The group finally got back to adventuring at location - we entered and have been exploring the remains of the Orcish Wizard's Tower of Damlagast - and there are some things that work now and some things that need the tower on to work. However, the 2 ghouls in torpor in the kitchen have awoken and are interested in eating the party, now.
Write up follows:
The evening before we left was spent extracting venom from the giant centipedes as well as loading up on whatever supplies the Reeve Donna was willing to let us take. We slept well and the morning of the 10th dawn bright and early.
We were off by 7:30 and took the long walk south along the Enderlyn River from Base Camp, porting out dugout canoes with us. Furtham’s Peak watched us from on high as we made good time through the grasslands and light scrub, slowing down only to avoid the harsher climb by Three Rock Falls. We arrived thereafter about 2:30 or so and took some time to look around. There were no signs of kobolds at this point and the tower appeared as it did each time we had passed it – sitting some 750’ feet or so from shore on a spire of rock, stretching up another 80’ or so with the top melted and busted appearing. There were no windows, doors, buttresses, or markings on the silent spire.
We split the group into 2 and paddled over, the remains of a dock that had been here was reduced to just some pilings. The rocky base was about 4’ over the height of the lake and there was an uneven path that circled the tower perhaps 3’ or so wide. Whatever safety chains or rails that had been here long ago had rusted or rotted away over the last century.
As for the entrance, there was an area near the front of the tower that showed the lines of a door, but no key, knob, or hinge was seen. Avulstein took out the precious scroll of “Knock” and aimed the effort of the spell at the door. It skittered about for a bit before settling along the Wizard Marked lines on the doors surface and forced them apart – opening the door for the first time in over a century.
A great gust of foul mouldy air billowed out, followed by an inrushing of fresher air. We cast light on a stone and tossed it in, taking the measure of the place. A set of steps started on the east wall and spiraled up along the tower’s wall to the 2nd floor above. A central pillar of thick stone ran through the center of the room. The carpet had become waterlogged over the years and was now a slurry of mashed fibers. There were a few dwarven skeletons in here one at the base of the steps with the head on backwards, one pinned to the southwest wall by a long rifled metal shaft. There was a smaller room along the north wall of the tower where the door had been ripped off its hinges and propped back in place.
Darius spiked the door open in place and we tested the wizard lock as it tried to close the door after 6 minutes and then got hung up on the spike. Once sure we were ok, we entered and scanned around. Outside of what had been described, the room was without any new features. The tower was cool, barely 50 degrees and smelled wet and foul. We decided to check out the closet first.
The door was moved aside and we looked inside. It was a coatroom with more dwarven skeletons in here. The closet rod had been torn free and impaled one of the skeletons to the floor, and the other was near the back of the room by and opening heading down, its right arm missing from just above its elbow. We discussed it a bit and decided a few of us would look down the stairs to the basement while the rest would keep watch up here.
There was a pendulum trap just at the steps down, sprung long ago and the missing dwarf’s arm and rusted axe lying on the stairs. We moved passed and made out way down. The basement had apparently had a seeping issue as there was a good foot and a half of water on the floor with various spongy growths floating on the surface. There were the remnants of a wood bin on the south wall, the west end of the chamber had a half dozen 40 gallon casks there, a rainbow film surrounding them in the fetid water. But the center of the chamber had a monstrous pebbly iron furnace looking thing sitting there.
We explored about a bit. The furnace had a wood repository for almost 400# of combustible material, there was an oil hopper as well, some parts looked like it opened and closed, and there was a bin on top with a mesh along the bottom where something could be placed in the 2’x3’ bin. The barrels were in poor shape, a few of them collapsed and one was leaking, but one or two might be good and we assumed from the leak and residue as well as the tar balls that it might be oil for the furnace. Under the steps were a dozen metal cages that might have held cats or small dogs – but right now most were empty a few had only some bone scraps within.
It was almost 4 when we came back to the first floor, not wanting to mess with the furnace for now. We took the door from the coat closet and leaned it against the front door to further camouflage from outside that the door had been opened and to keep the light pollution from the tower out to a minimum. From there we climbed the steps to the 2nd floor landing and looked around.
