Tenth Warp

9/24/2024
Tenth Warp
Lars, Skullgrin, Ragnarock, Eolas, Naldon
We are standing in the hallway with the dead hobgoblin guards, gathering their equipment and healing our wounded. We start discussing what our next step will be, and checking the side rooms. The first room NW of the pit has 2 made beds, a small side table, a mid-size beetle in a cage, and nothing else. SW room has no light from a beetle, 3 small beds, a Larger Canopy bed, a dinning table and chairs, and no loot. Lars is over on the East side and looks into the SE room, steps inside and finds a couple of creatures that attack him very quickly. (Glitches occurred here)
Lars calls out to us that he is under attack as the creatures clumsily start to approach him, Skullgrin yells back he shouldn’t touch them. Lars describes them and these creatures/ blobs/ things?, are gross. Lars fires his Arrow, and then commands his Primal Companion to move forward and attack also, and between the 2 of them this blob creature dies. The claws of the Primal Companion swiped through the outer layer and more faces inside like a disgusting Russian doll were visible as it died. Blob 2 moves slowly from its corner and gets next to Lars, and attacks with a fist, which Splats against Lars’s armor sickeningly without hurting him; and Lars calls out to us again, and we all respond that as he killed one already he is doing just fine. Ragnarock joins Lars inside the SW room anyway, and is able to land a solid attack with his greataxe causing 7 damage. Lars’ Companion attacks this 2nd blob from its right (the East wall), bites it at the shoulder and rips the right arm completely off. Primal Companion tosses the arm at the wall, where it loudly SPLATS and falls down to the floor. (Glitches were found here also)
With the blobs of whatever-they-were dead, Ragnarock inspects an Iron-bound chest in that SE room, and finds out it is quite locked. Skullgrin pulls out a crowbar and hammer and get the Iron-bound chest without breaking the goods inside. We find 2 Potions, 1 water skin, bottle of wine, explorers outfit and Pack, 4 sets of manacles, and 4 empty sacks.
The NE room has 16 cots, and nothing else, and thankfully no more guards. The N room here is also a small 2 bed guardsman room that is quite bare. Skullgrin and Lars jump across the trap pit, Lars nearly falls in, and Skullgrin moves the trap lever in reverse allowing the rest of us today to continue without needing to leap also. The door ahead of us do not seem to have locks, but they are not opening easily. Ragnarock and Skullgrin attack the doors but don’t do much damage. Skullgrin pulls the East lever, and we find out that there is a 2nd trap pit in this hallway that we had been standing above earlier.
Skullgrin tries a deception as if the guards won the fight, but whatever or whoever is on the other side, in goblin responds “Nice Try.” Ragnarock responds with threats and a 100 gold bribe, but we get no takers to open those large doors. We Inspect the doors again, and we are able to see small hole that we are able to use to listen to what is going on in there. We hear them calling us foolish, and asking each other if they are ready. We get a bad feeling about this . . . I use my keen senses and hear more Hobgoblin Guards behind us from the East rooms again!
The Doors in front of us open onto a Very large room with a Raise stage/platform a the South end, with 2 guards at the doors, and Strange, large, misshapen, bronze-skin Dwarf, wearing Black Plate Mail armor, that is holding a chain that is restraining 1 of the children! We can see the other children on the Stage, chained to a pillar. A total of 4 more Hobgoblin Guards come from the East rooms we just inspected, and move into our hallway, with Lars Responding with lightning reflexes. His arrow strikes and Kills the first guard behind us, piercing its neck and causing it to fall into the farther spike pit. The Primal Companion Runs back into the hallway and attacks the 2nd hallway guard, forcing it to drop the longbow it was readying to fire our backs. All 3 hallway guards attack Lars’s Companion and it dodges all 3 swords. I run toward the South doors and rush to the West Lever and open that trap back up to block them from getting closer to our backs. Door Guard #1 attacks and Skullgrin is able to slap the sword away, sending the hobgoblin a disgruntled and disgusted stare. Eolas cast sacred flame, and does only 1 damage of radiant energy to Hallway guard #2 (Apathetic Hobgoblin.)
