even got close enough to return the favor. Canter spent much of his time doling out healing spells, until his supply was nearly exhausted. Serena, after initially cursing the dwarf for keeping her from using her devastating area-effect spells, kept up a steady barrage of magic missiles and acid orbs. Kellen finally shed his bat-form and joined the fray, worried that one of his companions would fall if the damage rate against the monster was not increased. The flame of his enchanted scimitar, though, had very little effect. Finally, the giant ogre crashed to the ground lifeless, the magical glow of its chain fading.
"Where now?" panted Kellen as he completed one of his own healing spells on Cloudtoucher.
Canter focused his attention on his still-active magic, "North again. Through that wall."
"There must be a secret door," exclaimed Glim brightly, "This is a job for your local gnome!" He searched and quickly found the outline of a secret door where Canter was indicating.
"Great," commented Fjorda, "Now get it open."
"Er..." hedged the gnome, "The activation mechanism is not readily apparent."
They spread out and searched the room. Other than the ogre, the room was as empty as the others. Finally Cloudtoucher cried out.
"I got it! The ring the chain is set into, see?" he pushed one edge of the ring and it turned slowly. There was a click, followed by a loud boom from some sort of machinery. The section of wall Glim had noticed slid down into the floor.
"Hurry," urged Canter, "The spell hasn't got much longer."
They rushed through the opening, which led to a landing on a stairwell leading up and down.
"Up!" directed Canter, and up they sprinted.
And ran.
And jogged.
And walked.
Finally Serena exclaimed in disgust as their progress slowed to a crawl, "Exactly how many stairs are there anyway? I'm half tempted to suggest we fly again, except I only had that spell prepared once."
"We should be almost back up to ground level now," said Fjorda, "I can feel it."
They trudged up for another two dozen steps.
"We're there," said Fjorda, "Back up to the first floor. No doors or openings though."
"We're still supposed to go up," said Canter.
So up they went. After about another thirty steps, the nature of the stairway changed. After a certain distance from the ground, it stopped being neatly cut stone and became rough-hewn. The walls stopped being neatly carved and now looked like the walls of a natural cavern. The demarcation between the two styles was as sharp as a razor and perfectly horizontal.
"How... odd," remarked Kellen, "It looks natural, but I don't think it is. What do you think Fjorda?"
The dwarf stopped and looked at the rough walls, "It was carved to look uncarved," She decided, "I have no idea why."
"It seems to correspond properly to the difference we saw in the outer wall," said Serena, "We have the question of ‘why bother?' again."
After a few more steps, the stairway opened into what looked like a natural cave.
"They got it wrong," Fjorda snorted, "Anybody could tell this isn't a cave. Stalactites are supposed to grow from the ceiling down and stalagmites from the floor up. They got it backwards."
The others looked. There were pointy projections of rock coming from both the floor and ceiling. They looked pretty much identical.
"Um, of course," said Glim, pursing his lips.
"Right," directed Canter.
They followed the right wall and found after a very short distance another stairway going up. It was as if the large cavern was merely a big landing.
Canter directed them up again.
There was another sharp demarcation, and the stairway continued in its previous, well crafted style and started spiraling more tightly. Just in time for the third floor, there was a door off to the west, through which Canter directed them.
"It's on this floor then," said the cleric, "unless this place is a three dimensional maze."
The door opened onto a wide corridor. It terminated quickly to the north, but continued for some distance to the south. There were torches burning with a smokeless flame in sconces in the wall. It was by far the most inhabited looking place they had seen so far in the tower. There were several doors to the sides near the north end, but Canter directed them south.
"What's that?" Cloudtoucher asked, pointing. There were deep gouges in the floor in several places.
"Let me see," said Kellen, applying his tracking abilities to the marks.
After a few moments he announced, "Claw marks. Some old. Some very old. Some fresh. All from the same large creature."
"A dragon maybe?" wondered Serena, "I hope not. Nothing for it, though, but to press on."
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The rest will be posted soon... I haven't caught up to now-time yet.
) the next game in my story hour has been delayed 1 week to the 21st. The next SH update will be a few days later. Thanks!
