Heading southeast, the party enters a pantry. This decrepit pantry’s shelves are barren, save for the sheet of dust and soot covering the room. The hutch in the southeastern corner of the alcove appears to have been smashed in, and most of it lies in shambles. Searchiong through the rubble, Davo finds a flat container of silverware. Upon closer inspection, one of the spoons among the various ornate pieces of silverware (worth 300 gp altogether for their craftsmanship alone) is actually a sustaining spoon.
Continuing toward the west, you enter what "could" be termed a kitchen, though the food stuffs has since begun to rot. You note the rancid food moving and undulating right before two swarms of vermin pour out, looking for their next meal!
The swarms of grubs pour out of the rotting food and wash over the party!
Davo identifies the swarm as being composed of rot grubs. He know they possess vermin traits and are immune to weapon damage.
Everyone scatters as the fat, little, wriggling grubs swarm toward you!
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After Marduk moved or said 'bring it on'
Lady Lumikello will cast a Ground Zero, Intensified Fireball Coldball for Reflex DC 24.
(Including the grubs, herself and any infested partymembers, excluding the rest)
5 foot step outside the swarm and ready and able to Emergency Forceshield if the swarms survive the round.
Lady L drops an explosion of ice crystals on the swarm, but the prove resiliant!
Marduk follows up with own spell, this one more fiery. Neither swarm is fast enough to avoid either blast and are left charred and frozen as the few remaining live ones wriggle quickly away.
Nothing of interest is found in the kitchen.
Moving to the northern room, you find a sparsely decorated living area furnished with a sturdy bed, a rickety desk and wardrobe, and a three-foot-tall iron safe in the western corner.
Besides scattered pieces of parchment and faded ledgers pertaining to the old dwarven mining operation here, the only things of note in this chamber are a thick iron key in the top drawer of the desk and a leatherbound journal beneath the bed.
Three fellow miners: Hekrin, Pyndle, and Sortare
One priest: Clockmother Ingled
Two pets: Maximos and Tor
To those who heed my dying wishes, I seek for you all the best in the Great Beyond, and hope that fortune finds you well.
—Captain Retham
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Davo presses his blade against his infestation to end it.
"Perhaps in your new form you could quickly explore and see if a water breathing is prudent? I can give you temporary invisibility to help protect you as you scout - your great speed should be your greatest defense if you encounter trouble."
Davo attends to some of Lumikello's wounds, lecturing her on the virtues of preparedness as he does so.
Davo checks the chest and notes a trap, but is able to disable the trap. As he tries to unlock the safe, he fails to pick the lock, and resets the trap. He notes the safe has three key holes. After some time, Davo wither uses the keys, or picks (T10) the locks, opening the safe. Once open, you see the safe is full of gold pieces, emeralds, fire opals, and amethysts, along with fingersized pieces of yellow corundum, alexandrite, and golden topaz. In all, the gems and gold are worth 20,000 gp. In addition there is a periapt of health in this safe.
In addition to what’s in the safe, the container itself can be claimed. Equipped with 10 doses of burnt othur fumes and made of fine cast iron, the safe is worth 23,000 gp to those who would know what to do with it.
Davo thinks back to what he has read of eidite, and recalls the toxic mineral eidite is native to the Karggat Hills, and scholars speculate that it’s a result of the foul magic left here by Geb and Nex’s ancient wars. Any living creature that touches eidite risks exposure to the substance’s highly poisonous toxin. It also sounds like the mineral, the ratfolk was wanting samples.
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"For want of a shrink item. Perhaps we can return here at a later point to reclaim the safe."
The professor sighs.
"Right now, I am more concerned about about this eidite. It's poison - a dangerous one. It's concerning that these people would even consider mining it with living beings - dwarves, mutants or otherwise. We may want to keep the guecubu handy for handling the stuff when come to it, and anti-toxins may be wise to take before we come across any great deposits."
After the party discusses plans for the safe, Lady Lumikello turns into an elemental and dives into the water. She finds sinkhole is a 10-foot diameter shaft in the bottom of the floor that descends 100 feet before leveling off and connecting to a flooded tunnel heading to the northwest. Halfway down the sinkhole are the skeletal remains of a human miner who attempted to swim down the shaft to explore what lay beyond, only to accidentally wedge his foot in a narrow crack in the wall. Apparently, unable to free himself, the miner drowned and rotted in the watery environment. His clothes long ago decomposed, and the only item of value he had on him, a lesser strand of prayer beads, sunk to the bottom of the shaft.
Taking the northwest passage, Lady L travels about 30 feet befor entering another chamber. Exploring the chamber, she finds the southern half of this small, damp cavern is submerged in water, where underwater tunnel winds its way out of the cave from there. A now-barricaded tunnel appears to have once led northwest. In the north part of the room, there is a sandy, unsubmerged area. On the "beach" sits a huge, long and metallic form. This serpentine construction resembles a mechanical eel with several paddle-like limbs!
It does not appear to have notice Lumikello.
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"I can't imagine it to be friendly. We can also use the waterbreathing now; it certainly sounds worth it, and that way we could all go... if someone wouldn't mind, ummm, dragging me after them. Water does not... suit me"
"... bah, this thing is being willfull. Someone else use it!"
Davo hands the scroll to Lady Lumikello
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"All I can guess is a clockwork creature. Use electricity if you wield magic, and adamantine if you depend up on force of arms... but those are general features of clockwork creatures and those more exotic entities "robots". I do not believe that it is intelligent - rather, its actions are like a golem and determined by some artificers formulae. I have an amulet which can bypass some of its defenses, if a warrior is interested."
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"Let's get to it!"
Rouva will change back into a tattoo.
Message (Shahorn, so we can coordinate our attack and arrive at the same time),
Message (Gueguo, so we can coordinate our attack and arrive at the same time, he will be earthgliding),
Haste,
Vanish (Self, so Flagbearer will be off for a while, but don't want to be visible while recovering from DimDoor),
Dimension Door (Party)
(I assume Davo will do some buffs as well)
"And Go!"