Jarlyn’s place

We decide to go through the secret door. Ghoral opens the door and it’s 10×10 room with a 5×5 pit in the middle. Ghoral peaks over and it’s ten feet deep with rubble in the bottom and the walls are rough so that we can climb down. There is a tunnel that shoots off at the bottom of the pit. Kross goes down and determines that the tunnel ends up connecting with the room that we first found, next to “home” room. Kross does some tracking and determines that some rock people have traveled here recently. We decide to go back through the “big” room with the columns and determine where one of the off-shoot tunnels goes. As Perrol starts to go through the tunnel, Glaive notices that there are three rock people beside the tunnel entrance; two on left and one to right. Glaive warns the group and attacks the one closest to Ghoral. She hits DCV 9 for 5 body in the chest. Perrol moves over to one on the right and attacks; hits DCV 10 for 9 body. Kross attacks the one on the right as well; hits DCV 4 - misses. One rock creature attacks Ghoral for 5 body and 20 stun; only 6 stun gets through. The second rock creature attacks Ghoral too for 7 body and 21 stun; only 7 stun gets through. Jarlyn attacks the one on the right too; hits DCV 6 for 10 body in the vitals and it drops. Ghoral attacks the one on the left; hits DCV 6 for 14 body and its right arm falls off and it drops but is still alive. Glaive attacks the remaining standing one; hits DCV 15 for 3 body in the head. Ghoral attacks the guy that’s still standing; hits DCV 12 for 20 body in the head and it drops. Perrol moves in on the one on the ground screaming; hits DCV 14 for 10 body in vitals. It stops screaming. We continue on to the tunnel and Perrol notices that there is ichor on the floor; it looks like dried “rock people” blood. The tunnel ends in a room that connects to one of the hallways. It has a door with an “R” on it. There are a couple cots and a beat up chest in the room. Perrol checks the chest for traps, finds none, opens it and finds two dark robes, two flasks of oil, 3 sunrods, two twigs (tinder twigs), a stone, a ceramic mask (gnome sad face), and a silver ring shaped like a serpent with two tiny gems for eyes, and a ewer (pitcher) adorned with dancing Dryads and moss agates. Jarlyn performs detect evil, finds none, and Perrol does detect magic and doesn’t find any. Ghoral thinks the mask is worth about 5 sp, the ring 25 sp, and the ewer 8 gp. The stone is a thunder stone, which are flash bangs (grenades). We keep everything but the robes.

We go back through the tunnels to a new place and one offshoot opens to a room that has 4 large trees; it sounds and smells like a forest, with grass on the ground and the walls appear like tree limbs and bushes. Perrol sees rubble to either side of the door, pokes them and nothing happens. He does detect magic and the whole rooms is magical, so it’s an illusion. Perrol goes into the room and the floor feels like ground. He feels the ground and it feels like grass, he pulls some and it’s in his hand. He goes outside the room and it vanishes. We search the far wall for a secret door and find one. Perrol listens and doesn’t hear anything. We decide to go through, normal marching order. We are in a short hallway with an “R” door on one side (goes to a room we’ve been to) and a “D” door that leads to a room that we think someone is behind. Perrol listens and hears rumblings and whispering of a language he didn’t know. We go back to the illusion room and huddle. We decide to open the other “D” door in the illusion room to see if there is a trap. Glaive picks the lock and Ghoral goes through; he’s hit with a lightning for 5 body and 20 stun (6 gets through). Jarlyn goes through and is also hit; 7 body and 14 stun, none gets through. Ghoral and I notice in a side room that we hear running water and peak in. There is a basin with a wall on one side with a face that water is coming out and hanging from the ceiling above the basin is a humanoid corpse in spider webbing ~5 feet above the water. We tell the others to go around and come through a “J” door that goes to the same room. Perrol looks around at the ceiling and see lots of webbing, but doesn’t see anything else.  Perrol does detect magic and the water appears to be magical and there is something on the body that’s magical. Perrol starts to see through the illusion and a giant spider jumps out of the water illusion at Perrol; he yells to warn us - segment 12. Perrol attacks and hits DCV 7 in chest for 7 body. The spider attacks Perrol and misses. Jarlyn attacks and hits DCV 7 for 6 body in one of the legs and does the same for the second attack and the leg comes off. Kross fires his bow and hits DCV 12 (by 5) for 5 body in a leg. Ghoral moves in and hits DCV 9  for 6 body. Glaive does double attack, hits DCV 9 for 2 damage and then DCV 10 for 2 dmg. A blob drops from the ceiling and congeals around Jarlyn. Another blob shoots at Ghoral and encases him. Neither of us can move. Glaive jumps across and tries to free Ghoral; does 6 total body to web. The spider attacks Ghoral for 3 body and 5 stun. Ghoral attempts to break free and feels it weakening. Perrol attacks the spider and hits DCV 3; misses. Kross steps in and fires  an explosive arrow towards the ceiling, which is ~20 feet above; hits DCV 11 for 5 body and 20 stun. Glaive and Perrol hear two chitters and lets everyone know. Jarlyn struggles to get free but does not suceed. One of the spiders from the ceiling shoots at Kross and misses but the second hits and entangles him. Glaive slashes at Ghoral and frees him and then she successfully frees Jarlyn. The spider on the ground attacks Ghoral and hits but does no damage. Ghoral attacks back and hits DCV  8 for 5 body. Perrol attacks the spider on the ground and hits DCV 7 in chest for 5 body. Kross attempts to break free but is unsuccessful.  Jarlyn attacks the spider on the ground and hits DCV 7 for 5 body in the vitals and she drops squeling, my second attack kills her. Jarlyn and Ghoral get encased again and can’t move. Glaive crosses over and frees Kross. Ghoral tries to break free and feels it weakening. Glaive crosses over and frees both Jarlyn and Ghoral. Perrol tries to throw a knife at one in the ceiling and misses. Kross fires another exploding arrow at the ceiling for DCV 11 for 5 body and 20 stun and one drops out of the webbing in front of Ghoral.  Jarlyn attacks the one that dropped and hits DCV8 in chest for 9 body. Ghoral throws a dagger at the one in the ceiling and hits for 3 dmg. Glaive throws her rapier and hits DCV 14 for 6 body in the head and it drops. We find a pouch on the body with two gems and a stone, which is magical. Ghoral says it’s an ioun stone that grants magical powers to whomever holds it. He appraises the gems at ~10 gp each.

We earn 1 XP.

After  a long break, I’m back…..

