2023/01/11: The Vault Part 3 Report
General Summary
Othar, Garrek, Shane, Buzz, Malthoronam, Morros, Union
Observing the singing haunted buildings, we see two small buildings. One may be an inn. The other, inset into the stone wall, is emitting music and strange lights. The building may have once been a shop. An attempt to detect life found nothing but a few rats in another direction.
The party (grudgingly, in some cases) approached the shop. Morros got in first, and discovered scattered remnants of destroyed musical instruments. Towards the back, near the remains of a piano, is an attractive and somewhat transparent female form, still playing the nonexistent piano. She turned to the party, her face went from beauty to fanged horror, she shrieked, and Morros promptly zapped her with an undead-hurting spell.
Buzz hasted the party with his armor. Union tossed psionic knives, one of them nicking her on its way by, and then a second fan of knives (courtesy of haste) followed up on that knife's success. The ghost screamed in response, then exploded. The party stoically resisted the soul-tearing shriek and the subsequent blast of concussive force and instrument shrapnel. The floor, broken by the blast, was torn open further by the claws of a horde of glittering ghasts. They launched themselves at the party.
Othar, Malthoronam, and Shane were paralyzed by the monsters' claws. Union was left bleeding on the floor. The claws simply bounced off Buzz's armor, the paralysis was resisted by Morros, and the two ghasts attacking Garrek apparently decided to focus on a piece of rubble that was stuck to his helmet. Garrek responded by claiming their kneecaps for dwarvenkind.
Morros, seeing Garrek tearing the ghasts apart with ease, swung for the masses. Eight ghasts fell. And then Buzz hit the panic button on his belt and opened multiplied fire, vaporizing the rest.
The blue light that had been shimmering on the ghasts swirled around the room and concentrated in the center, forming into an elven vampire ghost with a harp. She promptly tried to soul-dominate the party with her bardic song. The conscious party members soundly ignored it. Garrek charged through the debris and jumped at her, burying the head of his maul in her stomach with a Strike of Righteous Vitality. Union, on the floor, found himself spontaneously reinvigorated.
Morros dampened the room and slashed at the vampire ghost, sending her reeling. And then Buzz, thinking it was a tragedy that this had happened to an elf, put his guns away, flew up to her, put one hand on her chest and one on his own, and then cast Phoenix Gate. "Come back."
The phoenix fire was more than enough to incinerate the undead, but the ghostly matter continued to swirl, slowly consolidating into a corporeal body. And then there was a petite half-elf bard standing in the middle of the room. Buzz gave her some juice.
The party members still capable of movement searched the room. They found a variety of interesting magic items and instruments scattered around and in the hole the ghasts came out of.
The elven girl is Tauriel. She was a bard, a few thousand... hundred? years ago. She is very confused. (Former vampire banshee ghost.) She says there was supposedly a very powerful blade being held by the ancient guardian under the old city. He was a vast, immortal red dragon. Not many people went down there.
Tauriel shared a bit about the Vault's civilization, mentioning that there were several distinct villages/cities and that their government was somewhat less than ideal. She said there were upper, central, and lower areas of the Vault and some parts of the lower area were OLD. Basically weird old ruins that were generally avoided. In the lower area there is a temple area, a few big cities right next to it right at the bottom of the cliffs, then just strange crystals, pillars, and creepy unused areas the rest of the way down to the dragon's vault.
She doesn't think she was around when the city fell. She remembers something about a cult of vampires and then she died. She thinks there was something about a lot of red light and an earthquake?
Buzz promised that he would help her get set up somewhere if she'd come with us. She agreed, and the party let her take the harp. She followed along with the party, tuning her instrument.
As they went, she noticed the colossus. She mentioned to the party that it didn't used to be there, and it almost certainly is alive and mobile, since there was no stone there before to have carved it out of.
She said there were three sectors to the city. Upper, lower, and old. The old city doesn't have a lot in it, but does have lots of old monuments and geometric crystal things much like that found in the temple by the party earlier.
The party decided to investigate the giant statue. It looks like a slightly bearded humanoid figure in lots of armor. Either a chunky human or a tall dwarf. Garrek took a look, and apparently the colossus wasn't carved by someone proficient in stonecarving; while the scale is impressive and the appearance from a distance is good, the detail work is very rough. Clearly not made by dwarves!
And then the statue tried to step on them all.
Buzz, seeing that Garrek was distracted by commenting on the craftsmanship and was looking away from the rising foot, cast haste from his bracer and grabbed Garrek to pull him to safety. Othar opened with a great orb of darkfire, discoloring and greying the stone of the statue's knee and leaving webs of cracks. Shane summoned a wild horde of muppets and backed away. They swung and charged out of the woodwork, swinging curved swords and trying to slash and climb the statue. Some missed and flopped on the ground, but just got back up and charged again. The statue's targeting solution had suddenly become very complicated.
Morros launched a vitriolic sphere, blasting the statue, while Union took advantage of the distraction and made a run for it. Malthoronam let loose a barrage of arrows to little effect.
