"Excellent. I enjoy a challenge, and if it will improve the lot of the poor and starving here then it will be worthwhile. To the gates!"
Quillan nods along.
"We must help where we can," says the quiet dwarf.
"Clovis and Vianna were right about your qualities."
Father Jappe and Varden exchange approving glances as the answers arrive. The priest is about to say more when there is an abrupt interruption.
A tremendous reverberation comes from the lower hold, the entire Citadel quivering as if some great knife has been dragged across the side of the mountain. Everyone stares in stunned disbelief as the tremendous cacophony echoes in a tooth-rattling, bone-jarring chorus before a final metallic clang shakes the halls and quiet settles once more across the camps.
"What the...?" Varden pauses only to grab his pickaxe before heading to the portcullis leading to the lower halls.
Grabbing his pack and flaming sword, Rusty stomps after the dwarf leader.
"By the gods, was that an earthquake? Has such a thing happened before?"
"I don't know. I've ever heard anything like it before."
Varden weaves his way through the camps, calling for calm as he does so.
"We're investigating, friends. Please stay calm."
Even so, he casts an anxious glance upwards. "I hope those pillars hold," you just hear him muttering.
The red-scaled dragonborn visually inspects the great pillar. He has eye for underground structures, honed from a lifetime of living and fighting in places where the sun is never seen.
Quillan pulls the heavy axe off his back and looks up with concern.
"Should we prepare for an evacuation? That sounded like somethin' awful important just moved. I'm not wantin' to think what could've done that."
"I can't recall ever hearing such a tremendous sound. Very disturbing indeed."
Amenephus, bringing Father Jappe with him, follows Varden and Rusty.
"Why do I get the impression that this is inextricably linked with the cooling of the pillars? The sooner we descend into the mine and resolve its problems, the better for all concerned."
Rusty's inspection of the pillar offers some comfort. There is no obvious danger from falling masonry. Structurally, the Citadel seems as sound as it ever was. Whatever the sound was, it wasn't an earthquake.
Moving swiftly through the Struck it Rich and Merchants areas, Varden arrives at the portcullis, still guarded by one of Halston's men. He looks at you incredulously.
"Going down? Now? Special price. 20gp, and I'll only take orichalcum. Boss's orders."
Varden looks as if he may be about to explode, and snarls inarticulately as Halston's smooth voice is heard.
"Now, now Blithus. We're not charging these good people to investigate. This trip is free, as a token of good faith among friends."
Varden and Blithus subside, and Halston beams happily.
Grumbling to himself, Blithus, fumbles with the locks and hauls on the chains to open the gate. "Go if you're going. Fetching your friend are you? Is she the one making all that racket?"
"Who is this friend, Varden, and what was she doing going down into the mine? Perhaps you could enlighten us as to all that has gone before?"
Amenephus is slightly puzzled by the apparent reference to a previous entrant to the mine, and is rapidly coming to the conclusion that everyone (with the possible exception of Father Jappe) has held something back.
Blithus sighs audibly and continues to hold the portcullis open.
"Not his friend, idiot. Yours. That dwarf woman who arrived with you. Blonde, coughing fit to wake the dead. Viella, her name is. Something like that. She looked terrible. Paid her entrance in orichalcum about half an hour ago. I'd fetch her back and take her to see Father Jappe if I was you."
"This presents an altogether more serious problem. If Viella has already descended into the mine, and is unwell to boot, then we ought to pursue her with all speed."
Rusty nods his big head in agreement. Unconsciously he wrings his hands thinking about Viella and her greed for orichalcum, which he thought a perfectly healthy thing. Until now.
"Gold fever." Isari sighs and draws his blade. "Come, then. We have no reason to stay up here any longer."
You descend in the old mine lift and arrive in the massive gateway chamber. Unlike the exceptional stonework of the upper halls, this first chamber is rough-hewn, shaped by the mountain itself.
Around the corner from the lift chamber, you see the stairs leading down into the mountain, opening into darkness.
To your left you see doorways bearing a close similarity to the doors in the upper halls. Around the far edges of the chamber however stand three further doors, each a marvel of clockwork intricacy, rune-engravened and set deep into the stone of the mountain. From the right gate, faint traces of green gas haze the air and scrawled dwarrven graffiti tells a bad tale.
Dwarven
"Danger! Poisoned Passage!"