Some dwarven bones here and some melted slag. The floor and walls were burned and scarred, and the door in to the next chamber had been smashed in. We looked in and there were a few 2 shelf cases that had been knocked over, a couch on the back wall that had been cut and stuffing was coming out, and two other openings on the south wall at opposite ends of the chamber.
We righted the shelves and looked about, some books, some bric a brac, most of it in broken and poor condition. There was the bust of a orc discovered under the display case. Out light spell was fading some we lit a torch and continued our exploring. We cleaned up the shelves a bit, confident there was not much to find. The two rooms beyond each was a small meeting room – each with a round table and 4 simple chairs.
The western room was initially the more interesting. Two dwarven skeletons were here, their heads smashed in and there was a large orcish skeleton here as well, head twisted the wrong way. In its bony grasp was a large wooden club with a curved top and sporting a heavy stone ball in place – the cosh being the item in question that most likely killed these dwarves. The liquor cabinets had been ransacked and we went back to the parlor. A detect magic was cast and then we panned about – seeing nothing magical in the parlor, the cosh was not, and a look downstairs showed nothing there as well.
The last room had the same layout as the 1st room, tables and chairs, but there was a difference here. There were spaces on the walls for pictures to be hung – currently one with an empty wooden chair. One of the chairs also had the wizard marking on it – the same as we had seen on the front door of the tower – both sides. Shim and Avulstein were sure it had something to do with the person who owned the tower originally.
There were other pictures on the floor and we swapped the empty chair for one that showed an orcish wedding feast. At first nothing happened and then a feeble glow appeared and an apple, a water clay mug of ale, and a poor spot of crumbly bread wavered into existence. What the hell? We tested it, everything tasted poor, but was real. We put the original picture back, left the meeting chamber, gave the couch a once over, and then left, heading up to the 3rd floor landing.
A lizard looking statue is here, snapped into three large pieces, hacked about. The door to the chamber is missing and no sign of where it went. The room beyond takes up half the tower, the other half is walled and two doors on the north and south side of the room arte closed. There are 4 pedestals here, two are empty, and two had the lower halves of what might have been more lizard looking creatures on it. There is busted stone everywhere and the northern most statue is only missing its head and one arm.
We enter and the pedestal on the north side gets a faint wavering glow. And eventually we hear a scratching noise coming from the north door. We test this by entering and exiting a few times – the glow stops and the noise stops. Also, after doing some rubbings, the base of the statues has the name “Damlagast” written again and again around the bottom in Orcish. Name of the wizard? Sounded believable.
We lit two lanterns as the torch was running out and continued our testing of the room. We knocked on one door and tried to hear if it was carried on the other door, other than the scratching noise – no, it seemed there were two rooms beyond here.
It was then that we heard a “THUMP” from below and we ran out and down the steps to investigate – the front door had closed and the table we had propped up there had been knocked down. The spike we had driven in the ground had given way. Ok – once sure no one was in here with us we concluded the Wizard Lock on the front door was the reason behind the noise and returned to the 3d floor landing.
We suspected we would have to start the furnace at some point – Shim and Avulstein letting us know about the Hearts of the certain Towers and some spells and accommodations lie dormant until it the Heart was lit. We decided to keep on looking up to the 4th floor for now.
The fourth floor here had parts of the steps just below the landing smashed again and again as if by a hammer, cracking the rocks in places but still allowing people to climb up. The room beyond showed a dining room that would seat 10, 8 of the chairs around the table, warped legs making the table not sit true. One chair has been shoved under the door handle to what you assume leads to the kitchen, propping it closed.
But we were making some noises in here and moving things around as we picked through the broken crockery, and we heard a snarling growl from behind the door. The chair which over a century had grown weak was bending and splintering. We grabbed the table, flipped it on its end and ran it at the door as the chair broke back. A weathered grey arm scrambled about and Shim tried to whip it, failing – and Darius pegged it with a bullet – but it slithered back and then something hit the table HARD from the other side and it fell out a few feet as something scrambled from behind it.
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