Argus tries to locate himself without much success while the others heal themselves and try to follow Kalkamedes in his way to the north.
Over the course of another two hours, the rough, mountainous scrubland gradually fattens and gives way to thicker copses of trees sustained by a series of chilly, narrow streams.
Kalkamedes’s trail meanders northward.
Kalkamedes continues walking tirelessly. The landscape becomes a bit kinder, going into a temperate forest. The sleepwalking paladin guides the party through a trial.
Delays to act with the humans
Delaying
Suddenly, Argus and Ardain notice something moving in the left trees. It seems some kind of skinny human with his face painted with vegetation colors. The figure seems to have seen you, but he stands in place, still, covered behind one of the trees.
Argus and Ardain advance protecting Kalkamedes. As they do so, 6 bandits ge out of the bushes with a clear intention to ambush them.
Argus recognizes them as typical human thugs, but they seem well trained into ambushes and might be dangerous if a flank is let to them. He also observes how they charge unhampered by the difficult terrain of the bushes and trees.
The bandits starts to shout "At last someone to get nice money from! Oh! Those guys have seen us! Ambush! Now!"
As the bandits charge over the party, Argus positions himself in front of Kalkamedes bravely protecting the party from the bandits ambush.
The bandits trying to flank Argus doesn't reach him comfortably failing their attacks, but the ones attacking from the front catch the dwarf overwhelmed and succeed to strike a couple of blunt hits with their saps.
Meanwhile, two other bandits run from the center of the pathway to reach the party.
Silas and Dailung slash at two of the bandits causing them considerable wounds.
Hundreds of small grass stems start growing getting stronger and mobile, wrapping around the bandits legs.
Three of the bandits get stuck on place strongly hold by the weeds!
Ardain hides between the trees, shooting a blast of acid into the air.
Meanwhile Argus hits with all his fury upon one of the bandits dropping him unconscious!
Kalkamedes moves into the weeds area, and the bandits profits the moment to strike over him with their saps. The already unconscious Paladin seems immune to the non-lethal damage because he continues moving without any kind of protest.
He seems to move with dexterity within the entangling weeds!
The rightmost bandit tries to free from the entanglement.
With all his strength he breaks the weeds and attacks Argus hitting him with his sap in the head!
"You! Don't kill my co-worker!"
Argus fells prone and unconscious due to the damage.
Similarly, the red and blue bandits try to hit him!
But the dwarf dodges both hits.
The red bandit retreats 5 feet into the trees. While the blue and green move 5' impeded within the weeds thanks to their Nimble Move feat.
The far away bandits try to break the entangle, only the black one succeeding. He moves towards Kalkamedes, ignoring the first 5' of weed, but being slowed for the rest of his movement.
Meanwhile, the other bandit continues fighting with the grass, but gets out a sling from his belt.
The green faced bandit drops unconcious when Dailung stabs him in the stomach with Gamin the Missforged guidance.
Silas slash though is pretty week and only cuts some grass, without the bandit even trying to dodge it.
Argus recovers his conciousness but he is still prone and badly damaged.
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Ardain leaves his cozy hideout to gain a better fighting position. Reaching into his component pouch, Ardain brings out a packet of multicolored sand. With a few Draconic words of power and a gesture he flings the sand out in a spray. There is a flash of clashing colored lights which bathes the two nearby bandits.
The weeds start growing again around the bandits legs, entangling them and stopping them on place!
Kalkamedes is also entangled!
A pattern of colors strikes two of the bandits. Both get fixed looking at it, then their minds are stunned and finally collapse to the floor unconscious letting their weapons to fall over the forest floor.
Kalkamedes fight with the weeds trying to free himself.
He succeeds and moves towards the north, forcing and attack from the bandit just in front.
The bandit hits him, but being already unconscious he totally ignores the damage.
Seeing so, the white bandit hits Kalkamedes in his legs but he do not suceed to trip him.
Kalkamedes responds trying to hit him unarmed.
The strike is true and the bandit is terribly hutted in his face.
Both bandits try to free up from the entanglement, without any success.
So they try again.
The one with his face painted in white finally succeeds and starts moving as fast as he can trying to retreat from the fierce defence.
"Oh my! This is not worthed!"
Argus beats the blue eyed bandit, leaving him totally and permanently unconscious, at least for some hours.
"Oh! Yah! I am also follower of Iomedae! Of course I surrender in place of such prowerness! Just dismiss these weeds of hell!" yells the bandit, hands up, in the middle of the curling grass.
