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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Milo Windby" data-source="post: 1703" data-attributes="member: 202">Keep of the Borderlands -part twenty-three (session 6)Milo stowed his handaxes, there'd be time later for practicing.  They had some cups to find.  Milo and his friends struck camp and prepared for their next assault on the caves.  He hoped it would be their last.  The pervading evil of the gorge seemed to be spreading across the countryside.  It made him nervous.They talked as they journeyed back to the caves.  Only one cavern remained completely unexplored.  There was also the secret passage they discovered in the gnoll cavern.  Mazi theorized that the secret passage could be a back way into the other cave complex.  Whether it was or not, none of them felt right leaving it unexplored.  They decided to head into the secret passage and find what lay in store.They ventured into the gnoll cave cautiously.  No dismembered corpses littered the floor.  No gnolls attacked them from the darkness either.  The cave was eerily quiet.  The only sounds they heard were from their own armor and gear.  They made their way to the secret door that Brigit found the day before.She triggered the catch and the door once again rumbled open.  The skeleton of the elf lay exactly as they had left it.  No obvious signs of passage were evident.  It seemed that this hidden path was not known to the other denizens of the caves.  The party carefully moved forward, all senses straining to hear or see anything out of the ordinary.The passage led them to another secret door.  They were on the other side of the camouflage and found the catch easily.  Before opening the door Brigit listened carefully through the solid rock.  Milo smirked and made a comment about listening to a brick wall.  Brigit cast a nasty glance back his way and opened the door.On the other side were stacks of supplies.  They were in a small room with an open entryway.  Boxes and crates were lined up along the sides and in the middle of the room.  Just down the hall they could hear a faint sucking, slurping noise.  It almost sounded like a child playing with his gelatin dessert in a bowl, magnified tenfold.  It dawned on Milo."Gelatinous cube!" he whispered loudly to the others, just as a translucent square of jelly rounded the corner outside the room and started to flop towards them."Probably the hallway cleaner, it's stupid, but it will attack if it senses us.  Don't let it touch you, you'll be paralyzed."Milo and Mazithra took the initiative by firing their range weapons before the creature could reach them.  Both hit the cube, their arrow and bolt sinking deep into its mass.  They sat suspended like fruit in a fancy upper crust dish.  Brigit also wasted no time.  She began pushing at a couple of crates, blocking the entryway before the cube could reach them.  "Brilliant idea Brigit, only now I can't see the thing to shoot it!" Milo said.  The crates were about a foot taller than the diminutive halfling.Brigit shook her head and ran to a small box, positioning it so Milo could hop up and see past the blockade.While they worked on the makeshift stool, Mazi had knocked another arrow to fire at the cube.  Jeremiah had also drawn his bow and readied an arrow.  They let them fly.  The large mass of gelatin made an easy target and both plunged into the cube.  The arrows made ugly puncture marks but otherwise just hung in the middle along with the other missiles.Milo crawled onto the box Brigit positioned for him and fired his crossbow.  His bolt joined the rest in the center of the goop.  He hoped the thing was being damaged as it flopped up to the barrier and began to ooze over the top.The adventurers backed away from the blockade, Milo hopping down right after he finished loading his crossbow.  After two steps backward he aimed and fired again.  The quarrel burst through the membrane of the gel and the entire cube collapsed.  Thick jelly poured through the holes their arrows and bolts had created.  A large puddle formed on the ground before them, stinking of decay and chemicals.Crinkling his nose, Milo toed the edge of the puddle with his boot.  No reaction, these gelatinous cubes weren't corrosive like the slimes from the other cave.  At least not after they were dead.The party regrouped.  There was nothing of value they could find in this room and the corpse wasn't exactly anything Brigit could dismember.  They hadn't made a lot of noise in the battle so they hoped that nothing was alerted to their presence, yet.They moved into the hallway.  Milo noted that the stonework was deliberate, much more so than the other caverns.  Brigit remarked on the same, her trained dwarven eye noticing the obvious labor that was put into carving the walls.  After a few feet the party came to the bend that the cube emerged from.  Around the corner was a long hallway punctuated by a door midway.The friends approached the door cautiously, Milo leading to watch for traps.  There was something odd about this portal.  The door was bolted on their side.  A quick discussion followed about whether it was to keep something out of the tunnels or something inside a room.  They remembered the bolted door in one of the first caverns, merely leading to the outside.  They decided to check it out anyway.  Brigit removed the bolt and rigged the door so it could not be locked on them after they entered.  They peered into the darkness, unable to see far even with Milo's lantern.  After a few feet they came to stairs leading down as far as they could see.  Something made Milo feel that this staircase would be better left for later.  He told his friends and received no objections.  They walked back out the door and Brigit bolted it shut.  Whatever dungeon awaited them down the stairs would be visited later.The group moved down the hallway, rounding the corner cautiously in case more cubes or worse were waiting for them.  An even longer hallway stretched before them.  Two passages led to the right and left at different points before the passage curved back off to the right.  The checked the right hand passage first, it was closer and they decided to clear out what was at hand before venturing down any further.The branching passage continued for a ways before cutting to the right.  There was a door at the corner, on the left side of the hallway.  They moved to search the area, Milo checking for traps on the door while the rest kept watch.  The door was unlocked and untrapped.  Milo pushed it open.Inside was a furnished room.  Hangings adorned the wall, depicting grisly scenes, demons, sacrifices, unholy symbols.  There were beds as well.  Filth littered the floor.  