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Varg wakes up early, before most of the others, and begins his morning routine of stretching and meditating to loosen his knotted muscles and prepare his body for what may come next.
When Brok speaks, the grey dwarf looks over to him.
Beware what you ask for. We do not know what the next level might hold. It might be great wealth, or great pain.
Grey was not idle that night. He moved his mask and communed with his goddess, then borrowed Arlok's glaive and spent a few minutes making light etched symbols int he haft, then scratched the metal lightly with a chisel as well.
Then he cut his own hand and gripped the weapon. Blood flowed forth fast, running along grey's symbols and soaking into the weapon. It warped and cracked, the surface of the wood splintering and the metal rusting over and then flaking, aging in moments. Grey stood, slamming the weapon once into the wall, causing a large spray of wood dust and rust to burst forth.
With all the decay knocked free, the weapon Grey handed back to Arlok was magnificent. The wood was blackened, but white beneath, and carved with skulls stacked one atop the other the whole length of the haft. The head was blackened as well, with gleaming runes etched into the face and a shining silver edge.
He handed it back to his large companion. "A gift."
Arlok is hesitant at first but give the weapon to the priest.
"What you do? Feel better balanced?" He eyes the man a moment.
"Father grant you power... Arlok thank you."
Brok quietly approaches the first door in the corridor.
He looks over the door for traps and checks to see if he can hear anything behind it.
(+3 for traps)
Brok explores the door carefully and determines it is safe to enter. The door reveals another corridor that heads due west for a ways before ending at another door.
"Not your father. Our mother. In a figurative sense."
After they had rested, when his prayers were complete, Grey repeated his bloody craftsmanship, this time remaking Brok's ratty boots. Somehow, when Grey was done they were comfortable, soft, and very quiet.
Keil follows in behind, checking Brok's work as he goes. "Check the mortar."
Brok nods in thanks to Grey for the magics that improved his simple goblin boots.
He slinks down the newly revealed corridor to the next door on his newly padded boots.
He searches for traps and listens at the door.
(+3 for traps)
Brok determines the door is safe. On the other side is a large room. The floor of this room sits five feet below the bottom edge of the door. All along the floor you see green flames that illuminate this room in an eerie light. The flames only extend a couple of feet from the floor whick leaves a three foot gap from door level down to the top of the floor. Curiously enough, there is no heat emanating from the flames. Only when you put your hands about a foot away from the flames do you heel the heat, which appears as hot as any fire you have encountered.
Also chains hang from the twenty foot tall ceiling at ten-foot intervals, extending to each door of which there is one in the east, west and south walls. Each door has a button next to it on the inside of the room to the left of the door. The button can easily be reached from the door without any risk of falling into the flames.
The room appears to be unoccupied.
"Room appears to be trap for overconfident fools." Brok says to the group.
"Swing from chain to chain until trap drops you into green fire."
Placing a finger on his chin Keil asks, "So what do you propose?"
"All place seem like trap. Chain probably break if Arlok try and swing."
Praetor casts his detection spell and easily determines the flames, while altered to only extend a certain radius, are quite real.
Raaz mutters a few words quietly in the infernal tongue before speaking up to the rest of you, "Those buttons next to the doors on the other side. Should you wish to have them pushed, I can tell my...companion Akkus to handle that minor chore."
Grey raised an eyebrow beneath his mask. The fact that Raaz had a companion had certainly never been mentioned prior.
"Companion?"
Raaz returns the witches' stare with an amused look. "Forgive me, my social skills have been said to be...lacking. Plus Akkus is a...little shy." His voice turns to a command as he adds, "Akkus, show yourself."
As the rest of you look on, a small humanoid figure appears before you obviously cloaked by an invisibility spell. All of you have no problem recognizing the fiendish wings and the scorpion-like tail behind this diminutive, humanoid red-skinned creature.
An imp.
"Ah. Useful. Greetings, Akkus." Grey said with a nod.
Akkus' coming out of hiding this late in their explorations gives Keil pause to wonder what else Raaz is hiding, or the others for that matter. Keil greets the imp with a sneer and spits, "Your Devil Brat should prove useful. Send it in Raaz."
Turning at Malzii's reminder of Scoot's usefulness Keil folds his arms in contemplation. Directing his words to the rest of the group yet keeping his narrow eyes on Malzii, "This faction possesses untapped resources. We should use them to their fullest. The imp and Scoot can scout ahead to snuff out this dungeon's secrets, reporting to their masters regularly and leaving the goblin's and myself free to focus on our crafts."
"Father sends servant. Arlok not know Akkus."
He watches as the imp does his task.
The imp bows in respond to the witch-doctor and the kobold shaman, while shying away from the godling.
Raaz stares at the fetchling for a moment, a chilling look in his eyes. "Akkus is not a pack mule to haul whatever beings wish a ride around for their own amusement!"
He does nods in agreement to Keil's suggestion and motions Akkus to fly off. He first gestures to the east door, and then the south door. "Which button do you want to have pressed first?"
Snickering at Raaz's reaction Keil waves off the suggestion, "Scoot is hardly a burden. But it matters not. Akkus is clearly only suited for menial tasks."
