Our Heroes:
- Sir Kentor (Human Paladin) played by Paladin Steve
- Sir Lantor (Human Fighter) played by Boom Gun Brandon
- The Mighty Xyzzifax (Human-ish Wizard) played by Blaster
- Samson (Halfling Mechanist) played by Shootist Will
- Jaric (Human Cleric) played by Variable David
- Malice (Human Bard) played by Grognard Mike
The party is level 5 at this point. This account is mainly written by Malice. The Ranger was out for this session. We begin on Day 63 of the campaign.
We make our way back to the water temple, after a meal of Sir Kentor’s chili, which is enjoyed by Malice and Jaric, and Sir Lantor’s stories – Malice notes to herself that she’s come to recognize most of his tragic tales – brace the spirits of Samson and Xyzzifax. Then, we proceed through the single door into the unexplored region of the dungeon. And, it is just a small room meant for water temple functionaries. It smells rank in here, and something appears to have been sleeping here for some time, though its now gone. There is a small keg of wine, and a large barrel of water, and a quartet of green robes. We give the room a quick once over, then take a door to the left.
It leads to a short passage, and we continue, not taking particular care to be stealthy, instead paying more attention to our defense. It leads to a square room with heaps of old carpeting that look like they have been piled into crude beds. Though there is another side doorway to our right, we instead push forward, possibly towards the edge of this level of the temple. Or perhaps not – it leads to a hallway that goes to our left and our right. There is a hallway that dead ends into a wall – the architecture that Malice refers to as “the hall with the obvious secret door.” We send Bubo to scout off down the hallway – there is a whole lot of hallway, it is easily hundreds of feet of hallway that wraps around the water temple, and there is a single door off to a side, eventually is a door behind which he hears clanking chains and growling noise.
We take the secret door, Once again, there is a lot of hallway. Maybe we have reached the edge of the temple after all, and there is a loop around it. There is a door nearby, that leads to a rectangular room. There are a group of bestial humanoids, speaking what we assume to be goblin – Malice is certain that it isn’t orkish. The room is full of them, half wearing the green robes, the other half wearing gray robes.
Jaric is the first to charge into the room, spiritual weapon springing into being as he slams into the bugbear. But, against the bugbear leader in green, Jaric is the worse for the wear – the exchange leaves our war cleric bloodied. Malice calls out commands, her words laced with magic, and the knights push into the room as Jaric retreats. Samson is next to join the fray, punching with his magical gauntlets. Sir Kentor is the next in, concentrating on the bugbear that seems to be leading group on gray. And then, Xyzzifax blasts the room with a fireball from the wand. Though none of the creatures fall, many of them are looking in significantly worse shape. Then, finally Sir Lantor barrels into the room, and the Gray Leader is slain! The troop of bugbears engage with spiked clubs and thrown javelin. Only Sir Lantor is wounded, though, and he’s stunned by the exchange.
The green leader keeps the heat coming onto Sir Lantor, who is slammed down onto the ground. Sir Kentor, Malice, and Samson all pile blade, firebolt, and fists clad in magical gauntlets into the leader in green, who is showing the effects of so many hits. Jaric's wounds close, and he is looking no where near so bad. One of the great things about having a wand of fireballs is that Xyzzifax can keep using it. After this second explosion, two bugbears are dead, and the rest are all terribly wounded. Instead of fleeing, the bugbears attack in a rage. It is only because Sir Lantor is off of his feet that any of them hit at all, and Sir Kentor’s defensive prowess allows him to block every blow.
Once they found the wand, given the way fireball wands work in 5E and onward, there was no lack of fireball usage in this campaign.
The Bugbear leader in green, still in his cold, deep rage, manages to slam with his shield powerfully enough that Sir Kentor’s arm is bruised. Malice utters the dark words to call a firebolt to kill this bugbear sergeant of the water temple. And the battle turns, Samson gruesomely kills another bugbear with his gauntleted fist. Sir Kentor cuts another down, then sprints across the room to the ones that had been throwing javelins. Xyzzifax launches a firebolt as Sir Lantor climbs to his feet. Swinging his mightly blade, he slays the last of the bugbears that were in melee, and then drags himself across the room, and cleaves another in twain. The bugbears, snarling, and losing control, stay in the fight – and in their rage they manage to hit Sir Lantor again. Then, Jaric’s spiritual hammer hits again and again, clubbing one of the last bugbears into a bloody mess, and then it springs to the other one, crushing its skull as well.
We quickly check the bodies of the bugbear leaders, Malice and Samson finding a total of 20 gp from them, as Xyzzifax orders the skeletons to grab a javelin. Jaric and Sir Kentor, quickly tend to Sir Lantor’s wounds, and then we retreat to the Water Temple, with its doors that we’ve arcane locked. That is secure enough that we’re willing to give Sir Lantor proper time to bind and bandage his wounds. While we’re taking this time, we don’t hear anything, but there is some distance between us and where the bugbear fight took place. We discuss which way we should go, and return in the direction of the bugbear fight, taking a door that we’d passed by before. It opens to a room that is unoccupied. There are pair of beds and chests, and a trio of barrels. Samson quickly gets them open, and we find 419 copper, 282 silver, 23 electrum, 133 gold, and 4 platinum within. And, a candlestick and rusty saw that we leave behind with the apparel. The clothing is large enough to fit ogres.
