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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Milo Windby" data-source="post: 354094" data-attributes="member: 202">Temple of Elemental Evil - part 50 (session 22)Talk that night revolved around the chance discovery of Duke Karemeikos and the sudden change in Mother Scrang and her daughter, Hruda.  It was certain that town was no longer safe for them.  The sudden disappearance of the town witch and blacksmith would definitely not go unnoticed.  Conversation eventually turned to the temple.  Brigit was eager to infiltrate the lower levels and find her father.  They decided to enter through a different staircase to keep the temple denizens guessing.  It was obvious that they knew they were coming.  Their actions so far had not gone unnoticed.  Milo was left alone to his thoughts as he took up first watch and the others settled down to sleep.The night passed quietly.  It seemed the sun rose early the next morning.  Milo was glad they had made such good time the day before.  It was less than a half day to the temple.  The corpses of the hit squad lay where they fell, strewn about the temple lawn.  Milo made a mental note to clean the mess up next time they left.  The first two levels of the temple were devoid of life.  They weren't surprised, judging from what they knew about the black clad organization below.  If anyone had survived the heroes' numerous forays the stronger creatures from below probably mopped them up.They made their way to the concealed staircase near the water temple.  The stairs led down into a dark, musty chamber.  The walls were angled together to form a perfect triangle, with the stairs in the middle of the base.  A dim passage led out through the apex, directly opposite from their entrance.  Four doors were set in the walls, two to either side of the stairs and one each in the opposite walls.  Milo felt an oppressive weight settle about his shoulders as they entered the room.  His quick eyes took in the details of the room.  His eyes were drawn to a large gong near the entrance.  There was a large scorch mark on the floor where multiple fires had been burned.  Near the mark was a triangle with bisecting lines meeting in the middle of an eye wreathed in flame.  It was then that he noticed the walls.  Thousands of angry eyes stared back at him.  The walls were painted with all sizes and shapes of eyes, all of them seeming to bore directly into Milo with their baleful gaze.  The hairs on the back of Milo's neck stood on end.  Suddenly the door to their right burst open.  There was a low growl and the heavy thud of huge feet.  Milo spun to see a hill giant and a warg enter the room.  The party was already high strung from the quiet journey to the lower levels, they were ready for a fight.Milo and Mazithra acted in unison.  One of Mazi's arrows sunk into the giant with a dull thud, barely drawing his attention.  Milo's spell ripped that attention away.  He had recently discovered another aspect of Usamigaras' trickery domain.  His confusion spell washed over the giant and warg.  They could see the muddled expression on the giant's simple features.  The two huge creatures stood dumbfounded.  Milo grinned at his compatriots just as the other three doors slammed open.  Two bugbears from the southwest, six bugbears from the southeast, and four ogres from the northeast beset the heroes.  Milo groaned.  On the outer edges of the group and closest to the newcomers, Brigit and Milo laid into their ranks before they could attack.  They each got a good shot with their axes before the battle was joined.  Sticky strands of a magical web sprang into existence around the ogres as Mazi finished her casting.  Two were entangled in the haphazard mesh of the spell, the other two avoided the trap, but were standing right in the center of the mess.  Something seemed to snap in the warg, momentarily forgotten in the rush of the battle.  The great shaggy beast spun and sunk its fangs deep into the giant's leg.  The huge monster roared, his eyes filling with rage.  In one mighty swing of his club he smashed the warg into furry jelly.  The bugbears stared, the giant was supposed to be on their side.One of the bugbears fell from Brigit and Jeremiah's combined assault.  Brigit slashed through the bugbear that Jer's sword weakened, only to have it batted out of her hand by her next opponent.  The bugbear drove its morningstar into her shoulder.  She gritted her teeth and drove her other axe into its flank.Suddenly a lightning bolt jagged from the midst of the web as one of the ogres activated his javelin of lightning.  Mazi managed to twist sideways at the last moment and the bolt just grazed her, continuing on to the confused giant.  The huge humanoid roared at the top of his lungs, shaking dust from the ceiling.  It stumped towards the suddenly terrified ogre.  Mazi stepped back and watched it go with a grin.  She trusted in the giant to deal with the ogres as long as Milo's spell held.  She instead aimed for the other bugbear attacking Brigit, dropping it with two perfectly aimed arrows.The other six bugbears spread out through the room, one strayed too close to Jeremiah's whirling sword.  It was cut down before it knew what direction the attacks were coming from.  The others were more cautious.  Jeremiah paid for his over-extension with a morningstar to his stomach.  