"Volund save us"
"Crying eyes are our salvation"
It is the middle gate that draws your attention however. The largest and most intricate of the clockwork marvels, it has been brutally and recently torn asunder, the magnificent gears bent and broken, protective runes still smoking. This must have been the source of the recent pandemonium.
Even worse, a grisly scene is laid out before the gate. Several emaciated refugees lie in a rough circle on the stone floor, their throats slit and chests exposed, displaying some bizarre range of arcane symbolism carved into their flesh. Several candles burned to nubs stand near the bodies and more runes, smeared with what appears to be a giant brush, are painted in what appears to be blood in the centre of the group.
Isari silently approaches the ring of corpses, ice forming on his blade.
Isari
Did anyone else come down with us, or did they just hold the door?
EDIT: Damn crosspost.
"This was a binding ritual. The runes are similar to the tattoos on the saboteur."
Did anyone else come down with us, or did they just hold the door?
Something nags at Nayce, but he can't quite put his finger on it. The knowledge is tantalisingly close.
Quillan stares grim-faced at the tragedy before him, but he says nothing.
With axe in hand, he wanders about the bodies and examines them. He looks for some religious significance in the ritual.
Quillan
The bodies are those of colonists, much like those in the hall above, and likely of their number. Despite their horrific injuries, there are no signs of any struggle. You would judge that something had rendered the victims incapable of retaliation before they met their fate.
The dragonborn steps around the carnage cautiously.
"So did the devil-worshippers sacrifice these people to summon up a beast? Or were they used to conjure a spell to destroy the gate?"
Amenepuhs carefully surveys the scene, concern showing on his face.
Amenephus points to the tracks that eluded passed Nayce and Rusty. Something very large passed through this chamber. Magic obscures the trail and no further traces of the creature's whereabouts can be found.
Amenephus
As the companions gather information and look in shock at the scene before them, a wounded and hobbled man pulls himself into view and crawls towards the great staircase. He is alive, but barely and seems shocked almost to witlessness by whatever he has seen.
"I fear that there is something seriously amiss here. Perhaps our injured friend can enlighten us as to what he has seen?"
Nayce approaches the injured man and asks, "What happened here?" with sympathy in his voice.
"I don't think they were worshipin' anythin' here. Least ways, nothin' I've ever come across. There's also no sign of a struggle. These folk were either willin' to let this happen or they were restrained magically, since I don't see anyone tied up. Coulda' been a charm too, I suppose."
Quillan stands back up from the bodies.
"Regardless, I don't think this was dwarven work."
Quillan then looks with concern at the injured man, though he remains apprehensive and looks for signs of deception.
The man turns towards you, empty handed, vacant eyed, and ashen as he tells his story.
"We came down here shuffling around for food when a dwarf came through, acting really strangely and messing with that big gate. The poor girl looked terrible - definitely had the greed fever. Shame. She was a pretty thing, blonde, nice smile. Said she was called Vianna. We started talking to her, but she suddenly spouted out some kind of gibberish, and we couldn't move. She'd put some kind of spell on us. She just tossed me aside like a twig but took Gen there, then Yethris and those others and started carving them up with those weird symbols. I couldn't even scream."
He gulps and continues.
"She lit those candles and started muttering a bunch of funny words, and then, she just went wild and started changing! I mean, she started getting big. Really big. Before you knew it, she was growing a tail and wings and well, I don't know how to explain this exactly, but she turned into a big gold dragon. You might not believe me, but she tore through that gate. Just peeled it like a fruit. It made a terrible racket. When she was done, she changed back to the way she was and walked down those stairs, just as though nothing had happened. Then the howling started."
The man is clearly injured, probably fatally and seems entirely sincere.
"What? But these runes are for a binding ritual. Unless she did it to undo a binding on herself... Could a dragon even be bound into a human form?"
Isari
Perception DC15
Dorvin remains grimly silent.
Perception
Dorvin remains grimly silent.
1d20+7 Perception
Dorvin is grimly aware that enemies are approaching. Fast.
To the wounded man, Quillan says, "You should probably leave. Back to the surface with ye', if ye're not trustin' the surface, then find someplace to hide. Sounds like we're havin' trouble."
Amenephus manages to staunch the worst of the survivor's wounds. Looking blearily around, he mutters,
"Thanks.... I ... I don't feel so good ... I'll ..." his voice trails off as the howling and Quillan's advice both make their impact and he staggers down the stairs behind you.
The howling draws ever closer, and you start to make out the sounds of many feet, padding rapidly towards the doors ...