"I'm ready. Geez, this is really getting weird."
While it’s apparent that this large room was originally a kitchen, the furnishings have been rebuilt and repositioned to create an improvised shrine. The western end of the hall, where a large fireplace for cooking food once stood, now serves as an altar of sorts. Looming over a human corpse is a towering statue in a feminine shape made of bones, covered in sheets of moldering cloth and hanging moss. A bare spot on the room’s north wall has been decorated with mud and blood to depict the same feminine form as the statue.
"I wonder who that is supposed to be? It must have been someone important to them for them to make a shrine out here."
”The sacrificial ‘Ghost Lady,’ I’ll bet. There’s some blood here. . . But where are the sacrifices done? And where’s their head hancho.”
Kka pauses when she sees the tableau that presents itself when they open the doors. Her red eyes flicker around the scene and settle on the human corpse. "Oh, noooo. No no no." She runs up to the altar hoping against all hope that she's wrong.
It is indeed a female corpse with a bird tattoo on her right shoulder. It is unsettling to see the lifeless form of a person you knew when they were alive, but it's unmistakably Tanji.
Next to the shrine is a pile of offerings, a stark contrast to all the rubble and refuse of the last few rooms. A small bloodstone worth 10 gp, a softly glowing rune etched onto a stone, and a small sickly green gem with a string attached to it, like a charm.
But no. As she feared, the corpse was Tanji's. It was one thing to hear that she'd been killed; it was quite another to see her laid out on an altar covered in blood. Kka's knees almost give way as the shock hits her; she drops her bow and grabs the edge of the altar to steady herself. A small sob escapes her before she can stifle it.
Then, just as suddenly, she grabs her bow off the floor and stands bolt upright. Anger and hate flood through her again. This time she's ready for it and it doesn't overwhelm her. She looks up at the towering statue and in a low voice full of malice, says, "they will paay for what they've done, and thaat goes double for their Ghost Queen if I ever run into her."
She then pulls some of the mouldering cloth covering the bone statue and places it over Tanji's corpse. She drops her head in a short prayer to Pharasma, bidding her take good care of her friend's soul. "We'll taake her body baack with us to Otari when we leave. I'm not leaving it here for these dirty scaavengers to paw over."
Not saying anything, Cherry Berry briefly lays a frond on Kka's shoulder.
"We'll be sure of it. I'll lead the ceremony myself if we have to."
"Oh, Oh god. Did you know her? Damn, I feel no sympathy for these guys."
After a quiet moment passes, Kka suddenly shakes her head to clear it. She takes a deep breath. "We caan't be staanding around here all daay doing nothing. We'll give Tanji a proper goodbye when we get baack to Otari. Until then, we haave a morlock infestation to exterminaate and a ghost queen to traack down."
She moves over to the small door in the corner and checks it for traps and confirms it is unlocked. She looks over to Lough and gives him a time to move on look.
Only a few fragments of the shelving that once lined the walls of this pantry remain today.
Kka does a quick sweep of the small room and then checks each of the doors at the north end.
In an uncharacteristically subdued tone, she asks the group, "which one first?"
He found it a little hard to care about the thieve's demise but was unexpectedly caught off guard by Kka's clear pain. He stands awkwardly nearby looking for something else to do. He takes a moment to study the "offerings" left by the Morlocks while Kka and Lough do their thing.
"I don't know what the rest of this stuff is, but this stone is a common potency rune. Should be handy for us later." He pauses as everyone eles appears to be moving on without care for the treasure. Shrugging he pockets the stuff. She must really be upset if she left that stuff...
He hurries to catch up with the others and looks around. Looking at Kka, "I'd say the left door first. The other one I think has a secret entrance back in the shrine room. We should go in that way."
Kka opens the door to the left. There's a small hallway beyond with a door to the south, terminating in a cave. At the north end of this small cave, the mouth of a swampy, flooded cavern yawns. A few ruined rowboats lie in heaps on the floor of this cavern, strewn next to tangled coils of rope. Remnants of a pulley system hang from the ceiling. Several swaths of disturbed earth litter the muddy floor between this cavern and the flooded cavern to the north, as though left by the movement of a large, serpentine creature.
Kka moves slowly and quietly down the hallway, ignoring the door in the southern wall for the time being. At the bottom of the stairs she looks north into what looks like a large cavern opening. If she sees nothing immediately dangerous, she examines the strange tracks. All she can tell is that they were apparently left by something large and snakelike. "I really don't like the looks of that."
Carefully stepping over the tracks so as not to disturb them in case one of the smart ones can determine anything more from them, she does a quick search of the rowboat remnants, not really expecting to find anything. She notices a small opening to the south and pokes her head down it to see if she can tell where it goes.
Then, just as carefully, she retreats back up the stairs and stopping at the southern door, first listens through it for any sounds. If she hears nothing, she proceeds to examine the door for traps and locks. She reports all that she discovers to the waiting group.
The opening to the south is a small tunnel that slightly bends eastward. It's very narrow and perhaps not the most comfortable place to walk through, but it's possible.
The door to the south does not seem trapped or locked.
In a whispered tone Giyozara says [b]"Wait, I know those tracks . . . Drake I think. They're like . . . small dragons, except they have a pair of wings instead of front legs, not in addition to. That's what all the sweeping is from. Not necessarily too bad, some drakes are quite weak. Some . . . are significantly tougher."
