Last Vestige of Aroden |
Sorry for the delay.
Ripped by sword and acid, the shadow surges toward you. It's abruptly halted at the threshold. You see it visibly flatten against the empty plane of the doorway. Another slash of Marius' sword and it flees, only to be cut down by another throw of the blade. Like its fellows it dissipates into a fading black cloud.
You are lords of the battlefield. Your foes swept away.
Last Vestige of Aroden |
Marius steps though the door and nothing untoward happens. The party hurries forward.
So B5a or B5b? They look identical. May I correctly assume the marching order is Marius, Waifrin, Zara, Fiosa?
Reaching the landing in the tall shaft-like room, you look down at the hole in the wall 30' below you.
And how to bridge that gap?
Zarabeta |
Zarabeta wonders if the magic is a separate enchantment, or some property of this extra-dimensional space, hopping up a bit, just to see if she can feel if she settles to the ground more lightly.
"I would not recommend following the copper coin's journey. It seems likely that such a magic could well falter unexpectedly, and lead a fatal plunge."
"On the other hand, a descent into the depths leading to the true treasure, might fit with Asmodean doctrine as much as a cruel bit of trickery such as that..."
Last Vestige of Aroden |
The coin sails toward the infinite depths of the vertical shaft. Long moments later she is proved correct when the coin flies down from above.
Roughly 12 seconds round trip
Fiosa can barely see past her companions. Somewhat bored she looks behind her. Turning the corner of the narrow stairwell passage are two more shadows.
Zarabeta |
Zarabeta delays her action, waiting to see if Waifrin jumps, and Marius follows. If they do, she'll fling a bolt of acid at one shadow and then follow. If they do not, and return to the safety of the doors, she'll fling a bolt of acid, and then follow. :)
ranged touch 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (17) + 5 = 22
acid damage 1d6 + 2 ⇒ (1) + 2 = 3
Acrobatics, if we jump 1d20 + 3 ⇒ (15) + 3 = 18
Last Vestige of Aroden |
Waifrin leaps into the void. She might have thought the slow gravity would make a 30' drop a piece of cake, but she has trouble estimating how fast she will drop, and he head and upper torso hit the wall above the opening. Pain rockets through her head as her hands desperately scrape at stone for a hold. They find no purchase and she begins to fall away.
The impact rotates her legs into the opening however and the remainder of her momentum carries her through and onto the floor. Bruised and shaken she turns to see the other's fate.
No game effect on that damage. In the interest of not-a-TPK, I am going to let Waifrin take 10 instead of that roll.
Carrot chomp. Sidelong glance. Next?
Last Vestige of Aroden |
Excellent!
Marius launches himself from the landing and passes squarely through the opening. Zarabeta follows. Fiosa looks back at the oncoming shadows and hurries after her friends. The shadows pursue her over the edge of the platform and down the shaft. They are stopped suddenly at the opening in the wall, while the halfling moves straight through.
Fiosa can take 10 as well.
The party finds themselves in a short narrow corridor. Just a few steps along the corridor another passage opens through the wall. This branching corridor is lined with doors ala a jail cell.
Better description for you tonight. I am so glad one of you did not end up falling eternally down the shaft while shadows drained you.
Zarabeta |
Once she's landed, with a deftness that surprises her and is more the result of luck than skill, since she's never tumbled further than off the back of a horse before, she turns and does what she can to Aid others coming down.
Aid Other roll, taking 10, to help the next arrivals by reaching out and pulling them to the shelf. +2 to their rolls.
Last Vestige of Aroden |
These halls are lined with doors—entrances into various jail cells. Each stout wooden door contains a narrow barred window set at eye level, and is also barred from the outside, with the exception of one door which is unbarred and empty. These halls wrap around the back sides of the cells, where smoky glass windows are set at eye level.
Most of these cells contains a simple straw mattress and the mummified remains of a long-dead and apparently once quite long-lived prisoner.
There is one door out of the cell block. From the last cell before the door you can hear low-pitched howling or moaning.
Last Vestige of Aroden |
It doesn't take a genius to guess this thing has something demonic or devilish about it.
When Marius looks into the eyeslit another of the long howling moans commences and then snaps off.
http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/monsters/devil.html#_devil-bearded
Zarabeta |
"There is magic to block dimensional travel, which could hold a fiend prisoner, but many lesser fiends do not even have the power to travel in this manner." Zarabeta says, her dry scholarly recitation making her nerves at this unseen source of these moans.
"And, given the nature of this places' designers, there's no guarantee that the prisoner hasn't been forced into a monstrous form, or is simply a tiefling of more than usually fiendish appearance, and no more dangerous or wicked than a fruit-vendor..."
"I am more concerned about the open cell. Someone, or something, may have escaped, and be stalking this place."
She leans near the door Marius peered into, and says in Infernal, "Speak you the devil's tongue? Why are you imprisoned here?"
Last Vestige of Aroden |
The demon replies to Zarabeta in a voice higher pitched than you might have guessed from the moans.
The devil's voice grows louder as it speaks and it punctuates the end of its answer by pounding on the door.
Zarabeta |
Zarabeta summarizes for her companions, "The fiend says that she was imprisoned for failing to warn Dargentu Vheed of a plot against him fast enough, and that, if released she will punish him terribly for this injustice."
Does Zarabeta recognize this name? Or should I? Please don't tell me it's someone like the Mayor, and I'm being terribly absent-minded... :)
Knowledge (local) to know this name 1d20 + 10 ⇒ (11) + 10 = 21
Last Vestige of Aroden |
Silence falls as the party looks at each other. It is a silence notable for its absoluteness. There are no sounds of insects, birds, wind.
Then the devil lunges against the door and jams its face to the eye-slit. A crystal red eye peers out at you and a strand of beard wriggles pleadingly through the bars. She draws breath and howls.
Zarabeta |
"So, she-devil seems well and truly stuck. Shall we get moving?" Zarabeta asks, looking around for any place that might seem to be a good hiding place for the item Arael wanted from here, which she's guessing will be in some sort of treasure room, and not a jail for fiends.
Last Vestige of Aroden |
"NOOOOoooooooo"
That leaves you with one trapless door.
Opening that you see a long room. Mildewy strips of wood panelling hang from the domed ceiling like drooping branches. A large pool of churning muddy water fills much of the room. At the far end it flows between a pair of slimy looking stairs into a smaller pool in a smaller diamond shaped room. The odor is swamp. There is a door at the far end of the diamond shaped room.
Zarabeta |
"Well, there's a room I would not include in my incomprehensibly expensive extra-dimensional snack chamber... A fetid pool of stank, occupied no doubt by something equally noisome." Zarabeta says dryly, as she pulls a scarf over her mouth.
She waves her hand in the air in front herself, and thin coils of scented smoke carry the scent of sandalwood, but it too quickly fades away to be replaced once again by the bog stench.
prestidigitation