Beyond the Pale Part 7
Log Info
- Title: Beyond the Pale Part 7
- GM: Thurid
- Place: Mausoleum under Sendor
- Summary: After the fight against the skeleton warriors, our intrepid crew of foolhardy necromancer-hunters go deeper into the depths beneath the graveyard...
With the skeletal guardians dispatched, the party are left once more to gather their wits. They've taken some licks and expended a decent portion of their energy thusfar, but have bested everything the crypt could throw at them, from traps to flesh eating slimes to undead abominations. Nothing seems to be rising up the stairs to meet them, but they do permit ingress deeper into the earth, and a lower level of the crypt. Haggerty mentioned detecting powerful conjuration magic that way, and surely this place, well guarded as it is, must serve some purpose.
Standing at the entrance of the stairs, Skyler stares down with a pensive expression. "So how likely do you think it is that whatever's down there is worse than a zombie centaur, handsy gargoyles, that *damned* pudding, *and* those two fuckfaces?" He asks, looking over his shoulder, adding, "Also, Crik, what about using a skull as a helmet? That'd give you a good disguise."
Crik continues to eye the skull in his hand, twisting his head this way and that. He looks at Haggerty. Back at the skull. At Skyler. Back at the skull. Finally, he carefully places the skull back where it was previous. "The pirate has too much positive energy for negative energy to mask us." He finally concludes, staring at the corpse. "Or me." He then steps carefully away from the corpses. "... usually we would set up a camp before exploring deeper. What is the plan?"
The corvid rogue turns towards Skyler then, a notepad in his hand. "The dead can still hear and they can be very upset at foul language." He says, "... and 'fuckface' is not a very good descriptor considering how common it is in the dig journals."
Bryn looks at Skyler, then to the piles of bones, then to the stairs down. Then... she laughs. "We stomped 'n broke ev'rythin' so far. Maybe whatever's down there'll be a challenge! Maybe it won't." She rolls her shoulders in a shrug. "So long as it's fun, it's all good! Ye ready?" She looks around to the others. "You all ready?" She seems to be.
Ulthan rolls his shoulders a bit, checking his mobility. "At least unlike those adventuring stories we keep hearing bards regale, we are not loaded up with loot..."
The swashbuckler purses his lips at Bryn when she talks about if they're all ready, and glances from Crik to Ulthan to the rest of the gathered group. He rolls his neck, takes a deep breath, and adjusts the grip of his sword. "Well, we should probably take a bit and rest." He says slowly, consideringly, before glances down into the darkness. "But if we want to push on, we can push on!"
Crik makes sketches in his notebook; apparently he was making notes on the skeleton warriors. Maybe for research later. "... I can explore the way ahead while we rest." The corvid says. "I am still well rested." He looks at the others - with spat blood, torn clothes and other miscellania to make him look like a walking dead. "Some of you might need to recharge."
Haggerty purses his lips and cants his pointy hat. The Aesir shrugs, also to the familiar whose big black eyes are on Skyler as well. He smiles to the skaldlike bard lady and to the sorcerous rager, "Ready. But do mind we are hear to help the dead rest primarily now that we know they are stirring. Worse, there are foul defilers of what should be a sacred space afoot. We cannot tolerate the defiling acts."
"I mean, I'm good to continue, but I know Jarik gets pissy if he can't rest and play with his owl every now and again." Skyler admits, and after a quick look over the group to count heads and see if anyone does ask to stop, he turns and walks to the edge of the staircase. "Also, Haggerty, that's why *you* are here. Me? I'm here for the vibes. Last one to the bottom of the stairs sucks eggs!"
And he turns, giggles, and throws himself down the stairs.
Ulthan groans. "If he gets gabbed by a Gargoyle, remind me to hit JUST the gargoyle?"