We decide to open the door with the centipedes behind it and let them come out as we think there are only three left (see other’s blogs for action from two weeks I missed). Glaive opens the door and Jarlyn stands ready to help attack. Once the door is open (segment 12), there is a screech and then three centipedes come out heading directly for Glaive. Glaive attempts to attack all three and hits two out of the three, one for a fair amount of damage. Kross shoots an arrow at the one that was not hit and does damage. I do a double attack and kill one. Ghoral moves up and attacks and kills one. The remaining centipede attempts to crawl up Glaive’s leg but fails. Glaive attacks the remaining centipede and squishes it. Perrol listens to hear if anything else is in there. The others remind me that the room iminates magic. It looks like it’s filled with a dense fog. I perform detect evil but don’t find anything. Perrol and I go in and start feeling around to see if we can find anything. Glaive waits in the door with a lantern, but that helps. Perrol finds a tunnel at the back and I find a ladder against the wall. I also find a brick that moves and it moves in and there is a click; it’s a door which I let the others know about.  Perrol picks up a rock and throws it down the tunnel through the fog and it skips a long way. He pokes his head through and the fog is not in the tunnel. He can see it goes down a ways with one offshoot and it T’s at the end. Glaive comes to do a security systems check on the door and finds know traps. I open the secret door and poke my head in. As soon as I do, a translucent image forms at the end of a small room that’s a gnome wizard lady that speaks the following: “I am Emistul, librarian of this fair city.  The scrolls you seek have been destroyed to keep you and others from fading into nothingness.  The curse of the fading began here, in these mystic halls, and here it will remain.  Be careful what you find, and mind whatever magic was wrought here.” Glaive checks for traps and finds none so I step in and look around but find nothing. I climb up the ladder and feel around but find nothing. Kross comes in the tunnel to do some tracking and sees a lot of tracks similar to the rock people, an orc track that’s old, a dwarf track that’s old, and lots of centipede marks.

We come out of the this area and go to another room with a tunnel and Kross does tracking but finds similar. We decide to go back to the first big room and see if there are any tracks that leads us towards where the traders might be heading, but we are unsuccesful. We go to the very beginning of the stairs and try tracking again. This time Kross detects several dwarven/orc tracks with one or two people being drug or forced. This leads to the very first secret door. Perrol goes to the door to listen but doesn’t hear anything. We open the door and Kross does tracking but doesn’t really see anything. However, Ghoral notices the slime starting to come up over the top and warns us - segment 12. Glaive attempts to grab Kross and drag him back so that Ghoral and Jarlyn can face the slime. The black ooze comes out and attacks Jarlyn but misses. I attack and hit DCV of 7 for 11 dmg and my second hits DCV of 5 for 3 damage. Ghoral attacks and hits DCV of 8 for 13 dmg. The thing is split in half and dies. Ghoral goes in and looks in the pit. He sees something shiny at the bottom. Kross will go down and see what it is. It’s Perrols old lantern; we keep it. Kross and Glaive check for trap doors. Kross finds a secret door on the opposite side of the pit. Perrol swears he hears something from behind the secret door. Glaive hears what sounds like a group of troops preparing behind the trap door. We decide that Glaive and Perrol will go down one of the tunnels from one of the other rooms and see if it flanks the guys, while we guard this way. They come after a while and we think we know the general area that the guys will be in but they didn’t actually see them. We decide to go around the way they went. We get to a door and it has the letter “N” on it, which we have a key for. Perrol listens and hears some shuffling and hears some whimpering and crying. Ghoral inserts the key and opens the door. Looking inside, in the center of the room is a cage with a gnome in it and empty weapons racks lining the wall. Next to the cage is a large wooden chest. I enter the room and says “shhhh” it screeches and jumps to the opposite corner. He seems to be blubbering and saying “It shouldn’t have teeth, it shouldn’t have teeth…” Jarlyn calls Perrol to try and charm him to calm down. Jarlyn attempts detect evil and botch it; I feel a complete severance of any connection with the Skyfather. He spends a hero point to not lose the connection. He says the feed him about once/day and that his captors come out of the wall behind Jarlyn; his name is Garmip. Jarlyn gives him a little of his food. Glaive checks for the secret door and finds it. We decide to go to the box, Ghoral in front and Jarlyn behind. As we get closer, arms and legs come out and it stans up with a huge mouth in tongue. We try to feed it and it wants more. I attack from behind and hit DCV 7 for 9 dmg on first hit and DCV 6 for 7 dmg; segment 12 starts. Glaive moves around and attacks and hits DCV 14 for 9 dmg and punches a big whole in it. Perrol thinks this may be a mimic. Jarlyn does a double attack and only hits once, DCV 9 for 6 body. Ghoral hits DCV 5 for 6 body. It turns around and attacks Jarlyn hits twice for 1 body and 12 stun each time. Glaive attacks hits DCV 7 for 6 dmg and DCV 10 for 6 dmg. Ghoral hits DV6 for 13 body. It turns and attacks Ghoral for 4 stun and on second hit 3 body and 13 stun gets through. Perrol moves in, attacks and misses. Kross holds. I do two attacks and hit both times for 9 dmg and 7 dmg. Glaive attacks and hits DCV 12 for 12 dmg and second attack misses. Ghoral attacks, hits DCV 8 for 9 body. It cracks open and the arms fall. Glaive picks the lock to let Garmip out. We escort him up to wait his 20 days and we come back.

