Session 22 - Out of the Temple
24 Flaurmont 1010 - 1 Yarthmont 1010
General Summary
Having become familiar with their new magical items, the party prepares to explore the remainder of the temple. They open the door from the centaur room to find their way blocked by a jade-colored wall. Upon examining the wall they find no way to open it but, giving a good push, it easily falls into the hallway beyond. Heading down this hallway and around to the north they find a wider section that has ladder rungs built into the walls, and rises to a latched plate in the ceiling. However the party decides to continue exploring on this level before trying the hatch. As Tork walks down the hallway, he notices some irregularities in the passageway, and the party stops to investigate further. Upon closer inspection, the irregularities seem to indicate a hidden door, and there is a matched one on the north side of the wider section of the passage as well. They don't see any obvious hinge points and try pushing but, having the universal option of Shatterspike, they soon decide to use forced entry. Once they break through they can see the mechanism of the hidden doorway, which seems to be operable from the inside.
On this side of the door, is a small passage that leads to another door, which opens to a larger room with a painted floor depicting ancient holy scenes. There is also a curtained off section. When Seraphina pulls the curtain aside, they find a seated stone statue of Seraphina (quite disturbing) that is clad in a feathered robe, and holding a gold scepter. When Seraphina touches the gold scepter however, she gets a faraway look in her eyes, and seems to stop responding to the group. Stavos tries to free her hand from the scepter, but before long they realize she is transforming to stone; strangely enough the statue, which looked just like Seraphina, is transforming from stone into flesh. This becomes quite confusing, as the original Seraphina that the party knows fairly well seems to have become the statue. The "new" Seraphina seems to hold up to first level scrutiny, being able to answer basic questions about their shared past experiences, but something is not right. Seraphina seems to have lost her connection to her god, and her ability to channel that into magic, and is acting as this should not be any concern. Given her past devotion, this is setting off alarm bells in the party, and Elezar soon is whispering thoughts into Leo's mostly suspicious mind, and he breaks down and attacks the now flesh statue version of Seraphina. The impostor moves to attack Leo, but this allows Stavos to strike at the now aggressive statue version of Seraphina, and it is unable to get past him, so it strikes out at Stavos. The party quickly is able to disable the statue, and when it drops it loses the appearance of Seraphina; it becomes clear that this is a similar creature to the one they encountered in the large diorama scene room that also looked like Seraphina.
The false Seraphina dead on the floor, nothing happens until Tork touches the gold scepter to the petrified form, which starts to become flesh again and is clearly "more herself" than the false Seraphina. They decide to try using the scales of harmony to see if there are any signs of evil in the area, which thankfully they do not.
Heading back to the other hallway (after proving to themselves how the mechanism works on the corresponding northern exit) they wind their way up to a room that has a large wheel, a lever, a portcullis, and a keyhole. Tork takes a spin at the wheel, and upon rotation, a trap door opens below him, into a spiked pit, but his quick reactions allow him to get his feet to solid ground before plummeting. The wheel, besides opening the trap door to the 30 foot deep pit of spikes, also raises the portcullis. Stavos tests the platinum key found in the well - it fits and, upon rotation, clicks. To experiment further, the lever is pulled, which then lowers the portcullis, and the wheel turns back. They verify the function of everything again, and confirm that if they don't turn the key, the portcullis won't stay open. They leave it open, and move along. The portcullis leads to a stairway and a door leading fresh air - they see they have arrived at the top of the temple and find themselves outside near some sort of altar. There is a bas relief bat on the wall that they emerged from, and the altar itself seems to be depicting a bat as well with large metal outstretched wings. As they examine the altar, it is clear that the altar is hinged, so Seraphina tries to push the altar open, but she can not get it on her own. Stavos and Tork help, and they are able to lift and pivot the altar, but in doing so they trigger another trap, and the wings swing around. Tork is able to dodge out of the way, but Tork and Seraphina take the slashing impact. Thankfully the party is able to heal them up, and they find below the statue a treasure trove. There is a large amount of silver coins, goblets, platters, and other valuables. They spend the time to pull this all out of the pit. There is a simple staircase down the south face of the pyramid, and they can see in the distance the place where the ground collapsed on their approach to the pyramid.
Before leaving the temple, Leo wants to investigate that strange hatch in the ceiling of the hallway below, near where the doppelganger Seraphina was. The party does this last trek into the temple, and Stavos climbs the rungs to check out the hatch. It has a latch on this side, and seems to hinge toward the party. However when he unlatches the hatch it flies open, and a gale force wind buffets the area, pushing him down to the floor, and then sliding across the floor into the sharp edge of the rungs. Seeing that this portal leads to nothing, the party decides their exploration of the temple is complete and, once they have gotten themselves back together at the exit, they decide they can head directly to Saltmarsh - they should be able to arrive before midnight.
On their way back through the woods, Tork notices a lone goblin, but it flees from the party and they are unsuccessful in tracking it, so they continue on their way back to town. Back in town they are able to take a full rest at the Everlasting Light and the Temple of Protius.
