You start in the hallway east of the vampire room.
"Let's open up these doors. Care to check for evil again Zanax?"
Hlarn has cast all his spells he normally uses before entering unknown areas: Negative Plane Protection (on Kadlian), Spell Immunity (hold person) and find traps upon himself.
Kadlian looks around. "Zanax, check the doors with your psionics as well. And then we may have Kailar check it via wraithform. My one worry is that we will stumble into the main temple without even realizing it."
Zanax frowns. "If the temple is behind that door, I'm not sure I'd want to do it. It may alert any demons in the vicinity to our presence."
Hlarn comments, "I thought the main temple was on the level below this one."
"Who says there are not entrances from up above? Like a balcony or stairs leading directly down. I do not want to take any extra chances. When we hit the main temple, I want us to be completely prepared."
Zanax does his standard search of good, evil, and precious metals.
The paladin detects nothing, so you open the door. Beyond it is a room (20' X 30': 10' south, 30' east) which is totally bare. Searching, you find nothing.
You return to the passage, head north, and look aroud the corner to the east.
From the corner, the passage runs for 30', then opens up into a chamber. There are doors in the middle sections of the north and south walls.
You move east and take a quick look into the chamber. It is odd-shaped (right wall runs south for 10', east for 20', northeast for 10' (door), north for 10' (door), northwest for 10' (door), west for 20' and then south 10'). It too is bare.
You go back and open the south door. Again, you find a bare room (20' X 30': 10' east, 10' west, 20' south). Searching, you find nothing.
You open the north door. More of the same is beheld (20' X 30' room: 10' east, 10' west, 20' north). Searching turns up nothing.
You return to the odd-shaped chamber and search it, turning up nothing.
You regard the doors, and Zanax does his usual detects. Through the centre and northeast doors he detects evil.
Kadlian finishes with his maps and looks up. "Spike the other doors, we go northeast, first."
He puts away his maps and draws his two swords.
Rage looks around, "Kad, shall I bar one of the two doors with a wall of ice before we continue? That would help prevent enemies from coming in while we are dealing with one of the evils."
"You think that would be more useful than spiking the doors? How quickly would the ice melt so that we can continue when we are ready?"
Zanax shakes his head as he whispers, "If I can detect the evil, then they'd probably be able to hear us spike the doors. Also, I think we should conserve Rage's Wall of Ice for now. A better idea might be to use one of our druid's Stone Shape to block the door. I could always use the Holy Avenger to remove it later."
"So, you want the druids to use Stone Shape to block both doors or just the one with the evil behind? Personally, I do not care what method we use to block the doors, just so they are blocked."
"Mages typically can release/remove their spells that the create, so if I use a wall of ice, I can remove it later. However, Zanax's idea of using the stoneshape is excellent, all we need is a small layer of stone to cover the door. I like it," Rage responds.
"Equinox, I believe you are up, then. What about the other door?"
Equinox walks over to the door and looks at it. "I cannot tell from here which way the door opens so I will rearrange the stone in the wall to completely cover the door in about 4 or 5 inches of stone. That should stop anything short of a strong giant from breaking through." He then begins casting the spell.
The druid speaks words of power, and the stone seems to grow over the centre door.
Before you enter the other door that has evil, Hlarn casts protection from evil, 10' radius on Rage. "That way you can help fight Zanax, and the magicians can also be protected should this be demonic evil. The spell should last just over an hour by the way Rage."
He then follows that spell with a protection from evil spell on himself, prayer, an aid spell for himself, and finally a blessing and then bursts the door open once the last spell is complete.
"What about the southeast door?"
"Grrrr...'nuff talk," says Gnarsh, and bashes open the northeast door.
Revealed is a hexagonal-shaped room (left wall runs northeast for 10', east for 20', southeast dor 10', southwest for 10', west for 20'). This place reeks of undead, and sure enough, there are three spectres in here. They move to attack you, but you have initiative.
"Spellslingers do your thing," Jerry says as he levels his staff horizontally across his chest, to hit anything the comes in his range of motion.
