250409 Fool of a Took
General Summary
Whilst contemplating this week’s instalment of the Band of Tomb Robbing Assassins, it struck me that the group had been missing the hustle and bustle of the city and even perhaps the company of more than each other. How quickly they resorted to domestication and enjoyed the hubbub of a bar, even if it was a Drow one. Of course, slaughter and violence were always a hair’s breadth away.
“Bugger!” said Drogon as he sat down and realised that he couldn’t see over the table. They had all got up that morning, washed in some cases, and met in the common room of the ‘Teat for breakfast and to discuss the plans for the day. They were hunched over whispering, quite used to the occasional comment from the Halfling, seemingly coming from under the table.
Sentinel left the table and chatted to Maloria the ever helpful, if dour, inn keeper. The bard asked about where they could rent a flat or house for an extended period of time, and it appeared that there were a number of vacant in the Arcane sector. Drow life was hard and fast, and came with little cost. Strange for such a long-lived race, but it did mean that there was always a place open for the next group of house-owning hopefuls. That is, as long as they didn’t mind the bloodstains and dagger marks in every piece of woodwork.
A surly, half-orc server came over to the table and demanded that they order quickly, in more of a shouty way than a polite way. When asked what was for breakfast, he bellowed “F**king mushroom stew, f**king mushroom porridge or f**king mushrooms”. They all chose which of the f**king dishes they fancied, with a side of lizard steak, which apparently came with f**king mushrooms.
Even Jude worked out there was a bit of theme to the cuisine of the Underdark. She asked the Half-orc his name and discovered that he was yet another Magyar, but his surname was Splittooth. That would explain his bad mood perhaps. The orcish fellow was very excited about a fight that was to happen in the square today at midday though. Something the team noted for later.
Maloria wandered over and let the band know that Thorg’s armour wasn’t permitted in the city and, to avoid any trouble with the city watch, he should remove it. This left the group with an issue, as Kurog and Thorg would now be unarmoured. Jude was wearing her old faithful chainmail from her travelling days around Chark, so she was fine. So, one point of order for today was to purchase some new chainmail, which was apparently just fine to wear, from the shops found in E.C.
Jude was pretty keen to get her shield imbued with some protective magic, but Griff decided that was at the bottom of the list of things they needed and was too expensive. The wizard pulled out a long list of things that they had, and had never told her about. Some rather nice things too. She was gently reminded that she was new to the group and hadn’t earnt the same share. This sudden parsimoniousness by Griff was noted and he could expect a few almost-too-late heals perhaps.
Throughout this whole conversation, Jude was getting more and more uncomfortable and she drank her breakfast wine. She had heard a voice in her head earlier and knew the others would be a little suspicious, especially Sentinel, as to its source. She had heard a watery voice tell her that she must go and save the Kuo-Tua as soon as possible, as they were in grave danger. They could be found west of her current location. She felt a need to get the team moving quickly in order to complete the bargain she had struck with Blibdoolpoolp. Jude decided honesty was the best policy and told the group about the message. Sure enough, Sentinel’s finely-plucked elven left eyebrow raised into its oh-so perfect and irritating arch.
However, the group agreed as one that west was the best course of action, but firstly they needed to get “tooled up!” as Kurog said. The group set off towards the commercial sector to go and buy some plain old chainmail for the boys. As they walked along the Merchant’s Way there was a little bit of a commotion and a crowd of people could be seen dispersing. Upon asking, one of the crowd members explained that a noble had just passed this way, an uncommon event it seemed. The noble was either Fedora, Mab or Nedaline perhaps. No one in the crowd was allowed to look at a noble or suffer death at the hands of the guards, so it was unclear as to whom they had been looking at.
During the fitting of the chainmail, Thorg noticed a poster on the wall advertising the upcoming fight in the town centre arena. A champion of champions billing between Xalamin and the general of the Fighter’s Society, Oberon. He overheard two other patrons of the store discussing the fight and thought it was fixed as Oberon was once from the same house as Xalamin. Even though the Drow gave up all affiliations to their origin house when they joined the Fighter’s Society, they suspected Oberon still had some love for his prior house.
