Session 54: The Masesians and Their Freedom Report

General Summary

29th of Haelynir 1524 Continued   Before going to bed, Lily and Fargrim sparred while Karl cast Alarm twice over the entrance and exit of the jungle area.   The group spends it’s first night as a trio, which involves having a longer rest. Karl took the first watch with the other two starting their rest. Once his watch was up he started his rest after casting the dome. Lily took the next watch, Fargrim after that, then Karl, before Lily and Fargrim were finished and both up for Karl’s last bit of sleep.   30th of Haelynir 1524 (or is it?)   Lily is quiet, until about 15 minutes before she expects Karl to wake up, at which point, she takes out a small bag and lays something gently next to Karl's face. As he starts to wake he hears a faint hissing by his ear. Playing it cool, he opens one eye and turns his head to see a snake by his head, curled up defensively, flicking its tongue at him. A small chat between him and Fargrim results in this not being Lily. Karl casts mage armour on his before tossing the snake away. A disgruntled hiss can be heard from that section of the jungle.   Fargrim is quick to pointedly comment to Lily such a thing was dangerous. However, the group moves past the incident without issue. Spells are prepared for the day with a fight in mind. Lily and Fargrim armour up before the whole group has some fruit and goes to find Sessilan.   Lily casts Pass without Trace as they go past the pineapple trees. As Lily leads the group, Fargrim is being very careful to be quiet, pausing after each step. Karl however seems to have become complacent as he sneezes in the middle of the area. A pineapple explodes next to him but doesn't hit him. However it's enough to give him a fright.   When they find Sessilan they learn that there was another place with writing on the walls. The group decides to go look at the writing instead of going straight up to the puppet master. Sessilan says the area is is symmetrical and will show them the door on the safe side, but it blocked off. So the group will need to find their own way on the reverse side. The group sees some people on the safe side as Sessilan shows them. All with the same darker skin, but not as dark as a Khinasi person. They have varying levels of scales and snake features.   Afterwards the group goes past the pineapple room again and starts to make their way through the area. As the enter the small entry hallway, Karl hears someone on the other side of the door and Lily can sense them. They prepare and pull the door open quickly. Kneeling by the door is a man, who looked to have been listening at the door. He jumps back in surprise as he pulls out his shortsword in a defensive stance. Lily and Karl recognise him as one of the people they saw yesterday entering the pyramid.   The men are naturally with surprised and Karl calls out for everyone to hold. The two groups talk. There are only three of them when there had been four. The only member is missing. As they left the temple yesterday the lamia and jackalweres attacked. Through the battle they lost consciousness and woke up in a maze with orange mist. The group directs the men to the jungle and tell them to be polite to the snake-people.   The men head that way and some pineapples drop on the men. The men have attacked Sessilan and the group runs back to depend the snake-man. Karl uses Misty step to get mast the pineapple room and tries to intimidate the men into stopping their attack, but the threat falls short. Fargrim manages to move quietly across the room to avoid pineapples dropping on him. Sessilan says he will not continue to attack if they stop (as translated by Karl), but the bandits say that he’s just like the other half human creatures in this place. One slashes at Sesslian, one attacks Fargrim and another attacks Karl. Sessilan is hurt, but the other two are able to defend themselves well.   Karl spins his staff and slams it into the ground, as flames erupt from his feet, yet somehow only target the bandits. However, two of them seem to dance completely out of the way of the fire and one avoided only some of it. Fargrim demands the group stop their asshattery behaviour as he casts Hold Monster on the bandit that attacked him. However, this speech has no effect on the group as they continue to attack. Sessilan defends himself and Lily slices at the incapacitated bandit. One bandit is unable to break through the spell holding him in place while the other two attack Sessilan and Karl. In response Karl summons his Arcane Hand and sticks the bandit that hit him. Karl takes advantage of the bandit focusing on minimising the damage to move away.   Fargrim once again demands for the fighting to come to a stop. Sessilan is holding his side, practically leaning into the corner of the room as he tries to stay up right. His spear held out in front of him as he tried to keep the evil men at bay. While he doesn't understand Fargrim, he seems to understand the tone. The battle pauses as the party and the bandits negotiate. The bandits agree to stop their attack and help the party in exchange for half the loot when it comes to facing the puppet master. The bandits agree to rest while the party looks into the writing and Sessilan escapes back to his family.  