Zanax cries out, "Agulhas, now would be a good time for your wand!"
Hlarn holds out his holy symbol. "Begone evil creatures!" hopefully buying more time for the wand to work. Hlarn holds his position by the door, knowing that Kadlian and himself are currently the best protected. After the turning attempt he hefts up his axe in preparation for the specter's attack.
The spectres ignore the dwarf.
Zanax moves to attack with the frostbrand, stopping behind Gnarsh, Kadlian and Hlarn.
"Fighters, hold at the door and let Agulhas use the wand. Agulhas, keep using it until they are gone."
As Kadlian speaks there is a flash from the wand. The spectres are hurt but not destroyed.
Kadlian waves the firebrand in front of him. "Come and taste your final death..."
Kal guards the rear of the party, if any of the undead approach him, he will attack with this spear.
The spectres attack Gnarsh, Kadlian and Hlarn. All of them are missed. As they swing their swords in return, though, there is a second flash, and the spectres are killed.
Searching the hexagonal room, all you find is a gem worth 100gp.
"Whew... I thought one of us would be going back to Sandas..."
"Okay, southeast door. We will leave the east door blocked for now."
Before they leave the hexagonal room, Zanax will search for good, evil, secret doors, and precious metals.
He senses nothing.
You open the southeast door. This reveals a trapezoidal-shaped room (right wall runs southwest for 10', east for 60', northwest for 20' and west for 20').
In here is nothing but a pile of treasure. Counting it, you find 4000sp and a vial.
You take the loot and return to the odd-shaped chamber. There, the east door awaits you.
When you are ready, Equinox cancels his spell, and the stone returns to its normal shape. Opening the door, you see a 10' wide passage running east for 20', after which point it opens up into a chamber.
Floating down the passage towards you are two small glowing balls of light.
"Those balls of light are probably Will-o-the-Wisps," shouts Equinox. "I have run into them before in my nature travels. They are extremely difficult to hit and I do not know how to defeat them."
"Oh joy, more will o' the wisps," Jerry says as he hold his staff tight and readies himself to batter either one across the room.
"Will o' wisps? Zanax, keep them bottled up in the passageway so they cannot get at us. We will let the mages soften them up before any of the fighters try to deal with them."
Zanax nods and stands in the doorway with his Frost Brand. He waits for the will o'wisps to get within his sphere of protection before attacking.
The wisps have other ideas about being bottled up, and suddenly speed up, zipping through the doorway just below the top of the door frame. Zanax swings, followed by Kadlian. The paladin misses, but the ranger connects with his longsword. Zanax swings again, and also connects this time, while Kadlian is unable to reach the other monster with his flame tongue.
Rage casts cone of cold at the creatures.
"Rage, that's what I love about you.. overkill !" Jerry says as he watches her cast the massively destructive spell. In response to Equinox, he remarks, "Any magical weapons will harm one."
"Overkill, Moi?" Rage replies sarcastically. "No such thing."
Not in this case, as the ray of icy motes engulfs both will-o-wisps, but does not harm them in the slightest. The mage suddenly finds herself dodging a spark fired from one of the 'wisps. While she is dodging one, the other one shocks her for 10 hit points.
They are floating above Rage, some 15' up, now.
Kal holds up his hand with the ring that shocks, in elvish "Is this why you attack us?"
He gets no reply.
"Agulhas, Rage, switch to magic missiles. Jerry, can you reach them with your staff?"
Rage grumbles, irritated now. She begins to cast magic missile spells.
Hlarn shakes his head. "Their spells won't touch it."
Until Agulhas sees that Rage's magic missiles are having an effect, he trusts in Hlarn's wisdom and withholds casting any of his own.
Hearing Hlarn, Rage cursees some more and waits... watching for other enemies and attempting to dodge any attacks.
Her dodging is unsuccessful, as she is sparked twice more for 20 hit points.
Kadlian tries to swing at them with his sword, jumping as high as he can at the top of his arc. The 'wisps easily avoid him.