We earn 1 xp

We decide to go check the other “J” door and open it. Ghoral opens the door and walks in and the floor starts to drop out from underneath him. He’s able to make his dex roll and jump to safety. There is a pit about 30 feet deep with spikes at the bottom. There is a tunnel to the left and a door in front with the letter “I”. We decide to go down the tunnel (we all jump the whole safely) and we end up in the room
with “A” above it. There is a lever by the door and Glaive notices an irregulatory against one wall. Glaive does security systems and  thinks the irregularity is a secret door. Perrol pulls the lever after performing security systems and we hear a thunk. We find out that it manages braces for trap door so we secure it. Perrol comes back and performs mage sight on possible secret door and finds nothing. Glaive pushes the brick and it opens into an empty closet with shelves. We continue on to the other tunnel that came out of room “A” and go left. We end up in a room North of the room with the stage, has “U” above door. Before we enter, Perrol hears some shuffling and lets Ghoral know. He enters the room but doesn’t see anything. We all enter and we notice a spot in the opposite wall where a “secret” door is slightly ajar. Ghoral pulls it open more and peers in. Inside the room appears to be filled with props, chests, etc.  so we enter; it’s a room with “R” above the door. We search the room and don’t really find anything of value; perform detect evil and magic and find none.  We turn around to go back the way we came and as we are leaving, Perrol and Kross hear a shuffling behind them. Kross turns around and sees a creature like the one we fought under the stage with a wolf mask on and a rapier; it looks ghost-like, i.e. transparent. Glaive is able to enter the room and attack first; hits DCV 9 in legs for 8 body. It shrieks and starts bleeding. Perrol is able to get into the room and attack; hits DCV 6 in arms for 3 body. Kross attacks and hits DCV 7 in vitals for 12 body; it shrieks even more and bleeds more. I move to doorway (can’t get into melee) and attempt turn undead, no effect. Ghoral  holds. The creature shrieks and runs past everyone but runs into Ghoral. Ghoral attempts to attack him and slips, falls, embeds his weapon in the wall; the creature runs passed. Glaive holds and Ghoral gets up, successfully, and attempts to grab the creature; is successful. Glaive is able to move by the creature. Kross switches back to his bow and waits; Perrol and I hold. The creature breaks free from Ghoral and moves runs. Glaive catches up and attempts a disabling move; hits a DCV 7 (by 5) in vitals for 7 body and it falls and stops moving. Perrol performs magesight on the mask, but doesn’t see anything, but he can tell somethings wrong so attempts again. In the meantime, Ghoral and I work to get his weapon out of the wall. Perrol’s second attempt shows the creature is glowing and unfortunately, so does Ghoral more strongly than before. We decide to give Ghoral one of the curse potions and he stops glowing - yeah!!! After a short rest, we go up the stairs on the west side of the room and come to another door with “J” above it. We unlock the door and peek in. There are a couple empty pedestals. On the other side of the room, there is a door with an “N” above it. We enter the room and Ghoral notices an irregularity in the wall by the “J” door.  Perrol does magesight and there is definitely magic behind. Glaive unlocks and Ghoral opensthe door. There is an empty, dusty room. Ghoral carefully enters the room and Glaive enters as well to check the room. As Glaive is checking the east wall, she stumbles on something on the floor. She feels around and there appears to be a cloth (invisible) around something. She attempts to pull off the cloth and it is successful but still can’t see anything. She sets it aside and continues searching around the room but finds nothing else. Perrol enters the room and for a moment, he gets a flash of something leaning against the east wall and something in front of it. He goes over and picks up the item against the wall and turns it, but we still see nothing. Jarlyn thinks this is some type of illusion. Glaive attempts to carry the item out of the room and she gets half way across the room and realizes she’s no longer carrying anything. Jaryln enters the room and gets a flash of a Glaive standing over rectangle thing, a blanket thing, and something against the wall. Jarlyn and Glaive attempt to take it out together; Glaive slips off but Jarlyn gets it out and it starts appearing as it goes out. It’s a painting of a landscape. Ghoral thinks it could be worth anywhere from 10-150 gp. We get the next one out and it’s a painting with a dragon flying around a volcano. We get out four more paintings, for a total of six; all as much as 150 gp. We take all the paintings back to the “Home” room and then we go back to the tunnels were we “teed” off to the left and go right instead this time. We come out by the steps that go up to a room that is on the other side of the “N” door. There are marble stair cases leading up. In the room there are two pillars and a throne in the middle. In the throne, there is a gnome slumped over snoring with a silver crown. Up the first steps is a childlike cherubic gnome face sculpture carved into the wall at top of steps. Perrol does magesight and the whole center mezzanine area and throne are rife with magic. I don’t detect any evil. Glaive and Perrol do security systems and doesn’t detect anything. Perrol walks up the steps and when he gets to the landing the cherub face comes to life. It says, “If you wish to talk to the king, please insert your finest coin in my mouth”. I insert a gold coin, it disappears and the face goes still. Everyone except for Kross walks up the top where the king is. On the left is the door with a “U” above it. Jarlyn notices that right amrest appears to be larger and probably has a compartment. I attempt to brush his arm but my hand goes through him. Glaive checks the armrest but doesn’t detect any traps and finds the latch which releases the armchair lid. I open the armrest and the king appears to mumble in his sleep. The king mumbles in this sleep, “xxyyzz”. In the compartment, are 9 gp, one which looks rather new. Under the coins are two steel rods, one with a “N” and one with an “E”. We decide to head through the “N” door, but when Kross gets to top of landing, the cherub comes to life and says same thing, Kross puts coin in and it does same sequence. We go on through the “N” door and go down the marble steps. We use the “E” key on the door  to the left after we go downstairs. Ghoral goes through first and is enveloped in flames; takes 3 body and 13 stun. We shut the door and decide we will meet in the in the “Home” room.