  The group sneaks back past the pineapples, but Karl triggers them again. However he throws up a shield as the ones go to hit him. The group carefully navigates the hallways to where the door should be, but there is not one there. They are almost at the point of destroying the wall when Lily tries a door one down from the one they want to find the room inside is much larger than what Sessilan had shown them but did have the door they wanted.   This huge room yawns in the darkness, unlit by the usual oil lamps. In the centre of the room is a huge black raised stone area and upon it lie a dozen sarcophagi. The faces that were carved into the coffin lids have been gouged out by deep claw marks. Now Lily is inside the room she can sense something in the centre of the unseen space of the room. Lily carefully sneaks around the room but when the creature she senses doesn’t move, she gestures for the others to follow her.   Once at the door they were told about, Lily listens at the door. Lily doesn't hear anything behind her door, but she does hear faint movement from the nearest sarcophagi. Quickly, she and the group continue moving as once they are away from that room she tells them about what she heard. They enter a long hallway with 3 doors. Two 30 ft to the right on either side of the hallway and one directly opposite the one they came through. To the left it seems to open up to a larger space. The walls and even ceiling of the red area have been carved with Masisan text.   The space opens up to a room with Old worn prayer rugs, their patterns faded and the cloth moth-eaten, are neatly placed about 30 ft wide in the room. A corridor enters the centre of the South wall. In the centre of the North wall, a 30 ft tall statue of a man, its head against the ceiling, a giant gemstone shimmering in its forehead. The gemstone in the statue’s forehead is made of cut glass red in colour. A compass rose is carved into the floor in front of the statue.   Lily reads out the writing for the group.   ABOVE OUR THOUGHTS NOW MASTER SLEEPS IN DREAMY REALMS AND SKY SO DEEP THE HIGH PRIEST WORKED A WONDER GREAT AND SEALED HIM UP UNTO HIS FATE     GREAT MUNAFIK THE PRIEST MOST HIGH STUDIES HIS TOMES THAT HE MAY PLY THAT WATER PATH WHERE ALL THE GREAT LEAVE DEATH BEHIND AND LOSE THEIR FATE     Walls: MUNAFIK WAS HIGH PRIEST OF AMUN-RE AND LEADER OF HIS RITES AND FAITH.     MUNAFIK, PRIEST, WAS KEEPER OF THE TOMES OF TERBAKAR, THE GREATEST LIBRARY IN ALL THE LANDS.     MUNAFIK SEARCHED, TOO, FOR LIFE ETERNAL AND SOME SAY THAT HE SOUGHT TO ROB PHARAOHS OF THEIR RIGHT TO THAT LIFE.     BUT THROUGH HIS STUDIES OF SECRET LORE HE SOUGHT ONLY TO SERVE     IN TRUTH, MUNAFIK’S SEARCH WAS REWARDED, FOR THE BOOS SHOWED HIM THE WAY OF LIFE ETERNAL     NOW TERRIBLE AND GREAT IN HIS POWER, HE ACTS AS THE VOICE OF AMUN-RE TO US.     HE CANNOT DIE, FOR HIS LIFE LIES ELSEWHERE.     MUNAFIK NOW IS SECOND ONLY TO MASELA HERSELF, AND HAS CLAIM ON THE RULE OF AMUN-RE   Afterwards Lily goes to look around the room. As she goes to climb the steps, the floor drops out from beneath her and she starts to fall. Karl quickly casts Feather Fall on Lily as she drops.  

---

Looking down as Lily slowly falls she can see straw below her. But she can also sense a few creatures. Lily transforms into an imp or the fiendish sort and flies back up to the trap door. Before she can even begin looking for how to open it again it opens and crushes her against the side of the wall.  