Zanax levitates up to strike one of the motes with his Frost Brand. His first swing misses badly, but his second swing connects handily.
Seeing that his staff is not long enough, Jerry waits for a wisp to fly by.
"Oh well, Rage," he says with a shrug of his shoulders. "Maybe they weren't wisps what we fought last time," he says with a weak grin.
"And when did you meet things like these before?"
"With Occa's crew, in the Dragon halls... guess we fought a lot of weird shit then," Jerry replies.
"Oh... And how did you defeat them?"
"Mmm, ah, I don't remember... I believe we just wailed on them with weapons. Gil used his frost brand and Brightaxe hacked one to death. So, weapons I think..." Jerry says, the events of that fight not as clear as they should be.
"If they would stay low enough to the ground, we would oblige them."
"Gnarsh, Sian, watch that eastern door to make sure no other visitors come a calling."
"Kailar or Furgh, do you have a spell that can make me fly?"
"If you want one, you've got it," replies Agulhas.
Kadlian blinks in surprise (being the emotional guy he is). "Really? Great."
Agulhas casts Fly on Kadlian, hoping that the leader will in turn make protecting him a priority.
Hlarn grimmaces. Suddenly wings fold out of his back as his cloak changes.
The 20' span of the flapping wings knocks everyone sprawling to the ground but Zanax, who is sent careening through the air to collide with the west wall. Even the will-o-wisps quickly move out of the way. Flapping upward, the dwarf moves to attack, but quickly learns that these wings are not very effective for meleeing in enclosed spaces such as this one, as the flapping wings mean that he can only achieve an altitude of 5' before their tips come in contact with the ceiling.
"Someone might want to keep a look out for any other bad guys." says Sian, rising to his feet.
While everyone is down, the wisps zoom in low and attack again. Rage is shocked for 12 more hit points and falls unconscious.
This turns out to be the opportunity that you have been waiting for, as Kadlian, Gnarsh, Kal and Sian jump on the 'wisps.
Gnarsh lands two mighty chops with his glowing broadsword, and the one wisp's light almost goes out. Kadlian nails the other once with his longsword.
Everything happens at once, as Zanax drops to the ground and rushes over, Hlarn lands himself, and Gnarsh and Kadlian dodge sparks while pressing the attack. Sian conects this time, and kills the 'wisp that Gnarsh pounded. Kadlian finishes off the remaining monster with his shortsword.
While some of you tend to Rage, the rest of you search their lair.
At the end of the 20' passage is a trapezoidal-shaped chamber (left and right walls run northeast and southeast, respectively, for 20'. The east wall is 50' long and connects everything up.) This chamber is bare, and searching turns up nothing.
Rage awakens to find herself in the same chamber where the will-o-wisps were battled. There is no sign of them now.
Zanax comes over, rubbing his head "Dang it, Hlarn! Watch what you're doing with those wings!"
Hlarn frowns. "Sorry, thought the room was big enough. At least I forced them out of the sky by taking up all the room myself!"
Rage begins to let a string of curses out of her mouth.
"Damned creatures," she says, struggling to stand and failing, "Not my day."
She goes into a swoon again.
"Hlarn, see to Rage immediately. Get her functioning again."
Hlarn casts death's door on her before anyone attempts any healing, bringing her up to 0 hit points.
Kadlian uses his two cure light wound spells on Rage, for 10 hit points.
While Rage is unconscious, Jerry puts his hands on her head and intones, "Oh great Silvanus, heal this woman." as he casts a cure critical wounds on the woman for 11 hit points. He then gets up and backs away as she begins to heal.
"Cocky humans," Kal mumbles in elvish.
"No way, Spock, I am not cocky, I am fearful. If she doesn't see me working on her, she won't flip on me again," Jerry says with a fearful grin, in elvish to respond to Kal.
Hlarn casts a cure light wounds spell on Rage for 6 hit points and motions for Sasha to cast as many cures as she has until she's done or Rage is cured.
Sasha sees to Rage immediately. The mage comes around again, and Sasha helps her to her feet. After a few minutes she feels much better and is ready to continue.
