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The column, despite being a mindless construct, has delusions of grandeur, imagining it actually struck the halfling, who dances aside unharmed.
Craggark chucks a flask at the blue column, and it starts on fire.
Meanwhile, Jamir carefully positions himself to stalwartly defend the rest of the party while leaving Mythryndyr a clear shot at the enemy. Jamir's totally defensive posture makes it extremely difficult for the creatures to hit, and Mythryndyr's arrows slowly chip away at them. After three rounds of hasted assault, the fire and arrows cause the blue column to crumble. You spend couple rounds healing and preparing for when the pit spell's duration runs out--Mythryndyr pulls out his spare quivers and gets a couple of assistants to stand nearby, keeping an ample arrow supply at hand. The pit disappears and the red column shuffles forward mindlessly. It hopelessly flails away at the halfling's defenses. After about another half minute or so, the red column joins his blue compatriot as a pile of rubble covered in shattered arrow kindling.
There is little in this room aside from rubble and many bits of shattered arrows.
The short hallway to the west reveals a room beyond with walls, ceiling, and floor covered in elaborate patterns of countless tiny tiles. The tiles also form three images on the south wall: one depicts a woman in a cloak hovering above a pile of skulls; another depicts the same woman kneeling before a massive fiend; the third shows her in the company of a godlike figure standing before a massive pyramid.
There are a number of heavily damaged objects scattered about the room, including: heavily dented gold-plated idols of the pharaoh; a lacquered box (covered in tooth marks but unopened); a ceremonial platinum dagger (snapped in half); dozens of pieces of pottery (smashed to bits); six scrolls (chewed up into spitballs and stuck to the ceiling); and numerous objects of gold and silver, all dented, battered, and broken a dozen times over.
Mythryndyr is able to open the box, and inside he discovers from very old, dusty, stale incense.
As you take the time to look about at the various damaged and shattered items, you try and assess what you have found.
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Jamir leans against some of the rubble, shaking out his sword-arm and resting his legs. "Yes, well done indeed, Mythryndyr! I have never before gotten such invigorating exercise not stabbing something that tried so hard to kill me!"
The halfling looks at the detritus scattered around the room for anything of interest.
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"Whew!" Katswiri takes out the wand again and heals Craggark's wounds. "Very well fought everyone! An excellent example of triumphing in a difficult situation through cooperation."
Katswiri will examine the shards of the shattered statues, looking for similar symbology or similarities to the previous statues. Were these also weakened magically? She will sniff them to see if the have the same burned smell as the previous statues.
Katswiri nods and points to the image as Aroden speaks. "That fiend is Ahriman, the lord of all Divs. But who is the woman? The source of the telepathic message we received near the entrance, perhaps?"
Katswiri will turn her attention to the found relics, cross referencing various items with her reference materials and examining them closely with her magnifying glass. When the incense is revealed, she will carefully smell it and cast detect magic, sweeping both the incense and the room.
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"I never doubted it; tough foes, but nothing a little basic strategy couldn't handle. That pit was key; that's a very useful spell." He joins Katswiri in studying the incense, making sure to roll a bit of it between his fingers to get a sense of its feel, and even dipping a fingertip lightly and putting a few granules on his tongue to note down the taste.
As you carefully examine and gather up the various items, in the hopes that Aroden may be able to mend them on the morrow, Jamir, Katswiri and Aroden all concur that these items date to the reign of the Pharaoh of Forgotten Plagues. Robbyn tastes ancient dust, and little else.
You peer through the entrance to what appears to be the final room in these ruins. You see a well-preserved wooden chest sits atop a platform against the east wall of this room. A series of arcane glyphs burnt into the top of the chest forms a spiral. Iron bindings reinforce the chest, and it has no apparent lock or key. A series of heavy latches keep the lid tightly shut.
The only aura not coming from your fellow adventurers is from the chest, and while it is a very strong aura, Katswiri cannot identify it.