---

Karl casts fly on himself and runs across the room until he feels the floor open up and stays floating in the air. The door starts to close before they can see Lily. Karl lands and lifts off again, allowing Lily to fly out without being hit by the door this time. Karl helps this by trying to hold the door open long enough for her to make it.   Karl tries to make up for hitting Lily with the door by helping her inspect the statue. However they don’t find much. They discuss their thoughts on what to do about the puppet master and their options based on what information they have found here.   The group then heads back to the jungle area. Thankfully the pineapples seem to be all used for the moment. The group takes a short rest to recover a little. During the rest the group talks to the bandits that are still resting there. They speak of the maze they came up through. The group tells the bandits a little about the puppet master and what they might expect to face in front of them. The bandits' names are Philo, Dominik, and Bastian. Before going back to see Sessilan the group all has some of the fruit to enhance themselves again. The group quietly moves past the palm trees. Sessilan is sitting in the small hallway area. Someone has bandaged him up.   Sessilance carefully moves to the pineapple room and instructs the group to stand near the walls. Then when they have translated and done this he puts his hands on the altar, his left hand grabbing something. As soon as everyone is in the room he says quietly. "TURIN." The altar glows briefly a yellow light. "REGRA". Fargrim and Karl recognise that this is Dwarven for On and Reverse.   The group all floats up and pulls themselves onto the catwalk. When everyone is safely over the edge Sessilan speaks again. "NEG." (off) With that the group falls down at a normal rate, which isn't far enough to be a concern. A walkway 3 ft wide circles this area, revealing the palms at chest level. Beneath the Southern section water runs out of the golden lion’s head. There is a large stone door before the group.   Lily using her sword and Karl using his blood ability try to sense for anything up here and between them they locate a Dwarf that feels very unwell on the other side of the stone wall. However, at this stage they have no way to get to him. Meanwhile Philo and Dominik manage to pull the door open. The group does join them in the hope of there being a way round.   There is a message on two doors on their side of a divider. Lily translates it:   BEYOND THESE DOORS LIE THE TESTS OF THE PHARAOH. TURN NOW FROM THIS DOOM OF POWER AND EVIL FROM A HEARTLESS MAN. GREAT AND AWFUL IS THE HORROR BEYOND THESE DOORS? YET IF YOU TURN AWAY, WHAT TREASURE LIES BEYOND YOU SHALL NEVER KNOW.   Lily inspects both doors, but neither one seems more special then the other. Going through it seems they both led to the same place. This is a well lit hall, wide and majestic. It is 30 feet high and 30 feet wide, with an arched ceiling. The entire hall is a series of ramps and stairs, rising twenty feet up to the final level. Water thunders in torrents past both sides of the stairs and under the landings. Its roar masks any speech except a yell. At the top is a gigantic bronze fist atop a bronze forearm. The 10 ft wide stairs run up to a landing 10 ft deep and 30 ft wide. There appears to be an alcove at each end of the landing.   Karl carefully tests the steps with his staff as the group goes up the stairs. Slowly the group climbs to the first platform. The alcoves seem to be about 10 ft deep and have spears inside. As soon as Karl steps onto the stairway, a golden human, looking thin and drawn, appears from each alcove, holding a sword. They advance towards the group.   The group quickly discovers that when these golden mud men are cut with a sword, they seem to multiple. If hurt in another way they crumble for a moment before reforming to attack. Lily grabs one of the spears and pins one the the wall. He seems unable to get off and the party quickly does that to the others. Sometimes doing it to their crumbled forms when they run out of wall space which pins them to the floor.   Lily leads the way this time to the next platform. As soon as Lily reaches the top of the steps here, a flaming barrier one foot thick bursts into place across the base of the stairs that would go up to the next platform. It’s heat can be felt on the face and skin. Karl dispels the obstacle.   The group continues onto the next platform. As each person steps on to the stairway to the next landing, a duplicate appears on the landing. These are exact copies of each person. Karl’s and Lily’s duplicates copy their actions. Fargrim asks his to step aside. His does not and instead holds his axe ready. Karl tries to walk past himself, but is attacked for his efforts. The duplicate of Bastian and Dominik are the first to try and attack Fargrim, but they only get one hit on him. Philo calls this bullshit and pushes past people to attack his double. Karl duplicate attacks him with his staff but misses.   Lily’s double tries to attack her with her spear. Lily touches the dagger on her belt and spectral golden wings sprout from her back as she leaps up over her double, getting up behind her before attacking her double. Philo’s double attacks him, while Bastian attacks the double of his boss. Fargrim’s double attacks him but misses. Dominik moves up to attack the double of Lily getting three solid hits in. Karl smirks slightly and leans back as his double swings a staff at him. He brings both hands up and spins a small red bead out of the air before sending it to explode behind Lily. This injures many of the doubles. Fargrim loses his temper and swings at Dominik’s double and hits but misses with the second swing. Bastian and Dominik’s double both attack Fargrim but only one strike makes it through. Karl’s double gets a cheeky hit in with his staff while Lily’s double fails to get her own hit in on herself. Lily bats aside the spear and slices into her double and destroys it. Bastian continues his assault on Philo’s double while Fargrim’s double attacks himself and landing a hit in. Dominik hits Fargrim’s double twice trying to keep him at bay.   