Zanax does the standard search of good, evil, secret doors, and precious metals.
"Let's follow that secret passage," says Gnarsh, for once showing some interest in something other than beer.
You return to the octagonal-shaped room to the south and go through the secret door. After 20' the passage turns southeast, becoming dank and rough. It then runs for over half a mile in this general direction, finally terminating...outdoors.
The tunnel comes out in the middle of a large pile of boulders in the forest on the south side of the ridge that the Black Keep rests atop. Kal knows this area well, and Sian and Kadlian recognise it too...but none of them suspected that this pile of rocks concealed a secret exit from the Temple.
Outside, it is late afternoon on a cool, partly sunny autumn day. All about you, the trees are turning colour and shedding their leaves. The forest floor is covered in a multicoloured blanket of them.
Looking around to make sure the party is in no danger from attack, Kal says in elvish, "I should mark this spot."
Sasha eyes Kal, not quite getting all the elvish, but seeming to understand his intent.
Furgh chokes down a comment, but otherwise remains quiet, and invisible, though you can hear him chuckling quietly to himself
Kadlian looks around. "Go ahead. So, do we continue on or do we head back to camp? If we continue, then we need to go back upstairs where we met the death knight and proceed through the other door."
Hlarn frowns. "Lets wait a day for that. As you know that is the path to the temple proper, and we should be at full spell strength and full healing. My trap detection spells have expired, as have most of the other protection spells today. One more day won't hurt us."
Zanax takes the opportunity to inspect the vial they found recently more carefully.
It looks like a normal vial. It of opaque glass, and is sealed with a cork.
Zanax shakes it a bit to see if it contains liquid.
It sounds empty.
"Perhaps it is a speciman jar, then?" Sasha offers, trying to bite her lip to keep from laughing.
Hlarn looks over at Zanax. "Let me perform some auguries and let the mages try to identify it. I bet we can determine its use without opening it. You think it might contain a spirit or something?"
Zanax shakes his head. "I don't think that will be necessary. It radiates goodness...I am currently trying to make contact with it."
"Why the obsession?" Furgh asks, cheerfully.
Rage looks at Zanax, "He's christmas shopping already, I bet his girlfriend or boyfriend loves Obsession."
"I thought that stuff was only for the sexually ambiguous..." Zanax replies, tongue-in-cheek. "I mean, what's next...designer armor?"
Sasha looks at Zanax in mock outrage. "What? Sexually ambiguous??? Me?" she stutters, lifting the hems of her robes. "I'll have you know that I am not sexually ambigious ... would you care to learn more? I can have you whimpering for mercy in 30 seconds ... and you will know I am a woman!" she storms, advancing on Zanax.
"It would take at least 45 seconds for me to whimper." Jerry says with a bright white smile.
"I am a woman ... more woman than you cna handle ... " she continues, eyes sparkling in anger ... and something more ....
"My, seems the Olympics are coming early this year," Jerry says.
"Ummm...yes, yes, yes...could we discuss this a little later?" Zanax replies, looking a little uncomfortable. "You know, the vial and all..." Zanax adds, pointing to the object in his hand.
"I'll hold him down fer ya, Sasha," offers Gnarsh with a leer.
Mischief sparkles in Sasha's eyes. She turns to Gnarsh, "Why thank you Gnarsh ... perhaps later I will take you up on that."
Zanax blushes furiously and concentrates even harder on the vial in his hand.
"See Sasha, that's the problem, Zanax would rather have it in his hand, then have a whirl with you," Jerry says, barely containing his laughter.
Sasha nods, "Yes indeed ... most unusual. I will have to consult with Isis on this later ... most unusual ... " Sasha replies, giving Zanax a speculative look and then shrugging her shoulders.
Sasha smiles ... "Besides, obession is my favorite perfume, silly!"
"Figures," replies the mage.
The mage laughs.
Looking to Rage, then Sasha, then Rage, then Sasha, Jerry breaks out into song, "You're my obsession, my obsession..."