Continued from last week…

Segment 12: Perrol uses his rapier and “pokes” at the column, which shrieks; hits a DCV of 9 for 7 body and 21 stun. Glaive, Kross, and I aren’t surprised. Glaive moves closer and perfroms the martial dodge. Kross moves closer and fires his bow; hits in the abdomen area doing max damage and it slumps. Jarlyn looks around and notice two more creatures coming from the rubble behind us that move to attack Kross from behind, one moves to me to attack, and a fourth comes from in front. Jarlyn yells, “look out behind you”. One takes a swipe at Kross’ head but it is deflected into his hand for 8 body and 8 stun; he manages to keep hold of his bow. The second on misses Kross. The third one attacks me but misses. Glaive moves next to the 4th one and attacks but misses. Ghoral turns around and attacks the one behind him and nearly cleaves it in two; hits DCV 6 for 11 damage in vitals. Perrol moves to the one next to Glaive - attacks and misses. Kross moves a half move back and fires an arrow at the third one and botches; the back half of the arrow disintegrates and blinds Kross for his next action. I attack the one next to me and hit DCV of 10 for 6 body in the left foot. The second and third one move in to attack Kross, the first hits DCV of 6 and 10 for 8 stun and 1 body getting through. The one attacking me hits DCV of 11 for 5 body and 15 stun; but none gets through. Glaive moves over to the ones near Kross (double attack); first attack hits DCV 12 in left shoulder for 7 body, second attack hits DCV 9 in right shoulder for 5 body. Ghoral moves over to one by Kross and hits DCV of 7 for 11 body in the vitals and nearly splits the creature in two; it drops. Perrol moves over to the other one by Kross and attacks but misses. I do a double attack for the one next to me; miss the first time but second attack hits DCV 8 in chest for 7 body and it screeches. The remaining two run off through the tunnel we came in to the room from. We check the creatures and find nothing. Perrol checks the room and notices a shiny object in some of the rubble. It’s a small wooden box with jewels on it and Elven looking creatures engraved on it. Perrol performs detect magic and Jarlyn does detect evil, but nothing is detected. Perrol picks it up and performs security systems and doesn’t find any. Perrol opens it and it appears be a music box. Ghoral can tell it is probably worth 15-20 gp. Kross looks at tracks and determines that only the creatures have been around here in a long time. I try the music box and play it, nothing happens. We decide to check the doors. We decide to check down one of the halls where light is coming out of it. As we enter the room, there is a stage to our left and Ghoral, Jarlyn, and Glaive notice a small bear coming from stage left; Ghoral notices that it’s really a Gnome in a bear suit. The rest of the team moves into the room. A play starts unfolding on the stage about a Dryad that falls in love with a ranger, yada yada yada. We inspect the rubble in the room and find it’s just rubble. Ghoral notices a trap door in the center of the stage. Once the play is over we go up to the trap door and open it. It’s about three feet down and the whole storage area looks like a storage areas with lots of cobwebs and “stuff”. Perrol goes down and starts to clear and then he hears something shuffling, so he jumps out of the whole. We see a tentacle move past him and another grab the ring of the trap door, segment 12. Glaive holds her action. A tentacle shoots out of the hole and wraps around Ghoral’s chest. Glaive trys to attack the tentacle around Ghoral’s chest, hits DCV 10 for 4 damage on first attack and hits DCV 7 for 9 damage; cuts the tentacle in half. Perrol gets up and attacks the tentacle that was on the trap door, hits DCV 7 for 9 damage and severs the tentacle. Jarlyn shuts the trap door and we hear thrashing under the trap door. We discuss setting it on fire but remember that fire and magic can be a bad mix some times.  We decide to get off the stage and wait to see if it comes out. The thrashing slowly starts coming down and then stops. Perrol hears it moving to the left of the stage and it appears to be struggling. We decide to go down, so Ghoral and Jarlyn go into the trap door; Jarlyn is using his dagger. Ghoral sees a manta ray like creature with three tentacles, two of which have been cut off. It wraps around Ghoral’s leg. Ghoral and I both attack but miss. Then Ghoral attacks again and hits DCV 5 for 11 damage and it goes limp. We drag it over for Kross to check out but he can’t tell what it is. We check out under the stage. Jarlyn finds a mandolin and Ghoral finds a wooden chest. Perrol performs security systems and there is nothing and he performs mage sight and something inside the chest glows. Ghoral opens the chest and inside is a fine cloak, a wand, locked book, and 5 inch steel rod with a rune on it, letter J. All items appear to be magical except the rod. Ghoral puts the cloak on and nothing seems to happen. Perrol does mage sight and it looks magical and it’s seems to be starting to spread to Ghoral. We tell Ghoral to take the cloak off because we remember the story of how the plague spread. We had back to the beginning where we started since there was a door with a J on it there. We take the chest with us. Perrol attempts to open the door with the rod and we hear a click. Perrol does mage sight and the door still glows. Glaive and Perrol do security systems and can’t say anything wrong. Perrol opens the door slowly and checks for traps again. Jarlyn opens the door all the way. Inside are more cots and more chests. We run security systems on the chests and nothing; we open and all are empty. We lock the chest in this room. Perrol notices that Ghoral has a faint magical glow about her.

We get 1 xp

We store all the goods in the big room with the door and lock it, then prepare to go down to the underground city. The marching order will be Ghoral, Jarlyn, Glaive, Perrol, and Kross. We decide to lock the door and then Perrol and Glaive will set something so that we can tell if anyone comes through the door. Ghoral notices that there are tracks going both way in the hallway and sconces for torches on the wall. As we go down some stairs around a couple corners, Ghoral hears some cheery giggling, leaves rustling, and birds chirping. Perrol can hear as well and it seems like the giggling is humanoid, adult giggling. We continue, cautiously, down the stairs. As Perrol gets close to the second corner, something niggles at Perrol that there is something wrong. Ghoral sees a room at the bottom of the stairs and notices faces along all the walls that are in metal. Perrol has Ghoral check the corner and he notices the sconce is off-center and a line in the wall. Ghoral and Perrol do security systems and determine that the sconce goes both ways; they think one way is a trap. We light a hooded lantern and take a closer look. Glaive notice that when it’s turned counter-clockwise the floor starts to tilt. We decide to turn it clockwise and a secret door opens. It’s a small 10×20 enclosed room; nothing is visible. Perrol goes in and starts looking around. When he gets towards the back, the floor drops out from under him. He drops about 10 feet and immediately feels stuck and something moving around him; he dropped his lantern when he fell. We start segment 12. He yells for someone to throw him a rope and he notices that it’s something slimey and a dark sludge. Glaive pulls out a rope and throws it to him while Jarlyn and Ghoral help pull Perrol up. There is a large sucking sound and we get him out. Kross starts lighting another lantern. Glaive notices that the black sludge is coming up over the edge right by Perrols feet. Glaive backs out of the room and Perrol gets up and backs out too. Kross tries to close the door but nothing happens. Perrol notices that Kross didn’t turn it far enough. Glaive reaches around and finishes and the door starts to close. We see the black sludge get in front of the door and get ready to attack and then the door closes. Ghoral decides to go in to the room and takes two steps in. The sounds are louder for Ghoral and it sounds like the giggling is coming from just to the left of the other hallway across the room; probably one fo the faces. Perrol moves into the room too; doesn’t notice anything different in the room. Ghoral also notices that at the end of the other hallway is a large gearlike doorway at the end. We all decide to enter the room and as Ghoral moves in a little farther, the giggling stops and a voice says:

“Welcome to Jidazrune.  Behold the wonder!
But beware, ye who seek to plunder.
Traps abound and guardians peer,
Beyond every corner, behind every gear.”