Karl takes a step back and blasts his double in the face with fire from both hands. The double tries to hit Karl as he steps away but misses. Fargrim changes target to go for Dominik’s double, hitting him twice. Fargrim secretly feels a little satisfaction attacking the mirror of the bandit. The doubles of Dominik and Bastian attack Fargrim again, but again only get one hit in. Philo finally manages to put his double down. Karl’s double changes focus to Dominik and gets a hit in and from behind Lily slices through the double of Karl. She then flies up so that she’s above Fargrim’s double, and attacks one of the bandit doubles but misses. Bastian and Dominik continues to slice up Fargrim’s double while the double attacks Dominik and Bastian back. Karl flicks three red darts of force at the image of Dominik and it fades away.   Fargrim attacks himself and gets two solid hits in. Bastian’s double tries to attack Fargrim but fails. However it is Lily who manages to slices through Fargrim’s double, then lands where it was. Bastian and Dominik disengages and dodges around the platform to get to Bastian’s double and slice into it. Karl supports them by throwing dire at the double and Fargrim slices into the double. This earns Fargrim an attack in return from the double. Philo disengages and gets in close to Bastian’s double and manages to finish it off. As the last enemy fades. As Fargrim leals Lily he notices the fist starting to lift and Lily notices someone standing in the shadow behind the fist.   Lily offers the figure a wave and greets them. As she does this a plague of locusts descend on the group. Bastian tries to cover his face and bumps into everyone as he makes his way out of the locust swarm, also walking headfirst into a wall. The fist floats towards Karl and Philo and slams them both hard. When the fist slams into Karl there's a flash of light and a shattering sound as green energy coalesces around him as this sets off Karl’s False Life Contingency spell giving him a bit more temporary health. The figure at the back of the room look at Lily and fires some flame at her, hitting her, before summoning a spiritual weapon in the form of a staff to attack Fargrim and hitting him.   Karl twists and vanishes in a cloud of mist, reappearing against the wall and throwing fire at the hand but misses. He tells the others to get out of the swarm. Philo takes a few swipes at the fist before attempting to run and get out of the swarm, but gets hit before he gets away. Dominik backs out of the swarm and fires his crossbow at the fist and hits it once. Fargrim moves out of the swarm next to Dominic and casts cure wounds on himself. Lily flies back out of the swarm, then looks at the swarm, pointing her sword at it, and attempts to dispel it but doesn’t manage it. She grunts in frustration and summons a hellhound spirit in front of the fist. Bastian fires his crossbow at the fist and gets a hit. The bolt seems to have a spark of fire to it as he fires.   The fist floats over to Karl and Philo. But Philo pales as he realises he is blocking it from getting Karl like this is the hero moment he never wanted. It hits him twice, hard, and his body crumbles to the floor. The figure attacks Lily with a Sacred Flame and his Spiritual Weapon, but only the flame hits. Karl glances down at Philo and pulls a wand from his holster, to level it at the Fist, firing nine darts at it before calling out to the others for help. Dominik cries out for Philo, but his aim with his crossbow is off. His bottom lip wobbles a little as he realises he didn't do much. Fargrim summons his own spiritual weapon and next to the figure but the attack misses.   Lily changes tactics, pointing her sword between the fist and the priest and sending out a burst of flame to engulf the two. The large fist falls to the ground with a clunk and is now blocking Philo and Karl in as the fire seems to bite at Philo’s unconscious form. Bastian changes his aim up to the next platform but even as he hits he notices his bolts seem to do nothing. But the man at the top doesn't even seem to notice the bolts until one seems to catch fire. That gets his attention. The man dispels Fargrim’s weapon and attempts to attack Bastian with his own Spiritual Weapon but misses. Karl kneels down and pours a healing potion into Philo's mouth. Philo coughs as the potion works his way through him. Karl is going to crouch down and try to hide behind the rubble while looking around to see if he can see the man. Philo slowly gets to his knees.   Bastian tries to back into a corner since he is unsure of what to do. Fargrim calls down holy fire which seems to hurt the man greatly to the point where he loses his focus on the plague of locusts and they fade. Lily dismisses her sword and replaces it in her hand with a bead of bright light that bursts out a beam towards the priest and lights up the area with sunlight. Bastian rushes over to help Philo. The man attempts to cast Harm on Lily but Karl is able to successfully counterspell it. Karl climbs on top of the rubble and aims a disintegration at the man. It fails. The man glares at Fargrim, but the cheer from his friends is able to stop the man from frightening him. A wave of energy goes over everyone, blocking their ability to heal. Fargrim calls down more holy fire onto the man and Lily aims another sunbeam at him which blinds him. He howls in frustration, casting Shield of Faith on himself.   Karl raises his arms and red energy starts to gather into his hands and swirl around him before forming into seven red darts that fly at the undead beast. Fargrim fires a Guiding Bolt but the man seems to stumble out of the way. As his vision returns to him, Lily destroys him with one last Sunbeam. He cries out in frustration until there is nothing left to cry out as his body crumbles. As the dust, quite literally for the man, the group breaths a collective sigh of relief. Lily looks over the remains. Karl helps Philo over the fist that is still blocking him in and the group heads over to the door. Lily looks over the door to find it is locked but not trapped. Lily, Bastian and Dominik all try to open it but are unsuccessful. Fargrim uses his goblin key to open the door.   This 30 foot semi circular room shakes with falling water. In the centre of the curved area a column of water thunders down from an opening in the ceiling straight down to a hole in the floor. This column of water is ten feet across and the entire room is damp from its constant pour. There are 10 ft wide corridors leadings to the East and West. On the floor in front of the column of water is a symbol in ancient Masesian. Lily tells the group it’s a question mark. Lily uses the wand to cast detect magic and see everything is magical.   