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Katswiri's brow furrows in worried concentration as she allows her hand to drop. "Hm. Whatever is enchanting that chest is quite strong. I'm afraid I can't place the school. I would need a closer examination to try to identify the spell itself, and there are a number of nasty candidates that might do something unpleasant if I did so. Robbyn, Aroden, can either of you place the school from a safe distance? We should know as much about this as possible before meddling."
Attempting to ascertain the properties of a magic item takes 3 rounds per item to be identified and you must be able to thoroughly examine the object.
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Katswiri reaches out to grasp Jamir by the shoulder when he goes to follow Aroden. "I would actually suggest we don't get too close to this all at once. Such strong magic on a chest could easily by some type of magic Symbol, and if we set off one of those it could be extraordinarily dangerous to be close to it." Katswiri looks over at Aroden and Robbyn with a concerned expression on her face. "If this is a Symbol of Death, Explosive Runes or some other type of magical script it may trigger if we attempt to read it. I should use my second sight to see if it is safe for us to try and do so before we proceed."
Aroden detects strong auras of enchantment and conjuration coming from the box itself. The chest itself seems to be magical, i.e. the aura is not coming from within the chest. After given the go ahead that the area around the box seems trap free, Robyyn circles the chest, examining it closely. But he is unable to discern exactly what its properties might be. There does not to appear to be any kind of a locking mechanism, just several latches requiring fine motor control to open (i.e. fingers and an opposable thumb).
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Katswiri gives a wry smile and lets go of Jamir's shoulder. "They are magical runes, but they explode in a fireball when you read them. Since there are many types of warding runes, and generally you must examine them closely and read them to attempt to determine the exact type, it can be rather dangerous. Since I can see glimpses of the future, however, I will use my second sight to see if such is the case here."
Katswiri will go into a brief meditative trance, her eyes flicking about as she looks at hints of what could be. When she returns, she nods and gestures towards the chest. "It appears reading the runes at least should be safe. Let us see what we can identify here."
Katswiri will approach the chest, and attempt to analyze it in the following order:
First, she casts Read Magic. She will attempt to read the arcane glyphs, and determine if they are a Symbol spell, a Glyph of Warding, or some other type of magical script.
Second, she casts Identify and attempts to identify the chest as a magical item. Her prophetic insights gleaned from the natural world will guide her to the correct conclusion.
And last, if she has not yet succeeding in identifying the magic of or on the chest, Katswiri will activate her second sight to tell her what spell effects if any are on the chest, meditating briefly before identifying any spell effects in place.
Katswiri consults the signs to try and get a sense of what the script might hold, but she gets nothing from her augury.
Her attempts to read the magic on the box merely reveals they are ruins related to enchantment and conjuration, but there's not enough there to truly reveal the nature of the script, other than its part of the creation of the chest.
Casting identify, Katswiri is able to determine this is a Box of Banished Memories, some kind of Memory Receptacle, designed to hold memories, which are stored in some kind of object contained within the box. One can access the memories by simply handling the object inside.
Her careful examination of the box and its auras determine that the enchantment are conjuration are simply tied into the memory trapping and storage. There is no other magic in effect.
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Katswiri finishes her examinations, her eyes snapping back into focus as an excited grin spreads across her face. "This is...well, I can't say it is definitely safe, but it isn't explicitly trapped, at least not with magic. This is magical device known as a Box of Memories, a type of Memory Receptacle. The memories are stored in an object within the box, and it is possible to access the memories by holding the object inside. I think we should open it, who knows what memories from ages past might lie in here!" Katswiri will put her words into action by opening the latches, and lifting the lid on the box.
You see three curved horns propped by little stands that are part of the box. The horns and box are all part of the same magic, and Katswiri is quite certain that each horn contains a separate memory. Simply touch the horn and the memory will manifest as a vision. There is no real danger to touching the horn and seeing the vision, other than whatever personal emotional reaction you might have from seeing the vision.
The woman stands surrounded by the aftermath of a great battle in the desert. She examines the wounded and dying with interest, ignoring their cries for help. She kneels by a dying man, places her hand on his forehead, and says, “Were you one of ours? One of theirs? It matters not. The Plague loves all of you the same. Do you feel it? As your body dies, does your mind cling to life? Yes—I sense it. Wonderful! I must try again. Soon even the Lady of Graves will have no hold over my fate.”