It’s coming from the mask by the hallway; the mask is animated. The two doors in room are large, gearlike doors. The door on the left has the Dwarven symbol for the letter “J” on it and the one on the left the letter “A”. The door on the left is half open.Ghoral, Perrol, and Kross notice that there is a rock wedged in the door keeping it open. Kross shines the light in and sees some rubble against the far wall and a very narrow hallway. Perrol does magesight and notices some magic spots in the walls and then the one face that is talking, as well as the “A” door. Perrol examines the walls and it appears the bricks in the area are what is causing the noise.I give Perrol my lantern and he lights and peers in to the room. He sees rubble everywhere in the room, a metal rod with a gold tip in the center in the room, and then another small tunnel against another wall. There are also lots of cobwebs in the room as well as a dozen small cots and chests. We decide this room is a trap and decide to look at “J” room. Glaive and Perrol can tell this one is trapped, but they can’t tell how it is triggered. Perrol looks at it longer and determines that you need the key or to successfully pick the lock, or the trap is triggered. We decide to head off down the hallway and leave these rooms alone. When we get to the end, the halway T’s and there is a door across the end of the hallway with the letter “Z” on it. To the right the hallway ends in a wall after ~50 ft and there are four doors with letters “D”, “I”, “N”, and “E”. Perrol does detect magic and determines that all are magical. Ghoral and Perrol go down the left side of the hallway and there are three doorways two on one side and one on the other. Ghoral feels the floor go out from under him as he gets towards the end. Ghoral is able to jump back in time and in the opened floor about 10 feet down is a a row of spikes with a weird creature impaled upon it. Kross takes a look at the creature and it looks like the creature has concealment which helps it hide in rubble.Ghoral jumps across the pit and sees the the other two doors have the letters “R” and “A”. I ask Ghoral to push against the wall, since our map doesn’t show one being there. When he tries to push against it, his arm goes through; it’s an illusion. I perform a detect evil and don’t detect any. Ghoral goes through the illusion and is in the room we expect with doors on the left and right that have letters “Z” and “E”, respectively. We decide to go through “Z”, so Perrol and Glaive do security systems and determines that it is trapped. Glaive determines that failing this lock will release deadly magic. Glaive attempts to pick the lock and is successful. When Glaive starts to open the door she realizes that the trap will still go off, so stops. I do a detect evil and detect nothing. Ghoral grabs the door to keep it open but doesn’t continue opening, while Glaive goes to the “E” door and attempts to pick the lock, but is unsuccesful.She attempts again and is successful, but it’s the same thing; the trap will go off if we open the door. Glaive gets a faint whiff of sulfur residue.We decide to let both doors shut and go back to the room with the rod. Ghoral goes in to the room and picks up the rod. The tip is a goldish color, but not gold. Perrol notices that two piles of rubbish are missing. He does detect magic and the only thing that shows up is the door. We look in the chests and find nothing. Perrol tries to listen down the tunnels and hears faint snoring coming from one of the tunnels.We discover that the rod will not help in disabling the traps so we decide to head towards the snoring sound. Perrol steps in and determines that the snoring is coming from the right side down the tunnel. Ghoral goes in to the right and when he gets to the left he sees a branch to the left there are lights coming from a room, the lights are moving. We decide to go in and Ghoral is first to see that this leads to a large room, indicated on our map. It’s a large room with columns and 30 foot ceilings.Ghoral sees lots of rubble throughout the room.We rush into the room. Perrol notices that one of the pillars is imperfect and only about 5 feet tall. Perrol decides to poke it with his sword….

 We get 1 xp.

I learn that my shield does not activate automatically; here are the stats:

Shield of Deflection: +3 with DCV plus Missile Deflection (Thrown Objects) (5 Active Points); 4 Continuing Charges lasting 1 Turn each (-1/2) 

After the dinner we go back to the room and go to bed. While Ghoral is on watch, he gets surprised and hit in the stomach for 10 body and 40 stun; it’s the spectral. Bob wakes up and sees a large spike (scythe) in Ghoral’s stomach; he yells and alerts everyone. Glaive gets up and uses fast draw to attack; she hits DCV 8 for 3 body. Ghoral recovers. Perrol tries presence attack; doesn’t work. Kross grabbed his weapon. I try to turn undead. A white light shoots out of my holy symbol but a red light shoots out of the spectral. My light erases the red light and penetrates the spectral but doesn’t appear to do much damage. Suddenly the room goes dark. I can hear it coming towards me and I feel a sharp blinding pain in my right shoulder. I’m hit for 10 body and 30 stun; 3 body and 15 stun get through. Glaive tries to perceive where the spectral is and is successful; she attacks and hits DCV 8 for 4 body. Ghoral tries to perceive the spectral and is successful; he hits DCV 8 and hits 13 body and it screeches. Perrol uses magesight and sees the outline of the spectral. He attacks and hits DCV 11 for 5 body. The darkness disappears and we see the spectral dissipating; the scythe is on the ground. We determine that it is magical and evil. Kross goes over to touch it and it crumbles to dust. 

We decide to eat, pack our stuff and check out; cost is 4 sp apiece. We are going to head to the underground city. We head off to the temple district first to visit the Hospin temple. When we get about a few steps away from the inn, Perrol notices a man on a roof about 1/2 block ahead. Perrol lets us know about this. He also notices the frame of a crossbow. Kross goes across the street and tries to come around behind and gets on a building. We wait a couple minutes and then head down the street slowly. When get about a block down the street, the assailant dunks down (he’s preparing the crossbow). Kross is behind him on a different roof so he lines up to take a head shot. Kross hits for 6 body and 38 stun; the crossbowman slumps over. Kross goes over to the other roof and waves to let us know he’s down. He tosses the crossbow and bolts over the side of the building to us and then he carries the man down. I perform paramedics and he is out cold and will be for a long time. I notice a red dagger tatoo on his left shoulder. Perrol does mage sight and detects magic; two items. It’s coming from two vials; symbols indicate one is Cure Poison and other is Cure Wounds. We decide to drop the body off at a guard station on the way to Hospin Temple. After a little bit of hassle with the on-duty guard, we get the supervisor and they put the assassin away. We get to the temple and ask to see the high priestess. We are taken back to see Helen in her office. We tell her that we are getting ready to go the underground city. She turns to a novice and tells him to get the kits that have been prepared for the unground city expedition. He returns with a wood box that contains seven potions: 5 healing potions, 2 remove curse potions (handles normal and magical malodies). We thank her for their generosity and head to Bob’s and Chad’s place. The gate is locked so Glaive attempts to pick it and is succesful. We go around back and look around and it does not look like anyone has been here since our last visit. We head off to the building with the underground city below it. As we approach the building we see palace guards situated around the building. One of them says, we are almost ready for you so go inside. The priest, wizard and lieutenant are inside waiting. We see crates of water and food, enough for 5 weeks for each of us, climbing kits, and hooded directional lanterns with oil flasks. There are also 40 arrows, 40 bolts, 3 sets of throwing knives, 2 sets of lockpicks, and first-aid supplies. There are also two books: Primer on Undercommon (languages for underground societies) and Primer on Dark Dwarven dialects. Once they leave, a barrier will be raised around the building. We will have to spend 20 days in here after we come back up. They give us a red flag to show that we are back. We head in and they raise the barrier.