"We'll get the movin dead back to not-movin dead, don'tcha worry!" Bryn assures Haggerty. "An we'll be all sacred about sacred stu-Ey!" She stops short when Skyler takes off and starts running for the stairs. She won't be last nor suckin no eggs!
Crik looks at the party just running forward without care in the world. He snaps his notebook shut, looks at the skulls - and then takes one along just in case. "Remember to dodge roll backwards!" He calls out after the running party. "... just in case you hear a click." He will himself, though, move a bit more carefully to see if there are any traps along the way.
Ulthan follows Crik, having charged into a rather nasty trap before, he appreciates keeping his rump unsinged by letting others trundle into the tripwires.
As Skuler descends the stairs he'll find himself in a large, dark chamber. It's lit, like most of the crypt, by torches and candles on the walls but these ones are dim and sputtering, their flame tinged with sickly green light. There are empty pews laid out throughout the room, interspersed with columns supporting the ceiling above. To the south of the room, through the gloom, he can just make out something that looks like it might be an altar or maybe sarcophagus on a raised dais. The altar has something on it, something that glimmers like gold. Beyond that, a great gate wrought in some kind of black metal, which pale mist clings to. The metal of the gate is twisted into the shape of bones- ribs and femurs intertwined to close off what lays beyond, and capped with a grinning skull.
Haggerty pointedly nods to the minstrel's response while he stifles a sigh. Then, "Skyler, wait up! Else you will run into more traps!" Silently, to the Unionist shapeshifter, "I wish we could get him reborn with two long ears and a br.. I mean, we need to return him to his chosen man when this is through." To Ulthan, "No reminders. We need his lucky blade." He jogs after the others. The wizard SHOULD have rested, but the decision has been made. It is so INTERESTING down here. Hagg engages his magely sight again.
At the bottom of the steps, Skyler is standing on the dais with his little ioun torch floating happily around his head as if it were a particularly cheerful little moon. He glances around, makes a little grimace of distaste, and turns to the others as they arrive.
"Bit of a fixer upper, but definitely looks like the lair of an evil necromancer." Skyler says slowly, tilting his head as he glances around, "So no obvious foes... Which means we probably need to get into the chapel and we'll be surrounded." Beat. "Hey, Crik, why don't you throw that skull? Maybe we can lure whatever it is to the chokepoint of the stairs."
GAME:: Haggerty casts Detect Magic. Caster Level: 6 DC: 15 GAME:: Crik rolls perception+2: (4)+11+2: 17 GAME:: Skyler rolls knowledge/religion: (1)+1: 2 (EPIC FAIL) GAME:: Crik rolls knowledge/religion: (12)+3: 15 GAME:: Bryn rolls knowledge/religion: (2)+9: 11
Crik looks around the place, making sure to touch the nearest stone with his foot several times. It's always a fake stone pretending to be a normal stone. Skyler's question makes him pause though - and he protectively turns the skull away from the man. "... no, preserve the sanctity of the dead." He says to the man, then gestures at him. "We could throw a bomb in there, though." He holds up a round orb in his hands suddenly, and his beak was open.
Bryn looks around, her eye able to see more in the dim (or even dark). "Huh. Sure looks like some kinda church ta me. Bettin this's a sacred spot. Or was, til somebody else redecorated." Then she points at the altar/dais/big bump on the floor with the shiny thing. "Bettin that's important. And pricey." All the more reason that she heads for the thing. Someone -did- just say that they should have bards singing about them with lotsa loot, right?
GAME:: Haggerty rolls knowledge/religion: (1)+9: 10 (EPIC FAIL) GAME:: Haggerty rolls knowledge/engineering: (16)+9: 25 GAME:: Haggerty rolls knowledge/religion: (18)+9: 27
Is throwing a bomb into an enclosed, underground space a good idea? No. But does Skyler discourage the Raven from doing so? Hahaha absolutely *not*. "Sounds good to me!" He tells Crik cheerfully, "Light it up *and* the shrapnel might trigger the traps before we do!" And he gives the rogue a thumbs up with his free hand, beaming and adding, "Aim for the altar in the center. It looks pre-profaned so you won't be profaning it more than it already is."