Sasha chuckles, shaking her head. "Yes, I could see how that would come about. Mind you, be careful around certain women .... never know what could happen." She grins, shaking her finger at Jerry.
"True, Sasha, you never know. What do you have in mind ?" he says with a raised eyebrow.
Sasha grins, shaking her head. "Not me ... Rage there ... she will give you a run for the money ... well ... I didn't mean thta .. she doesn't do it for money ... you know what I mean though .. ." Sasha stammers, glancing at Rage.
"Ah, well a challenge I like.. and it seems Rage can be a good sport. So, Rage, I propose a challenge, are you powerful enough to change your shape?" he asks the female mage.
Rage glances from Sasha to Jerry. "I have the ability to polymorph myself, if that is what you mean," the mage says.
"Beautiful... I propose a race.. in any animal form, the course can be set by our dearest Sasha. The terms are anything.. within reason of course.. if you win, anything I can grant you will be yours, if I win... the same.. again, within reason. If you won, I could be your slave, not forever, but let's say a month or so. So, what do you say, my dear Rage??" Jerry asks as he crosses his arms and leans against a tree, waiting for Rage's counter proposal.
Sasha laughs, again shaking her head. "It would be most unwise to race around here. That is best left until we have completely dealt with the evil here ... though it is a rather intriguing bet ... " Sasha says thoughtfully ... already imagining the outcome and blushing ...
"Sasha, the offer extends to you as well." he says with a really wide grin.
Rage glares at Jerry. "I am not your dear, and do not call me beautiful. The last person who did that... the less said the better!" the mage says angrily. "As for your proposal, you have nothing that I desire least of which is for you to be my 'slave'. " the mage says, "I spent my childhood as a slave, and have been quite vocal in my defense against the whole idea. Ask Hlarn about my attitude towards slavery."
"Back down there, tiger, I said beautiful, as in Great.. not you... mighty egotistical, eh? It was just a suggestion... I proposed this whole idea to loosen you up. You really would be happier if you would smile once in a while and a good mood wouldn't kill you!" he continues.
The mage gets a fire in her eyes, and clenches her fists open and closed several times while breathing deeply. She mutters something under her breath before continuing.
"You are new here Jerry, so you get this warning. I am like a delayed fireball ready to go off. Occa has helped me control my temper a bit, but your suggestion and attitude is bound to backfire on you sooner or later. I strongly suggest that you tread lightly around me. You are bringing up memories that are very bad for me, and I do not always remember what happens at times like this. You have been warned."
"Thanks for the warning, babe.. I am just being myself and since Sasha is playing hard to get, I thought I would play hard to want and it seems to be working quite well with you. I will take your words to heart, because you were kind enough to shuttle me around to the magical pools. Thank you again!" Jerry replies with a deep bow. "So, since that's said and done, where are we off to next?" he asks no one in particular.
"To camp!"
Zanax groans.. "Hush, all of you. I'm trying to concentrate."
Rage bites her tongue and looks at Zanax... shaking her head.
"You people are weird," Furgh observes.
"Want me ta open that for ya, Zanax." the elf offers. "I do have the strength a six elves, donchaknow."
Zanax shoots Furgh a glare. "Back off, man...er, elf! You don't have the strength of six elves, but you do have the mouth of a dozen kender! Now, stop bothering me and let me concentrate!"
Hlarn smiles. "There might just be some kender blood in him you know. Beware if he ever says he's bored!"
"What's a kender?" Furgh asks, cheerfully. "Bigger'n a elf? Six was always a rough estimate, I'm sure it coulda been twelve."
He chuckles, but clearly finds Zanax's seemingly out of place fascination with the vial much far too interesting to get distracted from it.
"Its just a jar, ya know. Any elf, worth his salt, woulda had that thing open, hours ago. If ya gotta concentrate so hard, maybe her turnin' 'er the wrong way? Maybe if ya used both hands?"
