"Ottavia are you trapped as well? Where are your allies? Have they entered the Vault of Heresies? I believe this was an elaborate trap to get us and you out of the picture and away from Mister Jierre."
Iva tips her head and listens. "Sounds like there's someone to the right. Shall we go and take a look?" She begins to walk down the hallway as quietly as she can.
As Iva is skulking down the hall towards the sound of chains clanking a pale, stunningly beautiful woman in a hot pink flowing dress can be seen levitating inches off the ground in a reclining position. Whisps are flowing from her figure as she lazes about.
When Iva strolls close enough to catch a glimpse of the floating woman, the floating woman also catches a glimpse of her. A look of surprise overtakes her face, though she doesn't leave her reclining position. From farther back in the hallway a resounding, "WHAT!", Can be heard
Ottavia smiles and say, "We were not 100 percent sure of whom you really are until you followed me to the island. My allies, what you mean Bree, Jierre, and Verzubak. I think they are still in the hotel. I argued that it may all have been a coincidence and wanted to know for sure. We cannot go out that door until sunrise"
Knowledge Religion
Looking at some obscure text in her possession, she says, Even then we need to pass the trials of virtue to escape. Which consists of drinking a chalice" and she points to the golden cups on the floor "in the next 8 chambers."
Iva and Primma
You hear a scurrying, some splashing, and the clatter of a quarterstaff on the smooth stone flagstones. ”Greetings, do you mind if I join you in here, I don’t think those undead will avoid me just because I’m sweet.” says a voice from the ether. ”Oh, right. Sorry.”
A figure appears before you where no one stood before, trailing the party some distance, but rushing to get inside, and to safety. He is bald man, carefully shaved on a regular basis so as to show off his very fine tattoo. The tattoo is of a stylized pseudodragon whose tail is coiled around his neck ‘clinging’ to the back of his head and just peering out over the top (barely visible from the front over the top of the head) as the tiny dragon looks out onto the world. The tattoo is lightly colored in greens and blues and is very beautiful, if you’re into that sort of thing.
From there, the gaunt man is dressed in several layers of homespun cotton, also brightly dyed, and a light silk scarf - a gift from one of his lady friends back home as a remembrance. He wears heavy well worn boots. He has a large sling bag over his shoulder and chest with a variety of clanking objects within. A light crossbow hangs at his waist along with a dagger that sees more use in dinner than in combat.
He looks levelly at the party, ”I’ve been assigned to assist you, and have followed you some little while. From what I’ve seen, you need little assistance however, but I’ll do what I can. I’m Euphemia Ferka, but my friends call me Femi.” he nods to Ottavia, ”Ma’am.”
”Trials of virtue huh? Not sure I’ll do well at that.” he winks and smiles broadly
He learns what he can from observing the cups and what little Ottavia has said.
Femi
Ottavia says, "Much obliged. I suggest we push on, should we go straighT or take tHe passage to the right or to The left?"
She says, "They were just mirages. I used scrolls to make illusory duplicates of them."
"Wait! Bree and Jierre are not here?! At the hotel?! Didn't we just follow them?" he says, asking his colleagues as much as Ottavia.
Femi smiles broadly, hoping to push through any confusion, "Why were you trailing those two? I'm afraid the home office didn't brief me terribly well, I was recently reassigned. Happy to be in the dark if we need to move on to stay ahead of those undead, but there's also some sort of curse, right?"
"Not a big fan of curses, but I do know a thing or two about these cups. See these sigils?" he points to a vessel without touching it, "That's Temperance, though I'm not sure why you'd put it on a drinking vessel." he laughs.
"Still, according to legend, we can fill these with holy water, drink, and lift the curse. 'course there's probably some ritual or other to adhere to as well, but that' beyond my current understanding."
He stands there smiling at the group happy to be helping, or at least believing he's helping.
Ottavia says, "Everyone needs to drink holy water in the next 7 chambers in order for the curse to be lifted."
Ottavia cocks her eyebrow and says "I only see one anyway, I did not trust you either, do not play innocent with me. You have been following my compatriots and I since definitely Cherage. The dwarf spotted you there following Boone, who has gone missing. Trust is a two-way street, my friend. You can either listen to my advice or not."
Iva looks at the floating woman, and then continues on down the hallway. She sees the half-orc, and stays back. Speaking to her, "Are you alright? Do you need assistance? Are you undead? There seems to be quite a bit of that going around on this damned island. Not Eschatologial at all. Their ends are not going to be at the right time and in the proper way. What a terrible existence."