We push back to the room where had the bugbear fight, with Xyzzifax leaving Bubo to watch the long hallway. We loot the fallen bugbears, so the skeletons are now set with javelins. We manage to pull 35 gold from the bodies of the bugbears. But, there is nothing else of value in the room, we continue – revealing a hallway with a doorway to our right. We form up on it, and burst in… only to reveal a pair of ogres. We probably found the owners of the chests we rifled through. And, Jaric hears tearing down the hallway, from around a curve, what he thinks sounds like the sound of tornados.
Xyzzifax flies over Sir Kentor and Sir Lantor, and casts slow on the pair of ogres, and has his skeletons form up to prepare for what we expect to be incoming air elementals. And then the expected elemental tears around the corner, and blasts a skeleton to bone shards. Malice steps into the room just long enough to hit the ogre that was still moving at normal speeds with the wand of binding, and then she retreats to the hall. Jaric moves in behind her, and with a pair of mighty blows with the staff of striking causes the ogre to have his guts completely blown back against the far wall. Sir Kentor charges the air elemental, to keep it from closing on the Valiant Swords. As expected, Verminax finds its target. The elemental crackles lightning back at him, and backs away down the hallway. Another air elemental bursts into the room with the ogre. It flings debris at incredible speeds at Sir Lantor, a broken sword jabbing into him and drawing blood. Samson makes use of a magic spear that darts into that elemental, and tears at it by rotating the opposite direction. The ogre, wounded, lumbers out of the room. Sir Lantor steps up to the air elemental that so grievously struck him, and is a beast of a man. With a series of slashes that shows off the mastery of the great swords that he has developed over the time battling the forces of the temple, he completely destroys that second air elemental.
Xyzzifax gives chase to the ogre, and throws a fireball into the room he is in, in case there are even more attackers waiting. And, he has the skeletons join him, and throwing javelins at the ogre as well. The air elemental in the hall charges forward, and engulfs Sir Kentor, but he braces himself, and his enchanted armor and shield hold fast – he is undamaged by the assault! Then, an armored figure comes out of a secret door in the hallway, likely from the room where the ogre had retreated. The armored figure points at Sir Kentor, and says in the Common Tongue, says, “You, Freeze.” and utters a word of magic. Quickly, Xyzzifax utters a countering word, and the hold spell fails. “Alrim sent you, didn’t he? Always sending his minions to do his dirty work.” the cleric says. “I don’t know who that is, but I am better than him!” Xyzzifax retorts.
This is the DM attempting to remind the players that they do have some intel about this place but they mostly didn't care.
Malice can’t help but do the most ironic attack. Knowing that her own hold is weaker than the wand of binding, she uses it to hold the cleric, and is successful! Jaric walks up to the evil cleric, staff of striking crackling, and he crushes the evil cleric’s head. Sir Lantor swings Verminax through the air elemental, and Samson throws the magical javelin, and after it jabs the air elemental again and again, it is looking notably weakened. The ogre charges back into the room, and swings his club completely through one of the skeletons, and spraying the bone shards into both Sir Lantor and the last remaining skeleton. From within the room, though, Sir Kentor hears the sounds of many hob nailed boots retreating.
Sir Lantor takes a pair of steps, and slashes deeply into the ogre. Bleeding terribly, he keeps his feet. Xyzzifax flies in, and hits it with a firebolt, and a skeleton stabs it with a javelin, and the hulking monster is managing to stand, even though it looks in very rough shape. The Elemental continues to tear at Sir Kentor, this time the knight is beginning to bleed from many lacerations, some of them deep. Malice steps into the door jam, sending a pair of scorching rays at the ogre, and she smiles as it falls, dead. The last ray blasts through the elemental. Sir Kentor declares the Air Elemental a Foul Wind, that shall face Judgement. And with the mighty Verminax, the Air Elemental is dissipated. Then, he goes back through the secret door, into the room that the cleric came out of. It is a spartan room painted gray, now all singed by the fireball. He pushes across the room and looks on the hallway that what we expect were more bugbears fled. There is a fountain on the wall, and a large number of weapons are stockpiled against the wall, and a chest as well. A stairway leads down. This is the hallway that we used to come up to this level from below.
Malice asks Samson to check the cleric – and he has plenty of magical things. +1 chainmail, ring of protection, +1 ridged mace, a dagger of venom, and a spell scroll of darkness. We give the ring to Sir Lantor, Xyzzifax takes the scroll and Malice takes the dagger. The chainmail and mace go into the bag of holding. Samson checks the chest, and without breaking a sweat he disables the trap, and finds 176 silver, 28 ep, and 11 gold. In a wardrobe, there is a robe of crystal beads and jet, a ceremonial robe of the temple of evil, worth 1500 gold. Then, since we found our way back out, we pile as many weapons as we can into the bag of holding, and we retreat to the tower. Xyzzifax sends the last skeleton chasing after the bugbears on a suicide mission.
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