Don't fight over me girls, I can shave both your feet.
Sorry the updates having been real late. I've been pretty busy lately. I'm going to continue in a more abreviated formate, only going into detail on the big fights (like the showdown with Mokmurian which I'll be posting momentarily).
Ox led the party into the next room which held a large cauldron covered in runes. A stone golem came out from behind the cauldron and attacked, but they quickly took them out with Ox landing the final blow.
The next room held many frozen giants, and five of them came to life (or is that unlife) and attacked. One of them had no head and wielded two giant axes! I don't need to tell you how cool that is. Oeuvre shot down one of the undead giants while ogre took out another with his greataxe. Loraine dropped the headless one with repeated channels of divine energy, and Oeuvre cleaned up the rest. They looted the undead giants armor and took them back to the dwarves, who were eager to help carry the loot for a share and free booze from Ox.
After resting with the dwarves, the party returned to the library and entered what appeared to be an empty room, but there was something moving within the walls. Flames burst out in both in front and behind the party, and some butt-ugly iron creature emerged from the walls to attack, tearing Ox's armor to shreds. Mara called it a forged fiend and promptly smote it down. She's awesome like that. Loraine conjured a water elemental to bring down the walls of flame.
Ox decided to use the armor taken from one of the trolls, which unsurprisingly smelled better than his usual armor. They went through some double doors next and were attacked by three wickedly evil hounds. Oeuvre dropped one with his bow, and Ox took down another with his greataxe. Oeuvre then finished off that last one.
More double doors led to a large lecture hall and were greeted by its sole occupant: Mokmurian! Dale buffed himself up as he moved along the far wall. Savir fired off a pair of scorching rays at him, but they fizzled against his magical shield. Ox, forgetting he's only good with his greataxe, fired his bow at the giant and naturally missed. Mokmurian then blasted the other four in a thick fog. Loraine and Mara made their way out from the fog, and Loraine dispelled some of Mokmurian's protective magics. Oeuvre followed and downed a potion.
Mokmurian then raised his hands and all save Savir (who was still in the fog) fell towards the ceiling, although Dale glided gently like a feather thanks to his magic ring. The others all downed healing potions while Savir created mirror duplicates of himself. Mokmurian lowered his arms and Mara, Ox, Oeuvre, and Loraine fell back down to the ground while Dale glided down to his feet. Savir then exited the fog and dispelled more of Mokmurian's protective spells.
Dale greased the floor beneath Mokmurian as Ox stood and downed a potion than made his skin thick like the bark on a tree. Savir dispelled another one of Mokmurian's protective spells, but the stone giant quickly cast two more on himself. Loraine attempted to deafen Mokmurian, but the giant proved too tough for her magic. Mara then closed for melee as Oeuvre shot him in the eye with one of his special giant-slaying arrows.
Dale buffed himself with another spell as Ox closed to attack with his greataxe, but he not only missed but managed to get hit with Mokmurian's greatclub. The hit that also drained some of his life and healed the stone giant! Personally, I'm surprised he didn't get drunk draining the half-orc like that. Savir continued to pull out scrolls from his robes and dispelled another one of Mokmurian's protective spells. Mokmurian casts two more spells, one of which made him move faster and the other allowed him to hover over the greased floor. Mara missed with his longsword as Loraine prayed to Iomedae for aid. Oeuvre continued to strike with his bow.
Dale moves to flank with Ox, singing an inspiring song as he does so. Mokmurian strikes him with his greatclub as he moved in, but this time he didn't drain his life like he did with Ox. Savir dispelled another protective spell on Mokmurian as Ox finally managed to strike with his greataxe, but flames sprouted forth from Mokmurian and hit Ox back when he did so. Mokmurian then clobbered Ox twice more with his club. Loraine imbued Mara with the divine power of Iomedae, and Mara struck twice with her longsword, and like Ox was struck by Mokmurian's fire in the process. Oeuvre struck twice more with his bow.
Dale used his wand to drain some of Mokmurian's life energy and heal his own wounds, but as he too was zapped with fire, he was no better (but also no worse) than before. Savir dispelled the enchantment speeding up Mokmurian with another scroll and Ox landed a nasty hit with greataxe to finally drop the stone giant.
As they were looking through Mokmurian's notes detailing invasion plans, battle tactics, and magical research, they uncovered a map of the Lost Coast region of Varisia. For points along the coast have "X" marks on them--three placed several hundred feet out to sea along the coast, but the fourth was right over Sandpoint! A note on the map, in the Giant tongue, read "Hellfire Flame ruins--foundation stones from each would know where the traitor Xaliasa dweft and perhaps where he hid his key to Runeforge."
Mokmurian's corpse then twitched and spasmed! He spoke in a heavily accented voice that was not his own. He said, "So these are the heroes of the age. More like gasping worms to me, soon to be crushed back into the earth when I awaken the armies of Xin-Shalast, when the name Karzoug is again spoken with fear and awe. Know that the deaths of those marked by the Sihedron--the giants you have so conveniently slain for me--hasten my return, just as yours soon will. Fools, all of you. Is this all you could manage in ten thousand years?"
Hey, creepy voice dude, if you bring me back to life, I'll kill all the giants you want me to. Just sayin'.
Anyway, using a key they took of Mokmurian, they entered a large library tended to be a construct. Dale chats with the librarian for a while, and then he brings tomes with info on Karzoug and Xin-Salast. The librarian also retrieves several magic compasses, about a dozen ioun stones, a cloak of Oeuvre, a staff for Savir, crown from Dale, and magical hand o' glory which delighted Ox.
On the way back up to see Conna, they came across a hill giant and a stone giant arguing with each other along the way. They both drank potions and moved to attack with greatclub and heavy pick respectively. Loraine summoned a celestial auroch (it looked just like Ox!) to attack from behind. The hill giant clobbered Ox with his greatclub, and the big guy was knocked out of the fight, and Mara was forced to fall back as well to heal. Savir dropped a fireball on the giants, but also sent the celestial auroch packing. Oeuvre then finished off both giants with his bow.
After healing up from the fight, they met up with Conna. She said the two giants they just fought were two of Mokmuarian's general (with the stone giant behind his second in command), and she pressed them to take out the rest of the generals as well. The last two generals were a pair of lamias. Mara dropped one with a nasty hit from her longsword, and Ox took out the other with his greataxe. Oeuvre heard some noise in the hallway then, and went to investigate and found a pair of young red dragons fleeing from the cave complex. Battered as they were from fighting the generals, they opted to let the dragons go.
In the lamia's lair, they found a secret compartment underneath the altar. They found several awesome books full of descriptions on how to disembowel, decapitate, drown, and slaughter all types of humanoids in ritual sacrifices, but those stupid losers burned this great find!
The next morning, Mara and Loraine claimed they had a shared dream of Iomedae, and Mara's longsword and Loraine's phylactery were now imbued with great power. I wonder what they dreamt about though. Maybe they dreamt of shaving one another's feet! I would have liked to seen that.