22 Eleint 2993
Early on the 22nd of Eleint, Wooshhh, Uffda, Tonk and Who, Susarra, and Vogelvina walk to the northern gate of Keep Hill to gain an audience with the Lady Alexia Basileon to sell her two of the ancient Archontean Imperial Field Plate. The party initially seeks to keep their purpose for the visit secret, explaining only that they need to see the Green Lady to sell important goods, but they quickly realize that the City Watch guarding the door take their job seriously and they show the field plate and explain its significance. Gaining entrance to the Residence, the party is escorted to a waiting room by two Azure Knight and shortly is joined by Freydis the Stern, major domo of the Residence. Freydis impressed by the imperial field plate, agrees to buy both sets for 4,000 gp each. With this transaction finished, Freydis tells the party that Lady Alexia Basileon is seeking the Regalia of the Archon of Arden Vul and is willing to hire the R3C, among other groups, to find the Regalia or at least bring items of the Regalia back to the Residence for purchase if found. She pays the group 500 gp for the promise that such items will be brought to her for purchase and intimates that such purchase may not only include monetary compensation but other perks, such as property, titles, or other remuneration.
After leaving the Residence, the party heads up to the plateau of Arden Vul, enters the basement of the Plaza of the Priests of Thoth, and tells Lankios that they have found Guivrel and show him the stone plaque that he himself made 250 years ago but has forgotten. He seems to regain some lucidity and demands that the party speak to Guivrel and seek her judgement before devolving into tears and self-loathing. Filling a few vials with the sludge of healing, the party heads to the northwest corner of the basement and decides to descend to the fifth level of the Halls of Arden Vul via the ancient privy located there. Tonk enters the mind of Hu and send him down the shaft. As Hu is flying, Tonk sees a ring suspended from a rung by a piece of twine and the owl brings it back to Tonk. Determining the shaft is safe and of the right distance, the party leaps from the basement and falls safely to the end through the help of Wooshhh’s feather fall spell. Alighting in a shallow cavern with a crusty, dried layer of effluent coating the floor, the party looks around and notices a tunnel heading to the northwest which slopes down, a tunnel ten feet up on the eastern wall that seems to remain level, and a large, worked stone room to the south down three steps to a single sarcophagus.
Before the party can move, Wooshhh hears a noise and looks up and sees a grey ooze detaching itself from the ceiling to fall on the unsuspecting party. Thwarting the ooze’s surprise, the party quickly dispatches the creature and turns their attention to the southern, worked, party of the cavern. At the bottom of the three stairs but before the sarcophagus four corpses lie on the slate floor. The finished walls of the niche feature brightly colored mosaics, while its centerpiece is a beautiful porphyry sarcophagus. Of the corpses, one is ancient, while the other three are modern; all have been scorched as if by intense heat. The ancient corpse wears the barely-recognizable robes of a priest of Set, and still clutches a strangely shaped stick in his skeletal hand. Two of the modern corpses are burned beyond recognition, while the third still possesses finely wrought chain mail and a still shines longsword. Looking about the room the party sees mosaics on the three walls before them: to the west, ancient Archonteans direct workers who are erecting the Pyramid of Thoth; to the east, an Archontean archon rides a dragon over the finished city of Arden Vul; and to the south, Archonteans inspect cave mouths from which protrude fierce chromatic dragon heads. Inspecting the sarcophagus, the party reads on it, inscribed and filled with silver: “Julian Grex, archon, he who first located the Obsidian Doors, plumbed the secrets of the Great Travelers, and revealed the properties of arcanum” on the lid and the sides listing epithets, namely: “Great Architect”, “Humble Overseer”, “Beloved Father,” “Intrepid Explorer”, “Favored Rider of the Old Ones. Noting the scorched bodies the party searches the room and discover nozzles on the ceiling from which they think fire issued as a trap. Undeterred, Uffda walks to the sarcophagus while the other retreat from the room and starts to push the lid off, tripping the trap and taking two rounds of fire damage as she heaves off the lid.