Now suitably tooled up, the crew continued west. With no further directions or narrowing of the area, Jude could give no further information, so they meandered looking for signs of their fishy friends. The further west they went, the more prolific webs became. They covered all areas where they could from houses, signs, balconies etc. It gave the whole street a deserted feel, even though there were a fair number of Drow walking about. The street they were in eventually opened up into a plaza, surrounded by buildings on all sides. In the centre was a ziggurat of some unknown black stone. Topping the pyramid was a gigantic statue of a spider, with a female Drow-like body merged at the top. Lolth! So, this was her temple then.
Rather than investigate the temple, the party outvoted Jude and decided to head south and then continue west, thereby avoiding the whole unpleasant building completely. The streets soon became a maze and the band found themselves heading down more and more dead ends, desperately trying to find a way west. Drogon to the rescue! The small halfling nimbly climbed up the side of one building whilst the others kept watch from below. As Drogon reached the top, he came face to face with a giant spider that sat on top of the building. Luckily for Drogon it didn’t see him thanks to his sneakiness and Luthiel’s invisibility spell.
As Drogon peered about, he could make out other spiders crouched on building tops as far his eyes could see in the Underdark gloom. This was a protective swarm of arachnids, designed to stop anyone from just traversing the rooftops. There was a quick discussion about polymorphing Drogon into his bat form, but that was quickly quashed, as the team knew that the Drow would have some protection against it, as per the Black Gate previously. The conversation was cut short as a huge demon walked past the opening to the alleyway they were hiding in. Its huge majestic and horrifying form dwarfed those around it, its wings brushing the walls as it stomped along towards the west.
Drogon scaled down the wall and followed the demonic being, watching the Drow move out of its way but not overly perturbed by its presence. The demon suddenly snatched out its taloned hand and grabbed a passing slave, non-Drow of course. Our rogue watched the demon pull the unlucky slave in half with a spray of blood and viscera and gagged as the red skinned hell beast began to snack on one half.
He continued to follow the demon until it reached a small alleyway and on each side of the opening was a brazier, burning with a sickly green glow. The demon approached the opening and squeezed the half of the slave he had in his right hand into the brazier and the flame turned red. The demon then moved into the alley and was gone. This was the gate to the Demon Quarter and also how to get through it then.
Drogon returned back to the others and they debated what to do next. They weren’t even sure that this was where the Koa Tua were. Jude cast an augury and asked if continuing west would let them find the fishmen. The answer was negative! A quick follow-up question confirmed that they would in fact find them in the Temple of Lolth and that they were due to be sacrificed to the demon queen herself, that day. The Demon Quarter run by House Eilservs would have to wait for another day. So, the party turned around and headed back to the dark and foreboding temple of Lolth.
Before approaching, Sentinel cast a Seeming on the band to make them all look like Drow – this had to be a stealth mission. In order to seem like they belonged here, the party walked with some confidence towards the temple, making sure that the Drow milling in the square weren’t alarmed by this action. Jude took the lead and walked towards the large archway at the base. The steps leading up to the arch were some twenty feet wide, and had a white filigree etched into the black material, to look like spider webs. The workmanship was outstanding. Jude mounted the stairs and walked into the temple. The room was about one hundred feet wide by thirty feet deep, with an altar at both ends.
Jude went west and approached the altar she found there; the altar was topped by a statue of Loth in her spider guise. On the floor was some elven script that read “Think on the glory of the mighty Lolth, for she will aid those that worship her”. As Jude got closer, she felt a sharp pain in her very core and her nose began to bleed a bit, so she backed up.
Sentinel entered the temple and approached the altar on the east and found a very different set up. Where an altar might have stood was an empty plinth. Again, there was writing on the floor, but this had been scratched out and was unintelligible. This was possibly the half that had been dedicated to Graz’zt and had been referred to by the succubus in the sort-of-garden they’d found. Griff cast detect magic, Sentinel cast True Seeing and Jude cast Death Ward on Grif in preparation.
On the north wall, were a number of openings, two smaller ones on the left and right and a huge twenty-foot archway in the centre. The party continued its pace of confident, yet nonchalant, ‘supposed to be here’, yet respectful and moved through the centre opening into a long wide corridor. At the far end was a circular area with a pool in it. The back wall showed a constantly moving cosmic scene, like a starry whirlpool. On the left was a stairway going up and on the right was a stairway going down.
