The Restless Dead

Mar 7, 2015

PCs present:
Osirian Silvertongue
Zaya
Fluffy
"Boy"
and Brugg

Taming The Wild Beast
175 XP

'Bob' The Boar

After resting, barricaded in the gnoll's archery practice hall, the party awakes to attempt to tame and heal the caged and injured dire boar.  With Zaya and Fluffy speaking in soothing tones to the beast and Osirian playing a calming ballad on his mandolin, Fluffy approached the animal and began to remove the protruding arrows from the animals body.  After successfully removing a couple of arrows the third arrow proved difficult as the shaft broke off leaving the arrow head still embedded.

Osirian decides to 'Glimpse The Future' to lend assistance to Fluffy but fails to see anything useful. 'Boy' decides to help and approaches the beast and casts his spell of 'Memory To Mist'.  Temporarily dazed the dire boar gives no resistance to Fluffy's digging and retrieval of the arrowhead. Zaya ties a rope around the beast's collar and the group makes their way back to the Seven Pillared Hall.  Osirian has a grudge to work out with Gendar for tricking Osirian into donning cursed armor.

Back in the Seven Pillared Hall, Osirian quickly finds Gendar, the drow elf, who is trying to piece back together his 'Curios and Relics' shop.  Looking up from behind his makeshift counter and sees the party which just closed and locked the front door.  Angry words were bandied back and forth until finally Osirian brow beats and physically dominates the drow into submission and demands the drow find a way to uncurse the armor.  Now tied together at the wrists they walk to the teleportation circle at the foot of the minotaur statue and Gendar calls for Orontor who appears before them. Orontor claims not to have the skills to remove the curse but decides, in the name of peace, to study up on the practice and tells the party to come back in a week and he shall attempt it.

After locking Gendar in his own shop for the duration of the wait, Zaya is approached by a few townsfolk who are surprised to see her riding the dire boar who they claim is the property of  Ulthand Deepgem who runs a gem store on the far side of the hall.  Zaya, a very honest thief, rides the dire boar over to its owners store.  There is a great reunion with much hugging and waaaay to much licking and kissing for most normal people.  Ulthand offers Zaya a reward for bringing back "Bob" the boar to him.  Zaya, whose gem collection is nicely growing says that she would like a nice diamond, as she eyes a nice diamond sitting behind the glass cased shelf.  Ulthand procures a diamond, not from the showcase, but from a drawer behind the counter.  It is very large and Zaya quickly agrees.

After returning to the rest of the group, Zaya shows off her newly acquired gem.  Both Osirian and Gendar agree, she has been swindled.  The diamond is a true diamond but of an incredibly flawed nature.  Angrily, Zaya returns to Ulthand's gem store and demands a better diamond.  After almost ending up with the dire board instead, Zaya is satisfied with a nice quality diamond.

The week quickly passes and the party finds their welcome slowly wearing thin and Fluffy's gold diminished after almost running the local tavern dry.  The group is finally standing before Orontor the mage who says he is now willing to attempt the enchantment.  The first attempt failed miserably but the second attempt was a partial success.  The curse is now lifted.  Osirian and 'Boy' check the magic surrounding the armor and do indeed find it no longer cursed but also find the armor is not enhanced to the degree it once was.  Incensed, Osirian, rages at the mage saying any idiot could have done that.  He wanted the curse removed but not the enchantment.  After suffering a humiliating berating, Orontor teleports back to inside the temple, but not before the party sees the tears welling in his eyes and hearing the parting sniffles of one trying to hold back sobs.

(DM note:  Hey the armor still has some enchantment left. Don't be so hard on the mage.)

