Plantmonth the 19th, 4:50 PM, 239 of the 29th age. We all drew up and proceeded down the dark clay corridor of the 4th landing. The passage moved on relatively straight and then opened up to a larger chamber, crudely 30’ x 60’. There were thousands…tens of thousand of ladybugs in here. They covered the walls, floors, and even took to the air now and again, landing on us before moving on. There were 3 body shapes under the carpet of ladybugs, scattered about the room.
It was decided we’d light a torch and a few of us would enter with care after Wilhelm confirmed the lady bugs, although not in their normal habitat, were indeed normal in all other respects. The floor crunched beneath our feet, covered below the lady bugs, with pulverized glass. We stepped carefully around. The three bodies were all elves, and all were paper-thin mummified looking.
There was a short male cobbler who died with a resigned expression on his face and a pocket with a handful of shoe nails. A horrified female in finer clothes and missing her wedding rings. And a younger elf mail in scullery clothes. No one had anything magical on them. We eventually left the room and went off to the southwest.
Past here we spent almost 2 hours going in and out of smaller side passages. There was the faint aroma of flowers at one point and we wandered around. Dried roots, other sections with roots still collecting water but nothing growing, multiple passage all over. We did come to an area where the clay looked like it had been scooped or dug from the eastern wall repeatedly – but the clay itself was nowhere to be found. Nate did tell us that the clay was some of the finest he had ever seen and took a few pounds of it for a later project.
There was a section with a narrow passage, just a notch over 2’ in width, barely 5’ tall, ran for 15’ before widening out. Smell of flowers was stronger and we could hear whining and crying past here, like someone was hurt and needed help. Connal, who had gone through, came back, let us know, and had Shim go with him.
On the other side the gnome did a summon and a lizardman appeared. He coaxed it to go down, it reported back as it was walking and then a weird scream and it was dead. A moment later, a whining call for help.
Yeah. Fat chance. He summoned 4 creatures now, telling the wild elf to go last and report back what it is. Lizardmen went down and there was more combat. Wild Elf was close enough to say it was a Leucrotta. A creature made of wizardry during the Kinslayer Wars. 7’ at shoulder, 1500 lbs, some magic resistance, a terrible beast to fight.
We all retreated and then found an area to set up the Hut. Once inside we all rested while Shim worked on a replacement set of underwear thanks to his needle and thread and Darius’ generosity. We slept well and the next day we awoke, broke fast, studied, and discussed plans and options.
We decided to finish up this side of the narrow passage eventually finding 1 last dead elf. Not nearly as mummified, it has a 4’ long spear of glass through its neck. Was a ranger, warden, based upon clothes as well as accoutrements. Eoghan took his nice boots as well as a handful of Eyl-Ivar arrows he had (elven master archer arrows).
We went back to the narrow passage and everyone that needed to took off their armor and inched their way through. We were getting pretty dirty but made it. As we were coming out to the other side we could hear the plaintive cries for help and moaning once again. We moved on, 2 other side passages (1 filled with daisies, the other dead ending) and could faintly see a room beyond there.
20 minutes was spent coming up with a plan and once we were ready, set it off. Summon monsters got us a handful of centipedes and giant rats. A bless bolstered us, and a light spell on one of the rats made it easy to find him. Zone of Sweet air took the Leucrotta’s debilitating stink out of the room. They entered the room and the monster within started attacking the vermin.
Wilhelm hit it with a fairie fire spell and then Godrick blasted it with a lightning bolt. It tore into the room, the Leucrotta dodged it, hit the back wall and rebounded, Leucrotta dodged again, and then it scored both Connal and Godrick (the monk dodged the bolt). It charged us and we returned the favor. Its bite was wicked and crushed shields and armor if it could get a grip on them. We struck as hard as we could and the leucrota took the blows and whirled around, kicking, snarling, and savagely biting.
But we outnumbered it swiftly, Shim got a lucky summons with a ghoul, and it was forced to split its attack and give ground and after a few minutes, it took the last fatal blow , was paralyzed, and the party tore it to bits before it fell over. Good job.
We found an elven silvered magical long sword, leaking magic and badly hurt – runes identified it as Doombringer. (poor condition, but +2!). We did some healing and then went through all the half rotten dead meat in here. Deer, cow, chicken, quail, pig. We identified a large portion that was still identifiable, and hit it with a purify spell – giving us about a day or so of raw meat (no salt, but we could cook it later and eat it). Nice.
We left here and went north. Wide passage that split. We opted to go north and could hear hoof steps in the distance. Strange glow. About half way around we guessed it would meet up with the other passage so we stopped following whatever it was, went down the other passage, and it did meet up (with a side corridor heading south). So we had a circle passage and a side spur. Nate wanted to go back and follow the circle, and he got Shim bouncing with excitement to do so. Eoghan and Wilhelm were of a different mind.
We did eventually go back to the start and sure enough, the ghostly figure and hoof beats were there. We sped up and it did too, but we could catch glimpses. A Stag. Glowing white and spectral. We picked up the pace and was 2 cycles around the circle approaching a third when Connal poured on the speed and tried to catch up. The deer turned to the wall and jumped through it – leaving a huge splash of ectoplasm behind. Which then turned to about 25 pounds of vegetables (potatoes, leeks, celery, tomatoes, etc..). The druid assured us it was good and fresh and we added it to our bags for now.
We headed south till we got to a larger chamber. A 13’ tall, 8’ diameter mushroom was here, faintly swelling as if breathing in the middle of the room. Nope. Nope. Do NOT go in and touch the damned mushroom., No one.
We stayed along the edge of the room till the other passage and left this chamber behind, heading northwest. We came to a split, southwest or northwest and went northwest. The passage did end in time but there was a 2’ diameter, 2’ deep pool of mercury, just sitting there. We discussed worth and we had vials with stoppers, so the party loaded up on the precious metal and then doled it out. It was about 20 after 10 on Plantmonth the 20th and we were going to head back to the other passage and wee where that led.
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