If it weren't for the garbage Milo thought this looked like a guestroom in some demon lord's estate.  He shuddered at the evil that seemed to fill the room.  There was nothing of interest in the room.  No secret caches or hidden compartments were behind the hangings and beds.Moving out of the room they continued down the hallway.  It cut back to the left and led down a steep staircase.  They decided to clear out the level they were on before heading down the stairs or behind the bolted door in the other hall.  Before they left Milo listened intently at the top of the flight.  He heard nothing.Back in the main passage the group moved to the left hallway.  It too went for a few feet before cutting, this time to the left.  Another few feet and it cut back to the right.  At the end of the hallway was a door set into the stone to the left.  It was solid metal with bars set up about human eye-level.  Obviously it was a prison of sorts.Jeremiah and Mazithra were the only ones tall enough to peer through the bars.  Jer moved forward and looked into the room.  He described skeletons hanging from shackles on the wall.  After a second he exclaimed in surprise.  He could just barely see a girl hanging in a corner.  She had her head down and he couldn't make out much, but she looked alive.Milo grabbed his picks and set himself at the lock.  He had the door open in a flash and moved aside to let Brigit and Jeremiah lead the way.  Brigit walked in with a stride, ready to rescue the girl.  A hissing came from the corner where the girl hung.  Brigit stopped suddenly froze in her tracks.  Jeremiah nearly walked right into her.  He stopped himself short and began to ask Brigit what was wrong.  Before he had the chance to utter the first word they noticed a strange change coming over the dwarf.  Her skin started to pale, her position remained the same, axe raised and in mid-step.  Seconds later a stone statue stood in Brigit's place.  A perfect replica of their dwarven friend in every way, down to the braids in her hair and the whisper of beard on her chin."Oh no!  Medusa!  Everyone come back into the hallway, we've got to think about this one." Milo said hurriedly."Help me pleassssssse." came a sibilant plea from the 'girl'.  "I have a potion ssssssss it will change your friend ssssssssss back to fessssssssssh."A quick look at each other told Milo that neither Jeremiah nor Mazi trusted the medusa farther than any of them could throw her, which was nowhere while she was shackled.  That gave Milo an idea."Hey, if it's chained to the wall, we can pick it off from a distance.  I can fire my crossbow over my shoulder without looking at it, or getting close to those snakes in its hair."  Milo said to his friends.  "But I'll have to shoot blind.  It can't move much, but I'm not going to be able to see it.  Maybe you guys can tell me how close I'm getting?  Hmm, that wouldn't work either, you'd have to look at it to see.""Eep!" Mazi exclaimed with an excited look on her face.  She took off her pack and started to rummage through her belongings.  "Ahah!" she stated as she pulled out a polished mirror.  "Mazi, your vanity will never cease to amaze me!  I'm glad you're with us." Milo said with a grin as he slowly shook his head side to side.  "Okay, you stand to my side and hold up the mirror and I'll fire at the abomination." he finished.  Mazi and Milo sidled past the statue of Brigit and took up position next to the wall opposite of the medusa.  Mazi held up the mirror and Milo looked into the face of a medusa for the first time."I sure hope you've got that potion, spawn of hell."  Milo said to it."Pleassssssse help me." came the reply.Milo didn't answer.  He set his crossbow over his shoulder, aimed as best he could, and fired.  A shriek answered his shot.  The bolt pierced the medusa's belly.  Milo could see the snakes in its hair writhe and hiss at his direction.  The medusa was impotent to protect itself.He fired again, this bolt slamming into its shoulder.  He tried to aim closer to where he hoped her heart was.  His next bolt missed, breaking against the stone wall under its armpit.Milo cocked the crossbow and fired a fourth shot.  The bolt protruded from the medusa's chest.  It shrieked again, writhing in agony.  He reloaded and took aim.  His next bolt missed.  It was trying to move now, its lithe body swayed back and forth erratically.  Milo had a hard time aiming at the wildly flailing creature in the mirror.He fired again and again and again.  Three more bolts shattered against the rocks.  His next bolt struck true.  The quarrel plunged into the medusa's chest, straight to the heart.  The medusa stopped thrashing and hung limp.  Milo fired another bolt into the body, to make sure it wasn't trying to trick them.The medusa didn't so much as twitch when the bolt thunked into it.  Milo turned around slowly and approached the body.  He kept his eyes squinted, just in case it moved.  He hoped he could shut his eyes before it could work its fell magic on him.  He prodded the body with his loaded crossbow, certain that a point blank shot would finish things if it were still alive.Nothing at all happened.  He breathed a sigh of relief and examined the body.  He was still careful to keep from looking directly at its face, just in case.  He found a vial tied around its neck, concealed by the rags it wore.  He removed the potion and walked over to the statue that was Brigit."I hope this works, I certainly can't haul Brigit out and we won't be able to make it to the keep with her through that undead army."Milo pulled out the stopper as he held the vial away from his body.  He slowly tipped it over Brigit's arm and let a drop fall to her stone skin.  The color immediately returned to her flesh, just a spot of living tissue in the middle of the statue.  He handed the vial to Mazi carefully and pointed at Brigit's head.Mazithra took the vial and poured its contents onto Brigit's helmet.  The steel shine returned immediately and spread down.  As it reached her forehead the pink of flesh showed through the stone.  The color flushed through Brigit's body in a wave."What the!?" The startled dwarf exclaimed.  "What in tha blazes is goin on?  Milo, Mazi, how'd ya git in front of me.  What's with tha bolts in tha girl.  I just stepped in an..." realization dawned on Brigit's face.  "I was - I was - that thing -" she pointed at the medusa with her axe. "A medusa!?" she finished.  Milo giggled and nodded.  He explained what happened to the dumbfounded dwarf.  She pounded him on the back and thanked him for risking his and Mazi's life to bring her back.  Milo stumbled from the impact but stood back up grinning."Well, ready to brave more doors, Brigit?  We're not done here."</blockquote>

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