Skullgrin and Ragnarock team up to remove 1 of the hobgoblin door guards, Skullgrin destroying the guards shield and left arm, as Ragnarock finishes the guard with his greataxe. The second door guard attacks Skullgrin and the longsword is easily dodged. Lars continues to fire his longbow at the hallway guards and hits the second (Apathetic Hobgoblin) with seeming ease, inflicting 6 damage. The Primal Companion attacked the same hobgoblin, biting through the armor and killing it. Lars’s Companion then moved away from the hallway guard #4 (Enraged hobgoblin) to circle hallway guard #3(Hungry hobgoblin), allowing guard #4 to attack it from behind with its longsword causing 14 damaged as it dodges guard #3’s longsword.
I, Naldon, casts Magic Missile, my arm glows lightly purple from my hand to my elbow as I send 3 turquoise colored and glowing magic crossbow bolts at the 3rd hallway guard (Hungry hobgoblin), the hobgoblin’s eyes get wide as the bolts approach him and it tries to turn away and run, but the bolts hit it and the hobgoblin screams as it falls into the trap pit on top of hallway hobgoblin #1 as it dies.
Enraged hobgoblin- hallway guard #4, picks up it longbow and shield and exits east, as Eolas move down the hallway to help in the large room. Eolas casts Sacred flame and burns door hobgoblin #2 for 6 damage. Skullgrin follows the flames with his Maul and re-arranges the hobgoblin’s face, tearing the jaw off it and killing the hobgoblin.
Ragnarock Moves into the large room and squares up to the misshapen dwarf and swings his greataxe, but it bounces of the plate armor. Lars fires an arrow at the Dwarf, but it narrowly misses. I move behind Eolas so I can see into the Large room, see a 2-headed creature, and cast Mind Sliver at it, causing both head to shake, and 1 of the heads to look dazed and this dog is hurt 3 points.
This dwarf, which by the captive children in this room we can believe is KAZMOJEN; attacks Ragnarock, saying “My Turn.” But Ragnarock manages to stay agile and avoid the strike from Kazmojen’s Great sword. Then Kazmojen yells out “Prickles, Attack” and points at Skullgrin. Prickles the 2 headed dog? (creature), attacks Skullgrin, 1 head fails but the other bites and inflicts 5 damage. Eolas casts Sacred Flame, but Prickles dodges it completely, and then Eolas moves forward into the room.
Skullgrin, with an enemy in front of him, keeps things simple and beats up the dog that bit him. Swinging once, Skullgrin hits resulting in 13 damage, then he swings from the other side, blasting another 12 damage into the 2 headed dog. Ragnarock attacks Kazmojen again but doesn’t do any damage. The Primal Companion moves up and attacks Prickles also, biting the right head, shaking it against the other head and then nearly ripping the head in its jaws off, and killing Prickles. We hear an enraged scream from Kazmojen as he watches Prickles die. Skullgrin turns toward Kazmojen and taunts him by saying “Dog Gone”.
Kazmojen lacerates Ragnarock with great force, and 2 great sword slices that inflict 20 damage onto our Barbarian. I move into this large room to the right of Skullgrin and attempt to cast Chill Touch onto Kazmojen, but I fail to connect. The hallway guard joins us by entering from the East wall, and fires an arrow from its longbow at ME, and it injures me taking away 6 HP. Eolas turns to Ragnarock and heals him 6 HP, then runs in a circle around Kazmojen’s range to face off with the hobgoblin guard.
Skullgrin moves forward to put pressure on Kazmojen and help Ragnarock, attacks Kazmojen and is not able to hurt him. He uses his Second Wind ability to regain 10 health, then Ragnarock Activates his Barbarian Rage and attacks Kazmojen again, but the Black Plate armor turns away the greataxe again. Lars moves next to me inside this large room, and lets an arrow fly at the hobgoblin guard, and wounding it 7 points. Lars commands his Companion to jog back into the hallway and then sprint toward Kazmojen, but the attack doesn’t succeed.