Returning to the question of which button to press, the shadowy man replies,"Any button will do. Without a closer look, there is no preference. Let us see what happens." Keil sighs, then adds, "South."
Raaz nods briefly, then turns to face the room issuing a mental command to Akkus. The imp now visible flies across the room before diving down into the flames. Raaz nods in response to a silent response, saying "Yes the flames are indeed real."
Akkus swoops up next to the south door and easily presses the button. As the stone button sinks into the wall, you hear a grinding noise and a stone bridge starts to extend from under the south door, level with the door. after a few seconds the bridge stops after extending twenty feet or so.
"So, a bridge? A nice way to bypass the flames." Raaz comments. "Should Akkus push the other button now?"
"Push all."
Brok ducks his head, expecting the worst, as the imp pushes the buttons.
Akkus nods in obedience to Arlok's command and hurriedly flies over to the west door and pushes the button. As before a stone bridge extends from the bottom of the door and about halfway before stopping. A push of the button next to the door you are at extends a mirror image of the bridge under your feet.
Now that all three bridges are extended you see they all meet up in the center of the room, thus allowing access to all the doors therein.
"Good, Arlok say go left."
The shadowy man sneers at the appearance of the stone bridges. Glancing over his shoulder at the godling, Keil nods then steps carefully out onto the bridge. Where the bridges intersect, Keil turns south and approaches the door on the left, his yellow eyes scanning the portal for anything out of the ordinary before checking the door next to it.
Keil sees the south door is un-trapped and opening it leads to a corridor branching off to the east and west. Each branch eventually ends at a door leading south.
Signalling to Brok and the others, Keil disappears through the door and into the next corridor. Keeping with the godling's advice, he makes for the door on the left first. Plying his trade as he goes, the fetchling's search turns out to be more routine than skill.
Despite Keil falling into complacency, nothing occurs as the fetchling opens the door. This large room contains three sarcophagi, one in each alcove to the east and west, along with one against the south wall. A closer look reveals each lid is set with a single ruby mounted on the top.
Nothing reacts to your presence here.
A small sigh of ecstasy escapes Keil's lips. Tapping his fingers together the shadowy man slowly approaches the sarcophagi to examine their lids before touching anything.
Ah, time to stretch my legs!
Scoot chitters in reply to Malzii and then quickly scuttles from her hand onto the ground and into the room with the sarcophagi. His eyes scan around for any immediate threats or things of interest besides the fetchling.
Raaz watches silently as the scene unfolds in front of him. He inclines his head and mutters over his shoulder in the infernal tongue, "No, this is a good test for the shaman. The deeper we travel in this goat-infested abyss, the more we need to rely upon one another's talents."
Scoot skitters into the room, barely leaving any trace of his passing, and follows along behind the fetchling. Other than the normal insects and tracks left by the spider's normal prey, rats, nothing seems to be lurking in this room. Drawing closer to each one of the sarcophagi, the spider sees there are several small cracks along the bottom of each stone surface that could be squeezed through, though it would be a tight fit.
Although the company his mistress kept was largely her own business, Scoot had to admit that the group had chosen well with the fetchling as he watches him examine the outside of the sarcophagi.
He'd make a fine spider himself.
But, there was still work to do and he himself could get to places the fetchling couldn't easily reach. Continuing to move slowly, he attempts to inch his way under one of the small cracks in the first sarcophagi.
"Arlok could just open. Then we get ruby from lid and treasure inside. If dead have money. Arlok like dead with money. Like saying, here Arlok you have our money now." He smiles.
Scoot manages to squeeze inside the sarcophagus after a few seconds and climbs deeper inside the dark, dank confines. Looking about the cramped area, the scarlet spider sees a humanoid skeleton, mostly intact, its skeletal hand grasping a longsword. Skittering along its body the spider also can tell it is covered in a suit of rusted chain armor. The skeleton does not react to the presence of Scoot in any way.
Keil finds nothing else around the outside of each sarcophagus, save for the gems that gleam brightly in his eyes.
Brok creeps around the room, looking over each of the stone coffins before Arlok starts to pry anything open.
(+3 for traps)
(+3 for traps)
(+3 for traps)
Brok looks over each of the sarcophagi closely but determines there are no traps that he can find.
After a moment, Scoot squeezes his way out of the first sarcophagus. He pauses for a moment and chitters in Malzii's general direction as he telegraphs an image of what lies inside the stone box.
Looking thoroughly disgusted Keil nods to Malzii and her pet - all his way of saying thanks. "Yes. See to the next while Brok and I open this one." The fetchling jerks his head in the direction of the next sarcophagus then gets to work prying open the lid. Before the lid is removed however, the shadowy man glances around to the warriors to see that they are ready to act.
Grey readied to attempt to take control of the skeleton if it moved.
Initiative
.
.
As Keil opens the sarcophagus the skeleton within rises up to face those who would disturb its resting place. Grabbing its sword it swings hard at the fetchling...
;
hit vs FF AC.
...the blade catching the fetchling on his arm drawing blood, though he is able to twist aside to avoid the worst of the blow.