The group heads to the West door. The door slowly opens to reveal a 30 ft wide octagonal room that has a marble table with 6 marble seats. There is an archway with another door opposite Lily. She sees the table has conjuration magic. The group decides to identify the table and what it does. As people sit food appears in front of them of the finest quality. Roast, stew, cakes, and all sorts. It smells divine. The group eats while Karl identifies the table, taking a short rest here.   Table of Feasts. If anyone sits at the table, food will appear in front of them of the finest quality. This works three times a day for each person.   When they have finished eating and resting, Lily goes over to listen at the door. However she is not sure if she heard something or not. The scraping of the men standing and pushing seats back might of covered it. The next room is a small room with two other door. Lily goes to the one to her left where she came out, but still can’t hear anything outside the scraping of chairs at the table. This room is empty, but has various shelves and boxes standing around the sides. The north wall is crumbled and broken like it collapsed from the other side, and at the top of the rubble the Lily can see there is a cave on the other side. The gap is 4 ft wide by 5 ft tall.   The group, including the bandits, spend a lot of time to clear the stone and rubble since it’s slow work to do so carefully. Fargrim casts Light on Karl’s staff before they make their way into the tunnel. It's a dark tunnel that twists and turns. Fargrim pauses to look into the stonework and sees it looks like someone dug this out with a very small dull instrument. The tunnel doesn't look natural.   It continues to twist and turn as Fargrim continues going and up ahead he can see how it opens up a little. The cavern is rough stone, hewn out of the stone. This area looks like someone was digging at it, going in random directions then gave up. However, some points don’t look like they were tunnelled at all. A huge dark shape is in the middle of the cave, hunched over. Lily activates her blood ability to detect life and look around. As the group comes closer to the shape, it is revealed to be a large stone statue of a man, with a gold eye carved into its chest. As Lily gets within 5 ft it moves suddenly, swinging at her.   The bandits move with Karl, not quite up with the action and all a little confused on what is happening. Fargrim fires a guiding bolt at it, but the creature redirects it at Lily. Hurting her and shining up like a light. The statue slams a fist into Lily and Fargrim, hurting them both significantly. Lily sends up a little bit of flame at it, but it doesn’t seem as effective as it should when it makes no effort to get out of the way. Lily grunts in pain as she's hit by both Fargrim and the statue, and her eyes glow red as she casts Guardian of Nature on herself. She manages to slice into the creature with her sword.   Karl finally makes it up to fight and sees that things are not going well, so he casts Wall of Force. A sphere of glowing energy flashes briefly around the golem before fading from view. Fargrim in his panic attacks the golem but his attack bounces off the wall of force. The golem tries to attack back but to no effect. Karl inspects the golem up close while it can’t hurt him and Lily inspects the jar it seemed to have been protecting. The jar has a fancy stopper with a jackal’s head on it but when opened they find it empty.   Meanwhile Fargrim heads off down the passage to look for the Dwarf sensed earlier. He finds the dwarf, a thin, wretched looking dwarf who is on his hands and knees, digging at the stone with a spoon. Fargrim first greets him in Brecht, but when that doesn’t work he tries Dwarven which does. The Dwarf is clearly mentally unwell and he is protective of his spoon. His name is Prit. The group heads back out of the tunnel with Prit in tow and as they get far enough away the golem goes back to standing protectively over the jar.   Once the group is safe away from the golem Lily looks over Prit to check on his condition. Seems like he hasn't had a decent feed in a long time. He seems easily confused but also happy to run with ideas put forward. He would not do well in any major scuffle right now. They take him to the Table of Feasts and leave him to eat while they continue exploring.   The last door on this side leads to a room that has manacles hung from each of the walls, open and dangling loosely. The middle of the room has a brazier in it, cold and empty of coals with several pokers in it. They look over the room but find something of interest. Afterward the group returns to the room with the water column and tries the other side.   An octagonal white marble room 30 ft across has 10 ft wide archways in the east and west halls. An old book lies on a marble slab in the centre of the room. The cover says "Liabram of Health and Magic". The walls are covered in tomes. This room is white marble and is scattered with comfortable cushions interspersed with low tables of marble.   The group stops here for a while to investigate this little library. There are lots of books here in Masesian. It makes it hard to reach, but with Lily helping Karl knows that there are books here about Masela, about priesthood, the afterlife, desert life (Flora and Fauna), books on magical theory. There is one in particular that catches Karl's attention. Tome of Cat Summoning written in Draconic. Karl starts to put all the books on magical theory into his magical bag. Fargrim tries to have a look around for secrets in the library but couldn’t find any.   Afterwards they move on to look at the last few rooms. Lily hears water bubbling at one of the doors. She opens it to find a 20 ft wide octagonal room fashioned of white marble there is a 10 ft by 15 ft long pool of water. A large bed with satin sheets rides in the middle of the pool on pontoons, tied to the pool's edges with ropes. It bubbles a little. It's calming.   The last room is another 30 ft wide octagonal room covered with a rug, a nice contrast to the white marble walls and ceiling. A chair and a bench stand against the west wall. Lily looks under the rugs but doesn’t find anything cool. Lily and Fargrim both look through the room for anything hidden. Lily uses the wand of Detect Magic to continue her investigation. Lily moves her investigation to the room with the bed and the pool. Meanwhile, Karl heads back to the library and looks into the book that was in the centre of the room.   Lily goes back to the room with the column of water while Fargrim tries to talk out some of the facts that are confusing him. A watery voice speaks to Lily (Fargrim and Karl can faintly hear but can't understand). It asks her three questions.  