We earn 1 xp

We are still up and we hear a knock on the door. It’s the Innkeeper asking if we are okay and we say send them away. The rest of the night is unevenful. We eat breakfast and head to the Temple of Aladan. As we are getting close to the temple district, a crossbow bolt hits Perrol from behind in the vitals for 7 body, none gets through, and 56 stun; Perrol drops unconscious. Glaive moves over to Perrol, Kross climbs up to a rooftop, I grab Perrol and pull him under a nearby wagon. Glaive noticed that the crossbow bolt has an ichor on it. I do a quick paramedics check on Perrol and don’t see anything other than he’s unconscious. Kross and Glaive are looking around. We do some more searching, but never find anything. Appears to have been a hit and run. Perrol recovers, we grab the crossbow bolt (wrap it in a cloth), and we continue on.

We get to the temple of Aladan enter. We see a balding man sitting at a desk. We let him know we would like to speak to someone that might have knowledge of the Red Talons. He looks at a ledger, says that the expert is out of town but there is another person that has some knowledge. He comes back with a middle-aged lady. She agrees to tell us as much as she can. She gives us a history of how it started. Kelgar is the muscle, Arvaga provides the organization, Yanna has knowledge of slave markets, Valmerillion was brought in when they started to specialize in certain requests. A lot of customers are Orcs and Ogres willing to pay for human slaves. She says mind shields and dispel magic are the best defenses against Valmarillion. There is a secondary ring of lieutenants that are responsible for certain areas. She doesn’t have any special knowledge of their weaknesses. She assumes that Kelgar’s ability to teleport is item based. We thank her for the help and I give 2 sp offering on the way out. We head to the Temple of Varadon. We are on high combat alert as we walk. We notice a wizard walking in front of us that is going to the same place. It has a similar setup as the Temple of Aladan. As we enter, we notice that the person behind the desk’s head snaps up to look at us. A lady comes up to us and relaxes as she notices my Azure Banner outfit and boon. We tell her we are looking for information on combating mind control magic, particularly Valmarillion’s magic, if they are aware of him. A young lady, half elven, comes down and talks to us. She says her name is Coriries Gellantara and we will probably get more information from the wizards. She lets us know he considered a master of sorcery. She let’s us know that there may be an individual in town that has items that may be of use to us. She offers to set up a meeting in a day or two. I drop in 2 sp donation on the way out.

We head to the Wizard’s college but stop at the potion shop on the way. We ask the proprieter if he has more dust of imprisonment; he says yes. He has two doses for 25 sp each; it’s more expensive because we have an unhonorable person with us (Glaive). Perrol and Ghoral each buy one. Perrol also asks if he can analyze the bolt to determine what the ichor is and if there is a possible antedote. He offers to do it for 5 sp. We then go on to the Wizard’s college and head to meet Igor. He lets us know that for teleportation it’s mostly ritualistic magic or large items. General dispel/suppress magic items can be used sometimes but this is not readily made and usually not mobile. He says they did find some items in inventory for combating mind control. There are two pendants in the Wizard’s college inventory that help shield the mind; would need to talk to Aaron. There is also a headband that makes the mind invisible, but it’s doubtful that the college would part with this. He also says that the fact that we can’t read scrolls limits our options. He says there are several items that they have found described, but nothing they have on site. We thank them for the information and go to talk to Aaron. We talk to the receptionist and she says Aaron is not available and won’t be in until tomorrow. We ask if anyone else can help, but she lets us know in a subtle way that due to who we are, it’s best to go through Aaron. We decide to wait. We go back to the inn and there is an evelope with the Regeant Mother’s seal on it. It’s an invitation to the dinner, no weapons larger than a dagger or a stilleto. We kill time in the afternoon and then head to dinner with the Regeant Mother.

As we are heading to the dinner, Perrol, Kross, and I notice we are being tailed. We notice that it appears to be one of Julliene’s people. We get to the castle gates, not problem. We are led in by two privates; we notice no one else has escorts. We are led in through the servants entrance. As we are walking along, Julliene steps in. She lets us know there will be a dinner and then a private meeting afterwards for the delivering of the boons. We have a nice dinner. We as well as others are praised for their service over the last quarter or so. After dinner we go to the Regeant Mother’s study. She offers us boons that she hopes we will find usefule. To Ghoral she gives a necklace that should help against sight/sound attacks. To Perrol she gives a magic travel book that contains an atlas a language primer with automatic familiarity of known world. To Jarlyn she gives a large shield (+3 DCV) that has been magicked to ward off missiles four times/day; extremely light. To Glaive she gives a ring of gliding (feather falling). To cross, she gives him 4 arrows; three that  work against spectral entities and one that once/day explodes on impact. The pendant, ring and shield activate automatically.

Earn 1 xp

Perrol continues asking about the happenings in the castle since the Lord Marshall has been “outed”. Once done we decide to go to the Wizards to learn more about Valmarillion and also to see if there is a way to prevent teleportation. As we are leaving, Perrol realizes that small animals seem to have been following us.  We wonder if this could be the work of Valmarillion.

We get to the Mage Academy and ask the admin if we can see Aaron. After telling her what we are interested in, she takes us back. Aaron tells us that Valmarillion has been a thorn in their side for 50+ years. He specializes in mind control and he has a very dangerous magical wand. The wand shoots fire bolts that are powerful. He is not aware of him being able to control animals. I ask him what magic items would be the best defense against Valmarillion’s mind control magic. He said one of his junior associates, Igor, would be the one to ask; we can arrange with the admin. We ask him if there are ways to prevent teleportation. He says there are ways to suppress or disrupt teleportation, but need to ask junior associate for specifics. Perrol asks more about animal communication. He also asks if anything more has been discovered about the area we investigated for them where all the mages died. He says there is a committee that was put together to study this. As we are leaving, Aaron tells us to be wary of the mage in the palace; he may be in cahoots with the Lord Marshall. We ask the admin to talk to Igor, but he is not available because he is sequestered looking at some of the Lord Marshall’s things. She says an apprentice is available though to help answer questions. We agree and she calls a page to take us down to Igor’s area to talk to one of his apprentices. He takes us to another building and into the basement. We enter a small room that has four people at four desks looking over scrolls. One of the apprentices tells us there are ways to suppress, most of which aren’t practical for us. They offer to research combating mind control and supressing teleportation for us at 20 sp. We decide to head to the temple but as we are walking, Perrol notices a cat watching us (and hissing). We don’t detect magic or evil so we let it be.

