Ungor will cast Barkskin upon himself in an effort to reduce the number of arrows sticking out of his fur. Then prepare to rush through the door and maul some skeletal archers to repay them the favor.
Torvi will cause her weapon to start flaming.
"We got ourselves in a proper mess now, didn't we? "
Karti downs a shielding extract and then uses the wand two more times before readying his weapon for what's to come.
Atash unlocked the door, which swung open on its hinges. The skeletons inside loosed their crossbows. One bolt grazed Atash, drawing blood.
Inside the room, the Frozen shades had moved up to the arrow slits. Standing just outside, they were able to hurl their bolts of frozen energy into the room. The arrow slits were built to be used one way, but mostly they worked well for whoever was closer to them.
"I'll take on some shades in the open with my protections if you can take the stick slingers."
Ungor races back out into the room and advances on the closest shade to begin his counterattack.
Karti rushes forward to help Atash and if possible, redirect the archer's arrows towards him. Surely the shield extract will do its job and keep Karti safe!
Torvi double moves towards the archers.
Retcon: Torvi stopped when she stood over Atash, reached down and placed her healing hands against her companions forehead. "It is not quite time to sleep my friend," she whispered.
Ungor grabbed ahold of one of the shades. He noticed that its helmet was badly dented, recalling that Torvi had struck one of them in an earlier engagement. Though small, it was exceedingly strong, wriggling and jerking backwards to try to create enough space to land a blow. The druid managed to maintain a tight control while also keeping the grappled shade between himself and the second one.
Both sent their images away from Ungor.
Pressed into a corner, the skeletal archers loosed a volley at Karti. One splintered on his [i]shield,[i] the others missed him completely. Seasoned in the ways of the undead, Karti knew that they felt no fear. Yet there was something in the empty eye sockets of the cornered archers that cowed.
Karti moves up and engages the archers in hand-to-hand combat. He knows he has to buy Torvi as much as time possible so that she can take care of Atash.
Torvi heals Atash again...
... and moves forward to where she can threaten all 3 of the archers.
Atash wakes with a gasp, casts vanish on himself, and stands up.
Ok retcon:
Torvi moves to where she is and attempts a Great Cleave to hit all 3 archers, starting from the northernmost:
Bludgeon + Fire
Bludgeon + Fire
Bludgeon + Fire
Ungor has seen this run away tactic before and doubts his hold on the creature will keep it here, so he lets go only to maul his target.
Karti sliced the skull of one of the archers in half. It crumpled to the ground, limp. A moment later and Torvi finished off the other two. Ungor tore the Frozen Shade in his claws limb from limb, finding it cold and tasteless in his mouth. Not a touch of grave rot on that kind of undead.
The final Frozen Shade vanished, its image having moved out of sight down the tunnel.
Taking stock of the situation, there were three exits, not counting the one you had already come through. Beside the bloodied figure of Atash, a huge slab of carven stone blocked the way forward. It depicted a dwarf who turned away from a well laden table, towards a burning forge. At the center of the forge, where its fire would be lit, there was a spherical indentation in the stone face. It was set with runes.
A drownstone key can be placed in the indentation to open this door.
On the left side of the room was a tunnel that looked naturally formed. The whole room was damp, but this tunnel much moreso. Stalactites hugged the walls to either side. Dwarven script beside the tunnel identified it as a mine containing zinc, copper, and zercon.
On the right side of the room were the remains of another strongroom. A tunnel in the back led on.
Karti inspects the runes and then the indentation but whatever 'this' is supposed to be, he can't quite figure it out. Did it use to hold something valuable? Is it a keyhole of sorts? Or is it purely decorative? Who knows, Karti sure doesn't.
He conveys this by turning around to his companions and offering them an apologetic shrug.
"How are you holding up, Atash?"
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A tiny, disembodied voice whimpers back to Karti. "Not...well." After a few more moments he seeps back into view. An entire arm and part of his chest is deeply frostbitten, and he is shivering so bad it looks like he's going to fall to pieces. He points his good hand at the spherical indentation. "T...t-t-t-t-takes...a....d-d-d-drownstone key."
"Well, we have no such key, and with the state Atash is in, we need to find somewhere to hold up." She looks about, "Ungor, yell if that thing returns."
Torvi will reach out and heal Atash some more.
Ungor seeing the fade flee, decides to wait until his companions can join in a pursuit. he moves back around the door into the room with the archers.
"hey friends, i destroyed one of the ..." Ungor's expression changes when he glances at Atash. "perhaps we should retreat to a better hiding place and let our little one recover?" You fool! if you hadn't have burned your hidden campsite, the retreat place would be right here whenever you want it!
"I can offer minor healing but I usually save it for only those near death's door. given you seem to have recently returned, I can offer it to you?"
"Karti, break that wand out and help Atash a bit!"
"Well it seems like this door behind the 2 portcullises is guarding something pretty important?" Ungor will attempt to listen for sounds beyond the door.
Though he presses a large ear to the door, Ungor can't hear anything moving on the other side.
Karti does as Torvi commands and uses the wand of positive energy to administer first aid to Atash. It takes him some time to patch up the worst of Atash's wounds.