Kazmojen turns toward Skullgrin and nearly screams “You Killed My PET” and then attacks Skullgrin, slicing the Great sword across Skullgrin’s chest and wounding him 9 HP. Skullgrin noticed the wounds and skin on Kazmojen healing after he did damage to us. I attack the hobgoblin guard with my Fire Bolt cantrip, but I miss. The hobgoblin looks between us and its boss Kazmojen, decides Kazmojen is worse, and drops his longbow to attack Eolas with its longsword, misses the swipe. Eolas counter attacks with his mace and also misses. Now it is Skullgrin’s chance to attack again, and he Hammers Kazmojen with a 15 damage strike. Smartly he uses his Second Wind again, restoring another 10 HP.
Ragnarock gets a little daring and attempts to take the great sword from Kazmojen, but fails, and then he quickly uses the potion of healing and returns 5 HP to himself. Lars Runs up onto the stage to get a clearer angle to hit Kazmojen, and succeeds wonderfully by blighting Kazmojen with 11 damage. His Beast Companion follows right after by slashing with its claws with 7 more damage. Kazmojen’s body seems to change as he take the injuries, and his arms look much too long for his body and his hands too large for his arms.
Thankfully Ragnarock is in Rage mode, as that hardens his body against damage from enemies, as Kazmojen decides to focus back on Ragnarock again. Kazmojen yells “You want sword? Take IT!” as he lightly tosses his great sword at Ragnarock and then attacks right after with his now very oddly shaped hands with claw-like nails. Ragnarock is still in a world of pain as Kazmojen connects with both arms forcefully, and then he finishes the assault by using Rend in a lacerating strike as Ragnarock takes 12 damage.
I decide to try 1 more time to knock out the hobgoblin guard by Eolas, casting Fire Bolt again and I burn it with 8 Fire damage, which is more than it can live through. With the guard dead I run over to the stage/platform area of the room like Lars, and move over East to the South of Kazmojen. Eolas is now free to dash over to Kazmojen and tries to hit the semi-dwarf with his mace but fails to connect again.
Skullgrin retorts loudly “Time to die, Runt” as he forces the odd dwarf to swiftly dodge the heavy head of his mace. Ragnarock continues to push his attack despite his injuries in true barbarian fashion, using the new great sword he has, but Kazmojen’s black armor is still protecting him well and the sword only leaves a bright scar on the chest plate. Lars draws back his bow as he carefully aims at Kazmojen and lets the arrow fly right into the gap of Kazmojen’s armor in a debilitating 10 point hit. Lars’s Beast of the Land was waiting for the arrow to impact and with a lightning speed assault struck Kazmojen again with 7 damage and knocked the dwarf over!
Skullgrin looks at the Primal Companion, turned back to Kazmojen and starts pulling out the manacles we just got from the rooms back in the hallway. Skullgrin also loudly calls out to us “I get that Plate Armor!” Ragnarock assists Skullgrin in disarming and restraining this bizarre dwarf opponent.
After we get Kazmojen manacled hand and foot, we hear a loud slow clap, from a shadowed woman up on the stage behind Lars and myself. She shimmers into view, and next her appears a Creature from our Nightmares – A Beholder!! It center eye thankfully remains closed towards us, and then it speaks to us in Common! The Beholder calls out the name of one of the children, saying that child should Not have been abducted.
In its resonant, low, and powerful voice it stated firmly
“I have come for Terrem Kharatys. That boy should not have been taken from Cauldron. I intend to see that he is safely returned to his orphanage. You can keep the others. They are of no consequence. Come, Terrem- you will be safe with me.”
Ragnarock chooses for us, uses the great sword to destroy the chain restraining the child next to him, and helps the boy stand up. The woman casts a spell upon the boy, his eyes lose focus, and as if in a trance he shuffles from next to Ragnarock all the way past me to the this female being and the Beholder. As we watch in tense anticipation, all three of them fade from our vision. We all feel the dreadful and overwhelming presence of the beholder also stop oppressing us. We are then able start to regroup and figure out how to safely guard and guide the 3 other children down here back to the surface.