"I like the rope idea, boulders on the head hurt. I'm not saying I know from experience, but I have a wonderful imagination..." comments Suzumaru beginning to blush. "Shut it Harvey, no need for you to chime in, that was a long time ago..."
Raphael grins as he ties one end of his rope to the door. He then moves outside, making sure everybody is clear before tugging on it to pull the doors open.
As the rock falls down and settles, he begins looking for another entrance.
"Well, let's get it done then. Who wants to be the one who sacrifice a rope in the name of exploration? I'll try to disarm the mchanism and than we'll see about this door."
Raphael, make a strength check to try and pull the doors open or wait for Hamish's suggestion.
Raphael shrugs. "If you want to try disarming the trap yourself, go ahead. I'm fine either way." Raphael then waits to let Hamish do whatever it is he wants.
Hamish, give me a knowledge engineering check if you want to figure out how to disable this.
You have the strangest feeling that it would take several months and dozens of people in order to safely remove the offending rocks that seem to be looming above you.
Jean grabs behind Raphael and also pulls.
So as to stop wasting your time, Hamish, you can figure out that you cannot safely disable this hazard, and so you step outside while those pulling on the rope finally succeed at getting the door open. You can catch the briefest glimpse of a stone wall behind the door as the rocks come crashing down and completely blocking the entrance.
Not disheartened, Andross continues to search the sand until he finds a small indent in the center of the sandy hill.
Waving you all over, he asks, "So, do you want to keep digging? It looks like the last indent on this hill."
Raphael walks over to the indent Andross found. "Yes, we might as well continue digging." He laughs slightly. "Although I'm afraid at this rate I'll be trying to get sand out of my armor for the next month. With that, he cheerfully starts digging.
Andross looks at his own tool and sighs, before helping out Raphael again, seemingly content to help the worshiper of Sarenrae. After about another thirty minutes, you clear out an entrance just like the other two, however when you finally have an opening in the sand, this tunnel reveals itself to be MUCH longer.
Light from the entrance shows this tunnel is extremely long and heavily decorated in a riot of bright colors and patterns. The walls and ceiling have been coated with plaster and painted with a variety of unusual scenes featuring strange rooms, odd creatures and exotic locations. The floor is decorated with mosaic tilework which features an obvious “path” of bright red tiles that wind across the ground. Not a hint of the original stonework is visible under the heavy decoration.
Just as you all finish digging, you hear a high pitched laugh ring out... but not in the tunnel. Oddly enough it sounds like it is in each of your thoughts. It starts speaking... not in common, but for some reason you can understand it. "Well well my master... It looks like they finally found the right entrance. I thought they would never find it. Hehehe, ah, will we have fun with them master? I think we shall..."
With that, a wave of energy overcomes you. Everyone give me will saves.
"Apparently Aceptrex-a-lich has a minion that likes games. I hope they aren't too troublesome? Are we ready to proceed into the tomb?"
or 31 vs. illusions or death effects
"Hmm, a red path. I'm guessing this means following it is either a very good, or a very bad, idea." Raphael moves to the beginning of it and looks at it more closely.
. If it's an enchantment I can reroll next round.
Anybody see any large stones around? If the floor is trapped I bet we can roll it down and trip them.
You see no loose rocks or stone, and in fact... there even seems to be a lack of cobwebs or even musty air.
"Maybe we should go get some from the false entrance, that collapsed just a bit ago."
Hamish shakes his head. "Best to use somethin live for bait. Not every trap triggers by weight. Some trigger by heat, sight, magic etc."
Let's wait until everyone gives me a save before continuing.
As the voice in your heads falter, you are all suddenly hit with a blast of telekinetic energy which leaves you all standing woozy, but as for right now, you are still up. In fact, only Andross seems to be unaffected, looking at you all with a confused expression.
The voice laughs once more at your obvious discomfort. "But they are so weak master! How could they stand up to an illithid? No, maybe the Tomb itself should be their game."
Father Raphael, before you were so rudely interrupted, you started to notice the red path was made up letters. At first they were hieroglyphs in a language you had never seen before, but the writing had become like Taldane. If you go back to reading it, you find this message scrawled out repeatedly:
viewer’s eye./You’ve left and left and found my Tomb/ and now your soul will die.”
Hamish groans as he's hit with the wave of energy. "Bloody hell what was that?"
Maxwell moves up, then cast light on an arrow and looses it down the hall.
There is now a light source at the other end of the hallway, however, Maxwell, you too take this damage.
Suzumaru moves ahead 4 squares, carefully testing each footstep looking for traps as she goes along. "That writing on the stones sure is funny, I wonder if we are supposed to walk on it...".
Life link triggers, twice per injured person - I take a total of 20 damage.
Frowning a bit, Suzumaru casts Cure Light Wounds on her self.
"Hold on a moment! It looks like there's a riddle telling us where to tread here."
Raphael then tries to look at the walls. He looks especially for buildings/archways depicted in the scenes nearby.
