Fullfalling 27
2022-03-30
It took some time to really scour the Earth Temple area to make sure they didn't miss anything, but eventually the Venatore moved on. Not wanting to leave enemies behind them, they headed south through the guard rooms, exploring a northeast corridor between the original guard chamber and the earth temple bastion. The corridor heading northeast, then north, then northeast again before turning south.
Heading south they realized that they were approaching the harpy hall from their first excursion, but another side corridor, also heading northeast hadn't been explored. With
Rudy and
Virion taking the lead, they snuck into a large hexagonal chamber with a lot of insect-like buzzing. A huge broken stone throne dominated the north of the room, which was littered with rubble and broken furniture. As they began to look around, two large swarms of stirges descended from cracks in the ceiling overhead.
After defeating the swarms, a thorough search found some copper coins in the rubble, along with an untarnished ring worn by a skeleton.
Elyot also found a secret doorway behind the throne.
The secret doorway led to s a short corridor, another secret door led into a chamber tiled with black stone. A low circular pit lay in the center of the circular chamber, surrounded by low benches facing in. A quick search discovered small drawers lining the pit which contained various types of augury bones.
The door to the north led into another chamber lined in black stone. Chips of glass or stone formed constellations in the ceiling above, and over the archway heading south the words "Exalted Chamber of High Augury"
The passage north brought the companions to an east-west hall, westward they saw the ten-foot-wide hallway empty out to a large chamber or room while two doors lay on the north wall of this hallway. Heading east the encountered a door with a massive padlock. Rudy quickly discovered the glyph on the lock and was able to scratch off enough to disable it without triggering its magic. The lock proved even less difficult.
The locked chamber was a crypt with 11 sarcophagi in niches along the walls and in a northern corridor. These seemed to be the bodies of former earth temple priests, with one sarcophagus empty. Each of the remains had a bronze ring set with a triangle of jet, and using detect magic, Elyot noted that one of the bodies had a magical cloak. Taking the rings and the cloak, they left the crypt.
The northern door to the west split led to a northern storage room and a corridor east which led into a meditation chamber, whose walls were lined with scenes of destruction caused by the element of earth and demonic forces working in concert. A quick search of the storage room turned up a small bag of yellow powder and a stoppered vial with a black powder within. Not taking the time to search further, they companions headed back to the main hall.
The corridor emptied out to a large sandstone corridor to the west. This twenty-foot wide corridor had inlaid triangles pointing to the north, then turning to the west, the triangle pattern could be seen to continue around the corner.
Heading south, they soon figured out that the secret door from Romag's chamber led into this hall, but another corridor headed east before even the suspected secret door. Heading east the located the remains of a large library. At Elyot's insistence, they spent a long time sifting through the torn and burnt parchments and books before finding a few works that survived the destruction.
The hallway turned south right after the library. Based on their map, they suspect it linked up with one of the corridors they had explored.
Adrea insisted that Rudy and Virion search, and they did discover a latch which pivoted a section of wall between the two corridors.
Moving back to the sandstone corridor, they followed it south, where they came to a grand staircase heading down into darkness. The western side of the corridor mirrored the east, and soon they saw the triangular inlays again. Taking the first western side passage. They found it quickly turned south with several other passages branching off of it. At the southern end, they turned east. Another passage branched south, but the eastern passage ended with a southern door. There they could easily hear the sounds of voices.
Opening the chamber, they soon engaged in battle with some of the elite guards of the cult, though none of them were Black Earth Guards. Though the guards were tough, they weren't a terrible threat to the Venatore, who soon defeated them.
Checking behind the two doors in the south, they each opened up to a different hallway. Searching the room, they found two spigots under the basin of the northern fountain. Turning each, they heard the sound of running water in the southern corridors, but saw no indication as to where the water was flowing.
Back to the northern passage they took one of the western side corridors and ended up in a northern corridor lined with a few cell doors. Looking into the first cell roused the three zombies there, and six more poured out of the northern cells during their fight. A squeaky little voice encouraging them during the fight proved to be an actual captive, a naked gnome who introduced himself as Wonillon. Catching their breath a bit, the companions had yet to decide their next move.
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