• Her name
• Her quest
• On Whose hallowed ground does she stand.

  Lily answers honestly with the first two and says that this ground is Masela’s. After a while Fargrim gets up to look for her. He tells Karl she’s missing and he insists he finish reading this section of his book. Karl reassures Fargrim Lily is likely fine as she tends to go missing and can look after herself. Fargrim casts Sending to check on her.  

---

Lily is pulled into the water and going to another area of the pyramid. There she pulls herself out of the pool of water. On the walls it is painted with scenes from a man's life and showing his accomplishments. She goes to check out the door in the room and listen at it. She doesn’t hear anything and moves into the next room.   A bronze door blocks off this room, which is thirty foot square with four squat pillars in the middle. The West side of the room holds a long reed boat holding several jars. There is a post in the boat’s bow that appears to be the setting for something large. On the east wall there is a large painting of the same boat, floating in the clouds. In the bow is set a huge ruby the size of a fist. In the centre of the room stands a large case or box, eight feet by four feet square. There is a lock on the box.   As she enters this new room she receives a message from Fargrim. She explains what happened before going back to investigating. Lily uses the want of Detect Magic again. The wall with the painting is magical and so is the boat. Lily gets the sudden sensation from Xeldarix that she feels confused, lost, sad and mad. Lily prays to her to try and soothe her which works to help a little.  

---

Fargrim doesn’t seem convinced by Lily’s reply and tells Karl they have to find her when Karl snaps at him that he just needs to finish what he is doing and then he will help look for her. Reluctantly and grudgingly Fargrim does wait.   Once Karl is done with his reading he agrees to look into these quests. Karl stands up and puts the book into his satchel, then slides the rest of the books from the shelves into the haversack. He starts walking toward the waterfall and Aeryn appears on his shoulder. Karl is the one to step on the symbol to receive the same questions. He answers the last question with Amon-Re. He still gets the white hand and is told to touch it. He quickly tells the others what he did. A few minutes later Fargrim and the others follow him up, answering the same way as him.  