Seeing the body of Julien Grex inside, she is quickly distracted by his specter rising and raising the four corpses as skeletons, which attack. A fierce battle ensues and the party is stretched to the limit. Vogelvina is rendered unconscious at one point and her maximum hit points are lowered drastically. The party prevails in the end but is seriously battered and bruised. Searching the environs they take the chain mail and longsword off one former zombie and the fancy set stick off the former zombie priest of set. In the sarcophagus they find 1,753 ancient silver pennies which they deem too heavy to take; a fist-sized piece of arcanum; an annotated map of an unknown section of the Halls, scribed on a piece of brass; two disks (28” in diameter) of grooved, beaten gold with 1” holes in their centers; a fancy longbow; and 10 fancy arrows made of ebony. The party finishes searching the room and uncover a secret door to the south. Taking it they seem to pass under some party of the fifth level to come back up in a room with a looted sarcophagus above which on the wall is written, in the same hand that had previously had denoted “Basil, archon after Adrienic. He lasted only a few days”, “Sibillire, Court Wizard”. There they decide to rest and ponder their next steps.
The party, now comprised of Wooshhh, Susarra, Nubbins, and Tonk, refreshed by their rest in 5-19, backtracked to 5-85 and solidified their belief that the pathway trending down from the cavern to the west likely continued to a lower level in the Halls. Sending Whom down the path to the east, Tonk discovers the chasm but turns Whom back before reaching it do to the number of spiderwebs in the last part of the tunnel.
Returning to 5-19, that party cautiously opens the door to the south and discovers an octagonal room with seven other doors leading away. To their left, standing in 5-19, is a door made out of a strange material, smooth, but not wholly like metal that would seem to open in a symmetrical circle. It is unlike anything anyone in the R3C has encountered. There is a similar, small, rectangular, space on the wall next to this door, at about humanoid head height. The party tries a number of things to open this door but cannot accomplish it. One of their final attempts involved Wooshhh casting Knock on the door to no avail, but making a loud noise that echoed through out the chamber and without as well, as a short time later a heavily armored figure entered into 5-18 through 5-6F. The figure introduced himself as Sir Calculor, the Sun-Scarred Knight. By accent, Archontean, this human bares scars covering his face, the rest of his body covered in a black platemail. He asks the party if all is well given the boom, and talks to them briefly, telling them that the Rudishva (iris door) will not open without an identity plaque. Deflecting most questions, he bids the party well and leaves.
To the left of that door they discover 5-24, a burial chamber like 5-19, with a similar scrawl of red paint on the wall opposite the door that reads, “Kalliston, priest of Debellaton. One of the good ones.” The sarcophagus is decorated with figures of legionares and the sickle of Debellaton and an inscription in Archontean: “Kalliston, beloved of Debellaton, fallen in battle.” More interestingly, a translucent, 5”-tall image of a cloaked figure with a scythe hovers just above the sarcophagus. When the party approached to search the sarcophagus, the incorporeal image grew to 9’ tall and shouted menacingly in Archontean, “Lord Debellaton commands that you let his servant rest!”. The party nevertheless overthrew the lid, in doing so felt something pass through their bodies, but found among the bones of Kalliston a magical flail, three 5”-tall basalt statuettes of the reaper (275 gp each); a lemon-yellow silk shroud with purple images of hoplite images and swords (a piece of silk from the imperial factories, worth 350 gp); and a silver and gold holy symbol of Debellaton (75 gp).
In the next door clockwise from 5-19, the party found 5-23, the tomb of Basil, which was found the day prior.
Continuing clockwise, the party entered 5-22, and found scrawled in red paint opposite the door, “Kyrenaios the Chartoularios”, with the same name is inscribed on the side of the sarcophagus. The party knowing that the lowest level of functionaries in the House of the Thesmothete are called chartoularii, finds it curious that someone with that title would have a tomb to themselves. Looking inside the sarcophagus, which lid was destroyed, that party finds a 2’-long, leathery, brown egg. After debating its provenance, Nubbins reaches in and tries to pick it up, only for it to burst and spray him with its putrid contents. Nubbins smelled so bad that the party realized that they would more easily be found by wandering monsters.
