The harrowing battle concluded, the party takes stock of their surroundings. Three wooden tables stand in the middle of the room where Vreeg finally succumbed to his wounds and the stirges. Their surfaces are stained a ruddy brown from layers upon layers of dried blood. To the east stands a ten-foot-wide hutch with wicker doors opening into a straw-lined cage, which is currently empty.
You also find a corpse on the table, with four stirges lolling about on it. The creatures are sluggish and nearly unmoving, having fed heartily on the body and are no longer hungry. The corpse is no one you recognize, but judging by his clothing, was a vagrant of some sort.
Your search yields nothing of value in this room.
Searching Vreeg's quarters back north, you find his spellbook, as well as:
- two silver rings
- a gold and pearl bracelet
- a mithral hip flask emblazoned with an etching of a house drake
- a strange, 12-inch iron bar that emanates magic
The silver rings are each worth 100gp. The bracelet is worth 150gp. The hip flask is worth 400gp.
Vreeg's spellbook contains all cantrips except those of the conjuration and illusion spells. You would presume those are his opposed schools of magic. Curious that he had a mirror image spell on him, then.
It also contains the following first-level spells:
Cause fear, chill touch, magic missile, ray of enfeeblement, shield, sleep, and feather fall.
It contains the following second-level spells:
Blindness/deafness, scorching ray, spectral hand, false life, command undead, darkness, and scare.
It contains the following third-level spells:
Fly, vampiric touch, and water breathing.
The spellbook is worth about 750gp to sell.
Stepping out of Vreeg's bedroom and into the adjacent room (presumably the room used by Rolth himself) you find little of value in plain sight, aside from a jagged piece of a broken knife. It is otherwise of extremely fine craftsmanship, and resembles the teeth of a key. Something about it feels familiar to Andakos.
Behind the mirror you find a hidden cache with a few items of value:
- a set of masterwork thieves' tools
- a pearl and silver snuffbox, containing a tiny sack with magical dust and a magic spoon
The snuffbox is highly valuable, worth about 250gp.
As you finish your scouring of Rolth's room, you all hear a loud, angry whump! whump! coming from under the bed in Vreeg's chamber next door.
Golloriel, relief in her eyes, looks over Berta.
"I... I don't know what those things were. We should have someone at a temple look you over. Actually..."
"... maybe I should go with you. I'm not feeling very good."
Caladaer is impressed by his daughter's aptitude with many of the items, and he looks over the remaining ones.
He tries to keep his excitement contained as he looks through the spellbook. Finally! It has been literal years since he has added a spell to his repertoire. He doubts he will sleep tonight as he pores over the spells in this book.
Andakos groans inwardly when the banging starts. What now? He draws his spear and cautiously leads the others back into Vreeg's room.
+2 traps
Neither Andakos nor Caladaer have any idea what the sound might be without getting closer, but Cal is certain it came from under the bed. At least the barbarian is coming with...
As they creep up on the necromancer's bed, another whump! comes up from under it, making the entire mattress lift off the frame momentarily before settling back in a puff of dust.
A meaty, bronze-skinned fist flies out from under the bed and slams Berta in the face, knocking her off-kilter for a moment.
Out from under the bed flops and flails a human male torso, thick with muscle and battle scars. Its head and left arm are missing, and its right arm, covered wrist to shoulder in stylized tattoos, swings and flaps around violently. Getting close to it might prove slightly hazardous, seeing as it already clocked Berta in the mouth.
This is apparently a failed attempt to animate the dead. There are traces of necromantic energy in the torso, but it has no mind or capacity to be controlled, and the energies animating it are weak. It wouldn't take much positive energy to disrupt it. (You suspect no more than 2 damage would be required.)
The tattoos are common among certain tribes of the Shoanti. This one appears to be Skoan-Quah, the same tribe as Thousand Bones, meaning this is likely the torso of Gaekhen.
S@*+.
Andakos puts his arm around Berta and turns her away. "It's okay. It's not him. He is gone. He is gone." Meanwhile, he catches Golloriel's eye and nods toward the monstrosity.
Golloriel sees Andakos's gesture. "What? Oh. Oh!" She rushes to the thing flopping around on the floor, cautiously avoiding its flailing fist. She reaches out and touches it, sending Sarenrae's grace into it.
The powerful wave of positive energy flows through the gruesome thing, and it shudders and falls still. The air around it sizzles and fills with the smell of ozone as Gaekhen's torso finally goes inert.
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Berta begins shuddering violently, unable to hold back the sobs this time. It's not fair. It's not fair that the tribe sent him away for their love. It's not fair that filthy racists murdered him in these hideous streets for being different. It's not fair that this gods-cursed necromancer got hold of his body and defiled it.
It's not fair that it has to be her that brings his ravaged pieces back.
It's not fair.