---

Karl arrives in the same room Lily did. He grimaces with the pain the water had given him. He sends a message to Lily but doesn’t get a reply. Instead the door ahead, which opened a crack, slams shut. Karl uses mage hand to open and push it. There is an exclamation of pain as the door hit Lily in the face for the second time today. She is unhappy to notice Aeryn is with Karl instead of with Xeldarix, but doesn’t comment.   They try to message Fargrim about the last question which may have caused the pain for Karl but get no reply. They look around while they wait for Fargrim. Lily is unable to get into the locked box. Karl counts the coin in the jars. There are 50 coins between 5 jars.  

---

A few minutes later after making sure the bandits know what to do Fargrim answers the question as Karl did, but there is no pain as he goes up to join the others. A few minutes later Philo and Co join the group and they were also hurt by the water. They are very happy to hear there is treasure here. They each try to pick the lock but are unsuccessful.   Lily goes to investigate the next room while Karl identifies the rod in the boat.   The Star of Mo-Pelar: This finely cut and polished stone appears as an opalescent large gem 5" in diameter. This gem is one of a set of three that have a foretold destiny in The Emirates of Ylaruam. When it is gazed through, the star functions as a gem of seeing enabling the user to see as though she were affected by the true seeing spell. A gem of seeing can be used for as much as 10 minutes a day, divided up into periods of minutes or rounds as the user sees fit. Functions specific to the pyramid and temple. The Star of Mo-Pelar can direct the flow of the water to go up or down between the tomb and the upper area of the priesthood as well as allow the water to flow out to the basin outside. It can also allow access to the teleportation circle in the temple to come back up here instead of it being a one way trip. They must be holding the rod to come back up here.   Afterward Karl looks through the gem, goes and sticks his head through the wall with the painting of the sky. He sees he is thousands of feet above the ground. Through the gem he sees an invisible dock and a current of air. He also notices it’s about 3pm. Karl uses the gem to look into the next room which has a sarcophagus and sees on the far wall there is an illusion leading to an empty room. Fargrim casts Detect Good and Evil he doesn’t detect anything except the area is consecrated.   The group opens the sarcophagus to make sure the phylactery is inside for the man they faced earlier that day. Everyone helps, grunts and heaves as the stone slides off, it is suddenly helped off by the managed hand that grabs the edge and fully shoves it off and it sits up with a garbled roar. However the fight doesn’t last long as everyone attack it in panic and it is quickly put back to rest. Lily’s eyes glow gold briefly as she uses her Divine Sense to check things over. The sarcophagus was lead lined and had scratches on the inside. Lily also casts Detect Magic as well as they look it over to make sure it isn’t hiding anything. They are convinced that there is nothing hidden here.   After finishing their investigation Karl goes through the illusion wall and disappears. Once Lily and Fargrim realise Karl can’t hear their questions they set about grabbing everything they can to get ready for when he returns (or so they hope). Fargrim is instructed to get the ruby off the boat and physically pulls it off of the boat. A few minutes later Karl returns and tells them it sent him to the room hidden in the temple with the book with the white cover. He explains it only goes both ways if you have the rod.   Aeryn sees some runes on the boat. She points them out by biting Karl’s ear and pulling on it until he’s looking at the runes. Karl realising they are fading and quickly gets Fargrim to put the ruby back. Then Karl tries to identify it but it’s not coming up as magical. Fargrim sends a message to Sessilan while wearing the mask. Afterward the whole group teleports back to the temple, however the room quickly becomes very crowded as the group struggles to find the hidden switch on the inside. Thankfully in the end Karl finds it and they are free. They go to the wells in the hidden area of the pyramid to try and rest for the rest of the day and sleep overnight.   During their time before sleeping for the night Fargrim communes with his god and Karl is reading and working on scrolls. Lily gets some instruction from Uqaviel and Fargrim (once he’s free) on learning some new weapons and become skilled with her blade. Xeldarix joins in with them. They start the 10 hours rest period, not trusting the bandits to take any of their watches, at 7:30pm. The Forged is in the West well and the bandits in the East well.   31st of Haelynir 1524 (or is it?)   In the last two hours of Karl’s rest, Fargrim and Lily hear something in the open part of the pyramid. Lily sends her familiar to go and check it out. A little white bat spies the Lamia taking Gnolls into the East offering room and a flash of fire is seen coming off one of the walls. Afterward only Lamia comes out and the pyramid is quiet again.   Once Karl is done getting his sleep, the group (bandits included) conven in the middle space which has been their shared space. They look to have another try with the locked chest. Fargrim casts Find Traps on the chest, but finds none. Lily is unable to unlock it, but Philo is. Inside there are:  

