Mara stepped inside and scanned the room for magic auras/ "I wonder if this is the location that the nemhain is tied to? Unless that location is destroyed, the ghost will re-form. But I don't know how one would figure out if this is it, other than lengthy trial and error."
Dervak will examine the sarcophagus for traps.
If he finds none, he will try to open it.
"Stand ready with the Sunbeams..." he says to Mara and CiCi.
Theophilus orders Frederick to help Dervak.
Frederick just looks at the White Rabbit, who shakes his head and shrugs his shoulders.
Frederick (shoulders slumped) then trudges over to Dervak and tries to help push the lid.
The effort was there.
Dervak finds treasures:
Viol of potent summoning, a deep blue spinel worth 474 gp, three purple corundums worth 735 gp each, a darkwood statuette of a serpentfolk warrior with black opals for eyes worth 1,975 gp, a gold ring set with rubies worth 2,340 gp, and the following coinage: 618 pp, 2,387 gp, 8,575 sp, and 9,600 cp.
Dervak puts the Viol in the Haversack.
"This probably belongs to the Musician, right?"
He also stuffs in the gems and valuables, but leaves the copper just to be insulting.
"What should we do about the sarcophagus? I imagine it belongs to an important vampire..."
Dervak will happily smash up the sarcophagus if we have time. I don't suppose we have any other options for making it unusable?
"Where to next? The big creature to the north?"
The White Rabbit is seen wearing a Bathroom Attendant's outfit, as he posts outside the converted sarcophagus with a fresh hot towelette and some mints.
Theo grins in approval.
Dervak easily smashes the sarcophagus to bits, if the vampire who owns it dies tonight, it will surely be slain forever.
The White Rabbit is seen wearing a waste management outfit with a shovel and hard hat.
Theophilus laughs.
He was going to charge for each flush.
"Okay, let's keep going. North?"
Dervak goes to the northern portcullis.
Once everyone is there with him, he will Str-rage and give a mighty heave, planning to keep Raging to fight whatever thing it was that Rockwell had spotted.
The western portcullis is bypassed with some effort and an application of strength.
Cell doors line the north and west walls, each set with a small barred window. Two more cells flank a corridor that heads south into another chamber. A sour, fetid smell comes from the southern room. Organized into small piles are soiled blankets and pillows in one corner and human bones and scraps of flesh in another.
To the south you see a hulking bloated creature with eyes that protrude from numerous fleshy fat rolls. It regards you with its numerous eyes.
Theophilus wonders under the western portcullis that his good friend Dervak is kind enough to lift. Tipping his hat, the Witch enters the initial chamber glances down the corridor at the Mound Has Eyes and shits himself.
No one seen that did they?
"Should we try to talk to it? If it is a guardian of some sort, it doesn't seem to be very good at its job, seeing as we've been breaking and blasting everything in sight," Ci Ci says.
Dervak can tell from his companions' reactions that the Large thing is still around the corner.
But when CiCi expresses a wish to talk to it, Dervak ends his Rage for now.
He'll wait until the Fatigue ends (2 rounds) before entering the room.
Once her friends were ready, Mara approached the bizarre, trying to figure out what it was before greeting it.
Ci Ci is wise enough to determine that it is not a construct, and not an illusion.
Mara divines that the monstrous mass of eyes is something called a hyakume. A monstrous mystic able to steal memories and control those it drains. It is able to detach its eyes and send them out to spy for it. It is not limited mental attacks however, with a single strike it can set up vibrations in a victims body that is able to kill should the hyakume will it.
The White Rabbit is seen wearing another waste management outfit complete with a bigger shovel and nose pugs.
Theo just looks a bit embarrassed.
Clearing his throat, Theo actuall spills out some words at the friendly looking fella.
A dull monotone voice rings in your heads as Theo attempts communications, "Oh hello there. Thanks for noticin me. Artist? I don't remember an artist." A single eye breaks off from the hyakume and stares at Theo eye to eye.
Mara added, "The fellow we're looking for is a human musician. Perhaps we'll just look around"
She suspected that it wasn't a good idea to engage a hyakume in an extended conversation. She made sure that Theo didn't keep staring at it, and started checking in the cells on by one.
All the cells are empty.
Another eye detaches from the occular aberration and follows Mara around, "Oh musician. Yes I remember him, his memories aren't boring like the kinds Avaric usually brings to me. "
Ci Ci rests her hand on her darkwood club, and does her best not to look at the thing. "We should find and destroy every coffin we can in this area," she mutters to her companions.
The aberration continues to lose eyes a third now, which floats near Ci Ci. It comments, "If you intend to kill Lord Avaric, I won't stop you. You would perhaps be doing me a favor. And then I can owe you a favor."
Dervak enters the room.
"You have the musician's memories? Does he still have them too - like you made a copy of a book - or did you take them from his mind?"
Theophilus smiles.
