Write up follows:
The base of the door had a layer at least half of foot of greenish filth corroding the bottom of it, and we know our torch light had driven some mice and rats in the hall ahead of us and under the door. The sweet stink of rot was pretty heady as we finally opened the door and took a look in.
The floor was pretty rank with a trough of some sort of decaying flesh shoved against both the left and right sides of the corridor, leaving about 5-6’ of clear walking space that was covered by a thin layer of ooze. The walls seemed damp and the smell of decay and rot was pretty strong. Looking ahead it was 15 or so feet of passage before it opened to a larger room. We could just make out a closed wooden box and the edge of a couch but little else. The far end of the room had a glow to it as if lit from a corridor nearby but we couldn’t tell for sure.
Brading fired up a light spell for us and with some tossing, we managed to send the stone with the spell upon it across the chamber. The room had 5 very large couches and 4 covered wet wooden boxes. Each couch had 3 or 4 dead naked bodies upon them. The bodies were placed on the couches in sitting positions and each one showed feeding from the knees down from the vermin that inhabit the area. There was another corridor all the way across the room that led to the east but we’d have to enter and no one was comfortable about it.
Plus, with the treacherous floor, we were going to be forced to move very slowly to avoid falling. If the room was all zombies, no one wanted to enter as we’d be slaughtered. So the decision was to have Negan ask Odin for a blessing and let us know if there were any undead in the area.
Four.
Four of the dead bodies, all on different couches, were tied to the negative plane. We all backed up into the hall and Darius let fly his sling, hitting the furthest Zombie and then hitting it again. The figure stood up and began to walk towards us, and then within 10 seconds, the other 3 did the same. Sybil shot off her own rock and the two of them took turns peppering the slow shambling undead with shot and stone. Brading was ready to turn them but we kept picking at them.
A strange thing, each time a zombie took some serious damage, it turned to one of the other dead bodies in the room and took a bite of the flesh, fixing the wounds they had taken from the group. We changed our tactics to finish off each zombie that was stopping to eat others to prevent them from healing. Two of the zombies were very close, each of them tearing a bit of couch apart to hold in front of them like a shield as they were almost at the door.
One made it through and the last one still moving in the room was killed. Brading, Negan, and Connal hit and struck the closest zombie who threw its couch cushion away and then grabbed Connal who was right in front of him. He lifted the monk off the ground and was staggering back into the room when Darius brained the zombie and tore the top of its head off with a well slung bullet.
Combat over we took stock of ourselves and after some light healing we entered the room. The couches, bodies, boxes, walls – everything was damp. The stink was growing on us as we no longer felt like retching. Sybil touched the boxes and assured us they were pretty rancid and water logged, but sound. After talking about it a bit and making sure the next corridor was clear (at least 20 paces, slow burn torch on the south wall, and it opened to some larger chamber beyond) the Halfling and monk made an attempt to open the closest box.
Pushing didn’t work, spear tips didn’t work, poles didn’t work. The top was pretty tight on and water logged swollen. Finally Connal moved Sybil aside and used a crowbar to force the top open. A blast of gritty dust spewed out, coating the monk and the surrounding area. He waited a moment for them to disperse before he was able to look inside. The cover and most of the top of the box had some sickly looking green mushrooms growing in it and the majority of the box had what seemed to be various body parts: arms, legs, hands, torsos, it was disgusting.
We lit new torches and travelled off to the east, walking the corridor with care. The passage eventually opened to a 30’ square room with a table in the center about 10’ diameter, a door on the north wall, a tapestry on the south wall, and a passage continuing to the east. Sybil gave the group the green light but stopped us as she looked at the table.
Four candles were burning on it, melted upright and stuck on the surface. And the table was levitating in the air. Floating there without legs or support. We went in and looked around. The tapestry on the wall was 20’ wide, 5’ tall, and showed three women drinking wine and eating grapes in a room that looked like this one, sitting at a table. While we discussing what to do, we heard the distant sound of something moving from where we had come from and coming closer.
The group hid, weapons out, while some figures came closer and stopped just at the corner of the last room. We could faintly hear some noises and using Brading’s mirror on a stick, they were able to see two bugbear looking figures, only VERY thin and emaciated, looking down in our direction. One of them took a rock and tossed it and waited. We watched it hit the floor and bounce. Then they did it again. Again, we were quiet.
It was when we saw them bend down and go to pick up one of the wooden boxes that might have spore rot in it that Connal opened his mouth with a fake deep voice and yelled, “That’s enough!!” What followed was a conversation where the two coming thought we were Zakthar’s men and they were investigating possible “’Venturers” who came in the “Fucking Quillian’s didn’t do their job.” We made as if they never came this far and most likely left. Then the two of them volunteered to “reset the damned zombies if you don’t want to” and we said we’d take care of it.