Falko
You go off in the direction that Iva had gone in and see. And go around and see cracked and toppled statues which here depict seven saints of the Clergy who embodied the saintly virtues, as well as a statue of the person who commissioned the vault. And in the far corner, just before a staircase that goes down and where the corridor opens back to the right you see a female half-orc and Iva conversing with her and she is in chains.
"We got thrown in here by some traitorous lechers a day or two ago. This is Primma, I'm Carmen, we where supposed to meet with people from the HRC when business partners of ours decided that we'd be more useful dead." The wispy Carmen floats towards the chained Primma. "She's thirsty if you've got anything for that, the chains need taken off to."
"Ohhhh, you're not together!" Femi gestures to Falko and the Ottavia.
He apologizes to Ottavia, "A moment please." and he takes Flako aside. He explains to him who assigned him to this task, that he's working for the RHC, and tries to generally prove his bona-fides.
Assuming he's successful, he follows the group into the next chamber, and is instantly fascinated.
"Wow."
He casts Detect Magic and tries to figure out how she's floating, and any other auras.
Ottavia shrugs and says, "You sure have folks all over the place."
Falko deftly unlocks the chains around Primma setting the Half-Orcess free. She slips to the ground.
Ottavia hands Primma a water bottle and says, "You work here in Sid Minos?"
Primma Chugs the water down, emptying the bottle before speaking in a scratchy voice. "Sorta, deep cover for a couple years. Guess I had overstayed my welcome when I was set up to meet a group from the RHC headed into the city." Primma looks up from the empty bottle in her hand. "And by what monocur might I address my saviors"?
Ottavia shrugs and says, telepathically, "Seems like everybody is from Risur. I am Ottavia Sacredote from the Clergy."
]
"I did not come from Risur. I arrived to the train from Drakar. That's not important though. Parthena Burnett barrister at your service." Iva helps the half-orc woman stand.
That's a neat trick there Falko. You should learn to do some slight of hand and take that on the circuit. You could make a lot of cash with skill like that." he grins.
He nods to Primma, "I'm but recently joined myself and can take no credit for your release, but my name is Femi. At your service."
When Ottavia speaks telepathically, he's surprised again. A telepath! I wonder if she can read my thoughts! I'll have to keep it clean. he grins as he immediately doesn't, and then gets embarrassed.
He turns back to Falko, "What Ottavia said about the cups is true I think. If there's a curse, and we need to break it, that's the way to go." He turns to Primma, "The outside is positively swarming with undead, so we're sort of stuck here for the night. Ottavia here says to get out we have to lift a curse, and these goblets, filled with holy water and drunk by all, should do the trick."
"Maybe." he hopes.
Ottavia says, "We can go down the stairs, take a left or go back down the main corridor. Plus there was another passage back from where we arrived."
Femi's smile widens as he leans on his staff. "I do enjoy a good train ride, watching the countryside go by in a whirr."
He considers Ottavia's suggestions, and makes one of his own, "Let's try the passage back where we arrived. I don't like skipping areas as folks might come at us from the back, and that's where I usually am!" he jokes, ready to move on where someone else will lead.
First Demi activates his dancing lights spell. According to Femi's suggestion you make your way back to the way you came and and then into a smaller room which has two circles glowing dimly.
Each circle here has a pedestal supporting some item of note. One supports a book on a stand, sitting open. Beside the pedestal lies a long-decayed human corpse that looks like it was mauled.
The other circle contains a helm of ivory that looks as if it may have been made of ivory. The looks to be a staircase at other opening.
Femi, always drawn to knowledge, hesitates out of fear, but is drawn eventually to the open book. He slides toward it sideways as if that would somehow neutralize the runes he fears on the page. Eventually, he looks down upon it and tries to gather its meaning.
Femi
The text, The First Spellbook of Giovanni the Painter, contains guidance for creating extradimensional spaces, and includes the rope trick spell.
In the corner of the room, appears a large white tabby cat, which says, "Who pray tell are you folk?"
Femi smiles and mutters, ”It’s a storybook, and spell book, though I’ve already got the spell - it’s a good one.”
In the corner of the room, appears a large white tabby cat, which says, "Who pray tell are you folk?"
”Oh, hello! I’m Femi, at your service. Are you here to teach us fire? For we already know that trick.” and to prove it he casts Spark, lighting up some small scrap of paper (not the book!) with a greeting smile.
