Nathadriel casts light on his shield and follows Gordon into the tomb.
Feeling uneasy, but deciding to stick with her teammates, Leifa will follow behind Nathadriel.
The party approaches the door to the northern crypt, and Gordon takes hold of the handle and pulls. With a strain that turns his face red, he manages to slide it open, revealing the space within.
As one might expect in a crypt, the room is lined with humanoid-sized stone sarcophagi. Each bears a two-word inscription, one word of which matches the proper noun on the door, and the other is different on each sarcophagus. At the back wall is a six-foot-tall engraving of a winged humanoid standing in a regal posture, labeled with two words, one of which is again the same as the proper noun on the door.
"Should we crack open these sarcophagi? For investigative purposes only, of course."
check out the other rooms?
"Unless you see some evidence of tampering, we do need to distinguish ourselves from common grave robbers, don't you think?"
Nathadriel nods in agreement with Layali, clearly uncomfortable. "Yes. Let's leave these in peace. If there are any more undead we should destroy them, but there's no call for violating undisturbed graves."
"I agree." "Lets leave the graves in peace."
"But does anyone else find it odd that the bandits just happened to be dumped outside of a building that turned out to be a mausoleum? It's almost like the people who killed the bandits where planning on burying them inside the mausoleum, but found the doorways blocked, and thus simply dumped them outside instead. Which resulted in the bandits turning into zombies, having not been properly buried. But who besides the original hilvans would of known this building was a mausoleum? There were no indicators outside of what it was."
"Everything dealing with these Hilvans seems to be a mystery of sorts, " Layali says to Leifa. "Perhaps we can find other clues inside there? I am not opposed to exploring and learning more."
"Should we finish here at the crypt, then make camp for the night, back where the horses are? I don't like the idea of leaving them unattended during the night. We can continue exploring in the morning. Does that sound like a good plan?"
"I think we have time to explore a bit more making camp. I'd like to check out at least one more building, if the rest of you are game. It definitely has nothing to do with wanting to make camp away from where the zombies were... On to the ziggurat?"
"Sounds good."
"In light of the zombies, I feel like not fully exploring this crypt before we move on may be a mistake." Layali says.
"I think we should examine these last two chambers, just to be sure there are no more undead. After that, let's move on towards the ziggurat and at least look for a way inside."
After a bit of discussion, the group decides to go with Layali's and Nathadriel's idea of exploring the crypts a bit further. Moving to the nearest door (the western one, labeled as commoners), you once again find it heavy but able to be slid open. Inside, you see stone walls lined with innumerable small alcoves (about one cubic foot each). Most of the alcoves contain what look like small stone urns.
These aren't made of potter's clay; they look to be the same type of stone as the building and everything else you've seen in these ruins today. Additionally, the style looks like metalwork, almost as though someone carved these stone urns deliberately to look like metal ones. Finally, they don't look like they can open: each seems like it was carved from a single piece of stone, and even seem to be attached to the stone of the alcoves on which they rest.
You hear a noise outside, like something heavy being dragged. The noise stops after a few moments.
"Ahh, did you guys here that? Sounds like something is being dragged around outside. Should we go check it out?"
"I don't see nothin'!"
Nodding to Leifa, Nathadriel draws his sword and heads in the direction of the sound.
"I heard it too. We should go see what's out there."
Layali looks around a little, but seems disappointed. Reacting to the elves' agitation, Layali readies her crossbow. "What now?"
Rushing outside with weapons at the ready, you see two things of note: first, that the bodies of the zombies have been re-piled (not high, just close enough to all be touching); and second, that a torch is lying on top of the bodies, which are beginning to burn.
You hear a faint, rhythmic whooshing sound somewhere above you, fading into the distance in the direction of the ziggurat. However, you don't see a source for this sound.
"Do you hear that? Something flying, maybe? That way, I think..."
Nathadriel points vaguely into the air in the direction of the Ziggurat.
"Someone, or something doesn't want these bodies left laying about apparently. I am uncertain if that is a good thing or a bad thing."
"I didn't hear it." Leifa will look away from the sky to the burning zombies."But that is a little ominous, but fitting. There's no way getting around it, there is someone besides us in these ruins."
"Perhaps one of us should stand guard while the others finish exploring the crypt."
"I'll, uh, keep watch out here. You all finish the crypt."
Gordon shivers a bit.
[b]"Sounds good."[b]
Leifa will head back inside.
Gordon stands watch over the pile of burning bodies, while the rest of you head back inside. You open the southern door (the only one you haven't checked yet) and find it much like the northern crypt: multiple sarcophagi labeled with what you would guess are names (the common word on all of them matching the proper noun on the door), and a similarly-labeled 6ft high engraving of someone on the back wall.
So, to sum up:
A mausoleum, mostly buried in a hill, with no access point other than where you broke through the wall. Inside is a center chamber which has what looks like it should have been an iron-gated entrance but is instead a stone-gated nothing. Three doors lead to three crypts: two seem to be family crypts, lined with labeled sarcophagi; another seems to be a commoners' crypt with rows and rows and rows of stone funeral urns such as one would put the deceased's ashes in, all unlabeled.
Meanwhile, Gordon has noticed nothing alarming other than the stink of burning flesh.
"Let's return to the horses and make camp for the night. There don't appear to be any more zombies and I'd prefer to be fully rested before exploring the Ziggurat."
"That would be my preference as well. I think we all could take a rest before moving on. But if both of you," indicating Gordon and Layali, want to move on to the Ziggurat tonight, I'll accompany you."