Supposedly there’ll be a meeting in a few hours near the “old alchemy lab” to discuss what everyone found and then they left and we waited until we heard doors closing.
Brading and Avulstein confided in the group the figures seemed undead but were self-willed and aware – which could be ghouls, ghasts, wights, or the like. Fucking wonderful. Not wanting to go BACK that way now, we decided to finish investigating here and then moving on. The table, we tested it out. It could be moved and raised and lowered but required a bit of force to do so. And if the candle was extinguished, that side of the table fell to the ground.
Sybil was checking out the north door when she noted a strange odor, got light headed and passed out. Then Avulstein checked out the door and again, strange odor and knocked out. While all this was going on, Gryg had checked around the corner down the short corridor and it was a long hall, at least as long as his infravision, but there was a small stool some 20 odd feet down on the left side, with something hot and cooling sitting next to it.
Shit.
We were waking up Sybil and Avulstein and checked out the stool. It was a larger than normal 3 legged stool, and there was a hunk of what seemed to be well eaten cow bone there and a slightly larger than normal clay pipe still warm with a dying bit of halfling’s weed within. Something was here, not even 10 minutes ago, in this hall, guarding, and probably heard us screwing around in the table room.
Then we heard a distant door open up down the hall and we ran back to the table room, weapon at the ready and shaking as we heard 1, 2, 4, 5 LARGE figures coming down and muttering in a strange language that Negan and Brading identified as Ogre. 5 Ogres? Run. Run now.
We ran back to the zombie room just ahead of the approaching Ogres, raced to the other door, and filed in, pulling it shut and bracing it closed while Gryg and Sybil ran down the long hall to the other door and stopped to hear MORE voices in the “exit” chamber, male, deep, confident, and talking in a tongue no one could recognize. There were at least THREE of them in there. Shit shit shit.
We heard the ogres come into the zombie chamber and talk. One of them reported hearing adventurers to another ogre names Zakthar who was happy to hear about it and we’d “see who they were soon enough if they were still around”. They looked over the mess and spent ten minutes doing something in the room where they were “resetting the zombies, going to take 10 minutes.” The lone Ogre was to stay on guard, and report to Zakthar about the group if they came back.
We waited until all was quiet, had to light 2 more torches, and then another 10 minutes just to be sure. We then opened the door and looked in. The bodies were back on the couches and the room looked as it did before. Se we once again starting with Darius and Sybil, started slinging rocks into the room to see which dead bodies get up. And there were 4 of them again, different ones from before, and they shuffled towards us slowly while the three of them and Gryg’s blunt bolts and Brading’s hurled axes whittled the undead down until the last were killed again.
We took the bodies and put them BACK on the couches and made our way towards the table room again. It was here that a wind started blowing towards us, gathering in strength until it was whistling through the air for a bit before eventually slowing down and growing still again. Gryg was able to scent burning halfling’s weed on the breeze, leading us to suspect the pipe smoking ogre was back at the stool.
It was with great care that we inched forward and Sybil snuck up to look around the corner – one ogre, 9’ tall, sitting on a stool, smoking a pipe, and casually eating a large cow bone rib.
We discussed plans and settled on a Silence spell from Brading on a coin and then a Bless spell from Negan and then the party race around the corner and waste the bastard as fast as we can while Brading runs PAST the Ogre to make sure that no noise carried down the hall.
Three, Two, One.
Gryg hit the corner first and fired his crossbow, striking the Ogre who reared up followed by Negan and Connal charging up and Brading shooting past. Negan’s sword slammed 2’ of metal into the Ogre’s chest who was silently screaming while Connal delivered punishing blows and Brading sliced his battleaxe. Then Darius and Sybil shot bullets with devastating force. Total assault – 16 seconds.
Ogre dead.
He was dead long before he hit the floor and the group was thrilled. We checked him over, getting what we could off of him while Avulstein suspected we only had a few seconds of silence left down the hall. We all retreated as he placed his hands on the Ogre and cast Strip Flesh – covering the room in gore and leaving a skeletonized Ogre behind.
Darius, Connal, and Avulstein were discussing the merits of doing this now, possibly raising the Ogre, and getting the hell out of the hall when Sybil and Gryg checked out the closest door in the hall. Untrapped and open, it revealed itself to be a long trashed trophy room with signs of adventurer’s stay in the past. We decided it would do for now as we dragged the body in, we all entered, and then shut the door, pushing the iron shanks at the top and bottom of the door into the drilled holes and sealing the room closed for now.
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