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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 4197142" data-attributes="member: 143">Chapter 31THE ELEVATORThe metal frame struck the floor with a cacophonous noise, shaking the walls around them as the force of the impact was distributed outward from the floor.  The Seer and Falah had fallen to the ground; the falling frame had passed along the very edge of the archway threshold, and if they’d been leaning forward just a bit, both would have likely been struck by it, with obvious unpleasant consequences.  Parzad turned to look at the others waiting in the archway.  His body was insubstantial, but as he stepped up, onto the grate that was now embedded in the floor, his shed body power faded, and he took on solidity again.  “A useful trait,” Duke Aerim commented.  He had barely flinched when the grate had plummeted through the ceiling, and he offered a hand to help Falah back to his feet.There was a loud grinding noise, and the floor started to sink.  Not just the floor; the ceiling was descending as well, and within a few seconds they could see it start to cover the archway from above. “It is an elevator!” Ghazaran exclaimed.  “Quickly, into the chamber, before the entry is closed!”“And if the goal is to seal us within?” the Seer shot back, but he followed the others as they obeyed the cleric’s command.  Ozmad was the last to make it, and by then he had to duck to avoid the descending ceiling.  He hopped down onto the grate, already five feet below its original level, and slowly building up speed as it continued to drop.  The grate provided uncertain footing, but the spaces between the thick bars were not wide enough for them to stand on the stone floor, so they had to make do. The elevator continued to descend, grinding on unseen gears.  The mechanism seemed to reach a terminal velocity; at least it did not appear that it would reach a speed that would prove hazardous upon a sudden stop.  Striations on the walls allowed them to judge their approximate speed; it looked as though it took about a minute to cover roughly twenty feet.   “How deep does this go?” the Seer asked, after about five minutes had passed. “It looks like we are about to find out,” Ghazaran said.  The cleric had given up trying to stand on the vibrating grate, and had sat down.  He now pointed at the wall, where another archway had become visible.  The others readied themselves as the opening expanded, revealing another passageway beyond.  “How far down, do you think?” the cleric asked Jasek. “About a hundred and ten, hundred and twenty feet,” the thief said, moving lightly over the grate to the tunnel mouth.  The elevator came to a halt with a grinding thud; once it had stopped, Ghazaran got up, and walked over to the arch, with Ozmad as his shadow behind him.  Jasek saw that the new floor lined up with that inside the elevator, with less than a finger’s thickness separating the two.  “Impressive construction,” he said, checking the archway for traps before proceeding.“It would appear that this was a one-way trip,” the Seer said.  “Even if the elevator is designed to reset, I see no mechanism for lifting the grate back up into the ceiling.”“If necessary, we will follow the Ravager out,” Ghazaran said.  The cleric had recovered some of his confidence, it seemed, and he did not stop to check with his companion before gesturing Jasek forward.  They fell into their usual formation, with Jasek scouting in the lead, and Navev shuffling along in the rear.  The passage ran straight ahead for about forty feet, then opened onto an irregular chamber through yet another broad stone arch.  This room, unlike most of the others through which they had traveled, had been done up in a remarkable decoration.  The walls were covered with reliefs that depicted a forest scene, supplemented by a series of stone carvings in the shape of tall, ancient oaks arranged around the perimeter of the chamber.  Those statues rose up to brush the tiled ceiling some thirty feet above.  Another of the now-familiar mithral vault doors, recessed into a deep alcove in the center of the opposite wall some forty feet away, appeared to be the only means of egress. “Well now, if this isn’t a trap, I don’t know what is,” Jasek said.  Navev lifted a hand and blasted one of the stone trees flanking the entry.  Stone chips went flying as the eldritch blast tore across the trunk of the statue, but nothing else happened.  “All right.  Cautiously, but quickly,” Ghazaran said.  The cleric nodded at Jasek, who took the lead.  His sword was a black gleam in his hand, and he scanned the floor before every step, alert for hidden triggers or other traps. He had reached the middle of the room when the response finally came. The noise was surprisingly gentle, more like the whistling of wind through a forest than the cracking of breaking stone that he’d expected.  Jasek shifted into a defensive stance and fell back as six of the stone trees came alive, their thick branches sweeping down like long arms.  Their carved roots became legs that lifted the huge trunks off the floor. Once animated, the stone guardians stepped forward to attack.</blockquote>

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