You trek back to the late bandits' hideout, and find your horses safe and sound as you left them. Just as you left it, the shrine contains the sleeping mats, dishes, rotting foodstuffs, and bags and boxes of who knows what that you now know to have been the supplies and spoils of those zombies' banditry.
Leifa will start making a map of all the places they've been so far and can see in the ruins.
Layali will investigate the bandit gear again, in case they overlooked anything of value last time before heading off to bed.
In the morning, Layali is excited and ready to head to the ziggurat after a light breakfast.
A few boxes and bags sit against one wall. One open-topped box is filled with weapons of various types and quality, another with foodstuffs that seem to be going bad. An open bag appears to contain fabric, perhaps spare clothing? Another large bag is closed, and looks to be full of bulk. A final box is steel-edged and closed, with a padlock lying on top of it.
Layali reexamines the various containers. The bag with the fabric in it turns out to be dirty laundry. The bulky, closed bag contains three shields, a chain shirt, and a set of half-plate armor. The steel-edged box is full of cash and jewelry: the cash totals gp, and you would guess the jewelry at about another 1,000gp.
"Cool, free money. I guess we should check out the ziggurat today..."
"I'm ready." Leifa will say as she does a few morning stretches.
Another bright and fair dawn breaks, and after a bit of breakfast, spell preparations, and so forth you begin your trek toward the ziggurat.
Through the area you've already traversed, Leifa's near-photographic memory for terrain offers you a path of no climbing, instead winding this way and that, occasionally going up or down a set of seemingly-pointless stairs.
You trek on for a good long while, eventually passing the mausoleum (the furthest point you had yet traveled) and you begin blazing a fresh trail.
As you pass the mausoleum, you happen to look back and see that the spot where the bodies were burning is now vacant. Not even the burned remains are there anymore.
About 10 minutes past the mausoleum, you find that the path ahead leads directly through the midst of four of the armored, winged statues that dot the landscape. Going around them would involve climbing down from where you are, walking way out around, and then climbing back up onto your current path once you're past them.
So now, you must decide: continue past the four statues and hope they don't animate, or go around and hope you don't take a nasty fall on these steep slopes? The statues are about 100 feet away.
"Those burned bodies are gone. I'm spooked. Let's not push our luck with the statues."
Layali nods in agreement with Gordon, "Probably best not to start our day fighting more of these creepy statues if we can avoid them."
"I'm for going around too. If there are people here and they have some connection with the statues, I want to antagonize them as little as possible."
Leifa scans the area, quickly spotting suitable places to tie off a rope. She ties one end to a rock, and everyone trivially clambers down, then she unties it and follows.
Leifa then joins the party in a long walk around the statues, then climbs up toward another anchor point.
With very little difficulty, Leifa climbs the hill, ties off the rope, waits for everyone else to get up, then reclaims her rope.
Moving on, you continue your winding path through the bizarre mix of hills and ruins and tiles and statues and whatnot.
As you trek along, walking now along one of the many tiled paths that are scattered around the ruins, Layali's eyes go wide as she sees a couple of the tiles shift under Leifa's feet, but she hardly has time to inhale, let alone speak, before Leifa takes her next step and the tiles beneath her feet give way!
Fortunately, Leifa's quick elven reflexes kick in as the falls, and she grabs the lip of the hole in which she finds herself, her legs dangling in the dark interior of what had seemed to be an ordinary hill. She pulls herself up to safety, and the lot of you are able to peer down into the hole.
It appears that you are in fact walking on the roof of a (buried?) building, as down below you see a room with carved-stone walls, a table and chairs, and two doorways that seem to be entirely blocked by the packed earth of the hill. The floor is about 20ft down.
"Oh, what have we here? This place is just full of fascinating strangeness isn't it?"
Layali tries to peer into the hole with her darkvision hoping to see something interesting.
Being careful not to cause further collaps, Nathadriel will also peer down into the chamber, looking for exits and perhaps an easy way down. If it's useful he'll cast light on a pebble and drop it down for everyone to get a look.
Layali and Nathadriel both lean in, peering down into the hole. As best as you can see from up here, the space below seems to be a sitting room: a small, round table sits with a couple of chairs beside it, and a rectangular structure that might be a bookshelf or something similar stands against one of the walls (though you can only really see the top of it).
The only things even vaguely resembling entrances or exits to this room (other than the new skylight Leifa made) are the two archways, each doorless but blocked by hard-packed earth.
Any closer examination would require getting down there somehow.
"Do we want to go down there? We could tie the rope on a rock again and shimmy down it to the room below."
"Might as well. We can lower the monk down, since the rest of us can cover her from above."
Much like many other things you've encountered in these ruins, the things in this room seem to be made of stone even if they look like they shouldn't be: the table and chairs look like stone that's carved to look like wood, and the bookshelf is full of "books" that look to be just stone carvings rather than actual books. One wall also includes rectangular areas that look like the stone wall was carved to resemble windows, even the part that should be glass.
Not only is everything made of stone, but these items seem to be a single object. That is, the chairs and table and bookshelf are all fused to the floor as though carved from the same stone, and the "books" are likewise part of the same piece of stone as the shelves on which they sit.
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Leifa will set up the rope and climb down to look around.
lets try this again
What! Unbelievable.
Well, here it goes... "Och. I'm alright"
"Umm, I mostly just see stone. The books are stone, the table is stone, and even the windows are carved stone."