Haggerty squints and beholds the space with an azure gleam to his eyes. He tells the party, "A strong necromancer. The elevation to the South of us is laden with powerful forces. Tread carefully, by all means!" The wizard does have his magical torch lit at his belt. "Ahum. The statue on the altar is a despicable foil of Vardama's holy judgement. It deflects the due suffering with a false soul. What should be tormented is instead frolicking without having earned such pleasures like feasting among the honored of Kor and Angoron." Braids fly when the redhead shakes his head. "The statue will be protected. Protection is also at stake when the columns get damaged. We will be flatter than dried halibuts, if that occurs. I am afraid that no, no, no. No explosions, please!"
Crik bops his head at Skyler repeatedly, putting aside the skull for a moment. The round bomb's 'fuse' is lit, and he then takes a step back, before throwing. Right around when Haggerty was saying no to any explosions.
With a long rattling skitting, rattle and roll, the bomb agitatedly throws sparks around as the fuse nears the end and gets closer towards the altar. The bomb stops. The fuse burns down to the core, before there's a sudden quiet 'phaff!'. A bit of smoke comes out from the now dead still bomb.
Crik turns to look at Haggerty. "... who said anything about explosions?" The corvid egalrin asks the redhead.
Ulthan lets out his held breath in a guffaw. Then he follows Bryn towards the dais.
After the smoke bomb goes off, Skyler gives Crik an hurt, vaguely disappointed look. "That isn't exactly what I expected." He says mournfully, before moving to the edge of the dais they're standing off and briskly walking off the edge to gently fall down with only a light bounce to his step rather than a tumble that leaves him sprawled out.
THe bomb rolling up to the altar doesn't seem to do anything, even when it ejects a puff of smoke- no monsters appear, and the door remains eerie, but still, past it. Now Bryn is closer she can see that the figurine is very lifelike and seemingly cast in pure gold. The figure appears as a muscular and well sculpted human male. Its face bears a resemblance to the visage that was carved into the sarcophagus that concealed the entrance to this crypt, though the figurine seems to depict him when he was much younger.
GAME:: Bryn rolls appraise: (1)+5: 6 (EPIC FAIL)
Haggerty blanches in the strictly blood motions out of face sense. His eyes widen. He swallows like a fjord eagle does a freshly claimed salmon. He knows to keep his mouth shut, though. No scream. The wizard scowls and shrugs helplessly while the pug covers his eyes with both paws, tonelessly whines. The hatly man straightens himself out while he squares them narrow shoulders. What will happen now? Hagg manages a shiny smile to the avian person, "I think I see now."
Crik's beak was still open, and there was a distinct feeling that may have been a sign of amusement. He follows on after the others with a light hop and rustle of his cloaks. "Expectations are a deadly friend, friend." He bops his head up and down, and continues to hop on after Bryn, to pick up his now dead bomb.
Bryn looks at the little golden man. Well, little is a bit subjective, since it's, well, GOLD. "Kor's colossal cod! This's gotta be worth half a kajillion! Good thing nobody blew it up! Gonna have those riches, ain' we!"
She reaches out her flesh hand to grab it (don't want to scratch it up!)... and her hand passes through it like it almost isn't there. Because it is only barely there. The paper-thin gold leaf shell collapses like dry leaves at her touch. Bryn promptly blinks.
"What the hells?! That ain' fair!"
When the figurine collapses under Bryns touch, leaving her fingertips with a fine gold leaf coating, there is a sound- a thud, and then a slow rumble as the massive bone-wrought gates begin to open. As soon as a crack forms, a howling wind beings to billow through carrying with it a bone-deep chill and the scent of decay. Haggery's senses are suddenly overwhelmed as the Auras he detects- from the gate, from his allies magical equipment- all of them are overwhelmed by a sudden surge of negative energy.