W4 - Shrine To Baphomet
1,300 XP

Returning back towards the 'Well Of Demons' in order to find the last two slaves, the party travels down the corridors of the Labyrinth until they again have to make camp and sleep in the dark, cold corridors. It is Zaya again who is awakened in the night.  This time it's a small demon that pokes her and welcomes her to the 'Well Of Demons' and offers the answers to any 3 questions she may have, in return for 100 gold or a portion of her life force (a healing surge).  Zaya ponders this then wakes Osirian.  Long story short they end up getting 2 feeble answers to 2 feeble questions.  When Zaya wakes Fluffy and informs him of the demon's deal, Fluffy asks if he can ask a question, the demon answers 'yes' and demands payment.  When Zaya refuses to pay for such inadequate answers the demon approaches her, touches her forehead and Zaya feels a surge of life force leave her body.  With that the party decides to resume sleeping, all except Zaya who lies awake stewing in anger.

(DM note:  Hey Zaya, it seems you seem to keep getting the weird stuff happen to you during the nights. I'm not picking on you.  The dice keep simply picking you.)

Upon waking the group decides to investigate a room they had come across the previous time but didn't go into.  Here they encounter a gnoll demonic scourge who's meditation was interrupted by Zaya, not so stealthily, stumbling into the room.  For a moment they stare at each other and then the battle ensues.  During the next round the party hears a roar from the next room which they find was from a Barlgura who then emerges from the room.  The party is surprised and excited to see such a creature but with a series of amazing hits both the gnoll and the barlgura are defeated.

In the shrine where the barlgura was summoned, Osirian finds a magical tome which he discerns is probably used in a cult of Baphomet ritual.
If Your Not One Of My Players Click The Button.

They have now discovered The Book Of Wrath Unveiled which is one of the items they will need in performing the upcoming ritual to open the doors to the inner sanctum.
Hey! Fluffy! I thought I told you not to click on the button!

Fluffy and Zaya, in the other room, find a small treasure chest which Zaya easily picks open.  Inside they find treasure in the form of gold, and jewelry and a pair of Shadowfell gloves. 
Fluffy then searches the body of the gnoll and finds the key to the chest.
Zaya scoffs.  Who needs keys.

W5 - The Restless Dead
1,000 XP

Ghosts!    Will one of the ghosts turn out to be Gendar in disguise?

The party moves on down undiscovered corridors until they approach a room which has an cold blue glow.  Here they encounter 3 ghosts, Valdrog The Brute (a human male who wears chainmail and who bears a large slash across his face and down through his armor), Sir Terris (a prim and proper dwarf who's one side of his head is crushed) and Mendara The Mystic (a female wizard who appears every so often as completely burned).

The ghosts challenge the party to prove their worth to them. Osirian fails to impress with his athletic prowess but demonstrates his knowledge of arcana.  Zaya overwhelmingly impresses the spirits with her ability with the bow.  Fluffy impresses with his dungeoneering knowledge but fails to impress with his attack ability.

With that the spirits impart their knowledge of the Proving Grounds:
- The party must find the 4 magical items:  a knife, a bell, a mask and a book.
- Each of the items must be placed on one of the four circles of ruins within the complex at the exact same time.
- 3 of these items are found in rooms off of this complex to the north, west and south.
- the fourth item is on an altar in a shrine to the east
- to the east of the complex is the Inner Sanctum whose doors will only open when the proper ceremony is completed.

After wandering around the complex inspecting the various areas the party comes across a room with 4 pools glowing a different color.  The group excitedly debates the merits and risks of drinking from one of the pools.
Osirian is the first to step up and drink.  He chooses green.  He feels nothing unusual.
Zaya drinks from the blue.  She finds it cool and refreshing.
Fluffy drinks from the red pool and immediately feels a surge of energy and rage.
'Boy' is told by Osirian to drink from the yellow pool.  As soon as he does he vomits and feels horrible and loses 5 HP.  The pool is poison and 'Boy' is taking ongoing poison damage.

Fluffy figures the boy should drink from the green pool in hopes that it might cure the poison.  He is right and 'Boy' is put right.

(DM Note: I'm not sure how Fluffy figured that out but it was a good instinctual guess, which I was impressed with enough to grant an 'Action Point' reward for)

At the end of the evening, the group is now prepared to search for the other magical items in order to perform the ritual.