The next day they all do some chores around town. They want to report to Eliander their findings at the temple, and also report on their encounter with the goblins, as this could be of concern to the council. Since it is a weekday Stavos, Tork, and Elincia find him at Hoolwatch Tower. It turns out that the council would like the party to stick around for the next week, as they are nearing the end of their joint planning session with the alliance against the Sahuagin. Leo makes a similar report of their finding of goblin ambushers in the woods to Ferrin Kastilar at the Sea Grove of Obad-Hai. This place is a nice natural atmosphere that Ferrin maintains with his frog. Ferrin explains to Leo that it is not unusual to find goblins in the wilds, and that it is probably not too much of a concern if they are not in large numbers, but thanks him for sharing the information.
Leo heads on from the Sea Grove to Winston's to check in on his orders, and meets up with Stavos, Elincia, Tork, and even Seraphina, who is headed to town. Winston's appears to be closed still, which surprises Leo, since it has been a couple more days since they were here. Leo had ordered scrolls, and had expected them to be available by now. They see that while it is closed, there is a younger halfling in the store, so Leo knocks. The halfling comes to the door and explains that Winston is away. Leo mentions that he had placed some orders with Winston, and the halfling asks his name, and goes off to retrieve some of the pre-ordered scrolls. It is possible that the other scrolls are not ready yet, and that that may be part of what Winston is off doing.
As they head back to town, they find a reasonably excited Belfur. It turns out that he has been summoned back to Rockhome to help with Showing Day which is a very important opportunity. His guild is requesting that he participate with the brewers association, and he expects that this will be a great opportunity to share his findings on exotic ingredients he has found in his journeys, and their impact on flavors. They are all sad to see him go, but are happy for his opportunity to share his brewing lore. He is fairly confident that he will not need the Eagle Whistle and the Ring of Protection during his travels back home, so he leaves these with the party. This means he won't be able to stay in town to see what the council is planning, as he immediately heads off toward Rockhome.
With Winston being unavailable, the party has one other follow-up activity - checking in at the Faithful Quartermasters of Ostland, as Wellgar had suggested that they may have a way to remove the harmful curse from the Axe found in the temple. They introduce themselves to Captain Xendros, a tall blond woman from Ostland, an area with too little food production for its population. This is the reason for the delegation here in Saltmarsh, as they regularly import large quantities of fish to supplement their food supplies. As they visit many ports, they have access to goods from far of lands, so if the party is seeking anything in particular they can watch for these items and perhaps bring them in, or even have items crafted for them. This is intriguing, but the party doesn't have anything in particular in mind at the time. She also mentions that Ostland is seeking an Apparatus of Kwalish, which is a magical underwater ship. There were rumors that there was one near Saltmarsh, but when she arrived here, nobody seemed to know of it. If the party can find this magic underwater ship, Ostland would pay well for it. She says she doesn't have any immediate solution for the axe but, if they leave it with her, and a deposit of 100g, she can try to find a solution and get back to them. They agree and warn her of the nature of the curse and the dangers of using the axe.
When they get back to the docks, they see that the Sea Lion is in port. They decide to give their regards to the crew and Captain Hummock for helping them avoid the pirates in their earlier adventure. The captain it appears is somehow involved in the planning going on with the alliance, but the guard calls down a liutenant to see the party, and they thank him for his help. They head back to their ship to manage their various projects.
The party goes about its business, selling the items they found, exchanging coins for gems ,and restocking and repairing their gear, as well as transcribing spells into Leo's book of ancient secrets.
A few days later the council requests that the party come to the council hall, where they reveal some details of their joint plan. It turns out that the Sahuagin have moved into the former home of the Lizardfolk, though the island has been changed. It has sunk down into the sea a bit and there are likely other changes as well. The alliance needs to scout out the area to prepare for their joint assault. It is believed that the party is their best option for scouting out the modified layout of the cavern system. The alliance shares what is known about the island from when the Lizardfolk lived there, but this is likely changed significantly since. The intent is to seek information, not engage the Sahuagin. The party agrees to help, and they will need some time to prepare for this exploration.
The party heads back to the Everlasting Light to contemplate this as a group.
Arriving at the Everlasting Light, Captain Kazimir pulls them aside and says that the ship being idle too long is bad for the crew, and will lead to them either leaving or becoming ineffective. He suggests that when the party is away, that they operate the ship as a fishing boat to keep their skills fresh and sharp. The party agrees that this is wise, as the ship should usually only be gone during the day, and that should not prevent the party from access to the ship for very long.
Captain Kazimir will begin outfitting the ship for fishing operations and report back on the costs.
It will be interesting to see if the party is able to adjust their tactics from righteous battle to sneaking in to an enemy base. The closest to this that the party has done was to investigate the Lizardfolk but, by the time the party had gotten to the home of the Lizardfolk, they were convinced that they were not hostile, so they did not "sneak about."
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Report Date
19 Jun 2020
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