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It is decided to rest up before pressing onwards. After about ten hours
Czevbourne has recovered all of his 'spells', and Gruff fully prepared to
do that healing thing he does. The door from which Czevbourne got the
strange impression is opened, and leads off into an intricately carved
corridor, of triangles and suchlike. Czevbourne has some knowledge of
mathematics, and seems impressed. Everyone enters the room, some with a
strange sense of deja vu. Everyone finds themselves floating in nothing.
A strange little man greets the party. This all seems quite
familiar to some of the party members, who feel as though they have been
here before. The little man talks for a while, and says he'll be sending
the party to find these three weapons that he is after. Not listening to
what the party are saying, he waves his hand, and the party find
themselves standing knee deep in the watery tunnels of White Plume
Mountain. Everyone feels as though they are a lot stronger, and seem to
remember that that strength will be necessary if they are to recover the
weapons. Dyxs and Fourn flip a coin, and Dyxs opts to use the strange
sharp shortsword they found with his new found skill. Mat takes his
longsword. The party press onwards, strangely knowing some of what to
expect next.
The party head for a room that they remember contained these sphere
things, remembering a ring that might help them cross a big fiery cavern
that is also remembered. The room is empty, and as the party are walking
back off down the tunnel, Dyxs is suddenly dragged underwater by
something. It soon becomes clear that two very large snakes are attacking
the party. Dyxs does very well to free himself from the constricting grasp
of the muscular snake, but Haiko is grabbed by the other one.
Mat and Fourn score 18 points of damage between them on the stray
snake, but it is still fighting. Haiko continues to struggle against the
snake, and Dyxs gets himself to his feet, but his weapon is for the moment
lost beneath the churning water. Fourn and Mat continue to attack the
other snake, and are doing well, until Gruff and Mat manage to drop the
lantern into the water in passing it between themselves. Dyxs and Haiko
continue to wrestle with the snake attacking Haiko, but aren't making any
progress. Mat takes to attacking the snake on Haiko, but only manages to
further injure Haiko. In the next round, Dyxs feels Haiko go limp beneath
the constriction of the snake, and Gruff still has no luck in finding the
lantern under the water. The snake continues to attack the unconscious (or
worse) Haiko in the next round, and he really looks a mess when it finally
lets go. Dyxs eventually gets a longsword into his hands, and Fourn
finishes off one of the snakes with his long spear. The remaining snake
takes to attacking Fourn, who is both bitten and constricted for
comparatively little damage. Mat manages to find Haiko's corpse, and makes
sure it is not below the water. Dyxs puts his blindfighting to good use,
and in the following round deals out 26 points of damage to the snake
around Fourn, killing it, without injuring Fourn. Gruff rushes to tend to
Haiko, but doesn't do him any good when he attempts natural healing. Gruff
casts his newly empowered 'cure serious wounds', but will need a lot of
luck if he is to restore Haiko. He manages to restore 14 points of damage,
and Haiko is back on his feet, not feeling too bad. Somebody makes a torch
from the spilled oil and some rags, and the party head in the direction of
the lava cavern, as they seem to remember.
The group reach a door, and upon entering the room, are beset by
four or five leathery winged evil looking flying chicken things. It is
decided to barge past them towards the far door, but it soon becomes clear
that the party will have to fight. Dyxs, Fourn and Mat are attacked. Fourn
and Mat are struck, and both turn immediately to stone. Haiko strikes one
of the things with a punch, and Dyxs kills one with one sword blow, and
takes a fair chunk out of another.
Dyxs and Haiko are both struck in the next round, and both manage to save
against the petrification. Dyxs kills one of the injured creatures with
his first attack, and manages to catch his balance after nearly fumbling
his second. Czevbourne casts 'Melf's Acid Arrow' at one of the creatures,
covering it with a spray of acid that will continue to burn. Haiko takes
to attacking with a staff, beating on the acid covered chicken thing. Dyxs
is forced to save against petrification once more, before himself and the
acid dispatch the last two creatures.
Fourn and Mat still stand as statues. Czevbourne opts to try to
dispel any magic at work, but something odd occurs (as it is wont to) and
he isn't really sure how well it worked. Mat remains unchanged, and Fourn
slumps to the ground, back to flesh and bone. Gruff examines him, and
although there is nothing physically wrong with him, Gruff declares that
his spirit has left him, and he is dead.