Ataah nods a thanks, ready to proceed now that his frozen limbs have returned to their normal temperature.
He moves forward to help with the lock. Although he has some trouble with this one.
"Continue then, or hole up and rest?"
Atash got to work inspecting the door. There was no obvious keyhole aside from the indentation intended to take a lump of drownstone. It was fitted with runes that would hook into the drownstone key and hold it in place, and a few small tubes that ran deeper inside the door. The wizard could find no crack where the door might part. Perhaps it would be drawn up into the ceiling, like a portcullis.
"Atash, are you able to close those door tight? Maybe we can bunk down in here? Possibly plug up the murder holes, and this place will be safe for a rest."
"Worst case, we fight our way out, but that does mean we'll have to run the gauntlet again with those accursed shades."
"Yes...I can fiddle that lock...locked again."
Atash locked the door behind the group successfully.
Torvi will cast keep watch on herself and 2 others. Volunteers?
"If we are attacked during the night, we shall have to sleep if we fight, so if possible, don't engage."
Ungor will use up his 1 heal spell to take out some of the arrows sticking out of his fur.
"Do we think we can get around that door if I shape the stone wall on the side to give us access without the need for a key? I don't know the protections of this place and if there is something that would prevent magical aid."
"Uses...drownstones...may be resistant...to most magic...we should test it." Atash attempts to do just that, casting cantrips like light and mage hand and acid splash on the wall to see if there are any unexpected effects.
Atash got to work on the stone door. Whatever magic he tried winked out the moment it touched the stone. Atash himself felt a weight to the air around it, a blockade in the flow of spellcraft.
The walls to either side were ordinary stone, however.
After locking themselves into the strongroom, the group settled in to rest. The bones of the dead made poor company, though at least they were not as bad as the horrid Fleshmeld you had fought earlier. Far off, down the mine shaft on the left side of the cave, you could hear a slow drip. The noise grew loud each time you fell silent, the sound of water reverberating off rock walls.
The Frozen Shade which had fled earlier did not return. Nothing else attacked you in your rest. There was no light when you prepared to move again, no sign of any change at all. The undead you had slain must have waited down here, year after year. Unmoving, unbreathing.
"We'll need...the key...magic won't work."
Well-rested, Karti goes through his daily preparations with almost military discipline and precision. Their surroundings ought to put the dwarf on edge, but here, amongst the stone and with the constant threat of the living dead, Karti is the (near) perfect professional.
"We could scour these tunnels for it. There's a small chance, okay, tiny chance, that we'll find the personal possessions of the shades that haunt this place. I imagine that the key is supposed to remain on the other side of this here door, but perhaps the captain of the watch of these tunnels has a copy ... and his remains might be found down here ..."
It sounds like Karti has yet to fully convince himself of what he's saying. Barring the possibility of it being here, they'd need to apply some mighty fine jury-rigging to get around this bastard of a barrier.
Atash places a tiny paw on the stone, narrowing his eyes, tracing it to the edge. "The edges...are normal stone...we could try to shape it...with Ungor's magic...might be too much stone...but worth a try."
Ungor will awake and not turn immediately into a bear as he studies the situation near the door. "The edges are normal stone. Well then let's see if we can make a hole through the normal stone wall to whatever is on the other side of the door." Casts Stone Shape.
Ungor touched the rock, feeling the softer material it had once been. His magic bored through it like a mole through lose earth. When the spell was done, there was a tunnel three feet long, two feet high, and nearly three feet wide. On the other side, a passage led onward.
Atash peered into the shadows on the other side of the door. The other side depicted a busy kitchen, though instead of food, the cooks worked with rocks. There was an identical locking apparatus, designed to take a drownstone key, on the far side.
A tunnel led away from this gateway. Atash could see a small room, no more than twenty feet to a side, with a single exit on each wall.
Good Gods below, it had worked! Karti waits with bated breath to hear from Atash what is on the other side.
Atash scampers back to the party. "It worked!...I'm going to scout...I see another...drownstone key door...if I'm not back in five minutes...it means trouble." Then Atash truly vanishes from sight, and the nearly imperceptible sound of his soft footfalls are heard scuttling away.
Atash walked forward into the small room.
To the right, he could see part of a larger room. Weapons and armor were stacked on rows of racks in that room.
Straight ahead, there was a long, wide room. Two colonnades ran down its length, depicting the dwarven god Angradd smiting various types of foes.
To the left, Atash saw a small bare room with two sets of stairs, one leading up and the other leading down. It had two exits. One, leading back towards the colonnade room, led into a very small room. It had once been filled with carvings, but they had been scratched away by something over the years, so much that they were barely intelligible. The other exit was blocked by an ordinary wooden door, warped and aged with the years, but still able to close.
Atash continues forward, moving up the stairs.
The grey stone of the stairs wound upwards. At the top was a faded wooden door. A lock with spiraling metal decoration stood out against the mossy surface of the wood. The door was stuck.
Beside the door, an inscription on the wall identified the room beyond as the living quarters of the priest who had once tended to this section of the Pyrsan Underground. Bruen Darrowhen had been his name. If he still walked these halls, perhaps some shred of him still remembered it.