"My abilities as pertain to light span no further than a mundane torch, which I also do not have."
I have a few, says Dragomir, lighting it.
Allow me
Kierdan calls upon Pelor to illuminate a small rock which the priest picks up the floor. When the Light spell is cast, Kierdan lightly tosses the stone 20' or so into the chamber.
As your light illuminates the pool, you see it at least five or six feet deep -- and filled nearly to the brim with a thicket of human bones. Pale cave fish dart between the skeletons, which have been picked clean and left to grow moss in the clear spring water. Fat toads squat near the surface, remaining still and silent as you approach. Near the pool's edge you see old, muddy footprints on the stone. A pair of short, pronged spears stand in one corner of the room, near a pile of tangled string. You see no exits other than the door you entered from the stairwell, which continues below.
Fishing hole for the locals? Oh well, let's move on.
Rolen heads back down thd stairs further, searching as he goes.
"If we can pause here for a moment, I would like to perform a short ritual to see if there is any magical residue within this chamber. It seems like a very strange place with a pool full of bones and such. Do you mind?"
If no one says anything, Alistair will cast Detect Magic as a ritual.
In reply to Alistair, Kierdan says That is a good idea. I think we can spare a few minutes before moving on.
"A wise choice."
"Ok then, it will be about 10 minutes. Maybe watch the entries just in case I alert something to our presence.....you never know!"
Right, sure. Investigate away, and I will keep my eye on the stairs. Let me know if you need any assistance.
The stairwell remains dark and silent as Alistair completes his ritual. As he finishes, the bones within the pool take on a pale glow, indicating to Alistair's trained eye the residual taint of necromantic magic. The imprint of the magic is faint, judging from the worn and broken nature of many of the bones, the wizard surmises that the skeletons are all that is left of bodies that had been animated as zombies or some other form of undead. Once the animating energies were used, up, the bodies were dumped here, where the fish and other fauna cleaned the bones.
As he finishes his examination, Alistair's gaze catches the glint of something metallic caught in a tangle of bones. The darting fish and watery shadows make it difficult to make out, but it seems to be made of silver ...
It's a silver key with an intricate series of teeth on one end and a knotted pattern on the other. On closer examination, the knot is made up of a serpent eating its own tail.
Also: [b]Make a DC 15 Dexterity save. If you fail, your hand brushes against a large red toad when you reach in. It stings a bit, but you don't notice any immediate effects ...
"Hmmm...looks like the bones were once animated dead, but the magic is mostly gone now. There is something silver in the pool...but I do not trust those fish...not since the pool by the monument...sorry!"
[b]Point it out to me Alistar... maybe I can fish it out for you? I've got gauntlets on so they wont nibble my fingers[/dice]
(not sure if you'll give me a bonus or advantage for the gloves[/dice]
"It's right there...beside that skull with the big crack in it.", the wizard says, directing the warrior to the shiny object.
Following Alistair's directions, Dragomir reaches a gauntleted hand into the bone-filled water. The cave fish swarm around the intruder, but their tiny mouths pose no threat to the armored appendage. Withdrawing his arm, the big man jumps when his elbow jostles a bright red toad -- he notices a streak of glistening slime on the armor covering the joint, but it doesn't seem to have touched his skin ...
Opening his dripping hand, Dragomir reveals a silver key, black with corrosion in places, that features an intricate series of teeth on one end and a knotted pattern on the other.
Kierdan is looking at the deep wounds left on Dragomir by the crazed cultist. The priest raises up his hand and says, Hold friends, let me attend to Dragomir's wounds first, before we proceed further.
Kierdan then intones a brief prayer in Flan as he lays a hand on the big warrior's shoulder.
[dice=Cure Wounds]2d8+4+3
Next, Kierdan turns to Koralyn and says, Koralyn, I saw you take several strikes form those vipers. Is there anything I can do for you before we move on?
No friend Kierdan, I was not bitten, though it was at high cost in spells and abilities that protected me.
"Interesting! I wonder what container it will open? Keep it close Dragomir...you never know when it might come in use. Well I suppose we should move on before we are discovered again."
"Yes, it is rather ornate, so I imagine what it goes to is extremely important."
Pocketing the silver key, you continue your descent down the spiraling stair, the heavy scent of earth, rot and stagnant water growing stronger with every step. Doing your best to shield Kierdan's magical light, you pause every few steps to listen for sounds of pursuers -- or ambushers -- but you meet no one as you follow the curving stairs down, down and down.
The stairway finally ends at a point you judge to be 100 feet or more below the room with the bone-filled pool. Where the stairs end, a stone doorway has been unearthed and enlarged, the crumbling stones that once made up the frame pulled free and replaced with bowed, moss-encrusted boards. There are even fewer signs of passage here, although you spot a few claw marks gouged into the wood and the stone walls.