Sasha nods at Zanax's assessment ... "Mouth of a dozen kender! That is good .. I have heard tales of that race ... and I think we are blessed not to have one amongst us ... Furgh aside that is .. though I know he ins't exactly Kender ... but does act so on occasion ... doncha know ... "
Rage looks at Furgh with renewed interest. She saunters over to him, placing her arm around his shoulder and squeezing. She whispers, "Strength of six elves? We must talk more my dear Furgh. We must talk indeed."
Furgh, being more a cheerful voice attached to an invisible body, does his best to evade the woman. "Hey, back off lady!" he says, accusingly.
It doesn't take him long to figure out that being quiet helps the invisibility much better.
"Kal, I must agree, this day is a memorable one. The breeze, the sky, the leaves... this is what life is all about." He turns to Rage and says, "Lady, inhale and enjoy... this is what the essence of life is. The beauty, the invigorating feeling.. aah, gotta love it." Jerry says as he raises his arms to the sky and twirls around for a few minutes.
"Rage, can you fly ?" he asks, impatience seemingly abounding in him.
Rage looks at the druid and sighs. "Let's get back to business," she says slowly.
"Rage, you really need to relax. You'll live longer," he says with a smile.
Rage raises her eyebrow and looks Jerry hard in the face. "I am relaxed," she says, "For almost dying because of a ball of light... I think that I am quite relaxed."
"Ah, one of those so called 'I have seen the light' events," Jerry says in Common with a mild grin.
Switching to elven she points to Kal. "Finished marking your territory yet?" she asks. "Guys have all the luck,they can just point and shoot to mark their territory. It's much harder for women you know. How do female druids do it?"
"They can transform into an animal that has less trouble doing so," Jerry replies in Elvish.
Kadlian rolls his eyes. "Can we go now?"
"Yes, Kadlian, you may go now. Unless, that is, it will confuse Kal and his markings," replies the mage impatiently.
Kadlian sighs. "Okay, then let us go."
"All of us? Really Kad, you have got to be kidding! But, if you insist..." Rage hikes up her skirt and squats...
Kadlian holds up his hand. "Enough, Rage. You know what I mean. Let us return to camp."
Rage drops her skirt and stands, "I wish you would make up your mind Kadlian. As a leader, you need to learn to be decisive," the mage snarls. "I see there is still a lot of work to be done with you." She shakes her head and prepares to return to the keep.
Kadlian groans in frustration. "Enough! Stop twisting the meaning of my words."
Sasha chuckles at Kad's discomfiture. "You poor dear, don't let Rage get to you ... she is just a tad ..... err ... well .. you know ... " she stammers, blushing.
Zanax looks puzzled. "Sasha, do you mean that Kadlian's words aren't the only things that are twisted around here?"
Sasha nods, "Oh yes ... most certainly ... I mean .. here we are ...discussing such ... errr .. interesting things ... at this particular time.. as if we all didn't have a real purpose in life ... "
"Moi?" replies the mage, "You wound me, Kadlian, to be twisting your words." Rage checks off points on her fingers. "First, Kal asks to mark his territory here. Second, you ask us all to go. When I comply, you get angry. Where have I mishandled your words?" the mage says, staring at the elf.
"Kal said he wanted to mark this area. What makes you think he wants to urinate here? And all I have been saying since Hlarn answered my original question is that I want to return to camp now. I have never said anything other than that."
While this is going on, you do indeed see Kal taking a whiz nearby. He then moves on to another spot and repeats...
Sasha laughs out loud, then claps her hand over her mouth and politely turns her back again ...
Kadlian puts his face in his hand and shakes his head.
"Kad, you are such a stuffed tunic." Rage says, rolling her eyes. "What ever are you going on about?" she asks the ranger. "Why would Kal want to urinate here? Or is that how men mark their territory?" Rage asks with a puzzled frown on her face.
Sasha makes herself comfortable on the ground, leaning comfortably on her pack. "I can see this is going to be a long conversation ... don't you all have anything better to do?" she asks sweetly.
Kadlian throws up his hands in frustration and marches back into the tunnel as he heads back to camp.
You return to your secret lair.
The night passes quietly.