When we arrive at the Skyfather’s temple, we ask to see Aldus Manus. Mathias comes out to greet us. We tell him that we have news on the family disappearances. He says the High Priestess of Hospin, Helen Gaius, will be interested in this. We relay the story of how the families are being kidnapped so they can be sold in to slavery. He has heard of the Red Talon. He thinks we might want to talk to someone at the Temple of Aladan about the Red Talons. He does know there are four main leaders of the Red Talons; Arvagh, Kelgar Coalbeard, Valmarillion, and Yanna Windhand. We also ask if there is anyone in the church that can talk to us about suppressing teleportation and combating mind control. He says we should speak with the Priest of Varidon. We thank him for his time and head to the Temple of Hospin. On the way Kross notices small animals that seem to be watching the group. When he gets close to a cat, he hisses and runs away. He also notices a crow that is watching us. We do a test. Perrol goes close and it continues to watch the rest of us. Same for Ghoral and Jarlyn, with same result. Before we can test Glaive and Kross, someone closes a shutter and it flies away. We continue to the Temple of Hospin. When we arrive we ask to see the High Priestess. After a little while, we are taken back to see her. We give here the story of what is happening to the families. She tells us she is interested in seeing Yanna strung up because she is an assassin that may be responsible for about a half dozen priests killed in a different town. She’s mainly a thief by trade. We asks about Arvagh and she knows that he is a disowned noble of the Vestrian house of Altonshar. He is considered the unofficial leader of the Red Talons. He had a couple “appetites” that his family did not approve, which is why he was disowned. It is rumored that Kalgar and him are the ones that founded the Red Talons. Perrol gives her the whole story of how we determined this. She tells us that she doubts there are more than two of them together. She lets us know that if we decide to go down to the city, they will be willing to provide help, e.g. healing potions, food, etc.

It’s evening, so we head for Inn. As we do Perrol notices a dog watching us. We do the final tests and it appears to be that Kross is the one the animals are watching. We eat, check our room for magic/evil, and set watches. On Jarlyn’s watch, Kross loses 4 body and 9 stun, and he whimpers and wakes up with a Spectral over him and it’s hand in his stomach. Glaive woke up immediately, sees the Spectral, and attacks. She misses with her first and second attacks. Segment 12 starts. The spectral reaches into it’s robe and pulls out a stick, strikes it on the ground, and a scythe pops out. It approaches Jarlyn and attacks but misses. Glaive moves in and attacks, hits it in the chest for 9 body, and it screeches. On her second attack, she hits it in the vitals for 4 body. It is leering at Glaive. Perrol attacks and misses. Jarlyn  casts Destroyer of the Unliving -Turn Undead and it shrieks. Ghoral attacks and misses. It turns away from me and books right through the wall. I look at him but can’t see anything wrong. I get ready to heal him but Kross starts feeling better and his color returns and he regains his body. Kross tells us that this was a Wraith.

We gain 2 xp.

The gnome is in shock and is mumbling, “They’re going to kill him…”. Perroll slaps the gnome and snaps him out of it. We start interrogating him. He says the “him” is his apprentice. “They” are people that were having him make master keys. We assume this was to get in to the houses where the people were kidnapped. He says there are usually others watching him from outside. I ask if the people watching him are all dwarves; Ghoral comments that this is a Dark (Deep) Dwarf not a regular dwarf. He says no, there are Goblins too, but they seem to be darker Goblins than normal. We ask how they are getting in to the city and he appears to be getting nervous. He says they are coming through his house. He says it’s a tunnel and we ask where. He goes over to the stairs and opens a secret panel. There is a hole that leads down with a ladder probably 50 feet. Ghoral says he hears someone approaching from outside, “chink, chink, chink…”. Ghoral goes to the door to see who is coming; it’s a dwarf…segment 12.

Glaive moves over by Ghoral. Perroll grabs the gnome; the gnome is mumbling, “Please don’t let it be the dwarf, please don’t let it be the dwarf, …”. Glaive notices that he has a tatoo (red mark, almost talon like) and it scares her, but she can’t remember why. Perrol recognizes the tatoo as a member of the Red Talon guild, which are slavers. Dwarf hits Ghoral with a war hammer in the hand for 12 body and 18 stun. As that happens there is a flash and a loud thunder. Everyone takes 20 stun; Gnorm the gnome collapses. Post segment 12 recoveries; Perroll, Kross, Ghoral, and I recover from being stunned. Glaive recovers from being stunned. The Dwarf goes to attack Ghoral again and Ghoral aborts to dodge; he misses. Kross moves to a window upstairs and he sees two dwarves outside with crossbows across the street; he opens the window. I move over by him near the counter and throw my dust of entanglement, using a hero point I hit for 20, i.e. 5 body; he is entangled. Glaive gets ready to attack; the dwarf looks around, mumbles I’ll be back, and then disappears with a red flash. Glaive waives her hand through where he was and also notices that a crossbowman is still out there so she goes out the door (and sees the second as well). They both fire at her and miss. Ghoral moves out towards this and says “Drop your crossbows and come with me if you want to live”. They answer and say “okay, okay”. Kross goes out the window and on to the roof.  I go to the door and look around; people are starting to take notice. The dwarves drop their crossbows.  

Glaive and Ghoral disarm them and bring them in to the store. Perrol asks them if there are any others in (or under) town. They say yes (under). There are 15+ under. I ask if they are abducting families and selling them in to slavery. They say they are just the muscle and mules. We ask the name of the leader dwarf; it’s Kelgar. Perrol remembers something about Kelgar and the Grayward Mountains. Perrol asks if there are any other lieutenants/leaders and they say there is an elf, Valmar…something or other. He seems to be a magic type.  Peroll remember there are stories of an elf called Valmarrellian that was born in elven home that left elvish society a century ago or so that was a cold-blooded, mercenary type that quested for power. He had studied sorcery, in particular the study of mind control. Peroll asks where the hole leads to. They say it leads to an underground, abandoned city, probably dwarven or gnomish. Gnorm is starting to wake up. I try to open the big door and its locked so we tell Gnorm to open it. He objects but he open it. It looks like a forge room with locks. Perrol does magesight and determines the gloves and forge are magical. Perrol and I go upstairs to check whats behind the other doors. In the first room there is a bed,wardrobe, and a chest and a door. Perrol does magesight and finds something in the bottom of the chest that’s magical but it’s locked. We go in the door and it’s a kitchen area with a door on the opposite side. We go through it and it’s another bedroom, but nothing remarkable. We go downstairs and we ask Gnorm to open the chest. He goes upstairs and we ask him to open all the drawers. When he gets to the bottom one he is opening it nervously and it’s a book. We ask him what it is and he says it’s his spell book for lock making. We tell Gnorm that we have to tell someone about this and he asks if we can save his apprentice. He gives us a map. He says his father told him a story of an old abandoned gnome city. There was a magical curse on the city that caused people to start fading away. We decide to take Gnorm with us and the dark dwarves to the city. We have Ghoral board up the secret door first. We get about 4 blocks away and one of the dwarves starts slowing down and looking around; the agrophobia is at work. We duck in to an inn for a little bit; Perrol and Kross get an ale. We leave after the dwarf calms down and we make it to a guard station. We tell the guards that these dwarfs are with the “abductors”. They take us to a holding area and they return with a middle-age man with robes comes in. We give him the information that we have and he takes notes.  He leans out the door for and whispers to the guard to get two more guards and an investigator from the major crimes division. We tell him more about Kelgar and he leans out and asks for more guards. The investigator thanks us and we leave. We tell Gnorm that he should stay with us until we can get him to the regeant mother. We go back to the inn, eat, and go to sleep with the normal watch rotation.