• Gem 16
• Cloak with brass clasp
• *Longbow = Oathbow
• Breastplate Myrthirl
• a suit of blood iron plate and chain
• *a scimitar wrapped in blue velvet = Sword of Life Stealing
• *Stone in box = Luckstone
• *Gloves = Gloves of Soul Catching
• *Desert sandals = Dune-walker Sandals
• *Ring = Ring of Quipical Hits (description later)

  *Magical   Lily uses the wand to see what is magical. Karl takes the time to identify them while the bandits look over the gems.  

• Pearl (45gp),
• Malachite (25gp),
• Aquamarine (55gp),
• Ruby (3gp, 22gp),
• Velune (72gp),
• Cat’s Eye Agate (25gp, 2gp),
• Amber 34gp),
• Carnelian (14gp, 5gp) and the following uncut gems:
• Sapphire (30gp),
• Amatrine (18 gp),
• Peridot (17gp),
• Topaz (7gp),
• Star Ruby (40gp).
• There are wrapped in red velvet worth 8 sp, a brass cloak clasp with diamond (37 gp) and a bone button (2gp).

  Ring of Quiptical Hits - Two interlocking bands, one gold engraved with a motifs of laughing faces and the other granite with a motif of faces set in stony silence, the ring rewards the witty but punishes japes that fall flat. Once per day, on a successful attack roll, if the wearer can deliver a one-liner, quip or appropriate pun before rolling damage, the attack is converted into a critical hit. However, if the jape is deemed to have fallen flat the wearer is overcome by lethargy and behaves as if affected by the spell slow, until the end of it's next turn.   Dune-walker sandals Wondrous. Require attunement When found they have 1d6+4 charms on them. They cannot be removed. While wearing the shoes you ignore difficult terrain from sand or dust and cannot be exhausted by walking, and weather doesn't hinder you. You don't need food or water. Whenever you hit 0 hp one of the charms breaks and you go back to 1 hp   The bandits are willing to take the gems and pay out the party and take half the platinum. Which Fargrim splits up among the party as 8 platinum and 153 gold between the three of them. When it comes to the items everyone puts their name against things that interest them.   Gloves - Fargrim, Lily and Karl. Bow - Lily. Stone - Fargrim.   With these results in mind and the bandits are happy to take anything.

• Bastian - Sword of Life Stealing
• Dominik - Dune-walker Sandal
• Fargrim - Luckstone
• Karl - Gloves of Soul Catching
• Lily - Oathbow
• Philo - Ring of Quiptical

The group takes an hour for Fargrim to attune to his new items and the bandits do the same. They are going to head home once they have finished resting. Lily plays with Skywrite as a Ritual to write “Lily was here” in the sky. Once the rest is finished the group tries to sneak back to the teleport room, Lily falls down some stairs and is spotted by the Lamia and Werejackals that are in the temple. Xeldarix throws herself down the stairs with Lily, thinking it some game. Now knowing how to deal with such creatures the group has no problem dealing with them. They do manage to lull Xeldarix to sleep again, which angers Uqaviel as they try to run off with her. The group ensures this doesn’t happen and kill the remaining creatures that try to run to ensure there are no reinforcements.   Afterwards they teleport up to the tomb and try to scry on the area where the water column goes. Xeldarix sits with Lily as she looks into the mirror. This gets flickers of images from the desired space. Fargrim and Karl notice that Xeldarix’s nose is bleeding as she puts her own efforts into pushing through the resistance. Everyone demands she stops and just smiles at Lily. The group decides they think it is safe enough to return to this point. They all link hands to go down in one go. This hurts Karl once again. Uqaviel looks over Karl, grabbing him by the chin and looking at him critically. Karl is released and Uqaviel informs the group that no fey or anything has taken Karl’s place unless their magic is very good.   The group goes into the table room with the food to plan how they will approach this golem.

Notes

Name	XP	Running Total	Level at end of Session
Fargrim	1225	102,110	12
Karl	1225	102,110	12
Lily	1225	102,110	12