Guarding the stairways were two huge spiders, one on each side. One glance from Sentinel and she knew that these spiders weren’t everything they seemed. They were actually something demonic, in spider form. Hideous and mind-bending. As dungeons were normally down and rarely up, the group decided that they should try and go right and past these spiderlike monstrosities.
Griff reminded Jude about the spider priestesses’ broach that she was carrying and that perhaps that would get them past. Jude fished it out and put it on and walked towards the spider guarding the stairs down. It scuttled to one side to let her pass. It quickly moved back into position denying the others passageway down. It seemed just Jude was going to go on this adventure. Walking downstairs, Jude noticed another of the demon spiders on the ceiling just out of sight from the passage way above.
As Jude got to the bottom of the stairs, she could see a dimly lit passage way that had two frescos on either side depicting scenes of the worst depravity and horror, both giving off a greyish light. Spiders featured heavily and seemed to almost be real. Jude’s mind snapped and she suffered the worst fear she had ever felt and started to back away and go back upstairs, until she felt a compulsion push her back down. She knew the Koa Tua were in danger and Blibdoolpoolp’s Geas battled the fear and eventually won, allowing Jude to continue, but left her extremely shaken.
Everything seemed to be going well and now Jude could continue to the doors she could see ahead, the ones that no doubt held the prisoners she was after. At least, everything would have gone well apart from one little curious team member who decided to try and sneak past the massive demonic spider beings. That team member shall go nameless but let’s just say his name rhymed with That Clucking Tool Grogon. He was seen of course, and instantly the four spider demons moved in to attack. Kurog grinned and screamed out loud “At last!” as he hefted his giant war axe off his back.
Standard battle tactics were deployed with Thorg marching in to fight one of the spiders that was threatening Luthiel. Slashing deeply into the arachnid chitin, causing the spider’s form to shimmer and the true demon was revealed, a horrific visage of death incarnate, with a multitude of waving appendages all looking to strike. Sentinel cast her charm spells on one, trying to get it to attack one of its fellows, but had no effect. Kurog’s axe on the other hand was extremely effective and forced another of the spiders to revert to its real form. The fight continued and was going in favour of our band, until two of the demons turned to a gaseous form and flowed into Sentinel and Kurog. Both resisted whatever evil the demon had plotted, but their smug smiles soon faded as two more of the spider demon appeared, possibly summoned by their compatriots.
Griff’s response was immediate and worthy of the moment. He fired off his Chain Lightning spell to great effect as it hit three of the Spider Demons, leaving the heady smell of ozone and burning spider hair thick in the air. Luthiel snapped off a quick spell, blasting a spider with radiant light and her paladin skills allowed her to do compounded damage to this demonic being. Drogon found himself facing directly one the of the Spider demons and completely unphased, dealt a swift and deadly sneak attack into his adversary’s body.
The spiders weren’t still during this exchange and their huge mandibles dug deep into the new chainmail of our heroes. Sentinel changed tactics and cast her Synaptic Static spell upon the two enemies she could see, causing smoke to billow and spider screams to rent the very air. The spiders rallied and began to take their toll on the hapless band. It seemed that every time they killed one of the demonic spiders, two more appeared to take its place. Surely, they’d make some headway soon?
One of the creatures in its demon form, turned to Thorg and the Eldritch Knight found himself charmed and under the influence of the demon. He faced Luthiel as she was stood beside him, swung his legendary flaming blade, but managed to miss her three times in an epic display of lucky ineptitude. One of the demons fell to Kurog’s axe but was replaced by another two, gating in from whatever foul plane they originated from.
Hearing the battle turn the wrong way over the mind-link, Jude rushed back up the stairs and blasted two of the spiders with radiant sunlight with some effect, but not as much as she’d hoped. It was then that a huge and monstrous creature appeared from further down the corridor, an absolutely huge spider but with a male Drow torso attached to the thorax. Its spider legs clicking as it approached the adventurers.
Griff quickly cast a wall of force, separating the spiders from some of the band, but also separating Thorg from Luthiel. It was then that the spiders managed to poison both Sentinel and Drogon, leaving them incapacitated. When he realised that he could no longer get at Luthiel, Thorg turned his head towards the now prone Sentinel and grinned as he walked towards her, flaming sword raised high.
Report Date
09 Apr 2025
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