As the entangle disappears, the remaining bandit starts running after his fellow. Those ones will take a time before trying to assault any traveller in the region.
You take some of the money and tools from the fallen bandits.
As you see Kalkamedes walking North, you understand you have little time to lose. Kalkamedes continues his trek, largely oblivious to the combat and your attempts to question or search the bandits.
Thus you pack together and follow him hastily without much entertainment.
He journeys north and then gradually gravitates to the northwest for two more hours.
The light of the sinking moon washes the sub-alpine valley ahead in silvery light. A squat, stone bunker crafted of dark rock sits nestled among the low trees, its domed roof barely peeking out from above the leafy canopy. As a cloud passes over the moon, the entire structure seems to fade from view, leaving a momentary void before the moon’s light again illuminates it. Only a single entryway mars the smooth, windowless facade of the lone building.
The structure is the Black Edifice. Given Kalkamedes notes from the region, you picked up at the beginning of the night, it seems to be an ancient waystation used by the Thrallkeepers thousands of years ago to summon and store dangerous creatures from the beyond. Most of the flat defensive tower’s levels are deep underground. In order to conceal their dangerous summoning activity from inquisitive minds and curious neighbors, the keep’s designers enchanted the structure’s exterior to be invisible by day and visible only by the direct light of the moon. Fortunately for you, Kalkamedes’s subconscious knows the way to the entrance, and he is not deceived by the illusory defense.
A ten-foot wide stone archway, its keystone inscribed with a seven-pointed star wreathed in ancient markings, offers ingress into an unlit corridor built of cut stone blocks. Weathered script snakes its way up and down each side of the entrance.
The words on the entrance are written in Thassilonian.
“Enter the Black Edifice, locus of the Thrallkeepers, servants of the Runelord of Sloth.”
Paw prints of dried mud left by resident animals show regular ingress and egress.
You follow the corridor until it turns into a new room.
Steep stairs descend into the room, whose only other entrance is sealed by a massive set of iron double doors that block passage to the east and rest upon a dais of glistening black stone. To the west stands a statue of an elderly, robed man carved from the same dark stone, and in his hand he brandishes a slender golden wand that points toward the door. Ancient script winds around the statue’s round base, and dried leaves, dirt, and small animal bones are scattered about the room.
The statue depicts the High Gorelock Ahm’Jugarian, a mid-ranking Thrallkeeper who was once the custodian of the Black Edifice.
There is another Thassilonian inscription on it.
“Those that would dare believe they are strong enough to oppose us shall learn that their strength is their weakness and our weaknesses are our very strengths.”
It is a wand of ray of enfeeblement (16 charges).
Kalkamedes repeatedly attempts to walk through the closed doors, and he fails once and again to trespass them. It seems he will not go any further without help. This might have been the end of his night travels during his last weeks.
Ardain tries to investigate the wand without much success. It is certainly something familiar, but he doesn't really get it at the moment.
The party a bit startled reminds in the entrance of the room seeing Kalkamedes stomping against the iron door without knowing or deciding what to do next.
Ardain tries to operate the door.
Tour pushing efforts seem not enough to open the door.
Siglas casts detect evil in few targets without getting any evil aura.
Argus pushes the doors but as he climbs to the dais his great strentgh seems to fade away making impossible for him to push the doors not even a millimetre.
Shagruk sees nothing hidden in the room, but he perceives an awkward situation. Ardain the wizard seemed to move the iron door more than Argus the brutal dwarf brawler. Strange.
When Shagruk climbs to the dais, he suddenly feels invigorated. His theoretical weakness unexpectedly transforms in brute force.
His push is enough to open wide the iron doors to surprise of everybody.
Kalkamedes starts walking along the corridor behind the doors until he arrives to a new chamber.
Suspended by thick chains, a massive metal cage shaped like a demon’s head hangs over a dark shaf with no bottom in sight. The cage’s door—by all appearances a menacing maw, filled with incisor-like fangs—hangs open to the west. There, a narrow bridge spans the short distance between the ledge and the cage. A small console on the north edge of the bridge bears a single lever.
When Kalkamedes reaches the room, he walks straight into the cage through the open mouth and silently waits inside as if waiting for it to descend in order to continue his travel.
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Ardain takes a moment to scratch his head. That door... The golden wand... It is most puzzling.
"Kalkamedes is obviously waiting for us to pull the lever. Once we do so, the cage will descend down into the pit." Ardain gazes at the golden wand. "I think we should take that with us. Trouble is... I'm a little scared of booby-traps."