Golloriel takes Andakos's place at Berta's side, saying nothing, but embracing her while she cries.
Andakos gently takes Berta's bag of holding from her hip and takes care of the task of placing Gaekhen's remains within.
Caladaer is only tangentially aware of the activity going on around him. Instead, he is still eagerly flipping through the spellbook, anxious to get out of here so he can begin learning the spells.
Your GM is a space case and forgot about the corpse of your hated foe. Vreeg had on his person the following:
- a magic robe
- a magic wand
- a magic ring
- a Small masterwork dagger with Cal's blood still coating it
- 38 gp
The wand is a wand of ghoul touch with 20 charges remaining.
The ring is a ring of protection +1.
The robe is a robe of bones. Because it is missing 3 of its patches (both ogre zombies and one skeletal warhorse, if you wish to keep track), the value is reduced to 1800gp.
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Berta, feeling thoroughly embarrassed, wipes her eyes and nose on her forearm and looks up as Andakos places the body of Gaekhen in the bag of holding.
"Thank you," she mumbles sheepishly. "All that is left are his legs." She stares down at the bag for a moment before turning to the others. "I want to see it done. My task--our task--is almost done. I do not want to come back here ever again. I am willing to press on if the rest of you are."
She glances at each person's condition, then touches Golloriel.
Cal puts on the robe, replaces the mage armor wand in one of his wrist sheaths with the ghoul touch wand, then shoves the mage armor wand in his belt. He hands the ring to Golloriel. "If you're going to be our protector, you'll need that."
Once done, he looks at Berta. "I don't have much left, especially if we run into more darkness, but I'm good to keep going."
Golloriel thanks her father and puts on the ring. Then she takes a few moments to establish a life link with all three of her companions.
"I only have one spell left, but we can keep going. I want to see this done."
Andakos pulls the potion of lesser restoration out of the party pack and hands it to Berta. "Here, this should help with what those stirges did to you."
After she drinks he, he leads the party back to the room they found Vreeg in and checks out the southwest tunnel.
+1 traps
Long before you reach the room you can clearly see ahead, you note two things. First, the smell coming down this corridor is almost overwhelmingly vile, like twenty rotten apples wrapped in spoiled meat. Second, you hear a voice humming to themselves. It's gurgly, throaty, deep, and horrifically off-key. They occasionally accentuate their singing with loud, wet chewing noises. Whoever they are, they sing with their mouth full.
"Nommy noms! Leggy legs! Handy hands! Chewy chews! La la laaa! Omnomnomnom"
So far, the singer doesn't seem to notice you're there.
Andakos downs his last shield extract, then holds his hand up to the others to indicate they should wait, and creeps along the tunnel.
+2 traps
Andakos creeps around the corner and into the next chamber. The majority of this room contains a nasty-looking stretch of mud--a partially collapsed sinkhole--kept damp by rivulets of water seeping from the walls. A patch of solid ground extends into the mud to form an island, on which is heaped a reeking pile of body parts. To the north, a rickety wheelbarrow sits on its side against the wall.
Sloshing around in the brown, filthy water is a familiar creature to Andakos: one very nearly murdered his friends (and one prisoner). An otyugh waddles on three awkward legs through the refuse, covered in chunks of old gore, one of its tentacles shoving a severed hand into its jagged-fanged maw while singing to itself.
Just as Andakos reaches the end of the tunnel, he steps on an old bone that cracks under his heavy foot. The otyugh immediately stops and stands stock-still; one of its tentacles turns slowly where it is raised in the air to reveal it's covered in small, unblinking eyes, all of which stare at the tiefling.
It squeals with delight and screams,
ROUND 1
[color=green]
Caladaer (23/23 hp)
Andakos (19/23 hp, +4 AC)
Berta (31/39, 3 Con dmg [28/36 hp])
Golloriel (30/33 hp)
Otyugh (0 dmg)
[/color]
Otyughs live in and eat filth. They are bred and allowed to roam Korvosa's sewers, acting as a living cleaning service for their gutters and plumbing. Eating and living in filth has slowly evolved the otyugh to be immune to diseases, though they are nearly all carriers of filth fever, which their bite spreads. They also have two long tentacles which it uses to grab and constrict foes before bringing them in to take bites out of them with its filthy mouth.
Wedged near the top of the pile of body parts are two thick, muscular legs with bronze skin and several tattoos. It's a fair bet these legs belong to Gaekhen.
"Ugh, gross. There's an otyugh in here. Try to kill it from range."
He steps to the side to make room for the others, then grabs a tanglefoot bag and tosses it.
Cal moves down the hall, flicks his wrist to retrieve the wand of magic missile, and fires it at the nasty thing.
Golloriel looks at Berta. "'From range' doesn't seem like your style." She touches Berta's shoulder and casts shield of faith, then heads down the hall behind her father.
