2023/01/04: The Vault Part 2 Report
General Summary
Othar, Garrek, Malthoronam, Shane, Union, Morros, Buzz
The party debated plans. Draw the enemies into prepared ground and annihilate them? Bypass them while they fight each other? Hunt down specific targets? Figure out what turned the lights off? They chose the latter, attempting to reach the door in the ceiling via a psionic teleport from Shane, and things immediately went wrong.
Something drew the party off course, and they found themselves in an abandoned temple. A glowing white diamond crystal hovered above a multileveled floor. Lots of engravings were visible on the walls, depicting worship of crystals like the one in the room and beams of lighte from the sky. The temple favored blue and white colorations overall. A donation box was available, as was a giant 40'x40' exit passage. The cavern outside didn't look quite like cavern before; it was darker, and there was a red tint to the light.
The party quickly discovered that the exit passage was trapped, with hundreds and hundreds of obvious holes, likely for arrows. Shane discovered that the trigger seemed to be motion sensors based on mica bits in the walls. Meanwhile, the psionic Union investigated the crystal floating in the center of room, resonating an emotion of transcendence. Union tried to psionically contact the crystal after it failed to respond to vocal greeting, but wasn't able to spend enough PSPs to properly contact it.
Shane tried to figure out how the religion worked, but got it very wrong initially. The crystal may feed on souls? The frescoes suggest people brought the old and infirm here, and they disappeared in beams of light. Morros found some cubbies with personal effects, suggesting some of the people living here may have been lizardfolk.
Garrek noticed that there was a suspicious part of the floor, possibly a door. He couldn't find a switch, but when he asked Union to check, Union detected a psionic resonance from behind the door. He poked it with his mind, and the door ground to the side, revealing a staircase down.
Union tried to poke the crystal again, this time with more power. This time, something apparently heard him knocking. The light in the room turned odd, with geometric shapes being projected on the walls in a rainbow of color. Malthoronam realized there were useful patterns in the light, and he started moving around the room to see where the proper emotional resonance and image combinations came together.
Morros, Shane, and Garrek headed downstairs while the psions and empaths were doing their thing. Morros found some tablets covered in math. Garrek, an engineer, identified that they were trigonometric proofs, showing angles and the strength they provide in construction. Morros also found a golden scroll, apparently detailing a rite of ascension. It was remarkably similar to what Malthoronam and co. were doing upstairs.
Morros interrupted the group upstairs before they could accidentally "ascend" Malthoronam. Union took a look at the trig proofs, and apparently most of them were elven, with some dwarven and some unidentified work from something that worked in base 3.
Morros checked with her magic book, and it appears this crystal is a cosmic recycling device. It spreads one's energy to the universe if activated and touched, which effectively kills them and evaporates their souls.
The group started trying to find a way past the doorway trap. Shane's hand got shot with a laser when he tried to bypass the trap with a veil of shadows. Union got in touch with the crystal and discovered that the trap was powered by the crystal; it could be turned off if the crystal was told to telepathically and someone "ascended" to power it. Garrek (and Othar) suggested the crystal could be the one to be sacrificed instead. Morros elected to turn everyone invisible and just walk past the light detectors and bypass the issue entirely. (She grabbed the crystal with a water tendril and dropped it in a bucket to bring with.)
Outside, there were odd crystalline statues and obelisks. There are 50 or 60 elven buildings forming some sort of city. A red glow pointed the group to a tram system, and a dwarven city far above on the far wall. There's an unlit refraction crystal next to the tram station. There's a wall of magma slowly oozing down nearby.
The group saw a pair of what were probably stone giants walking along in the distance. In the opposite direction from them were giant crystalline wizard towers. The group headed toward the towers, and they found that their expectations of traps and wards were correct; several of the towers have apparently collapsed due to massive explosions, and there are charred corpses and remains all over the place. Several towers were still standing, though, and a red light was pulsing in one of them. Othar noticed that the pulsing apparently matched his pulse.
An attempt by Garrek to prompt a jump in Othar's pulse with an axe nearly to the face failed, since Othar trusted he wouldn't actually do it. (Garrek found this surprisingly touching.) A follow-up attempt by Morros should have worked, but it appeared the source of the light was actually keeping Othar in some fixed emotional equilibrium. Othar punching the ground similarly provided no effect, despite the bloody knuckles. The group found this... concerning. Except Othar, who wasn't really feeling anything.
In the middle of a very large open building was a glowing red gem, the source of the pulsing. It was surrounded by small walls that may once have been parts of obstacle courses, and there are plenty of corpses. It looked like they tried to get through the obstacle course and something killed them. The obstacle courses themselves appeared to have been shattered or hammered to pieces, but this evidently had little effect on the dangers.
The party sent a bevy of summoned creatures through the obstacle course to figure out how it worked. Lots of crushing and stabbing traps, plus some acid. Othar managed to get through with a very thoroughly informed attempt and some brute force. (His dragon companion/alternate form, Vicious, got pretty painfully battered on the way out.)
The "smoldering crystal of dragonfire" turned out to be a casting implement for enhancing fire magic. It also does fire damage to whoever's carrying it.
The rest of the towers were destroyed or sealed, so the party moved on. They heard some creepy music from somewhere above, and they saw a human coming down a very tall staircase far away. Apparently exploring? Large menacing man in a shadowy cloak. Black paint on the eyelids and around the eyes, with the profile broken up by small bones. Seeing the few party members waiting for him, he cautiously approached. No one said anything; he slowly edged around the party and then disappeared into the shadows. The party continued up the staircase and discovered that they were where they were trying to get to begin with; they were between the legs of the colossus in the city they'd first seen.
Looking for the source of the unfamiliar music, they saw an enclave a little ways up that was surrounded by ghostly lights.
Rewards Granted
3 xp, smoldering crystal of dragonfire, weird "ascension" crystal, tablets of trigonometric proofs, golden scroll detailing "ascension" ritual
Character(s) interacted with
A mysterious explorer, the crystal of transcendence
Notes
Note: Othar is technically a black dragon with a bunch of weird mutations. He may or may not have consumed a swimming pool of souls once, which may or may not have improved his condition.
Malthoronam
Union
Morros
Othar
Shane
Buzz Gizmo
Garrek Bardinson
Report Date
04 Jan 2023
Primary Location
Related Characters
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