The party press on, and eventually arrive at the familiar ledge
overlooking the lava cavern, with its two great spurting gouts of
fire. Gruff heals up some of the more injured party members, and
Czevbourne prepares to cast the 'fly' spell that he has thankfully
learned. Dyxs is to be the target of the spell, and to be the one to haul
the other party members across while under the influence of the
spell. Something goes wrong with the spellcasting, and a random spell from
Czevbourne's memory is cast upon Dyxs. Luck is with the party, and 'fly'
not 'fireball' or something equally unpleasant is cast upon him. Haiko is
the first person Dyxs carries across the cavern. They safely reach the
opposite ledge, but the door is stuck, and both are burned severely by a
blast of lava before they reach the safety of the corridor beyond. Dyxs
continues to ferry people back and across, but carrying all of the
backpacks and armour is far too bulky.
During this time Fourn awakens from his slumped position in the
corner. Looks like he wasn't dead after all. Eventually everybody is
ferried across, Czevbourne being the easiest as he had cast 'levitate'
upon himself, making it a simple task of pushing him straight across.
The party stand in a dark corridor ending at a stout door. From
what the party seem to remember, one of the weapons is likely to be just
beyond the door. From what they remember something very undead and very
nasty is likely to be there too. Czevbourne has learned a spell that will
allow him to create and invisible all-seeing eye like sensor, so he casts
'wizard eye' and sends it through the hole in the door. The 'wizard eye'
is unable to see anything but darkness in the room beyond the door, but
Czevbourne is at least able to map the rough size of the room before the
spell ends. The room is about 30' by 30'. Gruff steps to the front, and
opens the door. Gruff casts 'dust devil' and sends it into the dark
room. None of the light from the corridor seems to enter upon the
room. The 'dust devil' is killed soon after entering the room. Czevbourne
steps to the front with the intention of casting 'fumble' inside the
room. A humanoid creature, shrouded in black, appears at the door in front
of Czevbourne. The creature strikes Czevbourne, and he finds himself
considerably less experienced that he was before the blow. The 'fumble'
spell fails. The creature seems to cast some sort of spell itself before
fleeing back into the room, but nothing comes of it, or it doesn't
work. Dyxs manages to step up and deal the creature, being dubbed a
vampire, a solid blow with the shortsword. There is a hiss and a spark of
light as the creature is struck, and it retreats back into the
room. Czevbourne announces that he is going to cast 'haste' upon the
fighters. He does so, and Dyxs, Fourn and Gruff charge into the room. All
three stumble over a small step, but pick themselves up quick enough, and
begin scouring the darkness for the vampire. Dyxs and Fourn are both
capable of attacking four times per round while under the influence of the
'haste' spell, and as soon as the vampire betrays its position Dyxs
strikes it (the sword sparking as it makes contact) for 9 points of
damage.
The vampire attacks Fourn, and hits him, reducing him to about
half the fighter he was beforehand. Dyxs continues to rain down the blows
on the hard to hit creature, striking for 4, then 10. Fourn too strikes
the creature, but his spear passes straight through it and the vampire
changes his target to Dyxs. Gruff searches for another door out of the
magically dark room.
Dyxs fails to strike the vampire before it strikes him, but does well to
land one blow as most of his strength is drained from him. Dyxs is down to
attacking twice per round, and manages to land one more weak blow before
all life is drained from him by the vampire. Fourn takes up the attack
with the shortsword, and Gruff is alerted to Dyxs' plight. Fourn fights
on, one hit from oblivion. Seemingly, so is the vampire, and Fourn is the
first to strike home. A hiss of gas is heard to rush out of the room, and
Czevbourne and Haiko in the corridor notice it pass them.
Gruff kneels to tend to Dyxs, darkness or no. His 'cure serious
wounds' spells are spent, and he can but cast 'cure light wounds'. Dyxs'
injuries are grave, and he is only slightly less lucky than Haiko that the
healing restores him to life. The room no longer seems so deafeningly
black and Fourn tears a plank from the vampire's coffin to get some fire
going. The room is bare, save for the coffin, and some pretty unpleasant
wall carvings. Haiko searches the bottom of the coffin, and uncovers a
little door opening to reveal quite a horde of treasure. There are a
couple of scrolls on top, which he passes to Czevbourne. Inside is also
the Dwarven hammer, which the party seek. Haiko picks up the hammer, and
is immediately dragged out of the room at great speed by the hammer flying
through the air. A few moments later, the party find themselves once more
empowered, and ready to take on the task of finding the next weapon.