Though Andakos deals a direct hit and entangles the creature, it manages to dodge the goop trying to gum up its legs. Whether it's the muddy water or the natural slime secreting from the otyugh's pebbly, gore-slicked skin, something kept it from sticking like it should.
As Berta hustles into the room, hoping Golloriel's spell will protect her from the gross poop monster's attack of opportunity, she finds herself underestimating both the reach and nimbleness of the otyugh's tentacles. One slaps her on the arm, digging its long barbs deep into her flesh and whipping in a twirling motion with shocking speed, wrapping the dwarf up and squeezing hard. The otyugh moves her quickly to its mouth. It wastes no time maintaining its grip on her and squeezing again and then biting down hard on her, it's gross, jagged teeth puncturing her banded mail and drawing a huge gout of blood. That mouth is definitely not clean...
She'll be fine, you're sure.
ROUND 2
[color=green]
Caladaer (23/23 hp)
Andakos (19/23 hp, +4 AC)
Berta (10/39, +2 AC)
Golloriel (30/33 hp)
Otyugh (6 dmg, entangled)
[/color]
Caladaer quickly calculates how to not hurt Berta with what he is about to do, moves in front of Andakos, and fires a burst of flames from his hands.
Andakos steps to the side to get a straight shot, pulls his acid/fire concoction from his haversack, and tosses it at the beast, aiming for its hind-end to avoid hurting Berta.
Golloriel groans as some of Berta's numerous wounds transfer to her.
She flicks the wand of cure light wounds into her hand and trudges through the mud to reach Berta.
Apparently this stupid otyugh took levels in ninja because it ducks behind the pile of meat, avoiding the worst of the fire. It then crushes her hard with its tentacle and takes another massive bite out of her . The barbarian is covered in horrific, filth-covered wounds, and you can hear her bones cracking underneath the crushing weight of its tentacle. Blood pours from between its jagged yellow teeth.
Yep. Something definitely slipped into the wound on that last bite. Without going into too much detail, you note pieces of undigested corn in there.
Fortunately for Berta, she feels some of her wounds seal up, and Golloriel feels the flesh of her abdomen tear open of its own accord and start gushing blood.
ROUND 3
[color=green]
Caladaer (23/23 hp)
Andakos (19/23 hp, +4 AC)
Berta (5/39, +2 AC)
Golloriel (20/33 hp)
Otyugh (21 dmg, entangled)
[/color]
Cal fires another couple missiles at the beast, then drops the spent wand into the mud.
Andakos sees that Berta is on the edge of death. Not having anything else to do, he steps forward and jabs his spear into the filthy thing.
The second onslaught of attacks tear into the otyugh, who wails in agony as two missiles of pure force crush one of its legs, and Andakos tips his spear into the beast's mouth as it opens to cry out. The otyugh chokes on the power of the magical spear, gurgling feebly as it collapses to the ground. Berta tumbles and rolls through the disgusting water as the beast goes limp.
COMBAT OVER!
Golloriel kneels next to Berta, comforting her with one hand while tapping her with the wand with the other.
She then taps herself a few times for good measure.
Then she sits quietly next to Berta, arm around the dwarf's shoulders.
Andakos is somewhat ashamed that he is relieved that comforting Berta hasn't fallen to him. He instead uses the time to look around the filthy room.
Cal tries not to look directly at Berta while helping Andakos.
Andakos finds he can't quite bear to stick his hands in the corpses or the poop-water to look for trinkets, but for whatever reason, Caladaer does not share his hesitancy. He spots something shiny near the bottom of the meat pile and digs it out, causing a cascade of body chunks to fall into the stagnant brown liquid. While deeply unsettling to witness, it does jar free a few items of worth:
- an amber necklace
- a silver dagger
- a wax-sealed metal flask (magical)
- a wand (magical)
- a ring (magical)
The amber necklace is worth 350gp.
The wand is a wand of spiritual weapon (CL 3rd) with 48 charges on it.
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Berta squeezes Golloriel's hand in thanks, then stands up and, still whispering the mantra over and over in Shoanti, she pulls out the large embroidered cloth containing his other parts, re-wraps them, and places them in the bag of holding. She wipes her face--smearing vile-smelling gunk across her as she does so--and says, "I am ready to leave this horrid place. Gaekhen must be tended to as soon as possible."
Oh yeah, bee tee dubs:
Cal sorts through the items, matter-of-factly narrating their purposes. "Helps you see better"; "helps you swim better"; "some cleric-y weapon thing." He seems quite disappointed there is nothing more useful to him.
Andakos hastily takes the items from Cal; he gives Golloriel the ring and wand and stows the rest. "Berta is right; let's get out of here." He leads the others out of the crypt and back to the Citadel. When they pass the Cathedral, he makes a mental note to stop by there a few times a week to check on Anya.