Any hints as to how best to dispose of Avaric? And, what Dervak said. That really needs to be addressed.
"He has a few left but not much. The last bits are always the hardest to scoop out. I can put them back just as easily as they were taken. But I don't have a lot of reason right now. As far as killing Avaric, I can lure him down. He will think he's got you cornered and at a disadvantage but you'll be ready for him."
Mara tried to read the aberration's motives, but found it difficult because it was so alien to her.
Mara consulted with her allies, "What do you think? I cam shoot rays of pure sunlight that can potentially destroy Lord Avaric with a single shot. But be warned that the light is so bright that it will likely blind someone who gets in the way."
"I can almost guarantee that I will be in the way between you and the vampire lord, since that is my job. I will try to dodge your rays the best I can. Or you can heal my eyes later."
"Mara, can you call on that power of your ancestors? The heroic blessing?"
Theophilus just looks down at the White Rabbit, who just shrugs.
Mara replied to Dervak, "Alas, I don't have any more of those prayers memorized.
Theophilus cracks his knuckles. He slaps his good friend Dervak with a Feather Step.
The White Rabbit just shakes his head.
"Okay then. Well, I am ready. What is our plan? Theo makes him unlucky, Cerise and Mara blast him with Sunbeams, and I attack with my sword?"
Mara senses no deception from the disconcerting, unusual, and unexpected ally. A final eye now begins to follow Dervak around, "Whenever you're ready."
Theophilus takes position by the door, gaining a long (safe?) view of the main hall.
The White Rabbit is seen getting ready for war!
Ci Ci positions herself just outside the entrance foyer, where she can (hopefully) get a clean shot at the vampire with her power before he has a chance to react.
"I will be the rubble of the maze - the place that Cerise Disintegrated. That way, if Avaric comes through the trapdoor, he will see me and hopefully think that I am on my way to his coffin.
Cerise, it wouldn't do to have you and Mara catching each other the crossfire of your Sunbeams. I would suggest you pick one side, either north or south. The one closer to me can cast and step aside to make room for the next."
Mara advised her allies, "Its going to be very difficult for me to get a shot at Avaric without risking blinding someone. I may call out for a clear shot, to give you a chance to get out of the way."
"Feel free to catch me in the effect if you need to - we don't want to give Avaric warning. I have Echolocation, so if I am blinded I can make do until you can heal me."
He turns to the aberration.
"Can you tell Avaric that intruders have defeated the ghost and are on the way to his coffin? That might make him hasty and less careful."
Seeing Mara position herself in the maze near Dervak, Ci Ci adjusts her position to the other end of the hall, near the portcullis. Now with a wall between them, the likelihood of she and Mara accidentally catching one another in their beams is greatly diminished.
"Let's hope he doesn't have a back door into this place," she says to no one in particular.
With your ambush ready the ocular nightmare concentrates on something. A few moments later a cloud in the shape of Lord Avaric descends to the dungeon.
Dervak will Dex-rage and use his remaining 3rd-level slot to cast Bladed Dash as a standard action. It's a 2nd-level spell, so normally he can cast this as a free action when he enters Rage, but he's out of 2nd-level spell slots and has to use a 3rd-level slot as a standard action.
"Party's over. Mara, let him have hit!"
Mara stepped into the space that Dervak vacated, and prayed to the Heavens Spirits to blast the cloud of gas with a beam of focused sunlight, "Behold the radiance of a star brought to Carcossa!"
After Mara unleashes her beam of light, Ci Ci floats from around the corner and unleashes a beam of her own.
"Radius Solus Lumos!"
/2 = 25 points.
Theophilus watches all the action being centered outside his current line of sight.
I was thinking that we were allowing him to get into the hall?
He looks about for confirmation.
No?
The Witch then shakes his head.
Anything left of him in there, Dervak?
He shuffles a bit into the hall. He decides to hit his good friend Dervak with a Fortune Hex.
With a well coordinated strike Lord Avaric is obliterated by as the light of a distant star shines on him in full force.
Theophilus looks down at the sudden appearance of the White Rabbit.
Much like our early prepubescence days, huh?
The White Rabbit quietly puts away a kleenex box.
Dervak blinks.
He watches the mist evaporate.
He turns to Mara, his eyesight still functional. "Nice shot!"
"Uh... I guess that means we don't get his stuff?"
He goes to check on the eye-aberration.
"Now then. Can you help us find the Musician? And can you give him back his memories?"
"Well done, Mara! While we're at it, we need to check every corner of this place, and make sure any other coffins are destroyed," Ci Ci says.
Mara gave a sigh of relief that Lord Avaric had been vanquished without any casualties on their side. She looked around to see if any trace of him remained.
Then she went to speak with the strange creature that had too many eyes, in all the wrong places, "yes, as my friend says, we've delivered on our part of the bargain. Please take us to the musician, and restore his memories"