"We might also want a silver ring? I have silver dust, but I don't think I have a ring. Although that may have been something useful for trying to bind demons in a circle."
Can we even trust writing here? Were I to have a strange old tomb of Horrid Horrors that are Horrible, I would have as many misleading clues as possible.
Raphael shrugs. "Acererak seems to think he'll kill us regardless. It's true that the text could be misleading, but I think not; otherwise why not just speak plainly? But you can do as you wish."
Everyone took the damage exactly once. And yes, you all failed that save.
As for the scenes on the walls... I could tell you if you walk up to the scenes and specify which one you would like to examine. The angle you're at obscures them from view.
As for where Suzumaru and Maxwell are, Maxwell, the second you step onto the beginning of the tracks, they begin to glow slightly (red of course) however, other than that, nothing happens. Likewise, Suzu, you neither find anything nor does anything happen when you step there.
The voice once again cackles "Look at them master! Aren't they adorable, creeping along? Shall I go visit them? No...." It sighs, almost as if disappointed. "Fine, I'll wait. But please, let me play soon! It's been so long..."
Guys I am not so sure about this hallway. There maybe traps. Watch your steps.
Be sure to put an S where you are searching.
And the floor over there looks perfectly benign. If everyone has taken their desired actions, you may start moving again.
Taking the utmost care HAmish picks his way carefully through the corridor ignoring the voices as he works.
"Hells, anyone got a mirror?"
Raphael channels energy to heal everybody from that most recent attack.
Raphael then moves forward to get a better look at the two images.
"I have a mirror." Without taking his eyes off of the paintings, Raphael pulls a mirror out of his bag and holds it in Hamish's general direction.
Raphael, the mosaic on the east is simply that of cows grazing on the field. The one on the west seems to be that of a wizards workroom, however, when you look more closely you notice that the incredible detail of the paintings hid something from casual observation that now seems obvious. A pair of robed, wolf headed figures are painted on the wall, holding an elaborate bronze chest between themselves. However, the chest is no painting, but an actual box embedded within the plaster, extending only a few inches from the surface.
Raphael briefly looks at the cows, wondering if the green grass is in any way related to the 'shun green' mentioned earlier.
"Hmm, there seems to be a box embedded in a little niche here. I'm guessing this is one of the 'two pits along the wall' that will 'lead to a fortuitous fall.' The rhyme suggests that these are important, but should only be retrieved with a steady hand unless we want to get mauled, so they're most likely trapped."
Raphael steps closer to the painting with the trick chest and attempts to determine if his suspicious is correct and the slot is indeed trapped.
As he looks, he murmurs to himself. "Too bad the box is likely too heavy for a mage hand."
While looking at the box, you notice that it is possible to open by pressing a stud located on the top half of the chest, which would cause the bottom half to swing downwards. However, it looks like the stud is hiding a small hole in which it looks like a needle is hiding. You can figure out the pressing the stud with your finger would likely cause the needle to prick your skin.
Father, I would not recommend touching anything.
Passing a folded up 10ft. pole to Raphael he says. "Use this but don't trust it not to open up and kill you with the contents. In fact ye may want me ta do it."
And then backs away to let the priest attempt suicide.
Half to himself, "Hmm, looks like this button would release the contents. But it's going to try to prick me if I press it..."
Raphael pulls out his dagger and attempts to use that to press the button. If that doesn't work, he pulls out a fishhook, bends it, and tries to use that.
"Thanks, but I'm not about to put another person in danger for my sake." He replies absent mindedly.
A rock falls and everyone dies.
Just kidding. Actually, as soon as you press the button with the dagger, the bottom drops open, and the needle swings down at the same time, clacking against the steel of your blade. You can now see that the inside of the small box has a lever that looks like it pulls out towards you.
"A lever? That's rather suspicious."
Raphael looks for more traps that will spring out if he reaches in to grasp the lever or if he pulls it.
If he doesn't find any, he pulls out some twine to tie it around the lever and moves 20 feet away.
"Ok, I'm going to pull this lever. Everybody be on the lookout for what it does, either positive or negative."
He'll then pull the lever.
Give me a strength check. You don't find any traps by the way.
I will say a small prayer for you.
With that Maxwell begins muttering something under his breath.
Does anyone have a wand of mount? or have any way of cunjuring? We could perhaps conjure up something to walk ahead of us down the hall.
Suzumaru watches Father Raphael work with the strange picture that is clearly too high for her to reach. "Good Job Father! Maybe we can get Jean to help you yank on that string. He looks like he does that kind of strength exercise all the time!"
"My patron only allows me to summon a fire elemental, and it probably won't be much help in discovering traps. Though if we need to set something on fire..."
"I can summon a few things, like that eagle I created earlier. It's pretty limited though."
You pull and pull and pull... l and feel as if this is a pointless venture, as it seems like,from this angle, you CAN'T pull the lever towards you. Let alone ripping the box from the wall.