Screams echo around the dark halls as the woman snarls. “They die too quickly! There is no time. I need healthier subjects.” She looks up, but her features remain obscured. “Go to the training grounds. Tell the captain I require another full squad of his most able-bodied guards for the Dungeons of the Ever-Dying. Perhaps they can survive long enough to further my studies. No—not one squad. A dozen fresh recruits each week.”
As first Myth, then Aroden reach out and touch one of the horns, their eyes become glazed and unfocused for just a brief moment or two. Then, with a slight shake of their head, their gaze returns to normal, and they're minds are focused again on your current time and place.
Robyyn reaches out and touches the third horn, and his gaze also drifts into an unseen distance for a moment or two.
Feelings of intense pain and desperation accompany this memory. The woman mockingly waves one of the horns into view. “What better material to preserve a memory than the horn of a creature fundamentally obsessed with knowledge? Perhaps I shall find others like you, take their essence, and perfect my magic. Pain? Yes. There will always be pain for you. I will leave you those memories. A suiting gift for a traitor."
The visions that were shared were so indelibly etched that each of you can close your eyes and see them again. And indeed, Katswiri is visited with each of the visions when she touches the horns.
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Aroden looks shaken. For the next few minutes, he seems to flit between being in the moment and being far away.
"She was of Ancient Osirion, although her evil in the pursuit of knowledge brings to mind some of the Runelords of Thassilon.
She was researching something... and had enslaved an immortal being with a lust for secrets. Possibly a div or a demon. Which likely carved the phrase 'I will seek the Dungeons, find the screams, remember your name, KILL YOU!!!' into the walls in fiendish languages among others. And she sacrificed many lives in the pursuit of some knowledge or other."
"I think finding these Dungeons of the Ever-Dying should be our next step."
"Hmmm... our secret-obsessed immortal slave was a Doru Div. It seems that the Orision woman took three of its six horns to hold the memories. The Div itself is a disembodied head, so not too unlike a Vargouille in appearance. Anaref's description was fairly accurate, it seems, and the Div has now escaped its prison and is in search of those Dungeons."
"Without hands, the div could not open the box, though it tried to scratch it open with its horns."
Having thoroughly explored the depths of these ruins, you make your way back to the surface, where you find Obahar eagerly awaiting your report.
"So what did you find down there?"
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Robyyn's hand goes to his face, comforting an imagined pain as he listens to Aroden explain. "I remember her doing it!" He waves off anyone who attempts to touch the same horn, and refuses to touch any others. "You don't need to remember that. Don't."
When they arrive at the surface he responds to Obahar simply. "We know what we seek now, that's for sure." He tries to think of a way to explain what he saw, but pushes the explanation away. "It's complicated. But it's no varguille, that's for sure. It's a nasty kind of div." He motions towards the way down. "But it's safe to head down there now."
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"Exploding runes!" He shakes his head in disbelief. "Maybe the blasted goblins have the right idea about reading after all!"
Once Katswiri identifies the contents of the box, Jamir tries the horn that Myth touched. When he comes out of the short trace, he shakes his head, scowling, then spits as though trying to clear a bad taste from his mouth.
"Bah! Why would anyone want to save these memories?"
Jamir adds to Robyyn's explanation to Obahar, "Yes, we will find this Div, and we will end its murderous rampage. It may be a glorious fight to the death, or some other, less interesting means of deterring it from further bloodshed. Whatever the means, my friend, you may rest assured that we shall prevail, or my name isn't Jamir Montajay, of the Cassomir Montajays!"
Jamir strikes a heroic pose, and shows very little disappointment when nobody notices.
"How do you know it's a div? Do you know what kind?" He pauses for a moment and taps his chin. "Ah, probably a Doru Div--the floating head! Did you find any clues on where it might be headed?" He chuckles a bit at his attempt at being punny...