The colossus's foot came down just where Garrek had been standing. Several muppets goggled at the incoming foot in comical fashion before it landed on them. Only one was crushed; one of the other two was only partially flattened, while the last escaped entirely and enthusiastically launched itself back at the foot. The statue then let loose a word, nearly deafening the party and blasting them with sonic force.
Garrek charged back in, and as the statue raised its foot again, he smashed the ground next to its other foot with an Earthquake Strike. The ground came apart, and then collapsed, the foot burying itself in the ground. And then the 250-foot-tall colossus, unbalanced, tilted into the vast passage into the lower city that it had been standing over.
About a mile down, it bounced.
About two and a half miles down, it didn't bounce.
Several hours of climbing and several wall of stone stair replacements later, the party reached the crater the colossus had left at the bottom. They found pieces of it scattered all over. Near the center were the mangled remains of a throne, apparently inhabited by the remains of a human mummy of some sort. It probably was the pilot. Was.
According to the bard, the throne was a "dwarven throne" meant for animating stone, apparently being used by a human to form some sort of "eternal guardian" for the city.
The party continued wandering downwards. Near the grey elf city, they saw a few garns, but these ducked away into the city.
A while later, they found themselves under an arrow barrage from a group of garns. Most of the arrows scattered uselessly, but one pinged off Garrek's gromril armor and a second gutshot Buzz. The garns tried to pull back into concealment after the volley. The party disapproved.
Morros pointed toward them, a scantily clad fairy figure appeared, a pillar of ice materialized across the area the garns were in, and then the ice shattered. There were no further signs of movement. Morros brushed herself off in satisfaction.
Shane used mundane first aid to remove the arrow from Buzz's stomach, and Garrek gave him some gruff words of encouragement and a pat on the shoulder to help his regeneration along. The group then ambled over to check the shattered remnants of the garn for loot. Among the remains, they found some bows (built for very strong creatures), hundreds of spare arrows, and a knife.
The group continued along. They watched the stone giants fighting something in the distance, likely the lone barbarian. At least one of the stone giants lost that fight.
The group decided to return to the geometric temple for the night, getting a good night's sleep behind the safety of the laser trap. They shared some spells. They also discussed their various combat proficiencies and how to work together better.
Othar is focused on soulfire, but has some skill as a fighter as well. Also, dragon.
Garrek can be a tank, a hammerer, or a flamethrower.
Shane is a cleric and a rogue. He brings healing, stealth, and silent spellcasting.
Malthoronam is an archer. He has some spellcasting, but it's mostly focused on improving spellcasting.
Buzz does weird device stuff. Can do soulfire? Lots of walls of stone. Lots of shooting.
Morros doesn't do fire. She's a water-focused mage, but also a ranger.
Union has psionic abilities. He can focus psionic energy into a weapon and do things with it. He has a hilt he can manifest a mindblade of his choice on. He also once was able to control time and space, but he can't do it now and doesn't fully know his potential abilities.
Tauriel mostly sings. She can also use a crossbow, as long as it's a small one. Other than that, she tries to keep out of trouble. The group handed her some equipment to help keep her alive for now.
As they chattered, Morros summoned plenty of soup, and Garrek set up his field cooking kit.
In the morning, the party set forth once more. They passed magma falls and abandoned buildings, then were led by Tauriel to an area with still-operating elevators. Garrek, as the physically strongest, got to pulling on the winches and mechanisms to open the door to the emergency elevator and pull the elevator up on its long way from the bottom. The elevator, apparently dwarven, uses a handoff system of multiple chains and counterweights to get around the danger of overstressing a single long chain. The mechanisms are simple, reliable, and very well made.
The next elevator over appears to instead function via some precursor to technomancy, as Buzz discovered. It uses a network of crystals and a sort of feather fall field to keep people safe as they descend. Buzz set to repairing and recharging the cracked and drained crystals.
Some of the party members chose to use the newly repaired magic elevator, while the rest preferred to trust the reliability of dwarven engineering.
Buzz got to investigate the bottom for about five minutes before the rest of the party arrived. At the bottom were a variety of exits leading away from the elevator center, as well as a giant set of closed doors. The big doors were locked from the other side.
As the group considered this next obstacle in their path, Buzz asked Tauriel what the name of this mountain was. Apparently it had multiple names. To the dwarves, it was Root Mountain. To the elves, Shadow Serpent Cavern. The dragon under the mountain had a long and poetic name, something about the end of the world. He's a guardian dragon defending the root of the world, and is supposedly going to be the one who will end the world when the time comes. Apparently, though, one of the people Tauriel got to drinking so long ago had been to talk with the dragon, and he was going by the much simpler name "Cal".
Rewards Granted
3 xp, a bunch of high-strength bows, plenty of arrows, a knife, various magic instruments and some miscellaneous gear
Character(s) interacted with
Tauriel
Created Content
Tauriel
Malthoronam
Union
Morros
Othar
Shane
Buzz Gizmo
Garrek Bardinson
Report Date
11 Jan 2023
Primary Location
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