The next morning after breakfast, we go the castle first. We let them know that we would like to see the Regeant Mother or Julliene. They tell us to go on up. Two runners go out ahead of us. Julliene shows up. We ask about the Regeant Mother. We go to Julliene’s office and proceed to tell her the story of what we’ve learned and that we want to put Gnorm in her protection. She agrees to. We let her know that we would like to be involved in any action against the underground city, since we told Gnorm that we would help save his apprentice. She says the Regeant Mother will want to see us tomorrow evening for dinner; she should be well enough then. She lets us know that if we do go down in to the underground city, we’ll have to be quarantined when we come back up. She tells us to talk to Aldus Mannus or the High Priestess of Hospin (only) and Aaron (only) if we are going to the talk to the temples and wizards, respectively. She tells us to let her know if there are any requests of the lady, tomorrow would be a good time to ask it. She expects that she’ll want to give some type of boon.

We earn 1 xp.

We wake up and head to Bob and Chad’s  but after searching around don’t find anyone. We even look in house and don’t find anyone. Perrol does use mage sight and finds a magical spot in one wall but we leave it alone. Kross does some tracking on the outside and sees a heavy set of footprints that head towards the stable and ends and a ligher set that goes to the woods to a central area. We head off to the Temple and as we arrive we notice a lot of loiterers in the temple district; mostly mothers with children. All appear nervous, we believe it’s possibly related to the disappearing families. We go to talk to Aldus Mannus, but we are stone-walled by one of the lower priest. A Favored of Kilbern happens to come by and goes to get Aldus. He comes back and says it will be 15 minutes. As we are waiting, Methius comes by and takes us to Aldus. We ask if there is any news of the missing families. He says there have been more families including a merchant family whose father was an “up and coming star”. There was no signs of forced entry, not shouts in the night, etc. We discuss and decide we should go to search the house; Aldus Mannus likes that idea. He goes back to the desk and writes something on parchment and seals it. He says this may help us gain favor in entering the building. We leave and on the way the initiate that was stonewalling us finally notices the boon and recognition dawns. We arrive at the guard station to get permission and we provide the letter to a clerk. She takes it back to an office and we hear some consternation, but once the letter is shown, whoever it is caves. They come out and a young man is directed to take us to the house. We arrive and before we enter, Perrol does magesight and I do detect evil. The only thing Perrol detects is the ring on the guards finger and I detect nothing. Glaive checks the lock and doesn’t see any tampering or anything. Kross checks tracks and notices two heavy tracks that are partially obliterated, at least a day old. We go in and Ghoral will notice that the house has things that indicate someone that was starting to “make it” but not rich yet. We start looking around. Perrol notices on a dresser that something was grabbed and it looks like claw marks. He also notices something wedged between the mattress and headboard; it’s a bag with some type of dark grayish/black powder in it and faint odor. He does magesight and detects trace magic. I take a look and it seems to have base components of potions/powders to put people to sleep. Perrol also notices a section of wall that’s not normal; a stone not quite right. He checks it and it moves, but guard comes in so Perrol stops.  Glaive also notices 5 wooden blocks that are of Ulronai origin. She decides to “repatriate” it. The guard doesn’t notice. After guard leaves, Perrol pulls out the rock and finds a pouch that jingles and a ledger. He opens the bag and finds coins, 30 silver and 10 gold, and 2 gems . He looks at the log and finds it’s his business log. We don’t find anything else. Perrol give the money to the guard and lets him know that it’s counted. When we leave, the guard is nervous and would like us to take him back because of the back. Perrol and I tell the others what we found. Perrol thinks the claw marks may be Orc or Goblin. Glaive tells us what she found and that it’s a children’s toy. We go back to follow the tracks and Kross picks up. It seems to be going to the merchant district. The tracks diasppear near a Locksmith shop; it appears they may have gone in here. Perrol notices that this shop belongs to Gnorm the Gnome, a well respected locksmith that’s a little kooky. He’s not a master locksmith but is best in town. He does low-level magic locks too. We decide to go in and the bell rings when we enter. We hear someone say “just a minute”. The big door will open and a gnome on stilts comes out and get’s behind the counter. Perrol says we’ve heard of his good reputation and are interested in some locks. He says he’s had quite the run on them lately. He pulls back the curtain to show us his stock. Glaive and Perrol notice that the locks aren’t very good.  While he’s talking, I do detect evil and Perrol does magesight. I detect evil above us, there are stairs up before me. It’s one blob of evil - humanoid. I ask what is upstairs, more stock? He says it’s his apprentice and his living quarters. Perrol detected magic behind the big door  (lets me know).  I ask “You don’t have the apprentice helping you?” and he says he is out of town visiting family. We ask if he thinks the run on the locks has anything to do with the missing families. He says we are the 4th person to mention that to him. Perrol notices that he is lying, nervous, guilt-ridden. Perrol uses a presence attack on the Gnome and tells him to stay calm and he won’t get hurt. Glaive signals to Kross to get Ghoral and come in. I activate my “Shield of the Faithful” successfully and go defensive. I notice that something is dropping towards me from above and I let everyone know; it’s a dwarf. He misses me. Glaive moves in to attack from behind to do a disabling move. Hits him in the back for 7 body. Her next attack hits in the vitals for 9 damage. He drops.  Perrol prepares to grab Gnorm. The gnome pisses his pants….

We earn 1 XP. We break for the evening.