The howling wind carries a voice- it's a man's voice, "Has the time come, at last? Wait... no, you're not-" there is a moments pause. "Ah, I see. My subjects must have grown careless." as the doors creak wider and wider open. Beyond is what looks like... a landscape, the ground hard-bit by ice and with a dark, turbulent, sunless sky. Green fires burn on the ground here and there, and there is the vague silhouette of a great spire, impossibly tall, and seemingly miles away. "No matter. I will have what is rightfully mine, and you will not stop me." the voice says- and then a rime-encrusted mound beyond the Gate lurches into motion, beginning to plod ponderously towards the opening.
Ulthan peers out, then mutters. "Why is it always spires?"
GAME:: Crik rolls knowledge/the planes: (15)+4: 19 GAME:: Bryn takes ten on knowledge/the planes: (10)+9: 19 GAME:: Haggerty rolls knowledge/the planes: (15)+9: 24
"Megalomaniacal would-be warlords usually have small penises." Skyler tells Ulthan with a wise, cynical nod, moving closer to the bigger man, "So they have to have big ol' spires to make up for the fact they're barely swinging an ankle sock." He taps the side of his nose with his free hand, and adds, "Bryn, want to go sideways so we can show him size is, indeed, important?"
The landscape is so beautiful the way the fires make the snow sparkle! Witchfires. The bad kind! Hagg frowns while his glowing eyes bleed a little actinic whisping from the freckled spellcaster's tear ducts and lids, "Transplanar gate! The spire is the wretched lord of undeath's demesne. Assumptions are bad friends, but this mess has no business near the sarcophagus!" The light effect winks out when the arcanist kneels and starts up the doge summoning business, because that is not so speedily done!
Crik looks at the gold and was about to raise his hand at Bryn. "... it might-" He then turns his beak towards the opening gates. All of his cloaks, the dangling books, caltrops, weapons, what looks like a belt with quick access scrolls, emergency jewelry - and then he pulls all of his cloaks shut around himself. "... I believe we should not discuss manhood envy and coitus at this moment." He says - and off he runs into the darkness, hood over his head.
And the skull.
GAME:: Haggerty casts Summon Monster III. Caster Level: 6 DC: 19 GAME:: Ulthan casts Enlarge Person. Caster Level: 5 DC: 13 GAME:: Haggerty used a Rod of Lesser Extend. GAME:: Haggerty rolls 1d3: (2): 2 GAME:: Crik rolls stealth: (14)+13: 27
Bryn takes a step back to Sky Guy, maybe to go along with that 'sideway' plan. "Ye! It's time alright!" She calls back to The Voice. "Time fer yer dead ass ta get kicked back ta bein dead 'gain! We got this!" The last part is for her peers, of course, and not the... pile of whatever-the-shite-that-is.
"Bones ta dust! Iron to rust! Gonna stomp ye till ye bust!" she begins to belt out. The place needs some class to brighten up all the angsty goth decor.
GAME:: Bryn casts Good Hope. Caster Level: 8 DC: 16
Ulthan quietly mutters his words of power, and his form fills out to tower over the rest of his team.
The ponderous form trudges closer, the hoarfrost shaking loose from its form with each step revealing that it is no mere shambling mound. It's roughly humanoid in shape, but in lieu of a proper head, its entire torso is a mass of chattering human skulls. Jutting out from this are large bones, likely from a giant or something of that sort- much bigger than human bones, to form arms which end in three fingered hands. It's legs look to be the hind legs of some kind of large bird or reptile. It's an amalgamation of bones, all held together with bolts, straps of tanned hide from various creatures, and sinew sutres.
It finally steps through the portal to the other plane beyond, and the man's voice echoes once more from behind it. "I can't be stopped, not now. Drive them out, destroy them if you must." he instructs, and the amalgamated creature readies to charge at the group.