Milo's shoulder was clipped as he tumbled for a better angle.By then the giant had tromped to the edge of the web.  He ignored the magical obstacle to his misfortune.  The giant was soon entangled in the sticky strands, struggling to reach the horrified ogre.  His compatriots were slowly making their way through the web back the way they came, wanting no part of a confused hill giant.  The rest of the bugbears fell in a quick succession.  Mazithra brought one down with an amazing bowshot, her arrow actually pierced the back of the bugbears skull, splattering gory bits of bone and flesh on her fighting companions.  Milo's axes brought down another before Jeremiah activated his Windsword.  The whirlwind of attacks easily cleaved through the last three remaining bugbears.  The giant easily tore free from the thin strands of Mazi's web and pushed closer to the ogre unwise enough to damage him.  Meanwhile the others dropped their weapons and drew bows, or in Milo's case, a crossbow.  The web offered marginal cover to the ogres, but a few arrows and bolts made it through.  They were beating a steady, if slow, retreat through the web.  The lead ogre struggled to make it far enough through the web to get away from the giant.  The ponderous monster merely raised his club and brought it down, thundering on the thick ogre, caving in its misshapen skull.  "Get ready everyone, that confusion isn't going to last much longer." Milo shouted.Jeremiah and Brigit stowed their bows and picked up their discarded weapons, readying for the giant's revenge.  With no more ogres in range the giant lurched for the nearest living thing, Brigit.  Brigit scoffed at the huge giant and easily dodged the club.  Her racial enmity against giants gave her a supernatural insight to the way they moved and attacked.Brigit moved in and attacked.  Her twin axes, Trollgrater and her family waraxe cut deep into the giant.  With another roar the giant swung back, this time connecting twice.  Brigit reeled from the blows.  One of the ogres had made it free and immediately lit the web on fire from the rear.  The fire spread towards the other ogres.  They looked almost eager for the lick of the flames if for nothing else than the freedom they would grant.Milo drew his axes and tumbled into the giant's range.  He was too distracted by Brigit to notice the small halfling until his axe bit into the giant's ankle.  The giant spun to find the source of his new pain.  He growled at Milo who flashed back his trademark grin.  While he was turned Brigit and Jeremiah closed in.  Their combined offense brought the giant crashing down.  Milo tumbled to the wall, just a hair's breadth from being crushed by the giant's heavy skull.  All that was left to deal with were the three ogres.The web burned slowly.  Mazi drew her flametongue and spoke the activation word."Flamberge!" flames sprung from the hilt of the longsword and coursed down its length.  She gently touched the blazing sword to the web.  The ogres had a bloodthirsty gleam to their eyes as the burning strands of the web neared.In seconds the flames washed over the ogres.  They emerged slightly singed, but no worse for the wear.  Rather than charging at the heroes they simply stepped back into the corridor, grinning, and closed the door.  Milo blinked in bewilderment.  He'd never known ogres to back down so easily from a fight.  "Ambush." said Jeremiah."Aye, an' Ah have'na tha desire ta waltz right inta it." Brigit said."Neither do I.  Let's let 'em stew.  They'll wait for us who knows how long.  I'm sick of playing their games." Milo said.They investigated the bodies of the bugbears and giant before moving on.  They found some jewelry on the corpses as well as the usual gold and platinum pieces.  To be certain they weren't leaving anything important, Milo cast his detect magic cantrip.  Nothing in their recent findings glowed in his enhanced sight.  They picked the first door to the right, the giant's room, to investigate first.The large room was covered in mosaics.  The scenes were graphic, but Milo was growing used to them in the profane temple.  Something different was depicted along with the usual filth.  A fungus like growth seemed to be covering various places and objects all over the mosaic.  Milo hoped that it wasn't another element they'd have to face.  Splintered wood from broken furniture lay about the room.  The giant's bed was made up of musty old cushions spilling stuffing all over the floor.  A few tapestries or blankets topped the heap. Milo wasn't interested in investigating those any further.  A large cast iron kettle was suspended over a cold fireplace set in the eastern wall.  A large ironbound chest squatted in one corner.  Milo's attention was immediately drawn to the chest.  He let the others explore the rest of the room.  The heavy padlock on the chest was soon sprung.  Inside the chest a multitude of coins and jewels glittered back at Milo.  He grinned at the cache.  Under a pile of gold coins he found a vial of fluid.  Mazi examined the potion as Milo counted the coins.  After casting a detect poison cantrip Mazi declared the potion safe, at least where poison was concerned.  They stowed the vial for later identification.While Milo had worked on the chest the others had found nothing but a kettle full of congealed fat and rancid meat."Shall we see if the ogres are back?" Milo asked as they headed out of the hill giant's den.</blockquote>

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