Session 76 Report

General Summary

Haymin’s Heroes entered the sanctuary through the mouth. At the back of the entry room was a door. They opened it and were greeted by mind blasts from a pair of mind flayers farther down a long hallway. A few of the party were left stunned. Ladigo Farthon reacted quickly by casting Wall of Sand, filling the corridor from the doorway to the wall at the far end. The mind flayers were stuck in the middle. Ladigo concentrated on the Wall of Sand for about five minutes, giving the rest of the party plenty of time to recover from the mind blast. When he finally let the Wall of Sand fade away the mind flayers slumped to the floor, lifeless, having suffocated as they tried to dig through towards the back of the hallway. The party regrouped and approached two nearby sets of doors. Mogi Delvin could sense the presence of beings on either side, but could not sense any evil. What they found were more thralls in a pair of dens where some of the poor victims were resting on makeshift beds. Seeing the white spiral pendant Titta Morco wore, the thralls deferred to her orders. The thralls were told to remain in their rooms until further instructions. Then Auren Sylynn used some rope to tie the handles of the double-doors closed. They did not want the thralls to come after them later in case they were commanded mentally to do so by the Masters. Beyond this hallway, the corridor widened and twisted before coming to an oblong room with a pit in the center. As they approached the room, Titta noticed the enemies waiting around the bends of the curved walls and warned the party. They fought against three mind flayers and two intellect devourers. Pyzar Zim rushed in and headed straight for a pair of mind flayers. He wounded one of them before getting stunned by a mind blast. Titta and Auren backed him up and finished dealing with these mind flayers while Mogi attacked the third on the other side of the room. When the mind flayers were dealt with, they then focused on the intellect devourers. Luckily, one of them had fallen victim to a mind flayer’s mind blast when it was caught in the crossfire, so there was only one active threat left. With their enemies defeated, Haymin’s Heroes could focus on the man and woman in the pit. They looked haggard and browbeaten as they huddled for safety. There was a nearby ladder along one of the walls that the party used to descend into the pit and tend to these victims. Their minds had not been broken yet, but their trembling and nervous ticks showed that the mind flayers had done considerable damage to their mental states. The party took these to one of the thrall dens earlier in the sanctuary and forced the thralls all into the other den, just in case the thralls turned hostile on the new victims who had not yet been completely broken. Again, Auren tied both doors closed. They did not want to risk the man and woman trying to escape on their own. The large tentacle canine was still lurking in one of the outer caverns. At the back of the room with the pit was a spiral staircase leading up. Haymin’s Heroes ascended these stairs and came to another oblong room. This one had a sunken area surrounded by a few concentric descending steps which looked like they could serve as benches. The center of this area was about twenty feed wide and open. Its floor was stained with blood. From this room, the opening split in two directions, each path a curving hallway that led away from each other. They chose the left path and followed it as it twisted and ended at a double-door. They found a large room with a pair of bookcases and another spiral staircase which led farther up. Two thralls were here performing cleaning duties. Titta told these thralls to wait at the room with the sunken area until they received further instructions. A pair of doors at one side led to sleeping quarters for more mind flayers, though the rooms were empty. A door opposite where they had entered led to the right sided corridor, which they had not taken. Titta walked into this hallway to confirm it eventually led back to the room with the concentric steps and sunken floor. The way these corridors curved away from each other before turning back inwards, made them think there must be a hidden area somewhere between them. The party searched the walls around it before finding a secret door down where the two paths originally split. This door opened into a room that contained a single chest in the center, plus a pair of tables and two sets of shelves on opposite walls. Mogi sensed an aura of magic or psionics on the chest, on an object on one of the tables, and on one of the shelves. Being cautious, Titta fired an arrow at the chest from the entrance. As soon as she did so, she felt a sharp pain in her mind as if something attempted to reach into her brain and rip a piece off. She shook off the mental attack and backed off. Selia cast Dispel Magic on the chest and felt the same psionic attack. Her spell did not remove the psionic aura, though. Hoping to avoid the psionic trap on the chest, they backed away to the previous room and the other side of the sunken area. Then Selia cast Dispel Magic again at distance, but again, the spell did not work. They decided to ignore the chest for now and try again perhaps the next day when she would have more Dispel Magic attempts available. They grabbed the other two magic items, however and identified them. One of them was a Third Eye Clarity, which would prevent a single mental condition. They gave it to Pyzar to wear, knowing they would be facing more mind flayers soon and he would be likely to be face to face with them. They went upstairs and found another room with a pair of book cases, and another two sleeping quarters. These were all empty. There was one other exit to this room which opened to a hallway that winded towards another oblong room. In the center of the room was a round set of concentric steps leading up to a platform that contained a large pool of slimy water teeming with large slug sized tadpoles. In this pool was a large brain, about eight feet wide, protruding with flailing tentacles. Three more mind flayers and a pair of minotaurs stood guard before the brain. Haymin’s Heroes reacted quickly and rushed in before the minotaurs could charge. Pyzar rushed towards the nearest mind flayers and was greeted by mind blast. The Third Eye Clarity saved him from the mental stun. Titta suddenly felt an assault on her mind and she collapsed, bleeding from the eyes, ears, and nose. Kyrie Eleison Thatcher-Stone cast Mass Lesser Vigor to stabilize Titta and help some of the other party members heal. Haymin’s Heroes focused on the mind flayers first and managed to kill all three, but not before Pyzar fell victim to another mind blast. Selia flew to the back of the room and prepared to target the elder brain. As the minotaurs fell, they could all target it as well. It started to fly up to escape its surrounding threats, but one of Ladigo’s summoned dire wolves managed to clasp on to a tentacle with its mighty jaws and brought the brain crashing to the ground. The creature was resilient, but could not escape once surrounded. The dire wolves, Titta, and Auren assaulted it with bites and blades and eventually it stopped moving. Still, they could see it regenerating. Only the acid from Auren’s kukri seemed to prevent this But once it was down, they focused enough damage onto it to deal it a killing blow. The party made sure all the enemies were dead. Then they regrouped and healed. Selia used the Wand of Lightning Bolt upon the pool to kill all the tadpoles. When they were done here, they began to head back towards where they left the thralls, wondering if they would have snapped out of their mind control now that all the Masters were dead.

Campaign

The Heart of Embril

Protagonists