Czevbourne, with a new array of spells, casts 'continual light'
upon a stone, that the room may be properly illuminated. The rest of the
coffin is searched. The compartment is seen to contain a potion, along
with thousands of quite large gold and silver coins. With metal being
scarce the way it is back home, this is more than a king's
ransom. Czevbourne has learnt 'fly' again to get the party back across the
cavern. Once more, he fails to cast it properly, but this time there is no
saving wild surge. The group of Fourn, Czevbourne, Gruff and Dyxs are
quite stuck as to how to get back across the cavern. Czevbourne's spells
are a once off thing upon empowerment, and he has no way of meditating for
more. After a good deal of arguing, useless ideas and Gruff throwing coins
around the room, a plan is hatched. Gruff says that he'll need to meditate
for 8 hours, and maybe he'll be able to change his spells, which come from
his stupid boar spirit, not from a non existent spellbook like
Czevbourne. A boring eight hours pass. Dyxs goes out to the ledge, and
sees Haiko on the other side of the cavern. Mat is with him also. So he's
no longer stone. There is no way of communicating, so both sides just
wait. When Gruff is done, he announces that he will be able to protect
everyone from the flames of the lava, and enable them to walk across the
fiery lava itself. This combined with a 'levitate' and 'haste' spell from
Czevbourne is enough to get everyone down across and up the other side of
the cavern safely and quickly.
With that, everyone heads for the left branch of the central
tunnel, with that strange remembrance of what might be ahead. A pit below
the surface of the knee deep water is safely crossed, and the party arrive
at the metallic walls that they remember will not allow metal to pass
between without being heated enormously. After a good deal of argument,
Haiko presses forward, expecting to set off an onslaught of ghouls, and to
run back. Indeed this occurs, but as Haiko is backing off down the tunnel
the ghouls fall upon him. Dyxs charges up to drag Haiko back away from the
ghouls, and back at the corner, Czevbourne reads out the 'monster
summoning III' scroll found in the vampire's coffin. All but one of the
ghouls back off down the corridor, the remaining one clinging to feast on
the paralysed Haiko. Fourn runs up to help Dyxs drag Haiko back, and in
the meantime six ogres have appeared in the corridor behind Czevbourne. A
couple of the ghouls turn around to attack Fourn and Dyxs, who manages to
land the ghoul on Haiko a solid blow, but not dislodge it. Haiko is really
looking the worse for wear, and healing isn't any good if he's killed by a
ghoul. Gruff rushes forward in an effort to turn the ghouls back with the
power of his faith. He succeeds, and just as well for Haiko. The ghouls
shy back away from Gruff, just as the first of the ogres are barging
forward towards them on Czevbourne's command. A few moments later the
sounds of killing are over. The party argue for a good deal of time, and
eventually discover, after much burning, that it is impossible to get any
metal all the way through the corridor. Armed only with staves and broken
spear hafts, the party press onwards and reach the room in which the
ghouls were evidently killed by the ogres.
The party enter at one end of a 60' long by 20' wide room. They have 10'
by 20' of space to stand in before the floor gives way to a 5' long and
10' deep pit. In the corner there are a number of ghoul corpses, along
with some at the bottom of the pit, along with row upon row of nasty
looking rusty razors. It soon becomes clear that jumping over the pit will
not be a simple task. There is another pit about 30' after the first one,
and the floor in between seems to have a strange sheen to it. This is
confirmed when a number of rocks and stuff are thrown onto the stone floor
in between the two pits. The objects scuttle along as though experiencing
no friction at all, and one end of a rope slung onto the area between the
two pits slides and skids at the slightest movement. Dyxs, still under the
influence of the 'levitate' spell, notices that it doesn't work while he
is in the greasy floor room. Czevbourne tries to cast 'dispel magic' on
the floor, but nothing comes of it. The walls and ceiling in between the
two pits seem to have the same frictionless quality too. One of the stones
thrown across the pits reveals that the opposite wall is some sort of
illusion, and the stone passes through it, but that doesn't help the party
for the moment. Czevbourne casts 'wizard eye' again, to have a look at the
far side of the pit, but there is nothing beyond the false wall other than
another 10' of space. Czevbourne does notice that the razors in the far
pit seem to be covered in some sticky substance, and upon inspection, so
do the ones on this side. Nobody doubts that it is poison.
A search for traps on the party's side of the pits reveals
nothing. Eventually it is decided that Haiko brave the crossing. A rope is
tied to him, and he leaps across the pit. He immediately falls sprawling
to the ground, unable to get any traction against anything. As luck would
have it, the knot that Fourn tied breaks. Czevbourne has a strange spell
learned called 'alternate reality', and Fourn gets another chance to tie
the knot. His second attempt is worse, and Haiko remains free of the
rope. Haiko slides back and forth on the frictionless surface, growing
ever closer to the far pit. The party can do nothing but watch. He slips
over the side out of sight, and there follows a bone chilling scream of
pain. The group call out to Haiko, but all he can manage to utter is "I'm
all-right, I'll..", when clearly he is not.
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