The tabby cat twists its left front paw towards its face and examines its claws and says, "Pah, to think I am here to teach you something... do I look so old as if to be the cat who was in said story?..... herah... meow, my familiar painted that for the clergy centuries ago. I have not had any meat in many a year. Would any of you perchance have something for me to nosh on? "
He then looks at the rest of the group and says, "What brings you to my vault? Do be quick about it!"
The large cat says, "So you are not here to commune with one of the permanent residents... meow... interesting meow... my familiar, Giovanni the Painter and I are trying to get rid of the so-called legion of Belcamp of the Golden Chain. Those fellows are in actuality demons and members of the demonocracy... meow. To leave this place, you would need to drink holy water from the other 8 chambers. By the by, I am Algunn the Artiste"
You then hear the sultry woman's voice again, who say, "You should visit the ninth chamber. I am the one can really help you and I have something that can assist in the future."
Iva sighs. Great a test. Who is telling the truth? Who wants to help and who wants to harm? This is going to get complicated.
Iva asks the cat, "Who is Giovanni the Painter, and who is the Belcamp of the Golden Chain?" She tries to recall what she knows to compare it to the answer from the er wizard.
She asks the voice, "Who are you? Why should we listen to you?"
Iva
Algunn says, "Giovanni is my Familiar, he likes to paint paintings wherein people may live. Belcamp is a bearded devil or demon. I have not seen him personally nay on two centuries."
The voice says, telepathically to Iva "I am the Lady of the Forked Tongue. Because I have the secrets that change worlds, save societies and those that defeat false idols. But come to see me and we will speak. I have interesting thing to speak to you about. Make sure to purify yourselves by imbibing the Holy Water."
Ottavia says, "The prisoners here are in here for either being members of the Demonocracy or committing some sort of crime against the beliefs of the Clergy. Some may in fact be dangerous while others may not. If I recall correctly, the first chamber with which we can drink from the sacred vessel is the next chamber."
Femi nods, trying to absorb all he hears. There is much to this place - not just a prison, but a strange place indeed. Multi-layered.
"Shall we proceed to our first drink then?" He turns to the cat, "Will you be joining us?"
He walks with the group to the next chamber to drink from the sacred vessel.
Femi realizes that he is unable to leave the circle where he was reading the book.
The cat says, "You seem to be stuck in that circle. I will not be following you as I will go and seek my familiar. Any more questions before I meet up with him?"
Knowledge Arcana or Religion for the circles DC 28
"Fascinating, a sort of summoning circle I guess?"
He tries again.
Sweat begins to bead as he tries hard to exit his prison.
The cat says, "These are called Binding Circles, the Clergy is a cruel lot, if it weren't for my familiar people would end up starving to death in this Vault."
After about a minute Femi is able to break his way out of the circle.
Algunn continues, "This vault is filled with some very interesting artifacts. There used to be more in the past but robbers took them."
He then points at the helm in the other circle and says, "The helm that circle will enable you to speak with some of the other beings in this Vault, my meow familiar and I have only been here since around the time King Kelland slain Srasma but some of the other things predate that and do not speak Common or the language you speak in RIsur Primordial."
Ottavia says, " We are not in that much of a hurry anyway, even if we drink all of the holy water, we still need to wait until sun up to leave because the thousands of undead outside would still kill us."
She then pulls out her pocket watch and says, "That will not be until 6am and as I recall, the train does not leave until 730 or so.It is currently a little past 8pm. Having the Helm would make it easier for us to communicate with the different creatures herein."
"Right." says Femi. He takes a deep breath and first tries to gather up the helm with a casting of Mage Hand. If it weighs less than 5lbs, he carefully lifts it up and levitates it to him.
When that doesn’t work, he steps in the circle and collects the helm personally. Then tries to get back out again…
Femi tries the mage hand but the item is too big so he goes in to get it and after about 40 seconds he gets himself out of the binding circle.
You move back to are B where you found Primma and then head down the stairs, once you get there and now with the dancing lights spell with you, you can see broken and rotten benches here facing a podium once used for organized prayer. The bones of at least a dozen people have been arranged around the podium, some of them showing partially burnt hand-prints. In one wall, a cracked stone basin still drips holy water.
You see a room off to the right as well as another staircase go up to the left on the top of that is what looks like a Mosaic of the Chryssiliri flag.
"Fascinating." Femi lingers a moment, trailing behind Falko, trying to take the scene in.
"Hey Gauthier, don't we need to drink holy water in each room? Wait up!" If Gauthier stops, he breaks out the goblets and starts to fill them with holy water from the leaky font. He passes the flagons around.