Passing through the crumbling doorway, you find yourselves in a crypt, not unlike the one you explored beneath Merikka's church in Orlane. This one lacks the wooden maze that had been constructed there, but you see small shrines and altars built into the walls among the burial niches. Squat pillars interspersed through the crypt mar your lines of sight, but the low-ceilinged chamber seems to stretch on for at least 60 feet, where you can just barely make out a pair of shadowed arches.
Whatever religion once held sway here appears lost to time. The carvings are all worn or defaced, the skeletal remains in the niches long crumbled to dust. Here and there you see tracks in the dirt, the long prints tipped by the marks of sharp talons. In the still darkness, the smell of rot suddenly reminds you of rotten meat and offal, and you begin to imagine the sound of shuffling in the gloom ...
Pelor illuminate our path! Kierdan mutters softly to no one in particular, Do you hear that sound?
"We might be needing Pelor's light if that is what I think it might be...undead!"
Perception:
Try as he might, the wizard can hear nothing else in the dim darkness.
Rolen peers ahead.
Something large, and with claws seems to have drug itself through that entryway. Koralyn observes.
Dragomir raises his torch against the gloom.
Dragomir raises his torch, casting wavering light on the immediate area. In addition to the clawed prints -- man-sized, for all the apparent inhumanity -- you see pieces of cracked and chewed bone, the marrow sucked out.
Cupping his own light stone, Kierdan spreads his fingers, allowing a beam of light to lance out into the darkness. Breathlessly, he scans the area, stopping when the beam of light tracks across the back of a pale creature -- a ghoul, squatting on the floor 60 feet away, gnawing on a scrap of flesh or bone. With growing horror, Kierdan casts the beam of light around the room, illuminating a dozen more ghouls scattered in small groups around the perimeter of the crypt. Some lay on the ground, while others squat, lost in a sort of reverie or torpor. For the moment, they appear oblivious to your presence.
Seeing the undead at the far end of the room, Alistair quickly intones a number of arcane words while seeming to mix something in his other hand. Once complete he tosses the object towards the ghouls. It starts out as a small glow, but builds up speed and grows in light, until it is a ball of flame that explodes when it reaches the creatures.
Fireball:
Eldramin summons his spiritual blade and prepares to attack the first that rushes at them with his eldritch blast and the second with his blade.
The burning orb streaks out from Alistair's hand, blooming into an inferno that incinerates a clump of ghouls on the far corner of the room. You have a second to shield your eyes from the blinding light, then the pressure wave hits you, followed by the roar of the explosion. Stone cracks and dirt and rock rain down on you as the ceiling of the ancient tomb shakes -- pieces fall, but the structure holds, though just barely in places.
DC 11 or
As the dust clears, you hear howls of pain and rage and see glowing eyes approaching in a wide semi-circle. And who knows what you've awoken elsewhere ...?
Form a line and let them come to us!, Dragomir bellows as he steps forward a few feet to let the ones behind him access to the upcoming fight.
Koralyn curses as the debris strikes her knocking her off balance and says Alistair damn you, coordinate such things next time! This was not the fight we came for and is at best a waste of resources.
Kierdan readies his shield and moves into position to Dragomir's left
Shining One! Shed your righteous light upon our company!
Dropping his light stone at his feet, Kierdan begins calling upon Pelor to bless him and his comrades.
Rolen fires at one of thf ghouls engaged with Dragomir with a +1 Arrow.
He then uses a cunning action to hide.
Looking embarrassed at the devastation of his fireball, the wizard falls back on the tired and true magic missiles, which he fires at the closest ghoul.
Magic Missile:
Umm..sorry guys..I miscalculated the volume of the explosion."
Kierdan calls on Pelor's blessing as the group moves into defensive positions, seconds before the ghouls rush forward. Dragomir hacks a vicious, but not quite fatal wound into the first to arrive; moments later, Eldramin finishes off the beast with a readied eldritch blast.
Rolen drops a second ghoul with a well-placed arrow before retreating to the shadows behind the doorway. Alistair wounds a third with his magic missiles as Koralyn gathers her wits after being struck by debris.
The remaining ghouls arrive like a wave of claws and diseased flesh; three swarm around Dragomir while the other four move past to strike at the rest of the group (other than the hidden Rolen).
Despite being surrounded, Dragomir fights off the ghouls with ease, suffering only a minor scratch and resisting the undead's paralyzing touch.
Kierdan, too, easily bats away the clumsy strikes of his attacker. Eldramin is not so lucky and is struck by both fang and claw .
Alistair evades a ghoul's paralytic claws but his mage armor is not strong enough to protect him from the fangs that clamp down on his leg .
Koralyn also is bitten but the damage is less severe .
Dragomir drops his torch and hacks away with both hands.
for
for Crit! add
If any of my foes go down from an attack...
for