The next door clockwise, is a set of ruined and now permanently open double bronze doors which have been shattered inward toward 5-6. The area around the keyholes looks molten, as if they had been blasted with intense heat. Going out of the doors, the party finds that they are further along the great columned hall where they fought the ghouls and ghasts the day before. They see another set of bronze doors opposite them, but these are closed.
Retuning to 5-18, the octagonal chamber, the party investigates the next door continuing clockwise. Across from the door to this chamber, 5-19, the party sees scrawled, “Tulliaros, polemarch of II Scutarii,” but finds the sarcophagus completely empty, as if there was next a body interred here.
The last door clockwise from 5-19, 5-20, was explored by the party, across from the door they found scrawled, “Georgios and Hradulfus, warriors of the Sacred Band.” A badly faded mural of two black-haired warriors fighting trolls may still be discerned against the northwest wall. The fragments of what might be two sarcophagi, as well as some badly scorched bones, are all that remain of the pair.
Exploring 5-18’s walls, the party spent some time reading and recording graffiti, which is listed below, in pertinent part:
— Gate Keys – one silver? One gold?
— Thanks, Adrienic. We enjoyed your hospitality.
— Humanz r meat. Yum.
— Sketch of an eye with eyelashes and a large eyeball
— A chalk sketch of a complex knot (known to be a Sortian knot)
— Don’t trust Gog. He knows more than he’s telling
— The Arena must lie behind those damned Gates.
— We claim this territory for the Red God of the desert! (A known aspect of Set)
— Go to hell, Set!
— Kaitor has betrayed me, Guivrel is gone. The darkness is closing in.
— The Rabbit was here. But now he’s gone. (A reference to an infamous Narsileon cat burglar?)
— The thegn is coming! (The trolls have a leader called the thegn?)
— Guivrel has changed. That bitch is evil, now! (Written in a different hand than “Kaitor…, above)
— Sure, Lankios is acting like a leader now. But where was he when the trolls fell on us? Stupid paladin.
— Adrienic was a stupid ponce. Glory my ass! Now we’re all gonna die.
— That worm Pollitt assured us he could find Marius’s tomb on the level below this one. But he’s scarpered with some of our valuables. Guivrel sent Justinus to bring him back.
— The goblins control access to the Sundered Span. Guess we shouldn’t have slain so many of them. Now we’re stuck.
— Make Gog happy, and he’ll make you happy
— Gog has a taste for beastman flesh, despite his so-called treaty
— Grease the paws of that goblin, Killik, and doors will open for you
— Don’t go too far east of the Troll Lift – we lost Grevius there.
— The Inn of the Lost lies just below the Troll Lift. Ask for Thegan. He’s a good bloke.
— Tremarus kept messing with the damned gates, and kept summoning more undead. He’s joined them now.
— There must be a way around these damned Gates. Maybe if we go down a level, and then come up behind them?
— Arcanum, huh. What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!
In the middle of 5-18, octagonal chamber the party found when leaving 5-19, the party found In the exact center of the room is a 15’-diameter raised dais (3’ off the ground). In the center of the dais is a 5’-tall lump of weathered, mostly shapeless stone; its original subject is impossible to discern. Investigation the statute that is now a lump, the party finds that it looks melted as if by some tremendous energy. Strangely, there are no areas of melting or signs of heat other than on this former statute. Just in front of this lump, facing the doors at 5-6F, is a second, newer statue of a human with one arm pointing forward and the other clasping a bundle of rods to his breast. A plaque reads ‘Adrienic, Governor of Arden Vul, 2759 AEP’ The figure is dressed in a toga-like garment, with sandals, a torc, and a circlet. The statue is white marble, originally with inset gemstones, but the stones are gone and the statue has been badly vandalized with graffiti and excrement.
After exploring most of the octagonal room at 5-18, the party retreated to 5-85, with Nubbins wildshaping into a spider to get back into the privy tube up to the basement of the Plaza of the Priests of Thoth, then changing back and attaching a rope for the others. They spent the night in the sludge room near Lankios.