Looking around the place, you see a setup for ferrying supplies between here and higher up, but that setup has fallen into disrepair long ago.
The GREEN GEM remains unidentified.
"In case anyone was wondering this rune is a potency rune. It makes weapons strike a bit more accurately. The gem is something called a 'fear gem.' It's a thing you can affix to your weapon. You can expend its energies to attack in a ghastly way. If the strike hits you make the target scared of you as well as the damage of the hit, but the effort uses up all the power of the gem and renders it useless, regardless if you hit or not."
Kka hears from Giyozara about the identity of the green gem. "A fear gem, a potency rune, and an expensive bauble. Thaat was a good haul." Despite her words, she doesn't sound quite as excited as she normally is about finding good loot. She goes to stuff them into her backpack for safe keeping.
She turns back to the door in the hallway. "Looks like this door is free of traaps and unlocked. Shall we have a peek inside?"
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"Seaworthy" Lough declares, scratching off some of the rot patches, and looking around some more "Somebody was ferrying supplies up" having stopped at a pile supplies, and pointing to it "Likely some time ago"
"Fear Gem?" Lough takes the tiny talisman Kka discovered, and looks inside of it with curiosity, expecting, perhaps, to see what crystalized "fear" looks like. He pockets it for luck.
"Any kind of dragon be awesome to meet. At least if its the kind of dragon we can talk to. But why would it want to live down here?"
Sneakers clambers up Kvit's robes to stay out of the mud while the two of them look around. Kvit stops short when he comes across the tracks. Whispering to himself and Sneakers out loud "River drake..." Sneakers sniffs the air as he looks around and nods. "Yeah... definitely."
Kvit tries to get everyone's attention while not being too loud. Clearing his throat, "This is almost certainly a River Drake. In any case, you do not want to meet them Cherry. Although, you would probably be fine since they don't typically eat salads. It'd be best if we could avoid it. Like Giyozara said, some are stronger than others."
He looks around at the boats and Lough inspecting them. "I really hope you are not considering us to travel in those boats or across the water at all. Especially in light of this river drake." Kvit and Sneakers did not like water or boats if they could help it.
Kka suggests clearing this corner of the dungeon first, and hearing no objections, opens this door.
The walls of this octagonal chamber are adorned with swirling runes carved into the stone and then filled with dull, silvery metal. The floor is polished smooth, as is the ceiling ten feet above.
"Definitely some sort of magic or shrine. Does anyone have any ideas?"
Sam follows her friends, completely out of her element with regards to magic identification.
Thinking about it a little longer, this room might seem familiar to some of you.
Kka opens the door and pokes her head in. "Empty. How disappointing." She steps in and carefully examines the room for anything of interest. She takes special care with the walls (particularly the southern wall) looking for any secret entrances.
Whatever small interest the room might have held for her, it is soon gone. "Looks like a dead end. How about we try the tight cave tunnel next to see whaat's at the other end?"
** spoiler omitted **
Thinking about it a little longer, this room might seem familiar to some of you.
Kvit snaps his fingers, "Ah! That's why this looks familiar. This pattern is similar to the teleportation circle we found on the ground floor. I wonder if we can activate it from here. This one looks more intact."
"I think we might be under the old destroyed Teleportation circle on the first floor. Maybe this was some sort of magical support system to keep the teleportation magic working. It couldn't have been the destination, right? I mean, why go to all the trouble when you could just go upstairs?"
Your wondering aloud might trigger some memories on how teleportation circles function.
"I think there is generally a activation phrase or a portable object that acts as a key. I'll be honest, while I have a general working idea of how teleportation works, I've not had any experience with it yet."
Kka listens to all the teleportation talk with increasing apprehension. "Uh. I hope you're not suggesting thaat we try teleporting somewhere. If I remember correctly, the circle upstairs waas busted, so the gods only know where we'd end up. It could be someplaace really, really baad."
"Don't worry Lough, we are just musing, the teleportation circle is still destroyed, we couldn't use it even if we wanted to. It's just . . . odd that there would be a sub-chamber."
"It could be useful if we need to rush back to town though. Let's keep an eye out for anything that might help us repair the surface's circle."
"Awe, it's broken. It hasn't be used in a long time and we'd need a specific ritual to awaken them and rebind them to the other circles."
Cherry shrugs. "For future use maybe."
Sam has a look to try to recall if she read about these things.
When it appears that no teleportation attempts were going to be made, Kka breathes out a sigh of relief. "Yes, Cherry. Maaybe in the future." "... the far, far future"
"Now that thaat's taken caare of, where to next? How about we, liiike... try the tunnel behind the boats?" The last part is rushed out in her excited anticipation of what they will find at the other end. She looks from face to face nodding eagerly as if trying to get everyone to agree.
Kvit stares expressionlessly at Kka. "Did you not hear the part about the drake. The River Drake? Maybe I should have mentioned it spews acid and can whip you with its tail before you can even get close enough to stab it? I shouldn't have to mention that they're definitely evil, like everything else living here."
Kka rolls her eyes in exasperation. "Look. I'm not saaying we go in the waater. We just have to sneak quietly paast the boats to reach the tunnel. If the draake was going to attaack us, then both me and Lough would already be sleeping with the fishes by now."