Wilderlands: Session 24

 

This is part of an ongoing campaign. You can find the other sessions over on the sidebar.

This session was run on November 14, 2022. 

 

13 Meadowlark

 

 

At first light, the party set out from Byrney for the barrows to the south. They hoped to investigate Sir Mar’s report of Armentgart, the Black Knight from the tournament, participating in demon summoning beneath one of the mounds. The trip south to the barrow mounds took most of the day, but it was easy to follow the road and it was uneventful.

 

 

While Sir Mar indicated that Sabine’s Lot had entered the complex under the mounds through the barrow in the northeast corner, the party decided to enter through the opening in the northwest.  

 

 

Uggmar snuck into the opening and down a ramp. He found himself in a rough room with a coffin that had clearly already been looted. Previous explorers had broken through a wall to the east. He noticed that the wall was thin, and the opening led to a chamber full of jars with an exit to the north. He searched through the jars and found 25 gold pieces. He called back up the ramp to let the others know it was safe to enter. They spent some time looking at the walls and determined that the west wall was also weak. While Uggmar and Vargr were arguing over the best way to knock it down, Creng kicked the wall and it collapsed.

 

 

On the other side of the wall, they found a wedge-shaped room with a once-rich carpet covering the floor. Having been both enriched and attacked by carpets in the past, they did not want to abandon it, but were wary of it. Duycken decided that the best way to handle the potential danger was to hit the rug with his mace. A cloud of yellow dust puffed out of the rug, quickly filling the area. The characters doubled over in coughing fits; some even fell unconscious. Rouen, Duycken’s new retainer, was seriously injured and had to be cured. The conscious characters pulled those who had passed out to the surface to recover.

 

 

 

Gwythian made his way back down to attempt to move the carpet without disturbing the dust. Uggmar accompanied him, but for safety reasons, they decided that he should wait in the east room in case there was another large release of the dust. Gwythian pried up the edge of the rug with his sword. He briefly lost control of it, causing it to flop over, releasing more dust. While he was slightly injured by breathing it in, he remained conscious and continued to roll up the carpet. As he rolled up the carpet, he noticed a glyph inscribed on the floor. Unfortunately, he did not notice the glyph until his foot was on it. He found himself teleported to a circular room with no apparent exits. 

 

Uggmar heard the rug hit the floor in the other room and, after waiting a few minutes without hearing Gwythian, stuck his head into the triangular room to find Gwythian missing. He did not see the glyph on the floor. Uggmar called for the others, who joined him. After looking in the room, and not seeing any sign of Gwythian, they decided to explore further in hopes of finding him instead of risking any more contact with the carpet. 

 

 

 

Their explorations took them north and then east; the hall stank of sulfur. Uggmar, who has an exceptional nose, determined that the smell was stronger to the east. Stranger, who has exceptional ears, could hear someone pacing coming from the same direction. 

 

 

 

They entered a larger chamber and found a man in red, lacquered armor pacing inside a ring of fire. The man had an ornate headdress and olive skin. Duycken, who recognized the ring as a summoning circle, called out to him, but he replied in a language that no one could understand. Duycken threw some bread and jerky over the fire to the man, but he seemed to not like the taste after taking a small bite of each. Vargr and Stranger attempted to cast detect alignment and detect neutral on him, but both spells failed. They bid him farewell and continued south in search of their missing companion.

 

 

 

Meanwhile, Gwythian was feeling out the confines of his prison. He found the stone ceiling to be sound after testing it with his sword. The stone tiled floor proved difficult to pry up with the piece of steel he carried for starting fires, so he turned to the walls. The walls were constructed of stone blocks, tightly fit together. When he knocked on the blocks, he decided that the echo indicated that the wall was not very thick and started prying at one with his steel.

 

 

 

Outside, Stranger could hear the scaping sounds and quickly located the source. By tapping on the wall and getting a response, he determined that Gwythian was on the other side. He could see several more curved walls in the area, and the others started exploring while he used his crowbar to remove stones to allow Gwythian to escape. 

 

 

 

Once the bard was free, they decided to open one of the other round walls to see if there was a similar chamber on the other side. Stranger pried a stone loose and could see a large snail pulled up in its shell inside. He threw a piece of the stone he removed, and the snail sprung to life, charging the wall.

 

The seven-foot-long snail, which had seven club-like tentacles, bashed its way through the wall in an attempt to get to Stranger. The others joined the fight, with Stranger, Duycken, and Argus forming the front line, while the others fired missile weapons through the opening in the wall. Vargr cast bless on everyone. 

 

 

 

The first round of blows from the snail were intense, it attacked everyone on the front row with its tentacles. Stranger ordered Argus, who was the most seriously wounded, to withdraw.  Uggmar managed to get a clean hit in with his bow before the next round of tentacle attacks from the snail, which hit both Duycken and Stranger.

 

Vargr rushed to cast cure light wounds on Duycken, while the duck knight and the hoop both managed to land clean blows. Four of the snail’s tentacles ceased to function and it was only able to retaliate with three attacks. Stranger landed another mighty blow with The Father of Swords and two more of the tentacles dropped to the floor.

 

 

 

The snail was only able to lash out with one tentacle, hitting Stranger. Vargr moved to cast cure light wounds on the druid. Duycken finished the snail with his mace and the party paused to heal with first aid and goodberries. Duycken recognized that flail snail shells were often prized by alchemists and they worked to remove it from its shell before returning to the surface.